Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) said in a new interview that he has decided to fuck this shit, including all this fucking bullshit.
Murphy is the ranking member on the Appropriations Committee panel that oversees funding for “Homeland [sic] Security.” Which means it’s his job, as the leading Democrat on that subcommittee, to oversee negotiations with the Republicans who control it and come up with a budget for the Department of Homeland (sic) Security, which is now, against all odds and logic and physics, run by DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.
But Politico reports that Murphy has decided to take a new tack on that part of his job. Namely, to fuck it.
Specifically, Murphy’s been voting “fuck that shit” on everything, no matter how bipartisan. Other Democrats are continuing budget talks with Republicans, as if it matters, but Murphy’s out.
Here’s Politico:
“…in recent weeks, he opposed all spending measures advanced during Senate Appropriations Committee markups for which he was present, challenged his Republican counterpart on the DHS funding bill and voted ‘no’ on the Senate’s first bipartisan funding package of the year.”
As Murphy told Politico, “It’s lonely. 28-to-1 votes are lonely.” So why, then, is Murphy solo-fucking it?
Because Pres. Donald Trump, in Murphy’s words which are also TFN’s, “doesn’t give a fuck what we write” into law.
Murphy’s point is that Trump is treating spending laws as menus rather than mandates, ordering Big Macs at the Taco Bell drive-through.
Trump is ignoring spending he’s legally required to execute and he’s spending money he doesn’t legally have. Like he always has.
And Republicans are letting him because they, too, in their own way, have opted to fuck it.
According to Murphy and also to TFN, by continuing to negotiate spending bills, Democrats are creating the impression the process is still working. And the outcomes are legitimate. Here’s Murphy:
“Every time that we go along with these appropriations bills, we’re putting a bipartisan veneer of endorsement on an illegal process that’s ultimately part of his [Trump’s, duh] campaign to destroy our democracy.”
With yet another government-shutdown deadline coming up fast on Sept. 30, however, the tippy-top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee — which includes Murphy’s and all the other spending subcommittees — has decided to continue not fucking this shit. Even though it’s already fucked from the other side.
Appropriations Ranking Member Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) told Politico without evidence that “the more we can do to get bills done, the better chance we have of getting better things for our country,” as if the last seven months hadn’t just happened in the same space-time continuum where we are.
What Politico doesn’t really get into, but TFN sure as fuck will, is that there are still Democrats who want to help Republicans avoid a government shutdown on Sept. 30. And Republicans still need Democratic help passing spending bills because their further-right flank will balk at basic spending needs.
And Democrats still aren’t demanding any actual accountability or oversight in these spending bills, they’re just haggling over what numbers to put down for Trump to ignore.
You may remember Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) behind closed doors screamed at her colleagues to vote for a Republican bill to avoid a government shutdown in March. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) had vowed they would stand fast, but they didn’t even slow-walk it.
Gillibrand’s role was largely downplayed, but your up-playing TFN newsfucked the shit out of it at the time. Basically, Gillibrand’s point was that shutdowns give presidents vast powers to decide what to shut down. TFN’s much smarter point was that if Trump wanted that power he could’ve just vetoed the bill.
Trump — and Republicans — don’t want to shut down everything like they’ve said they do, because they know that’ll make them even more unpopular. But if they’re understood to have total power and still don’t use it, that’ll piss off their anarchist, commerce-über-alles faction.
Politico, because they can’t help themselves, frames this solely as a 2028 presidential race will-he-won’t-he thing, as if this were a sit-com no one would watch without the chance the two leads might fuck each other. But the real question here, now, is whether Murphy will press Democrats to take a stand the way Gillibrand pressed Democrats to take a seat. Or whether he’ll say fuck it.
Excerpted with permission from The Fucking News.