Monday Open Thread [1.5.15]

Fox News host Greta Van Susteren on Sunday said that Republican members of Congress should put more pressure on House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) to step down following reports that he spoke at an event for a white nationalist group in 2002.

“The moral courage would be to step down because it sends a very bad message to the American people,” Van Susteren said on Sunday.

The message being sent to the American people is that the Republican Party enjoys racism and fully supports David Duke and the KKK. And every day that Scalise remains in office, that message hardens in cement, not that the sidewalk of history isn’t already paved with similar racist messages.

Paul Krugman:

[E]ven if you think Mr. Obama deserves little or no credit for good economic news, the fact is his opponents have spent years claiming that his bad attitude—he has been known to suggest, now and then, that some bankers have behaved badly—is somehow responsible for the economy’s weakness. Now that he’s presiding over unexpected economic strength, they can’t just turn around and assert his irrelevance.

Oh yes they can. Logic is foreign to Republicans.

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) announced on CBS’s Face The Nation that Senate Democrats have enough votes to sustain the widely expected veto that President Obama will issue after Republicans pass a bill authorizing the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.

“I think there will be enough Democratic votes to sustain the president’s veto…Our Republican colleagues say that this is a jobs bill but that really is not true at all. By most estimates it would create several thousand temporary construction jobs and only 35 permanent jobs…Why create very few jobs with the dirtiest of energy from tar sands when you can create tens of thousands more clean jobs using wind and solar? Our Republican colleagues are doing what they always do: they’re appeasing a few special interests — in this case oil companies and pipeline companies and not really doing what’s good for the average middle class family in terms of creating jobs.”

I expect Chris Coons to vote no. I expect Tom Carper, the treasonous Republican, to vote yes.

In the lead-up to the 2012 presidential election, Think Progress reminds us that Westgate Resorts CEO David Siegel sent an email to all employees: “Of course, as your employer, I can’t tell you whom to vote for” but he noted that re-electing President Obama would “threaten your job” and result in “less benefits and certainly less opportunity for everyone.”

Two years later, Siegel informed employees that he would boost their salaries because 2014 beat all expectations: “We’re experiencing the best year in our history and I wanted to do something to show my gratitude for the employees who make that possible.” He told the Orlando Business Journal that “things have never been better.”

I hope he sent a thank you card to President Obama.