Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) has handed over power of attorney to her daughter, even as she remains in the U.S. Senate.
Feinstein has prompted concern if not outright alarm in recent years amid numerous mental lapses in the public eye. Earlier this year, she missed more than two months due to shingles. When she returned, a reporter asked Feinstein about her absence, but the senator’s response suggested she was unaware she had been away from Washington, D.C.
On Thursday, the New York Times reported that Feinstein, 90, gave power of attorney to her daughter Katherine Feinstein, 66. The Times said Katherine is currently engaged in a nasty legal dispute with the three daughters of her mother’s late husband Richard Blum, who died in 2022:
In one legal dispute, the family is fighting over what’s described as Senator Feinstein’s desire to sell a beach house in an exclusive neighborhood in Stinson Beach, north of San Francisco. In another disagreement, the two factions are at odds over access to the proceeds of Mr. Blum’s life insurance, which Senator Feinstein says she needs to pay for her growing medical expenses.
[…]
Katherine Feinstein, 66, Senator Feinstein’s only child, who has power of attorney over her mother’s legal affairs, filed two lawsuits against Senator Feinstein’s co-trustees. The first lawsuit, over the beach house, says the property is in disrepair, that Senator Feinstein no longer wishes to use it, and that she wants to sell it this summer or fall.
Feinstein is not running for reelection in 2024, but she has rebuffed calls to resign from the Senate, which Democrats control 51 to 49. During her absence earlier this year, several of President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees stalled in the Judiciary Committee, as Feinstein was not present to cast tie-breaking votes.
In an Appropriations Committee hearing last week, Feinstein began speaking about a defense spending bill at a time when she was simply supposed to cast a vote for or against the legislation. “Just say aye,” a fellow senator instructed her.
In May, Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) said Feinstein’s struggles are “painful to watch” and called on her to resign.
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Seriously, is there anywhere else on the planet where 90+ year olds are still participating in government? We seriously need an upper age limit. She’s 6 years older than the first jet powered aircraft for fuck’s sake.
Age limits if not term limits. Get these geriatric fucking career politicians into retirement homes.
I’m way more in favor of upper age limits than I am of term limits.
Quite a few countries, apparently. Wikipedia list of top ten currently serving state leaders by age
I did find this from the Pew Research Centre about leader ages though while looking:
Countries that are less free tend to have older leaders. In countries that Freedom House classifies as not free, the median age of the national leader is 69, compared with 61 in countries that are classified as partly free and 58 in countries classified as free. The United States is one of only two countries that are classified as free and have a leader in their 80s or older. The other is Namibia, where the president is 81-year-old Hage Geingob.
I propose stuffing and implanting her with animatronics so she can hit the vote button as and when required.
Same for all other geriatric politicians because they’re all just objects slapping the vote button anyway.
Disney pioneered the technology.
How do we know she isn’t dead already and this is some sort of Weekend at Bernie’s thing.
While I understand the sentiment, directly encouraging someone to die like this is not acceptable on this magazine, so your comment has been removed. Please try to keep things civil.
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this should be a warning to the general population… but it wont. these old fucktards will never remove themselves from power, they will need to be forced to retire like the rest of us.
80 year old presidents?? wtf is wrong with us?
Nobody is forced to retire. Retirement is just an age when you can start collecting benefits but doesn’t mean you have to stop working.
I know it’s easy to keep blaming all the old fuckers but what about all the people that keep voting for them? Some of the blame needs to be placed on the people too. Who in their right mind thought it was a good idea to vote Feinstein back into office? It’s not like she was young during the last election.
Some of the blame needs to be placed on the people too. Who in their right mind thought it was a good idea to vote Feinstein back into office? It’s not like she was young during the last election.
She wasn’t young* (edit to correct autocorrect) in the last election, but she was the only Dem choice, I’m willing to bet. That or the DNC only funneled resources into her to squash any primary challengers.
God damn. I’m not from California and I don’t follow politics super closely but how was there not a competitor running in the primaries? I would think almost anyone could’ve beat her.
Not an American and left leaning.
Get your shit together Democrats. This is shameful, and the Right has every right to roast you for it. You’ve roasted them for the exact same thing under the same conditions, so there’s no rebuttal.
The difference is we want her out too, we’re not defending her like they would, because we aren’t brain dead morons in a cult.
I’m talking at the official party level. Apply maximal leverage and make it happen.
I see no value in taking a shot at the Right here. Removing a senile politician needs to be normalized, and quite independent of party lines.
I agree on all accounts except you originally brought up the right and are giving a “both sides” argument. While you’re very specific call out that you clarified in your second post makes sense, I still won’t stand for a more generalized “both sides are the same” argument which I read your initial comment as because both sides are just not the same. Even with your clairification, which I agree with, the “shot” i took still applies.
To clarify, this is most definitely not a Both Sides are the Same arguement, as there are Stark differences between the two parties.
This is an issue that should be non partisan, and should be called out irrespective of party.
Absolutely
Unfortunately, in this particular instance the Democratic party has painted themselves into a corner. Getting rid of her, or her retiring, or dying, would mean no more judges at all. Due to the way senators are appointed to the committees, Republicans can easily block her replacement on the judicial committee. Her senate seat would be replaced, sure, but not what is arguably the most important committee seat she has.
Now, this is still their fault for supporting her last run in the first place. But that’s done and can’t be changed. They need her gently alive corpse to vote for judges because the alternative as it stands right now is to have no judges due to committee lock up.
One can hope, though, that they learn a lesson from this and don’t support the geezers next election cycle. I doubt that will happen, though.
During her absence earlier this year, several of President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees stalled in the Judiciary Committee, as Feinstein was not present to cast tie-breaking votes.
This is why she needs to resign already. She’s 100% fucking up any gains the Democratic party is attempting to make because she simply refuses to give up her seat.
My understanding is that if she dies or retires, that seat on the judiciary committee opens up, but can’t be filled because the Republicans can more easily block it now than they can at the beginning of the session.
That is correct, and something that is going far above the heads of most people here. If she resigns or passes away, Biden’s judicial appointments are over until 2025.
I’m sure those same people would then scream at Democrats for not then finding a magic hat that suddenly makes its wearer a member of the Judicial committee.
FTA:
“the two factions are at odds over access to the proceeds of Mr. Blum’s life insurance, which Senator Feinstein says she needs to pay for her growing medical expenses.”
Can we just take a moment to say how BROKEN the system is that a multi millionaire 30 year Senator can’t pay for their heavily subsidized healthcare without access to a deceased spouses life insurance?
Senators have the best health care in the country, she has a net worth of $87 million and she can’t pay for her health care?
https://www.opensecrets.org/personal-finances/dianne-feinstein/net-worth?cid=N00007364&year=2018
I suspect she’s lying.
You really think she’s struggling to pay for her medication?
It may just be a ruse to support the lawsuit to swing in her favor, but she may also be somewhat cash poor if her wealth is tied up in properties and stocks or other equities. Just because she’s worth several million doesn’t mean that she has that cash sitting in the bank account, though I agree it raises a lot of questions about how she pays monthly obligations then.
I just can’t imagine signing over power of attorney and then not seeing that as the clear sign to retire.
Power of attorney is a normal thing, and it doesn’t actually indicate that she’s unable to care for herself.
It’s something all people should seriously consider if they have a responsible adult child.
It has to be done BEFORE you’re actually in need, because you have to be competent to make the decision. It saves families a lot of drama if the person winds up in the hospital and someone needs to pay their bills, or needs to make other financial decisions while they’re incapacitated.
All that said, feinstein is definitely incapable of caring for herself, so she needs to go. But I wish people would stop demonizing this particular thing, since it has nothing to do with the actual issues.
No one is demonizing this particular thing. People are complaining about a senator who needs to give way to a younger, more progressive person.
Like a 70 year old. /s Jokes aside this highlights things well.
Seriously though, no one is demonizing the thing. They’re pointing out the thing adds strong evidence to the arguments they’ve been making for the better part of the last 20 years. When W Bush went under the knife he signed over power to Cheney. That’s the responsible thing to do. On the same token, Feinstein has indicated the likelihood that she is unable to serve her role in numerous ways, with this just being one more way. If she can no longer speak for herself, how can she speak for Californians? I live here, BTW. I’m affected directly.
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But it does really. If you wait till her age to do it. And didn’t bother or care to do it until this late. Something brought the subject of and finally made it a reality. There’s been evidence for a long long time but she was in declining mental faculties. And the fact that this late Madame their rushing to do this is definitely adds to the evidence.
If these positions can have minimum age limits (House 25, Senate 30), they should have maximum age limits as well.
Another Ruth Ginsberg that won’t give up the reins… Idiots
Username checks out.
rgb was still of sound mind just not physically healthy. Feinstein is not there mentally at all.
if youre no longer fit to make decisions for yourself on a permanent basis, like dementia here, you should be forced to resign. im not calling for someone who needs it for a short term injury or impairment though.
Gerontocracy, very strange.
Poor lady. The entire USA has failed her. She maybe blamed at age around late 70. For not leaving power. But now the family controls her. Wish she can be relived.
Fuckin just leave at this point!
Dude, someone reported your comment. It’s as simple as that.
We are here to maintain community standards set by the community. Don’t get it twisted.
🤦♂️
Couldn’t Democrat leadership just remove her? Or is there a reason why they are so quiet about her.
No, they can’t. Not that they would even if it was possible.
