Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans in disarray!

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

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

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

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

Bad news for Ron DeSantis is great news for America.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

This really is a full service blog.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

I’m pretty sure there’s only one Jack Smith.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

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

I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

This fight is for everything.

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

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69Comments

  6. 6.

    Jennifer

    Glad you’re feeling better.

    Since I killed the last back thread, I’ll post this again – anyone who has back problems should have one of these. It heats up in the microwave in 2 minutes or less, and thanks to the strap you can position it wherever it needs to be and it will stay in place if you’re up moving around, sitting, or lying down.

  7. 7.

    JGabriel

    Remember SD State Rep. Steve Hickey? The guy who said:

    Certainly there are board-certified doctors in our state who will attest to what seems self-evident to so many: gay sex is not good for the body or mind. Pardon a crude comparison but regarding men with men, we are talking about a one-way alley meant only for the garbage truck to go down.

    Well, Steve had a video chat:

    Hickey drew tons of attention last week when he wrote a letter calling on the medical community to sound the alarm about the dangers of anal sex. Later, Dr. Kevin Weiland, who has run for Congress as a Democrat, responded with a letter of his own in the Argus Leader, calling Hickey’s words “not only hurtful but entirely wrong.” During his video chat on Monday, Hickey argued that Weiland was missing what he’s described as a “self-evident” concern.

    “And here’s what I’d like to ask Dr. Weiland. Do you tell your patients to wash their hands before they eat? Why? Because you touch a doorknob and you don’t want to get it inside your body. I hesitate to get crude again, but Dr. Weiland, is it OK for, you know, eight of your friends that you’re in love with to take a dump in your bed and then you can sleep in it all year long?”

    Which of course leads one to ask, “Jesus Christ, man, what kind of porn are you watching?”

  9. 9.

    WaterGirl

    @JGabriel: Wow, that revealed a lot about Steve Hickey, and he probably doesn’t even realize it. Do these people even listen to themselves?

    Edit: I thought I’d take a break from my usual “what the fuck is wrong with these people?” Was it John Oliver who said “you do know we can hear you, right?’

  10. 10.

    Schlemizel

    Going on a road trip this summer – going to be on Cemetery Ridge on July 2nd. Anyone have recommendations for the battlefield or surrounding areas?

  11. 11.

    Violet

    Betty, sorry I’m late to the last thread. If your back injury is within 24 hours use ice and ibuprofen to decrease the inflammation. After that, stretching and techniques like epsom salt baths to help the muscles to relax. You can also apply magnesium oil directly to the strained muscles. Hope you feel better!

    I just ate frozen yogurt with fudge topping. Now I’ll have dinner. I believe this is the proper order. I spent all day with my dad taking him to the doctor. I’m back on parent duty again tomorrow. I think I earned dessert first.

  13. 13.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @JGabriel: He’s a Rethug, so it’s highly likely that he as VERY odd tastes, and he cannot stop thinking about them.

  14. 14.

    Mnemosyne

    @JGabriel:

    Um, eeewwww. Is he somehow under the impression that gay men don’t shower or bathe, like, ever? What is this telling us about his personal hygiene habits?

  15. 15.

    Schlemizel

    @JGabriel:
    Can you imagine how f’ed up the world would be if gay men were as obsessed with gay sex as the goopers are?

  16. 16.

    Gin & Tonic

    Thinking of spending a few days in Savannah while on our way to a mandatory visit to Jacksonville. Never been, although we’ve been to Charleston. Is it worth maybe three days?

  21. 21.

    tybee

    @Gin & Tonic:

    personally, i’d say yes. :)

    similar to chucktown but different enough.

    fort pulaski and the wildlife refuge. historic district. a kayak trip to little tybee is well worth it for a basically 2 mile beach with no one on it but you and the gaggle you go with. look for the three palm trees at the dog leg. a trail off to the left leads aways back around old inlet.
    the 8th airforce museum. the telfair museum/jepson museum. around the jepson in the mornings, stay out of the alley or you might run into me on the way to Wright Square.

    and there’s a bar about every 20 feet down on river street.

  23. 23.

    Mnemosyne

    Also, too, big plans for tonight include playing The Sims Freeplay on my iPad and making chili for dinner. Not too much else in the pipeline. I really should do laundry but I don’t feel like it, so I’m not gonna.

  24. 24.

    dmsilev

    NewsMax: “Ted Nugent: Benghazi Debacle Defies Logic”. It is performance art, right? I mean, they can’t be serious, can they?

  25. 25.

    Gin & Tonic

    @tybee: Will the water be comfortable for swimming in early June? Tybee is the island out on the oceanfront, right?

  26. 26.

    Suffern ACE

    @beltane: ok. I have no problem with Monica. Never have, actually, beyond the usual qualms I have about people who knowingly sleep with people they know to be married. (I’m forgiving, so don’t be hating). She hasn’t been trading on her celebrity, and I’m not thinking that we’ll hear more of her, execpt for occasional where are they now interviews, like she’s given in the past. She isn’t hawking fake diet pills, she isn’t on reality TV, she hasn’t been commenting on current events, she isn’t trying to cut an autotune record, or posing in playboy. I generally don’t think of her as a soundrel. She isn’t a Palin.

  27. 27.

    dedc79

    Reading and commenting on this post is the closest I’ve ever come to meeting a Rays fan. I didn’t think any existed.

  28. 28.

    Hal

    @dmsilev:

    It is performance art, right? I mean, they can’t be serious, can they?

    I know when I want the lowdown on world events the first person who I think of is Ted Nugent. Scary to think there are people out there who give two shits what he thinks about anything.

  30. 30.

    tybee

    @Gin & Tonic:

    water should be warm enough by then. it’s at 65 now.
    i’ll go seining at about 68 or so.
    pay attention to the jellyfish warnings if there’s an easterly fetch.
    on the back side of tybee it’s a bit more like a lake but beware of the currents.
    8′ swing in tides every 6 hours. currents can be brisk.

  31. 31.

    WereBear

    I’m on vacation and was finally able to learn my new microphone & mixing board. (Got it months ago, unable to get enough time to learn it until now.)

    Finished my new podcast (here’s the last one) and and I don’t know how any sound engineer gets through the week with all the fiddly bits they are supposed to keep track of.

    I do love doing them, even though the script, recording, and then editing takes up a LOT of time. At least I have Mr WereBear’s expertise to fall back on.

  32. 32.

    beltane

    @Suffern ACE: I really haven’t thought of her at all since the horror of Bush v. Gore and all the subsequent atrocities that ensued from it. However, the Clinton impeachment was not one of my favorite memories of the 1990s, and I’d like Monica Lewinski much better if she were in a permanent state of out-of-sight-out-of-mind.

  34. 34.

    geg6

    @Schlemizel:

    It’s a beautiful part of the state, but not much in the way of civilization. Gettysburg is a quaint little town and has all the usual touristy stuff. Eisenhower’s farm is in the area and of historical interest, if you OD on the Civil War stuff. But the battlefield is the true star, so beautiful and haunting. If you’re a buff, it’s truly worth it to walk as much of it as you can. If you aren’t, the guided tour is worth your while as the guides are excellent and knowledgeable and will give you ideas for things you’d want to explore on your own.

  37. 37.

    tybee

    @Betty Cracker:

    whiting, troots and reds are mostly on the reports. haven’t heard of any decent sized sharks yet. water needs to be warmer for those.

    as to the back, sour mash cures all ills.

  38. 38.

    WereBear

    @Mnemosyne: I really should do laundry but I don’t feel like it, so I’m not gonna.

    It’s the pile of clean clothes I’m overwhelmed with. Now that the seasons have changed I don’t know which pile to burrow through.

  39. 39.

    Cacti

    @dmsilev:

    “Ted Nugent: Benghazi Debacle Defies Logic”. It is performance art, right? I mean, they can’t be serious, can they?

    I thought the same.

    What makes Ted Nugent an authority on anything outside of pants-pooping, pube rock, and statutory rape?

  41. 41.

    MomSense

    Got my mother’s day present from my mom early. She had one of her violins restored and gave it to me. It is absolutely beautiful. First lesson is on Saturday morning and it is going to be painful since it has been sooooo long since I’ve played.

  42. 42.

    JGabriel

    @beltane:

    Brilliant and groundbreaking or “2 Republicans 1 Cup”.

    Apparently we’re talking about “8 Republicans 1 Cup”. Coprophagia: It’s What’s For Dinner In The GOP.

  43. 43.

    danielx

    @JGabriel:

    Considering the Republican obsession with teh buttsecks, you really have to ask? This guy sounds like he’s done extensive research on the whole topic.

  44. 44.

    geg6

    @tybee:

    Savannah was the setting for one of my most epic drunken holidays ever. Stayed at a hotel that used to be a cotton warehouse, right on the river. It was New Year’s Eve and the Steelers were playing, don’t remember who. Ate and drank our way up and down the River Street. It was like a miniature New Orleans. Everybody partying and drinking, inside and out in the street. Ate at Paula Dean’s place the next day for brunch and the boatloads of grease were good for the hangover. We also went to see the drag queen from Inside the Garden of Good and Evil. A great party town. This was probably the early ’00s, I think.

  45. 45.

    Gvg

    the Monica story I read on TPM just had her speaking up about excessive media attention being terrible. she was motivated by the story of the gay college student whose roommate posted videos of him having gay sex and as a result committed suicide.
    seemed reasonable to me.
    I don’t know if there are other interviews out there.

  47. 47.

    Baud

    @JGabriel:

    , is it OK for, you know, eight of your friends that you’re in love with to take a dump in your bed and then you can sleep in it all year long?”

    What does the House of Representatives have anything to do with gay people?

  48. 48.

    PhoenixRising

    @Schlemizel: We would never again see a truly well-planned holiday homes tour, for one thing. And the local Habitat for Humanity would have to make other plans for fundraising.

  50. 50.

    danielx

    @Schlemizel:

    Little Round Top, definitely…but as noted by WereBear, I wouldn’t be up there under the trees at night for nothin’.

  51. 51.

    Schlemizel

    @geg6: I am a buff and there are several places I want to see but I really want to stand where the 1st MN stood on the 2nd. I’m thinking we might hit Philly for its historical stuff. I was there years ago but the Mrs has not.

    @WereBear:
    If I believed in ghosts I am sure that place would be loaded. Part of the experience would be a hot muggy day I think.

  52. 52.

    Schlemizel

    @danielx:
    Having read about it a thousand times I am anxious to see it to scale. See what our guys were defending & what those people were climbing. I can believe the emotions of the place could summon a lot of things in a mans mind, the dark would let them run free.

  54. 54.

    raven

    @Schlemizel: I’m becoming more of a buff as I learn more about the Georgia Campaign and my ancestor that was with the 11th Tennessee at Cheatham Hill and then killed on July 22, 1864 at Legget’s Hill in the Battle of Atlanta.

  57. 57.

    Suffern ACE

    So I signed a contract to renovate my bathroom today. I have one bathroom and I’m replacing the bathroom with a shower. Now I am regretting it. I have a slow drain and I’m worried about the choice. I hate bathtubs, but apparently not having one is a problem. Ugh. So much for sleep.

  59. 59.

    danielx

    @Schlemizel:

    I got fascinated with the late unpleasantness as a kid after learning that one of my great-great-grandfathers was in the Army of the Cumberland and was wounded charging up Missionary Ridge. It’s worth some study; slavery is this country’s original sin and the Civil War is our Iliad and Odyssey all wrapped in one. Bruce Catton’s Army of the Potomac trilogy in hardback with the original covers for two bucks per volume at a used book store – major score! I was amazed when I saw the tree stump from the Bloody Angle at Spotsylvania in the Smithsonian, since you wouldn’t think black powder single shot muskets could cut down an oak tree. But it helps to explain the hideous casualty rates in Civil War battles.

    I’ve always found southern apologists’ insistence that it wasn’t about slavery to be one of the most revolting pieces of hypocrisy I’ve heard in my life, and I’ve heard a lot. Have these people never read the articles of secession from the various confederate states? Every goddamn one of them makes the defense of slavery a clear objective, although by no means the only grievance. There were other causes, but absent slavery I doubt very seriously there would have been a war. Not to mention a wound that in some ways has never truly healed – during my six month sojourn in Virginia I noted pretty quickly that for some denizens of the Old Dominion, the “War of Northern Aggression” might have ended last year instead of in 1865.

  60. 60.

    Hal

    Apparently Rand Paul can’t count:

    http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2014/may/05/rand-paul/rand-paul-says-40-times-more-kentuckians-have-gott/

    “Since the implementation of Obamacare, hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians have received cancellation notices from their current health care providers. For every Kentuckian that has enrolled in Obamacare, 40 have been dropped from their coverage. Obamacare has been presented to the American people through twisted rhetoric, smoke and mirrors. Obamacare is not good for America and it certainly (is) not good for Kentucky. I would like (to) hear how Obamacare affected you, your family or your small business. Share your story by visiting my website.”

    Paul said that “for every Kentuckian that has enrolled in Obamacare, 40 have been dropped from their coverage.” That’s not mathematically possible. If you take the narrowest definition of “sign-ups,” there would have to be 3.3 million cancellations in the state for Paul’s statement to be accurate — and there aren’t even that many Kentuckians with private insurance plans that could theoretically be canceled.

    So what’s his excuse? Blame the staffers!

    After we published this item, Paul’s office contacted us to explain how they calculated the 40-to-1 ratio of cancellations to signups. The office said that “the numbers he used were accurate as of November of last year” but that staffers failed “to update the numbers for the newsletter.” Specifically, Paul’s office said that a Nov. 8, 2013, news release from the Kentucky governor’s office reported that 7,011 Kentuckians had enrolled in a private health plan through Nov. 8, compared to the 280,000 Kentuckians who the state believed at the time might be subject to cancellation notices.

  61. 61.

    Mnemosyne

    @MomSense:

    I had not seen them, but I just saved the web pages as PDFs just in case someone at the Giant Evil gets overzealous. (They rarely do for patterns — it’s usually finished merchandise they get huffy about — but you never know.)

  62. 62.

    Jennifer

    @Suffern ACE: Remodel contracting project manager here. Not having a tub is only a problem if you plan on selling your place within the next 10 years. Even then, it’s only a problem, generally, if the people looking to buy have young children. Those are the folks that have to have a bathtub; just about everyone else is fine with just a shower. I say 10 years because, if you plan on being there that long, you should have what works for you rather than worrying about someone else’s needs 10 years from now.

    Tip on your remodel: make sure you specify what materials are to be used. I’ve seen jobs where the homeowner didn’t know to do that and the contractor supplied the cheapest shit off the shelf at Home Depot, in one case, a tub with a 3 year warranty. Here’s what you know about a tub with a 3 year warranty – they expect it to fail in 4 years, which is what had happened to this guy. Upgrading materials to get a longer lifespan makes a lot of sense, because it costs as much to install cheap shit as it does quality materials, and the price difference between cheap and quality materials usually isn’t all that much.

    Edit: BTW, the slow drain thing is more an issue with tubs than showers, because tub drains do a 90 degree angle right there under the drain cover. Usually a slow tub drain is caused by a ball of hair trapped right there under the drain cover. If you remove the cover, I predict you’ll find a hairball right there.

  63. 63.

    Mnemosyne

    @danielx:

    I’ve posted this link before, but you might find it interesting: one of our local museums has an extensive Civil War documents collection, and a researcher came across a reference to “12 Years A Slave” while doing other research.

    (Short version: some Union soldiers did a little “abolitionist tourism” on the side while they were on campaign and this guy went to the plantation where Northup had been held.)

  64. 64.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @Schlemizel: There should be all sorts of special events going on, since you’ll be there during the anniversary of the battle. When we were there for July 1-3 some years ago, the place was crawling with reenactors. Some say that not everyone you meet there in a uniform is a reenactor….

    If you’re physically up to it, pick a unit and walk through its movements. We caught a couple of battlefield tours that did that, and it’s quite revealing.

    We’ve been there twice, once during the anniversary and once not, and there’s something odd in the atmosphere that first week in July. Oak Hill at night is damned spooky, and we had a “vanishing reenactor” experience there. Of course, you don’t have to be out at night to see some odd things. I certainly did, in broad daylight, on Cemetery Ridge.

  65. 65.

    NotMax

    Posted this in a likely dead thread, so again here.

    Easy to make a non-electric heating padlet.

    Get a heavy woolen sock.

    Fill it about 3/4 with uncooked rice (or a bit more, but not stuffed full).

    Sew it tightly shut.

    Voila – instant microwaveable heating pad.

  66. 66.

    lol chikinburd

    A federal judge has just killed John Doe II (a preliminary injunction, but one that orders prosecutors essentially to destroy all the evidence they’ve collected), because First Amendment, of course.

    So we can officially forget (1) law ever constraining Li’l Nixon and his pals and paymasters (since such law is, by definition, not law), and (2) any notion of “corruption” hampering his present or future electoral prospects.

  67. 67.

    Comrade Mary

    So, um, Clay Aiken may be the Democratic nominee for North Carolina’s second congressional district. I still say that Ruben will beat him at the last moment.

  68. 68.

    Steeplejack

    @lol chikinburd:

    From the article:

    [Judge Rudolph] Randa said his decision was about “the limits that government can place on First Amendment political speech.” He wrote that the U.S. Supreme Court, in the recent McCutcheon decision tossing out aggregate limits on campaign contributions, found that government can only regulate political activities as they relate to the potential for corruption.

    “[Eric] O’Keefe and the Club [for Growth] obviously agree with Governor [Scott] Walker’s policies, but coordinated ads in favor of those policies carry no risk of corruption because the Club’s interests are already aligned with Walker and other conservative politicians,” Randa wrote. “Such ads are meant to educate the electorate, not curry favor with corruptible candidates.”

    WTF?!

  69. 69.

    JGabriel

    danielx:

    Not to mention a wound that in some ways has never truly healed – during my six month sojourn in Virginia I noted pretty quickly that for some denizens of the Old Dominion, the “War of Northern Aggression” might have ended last year instead of in 1865.

    War of Northern Aggression … ? I’m guessing you mean the Slaveowner Rebellion Treason?

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