Surprise Inside

By Zamboni

When visiting the True North, it's always good to pop into the local bookstores and see what's filling the shelves. One is Justin Trudeau's new memoir, his get-to-know-me tome that we'll all need to read before he runs for President — oops, Prime Minister — next year. And we have to admit it's shorter and breezier than the giant Clinton doorstop that we recently slogged through.

Maybe that's because Justin spends a lot of time in the book talking about his famous family. There are fewer Trudeaus than, say, Kennedys, but their lives are just as crazy and glamorous. (And yes, sad.) And naturally, he slams the ever-unappealing Stephen Harper and his "we hate everybody who's not like us" Conservative Party at every opportunity. But we cats were pleasantly surprised to come across slaps at right wingers south of the 49th parallel as well.

Here's one: "My father was fond of quoting Thomas Aquinas's admonition hominem unius libri timeo (I fear the man of a single book). I internalized that: Whenever a classmate or friend tried to convince me that the answers to life's big questions or major political issues could be derived from The Communist Manifesto or Atlas Shrugged...I grew wary. [T]he world is too complicated to be stuffed into a single overarching ideology."

Fun! What American would pick up this book expecting a shot at Paul Ryan, Ron and Rand Paul, and the entire staff of The National Review? We cats loved it, and we PURR.

Tidbits And Cats Treats: Ingrate Edition

By Baxter

Today is Thanksgiving. Are we thankful for our nine lives, for being Democrats, for being cats? Absolutely. But this Turkey Day, there are definitely some things that we feel no gratitude for. Here are a few.

We cats are not thankful for the farce that took place in Ferguson, Missouri, this week. So many things trouble us about the Michael Brown shooting that we don't know where to start, but this is probably the most eloquent summation we've seen yet.

Meanwhile, the police officer has been waltzing around free as air, milking his moment in the sun and giving interviews to the world. This is repugnant. We cats suggest that he do what he did right after the shooting: Vanish.

We cats are not thankful that former Attorney General Janet Reno recently lost another member of her family.

We cats are not thankful that the only Republican we ever kinda had a crush on got dumped from the Cabinet. And who's going to get confirmed as anything on Capitol Hill these days?

We cats are not thankful that journalists are so easily cowed and never ask what they should and faithfully toe the Republican line on so much stuff (example: "Bobby Jindal is a clever policy wonk"). But if we're going to be fair, we are thankful that every now and then, somebody in the media notices.

And while we're not thankful that Ruth Bader Ginsburg had to have stent surgery this week, we're relieved that she's out of the hospital and expected to be back at work on Monday.

So, okay... pass the drumsticks. Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!

If The Lion Had Lived

By Sniffles

Now that Chuck Schumer has provided us with headlines like this, we cats have to admit to something that, coincidentally, has been on our minds: A "what if?" game with the Affordable Care Act.

We generally don't care for "what ifs." But in this case, with the ACA once again in danger from the right-wing maniacs on the Supreme Court, we were wondering what might have happened if Senator Edward Kennedy had not died on August 25, 2009.

Actually, we have to go back to January of 2008, when Kennedy endorsed Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton for President. Did Obama promise then and there that if elected, he would dedicate his first term to Kennedy's signature issue, healthcare reform? Or did Obama decide to pursue it once it became clear that his friend the Massachusetts Senator was seriously ill?

We'll probably never know — Teddy is gone, and the President's not much of a sharer, is he? But it doesn't matter because the big question right now is how much better off the ACA would be if it had had a living, breathing Edward Kennedy to shepherd it through.

Answer: A lot.

Just picture the long-serving Kennedy holding forth on affordable healthcare on the Senate floor. Buttonholing colleagues in the cloakroom. Working the phones to wavering members late at night. Driving not only himself but his expert staff to fight the battle in the offices, dining rooms, gyms and watering holes of Capitol Hill. Gosh, the bill even might have passed with a few Republican votes!

And most of all, imagine Teddy elbowing John McCain off the Sunday talk shows and championing healthcare reform to the skies. In fact, he'd have been everywhere — on TV, talk radio, the Internet, in town halls, in infomercials, at pro-ACA rallies — not only selling affordable healthcare before, during and after passage, but outshouting all the haters on the right.

It would have been a sight to see. If not for an inoperable tumor in Ted Kennedy's brain, the ACA would be possibly one of the most popular pieces of legislation ever passed. Surely the GOP would be less able to chip away at it with appeals and lawsuits. In short, healthcare reform would be a lot healthier today. Which makes us cats HISS.

The Lameness Of Positive Talking

By Miss Kubelik

We cats think that Harold Ickes is a very nice man. But right now we're ready to dump our dirty litter boxes over his head.

Why? Try this on for size: "I would think that Jeb Bush and Rob Portman...would be a strong ticket for [the Republicans in 2016]."

Oh, Harold. Why would you say anything favorable about a hypothetical GOP Presidential ticket? In fact, why do we Democrats do this anyway? We're always ceding philosophical and strategic ground when we don't need to — because, as we pointed out earlier, we're nice. Certainly nicer than Republicans are these days.

Believe us cats: If, say, a Hillary Clinton-Julian Castro ticket were floated to a GOP talking head, that talking head would instantly slam it. He (or, maddeningly, she) would probably start out by insulting Clinton's age and Castro's youth. Never, never would the talking head admit any strengths, like the excitement of electing both a woman and an Hispanic to the nation's two highest offices. And the media, as usual, would dutifully repeat the Republican arguments for hours on end. (And we're not just talking about FOX, folks.)

Harold is also ignoring the fact that the crazy right-wing base of the Republican Party hates Jeb Bush because he let Terri Schiavo die, supports Common Core, and says not-vile things about immigrants. And they hate Rob Portman because he flipped on marriage equality. So the chances of a Bush-Portman ticket are nil. Why even discuss it?

We really must get better at this. No matter how horrible the Republicans get, and how much they doom the long-term prospects of their party, in the short run they still play as hard as ever, and for keeps. Which means no more Mr. Nice Guy, Harold. We cats HISS.

Tidbits And Cat Treats: The Two Faces Of The GOP Edition

By Zamboni

Here we are entering a major holiday week, and so much is going on! We cats are taking it easy and catching naps in front of the space heater. But we couldn't pass up the chance to comment on a few items from the headlines:

A Republican-led House committee has issued the umpteenth report on "Benghazi": There's no there there! We just had to check on our right-wing friends over at Free Republic to see how they were handling the news. As always, they were crabby and defiant. Just wait until Trey Gowdy's committee starts investigating! Then the truth will come out!

(Actually, it sounds to us as if the House Intelligence Committee went easier on Benghazi than the State Department itself, which issued 30 recommendations for security and communications improvements, which Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton implemented before leaving office. So there.)

Meanwhile, on the immigration front, yippee! Republicans have decided that Kansas Secretary of State and all-around hater "Kris Kobach" should be the face of GOP outrage over President Obama's recent executive actions on immigration. We could not be happier. Still, we're wondering why the media aren't stampeding to Rancid Pieface's door, asking whatever the hell happened to the Republicans' post-2012 "Growth and Opportunity" report.

Remember that? Here's what it said: "We must embrace and champion comprehensive immigration reform. If we do not, our Party's appeal will continue to shrink...We also believe that comprehensive immigration reform is consistent with Republican economic policies that promote job growth and opportunity for all."

What a bunch of lying hypocrites. Which makes us cats PURR.

JFK 50 + 1

"Our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal."

Lest We Furr-get: Republican Lawlessness

By Baxter

We cats were traveling yesterday and only caught the last few minutes of President Obama's address on immigration. But it wasn't long after that that we switched off the cable news talking heads in disgust.

We were already fed up that they offered no recap — why inform when you can go straight to arguing? But when MSNBC brought on a little twerp from the RNC who started his comments with "I'm not a constitutional lawyer" (when the entire Republican argument is based on constitutionality)... well, let's just say we hacked up the world's biggest hairball.

But back to that GOP talking point. We wondered: If what Obama is doing is illegal and lawless, then wasn't it unconstitutional when:

• Nixon bombed Laos?
• Ronald Reagan sold arms to Iran to fund the Contras?
• Karl Rove and "Scooter" Libby outed CIA agent Valerie Plame?
• The Worst Person Who's Ever Lived invaded Iraq, killed thousands of American soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians, all on a credit card, and all for weapons of mass destruction that didn't exist?

We're not equating last night's executive orders with those horrendous Republican acts. We're just saying that as always, the hypocritical GOP is silent on such crimes, but invents others for Presidents they don't like. And to make matters worse, the media give them a pass. All of which makes us HISS.

Disenfranchisement By Robocall

By Sniffles

We cats love any opportunity to use the word "hoosegow," and the Conservative Party up in Canada has just given us another chance. Today a little Tory creep named Michael Sona learned that he'll be hauled off to the you-know-what: He was sentenced to nine months in jail and additional 12 months' probation for election fraud.

Yep, fraud. We cats don't know what else to call it when you robocall Liberal Party voters in the 2011 federal election with false alarms that their polling places had changed. It's perverting the election process and a subversion of citizens' most cherished right. Sona actually deserves the maximum — five years — but we'll take what he got, thank you.

Funny how this sort of thing always seems to happen on the conservative side of the spectrum. As we know, here in the land of E Pluribus Unum voter suppression is a cause celebre of the Republican Party, and robocalling is just one weapon in their arsenal. Proof: A flunky for former GOP Governor Robert Ehrlich's campaign was convicted in 2011 for precisely the same thing (except those robocalls were aimed at predominantly African-American neighborhoods in Maryland's Baltimore and Prince George's counties).

What a coincidence! That direct line between Stephen Harper and Karl Rove was busy, yes? But messing with the vote makes us sick. So we cats hack up a hairball and dump our dirty litter boxes over Michael Sona's head. Enjoy the hoosegow, Mikey!

(IMAGE: What a lovely couple!)

UPDATE: Is it just us, or is Michael Sona a dead ringer for Adam Lanza?

Long Shot

By Miss Kubelik

We cats have written more about Mary Landrieu in the last week than we have in six years of blogging — and probably more than we'll ever write about her again, since Pundit World has followed today's Keystone vote by pronouncing her dead.

That may well be. Nevertheless, we have some last-ditch advice for the beleaguered Senator, since we won't see our earlier cunning plan that could not fail — well, fail.

We respectfully suggest that Landrieu, who now has completely nothing to lose, scorch the campaign trail between now and December 6 with raging, flaming populism. She needs to rag without mercy on Bill Cassidy, Piyush Jindal and all the smug Republicans who continually, mysteriously manage to convince their constituents to vote for them against their best interests.

Why shouldn't she? Louisiana is a mess. It scrapes the barrel bottom in health, education, poverty, employment, growth, you name it. Landrieu should just shamelessly tar the Republicans and their mean, wizened, punish-the-poor-and-gut-government policies for letting it get that way.

In short, go Huey Long on their ass. Go ahead, Mary. If you're heading for the exit, you might as well do it telling the truth with your head held high. (And, of course, with spunk.) We cats PURR.

Everybody (Except Rich Republicans) Should Love Obamacare. Here's Why Everybody Doesn't.

By Zamboni

On Saturday, we cats received a cheerful email from Organizing for Action, announcing that Obamacare was "open for business" again. While we are strong supporters of the ACA, that message made us less than cheerful ourselves.

Why? Because it was our first head's up that a zillion more Americans could get something that the Republicans don't want them to have — health coverage. So we'd like to ask "Team Obamacare": Why weren't you guys shouting "opening soon" from the housetops weeks and months earlier?

We said "housetops." Yes, we know that many OFAers — and maybe even people who need health insurance — spend a lot of time on the FaceThing, in the Twitterverse, and in other parts of cyberspace that we cats are too busy to bother with. But we're talking about a full-bore, mainstream hype-the-hell-out-of-it campaign, with speeches and orientations and town halls and TV spots and ice cream and balloons. Something that most of America simply cannot miss.

We know we've HISSED about Obama's lack of communication before. But we get vexed anew when we see stories like this. (Sure, it's Gallup, and Gallup pretty much sucks. But do we really have to point out that the Republicans will take a poll like this and run with it? "See, nobody likes Obamacare. Repeal!")

There's something eerily Carteresque about this administration's reluctance to brag on its good deeds. We can't get into all of the reasons here. But suffice it to say that once again, Americans don't have a clue about the great things a Democratic White House has done for them. Which makes us very sad. We cats SNIFF.

Just Because

Yes, we know that Obamacare is back open for business, and that the website is working great. But before we write any more about that, here's a picture of something else that we like.

(PHOTO: Nyein Chan Naing/European Pressphoto Agency)

Feeding Frenzy

By Baxter

Chris Christie must be feeling pretty good these days, what with all those Republican governors who got elected on November 4. We cats are sure that he sees a boost to his Presidential hopes for 2016 — never mind that A) Bridgegate has yet to play out, and B) the Republican base hates him.

Many things about Christie bother us. But one is a subject that's rarely talked about, at least not until the GOP primaries heat up: the LAP-BAND procedure he had a year ago February. Team Christie has been quite secretive about it, but if they're serious about a White House run, eventually they're going to have to release some details. (Remember the Presidential candidates' personal health reports from 2008? McCain, an elderly cancer survivor and former POW, issued a monster at 1,200 pages. The athletic, then-47-year-old Obama's was a single sheet.)

Republican primary voters might be interested to know: What were Christie's weight and vitals prior to the surgery? What are his weight and vitals now? Why did he choose the adjustable, least-effective method of the three bariatric procedures currently available? How much will he eventually lose? When will he have the band removed? Will he gain weight back? Has his life expectancy increased? And so on.

Yes, we know Christie gets all pissed off and yells when he's asked questions he doesn't want to answer, but we cats are just looking out for our friends in the other party, don'tcha know.

Meanwhile, because it's traditional for Presidential candidates to sample the primary and caucus states' local delicacies, it should be pretty interesting to see how Christie navigates the various food he'll encounter on the campaign trail. In Iowa, all GOP wannabes are simply required to stop by the Pizza Ranch for chicken, pizza and wings, and the State Fair will have corn dogs and deep-fried Twinkies, Snickers bars and bananas. New Hampshire will bring Polish sausage on a roll, plus flapjacks and maple syrup. And in South Carolina, he'll run into fried catfish, hush puppies and, of course, barbecue.

Well, perhaps Bridgegate will explode between now and the Iowa caucuses, and finish Christie off before the campaign begins. But just the same, we hope he has a plan. Perhaps Michele Bachmann can give him some pointers on taking smaller bites.

And Speaking Of Mary Landrieu...

By Sniffles

Some of our lefty friends, of whom we're very fond, are upset about Mary Landrieu's push for a Senate vote on the Keystone Pipeline. All that will do, they argue, is enrage the Democratic base — and not benefit Landrieu one bit, since her Republican opponent, also a Keystone supporter, is spearheading the same effort in the House.

We cats thought about this for a little while. And then we came up with what could be a cunning plan that cannot fail.

Congress approves the pipeline. The bill goes to President Obama, who promptly vetoes it. Senator Landrieu runs against President Obama for the rest of the election.

See? It's a total win. Obama takes a hit in a state that hates him anyway, so no skin off his nose. The pipeline dies. And going against her own President, Landrieu gets to remind Louisiana voters that she's got, as we were just saying, spunk.

It could work. Which would make us cats PURR.

Spunk

By Miss Kubelik

Pull out the smelling salts again. Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu, in a tight December runoff with Republican Bill Cassidy, has released an attack ad! Horrors!

Which is our way of saying that the GOP is whining and wailing about how awful Mary Landrieu is. We cats fail to see the problem. After all, her ad only does exactly to Cassidy what Andrew Breitbart did to Shirley Sherrod, and you know what they say about dishing it out and taking it. Besides, what has Landrieu got to lose? The DSCC has abandoned her, and Cassidy, like the other Republicans elected this year, is an idiot.

So we admire Senator Landrieu's spirit. She's got spunk, and unlike Lou Grant, we like spunk. In fact, the White House could use some.

See, when Team Obama — asked on TV about how Obamacare saves lives — fails to tout that storyline and gets all namby-pamby about how they're willing to "work with Republicans" to "fix what's wrong with the law" instead... well, Team Obama might as well just sit back and watch their President's greatest legacy erased.

The Ted Cruzes of the world must rub their hands in evil glee when they hear girly-man capitulation like that. How easy it will be to get rid of Obamacare when its own architects refuse to fight!

We cats are not quibbling with the Administration's accomplishments, of which there are many. We are furious at the lack of communication, which makes us HISS.

So, memo to the White House: The American people would not stand for a single Republican rollback if they understood everything you've done to make their lives better. From now until you pack up your desks in January 2017, show us more Mary Landrieu and less Mary Richards.

Tidbits And Cat Treats: Post-Midterm Edition

By Zamboni

It's amazing what a weekend packed with more naps and plates full of tuna will do. It brings some calming perspective. So on this chilly November night, here are some further thoughts on the debacle that was last Tuesday:

Democrats are debating whether to run more anti-Koch ads? What's to debate? Do it. We always thought the wily Mormon Harry Reid was prescient to start putting the Kochs' ugly faces on all that slimy right-wing money. So the message takes awhile to sink in? So what? Somewhere in America, there is a brilliant copywriter who will figure out how to do this.

We cats are always happy to see openly gay Republicans lose. What the heck are they doing in that party in the first place?

Awww, how sweet. The New York Times is trying to cheer us up with this: The Republican establishment may be riding high, but the teabags are furious. We cats think that the losses in Mississippi, Kansas, Kentucky, Georgia and Oregon primaries still fester in Freeper World, and the idea of a (pick one) Bush-Romney-Christie nomination in 2016 enrages them. Cue the fireworks!

Finally, let's take a moment to recognize some Democrats for fighting the good fight in a horrible year: Elizabeth Warren, who went to West Virginia for Natalie Tennant. Gwen and Bob Graham, for proving that Florida's not a total lost cause. Tom Wolf, for crushing the odious Tom Corbett in Pennsylvania. Al Franken, who won big this time! Michelle Nunn, for giving a great concession speech. And any Democrats who jumped into races they lost, just to make sure that no damn Republican ran unopposed. We cats PURR.

Virginia Keeps Its Senator With A Chin

By Baxter

Although we cats fear that we haven't seen the last of Chinless Ed Gillespie, we were happy to hear that he called Mark Warner today to concede the 2014 Virginia Senate race. Hooray!

For us, Warner's 17,000-vote lead was never in doubt — especially after Virginia's 2013 attorney general's race, which Mark Herring won by only 165. (Now, that was a close one.) Nevertheless, this is welcome news after a particularly brutal week.

We cats can rest happily now, knowing that GOTV efforts are never a waste of time. Oh, and one more thing: You're probably aware that we're not big fans of Chinless. But at least he had the grace to place today's phone call. Unlike some people we know... named "Cuccinelli."

Decision Time

By Sniffles

As if this week weren't politically fraught enough already, the Supreme Court now will have to rule on marriage equality. A federal appeals court has finally gone the other way and pronounced same-sex marriage bans constitutional in Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee.

Which leaves Anthony Kennedy, Steven Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ruth Bader Ginsburg as the batters on deck — waiting, we hope, to knock the marriage question out of the park for good and all.

Wanna hear a coincidence? It crossed our minds yesterday that the 2014 midterms might have been a partial scream of frustration from old white guys about gays getting hitched. After all, it was the first nationwide election in which anybody could express an opinion, if they had one, on the tremendous progress the country has made since Windsor. So maybe all those teabags out there were hating on Adam and Steve at the same time that they were hating on Obama.

This is making more and more sense, especially since the demographics of Tuesday's voters have come out: They were more white and more male than in 2012, with fewer young people, and smaller percentages of blacks and Hispanics. Blowback on gay rights from an electorate like that certainly could have made a difference in states like Florida, North Carolina, Arkansas, Iowa, Kentucky, Georgia and Kansas.

Oh, well. For us cats, the expansion of marriage equality has been the feel-good story of the year, and we wouldn't trade that for anything. We look forward to our gay loved ones' rights soon being settled law, for now and forever. It would make us PURR.

(IMAGE: The New Yorker)

Failure To Communicate

By Zamboni

We cats have sifted through the headlines and had a couple of naps, so we're ready to talk about the midterms again.

And because we are superior beings who refuse to live in a Romneyesque bubble, we realize we have to send some HISSES and SNARLS the Democrats' way. (Like that infuriating embarrassment, Alison Lundergan Grimes, whose speech last night was awful. How in the world do you let Mitch McConnell outdo you in the graciousness department?)

But the real objects of our disdain are the folks over at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Amazingly, the vaunted 2008/2012 election machine — and its most famous practitioner — have forgotten how to communicate. It's the only explanation we can think of for what's happened to them (and by extension, the rest of us) these last six years.

We cats have pointed out before the many ways that the Obama Administration has helped the country pick itself up and dust itself off after the debacle of the Bush/Cheney regime. We won't repeat them all again, except to wonder why it seems to be against Democratic rules to take a page from St. Ronnie Reagan's book and celebrate your success.

The glaring-est example? The Affordable Care Act. The most significant social legislation since Medicare was signed into law in March of 2010, but Team Obama never sold it to the American people, before — or, especially, after — it passed. Sure, it was going to take three years to set up and implement. But what good is the bully pulpit if you don't use it to ceaselessly remind the country about all the Obamacare benefits that were A) coming on line, and B) still in store?

Believe us cats: If the Republicans had passed the ACA, they wouldn't have shut up for a second about how wonderful it was going to be. But since the White House walked away from the sales job, Americans had no grounding in the law and why it was so fabulous. Which meant that when Republicans in the House endlessly tried to repeal it, or screamed about the website screwing up, voters had no frame of reference that allowed them to say, "Hey, shut up. This is a good thing."

This drives us mad.

Somewhere in the White House, a light bulb needs to go on that you can't keep doing the same stuff and expect better results. That goes for messaging more than anything else. But it also goes for Congressional relations, for delivering stump speeches that always sound the same, and for giving 10-minute answers at press conference when a simple "Yes, we fucked up" will suffice. And it also goes for thinking that at some point, the campaign is over and you can relax. Sorry, Mr. President: The campaign never ends.

Wipeout

By Miss Kubelik

All righty, then, the Republican wave finally materialized last night. It sure was slow getting here, but once it arrived, goodness gracious. (One bright spot: Minnesota, that island of sanity in a sea of craziness.) We cats are still picking up the pieces, and will have more to say as further trouble ensues.

But in the meantime, we're struck by the number of headlines we're seeing, one right after another, that drive home the true darkness lurking beneath: "The most expensive Senate match-up in US history," "Tens of millions of dollars in negative advertising," "One of the most expensive races this cycle."

Yep, it's the money — Koch money, Adelman money, and other money that came from God knows what right winger where. (And only God, since the donors will never have to be revealed.) So first and foremost, we can lay this debacle at the feet of Citizens United. Thanks for nothing, John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia and Samuel Alito.

We cats were hoping that the Democratic ground game would be able to make up for all the conservative spending. But now we're afraid that after yesterday, the Kochs and their ilk will be emboldened and double down. Which makes us HISS — and fear for our country.

And Don't Forget That Blankety-Blank Photo ID

By Baxter

We cats are off to do our civic duty, and then will spend the rest of the day helping humans get to the polls. Democratic humans, of course.

Meanwhile, after some bad numbers this weekend, now suddenly when we look at the headlines on sites like this, everything's tied again. Yes, including Iowa.

We're wondering why the highly paid morons on Talking Head TV haven't been asking why. It's the sixth year of a re-elected President's administration. His party is supposed to be wiped out big, and we all should have been able to see it coming weeks and weeks ago. But a zillion key races are too close to call.

The media really need to break loose from their lazy narratives and start doing some substantive, break-from-the-pack analysis. And oh yes, reporting. We cats HISS. (Go vote!)

P.S. Speaking of Iowa, can we cats just say that we think Tom Harkin's comment about Joni Ernst was right on the money? Ernst is "offended"? Too bad. We're offended that she refused to talk to The Des Moines Register.

Fasten Your Seat Belts, Senate Republicans, You're Going To Have A Bumpy Ride

By Sniffles

Election Day isn't until tomorrow, but "Ted" Cruz is already pledging to wreak havoc in a Republican-controlled Senate.

And we cats mean wreak. As lefties and Democrats, we are appalled by the prospect of the Senate defunding Obamacare, rolling back environmental protections and restricting reproductive rights. But the guys and gals in the storied upper chamber who have "Rs" next to their names should be worried, too. Because "Ted" is not going to play nice.

In fact, in true teabag fashion, he won't even say he'll support Mitch McConnell for Harry Reid's job. What, promote his Minority Leader? Tish-tosh, says "Ted."

So we cats are left wondering what sort of fratricidal bloodbath the GOP will have on its hands should it take the Senate tomorrow (or in December, or January). On one side will be McConnell and his "establishment" cronies like McCain, Cornyn, Corker and Alexander. On the other will be the right-wing nutjobs — Cruz, Lee, Johnson and the rest of the clown car. Who are they going to run against Mitch instead? Deb Fisher? (She'd be the radical choice: She's a baby teabag, a woman, and nobody knows her.)

But we're getting ahead of ourselves. Let us simply say that, should things not go our way in the next 24 hours, we cats will console ourselves by saying, "Let the games begin."

After all, don't forget: This "Ted" Cruz stuff wouldn't even be happening if not for — you guessed it — John McCain. It was Sarah Palin who parachuted into Texas to boost Cruz in the 2012 Republican primary. By giving Palin a national profile — and canonization by the whackos — McCain has ironically ensured that the Senate in which he has served for 27 years will soon descend into chaos. We cats HISS, but we also PURR.

What Harry Should Say (And What They'll Do)

By Zamboni

Gee, those Senate polls are looking terrible, aren't they? Although we cats believe there's still too much weirdness at play to make the ever-repulsive Mitch McConnell automatic Majority Leader on Tuesday, it's kinda discouraging to see bad numbers on the last weekend before Election Day.

We may not know anything until December or even January. But whenever Harry Reid holds his first press conference after the Republicans take over the upper chamber, we hope he gets asked this question: "Is your mission over the next two years to keep the Republican Senate from accomplishing anything? Because that's what the GOP has done to you."

And if Harry got that question, and answered it honestly (that is, "yes"), he would of course be raked over the coals — not just by Republicans but by the credulous talking heads in Pundit World.

We cats have never understood why nobody in the Beltway opinion sphere has ever pointed out how Democrats, smarting from a good whuppin' in 1980, put the country ahead of partisanship and worked with Ronald Reagan and the GOP to get stuff done — while the Republicans, in their 2009-Inaugural secret dinner, buoyed their spirits by deciding to block Obama at every turn, the welfare of the nation be damned.

To thump their chests as uber-patriots for so long, and then to do that? We thought the media lived to expose hypocrisy, so we don't know what they're waiting for. Until the GOP gets called on their treachery, we cats HISS.