Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

We won’t go back.

The jury literally has a bell they can ring to force Trump to show up on command. Greatest thing ever!

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Never forget that he train is barreling down on Trump, even as he dances on the tracks.

T R E 4 5 O N

How can republicans represent us when they don’t trust women?

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

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

Republican also-rans: four mules fighting over a turnip.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.

Found liable for massive fraud, is required to post a massive bond, gets a break, then files a *fraudulent* bond!

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

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

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

The revolution will be supervised.

Shut up, hissy kitty!

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

The republican speaker is a slippery little devil.

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Luxury Denied (Open Thread)

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Who was it who said (paraphrasing) a competent administration provides its citizens the luxury of not thinking about politics all the time? This cartoon is my life now:

I hope the science marches are HUGE today. I can’t go because of a family thing, but my encouragement, admiration and good wishes go with those of you who are marching!

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

58Comments

  3. 3.

    hovercraft

    @TaMara (HFG):
    Mine too. I’ve given up cable news, but most evening I can hear my mother yelling at the TV about something he says or does, she watches CNN. I keep telling her to stop watching, but she refuses.

  5. 5.

    ruemara

    One of the consequences of building a stable, prosperous society is the logical fallacy of it was so and it will always be so becomes impossible to counter.

  7. 7.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @ruemara: They need to be maintained, and it needs to be understood how it was built. You can’t take it for granted.

    Too many Americans take it for granted.

  8. 8.

    TaMara (HFG)

    This is a heads up apology to Betty Cracker, I’m gonna bigfoot her in about 15 minutes with a live feed of the Science March.

    We stomp on each other because we love each other….

  9. 9.

    waspuppet

    Conversely, the hallmark of alcoholics and/or narcissists, which our last two GOP presidents have been but especially this one, is a distinct discomfort at the notion that someone, somewhere, is NOT thinking about what you’re doing and thinking and planning. That someone out there considers themselves to be something other than a helpful supporting player in your life.

  13. 13.

    ET

    I had wanted to go to the one in DC but I had to work. (sad face). I have seen a few photos – crowds still big it seems and like the women’s march there are many events worldwide. But thee are hastags #marchforscience and #sciencemarch

  18. 18.

    Baud

    @Libraryguy: Pattern of recent posts. Last week, he lied about states being on the verge of adopting single payer when the ACA shut it all down. Last couple of days, he had a dismissive post about the bigotry underlying Trump voters and proclaimed that they are getting disillusioned with Trump’s pro Wall Street policies. And today he had a post about how Dems shouldn’t have “cleared the field” for Hillary. (just read the title of that one).

    If that’s the audience he wants to play to, he doesn’t want me as a reader.

  19. 19.

    A Ghost to Most

    As I work in an office chock full of coal humpers and other assorted wingnuts, and where two of the three known (to me) liberals just quit without jobs to go to, rather than continue on, I spend my days biting my lip bloody and saying nothing. It doesn’t help my crazy much.

  22. 22.

    Splitting Image

    @Baud:

    And today he had a post about how Dems shouldn’t have “cleared the field” for Hillary. (just read the title of that one).

    If that’s the audience he wants to play to, he doesn’t want me as a reader.

    I saw that article and had the same reaction.

  23. 23.

    mai naem mobile

    This fucking Celebrity Apprentice President season us 13 episodes too long. Put it out of its misery. The main contestant isn’t enjoying it at all except for the freebies you get for doing the show.

  24. 24.

    MomSense

    @ruemara:

    Same mindset as the anti-vaxxers. They don’t know how tragic or common it was to lose your children before we had immunizations.

  25. 25.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Splitting Image: Someone doesn’t understand that the entire purpose of a primary election system is to “clear the field” for one candidate.

    /headdesk

  29. 29.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Villago Delenda Est: As usual with their ilk, the phenomenon “people liking a different candidate” can only be explained with conspiracy, skulduggery, and assorted bad intentions. Show me one Sandersite candidate winning any goddamn thing before condescendingly lecturing me about how it’s an obvious ticket to victory everywhere that The Democrats refuse to use because of something something neoliberals. It’s just the thought process of fools.

  30. 30.

    Mnemosyne

    I’m steeling myself to drive down to LAX (G comes back from Chicago today). It’s also our first truly hot day, so I have to stop procrastinating and shave my legs.

    (I tend to get eczema on my shins in the winter that’s aggravated by shaving, so I generally don’t shave in the winter. G’s okay with it.)

  31. 31.

    Splitting Image

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    Someone doesn’t understand that the entire purpose of a primary election system is to “clear the field” for one candidate.

    Well, in fairness what Atkins is complaining about is that the Democratic establishment “cleared the field” before the primaries started rather than let the process play out as usual. Unfortunately, he is claiming that Obama forced Joe Biden not to run (ignoring Biden’s grief over his son dying), and that Elizabeth Warren and Cory Booker were also forced out. As far as I know, Warren was all-in for Clinton from the beginning and Booker never even made noises about running.

    It’s true that the Democratic field was a little thin, but the main reason for that was the rout of 2010, which left no “popular swing state governors” to fill out the field. Atkins completely fails to mention this.

    But you’re right. No matter how large the field had been, none of the also-rans would have survived Iowa and New Hampshire. The rest of the primary season would have proceeded as it did.

  32. 32.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Splitting Image: I’m kind of surprised at how seldom the argument is made that Hillary Clinton should have known better than to run in the first place. That could at least be argued. Instead we get subjected to this idiocy about nefarious neoliberal establishment forces corruptly pulling strings like The Syndicate in the X Files.

  33. 33.

    Mnemosyne

    @FlipYrWhig:

    That’s because there’s a large group of people on the left who actually think that all of the bullshit propaganda the Republicans spout about the Clintons is true. Any theory that does not include the fact that Hillary is evil and manipulative gets dismissed out of hand.

  36. 36.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Mnemosyne: A lot of people on the “left” are useful idiots of the .01%. Fuck them and the rented mules they rode in on.

  37. 37.

    opiejeanne

    @MomSense: I’ve ranted about the anti-vaxxers before, and told the story of entire towns in the Ozarks without a child under age 16 left alive after polio raced through the hollers (spelled “hollows”). People of my grandparents’ generation told me about it.

  39. 39.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @opiejeanne: My retort to any anti-vaxxer is “Got Polio?”. The “dumbass” or “shithead” is of course implied. :D

  40. 40.

    Ruckus

    @opiejeanne:
    People of our generation knew about it. We just didn’t all die from it. I went to school 12 yrs with a girl who had polio and 2 of my friends moms had it, one had a portable iron lung in the dinning room. I remember standing in line with a lot of people at a bank to get the first generation vaccination on a sugar cube. My schoolmate came to our 10 yr reunion without any braces, crutches or canes. First time I ever saw her without support.

  41. 41.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    A lot of people on the “left” are useful idiots of the .01%

    finally, there is something worse so I no longer have to feel bad about being a useless idiot

  42. 42.

    Uncle Ebeneezer

    @hovercraft: We swore off cable news a few years ago but have been trapped at our in-laws’ place n TX. They watch CNN/MSNBC for 10-12 hours a day. They are lefties but still…

    So glad to be heading back to my Blue state!! I’ve come to the conclusion that yes, I’m a coastal elite! Between the open racism (confederate/Gadsden flags, MAGA hats, businesses switching C’s to K’s etc.) and the nasty attitude/looks from camo-clad dudes, I don’t if I could hang with living in the South/Red States. Went to Deep Ellum Brewery in Dallas which had good diversity and hipsters (and great beer) and Austin was great (though we zipped through it pretty fast) but otherwise it was everything I hate about America.

  43. 43.

    Aleta

    @opiejeanne:

    the story of entire towns in the Ozarks

    I’d like to read that if you have the date of the post where it appeared, so I can look for it. Or if you care to rewrite.

  44. 44.

    catclub

    Trump Fires Surgeon General Who Called Gun Violence a Public Health Issue

    From Slate.

    What took him so long?

  45. 45.

    catclub

    At TPM

    Trump: ‘I Think We’re In Great Shape’ To Avoid Government Shutdown Next Week

    Ok, Now I’m worried.

  46. 46.

    Aleta

    @Baud:

    You think he’s aiming for a gig.

    All I see is that he seems to be working in parallel with the politician who claims he is reforming the Dem party. (Who strangely claims to be its leader even though not a member.) If I read him right, Atkins is even putting down Clinton supporters.

  47. 47.

    Steve in the ATL

    @catclub:

    Trump: ‘I Think We’re In Great Shape’ To Avoid Government Shutdown Next Week

    Ok, Now I’m worried.

    There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to assume that he is being honest here

  48. 48.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    I hope the science marches are HUGE today.

    Back home from the Philly march. It was HUGE enough. My amateurish estimate is 10-20000. This being a science march, let’s call it an order of magnitude estimate of 10^4. It could easily have been larger because I have no idea how much crowd was behind me. And that despite a cold, wet rain.

    Assuming (hoping) there will be a thread devoted to M for S experiences later.

  50. 50.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Aleta: Atkins has said that his mission in political life is to thwart corporate establishment whatever Democrats. Eye on the real enemy, dude.

  52. 52.

    Scott

    Who was it who said (paraphrasing) a competent administration provides its citizens the luxury of not thinking about politics all the time?

    I heard this also and have been trying to remember where. I may be totally wrong but it think it was on Bill Maher and it was Andrew Sullivan who said it. He was refering to the Obama administration as being competent.

  53. 53.

    J R in WV

    @Mnemosyne:

    I don’t shave my face, I have no right to ask anyone to shave anything. You do what you need to do, eczema is a terrible thing. Anywhere. I use Eucerin for mine.

  54. 54.

    opiejeanne

    @Aleta: It was one of those family forums, Pioneers of Camden County, and I stomped out of there after Obama was elected because one of my distant cousins who was a Democrat and quite sensible just lost his shit and started foaming at the mouth. I’m sure he’s sorry Trump won.

    I may have written it down somewhere. The gentleman who told me about it was in his late 80s 20 years ago; his grandfather had walked with one of my great grandmothers when they were about 12, from North Carolina to the area around Climax Springs/Bannister Hollow/Macks Creek following the Civil War.Great Grandma divorced her husband, took the kids, and went west to where her parents had already settled.

    I would guess that the polio epidemic was late 20s/early 30s and somewhere nearby those places. It’s a “family story” and a couple of the old ladies on that site knew about it.

  55. 55.

    J R in WV

    @Uncle Ebeneezer:

    That’s how I feel about Houston, and most of Texas. West Texas, and central Texas are particularly bad!! Now I cross the northern panhandle, I can do it with one stop to pee and one to get gas. From OK to NM ASAP!!

  57. 57.

    Ksmiami

    @A Ghost to Most: I got into it with a woman who called me a sore loser – I told her I might be a sore loser but you (she) didn’t actually win anything by electing Trump. It was an effective conversation

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