Senator Manchin is on Morning Joe complaining that no one in congress works together aka “reaches across the aisle”. As a result he joined Mark Mckinnon’s “No Labels”, an imaginary caucus that has an imaginary constituency based on the idea that the real problem with Washington is that everyone whose job title is “politician” is wrapped up in “politics” that they can’t get anything passed.

What doesn’t get said is that Manchin is a member of congress who could you know, take two steps across the actual aisle and approach his colleagues under his own power as is his right and duty without proclaiming that he’s “West Virginia Democrat” who wants there to be “No Labels”.

Chris Christie has no national party.. It’s hard for beltway both-siders to admit, but Chris Christie or any Republican who can win executive statewide office in the North East in the post George W. Bush “you’re with us all the time or against us forever more” era will not be able to take hold. The “debt-ers” and the “my values are opposite black president’s values voters” are the national base of the party. They built it that way. They enabled those people and now they are stuck with these constituencies being the folks who dictate national aspirations. Sheriff Joe is their Sheriff. The Tea Baggers are the soul of their caucus. Grover Norquist their deacon.

You can’t be an AG or a Governor out here, have these cities, transportation systems, schools, hospitals and jails to run and then be against all those things being run by someone who was elected. The Republican plebiscites have shown they are firmly against all of that.

They really are faux outrage pimps. Pay us and we’ll get a bunch of other people walking around mad on your behalf.

Is there nothing that can be tried in court anymore?

Gordon’s musician family emigrated to Japan in the late 1920s and she saw first-hand how few rights women had — they were merely property. She helped make sure the all-important Article 14 made it into the final document. It stated, in terms that in 1946 were nothing short of revolutionary: “All of the people are equal under the law and there shall be no discrimination in political, economic or social relations because of race, creed, sex, social status or family origin.”

For generations, Gordon stayed out of the limelight. She feared that the conservative men running post-war Japan would exploit her youth and inexperience to revise the constitution. She joined the Asia Society in New York in the 1950s, where she had an illustrious career focusing on performing arts. Thankfully, Gordon began speaking out more in recent years, recounting her experiences in Tokyo during the U.S. occupation.

source: Japanese Women Should Honor Their Gloria Steinem – Bloomberg.

Not believing Blah people about Blah people
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Boehner put the knife in his own back. I hope he enjoys the maniacs he helped get into office.

Why you should donate or pay independent news orgs: Mother Jones US Mass shooting Database.

No Obama Administration nominee is safe, so 44 may as well just fight for the ones he wants.

Boehner holding up our economy so he can be re-elected speaker of the house (By Harry Reid via TPM).

Andrew Sullivan nominates Cory Booker for an Yglesias award.

The Yglesias Award is for writers, politicians, columnists or pundits who actually criticize their own side, make enemies among political allies, and generally risk something for the sake of saying what they believe.

The awar would be for this:

Cory Booker (May 21):

“This kind of stuff is nauseating to me on both sides. It’s nauseating to the American public. Enough is enough. Stop attacking private equity,” – Newark mayor Cory Booker(D), criticizing the anti-Bain ads launched by the Obama campaign against Romney. Booker kept up the pressure on Twitter.

source: 2012 Yglesias Award Nominees – The Dish | By Andrew Sullivan – The Daily Beast.

No objective analysis said that Obama was attacking private equity in general or that these attacks on Romney’s time at Bain were anything but a plus for the Obama Campaign.

Also, saying both sides do it isn’t saying what you believe. It’s trying to seem reasonable to villagers who run the traditional Sunday show panels where John McCain is and will always be bi-partisan Maverick in Chief of all reasonableness and defense. It’s a classic hedge from a politician prepping for higher office or leveraging more influence.

Kind of like Bloomberg vigorously and publicly endorsing Bush in 04 and Scott Brown in the MA election vs. Elizabeth Warren and then complaining that nothing was getting done about gun control and demanding action.

Kent Conrad self negotiates the fiscal cliff on Fox News:

There are good theoretical arguments that the fiscal cliff’s tax hikes gives Democrats the bulk of the leverage, but the White House has watched Senate Democrats fold on taxes again and again and again. They worry that if we go over the fiscal cliff, skittish Senate Democrats will quickly fold before some House-passed plan that raises taxes on income over $750,000, does nothing on stimulus, and sets up a debt-ceiling fight for early next year. The White House thinks it’ll be very difficult for them to veto anything Senate Democrats agree to, and so they would prefer to strike the deal themselves rather than getting into a situation where vulnerable Senate Democrats could strike a deal on their behalf.

Again Senate Democrats are negotiating against majority voter preference and the party platform. Who the hell spooks them like this?

Q: How Many people in Dick Armey’s Tea Bagger Militia?

A: 3

Richard K. Armey, the group’s chairman and a former House majority leader, walked into the group’s Capitol Hill offices with his wife, Susan, and an aide holstering a handgun at his waist. The aim was to seize control of the group and expel Armey’s enemies: The gun-wielding assistant escorted FreedomWorks’ top two employees off the premises, while Armey suspended several others who broke down in sobs at the news.

The coup lasted all of six days. By Sept. 10, Armey was gone — with a promise of $8 million — and the five ousted employees were back. The force behind their return was Richard J. Stephenson, a reclusive Illinois millionaire who has exerted increasing control over one of Washington’s most influential conservative grass-roots organizations.

Stephenson, the founder of the for-profit Cancer Treatment Centers of America and a director on the FreedomWorks board, agreed to commit $400,000 per year over 20 years in exchange for Armey’s agreement to leave the group.

Read More: FreedomWorks tea party group nearly falls apart in fight between old and new guard – The Washington Post.

Trouble in AstroTurf land.