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RachelWatch: Doubling Your Boehner Won’t Double Your Fun

Today: Representatives Anthony Weiner and Jan Schakowsky. And Chomper the dog. No, really.

Every now and then, I resolve to be more of a grownup. And then Rachel and the gang come up with segment titles like:

Boehner vs. Boehner

We got to the giggle-and-nightmare-inducing segment title because Congressman John Boehner (R — Ohio) is continuing to be a complete tool.

He’s claiming that President Obama’s plan to reconcile the House and Senate health care reform bills is too short. Which is odd, because before he was complaining that the health care reform bill is too long.

It must be a trial serving him porridge.

As Rachel pointed out, Boehner seems to be wrestling with himself. So much back-and-forth! How long until he’s spent?

Rachel Continues To Take the High Road

Rachel reported that Dick Cheney had a mild heart attack — his fifth — on Monday and is recovering well. She acknowledged that the two were politically at odds, to say the least, but also pointed that Cheney is a husband and father and sincerely wished him a speedy recovery.

Not even ten days ago, in this very column, I called Cheney a “villainous scum golem.” While I stand by that assessment of his character, I will join in Rachel’s good wishes for his health.

I don’t wish Cheney any physical pain, and I certainly don’t wish the anxiety of worrying about a loved one on anyone. I sincerely wish him a return to good health.

And then I wish him a fair and speedy trial for war crimes.

Hijacking Health Care

Congressman Bart Stupak (D — Michigan) is once again trying to use health care reform to drastically reduce — if not end — access to abortion services. As Melissa Harris-Lacewell pointed out Monday night, abortions are in fact a part of health care. Women’s health care counts as health care.

Which reminds me, I haven’t called Bart Stupak’s office to update him on my uterus in weeks. He must be worried sick. I’ll take care of that today.

I respect people who are against abortion on principle, but Stupak is not behaving in a principled manner about this. He is trying to make it impossible to get a legal service, and he is flat-out lying about what’s in the competing language. (Either that or he’s mind-bogglingly stupid. I am really getting tired of the stupid-or-liar dilemma.)

In marked contrast, Representative Jan Schakowsky (D — Illinois) dropped in with an armload of awesome. In addition to pledging not to vote for a bill with the Stupak language in it, Schakowsky is pushing to stop private military contractors from doing sensitive work that our military used to do.

Schakowsky’s point is that contractors like Blackwater/Xe have repeatedly put our troops in danger and have murdered people.

Why is there even an argument about this?

Kill Bill Volume 290

Get ready for the fastest — and yet the longest — Crawl of Shame in Rachel Maddow Show history. Rachel ran the crawl while explaining that the Senate is sitting on an astonishing 290 bills that the House has already passed because of threatened Republican filibusters. On all of them.

If these same Republicans start bellowing into microphones about what the Founding Fathers really wanted again, I hope the ghost of Thomas Jefferson will appear and give them atomic wedgies.

Ms. Information

Senator Scott Brown (R — Massachusetts) voted for a job creation bill during an unemployment crisis. As a result, many of his until-that-moment supporters lost their minds so hard that they got angerspittle all over the internet.

I have taken some shots at Senator Brown in the past and look forward to doing so again in the future, but right now I applaud him for breaking ranks and doing the thing that will actually help people. He surprised me.

But as Rachel noted, Brown isn’t what he seemed on the campaign trail in lots of ways. In addition to being, according to his newly former supporters, a Secret Commie for wanting to help people find employment, he’s also a Secret Rich Guy who bought his Joe six-pack truck to help haul around his daughter’s horse.

So many Browns! Think of the different conversations they could have with all the versions of Boehner!

Moment of Geek

Rachel claimed that the TRMS staff did some intense arguing over this Moment of Geek. Sources close to the show have confirmed multiple hair-pullings, six axe fights, and one full-on interoffice brawl. My congratulations to the survivors.

The high feelings are understandable, though. This is a scientific debate that blows unification theory right out of the water: Why do some dogs howl when they hear the Law & Order theme?

Rachel welcomed canine behavioral expert Robert Brandau and Chomper, a Labrador who is even more versed in canine behavior. They had hardly any axe fights.

Sour Grapeski

Rachel, always a stickler for manners, was ticked off at figure skating silver medalist Yevgeny Plushenko, who is perhaps not a pillar of humble sportsmanship. He at first jumped up into the gold position at the medal ceremony, and his website now lists him as receiving a “platinum medal.”

It’s possible that we can put this down to cultural sense-of-humor differences. Or maybe he’s just kind of a box.

Rachel seemed more offended by Russian Prime Minister and National Studmuffin Vladimir Putin’s congratulatory telegram that implied that Plushenko deserved the gold.

I’m having trouble getting that worked up about it.

I like to believe that somewhere in Russia there’s a brilliant, gutsy pundit doing a story about how Americans still won’t shut their blintz holes about the Miracle on Ice.

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