Senate Democrats' Cowardly Eight Knifed Americans In The Back
The sudden move on Sunday, despite claims to the contrary, appears to have been caused partly by worry about holiday travel amidst chaos at the nation's airports, giving Trump an easy win. Again.
The moment that The Cowardly Eight™ began discussing caving in to Republican bullying, somebody should’ve shown them an image like this, because this is how it’s going to be remembered now.
Look at that. He’s triumphant. He won without having to negotiate. He won without doing anything but act like a twelve-year-old and inflict pain on the most vulnerable people deliberately. Even that subhead does not come close to describing what he did: deliberately hurt those he took an oath to serve in the name of political power. “Punishing actions” like starving the poor and not paying government workers and shutting down air travel. Breaking the law at every turn by firing federal workers and threatening no back pay. Refusing to disburse SNAP funds already budgeted to prevent the poor from being hostages, and then threatening prosecution of any grocery outlet or food bank that gave extra help to SNAP recipients.
Meanwhile, what did these losers get?
NOTHING.
They got a bill that would fund SNAP through next year (money that already existed in the contingency fund).
They got rehiring of all federal workers fired by Russ Vought during the shutdown (that ain’t happening, because the GOP never enforces the law against Trump, and he’s not going to do it because his puppetmasters Vought and Stephen Nosferatu Miller won’t let him).
They got “a promise of a vote on restoring the ACA subsidies,” which especially doesn’t mean a goddamn thing, because Speaker of the nonexistent House Mike Johnson said he won’t hold a matching vote before the senators even voted to reopen the government.
Just what in the hell were they thinking? They got two things already required by the law and one thing that is an empty promise, while not getting the one thing they said they wouldn’t back down on. What was the point?
“Standing up to Donald Trump didn’t work,” said Senator Angus King on Morning Joe. “It actually gave him more power.”
Ladies and gentlemen, your political opposition.
Donald Trump’s approval ratings slid to historic lows. He was loudly booed conducting a citizenship ceremony at the Washington vs. Detroit NFL game yesterday. MAGA support was cracking. The courts were holding firm against the illegalities. A senior judge appointed by Reagan resigned after forty years to specifically speak out against the creeping dictatorship. The opinion polls showed that the public rightly believed Republicans were responsible for this mess, because they are.
Democrats, for their many, many faults, some of which I’ll be getting into shortly, do not hold a majority in any part of the federal government. This is a government run by Republicans solely for the purpose of benefiting wealthy Republicans and screwing over “the woke left,” which is anyone that isn’t white enough, Christian enough, or wealthy enough for their tastes. There was a lot of evidence that the poorer MAGA supporters saw their safety net disappear and finally realized that their Lord and Orange Savior Donald Trump was screwing them.
But no, The Cowardly Eight™ panicked and lost their nerve. It felt inevitable that at least two of the eight would cave in at some point, especially Fetterman, who might as well switch parties since his politics are incoherent post-stroke and he just seems to want to rage-bait others. Republicans are masters of rage-baiting without doing any useful work. So glad I spent effort and money getting him elected!
But this, this seems ridiculous. Durbin used to have something resembling a spine, and he just quivered and collapsed into goo. Shaheen’s decision was such trash that her own daughter released a statement declaring how terrible it was.
Imagine being such a fool that your own kid points out at the very top that Mike Johnson’s refusal to hold a vote in the House means you made no deal at all. You just capitulated. These people are embarrassing, absolutely pathetic at the basic art of politics. They think we’re in some era where the other side has basic decency and principles. Are you blind, deaf and dumb all at once? Are you so high on your own supply of stale platitudes that you do not recognize what is happening?
The Republican Party is, in many quarters, openly embracing neo-Nazis. They are cheering on, funding, and actively defending state-sponsored terrorism by ICE. They defended the most racist Supreme Court ruling since Korematsu, and do not even try to stop the worst impulses of the President and his deeply terrible cabinet secretaries. The President posts an AI-generated video where he literally dumps a planeload of shit on top of protestors and their response is, “I didn’t see it.” THE HELL YOU DIDN’T. The President sends people to torture prisons and they shrug. The President orders the military into American cities where they are assaulting innocent bystanders, arresting citizens, and destroying property, and they do nothing to rein him in. The President takes billions of dollars in bribes and pardons criminals, and they do nothing.
THIS IS WHO YOU MADE A DEAL WITH????
I have witnessed a quarter-century of gross political ineptitude by Democrats across the nation, and somehow stomached it. I registered as a Democrat only when it became necessary to vote in primaries, because as a progressive, I’ve often been left of the party itself. I have absolutely had it this time. Chuck Schumer, that worthless excuse for a “leader” in the Senate, not only got steamrolled by these clowns, but is so worried about Israel that he’s letting this country mutate into Nazi Germany redux through his lack of will. The Onion put it best Monday morning when they republished this from March (itself very telling).
Schumer’s been quoted again recently that he believes that he needs to be a guardian of their [Israel’s] interests here. If he wants to be their ambassador, the door is to the left, and you can leave your resignation with the governor of New York, Chuckles. This spineless creep voted for a sexual assaulter because he couldn’t bring himself to support a Muslim. He refused to support the Democratic Party’s nominee for mayor of the city of New York, a city he represents, and he has the fucking nerve to tell us we should always vote for Democrats?
The same goes for Hakeem Jeffries, whose AIPAC sack of cash is so heavy that he could barely make it to NYC in time to endorse Zohran Mamdani the last week before the general election. The American Israeli Political Action Committee hates Zohran Mamdani for loudly condemning Israel’s wanton genocide of the Palestinian people. They have spent years donating millions to New York Democrats like Schumer, Kirsten Gillibrand, Ritchie Torres (that useless pinkwashing scumbag), Jeffries, so on and so forth, to ensure that they always got aid for Israel, no matter what. A Muslim who called them out on their bullshit and is a better leader for everyone? They couldn’t have that! So, they activated their bought-off politicians and their “liberal” pawns like actress Debra Messing, and they told the people of America that it was better to vote for the guy who sent the elderly to their deaths in nursing homes during COVID and sexually assaulted his female subordinates because he supported Israel.
Just what city do they think Zohran Mamdani and Andrew Cuomo were running to lead?
The Democratic “leadership,” who are supposed to be looking out for the best interests of Americans, who embarked on this standoff promising to fight for our healthcare, couldn’t keep it together for more than six weeks. Yet when it comes to the heavily-armed, nuclear-armed ethnostate that is murdering an entire race of people in the most perverse twist of history, unity was maintained for a full year! Who are they representing? Americans or Israelis? Americans elected them to represent us. Tens of millions of Americans are going to lose healthcare without the ACA subsidies. The rest of us are receiving reduced quality of coverage at increased costs because the downstream effects from the ACA subsidies ending means everyone’s coverage got more expensive.
While this is happening, food inflation continues to skyrocket, and tariffs have made everything else more expensive too, because the dementia-riddled dimwit in the Oval Office thinks you can grow coffee and bananas in America, and slaps tariffs on their import. The alleged opposition, the marshmallows known as Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, what have they done? Schumer couldn’t keep eight people in line through Thanksgiving so the people could know without a shadow of a doubt who was starving them and denying them healthcare? Jeffries couldn’t be bothered to actually fight against this draconian regime instead of repeatedly telling us, “it’s in God’s hands?”
Enough.
I will not accept any longer the false binary put in front of us. I will not support weak-kneed, spineless, cowardly, past-their-prime, mushy-headed excuses for leadership. I will not vote for, donate to, or volunteer for weak politicians who cannot be counted on to hold firm against tyranny. I will not make any more excuses or rationalizations for leaders who cannot play the best hand they’ve had in over a year with any competency. I will not accept the tepid, lukewarm, insipid “ideas” that beg the question, in the immortal words of Jeff Daniels on The Newsroom, “If liberals are so smart, how come they lose so goddamn always?”
That’s another thing too. The reason progressives got so sick and tired of being called liberal, and came to wield it as a slur, is because liberals became light-wing conservatives. Liberals got us into the Iraq War with the neoconservatives. Liberals gave us the ACA and not universal healthcare, or even a public option to buy into Medicare. Liberals gave us compromises on stimulus and made the common folk deal with austerity while they, the powers that be, maintained their six-figure salaries. Liberals continued the Patriot Act, and the drone murder program of “terrorists” that usually turned out to be somebody’s wedding party or some poor kid herding sheep. Liberals left Guantanamo open. Liberals continued using expanded executive power for the worst reasons, and didn’t ever try to bend it for the best ones. Liberals kept telling us that the things we’ve been crying out for since we were paying $5/gallon for gasoline and drowning under housing debts and prices in 2008 are “wishful thinking” and demanded we accept incrementalism.
The fascists don’t tell their people that. They take power, smash everything, and even give their supporters some of what they want. They don’t tell them to suck it up and accept crumbs. They aim for big things and do whatever they can to achieve them. It’s why they gain followers when all reason and logic say they shouldn’t have this level of support. People long for leadership and for somebody to be open about what they believe in. It perversely explains a lot of Donald Trump’s support. He’s openly corrupt and they accept it because he’s not hiding it. He states a goal, no matter how grotesque it is (mass deportation, terrorizing the populations of large cities), and he is seen to follow up on it. We hate those things because they are morally evil, illegal, and counterproductive, but he maintains a baseline of support because he stands for something.
The Cowardly Eight™, Hakeem Jeffries, Chuck Schumer, Kamala Harris, and so many more in Democratic leadership have not stood by anyone. They’ve thrown minority groups to the wolves. They promised to be tougher on the border and immigration than the guy who’s recreated the Nazi SS within ICE. They abandoned trans kids, who weren’t even thought about by everyday Americans five years ago until the fascists turned them into a punching bag for the supposed immorality of the left, and now those kids and their parents are going through hell because of hate campaigns against them, care restrictions, and banishment from athletics. They refused to let Palestinians into the DNC last year for fear they’d “make a scene,” even though their only grievance was that their government was providing the weapons used to perpetuate the genocide of their families and friends in Gaza and the West Bank. When Donald Trump accused Haitian immigrants of eating the dogs and cats from their neighbors, Harris, Schumer, Jeffries—none of them could be bothered to fly to Springfield, Ohio and appear on camera showing support for these innocent people. The only crime of these Haitians was to be maligned in a video a racist freakshow posted to social media making these wild accusations.
To everyone involved in this unilateral and appalling surrender, including the incompetent leadership, I have three words for you: RESIGN. GET OUT. You have doomed us by showing there is no principle Democrats won’t abandon if Trump bullies the nation enough. The hell with all of you. You betrayed America. You betrayed all of us who believed in you. You betrayed the very cause of democracy by selling out to a wannabe tyrant by further enhancing his sense of imperviousness.
Here is my mission statement going forward: I am supporting challengers. I am declaring bright red lines for any candidate that I donate money to, volunteer for, or otherwise help in the next year. If they are against these, if they won’t even consider these, then the hell with them too.
A promise to vote for new leadership in whichever house of Congress they are running for. No more seniority rules. No more choosing the gerontocrats over the skilled youngsters when they’ve got terminal cancer or early onset dementia. We need leaders, not craven careerists.
A pledge to vote for an immediate ban on insider stock trading by Congress. No more trusts, no more managed investment funds. No spouses or kids handling it and “not telling you what activity is taking place.” Sell your stocks, and purchase no others until you leave office. You’re in public service, not private enrichment.
Require AIPAC to register under FARA (Foreign Agents Registration Act). They need to play by the rules and go through the same scrutiny as everyone else.
Disavow AIPAC funding to your campaign.
Support the prosecution of every criminal in the executive branch from Donald Trump on down for the dozens of laws they’ve shattered. From trading bribes for pardons to accepting luxury jets as personal gifts to using ICE as a Gestapo and violating the rights of millions, this cannot be waved off. That’s been tried once and it failed. We warned you after January 6th.
Refuse to vote in favor of supplying any more weapons to Israel until they actively end their genocide and depart their illegal settlements, returning all of their post-1967 land back to its rightful owners.
Support statehood for Washington, DC and Puerto Rico. Alternatively, hold a referendum on independence for Puerto Rico. It’s 2025, and colonies are so passé.
These are starting points. I also believe constitutional amendments badly need to be returned to the forefront of American politics. We need the ability to hold recall elections for Senators so they remember who they are answerable to. We need an end to the Electoral College. We need a vastly reformed Supreme Court, one that isn’t so partisan, reactionary, and above the law (Sorry, Uncle Clarence, no more yachts and RVs for you!).
We need the Equal Rights Amendment to protect every gender, sex, ethnicity, and disability from discrimination. We need the guaranteed right to prosecute any president for criminal behavior, past or present. We need to reduce the conviction threshold for impeachment. It hasn’t worked once in our history even when it was completely called for (Johnson, Trump). If you can’t ever convict someone in an impeachment trial, then it’s a toothless article. Laws that cannot be enforced in any meaningful way cease to matter. We need guaranteed reapportionment of House seats that properly and fairly recognize the population where it is at, and end this unfair distribution of a fixed number of seats that leaves large cities underrepresented or vast geographical swathes covered by a single person. Neither is good for democracy.
Incrementalism is dead. The nation’s very existence is in danger at the hands of these thugs. A lawful revolution is necessary for our democracy and freedom to live. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez gets it. Bernie Sanders gets it. Zohran Mamdani gets it. Mallory McMorrow gets it. To Democrats who are wavering or stuck in the old ways, either get on board to save America or your names will only be spoken in Hell when it’s all over.