Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

‘Museums aren’t America’s attic for its racist shit.’

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

Ron DeSantis, the grand wizard, oops, governor of FL.

Russia bombs Ukraine’s maternity hospitals; Republicans in the House can’t sort out supporting Ukraine.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

Books are my comfort food!

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

When we show up, we win.

Consistently wrong since 2002

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

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Open Thread: All Klass, This Guy

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177Comments

  1. 1.

    efgoldman

    Much as i love the comment dialog, Schooley says it all in two tweets.
    It’s a nice skill.

  3. 3.

    Gin & Tonic

    What are “Internet taxes”? When I buy goods on Amazon, I pay state sales taxes, just as I would if I went into a brick-and-mortar store.

  4. 4.

    momus

    Right, what really gets Trump’s goat is being caught in a dead end job while others are making beacoup bucks

  8. 8.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Gin & Tonic: @Major Major Major Major: He doesn’t understand how the Internet works. Or shopping on the Internet. Someone once told him that there were no sales taxes on Internet sales and he doesn’t know/realize/understand that this is no longer the case.

  12. 12.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    The #AmazonWashingtonPost, sometimes referred to as the guardian of Amazon not paying internet taxes (which they should) is FAKE NEWS!

    Can someone please translate this? It sounds like he’s having a stroke

  18. 18.

    PhoenixRising

    Picking a fight with a guy who owns a printing press and is an actual self-made billionaire: Smart.

    Doing it a second time (Mike Bloomberg was first): Genius.

  19. 19.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Baud: That is between you and your significant other. Or designated professional, semi-pro, or amateur provider.

  20. 20.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Gin & Tonic: Sorry, long day and I had been working on something where I was focusing on necessary and sufficient conditions. I suppose I have sufficient/not sufficient rattling around in my brain. I’ll go correct it.

  22. 22.

    Roger Moore

    The most ridiculous point, of course, is that Amazon stopped dodging on collecting sales taxes a few years ago. California (and I’m sure other states) pushed very hard to force them to start collecting, and Amazon kept dragging their feet, claiming they would have to drop all their California affiliates, etc.

    Once Amazon caved, though, it turned out the exact opposite of what they had been saying. Instead of abandoning California, they lost their reason for not having any facilities here, so they started building warehouses and distribution centers here to cut down on distribution costs. They’d have a very hard time doing same day delivery, much less trying something like Amazon Fresh, if they had to keep their warehouses in Nevada for tax reasons. And they’d never have even dreamed of buying Whole Paycheck if they hadn’t already capitulated on collecting sales taxes.

  24. 24.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    Caught this in the dead thread:

    And there it is from Dean Heller: “I do not believe Ronald Reagan would have supported this health care bill.” from John Ralston

    Reagan actually did sign several Medicaid expansions into law. mattyglesias

    Will the GOP pull a damnatio memoriae on Reagan now?

  32. 32.

    Roger Moore

    @Baud:

    I wonder why no one also blames Gary Johnson.

    They’re assuming that Johnson voters probably would have stayed home rather than voting for Clinton had he not been in the race.

  34. 34.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    @Adam L Silverman: Which would be an interesting argument if there were any credence to it. At this point, everyone knows the only reason he’s tweetstorming about this is because that Time Magazine story. WaPo is one of the few MSM sources worth a shit these days. Wasn’t it not too long ago that it sucked? Before Bezos bought it?

  36. 36.

    chopper

    so trump is complaining about others not paying their fair share in taxes. interesting.

  38. 38.

    craigie

    Is Trump really complaining about someone else not paying taxes? Is this something he wants to bring up again?

  43. 43.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Gin & Tonic: @Major Major Major Major: Nope, just a brain fart. Not helped by not making it to the gym and having it start to monsoon as I was getting ready to take the dogs for a run. So I’ve gotten no exercise in today. What I had for dinner last night has been eating me since. Just a funky 24 hours.

  44. 44.

    TenguPhule

    @craigie:

    Is Trump really complaining about someone else not paying taxes?

    Yes.

    The zombie corpse of the Onion is restless again.

  45. 45.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Baud:
    I think there’s no anger because A) apparently the voters who went for Johnson were split down the middle and didn’t make much difference, and B) Johnson wasn’t failing to do his publicly claimed job.

  51. 51.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    @Major Major Major Major: Not a bad idea, if only symbolic atm. Show people we have concrete plans to solve real problems affecting them. Always promote at every opportunity. It’ll be a real contrast to the Republican shitshow and the incompetent Trumpian Regime. I’d rather have Jeb as president, if not Hillary. At least he would presumably give a shit about Russian threats against natsec and natsov.

  56. 56.

    Adam L Silverman

    @? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?: Jeb! is also technocratic enough not to settle for the AHCA/BCRA as an ACA replacement. He’d still be pushing for a replacement, but he’s competent enough to know these are not good replacement options.

  57. 57.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    I’m trying to figure out what to do about some co-workers. There are a few things that we’re supposed to do besides just sitting around waiting for alarms to come in. We have about 400 cameras in the system that we monitor, and once per day, either the 2nd or 3rd shift officer is supposed to check them all and note the ones that aren’t working; it’s been several months since either of the 2nd shift guys have done it, leaving to 3rd shift. (A part of the issue is that no one ever checks the list of camera malfunctions until after something goes wrong and there’s no coverage, so the incentive to get it done is missing, but still . . .)

    Right now, we’re going to switch to new software for managing the employee badges and permissions. We have to go through about 4,000 entries, reconciling the old system with the security software that controls granting entry to facilities before the switch. This project started last Friday. I’ve worked two shifts since then and gotten about 600 entries done. In the other 11 shifts (excluding the 1st shift weekday guy, since he has other things he needs to do) since the project started they’ve gotten a bit less than 800 done.

    I’m starting to get pissed about no one else carrying their weight, but I don’t really want to go to my supervisor with it. Trying to shame the other workers by bringing it up to them is pointless. So, there may be nothing to do other than stew about it.

  60. 60.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    @Adam L Silverman: A dying breed in the GOP. It’s incredible to think that these cretins are descended from Lincoln and the Radical Republicans

  61. 61.

    p.a.

    I don’t pay that much attention to twitter, but has anyone there who tRump obsesses over trolled him with some form of “it’s really a McConnell/Pence Regency because Donnie’s a child”?

    could be fun. if it’s already happened I’ll check it out.

  65. 65.

    Mnemosyne

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    Is there a way to send out a fairly neutral email to your supervisor, cc’ing all parties, to ask if there’s a deadline for the project?

    If not, I would just keep doing what you’re doing at a normal pace (i.e. no need to bust your ass to cover for them). Don’t shirk your part because they’re slacking off, but don’t work harder to cover for them, either.

  66. 66.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    @p.a.: Hilariously enough, he blocks people for trolling him or some staffer does. If it’s him, that’s so pathetic and infuriating. You’re the leader of the US and you waste time blocking trolls on Twitter. SAD!

  68. 68.

    GxB

    From Cole’s twit feed, an AI meme generator: “Man boobs kills solitude.”

    I thought at first it would be just the opposite, but then…that’s goddamn downright zen, I have to admit.

  70. 70.

    JDM

    I must say it’s nice to see Trump following the left-wing, which has long sought to close the Amazon sales tax loopholes. Naturally, as in everything Trump, he’s a follower so he’s a bit late, by years in fact.

    Funny how he’s never there when the work is being done, but always shows up for the celebration party and pushes his way to the front for the photos.

  71. 71.

    MomSense

    @Adam L Silverman:

    It’s been a weird day for me too. I was dragging all day and then when I cooled off after my usual bike commute home, my knee felt terrible. Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day for both of us.

  75. 75.

    randy khan

    I was going to write something about Trump’s willingness to display his ignorance, but after a moment’s reflection, I realize that isn’t what he’s doing. He’s confident that he knows a lot; he’s just wrong about that.

  76. 76.

    Mnemosyne

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Jeb decided to score political points by persecuting Michael Schiavo, so he’s definitely an asshole. I’m not sure he’s any smarter than his big brother W, which sadly means he would be a big step up over the current administration.

  77. 77.

    dmsilev

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym: It’s your supervisor’s responsibility to handle problems like that. I think it’s appropriate to bring up concerns, but I would try to do so in a way that doesn’t blame your coworkers for slacking off (because if you do that, if/when they find out they’ll not be happy with you). Instead, I’d think about something along the lines of Mnemosyne’s suggestion of asking whether the group is on track to meet deadline.

  79. 79.

    mai naem mobile

    Dolt could go after Amazon legitimately and score poltical points for Amazon outsourcing ,working conditions,concentration of wealth in fewer people, brick and mortar jobs going because of Amazon etc. but he’s too stupid. It probably burns his ass because Bezos is self made not a silver spoon legacy richie rich.

  82. 82.

    Adam L Silverman

    @MomSense: Hopefully. I plan on taking the dogs for their run first thing. Then I’ll have most of the day to recharge before I go to the gym in the afternoon. Feel better.

  83. 83.

    Mnemosyne

    @MomSense:

    It was kind of a weird day. I had a snippy conversation with someone in another office over a charity project I was expecting to receive from her and never did. It looks like there was miscommunication on both sides, but those are never fun conversations to have.

    On the plus side, Annie saw the vet this morning and the steroids are pretty much a miracle drug for her pemphigus (autoimmune issue) — she’s already gained back a pound of the almost 2 that she lost. Now we work on perfecting her dose so she doesn’t develop diabetes or liver disease from the steroid.

  84. 84.

    MomSense

    Either Lawrence O’Donnell decided to go the full trump at the spray tan salon or something is seriously wrong with my tv.

  87. 87.

    dmsilev

    Sigh. Day One of a year-long construction project (not counting the ~1 year we spent in planning) and things already got messed up. We spent months telling the general contractor about the issues involved in renovating in close vicinity to lab space (vibrations == bad) and they swore to be good. First day’s work is putting up protective fencing around the building, and the damn fencing subcontractor decides to break out a jackhammer and start cutting big slots in the pavement to mount a chain-link fence. Gee, maybe someone could have warned us _before_ the whole damn building started to shake? The atomic microscopes were _not_ happy. Time to have another chat about proper communication of site requirements to all subs.

    Sigh. One day down, 364 to go.

  89. 89.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Mnemosyne: I am aware of what he did. I lived through it. The SWAT sniper you may have seen on TV who was on the roof of a building and lit up a news chopper with his tactical laser to signal to them to go away because they had violated the air access provisions is a good friend of mine. The SLP who would have been called in to do the swallowing study had Jeb! gotten his way would have been my Mother because of the agreement between the hospice facility and the regional healthcare provider.

  90. 90.

    Adam L Silverman

    @p.a.: It certainly isn’t through filling the 4,000 appointments across the Executive branch agencies and departments.

  91. 91.

    J R in WV

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    Do your work at your pace. It appears that you are doing several times as much work as the next most active worker. So when deadline occurs and task is incomplete, you are the person least responsible for failure. Win, win.

  94. 94.

    Dmbeaster

    @eclare:

    Please proceed, president (gawd how it pains me to type that)

    Just think or type President Pussy Grabber, and it gets easier.

  96. 96.

    The Dudeist

    @craigie: I own a business that ships and sells products to amazon. Since orange buffoon tweeted today, sales are through the roof. Idiot potus.

  106. 106.

    Adam L Silverman

    @The Blig Dahlia: I tried that before I posted the comment. When you do a keyword search for

    \m/

    what you get back as the returns is a bunch of stuff for the letter M.

  117. 117.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    @jonas: Only for him; for people he hates and wants to destroy not so much. He has no principles to speak of, except making lots of $$$.

    Ironically, not paying taxes makes him a moocher.

  119. 119.

    cmorenc

    @Baud:

    @schrodingers_cat: I wonder why no one also blames Gary Johnson. William Weld was practically begging people to vote for Hillary toward the end.

    …or the people who delusionally thought that voting for Gary Johnson would have any constructive effect whatever toward electing a libertarian-friendly government, instead of the precise opposite – and whose core motivation was actually as much about feeling virtuous and hip about themselves as it was about trying to actually further libertarian policies.

    What the Hell did you think was going to happen in a close election, you smug shitheads?

  122. 122.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    @Cheryl Rofer: Yet they still like talk up Lincoln as if he’d want anything to do with them today. He may have ran the Union as a virtual military dictatorship during the CW out of necessity, but he still believed in democracy and decency. Dixiecrats indeed

  129. 129.

    GregB

    Trump and his followers have gone so far up his ass in their revisionism that the new talking point is that Obama did nothing to Russia in retaliation for election hacks.

    Fully forgetting that Flynn went running to the Russian embassy to say that Obama was mean to the Russian’s and Trump would go easy on them. Then the whole charade that Obama was so tough on Russia that when Tillerson went to meet the them, relations had never been in worse shape because of meany Barack.

    Suddenly Obama is a pushover on Russia. Did nothing!

  134. 134.

    Quinerly

    @Baud:
    I blame a lot of Wilmer write in voters (yes, I know quite a few) and those purity non voters who couldn’t bring themselves to vote at all because HRC and Trump were the same…Wilmer and Sarandon told them…so it must be true.

  137. 137.

    grillo

    @scav: If you are writing a regular expression to eat an HTML address, you will need a martini delivered by funnel, although I favor whiskey for a regex.

  138. 138.

    catclub

    @? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?:

    And there it is from Dean Heller: “I do not believe Ronald Reagan would have supported this health care bill.” from John Ralston

    I am pretty sure that the quote from Reagan about ‘Our grandkids will ask what it was like when we were free”, is from his opposition ads against Medicare – the early 60’s.

  139. 139.

    dmsilev

    @efgoldman: The project management team handed us a Gantt chart last week with jobs laid out and scheduled to half-day increments for the next year.

    I admire their optimism.

  140. 140.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Junior G-Man) ? ?

    @catclub: He did speak out against “socialized medicine”. If I had been the surgeon operating on him after he took that bullet in 1981, I would given him a labotomy. Whoops! Butter fingers!

  142. 142.

    Omnes Omnibus

    Open Thread? Today ended up being a shitty day. Torrential downpour as I was driving home from work and ongoing roadwork on my street led to me unknowing driving into standing water. Car stalled as I was pulling into my driveway. Because of the torrential downpours, my Ins. Co. wasn’t able to get a tow truck to me for nearly 3 hours. I had the car towed to my mechanic’s place and I will see what happens from there. Ins. co. will cover and provide a rental, but I worry about my Saab.

  143. 143.

    seaboogie

    Since it’s an OT, sharing the delightful news that I am trying to figure out whether I have bedbugs or fleas at my joint. Happened since my cat passed away a few months ago – second happening now. Am mindful that two things can be possible at once.

    Planning some deep cleaning and treatment which should be relatively easy in my small, easily treatable space – mattress is fully enveloped in a waterproof envelope (because of old kitty now gone) and box spring also quite encased.

    Trying to decide if I should use this situation to keep my mind off Trump, or whether I should focus on Trump to keep my mind off the other vermin. It’s a tough call. Both make me pretty itchy and cranky.

  146. 146.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @seaboogie: Backatcha. Get an expert in. I made the mistake of googling what could be wrong… I knew better, but I succumbed to the need to google. I’ll just pay my $250 deductible and let them fix my baby – unless the horror story google things are true… I think I will have another drink.

  148. 148.

    eemom

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Well, I had a day trip to Philadelphia for a federal court status conference, which got fucked to smithereens by an Amtrak service outage, such that I ended up doing the conference on my cell phone with a fluctuating signal strength from a noisy train. The conference ended just as the train reached the Philly station.

    What caused the outage was an accident on the tracks outside DC last night in which two CSX employees were killed.

    Perspective.

  151. 151.

    seaboogie

    @eemom: I hear you. I remember talking to a former rep of mine stuck for ages on the NJ Turnpike, and told him that when he got to the point of the cause of the jam, he’d witness the scene of someone who was having a worse day.

  152. 152.

    seaboogie

    @Omnes Omnibus: Going to give it an initial go on my own – good news is that I have a bottle of Advantage flea & bedbug killer – seems to kill a bunch of other stuff too.

    And I am having some wine. Still itchy – less cranky.

  153. 153.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @eemom: A fair point, but it is my lovely, irreplaceable Saab. I am guessing you are not a car person. I know it is a first world problem.

  155. 155.

    eemom

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    Ah. I was kind of hoping you weren’t gonna go there.

    You see — while I am indeed NOT a car person — the word Saab always brings to mind an old mid 1980s era boyfriend who was the biggest asshole God ever made. He possessed a tan colored Saab in which I rode throughout his painful — for me — descent from man of my dreams to sociopathic scumbag.

    It wasn’t the car’s fault, of course. And I WAS a young naive fool at the time.

    But, still….Saab. You know.

  156. 156.

    Anne Laurie

    @Amir Khalid: They’re teen parents, expecting their second kid. So all indications were that forethought was not high on the list of personal attributes.

    (Of course, many 19-year-olds have a firm belief that they’re immune to death, but only the very special ones also believe they’re immune to bullets.)

  158. 158.

    Anne Laurie

    @seaboogie:

    Planning some deep cleaning and treatment which should be relatively easy in my small, easily treatable space – mattress is fully enveloped in a waterproof envelope (because of old kitty now gone) and box spring also quite encased.

    If you search for ‘yellow sticky flea trap’, you’ll get lots of images / ads for a device that will let you know whether it’s fleas. (Lots of instructions for making your own, or buying a gadget for under $15.) Such a trap won’t kill *all* your fleas, but it will let you know if that’s the problem… and, almost as important, it’ll let you know when there are no more fleas to be a problem.

  160. 160.

    seaboogie

    @Anne Laurie: Thank you, Anne – bites look suspiciously bed-buggy – tho where I could have picked them up is a mystery for this hermit.

  161. 161.

    Anne Laurie

    @bago:

    Why the hell are you using meat to verify a circuit?

    My guess would be that the ‘meat’ is already paid for (salaried), and the people instructing them to do such verification figure it’s cheaper to get the minions to double-task than to pay more for outside experts.

    One of my first student jobs, forty years ago, was erasing used library catalog cards with an electric eraser, so the cards could be reused. The federal government paid the university for x number of student salary hours, but *not* for office supplies. So, when we were sitting at the checkout desks, we were supposed to make ourselves useful by recycling catalog cards.

    (And, yes, I know there are college students out there wrinkling their foreheads because they have no idea what a ‘catalog card’ might be, or why a university library would need to order them by the carton.)

  162. 162.

    Anne Laurie

    @seaboogie: Apparently bedbugs, like cockroaches, have taken to travelling in cardboard shipping cartons — maybe that’s your source?

    I don’t know if bedbugs would be attracted to the yellow sticky traps, but if they are, you’ve got something that can be identified. And if they’re not, at least you’ve eliminated fleas as a possibility. (I can attest from prior experience that fleas are very fond of yellow sticky traps.)

  164. 164.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Anne Laurie:

    (And, yes, I know there are college students out there wrinkling their foreheads because they have no idea what a ‘catalog card’ might be, or why a university library would need to order them by the carton.)

    Aside from Goku, I doubt they are around here.

  170. 170.

    Omnes Omnibus

    I am going to bed. I may have mentioned my sad about my Saab, I do love it so.

    sa

  171. 171.

    Emma

    @Anne Laurie: When my library got rid of the card catalog I got my paws on a carton of blank cards. Used them for years to take notes. They were perfect.

  173. 173.

    TenguPhule

    @Quinerly:

    Trump has turned me into a terrible person. I’m appalled by the things I wish for.

    Don’t worry. In three months you will no longer be appalled.

  174. 174.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @seaboogie:
    If it’s fleas, they’re either human fleas (rare) or you have another animal in your home. If you’ve been in residence that long without a pet, the second generation should have died, unable to breed. Might be time to investigate crawl spaces and attics.

  175. 175.

    sm*t cl*de

    @GxB:

    “Man boobs kills solitude.”
    I thought at first it would be just the opposite

    Yes indeed. A man wth his own boobs need never leave the house again.

  176. 176.

    Wyatt Derp

    @JDM: @JDM: @JDM:

    I must say it’s nice to see Trump following the left-wing, which has long sought to close the Amazon sales tax loopholes. Naturally, as in everything Trump, he’s a follower so he’s a bit late, by years in fact.

    Funny how he’s never there when the work is being done, but always shows up for the celebration party and pushes his way to the front for the photos.

    Cue Trump taking credit for Amazon paying sales tax in 3…2…1

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