The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee is slamming a fellow Republican in the Senate for waging an unprecedented attempt to change Pentagon abortion policy by holding up hundreds of military nominations and promotions.
Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville is “paralyzing the Department of Defense.”
“The idea that one man in the Senate can hold this up for months, I understand maybe promotions, but nominations,” McCaul said. He added, “I think that is a national security problem and a national security issue. And I really wish he would reconsider this.”
Tuberville’s move has forced less experienced leaders into top jobs and raised concerns at the Pentagon about military readiness. Defense officials say Tuberville is jeopardizing American national security. Senators in both parties, including Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, also have criticized Tuberville.
Tubbs hates our troops and America. I remember a time when he would have been torn to shreds for this.
He absolutely is getting torn to shreds over this, at least everywhere that cares about military budgeting.
Or places that are concerned about the next insurrection succeeding.
In any other job, someone would be fired for blocking the rest of an org/team/company from accomplishing something. it feels crazy that we draw so many exceptions around politicians. It often just feels like a bunch of rich fucks flaunting the power they’ve bought.
You’re right, but politics is a different thing.
The voters are supposed to make this decision, but, well, without being condescending, yeah…
Is it really that different?
The US is more of a representative democracy, which means that the politicians are ‘elected’ by the people to represent the people. So they’re arguably ‘hired’ by will of the majority within a specific area.
The difference is there’s just not a lot of rules, punishments, or even recourse for the majority that voted aside from waiting 4-6 years and voting a different way.
the GOP are TRAITORS / FULL STOP
How can Tuberville hold up all these nominations, all by himself? I had to look it up. The way Senate rules work, they figure out nomination approvals in committee and then pass them on the floor with votes of “unanimous consent.” By withholding his consent, Tuberville forces all the committee work to be done on the floor of the Senate.
That is to say, he is hijacking the nomination approval process. This process has developed and become institutionalized in the Senate over many decades. Tuberville is hijacking this process for a largely unpopular, far-right political purpose that is, at best, only tangentially related to the services with vacant leadership positions, and that is in no way related to the actual nominations in question.
Ironically, perhaps, the reason this glitch in the Senate rules allows one person to hold up all the nominations for everyone is itself just another institution. Senate “holds” have been around for decades as well. It wasn’t until 2011 the that a bi-partisan group of Senators voted to change the rules to disallow “secret holds.”
So Tuberville is exploiting one Senate institution in order to shut down another Senate institution, just to generate propaganda for his federally mandated forced-birth agenda.
It’s like an echo of Gingrich in the '90s: It’s like he’s saying, “The interests of the people who elected me are more righteous than the interests of the people who elected all the rest of you all, so there will be no compromise from me on anything. We will run things my way or I’ll use my position to shut it all down.”
The only difference is that Gingrich shut down all the post offices for a few weeks. This asshole Tuberville is trying to shut down our military.
EDIT:
Maybe this could be McConnell’s saving-grace swan song, before he gives up his GOP leadership position in the Senate. As the leader of Tuberville’s party, I’m pretty sure rules allow him to end the hold that Tuberville requested.
Doing so would go against precedent and it would go against the spirit of the institution. But Mitch McConnell is no stranger to going against precedent and disregarding institutions when he thinks it serves his purpose.
It wouldn’t earn him much forgiveness from people like me, but it would make him look a little better on his way out.
The executive branch should play hardball with this and order the immediate reassignment of every soldier at the FIVE ACTIVE MILITARY BASES in Alabama, to other bases and make it clear that the collapse of the local economy is Tubervilles fault.
I’m pretty sure that’s within the wide latitude granted to the executive in terms of military control.
Make Alabama hurt and I bet this bullshit stops.
As much as I love this Biden is very much a don’t rock the boat kinda guy. It’s unfortunate.
When one single individual who isn’t the executive can obstruct the entire system like Tubbs and Turtle, it’s time to burn the system and start over
Winning football coaches in Alabamistan are geniuses and one half step below god and his two sons, jeebus and donald.
Jesus, I always forget that’s where he came from.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
WASHINGTON (AP) — The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee is slamming a fellow Republican in the Senate for waging an unprecedented attempt to change Pentagon abortion policy by holding up hundreds of military nominations and promotions.
Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday that Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville is “paralyzing the Department of Defense.”
“The idea that one man in the Senate can hold this up for months, I understand maybe promotions, but nominations,” McCaul said.
Tuberville’s move has forced less experienced leaders into top jobs and raised concerns at the Pentagon about military readiness.
Senators in both parties, including Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, also have criticized Tuberville.
McCaul said on CNN that the House would be tackling the issue of abortion in the military as part of a sweeping defense spending bill making its way through Congress.
The original article contains 260 words, the summary contains 147 words. Saved 43%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Oh no, a paralyzed US military. How will they protect the world and our freems?
That’s much less of a concern than what they’re likely to start doing. Remember when they held up all the judicial appointments and a Supreme Court appointment, so they could stuff all the courts with their favored lackeys? How do you think the next insurrection is going to go, once they’re stuffed military leadership with more of their favored lackeys?
