The Daily Parker

The 118th Congress has done less than any previous Congress, except the 72nd, which didn't convene until December 1931 (after taking office in March):

What do House Republicans have to show the voters for their year in power? A bipartisan debt deal (on which they promptly reneged) to avoid a default crisis that they themselves created. A pair of temporary spending bills (both passed with mostly Democratic votes) to avert a government-shutdown crisis that they themselves created. The ouster of their speaker, nearly a month-long shutdown of the chamber as they sought another, and the expulsion of one of their members, who is now negotiating himself a plea deal.

Among the 22 bills in 2023 that became law as of this week was landmark legislation such as: H.R. 3672, “To designate the clinic of the Department of Veterans Affairs in Indian River, Michigan, as the ‘Pfc. Justin T. Paton Department of Veterans Affairs Clinic.’” Also, H.R. 5110, the “Protecting Hunting Heritage and Education Act,” which authorizes federal education funds “to purchase or use dangerous weapons” for instruction.

As the year ends, Ukraine will have to wait for more ammo. The federal government will have to wait for its 2024 funding to be settled. But there was one priority so urgent that it absolutely could not wait until after vacation, and it united every single Republican in the caucus. The day before skipping town, they voted in an entirely party-line vote of 221-212 to put the House on an all-but-inevitable course toward impeaching Biden for the high crime and misdemeanor of having a drug-addicted son.

Democrat Eric Swalwell (Calif.) congratulated Republicans for their dogged pursuit of the president’s son. “I want to give James Comer some credit,” he told the House, “because after 50,000 pages of depositions and secret hearings and closed hearings, I think if we give him enough time, he is going to prove that Hunter Biden is Joe Biden’s son.”

Just remember, the current Republican Party wants to rule, not to govern; and making Americans question the effectiveness of all the government (rather than just their own sabotaging party) will help that along.

In a few related stories from the last day or so, it appears the Republican Party just can't help themselves with their dishonesty:

• Tom Nichols points out the disingenuousness of Republicans holding up Ukrainian aid, which "might count as one of the most devastatingly efficient and effective defense expenditures of American treasure in the history of the republic," until Ukraine presents an "exit plan:" "For Ukraine, the only exit strategy is survival, just as it was for Britain in 1940 or Israel in 1973. The Ukrainians will keep fighting, because the alternative is the enslavement and butchery of the Ukrainian people, and the end of Ukraine as a nation."
• Earlier today, the House passed the Senate's $886 billion defense reauthorization bill shorn of all its cultural hot button issues, despite all the bullshit Republicans and Fox News have fed their constituents about "the woke military."
• Meanwhile, House Republicans also passed a formal impeachment inquiry into President Biden's non-existent corruption, despite knowing he hasn't got any and they won't find any in the inquiry.

Of course, as Charles Blow points out, Republicans are lying about these things because they see the hastening arrival of authoritarianism in the US and want jobs as gauliters:

Confidence in many of our major institutions — including schools, big business, the news media — is at or near its lowest point in the past half-century, in part because of the Donald Trump-led right-wing project to depress it. Indeed, according to a July Gallup report, Republicans’ confidence in 10 of the 16 institutions measured was lower than Democrats’. Three institutions in which Republicans’ confidence exceeded Democrats’ were the Supreme Court, organized religion and the police.

And as people lose faith in these institutions — many being central to maintaining the social contract that democracies offer — they can lose faith in democracy itself. People then lose their fear of a candidate like Trump — who tried to overturn the previous presidential election and recently said that if he’s elected next time, he won’t be a dictator, “except for Day 1” — when they believe democracy is already broken.

As I and others have said before, the Republican Party needs to change its policies or accept losing elections. But they don't believe that, so they're willing to torch our democracy to keep our lot from changing it for the better.

Josh Marshall, who studied history before he became a journalist, thinks the civic democratic vs. authoritarian contest in the US won't end with the next election—or the ones after it (sub. req.):

We often think about authoritarianism being defeated or democracy ending with the election of a Trump or one of his various imitators or progenitors abroad. But it may not necessarily work that way. The Polish Law and Justice party took power in 2015 and set about reshaping the Polish state into a post-democratic authoritarian and anti-liberal democratic state. This year they were defeated by a coalition of liberal democratic parties after eight years. Top Trump ally Jair Bolsonaro was defeated by incumbent President Lula da Silva. There are various other examples.

It is in the nature of authoritarian parties and leaders that they are rule breakers rather than rule followers. And in a contest between rule breakers and rule followers the former have an inherent and sometimes insuperable advantage. ... [I]t is also the case that if the authoritarians aren’t going anywhere it is unrealistic to think they will never win another national election. Indeed, not only are they not going anywhere but the post-2021 period suggests Republicans are becoming increasingly identified with their authoritarian commitments in a way that will likely outlast Trump himself.

This isn’t necessarily good news. But it’s helpful to understand the situation in its totality. We have a temptation to hope for final victories and fear final defeats. But both may be unrealistic. It may be more of a long haul with an uncertain outcome.

My guess would be 12 years of authoritarian rule before they get kicked out. But those 12 years would do incalculable damage to the country and the world. At least they won't get 3/4 of the states behind them, so absent a constitutional convention, we'd still have a constitution to go back to.

I complained yesterday that Chicago hadn't seen sunlight in almost a week. Ever the fount of helpful weather statistics, WGN pointed out that it made it the cloudiest start to a December since 1952. This streak had nothing on my winter break in 1991-92, when Chicago went 12 days without sunlight, or spring 2022, which had only 1 day of sunshine from March 21st through May 2nd. So the sun on my face this morning was delightful.

In other gloominess:

• Julia Ioffe reports that Hamas has refused to release more women from the 137 Israeli hostages it still holds, because, as US State Dept spokesperson Matthew Miller said, "they don’t want these women to talk about what happened to them during their time in custody."
• Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA), the only person ever removed from that office, will retire from Congress at the end of the month. This will leave House Republicans with a majority of just 2 votes.
• Researchers at HP found that elections for the Doge of Venice followed the same protocol from 1268 to 1797, which had ingenious anti-corruption and minority-protection features.
• Crain's columnist Greg Hinz frets that Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson doesn't seem ready for the job.
• Of course, Johnson got the job in part because many of us would like to end the problems that have led to $700 million in wrongful-conviction settlements the city has paid out since 2000. Seven hundred million. Glad to know my property tax is well-spent.
• The Dept of Transportation has approved $95 million in grants for long-overdue upgrades to Chicago Union Station.
• Ryan Chester made a 16.8-meter sketch of all the buildings on the Chicago River, which you can now buy in book form.
• John Scalzi recommends the 2003 comedy Down With Love for your winter viewing pleasure.

Finally, Block Club Chicago today posted almost exactly the same thing I have posted more than once: that Friday will be Chicago's earliest sunset of the year. I'm just sad they didn't cite Weather Now.

US Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), top contender for Dumbest Person in Congress since taking office earlier this year, finally released his hold on over 400 general and flag officer promotions he's held up for almost a year:

The hold, which Tuberville began in February, applied to all senior military promotions, and hundreds of officers were caught up in its net. As officers increasingly complained of the toll on military readiness and morale, and as a war raged in the Middle East, Tuberville faced increasing pressure from his fellow Republicans to drop the hold.

He has now narrowed his hold to the 10 or so promotions at the four-star rank. Tuberville said he relinquished the hold because he wanted to keep Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) from bringing up a vote to get around his maneuver. He did not receive any concessions he previously demanded, such as a change to the military funding bill to address the abortion policy.

Tuberville’s hold led to a remarkably public confrontation with some of his GOP colleagues, who staged a late-night attempt to promote the officers he had blocked, forcing him to personally object to each one. Republican Sens. Dan Sullivan (Alaska), Joni Ernst (Iowa), Todd C. Young (Ind.) and Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), all veterans, implored Tuberville on the Senate floor to lift his hold for the sake of national security.

As of Tuesday, there had been 451 senior military officers nominated for a total of 455 jobs, he said.

Assuming the Senate confirms them all tonight or tomorrow, a lot of senior officers will have a lot of work. Families have to move, for starters, and not just the families of the 451 new admirals and generals. Each of those officers will pick a new staff, meaning a lot of captains and colonels get to pack their bags right before Christmas. And while all this happens, many of the new admirals and generals will spend tens of hours signing all the papers that no one could sign because their predecessors had to retire before they could start.

I wish I had a transcript of the conversation Mitch McConnell had with Tuberville to convince him to get out of the way. What a stupid asshole, causing this much disruption for so little gain.

The universe, following up on the death of one controversial right-wing figure in American politics, continued tidying up with the death of former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor (I/r), the first woman appointed to the United States Supreme Court:

Very little could happen without Justice O’Connor’s support when it came to the polarizing issues on the court’s docket, and the law regarding affirmative action, abortion, voting rights, religion, federalism, sex discrimination and other hot-button subjects was basically what Sandra Day O’Connor thought it should be.

When President Ronald Reagan named her to the Supreme Court in 1981 to fulfill a campaign promise to appoint the first female justice, she was a judge on a midlevel appeals court in Arizona, where she had long been active in Republican politics, though she had friends in both parties. Fifty-one years old at the time of her nomination, she served for 24 years, retiring in January 2006 to care for her ailing husband. As the court moved to the right during that period, her moderate conservatism made her look in the end like a relative liberal.

“Liberal” was undoubtedly not her self-image, but as the court’s rightward shift accelerated after her retirement — her successor, Samuel A. Alito Jr., was notably more conservative — she lamented publicly that some of her majority opinions were being “dismantled.”

O'Connor did write reasonable opinions, but her "balance" took the Court much farther to the right than her obituaries suggest. She also voted in the majority on a number of 5-4 decisions of dubious (or worse) jurisprudential reasoning, decisions the current feral reactionaries on the Court use to bolster their worse jurisprudential reasoning.

Presidents Reagan and Bush Sr nominated her and Justice Thomas (R$) as total F-yous to their demographic groups, too. At least O'Connor "evolved" somewhat, though her "evolution" mostly occurred after Justice Alito (R) took her seat. Funny how that works.

So: two complex but historic American politicians who made the world worse died in two days. I wonder if there will be a third?

Speaking of people who made the world worse, this just in: 311 Representatives, including 105 Republicans, voted to boot Rep. George Santos (R-NY) back to Queens a few minutes ago. The Republicans voting Aye really, really, did not want him to run for re-election in such a close district, I guess.

Tomorrow I have a quick trip to the Bay Area to see family. I expect I will not only continue posting normally, but I will also research at least two Brews & Choos Special Stops while there. Exciting stuff.

And because we live in exciting times:

• The US Attorney for the Southern District of New York has charged an Indian national with a murder-for-hire scheme in which our "friend" the Government of India put out a hit on a Sikh activist living in our country.
• The US Dept of Defense has released its general demographic data for 2022, including all 1.3 million people on active duty and 994,000 reservists. (As Paul Krugman has said many times, the US Government is an insurance company with an army.)
• US Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) continues his fight to win Dumbest Asshole in Congress, scoring big points this week by appearing not to notice that his hold on 400-plus general and flag officer promotions has hurt the military.
• Julia Ioffe speculates on what will happen the day after the Gaza war ends.
• A Virgin Atlantic 787 made the Heathrow to Kennedy run yesterday using only biofuel.
• Meanwhile, both United Airlines and American Airlines have raised concerns about the planned Terminal 2 reconstruction here at O'Hare.
• Walking is good for you; walking quickly is better.
• Despite the declines in performing arts attendance generally, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra actually enjoyed a slight increase in ticket sales this year.

Finally, if you're in Chicago tonight around 6pm, tune into WFMT 98.7 FM. They're putting the Apollo Chorus performance at Holy Name Cathedral in their holiday preview. Cool! (And tickets are still available.)

I guess not all of the stories I read at lunchtime depressed me, but...well, you decide:

• Writing in the Atlantic, Rogé Karma weaves together the threads of white backlash to civil rights laws, the Democratic Party's cultural elitism, and a series of global crises, to explain why the US uniquely among its peer nations has made such a hash of the post-1970s economy.
• Georgetown public policy professor George P. Moynihan, who studies government bureaucracies, lays out how the XPOTUS intends to destroy the civil service if re-elected next year.
• A simian truck driver following GPS instead of looking outside her cab windows may have destroyed one of Illinois' last 19th-century covered bridges.
• Today I learned about the history of Gretna Green, Scotland, where people go to elope.

One happy(-ish) story, as I didn't have to travel this past weekend: the TSA reported that on Sunday they screened more people (2.9 million) than on any single day in history. And of the 100,000+ flights scheduled between Wednesday and Sunday, carriers cancelled only 201 (0.2%). Amazing.

Ah, Tricky Dick, you were far worse than a crook:

For context, Woodward and Bernstein had only just started investigating Watergate, and he still hadn't gotten us out of Vietnam. But good thing he reassured us he didn't do anything illegal.

I have tickets to a late concert downtown, which means a few things, principally that I'm still at the office. But I'm killing it on this sprint, so it works out.

Of course this means a link dump:

• The XPOTUS has a hate-hate relationship with life.
• After a damning ethics report, Rep. George Santos (R-NY) has announced he won't run again, which is too bad because it would have been an easy D pickup.
• Speaking of Republicans in Congress, why do they behave like adolescent boys all the time?
• Israel is seeing a rally-around-the-flag effect, with the odd wrinkle that everyone hates the Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu (Likud).
• The Post has decided to show people the horrific things 5.56mm rounds do to a body, as their public editor explains.
• George Packer looks at why political writing, in general, sucks.
• Where do all the stolen catalytic converters go?
• A train crash at the Howard St El station injured 23 passengers, and somehow distracted the cops on the scene from a shooting a block away.
• It will take Caltrans 3-5 weeks to fix the I-10 freeway in Los Angeles after a fire last week, with about 300,000 vehicles diverting each day.
• After Elon Musk's latest anti-Semitic garbage, author John Scalzi has left Twitter for good.

I promise to write something substantial tomorrow or Saturday. Promise.