Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

Joe Lieberman disappointingly reemerged to remind us that he’s still alive.

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

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

Jack Smith: “Why did you start campaigning in the middle of my investigation?!”

“I never thought they’d lock HIM up,” sobbed a distraught member of the Lock Her Up Party.

If you are still in the GOP, you are an extremist.

The GOP is a fucking disgrace.

How can republicans represent us when they don’t trust women?

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Prediction: the GOP will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

White supremacy is terrorism.

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

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself.

T R E 4 5 O N

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Department of Blind Hogs and Acorns

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From Papa Doc’s gold-buggery and racist newsletters to Baby Doc’s whiny assertion that healthcare reform enslaves physicians and civil rights laws oppress business owners, the Pauls have consistently been wrong about most things most of the time, and when they’re right about the few things they’re right about, they’re right for the wrong reasons.

But apparently there’s at least one indisputably true sentence in Baby Doc’s forthcoming campaign book, according to an excerpt published at Buzzfeed:

“It’s also bothersome that the mainstream media continues to invite the architects of the Iraq invasion on to share their opinions on Sunday morning shows.”

Yes. Yes, it is.

Reader Interactions

152Comments

  1. 1.

    Kropadope

    Rand showing he doesn’t have what it takes to make it in the Republican Party. Sure, he knows how to be wrong, but you gotta be wrong about the right things. All of the right things.

  2. 2.

    Mike in NC

    Mainstream media helped market the war in Eye-Rack, so they can’t possibly admit it.

  3. 3.

    SFAW

    “It’s also bothersome that the mainstream media continues to invite the architects of the Iraq invasion on to share their opinions on Sunday morning shows.”

    It’s even more bothersome that the mainstream media continues to treat Rand Paul as if he is not a complete fucking jerkwad un-American hypocritical moron who games the system and pretends he hasn’t.

    And that’s MY Rand Paul endorsement, where can I record it?

  4. 4.

    singfoom

    Dan Carlin was talking about this on his latest Common Sense show. We need to have a rating on the screen when they interview people. Like a batting average. “3/15 major foreign policy predictions”.

    Though, grifters gonna grift. Plus, are you going to make producers on news shows call people out on their shit? I mean, that’d be like real journalism and stuff, and that’s hard….

  6. 6.

    satby

    It’s even more bothersome that the mainstream media continues to treat Rand Paul as if he is not a complete fucking jerkwad un-American hypocritical moron who games the system and pretends he hasn’t.

    Thank you! So true!

  7. 7.

    SFAW

    @singfoom:

    Dan Carlin was talking about this on his latest Common Sense show. We need to have a rating on the screen when they interview people. Like a batting average. “3/15 major foreign policy predictions”.

    That is an outstanding idea. Of course, instead of the “Mendoza Line,” there would have to be the “Bloody Billy Kristol Line.” Of course, to fall below the Kristol line, your predictions would have to be wrong more often than they were actually made, but I’m sure the details can be worked out.

    But it’s kind of a shame to lump Mario Mendoza in with that evil fuck Kristol.

  8. 8.

    Kay

    I get going on to cable shows and spouting theory, I see how they do that, but I don’t get how they handle it on an individual level, with people who were injured in Iraq.

    They’re around here. We see them. Not a lot but a few. Do they never encounter any of those veterans? It’s a monstrous thing, to look at them and put that in the same category as a “mistake”. That isn’t a big enough word.

  10. 10.

    SFAW

    @Belafon:

    I forget, did the Iraq war start during Clinton’s term or Obama’s?

    Or Carter’s second or third term?

  11. 11.

    dedc79

    @singfoom:

    Dan Carlin was talking about this on his latest Common Sense show. We need to have a rating on the screen when they interview people. Like a batting average. “3/15 major foreign policy predictions”.

    That’s not so easy to score though. What to do, for example, with Peggy Noonan’s against-all-the-polls prediction that Romney would win, based only on her and her friends’ observations that there were more Romney signs in people’s yards?

    There is no denying the Republicans have the passion now, the enthusiasm. The Democrats do not. Independents are breaking for Romney. And there’s the thing about the yard signs. In Florida a few weeks ago I saw Romney signs, not Obama ones. From Ohio I hear the same. From tony Northwest Washington, D.C., I hear the same.

    Can you really just count that as her going 0-1?

  12. 12.

    the Conster

    One of the MSNBC shows – Thomas Roberts’ news reading hour I think, allowed twitter scrolls across the bottom in real time IIRC. It would be very easy for news shows to have that kind of feedback, screening for bad language. Why we even need any pundit shows is beyond me – there is much better punditry on twitter and blogs than there will ever be on TV. It’s like all those media producers and bookers have been locked in a room with their Rolodexes since 2001 and have never ever even looked at social media.

  13. 13.

    Germy Shoemangler

    @SFAW:

    It’s even more bothersome that the mainstream media continues to treat Rand Paul as if he is not a complete fucking jerkwad un-American hypocritical moron who games the system and pretends he hasn’t.

    I don’t understand why he’s given so much credibility by the MSM. I don’t remember his father being treated that way. Ron was treated like a kindly but clearly confused, beloved uncle. But he was never taken seriously like his son is.

  16. 16.

    different-church-lady

    @the Conster:

    …there is much better punditry on twitter and blogs than there will ever be on TV.

    That’s like creating a taxonomy for different kinds of turds.

  17. 17.

    Roger Moore

    @Kay:

    Do they never encounter any of those veterans?

    No, they don’t. The political and media elite live in a sheltered, isolated world where they don’t have to encounter things that the rest of us deal with every day. That includes not having to face the human cost of their policy failures, except possibly for the occasional photo op. It’s a big reason why they keep making those mistakes.

    And, FWIW, I think the main reason Rand is complaining is jealousy.

  18. 18.

    Germy Shoemangler

    @SFAW: Quite possibly. Mainstream media is all about the hair. Look at the coif on George Will. Or George Steph. I won’t even mention Trump, because I think he’s being held hostage by an alien life form.

  19. 19.

    Chris

    @Germy Shoemangler:

    His dad was happy to be on the fringes, but the son’s actually made some effort to integrate into the “mainstream” of the Republican Party, being more generic teabagger and less (though he hasn’t abandoned it entirely) of what Republicans call “blame America first.”

    I assume the MSM’s acted accordingly in according him respectability.

  20. 20.

    Mnemosyne (iPhone)

    @Kay:

    It seems as though the conservative answer to the Vietnam-era question, “How do you ask a man to be the last one to die for a mistake?” is to never admit that you made a mistake. Problem solved.

  21. 21.

    RareSanity

    @Belafon:

    I forget, did the Iraq war start during Clinton’s term or Obama’s?

    Well, since Obama seems to have immediately followed Clinton’s historic 4 terms in office, I’m sure Republican’s will tell you each of them is equally responsible for the failure.

  26. 26.

    jl

    @RareSanity:

    Crazed warmonger Graham says he intends to say he intends to run. Even less room for attention to Rand Paul, except whenever the corporate media feels like it’s a good times to show a medley of the crazies, swindlers, and stoops who comprise (did I use it right?) the GOP 2016 presidential field and slobber over their deep bench, and how just so very exciting it all is.

  28. 28.

    jl

    @SFAW:

    ” your predictions would have to be wrong more often than they were actually made, but I’m sure the details can be worked out. ”

    Easy work for the Fox News infographics department. They will show how it should be done.

  30. 30.

    Amir Khalid

    @Roger Moore:
    It’s an odd announcement. There’s not going to be a wedding, but apparently the party that would have been the reception is still on.

  31. 31.

    Kay

    @Mnemosyne (iPhone):

    I see Dan Senor and I think “sooo, we’re just pretending none of this happened?”

    I hate it because I think that’s where some of the sappy sentimentality about “the troops” comes from – my feeling it’s insincere or dodgy- our inability to look straight at what happened. Well, their inability to look at it. The architects or participants. I don’t blame voters because I generally think people only have individual responsibility to the extent they have individual power, so voters have some responsibility, but not a whole lot.

  34. 34.

    SFAW

    @opiejeanne:

    Of course, to fall below the Kristol line, your predictions would have to be wrong more often than they were actually made, but I’m sure the details can be worked out.

    I think that qualifies as being below .200.

    @jl:

    Easy work for the Fox News infographics department. They will show how it should be done.

    Excellent point.

  35. 35.

    Poopyman

    @JPL:

    Mama Palin said that even though the wedding is off, the party will go on. According to her post, both families will still gather in Meyer’s native Bluegrass State on what would have been the aisle-walking date: “Many friends and family still look forward to getting together that day in Kentucky anyway – and the Palins and Meyers are happily looking forward to still being at ‘the old Kentucky home’ on May 23 to celebrate life, in general!”

    I wonder if adult beverages will be consumed? I wonder if Todd will get belligerent? Then Sarah, then Bristol, Willow, Wishbone, Tracer, Prancer, and whatever other leftover spawn I’ve left out.

  36. 36.

    catclub

    @Chris: Also, difference between a senator and a House Rep.

    My question on Iraq for the candidates: How many of your advisers were against the war in 2003? Zero, or negative 500?

  37. 37.

    SFAW

    @Amir Khalid:

    There’s not going to be a wedding, but apparently the party that would have been the reception is still on.

    They’ll probably hire some (poor, misunderstood) Waco bikers as security. You betcha!

  41. 41.

    Elizabelle

    @Poopyman:

    Bristol, Willow, Wishbone, Tracer, Prancer …

    You made me laugh.

    They had a Palin baby name generator online for a while.

  42. 42.

    RareSanity

    @jl:

    Man, I’m going to miss Jon Stewart’s mockery of Graham. The whole southern belle bit was funny on so many levels.

  44. 44.

    catclub

    @SFAW: I am on Rand’s side here. I think inviting the people, who were architects of the US’s worst foreign policy disaster, and hundreds of thousands of deaths, millions of people turned refugees, to be seen anywhere in public except a prison, rates far worse than whatever stupid things Rand has said.

  46. 46.

    boatboy_srq

    @SFAW: Besides being right twice a day? Nothing besides take up space, and drop a weight on my toe (once).

  48. 48.

    D58826

    @Poopyman: I know it’s not nice to enjoy other peoples misfortune but please tell me again why I should not be rolling on the floor laughing my silly head off.

  50. 50.

    Hurling Dervish

    @Belafon: no, no. It started under Bush and was a huge success. Don’t you even remember that Mission Accomplished sign and all those terrorists being, ah, punished in Abu Greb? It was do safe Bush even got to deliver a plastic turkey! Also, purple thumbs.

    It was Obama who screwed it all up. Until then, it was just perfect.

  52. 52.

    SFAW

    @Amir Khalid:

    That worked out so well for the Rolling Stones, didn’t it?

    You’re older than you look. (But, yes, that was the point.)

  54. 54.

    Patrick

    @singfoom:

    Dan Carlin was talking about this on his latest Common Sense show. We need to have a rating on the screen when they interview people. Like a batting average. “3/15 major foreign policy predictions”.

    Can we start with Lindsey Graham? Today he stated:

    “I’m running because of what you see on television, I’m running because I think the world is falling apart, I’ve been more right than wrong on foreign policy,” he said.

    This IDIOT was about as wrong as can be about the Iraq. It is people like him that bears responsibility for ISIS as there was no ISIS before the war he advocated started.

  55. 55.

    MomSense

    @Germy Shoemangler:

    I won’t even mention Trump, because I think he’s being held hostage by an alien life form.

    Kind of like Professor Quirrell except with “hair”.

  56. 56.

    Patrick

    @Hurling Dervish:

    Don’t you even remember that Mission Accomplished sign and all those terrorists being, ah, punished in Abu Greb?

    Don’t forget the surge! The same surge where Bush among other things took our hard-earned tax-payer money and lavishly gave it away to our enemies in Iraq. The same surge the we were told never was needed since the fricking war was going to be over in 5 months in 2003!

  57. 57.

    SFAW

    @catclub:

    I am on Rand’s side here.

    As is Betty (and most of us), which is why this post has the title it does.

    I think inviting the people, who were architects of the US’s worst foreign policy disaster, and hundreds of thousands of deaths, millions of people turned refugees, to be seen anywhere in public except a prison, rates far worse than whatever stupid things Rand has said.

    It’s not the stupid things he says that worry me, it’s the evil/stupid things he’d (try to) implement that are the problem.

  58. 58.

    scav

    @jon: Nice numbers on education funding issues, all in all, especially given Walker and Jindal’s antics elsewhere.

  59. 59.

    D58826

    @catclub: twenty five billion dollars and counting in training costs and the Iraqi army still will not fight. I really really wish one of the GOOPers would explain why/how a residual force of 10-20k Americans would make a darn bit of difference. Was the plan that there would be on American soldier standing behind each Iraqi soldier with a bayonet between the shoulder blades (or maybe a bit lower) to force him to move forward?

    As the architects of this ongoing disaster the entire Bush family should be stripped of their citizenship’s and exiled on a very small island somewhere in the deep southern Indian Ocean. THe rst of the neocons should be exiled on another very small island.

  60. 60.

    Cacti

    And yet, Rand Paul had no problem attaching his name to Tom Cotton’s “Dear Iran, please have a war with us, XOXO” letter.

  62. 62.

    JPL

    OT Wonkette has a story about domestic wife abuser O’Reilly. What’s the over/under on Fox terminating him?
    The odds are higher the Palin’s will be involved in a non-wedding day brawl.

    Sorry for OT again, but the Paul’s boor me.

  63. 63.

    Cacti

    @D58826:

    As the architects of this ongoing disaster the entire Bush family should be stripped of their citizenship’s and exiled on a very small island somewhere in the deep southern Indian Ocean. THe rst of the neocons should be exiled on another very small island.

    Nah, they should all be exiled to Iraq for some first person interaction with the “beneficiaries” of their policies.

  65. 65.

    SFAW

    @D58826:

    Was the plan that there would be on American soldier standing behind each Iraqi soldier with a bayonet between the shoulder blades

    No, Dolchstosslegende meant something else.

    [Note to Amir Khalid: you probably know how to do the Eszett — I don’t — hope you can forgive me.]

  66. 66.

    Turgidson

    @jl:

    I dunno. When Graham starts talking about ISIS and gets so terrified that he pees his pants and starts bawling uncontrollably, the media use that awkward moment to give Rand a chance to spew some unrelated dumbassery.

  67. 67.

    SFAW

    @JPL:

    O’Reilly. What’s the over/under on Fox terminating him?

    Can “never” have an over/under?

  68. 68.

    Patrick

    @JPL:

    OT Wonkette has a story about domestic wife abuser O’Reilly. What’s the over/under on Fox terminating him?

    Somebody made this comment to the original article that I thought was funny:

    …I’m confused, what does this have to do with Benghazi?

    -Typical Fox News viewer

  69. 69.

    Turgidson

    @opiejeanne:

    As Krugman has pointed out, the last few years have shown that it is possible to have an interest rate that is effectively lower than zero. The only way a Bloody Bill WRONG Kristol line can exist is if it’s proven possible to correctly predict things less than zero percent of the time.

    If there’s any group of lollygaggers who can pull this off, it’s today’s Republicans.

  71. 71.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    I get going on to cable shows and spouting theory, I see how they do that, but I don’t get how they handle it on an individual level, with people who were injured in Iraq.

    @Kay: You would not believe the condescending and utter contempt with which these people treat actual veterans, particularly if the vet is not spouting the approved Foxbot nonsense.

  72. 72.

    Belafon

    @Patrick: Every day of my adult life I have observed that most people in the world stay in their own countries. Thus, I have been more right than wrong on foreign policy. Guess I should run for president now.

  74. 74.

    scav

    @SFAW: Or Ampersandszlig; reportedly (test ß) and thanks, I didn’t know there were letters without upper cases (or so wildly different ones).

    RATS! need to go test more.

    ß ß

    ETA gazillion. whew.

  75. 75.

    ms_canadada

    @dedc79: Oh, dear. But you’re speaking of Peggy Noonan of the, ‘I’ve never met a martini I didn’t drink,’ variety.
    Poor Peggers only sees a misty glow around her visions. IOW, she’s a souse.

  76. 76.

    opiejeanne

    @SFAW: I thought it had been established that these biker gangs were liberals, so Palin probably wouldn’t be hiring them.

  77. 77.

    Tree With Water

    Good words from Matthew Pulver at Salon.com:

    “..After four decades of intense globalization, the results are in: America used to make things, often in unionized and well-paid sectors, but cheap labor abroad — accessed by corporations when free trade agreements hammer down tariff barriers — have steered the U.S. toward a low-wage, non-unionized service economy. And yet the president, so readily vocal about the phenomenon, has made advocacy for a trade deal that challenges American jobs with dirt-cheap labor in Vietnam, Indonesia, and elsewhere his job lately. Obama is a skilled code switcher and rhetorician, but it’s rare to see him speak out of both sides of his mouth with such regularity as during his defense of the Pacific trade alliance…

    …In one of Obama’s more remarkable speeches on 21st century economic woes, December 2013’s address on economic inequality, he was explicit on the ill effects of free trade in recent decades:

    “A more competitive world lets companies ship jobs anywhere. And as good manufacturing jobs automated or headed offshore, workers lost their leverage, jobs paid less and offered fewer benefits.”

    Right! That’s been the problem. How, then, does the president turn right around and propose to introduce tens of millions more desperate workers to our race-to-the-bottom labor circumstance, even acknowledging the conflicting phenomena in the same speech?..

    ..Obama knows all this”.

  79. 79.

    Elizabelle

    @Yatsuno: didn’t get the strasse symbol, but:

    Fascinating. What I get from holding down the alt key on my MacBook and running the numbers:

    ¡™£¢∞§¶•ªº and alt= gives you ≠

    What’s that tiny ª for?

  80. 80.

    Roger Moore

    @jon:

    Here’s a fun game: what’s Arizona Governor Doug Ducey’s approval rating?

    Without checking: 27%
    [Checks]
    Looks as if your hint worked.

  81. 81.

    SFAW

    @opiejeanne:

    I thought it had been established that these biker gangs were liberals

    Which is why they have the SS lightning strokes on their vests/jackets, no doubt.

    I assume you were joking, but I don’t recall anything regarding that concept. (Unless that was a Jonah Goldbeg reference.)

  82. 82.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Amir Khalid: Didn’t work out that well for one concertgoer, but doesn’t seem to have affected the Stones, who have made about eleventy bazillion dollars since then.

  84. 84.

    catclub

    @Tree With Water: The one helpful explanation I have seen ( but only at Andrew Tobias’s blog) is that the TPP is designed to fix some of the flaws of NAFTA. Mentioning this fact with the Clintons around is possibly awkward.

    I would also note that the phrase “America used to make things,” that you quote, is carrying a lot of baggage. We are still, by far, the biggest manufacturing nation in the world. Fuck yeah.

  85. 85.

    Amir Khalid

    @SFAW:
    I just cut and paste ä,ö,ü, and ß from Google Translate, which now provides a virtual keyboard for German text.

  87. 87.

    Roger Moore

    @Yatsuno:

    The alt key then 225. Like this. ß. ASCII codes are my jam!

    Nitpick: that is Unicode, not ASCII. ASCII is the old-style that has only the Latin alphabet and a handful of symbols. The version that has all the extra characters that you need to write in languages other than English is Unicode.

  88. 88.

    SFAW

    @Amir Khalid:

    You’re too damn honest, you know. You should have just riffed off of Yatsuno’s reply, and I would have believed it.

    [Sound of scales falling from eyes]

  90. 90.

    opiejeanne

    @SFAW: Yes, I was joking. Yesterday some of the Fox idiots were saying something to that effect. Also, Wolf Blitzer was blaming Obama for the white unrest in the country that he has not addressed.

  92. 92.

    Tree With Water

    @catclub: As Pulver counsels, look at the manufacturing tags on everything you own to put that statistic in perspective.

  93. 93.

    Roger Moore

    @scav:

    I didn’t know there were letters without upper cases (or so wildly different ones).

    The ß character is really a shorthand for ss, but only when you can’t divide syllables between the two ses. Since that double s can only happen in the middle or end of a word, there’s no need for an upper case version.

  94. 94.

    Kay

    @CONGRATULATIONS!:

    You would not believe the condescending and utter contempt with which these people treat actual veterans, particularly if the vet is not spouting the approved Foxbot nonsense.

    I struggle with it, because while I think it’s horrible to treat an individual as a symbol of something or other (The Glorious Iraq War, The Mistake of the Iraq War) you also feel you should recognize it somehow- “you’re only 27 and you’;re unsteady going down the steps because you were injured in that war, which we all know and are not ignoring…” and of course maybe that person doesn’t want to talk about it at all and just wants to get on with it.

  96. 96.

    scav

    @Elizabelle: Try the same option/alt key while pressing “s” ß – there’s also fun to be had holding holding down the shift key at the same time: Í (ok, minding-bendy fun trying to link the two). ∂ƒ∂ƒ∂ß ˚∆¬˙˙© ¨ÁÏÔ˝Ï◊ Oh dear, never bothered much learning the hidden keyboard, usually going to the html code route. I am so in trouble.

  97. 97.

    SFAW

    @opiejeanne:

    Yesterday some of the Fox idiots were saying something to that effect. Also, Wolf Blitzer was blaming Obama for the white unrest in the country that he has not addressed.

    I can’t even come up with a half-witty response to that, it’s just so depressing. Yes, I know it’s not surprising that those idiots says that, it’s just … I don’t know, I just get tired of the insane asylum that is the media discussion in this country.

  100. 100.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Roger Moore: Actually, the Alt-numeric codes are “Extended ASCII” – they are all in the numeric range 128-255, so 8-bit. You can’t get to Unicode code points using that trick.

  101. 101.

    scav

    @Roger Moore: Only if we stick with the standard upper and lower case conventions we’ve got now. ANGRY HYPER-TRADITIONALIST GERMANS WITH INTERNET ISSUES MIGHT BEG TO DIFFER WITH YOU!

  102. 102.

    opiejeanne

    @SFAW: It was a surreal moment reading Blitzer’s comment. I read it aloud for my husband and he looked at me in disbelief.

  104. 104.

    SFAW

    @SatanicPanic:

    that’s a terrible way of evaluating our manufacturing sector

    How so? If a piece of electronics is assembled in the US, from parts made in China, or Taiwan, or Malaysia, doesn’t that tell you something?

  105. 105.

    opiejeanne

    @scav: I just heard the ghost of my HS German teacher, yelling at the class. This was in the late 60s, so it wasn’t about computer coding.

  106. 106.

    Roger Moore

    @Tree With Water:

    look at the manufacturing tags on everything you own to put that statistic in perspective.

    The problem with that argument is that it’s looking at only a small cross-section of things. Many of the things that are made in the US are big, expensive things, like airplanes or medical equipment, that the average consumer will never buy but that put a lot of money into the economy. Many of the other things are consumables, like medicines, that people will never look at the place of manufacture. And those are things where we’ve been putting the manufacturers in other countries out of business, just as they’ve been putting clothing manufacturers in the US out of business.

  107. 107.

    Belafon

    @Tree With Water:

    That’s been the problem. How, then, does the president turn right around and propose to introduce tens of millions more desperate workers to our race-to-the-bottom labor circumstance, even acknowledging the conflicting phenomena in the same speech?

    The question is, how do we know this? I understand that lots of people on the left fear “trade agreement” but until the negotiations are final, we don’t know what’s in it. If it sucks, then Democrats have a large enough minority to block the bill from passing.

    And before someone says, “He won’t show it to us” I’m just going to say “He won’t show us the Iranian negotiations either” and a lot of us defended that tactic against Republicans.

  109. 109.

    Elizabelle

    @scav:
    ßßß whee!

    œ ∑ ´® † ¥ ¨ˆø π
    å ß ∂ ƒ © ˙ ∆ ˚ ¬
    Ω ≈ ç √ ∫ ˜µ

    There’s the qwerty keys with alt engaged.

  111. 111.

    SFAW

    @Roger Moore:

    Many of the things that are made in the US are big, expensive things, like airplanes or medical equipment, that the average consumer will never buy but that put a lot of money into the economy.

    Airplanes, maybe. But I would bet a beer that medical equipment contains a significant amount of off-shored components. And aren’t drugs being manufactured offshore? The computer industry – especially companies like HP and Dell — have been getting their stuff made in Taiwan and China for 15-20 years. Automobiles, probably the same.

    Which brings us back to my original question: by what metric? Sales volume for US-based companies? Dollar value of the various “raw” components? Number of units shipped?

  112. 112.

    SatanicPanic

    @SFAW: it tells me something about that piece of electronics. Nothing about the whole sector though.

  114. 114.

    Amir Khalid

    @opiejeanne:
    Was the case system a headache to memorise? Or did you and your classmates forget the “initial cap on nouns” rule a lot?

  115. 115.

    SFAW

    @SatanicPanic:

    “Pick a sector. Any sector.”

    There are precious few sectors left where the content of individual products is US-heavy (vs. offshore).

    But I think fucked-in-the-head punditry is still one where the US leads, so there’s that.

  116. 116.

    catclub

    @David Koch:

    but nobody watches Sunday shows.

    The weirdest thing about listening to Washington Wizards games on radio are the ads for 1)The Air traffic Controllers ‘Organization’ and 2)What used to be SAIC and is now named Scitor. Beltway bandits need to know these things.

    Listening to the local NBA broadcasts gives a very different view of each city – and who is listening.

  117. 117.

    SatanicPanic

    @SFAW: I don’t understand the point you’re trying to make. If I am manufacturing something from component parts made elsewhere I am still manufacturing something.

  119. 119.

    sharl

    Awww man, the business on how we got into ourGreat and Glorious Iraq Adventure never ceases to depress me; and I was never even directly impacted, let alone at the front lines. Others weren’t so lucky.

    Greg Sargent @ThePlumLineGS

    Crucial Krugman point: “It was quite clear AT THE TIME that the case for war was fake.” Blinkers and Lies

    T Karney @pecunium
    @ThePlumLineGS The part of the Intel community I was in (as well as V Corps) all knew it was fake. Not much we could do about it.

    Stephan Lorentz @Steplor
    Dark, sad time
    Pt.1 - http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/in-rumsfelds-shop/
    Pt.2 - http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/conscientious-objector/
    Pt.3 - http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/open-door-policy/ …
    @pecunium @ThePlumLineGS

    T Karney @pecunium
    @Steplor @ThePlumLineGS It was, and it’s not really over yet. Hard to say how grim it was for those who didn’t buy the story.

    It’s still making policy, has corrupted my area of Intel (interrogation): that’s been swept under the rug. #bitter

    Of all the self-described former intel people I’ve crossed paths with on social media, the interrogators feel the most betrayed and embittered; they were basically replaced by torturers, as the revelations from Abu Ghraib and so many other sites have shown. So instead of winning the trust of captives using humane treatment and a professional comportment, go ahead and torture them so they’ll tell you whatever they think you want to hear. VICTORY!

    By the way, those URLs I wrapped in the {code}{/code} command above – to avoid exceeding the three-link limit – go to the (nearly) real-time account, by then Pentagon insider USAF LCOL (ret.) Karen Kwiatkowski, of the neocon takeover of Defense intelligence operations. Those ghouls did so much damage, I’m not sure how many subsequent non-neocon Admins it will take to repair it all.

  120. 120.

    Mary G

    @Kay: No, they never see a real veteran in person. Pundits don’t even have to do town halls like politicians, who will occasionally get the uncomfortable Ivy Ziedrich-Jeb Bush-your-brother-caused-ISIS question. Pundits only meet military people who have a billion medals on their chest for sending other people’s sons and daughters to the slaughter at tony cocktail parties and dinner parties in DC.

  121. 121.

    jl

    @Belafon:

    ‘ And before someone says, “He won’t show it to us” I’m just going to say “He won’t show us the Iranian negotiations either” and a lot of us defended that tactic against Republicans. ‘

    I think what the GOP (and some Dems) in Congress are suggesting for the Iran negotiations is a lot more meddling than showing us the final result.

    The fast track bill Obama wanted included a lot more than just making the deal public. I also think that trade negotiations are a quite a bit different from weapons and nuclear non-proliferation treaties. And Obama’s policy on public availability of the treaty is more restrictive than that of Bush II.

    And, IIRC, there is a specific rationale for fast track approval and limiting debate and access to information for trade deals. The idea originally was, for global multilateral trade talks, the benefits would be diffused to a very large number of people around the world, while the costs would be concentrated to a few protected industries hiding behind high tariffs. Limiting debate and making information on specifics difficult to get made it harder for the losers to put pressure on a few Congresscritters to vote it down, denying the wide benefits to everyone.

    But that was in the context of truly global multilateral trade talks that the US and other high income industrialized countries seem to have abandoned. It was in the context of negotiations over relatively simple conventional trade barriers to markets, like tariffs, and patently artificial restrictions on access to markets. Those kinds of talks are very different from things like NAFTA and the TPP. Like it or not, there is a potential for interference with legitimate national democratic governance, such as financial reform on that basis that it restrains trade.

    So, I have not problem opposing Congressional meddling in the Iran talks and also opposing fast track approval for the TPP.

  122. 122.

    sharl

    Heh, just tried to use the {code} command to avoid the 3-link limit, and damned if the resulting text wasn’t converted to active links anyway, leading to…moderation. Hahaha, FYWP!

  123. 123.

    Kay

    @Tree With Water:

    I don’t like the piece because it makes the current trade deal the same as NAFTA and that isn’t true.

    The President is correct is when he says most of the manufacturing that was going to go is gone. I think he’s also correct when he says manufacturing has changed- it’s not about making complex high-value added things (exclusively), that’s not where the US can do well.

    The US can do well making high or low value products using complex processes, and that means fewer lower level workers but the people who do work in the sector can make good money, because they don’t “make” the product- they know how to run and maintain the complex process. My son is doing this right now. He’s working at a modern facility where his job is not to make the (simple) product but to maintain the machines that make the product. Those are good jobs, but they’re skilled labor. That’s what Obama is talking about when he says “21st century manufacturing”- that’s real. His administration has been very supportive of it. It’s “hot” in Ohio. My son was and is actively recruited and he has the lowest level cert for what he does (he’s only 21).

    My objection to it is telling people over and over this will “create jobs” (which is the flip side of equating it to NAFTA and telling people they will lose jobs). That’s not true either.

    They may be doing this for a lot of good reasons but it isn’t “to create jobs”. I don’t even know why free traders say this with every trade deal. All it does is damage their credibility. Not a job killer but not a job creator either.

  124. 124.

    Marc McKenzie

    “But apparently there’s at least one indisputably true sentence in Baby Doc’s forthcoming campaign book, according to an excerpt published at Buzzfeed:

    “It’s also bothersome that the mainstream media continues to invite the architects of the Iraq invasion on to share their opinions on Sunday morning shows.””

    And…so what? Should we suck him off, then? Look, you want to give him credit, fine–but if you decide to drop trou for him despite the fact that he’s pretty much against a good chunk of stuff that progressives are for, then…we’re done.

  125. 125.

    SFAW

    @SatanicPanic:

    Anybody (within reason) can assemble something. Although it is still considered “manufacturing,” it is not at the same level as something like stamping out a car fender or a computer chassis or take-your-pick. In the long run, the entity that controls the machinery (or whatever) that produces the constituent parts is in a much stronger position than the entity assembling those parts – even if the assembler is paying the bill.

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Thanks. Won’t get a chance to read the article until who-knows-when, but it’s something I’ve been hearing other places, and I am hopeful. What concerns me is that the typical US mindset – both corporate/political and individual – has not really been that proficient at looking at the long game.

  126. 126.

    SatanicPanic

    @SFAW:

    the entity that controls the machinery (or whatever) that produces the constituent parts is in a much stronger position than the entity assembling those parts

    Not sure why you think this

  127. 127.

    Gin & Tonic

    @SFAW: It’s a long article, but one of the key points is that the machinery for automated manufacturing, whether it’s additive (i.e. “3D printing”) or just robotic, costs the same whether the machine is located in China or in California, so to the extent you’re taking people out of the process, you can move the manufacturing close to where you’ll be selling the stuff. The downside of that, of course, is you don’t employ as many people when it’s just robots and 3D printers making all the stuff.

  128. 128.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    As others have said Republicans absolutely adore the troops and hate Veterans, especially disabled ones. Just like they love the fuck out of them fetuses but can’t stand babies, especially the poor ones.

  130. 130.

    opiejeanne

    @Amir Khalid: No, I was mostly kidding. I didn’t have any problems with that, and I don’t think most of the other kids did either. The teacher was hilariously adamant every once in a while and would shout at us, “Kinder, Kinder, Deutsche bitte!” as well as other bits of direction, -and we would all laugh.
    . The kids in that class were there because they wanted to be, unlike a lot of the kids in Spanish. Looking back, I should have taken either Spanish or French as well.

  132. 132.

    Germy Shoemangler

    Marihuana made the cover of the latest National Geographic

    Does anyone think Rand Paul would really legalize the bud if by some miracle he got voted in?
    Or would he find some excuse not to?

  133. 133.

    Kay

    @Tree With Water:

    This is a real thing:

    WASHINGTON – The omnibus spending bill passed by the Senate on Saturday night included two bipartisan manufacturing bills that would create a national manufacturing strategy and expand a national network of manufacturing innovation institutes. U.S. Senator Chris Coons (D-Del.), a member of the Appropriations Committee and the leader of the Senate’s Manufacturing Jobs for America campaign, was a strong supporter and co-sponsor of both bills.

    “American manufacturing has the ability to provide good jobs and drive strong growth far into the future,” said Senator Coons. “It’s time we catch up to our competitors around the globe and create the kind of national strategy and network of manufacturing innovation hubs that the most advanced economies have long boasted. The bipartisan manufacturing bills passed this weekend would take important steps to build a strong foundation for the 21st century manufacturing economy America’s workers and businesses deserve. As these bills’ passage shows, creating good manufacturing jobs continues to be something on which both Democrats and Republicans can strongly agree. I look forward to continuing to work hard with my colleagues in both parties to strengthen American manufacturing and our middle class.”

    The Administration has been a big supporter and they’ve also been big supporters of skilled trades mostly thru the Labor Department. Obama isn’t killing manufacturing and his trade deal won’t either. The Democrats in the Senate had very specific fixes or conditions they want and if you read them it isn’t about “stopping” trade or protecting aging auto workers or whatever the current smear is. They agree with the Administration on “21st century manufacturing” because that’s already happening and it’s a good news. They want concessions on currency, labor protections, environmental and they want a real debate on the proposed investor adjudication system.

  134. 134.

    Chris

    @Kay:

    I don’t think the pundit classes literally never encounter any veterans, so much as the veterans they meet are only the ones that conform to their image of What An ‘Meri’can Soldier Looks Like. People who don’t fit that profile, a profile which probably owes more to Tom Clancy level literature than anything else, aren’t figured to be newsworthy, so there’s kind of a filtering process. Basically, the pundits want Chris Kyle. Proud and enthusiastic and unapologetic about everything done Over There; committed not merely to his job but to the entire war and the ideology behind it and willing to deliver media-friendly quotes about it; preferably from an elite combat unit; and preferably white, Southern, Christian, and Republican. That, they love, and seek out.

    On the other hand, the grunt who joined because he needed help paying the bills, or didn’t see any career prospects in his Rust Belt town, or simply because his sibling joined first and he thought he should follow in his footsteps, but came back with missing limbs and doesn’t understand what the hell the war was about… not so much.

    The military doctor who’s sickened by the number of people like that that he’s had to treat so that W. could get his war on… not so much.

    The illegal immigrant who served in the military and did more to earn citizenship than most native-born people but is now threatened with deportation because not all the I’s were dotted or T’s crossed… not so much.

    The woman who was raped by fellow soldiers, or the gay guy who got run out under DADT… not so much.

    The veteran who showed up at the Occupy Wall Street rally and got in the police’s face to tell them their duty was to serve and protect and not to be paid thugs for the rich… not so much.

    The veteran who rather than giving the General Boykin speech about how them hajjis gotta learn that our God’s better than theirs, instead gives them an earful about how his unit’s Afghan translator is in danger of being abandoned because that’s often what America does to the natives who’ve outlived their usefulness… not so much.

    Shit, you can be John Kerry and Max Cleland, have done everything one could possibly ask of a soldier at enormous personal sacrifice, and when you get home, you’ll still be a Dirty Fucking Hippie. Because you had the gall to come back from war with something to say other than “THAT WAS TOTALLY AWESOME! LET’S GO AGAIN!”

  135. 135.

    SFAW

    @SatanicPanic:

    If I am machining/fabricating Widget A and Whatsis B and Kludge C, all of which are required to build Product X, I control who gets what when. Although Company Z – the one under whose name Product X is sold – may be paying me, and there’s a contractual relationship, what if I decide I don’t like Company Z, and withhold the parts, to make a point? And what if Company Z cannot produce the parts on their own (which is usually the case if they’re subbing it out)?

    OK, now let’s say I’m the assembly house (assuming no highly-advanced technology, such as control at a sub-nanometer level), and I decide I’m not going to build Company Z’s products, to make a point?

    It’s generally much easier to find a replacement for an assembly shop than it is for the machining location, because of the investment required to start-up a backup operation.

  138. 138.

    Kay

    @Tree With Water:

    The reason “we” (those of us who want concessions or a real debate) shouldn’t make it about losing manufacturing jobs is because that isn’t what it’s about but also because that plays right into “holding onto the past” and this narrative of men with lunchbuckets bending steel. That isn’t even what labor is about in the US anymore. They represent tons of other workers – the group with the highest concentration of unionized workers is African American women- and labor are more than happy to promote “21st century manufacturing” because that’s not a bad national strategy and those ARE good jobs. But they are skilled, or at least semi-skilled.

  139. 139.

    SatanicPanic

    @SFAW: I don’t know if you’ve supported your contention all that well. Could just as easily say that the assembler has greater capital than the component maker so they have more power. That’s why Apple or Walmart can squeeze them so hard. Plenty of places make chips for a phone, but only one place stamps “Apple” on them.

  140. 140.

    Kay

    @Tree With Water:

    The reason I took Obama’s approach to the deal so personally was because 1. Obama can’t tell me Sherrod Brown doesn’t know about trade and 2. when I hear him go after labor unions I don’t think of Trumpka, who can take care of himself, I think of the due’s paying members who supported the President (because that’s where political donations and endorsements come from) and I think that’s disloyal.

    There’s no reason to discredit them. He can disagree with them but attempting to discredit them on trade goes too far, you know, especially when they DO know what they’;re talking about :)

  141. 141.

    SFAW

    @SatanicPanic:

    I expect that no matter what I write, you’ll tell me you’re not convinced, etc. etc.

    Walmart does not product anything, they only sell things produced by others, so using it/them as a counter-example is without merit.

    As far as having the Apple stamp: I’m not really sure what point you’re trying to make, other than a “so answer THAT one, smarty-pants!” But, I’m sure you realize, Apple chips are produced by Samsung (Korea) and TMSC (Taiwan), probably others. If TMSC decided tomorrow that they wanted turn off (or severely restrict) the flow of chips, where exactly would Apple go? They might have a foundry in Cupertino, but I’d bet that ubiquitous beer that it couldn’t handle the volumes.

    Not sure what you do for a living. If it’s completely unrelated to the manufacturing sector, then there may be no argument to which you’d listen, which is OK at some level, I guess. But, for what it’s worth: the ability to control the process which required the largest investment generally results in the position of greater strength.

    ETA: And Apple’s primary source of control/power is not the assembly function, it’s the IP. It is significantly harder to replace to replace the design (et al.) “infrastructure” than replacing machinery. That’s why so many companies try to reverse-engineer, rather than develop something on their own. Yes, there are always exceptions.

  142. 142.

    Iowa Old Lady

    Mr IOL is watching Todd interview Paul right now and it makes my head hurt. Paul says the media should ask HRC about the invasion of Libya that she initiated with Obama’s cooperation. Todd just lets that go.

  145. 145.

    Kathleen

    @Patrick: Does anyone else recall through misty water color memories the skids of cash that went missing in Iraq? Ah, good times.

  146. 146.

    SFAW

    @Turgidson:

    Leave it to Obama and Hillary to invade Libya but forget to send troops there.

    But they did – it was an elite fighting force known as the 101st Keyboard Kommandos, and they brought the same shock-and-awe tactics that they have used to great effect in other theaters of war. You know which ones I mean: the coordinated attacks on Lil Peaches across the nation, to liberate those defenseless mega-bags of Cheetos; their daily stalwart defense against Reality and Sanity (the REAL Axis of Evil); their tireless pursuit of the poor or defenseless. Yes these children-in-the-bodies-of-men, those few …

    ah, fuck it, I can’t keep this shit up

  147. 147.

    SFAW

    @Kathleen:

    Does anyone else recall through misty water color memories the skids of cash that went missing in Iraq?

    Thanks, Obama!

  148. 148.

    J R in WV

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    So Paul thinks that Hillary was president, and President Obama was just hanging out, watching Hillery do her thing?

    How fuckin stupid is that?

    If the question as asked, I would hope that Mrs. Clinton would say that she executed Mr Obama’s orders and policies to the best of her ability, which is the case for a Secretary working for a President.

    Paul doesn’t even know how government works, how is he going to take over the leadership of a vast machine he appears totally ignorant of?

  149. 149.

    SFAW

    @J R in WV:

    how is he going to take over the leadership of a vast machine he appears totally ignorant of?

    See, there’s your problem: you seem to think that he and his fellow crazies/grifters/clowns have any desire to do anything other than:

    A) Destroy a functioning central government in the US
    B) Enrich (or amass power for) themselves and their pals as best as they can while doing A

    Once you fix your assumption set, things become a lot clearer.

  150. 150.

    boatboy_srq

    @sharl:

    Of all the self-described former intel people I’ve crossed paths with on social media, the interrogators feel the most betrayed and embittered; they were basically replaced by torturers, as the revelations from Abu Ghraib and so many other sites have shown

    Yet more proof that it was never about WMD or “regime change,” and that Gitmo was never about either good intel nor incarcerating Terrrrrists. The more I see coming out of the GWoT, the less it looks like an actual “campaign” and more like an exercise in creating the conditions the [mal]administration was supposedly fighting – a global conflict solely for domestic consumption, engineered to produce the results we’ve seen ever since. One wonders whether the “instability” we’re seeing in Iraq and Afghanistan is merely an accident of abysmal execution of the campaigns and recovery, or the deliberate consequence, created to reinforce the presumption that “r#gheads can’t govern themselves; we need to go back in and create a permanent puppet government peacekeeping presence.”

  151. 151.

    Chris

    @boatboy_srq:

    On the bigger topic, I don’t agree. I don’t think they were trying to do anything as prosaic as “proving that the ragheads can’t govern themselves so we can go back in later,” or planning for the occupation to fail. I think they believed every word of their own bullshit. The aftermath of the war was handled exactly the way you’d expect a True Believing Conservative from the Heritage Foundation to handle it if he were sincerely trying to create the best outcome according to what he “knew:” the government was drowned in the bathtub, and we were told that a nice modern Western-style democracy would just will itself into existence as a result.

    Everything I’ve seen from Republicans in the more unhinged teabagger years has only convinced me more of this – Romney’s campaign’s “unskewed polls” moment, which was really just a callback to Karl Rove’s “we create our own reality” a decade earlier, illustrates it nicely. They really are that delusional, and they really do believe that the very fabric of the universe can be warped simply because they want it to.

    It’s also true, as you said, that the Iraq War was almost entirely done for domestic consumption and that they cared a whole lot more about getting reelected and funneling a ton of money into the bank accounts of defense contractors. But I don’t think that means they didn’t still believe their own bullshit. A huge part of Randian, and more generally, conservative ideology is the belief that what’s best for the people at the top will automatically work out best for the people at the bottom, because the people at the top are just that special and smart.

  152. 152.

    Chris

    @boatboy_srq:

    As for torture specifically? Two things:

    1) It’s just a theory, I don’t insist on it, but I think torture is one of these things that they did in part because they knew that it would provoke a backlash – if not from Democrats then from the left and the international community, which they then equate with Democrats – and that they could follow up on that backlash by slamming all their critics as anti-American and on the side of the terrorists. Which is what they want. Using war as a pretext to attack domestic and other political enemies has been Republican SOP since McCarthy at least. They want to feel like it’s always them against the world in a perpetual siege mentality. Odd as it sounds, the universal expressions of support that poured in after 9/11 are the last thing they wanted.

    2) (This one I’m far more certain of); they tortured because they wanted to, and because their ideology demanded it. Right wingers equate cruelty with strength and with efficiency. Broken windows policing, cutting services to the needy, you name it. It’s all part of the same macho, posturing, frat boy/jock culture. Torturing people proves, to yourself and to the world, that you’re a fearsome Manly Man willing to Make Hard Choices, and not one of those sissy oversensitive girly liberals. It proves that you’re strong and badass, which will make your enemies quake in their boots. Even without my other theory, that alone is all the justification they ever needed.

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