Some Republicans have apparently decided that political dog whistles are just no longer even necessary. After the bombast of Donald Trump, they're now quite comfortable just openly saying exactly what they mean -- no matter how racist it might be.

We refer to the formation of a new congressional caucus: the "America First Caucus." Normally, this wouldn't be all that big a deal -- just some group of extra-Trumpy GOP members getting together to figure out what their Dear Leader would want them to do in Congress. But their founding document was leaked, and it goes a wee bit further in laying out the founding principles of the new caucus. Here are their first few paragraphs on immigration, for instance:

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Democrats in both the House and Senate just unveiled bills to increase the size of the Supreme Court from its current nine members up to 13. The motivation behind this is obvious: Democrats see two out of the three Supreme Court justices Donald Trump got to appoint as being totally illegitimate. First, Barack Obama was denied a pick because Mitch McConnell got all sanctimonious about a brand-new "tradition" he made up out of whole cloth: "the voters should have a say" in such decisions. This cuts completely against what the United States Constitution actually says, but whatever. Second, when Ruth Bader Ginsberg died, McConnell suddenly developed a great passion for denying the voters a chance to be heard in the decision, and hustled through a Trump pick in record time, just before the election. Because two seats flipped from liberal to conservative, the court's makeup is now 6-3 conservative, whereas it would have wound up 5-4 the other way if liberals had had their way. So, to rectify this, Democrats are proposing to hand Joe Biden four new picks, which would leave the balance at 7-6 liberal, in a new 13-member court.

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In the next two or three months, we may begin to see an answer to the big question in Washington right now: is bipartisanship still possible? The biggest test of this question will be on President Joe Biden's infrastructure plan. If Republicans can't even vote for an infrastructure bill, then bipartisanship will be seen as stone cold dead, at least until after the 2022 midterms. If, however, some sort of deal is worked out, it could raise the prospects of future cooperation across the aisle -- which Joe Biden would dearly like to see.

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Ever since President Joe Biden rolled out the first part of his infrastructure plan, Republicans have been largely caught flat-footed. They just don't have much of an answer for why they don't support it. Which makes sense, because most of what is contained in the plan is actually widely supported by the public. So the one thing Republicans really haven't been able to do is to point to the plan and give any good examples as to why it would be such a terrible idea.

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This isn't going to be a new column on politics. It's not even going to be a full column, really. I am scheduled to get my second vaccine shot this afternoon, therefore I didn't have the time for either one of those things, sorry.

After today, I've got a few more weeks of waiting and then I will feel (relatively) safe once again. I am not saying this to lord it over those who have not even gotten their first shot yet, because I know how bad "vaccine envy" can be. I say it positively instead, as an encouragement -- because you too will be here, very soon now. Take heart!

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Nothing illuminates the difference between the current United States president and the former one as much as how they respond to a misstatement. President Joe Biden, speaking recently about his dreams for American infrastructure improvements, said the following:

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The Republican Party has now been reduced to being so deathly afraid of the unpopularity of their political agenda among the electorate at large that they are now openly admitting that the only way for them to win elections is to suppress as many votes as possible. This is the exact opposite of "having the courage of your convictions," folks. Republicans are quaking in fear of the efforts to expand voting to make it easier and (much more important) safer for everyone, because they think they'll lose if that happens.

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To be clear, that title is pugilistic in nature, not legalistic. Not a courtroom lawsuit, in other words, but a boxing match. Because corporate America and the Republican Party seem to be at least preparing to trade some major blows. So far, it's all been just shadow boxing, but that could be about to change. This is a fairly major development, considering the long and close history between the two. Whether it becomes a full-blown punching match or not is going to depend on how far both sides are willing to go and what price they're willing to pay.

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The irony in Washington is so thick on the ground right now, you could slice it up and sell it to the tourists as souvenirs. Seriously -- the hypocrisy currently emanating from the Republican Party is just stunning, since to believe any of it you would have to erase your mind of pretty much everything the party has ever said on the subject previously. And even then it would still be hypocritical and ironic.

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As I am wont to do, I watched all the Sunday political chatfests this weekend (well... as many of them as I could stomach, at any rate...). I was mostly interested in hearing the Republicans' counterargument to the American Jobs Plan that President Joe Biden introduced last week, a massive $2.3 trillion investment in America. What I heard, however, was just laughably weak. Republicans apparently want to have a grand debate over the proper definition of the word "infrastructure," since they apparently have already figured out that talking about the specifics of Biden's plan doesn't exactly help their side. I mean, what is a respectable Republican politician supposed to do, when just about everything in Biden's plan sounds like a dandy idea to most of the public? So, rather than hold a debate about these popular specifics, Republicans instead prefer to play semantic games.

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