Here are a lot of people mad that solar power is taking off.
Here are people mad that people are getting healthcare.
Here are people who are mad that the government isn’t going to give them a military arsenal.
Here is someone who is just barking mad.
Other than that last one, all of this seems to me to mean that that @POTUS fellow on twitter is doing something right.
SatanicPanic
That pretty well ends Sanchez’s chances of being a US Senator. From California at least.
Elizabelle
I heart POTUS on Twitter. Or wherever his dashing self is.
Poopyman
@efgoldman: Well, it is pretty much the same set of people who are mad about all these things. I’d guess, maybe… 26% of eligible voters? Could be more, I guess.
Big ole hound
@Poopyman: See, that biker fight in Texas reduced the 27% to 26%. Toldya it would reduce a certain gene pool.
John Cole +0
@efgoldman: Fixed the second link. As for the subscription required, copy the title, paste it into google news search. Voila. No subscription required.
Poopyman
@Big ole hound: Every reference to that biker fight makes me think of this. Am I the only one?
Baud
@John Cole +0:
Taker.
JPL
@John Cole +0: That sounds like to much work for a wsj article. just sayin
David Koch
Here are a lot of people mad that a black guy knows how to play chess.
chopper
@JPL:
merely clicking on a link is too much work for a WSJ bit.
shell
Damn. I thought the ‘barking mad’ link was gonna be a video of Thurston. Cole, when you get a chance, some more pictures please.
NotMax
No more Warning: Politico link caveats?
Elizabelle
@shell: I was expecting Thurston too.
More Howls family, please.
raven
Sunset over the sound.
Omnes Omnibus
@raven: How are the paw and knee doing?
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
24 hours left to take a step forward and support Becoming Phoebe. Thanks to my parents it looks like there will be a print edition but there remain all sorts of ways that the eventual product could be improved.
Patricia Kayden
@Elizabelle: He is dashing. Lucky Michelle (who is a looker too). On a serious note, unfortunately whoever is handling this twitter account for him is going to have to block loads of crazy people.
Patricia Kayden
@David Koch: Or just mad that a Black person exists.
JPL
@Patricia Kayden: According to Mediate, Nicolle Wallace of the View, said if Romney showed his hot body, he would have won the election. hahahahahahahahahhahahahahah
Just Some Fuckhead
You can’t spell progress without ogres.
David Koch
Obama’s Gulf calculus pays off
Tenar Darell
@raven: Wow, that is a good one. Hand and knee holding up okay?
@Omnes Omnibus: Wait, Raven hurt his knee too? (So, I don’t follow a few threads to their ends and I miss all sorts of things!)
Which reminds me, @Karen in GA, how’s Phoebe handling the pacemaker?
raven
@Omnes Omnibus: The knee is just a scrape and there is no way I can surf fish and keep it dry so I’m not! I’m using a surgical glove and a big rubber glove on the hand and it seems OK. I worry a little keeping it in the glove promotes moisture but it the best I can figure out. thx
Mike in NC
@efgoldman: I always thought Mitt’s favorite workout routine was to sign a big stack of pink slips.
raven
@Tenar Darell: I caught a nice redfish and stupidly let it jump out of the bucket. I dove on him and wrestled him back in but scraped the shit out of my knee and soaked my recently surgically repaired finger.
raven
Yay:
El Caganer
@efgoldman: I don’t know if you meant it that way, but that’s a pretty disturbing image.
SiubhanDuinne
@David Koch:
Bad link
SiubhanDuinne
@raven:
Wow, beautiful. How’s the hand?
raven
@efgoldman: It was totally stupid on my part. I had it was up on the beach, got a guy to snap a couple of shots and then took it back to the water in the 5 gal bucket. When I swooped it down to run the water in it he made a break for it. I am really thinking the anesthesia Thursday hung on longer than I though. I have trouble recalling events yesterday.
Tree With Water
“Other than that last one, all of this seems to me to mean that that @POTUS fellow on twitter is doing something right”.
Who said he wasn’t?
Obama has never struck me as a politician that needs to have his political ego stroked (to say the least), but that certainly isn’t how a great many of his knee-jerk partisans see it. They are constantly aggrieved when his applause isn’t loud enough, and seem to feel that criticisms of the man as being tantamount to a cancer within the party.
raven
@SiubhanDuinne: I’m doing my best while totally going against the docs orders.
SiubhanDuinne
@raven:
Good for him.
I’ll contribute to his bail if there’s a crowdfunding up.
SiubhanDuinne
@raven:
See, it’s that attitude is why we all love you.
Poopyman
@raven: Currituck, Albemarle, or Pamlico?
Tenar Darell
@raven: Glad to hear it wasn’t serious. Watch out for those slippery redfish, they’ll get you every time. You’re right to be careful with your stitches. I was bartending, broke a glass in my hand, and it was impossible to keep the stitches at the base of my thumb dry.
By the way, your pictures are great.
Valdivia
@JPL:
oh lordy, I had to unsee his body, after accidentally seeing it posted by someone on twitter. What an idiot.
@Elizabelle:
oh yes, very dashing he is. I am going to miss him as our president (not just for the danshingness)
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: That is, of course, what the M2 is for. There won’t be much fish left, if it won’t get away
Elizabelle
@raven: The dog’s owner just can’t buy the publicity he/she just brought upon self.
Charges against a good Samaritan/military veteran? Check.
For rescuing a dog from a hot car? Check.
Keep us posted, please.
RaflW
Part of the bio for Mr. Potts, who I believe wrote the WSJ solar piece:
Obviously the dude has some knowledge of power issues. But he’s a deep industry insider who wants all the money to go to his utility industry clients, not, blech! average citizen homeowners. Eghad, that’s nearly soshulism.
Howard Beale IV
@David Koch: It’ll probably pay off more for Russia, China, hell, even France than for us once Iran gets unshackeled and starts to modernize their conventional forces.
Zinsky
With the exception of TPP, Obama has been doing a masterful job these past six months. If he had been behaving in the “go fuck yourself” manner he has embraced lately, he might have been the best president ever.
Elizabelle
@Valdivia: I know. The sheer competence and intelligence and persistence.
And then you add in “dashing” and killer wit.
raven
@Poopyman: Hmm, I guess technically it is Topsail Sound?
raven
@efgoldman: I paid $1000 for this house on the beach for a week. There is no way I’m not fishing.
jl
@RaflW: Looks like that is the case.
I did a little googling to learn me up on the arguments.
The Red Faces of the Solar Skeptics
Economix, NYT Nancy Polbre
http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com//2014/03/10/the-red-faces-of-the-solar-skeptics/
raven
@Elizabelle: This looks like the end of it.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Zinsky:
Might have been? Are you new here?
Patrick
@raven:
I took a closer look at the story. From one article “Current Georgia law states you can break a window to save a person, but not an animal”.
That’s crazy. The law needs to be changed.
Furthermore, this guy did a good thing. Hell he saved the dog. Yet, the owner of the dog wants him prosecuted. Insane!
Elizabelle
RE what’s jousting to replace PBO:
Dana Milbank today in the WaPost today, re Huckleberry Graham’s fan dance:
The Republican field is a clown car.
The Post’s title. Not ours.
raven
@Patrick: I hope it doesn’t become racial. The sister was pissed and insisted that he be arrested.
FlipYrWhig
@Zinsky: Or, alternatively, the reason why he’s doing more stuff is because he and his party have almost nothing left to lose… which only happens after they’ve managed to lose a lot. There were rewards, or perceived rewards at least, in being cautious most of his presidency. There are no rewards for that anymore.
Omnes Omnibus
@Elizabelle:
That had to sting.
Elizabelle
@raven:
And you could have had a Balloon Juice meetup for the ages.
But no.
You are out there with the … fish.
Elizabelle
@Omnes Omnibus: Don’t f*ck with Mary Lee, the #partyshark.
https://twitter.com/maryleeshark
Sutter Brown might be following her.
From the shore.
Botsplainer
If anybody is curious, Kentucky’s courtnet confirms that Dakota Meyer’s divorce was final in 2010. Bristol was right – there’s no there there.
jl
@jl: And
COLUMN-Unsubsidised roof-top solar power grows competitive: Wynn
Reuters, Gerard Wynn
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/22/column-wynn-solar-subsidies-idUSL6N0BKEGQ20130222
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: The remoras actually do the typing.
Elizabelle
@efgoldman: Privately, I think it’s brown-nosing remoras, but I don’t know that for sure. Yet.
lamh36
So apparently you have a bunch allegedly conservative idiots are tweeting “nigger” this ans that and lynching threats and one out right call for assassination to the new @POTUS twitter acct
ugh…
They are so stupid. It as been part of Presidential information policy that all communications between a POTUS is archived in WH archives. So every direct tweet, every DM, every RT is archived and saved as part of WH archives…funny the same people who are afraid of “big government” don’t even realize this…
” ..‘Welcome To Twitter, N*gger’: Righties Go FULL RACIST On POTUS Twitter Account (TWEETS)
”
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2015/05/18/welcome-to-twitter-ngger-righties-go-full-racist-potus-twitter-account-tweets/
Valdivia
@Elizabelle:
Exactly.
Then you look at the clown car and want to weep.
Patrick
@raven:
So was the dog’s owner African-American?
The police say they would never have arrested him. They only did it because the owner demanded it. If this goes to trial, good like to the owner winning it. Sounds like witnesses etc is backing Mr Hammons and not the owner.
Patrick
@lamh36:
They are not afraid of big government. They are the same folks who thinks it is up to big government to determine if a woman can have an abortion or not. They are also the same folks who didn’t think Mrs Schiavo had a right to decide what should happen to her. They are just a bunch of hypocrites…
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: I always knew there was a reason clowns creeped me out (aside from their simple creepiness); they have harbingers of the 2016 GOP primary all this time. You can’t say we weren’t warned.
Omnes Omnibus
@lamh36: They’ll get visits from the Secret Service and then claim that Obama is trying to bully them into silence.
jl
@lamh36:
‘ So apparently you have a bunch allegedly conservative idiots are tweeting “nigger” this ans that and lynching threats and one out right call for assassination to the new @POTUS twitter acct ‘
I look forward to corporate media political hacks, er… analysts sadly concluding that Obama has not brought us a post-racial America.
Zinsky
@FlipYrWhig: True dat.
Mr Stagger Lee
I seem to recall with irony,President Obama’s arch radio enemy Rust Limpballs,once said at the time of Waco and the RW’s outrage of the government’s assault of the Branch Davidians.
Now I don’t know if he is the true originator of that saying, but I bet he is not applauding the President’s announcement.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
I always think of horror movies when I see clowns, so like you, I find the use of that term for the GOP perfectly ominous (& prescient). Don’t want to even imagine right now having to withstand these clowns 18 months until election day.
Omnes Omnibus
@efgoldman: They’ll do it while hungover and cranky. What do you think the sunglasses are for?
Viva BrisVegas
@Patrick:
In civilized parts of the world they have animal cruelty laws that would have the dog’s owner scrambling to avoid conviction.
CONGRATULATIONS!
Glad that someone finally posted about the WSJs insane opposition to solar power. It is a non-stop issue with them and they are around the bend about it.
They hate Elon Musk too, wonder why, he’s a billionaire just like them so what’s the problem?
Poopyman
@Omnes Omnibus: Hmmm. I would have said that really bites.
jl
@Zinsky:
” With the exception of TPP, Obama has been doing a masterful job these past six months. ”
I am cautious, so will settle for ‘good’ and ‘reasonable’, and ‘competent’, but those qualities are rare in presidents so in my book, that qualifies as ‘masterful’
On TPP, am not in favor of the treaty from what we know about it now, though I was very much opposed to fast track authority.
I guess chances are still very good that TPP will pass with dangerous provisions, but I have to wonder whether Obama is playing rope-a-dope with it, like Keystone. What exactly has he done to help get fast track and TPP passed. He did stir up the left in his clumsy attacks on the opponents. The WH responses have been desultory boilerplate (but, that may be the best they can do); I don’t believe Obama plays eleventy dimensional chess as much as many do, but I have to wonder how much he will do for the TPP, other than piss off the supposed lefties.
the Conster
New Jersey loves Chris Christie too much to let him go. Approval rate at 35%, so yeah, no.
Also, Glenn Greenwald is a principled libertarian. Yeah, no.
jl
@Valdivia:
” Then you look at the clown car and want to weep. ”
So far the GOP clown car has brought a smile to my face. Everyone who has a chance has piled out, fallen down, and cannot seem to get up. If that changes, I will start getting scared and I might weep then.
Edit: Watching Graham and Jindal get in will be fun.
Omnes Omnibus
@Poopyman: And your line would have been better.
NotMax
@CONGRATULATIONS!
Each time I see the name Elon Musk have to remind myself it is not a reference to a character in a Dickens novel.
different-church-lady
Here are a lot of people mad that Hillary Clinton is running for president.
different-church-lady
@the Conster:
Well, if he gets a fee for it, he can’t speak for the poors anymore.
different-church-lady
@efgoldman: Fixed by edit. Thanks.
Howard Beale IV
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
That’s the problem-he’s not like them at all (especially felchers like Steve Forbes, the ultimate born on 3rd base dilettante.) He built the businesses up from nothing instead of being a trust-fund baby. Elon embarrasses each and every one of them for coming out from post-apartheid South Africa and calling the shots in two different industries-electric cars and commercial space travel.
The rest? Steve “Mr Flat Tax” Forbes is an embarrassment to Princeton and I’m surprised he hasn’t totally destroyed the family empire. Then again, the right wing isn’t necessarily known for having intelligence as opposed to separating rubes from their capital.
Kropadope
@efgoldman: No, it was a joke…sort of.
Alison
This pupper isn’t mad, even though he’s been in the shelter for over 800 days http://shelterpetproject.tumblr.com/post/119325830190/louie-armstrong-has-been-looking-for-a-home-for
Pleeeeeeeease someone go get him, that just breaks my heart. As the post says, he’s in Cincinnati but the foster mom will drive him anywhere for the right person!
Look at that faaaaaaaace <3 <3
Omnes Omnibus
Awesome. Tower of London looks like it will be awesome. Rathbone as Richard III? Karloff as a headsman?
ETA: Is that Vincent Price I see there?
SiubhanDuinne
@Elizabelle:
I would have made the drive.
Mike J
@Mr Stagger Lee:
Nice bumper sticker, but wrong, The purpose of the military is to carry out foreign policy in whatever manner they are ordered to.
Omnes Omnibus
@Howard Beale IV:
The number of embarrassments to Princeton I personally know would choke a horse.
Valdivia
@jl:
Hey there! :)
I am all for having a hearty laugh at their expense (and often do) but there is also something deeply sad to me that these idiots think they are worthy of the presidency and have others even give them credence. Like you I tremble in fear too at the thought of any of them getting near it.
Kropadope
@Mike J:
Or their portion thereof. Don’t forget the diplomats. Too many forget the diplomats.
Mike J
@Kropadope: I never said they were the only people to carry out foreign policy.
Bill E Pilgrim
So, a bunch of mad men, you’re saying then.
Speaking of which, not that anyone was: I knew that was Helen Slater, as the woman who invited Draper to the Esalon type thing. The cast in the show’s IMDB page for that episode doesn’t list her or much of anyone yet, but her own page on IMBD has a photo of her in the episode. Supergirl!
Gin & Tonic
@efgoldman: Saw something downstairs about a kidney. I must have missed stuff while I was traveling the last few weeks, but you’ve had your share of troubles. Here’s hoping for the best.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
is this playing now? Am I missing it?
different-church-lady
@Omnes Omnibus: Uhh… not to get all didactic here, but I’d think it would only take one to choke a horse. Unless you were thinking of cutting him into very small bits…
Poopyman
@NotMax:
Or a men’s cologne.
Kropadope
@Mike J: Yes, but the idea that our entire foreign policy is the province of the military is an idea with legs in some segments of society. So, I thought the others worth mentioning.
Howard Beale IV
@efgoldman: Steve Forbes’s folly had to burn through some of that, but I think that was his and not any that was in trust for his offspring-it also appeared as Forbes is a little more tolerant of opposing political views of their journalists as opposed to Murdoch’s mausoleum (which is more heavily gated that Forbes is to begin with.)
C’est la vie as it were.
Poopyman
@different-church-lady: Wouldn’t that be more pedantic than didactic?
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: On TCM right now.
different-church-lady
@Poopyman: It’s been a long week…
Omnes Omnibus
@different-church-lady: I just picked a cliche at random. But some of those I know would probably be improved by being cut into very small bits.
different-church-lady
@efgoldman: I stand by my statement.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Poopyman: I think if choking is involved though it could be auto-didactsphxysiation.
Valdivia
@efgoldman:
oh I don’t want a saviour for them just wish we had a serious sort of opposition in this country, but we don’t. Instead we have a bunch of ignorant nihilists.
@Omnes Omnibus:
oh thanks, will find it now. ETA: so so good.
different-church-lady
@Bill E Pilgrim: I never LOL on the interwebs.
I will make an exception in this case.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: It has Vincent Price as Clarence.
ETA: And Karloff’s character is named Mord.
Howard Beale IV
@Omnes Omnibus: Let’s just say this this particular graduate is extremely embarrassing. Which, when we’ve seen other dropouts from other schools, proves that a piece of paper from an institute of higher learning in the end means very little. I had an online acquaintance who graduated from Princeton with a Chem degree and had a deferred MBA admission to University of Chicago-instead, he went to seminary, and is now a minister with the PCUSA. So not all Princeton grads are smegma.
Elizabelle
@SiubhanDuinne: I believe you.
You must point that roadster toward DC again sometime this year.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
I just saw Mord! He’s quite creepy.
Valdivia
@SiubhanDuinne: @Elizabelle:
I second the request too!
Omnes Omnibus
@Howard Beale IV: I don’t really have a horse in this race. I am not an alum.
ETA: One of my very best friends is an alum (Tiger Inn) and one of the single most decent people I have ever known.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: This thing is awesome. At least it presents Richard as a good soldier and clever man.
mai naem mobile
I caught the regular 3 min news from the AP this AM and they had the Sanchez story. I cannot believe they managed to screw it up. They mentioned Sanchez doing the war cry and how she had confused Indian Americans and Native Americans. The next sentence of the story was how Kamala Harris had Native American heritage. How do these people become reporters? Never mind that that piece didn’t really didn’t need to be in the story.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
I love these old battle scenes too.
Richard was cleverer than the whole of them put together.
catclub
@efgoldman:
Some article pointed out to me that when the Mittster was shunned from running again, that although I thought it was a vast block of Jeb supporters, the article pointed out it was Murdoch and Ailes.
This makes more sense, since there does not seem to be ANY vast block of Jeb supporters.
Juju
@raven: Actually it’s Greenville Sound. The Pamlico, Albemarle, and the Currituck sounds are much larger and further north.
If you ever do make it to Hatteras island let me know. I am often in the area, and I spent part of my childhood in Champaign IL. I actually attended Savoy school.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: The sword play was so non-authentic for the period. But cool.
Do I detect pro-Richard III sympathies? I sympathize with Edward IV a bit. He spent so much of his youth fighting to survive and get the throne that, once he had it, he was damn well determined to enjoy it.*
*Echoes of Robert Baratheon.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus: I find him fascinating. The real deal in playing evil political power chess. What the character from the US House of Cards aspires to be but can never be.
Oh yeah–I like that Baratheon parallel
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: It was a brutal period. Ivan the Terrible in Russia was a contemporary. As were the Borgias. And Vlad Drăculea.
ETA: For a while, I saw Robb Stark as the Edward IV parallel – the king who never lost a battle. The one who avenged his stiff necked father’s death, but I think Robert is the better parallel. (God, I have spent too much time and thought on this.)
Mike J
@efgoldman:
Yet whichever one gets the nom will wind up with 48%+ of the vote.
SiubhanDuinne
@Elizabelle:
Yes, I’ll be coming through in July, either on my way to or from a quick visit to Boston. Will be in touch with you when I have a better idea of dates.
SiubhanDuinne
@Valdivia:
I really want to meet you this time!
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
As I was typing my comment I was thinking of the Borgias actually.
I would love to read a side-by-side or comprehensive history that looks at all of these together. Surely this exists already no?
ETA: well I am benefiting from all that thought. I like seeing these parallels.
dopey-o
@Mr Stagger Lee:
i recall an army general stating – sometime in the 1950’s – “The mission of our military is not to fight wars. it is to prevent wars.”
dunno who, though.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: I am sure there is. Political historians couldn’t have missed the opportunity.
Valdivia
@SiubhanDuinne:
Me too! I will be here in DC most of the summer only away the weekend fo the 25th in nyc. When you know your dates let me know. :)
@Omnes Omnibus: I will look into this and report back.
jl
@dopey-o:
‘ i recall an army general stating = sometimes in the 1950’s – “The mission of our military is not to fight wars. it is to prevent wars.” ‘
That kind of cowardly un-American DFH un-militaristic attitude is what lost us the Cold War… .I think…
Or maybe I’ve been watching too many political TV news talky shows lately.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
Speaking of clown shoes, Marc Thiessen today used this as a justification for going to war with Iraq 10 years ago:
In other words–if I’m reading this right–it was worth it to go into Iraq for bullshit reasons because it was only by going into Iraq for bullshit reasons that we can now prove that we went into Iraq for bullshit reasons. I knew the guy was a soulless fuckwad, but I had no clue he was that utterly demented. I mean, how can any sane person write that–knowing that other people will read it–without dying of humiliation?
jl
@Valdivia: Hi there to you too. Still taking very nice pics, I see.
But, a cat got into them, did you know that?
scav
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): I bet if we carpet bomb his house we can definitely prove Elvis and Jimmy Hoffa aren’t in the basement playing Parcheesi.
jl
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): I’m very glad that Jeb!’s skill at answering a very simple question has started the process of putting the Iraq war fraudcrimewar issue behind them.
So far, the fallout seems to be lessons in learning how to dig even deeper holes a ’round at the GOP.
Omnes Omnibus
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): Given that Hans Blix, et al. were documenting things at the time…. Well, the sheer amount of bullshit boggles the mind.
Valdivia
@jl:
:)
it was one of my boys, who died a couple of years ago… I felt I couldn’t delete him for the sake of aesthetic coherence.
Eric U.
@dopey-o: the purpose of the military is to waste the time between negotiating sessions. Clausewitz said something like that, but his version seems to be more approving of combat as a political tool.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia:
Excellent. I am fascinated by the period, and I would be very happy to read more about it.
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
@scav:
I’d sign on for that, if only to ensure that he’ll never write any self-serving, psychopathic horseshit again. Really, I know people throw around words like “psychopath” fairly haphazardly, but who but an utter, raving psychopath could write that?
jl
@scav: Odds of that are about the same as the Bush II crew claims of WMD. We know Elvis and Jimmy are taking a beer break south of the fridge, and north and east and west there abouts. Fer sher.
jl
@Valdivia: Beautiful orange tabby, and I think his image coheres nicely with the architecture. You got one of those mysteriously glowing orange red trees too. Where do you find those?
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
‘Cause, shit, I’ve seen a good bit of shit in my life so far fetched that it makes me wonder of maybe I might have dreamt it all up, but what he wrote there is just motherfuckingly beyond belief to me.
Tree With Water
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.): Just like we didn’t have to fight the Viet Cong in the streets of San Francisco after Saigon was renamed…. “dominos-shmaminos, but lesson learned, and thanks to all concerned”.
Roger Moore
@catclub:
Depends on whether you’re using a raw count or weighting by the amount of money they’re willing to spend on the campaign.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
Me too. As soon as I find something I will send a flare up.
ETA: Mord has a heart? did he hide them?
@jl:
thank you, he was such a sweet boy.
The red tree is courtesy of our lovely autumns. Really my favorite time of year. Everything aglow in those red-orange tones.
Roger Moore
@Eric U.:
The purpose of the military is to give you a stronger negotiating position.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia:
Nah, he was measuring their heights so the hole could be dug to the right size.
ETA: He is Mord.
ETAA: Neither contemporary reports nor modern evidence indicates that Richard was killed any place other than the middle of the battlefield.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
hhis. romantic to the last I thought he would hide them…
and now he gets his just desserts.
danielx
@Roger Moore:
Or, if you’re Dick Cheney or some other neocon orc, to let you say “why are we negotiating at all? let’s just bomb the fuck out of some brown people: problem solved!”
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: Well, the two of managed to sort of liveblog this movie. I beg the indulgence of everyone else.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
was going to thank you for the tip since I really enjoyed it.
And yes, apologize to others for imposing the live blogging!
Roger Moore
@danielx:
Realistically, one way that the military can give you a stronger negotiating position is to boot out the old guys and install a puppet who will do whatever you want. This is a well understood strategy with a long and dishonorable history.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: I am now debating a good night’s sleep and a bike ride before work or watching Quentin Durward and cycling after work.
Tree With Water
@Roger Moore: Funny you mention that- I just re-read this passage yesterday from The Gathering Storm; Winston Churchill; pg. 325. Recall that a cabal of high ranking German General Staff officers had been prepared to overthrow Hitler had he dared invade Czechoslovakia in opposition to the wishes of Britain and France.
Duff Cooper to Parliament during the 1938 debate on the Munich Accord. Cooper had just resigned as head of the Admiralty in protest of the Accord: [regarding mobilization of the British fleet:
“.. I remember the Prime Minister stating it was the one thing that would ruin [his mission to Munich], and I said it was the one thing that would lead to its success… That is the deep difference between the Prime Minister and myself throughout these days. The Prime Minister has believed in addressing Herr Hitler through the language of sweet reasonableness. I have believed that he was more open to the language of the mailed fist”.
danielx
@Roger Moore:
This is true. On the other hand, that hasn’t worked out real well for us either.
Omnes Omnibus
@Tree With Water:
There were an number of those – or one continuing one. The July 1944 plot ended up taking away the General Staff’s ability to offer any argument against Hitler’s military strategies.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus: grins. I was debating along the same lines but my day doesn’t involve a fun bike ride. I have a dentist appointment in the morning and should get work done before that in case I’m all out of it afterwards.
Hmm. Temptations. Temptations. :)
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: I have a history of giving in to temptations. Being dissolute is a part of my charm.
Tree With Water
@Omnes Omnibus: Yeah, but a coup by Beck in 1938 would have nipped it all in the bud.
Omnes Omnibus
@Tree With Water: But Beck resigned quietly, didn’t he?
ETA: Random trivia note: I’ve met Stauffenberg’s son at a couple of social events.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
I am afraid I have a similar history with temptations. Bad bad me.
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: Well, don’t do it tonight. Going to the dentist takes great fortitude. I have had a total of two fillings and one has been replaced twice. The cleanings (scrape, scrape, scrape) are enough to terrify me.
Valdivia
Shooting someone over a non kosher cocktail. I have heard it all. Kosher and guns, not a good combination it seems.
@Omnes Omnibus: I know. Not a fan of dentists visits. Hoping it turns out to be nothing (just reading the scrape scrape part made me shudder!)
The great big storm we are having will help with the falling asleep bit I hope, which I didn’t manage at all last night.
Tree With Water
@Omnes Omnibus: He was retired but the gestapo kept tabs on him, and he was executed in the aftermath of the failed plot of 1944 (after a botched suicide attempt, if recollection serves). The devil looks after his own..
Omnes Omnibus
@Tree With Water: What is was saying is that the German officer corps waited until it was a pointless gesture to try their coup.
@Valdivia:
Storms can be so soothing, can’t they? Counter-intuitive as it is.
SFAW
@efgoldman:
Started watching it with the SFAW-ette, who knows much more about hockey than I, and commented that the Rangers were really sloppy. She disagreed – for about 10 minutes. But after Johnson scored that 3-on-5 shorthanded goal – something I don’t recall ever seeing, ever, ever – I knew the Rangers were done for tonight. (Well, last night, I guess.)
The Mets won, however, so the night wasn’t a total loss, despite Alex Torres’s best efforts to throw away the game, literally and figuratively.
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
yes especially since it’s the sound of my childhood nights (in Costa Rica we have like 9 months of rain). Off I go then to try and embrace morpheus.
Hope you have a nice bike ride tomorrow and thanks again for the movie
Omnes Omnibus
@SFAW: With the ‘Hawks out, I care little about the hockey playoffs.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
That, and being a Cheesehead.
And, apropos of nothing in particular: watched a Celebrity Jeopardy show, Aaron Rodgers was one contestant, he ended up winning, did a pretty good job. Of course, I was hoping to see Wolf Blitzer, but what can you do?
Omnes Omnibus
@Valdivia: Cheers. And golden slumbers.
Tree With Water
@Omnes Omnibus: The conspirators of 1944 were resolved to continue the war in the east, and fantastically believed that the U.S. and Britain would throw in with them. Simply, they were detached from political-military reality.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
???
Do you mean the Blackhawks? Aren’t they still in it? Or do you mean “out” as in “not playing tonight”?
Or did you mean the ULowell (a/k/a UMass Lowell) River Hawks?
Omnes Omnibus
@SFAW: Blackhawks are done. I have no interest in U-Mass-Lowell.
Debbie(aussie)
@Viva BrisVegas: That would be us. Just a small brag.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
“Pretty wantons”?
Omnes Omnibus
@Tree With Water: Agreed. I have far more respect for the White Rose folks than the Valkyrie ones.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
What, did they forfeit the next three games? I’m confused. Again.
Omnes Omnibus
@SFAW: I, occasionally, am a moron. I misread the 4-1 loss the other night as a series loss. I was deep into the Mad Men marathon at the time. Ignore my comments on hockey above.
Omnes Omnibus
Modern blue-eyed soul. Done, I think, with respect and awe.
PurpleGirl
@raven: Inhumane dog owner needs to be arrested for cruelty to an animal and/or banned from ever owning a dog ever again.
ruemara
I’m so disgusted with the people on twitter who thought that calling the POTUS a nigger and telling him to swing from a tree was a thing they should do. You just have to wonder if they have the slightest modicum of couth.
Hal
So is Ruth Bader Ginsburg presiding over a same sex marriage a sign? I seem to remember Scalia throwing a tantrum at some venue or forum just before the original ACA decision and the DOMA decision. Hopefully a good sign.
Omnes Omnibus
@Hal: Link?
@ruemara:
They don’t. Obviously. But many of them will be getting visits from the Feds. And soon.
joel hanes
@Zinsky:
If [Obama] had been behaving in the “go fuck yourself” manner he has embraced lately …
… from an early point in his Presidency, I believe we might have seen armed insurrection
Too uppity too soon.
Instead, he gave them six years to get used to the idea, and over the course of six years took firm control of the bureaucracy. Then, the hammer.
Chris T.
@RaflW: Just so.
I like how the article outright says: “people think installing solar PV will save them money… and they’re RIGHT! how AWFUL!”
Valdivia
@Omnes Omnibus:
I was so absolutely tired last night I didn’t even see the song link. Rock-lullaby, what could be better?
Feeling veritably restored after a good night of sleep.
And those Broken Bones guys are pretty amazing despite the blond blue eyed part.
NorthLeft12
Up here in Ontario Canada, there is a fair bit of opposition to our provincial government’s investment in “green power”. A short summary:
Solar – too expensive, takes up valuable farm land that could be used to feed the starving people of the world, eye sore, too close to populated areas.
Wind Turbines – too expensive, eye sore, long term health issues to people living within a kilometer of the turbine, impact on migrating birds.
And always there are the voices of “reason” that suggest we should continue to invest in some kind of different technology that is right around the corner which will make solar and wind generated power technologies completely obsolete. Some of these same people think that coal and gas fired plants are fine if we just implement some upgraded scrubbers for the boiler stacks.
A few of my knowledgeable neighbours and curling team delight in pointing out that the nearby coal burning plant [which has just been closed by the province] was the cleanest coal burning generating station in North America. I have always responded with “How does that rank among all generating stations?” I never get a response.
NorthLeft12
@Chris T.: According to the WSJ and the writer, this is probably a case of the wrong people making money from energy generation.
brantl
@Mike J:
But since killing people and collaterally breaking things is what they’re best at, it almost always happens, while they are doing whatever else they were ordered to do.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
I just thought it was a “they’re dead to me” thing for you. Thanks for ‘splaining. But “moron”? Hardly.
They’re still going to lose, but no need to weep prematurely.
And what do you have against Lowell?
RaflW
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Think of Mortimer and Randolph Duke (Trading Places). The WSJ hates innovation and especially hates market disruption. They know how to milk utility profits and screw average consumers. They know how to pull carbon from the ground and burn it for fun & profit.
But Elon Musk is upsetting the electric cartel and the oil cartel. That is bad for oligarchical, easily manipulated “capitalism.” The WSJ opinion page is Mortimer and Randolph, daily, in 600 word bitter screeds.
Brachiator
@RaflW:
With a net worth of $11.9 billion, Musk qualifies as an oligarch.
SFAW
@Brachiator:
Not until he starts running some or all of the government, he doesn’t. For now, he’s just really rich.
Matt McIrvin
I did read recently a claim that lifecycle estimates of the carbon impact of current solar power were too optimistic, because the reason solar has gotten so cheap lately is that the market is being flooded with Chinese panels produced in smoke-belching coal-fired factories, and the combination of that and putting them in not-so-great places like German rooftops reduces their carbon benefit greatly.
If the industry is growing rapidly, so that the cost from production is multiplied over the benefit of already-installed panels, the solar industry as a whole could even produce more carbon output per year than fossil fuels (though I’m not sure how alarming we should consider that, since any given panel would still provide a net benefit, and presumably the market has to saturate eventually):
http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2015/04/how-sustainable-is-pv-solar-power.html
This particular article isn’t urging abandoning solar, it’s urging being more careful about sourcing and siting.