131 Comments

Bernie Sanders, HANDS DOWN.

Expand full comment

Amen, Qasim. We have been sold out by the majority of Dems we worked so hard to elect. We need Bernie and AOC plus more young leadership (and I say that as someone on Social Security—for now, anyway).

Expand full comment

That was exactly right. I'm ready for a change!!!

Expand full comment

Spot-on. Democrats need to be more like Bernie and less like Schumer/Durkin/Klobuchar

Expand full comment

You are correct. The Dems are losing voters right and left. I mean, all over the place. As an executive board member of my local Dem Club, I'm reluctant to leave. The president of the club married my husband and me. What a choice! But with Pelosi supporting an anti-abortion Democrat against a more left-wing one (Jessica Cisneros) in Texas, and going to Taiwan with a cadre of destroyers, I'm nearly ready to leave.

But there is not one choice, there are many choices of lesser parties to belong to. Which one? If they could coalesce into a single party that would work. Otherwise the Repubs will keep winning, as there's no true opposition party. I believe that this country is on such a downward spiral now that there might not even be a country left to have an election! If this were a cartoon you'd have to draw me with lots of droplets of sweat flying into the air, wide-eyed and wide-mouthed.

Expand full comment

Resign old man Schumer!!! You move a slow as a sloth, and you have no spine! Not to mention not having balls enough to stand up and do the right thing!!! I am not a Democrat anymore! I quit being a Democrat the moment the Democratic Party did not step in before this shit even started! Had they done the fucking jobs that our tax dollars pay for it? We wouldn’t be in this fucking hellscape!!!

Expand full comment

I have been calling and when I can get through I can’t leave a message. I emailed. I can’t agree with what you said more!! Everything is exactly how I feel. If Schumer is going to play dead then get the F out of the way so the rest of us can fight. I’m so frustrated I can’t even see straight. This is the ONE THING DEMS CAN DO and he’s not leading them to do it 🤬🤬🤬🤬

Expand full comment

Mr Rashid, I would really like to know your thoughts on Schumer's assertion that letting the govt shut down would give carte blanche to the Trump regime. I honestly don't know enough to know if this is a valid concern. Either way, I agree that Schumer's timing SUCKS and he needs to go. But I'm very curious about this situation.

From a times article "In a shutdown, Mr. Schumer said, “the Trump administration would have full authority to deem whole agencies, programs and personnel nonessential, furloughing staff with no promise that they would ever be rehired.”

He also warned that if the government closed, Mr. Trump and Republicans would have no incentive to reopen it, since they could selectively fund “their favorite departments and agencies, while leaving other vital services that they don’t like to languish.”

Expand full comment

I address this point in the article briefly.

"By voting with Republicans, he is handing Trump and Musk a budget bill with no limit on where and how they can spend funds. On what planet is giving trillions of dollars to two unaccountable billionaires a good idea? It is absolute lunacy."

Trump is *already* destroying federal government agencies and will continue no matter what. But to give him trillions more funding and more time is simply nonsensical. Schumer also seems to have no faith in the American people, as if we would sit around twiddling our thumbs and not putting pressure on Trump to act. To instead give him trillions of dollars to do as he wishes makes zero sense.

Expand full comment

Thank you! Sorry, I need to work on my reading comprehension. I really do appreciate you.

Expand full comment

Did not Ted Cruz just say "everything is for sale" (he was referencing Greenland)?

So how much did it cost to buy's Chuckie's endorsement? Asking for a friend.

Expand full comment

I called Schumer's office this morning and got voicemail. He really is a coward. I left a message telling him to resign.

Expand full comment

Agreed, and good.

Expand full comment
12hEdited

Giving the evil-doers a shutdown, I have learned, will offer the opportunity for them to invoke on day 31 of shutdown, ROF—reduction of (work)force which means they may permanently fire any furloughed by the shutdown federal worker. There is no right answer here so the option I think is for the Dems to go with the optics—do what they can to make the R's look bad and own the bad outcomes.

Expand full comment

OTOH, a yes on the CR is a yes to destroying DC's funding for a host of local services like schools, police.

Expand full comment

When is the vote?

I called a bunch of the above senators this morning, emailed my senstors, & published on Medium an essay version of the letter I sent my senators.

Expand full comment

The Democrats are facing a situation where they’re handing Republicans a lifeline whichever way they vote. If they vote for the bill, you’re howling for their heads, and if they vote against it, the government shuts down and all restraints on Trump and his gang of thugs disappear. What they would do when they have free rein is unimaginably destructive, so it seems to me that avoiding that at all costs is a good argument. If you dump the Democrats, what’s your backup plan? I’d say we’re screwed either way, and Schumer chose the least awful one.

Expand full comment

On a different note, way more snarky: If each of us writes even a single postcard to the president, and we put them all in the mail on the same day, March 15th, well - you do the math. No alternative fact or Russian translation will explain away our record-breaking, officially-verifiable, warehouse-filling flood of fury. Hank Aaron currently holds the record for fan mail, having received 900,000 pieces in a year. We’re setting a new record - over a million pieces in a day, with not a single nice thing to say #TheIdesOfTrump

Write one postcard. Take a picture and post it on social media tagged with #TheIdesOfTrump! March 15th, mail your messages to:

President (for now) Donald J. Trump

The White House, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW

Washington, DC 20500

Expand full comment

The Democrats can't fight fascism because they're beholden to the same oligarchs. Nothing's going to change until Citizens United is overturned. And notice no Democrat is rushing to do that

Expand full comment

No Democrat can overturn a SCOTUS decision. The both-sidesism is tired and harmful. Authoritarians love the disempowerment and apathy it offers.

Expand full comment