Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The desire to stay informed is directly at odds with the need to not be constantly enraged.

Mediocre white men think RFK Jr’s pathetic midlife crisis is inspirational. The bar is set so low for them, it’s subterranean.

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

Republicans: The threats are dire, but my tickets are non-refundable!

When you’re in more danger from the IDF than from Russian shelling, that’s really bad.

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

In my day, never was longer.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

One of our two political parties is a cult whose leader admires Vladimir Putin.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

With all due respect and assumptions of good faith, please fuck off into the sun.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

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Open Thread: Palin Wept

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All of them, Katie!

Yeah, I think Sam Bee is right — the President-Asterisk can’t read, at least not with any fluency. And he’s too spoilt to put in the effort to overcome his deficits.

(I always suspected Dubya was an unacknowledged dyslexic / ADD sufferer, but at least his parents had taught him to fake an interest. Sometimes. “All right, you’ve covered your ass… “)
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Reader Interactions

180Comments

  3. 3.

    Tilda Swintons Bald Cap

    Reading books is for lieberal elites who think they are better than everyone else.

  4. 4.

    dedc79

    So the area around my office in DC got closed off by the bomb squad because of a suspicious package and I decided to head home. Walked out the door and who do i see passing me in the other direction? Lou f’ing Dobbs. Of course I couldn’t pass up the opportunity and told him he’s an awful human being. He said thanks and kept walking.

  5. 5.

    Trentrunner

    I have Ph.D. in English, I’m the same age as Barack Obama, and he is FAR more well-read than I am.

    We are so, so very, very fucked.

  6. 6.

    SiubhanDuinne

    I think it’s not so much that he is illiterate as that he is painfully, gallingly incurious.

    The contrast with that feature on Obama’s reading habits couldn’t be any starker. We are losing so much in slightly over 20 hours from now.

  8. 8.

    low-tech cyclist

    Whether Trump can read or not, it’s clear that he doesn’t. If he ever did have the ability to sit down and read a book, it’s clear that he’s not done so in such a long time that he wouldn’t have the endurance for it any more.

    ETA: Say what you will about Nixon, the blackhearted bastard was capable of understanding fairly complex ideas. Now we’ve got evil, dumb, and ignorant in a single package.

  10. 10.

    Corner Stone

    “I like the ones with the pictures. And the pictures you can color on, on, on the books. Those are best, and very classy.”

  13. 13.

    low-tech cyclist

    Mark 13:14, NIV: “When you see ‘the abomination that causes desolation’ standing where it does not belong…”

    That would be at noon tomorrow.

  14. 14.

    BGinCHI

    Trump’s favorite joke:
    –Knock knock
    –Who’s there?
    –Narcissist
    –Narcissist who?
    –Me
    –Who?
    –Me
    –I don’t know you
    –Everybody knows me
    –I’m calling the police
    –It’s me
    (batters down the door, ruins the country for a generation)

  16. 16.

    Corner Stone

    Trump doesn’t do any actual “work”. What does he fill his time with? Besides golf, I mean. Before Twitter he would have had to obsessively scan a dozen or so papers and/or magazines to see if anyone was talking about him. He infamously doesn’t use computers. Does he just sit in a room and look out the window?

  17. 17.

    Ronnie Pudding

    Dubya actually had a voracious appetite for reading when is was President (at least if you believe Karl Rove, LOL).

  18. 18.

    Corner Stone

    @dedc79: Did you say it straight out at him? “Lou Dobbs you are an awful human being.”
    Because he probably heard, “You are awesome.”

  19. 19.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @Weaselone: This reminds me of sugary cereal commercials that show a bowl of marshmallow fluffy candy chews on a table with whole wheat toast, an egg, juice, etc. And they say “a part of this nutritious breakfast,” when they mean “next to this nutritious breakfast.” Trump is next to some books.

  21. 21.

    Bobby D

    He can read fine (not that he does a lot of it), and despite his garbled syntax, he isn’t as deficient in raw brain power as we like to paint him (no, I am not saying he has some big plan, or is playing 8dim chess or something).

    But as everyone in a position to know has said, he has no attention span, at all. Couple that with likely early stages of alzheimers, and he probably can’t get two pages into something without forgetting what was on the first page.

  23. 23.

    dedc79

    @Corner Stone: I think I blurted out something along the lines of “Lou, you are awful! Just awful!” He was practically past me by the time I realized who it was. But he turned and looked at me and gave a sarcastic thank you.

  24. 24.

    Corner Stone

    The last two Republican POTUS were completely incurious, ignorant bullies. Raised in wealth and privilege to the extent nothing ever forced them to peek outside their insular shell.
    This seems significant, somehow…

  31. 31.

    Ian G.

    Anyone have a transcript of the Obama interview referenced above?

    You know, I’m an outer borough child like Trump, born in Queens, in fact, to an NYPD cop and a public school teacher, and my visceral, instinctual reaction to Trump is to consider him low-class poseur trash, even though his father made more money in a month than my parents did in a lifetime.

    I’m constantly laughing to myself at how boorish his taste in everything is. I halfway want to create a Twitter account just to remind him daily, one Queens kid to another, that’s he’s low-rent trash.

  32. 32.

    Corner Stone

    @john b: I misphrased that a bit. I meant to include Trump and GWB, even though Trump is not actually a POTUS or technically a last POTUS.
    But I meant those two incurious, ignorant bullies. Sorry.

  35. 35.

    JaneE

    At the very least, Trump could have said “I only have time to read briefing papers at the moment”. Or had enough foresight to pick some simple answers to common questions ahead of time.

  36. 36.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Corner Stone: The Piano Guys are actually pretty decent. We have a couple of their CDs and our toddler loves them too. I’m really sad they’re performing for Trump, honestly.

  37. 37.

    HeleninEire

    Ahhhhhh… I have a job interview at Trinity College on Wed. They say it will take only 30 minutes so clearly it is a very preliminary cull. There will most likely be at least 2 more. But hey YAY, ME!

  39. 39.

    GregB

    Remain calm. I am sure the human potato sack with a mustache, Terry Branstad, will calm down the Chinese after we start a naval blockade against them.

  40. 40.

    J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford

    I always suspected Dubya was an unacknowledged dyslexic / ADD sufferer, but at least his parents had taught him to fake an interest. Sometimes. “All right, you’ve covered your ass… “

    I thought it was confirmed that George W Bush did have something like dyslexia and that his mother Barbara worked very hard with him when he was child to overcome it.

  41. 41.

    Elizabelle

    Hamby twitter links to the new Jim Vandehei-Mike Allen clusterfuck, Axios (and don’t you think of bodywash meant for major odors, with that name?) — anyhoo:

    From their article, Reality Bites: Trump’s Wake-Up Call, which does not say that much about T-guy’s reading habits, except that he prefers to do as little as possible.

    His aides find time to swipe at Chris Christie.

    Trump’s advisers tell us privately that many parts of the operation remain messy — in large part, they say, because New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie left them with virtually no preparation for a transition. Advisers told us horror stories of struggles to fill key roles — including getting handed files of candidates, most of whom were Democrats. This is only adding to the confusion and slowed policy-making discussions.

    God forbid they consider a well-qualified Democrat for a position.

    Trump seemed, dare we say, humbled by recent intelligence briefings on global threats. Dick Cheney’s friends used to tell us he was a decidedly darker, changed man once he started reading the daily intel reports after 9/11. [After?!] Trump seemed moved by what he’s now seeing.

    “I’ve had a lot of briefings that are very … I don’t want to say ‘scary,’ because I’ll solve the problems,” he said. “But … we have some big enemies out there in this country and we have some very big enemies — very big and, in some cases, strong enemies.”

    Would you say that’s third grade use of vocabulary?

    Funny moment: When asked about books on his desk, he showed us “Adams v Jefferson” by John Ferling. We asked if we should read it. “I wouldn’t,” he said.

    That last part is funny, and human, but, dog, are we in a world of trouble.

  42. 42.

    trollhattan

    @Ian G.:
    New Yorkers know and loathe the Trump, have for decades, and I’m still flabbergasted they weren’t able to educate the rest of the country to his loathsome ways. Ironically, I’ve heard many, many supporters wave off his boorish ways with a casual, “He’s from New York, that’s just how they are.”

  44. 44.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @Ian G.:

    The irony (of which there is way too much these days) is that his supporters aspire to his taste, but since they’re actually considered to be the low-rent trash by Trump, they’re the sorts of people he cheats, lies to and steals from and whom he would never let populate his lobbies and golf courses, and who voted for him for that very reason because “he says what he means’.

  45. 45.

    Elizabelle

    @Ian G.:

    I halfway want to create a Twitter account just to remind him daily, one Queens kid to another, that’s he’s low-rent trash.

    And what is stopping you?

    Fuck the Fucking NY Times ran some articles on Obama’s reading habits. Could put those up, if they’re what you were searching…

  49. 49.

    Calouste

    @HeleninEire: Congrats! Of course, Trinity College is the alma mater of Jonathan Swift, Samuel Beckett, and Oscar Wilde, so we are going to have some expectations about the quality of your comments in the future…

  50. 50.

    Ian G.

    @Elizabelle:

    Mostly I don’t want to open a can of worms and have the Pepe the Frog crowd after me should Trump declare that killing me would bring the person who did it 72 virgins in heaven.

  51. 51.

    West of the Rockies (been a while)

    @dedc79:

    Good on you! I hope he gets that a lot, that it adds stress and trims another sixty seconds off his shitty life, that it makes the two million a year (or whatever it is) feel a bit less.

  53. 53.

    piratedan

    @Corner Stone: well, apparently he spends his free time updating his enemies list, chasing poontang and spending time on twitter. I have to tell you, as an American, I feel so much freer now, I can’t begin to express just how free I feel because of there being words that I can use but I do not understand. Thankfully, I am freer knowing that.

  58. 58.

    Elizabelle

    FTF New York Times: Transcript: President Obama on What Books Mean to Him

    Michiku Kakatani: Obama’s Secret to Surviving the White House Years: Books

    Not since Lincoln has there been a president as fundamentally shaped — in his life, convictions and outlook on the world — by reading and writing as Barack Obama.

    Last Friday, seven days before his departure from the White House, Mr. Obama sat down in the Oval Office and talked about the indispensable role that books have played during his presidency and throughout his life — from his peripatetic and sometimes lonely boyhood, when “these worlds that were portable” provided companionship, to his youth when they helped him to figure out who he was, what he thought and what was important.

    During his eight years in the White House — in a noisy era of information overload, extreme partisanship and knee-jerk reactions — books were a sustaining source of ideas and inspiration, and gave him a renewed appreciation for the complexities and ambiguities of the human condition.

    “At a time when events move so quickly and so much information is transmitted,” he said, reading gave him the ability to occasionally “slow down and get perspective” and “the ability to get in somebody else’s shoes.” These two things, he added, “have been invaluable to me. Whether they’ve made me a better president I can’t say. But what I can say is that they have allowed me to sort of maintain my balance during the course of eight years, because this is a place that comes at you hard and fast and doesn’t let up.”

    This, and seeing the Fuck the Fucking New York Times banner headline up now, Trump Arrives in Washington on Eve of His Presidency

    is going to make me cry. Emails, you fucks. Emails, emails, emails.

    We could have a sea of women smiling and marching in white suits after President Hillary’s inauguration, instead of p u ssy hats.

  60. 60.

    Steeplejack

    @Corner Stone:

    One of the scarier things I have realized is that Trump is not even a businessman. He’s a deal-maker. He sees everything in terms of making deals. You start to notice that he talks about everything in those terms. Tex Drillerson Rex Tillerson is really well suited to run the State Department; he’s “a great deal-maker.” Etc., etc.

    I think (in his business life, before the election campaign) Trump spent his time shmoozing with other deal-makers on the phone and yelling at a coterie of Smithers-type aides, enablers and minders in Trump Tower.

    We’re all about to see how that genius for deal-making translates into running the country. But not until next Monday—remember, he’s taking the weekend off so as not to interfere with the inauguration festivities!

  62. 62.

    Cacti

    @low-tech cyclist:

    Whether Trump can read or not, it’s clear that he doesn’t. If he ever did have the ability to sit down and read a book, it’s clear that he’s not done so in such a long time that he wouldn’t have the endurance for it any more.

    I’ve no doubt that Conald was given “gentleman’s Cs” throughout his educational career.

  63. 63.

    Joyce H

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I think it’s not so much that he is illiterate as that he is painfully, gallingly incurious.

    I think he forgets things. When the whole kerfuffle with John Lewis started, I instantly realized that at the beginning, Trump didn’t have a clue in the world who Lewis is. All he knew was he’d been dissed by a congressman and since the congressman was black, his district was obviously The Ghetto, which Everyone Knows is a dystopian hellscape. Once the blowback began, I’m sure he now realizes that Lewis is the Civil Rights Icon, but he’d never ever admit that he didn’t know that going in.

    But the realization that he didn’t know Lewis from Adam really struck me (again) on the issue of the VAST amounts of things he doesn’t know! Things that you learn without seeking out the information, just living in the world. I mean, I doubt if he reads a newspaper, but he takes in an occasional television newscast, he sees headlines and hears people talking. (I’m sometimes surprised when I’m able to answer a crossword clue or trivia question about sports I don’t follow or TV shows I don’t watch – it’s info you just absorb from the culture around you.) The guy hasn’t been cloistered – he must have heard a lot of this stuff! So I think he just forgets them.

    Maybe it is Alzheimers, but maybe it’s just complete indifference. If something isn’t about himself, his glorious business, his amazing family, or his unparalleled magnificence, the information just bleeds away. Man, when he was in Scotland for that ribbon cutting of the golf resort, he was going into exhaustive granular detail about the golf course refurbishment. But… books? Pffft.

  65. 65.

    JordanRules

    Obama’s last call to a foreign leader, as President, was to Merkel.

    I wonder how that went?

  68. 68.

    RSA

    …what books are on your nightstand, or what’s a book —
    Well, you can see some of them over there. You can see some of them right over here.

    Pro tip: Don’t interview Donald Trump in his bedroom.

  71. 71.

    Steeplejack

    @trollhattan:

    Well, it would have been nice if the hometown newspaper had stepped up and let us all know how awful he was, but, you know, e-mails.

  74. 74.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @dedc79:

    I don’t know how you avoided punching his jowly face. I’m not sure I could have, which makes it good that I don’t live in a major political media market.

  75. 75.

    Quinerly

    Is anyone else listening to Jon Voight’s speech? Crazy. And, yes, I know he’s a RWNJ but I’m still shocked.

  76. 76.

    Roger Moore

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I think it’s not so much that he is illiterate as that he is painfully, gallingly incurious.

    He isn’t illiterate; he’s aliterate. He’s capable of reading, but he doesn’t want to exert himself beyond about 140 characters at a time.

  77. 77.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Trentrunner:

    A few weeks ago, Xinhua asked these questions of Xi Linping, who spoke of what sounded like a pretty thoughtful list.

    Of course, if you asked me, my list would consist mainly of things slightly better than smut – but I have some other, higher brow items related more to history (and some actual smut).

  78. 78.

    Corner Stone

    @Steeplejack: I don’t think he’s a businessman or a dealmaker. It seems obvious to me that other people have been putting all the details together and crossing the I’s and dotting the T’s for a couple decades now. IMO he’s not only basically illiterate but functionally illiterate. IOW, he can go potty on his own still but basically everything else is handled by other people.
    I think if you put him in a soundproof box for 24 hours, brought him out, kept his family away from him and asked him to describe any recent event of the last year or so he would be unable to form coherent sentences.

  81. 81.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Corner Stone:

    What does he fill his time with? Besides golf, I mean.

    And does he actually golf for enjoyment, or just status?

    He doesn’t appear to be a man who finds joy in activities or hobbies or relationships.

  85. 85.

    Corner Stone

    That fucking gibberish of an answer when Trump was asked about his heroes was terrifying.

  87. 87.

    Anne Laurie

    @J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford:

    I thought it was confirmed that George W Bush did have something like dyslexia and that his mother Barbara worked very hard with him when he was child to overcome it.

    No, that was Neil Bush — the runt.

    The Fortunate First-Born, Mother’s little man, was not permitted to have flaws.

    The whole Bush family’s fvcked up, on both sides.

  90. 90.

    Corner Stone

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Or anything, at all. He has no pets, beyond Melania I guess. He doesn’t attend the symphony or orchestra. Sponsor causes. Anything. What does he do while he is awake?
    I at least comment on a top 10,000 blog and watch a lot of pr0n. Where does he get his kicks?

  92. 92.

    Corner Stone

    I mean, it’s obvious he doesn’t even read comic books. Otherwise he could have easily answered the question about who his heroes were.
    Does he just sit there stacking and restacking folders full of blank paper?

  93. 93.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Elizabelle:

    If there is any history of these times (carved on tree trunks or scratched onto the exterior wall of a ruined WalMart with the shattered end of an empty, useless rifle), I’m hoping that someone begins untangling the Gordian knot of his multiple emotional and cognitive disorders, and comes up with a theory as to how he appealed to people who actually knew better.

  98. 98.

    Corner Stone

    @Ronnie Pudding: You mean like Camus’ The Stranger ? As I have said here before, I don’t really give a shit if that was in his book bag or not. But they at least tried to sell that effort. They gave half a shit to put a real world, adult fucking answer out there, whether it was true or not.

  99. 99.

    Leto

    This was brought up as a comment in the last thread but: Congress moves to give away national lands, discounting billions in revenue

    According to the Outdoor Alliance, US public land is the government’s second largest source of income after taxes. In addition to economic stimulus in outdoor activities, federal land also creates revenue through oil and gas production, logging and other industrial uses. According to the BLM, in 2016, it made $2bn in royalty revenue from federal leases.

    Ignoring those figures, the new language for the House budget, authored by Utah Republican representative Rob Bishop, who has a history of fighting to transfer public land to the states, says that federal land is effectively worthless. Transferring public land to “state, local government or tribal entity shall not be considered as providing new budget authority, decreasing revenues, increasing mandatory spending or increasing outlays.”

    Essentially, the revised budget rules deny that federal land has any value at all, allowing the new Congress to sidestep requirements that a bill giving away a piece of federal land does not decrease federal revenue or contribute to the federal debt.

  101. 101.

    Corner Stone

    If you are Tiffany Trump…are you secretly arranging a small sale of polonium to take out that bitch Ivanka for the Daddy’s favorite slot? I use the term “slot” advisedly.

  102. 102.

    Roger Moore

    @Ian G.:

    Mostly I don’t want to open a can of worms and have the Pepe the Frog crowd after me should Trump declare that killing me would bring the person who did it 72 virgins in heaven.

    So? Register the Twitter account with a throw-away email and feel comfortable that the Pepe crowd couldn’t find the real you if they tried. If you can get them to the point they’re making regular death threats, it means you’re having an effect. Good luck to them doxing an account that doesn’t connect to anything else.

    ETA: I would suggest leaving a fake trail to somebody you don’t like, but that would be wrong.

  103. 103.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Corner Stone:

    I got everything I needed to know about classic literature from Classic Comics Illustrated when I was 10 or 11. Later, when I actually read the stuff, I had to laugh about how completely those guys captured the stories.

  106. 106.

    trollhattan

    @JordanRules:
    “Madam Chancellor….yes of course Angela….what’s that? Yes I’ll miss you too, in fact I’ll miss you a great deal and want to wish you well in the forthcoming elections. What’s that?…yes, I’m sure it will all work out and he’ll be fine. He supports Europe and especially Germany, given his father and all. And…oh yes, he’ll certainly behave but I just hope you’re ready for more neck rubs.”

    With apologies to Bob Newhart

  108. 108.

    Corner Stone

    There’s nothing quite like a large phallic symbol dominating the background against a reflective and still receiving body of water in the foreground to make me fucking puke about our nation’s damaging patriarchic heritage.

  109. 109.

    Shell

    Is anyone else listening to Jon Voight’s speech? Crazy. And, yes, I know he’s a RWNJ but I’m still shocked.

    Amazing isn t it? They won the electoral vote, are lying to themselves that they won the popular vote. Its now the eve of Trumps big triumph and they still have to whine, bitch and paint themselves as victims.

    Im watching highlights from Obamas first inauguration concert. Springsteen, Pete Seeger, U2, Stevie Wonder and al… I just want to weep.

  110. 110.

    Corner Stone

    GAH! The fucking asshole can’t even get his tie tied correctly for this one fucking thing! FUCK YOU!

  111. 111.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Corner Stone:

    I’m just wondering about the sets and actors on the inevitable highbrow pr0n production of “From Assprentice to First Lady”. Will there be an Ivanka and Tiffany scene?

    Asking for a friend.

  112. 112.

    raven

    This motherfucker is playing the Stones “Time is on my Side” at his fucking concert intro.

  114. 114.

    dr. bloor

    @trollhattan: Being loathed by the coastal elites plays very well in the “Heartland,” dontcha know. The Twin Towers are OK when they’re on a t-shirt with an eagle and the American flag, but NYCers are otherwise viewed as aliens at best.

  117. 117.

    gene108

    @Elizabelle:

    Would you say that’s third grade use of vocabulary?

    As much as we (liberals) tend to mock Trump and mocked Bush, Jr. for their inept ability to speak coherently, I really think their inability to talk coherently appeals to a lot of people.

    Why? I don’t know. Maybe, big words, complete sentences scary. Small words, sentence fragments good.

    But it does seem to attract people to them.

  119. 119.

    ThresherK

    @Shell: Well, you won’t be missing The B Street Band, a well-regarded Springsteen cover act. They have pulled out of the Inauguration festivities at Bruce’s request.

    I hear Trump is pursuing “The B Street Band-omania! Not the B Street Band, but an incredible simulation!”

    (I can’t tell when I’m kidding any longer.)

  121. 121.

    Anne Laurie

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    I’m hoping that someone begins untangling the Gordian knot of his multiple emotional and cognitive disorders, and comes up with a theory as to how he appealed to people who actually knew better.

    “Well, at least he has a penis.”

    “And he hates all the same people we hate, too!”

  122. 122.

    Roger Moore

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    comes up with a theory as to how he appealed to people who actually knew better.

    By putting an (R) after his name. Once he had the nomination sewn up- against the better judgment of most of the remotely serious people in the party- they felt as if they had to stay in line or risk having the party self-destruct. I don’t think it ever occurred to them that a self-destructing party might be preferable to a self-destructing country. Also, too, his buddy Vladimir Vladimirovich may very well have had compromising information on a lot of those people that kept them cowed.

  124. 124.

    Mike in NC

    Wasn’t part of the Big Lie about Dubya’s reading habits the ridiculous bit about his reading some of the classics in the original Greek and Latin?

  125. 125.

    Anne Laurie

    @Corner Stone:

    If you are Tiffany Trump…are you secretly arranging a small sale of polonium to take out that bitch Ivanka for the Daddy’s favorite slot?

    No, I think Tiffany is realizing just why her mother was so eager to raise her on the opposite coast from Daddy Dearest, frankly.

  126. 126.

    Villago Delenda Est

    This man is a hopeless classless philistine. And his constituency is hopeless classless philistines.

    All utterly unworthy of a government bestowed on them by enlightened, learned men.

    Franklin was right to be skeptical of whether or not we could keep it. This is worse, far worse, than the crisis of the mid 19th Century. That was mostly sectional in scope.

    And these philistines are in the process of destroying that government, validating Franklin.

  128. 128.

    Roger Moore

    @Corner Stone:

    If you are Tiffany Trump…are you secretly arranging a small sale of polonium to take out that bitch Ivanka for the Daddy’s favorite slot?

    My impression is that Tiffany is trying- fairly successfully- to stay away from daddy. If she had some 210Po to use on a family member, he would be the more likely target.

  130. 130.

    catclub

    @gene108:

    Small words, sentence fragments good.

    Also much less specific. Even better than dog whistles – since different listeners fill in the illogic differently.

  133. 133.

    trollhattan

    I smell a pardon as soon as next week, but in the meantime, good!

    A federal appeals court on Thursday let stand former Massey Energy Co Chief Executive Donald Blankenship’s conviction for conspiracy and one-year prison sentence related to his role in a 2010 West Virginia coal mine explosion that killed 29 workers.

    The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Blankenship’s argument that his conviction should be overturned because the trial judge made several errors, and because prosecutors did not properly allege the specific mine safety regulations he allegedly conspired to violate.
    ADVERTISING

    A lawyer for Blankenship did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

    Blankenship was convicted in December 2015 on a misdemeanor charge of conspiring to violate federal safety standards in connection with Massey’s Upper Big Branch mine, site of the April 5, 2010 explosion. He was acquitted on related felony charges.

  137. 137.

    Chip Daniels

    In Edmund Morris’ biography of Teddy Roosevelt, TR was asked once to list his favorite books.

    His list was 800 titles long and in the Morris telling, he had actually read them.

  138. 138.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Roger Moore:

    If true (I’d rate it 80% likely), his passion for vengeance both public and private is a pathology unto itself.

  139. 139.

    Mai.naem.mobile

    This is a really depressing thread. Or I’m in a funk and pretty much nothing seems to getting me out of it.

  140. 140.

    Bobby D

    @Roger Moore: If I were her, I’d take out those two brothers first, American Pyscho and the Child of the Corn. I can’t keep em straight, one looks like Donnie’s Wife-2 was banging the gardener (that boy is way too olive/darkhair to come from Drumfp and Ivana’s loins), the other looks like a gas huffing version of Donnie, complete with the butthole mouth.

  141. 141.

    rikyrah

    Team Trump touts the ‘diversity’ of his mostly white, male cabinet
    01/19/17 12:58 PM
    By Steve Benen
    In 1992, then-Gov. Bill Clinton came up with a memorable phrase: the Democrat promised voters he’d create a cabinet that “looked like America.” The point, of course, was to assure the public that when it came to policymaking, the Clinton administration would place a high priority on diversity.

    It’s a goal Donald Trump doesn’t appear to share.

    The Republican president-elect finally wrapped up his cabinet selections yesterday, tapping former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue (R) to lead the Department of Agriculture – and like most other members of the Trump cabinet, Perdue is a wealthy, older, white man. This post was Trump’s last choice to pick a Hispanic American for his team, which means the new presidential cabinet will be the first without a Hispanic member in three decades.

    During the campaign, Trump was asked if his cabinet will include women, blacks, and Hispanics. “Oh absolutely,” he replied. “It’s so important.”

    Evidently, however, Trump doesn’t believe it’s that important. His cabinet will have zero Hispanics, one African-American man, one white woman, and one Asian-American woman. (The number of women grows from two to four if you include Nikki Haley and Linda McMahon, who were chosen for positions that may be considered cabinet-level.)

    The funny part, however, was listening to Sean Spicer, the incoming White House press secretary, defend the diversity of Trump’s team. Yahoo News reported this morning:

    “Look at the Cabinet. Elaine Chao, Dr. Ben Carson,” he said, motioning to former presidential candidate, who was in the room. “Gov. Nikki Haley, the first Indian-American… The number one thing that Americans should focus on is, is he hiring the best and the brightest?”

    First, no, we’ve had a chance to look at the folks Trump has chosen, and they’re not actually the best and the brightest. Second, “the best and the brightest” is a phrase that was intended to be an ironic reference to those responsible for the war in Vietnam.

  143. 143.

    Sab

    My cat is still alive and sitting happily in his box in the living room. What is wrong with modern phone chargers that you can bite through one while it is plugged in and not get electrocuted? I was coining to toss him outside (in Ohio in January) but my stepson says said cat has a lawyer so probably not a good idea. How does he pay for lawyer?

  147. 147.

    SenyorDave

    Rick Perry once got a D in a college course called “Meats”. The best and the brightest.

  148. 148.

    catclub

    I don’t know how much of his legacy will survive. A fair amount, I think, since repealing things like Obamacare, Dodd-Frank, and the Iran treaty are harder than they look.

    Found this at Kevin drum’s place. My bet is that Dodd-Frank gets repealed while we are waiting to see what happens with ‘repeal and replace’
    on Obamacare.

  151. 151.

    HeleninEire

    @Major Major Major Major: LOL I used to think about you “oh my he is a bit too direct” But now after that comment I may be a little bit in love with you. Not because of the content but because of how you worded it. Beautiful.

  152. 152.

    SenyorDave

    @Iowa Old Lady: My idea of hell is being stuck in a waiting room without a book. I can’t imagine how boring life is if you don’t read.

    Ditto for me. I always think of the old episode of the Odd Couple where they go to a Monastery to de-stress and there is absolutely no outside reading material allowed. They are having a meal and Felix is reading the ingredients on the ketchup bottle, and Oscar tells him to hurry because he wants to read it next.

  154. 154.

    1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)

    @BGinCHI: Are they the same as the old firm Dewey, Cheatham, and Howe, or is that just a coincidence?

  156. 156.

    Anne Laurie

    @SenyorDave:

    Rick Perry once got a D in a college course called “Meats”.

    Meat Science. Don’t go hating on the agriculture courses, somebody has to breed, feed & butcher the steer for your burgers!

  157. 157.

    Paul in KY

    @dedc79: Understand. Wish I’d been there. I Wouldn’t have punched him either (he’s not worth going to local jail for), but I’d have let him have it.

  165. 165.

    Larkspur

    @Mai.naem.mobile: Yeah, I’m there too. A little while ago I finally got around to reading last Sunday’s NY Times, and there was an article about how Supergirl, in its second season, is the most progressive show on television. Who knew. Maybe we should binge watch it.

  166. 166.

    Shana

    I generally don’t like her writing but did once read a Joan Didion book where she had a piece about Reagan when he was governor of California and she went on at some length about how there were no books to be seen anywhere.

  167. 167.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @XTPD:

    GHWB might not be incurious, but if the info in this LGM thread is true he is a dipshit.

    I think you’re confusing the two Bushes. The article you cited talks about George W. Bush, not GHWB.

  169. 169.

    XTPD

    @SiubhanDuinne: Nope, it’s right; while Scott’s fisking of the Rensin piece has w. as a point of focus, the part of the thread I linked to discusses HW’s intellectual shortcomings (check the Halberstam and SNL references).

  170. 170.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Joyce H:

    When the whole kerfuffle with John Lewis started, I instantly realized that at the beginning, Trump didn’t have a clue in the world who Lewis is.

    Interesting observation, and one which never occurred to me. I guess I can’t fathom how an American more-or-less my age could possibly not know who John Lewis is. But even being as generous as possible (maybe he was too busy making deals, or running Trump University, or signing tax returns, oh wait…) — at the very least, when Lewis first said he wouldn’t be attending the inauguration, T could have taken 15 seconds to Google “John Lewis” and learn a little bit about the man and Georgia’s Fifth Congressional District, before starting a Twitter rant.

    He could have, but of course he never would. WASF.

  171. 171.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Roger Moore:

    He isn’t illiterate; he’s aliterate.

    Yes. A much more accurate word. One of my brothers is like that. The big difference is, he’s sufficiently self-aware not to run for president (or, indeed, any other office).

  174. 174.

    Mnemosyne

    @Quinerly:

    That may not be a great idea. Jagger is quite litigious. But he may be a RWNJ for all we know and have given his permission.

  175. 175.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @XTPD:

    Okay. I’m not finding it but I leapt to a conclusion with I sufficient data, and I apologise. Will dig more carefully through the links a bit later.

  176. 176.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Shana:

    [Joan Didion] had a piece about Reagan when he was governor of California and she went on at some length about how there were no books to be seen anywhere.

    I will admit, when I visit people I judge them right off the bat on their books. Not even so much what the books are, or by whom, but just whether books are visible. Do they look like books that are read and loved and used, or are they strictly for display like so many accessories? Do they align with the person’s expressed interests? They don’t need to have wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves (although that would always be my preference), but if there are no books at all I start feeling itchy and weird. I expect that’s how Didion felt.

  177. 177.

    Aleta

    A TV interview in the Tower living room showed a big beautiful leather-bound book (obviously one of the best) placed on a table close to his chair. On top of the book was a vase of flowers. All I could hear, instead of the interview, was the voice of my departed Mom saying get that vase off that book right now because water will ruin it. If I needed a clue as to how books are regarded…but somehow I already suspected.

  178. 178.

    Citizen Alan

    @Corner Stone:

    I’ve always suspected that W nanechecked Albert Camus because that was what Sacha Baron Cohen’s snooty race car driver read in Talladega Nights (the Will Farre9 comedy) and so it was the only “start person author” he’d heard of.

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