#Tim Walberg

[phoenixyfriend]

"Biden is just as bad as the Republicans--"

A Republican House Rep. called for no aid and bombing Gaza like Nagasaki and Hiroshima yesterday.

Like yes, Biden is signing off on way too much military aid to Israel. This is in fact a very bad thing. But he is also (at least in theory), pressuring Israel to increase the amount of aid that it allows across the border.

Meanwhile:

Congressmember Tim Walberg of Michigan made the comment during a recent town hall event. Rep. Tim Walberg: “We shouldn’t be spending a dime on humanitarian aid. It should be like Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Get it over quick.” After facing widespread criticism, Congressmember Tim Walberg, who is a former pastor, issued a statement claiming he was not advocating for the use of nuclear weapons in Gaza. (Src)

Like. That's worse. You understand how that's worse, right?

You understand how pressuring the Dems, while having them in power, is more effective than allowing the GOP to get more seats, right?

Please tell me you understand how the GOP is worse.

[theivorybilledwoodpecker]

From AlJazeera: US lawmaker says Gaza should be treated ‘like Nagasaki and Hiroshima’

A US lawmaker has been captured on video invoking the atomic bombings of Japan’s Nagasaki and Hiroshima as an example for how to bring a “quick” end to the war in Gaza.In a video posted on X, Tim Walberg, a Republican who represents Michigan in the House of Representatives, can be heard telling a town hall that the conflict should be treated like the Japanese cities were during World War II.

“We shouldn’t be spending a dime on humanitarian aid. It should be like Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Get it over quick,” Walberg said.

Walberg’s spokesman Mike Rorke told Detroit Free Press that the Congressman was using a metaphor and has “great empathy for the innocent people in Gaza who have been thrust into this situation due to the attack carried out by Hamas” on October 7.

“During his community gathering, he clearly uses a metaphor to support Israel’s swift elimination of Hamas, which is the best chance to save lives long-term and the only hope at achieving a permanent peace in the region,” the spokesman was quoted as saying.

Every time I think I can't be surprised by how blatantly evil US politicians are, I'm proved wrong.

I mean, I know many otherd have said equally horrific things, but it never ceases to shock me.

[tomorrowusa]

In addition to being the dictator party and the abortion police party, the GOP is becoming the "kill the gays" party.

In a little-noticed Oct. 8 speech in Uganda, Rep. Tim Walberg (R-MI) urged that nation to stand behind its new Anti-Homosexuality Act, which includes the death penalty. Walberg’s remarks came at Uganda’s National Prayer Breakfast. His trip to attend the event was paid for by the secretive U.S. group behind the National Prayer Breakfast, congressional filings show. As the keynote speaker of the Entebbe event, Walberg advised Uganda to “stand firm” on the new law. Walberg can be seen in video of the event listening to, endorsing, and associating himself with the remarks of other speakers. Speakers called LGBTQ+ advocates “a force from the bottom of Hell” and urged government officials to adopt “Christocracy” over democracy. Walberg explicitly encouraged Uganda’s leaders to resist opposition to the law from the U.S., the UN, and other global institutions. His audience included President Yoweri Museveni, who signed the Anti-Homosexuality Act into law in May. Museveni afterwards said Walberg’s presence showed his people that there were Americans who “think like us.” Walberg justified his Uganda trip as related to his official duties in part because of his role as co-chair of the Feb. 2 U.S. National Prayer Breakfast.

Yep, Rep. Walberg went on a junket (taxpayer financed?) to the most homophobic country in Sub-Saharan Africa just to "pray" at breakfast — presumably for the death of gays. And he got to do so alongside the country's longtime authoritarian president.

Yoweri Museveni has been mis-leading his country since 26 January 1986 – the same day the Chicago Bears won Super Bowl XX. He's one of those corrupt de facto presidents for life who plague a number of countries in Africa. It's natural that Republicans would gravitate towards such a figure.

[L]ast year’s Ugandan National Prayer Breakfast also served as a rally to resist international pressure for LGBTQ+ rights. The latest version of the Anti-Homosexuality bill, commonly known as the “Kill the Gays Bill,” was introduced shortly afterwards. The law provides penalties of lengthy prison sentences and even execution for “aggravated homosexuality,” including “serial offenses.” Even advocating for LGBTQ+ rights can mean years behind bars under the new law. Just attempting to engage in same-sex conduct can draw a sentence of ten years. According to Human Rights Watch, Ugandan rights groups have seen a spike in anti-LGBTQ discrimination and persecution since the bill’s introduction. Advocates in Uganda report government crackdowns on rights organizations and, since the law was enacted in May, hundreds of individual acts of violence, discrimination, and even evictions. As recently as Dec. 11, the Biden administration reiterated its demand that Uganda repeal the law and stop its official persecution. The White House cited U.S. visa restrictions and sanctions of Ugandan officials. The U.S. has suggested further economic consequences may follow.

Walberg seemed to imply that he's not on the side of the United States of America. Well, that's not unusual of House Republicans.

Referring to himself and the Ugandans there as “we,” Walberg asked, “Whose side do we wanna be on? God’s side. Not the World Bank, not the United States of America, necessarily, not the UN. God’s side.”

Somebody should ask Rep. Walberg if he's going to introduce a "Kill the Gays Bill" in the US House. Knowing how self-hating the Log Cabin Republicans are, they'd probably lobby in favor of such a bill.

A fascist mindset permeates the Republican Party. If you support the continuation of democracy in this country, Vote Blue No Matter Who. People who claim that both parties are the same are either stupid or too lazy to pay attention.

[politicaldilfs]

Tim Walberg

[plethoraworldatlas]

U.S. Rep. Tim Walberg became the latest Republican lawmaker to openly call for the genocide of Palestinian people in Gaza, saying at a town hall that instead of sending humanitarian aid to starving civilians there, the U.S. should "get it over quick" by dropping a nuclear bomb on the besieged enclave.

The Michigan Republican was asked by a voter why taxpayer money was being spent to build a port off the coast of Gaza at an event in the town of Dundee, in a video that was apparently recorded on March 25 and posted to social media on Saturday.

"We shouldn't be spending a dime on humanitarian aid. It should be like Nagasaki and Hiroshima," said Walberg, referring to the two Japanese cities where the U.S. detonated two atomic bombs in 1945, killing an estimated 214,000 people and leaving survivors with the effects of radiation, including chronic and deadly diseases.

Walberg's comments were made public a day after it was reported that the Biden administration had approved the transfer of new weapons to the Israel Defense Forces, including 2,000-pound bombs like those that have already made Israel's bombardment one of the deadliest and most destructive in modern history.

The White House has called on Israel to allow more humanitarian aid into Gaza, where at least 31 people—including 27 children—have already died of starvation as a result of Israel's near-total blockade on aid since October. Parts of northern Gaza are now experiencing famine, according to the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification global initiative (IPC), after months of warnings from experts that a man-made famine would eventually take hold unless humanitarian aid increased significantly.

The Israel Defense Forces' U.S.-backed bombardment of the enclave has killed at least 32,705 Palestinians so far.

Dawud Walid, executive director of the Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said Walberg's "clear call to genocide... should be condemned by all Americans who value human life and international law."

"To so casually call for what would result in the killing of every human being in Gaza sends the chilling message that Palestinian lives have no value," said Walid. "It is this dehumanization of the Palestinian people that has resulted in the ongoing slaughter and suffering we see every day in Gaza and the West Bank."

[hicginewsagency]

U.S Senator Urges Uganda to Stand Firm Against Western Demands on Anti-Homosexuality Law

by Mourice Muhoozi United States law maker, Tim Walberg overwhelmingly passed the bill. Referring to the Ugandan president, Walberg said, “He knows that he has a Parliament, and … even congressmen like me who will say, ‘We stand with you.’” A former Bible salesman, Walberg has always been a standard issue religious conservative in Congress. HRC designated him a member of its Hall of Shame in…

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Salaried employees who work long hours for low pay aren’t finding much sympathy among Republicans on Capitol Hill.

GOP lawmakers filed a resolution in Congress on Wednesday that would block the Labor Department from extending overtime protections to millions of salaried workers, a key workplace reform pursued by President Joe Biden.

Under federal law, only certain workers have a right to time-and-a-half pay when they work more than 40 hours in a week. Currently, salaried workers must earn less than $35,568 per year to be automatically entitled to the overtime pay.

A new rule from the Labor Department, finalized in April, would raise that salary threshold to $58,656 per year, bringing an estimated 4 million additional workers under the law’s protection. Employers would then have to pay those workers a premium when they work additional hours, whereas now they don’t have to pay them anything at all for that time.

But the GOP lawmakers have filed what’s known as a “resolution of disapproval” under the Congressional Review Act, which, if passed and signed into law, would nullify the reform.

Rep. Tim Walberg (R-Mich.) sponsored the resolution in the GOP-controlled House. Forty Republican colleagues have joined him as co-sponsors as of Friday. No Democrats have signed on to the legislation.

GOP Sen. Mike Braun (Ind.) is leading the companion legislation in the Senate, where Democrats hold a threadbare majority.

Republicans have used the Congressional Review Act to kill progressive reforms before, most notably at the end of Barack Obama’s presidency.

This particular effort has slim chances of succeeding, since the legislation would face a Biden veto threat if it managed to pass both chambers. And regardless of the maneuvers in Washington, Biden’s overtime reforms face the possibility of being blocked in federal court. But the resolution still helps show where both parties stand on a key economic issue — worker pay — in an election year.

Business groups have come out strongly against Biden’s overtime rule and have opposed similar reforms for years, claiming they would force employers to cut jobs. But giving more employees overtime protections is popular among voters, much like the idea of raising the minimum wage.

The Labor Department estimates the reform would transfer $1.5 billion a year from employers to employees in the form of higher wages. The benefits would go disproportionately to workers who are women and people of color, according to an analysis from the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank.

But Walberg called the overtime changes “burdensome” in a statement and claimed it would lead to inflation.

“Small businesses, nonprofits, and colleges across America will now be looking at bottom lines, and then make the tough decisions to lay off valuable staff or force salaried workers into hourly positions,” he said.

Braun argued that overtime decisions should be left to the bosses. “If the free market sets the price of labor, opportunity and prosperity are the result,” he said.

Overtime protections in the U.S. stretch back to the Great Depression, when the right to time-and-a-half pay was first enshrined in law. The idea was to prevent employers from overworking their employees, and to spread more work around during a time of high unemployment. If a company would have to pay a premium to work someone overtime, the thinking went, then the employer might choose to hire another worker to cover the additional hours.

But the law has gone long stretches without being updated, and so fewer employees as a share of the broader workforce now enjoy overtime rights compared with decades ago.

The Labor Department said when it announced the proposed reforms that it was trying to rectify “outdated and out-of-sync rules” that leave many low-paid salaried employees — retail store managers in particular — working lots of extra hours with nothing to show for it.

[xtruss]

The Vicious Things Republi(Cunts) Have Said About Palestinians Since October 7

“The Costs of Saying Things That are Undeniably and Horrifically Dehumanizing Toward Palestinians are So Low.”

— Prem Thakker | April 4, 2024

Boak Bollocks Senile Oaf Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Michigan, speaks during a House Republicans news conference in the Capitol on December 6, 2023. Photo: Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

Michigan Republi(Cunt) Boak Bollocks Senile Oaf Rep. Tim Walberg recently declared at a town hall that the U.S. “Shouldn’t Be Spending a Dime on Humanitarian Aid,” in Gaza. Instead, he posed, “it should be like Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Get it over quick.”

After the shocking statement went viral, his office tried to soften the blow. It provided a full transcript of Walberg’s comments to CNN, which reported that Walberg had also said that a similar logic could be applied to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “Defeat Putin quick. Instead [of] 80% in Ukraine being used for humanitarian purposes, it should be 80-100% to wipe out Russia, if that’s what we want to do.”

Walberg then attempted to walk the comment back in a statement, in which he said he was not suggesting that nukes be used to end either war. Yet there’s no denying that he invoked horrifying instances of the U.S. dropping atomic bombs in reference to Gaza — just the latest vicious, warmongering statement by a Republican lawmaker since October 7.

While Walberg’s comments received a fair amount of critical media coverage, the response from his congressional colleagues was muted — underscoring a stark double standard in the public treatment of those who advocate for Palestinian rights, and those who dehumanize them.

Members of Congress like Reps. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich.; Ilhan Omar, D-Minn.; and Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., have long been pilloried — and even censured — by their colleagues for speaking out against Israel’s brutal treatment of Palestinians, while the media class has spilled boats-worth of ink on bad-faith interpretations of the progressive Democrats’ statements. Republicans who belittle, or even encourage, Palestinian suffering have typically generated no such equal, let alone proportional, response.

Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson and Democratic House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries did not respond to questions about what party leadership is doing in response to lawmakers’ callous comments about Palestinians, especially as the death toll in Gaza continues to rise.

Yousef Munayyer, a political analyst and senior fellow at the Arab Center Washington DC, noted that the cost of misspeaking — or having comments misconstrued — on Israel is unparalleled.

“The social and political costs of stepping on the taboos of saying anything that could be even possibly misconstrued as antisemitic are so high,” Munayyer told The Intercept. “And yet the costs of saying things that are undeniably and horrifically dehumanizing toward Palestinians are so low. I don’t know of a double standard as extreme as that on any other issue.”

Republi(Cunts’) Hunger For Violence began just days after Hamas’s attack against Israel on October 7. “We are in a religious war here, I’m with Israel,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., declared on October 11, in an appearance on Fox News. “Do whatever the hell you have to do to defend yourself. Level the place.” (Graham later said that no amount of civilian casualties in Gaza would prompt him to scrutinize Israel’s conduct.)

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., echoed Graham’s bloodlust on Fox in mid-October. “As far as I’m concerned, Israel can bounce the rubble in Gaza,” said the senator who famously called for the Trump administration to sic the military on protesters at the height of the George Floyd uprising. “Anything that happens in Gaza is the responsibility of Hamas. Hamas killed women and children in Israel last weekend,” he added. In the months to come, Israel would go on to kill over 25,000 Palestinian women and children.

In the House of Representatives, Republicans have taken glee in fantasizing about Palestinian suffering.

On October 11, Ohio Rep. Max Miller lambasted Tlaib for planting a Palestinian flag outside her congressional office. He refused to recognize Palestine as a state, calling it “a territory that’s about to probably get eviscerated and go away here shortly, as we’re going to turn that into a parking lot.”

A few days later, Miller’s colleague Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla., took the unusual step of donning the military garb of a foreign country in the halls of the Congress — wearing an Israel Defense Forces uniform he earned while volunteering for the country’s military in 2015. Shortly thereafter, he introduced an amendment that would slow down humanitarian aid to Gaza. “Any assistance should be slowed down — any assistance,” Mast said in a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on the bill. “Because I would challenge anybody in here to point to me, which Palestinian is Hamas, and which one is an innocent civilian? … It should absolutely be every effort made to slow down any perceived assistance that’s going there.”

Mast later tripled down. “I would encourage the other side to not so lightly throw around the idea of ‘innocent Palestinian civilians,’ as is frequently said,” Mast said on the House floor. “I don’t think we would so lightly throw around the term ‘innocent Nazi civilians’ during World War II.”

In late January, when asked about the babies Israeli forces have killed in Gaza, Mast responded coldly: “These are not innocent Palestinian civilians.” Confronted with the idea that Israel has destroyed more infrastructure in Gaza than was destroyed in Dresden during World War II, Mast said, “There’s more infrastructure that needs to be destroyed,” repeated the line, and promised “there will be more that gets destroyed.” Finally, he vowed to do everything he could to stop the government from supporting the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees. Mast described the creation of UNRWA as “moronic”; last month, Congress voted to defund the agency for a full year, even as a widespread famine looms over Gaza.

In late February, Tennessee Republican Andy Ogles vilely dismissed protesters who took issue with their taxes going toward killing children.

“I’ve seen the footage of shredded children’s bodies — that’s my taxpayer dollars going to bomb those kids,” a protester said.

“You know what, so, I think we should kill ’em all,” Ogles responded. “If that makes you feel better.”(His spokesperson later claimed to The Tennessean that he “was not referring to Palestinians, he was clearly referring to the Hamas terrorist group.”)

The protesters cited Israeli forces starving women and children, killing over 300 health care workers, and “sniping Christian women in churches” as war crimes. Ogles, however, instead responded only to being called an “AIPAC zombie” with “Death to Hamas.”

In early March, a flustered Rep. Chuck Fleischmann, also of Tennessee, yelled at a Palestinian American protester from Gaza, who has now lost over 100 family members in Israel’s war.

“They are not guilty of genocide,” the Republican said of Israel, which the world’s highest court and a U.S. district court have both said is plausibly committing genocide in Gaza. “You can tell the Palestinians — I will never support them!”

“I am a Palestinian myself,” a protester responded.

“Then I will tell you, I will never support you,” Fleischmann screamed back. “I will tell you to your face: Goodbye to Palestine!”

After Months of this Behavior From Republi(Cunts), not one has been censured by their colleagues, not one has been savaged by the media for days on end, not one been cast as a poster child of the virulent anti-Palestinian racism flowing through American institutions.

Meanwhile, last year, Jayapal was pilloried by Republicans and thrown under the bus by fellow Democrats for suggesting that Israel — which has for decades committed human rights abuses, engaged in land dispossession and home demolition, and maintained separate systems of law and a militarized police state against Palestinians — is a “racist state.”

Jayapal walked back her comments after the pile-on, singling out Benjamin Netanyahu’s government for its racist practices instead. Still, Ogles and his colleagues Randy Weber and Jeff Duncan filed a resolution seeking to censure Jayapal for what they said was antisemitism, though the resolution did not name a single instance of Jayapal saying anything negative about Jewish people.

The attacks were familiar. Tlaib — the only Palestinian member of Congress — was attacked last year for supporting an event raising awareness about the Nakba, the series of events beginning in 1948 that led to the mass displacement of Palestinians. The smears massively escalated as she was censured — with the help of 22 Democrats — in November, after she criticized the Israeli government and called for Palestinian liberation.

Omar, likewise, has been subject to constant scrutiny by her own party for her criticism of Israel, accused of antisemitism for allegedly singling Israel out — even though she has been a consistent critic of other human rights-violating governments, from Saudi Arabia and China to El Salvador and Russia. Those attacks paved the way for Republicans to boot her from the Foreign Affairs Committee last February, after they retook control of the House.

“Democrats too often are willing to go along with what are obviously bad-faith smears against other Democrats, whereas Republicans simply don’t give a shit. And that creates this situation where you can easily bait Democrats into this issue repeatedly,” Munayyer said. “That’s a choice that Democrats are making, and they don’t have to make that choice.”

That’s not to mention the Democrats who have made anti-Palestinian remarks themselves, from Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Ill., accusing a Palestinian American of “trying to kill every Jew,” to Rep. Dan Goldman, D-N.Y., discounting the death toll of children killed in Gaza. Beyond Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman’s continued insistence on supporting Israel’s mass civilian killing campaign unconditionally, he has repeatedly dismissed and mocked protesters calling for a ceasefire in Gaza or mobilizing voters against Biden’s Gaza policy.

Lara Friedman, president of the Foundation for Middle East Peace, said that the question of acceptable language on Israel and Palestine often comes down to whether the orator is supportive of Israel or not: “It’s never really about what any of them say.”

[ymustutortureme]

It was never about Hamas.

US Congressman Tim Walberg suggests dropping nuclear bombs on Gaza.

'We shouldn't be spending a dime on humanitarian aid. It should be like Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Get it over quick.'

[republicansaredomesticterrorists]

Funny how those disrespecting Biden never seem to notice the Republican contempt for Palestine.

But keep on dragging Biden and see what happens to Palestinians if Trump gets into office.

See the big picture.

[azspot]

In a little-noticed October speech in Uganda, Rep. Tim Walberg, R-Mich., urged that nation to stand behind its new Anti-Homosexuality Act, which includes the death penalty.

[documentationofcorruption]

today's most ethically sound zionist award goes to Tim Walberg, for suggesting that Gaza needs to be nuked:

[wingedalpacacupcake]

US congressman Tim Walberg suggests dropping nuclear bombs on Gaza

[palestinegenocide]

GOP Congress member suggests nuclear bomb be dropped on Gaza

"It should be like Nagasaki and Hiroshima," Rep. Tim Walberg told a town hall audience in Michigan. "Get it over quick."

[link]

Yeah and I'm sure dropping a nuclear bomb won't hurt the hostages at all...