Tag Archives: Kevin McCarthy

Democrats Hate Being Held to Their Own Standards: Committee Assignments Edition, by Guy Benson

Is anybody going to feel sorry for a worm like Adam Schiff because he lost his prized Intelligence Committee assignment? He had it coming. From Guy Benson at townhall.com:

AP Photo/Amanda Andrade-Rhoades
Back in 2016, with a presidential election underway, I made the case that Senate Republicans should force Democrats to live under their own power-hungry rules.  They should do so, I said, by applying the Joe Biden and Chuck Schumer standards to the newly-created Supreme Court vacancy, following the death of the late great Justice Antonin Scalia.  Then-Majority Leader Mitch McConnell did precisely that, holding the seat open until after the election, paving the way for President Trump’s trio of superb SCOTUS nominations.  The Democrats got red in the face and stomped their feet, but after decades of hyper-partisan, unilateral escalations in the judicial confirmation wars, they were merely getting a taste of their own medicine.

When Democrats attempted to filibuster Neil Gorsuch’s nomination to fill that seat, I urged Republicans to enact the Harry Reid standard and change the Senate rules to confirm Gorsuch.  They did so, thus fulfilling McConnell’s famous prophesy that his colleagues across the aisle would come to rue the day they’d nuked the filibuster on executive and judicial nominations, for short-term partisan gain (eliminating a tool of the minority they’d abused for years while it benefited them).  In Washington, no one squeals louder than a Democrat held to his or her own standards.  A few Democrats mumbled about ‘regrets’ after their GOP colleagues pressed the Reid Rule button, but nearly all Senate Democrats now favor doubling down even further by jettisoning the legislative filibuster, which they’ve called a racist vestige, even as they’ve repeatedly used it themselves.  Expect some of them to change their tune if and when they lose the Senate majority in 2024.  They never fully learn, which is why the teachable moments need to be clear and painful for them.

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“Chinese Aggression” Sure Looks An Awful Lot Like US Aggression, by Caitlin Johnstone

So much for Kevin McCarthy. He’s just as stupid as Nancy Pelosi, reprising her “poke China” trip to Taiwan. From Caitlin Johnstone at caitlinjohnstone.com:

Punchbowl News reports that House Speaker Kevin McCarthy is planning a trip to Taiwan, which will be yet another incendiary provocation against Beijing if it occurs. The previous House Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, sparked a significant escalation in hostilities with her visit last year, the consequences of which are still reverberating today.

Antiwar’s Dave DeCamp explains:

Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan was viewed in Beijing as a major provocation, and it sparked the largest-ever Chinese military drills around the island. The exercises included China firing missiles over Taiwan and simulating a blockade of the island, both unprecedented actions.

China has kept up the military pressure on Taiwan since Pelosi’s visit, and its warplanes regularly now cross the median line, an informal barrier that divides the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. Before Pelosi’s trip, China barely crossed the line. Now, it’s an almost-daily occurrence.

Beijing views the US House speaker visiting Taiwan as an affront to the one-China policy and the understanding the US and China reached in 1979, when Washington severed formal relations with Taipei.

US-led provocations and escalations against China are becoming a regular occurrence, both from the US itself and from its imperial assets like Australia and Taiwan. Yet according to the western political/media class, the urgent threat of our day is “Chinese aggression”.

After the House of Representatives voted to approve the new Select Committee on China — a Republican initiative designed to increase internal pressure in the US government to ramp up the new cold war — the committee’s chairman Mike Gallagher put out a statement saying that it is “time to push back against the Chinese Communist Party’s aggression in bipartisan fashion.”

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