Today’s Republican Party Update

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Dave Weigel:

If you were expecting the Republican-run House of Representatives to hurry on a patch to the Voting Rights Act, what’s wrong with you? The Judiciary Committee’s Constitution subcommittee met today to talk this over, and the consensus was that the leftover parts of the VRA would work out alright.

Of course that was the consensus. There was never the slightest chance that they’d reinstate preclearance in any way, shape, or form. I confess that I’m mystified that anyone ever thought otherwise. But then again, I’m endlessly mystified that there are so many people who, even now, still don’t seem to understand the nature of the modern Republican Party. They would (a) never do anything to the VRA that might benefit Democrats, and (b) they would never do anything which tacitly admits that racism still exists. (Except for anti-white racism, of course. You know, the real kind.) Put those together and the chance of action on the VRA from Republicans was always zero.

And as long as you’re over in Weigel-land, you might as well check out the latest non-bombshell from Darrell Issa in the IRS scandal. The whole IRS affair has dwindled away to nothing over the past few weeks as we’ve learned more about what really happened, and obviously Issa just can’t stand that. So he promised fireworks today. Fireworks, I tell you! But guess what?

What’s that? You’ve already guessed? Hmmph. But I suppose that wasn’t very hard as Final Jeopardy clues go, was it? Click here if you still want the details.

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AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

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If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

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