Sen. Cory Booker just finished talking for 25 hours and 5 minutes in the Senate. His theme was “I hate President Trump.” I confess, I heard 10 seconds of the speech and decided it was too stupid to listen to any more of it. The part I heard: “The President doesn’t seem to care about people who are shackled to debt!” What an astounding statement in a 25 hour rant that mostly focused on how heartless the DOGE effort to cut government waste and fraud is! Every single American is “shackled” to a $36 trillion (and growing) national debt that exploded under the last Democratic administration, and it can never be addressed as long as the attitude is “well, what’s the point of cutting just a few million (or billion) dollars?” The US pays $2.6 billion per day on interest payments for that debt and receives nothing for it
Booker began his filibuster—not to stop a bill, mind you, just to show how much his party hates Trump—by saying, “These are not normal times in our nation.” “Not normal” is one of the consultant-scripted talking points the Democrats have been using against Trump since the 2024 campaign. “And they should not be treated as such in the United States Senate. The threats to the American people and American democracy are grave and urgent, and we all must do more to stand against them.” Ah! The “threat to democracy” mantra from the party that inflicted a fake President and a selected-by-fiat Presidential candidate on the nation! Later, Booker used the “Constitutional crisis” cliché, without explaining exactly what it was in the Constitution his party is concerned about.
Booker also raved about non-existent cuts to Social Security and Medicare. Heck, if he was going to make stuff up, he should have been more creative than those old claims. You know, like saying that Trump wants to put in effect the same reforms as the rebel president of San Marcos in Woody Allen’s “Bananas”…
I haven’t seen the transcript, but by all reports Booker never included any condemnation of the domestic terrorism being directed at Elon Musk by his party members who were the main audience for his “I hate Trump” orgy. So far, no Democrat has said the attacks on Teslas, their owners and Tesla dealerships are wrong. Maybe those are all considered “normal” by Booker.
“Your strength, your fortitude, your clarity has just been nothing short of amazing and all of America is paying attention to what you’re saying,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said as he asked Booker a question on the Senate floor. “All of America needs to know there’s so many problems, the disastrous actions of this administration.” Booker, like Schumer, has no solutions to those problems except ranting ad infinitum so no business could get done in the Senate.
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries entered the Senate chamber to watch Booker and called the New Jersey Senator’s stunt “an incredibly powerful moment.” Why? Well, Booker had broken the record of Senator Strom Thurmond when he tried to filibuster the civil rights bill back in 1964. But at least old Strom was trying to accomplish something, wrong-headed though he was. There was no end objective to Booker’s speech at all, except to get an entry in the Guinness Book of Records. Jeffries also explained that Booker was “fighting to preserve the American way of life and our democracy.” By talking, making stuff up, and using the same old fear-mongering tactics that lost his party the election? Good luck with that strategy.
I’ll give Booker this: his silly, impotent speech was better than holding up little paddles.
Barely.
Addendum: This morning the New York Post has an editorial: “Cory Booker’s sad stunt epitomizes Democrats’ empty agenda.” Quote: “Such symbolic performances are as onanistic as politics gets, but that’s where Dems are right now.” Yup. Meanwhile, two Democratic newspapers in New York City as of 8:30 am The Morning After don’t mention Booker’s Filibuster to Nowhere at all. From this I derive that the editors don’t think his futile gesture makes their party look very good. Why else wouldn’t a record-breaking performance be considered “fit to print”?
Ethics Alarms 
Think I will give up. I wrote a long comment
as did I, and could not get it posted. Frustrating
The comment is finally up. Note to all: if this happens to you, email me the comment and I’ll get it up. I apologize to unabashedhonestlyed4bc0122c and everyone else this happens to. I’m trying to get WP to fix it.
Email it to me, and I’ll put it into THIS comment.
“Not normal” is one of the consultant-scripted talking points the Democrats have been using against Trump since the 2024 campaign.
Did these people even try normal opposition methods?
And, a minor point, I’d say the Dems have been using the revolutionary’s excuse ever since Trump’s 2016 candidacy became plausible.
I wonder why they chose that circle.
I watched the last hour. I agree with most of what you wrote BUT the filibuster was nonetheless impressive. Did not hear DJT’s name once during that time, but did hear a lot about John Lewis. Did it block legislation Sen Booker was against? Was there actually anything of great substance to it? Could it be categorized as “Trump deranged?” No. No. Yes. However, it was a great piece of perseverance theater; a throwback to a different time. One might say it is an exercise in American century theater. It is also meaningful simply that it bested the record set by Storm Thurmond and tied the record of Mr Smith. I would liken it to endurance sports theater. Not compelling. Not exciting. Not substantive. Not something to watch throughout its entire length. Yet, an impressive accomplishment and not entirely without meaning. He did best Strom Thurmond’s record in that Senator’s failed attempt to stand in the way of civil rights legislation, and tied Mr Smith’s perhaps more principled stand. Impressive. A little like Bob Gibson’s 14 inning complete game against the Padres, except that Gibson won the game and Booker won nothing. So, I guess Sen Booker’s endurance record is more akin to Leon Cadore and Joe Oeschger both pitching a 26-inning complete game that ended in a 1-1 tie. Impressive but unproductive. That was 1920, during the American century, as was Mr Smith’s feat in 1929. Sen Booker’s endurance record harkens to that era
I don’t know what’s going on. Sigh. I’ll get back on line with WP again. None of the comments you refer to are in SPAM or pending, which is where missing comment usually appear. The short comments got posted on their own. %$#!@!
Jack,
As another issue with Word Press, to add to your growing list, pushing backspace deletes the entire paragraph occasionally. This paragraph here has been written three times due to the issue.
I have been getting around this by typing my entire comment in Word, but sometimes that is not an option for me and I comment using my phone, which when the problem occurs most often. I know that after crafting a paragraph or two, just to find a spelling error that must be fixed, that half of the time deletes the whole paragraph, I get frustrated and skip commenting.
Obviously not your fault, but if you could mention it when you are dealing with Word Press next, I would appreciate it.
That one happens to me while I’m trying to compose posts too. If I x-out of the post fast enough, usually its still in the draft.
That happens when I type on my phone. I figured it was an iPhone issue.
-Jut
“As another issue with Word Press, to add to your growing list, pushing backspace deletes the entire paragraph occasionally.”
That issue is specifically SHIFT-BACKSPACE, which will essentially delete the entire paragraph. I’ve run into it a number of times when typing something in all caps or when I just don’t release the SHIFT key fast enough.
The work-around, is that you can use CTRL-Z to “undo” this deletion and immediately get back what you typed.
–Dwayne
In baseball terms, though, isn’t the analogy a showboating performance in a Spring Training exhibition game?
More than even the pathetic “town halls” Bernie and AOC are conducting in allegedly GOP districts in front of most likely paid attendees, Booker’s pathetic stunt simply demonstrates how absolutely bereft of power the Dems are at present. Booker might as well have concluded with the current, trite phrase, something along the lines of, “Other than that, I got nothin’.”
Or, perhaps Don Quixote raving at windmills.
jvb
How’s that proverb go again?…
“It’s better to be thought a fool than…” – something…
I think a good number of people have pulled back the veil on “the great and powerful Oz” that is the Democratic Party/Media (since they’re one and the same now) and can see the truth: they are freakishly little men and women who are bent on funneling money to all their friends (since that’s what a great number of the DOGE-cut programs really are), are bent on taking away the power of the citizenry (since that’s what taking so much of our money ultimately does), and are bent on supporting violence, vandalism, and destruction when it’s focused at anything deemed “Trumpian” (since that’s what they advocate).
Sen. Booker is just another largely impotent big mouth attached to a small brain that repeatedly shouts “pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.” Now, go eat a sandwich and give your mouth something else to do.
Oh, I know him better than most here. I worked through his entire administration and the man cannot talk TO people, only AT them. He was given to stupid stunts, like participating in a rescue that the NFD was handling and shoveling a driveway himself when a constituent said otherwise his elderly dad was going to do it himself. He was also given to sulking, like at the beginning of his second term when the municipal council shot down his proposal to abolish the Department of Water and Sewer and instead create a Municipal Utilities Authority which would have its own bond issuing authority, since the city’s bond authority was all used up. He was also into making everyone miserable, like when he started furloughing and then putting the whole city on 4-day work week to save money. Cory Booker isn’t interested in anyone but Cory Booker.
So, Cory Booker furloughed public employees? I thought that was cruel and unusual punishment. Did he not even offer to teach them to code?
You have my deepest sympathies.
Did Cory Booker wanted to emulate the movie “Mr. Smith goes to Washington”? Looks to me that this filibuster has not only historic and stupid, but also irrelevant. Nothing but empty grandstanding. I believe it was Frank Zappa who once said that politicians are people who keep talking until they start coughing.
In the past long filibusters where used to stop legislation by continuing the debate. And that meant that as long as the measure was in debate no other legislative activity could be considered by the Senate, but it also required that the filibustering senators needed to keep the floor by continuing to speak. Senator Huey Long recited Shakespeare and read out recipes for “pot-likkers” during one of his very long filibusters (Wikipedia). Other Senator read out of the Bible when they ran out of meaningful thing to say. The rules of the Senate have changed since, rendering this type of filibuster obsolete.
I cannot resist to add another cultural reference, namely a painting “The Opposition” from William Gropper in 1942, in order to illustrate that boring grandstanding by politicians is not something new.
According to Senate.gov:
The Senate tradition of unlimited debate has allowed for the use of the filibuster, a loosely defined term for action designed to prolong debate and delay or prevent a vote on a bill, resolution, amendment, or other debatable question.
In this episode of Booker’s “Endurance Sports Theater” was he filibustering, or is this just an opportunity for media to abuse words and make them useless?
Was it a filibuster to nowhere?
Was it a show of force?
Was it a challenge to Trump to run for Senate after his second presidential term is finished?
Wasn’t it Democrats that had a strong desire during the MMA (Mobile Mannequin Administration) to kill the device?
Funny how that works out…
As an operational suggestion; on those occasions when I post in WordPress I tend to either compose in Word and Paste without formatting into WordPress, or copy from WordPress into Word to check spelling and grammar.
Works for me (usually!)