46 thoughts on “The State of the Ship of State”

  1. Now there something gone wrong, we got red skies at dawn
    Can’t find the Captain and the lifeboat’s gone

    We’re going down with the ship
    We’re going down, down, down, down with the ship
    It’s all for one and one for all, yeah
    We’re going down with the ship

  2. Ellen, hey girl, this your sneaky backdoor way of getting to be POTUS?
    (psst psst… your BFF Donna’s not gonna like it, you getting all this attention.)

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2024/12/19/elon-musk-as-speaker-of-the-house-gop-congress-members-float-billionaire-amid-spending

    The world’s richest man Elon Musk’s growing influence in Washington that proved pivotal to killing a proposed government funding bill has catapulted him into the conversation for House speaker, at least among two outspoken Republican members of Congress, though earlier attempts to put an outsider in the role have failed to gain traction and were seen as political stunts.
    Key Facts
    “Nothing would disrupt the swamp more than electing Elon Musk” as speaker of the House, suggested Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., in a Thursday post to Musk’s social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
    Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene, R-Ga., responded she’s “open to supporting” Musk for the role as a means of “reigning in Congress to enact real government efficiency.”
    The suggestions come as some Republicans, including President-elect Donald Trump, cast doubt on House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., for the funding bill Johnson backed which Trump derided as “ridiculous and extraordinarily expensive.”
    Musk did not immediately respond to Forbes’ request for comment and has not addressed the suggestions on his highly active X account.
    Can Elon Musk Be Speaker Of The House?
    Yes. The Constitution does not specify the House Speaker must be a member of the House of Representatives, or any sort of elected official. The House Speaker has never been a non-Congress member, but Musk is not the first outsider floated as House Speaker: Trump earned a vote for the role from Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., in 2023 after the ouster of then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., in a lengthy process that eventually put Johnson in power.
    Forbes Valuation
    Musk is by far the richest person in the world, with a $438 billion net worth according to our latest estimates. That’s about $200 billion more than the next-richest person, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who reportedly shared dinner Wednesday with Musk and Trump. Musk’s fortune stems mostly from his stakes in the automaker Tesla, aerospace company SpaceX and artificial intelligence startup xAI. Musk is more than $160 billion richer Thursday than he was on Election Day after shares of Tesla surged and valuations for the private SpaceX and xAI swelled.
    Key Background
    Musk donated $239 million toward committees supporting Trump’s election bid, making him potentially Trump’s most prolific backer. The centibillionaire has been nearly inseparable from Trump since Election Day, describing himself as Trump’s “first buddy,” and his close advisory role has earned him the moniker of “unofficial co-president” from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. Musk’s official role is as the co-chair of the newly created “Department of Government Efficiency” commission aimed at reigning in federal spending and regulations. Greene will lead a House subcommittee on the Musk-led initiative.

  3. Some people are calling Elon Musk “president” after President-elect Trump followed Musk’s lead in coming out against the House Republicans’ spending bill, the first severe human case of bird flu has been reported in the U.S., and Stephen takes a look at some of the world’s strangest Christmas traditions.

  4. Once again the Democrats caused the CR to fail.  It is like they are in the majority in the House.  Looking like the odds of a government shutdown have increased.  Hopefully the speaker will hold everyone over to work on another CR.  If the government is closed and no pay checks going out, those worthless stains should at least try to fix things.

  5. Let’s see if I’ve got this right. The Republicans & Democrats negotiate a continuing resolution that would have kept the government open, and because Elon Musk said don’t do it the Republicans couldn’t deliver enough votes to pass it with Democratic support. Chapter 2 Republicans come up with another alternative that’s approved by Elon and Dumbass and the Republicans can’t deliver their caucus to vote for it after Democrats said we’re out, and if you want us to vote on something you’ll negotiate something with us, so Republicans, who can’t deliver their caucus blame Democrats for tanking the bill.Chapter 3 rinse and repeat, and this time after losing 38 of their own parties votes little Mikey Johnson again blames Democrats for failing to to pass a Continuing resolution that he put up and again couldn’t deliver his caucus. Is that about right?

    Seems to me that little Mikey Johnson oughta understand that if he can’t deliver all of his votes, he better negotiate the bill that he puts on the floor with the Democrats so that he can get enough Democratic votes to mix with Republican votes And get at least 218 of them.

  6. Feel for the government workers trying to do anything this week.  First is get ready for shutdown; packet of information, meeting with supervisor to learn if essential or not; prepare computer and phones; create voice mail message; create email message; prepare mail stop, clean desktop and cube for time away. Second, news of CR, undo everything.  Third, repeat first step. ad nauseum
    After the first couple of these dance parties we were told to keep the packet of shutdown information, change the date and get ready to do whatever.  This went on the entire four years of sfb grifting the world.  There were even the Friday’s that the CR was not passed, so we did shutdown routine, and then the Congress would pass it over the weekend, and we had to come in on Monday and undo it all.  I am so happy that is long gone.  Now I just care about my retirement pay, Social Security is a separate system and does not stop anymore.

  8. BB, I also feel for all those families who’ve saved all year and booked tickets to travel to such things like smithsonian ZooLights, national park events which won’t happen let alone all those in dire need who’ll be without gov’t help they’ve come to rely on.   magaT grinch time once again throughout the country

     

  9. Pogo, you summed it up just right. I’ve been through many of these shutdown dramas but this is the first with the world’s richest man calling the shots.

  10. Good question on Bluesky this morning: Why would Trump want to eliminate the debt ceiling during his entire presidency when he promised to cut the total budget by 33% and balance the budget?

  11. I think I needed to smersh the last two chapters of the CR saga together.  In my chaotic perusing of news as the end of the year approaches, judges aren’t going to be in their offices for the next 10 days but shit still has to be submitted, I thought there had been 3 votes instead of two.  Accordingly ignore Chapter 3 until anther vote is attempted, and if it fails I was just prescient.
     
    That said, headlines at WaPo today on the subject:

    House GOP searches for new plan with government shutdown hours away

    Republicans revolted against a bipartisan bill, then the House on Thursday night rejected a party-line alternative.
     

    Trump urges debt limit suspension after failure of the bill he endorsed

     
    Musk’s swift accumulation of political power sparks alarm
    The unelected billionaire’s outsize role in sending the federal government careening toward a potential shutdown worried Democrats, academics and watchdog groups.

     
    Why some Republicans bucked Trump

  12. I’m unable to follow it all minutely at this time, so don’t fault me for lack of intricate knowledge, but I suspect that’s like many people. However, my sense of it that as long as Fox can adequately headline a shutdown as a dereliction of duty by Democrats, that is theme that will carry the day around my holiday tables.

  14. A reminder about magats talking about putting a non-House member Speaker.  When they kicked out one Speaker there was a push by a few to replace him (repub/magat no women allowed) with someone from not the House. At one of these silly talks there was even the name sfb raised to be Speaker. 
     
    This falls into the garbage that a businessman (see above) would be the best president because running the country like a corporation would work.  Every department, agency or program to be run as a for profit center.  magats lap that up like the polluted water of the magat septic tank it is.

  15. Yep, Ivy, that’s what they’re trying to do. Summing up Pogo’s summation, I say call it the Musk shutdown — it’s the result of his veto of a bipartisan deal, and his failure to get enough Republican votes for an alternative.

  18. Cook Report Editor-in-Chief Amy Walter: “Please stop calling it a landslide. R’s wins in ‘24 were decisive but not overwhelming. R’s held the House by 7,309 votes; Trump won Electotal College by 229,766. And, only purple SEN seat won by R’s was won by 15,115.”

  19. So what happened to the Musk/Trump continuing resolution bill? It went down in flames. 
    Musk is a bomb thrower.  To get legislation passed you have to be a consensus builder. The Musk/Trump consensus fell apart in a most spectacular manner. That is what happened last night. Keep your eye on the ball, all those words out there are just to distract you from the ball. 
    Trump is not even president and he is already a lame duck.
    Given the quality of the people surrounding Trump expect the next 4 years to look very much like the clusterfk of the last 24 hours.
    Jack

  20. Craig
    Ms Walter has an important point and every member in Congress knows it. They also know if they are more popular than Trump, in their districts. In a situation where Congress is so evenly divided it doesn’t take many to do the math and ignore Trump.
    Prediction: Some version of the original compromise will be drawn up with Trump declaring victory after getting half of his desired extension of the debt limit. Instead of all of his term it will expire just before the midterm elections. Chip and his cohort will vote against it and it will pass because the Democrats got what they wanted.
    Jack

  21. Someone should probably tell President Musk that it takes 218 votes in the House and 51 votes in the Senate to pass legislation, and that with 220 members Republicans can only lose 2 votes in the House at present and still pass legislation without Democratic help, and that with 49 senators Republicans need 2 Democrats to vote for legislation in the Senate to pass it.  Oh, and until January 20, Joe Biden is President and has to sign any legislation for it to pass.

  22. Dana Milbank – WaPo.  Calling strikes nnd balls, as usual.

    They’re baaaack.

    Just six weeks ago, voters elected Donald Trump by the slimmest of margins in hopes that he would lower the cost of living. But Trump quickly walked back that promise, saying “it’s very hard” to reduce prices.

    Instead, he has already returned the country to the unrelenting chaos, and the government to the ludicrous dysfunction, that dominated his first term. And he hasn’t even taken office yet. This week alone, Trump:

    Announced, in a 3:23 a.m. social media post, his interest in annexing Canada.

    Spread unfounded paranoia about UFOs invading the East Coast. (“The government knows what is happening. … Something strange is going on.”)

    Signaled, in another middle-of-the-night post, his desire to have the FBI probe prominent Trump critic Liz Cheney for violating “numerous federal laws” in the congressional investigation of the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.

    Declared that he was suing the Des Moines Register— because the Iowa newspaper’s election poll was wrong.

    Suggested, via Robert F. Kennedy Jr., that he would limit access to abortion medication.

    And then, the pièce de résistance: Trump, and the man he tapped to police government spending, Elon Musk, killed a painstakingly negotiated, bipartisan spending package at the 11th hour, sending the federal government hurtling toward a Christmas shutdown — which would be the first time the government is forced to turn out the lights since, well, the last time Trump was in charge.

    Musk, with an extended tantrum on his social media site X, successfully sabotaged the spending bill, which would have provided aid to farmers and disaster relief for storm-ravaged North Carolina, Florida and other parts of the country. “‘Shutting down’ the government (which doesn’t actually shut down critical functions btw) is infinitely better than passing a horrible bill,” proclaimed the richest man in the world, who also posted “YES” in response to the sentiment “Just close down the govt. until January 20th. Defund everything.” The man who spent hundreds of millions of dollars to help elect Trump also threatened to defeat those Republicans who didn’t do as he commanded.

    Trump, who had voiced no previous objection to the legislation, sided with Musk. Congressional Republicans folded and then, over the next 24 hours, rewrote the bill to be satisfy Trump and Musk, their multi-billionaire masters. They kept most of the spending in the bill but, at Trump’s insistence, added a provision to raise the debt ceiling by about $5 trillion — enough for Trump to push through another massive tax cut for corporations and the wealthiest Americans. They removed funds for nutritional assistance and community hospitals. They excised a provision that would have kept down drug prices. Incredibly, they even struck a provision that would have limited American businesses’ investments in China.

    Musk and those like him stood to save untold billions in taxes — while securing green lights to move jobs to China. That’s a sizable return on the $277 million Musk spent on Trump’s campaign. MAGA!
     
    Let us at least give Trump credit for transparency. For decades, corporations and billionaires shaped Republican policies from the back rooms of the Capitol. Now, they control the Republican Party right out in the open, for all to see. This kind of naked power grab is straight out of the Gilded Age.

    ***

    As the world’s wealthiest man killed the spending bill, Republicans marveled at their own dysfunction.
     
    “It’s a total dumpster fire,” Rep. Eric Burlison (Missouri) told reporters.
     
    “It’s a fascinating mess,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) told CNN’s Manu Raju.
     
    “This is ridiculous,” Sen. Josh Hawley (Missouri) told Semafor’s Burgess Everett. “This is how you want your government to run? I mean, these guys can’t manage their way out of a paper bag.”
     
    Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (Florida) was so baffled by the happenings that she walked over to the speaker’s office to investigate. “I’m actually over here because no one’s returning my phone calls,” she told reporters. “I was trying to figure out what’s going on.”
     
    She left without an answer — because House GOP leaders had no plan.
     
    Even before the Musk-led meltdown, Rep. Victoria Spartz (Indiana) declared she would no longer “participate in the caucus until I see that Republican leadership in Congress is governing. I do not need to be involved in circuses.”

    But this is just the first act of what promises to be a four-year circus. Already, a dozen or so House Republicans, angered by Speaker Mike Johnson’s inept handling of the spending bill, are now making noises about blocking his reelection as speaker Jan. 3 — and the defection of even two or three Republicans could doom him. This, in turn, could delay Congress’s certification of Trump’s election victory and possibly create a constitutional crisis over the transfer of power. Even if Johnson (R-Louisiana) gets out of that mess, a few House Republicans are already lining up in opposition to extending Trump’s tax cuts, a core component of his 2025 agenda.

    ***
    “THIS CHAOS WOULD NOT BE HAPPENING IF WE HAD A REAL PRESIDENT,” Trump wrote.
     
    So true! But instead, Americans elected Trump — and now we’re doomed to four years of this mayhem.
     
    As Republicans circled the drain toward a shutdown, former speaker Newt Gingrich, the GOP architect of the 1990s shutdowns that started the modern era of dysfunction, celebrated the collapse.

    “President Trump and Republicans should not be afraid of a government shutdown. The next election is two years away,” he wrote.
     
    “I’m all in,” responded Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia). And, echoing Musk, she added: “The government can shut down all the way until [Jan. 20] as far as I’m concerned.”

    ***

    With less than 24 hours to go until a shutdown, the House Republican majority, now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Elon Musk, couldn’t come up with the votes to keep the government opened. “There is no plan,” Rep. Ralph Norman (R-South Carolina) told the Hill’s Emily Brooks after the vote. “Trump wants the thing to shut down.”
     
    Shutting down the government because of the rants and threats of an erratic billionaire is no way to run a country. But this is where we are. Welcome (back) to the Trump administration.

    Sorry if it’s too long, but it’s about half of what I could have posted.

  23. Eliminate the debt ceiling = extend tax cuts for billionaires.    
    Hey, if SOTH doesn’t have to be a member of Congress, what about Liz Cheney?  Are there any Repugz with the spine to not fall in line with the MAGAts?  Would Dems do that?    Would enough Repugz vote for Jeffries?   All we need is a tiny crack in the damned dam and we can handle it.  
     
    ps – Anything to stick it to (F)Elon. 
    F U Russian warship!
     
    Being afraid of being primaried is silly.   Once rural voters start hurting from two years of tRUMPskyism, they will vote Dem or stay home.  Once the Gaza-protest vote/no voters realize it was a fool’s errand, they will show up for Dems. 

  25. Not a landslide, a mudslide. Only two reasons why we are wallowing at the bottom of it: Thomas/Alito … and Mitch. 

  26. That Milbank piece, I’m not even sure where to start on it. But it does remind me why I never read his column. LOL, his Republican quotes where he ties together Murkowski with the little known members of the bomb throwing caucus. Then instead of placing the blame on the bomb throwers for the chaos.  (sigh)
    As I said yesterday, too many gummies.
    Jack

  27. There is a tendency for you all to enjoy anything that slams Trump and now Musk. You click on it and pass it around. That is what the Milbank piece is. It wasn’t serious analysis just click bait for liberals. And not very good click bait.
    quoting an arsonist about the dumpster fire, or a clown about the circus? But it is what he did and passed it off as journalism.
    Jack

  28. Number of Federal Employees by State and Territory.

    Maybe someone should let Marjorie frog toe that 79,000 Georgia voters will have their Christmas ruined by a shut down.

    R47716

     

  29. She is smart, she is tough, she is a Marine, a daughter of Iranian immigrants, a mother and now an astronaut. 
    Liberals sneer at American exceptionalism but in some ways we are. In most of the world she would not have been allowed the opportunity. The places in the world where it can happen are the exception not the norm.
    Jack

  32. No wonder Trump wants to raise the debt ceiling.

    David Axelrod:

    “On the debt ceiling, it’s worth noting that one-quarter of the federal debt, from the founding of the Republic to 2021, was accumulated during the first administration of Donald J. Trump”

     

  33. Craig – It’s all about the tax cuts continuing.  

    Republicans have deserted seniors, veterans, farmers, even children with cancer, at the will of a foreigner (who should be denaturalized and deported for violating the Logan Act, for starters), because he threatens to back someone else in their Republican primary. 

    Guess what, all of those seniors, veterans, farmers, and the families of children with cancer that they are abandoning at the command of an unelected asshat will vote against them if they don’t show some spine now.

  34. German Christmas festival shattered by a doctor driving a car into a crowd of people. Terrorism.
    Here, Senator Chris Murphy just reported that Elon Musk with Trump’s cooperation has invoked a handshake agreement to CUT MEDICARE AND VETERANS’ BENEFITS to create more wealth for this cadre of billionaires running the country a MONTH before Trump becomes POTUS. 55% of polled Americans approved of this transition. What the damn HELL? Yeah, a billion dollars don’t go as far as it used to, but there are millions of Americans on Medicare and veterans’ benefits.
    You wanted this deal, with Musk running the country and Trump nodding agreement to all of it. Also, if this deal does not go through, military personnel are not getting paid anymore this year.
    This is MAGA. If you voted for these bastards, you deserve it.

  35. Dex, damn skippy!

    Well, Jack, I enjoy Milbank’s articles.  He does have a bit of a jaundiced view of the current crop of Republicans, and he takes his digs at dems as well.  His sieve isn’t as fine as some, but the criticism of Dumbass and Elon is well deserved and IMHO necessary.  He’s an opinion writer, not a reporter, and I don’t think he has any pretense of being overly analytical.   

    And as of late (MAGA) it ain’t liberals who scoff at American exceptionalism.  That shoe is on the other foot now.

  36. And not to forget, but the Winter Solstice is tomorrow – Sat, Dec 21, 2024, 4:21 AM. Unless my plans go a-gley, I’ll be sleeping through it.

  37. Elon walking the halls of Congress with one of his offspring on his shoulders is a despicable piece of PR.

  38. https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/20/media/elon-musk-afd-germany-politics-far-right/index.html
    “Elon Musk endorses far-right German political party, wading deeper into global politics”
     
    “Only the AfD can save Germany,” Musk wrote Friday while re-posting a video from far-right political activist Naomi Seibt.”
     
    ”The AfD, which has recently seen its popularity swell, has touted populist and anti-immigrant “Germany first” positions. But the party has also been accused of resurrecting Nazi-era ideology and slogans. In May, a judge ruled that Germany’s domestic intelligence agency could continue to keep the the AfD under surveillance for the alleged threat it poses to German democracy, rejecting a challenge by the party.”
     
    “Its youth arm, the Young Alternative (JA), has been designated by German authorities as a “confirmed extremist” organization. The party’s lead candidate in the eastern German state of Thuringia, Björn Höcke, was convicted earlier this year after breaking German laws against uttering Nazi slogans in public.”
     
    *If it walks like a Nazi & talks like a Nazi…
     

  42. They can keep showing the clips of President Musk with his sidekick in which the sidekick looks like a painted cadaver. 

  43. https://newrepublic.com/post/189622/elon-president-musk-reaction

    Elon Tries to Kill “President Musk” Allegations After Total Disaster
    Musk has since tried 

    “Musk has since tried to shift blame and downplay his role in the outcome. He’s also apparently hoping to shut down Democrats’ suggestions that his outsize role in the legislative process indicates that he’s the one truly pulling the strings in the incoming Trump administration.”

    “Many Democrats leapt on the events of the week to say just that: “The leader of the GOP is Elon Musk,” tweeted Representative Brendan Boyle. “I don’t know why Trump doesn’t just hand him the Oval Office,” saidRepresentative Greg Cesar. “It’s clear who’s in charge, and it’s not President-elect Donald Trump,” posted Pramila Jayapal, saying Trump followed the lead of “Shadow President Elon Musk.” 

    *So much for Muskrat love.

  45. https://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/a-planet-parade-is-coming-in-early-2025-and-this-one-will-be-particularly-special/3619768/

    “A planetary parade is set to be visible in the night sky for the start of the new year — and this one will bring with it a rare occurrence.”
    “According to Hunter Miller, an astronomy educator with the Adler Planetarium, throughout the month of January, viewers will have a chance to see six of the Solar System’s planets.”

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