Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., repeatedly suggested a leading Arab American activist is a Hamas supporter when she testified Tuesday at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on hate crimes, and he told her she should hide her “head in a bag.”
The activist, Maya Berry, said repeatedly that she did not support Hamas and was “disappointed” by the minuteslong exchange toward the end of a hearing called “A Threat to Justice Everywhere: Stemming the Tide of Hate Crimes in America.”
“You are the executive director of the Arab American Institute, are you not?” Kennedy said at the beginning of the exchange. She said she was and agreed with Kennedy that she is a Democratic activist.
“You support Hamas, do you not?” Kennedy asked, referring to the militant group behind the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks on Israel. The question prompted gasps and surprised laughs from the audience.
“Senator, oddly enough, I’m going to say thank you for that question, because it demonstrates the purpose of our hearing today in a very effective way,” Berry responded. Kennedy then cut her off and insisted he needed a yes-or-no answer.
The housing crisis is an issue of democracy, not the federal government. Fixing it would get them voted out in a heartbeat, because the only fix is to drop existing house prices by around 80-90% and 65% of the population lives in a house they or their family own. Homeowners are also far more likely to vote.
The health care system strain is an issue of resources, there’s an unlimited possibility to spend money here to do more. The government has to balance available money with an acceptable level of care. Again if you asked voters for an extra $1000 each a year to boost healthcare, you’d likely get voted out.
Indigenous rights, same problem. You can’t give the land back entirely, the citizens wouldn’t allow it. What will citizens allow, and indigenous people accept that will resolve the situation? Probably nothing. So they balance what they can, and neither party is exactly happy.
Public transportation is a provincial, or even a municipal issue, not a federal one. It’s also not a popular issue with voters, because again the demographics of voters is heavily tilted towards car owners.
We’ve tried things for the opioid epidemic, other places have tried things for the opioid epidemic, nobody in the world has found a solution yet. Even countries with harsh drug laws like Japan are seeing massive drug use deaths, almost 100k people a year right now. So how is it OUR government that’s failing?
The system of government we have follows what people want, and people don’t always want what they say when there’s a cost associated with it. It’s all well and good to say “I want this fixed” but if you put the real price tag on it, people are rarely willing to pay that cost. It costs more than the annual family income to jail someone for a year for example. Lots of people are tough on crime, until they realize it takes all the taxes for their entire block to pay for one inmate.