Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

We are aware of all internet traditions.

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

People are complicated. Love is not.

Republicans in disarray!

Fuck the extremist election deniers. What’s money for if not for keeping them out of office?

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

John Fetterman: Too Manly for Pennsylvania.  Paid for by the Oz for Senator campaign.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Today’s GOP: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

T R E 4 5 O N

The revolution will be supervised.

All your base are belong to Tunch.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

I really should read my own blog.

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

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

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111Comments

  2. 2.

    suzanne

    How’s the weather? Surprisingly chilly. 44 degrees outside right now. Frost on my lawn this morning.

    I think I am starting to get sick. UGH.

  4. 4.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    Iowa weather: weird. Supposed to be a 14 degree low at our home in south central part of the state tomorrow night (meh), but minus 5 degrees (!) at our hobby farm in western Iowa, which really isn’t all that far away. Doesn’t look like those lows will reach here soon. Weather here has been strange all year. But, hey, we’re not Texas.

  5. 5.

    MikeJ

    It is December and it hasn’t rained in Seattle since last week, and isn’t forecast to rain for days and days yet.

    It’s making me breathe funny. Everything is wrong.

  8. 8.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    I feel like I have to explain that phrase ‘hobby farm.’ My father in law would never speak to me again if he’d heard me use that. He left it to four of his children in his will, as a safe place. He was convinced, for years, that the ‘big one’ would return, i.e., the Great Depression, and wanted one place we could all go to when that happened. It’s nothing special – just a beautiful little piece of land and an old, old farmhouse. We love it, and we used to laugh at his fears, and …. was he right or what?

  9. 9.

    General Stuck

    Blagojevich sentenced to 14 years in prison

    Bye Bye Blago to the BigHouse. It’s a federal sentence, so he will have to serve at least 90 percent or so. He will be right at home swimming with the sharks, his native species.

  10. 10.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Little Boots: I noted in in a previous thread that I can’t get into Christmas without snow. I have shopping to do and I can’t do it until either the very last minute or snow.

    ETA: Could I get released from moderation in the previous thread? FYWP!

  16. 16.

    Rick Massimo

    Pouring here too. Recycling nothing – I got 31 bags of leaves to put out (yes I waited this long shut up). I just decided to wait and get up at 530 am to do it. I don’t want the bags to disintegrate.

  18. 18.

    Little Boots

    don’t yell, everyone.

    the important thing is I gave the gift of Supremes.

    Merry Christmas.

  19. 19.

    Mike in NC

    Still in the 70s but a cold front hits tomorrow and temps will drop to the 30s/40s and stay there just in time for Xmas.

  20. 20.

    catdevotee

    On the southern coast of Oregon,it’s highs in the low to mid 50’s and sunny – very unusual for Dec. The temps are fairly normal, but rainy season should be in full swing by now. We’ve had sun for over a week. No frost yet of course… we usually get one or two a year.

  24. 24.

    JGabriel

    Anne Laurie:

    And, yes, I am fully aware that I should count my damp-cardboard blessings because it could be snowing …

    I’m not speaking for everyone, but I know I’m speaking for a lot of us when I say we positively prefer snow to cold rain. Cold rain gets you all wet and chills you to the to the bone, especially if it’s windy.

    Snow, you just sort of shake it off when you come in. It blankets everything and makes it all look white pretty, where rain makes it all look muddy.

    So I’ll take snow over rain any day of the week. Of course, I don’t have to drive in it, and I sympathize for those who do.

    .

  25. 25.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @Omnes Omnibus: Yup. Sixty miles from the WI border. We had a photo in our newspaper here today with a Houston TX resident dressed in triple layers of clothing ’cause the low reached 31 degrees. Pretty amusing.

  26. 26.

    RossInDetroit

    Hmmph! I’ve been waiting for an OT so I could bitch about my day, which was epically terrible.
    But the weather was actually pretty good. Clear, sunny and calm. Temps in the 40s. Not really bad for December in MI.

  28. 28.

    PurpleGirl

    It’s raining in NYC; supposed to rain heavily all night with a possible thunderstorm. TV weather talker said something about possible snow tomorrow but National Weather Service says breezy, in the high 40s and doesn’t mention snow. I go with the NWS.

  29. 29.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @JGabriel: I prefer driving in snow to driving in near freezing rain. Also, running when it is snow beats the living hell out of running in cold rain.

  30. 30.

    General Stuck

    WTF is ABC News breathlessly reporting drek coming out of Third Way?

    President Obama’s uphill battle to re-election is getting steeper.

    A report released today by the centrist think-tank Third Way showed that more than 825,000 voters in eight key battleground states have fled the Democratic Party since Obama won election in 2008.

    “The numbers show that Democrats’ path to victory just got harder,” said Lanae Erickson, the report’s co-author. “We are seeing both an increase in independents and a decrease in Democrats and that means the coalition they have to assemble is going to rely even more on independents in 2012 than it did in 2008.”

    There is no evidence of this I’ve seen in any of the polling done by major polling outfits, and if anything, dems have pulled even with wingers on party ID, after they fell behind some in 2010. And have even pulled back in front in some polls.

    And all of the polling for dems in individual state races like the senate, have taken a sizable turn in dems favor lately, especially senate races in so called swing states, as well as deep red ones.

  33. 33.

    cg

    NE MN. 18 degrees F. Snowing lightly but we need MUCH MORE snow please for the tourists who come up to play and spend their money. And for those of us who, blizzard bound, will be supremely happy with a good book and a wood stove.

  36. 36.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @cg: @cg: @cg: Despite hating winter, I’m with you on the blizzard respites. They’re wonderful. All you can do is read, firesit (if you’re lucky enough to have a fire) and drink whatever alcoholic beverage you might have purchased before the storm. If you don’t have a fireplace or said beverage, curling up under a blanket and reading is just as nice.

  37. 37.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    wutthehell? I have no idea why you’re up there in my comment 3 times, cg – guess it means I really love you.

  38. 38.

    Little Boots

    can I ask you goobs.

    I am really starting to like Obama.

    Am I fooling myself or has he finally woken up?

    would love to know what you think.

  40. 40.

    JGabriel

    @The Fat Kate Middleton:

    [My father] was convinced, for years, that the ‘big one’ would return, i.e., the Great Depression, and wanted one place we could all go to when that happened. […] We love it, and we used to laugh at his fears, and … was he right or what?

    Anyone familiar with period 1920-1935 could probably see that Reagan’s and the GOP’s governing philosophy would eventually lead us to another economic crash. The people I knew who were in their 60’s during the 1980’s thought that the Reagan tax cuts were ridiculous, would have preferred to keep paying the previous rates, and see the money go to people who needed it.

    Now, obviously, there must have been a lot of older people who felt differently, since Reagan won that demographic. But there were people even then who could tell that the GOP wasn’t leading us anywhere good.

    .

  45. 45.

    Shinobi

    @amk: I am SO hoping it gets over 100k dislikes in 24 hours, that would make my year.

    But then again, the internet has a well known liberal bias.

  46. 46.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @Little Boots: I can’t read enough about Scooter and his chances of disappearing from the political scene. One of my favorite places for keeping up with all of this is the unfortunately (to some) named FB page “Scott Walker is a Douchebag.” Of course, now with what I’ve been reading about FB lately, I’m thinking I’m going to have to sign out.

  48. 48.

    Redshift

    @General Stuck:
    Their site says it:

    compiles data from Secretaries of State in each of the 8 key swing states with partisan voter registration and found striking never-before-released statistics.

    Yeah, breathless rhetoric like that gives me confidence that they knew what they were doing, and didn’t just interpret things to support their narrative.

  49. 49.

    JGabriel

    @Rick Massimo:

    I got 31 bags of leaves to put out (yes I waited this long shut up).

    Well a person can work up a mean mean thirst
    after a hard day of nothin’ much at all
    Summer’s passed, it’s too late to cut the grass
    There ain’t much to rake anyway in the fall

    […]

    First the lights, then the collar goes up, and the wind begins to blow
    Turn your back on a pay-you-back, last call
    First the blast, then the leaves at last, here comes the snow
    Ain’t much to rake anyway in the fall

    .

  53. 53.

    Tom Q

    @General Stuck: Treat anything from Third Way as you would a study from Doug Schoen & Joe Lieberman. They’re all committed to the DLC premise: Democrats must ALWAYS move to the right, or they’re doomed.

  54. 54.

    Hill Dweller

    Scott Brown is down 7 to Elizabeth Warren in the new UMass-Lowell/Princeton Survey Research poll.

    Also, too, Jon Stewart was a d-bag on tonight’s show.

  55. 55.

    RossInDetroit

    I dread the first real snow. Not because I hate snow, but because I serviced eleven plow tractors and 22 snow blowers last month and I just know a few of them are not going to start. No matter how many times you tell people “start it up and test it so you’ll know how it works before the snow comes” a few people will not do it. Then it will be my problem because snow needs to get moved so school can open.
    When it starts coming down for real I may fake a broken leg just to spite them.

  57. 57.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @JGabriel: My father-in-law was born in 1911, an old time populist from the great era of the prairie populists, who read Nation magazine up to the day he died, literally. His son-in-law just told his wife he didn’t want to visit London UK because there were “too many liberals and Muslims.” RIP Ray. Thank you for our beautiful home, and your legacy of what’s left of progressivism that you worked as hard as anyone to build.

  59. 59.

    Punchy

    Its supposed to snow less than 0.5 inch 2morrow. But here in eastern KS, that’ll close at least a half-dozen schools. I wish I was joking.

    Sorriest bunch of Nancy boys you’ll ever see.

  62. 62.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @KS in MA: Hawks are kinda sucking right now, but thanks to money hunger, are in a bowl game somewhere. BTW – have dear relatives in MA – Beverly, to be exact. Wish I could be there with them.

  65. 65.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @RossInDetroit: Oh yeah. This is what my husband does as a sort of part-time hobbyist thing in our neighborhood. And he could had written would you have here if he read this blog. I hear this a lot.

  66. 66.

    Punchy

    Lets not discuss my Hawks bowl win chances, for fear I may fly into a rage. All the fucking bowls and we get Oklahoma? Could there be a more lopsided matchup?

    /peruses vegas odds…nope

  67. 67.

    boss bitch

    @Little Boots:

    I am really starting to like Obama.
    Am I fooling myself or has he finally woken up?
    would love to know what you think.

    Nah. Like Spike Dolomite you are finally catching up.

  68. 68.

    JGabriel

    The Fat Kate Middleton:

    My father-in-law was born in 1911, an old time populist from the great era of the prairie populists, who read Nation magazine up to the day he died, literally.

    I figured as much. That’s how he knew what was coming. He’d already lived through it once before.

    .

  73. 73.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @Punchy: I was successfully forgetting that, thank you. This whole bowl game thing is so stupid. What’s wrong with playoffs? Oh, wait … wait… a full year of football. Hmmm…Let me go back into my thinking workshop (which isn’t very well equipped).

  74. 74.

    Steeplejack

    Rained all day here in NoVa, and it has taken a turn for the colder in the late evening. It’s 38° now, going down to 32° overnight with continued rain. But sunny and 45° tomorrow. Not bad for December.

  75. 75.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @JGabriel: I’m getting all teary here. He had seven kids (all great people, really), but my husband is the only one who carried on his legacy. We simply can’t talk politics, ever, to the siblings. I’m constantly raising my voice when the the family rightwhiners start in, saying, “Stop! Stop! Remember that we love one another!”

  77. 77.

    Hill Dweller

    @boss bitch: Stewart rightly went after congress for trying to enshrine indefinite detention in the defense appropriations bill. But then he started hammering Obama for not using the right rationale when threatening to veto the bill.

    A veto is the outcome we all want. If it doesn’t happen, Obama will deserve all the criticism he gets, but why preemptively do it now?

    It reeked of the ‘centrism’ found in the beltway press he usually ridicules.

  79. 79.

    Sammy

    HYPOCRISY at it’s best:

    Monday, December 22, 2003

    Office of Gov Rick Perry [Photo]

    The First Family Wishes You Happy Holidays:

    http://bit.ly/t1exaj

    Wait, what? Where is the Merry Christmas?

    Perry took the Christ out of Christmas.

    This is too funny not to pass around.

  80. 80.

    cg

    @ The Fat Kate Middleton, preferred beverage: Bell’s Two Hearted Ale, or Sierra Nevada’s Torpedo, or anything from Deschutes (Bend, OR) or Surly’s (Mpls).

  83. 83.

    JGabriel

    @MikeJ:

    Isn’t there somebody who comments here who played in the same showcase (with another band of course.) Who was that?

    I think it’s GBear.

    .

  84. 84.

    Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason

    How’s the weather out there?

    Snowing. And I have a work road trip tomorrow from South PA to Delaware and then the part of NY east of Binghampton that’s been getting snow all day. Maybe I’ll be lucky and they’ll cancel the meeting. Probably after I spend 5 hours getting there.

    \Eeyore

  85. 85.

    JCJ

    @Omnes Omnibus:
    I agree! Here in the Kingdom of Wingnut (aka Brookfield) there is a painful lack of snow with none in the forecast! It is December, dammit! Snow already!

  86. 86.

    Scamp Dog

    @Little Boots: I think it’s always been there, you’re just noticing. He doesn’t fight the way I want him to, but he’s actually gotten some good stuff done. Now if we could just get him backed by more than 60 senators (ideally enough more that we could tell the blue dogs to take a hike), we’d be in good shape.

  87. 87.

    The prophet Nostradumbass

    How’s the weather out there?

    clear, 37º Fahrenheit, at 9:45 PM. Our local news programs all predicted the overnight low would be 40.

  88. 88.

    Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason

    @The Fat Kate Middleton: Many years ago, right after we were married, as the snow kept falling, my wife and I discovered we were out of bourbon. No sours for us! Oh noes!!

    We walked a mile through the blowing snow to the local liquor store to take care of that problem, and our little mutt had the time of her life chasing around in it.

    BSoSR +4 watching the cold rain and snow

  89. 89.

    Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason

    @Little Boots: Obama? I think he’s the smartest, and better yet, most savvy President I can remember. He’s been dealt shitty hands and he’s been playing the best he can.

    To continue the card game metaphor, maybe instead of “waking up” he’s finally watched long enough to learn who’s bluffing and sandbagging and he’s starting to play the other players.

  90. 90.

    Brother Shotgun of Sweet Reason

    @RossInDetroit:

    I serviced eleven plow tractors and 22 snow blowers last month and I just know a few of them are not going to start.

    And that’s why I’m still shoveling. I owned too many British cars, I have a lawnmower that won’t start in 80 degree weather, why the hell do I want to deal with a cranky engine in the middle of winter?

  91. 91.

    Viva BrisVegas

    Yesterday was our coldest December day in 123 years, 19 degrees.

    Centigrade of course.

  92. 92.

    The Fat Kate Middleton

    @cg: That sounds so fkng wonderful. I haven’t been able to drink beer for ten years now, after a, um … lifetime … of it. After all that time, it now makes me violently ill, never mind that I still love it Can’t figure it out. It’s white wine only now.

  94. 94.

    Redshift

    @Hill Dweller:

    But then he started hammering Obama for not using the right rationale when threatening to veto the bill.

    And an equally major sin, he treated statements by Rand Paul as if they were true. That’t the thing that keeps pissing me off. The occasional mocking of Dems that I think is misguided is part of the territory. But taking some wingnut line and riffing off it assuming it’s true, when you know they’re lying or delusional almost all the time, that’s just satire malpractice.

  98. 98.

    Jebediah

    @JGabriel:

    Summer’s passed, it’s too late to cut the grass

    All by itself that line earns him genius status in my book. It is so beautiful. OF course the rest of the song is pretty damn great, too.

  99. 99.

    Jebediah

    @Little Boots:

    can I ask you goobs.
    I am really starting to like Obama.
    Am I fooling myself or has he finally woken up?
    would love to know what you think.

    I am going with waking up to the value of poking a stick in the eye of the GOP.

  100. 100.

    Jebediah

    And I have a “Stand with Scott Walker” ad.
    Think I’m gonna pass on standing with that douche.

  101. 101.

    boss bitch

    he treated statements by Rand Paul as if they were true.

    Grrrrr…He’s done this one too many times with other liars.

  102. 102.

    Mnemosyne

    @The Fat Kate Middleton:

    His name faked you out — he’s actually in Australia.

    ETA: It gets cold in Las Vegas during the winter — 50s during the day, 30s or lower at night. The desert is not fun in the winter.

  103. 103.

    No one of importance

    @The Fat Kate Middleton:
    “where the hella are you living?”

    BrisVegas == Brisbane, Qld, Australia

    Tomorrow’s gonna be 27 degrees centigrade and even though I don’t like the heat, being cold in summer is not on.

  104. 104.

    MJ

    @Shinobi: Your internet wish has been granted. It is now 3:07 AM and Pretty Ricky’s stupid Ad now has 2887 likes & 120370 dislikes.

  107. 107.

    Chuck Butcher

    It has barely made 40f for the last 2 weeks here and if we’ve been lucky stays above teens for lows. At night the cold air pours down off the mountains and we ain’t low down here in the valley.

  109. 109.

    Munira

    Here in southern Quebec, we got some snow last night – everything looks pretty this morning and more like December, but I’m afraid it isn’t going to last. As for Obama, he has a way of letting his opponents get way out on the limb before he starts cutting it off. I have no idea how intentional all of this is, but the Repubs are in a corner now, thanks to their own idiocy, and Obama’s playing it for all it’s worth. If he hadn’t been so reasonable and accommodating for so long, it wouldn’t work as well.

  110. 110.

    Ronzoni Rigatoni

    A little cool down here in south central FL (40’s and 50’s at night) but daytimes approach the 80’s. Humidity is thankfully gone. We’re just off the former Gulf of Mexico (now known as BP’s Ultimate Sludge Pond). About the only ice we can find is still in the refrigerator (and sometimes even, inna glassa bourbon).

    I once hung a snow shovel over the fireplace so the neighbors could ask “Wuzzat?” Haven’t seen snow fall outa the sky in over 40 years. Think I’ll keep it that way.

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