#BREAKING: Sessions hires his own lawyer https://t.co/REFCH5fgB3 pic.twitter.com/gE9f6zSxt9
— The Hill (@thehill) June 20, 2017
NEW: Lawyer Chuck Cooper tells @NBCNightlyNews that he is representing AG Sessions on Russia investigation matters – @PeterAlexander
— NBC Nightly News (@NBCNightlyNews) June 20, 2017
Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III made his career using the full weight of “Law & Order” to abuse unruly people of color, uppity women, young people and poor people with ever-more-restrictive drug laws, capricious enforcement of petty regulations, and statutes restricting the lives and freedom of ex-felons. He was an earlier rider on the ‘Trump train’ because he saw, in a Trump administration, a cushy future where he would be able to enforce his eighteenth-century prejudices on even more people over a wider range.
Were he to end up bankrupted and emotionally broken due to the application of those expansive “Law & Order” codes… well, it wouldn’t improve my estimate of the Trickster God’s script-writing abilities, but I would enjoy the final act.
MAGA: Make Attorneys Get Attorneys
— This Isn't Normal (@thisisntnormall) June 20, 2017
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
(cross-posted from other thread): This isn’t related to the thread subject (and not sure how many hip-hop fans frequent these parts), but Mobb Deep’s Albert “Prodigy” Johnson died of sickle cell complications today. He was 42.
James Powell
Amazing how all this is being treated like normal stuff, nothing to see hear, not nearly as bad as Whitewater or any of the other stuff the Clintons supposedly did, certainly not anything we should be alarmed about, let’s everybody just act normal.
I hate half of the country and nearly all of the press/media.
efgoldman
Just kind of skipped the part where you perjured yourself in your testimony and falsified a sworn document, eh Jeffy boy?
Major Major Major Major
I don’t think trickster gods are really ever particularly skilled writers so much as the other characters in their stories are (perhaps realistically) dumb.
Waratah
I was expecting him to retain legal council before the hearing and was surprised he did not.
How soon for him to throw Trump under the bus if he gets charged?
efgoldman
@Waratah:
It will be the first non-fictional use of negative time
MobiusKlein
Every day is a reminder of how bad Trump is for America.
Adam L Silverman
@Waratah: This may be why he formally retained Cooper. Cooper worked with him on his testimony and by retaining him he has now bound Cooper to attorney-client privilege.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@efgoldman:
He amended his testimony, so it’s all good.
hellslittlestangel
Yes, now that Handel has won in Georgia, let’s just breeze on to another fantasy of a Republican getting his comeuppance.
ArchTeryx
Well, in a real way, I *am* doing something, albeit by the luck of the draw.
I work for ACCES-VR, that specializes in two things: Getting special ed students through college, and getting disabled people living-wage jobs. As Office Assistant 1, I basically am the grease that keeps the gears turning, and I take that shit very, very seriously.
The counselors are seriously bemused why a white dude PhD would tear so avidly into a secretary job. Well, part of it is, “I’m on this lifeboat and I’m going to row like hell.” But that’s not all. The other part of it is that I’m helping, indirectly, dozens of disabled people get out from under Damocles’ Sword. The harder I work, the more time the counselors have to devote to their cases – and to help these people find work.
Looking up a local Albany Indivisible chapter is a good idea too.
Mnemosyne
Who needs a kitten cam tonight?
rikyrah
@Adam L Silverman: thanks for the reminder
Kraux Pas
I mean I’d love to see Sessions go down and all, but hiring a lawyer tells us nothing about what happened or any future outcomes.
? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?
@hellslittlestangel: The future isn’t written in stone. Do you have a crystal ball?
Newsflash: Republicans tend to vote for Republicans. Ossoff was only off by 4 points in Newt’s old district. The national GOP had to spend 18 million to defend a supposedly safe seat. That’s foreboding for the GOP.
rikyrah
@?BillinGlendaleCA: I know all folks guilty of perjury wish that they could just AMEND their testimony.
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
Remember, the best-known trickster god story in American culture is Br’er Rabbit convincing Br’er Fox and Br’er Bear to throw him in the briar patch.
(And for those watching American Gods, Br’er Rabbit is a transplanted version of Anansi, the West African trickster god.)
? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?
@Kraux Pas: It means he’s scared enough that there’s a real chance he’s going to get taken down in this mess. And remember he’s not the only administration flunky to hire his own lawyer.
Smiling Mortician
@ArchTeryx: Good on you. That’s awesome.
efgoldman
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
I really don’t understand this bullshit. If you testify in front of a judge and lie, are you allowed to “revise” or “correct” your testimony?
I understand that the senate has to make the complaint for Evil Leprechaun (or any other of the lying sacks of shit) to be charged, and they won’t. But still…
Mnemosyne
@? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?:
Someone was saying in the thread below that it’s now estimated that about $50 million was spent on the GA-6 race, and the Republicans spent 2.5 times more than the Democrats did. Someone else will have to do the actual math, though.
Timurid
Did that nutty Rosenstein memo actually have some effect? The daily newsdumps stopped right after it was posted…
rikyrah
@ArchTeryx:
You rock
Kraux Pas
@? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?:
It could mean that. Or it could just mean he expects to be hauled into court. After all, only a complete fool represents himself.
Speaking of which, anyone got odds on Trump representing himself?
? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?
@Kraux Pas: Given everything we already know about his contacts with Russia, that seems highly unlikely at this point.
Trump will be reduced to having his tax attorney representing him
efgoldman
@? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?:
Either that, or he’ll have to break down and pay a huge retainer to a criminal lawyer. Kasowitz ain’t gonna’ cut it.
hellslittlestangel
@? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?: I think Handel’s win will convince those Republicans purportedly wavering that they can safely vote on Thursday to fuck over 23 million Americans. Neither “moral victory” nor the fact that the Republicans successfully invested a few weeks worth of fund-raising is anything to cheer about. This is a serious blow to liberalism and democracy, and pretending that Jefferson Beauregard Sessions is in any danger of going to prison won’t change that.
SFAW
@efgoldman:
Random thoughts re: Evil Elf’s
perjury“testimony”:1) I’m shocked, SHOCKED that anyone would impugn Mah Honah, suh!
2) If he were really as “honorable” as he professed, he would have committed seppuku long before now.
3) I am SO hoping that he is one of Mueller’s “persons of interest”
4) It’s probably too much to hope for that he spends so much time trying to stay unindicted, that he won’t have time to fuck over any more persons/groups he’s dying to fuck over.
5) Fuck you, you traitorous motherfucker. I hope there’s a Hell for you to burn in. You fuck.
Bupalos
I’m pretty tired of “this is not normal.” It actually is. Or anyway, it doesn’t matter if it’s not or wasn’t or whatever, it’s really starting to feel like the country has just lurched over a cliff and there’s just no point in talking about whether it’s “normal” or not.
This country just sucks. It’s a racist, lying, terrified shitpile of greedy, empty, brain dead fucks that is getting worse by the minute, and im sick to death of it.
MomSense
@ArchTeryx:
You’re my hero! Good work!
Cheryl Rofer
Josh Marshall has a good take on the GA-6 election.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Mnemosyne: No thanks, I have a dog cam.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@hellslittlestangel: Sure, lets just curl up into a ball and cry.
? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?
@hellslittlestangel: I didn’t say a moral victory. I implied that trends don’t look good for Republicans electorally. It was a safe GOP district that has been in their hands since the 70s. Both Ossoff and Parnell came with an few points of winning when in the past R’s won by double digits. It suggests the possibility of a sea change.
As far as Sessions going down for anything, I’m leaning towards something happening, but I simply don’t know. I can’t see the future. I doubt the election outcome would have had any real effect on the AHCA vote anyway. Since it was so close, one could make the argument that these same squishy R votes might still say no. And anyway, the fight isn’t over yet. I plan on calling Portman tommorow. I can’t just give up.
SFAW
@hellslittlestangel:
I don’t think Turtle gave two shits about GA-6. He’s going to do what he’s gonna do, and fuck over whoever he can that doesn’t have the power to do anything about it. About the only effect it might have on him is redoubling efforts to suppress votes/registration wherever he can (either himself, or through others).
McConnell is unmitigated evil, further proof that there is no such thing as a Just God.
Adam L Silverman
@Mnemosyne: Those numbers are correct based on the reporting I saw earlier this evening.
Bupalos
@? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?:
Or you could look at the dark side, since that’s actually like 80% of the surface area here. After a hundred and whatever days of the worst administration in history, who’s every shifty vulgar move has been covered wall to wall, a really crappy repuke beat our candidate by a larger margin the than trump beat Clinton there. I’m not seeing it.
Mnemosyne
@Cheryl Rofer:
Good message here, which I bolded for emphasis:
SFAW
@Cheryl Rofer:
Thanks. Josh is usually thoughtful, this was no exception.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Cheryl Rofer:
After reading though the comments on the last few threads, I think this paragraph and the one that follows is what some here need to read.
ETA: Beaten by Mnemo once again.
(Shakes fist @ Mnemo.)
? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?
@Bupalos: They had to spend a lot of money to defend this seat. That should have never happened. It’s been a safe R district since like 1976 or so. He was probably never going win there now. But came really close, closer than anyone before him. That suggests to me that the political landscape is changing and that R districts won by 20 points or less are winnable by Dems
Mnemosyne
@Bupalos:
Given the fact that Price was re-elected by 20 points in November, I suspect that Hillary’s smaller margin of loss was due to Republicans leaving the presidential line blank or voting for Gary Johnson rather than splitting the ticket. Those numbers are probably out there somewhere.
sigaba
I’m presently at Dodger stadium, pretending the Mets are Republicans.
Adam L Silverman
@Timurid: Not necessarily. There have been several in the past two days that have gotten lost in the shuffle about the runoffs and the Senate health care bill.
You have to avoid falling into a pattern recognition trap. Some of the stories that are reported, with some of the most damaging material, began months ago. One of the big ones from two weeks ago started with a legal leak (as in nothing was leaked that was classified) back in December.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@SFAW:
Sure there is, she just takes her time.
Lizzy L
@Cheryl Rofer: Thanks; good take. Here’s the piece I keep returning to. It’s vital.
ArchTeryx
@Mnemosyne: Yeah, I fell headlong into that trap, though my spasms of doom aren’t typical purity pony rantings, that doesn’t make ’em any less self-loathing or destructive.
NotMax
The circle inexorably tightens (although personal opinion is that the estimate provided is a lowball one).
In a more unusual vein –
Hmm. How could Nazi booty possibly have found its way to Argentina? (Rhetorical question.)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I wonder if that was an elected or a campaign professional. Because I’d really like to know how they get there from this race.
ETA: it’s like a certain individual who keeps saying the Democratic Party must abandon “top down decision making!”. Somebody ask him what the hell that means
?BillinGlendaleCA
@sigaba: LAPD doesn’t take kindly to public mooning.
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
The Boys from Brazil was a terrible movie, but a really good book. When Ira Levin was at the top of his game, nobody could beat him at ludicrous-sounding premises that worked like gangbusters.
James Powell
@Bupalos:
Agreed. Not sure what we who live in deep blue places like Los Angeles can do about it.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I think it was Dwight.
Cheryl Rofer
Thanks, @Mnemosyne and others, for pulling some of the good parts out of Josh’s post. We closed the margins significantly in a very red district in a very red state. It would have been great to win, but the trends suggest we can next year.
Adam L Silverman
@Lizzy L: He got attacked on twitter by Matt Stoller this evening over the GA 06 results. So…
Adam L Silverman
@NotMax: I believe there is binge viewing of a History Channel reality show in your future.
http://www.history.com/shows/hunting-hitler
Dread
I’m not finding much happy news. I don’t think the 2018 elections will be a wave election. Half the country doesn’t give enough of a shit to bother to go vote, and too many Democratic voters join them in sitting it out.
And I think about the only way Trump might be impeached, is if a tape surfaced of him giving a BJ to Putin. Russian pee hookers wouldn’t be enough, so long as they were female pee hookers.
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Matt Stoller. He went after Marshall with a personal attack.
lamh36
Made the mistake of viewing a bit of the Castle dashcam footage????
I’m going to bed
#Mood
They Don’t Care About Us https://g.co/kgs/VLh2QZ
hellslittlestangel
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Not wanting to play “let’s pretend Sessions is in trouble” is not the same as curling up in a fetal position. But I’m sure you know that.
Mike J
The new Arcade Fire song sounds like New Order.
Wind N@12, gusting 18, got second, first, second, I had the tiller for the second race.
Another Scott
@Mnemosyne: I think all the Georgia Numbers are here, but I don’t have time to sort through them.
Happy hunting! Let us know if you find anything interesting to account for the differences between Price’s and HRC’s results.
Cheers,
Scott.
NotMax
@Mnemosyne
“Terrible” is mighty strong sauce when applied to any film Gregory Peck was in. Not near his best picture, sure, but terrible?
SiubhanDuinne
Since it’s an open thread, here’s a weird little thing that happened.
I wear glasses, but because I am paranoid that I’m always going to wreck my normal pair, I always carry a backup emergency pair. Almost never bothered with Pair 2 until today.
Last night, as usual, when I went to bed I placed my usual pair on a shelf next to the bed. The way I do EVERY SINGLE NIGHT, and have done for years.
When I woke up this morning, Pair 1 was nowhere to be seen. I looked everywhere, on the floor, behind and under the furniture, in the bedding. Nothing. Damnedest thing. Hauled out Pair 2 and wore them all day (they’re attractive, but cut painfully into the bridge of my nose, so I rarely use them. But boy, was I glad to have them today!)
Out all day, poll-watching in the GA-6 special election. Treated myself to wine and dinner, got home about 11:30. Walked into the bedroom, and there were my glasses! On the floor, yes, but in an obvious place I had checked about 70 times this morning.
I’m so glad they aren’t wrecked! And I’m so glad I had a back-up pair to get me through the day! There’s probably a major life lesson here that I haven’t yet grasped, but I’m grateful for the obvious and see no need at the moment to search for metaphors. Especially since, without my specs, I couldn’t find them in the first place.
hellslittlestangel
@SFAW: Believe it or not, in addition to McConnell, there are 53 other Republicans in the Senate.
SFAW
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
That’s nice, but sooner-rather-than-later would also be good.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Adam L Silverman: good lord
His father the Wells Fargo VP ought to get in touch with Matty’s prep school and get a refund on tuition.
And for Stoller, isn’t the fact that Clinton nearly won the district proof that it’s a hotbed of right-wingery and corruption?
ETA: If you’re wondering what a non-embarrassing campaign looks like for Stoller, he worked for Alan Grayson
FlipYrWhig
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: A nimrod “friend” on Facebook (teacher with a PhD, natch) got all hot and bothered tonight and posted something from someone with three names (none of which I had seen before, so I don’t know who was making the suggestion or how seriously) about how the Democratic Party was irredeemable and what there really needed to be was a party that stood for [list of good things like trans rights and young people] instead of millionaire billionaire Wall Street or whatever the fuck they’re on about lately. And immediately got a bunch of likes. Yes, if only there were a party that stood for the things I like, and not for the things I don’t like, that would be great. How many people would vote for this party, or why this party doesn’t exist in satisfactory form yet, didn’t seem to enter into it at all. SMH.
Lizzy L
@Adam L Silverman: FFS. We (Democrats) really really need to stop doing that.
Disappointed, sure; but tomorrow is another day and we keep fighting. Good night, jackals.
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I have no idea. I’ve yet to see that guy write anything – from a tweet to an article – that makes any sense unless one is fully marinated in whatever his ideology is.
Adam L Silverman
@FlipYrWhig:
Hey now! ?
SiubhanDuinne
@Mnemosyne:
Recently reread Rosemary’s Baby and The Stepford Wives. They are both really brilliantly constructed. Am about halfway through This Perfect Day, which I would have sworn I had read some years ago, but which, oddly, isn’t the least bit familiar. It’s well enough done but seriously drags in parts, which is why I haven’t scooted straight through the way I did with RB and TSW. But in my view, Ira Levin was one of the finest suspense writers in the history of the genre.
SFAW
@hellslittlestangel:
Yes, I have no doubt that all the Moderate Republican Senators will force Mitch to change course. Just as they have in the past.
I would LOVE for my cynicism to be proved wrong.
But in the meantime, I guess I gotta get off my fat ass and call the office of Noted Moderate Susan Collins, even though I don’t live in Maine — yet. Gotta figure how to word it, but I expect I can come up with something.
FlipYrWhig
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I like how the Mobile Goalpost Crowd goes from “the Democratic Party needs to speak to the issues of each district in a 50-state strategy kind of way, because the Party is too hidebound and one-size-fits-all!” to “the Democratic Party needs to run class-warrior pugilistic populism everywhere all the time because it obviously wins, if you don’t take into account the zero times it has won, but those were because of other reasons, like neoliberals neoliberal-ing it up too much beforehand!” Stoller = doofus.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
if the phrase emo-prog didn’t exist…
James Powell
@FlipYrWhig:
For such people, winning elections is not part of their political identity. In fact, focusing on winning elections is considered evidence of corruption, a thing to be disdained in other, lesser people.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@FlipYrWhig: also, Democrats need to spend more money, on every candidate, everywhere, and only take money from people I approve of /WilmerCon ’17
FlipYrWhig
@Adam L Silverman: I know this person because we were in the same degree program. I find this person endlessly irritating as an un-self-aware embodiment of everything _this person this person’s self_ claimed to hate about graduate school.
Another Scott
@SiubhanDuinne: J lost her Bluetooth earpiece/microphone a month or so ago when she got out of her car at home. She looked around for it for a while, then I looked around for it for a while. Couldn’t find it.
Oh well, order another one.
About a week later, she found it in the driveway almost exactly where she thought she probably dropped it. A place we had both looked for it multiple times….
Being outside, it is easy to think a critter (mouse, chipmunk, bird) might have grabbed it and moved it, or maybe it bounced into a drainage pipe and got washed out in the rain. If it had happened inside, well, … :-)
Good luck!
Cheers,
Scott.
Timurid
Apparently we’re outsourcing our news dumps to the Saudis now…
SFAW
@NotMax:
Yeah, it was pretty bad. Not nightmare-inducing bad, but bad.
Mnemosyne
@Another Scott:
I started looking, but for some reason they only listed the top three candidates for president. Seriously, they didn’t have a single write-in candidate for president in the whole state?
Adam L Silverman
@FlipYrWhig: I was just teasing. Hence the emoji. There’s at least one in every group – no matter the demographics of the group.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Timurid: holy fuck. Even knowing little about the internal politics of the KSA, that is not calming news
efgoldman
@SFAW:
Did you see the stupid fucking headline in the Globe? Ran two days in a row in the web paper.
Timurid
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I’m not an expert either, but the new guy is supposed to be a prick even by Saudi royal family standards.
NotMax
@Mnemosyne
Go to for complete numbers is The Green Papers.
Adam L Silverman
@Timurid: This is huge news. This means the deputy crown prince, Muhammad bin Salman (referred to as MBS) is now the crown prince or is going to be. This cements his part of the family and his father’s legacy to him. And is indicative of a palace coup. Moreover, he, in conjunction with Abu Dhabi’s crown prince Muhammad bin Zayed (MBZ), has been pushing the realignment I wrote about yesterday.
Give this a read:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/06/13/saudi-arabia-middle-east-donald-trump-215254
FlipYrWhig
@James Powell: My take is slightly different. My take is that people who are surrounded by like-minded, activist-leaning people brainwash themselves into thinking that there are so many of them — practically everyone they know! — that the only reason the political world hasn’t be reshaped already to their satisfaction has to be corruption or just plain evil. They want to win; they think they’d win easily without even trying because nearly everyone already agrees with them, just ask. So they get to feeling like someone is out there keeping them down. I live in Virginia and three of my neighbors are fire fighters, IT workers for the fire department, or retired cops, and the dominant population is retired military. There is NO FUCKING WAY ON GODS GREEN EARTH that what my neighbors have been waiting for is a more black-friendly, trans-friendly, “woke” social democracy. Even if they vote for Democrats — and I’m not sure they in particular do — it’s far more likely that they’ll vote for the kind of Democrat who’s a bald white guy who headed a local economic development nonprofit. This is not that hard to understand. I don’t get why “the left” is so intent on refusing to understand it.
Another Scott
@Mnemosyne: I see Johnson in the detailsxls.zip file (in the spreadsheet, tab “2”, scroll over to the right). Column “Q” is Johnson’s total – he got 14466 in Cobb County.
I haven’t seen the votes broken down by Congressional District, but you can probably get fairly close by combining the results for the 3 counties in GA-6: Cobb, Fulton, DeKalb.
Gotta run. Let us know what you find!
Cheers,
Scott.
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
This is probably going to require some work in Excel, which I don’t want to have to do tonight since it’s already 9:30. ?
SFAW
@efgoldman:
In fact I had. Fucking Globe, first it starts turning into Herald Lite, now it’s being written by morons. Who’s the editor. Michael Sheehan? He and John Henry are living up to the Rethuglican “ethos” (i.e., destroy something [like government] that was working reasonably well, then scream about how terrible it is). Henry should have just bought the Herald, let Bezos have the Globe.
It’s among the reasons we cancelled our subscription after almost 30 years.
As a wise man once wrote:
Fuckem
Another Scott
@NotMax: The main results from your link go to my link above, but the Write-in results are also there.
Thanks.
‘night all.
Cheers,
Scott.
FlipYrWhig
@Adam L Silverman: No, I get that. I was mostly trying to clarify that I wasn’t trying to pull the “eggheads, whatcha gonna do?” maneuver. I teach and have the same degree the person in question has. Also, I’m posting here because if I post on his FB feed about his endless poseur bullshit it’s going to end up being a whole bitter thing that burns up like 8 20-year-long quasi-friendships.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@FlipYrWhig: a similar but separate kind– the ones who are so convinced that their cause(s) is/are infallible, if people only knew! If the people just heard Dennis/Ralph/Dennis…. Bernie! (and always first names). The endless bleat of the Wilmerites at the Convention last year: “We just want our voices to be heard..”. Me: “For the love of christ, you never shut up!”
Reminds me of the line from the Rainmaker: “I see your side, Billy, I just ain’t on it”
Mnemosyne
@Another Scott:
I’m probably going to have to look for “missing” votes between the totals for president and the totals for the House race. Can’t do it tonight, though, and definitely not from the iPad.
SiubhanDuinne
@Another Scott:
Glad your J found it. But that is the mystifying thing to me: how one can look multiple times in one place and totally miss seeing (whatever it is one is looking for), and then, when you’re maybe not actively searching, it’ll pop right up in the exact same place.
Fucking Trickster Universe.
efgoldman
@SFAW:
I’d cancel if I could get the Boston TV stations, but I can’t.
For better or worse, it’s still my home town paper. Although all I really read now are the Metro and sports sections.
SFAW
@efgoldman:
I thought the ProJo sports section was semi-reasonable?
Maybe if the native Rhode Islanders could read without moving their lips, they might get a better hometown rag?
ETA: Mrs. SFAW is under the impression that the Boston stations are streaming their news shows. I have no idea if this is true — Mrs. SFAW is not, shall we say, the most tech-savvy person.
efgoldman
@SFAW:
No matter how hard they try, it’s still a small town paper
Peale
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: top down decision making basically is a nice way to leave it to the grass roots. But for some reason, the grass roots are wise. And know how to organize themselves, and the iron Law of oligarchy isn’t going to apply. It’s kind of like wanting to be disruptive these days. It’s good for a couple of billion in theoretical market cap, but no one wants to actually test those valuations in the actual market since disruptive entities are usually worthless.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
in this particular case, I think it refers to one very specific decision, and the only valid grass roots are the one who made the right decision
SgrAstar
@ArchTeryx: Nice. Good on you, Arch.
patrick II
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
It means the DNC should not have helped Hillary at Bernie’s expense.
Mnemosyne
@patrick II:
Good thing they didn’t, then. Or do you still think that Wikileaks released emails stolen by the Russians from the DNC because Assange was just so concerned about Bernie getting a fair shake after he had been mathematically eliminated from winning the primary?
Mel
@ArchTeryx: You are doing work that is so vital, so important, and potentially life-changing for the clients with whom you and the counselors work. Thank you for this. And thank you, thank you, for your compassion for and dedication to your clients.
Too many people who struggle with a serious illness or disability become invisible / negligible in the eyes of society.
To find an engaged, intelligent, welcoming person ready to help navigate the red tape can feel like nothing short of a miracle to someone struggling against the odds.
Kryptik
@Mnemosyne:
Honestly, the thing that depresses me is precisely that this will not be heeded.
I mean, my brain understands that the inroads made in all those districts and special elections were big, and it should be taken as a good harbinger. On an intellectual level, I understand that.
But my heart refuses to take that to…well…heart, knowing that I only really understand that as a political junkie, and most folks, especially the media types, aren’t going to see the inroads. They’re just going to see the L. And sadly, that still matters: a moral victory can sustain only so much, and lessons toward the future applied so much, but a loss is still a loss, and most folks simply aren’t going to see past that, and the narrative will only become “YOu keep losing, you’re losers and everyone hates you because you’re losers, why should we care about you or vote for you if you’re always losing!!!” Success begets success, and a lot of people will only feel safe to jump on the wagon if they think there’s a ‘win’ there, and if the media, the lefter-than-thou folks, and the GOP themselves continue to be lockstep in the refrain of ‘Democrats always lose, they must lose because America hates them for everything!’ and that gets repeated ad nauseam, it gets ingrained. You already get a lot of induced apathy of ‘why should I vote when it won’t matter?’ shit, and taking repeated Ls just makes it even easier. We get our dander up because we’re invested in this shit, but from the outside looking in, losses piling up will beget more losses precisely because of that induced apathy.
And that’s what makes me depressed: that the lesson to be learned from this will all too likely go unheeded, and the exact wrong lesson of ‘This loss means the Democratic party is wrong about everything and needs to be blown up’ will remain the prevailing narrative forever and anon.
James Powell
@Kryptik:
People also say this after narrow wins. The habit of disparaging the Democratic Party is so deeply embedded in the political class and the press/media that it is almost impossible to avoid it.
Steve in the ATL
@Mnemosyne:
D spend = x
R spend =2.5x
Total spend = 3.5x = $50M
Ergo D spend = $14.3M
Kryptik
@James Powell:
At this point, we need an outright win, just for the psychology. And I don’t know how we get that anymore. Not when we seem to be getting kneecapped from all sides.
sharl
OT – from a NYT tech reporter: Uber Founder Travis Kalanick Resigns as C.E.O.
Davebo
@Adam L Silverman:
Matt Stoller is just more proof that The Atlantic never learns from it’s mistakes..
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I agree. I’m not one of the “give up the ship” crowd, but a loss is a loss
next big races are VA and NJ govs, AFAIK. It would be great if the Resistance movement turned its focus to local and state level races
JR in WV
@SFAW:
Here’s a tip for speaking to Republicans about health care. Remind them that in Matthew the Lord said “Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” I’ m not a christian, but there’s a lot of good work in the Bible to put to good and proper use; this so clearly means that we need to provide health care to the least of our countrymen, if we expect any credit for providing it to the others who receive it.
And the ACA attempted to and intended to provide health care to everyone, as it should be done. The right to be healthy, and to be cared for if not healthy to the maximum extent possible, may not be a human right everywhere, but in the wealthiest nation on earth, should it not be the rule that all the sick receive care?
When did we decide to just take the ill folks who are poor or disabled out to the landfill to wait ti die? Surely that isn’t the goal of Mr.Trump’s administration! Or of Mr. McConnell’s Senate?
Now I suspect it is the goal of Mitch, but we don’t need to say so, we can just allow others to infer that that is what we suspect Mitch’s goal is. At least to start out. We can get more explicit as things progress.
I think Mitch would be happy in an air conditioned cab burying poor black folks at the dump. But I doubt if he wants folks to think that of him. Especially other senators on the bubble.
Peale
@James Powell: it’s embedded into the psychology of liberals. Trump tomorrow could abolish the EPA and not just allow but command chemical manufacturers to dump their waste into Flint’s water supply and a very notable and vocal contingent of nominally democratic “voters” will show up here to blame the democrats for letting it happen.
Mnemosyne
@Steve in the ATL:
Yes, but we were talking about the R spend. Originally I heard it as the R’s spending ~$15M, but your math is saying the R’s spent something more like $35M to keep the seat.
Mnemosyne
@Kryptik:
As Jim noted, the VA governor’s race is coming up. It’s a blue state with a Dem governor who’s done a good job, so the odds of holding the seat look pretty good.
I don’t know much about NJ, except that Chris Christie is about as popular as syphilis there right now. No idea if that translates into a D win.
patrick II
@Mnemosyne:
Jim asked what they meant. Try to keep up.
SFAW
@JR in WV:
Thanks for the tips/ideas/thought.
Of course, devout atheist that I am, were I to quote Scripture, God might smite me for being a fucking wise guy. [To be more serious about that: if I start doing that, I run the risk of being asked about it, and being “found out” might negate my attempt.]
But I can probably work some variant in there.