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You are here: Home / Past Elections / Election 2016 / Teach Your Children Well

Teach Your Children Well

by John Cole|  June 5, 201612:48 pm| 429 Comments

This post is in: Election 2016, Post-racial America

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hateagain

Regardless if Trump loses or not, his candidacy and his tactics are going to have long-standing repercussions for society. Today, der TrumpenFührer decided that not only are Americans of hispanic descent not fit for the court, but Americans of the Islamic faith:

Presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump said that it was possible that a Muslim judge would be biased against him when asked in an interview aired Sunday for his views after proposing a ban an all Muslims.

Trump reiterated on CBS News’ “Face the Nation” that he thought U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, who is presiding over the federal fraud case against Trump University, was biased toward him because he was “very strongly pro-Mexican.”

CBS host John Dickerson asked Trump if he thought he wouldn’t be able to be treated fairly by a Muslim judge.

“It’s possible, yes. Yeah,” Trump replied. “That would be possible, absolutely.”

“He is a member of a club or society, very strongly pro-Mexican, which is all fine. but I say he’s got bias. I want to build a wall,” Trump said, referring to the wall he wants to build between the U.S. and Mexico.

I wish there was an enterprising reporter or journalist who would just confront Trump with a checklist of ethnic backgrounds and religions and ask him to put a check next to which ones are real Americans who are capable of serving on the judiciary fairly.

At any rate, by validating his candidacy, Paul Ryan and others are most certainly partly to blame for this kind of thing:

whitewalkersandtheirwall

A group of students at a western North Carolina high school built a wall made of boxes and blocked access to a common area, and their Latino classmates are upset.

The students were allowed into McDowell High School, about 100 miles northwest of Charlotte, on Wednesday to perform a prank as a teacher supervised them.

A photo of the wall with about 30 students standing in front of it was shared on Instagram and captioned, ‘We built the wall first.’

Principal Edwin Spivey says one of the kids wanted to put a Donald Trump logo on it and was told he couldn’t do that.

The wall was taken down before classes began on Thursday.

Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, has promised to build a wall along the US-Mexico border if he gets elected.

He said in a June 2015 speech announcing his candidacy: ‘I would build a great wall, and nobody builds walls better than me, believe me, and I’ll build them very inexpensively, I will build a great, great wall on our southern border. And I will have Mexico pay for that wall.’

At the time, he also said: ‘When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best.

‘They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you.

‘They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us.

‘They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.’

Why is that teacher still employed? Oh, yeah. North Carolina.

I’ve long said that I prefer to have my racists out in the open- I like letting the Klan march in Skokie because I actually do like people to speak their minds and then be held accountable for them. I much prefer being able to keep an eye on those hooded peckernecks than have them hidden underground making bombs and planning lynchings. At the same time, I don’t think political correctness is some horrible scourge on humanity. Yes, there are a bunch of whiny shits on college campuses, but hopefully they will grow out of it, and when they don’t, it’s because they have shitty faculty who didn’t teach them. But most of all, what political correctness means is a basic sense of fucking decency.

The Trump campaign has burnt to the ground any sense of decency, and is actively whipping up hate. This is scary and is going to be a mess for a long time coming, particularly since these kids are learning it from their parents and are going to get even angrier and more radical unless their beliefs change, because they are soon going to be the minority in America. What’s happening in schools like this in North Carolina is we are breeding the next group of racists who are going to make life hell for all of us long after I am dead.

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Reader Interactions

429Comments

  1. 1.

    tastytone

    June 5, 2016 at 12:53 pm

    And the wheel goes round. Ai yai yai.

  2. 2.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 12:54 pm

    Thanks to Drudge, upcoming tell-all book CRISIS OF CHARACTER by Hillary’s former Secret Service Agent shot up to #1 on Amazon from #6,000 or so overnight! This will be the UNFIT FOR COMMAND of 2016!

  3. 3.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 5, 2016 at 12:54 pm

    You’ve got to be taught
    To hate and fear,
    You’ve got to be taught
    From year to year,
    It’s got to be drummed
    In your dear little ear
    You’ve got to be carefully taught.

    You’ve got to be taught to be afraid
    Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
    And people whose skin is a diff’rent shade,
    You’ve got to be carefully taught.

    You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late,
    Before you are six or seven or eight,
    To hate all the people your relatives hate,
    You’ve got to be carefully taught!

  4. 4.

    J.

    June 5, 2016 at 12:56 pm

    While it is too late to prevent Trump from seeking the office of President of the United States, this solution would (hopefully) prevent future Trumps from even considering a run, or would prevent them from being the nominee.

  5. 5.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 12:57 pm

    From the book blurb:

    Posted directly outside President Clinton’s Oval Office, Former Secret Service uniformed officer Gary Byrne reveals what he observed of Hillary Clinton’s character and the culture inside the White House while protecting the First Family. Now that a second Clinton administration threatens — their scheme from the very beginning — Byrne exposes what he saw of the real Hillary Clinton.

    While serving as a Secret Service Officer, Gary Byrne protected President Bill Clinton and the First Family in the White House and outside the Oval Office. There, he saw the political and personal machinations of Bill and Hillary Clinton and those who were fiercely loyal to them. In CRISIS OF CHARACTER Byrne provides a firsthand account of the scandals–known and unknown–and daily trials ranging from the minor to national in scale.

    Having witnessed the personal and political dysfunction of the Clinton White House–so consumed by scandal and destroying their enemies, real and imagined–Byrne came to understand that, to the Clintons, governing was an afterthought. He now tells this story–before voters go to the polls–in the hopes that Clinton supporters will understand the real Hillary Clinton.

    This is going to be extremely damning. Watch it get wall-to-wall coverage on cable news right up until the convention. Hillary is being defined.

  6. 6.

    RepubAnon

    June 5, 2016 at 12:57 pm

    There’s really no such thing as “political correctness” – there are only people speaking their minds. The term “political correctness” is basically a phrase that conservatives use to suppress speech they disagree with – as in:
    “Conservatives speak their minds – liberals don’t want to admit that the conservatives are right, so they just make hypocritical criticisms in an effort to be ‘politically correct.'”

  7. 7.

    bystander

    June 5, 2016 at 12:58 pm

    Ya You! Another reason not to spend money in North Carolina!

  8. 8.

    NCSteve

    June 5, 2016 at 12:58 pm

    No. Not “because North Carolina.” Because Western North Carolina. The part of North Carolina that is to North Carolina as, say, West Virginia is to Virginia, or Pennsyltucky is to Pennsylvania.

  9. 9.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 1:00 pm

    John you are too naive, white people can are the only people who can judge white people. White people are also the only one’s who can judge black people latino, and any other people. Whites are mature enough to set aside petty personal prejudice, the rest of us not so much.

  10. 10.

    Miss Bianca

    June 5, 2016 at 1:00 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: My father told me that a lot of bigwigs told R and H that they loved South Pacific, except for that one song – that they really needed to take it out if the play was going to go anywhere. Thankfully, they didn’t listen.

  11. 11.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 1:00 pm

    And you know what? I don’t feel a shred of sympathy for the Republican politicians who are now stuck between the actual Trump and their fantasies of a ‘good’ Trump that’s– somehow– lurking under the badger, somewhere.

  12. 12.

    shomi

    June 5, 2016 at 1:01 pm

    “Regardless if Trump wins or not”

    That’s as far as I got. What a ridiculous way to start a blog post. Like it’s a 50/50 type thing and just roll with it….Lol. Stay wrong….Cole. That’s what you are good at.

  13. 13.

    Tim C.

    June 5, 2016 at 1:02 pm

    @RepubAnon: Wait… huh? I’m not following. I thought “politically correct” was the Right-Wing code term for “Not overtly bigoted in some way”

  14. 14.

    Iowa Old Lady

    June 5, 2016 at 1:03 pm

    Is anyone else getting some sort of security alert when the log onto BJ? I’m wondering if it’s my computer that’s borked.

  15. 15.

    Baud

    June 5, 2016 at 1:03 pm

    I too am pleased it’s out in the open. It had to be sooner or later.

  16. 16.

    max

    June 5, 2016 at 1:05 pm

    The Trump campaign has burnt to the ground any sense of decency, and is actively whipping up hate.

    Er, what sense of decency? Do you not recall the Ground Zero mosque and all that going back to 2001?

    This is scary and is going to be a mess for a long time coming

    It’s been a mess and a long time coming. I’m pretty sure popping this pimple coming to a head is going to be good, not bad.

    particularly since these kids are learning it from their parents and are going to get even angrier and more radical unless their beliefs change, because they are soon going to be the minority in America.

    There is no limit to teenage stupidity. They’ll be embarrassed by the whole thing in ten years or so. Well, a lot of them will be.

    What’s happening in schools like this in North Carolina is we are breeding the next group of racists who are going to make life hell for all of us long after I am dead.

    They never left. But as you say, they lack manpower so this is likely a dwindling problem. (There’s always a Confederate revolt when their manpower is crapped out and they’re going to lose. When they have the manpower, they don’t need to revolt.)

    max
    [‘The ghosts of 1861 walk among us.’]

  17. 17.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 1:05 pm

    @Iowa Old Lady: Not me, so far.

  18. 18.

    RepubAnon

    June 5, 2016 at 1:05 pm

    @Ramping Up: The working title was probably “Our Loosely-Enforced Libel Laws…” You’re correct, though – Maureen Dowd will be pushing this book in every column until the election – and if Hillary wins, throughout Hillary’s term in office. Trump University will be on page 12 below the fold.

  19. 19.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 1:06 pm

    In an earlier thread that was taken over by trolls, I pimped an article my son got posted on Salon.com today Looking the other way: The accepted sexual abuse of young boys by institutional powers.

    I was reading the comments about it and surprised to see an opinion that part of the solution should be to educate children that this type of behavior is not acceptable. At first I thought this is just another way of blaming the victim but is it even possible to help children understand that is not acceptable to the point they can control the situation? Too many times this abuse is done by authority figures so how can a child take command of the situation? Seeing a bully like Trump be in authority and being praised by his supporters for his oppressive behavior, aren’t children being taught that intimidation is an okay social behavior?

  20. 20.

    Anoniminous

    June 5, 2016 at 1:07 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    If you need help with the long words your local thrift store will have an English dictionary for sale, cheap.

  21. 21.

    Walker

    June 5, 2016 at 1:08 pm

    @NCSteve:

    Yeah, because the eastern coast (excluding the Black Belt counties) is such a progressive area. In my experience, the out of state retirees in the Wilmington area are even more racist.

  22. 22.

    Iowa Old Lady

    June 5, 2016 at 1:08 pm

    @MattF: Then it’s probably me. Thanks.

  23. 23.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 1:08 pm

    @MattF:
    It’s the epistemic closure, they truly thought/think that their view of the Clintons and Obamas is shared by the silent majority. Trumps boasts of having the number 1 show with 10 million viewers suckered them into believing he could win. Since he crushed all his challengers they thought he could crush Hillary. You would think they would learn after 25 years, they are not hated.

  24. 24.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 1:08 pm

    @Renie: And kids often just repeat their parents’ opinions. Most of them will grow out of it, some won’t.

  25. 25.

    Chyron HR

    June 5, 2016 at 1:10 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    So “HILLARY UNIVERSITY” lasted for less than 12 hours? Even for you, that’s pathetic.

  26. 26.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 1:13 pm

    Coincidentally I have a friend, now retired from the Secret Service, who was on HW’s, Bill’s and Hillary’s details. Soon he’ll be able to note he protected three presidents.

  27. 27.

    shomi

    June 5, 2016 at 1:14 pm

    @Chyron HR: You see that pattern as well I see. Apparently they are still following the 90’s playbook. Nobody ever accused conservatives of being adaptable and innovative.

  28. 28.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 1:16 pm

    @MattF: I should say, I’m not suggesting that the kid’s parents would approve of abuse– just that ‘teaching’ that abuse is bad isn’t likely to be effective. You need to encourage specific behaviors that combat abuse.

  29. 29.

    Miss Bianca

    June 5, 2016 at 1:17 pm

    So, I had a comment about character, honor, Hamilton, Burr, and Trump, and it just vanished into the ether. What triggered that? “Hamilton”? Testing…

    ETA: OK, so it wasn’t “Hamilton”. Good to know, for Mnem’s sake, if not for mine!

  30. 30.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 1:18 pm

    @Ramping Up: He wasn’t a Secret Service agent. He was a junior – as in two years on the job – uniformed Secret Service Officer at the White House. He worked a shift assigned to a specific location in the building, then he went home for the night. He was not on either President Clinton’s or Secretary Clinton’s actual security detail. His only actually notoriety was informing the Deputy Chief of Staff that he saw Monica Lewinsky in the West Wing at times when he didn’t think she needed to be there. That’s it. He never traveled with the Clinton’s. He didn’t spend time in either of their White House offices. He didn’t spend time in the residence. Talk about suckering the rubes.
    http://www.nytimes.com/1998/04/24/us/secret-service-officer-worried-about-lewinsky.html

  31. 31.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 1:18 pm

    @Ramping Up:
    Dysfunction, the word that personifies Trump. His campaign is in turmoil run based on what fleeting brain fart the candidate has, with no one able to save him from himself. A candidate who lacks impulse control in both his personal and public life. You do know that to discredit Trump there’s no need for an informer, all we need to do is put out his sessions with Howard Stern, or his hundreds of interviews in his own words/voice. The commercials will be epic.

  32. 32.

    Mary G

    June 5, 2016 at 1:18 pm

    My comment got eaten twice?

  33. 33.

    RepubAnon

    June 5, 2016 at 1:19 pm

    @Tim C.: Yes, conservatives use “politically correct” whenever they’re called out for overt bigotry – but it’s broader than that. Anyone criticizing a conservative is accused of making those criticisms in bad faith in an effort to be “politically correct” – and that accusation is then used to silence those critics. In essence, the dreaded “PC Police” are the conservatives seeking to silence anyone trying to introduce facts, civility, or anything else conservatives disagree with into a discussion.

  34. 34.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 1:19 pm

    Ethnically diverse crowd in front of the “wall” there.

    Every last one of those snots should be hauled off to basic training under a Hispanic surnamed drill sergeant.

  35. 35.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 1:21 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: The rubes are predisposed to be suckered. Doesn’t take much to give them the fully monty.

  36. 36.

    Teddy's Person

    June 5, 2016 at 1:22 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: The teacher supervising the “prank” should join them.

  37. 37.

    Baud

    June 5, 2016 at 1:23 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Good enough for Wingnut Welfare.

  38. 38.

    RandomMonster

    June 5, 2016 at 1:23 pm

    @Ramping Up: I’m sure the Clinton campaign is trembling over the latest hatchet piece. They’ve probably decided to just declare Bernie the victor and retire in shame, to live out the rest of their days in obscurity.

  39. 39.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 1:24 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: This is true. “I stood in front of the Oval Office for a year, but I know everything that went on inside when the door was closed. And in the First Lady’s Office on the other side of the building. And upstairs in the residence. And on Air Force one and Marine One, which I never set foot on….”

    Genius!!!

  40. 40.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 1:24 pm

    @Ramping Up: You are a idiot. But we knew that already.

    (Note to Juiceitariat: Ramping Up is one of the rubes.)

  41. 41.

    bystander

    June 5, 2016 at 1:25 pm

    @bystander:
    “Ya You” was autocorrect’s version of “Yay!” I really don’t use “ya you” as an interjection. For the record.

    Is it just me or is there a significant uptick in trollposts?

  42. 42.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 1:27 pm

    @RepubAnon:
    Politically correct is their new ‘race card’, or any card. It’s used to turn themselves into victims. Kind of like how they love the first amendment until it’s used to criticize them. I want banners all over the country telling them,it allows you to criticize but does not protect you from criticism.

  43. 43.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 1:27 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: That’s where my mind went.

    Good rant, Cole.

    My first thought was a David Cross bit. I don’t remember anything but this one line, but it’s about how you have to learn these things…

    No baby’s first words are ‘the Jews have all the money!’

    I will take issue with this:

    Yes, there are a bunch of whiny shits on college campuses, but hopefully they will grow out of it, and when they don’t, it’s because they have shitty faculty who didn’t teach them.

    The fish rots from the head there. The administration is feckless. The ranks of faculty members who will risk their careers for this stuff are shrinking. (Not blaming the faculty though, their job market is, um, rough.) The problem’s still overblown, and it’s not going to have any measurable effect on society other than some kids who aren’t fit for the job market until they’ve earned their lumps (and lord knows that’s never happened before), but… bleh. I blame money.

  44. 44.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 1:27 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    The media won’t care and neither will idiot low-info swing voters. Keep on trying to dispute it–it only gives it oxygen. Remember UNFIT FOR COMMAND?

  45. 45.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 1:27 pm

    @bystander: The trolls are getting ever more insistent. It’s actually a positive sign, but it is irritating.

  46. 46.

    Cat48

    June 5, 2016 at 1:32 pm

    My mother taught me when I was going to kindergarten to treat everyone the same, regardless of their race. Thanks mom.

  47. 47.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 1:33 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Remember UNFIT FOR COMMAND?

    Remember when your boy had to steal both his elections because he was too much of a dumbfuck to actually win?

  48. 48.

    Frank Wilhoit

    June 5, 2016 at 1:34 pm

    As usual, the real point is a much more general one.

    Trump cannot imagine losing except through “unfairness”, viz. bias or corruption. A “fair” process is one that gives him the outcome he wants, and that is how it is known to be fair. Conversely, an outcome that he does not like proves that the process was “unfair”.

    The source of the “unfairness” only matters insofar as he can tell a resonant story about it. This is where it becomes possible to talk about “racism”, because what that signifies is the resonance of a story about Mexicans, Muslims[, Jews, blacks, queers, liberals, etc. ad inf.]. But there again, the primary resonance of the story is always the notion that “if it had been fair, we would have won”.

    This is the real toxicity of Trump’s attacks upon his perceived enemies, whomever they may be, whatever their group affiliations may be.

  49. 49.

    Oldgold

    June 5, 2016 at 1:34 pm

    I am starting to worry that Trump is imploding so fast that he won’t be the nominee and that we will end up facing a plausible GOP candidate in the fall.

  50. 50.

    Mnemosyne

    June 5, 2016 at 1:36 pm

    @Renie:

    From what I’ve read, child molesters try to target the kids who have some kind of chaos at home that makes it difficult for them to talk to their parents, which makes it less likely that the molester will get caught. If anyone has a responsibility, it’s the responsibility of the parent or parents to make sure they keep those lines of communication open so their child feels comfortable confiding in them.

  51. 51.

    geg6

    June 5, 2016 at 1:37 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    LOLOLOLOLOL!

    Hilarious troll. Thanks, I needed that laugh.

  52. 52.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 1:37 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: I believe what you want is:

    Never try to reason the prejudice out of a man. It wasn’t reasoned into him, and it cannot be reasoned out.

    Sydney Smith 1771-1845

  53. 53.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 1:37 pm

    I weep for what might have been. The late 90’s featured a burgeoning neo-hippy movement, which was absolutely crushed by 9/11 and W. And we’ve been descending a dark path ever since, despite the light of Barack Obama.

    If Trump were to win, I fear the darkness would fully descend and who know what happens after that.

    We’re fighting not just for our country, but for our very world and everything alive on it.

  54. 54.

    A Ghost To Most

    June 5, 2016 at 1:39 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Remember UNFIT FOR COMMAND?

    Is that like ON-DEMAND FUNDING?

    Fucking Hitler Youth.

  55. 55.

    Tim C.

    June 5, 2016 at 1:40 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: He won legit in 2004. At least I’ve never seen any real evidence to the contrary. 2004 was also before a lot of the crap hit the fan for the W administration, Pre-openly admitting torture, pre-Katrina, pre-attemting to destroy Social Security, Pre-near economic collapse. The GOP winning formula for presidential elections has been since 1980: Sunny talk about cutting taxes, fear the outsiders… but don’t look like an a-hole about it. That’s a hard plan to execute these days for anyone, much less Trump.

  56. 56.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 1:41 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Haha, keep whining you little bitch. Here, take a trip down memory lane.

    Bush WON.

  57. 57.

    Brachiator

    June 5, 2016 at 1:42 pm

    I wish there was an enterprising reporter or journalist who would just confront Trump with a checklist of ethnic backgrounds and religions and ask him to put a check next to which ones are real Americans who are capable of serving on the judiciary fairly.

    Trump’s got his enemies list already, and he ain’t even president yet. Hell, he ain’t even the official nominee yet.

    There are all kinds of legal and constitutional objections to everything coming out of Trump’s mouth concerning his bizarre and racist idea of judicial conflict of interest. And yet, while GOP leaders try to gently back away, they know that they are held hostage by this mad man, and so refuse to clearly point out that he is an idiot as well as an obvious bigot.

    Trump is finding a new way, every day, to demonstrate the proof of Hillary Clinton’s contention that he is temperamentally unsuitable to be president. And yet instead of looking for an alternative before it is too late, the Republicans cling more tightly to him.

    This cannot end well for the GOP, even if they somehow win in November.

  58. 58.

    Gimlet

    June 5, 2016 at 1:42 pm

    @Frank Wilhoit:

    Trump cannot imagine losing except through “unfairness”, viz. bias or corruption. A “fair” process is one that gives him the outcome he wants, and that is how it is known to be fair. Conversely, an outcome that he does not like proves that the process was “unfair”.

    Also brings to mind McConnell’s refusal to allow Obama to name Scalia’s replacement on the SC. Apparently there is widespread perception of unfairness in the courtroom rather than dispassionately applying the law to facts.

  59. 59.

    Catherine D.

    June 5, 2016 at 1:42 pm

    Ah, don’t worry. There won’t many human generations to worry about after the planet implodes. I’m rooting for the cockroaches to take over. (quietly sings “Their Brains Were Small and They Died” to self)

  60. 60.

    Elizabelle

    June 5, 2016 at 1:42 pm

    @Oldgold

    I am starting to worry that Trump is imploding so fast that he won’t be the nominee and that we will end up facing a plausible GOP candidate in the fall.

    I’ve been wondering about that too. And then, whoever ends up the GOP nominee, the mainstream media will be “look! A return to sanity.” It’s worrisome.

    Although: since he does seem so close to imploding, I am surprised that Ryan and McCain endorsed Trump NOW, and not a lot closer to the convention. I don’t see either living down that endorsement, either.

    Cannot guess what is going on on the GOP side. They’re way over the shark, into barrel over Niagara Falls mode. Only question is “do they bounce?”

  61. 61.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 1:42 pm

    @Ramping Up: I’ll be impressed if you can continue this act in 2020.

    UNLIMITED BITCOINS!

  62. 62.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 1:43 pm

    CRISIS OF CHARACTER author is also setting up a group of former Secret Service workers against the Clintons. Very reminiscent of 2004! Gonna be even more fun for my side this time!

    Turmp U will turn into “Trump Who?” now that CRISIS OF CHARACTER is #1 on Amazon. Drudge is endlessly promoting the book and Rush will be reading excerpts from it tomorrow. Halperin will talk about it on Morning Joe!

    Crank up the loudspeakers! We’re going to push this thing wall-to-wall! It will be THE story of the Summer!

  63. 63.

    Gimlet

    June 5, 2016 at 1:44 pm

    Was kind of hoping Obama would give the eulogy at Muhammad Ali’s service.

  64. 64.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 1:44 pm

    @redshirt:

    I’ll be working hard for the reelection of President Trump in 2020.

  65. 65.

    Miss Bianca

    June 5, 2016 at 1:44 pm

    “Marked as spam”, by God!

  66. 66.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 1:45 pm

    @Tim C.: There was a lot of ratfuckery in Ohio, certainly enough to flip it, and still a lot of fallout from the 2000 purges and caging in Florida and some other places. Remember that big purge they were going to do in Florida before they got caught? Who knows what else we missed. But yeah, I was mostly using hyperbole. Thanks for the call-out, that sort of thing can be irresponsible ?

  67. 67.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 1:46 pm

    @Ramping Up: lol. As if. For as long as I’ve been reading your drivel you’ve literally never been right. Heck, just this campaign you’ve cycled onto your 4th choice, the very candidate you were bad mouthing a few months ago.

    You do realize you’re never right, right?

  68. 68.

    Gimlet

    June 5, 2016 at 1:46 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    I’ll be working hard for the reelection of President Trump in 2020.

    I only hope you are able to do for him what you did for “Jeb!”

  69. 69.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 1:47 pm

    @Ramping Up:
    That’s the word that earned the banhammer last time. Consistent, is our little remora of desperation.

  70. 70.

    Iowa Old Lady

    June 5, 2016 at 1:48 pm

    @Brachiator: A big advantage of the temperamentally unsuited claim is that it’s true, so Trump constantly enforces it all by himself.

  71. 71.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 1:48 pm

    @redshirt: Bitcoins are a perfectly legitimate technology, they’re just not what most of their supporters claim/think they are. (I love the nickname ‘Dunning Kruggerand’.)

    @Catherine D.: I don’t know where people get this idea that humans will go extinct. We’ve survived bottlenecks before. We’re awesome at that. We’re hearty. So is herpes, I’m not making a value judgment.

  72. 72.

    Jeff Spender

    June 5, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    As a piece of performance art, I think Ramping Up might be the Stephen Colbert of the internet.

  73. 73.

    Tim C.

    June 5, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: I’ve been there myself. Did the tour, got the t-shirt.

  74. 74.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    @redshirt:

    I was nervous about Trump at first given his limited involvement in the conservative movement and unconventional campaign tactics. But the latter fear was allayed by his unconventional tactics utterly wiping out the entire GOP field, and the former by his list of SCOTUS nominations.

    Trump just wants the glammer and prestige, that list made it pretty clear. He’s not going to follow through on his tradewar stuff or universal healthcare. He will let his cabinet and judicial appointments be hand-picked by The Heritage Foundation and his legislative agenda written by ALEC. Grover Norquists’s “working digits” line is apropos for Trump.

    With Trump, THE BOYS ARE BACK IN TOWN…, and running the government behind the scenes.

  75. 75.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    @Gimlet:
    And Willard. It’s the moron trifecta–put your money on Trump to place.

  76. 76.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 1:49 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: My joke was that by 2020 bitcoins would be the default currency. Fell flat, I guess. I love “Dunning Kruggerand”.

  77. 77.

    Brachiator

    June 5, 2016 at 1:50 pm

    @Frank Wilhoit:

    But there again, the primary resonance of the story is always the notion that “if it had been fair, we would have won”.

    Wait, are you talking about Trump or Sanders?

  78. 78.

    A Ghost To Most

    June 5, 2016 at 1:50 pm

    @Gimlet:

    You do realize you’re never right, right?

    “Damn the accuracy, it’s the sound we want!”

  79. 79.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 1:51 pm

    @Miss Bianca: And yet our troll gets off scott-free! ☹️ ? ?

  80. 80.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 1:51 pm

    @Elizabelle: It’s a problem, but it’s their problem– I don’t see how the past six months could just be sent to the memory hole. They’re just wending their way from the deep bench to the deep do-do.

  81. 81.

    patroclus

    June 5, 2016 at 1:51 pm

    @Gimlet: I wish.

    Unfortunately, decency, like Elvis, left the building. In my view, it was when the Republicans decided to go all in on Lewinsky and impeachment over sex. But it had been building for a long time even before that. Trump will be the worst Presidential candidate ever nominated by a major party. He doubled down on his racism this morning by disqualifying Muslims from the judiciary (in addition to Latinos). I suspect women, Asian-Americans, African-Americans and gays and lesbians will be next. But, he’s had a terrible week and seems to be cratering (almost entirely on his own). I’m beginning to get my hopes up about a landslide again.

  82. 82.

    frosty

    June 5, 2016 at 1:51 pm

    @Miss Bianca: South Pacific, eh? I was thinking Tom Lehrer since I had a vague recollection of the song and it read like it was right in his wheelhouse.

  83. 83.

    Jeff Spender

    June 5, 2016 at 1:52 pm

    My cryptocurrency of choice is Dogecoin.

    Not to be confused with Nerdgold or Digibits or BicuitsN’Gravy or however many hundreds of other cryptocurrencies there are.

  84. 84.

    Elizabelle

    June 5, 2016 at 1:52 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Dunning Kruggerand

    That is perfect. LOL.

  85. 85.

    Formerly disgruntled Clinton supporter

    June 5, 2016 at 1:52 pm

    @Right To UNLIMITED RIDICULE: Too bad your boundless enthusiasm and blind optimism can’t be put to better use. Humanity’s loss, I suppose…

  86. 86.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 1:53 pm

    @patroclus:

    And YET, this thing is TCTC in the RCP average, both nationally and in the swing states. What does that say about Hillary if Trump is so awful?

  87. 87.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 1:55 pm

    @Ramping Up: glammer!

    @frosty: National Brotherhood Week

    Oh, the white folks hate the black folks,
    And the black folks hate the white folks.
    To hate all but the right folks
    Is an old established rule.

    But during National Brotherhood Week, National Brotherhood Week,
    Lena Horne and Sheriff Clarke are dancing cheek to cheek.
    It’s fun to eulogize
    The people you despise,
    As long as you don’t let ’em in your school.

  88. 88.

    patroclus

    June 5, 2016 at 1:57 pm

    If the racist troll is going to be continually allowed free rein here, then I’m out.

  89. 89.

    germy shoemangler

    June 5, 2016 at 1:57 pm

    washington post

    A possible murder witness is talking.

    The question is whether anyone should listen.

    His name is “Bud,” and he’s an African gray parrot in Ensley Township, Michigan, with a filthy mouth, according to NBC affiliate WOODTV.

    His latest phrase – the one he won’t stop shouting at the top of his lungs mimicking his owner’s voice – is a chilling one: “Don’t f-ing shoot!”

    The bird’s antics might be laughed off, were it not for the fact that Bud’s owner, 45-year-old Martin Duram, was fatally shot at his home in May 2015, according to ABC affiliate WABC. His body was found near his wife, Glenna, who had suffered a gunshot wound to her head but is alive. Though police initially assumed Glenna Duram was a victim of the shooting, police reports obtained by WOODTV reveal that she is now a suspect in the slaying.

    Relatives told the station that they believe Martin Duram’s final moments were imprinted in the bird’s memory and that he continues to relive the slaying. They noted that Bud mimicked both Durham and his wife.

    “That bird picks up everything and anything, and it’s got the filthiest mouth around,” Duram’s mom, Lillian Duram, told WOODTV.

    “I personally think he was there and he remembers it and he was saying it,” Duram’s father, Charles Duram, added.

    Bud’s new owner, Martin’s ex-wife, Christina Keller, agrees, telling the station that the bird has a habit of replaying voices of a man and a woman locked in a fierce disagreement.

    “I’m hearing two people in an intense argument,” Keller, who believes “Don’t f-ing shoot!” were Duram’s final words. “Two people that I know, voices that I recognize.”

    “It’s intense,” she added. “When it happens, my house turns cold.”

    Police reports reveal that investigators have been asked whether the bird could be used as evidence, according to WOODTV, but they don’t show how police responded.

    Newaygo County Prosecutor Robert Springstead told that station that he has heard about the talking parrot but hasn’t reviewed any footage of the animal. He said he’s waiting for Michigan State Police to finish their investigation before deciding whether to file charges, noting that “there’s some evidence to support” the idea that Glenna Duram killed her husband.

    “Although the law allows charging on probable cause, I don’t like to do that, especially when you have a very serious case,” Springstead told the station. “When the investigation is done, I like to be satisfied there’s proof beyond a reasonable doubt.”

    Duram told police that she remembers nothing of the shooting and regained her memory only once she was in the hospital. She left three suicide notes for relatives before the shooting that she claims she doesn’t remember writing, police records reveal.

    “I know for a fact I didn’t kill my husband,” police quoted her as saying.

    Doreen Plotkowski, the owner of Casa La Parrot in Grand Rapids, told WABC that African gray parrots typically vocalize phrases they’ve heard many times, but the birds also are capable of using words they’ve heard only on a few occasions. Presented with video evidence of the bird using the violent language, Plotkowski told the station that she “definitely” heard the bird mimicking an argument between a man and a woman.

    She told the station that she also heard the bird say, “Don’t f-ing shoot.”

    “In my mind, it’s something that he’s heard, definitely heard before,” she said. “And if it’s fresh in his mind, he might even say it more now.”

    Martin Duram’s father told WOODTV that he’s not ready to weigh in on his daughter-in-law’s guilt or innocence.

    “I got hope that maybe there’s something out there that we don’t know about that can change this whole situation,” he said.

  90. 90.

    Brachiator

    June 5, 2016 at 1:58 pm

    @redshirt:

    lol. As if. For as long as I’ve been reading your drivel you’ve literally never been right.

    And yet, holee crap, rampant inanity is actually on to something here:

    He will let his cabinet and judicial appointments be hand-picked by The Heritage Foundation and his legislative agenda written by ALEC. Grover Norquists’s “working digits” line is apropos for Trump.

    With Trump, The Boys are back in town…, and running the government behind the scenes.

    Paul Ryan has promised to deliver position papers on taxes, the economy, etc., which I guess will set the course of the Republican agenda. The plan has to be that Trump will give these plans his blessing and promise to be a good boy and allow them to be enacted if he wins.

    Then, I guess the plan is that Trump will not have to bother pretending that he has any coherent ideas about government and just concentrate on being the ringmaster of the GOP general election campaign circus. After all, the only thing he has going for him is being a master showman.

  91. 91.

    Miss Bianca

    June 5, 2016 at 1:58 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: I know. I’d console myself with the thought that it was just my gorram brilliance that was making FYWP flip out, but even I am not capable of that level of delusion.

  92. 92.

    greennotGreen

    June 5, 2016 at 1:59 pm

    Several commenters have mentioned the responsibility of parents to not teach their children racism. Both my parents were racists although I’m sure they’d deny it. I was once disowned because I had a black boyfriend.

    Neither my sister or I are racists. (Usual caveats for white Americans apply.) I think it’s for two reasons. One, having been raised in a secure environment and perhaps having the necessary genes (whatever genetics may contribute to it,) we both have liberal brains. We’re more tolerant of and curious about differences, new experiences, new information. Two, for me, anyway, I listened in Sunday School. I read the New Testament. I read the parable of the Good Samaritan. I read the new command Jesus gave, “Love one another as I have loved you.”

    So, from our parents we could have learned racism, but we didn’t. At some point in everyone’s life, one has to accept responsibility for their own character. At some point those Drumpfjugen in the photo may look back and be appalled by their behavior. If not, it’s on them.

  93. 93.

    gindy51

    June 5, 2016 at 1:59 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: My friend’s uncle did work with Clinton and Bush I as well as training during Reagan (he’s 85 years old). If Hillary had won in 2008, he’d have voted for her. He is planning on voting for her this November… his first DEM vote EVER.

  94. 94.

    Keith G

    June 5, 2016 at 1:59 pm

    @Renie:

    I was reading the comments about it and surprised to see an opinion that part of the solution should be to educate children that this type of behavior is not acceptable. At first I thought this is just another way of blaming the victim but is it even possible to help children understand that is not acceptable to the point they can control the situation?

    Doing such a thing in the right way could be part of a multifaceted way to attack such abuse. A victim might not be able to escape the initial incident, but if children are able to feel that it is important to talk about such events in a safe environment, it is possible that the damage might be limited.

  95. 95.

    Gimlet

    June 5, 2016 at 2:02 pm

    SAN JOSE — A day after a melee erupted outside a Donald Trump rally, the San Jose police chief and mayor on Friday defended themselves from a national backlash

    While it appeared to many onlookers that police allowed the violence to proceed unchecked, San Jose police Chief Eddie Garcia insisted that it was more important for police to hold their “skirmish line” formations than to stop individual attacks. Four arrests were made.

    “We are not an ‘occupying force’ and cannot reflect the chaotic tactics of the protesters,” Garcia told reporters. Unless a victim’s life was in peril or the violence was “spiraling out of control,” he said, officers held back to avoid inciting more violence and having the crowd turn on officers. He also said the 250 police weren’t enough to control the roughly 400 protesters.

  96. 96.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 2:02 pm

    @germy shoemangler:

    Hello Waldo!
    Laura?
    Laura?
    Don’t go there!
    Hurting me!
    Hurting me!
    Stop it!
    Stop it!
    Stop it!
    Leo, no!
    Leo, no!

    (Twin Peaks)

  97. 97.

    J.

    June 5, 2016 at 2:02 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: Sadly all too many children if not being actively taught to hate are being shown how to. (Also who knew this song from South Pacific would become a presidential campaign theme song over 65 years later?)

  98. 98.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:02 pm

    And a big fat LOL to you all still believing Trump will drop out soon. I believed as you did once before I saw his political genius. This isn’t a big joke or publicity stunt–Trump is for real and ain’t dopping out, no way no fucking how.

  99. 99.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 2:03 pm

    @Brachiator: Except that Der Trump wouldn’t be led around so easily. Trump creates chaos– someone like Ryan, trying to promote specific policies, might as well be having a conversation with a lamppost.

  100. 100.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:03 pm

    @Brachiator:

    You got it! Paul Ryan will be a kind of Prime Minister in the Trump Administration.

  101. 101.

    germy

    June 5, 2016 at 2:03 pm

    @Brachiator:

    Trump will not have to bother pretending that he has any coherent ideas about government and just concentrate on being the ringmaster of the GOP general election campaign circus. After all, the only thing he has going for him is being a master showman.

    Another ADHD candidate. Just like McCain and Palin and W. They couldn’t focus for two minutes. Just scribble their name over whatever is pushed in front of them.

  102. 102.

    Howard Beale IV

    June 5, 2016 at 2:04 pm

    Here’s hoping Trump’s lawyers get sanctioned if they continue their Curious Curiel attacks. And none other than Larry Klayman shows what happens when you go down that rabbit hole of attacking a judge.

    There’s a U.S. Second Circuit judge, Denny Chin, who might be able to set Donald Trump straight on his allegations against the district judge Gonzalo Curiel—but so could any second-year law student who has remained awake during professional-responsibility class.

    Zero plus zero equals zero.

    Most lawyers would call the 1998 case this lesson comes from, Macdraw Inc. v. CIT Equipment Financing, an “ordinary case”—one company agreed to help another finance a large sale of industrial equipment. The deal went south, the buyer went bankrupt, and the borrower sold the collateral. The lender, Macdraw, sued for its claimed share, and the case had dragged on for six years in a New York federal district court by the time Chin had to school Macdraw’s lawyers on legal ethics and judicial impartiality.
    There was nothing ordinary about those lawyers. The lead attorney was Larry Klayman, the founder of the conservative advocacy group Judicial Watch and the force behind dozens of politically minded lawsuits, including a recent one claiming that the Obama Administration engineered the spread of Ebola to exterminate the “Caucasian race and Jewish-Christian religion.”

    Eventually, Chin dismissed Klayman’s client’s case with a few choice words for the way counsel had conducted it. Not long after, the judge got a letter from Klayman and his co-counsel, Paul Orfanedes, asking a few “questions” about the judge’s Asian American background and mentioning another case they had brought against the Clinton administration. They then filed a brief questioning the judge’s impartiality:

    Mr. Klayman and Mr. Orfanedes became concerned that because the Court was a recent appointee of President Clinton … and Mr. Klayman had been prominently mentioned in the media for his role in the Commerce Department case, which focused in part on the White House, the Democratic National Committee, John Huang, Melinda Yee, and other persons in the Asian and Asian–American communities, and because the lawsuit had elicited such angry responses from the White House, Democrats and the Asian–American community, that the Court might be angry at them and unable to be fair and impartial …
    In a written response, Chin noted that he hadn’t been aware of Klayman’s other lawsuit. As for the questions about his race, he said, “This sentiment is absurd and demeans me individually and the Court as a whole.”

    He then lowered the boom. Klayman and Orfanedes were required to withdraw as counsel from the case and would not be permitted to appear in Chin’s court on any matter ever again. They would be required to show his opinion to any other judge in the district in any future case. The court clerk would also report the sanctions to every court where they held bar membership.

  103. 103.

    germy

    June 5, 2016 at 2:05 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Trump is for real and ain’t dopping out, no way no fucking how.

    I agree. No way in hell would he ever drop out. I just don’t see him doing that. He’ll stick with it right to the bitter end.

  104. 104.

    Mike in NC

    June 5, 2016 at 2:06 pm

    @Ramping Up: You keep using “we”. Do you keep a pet turtle in your mother’s basement? Don’t feed it the lead paint chips!

  105. 105.

    germy

    June 5, 2016 at 2:06 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    You got it! Paul Ryan will be a kind of Prime Minister in the Trump Administration.

    It’ll be great British comedy: Yes Prime Minister!

  106. 106.

    Shell

    June 5, 2016 at 2:07 pm

    This will be the UNFIT FOR COMMAND of 2016!

    Another swift-boat of lies and utter bull shit. You should be so proud!

  107. 107.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 2:08 pm

    @Howard Beale IV: Tsk. Those judges all stick together. It ain’t fair.

  108. 108.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 2:10 pm

    @Mike in NC: Poor turtle.

  109. 109.

    aimai

    June 5, 2016 at 2:10 pm

    @Renie: The current thinking on children and autonomy is that we need to begin very early teaching children that they have the right to say no–no to forced kisses, forced touches, etc… And it starts very early and with interactions that some parents are not comfortable policing. Its quite common in many families for children to be forced to comply “Give Grandma a Kiss!” or “Give Uncle Bob a hug!” This is considered a prerogative of older relatives and children are not considered to have the right to refuse. Of course its generally harmless–grandma just wants a kiss and uncle bob just wants a hug. But it can set kids up for a lifetime of disregarding their own bodily autonomy, of believing they don’t have the right to say no.

    The issue isn’t that kids who are taught they have the right to bodily automy can fight off a pedophile authority figure. But that those abusers are generally looking for, and even grooming, kids with weak protections and no boundaries. So a kid who can say “no, I’m not sitting on your lap” doesn’t get molested. The predators are stalking easier prey. (I’m not arguing for throwing other kids to the wolves. Just pointing out that all kids need to be given the freedom to protect their own boundaries, at the same time that we need to protect kids from more agressive abusers.)

  110. 110.

    JPL

    June 5, 2016 at 2:12 pm

    @Oldgold: The problem at this point with Trump withdrawing, his supporters would riot. They will anyway, so what the heck..

  111. 111.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 2:12 pm

    @germy:
    We’re going to have a PM? What will Republicans call themselves when we’re no longer a republic?

  112. 112.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 5, 2016 at 2:12 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Now that a second Clinton administration threatens — their scheme from the very beginning — Byrne exposes what he saw of the real Hillary Clinton.

    The part in bold is what makes this blurb Art.

  113. 113.

    greennotGreen

    June 5, 2016 at 2:13 pm

    @Brachiator: This is actually the preferred Republican modus operandi. They thought it worked great during the Reagan years, especially during Reagan’s second term. They like a figure head so they can control things behind the scenes without repercussions on the actual actors (no pun intended.) That’s what they thought they were getting with W., but he turned out to be a bossy, arrogant know-nothing largely out of their control. But since they’re Republicans and incapable of learning from history, they’re trying again with Trump, another bossy, arrogant know-nothing. We can’t let them steal it this time! Trump doesn’t have a brother or sister who’s a governor, does he?

  114. 114.

    lollipopguild

    June 5, 2016 at 2:13 pm

    @frosty: Tom had “National Brotherhood Week” which was/is very good. Most of the people in the song have passed but his point is still valid especially with T-rump being openly racist.

  115. 115.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 5, 2016 at 2:14 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    I have heard or read that as well. It’s a powerful lyric.

  116. 116.

    JPL

    June 5, 2016 at 2:14 pm

    @patroclus: He does tend to spoil things.

  117. 117.

    J R in WV

    June 5, 2016 at 2:15 pm

    @Tim C.:

    I don’t think he did win in 2004. The Ohio Sec of State was a former exec of Diebold, [whatever they call themselves today] which provided many of the voting machines in Ohio. Voter suppression, crooked voting machines, stolen electoral votes from Ohio = stolen election # 2 for G W Bush.

    Diebold, which provides audit tapes in their banking ATMs, but not in their voting machines, because voting isn’t important and money is? Or because they intended for their machines to be stealable from square one?

  118. 118.

    Shell

    June 5, 2016 at 2:15 pm

    I only hope you are able to do for him what you did for “Jeb!”

    Hee-hee-hee. Zing!

  119. 119.

    John Cole

    June 5, 2016 at 2:16 pm

    @shomi: That was supposed to be loses. Doesn’t make sense if it is wins.

    Fixded

  120. 120.

    lollipopguild

    June 5, 2016 at 2:16 pm

    @Elizabelle: Sounds like a law firm. Cheatem Dewey and Howe.

  121. 121.

    germy

    June 5, 2016 at 2:16 pm

    @trollhattan: a dumpster fire?

  122. 122.

    Surreal American

    June 5, 2016 at 2:17 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    The key is to get people *outside* the epistemic closure of wingnuttery to buy your bullplop, you nitwit.

  123. 123.

    Shell

    June 5, 2016 at 2:17 pm

    Now that a second Clinton administration threatens

    There already has been two. Bill Clinton was elected twice, remember? Try to keep up.

  124. 124.

    Mnemosyne

    June 5, 2016 at 2:18 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I particularly like that we’re supposed to be unaware that a person who almost got the Democratic nomination in 2008 is now “scheming” to get it in 2016. I guess publicly stated goals and plans count as “schemes” to people who are unused to how politics work.

  125. 125.

    hamletta

    June 5, 2016 at 2:19 pm

    @Gimlet: Obama probably never met Ali. Bill Clinton has been asked to speak, though.

    Was just at the beer store, and some Teamsters were picketing the Red Hot & Blue in the shopping center. The guy handing out leaflets was young, so I gave him the Readers’ Digest bio on Lee Atwater to explain why I’ve been boycotting them forever.

    Profiting from stirring up the rubes’ racism is more evil than racism itself. Atwater was the worst. No wonder he needed to unburden his soul when he was dying.

  126. 126.

    lollipopguild

    June 5, 2016 at 2:20 pm

    @trollhattan: Nazi’s.

  127. 127.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:24 pm

    @Shell:

    “The important thing is to win.”–Richard M. Nixon

  128. 128.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:25 pm

    @Surreal American:

    And of course they did in 2004, it was all too easy. Obama was a special case because white guilt kept swing voters from really buying in to the fact that Obama has a real hatred for this country and is an incompetent boob to boot.

  129. 129.

    greennotGreen

    June 5, 2016 at 2:26 pm

    @hamletta: In Nashville there’s a popular pancake restaurant that I have boycotted since 1969. At that time the owner stood in the doorway with a shotgun to block any black people from eating his stupid pancakes. It’s been run for years now by his son who, I’m told, is a good guy (although I believe there was an incident a few years back with some poor service for a guy of east Indian ancestry.) Anyway, I won’t eat there because it’s an indictment of Nashville that the place is still in business. It should have closed in 1969 when the owner showed himself to be a racist jerk. Unfortunately, there were plenty enough racist jerks in the city at that time to keep the pancakes coming.

  130. 130.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:26 pm

    @Shell:

    “Thanks” to one H. Ross Perot.

  131. 131.

    greennotGreen

    June 5, 2016 at 2:27 pm

    @Ramping Up: Are you still taking your meds? Up the dosage.

  132. 132.

    Elizabelle

    June 5, 2016 at 2:28 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: Great catch. You got me to look.

    also:

    Byrne came to understand that, to the Clintons, governing was an afterthought.

    Clean case of projection; it’s a statement that’s arguably true about Republicans, and that no one who can be taken seriously has ever said about either Bill or Hillary Clinton. They are both policy wonks, and actually care deeply about their American constituents. You may not care for their policy solutions, as the rightwing does not, but describing their work as being “afterthoughts” is insane.

    Byrne “came to understand” nothing. He saw what he wanted to see, (and from outside the building, peeps!), and now he is trying to fleece the Trumpenfolk of their cash.

  133. 133.

    Shell

    June 5, 2016 at 2:28 pm

    @Ramping Up: I thought you just said winning was everything, no matter how you do it.

  134. 134.

    Surreal American

    June 5, 2016 at 2:28 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Prime Ministers typically have more political power than heads of state. So yeah, that’s gonna fly really well with Der Trumpenführer.

  135. 135.

    Miss Bianca

    June 5, 2016 at 2:28 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: What made me remember the story, tho’, is that my dad was not, to put it mildly, the model of the social justice warrior. Not openly racist, but subject to all the prejudices that an upper-middle-class WASP guy would be likely to have. So the fact that he commented approvingly on that song always said something to me – I just wasn’t sure *what*. Maybe, just as you said, that it’s a powerful lyric that’s going to get you thinking whether you want to or not.

  136. 136.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 2:30 pm

    @greennotGreen:
    New dose instruction: Take them all. Now.

  137. 137.

    sigaba

    June 5, 2016 at 2:30 pm

    I happened to open up a Private Browsing tab and click on Breitbart’s rundown on Meet the Press. All the commenters could stand to talk about was how awful it was that Trump said something nice about Paul Ryan, and then other commenters rushing in to remind them that Trump is just doing his Art of the Deal and keeping his enemies closer, and in November Trump would “fix” Ryan. Others rushed to promote the guy who is trying to primary Ryan as the only solution to fighting the “Globalist” agenda.

    I don’t think Hillary came up once. It was simply taken for granted that the enemy was the RINO and Hillary was maybe beside the point (or would surely be in jail in November, I suppose).

  138. 138.

    Surreal American

    June 5, 2016 at 2:30 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Kicked Rmoney’s ass. Funny that you’re still all butthurt about it.

  139. 139.

    shomi

    June 5, 2016 at 2:31 pm

    @John Cole: Still sounds to me like you think he has a shot.

    The reality is that most voters including die hard Republicans cannot stand Trump and no matter what they say about Hillary, they are going to vote for her or 3rd party candidate (effectively the same thing).

    Anything the media says to the contrary (including their cherry picked polling) is bullshit. The media will always always always try make it seem like it’s more of a horse race than it actually is.

  140. 140.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 2:32 pm

    @Racist Hump:
    Hey, racist, go back to Stormfront with others of your ilk.

    You lying, racist, misogynistic fuck.

  141. 141.

    Baud

    June 5, 2016 at 2:34 pm

    @Elizabelle: Are you back from Barcelona?

  142. 142.

    Frankensteinbeck

    June 5, 2016 at 2:34 pm

    @Renie:
    This education is actually very useful, although obviously it’s not a solution, just one part of a solution. Never underestimate not just the physical powerlessness of a child, but the mental and emotional powerlessness. Abusers get away with a lot of stuff because the child is too intimidated, guilted, or even fooled into thinking it’s love to report it. Not to mention that if it happens to them and they know it’s not their own fault, the kids are saved a portion of the psychological scarring left in their adult lives.

  143. 143.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 2:35 pm

    @greennotGreen: Easy there, that shit can be fatal.

    On the other hand, if he decreased the dosage, the filter might slip and he’d say something blatantly racist and get banhammered twice in one weekend.

  144. 144.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 2:35 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    “Thanks” to one H. Ross Perot.

    Lying as usual.

    Perot took as many votes from Clinton as he took from Bush.

    Go back to Stormfront, you lying, racist, misogynistic fuck.

  145. 145.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 2:36 pm

    @A Ghost To Most: It’s also like UNLIMITED CORPORATE CASH! Just ask President Romney how well THAT worked out!

  146. 146.

    hamletta

    June 5, 2016 at 2:36 pm

    @greennotGreen: That’s my opinion, too. If you’re a racist, your mama didn’t raise you right, and you were too dumb to figure it out on your own.

    I just pity you.

  147. 147.

    Mnemosyne

    June 5, 2016 at 2:36 pm

    Interesting tidbit about Muhammad Ali that I came across in Wikipedia — in 2009, he traveled to Ireland to visit the hometown of one of his Irish ancestors. The people of the town understandably went insane with joy that Ali came to visit them.

  148. 148.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 2:36 pm

    @J.: I iz in ur blog, commentin on ur post

  149. 149.

    Emma Anne

    June 5, 2016 at 2:36 pm

    @John Cole:

    So, John, any chance you could expand your list of bannable offenses to people who are banned and come back under different names?

  150. 150.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 2:37 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    he’d say something blatantly racist and get banhammered twice in one weekend.

    He already got banned for that some months ago. Too bad it can’t be made to stick, because he sure as shit hasn’t become an “un-racist.”

  151. 151.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 2:38 pm

    @greennotGreen: I have a long list of businesses I won’t frequent because they displayed their political orientation. I’ll never understand why a business would risk pissing off a sizeable percentage of their prospective customers by putting up Trump signs.

  152. 152.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 2:39 pm

    @Emma Anne: Too much work.

  153. 153.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:40 pm

    @Surreal American:

    Romney was on track to victory until Sandy.

  154. 154.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 2:40 pm

    noted jurist Alberto Gonzales sez that Trump is right to question the judge’s impartiality

  155. 155.

    Reggie Mantle

    June 5, 2016 at 2:40 pm

    @Frank Wilhoit:

    Trump cannot imagine losing except through “unfairness”, viz. bias or corruption. A “fair” process is one that gives him the outcome he wants, and that is how it is known to be fair. Conversely, an outcome that he does not like proves that the process was “unfair”

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Remember when your boy had to steal both his elections because he was too much of a dumbfuck to actually win?

  156. 156.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 2:40 pm

    @hamletta:
    Ali was at Obama’s inauguration in 2008, and he also attended at least one other event at the white house.

  157. 157.

    The Republic, Blah Blah Blah...

    June 5, 2016 at 2:43 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    upcoming tell-all book CRISIS OF CHARACTER by Hillary’s former Secret Service Agent shot up to #1 on Amazon from #6,000 or so overnight!

    And how many of those books were bought in bulk purchases by ‘unidentified parties’ w/ the express intent of pushing that book onto the Amazon best sellers list?

  158. 158.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 2:43 pm

    @Reggie Mantle: You are stupider than I thought if you think the 2004 election was fair, and even stupider than that if you didn’t know 2000 was stolen. The latter is up there with denying climate change.

  159. 159.

    Surreal American

    June 5, 2016 at 2:43 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Protip: Try not to believe what you’re trying to sell to others. Don’t get high on your own supply.

  160. 160.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 2:44 pm

    @Elizabelle:
    Especially since one of the most consistent things people say about her is that she is a policy wonk, to the point that villagers complain that her speeches are boring because they are too policy oriented.

  161. 161.

    sigaba

    June 5, 2016 at 2:45 pm

    Okay I must know,

    @Ramping Up: why would Sandy change anyone’s vote? It seems like both Obama and Romney didn’t really offer much difference on hurricane response policy.

  162. 162.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 2:46 pm

    @Mnemosyne: That’s a very good point. Having communication open is also vital to avoiding a lot of issues where kids can go astray. It also teaches them an important skill about learning to discuss things.

  163. 163.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:47 pm

    @sigaba:

    “Rally ’round the flag” effect plus Christie sucking up to Obama gave him bi-partisan cred.

  164. 164.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 2:47 pm

    @Mnemosyne:
    The Irish love their “black Irish”, they love their “native so ” O’bama.

  165. 165.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:48 pm

    @The Republic, Blah Blah Blah…:

    So? The point is to get the attention of Morning Joe, Mark Halperin, Politico et al. Then the masses will buy the book for real.

    It goes like this:

    Drudge–>Bulk Purchases–>Rush–>Fox News–>Halperin–>Morning Joe–>Politico–>CNN–>WaPo/NYT–>more book purchases and repeat

  166. 166.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 2:48 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:
    Gonzales…sounds suspiciously Mexicanian to me. Investigate!

  167. 167.

    hamletta

    June 5, 2016 at 2:49 pm

    @greennotGreen: Would that be Pancake Pantry? I didn’t know that history.

    I interviewed the owner 20 years ago, and he bragged about serving Whitney Houston, so I’d imagine he’s a little more enlightened than his daddy. But not surprising some of those battle-axes waiting tables are less so.

    I still dream of the sweet potato pancakes, though. Sorry.

  168. 168.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 2:51 pm

    @sigaba:
    Everyone knows that the polls all showed RMomey was going to win until Christie hugged Obama. Therefore Sandy is the only reason Obama won.

  169. 169.

    The Republic, Blah Blah Blah...

    June 5, 2016 at 2:52 pm

    @Ramping Up: I have no idea what point you think you’re making…

  170. 170.

    J.

    June 5, 2016 at 2:53 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Iz thanks you. :-)

  171. 171.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 2:54 pm

    @greennotGreen: This sentence you wrote: At some point in everyone’s life, one has to accept responsibility for their own character. That’s maturity. Many people go through their whole life without accepting personal responsibility. Trump is the perfect example.

  172. 172.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 2:54 pm

    @The Republic, Blah Blah Blah…: Sounds like he’s saying the point is to sell books. Not sure what that has to do with people actually reading them or caring though.

  173. 173.

    tybee

    June 5, 2016 at 2:54 pm

    @Retching Up:

    I believed as you did once before I saw his political genius.

    yeah, just like you saw jeb! and rafael’s sooper jeenyus. and there was someone else you thought was going to run away with the election. it is difficult to remember all the people who have fooled you.

    yer a hoot.

  174. 174.

    rikyrah

    June 5, 2016 at 2:55 pm

    This is W-H-I-T-E-P-R-I-V-I-L-E-G-E

    Trump vows not to change — which means everyone else in politics has to

    By Karen Tumulty
    June 3 at 7:14 PM

    There are reasons to be skeptical that the wall on the border would ever be built. Putting a ban on Muslims entering the country seems neither practical nor constitutional.

    But Donald Trump has finally made one three-word campaign promise that voters may be able to count on.

    “I’m not changing,” he declared this week.

    Indeed, it is the rest of the political world that is having to adjust.

    If recent days are any indication, the remaining five months of this presidential campaign are likely to be fought entirely on Trump’s terms.

    The celebrity real estate mogul continues to defy predictions — including some of his own — that he will soften his rhetoric and elevate it to a more presidential level as he moves into a general-election campaign.

  175. 175.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 2:56 pm

    @Oldgold:
    There is no plausible republican candidate. Hasn’t been for a couple of decades. (ETA OK, several decades) So they get a shitty one elected by lying. Trump at least refuses to not tell how he really feels. Is there any doubt that he’s a bigot? No. Is there any doubt that he’s incompetent? No. The only problem is that a portion of the voters want an incompetent bigot as president. They don’t want him to run the country, they want him to ruin it.

  176. 176.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 2:57 pm

    @Keith G: Yes I didn’t think of it in that respect. As a tactic to bring it out into the open more often and hopefully, that translates into less occurrences.

  177. 177.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:58 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    The point is to dominate the news cycle with doubts/scandals about Hillary.

    We will do to Hillary what we did to Kerry and Gore. That’s the point.

  178. 178.

    The Republic, Blah Blah Blah...

    June 5, 2016 at 2:59 pm

    @Ramping Up: oh wait… it get…

    You’re actually validating my point..

  179. 179.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 2:59 pm

    @tybee:

    That’s just it–Trump wiped the floor with the deepest, most talented bench we’ve had in a generation with nothing more than free media and a Twitter account. He will do the same to Hillary.

  180. 180.

    Elizabelle

    June 5, 2016 at 3:00 pm

    @Baud: Nope. Still in the wonderful Barcelona. Gonna stay in Spain a few more weeks; at least another week or two in BCN.

    Is probably a good idea to eventually head to Salamanca for language training at the same school, but Barcelona is just too beautiful, and it’s before the summer crowds. You do not even want to hear how perfect the weather has been. And so I stay.

    Cannot speak well at all yet. Can understand a lot more words than I can come up with, off the top of my head. It’s so different at school, with our teachers who carefully pitch full phrases at us that we will understand, or maybe just a few new words. In restaurants, it’s easier.

    But then at this homestay, with my extremely animated hostess who speaks no language other than Spanish — gah! (ETA: of course, she speaks Catalan. But no English, or French.)

    Situation was masked, because we had another American woman with very good Spanish in the apartment last week, but once she left, Antonia finally realizes my listening comprehension is like with Gary Larson’s dog cartoon: “Ginger! Blah blah blah blah Ginger! … blah blah…”

    She is notably deflated today, and I’ve been kinda hiding in my room.

    Meanwhile, today brought the arrival of a vegan Russian — Vladimir — who smokes and drinks. Unbeknownst to Antonia, he has brought his own seeds for making sprouts. He eschews eggs and anything cooked. Raw, raw, raw. This is gonna be interesting.

  181. 181.

    Mike in NC

    June 5, 2016 at 3:01 pm

    The pathetic troll didn’t care that Drumpf basically humiliated and emasculated his previous heroes Rmoney and JEB! Says a lot about his complete lack of self-respect. But think about his previous moronic trolling about UNLIMITED CORPORATE CASH etc. Definitely fits the Drumpf demographic of poorly educated white males who are stuck in shitty dead-end jobs and need to let out their aggression on somebody else, instead of accepting that they’re angry losers only due to their own shortcomings. Probably reads all the ‘best’ skinhead blogs to get his ideas. He’ll climb back under his rock in November and resurface here in 2020 unless his mother throws him out.

    Sad!

  182. 182.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 3:01 pm

    @redshirt:
    Have you just outted B Kristol’s side job, blog commenting for losers?

  183. 183.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 3:02 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Trump wiped the floor with the deepest, most talented bench we’ve had in a generation

    Wow, your benches fucking suck. Can I have a list of places that buy them so I can avoid sitting down there? If Trump could beat that then those benches would probably just snap under the staggering weight of my 200-pound frame.

  184. 184.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 3:02 pm

    PLUS not only will he have the Twitter account but also the anti-Hillary infrastructure we’ve been building for four years–the book is just the beginning.

    We’re going to hit her so hard over the head with a mudslide of negative attacks it will make what we did to Kerry and Gore look like a walk in the park!

    Next up will be Bill’s “Orgy Island” where he had sex with teenage girls.

  185. 185.

    Surreal American

    June 5, 2016 at 3:03 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    We will do to Hillary what we did to Kerry and Gore.

    And what you did to Obama. Oh wait…

  186. 186.

    germy

    June 5, 2016 at 3:04 pm

    @Surreal American:

    Protip: Try not to believe what you’re trying to sell to others. Don’t get high on your own supply.

    “Love is like oxygen. You get too much, you get too high. Not enough and you’re gonna die. Love gets you high”

  187. 187.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 3:04 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    The point is to dominate the news cycle with doubts/scandals about Hillary.

    Whilst simultaneously getting Donny to shut up for five months. Please proceed, governormorons.

  188. 188.

    Percysowner

    June 5, 2016 at 3:04 pm

    Fortunately, Hillary Clinton is not John Kerry. What I mean is that it never occurred to Kerry that anyone would attack his military service. He was unprepared to be Swiftboated. He never thought anyone would listen to that tripe and he paid for it. Clinton has no illusions that the Repubs won’t lie, cheat and steal to win. She is prepared for attacks like this. Whether it will be enough is the next question. I think she is, but I’m sure she’s one of the people who bought that book just so she knows what accusations are being made and she’s preparing to answer them in one way or another.

  189. 189.

    cleek

    June 5, 2016 at 3:05 pm

    @NCSteve:
    not Western: rural.

    that school is in town of 7000 people, halfway between nowhere and notever.

  190. 190.

    Shell

    June 5, 2016 at 3:05 pm

    deepest, most talented bench

    Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Santorum? Carson? Crazy Cruz? You just brightened this rainy Sunday.

  191. 191.

    Betty Cracker

    June 5, 2016 at 3:06 pm

    @rikyrah: That’s one of the dumbest columns I’ve ever read from a so-called serious political analyst. It would also make a fine Exhibit A in an indictment of our thoroughly useless Beltway media.

    Memo to Karen Tumulty: You don’t change the way you cover campaigns because a candidate is campaigning as an overtly racist, incoherent, lying demagogue; you report that the candidate is campaigning as an overtly racist, incoherent, lying demagogue, you nitwit!

  192. 192.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 3:06 pm

    @Percysowner:

    Yeah and what about Gore? Dukakis? Mondale? Only Obama was able to withstand attacks thanks to (1) white guilt and (2) Sandy, Bill won the first time thanks to H. Ross Perot and the second time thanks to a tech bubble.

  193. 193.

    Omnes Omnibus

    June 5, 2016 at 3:06 pm

    @germy: The Sweet? Wow.

  194. 194.

    Citizen_X

    June 5, 2016 at 3:06 pm

    @germy shoemangler: Guaranteed that that bird is far more intelligent and less repetitive than Racist Up.

  195. 195.

    Elizabelle

    June 5, 2016 at 3:07 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    That’s just it–Trump wiped the floor with the deepest, most talented bench we’ve had in a generation with nothing more than free media and a Twitter account. He will do the same to Hillary.

    DougJ! Come on down.

    Calling parody troll.

  196. 196.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 3:08 pm

    @aimai: It sounds like a very difficult line to walk. Keeping them safe while not making them fearful of everyone or everything.

  197. 197.

    D58826

    June 5, 2016 at 3:09 pm

    @Anoniminous: Maybe they can come with a comic book version just for ‘Ramping Up’. No need to fill in the bubbles

  198. 198.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 3:11 pm

    @cleek: 7000 people is a big town in Maine. Like in the top 20 in the state.

  199. 199.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 3:11 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    the Twitter account

    That’s a great strategy, right there.

  200. 200.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 3:12 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Worked in the primaries!

    BTW Trump gives his big counter-punch speech tomorrow. Will bring up Libya, Iraq, and Emailgate.

  201. 201.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 3:12 pm

    What’s hilarious is that Racist Hump calls the Rethuglican Klown Kar Kandidates “the deepest, most-talented bench,” as if they actually had any talent, other than using dog whistles.

    It’s kind of like say an elephant is the most aerodynamic of animals — if all you’re comparing it to is slugs.

  202. 202.

    dedc79

    June 5, 2016 at 3:13 pm

    If people want to comment here to voice disagreement with the content of a post, that’s fine. But when you’ve got comments like Ramping Up’s that don’t even relate to the topic of the post, isn’t that sufficient grounds to block them?

    And to the folks who keep taking the bait, what do you think you’re achieving? You’re not going to change the troll’s mind, and the troll isn’t going to change anyone else’s mind.

  203. 203.

    Reggie Mantle

    June 5, 2016 at 3:14 pm

    @Percysowner:

    Fortunately, Hillary Clinton is not John Kerry. What I mean is that it never occurred to Kerry that anyone would attack his military service.

    Well, her campaign theme seems to be the same. “You HAVE to vote for me, stupid peons, because the other guy is WORSE!”

    Objectively true, but it didn’t work, did it?

  204. 204.

    Surreal American

    June 5, 2016 at 3:14 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Only Obama was able to withstand attacks thanks to (1) white guilt and (2) Sandy

    Excuses. The GOP should have prevailed over a candidate that allegedly was an incompetent boob who hated his country.

    You failed. You failed *so* epically!

  205. 205.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 3:14 pm

    According to Mussolini, Fascism is a merger of state and business, corporatism. On one hand this definition could be loosely applied to European governments like Britain, Netherlands et al as they divided up the rest of the world soon after the rise of the business class. That could have been applied to the US too, and certainly applies to it today, when the party that used to represent the average person (fitfully and in spurts) is now heavily tilted towards corporate lobbyists.

    Still, there is a threat from a Trump candidacy and the general slide of Republicanism into (further and more absurd) bigotry which someone here noted the other day, is going about the process of normalization. The Nazis called it the “salami tactic”, a slice here, a slice there, until things have changed and you find yourself having gone along with steps one through nine, and it’s too late not to take step ten. There was a quote by Voltaire (or what someone imagined to be Voltaire) floating around on the internet, approximately He who can get you to believe absurdities can convince you to commit atrocities. That would apply to building giant walls and banning Muslims from coming to the US, certainly.

    But the salami tactic now applies to both major parties. Back in the seventies when it became known that the CIA was assassinating people around the world there was a movement to make it illegal for Presidents to order anyone’s death. It’s been awhile, but I vaguely recall a Presidential memorandum, maybe during Ford’s time in office, where a President ordering murders was explicitly banned.

    Now we have the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize routinely assassinating people around the world.

    Now it’s okay for the President murder someone, even an American citizen, on the basis of incomplete intelligence (and if the intelligence is completely wrong and innocents are killed, it’s what happens when the world is the battlefield for the war on “terror”) and in seeming violation of the Constitution. We have police routinely shooting minorities in the street. That’s a result of slow changes in our society.

    I realize people here dismiss me, but even those here who two years ago who called me a nut or whatever for pointing out post-WWII America’s involvement with fascists and fascist movements around the world don’t seem to deny Trump’s fascist comments and behavior. You may not see or understand the important part of Mussolini’s definition of fascism, the merger of business and state, which is too bad. You miss the bigger story.

    We are faced with a choice of two different versions of fascism, the cartoonish Trump who seems intent of making himself look like a typical barbershop bigot, and the more acceptable and more thorough kind of fascism now being advanced by the Democratic Party, wherein business interests control government. The kind that allows us to sit meekly while we have endless war around the world. That’s another change in our society. There was actually once an anti-war movement in the US. It’s pretty much gone.

  206. 206.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 3:15 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    No, DougJ doesn’t, and wouldn’t, spew racist, misogynistic shit that way Racist Hump does/did.

    Racist Hump is a thoroughly vile entity.

  207. 207.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 3:16 pm

    @dedc79: Eh, I’m having fun.

    As for relevance, why would you want relevance when you could have a picture of my cat?

  208. 208.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 3:16 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck: Yes I’m starting to see how we can educate them. But I wonder if it would work more with strangers than for the poor children who deal with it in their own family, such as the intimacy in families that is common, similar to what aimai talking about.

  209. 209.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 3:17 pm

    @Reggie Mantle:

    Objectively true, but it didn’t work, did it?

    You got a time machine?

  210. 210.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 3:17 pm

    @SFAW:
    There was that one time Galileo dropped the elephant and an iPhone off the Tower of Pizza….

  211. 211.

    Mnemosyne

    June 5, 2016 at 3:17 pm

    @hovercraft:

    They love every famous person who has Irish ancestry and goes there to visit, regardless of color. But getting a living legend like Ali to visit was probably better than anything other than a presidential visit.

    Also, I’m assuming Obama’s schedule wouldn’t allow him to do the eulogy, but Bill has some time on his hands right now. I’m guessing that Bill will have a lot of really interesting things to say about the transformation of the country and especially the South that both he and Ali witnessed in real time.

  212. 212.

    rikyrah

    June 5, 2016 at 3:17 pm

    to those who attempt to whitewash Muhammad Ali.

    From a Playboy interview in his OWN WORDS:

    “Do you think you’ll be remembered that way?

    I don’t know, but I’ll tell you how I’d like to be remembered: as a black man who won the heavyweight title and who was humorous and who treated everyone right. As a man who never looked down on those who looked up to him and who helped as many of his people as he could–financially and also in their fight for freedom, justice and equality. As a man who wouldn’t hurt his people’s dignity by doing anything that would embarrass them. As a man who tried to unite his people through the faith of Islam that he found when he listened to the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. And if all that’s asking too much, then I guess I’d settle for being remembered only as a great boxing champion who became a preacher and a champion of his people. And I wouldn’t even mind if folks forgot how pretty I was.”

  213. 213.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 3:18 pm

    @dedc79: I’m preparing two dozen links which I’m convinced will turn the troll into a Sanders supporter.

  214. 214.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 3:18 pm

    @Reggie Mantle:

    Back to trying to pick a fight, I see. Go for it, little fella.

  215. 215.

    Howard Beale IV

    June 5, 2016 at 3:19 pm

    @Ramping Up: HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW HAW!

    You felchers have had twenty years to come up with the goods on Hillary and have come up with bupkis.

    Y’know what your problem is? You can’t STAND a strong woman. All Hills has to do is point at your crotch, giggle and yer toast.

    OK, who’s breaking out the troll grill?

  216. 216.

    trollhattan

    June 5, 2016 at 3:20 pm

    Oh god, somebody lit the calling-all-morans lamp. Let the cutting and pasting commence. Later, all.

  217. 217.

    dedc79

    June 5, 2016 at 3:20 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: I think there’s a longstanding precedent for pet pics being welcome, no matter what the topic :-)

  218. 218.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 3:21 pm

    @trollhattan:

    There was that one time Galileo dropped the elephant and an iPhone off the Tower of Pizza….

    Damn, he must have been seriously ripped. Carrying an elephant all the way up? I certainly wouldn’t mess with him.

    And was it a thin-crust or thick-crust Tower?

  219. 219.

    aimai

    June 5, 2016 at 3:21 pm

    @Percysowner: This isn’t exactly true. Kerry had to go dark for a few crucial weeks or months because of lack of money. But its also the case that nobody is as prepared as Hillary and Bill to run against a figurative shit storm of lies.

  220. 220.

    Omnes Omnibus

    June 5, 2016 at 3:22 pm

    @SFAW: Chicago style.

  221. 221.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 3:23 pm

    @redshirt:

    I’m preparing two dozen links which I’m convinced will turn the troll into a Sanders supporter.

    You’re a day late and a bitcoin short: BiP has already convinced him.

  222. 222.

    Citizen_X

    June 5, 2016 at 3:23 pm

    @rikyrah:

    If recent days are any indication, the remaining five months of this presidential campaign are likely to be fought entirely on Trump’s terms.

    Yeah, right: The Wicked Witch of Arkansas made one whole speech about him, and he spent the whole week sputtering and bursting into flames.

    I’m not changing,” he declared this week.

    I heard of one leader like that. Interesting story: he ended up shooting himself in a bunker beneath the ruins of Berlin.

  223. 223.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 3:23 pm

    @gindy51: Says something important, doesn’t it.

  224. 224.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 3:24 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Chicago style.

    Just like the Thug in Chief?

  225. 225.

    HinTN

    June 5, 2016 at 3:24 pm

    @Ramping Up: OMG, you’re my co-worker.

  226. 226.

    aimai

    June 5, 2016 at 3:24 pm

    @Renie: No, its really not that difficult. Its really more of a modern orientation towards children and bodily (and emotional) autonomy. You begin with that and the rest follows naturally. You aren’t scaring the kid because you are simply teaching them that they have a right to have their boundaries respected, and that they need to respect other people’s boundaries. Done right, and naturally, its just part of creating a safe and healthy environment for all kids.

  227. 227.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 3:25 pm

    @Citizen_X: Say what you will about Hitler, but you’ve got to admit, he did kill Hitler.

  228. 228.

    dmsilev

    June 5, 2016 at 3:25 pm

    @HinTN: Condolences.

  229. 229.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 3:26 pm

    @Oldgold: Someone scary like Paul Ryan comes to mind.

  230. 230.

    skerry

    June 5, 2016 at 3:26 pm

    @greennotGreen: No, but his sister is a Senior United States Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Maryanne Trump Barry.

  231. 231.

    Omnes Omnibus

    June 5, 2016 at 3:26 pm

    @SFAW: I am just saying.

  232. 232.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 3:27 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Say what you will about Hitler, but you’ve got to admit, he did kill Hitler.

    Channeling Walter Sobchak, are we?

  233. 233.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 3:28 pm

    @Ramping Up: Quoting a criminal. How typical of the party of criminals.

  234. 234.

    Mnemosyne

    June 5, 2016 at 3:28 pm

    @rikyrah:

    The president chose very similar words to quote in his condolence statement:

    “I am America,” he once declared. “I am the part you won’t recognize. But get used to me – black, confident, cocky; my name, not yours; my religion, not yours; my goals, my own. Get used to me.”

    I have to admit, I kind of marvel at the people who are trying their best to whitewash Muhammad Ali right now. It’s so bonkers that I can’t even believe they’re trying to do it. It’s like trying to whitewash Bobby Seale.

  235. 235.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 3:29 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    Nixon was before my time but from what I can tell from that generation he really drove liberals up the fucking wall.

    The Checkers Speech alone was some excellent trolling! In fact it could be one of the greatest trolls of all time. He never did have to explain that slush fund!

  236. 236.

    Mothra

    June 5, 2016 at 3:31 pm

    I agree – no matter what, this has damaged our nation. Trump’s voters are going to believe that his loss is because of fraud. They will continue to exempt themselves from basic decency and manners to any other than those who agree with them.

  237. 237.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 3:31 pm

    @Citizen_X: Just as an aside, I am reading RATLINE by Peter Levenda, who makes an interesting case that Hitler ended up living out his string on a small island in Indonesia.

    As a child I remember Hitler fleeing was dismissed as a joke, but in the eighties when prominent Nazis like Eichmann and Barbie turn up, some in pretty big positions of authority in South America and the Middle East, the laugh is on the world.

  238. 238.

    Lurking Canadian

    June 5, 2016 at 3:32 pm

    @Ramping Up: Dude, we are still waiting for the flood of oppo that JEB! was going to unleash to drown the upstart Rubio. Actually, we are still waiting for th BRINKS TRUCKS that were going to let Romney bury Obama. To say your credibility is low is to stretch the definition of low.

    Are you just making this shit up? I’ve been assuming you were some kind of paid shill, spreading some kind of organized disinformation, but if that were the case, I’d think you’d be right some of the time. Do you get your talking points from the voices you hear over your fillings?

  239. 239.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 3:32 pm

    @Bob In Portland: Jeez Bob. Do you believe Hitler is still alive in Indonesia?

  240. 240.

    Mnemosyne

    June 5, 2016 at 3:33 pm

    Also, since i just realized I forgot to address the original topic — kids are idiots and they can probably be dealt with by making them do some community service and book reports, but the teachers and administrators who participated in and facilitated this “prank” should be out on their asses.

  241. 241.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 3:34 pm

    @Lurking Canadian:

    But we DID. We did spend millions of dollars against Trump and did unleash oppo on him–Trump U, Trump Steaks, Trump Water etc etc. It just made him even stronger. Hillary is repeating the same mistakes.

  242. 242.

    Omnes Omnibus

    June 5, 2016 at 3:35 pm

    @Bob In Portland: Congratulations. You found a new CT. I am happy for you.

  243. 243.

    Mnemosyne

    June 5, 2016 at 3:35 pm

    @dedc79:

    If you’ve never installed the pie filter or another troll filter (some people prefer Troll-B-Gone), I would highly recommend it for you. It also makes it easier to scroll the threads because it reduces long posts down to one or two lines.

  244. 244.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 3:36 pm

    @SFAW: OMG. The Eagles came on my Pandora station literally as I was reading that.

  245. 245.

    HinTN

    June 5, 2016 at 3:37 pm

    @dmsilev: Needed. Thx

  246. 246.

    Mothra

    June 5, 2016 at 3:37 pm

    @Ramping Up: maybe the 4,000th time is charmed! Maybe this time your dumb anti-Clinton fantasies will work on the normal person!

  247. 247.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 3:38 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Has he/she/it already been banned this weekend? If so, please point me to where that happened and I’ll pull the record and check the IPs.

  248. 248.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 3:39 pm

    @aimai:
    My folks taught my siblings and I that, even if they weren’t trying to consciously. Respect yourself and others and treat people how you want to be treated. Of course it won’t be the same if you are taught that some groups of people are excluded.

  249. 249.

    Brachiator

    June 5, 2016 at 3:42 pm

    @rikyrah:

    If recent days are any indication, the remaining five months of this presidential campaign are likely to be fought entirely on Trump’s terms.

    Except the past few days have been fought on Hillary’s terms. Trump was at first flailing, then absent. He kept wailing “Hilllary lies” even as even the most reluctant journalists had to admit, “nope, she’s quoting exactly what Trump said.”

    His guaranteed counter punch was weak, childish nonsense.

    And now I really hope the Democrats take the battle to the GOP as a whole and keep asking, “exactly why are you embracing this fool?”

  250. 250.

    ThresherK

    June 5, 2016 at 3:42 pm

    @Gimlet: Did that story includer Trumpsters using pepper spray on the anti-Trump crowd?

    I’m fascinated with how quickly that fact will be disappeared.

  251. 251.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 5, 2016 at 3:42 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Can’t you just see Scheming Hillary rubbing her hands together in glee? All she needs is a moustache to twirl.

  252. 252.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 3:43 pm

    @Lurking Canadian:
    To be right some of the time, even a minuscule amount of time, one would have to have material that was right some of the time to work with. As that is not available we get to go with wrong all the time.

  253. 253.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 3:44 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Tsk. I go away for a half hour and lightning strikes.

  254. 254.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 3:48 pm

    @dedc79: This is the official policy straight from Cole, I checked with him the other night for clarification after others complained:

    My general policy is anything goes, as long as it is not a sustained harassment of a person and sexist/racist bullshit. If someone is just spewing political nonsense, I ignore them and suggest others do.

  255. 255.

    Keith G

    June 5, 2016 at 3:49 pm

    @Renie: Strategies that prevent are important, but will never be perfect since those who wish to victimize can be so cunningly insidious and children cannot be counted on to be their own best advocate. My own experience leads me to firmly believe that giving children the power and expectation to be able to communicate blamelessly what has happened to them is key (though also not perfect) to harm reduction – even if that communication is years after the fact. Youngsters get hurt and move on, coping in silence. But even an isolated event will probably set up emotional consequences that are not isolated.

    I think we are crap at after-care. But then, we are crap at all aspects of mental and emotional health.

  256. 256.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 3:49 pm

    @aimai:
    For all that Obama went against campaign finance precedent in ’08, he was able to out raise McCain and showed the democrats how to defeat the GOP smear machine. Kerry should be the last democrat to allow that to happen. Though if BS had won, I wonder if he would have stood on principle, and allowed himself to be branded as a high taxing, sexual deviancy writing, socialist. Despite the GOP advantage in overall dollars, having more campaign dollars offsets that.

  257. 257.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 3:52 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I got the impression that sockpuppet Rolling Along went bye-bye yesterday afternoon.

  258. 258.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 3:53 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: It’s a good policy overall.

    The internet is filled with BS. You must train yourself to ignore it if you don’t want to see it.

  259. 259.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 3:53 pm

    @Bob In Portland: Mussolini never said it, nor wrote it. Nor did the noted Italian fascist philosopher Gentile.
    http://www.publiceye.org/fascist/corporatism.html
    http://blog.skepticallibertarian.com/2013/02/07/fake-quote-files-mussolini-on-fascism-and-corporatism/
    http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2015/11/donald-trump-may-not-be-fascist-but-he.html
    At the link immediately above, to Dave Neiwert’s site, he provides the following definitions from the actual scholarly literature. It might behove you to actually read something other than The Sakers Vineyard and Southfront.

    Stanley Payne, in Fascism: Comparison and Definition (1980):
    A. The Fascist Negations:
    — Antiliberalism
    — Anticommunism
    — Anticonservatism (though with the understanding that fascist groups were willing to undertake temporary alliances with groups from any other sector, most commonly with the right)

    B. Ideology and Goals:
    — Creation of a new nationalist authoritarian state based not merely on traditional principles or models
    — Organization of some new kind of regulated, multiclass, integrated national economic structure, whether called national corporatist, national socialist, or national syndicalist
    — The goal of empire or a radical change in the nation’s relationship with other powers
    — Specific espousal of an idealist, voluntarist creed, normally involving the attempt to realize a new form of modern, self-determined, secular culture

    C. Style and Organization:
    — Emphasis on esthetic structure of meetings, symbols, and political choreography, stressing romantic and mystical aspects
    — Attempted mass mobilization with militarization of political relationships and style and with the goal of a mass party militia
    — Positive evaluation and use of, or willingness to use, violence
    — Extreme stress on the masculine principle and male dominance, while espousing the organic view of society
    — Exaltation of youth above other phases of life, emphasizing the conflict of generations, at least in effecting the initial political transformation
    — Specific tendency toward an authoritarian, charismatic, personal style of command, whether or not the command is to some degree initially elective

    Robert O. Paxton, The Anatomy of Fascism, p. 218:

    Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal constraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.

    Paxton’s nine “mobilizing passions” of fascism:

    — a sense of overwhelming crisis beyond the reach of any traditional solutions;

    — the primacy of the group, toward which one has duties superior to every right, whether universal or individual, and the subordination of the individual to it;

    — the belief that one’s group is a victim, a sentiment which justifies any action, without legal or moral limits, against the group’s enemies, both internal and external;

    — dread of the group’s decline under the corrosive effect of individualistic liberalism, class conflict, and alien influences;

    — the need for closer integration of a purer community, by consent if possible, or by exclusionary violence if necessary;

    — the need for authority by natural leaders (always male), culminating in a national chief who alone is capable of incarnating the group’s destiny;

    — the superiority of the leader’s instincts over abstract and universal reason;

    — the beauty of violence and the efficacy of will, when they are devoted to the group’s success;

    — the right of the chosen people to dominate others without restraint from any kind of human or divine law, right being decided by the sole criterion of the group’s prowess in a Darwinian struggle.

    Roger Griffin:

    Fascism: modern political ideology that seeks to regenerate the social, economic, and cultural life of a country by basing it on a heightened sense of national belonging or ethnic identity. Fascism rejects liberal ideas such as freedom and individual rights, and often presses for the destruction of elections, legislatures, and other elements of democracy. Despite the idealistic goals of fascism, attempts to build fascist societies have led to wars and persecutions that caused millions of deaths. As a result, fascism is strongly associated with right-wing fanaticism, racism, totalitarianism, and violence.

    To these I would add one other important component, taken from Harald Oftstad’s Our Contempt for Weakness: Nazi Norms and Values – And Our Own (1989), namely, the logical extension of the Darwinian struggle against the “lesser” that pervades so much fascist literature: the deep-seated hatred and contempt in which all persons deemed “weaker” (be this ethnic, racial, medical, genetic, or otherwise) are held, and the desire to eliminate them entirely that it fuels.

  260. 260.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 3:53 pm

    @redshirt: No. The book says that the couple smuggled out of Germany and used the identification of a couple of Austrian anthropologists who measured Jewish skulls during the war were Hitler and Braun, and that the man died in 1970. It’s an interesting book, and it’s more important for presenting and understanding how the globe happened to end up covered with Nazis who avoided Nuremberg. What was Costello’s line? “It seems like South America is coming into style.” It should not surprise anyone that places where war criminals found comfort were places that were down with Operation Condor. And you can’t deny that Pinochet and many of those Argentine generals certainly copied Nazi fashion in their clothing and accessorizing.

    I have no opinion about whether or not Hitler escaped death. All the evidence about Hitler’s death in the bunker seems to come from a few Nazis who had worked there. The various conflicting stories about Hitler’s last days do not have any actual forensic evidence other than the testimony of a dentist who claimed from memory the bridgework of Hitler, Braun and Martin Bormann. The Soviets made claims about recovering Hitler’s remains, I think that they actually discovered four different remains in different places that were supposed to be Hitler, the last one being the skull of a woman. Stalin never believed Hitler was dead, nor did J. Edgar Hoover. Those elements of western intelligence who insist that he died in the bunker turn out to be the same elements who helped moved Nazis along the ratlines around the world.

    Whether or not Hitler escaped is probably the least important part of the book. I find it interesting but have no definitive judgment. The more important element was western collaboration with Nazis, fascists and the Catholic Church in moving these war criminals out of Europe. Heck, Walt Disney used to have Wernher Magnus Maximilian Freiherr von Braun on “The Wonderful World of Disney.” Suck on that lozenge for awhile.

  261. 261.

    D58826

    June 5, 2016 at 3:54 pm

    @dedc79: 21st century version of bear baiting. The commentators enjoy it and the troll is harmless

  262. 262.

    Shell

    June 5, 2016 at 3:55 pm

    and keep asking, “exactly why are you embracing this fool?”

    Exactly. Saw an article by Ben Stein decrying Trump, saying he knows nothing about economics and his views could lead to a trade war. But is he still going to vote for him? Uh, do you need to ask?

  263. 263.

    Iowa Old Lady

    June 5, 2016 at 3:55 pm

    @Keith G: As you might expect, children often have trouble getting adults to believe them when they report abuse. The younger the child, the less adults believe them. And if the abuser if a family member, the complications involved make some adults hope the report is untrue, so less likely to believe it. Maybe it’s the adults we need to educate.

  264. 264.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 3:56 pm

    @D58826: The 21st century version of bear baiting is still bear baiting. Still legal in Maine.

  265. 265.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 3:56 pm

    @SFAW: No deep dish, with a cornmeal crust, and the sauce on top of the toppings and cheese.

    Now I want pizza from Gino’s East! You people are evil!!!!

  266. 266.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 3:58 pm

    @Brachiator:
    With an incumbent democratic president this election should be a referendum of him and the economy ( Obama +50% so good for her, right/wrong direction not good, economy mixed). But Trump is so egocentric that he is making it into a referendum on him. I don’t think that’s a contest he can win.

  267. 267.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 3:59 pm

    @Shell: Trump’s further exposing the utter emptiness of the Republican Party. That “Maverick” John McCain rolls over and shows his belly to the man who mocked his prisoner of war experience says it all.

    Authoritarians, every single one of them.

  268. 268.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 4:02 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I waited like an hour to eat at Geno’s East and while it was good, it was a little much too, and certainly not worth an hour’s wait. But that’s what hype gets ya.

  269. 269.

    Brachiator

    June 5, 2016 at 4:02 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    They love every famous person who has Irish ancestry and goes there to visit, regardless of color. But getting a living legend like Ali to visit was probably better than anything other than a presidential visit.

    One BBC story is noting how the story of Ali’s visit in 72 keeps growing over time:

    “Not since the late President John F Kennedy was in Dublin in 1963 has a visitor from abroad been given as big a welcome at Leinster House as that accorded to Muhammad Ali,” the newspaper said.

    As the tales continued to grow of Ali’s week in Ireland, it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction.

    There are a number of stories about him spending time with everyday people, stopping in for tea with an elderly lady and having a lengthy chat with a road sweeper outside Croke Park….

    For Hannigan, the social impact of the visit was encapsulated in one encounter in Dublin’s O’Connell Street.
    “He was walking down O’Connell Street in Dublin with groups of kids following him chanting ‘Ali! Ali! Ali!’

    “At a time when Dublin was one of the whitest cities in Europe, this icon comes along and is welcomed so warmly that some in Ali’s entourage say that the reception he received compared only to two other places – Atlanta and Harlem!”

  270. 270.

    Kay

    June 5, 2016 at 4:03 pm

    He’s not going to win, John. There’s more of us. We just have to all get out and vote and we know how to find our voters and get them out.

  271. 271.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    June 5, 2016 at 4:03 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: It’s all Yuri’s fault:

    The operation, code-named “The Archives,” was carried out by a group of special KGB agents in Magdeburg, East Germany, where the bodies had been secretly buried February 21, 1946, on the territory of a Soviet military facility, Khristoforov said.

    Two protocols were compiled after the operation was carried out on April 4, 1970, the general said. The first documented the opening of a grave that contained the remains of the Nazi leaders and their family members, and the other one detailed their physical destruction.
    “The remains were burnt on a bonfire outside the town of Shoenebeck, 11 kilometers away from Magdeburg, then ground into ashes, collected and thrown into the Biederitz River,” the second document reads, according to Khristoforov.

    The bodies of Hitler, Braun and the Goebbels family had been discovered by the Soviet Army in May 1945. The bodies of Goebbels and his wife were found May 2 in the garden of Nazi Germany’s Reich Chancellery. The bodies of the couple’s children were recovered the next day, and the corpses of Hitler and Braun were discovered May 5 in a crater from an artillery shell outside his bunker in Berlin.

    According to historical accounts, Hitler’s death was a combination of a suicide by gunshot and cyanide poisoning on April 30, 1945, when the Soviet Army entered the Nazi Germany capital.
    In early June of that year, the Soviets buried the bodies in a forest near the town of Rathenau, Germany. Eight months later, they secretly re-buried the remains in the Soviet Army’s garrison in Magdeburg.

    But in March 1970, the Soviets decided to abandon the garrison and pass it over to the East German civilian authorities.

    As long as the burial place of the Nazi leaders was in the territory of a Soviet garrison, it could be kept secret and barred from strangers. But following relocation of the Soviet Army unit, the decision was made not to rebury Hitler’s remains but to burn them, Khristoforov explained, calling it “perhaps a reasonable decision” given the circumstances.

    Khristoforov said that all that remains of Hitler’s corpse are fragments of his jawbone and skull, items that are kept in Russia.

    The general said the Russian FSB has no doubts that the bone fragments are genuine. No other fragments of the German dictator exist in other countries, he said.

    Have I killed the thread?

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  272. 272.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 4:06 pm

    @Iowa Old Lady:
    My sister told me that one of our great uncles molested her. We were in our 50s and he was dead so the point I think was to try get someone to believe her because no one did when she was a child. It is possibly that this explained a lot about her life, both the initial act and the denial to her. I wonder how many kids grow up like my sister, not feeling that people believe in them and wondering what they did wrong to provoke such an act.

  273. 273.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 4:09 pm

    @redshirt: Whenever I’ve eaten there I’ve been in Chicago for professional meetings. These are always held at the Palmer House. The concierge at the Palmer House always gives me a card that lets me get moved into the fast lane.

  274. 274.

    Shell

    June 5, 2016 at 4:09 pm

    @redshirt: And you know, if by some miracle, a viable, electable candidate suddenly came out, they’d drop him like a rotten zucchini.

  275. 275.

    dedc79

    June 5, 2016 at 4:11 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: @Mnemosyne:
    Thanks for the clarification and script link. I wish everyone would just ignore them because they go away when they’re ignored. But I get that others feel differently and like to spar with the trolls.

  276. 276.

    Mike in NC

    June 5, 2016 at 4:11 pm

    Drumpf has now lost Jennifer Rubin. How many winger pundits are still backing the idiot?

  277. 277.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 4:11 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Nice. I’ve only been to Chicago twice, both on business, and loved the parts of the city I saw. The downtown area with the pier and the parks and the museums around the lake is just spectacular.

  278. 278.

    chopper

    June 5, 2016 at 4:11 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    the deepest, most talented bench we’ve had in a generation

    i just can’t stop laughing at this. mind you it’s the one true thing you’ve said all year, but i just can’t stop laughing.

  279. 279.

    rikyrah

    June 5, 2016 at 4:12 pm

    The Fix
    Jake Tapper asked Donald Trump if his judge attack was racist — then followed up 23 times

    By Callum Borchers
    June 3

    There’s persistent … and then there’s Jake Tapper.

    The CNN anchor posed the following question to Donald Trump on Friday:

    Let me ask you about comments you made about the judge in the Trump University case. You said that you thought it was a conflict of interest that he was the judge because he is of Mexican heritage, even though he is from Indiana. Hillary Clinton said that that is a racist attack on a federal judge.

    Actually, Tapper didn’t quite get to form a question. Trump interjected to talk about Clinton’s emails. So Tapper tried to steer the conversation back to whether Trump’s complaint about U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel was racist. Trump deflected again. Tapper tried again. And again.

    In all, Tapper made an astounding 23 follow-up attempts. This moment right here — with this look on Tapper’s face — perfectly encapsulates the exchange.

  280. 280.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 4:12 pm

    @redshirt: One of my favorite cities.

  281. 281.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 4:13 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I love the Palmer House. They put us there for a wedding one time. The ceremony was in the basilica, the reception was in the rotunda room in the old public library, and all the rest was in the Palmer House.

    That weekend had some great ceilings.

  282. 282.

    Gimlet

    June 5, 2016 at 4:14 pm

    @redshirt:

    That “Maverick” John McCain rolls over and shows his belly to the man who mocked his prisoner of war experience says it all.

    Could be the Republican version of supporting the lesser of two evils

  283. 283.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 4:14 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: The Grande Foyer of the Palmer House.

  284. 284.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 4:14 pm

    @Mike in NC: FWIW, Rubin has consistently despised Trump.

  285. 285.

    Mnemosyne

    June 5, 2016 at 4:16 pm

    @dedc79:

    Of the three trolls currently on the thread, two of them have been persistently showing up for at least two years despite having been banned at least once apiece. Those are the kind of trolls who should probably go in your troll filter of choice.

  286. 286.

    Cermet

    June 5, 2016 at 4:16 pm

    @Bob In Portland: LOL; please, just stop the nonsense. By that logic everyone who ever died in WW II really is alive and living in South Amerika …even U.S. soldiers. LOLOLOLOLOLOL

  287. 287.

    Brachiator

    June 5, 2016 at 4:18 pm

    @hovercraft:

    But Trump is so egocentric that he is making it into a referendum on him. I don’t think that’s a contest he can win.

    Interesting point. Hillary’s attack has definitely exposed a vulnerability. Trump knows how to attack and how to counter punch, to a degree, but he doesn’t seem to know how to retreat or to change his tactics.

    But Paul Ryan and the party leaders are rushing to provide him some cover. And Trump’s strongest supporters are doing everything they can to deny and dismiss the tough, relentless logic that Clinton used to dismantle The Donald’s pretense of competence.

    It is not looking good for him, but it is still way too early to count him out.

  288. 288.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 4:19 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: It would rank higher for me if it wasn’t for all the murders. I don’t get what’s happening in Chicago (as opposed to NYC and LA) that’s creating a climate that allows for so many murders.

  289. 289.

    Cermet

    June 5, 2016 at 4:19 pm

    @Ruckus: Tragic – and also, happens far too often. So sorry for her.

  290. 290.

    dmsilev

    June 5, 2016 at 4:20 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    the reception was in the rotunda room in the old public library,

    For people not familiar with Chicago, this building is now known as the Chicago Cultural Center; it’s on Michigan Avenue across from Millennium Park and is free to walk in and look at the exhibits. The domed ceiling is Tiffany glass, and it’s beautiful. Go on a sunny day so that it’s properly back-lit.

  291. 291.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 4:20 pm

    @Brachiator: I wonder if the death of Ali took away a significant amount of time for Trump et al to respond this weekend.

  292. 292.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 4:21 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Well, yeah.

    Also Our Lady of Sorrows and the old library.

  293. 293.

    Doug R

    June 5, 2016 at 4:21 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Maybe not so hyperbolic after all: http://harpers.org/archive/2005/08/none-dare-call-it-stolen/?single=1

  294. 294.

    Kay

    June 5, 2016 at 4:22 pm

    Regardless if Trump loses or not,

    If he loses he collapses like a popped balloon. There’s nothing to him but “winning”. He’s empty, an image in a mirror.

    I personally think it will be enormously gratifying and enjoyable to beat him, because it will destroy him. He won’t recover. As a bonus we get to beat his idiot sons too :)

  295. 295.

    Mobile

    June 5, 2016 at 4:22 pm

    @Iowa Old Lady: Got it a few days ago. Something like, “Site not to be trusted.” Wouldn’t allow me to enter. Went away after a few hours.

  296. 296.

    MattF

    June 5, 2016 at 4:22 pm

    @redshirt: More like, gave them an excuse to keep quiet. They’d all prefer to keep away– belling the cat is for people with courage.

  297. 297.

    sukabi

    June 5, 2016 at 4:25 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: it’s possible his r!ght to r!se flop sweat affected his mental capabilities, paid trolldum must be a depressing way to get by.

  298. 298.

    Doug R

    June 5, 2016 at 4:28 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Yeah, we survived at least four ice ages for frack’s sake.

  299. 299.

    Iowa Old Lady

    June 5, 2016 at 4:28 pm

    @Mobile: Oh thank you! That’s encouraging.

  300. 300.

    Doug R

    June 5, 2016 at 4:31 pm

    @germy shoemangler: Is the witness a “flight” risk?

  301. 301.

    cmorenc

    June 5, 2016 at 4:32 pm

    At first glance when I started reading John’s post – my presumption was that the students were building the mock-wall with the intention of a means of demonstratively protesting against Trump’s proposal. UNTIL I read further and realized: a) some of the students expressed that they did so in support of Trump’s idea, and b) it was in McDowell County, NC (a relatively rural county east of Asheville (far enough to be outside its cultural influence), represented by a Neandrethal Tea-Partier Mark Meadows in Congress. That area has long been one of the more deeply red parts of NC.

    Note that every damn one of the kids in the picture appear to be Caucasian, even though blacks and hispanics are anything but rare in the high-school age demographics of the area.

  302. 302.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 4:33 pm

    @Doug R: You are the worst person ever.

  303. 303.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 4:34 pm

    @redshirt: Social structure impact on social learning of behaviors. Combined with several generations of poor governance and worse policing and law enforcement. These are also social structural factors that further impact the social learning component. To markedly oversimplify: you have a distinct minority (as in a very small number) of individuals within certain historically underrepresented and marginalized demographics – by and large African Americans in Chicago, that have learned definitions favorable to and neutralizing to both criminal and deviant behavior in general and violent behavior in support of those activities in specific. Sutherland, the father of modern Criminology, recognized this empirical pattern when reviewing his colleagues work on deviance and delinquency in the 1920s and 1930s. Sutherland’s argument was that “yes, you’ve correctly identified where the deviance and delinquency is, but your explanation is missing something”. What was missing is that you don’t have socially disorganized or deviant neighborhoods and the societies within them, rather they’re differentially socially adjustedmaladjusted. The structural components lead to the deviant behaviors. If the schools are atrocious and education doesn’t provide a socio-economic escalator, then it makes perfect sense to engage in drug dealing or other criminal activities to get ahead. Similar for prostitution and drug usage and alcoholism. Sutherland correctly argued that under these types of conditions all of these behaviors are really the normative thing to do, because doing what would be normative elsewhere makes no sense. Combine this with the inability of the Chicago PD to do appropriate and effective law enforcement and the fact that no one cares about these areas and the communities in them except those living in them unless something really bad happens and you have a set of reinforcing social behavioral mechanisms.

  304. 304.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 4:36 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I’ve gone through my 1943 copy of George Seldes’ FACTS AND FASCISM, and his THE GREAT QUOTATIONS and after thumbing through pages of Mussolini quotes I can’t say for sure he used the word “corporatism” and it would have been in Italian anyway. He said a lot of things like that, though, and he emphasized the merger of business and state. Since I didn’t use quotes, then we are not talking quotes anyway. We’re talking about the meaning of fascism. Considering that both Hitler and Mussolini arose in their respective countries with the aid of corporate elements who expected something in return, if you remove the profit half of the equation you essentially have “fascism” as something that develops out of nothing for no good reason.

    But it reminded me of a discovery I made back in the 90s. The American Heritage Dictionary changed its definition of “fascism” between 1975 and 1993.

    From 1975: “A philosophy or system of government that advocates or exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with an ideology of belligerent nationalism.” That was the accepted definition of fascism from WWII until the mid-seventies.

    From 1993: “A system of government marked by a totalitarian dictator, socioeconomic controls, suppression of the opposition, and usually a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.”

    So at least the American Heritage Dictionary used “the merging of state and business leadership” as an important element of fascism, at least until Bill Clinton became president.

    Are you saying that the merger of state and business leadership has nothing to do with fascism? Or, that’s just a coincidence? Do you feel the need to drain the profit motive from fascism? Do you feel the need to hide those elements and the profit motive behind fascism?

    I would note that the vaguer, later definition of fascism offered by the AHD is so vague as to apply to any dictatorship, right or left across the spectrum. Specificity is better than vagueness in definitions, and someone in charge at American Heritage thought that their original definition was beginning to sound too much like what was going on in the US.

    In any case, do you exclude the merger of state and business leadership from your definition? Why is it no longer important? Our government has waged wars, overthrown governments and decapitated regimes for the benefit of corporate investments over my lifetime. I see lots of Wall Streeters in Obama’s administration and lots of donors and people in Clinton’s campaign who work for a living in large corporate enterprises.

    I realize that whenever anyone here points out the inevitable quid pro quo that arises with the billions that have been shoved Hillary’s way, but, really, removing the profit motive from fascism and the participation of business in fascist governments is a peculiar move.

    By the way, the location of Auschwitz was determined by a meeting of Nazi officials and businessmen as to where would be the best location for slave labor. Herman Ab, German banker, was at that meeting. David Rockefeller in the New York Times obituary, called Ab the greatest banker of our time. Think about mouth gold when you ponder that.

  305. 305.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    June 5, 2016 at 4:36 pm

    @redshirt: There’s a big multimedia story in the NY Times about the recent Chicago shootings. Not a lot of answers (gangs, turf battles, retribution, lack of arrests, etc.).

    I don’t think it comes out and says it, but presumably at least two main things are needed:

    1) The police need to straighten up and “serve and protect” and convince the city that they’re actually doing that.
    2) There needs to be jobs for people that pay a decent wage for young people so that gangs aren’t appealing as a way to get ahead.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  306. 306.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 4:39 pm

    @Ramping Up: Nixon’s guilt was obvious to even Barry Goldwater who informed Nixon that he didn’t have the votes in the Senate to avoid conviction and removal from office. Every Rethug who defended him on the House Judiciary Committee, after the “Smoking Gun” tape was released, announced they’d vote for Impeachment.

    If the criminal Nixon had not resigned first, he would have been Impeached AND convicted and removed from office. Only Jerry Ford’s pardon saved him from well deserved time in prison.

  307. 307.

    Keith G

    June 5, 2016 at 4:41 pm

    @Iowa Old Lady: @Ruckus: I have a growing confidence as I see more parents practicing a “matter of fact” methodology when it comes to discussions (age appropriate) about all things related to sexual development and conduct. Reducing the mystique and the “Ick!” factor is a potent protection.

    I also hope we can get to a point where adolescents and young adults are given the information and social permission that will enable reaching out beyond their family to address past abuse so that they can really account for the challenges they are facing. I think that it is a safe bet that a lot of folks are drifting along in need of addressing past injuries. I know I did for far too long.

  308. 308.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 4:42 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    He won in the end, didn’t he?

    Republicans always do.

    Just a fact of life you must accept.

  309. 309.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 4:43 pm

    @Ramping Up: He resigned in disgrace. If you call that winning, then it explains the glorious victories of President McCain and President Romney.

  310. 310.

    robert thompson

    June 5, 2016 at 4:44 pm

    I am reminded by Cole’s definition of political correctness as simply common sense; that manners are the lubricant of civilization. Very late here but I don’t think the Trump rubes care much for civility, much less civilization.

  311. 311.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 4:45 pm

    @Brachiator:
    I don’t think anything is going to dislodge his core base, nothing will move them. But for the majority of sane people his showing his ass is not attractive. The cover he’s getting from the GOP is not as big of an asset as it should be because they can’t focus on anything positive, they have to spend half their time defending him and repudiating his statements.

  312. 312.

    robert thompson

    June 5, 2016 at 4:46 pm

    @Ramping Up: Being a pariah throughout the world is a strange definition of wining in the end. Perhaps Charlie Sheen was correct in his thinking as well.

  313. 313.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 4:46 pm

    I want a new thread ☹️

  314. 314.

    guachi

    June 5, 2016 at 4:46 pm

    @rikyrah:

    to those who attempt to whitewash Muhammad Ali.

    From a Playboy interview in his OWN WORDS:

    “Do you think you’ll be remembered that way?

    I don’t know, but I’ll tell you how I’d like to be remembered: as a black man who won the heavyweight title and who was humorous and who treated everyone right. …”

    Like the multiple wives Ali cheated on or the opponents he hurled racist epithets against? Ali was a great man but neither he nor you should pretend, in his death, that he was pure.

  315. 315.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 4:47 pm

    @Cermet: You misquoted me. Do you think your argument is strengthened by misquoting me? I even pointed out to another liar that the book said the man believed to have been Hitler died in 1970, and I also said that I had not made up my mind that that story was true. And as I said, it wasn’t the most important part of the book. The most important part of the book was western intelligence cooperation with helping Nazis escape Europe.

    Do you deny that the US and MI6 helped to move around Nazis after WWII? If not, are you at all familiar with names like Eichmann and Barbie? I realize that some people here are sensitive about former Nazi concentration camp guards being deported from the US, but could you at least admit that they somehow got here? How?

    Misquoting me is the lowest form of argument here. If you want to reply to me, please reply to what I write, not to something else.

  316. 316.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 4:49 pm

    @robert thompson:

    He died as a respected elder statesman.

    And never served a day in jail.

    Just like Bush and Cheney never will. Sucks for you don’t it? That’s what you really wanted, and you’ll never fucking get it EVER.

  317. 317.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 4:49 pm

    @Bob In Portland: On way out the door, so really quick: 1) I’ve provided three citations that Mussolini never said it. You can’t provide one that he did. 2) Corporatism is a type of fascism, but it isn’t all that is fascism. Don’t have time to deal with the rest now. I suggest you read any of the authors that I provided excerpts from. Their works are considered the scholarly standard into the study of fascism. The American Heritage Dictionary is just a dictionary. In other words it isn’t.

  318. 318.

    smintheus

    June 5, 2016 at 4:49 pm

    They build a g0ddamn fire hazard, and the principal says he can’t see any evidence the kids did anything wrong? The other kids who are offended by this should demand the right to bring a bunch of old tires in and build barricades in the hallways.

  319. 319.

    Mike in NC

    June 5, 2016 at 4:53 pm

    Once the loser troll gets kicked in the junk enough, he falls back to “Reagan elected twice!” no matter that it was 30 years ago. Reagan is dead and forgotten and the Gipper ain’t coming back. Almost nobody under age 40 has ever heard of him.

    Keep fucking that chicken you keep in your mother’s basement.

  320. 320.

    FlyingToaster

    June 5, 2016 at 4:55 pm

    @Ramping Up: “White Guilt”‽

    You’re out of your mind. White people who voted for Obama don’t feel guilty, trust me; we’re mostly sad that we can’t vote for him again. I and my whole family will laugh you back under your rock. Of course, we’re city folk, who have African-american neighbors and have gone to school with black (and hispanic and asian and for all I know, martian) kids since 1966, so we’re not your target audience.

    Let’s see, you’re failing to re-elect McCain and Romney, so in 2020 you’ll be failing to re-elect Trump.

    BTW, for most white Democrats, our preference is {Clinton OR Sanders} > {Ebola OR Zika} > {Trump or the other 16 dwarves}. Guilt really isn’t part of that picture, either.

  321. 321.

    Lurking Canadian

    June 5, 2016 at 4:56 pm

    @Gimlet: That’s exactly what it is. There is a non-zero probability that Hillary Clinton will raise taxes on the rich. Since that is the only issue that matters to Republicans, they would vote for the the re-animated corpse of Genghis Khan, provided he had an (R) after his name.

  322. 322.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 4:56 pm

    @Cermet:
    She went to her grave with it. Although in the last few yrs she seemed to get past a lot of the crap in her life. She was calm and accepting of her death. Facing down death gave her the strength to face down the past as well.

  323. 323.

    robert thompson

    June 5, 2016 at 4:57 pm

    @Ramping Up: Thats pariah with a capital P. Sucks for me? Must suck to defend the soulless and heartless. The only people respecting this triumvirate of sociopaths are sociopath trolls like you. Be gone.

  324. 324.

    aimai

    June 5, 2016 at 4:58 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Another way of looking at it is that for certain neighborhoods in Chicago you simply don’t have a working State. The inhabitants are living in a failed State, where the economy and the streets are controlled by war lords (i.e. gangs). You get the same amount of violence anywhere there is no functioning police power, no justice, and no legitimate economy. Its just that we aren’t expecting it in a small area, perhaps only a few blocks. But its not uncommon historically or geographically.

  325. 325.

    The Sheriff's A Ni-

    June 5, 2016 at 4:58 pm

    @Kay: I’m unsure if losing is already factored into Il Douche’s strategy. Blame the Republican ‘establishment’ for sabotaging his campaign, complete the hostile takeover of the party, spend the next few years taking the base for everything they’ve got, and then leave Ryan and Cruz with the smoldering remains.

  326. 326.

    D58826

    June 5, 2016 at 4:59 pm

    @Kay: Trump will disappear for sure. What I worry about is he has made bigotry, racism and stupidity mainstream AND without the need for a dog whistle. After a taste of the limelight and media attention his followers will not go away. They have always been the dark heart of the GOP but now the republicans can no long wink and nod and say ‘oh the don’t represent us’. It will take time to put that evil monster back in the bottle and the GOP may not want to as long as they continue to have electoral success everywhere outside of the presidency. Not controlling the WH may actually work in the GOP’s favor. What has happened over the past 6 years – they have blocked almost everything Obama wants to do, they almost drove the country into default, they shut the government down and still had huge wins in 2010 and 2014 at all levels. So they deadlock the federal government and the democratic President gets the blame. If they controlled both ends of Pennsylvania Ave. people might start noticing where the real problem lies.

  327. 327.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 5:00 pm

    @FlyingToaster: ⸘interrobang‽

  328. 328.

    Richard Grant

    June 5, 2016 at 5:01 pm

    I am predicting now that the Republican nominee in the 2020 Presidential race will be named N. Ron Hubbard, just to mess with us.

  329. 329.

    Ramping Up

    June 5, 2016 at 5:03 pm

    “mother’s basement”

    As someone else said this obsession about poster’s living situations and/or what they do is really creepy.

    But this is nothing more than a typical progressive projecting their own failures in life onto somebody else.

    If you must now, from where I am typing this from in my fully paid of house in which I have a beautiful “rolling hills” view of the Shenandoah Valley from where I’m sitting now. I’ve always been good at finding ways to ferret out money and have done very well for myself.

    How about you? Perhaps that’s a life skill you could learn rather than whining about your minimum wage. Go out and be your own boss.

  330. 330.

    robert thompson

    June 5, 2016 at 5:05 pm

    @FlyingToaster: I was born and raised in basically a whites only milieu but was taught at elementary school that bigotry and especially racism was not a good thing if you wanted an equitable society. It stuck. Wasn’t city folk and had deep rural South roots but was always reminded that one ancestor dodged the Confederate draft; the first in American history, and another was a Kansas abolitionist who joined the Federal Army with his eldest son who did not come home. Roots matter. Respect matters. Education matters. Trolls do not matter. Thanks, I like what you said.

  331. 331.

    PatrickG

    June 5, 2016 at 5:05 pm

    @patroclus:

    I used to read (after the fact, because West Coast and work) the entirety of comments threads on most posts. Lately, though, I’ve had a process, which goes like this:
    (1) Ctrl-F, note 73 references to Ramping Up.
    (2) Note that 44 of those references are explicit replies (@Ramping Up).
    (3) Observe that Ramping Up is still active (and being responded to) within the last five comments.
    (4) Write off the entire thread, because fuck it, I don’t enjoy fishing for pearls in shit.

    So yeah, I’d like to agree with patroclus. I like BJ because it’s not a newspaper’s comment section. Pie and other filters are nice and all, but if you want people to read the comments, they shouldn’t have to wade through the effluent from a Texas pig farm.

    On the other hand, some regular commenters and FP’ers seem to enjoy it. This is just a ‘meep’ of protest from a semi-lurker who would like to want to read the comments again. :)

  332. 332.

    ? Martin

    June 5, 2016 at 5:06 pm

    @Lurking Canadian:

    Since that is the only issue that matters to Republicans

    They don’t care about that. Trump said he’d raise taxes on the rich, and I have a hard time seeing non-college educated whites honestly giving a shit about top marginal rates.

    This is just straight up tribalism. They hate Democrats because of Limbaugh and company, therefore in a 2-party system they have to support Republicans. That means they’re on board with whatever Republicans want. Their interest is their tribe, not the specific policies of their tribe. If the GOP turns on the rich, they’ll easily go along. That’s not the kind of lizard-brain issue that connects them to the tribe – not like religion, not like fear. Taxes are very peripheral.

  333. 333.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 5:06 pm

    @redshirt:
    I was thinking something similar. That Muhammad Ali’s death would bring out even more in the open that he was a great man and that in comparison drumpf’s hate and bigotry is even more apparent and truly disgusting. There is nothing drumpf can say or do to minimize the comparison of how hateful, small minded, moronic, useless, stupid, white, poor, he is, against how great Ali was. Everything that Ali stood for, everything, is a million, no billion times better than what drumpf stoops for.

  334. 334.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 5:07 pm

    @I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: The Soviet part in the Hitler body debacle is well-known. By the way, have you ever tried to burn two bodies in a shallow grave with a little kerosene?

    Like I said a number of times, the important part of the book is in the title, RATLINE. We’ve discussed this before, and lots of people here don’t actually want to discuss this. Nazis got out of Germany at the end of WWII and some ended up holding important positions in various South American and Middle Eastern governments. As files are declassified we know lots about the Catholic Church and the US government moving these people around, people who should have been put on trial at Nuremberg. Unless you’ve deliberately avoided the subject, you know about Operation Paperclip. You know the Congress For Freedom and other CIA programs that moved Nazis and fascists around the world.

    Napoleon said, and he said it in French so this is not a direct quote, history is a series of agreed upon lies.
    A little history is a lie. Your quote is not the last word, or even the full story, of Hitler’s eventual death. But since whenever I mention a book here the villagers run the opposite way, you can think it’s the whole story. Ignorance is strength.

  335. 335.

    greennotGreen

    June 5, 2016 at 5:09 pm

    @hamletta: Yes. I’m an old hippie, and I don’t forgive injustices easily.

  336. 336.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 5:11 pm

    @PatrickG: Get troll-b-gone, you’ll thank yourself.

  337. 337.

    D58826

    June 5, 2016 at 5:11 pm

    @Bob In Portland:

    By the way, have you ever tried to burn two bodies in a shallow grave with a little kerosene?

    Please enlighten us since you seem to be speaking from experience. Day job perchance

  338. 338.

    Omnes Omnibus

    June 5, 2016 at 5:12 pm

    @Bob In Portland:

    By the way, have you ever tried to burn two bodies in a shallow grave with a little kerosene?

    Come on, who hasn’t?

  339. 339.

    Brachiator

    June 5, 2016 at 5:13 pm

    @redshirt:

    I wonder if the death of Ali took away a significant amount of time for Trump et al to respond this weekend.

    I would like to think so, but probably not.

  340. 340.

    Lurking Canadian

    June 5, 2016 at 5:14 pm

    @? Martin: Oh, yes, rank and file Republicans are voting for Trump because he’s promising to let (and in some cases, help) them stomp THOSE PEOPLE in the face (for local values of THOSE PEOPLE). I’m glad you gave me a chance to clarify that.

    But the original post was asking how could a guy like John McCain, who coasted for forty years on his war record, embrace a guy who called him a loser for being shot down. Or more generally, how could all these #NeverTrump Republican leaders, who swore a solemn oath to keep him from the nomination, now be lining up to kiss his brass-and-zirconium ring. And, for them, I believe, the answer is upper bracket tax rates.

  341. 341.

    Iowa Old Lady

    June 5, 2016 at 5:14 pm

    Whoa. I just got a phone call asking me to vote for a particular candidate in Tuesday’s primary. I haven’t had a political call since the first week in February.

  342. 342.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 5:15 pm

    @I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet:

    There needs to be jobs for people that pay a decent wage for young people so that gangs aren’t appealing as a way to get ahead.

    Gangs rarely prosper as the replacement for worth, they prosper as the only avenue of worth. IOW when there is nothing else, no hope at all, gangs will prosper. When criminal activity is the only activity available…..

  343. 343.

    scav

    June 5, 2016 at 5:15 pm

    Give it its due, the believer in Magical Brinks Trucks aims personally high — who knows, given enough millenia he may finally achieve the dizzying mental heights and accumen of Allium tricoccum.

    As for the students and their instructors, It’d be altogether a better world if they stay permanently on their side of their damned boxes.

  344. 344.

    Shell

    June 5, 2016 at 5:16 pm

    Just like Bush and Cheney never will. Sucks for you don’t it?

    No, Id say it sucks for this country and is a continuing national disgrace.

  345. 345.

    pat

    June 5, 2016 at 5:16 pm

    the fact that Obama has a real hatred for this country and is an incompetent boob to boot.

    That does it. Time to get rid of this a-hole forever.

  346. 346.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 5:16 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: And I didn’t use quotation marks and Mussolini spoke Italian, not English, so creating a fight over specific words that Mussolini said is avoiding the subject.

    The 1975 definition in the American Heritage Dictionary, “A philosophy or system of government that advocates or exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with an ideology of belligerent nationalism,” is a better definition.

    So, essentially, you agree with me and the American Heritage Dictionary of 1975. Unless you can’t see any belligerent nationalism in today’s US policies, and you can’t see any merging of state and business leadership. Which would be commentary about you, not fascism.

  347. 347.

    hueyplong

    June 5, 2016 at 5:20 pm

    I can’t understand why the troll uses “we” when talking about the guy who cut off his stalwart hero’s appendage and made him eat it.

    And there’s no way I think he lives in his mother’s basement. Instead, I suspect his mother lies mouldering in his basement, near the motel.

  348. 348.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 5:21 pm

    @Richard Grant:
    Unless I’m misunderstanding your comment, isn’t that L.Ron Hubbard?
    Who also seems to have been dead for a number of years.

  349. 349.

    Gravenstone

    June 5, 2016 at 5:22 pm

    @Shell:

    Saw an article by Ben Stein decrying Trump, saying he knows nothing about economics

    Ben Stein denouncing anyone else for not understanding economics is rather rich, no?

  350. 350.

    Ian

    June 5, 2016 at 5:23 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    governing was an afterthought

    Sounds like a perfect politician for you. Can’t you troll more logically?

  351. 351.

    Mike in NC

    June 5, 2016 at 5:24 pm

    @pat: Frankly, I got bored messing with the troll and put the motherfucker in the pie filter, soon to be joined by a few BernieBros.

  352. 352.

    Matt McIrvin

    June 5, 2016 at 5:25 pm

    The idea that Sandy won it for Obama is the standard face-saving explanation for how Romney could lose when he had it in the bag, but it’s completely untrue. Obama led all season in state polling for the EV and his lead was small only between the first and second debates.

  353. 353.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 5:26 pm

    @Gravenstone:
    Maybe Ben knows what he doesn’t know. That’s a couple of miles above drumpf on the scale of knowing things.

  354. 354.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    June 5, 2016 at 5:28 pm

    @Iowa Old Lady: Iowa does the suspenders and a belt primary and a caucus thing? I did not know that. Non binding?

    ETA: @Shell: I knew Stein mostly as a famous-for-being-famous type– the bit part in Ferris Beuller and that quiz show he had on Comedy Central (I’m a sucker for quiz shows)– when I saw him on the old Maher show, yelling at Doris KG for supporting baby killers and getting yelled at by that MTV guy Jon Stewart. I’d heard he was some kind of libertarian, but he came across as one hateful PaleoCon sonofabitch that night.

  355. 355.

    PatrickG

    June 5, 2016 at 5:28 pm

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Pie filters (I use cleek’s) and troll-b-gone don’t help with the fact that so much of the thread is nothing but responses to the troll — see the now 48 / 348 comments that are direct responses to the troll.

    The point of trolling is to drive conversation. RAMPANT ASSHOLE is certainly doing that!. I’m perplexed at the “Feed the trolls, they don’t matter” strategy employed here, and more perplexed as to why the response to mosquitoes is “get stronger bug spray”.

    Like I said, my response is going to be to stop reading the comments where Ramping Up is included, because life is too short. Patroclus indicated likewise. I’ll leave it to the management to decide if that’s a desirable outcome. /shrug

    Edited to Add: pie filters and troll-b-gone are more than sufficient for characters like Bob in Portland. Ramping Up is rather better at dominating threads.

  356. 356.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 5:29 pm

    Heywood Broun, May 1936:

    I am quite ready to admit that the word Fascism has been used very loosely. Sometimes we call a man a Fascist simply because we dislike him , for one reason or another. And so I’ll try to be pretty literal in outlining some of the evidence which I see as the actual danger of Fascism in America. First of all, we need a definition. Fascism is a dictatorship from the extreme Right, or to put it a little more closely into our local idiom, a government which is run by a small group of large industrialists and financial lords. Of course, if you want to go back into recent history, the influence of big business has always been present in our federal government. But there have been some checks on its control. I am going to ask latitude to insist that we might have Fascism even though we maintained the pretense of democratic machinery. The mere presence of a Supreme Court, a House of Representatives, a Senate and a President would not be sufficient protection against the utter centralization of power in the hands of a few men who might hold no office at all. Even in the case of Hitler, many shrewd observers feel that he is no more than a front man and that his power is derived from the large munitions and steel barons of Germany. . . Now one of the first steps which Fascism must take in any land in order to capture power is to disrupt and destroy the labor movement. . . . I think it is not unfair to say that any business man in America, or public leader, who goes out to break unions, is laying foundations for Fascism.

    This is how Americans prior to WWII defined fascism.

  357. 357.

    Major Major Major Major

    June 5, 2016 at 5:31 pm

    @PatrickG: Last time I used it, troll-b-gone got responses to the troll too.

  358. 358.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 5:32 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Thanks for the details. I agree with that and understand it; what I meant specifically (I should have been clearer), why is Chicago specifically going through these issues now when all the other big cities have seen their murder rates drop dramatically. What has NYC done to reduce murder in that city that Chicago has not/can not?

  359. 359.

    ? Martin

    June 5, 2016 at 5:32 pm

    @Lurking Canadian: Ah, yes. It’s a bit self-referential that way. They carry the same avenue that we do that controlling USSC nominations and what bills move through Congress enable a host of other things to happen. Even if Trump isn’t the standard-bearer for your issue, your issue is likely better served provided your party maintains power. It’s always an exercise in convincing the rubes to give you power which you wield for your own interests. That’s true on the Democratic side as well.

  360. 360.

    Matt McIrvin

    June 5, 2016 at 5:32 pm

    As for 2004, I think Bush did win it. The vote in Ohio was crooked but most polling indicated that it didn’t make the difference; he would have won anyway. Bush also pretty clearly won the national popular vote, for what it’s worth.

  361. 361.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 5:34 pm

    Early results from PR

    Tweets

    Benchmark Politics
    @benchmarkpol
    2m
    Clinton now up 70-30 in Puerto Rico. democratas2016.ceepur.org/Isla.htm
    View location ·

    Oh and the voting was a mess, final tallies not expected till 10pm. Polling places cut from 2000 in ’08 to 435 today.

  362. 362.

    PurpleGirl

    June 5, 2016 at 5:37 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: Great reference. I know many people don’t like Rogers and Hammerstein’s music but they so often slipped in a song like You’ve Got to Taught into what otherwise seems to a saccharine libretto. The song is pointed and concise. And about a northern culture — Lt. Cable is from Philadelphia and mentions Princeton. We expect it from Nurse Nellie from Little Rock but not really from Lt. Cable. I think this song redeems the other songs.

  363. 363.

    Iowa Old Lady

    June 5, 2016 at 5:41 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: The caucus is only for the presidential choice. The primary is everything else. So I’ll be voting for the Democratic candidates for our House district to run against Rod Blum and for Senate to run against Grassley.

  364. 364.

    burnspbesq

    June 5, 2016 at 5:41 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    No actual person could be as stupid as you seem to be. Ergo, you must be trolling (and doing it rather badly, truth be told).

  365. 365.

    D58826

    June 5, 2016 at 5:42 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Actually he is a bit more than famous for being famouts. From wiki

    Benjamin Jeremy “Ben” Stein (born November 25, 1944) is an American writer, lawyer, actor, and commentator on political and economic issues. He attained early success as a speechwriter for American presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. Later, he entered the entertainment field and became an actor, comedian, and Emmy Award-winning game show host.
    Stein has frequently written commentaries on economic, political, and social issues, along with financial advice to individual investors. He is the son of economist and writer Herbert Stein, who worked at the White House under President Nixon. His sister, Rachel, is also a writer. While as a character actor he is well known for his droning, monotonous delivery, in real life he is a public speaker on a wide range of economic and social issues.

    He is still an a-hole but at least he is a bit more than just famous for nothing.

  366. 366.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    June 5, 2016 at 5:44 pm

    @Major Major Major Major: Does TBG work when people post a quote without the URL anchor to the comment they’re responding to? Or those who reply without a link or a quote?

    TBG and the Pie Filter (seemingly) can’t handle every variation of reply types that one might want to filter. Ultimately, readers have to figure out how to skip over things that they find annoying. It’s unfortunate, but that’s the way it goes.

    I try to reply at most once to a troll or (to what I consider) an annoying poster. Piling on doesn’t help in most cases, and if someone is already beating the poster about the head, my feeble additional comments aren’t going to help.

    Moderation in all things (even moderation). ;-)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  367. 367.

    D58826

    June 5, 2016 at 5:44 pm

    @hovercraft:

    Polling places cut from 2000 in ’08 to 435 today.

    Probably just to spite Bernie

  368. 368.

    Gravenstone

    June 5, 2016 at 5:45 pm

    @PatrickG: Actually, Troll-B-gone blanks not only the offending posts, but any replies to them. Yes, it leaves large holes in overrun threads, but you will be spared reading any of their tripe, either direct or via quote.

  369. 369.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    June 5, 2016 at 5:48 pm

    @D58826: I knew he was a speech writer– that’s what Stewart kept yelling in disbelief (You worked for NIXON!) as he ranted about the evil and corruption of the Clinton administration, which at the time I think was the travel office thing– but I always figured it was the Beuller, Beuller thing that made him a media presence.

  370. 370.

    PatrickG

    June 5, 2016 at 5:50 pm

    @Gravenstone: @Major Major Major Major:

    Well, that’s interesting, didn’t see that from my casual inspection of the code. Might have to invest in that specifically for this asshole. I do like pie from Bob in Portland, after all. :)

    My larger point about “seriously, you want people to install third-party software to avoid THIS IDIOT” remains, though.

  371. 371.

    hovercraft

    June 5, 2016 at 5:52 pm

    @D58826:
    Of course it was. I’m sure it has nothing to do with the budget crisis.

  372. 372.

    Schlemazel Khan

    June 5, 2016 at 5:52 pm

    OH BOY! Cramping Up and Боб в Портленде both in the same thread!!! SO glad I went for a long bike ride despite having 22 MPH headwinds. At least I am not dumber for having done that but would be if I read those two. It would be nice if we could have a thread just for them so that decent, normal people could have an adult discussion

  373. 373.

    Doug R

    June 5, 2016 at 5:53 pm

    @I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: There was an analysis of where Chicago guns come from. Sensible gun laws would help
    http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2013/01/29/us/where-50000-guns-in-chicago-came-from.html?_r=0

  374. 374.

    Doug R

    June 5, 2016 at 5:57 pm

    @D58826: Yeah, but more people actually voted Democrat than Republican, it’s just the Gerrymandered seats hid it. With Drumpf at the top of the ticket, we could be looking at a clean sweep. 2006 all over again….

  375. 375.

    Doug R

    June 5, 2016 at 5:58 pm

    @PatrickG: That’s what scroll wheels are for

  376. 376.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 6:00 pm

    We might get a forced Tbogg if this continues.

  377. 377.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 6:01 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: The first quote was by Chip Berlet. I would be cautious about anything he writes. Or wrote. I presume he’s dead or out of circulation now. I don’t know who the guy is at the libertarian site. I respect David Neiwert and used to read him regularly.

    The point about definitions of “corporatism” in 1920s and today is consequential only in that corporatism today has several definitions. Within most current definitions is the merging of state and business hierarchy. I came across a definition of corporatism that included FDR’s New Deal, so it can be agreed that one word is not the single definition of fascism.

    A quote from Vernon Louis Parrington:

    You see the dilemma in which I find myself. We must have a political state powerful enough to deal with corporate wealth, but how are we going to keep that state with its augmenting power from being captured by the force we want it to control.

    In WWII the US spy agency, the OSS, was built in large part from Wall Streeters like Allen Dulles. They moved on to the CIA. Soon thereafter we see our foreign policy, as enforced by the CIA, to be an international coal and iron police. When the CIA overthrew Arbenz, it wasn’t for our security. It was United Fruit Company. British Petroleum was a primary backer of and beneficiary of the Iran coup. Who were the people so threatened by Castro? The businessmen who owned the sugar plantations and the casinos and whorehouses.

    Our wars over the last several decades have been about energy, countries that have natural resources and countries that need to be crossed to move the raw materials to market.

    If you are stuck on “corporatism is fascism” or are concerned that someone may be misquoting Mussolini, then what is your definition of fascism. After all, Trump can’t be a fascist to you if you can’t define fascism.

    The ball is in your court.

  378. 378.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 6:06 pm

    @I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Apparently, some sites are not allowed to be posted here, so if I can’t post a link it’s the result of Balloon Juice censorship. I’ve got a comment right now awaiting moderation, and there’s no links except for the comment I was replying to. I presume that I’ll be banned here again. There are a lot of places on the net that censor.

  379. 379.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    June 5, 2016 at 6:08 pm

    @Doug R: As long as the SCOTUS doesn’t change its mind on DC v. Heller, banning guns isn’t likely to work. Many Chicago laws were struck down already.

    I like the Chris Rock idea (1:17). Make bullets in Chicago subject to a $2-5/ea tax (or pick a number). If the SCOTUS says people have the right to have a personal weapon, make sure there’s a (non-trivial) cost to go along with it.

    Or maybe we should bring back public armories where people store their weapons:

    By the eighteenth century, armories were so important to the arts of war that armorers and their portable forges travelled with armies. British warships carried an armorer and forge to repair lots of metallic implements and weapons, particularly the rifles the ship’s marines used. Close-quarter naval engagements were a matter of bullets, not cannon balls, fired by marines up the masts and in the rigging. It was a French bullet to the shoulder that killed Admiral Nelson in 1805. And it was an arglebargle with the Polynesians over a pilfered pair of armorer’s tongs and a chisel from the ship Discovery that brought about the death of Captain Cook in Hawaii in 1779.

    Such was the state of play in 1776 when Virginia appointed Williamsburg blacksmith James Anderson public armorer. He began work for the colony in the rear of a lot he owned that fronted a tavern along Duke of Gloucester Street. Starting in 1778, in the teeth of the War for Independence, his modest but thriving blacksmith operation was converted into a 68-by-20-foot building with four brick forges, complete with the requisite hooded flues and big leather bellows for ramping up the heat in the coals. It’s as formidable and bristling as a wood-framed building can be.

    As such, Williamsburg’s Public Armoury could be called an arsenal, a place where arms were made, but also stored until needed. Such places were strategic, soft targets for any enemy. They deserved expensive, special precautions.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  380. 380.

    Omnes Omnibus

    June 5, 2016 at 6:09 pm

    @Bob In Portland: Fuck your whining, Bob. No one is censoring you. If the link isn’t working, it is because of FYWP. Go to tinyurl and redo the link. That should fix it.

  381. 381.

    Matt

    June 5, 2016 at 6:10 pm

    The Trumpenjugend in that photo kinda make me want him to win, just so I can cheer for them to get drafted & then killed in a war over how Random World Leader insinuated Drumpf’s hands were inadequately sized.

    The whole “PC” thing seems to come down to bigots and fascists whining because they’re increasingly unable to say bigoted, fascist shit in public without being called on it. Oddly, their insistence that “people should be able to say whatever they want without consequences” fails to extend to anything vaguely critical of themselves or their beliefs…

  382. 382.

    bystander

    June 5, 2016 at 6:14 pm

    @PurpleGirl:

    They would rip you limb from limb on allthatchat.com for misspelling Richard Rodgers name alone.

    South Pacific is a singular testament to the Greatest Generation and the other songs among the greatest achievements in American popular culture.

  383. 383.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 6:14 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: Omnibus, I tried posting a link four times yesterday. I guess it could have been a BJ hiccup, but it seemed peculiar at the time. But thank you for your assurance.

  384. 384.

    D58826

    June 5, 2016 at 6:20 pm

    @hovercraft: There is a facebook link on my iphone to an article by Robert Reich. He posted a long e-mail about how corrupt the process is in PR and the Clintons are behind it. The post has a string of comments accusing the Clintons of stealing the election, Carter Center should investigate all of those stolen votes in New York, etc etc etc. There are many comments hoping that Hillary will be indicted. If they don’tr get their way they are not voting because the will of the people is being denied. The 3 million vote advantage that Hillary has is written off as stupid people who didn’t know they were being robbed. Bernie has stirred up a hornets nest that he may not be able to control, even if he wants to.

    Newsweek has a piece about what Bernie wants and how he has changed the terms of the democratic debate with his push for single payer and free college. I just wonder if, after getting crowd on its feet with free college, etc, if he mentions that that college isn’t really ‘free’. All Bernie is planning on doing is shifting the burden as to who pays for it. I really doubt that he spends a lot of time talking about the tax increases that will be needed to pay for his vision. Does he explain how he will close the gap between his plans and his tax increases that non-partisan economic modeling outfits have come up with. Or are they part of the corrupt Clinton plan to destroy Beanies dream. George HW Bush called Saint Ronulus the Unready’s tax plan voodoo economics. I think Bernie’s qualify for the same label.

  385. 385.

    HinTN

    June 5, 2016 at 6:22 pm

    @dmsilev: Plus the wonder of the giant silver bean and the Geary pavilion itself, not to mention the museum, it’s a great place to spend time.

  386. 386.

    Terry chay

    June 5, 2016 at 6:22 pm

    @Percysowner: even if she was not prepared (she is). Trump would never allow Hillary to top the news cycle for more than a day, even if he has to say the most racist and outlandish shit to regain attention.

    Not
    Going
    To
    Happen

  387. 387.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 6:25 pm

    @Bob In Portland: No one at BJ is censoring your links Bob.

  388. 388.

    PatrickG

    June 5, 2016 at 6:28 pm

    @Doug R:

    Well, my irritation stems from accidentally scrolling over actually interesting comments. But whatever, I’ve long since passed the irony gap of adding worthless comments provoked by trolls. Like the sands in a glass, these too are the trolls of our lives.

    But I gotta say, Bob’s martyr-shtick is just funnier than Ramping Up’s racist poll-unskewing.

  389. 389.

    HinTN

    June 5, 2016 at 6:31 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: In summary, the Chicago PD have been pigs since before they hassled my white teenage ass in 1969 (thank FSM we had not discovered the mythical marijuana we so desperately desired) and they remain so today. Not that they are radically different from police anywhere in that doing the hard work of serving and protecting is not selected for by the pay scale usually attached to the job.

  390. 390.

    SiubhanDuinne

    June 5, 2016 at 6:36 pm

    @PurpleGirl:

    I grew up on early R&H musicals, wore out the original cast and soundtrack albums, and memorized all the songs at a young age. So “Carefully Taught” was just one of many Broadway songs I knew, like “Surrey with the Fringe on Top” or “June is Bustin’ Out All Over” or “Hello, Young Lovers.” I think I was quite a bit older before I really grokked how powerful those simple lyrics were, and older yet before I learned how controversial they had been at the time. Says Wikipedia:

    Rodgers and Hammerstein risked the entire South Pacific venture in light of legislative challenges to its decency or supposed Communist agenda. While the show was on a tour of the Southern United States, lawmakers in Georgia introduced a bill outlawing entertainment containing “an underlying philosophy inspired by Moscow.” One legislator said that “a song justifying interracial marriage was implicitly a threat to the American way of life.” Rodgers and Hammerstein defended their work strongly. James Michener, upon whose stories South Pacific was based, recalled, “The authors replied stubbornly that this number represented why they had wanted to do this play, and that even if it meant the failure of the production, it was going to stay in.”

  391. 391.

    Terry chay

    June 5, 2016 at 6:37 pm

    @Gimlet: the lesser evil being dis honoring yourself and condoning the destruction of American democracy. The greater evil, of course, is losing re-election.

  392. 392.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 6:39 pm

    @aimai: Yep, I’ve written a paper about this that explains that the problems faced in Iraq or Afghanistan or the Democratic Republic of the Congo or other similar locales are the same as we face here at home: differentially socially organized societies. Its why reconstruction of them, whether internally directed, externally directed, or a combination of the two is so hard: you have to overcome the learned behavioral components that allow one to survive under a warlord or where there is no functioning government or no jobs, etc.

  393. 393.

    dww44

    June 5, 2016 at 6:41 pm

    @trollhattan: and I hope your friend does the right thing and never writes a tell-all book.

  394. 394.

    Bob In Portland

    June 5, 2016 at 6:42 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: What I find interesting is that “corporatist” is in one of the definitions you use to condemn the use of corporatism as a definition of fascism.

    Are you so worried that Mussolini might be misquoted, or are you concerned about the idea of fascism having an economic element?

    This was the line that gave you so much trouble:

    According to Mussolini, Fascism is a merger of state and business, corporatism.

    Last night I got a lot of grief for missing a comma when reading a comment. So, again, are you disputing the word “corporatism” or “Fascism is a merger of state and business”?

    My point is that fascism is a money-making proposition. If fascism is merely the scary clown with orange hair, then you don’t understand fascism.

  395. 395.

    HinTN

    June 5, 2016 at 6:42 pm

    @redshirt: That is the $64,000 question that I don’t think Rahm can answer.

  396. 396.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 6:44 pm

    @redshirt: Crime is cyclical, so even if its down in most places it may still be high in a few. The other reason is NY basically just ran it out. They instituted overauthoritarian responses based on the broken windows argument (its not a theory, you can’t test it!) and they did so as crime had already fallen way off in NY City. What was left they pushed out into other areas making it someone else’s problem. Then, following 9-11, they ramped up and cracked down even more. Easy to police if every zone is covered in cameras. And other types of crime are still there, but the ones people bitch about have been relocated.

  397. 397.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 6:46 pm

    @HinTN: That works too!

  398. 398.

    HinTN

    June 5, 2016 at 6:47 pm

    @Schlemazel Khan: My definition of canoeing: the wind is in your face no matter which way the river bends.

  399. 399.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 6:50 pm

    @Bob In Portland: Again, one of the elements of fascism is corporatism. In some places, like Switzerland that has a corporatism system, that’s all you get. So sometimes scholars refer to Switzerland as a soft fascist state, but it really isn’t a fascist state – it just has borrowed and enacted this one thing that is an element of fascism. All fascist states are corporatist, not all states that use corporatism are fascist. Beyond that I don’t have the time or the interest in typing a pro-seminar on ideology. Just read one of the actual scholars I referred you too in my initial response.

  400. 400.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 6:55 pm

    come on come one let’s get to 400

  401. 401.

    Mike in NC

    June 5, 2016 at 7:01 pm

    @Renie: You did it man!

  402. 402.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 7:02 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: While that may be true of some crimes, I don’t think NYC’s sky high 1970’s murder rate has been pushed out to NJ or CT.

  403. 403.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 7:18 pm

    @Bob In Portland: Hodor!

  404. 404.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 7:28 pm

    @Bob In Portland:
    ETA: I never said it wasn’t. You didn’t actually seem to read what I posted. My problem is you were claiming Mussolini said something without a citable source, when I provided you actual legitimate and credible sources you decided to ignore them and then you decided that Chip Berlet has somehow failed one of you purity tests. Forget what I wrote below. You’re taking a long overdue and well deserved time out. Go shill your agitprop somewhere else.

    We’re not even having the same conversation. Go bother someone else. One more accusation about me or anyone else here and you’re banned.

  405. 405.

    pseudonymous in nc

    June 5, 2016 at 7:28 pm

    @NCSteve:

    Because Western North Carolina. The part of North Carolina that is to North Carolina as, say, West Virginia is to Virginia, or Pennsyltucky is to Pennsylvania.

    Hm. HB2’s lead sponsor came from the Charlotte suburbs, and you’ll find #EverydayTrumpism not far from the urbane sophisticates of the Triangle.

  406. 406.

    pseudonymous in nc

    June 5, 2016 at 7:31 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    If you must now, from where I am typing this from in my fully paid of house in which I have a beautiful “rolling hills” view of the Shenandoah Valley from where I’m sitting now

    with your wife, Morgan Fairchild.

    Right To Shite is not even an original fucking troll. Where is Gary Ruppert when you need to laugh at him?

  407. 407.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 7:31 pm

    @redshirt: Those numbers were already down when NY, under Giuliani, started cracking down. Honestly, other than the cyclical nature of crime, no one is really sure why it went down. I’m of the “it was the elimination of lead” camp. What Giuliani did, and what NY has done ever since though, has been to crack down in a way that pushed the stuff to other places.

  408. 408.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 7:38 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: I like the lead theory too, but then, did that not happen in Chicago?

  409. 409.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 7:45 pm

    @redshirt: Yes, but the other dynamics are different.

  410. 410.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 7:50 pm

    @Renie: Wow never thought I would be #400. I guess being home on a rainy day helps with posting here; usually I see threads hours later or days later.

  411. 411.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 7:53 pm

    What am I doing wrong? I’m using the pie filter, it shows at the bottom and I can enter names but I’m still seeing BIP and Mr. ThrowingUp?

  412. 412.

    Villago Delenda Est

    June 5, 2016 at 7:56 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: /applause

    BiP’s main problem is his rigid ideology that gets in the way of nuance and thought.

  413. 413.

    Adam L Silverman

    June 5, 2016 at 8:00 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: Thanks, I think. I don’t like doing that stuff. The only problem is I’m not sure wordpress lets me take him out of time out…

  414. 414.

    redshirt

    June 5, 2016 at 8:01 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: Yeah, he seems like a smart enough guy with a lot of interesting experiences. But ideology trumps all.

    And I hate that for at least a few years the Donald has ruined that word.

  415. 415.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 8:04 pm

    @Renie:
    You have to have the latest version for it to work.

  416. 416.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 8:10 pm

    @Ruckus: I just downloaded it yesterday for the first time. Guess I’ll try it again

  417. 417.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 8:26 pm

    @Renie:
    Did you also download grease monkey? That is required to make the pie filter script run.
    Also what browser/OS are you running?
    I do fine with mac os/firefox, have used win/firefox before and also had good luck.

  418. 418.

    Rand Careaga

    June 5, 2016 at 8:27 pm

    @Elizabelle: I agree with Elizabelle. The guy is a parody troll (which I think is actually a more dishonorable stance than “sincere” trolling). For chrissake, he twirls his moustache like a cartoon villain: “Hahaha! Yes, we will use dishonest tactics, and the masses will fall for it again, hahaha, and there’s nothing you liberals can do about it!” It’s pissing in the discourse that gets him off, with politics a distantly secondary consideration, and the attention this yields (one reason I do not employ his handle in this comment), and as others have noted, feeding him is both positive enforcement and also pollutes the thread. Over at “Lawyers, Guns and Money” they’re pretty good about troll-starving, and it generally works.

  419. 419.

    I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet

    June 5, 2016 at 8:33 pm

    @Renie: If you see “Pie filter stuff Add Remove ____ Show List” then I assume it’s installed right.

    To use it, just cut-and-paste the full name (handle) of the poster that you want to “pie” and click Add. Confirm your addition, then the page will refresh and you will see the ‘pied’ version of his/her post.

    HTH.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  420. 420.

    JWR

    June 5, 2016 at 8:34 pm

    ” But most of all, what political correctness means is [having] a basic sense of fucking decency.”

    Quote of the day month year decade ages!

  421. 421.

    SFAW

    June 5, 2016 at 8:35 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    I’ve always been good at finding ways to ferret out money and have done very well for myself.

    Well, if you consider the beneficence of your johns to be “ferret”ing out money …

  422. 422.

    Miss Bianca

    June 5, 2016 at 9:14 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Speaking purely personally, the creature could remain in time-out forever so far as I am concerned. But I have it on good authority (BiP’s, in other words) that I’m a rich-bitch faux feminist – which would be *awesome*, the rich part anyway, if only it were true! – so I may be a *wee* skosh biased.

  423. 423.

    PIGL

    June 5, 2016 at 9:21 pm

    @The Republic, Blah Blah Blah…: All of them, Katie.

  424. 424.

    Renie

    June 5, 2016 at 9:46 pm

    @Ruckus: Yes I have GreaseMonkey and am using Firefox on Windows 8. I can see the two of them in the list but still see them here. When I was on later threads I don’t see them but that could be cuz its working or they’re not posting in the other open thread.

  425. 425.

    Ruckus

    June 5, 2016 at 10:03 pm

    @Renie:
    Ahhhh yes. I’ve had that problem sometimes. It wouldn’t take them out of a post that they had already showed up in but would in later posts. If I closed the BJ tab and then reopened it, all was OK and they were gone from every post. It used to take them out of any post if you just refreshed but not so much any more, at least not all the time. Also the risen idiot seems to have so many IDs that I’m not sure if it can be removed, certainly not permanently. Maybe with a flame thrower or possibly by VDE.

  426. 426.

    Bill Arnold

    June 5, 2016 at 10:47 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Nixon was before my time but from what I can tell from that generation he really drove liberals up the fucking wall.

    For raw political talent, I would put Nixon up there with LBJ, Bill Clinton and Barrack Obama. (Ranking to be done by historians 20+ years from now.)

  427. 427.

    Bill Arnold

    June 5, 2016 at 11:00 pm

    @Ramping Up:

    Romney was on track to victory until Sandy.

    Nah. Obama was already very likely to win. (Are you suggesting that Sandy was … engineered … to boost the odds of an Obama win?)

  428. 428.

    PurpleGirl

    June 5, 2016 at 11:10 pm

    @bystander: Hey, I got Oscar Hammerstein’s name right didn’t I. I don’t think that bad for memory. I said some other people called their work saccharine but they usually had one song that was pointed and concise like “Carefully Taught”. In The Sound of Music they included the song about the Anschulss (sp?). R&H had a definite social conscience pertaining to the eras they wrote about. And if you looked at record/CD collection, you find an original cast album for both those shows. Maybe I should have included a line or two about how much I like those shows.

  429. 429.

    joel hanes

    June 5, 2016 at 11:47 pm

    @Jeff Spender:

    What would the Doge do with a Dogecoin?
    And what would the Duke do about the Duchess?

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