Not every amendment to the Constitution of the United States has been a winner, as we are all aware. The Eighteenth Amendment was a stain on our beloved Republic's history, but at least it was knocked out of commission by the Twenty-First. Fiscally conservative, small government types (most of us here) will point at the Sixteenth as being the bane of the country's existence. I would certainly give a nod to that as my least favorite. Running a close second on my "Ugh" list would be the Seventeenth, which allowed for the voters to elect United States senators, rather than state legislatures.
"But Kruiser, why do you oppose the will of the people?"
The easy answer there is that the people are very often morons. I know, I know, so are state legislators. Sometimes, it's best if the pool of morons can be limited.
My real beef with the Seventeenth, however, is that the once august upper chamber of the United States Congress has become a calcified, moribund private club that's paid for with public money. That's slightly ironic, given that one of the arguments that the pro-Seventeenth Amendment people used to make was that the Senate had become a private club that was being funded by special interest money.
Pick your poison. I would much rather have people who can afford it funding the dysfunction than the U.S. taxpayers.
What we are saddled with now in the Senate are people who live much longer than they used to and who seem bitterly opposed to the idea of retirement. I really thought that they were going to wheel the late Dianne Feinstein onto the Senate floor and just wait for her to expire. Mitch McConnell has been in the Senate since the beginning of Ronald Reagan's second term, has had severe health problems for years, and is still hanging around until the end of this year.
Seriously, don't any of these people have loved ones who they want to spend time with?
McConnell did have a good run of a couple of years during President Trump's first term in office, helping to get a lot of non-commie judges confirmed. Unfortunately, most of McConnell's slog of a career has been characterized by the kind of squish moderate behavior that has conservative Republicans forever thinking about starting a new party.
Mitch McConnell's legacy of unhelpful mediocrity is being carried on by his successor as the highest ranking Republican in the Senate — South Dakota Sen. John Thune. This isn't surprising, given that Thune was McConnell's righthand man even after Cocaine Mitch went full Never Trump. While President Trump is trying to shake up the GOP and make it a party that wants to fight and win, its leadership in the Senate is doing what it does best: leg-humping the status quo.
Mustn't rock the boat and make things uncomfortable at the Capitol Hill Club, after all.
Early in his tenure as the majority leader in the Senate, I mistakenly thought that some of Trump's gumption might be inspiring to Thune to break free from McConnell's invertebrate shadow. Other than giving his lunch orders to aides and reminding people which Dakota he's from, Thune isn't doing much in the way of governing or leading these days.
Election integrity is on the minds of most liberty-loving Americans right now. If the Republicans don't do something to strengthen it, the next couple of elections are going to be doused in nightmare fuel and set on fire. This is from a column I wrote last month:
In a VIP column I wrote earlier in the week, I worried about the future of the Republic if the Democrats ever get control of the White House and both chambers of Congress again. Barring a civil war, it will be lights out for the United States as we know it. The Trump Derangement Syndrome Dems have been very open about their desire to pack the Supreme Court with radical progressives and make Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. states. This will guarantee one-party Dem rule until they flush the country all the way down the toilet and we go the vestigial way of the once-great countries in Europe.
If the GOP can't combat the Democrats' relentless efforts to game the system, the above scenario will come about very quickly. Right now, the best thing that the Republicans can do is pass the SAVE America Act, which would introduce a modicum of sanity into the election process. Senate Republicans are the sticking point and John Thune is apparently never bothered by a sense of urgency. As my good friend and partner in thought crime Stephen Green wrote in a recent column, Thune needs to "stop posturing on X long enough to pass the Save Act."
It is of the utmost importance that Republicans approach every legislative and legal battle over election integrity as being an existential crisis that can't be allowed to play out. For every one thing that the GOP does to bring about transparency and common sense in our elections, the Democrats come up with five ways to undo it. The obliteration of any guardrails in the election process is the Democratic Party's raison d'être. It is the linchpin in their plan for one-party rule.
John Thune is in his mid-60s and has "only" been in office for 21 years, so he's practically a freshman by modern Senate standards. He no doubt wants to milk this sweet gig for a couple of more decades. He obviously doesn't get outside the Beltway very much though. If he did, he would know that the 2026 Democrats are rabid and feral beasts now. Congressional Republicans who are permanently in the minority won't be treated like they used to be.
A recent article in The New York Times lead with a headline about Congress not being prepared for job losses to Artificial Intelligence. It was about the private sector, of course, but I immediately went to dreaming of AI coming after Congress's jobs. I'm eternally hopeful that way. I think we can all agree that AI John Thune would have to be an upgrade from the Jellyfish John Thune, who's just mucking up the works right now.
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Editor's Note: The Democrats are doing everything in their power to undermine the integrity of our elections.
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