Senate leaders should listen to the American people. #DoYourJob pic.twitter.com/vArMxcZh5W
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) May 13, 2016
A little gift to all the GOP senators now “home for the weekend” with their constituents, already faced with the delicate task of explaining why a megalomaniac reality tv star / real estate developer is the new voice of their party, not that there’s anything wrong with that. Nice one, President Obama!
***********
Apart from no longer giving a rat’s arse, what’s on the agenda for the weekend?
Major Major Major Major
Hillary interview starts now!!! eeeek
Germy Shoemangler
from the Los Angeles Times:
jeffreyw
Via Joe.My.God.
burnspbesq
@efgoldman:
Did you go to the place downtown with the metal detector at the entrance?
Patricia Kayden
More good news for John McCain!
Amir Khalid
@Major Major Major Major:
Interview by whom? About what? Is it live? Is there a link?
From TPM:
MSNBC Host To Top Sanders Aide: Telling Fans He Can Still Win Is ‘Dishonest’
A Ghost To Most
@Major Major Major Major:
Cool,calm,confident. Good luck.
singfoom
Yeah, they should do their jobs, but they were elected because government is the problem, so in their constituents addled minds they are doing their jobs by not allowing anything to be done.
Self-fulfilling incompetency.
Also, too:
Shorter Texas: “The ability to discriminate against transgender people because they make us feel icky is worth more than $10 billion dollars.”
Patricia Kayden
@jeffreyw: Republicans are okay with losing billions of federal dollars to support their bigotry. They’re disgusting.
burnspbesq
@srv:
I am increasingly comfortable with the idea of Texas secession.
If they don’t share American values …
rikyrah
@srv:
Illinois will take Texas’ funding.
dr. bloor
@jeffreyw: @srv: Serendipity. Or something.
scav
Parts of the South really do always go to the mat and threaten to bail from the country over the possibility of being crap to people.
Emma
@srv: Good. An uneducated workforce in the global economy. Texas will go bankrupt in ten years and the federal government can buy it back at a yuuuuuge discount.
Keith G
I have changed my mind (For all the good it will do).
In most possible out comes imaginable, Hillary will win the presidency. At which time, the GOP will once again use Obama’s adherence to decency as a weapon against the march of liberal ideals. The Senate GOP will allow Garland to be voted in knowing that Hillary’s choice will be less favorable to a conservative’s view of the world. Their gambit of ahistorical disruption will gain them no penalty.
In that case, I want Obama to withdraw Garland and then tell McConnell to shove his gavel up his tight turtle ass.
MattF
Considering that Congress’ approval rating is 11%… when a huge 31% approve of what the Senate is doing, they’re golden.
ETA: I should say ‘don’t disapprove’ rather than ‘approve’.
Cacti
My in-laws are coming up for a visit.
Shoot me in the face.
Alain the site fixer
@efgoldman: glad to hear it! Eden Center is a treasure!
Glad the sun is finally out.
Off to the third of the four operas in The Ring Cycle. It’s been quite a commitment and expense but it’s 30 extra hours of quality time with my mom!
Hope your Monday event goes well and you continue to enjoy the area.
kdaug
Small bleg: could I get certified as a non-Trump supporter?
There seems to be some confusion on other channels
Iowa Old Lady
@Cacti: Paging Dick Cheney.
starscream
Between voter ID laws and bathroom bills, I wish Republicans would just drop the conceit and admit they hate large swathes of Americans. It has nothing to do with solving any actual problems. How much taxpayer money has been wasted on these monsters?
Keith G
@srv: Dan Patrick is a cagey Reich-wing talk show host who funneled his earnings into a political career and his position as Lt Govern gives him a huge amount of power in Texas’ legislature.
I do not use the word hate, so I will just say that I deplore how Patrick is so easily able to trade on hate, fear and, ignorance. But there is a silver lining. Texas IS changing and the days of Patrick’s focus of fear are definitely…..finite.
BillinGlendaleCA
Headed out to start the weekend with some new ink.
MattF
@Keith G: Even better, if Garland withdrew and told the Senate what he actually thinks of them. And then endorsed Hillary.
Cacti
Oh happy day!
Sheriff Joe Arpaio (Nazi-AZ) has been held in contempt by the U.S. District Court.
Next hearing is on 05/31 to determine whether there will be a criminal contempt case.
A Ghost To Most
@Amir Khalid:
Interview for a job with the Hillary campaign,I believe.
sunny raines
obama is flat-out WRONG to let republicans get away with not doing their job in reviewing Garland – its a precedent that can not be allowed to stand!.
obama should take the refusal as consent and seat Garland on SCOTUS – PHUCK mcconell and the Senate republicans. If republicans want a Constitutional crisis, obame should shove it right up their arses. Then obama could have a legacy worth having.
scav
@Cacti: Wonder if some of his defense will be as amusing as the Bundys’. Might be a lot of possibility for a cross-over circus.
singfoom
@starscream:
Yeah, they don’t want to fix any of those actual problems because then they couldn’t fundraise on government being broken and then use their power in government to make sure it doesn’t operate well, thereby fulfilling their own prophecy.
Can’t let the rubes in on the grift.
kdaug
@srv: You’ve no idea, mate. This is going to be epic.
Think “bathroom panty sniffer” v “leave me the hell alone”.
K488
@Alain the site fixer: Oh! Siegfried! Nice – by me, some of the best combination of music and character of the four, esp. the first half of Act III. Enjoy!
Major Major Major Major
ugh that was awful
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Major Major Major Major: :-(
Hang in there.
Cheers,
Scott.
The Thin Black Duke
@sunny raines: Huh? “a legacy worth having”? Idiot.
Trollhattan
Politics makes strange bedfellows, California edition.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Major Major Major Major: Luck to you.
The Lodger
@efgoldman: Apparently you weren’t that far from Jeff Weaver’s comic book store.
A Ghost To Most
@Major Major Major Major:
What happened?
FlipYrWhig
@Keith G:
At first I thought this said that he funneled his earwigs into a political career. Which seemed vaguely possible in Texas.
Iowa Old Lady
@Major Major Major Major: Oh no. I’m sorry. Still you can’t really tell.
SiubhanDuinne
@Cacti:
One of Drumpf’s yuuugest, classiest endorsers!
Brachiator
Damn. Patrick pulled a religious Godwin on the president.
Comparing the president to Judas is some serious shit.
As dumb and hateful as Texas is being, the administration may have stepped too far on this. It does not make sense to hurt students by pulling the education funding.
I hope that people are working behind the scenes for a compromise, and quickly. I do not want to see some child or teen hurt by some fool trying to take out their anger at Obama.
Frankensteinbeck
@efgoldman:
I think they’re really hoping they can get their most bigoted dreams passed, and will whine and drag things out like the toddlers they are. The politicians do hate to lose money to the state, and that’s an influence that will probably win, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t deeply conflicted, willing to lose a fair amount of it to accomodate bigotry, and hoping they can have their cake and eat it too.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Cacti: I will if you will. Have $; will pay prior to transaction.
Drive by here June 3-4. Short only because they’re headed back east after resettling their g*dly Xian son into housing after his time as a guest of the state. Here isn’t exactly on the way home and they’ll have been there for a week.
rikyrah
we have GOT to rid ourselves of this mofo.
………………….
A Republican senator and his beloved conspiracy theory
05/13/16 04:30 PM—UPDATED 05/13/16 04:33 PM
By Steve Benen
Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), who’s up for re-election this year, has an incentive to appear as moderate and level-headed as possible. He is, after all, a Republican running in a pretty blue state, sharing a ballot with Donald Trump in a presidential election year. The circumstances have made Kirk arguably the Senate’s most endangered incumbent.
And yet, the GOP senator just keeps making bizarre comments. Politico reports today:
U.S. Sen. Mark Kirk hasn’t let up on his insistence that President Obama is using his power as president to lash out at a political enemy.
At a fundraising event last month in Chicago, the Illinois Republican can be heard on audio defending indicted New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez, a Democrat, while accusing Obama of targeting Menendez because of his stance on Iran.
According to a recording Politico obtained, Kirk told his audience, “And let me say something about Bob Menendez. I believe that Bob Menendez was indicted solely on the crime of opposing the president on Iran.”
It wasn’t an off-hand comment: the Illinois Republican has pushed the same conspiracy theory over and over again.
Major Major Major Major
@A Ghost To Most: Everything was going fine, and at the end they asked the ‘how does the internet work’ question and I totally froze. Forgot about DNS completely, forgot how UDP works, managed to completely skip the backend request handling until I caught myself…
This is after an interview where we discussed in some depth things like distributed data architecture, so I don’t know how important it was??
Mary
@Brachiator: I think technically Obama is the Romans in the analogy. If Texas were to take the money, they would be Judas.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Major Major Major Major: Should have gone with ” it’s a series of tubes, it’s not a dump truck”.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Alain the site fixer: Ring cycle with your ma! That sounds like a dandy time. Though as you’ve no doubt noticed, a lengthy one. Enjoy.
@Cacti: About time. I’m guessing you saw that coming a while ago – can we reasonably hope for a criminal citation as well?
Brachiator
@Mary:
Fair point.
scav
@Brachiator: Over official guidelines suggestions? Not even an enforcement action? the Horror! I’ll echo: “Well I think this does underscore the risk of electing a right-wing radio host to a elected statewide office,” Go Earnest.
Dadadadadadada
@starscream: The “actual” problem this is meant to solve is simply this: Republicans do not have enough power. By callously exploiting the hatreds and insecurities of the worst Americans, they hope to gain more power. “Problem” solved.
Mike in NC
@Cacti:
So no longer a contender to be Trump’s VP?
Major Major Major Major
@Mike in NC: I think that’s a prerequisite.
Dadadadadadada
Copied from earlier thread:
OT: NPR just reported that the Feds won’t be releasing the list of unindicted co-conspirators in the Bridgegate affair because someone whose name is on the list made a motion last night to keep the list secret, claiming that the release of his/her name would cause “immediate and irreparable reputational harm”.
tl;dr: Chris Christie. It’s Christie. It was always Christie.
singfoom
@Major Major Major Major: You have my sympathies. So many tech companies don’t know how to interview people. And so many tech workers don’t know how to interview people. I bet it went better than you thought it did.
That’s a silly question unless you’re working for a backbone company or L3, or something. If it was at the end it might not have been serious.
My stupid ending question when interviewing developers was always: “Are you a mockist or a classicist?” There was no wrong answer, it was just a way for me to see if they knew what mocking was and if they enjoyed it or not.
Good luck!
Elmo
Yay, an Ann Laurie thread! So we can talk about animals! and maybe a little bleg. Read on:
A dear friend of mine from high school adopted a special-needs child from Ukraine, and has been actively training a service dog to work with her while trying to raise the scratch to pay the $15,000 to bring the dog home. They are down to the last two grand on their GoFundMe.
If anybody has loose change weighing down their pockets, desperate to MAKE THE JINGLE STOP, this is a good place to dump some coin, or at least I think so. All good wishes are welcome.
BillinGlendaleCA
@singfoom: That reminds me of a question asked of the Beatles in “A Hard Day’s Night”, “Are you mods or rockers?”. Lennon answers, “We’re Mockers”.
Millard Filmore
@kdaug: “bathroom panty sniffer” … where will they post for that job title? I want to apply.
NotMax
@Alain the site fixer
Wagner has great moments but dull quarter hours.
– Rossini
Wagner’s music is better than it sounds.
– Mark Twain
And the always obligatory link to Lady Anna Russell’s still hilarious synopsis of the Ring Cycle.
Shana
@efgoldman: Ooh yum. Do you remember the name of the place?
I’m off to have dinner with younger daughter and her boyfriend before I head off to NYC tomorrow morning with both daughters, meeting up with hubby, for a theater weekend. She Loves Me tomorrow night and Do I Hear A Waltz Sunday afternoon.
Then back to the DMV in time for the BJ meetup Monday evening.
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major:
I would have gone with the hamster running in the wheel to keep the Internets up.
gogol's wife
The NYTimes has got me addicted now to watching Rory Scovel videos. He is a seriously brilliant standup comedian. Anyone know him? One routine is about the grocery store, and after you hear it, you can’t go into the grocery store without cracking up. It just happened to me.
NotMax
@Dadadadadadada
Imprecise. Release (scheduled for noon today) deferred until noon Tuesday while motion is under consideration.
WaterGirl
@jeffreyw: That thymes with bucket, too!
? Martin
@Brachiator:
See, this is where the Dem civil rights fights always fall on themselves. The problem with being in the minority is that the majority argument is always the easier one to make. We can’t restore civil rights to X group because that would hurt large Y population. This is why minorities have a very tenuous relationship with Dems – the highway bill can always be taken hostage over gay rights, because Dems when forced to choose usually go with the majority, even when it’s not a moral imperative.
It does make sense to impact students over this because the benefits are conferred entirely on students. It would be wrong to pull education funding to solve some social security problem, but students are currently being harmed and this is a step to make that right. And if we take this as a moral issue, we can’t very well discount the rights of some students over others simply because they are smaller in number.
Iowa has had this law on the books since 2007. This is not some new hill for Texas to die on, it’s personal crusade from a known panty-sniffer.
? Martin
@Major Major Major Major: I knew Al Gore, and you are no Al Gore.
Alain the site fixer
@K488: thanks! I’ve not been the biggest Wagner fan but this is just mind blowing. I plan to learn lots more about it.
Brachiator
@scav:
Ultimately, the administration is talking softly and carrying a big stick, just to help the schools to do the right thing.
The idiots in Texas are probably saying that anyone with a big stick has to use the men’s restroom.
bemused
@kdaug:
I love this. TX kids don’t need no stinkin’ education if liberals think they’re gonna be the boss of our bathrooms.
Alain the site fixer
@NotMax: thanks for that, I’ll check it out tomorrow. Listening to pre-Siegfried lecture then joy.
The Other Chuck
@bemused: Not just kids. I think the wingnuts will notice when Texas A&M starts losing funding.
Alain the site fixer
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): time with mom is the best! The only reason we moved back to DC area from Colorado was to be close to family for such opportunities. Though she misses coming out 2-3 times a year for visits because Southen Colorado is just awesome. Ok back to lecture.
Steeplejack
@Shana:
Efgoldman, his better half and I had lunch at Huong Viet at Eden Center (Seven Corners in Falls Church). Just one of many good restaurants there—more like 30 than a dozen. Fine dining, cafés, delis, banh mi places, bubble-tea stands—everything. And they’ve added a gigantic Asian supermarket that is pretty phenomenal.
Mrs. efgoldman had spicy lemongrass chicken, I had spicy lemongrass beef, and efgoldman had a bowl of pho about the size of a small pond with many intereresting things floating in it. We shared some shrimp toast as a starter. Good eats. And delightful company.
Brachiator
@? Martin:
I don’t agree with your argument here. It does not make political or legal or moral sense to say, students are being hurt, so we will hurt them some more.
And as noted, for now the administration has no plans to actually withhold funding while the matter is in the courts.
bemused
@The Other Chuck:
Weird how they never think of pesky little things like that.
Mnemosyne
Some genius at the Vogue Knitting convention decided that the marketplace should open four hours AFTER morning classes were done. WTF.
On the other hand, I’m in a bakery a few blocks away drinking iced green tea and posting here thanks to an insanely strong wi-fi signal from across the street, so it’s not all bad.
Gin & Tonic
@Alain the site fixer:
That way lies madness.
Raven
@Steeplejack: beef pho or did you commit blasphemy and have chicken?
bemused
@The Other Chuck:
I read John Cole’s link to story from Scalawag Magazine and then read another from NC woman who wrote a bit about the state going backwards on gay rights and how it’s affecting the colleges/universities there. These Republican governors really want their states to fail miserably.
I did enjoy reading that Gov Brownback’s approval rating is 26%, lowest of all 50 states.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@The Other Chuck: Didn’t the NC congressional crew about go apeshit over the potential unfunding of the Tarheels?
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
For future reference, sometimes it can work in the moment if you just admit to the brain freeze, especially if you can make a joke about it. Like, Can you believe my brain just froze up? Hang on, I’m restarting it now …
Steeplejack (phone)
@Raven:
efgoldman had the pho; I don’t know which one. There was a big lotus pad floating in it that obscured a lot of the goodies below. Pretty sure it was a lotus pad.
Shana
@Steeplejack: Thanks for the info. I used to time my visits to G Street Fabrics at 7 Corners around lunch in order to go have dim sum at Fortune, but I’ve never been to Eden Center, which I KNOW is a serious mistake.
Fair Economist
@Brachiator:
Ooh, so the tubes are *hamster* tubes! That makes so much more sense.
Gimlet
Our good friends, the Saudis.
I know, let’s invade Iraq!!
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/may/13/september-11-saudi-arabia-congressional-report-terrorism
They took seats in front of a former Saudi diplomat who, many on the commission’s staff believed, had been a ringleader of a Saudi government spy network inside the US that gave support to at least two of the 9/11 hijackers in California in the year before the 2001 attacks.
At first, the witness, 32-year-old Fahad al-Thumairy, dressed in traditional white robes and headdress, answered the questions calmly, his hands folded in front of him. But when the interrogation became confrontational, he began to squirm, literally, pushing himself back and forth in the chair, folding and unfolding his arms, as he was pressed about his ties to two Saudi hijackers who had lived in southern California before 9/11.
Even as he continued to deny any link to terrorists, Thumairy became angry and began to sputter when confronted with evidence of his 21 phone calls with another Saudi in the hijackers’ support network – a man Thumairy had once claimed to be a stranger.
Raven
@Steeplejack (phone): prolly a hockey puck!!!
D58826
@srv:
go for it bigots. I’m sure there are a number of states that could that 10 billion to good use.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Shana:
Fortune is a great Chinese restaurant. I’m a regular there—well, takeout, usually. And there’s a good Thai restaurant around by Shoppers on the upper side, Bangkok Golden.
But definitely check out Eden Center.
Gimlet
@D58826:
Texas currently receives about $10 billion in federal education funding.
Will this affect the football season?
Steeplejack (phone)
@Gimlet:
Finally! The key question.
Corner Stone
@? Martin:
You’ve said a lot of really awful and just flat tone deaf things about a number of categories of people. Elderly people you wanted to make choose between medicine and food, working class people you wanted to make sure never worked again so you could better protect your investments in Apple, and now children in school who are powerless and should be held blameless in this idiotic power struggle?
You are a truly awful individual and should consider what the fuck part of society you actually believe in.
debbie
@Brachiator:
I’m not religious, but I found that reference to Judas pretty f*cking offensive.
scav
@Gimlet: If they could drive all the demanding whiney education-type student students away, they’d presumably have a bit more spare cash to switch from classroom to locker-room. It’s not as though students are the most important butts on the arena seats either I would imagine.
NotMax
Heh. A reference to Wheeler & Woolsey in this week’s Archer.
Zing! Flew over the heads of probably 99% of the audience.
MomSense
I returned to work too soon and now I’m home, exhausted, starving, and still on a restricted diet. The dog is super hyper.
Waaaaah.
I did find a box on my doorstep that was a present from my kids. Yellow chicken gardening shoes in the right size. So ridiculous looking they are cool.
Ok, pity party over.
Smoothie and dog walk.
? Martin
@Brachiator: The feds are not hurting them, Texas is. This is entirely Texas’s choice. They have decided that they will deliberately hurt some of their kids, and in order to preserve that they are willing to hurt others as well.
debbie
@Mary:
I think you err in assuming they’d get the analogy right.
bemused
@D58826:
Yes, all the states that get less than the $1 they pay in while the welfare queen states get more, much more such as South Carolina, over $7 back in 2014.
Steeplejack (phone)
@NotMax:
Noticed that. My favorite line this week: “What is this, a chair factory?”
Corner Stone
Don’t for a second think Texas officials are bluffing on giving up $10B in education funding. They have long, long wanted to absolutely kill public education. Kill it fucking dead and reinstate the Christianist Caliphate as default.
Now they can kill public education, destroy communities of color and get to hang it right around the queer loving Kenyan blackie. Did you know the president is black? Because he is and that’s why your Lil Johnny needs to pay $199 for this Xtianist curriculum and personally inscribed Bible for the upcoming semester.
WaterGirl
@MomSense: I must have missed something. Are you okay? :-(
I googled the chicken gardening shoes, and I laughed. The part I’m shocked about is the they go the right size!
p.a.
hope everyone has had a good Carberry Day.
Gimlet
@Corner Stone: that’s why your Lil Johnny needs to pay $199 for this…
As long as they don’t call it a tax.
delk
@Mnemosyne: Have you seen the Chris Jackson Hamilton lyric quiz video on Vanity Fair?
Uncle Cosmo
@Brachiator: Some big-arsed hunks of argentum there. At current value of $551.71/kg and a specific gravity of 10.49, 30 equally sized cubes of Ag totalling $10bn in value would each be 3.86m (12’8″) on a side. Not even a Brinks truck of unlimited!corporate!ca$h! could handle one of those.
Patricia Kayden
@Keith G: Your scenarios is disturbing because it foresees the Senate remaining in Republican hands. I hope that is not so.
@starscream: What conceit? It’s clear that they hate millions of Americans. Romney was caught on tape talking about the 47% that they believe are useless. Currently, Republicans are going on a tear against transgender Americans. I’m sure they’ll find another target for their hatred when they tire of anti-transgender bigotry.
MomSense
@WaterGirl:
I had a medical hiccup. I’m fine but tired.
Patricia Kayden
@D58826: Texas must be forgetting that it’s just one state. The U.S. would survive without it. Maryland could use some of that $10 billion.
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: Yeah, I did that. After some flailing. Shrug. Feeling a little better. Ooh, I have ice cream…
Corner Stone
@Keith G:
They are finite only in that we can get a SCOTUS to reinforce the VRA, or laughably, a Congress.
I keep trying to tell people that Texas is no closer to going purple now than it has been since the mid 90’s. Hispanics and Latinos have to see it as in their interest to come out and vote and b) be able to actually cast a ballot that counts. Before texas ultimately dooms the R party to the dustbin of history with no shot at winning the WH for the foreseeable future.
2024, maybe.
Patricia Kayden
@sunny raines:
President Obama has a legacy worth having already. Not sure why you would claim otherwise.
Corner Stone
@Patricia Kayden: You did not read any of the related articles. It’s not just Texas. It’s all of the South. They are all willing to fuck the kids in those states to thumb their nose at the unqualified feckless black tyrant dictator in the WH.
WaterGirl
@MomSense: So glad you are okay!
NotMax
@p.a.
Gotta do it. Vic and Sade, Going to Carberry.
Prescott Cactus
@Trollhattan: I departed from my local Dems meeting Wed night because the Guest Speaker was an anti medical marijuana physician. So not only dirty hippies, but dirty hippies with cancer or immune disease.
That’s not my Democratic Party. It’s weed. Has Colorado fallen apart ?
Corner Stone
@Gimlet:
Supporting Religious Freedom!
MomSense
@WaterGirl:
Thanks!!
LABiker
If Texas secedes, will Trump force the Texans to pay for the wall?
Iowa Old Lady
@MomSense: “Fine” is good.
Prescott Cactus
@Mary: On Thursday night you’ll find him where you want him.
Far from the crowds, in the Garden of Gethsemane.
Corner Stone
@Iowa Old Lady:
Slow Is Smooth…Smooth Is Fast
D58826
@LABiker:
I would willing throw something in a crowdfunding effort to pay for the wall
Mike J
@Gimlet:
It could.
WaterGirl
@MomSense: Okay, the google found an old thread and filled me in. That was some hiccup!! Very thankful for the outcome!
different-church-lady
@BillinGlendaleCA: Have you taken a good look the internet? I’m pretty sure it is a dump truck.
Trollhattan
@LABiker: At the least the wall moves north to the new international Oklahoma-Texas border. Mexico gives a big, “Ye-haw!” or perhaps an “Ole!”
I enjoyed this additional Patrick quote:
i.e., “Keep your cotton-pickin’ federal hands off of our federal dollars.”
eemom
@Steeplejack:
Really hope you can make it on Monday. No FAIR if the ef’s get to meet you and the rest of us don’t!
‘Sides, you promised we’d drink a toast to General Stuck someday…..
? Martin
@bemused:
Texas is the only red donor state, so they do have that in their favor.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@MomSense: And you have chicken sloggers! Rest up, and I hope you continue to improve.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@eemom: Tell me what time y’all are meeting and I’ll raise a glass for Stuck from closer to where his ashes rest.
Do ashes rest?
? Martin
@Corner Stone: You’re right. It was wrong of us to integrate those schools and make those white kids suffer so terribly. Thank you for being there to remind us of the terribly suffering of white students in 1963. Too bad you weren’t around then to spare them from the horrible federal government. Maybe you could have stood in a doorway or something.
Ian
@sunny raines:
Go read the constitution again. You sound like a page out of John Yu’s book.
Mike J
How do you know when your case is a dog?When you can’t even convince your attorney.
Yeah, we knew it was a bullshit argument, but the check cleared.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Corner Stone: Virginia went through something like this in the ’50s in response to Brown v. Board of Education. UVa:
I don’t think that Texas would be even that “successful” – they would quickly cave. The country is not going back to a “separate but equal” system for any minority group, IMHO.
Cheers,
Scott.
Corner Stone
@? Martin:
I don’t think you’re getting to the acidic point you think you are. I’m arguing for inclusion, and you’re saying inclusion is fine, as long as those who benefit from the funds get punished along the way to making it happen.
joes527
@Corner Stone: an interesting fallout of Texas burning it all down wrt public education is that the disproportionate influence that the god botherers and science deniers in Texas currently have on textbook content would be greatly diminished.
Prescott Cactus
@MomSense: Enjoy your new “kicks” and may your weekend be full of health and vitality !
Corner Stone
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Who said anything about “the country” ? I am saying that Texas and other entities across the South are more than happy to deny children funding for public education. They have the perfect last gasp scapegoat to blame it on while they destroy it.
? Martin
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Texas will cave because Texas is not filled with assholes. It’s led by assholes, but it’s not filled with them (CS notwithstanding – he is a fine, proud asshole). I do not believe most Texas parents give a shit about this issue, and if faced with school closings, I’m pretty sure they will fucking storm the courthouse. They may put oversized importance on their football and have a shitty process for selecting textbooks, but they’ve got a pretty damn good educational system there. Parents care, and in aggregate they know what’s right. There has been pretty solid fights against this in Texas.
Corner Stone
@joes527:
Maybe, maybe not. Free market capitalism has not yet been able to keep Texas from whitewashing Thomas Jefferson et al out of the history books for a huge order lot. Seems to me that the publishing houses would just start incorporating a lot more Bible verses into their Southron Mix editions.
The Lodger
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): Unless they’re in a seismically active location, I sure hope so.
Corner Stone
@? Martin:
You have no fucking clue what you are talking about.
? Martin
@Corner Stone:
I’m saying that civil rights is rarely painless. My kids have three transgendered friends between them. They’d gladly (and we’d gladly) see the schools shut down for a month on their behalf if that’s what was necessary. If you’re going to fight for something, fucking fight for it. Civil rights wasn’t won from the bully pulpit, it was won with federal troops, federal funding pulled, lots of federal agents, and more lives lost than should be tolerable. If this matters, then prove that it matters – call their bluff, see how much it matters to them.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Corner Stone: Virginia was more conservative in the 1950s than it is now, and they quickly caved. That was the point of my link and excerpt.
The GOP makes lots of noise about being tough, but they can be and are defeated quite regularly. (Look at Obama’s successes.) Yes, it takes uncomfortably long at times…
I appreciate that you see this stuff daily. But don’t freak-out about the Texas GOP. They’re not going to win this.
Cheers,
Scott.
Corner Stone
@? Martin:
If that was “necessary” to do what? It’s not a bluff, that’s what you don’t understand. They have long wanted to destroy public education in Texas. Punishing the students “who benefit”, a term I still have no fucking idea what means is not going to get to an end goal of equality in this case.
Corner Stone
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
Please to define what you mean when you say “win this”. Thanks
joes527
@Corner Stone: without a single bulk buyer, there would be much less pressure on the publishers to accommodate a bunch of smaller buyers who would all have conflicting doctrine that they would be demanding.
There would no longer be a single hurdle to get into the Texas market. Instead there would be hundreds of different hurdles.
The value of bowing down to some private school’s demands would just be too low to justify it.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Corner Stone: Texas is not going to successfully defy the DOJ and the rest of the federal government about discrimination against transgendered people. Lynch Press Statement:
She’s not going to back down on this, and she shouldn’t.
I know that so far it’s just been GOP people in Texas spouting off about the letter to public schools. I guess we’ll see soon enough if they’re willing to sue over it, or whether they just want a verbal punching bag.
HTH. My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
JPL
Mom Sense, As mentioned previously, take care and enjoy your weekend.
Peter
@Corner Stone: That doesn’t even make sense as a distorted straw man version of his position.
Prescott Cactus
Sounds like they are trying to kill it one way or another
ruemara
Lady Bunny is now home. I’m on the verge of panic, but I think I did ok, negotiation wise. I don’t want to do that again without $20k cash. Awful. I don’t know how house buyers do it.
I’m probably hosed. This will be a long weekend.
Villago Delenda Est
@? Martin: This. People fought, bled, and died for Civil Rights, just like they fought, bled, and died for a 40 hour work week, time and a half for overtime, paid vacations, workers compensation, and other things that are taken for granted.
This bullshit short term “think of the children!” crap ignores the history of the struggle to make this world a better place for everyone, not just a privileged few parasites.
Corner Stone
@Peter: Fuck you, clown. If you can’t read it’s not my problem.
Villago Delenda Est
@Corner Stone: What a pathetic white flag you put up in that post.
Corner Stone
@Villago Delenda Est: Man, I can’t even with people who want to advise hurting children who have no way to advocate for themselves or their future opportunities.
Go back to advising for tumbrels for all as that’s what you’re best at.
Villago Delenda Est
@Corner Stone: “Oh, won’t someone think of the children!”
We are thinking of the children, doofus. Long term. You, however, cannot see the forest for the trees.
Uncle Cosmo
@efgoldman: I will do everything I can to make it to Fado* as close to 17:30 as possible–I must leave NLT 20:30 to return to B’More & take a friend from Prague swing-dancing. So anyone desirous of hearing me dulcet tones in person had best be outrageously prompt by Oyrish standards.
* (which is a Portuguese song style as well as half of “Fadó fadó”, long long ago in Irish Gaelic)
Gimlet
Maybe the politicians can take over the Alamo and rename it the “Malheur National Wildlife Refuge of Texas”. Then taunt the feds and put up a fund-me page for state education.
Corner Stone
States dig in against directive on transgender bathroom use
States. Notice the plural. This is not just about Ole Whacky Ass Texas. How about we cut all the funding off for all the kids in almost a dozen states? That’ll teach ’em, because their benefit should be brought to bear in this argument.
I personally want LTG Dan Patrick to be taken on the infamous tumbrel ride. But since that’s not happening anytime in the next 10 – 15 years, I don’t plan on celebrating the joining with Texas GOP to destroy public education in Texas. Because they want to do it. And they’ve been doing it for over two decades. That’s what they want. And if they can blame blackie overreach that makes it that much sweeter.
Corner Stone
@Villago Delenda Est: You are not getting it. You do not know what you are talking about. You are in a bubble that does not get what is happening here.
A Ghost To Most
testing? Is this thing on?
I had several comments eated earlier.
Corner Stone
Tumbrels for all! Charter schools for white rich kids! Home school for other white kids! Farm labor for kids of color!
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Prescott Cactus: Gadzooks! Have you glanced at the ruling? (100 page .pdf):
(Some footnotes scratched in editing.)
Why didn’t they just print a Teabagger press release?
:-(
Cheers,
Scott.
(“Who needs facts and figures and numbers? We say ‘Reform’ will take care of the problems.”)
SiubhanDuinne
@NotMax:
I used to able to do that entire Anna Russell album by heart — the Ring, the How to Write Your Own Gilbert and Sullivan (Happy Birthday, Sir Arthur Sullivan!!), and the President of the Women’s Club introducing the guest speaker.
I’m not making this up, you know.
Corner Stone
@Villago Delenda Est: Did you just call me “doofus”? I guess I’ll take it as that’s as close I will get to the esteemed Senator Warren.
JPL
@Corner Stone: Sooner when my sons were in elementary school in the eighties, Texas schools were surprisingly good. I hate reading what a few whackos are doing to the state.
Gimlet
Escalation
Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) on Friday said he would likely call a hearing on President Obama’s directive telling public schools to allow transgender students to use bathrooms that match their gender identities.
“I oppose that piece of policy. I think … it is an executive overreach,” King said on C-SPAN Friday. “And it’s a topic we’re likely to bring up in a future hearing before the task force that I chair.”
geg6
Where’s Cole? We need a hockey thread.
Keith G
@Corner Stone:
Indeed some have.
I’ve been out of the game for a while now, but my 25 years teaching in Texas Public Schools gives me a little experience to be able to think that such an action on their part would ultimately be a losing hand. The folks whom you talk about wanting to close, or better yet just devastate, public schooling are not a majority. There’s a hell of a lot of middle-class, workaday suburban parents who at the very least like, and in some cases greatly are attached to, their local school systems. Is well worth noting that a lot of those work a day middle-class parents have children who fall under the umbrella of the special services that federal dollars help pay for. I think it’s safe to say that the majority of them will be wondering what Dan Patrick and friends are fucking up to.
Now, here is where I would insert that an unfortunately large number of those people could be scared by the words of Dan Patrick, but more and more of them will not be. And of course here is where Obama would need to do what Obama doesn’t do all that well and actually come out and talk a lot, proactively supporting the changes his administration is wishing to make on the way schools deal with this issue.
Gimlet
I think they’re going to impeach Obama for overreaching.
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/05/obama-transgender-bathroom-students-title-ix-223170
“I believe it is the biggest issue facing families and schools in America since prayer was taken out of public schools,” Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick declared Friday, mere hours after the Obama administration’s letter was released.
In Patrick’s view, the Obama administration’s transgender rights stance will divide the country along a “family-values” fault line, sow discord within school school districts and create a “modern day ‘come-and-take-it’ moment” that Trump can use to defeat Hillary Clinton in November.
Patrick, and many others on the right, see the threat of withholding federal resources for noncompliance as nothing short of “blackmail,” and vowed that the Lone Star State won’t be bullied by Washington.
? Martin
@JPL: I see a lot of students out of Texas schools. They’re quite good students. I take CSs point that in a dozen years they may no longer be, but up until now they have been.
? Martin
@Gimlet: Iowa has had a transgender bathroom policy since 2007. First one in the nation, IIRC.
Interesting position to argue from.
magurakurin
@Uncle Cosmo: I’ve seen Fado in Lisbon a couple of times. It’s cool. Very nice experience. Lisbon itself is the finest capital in Europe. If I could live in any city in Europe it will most definitely be Lisbon.
Corner Stone
@? Martin:
Texas places 43rd among states in national education ranking
Of course there are a number of excellent students in/from Texas. We’re yooge, and classy. So there are a chunk of kids that can get the access and resources they need to excel.
But as a whole the people in charge of Texas education have been systematically destroying public education for some two+ decades.
Corner Stone
@Keith G:
You indeed have been out of the game for over two decades.
Matt McIrvin
@singfoom: I have definite opinions on this subject, but I admit this is the first time I heard the two sides described as “mockist vs. classicist” and I had to look it up.
(I lean classicist, I think. Isolated unit tests are all well and good, they can pinpoint where regressions are, and you can’t automate much without some mocking… but I feel a lot better when things run end-to-end, and needing to write a mock for some complicated system drives me up the wall.)
Keith G
@? Martin: at the last school I worked at, high school, I was an advisor to an advanced academic competition in which we had student teams enrolled. One of our teams of seniors made it to the national competition and the district flew me and them to the University of Michigan campus (Boo) for the competition. The for kids I was traveling with were fixin to have a very interesting awesome. One was on her way to Harvard another to Yale the two boys were not going east. One was staying nearby at Rice University. The other was enrolled in Stanford.
Our school was a large Urban / Suburban High School with a highly mobile population 30% of which were White. There are school systems in Texas that are miserable scary. There are school system in Texas which are really quite good. Many of the ones that are good because of the combined efforts of community and staff to strive above conditions which others might find a bit problematic.
rikyrah
Found at POU:
Lips pursed.
Blood pressure rising with lips pursed.
Michael Bloomberg yall:
Keith G
@Corner Stone:
I’m confused about what you are getting at, but on a level of plain English, that statement is false and beyond merit.
Ruckus
@ruemara:
I’ve been buying/leasing for a long time and was pretty good at it. But remember that you are always at a disadvantage at a dealership. They know more than you do about the pricing, they have something you need and/or want and if you are in dire need they have you over the barrel. The big thing is, did you get a car that you like at a price you can live with? If you answer those two questions yes then you did OK. I just purchased a car last weekend and I feel the same way you sound, did I do OK. And the answer is yes, I paid close to what I felt the car was worth, I got more than expected in trade (part of the reason I signed on the dotted lines at this time) and I like the car. It is a lot different than my last vehicle, which I had for 9 yrs so I will have to get used to it. That really is the bottom line, purchasing a car for transportation always costs, it is never a positive monetary transaction for you.
Corner Stone
@Keith G: Sorry, read that wrong. Not teaching 25 “years ago” but 25 years teaching.
I would continue to argue that the situation has drastically changed in the last decade or so, with significant changes starting in the mid 90’s.
chopper
@Keith G:
forget it, keith. it’s derp town.
SiubhanDuinne
@Alain the site fixer:
I have been a Wagnerian more or less all my life, and I assure you, there are tons of resources out there to help you learn more about the Ring Cycle. But I would start with M. Owen Lee’s classic Wagner’s Ring: Turning the Sky Round. These were intermission features from a Met cycle some years ago where Fr. Lee was the radio broadcast commentator.
Also, try to get hold of the 2-CD set of Sir Georg Solti/Vienna Philharmonic playing Every. Single. Leitmotif. I think it’s called something original like “An Introduction to Wagner’s Ring.” The added value is that Wagner scholar Deryck Cooke identifies and explains each theme before you hear it, pointing out how they’re related and what they signify. There’s a handy booklet, too, to help you keep track.
You can go nuts, of course — my own Wagner books take up two or three shelves at least, and that’s not counting all the CDs and DVDs. But there are some I return to again and again, and these are two of the best, perfect for a newcomer as well as a Ring veteran.
I envy you. You are in for a great ride!
Prescott Cactus
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:
and lets cut $10 billion from that cause of . . . ah. . . bathrooms.
Some will never learn. Literally.
Keith G
@Corner Stone: Cool.
I would be among the first in line to say I wish things were better and they need to be. The Supreme Court (TX) ruling yesterday was extraordinarily disappointing. That said, I read beyond the headlines of the news article you linked. Allow me to paste a segment of it.
The italics are mine
WaterGirl
@rikyrah:
He forgot to mention those straight white males who have it so rough, too. Or maybe that’s in another paragraph. I think we really dodged a bullet when he decided not to run third party.
No One You Know
@srv: Does this mean there’s a chance Texas won’t be able to influence what the rest of the country reads in its school textbooks?
Corner Stone
@Keith G: I read that whole thing also before I linked it. Not sure if you’re grabbing some sense of accomplishment off the ranking of 24th, or just glossing past the ranking of 42nd for “chance for success”.
“Texas came out ahead of eight states: Louisiana, Arizona, Oklahoma, Alabama, Idaho, New Mexico, Mississippi and Nevada, in descending order.”
Man, but if that isn’t a murderer’s row.
SiubhanDuinne
@Gin & Tonic:
Ain’t that the truth!!
Gimlet
Of course if you believe in Satan, then you believe God exists and aren’t an atheist.
Steve Hill in many ways is a typical candidate running for elected office in California. He’s a former U.S. Marine looking to reform public schools, reduce the state’s mass incarceration rates, and create jobs. But a couple things are holding him back: He’s an avowed atheist and Satanic Temple organizer.
Hill is a Democrat running for the state Senate in California’s 21st district, and probably the only candidate in the country who embraces both atheism and the tenets of modern-day Satanism.
Keith G
@Corner Stone: There will come a point when it is not near my bedtime (I have to get up at 3 to go to work) so that I can do some exploration and figure out what the difference is between a measure of “academic achievement” and a measure of “chance for success”. I do wonder how you can rank in the middle of the pack of academic achievement and yet not do as well for chance for success. How is that different? Can you translate?
Corner Stone
@Keith G:
STAAR testing results. They spend inordinate amounts of time teaching to the standardized tests. That + attendance measurement is all that is needed for an ISD to achieve excellent rankings vis a vis other ISDs.
Then take those kids into a competitive environment, aka university, where they are measured against kids from states with actual resources, financing and a belief in education.
Mike J
@Gimlet: Satanists believe Satan is a symbol, not an actual entity. I’d bet most Satanists are atheists.
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
We absolutely did.
@rikyrah:
He’s a class act, he is.
That is snark, in case you didn’t catch it.
? Martin
@Gimlet:
Yeah, I’ve met quite a few satanists. Every one is an atheist that is just in it to troll fundamentalists. The only real way to fight ‘religious freedom’ is from the inside. Would be nice if the media could figure this very simple thing out.
Gimlet
@Mike J:
Figured they were just trolling fundies.
Helen
JFC just got back from Dublin. Was asked 100 times WTF???? Then there was an opinion piece in the Independent that asked “Is Donald Trump right?” FUCK.
gogol's wife
I keep reading the original post as calling for a vote on Judy Garland.
Mike J
@Gimlet: I believe there is a fair amount of that too.
Ruckus
@Mike J:
How could you believe something that is opposite the normally accepted side of a story, but a very important part of the entire tale without buying into the whole, be it symbol or reality? Oh wait I was applying logic, nevermind.
Ian
@Corner Stone:
The tumbrel is sarcasm. Death penalty is frowned upon here, generally, execpt when it really merits it.
scav
@Keith G: There’s a difference between being able to spit back the results for a known test and being educated in the all the skills and methods necessary to be able to determine the correct or most likely result in a novel environment. Integrating knowledge etc etc. The methods necessary to guestimate the correct answer on a multiple guess exam don’t count. See also the difference between book smarts and the better end of garden or common sense.
Villago Delenda Est
@Corner Stone: Yet this is precisely what will result from not standing up to regressives like Abbot, Patrick, McCrory, and Bryant.
Villago Delenda Est
@Gimlet: They’re firing up their loathsome bronze age base because the presence of Drumpf at the top of the ticket will actually suppress their GOTV effort, and something must be done to get these primitives to show up at the polls. This isn’t the first time they’ve found a diversion from the smell of fail with their candidates.
Kropadope
@Mike J:
That’s my view also, though I’m more of a self-styled Unitarian Universalist.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
My speaw was in the caw, fwont passengew seat, wight next to me. I weft the magic hewmet in my hotew woom.
Davis X. Machina
@Corner Stone: There’s enough freedom and godliness in that list of states to make your teeth hurt.
schrodinger's cat
@rikyrah: Did you read Andrew Sullivan’s piece about Trump in New York Magazine? He should have stayed retired. I couldn’t complete more than 2 paragraphs before ::headdesk::
Matt McIrvin
@rikyrah: This person in the middle of it is rather more self-aware (see the footnote at the bottom):
https://morecrows.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/unnecessariat/
I would have nothing constructive to say to this person. What they need in these places that have no jobs any more, and probably never will have any, is probably just helicopter drops of money. But lots of black Americans, Native Americans, etc. have been in similar situations since forever and helicopter drops of money for them are a surefire way to make white people lose their shit.
tybee
@? Martin:
Elie
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
Here is to Stuck — sigh — one of the best thinkers ever… and a real human being — it appears to not be an easy or foregone conclusion anymore.
SiubhanDuinne
@tybee:
If you’re somewhat aged, and don’t have the best vision without glasses, and happen to glance quickly at your comment, it ends up looking an awful lot like “I farted.”
Thought you would want to know.
WaterGirl
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): @Elie: I don’t know if I have this right, but it seems to me that Stuck gave Charlie his bath on Friday nights, so it seems fitting to raise a glass to the general tonight.
Stuck, I’m not sure if you would approve of what I’m drinking – hot chocolate & rumchatta – but I raise my glass to you. You are missed!
PurpleGirl
@SiubhanDuinne: For years I went the BDQ Bach winter concerts in NYC. One Year Anna Russell was the opening act and did her Ring Cycle lecture Another year she brought on weird classical music acts. Luckily I (and friends) had .seats in the orchestra sections where we could really hear and see the performances.
The Lodger
@SiubhanDuinne: I don’t think you can deny a fundamental relationship between the two activities.
Matt McIrvin
@Matt McIrvin: …And also, if it’s mostly because Hillary Clinton and people like her truly don’t give a shit, why haven’t black Americans abandoned the Democrats and fallen into pure nihilism, like these white people are doing?
eemom
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
@Elie:
@WaterGirl:
Raising my sparkling rose as well. Clink!!
eemom
@Elie:
And SO true. : (
SiubhanDuinne
@PurpleGirl:
Oh, I am envious! Saw her on TV several times, and wore out all the albums (and, as mentioned above, committed a fair few of them to memory), but I never saw her live.
I did once see P.D.Q. Bach live, when I lived in NYC.
chopper
@eemom:
I’ll raise a glass to that.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Elie:
Here’s to General Stuck. He would have been a strong ally against all of the current insanity, hugging his plastic unicorn.
gogol's wife
@eemom:
Here’s to General Stuck! He is missed.