The Age of Stupid ✡️🌻✡️🌻✡️🌻

The Stupid Season:  Congress is facing a lot of deadlines but really who cares about funding the government, dealing with border security, providing aid to allies or reauthorizing the FAA, there are more important, and by important think politically craven, things to do.  So, to counter George Santos’ ejection from the House, Republicans, with the help of a handful of Democrats, censured Westchester/Bronx Congressman Jamaal Bowman on Thursday.  Bowman is the clueless Democrat who “accidently” triggered a fire alarm while rushing to vote on Septembers government funding bill.  Though he still insists that he didn’t realize what he was doing, an excuse that few believe, he has pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge related to the incident. While being censured doesn’t affect Bowman’s tenure, it does give Westchester County Executive George Latimer, who announced this week that he’ll be primarying fellow Democrat Bowman, another thing to talk about during the upcoming campaign. Bowman is the most vulnerable member of the “Squad” due to his pro-Palestinian stance, so Latimer’s plans aren’t surprising.  Unlike Bowman former Speaker Kevin McCarthy won’t be in the House come January.  On Wednesday, Trump’s one time “My Kev” announced that he’s resigning, stepping down at the end of the month.  Count McCarthy as just another Trump era victim who should have known better.  He groveled and bowed so low to the Orange One that he ultimately ended up face down in the mud and now doesn’t have the stomach to stick around to watch Trump’s newest favorite, Speaker for the moment Mike Johnson, in his former office.  As to Speaker Johnson, his days in his job could be numbered. Though he’s got Trump’s support, he doesn’t have McCarthy’s fundraising prowess and more significantly, his already slim majority keeps shrinking.  Unlike Senators, Governors don’t get to appoint interim Representatives so while McCarthy’s Bakersfield, California seat will likely stay in very MAGA hands it will remain vacant, probably until March.  Santos’ seat which will likely flip into Democratic hands will remain vacant until February. It’s not just McCarthy and Santos, another Republican seat, the one held by Ohio’s Bill Johnson, will open up early next year once he assumes the presidency of Youngstown State University. Then there’s the reality that House members, like everyone else, don’t live forever.  If any Republicans fall of roofs, as one did last year, Johnson could end up having to hand over his office keys to Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries even before 2025.  That may be unlikely but it’s not out of the realm of possibility and given the unruly nature of his caucus. Johnson who attributes his rise to the speakership to the power of prayer, may find himself wishing he hadn’t prayed so hard.  Unfortunately, in the meantime, Johnson will continue with the stupid.  He’s keyed up that much promised vote to initiate impeachment proceedings against Joe Biden for next week and it’s highly likely that even the so-called Republican swing district “normies,” who really aren’t all that normal, will vote with him because though he’s not the best fundraiser, he’s the only one they’ve got. The stupid is so bad that interim Speaker Patrick McHenry, the more competent than most North Carolina Congressman who chairs the House Financial Services Committee, is fed up and has announced his plans to retire at the end of the term.     

Weirdly Stupid: Last night Special Counsel David Weiss, the Republican holdover tasked with torturing Hunter Biden, filed nine additional charges against him all related to his failure to pay his taxes.  Hunter, hardly an altar boy, has since paid those taxes so those charges are unusual and probably wouldn’t be leveled against him if his last name wasn’t Biden, but then again, he wouldn’t have had the opportunity to make all that money if his last name wasn’t Biden so there’s that.  It’s hard to know what’s really happening here, whether this is political gamesmanship or just a hard-nosed prosecutor squeezing a defendant but whatever, it’s ugly for all and not particularly helpful for Joe who said he learned about the indictments the same way the rest of us did.  Anyway, who’s to say that squeezing doesn’t work.  It appears to be helping turn Kenneth Chesebro.  This morning CNN reported that Chesebro one of the main architects of the fake elector scheme, is now cooperating with prosecutors in four states, including Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona and maybe Nevada, in an effort to avoid additional criminal charges.  

Truly Stupid:  If you’re like me, you missed the fourth and final official RNC sanctioned debate but in case you also missed the overviews here’s a short one.  Ramaswamy went all in on the stolen election conspiracy because he’s really angling for a spot in Trump’s next administration or a lucrative podcasting gig. Chris Christie who was the only candidate to lambast Trump, called Ramaswamy out for being the most obnoxious blowhard in America.  Christie also defended Nikki Haley, saying that though he disagreed with her on some things, blowhard Ramaswamy’s assertion that she was stupid was stupid. Ron DeSantis wasn’t awful but didn’t make up any ground and while Nikki Haley wasn’t great, she wasn’t bad and likely improved her standing. Did the debate matter, probably not because Trump is so far ahead of the crowd that absent a ladder catastrophe or worse, he will be the Republican nominee.  And because we all need to gag a bit in the morning, the NY Post reports that Melania wants her Donald to select Tucker Carlson as his running mate but in the event that the Donald is concerned that Carlson will outshine him, Senator JD Vance, Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Governor Kristi Noem, Florida Representative Byron Donalds or Margie Q will also suffice.  Though the Orange one wouldn’t pick her for anything, the president of his alma mater may have some free time soon.  Fresh off that dismal House testimony where she couldn’t come out and say that calling for genocide against Jews was unacceptable, University of Pennsylvania President Liz McGill is going through some things. She issued a statement clarifying her testimony, but it looked more like a hostage video.  She’s still got her job but may not have it much longer.      

Happy Hanukkah

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 #BringThemAllHomeSoon

WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich too!