Occasional Words from the Resistance

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…from the desk of R.E. Vanella. Jemand mußte Josef K. verleumdet haben, denn ohne daß er etwas Böses getan hätte, wurde er eines Morgens verhaftet. --Franz Kafka, ‘Der Proceß’ [Someone must have been telling lies about Josef K. because one morning after doing nothing wrong he was arrested. 'The Trial']
How Tom Carper’s Positions and Votes Screw People and Help Rethugs Screw People. Volume 4

How Tom Carper’s Positions and Votes Screw People and Help Rethugs Screw People. Volume 4

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Let's first look at the terms of this unholiest of marriages.  In exchange for being perhaps Big Pharma's most dependable stooge (Sen. Menendez of New Jersey is also in the running), Tom Carper has received compensation from the industry commensurate with his stoogery.  Big Pharma has contributed $225,010 to Tom Carper from 2011 to the present (end of year contributions not yet reported).  Of that amount, $194,410 came from PACs as opposed to $30,600 from individual donors. 86.4% of all dollars from the industry in PAC dollars.  Open Secrets has it all right here.  If you look at Carper's 20 Top Contributors, the following all have significant involvement in Pharma:  Astra Zeneca, Ashland, Pfizer,  and DuPont. In addition, the following big donors have holdings in, and/or are lobbyists for, the pharmaceutical industry (relevant links provided):  Blackstone Group, Akin, Gump, et al, Skadden Arps, et al, and King and Spalding. So, what exactly did/does Big Pharma get from Tom Carper?  A lot.  Carper's obstructionism on behalf of the industry paid off handsomely during Obamacare negotiations. And, yes, people who rely on government insurance programs bore the cost.

The December 13, 2016 Thread

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The RNC “is overseeing an expansive whip operation designed to lock down Donald Trump’s Electoral College majority and ensure that the 306 Republican electors cast their votes for the president-elect,” Politico reports. “Two RNC sources familiar with the effort said the committee — with the assistance of state Republican parties and the Trump campaign — has been in touch with most of the GOP electors multiple times, and has concluded that only one is a risk to cast a vote against Trump on Dec. 19, when the Electoral College meets.” Which is why I have been dashing any liberal or progressive dreams that somehow the GOP electors will vote their conscience. These people are usually GOP partisans and party regulars. So they don't have one.

GOP takes first mover advantage: Picks Marino for Upcoming Special

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Marino's 49% against BHL probably overstates his strength a bit because a few of those percentage points can be attributed to the late breaking sign theft scandal. Still, someone running a follow-up race is typically tougher to beat than a pure newbie. Dems will probably field Earl Jaques, who is a workaday retail pol who knows to spend shoe leather.

The December 12, 2016 Thread

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The Economist: “These latest revelations have probably not changed any minds at all. Republicans [and certain leftists] who hate Mrs Clinton are still delighted that she was defeated. Democrats who loathe and fear Mr Trump have one more reason to dislike him. Outside Washington, red-blooded Americans who mostly rather dislike President Vladimir Putin, according to polls, seem to be shrugging off the latest allegations: President-elect Trump was loudly cheered by spectators when he turned up in Baltimore on December 10th to watch the Army-Navy football game, an annual pageant of patriotism.” “And that is what is, or should be, so unsettling. Russian interference in elections across the Western world is like a nasty virus, attacking the body politic. Normally, America is protected by powerful, bipartisan immune responses against such a menace. It also boasts some of the world’s most sophisticated intelligence and cyber-defenses, and when spooks tell the Republicans and Democrats who lead Congress and sit on the House and Senate intelligence committees of hostile acts by a foreign power, love of country generates a unified response. That immune response is not kicking in this time.” “This squabble does matter. When the next president of America takes his oath of office in January, officers of Russian intelligence can savour a historic win. And that astonishing, appalling fact has divided, not united, the two parties that run the world’s great democracy. That should be enough to unsettle anyone.”
The December 11, 2016 Thread

The December 11, 2016 Thread

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On Friday night, bombshell news reports noted that the CIA had assessed Russia intervened in the US election to help Trump win; that during the campaign senior congressional Republicans, including Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, had resisted a private White House request to be part of a bipartisan effort to call out Russian hacking of Democratic and political targets; and that Moscow had penetrated the computer system of the Republican National Committee but had not publicly disseminated any of the stolen material. Aaron Blake: “The report highlights and exacerbates the increasingly fraught situation in which congressional Republicans find themselves with regard to Russia and Trump. By acknowledging and digging into the increasing evidence that Russia helped — or at least attempted to help — tip the scales in Trump’s favor, they risk raising questions about whether Trump would have won without Russian intervention.”
The December 10, 2016 Thread

The December 10, 2016 Thread

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Joan Walsh at The Nation says Democrats should fight all of Donald Trump’s nominees:
[S]o far, presented with these political gifts, Democrats have been fairly silent. They’ve pledged to fight Sessions, and they should, but no one else has come in for much attack, although today Senator Ed Markey said he would oppose Pruitt’s nomination to head the EPA, and Schumer had some tough words for Pudzer as labor secretary. That’s good news, but it’s not enough. On one level, I understand the need for Democrats to “pick their battles.” They may be more likely to win GOP support to actually block a nominee or two by being selective. But no one has yet marshaled an argument to Trump voters that they’ve been hoodwinked: that the outsider candidate has picked a cabinet of insiders, who make an utter mockery of his promises to look out for the “forgotten man.” Democrats should be making the case, as Ben Adler argues in The Guardian, that Trump is “a self-dealing political profiteer and a tool of the business and political elite.” Jeff Hauser of the Revolving Door Project has suggested that Democrats refuse to consider any appointments until Trump discloses and then divests himself of his global and largely secret financial empire—especially since we can’t trust Trump’s picks to monitor his self-dealing.