"Tuberville, a former college football coach... has showed few signs of letting up.

Democrats have repeatedly gone to the Senate floor to try and call up the nominations. But Tuberville has objected each time.

Tuberville... hasn’t introduced legislation to overturn [the policy] and insists that... Democrats should introduce their own bill on the policy and hold a vote."
https://apnews.com/article/tuberville-military-holds-senate-officers-45c4230a8aee5222bf32b43823e29acc

#Republicans #GOP #Obstructionism #Idiocy #Politics #USA #News

plastic companies are doing a fossil fuel number on the world by resisting clean up efforts

https://www.juancole.com/2023/06/pollution-campaigners-manufacturers.html

#PlasticPollution #RefusingResponsibility #Obstructionism

I think this is worth a read. Spread it around, if you can... https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/feb/15/michigan-state-shooting-republicans-blocked-gun-reform-laws #michigan #guncontrol #massshooting #obstructionism

McCarthy "is an embodiment of officialdom that can serve as a point of attack for those who orient their politics around battling entrenched power. McCarthy’s opponents are happy to discuss ways in which they can get more power in the legislating process...

But many of them would also be happy with toppling him, claiming an establishment casualty that can be discussed on Twitter and Fox News."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/01/06/mccarthy-speaker-house-republicans/

#GOP #Obstructionism

"McCarthy and his allies hold power, so attacking their use of power makes sense as an oppositional strategy....

For many on the right, particularly those most vocal in opposition to McCarthy, opposition is the core political strategy. Opposition to how things are done. To Washington. To their colleagues."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/01/06/mccarthy-speaker-house-republicans/

#GOP #Obstructionism #USPolitics #Republicans #Speaker #McCarthy #Fail

"The pattern repeated on Thursday. McCarthy’s allies talked about what they wanted to do (recognizing, at times, the limits imposed by a Democratic president and Senate). His opponents argued for upending the system.

And that, in a nutshell, is the distinction."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/01/06/mccarthy-speaker-house-republicans/

#USPolitics #Congress #Speaker
#GOP #Republicans #Obstructionism #KevinMcCarthy #Fail

INTRO: Live in #MaricopaCounty #Arizona. Longtime #Independent turned #Democrat. Hopeful for the first time since 2015 that all #politicians will actually govern again. The #trumpism , #obstructionism , and #extremism has to stop. Believe we are all better than that. #DemocracyWon -- for now. The challenge is far from over.

Other stuff: #Partnered , #lgbt , #digitalmarketing and #fundraising , writing first #fantasyfiction , #BFA , #MBA , love to sing #soprano .

In looking at various forms of power, one point that's increassingly clear to me is that in a mature and multipolar society what exists are multiple power centres, each often with the effective capability to say "no". The word veto comes directly from the Latin, for "I forbid", and comes from that culture's multipolar power structure, the Senate.

There's also a lesson from warfare and combat, which is that the ability to induce damage or cost on an enemy whilst avoiding it oneself is also powerful. This is the difference between melee and ranged weapons (hand-to-hand, or tooth-and-claw, vs. ballistic or projectile weapons, see also "time-ranged" weapons in the form of traps and snares). "You don't have to be there for it".

Camouflage and armour afford similar capabilities.

The dynamics enabling NIMBY attacks are that stalling tactics don't incure consts or liabilities for those engaging in them. Sometimes this has merits, it very often does not, e.g., the delay of a bike-lanes project which sees scores of additional cycling and pedestrian deaths due to street traffic.

#MoneyIsPower #TimeIsMoney #VetoPower #Obstructionism #NEPA #NIMBY #constructionCosts #construction #housing #UCLALewisCenter

Why does it cost so much to build things in America?

Researchers have ruled out some of the more obvious potential explanations for why these projects cost more in the US.

As transit researcher Alon Levy writes in a report for the Niskanen Center, “This is not about our wealth: there is no correlation between a country’s GDP per capita and its subway construction costs. Nor is it about geological factors: the biggest factor behind a project’s cost is what country it is in, and costs are fairly consistent even across different geologies ... This is purely institutional.”

And when it comes to roads and the bulk of the high costs — “the new construction bit” — Turner says even though he has “no idea why those prices are increasing,” he can “eliminate a lot of things.” Turner explains that common theories like unions or the way we’re building roads or where we’re building them (for example, in more urban areas) are not supported by statistical evidence.

Time is money, money is power, power is delaying transportation projects

https://www.vox.com/22534714/rail-roads-infrastructure-costs-america

h/t Shane D. Phillips / #UCLALewisCenter

#housing #construction #constructionCosts #NIMBY #NEPA #Obstructionism #VetoPower #TimeIsMoney #MoneyIsPower