Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republican also-rans: four mules fighting over a turnip.

Biden: Oh no. We’ve upset Big Pharma again.

“Cheese and Kraken paired together for the appetizer trial.”

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

If West Virginia and San Francisco had a love child.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

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

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

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

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

Russia bombs Ukraine’s maternity hospitals; Republicans in the House can’t sort out supporting Ukraine.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

I have other things to bitch about but those will have to wait.

Democrats have delivered the Square Deal, the New Deal, the Fair Deal, and now… the Big Joe Biden Deal.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

Marge, god is saying you’re stupid.

It’s a new day. Light all those Biden polls of young people on fire and throw away the ashes.

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Archives for February 2016

Clinton vs Sanders Steel Cage Death Match (Open Thread)

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Watching the pre-smackdown buildup on CNN. A CNN-bot was out there doing wo/man-on-the-street interviews to find out what we-the-pipple want to ask the candidates. If the slack-jawed ninnies the reporter buttonholed are any indication, we-the-pipple could use a good swift kick in the ass.

“I’d ask Clinton what she’s hiding in those emails,” one woman sniffed. “I heard she hid them and I’d ask her why.” Or something about that stupid.

The truth is out there, New Hampshire ninny. Just Google it and pick which version you prefer. You could even choose the candidate’s 5,000 statements on that very issue to get an inkling of what she’d say to you personally, you extra-special snowflake.

I wouldn’t blame a candidate who got such a dumb question for swinging his or her microphone on its cord like a mace and smacking that potential voter in the face.

And…we’re off!

PS: See our lovely Chicagoans here! (Sorry to step on you, Anne Laurie!)

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Open Thread: Chicago Meet-Up Success

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chicago meetup jan 16

From ever-reliable commentor Satby:

Here’s the best picture from last night’s meet up in Chicago.

Counterclockwise from bottom right it’s Elmo, Eric S, MGB, my exchange daughters Valentina and Qunoot, me (satby) in the red sleeves, ThomasB, and Christopholes. We had lots of fun swapping stories.

Elmo gets to Chicago several times a year, so we’ll plan further out for the next meetup and give people a chance to plan.

Tales of Balloon-Juice glory, increasing global outreach :) !

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Open Thread: Bots Have Taken Over the House GOP

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… and the results are still less obnoxious than previous GOP efforts to commemorate the civil rights struggle!
***********

Apart from the usual [sad trombone noises], what’s on the agenda for the evening?

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News From the Faunasphere: I Like Big Boats Edition

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I’m as caught up in the primary stuff as anyone—maybe too much. I keep thinking about the perhaps apocryphal story that Mozart never once mentioned a little thing called The French Revolution in any of his letters. The guy was a bit focused on his work, I guess, and that’s looking pretty good right now.

As a Sandernista, I appreciate Richard’s hard look at Bernie’s health care plan, and Betty’s wise suggestion that both candidates rein in their more obnoxious proxies. At the very least, I’m sure we can all agree that, now more than ever, it’s GREAT not to be a Republican!

Anyhoo, I’ll be posting something politicky soon that I’m sure many of you will enjoy eviscerating. In the meantime, perhaps as a break from the all the politicking, how about some News From the Faunasphere?

  1. FBI now tracking animal abuse like it tracks homicides and other serious crimes. Not just for the animals’ sake, but because “research has backed up that animal abuse can be a precursor to future violent crimes.”
  2. A lovely piece in The New York Times on a rehab center where traumatized vets and parrots help each other heal.
  3. Bad news for grandma, and so effed up. States use so-called “ag-gag laws” to criminalize free speech, free assembly, and whistleblowing. They’ve primarily targeted animal activists who document animal abuse and other malfeasances at factory farms and slaughterhouses. However, North Carolina’s new version adds “nursing homes, day care centers, and veterans’ facilities” to the list of protected enterprises.
  4. Courageous pilot who was tracking elephant poachers in Tanzania died after his helicopter was shot down by one. Roger Gower was only 37. So sad.
  5. The very first cultured-meat meatball has been produced and—surprise!—tastes like a meatball. Video: https://youtu.be/Y027yLT2QY0 Mosa Meat founder says cultured meats will be on supermarket shelves within three years. (Note: cultured meat isn’t cruelty-free since it originates with non-cultured meat and requires animal-derived nutrients for growth. But it will still relieve a lot of suffering.)
  6. sea shepherd dream ship 16x9Sea Shepherd is buying a new boat and it’s big (and cool).
  7. The New York Times ponders which pronoun to use for a non-human.
  8. Kids from Guatemala being trafficked to work on egg farms.
  9. If you can’t beat ’em… After a year of feckless anticompetitive shenanigans against vegan upstart Just Mayo, Unilever (maker of Hellmann’s/Best Foods) just announced that it will sell its own brand of vegan mayo. And last, but way not least:
  10. It’s here!!! Ben & Jerry just (today) announced its long-awaited vegan ice creamfrozen dessert line.

Thoughts on any of the above, Juicers? Got any other fauna-related news?

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Remember This When He Wants to Run

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It’s no secret that I think Andrew Cuomo is one of the worst Democrats out there, and here is some more evidence:

Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who should be using his power to make New York City more hospitable to working-class and middle-class families, has instead slipped a little poison into his executive budget that could cripple the city’s ambitious efforts to build affordable housing.

Housing is the centerpiece of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s agenda. He has promised to build or preserve 200,000 affordable apartments over 10 years — a tough proposition under the best of circumstances. It could be even tougher now that the governor has proposed placing new layers of state control over the city’s use of federal tax-exempt bonds to build and preserve affordable rental apartments. It’s not a stretch to call this sabotage.

Mr. Cuomo says it’s transparency and accountability, but it is more about intrusion and control. It would give the head of the Empire State Development Corporation, a Cuomo appointee, the power to sign off on the flow of tax-exempt bonds to New York City, which uses them almost exclusively for affordable housing. It would also require that every single affordable-housing project in New York City that uses the bonds get the approval of the Public Authorities Control Board, a shadowy entity controlled by the governor and the leaders of the Assembly and Senate.

These are the proverbial “three men in a room” who hold a death grip on policy-making power in New York State government. The phrase evokes the low-minded, chronically corrupt jockeying and deal-making that govern how the Albany game is played. That two of the three — Sheldon Silver and Dean Skelos — were ejected from the room last year, because of federal felony convictions, is about all you need to know.

History buffs- have there ever been a governor of a state and a mayor of a major city in the same state in which the governor, for no reason other than political ambition and spite, has done everything he can to screw the mayor?

At any rate, remember this when Cuomo announces his inevitable run for President down the road. He’s horrible, and should never be allowed to advance.

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What’s a couple trillion among friends

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The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget ran the numbers on the Sanders’ healthcare plan and its financing and depending on the assumptions, the Sanders plan is either $3 trillion dollars short over 10 years or $14 trillion dollars short over ten years compared to what the campaign is claiming.

That Sen. Sanders has shown a commitment to paying for his new initiatives and has proposed specific concrete changes to do so is quite encouraging. However, by our rough estimates, his proposed offsets would cover only three-quarters of his claimed cost, leaving a $3 trillion shortfall over ten years. Even that discrepancy, though, assumes that the campaign’s estimate of the cost of their single-payer plan is correct. An alternateanalysis by respected health economist Kenneth Thorpe of Emory University finds a substantially higher cost, which would leave Sanders’s plan $14 trillion short. The plan would also increase the top tax rate beyond the point where most economists believe it could continue generating more revenue and thus could result in even larger deficits as a result of slowed economic growth.

Sanders is not running in the Republican primary where the ability to propose programs with multi-trillion dollar piles of bullshit is an asset.  His campaign should respond to CRFB and Thorpe’s cost estimates on a non-ad-hominem basis to explain why their estimate that single payer is a net neutral fiscal move instead of a massive budget buster.

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