The Politico mainstreams spin into CBS:
With many polls indicating the Republicans may win back control of the House of Representatives (and possibly the Senate as well) in the upcoming mid-term elections, Jim VandeHei, the executive editor of Politico, told CBS’ “Face the Nation” that the Obama administration is in a horrible position.
“Does the White House understand this?” asked guest host Harry Smith. “Do you feel any sense of panic or concern” on the part of the administration?
“They get it. There’s panic. There’s concern,” VandeHei said. “The reality for this administration stinks, politically and practically, when it comes to the economy. You’re not going to be able to change that 9.6-percent unemployment figure. You can’t get anything from Congress in the next couple of months.”
Thought this dovetailed nicely with Mistermix’s last post. The Politico is basically Breitbart without edited videos, so your guess is as good as mine how much of this is true. Personally, I think they should be panicking, but the problem is that most of the people who are going to get wiped out in the “tidal wave” are blue dogs who will fight any attempts the administration makes to help them. They’re too busy talking about deficits and tax cuts to notice they are Democrats and that unemployment at 10% is unacceptable. Then, to make matters even more fun, you have progressives concern trolling the blue dogs with health care polls, when the reality is that if the blue dogs voted for single payer or whatever HCR hobby horse the prog. blogs wanted, the blue dogs would be wiped out for sure.
Screw it. I’m ready for America to get a good, hot dicking at the hands of the GOP. Apparently the lessons of the last decade didn’t stick. Time for a refresher course at the hands of Speaker Boehner.
TR
Are you sure the GOP can handle that job? After all these years of complaining that the Democrats were ramming various things down their throat, I got the distinct impression that Republicans saw themselves as catchers rather than pitchers.
Mr Furious
I starting to think exactly the same thing, John.
It’s getting pretty fucking difficult to get motivated to try to save this country from what it apparently deserves.
c u n d gulag
Yeah John, but can we survive another Republican ‘dicking?’ These new dicks are even stupider than the previous ones.
JGabriel
John Cole
Already? I hoped we would get a couple decades respite from the GOP. It’s only two years since the GOP crashed the economy, and people want to put them back in power?
I give up.
.
beltane
One thing I can guarantee is that within two weeks of Speaker Boehner’s reign the GOP will be as popular as a tuna sandwich that’s been wedged under a car seat in the hot sun for a few days.
Mr Furious
The only downside here is that the country will still be stupid enough to believe the GOP blaming it all on Obama. So long as it isn’t Palin in 2012, I’m getting ready to ride it all the way out.
Ed Marshall
The campaigns don’t start until Labor Day. Cheer up, I don’t think people know who these jackasses are yet. When people get a look at them the house races are going to tighten right the fuck up.
JGabriel
c u n d gulag:
Is that even a relevant concern anymore? Apparently, we didn’t survive the last one.
.
BDeevDad
I love the short term memory of the American voter.
Mr Furious
@Ed Marshall:
Let’s hope. I have absolutely zero faith left in the electorate and even less in the media.
Frank
If the GOP does win one chamber of Congress or both, it would not be my first choice. On the other hand, it would also mean they actually have to make an attempt at governing. And they showed between 2000-2008 that they simply don’t know how to.
And if things are the same in 2012 (bad economy), the Dems will easily take back Congress. As shown in this election, people in our country don’t vote based on much logic. If things are good, the majority seems to vote for the incumbent. And if things are bad, the majority seems to vote for the challenger (even if that challenger has no clue about anything, hate America and created the problem in the first place).
And Obama should not have problems whatsoever with the idiot from Alaska. This should set things up nicely for 2016, when hopefully Hillary Clinton will run.
matt
WHO SOUNDS LIKE A FIREBAGGER NOW
SiubhanDuinne
@Ed Marshall:
And today is . . .
sparky
hmmm…pretty accurate looking to moi, though i must disagree with this:
a. nobody knows what the “reality” would be, so this is not even a counterfactual.
b. i don’t think this even makes any sense. for example (since we are speculating) if there were was a public option, the Ds could simply say that they gave the public a choice. as it is, all they can do is say: well now you can have insurance–from people you loathe–provided you can afford it and provided that the people you loathe profit from your illness. that’s a great selling point. and in either case, the Rs would be opposing it, so what exactly would have been the down side of going further and actually enacting change, rather than simply expanding a dysfunctional, profit-centric system?
i really do understand that most of the people on this blog want to believe in the Ds–i just wish they could see that what’s been going on isn’t because the Ds are spineless so much as it’s what their real owners want/will permit.
jwb
I’m still not sure how much truth there is in this particular media narrative, just as I no longer trust any polling result I see. It wouldn’t surprise me if it’s accurate, but it also wouldn’t surprise me if the actual numbers were running quite counter to the polling and the polling firms are lying through their teeth or not recognizing the actual numbers because they are having to manipulate their numbers to such an extent to bring their raw data into conformity with the demographics. Because one thing I’m pretty sure about is that people do not like the choice that is being presented at the moment between the status quo and the crazy, and when all is said and done we just don’t know which side they are going to come down on.
numbskull
John, you seem frustrated. I think part of this arises from an inaccurate understanding of some of the politics you’re writing about, but what do I know.
Go do something constructive and you’ll feel better. Go out today and talk to one person, just one, about why they should vote Democratic. You’ll feel better. Honest.
Tractarian
I think you mean “mainline,” not “mainstream,” but the point is well-taken.
Believe me, when Speaker Boehner is finally thrust upon this nation, he will provide us with the hard, stiff dicking we deserve.
Michael
@JGabriel:
When Chinese and French peacekeepers arrive to put the pieces back together, I’ll recommend that the franchise be denied to white Christian conservatives for at least 50 years.
Were it up to me, it would be denied to them now. They’ve not demonstrated that they can act responsibly.
@Dogsdoingthings
Dogs giving America a good, hot dogging.
WaterGirl
Please tell me you didn’t really mean what you said in your last paragraph. Winning even one house would mean total disaster, and the consequences would last long after the 2012 elections.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@SiubhanDuinne:
The day Obama calls for a $50 billion dollar jobs/infrastructure program. I’m a long way from optimistic, but maybe David Plouffe and Nancy Pelosi can figure out how to frame this fight after all.
wvng
Steve Benen had a piece the other day reporting that if dems just vote then we won’t lose either House. Having been dicked by republicans quite enough over the last 20 years, I’m in no hurry for that to resume ever again. I’m ready for them to simply disappear into their fainting couches. So my intent over the next two months is to do retail GOTV with everyone I know (“do you really want to lose everything you worked for in 2008 just because you didn’t get a magic wish pony”) and partake of Cole-in-the-barbershop discussions wherever possible.
beltane
@Michael: People whose main desire is to bring about the end of the world in their lifetimes probably have no business voting.
Ross Hershberger
The modern GOP really amazes me. I grew up in a half-Republican household and learned to appreciate thrift, hard work, duty, community and other traditional conservative values.
Today’s Repub leadership wouldn’t hesitate to burn down all that we’ve built as long as they get to rule the ash heap.
WaterGirl
@jwb:
This.
cmorenc
The problem isn’t that the GOP has truly added anyone to their base in the past two years, but rather simply that their partisans are motivated to make a hard stand in the trenches, whereas the Obama Administration, coupled with feckless clowns in Congress such as Harry Reid and Max Baucus, have effectively dissipated the Dem’s motivation. Meanwhile the independents who supported “change” and Obama in 08 were enormously turned off by the way the Obama Administration handled their half of the Wall Street bailout (the HUGEST mistake by far of the Obama Administration), and lost patience with watching the Administration get beaten up as by the fecklessness of their own congresscritters, and the failure to push back fiercely against deeply dishonest GOP obstructionism and lies about health care.
We expected Obama to be more like the second coming of FDR than the second coming of Jimmy Carter, and while the latter analogy doesn’t truly fit Obama, unfortunately by failing to act in nearly as resolute a manner as FDR he leaves himself open to the Carter analogy in voter’s minds. We need a FIGHTER, not a facilitator.
demo woman
Boehner first bill will be to repeal the tanning bed tax to save us all from government interference.
Long live the orange man.
Pancake
Actually, the Politico’s understated the magnitude of looming disaster for the Democrats, as indicated by this new CNN poll. Here’s a small excerpt:
“Republicans also have a large and growing advantage among independents. Sixty-two percent of independents questioned say they would vote for the generic Republican in their district, with three in 10 saying they’d cast a ballot for the generic Democrat. That 32-point margin for the Republicans among independents is up from an 8-point advantage last month.”
numbskull
@sparky: You win The Best of the Morning
(well, by numbskull standards, but that’s all I got)
This is actually how DC works, both parts of what you wrote. 1) There is no downside to proposing and/or voting for [insert flavor of the day]. Just doesn’t happen any more in American politics when it comes to policy, and arguably hasn’t happened in my long-ish lifetime. 2) We end up with what the corporations want or, at best, will allow. Again, arguably been this way all my life. It’s slightly better with Dems as they can’ get elected without at least appearing “to care”. Republicans seem to actually gain votes by being assholes…
TaosJohn
Republican dicking pales in comparison to what Obama has wrought and is still trying to do, which is why I’m not voting. The lesser of two evils theme is dead.
ALL of the old ways of doing things are sliding down the tubes. GOTV is dead, too.
Chad N Freude
@Frank:
If you define governing as trying to undo whatever Obama has accomplished to date, then yes. If you define governing as attempting to continue and codify the financial disparity between different socioeconomic classes, then yes. If you define governing as advancing justice, prosperity, and real US interests in the rest of the world (as opposed to enriching the American oligarchy), I don’t think so.
Corner Stone
@wvng: May I politely suggest you not reference their desire for a “pony” when you conduct your GOTV?
Kryptik
@WaterGirl:
But at the same time, it not only looks like an inevitability, but as well the only way people will actually bother to see the fuck ups for what they are. Depressing thought, yes, but it honestly feels like it’s more and more the case every day.
@Frank:
I’m not going to underestimate the sheer blindingly counterintuitive ability of the Republicans to successfully blame all their fuckups on Democrats and get the media nodding along blankly. Even if Palin is the nominee in 2012, I fully expect the ‘narrative’ to thoroughly smear all dems and liberals, especially Obama, to the point that even she’d have a fighting chance of winning. We’ve already seen just how blindingly easy of a time the GOP has had in blaming every single fucking thing wrong in our country on 1 1/2 years of an Obama administration, while whitewashing (to varying degrees of success) the whole of the Bush years.
JAHILL10
John Cole, C’mon! You’re starting to sound like one of the trolls on your own site. You recognize this for the propaganda that it is and then for some reason you surrender to it. This defeatist attitude simply leaves the field open for the stupid repubs. And while you may have the personal resources to weather another round of nihilist Republican rule, there are millions of people out there who don’t. I had parents who grew up during the Depression and I personally would not want to see those times myself.
I haven’t seen your ActBlue list yet, man. Where is that?
Omnes Omnibus
@Pancake: Just keep fucking that chicken.
Chad N Freude
@jwb: The polls are predicated on the respondents being honest and truthful about their opinions. I don’t think there’s a whole lot of evidence that this is true.
WereBear
As recently as last week Mr WereBear was believing the polling, the gloom and doom, and the chipper pundits predicting the R’s would win back at least one branch because “it’s always been that way in mid terms.”
He spent 20 years working in the Beltway, with a security clearance, and knew admirals by name, among other attributes. He’s generally reliable; except now, he’s not.
Because all the rules have changed.
Now he’s much more cheerful, because “the R’s are running completely batshit people, and the voters won’t notice until late September, when they start paying attention at the earliest. People are going to say, ‘I’m worrying about my children starving, and I don’t hear one word about how you’re going to fix it. It doesn’t matter if people think it will work, people are not economists. People will see that the President is the only one with an idea at all.”
He’s a bright fellow; I’m going with his take. Because maybe it finally sank in that most of what you are being told is an outright lie.
Kryptik
@JAHILL10:
I think part of it is the realization and resignation that the propaganda is working, and in way too many ways, fully worked far beyond its intended scope. The acceptance of the self-fulfilling prophecy the GOP and media have created, and to which the feckless, spineless assholes amongst the Democratic leaders have willingly fallen into.
As far as ActBlue, I do remember a post a few days ago about putting up one when the campaigns truly get underway.
Montysano
@Frank:
New to these parts, are ya?
Teh new, improved GOP doesn’t govern. They just smash shit, drown things in bathtubs, then blame poor/brown people when it all goes south.
Omnes Omnibus
@WereBear: So let it be written; so let it be done.
BDeevDad
@Kryptik: They were also still blaming Clinton in 2008. So, I’d like one Democrat (preferably Grayson) to ask if the economy was Clinton’s fault in 2008 and Obama’s thereafter, why do the Repubs think any typical GOP policies would be effective?
Davis X. Machina
Sorry. We end up with what we want, or what speaks badly of us, what we will allow. Hate to be blunt, but having spent the summer reading about the run-up to the Civil War, which I think counts as a wholesale change in the national direction, I have to conclude that however bad it is, it’s not bad enough. People will act, because they have acted.
The streets are there, and Lord knows guns are abundant.
There’s a defensible argument that the game isn’t worth that particular candle. Violence isn’t even an instrumental good. Civil peace is, and maybe is a good per-se.
But to deny agency and throw up one’s hands is a cop-out.
“They” are “us”.
John Cole
@Pancake: Can you explain why it is that anyone could give a shit about what British wingnuts think? Why do you even waste your time here? We’re not talking about Israel, troll.
JGabriel
cmorenc:
Interestingly, today’s Krugman column argues that the country is making the same mistakes as FDR in the 30’s. The major difference is that WWII pushed the US into a spending program that the country wouldn’t support absent a war.
.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Don’t say this. That is the first Pancake comment in BJ history that actually expressed a real discussion point rather than a stupid, brainless insult. We should encourage that, not deride it.
wvng
@Corner Stone:
Yes, you may.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: Fair enough.
BDeevDad
@Pancake: When Republicans stop running tea party nutjobs and begin running generic Republicans again, we’ll talk.
Tyro
Screw it. I’m ready for America to get a good, hot dicking at the hands of the GOP. Apparently the lessons of the last decade didn’t stick. Time for a refresher course at the hands of Speaker Boehner.
You know, I would have said something like this when I was in my 20s. I’m now in my mid-to-late 30s: another 10 years of the US getting screwed over by the GOP will be too much for my career to take. I don’t have the time to wait for the US to come to its senses when I’m pushing 50. I’d rather we fix our problems now.
Chad N Freude
@John Cole: John, what I said @Chad N Freude. I don’t understand how your invocation of past stupidity has any relevance to Pancake’s quoting a CNN poll.
angler
JC, you are the zeitgeist. Meant as a compliment, not criticism.
BJ went from flaming the admin’s liberal critics last fall-winter to wishing America a “good, hot dicking at the hands of the GOP.”
The HCR critics get zinged here for balance, but it’s clear we’re all firebaggers now.
Frank
@Kryptik:
Yes, because the Dems were in charge of both the White House and Congress.
Why wasn’t it that easy for the GOP then to blame the Dems in 2008? Because the GOP was in power and the economy was bad.
The same thing is likely to happen in 2012 if the economy is bad. “Throw the bums out” all over again.
Omnes Omnibus
@BDeevDad:
@Pancake:
The generic ballot polls cited in the link do not take into account the crazies in any given district. Tautology, sure, but significant.
valdivia
So I’ll definitely planning on volunteering my time on weekends to knock on doors on one of the many senate and congressional districts near me that are hard fought this November. Instead of giving up I think the next two months we can actually get out there and make sure the voters we need get to the polls. But that’s just me…
Chad N Freude
People, reflexively attacking Pancake’s innocuous comment on this thread only proves the point he keeps trying to make about how doctrinaire and unthinking the local commentariat is.
JAHILL10
@Kryptik: The problem is you accept the notion that these idiots can “create their own reality” like they claimed to be able to do under Bush. They really can’t. Honestly. Particularly if you don’t accept their bullshit made up narratives.
And talk about short term memory. One of the tags for this very site “Good news for John McCain” is the product of this same right wing propaganda machine. I can’t count the number of time during the 2008 campaign when the driving narrative was that Obama was dead in the water. Or more recently, how about heath care being Obama’s “Waterloo”?
I’m really impatient with the whole, “Let the Republicans screw the country over! That’ll teach ’em a lesson!” meme on the left. I thought we were supposed to be the compassionate party. To punish a handful of racist teabaggers we’re going to let the whole country go to hell? It may onerous to have to carry this dead weight into the 21st century, but the alternative for many, many, many more people is too horrible to contemplate.
Frank
@Pancake:
This is pretty irrelevant. There are so many Republicans who are embarrassed by what the GOP did when they were in charge between 2000-2008 that they now rather call themselves anything except for Republican. Do you really think a tea bagger would call himself Republican when the word Independent is available? These independents are for the most part Republicans.
JAHILL10
@valdivia: I’m with you!
FlipYrWhig
@cmorenc:
I’ll accept that the vaunted “independents” have misgivings about the bank bailout, but there’s _no way_ they paid any attention to meta-meta-level worries about missing opportunities to push back against the GOP. You’re merging liberal complaints about Obama with those of “independents.”
I virtually guarantee that what “independents” think about Obama is that he spent too much money trying to help welfare-sucking moochers instead of hard-working regular Joes, and that’s the reason why the economy is bad.
roshan
Hey, where are Phil and Bender? Out dicking themselves, eh? Pancake is feeling lonely out here. Come on, guys, give him a hand, will ya?
Bnut
People my age (18-30) can’t handle another 8-10 years of the GOP. With young voters at almost 50% real unemployment now, you would be looking at a real lost generation.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: Since your comment to me, two people (including myself) engaged the substance of Pancake’s comment. I believe your point was taken.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@JGabriel: to me, the biggest point people miss in comparing Obama to FDR is (setting aside the 85 or so other major historical variables and stipulating that IANAH and I’m going by my sense of things rather than research or scholarship which is to say I’m talking out of my ass), in the thirties the labor movement and non-rich people in general had some sense of both having a stake in society, and in being owed representation by the government, to strike a balance against what we know call corporatists. They didn’t see government as the enemy, but as a tool, their tool, that they could use to level the playing field.
Again, IANAH, but my sense and recollection (born in ’67) is that Reagan really persuaded the majority of Americans that government is the enemy, all government spending is Waste, Fraud and Abuse, ergo all taxation is theft. So you get people whose taxes Obama cut ranting and raving that the Koch brothers are treated unfairly.
scarshapedstar
Lemme get this straight.
The Blue Dogs are going to lose their jobs no matter what because EVERYONE hates them. They had a choice to vote for some decent legislation before losing their jobs, but chose to thumb their nose at world+dog and refuse to do so. Now they will lose their jobs after having destroyed the near-term political viability of the Democratic party… whining all the while about how libruls ruined everything and now Obama won’t be able to pass anything without their votes even though they voted with the GOP 100% of the time.
Somehow, this proves that the nutroots were wrong when we said that the Blue Dogs are a bunch of useless, lying pricks who should have been forced to floor votes by push of bayonets.
I love when John concern trolls his own readers :)
burnspbesq
@sparky:
Have mercy – it’s far too early in the morning to have to deal with this sort of nonsensical, evidence-free conspiracy theorizing. I haven’t even had my second can of Diet Coke yet.
JAHILL10
@Frank: Yet the polls you people are so worried about consistently show that 70 percent of the nation still blames the Bush administration for the economy, not Obama or the Democrats.
Chad N Freude
@Tyro: I’m old enough to be your father, and I doubt that I would live to see the end of the downward rush that would result from a republican victory. I would like to spend my few pitiful remaining years not spiraling down the Toilet To Hell.
Pancake
@John Cole:
“….why it is that anyone could give a shit about what British wingnuts think? Why do you even waste your time here? We’re not talking about Israel, troll.”
British wingnuts…Israel…???? WTF…Drunk already, John?
Frank
@Bnut:
Then I wish people in that age group would vote. If they actually bothered to vote as in 2008 the Dems would remain in power. So, if they are concerned about another 8-10 years of GOP, they have the power in their own hands.
WaterGirl
@Kryptik: The thing is… if they don’t remember it after having lived through 8 years, the whole thing happening again isn’t likely to help their long-term memory.
I see no upside, long-term or short-term, if we lose either the house or the senate. Losing 2 years of governing ability (if we lose in 2010) – only to get back to where we are now (if we win in 2012) – that sure doesn’t look like a win to me.
Nobody has voted yet, so the Dems have not lost. This conversation this morning is helping me see that the only sane response for me is to get involved again and try to influence the outcome of the election, like I did in 2008.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Right. I posted my plea for non-reflexive engagement while the real-time conversation was in progress.
valdivia
@JAHILL10:
excellent. I am in DC so there are plenty of places where I can drive to and/or take the train and make a difference. I am signing up this week with OFA and hope to get as much done as possible. I am all for getting worried but I find that it is better to be worried and getting our guys elected, or trying to, than just putting your arms up and giving in to these Rep fuckers.
Frank
@JAHILL10:
Yes, but the Dems haven’t fixed the problem and the voters are obviously impatient. Or what other take do you have on it?
John Cole
@Pancake: Are you or are you not the British troll who only shows up in threads about Israel? I mean, “Pancake” is dedicated to Rachel Corrie, is it not?
FlipYrWhig
@scarshapedstar: Except aren’t the Blue Dogs and HCR opponents doing pretty well in polling? It seems like the people who are most vulnerable are the ones who went out on a limb to vote for progressive priorities when their districts aren’t too amenable to that, like Tom Perriello in VA.
Davis X. Machina
Anyone comment on CNN’s poll today?
———–
Steeplejack
Deleted because FYWP, that’s why.
Kryptik
@WaterGirl:
And I think the operative phrase here is ‘it has to get worse before it gets better’.
I really , really, really hope it won’t come to it, and I really don’t want to. But the more things go on, the more I’m convinced that it’s going to take a few more years of total Republican fuckups and the rape of the nation’s foundations before people will finally wake up.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Frank: I was just looking for a blogpost from a week or so ago, I thought it was Steve Benen, showing how different the polls would look if the 2008 electorate showed up, instead of the usual old, rich, frightened, white people that show up for mid-terms. Anybody remember who had that up?
Chad N Freude
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I think that’s a pretty fair assessment, and I would add that the financial overlord class still sees government as a tool for accomplishing their agenda.
catclub
@Kryptik:
“We’ve already seen just how blindingly easy of a time the GOP has had in blaming every single fucking thing wrong in our country on 1 1/2 years of an Obama administration, while whitewashing (to varying degrees of success) the whole of the Bush years.”
So this is why Benen is reporting that polls show the people of the US STILL blame Bush far more than Obama for present bad economic conditions.
I knew there was a firebagger explanation for it.
Frank
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Sorry I don’t but I do remember what you are referring to. If the dems who voted in 2008 would just vote in 2010, the Dems would hold onto Congress.
Steeplejack
All may not be lost. Yesterday I got a report from my friend in Alaska (70-year-old woman), who went to a “meet and greet” for Scott McAdams, the Democratic nominee for the Senate.
azlib
I have always found it odd the overall narrative sees the Democratic Party as a liberal monolith and even a reduction in the Dem majority is seen as a repudiation of liberalism. You are correct that the Dems who will be wiped out this Fall are predominately in conservative Republican leaning districts. After the 2006 and 2008 wave, it is little surprise to see some of these folks lose this Fall.
Our media pundits do not help with their focus on the horserace and not on issues or policies or even the wave problem. This election is a combination of a bad economy with the subsiding of the 2006 and 2008 Dem wave.
Pancake
John Cole: “I mean, “Pancake” is dedicated to Rachel Corrie, is it not?”
ABSOLUTELY NOT, as I have explained here in the past!
Bnut
@Frank: One could say this about any group of disenfranchised voters. How can I expect my own generation to learn to vote in their own self interest when people who have been on the planet much longer than we seem to not grasp the concept? I’m not trying to start anything, but this the same as punching hippies. I will vote for Dems till my fingers fall off, but telling the majority of young Americans (who are well informed, but very cynical) to “just listen to us” and vote Democrat as often as possible is not going to work. There must be some tangible results. Just saying, and too.
WereBear
Them liburul facts mean nothing!
Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!
Nick
@sparky:
you assume the healthcare bill is unpopular because it doesn’t have a public option. It ignores the reality that it was unpopular even when it did. It’s unpopular because its complicated and suspicious and the media did a good job of making people believe it’s some shady power grab.
The humanity
In Corporate America, GOP dicks you
FlipYrWhig
@JAHILL10: I have a feeling that people blame Bush for creating the problem, and they also blame Obama for not doing enough to fix it. So Bush and Republicans are more to blame, but Obama and Dems aren’t blameless either.
But I still don’t understand why anyone other than that truly hardcore 27% of the population would ever see the current crop of Republicans as good people to turn to in a moment of peril.
I feel like what must be happening is that the “enthusiasm gap” is all about not-very-tuned-in people who voted for Obama as Obama; they may lean D but don’t see themselves as partisans and don’t really feel like making a special effort to vote for Joe Schmoe, D-Springfield. (There’s also an enthusiasm gap among frustrated liberals, but that’s a small slice of an already-small slice of the electorate; it just happens to be one of the loudest segments of the blogosphere.) There are more D’s than R’s, but many more hardcore R’s than hardcore D’s, the softcore D’s are disengaged, and the softcore R’s are extinct.
eemom
@Chad N Freude:
@Omnes Omnibus:
You two are entirely too reasonable, civilized, and even-tempered for this anarchic zoo of a blog.
Meant as a compliment, both to you and the zoo.
keestadoll
“I’m ready for America to get a good, hot dicking at the hands of the GOP. ”
Ugh. To quote “Singles:” “Desperation, the world’s worst cologne.”
FlipYrWhig
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I also think it was Benen, quoting someone else.
jwb
@Chad N Freude: They are also predicated on the sample being representative of the population, which we (and even the pollsters) know is no longer accurate. So they estimate the actual population and then apply a series of transformations to the raw polling data to bring it in line with what they believe the actual population to be. (Young people underrepresented in the polling data—well then you weight the young people you actually managed to get into your poll higher, etc.) But at least one of the problems is that they don’t really know what the actual population looks like except in the grossest demographic terms, so they don’t actually know how accurate their weightings are. Moreover, in an election like this one, where people are unhappy with their choices and so not liable to follow historical patterns of voting, my guess is that the polling results will be even more unreliable than usual.
burnspbesq
For the next 40 minutes, I am ignoring our screwed-up politics.
I have a brand-new, remastered, 180 gram vinyl copy of “Grievous Angel.”
See y’all later.
Nick
@FlipYrWhig: Yes, the only reason the “Blue Dogs are gonna lose” reasoning is out there is because the first seats to flip are the ones with retiring Blue Dogs (Gordon, Tanner, Moore, Ellsworth, Berry)
Ross Hershberger
The GOP doesn’t have to seem good to turn to. They can accomplish the same thing by making people terrified of the Dems. With their control of a big chunk of the media this is the natural strategy. Hence the GOP’s concentration not on what they would do if elected, but on death panels, killer immigrants and scary Muslims.
Make a storm, be the only port and people will come to you.
Steeplejack
@John Cole:
I believe he usually comes back and says that “Pancake” was the code name of his favorite Cold War spy (fap-fap-fap).
Omnes Omnibus
@eemom: Bite me. How’s that?
Chad N Freude
@eemom:
Thanks. It’s a dirty job, but somebody’s got to do it.
Jennifer
After having been lectured last night about how the bad economy is my fault because I refuse to reward Blanche Lincoln with my vote for f***ing up the public option, this is somewhat gratifying.
Some Dems deserve to lose, even though they’re going to lose to batshit insane Republicans. Lincoln’s numbers would be a lot better now if she had just quietly thrown in her lot with her Senate colleagues rather than staking out ground as the last holdout on public option. Since she ultimately voted in favor of the (greatly watered down) health package, she managed to piss off everyone with her antics. She’d probably still lose, but at least everyone in the country wouldn’t be looking at paying 30% more for their health insurance.
Chad N Freude
@jwb: True. It’s a lot like the Quant computations that so accurately calculated the Market.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Dude, it’s a compliment. Be reasonable, civilized, and even-tempered.
Frank
@Bnut:
My remark was directed to the poster who was in the 18-30 age group and who himself stated that the GOP would cause that age group to be a lost generation. He said it, I didn’t. Perhaps you respond to him instead.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: I was trying to fit in.
Chad N Freude
@Jennifer: Your first sentence isn’t really what it was about. The discussion was whether withholding a vote from Lincoln would risk (or perhaps guarantee) something even worse than returning her to to the Senate.
Stillwater
@burnspbesq: I have a brand-new, remastered, 180 gram vinyl copy of “Grievous Angel.”
And now you know just what you have to do.
hilzoy
“It’s getting pretty fucking difficult to get motivated to try to save this country from what it apparently deserves.”
If only I had some confidence that “this country” was one big person, or at least that the people who would get screwed under the Republicans were the same people who voted for them…
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Ah. Then you can’t be reasonable, civilized, and even-tempered. Carry on.
Glen Tomkins
Huh?
“…the reality is that if the blue dogs voted for single payer or whatever HCR hobby horse the prog. blogs wanted, the blue dogs would be wiped out for sure.”
What’s the evidence that purple America would absolutely hate Medicare for All in comparison to the insurance options they have now, beyond all hope of convincing them otherwise, but that they are down with the individual mandate?
Jennifer
Chad – I don’t owe Lincoln my vote, just as she clearly doesn’t feel like she owes me representation.
Bernard
i would be surprised to see Blue Dogs lose. to think the Independents will ever vote left of center when the right is where they “feel” at home. the Middle may “think” we have the answers, but they will never trust the “left.” a matter of upbringing/education.
the Middle sees the right as loony but more reasonable/ lol/grounded. the Middle votes on how they “feel” about issues. the Left scares the shit out of the Middle, no matter what else they say.
of course, the Right is continually wrong about everything. what else is new? The Middle Voter will never trust the Left. There is no way the Middle “Trusts” the left of center.
the Left is too Rash in its’ action. the Right is “safe and believable”.
so i would love to see Blue Dogs lose, but won’t hold my breath.
Chad N Freude
@hilzoy: This is America. The Constitution guarantees that there can be no discrimination between different groups of screwees. As much as I respect John, I can’t agree with the position of a plague on my house as well as yours.
bago
If you need to see one movie this summer, it’s: Machete!
eemom
@Omnes Omnibus:
: (
Chad N Freude
@Jennifer: I’m lucky that I live in a state where I’m not faced with this. If I were in your position, I would come to a different conclusion.
sparky
@Nick:
two things–
first, i was making a counterfactual argument that if a different kind of health care reform had been enacted, then the Ds would at least have the possibility of making a more compelling argument that they had enacted an improved piece of policy, and that consequently people should vote for them. in other words, all i was doing was illustrating the proposition that if the Ds had done more, they would have a stronger (as in if nothing else more clearly defined) item to point to as in a distinction between themselves and the Rs, who had had the opportunity to enact something similar when they were in power but did not. i’m just countering the “crap is the best policy we can ever hope for” line of thinking as applied to electioneering.
second, as to your argument about polling for health care reform being bad, i think the polling supports my view rather than yours. it was not until the general public saw that they were going to be fed a brass-plated shit sandwich that they soured on the plan. from the NYT of June 20, 2009:
Chad N Freude
@eemom: I chastised him, and I’m sure that will make him repent.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@hilzoy:
Not voting is a vote, and in this cycle, it’s a vote for the worst of the worst
SiubhanDuinne
Pancake, as usual, is full of crêpe.
Jennifer
Chad – that’s easy for you to say, given that you haven’t been dicked over by her on virtually every issue you care about for the past 12 years.
Omnes Omnibus
@hilzoy: Aye, there’s the rub. I understand that urge as well, but I know too many people who are not tea-baggin’ idiots. They, and I, will get completely hosed as well. In addition, some of those whose votes are in play are not tea-baggers but rather simply ignorant. a lot of people are working their asses of to simply “put food on their families.” They have neither the time nor the energy to wade through the mountains of BS that now constitute our national dialogue. I would not want to see them punished as well.
Chad N Freude
@SiubhanDuinne: For once, P posted a comment that was not insulting, stupid, or irrationally hostile. John and a few others responded reflexively to what he’s said in the past and not what he posted today, and the moment for civil discussion passed. RIP.
Omnes Omnibus
@eemom: As I said, I was trying to fit in. What do you people want from me? It’s all take, take, take until I have nothing more to give. Damn you, I am only one man.
Nick
@sparky: June 20, 2009 was before the media assault on HCR, before the town halls, before death panels, before the sausage was made.
angler
Read the thread. Anyone got something better than “more and better Democrats?” Until we do it’s knock doors, make calls.
Chad N Freude
@Jennifer: Even so, when faced with multiple bad choices (including not voting at all), I go with the one I think is the least evil.
burnspbesq
@Stillwater:
Yes, I do.
Nick
@Jennifer:
Did Lincoln hold up the stimulus, did she hold up the jobs bills? Will Boozman?
Yes, you’re screwing the country because your personal pony was not delivered.
Lincoln or not, the public option wasn’t passing, because two other Democratic Senators opposed it, but Lincoln has not been terrible on issues related to the economy.
This idea that someone the public option is the reason she’s losing is rather ludicrous. Her approval ratings were around 40% before the HCR battle even started.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Wow. You’re such a prolific commenter I thought you were a committee. Who knew?
Nick
@Jennifer:
maybe you need to move to a different state. I find it odd that the only issues you care about are the ones she dicked you over on.
Bernard
the media didn’t “buy into” the selling of the Healtcare fiasco. the Media is owned by Corporations, as such what is good for the Corporations is what the Media “sells.”
to think otherwise is outright rightwing nonsense/ignorance of reality.
Davis X. Machina
@sparky, & nick, from Jonathan Bernstein today:
Bernard
i grew up believing in the “lesser of two evils” theory, coming from a split Democratic/Republican household.
now there is NO difference between the parties.
so now i have a choice between “this” evil and “that” evil.
oh boy i have a choice!!! oh boy!!! oh boy!!!
this evil/Democrat is owned by this Corporation
that evil/Republican is owned by that Corporation.
or is it the otherway around? hmm..
i get to choose!!!!! oh boy lucky me!!!!!
eemom
@Chad N Freude:
also those “omni” prefixes imply some “all commenter” type status if I remember my Latin…..
Mike in NC
Much has been written about the “Myth of the Independent Voter”, yet the media will continue to pretend that half the voters out there are completely nonpartisan. That fits their narrative that every election is a horse race that can be flipped at the last minute by the “swing” voter. Bunch of drama queens.
Chad N Freude
@eemom: So “omni” is ominous?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Bernard: Heh. There’s a Dickensesque parody to be written, wherein Jacob Marley is the ghost a Nader voter, wearing a chain forged of dead American soldiers and Iraqis, John Roberts, Samuel Alito, et cetera, who comes to visit Janeaneezer Scroogewald, who replies “Bah! Not a dime’s worth of difference! Humbug! Vealpen! Under the bus! If I had my way, every Obot would be buried under a mountain of Change we can believe in signs, with Hope buttons stuck in their hearts!”
burnspbesq
@Jennifer:
Got any data to back up that number? Cause I’ve already been told that my contribution to the cost of my employer-provided health insurance is going up 11 percent. Which makes your statement demonstrably non-factual.
eeeeewwww
@Tractarian: Maybe, but from what I’ve heard, long-term hard drinkers like Boehner have a difficult time getting it up for the ramming. Maybe the little blue pill fixes that, dunno.
But whatever, I think getting it long and hard from a drunk-assed GOPer sounds sloppy, gross and seriously lacking in satisfaction for the partner(s). So can we skip that option?
Chad N Freude
@Mike in NC: I think a lot of “Independent Voters” claim to be independent because identifying with a party that might take positions on some issues that they don’t agree with would tarnish their self-images. They would consider themselves somehow tainted in their own minds.
burnspbesq
@Bernard:
If you seriously believe that there is no difference between the Democrats and the Republicans, then you are clearly incapable of rational thought. Please crawl off to the nearest unoccupied corner, assume the fetal position, and continue drooling on yourself until help arrives.
Chad N Freude
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Cute idea. Tiny Tim could exclaim “Allah bless us, every one.”
Nick
@Bernard:
There is no where in this country where a Democrat and a Republican in an election are exactly the same with the possible exception of the 2nd district of Alabama.
Nowhere.
Pay attention.
WereBear
I could accept John’s point: except the ones still voting Republican at this point have made it crystal clear that they are incapable of knowing how, when, and where they have been screwed over.
Rush Limbaugh could stuff them into a pet carrier on a conveyor belt to the mouth of an active volcano, and all they could say would be, “I met Rush!”
Chad N Freude
@burnspbesq: Well, at last we’re back to civil debate. Sondheim sends his regards. (Giggles hysterically.)
SiubhanDuinne
Chad N Freude: Well, I was really only trying to make a lame pun. But putative excursions into civil discourse notwithstanding, I’m not going to pay much attention to anyone who quotes polls on generic Reps and Dems.
Jennifer
It’s quite funny to read all the comments about “firebaggers” here, when the lockstep position is maintained w/r/t “vote for a Republican who calls herself a Democrat – or everything is all your fault!”
No, no it’s not my fault. Perhaps, just perhaps, if we hadn’t all been holding our noses and voting for “centrist” Dems all these years, more people would have awakened to what the Republican party has become – because we wouldn’t have so many elected Democrats lending it legitimacy with their support.
There will ALWAYS be a reason why my support is CRUCIAL, DO or DIE, THE WORLD WILL END IF I DON’T VOTE FOR THE FAKE DEMOCRAT. Most of the time, I’m able to hold my nose and vote for them. This time, I’m not. And it won’t make a damn bit of difference in the outcome. So take all your opinions on my free decision as an adult to excercise my right to NOT vote for an odious candidate just this once, and shove them where the sun don’t shine.
If Blanche needs votes, she should seek them from Arkansas Blue Cross and Blue Shield, whose water she carried in the health care debate. If she needs votes, let her appeal to the Walton and Tyson and Stephens families, whose backs she’s got with her bill to permanently eliminate the estate tax. If she needs votes, let her go to the companies owned by some of those same families, Wal-Mart and Tyson Foods, who owe her big time on her anti-union positions. If she needs votes, she’s got a few places to turn for them. A very few, because that’s the only people she’s represented. I’m not one of them so she shouldn’t be looking here.
Chad N Freude
@SiubhanDuinne: I was kind of hoping that civility might trick him into being assimilated into the BJ Borg.
pablo
My sedements xzactly!></a?
Great time to be a 'toonist…
lousy time to be a 'Merican!
Chad N Freude
@Jennifer:
This is a misreading of the conversation, but there is no effective way to break through such defensiveness.
MattR
@Jennifer: I think it was Bruce Willis (though I am not 100% sure) who was on Bill Maher’s show about 6 years ago unrepentingly defending his vote for Nader in 2000. His basic point, which I agree with, is that transformational change is never going to happen without some short term pain and there will always be a reason why “this time” is not the right time to make a stand. I don’t know if getting rid of Blanche Lincoln now will result in a better Democrat being elected in 6 years, but I can’t blame anyone who wants to try.
NobodySpecial
Well, it appears half my party is too chickenshit to go out on the plank and get the prisoner back before he falls in, and the other half want to saw the plank in half to make sure he goes.
Deep breaths, people. Labor Day weekend isn’t even over yet and most of the electorate couldn’t tell you who’s running on EITHER side. Now is when you get out and do some ground game, not wring your hands on a fucking blog and pass out ammo for the circular firing squad.
Corner Stone
@Bnut:
This is similar to the point I was making yesterday, but no one wanted to hear it then either.
Chad N Freude
@pablo: I clicked through to your site. “I See a Theme” is totally excellent. Everybody go look. Would you consider renaming it “I Have a Theme” for the 11-dimensional politico-cultural reference?
pablo
My sedaments xzactly!
Great time to be a ‘toonist…
lousy time to be a ‘Merican!
Corner Stone
@scarshapedstar:
Cole is doing his best to drive his own narrative, regardless of what he proclaims about spin.
Jennifer
@MattR:
Thank you, Matt.
This is a state which, while being very backward in a lot of regards and socially conservative, does not suffer complete loons for long. Right-fringe nutjobs do not last long in state-wide offices (governor, US Senate), while a Republidem can hold on forever, because as long as they’re just carrying water for the same interests without making everyone uncomfortable with their preaching and pronouncements about how “rape victims can’t get pregnant from a rape because God gives them a magic shield against impregnation” or how “incest is a family matter which should be dealt with inside the family,” a Conservadem can stay in office forever with just the same garden-variety pandering to “family values” and “our men in uniform” that most Republicans from white suburban areas have skated by on for lo these many years.
Boozman will be a ripe target for picking off 6 years from now – he’s nuts. And hopefully then we can elect an actual Democrat. We used to have 2 of them in the Senate and I’m hopeful that we can at least have 1 six years from now.
Chad N Freude
Wow! 153 is a response to 154. FYWP shoved Comments 153 and 154 through a time warp. Does the Defense Department know about this?
MattR
@Chad N Freude: The NSA saw your comment and is notifying the DOD now.
Chad N Freude
@MattR: I feel so safe now.
eemom
@Corner Stone:
No actually, the “point” you were making yesterday is that it’s justifiable to not vote and still scream about how fucked up things are after things get even MORE fucked up because the republicans you didn’t vote against are back in power. Because you CAN.
Chad N Freude
I’ve reached my squabbling quota for today. See y’all later.
Corner Stone
@eemom: Sigh. That whole discussion started because I asked a simple question regarding voters in Bnut’s cohort. It’s a valid question that’s met with a smorgasbord of “Because Republicans are worse, that’s why!” and “If they don’t then they can stfu!”
And my point was that some people need, and deserve a cogent answer as to how they should implement their resources.
Screaming at them that “Trust me! It’ll be worse!” does not have a lot of weight for people who’ve never seen the benefit in their voting lives to this point.
And you can call them silly, or foolish or discuss their pony fetish if you like, it’s got nothing to do with me. But it doesn’t seem to be swaying them so far. Which is what Bnut was alluding to in this thread.
Xenos
Time to go Bolshy? These contradictions are not going to heighten themselves, are they?
All together now, with feeling (Rhianna’s part) “Just gonna stand there and watch me burn…”
Nick
@MattR:
what’s the definition of insanity again?
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: But with you gone, who’s left to be reasonable, civilized, and even-tempered?
Because I, for one, reject that in its entirety.
FlipYrWhig
@Bernard: Dude, your time machine totally worked! Just be sure you respect the continuities of history and, when you make it back to 1999, don’t tell anyone that M. Night Shyamalan is kind of a joke!
Bernard
come live down here in the South. lol you’ll see the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans, if you looked. lol
it is a shame you profess to see a difference between Tweedledee and Tweedledum, cause people like you are responsible for the right wing Corporatist take over of this country.
oh morals, people. it’s all about morals, you know, having them, living by and with them. that old, “do unto your neighbor, bs”
one day you may wake up to see how “bought” you are. i did. a long long long time ago. and every day i discover it again and again.
it’s not your America i am concerned about. it’s the children who will pay, not us.
Corner Stone
@FlipYrWhig: I agree he’s not too strong but I did enjoy The Sixth Sense, and even The Village was a little moving if you played along a little.
The rest of his oeuvre is kinda meh.
FlipYrWhig
@Jennifer:
Or perhaps, just perhaps, if “we” in states where liberals are a minuscule minority hadn’t been holding our noses and voting for “centrist” Dems, we would be on the business end of a coalition of batshit crazy Republicans on the right and batshittier crazier Republicans on the farther right. But our 24-member Senate Democratic caucus would believe in all the right things, so that would be a nice ego boost, which, when you get right down to it, is the chief function of a representative democracy.
shortstop
I really think that today’s GOP voters would watch their children starve to death, their spouses die in agony of untreated illnesses and all their neighbors cast penniless into the streets before they were wrong about anything. A good portion of America is incapable of learning anything no matter how bad it gets. They will go down blaming everything on brown people, gay people, feminists and environmentalists.
eemom
There are two separate issues here. One is how best to persuade young people to vote Democratic, and I agree that “because republicans are worse” is a lame reason, at least if that’s all you got — which I personally don’t believe it is, but that’s beside the point.
The issue of whether to not vote AT ALL is an entirely different one, and that is because it is the civic and moral responsibility of every citizen to vote in every election. To use a tired old cliche, democracy is not a spectator sport. We are all in this together — win or lose, we all have to live with the results.
That point exists irrespective of politics, and it ought to be taught in schools. It was to me, by a HS social studies teacher, and I’ve never forgotten it. He said, simply, “It is the responsibility of every citizen to make a choice.”
So to the lady above who doesn’t want to vote for Blanche Lincoln, ok, fine. There’s still a choice to be made about who should be the senator from Arkansas next year, and you have a responsibility to make it. If you honestly think the best choice is the republican, the Green, another 3rd party or a write in, that’s who you vote for, and you’ll get no condemnation from me.
Cain
@FlipYrWhig:
Some of those welfare-sucking moochers were hard working regular Joes…
cain
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: That’s because Bernard got in his time machine, told everyone in 1999 that The Sixth Sense was an aberration, and it altered history… into the shape we recognize already.
FlipYrWhig
@Cain: I know that, but that’s not the narrative “independents” embrace. In their minds the economy was bad, Obama spent too much trying to fix it, the money went into all the wrong pockets, and now things are worse than they were when he started.
Bernard
it really is gratifying to realize supposed “thinkers” find attacks on their thinking comes from all stripes. gee for a moment there i thought this was a Right wing blog. all for one and one for… oh not for you, you think …. differently…. lol
just say there is “no real” difference between Right and Left/aka Democratic and Republican Parties. and whammo. lol.
tolerance is the last hope, stupidity isn’t.
but heh? right. this is America! Just agree with me or take the highway. lol 40 years for me of watching the Democrats become Republicans is enough. kind of like, The Day of the Locust. Do unto others so they’ll shut the fuck up!!
i still want my pony, and he must be black with a white mane and tail. lol
Chad N Freude
@Chad N Freude: The comment numbers keep changing.
WTF FYWP?
Cain
@Steeplejack:
So what will we get in the end? Will he vote democratic platform or will he be a blue dog?
cain
eemom
Sixth Sense is a great movie, ‘xceptin it always makes me cry at the end.
And Bruce Willis is teh hawt.
Cain
@Pancake:
Liar, liar, pants on fire! British pig!
cain
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: I came back because I forgot something. Your post is unclear.
Are you rejecting reasonable, civilized, and even-temperedness in its entirety, or the fact that I received an unsolicited testimonial to my reasonable, civilized, and even-temperedness?
FlipYrWhig
@Bernard: Yes, you’re very courageous to not be silenced, to take a brave stand to say… the same stupid shit 11-year-olds of all ages always say about politics.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: Now you’re being reasonable, civilized, and even-tempered. The Sixth Sense was a good movie. Maybe he’ll make another good one some day.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude:
I rather closed mindedly refuse to differentiate on this matter.
Now you go to hell! You go to hell and you die!
Cain
@Jennifer:
Jennifer, it’s your vote and you’re free to vote your conscious. Just don’t “not vote”. Blanche sucked and if the great state of Arkansas wants to vote for someone against their interests because a black man is president and dance with the Devil then let em.
cain
Corner Stone
@FlipYrWhig: Yes, your very flexible and open minded view of politics is of course the only viable one. Natch.
Chad N Freude
I think you have the order reversed. But I’ll meet you there and we can have a beer together.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: Man, first you’re not familiar with Simpson’s episodes and now you’re unaware of South Park mainstay?
Sheesh, no wonder you’re so civil and even-tempered.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: I certainly hope not.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: I’m polling at 100% approval within the key FlipYrWhig demographic. But if I don’t placate my own narrow interests, I’m afraid of the enthusiasm gap.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: I regret to admit that the only animated series I try to follow is Futurama. If I ever get to retire, I’ll probably try working my way through the Groening and Parker/Stone oeuvres.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Probably not, but perhaps omniscient?
Corner Stone
@FlipYrWhig:
Not sure why you’d be worried about that. There is absolutely no decision or course of action you could take that you could not justify or self-rationalize.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: I do tend to do well in games of Trivial Pursuit.
Bernard
fascinating to see the unwillingness to stand by your man. lol
must be this way or that. my man won’t change come hell nor high water!!!
well honey, life changes as we change. never thought i’s see the levee break, but it did. New Orleans flooded. Change happens.
i find the superciliousness of supposed adults even less credible than some 11 yr olds. at least children don’t have grand circular excuses for lying. it’s right up front and in your face.
but don’t let the truth get in your way/face. that might be unpleasant, even for those on the “left side” of life.
i do recommend getting a boat though, when the levee breaks, all your righteous bs will be underwater.
come down to New Orleans if you want to see some “truth” about “oh no, that could never happen. ”
meanwhile, i still want my pony!
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: @Omnes Omnibus: Not a good indicator. I once lost a round of TP because I said that the originator of the phrase “brave new world” was Shakespeare (right) and the card said it was Aldous Huxley (wrong).
Bernard
“Brave new world” came from Shakespeare?!!
Chad N Freude
@Bernard: The Tempest, Act V, Scene I.
Bernard
thanks for that elucidation.
gosh change i can believe in!
Chad N Freude
@Bernard:
I think you meant “edumacation”.
BJ is a veritable goldmine of pointless erudition.
BTW, you’re welcome. My lecture fee invoice will arrive shortly.
hilzoy
“One is how best to persuade young people to vote Democratic, and I agree that “because republicans are worse” is a lame reason, at least if that’s all you got—which I personally don’t believe it is, but that’s beside the point.”
I agree that better reasons would be nice, but consider:
Republicans might well decide to do something completely nutty like bomb Iran. They would certainly try to undo health care reform, which matters a lot if you don’t have health insurance, will ever be tempted to switch to a job without health insurance, or just plain don’t want your country to end up paying half its GDP in health care costs by mid-century. They will do nothing about global warming, which would, admittedly, have bigger effects on all kinds of other people than on us — bye bye, Bangladesh! — but will still do us all kinds of harm. They will accelerate their program of shoveling money at the rich while ensuring that the rest of our paychecks do not get appreciably larger however much more productive we are. Etc., etc., etc.
Which is just to say: the lameness of “they’re worse” depends a lot on how much worse. If we get into another war and you’re one of the casualties, I suspect this line of argument will suddenly look a lot less lame.
SiubhanDuinne
@Chad N Freude, Pablo: the bumper sticker “Coexist Motherfuckers” is also very fine, as is “More . . . After the Jump.” Good stuff, Pablo.
fasteddie9318
It’s practically axiomatic that the mentally disturbed must hit absolute rock bottom before they’ll really seek help. America clearly has not hit rock bottom yet.
ornery curmudgeon
@burnspbesq: @burnspbesq: “this sort of nonsensical, evidence-free conspiracy theorizing…”
The theory that the Democratic Party is in the same pocket as the Republicans does have evidence.
If you are honestly trying to determine why the Dems don’t speak up and defend their ‘base’ or fight, or why the Dems acceded to so much of Bush’s agenda, why the legislation the Dem’s pass is so often written to favor corporate interests … IF you are honest in seeking an answer, you need to accept the possibility that the Democratic Party is composed of corporate whores selling this country out just as the badly, though more slowly, than Republicans.
Chad N Freude
@fasteddie9318: Seriously, I don’t think this is a valid analogy. A frightened, ignorant nation is not analogous to an individual alcoholic/addict. It’s far more likely that some neo-fascist group will be elected to solve the country’s problems.
Corner Stone
@hilzoy: Throwing boogeymen out there like Iran isn’t an actual rebuttal. Democrats did nothing to stop the Iraq War, IIRC.
Last I checked Cap and Trade was going no where, nor was an Immigration Bill. And “Health Insurance” doesn’t kick in for a huge section until 2014. And guess where rates are going until then?
And I quote health insurance because it is not the same thing as “health care”.
As for shoveling money to the rich, care to explain the dollar for dollar bailout of AIG?
roshan
@ornery curmudgeon: No way dude/dudette. Election time is a time for wallowing in sycophancy of our dear leaders and expecting a crumb being thrown at us in return. No retrospection allowed, spoils it for everyone. Think of the children, I say.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: I was also captain of my high school’s quiz bowl team. If that is not sufficient, then we will have determined that I am not omniscient. In any event, my ‘nym has no relation to anything you folks have brought up. However, bragging rights go to whomever can guess whence it came.
Corner Stone
@roshan: “Nothing can be done!” “Generic Boogeyman!” “The Republicans Are Worse!”
hilzoy
Corner Stone: If I’d thrown out Iraq back in 2000, you might have said it was a bogeyman then too. “Oh, ha ha, invading Iraq! That’s a good one!” (And don’t say: well, who could have foreseen 9/11?, as though invading Iraq had anything to do with that.) And yet, for all the rhetorical force that rejoinder might have had, a whole lot of people are still dead. When the GOP amasses a long record of caution in foreign policy, I’ll stop worrying about the next war.
One party is nuts. One party is wimpy, but broadly speaking sane. There’s a difference. For some people, it’s the difference between long-term unemployment and employment. For some people, it’s having a competent FEMA during a hurricane and not having one. For some people, it’s being killed in some godforsaken corner of the Middle East and living to enjoy your retirement with your family.
I’d be out working for the sane party in any case. But having seen what just one bereavement did to one family, I’ll work twice as hard so that no one has to go through that again needlessly.
hilzoy
And while some Democrats did nothing to stop the Iraq war, almost all the people who did try to stop it were Democrats. And I see no reason to believe that most of the Democrats who were too gutless to stop the war would have gone to the lengths Bush went to to start it.
Wayne
The American people have already had a good hot screwing at the hands of Democrats since 2007, with Nancy Pelosi acting as the Madame. And they’re not stopping after everybody’s dead. Take a look at http://www.irshelpdallas.com for the upcoming extravaganza the Dems have in store for us.
Remedy for economy. Stop spending, now. Cut taxes. Cut all government services to the bone. Eliminate the abortion called Healthcare with a repeal. Business and Venture Capital groups are holding a trillion dollars in cash. They won’t do it with oppressive anti-business climate in this country. Try think of lt like this. You earn $10,000. The Government keeps $7,000 and you get $3,000. How much of your money would you invest? Just add a few more place values. It’s all relative. Invest in overseas operations in countries with lower taxes and cheaper labor? Now you’re talking.
I’ll let the history of Detroit do my talking. Labor Unions in America helped to suck dry the Big Three. They remind me of the fable of the goose who laid golden eggs. The thief who stole the eggs couldn’t be satisfied with one golden egg a day. He killed the goose, cut it open, only to find nothing.
The moral is simple: Greed often overreaches itself. In this case, all we have is a rusty, dead goose.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Well, are you a Rafael Sabatini fanboi?
General Stuck
@hilzoy: Jeebus, a dose of the patented hilzoy reasoned nuance. Thank you:)
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Let me guess: in 2000, you were one of those people who said it was no big deal that the Supreme Court handed the presidency to Bush because it’s not like Gore would have governed any differently.
I’m beginning to understand why America is so screwed: even people who are ostensibly on the left buy into the “both sides are the same” bullshit after 8 years of being shown otherwise.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: Fanboi? No, but well done. Google or knowledge?
Wayne
@Mnemosyne:
No, I’m one of those who sees that we are broke on our asses, our credit rating should be junk, and we better stop spending now, grow a business environment, and get our house in order kinda people.
Corner Stone
@hilzoy: You can’t just casually dismiss 9/11 as the rhetorical device it was used as.
It’s like saying, well except for the cancer you wouldn’t had chemo.
2000 and now are worlds apart, there is no comparison. We were not invading two ME countries in 2000.
I hate to tell you this, but long term unemployment actually is a real problem for way too many families. The 99’ers. And those 30K troops being surged into Afghanistan for pretty much no discernible reason? They’re still dying at a rate that is highest of anytime of of our occupation there.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: As usual, you are completely fucking wrong and have no god damned idea what bullshit you are spouting.
SiubhanDuinne
@Chad N Freude: Born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad?
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Google. I have no knowledge.
Corner Stone
@hilzoy: And if Israel bombs Iran? What then?
I just disagree with it being thrown out as a boogeyman to discern some kind of significant difference.
It’s a scare tactic and a rhetorical device. Even if the R’s take back both chambers of Congress Obama is still the President for 2 more years.
Wayne
@Corner Stone: When you’re broke, stop spending, and get to work. By the way, when you said “the last eight years” are you referring to the last 4-5 years the Democrats have been in charge of the Congress and the White House?
As far as having no idea, again let the numbers speak for themselves. Did you have any relatives that went down with the Titanic?
Chad N Freude
@SiubhanDuinne: So why are we hanging around with all these ignorant illiterates?
(While I used Google to break the Omnes Omnibus Code, I did at one time read Scaramouche. Or saw the movie. Or something.)
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: Sorry to have brought up a sore subject. Anyway, congrats on winning bragging rights. [golf clap]
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Not a sore subject. I’ve always said that an expert is someone who knows one thing that you don’t. In this case, it’s a well-read, literate intellectual is someone who knows how to use Google.
ETA: Yeah, I know that “well-read, literate” is redundant. Bite me.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: I have never watched the movie.
General Stuck
@Mnemosyne:
More like either way, corner stone would still be a clueless wanker. This is our little universal truth private hell here on balloon juice.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: High-budget 50’s swashbuckler, from MGM I think.
ETA: Checked it on IMDB (the Google for all things movie). MGM, 1952.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: I am a expert by your terms because I know how many fingers I am holding up and I presume you do not.
Wayne
I would sure as hell hate to see the unemployment numbers if everyone started looking for work. Would the number look like 25%? Would it still be a recession or a full blown depression? What do you think?
SiubhanDuinne
@Chad, Omnes: if I ever saw the movie it was a very long time ago, but that sentence is the best opening line of a novel evah!
Zipperupus
Corner Stone:
Do you think the Iraq war would have occurred under a Gore administration?
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
And yet you claim in your response to hilzoy right above mine that Gore would have reacted exactly the same way as Bush did to 9/11. Because, what, Gore would also have ignored the “Bin Laden Determined to Strike Inside US” memo? Gore would also have refused to beef up airport security? Gore also would have used 9/11 as an excuse to invade Iraq?
Wayne
@Omnes Omnibus: You’re not holding up any if you’re typing.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne:
Please, PLEASE, show me where I said that. Quote it.
Corner Stone
@Zipperupus: Obviously, it’s impossible to say for sure. I’d like to hope not. But we’ll never know either way. Because he was not President at the time.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: I know of it; I have just refused to watch it. Stewart Grainger is not Andre-Louis Moreau, just doesn’t work. On a slightly related note, I refuse to watch the Grinch movie with Jim Carrey.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Exactly! And I am an English grammar expert because I know that you should have typed “I am an expert”. See how easy it is?
Mark S.
I don’t remember where I read it, but a couple weeks ago I read something that said McConnell might secretly be hoping some of the teabags like Paul and Angle lose because he might lose his leadership position to DeMint. Has anyone read anything about that?
ETA: Never mind, I meant to post this somewhere else. Have too many tabs open.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: How about “Not very likely, based on what we think we know of his policy positions”?
daveinboca
@John Cole:
Pancake cited as source: “According to a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday, the GOP leads the Democrats by 7 points on the “generic ballot” question, 52 percent to 45 percent. That 7-point advantage is up from a 3-point margin last month.” and how does this square with “British wingnuts.”
Delirium tremens getting to you?
Omnes Omnibus
@SiubhanDuinne: My father gave me the book when I was eleven. I was hooked from that sentence on.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Doesn’t matter. Handsome leading man trumps preconceptions. With a British accent no less.
Chad N Freude
@Mark S.: I read that, too. It’s all about what’s best for the country, isn’t it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: F*cking typos!
ETA: No. Wait. I cite Dickens as my grammatical inspiration. “’If the law supposes that, said Mr. Bumble,… ‘the law is a ass—a idiot. If that’s the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is that his eye may be opened by experience—by experience.” Oliver Twist
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: I forgot to note that I refuse to watch [name of any movie in which he appears] with Jim Carey. “The Truman Show” was pretty good, since then everything he’s done has been unwatchable. (This has nothing to do with his politicking against vaccination.)
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Bigot! Some of my best friends are typos. I suppose you’re opposed to typo marriage and the building of typo centers near Ground Zero.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: Doesn’t match the description in the book. British accents don’t enter into it.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Don’t Twist Dickens’s words. He is subtly establishing Bumble’s character.
I have a new-generation Kindle on order, and I may start reading classics on it,mostly because they’re free. Of course that means taking time away from reading mystery fiction and spy thrillers . . .
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus:
They do if you’re MGM hoping to attract the girlfriends of the guys who want to watch big-budget swashbucklers.
Mnemosyne
@Chad N Freude:
Give Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind a try sometime. It helps that there are times in the movie where you’re supposed to want to punch him in the face.
ETA: I just got my e-mail notice that I’m getting my Kindle in two weeks.
/bragging
jaleh
I am doing my best to prevent Boner from that spot. Just talking to friends and family, who don’t vote in the off election year, helps. I just got two votes yesterday! And I am going to volunteer here in CO for Bennett, as much as I really don’t care about him, I do absolutely hate Buck.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: I wasn’t twisting anything; I was doing an homage.
Chad N Freude
Omnibuddy, speaking of Dickens writing on Law, have you ever read Bleak House?
Chad N Freude
@Mnemosyne: OK, I’ll give you that one. And Amazon has emailed me that my Kindle will be arriving next week, maybe, possibly.
ETA: But don’t hold my breath.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: Let’s try that again: Don’t [OLIVER] Twist Dickens’s words.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: So you’re claiming you like to strangle puppies while you cook endangered species for dinner?
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: How about, “not very likely but we’ll never know.” ?
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: True. Doesn’t contradict what I said.
hilzoy
Did I casually dismiss 9/11? No. I just said that getting from there to invading Iraq was a very big stretch, far too big to get there in the absence of an antecedent desire to invade Iraq. And I don’t see why you say that “we” weren’t invading ME countries before 2000: we went to war with Iraq in 1991, and some of “us” were advocating forcible regime change in Iraq throughout the late 1990s. (PNAC, anyone?)
“What if Israel bombed Iran?” — If I were President, I would make it abundantly clear to Israel that they would be making a big, big mistake if they bombed Iran. (“Nice foreign aid package you have there. Be a shame if anything happened to it …”) — I used to live in Israel. It’s a wonderful country in a lot of ways. But we should help it out only so long as it does not do irreparable harm to our own interests. And bombing Iran would. I would also make it as clear as I could, both to our own citizens and to other people in the region, that I had said this.
If they went ahead and bombed Iran anyways, I would cut off their aid, and do everything in my power to make it clear that their actions did not have our approval, tacit or explicit. If they want to be our allies, great. If they want to bring the Middle East down in flames, on the other hand, they’d have to do it alone.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Hey, don’t knock panda stew until you’ve tried it.
Chad N Freude
I have to go, but don’t let the party stop.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: Sorry. Missed that. Groan.
Omnes Omnibus
@Chad N Freude: A long time ago. I have actually been contemplating rereading it.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Sure, right here in your comment # 217:
Your claim is that 9/11 would have happened no matter who was president, and whoever was president would have reacted the exact same way Bush did.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: So you’re claiming you work with poachers in South Africa to hunt and serve restricted animals?
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne:
Are you out of your fucking mind?
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Then what was your point in attacking hilzoy for saying that a President Gore would not have reacted to 9/11 the same way President Bush did?
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Well, actually, pandas live in Asia, not South Africa, so I rely more on Chinese poachers for my supply, but I’m sure that if I really wanted a nice rhinoceros steak instead, I could turn to poachers in South Africa to score one.
Corner Stone
@hilzoy: You said “(And don’t say: well, who could have foreseen 9/11?, as though invading Iraq had anything to do with that.)”
Obviously, invading Iraq had a hell of a lot to do with 9/11.
The Republicans and Bush used it extensively as a priori to invade Iraq. You can’t possibly say 9/11 had nothing to do with Iraq.
How many troops did we have in Iraq and/or Afghanistan in 2000?
And I’m going to tell Santa Claus he must deliver to my house first.
It is laughable to think any US President is going to threaten aid to Israel. Under any conceivable circumstance.
To be clear, I’m not arguing what we as a nation *should* do wrt Isreal, only stating pretty clearly what will never happen.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne:
Where did I say this you lying psychopath? Quote it or stfu.
And I haven’t attacked hilzoy in any regard, only rebutted some nonsensical answers she’s propagating here.
burnspbesq
@Jennifer:
Are you always this stupid?
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: So you’re claiming you eat little blonde hair caucasian babies for lunch?
General Stuck
@Mnemosyne: In all fairness, I am not so sure CS makes points with attacks. More like bending over spreading his cheeks and letting the shit fly ever which way. Too much firebag texmex and not enough actual voting.
burnspbesq
@Bernard:
Fuck you. I killed your pony and fed it to my dogs, because you’re an idiot.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Dude, you repeated yourself again right above!
hilzoy’s argument was that we probably wouldn’t have had an Iraq War if Bush had not been president because we (a) would not have reacted to 9/11 the same way and (b) may not have had 9/11 at all since it’s unlikely that President Gore would have used Operation Ignore on al Qaeda.
You keep handwaving that away and pretending that 9/11 was not only inevitable, but it was inevitable that the US would have declared war on Iraq because of it (hence your saying that “Democrats did nothing to stop the Iraq War, IIRC” in comment # 207).
I’m just quoting your own arguments back to you, dude. If they don’t make any sense, that’s not my fault.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Babies are too old and tough. Fetuses cook up much better, especially if you roast them over a nice charcoal barbeque. Yum yum.
hilzoy
“How many troops did we have in Iraq and/or Afghanistan in 2000?”
My entire point is that it matters which party is in power. So I have no trouble answering: none. I also believe that we would have had no troops in Iraq, and that we’d be out of Afghanistan by now, if Gore had been sworn in as President in 2001.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: So your claim is that if Mao was not an alien then China would be a quasi gamblers paradise?
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
How many times do we need to tell you — eating the worm when you get to the bottom of the tequila bottle is a bad idea.
Omnes Omnibus
@burnspbesq: If you find my unicorn, please don’t feed it to your dogs. I will pay shipping costs to get it here.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: Blatantly lying and being unable to quote what you state others write is a bad idea as well.
YMMV, obviously.
Der BlindSchtiller
The true irony is that all this Baby Boomer stupidity (and yes, I am tarring all of you with the same broad brush) is that it’s turning me into a true Republican.
My outlook has pretty much come to this: If this country is so stupid as to hand back leadership to those who did so much to create this problem, then “fuck you”.
When your kids have no other jobs other than Wal-Mart greeters (my kids won’t deal with you because they don’t have to shop there), I’m gonna laugh my ass off.
Meanwhile, I’ll park all my money in Switzerland.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
I did quote you. Repeatedly. With comment numbers to show precisely which comments I was referring to.
Who’s lying now?
Odie Hugh Manatee
@General Stuck:
I have to laugh at the thought of even engaging CS in any political discussion. Like I said, if someone doesn’t vote then I couldn’t care less what they have to say. Combining that with CS’s incessant whining about people sounding defeatist and giving up or thinking there is nothing else they can do, I know that they are not to be taken seriously.
If goat fucking was offered as a college course, CS would ace the final. Nothing would impress the instructor more than seeing a PUMA fucking a goat.
eemom
aw, ferfucksake. I leave y’all to study the Gospel of Reason and Civility According to St. Omni and St. Chad, go off for a few hours and y’all are back in the sandbox fighting again. Sheesh.
Corner Stone
@Odie Hugh Manatee: Glad to see you have zero comprehension skills as well.
Please quote where I said I do not vote.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: Yes, you keep quoting me. But nothing you quote has anything to do with what you claim I am saying.
Again, I asked you to quote where I said this:
“And yet you claim in your response to hilzoy right above mine that Gore would have reacted exactly the same way as Bush did to 9/11.”
I never once mentioned Gore until I said later that i did not know how he would’ve responded.
Now, if you can find where I said this I will shut up for tonight.
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Corner Stone:
Fuck you. That’s all I have to say.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Here is is for the second time, your comment #219:
If I’m misinterpreting what you said, then explain it. Running around going, “Nuh-uh, I never said that!” is not an explanation of what I want you to explain.
If my interpretation was not what you meant to say, then explain what you meant to say. Otherwise, my interpretation stands since you refuse to give us another one and you STFU.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Also, too, your comment #272:
hilzoy and I have both interpreted that as you saying that 9/11 would have happened regardless of who was president and that we would have invaded Iraq because of 9/11 regardless of who was president. If that was not what you meant, what did you mean?
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: Please explain how this quote is the exact same thing as saying Gore = Bush and 9/11 was inevitable no matter who was Pres?
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: Wait a second. First, don’t drag hilzoy along with your crazy.
Second, please see where I said, “The Republicans and Bush used it extensively as a priori to invade Iraq.”
Where does Al Gore fit in there?
Corner Stone
@Odie Hugh Manatee: I wish that was all you had to say you useless fucking douchebag.
You can’t quote me saying what you claim so you can fuck off.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: I just re read this and saw “interpreted”, which is what I have been saying you do to everyone.
You don’t take what they say, you mind jumble it up in your twisted little empty cavern then spit it back out to mean what you want it to say.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne:
Yep, we’re seeing a pattern here.
You can’t actually copy/paste things people really say so you just make shit up and call it your “interpretation”.
Even though it’s no where close to reality of what was said.
General Stuck
@Corner Stone: You said you voted for Hills in 08 general election, that either makes you a liar, or a damned liar that didn’t vote in that election.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
If my interpretation was wrong, then tell us what you really meant. What is the reality that I got so wrong?
Otherwise, I’m going to have to assume that I was correct since you are unable to explain in what way I was wrong when I read your words and came to the conclusion that I did.
Nick
@burnspbesq:
Arkansas is one of our least educated states.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: You can assume whatever the fuck you want. But you can’t put words in my mouth that aren’t true.
It’s simple, and should be simple even for a simpleton like you.
Bush and the Republicans used 9/11 in a cynical fashion to invade Iraq and further their domestic and foreign agenda.
Elected Democrats did not do very much to stop that invasion from proceeding.
No where in there do I say Gore would’ve done the same thing, I say we will never know what would’ve happened. If you can argue against that then you are God-like.
What is so hard about simple reading comprehension that you can not understand this?
eemom
After reviewing comments 211 et seq. above, I have this to add.
Mnemosyne, the only mistake you make is in attributing ANY kind of coherent assertion to Corner Stone, even if it’s one as ridiculous as “we would have invaded Iraq because of 9/11 regardless of who was president.”
That IS the clear implication of what he said — but he didn’t actually come right out and say it — or anything else, actually. What he did, as he always does, was throw various haphazard “this is why Democrats suck” ingredients into a bowl, turn on the blender, and serve us all up another heapin’ helpin’ of his signature TexMex dessert, “I Think I’m A Cool-Ass Cynic, But I’m Really Just An Ass.”
Corner Stone
@General Stuck: Hills! Hillary Four Evah!
Hillary yesterday, Hillary today, Hillary forever!
Corner Stone
@eemom:
Clear implication of what? What did I say that clearly implied this?
General Stuck
@Corner Stone: Liar, liar, liar, for ever!. That’s all you have dude. That and Mclaren.
Corner Stone
@Wayne: Did you mean to reply to me? I can’t tell how your response has anything to do with what I have posted in your link.
General Stuck
@eemom: It seems to me that CS is reaching peak mendacity and about to go supernova into a galt wormhole. Critical mass for clowns
burnspbesq
@Omnes Omnibus:
How will I know it’s yours?
Corner Stone
@burnspbesq: Mine’s fuchsia. But I never got it so I can’t really describe it any better than that. I’m sure it’s pretty though.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Let’s go all the way back to the beginning of your “argument,” shall we? hilzoy pointed out that the Republicans are, in fact, worse and have caused all kinds of problems since they were handed power in 2000. Your response was comment # 207:
From the very beginning, your very first response to hilzoy, your claim was that it was pointless to remind voters that the Republicans screwed up for 8 years because “Democrats did nothing to stop the Iraq War.” This is, you may be surprised to hear, an argument that Democrats are the same as Republicans. And you just kept doubling down on it until I insisted that you explain yourself. Now you’re coming up with a lame, after-the-fact claim that you didn’t really mean it that way even though your earlier comments make it pretty clear that you did, and I was not the only one to interpret them that way.
I don’t think you need to be God-like to think that Gore would have kept Richard Clarke on as his terrorism advisor if he had been elected, and that Gore would have paid attention to what Clarke had to say instead of ignoring him. I also don’t think you need to be God-like to say that, even if al-Qaeda had sneaked through and carried out their plans, a President Gore would not have used the attack as an excuse to invade Iraq with too few troops. You just have to look at the facts.
That’s why I’m saying that your argument boils down to saying that the Democrats are no better than the Republicans: you’re claiming that it would take God-like skills to discern that Gore and Bush would have reacted differently to 9/11. If that’s the case, then the only logical conclusion is that Gore and Bush would have reacted exactly the same way and taken the same actions, which is an argument — guess what? — that Republicans and Democrats govern the exact same way.
eemom
@Corner Stone:
Responding to Hilzoy’s point about why it’s better to vote for Democrats, you said:
Hilzoy said:
To which you responded, first:
before going off into an unrelated tirade about unemployment.
The first two sentences of that latter post, taken in context, imply that there would have been an Iraq war because of 9/11 regardless of who was president. You say that 9/11 can’t just be dismissed as a rhetorical device, and then you make a cancer-chemo comparison.
Those two sentences — to any logical person reading them –describe Iraq as an inevitable consequence of 9/11. “Except for [9/11] you wouldn’t have had [Iraq].”
That is, to the extent a logically coherent proposition can ever be extracted from one of your arguments. As noted above, I am of the opinion that it can’t.
Omnes Omnibus
@burnspbesq: Tattooed on the back of its neck.
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne: Sure, let’s go back to the beginning. Where you said this:
Which by all thinking people capable of reading (this does not include eemom obviously) is obvious I have never said.
Is it a fact that while Bush was President we went and invaded Iraq? Is it a fact that the elected Democrats in Congress did not do much to stop that? Is it also a fact that Gore was not President?
You can conjecture all you like about a President Gore administration. I do not know the answers to how that would would’ve turned out.
You, obviously, do.
Corner Stone
@eemom:
This may be the single most stupid thing you have ever written here. Which is saying a lot.
Anyone who can come to the conclusion that I have said Gore would’ve invaded Iraq after 9/11 needs mental help.
I quite clearly state it is a rhetorical device used by Bush and the Republicans.
Mnemosyne
@Corner Stone:
Your comment #219, continued:
So if you weren’t claiming that Bush and Gore would have reacted the same to 9/11 but only saying that 9/11 changed everything, why did you reference 2000 (the election year)? And if 9/11 did change everything, why do you think the Democrats voting for the Iraq War is indicative of anything at all since the whole political landscape was different post-9/11?
Bob In Pacifica
@Frank: Hillary, I’m afraid, is from the same DLC corral as Obama.
Cain
@Der BlindSchtiller:
You’re assuming that the American dream is still going to be working.. you’ll be with us in the trenches, trying to eat pig snot in some pig pen.
cain
Corner Stone
@Mnemosyne:
God in Heaven. I did not reference 2000, Hilzoy did at #211. She then told me I couldn’t use 9/11 to say things would’ve been different regarding Iraq.
Can’t any of you actually read?
I mentioned elected Democrats (not President Gore) in #207, she responded by mentioning 2000 and the concept of an Iraq invasion at that time.
I then said in #219 that now and 2000 are not comparable. Again, not mentioning President Gore, just stating where our country is currently. Not some hypothetical President Gore aftermath.
God. This isn’t hard.
Chad N Freude
I’m gone for less than three hours, and look what happens. Go to your rooms, all of you. Well, OK, eemom and Omnes can stay, burnspbesq can stay if he promises to play nice. Everyone else, take a timeout.
Mnemosyne and Corner Stone and hilzoy, please stop screaming at each other. You really do sound like a bunch of five-year-olds. I don’t care who said what or how it’s interpreted or misinterpreted or how the comma that may be misplaced changes the meaning. You guys are so wrapped in your respective egos it’s a wonder you can breathe. You’re certainly capable of making intelligent observations and carrying on a real discussion (unless you’ve been paying intelligent people to stand in for you). What do you think you’re accomplishing here?
eemom
@Corner Stone:
I’m afraid your name calling schtick is getting kinda old, dude.
There are only so many of us you can dismiss as stupid people who don’t know how to read who share some mystical agenda for distorting everything you say.
Hell, even your fellow fucktwits are turning on you. Better hope fuckhead shows up soon or you won’t have any friends left.
eemom
No, you did not “clearly state” that; and furthermore, as I’ve explained above, you couldn’t “clearly state” your way out of a paper bag.
Or if you can, there’s never been any evidence of it on this blog.
eemom
@Chad N Freude:
sorry dude, I guess I’ll have to go in time-out too.
It is really not fair to equate those three. This nasty little insect from Texas is incapable of making an argument in good faith on this or any other thread — and when people attempt to engage him on the merits, he inevitably resorts to insults and name-calling. That is not true of the others who have called him out on his bullshit here.
Chad N Freude
@eemom: You can’t make clear statements when the air is full of flying mud. All you can do is see who can scream their defensive statements the loudest.
Chad N Freude
@eemom: He can’t help it, it’s kind of like Tourette’s. He’s capable of carrying on a conversation, he just doesn’t seem to be able to hold back the bile.
General Stuck
@Chad N Freude: Maybe you could adopt him and raise the little shitheel up right.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: I think you should put your civil even-tempered schtick away and understand the kind of individual you are dealing with.
Let me ask you, did you read the thread? What do you think, based on facts in evidence here?
Not just the vitriol, but how we got there.
burnspbesq
@Chad N Freude:
I am being nice. I’ve only said “Fuck You” and “idiot” once each, and if you are being objective you will agree that both were well justified. I haven’t resorted to a single ad hominem attack, false equivalence, or strawman all day. Please don’t tell Santa on me!
burnspbesq
@Chad N Freude:
I only killed Bernard’s pony because he was being a big poopy-head. He deserved it!
Chad N Freude
@General Stuck: I’m trying.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: Alright.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: I read part way through your argument, but when my head began to swim because of the time-loop quality of the you-said-no-I-di’nt-yes-you-did, I stopped before I descended into total madness.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury” is usually followed with a summation, not a review of every sentence of testimony. It’s obvious to me that you could carry on a substantive argument if you chose to, but you really sounded here like you were involved in a contest of “My ego is bigger than yours.” When self-justification becomes more important than the debate, the debater not only doesn’t win, but he looks like someone not worth discussing anything with.
Karnak presses envelope to forehead and says “The response is Go fuck yourself.” I hope Karnak is wrong for once.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: BTW, the civil, even-tempered shtick is the real me. I can also be very funny.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: Wait a second. I had two separate people straight lying about what I wrote.
I mean, not even trying, just straight saying I made a claim I never made.
This is a Repub tactic. Just keep schmearing and obfuscating and lying and force the other party to clear the air. And when they try to clear up the record the audience throws their hands up and says, “Sheesh! You’ve been doing nothing but a he said she said dealio for the last 10 comments! I just can’t keep track of all that nonsense!”
But, in any regard, it’s ok with me.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: You know, I re-read your response here. It’s pretty damn lame man.
You think it was ego for me to try and correct it when I had people lying about what I said?
Ok.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: Apparently you see a misstatement about something you wrote as a lie and a smear and respond accordingly. You could just respond “You misinterpreted what I said,” or “appear to have misinterpreted” if you want to be really polite, and offer a restatement in different terms. That doesn’t always work, but frequently it evokes a non-hostile response from the other party and you go on from there. In this particular case, what you thought was clearing the air I saw as a shouting match, and I was unable to
and tuned out. (Did you see what I did there?) If your debate opponent insists on using “Repub tactic[s]”, just say something like “I don’t seem to be able to get my point across to you” and leave the field.
And it sure looked like ego protection to me. But I’m not a psychologist, so I could be wrong about that.
Re the lameness: It’s the best I can do. Does that mean I have to repeat the class until I get it right?
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: No, not at all.
Good luck to you.
Jrod the Cookie Thief
This thread is typical BJ horseshit.
First, we have Pancake, a person who is best known for cracking jokes about the bloody death of an American woman. Nearly every post he’s made on this site has been to cheer the deaths of Palestinians, in the most hateful and mocking way possible. He’s a genocidal racist, or at least he pretends to be one while he’s trolling.
When he shows up to taunt us with meaningless polls, a trolling trick that’s so old my grandmother had to deal with it on the ARPAnet, we have regular commenters admonishing other regulars for not taking his bullshit seriously and giving him the serious response he’s worked hard for several months to not deserve.
OK so far. I mean, dude’s a troll, but if you want to be the easygoing, forgiving type…
Then we have 150 posts tearing Corner Stone to pieces because…. um, it must be assumed that if he thinks 9/11 lead directly to the Iraq invasion in our actual timeline, and that Bush was heavily assisted by Democrats in doing so, then he obviously believes that a fantasy timeline in which Gore was president would have had the exact same Iraq War! Near as I can tell this is the argument being spat at CS.
This assumes that specific President Gore is thought of as no different from democrats in general, or more specifically the democrats in Congress in 2003. CS has never hinted that he believes this. His point, I think, was that the upcoming election won’t change our chances of attacking Iran or another middle eastern country.
Yet, this is what draws hundreds of comments. A pile on CS for something he didn’t say, while the pilers high-five each other for being so much smarter than the person they are deliberately misunderstanding and oh isn’t he a dunce and a- oh, now it comes out for real- a Hillary Clinton supporter! (cue dramatic horns)
The commenters here still aren’t over the 2008 primaries, and they don’t want to be over it. Having free reign to hate some fellow democrats, it was intoxicating, wasn’t it? To have an enemy to demonize and despise, you didn’t want to let it go, did you? But, gradually, all of the old targets left, and all that remains is Corner Stone, someone who picked the other nearly identical corporatist democrat in the primary. Well, he’ll have to do, because this bile and hatred has to go somewhere, right?
It’s truly sad, and made more so by the constant backslapping and praise over how fucking great and smart you all are for hating former Hillary supporters so much.
But at least you have patience for the genocidal maniac troll. That proves you’re good people.
pablo
@Chad N Freude:
Done!
Chad N Freude
@pablo: Wow. I have cultural influence! My mother would be so proud.
Thanks.
Chad N Freude
That’s one way to look at it. Another way is to see it as a tentative attempt to start a civil discussion about something, regardless of what he’s said in the past.
Chad N Freude
@Jrod the Cookie Thief: One thing I really like about your comment is the way you conflate all the commenters into one awesome personality. Because we all haven’t gotten over the 2008 primaries.
If BJ is typified by horseshit, why do you read it? I would assume that you have better things to do with your time.
General Stuck
@Chad N Freude: I just hope Jrod had a rag to clean his self with after that little rant of sunshine.
Chad N Freude
@General Stuck: This thread has been one of the worst — maybe THE worst — for screaming and ranting that I’ve ever seen on BJ. It has some entertainment value.
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@Chad N Freude:
This is a courtesy that must never be extended to PUMAFIREBLARGGERS though. Only genocidal right-wing trolls.
One thing I like about your response is that you completely ignore my point about Corner Stone’s words being twisted to say something he didn’t even hint at, whereupon a handful of regulars piled up on the guy for saying the thing that he never said.
As for why I read this? I read the front pagers because they’re actually interesting and informative. I picked this comment thread at random, just to see how the conversation went. Sadly, it went like this.
I used to enjoy the comments here, but since the election it seems the majority here are interested in nothing more than bashing on anyone who dares to criticize Obama or any other Dem… from the left. Yeah, you’re more than willing to have a conversation with a right wing troll, but CS? That guy is waaaaay beyond the pale, man.
Whatever. Nobody has to entertain me here, I understand that. It makes me sad, so I’m saying so. Go ahead and let a bunch of invective about how I’m a huge firebagger or whatever fly now. That’s just how it is now, I guess.
At least everyone here will know who’s to blame if the Dems lose a house this fall: those damn leftists!
(P.S. Dems won’t lose either house in November. Book-mark it, libs!)
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@General Stuck: Good lord, you’re pathetic. Sitting on this blog eighteen hours a day, just waiting for someone to say something you can call “firebagging” (which apparently means “person to the left of Nixon I don’t like”). You never have anything of substance to say, just recycled one-liners and tired insults, but you say them in every goddam thread without fail.
I pity you.
Corner Stone
@Jrod the Cookie Thief: Ah, it’s not the epically stupid Stuck, or the congenital liar Mnemosyne, or the Cape Buffalo density of eemom.
I expect no better from bad actors like them.
It’s the inestimably pathetic douchebaggery from people like Chad that I find amusing.
You can’t keep track of what happened here? It’s too much for your delicate sensibilities? Really?
David Broder would be proud yo.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude:
Who do you think you’re going to start a dialogue with?
Pancake would just as soon slit you from asshole to appetite than cede a rhetorical point to you.
Chad N Freude
@Jrod the Cookie Thief: I missed the part where I was unwilling to have a conversation with CS. I really couldn’t track the argument of quotes, because of the tone and the repetitions, and chose not to participate. I don’t think I would have been heard or taken seriously if I had. If that puts CS beyond the pale of civil discourse, I guess I’m guilty. I responded to the question that he asked me at @Corner Stone, which led to a non-political discussion. But I did comment that ALL of the participants in that screaming argument were behaving like children, so I’m an equal opportunity beyond-the-pale judge.
Omnes Omnibus
Wow, this is still going on? One is both amazed and appalled.
Chad N Freude
Really. I had trouble keeping track of the thrust and parry and rethrust and reparry and didn’t want to spend the time and energy trying to untangle it.
And it doesn’t bother me that you’re amused by the inestimably pathetic douchebaggery of people like me (not sure if that includes me or only people like me who are not me). I like the attention.
Re @Corner Stone: I’ve consistently derided Pancake for his trollery and advocated ignoring him, but what he put up today was not intrinsically insulting or perverse, and I thought it would be worth testing his seriousness. If he got nasty or crazy, I could metaphorically walk away. This is the Internet, and he can’t do me bodily harm, so I don’t care if the test fails.
Chad N Freude
@Omnes Omnibus: It’s a social thing.
ETA: And I’m a glutton for punishment.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: Well, you and people like you.
What good are you if you can’t read a simple statement? This ain’t pidgin.
You advocate for certain actions yet can’t even be bothered to determine one set of actors is straight lying?
And it’s interesting that you interact with Stuck after it’s said and done. Like he’s outside the circle.
Like I said, ah well.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone:
It ain’t narrative neither.
I interact with a lot of people on this blog. You,for example. Why is it interesting?
What circle? The Circle of Life? The Winner’s Circle? The Circle Outlet? I really don’t know what you mean here.
General Stuck
@Corner Stone: @Jrod the Cookie Thief:
Looks like you found a soul mate corner. I wish the both of you the best. fuckhead was much to crude for you, I always thought, and then there’s Mclaren.
General Stuck
@Chad N Freude: You have your work cut out for you Mr. Freude.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: I just re read this thread.
You are a flat fucking moron if you can’t easily discern what happened. There is no two ways to dissemble here.
I made statements and others flat fucking lied about what I said. Just lied. That isn’t “ego”, as you indicate it’s just the way it happened here.
If you can’t see that then I guess that’s all that needs to be said.
NobodySpecial
Jrod, don’t use logic, it only confuses them.
Which of course is why they can hold the directly opposing beliefs that the left is absolutely powerless and yet is destroying all Obama could do by complaining.
eemom
@Chad N Freude:
You is either with the Cornster, or agin’im.
He’s already started dissing you on other threads, so yer running out of time here, pardner. Better renounce me and Stuck and Mnemosyne and all the other folks above except Cookie Monster and McLoser, asap, or you’ll land on the dreaded Corner Stoned shit list, forever doomed to be the target of his rapier wit.
Think carefully sir; his is not a wrath to be incurred lightly. Any minute now he will fell you with devastating ammo from his vast Arsenal of Epithets. Be fairly warned, he’s got “stupid,” “idiot” and “liar” in there, and he’s not afraid to use them.
ETA: Doooochebag, also too.
eemom
Nah, no ego here. If Chad isn’t willing to devote hours of his life to painstaking parsing of a 350+ comment, typically vituperative and discombobulated thread just so he can conclude that by GOD, Corner Stone is right and everybody else is wrong, that makes him a “flat fucking moron.” Ego is not even in the same zip code as the desperately important urgency of Corner winning the argument.
Corner Stone
@eemom: When you have something you can’t figure out, like how to open a plastic ziplock baggy, or how to change the TV station, do you grunt and ram your head into the wall til someone helps you?
Because that’s how I picture you. Little beady pig eyes and a forehead like a battering ram, trying to smash through a wall in order to change it from QVC to Home Shopping Network.
Grunting inarticulately all the way.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone:
Regrettably, I have not. I may fly to Europe next month (really), and I will have time on the plane to correct this error.
Chad N Freude
@eemom: RE @Corner Stone: No more Mister Nice Guy.
Chad N Freude
@eemom:
I’ve found one of them here. Any others?
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: I doubt it will be long enough of a ride for you.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: OK, you’ve talked me out of it.
Corner Stone
@Chad N Freude: Whew! Wouldn’t want you to have to trouble your beautiful mind with realizing the truth or anything.
You’re probably better off just holding your palms out in front of you and moving them up and down a little.
Ahhh, that’s better.
eemom
@Chad N Freude:
that’s the only one I’ve seen so far, but give him time. As today’s epic saga makes obvious, he ain’t got much else to do with his, except hatin’ on people in cyberspace.
Probably cuz any flesh and blood people in actual physical proximity give him a wide, wide, berth.
Chad N Freude
@Corner Stone: OK, you’ve talked me out of it.@Corner Stone:
You may have confused me with John Nash.
This has gotten old. I’m cutting this thread. See you elsewhere.
[snip]
eemom
@Corner Stone:
See what I mean about rapier wit?
General Stuck
Well, this session of therapy for our wild child went well.
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@General Stuck: Seriously, just once, one fucking time in your worthless trolling career, say something of substance. Something with meaning greater than, “Haw haw ur a doody head.”
I don’t think you’re capable.
Whatever. If you’re comfortable being the annoying dipshit who spends all day every day spitting the exact same insults at the exact same people to lesser effect than you’d achieve pulling your pud, go right ahead.
Remember, Stuck, the true enemy is the marginal and powerless left. Don’t let yourself be distracted by the Republicans who want you to die starving in the street if you’re not one of the wealthy elect, and are actually capable of gaining the power to make that a reality. Eyes on the prize, bro!
Here, let me make your response for you: “That Jrod sure is a firebagger and stuff. I bet he and Corner Stone are kissin’ buddies!” (giggles like a school girl and runs off)
General Stuck
@Jrod the Cookie Thief: Are you on drugs? seriously.
Jrod the Cookie Thief
@General Stuck: Yet another meaningless insult. What a sorry person you are.
General Stuck
@Jrod the Cookie Thief:
It wasn’t an insult, I was being serious because you are bouncing of the wall. I didn’t call you a firebagger on this thread, I did mock your spittle flecked rant, and teased you a little. You don’t seem to be tethered to reality all that securely is all. But do carry on, it is somewhat entertaining.
roshan
I hope you guys left the ads on while squabbling. Even Cole has a belly to feed. And now, he doesn’t even have a phone. How can we let this happen to the proprietor? For all we know, he might be running this blog from a soup kitchen. He sure does put out good stories about visits from friends and family. It’s just a coping mechanism, nothing else, I can tell. I have enabled all the ads on this site, I can’t see people suffering that’s all.
Mark S.
Shit, this thread’s still going on?
Xenos
@hilzoy:
Since we are playing alternate history, I think it is also clear that if President Gore had foiled the 9/11 plot, succeeded in killing OBL and the rest of al Qaeda leadership, managed to deflate the housing bubble when it presented itself in 2004, and reversed the outsourcing trend and saved millions of jobs, with the result that this was a tremendously more safe, stable, and wealthy country, the following would be true:
— Gore would be widely denounced as a sokialist,
— The media would be running anti-Gore oriented ‘news’ shows nearly constantly, at least when it was not time for ‘Summer of the Shark’ or “missing intern’ obsessions,
— Gore would be held in lower esteem than Jimmy Carter,
— The American Experiment would be widely touted as a failure due to the meddling and mismanagement of the Democrats,
— George W. Bush would have swept into power with Vice President Demint in the 2008 election with several billion dollars of election funds.
Nothing would be different. The same mistakes would be made, and effectively the same disasters would end up happening, just 8 years later. Until this country changes – structurally, psychologically, culturally – we seem compelled to fuck it up. It is pretty depressing.
Xenos
@hilzoy:
Since we are playing alternate history, I think it is also clear that if President Gore had foiled the 9/11 plot, succeeded in killing OBL and the rest of al Qaeda leadership, managed to deflate the housing bubble when it presented itself in 2004, and reversed the outsourcing trend and saved millions of jobs, with the result that this was a tremendously more safe, stable, and wealthy country, the following would be true:
— Gore would be widely denounced as a sokialist,
..
— The media would be running anti-Gore oriented ‘news’ shows nearly constantly, at least when it was not time for ‘Summer of the Shark’ or “missing intern’ obsessions,
..
— Gore would be held in lower esteem than Jimmy Carter,
..
— The American Experiment would be widely touted as a failure due to the meddling and mismanagement of the Democrats,
..
— George W. Bush would have swept into power with Vice President Demint in the 2008 election with several billion dollars of election funds.
Nothing would be different. The same mistakes would be made, and effectively the same disasters would end up happening, just 8 years later. Until this country changes – structurally, psychologically, culturally – we seem compelled to fuck it up. It is pretty depressing.
Gex
Why the fuck are people quoting the wisdom of Bruce Willis?
Well after 2000 I saw an interview with him. What’s his tax bracket again? For doing what?
I ask because he wanted lower taxes AND for fire/police/teachers to get paid more. So I guess Bruce voted for Nader because he thought that was the route to having his cake and eating it too.
roshan
__
Now, why did you follow the above with this:
Are you just mindfucking yourself and us all in one? And, just how much time the things above in bold require? Are we all campaigning for the elections in 2212?
Xenos
@roshan: Not a mindfuck, just trying to size up what we are trying to do when we try to reform this country. And will take decades of fighting rear guard actions to stall for time while the cultural and social work needs to be done.
Lefties and progressives sound whiney because they are unrealistic about their ability to improve things. The sooner realize that the recovery and rebirth of the USA is not likely to be something we live to see, the better we can focus our efforts and manage to live decent lives in spite of the economic carnage.
We need something like a secular evangelical movement. Measure you goals one person at a time, one life improved and turned around. Don’t expect political leaders to manage, at best, the smallest of baby steps.
mclaren
@Cain:
I think we all need to vote unconscious. Much easier that way.
thalarctos
@Chad N Freude: It also says elephants have four knees, a misconception which I demonstrated on both embryological and evolutionary grounds (you can rotate carpals or an olecranon all you want; doesn’t make it a patella, though).
However, I was overruled by the other guests in the interest of continuing play.
thalarctos
@Mnemosyne:
thalarctos
Oh, and FYWP.
If it’s not clear what I was blockquoting, I was responding to Mnemosyne’s “fact” about pandas in Asia, as if Kevin Kline would lie about something like that.