Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

Balloon Juice, where there is always someone who will say you’re doing it wrong.

Celebrate the fucking wins.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

You are either for trump or for democracy. Pick one.

I conferred with the team and they all agree – still not tired of winning!

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

Beware of advice from anyone for whom Democrats are “they” and not “we.”

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you don’t.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

The revolution will be supervised.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Putin dreamed of ending NATO, and now it’s Finnish-ed.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Let the trolls come, and then ignore them. that’s the worst thing you can do to a troll.

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

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

Republicans don’t trust women.

The low info voters probably won’t even notice or remember by their next lap around the goldfish bowl.

You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2016 / Late Night Open Thread: Sad Little Trombones

Late Night Open Thread: Sad Little Trombones

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From the Washington Post article:

… “All the money that was spent by the Never Trump people, they weren’t even delegates. They’re sitting on the sidelines pretending that they had these votes, which they never did. I never had any doubt. I was never worried that they would get 28 votes. Plus, I was never worried that if they did that it would matter on the floor…

“This convention is going to be a unifying convention. You’re going to see over the next five days the party coming together. I’m talking about on the convention floor, at the podium, and the distraction of the rules fight and the platform fight were just distractions. They were never threats.

“If you look back at this week, the platform hearings and now the rules hearings, we had a very good week. We have a platform that has Trump’s campaign positions all over it. and you’ve got the rules that were adopted that did two things. One, it took out Never Trump but it also will be calling for a commission to be formed to discuss the issues Trump talked about in the primaries. From our standpoint, this was not the time to tinker with the rules, but after he’s president – based on the commission that’s formed – we’ll deal with an investigation and figure out how best to make the system fairer and more transparent.”…

Manafort really comes across as a guy more used to working with dictators than with American voters. Funny (not funny), that.

Footnotes from earlier on Thursday:

For weeks now, Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus and his flack Sean Spicer have denigrated the #NeverTrump movement, claiming it is nonexistent, a figment of the imagination. His actions tell us the opposite is true.

First, some background: Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), a very popular figure on the right who refused to endorse Donald Trump and is close to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), is on the Rules Committee along with his wife…

So, if the Dump Trump crowd was a fantasy, Priebus would simply ignore it, steamroll the Rules Committee and jam the Trump nomination through, right? Well, that is not what he did. In a vivid display of weakness, he met with Lee and the Dump Trump reps seeking a “compromise.” (Hint: There is no compromise.)…

(Aside: When Bill Kristol finally stops being wrong about everything, Jen Rubin is well positioned as his replacement.)

Reader Interactions

32Comments

  1. 1.

    Villago Delenda Est

    This is how the “Party of Lincoln” ends. Not with a bang, but endless whining about how a seventy year old five year old is being treated unfairly.

  3. 3.

    Schlemazel Khan

    @raven:
    Who?

    Also too, what the heck does “unbinders and quarter” mean? I realize twitter can cause mashed language but I don’t get that phrase at all

  6. 6.

    Amir Khalid

    Given the ineptitude that the never-Trumpers showed from the beginning, it would have been very surprising indeed had they managed a last-minute success in unbinding Trump’s delegates ahead of the party convention. So let’s see how the convention turns out. One hopes for an underwhelming show that will let Trump’s opponents feast on Schadenfreude.

  7. 7.

    Schlemazel Khan

    @raven:
    Thanks, I thought maybe it was me

    I have given up on all TV news shows so I’m not surprised they bring in new kids I have never heard of

  8. 8.

    Mustang Bobby

    I shut off the TV when Brian Williams was still vamping last night about Nice. I had intended to watch the town hall on race on ABC, but sometime yesterday the AC at home went tits up and it was 92 inside when I got home. A quick call to the landlord and it is to be hoped that it will be repaired today.

    Having the AC go out in the middle of summer in Florida is not the same as having the furnace die in the middle of winter in Michigan. But it makes you appreciate their purpose.

  9. 9.

    Schlemazel Khan

    @Amir Khalid:
    It would have been a long-term disaster for the never-Trump folks to win. Why hold primaries or caucuses if the delegates are free to do whatever they please? Not that the GOP does not deserve that disaster. That anyone could think it was a good idea shows just how infantile the party has become, “I WANT WHAT I WANT AND I WANT IT RIGHT NOW! DAMN THE CONSEQUENCES!”

  10. 10.

    Botsplainer, Neoliberal Corporatist Shill

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    My prediction is that Trump’s VP nominee will have to sign a personal NDA with Trump before the announcement is made. If elected, he’ll present NDAs to each member of his cabinet, INCLUDING Rudolph Hess as well as Himmler.

  11. 11.

    The Thin Black Duke

    @Amir Khalid: Trouble is, even though it’s likely that the convention is going to be disastrous from beginning to end, the usual suspects in the news media will report it as a triumphant success for Trump and the Republican party. Who are you going to believe? Us or your lying eyes?

  12. 12.

    raven

    @Mustang Bobby: I keep holding my breath on ours. We kept the old hvac when we added on and it is just sufficient. Lots of folks say if you have an older unit that works you are better off keeping it because, while more efficient, the new ones don’t last.

  13. 13.

    Schlemazel Khan

    @Mustang Bobby:
    Heh, I tried to imagine what Florida would look like today if air conditioning had never been invented. Phoenix too for that matter.

    It always amazed me to see pictures in the historical places of men in suits with high collars and women in huge dresses with multiple layers. I can imagine the smell but wonder how bad heat stroke was at the turn of the last century there.

  14. 14.

    TheMightyTrowel

    Hello all and good morning to those of you not in my neck of the world. I spent all morning at the local science museum talking about archaeological geophysics with the kiddies. The sinus infection is very much still present and between that and the hours of trying to be heard over screaming 4 year olds i have totally lost my voice. Hey ho at least it’s the weekend here!

  15. 15.

    Mustang Bobby

    @raven: This one has been inadequate since I moved in eight years ago; it can’t keep the house cooler than 82 F. The problem is twofold: a black shingle roof and single-glaze windows from the time the house was built in 1972 that might as well be just screens. I had ceiling fans installed this spring and they help.

    It’s up to the landlord to decide what to do about it.

  17. 17.

    Luthe

    @The Thin Black Duke: I don’t know, complete shitshows make for good TV. And while the media like Trump for getting them ratings, they hate him for denying them access on a whim. I don’t think the GOP will be getting a tongue bath this time.

  19. 19.

    Another Holocene Human

    Wait, is that Paul Manafort in that pic and does he have gayface? He’s been moisturizing.

  20. 20.

    qwerty42

    In the course of running for the nom, Trump (repeatedly) criticized Republican orthodoxy. And was rewarded for it. The orthodoxy seems fairly brittle, contradictory, and (in truth) unpopular. Any evidence this has had any effect? Right now, it does not seem so, and the keepers of the flame will want to brush this off as a “special event”, but at some level it has to be considered …

  21. 21.

    qwerty42

    @Mustang Bobby: ceiling fans had almost disappeared when the Arab oil embargo came in the 70’s, but sure came back. The guy who built this house (in early 80’s) made extensive use of insulation and all windows have double panes. No ceiling fans though.

  22. 22.

    Mustang Bobby

    @qwerty42: My grandparents’ house in St. Louis had ceiling fans on the back porch, and we had one on ours in Perrysburg, Ohio. There’s something classy about them… quiet dignity as well as useful functionality.

  23. 23.

    qwerty42

    @Mustang Bobby: They were all over in Savannah, but with AC began to disappear. Some places kept them for the looks, but never turned them on once they got the AC. That all changed …

  25. 25.

    Mustang Bobby

    @qwerty42: A lot of houses here in Florida have them even with central air because it helps circulate the cool air. They also promote evaporative cooling on you when you sit under them in a high humidity climate, which is why they tell you to turn them off when you leave the room.

  26. 26.

    low-tech cyclist

    @Mustang Bobby:

    My grandparents’ house in St. Louis had ceiling fans on the back porch, and we had one on ours in Perrysburg, Ohio. There’s something classy about them… quiet dignity as well as useful functionality.

    Still, in Florida in the summertime (which I’m quite familiar with, my in-laws still live in Plant City where my wife grew up), a ceiling fan is just pushing the hot, humid air around to make it a little less intolerable. There’s a reason why the South was a lot more thinly populated 60 years ago, before A/C became the norm, than it is now.

    Have you considered buying a window unit? You can get them for under $150.

  27. 27.

    gvg

    yes, I do remember fans used to be uncommon but now most rooms have them here in Florida. Not kitchens though, not sure why. My sister can’t stand them because of allergies and she also is a heat lover. My nephew has trouble sleeping without one and I usually prefer it too. I love the improved insulation in newer and remodeled houses. Best temp control in Florida is lots of huge live oaks IMO. they keep improving energy efficiency in everything and it seems to me people are kind of competitive about it and often go for the “best” even if it’s not yet economically a good trade off. That’s if they have the money to, and then they tell everybody about it.

  28. 28.

    Cmm

    @Mustang Bobby: yes! And why they are much more efficient when you come in hot and sweaty from exercise and are tempted to push the whole-house thermostat down a couple of degrees. Leave it alone, turn the fan on hi and sit in front of it for 10 or 15 minutes. By the end of it I actually start to feel chilly and have to turn it down.

    And they are a godsend for perimenopausal women, holy crap!

    The AC is needed more for the humidity. Get that down and the fans do the rest.

  29. 29.

    Rasputin's Evil Twin

    I’ve decided not to watch the GOP clusterfuck at all, but will watch “Triumph of the Will” and some Three Stooges shorts. It should be about the same.

    Also, too, If anyone has a super-deluxe, huge and classy DVD of “Citizen Kane” please send it to Trump. I’m pretty convinced he’s never seen it.

  30. 30.

    The Pale Scot

    @Mustang Bobby:

    Having the AC go out in the middle of summer in Florida is not the same as having the furnace die in the middle of winter in Michigan.

    Ya but in Michigan you can put on some long johns and sweaters, down here in FL no AC = heat stroke

  31. 31.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @low-tech cyclist:

    Still, in Florida in the summertime … a ceiling fan is just pushing the hot, humid air around to make it a little less intolerable.

    Same here in Baltimore. Room height is critical, as the hotter air rises. I went from a top-floor apt in a converted 1890s-era townhouse with 12′ ceilings to a 1937 interior group row house where at 5’8″ I can stand flatfooted & touch the upper-floor ceiling. I had to install an attic fan to disperse the trapped heat that pushed down into the bedrooms; it takes the ambient summer daytime temps down from ~90 to ~82.

    If you have a mostly below-ground basement like mine (which you probably don’t in FL–how deep is the water table, 18″ maybe?) your best bet short of central a/c (which I can’t do without ripping the whole house up to replace the hot-water radiant heat pipes with ducts) would be a whole-house fan in the attic drafting through from that basement. In my situation the basement floor is ~5′ below ground & stays 10-15F cooler on hot days than the ground floor.

    If you already have ducts, ground-source heat pumping may be the energy-efficient way to go for both cooling & heating. Even with enough land to trench out to ~2m & install a squashed-slinky transfer loop it wouldn’t be cheap. I’d love to do it here but I’d have to sink a shaft ~400′ down for heat transfer, & that is ruinously expensive. Small-lot GSHP installation on a large scale would need a cheap & easily movable drill to sink shafts 60-80′ down at 8-10′ spacing for heat-transfer pipes to be interconnected ~2 m down to complete the loop. (Plus the cooperation of local government, which may be much harder to achieve.)

    Ah, well, TMI…

  32. 32.

    J R in WV

    @Mustang Bobby:

    You can buy white elastomeric paint designed to coat roofs in hot climates – like Tucson and Phoenix, which claims to reduce the temperature of your roof by like 15-20 degrees. That would make a real difference inside the house, probably for a couple of hundred dollars.

    You could hire a couple of illegals sidewalk contractors and buy 3 buckets of the roof goo and stealth that roof into white cool!

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