Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Peak wingnut was a lie.

She burned that motherfucker down, and I am so here for it. Thank you, Caroline Kennedy.

DeSantis transforming Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

Let there be snark.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

’Where will you hide, Roberts, the laws all being flat?’

Of course you can have champagne before noon. That’s why orange juice was invented.

We can show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

Also, are you sure you want people to rate your comments?

The only way through is to slog through the muck one step at at time.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Books are my comfort food!

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Weird. Rome has an American Pope and America has a Russian President.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

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

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

The revolution will be supervised.

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Hail to the Hairpiece / Saturday Morning Open Thread: All Hail! — Hell

Saturday Morning Open Thread: All Hail! — Hell

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(Jeff Danziger’s website)
.


***********

Apart from the ongoing Trumpocalypse, what’s on the agenda for the day?

Reader Interactions

174Comments

  2. 2.

    Baud

    Trump always sees problems as the result of a grand conspiracy of nefarious forces out to get him. He obsesses and seeks revenge

    In a campaign, too it can work: Voters might like the narrative.

    I’ll try it.

  3. 3.

    Groucho48

    Posted this in the last thread, but, at the the tail end.

    For any dog lovers in the Portland area, a friend of mine is looking for a good home for a young Pyrenee/cattledog mix. If you are interested, post here and we’ll work out contact info or ways to see photos. The dog is a cutie and is very affectionate.

  4. 4.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: Don’t forget to egg on your rabid supporters to assault anyone who doesn’t agree with you.

  5. 5.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Groucho48:

    Pyrenee/cattledog mix

    An interesting mix, the Pyrenee half will lay in the shade while the Heeler (I’m assuming) half will go nuts if it is not allowed to herd the rabbits/squirrels/small humans toward safety.

  6. 6.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    1:47 AM: a 24 year old night watchman named Frank Willis discovers the garage door entry has been tampered with. He contacts local police and reports: burglary in progress at the Watergate office complex.

    Saturday, June 17, 1972

  7. 7.

    Aleta

    @OzarkHillbilly: We had a part golden part collie. The golden half was compelled to jump in the water with us whenever we swam and the collie half looked miserable the whole time.

  8. 8.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Inside Houston’s second ring road, 30 miles east, a photo album sat on a table in Dean Bixler’s living room. It was not filled with happy family portraits, but murky images of the flood-ravaged rooms of his house, with sofas elevated on chairs above coffee-coloured water.

    The 60-year-old bought it in 1996, not imagining that his renovation budget would ever need to take the cost of pumps into account. Bixler said his house, built in 1960, has flooded three times since 2009, submerging his long front lawn and invading his home. “You could not see any grass. That’s a lot of frickin’ water,” Bixler said. In 2015, the repairs took about five months. In 2016, his flood-proofing measures kept water infiltration to an inch and a half.

    Bixler is a member of Residents Against Flooding, a group that last year filed a lawsuit against the city and a local infrastructure authority alleging that poorly mitigated developments are causing hundreds of homes to flood.

    “The truth is that most of the flooding in Houston is manmade,” said Ed Browne, another member, pointing out that many people who get flooded, Bixler included, are not in the 100-year floodplain – an area calculated to have a 1% annual chance of flooding.

    But Bixler’s part of town has in the past decade been extensively redeveloped, with new shopping malls, office blocks, homes and apartment complexes, many designed, critics say, with flood-control strategies such as elevation that appear to prioritise self-protection with little overall plan as to what happens to the diverted water.

    It is a worrying vision of the future: stronger and more frequent storms with fewer natural barriers, while rapid and haphazard urban development with limited oversight creates new at-risk zones or worsens drainage in known problem areas.

    The Harris County flood control district did not respond to requests for comment; its executive director, Russ Poppe, told the Houston Press last year that there are regulations to stop builders from increasing flood risks and that it is difficult to protect against exceptionally violent storms.

    Good piece, not too long, on the flooding problems in Houston.

  9. 9.

    bystander

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    @Baud: Don’t forget to egg on your rabid supporters to assault anyone who doesn’t agree with you.

    You can always have a surrogate make a tearful plea for civility later. Followed by a thick-fingered guitar solo.

  12. 12.

    Quinerly

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    Whatever you do, don’t read any of the on line readers’ comments to any of the published pieces on the monument in RFT, Post, etc. I made the mistake. You don’t have to.

  13. 13.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @bystander: Or you can just exercise the Gianforte option: Gianforte calls for civil politics after assaulting reporter

    Gianforte refused to answer questions about the attack and why his campaign initially released a statement painting Jacobs as the instigator, which contradicted witness accounts, Gianforte’s own apology letter and the criminal charge to which he eventually pleaded guilty. Instead, he repeated nine times over the course of Friday’s half-hour interview that he had taken responsibility and wanted to move on.

    “I have addressed the issue,” Gianforte said. “I think I’ve been very clear, I’ve taken full responsibility. I’m not proud of what happened that evening, but I have accepted full responsibility and both Ben and I, and I think the people of Montana, want us to move on.”

    “Jesus has forgiven me and now we can all pretend it never happened.”

  19. 19.

    Peale

    @Baud: I believe Baud’s unique
    paranoia narrative ought to be based on his belief that no one is out to get him. He’s the one who has constant nightmares about having to give a speech in front of an audience while properly clothed or that he’s taking an exam at the end of the semester that he’s fully prepared for. He wakes up in cold sweats after dreaming that he’s comfortably in bed, concerned that he ought to be falling.

  20. 20.

    Lapassionara

    @David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: I remember that day. We were in NYC for some reason, and the burglary made the front page of the NYT. (Yes, I know it is garbage.) Two years and almost 2 months later, Nixon got into the chopper. I don’t think we can last that long.

  25. 25.

    Quinerly

    @OzarkHillbilly: @Raven: @Raven:
    Usually never read them. But I was really curious about this issue. Many of my liberal St. Louis native friends (I’m a transplant from the South here since 1982) are very vocal ANTI removal. Their arguments make no sense to me. When backed in a corner, they start talking about the cost of the removal. Other than me, I can’t find anyone in my large circle who feel strongly that it should be removed. Most don’t care or feel strongly it should stay.

  26. 26.

    bystander

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    @bystander: Or you can just exercise the Gianforte option:

    I don’t know that Baud is up to Gianforte-style fisticuffs. Personally, I prefer the whipping-by-frenzied-fanatic-surrogate method, as practiced by Trump.

  27. 27.

    Kay

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Gianforte said there is an obligation for members of Congress to ratchet down the vitriol in politics, especially after this week’s shooting of Rep. Steve Scalise during a Republican congressional baseball practice by a man who volunteered for Bernie Sanders’ Democratic presidential campaign.
    “I believe that good things can come out of bad,” he said. “It’s important to make sure we reach out to all parties and hear their voice. I think the other parties have an obligation, as well, to be respectful and in that dialogue.”

    This is the part I don’t understand. The absolute worst actors feel perfectly comfortable scolding the rest of us.

    It would be one thing if it were people who are known for behaving decently, but it’s not. He’s simply not in a position to lecture anyone on this. He could just not do it – forego the lecture- but he can’t help himself. He has to grab the moral high ground although he has NO legit claim to it.

    The could probably find 10 people in Congress who behave decently and they could lecture us, but instead it’s people like the guy who assaulted the reporter.

  29. 29.

    Millard Filmore

    @Peale:

    he’s taking an exam at the end of the semester that he’s fully prepared for.

    Forty years out of college and I still get that nightmare.

    No, not that nightmare, the other one.

  30. 30.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    This is the part I don’t understand. The absolute worst actors feel perfectly comfortable scolding the rest of us.

    That’s what makes them the worst actors.

  31. 31.

    BC in Illinois

    @Quinerly:
    @OzarkHillbilly:

    The monument, from 1914, is as creepy a celebration of the glory of the Lost Cause as you will find.

    To the Memory of the Soldiers and Sailors of the Southern Confederacy.
    Who fought to uphold the right declared by the pen of Jefferson and achieved by the sword of Washington. With sublime self-sacrifice they battled to preserve the independence of the states which was won from Great Britain, and to perpetuate the constitutional government which was established by the fathers.

    Actuated by the purest patriotism they performed deeds of prowess such as thrilled the heart of mankind with admiration. Full in the front of war they stood and displayed a courage so superb that they gave a new and brighter luster to the annals of valor. History contains no chronicle more illustrious than the story of their achievements; and although, worn out by ceaseless conflict and overwhelmed by numbers, they were finally forced to yield, their glory, on brightest pages penned by poets and by sages shall go sounding down the ages.

    Words that are hard to read aloud without loathing.

    Fortunately, when the legal challenges are over and the question returns of what to do with the 42 tons of rock, there is a large river conveniently located nearby.

  32. 32.

    Kay

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I love how he goes from “I” to “we”, too. He’s been doing that for a long time, I bet. “I made a mistake. We must do better”.

  33. 33.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: As I recall, there was an element of incompetence that helped get them caught.

    My recollection: the guard sees scotch tape holding the latch open. He takes it off. Comes back a little later, sees it taped open again, takes the tape off again. Comes back a little later, sees it taped AGAIN, and calls the cops.

  34. 34.

    Kathleen

    Heading down to the Y for a short run downtown. Meeting friend for lunch and Wonder Woman. If I’m super adventurous may go to see my brother play drums in a new band (for him) in Northern KY, I believe. Or not. I don’t like going out at night.

    And Good Morning, rikyrah and all!

  36. 36.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Quinerly:

    When backed in a corner, they start talking about the cost of the removal.

    Interesting. The civil war museum says they will do it at their own expense. (I really don’t understand why the city feels they need to OK whatever happens with it after it is gone)

    Also, det cord is cheap. Probably get the rubble removed for free by letting all the dead enders in the STL area take a piece of it ala the Berlin Wall.

  37. 37.

    Baud

    @Kay: If I could go back in time, I’d advise Bill Clinton to go on TV and preach to the American people that we all need to stop cheating on our spouses.

  38. 38.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    “My dear friend Steve Scalise took a bullet for all of us,” Trump said. “And because of him and the tremendous pain and suffering he’s now enduring — and he’s having a hard time, far worse than anybody thought — our country will perhaps become closer, more unified — so important. So we all owe Steve a big, big thank you.”

    What? We’ve had a lot of dishonest “debates” after shootings, but this has to be the worst. We’re now on a different planet.

  40. 40.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @BC in Illinois: I once ran into a 50th Anniversary book of Civil War photos, which I thought was pretty cool and historic. But the Forward, written by Woodrow Wilson, read much that way when describing the Confederacy.

  42. 42.

    Schlemazel

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:
    The Keystone Kop team taped the door wrong. Instead of running the tape up and down the door they ran it across so it stuck out both sides, very easy to spot. We have been fortunate that Nixon and hair furor are not able to hire competent help or we would be in a lot more trouble

  43. 43.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    That’s why people on the Right hated Carter’s lectures. They knew he actually lived like that. The Carter hatred and the Obama hatred had a lot in common in that area – personal qualities- decency. They could not admit the Democrat had taken the higher ground- they think they own that real estate.

  44. 44.

    Baud

    @Kay: GOP calls for unity = Dems must STFU.

    I don’t think our party will fall for it, but we’ll need to stay strong when Mika gives us her concerned face.

  45. 45.

    SFAW

    5/ Power in a regime of divided authority is often about trust: The other branches won’t check you if they trust you. Will if they don’t.

    So, I was having a “senior moment” this AM, and needed to look up the definitions of “naive” and “moron.” Imagine my amazement when a picture of Orin Kerr accompanied each word.

  46. 46.

    Central Planning

    @amk: I put money on the shark to win. Phelps doesn’t finish, mostly because the shark ate him

  47. 47.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kay: In a similar vein:

    “Let us address the elephant in the room,” said Arianna Huffington, perhaps the most high-profile member of Uber’s board. “Where is Travis?”

    The answer: Travis Kalanick, Uber’s 40-year-old co-founder and chief executive, was taking a leave of absence from the taxi-hailing app he has transformed into a global behemoth valued at almost $70bn. Huffington told Uber’s staff that the company would not await Kalanick’s return, choosing instead to act immediately on the findings of a damning investigation, accepted by the board, into the company’s workplace culture amid claims of sexual harassment.

    “Uber is his life,” she said of Kalanick. “He has taken full responsibility for what the company has gone through in the last few months and now he wants to be part of us turning a new page and together building the next chapter in Uber’s history.”

    The embattled company had hit the reset button, without its controversial CEO, it would, Huffington declared, be “a new Uber”. It lasted all of six minutes and 45 seconds, when another board member, venture capitalist David Bonderman, interjected with a sexist joke, saying that more women on the board means “it’s much more likely to be more talking”.

    Within a few hours, Bonderman had resigned, the latest in a seemingly never-ending stream of company leaders and senior executives who have either been forced out or, more often, simply abandoned ship.

    Let me finish that for you Arianna: “He wants to be part of us turning a new page and together building the next chapter in Uber’s history and that is why he isn’t here, because the best thing he can do for all is to just fucking disappear from the face of the planet.”

  48. 48.

    Kay

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Right, but parents actually have more of an excuse. Kids only have one set of parents. They might have to be hypocrites. There are thousands of politicians. The worst of the worst go out of their way to speak on this this? They could just shut up. That’s a possibility. Let someone with some credibility say it.

  49. 49.

    Schlemazel

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:
    Woody was a ‘gentleman of the South’ He issued an executive order forbidding the hiring of Negros and removal of those already in place. He also officially segregated the Army. He sent the Marines to Haiti to overthrow the legitimately elected government because it was made up of black former slaves. He replaced it with a white government.

    Is there any wonder there was a huge increase in lynching and growth of the KKK under the schoolmaster of politics?

  50. 50.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    The Carter hatred and the Obama hatred had a lot in common in that area – personal qualities- decency

    Then they are sure to love me.

  51. 51.

    SFAW

    What? We’ve had a lot of dishonest “debates” after shootings, but this has to be the worst. We’re now on a different planet.

    An irrational fear of mine is that the RWNJs inclined to do so will use Hodgkinson’s spree as an excuse to get us on the road to Gilead.

    As I said, it’s irrational. I just wish it were a lot more irrational.

  52. 52.

    Schlemazel

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    I am still trying to figure out how a company that has not always paid its employees (and shorted many on other occasions) yet still never made a profit could be worth $70B. Sounds like the 90s all over again & one day investors will wake up and wonder where their money went.

  54. 54.

    Quinerly

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    Haven’t checked in with my friends about how they feel about the cost thing now that the museum will remove for free. Big discussion last week at breakfast with St. Louis native, Liberal (you probably even know him from your Soulard/Venice Cafe days). He is adamant about not removing it…mostly because of “history.” He retreated to the cost argument. I’m shocked about his feelings on this. In his defense, he has written a lengthy poem about the whole removal saga…his “compromise” is to leave the monument and rededicate it to the victims of gun violence. He is one of three close male friends in their 60’s (natives) who have been very vocal at our Sunday breakfasts about non removal. They were also very passionate about non removal in NOLA. Come to think of it, they also see nothing wrong with the “Redskins” remaining the “Redskins.”

  55. 55.

    Baud

    @Schlemazel: I think Wilson is how far back in time I’d have to go to have considered voting for the GOP candidate (or the Bull Moose!)

    ETA: The only other possible exception is Eisenhower. He was very likeable.

  57. 57.

    satby

    @Kay:

    They could not admit the Democrat had taken the higher ground- they think they own that real estate.

    I’ve always felt that one of main reasons the Obamas were so hated was envy. Yeah, sure, racism; but the racism was exacerbated by envy that those two people coming from modest backgrounds had achieved so much by their own hard work and merits in spite of the racism they faced every day. The people who hated them the most knew the Obamas earned every single thing they had and also knew that they were deeply admired for it. The haters never had the ambition, the tenacity, the intelligence, or the guts; and they resented the hell out of the President and FLOTUS for having all the qualities the haters lacked.

  59. 59.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Quinerly:

    mostly because of “history.”

    Jeebus. Did you mention to him that these “monuments” exist for the sole purpose of reinforcing the doctored history that is the Lost Cause?

  60. 60.

    Schlemazel

    @Baud:
    Everybody likes Ike.
    The problem was the people he brought in, and not just that SOB, Nixon. Ike’s state Dept scuttled the elections in Viet Nam and sent Marines (one unit used to brag they had been there since 1957) setting the stage for what would follow. They overthrew the elected government of Iran & installed the Shah, they did nothing while Batista raped Cuba or while Castro was leading a revolution (they also planned the Bay of Pigs but left JFK holding the bag). Then there is all the damage they did in Central America and the Caribbean. Plus he never had the courage to speak against the Senator from Wisconsin (silence in the face of party supported violence against Americans is a GOP trait I guess)

  61. 61.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    Kay, do you know of this guy? He’s a RWNJ talking head around here. Listening to a local PBS roundtable program last night discussing the Salisse shooting, he condemned the anger and violence on the left. The other panelists (usually calm) erupted in protest, saying the anger is a reaction not only to Trump, but to the past 8 years. He dismissed that, saying only “the here and now” should be at issue. I almost threw my television out the window.

    I think this “here and now” is going to be the next GOP talking point.

  62. 62.

    Quinerly

    @BC in Illinois:
    I am flabbergasted by several friends’ support of the monument. See my other comment. I even printed out this inscription and had it with me at our regular breakfast gathering on Sunday to be ready when the discussion came up. For the most part these men have no connection to the war…no ancestors who fought (I do. Grew up with pictures of relatives who were Southern heroes, etc)Try as I might, I can’t convince them that it is racist, an insult to others…that no other country I can think of built monuments to losers/traitors. Don’t even get me started on the military bases named after Civil War era Southerners. I’m on the smarty pants phone so typing that screed would be impossible for me.?

  64. 64.

    Baud

    @Schlemazel: Yeah. I know. But we can only guess what Adlai would have done. On foreign affairs in the 1950s, I’m not sure how deep partisan differences were.

  65. 65.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    Kay, are you familiar with Mike Gonidakis? He’s president of Ohio Right to Life and a RWNJ talking head around here. Listening to a local PBS roundtable program last night discussing the Salisse shooting, he condemned the anger and violence on the left. The other panelists (usually calm) erupted in protest, saying the anger is a reaction not only to Trump, but to the past 8 years. He dismissed that, saying only “the here and now” should be at issue. I almost threw my television out the window.

    I think this “here and now” is going to be the next GOP talking point.

  67. 67.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Schlemazel: Fuck the stockholders. I hope those soulless sons of bitches lose everything they’ve ever had and all they might ever get:

    Critics argue that a dismissive attitude toward drivers is embedded in the company’s current business model, which is dependent on cheap labor. Yet Uber’s recent public discussions of reform have barely broached the issue of its relationship with drivers, which is often tested when workers are put in vulnerable positions.

    Casmir Patterson, 32, found early on in her Uber-driving career that she preferred to work late nights, when the LA traffic was more tolerable and when she could provide rides to women looking for a safe way to get home. But on 13 June 2016, during her last ride of the night, three intoxicated men entered her vehicle in West Hollywood and she quickly sensed trouble.

    One of her passengers sounded like he was going to vomit in her car. She pulled over and asked the trio to leave. They refused, and then dragged her into her backseat where they started punching her. “I thought I was going to die,” she told the Guardian.

    The men eventually fled, but not before kicking the outside of her car and running off with her keys.

    Patterson called police and reported the incident to Uber in the hope that the company could track down her attackers and help her with medical bills. But the criminal investigation went nowhere, and Uber, she said, did little to support her. LA police did not respond to repeated inquiries.

    A week before the incident, Patterson had signed a lease through Uber’s vehicle loan program, known as Xchange. She was required to pay weekly fees of about $146. As a result, Patterson had no choice but to keep driving for Uber, despite suffering from post-traumatic stress stemming from the attack as well damaged vision in her right eye.

    “I just felt like I was trapped, like I was an Uber slave,” she said, noting that she could barely drive enough hours to make the car payments. Unable to keep up with her bills, she ended up living out of her leased Uber vehicle for about a month until, running of options, she moved back home to Chicago, where she fell further into debt before her car was repossessed. “It’s just been a domino effect,” she said. “It’s really ruined my life.”

    An Uber spokesperson said in a statement to the Guardian that after Patterson reported the incident, the passenger who booked the ride was immediately blocked from the platform, and after further investigation was banned permanently.

    “Uber does not tolerate any violence in our community and this incident was upsetting,” the spokesperson said.

    Uber also noted that it has recently launched a pilot program to give drivers the option of purchasing injury protection insurance.

    Patterson is just one of several women driving for Uber who have come forward in recent months to share stories of assault and harassment. But despite all of its promises of corporate reform, there appear to be few if any substantive changes that enhance the rights of victimized drivers.

    Oh, well, that’s mighty white of you.

  68. 68.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Kathleen:

    Meeting friend for lunch and Wonder Woman.

    You’re meeting Wonder Woman? Can I come too?

    Good morning, all, by the way.

  69. 69.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Kay:

    “My dear friend Steve Scalise took a bullet for all of us.”

    In addition to your other excellent points, it’s simply NOT TRUE. Scalise didn’t take a bullet for anyone, as far as I know. Did he step in front of someone to protect them? No, he was targeted and shot. He took a bullet “for all of us” as much as I just ate my oatmeal for all of us. The rest of you don’t need breakfast.

  70. 70.

    MomSense

    @debbie:

    Ok “the here and now” makes me laugh a bit since that has been the message a lot of us have used in a religious context to explain our different focus from the christianists who are mostly concerned with the after death.

  73. 73.

    Quinerly

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    Of course. I just don’t get it. Smart men. Good friends. I’m floored. They also love the argument of “where does this end, once you start this.” Last Sunday’s breakfast got a bit heated. I’m the organizer of our Sunday breakfasts…used Father’s Day as an excuse to not have our regular gathering tomorrow. Hoping things will cool down by next Sunday. Can’t describe how shocked and disappointed I am in my dear, dear friend and the other two. It’s not these guys nature but I really felt they kinda ganged up on me about it. Almost like they were very possessive of THEIR city’s monuments.

  75. 75.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Quinerly:

    They were also very passionate about non removal in NOLA. Come to think of it, they also see nothing wrong with the “Redskins” remaining the “Redskins.”

    Hmmm, can you say white male privilege?

  76. 76.

    Another Scott

    @Quinerly: As you might imagine, there are a vast number of Confederate monuments in Virginia, including in the middle of important roadways that need to be improved.

    Unfortunately, there is text in the Virginia Code going back to 1950 that makes them permanent.

    § 15.2-1812

    Memorials for war veterans

    A locality may, within the geographical limits of the locality, authorize and permit the erection of monuments or memorials for any war or conflict, or for any engagement of such war or conflict, to include the following monuments or memorials: Algonquin (1622), French and Indian (1754-1763), Revolutionary (1775-1783), War of 1812 (1812-1815), Mexican (1846-1848), Confederate or Union monuments or memorials of the War Between the States (1861-1865), Spanish-American (1898), World War I (1917-1918), World War II (1941-1945), Korean (1950-1953), Vietnam (1965-1973), Operation Desert Shield-Desert Storm (1990-1991), Global War on Terrorism (2000- ), Operation Enduring Freedom (2001- ), and Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003- ). If such are erected, it shall be unlawful for the authorities of the locality, or any other person or persons, to disturb or interfere with any monuments or memorials so erected, or to prevent its citizens from taking proper measures and exercising proper means for the protection, preservation and care of same. For purposes of this section, “disturb or interfere with” includes removal of, damaging or defacing monuments or memorials, or, in the case of the War Between the States, the placement of Union markings or monuments on previously designated Confederate memorials or the placement of Confederate markings or monuments on previously designated Union memorials.The governing body may appropriate a sufficient sum of money out of its funds to complete or aid in the erection of monuments or memorials to the veterans of such wars. The governing body may also make a special levy to raise the money necessary for the erection or completion of any such monuments or memorials, or to supplement the funds already raised or that may be raised by private persons, Veterans of Foreign Wars, the American Legion or other organizations. It may also appropriate, out of any funds of such locality, a sufficient sum of money to permanently care for, protect and preserve such monuments or memorials and may expend the same thereafter as other funds are expended.

    (Emphasis added.)

    They wanted the monuments to the system that supported – and waged a treasonous war to support – slavery to last forever. The law needs to be changed. Unfortunately, the Teabaggers have the majority in the legislature (via gerrymandering), so it’s an uphill battle (one of many, like Medicaid Expansion)…

    Huzzah! for those states and localities that are successful in removing these monuments, but the battle will go on for a long time….

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  77. 77.

    Currants

    Sail Boston for me today, though here at the water it’s completely foggy. (Stayed at a friend’s in the North End last night.)

  78. 78.

    Schlemazel

    @O. Felix Culpa:
    Maybe it was part of the NRA’s “leave a bullet – take a bullet” program so you don’t have to have loose bullets in your pocket. They have little trays by the cash register in convenience stores.

  80. 80.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Schlemazel:

    Maybe it was part of the NRA’s “leave a bullet – take a bullet” program

    That’s so ridiculous it could be true, in the inverted logic world of the NRA and their cultists.

  81. 81.

    Schlemazel

    @Another Scott:
    the bastards knew to plan ahead I guess. If they are near roadways I wonder if the roads could be built around them so that they could not easily be gotten to & then have shrubbery & trees planted to hide them?

  82. 82.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Schlemazel:

    One senior Silicon Valley executive whom Uber tried and failed to poach last year told the Guardian that his job interview left him with the impression the company had little regard for its current fleet of human workers.

    The executive said he asked Uber’s chief product officer, Jeff Holden, about the company’s long-term viability given the discontent he had observed among its drivers, and was shocked at the reply. “He said, ‘Well, we’re just going to replace them all with robots’. It was quite chilling.” (An Uber spokesman said that Holden does not recall making the comments.)

    “There was zero human empathy,” the executive said of his impression during the recruitment process. “It was as if he was saying ‘Duh. Who cares if they complain?’ That was the moment I thought, ‘I don’t want to work here.’”

    Uber views its human drivers as a stopgap, a prelude to a roboticized and thus far more profitable era. In the meantime, Uber appears to be adopting sophisticated psychological tricks to manipulate its drivers into acting with the kind of efficiency it would expect from machines.

  84. 84.

    Kay

    @O. Felix Culpa:

    I just have no idea what it means. It sounds like it might make sense at first reading so it’s more of a disappointment that Trump’s usual bellowing.

    My husband is driving the Democratic float in the town parade today. If people yell at him (which they do) he yells back. He doesn’t cuss but I know he’ll be like “yeah? YOU TOO!”

    He mostly reads sports so I bet he missed the whole civility lecture :)

  87. 87.

    Schlemazel

    @O. Felix Culpa:
    Sick humor is all I have left.

    I envisioned a guy digging through the little tray to find the right caliber so he could hold up the attendant. Can’t help it I am addicted to self-amuse

  88. 88.

    Lurking Canadian

    @Schlemazel: Actually, a service-provision company that can get by without paying the employees who actually provide the service would be a pretty profitable business model.

    You just have to fight through all that “ethics” and “humanity” stuff that sometimes gets in the way.

  89. 89.

    Quinerly

    @O. Felix Culpa:
    I’m beginning to see that. Very shocking, though, on this subject. These three men are quite the Civil War history buffs (The one that I am quite close to…I knew that; the other two I did not know that about them until the three of them got so worked up Sunday discussing battles…geez). All three were rather strong BS supporters in the beginning. All three switched to HRC. I’m rambling but trying to connect some dots. Very disappointed in these guys. Obviously there is a streak through them that I was unaware of for 30 years.

  90. 90.

    Schlemazel

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    I was aware that Ubers long-term goal was self-driving cars. It does not surprise me that they think so little of their human resources, this is corporate thinking for a long time now. You have to wonder who will be using Uber when nobody is working, robots don’t need a cab

  91. 91.

    hueyplong

    @Another Scott: In the town where I live, there is a memorial in the middle of the street depicting an angel bearing a fallen Confederate to heaven. Thanks to this board, instead of mumbling obscenities when I see it, I point, say “participation trophy,” and laugh.

    In my car, of course. Don’t want to get shot. Being a whiter shade of pale is like wearing a bullet proof vest, but that vest doesn’t cover everything.

  92. 92.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @MomSense:

    the christianists who are mostly concerned with the after death.

    Their actions say they don’t believe in an after life.

  93. 93.

    Kay

    Years after everyone else in the world, transparency advocates realize there’s no actual transparency or accountability in Wikileaks:

    We were disturbed, however, to learn that Julian Assange and WikiLeaks sent cease and desist letters to our distributors demanding they stop the release of Risk: “We therefore demand that you immediately cease the use and distribution of all images of the Named Participants and that you desist from this or any other infringement of the rights of the Named Participants in the future.”

    “Information wants to be free”, Julian. Like a butterfly. Release the butterflies.

    File this under “Donald Trump lectures nation on civility”

  94. 94.

    Schlemazel

    @Lurking Canadian:
    Yes, their business model should be profitable . . . but it is not. That makes no sense but that fact that this failing model is booked at $70 makes even less sense.

  95. 95.

    Another Scott

    @Schlemazel: The “Appomattox” statue is right in the middle of the main N-S drag in Alexandria. It’s impossible to not see when driving on that stretch of road…

    Even before that 1950 law, the Confederates made sure that it would be permanent.

    To ensure that the statue would not be moved at some future date, the UCV [United Confederate Veterans] had legislation introduced into the Virginia House of Delegates which passed on January 9th, 1890 and which reads in part: And whereas it is the desire of the said Robert E. Lee camp of Confederate Veterans and also the citizens and inhabitants of said City of Alexandria that such a monument shall remain in its present position as a perpetual and lasting testimonial to the courage, fidelity and patriotism of the heroes in whose memory it was erected… the permission so given by the said City Council of Alexandria for its erection shall not be repealed, revoked, altered, modified, or changed by any future Council or other municipal power or authority.

    There’s something fundamentally undemocratic about a handful of people in a particular place and time vetoing any future changes for all time. That law needs to be changed.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  96. 96.

    CarolDuhart2

    @Quinerly: Isn’t it worth noting too, that the descendants of those being honored, the generals and such, aren’t too worked up about the removals? It seems to be people not living in or having ancestors in the area who are most worked up about keeping the monuments. Did you ask whether or not the black locals who actually have a say in the matter should have it?

  97. 97.

    Quinerly

    @Baud:
    You are sure right about that. This was brewing a week prior. Escalated at warp speed last Sunday. Many people in our group just choked down their 5 buck breakfast and fled. I was left to fight the battle with my friends….in a South City biker bar, no less.? We finally took the discussion to the parking lot. Biker guys were jumping in to defend the monument. Yes, I know the culture but we go to this place every Sunday because woman owned, 5 buck breakfast and $2 Bloody Marys. That’s another story.?

  98. 98.

    Ken

    @Baud:

    I’d advise Bill Clinton to go on TV and preach to the American people that we all need to stop cheating on our spouses.

    Newt Gingrich was already doing that.

  99. 99.

    Quinerly

    @CarolDuhart2:
    All those arguments covered. That’s when the corner backing starts?….that’s when the “city is broke and shouldn’t be spending $ on this” arguments start. I’m going with my NM friend’s argument above…”white male privilege”….it seems to have some roots here.

  100. 100.

    BC in Illinois

    @Baud:
    @Quinerly:

    The comments I have seen in the local Post-Dispatch and Riverfront Times [ Yeah, I know, I know . . . comments! ] usually tend toward the “What about Washington? Or Jefferson? Or the Arch?” Which is a variation on “where do you stop?” To which my answer is that you stop on this side of glorifying what was done wrong. That’s what I hear people doing when they talk about Washington and Jefferson. There are things you can’t defend. Even the Arch makes the attempt to place Native American history into the story of “Westward Expansion.”

    But the most vehement reactions are the ones along the line of “Oh, yeah, take down the monument – – THAT will bring down the murder rate ! That’ll solve all our problems.” This is an argument I have little use for–even if it comes from people who are indeed trying to solve some of our problems. The point is, this Monument is a problem. It’s not a relic of the Civil War. It’s a relic of 1914 White Supremacy; an era of let’s all get together and celebrate, being white, together.

    The only thing to do is to try to get people to see things as they appear to others. You’re analogy to the Washington Redskins is right on the money:

    Come to think of it, they also see nothing wrong with the “Redskins” remaining the “Redskins.”

    I grew up near Washington. When I think of “The Redskins,” I think of Sonny Jergensen, Charley Taylor, Larry Brown, Charley Harraway, Art Monk. John Riggins. But John Oliver had the best depiction of someone defending the name of the team . . .

    “What? Change the name of the Redskins ?!? But . . but . . . but . . . yeah, you’re right.”

    It feels like we’re losing something, but we’re not.

  103. 103.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Schlemazel:

    The Guardian provided Uber with detailed questions about homeless drivers and their struggles with car payments and low wages. The company’s response was a two-sentence statement, released through a spokesperson.

    “With Uber people make their own decisions about when, where and how long to drive. We’re focused on making sure that driving with Uber is a rewarding experience, however you choose to work.”

    It’s all about the freedumb.

  104. 104.

    bemused

    @Quinerly:

    Huh, seems like typical white guys not liking women disagreeing with them. Did any use the word “hysterical”?

  105. 105.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Another Scott:

    Robert E. Lee camp of Confederate Veterans

    Something tells me the members of that group were not veterans of any actual battles during that “rich man’s war and poor man’s fight.”

  106. 106.

    Quinerly

    @debbie:
    I personally think every last monument having anything to do with the Confederacy should be removed. I’m from the South,with deep Southern roots. I have always thought they should be removed. I have to admit in the last 10 years that I evolved a bit. There was a time I rationalized keeping those generic Southern soldier ones that you see outside almost every Southern courthouse. Now, I’m so disgusted by all of it and the way people have behaved over the flag and these removals, I feel very strongly about EVERYTHING coming down (ok, except the monuments in the cemeteries…haven’t gotten to that point yet…and I don’t mean the individual grave ones, I mean the generic monuments in many Southern cemeteries…I struggle with my thoughts about those…I visit a lot of cemeteries.)

  107. 107.

    Another Scott

    In other news…:

    The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has raised a record amount of money for the month of May, according to fundraising figures provided exclusively to Roll Call.

    The campaign arm for House Democrats raised more than $9.3 million last month, with more than two-thirds of the funds raised through grassroots online, phone and mail donations. The boost in funds comes after the House passed the GOP health care bill, and amid a closely watched special election in Georgia’s 6th District.

    “The huge enthusiasm gap between Democrats and Republicans has shown up in special elections, primaries, and with record-breaking small-dollar fundraising,” DCCC spokesman Tyler Law said in a statement. “Democrats are unified heading into the 2018 midterms, and we will continue to channel grassroots energy towards flipping seats on the largest House battleground we’ve seen in a decade.”
    According to the fundraising figures, the DCCC raised $6.55 million through its grassroots programs, with $4.5 million coming from online donations, with an average donation of $19.

    […]

    Good, good. More, please.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  108. 108.

    bemused

    I recently read that some confederate monuments in AZ were not put up decades ago but in the 2000’s which surprised me. I wonder how prevalent that is across the country.

  109. 109.

    Quinerly

    @Another Scott:
    Scott..thanks for your other posts up thread. Saving them for thorough read over breakfast this AM. I really need to quit lying around in bed these mornings with BAlloon Juicers while I’m rambling on and trying to read on the smarty pants phone. Serious stuff requires a lap top.

  110. 110.

    Frankensteinbeck

    How annoying. Let’s try that again.

    Mr. Kerr, the Republican congress clearly does not want to jeopardize the power they had to cheat (and winning by losing the popular vote by 2.8 million is a LOT of cheating) to get. Otherwise, you are dead on. Ryan pursued his own agenda. McConnell pursues his own agenda. Nobody gives a damn what Trump wants.

    @Kay:
    Assholes demand to be praised for being assholes. One popular way is to pretend they are the only blameless, when they are the worst to blame.

    @Quinerly:
    Racism comes at all levels. One of the most common is an attitude that black lives do not matter. The suffering of minorities is a theoretical thing that must always give way to whatever they want. They may even be totally sympathetic to minority suffering that does not interfere with their minor desires. A few steps up from that is getting actively angry at any attempt to make black lives matter. In both cases, they would not want to believe themselves racist, so they don’t. If their desires are more important than minorities, why should they make the sacrifice of self-awareness?

  112. 112.

    Gretchen

    I love that they keep describing Trump’s lawyer as a pit bull. Pit bulls might have worked in NY real estate. They don’t seem to realize that now they’re up against the 101st airborne and a team of Navy Seals aka “government workers.”

  113. 113.

    Quinerly

    @bemused:
    Well, McCain and his state were some of the last hold outs on making MLK Day a national holiday. That should tell you something. And yes, I’m painting with a broad brush.

  114. 114.

    Another Scott

    @Schlemazel: BI from May 12:

    But despite Uber’s popularity, its original business plan is in jeopardy and it faces the unappealing prospect of having to spend massive amounts of cash while simultaneously managing Kalanick’s excesses and reforming its company culture.

    “Uber has a great strategy and is a great company,” Evan Rawley, a Columbia Business School Professor, told Business Insider. “But it wanted to be the only national ridesharing platform, and it hasn’t been able to eliminate the competition.”

    Rawley, who wrote his dissertation on the taxi-and-limousine business, said that Uber aimed to be a monopoly — a winner-takes-all-tech player — but that it will have to settle for being the “leader of an oligopoly.”

    “Network effects are important,” he added. “Uber will be most profitable in the long run, but right now it’s spending way too much fighting Lyft and is engaged in a costly battle for market share.”

    […]

    Rawley doesn’t think that Uber is facing any true existential threats, but he’s less sure about Kalanick.

    “I think Uber is here to say,” he said. “The bigger question is, ‘Is the management team here to stay?’ Management is playing a very dangerous game.”

    Effectively, Uber’s core strategy for dominance has worked, but it’s become disastrously expensive. And unless Uber figures out how to stop losing almost $1 billion every three months, even as revenue increases, the real threats could appear.

    “Uber will have pricing power,” Rawley said. “But it’s going to have start using it soon, or there’s no way they’re going to exist.”

    That pricing power, of course, means making users pay more, setting the cost of rides at a company-determined price rather than at a level determined by market competition. It’s classic monopolistic — or oligopolistic — behavior, and Rawley thinks it could eventually attract the attention of government antitrust regulators.

    If Uber doesn’t shift into an extraction mode, however, it will be time to raise more money from investors — investors who Rawley thinks this time around will be less enthusiastic about letting Kalanick run the show.

    “That’s what at stake,” Rawley said. “Travis could lose his job.”

    Hmm….

    Uber’s business model is all about the Monopoly. Unfortunately for them, it can’t work (as long as governments are willing do do their jobs anyway). It seems obvious to this outside observer (who has never used Uber and never will if he has a choice) that it was a pipe-dream from the beginning: “Oooh – I’ve got an app! And I claim that my employees aren’t employees! And rules that my competition has to follow don’t apply to me! Pay me all the moneys!!1”

    :-/

    Cheers,
    Scott.
    (“Sharing” isn’t a legitimate business model – it’s not “sharing”; it’s exploitation and breaking the rules.)

  115. 115.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Quinerly: Yes! Now I can ascribe all my less-than-astute remarks to my smarty pants phone! Thank you. ;)

    ETA: All my spelling errors, also too.

  116. 116.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Another Scott:

    it’s exploitation and breaking the rules.

    It is exploitation but I feel the need to point out that the rules were expressly written to allow it.

  117. 117.

    Quinerly

    @bemused:
    No. No use of the word “hysterical.” These men are dear friends..known them 30 years…let’s not lump them in those stereotypes. They are poets and musicians, ex Vista, Peace Corps workers. World travelers. The one who is one of my closest friends has a daughter..only child..that he mostly reared. On the weekends, 30 plus years ago when she was 5 or 6, he would let her paint his face, practically dress him because that’s what she wanted to do. They would hang out in our funky little neighborhood like that. I’m just baffled over this Confederate monument thing.

  118. 118.

    CarolDuhart2

    @CarolDuhart2: Also, I noticed back when the New Orleans monuments were being removed, that those who protested the removals were from out of town. To me, this was the paradox of white flight: those who objected to the removals were, or were descended from, those who fled the black residents. Therefore, they no longer had the ability to vote against the removals in the first place.

    Also, as American cities become more international in both business ties, immigration and tourism, explaining these monuments to resentment become harder.

  119. 119.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo fka Edmund Dantes

    So there’s an article in Politico (I won’t link) calling Mike Dense the “mostest consequential Vice President EVAR”, ignoring completely the notion of what Harry Truman walked into.

  120. 120.

    MomSense

    @Quinerly:

    I had an experience like that last summer when I met some college years friends I hadn’t seen in decades. It was truly shocking. I lost them to ? news and freedumb. I have since found out that the secret service paid a visit to one of them because of some things he posted on (anti) social media when Obama was president. It’s honestly like some sort of parasite has invaded their brains.

  122. 122.

    bemused

    @Quinerly:

    I can see why you are baffled. They don’t seem to fit in the pro-confederate monument camp. If you ever get to the bottom of this mystery, I hope you will share what you learn.

    I found the story of AZ monuments/markers put up in last twenty years, new phoenix times. The revival of civil war pride came with southerners who moved to AZ. Although the article didn’t say so, I’m picturing white southern conservative retirees.

  123. 123.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @Quinerly:

    white male supremacy white male supremacy white male supremacy white male supremacy white male supremacy white male supremacy white male supremacy white male supremacy white male supremacy white male supremacy

    Only white men can point it out to other white men and it needs to be called what it is. Good luck with that, because it’s a helluva drug that white men of the left and right don’t want to give up.

  125. 125.

    Quinerly

    @MomSense:
    My guys all Obama lovers (and BS lovers). Other than their love of all things BS, the only thing that I have differed with them on is the St. Louis Confederate monument thing. They are less passionate about other Confederate monuments (Although the one I’m closest to, did get himself worked up over NOLA’s Lee Circle). I admitted to myself long ago that St. Louis is a very racially divided/racist town (I was shocked when I got here from NC in 1982…certainly more racist than the area I was from). I think we have a bit of white male privilege at work here, coupled with something very deep about race that has bubbled up.

  127. 127.

    stinger

    @Kay: I want somebody to ask him if he’ll promise never to do anything like that again. ‘Cause I don’t see language like that in his “apology”.

  128. 128.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @the Conster, la Citoyenne:

    Only white men can point it out to other white men and it needs to be called what it is. Good luck with that, because it’s a helluva drug that white men of the left and right don’t want to give up.

    It’s not that they don’t want to give it up (they don’t), it’s that they don’t even want the existence of it to be acknowledged. As long as they can pretend it isn’t there, it’s all good.

  129. 129.

    tobie

    @O. Felix Culpa: @Kay: The GOP loves them some sacrificial lamb if it enables them to get their cruel agenda through. Steven Scales didn’t take “a bullet for us all.” He got shot for what he is and does and for the policies he advances. The shooting is horrible, but not symbolic. The people who were representing something who got shot were the two Capitol police people. They were hit not because of anything they did or said but as symbols of the rule of law, duty to country, etc. I hate the whole rhetoric of sacrifice, but if one wants to insist on it, the only appropriate thing to say is that the Capitol police “took a bullet for us all,” meaning Americans caught in the crossfire of politics.

  130. 130.

    Quinerly

    @O. Felix Culpa:
    I just say, “damn you, tiny keyboard.” Right now, I must quit lounging around in bed with all you guys, Poco, and tiny keyboard and get moving. Thanks guys. Didn’t mean to hijack the thread. I blame Ozark. He sucks.?

  131. 131.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Hence the obsession with making everything about class and economic anxiety – means they don’t have to look in a mirror.

  133. 133.

    bemused

    @the Conster, la Citoyenne:

    Truth. White males are born winning a participation trophy. Even the most decent, progressive white men I know can be pretty oblivious to a lot of the manifestations of “isms” that are immediately picked up on by women, people of color, etc. For example, my women friends and I will point out to our husbands when a guy is being condescending and talking over us, not overtly but we women caught it immediately. The other guys are shocked, they didn’t notice it because they rarely or never experience it.

  134. 134.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo fka Edmund Dantes: I saw that, no I didn’t read it. However, here’s a profile of Misery’s own Jason Kander:

    Since losing his Senate race to Blunt last year—Kander nearly won in a state Clinton lost by 19 points, and picked up 220,000 crossover Trump voters by running on a progressive economic message—he’s become a star of the Democratic grassroots circuit. He’s picked up 100,000 new Twitter followers and a CNN contributor contract. He’s been embraced by the insular Obama orbit and all but adopted by Joe Biden, who sees in Kander a little of his late son Beau, another earnest young Army veteran. The former vice president spent many a donor dinner last year calling out to a staffer “give me the iPad” so he could play the rifle ad—which has been view nearly 1.5 million times on Kander’s YouTube channel—for them himself.

    Under attack by Blunt and the NRA for not understanding guns, he put together an assault rifle, blindfolded, while ticking through his record in the Army and fighting for background checks in the statehouse—finishing in under 30 seconds with a dare: “I approved this message because I’d like to see Senator Blunt do this.”

    There’s not much market for more of Ted Strickland or Katie McGinty, who also lost Senate races last year, or Alison Lundergan Grimes, the Kentucky secretary of state who tanked a Senate race of her own in 2014. But people can’t get enough of Kander.

    “He’s clearly a star and everybody knows it,” said Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.), who campaigned for Kander and has continued checking in with him by phone. They met when Franken did a USO show in Kabul in 2006, and though Franken doesn’t remember that, Kander has made an impression on him since: “He’s the funniest of the candidates that we’ve had since I started doing this.”

    If Kander had beaten Blunt last year and been a freshman progressive Democratic senator from a red state with a history that includes fighting for voting rights and serving as an intelligence officer in Afghanistan, he’d be at the top of all the 2020 speculation lists. Now, “he’s a winning commodity—but there’s no elected position for him,” is how one high-ranking Missouri Democratic aide put it, despite the hopes of some local Democrats that he’d run instead of top GOP target Claire McCaskill next year. .

  135. 135.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @bemused:

    Trying to point out the privilege white men swim in – especially mediocre ones – is like explaining water to fish. They get extremely defensive. But once pointed out to them and they see what us non-males non-whites see, it can’t be unseen. In fact, it’s the only way you can see.

  138. 138.

    Immanentize

    @Quinerly: I know you probably left the thread, but reading all your comments, I think I see what might be up with your three friends. You say that they are all civil war buffs. I’m thinking Robbie Robertson and the band. Or Tom Petty It’s not so much much the racism, etc. that they might feel is being attacked — it’s their expertise. It’s their view of their own efforts and understanding that’s at stake. So, they probably agree with all of your arguments, but they have a lot invested in their efforts which they never before investigated. Have you tried to ask them sincerely, without arguing back, what they are most interested in when studying civil war history? Maybe if you listen for that part of their passion, you will find a way to help them to your point of view?

  139. 139.

    cmorenc

    Most courthouse squares in the south have a monument somewhere on the grounds, most often an obelisk – and most of them have a simple inscription “to our confederate dead” (not enough room at the base of most obelisk monuments for elaborate, extended wording). Simple monuments that acknowledge community loss of its native sons in conflict, without adding flowery bullshit nobly justifying the Confederate cause – are more counterproductive to seek removal of than they’re worth – those are monuments more to the local boys of local families who were lost in that war than to the cause they served. It’s easy to tell if the wording of a particular monument is focused instead more on praising or justifying the Confederate cause – if some form of the word “chivalry” appears in the wording, it’s a monument at least as much about bullshit defense of cause as about local boys who were lost, and deserves consideration for removal.

  140. 140.

    bemused

    @the Conster, la Citoyenne:

    The blatant, in your face behavior, decent white guys will notice. They don’t catch the more subtle superior attitude behaviors, not subtle to those getting put down but harder for white guys to see. So we gotta keep pointing it out as it happens so decent white guys start paying closer attention, develop the radar the rest of us have from lifelong experience.

  142. 142.

    Immanentize

    @cmorenc: And when did the monument go up? In the years soon after the war? Or in the 20th century during Jim Crow?

    All over rural upstate New York, there are also local monuments near courthouses memorializing the locals who went to fight for the union. Some bigger cities — like Binghamton near where I was raised — even have some civil war hardware (mortars in Bingo) to go with the monuments.

  143. 143.

    Quinerly

    @cmorenc:
    Good comment. The counties I am most familiar with in my home state mostly have that generic Confederate soldier with inscriptions similar to what you describe. Side story..my mother was born in 1923. She was the first great grandchild of a man who had fought in the war. He lived in the same house..a lot of extended family…he was beloved by his grandchildren, including my mom’s mom. He was sick for a couple of years but wanted to live long enough to see my mother walk. As the story goes, the day he died, she started walking and wouldn’t stop. So back to the generic Confederate soldier monument at the Pitt County, NC courthouse…My mother’s “Grandpa Bill Joe” was so revered in that household that my mother actually thought the generic soldier monument was her great grandpa…she would shake her head and say that she pretty much thought that until just before she went to college. Her family had been too poor to own slaves.

  145. 145.

    Quinerly

    @Immanentize:
    The generic Confederate soldier ones that I have commented on at the county seats that I’m most familiar with went up shortly after the war, some as late as early 1900’s.

  148. 148.

    Immanentize

    @Quinerly: Those seem appropriate and sorta sad when I see them. But when I see a civil war general or Jeff Davis my friggin blood boils.

    I had a dear friend and colleague who was a civil war buff — very knowledgeable about it all. Travelled to all the battlefields and cemataries that he could. Especially the small town cemtaries — looking for the vets stones. So one time he was in Jackson Mississippi at a family law conference and he was talking to a Mississippi lawyer at the bar after the conference who was also a civil war buff. My friend Charley said, “You know, Mississippi is the southern state that had the most people who ended up fighting for the Union.”. The guy looked at him like he was crazy and was going to object — if not punch him, when it dawned on him and he replied “Oh, You are referring to the black Mississippians….”

  149. 149.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Quinerly: I was similarly shocked to find the racist attitudes in a friend of mine, of over a decade and half. But when she never once criticized T and even defended the first travel ban, scales fell from eyes. Her dormant racism had become virulent over the second half of President O’s administration, of course she still doesn’t see it that way.
    ETA: I don’t think racism is gender specific.

  150. 150.

    Immanentize

    @schrodingers_cat: I just don’t get how people can do that. What was it that either made your friend more racist or made her feel she could let her freak flag fly??

  152. 152.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Immanentize: She is personally in a unhappy place. She moved to be near her mother who was old and ailing, they never had a great relationship, moving closer to her mother just made it worse. The mother passed away a little over a year ago. She lives in a blood red state now. I think its more acceptable to be like that in her social circle now than it was in the north east. I don’t know, this is just my guess.

  153. 153.

    Heidi Dog

    This discussion reminds me of an article I read years ago in (I think) the NYT, about white fraternities in post-apartheid South Africa. The frats welcomed black members with open arms, up until the point that the black members suggested making a few changes to incorporate some of their own traditions. (Sorry about the vagueness on details, it’s been a long time.) At that point, acceptance ceased. It seems the white men wanted to set the terms, and were willing to accept only those who bought into that scenario.

  154. 154.

    cmorenc

    @Immanentize:

    @cmorenc: And when did the monument go up? In the years soon after the war? Or in the 20th century during Jim Crow?

    Without even need to research the local history of a particular courthouse-square monument, the wording of its inscription is usually an easy giveaway as to the dominant motivation for its creation – look for ornately flowery wording about the noble chivalrous nature of the cause and the fine southern gentlemen who fought for its honor – um, you catch my drift here. Then, the monument is about something more than the tragic loss of some local boys in a tragic war – the monument is no longer about tragedy, but about alleged chivalrous nobility in serving the Confederate cause.

  156. 156.

    BC in Illinois

    @the Conster, la Citoyenne:

    But once pointed out to them and they see what us non-males non-whites see, it can’t be unseen. In fact, it’s the only way you can see.

    As Baud has rightly said:

    It’s hard to tell what will set people off.

    It’s also hard to tell what story, what insight, what piece of data will get through and make a difference.

    For me, there are lots of stories/moments/people – – but the moment I remember when something cracked and light shone through, was a standard newspaper article (of which there have been thousands of similar articles). This one was, I think in the Post-Dispatch in the ’70s, telling of yet another study that showed that a Black person applying for a loan / insurance / an apartment etc., would get more refusals, and if they were “approved,” they would get be charged more.

    Now. Think of how many articles like that you have read. (For many of you, think of experiences you have had like that.) Now, think about someone who has never thought about this aspect of the world at all. Think about me, picturing my world in my own mind: “I can get a car loan; the next guy can’t. I can get insurance; the next guy will be charged more. I can move wherever I want; the next guy can’t.”

    And yes, I can say I didn’t do this. I didn’t ask for things to be tilted my way. But I can’t unsee what has been seen .

    And yes, I can understand the desire to deny. I can understand the comfortable White male, thinking that if this reality is admitted, then he will have to go through life apologetic and ashamed (which is how he imagines that we are like).

    But there is a time when “seeing the light” just leads to more light and better light. Listening to more and different people means that they can point out more and different things that are coming to light.

    There is a Post-Dispatch reporter of the ’70s who thinks that their dry-as-dust reporting on an obscure study-like-so-many-studies was printed, disappeared, and was forgotten. That reporter is wrong. It still shines.

  157. 157.

    bemused

    @BC in Illinois:

    People who only listen to rightwing media probably don’t know any of this or would believe it if they read or hear it from other media.

  158. 158.

    frosty

    @cmorenc: I remember seeing the monument in Macon, GA, which said something like “To the soldiers who gave their lives to establish the Confederate States of America, 1861-1865”. That’s when the light bulb went off “These guys think they were right.”

    It also doesn’t seem like the flowery language you describe.

  159. 159.

    Heidi Dog

    @BC in Illinois: Beautifully said, BC. Yes, none of us alive today owned slaves, but then none of us wrote the Declaration of Independence either, yet we still celebrate those who did. (Credit to Ta-Nehisi Coates for that thought.) We all carry the burden of our history, good and bad.

  160. 160.

    Heidi Dog

    @Immanentize: Mississippi also had the Free State of Jones (the movie was based on fact). That’s a good rebuttal to all those who say “that’s just the way everyone thought back then.” Not everyone.

  161. 161.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @BC in Illinois:

    What a lovely hopeful comment. All of us white people need to do better, need to keep pushing, need to keep pointing out the system of oppression we are all suffering from is white male supremacy, not capitalism (which isn’t inherently evil and doesn’t have to be exploitative). Coupled with unfettered capitalism white male supremacy is deeply toxic, and a threat to democracy, the planet and all living things. So much so, that rich white males felt the need to commit treason with our enemy to keep control of the country rather than share it with women and blacks. They want to kill us all – including you white males who aren’t in their club. Get woke, white men.

  162. 162.

    Quinerly

    @cmorenc:
    Curious. What are your thoughts on the non flowery language ones…the obelisks/generic Confederate soldier ones…mostly in Southern town squares/outside of Southern courthouses put there shortly after the war (say, up to 50 years after the war)? Should they come down? Up until a few years ago, I thought they should stay. Now I don’t…as indicated in a long comment above.

  163. 163.

    J R in WV

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    This flooding issues isn’t new. When I was in my twenties, in the 1970s a mall (the very first one) was built in my hometown. It was built in a floodplain, which in the mountains is what all the low-lying flat ground is. Flat ground on hilltops and benches is not floodplain, but is scarce and built on early in development cycles.

    For years nothing really happened. Then another larger mall went in across the highway, using even more of the floodplain. The next heavy sustained rainfall caused the older mall to flood, along with the small amount of residential development still left in the area. Because the newer mall was built higher, to protect it from adverse weather events!

    ETA: A ton of money was spent (after several floods) to channelize the small creek that drained the area, making it large, concrete lined, and underground for several miles. I’m not sure if this worked, I don’t live there any more, and don’t keep in touch with the flood news there at all. My only friend in the area lives on a hill.

  164. 164.

    Mnemosyne

    @Quinerly:

    Coming in at the very end of the discussion, but next time you may want to ask them to explain why they want the monuments to stay. And when I say “ask them why,” I mean ask it like a 5-year-old does, with your response to every reason being “But why? I don’t understand your reasoning,” without an argument for them to latch onto.

    This is the one scientifically proven way that you can sometimes use to get people to examine and question their own beliefs, but it’s hard to do because you have to resist any urge to try and counter and argue against what they say and just stick to making them explain themselves.

  165. 165.

    cmorenc

    @Quinerly:

    Curious. What are your thoughts on the non flowery language ones…the obelisks/generic Confederate soldier ones…mostly in Southern town squares/outside of Southern courthouses put there shortly after the war (say, up to 50 years after the war)? Should they come down? Up until a few years ago, I thought they should stay. Now I don’t…as indicated in a long comment above.

    The principle “choose your battles wisely” is especially apt to deciding which particular monuments are worth the political and social capital to take on, and which are counter-productively exhaustive of those resources, accomplishing nothing beyond arousing local resentment rather than enlightenment.

  166. 166.

    Quinerly

    @Mnemosyne:
    That was asked. After a three hour circular discussion that drove off 10 people in our breakfast group with an hour of that being 3 men… otherwise very liberal men…. working themselves in a lather trying to outdo each other with knowledge of specific Civil War battles, it boiled down to what it is costing to remove these monuments and “at what level do you stop?” Hence a short discussion about the monuments in cemeteries. I left them in the parking lot. I will never understand it. We’ve beaten this to death. Otherwise very good Liberal, Midwest men with no dog in this fight…no relatives who fought. The myth of the chivalrous South glorified by Rhett Butler lives!?

  168. 168.

    Mnemosyne

    @Quinerly:

    Right, but you keep going even past that level (when you have time — I realize you ran out of time). By letting them say, “At what level do you stop?” they changed the subject to the cost and away from the monuments.

    Really, this is meant to be advice for when it comes up in the future, not a criticism of you. ? In the future, make them explain their opinion to themselves and keep asking why until they either have a breakthrough or drop the subject.

  169. 169.

    J R in WV

    @Schlemazel:

    Wilson also twisted the national educational system from teaching facts and critical thinking about those facts to teaching youngsters to obey authority without question. Stand in line and be quiet, do what you are told, and don’t ask any questions. We will tell you what to know and what to think about that.

    He was a fascist, before the term was invented.

  171. 171.

    sm*t cl*de

    @Schlemazel:

    I am still trying to figure out how a company that has not always paid its employees (and shorted many on other occasions) yet still never made a profit could be worth $70B. Sounds like the 90s all over again & one day investors will wake up and wonder where their money went.

    The Uber business plan has often been compared to a Ponzi scheme. Basically they intend to go on spending other people’s money to undercut Lyft, taxis and public transport, until all their rivals are bankrupt, so there will be no competition when they roll out Uber self-driving cars. This does not make a great deal of sense,

  172. 172.

    Tehanu

    @Immanentize:

    I wonder if people’s attitudes towards race really change, or if we just don’t notice our friends’ prejudice until something keys it and they blurt it out. I used to have a very close Jewish friend (I’m half Jewish myself) — we traveled together, saw every British movie together, encouraged our kids’ friendships, for almost 20 years. One day she called and I happened to mention I’d just dropped off a couple of grocery sacks’ worth of canned goods at a local church for the victims of a big hurricane — in Honduras, I think it was. She said, “Well, you know, in 6 months they’ll all be up here.” And then went into a rant about dirty, uneducated, prolific, yadda yadda yadda…. I don’t think I’ve ever been so shocked in my life. I said, “But that’s practically word for word what the WASPs said about your grandparents when they fled the pogroms in Russia.” Oh, she said, that was different. The friendship didn’t last very long after that. I still miss her sometimes, but I also still wonder why I never knew that about her until that day.

  173. 173.

    Another Scott

    @sm*t cl*de: Especially since, as Atrios points out at every opportunity, self-driving taxis are about the worst possible early application for self-driving cars.

    1) How do self-driving cars help people with their luggage? Their groceries? Old people with mobility problems?

    2) How do self-driving cars figure out how to temporarily double-park (to pick up and drop off people) in a city?

    3) How do self-driving cars handle city construction, detours, other double-parked vehicles, cops and construction workers directing traffic?

    It really is a stupid early application for self-driving technology.

    What makes some sense is self-driving trucks for well-defined highway routes outside cities (distribution center to port / port to distribution center). Not for taxis.

    Uber pushing self-driving cars seems to be more like an Enron-type thing – keep the buzz going so the retail investors don’t cash in before the upper-management-types can…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  174. 174.

    Applejinx

    What if they are allowed to continue to have a history, but it’s a new history?

    I can’t help but be reminded of Ozymandias. ‘two legs of stone’ and most of the inscriptions worn away, in trackless desert sands.

    Is that how they feel? They would rather have a history of blood and evil, than be washed quietly away as all the kids go to big cities and the places they live dry up and blow away, forgotten? Neither the good nor the evil that happened there will be remembered. The future is a chrome plated city built by you-know-who (not Trump, that would be ‘gold plated’, the other one), and it’s always somewhere else.

    This doesn’t forgive anything but it’s all I can think of that would explain liberals earnestly clinging to Confederate memorials, and competing with each other to see who can remember the most history. Do they think their home is going to die off and be forgotten forever? Do they feel it is growing, or diminishing?

    The OTHER big chunk of this thread has been Uber. It’s well to remember that the big-city chrome plated dream that small deplorable townspeople are expected to pack up and move to, is basically Uber in a thousand guises. Clinging to history just because it’s any sort of history, seems like an understandable response, especially if the history is ‘romantic denial of the future and indeed the present’. There’s plenty of reasons intelligent liberal people might wish to deny the present, and one of them’s the President.

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