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June 12, 2018 02:53 PM UTC

"Media Is Afraid" GOP Will Retain Control of U.S. Senate, And They "Want Us to Fail," Says Gardner

  • 53 Comments
  • by: Jason Salzman

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

Senator Cory Gardner (R).

U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner (R-CO) said last week that he’s not planning to run again for his current U.S. Senate leadership position, in which he’s charged with electing Republicans to the U.S. Senate.

His reason for stepping away: “I am going to be focused on 2020,” he told The Hill, a Washington DC publication.

Translation: He’s going to work on his own re-election campaign in Colorado, where he’s even more unpopular than Trump–and that’s in a state that voted for Hillary Clinton by five points.

Gardner, who doesn’t return my calls, likely sees the obstacles to his own re-election in 2020 as similar to those facing Republicans this year.

A big problem is the media, according to Gardner. The media is making the November election look really lousy for Republicans.

Telling fellow conservatives at the Western Conservative Summit in Denver Friday that Republicans will be able to confirm scores of judges if they can retain control of the U.S. Senate in November, Gardner said the “media is afraid of this,” and they “want us to fail.”

Gardner (at 57 min 45 secs here): There is only one body that confirms judges and that is the United States Senate. We have the potential to confirm scores more of these constitutional judges, but we have to keep the senate.

The media knows this. The media is afraid of this. And that is why they want us to fail. They are already writing their stories. You can see it in the news. They don’t want us to think we are just going to lose the house and the senate, but sometimes I get the feeling they are cheering it on. This past election was a rebuke of their narrative that our movement is on the outs.

This is not the first time Gardner has claimed the media is aligned against Republicans. Back in 2012, Gardner blamed Mitt Romney’s loss in part on the media.

He once told a right-wing talk radio host that the media is biased against “people like us.”

In focusing on the media as a big Republican problem in November, Gardner is skirting discussion of the GOP legislative collapses on healthcare, immigration, and trade, or the mood swings of President Trump, or the tax bill’s failure to deliver promised wage increases for middle-class voters.

Comments

53 thoughts on ““Media Is Afraid” GOP Will Retain Control of U.S. Senate, And They “Want Us to Fail,” Says Gardner

  1. Well, when it comes to shredding the social safety net and taking away peoples' healthcare, and turning the US into an autocratic fascist dystopia, I want them to fail.

  2. "We have the potential to confirm scores more of these constitutional judges."… He says that like it’s a good thing. “…and that is why they want us to fail." And he says that like it's a bad thing. 

  3. Those "constitutional" judges – you know what that means, right? Those are the judges who think air and water pollution laws violate the Fifth Amendment's takings clause, that the First Amendment actually obligates the government to favor Christianity in all things, that criminal defendants actually don't have any enforceable rights, that police can pretty much do whatever they want, that the Constitution is not actually color blind but instead is designed to assure white supremacy forever, that the public lands we all love and enjoy should not be public, and that voting is a privilege and not a right. If "scores" – perish the thought – of those kinds of judges are confirmed, we'll be living in a dystopian nightmare.

        1. Your constant refrain:

          RandR

          2  + 2 is four 

          MJ 3 +4 = 7

          Answer

          The two statements are not contradictory.

          Simple math proves there were enough Jilliot voters to push Trump to victory in the three swing states.  It doesn't prove what they would have done if Trump's toady had not been on the ballot.

          Voter supression is harder to prove since guessing what people who didn't vote would have voted if they had voted is a bit more problematic than just adding Jilliot votes to Hillary.  But it is pretty blatant and, yes, it probably also tipped those states.

          Like a basketball game won 78-77 on a last second shot, any one of the Trump shots can be said to be decisive.

          Conclusion:

          Jilliots elected Trump.

          So did Democrats who didn't vote, whether actively suppressed or otherwise just not voting.  This group includes an unknowable group of Bernie or nobody zealots, but not Bernie itself.

          So stop swinging naked from the chandelier every time RandR asks the Jilliots if they like the President they elected and the fascist courts he installed to rule us for the next genetation.  It's a legitimate question.

          1. Your metaphors are intentionally offensive.

            Chances of me "stopping" any posts based on your rude requests = < 0

            Chances of a Jill Stein voter changing their voting next election based on R&R's or your scolding also =< 0

            Chances of getting out the vote (including Jill Stein voters) by running exciting candidates with relevant policies:  v x 5, v being volunteers on the ground having persuasive , respectful , face-to-face conversations with  at least 5 other voters.

                1. Repeal and Replace,

                  Talk to me as "you", not as 3rd person "mj".  I give you that respect. Do you have to have V fight your battles for you?

                  And I'm just keeping my promise…..I told you that  I would post information about voter suppression every time you blame "Jilliots" for Trump, and I will. You may depend on it.

                   

                  1. I know that in your narcissistic mind, mj, "you" are the only person who counts.  But there are actually many people on this board and referring to MJ when she is the specific object of a post is much clearer than

                    "You are swinging naked from the chandelier again."

                    Although, on second thought, I guess it's pretty obvious who that person would be.

                    1. Now, now.  I adore both of you and this site wouldn't be the same without your combined contributions: Mama's analytical mind, commitment to the underserved and on-the-ground activism. V's incredible ability to weave history and facts into present-day scenarios, his matter-of-fact style and our shared experiences from east of the 104th parallel.  The feminine and the masculine. 

                      You're both good folk and we need both of you for the fight that lies ahead of us.  

                    1. There you go. Insult me as your own man. Better yet, stick to the facts and issues, and leave the personal insults to our Tweeter in Chief.

                  2. The funny part mama is the way V. and R&R spit out their knee-jerk, know-it-all, Jill Stein comments as reliably as Zap goes after SFL Bennet.

                    Hypocrisy can be funny…right?

                    1. Hypocrisy is hilarious (said every late night comedian ever)

                      What I'm trying to do, perhaps not very effectively, is to get people to stop rehashing the past and look to the future.

                      There's nothing we can do about the 2016 election, except learn what we can for 2018 and 2020.

                      Those Jill Stein voters are today's Green and Unaffiliated voters. They are in Indivisible groups and pop-up issue groups and coalitions. They are passionate and committed to social justice, but they are very skeptical of Democratic promises and moderate candidates.

                      They may or may understand how badly they were targeted and propagandized by Russian trolls in '16, and what sights are aimed on them now.

                      I don't think that scolding and shaming them will persuade them to vote at all, or to vote for Democratic candidates. We have to sell them on a positive message of possible change.

                      Voter suppression, on the other hand, is a unifying issue. Everybody wants everybody to vote (well, except for maybe the Koch/ Kobach KKKlan). And it's a lot easier to tackle in the courts and legislative chambers.

                       

            1. No one expects a jilliot to embrace reality.  Elections are won by recruiting, registering and voting people who are willing to listen to reason.

              1. Voting people willing to listen to reason….

                Not necessarily. I'm reminded of Adlai Stevenson's famous quip when told that all the intelligent people were planning on voting for him in 1956. He responded by saying, "That's not good enough. I need a majority to win."

          2. Voter suppression is harder to prove since guessing what people who didn't vote would have voted if they had voted is a bit more problematic

            BINGO! I've never denied that some voter suppression exists. My issue is how the hell do you quantify it. (Although apparently MJ has.) 

            1. Lots of Democratic  election pundits, as well:

              Pundits: Stein didn’t cost Clinton the election

              Political pundits such as 538’s Nate Silver , WSJ’s Tau, and  TheHill’s Jeffries point to Gary Johnson’s taking equally from Clinton and Trump, and say that there is no realistic scenario in which Stein voters cost Clinton the Presidency.

              If only 90% of the extra Stein voters had voted for Hillary while the rest voted for Trump or stayed home, Michigan is the only state that would have flipped. In none of these scenarios did Jill Stein voters cost Hillary Clinton the presidency.

              It’s harder to say who Johnson hurt more since he tended to pull more evenly from both sides of the political divide.

              Nate Silver of 538 combs through the weeds in his piece, Jill Stein – Spoiler or Scapegoat?. Even the New Yorker’s Toobin, no friend of “narcissist” Jill Stein, writes 

              It’s difficult to count uncast votes, but there were clearly thousands of them as a result of the voter-suppression measures.

               

              1. Jilliots, we're gonna have jilliots, jilliots,

                Let me hear the far left talk.

                They elected Donald Trump

                Donald Trump

                Because they're jilliots, jilliots,

                Let me hear the far left talk.

        2. MJ, shouldn't you be focused on asking your more appropriate question: Can anyone prove that Zyklon B is not be stockpiled at the detention sites by ICE?

      1. Not a mad-lib, but:

        Kim Jong-Un walks into a North Korean bar. Everyone stands and salutes him. They remain standing. And smiling fixedly. 

        Donald Trump walks in, and thanks them for being the largest, most enthusiastic bar crowd he's ever had, and how great the ratings will be.

        Cory Gardner walks in, gets Kim Jong Un's autograph to add to his Dictators of the World collection, and explains why Trump is telling the truth about the crowd size.

        He then tries the fish intestines on the Korean BBQ platter and chews them with his mouth open, exclaiming about how delicious they are. Photo of Yoo Ga Ne Korean Restaurant - Toronto, ON, Canada. Grilled Intestine!  Yum ;)

            1. It's like the Rocky Mountain Oyster Cult around here sometimes. Never quite developed a taste for them, but yeah, it is like any gross ethnic dish – it's less about the taste than it is a loyalty test and a chance to show your ethnic pride.

              All "soul food"  started out as cheap foods that would have been thrown away, but thrifty householders made them edible. Then they became compulsory cultural icons.

              Chitlins= gross

              Lutefisk= gross

              Tacos de Lengua (Tongue tacos)= gross

              Korean BBQ: half gross, half delicious

              Mike, I adore you back, and respect V's knowledge and wordsmithery, as I do yours.

              I'll go back to ignoring V's provocations so we don't ugly it up around here too much. I'm determined not to be driven off of this forum, as so many have been….I have diaries to write, things to say.

              1. Lutefisk is the most awful thing I've ever tried. To me, it fully explains why Minnesotans go around with scowls on their faces. The winters are a piece of cake by comparison.

                 

                1. I was married to a Norski from SoDak. For his family, lutefisk and lefse at Christmas was a holy rite.

                  In the old country, it was just a way to preserve fish over the winter – dry it, soak it in lye, leave it in a barrel under the house. Then boil it to get the lye out, and serve it with butter to make it palatable. So it's a smelly, buttery fish gruel. Bleh.

                  Or leave it semi-solid, so you have a smelly, translucent fish jello. That is much, much worse.

                  Lefse isn't bad – every culture has an all-purpose flatbread.

                    1. Lefse are mostly mashed potatoes, flour, and cream. Not a low calorie or low carb food. There are probably ways to lighten it up. I never tried making them from scratch, although my ex''s mother and most of his sisters did. It's a lot of work.  You can buy a dozen or so in most grocery stores now for ~$3, especially around the winter holidays.

                      I have made kuchen and gravlax, though.

                       

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