Let’s play the game by the same set of rules being used by Joe Biden.
Any tactic he’s allowed to use, we’re allowed to use.
Whatever heights of hyperbole he soars to, we’ll fly right alongside him.
Whatever depths of mud and slime he’s willing plumb, we’ll wallow in it.
You’ve been warned.
Joe Biden presents controversial plan: Wants to make big change in Congress
Mikkel Danielsen, Berlingske.dk, Jan 12
Here’s the lede:
Joe Biden has been discussing his plan behind closed doors for months. Finally, he says it out loud: In an attempt to reform U.S. election laws, he wants to use an unusual remedy. One of the president’s most important election promises will probably fall to the ground anyway.
In other words, this is an anti-democratic plot he’s been planning in secret but has finally made public, even though it’ll probably fail.
Joe Biden stepped up to the podium in Atlanta. And then he presented a sensational idea.
He wants to adjust to the rules of the game in American democracy.
He wants to rig the system. (Fixed it for you, Danielsen.)
In a speech on Thursday, Joe Biden proposed changing the rules on the so-called “filibuster”.
The filibuster is a rule that in practice means that almost all legislation in the United States must be passed by 60 votes among the 100 senators in the Senate. The filibuster thus acts as a kind of emergency brake for the political minority.
Joe Biden has previously defended the rule, just as the longtime senator has defended many of Congress’ old traditions.
But now—in a desperate attempt to enact new election laws in the United States—Joe Biden says the filibuster must go away in special cases.
Shorter version: Joe Biden’s plotted assault on democracy requires passage of a bill that requires too many votes to pass, so he’s demanding the Senate change the rules for voting on presidential assaults on democracy.
(That Biden now opposes something he previously supported will surprise no one: the real question is whether he knows he used to support the filibuster.)
“I’ve been having these quiet conversations with members of Congress for the last two months,” he said of his plan.
“I’m tired of being quiet.”
(I’m using his actual remarks according to CNN here, rather than translating Danielsen’s Danish. CNN also notes, and Danielsen omits, that Biden delivered that last line “slamming his hand on the lectern.”)
Many Democrats have long believed that it is high time to change the filibuster rules. Some want a simple majority of more than 50 senators to be enough to pass legislation in the Senate. Others believe that the limit should be lowered from 60 votes to 55.
The Democrats have good political reasons to feel this way. Democrats have 50 seats in the Senate, but because of the filibuster they most often need the support of at least ten Republican senators to make policy. In a divided United States, where the parties are reluctant to cooperate, ten is a whole lot.
The Filibuster has stood in the way of much of Joe Biden’s political agenda.
And now it threatens one of his most important election promises. He’s apparently had enough.
Interesting logic: Joe Biden is calling Republican-led efforts to reform voting laws an “assault on democracy,” and he wants to stop them, but the Constitution gives him no authority to do that on his own and the current rules of the Senate prevent him from getting it through, so he wants to reform voting laws in the Senate to prevent Republicans from reforming voting laws in the states. (Something they’re doing legally and by means of existing rules.)
In other words, Biden wants Americans to rally behind his assault on democracy to prevent an assault on democracy because he’s an angry old man who’s tired of all your malarkey and doesn’t want to hear any of your sass.
Joe Biden does not want a complete showdown with the filibuster.
But he wants it to be set aside in special cases: when it comes to bills that deal with Americans’ right to vote.
“I’ll make it clear,” he said.
“(To protect our democracy), I support changing the Senate rules, whichever way they need to be changed to prevent a minority of senators from blocking actions on voting rights.”
Joe Biden and the Democrats are deeply concerned that Republicans in numerous states have passed or are in the process of adopting new measures to tighten election laws. The Republican bills will, among other things, limit the possibilities for voting by mail, place greater demands on voters’ identification papers and, in a single case, prohibit persons queuing for a polling station from receiving water and drink.
But apparently nothing will stop the lickspittle Mikkel Daniels from carrying water for the tyrant Joe Biden.
I went over all this in great detail last March (“More Than Just an Old Sweet Song“), when Biden was running around in his stinky underpants barking out the Big Lie that voter law reforms in Georgia were “Jim Crow on steroids.” Please go back and read that whole post to get a sense of just how wildly overheated and dishonest Joe Biden and his Democratic minions in Congress and the media were being back then and are being right now.
It’s especially disgusting for Danielsen to have included the old lie about voters in queue being denied food and water: not because that’s just one of the many lies Democrats have been pushing, but because it is a lie and Danielsen isn’t saying “according to Democrats” or “Democrats claim” or anything of the sort. He’s saying “this is what the Republican bills will do.”
That’s an absolute falsehood that Danielsen has had ten months to fact check—and hasn’t. Because he’s not a journalist, he’s a relay service for the Democratic National Committee. He’s just one more pair of arms to help prop up the vicious, racialist, senile old illegitimate president of the United States simply because the media is committed to supporting the party of slavery, the KKK, Jim Crow, and opposition to the civil rights act.
Danielsen’s probably only mentioning this bit about food and water because Biden stressed this lie in his speech, lying elaborately and enormously about Republicans’ desire to deprive voters of sustenance.
Biden’s not even being subtle here: he’s not asking to get rid of the filibuster, he’s just asking for it not to apply to a thing he wants to do because he wants to do the thing and the filibuster’s in his way.
“I’m not saying we don’t need speed limits, I’m just saying when I’m on my way to a hot date they shouldn’t apply.”
Republicans argue that the bills will reduce the risk of election fraud. Democrats argue that the real purpose of the proposals is to make it more difficult for black voters to vote – and black voters most often vote democratically.
Joe Biden has previously called the Republican bills an “assault on American democracy.”
Note what Danielsen is doing here: after setting out the Democratic lies as established fact (“no food or water for people waiting in line!”), he presents Republican arguments as… Republican arguments. Then he tells us what Democrats claim are the “real” Republican motives, despite not having once offered Republican interpretations of Democratic motives, which are plainly to achieve one-party rule of the country by whatever means necessary.
And of course he reminds us that the tyrant Biden has smeared the Republican laws as an assault on democracy, without bothering to include any Republican interpretations of Biden’s own assault on democracy.
Why is Joe Biden’s filibuster proposal coming right now?
There are two reasons:
First, one of Joe Biden’s big election promises is on the verge of falling to the ground.
Joe Biden has promised that he will implement reforms that will “ensure Americans’ right to vote.”
This passage is doing a bit of razzle-dazzle you might not have noticed: he’s saying this assault on democracy is important to Joe Biden because he promised reforms that would “ensure Americans’ right to vote.”
But nothing proposed by any Republicans anywhere seeks to, or would, have any impact on Americans’ right to vote.
So this has nothing to do with that particular promise, meaning this part of Danielsen’s analysis is meaningless.
Even if Republicans were really and truly passing legislation to deny food and water to the poor Georgian voters dying of dehydration while waiting in the 8-day queues at polling stations, that would have no impact on their right to vote.
And as I noted in my March post, which I really hope you read, there’s not a single thing—not one!—being proposed by Republicans that isn’t already law in at least a few Democratically-controlled states.
What is the second reason?
The spin doctors in the White House seem to think that right now there is a window into American politics where there is room for the sensational filibuster proposal.
The anniversary of the storming of Congress created renewed focus on the threats to American democracy.
No it didn’t.
It created an opportunity for Biden’s lying minions in Congress and the media to gin up more division in the hopes it would help the leftist project of establishing a one-party state in America.
In his gloomy speech on January 6, Joe Biden warned that his predecessor, Donald Trump, and his allies are trying to undermine and take control of American election actions. The president spoke of “a democracy in danger.”
Thursday’s speech in Atlanta was similar to the second act:
“This is one of the defining moments in the history of the United States,” the president said.
“History will judge every single member of the Senate by where they stood before the votes and where they stood after the votes.”
Joe Biden apparently hopes he can present his filibuster plan in a way that leaves his fellow Democrats unable to do anything but back him up.
Translation: Joe Biden is using divisive and apocalyptic language for political purposes.
Joe Biden “the uniter.”
There’s no way of knowing how history is going to judge this moment, but it’s not going to have many kind things to say about the thundering, blustering, blundering, doddering Joe Biden—whose job approval is so low that if you remove the media, big tech, and academics, there’s hardly anyone left.
Can Biden’s plan succeed?
It looks difficult.
Because it doesn’t look like he has the votes necessary to change the filibuster.
Ironically, changing the filibuster rules only requires a simple majority. Joe Biden’s plan will therefore require the support of all 50 Democratic senators to support his plan, after which Vice President Kamala Harris, according to the rules, will break the tie.
But at least three Democrats—and probably more—are against his plan. They fear among other things that a slippery slope will be established in which the filibuster will completely disappear and the ideal of cross-party cooperation will cease.
There are hardly any Republicans who will back him up.
Go figure: Republicans aren’t on board with lyin’ Biden’s hail Mary effort to render them impotent.
Danielsen then anticipates the obvious question (“why is Joe Biden barking and slamming the podium to try and get something he knows he won’t get?”):
Why this speech if the battle may have already been lost?
Because the White House probably thinks that the fight itself is very worthwhile.
Opinion polls have shown that many blacks and minority voters who voted for Biden last year are disappointed with his first year as president.
Their dissatisfaction is partly due to the fact that they think Joe Biden has done too little to stop the Republican tightening of the election laws, writes the Washington Post.
A major coalition of political activists in Georgia chose to stay away from his speech in Atlanta because they were disappointed that election reforms had not yet been introduced.
Joe Biden needs to show voters that he takes their right to vote deeply seriously. He needs to show the black activists that they can count on him.
If the president’s reforms crash and burn, it must not look like they fell without a fight.
First of all, opinion polls show that pretty much everyone is disappointed with Biden’s first year as president. He’s probably the biggest disappointment since Sea Monkeys:
For just one of your hard-earned bucks you were promised a bowlful of mermaids and mermen and merkids with their own castle… and all you got was a bunch of lousy brine shrimp.
Which is still less disappointing than being promised decency, civility, and unity from a guy who ends up being the most divisive, racialist, dishonest, and intellectually handicapped president in the history of the republic.
Danielsen is still under the impression that the Washington Post is a reliable outlet. And he’s apparently credulous enough to believe that “a major coalition of political activists” boycotted the Atlanta speech because they were disappointed that Biden’s “voting reforms” hadn’t already been passed.
Those activists don’t care about voting reforms: they care about power, and they’re irritated by Joe Biden’s inability to establish the one-party state they demand. Plus they probably don’t want to be seen in the same room as him.
That last excerpt was the end of the article, so let’s examine Danielsen’s closing remarks: “Joe Biden needs to show voters that he takes their right to vote deeply seriously. He needs to show the black activists that they can count on him. If the president’s reforms crash and burn, it must not look like they fell without a fight.“
No.
Joe Biden is trying to convince voters he’s fighting for their “voting rights” rather than merely trying to cement the Democrat’s hold on power. He’s trying to convince black activists that if they don’t support him, and his hunger for power, then, in his own words, “they ain’t black” and anyway Republicans are (also in his own words) “gonna put y’all back chains.”
Because that’s how Mr. Uniter McUnity rolls.
His intended “reforms” are doomed to crash and burn: whether or not they fall without a fight is irrelevant. All Biden is doing is trying to frame himself and his minions as the great defenders of the very democracy they’re assaulting.
One more thing: the CNN article I referred to earlier references a part of Biden’s speech that Danielsen (wisely) neglected.
He said the narrow majority Democrats hold in the US Senate made achieving anything more difficult but that this moment, like other consequential moments in history, provides a binary choice: Lawmakers are faced with either standing on the side of civil rights leaders like King or on the side of segregationists like former Alabama Gov. George Wallace.
“Do you want to be the side of Dr. King or George Wallace? Do you want to be the side of John Lewis or Bull Connor? Do you want to be the side of Abraham Lincoln or Jefferson Davis?” Biden asked. “This is the moment to decide, to defend our elections, to defend our democracy. If you do that you will not be alone.”
How stupid is Joe Biden?
Dr. King was a Republican; George Wallace a Democrat. Bull Connor was a Democrat. Abraham Lincoln was a Republican. Jefferson Davis was a Democrat.
So yeah, by all means: what side do you want to be on?
Featured image: screencap of Berlingske’s featured image, credited to Megan Varner / AFP / Ritzau Scanpix.