Call it true irony. The man who had a book ghost-written for him called "The Art Of The Deal" could never actually manage to strike any kind of deal. So the man who replaced him ran on his own dealmaking skills, in a time where pretty much everyone in Washington considered the idea too old-fashioned to ever work. But President Joe Biden just got his first big deal, this week. A bipartisan infrastructure plan is now going to move forward in the United States Senate and has what can only be called a better-than-average chance of passing.

Biden doesn't just value bipartisanship for bipartisanship's sake, of course. He truly does believe in the concept and really would prefer Congress return to the days of yore when bipartisanship was actually pretty common (always hard-fought, but mostly achieved). But at the same time, Biden is a politician and knows full well what this will mean for him, personally.

Now, Biden is savvy enough not to say this until after he signs the bill, because he knows how fragile the applecart is right now, and how there are many things which could still upset it before it does arrive on his desk. But immediately after he does sign it, he will quite likely say something along the lines of: "Cynical people thought it wasn't even possible to bring the politicians from both sides of the aisle together to get something done. I never believed that. I think America works best when we work together, and I have always believed that. I promised bipartisanship during my campaign, and many in my own party scoffed at the idea. But here we are, with the proof that -- with leadership and support -- it is still possible."

Biden's polite enough not to put it this way, but others will: "Biden singlehandedly brought bipartisanship back to Washington." Moving forward, this is going to be seen as one of his crowning achievements. If he decides to run for a second term, this will be a central theme of his campaign: "They said it was impossible, but I got it done." And it won't be that much of an overstatement, either.

Of course, as we said, nothing is guaranteed at this point. Republicans still have to actually vote for it in the Senate for it to become reality. And already some of them seem to already be formulating an excuse for why they can't. Their excuse is absolute tommyrot, because what they are now saying is: "We won't vote for this if President Biden is going to pass any other bill for the rest of his term with just Democrats." The bill they are so worried about is the companion bill to the infrastructure package, containing all the things that -- according to Republicans, mind you -- are not infrastructure. Before, they threatened to vote no because they only wanted to vote on infrastructure items, and now they are threatening to vote no because Democrats might pass some non-infrastructure items in another bill. Which is just laughable, since these very same Republicans have never had a problem passing anything they wished on purely partisan lines in the past.

It's also ludicrous because they are acting so shocked -- shocked! -- that Democrats are going to do exactly what they've been saying they're going to do all along. The second bill was no secret. It was not some closely-held strategy within the Democratic caucus. They admitted the whole plan to anyone who would ask, sometimes even unprompted. So all the GOP handkerchief-clutching now is just absurd.

Meanwhile, the Republican Party is collectively losing their minds. Pretty much ever since I've been alive, the Republicans have painted themselves as having two absolute, bedrock core virtues: they were the "law and order" party, and they supported the U.S. military no matter what. The first was an attempt to pin every crime ever committed anywhere on the Democratic Party, and the second goes back decades, to (at a minimum) the Vietnam War. Republicans were for cops and our fighting men in uniform (back then, this would now read: "our fighting men and women," of course). Without reserve. Unquestioningly.

Boy, those were the days, eh?

This week, a member of the Republican Party in the House who is under investigation by federal authorities for child sex trafficking tweeted out: "If Democrats want to defund the police, they should start with the FBI." Donald Trump routinely excoriated the F.B.I. and any other federal law enforcement for daring to investigate him, his family, his henchmen, or really any Republican anywhere for any reason.

Earlier, many Republicans showed their open contempt for the Capitol Police -- the people who defended Congress with their lives during the insurrection, mind you. But many Republicans refused to honor them with medals for doing so, and one wouldn't even shake an officer's hand in an elevator. So it's not just the F.B.I. -- Republicans don't seem to support any federal law enforcement, these days. And now the GOP seems like it is on the brink of turning on the military, too.

That same congressman (we refuse to say his name this week, because we are just not in the mood for giving him any publicity whatsoever) grilled the highest-ranking Pentagon officers about the supposed sins of allowing the military to become "woke" and being infiltrated by "critical race theorists" (a term that has never before existed, before very recently). This is all part of their newfound Critical Race Theory Derangement Syndrome (but more on that in a moment).

General Mark Milley, the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the absolute highest-ranked military officer serving, responded, and what he said is worth watching (it's only a minute and a half long) or at least reading:

"I personally find it offensive that we are accusing the United States military... of being 'woke' or something else because we're studying some theories that are out there," [General Mark] Milley said.

The four-star general told lawmakers that service members should be "open-minded and be widely read" because service members "come from the American people" and said he wanted to better understand racism as well as the climate that led to the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.

"I want to understand White rage -- and I'm White," Milley told lawmakers "What is it that caused thousands of people to assault this building and try to overturn the Constitution of the United States of America?

"I've read Mao Tse Tung. I've read Karl Marx. I've read Lenin. That doesn't make me a communist," Milley continued. "So what is wrong with understanding, having some situational understanding about the country for which we are here to defend?"

It's rare to see Republican anti-education idiocy be put down so brutally, which is why it's such a refreshing video to watch. He wasn't the only one, either, as General Lloyd Austin also expressed how offended he was by what the Republican congressman was trying to insinuate. So what was the conservative reaction to all this? Let's check in over on Fox News. Here is Laura Ingraham, to begin with:

"Why is Congress not saying, 'We're not going to give you a penny until all of this is eradicated from the military budget?' " Ingraham said. " 'Nothing. This is my offer to you: nothing.' That's what I would say. I'm totally outraged by [General Austin] and his ridiculous response today."

Ingraham doubled down later. "Go after their budget," she said at the end of the segment. "The only thing they understand is their budget, their money. That's it. That's all they understand."

Meaning Republicans are actually flirting with defunding the military after making lots of political hay over Democrats who supported the idea of defunding the police. There weren't a whole lot of Democrats who actually did endorse that idea fully, which means it is equally as fair now for Democrats now to paint all conservatives with the same brush that Ingraham just used. But she wasn't the only one:

"Mark Milley is the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff," the conservative personality [Tucker Carlson] said on Tucker Carlson Tonight. "He didn't get that job because he's brilliant or because he's brave, or because people who know him respect him. He is not, and they definitely don't.

"Milley got the job because he is obsequious. He knows who to suck up to, and he's more than happy to do it. Feed him a script and he will read it."

After playing a clip of Milley's comments at a House Armed Services Committee hearing Wednesday, Carlson commented that he found it "hard to believe that man wears a uniform, he's that unimpressive."

"He's not just a pig, he's stupid," he added after a second clip.

Got that? A stupid pig. The highest-ranking military officer in existence. Salon had the pithiest comment on how far down the rabbit hole conservatives have now gone:

The party that once extolled the police and the military as the highest form of civic duty and patriotism is now celebrating the actions of people who beat cops over the heads with metal pipes and calling the military leadership stupid pigs, as if they've traveled back in time to a Bizarro World version of 1968.

That's an excellent way to put it. Remember when it was liberals who called law enforcement officers and members of the military "pigs"? Yeah, that coin has now completely flipped. As, seemingly, have at least a few fringe members of the Republican Party -- they've just completely flipped out, in fact.

That's where we now are, folks. Welcome to Bizarro World!

We end with one amusing footnote from last weekend, which involved a Republican venturing out into the real world (instead of GOP Bizarro World) and getting told in no uncertain terms what people thought of him.

Senator Ron Johnson -- a man who singlehandedly stopped Juneteenth from becoming a holiday last year, mind you -- finally realized the unpopularity of his stance (or perhaps just the fact that nobody stood with him, even in his own party) this year and the holiday was added to the federal schedule. Just in time for Juneteenth to actually be celebrated!

Senator Johnson decided it'd be a lark to go down to the very first "official federal holiday" celebration in his home state, in the hopes that nobody would notice his political pandering. Unfortunately for him, people did:

Relentlessly conservative Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) was roundly booed Saturday at Milwaukee's Juneteenth celebration.

"We don't want you here," said a member of a "growing crowd" of constituents booing the senator, reported the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

The boos were so loud the senator was drowned out at one point as he spoke to a TV reporter on camera.

Johnson was not pleased, complaining to the Journal that his reception is "not how you heal a nation."

He also said it was "unusual" behavior for folks from Wisconsin. "Most people in Wisconsin say, 'You are in our prayers; we are praying for you.' ... But you got some people here that are just sort of nasty at some points," he told the Journal.

The senator claimed he heard only "one" nasty comment, but several others were captured on Twitter.

One spectator told the newspaper that "Ron Johnson's politics are not for us." A Twitter critic "translated" the boos to complaints about Johnson's support for voter suppression and for the Capitol insurrection, which he has insisted was "peaceful" (though he also said he would have been "concerned" had rioters been Black Lives Matter protesters).

Spectators were also particularly upset that Johnson has steadfastly blocked making Juneteenth a holiday. Johnson single-handedly blocked the bill from advancing in the Senate last year due, he said, to concerns over its cost.

He finally backed down this year at the last minute, then quickly attempted to capitalize on the holiday by turning up at the city's celebration.

Talk about clueless. Seriously, what did he think was going to happen?

We have two Honorable Mention awards to hand out before we get to the main one.

The first goes to a big upset candidate in a local mayor's race:

Buffalo Democrats nominated a self-identified socialist as their candidate for mayor, as nurse and activist India Walton scored an upset victory over four-term incumbent Byron Brown in Tuesday's primary.

"We set out to not only change Buffalo, but to change the way progressive politics are viewed in Upstate New York," Walton told supporters as she declared victory Tuesday night. "All that we are doing in this moment is claiming what is rightfully ours."

The Associated Press projected Walton, 38, as the winner Wednesday morning. She held a lead over Brown with most in-person ballots counted and with a few more than 1,500 absentee ballots left -- fewer than the margin in the mayoral primary. Brown, who refused to debate Walton during the campaign, had not conceded the race by Wednesday morning.

That's pretty impressive, we have to admit. Our second Honorable Mention goes to President Joe Biden, for pulling off the seemingly impossible by getting Republican senators to agree to a deal, without giving in on his dealbreaker insistence that no taxes be raised on families making less than $400,000 a year (which, astonishingly, Republicans were proposing to do). We would have considered Biden for the Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week award but for one important point: it's not a done deal quite yet. When he signs it, we'll give him full credit, but not before.

Instead, our Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week this week is Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, who came up with a very elegant and brilliant solution for what could have been an intractable problem.

The problem, in a nutshell, is that progressive Democrats simply do not trust Joe Manchin to vote for the second bill. All along, Biden knew he'd have to pass his economic agenda in two parts -- one he might be able to get Republican votes on and one that raised taxes on the wealthiest Americans that would never get any GOP support. The first one is now being drafted, but there's no guarantee Manchin isn't going to suddenly decide, after the first one passes, that he somehow can't vote for the second one. So progressive Democrats were in a bind, and wanted some sort of iron-clad promise out of him (and all the other moderate Democrats).

Pelosi, however, just solved the whole problem in one fell swoop.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) served up a reminder Thursday that the House isn't simply a bystander in this whole process -- that House Democrats won't simply pass whatever the Senate sends over unless their priorities are also included.

"We will not take up a bill in the House until the Senate passes the bipartisan bill and a reconciliation bill," Pelosi said Thursday. "If there is no bipartisan bill, we'll just go when the Senate passes a reconciliation bill."

In other words, Pelosi's going to "pull a McConnell" -- and just sit on the bipartisan bill the Senate sends over until there is a companion bill to it, completing Biden's entire economic agenda. If no second bill appears, then the bipartisan bill will just gather dust. This is hardball, but more importantly, it makes everything a very simple equation. Progressive senators no longer have to worry, because unless the reconciliation bill does pass, nothing is going to get to Biden's desk.

Pelosi had a good week all around, in fact. Earlier she made news by announcing that the House will form a select committee to investigate the 1/6 insurrection attempt, now that Republicans have decided they don't want a bipartisan commission to do so. This is a necessary step, in other words, and Pelosi just got that ball rolling. And now that Democrats are in complete control of the process, they won't have to put up with any stalling or obstructionism from Republicans, either.

For both announcing this select committee and for coming up with an elegant solution to a thorny political problem over in the Senate, Speaker Nancy Pelosi is our Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week this week.

[Congratulate Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi on her official contact page, to let her know you appreciate her efforts.]

Our Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week award is going to a different candidate for a different New York mayor's race. The Democratic primary election for mayor of New York City was held this week, but the final results won't be known for a while (due to the newly-instituted ranked choice voting system). But while we don't know who won, at this, point, we do know at least one candidate who lost -- Andrew Yang.

Yang placed fourth (out of over a dozen names on the ballot), and, being a math guy, quickly realized he had no chance of winning:

"You all know I am a numbers guy. I'm someone who traffics in what's happening by the numbers," he told supporters at his election night watch party, on a hotel terrace in Hell's Kitchen. "And I am not going to be the next mayor of New York City based upon the numbers that have come in tonight."

This was an extremely disappointing finish for his supporters, and a somewhat-surprising result for those who had been watching the race. Yang dominated the polling early on, but this was likely just due to name recognition (which, for Yang, was pretty high after his failed presidential bid). But he spent a whopping $8 million on a race that he couldn't even manage to crack the top three.

Of course, this is just the primary election, but in New York City the general election is going to be a formality, as the Democratic candidate will crush whatever hapless Republican is on the ballot.

For Yang's dismal performance at the polls after attracting so many supporters to his cause, he has to be seen as this week's Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week.

[Andrew Yang is now a private citizen once again, and it is our blanket policy not to provide contact information for such persons, so you'll have to search it out yourselves.]

Volume 624 (6/25/21)

We have to begin this week with a few odds and ends. The first is to give early warning to everyone that this column will be taking a summer break in two weeks, on July 9th. We'll put a re-run column up but will not be writing a new Friday Talking Points, so consider yourselves duly warned.

The second is a bit of sad news, as we send our condolences to America's First Family on the loss of the elder of their two dogs. Sadly, First Dog Champ Biden passed away earlier in the week, and it has always been our policy to support First Pets without regard to political party. Animals simply aren't political (although politicians sure can be animals, at times).

Requiescat In Pace

You will be missed.

And finally, we have to at least smirk at one of the Supreme Court decisions this week. Well, we do actually support the ruling (which was an astonishing 8-1), as it upholds First Amendment protections for high school students -- a cause we have strongly believed in since we ourselves were in high school, lo these many years ago.

It's just the way this one will be remember that is amusing (and also sort of takes us back to our teenage sense of humor). The previous case in this realm will forever be known as the "BONG HiTS 4 JESUS" ruling, but this case involved a girl who was denied a spot on the cheerleading squad and responded (off school property, on social media): "Fuck school, fuck softball, fuck cheer, fuck everything." She was then punished for her free speech, which the Supreme Court just affirmed is simply not constitutional in any way. Perhaps this one will be shortened to the "Fuck cheer" Supreme Court case? One does wonder (heh).

   Biden got it done

There was truly only one reason why Joe Biden spent so much time on his bipartisan deal, seeing as how everything that got cut is quite likely to pass in another bill (with just Democrats voting for it) anyway. So what was the real point? Biden being able to check this box from his list of campaign promises, that's what. So beat this drum right along with him, he deserves it.

"Joe Biden campaigned on a promise many thought was unrealistic in today's Congress -- to achieve major change with bipartisan support. And now he has gotten it done. He did what both Donald Trump and Barack Obama never really achieved. Because of his determination to bring a new spirit of cooperation and comity back to his beloved Senate, a very historic investment in the infrastructure of our country is now looking eminently possible with significant Republican support. Joe made a promise, and he is delivering on that promise. Biden got it done."

   Defund the Pentagon?

This one is just too, too easy.

"Voices on the right are now demanding that Republicans defund the Pentagon. They didn't get the answer they expected to their ridiculous claims, and so in a snit some conservatives have decided to threaten the Pentagon to change its ways by just cancelling their budget. Laura Ingraham explicitly begged Congress to tell the Pentagon: 'Nothing. This is my offer to you: nothing.' Tucker Carlson called the highest-ranking military officer in America both a 'pig' and 'stupid' this week, as well. Such disrespect is jaw-dropping, and one can only wonder what right-wing media would say if any Democrat ever said anything remotely like that. Well, it's a good thing Democrats are in control, since defunding the Pentagon is such an insane concept. Boy, I remember back when Republicans used to beat up on Democrats in politics for being anti-military and calling people 'pigs.' How times have changed, eh?"

   C.R.T.D.S.

Republicans now have a second thing they're going to run on. No, really....

"The Republican Party now stands for, by my count, two things. They used to also be against all taxes, but they tried to fund their infrastructure bill with a gas tax hike that would have hit drivers across the country, so that one's no longer really operative anymore. The entire 2021 GOP campaign platform seems to now be, one, make it as hard as possible for as many Democrats as possible to vote; and, two, terrify White parents that their kids' schools are teaching them to hate all White people. Of course, if you asked most Republican politicians what the 'critical race theory' they are demonizing actually is, they cannot answer because they haven't bothered to find out. They have what I call C.R.T.D.S. -- Critical Race Theory Derangement Syndrome. And they're going to use it to try to whip up White fear from now until Election Day. Republicans' entire answer to what America should do to solve today's problems is to make it hard to vote and to terrify suburban White parents into coming back to the GOP fold over baseless fears. That's really all they've got left to offer, folks."

   Power should rest where Republicans can still win elections, period

More GOP hypocrisy to point out.

"Republicans used to have this grand article of faith -- that government was always a bad thing, but the closer you got to having local control of it, the better. The local school board, for instance, was more virtuous than the U.S. Congress or the state legislature. But now they're passing laws reversing what used to be a tenet of their political religion. Many red states are now passing laws limiting the power of counties and cities to pass local ordinances. They're restricting mayors on voting procedures, pandemic response laws, and even local laws concerning drilling or fracking. The problem, from the Republican point of view, is that more and more cities are solid Democratic districts, which allowed them to pass very sane laws -- mandating mask use during a worldwide medical emergency, for instance. So now Republicans aren't for local control anymore. They're for giving all the government power to whatever parts of government they alone still control. I mean, it's just so blatantly about power -- makes you wonder whether any of that high-minded preaching about the wonderfulness of local control was ever sincere, doesn't it?"

   Superspreader!

Look! [cough, cough] Out on the links! [cough! cough! cough!] It's a giant rabid flamingo... it's an orange dirigible... no... it's Superspreader!

"The Secret Service is a much healthier place to work now that Donald Trump is gone. Trump disdained all measures to combat COVID-19, and then when he caught it himself and had to go to the hospital, he forced Secret Service agents to ride with him in a hermetically-sealed car just so he could wave to a very small crowd of people. The callous indifference was plain to see -- Trump could care less who else he infected, even the men and women who have dedicated their lives to presidential security. While Trump was in office, almost 900 Secret Service agents tested positive for COVID. So, since Trump loves superlatives applied to himself, we now have a new one to add: Donald Trump, Superspreader!"

   Some sane Republicans still left

This is certainly worth celebrating, right?

"Yet again, a group of Republicans at the state level have bravely stood up for the truth. A Michigan state senate committee just released a report on all the conspiracy theories swirling around the 2020 election, and in excruciating detail the report dismantles every single one of them. Overall, it concludes: 'This committee found no evidence of widespread or systematic fraud in Michigan's prosecution of the 2020 election.' They went even further, and publicly rebuked those who are making quite a bit of money fanning the flames of one particular baseless conspiracy theory about one particular county, suggesting an open investigation into: 'those who have been utilizing misleading and false information about Antrim County to raise money or publicity for their own ends.' So not only did the three Republicans and one Democrat on the committee debunk all the insane Trumpian Big Lie theories, but they also took to task those grifters fleecing people on the right and turning the whole conspiracy theory idea into a growing industry. Good for them! We need more Republicans like this, and we are thankful for the ones who bravely insist that they still live in the real world."

   Maybe he'll give another presser at Four Seasons Total Landscaping?

Granted, the wheels of the justice system turn slow, but finally some people are starting to actually pay a price for what they did to support Donald Trump's Big Lie. And one of the first such consequences contained the most delicious schadenfreude imaginable. Rudy Giuliani just got his law license yanked. Well, technically just suspended at this point, until a final decision is reached, but the language of the decision is definitely worth quoting (which is why we saved it for last).

There is uncontroverted evidence that respondent [Rudy Giuliani] communicated demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large in his capacity as lawyer for former President Donald J. Trump and the Trump campaign in connection with Trump's failed effort at reelection in 2020.

These false statements were made to improperly bolster respondent's narrative that due to widespread voter fraud, victory in the 2020 United States presidential election was stolen from his client. We conclude that respondent's conduct immediately threatens the public interest and warrants interim suspension from the practice of law.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant

Cross-posted at: Democratic Underground