Murkowski openly admitted that she and her Republican colleagues were “all afraid” of “retaliation” from Trump, as she criticized his policies.
Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) openly admitted that she and her Republican colleagues were “all afraid” of “retaliation” from President Donald Trump as she criticized what she called “unlawful” executive overreach and sweeping federal cuts.
"We are all afraid", says one of the literally only people on the planet with the power to actually do something about it.
Seriously. DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT, YOU FUCKING CHODE.
This whole ordeal can be stopped by about half a dozen Republicans any time they want.
Threaten to leave the party, go independent, and caucus with Democrats to appoint a new House and Senate speaker. It would take, what, 3? Maybe 4 Republicans in each chamber to flip control of Congress. You don't even have to hold your nose and vote with Democrats on actual funding bills or anything. Just vote with Dems on curtailing Trump's actions and impeaching the fucking bastard. Even if you can't get him removed from office because the rest of your party are spineless cowards, you could at least pass bills to do things like reverse these stupid tariffs and actually reclaim power that was granted to you by the Constitution in the first fucking place.
This woman, Rand Paul, and Susan Collins have all spoken up. All they need to do is find one more Republican willing to say "We are willing to caucus with Democrats to elect a new Senate majority leader unless our demands to curtail these damaging Trump tariffs, reclaim Congressional powers, and reverse these destructive policies are met." That's it. Same in the house. 3 Republicans in the house willing to stand up and caucus with Democrats to get shit back under control.
But if all you're going to do is complain about being "afraid" when you're simultaneously rubber-stamping his entire agenda, then have a coke and a smile and shut the fuck up, because you voted for this. And if the rest of us are going to have to suffer because of your cowardice, then we're going to at least get some entertainment out of it along the way once the leopard starts eating your face.
I have absolutely zero pity for some of the most overpaid, well-protected, resourceful people on the planet when they're the ones complaining about being afraid. Fuck you. What about the rest of us? You seem to have been perfectly OK with it when it was just the brown people and poors being effected.
It's interesting you mention why Republicans are so unwilling to consolidate votes, yet the only time in history where they did consolidate votes was to prevent Hunter S Thompson from becoming sheriff of Aspen.
She's 67 years old. She's been in the Senate for over 20 years. She can decide to retire after her current term and they can't use the threat of a primary against her. It's her choice to cower in fear and empower the destruction of our democracy. Because she is watching that happen. In the end she's just another pathetic boomer willing to bow to trump to cling to power.
they can't use the threat of a primary against her
She lost the 2010 primary during the height of the Tea Party movement, ran a campaign to have people vote for her as a write in candidate, and won as a write in.
In the end, the problem is that her vote doesn't actually matter this cycle, at least not by itself. In order to flex any muscle she'd need to actually persuade some colleagues to stand up to Trump. At this point she's more of a Republican Fetterman than a Republican Sinema/Manchin.
Yeah, I'm aware she's an outlier in that she beat back the crazies once before, but 2010 is not 2024. In 2010 Trump wasn't a factor. The cult was forming, but there was no messiah yet. If tomorrow trump singled her out for hate like he did Liz Cheney she'd get wrecked instantly, and she knows it.
“We are all afraid,” Murkowski told the crowd on Monday.
Pausing, she added: “It’s quite a statement. But we are in a time and a place where I certainly have not been here before. And I’ll tell ya, I’m oftentimes very anxious myself about using my voice, because retaliation is real. And that’s not right.”
This, right here, is the most open and honest admission of what the US is today, by the ruling party elite: A dictatorship. An authoritarian state.
They are doing the jobs they were paid to do, by corporate America.
Being ineffectual corporate-whores who capitulate to capital is the core requirement of every politicians job description in the 21st Century. Though, it turns out corruption is incompatible with democracy and the rule of law. Who would have thought?
On one hand, sure. She's a coward. She's one of the most privileged people in the US, but she's afraid. She's not doing her job because she's afraid, and that's just allowing the fascists to win.
On the other hand, at least she's admitting it. That's a small step in the right direction. You can't fix the problem until you acknowledge it exists. Being scared of MAGA is rational, and it would be good if more politicians admitted that they were acting out of fear, not because they believed in what these assholes are doing.
So, if she's scared, maybe she needs support. The US goes on and on about how the 2nd amendment is about keeping the people free from a tyrannical government. So, be like the Black Panthers. They were probably also scared. They were in a lot of danger, much more so than women or non-straight people today. But, they tried to make the other side scared too.
Chris Van Hollen travelled to a dictatorship to free a man wrongfully imprisoned without due process by two authoritarians, while these simpering cowards whine about the monster they created.
As bad as things are, it's cathartic to watch the old guard, bourbon sipping Republican party that originally weaponized misinformation to further the agenda of big corpo (faux news since they existed: "Herp derp climate change is a hoax for scientists to sell books") realize that though their long in motion coup worked, they lost control of it in 2015 when King confidence scheme scam artist stole their grift out from under them by saying the dogwhistles they used to string their racist base along out loud with a dumb little dance.
Its not helpful, but knowing Mitch McConnell and John Roberts know they sold out their entire society's future not even for their benefit or the benefit of the right small room of classy old money bigots, but for some crass asshole that's as belligerent and willfully ignorant as their sucker voting base to take the reigns of post democracy machiavelian power they so carefully curated since the 70s as they watch powerlessly, and IN FEAR no less?
You chose this. Purged everything that wasn't MAGA so that all that was left was hate. Dont be a bitch now. All those GOP motherfuckers were straight creaming on election night. Lie in your nut stained beds.
But we're all being smothered in their nut stained beds, brother. For them to lie in their beds would be to accept retaliation of their party and fight back, not to take it. They deserve the flak but are seemingly not brave enough to save us all.
Nobody will save us but ourselves. Dont let that leave your head during all of this. The charge to.lead the people will only come from the people. The military isnt tagging in, politicians are still talking about elections, nobody is doing anything until the first American burns a heritage foundation office and then doesnt stop.
It's not the trump organisation, it's the republican party, and by not doing anything, you're supporting them, and saving your own ass in the case the republican party fails.
Keep up the good work propelling fascist imperialism forward
Doesn’t she realize that to an authoritarian government, the senate having the ability to break his power is the most threatening thing ever : the more you wait the more you need to be fearful because your life will be shortened. Right now, it is in Trump’s best interest to disappear congress and the supreme court. And the supreme court is mostly dealt with by now because proven powerless. He has two years two deal with Democrats and way more time to deal with whoever he believes a problem, but the senate is an everyday threat to his power.
Confirmation of something we already know, or should already know - elected politicians are craven cowards.
This is actually great news. We can get them to side with us against HitlerPig. All we have to do is make them fear the citizens more than HitlerPig, and there are a LOT more of us than them.
Politicians: Take the job and the paycheck to represent the people, bow out when it's time to do that.
I might get called extremist for this, but senators and representatives should be willing to kill their career and reputation in politics to fight for their constituents. Otherwise, are we just paying them to have a good time??!
You nailed it, we're getting into a "following orders" type scenario now, if you don't agree with what they're doing but too scared to do anything to stop them, then step down! If you can't do your job which is to protect the people you represent then let someone else step in.
5-10 Republicans, that's all it would take to impeach him in the house, and less required to remove in the senate. Clearly he can ignore most lawful orders, but if Congress came together to stop him, I'd argue that would be the end of him, no matter how hard he wants to fight.
We don't know. Can someone drop the coordinates here or Reddit thread? I used to work on this kind of imagery and would like to poke around (we sold to Google too!). I'm a bit suspect of it. The 'bodies' (not being sarcastic, I dk what it is but that's not unusual for aerial imaging) do not look proportionate. Google offers imagery from 10m per sq pixel to 0.3m. The older stuff, and stuff not in the first world is much more likely to be on the bigger end. Those ?objects seem too big. Look at the length of the units against the structures. Not saying terrible things don't happen there, but from the clip, they look like giants but I have to look at it to actually know what's going on. Also, they're awfully straight for a haphazard pile.
Edit: I'm pretty sure they are too big, unless they're housing some 9ft+ humans. Look at the cars and road nearby for size comparisons. That stain is also persistent across years to some degree.
Edit edit: Also take the colour with a grain of salt, those images get bulk normalised.
Yeah, we have been well aware of this since the 2016 primaries. You are all massive chicken-shits who’s fear of a con artist eclipses your duty to the American people and the constitution. I’ll be sure to make a note of it in case I forget.
In other words, nothing is going to improve until the death threats from the MAGA cultists for defying Trump start to get outweighed by death threats from sane people for obeying him.
You're scared? However scared you are is nothing compared to the people you are supposed to be representing. And if they can start making a stand against this you have no fucking excuse for your inaction.
Quick, let me find the world's smallest fiddle for these absolutely repugnant assholes. Go ahead, sell out the entire fucking country for power and then try to give us your fucking sob story. I'll get to you right after I finish mourning the people you've sent to the death camps, I swear.
The irony is that senators are historically one of the safer positions in Congress, due mostly to name recognition, the six year term, and preestablished alliances within their party and special interests. Sure we talk a big game about primarying people but that doesn't happen that often, either (even when it should, like with many Dems).
Then again, these aren't historical times and deeply unpopular people like Ted Cruz might actual lose to a democratic challenger if he lost the cults backing, even with RNC and billionaires backing him, so idk. Maybe fear is correct.
Listen the clearly more liberal candidate didn't say the thing i liked, so i voted to get my friends deported, and removed everyones first amendment rights.