Democrats Behaving Badly

Bad (Blue) Dog! Bad (Blue) Dog!

March 5, 2021

Andrew Cuomo is making Al Franken look like Mike Pence (sorry Al, but you know what I mean). Franken was pilloried for less offensive behavior than what Cuomo is being accused of, and Franken's "offenses" took place long before he was in office. Also, dozens and dozens of female co-workers vouched for Franken; I have yet to hear anyone stand up for Cuomo. To make matters worse, the junior senator from Cuomo's home state, Kirsten Gilibrand, who was instrumental in causing Franken's political demise has yet to offer up a peep against Cuomo. This makes me more pleased than ever that Gilibrand was blamed and shamed for her role in giving Franken the bum's rush without any investigation, let alone any kind of hearing.

Cuomo: “I never touched anyone inappropriately.”

She is not looking longingly into his eyes.

If there was ever a time when Democrats should act more like Ratpublicans and let one of their own get away with something, it would have been with Al Franken, but not Andrew Cuomo. This is true, even without getting into Cuomo’s fudging the numbers of nursing home deaths to make it look like he was doing a heck of a job with the coronavirus in New York State. He was not, even though he was on TV every day saying he was.

Shitty Joe Manchin

West Virginia’s “Democratic” Senator Joe Manchin is suddenly feeling a need to be…well, act principled. Manchin voted to confirm 20 nominees of the previous administration, who had histories of behavior much more egregious than Neera Tanden, whose nomination to Biden’s cabinet Manchin has single-handedly canceled. He said he didn’t like the combative tone of some of Tanden’s tweets. Really? Did Tanden talk about grabbing anyone by the balls? Has Manchin been unconscious for the past five years? Don’t bother answering that.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pointed out that Manchin had no problem voting to confirm fellow white male Jeff Sessions as Turmp’s attorney general despite his history of, shall we say, racial insensitivity. Surely it is a coincidence that Manchin, senator from the third whitest state in the Union – at 93% – has been fine with snarky, sexist, racist white guys, but gets his knickers in a twist over an Asian American woman who dared say things out loud that many people are thinking. Did I mention Tanden went after people on both sides of the aisle? Nonetheless, her nomination was ultimately withdrawn. Manchin will continue to serve as senator, and jeopardize all manner of progressive legislation for years to come.

Manchin is also currently working to kill the possibility of passing $15 federal minimum wage, though he had no objection to handing over huge and wholly unnecessary and undeserving sums of money to America’s richest assholes, the vast majority of whom are white males, in the form of tax cuts. The senator is also fighting against allowing too many people to get more rescue funds and increased unemployment benefits during this current pandemic crisis. This is bound to effect many of his constituents in West Virginia where the minimum wage is $8.75. Not that there’s anything right with that.

It’s my money, I’m saving it for rich, white guys, and you can’t have any.

Manchin has also expressed unyielding refusal to end the racist, Jim Crow-sustaining filibuster. Naturally, besides being affected disproportionately health-wise, black business owners are suffering dire consequences of the pandemic/recession. As you might expect, there are disparities between American white owned businesses people and those owned by all minority groups. The largest disparities are typically with Black entrepreneurs and could put a generation of Black entrepreneurs out of business. I am not saying the Joe Manchin is a racist. Nor am I saying he is not.

Of The Rich/White People, By The Rich/White People, For The Rich/White People

Never to be outdone when it comes to behaving badly, Ratpublicans are planning to do everything possible to gum up the works in passing Joe Biden’s COVID-19 rescue package. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WTF) is invoking a rarely-used ploy, insisting that the entire 628-page bill be read aloud to the Senate (likely because he is unable to read it himself) before the 20-hour make-believe debate on the Senate floor, before the actual vote can take place. Apparently, it’s not enough that these rich, white motherfuckers do not want regular folks to receive a pittance of the money they pay in taxes, most of which goes either to building useless military equipment or gets hijacked to support rich white motherfuckers, in order to meet the bare minimum of survival.

Ron Johnson, wasting valuable oxygen

For the record, Ron “Bet He’s Dumber Than He Looks And Sounds” Johnson is worth more than $10,000,000 and Joe Manchin-of-the-people is worth upwards of $7,000,000. More than everyone I know put together. Probably more than the collective wealth of half the people in West Virginia – the state Manchin claims to represent. But, God forbid single moms should be paid a living wage. (Fun fact: $15/hour was a good idea 20 years ago; now, not so much.) Manchin is not the richest senator, probably not by a longshot, but he is rich enough to STFU when it comes to rescuing desperate, struggling American families with a little bit of cash that will, by the way, help to stimulate the national economy. Oh, and will keep millions of children from starving to death. To be fair, it was after all rich, white, male assholes who founded this nation, mostly for their own benefit. So I guess things are working pretty much as the framers intended.

I. Mangrey reporting.