.
Megan Marguiles, in the Washington Post, “My grandfather helped create Captain America for times like these“:
Amid the masses of strangers gathered to protest at the Boston Women’s March, I spotted something familiar: that shield — red, white and blue — a simple design that holds the weight of so much conviction. Captain America’s iconic getup caught my eye, not only because of the principles it stands for but because he reminds me of another hero of mine.On Dec. 20, 1940, a year into World War II, my grandfather Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, both sons of Jewish immigrants, released the first issue of “Captain America.” The cover featured Cap slugging Adolf Hitler . Because the United States didn’t enter the war until late 1941, a full year later, Captain America seemed to embody the American spirit more than the actions of the American government.
As Cap socked the Führer, many rejoiced, but members of the German American Bund, an American pro-Nazi organization, were disgusted. Jack and my grandfather were soon inundated with hate mail and threatening phone calls, all with the same theme: “Death to the Jews.” As the threats continued, Timely Comics employees became nervous about leaving their building in New York. Then my grandfather took a call from Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, who promised to send police officers to protect them. “I was incredulous as I picked up the phone, but there was no mistaking the shrill voice,” my grandfather recalled in his book “The Comic Book Makers.” “ ‘You boys over there are doing a good job,’ the voice squeaked, ‘The City of New York will see that no harm will come to you.’ ”…
For years, Captain America… came to symbolize the immense love I had for my grandfather and, with that love, a kind of selfish chokehold on the character. More than once I approached a stranger wearing a Cap T-shirt and asked if they knew who created the superhero gracing their chest. It was an attempt, especially after his death, to shout his name far and wide, but also a childish statement: He’s mine. A part of me feared that by sharing my grandfather’s creation, our bond and the love that we had would be diluted. Cap was mine because Daddy Joe was mine.
Yet as I stood among thousands at the Boston Women’s March on Jan. 21, the personal suddenly felt global: More than five years after his death, my grandfather and his creation seemed newly meaningful. In life, my grandfather stood up for justice and taught me about compassion and understanding. Captain America contains all of that for me on a personal level, but now, in this time of turmoil for America, it’s clear that Cap represents something much larger, something we need as a nation…
Late last month, the Jewish Community Relations Council released a statement in response to President Trump’s executive order on immigration, saying that “these actions — which are causing anxiety, pain and anguish throughout immigrant communities and our nation — are unjust. We stand together on the side of empathy and religious tolerance and we urge the administration to open the gates of compassion to those seeking safety, regardless of their faith or country of origin.”…
***********
What’s on the agenda for the day?
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone???
Baud
@rikyrah: Good morning.
Jrod
A lovely sentiment, though one somewhat marred by the fact that currently in Marvel Comics Captain America is a nazi. Yes, I mean Steve Rogers. Is a super nazi HYDRA leader. Also he runs the US government. So yeah…
Baud
I finally saw HBO’s Westworld. I approve of the extensive nudity.
CarolDuhart2
Good Morning
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: I guess there’s a reason for me to watch that after all.
Baud
@CarolDuhart2: You’re getting good at that, newbie.
CarolDuhart2
Obama as Captain America
cosima
Dropping an interesting piece about the Jewish community in Scotland into this open thread. Adam & I have had some exchanges about its history here. A close friend of mine grew up in Glasgow as part of its community, and the change even in her (relatively short, at 50-something) lifetime is dramatic.
http://www.jpost.com/Magazine/Seeing-Scotland-through-its-Jewish-community-478214
The nearest ‘big’ city to us is fairly diverse, and when we last spent a day there I remarked to my husband that it was nice to be among so many women wearing hijabs (or similar ethnic attire) and not a hater around to berate them, as would be the case in the US. I don’t know how they feel about it, though, if they live on tenterhooks waiting for the sea-change to migrate to this area. For now it’s a peaceful bubble, for the most part. May have something to do with Scots rejecting the SCROTUS, and extending that, even if unconsciously, to all that he espouses. And along those lines, if you can find the Samantha Bee piece where she sends someone to Scotland to gauge local feelings about the SCROTUS it’s well worth watching. They are so amazing when it comes to creative put-downs.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: Yes, but no emojis.?
Baud
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Baby steps.
CarolDuhart2
@CarolDuhart2: Well, it just means we have to take back Captain America too, or just embrace the original version.
cosima
@Baud: Needs more Rodrigo Santoro nudity. I just couldn’t get into that show, but glanced at it now & then as my husband watched. My husband had the big ‘shocker’ finale figured out from early in the show. I never liked it enough to bother to try to decipher any of the tells or twists.
Baud
@CarolDuhart2: We need a new hero. Captain Baud!
@cosima: HBO shoes are like slow moving novels.
People love Game of Thrones, but I couldn’t get into that either.
Taylor
@Jrod: The cynicism of the current writer is going to destroy the character. The consolation is that no-one is reading the comic any more, except a few middle-aged men trying to recapture their childhood.
Chris Evans has done a fine job of establishing the character for current generations.
Baud
@Baud: shoes = shows
Kay
Trump gets all the blame for being such a bad manager (which he is) but you have to wonder how much worse it is with his daughter and son in law taking such a huge role. “The President” is one thing, you could justify working under him because of the inherent power of the office but it must be a daily humiliation to take orders from the son in law and daughter. It’s like they’re throwing “merit doesn’t matter” in these appointees faces every day. It would literally devalue all the work you had done your entire career- anyone can do your job. They’re telling them “everything you have done professionally for decades is worthless”.
That’s aside from the fact that they’re like loyalty enforcers skulking around spying on people and reporting back to dad. It’s a nightmare workplace.
We did this training once at the law office and the basic premise of the thing was you cannot do good work consistently unless it aligns with your values- your beliefs. So if you believed that experience and preparation mattered it would be all but impossible to accept Jared as someone who should be your boss and do good work because your whole sense of yourself at work is based on meritorious rise and he doesn’t possess the same values. The conflict will plague you daily – it’s fruitless to try.
J R in WV
@rikyrah:
Good morning, Rikyrah!! Hope things are good where you are. OK here. Awake when I would rather be asleep, but nothing odd about that.
OzarkHillbilly
cosima
@Baud: I like GOT, but don’t love it. I did/do love the books. The show was/is getting tedious for me, but I continue to watch, if only to see if it comes up with something shocking/interesting that the books didn’t have.
I am desperate for The Dark Tower series to show up, and I think that will be on HBO. Those books are amazing, and I love the idea of Idris Elba as the lead. Name the Wind and its sequel(s) are also being made into a series, maybe on HBO, I cannot remember — I’d watch those, even if on HBO. The Outlander series is doing a very good job of keeping things moving along — that’s a great book series (before the 5th book, anyway), that’s been turned into a great show on Starz, plenty of action, and Scottish scenery — and Tobias Menzies is mesmerising as the bad guy. Even Mr Cosima is enjoying that show, though I don’t think I could get him interested in the books.
Baud
@Kay: They would hire al-Baghdadi as National Security Advisor if he polished Trump’s knob.
danielx
@rikyrah:
Good morning!
Iowa Old Lady
@cosima: Rothfuss’s NAME OF THE WIND series is being made into a TV series? I love those books. I keep checking to see if the third one is coming out. He’s a very slow writer. I’ve read him saying he revises more than anyone he knows.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay: The NSC is dead, welcome to the NIC: the National Insecurity Council.
Baud
@cosima: I only read the first book. Couldn’t get into it.
danielx
Agenda –
Enjoying the abnormally warm weather while it lasts. Also too, enjoying some of the delights my brother provided from a place called the Smoking Goose (Warning: do not view this site if you are a vegetarian). Along with whatever else I feel like putting on the grill, plus making Two Tone Potato Salad, the best potato salad in the world. All other recipes are mere pretenders.
amk
@Kay:
guess it’s all part of winning bigly.
zhena gogolia
@cosima:
Rodrigo Santoro nudity? How have I missed this?
But sorry, it’s not worth the violence. Even Rodrigo Santoro.
Kay
@Baud:
It sounds like the better hires are already doing that thing people do with a weak manager/dysfunctional workplace – “I’ll just tend to my own job and it will be FINE as far as me” – which never works.
Trump thinks these people are bad for him – disloyal- but it’s reciprocal- he’s bad for them.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Taylor: The story is more complicated than that, of course, but I think they’re letting it run too long before making Kubik put things back the way they were.
Baud
@Kay: Many games of solitaire shall be played.
Baud
@amk: I think there was a time when the GOP had a chance to making inroads with Asians.
Lurking Canadian
@Iowa Old Lady: Yep. If you hang out at tor.com with the rest of us nerds, they have periodic updates about the development. Lin-Manuel Miranda is involved in some way.
cosima
@Iowa Old Lady: Yes — cannot wait! I read the 1st book when it first came out (hardback, even), and have recommended it to so many people. Turned my daughter & her friends into true Rothfuss believers. He seems to get particularly cranky about people asking him when the 3rd will be out. He does a lot of great things for the left/progressive community. I’ll wait patiently.
If you haven’t read Deborah Harkness’ trilogy, you should do that — great books and it’s another that’s currently in the process of being turned into a TV series (that should be amazing).
Kay
@Baud:
I knew Jared and Ivanka wouldn’t accept “working behind the scenes” as informal advisers. They require public recognition of their power and influence. They’re not putting in all that time without glory.
Quinerly
Good morning all! Had the wonderful pleasure of meeting commentator dexwood and his lovely bride at La Cumbre Brewing in Albuquerque yesterday. Great people and I feel like instant friends. So glad they suggested meeting at that place.. would have never thought of it. Mostly locals, really good band…Mark Knopfler/Dire Straits/Grateful Dead covers? Earlier, I saw a Zuni dance at the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center and prowled around the Village of Corrales. If you are ever there, check out the Tijuana Bar. Great locals hangout, (been a bar since 1935…oldest building in Corrales)… fantastic green chile stew. The sun was shining brightly and an impromptu jam session broke out on the patio. Gonna hate leaving Albuquerque on Tuesday. Have a great day! Thanks for all your comments and interest.
ThresherK
@Taylor: Webcartoonist David Willis on Bizarro Captain America.
That was done in response to some incredibly idiotic tweets by Steve Rogers.
Quinerly
@Baud:
I still remember having nightmares about Yul Brynner from the original.
Kay
@Baud:
I’m looking at Trump’s drop off in popularity as the percentage of his supporters who ACTUALLY voted on “jobs and the economy”. So about 20%. The rest were voting on something else and are probably unreachable.
OzarkHillbilly
@amk: Mission accomplished.
Baud
@Quinerly: One of my favorite movies.
@Kay: Fuck all of them.
cosima
@zhena gogolia: I suppose that I’m fairly immune to screen violence (unless it’s zombie stuff — I hate that). Rodrigo Santoro is so beautiful that I’ll watch him in pretty much anything (I’ve got a couple of subtitled foreign films with him in them, specifically because he was in them). I’m not a Westworld fan, but its violence was pretty low-key compared to Game of Thrones, Walking Dead, and plenty of other shows. I don’t watch much TV, most is what my husband has recorded, and he’s a big fan of explosions & violence (on the screen).
WereBear
@rikyrah: Good morning!
Zinsky
I used to read and collect Marvel Comics as a kid and still love them! I have the Marvel Comics app on my iPad and still read the Silver Age comics like Spiderman, Daredevil and Fantastic Four all the time. Great entertainment that never grows old. Stan Lee and Jack Kirby were a great team and both were liberals. I remember Fantastic Four #21 had a villain known as the Hate-Monger who whipped up irrational fear of immigrants and certain religious groups (is this sounding familiar?). The Fantastic Four kicked his ass! There was actually a serialized radio program of the Fantastic Four for a while. Here is that particular episode, if you care to listen.
Chris
@Jrod:
Steven Atwell at LGM has had a series of posts about Captain America comics and their politics. Needless to say… lots of passed off people at the HydraCap story, including me. The writer needs to be gone yesterday.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: The GOP was very popular with quite a few Asian communities. Many were small business owners and responded to the low tax, low regulation message*. That started to change during the Clinton administration and accelerated during Shub’s administration.
ETA: *I should also note that the anti Communism message also resonated with some groups of Asians, particularly with Koreans and Vietnamese.
amk
@Kay:
from this guy? do these people even understand English?
Lurking Canadian
@Kay: That’s how I see it. The people at the Trump rallies like yesterday’s are not reachable. You might even call them a basket of deplorables.
It is regrettable that about a third of the population is so vile, but democracy has a solution for that. The only way is to swarm them under and beat him 70-30 in 2020, assuming he lasts that long.
henqiguai
@OzarkHillbilly(#19): Thanks, dude. This excerpt and link has justified my entire (probably otherwise wasted day online) day of hanging out online. Make ‘them’ take back all the bad things ‘they’ have been saying about you… ;-)
cosima
@danielx: Do you add the olives? That seems strange. And have you tried that with dill, rather than parsley? I use a potato salad recipe adapted from The Silver Palate Cookbook (which is epic, by the way). I really like its use of mayo + sour cream — makes for a lighter salad (not a mayo fan). The addition of capers sounds interesting, though.
Quinerly
@Baud: I must have been 12 or 13. Scared the crap out of me.
WereBear
@cosima: I can handle nudity and violence — if it is well-written. And while I think Game of Thrones is very good, it’s just too freakishly stark: doom comes to the innocent on a regular basis, and I’m the kind of person who never got over watching Old Yeller.
I far prefer the kind of mayhem in The Sopranos or Boardwalk Empire. The innocent suffer, but mostly it is bad things happening to bad people because they asked for it. I find that much more bearable.
OzarkHillbilly
@Quinerly: You blow.
Chet Murthy
@?BillinGlendaleCA: heh indeed. the gop royally screwed that pooch.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/clinton-is-trying-to-woo-muslim-voters-they-could-make-all-the-difference/2016/09/07/876821f6-6bae-11e6-99bf-f0cf3a6449a6_story.html
Eric S.
Good morning!
1. It’s 50+ degrees with sun in Chicago.
2. I can’t remember our last snow.
3. There’s been plenty of rain to wash away any road salt.
The math couldn’t be more clear. 1+2+3 = Taking the Porsche for a ride.
OzarkHillbilly
@henqiguai: Those are bad things they say? I thought they were compliments.
cosima
@WereBear: I’ve found GOT okay — mainly because it is so awful to so many people, not just the good people, and also because some of the worst people (Cersei & Jamie) are actually nuanced — the last finale blew my mind with regard to those two, and where they will go. Here’s one that I couldn’t watch (somewhat for the reasons that you describe): Breaking Bad. Good guy, all goes to hell in a handbasket immediately, and it was too much for me. I just really could not watch. We own all of the seasons, I bought them because the reviews were so great, and I could not get through the 3rd episode of the 1st season.
Shameless (the US version) is somewhat similar to Breaking Bad in terms of bad things happening to (somewhat) good people. Most of that bad seems to originate with William Macy, and it’s fascinating to watch him play someone so horrible. Joan Cusack was amazing. I’ve not watched the show in years, so haven’t kept up with it, don’t know if it’s still great, but watched the first 3 seasons, and loved it.
Gindy51
@Iowa Old Lady: Let him finish the books first, look at the mess TVGoT has made of GRRM’s novels.
Quinerly
@OzarkHillbilly:
And a good morning to you! Google “Mayling Garcia Albuquerque.” She was my waitress at the Tijuana Bar yesterday. One of 13 people in the world who plays this fascinating instrument invented by Ben Franklin. Has made the cut of America’s Got Talent. I’m having a blast on this trip. Are you still going to a dog parade today?
scav
Neil Gaiman announces Neverwhere sequel, The Seven Sisters
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Quinerly: The glass armonica! We ran into a guy playing that on the street in Europe, who turned out to be American. I think it was in Munich. Wonder if he’s one of your 13.
scav
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: I’ve got a cd of one, only purchased in Prague, so may or may not be one of the thirteen. Oh well. Stunning sound for the right places.
Debbie1
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Did you say these Asian small business owners used to vote Repub. because of the lure of low taxes and low regulation?
Tell me, just what onerous regulation were these business owners being crippled by? The regs. requiring companies to put a sell-by date on foods so that people wouldn’t be sick or poisoned? Or is it regulations requiring seatbelts in cars. We all know that whatever costs are incurred by these companies are immediately passed on to their consumers. And we all know by now that taxes pay for the infrastructure (roads, traffic lights, bridges, internet cables, etc.) used by these very businesses’ customers.
Slightly off-topic, but, I think that we inadvertently help Republicans when we blindly repeat that they stand for “Low Taxes/No Regulations” without adding Bad Roads & Failing Bridges – anything to show that there is (or should be) a purpose for paying taxes, and there is a penalty (a Kansas, if you will) for worshiping mindless tax cuts & no regulations.
WereBear
“Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy” was actually written for this instrument. I love it!
Quinerly
@WereBear:
I’m going to take time to read up on it. I wish I had had more time in Corrales and with her. Never watch those talent shows but will try to catch her episode she says is set to air. Think I’m going to take time to double back to Corrales for lunch on Monday and hopefully catch up with her. She’s a delight.
Eric S.
@Iowa Old Lady: I had forgot about Name The Wind. I loved the first 2 books. Now I’ll have to start watching for the third. Had there been any mention of its publishing?
Quinerly
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: I had never heard of it. One of the articles that comes up when you Google her is “Albuquerque Magazine.” I think it’s the piece that says she is one of 13. Turns out the world is pretty small. Commentator dexwood and Mrs. dexwood (met them later) know Mayling quite well. I just adore this kind of stuff.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@cosima: Agree with you about Harkness, but deplore the “Let’s make a TV show/movie about a book series” thing. I’ve rarely seen it work well: Roots (the first one), Shogun, Outlander, maybe, and the SciFi Dune miniseries a while back. But I don’t care for GoT, the Magicians, the Expanse, LotR, The Hobbit (especially horrible), Narnia, Lemony Snicket (although Neil Patrick Harris is a hoot), Harry Potter, etc, etc, etc. Why people need to see a production team “reimagine” a book, and accept all the compromises that come with telling a story on film versus telling a story in a novel is beyond me. Not to mention the films’ tendency to “reinterpret” characters, sometimes to the point of changing them completely (LotR was especially heinous in this regard.) I know that the hype around these movies create properties that exceed the GDP of many countries, but really? You can buy the book for the price of going to the odeon, and have a much better movie playing in your head as you read it.
danielx
@cosima:
Green olives yes, no on the black olives. Trust me, it works.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Eric S.: Don’t expect a third volume. Rothfuss is worse than GRRM. Which is okay with me actually, because I got so fucking tired of Kvothe mooning over Denna that I only kept reading the second book in the hopes that Bast would rip her to pieces.
Spoiler: Didn’t happen.
Jeffro
@Zinsky:
The Fro household is saturated in comics, with Daredevil being a major focus ;)
It’s funny, I passed that Captain America article over to Fro Jr this morning and he loved it…I think he (Jr) has always had a good grasp of Cap the American idealist. The Cap and Avengers movies have certainly made it clear to a whole new generation as well!
Eric S.
@Debbie1:
I wish that were true. I got into a conversation with a couple of small business owners a few weeks back. One owned bars and restaurants. The other sells cloud storage. Neither one of them could even conceive of the idea that their businesses benefited more from infrastructure than any guy or gal trudging to their corporate job daily.
WereBear
@Comrade Scrutinizer: It is very difficult to sell an original series compared to the advantages of building on an existing audience. And some fans find a dramatic treatment builds on their enjoyment of the work.
I’m just saying: it’s not going away. And sometimes it can be an enhancement and a revitalization.
Writing and casting are absolutely key, and that gets screwed up by the suits more than it does mistakes via the talent involved. A classic example is Babylon Five: designed for five seasons, half-way through told they only had four, and after the fourth season had been compressed and revamped to fit… told they now had another!
This doesn’t happen with books: not only does an author have an “unlimited budget,” they don’t have to release the book until it is the way they want it. A continuing series with deadlines and high economic outlay makes for panic and bad creative decisions.
Taylor
@Comrade Scrutinizer: The film version of Dr Zhivago, especially what Tom Courtenay did with Pasha/Strelnikov, was better than the book.
WereBear
@Eric S.: The incredible ignorance of ordinary people astounds me. But I guess it is the natural consequence of being a “normal” person in our society.
I was bullied so much for being intellectual and curious and wanting the big picture a lot of people don’t even try to grow their brain. And then, when it would do them some real good, there’s nothing there :)
frosty
@Debbie1: It was probably regulations regarding expanding their businesses. Zoning — no wait, that’s local government. New development — stormwater management and traffic. Nope, local again. Minimum wage — oops, state regs. Small business setasides — yes, there’s a Federal one but wait, doesn’t that give them a leg up???
Jeffro
Interesting long read in the New Yorker: Michael Flynn, General Chaos.
Had no idea that Defense News had a “100 most influential” list(!) Much more importantly, I knew Flynn was anti-Iran, but he is REALLY anti-Iran and this appears to be an overwhelming factor in how he started veering off course and causing problems for himself as well as the offices he worked in.
Elizabelle
Good morning, all. Happy Sunday.
Haven’t had time to read it, but this looked good. Joint reporting by the Long Beach (CA) Press Telegram and Orange County Register. OCR link (since no paywall): 75 years ago today: The other day of infamy changed everything for Japanese Americans
Whatever could have been the impetus, besides history (which is plenty, on its own), for dealing with Executive Orders?
JMG
@Eric S.: Bill McBride, better known as Calculated Risk, has written that an important indicator of a strong economy is small business owners bitching about the government. When times are bad, they bitch about sales.
mai naem mobile
I watched Milos on Bill Maher on Friday. I’ve never paid attention to Milos. Not the Twitter feed, not Breitbart – nothing. I was completely underwhelmed and unimpressed on Friday. Did anybody else have the same impression? He just came across as an unfunny gay/transexual(is that the right term?) performance artist of Ann Coulter trying to play Andy Kaufman. Maybe its because I was expecting a nasty uncouth version of Andrew Sullivan.
TS
@Quinerly: Loving your travel stories – such a relief to forget the reality of frump while following you around.
danielx
@WereBear:
Another Scott
@Jeffro: Interesting article, but there’s too much crazy there for a Sunday morning. :-/
Far too many people in and near the US power structure are crazy (in the bad sense) about Iran. Even the Israeli military doesn’t list Iran as a threat. Obama was able to keep the crazies in the US bottled up. I have no confidence that Donnie will be able to…
Cheers,
Scott.
Elizabelle
@Quinerly: Pats and treats to Poco. Keep us in your pocket. Agree with TS; the travel reports are the best.
SiubhanDuinne
@Elizabelle:
I am seeing George Takei’s Allegiance this afternoon. It’s probably not a coincidence that this date was chosen for the encore screening. And I heard Takei mention in a radio interview that he’ll be watching it in Hyde Park, NY — home of the president who signed the order that confined him and his family 75 years ago.
bystander
@Baud: Indispensable in serial drama and science fiction. Oh, and historical fictions about the Roman Empire.
HeleninEire
One thing I miss about NY: A full-on breakfast with two eggs, home fires, sausage, and toast. All for $3.99. Yum.
Elizabelle
@SiubhanDuinne: Good for you.
George Takei is in my thoughts today too.
liberal
@Debbie1: small business owners typically seem to be right-wing in most polities in most eras.
bystander
@mai naem mobile: Ish. Really sickening. Listening to a guy wearing bangle bracelets and three rows of pearls around his neck call a transsexual a freak was like hearing portly eggplant Trump talking about somebody else’s appearance. I hope Milo gets a lot more coverage because the Trump base will loathe him on sight.
bystander
@HeleninEire:
Remind me not to invite you to my house for brunch.
Another Scott
@mai naem mobile: I think the term you were looking for is transvestite (based on a picture I saw of him – I haven’t seen the show. I haven’t watched Maher in a year or more).
Apparently the term is out of favor now.
Cheers,
Scott.
Eric S.
@HeleninEire: I’ve never been so I’m going on reputation only, but that price can’t apply to NYC anytime in recent memory
Quinerly
@TS: @Elizabelle: Thanks so much. I’m getting most of my news from BJ in the AM and at night. Streaming my NPR station from St. Louis and BBC. Haven’t turned on cable since Tulsa almost 2 weeks ago. Honestly, I think I still am in shock over the election. Can’t believe that people voted for him. Poco is being such a good boy. Love this aging ex inner city street dog so much. He was actually smiling yesterday when he got to sniff the Rio Grande. I love giving him this life…he obviously had a bad one prior to March, 2014. Never had a dog so devoted.
HeleninEire
@Eric S.: I am not kidding. I just finished it. Got it at a hole in the wall deli on 52nd St right off 6th Avenue. Delish.
Bostondreams
@bystander:
The base, big parts of it anyway, seem to love him because he tells them what they want to hear. He is their pet gay, to be crude.
Gin & Tonic
The thing about NYC is that there’s a million places that cater only to locals, but you have to know where they are. So, sure, you can spend $22 for toast and coffee in a midtown hotel, but go out to Astoria or Woodside or lots of other similar neighborhoods and you can do what Helen says.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Elizabelle: I was just reading this, just a few minutes ago.
Corner Stone
@bystander:
I was wondering if she had recently been to MomSense’s place for the smoking hot grilled cheese.
Ohio Mom
@mai naem mobile: Same here. I looked up the video online because I thought that even if I am a novice old lady, I ought to at least try to keep up with the world of popular culture.
I watched about half of it before I was too bored and nauseated to continued. Too juvenile and too mean, no humor or wit, just outrageous for the sake of being outrageous.
My first reaction was that Milos was the descendent of Morton Downey Jr. and Limbaugh, but Coulter and Kaufman work too.
It was a waste of Bill’s other guests, who struck me as informed and thoughtful.
Iowa Old Lady
@Eric S.: Last I saw, no publication date had been announced.
Peter
@Chris: I was initially in the ‘wait and see’ position, but I’ve waited and I’ve seen and I’m still not sold on it as a story, and even if I was this is NOT the time for it. Time for Marvel to pull the plug.
Shalimar
@Comrade Scrutinizer: I agree that the tv shows/movies aren’t generally as good as the books, but I disagree that they aren’t good things. There is a dearth of good story ideas in Hollywood. Would you rather have the Magicians, or Charlie’s Angels: The Teen Years? Because the alternative to adapting good books is rehashing screen ideas that weren’t even watchable 40 years ago.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Ohio Mom:
Both of whom told Milo to “Fuck Off!”.
HeleninEire
OK off to get a pedicure then off to the Muslim march. I’ll report back. Then tonight out to Long Island for dinner with one of my best friends.
Cheerio!
Ohio Mom
@?BillinGlendaleCA: I imagine that lousy, unresponsive and corrupt government felt familiar and comfortable, the way things should be, to Asian small business owners, and that was part of the appeal of voting for Republicans.
In the way that a good number of people who were raised by abusive alcoholics find themselves married to abusive alcoholics. At least before they discover therapy and/or Al-Anon.
WereBear
@Eric S.: Not at a place you would really want to eat at :)
WereBear
@Ohio Mom: Wow! I really like that insight.
Explains so much.
Ohio Mom
@?BillinGlendaleCA: That’s what convinced me of the depths of their intellects!
PK
@mai naem mobile:
He came across as ridiculous. He needs to be laughed at. He looked ridiculous, talked nonsense and you can tell he just desperately wants attention. The worst thing you can do is to pay attention to the fool. CPAC has invited him to its next conference. Which is where he belongs, with like minded morons.
Tenar Arha (same Tenar, more Nameless Ones)
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Totally deservedly after he basically put down their intelligence.
I didn’t watch it because Maher can go fuck himself trying to be edgy and failing to actually help hold that troll to account for endangering people. Milo is a “mean boy” on steroids, who uses his platform to target trans women, undocumented students etc. & OUT them to his followers. It may all be a pose for him but the Nazis & white supremacists who follow him are not ironically posing. It’s not funny, it’s dangerous, and giving him a national audience is fucking stupid naïveté of the worst kind.
Eric S.
@HeleninEire: I stand corrected. My bacon-egg-cheese steamed bagel was $6.60 in Chicago.
schrodingers_cat
@mai naem mobile: Not going to watch. Shunning them is the best. They thrive on attention even the negative kind. Bill Maher can go fuck himself, also.
rikyrah
@Kay:
This is outrageous. What the hell does he know about the Secretary of State’s office?
rikyrah
@Eric S.:
Go for it ???
chris
Ack!
schrodingers_cat
@Ohio Mom: Last week it was Carol Duhart 2 telling us how aspiring Jewish people, black people and immigrants are Ivanka’s target market unlike the more cultured WASPs and now you are here saying how Asians were Republican supporters because they like corruption.
According to statistical data, Republican support is the highest among self identified white people more than any other group you so condescendingly write about.
Bigotry, its not just for T’s R base.
Corner Stone
I am starting to think that Betsy DeVos was a bad hire.
rikyrah
@Another Scott:
The Persians are NOT Iraq. Mess with them at your own peril.
Yarrow
@Quinerly: Love your posts and letting us follow you along on your trip. I’ve been to some of the places you have been and it’s really fun to hear about them again. So envious of your wonderful trip. And Poco sounds like a wonderful companion for you. How much fun to watch him have a great time too!
rikyrah
No outrage over the terrorists in Sweden lie from the Klan rally yesterday????
hovercraft
@amk:
They did not resign, they were FIRED !
The president wanted to hire the best people, not these Obama holdovers.
Now if the replacements just happen to be melanin challenged non Asian people, why would anyone have a problem with that. The WH does not see color and they don’t believe in quotas or racial profiling.
scav
I want a subscription to the Aftonbladet
‘Sweden, who would believe this?’: Trump cites non-existent terror attack
And, as for the pushing of the terrible spike in Swedish crime?
schrodingers_cat
@rikyrah: Nope, shitting on minority groups is in style right now.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@Shalimar: Why do I have to choose between the Magicians and CA:TTY? There have been plenty of good television shows and plenty of good movies that weren’t poorly done book mutations. The problem isn’t a dearth of good story ideas. The problem is that media execs are afraid to take a chance on promoting a good, but untested, idea. That’s why we have sequels of sequels and 3 book series turned into 4 films instead of more Sicarios,
Uncharismatic megafauna
@OzarkHillbilly: Thanks for posting the coral reef story. It’s nice to be gobsmacked by something wonderfully incredible (at least to this biologist) rather than the shitgibbon’s stomach-turning spew.
WereBear
@schrodingers_cat: And yet there are black, gay, and other minority Republicans. Even though that makes no sense at all.
tobie
@amk: My fear is that Trump will reap the benefits of the Obama recovery.
Sebastian Mallaby has a column in the Washington Post today about the incredibly robust economy Trump has inherited. Unfortunately it’s not something Democrats can capitalize on, as the left of the party just spent two years moaning and groaning about how horrible the economy is.
schrodingers_cat
@WereBear: Stupid does not depend on the color of your skin or your orientation. Its universal.
ETA: If you look at percentages however, the demographic that overwhelmingly supports Republican policies is not Asian, or Black or Jewish.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Debbie1:
He means Asian business owners are penny wise, pound foolish.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@tobie:
Seems unlikely since he keeps on going on about how horrible things are. Even the conservatives have noted how negative Trump’s tone is.
Omnes Omnibus
This thread is heading in an ugly direction.
Yarrow
@PK:
If someone wanted to undermine him they could hire some of those professional laughers they sometimes used to stock sit-com filming audiences with to get the rest of the crowd really laughing. Once the crowd started laughing at him it would be all over.
schrodingers_cat
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Grover Norquist and Paul Ryan are Asian small business owners, also Tax Cut Jesus Reagan. Thanks for pointing it out. I hadn’t noticed.
Corner Stone
Jeebus. KAC on that 2/14 Today show segment likes like absolute hammered ass. She looks medicated and just worn down to nothing left.
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus: Have they started talking about eating babies yet?
tobie
@Yarrow: Professional laughers…this is a great idea. I mean it in all seriousness. No laughter.
MomSense
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yup. I’m going back to music videos.
scav
@schrodingers_cat: nor does the easy mental-thrill of being “contrarian” or in on the secret knowledge unlike the other rubes in your community. Gnostic trends in political identity should be pretty evenly distributed.
Yarrow
@WereBear: There seemed to be a lot of “Blacks for Trump 2020” signs behind him at that rally yesterday. I inadvertently saw a photo. What in the world is up with that?
schrodingers_cat
deleted
MomSense
@Yarrow:
See Adam’s thread last night. Scary stuff.
ETA Look up Yahweh ben Yahweh “blacks for trump”
Jeffro
@Jeffro: Btw folks, I sent the “General Chaos” article to my RWNJ dad, noting it was in the New Yorker.
He responded back, “Sorry, I stay away from the NYT”. The aversion to reality is THAT strong that he couldn’t be bothered to note the
“New Yorker” and “New York Times” are not the same thing, much less read the article. Wow-o-wow.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@schrodingers_cat: speaking as a white who works for an Asian owned company – it’s really odd. They admire the heck out of us whites but they can’t quite embrace our ideas – like it takes money to make money or slowing down and doing the job right is faster in the long run.
Also worth keeping in mind the Asians aren’t ditto heads – they are quite aware of the racism and vote Blue a lot.
debbie
@MomSense:
Your hat showed up yesterday. Thanks! I’m plotting how to use it to best effect.
Yarrow
@tobie: I think the Obama economy is strong, but the craziness of Trump is causing a lot of things to change and quickly. Travel to the US is down quite a bit, for example.
That will affect the tourism industry pretty quickly. It is affecting business already. I mentioned before that one of my neighbors said that Germany has already put projects with his American company on hold and canceled all business travel to the US because things are too volatile here. It is affecting my neighbor’s business right now. He’s worried about his job.
So my impression is that some of the Obama economy will chug along, but there are a lot of things we aren’t quite yet seeing but will in a month or too–say, quarterly reports at the end of March–that will show that Trump has had a negative effect on our economy.
JMG
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Asian Americans voted strongly Democratic as a group in 2016. ALL small business owners tend to be conservative. 1. Little or no staff to deal with government stuff, which can be a pain in the ass. 2. Small capital base makes one extremely cost conscious. 3. Heroic self image as entrepreneurs.
Bill McBride a/k/a Calculated Risk, has written that when small business owners are complaining about the government and taxes it’s a sign of a healthy economy. They wail about sales when times are hard.
MomSense
@debbie:
Purrfect! Making more right now!
scav
@Jeffro: Point out to your dad that a large orange human megaphone also hails from New York and should be automatically not listened to alongside the dreaded NYT and New Yorker.
Yarrow
@tobie: It can’t be that hard to pay the entry fees for some of them to go to CPAC. They could laugh at everyone. I wonder what effect that would have on things?
schrodingers_cat
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Asia is the most populous continent. Not all Asians think alike. Asians in this country much less your company are not representative of Asians in general. I would be much more comfortable if people didn’t indulge in broad brush strokes like this. Leave that to T and company.
Anyway, I am going to lunch.
Yarrow
@MomSense: Thanks. It sounds kind of like a cult? I guess I’ll give a deeper dive a miss on that one. I just saw one photo with a lot of African Americans waving those signs standing directly behind him and it seemed really odd.
Jeffro
@scav: He’ll never hear me. Taking the media-bashing to 11 is a stroke of genius by Trumpov & Co, I’ll give them that. They have hardened “the bubble” so much that nothing but the God-Emperor’s own words register.
However, if the SS is going to keep letting whack-jobs onto stage with the prez, then maybe we don’t have to worry a whole lot…
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Yarrow: Just anecdotally and as someone paying half-assed attention to economic/financial news, I’m hearing a lot of the kind of optimism that makes me a bit nervous, even without the chaos of Trump. But the two or three times in my life I’ve tried to outguess the market have ended badly
dexwood
@Quinerly:
Good morning. It was our very great pleasure to have met you, our newest old friend. You know how to reach us, stay in touch. Next year, we’ll show you around a bit more, take you to another favorite spot or two. Safe travels.
Yarrow
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I keep hearing that a recession is overdue and seeing signs that people who deal in financial markets are moving their money out of the market into…bonds, I guess? Not sure how safe those feel with the current Republican president at the helm.
Baud
@Yarrow: Hillary should have had more Whites for Hillary signs at her events.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I got out after the election. Peace of mind is worth any potential lost gains.
Another Scott
@Yarrow: A good place to keep an eye on economic trends, in context, is CalculatedRisk. McBride notes that travel and immigration restrictions will impact GDP growth, and [he] has a weekly graph of new claims for unemployment benefit[s]. New claims are and have been at a very low level, but it’s hard to believe that they won’t pick up soon (with all the chaos Trump is creating). There’s the federal budget and debt ceiling issues coming up shortly as well…
Prediction is hard, especially about the future, but it’s really hard to the see the economy as a whole thriving with all of the idiotic and dangerous things they’re doing and proposing to do.
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Another Scott: I’d rather the economy do better now than 4 years from now by happenstance.
Yarrow
@Another Scott: Yes, I think the debt ceiling discussions are going to be very interesting. If Donald lasts that long. Or, if he’s in the middle of dealing with greater leaks about his Russian involvement and financial ties, and the calls for impeachment are much louder, how will that affect things? Either way, any move toward impeachment is going to affect our economy.
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: Rs will pass the debt ceiling quietly because they have an R President in charge.
tobie
@Yarrow: My very crude understanding of what’s happening in the stock market–which says next to nothing about what’s happening in the economy–is that individuals and companies that parked their capital overseas for fear of taxes are now investing in the market again in anticipation of tax cuts. Apparently one-third of the stock market’s gains come from one company, Goldman Sachs. Goldman is funneling in huge amounts of capital that had been parked offshore. What Trump’s trade policy will mean for jobs is another question entirely. A 17% fall in international tourism is substantial. I didn’t realize the number was that high.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat: Agreed.
Doug R
@CarolDuhart2: Superman was also created by the sons of Jewish Immigrants, one of them Canadian.
Corner Stone
@Another Scott:
And that’s why I focus on selling my services for predicting the past. Only $9.99 a minutes to hear what I believe will have happened over the last years!
*yes, I know it’s a quote. Still too good to let go by without swinging.
scav
@Yarrow: I’d say there’s a lot of uncertainty running about the markets / economy writ large. Brexit is going to alter relationships and trading patterns so there should be admustments throughout the network. (Orchestras beginning to up-sticks from the UK now, plus all the plans from financial entities and certain factories and the labor issues in ag beginning to get attention). Trump’s willingness to shred treaties and papers, plus retaliatory blow-back from the trading partners adds more uncertainty (there are similar ag-labor issues (as Brexit) here). We still haven’t cracked a month yet, have we?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@tobie: Krugman has been pointing out that run up in the DJIA is almost entirely due to the financial sector, Goldman, JP Morgan, etc, because drain the swamp forgotten working class rust belt
WereBear
@Baud: Me too. Obama sent the market to record heights; and now the DumpsterFuhrer will set new records the other way.
Corner Stone
I love these people in the Chevy commercial. “OMG! We’re in a warehouse and trucks are coming at us from out of nowhere! How did we get here?!”
Lyrebird
@cosima: Sounds like this grandaughter (in OP) would love the adventures of a Sikh doctor who dons a Captain America costume to reduce bigotry… Lots of awesome, and so needed.
Did you see the Sam Bee (iirc) investigative report on Scotland & the farmer who resists our wanna-be tyrant? Probably saw it linked here…
sdhays
@tobie: “The left” isn’t wrong that there are serious problems in the current economy, but regardless of whether or not you agree with that, the people currently responsible for running the government are white supremacist know-nothing morons and that fact will have a significant effect on the performance of the economy as long as it remains the case. The So-Called President’s immigration policies alone have already caused a significant hit to international tourism, sabotaging the ACA will cause a drag (at best), and you know there’s a lot of chaos and mal-governance to look forward to in the coming year.
I’ll be impressed if we’re not in a recession by January 2018.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Sounds like Occupy was wrong not only in their tactics but also in their principles.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Their both-sides-do-it BS was utterly unhelpful.
Ohio Mom
@schrodingers_cat: I meant newcomers, and ones I have known have indeed been rather right-wing. I’m sorry if I sounded biogoted, I meant it as observation, not criticism. There is a such thing as group behavior and values.
I grew up the grandchild of Eastern European Jews. There was a lot of carefully hidden suspicion of all non-Jews — “scratch a Goy, find an antisemite” — that has (sadly) continued down to the third generation among some of my cousins. That is the legacy of the pogroms, Hitler was just icing on the cake.
We weren’t quite red-diaper babies but at least one of my uncles was a very active member of the communist party (others in that generation were dabblers) and several of the neighborhood dads worked for unions. Did you ever see Fiddler on the Roof — imagine the sequel, that was my family.
My now retired dry cleaners were Cuban boat people. The difference between the parents’ and adult daughter’s politics was very instructive, with the daughter being much more matter-of-fact about the US re-establishing relations with Cuba; she thought it inevitable, and for good reason.
The store closed a couple of years before Obama went to Cuba but I am sure the parents, especially the dad, are still livid.
It was very obvious they kept two sets of books for the store. Following government rules wasn’t their thing, and to me, the fact that they came from Cuba completely explained that.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat: I agree. But they really lost credibility with me when I didn’t hear a peep out of them during the election. Maybe they were screaming from the rooftops and I missed it somehow, but I doubt it.
schrodingers_cat
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: DJIA is not representative of the stock market and the capital markets are not representative of the economy.
ETA: Russell 3000 or at least S&P 500 are better indices to watch.
Dave
@Tenar Arha (same Tenar, more Nameless Ones): He’s an attention whore. Maher is as well. Yianwhateverthefuckhisnameis plays a dangerous game he loves to be flamboyantly outrageous while mixing with some people that would be perfectly happy to end his existence. It may end very badly for him if he continues to play these games in order to get his fix.
Tenar Arha (same Tenar, more Nameless Ones)
@Yarrow: Businesses will be affected first but think about all the summer vacationers that suddenly decided that visiting the good ol’ USA this summer wasn’t worth it. Or the kids applying to universities for next fall…
(I shouldn’t be surprised but it’s like none of them understands that the uncertainty they’re injecting into the system will have knock on effects).
hovercraft
@Yarrow:
Yesterday someone posted this link to The first casualties of Trump’s trade wars are Texas cattle ranchers in the comments. The arbitrary actions and decrees of the shitgibbon are unsettling business, they all assumed that he was just like all his previous republican predecessors, spout nationalist fervor during the campaign and then just continue with business as usual once you get in. Right now they are still benefitting from Obama’s economy, but once his policies actually take hold, I suspect the numbers will turn. Trade is necessary for a stable and growing economy, China is happy to pick up all of our slack. Just as it took months for the Obama policies to take effect, it will take a while, but it will catch up and then we’ll see how much Wall Street enjoys that.
He thinks he’s having a rough time right now, just wait until the economy begins to wobble, he aint seen nothing yet. Good times, they are a coming.
scav
@sdhays: A robust mob-and ego-pleasing style of pissing off foreign leaders and trading partners isn’t going to smooth things either. See Mexico. I forget if I found this thing on TX ranchers here but here it is again (Dallas Morning News). And here’s something current I ran across at Iowa Farmer News (Amid Mexico trade worries, little response in markets) as a by-product of looking for the Rancher link. Rearranging trade isn’t cheap and easy and it sometimes tickles some remaining geographic neurons in my head, hence the Brexit watching and this.
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat: Well, that’s a good bet. But so far not much has gone well for the Republicans in Congress. I seem to remember the “Freedom Caucus” (née Tea Party) was really against raising the debt ceiling. Ryan may have to deal with that issue along with whatever craziness is happening with Republican president Trump.
I do think if Congress is consumed with impeachment-type of issues that it will affect all activity in Congress. Whether things will quietly pass like you say or everything will grind to a halt, I’m not sure.
Another Scott
@schrodingers_cat: You’d think so, but the HFC is kinda crazy – even moreso than the rest of the GOP. TheFederalist:
Dunno about the details of the rest of the argument above, especially the impact of Obamacare on them, but it’s clear that there are many moving parts in the budget and debt-ceiling processes and it’s not at all clear that the GOP is competent enough to get them done in time without creating another self-inflicted crisis. The GOP can repeal Obamacare via Reconciliation (simple majority in the Senate), but they supposedly can’t pass a replacement under Reconciliation and will need Democratic votes to reach 60 (unless they kill the filibuster totally).
The debt ceiling problem would go away if the House (sensibly) went back to the Gephardt Rule, but that seems unlikely.
Given the chaos over the last month, I’m not at all confident that it won’t get more chaotic once they start actually have to start passing legislation. We’ll see.
Cheers,
Scott.
Yarrow
@tobie:
On Monday I was stuck in a waiting room at a place that usually doesn’t have Fox News playing but for some reason that day it did. The chyron said that the market was closing at a new high and was up something like 150 in anticipation of tax cuts. So I think you’re right on that.
Another Scott
@Corner Stone: Thank you. I knew I would not be disappointed, leaving that hanging curve ball out over the plate. ;-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Yarrow
@scav: Good point. There are a lot of changes happening (like Brexit) so it’s not just about the crazy man in the White House.
Ohio Mom
@Doug R: Are you aware of the parallels between the Superman and Moses stories? Superman’s creators knew their Torah.
Moses: to save his life, as a baby he is sent off, via a basket in the river, hopefully to be saved.
Super man: to save his life, as a baby he is sent off, via a rocket ship, hopefully to be saved.
Moses: lived as Egyptian royalty, secret identity was that he was Israelite (an alien)
Superman: lives as all-American Clark Kent, secret identity is that he is Superman (an alien).
Both had to come to terms with their true identities and super powers, both are champions of justice and the underdog.
tobie
@sdhays: For some time now I’ve felt the big question in the developed world is what the future of labor will be in the face of automation and globalization. I also thought that the Democratic Party as a whole and HRC in particular were grappling with that very issue. Evidently if you don’t couch these concerns in populist rhetoric, you are just not heard. All that, though, is water under the bridge. We’re facing a unique threat to civil society.
I fear the economy collapsing from many reasons, some selfish, some not. I’m 52 and could lose whatever I’ve saved for retirement but at my age I also won’t have many decades ahead of me to rebuild.
OT: I’ve seen a few people, including you, use the phrase “so-called President” today. I like it and will crib shamelessly in the future.
Doug R
@CarolDuhart2: I suspect the current incarnation of Captain America is kinda a Professor Snape ruse.
Doug R
@cosima: I hear Oprah is getting behind another version of A Wrinkle In Time.
Yarrow
@Tenar Arha (same Tenar, more Nameless Ones): Agreed. By summer, if he’s still there, it’s going to be a mess. The university decisions are happening right now. Families are deciding that, no, we won’t send our kids to the US. It’s not safe.
I think we’ll see the first bit of the “Trump economy” effect happening with the quarterly results at the end of March/early April. I expect that tourism related businesses will show a downturn and their projections will have to be lower. The airport chaos has made people in general wary about traveling even inside the country and even if they’re native born Americans. Especially if they’re non-white, of course, but even white people are thinking twice about it.
Timurid
@Dave: I wonder if that guy has ever Googled ‘Ernst Röhm.’
CarolDuhart2
@Yarrow: Which means clogged roads, as Americans would rather trust their cars and even buses to that mess
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Looks like poor dumb damn Reince opened himself up a can of worms this morning
Tripod
monetary whasis and trade does what now? Somebody get Flynn on the phone – STAT!
Baud
@Tripod: Trump voters all. Fuck em.
Baud
@Tripod: Wait till they eliminate food stamps.
JMG
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I just assumed Priebus was lying. Easier that way.
Tripod
@Yarrow:
Rural schools are dependent on big city students.
Mike J
@MomSense: Got any upspoken for hats?
hovercraft
Some of what you missed on the Sunday shows:
FOX: Limbaugh Says Trump Has Racial Disadvantage: Obama Got ‘Everything He Wanted’ Because He’s Black
“[Obama was] the first African-American president,” Limbaugh opined. “You have everybody falling all over themselves to acknowledge that, to reward that. Obama was going to get everything he wanted in the first year because if anybody opposed it, they were going to be accused of being a racist or bigot or who knows what.”
NBC: Reince Priebus: No One Had Contact With Russia During The Campaign — As Far As We Know
Talk about fucking weasel words, I think they are getting nervous. He also said:
Priebus Says There Are No ‘Problems In The West Wing’ And Everything Is ‘Great’
Nothing to see here folks, just the lying liars in media making up fake news, just move along.
Over on ABC, Adam Schiff wasn’t having it.
Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) said on Sunday that calling the press “an enemy of the people” is “something that you hear tin-pot dictators say.”
“I didn’t think I could be shocked anymore by this President but I have to say, of all the things you said since he became President or since the election, this to me was the most devastating and the most alarming,” Schiff told Jon Karl on ABC’s “This Week.”
hovercraft
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
But Bill Clinton and Loretta Lynch in a plane on the tar mac !!!!!!!!
Tripod
@Baud:
Rahm was clear as a bell on their idiotic street sweeping musings.
Shred that stuff now. They won’t listen.
Omnes Omnibus
OT: This is from an email I got this morning from Tammy Baldwin’s people:
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus: Wisconsin has a shot to begin the process of redeeming itself.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Omnes Omnibus: I wonder if Baldwin is studying Claire McCaskill’s playbook from the Akin race. Interesting that Duffy dropped out, he strikes me as more ambitious than smart, the numbers must have been very bad, bigly sad.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: If she hasn’t, I am sure she is going to start. I have the same view of Duffy that you do.
Yarrow
@Tripod: Seems like for the most part, rural is dependent upon the big city for their oh, so independent lifestyles.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@bystander:
He apparently fetishizes black men; why any of them would fancy him back mystifies me.
hovercraft
@Omnes Omnibus:
I know nothing about Wisconsin politics, but I can totally see Clarke as a big draw to get African Americans out to vote. Not for him as I wouldn’t be surprised to see republicans think he would, but against him. At what point do they get the fact that we do not vote for people just because they happen to be the same color as us. It’s the fucking policies, stop running POC to get us, we’re not stupid.
Baud
@hovercraft: Oh sure. You say you want diversity, but you’ll only vote for people who represent your “interests.” Typical liberal hypocrisy.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
The Norma Desmond of American punditry is ready to return to business of fluffing anonymous sources in splashy behind-the-scenes accounts in a new book, somehow still unaware that the internet has done to his business model what the talkies did to Norma
When will Trump ask to borrow his Deusenberg?
MomSense
@Mike J:
This week I’ll have six more.
WereBear
Bob Woodward needs to have a meeting with a Linotype machine used in a way that is not in the instruction manual.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Is there such a thing as rage sex?
JMG
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Did Woodward elucidate what “good things” he meant? Rhetorical question obviously.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Two GOP congress critters on MSNBC in the last ten minutes (cause they’re a mirror image of Fox News) have said that they will appeal Obamacare while preserving protections for pre-existing conditions and coverage of young adults (could we please stop saying “kids up to 26”?), one specifically mentioned the ban on lifetime limits.
I’m not ready to get optimistic cause I have no doubt Ryan can pass something terrible, and in the Senate Collins will cave unless Flake and Heller get really scared, but I think getting there is just gonna get uglier.
randy khan
Agenda for the day is, well, the day is almost over because I’m in Paris. So, after a flea market, the decorative arts museum, Galeries Lafayette, and Sacre Coeur (plus various wandering), it’s almost time for couscous for dinner.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@randy khan:
Sacre Coeur and Montmartre are really wonderful – enjoy yourself!
Corner Stone
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I like saying “kids”. What’s wrong with that term usage? Sure they are adults making their own decisions but it’s a way to ease fears a lot of parents have.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
In some circles around here, that’s called a grudge fuck, usually when a separating couple who hate each other hook up.
Corner Stone
@randy khan: I have been considering planning an extended trip to Europe this summer. I guess we’ll see if you make it back alive before I start booking anything.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Corner Stone:
That 26 thing is more about reducing the sting of the mandate on a financially fragile but super healthy demographic.
Corner Stone
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Sure. It smooths a cost curve for one population and keeps parents on board for one more perk, if they can afford it.
Iowa Old Lady
@randy khan: Between you and Quinerly, I’m green with jealousy.
Shalimar
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: They’re going to repeal Obamacare, but keep several of the most expensive parts, while also repealing the tax that pays for them? Sure they are.
Republicans still have no repeal plan. Anything any Republican says now is just one faction in an unresolved dispute.
scav
@Corner Stone: I’d think randy’s staying in Paris with Rues Cler Mouffetard, Dehillerin, Hédiard, Cluny, … Oh bother, I don’t care if he stays or goes, I would plan extended. The 19th arrondissement is sounding interesting.
Iowa Old Lady
As I understand it, the ACA is at worst revenue neutral. My guess is the Rs will repeal all the measures that bring in the money and leave the popular stuff.
Yarrow
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: There’s something sadly ironic about one of the guys who made his name on Watergate propping up the president whose scandals dwarf Watergate. Norma Desmond indeed.
biscuits
@cosima:
This, yes more Rodrigo! Meow! Purrrr :)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Yarrow: “I’m still big, Mika. It is the scandals that have gotten small!”
When I see him quoted, it seems like more and more he’s just one more confused old white guy on Fox News.
Miss Bianca
@Omnes Omnibus: is it? I just wandered in to say “hi” before going outside to try to do something useful. How are you?
Mnemosyne
@hovercraft:
They’re never going to get it because that’s what they do.
tobie
@Shalimar: @Iowa Old Lady: There are other popular provisions to point out that the Republicans thus far have ignored. For instance mandatory coverage of routine physicals, mammograms, colonoscopies, etc. I have employer-provided health insurance but in the past I paid through the teeth for the bloodwork for my physical, ultra sounds requested by my doctor, etc. Not this year. Obamacare closed the donut hole, too. We have just got to keep on hammering the GOP with every aspect of this law. Remove minimal requirements for what health insurance is supposed to cover and then insurance itself becomes as worthless as the paper it’s printed on.
Eric S.
Home from my 40 mile cruise and we’re on the same thread. It was a beautiful drive with the top down. I topped her off with premium, attached the trickle charger, and tucked her away for a few months. I’m having rotator cuff surgery in 9 days. My shifting arm will be out of commission for a while.
Chris
@Doug R:
It’s not well appreciated just how loaded the original Captain America and Superman comics were, at a time when Irish and Jewish people were still loathed as un-American by a wide segment of the population. (This was only a few years after an Irish-Catholic presidential candidacy went down in flames after being greeted with burning crosses in quite a few places, while FDR’s reforms were attacked as the “Jew Deal” and the Bund was marching in solidarity with Hitler). The equivalent to Steve Roger’s today would be a child of Mexican immigrants raised in the inner city, and the equivalent to Superman would be written by Muslim authors who worked in a bunch of references to their religion.
The closest heir to that right now is probably the Kamala Khan comic.
Corner Stone
@Eric S.: A 40 mile cruise in a Porsche isn’t exactly a good measure of a thread. But yeah, slow news Sunday. Which is a good thing, maybe?
pamelabrown53
@Eric S.: #234.
Your “cruise sounds great. We have an old Z-series BMW which we bought after it was introduced in a James Bond movie circa 1995. It still drives like a dream and we love to open it up on A1A between Ponte Vedra Beach and St. Augustine..
Good luck with your surgery; we always need to keep our shifting arm in good repair.
Another Scott
BBC: Tiny Trump memes.
Hehe.
Cheers,
Scott.
cmorenc
@mai naem mobile:
Ever hear the phrase “banality of evil”? It refers to the fact that not all the evil actors in society are so flamboyantly, blatantly so as e.g. Joseph Stalin, Adolph Hitler, etc. Many of them can even be superficially charming or at worst, seemingly innocuously boring personalities until you start examining the things they actually do that have deliberately malevolent motivation and impacts on others. Always “others”, who are viewed as a different, threatening species who must be dealt with firmly and harshly, to protect the members of the tribe the evil person purports to be acting on behalf of.
Ruckus
@cosima:
I have found that I have almost zero tolerance for TV or movie violence any more. It seems to me that it’s senseless violence for it’s own sake, something to keep the fans wound up. I think that it becomes the new normal if one is not reasonably adjusted, after all it is just acting. But somehow it’s just become abhorrent to me, like republican framing of life. It’s bullshit, done for the smell of the bullshit. Wait that describes our president……..
Baud
Sure glad we have these jump-to-bottom buttons now.
Kathleen
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: So much win here. I chuckled out loud and I needed that. Thanks!
ETA: “Ready for my Pulitzer, Mr. Trump”.
germy
@Baud: That’s why I voted for you. You were the candidate I felt most comfortable with having a finger on the jump-to-bottom button.
Baud
@germy: Get to the bottom quicker. Vote Baud!
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@cmorenc:
Milos reminds me just a bit of a Major Strasser type (Casablanca): a strutting, decorated peacock. If things end for him on a rainy tarmac with a lead round, so be it.
Ruckus
@Debbie1:
Couple of decades ago my across the street neighbor owned a business very similar to mine, in CA. We were subject to a few environmental regulations that were costly but not unreasonable or without purpose. He moved his business and family to Nevada because they had no regulations there and he could make maybe an extra $500/yr. Of course he’d have far less business and far fewer trained workers to hire, but he hadn’t taken that into account, only the regulations. I asked him why those regulations were bad, if they kept the water clean/pure, the air more breathable and he just stared at me like I was crazy. I’d bet he votes republican, straight ticket. Some people are incapable of seeing cause and effect, or they refuse to see what 6 billion people living in the world does to the environment if they don’t each at least try to mitigate their impact.
glory b
@hovercraft: Yup. Ask Michael Steele and Ken Blackwell.
trollhattan
@MomSense: @cmorenc:
All the charm of O’Keefe with none of the fashion sense. Somebody should sic Eddy Izzard on little Milos.
Ruckus
@Comrade Scrutinizer:
But the vision in your head from the book is yours alone. Those who make movies of books and change the effect completely may be trying to tell you that your interpretation of the book was wrong. That theirs is the one truth and light, that in lots of cases even the original author got wrong. Guess which one book is the most subject to this.
debbie
@Baud:
I have trouble with the jump to the bottom button on my iPad because it’s so close to the corner. But when it works, it’s great!
Ruckus
@mai naem mobile:
Andrew Sullivan is the nasty, uncouth version of Andrew Sullivan. He needs no imitators.
pamelabrown53
@randy khan: #217.
Paris is the best for daily wanderings. Probably why I love it so much. There is so much beauty, art and history infused throughout the arrondissements. One trip, we started from Notre Dame to the left bank and walked all day to the haunts and houses of the Parisian and American expat writers of the 20’s. We had a blast! Plus we stopped for a 90 min. lunch of roast goose and wine. Ended the day on top of La Samaritaine, surveying and discussing our adventure.
P.S. If you have the time, it’s worthwhile to make the trip to “Pere Lachaise”. Have a safe trip home and would enjoy further travelogs.
CaseyL
Good morning, everyone! It’s a slow and lovely Sunday here. Sun came out, much to the kitties’ delight. I did a spot of grocery shopping, and may go to a matinee this afternoon with a friend.
@trollhattan: Ooh. I’d watch that. I’d PAY to watch that.
Ruckus
@Ohio Mom:
I think you are right but what gets me is that there is supposed to be in this country, the idea that it can get/be better. The entire republican/conservative concept is that it can’t get any better, so fuck over everyone else, grab your piece of the pie (and anyone else’s that you can) and just breathe, if you can. It’s so limiting in scope, to think in such a tiny box that there isn’t any even possibility of better. But I’m here to tell you all that while there were jobs in the 50s, lots of people struggled and even with the controls the rich got richer off WWII and the poor just suffered along. It just wasn’t better than now, not in any measurable way.
WereBear
Part of their petulance is focusing only on what annoys them, and takes for granted anything that works for them.
Ruckus
@Tenar Arha (same Tenar, more Nameless Ones):
The best critique of BM I’ve ever seen.
HeleninEire
The NYC I am a Muslim march was real small. Like one and a half blocks of marchers small. Disappointing. Lots of cops and barricades though, so they must have expected many more. Lots of media too.
Another Scott
@HeleninEire: There are some retweeted pictures on the Women’s March Twitter Feed. It looks like a good crowd.
Thanks for showing up!!
Cheers,
Scott.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Ruckus:
You frame the Republican perspective succinctly and effectively!
Conservatives are essentially about maintaining the status quo, returning to a time that never really was. They operate from fear, greed, resentment. They, as individuals, can be intelligent, generous, kind. They’re not a monolithic force of pure idiocy or malice, but they are misinformed, or perhaps purposefully uninterested in the truth because it may challenge their goals and beliefs.
bmoak
@Omnes Omnibus:
Isn’t Sheriff Clarke nominally a Democrat or at least constantly re-elected as one?
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Ruckus: That’s why I’m fan of the TV adaptation of The Expanse. The book authors are in the writing room.
Ruckus
@tobie:
As someone in the thick of the unable to retire blues (got 15 yrs on you) but tired of having worked for the last 55 yrs without much to show for it, (Yes the last republican recession was really, really not my friend) having that time to save for the future is vital. I told one of the kids that I work with, early 20s, to save something, anything, get used to it, save for old age because you might just get there sooner than you think and it won’t get easier, it never has.
But 15 yrs can be enough time to help, if your SS fund is full. It may not be the life of Riley, but it can be acceptable. Good luck.
Redshift
@Yarrow:
Bookings for travel to the US are apparently already down 3.4% compared to a year ago.
StringOnAStick
@Ruckus: I’m with you on not being able to handle violence in entertainment anymore. We don’t watch much TV other than Create or things we pick from Hulu or Netflix, so when I see what most channels and movies are stuffed with, it creeps me right out. It feels like I’m willingly allowing myself to be assaulted by all that, so we just don’t watch it.
Uncle Ebeneezer
Went to the Free the People march yesterday in downtown LA. It was wonderful. About 2,500 people, mostly immigrants and Latinx, Asian, Armenian etc. people proudly standing up for their rights and culture. Lots of great signs. My faves were: “a Cheeto we don’t needo” and “we can do this shit every weekend, asshole.” There were dancers in Indigenous Mexican outfits, lots of Guatemalan and El Salvadoran flags, etc. It was such a wonderful example of what I consider Real America. In addition to heavy emphasis on Sanctuary and ICE there was mention by speakers of Blacklivesmatter, Transgender rights and the question of “where are the 750,000 women who came out for the Women’s March?”
Aleta
Booker asking us to realize what’s happening right now:
https://twitter.com/SenBookerOffice/status/833387385379573761
Ruckus
@Uncle Ebeneezer:
Some of that “Where are the 750,000 women who came out for the Women’s March?” stuff has to do with the promotion of that march. Not only did it capture the imagination of a lot of people, it had the benefit of just being positive. It looked and felt positive. For example I didn’t even know about the “Free the People march in LA. And It sounds like “We need to get angry and save the people!” and that turns off a lot of people. It’s subtle, the difference, but it’s there and I’d bet a lot of people would rather not be angry all the time. Another point was the Women’s March actually took some time to get it going and get it right. It appealed to a lot of different demographics, both genders, all ages, all races. All the sites specific to the march were not politically slanted, and captured a very personal view of life.
I would have gone yesterday had I known, I’d bet a lot of people could say the same thing.
Jeffro
@Ruckus:
Conservatives have never meant that the 1950s were better in any way other than “whiter”. They pretend to care about bringing back good jobs (i.e., unionized jobs, when America was the sole economic powerhouse in a post-WW II battered world) but really they only mean “whiter”.
zhena gogolia
@trollhattan:
I couldn’t stand more than a couple of minutes. I really could only think that Eddie Izzard needs to call his lawyer.
randy khan
@Corner Stone:
I have Global Entry (plus my nym does not reflect my actual name – it’s a thing from when I was in college lo these many years ago), so fingers crossed.
randy khan
@pamelabrown53:
My wife has been here a million times (well, closer to 50, but it might as well be a million), and the last couple of times when we’ve been here together, we’ve had some extended wanderings, which have been some of the best parts of our trips.
This time we revisited a lot of favorite places – Ste. Chappelle, D’Orsay, the Orangerie, the Guimet, but did manage to get some places I hadn’t been before, including the Cluny. It’s been fun (but we’re leaving tomorrow – *sigh*).
For those who haven’t been, my wife and I have discovered that there are really cheap fares and really cheap hotel rooms in February. (I mean, like half of what it costs much of the rest of the year.) And we don’t care if it’s cold, so it’s a great time for us.
Ruckus
@Jeffro:
Oh I know. I fully understand the concept of “whiter.” But even for those who are whiter it wasn’t better. It was, as has been stated by many and far more elegantly than me, even worse for those not white. Yes lots of whites had jobs and minorities did not. Yes some of those jobs involved unions, some of which did nothing to help the non whites have a better life. But life was still worse for all but the top few %, and worse for most than now. My dad had a solid job path to middle class life in the early 50s, working in metalworking mfg. But finding a job was still not all that easy and while he was able to purchase a new house in 1949, it was a 2 bedroom box, for 5 of us, and was smaller than the 2 bedroom apt I live in now. It was a major improvement over actually being in WWII though that it seemed like a very large improvement. My father was a very hard worker and was very good at his craft but he was one of millions who thought they lived in the middle class while they really didn’t. Today, the average salary is what $50K? That won’t buy you a lot of (or any) house, retirement, or lifestyle. One can be comfortable on that, if one doesn’t want to travel, have a second home, own a home in almost any urbanized area, a middle of the road car, save for retirement, a family…….. And it was worse in the 50s.
Uncle Ebeneezer
@Ruckus: The Women’s March was unique for several reasons that made it an event of a scale unlikely to be reached on a regular basis for other causes. That said, it doesn’t negate the feelings of BlackLivesMatter or Immigrants Rights groups who look at the disparity between the enthusiasm of White people to show up for something we (White people) view as being For Us, like the Women’s March vs. something that doesn’t (at least directly.) I think that’s a legitimate concern and a fair critique to make, even after accounting for the differences between different events.
Ruckus
@Uncle Ebeneezer:
I do agree with you on this. We are in unprecedented territory in our history and we can fight together or lose. And I’m worried far more about actuality more than feelings. And it is something that affects all of us, unless one thinks that a citizen has to be white and from about 2 European countries worth of ground. That is one of the things conservatives have managed to do is to pit different groups against each other, all the while actually fucking all of us. Being lying racist scum seems to have helped there. That and the 40-50 yrs of their bullshit that many, especially whites, have swallowed, hook, line and sinker.
But we need to know that these events are taking place and I don’t see too many places to see the resistance. Of course this morning I’ve come down with a pretty tough cough that when I do makes breathing a bit tough, now a fever and I feel like fully distilled shit. So either the flu or pneumonia is likely. Doesn’t feel like the flu and some of the meds I’m taking do make one somewhat more susceptible to pneumonia. I’ve had the shot but what with everything I’ve got going on… hopefully flu but who the hell knows. And yes if it’s not better in the morning, and it is somewhat better now, off to the VA. Or even if it gets worse tonight, off to the ER.
Uncle Ebeneezer
@Ruckus: Oh man, that sucks sorry to hear about the flu. I’ve found that joining a couple Indivisible groups on FB and signing up for OfA has really helped keep me up to speed on local actions that are happening all over the place. Also, SURJ and WP4BL and a couple local police reform groups. So now, I’m getting more actions/events thrown at me than I can possibly keep up with, but it’s a good problem to have. I just pick/choose based on my schedule and priorities. I’ve also been paying more attention to my activist friends on FB so we are all constantly giving “heads ups” to each other about events. So social media can be very helpful in this regards. Hope you feel better.
No One You Know
@Ohio Mom: Ah….that could explain it. My pharmacist ranted at me regarding the government and the ACA for nearly five minutes, while my $170 prescription cost $20 or so. I felt held hostage by her seemingly inexplicable anger. Same thing with the local restaurant proprietor, who saw no value in protests because “what will it change? Nothing.”
It was not an opportune moment to argue the point, unfortunately.
No One You Know
@tobie: W/r/t retirement worries, me too. And like a lot of people, recovering from the double-dip recession in the late-aughts hasn’t become a reality, either.
Retirement looks like it’s not realistic, for me. More like, income to supplement unemployment when I’m over 65.