-by NoahWhat is the price for integrity? Can you sell something you never had? Bob Corker isn't the first $enator, of any party, to sell his vote while selling out his constituents, and we know he won't be the last. But what Corker has just done is a glaring, prime example of how things get done in Washington, all too often to our detriment as individuals and as a country. Corker's action even has its own name: The Corker Kickback. It seems that Corker has not only put his party before his country but put himself first as well. A few weeks ago, Corker, in an interview with NBC's Chuck Todd said about the Trump/Ryan Tax Scam 2017 bill:
If it looks like we're adding one penny to the deficit, I'm not going to support it. It's the greatest threat to our nation.
Apparently, in Corker's villainous tiny pea brain, the price of the nation is the same as his price and threats to the nation mean nothing if he can profit from them by asking for a last minute self-enriching provision to be added to the final bill. He has switched his vote even though the tax scam adds $1.4 Trillion to our deficit. That's a lot of pennies. This time, not wanting to face anyone directly, he just quietly issued the following statement:
I've decided to support the tax reform package that we will vote on next week.
Senile $enator Orrin Hatch of Utah says it is he that wrote the controversial provision, a provision that gives large financial advantages to those who own real estate LLCs. It just so happens that Hatch gets a large bulk of his bribes, er, "campaign contributions" from the real estate industry. He also bogusly claims that the provision was always there, a claim that the International Business Times calls "factually false"; aka a bullshit lie. Imagine that!By the time you read this post, the deed will probably have been done and the middle and working classes of this country will be getting a lump of coal from the republicans for Christmas. Not only that but the new tax scam gets rid of the Affordable Care Act's mandates, effectively terminating insurance for at least 13 million of our fellow citizens while raising premiums for the rest of us. If you find a tumorous lump, you can keep it. In fact, you can watch it grow as fast as the bank accounts of people like Bob Corker and the Republican Party's benefactors while you have no money for medical care.So, one has to ask, what price did this lowlife Corker sell his vote for and sell out his constituents for? Was Corker promised a job as the new Secretary Of State when Rex Tillerson is gone? Is Corker planning on running for president if the country wakes up in time to the evil that is Trump or Trump simply ideally chokes to death on a bad fast food taco and Diet Coke combo on live TV by 2020? If that's what Corker is thinking, he will need to be in the good graces of the Republican Party and their donors who said they would cut the party off if they didn't pass the Tax Scam they wanted.Or, did Corker just sell his vote for the aforementioned self-enriching real estate LLC provision, or were additional cash "provisions" waved in his face? A lap dance from a Capitol Hill hooker, perhaps? Can you just see him feverishly salivating in some meeting with Mitch McConnell and some slithering lobbyist as they waved hundred dollar bills in his face?Corker was the last hold out Repug. He was the only republican to vote against the $enate version of the Tax Scam in the preliminary, pre-reconciliation vote. He denies knowing about the provision that amounts to personal tax breaks being slipped into the bill at the last minute. He even has the chutzpah to say he hasn't even read the bill. It's just a Christmas Miracle! But, think about what I just pointed out: Corker hasn't read the bill but he changed his yes vote to a no vote. Something got him to change his vote. Meanwhile, his explanation amounts to the Sgt. Shultz "I know nothing. I see nothing" approach; not unlike his boy Trumpanzee who says the same thing about collusion with Russia.Corker is not alone in the Republican Party's banana republic style of law creation. Texas $enator John Cornyn got a nice midnight provision slipped in for people who invest in master limited partnerships in the oil and gas pipeline business. $enator Rafael "Ted" Cruz" is one of many $enators who will benefit from that. House Speaker Paul Ryan is one of the vermin who will benefit from the last minute real estate LLC provision. Oh, and what is Trump's main business? Shocking, eh? These and other provisions will mean multi, multi-millions in passive income and deductions for numerous $enators and Congre$$cretin$. Personally, I'd love to know what $enator Susan Collins of Maine got. After all, she was pissed after the pre-reconciliation vote when it dawned on her that Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan had lied to her about a mechanism to cap the inevitability of rising local property taxes that will result because of this scam. What made her look the other way? And, as I mentioned in one of my meme posts the other night, $enator Marco Rubio of Florida sold himself for less than a Capitol Hill prostitute gets. It takes a lot to fail at being a whore, but, I will give Rubio credit. At least, he held out for something, an increase in the child tax credit, that, if only on paper, has the appearance of helping other people. Which is worse? Which is more cynical and evil? You decide. I'd throw them all into a vat of lye until nothing was left but their gold cufflinks and Rolexes.One day, we may see the master list of what all of these scum got for selling us out so their $$$ gravy train will keep going. It won't do us any good by that point. Our only option will lie in the world of revenge.
