Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Israel is using food as a weapon of war. Unforgivable.

The US Supreme Court is on the ballot in november.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

Republicans can’t even be trusted with their own money.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

“Let’s not pretend [Trump] wants to engage in high-minded discourse.”

Elections aren’t won by handwringing, cowering, and/or bashing your own candidates.

The choice is between normal and crazy.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Michigan is a great lesson for Dems everywhere: when you have power…use it!

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

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

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

No Justins, No Peace

Republicans do not pay their debts.

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Everyone is in a bubble, but some bubbles model reality far better than others!

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

I did not have this on my fuck 2022 bingo card.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

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Reader Interactions

141Comments

  9. 9.

    mclaren

    Since 2007, real median household income has declined 6.4% and is 7.1 % below the median household income peak prior to the 2001 recession.

  10. 10.

    Irony Abounds

    You really wonder where the country is headed when Mitt Romney is considered the sane adult alternative as the Republican nominee.

  11. 11.

    Jager

    @paradox: I figure we will be in permanent campaign mode from here on out. The push for 2016 will start the day after the election next year when Obama wins again. We’ll have 4 years of nonsense, horse races, polling, punditry and the Republican debates will start in January of 2013.

  13. 13.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    For anyone who’s disgusted enough with politics to feel like helping people less fortunate than those of us who are political junkies, look here.

    Not as heartwarming as pets in need of homes, but a good cause nonetheless. Oh, and the GOP sucks.

    @Morzer: I see you’re still at the funny stuff! Gracias.

  14. 14.

    lamh32

    I’ve been tired of it all, but I just can’t quit youse guys. It’s gonna be a long 15 months.

    Until then though, I’ve decided to become a stalker instead. I’ve decided I’m gonna marry Idris Elba and I’m gonna have to have his babies. I’m claiming it in the name Jesus, Buddha, Allah, Confucious, zerus, hera and um Hercules. That should work right?

    Anyway, ya’ll can now just call me Lamh Elba from now on.

    The Future Mr LAMH…Idris Elba

  15. 15.

    OzoneR

    Progressives are about to get a valuable lesson on why Democrats focus more on moderates than them.

    Because when they’re unhappy, they actually do vote Republican.

  16. 16.

    Cap'n Magic

    What I find amusing as he’ll is the right-wing ads that get served up when I visit from my iPad.

  25. 25.

    Dee Loralei

    Wow in 2008 Ron Paul’s campaign manager died from pneumonia and left his family 400K in debt because he didn’t have insurance. And Ron Paul said that was ok last night? Dude raises 10+ millions for Paul campaign and wasn’t given health insurance? Or enough pay to buy it for himself?

    Holy fuck, these folks are sick!

  27. 27.

    JPL

    Mentioned this earlier but John, watch My Dog Tulip. I’m not saying that is Lily but what I’m saying is the anime is great and it could be Lily. imho, also too, it’s hilarious.

  28. 28.

    Cat Lady

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred):

    Ugh. I was 13, and realized that the good ones were all going to be shot. I’ve fought cynicism and despair in a hand to hand battle every day since then. I’m getting tired of the stupid and evil. If it weren’t for this place, I’d have given up. Thanks everyone.

  30. 30.

    jl

    Cole is worried because, when this country returns to its great heritage of survival of the fittest and strongest, and if you get in any kind of trouble, well, why did you let that happen, stupid its your fault…

    then Tunch and Rosie will be unleashed to extract all the value they can out of the hapless Cole.

    They will allow him life until they get bored and extra cranky, or richer mark comes along.

    I don’t even want to think about it.

    Cole should allow us to pre mourn with some fun pet pix of those cute little monsters.

  31. 31.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred):

    I was living a very different (VERY different!) life in 1968, but yeah, it’s like last week. Vivid. Disturbing. Exhilarating. Depressing. Tragic. Stoned. Hopeful.

    Thank the gods I was only in my mid-20s at the time and had the strength to deal with and withstand it all. Don’t think I could do that again, certainly not now.

  33. 33.

    JPL

    I mentioned this many times but I’m on antenna and a friend was over and said what about 24/7 news just in case. I pointed out that I can get france24. through the air waves and Al Jazeera through roku. BTW, the France 24/7 has great news on fashions.

  38. 38.

    MattR

    @JPL:

    BTW, the France 24/7 has great news on fashions.

    Shocking

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    John, I would really like to see pictures of Tunch and Lily and Rosie.

    Let me add my voice to this request.

  39. 39.

    JPL

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred): I lived in a small city and what I remember is walking with a police officer towards my home. He had just lost his son in Nam. What I remember is his staunch, his looks but not his name but I could probably find that out. My brother was over there at the same time.

  40. 40.

    Chris

    @jl:

    Cole is worried because, when this country returns to its great heritage of survival of the fittest and strongest, and if you get in any kind of trouble, well, why did you let that happen, stupid its your fault…

    This is one big reason why people get drawn to totalitarian governments. Watching the people all around them dying or having their lives ruined every time they make a simple mistake, while a small minority of people at the top get to cushion themselves and their progeny from every fuckup they’ll ever make (and if they run out of money, the government’s right there with a bailout and a contract).

    Small wonder that so many people in the early twentieth century were going “‘freedom’… this is a fucking joke. There’s gotta be something better than this.”

    Course, the Galtian overlords just take it as proof that those guys were commie scum all along who just couldn’t handle the freedom and awesomeness. People dying in the streets is the price we pay for Wall Street’s freedom to drive the economy off the rails every decade or so, doncha know.

  41. 41.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred):

    I suspect you’re right. I was leading a double life as a traditional conservative* pearls-and-heels corporate wife, a “working girl,” and a closet hippie. One can maintain the illusions only so long.

    *I’m sorry to say, “conservative” in both the political and sociocultural senses of the word. So unlike me now, it’s hard to believe it was even me.

  45. 45.

    handsmile

    Well this article may prove a tonic for what ails you: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/sep/13/news-corporation-shareholders-complaint

    A prominent group of US bankers, led by Amalgamated Bank that manages $12B on behalf of institutional investors and holds approx 1 million shares of News Corporation stock, has filed a lawsuit against Rupert Murdoch, sons James and Lachlan, and other members of NewsCorp’s board of directors.

    Accusing the company of wide-ranging misconduct, extending beyond the phone hacking scandal, the shareholders contend that the board allowed Murdoch to use NewsCorp as his “own personal fiefdom.”

    I would imagine that legal actions initiated by banks and investment funds will be addressed with greater attention and gravity than those filed by mere private citizens victimized by News of the World reporters.

    In related Murdoch schadenfreude, NewsCorp chief executive James Murdoch is to be recalled by the Commons culture, sport and media committee. It is understood that this appearance will not occur until November, which may give parliamentarians sufficient time to arrange for Murdoch to provide testimony under oath, a pesky detail they neglected in his first appearance before the committee in July.

  47. 47.

    JPL

    Since this is an open thread who wrote about In the Garden of Beasts? I had read the review in the NYTimes and didn’t think I could read it but the poster convinced me otherwise. I think it should be required reading because history repeats itself.

  48. 48.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Dee Loralei:

    Okay, that’s even more amazing and repellent than the applause last night for “let him die!!”

    What the F.U.C.K. is wrong with these people?? (Rhetorical, no need to reply.)

  49. 49.

    Keith G

    Good. An open thread, so I can ask for help.

    I have many VHS cassettes that I want to convert to digital files and put on an external drive. I need product/process recommendations before I gear up to start this task.

    Who can help?

  52. 52.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @JPL: debbie – August 6, 2011 | 8:03 am · Link

    They really are only missing that one person though, for now. It’s that precarious.

    A bigger danger than a charismatic leader is the lack of long-term vision. Like 1930s Germany, people now are primarily focused on short-term expediency and immediate advantage. The inability (or refusal) to see consequences of an action are what really led to the Third Reich and will be what undoes this country.

    I’m in the middle of reading “In the Garden of Beasts,” the story of the US Ambassador to Germany in the mid-1930s who witnessed the rise of Hitler and the N@zis. He never saw any of that coming and refused to believe that people could be as misguided and as evil as they in fact turned out to be. It was militant ignorance that enabled them in Germany, and it’s militant ignorance that gives the Tea Party its oversized influence today.

  54. 54.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @JPL:

    Yes, and also, too, who posted the link to those kids doing the magic trick with the tablecloth the other night?

    You know what, I don’t need to know who posted it so much as I need to know how to find it again so I can send it to my siblings.

  59. 59.

    jrg

    There’s some fucko running for Congress here in NC who’s got an ad out that says “The America I grew up in just doesn’t exist anymore”.

    What the hell is he talking about? Why the hell would I NOT assume this guy is talking about the fact that the president is black, when he won’t come out and say what he’s thinking? Clearly he’s alluding to something he can’t say in a campaign ad.

  63. 63.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    anything specific prompt this post, or just exhaustion?

    I did hear on the radio that there is another Republican primary debate next week. I just laughed

  67. 67.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @JPL: When my good friend from high school was kia in Nov 68 they announced it at the high school gymnastics meet. He was a state champ on rings and high bar and went to Oklahoma on a scholarship but bailed and joined the Marines. I was obviously not there but I heard a great deal about it. I dedicated my dissertation to him.

  68. 68.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @JPL: if no one’s answered: I believe his name is Eric Larson? Same guy who wrote Teh Devil In The White City?

  69. 69.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Oh, and speaking of being disgusted with politics (as JC was doing in original post):

    Did y’all see? right wing nut media are all crazeee because Obama presented his Jobs Bill yesterday held together with a binder clip.

    ! ! ! ! !

    I mean, c’mon. If he had presented it in a bound volume, they would have bitched that he was spending unnecessary government resources on fancy packaging. When he provides a bunch of Xeroxed pages gathered in a Bulldog clip, he’s “chintzy” and “tacky.”

    Cain’t win for losin’.

  74. 74.

    JPL

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred): It’s the first book that I have read that showed how a people could become so indifferent to the suffering of others. They…were stealing jobs…they …were against the country…they …are stealing your money.
    It’s like boiling frogs. Part of the book reminded of Frank Luntz. Imagine that.

  76. 76.

    Fulcanelli

    1968

    The whole world’s watching, the whole world’s watching…

    Lots of hippie punching going on…

    Cream, The Beatles, San Francisco, Hendrix, war protests, The Dead, Quicksilver and The Airplane at the Fillmore, The Stones…

    I was 11 and worshipped the AM radio in our family car…

    It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…

  79. 79.

    Lojasmo

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Yup. Vibram five fingers. Had terrible ankle pain when I rsn in shoes. Cleared up when I stopped eating grains, but I firmly believe we were not made to run while wearing fluffy shoes.

  81. 81.

    Southern Beale

    Well, RWNJs did want every bill to be only 3 pages long, double-spaced and with 2 inch margins. Right? So binder clips are a totally unnecessary government expense! Obama FAILED!

  82. 82.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred): The first man I ever had a crush on went to the Nam when he was maybe 21, though it was after 1968. I was a teen, but when he came back, he was very different. I knew with certainty, without having a clue how I knew, that he would kill himself.

    I lost track of him, of course. On my 22nd birthday, I was in a bar and ran into some folks I’d known then but hadn’t seen since. They had news – he’d indeed ended his own life, the previous month. That was apropos of nothing, except I always remember that sorrowful feeling I had the first time I saw him when he came back; it felt as if he were already dead.

    Thanks for indulging me, folks. It’s not a story I tell often, for obvious reasons.

  83. 83.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @Jager: I remember while we trained as a unit to go over that summer how amazed we were when an EM who had been to college joined us.

  84. 84.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred): ah, that makes more sense, I missed the “about”

    @Southern Beale:

    Can we just dispense with the charade that these are “debates” and admit they are free advertising for conservative ideology?

    No doubt a lot of it has to do with the networks being scared of underplaying the Republican primaries!” but I don’t know how much good it’s doing them:

    From Dean Debnam, President of PPP polling: “In just three weeks Barack Obama has nearly doubled his lead over Rick Perry. That would seem to be an indication that Perry’s comments about Social Security are giving him trouble with swing voters.”

    I’m not on board with the Romney Death Watch. Yet. But i have some corn ready to pop if things keep going this way.

  86. 86.

    Suffern ACE

    @SiubhanDuinne: If he really wanted to fuck with them, he would have delivered it with appendices translated in Arabic, Spanish and Chinese with the explanation that he wanted his friends to be able to read it.

  87. 87.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): I think what saved me was that in Champaign-Urbana there were a bunch of us who had just come home and we supported each other. The isolation many guys felt was not helpful. Some of my buddies committed suicide by bottle but it took many years.

  91. 91.

    MikeJ

    @Suffern ACE: It’s interesting that Fox’s complaint was that the clip was “chintzy”. Did they expect or desire a blinged out gold plated flexible “O”?

  92. 92.

    DonkeyKong

    Rick Perry: What makes you think he’s a kenyan witch doctor?
    Teabilly: Well, he turned me into a newt!
    Rick Perry: A newt?
    Teabilly: [meekly after a long pause] … I got better.
    Crowd of Teabillies: [shouts] Burn him anyway!

  95. 95.

    jwb

    @Southern Beale: Except for the fact that we haven’t won. It actually reminds me of the same sort of shit that was going on day after day during the first six months Obama was in office. Did he bow too low to the Japanese Emperor? Did he give the Queen of England a proper gift? That stuff has started up again. Before paperclipgate, on Sunday, it was did Obama bow his head sufficiently during the 9/11 event?

  97. 97.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @JPL: The “self help” movement grew out of “rap groups” originated by VVAW chapters. You get with people with common experiences and support each other. Now they have them for every kind of affliction. Ever see “Fearless” with Jeff Bridges about survivors of a plane crash?

  98. 98.

    arguingwithsignposts

    @Nevgu:

    Look in the mirror if you want to know what is wrong with American politics you naive pathetic little child.

    Well, I guess what’s good for the doctor…

  101. 101.

    Southern Beale

    @jwb:

    Remember OH MY GOD HE’S NOT WEARING A FLAG PIN! WHY DOES OBAMA HATE AMERICA?

    Yeah that was fun. Well, now we can compile an entire box set of this asshattery and sell America on the notion that Republicans are the Petty Party who worry more about paper clips than creating jobs.

  102. 102.

    Fulcanelli

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred): There may have been “underground” FM radio, but what I didn’t have at the time was an “above ground” FM radio to listen on! ;p

    I remember the first time as a lad I heard FM stereo radio in a car, ’twas a revelation!

  103. 103.

    Southern Beale

    Completely unrelated, but I hate it when we’re watching TV and someone calls my husband so he puts the TV on pause and for the next 45 minutes I watch the DirectTV logo floating around the TV screen because he’s yakking with an old buddy.

    Especially since we were just watching some bullshit rerun that wasn’t important.

    Rant over.

  106. 106.

    Suffern ACE

    @jwb: It’s actually a fun history lesson for the next time a Dem wins and people forget what petty shits the rightwing and mainstream broadcasters are. Make you have to defend 24 hours a day. Let’s now relive mustard gate, bare arms gate, food kitchen cell phone gate, organic garden gate, dropping in on his daughter’s soccer game gate…

  107. 107.

    Morzer

    @Nevgu:

    Have you met Uncle Clarence Thomas? I think you’d really, really like him. In a hot palpitating weak at the knees teabag me now kind of way.

  111. 111.

    harlana

    @jrg:

    There’s some fucko running for Congress here in NC who’s got an ad out that says “The America I grew up in just doesn’t exist anymore”.

    wow, i could say the same thing but for very different reasons

  113. 113.

    Jager

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred): I was going to be drafted. One of my old man’s friends was a retired Infantry Bird Colonel, he said go to OCS. But that meant 3 years after graduation plus about a year of training prior to getting the bars and damn near a life time in the reserve. If I let them draft me, I would have zero choice of MOS. Joined as an RA, Medical Specialist, Ranger, Recon and trainer of small brown men. When I went to the mess hall in basic and you’d have to say: US, NG, ER to get in, the heads would snap when they heard RA out of my mouth.

  117. 117.

    jwb

    Cole, that’s one fucking irritating pop ad for a “free ipad” you are allowing your ad folks to run.

  118. 118.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Morzer: Should you really be encouraging the trolls to mate? I understand the potential scientific value, but, really, there must be limits.

  121. 121.

    B W Smith

    @jwb: That’s weird. The only picture I say of the 9/11 event, President Obama’s head was bowed. George Bush had his eyes open and was looking straight ahead which struck me as odd. I guess they cropped George out of the picture to make their point.

  122. 122.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @efgoldman: Elements of the US army were in Prague not quite 22 years later. That is, a couple of my buddies and I went the first weekend that we could do it without special orders (May 1990).

  123. 123.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @efgoldman: Yep, I remember you from those crazy days! When I got shipped to Korea in 67 it was all “the land of the morning calm”. Then those crazy motherfuckers started blowin shit up, hijacking US ships and trying to kill Park Chung Hee. Shit went south quick! The problem was that when I came home I couldn’t hack stateside chicken shit so I weasled my way into a unit headed for the Nam. If brains were dynamite I couldn’t blow my nose.

  124. 124.

    Raven (formerly stuckinred)

    @Omnes Omnibus: I worked with a woman at Georgia Tech who was there in 68. They told her to get out and she said the hell with it and stayed. Great stories she had.

  126. 126.

    Steeplejack

    @Southern Beale:

    Solution: You go ahead and watch it. When he gets done, he can rewind and watch it by himself, if he wants to.

    This is a pet peeve of mine. I hate it when one person demands (or assumes) that everyone else’s activities come to a stop because he is taking a phone call. My brother shushes everyone else in the room, rather than doing the obvious, “normal” thing of stepping into another room himself.

  127. 127.

    Suffern ACE

    Well, since we’re covering -Gates, we’ve got “Cap-Gate” now because the Mets didn’t wear the first responder hats during the game on Sunday. http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/blog/big_league_stew/post/The-Mets-backed-off-the-9-11-caps-because-of-a-l;_ylt=AhfpM50G.onfQDo_q_xLop8RvLYF?urn=mlb-wp19313

    Unfortunately, birthing a controversy that took away from the day’s true meaning was.

    Actually, birthing controversies over proper observances have been at the heart of the meaning of the day since, oh, 2002.

  128. 128.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @handsmile:

    I’m reading the complaint and holee sheepdip that reads like something a liberal would be accusing Murdoch of. Basically that the Board of Directors is a farce and that they were complicit in helping Murdoch use the company as his own personal fiefdom to get whatever he wants and to directly enrich himself and his family.

    That this was filed on the behalf of investors is pretty wild. I bet Murdoch is sweating this problem being heaped on top of his many other current (and past) problems with the law. I hope the old adage “the bigger they are, the harder they fall” holds true for ol’ Rupert, his family, his friends and his investors.

    I want to see a BIG FUCKING FALL from an extremely high place. I want an impact that leaves a fucking crater.

  130. 130.

    Arclite

    I’m so damned disgusted with politics I can’t believe it is only Tuesday.

    Well, when you start the week off with the bang fart of a Republican presidential debate moderated by the Communist News Network (complete with Trotsky lookalike Wolf Blitzer), that’s what happens.

    Also, too, brown Americans being strip searched

  131. 131.

    mclaren

    Looks like I’m not the only one who won’t be voting for Obama come November 2012:

    Barack Obama is expected to lay out a plan next week that would cut several hundred billion dollars from Medicare and Medicaid, the large government healthcare schemes for the elderly and the poor, as part of a pitch to cut future deficits by more than $1,500 bn.

    “Obama to propose Medicare and Medicaid cuts,” Stephanie Kirchgaessner and James Politi, Financial Times, 13 September 2011.

    Bye-bye, Barack. Nice knowin’ ya.

  132. 132.

    cckids

    @Raven (formerly stuckinred): I just finished it. The cluelessness of the ambassador & family; the horrifying anti-Semetic attitude of most of the State Dept; that determination to just not see what is happening in front of their faces. Mystifying.

    And yes, history could very well be repeating itself. Salvation may be that the figures the right wing sees as so charismatic (Perry, Palin), make a significant percentage of the public shudder.

  134. 134.

    John Weiss

    @Dee Loralei: Look. Get used to it. Ron Paul and his Rand fantasiststies are the joke.

    Humans have never lived that way. We succeeded because we’re a collaborative folk. Libertarians preach the opposite.

    This is not rocket science.

  136. 136.

    Jay in Oregon

    @Southern Beale:

    Well, now we can compile an entire box set of this asshattery and sell America on the notion that Republicans are the Petty Party who worry more about paper clips than creating jobs.

    Thanks for that; I had to Google for “obama paper clip” to find out what all the fuss is about… /headdesk

  137. 137.

    Ruckus

    @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
    I spent a couple of months in a navy hospital in 73 with mostly marines from Vietnam. There were some scary messed up men in that hospital. If they were ever going to be able to join society it was going to take a long time and a lot of work. Unfortunately most of them didn’t get the time or the effort. I suspect that probably half of the men I knew in that 2 months are gone by their own hands. Some by the bottle as Raven pointed out or drugs or both. And some by violent means. War is a bitch and it doesn’t stop just because a service person goes home. It’s a pain that many carry for decades, always wondering when it might go away.

  138. 138.

    FlipYrWhig

    @mclaren: You can “cut Medicare” without cutting Medicare benefits or jeopardizing people’s health. You do things like crack down on duplicative and unnecessary tests, too-generous reimbursement policies (like for those stupid scooters favored by cranky right-wing oldsters), and such. It’s not that hard to imagine, and public health advocates have been trying to get people to get serious about it for _years_. Don’t play the fool.

    @jrg:

    There’s some fucko running for Congress here in NC who’s got an ad out that says “The America I grew up in just doesn’t exist anymore”.
    __
    What the hell is he talking about? Why the hell would I NOT assume this guy is talking about the fact that the president is black

    That could well be part of it. But he’s also almost certainly talking about how there are too many Mexicans around. Too many Mexicans, too many Muslims, too many queers, and we’re payin’ for ’em all. [squint, spit]

  139. 139.

    Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason

    @Fulcanelli: I’m late to the thread, but that was 1968 for me, too, best of times, worst of times. Prague Spring, ripping up the Cobblestones in Paris, Chicago, the Haight, and oh, lord, the music.

    I was only 16, stuck in a jerkwater town in South PA, but I was a DFH then, DFH now, DFH forever.

  141. 141.

    bob h

    The only consolation I find today is the clear evidence that Rick Perry is not electable. The Republicans may be launched on a suicide mission.

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