Yesterday I mentioned what had happened with the passing of H.R. 8  – The Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019 – through the House.

The Republicans forced a vote to add an amendment to the bill mandating that ICE be notified when an illegal immigrant wants to buy a gun.

Pretty much, the Republicans, knowing that the bill would pass the House, wanted the Democrats to go on the record with a vote choosing between supporting gun control and ICE.

The amendment passed because 26 Democrats voted with the Republicans requiring ICE notification when an illegal tries to buy a gun.

That catches you up to today.

‘This is not a day at the beach’: Pelosi tells moderate Dems to stop voting with GOP

Those 26 Democrats are in trouble.

House Democrats held an emotional debate behind closed doors Thursday over how to stop losing embarrassing procedural battles with Republicans — a clash that exposed the divide between moderates and progressives.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) took a hard line at the caucus meeting, saying that being a member of Congress sometimes requires taking tough votes.

“This is not a day at the beach. This is the Congress of the United States,” Pelosi said, according to two sources.

Pelosi also said vulnerable Democrats who had the “courage” to vote against the Republican motions to recommit would become a higher priority for the party leadership and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Being a Democrat in Congress means voting along party lines no matter what the bill does and her constituents want.

Then this took a turn for the fascistic.

And Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the superstar New York freshman Democrat, suggested she would alert progressive activists when Democrats are voting with the GOP on these motions, said the sources.

Forget Pelosi and her official means affirming loyalty.

If you cross Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who is a Freshman and has been on the job for all of 56 days, she will tell her Blackshirts on Twitter to attack you online.  She will bring her army of young Leftist, lead around by the nose by Progressive activists, to your doorstep to scream and rage at you.

Democratic leaders have vowed to do a better job preparing for the Republican motions, but the controversy has divided Pelosi and her longtime lieutenants, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.).

Pelosi argues that Democrats must stick together on procedural votes, which is the traditional view of party leaders on both sides of the aisle. Hoyer and Clyburn, however, have suggested that moderate members can vote with Republicans if they think it will improve their political standing.

The Democrats have the majority for now, but there are Democrats who are in areas that could easily swing Red in 2020.  Nothing would be better for Republicans than to show voters in these areas that Democrats MUST vote along party lines, no matter what.  Especially when it comes to topics like late term abortion and denying born alive babies medial care which is seen very unfavorably outside only the deepest Blue areas of the North East and Pacific Coast.

How will moderates in coal mining or car making districts feel about voting for their Democrat Representative if they know that their Rep must vote along party lines to end fossil fuel use in 10 years, even if that costs their district thousands of jobs?

The latest defeat came on Wednesday, as the House debated legislation requiring background checks on all gun sales — a position overwhelmingly favored by Democrats. When Republicans moved to amend the bill to require Immigration and Customs Enforcement be told of any undocumented immigrant who tries to buy a gun, 26 Democrats voted with the GOP. The language was added to the gun bill, spoiling an important Democratic legislative achievement.

An earlier GOP motion condemning anti-Semitism was successfully attached to a House resolution barring U.S. involvement in the Yemeni civil war. That maneuver, which was backed by every Democrat, later caused parliamentary problems in the Senate and upended Democratic attempts to challenge President Donald Trump’s foreign policy.

Making the Democrats condemn antisemitism when two of their three media favorite firebrands live, eat, sleep, and breathe Jew hatred had to hurt.

During the closed-door meeting on Thursday, Pelosi said Democrats who vote for the Republicans’ motions are putting pressure on other vulnerable colleagues who would prefer to stick with the party.

“We are either a team or we’re not, and we have to make that decision,” she said.

Please tie every Democrat in a Purple or swing district to the most outlandish and radical infanticide defending, reparations promoting, confiscatory tax rate loving, socialists in the party.  That is sure to win them a majority in 2020.

Inside the meeting, Ocasio-Cortez said she has “a text chain with 200 activists in her district” that she’s in constant contact with on issues facing Democrats.

She threatened her fellow House Democrats with an angry mob.  No shit, she really did that.

Ocasio-Cortez said she even considered voting against the background checks bill because of the Republican language on ICE, perhaps the most-hated federal agency on the left. Ocasio-Cortez went up to the gallery after the vote to tell activists she “had to choose between immigrants and gun violence. Not because of Republicans, but because of Democrats,” said a source in the room.

God damn, that is a stance to take.  When you hate law enforcement and love illegal immigrants so much that you are tempted to scuttle your own party’s dream bill, that’s not a sign of a rational person.

But other members stood up in the meeting and challenged this view, without calling out Pelosi or Ocasio-Cortez specifically.

Freshman Rep. Xochitl Torres Small (D-N.M.), who voted for the GOP motion on Wednesday, grew visibly emotional when speaking and pointedly said courage looks different to different people, according to two sources in the room.

Translation:

“I’m from a district in New Mexico that has voted for every Republican president since 2000.  I won the seat because the previous Republican Rep ran for Governor.  Please for the love of God don’t make me look like a San Francisco, Limousine Liberal, Champagne Socialist in Trump Country.”

A senior Democratic aide aligned with the caucus’ moderate wing said it was completely hypocritical for progressives to complain about the tough vote they had to take Wednesday.

“Moderates are in tough positions all the time and they don’t shy away from that,” the aide said. “They have to vote their districts or they will be defeated, plain and simple. The rest of the caucus should [understand] that.”

Nancy and AOC are going to destroy their party’s House majority.

Nancy I don’t get.

AOC has muscle in the form of her social media followers and a fawning media.  She has had a taste of power and she likes it.  She is going to strong arm her way to party leadership, not by the traditional route of power through wheeling and dealing like Pelosi or Clinton.  She’s going to unleash the power of young, under employed activists who have nothing to do other than protest whatever Twitter tells them to protest.

This is incredible to watch.

But what strikes me most of all is AOC and how she at 29 thinks versus Pelosi at 178.  Pelosi’s old school way of controlling the party is very different than AOC’s.  AOC has no shame in weaponizing social media and airing colleagues dirty laundry for the internet hate mob to focus their wrath on.

It is a particularly vicious tactic, which is why public shaming and show trials were so popular in Communist countries.

AOC has her Blackshirts and she is not afraid to use them.

She is an amazing fascist.