Island Dweller brings charm, not just wit:

Y’Maj,

Thinks have been rather grey and wet here on Shangri-La of late. After placing some rocks beneath an A/C drain outside the house yesterday and performing some forestry functions with the Czarina, I ruminated in the rockers on the back deck about an interesting facet of the Obamacare crackup.

It’s becoming more and more obvious this signature piece of Dear Leader’s presidency is quickly starting that repetitive circular journey around the porcelain bowl, on its way down the drain. Along with it, if the Republicans and conservatives in general play their cards right, may be going any majority the Democrats have in either house, plus a number of Democrat governorships come 2014.

There is no leadership in the White House, unless the Dems want to take their marching orders from Ms. Jarrett and Ms DL. If anything is going to be salvaged for the Democrats out of this mess, the impetus is going to have to come from Steny Hoyer, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid. All three have danced like marionettes on a string to DL’s fiddle for so long it’s difficult to fathom them having any independent judgement or strength of charcter left (certainly not in Nancy P’s case) to salvage the Democrat party from this mess. DL certainly can’t do it. The task falls to them by default. Does the Pulverizer of Peasants, the Killer of Kulaks, the Hacker of the Halberd, the Tamer of Tatars, and the Crusher of Cossacks have any predictions about how any of these people are going to make a serious try at independently rallying the troops the closer we get to 2014? DL is poison to Dems at the state level, and that’s where elections are decided. I can’t see Steny, Harry or Nancy stumping for some Dem candidate for governor; not only that, none of them dares campaign for a Congressional candidate since all three are intimately associated with this disaster. Who’s going to go on the stump for the Demo candidates in 2014?

ID

It is a good thing the Czar procrastinated posting this letter until today, because in fact these questions are indeed worthy of serious consideration. The Czar thinks a National Journal piece pretty much answers ID’s questions head on. The Czar thinks the piece is overly optimistic, but to spare you from reading it, here are the arguments:

1. The House voted in favor of the ultimately useless Upton Bill to protect existing insurance policies. The bill is Dead on Arrival in the Senate, but it was passed in the house with a 62.4% majority. Had more than 39 Democrats switched sides, the bill could have passed with a two-thirds majority. A bill to repeal the whole thing could pass with a two-thirds majority in 2015.
2. The Senate is very much in play for 2014. There is a very good chance the Republicans will capture the Senate: 10 of the 17 Democratic Senators running for re-election are in polling peril. If Republicans win, Harry Reid is no longer running the Senate, which means a repeal bill could be voted on. If so, Republicans could get enough swing votes from other threatened Democrats to reach the coveted 67 votes.
3. With two-thirds majorities in the House and Senate, the President loses the power of his inevitable veto.

Okay, this is their argument at NJ, not ours. The Czar thinks a GOP takeover of the Senate is well within the realm of possibility: it may even be a probability at this point. But 67 votes? Mmmmm. Dunno about that, but this is the sort of analysis that is making folks like Valerie Jarrett and the increasingly dysfunctional Nancy Pelosi want to vomit.

Have you noticed, by the way, that Nancy Pelosi is making the same arguments for Obamacare as she did in 2009? While everybody else is modifying their explanations, offering new caveats, moving goalposts, and so on, Pelosi is still claiming you can keep your health insurance, that it will lower costs for everyone, and help millions get insured, and create millions of jobs? The Czar has said it before, but he is genuinely concerned that she is suffering from a disorder. She seems oblivious to the reality of the last five years, and is making arguments that even the President openly disputes. That isn’t clueless: that’s delusional. One thing is clear: she has no idea what the law actually states, which is probably the origin of her now infamous assurance that the bill must be passed before anyone will understand what’s in it. She sure as hell has no idea even now.

And to follow up on your question about stumping: many of the senior Democrats have stumped for up-and-coming candidates, and it has been noticed that none of them even discuss Obamacare. In fact, incoming Virginia governor McAuliffe falsely claimed that his Republican opponent supported Obamacare in order to rob him of votes. This isn’t a case of Democrats avoiding the truth, but openly using Obamacare as a weapon.

How screwed up are these guys?

The Czar of Muscovy

Божію Поспѣшествующею Милостію Мы, Дима Грозный Императоръ и Самодержецъ Всероссiйскiй, цѣсарь Московскiй. The Czar was born in the steppes of Russia in 1267, and was cheated out of total control of all Russia upon the death of Boris Mikhailovich, who replaced Alexander Yaroslav Nevsky in 1263. However, in 1283, our Czar was passed over due to a clerical error and the rule of all Russia went to his second cousin Daniil (Даниил Александрович), whom Czar still resents. As a half-hearted apology, the Czar was awarded control over Muscovy, inconveniently located 5,000 miles away just outside Chicago. He now spends his time seething about this and writing about other stuff that bothers him.