My money is on "smile and take his other hand off the wheel". Gerrymandering and Citizens United have corrupted US politics to such an extent that the GOP doesn't have to be responsive to its voter's interests, and the GOP's voters have been so brainwashed by the decades of poisonous rhetoric from right-wing media that they will just blame Democrats for whatever happens, regardless of the facts. These are dangerous times.
I fear this result for the country. But if he does it, we all need to raise our collective protests and make sure that the fault is squarely pinned on the Republicans. This means not letting the media two-sides this.
I suspect that MAGA Mike has anticipated that his time as Speaker of the House would be of a short duration. To wit, keeping in mind also that Steve Scalise is ill with cancer:
ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE SPEAKER
The SPEAKER. The Chair announces that the Speaker has delivered to the Clerk a letter dated October 25th, 2023, listing Members in the order in which each shall act as Speaker pro tempore under clause 8(b)(3) of rule I.
RECALL DESIGNEE
The SPEAKER laid before the House the following communication:
CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES,
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
Washington, DC, October 25, 2023.
Hon. KEVIN F. MCCUMBER,
Clerk of the House of Representatives,
Washington, DC.
DEAR MR. CLERK: I hereby designate Representative Steve Scalise to exercise any authority regarding assembly, reassembly, convening, or reconvening of the House pursuant to House Concurrent Resolution 1, clause 12 of rule I, and any concurrent resolutions of the current Congress as may contemplate my designation of Members to exercise similar authority.
In the event of the death or inability of that designee, the alternate Members of the House listed in the letter bearing this date that I have placed with the Clerk are designated, in turn, for the same purposes.
Sincerely,
MIKE JOHNSON, Speaker.
APPOINTMENT OF MEMBERS TO ACT AS SPEAKER PRO TEMPORE TO SIGN ENROLLED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS DURING THE 118TH CONGRESS
The SPEAKER laid before the House the following communication:
CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES,
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
Washington, DC, October 25, 2023.
Hon. KEVIN F. MCCUMBER,
Clerk of the House of Representatives,
Washington, DC.
DEAR MR. CLERK: I hereby appoint the Honorable Patrick McHenry, the Honorable Adrian Smith, the Honorable Andy Harris, the Honorable Guy Reschenthaler, the Honorable Rob Wittman, the Honorable Ben Cline, the Honorable Richard Hudson, and the Honorable John Joyce to act as Speaker pro tempore to sign enrolled bills and joint resolutions through the remainder of the One Hundred Eighteenth Congress.
Sincerely,
MIKE JOHNSON, Speaker.
The SPEAKER. Without objection, the appointments are approved. There was no objection
Mine too! I agree. However, I know that his unhinged supporters are armed and dangerous. I think we should just have their return to the USA from Paris blocked. There should be some hold up in Paris. Can Biden make that happen with Macron? It would be cool if they were thrown into a French jail and not allowed out. Macron is on his last term. He should be able to risk it.
This is brilliant. Once Johnson is in Paris, revoke his Passport along with Mom's For Freedom and the others. Remind them of Putin's offer of the Russian MAGA village.
Yes. I love the idea of them all hunkering down in a Russian MAGA village. However, when Putin goes to interrogate them for some intel on USA, he may be sorely disappointed in how stupid they are. Even stupid enough not to know how to save their own skins. Of course, he will enjoy trotting them out on Russian television right before the election as they all say how wonderful living in Russia is.
OK, y'all - this is fun, but c'mon folks. We require actual legal grounds for doing stuff, and there aren't any for this exercise. We are not MAGAts, after all.
I like to focus on the small things that I can do. So this week I'm tripling my Food Pantry donation. People needing food is the ultimate end product of a government shutdown. Shame on Republicans. The cruelty IS the point.
I think they will have a government shutdown because they don't give a shit about their constituents and they enjoy the cruelty of the suffering that will ensue !! They get bribes from their wealthy donors so a shutdown won't hurt them !
They want to tank the economy because it's doing well under Biden. They have been doing similar things before. Remember last Thanksgiving when Abbott did border inspections and virtually closed the border to produce coming from Mexico to Grocery Shelves which he was trying to keep empty. Republicans don't seem to like Thanksgiving. Instead of a chicken in every pot, their slogan is we'll eat high on the hog, while everyone else can go rot.
I truly don't think they are serious about passing any spending bills, they want a shut down. And not even because they will get to blame the democrats, it's because they're cruel, and cruelty is the goal. Sadly there is a large group of voters who support them in doing this.
Yeah, along with the likes of South Dakota's adulterous Gnome, scurrilious Nigel Farage, the dunce-brained "Moms for (no) Liberty" and dimwit Devin Nunes.
Johnson as Speaker and crashing our economy is all part of the Republican coup just as 1/6/21 was part of their plan. I do not call them by other names. They are plain and simple Republicans. Not a single one wants to continue our democracy.
What an excellent piece today. The House GOP is nothing but a group of petulant do-nothings who have no concern for their constituents. I hope the Democrats will use this to show how fumbling and inept the GOP really is when election time comes around.
I don't know what Mike Johnson will or won't be able to pull off, or what he even wants to, but the overriding factor is that a faction of the Republican Party doesn't know enough about the American government to realize that a shutdown would be a bad thing. At most, all they know is that the 2013 shutdown didn't really hurt them in 2014.
This 12-bills process is nothing more than the beginning of a process where there's a standalone vote to fund the IRS so they can vote that down, and a standalone vote to fund the FBI, so they can vote that down. And any other government agency that displeases their orange Sun God and that he tells them to destroy.
Been wondering this exact thing myself. I've been sure some excellent investigative journalists would be all over it, but not a peep so far. All that really means to me is he's buried his shit deep, but since almost all money these days is ones and zeros here and there, it'll get found.
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to remember the platform, or at the very least the philosophy of the late 20th century version of the GOP was that the only focus of government should be defense, to fully fund the military and inflate the war machine. Now it seems they no longer believe in the defense of America and would only want to fund and use the military for support of their culture war. Since the military hasn't played along, its punishment as the majority of this country's citizens is their only purpose.
If there were any Republicans in Congress who truly believed in the Constitution and the freedoms it codifies, they would have to either purge the extremists in Congress and take their chances that they'd lose their majority or sacrifice themselves, their funding and their individual power to move things along. But like most of Americans in the 21st century, they've chosen greed over patriotism. Money and power are far more important than the American dream, or our security as a nation. They are deserving of nothing but our contempt.
I sincerely hope all Democrats shout from the rooftops at every opportunity that the GOP is responsible for compromising our security, both militarily and financially (since our ability to borrow money in the future could be severely compromised), not to mention the dead-stop to our GDP growth, job growth and the reduction of inflation so there is no doubt in the minds of our fellow citizens who is responsible for this shit-show.
They need to be screaming from the rooftops. They need to get on the media platforms and blast it loud and clear. They need to demand equal time and stop letting the airwaves only talk about the repubs. Seriously the democrats really need to step up their game and start clarifying this sh** instead of sitting back quietly watching it happen. I'm almost as tired of one as I am of the other. We need to get the message out there.
I love the line "MAGA government shutdown," finally some good messaging from the left. They need to lean into that hard, and they need to actually produce a senate originated solution, quickly. Because if you assume, as I do, that the MAGAT (MAGA Twits) extremists will do the bidding of the Big Head (err, the Big Orange ball, BO for short), they have two things on their agenda: Impeach Biden and Shut the government down. If I make my bet, here's their plan: stall until the 11th hour, then pass a horrible bill and shoot it off to the senate. Then before they've even had a chance to wretch their dinners over it, everyone hit social media and the conservative media network, and point your fingers at the dems who refuse to pass a bill because they want the government to shut down. You know that BO will be pointing his short, fat fingers at them as well. Anyone on the koolaide will take them at their word, and will echo the fake news, trying to turn it into fact.
Strong, constant messaging up front from the left, and a senate solution that the house ignores, would go a very long ways toward defusing their agenda.
Proposal: let the worst of the wacko provisions be included and send it over. The Senate strips all of them out leaving only the CR. All the Dems agree to support so only a handful of reps are needed. The crazy fringe can say they tried but the damned libs and RINOs thwarted them. The handful can say that they just acted responsibility. The Dems can say that they kept the government open. Even though I hate to give them (the crazy ones) anything in this everybody wins, especially the American people who get a functioning government.
..."in this everybody wins, especially the American people who get a functioning government." Wake me when that happens. I don't even remember when America had a functioning government. These bozos are in power because we voted for them. Sadly, we have the government we deserve.
We had a pretty well functioning government when the Biden Administration saw the passage of landmark bills under a Congress controlled by the Democrats. Let’s not discount what was accomplished with just as small a majority under Speaker Nancy Pelosi and in a 50/50 senate!
My money is on "smile and take his other hand off the wheel". Gerrymandering and Citizens United have corrupted US politics to such an extent that the GOP doesn't have to be responsive to its voter's interests, and the GOP's voters have been so brainwashed by the decades of poisonous rhetoric from right-wing media that they will just blame Democrats for whatever happens, regardless of the facts. These are dangerous times.
I fear this result for the country. But if he does it, we all need to raise our collective protests and make sure that the fault is squarely pinned on the Republicans. This means not letting the media two-sides this.
I suspect that MAGA Mike has anticipated that his time as Speaker of the House would be of a short duration. To wit, keeping in mind also that Steve Scalise is ill with cancer:
ANNOUNCEMENT BY THE SPEAKER
The SPEAKER. The Chair announces that the Speaker has delivered to the Clerk a letter dated October 25th, 2023, listing Members in the order in which each shall act as Speaker pro tempore under clause 8(b)(3) of rule I.
RECALL DESIGNEE
The SPEAKER laid before the House the following communication:
CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES,
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
Washington, DC, October 25, 2023.
Hon. KEVIN F. MCCUMBER,
Clerk of the House of Representatives,
Washington, DC.
DEAR MR. CLERK: I hereby designate Representative Steve Scalise to exercise any authority regarding assembly, reassembly, convening, or reconvening of the House pursuant to House Concurrent Resolution 1, clause 12 of rule I, and any concurrent resolutions of the current Congress as may contemplate my designation of Members to exercise similar authority.
In the event of the death or inability of that designee, the alternate Members of the House listed in the letter bearing this date that I have placed with the Clerk are designated, in turn, for the same purposes.
Sincerely,
MIKE JOHNSON, Speaker.
APPOINTMENT OF MEMBERS TO ACT AS SPEAKER PRO TEMPORE TO SIGN ENROLLED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS DURING THE 118TH CONGRESS
The SPEAKER laid before the House the following communication:
CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES,
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,
Washington, DC, October 25, 2023.
Hon. KEVIN F. MCCUMBER,
Clerk of the House of Representatives,
Washington, DC.
DEAR MR. CLERK: I hereby appoint the Honorable Patrick McHenry, the Honorable Adrian Smith, the Honorable Andy Harris, the Honorable Guy Reschenthaler, the Honorable Rob Wittman, the Honorable Ben Cline, the Honorable Richard Hudson, and the Honorable John Joyce to act as Speaker pro tempore to sign enrolled bills and joint resolutions through the remainder of the One Hundred Eighteenth Congress.
Sincerely,
MIKE JOHNSON, Speaker.
The SPEAKER. Without objection, the appointments are approved. There was no objection
https://www.congress.gov/118/crec/2023/10/25/169/176/CREC-2023-10-25-pt1-PgH5053-9.pdf
Mine too! I agree. However, I know that his unhinged supporters are armed and dangerous. I think we should just have their return to the USA from Paris blocked. There should be some hold up in Paris. Can Biden make that happen with Macron? It would be cool if they were thrown into a French jail and not allowed out. Macron is on his last term. He should be able to risk it.
This is brilliant. Once Johnson is in Paris, revoke his Passport along with Mom's For Freedom and the others. Remind them of Putin's offer of the Russian MAGA village.
Yes. I love the idea of them all hunkering down in a Russian MAGA village. However, when Putin goes to interrogate them for some intel on USA, he may be sorely disappointed in how stupid they are. Even stupid enough not to know how to save their own skins. Of course, he will enjoy trotting them out on Russian television right before the election as they all say how wonderful living in Russia is.
OK, y'all - this is fun, but c'mon folks. We require actual legal grounds for doing stuff, and there aren't any for this exercise. We are not MAGAts, after all.
Don'cha just LOVE individual Congressmen, whether in the House or Senate, having the ability to affect millions of Americans all by themselves??
I'm looking at YOU, Matt Gaetz and Tubby Tuberville.
Don't even get me started on the likes of McConnell, Manchin, Sinema, etc.
NOBODY should have that kind of power. Not now, not ever.
I like to focus on the small things that I can do. So this week I'm tripling my Food Pantry donation. People needing food is the ultimate end product of a government shutdown. Shame on Republicans. The cruelty IS the point.
We all can help alleviate the suffering that would result from a shutdown, yes.
Let's do it!
What a great perspective, thank you! I'm going to look for food pantries in the DC area to donate money to.
You are a hero. I mean it.
Yes, Margaret. I am doing the same!
Thank you! We are slaying dragons, one bite at a time.
Excellent idea; I’m going to triple our donation too!🫶🏼
THIS is winning. You rock!
Wonderful idea! I just made a donation.
I think Mother Teresa said, "we can do no great things, only small things with great love."
You are beautiful
So are you. We all are.
Thank you
I just joined you folks, wonderful idea! Took care of a pantry in Middle TN.
I think they will have a government shutdown because they don't give a shit about their constituents and they enjoy the cruelty of the suffering that will ensue !! They get bribes from their wealthy donors so a shutdown won't hurt them !
They want to tank the economy because it's doing well under Biden. They have been doing similar things before. Remember last Thanksgiving when Abbott did border inspections and virtually closed the border to produce coming from Mexico to Grocery Shelves which he was trying to keep empty. Republicans don't seem to like Thanksgiving. Instead of a chicken in every pot, their slogan is we'll eat high on the hog, while everyone else can go rot.
I truly don't think they are serious about passing any spending bills, they want a shut down. And not even because they will get to blame the democrats, it's because they're cruel, and cruelty is the goal. Sadly there is a large group of voters who support them in doing this.
I had hoped this was not true, but it appears increasingly evident that Johnson is on the side of the nihilists.
I had as well, but can any of us say we are truly surprised?
it's the voters who are allowing this...to their own detriment is what surprises me.
They have been voting against their own interests since Reagan, and you cannot convince them of the truth of that.
Very true, Dave. I'm still...shaking my head.
So these bozos go home instead of staying put & working? Color me surprised.
Well Johnson needed to get to Paris ya know. Long flight. Garbage to spew.
Yeah, along with the likes of South Dakota's adulterous Gnome, scurrilious Nigel Farage, the dunce-brained "Moms for (no) Liberty" and dimwit Devin Nunes.
Devin Nonuts - how can we miss him if he won't go away?
love the nickname and the riff off a typical country/western lyric.
And his wife had to get on her knees and "pray" one last time before he left
That’s their MO. Do nothing constructive; take off the weekend.
Johnson as Speaker and crashing our economy is all part of the Republican coup just as 1/6/21 was part of their plan. I do not call them by other names. They are plain and simple Republicans. Not a single one wants to continue our democracy.
What an excellent piece today. The House GOP is nothing but a group of petulant do-nothings who have no concern for their constituents. I hope the Democrats will use this to show how fumbling and inept the GOP really is when election time comes around.
Kristi Noem is, unfortunately, from SD, not Nebraska. We would happily give her to Nebraska or any other state that could stand her!
This has been corrected, thanks!
No thanks. We have the dour Jim Pillen to contend with and that is quite enough.
I don't know what Mike Johnson will or won't be able to pull off, or what he even wants to, but the overriding factor is that a faction of the Republican Party doesn't know enough about the American government to realize that a shutdown would be a bad thing. At most, all they know is that the 2013 shutdown didn't really hurt them in 2014.
This 12-bills process is nothing more than the beginning of a process where there's a standalone vote to fund the IRS so they can vote that down, and a standalone vote to fund the FBI, so they can vote that down. And any other government agency that displeases their orange Sun God and that he tells them to destroy.
I hope there are enough GOP traditionalists left that don’t want to see a shutdown, if only to save their own political hides.
Who can investigate why Mike Johnson does not have any bank accounts? To whom is he beholden? is the government shut down intentional?
Been wondering this exact thing myself. I've been sure some excellent investigative journalists would be all over it, but not a peep so far. All that really means to me is he's buried his shit deep, but since almost all money these days is ones and zeros here and there, it'll get found.
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to remember the platform, or at the very least the philosophy of the late 20th century version of the GOP was that the only focus of government should be defense, to fully fund the military and inflate the war machine. Now it seems they no longer believe in the defense of America and would only want to fund and use the military for support of their culture war. Since the military hasn't played along, its punishment as the majority of this country's citizens is their only purpose.
If there were any Republicans in Congress who truly believed in the Constitution and the freedoms it codifies, they would have to either purge the extremists in Congress and take their chances that they'd lose their majority or sacrifice themselves, their funding and their individual power to move things along. But like most of Americans in the 21st century, they've chosen greed over patriotism. Money and power are far more important than the American dream, or our security as a nation. They are deserving of nothing but our contempt.
I sincerely hope all Democrats shout from the rooftops at every opportunity that the GOP is responsible for compromising our security, both militarily and financially (since our ability to borrow money in the future could be severely compromised), not to mention the dead-stop to our GDP growth, job growth and the reduction of inflation so there is no doubt in the minds of our fellow citizens who is responsible for this shit-show.
They need to be screaming from the rooftops. They need to get on the media platforms and blast it loud and clear. They need to demand equal time and stop letting the airwaves only talk about the repubs. Seriously the democrats really need to step up their game and start clarifying this sh** instead of sitting back quietly watching it happen. I'm almost as tired of one as I am of the other. We need to get the message out there.
Yes - money and power - more important than care for their fellow humans and the earth. If they have hearts, they are stone.
Yep, Something in their good book about rich guy, camel, needle.....
They’ve gained the world, but lost their soul.
Unfortunately for ALL OF US, the GOP is a total "Clown Show".
Which is why my T-shirt says:
Protect Women's Rights
Preserve Democracy
Vote ONLY for DEMOCRATS
America should not need food banks..just sayin
I love the line "MAGA government shutdown," finally some good messaging from the left. They need to lean into that hard, and they need to actually produce a senate originated solution, quickly. Because if you assume, as I do, that the MAGAT (MAGA Twits) extremists will do the bidding of the Big Head (err, the Big Orange ball, BO for short), they have two things on their agenda: Impeach Biden and Shut the government down. If I make my bet, here's their plan: stall until the 11th hour, then pass a horrible bill and shoot it off to the senate. Then before they've even had a chance to wretch their dinners over it, everyone hit social media and the conservative media network, and point your fingers at the dems who refuse to pass a bill because they want the government to shut down. You know that BO will be pointing his short, fat fingers at them as well. Anyone on the koolaide will take them at their word, and will echo the fake news, trying to turn it into fact.
Strong, constant messaging up front from the left, and a senate solution that the house ignores, would go a very long ways toward defusing their agenda.
Proposal: let the worst of the wacko provisions be included and send it over. The Senate strips all of them out leaving only the CR. All the Dems agree to support so only a handful of reps are needed. The crazy fringe can say they tried but the damned libs and RINOs thwarted them. The handful can say that they just acted responsibility. The Dems can say that they kept the government open. Even though I hate to give them (the crazy ones) anything in this everybody wins, especially the American people who get a functioning government.
..."in this everybody wins, especially the American people who get a functioning government." Wake me when that happens. I don't even remember when America had a functioning government. These bozos are in power because we voted for them. Sadly, we have the government we deserve.
We had a pretty well functioning government when the Biden Administration saw the passage of landmark bills under a Congress controlled by the Democrats. Let’s not discount what was accomplished with just as small a majority under Speaker Nancy Pelosi and in a 50/50 senate!
Vote blue and have a large majority of adults in the room.