DL Open Thread Thursday, April 8, 2021

Delaware Republicans are shitting themselves over the inability of ammosexuals to intimidate lawmakers with the General Assembly meeting via Zoom, so they’re demanding a return to in-person sessions. Rep. Tim Dukes (R-Nepotism) said the quiet part out loud:

Dukes added that holding public comment on the gun control bills to one minute stifled conversation, and the influence having the public in the room can have on decision-makers. “You miss the connection, and then when you get in an issue or a piece of legislation that is really debatable, it is hard to have good debate. The good example were the two gun bills last week in the Senate.”

As you might recall, typically the ammosexuals turn out a couple of hundred armed, neck-bearded slackjaws to intimidate the lawmakers, and it always works, so the motivation here is as obvious as Delaware’s Republicans are stupid.

The ways in which West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin might as well be a Republican grew yesterday when he added bald-faced lying to his resume. Manchin wrote an op-ed for the Washington Post claiming he’ll uphold the Senate filibuster rules because, contrary to all available evidence, Biden’s agenda has bipartisan support. Like Chris Coons, Manchin failed to identify even one of the supposed 10 Republicans he’s talking about. Five Thirty Eight examines his motivations.

Some people hear “taco trucks on every corner” and say, “Great, where’s the menu?” Others apparently think it’s a sign of Ragnarok. Somebody analyzed the data on the 377 insurrectionists facing charges and found an interesting correlation: They are most likely to live in counties with large declines in the non-Hispanic white population.

Right-wing freakouts should be expected when Biden reveals his executive actions on gun control today. The steps are modest, but to RWNJs, every flat plane is a slippery slope.

While Republicans (and Rep. Krista Griffith) get the vapors over proposed tax hikes on the rich, former Labor Secretary Robert Reich explains seven little steps in that direction that would generate $6 trillion over the next decade, more than enough to pay for Biden’s infrastructure plan.

Despite losing the presidency, the House and the Senate, Republicans have no intention of changing their behavior or their policies, which is why they’re going all-in on voter suppression. Digby notes that the real threat in many of these bills making their way through GOP-dominated statehouses is that they empower state legislatures to take control of elections.

The floor’s yours.