There’s a user over on fark.com who tells a story about encountering Matt Gaetz sometime in the past. The story involves the phrase, “so I gas pedaled him right in the dick.” I will not swear to the veracity of the story, and I do not, on the whole, condone physical violence. It makes me giggle every time I read it, though, because it is basically a story of a self-important douchebag getting some comeuppance.
If you are interested, it’s in this thread. You’ll have to search the page for the words, “gas,” and, “pedaled,” or for the user name His Mexcellency.
I’m wondering if this was actually the case, that they wanted to get a response out of the Dems so they could argue … with b-roll footage of them being led out in handcuffs always rolling in the background … “unfair process, illegitimate investigations, etc”.
I think the facts that:
Only 23 bothered to do this (over 170 House Republicans had other things to do, like nail appointments and shit)
The idiots forgot to remove their smart phones, and then started lying about what they were doing even while they were doing it. Tweets from staff, indeed! (This is my favorite, and I’m assuming the transmission medium was telepathy: https://twitter.com/RepAndyBiggsAZ/status/1187041850286379009?s=20 )
Pretty much put the kibosh into the whole thing. The group started to realize that they weren’t going to get arrested, then some idiot ordered pizzas making this appear even more of a joke (Jeff Spicoli, anyone?), and about 4-odd hours after it began, it petered out under the sheer weight of embarrassment, boredom, and “shit, I’ve got things to do, guys”.
I understand where you are coming from. They did make themselves look like idiots, but chiefly only to people who already thought they were idiots. Schiff did take the high road in ignoring their illegal conniption fit, but they’re crowing about how “Schiff fled the room” and the FOX crowd is eating that up. Sane people see their stunt for what it was, an impotent flailing tantrum because things are going from bad to worse with the inquiry and they have no real defense, but their base is cheering their bold push for transparency (as if that’s what they really want!). Heck, even FOX News reported:
I understand all of that.
But just letting it slide, by being the parent who lets the kid kick and scream while ignoring them to prove that the tantrum won’t work, sometimes just results in a child with no boundaries and no manners. I know that I’m the one impotently flailing now, seething…how can we let them get away with this?! THIS is not how adults, especially Congresspeople, behave. If there are no consequences, it will just happen again next week when the inquiry resumes, and maybe more people will join since they weren’t stopped, or challenged, or punished.
I don’t know, but when my 4yo had a tantrum at the mall, I just walked away. She looked up, saw my back 25 feet away, got up, ran in front of me, then flopped down again!
So, I turned around, further ignoring her, and she got up and sullenly followed me.
Sometimes, the best thing to do is allow the tantrum-throwers to look like the fools they are. Escalating this in any way would’ve given them legitimacy to act further - now they’re revising their stories, claiming they didn’t do what they were doing, and it’s all a big fuckin’ mess for the GOP except, as you say, those who will go down with the ship… and what do we care about converting them, anyway?
They have the persecution complex, they have the victim mentality, now they just need to become martyrs for their cause.
Nothing would make them happier than to be able to play that video of them being handcuffed and led out of the “secret meetings”.
How proud are protestors when they get arrested? Same thing, really, just that they are protesting against the process of law and order.
And the benefit of Fox being a wholly owned asset of the far right is that the democrats are automatically wrong.
If they had arrested them, they’d be resisting the jackbooted thugs, if they had gone to another room, they’d be fleeing transparency.
No snark here, do you actually have an idea of what they should have done?
I almost say, go ahead and let the hearings go public, at the republican’s insistence, and let any threats to national security be entirely owned by them. (other than, of course, I don’t like inviting threats to national security.)
It’s a bit different when the toddler has a PR firm that says he can do no wrong, and you can be voted out as parent.
I think if Republicans want to delay the impeachment inquiry, the Democrats should let them. Draw out the inquiry and have the House impeachment vote in October 2020, and see how they like that.
I’m still struck by the fact that the Republican theory of the case is that there was a vast deep state conspiracy to swing the election to Hillary Clinton by spying on the Trump campaign and coordinating efforts to hurt Trump’s election, yet it somehow forgot to actually spring the trap before the election.
Perhaps the room needs better security at the door. You don’t get in unless your name is on the list. Put some beefy Marine bouncers at the door and cops ready to cuff and stuff any miscreants.
It seems these congresscritters have made it their purpose in life to stand up for this orange crook. Why?
I’m not so much concerned with national security as the personal security of witnesses and others called to testify. The Trumpists are keen to learn their identities so they can harass, intimidate, threaten, dox, “expose”, dig up dirt, create dirt, and otherwise to whatever they can to discredit and/or silence those opposed to Trump.
Yes, Trump DOES have a right to confront the witnesses and evidence against him… in a TRIAL… which will take place AFTER he is impeached and is sitting before the Senate. I’d say someone needs to explain that to him, but he wouldn’t listen anyway.
Buried in a CNN article last night I this little gem…
The same day they were arrested at Dulles, AG Barr was meeting with the SDNY. That same evening, Barr met with Rupert Murdoch. I wonder what they had to discuss?
It is also reported that the SDNY was monitoring twelve different cell phones. What are the odds Rudy or Sean were caught in a conversation?
I was thinking of having them calmly escorted from the room by security, as they would do with anyone who was in a secure area they had no business being in, but I also realize as, k9befriender also said, according to their perspective
I’m just fuming at their unchallenged audacity. At least, at least, they should be facing sanctions from the House.
This right here. Very incompetent deep state if you ask me! Yet they ignore what Comey did to Hillary and the deep state that was so against trump let Comey do it.
I happened to be watching CNN when that was announced. My friend and I both laughed out loud at it. It probably won’t amount to anything, but it’s such a lovely little grace note. One can’t but help admire the symmetry of Hannity being involved.
Instead the Ds behaved like the adults in the room that they are right now, ignoring the toddlers tantruming to try to get their way … and if not that then at least some attention.
