Friday Quick Hits

by Deacon Blues

Some items to chew on for the weekend:

Keystone Pipeline
Of course the House GOP rushed to approve the Keystone XL pipeline today, with almost 30 House Democratic votes along for the ride. It now goes to the Senate next week, where Mitch McConnell safely predicts it will pass there as well, again, with perhaps a half-dozen Democratic votes along for the ride. Politically, there's nothing noteworthy about this. These House and Senate Democrats are making safe votes, knowing that Boehner and McConnell lack the necessary votes at this time to override Obama's eventual veto. Once Obama vetoes the bill and survives a failed override attempt, we'll see if the president's negotiating skills have improved.

Romney Wants To Run
Despite Jeb's efforts to freeze out the Mittster, Romney today gave him the finger and indicated he may run anyway. With both Romney and Bush going after the same money class, and with Christie in a delusional state that he's still a viable candidate for the same financial base regardless of his skeletons, we'll be assured of months of entertainment watching the GOP's "adults" destroy each other.

Mitch Is A Laughingstock
The same man who obstructed all attempts to make the economy stronger these last six years now says with a straight face his ascension to Majority Leader is the real reason the economy has been doing better. Please, can we agree that anytime Mitch McConnell opens his mouth on the economy, that he's likely spewing bullshit? And while we're at it, we can also disregard anything Stephen Moore of Heritage and Diana Furchtgott-Roth of the Manhattan Institure ever say again about economics.

French Fallout
I have no idea why the French intelligence and law enforcement services didn't have the Charlie Hebdo killers on their radar screens, like we did here in America. But if Al Qaeda doesn't think that every one of their suspected assets in Europe won't be rounded up in the coming months, they are delusional.