I can’t believe it’s Thursday already. I’ve spent most of this week in a NyQuil stupor since I have a rotten cold, and I still have so much to do before I can wrap up the week and spend the weekend shivering under a pile of blankets.
The weather has been chilly and gloomy by Florida standards. Here’s what it looked like at the shoreline the other day:
It’s sunny today but still on the chilly side. Moar blankets!
Open thread!
Rand Careaga
YMMV, but that vile green fluid can be very hard on your liver. However miserable the cold, and tempting as the notion may be, you do not want, or at any rate ought not want, to exceed the so-called “recommended dose” of Nyquil.
raven
Fish!
japa21
8 degrees here this AM, wind chill number has a minus side in front of it.
Love how as the days get longer the weather gets colder.
dmsilev
So, for the nerds and geeks among us: In about an hour, the LIGO team is going to make a big announcement. It probably means the first direct observation of gravity waves, and therefore that this year’s Nobel in physics is all sorted out. I’ve heard some vague rumors about what specifically they’ve seen (mostly centering around waves emanating from black holes), but I guess we’ll find out soon.
Aardvark Cheeselog
A little bit out of Betty’s ordinary ambit, but still FL and I’d been meaning to draw attention to it: my hometown paper has been doing some investigative reporting: http://www.mypalmbeachpost.com/policeshootings/
Linda Featheringill
We’ve been in respiratory hell in this house for over a week now. We are by Philly but friends in NJ are also suffering.
If I had a higher fever, I’d swear that I had the flu.
OzarkHillbilly
@dmsilev: A bright bit of news in an otherwise drab week. Looking forward to it.
MazeDancer
The North East will be joining you in blanket refuge solidarity, Betty. (And may you feel even better, soon.)
Saturday night, predicted actual temp: Minus 11. Wind chill factor to minus 40. Winter reminds it gets a say in the 4 Season turn of the Big Wheel.
And if folks haven’t read Charles Blow in the NY Times today, good idea to do so.
Title: “Stop Bernie-Splaining to Black Voters”
It is good background to the simmering racial schism among Dems. And how the Bernie supporters “listen harder so you’ll see the light” attitude can make some women feel continued patriarchy, and not so much ground-breaking challenge of male privilege, in his “revolution”.
scav
@dmsilev: I’ll alert my brain to its oncoming bout of highly enjoyable befuddlement.
Gin & Tonic
Chilly? Hah. It might reach negative double digits here over the weekend.
MomSense
@Rand Careaga:
It’s scary stuff because it combines acetaminophen and alcohol.
FlipYrWhig
@MazeDancer: the new thing I’ve seen a few times lately is people laying blame on The Clintons for the crime bill, then when it’s pointed out that Sanders voted for it, pivoting to say that what he voted for had all these good features too. Well, no shit, maybe that’s what The Clintons had in mind. SMH.
NotMax
I got nothin’.
Betty Cracker
@Linda Featheringill: Ugh, we’re in the same boat, then. First our daughter had this cold, then I got it, and now the mister is showing symptoms. It’s mostly respiratory with low-grade fever.
Punchy
What’s with the whale or dolphin breaching the surface at photo time?
Cermet
@MomSense: That is a proven deadly mix – how on earth can a known deadly mix be sold? Really? UFB!
Oh, so Betty, you didn’t get a flu shot?
Betty Cracker
@Punchy: Could be a dolphin or manatee (there are tons of both around that spot), but I think it was just the wind blowing the whitecaps. It was super windy that day.
@Cermet: I’ve never had a flu shot in my life, but this isn’t the flu — just a crappy cold.
Dork
Has the Gruesome Twosome, Fryboy, and Lonely Jeffe succumbed to the Dark Side and cried Uncle yet?
Another Holocene Human
@FlipYrWhig: That crap about the crime bill is at once inflammatory, disingenious, and horribly misinformed, but good luck bringing truth to Tumblr; they’ve already made up their minds.
Instead of marveling how the youngs love Bernie, marvel at how sharply his support drops off among those who remember the 1990s. Listen to the Berniacs: you must vote for Bernie because Hilary Clinton is evil personified.
Betty Cracker
@MazeDancer: I’ve donated small sums to both the Hillary and Bernie campaigns, so I’m on their mailing lists. Here’s an excerpt of an email I got a couple of days ago from a subset of Team Bernie:
I like both candidates and am still on the fence about my primary vote. But that is a bad tactic right there.
Punchy
@Betty Cracker: You got Ryan Tannehill or Joe Ayrault living in your neighborhood?
C.V. Danes
@Rand Careaga: Oscillococcinum and Coldcalm. Works like a charm.
Redshift
Went to the Northern Virginia office opening for Hillary last night, and it was a good time. Very impassioned introduction by a woman whose name I unfortunately didn’t get, mostly about Hillary’s pre-White House career. A transcript of it should really be circulated among all supporters.
But my favorite line of the night was from Tim Kaine:
I serve on committees with Bernie Sanders. I know Bernie. I love him, I respect him.
I serve on committees with Ted Cruz. I know him.
CONGRATULATIONS!
49 degrees here this morning, going to take a huge jump up to 80 or so. Nice here. But it’s almost always nice here.
Redshift
@Betty Cracker:
I keep reminding myself that it’s good we have a competitive primary so whichever candidate wins can make all these stupid mistakes now when the stakes aren’t so high. I just hope they figure out that they’re mistakes and remember.
Iowa Old Lady
@CONGRATULATIONS!: 8F here this morning, so shut up.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@Cermet: Please. The flu shot is a joke. Got mine in November. Guess what I’ve had for the last month?
I never used to get them and rarely got sick. Now I get them every year and every year, I get sick. Think I stop next year.
Cermet
@Betty Cracker: Flu’s (really complications) kill over 30,000 a year. You should really consider the flu shot. The up side besides some (not always very much) protection against the flu is that these may very well help reduce issues with colds. Just saying.
PurpleGirl
Betty — Hope you feel better soon.
I love my living room window wall (roughly 25 ft by 7 ft tall) for the light but on windy days it can be chilly even with the heat on. It’s 26 degrees with winds gusting to 33 mph to feel like -3. Time to put on combo of a turtleneck and a sweater.
Punchy
@CONGRATULATIONS!: You know who else gets flu shot? Pheasants during hunting season.
Betty Cracker
@Redshift: Agreed. I think a competitive primary is a good thing for many reasons, including the opportunity to identify and remedy counterproductive approaches as you noted and also to address constituencies that are taken for granted in the absence of an all-out battle for votes. I predict we’ll see both candidates emphasizing the needs of black and Hispanic voters at tonight’s debate.
ThresherK
@Rand Careaga: Yeah, as much as I associate that disgusting taste with “getting better”, we’ve been separating our OTCs for awhile also for just such a reason. In addition to NyQuil, the Alka-Seltzer Plus (or store-brand equivalents) cold medicine was switched from acetominophen to aspirin a few years ago.
When a bad cold travels through me I get different symptoms at different times, and acetominophen (on the liver) and sudafed/phenylephrine (on the heart rate) should not be overdone.
CaseyL
@CONGRATULATIONS!: That’s odd, because for me it’s just the opposite. I get my flu shot and not only do I not get the flu, I get fewer colds, too. I don’t know how that works. Maybe my immune system is generally boosted, and better able to fight viruses as well?
Benw
Yep, LIGO detects gravitational waves consistent with Einstein’s general relativity prediction for two black holes spiraling together and merging!
Betty Cracker
@PurpleGirl: I’m totally jealous — I once had a window/wall like that at an apartment I lived in years ago, and even though the view was nothing special, there was something satisfying about it, as if I was somehow more connected to the world and yet had my privacy too.
Shell
Betty, my sympathies on the lousy cold. Not so much the weather; like a lot of us here, its going down near zero this weekend. Damn, and Ive been feeling chilly when it was in the 40s.
Why not try an old fashioned hot toddy, especially right before you turn in. Honey, lemon, some grated ginger, a splash of rum, all hot as you can drink it. Not bad.
FlyingToaster
The Flu shot’s effectiveness depends upon the year. Last year (2014-5) it missed and HerrDoktorToaster got both strains (A&B) — he gave me strain A. I moved to the guest room when he came down with B.
This year seems to be a good match; we all had our shots in the fall, and none of us have gotten more than a cold this winter.
WarriorGirl’s [private] school requires vaccinations unless there’s a medical contraindication — the girl with the egg allergy finally got her flu shot over XMas break. WG got the last of batch 1 back in October; our pediatrician said the next batch wouldn’t be in until after Thanksgiving.
So I recommend flu shots, with the caveat of talking to your PCP about it first.
Jim, Foolish LIteralist
From MediaMatters:
I love the “pardon?”. But who in his own party does Kaisch talk to that he seems surprised that True Believers still believe in Saddam’s nukes pointed at Akron, Wichita and Cobb County?
ruemara
@MazeDancer: I would share it to Facebook, but the near 95% Bernie fans that I have as friends are set to zero chill about him. I really can’t take another dose of “watch me display a level of condescension towards you that makes you feel as if you wandered into a white supremacy practice session”. It takes hours from my page and life from my soul.
That being said, I had the strangest interaction with a Bernista who was spreading conspiracy theories about evil PACs connected to Hillary who were using dark money for the purpose of… GOTV AND REGISTRATION! Yep. Money collected by ” establishment” was going into the nefarious efforts of registering people to vote and encouraging black to people to vote. I tried to explain how wrong that is, as no GOTV operation is beholden to anyone nor can you register people for only your candidate or your party. He insisted it should be the DNC’s responsibility to do these things. When I pointed out that an attitude like that does not go over well for POC, who want voting rights & access to be dealt with now and not wait for a court case to happen along, he said it was pandering and dark money groups were buying the black vote for Hillary. A revolution with no voting outreach & no registration. How does that work?
Just Some Fuckhead
Worst part of being an adult: still having important shit to do when your sick.
Just Some Fuckhead
@ruemara:
How do you muster the will to go on?
dedc79
Oregon live stream is back up
ThresherK
@Jim, Foolish LIteralist:
Ladies and gentlemen, your Reasonable Republican who isn’t gonna take right-wing media shite!
Jim, Foolish LIteralist
more Katich as I click around
(he’s campaigning in Nikki Haley’s South Carolina). And the it would be funny if it weren’t about cancer part:
Ask not what you can do for your potentials voters, ask what they can do for each other
Librarian
@NotMax: Speaking of which, I am really getting annoyed by those Jennifer Anniston commercials for Emirates Airlines. I wonder if she knows anything about the state of human rights and women’s rights in the UAE. Probably not.
MattF
Welp, the LIGO evidence is out and published. Two merging black holes, flat-out agreement with theory, no ifs ands or buts. The black holes were about equal in mass, after the merger the new black hole was three solar masses lighter than the sum of the originals. The discrepancy is the amount of energy radiated during the collision. !!!!.
yellowdog
@CONGRATULATIONS!: I’m an epidemiologist and I have significant doubts about the value of the flu shot for anyone not in or in close contact with a vulnerable population. I am considered to be in a vulnerable population, however, since I am an OLD. Also, a couple of months ago I got the shingles vaccine and a couple of weeks later I had a shingles outbreak (I had shingles several times before I got the shot). Take from that what you will. But don’t get me wrong, I’m not against vaccination. Elimination of polio FTW! I think I was one of the kids the Salk vaccine was tested on in the early fifties. I remember everyone in kindergarten being rounded up and given a shot.That would have been 1953/54.
Germy
Final Batman V Superman trailer is out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cle_rKBpZ28
Amir Khalid
Salon has an Associated Press story reporting that Simon & Schuster will publish Bruce Springsteen’s memoir, titled Born To Run, on September 27. Bruce has spent the past few years writing it, all by himself!
Some not-so-happy news on the left-pinky front. The swelling is confirmed to be gout, with no sign of malignancy — that is, no cancer. But the finger may still have to go, according to the orthopaedic surgeon: the bone erosion extends to the joint between middle phalange and tip. She suggested an amputation going past the knuckle. I am not keen on a Mickey Mouse-style hand, and would prefer to keep the stump as well as a good chunk of my perfectly healthy left palm. Next appointment with orthopaedic clinic in three weeks.
gene108
@Another Holocene Human:
I think it’s more like she’s the Evil Queen, with Bill being the equally devious Evil King.
They seem to attribute everything bad in their lives to the Clinton Administration and gloss over the impact the 43rd President had on this country.
Germy
@Amir Khalid: Don’t surgeons always recommend surgery? Good luck, whatever you decide.
dedc79
@Librarian: The Verizon center – the hockey/basketball/concert arena in the heart of downtown Washington, DC – is plastered in advertising/sponsorships by Etihad Airways, which is the other major airline in the Emirates. Seems like they’re in the midst of a major PR blitz in the U.S.
Magatha
@FlyingToaster: Yeah, when I learned more about how the yearly flu vaccine is prepared, I understood why some years’ vaccines work better than others. I get my flu shot every year and haven’t had the flu, and I guess that’s partly vaccine and partly luck. But I’m curious: how do you know if you’ve had strain A or B or both? Do you know by the particular symptoms, or do you go to the doctor or clinic and get it specifically diagnosed?
Goblue72
@Betty Cracker: How exactly is getting supporters together to discuss how a candidates policy agenda is of benefit to a particular constituency group so that volunteers are ready to discuss that agenda when doing outreach a problem?
Benw
@MattF: black holes moving at nearly half the speed of light by the time they collided!
Distinguished professors and senior scientists totally geeking out like students about pendulums and laser interferometers at the NSF press conference.
J R in WV
@yellowdog:
I’m a firm believer in vaccinations, I get them asap usually. My family doctor gave me orders for shingles, the combined diptheria/tetanus/whooping cough, and the pneumonia with, what was it, 13 different strains… anyway, I’ve been pretty busy and haven’t gotten but the new flu shot. They’re all free at the county health department!
I got flu shots annually at work for years, free courtesy of HR to keep down sick leave usage – think I only have had THE fue once since vaccinations for it became available, and only a couple of colds. Being nearly a hermit helps too, if you never meet anyone carrying the virus, you can’t catch it!
Goblue72
@gene108: I lived through the 90s – we got no lasting positive legislative achievements and several negative ones – DOMA, the crime bill, ending welfare, financial deregulation, NAFTA. He balanced the budget – wheeeee! – which just turned into tax cuts when he left office.
It was a great legislative resume. For a Republican.
ruemara
@Just Some Fuckhead: The same way you soldier on being a fucking asshole that no one ever sent a jackass signal for.
Betty Cracker
@Goblue72: Here’s a thought experiment to explain why the wording below rankled:
Now, imagine this email blast going out in 2008:
Spot the condescension there?
J R in WV
@Amir Khalid:
There are treatments for gout – stop drinking all that red wine, for one!! ;-) I kid.
But my dad got gout while being treated for his leukemia, and had pills to take. IIRC there were several choices if that first one hadn’t worked well with limited side effects.
Best of luck. I wouldn’t get a voluntary amputation with no infectious reasoning, myself, unless there was serious pain involved. After all, if really sweet treatment options come along post-surgery, you can’t benefit if the limb in question is GONE, can you.
gene108
@Librarian:
But by all accounts I’ve heard Emirates is an outstanding airline. Much better service than you’d get on an American commercial carrier flying international routes.
Goblue72
@Betty Cracker: The wording could be better. But I don’t see anything wrong with getting campaign volunteer to prep on talking points about the candidates policies.
japa21
@Goblue72: You mean other than the fact that saying women voters vote for Hillary simply because she is a woman is extremely condescending, much like AA’s only voted for Obama because he is black.
Tell me, what mistakes has Bernie or his supporters made in this campaign?
Hillary supporters are quite willing to admit she has made mistakes, and she has admitted to making mistakes. I don’t remember Bernie doing so (and I admit I may be wrong). But I rarely if ever have heard or seen any of his supporters acknowledge mistakes.
ETA: Betty obviously doesn’t need me to defend her, she does better than I can anyway.
ETA ETA: Nobody is saying the meetings themselves are bad, but that language is bad. It is as bad as anything Steinem or Albright said.
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid:Are you going to get a second opinion? Amputation sounds pretty drastic.
Amir Khalid
@Librarian:
I wonder how much say a national airline has in matters like its country’s human rights (or women’s rights) policy.
Jim, Foolish LIteralist
Yeah, enough Muggle presidents!
Betty Cracker
@Goblue72: There isn’t anything wrong with volunteers getting together to discuss talking points, but the assumptions and approach matter, no?
FlipYrWhig
@Betty Cracker: Meanwhile Hillary Clinton’s attempts to suggest that she is a progressive and a suitable candidate for progressives initiated a weeklong freakout. THOSE ARE OUR WORDS!
FlipYrWhig
@japa21: His only mistake is having been TOO tolerant of the dirty tactics and corruption of his opponent! Sometimes we wonder if he can recover from being just too good!
gene108
@Goblue72:
The Brady Bill*
Family Medical Leave Act
CHIP
DADT – allowing gays to legally serve in the military, whereas before it was 100% illegal for gays to be in the military. Not a perfect bill, but progress.
Requiring protesters to be 30+ feet from the entrance to abortion clinics.
There’s probably more, but that’s off the top of my head.
There were other things that gut scuttled by Bush & Co., such as the Assault Weapons Ban and adhering to the Kyoto Protocols to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
* One reason we’ll never have any sane gun laws, self professed liberals don’t give a damn that Bill got the two most sweeping gun control measures passed, since 1968. It’s down the memory hole.
Just Some Fuckhead
@ruemara: Wow, good luck attracting voters to your candidate with that hateful attitude.
FlipYrWhig
@gene108: IIRC new tax credits for college, too.
Brachiator
@dmsilev:
Also look for the first indirect evidence of the Silver Surfer riding over the gravity waves.
japa21
@FlipYrWhig: I have to assume that was meant as snark. Nobody could actually believe that.
Librarian
@Amir Khalid: I don’t care how much say it has. If you’re doing ads for a company owned by a repressive government, you’re supporting that government.
gene108
@FlipYrWhig:
Plus focus on AIDS research / outreach, anti-discrimination policies regarding gays in the Federal government, appointing more women and minorities to the Federal bench than any of his predecessors by a large margin.
Appointing the first women and minorities to various Cabinet level positions.*
Like I posted up thread, there’s probably more. I just don’t remember. He was not nearly as right-wing as liberals make him out to be.
* I give Bush, Jr. credit for maintaining a diverse Cabinet. He could’ve gone with a bunch of old white guys, but did not. That is a good thing on principle.
Amir Khalid
@schrodinger’s cat:
If the Professor who heads the hand/microsurgery unit is around at my next visit, I might ask her.
Corner Stone
I’m still not sure on the attack line using WJC’s time in the WH and policies is valid against HRC now, or why anyone thinks the timeline of our nation then is equal to where we are now.
Jim, Foolish LIteralist
@Corner Stone: Hillary is responsible for the things Bill did in office, Bill (according to our house Middle-Management Radical @Goblue72: ) is responsible for the things Bush did after Clinton left office, and Bernie is not responsible for his own votes.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Corner Stone:
I want to repeat the rousing online argument we had in 2008 where we decided that Hillary Clinton, an unprecedentedly powerful First Lady (save for Edith Wilson and Eleanor Roosevelt) was only responsible for the good things that happened in the WJC administration but none of the bad things.
But, alas, I’m a Clinton supporter now. The argument will have to be copy and pasted out of the Wayback Machine by the Utes and BernieBros.
Corner Stone
@Just Some Fuckhead: I hope that “we” is some reference to the Balloon-Juice commentariat. Because, as a Bernie supporter, I consider the First Spouse position to be largely ceremonial. One main benefit is to see up close how the deals get done and the apparatus functions. So it’s a semi-useful perspective but just as I did not see Michelle Obama in the room when Obama was taking out Bin Laden, similarly I did not see HRC in the room when WJC fired off cruise missiles at a reputed p-harma facility with the chance Bin laden may have possibly been there.
HRC’s failed attempt at health care reform in the ’90s may have exposed her to a hotter fire than MO’s school lunch program reform, I don’t think either in and of themselves closes the deal.
laura
@Betty Cracker: I just left work here in Sacramento with the very same and am in bed in my clothes because must lay down now!
When I can get up I have some ricola powder in a can and will make a hot ricola drinky. No acetominephine, alcohol only if warranted.
Sick and crappy, but just well enough to feel guilty and capable of working. Blergh
MazeDancer
@Betty Cracker:
More bad tactics: Bernie staffers got together with his Nurses SuperPac today for a session to learn how to speak to Black Women. They tweeted about it. Tweet got deleted. But, of course, screenshots abound.
Also, Bernie dissing Mr. Obama isn’t exactly the best tactic with Dems either. As is headlining Obama basher Cornell West.