Congress Now Blaming Obama For Its Embarrassing Override Of His Veto

[TomCADem]

Source: Huffington Post

WASHINGTON — On Wednesday, Congress was so determined to pass a law to sue Saudi Arabia that it overrode President Barack Obama’s veto. But possible backlash against America had top Republican leaders looking for someone else to blame Thursday. And they appear to have settled on Obama.

The Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act allows victims of the 9/11 attacks to sue the kingdom for its alleged, but unproven, support of the hijackers who flew planes into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

Opponents had argued that the bill was caving in to conspiracy theorists and that it would raise the specter of other nations hauling the United States into court for things it actually does — such as killing civilians in drone strikes. The White House called the override the “single most embarrassing thing that the United States Senate has done” in decades.

* * *

Before criticism started blowing up around the world over JASTA, Republicans accused Obama of doing too much to kill the bill they are now worried about. And Cornyn in particular was angry about it. He said so in April, on the Senate floor, just before Obama went to meet with the Saudis.

Read more: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/congress-now-blaming-obama-for-embarrassing-override-of-his-veto_us_57edacd1e4b082aad9ba8595?section=&

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Amazing. Republicans attack President Obama before the bill trying to kill it. Then, after they override his veto, Republicans attack President Obama for not trying hard enough to kill the bill.

[underpants]

1. McConnel actually said "failure to communicate"?

And then...


“I think it was just a ball dropped,” McConnell added. “I wish the president — I hate to blame everything on him, and I don’t — but it would have been helpful had he, uh, we had a discussion about this much earlier than last week.”

[CincyDem]

2. Because, ya know, we always make so much progress when we discuss things. n/t

[IADEMO2004]

3. Is McConnell competing with Trump in a let-shit-fall-out-my-mouth contest?

[Marthe48]

4. Incompetent

McConnell on down to Cornyn and every Republican in-between. There are 53 Lawyers in the Senate and 160 lawyers in the House. How long did they have to research the bill, consider ramifications, make a rational, sane decision? Months and months. But I imagine all the stupid hearings over Benghazi and email distracted their eenie weenie minds.

[allan01]

5. o come off it !!!! geeze

get off your dariairs and do your blooming job.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. Republicans are pulling election stunt here

Blame Obama so they can rally their base against Obama

and Democrats, not wanting to be blamed for siding with Obama
went along with it

Total CYA election posturing

And this is not even a prime election year issue for undecideds

IMHO anyway

[cprise]

7. ...

Call it "globalization".

[mountain grammy]

8. It really makes me want to grab Mitch

by the throat and just beat him up.. I swear, they take incompetence to a whole new level.

[smirkymonkey]

23. I would be happy to assist you.

I can't even tell you how much I hate that effing creep.

[Vilis Veritas]

9. I kind of predicted this yesterday in the original thread.

I just knew they would find a way to blame the president if there was backlash.

smh...

[goldent]

10. Does anyone care?

[alcibiades_mystery]

11. Morons

Everyone who voted for or supported this bill at any level is a schmuck, an idiot, or a coward.

[Missn-Hitch]

13. 97 to effing 1 in the senate. Unbelievable!!

[JoePhilly]

18. Notice that the 1 was Harry Reid.

Why?

Because he is the leader of the Dems in the Senate. All of the other Dems played along and voted with the GOP intentionally, because they all saw this stunt for what it was. They let it pass so that the GOP leadership would end up squirming immediately after.

Reid's single vote tells you where the Dems REALLY are. Obama and the Dems played the GOP once again.

[Missn-Hitch]

20. If they were going to let the override happen

then they should have did it with as few Democrats as possible. 66 - 32.

I don't know - it still gives the shitbags ammo.

"The Democrats voted for it too!"

[JoePhilly]

21. The American people liked the bill ... hell, DU members wanted it to pass.

Any Dem who voted against it would have been crucified in their home state. And the people would have fallen for it. "Rah Rah ... sue Saudi Arabia!!!!"

Now ... the GOP has a problem. The GOP owns the Congress and its up to them to fix this bill.

Dems can simply stand back and let them squirm.

[Missn-Hitch]

22. Okay, I feel a little better. Cheers!

[Egnever]

28. You shouldn't

Dems are responsible for this. They could have and should have stopped the override with safe seats.

[Missn-Hitch]

42. But like JoePhilly said, the republicans would have hit them on it.

These are not people you can reason with.

I can hear the ads now, "Why are democrats protecting the country of the 9/11 terrorists?"

[Egnever]

44. So what?

They would have been right. Now they are spineless instead. That is somehow better?

The republicans can now point at them and say they all voted for it as well. The override should not have passed. There is no excuse for it and we will all pay for it just as we did with the IWR.

Can you hear the add the republicans wanted Iraqis to sue us for invading Iraq?

[Missn-Hitch]

45. Believe me friend, I hear what you are saying.

I am torn.

Enjoying your dialogue with JoePhilly. I should have read those first before replying.

Cheers.

[Egnever]

27. Weak. Only 8 dems up for re election this cycle

44 total in the senate 46 if you count the two independents that caucus with the dems.

So 36 of them could have safely voted against the over ride which would have been enough to kill the override. A veto over ride requires 2/3 of the senate to pass.

[JoePhilly]

29. The goal was not to kill the override ... the goal was to allow it.

If the bill failed to pass via override, the GOP would claim the Dems (all of the Dems) killed it because they wanted to protect the terrorists.

This tactic ... and that's what it was, a tactic ... prevented it.

The GOP needed the bill to fail because of the Dems for their stunt to work.

And that's why you now hear GOP leaders getting all upset. Republicans stepped in their own trap.

[Egnever]

30. So now we are held hostage to republican bullshit?

Sorry that is not good politics.

And the republicans now look good because they are upset over it and the dems are just fine with it.


You can keep trying to spin this but this was a fucked up move by the Dems and we are now stuck with the consequences. Exactly the same as the IWR vote.

Hillary is paying for that bullshit vote to this day. Somehow you think this will be better? You need to take off the blue blinders.

[JoePhilly]

31. We aren't held to anything.

The GOP leadership now has to publicly agree with Obama. Which they hate more than tax increases.

Dems can simply say they are very open to improving the bill.

Problem solved.

How exactly is Hillary suffering?

She's kicking Trump's ass and he's tweeting about beauty queens and sex tapes.

You might want to give up the effort to find dark clouds in a clear sky.

[Egnever]

32. Trump stood in the debate and said she ran down to vote for it proudly

And she can't refute it. It cost her dearly last go around and it is still costing her today.

[JoePhilly]

33. What's that got to do with the issue at hand?

Oh wait ... you are wrong about the latest vote ... so you have switched topics ... a topic that was going to put Bernie over the top.

Which of course never happened.

Obama and the Dems just punked the GOP leadership in Congress, and Hillary is kicking Trump's ass up and down the street.

You've got nothing.

[Egnever]

35. Hahah

Yea that's what hillary thought when she cast the IWR vote and that worked out perfectly.

Bernie was a weak candidate. A good guy but a weak candidate. Still he came close part of that was because bernie could point at that IWR vote as an example of poor judgment.

This is no different. We have not seen the fall out for this yet but we will and when we do all of thos dems are going to be vulnerable because of it. Short term gain for long term pain and horrible leadership.

[Egnever]

37. Hillary didn't vote for this nonsense thankfully

She would have fallen for the same bait again more than likely.


How am I wrong about the latest vote?

[Old Vet]

34. Harry Ried was probably the only one other then the president to read the F-ing bill

[Egnever]

36. It wouldn't surprise me a bit.

[Marthe48]

39. And Reid is retiring

I'll miss him. He is canny.

[Missn-Hitch]

12. What the f*** is going on? Can we just let them secede?

I read the article and, well....it is just too bizarre.

I hope it's a crushing, landslide defeat for the g.O.p. I hope.

[truthisfreedom]

14. He fucking vetoed it.

He. Fucking. Vetoed. It.

What else did he have to do? He's been threatening to veto it all along. He's been warning them all along.

They're fucking deaf. They deserve exactly what they get.

[Historic NY]

15. In the rush to make Obama fail they bit their own tails.......

if any lawsuits are now filed they will look like idiots.

[Marthe48]

40. Someone will make it hard to sue

It'll be so hard to get a case into a court, this law will be a waste of ink. And taxpayers' money.

President Obama and most, not all, Democratic Senators and reps really do have our backs. The ones I want to praise are knowledgeable, savvy, smart and can out-think and outmaneuver any Republican, any day, any time.

[Egnever]

16. Republicans are being ridiculous but

What are the Dems excuse. The Senate over rode the veto unanimously. The only no vote was Harry Reid.

The house vote was better but not much

[JoePhilly]

19. Obama took all the initial political heat.

Now the GOP leaders are FORCED to rework this stunt of a bill.

And the Dems played along, thus avoiding the political fallout the GOP intended for them.

[Egnever]

24. So they played political games?

That is a pretty weak excuse.

[JoePhilly]

25. New to politics are you?

Dems would have been crucified for voting against this ... hell, much of DU was pissed that Obama planned to veto it.

So the Dems stepped back, and let Obama (and Reid) stand against it.

No one can claim the the Dem member of their state "protects terrorists", which is what would have happened.

Now, the GOP is stuck holding the bag. They knew from the start the bill was a political stunt. That was the entire point.

So what happened? The GOP tried to set a POLITICAL trap. And the Dems found a POLITICAL solution.

Politicians playing politics ... GASP!!!!!!!

[Egnever]

26. At the expense of the country

Just like the Iraq vote.

Yay Dems once again we get fucked so they can keep their office. The original vote is excusable the veto over ride is not.

Pretty easy to defeat the over ride in the Senate with safe seats.

Someone is new to politics it's not me

[TomCADem]

41. Giving the GOP a Free Pass?

They have a majority in both chambers. President Obama did his part in vetoing the bill, which many folks here supported. McConnell and Ryan really can't blame Obama for a bill that they passed over his veto.

[Egnever]

43. Nope

But the Dems could have stopped it and chose not to.

The GOP looks ridiculous trying to blame Obama for it but the dems played politics with an issue there will be fall out from. It is going to be very hard for them to point fingers at the republicans when they all voted for it as well.

I get it. It was a poisonous vote. A blatant attempt to play election season politics. At some point you have to put the country ahead of your seat.

One of the moments I am most proud of the dems for is voting for the ACA that vote was sure to lose people seats and it did but many voted for it anyway. I was sickened when they ran away from it in the next cycle instead of defending it but at least they did the right thing initially.

Leadership is not following what the mob wants it is moving the mob to your position. The mob is very often very wrong. It is why we are a republic in the first place.

This vote on the Dems side was cowardly especially the override vote. There will be repercussions from this. Sadly even though the Pukes created this situation they are now talking about fixing it meanwhile the dems are silent. Sure the pukes look stupid blaming Obama for their vote. That doesn't save us from having to deal with the consequences.

Obama tried and congressional Dems caved instead of standing up for what is right.

[rocktivity]

17. Which is why Obama vetoed it in the first place, duh!

The "Rope-A-Dope Kid" strikes again!


rocktivity

[Bernardo de La Paz]

38. Headline lies. Republicans, not Congress, blame Obama. Such a typical media lie about "Congress". nt

[LiberalLovinLug]

46. "EMBARRASSING"?

Matter of opinion. Sure an inside the bubble "Senior Congressional Reporter" coins it this way.

I look at it as Washington inadvertently stumbled into doing the right thing. On the left, Democrats wanted to defend victims rights, and some segment also still wants to get to the truth surrounding Saudi ties to 9/11. On the right, Republicans of the libertarian bent also have been whispering CT about 9/11, combined with the Repukes MO of simply doing the opposite of whatever Obama wants just to piss him off. So Thanks Obama.

The perfect storm.

OMG! maybe one day the US will actually be made to answer for some illegal invasion or coup attempt, torture, rendition, war crimes etc..!!! Well....not so much, as they will simply ignore any case like that or work around it. But its the thought that counts..at least a bit.

Obama doing his best in his last days to protect his soft landing into the corporate world with this veto to protect the MIC and the Corporocracy in future, and for the same reason his shilling of the chilling TPP. And yes, he has done mostly good things, but these two actions are glaringly transparent. I get it, he wants to set his family up the best he can monetarily for their future, but its still tough to watch.

[cprise]

47. But the reactions here are highly entertaining...

People behaving more like elitist Party hacks than Congress. Now that says something about DU in Campaign Mode.



BTW, commenters here may be interested to know that foreign corporations sue governments all the time. Its called "free trade" and "globalization", of which Obama is a key promoter.

And there is already a precedent for individuals being allowed to sue foreign governments.

[whistler162]

48. Obama, "Don't light that match. Don't light that match."

BOOM

Congress, "You never told us it would blow up!"