Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

So many bastards, so little time.

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

I really should read my own blog.

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

One lie, alone, tears the fabric of reality.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Someone should tell Republicans that violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, or possibly the first.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

DeSantis transforming Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

Giving in to doom is how authoritarians win.

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

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Reader Interactions

85Comments

  1. 1.

    quaint irene

    Has McCain finally taken the day off? Ya know, for Labor Day and all.
    Cause bloviating on any talk show he can IS his job.

  3. 3.

    RedKitten

    Fucking mice. First I had one in my car, and now this morning we wake up to find droppings in the house (due to an improperly latched window screen.)

    It’s still warm out, why can the little fuckers not stay outside?

  4. 4.

    morzer

    Well, for me, Sunday morning means a bright sunny day, damn fine coffee and an omelette that makes me feel 39 again.

  5. 5.

    Punchy

    Ah…the Sunday that feels like another Saturday.

    NFL! NFL! NF….wait a minute….uh, nevermind. Dammit.

  6. 6.

    jwb

    I thought Rich’s article was excellent, but I do wish that he’d focus attention on the goopers and their media enablers until the election.

  7. 7.

    DougJ

    Watching Amanpour. They should have had the guy who played Blair in “The Queen” do the interview though, I like him better than the real Tony Blair.

  8. 8.

    Alwhite

    I was a little disappointed with the story on “reality” TV. The information I really was hoping they would provide was why the shows stopped filing during the writers strike. Seems to me if you are filming real life you don’t have writers.

  9. 9.

    El Cid

    David Gregory is telling me that the reason Democrats are in such trouble, especially with independents, is that they failed to work in a bipartisan fashion.

  12. 12.

    DougJ

    @Alwhite:

    At some point I would like to do a “what’s the deal with Tony Blair” thread so I can read what our UK commenters have to say about him. I don’t understand him, somehow. He’s so good at talking, but his decisions are mostly idiotic.

  14. 14.

    Chad N Freude

    @Alwhite: Sarcasm, right? Reality shows, reflecting the reality of carefully edited 30- or 60- minute (less commercials) planned story arc segments, are a form of fiction.

  16. 16.

    Cat Lady

    Finished watching Season 1 and Season 2 of The Wire last night that I got for my birthday. Wow. I know everyone but me has seen it pretty much, but I just couldn’t have imagined how good it is. I’m running out soon to get the other seasons, but one at a time. So many good lines, but so far this exchange was my favorite:

    Cop to Bodie: You’re stupid.
    Bodie: I ain’t stupid.
    Cop: Nobody thinks they’re stupid. That’s part of the stupid.

    Words for our age, and especially for David Gregory, apparently.

  19. 19.

    El Cid

    Oops, I should mention that Gregory is interviewing David Plouffe.

    Coming up is Kendrick Meek and, presumably not at the same time, Marco Rubio.

  20. 20.

    El Cid

    @Chad N Freude: Many liberal extremist Democrats advised avoiding the wall altogether, but a gathering number of conservative Democrats advocate still hitting the wall, but maybe not straight on.

  22. 22.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @RedKitten: Apparently you and SamKitten and MisterDaddyKitten aren’t the great mousers that your handles would imply. MOUSEFAIL.

  23. 23.

    numbskull

    Via Atrios, best of the web this morning:

    The thing about Britain is that their debate is closer to the real meat and potatoes of what this argument is all about.  Ours is frustratingly diverted into “Like or Dislike Obama” or “Is the Tea Party Racist” and other tangential questions./blockquote>

    Britain makes it clear: it’s really about social democracy vs. neoliberalism.

    It is important that [Open Left] understand this.  This is the debate that is barely allowed to be mentioned on our side of the pond but it’s the crucial distinction.

    When Paul Krugman argues for Keynesianism he’s taking the social democratic side of this argument.  But he’s not allowed to say so, or at least not willing.

    The mistake of our side in the past period was in not understanding how strongly our opponents believed in the other side of this argument. It was indeed their central rationale.  It wasn’t “just politics”.

    continued at

    http://www.openleft.com/diary/20040/great-comment-on-neoliberalism

  25. 25.

    numbskull

    Best of the morning’s web, via Atrios:

    The thing about Britain is that their debate is closer to the real meat and potatoes of what this argument is all about.  Ours is frustratingly diverted into “Like or Dislike Obama” or “Is the Tea Party Racist” and other tangential questions. Britain makes it clear: it’s really about social democracy vs. neoliberalism. It is important that [Open Left] understand this.  This is the debate that is barely allowed to be mentioned on our side of the pond but it’s the crucial distinction. When Paul Krugman argues for Keynesianism he’s taking the social democratic side of this argument.  But he’s not allowed to say so, or at least not willing. The mistake of our side in the past period was in not understanding how strongly our opponents believed in the other side of this argument. It was indeed their central rationale.  It wasn’t “just politics”…

    Continued at:

    http://www.openleft.com/diary/20040/great-comment-on-neoliberalism

  26. 26.

    El Cid

    Economist David Zandi is explaining on Face the Nation that the Bush Jr. tax cuts should be renewed for the wealthiest because “high income households are psychologically very very fragile.”

    Wow. I’d say “you really, really have to be shitting me.”

  28. 28.

    El Cid

    @morzer: “There are a lot of independent voters who want to see the Democrats taking on more Republican ideas.” [Strangely enough, not a real quote.]

  31. 31.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @El Cid: I thought the wealthiest were the wealthiest because of their almost superhuman abilities and work ethic. This does not square with a description of the wealthiest as “psychologically very very fragile.”

  33. 33.

    El Cid

    @Omnes Omnibus: We know that though they are superhumans who create matter and energy out of nothing, they are psychologically very fragile, because whenever people say something negative about the super-ultra-rich they exclaim that they feel so oppressed that they may not be willing to continue making themselves even super-ultra-richer.

  35. 35.

    morzer

    @El Cid:

    You, sir, shall get my psychologically fragile omelette when you pry it from my cold dead stomach!

    Yum fucking yum!

    Damn fine coffee.

  38. 38.

    El Cid

    @Omnes Omnibus: That is why you are an extreme Communist partisan (and not the temporarily good WWII type who we had to help destroy and jail as the war was ending & afterward) and you would destroy America by making the super-ultra-rich feel bad. How dare you, sir! The Founding Fathers didn’t want people like you to do that to the infinitely rich, otherwise it would have been in the Constushun.

  40. 40.

    Corner Stone

    @El Cid:

    Many liberal extremist Democrats advised avoiding the wall altogether, but a gathering number of conservative Democrats advocate still hitting the wall, but maybe not straight on.

    I remember being told that even though the car was headed for the wall, nothing could be done to change course.
    Ostensibly everyone was in the back seat.

  43. 43.

    Chad N Freude

    @El Cid: What is that, satire? We who live in Greater Los Angeles have been having the McCourt divorce war shoved in our faces by the LA Times and less respectable media for weeks now. The psychological fragility of this couple fighting over ownership of the Dodgers and $1,000,000/month lifestyle maintenance for seven mansions is terrible to behold, and we would fear for their sanity if they had any to begin with. (The link offers a good 30-second summary. Fun fact: Her lawyer is David Boies. Yes, THAT David Boies.)

  44. 44.

    El Cid

    @Chad N Freude: Yes it was snark. There is no serious way one needs to discuss a nation’s economic policies on the basis of the delicate theoretical feelings of the most rich.

  47. 47.

    Suffern ACE

    @El Cid: This extreme communist notes that it appears to be the well-heeled owners of the Post and the WSJ who are most bent out of shape by our deficit, so much so that they can’t stop talking about it. I am assuming that they will rest much easier knowing that their taxes are going to help eliminate that deficit. Since it will be a wash, the well heeled can go back to their other obsession, which is bitching about how the poor are living on easy street.

  48. 48.

    Mnemosyne

    @Alwhite:

    I was a little disappointed with the story on “reality” TV. The information I really was hoping they would provide was why the shows stopped filing during the writers strike. Seems to me if you are filming real life you don’t have writers.

    HAHAHAHAHA!

    No, but seriously, I knew some writers for reality shows. They’re all scripted. Every single one. I’m still shocked that the producers of “Real Housewives of DC” didn’t get charged with anything. You think the Salehis came up with the idea of crashing that reception at the White House by themselves? But plausible deniability came to the rescue once again.

  51. 51.

    Amanda in the South Bay

    My favourite chaplain moment in the Army was when I came out as trans, and after spending the weekend in the hospital for suicidal ideation having the obligatory talk with the BN chaplain, he tried to impress on the need for me to follow Jesus, put my faith in Dog, blah blah blah. I actually rolled my eyes at him-I suspect he knew he wasn’t going to get his message across, but had to do it anyways. Plus I got to tell him to politely bugger off when he straight out asked me if I was gay.

  54. 54.

    Mnemosyne

    @numbskull:

    Well, to be fair, you’ve got the word “social” in “social democracy,” which means you’re really secretly talking about sociaIism, which means the right-wing hordes have to veer off into screeching about how Communists Islamofascists Are Coming To Kill Us All! and can avoid the entire discussion.

    It would be nice to live in a country where the political class was actually capable of discussing the problems we face without latching onto buzzwords to derail the entire conversation, but I don’t think I have sufficient marketable skills to emigrate.

    (I’m trying Yutsano’s trick for typing The Forbidden Word — let’s see if it works.)

  55. 55.

    El Cid

    Tony Blair on Amanpour: All the utter bullshit propaganda used to launch the Iraq war was justified because I was a decision maker.

  56. 56.

    4jkb4ia

    Did you read Taylor Branch today!? Do not pass go. Do not collect $200.

    Key paragraph:

    When it came to politics at the rally, Mr. Beck always stopped short, perhaps because his new framework points directly away from anti-government orthodoxy. Washington and the founders established freedom by upholding experimental government against those who would tear it down. Lincoln saved the Union from deconstructionist zealots. Dr. King’s dream speech, from patriotic and spiritual ground, appealed unreservedly for the nation to “rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed” by passing a civil rights bill to end segregation.

    Kristof was also very good.

  57. 57.

    El Cid

    @Suffern ACE:

    Since it will be a wash, the well heeled can go back to their other obsession, which is bitching about how the poor are living on easy street.

    The important thing is that assistance to the poor and middle class, in fact the very weakness of policies to punish them for even surviving, is harmful to the incredibly delicate, glass flower-like sensitivity of the super-ultra-rich’s feelings.

  58. 58.

    El Cid

    Tony Blair: George Bush Jr. was dumb but decisive. Though I liked Bill Clinton better because he talked gooder.

  60. 60.

    Chad N Freude

    I think we should start a charitable organization to raise funds for maintenance of the fragile psychological health of high income households. They are clearly a repressed minority in need of both government and charitable assistance.

  64. 64.

    El Cid

    @Chad N Freude: Look, just because you absolutely and without challenge dominate corporations, their investors, think tanks, political institutions, lobbyists, politicians, broadcast and printed media, and cultural institutions is no reason to think that you aren’t oppressed.

    Occasionally laws are passed and rhetoric is spoken which mildly rebuke you, often with few consequences, and this is just like suffering as a Jew in Nazi Germany. And frankly they can’t take more such torture any more than children can survive without food. I mean rich kids, of course. We need to cut school lunch programs so as to teach discipline.

  66. 66.

    demo woman

    @DougJ:

    Watching Amanpour. They should have had the guy who played Blair in “The Queen” do the interview though, I like him better than the real Tony Blair.

    Pierce Brosnan did a fair impersonation of the British PM.

  68. 68.

    Larry Signor

    In a recently released Galling Poll, 19 super-rich Americans were surveyed concerning their psychological-financial attitudes. All expressed optimism about their financial futures, citing the rising unemployment rate among poor Americans as proof that the massive wealth transfer now under way will continue. This fact has contributed to recent market euphoria where thousands of 401k investments that had been looted in the recent dip were restored to record values for the new owners.

  70. 70.

    numbskull

    @Corner Stone: I have to say I posted it because it has been my assessment since before the ’08 elections, actually, since ’06. But, whaddyagonnado? I phone banked, canvassed, held in-home get-togethers, etc. to elect Democrats and Obama, mainly as a “least of several bad choices.”

    I don’t agree with the many (some here) who say that we got the most that was possible for each of the legislative “victories” of the past two years. The final bills were always going to be just a smidge to the right of whatever was going to be originally proposed. Starting from center-right just means that we ended up with rightwing retreads.

    Cole, god bless ‘im, and many others here find some solace in the assumption that Obama and the Dem leadership always started with as much as they thought was possible to get. That’s not entirely how DC works; it’s valid only to a degree.

    In the end, for what it’s worth, I agree with Atrios/Open Left/etc. that what was proposed was proposed precisely because the end result was what we actually got.

  72. 72.

    SiubhanDuinne

    The English language just cracks me up sometimes.

    I was over at Media Matters for America, and I swear it took me about 5 minutes to make sense of this headline:

    *Fox News bullies organized labor in run-up to Labor Day*

    I was reading the subject (Fox News) as a modifier, a present-tense verb (bullies) as a noun, and an adjective (organized) as a past-tense verb. So what I was getting was “The bullies from Fox News sorted, arranged, and neatly shelved hard work.” It was incredibly disorienting, trying to make sense of it, like being in the middle of an Escher staircase. A verbical illusion.

    I guess I’d better get me some coffee NAOW.

  77. 77.

    Admiral_Komack

    @jwb:

    I didn’t.
    What I took from it was “gee, Obama isn’t emoting again”.
    And since the New York Times did all they could to get this country into that quagmire, Frank Rich needs to drink a hot, steaming cup of “Shut The Fuck Up!”
    (After 2 comments, the NYT shut down the comments section of Rich’s column, the weaselly fucks).

  79. 79.

    Turbulence

    DougJ, John Cole, and others: help me out here. Why do you watch the sunday shows on TV?

    I mean, you’re all very well informed about politics and policy. Certainly better than the moderators or the vast majority of guests you see on the sunday shows. Most of what you see just enrages you because the stupid, the stupid, it BURNS. So what are you really getting out of it? It seems like such a waste: you’re smart folks but you intentionally expose yourself to beltway stupid every sunday. Wouldn’t it be more pleasant to just attend a liberal church? Then at least you’d get some good recipes….

    I’ve seen you do these threads for years and I’ve always been meaning to ask.

  81. 81.

    master c

    Sunday shows are like a cute relic now. Never watch, like to read about them if it takes less than 45 seconds.

  82. 82.

    Origuy

    @Chad N Freude:

    I missed this. What’s the trick?

    Using a capital i instead of a lower case L in the word sociaIist. In the font that the Balloon Juice stylesheet is using for comment text, they are almost identical. The capital i is a few pixels shorter. (IlIlIl)

  83. 83.

    Chad N Freude

    @Origuy: Thanks. I would be embarrassed to tell you the first thing that occurred to me when I read “a few pixels shorter”. But I’m going to start using “a few pixels shy of an l” when I read about someone saying something stupid.

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