I endorse this message:
2/ Dems need to be a steadfast opposition, & not bend. But saying something now that may cause problems btwn Trump/GOP, on infrastructure…
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) November 17, 2016
4/Would I want Dems to actually support a Trump infrastructure bill? Almost certainly not. But that’s not where we are, & talking now…
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) November 17, 2016
6/There are emotionally satisfying responses to Trump/GOP control of gov’t, but probably no emotionally satisfying legislative strategies
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) November 17, 2016
8/And this is a much better Dem senate caucus than the one w Lieberman, Bayh, Ben Nelson, the Walmart Twins, etc
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) November 17, 2016
I’ve seen calls — mostly from the usual More-Leftist-Than-Thou suspects — claiming ELIZABETH WARREN SOLD US OUT YOU MUST DENOUNCE HER!!! These are people who chose not to remember that Senator Warren was one of Trump’s biggest Democratic bugaboos before the election; she could get under his skin every time she sent out another tweet mocking his thin skin and grifting ways. So now President-Elect Smallgloves (temporarily) has the full power of the Republican revanchists behind him; it would be less than smart for Warren to “fail the rules of comity” by calling for a Democratic suicide march, when she can tweak Trump much more effectively by saying “Of course we’ll work with the Republicans, as long as they’re willing to work with us.” I suspect Trump’s handlers have already had to quietly distract him from sending out nasty tweets attacking her — which would hurt his standing among the give-the-man-a-chance enablers/low-info voters. She will not be the only Democratic legislator calling for ‘comity’ while reserving their right to change tactics once the fighting starts.
To put it another way: Who are you gonna trust, President Obama and Senator Warren, or the rabble-rousers at Jacobin and Breitbart?
p.a.
“Of course we’ll work with Republicans. They have provided 8 years as our template.”
low-tech cyclist
Tru dat.
But if your Congresscritters are of the Dem persuasion (as mine are, I’m in Maryland), call them up anyway to urge them to hang tough on (choose your issue: today mine was Obamacare/Medicare/Medicaid; tomorrow it’ll be something else). Let ’em know that if they’re leaning that way anyway, we have their backs.
I recommend adding your Congresscritters to your contacts on your cell phone; then when the urge strikes you to call them about something, you don’t have to Google their numbers first.
The Pale Scot
Maybe try Jujitsu. Start a campaign to move call centers that service the USA back into the country employing people who speak English. There are other things that can be tried to get the hyenas to start attacking each other. That should be a thing. Populist one sentence proposals that gets the TeaKlaners and the ALEC factions at each other throats. We can has wedge issues too.
Gin & Tonic
Fuck comity. I want a prominent Dem to echo the turtle’s words way back at the beginning of PBO’s first term.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Not to mention, Warren being all chummy with Trump is just going to stroke all those conservative fears that Trump is really a Democratic plant in the Republican party.
And brings me to next happy thing to say to a conservative
“Wow, never saw the banner bearer of the Conservative Movement coming from New York City. I mean I was just reading how it’s filled with rich old men who sexually prey on teenage girls. But with a man of Trump’s proven moral fiber America will be praying for God’s help in no time at all.”
kindness
I got into it yesterday with someone (don’t really know them) who was pissing all over the Democratic Party. Going on and on about how corrupt it is. This was a BernieBro btw. The point was only Bernie can save us for ever and ever and anyone who voted for Hillary, or anyone who allowed corporations to donate any money to them at all, was part of why Democrats will lose for ever.
While I’ve seen these critters it made me think a bunch of those still flogging that dead horse have to be paid trolls. Then this morning over at Crooks and Liars it all happened again and most of those commenting agreed with the BernieBros. What’s a liberal to do?
Turgidson
Hopefully the Democrats will look past the inevitable “Trump MAGA Infrastructure The Best Bill Believe Me, That I Can Tell You” Orwell inspired naming and framing and actually read the bill his goons put together, which if the Vox explainer is any indication will be a bonanza of corruption and privatization with little to no actual improvement to existing infrastructure.
And when they discover it’s a pile of shit, they have to communicate this effectively. That’s the part that usually doesn’t work out, between Democrats not being good at sticking to talking points and the media’s disinterest in even knowing the Democratic position. Obama couldn’t even get his message out effectively, particularly early on in his first term. But they have to do the best job they can of it.
c u n d gulag
The GOP has more cracks and fissures than a glacier that’s melting due to global warming, and any number of chunks are ready to fall off.
The key for Democrats right now, is to sit tight, do what they’re doing now, lay a bit low, and then, as the current GOP coalition starts even more infighting, THEN come in and focus on what cracks they can take advantage of, and force them to come as close as possible to cracking wide apart.
The HoR’s is full of nuts, yes, but they’re nuts that don’t go well together.
Wait, and let them really start to cannibalize one another.
Buy popcorn futures!
WereBear
@Turgidson: The Dems should be serious about this and have a Resistance Press Office to put out the truth.
Since the corporate media is utterly useless and in fact, is now a propaganda arm.
daverave
Some of these current headlines are just leaving me SMDH:
Twitter CEO apologizes for allowing white supremacist ad
Trump considering Mitt Romney for secretary of state: NBC News
The Latest: Pelosi says Pence will be ‘valued player’
D58826
from the Nation : Why Do White Working-Class People Vote Against Their Interests? They Don’t.
Corporate Democrats have never advanced their interests—and at least Republicans offer a persuasive story about why they are getting screwed.
Mai.naem.mobile
Well,can I at least tell Susan Sarandon to go DIAF? She’s got the fall to be asking for stuff for the ND Native American tribe for the winter while they’re protesting. Never mind that she just helped elect Lumpy Dumpy who will not help them fersure.
WereBear
@c u n d gulag: One thing I will admit, I would far rather see Trump as the head of their party than of ours :)
Turgidson
@daverave:
Well shit, I think Willard Mitt “Mittens” Romney is about as non-horrifying a potential Secretary of State as we can possibly hope for from Emperor Small Hands. And I say that as someone who has absolutely not one positive word to say about the never-ending volcanic eruption of heinous bullshit he called a campaign in 2012.
Mnemosyne
Can I just say that I’m really, really grateful that my old-school Republican brother at whose house we will be having Thanksgiving is a firm Never Trumper? We may not agree on much when it comes to politics, but we agree that Trump is an unqualified asshole who will be a disaster for the country.
At this point, minor miracles are enough to make me happy.
liberal
Great comment over at Daniel Larison’s blog:
D58826
@daverave: lotta CYA, trial ballons and post election hot air. See how it all plays out once they put pen ro paper and actually draw up legislation before jumping off the cliff.
daverave
…oh and this one:
Americans want Trump to focus on healthcare first: poll
How’d that work out for the last guy?
Patricia Kayden
Doesn’t this presume that Republicans give a damn about working with Democrats? I see no evidence of that.
Cacti
@kindness:
I got banned from C&L during primary season for being too Bernie-critical.
humboldtblue
I thought this election was going to be the final death knell for the Republican party?
You fucking people are delusional. George Bush walked all over Democrats and ruined the fucking economy and nearly the nation and that’s when Democrats had some leverage. Now you actually believe some tough words from Democrats in the Senate are going to stem the shit storm headed our way? The Republicans are gonna fuck Democrats so hard it’s gonna take a few election cycles to even appear to be credible again.
But at least we have those fucking safety pins, right?
schrodinger's cat
@D58826: Isn’t Katrina’s husband a paid Russian stooge, why are listening to Nation, again?
Patricia Kayden
@Gin & Tonic: If only. A girl can dream though.
dogwood
@kindness:
Ignore them. There is no other answer. My sister and her colleagues who have worked for decades basically got kicked out of their democratic county organization. They’ve moved on and are organizing calls to Congress. They’re committed to making 5 phone calls a day. They’re calling democrats and republicans all over the country. The woman she spoke to at Jeff Flake’s office said they are being inundated. When dear sister asked if the aide wanted to know where she was from, the aide said, no; it’s an American issue. Flake’s aide told her straight out that Senator’s position on Bannon is that a man that decent people wouldn’t sit down to dinner with has no business anywhere near the White House.
daverave
@Turgidson:
I totally agree but to think that the Revenger-in-Chief would ever consider someone who so publicly denounced him is beyond my comprehension.
Patricia Kayden
@humboldtblue:
I’m one of those delusional people. You could have knocked me over with a feather when Trump won. So yeah, Democrats aren’t doing so well right now. Things could turn around if they develop a backbone, stick together and vote against Trump every chance they get. They need to demarcate between themselves and Republicans so that by 2020, they can point out the damage that Trump’s policies have done to the country and how they will legislate different policies to actually help people.
Democrats can rise again so we’re down but not out.
Hoodie
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Sorry, but no sale. That might work if the GOP didn’t hold all the cards in Congress, but he’ll just use people like Warren as political foils to enact corruption-enabling infrastructure bills or scammy medicare “reform.” In particular, he’ll pretend to take them seriously but then join forces with McConnell and Ryan to put out a bill that dumps the trust funds to private contractors, Wall St. and the insurance industry while grandfathering in the olds and making the phase in gradual enough that younger people won’t realize how screwed they are until it’s too late. If Warren ends up not supporting his “reforms,” he’ll say she’s just Lyin’ Pocahantas who wanted socialism for the undeserving, not tremendously beautiful benefits from the free market for real Americans.
Honestly, that’s why the Turtle put up the uniform wall of resistance to Obama. He figured that Obama would get most of what he wanted anyway, so why be undermined in your own base by being associated with something that you could instead use to rally their anger? Of course, the difference here is that Obama was on the level and McConnell was the bad faith actor, but McConnell figured the base would not notice Obama’s attempts to compromise and would instead buy McConnell’s fictions about Obama being an overreaching dictator. The only reason you would negotiate in good faith with Trump is if you really believe that he has the public’s best interests at heart. Unlike Obama, there’s nothing in Trump’s history that would make that likely; in fact, all evidence is to the contrary. Like any narcissist, you interact with him at your own risk.
FlipYrWhig
@D58826: The word “corporate” sure does a lot of heavy lifting over there. I think it’s about time for me to cancel my subscription.
catclub
Bullshit. That Dem senate caucus passed the ACA and Dodd-Frank, and Consumer Finance.
I would rather have a majority that can do some good than a pure minority.
Anne Laurie
@daverave:
I watched the relevant clip from Bloomberg. Pelosi doesn’t quite add “as a tackling dummy”… but you can read it in her smile!
Gin & Tonic
@schrodinger’s cat:
Yes. He’s made a very good living at it for nearly 50 years now.
One of my friends took a course from him when he was junior faculty at Princeton in the early 70’s, and he was a Soviet apologist even then.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
Sorry but the two articles that we need to read are here:
LGM – Is our Democrats Learning ? link.
and
Jamelle Bouie – The Democrats Are Screwing Up the Resistance to Donald Trump link.
That is all.
MaryL
@low-tech cyclist: I called Mikulski and Van Hollen on Medicare yesterday. Anthony Brown (the new rep for MD 4) doesn’t have any contact info listed, which in my mind is not a good sign of things to come.
Also, I think the lesson from the 2005 Social Security fight is that we SHOULD be vocal and encourage our reps to be as well. Take a firm stand on Medicare.
WereBear
Trump didn’t win. He cheated. The republicans cheated. Again.
Anne Laurie
@Mai.naem.mobile:
I thought Sarandon had gone full GBCW on the Democratic party?
Or did she call it the ‘Democrat’ party?
Shell
Looks like the Thanksgiving day parade might be impacted by the bulwark that Trump Towers is becoming. Thanks, Mr. Man of the People!
jenn
I am not so sanguine. I feel betrayed by Warren’s emphasis here, myself – I thought more of her. I’ve never been a Bernie fan, so I don’t feel betrayed, more disgusted. I’m not suggesting that Democrats vow to obstruct anything and everything, just that their message now be one of protecting the vulnerable, whether that be Muslims, people of color, or anyone who needs health care. Frankly, Harry Reid and Rep Gallego are the only ones I’m seeing speak out as I’d have them speak out.
I have called my Senators and Rep both yesterday and today re Medicare and this Nazi plan to register Muslims. Today’s goals are to make a few donations.
Anyone else contributed to Foster Campbell’s Senate election coming up on December 10?
jenn
@dogwood: That is encouraging, thank you for sharing it!
liberal
@Gin & Tonic: As opposed to commenters on blogs who think we should go to bat for a bunch of fascists and oligarchs, in places where we have absolutely no national interests.
WereBear
Those who think the Republican party will get all upset if they get rid of Trump and install Pence instead should remember the keys to Trump’s coalition are white Fundamentalist Republicans (but I repeat myself.)
Pence is their Grand Inquisitor. We might not have Donny Boy to kick around too long.
liberal
@kindness: There’s no dichotomy here. It’s not like you have to be a BernieBro to think the party has gone too far to the right.
While of course Clinton was a gazillion times better than Trump, by veering to the right, the party has lost its brand. That’s toxic.
schrodinger's cat
Jon Stewart blames both sides for the election. Stay retired Jon.
Anne Laurie
@Patricia Kayden:
So that nice Warren lady held out the hand of friendship, and the Repubs slapped it away. This is a good look for which side?
Boxers shake hands before a bout. Doesn’t mean they like or respect each other, but the audience wants to see the handshake; failing to do so (even when both sides have been saying terrible things right up until that handshake, even when one participant is a proven liar) is held as a serious breach of etiquette. Which means that provoking one’s opponent into rejecting the ‘fair play’ gesture is a standard tactic, too!
Gin & Tonic
@liberal: I’m sorry, that was responsive to a question about Stephen Cohen how, exactly?
liberal
@jenn:
While I would never completely trust any political leader, I assume it’s too early to say for sure what Warren and other Democrats are planning/thinking.
jenn
@Turgidson: Well I agree with that assessment. I have some problems imagining Romney taking the job, though, because of his utter distaste for Trump. (Honestly, given Romney’s Never-Trump stance, I have a problem seeing Trump actually offering it, to begin with.) Of course, he could feel that he owed it to the country to have at least one sane person in the cabinet.
liberal
@Gin & Tonic: Uh, because you support a bunch of fascists and oligarchs in Ukraine?
mdblanche
@c u n d gulag: And no more TIABMITWH to spackle those cracks. Unity gets harder when you have to say more than “no”.
schrodinger's cat
@Gin & Tonic: Russian stooges gotta hang together, whether it makes sense or not. mother Russia demands it.
liberal
@schrodinger’s cat: Yawn. Talk about a fucking stupid ad hominem argument.
SenyorDave
We have a small window on Bannon. I would like to think the Democrats in Congress could 100% to oppose him, call a presser and at least state your unanimous opposition and why.
schrodinger's cat
@Gin & Tonic: liberal is BiP’s new avatar. He is back!
liberal
@schrodinger’s cat: I suppose John Meerscheimer, who thinks the imbroglio in Ukraine is more the West’s fault than Russia’s is also a Russian stooge?
debit
Has this already been discussed? Trump set to embark on victory tour. Jesus fucking christ, he doesn’t have time to meet with cabinet members, but he can go jerk off in front of a crowd.
Jeffro
@Gin & Tonic: yup – first last always
liberal
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
What really surprised me was how much support he got from flyover country yokels, given his accent.
MaryL
@WereBear:
I think this is true as far as current elected officials go, but voters are not likely to respond to Pence the way they did to Trump. He’s not very exciting, and was about to be run out of Indiana on a rail before Trump swooped in and saved him.
Weaselone
@liberal:
There’s more fascists and oligarchs in Russia. Russia probably has more fascists and oligarchs in Ukraine than Ukraine does.
jenn
@liberal: I agree with that. However, given the number of people with actual life and death fears, I want to see that first and foremost, rather than what I interpret in my more cynical moments as pivoting to the white. In their haste to put HRC in the past, I fear they are ignoring what made her campaign beautiful and inspiring.
Archon
@liberal:
Trump was able to pretend he hates the same people flyover country does. The election is over now. On that note do you think it bothered the yokels to hear Trump getting a standing ovation at some elite New York dinner hangout while promising to cut their taxes?
That was a rhetoric question of course.
sukabi
@daverave: gee, what’s wrong all the other loons can’t get cleared to be SoS? Doubt Rmoney will want to be associated with the drumpfster fire.
ETA, besides there are going to be plenty of yuge $$$ picking over the corpses of businesses that drumpf &co will force out of business.
GregB
I think a ton of the information is being leaked to keep people running down ratholes and walking in to dead ends.
Gin & Tonic
@liberal: It was a factual question: isn’t Stephen Cohen a Russian stooge? I gave a factual answer, with an evidentiary anecdote. My own views on any other geopolitical issue weren’t part of either the question or my answer. If you wish to argue that Stephen Cohen is not a paid Russian stooge, feel free to do so.
Gin & Tonic
@schrodinger’s cat: No, s/he’s been around. Anyway, far too few words to be BiP.
WereBear
@MaryL: You also have a good point.
I only see republicans get upset with their little tin gods when they screw up enough to be horribly embarrassing publicly, like Bush & Katrina.
Fortunately, I think the odds are very good this could happen with Trump.
schrodinger's cat
@Gin & Tonic: Similar insults, though.
Mary G
@WereBear: Paul Ryan probably has the papers all drawn up except for the date.
WereBear
Quick reminder that the:
Could Happen to You
site is live on Tumblr to take your health care stories!
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
Oh and fuck Bernie Sanders with the force of a thousand suns:
Francis
Speaking of legislative strategies,
Why aren’t we asking our Congressmen to start holding town hall meetings on ACA repeal? With very little effort we should be able to fill rooms of people telling true stories about how the ACA is a matter of life-and-death.
Juice Box
@liberal: Clinton went to the right by having the most liberal platform and policies ever? That’s a strange assessment.
Chris
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
One of the several times I appreciated Trump during the primaries is when some Republican opponent (I forget who) went with the usual line about “New York City values” and Trump essentially told him to go fuck himself, and doubled down by playing the 9/11 card.
There is no reason at all why we should have to listen to these fuckers prattle on about how “we grow good people in our small towns, with honesty and dignity” as if small town America had invented those fucking things, or why it should be okay for them to incessantly trash the godless coasts to the point that their religious gurus thought nothing of going on national television after 9/11 to gloat about how God smote NYC because of its gheys and wimminz. If it took Donald Trump to shove that message up their asses, well, good for him. Broken clocks, twice a day, etc.
schrodinger's cat
@Tilda Swinton’s Bald Cap: Another useful idiot for Putin.
Corner Stone
@liberal:
I am going to need a little more on this, please.
WereBear
@Mary G: Paul Ryan seems to put a lot of his sick fantasies on paper. Maybe he should write for Penthouse:
I never thought my dreams of starving grannies would have come true…
Mike J
@The Pale Scot:
Require buildings to have a plaque by the front door that certifies the country of origin for the steel.
SiubhanDuinne
@debit:
He’s planning to go to every state he won. Victory rallies for his adoring cultist mobs. Think there’s any chance we might get CNN or MSNBC to broadcast them?
trollhattan
@Anne Laurie: Former colleague after all, and IIRC perennially among finalists for Stupidest Congresscritter.
Chris
@Turgidson:
A vulture capitalist SecState for a vulture capitalist President. It’s a match made in Ayn-Rand-nonreligious-heaven.
SiubhanDuinne
@Chris:
Had forgotten about that, but I’m almost certain it was Cruz.
trollhattan
@debit:
Have you just recently met Our Donald?
Corner Stone
I have no clue what the data Kornacki just showed us means. That was confusing af.
sukabi
@SiubhanDuinne: shit they’ll both fight fox for the broadcast rights.
ThresherK (GPad)
My wife is in recovery after a successful knee replacement. I told her some nice folks she doesn’t know personally were wishing her the best.
WereBear
@SiubhanDuinne: Triumph of the Pill.
SenyorDave
@SiubhanDuinne: Seriously, this sounds like the sort of thing a fascist would do after getting into office.
piratedan
i’m of two minds about this… if the GOP happens to be the blind squirrel that finds a nut and offers up some legislation that would modestly be a win for a large group of people (say, closing the gun show loophole), I wouldn’t be averse to letting Dems climb on board (but honestly, what are the chances?) or an infrastructure bill that actually goes to infrastructure repairs and updates. I want things to get done that are in the best interests of the country to get done. Anything else, I’d just as soon let these guys wallow in the mess of their own making and toss them anvils where applicable. I’d rather be pragmatic and pick the battles that are worth fighting (medicare and social security, not bombing the crap out of everyone, health care reform).
SenyorDave
@Tilda Swinton’s Bald Cap: Fuck Bernie, he just wants to stay relevant
Roger Moore
@daverave:
He didn’t work on healthcare first. He did stimulus first, and there were other things that came between that and healthcare, like the Lilly Ledbetter Act. I think they deliberately pushed through some simpler stuff to clear the deck for HCR, which they knew was going to be more contentious and time consuming.
Corner Stone
These white women Trump voters in Macomb MI. This is all and everything.
kindness
@Cacti: My apologies for being 86ed at C&L. I used to comment there a lot but it’s become popular so I lurk now mostly. Seriously though, how many of the raving Bernie faction does anyone figure are trolls?
Corner Stone
@piratedan: Is your other mind the rational one? Because the comment you just made is a total recipe for disaster.
Have we learned nothing from doing deals with GWB?
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@kindness: Bernie’s a fucking troll.
Peale
@Roger Moore: Its kind of difficult to focus on Healthcare when the economy was collapsing. I don’t think the voters minded. Its like “why didn’t they raise the minimum wage?” Well, its kind of wise to do that when the economy is on the upswing and it wasn’t for two years.
SiubhanDuinne
@Turgidson:
@Chris:
I can’t imagine why Mitt would consider, even for a moment, being part of the administration of a man he so thoroughly loathes and so publicly denounced.
Oh wait, yes I can. Mitt’s as much a craven hypocritical lying quisling as anyone under consideration.
debit
@SenyorDave: Has any president ever done this? I just…I know what a whore he is, and how stupid he is, but did no one around him say, “Hey, maybe this isn’t a good idea”?
japa21
We buy a lot of our spices from Penzey’s, a national chain based in Brookfield, Wisconsin. As a result we get their catalog regularly as well as emails. We have known for a while that the owner was a liberal, specially in the run up to the election. What follows is from an email we received today:
Some may think he wasn’t harsh enough, but it is obvious what he thinks of Trump voters.
ETA: He also obviously is willing to put up with a backlash from unhappy customers. IOW, he is willing to lose business to get the message out. I admire that a lot.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: See, back in the day, Democrats were firebrand liberals who all were dedicated to fighting for the little guy. Like John Stennis, Howell Heflin, and Richard Shelby! But then something dreadful happened and they started to drift away from their roots.
Roger Moore
@dogwood:
I guess we’re seeing which of the Republicans actually have some principles they’re willing to stand by, and which are a bunch of apparatchiks. Flake can probably escape the revolution with some time in a reeducation camp rather than being up against the wall.
Corner Stone
That’s from an article in tabletmag that someone (sorry) linked earlier.
They have shown us who they are, they are telling us what they want to do, they are looking for vichy Dems to do it to us with.
I hope very much this is a honey pot trap, and our people are going to do the Congressional version of “You thought we were going to go along with that? Bless your poor heart.”
But my entire life of living with the D party tells me to be very afraid and not give them any room to wiggle.
SenyorDave
@japa21: Do they have mail order? I live in Maryland but would like to support a company with a CEO like that. I’ impressed that he didn’t hedge like I see so often “I’m not sure if he’s racist…” He called it like he sees it, and I admire that.
Philbert
@SiubhanDuinne: If he has the time to do a victory tour, he has the time for his Trump University trial.
WaterGirl
@japa21: How funny! I came here to post my email from Penzey’s because it made me feel better. I LOVED what they wrote!
Proud to buy from Penzey’s.
kindness
@liberal: Sorry but the 2016 Hillary is significantly to the left of the 90’s version. So is Bill. So is the Democratic party. Not sure where you are getting the collusion. We don’t hate Bernie. We just hate bullshit. I would have voted for Bernie. But a whole bunch of Bernie folk wouldn’t vote for Clinton. Now that isn’t why she lost. She lost because the media beat her with the Clinton Rules for the last 4 years and the FBI director dropped a bomb 11 days before the election. And Hillary still got 2 million more votes than Trump and still lost. No, it isn’t Hillary I’m pissed at.
Corner Stone
Trump knows fuck and all about god damn Domestic Policy. He knows several magnitude of orders *less* than that about Foreign Policy.
The man is a buffoon who claims to have read two books in his entire life. And I would bet money he has never finished either fucking one of them.
WaterGirl
@SenyorDave: Yes! Easy to remember, too.
Penny’s Spices
penzeys.com
WaterGirl
At this point, I want the Dems to obstruct, obstruct, obstruct.
Anything to slow down the damage.
Peale
@Corner Stone: Frankly, I don’t think it really matters. If the Dems make a deal with Trump its because they’re too far to the right and still too corporatist. If the Dems make a deal on those Trump things that had the Bernie Bots accusing Hillary of Running to the Right of Trump, they’ll still be corporate sell-outs. If they bring jobs to their states, good, jobs, well paying jobs, but those jobs are at a corporation of any kind in one of the disapproved industries (pretty much all of them), they are corporate sell-outs. If they make no deals with anyone, they are corporate sell outs. If the fillibuster is removed and the Dems aren’t able to block any legislation, its because they are corporate sell outs. If they vote against every bill, they are corporate sell outs.
See the pattern?
Brachiator
Democrats, lefties and others who want to fall back on the same old rhetoric and backbiting are going to be in for some rude surprises.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: On the campaign trail, it wasn’t even clear that he’d finished reading _his own speeches_. He’d be reading along and then look up and say things like “this is so true.”
japa21
@SenyorDave: Yes they do. Just go to Penzeys.com. The quality of their spices is excellent.
trollhattan
@SiubhanDuinne:
Can hear it now: “Romney, you greasy loser, get your ass in here right now and tell me exactly why Vlad is angry. Did I not make it clear that Vlad is to remain at least happy at all times and ecstatic weeky. You’re a LOSER Willard, and you’re lucky I don’t replace you with a Guatemalan hooker!”
“Gee whillikers mister president, I’ll try harder, I PROMISE.” [Towed out of Oval Office by SS agent on each elbow.]
dogwood
@FlipYrWhig:
Don’t forget Strom Thurmond.
Hoodie
I think I just found something to put on cards for my wife’s parents and my brother in law before Thanksgiving dinner.
japa21
@SenyorDave: BTW, they have a store in Rockville, MD.
trollhattan
Story that’s not going away: Michelle Rhee considered for Education Secretary.
Elect an arsonist; harvest an army of arsonists.
WaterGirl
@daverave: Some of these people are stupid enough to believe that Dump will help them with their healthcare costs. And I guess it’s true if by “help people with their insurance costs” means they won’t have any insurance, so there won’t be any cost.
SiubhanDuinne
Any Ohioans here who know anything about Rep. Tim Ryan? Apparently he’s challenging Nancy P. for the Dem Leader post.
I’m a fan of Nancy SMASH! and think she’s been as effective as anyone could be in that thankless job, but it would be mildly amusing if the Speaker and the Minority Leader were both named Ryan. Tangled tongues from Capitol Hill reporters, flat-out wrong chyrons on all the cable channels, and a nice workout for the NYT stylebook.
These days, I take my small pleasures where I find them.
JPL
@Corner Stone: I can’t remember but I did pass it on. My niece wrote back and wants me to March on Washington with her.
Gin & Tonic
I just got a fundraising e-mail from NARAL. Somebody better-educated on the subject than me please let me know – in the 40+ years since Roe has NARAL actually accomplished anything, anywhere?
Quinerly
@Cacti:
I hope you wear your banning like a badge of honor.
Brachiator
@Corner Stone:
Unfortunately, simply pointing out Trump’s inadequacies won’t get us anywhere.
I remember when Dubya was elected, some Southern California Westside types kept telling me how stupid he was (and by implication, how smart THEY were), as though this either negated the fact that he was president, or somehow suggesting that they could safely ignore the simpleton and live their lives the way they wished. Of course, Dubya plunged us into economic and military disasters and wasted the lives of thousands.
Trump is magnitudes more stupid, and some of the people he has surrounded himself with seem as vindictive and vile as he is. Right now, it is not clear whether he will insist on blundering in on policy issues himself or whether he will defer to his own evil Cardinal Richelieu, Mike Pence. Either way, things are not looking too good.
SenyorDave
@Philbert: The Trump U tial will be settled, IMO. It would be embarrassing for him to testify, and while I’m sure he would love to do it, his advisers will nix it. IT will be settled, and somehow someone else will pay the tab. BTW, would that be legal? My understanding is that the POTUS is actually not subject to ethics rules.
Joyce H
@SiubhanDuinne:
Followed by the torch light parades and ritual shattering of windows of minority owned businesses, I presume?
Peale
@FlipYrWhig: Frankly, I think they started why they stopped nominating William Jennings Bryan. (That’s who Bernie Reminds me of, anyway. Thank god, he’s old. Or we’d have to nominate him three or four times before anyone noticed that the country itself has a certain romance with the free enterprise system.)
JPL
@SiubhanDuinne: Nancy is great at organizing and keeping the democrats together. She is not great at exciting her base and spreading the message. Her TV presence is rare and ineffective.
I actually called John Lewis’ office and said maybe it’s time for new blood in the leadership. imo
D58826
@Turgidson: Just a bit of speculation here. We know have it on the best authority that S-O-S will be Newt, no wait, Rudy, oh sorry it’s John Bolton, or maybe Nikki Halley, say David Patreasu would make a fine choice if we could get past that guilty plea, but then the is good old man of principle Mitt.
Folks I think Trump has a very short list for state, defense, homeland security, DOJ and treasury. The rest he doesn’t give to figs about because only political wonks could name the other cabinet posts. And he is busy trolling use. The big con continues. Now maybe one or more of these folks will wind up in the cabinet but right now it is all about clicks and trolling.
Yes I know there have always been leaks from the insiders during the transition I just think they have kicked it up to 11 to make the media look like fools (again).
And I also wonder if now tyhat he will be president if suddenly he is taking the job seriously. At least to the extent that he would like to be the greatest president ever and wouldn’t it be huuuuge if his head (after he was dead of course) was added to MT Rushmore
SenyorDave
@trollhattan: Towed out of Oval Office by SS agent on each elbow
Is that SS for Secret Service or Gestapo?
SiubhanDuinne
@trollhattan:
?
JPL
The burqa bill in Ga has been pulled. Maybe the KKK complained.
trollhattan
@SenyorDave:
Figured I’d leave that indistinct until we know who the AG is.
Patricia Kayden
@Anne Laurie:
When did Republicans extend a handshake to President Obama? I must have missed that when one of them shouted “Liar” during his first SOTU speech.
piratedan
@Corner Stone: sorry, basing that position on what I realistically see taking place….
1) on the rash assumption that anything sane will come out of the GOP House that would be ratified by the GOP Senate and signed by President Trump… what are the odds? I don’t expect it to happen, but if it does, I would like to see it supported. Why? Because a win is a win, I have a hard time being bothered by who gets the credit, if we can tighten up gun control, then do so. If we can fix the bridges and the power grid, do so.
2) The Media has shown themselves of incapable of disseminating information to your average/low information voter without a certain bias anyway. What’s going to happen if the GOP crashes the economy? They’ll blame the Dems… if we start lobbing nukes in the Middle East, who will be blamed, Dems. It doesn’t matter how fucking atrocious the GOP is, it’s all going to be tied back to Obama anyway, through whatever means, no matter how fucking tortuous and unattached to any reality that may exist. This is what the GOP is going to do any fucking way and based on how this election was recently handled, can you say with any amount of surety that the media won’t be complicit in aiding and abetting that messaging?
3) The Dems support decent legislation that helps people, then do so. Otherwise, all we’re doing is continuing the polarization of our politics, someone has to be sane, in the unlikely event that the GOP finally comes to a table with something that doesn’t start with internement camps and mass deportations and actually helps govern the nation, you have to encourage that action. Now… realistically speaking… do ANY of us expect the GOP to behave in this fashion… no, I don’t. I believe there will be plenty of opportunity that will allow the Dems to differentiate themselves from the GOP on any number of levels, womens health care, minority rights, taxes, income inequality, education, medicare, social security, foreign policy. Just saying that if lightening strikes and there is something that would sanely benefit us, its stupid to reject the opportunity.
kindness
@Hoodie: Maybe you could use this to say grace before the Turkey day meal? Might go over poorly but they’d know exactly how you felt. Probably hear a lot less Trump gloating too.
@Joyce H:
Trumplenacht!
WaterGirl
Today is an absolutely gorgeous day here – high of 74 and sunny with a nice breeze. I am trying to enjoy our last nice day, which is not quite as easy as it sounds when you’re whipsawing between sadness, anger and despair. But I am trying!
Tomorrow it drops 5 degrees and it rains all day; after that we have highs in the 40s and lows in the 20s. I can’t imagine that will help my mood any. If you had told me on Wednesday of last week that a Dump presidency could actually be worse than my fears, I would have said you were wrong. Dump and his team are so greedy that they are showing themselves sooner than I would have guessed.
Corner Stone
@Joyce H:
That’s always my favorite part of any really good party!
Patricia Kayden
@debit: Trump’s victory tour will be limited to states he won.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/donald-trump-to-take-victory-tour
T S
@Anne Laurie: Adding ‘tackling dummy’ onto what is actually said is a good example of why Dems are in such disarray. Don’t delude oneself. Assume horribly milquetoast things could really just be taken at face value as the fecklessness they are, and you’ll be much less disappointed.
SenyorDave
OT, but Groundhog Day was on last night. I was kind of hoping that I would wake up and find it was November 8 again.
WaterGirl
@daverave: He is used to buying loyalty – it seems to me that he is trying to do that here. He wants Romney to give him some credibility, I think.
Emma
@SenyorDave: They do! they do!
hovercraft
@debit:
This is the aspect of the job he wanted. The adulation of his fans. The actual work of presidenting will be left to Kushner, Bannon and Pence. He won’t want to let them get the credit for doing the work, but he’ll want them to do the work. He wants to be like QE II, head of state without the responsibility, but with the credit.
SiubhanDuinne
@JPL:
Unfortunately, there are very few politicians–very few people, for that matter–who are equally skilled on both the organizational and public image/messaging sides.
FlipYrWhig
@dogwood: True, but that was 50 years ago. Shelby, Heflin, and Stennis were Democratic Senators in good standing in the 1980s and ’90s.
trollhattan
@SenyorDave:
Same–Every. Single. Night. Half-wishing I’m coming out of a coma and dreamt the whole nasty, nasty thing. Two minutes listening to the bedside radio clears that right up.
Skippy-san
@piratedan: I thought in the Dems may be n to something here. Because they know Ryan would sell his own wife into slavery to win his holy grail of fucking people out of SS and Medicare.
Joyce H
BTW, I hope Judge Curiel is taking notice. If Trump is not too busy to take this egomaniacal ‘victory tour’, then he’s not too busy for the Trump U trial.
goblue72
@kindness: You fools still tilting at BernieBros?
Jesus Christ, get a clue. Apparently losing to a monster like Trump, while getting creamed in state leg races, the House and the Senate was not a large enough clue by 4.
Patricia Kayden
@Gin & Tonic: According to a report printed on its website, NARAL has expanded and protected reproductive freedom.
Chris
@SiubhanDuinne:
Your second paragraph was on the tip of my tongue as I was reading your first :D
japa21
I posted that email from the head of Penzeys above, just beating WaterGirl to the punch. Senyor Dave has pretty much said he will buy from them. I think it would be nice to make a list of companies that are willing to go out on a limb like Penzeys did and try to use their services as much as possible.
Brachiator
@FlipYrWhig:
Life is complicated. The little guy grew up, and stopped caring about the next little guy. The pathway to middle class prosperity got more gnarled and tangled, and less easy for everyone. America’s original sin, racism, popped up again, and along with sexism and homophobia.Who to fight, when and how was not so simple anymore. If it ever was.
SenyorDave
@trollhattan: The problem is that we would have to relive the loss each time. I told my wife the last time I felt this bad about a single event was in 1994 when I got riffed at work, but I saw that coming for a few weeks.
Corner Stone
@piratedan: I fully and firmly disagree with your comment, in its entirety.
There are no deals to be made with the devil. They have shown us, over and over and over, who they are. Any “deal” will come with a big FU sugar filling. You only have to look at NCLB to see how GWB fucked Teddy Kennedy when he got on board to sell it.
Any support the Dems put in with will legitimize this fucking monster, and then the D’s will get hung out to dry. Sure as the rise of the sun Obama promised us.
We can not do it. I do not give a fuck if the R’s put a bill forth that says all babies will receive full medical care their entire lives and a scholarship to the four year college of their choice. No. NO. Because that is not what is going to happen. They will poison it. It will never, ever be what they say it is. It never has been and it never will be.
germy
Today in Celebrity News:
He was actually very good as General Zod.
Patricia Kayden
@Hoodie:
It’s a shame that millenials have to interact with oldsters who have destroyed their future by electing Trump. There will be a lot of awkward Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners this year.
MomSense
Took a long hike in the woods today with the dog which was good for the soul. I met the owners of one of my dog’s siblings at the feed store. They look like identical twins except he is a tiny bit bigger. They had the DNA testing done and found out their dog is Shepherd, Labrador, Border Collie, and Australian Cattle Dog. Well at least she gets her intensity honestly.
gene108
@liberal:
His accent wasn’t a Southern drawl or Midwestern tang, but he used very, very, very short sentences and very small, easy to understand, words.
He spoke at a level below their ability to understand, which was reassuring to many, I guess. They didn’t feel talked down to.
SiubhanDuinne
@Joyce H:
And wouldn’t you think that someone on his team might have had the same thought and suggested he cool it until he no longer needs that excuse to avoid testifying?
As for Judge Curiel, I imagine he’ll notice. He already postponed the trial date once, until after the election, to accommodate Trump. I kind of doubt he’ll be in much of a mood to reschedule it again.
MomSense
@germy:
Can’t say I disagree. Add leaving a fucked up planet for our young people as more reason to shun those selfish jerks.
Gin & Tonic
@SiubhanDuinne: Isn’t the trial in Indiana or something? Il Donaldo could go for a big rally, and then stay to testify.
Patricia Kayden
@germy: Good for Shannon. There should be personal consequences for people who voted for Trump. They’ve sent a message with their vote and now the rest of us can send a message to them.
@Joyce H: I can’t imagine Trump subjecting himself to a potentially embarrassing trial when he is a billionaire, the President-Elect, and can just open up his (or other people’s) wallet and settle the matter once and for all. He’s not going to want to go into inauguration day with this trial dragging out through his first term.
japa21
Speaking of Trump’s victory tour, how many times was Obama criticized for spiking the football and taking victory laps, even when he wasn’t.
SenyorDave
@Corner Stone: Can you please run for head of DNC? I am convinced that Trump will be able to play the Dems for fools. I’m starting to think that obama was one in a million, the last Democrat in 20 years who actual understands and executes strategy.
piratedan
@Corner Stone: and I’ve already said, REPEATEDLY, that I DO NOT EXPECT it to happen.
Trentrunner
@japa21: I’ll say it to my dying breath, but Trump’s misogyny is more consequential than his racism, and that business’s posting proves it. With racism, you could say “many of you whites never have to experience the effects of racism…” and it’s kinda true for many whites-only areas.
But EVERYONE in EVERY STATE is affected by the sexual assaulting misogyny that Trump propagates and condones.
So let’s not lose Trump’s misogyny. It’s not trivial; it’s absolutely key to why he won, and, more important, it affects more people.
Brachiator
@D58826:
He will replace the heads of the losers there now with his own visage and rename it Mt Trumpmore.
It will be huge.
trollhattan
@SiubhanDuinne:
Odds seem slim the judge hasn’t received a horsehead in his bed by now.
Mary G
@MomSense: That is a handful!
Jeffro
@FlipYrWhig:
This wouldn’t happen to have happened around 1964, would it? Is that when they started being more “economically insecure”? LOL
SatanicPanic
I’m not sure I trust anyone right now.
germy
@MomSense:
I remember seeing a story on Esquire about the nice young woman who went for a hike after the election and Surprise! ran into HRC. So she posed for a photo and posted it on Facebook.
But when I read the Esquire story I noticed their link to her facebook said something like “This no longer exists; it was either taken down or has gone private.”
And I said to myself, I bet she took it down because of harassment.
And sure enough, yesterday I read that she received a shitload of death threats, and had to take her facebook page down.
These animals are behaving even worse than if HRC had won.
Baud
@SatanicPanic: you can trust me.
Ksmiami
@jenn: yes. We need that
Jeffro
@Brachiator:
Rude surprises just for starters.
ACTION, folks. Block out 15 minutes tomorrow to make a few phone calls or dash off a letter to the editor. Join the ACLU, PP, or SPLC.
dogwood
I watched the President’s presser with Merkel today. She looked sick. I also realized that I was witnessing the passing of the baton from the leader of the free world to it’s next leader. Hope she can keep the white nationalists at bay. Britain is worthless now, and who knows what will happen in France
tobie
@SiubhanDuinne: I heard him on PBS’s News Hour last night. He seemed a little wet behind the ears and did say one thing that raised flags of caution for me. He proposed imposing sanctions on China if it continues to devalue its currency. The problem is that China has been inflating the yuan for the past two years.
NotMax
@SenyorDave
Quasi-obligatory.
Jeffro
@gene108:
Below? Wait…I thought he said he “had the best words”?? (Well, in a way I guess he did…)
hovercraft
@japa21:
I love this, I’ve never heard of them, but I will be looking to patronize them going forward to counteract some of the backlash.
PhoenixRising
@Gin & Tonic: Yes, maintained access to abortion for women who can’t take a week off to fly to LA to have an abortion. Send them dough if you have some to spare.
germy
@dogwood:
I read yesterday that the online ratfuckers have focused their campaign against her, now that they were so successful against HRC.
Hoodie
@Patricia Kayden: This really hits home for me. My wife’s parents are generous loving people, but unquestioning Republicans and Trump voters. My son’s longtime girlfriend is about as bright and wonderful a kid as you can imagine, studying journalism on a full ride at a nearby university. Her mother is an equally wonderful lady from Mexico who raised four kids on her own after her husband died. My oldest son is a pretty straightlaced kid in his first year of a business major (i.e., his idea of occupying Wall St. is to be behind a terminal at a trading desk), and he was devastated by Trump winning.
Jeffro
@SiubhanDuinne:
You know…if and when the Judge presses ahead, and Trump blows his cool at…at having to answer to this you-know-what…we’re going to see some epic-level acting out, well before the Electoral College votes.
So here’s to Judge Curiel standing firm on the court date, and best wishes for a speedy trial and verdict! ;)
Gin & Tonic
@PhoenixRising: And yet access to abortion has been restricted over and over in more and more places. Are they responsible for any legislative victories? I ask this honestly.
FlipYrWhig
@Jeffro: Exactly. I find it funny, not funny ha-ha but funny strange, to see how many people have ret-conned this mythical progressive past from which the Democratic Party unaccountably strayed. It never existed.
les
@D58826:
here’s where the article fails. Even if we could make plants stay, the jobs are gone. Steel and industrial plants don’t employ thousands, they employ hundreds. And they don’t employ high school grads, they employ knowledge workers to operate and maintain the robots. Promising these folks their jobs are coming back is just bullshitting them.
trollhattan
@germy:
Yup. She seems thrilled and Hillary, as always, is warm and accommodating. Little wonder all those nice Republicans refused to vote for such a monster.
Mary G
The trial’s in San Diego, so here’s hoping he visits one state that most emphatically did not vote for him.
PhoenixRising
@piratedan:
Category error: Trump aspires to a systemically corrupt state in which only his supporters will be paid to repair bridges.
The nation will be better off falling into a river periodically than to collaborate with the destruction this administration can wreak on our economy. Russia is never going to recover. Cambodia cannot recover. We are not smarter, better or more moral than Russians or Cambodians, we’ve simply been luckier up to now.
The con is to steal everything; the carnival sideshow keeps yours eyes off your pockets. But any collaboration to move any bill, anything that provides cover or normalization, is a mistake.
FlipYrWhig
@les: Mondragon for All!
Baud
@D58826:
Mexicans or black people?
JPL
@tobie: Now I’m questioning my call to Lewis’s office. I do believe that we need younger leadership.
A more vibrant TV presence would help.
Cermet
One critical thing Dems must do – if the small handed dick head nominates anyone for a Cabinet Post who is actually competent, then they need to jump on confirming them ASAP before the thugs realize the mistake – the exception is if a really good nominee for the Inferior court somehow happened (I know, and pigs will fly) but if it did, they need to act like this person is terrible and they’d never vote for that person – then when enough thugs vote yes, they all vote yes and confirm them.
PhoenixRising
@Gin & Tonic: Yes, in CA, NJ, OH…I could go on but their federal lobbying is the least of what they do.
If you’re concerned about choice in your state, send the dough to PPACT-Ohio or whatever. If you’re more concerned about ongoing access to termination for late pregnancy, which is the most vulnerable area for reproductive choice, send that dough to PP New Mexico. We have the clinic that helps families with fetal abnormalities not lose the mother too.
Ksmiami
@WereBear: he is a closet case. Really- he hates himself and that hate comes out in his policy
trollhattan
In case anybody is still curious, CA election results with 3M ballots left to count:
Hillary: 6,853,349/ 61.5%
Monsters, Inc.: 3,674,681/ 33.0%
That’s a 3.2 million vote whoopin’.
SenyorDave
@trollhattan: Can someone please explain California to me? Is this late a vote count standard? What would happen if CA was competitive?
Gin & Tonic
@PhoenixRising: Thanks.
les
@jenn:
Presumes ethics and moral consistency not in evidence.
goblue72
@Baud: Well, it persuades their voters. But in fairness, they also claim its the fault of pointy headed elites in their Ivy League academic towers. Which, when it comes to the uncritical support for free trade, is in part, true.
jacy
@japa21:
I just signed up for Penzy’s mailing list and will order from them — also shared with as many people as I can. The kids and I all cook — and it’s wonderful to know that I can support a company that has this kind of ethic. They have a Facebook page, if anyone want to show them some love.
Brachiator
@debit:
This is consistent with his need for adulation. His idea of the presidency is looking tough, talking shit, and basking in the expressions of joy of his loyal supporters. I imagine that he will double down on his promises to build a wall and deport illegal aliens. He will get a strong reaction from his base, making up for the difficulty in actually implementing his policy that he is getting back in Washington, D.C.
dogwood
Two weeks from today I go to Quito for the holidays. Thought it was going to by a nice getaway with grandkids and all that, but now I realize it might be good practice for living under a narcissistic populist dictator who intimidates the press, jails people who would dare to flip of his motorcade, and argues with people on Twitter. Scary thing is Correa is smarter than Trump.
MomSense
@Trentrunner:
I don’t know that it is more consequential but it certainly expands the numbers of us who find his status as our president triggering and terrifying. As a survivor, the calls to get along, give him a chance, etc are so reminiscent of the pressure we receive to put it aside for the good of the family/church/school/workplace. There is no putting it aside and making nice with an abuser. I’m sure I am not alone in feeling traumatized by him, by his continued and inescapable presence in our lives. That he gets to make decisions tha will affect us compounds the trauma. We were counting the days until we could be rid of this toxic, abusive, vile predator. There cannot be acceptance or cooperation. Do not be fooled. He will not temper his behavior or change. He is NOT trustworthy.
Baud
@goblue72:
Fair enough, except where those people are tagged as Dems. Some are, but free traders are mostly GOP.
trollhattan
@SenyorDave:
Yup. Here are the rules. State dictates when the count must be finished and our audit process is rigorous. Process is as follows:
Peale
@SenyorDave: We’d just have to wait. Its kind of the result of haven’t a very democratic system in which 12,000 local public officials get elected (harbor master! Who wants to be Harbor Master of Monterrey Beach.) plus referendums up the ass, including different local ones.
Jeffro
@FlipYrWhig:
Some folks will tell themselves the strangest, most irreconcilable-to-reality things in order to not have to change their preconceived notions (and thus, their minds). Like Trump being the better – or perhaps only? – Christian in the race. Or how he’s going to look out for the little guy.
Hey btw folks these articles coming out about how much fake news there was on Facebook – circulate that to your winger friends and relatives. Let ’em howl in cognitive dissonance for a bit. 99% of them will disregard it (“I trust what complete strangers put out on social media, what I DON’T TRUST is the LIEBRUL MEDIA”) but let’s get that 1% back on board so they can bear witness…and bring 2% next time…and 4% next time…
debbie
@SiubhanDuinne:
I believe Ryan replaced Jim Trafficant. He seems blue-doggish, which in my mind disqualifies him immediately. On the other hand, he’s young.
Baud
@Jeffro: I don’t do Facebook, so I wasn’t aware of the extent of the fake news.
trollhattan
@dogwood: The lack of oxygen could make it more tolerable (coca leaf!) Nobody tell Trump.
raven
Summary of the day in health care in Panama City. I thing we are lucky:
WereBear
@MomSense: So do you get herded retrieved, hustled into a pen, and have your heels nipped?
MomSense
@germy:
This is why we don’t have Democrats running for every office starting with dogcatcher and moving up. Women who decide to run for public office are subjected to threats, harassment, and worse. We can’t even post a comment to a local paper, write a letter to the editor, or speak out at a town meeting without enduring the worst kind of abuse and threatening. The public sphere is not safe. Until this is addressed we will not make any progress.
Shalimar
@Tilda Swinton’s Bald Cap: I don’t understand why Sanders supporting a $10 minimum wage is a bad thing, since there is zero chance that enough Republicans will vote for it in the House to pass it. Infrastructure I can see the worry since it theoretically could pass. I think the Freedom Caucus will kill anything called “infrastructure” too, though, even if it is a straight giveaway to businesses.
kindness
@SenyorDave: It’s the absentee ballots and the provisional ballots they are counting now. At the polling station they just run the ballot through an optical scanner when you finish voting. For what ever reason (I don’t know) I guess you can’t do that with provisional &/or absentee ballots.
Baud
@raven: Whoa. That’s something. Hope she heals quickly.
MomSense
@WereBear:
All of them, Katie!
mai naem mobile
@Anne Laurie: on her twitter feed she just little wittle Susan Sarandon and HRC had all the big shot Hollywood celebs so the election isn’t her fault.
debbie
@raven:
If this happened to your bride, I’m very sorry and hope her recovery is speedy.
D58826
@les: Oh I agree that today the jobs are gone. But to play devil’s advocate for the moment. If they had re=opened the mill in the early 80’s it would have employed thousands. If they kept up with technology they would have, over time, reduced the number of employees to the hundreds of today. But it would have been in their control to a much greater extent than in the way it happened. And since it was the locals who owned the mill, it would be the family members who were impacted by any downsizing. They might have gone about it in a more humane way and the folks who did lose out might not have been so mad
MomSense
@raven:
Oh Raven I’m so sorry. You are a keeper. I know you’ll take good care of her.
trollhattan
Jesus, stop with the performance art already. David Petraeus under consideration for secretary of state.
Now let’s discuss emails again, shall we?
raven
@debbie: Indeed it did. She had 2 weeks of sewing projects planned here at the beach. Plan B now!
FlipYrWhig
@Shalimar: I dunno, maybe because Bernie Sanders and his brigades spent months saying that Hillary Clinton was a lily-livered quisling for being willing to accept a $12 minimum wage, and now the saintly presence Himself is wiling to accept even less?
Mary G
@SenyorDave: Large sheets of paper with choices on both sides, so 4 scans per ballot. We’ve had this system since the days of Gore v. Bush hanging chads, if I remember right, so the scanners probably aren’t the latest technology. There are 1,250,017 provisional ballots that I assume have to be researched. There are also 98,090 ballots in a miscellaneous category that includes ballots that are damaged or ballots that could not be machine read and need to be remade, and ballots diverted by optical scanners for further review.
The smaller counties are done or closing in on the end, but LA is the 800 lb. gorilla in the room. San Diego and Sacramento also have big backlogs left.
Baud
@Shalimar: It’s the fact that he’s been so accommodating to the GOP, when he fought Hillary tooth and nail on $12 v. $15 per hour.
Brachiator
@piratedan:
This election cycle, some of the media wasn’t too good about getting information correct in the first place (exactly why were all those polls so wrong?).
And there really is no such thing as a low information voter. All of us who thought that Hillary had it nailed were, what, wrong information voters?
If nukes get lobbed in the Middle East, would it really matter much which party was blamed for it?
Mary G
@raven: Hoping for a fast and pain-free recovery for Princess Raven.
Baud
@Brachiator: We were wrong because the polls were wrong. But we weren’t using polls to decide who to vote for.
D58826
@Baud: Even before the campaign and Trump and Bernie wasn’t Obama having more trouble getting the D’s to vote for TPP? The GOP was pretty much on board because the Kochs, AEI, and chamber of commerce were for it
JPL
@raven: That;s the worse case and I’m so sorry. I had hoped that it would be just a break. Give her extra hugs.
Jeffro
@Baud: I check it a couple times a day, but the only way I was aware of the extent of the fake news was recent news articles, mostly through the WaPo.
It’s weird, because I was – in a way – also hearing about this through my mom. While pretty strongly anti-Trump, back in October she really started losing steam and was mentioning things like Hillary taxing churches into bankruptcy and other nonsense. Now, some of that she was hearing at her church, which is just as disgusting if not more so. But she was getting a LOT of it from stuff her fellow older/whiter/rural friends and relatives were telling her on Facebook.
It really was a concerted effort, paid for by the Mercers, directed by Robert Mercer’s Cambridge Analytica folks and Bannon. That, Russia/Wikileaks, and Comey – kind of a trio of strong headwinds and Hillz STILL won the popular vote, only losing those flipped Rust Belt states by 1% or less on average.
That’s why it’s important to fight now, and fight hard. This thing was rigged by crazy-a$$ billionaires, by a hostile foreign power, and by our own domestic intelligence with nothing but a grudge to settle.
MomSense
@trollhattan:
Not just emails but notebooks full of assets and operations in his desk drawer at home. And he gave his mistress his CIA email password so she could communicate by drafting emails and not hitting send. WTF else did she spy with her little eyes in his email account?!
Baud
@D58826: Yes. NAFTA was the same way. Bill was for it, but it passed on mostly R votes in Congress. But only one party gets dinged.
D58826
@Jeffro:
Maybe she wan’t such a weak/flaws candidate after all? ;=)
EJ
*Decries the dreaded “Circular firing squad”*
*Continues to punch left as hard as possible*
I actually do think this was the best Warren and Sanders could have gotten, especially since they got Schumer’s endorsement of Ellison out of the deal, which is huge.
raven
@JPL: She’s tough, she’ll adjust. I’ll just take make certain thatI stay on top of what she needs to make it as good as it can be. She can read and hang at the beach while I fish. We talked about going home but there wouldn’t be much sense it going back into the smoke when it is awesome here.
WaterGirl
@raven: I’m sorry raven to hear about this raven. But given that it happened, I’m glad your experience has been so much better than it might have been!
trollhattan
@MomSense:
That was practically a Mata Hari deal and he sneaked away with just a misdemeanor (lucky duck) but holy crap, this is breaking sideways faster than any scriptwriter could ever write.
WaterGirl
@WereBear: For half a second, I thought we were talking about what is going to be happening with people in a Dump presidency. I felt much better when I realize you were talking about the pup!
D58826
@Baud: ‘Clinton rules’ seem to apply to democrats in general.
I always wanted to be a little fly on the wall in 1998 to listen in when Newt talked to his mistress about the evil of the Lewinski affair.
raven
@WaterGirl: The Ortho just happens to be a hand man!
WereBear
@Ksmiami: Ah. That sure has been known to happen.
MomSense
@trollhattan:
Do you remember what Rep Massa said about him? I do. He is a snake.
D58826
@raven: moon light walks on the beach are nice
Baud
@D58826: Agree. Clinton Rules are the normal rules that apply to Democrats on steroids.
WaterGirl
@raven: Looks like you guys won the lottery with the medical help!
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Patricia Kayden: @Hoodie: And yet in my family, the younger members were the militant Trumpkins, and the olds voted for HRC. These generational memes aren’t very helpful.
Brachiator
@Baud:
The polls turned out to be the fulcrum of much that was wrong.
Too many people depended upon them, including the Clinton campaign strategists. But they were like faulty instruments in an aircraft. Somebody needed to look out the damn window and make a course correction.
Baud
@Brachiator: Sure. Hindsight is 20/20.
Plus, everything was screwed up because of Comey’s late intervention. It was a very fluid situation.
CarolDuhart2
@SiubhanDuinne: But that still doesn’t give him a reason to do so. He has no more political ambitions left, doesn’t need the job for anything-not even prestige. He knows that foreign policy under Orange Cheeto is going to be a mess. Any successes-he would get no credit-any failures, Orange Cheeto would just blame him.
Shalimar
@FlipYrWhig: I found late campaign Bernie to be annoying as hell too, and don’t support anything he or his supporters did from late April on. Fuck him. Still, this is posturing that means nothing. You can’t find 10 Republicans in the whole Congress who will be on board with a higher minimum wage. It will never pass, even with every Dem following Sanders in support. All talk to highlight the differences between Trump and the rest of his party.
NotMax
@raven
My understanding is you already do a goodly share but looks as if you’ll be doing all the cooking chez Raven for the rest of the year.
Break out those recipe files and best wishes to the good lady.
les
@Shalimar:
Because none of that reality bs bothered him when he was promising $15 and bashing Clinton for being willing to accept increments.
Roger Moore
@hovercraft:
Wasn’t that pretty much his gig on The Apprentice? He had a bunch of people working for him who did all the hard work, and then he came in and judged them. He would give figurative pats on the heads to the good ones and kicks in the behind to the bad ones, but most importantly he would get to take credit for whatever they came up with. I assume that’s how he thinks the presidency is going to work: the cabinet does the menial work while he makes the big decisions and gets the public praise. To some extent that is how it goes- the president really does delegate a lot of work- but he just doesn’t get how much effort goes into understanding the issues well enough to be able to make good decisions.
Shalimar
@Baud: He hasn’t been accommodating yet. He has said he will work with them if they pursue goals he supports. That is a big difference 6+ weeks before we even have a new congress. I see the worry that he will pursue compromise to turn terrible bills into pretty bad bills. I just think it is wise to hold the friendly fire until it is obvious that is what he is doing.
Baud
@Shalimar:
It would be one thing if it were that generic. The tweet suggests that he has backed away from $15/hour. What did he get in return?
Shalimar
@les: The past is the past. Dwelling on the worst aspects of Bernie’s campaign isn’t any better than all the assholes who come here insisting Bernie would have won if we had only nominated him instead of Hillary. We have much bigger problems than those recriminations now, and it isn’t obvious yet what strategy Sanders is pursuing. If he really does compromise on anything substantive, I will be calling his office right along with you to bitch them out.
Shalimar
@Baud: There isn’t going to be a negotiation, so he can’t compromise any more than he has. When the dust settles and nothing happens, Sanders will be able to say “I was willing to support the increase President Trump said he wanted, and he couldn’t even get a vote in the House.”
Baud
@Shalimar: Yeah, we’ll see.
Shalimar
@Baud: Agreed. I am right there with you in outrage if Sanders compromises on something that actually makes it to Trump’s desk.
Brachiator
@Baud:
Well, not quite. There is post election analysis, and then there is scapegoating and fingerpointing. But the polls were wrong, and nobody saw it. And much was based on the false premise that Clinton had and held onto a lead.
How many comments here blasted the media for trying to turn the election into a horse race when everyone knew, because of the polls, that Clinton had it in the bag?
This was just one thing that was clearly wrong. The rest I largely leave for others. And I certainly don’t simply blame Clinton or her team. I feel deeply sad that they might have misread this signal. But it was not the only one. And many people mentioned some of this before hand, and got shouted down.
Comey was a deep blow, but I do not know that he made a crucial difference.
One thing that I am seeing (after taking some time away from all election related things) is how hardened many became. For many reasons, and a lot of them I think false and unfortunate, Trump supporters became determined to back their man. Nothing would deter them. And he was able to peel away some who might have supported Clinton.
And on top of all this, in ways still to be investigated, the Republicans were able to use rural voters to negate big city majorities. This might not continue forever, but it might be a challenge to Democrats for a few more go rounds. Swing states are more important than ever. This does not mean that things are hopeless for Democrats, not by any means. But new strategies have got to be developed.
raven
@WaterGirl: @WaterGirl: We just lost it, BCBS called and said we are not covered for out of state. Looks like we have to pack up and go home.
Roger Moore
@Mary G:
This bears repeating. If LA County were a state, it would be 9th or 10th largest, about the same as North Carolina. There are a lot of ballots to count, the rules about counting absentee and provisional ballots are strict, and the deadline is long enough that the county election officials aren’t going to rush through things just to get a number out faster. I think we could improve matters by having more early voting locations- there were only a handful in the whole county- but the system is what it is.
Applejinx
@Juice Box:
Just so’s you know, this is crazy. Third Way politics is a historical fact, and a not unsuccessful way to get elected in deeply conservative times.
Own it. For what it’s worth, these times are far from that right-wing socially. However, we’re in deep trouble economically, and people are real tired of being lied to.
Steve in the ATL
@SenyorDave: you’ve only been riffed once? Piker.
Matt McIrvin
@debit: Warren G. Harding did a You Still Love Me, Pay No Attention To The Scandals tour, and died halfway through.it.
Shalimar
@Applejinx: Third Way politics is a historical fact. You can blame Bill Clinton for part of the rise of neo-liberalism. But that is not what Hillary Clinton ran on in 2016. She moved to the left of Obama on many issues. You can believe she was insincere, but you can’t change what she was saying.
msdc
@daverave:
This is about the best news we could possibly hope for out of a Trump cabinet. It would also put a nice fly or two in Putin’s ointment.
In other words, probably ain’t gonna happen. But it might be the best we can hope for.
Corner Stone
@Applejinx: Shut up, you stupid fucking gobshite.
Corner Stone
@Applejinx: How do you even get out of bed in the morning and figure out how to turn on the sink faucet?
Fuck you, you fucking moron. If you keep spouting this nonsense I am going to start suggesting people do not listen to you.
NotoriousJRT
@daverave:
Oh, I can see it. “You said I was unfit, you said I was a fraud. Well guess what? I triumphed where you failed. Now I get to offer YOU the chance to work under ME, and I know you think you are arrogant enough to take the job. I am gonna love humiliating you. Maybe I’ll even get to fire you.” Meanwhile, Mitt has to decide what it means to be a patriot in this repugnant scenario.
Corner Stone
@NotoriousJRT: He wants them to go through a full background check. Submit all their sins to him.
PIGL
@humboldtblue:I think you’re right and that’s why I think America is a lost cause.
J R in WV
@Patricia Kayden:
I was pretty stunned when Trump won. But I was shocked when W Bush won in 2004. Way more than when Trump won. Maybe that was mostly because of shlt going on in my life, but maybe more because the Bush win in 2004 made me realize that this country can really F up an election, even when all the facts on offer point so strongly at the Dem candidate as the competent candidate.
Groucho48
Probably better to donate directly to Planned Parenthood than to NARAL.
I think Dems making nice noises now is the proper thing to do. Don’t waste ammo on shooting at shadows, wait until they commit to some real outrage. Then, move on to the second step. The second step is the one that always causes Dems problems and is where Reps excel. Figure out the first few bills the other side is likely to focus on first, ponder them for a bit and decide which one offers the best chance of messing the other side up. Probably privatizing Medicare. Have focus groups and try various approaches and strategies. Need to have a quick talking point with resonating words like “freedom” in it. Also find some trivial but distracting flaw in either the bill or in the presentation. Get a bunch of talkers lined up and just blitzkrieg the bill as soon as it is proposed. Hit all the Sunday shows. Talk about how you want to work with Reps but, not if…”talking point”. You all know the drill. Find every bill’s death panels talking point. We won’t have the instant credibility the Reps have when they do this, but, keep at it. Tie up that bill for days, weeks, months.
Meanwhile, try to drive a wedge between trump and the Republican Congress. Shouldn’t be hard to do. Maybe Sanders can approach him, one outsider to another and start talking about his legacy. I bet Trump gets a hardon at the word legacy. A small one.The minimum wage is a good choice. Talk about how millions will remember him as the guy who gave them the boost they needed. Call it the Trump Poverty bill. Tell him to tell Reps to give him a clean bill. They won’t and Trump will naturally try to screw them back. And, Trump is in a better position to screw them than we are.
Do the same with the infrastructure bill. Talk about how Eisenhower’s legacy was the interstate highway system and that he could be known for modernizing the grid. But, not if he privatizes it. Then, GE or somebody would get all the credit, not Trump. Tell him to privatize roads in Texas and Alabama and such. Let his cronies make a few bucks off the Trump voters.
Really, we need to be creative. We’ve never had a President who is so loosely tied to his party. Talk about how all the best Presidents had bipartisan support. Flatter him a bit. People say he goes with what the last person he talks to tells him. we need to be in position to be that last person at least occasionally. Because, every time we are, life is a little better for folks who deserve a better life.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: The other day he was maintaining that the Clinton campaign didn’t send Bernie out to campaign in swing states, which, he insisted, Bernie would have loved to do. The fact that good ol’ Bernie, who Applejinx loves to pieces, ACTUALLY DID THAT seemed not to enter into the “analysis.”
Rex Everything
“Jacobin and Breitbart”? Oh, what an asshole you’ve become, AL.
Tehanu
@Corner Stone:
Sorry to say I agree with you. The worst of it isn’t even that they are morally lazy, ignorant, cruel, selfish, bigoted liars and bullies; the worst is, they can’t even recognize truth any more. They have totally bought into their own self-righteous rage at the rest of us for trying to stop them acting out their hatefulness. The only comfort I’m finding is the certainty that the voters who chose these bastards are going to get exactly what they voted for, and (I know I keep saying this) it isn’t what they think they voted for. Too bad the rest of us will also have to suffer for their moral blindness and dishonesty.
Tehanu
@Applejinx:
If people are tired of being lied to, why the hell would they vote for Trump? You could show them Trump saying something, then half an hour later claiming he hadn’t said it, and his voters all nodded their heads and agreed with him. That doesn’t sound to me like people who object to being lied to.