.
Some tasty leftovers (in my own defense, I did put in a double shift yesterday). Hope you will take them better than the outraged DC-area viewers who swiftly realized that PBS was augmenting last night’s weather-dimmed fireworks broadcast with clips from previous years.
Mr. Charles P. Pierce, in Esquire, “It’s Time We Called the Declaration of Independence’s Bluff”:
In this election year, in which kickass women seem to have the upper hand, it’s probably good to return to one of the avatars of this here shebeen—Mercy Otis Warren, poet, playwright, pamphleteer, propagandist, patriot, and blessedly ill-behaved society lady of Revolutionary Boston. In her magisterial history of the Revolution, Mrs. Warren had some words concerning the Declaration of Independence, which she generally admired. (Don’t get her started on the Constitution, however.) She recognized the Declaration—”drawn by the genius and philosophic pen of Thomas Jefferson, Esquire, a delegate from Virginia”—as a gamechanger…
She also was very much aware of the spirit animating the text, even those parts of it that the men who voted on it were painfully unaware.
“Democratic principles,” she wrote, “are the result of equality of condition.”
And she meant everybody, too. Women, for example. And slaves, both the actual slaves and anyone treated as such…
She suspected, as Herman Melville later would say outright, that the Declaration of Independence made the difference, that it not only was a statement of revolutionary principles, but that the statement was so profound that it could not be bound by the monochromatic and unisexual demographic of the people who signed it. She sensed that, at its heart, the Declaration was a self-perpetuating land mine in the history of the country that was just then coming to be. (Her dislike for the new federal Constitution in 1789 was based in her belief that it betrayed the Declaration by seeking to freeze its promises in time. She was partially mollified by the inclusion of the Bill of Rights.) And, in this, while she didn’t live to see it, she was completely correct…
Pierce goes on to cite Frederick Douglass, Susan B. Anthony, Martin Luther King Jr, and LBJ:
… So, here’s to Mercy Otis Warren, and to Frederick Douglass, and to Susan B. and MLK and poor old LBJ, too, kickass women and kickass men who understood that we are children of Revolution, but that this Revolution was based on an enormous bluff that demands to be called by every American generation in its own way. And on this weekend, as we celebrate our independence with bright explosions across the night sky, take a moment and listen for the low rumbling of that land mine in history, detonating again and again, in a thousand places, like a heart that grows stronger with every beat…
And finally, descending from those heights, looks like President Obama is not the only one keeping a rhymes-with-bucket list…
.@JoeBiden to @newtgingrich on potential VP post: “Gonna do it?” https://t.co/lUg1Yg1TI6 @kristenicoleast | AP Photo pic.twitter.com/xTu5mtNouu
— POLITICO (@politico) July 4, 2016
As if the Giant Albino Amphibian wouldn’t give his up his Tiffany charge card and the remnant tatters of his self-respect to get so close to the Oval Office. (As if Lord Short Thumbs Trump doesn’t know that even better than Newt himself.)
Apart from all that, what’s on the agenda as we (most of us) start an abbreviated post-holiday week?
rikyrah
Good Morning ?, Everyone ?
Mustang Bobby
I went with some friends and the rest of South Florida to the band concert and fireworks at the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables. It was hot and humid, but the music was good and loud as were the fireworks. Getting out on foot and back to our car took an half an hour, but traffic jams — either by car or shank’s mare — are typical of the place. The rain held off until I got home.
One thing I notice year after year that most if not all of our so-called “patriotic” music are appeals to the Sky Faerie for special dispensation or glorifications of war, including the jingoistic “America F*ck Yeah” Lee Greenwood anthem “God Bless the U.S.A.” I’d rather hear Pete Seeger or something less bombastic, thanks.
satby
Good morning rikyrah and everyone! Going to be warm and humid today and worse with thunderstorms the next two days. So the outside work has to get done today as much as possible. Ick.
OzarkHillbilly
Fuck LBJ. Beat you to it, Raven.
rikyrah
@satby:
Morning. I can already feel the change in weather here . Gonna be hot and humid
???
Schlemazel Khan
@OzarkHillbilly:
I’m sure he will appreciate the sentiment anyway.
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: Thank you, thank you very much.
Schlemazel Khan
Was up til 1 this AM, couldn’t sleep for some reason so going to work on 4 hours sleep. Today I am glad that they have given me nothing I have to do at work, I’ll sleepwalk through the day. I have started applying for other jobs. The new management team I had such high hopes for is clueless and fallen into the clutches of one of the big 3 consulting lampreys. The lampreys are attaching dozens of fresh college kids without a clue to the body of the organization and trying their mightiest to drain it dry without adding any value.
Jeffro
Just trying to get through the week in Rehoboth Beach without killing my relatives, who were great while hosting us out in Montana two years ago, but have turned out to be quite graceless, classless guests. I think it’s because my cousin knows that his wife would much rather not live someplace where it’s freezing cold nine months of the year ( she is very much a beach person ) and so he has been difficult the whole week .
raven
Oh my, Mika and crew are just beside themselves. . .
Patricia Kayden
@raven: About what now?
Mustang Bobby
@raven: What is it this time? Hillary Clinton schmeared her bagel the wrong way?
Schlemazel Khan
@Jeffro:
Ah relatives – can’t live with them, can’t have them killed.
Sorry to hear you are having to put up with that
RedDirtGirl
Happy 5th of July, y’all!
raven
@Mustang Bobby: She be’s a LIAR!
Randy P
@Mustang Bobby: There’s a hymn called This is my son That I’ve always been fond of (music of Sibelius, words by Lloyd Stone) that says “other countries have blue skies too” and other words about how yeah, my nation is not the only pretty one in the world.
OzarkHillbilly
@Mustang Bobby: Whenever I hear that sh!t, I always think of Lincoln’s 2nd inaugural address:
It is amazing to me how many people are wholly ignorant of the fact that Jews, Christians, Muslims, they all worship the God of Abraham. Which shall this ‘God’ favor?
rikyrah
@Schlemazel Khan:
Good luck on your search.
Mustang Bobby
@Randy P: One of the friends in my group last night brought along a guest from Toronto and I was a tad embarrassed by the over-the-top “up yours” kind of music. I’ve been in Canada for their Canada Day celebrations and while they are just as proud of their country — and have every right to be — it wasn’t so much in-your-face as it was quiet pride in a country that can be so diverse, large, and prosperous without being pricks about it.
Ben Cisco
Back at work after a pretty good weekend. I skipped the fireworks b/c 0430 comes mighty early, but the cookout was great.
Splitting Image
I’m not sure that God loves me enough to let me see Donald Trump and Newt Gingrich on a Presidential ticket together.
Mustang Bobby
@Splitting Image: Between the two of them they have as many wives as Henry VIII and will run on “traditional marriage,” “family values,” and calling Hillary Clinton a liar and enabler. More projection going on than at a Power Point convention.
Patricia Kayden
@raven: No mention of Trump retweeting from Neo Nazis?
Patricia Kayden
@Splitting Image: Sounds as if it’s either going to be Newt or Chris. Either is horrible.
Jeffro
@Schlemazel Khan: it’s a minor thing all things considered … I mean the beach is the beach no matter who else you’re with…I guess…
BillinGlendaleCA
Hope everybody had a Happy 4th! The fireworks didn’t annoy Nikki the Cocker too much and I went for a hike.
MomSense
Morning everyone.
Keith G
Slept in. Two cats are not amused that it is an hour and a half past breakfast time.
Patricia Kayden
At least ABC’s GMA mentioned that Trump’s anti-Semitic tweet came from a White Supremacist — even though very briefly. I guess that’s something.
JPL
My mutt climbs on tables, has jumped up on the bathroom counter and sleeps at the back of the sofa. The one thing he doesn’t do is sleep on the bed. He was beside himself last night, so I picked him up and put him on the bed to sleep. He looked at me and said, this is not bad. Although, I never encouraged Finch to get on the bed, I haven’t discouraged him, he just came that way. I hope the neighbors used up all their firecrackers, because I’m a tad tired of the noise, myself.
bah humbug!
bystander
I wish Clinton would repost something from saulalinsky.com just to see the media reaction.
Iowa Old Lady
Home from visiting our son and DIL in Chicagoland.
I’ve come around to thinking that Newt will be Trump’s pick. Trump said he wanted someone who knew congress and DC. And Newt has that same super self-confident huckster quality that Trump has. They’ll be tricky to debate because the lies that fall from their mouths are spoken with such confidence. Believe me.
JPL
PBS thinks it was patriotic to dupe viewers into thinking the fireworks were live… okay, not sure that is the best explanation.
OzarkHillbilly
Went to the ballgame yesterday, Cards-Pirates, very soggy. (cards lost) It’s been 2 years since David Freese got traded away, 4 1/2 years since he won the Greatest World Series Game ever played, saving the season in the 9th when they were down to their last strike (Lance Berkman did the same in the 10th inning) and winning the game with a walk off homer in the 11th, and he still gets a standing ovation when he comes to the plate.
If the man still drank, he would never again have to buy a beer in this town.
Matt McIrvin
King called it “cashing a check”.
OzarkHillbilly
@Jeffro: I suspect I could sympathize with the man. The beach is the most boring place in the world (if you can’t fish).
satby
@rikyrah: right there with you! ?
satby
@MomSense: Good morning to you, hope you’re feeling better!
BlueDWarrior
Of course Morning Joe is going on and on about the poll numbers about how 61% are alarmed with the election, and no one on the panel (shouldn’t be surprised) is even bothering to talk about why that is: the way we’ve conducted politics in this country for the last 40 years rewards people who try to sabotage the government (in the mainstream media), and they’ve been sucked into the right-wing’s vortex of grievance about all the things the evil liberals and coastal elites are doing to screw them.
At some point, if not in the main TV/print media but other avenues, there will be a coordinated campaign of “Why elect people to the government who want to sabotage it?”
That’s basically saying I want to run a race, so I’m going to take a pistol to both of my feet first because I’m pissed off about the running shoes I need to wear. It makes no sense, it’s self-defeating, and could be a potentially deadly thing to do; but we (the greater public, many of whom have soft views on political issues) so badly want to indulge our grievances that we can’t settle on what to do that would actually be -good- for the country, and by proxy us.
JPL
@satby: How are you doing?
rikyrah
@Iowa Old Lady:
Little LeRoy Gingrich comes with Adelson’s checkbook.
MomSense
@satby:
Thanks. Still in cold suckitude but I’m tough!
How are you doing? Any word from insurance company?
Baud
@BlueDWarrior:
I’m alarmed because one of our two major parties has nominated a fascist. Even though I’m happy to support Clinton, the situation is alarming.
Patricia Kayden
@BlueDWarrior: So I guess Mika is no longer pretending to be the liberal counter balance to Joe (now that they’re dating)? When I used to watch Morning Joe a few years ago, she at least pretended to represent the liberal side of politics (for the few times that she actually was allowed to say anything). With MSNBC skewing more rightward, there’s no need for any pretence.
Iowa Old Lady
@rikyrah: That too. I’m trying to imagine how Trump feels about needing the money of a man who really is worth billions and didn’t bankrupt his casinos. It makes me smile.
ETA: Good heavens. This comment wound up in moderation.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Patricia Kayden: Mika’s very CONCERNED about Hillary.
satby
@JPL: ok, thanks for asking. The pups, cats and I abide ?
The insurance adjuster will be back either today or Thursday to try to finish assessing the damage to the house. I’m still looking for a new place, now a touch more urgently since this place will probably need to be gutted to repair properly. And still signing paperwork for my mother’s estate, so still waiting for that to settle down. Until it does, I remain in a holding pattern.
Patricia Kayden
@Baud: Thankfully Trump keeps making unforced errors like the Star of David retweet. He still hasn’t figured out how to act presidential (or at least pretend to do so).
Baud
@BillinGlendaleCA: I could have predicted that several years ago.
Baud
@Patricia Kayden: Right. In addition to being a fascist, he’s incompetent. Good for us as a candidate, even worse if he somehow gets elected.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Patricia Kayden:
FIFY.
Chet
Back from four days vacationing with parents, brother, and sister in law in the Laurel Highlands of PA. If I understand correctly, that is Cole Country.
We went rafting on the Middle Yough and saw Fallingwater, but none of the fields I searched had a Subaru in them.
Patricia Kayden
@BillinGlendaleCA: Mika needs to stop being concerned about the candidate who is leading in most (if not all) of the polls. Her concern is amusing when you consider Secretary Clinton’s opponent.
satby
@Baud: The trouble is, as Brexit showed, a sizable chunk of people will vote to blow shit up, and then be stunned to find out that the debris will rain on them too. Hopefully less stupid Americans than stupid Brits, but we’ll see.
Matt McIrvin
@satby: If white Americans were only as stupid as white Brits, we’d be fine, because the pro-Trump margin would get outvoted. Unfortunately I think white Americans on average are probably slightly more stupid than white Brits, but it may all come out OK in the end anyway.
Betty Cracker
@satby: I would have zero confidence in Americans not to blow shit up if they were presented with a ballot that said “Blow Shit Up? Yes/No.” But since the “yes” choice comes in the form of a racist, sexist, xenophobic, serially offensive, pathologically lying and self-aggrandizing douchebag with an oddly elaborate combover, I think we’ll dodge the bullet.
satby
@MomSense: I answered above to JPL, but the bigger problem for me is the mortgage company. I was trying to get a loan modification because my house was way underwater, and now with the damage and the other stuff going on I may just do a cash for keys. I had to take it off the market, because it’s not eligible for FHA financing needing structural repairs.
Cermet
@OzarkHillbilly: None of the above since the whole concept is long sick, murderous and sexually savage delusions of very mentally ill people in the past that is taken as “gospel” by people raised from birth to believe such utter fairy tales that make Tolkien look almost sensible.
BlueDWarrior
@Matt McIrvin: Suburban and Rural White Americans want the America in their mind back, and if they can’t have it back, then they will burn it down to the ground and build it from out the ashes. Assuming they survive the chaos that the burning down would cause that is…
satby
@Matt McIrvin: @Betty Cracker: Yeah, I hope so too. My hardcore Republican, somewhat racist neighbors across the street are despondent about the election and haven’t put up any signs yet. They’re usually putting the first signs out. If they are any indication, we should be ok. Still GOTV all the way.
BlueDWarrior
@Cermet: Yeah but you tell them that and they become recalcitrant and believe harder, since in a lot of cases their holy books actually ‘program’ them to resist people who try to break their faith. I find that if you want to bring someone out of an (overly) religious mindset and have it stick, you almost have to be the White Rabbit to their Alice, and just lead them and hope they follow down that tunnel and out into Atheist/Agnostic Wonderland.
Trying to drag them kicking and screaming makes them start bleating about taking their country back and destroying the infidels.
Baud
@satby: The political leaders in Britain were idiots, as shown by the recent resignations. Hillary has run a good campaign and is popular among Democrats. And we have more minorities. And women will be key, unlike in the Brexit vote.
Betty Cracker
@satby: There’s a dude who lives down the road from us who seems similarly despondent. He’s a GOP precinct captain who usually has signs out by now for the most hard-right Republican on the ballot for every office from county commissioner to president — in fact, I often use his signage as an informal indicator of who is the biggest douchebarge in local elections. This year? Nothing.
satby
@Matt McIrvin: @BlueDWarrior: You both obviously missed the Jessica Williams Daily Show spot, where she interviewed several Bernie or Busters, who now state they’ll vote for Drumpf. It was a multiethnic cavalcade of derp. Most Drumpf supporters are white racists. But he has others in his camp that mystify me.
Edited to add: I know these are minorities of minorities. And I don’t really worry [too much] about November. But that they even exist is kind of a shock.
OzarkHillbilly
@Cermet: That pretty much sums it up in a nutshell. I always want to ask the loudest of the anti LGBTers how many non virgins have they stoned in the last week.
MattF
@rikyrah: I’m not so sure. I believed, for a while, that Noot was the leading VP nom contender, but Noot’s ego issues are likely to get on Der Trump’s nerves– and Noot has a standing army of enemies in DC. Also, the latest reading from Adelson is neutral– It’s safe to assume that Shelly is on to Donald’s game.
Baud
@satby:
The 27% rule guarantees their existence.
Kay
@BlueDWarrior:
They use poll numbers to feign a connection with their audience and deny bias. If “61% say something, something” then that’s Main Street and it’s not her just opinion- here’s the number- it’s 61%! It’s “objective data”!
I think it’s weird because shouldn’t professional media celebrities HAVE some connection with their audience? Why are they always casting around for clues? It’s almost an admission of out of touchness- “we don’t have the first thing in common with this tribe we’re observing but here’s some reports from the field”.
Patricia Kayden
@satby: Williams likened these “progressive” Trump supporters as someone who lost a vote to get into a preferred restaurant and decided to eat excrement in an alley as payback to those responsible. Perfect analogy.
Iowa Old Lady
@MattF: I have a comment I moderation that you counter quite nicely here.
I am ashamed of my fellow white people, especially the old ones.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Shake enough trees and a few nuts are bound to fall out of them.
Keith G
Well, the imperative for all the Joes out there in to provide some buzz that attracts potential customers for whomever is paying the bills.
Specific poll numbers (as opposed to chart-able trend lines) do not mean much right now. We have 30 days. What the numbers from the 1st week of Aug show us will be the telling of the tale. At that point, whomever chooses to get all buggy (or optimistic) will have some sound numbers to go by.
So until then, I intent to find ways to drown out the noise.
Matt McIrvin
@Keith G: All the way up to Election Day, it will still be pointless to cite a single poll as evidence of anything in particular about the election, but all the news outlets will keep doing it, and trying to concoct detailed stories about random fluctuations from one to the next.
MattF
@Matt McIrvin: Experience shows that the quantities measured in polls don’t actually vary all that much– essentially all the variation we see in polling is random. Which variation is then processed by the ‘pattern-recognition gone amok’ filters in our cerebral cortices.
BlueDWarrior
@Patricia Kayden: A lot of them believe, quite stupidly, that the way to Progressive Utopia(tm) is to bury the country in so much right-wing bullshit that the Revolution(tm) happens.
And they will stubbornly hang on to this idea no matter how many times in the macro and the micro it proves to not work.
Kay
@BlueDWarrior:
I haven’t watched Chris Hayes that much but when I have I noticed he doesn’t do this- this fake “finger on the pulse of the nation” stuff. He acts like a normal person with opinions- “this is what I think and here’s some polling and some interviews”. That’s ACTUALLY authentic so it comes off that way, but I guess Joe ‘n Mika’s whole fake “everyman” brand is threatened by trusting their audience that much.
D58826
a bit of humor from huffington
rikyrah
@Kay:
you continue to nail them to the wall, Kay.
rikyrah
@BlueDWarrior:
And, folks need to grasp – among ‘ those people’ -NOBODY is going back to the ‘ good old days.’
Oh well, if we have to fight it out at the ballot box – again – then, that’s how it’s going to be.
BlueDWarrior
@Kay: which ironically devalues their brand because they are seen as excessively pandering. Even if Chris Hayes doesn’t do amazing numbers, people look at him and go “He believes the things he believes, but can separate those beliefs from whatever polling data and research his people pull up”
Whereas it seems like Joe and Mika’s mindset almost flows to whatever the polls are spitting out at any given point in time.
rikyrah
Do you all realize that it’s a little over 2 weeks until the GOP Convention?
Eric S.
@Schlemazel Khan:
As we say, feature not a bug. In info technology, my field for 20 years, I am always surprised at how they continue to gain more clients. I have never, ever seen then deliver.
MattF
@rikyrah: And where is Mr. Priebus these days? He seems to have dematerialized.
Kay
@rikyrah:
Hayes is interesting to me because he’ll take a risk. I watched part of his series on coal and he assumes the pro-coal people won’t hate him for disagreeing with them, and they don’t. It’s a real dialogue. He trusts them not to be horrible. Mika and Joe wouldn’t know what to do- they’d need some “data” before communicating with the unwashed masses :)
magurakurin
@OzarkHillbilly:
I’m guessing you’ve never gone surfing. Beach…not a boring place. At all. I even go in the winter when it’s cold and rainy because….there are waves.
rikyrah
Liberals Shouldn’t Affirm Trump’s Message About Globalization
by Nancy LeTourneau
July 5, 2016 8:49 AM
To be honest, I didn’t listen to or read Donald Trump’s speech last week in Pennsylvania. For a while now I’ve been saying that it is not worth the time spent critiquing what he says about policies because he consistently changes his tune and backtracks when the mood and/or circumstances suit him. But after reading several critiques of what he had to say, I finally decided to take a look.
For a great refutation of that speech, you’ll find none better than Paul Krugman. But the approach that concerns me the most comes from those on the left who reinforce what the presumptive Republican nominee said. I’m sure it has come from others, but an article by Egberto Willies is the one that set off a lot of alarm bells. He quotes Trump’s speech extensively and then says:
Since when do people who claim to be reality-based think it’s a good idea to “forget about the inaccuracies?” And since when do we find “truth” from someone who is a liar, a demagogue, and a bigot? I’m not saying that’s impossible, but we can’t simply forget about the inaccuracies. Because whatever truth might exist is embedded within the same message being peddled by a lying demagogic bigot.
………………………
Both Sanders and his supporters try to distance themselves from the more noxious things Trump proposes by suggesting that we can separate his message about globalization from the nativism he also espouses. Here is how the Senator recently put it:
The trouble is that it is impossible to separate that message about globalization – whether it comes from Trump or the Leave campaign – from the demagogy and nativism on which it is grounded. Notice how Trump talks about “independence.” In the same speech he talked about how the U.S. has become dependent on foreign countries and he will put America first again. Of course, that also means “closing our borders.”
rikyrah
Block Trump’s Brexit by Re-Engaging America’s Partners and Launching a New ‘New Deal’
Randy Abraham, Guest Blogger
July 1, 2016
In reports around the world pundits are proclaiming Brexit as a shot across the bow to globalism. Trade agreements are out, economic nationalism is in.
Brexiters won Round One, but what is to come?
The day after the vote, Donald Trump hailed the “victory” of the Brexiters and said America is feeling the same wave and also wants to “take their country back” from political elites.
And again Donald Trump used fear to appeal to people’s base instincts, scapegoating Mexico and China instead of trying to promote greater understanding of the issues and the nature of trade agreements and internationalism.
But as someone whose branded merchandise is made in foreign countries, who used imported steel and labor to build his buildings and staff his hotels, and who recently opened a golf course in Scotland, Trump hardly seems an opponent of globalism. Rather, he is a demagogue, a free-market fundamentalist who uses inflammatory pseudo-populist and anti-establishment rhetoric to pander to the disenfranchised members of both the political Right and Left.
rikyrah
@MattF:
Reince is on the Orange Julius liquid diet.
He is on his second bottle of Jack Daniels by 11 am.
Matt McIrvin
@rikyrah: The best thing I’ve read lately on that subject is this Robert Kuttner interview with Lawrence Mishel, the president of the Economic Policy Institute, who is not pleased that Donald Trump kept citing them to support his “views” on trade, such as they are. Mishel is not happy with the Obama administration’s stance on TPP and wants Hillary Clinton to be less of a free-trader, but he states in no uncertain terms that Trump is running a con job.
rikyrah
Already Great: Why Donald Trump is Attempting to Sell a Version of America That Never Actually Existed
Trevor LaFauci
July 3, 2016
……………………………………
So Donald Trump came up with the phantom idea that America is no longer great. This notion is not backed by any empirical data; it exists solely in the minds of low-information Republican voters looking for someone to blame for their hardships. Because for this voting bloc in particular, times have been tough for a long time now. Thanks to Reaganomics, wages have been stagnant for nearly thirty years. Due to increased globalization, corporations have opted to shift jobs overseas and avoid paying taxes rather than keep jobs here at home. Student debt has crushed a generation of students so there now exists a large segment of the population with a college degree being forced to work minimum wage jobs. Green jobs and the new green economy has pushed coal country to the brink of extermination. And those with nothing more than a high school degree have become lost in our modern economy, falsely blaming immigrant workers for their lack of job prospects rather than a generation of trickle-down economic policies that were never designed to reach their pockets in the first place.
There’s a reason that Donald Trump doesn’t specify when America was great. Because for those outside the Republican base, there exists a very real America where life was simply not great for various segments of our population. Prior to 2015, life was not particularly great for a generation of LGBT Americans, who were denied rights and protections simply because of whom they loved. Prior to the 1970s, life was not particularly great for a generation of African-Americans, who were forced to attend inherently unequal public facilities, public schools, and institutions of higher learning. Prior to the 1960s, life was not particularly great for a generation of women, who were expected to sacrifice their own careers to be the subservient housewife to conform to the accepted gender norms of the time. These groups in particular have experienced firsthand our country’s long march toward justice. Many fought and died to provide opportunities to future generations that they themselves were unable to receive. With so much progress made and still more to come, these groups will simply refuse to return to a time when they were treated as permanent second-class citizens.
And that is what the notion of making America great again is truly about: White supremacy. Donald Trump’s campaign has been built on racism, sexism, and xenophobia. For him, America would be great when certain segments of our populations would know their role and place in society. We’ve seen him refuse to repudiate David Duke because he knows he needs Duke’s supporters in the general election. We’ve seen how he thinks women should be seen and not heard. We’ve seen him promote an anti-immigration stance that would bar an entire world religion from entering our country. Donald Trump would thoroughly embrace an America dominated by a single religion, where there existed a strong sense of nationalism, and an ingrained distrust of foreigners. This is a version of America that never actually existed but is one that Donald Trump would love to come to fruition. Should that happen, America wouldn’t excel, but instead would become a fascist state led by a mentally-unstable ruler.
hovercraft
Good morning,
this video should start everyone’s day off with a smile.
President Obama sings happy birthday to Malia last night. And miracle of miracles she didn’t die of mortification, but seemed to enjoy it.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@MattF: Perhaps he’s finally pouring Bailey’s in his cereal or desperately trying to find a Johnny Walker. He may no longer believe “this if fun.”
OzarkHillbilly
@magurakurin: No, I’ve never been surfing. Have never had enuf time around a place with that kind of water to learn how. And while looking at waves is strangely cathartic in the same way as staring at a fire, it is hard to watch the waves while a couple thousand people frolic, scream, and play in the water.
My experience with the big waters is limited to 2 short stays** only one of which was as an adult. I took a gal I was dating because she really wanted to go and it was semi-close to our real objective. For 3 days she lay on a towel and sun bathed. On the first day, I swam for about an hour, then said “screw this” and went for a hike. The next 2 days were repeats. The only enjoyable moments at the beach on that trip were sitting in the sand after dark long after all others had gone, drinking a few cold ones and listening to the waves come in and having quiet conversation.
** I’m not counting either of my trips to Mallorca. We went to the beach only once and that was only so I could go in the water and swim so I could say, “Yes, I did swim in the Mediterranean.” The rest of the time, the Med was the backdrop of all that we did. The source, the birthplace, the heart and soul of all that surrounded us, but still, little more than a backdrop.
Poopyman
@Eric S.: Or as Despair.com says …
D58826
help comment in moderation
Iowa Old Lady
Here’s a link to a current article in Industrial Equipment News about contractors still being upset that Trump stiffed them on the Taj Mahal. Link courtesy of Mr IOL, who reads that kind of magazine.
ETA: I like that this article is being read by engineer types like Mr IOL.
hovercraft
@Kay:
Chris Hayes is from the Bronx ( as an aside for all you Hamltonians he went to school with LMM), and he lives in Brooklyn, he is surrounded by real people in the very diverse city he grew up in. He doesn’t need to go out to do ‘man on the street interviews’, he just has to talk to his friends and neighbors. He also lived in Chicago for several years. So his life is a lot closer to the way most American people live in terms of diversity of people and opinion.
JPL
Sorry if this has been mentioned before, but Comey is going to make a statement at 11:00 am. hmmmm
MomSense
@hovercraft:
That was such a lovely moment. I am going to miss having that family in the White House representing the best of America.
Gin & Tonic
@Iowa Old Lady:
Shit, I must have let my subscription lapse.
hovercraft
@MattF:
Hiding in DC drinking copious amounts of alcohol, counting down the days when he can retreat ti Wisconsin to figure out what he’s going to do with the rest of his life.
Iowa Old Lady
@Gin & Tonic: Mr IOL reads these things so we don’t have to.
magurakurin
@OzarkHillbilly: yeah, crowded beaches can suck. a lot. But like you said the evening and night and early mornings, very nice. But I grew up near the beach. My grandparents had a house on the Jersey Shore (not like the tv show Jersey Shore) and I spent all my summers there until I went to high school. I still go back every August for two weeks and the whole family gets back together (grandparents are long departed though). Now I live on an island and the sea defines the limits of the world…kind of like in Mallorca in a way. You just need to visit nicer beaches. You’d probably like renting a little cottage on the beach in one of the quieter towns on the Oregon Coast.
Chyron HR
@rikyrah:
I thought “Suicide Squad” wasn’t coming out until August.
rikyrah
@Iowa Old Lady:
These folks need to be made into campaign ads.
Gin & Tonic
@Iowa Old Lady: I read that article quickly. Why anybody would do any work for Il Donaldo for anything other than cash up front is a mystery to me. His entire career is built on stiffing vendors, and by now everybody in any position ever to be a vendor must know it.
magurakurin
@Chyron HR: I wonder if the GOP convention will end up like the last scene in Reservoir Dogs?
danielx
@satby:
I wouldn’t bet any money on it if I was you. If there’s one thing of which I am tolerably certain in this uncertain world, it’s that a significant portion (at least) of our fellow citizens can be counted upon to vote their prejudices instead of their interests in every election.
Gin & Tonic
@magurakurin: It’s what you grow up with and get accustomed to. I’ve never lived more than about 50 miles away from salt water, most of my life even closer, and wouldn’t give that up for anything.
Iowa Old Lady
@rikyrah: Like the “When Romney Came to Town” ones. I expect the Clinton campaign is on it. They just have so much material that it takes a while to get to any one thing.
@Gin & Tonic: No kidding.
magurakurin
@Gin & Tonic:
Definitely. It wasn’t until I got older that I realized not everyone spent the entire summer on the beach, well older meaning 10 or so. But I truly was older when I really realized that some people see the ocean only a few times in their life. I can’t imagine being so far away from the sea anymore. I did live in Arizona for a couple of years, but most of my life I have been no more than two hours from the sea and for the last 20, only ten minutes away. But…tsunamis…suck hard…a real fear where I am now.
Poopyman
@Gin & Tonic: Between stiffing folks in NY and Jersey, I wonder how he’s managed to avoid the mob all these years.
rikyrah
@magurakurin:
Midwesterner here.
I have seen the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. But, the main body of water for me is Lake Michigan. I’m not a beach person, but I love the water.
Amir Khalid
The fireworks have started up for Eid, and as usual it sounds like small-arms firefights are going on in the neighbourhood. Bianca is at my feet receiving skritches. All is well.
Uncle Cosmo
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): “Johnny Walker” is what RNC PR BS uses in the middle of the night– to help him get to the facilities where he can empty his bladder.
germy
R.I.P.
Noel Neill
http://www.vulture.com/2016/07/noel-neill-tvs-lois-lane-dead-at-95.html
JPL
@germy: I had no idea she was still alive. RIP Lois.
hovercraft
@Gin & Tonic:
Here’s an interesting look at where Drump gets a lot of his financing. It looks at his ties to Russian oligarchs, and his desperate attempts to become a huuuge player there. It’s from Slate but still a good read.
Trump’s Russia connections
Poopyman
@Amir Khalid: I was just going to ask if it’s Eid yet, or whether you had to wait for sunset in Mecca. Guess that answers that question.
Happy Eid!
rikyrah
@hovercraft:
Con man, grifting, crook.
workworkwork
@Keith G: This is why we went with free-feeding.
Other than that, Emma, our little tuxedo cat crawls under the covers and goes to sleep with us. Charlie, the ginger, lies down between my pillow and the headboard so I have to be careful when putting my hands under there.
Both of them were pretty freaked out by the fireworks last night, even though they stayed indoors.
Peale
@hovercraft: yep. I do view his candidacy as an attempt by the Russians to puta friend in office. It’s actually rather alarming.
Shell
@Jeffro: Hmmm, the 5th of July, and dealing with a house full of relatives. I think thats a play!
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: Eid Mubarak! What do you make for the Eid feast in Malaysia. Indian Muslims make biryani and kheer (both are to die for, especially the biryani)
workworkwork
@magurakurin: When we lived in Chicago, we were a block from Lake Michigan. I used to go down there in winter and watch the storms and waves play against the grey skies. Good way to clear the mind.
My aunt used to tell me that this was because of my ‘Celtic soul’.
MattF
@hovercraft: Here’s another quote:
“I haven’t seen that” is a quote for the ages.
Matt McIrvin
@MattF: Well, some is randomness and some is just that different polling companies report at different times, and they all have different house biases. Your typical “shock poll” news story is usually doing an apples-to-oranges comparison of some specific new poll with whatever polls people heard about last, and that’s often most of the difference.
For example, at one point everyone here got very excited because of a Bloomberg/Selzer poll showing Clinton up 54-36. Was there some actual movement in the race? Maybe a little, but in hindsight it was both a high outlier, and a poll that seems to give better results for Clinton than most other polls. And it came out shortly after a bunch of polls from completely different companies that seemed to show Clinton in trouble.
Gin & Tonic
@MattF: He should talk to Alexandr Litvinenko’s widow.
Amir Khalid
@Poopyman:
In the Muslim calendar, the day runs from sunset to sunset so it’s already the first of Shawal (the date of Eid) as I type this. People will go to mosque for Eid prayers in the morning (it’s 10:25pm now) before getting down to visiting with family and friends plus the serious resumption of daytime eating and drinking (of soft drinks!).
Mind you, the kids don’t wait for Eid to start with the fireworks here, any more than the kids over there wait for the actual Fourth of July.
Matt McIrvin
@OzarkHillbilly: I’ve visited the Mediterranean a few times but avoided swimming in it, once because I was warned about a local outbreak of grisly-sounding parasitic infections, and the other times because I was too busy doing things other than going to the beach. I’m not really a beach person, honestly…
gene108
@bystander:
I believe Hillary wrote and received letters from Saul, back in the 1960’s, when she was in college.
Maybe post a few those letters from Saul and see what happens.
Shell
He’s probably quite busy trying to find anybody that’ll speak at the GOP Convention.
maurinsky
@Randy P:
The tune is Finlandia. I have a job cantoring in a Catholic church and they use these words when they sing it.
hovercraft
@MattF:
Between that and I read it on the internet, we have a lot to look forward to. I can just see it now, ” the WHO and the NIH say that Ebola is spread through contact with infected monkeys” well I haven’t seen that, but I did read on the internet that there are monkey-people who are mixing with people. We must ban all travelers from countries with monkey-people”.
Amir Khalid
Corey Lewandowski says some of Donald Trump’s best friends are Jewish. (Huffpo link.)
schrodinger's cat
@workworkwork: I like watching the rain at a distance while you are on shore.
Matt McIrvin
@maurinsky: That hymn-like part of Finlandia sometimes gets used as an anthem of sorts in Finland; it’s interesting to hear it used as an anti-nationalist song. The UUs apparently like to use it (I think I heard it at a choral concert once):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finlandia_Hymn#Other_hymns
Gin & Tonic
@Amir Khalid: I wish the media would correctly refer to him as “CNN staffer and Trump retainer” Lewandowski. Anyone stupid enough to believe that he is “former campaign manager” should probably not be allowed to handle sharp objects.
hovercraft
Hey looks like the bitter angry old man is felling the heat in Arizona, between his primary and Kirkpatrick he’s running scared. So I guess he’s decided to let his Obama hatred spew forth. FSM please let him lose, if you do I’ll never be bad again. Please!
Matt McIrvin
@satby: In polls that have an ethnic breakdown, Trump pretty consistently gets about the same fraction of the Hispanic vote as Mitt Romney–somewhere in the 20-30 percent range. (I think Mitt’s number was the iconic 27%.) All his explicit and extravagantly racist Hispanic-baiting can’t get him lower than that. (They generally don’t break it down further and ask these people what their national origin is and whether they self-identify as white: I suspect that would be edifying.)
And he gets single-digit support from African-Americans, but it’s not zero.
hovercraft
@Amir Khalid:
And most misogynists have mother, sisters, wives, and daughters, his point?
Kay
@hovercraft:
I kind of resent how they fob Trump’s horribleness off on “regular people”. Bullshit on that. Trump grew up coddled and promoted by fancy people. He’s one of theirs. I personally was never fooled by him but a lot of them apparently were. “Trump may not have 10 billion dollars” No shit. Why did all these supposedly smart people ever believe he did?
workworkwork
@magurakurin: The only question is – Who ends up tied in a chair, missing an ear?
germy
My day so far: We have a honda that is under airbag recall. Copied the VIN off the car (and it is almost unreadable because manufacturer puts weird patterns under the numbers and letters), called the dealer and read him the VIN. Doesn’t show up in his system. (invalid)
workworkwork
@rikyrah: Born and raised in Michigan. My family had a sailboat so we spent a lot of time on the lakes.
liberal
Yay! Let’s outsource everything! I’m sure Martin and Cacti would think it’s great.
And as long as we think it’s reasonable that costs are driven to their lowest value, remind me again why we should tax land value 100%? After all, if we tax land ownership heavily, the land will still be there.
Kay
@hovercraft:
It’s like opposite-land, because you know who actually came from the lower and middle class? Hillary and Bill Clinton. Donald Trump came out of the group who started on 3rd base. He’s their monster.
workworkwork
@schrodinger’s cat: Plus you’re usually the only person on the beach for miles. Really lets you think things through.
Matt McIrvin
@germy: This airbag recall is so gigantic that they’re slow-walking all but the most horrifyingly dangerous cases. I have one of these too and I’ve known about it for months, but the dealer tells me they can’t do anything until I get the letter in the mail, and as far as I can tell, they’re not even thinking about my state yet (for some reason Massachusetts isn’t considered “high-humidity”).
raven
fuck it
catclub
@germy: The best place to find the VIN is your insurance policy card. Of course, if someone read the VIN
off wrong to give to the ins. co, who is gonna know?
OTOH: I am guessing that the dealer who gets it for registration gets it right, then the ins. co gets it from the state dmv registration.
Fair Economist
@Iowa Old Lady:
Telling that Mr. Trump was claiming to have “plenty of cash” shortly before filing for bankruptcy.
raven
Comey on Hillary on now.
catclub
@Matt McIrvin: I’d say by comparison with Florida and the Gulf coast states, and Texas, Massachusetts does not have the most deadly combination of heat and humidity.
germy
@Matt McIrvin: I’m in voice mail limbo right now. The VIN number in the car is embossed on top of weird fillagree, so I was off by one number. I got the VIN off my wife’s registration card, and called back and off course I was bounced to voice mail.
I went through something similar with a Saturn that had ignition switch and power steering issues. It’s a clusterfuck.
My son has an ’02 civic; I hope they’re acting with a bit more urgency with him.
JPL
@raven: I’m not feeling positive…
raven
@JPL: The wingnuts are sure it’ll be zipola.
schrodinger's cat
@Kay: Isn’t it funny that the boot strappy party has nominated princelings since W.
W, McCain, Romney and now Trump.
hovercraft
@Kay:
The villagers have a weird concept of regular folk, as you say a pampered rich kid who lives in a gilded penthouse and in private country clubs is the regular candidate of the people. A kid who grew up with a single mother and at times lived with his grandparents in a little apartment but managed to go to Ivy league schools through hard work is an elitist. Suckers may buy that the guy who flies in on a plane or helicopter with this name on them is a regular guy (I’m looking at you media), but those of us who have a brain remember all the things he’s said to disparage and dupe regular people. I have no problem with people being rich, Jobs, Gates, Buffett, et al all made something that contributes to peoples lives, the Clinton’s are willing to take money from practically anyone who is dumb enough to pay hundreds of dollars to famous people to speak to them (separating fools from their money), Trump has built things but at the expense of everyone else involved, while he has profited virtually everyone else has lost. Not my idea of clean money.
Fair Economist
@Peale:
“Putin” a friend, you might say.
JPL
uhoh….
Quinerly
@raven:
I suddenly have a pit in my stomach. Hope I’m wrong.
nutella
@Patricia Kayden:
They don’t do him any harm though. Is he less popular with the public or the press now that we all know he reads and republishes white supremacist/anti-semitic propaganda? No.
And the fact that Putin owns him (and assigned Manafort to ‘work’ with him to keep an eye on him) won’t make him any less popular either.
Quinerly
@JPL:
Suddenly, I’m not either.
raven
@Quinerly: Hang in there.
raven
This was always going to be scathing, that doesn’t mean indictment.
cmorenc
@Betty Cracker:
The fact that said douchebag can count on over 40% of the electorate as a floor, rather than a ceiling, to his potential share of the vote – is not reassuring. With a sane, well-informed electorate, someone like Trump would be a fringe candidate getting single digit %s.
catclub
@Matt McIrvin: Pierce brought up King’s speech as one of a recurring series of people calling the bluff, to our betterment.
JPL
@raven: Seven emails.. wtf He’s going after her..
Quinerly
@raven:
Rough stuff.
raven
@JPL: No, this is shit she did,
Quinerly
@JPL:
I think so too.
raven
See, I told you.
Lizzy L
Good morning, all.
Summer in the SF Bay Area means fog, so the official fireworks were fogged out in a lot of places. I stayed home and ignored them — though there were plenty of local bangs, as my cheerful neighbors decided to set stuff off in their yards, the street, wherever. My dog slept. Loud noises far away are not an issue for him. Noises in the yard: different. Could be a stray cat, a burglar, the mail carrier…
From ABC News: FBI Director James Comey said today that the agency has completed its year-long investigation into Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server while serving as secretary of state. He said that the FBI spent “a tremendous amount of work over the last year” and now the case is headed to the Department of Justice “for a prosecutive decision.”
rikyrah
@hovercraft:
THIS explains a great deal. thank you for the link. As always, it pays to follow the $$$$$$
chris
Link fail. Disregard
raven
@Lizzy L: You are way behind.
Quinerly
@raven:
Thank you for the hand holding.?
JPL
@raven: phew… I am now picking up myself off the floor.
cmorenc
@Matt McIrvin:
There are curmudgeonly contrarians in every group. Like Clarence Thomas. Or even better, like Tim Scott the Republican Senator from South Carolina, who has assumed the perspective of the white southern plantation owners and merchants in every aspect, save for the re-institution of de jure segregation.
raven
@Quinerly: That’s ok, it gives the knuckleheads plenty to whine about. Fuck em.
eta The key has been how the wingnut press has hedged their bets for the last two days.
hovercraft
@schrodinger’s cat:
Those are bootstrappy sons, they took their fathers money and peddled it into even more money, and everyone knows how much harder that is than making your first million from nothing.
rikyrah
@Matt McIrvin:
I simply don’t believe the Ferret Head has the same amount of Hispanic support as Willard. I refuse.
rikyrah
@cmorenc:
I call them Modern Day Slave Catchers.
hovercraft
@rikyrah:
Harsh but true.
hovercraft
@raven:
Can someone check in on the HAHA Goodmans of the world and the Young Turks, are they okay?
grandpa john
@Matt McIrvin: Something I learned several elections ago from Nate and Sam. A poll is only as good as its crosstabs, that is the breakdown of the people polled according to several factors. Age, race/ ethnicity ,party identification, sex, and for national races general geographic location e.g. South, Midwest, etc Polls can easily be manipulated by varying any of the factors from what the national make-up of the electorate actually is. And yes all polls also have a built in house bias. 538 usually does a listing of all major polls by their house bias
Quinerly
@raven:
It’s just a lot harsher. Her actions were a lot more careless than I had thought. Poor judgment runs strong with the Clintons.
Quinerly
@JPL:
Me too.
Gin & Tonic
@hovercraft: Edgar Bronfman (of the Seagram’s distillery fortune): “To turn a hundred dollars into a hundred and ten dollars is work. To turn a hundred million into a hundred and ten million is inevitable.”
rikyrah
@hovercraft:
yeah…funny how that happens….
RealityBites
@germy: I got a letter that my Honda also is being recalled for the airbag problem. The letter said that they didn’t have the parts to fix it, but would send me another letter in a few months when the parts arrive. How nice of them//
Jeffro
@OzarkHillbilly: whaaaat? Grotto Pizza, Funland, mini-golf, outlets, movies, seafood – all of that rocks!
Jeffro
@Shell: really? Which one? or are you saying I should write it?
J R in WV
@Chet:
I think the Cole Subaru was recycled some years ago. Did you know there’s a second Frank Lloyd Wright house in the neighborhood? Unlike Fallingwater, it was designed and built as a full-time residence for a well-to-do dairy family who were friends of the Kaufmann’s, and who visited Fallingwater, which was intended as a weekend party house.
Mrs Kaufmann told Mrs Hagen to instruct Mr Wright that their son was 6’7″ tall, and that the ceilings must be at least 8 feet high on that account. Mr Wright was quite short, and also believed that low ceilings were a good thing. The house on Kentuck Knob is also open to the public most of the time, and is a little closer to Wright’s Usonian houses. It has long beautiful views of the Allegheny ridges, and quite a display of outdoor art.
It is currently owned by a Brit, Lord I.forget.his.name, who collects architecture and large scale art. When he isn’t resident at the house a foundation shows it by appointment. We quite enjoyed seeing it. There are almost no right-angles in the house at all, except for the shower and tub, the plumber was quite adamant about 90 degree angles in his plumbing work.
The house is built around 60 degree and 120 degree angles, has two bedrooms, an amazing fireplace, and a basement under the kitchen, which was made larger than most of Wright’s kitchens, as the Hagen family didn’t have servants to cook for them. There was a big skylight in the kitchen, which was soon covered over, as it made the kitchen way too hot.
We were preparing to build a house at the time we visited these houses, and toured lots of houses before settling on a design for ours.
J R in WV
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