I did some comparisons on different aspects of how America is doing right now compared to how it was doing at this time four years ago.

I put the links to the sources of information here so you can check for yourself.

1) Unemployment, the Deficit and the Debt

So in the past nearly year and seven months of Democrats holding the House and the Senate, we’ve gotten:

- The American Rescue Plan
- The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act
- Bipartisan Safer Communities Act of 2022
- The PACT Act
- Chips Bill
- Inflation Reduction Act

All this productivity in terms of important legislation, half of it bipartisan, leads me to a question I’ve never gotten an answer to:

What would the Republicans do I’d they were in control of Congress? Specifically?

Don’t give me meaningless phrases like “stop wokeness.” What specifically would they do?

Ask them. They can’t tell you.

What are their official policies? They don’t have any. They no longer have a party platform.

They’ve had a long time now to complain about everything that the Democrats do and think about what they would do if they take over Congress.

But they haven’t used it. They have nothing. No ideas. No policies. No plans.

Except …

Kevin McCarthy promises that if the GOP takes the House, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar, who both spoke at white supremacist conferences this year, will not only get their committee assignments back but will get better ones. He promised.

@MikeSington She is not a victim here.

When you’re trying to break down the last down between a violent mob you’re at the front of and a large number of sheltering elected leaders, when an officer protecting the VIPs points a gun at you, that’s the international sign for “stop!”

* the last door

If you listen to the pundits, you’d think that the @HouseGOP did very well during the 2020 elections.

That’s not quite true.

Here’s what actually happened.

The only state in the country where the GOP had a net gain in House seats since Trump took office in 2017 is Minnesota. The party gained one seat there in 2020.

In the following states, the GOP gained seats in 2020 - but - only gained the same number of seats that it lost in 2018:

Florida
(Lost 2 seats in 2018, gained 2 seats in 2020)

Iowa
(Lost 2 seats in 2018, gained 2 seats in 2020)

New Mexico
(Lost 1 seat in 2018, gained 1 seat in 2020)

Oklahoma
(Lost 1 seat in 2018, gained 1 seat in 2020)

South Carolina
(Lost 1 seat in 2018, gained 1 seat in 2020)

In the following states, the GOP gained some seats in 2020 - but - not as many seats as the number of seats it lost in 2018, leaving a net loss of seats in the Trump era:

California
(Lost 7 seats in 2018, gained back 3 of them in 2020. GOP now holds 11 of CA’s 53 House seats)

@MikeSington Looking at the tape:
https://t.co/c8rNEc0iSq

0:05 - Members of Congress evacuating from the mob
0:18 - First member of mob shatters the glass in the door separating the mob from the fleeing Members of Congress.
0:34 - Mob begins chanting "BREAK IT DOWN!"

1:36 - Officers guarding the door move out of the way, presumably to clear the way for the armed officers who are the last line of defense behind the door.
1:43 - Mob begins more aggressively attacking the damaged glass on the door (BTW, they need some better glass!)

1:58 - Member of mob shouts and continues shouting "THERE'S A GUN!" The gun is clearly visible at this point in the frame. Anyone near the door looking inside would have seen a gun pointed in their direction.

2:11 - 13 seconds after the mob started shouting "THERE'S A GUN!", referring to the gun pointed at them, Ms. Babbitt climbs up through the damaged glass of the right side door.

2:15 - Ms. Babbitt is shot.

Multiple members of the mob were shouting "THERE'S A GUN!" They obviously knew that there were armed officers, weapons drawn, on the other side of the door they were in the process of breaking down, behind which Members of Congress were sheltering in fear.

The Democrats are at least two parties. The progressive wing of the party (which is by no means unified) and the finance wing of the party, which is also the party leadership.

1/

During the leadership race, the progressive wing was represented by @SenSanders and @SenWarren; the former wants to minimize the role of markets in our lives, the latter wants to redeem markets by regulating them. It's a distinction with a difference, but I donated to both.

2/

Both wings of the party have prominent representatives in Congress; Sandersism are most visibly associated with @AOC (whom I donated to) and Warrenism is embodied by @RepKatiePorter (likewise), who was also one of Warren's law school proteges.

3/

Porter is a force of nature. She is infamous - and celebrated - for her brutal, no-holds-barred questioning of both corporate and administration witnesses, using a white-board to pin them down and eviscerating any attempts at bullshittery.

4/

This isn't just about getting facts into the record (though, she is SO GOOD at getting facts into the record!), it's also about effecting change, like when she single-handedly cornered the CDC's chief into guaranteeing universal, free covid

They’re shooting into the chamber.

1. Short thread - on the various claims we're seeing from Republican politicians over the last few days that the Democratic push for accountability is "divisive." Damn right it's divisive - that is what it has to be.

2. It is intended to enforce a clear division between those who accept and are committed to democracy and those who are willing to turn to violence when the vote doesn't turn out the way that they want it to.

3. One of the basic implications of Adam Przeworski's theoretic work is that democracy is made out of mutually reinforcing expectations, and those expectations are fragile. If some actors think they would be better off defecting from the democratic bargain, they will.

4. In other words: democracy and armed factionalism are far closer than we think, or we would like them to be. This means that it is incredibly important to police the boundaries between them. Allowing some to turn to violence can lead to expectation collapse and cascading ruin.

5. When we allow the divisions to become blurred, that means that we are running the perpetual risk of things getting fucked up. If a major faction turns to violence, and no-one responds, things can get really fucked up really, really fast.

Several Hindutva supporters, BJP members, Far RW propaganda websites and a few prominent handles (Journalists, Singers etc) were supporting this hate monger Mahant Yati Narasimhanand Saraswati. Let me share a few things he said about, The Missile Man of India, Dr. Abdul Kalam. 👇

This hate Monger claims, Dr. Abdul Kalam had a huge role in making Atom bomb for Pakistan.

He claims, The person who you (Hindus) chose as your role model, He (Dr, Abdul Kalam) was one of the biggest Jihadi India has ever produced. One of the biggest...

He further vomits, 'When Abdul Kalam visited USA, He was stripped naked. When Dr. Manmohan & Sonia G Objected, USA sent 124 files & said, He might be a Scientist to U, but according to our files, He is a terrorist, guardian of Pakistan & Father of Pakistan's Atom bomb'

He says, 'Anyone can recite a few slokhs of Gita & fool u.. Not once did Abdul Kalam miss Namaz. Yes, He was a vegetarian, But if he hadn't been a Vegitarian, How would've he got a Padam bhushan or Bharat Ratna. How would have he fooled you & made a Atom bomb for Pakistan..."

[thread]

I am going to do a thread on several numbers

1

2,996

4,494

43,730

106,158

Now

We go back into the dim and distant past in British politics

We go back over 2 decades

A lesson from the past

Now I am going to focus on the words of two politicians

Two politicians who have held high offices in this land

And I am going to agree with their words

So those with a long memory

May have already figured out perhaps what I am going to do based on the first two numbers

And you'd be right

So let me get going on the journey

In my first post

I deliberately anonymised those numbers

Let me now give them context

1 Princess Diana or Margaret

2,996 9/11

The final 3 are UK coronavirus death tolls:

4,494 (5th April 2020)

43,730 (30th June 2020)

106,158 (1st February 2021)