I do find Huckabee a bit scary

[thewayne]

"I trust Bernie Sanders with my tax dollars like I trust a North Korean chef with my Labrador!"
—Mike Huckabee live-tweeting the Dem debate

Not as scary as Trump and Carson, but still up there. I can't figure if he's sincerely running or just promoting his show/book brand. At least with Bernie you know your tax dollars wouldn't be going straight to defense and rich people's tax cuts.

I've heard an interesting concept that Fox wants the Dems to win next year's election so they'll have 4 or 8 more years of bitching about the government.

Comments

[davesmusictank.livejournal.com]

Yep, Fox News the extremely biased news organisation.

[cp.livejournal.com]

I tend to believe that myself. If you look at the past 8 years, the story of American politics has been a bunch of arsonists pointing blame at the firefighter-in-chief for failing to put out their blazing inferno, while also mandating smaller hoses and fewer hydrants. The GOP isn't interested in taking charge and cleaning up their mess. The mess is working in their favor, and they have all the power they need through obstruction in Congress and flapping their gums in the media.

I mean, seriously--if they actually wanted to win the White House, they would have learned the lessons of 2008 and 2012, that they need to moderate some of their positions in order to appeal to women, young voters, minorities, LGBT persons, pretty much anyone who isn't a white Christian heterosexual. If anything, they've doubled down on their nonsense. They have to know that puts them out of the running for the Presidency. So yeah, I think all they really want to do is maintain their hold on the House (which is easy due to gerrymandering) so they can obstruct everything while blaming the Dems for failing to achieve anything.

Of course, with the House on the verge of insurrection, things might get pretty interesting. We just might see a Speaker who is willing and able to tell the Freedom Caucus to go suck an egg while they work with Dems to obtain a majority. It might not extend to progressive, meaningful legislation, but perhaps we can at least dispense with the current model of governance by crisis. I can dream!

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

There's a very interesting development. Apparently nothing in the rules of the House of Representatives say that the Speaker MUST BE AN ELECTED OFFICIAL. The Newt has offered his services....

[cp.livejournal.com]

I did know that about the rules--the only thing the Constitution actually says about the Speaker is that it's up to the House to choose one, end of story. I wonder if anyone in the House actually likes the idea of Newt taking on the role. Might work for them since no one else seems to actually want the job!

I'm hoping for Jon Stewart, personally. ;)

[silveradept]

Huckabee is waiting for the time when the electorate has the same views he does to be truly serious about a presidential run. Until then, he's probably just promoting.

Fox very much lives being out of power, because it gives them and the GOP summertime to blame for why things aren't working, instead of having to shoulder responsibility rusts getting policy passed. Any time a Fox Commentator speaks, it should be replaced with "Blame Canada."

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

I think he's going to have a long wait. If it weren't for gerrymandering, the RNC would get squashed like a bug in a lot of states, and that's going to be a high priority if a Dem gets elected POTUS and the Congress also flips to Dem control.

[silveradept]

Quite. The question will be whether Dems can win enough, even in the gerrymandered areas, to get that kind of control. What I'd like to see them do after that is pass laws saying that Congress is not allowed to touch Congressional Districts and that responsibility lies with the nonpartisans in the Census Office.

[thewayne.livejournal.com]

While the Census Bureau would be a reasonable place to house a districting commission, you have to do something to lock the funding, otherwise you can have the classic technique of starving the budget of the bureau or commission when a party gets in that wants to change things.

It's quite a dance that needs to be done.