Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

It’s time for the GOP to dust off that post-2012 autopsy, completely ignore it, and light the party on fire again.

In my day, never was longer.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Everybody saw this coming.

T R E 4 5 O N

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

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Let there be snark.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

American History and Black History Cannot Be Separated

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

I’m pretty sure there’s only one Jack Smith.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

We’ll be taking my thoughts and prayers to the ballot box.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

You can’t love your country only when you win.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

You are here: Home / Politics / Domestic Politics / Wednesday Afternoon Open Thread

Wednesday Afternoon Open Thread

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After successfully avoiding it for years, I finally broke down and started watching “Game of Thrones.” I’ve seen most of the first season now.

As fellow viewers know, the show is gory as hell. That doesn’t bother me all that much. In fact, the primary reason I’m hooked so far is in hope of seeing Joffrey come to a sticky end! (No spoilers, please and thank you!)

But I wish they wouldn’t wantonly kill so many animals for no reason at all. It probably says something rotten about my character that that’s what I find most disturbing, but there it is.

Open thread!

Reader Interactions

160Comments

  1. 1.

    trollhattan

    Basically, don’t get attached to pretty much anybody and you’ll survive the viewing experience. Took me three seasons to sort out all the “house ofs” and various lands, but of course new ones are added as it goes along.

    Winter is coming.

  2. 2.

    dlwchico

    I hate movies or tv shows that fail to generate genuine emotional responses via good writing and acting so fake it by killing a dog.

  4. 4.

    jl

    There will be a horrifying expose on how many dragons died in order to make that damn show. Soon. You heard it here first. Believe me.

  5. 5.

    trollhattan

    I recall saying the useless Tomahawk strike on Syria was actually Trump’s gift to Raytheon. Now this.

    President Trump will nominate Raytheon lobbyist Mark Esper as secretary of the Army, according to multiple reports and a source in contact with the administration. Esper would be the third person nominated to be the Army’s top civilian leader and the latest high-ranking addition to the Pentagon from a major defense contractor.

    The Washington Examiner first reported the impending nomination, citing an unnamed administration official. Military Times later confirmed, citing “sources.”

    A source told The Hill his Trump administration contacts say the report is true. Esper has served as Raytheon’s vice president of governmental affairs since 2010. Prior to that, he held a number of positions at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

    That swamp’s almost completely dry now.

  6. 6.

    NorthLeft12

    Not sure if you have read GoT, but what turned me off the TV series is that the gratuitous violence has been amped up from the book. There is one scene in particular that absolutely ended any interest I had in watching anymore. I really struggled to understand why this scene was added. It’s not as if we did not know how cruel and awful the perpetrator was already. The scene had absolutely no redeeming value. Misogynistic violence porn. There, no spoiler.

  9. 9.

    Keith P.

    It starts to really pick up towards the end of season 2. The last two episodes of each season are always real good, in fact. I’ve gotten a few people hooked on GoT. A couple of them have tried to get into Twin Peaks based on my word, but it’s hard to binge-watch season 2.
    The last year of peak TV has been great for me…I’ve gotten caught up on/picked up: Fargo, Legion, Preacher, Expanse (season 1 in a day), American Gods, and GLOW. All of them are excellent IMO.

  10. 10.

    Emerald

    I think eventually far more people die in GOT than animals.

    But yeah, I get more upset about animal deaths too. They are the true innocents (innocent about us, anyway).

    Enjoy! Hope you’ve got a big screen. It’s a big screen kinda viewing experience!

  11. 11.

    craigie

    I know what you mean. I stopped watching after a few episodes when it became clear the dog was doomed. I don’t need that.

  12. 12.

    jl

    Having a good laugh reading about Trump’s meeting with the loser low energy GOP Senators who couldn’t get it done. Too bad he can’t fire them. Trump had a new idea: repeal and replace Obamacare AT THE SAME TIME! Why the hell were those dopes just voting to repeal? Sad.

  13. 13.

    Turgidson

    @NorthLeft12:

    Yes, that scene was indefensible. I still watch the show, but that scene was as close as I’ve come to swearing off it.

  15. 15.

    quakerinabasement

    Ditto, Betty. Violence against animals is a major dealbreaker for Mrs. Quaker.

  16. 16.

    TriassicSands

    @NorthLeft12:

    I think that both the violence and nudity are greatly overdone — they are both gratuitous. Many of the best directors over the years have shown that graphic depiction of things is often not the most effective way to present them. GOT is a lesson in proving that right.

    I’ve seen through season 6 and there is much about the series that is worthy of praise. I suppose the core lesson of GOT is that every living thing is expendable — either to advance someone’s ambitions or to move the plot along.

  17. 17.

    rikyrah

    The Questions Raised by Trump’s Relationship With Putin
    by Nancy LeTourneau
    July 19, 2017 10:55 AM

    ust as we aren’t likely to ever know what happened during the initial meeting between Trump and Putin, Aaron Blake put that question aside when he wrote about the second previously undisclosed meeting between them during a dinner at the G20 meeting in Germany. Instead, he asks:

    Why did Trump see fit to do something that may look so suspicious and raise even more concerns about his relationship with Russia? And why did he and/or the White House not disclose it?

    Blake then shares three different theories in response:

    1. There is something nefarious going on
    2. Trump is oblivious to how this might be perceived
    3. Trump is simply addicted to causing controversy

    It would be a serious mistake for anyone to assume that any one of those excludes the others.

  18. 18.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    As fellow viewers know, the show is gory as hell.

    You want gory, watch Boardwalk Empire . People get double smiles and shot up on a regular basis on that show. And no one is immune

  19. 19.

    rikyrah

    How Trump and the GOP Congress Failed in Just Six Months
    by Martin Longman
    July 19, 2017 12:58 PM

    I hate to do this but Trumpcare failed once before, in March, and I wrote its autopsy back then. In two long pieces (Trump Built His Own Prison and How a Tricky Tactic by Congressional Republicans Destroyed Trump’s Agenda), I explained why it was a major strategic error for the Trump administration to sign off on an unprecedented parliamentary gambit to avoid Democratic filibusters. I explained why it was doomed from the beginning and to the best of my ability what the fallout would be from the failure. I just went back and read them both, and I really wouldn’t add or amend anything. It’s playing out exactly as I described with the only difference being that the GOP couldn’t face the music back in March and so wasted April, May, June, and most of July trying to revive a corpse. I’d like to lay it all out for you again, but why reinvent the wheel when my pieces from March will serve the purpose?

    Instead, I’ll just give a brief recap. The Republicans decided that they could take advantage of the fact that they never passed a budget last year to pass two budgets this year. This would allow them to use the first to repeal Obamacare (quickly, they hoped) and the second to pass tax reform. There were mind-numbing parliamentary reasons for creating two separate bills that you can read about in the “Tricky Tactic” piece, but the primary rationale was that it would allow the Republicans to bypass the Democrats’ filibuster and pass through both major pieces of legislation on strictly party line votes. They wouldn’t need hearings or expert witnesses or to have a traditional committee markup of the legislation. And, because of this, they wouldn’t get but also would not need any Democratic input, buy-in, or votes.

    One obvious flaw in this plan is that it created an adversarial environment where the Democrats would not and could not work constructively with the Republicans, and in which the Republicans erroneously thought that they could get results without help. Even if the plan had worked for its intended purposes, there’s a lot more to politics than health care and tax reform, and the Trump administration would need a decent working relationship with at least some Democratic lawmakers (eight senators, for example, to clear a filibuster) to pass anything that wasn’t included in their two budget reconciliation bills. Their plan didn’t take this into account, so they salted the earth for any prospect of later bipartisan cooperation.

    This wasn’t the only way that Trump salted the earth. He came out of the box with a toxic travel ban, for example, and he filled his cabinet with people who are more interested in dismantling their departments than running them. All of this contributed to an environment where Trump would be hamstrung by his inability to pass legislation through Congress. But the most damaging thing, in my opinion, was the adoption of this dual budget reconciliation plan because it gave the Republicans the idea that they were operating in a political environment that didn’t actually exist. It gave them permission to act with no thought for the future.

    Of course, Trump did not understand what he was signing off on when the Republican leaders pitched him this convoluted plan filled with parliamentary jujitsu. But I was able to say in the third week of March, when Trump had just reached the sixty day mark of his presidency, that “he’s barely been in office for two months and he’s already cut off every possibility for success.”

  21. 21.

    smintheus

    Haven’t watched any trendy series since the absurdly over-hyped Dexter. Was there also a lot of gore in Mad Men and Downton Abbey?

  23. 23.

    rikyrah

    The Trump-DeVos budget ends loan forgiveness for those who go into public service to help those with the greatest needs. #KidsNotCuts
    — AFGE (@AFGENational) July 19, 2017

  24. 24.

    TenguPhule

    And this is why I’m not interested in GOT.

    And don’t even get me started on the writing.

  25. 25.

    jl

    I just had an idea for bi-partisan deal that will solve the Obama/TrumpCare mess. Schumer and Collins introduce the following bill.

    Beautiful And Terrific Supplemental Health Insurance Triage Act (Hisory will record as the BATSHIT Law (TM), but must credit jl and include royalty check)

    ” Beautiful And Terrific Supplemental Health Insurance Triage Act
    To fix the stupid mess the dumb black guy did. This act is a Great Deal to restore low premium low cost health care that takes care of everybody, ”

    Trump will sign it, Believe me. Its in the bank.

    PROBLEM SOLVED! You are welcome. Appreciate the congrats.

    Edit: I wonder whether ‘PROBLEM SOLVED! You are welcome. Appreciate the congrats.’ should go into the text of the bill. Trump would really like it them. But I did a word count, and you couldn’t tweet out the whole law, which is supposed a be a feature I was going to point out to Donnie. So, i guess it needs some work.

  30. 30.

    rikyrah

    JUST IN: DOJ new asset forfeiture policy – police can seize property from people not charged w/crime even in states where it’s been banned. pic.twitter.com/P8K0g80m4E
    — Paula Reid (@PaulaReidCBS) July 19, 2017

  32. 32.

    Kay

    Maine SOS Dunlap, one of the few credible Democrats on the Pence-Kobach fraud commission, promised “head-butting” on the push to make this commission about voter fraud.
    The first meeting of the Commission has just concluded. And if anyone expected Dunlap to be a voice for the concerns people have expressed about this fraudulent fraud squad, they’d be sorely disappointed.
    I called for Dunlap to step down from the Commission. He’s said he’d be more valuable as a voice in the room. So far he has not served that role, at all.

    I have no idea why these two Democrats volunteered to be fools for Trump. People don’t even like this fucking commission. They (understandably!) don’t want their voter information going into Mike Pence’s office, where God knows what will happen to it.

    One clear choice here, Democrats. One acceptable position on voting rights – “FOR” – Democrats are FOR voting rights.

    If they can’t hold together on this, an issue where they are CLEARLY right and all they have to do is NOT go along with bullshit like this then what can they hold together on?

    This is THEIR BASE that will be denied voting rights so even if they have no principles they could approach it as a practical matter. I mean, Jesus, it’s a slam dunk.

    Aren’t they on the state payroll anyway, these people? Why aren’t they home doing their jobs?

  34. 34.

    zhena gogolia

    @dlwchico:

    Me too.

    Whereas in Hitchcock’s Rear Window, the killing of a dog is a BFD, a dramatic turning point that calls everyone’s humanity into question. It’s an example of doing it right, IMHO.

  36. 36.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @smintheus:
    Never watched Mad Men, but quite a bit of Downton Abbey, and I can say there was hardly any violence at all in it. It was a (very good) period piece drama

  38. 38.

    Bill

    I watched three seasons of GOT. Initially I thought I was going to really like it. Well acted. High production values. Interesting characters. Plus I kind of dig the dragons and swords thing. But I finally – and apparently very slowly – came to the realization that It’s just not very good.

    The show is unbelievably slow. The pacing is really terrible. When it started there was some vague threat looming from the other side of “the wall,” the whole world was on the verge of war, and “winter was coming.” (Whatever that meant.) Three seasons later none of those things had come to fruition. There were whole episodes where basically nothing happened. (An hour of people walking in the woods or climbing a wall.) And when things did happen, they were rarely enjoyable to watch. The torture episodes really weren’t fun to watch.

    I think I’m one of the very few people who doesn’t like GOT, but I just don’t think it’s that good.

  39. 39.

    TenguPhule

    @rikyrah:

    JUST IN: DOJ new asset forfeiture policy – police can seize property from people not charged w/crime even in states where it’s been banned.

    You’re late, I linked to the article in the Washington Post yesterday.

  40. 40.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @rikyrah: Ugh fuck that shit. Wanna guess what kind of people will be hurt the most by this?

  41. 41.

    hellslittlestangel

    I gave up on GOT after 3 seasons. There’s violence necessary to tell a story, and there’s violence porn. GOT seems to me the latter.

  42. 42.

    Kay

    It isn’t even reciprocal. Kobach spends all his time on Breitbart accusing people of voter fraud. He is actively screwing the 2 Democrats on the commission WHILE acting as Trump’s voting czar.

    When these Democrats run for office next time their GOP opponent will run against them by accusing them of either allowing or promoting voter fraud. They will INVENT voter fraud to beat them.

  44. 44.

    LAO

    Washington Post Update — Trump ends CIA’s covert program of arming anti-Assad rebels in Syria, “a move likely to please Russia”

    Hmm…

    LINK:

    JUST IN: Trump ends covert CIA program to arm anti-Assad rebels in Syria, a move sought by Moscow https://t.co/IMZbZATtL6— Ed O'Keefe (@edatpost) July 19, 2017

  48. 48.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @zhena gogolia:
    Oh yeah, I laughed my ass off when I saw that. I also like it when Grantham punched that dickwad art collector in the face for trying to get in bed with his wife. Best moments the whole series for me

  49. 49.

    jl

    @zhena gogolia: There was a grease fire, or something like that, in the kitchen? I only watched when visiting my parents, and couldn’t keep track very well.

    Edit: and somebody important fell down once. And a bit about distracted driving (kind of anachronistic, IMHO).

  50. 50.

    JimV

    I assume you’ve seen the beheading of Ned Stark. In the books, and I assume in the series, that’s the point where the story grips you in a way that makes you keep going. That can’t be allowed to stand!

    I agree with a previous commenter that although the books are gory, the series takes it to a new level with things that aren’t in the books. Not just gore, but gratuitous nudity and shit (by which I mean actual shit). A few years ago I would have summed things up as: books great, series disgusting.

    However, it now looks like George R.R. Martin is never going to finish the books, so if I want closure I’m stuck with HBO (and they did give me good closure on Hodor’s story).

  51. 51.

    Kay

    This lie is what the two Democrats on that commission are endorsing:

    [email protected] to Kris Kobach: Are you saying Hillary Clinton didn’t win the popular vote?
    Kobach: “We may never know the answer”

    Kobach is a liar. He was just chastised by a federal magistrate for lying in a pleading. They’re endorsing this.

    Reap the goddammned whirlwind. If they think the 2016 election was bad wait until they crack down on voting rights.

  53. 53.

    LAO

    “This is a momentous decision,” said a current official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “Putin won in Syria.”— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) July 19, 2017

  55. 55.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @schrodingers_cat:
    I really liked Matthew as character. He was a genuinely good guy. That and Branson, the former driver for the Granthams-turned family friend.

  56. 56.

    Miss Bianca

    I have friends who keep pushing me to watch GoT. I’ve been resisting so far. From everythnig I’ve heard, there seems to be little in the way of redeeming facets. Rooting for unsympathetic characters to meet grisly ends as revenge for sympathetic characters meeting grisly ends seems to be the main pleasure involved, and I don’t feel like I need to wade thru’ innumerable rape and torture scenes for that sort of pleasure, no matter how cool the CGI dragons and dire wolves may be.

    Tho’ speaking of cool CGI dragons…now that we know it’s possible, any chance of Anne McCaffery’s “Dragonsinger” or “Dragonquest” series being made for TV? Now those I might actually watch!

  57. 57.

    Kay

    Trump’s voting czar conflated dual registration with dual voting in the voter suppression planning meeting they just held. He’s not dumb, Kobach. He knows this is a lie. It’s not complicated “registered” doesn’t mean “voted”.

    He said it anyway.

    That’s not complicated either. Saying untrue things over and over makes one “a liar” and he is one.

  58. 58.

    gene108

    I watched it pretty regularly through some point in season 3. Then I decided to read the books.

    I want to binge watch and get caught up again, but my mom has moved in with me for the last few weeks, while she gets here place set-up, near where I live, and she would absolutely despise all the sex and gore.

    So I wait, and wait, for the day to be able to watch it again…

  59. 59.

    jl

    @Kay: People need to contact their state governments to fight the commission as hard as they possibly can. Looks like we have, for example, California and Mississippi state governments ferociously opposed to any cooperation.Has to be a way to take advantage of a coalition like that.

  61. 61.

    TenguPhule

    @Kay:

    Saying untrue things over and over makes one “a liar” and he is one.

    Yes, but he is a Republican.

    Which means he will always be believed by stupid evil little people.

  62. 62.

    TenguPhule

    @Kay:

    Reap the goddammned whirlwind. If they think the 2016 election was bad wait until they crack down on voting rights.

    You sound like you want some cookies.

  63. 63.

    jl

    @Kay: My understanding is that the Trumpsters plan to take limited data that is insufficient data to ID anyone, and run it through mystery meat federal registries and then pick and choose who to harass in what states. I think we need to contact state governments to fight the scheme like hell.

  64. 64.

    germy

    I’m surprised and pleased that my local pbs station will be showing this tonight:

    Presenting Princess Shaw

    A look at the unlikely musical collaboration between Samantha Montgomery, a New Orleans nurse who posts songs on YouTube as “Princess Shaw,” and Ophir Kutiel, an Israeli artist known as “Kutiman” who creates mash-up remixes of online videos.

  65. 65.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @Kay:
    He’s playing with fire. Kobach and the rest of the commission better have good security

  66. 66.

    gene108

    @Kay:

    I don’t understand why this is so hard for the media to grok.

    You can be registered in multiple places. It’s not illegal. It’s really not much of a god damn issue either, because damn near no one votes more than once.

    Kobach: “80 bazillion people in America are registered in more than one place.”

    Media: “But it’s not illegal to be registered in more than one place and during the last Presidential election only 5 people (or however many it was) out of 130 million votes cast voted more than once, so it’s not really a problem either. Why are we spending so much time and money to address such a non-problem. Wouldn’t we be better off spending money on providing healthcare to more people?”

    But somehow the media gives these voter suppression goons the benefit of the doubt, as if they have a serious point to make.

  67. 67.

    ? Martin

    I want to respond to a comment from The Moar You Know from the previous thread:

    Whenever Dems get hold of power again, one of the first things that needs to happen is that they need to fire every ICE employee, Reagan-style, and hire back only on a case-by-case basis. The overwhelming majority of them decided to start enforcing Trump’s edicts to the letter and have consistently refused to abide by any court rulings to the contrary. That can’t stand.

    That won’t solve the problem. The problem is that ICE has one job to do – deport people. That means that every dollar they get is dedicated to deporting people, and every person they hire is motivated by deporting people. There no opportunity costs for ICE – no other form of policing that they are trading the task off of, so we dump money into ICE to deport grandmothers meanwhile the FBI or DEA are struggling to deal with the opioid problem because we don’t know how to shift dollars from agency to agency depending on need.

    ICE needs to be abolished and that activity rolled under another agency with a broader role, one that would allow them to prioritize the best use of those dollars internally, and that would attract a broader range of employees. You don’t want things so broad, but you do want there to be some internal tension for where energy gets spent. You can’t get efficiencies at the level of Congressional budgeting.

  68. 68.

    rikyrah

    After failing on health care, McConnell’s reputation takes a hit
    07/19/17 10:59 AM—UPDATED 07/19/17 11:58 AM
    By Steve Benen

    When Donald Trump sat down with the Christian Broadcasting Network last week, TV preacher Pat Robertson noted in passing, “Mitch McConnell is a tactician of great skill.”

    This is certainly the reputation the Senate Majority Leader has cultivated over the course of many years. McConnell, Kentucky’s senior senator, knows the institution and its procedures as well as anyone, and knows how to navigate difficult legislative waters. For months, many have assumed that Republicans would eventually pass a far-right health care bill, largely because of McConnell’s skills.

    But with the party’s gambit apparently collapsing, Politico noted just how “serious” a defeat this is for the Senate Republican leader.

    It’s … a blow to McConnell’s reputation as a master legislator and raises doubts in the White House about what Senate Republicans can actually deliver for President Donald Trump. McConnell, like Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), finds himself caught between the factions in his own party. And like Ryan, McConnell hasn’t demonstrated that he knows how to resolve the dispute.

    “This is an impossible hand,” said Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas), McConnell’s closest ally, of the party’s fragile majority

    .

  69. 69.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @gene108:

    Media: “But it’s not illegal to be registered in more than one place and during the last Presidential election only 5 people (or however many it was) out of 130 million votes cast voted more than once, so it’s not really a problem either. Why are we spending so much time and money to address such a non-problem. Wouldn’t we be better off spending money on providing healthcare to more people?”

    Kobach: “I don’t give a flying fuck. I got the power now and I’m never giving it up. Joseph McCarthy, eat your heart out. He could have only dreamed about going after pinko-commie voters. Now I get to.”

  70. 70.

    gene108

    @JimV:

    Not just gore, but gratuitous nudity

    A big selling point to keep people in engaged: BOOBS!!! And lots of them on display!

  71. 71.

    Kay

    Notice how Donald Trump’s voting czar, Kris Kobach, has spent the whole day calling Hillary Clinton’s votes into question but he has not called Donald Trump’s votes into question.

    Now, Kobach attended America’s most expensive colleges, so he knows that this is ludicrous- if you’re calling elections into question that applies to 20,000 Trump margins in Michigan just as it applies to 3 million Clinton margins elsewhere, but this garbage “argument” passes muster in the Trump Administration- because they’re low quality hacks even if they are fancy lawyers.

    It’s character and integrity that is lacking here. Nothing whatever to do with education or intellect. Bad faith.

  75. 75.

    rikyrah

    Senate Republicans Defy Trump And Announce Hearings To Stabilize Obamacare Markets https://t.co/kMdZov973Q
    — Dianne Wing (@DianneWing2) July 19, 2017

    I so hope this is a legitimate effort. Hard to trust anything Republicans do these days, even with the word “bipartisan” on it.
    — Dudette (@Dudette9t9) July 19, 2017

  76. 76.

    Mike in NC

    So, how long until we hear that there was a third private meeting between Trump and Putin, with no records kept?

  77. 77.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @Kay:
    It’s as simple as this: Trump and his flunkies (GOP too) want to turn America into Russia where he can away with even more heinous, corrupt shit.

  78. 78.

    Kay

    @gene108:

    I don’t understand why this is so hard for the media to grok.

    Please. They spent a decade printing headlines that claimed dead people were voting because dead people are registered.

    I don’t think they vote. They seem wholly unfamiliar with the most basic concepts. These are the same people who promoted a theory that millions of people were impersonating other people to vote. That doesn’t even make any sense! That’s not even a plus one! It’s ONE name!

    “Voter impersonation fraud” should have been a tip off they were applying NO thought to this.

  79. 79.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    It’s character and integrity that is lacking here. Nothing whatever to do with education or intellect. Bad faith.

    Keep on bringing the truth, Kay.

  80. 80.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    That’s not complicated either. Saying untrue things over and over makes one “a liar” and he is one.

    Nothing but a liar, Kay.

    L-I-A-R

  82. 82.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @rikyrah: Kay should seriously do FP posts on voting rights and ethics issues. She’s very good at it and her style, I think, is very effective against potential Republicans on the fence about Trump and the GOP

  83. 83.

    TenguPhule

    And today’s daily reminder that the Federal Debt ceiling and Federal Budgets are STILL not scheduled for votes and the law of government inertia is not working for us here.

    Still not too late to get those emergency plans in order. For now.

  84. 84.

    Tarragon

    I gave up on GoT pretty early in the series of books book series. I was tired of wading through an entire novel for 3 chapters about each of the characters I was interested in. I tried a couple episodes of the TV series but never got into it..

    My friends all look at me with a sad look in their eyes when I decline to join the mass watching parties they hold.

  85. 85.

    WTF

    Low voter turnout in the United States has confounded politicians, activists and academics seeking to reverse a trend that puts the country behind many of the world’s developed nations in participation at the polls.
    In August, the Pew Research Center ranked the U.S. 31st out of 35 countries for voter turnout based on the voting age populace, among the mostly democratic nations that are a part of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
    The study showed 53 percent of eligible voters in the U.S. cast ballots in 2012, the last time a presidential election was held, with about 129 million people out of a potential 241 million citizens taking part in the election.
    In recent history, participation in the U.S. has peaked during presidential elections, when the last several decades show about 55 to 60 percent of the eligible electorate will vote. But those numbers trail off during non-presidential years and in primary races.

    Confounded some politicians, not all, but obviously this dangerous trend in voter participation must be stopped at all costs!

  86. 86.

    Kay

    I have been reading Rick Hasen for years and he is not a bomb-thrower. He’s a professor and a voting expert.

    If he’s concerned, and he is, you should be concerned. He gets more upset every year. He started out as this calm professorial person and every year since 2012 he gets more alarmed. Partly it’s because suppression is cumulative. It builds. If they keep black and Latino people off school boards or water districts then that loss of political power accumulates. It ripples. That’s their bench for higher office and things like school boards and water districts and zoning are about public ASSETS- who gets them and who doesn’t get them. That’s about accumulating wealth over decades and years and generations. The harm accumulates. It’s NOT one election.

    He doesn’t pull the alarm for every patch on software or glitch or innocent recording error or over the top statement by one or another hack. It’s a real threat now.

  88. 88.

    Heidi Mom

    At this point it’s conventional wisdom that GRRM takes pleasure in killing off the good guys so don’t get attached to them, but I don’t think it’s that simple. Rather, the characters who appear in the beginning to be the heroes are not necessarily the characters who will save Westeros in the end (assuming that saving it will be part of the author’s intended “bittersweet” ending). I think the key is the statement by Tyrion — acknowledged by the author to be his favorite character — that he has a soft spot for “cripples, bastards, and broken things.” Keep your eye on them (there are more and more of them as the series goes on), and don’t despair.

  89. 89.

    TenguPhule

    Lazy Slob insists other Lazy Assholes should stay and work over the summer.

    A day after the GOP strategy to roll back the ACA appeared dead, Trump invited Republican senators to lunch at the White House and challenged them to work out an agreement even if it means remaining in Washington through their summer recess next month. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) had previously announced that the recess would be delayed by two weeks.

    “People should not leave town unless we have a health insurance plan, unless we give our people great health care,” Trump said at the beginning of the lunch.

    Gone Golfing Telling Gone Insane to Get to Work.

  92. 92.

    geg6

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Not the HBO I watch. I watch things like their documentaries and “Veep” and “Big Little Lies.” But then, I don’t watch and probably will never watch GoT. Nothing I have heard about it or the admittedly short clips I’ve seen from it looks or sounds as if I’d enjoy any of it.

  93. 93.

    TenguPhule

    @Kay:

    If he’s concerned, and he is, you should be concerned.

    None of the solutions to fix this mess are currently legal because of the Republicans.

  94. 94.

    Butch

    Nothing I’ve ever heard about this series has made me even remotely interested in trying to watch it; I do tend to be on the trailing edge of popular culture, but I think Game of Throne is something I can live without.

  95. 95.

    Chris

    @Miss Bianca:

    Wait. There are sympathetic characters?

    That is basically what stops me from getting into GOT. I can watch movies where everyone is an asshole – I love The Godfather, for instance – but a TV show, that’s asking me to tune in week after week for years, needs to elicit a reaction from me othet than “for the love of God, will somebody shoot this fucking prick already?”

    Have passed on Breaking Bad and House of Cards for the same reason.

  98. 98.

    Brachiator

    @NorthLeft12:

    The scene had absolutely no redeeming value. Misogynistic violence porn. There, no spoiler.

    Wow. I loved that scene. As always, your mileage may vary.

    Originally I had no great interest in the show, because while there were people who loved it, there was a bunch of others who were not attracted to the show at all. But their reasons were so diverse. Some only wanted straight SF. Others just wanted a tv version of dungeons and dragons. Still others wanted historical allegory.

    I love it precisely because it confounds so many expectations, and was so intent on NOT giving viewers the typical genre fare they were used to. And this included characters who are bad and who do vile things.

  99. 99.

    TenguPhule

    How to Destroy any respect for Police from the Public, A Case Study.

    According to the Minnesota bureau of criminal apprehension (BCA), Harrity told investigators he and Noor were in a squad car on Saturday when the sound startled Harrity. Damond appeared at the driver’s side door and Noor shot her from the passenger seat.

    Harrity’s attorney, Fred Bruno, told the Star Tribune “it’s certainly reasonable” to assume any officer would be concerned about an ambush. He referenced the recent death of a New York City officer killed in her squad car.

    So many shovels, so much bullshit mines to excavate.

    Officer Noor has so far declined to be interviewed. Investigators say they cannot compel officer Noor to give an interview.

    Dig-Dug. But with less amusing consequences.

    The officers did not turn on their body cameras until after the shooting, and the squad car camera was also not activated.

    Of course they didn’t.

  100. 100.

    TenguPhule

    @Brachiator:

    I love it precisely because it confounds so many expectations, and was so intent on NOT giving viewers the typical genre fare they were used to. And this included characters who are bad and who do vile things.

    A fantasy age Trump regime is not nearly so amusing when it happens in real life.

  102. 102.

    kindness

    Betty how do you not know what has already happened in GOT? You’d have to avoid much of the media to do so. As a regular viewer (I tried reading the books but 1,000 page tomes of which there are already 6 and one in the over (has been in the oven for 5 years now) let me just say I love the show and JRR is a complete asshole with my feelings. He will kill every single character you end up liking and rarely kills the ones that need killing. Have at it and join the club.

  103. 103.

    dlwchico

    @T S: Oh, I know that isn’t the case with GoT. Long time reader and watcher of that show. Betty’s comments about animals being killed just made me think of it.

    Like the Will Smith I Am Legend movie.

  104. 104.

    Mom Says I'm Handsome

    @TenguPhule: I started reading the first book a week ago, and it’s been a very compelling ride. GRRM does a great job with pacing, he offers up enough repetition of names and titles and relationships to keep everyone straight (apparently on Westeros you only need two degrees to get to Lord Kevyn Bayconne), and there are enough sympathetic characters to make up for the wretchedness of the others (fucking Lannisters, amirite?). I know they’ll probably all be dead by the end of season 2, but for now I hold out hope that most Stark heads avoid being be-piked…

    I have a son with Asperger’s, and have been thinking a lot about the notion of “theory of mind”, since that’s a less-well-developed skill for him. All the intrigue in Game of Thrones is a perfect illustration of what it’s like to be a human in a complex society, acting based on your interpretation of what others’ motivations might be; it’s been thought-provoking from that perspective. George Martin does a competent job of laying all that out.

    And I understand there is a reward of boobies for me when I finish the first book and take a break to watch the first season.

  105. 105.

    geg6

    @Chris:

    Yup, that’s exactly my problem. I won’t watch anything, even movies, that have not a single redeeming character. Which is why I despised The Godfather and won’t ever watch it again. Also never saw any of the sequels (with the exception of a few clips of II, which I couldn’t avoid).

    ETA: And to be perfectly clear, there doesn’t necessarily have to be a “good” guy. Characters can be ambiguous or flawed. Just not every single character unrelentingly horrible.

  106. 106.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?:
    @Kay:

    I entirely agree with Goku, and others who have suggested the same.

    Kay, please, we implore you, at least consider returning to being a front-pager now and then, and give us both your own thinking and links to others’ thinking on these issues of voter suppression, ethics, the deliberate destruction of norms and institutions, and anything else that speaks to your passions/expertise.

    You wouldn’t have to make a big commitment of time: we wouldn’t demand X number of posts per week, or anything like that. And I, for one, would even exempt you from troll-banning and get-me-out-of-moderation duty, and leave those jobs for other FPers. But your thinking is so clear, and your writing style is so engaging, that it is almost your civic duty to give us the occasional thoughtful post.

    Please think about it. Thank you.

    :: drip drip drip ::

  107. 107.

    gene108

    @Kay:

    I have no idea why these two Democrats volunteered to be fools for Trump.

    Never underestimate the ego of a politician; any politician, even the good ones. They probably think they have the power to do some good, so they jumped in, because they are awesome like that.

    Best thing for them to do is resign in protest. It’s not too late for that.

  108. 108.

    Brachiator

    @Chris:

    Have passed on Breaking Bad and House of Cards for the same reason.

    Never saw Breaking Bad, but loved the original British “House of Cards.” Then again, I love the play “Richard III.” I don’t need to approve of a character. I have to have a clear idea of what he wants and am intensely curious to see if he or she gets it.

    This is also why I loved the first two Godfather films. The characters are not really good people, and the seduction of Michael into the criminal life is fascinating. You like him even though he is doing terrible things. Godfather III, on the other hand, was a bore and the characters uninteresting.

  109. 109.

    geg6

    @kindness:

    It’s easy to not know. I don’t know a single plot point. I don’t read or watch anything that discusses it. I’m not interested in it so I don’t pay attention.

  110. 110.

    geg6

    @Brachiator:

    You like him even though he is doing terrible things.

    Speak for yourself. I found the character completely repulsive. From start to finish. Only saw the first one, but I doubt he suddenly gets better before sinking back into the muck of who he really is.

  111. 111.

    Brachiator

    @geg6:

    Yup, that’s exactly my problem. I won’t watch anything, even movies, that have not a single redeeming character.

    There are Throne watchers who have characters they want to root for, and characters who they think will find some kind of redemption. I think the demand that fiction must give you characters to root for, redemption arcs, the “heroes journey,” etc is incredibly reductive and not what literature, even pop literature, is necessarily about. As always, your mileage may vary and there is enough stuff out there to satisfy everyone.

    ETA: I remember watching people walk out of the magnificent Mike Leigh film “Naked,” because a character they thought might find redemption kept being a total shit. But there was a clear dramatic reason for this character’s behavior and choices, which made the film amazing.

  112. 112.

    Miss Bianca

    @Chris: I feel you. ;)

    (tribute to “The Wire”, which somehow managed to make me care about “the bad guys” enough to make me positively upset when any of them met a bad end!)

  114. 114.

    Brachiator

    @TenguPhule:

    A fantasy age Trump regime is not nearly so amusing when it happens in real life.

    Trump reminds me of a cartoon villain who escaped the screen and is now running loose in the real world causing havoc.

  115. 115.

    smintheus

    @geg6: I saw more than enough of the mafia growing up in RI. I’ve never watched the Godfather flics and have zero interest in anything that glorifies mobsters, who almost universally are the lowest form of scum.

  116. 116.

    Betty Cracker

    @kindness: I do know about some things just from a pop culture contact high. That’s okay. I don’t really expect the rest of the planet to shield me from spoilers.

  117. 117.

    nightranger

    I am only saying this tongue in cheek but …..

    so your ok women being treated like farm animals but heaven forbid someone hurts a real animal.

  118. 118.

    Brachiator

    @TenguPhule:

    “People should not leave town unless we have a health insurance plan, unless we give our people great health care,” Trump said at the beginning of the lunch.

    This is so funny. Is Trump trying to salvage his own reputation with the suckers who voted for him?

    Trump talks about “giving” health care to the people, even though he is clearly blowing smoke. But the Congressional Republicans are all about taking health care away from people, giving the rich tax cuts, and returning to a status quo in which the insurance companies could act in bad faith in order to maximize their profits. Something is seriously wrong with this picture.

    Gone Golfing Telling Gone Insane to Get to Work.

    Perfect!

  119. 119.

    nightranger

    So you’re ok with women being pretend treated like farm animals, pretend ra p ed, pretend beaten, pretend in cest, but heaven forbid they pretend hurt cgi or show biz animals?

  120. 120.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @nightranger:

    So your ok with women being pretend treated like farm animals but heaven forbid they pretend hurt cgi or show biz animals.

    Where the fuck did Betty ever say or imply this?

  122. 122.

    Raven Onthill

    Just called Senator Cantwell’s (D-WA) office to thank her for her work in helping defeat the ACA. I think, really, that most of the cred goes to Indivisible, but the Dems did have to stick it out and they did, at least that. And then the staffer said that the Senator would be seeking a bipartisan solution. Hunh? Having been given a victory, are the Dems going to bargain it away?

    Cantwell, note, is not a DINO. She’s a moderate Democrat from a state with a liberal majority, though one with a strong conservative minority. I don’t see that the Republicans are going to accept any compromise that will make the ACA better and anyway they haven’t budged in 20 years. Now, maybe the Dems see a chance to break the far-right coalition that dominates the Republican Senate delegation. Maybe. But it sure looks like the Dems are looking for an opportunity to cave after they have won, and I don’t understand it.

    (Soon to be posted to my own blog.)

  124. 124.

    nightranger

    @? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?:

    What else would you conclude if her only complaint (it’s a TV show btw, not real life…mkay) that animals are pretend hurt/killed in the show but has no complaints about all the much more brutal stuff committed on humans.

    Pretty funny to have people jump up and defend a pretty dumb complaint in general anyways. Reminder…it’s a fucking TV show!

    I’m not sure what scenes she is talking about but they might no even be real animals. Let’s start a collection for those poor pretend abused/killed CGI animals and find them a good home…lol.

  125. 125.

    Annie

    @Bill and Brachiator:

    I don’t care for GOT either because there is absolutely no hope and no chance, not for redemption, but even for decency.

    I’m 61 years old and I work in a court so I’m not naïve about the world. I understand that hideous things happen every day. But in GOT the only way to survive is to do hideous things all the time, and those hideous things turn the people who do them into monsters. What kind of world do those monsters create? One that creates more monsters because only monsters can survive.

    I really don’t need that.

  126. 126.

    PJ

    @Miss Bianca: If you like well-constructed, compelling characters, and (at least initially) tight plotting full of earned reversals, you may like the show. There’s a fair amount of kitsch, particularly in the first few seasons, and the plotting goes awry, as it did in the books, after the material in the third book, and sometimes the writing is dire (pun intended), but the acting and directing are usually very strong, characters remain compelling, as do the themes – What makes a good leader? What does power consist of? Is loyalty an unalloyed good? What does honor consist of, and is it always a good thing? What are we living, and dying, for, and how much does politics take into account what really matters to us? How do love, power, and family influence each other? And, pertinent to your qualms, what good comes from vengeance and violence? Plus magic, zombies, and dragons. It’s not everyone’s thing, obviously, but it sound like you might actually like it.

  128. 128.

    Miss Bianca

    @Raven Onthill:

    But it sure looks like the Dems are looking for an opportunity to cave after they have won, and I don’t understand it.

    let’s just jump to the pre-emptive conclusion that the Democrats, having held the line on the ACA (not “having helped defeat it”), are now going to help Republicans weaken it, shall we? Rather than oh, say, waiting to see what they actually *do*? I mean, it’s just so much more fun.

  129. 129.

    zhena gogolia

    @geg6:

    Same here. I vaguely know the names of the characters because they’re funny, but I couldn’t tell you a damn thing about the plot. Oh, and I know that Jerome of Robson and Jerome appeared on it.

  130. 130.

    VeniceRiley

    @NorthLeft12:

    Not sure if you have read GoT, but what turned me off the TV series is that the gratuitous violence has been amped up from the book. There is one scene in particular that absolutely ended any interest I had in watching anymore. I really struggled to understand why this scene was added. It’s not as if we did not know how cruel and awful the perpetrator was already. The scene had absolutely no redeeming value. Misogynistic violence porn. There, no spoiler.

    Later seasons (the last 2 and current) dialed that back quite a bit. I think due to the backlash. They never admitted it, of course.
    I’m still in only because they dialed back all the gnawing and gnoshing and food porn from, what I understand from friends, is many pages of the books.

  131. 131.

    trollhattan

    @Brachiator:
    Dear Lord, Breaking Bad is one of the best-written most cinematic shows to date. Solid from the pilot through the coda.

  133. 133.

    Miss Bianca

    @Annie: @PJ:

    I understand that hideous things happen every day. But in GOT the only way to survive is to do hideous things all the time, and those hideous things turn the people who do them into monsters. What kind of world do those monsters create? One that creates more monsters because only monsters can survive.

    There’s a school of thought that says that great art can show depraved people doing depraved things, but that the point of having some hope of redemption, or some redeeming character or action, is to show that we as human beings aren’t *doomed* to depravity and despair. That art that purports to show us “the real world” (even in fantasy) by insisting on no heroes, or heroic journey, or anyone learning anything constructive – in other words, art that intimates that human beings are just fucked and that’s all there is to it – may seem like good or even great art but really isn’t.

    It’s an ethos. You don’t have to agree with it, but I kind of do. ; )

  134. 134.

    VeniceRiley

    @Miss Bianca: In general, I think GRRM is all about hideousness of humanity, interspersed with moments of greatness that are few and far between.

  135. 135.

    ? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?

    @nightranger:
    You pretty much accused her of not giving a shit about the people “dying” in the show. The humans aren’t really dying either (simulated violence.)
    I gave her the benefit of the doubt. You just decided to troll

  137. 137.

    Heidi Mom

    @Annie: No chance of redemption, or even decency? Not true. See, e.g., Jon Snow, Davos Seaworth, Brienne of Tarth. And the story of Sandor Clegane, the Hound, appears to be a redemption arc if ever there was one.

  138. 138.

    Miss Bianca

    @trollhattan: somehow, I knew it was going to be that painting! : )

    @VeniceRiley: Which is why I think I’d reach the conclusion that GRRM is probably a pretty good novelist but not by any stretch of my imagination a great one. While I consider Bosch a great painter (one of my favorites). So either there’s some redeeming facet I see in Bosch that I don’t perceive in the descriptions of the GoT universe, or I’m capable of contradicting myself without the slightest hesitation. Maybe it’s both! : )

  140. 140.

    PJ

    @Miss Bianca: @VeniceRiley: One of the points of the books and the show is to illustrate how, despite their many and great mistakes and moments of weakness and terrible acts, people can learn and grow and do great, good things, and maybe save the world. As the series comes to a close, characters whom at first glance seem to be bad or irredeemable have learned enough about themselves and the world to take steps to do the saving, and characters who seemed to be good and innocent have found themselves making choices which may cause them to do irredeemable things. Another point is that chance, or the gods, or the universe, or whatever you want to call it, sometimes helps us to do these good things, and gives us hope. Almost every one of the major characters has suffered serious, traumatizing loss, and yet they persist.

  142. 142.

    PJ

    @Miss Bianca: Martin is not, by any stretch, a great writer (his prose is pedestrian, and he has too many interminable descriptions of food and the trappings of the life of the nobility), but, at least through the first three books, before he literally begins to lose the plot, he is a great storyteller. The Last Judgment by Bosch shows the damned and the saved; Martin does too, and he shows that there is a price to be paid by both, but he is not a Christian, and the existential threat which is coming down in his world will make no distinction between the good and the bad.

  143. 143.

    Miss Bianca

    @Raven Onthill:

    WTF are you even talking about? Do you have any clue at all? How do you get from this assertion:

    Just called Senator Cantwell’s (D-WA) office to thank her for her work in helping defeat the ACA.

    to this question:

    Do you given independent citizen activism no credit at all, then?

    From inaccuracy to irrelevancy, in one fell swoop?

    Are you stoned? Or something else?

  144. 144.

    Miss Bianca

    @PJ: Hmmm…dammit, you’re almost persuading me that GoT might be worth the effort. STOP THAT! >: >

  145. 145.

    Bitter Scribe

    I don’t get HBO, so I saw only one episode, in a hotel room. It seemed pretty boring. Until the girl-on-girl sex scene.

  146. 146.

    Raven Onthill

    @Miss Bianca: you said, “Democrats, having held the line on the ACA (not ‘having helped defeat it’)”

    I don’t think all the people who participated in the demonstrations and sit-ins were Democratic activists. Do you?

  147. 147.

    PJ

    @Miss Bianca: Oh, my sweet summer child, the journey is no easy one, and you will face both large and small disappointments in writing and storytelling and excruciating gaps between seasons and books, but the great moments are addictive and the story compulsive, and these will carry you through the long, dark night as winter comes down for us all.

  148. 148.

    Sab

    @PJ: Martin is a much better screenwriter than novelist. So his characters are interesting and complex, and his dialog is great. His descriptions of things like scenery are less so.

    I thought the two episodes he wrote in the first two seasons were the best of those seasons.

    The books are kind of paced like commercial television. Little short chapters, then you can take a break. Great to read if you are in situations where you need a long book but will be interrupted (doctors office, hospital waiting rooms, air travel).

  151. 151.

    Miss Bianca

    @PJ: OK, you’ve just cured me of that flicker of curiosity. Whew! I thought I was in trouble for a second there!

  152. 152.

    EBT

    Hot Take: Do yourself a favor and read the first three books, then pretend he pulled his Robert Jordan already and ignore everything else.

  154. 154.

    debbie

    @Turgidson:

    If it’s the one I’m thinking of, I agree. I had to turn away. I will say, though, every character does get what they deserve.

  155. 155.

    debbie

    @nightranger:

    This was more or less the Middle Ages. Neither animals nor “common folk” were treated at all well. I’m reading David Jones’ The Plantagenets (precursors to the Tudors, ie Henry VIII) and what was done to people was worse than anything in GOT (unfortunately).

  157. 157.

    hovercraft

    After successfully avoiding it for years, I finally broke down and started watching “Game of Thrones.”

    They’ve broken me too, my DVR is now fully loaded from the GoT marathon a couple of weeks ago. My plan is to spend a week of my August staycation binge watching.

  158. 158.

    EBT

    @hovercraft: People should heed my good advice. The Absolute Fucker ceded control to HBO so if you like the first couple seasons the others will taste different, as they pull away from his material.

  159. 159.

    JustRuss

    @Brachiator: I assume you’re referring to the scene in The Last Action Hero, where the fictional-turned-real villain kills a man, and when the police don’t immediately show up, he yells at the top of his lungs “I’ve just killed someone…” and nothing happens, to his amazement and delight.

    And yes, watching Trump get away with, well, everything, is exactly like that.

  160. 160.

    lethargytartare

    @NorthLeft12:

    Not sure if you have read GoT, but what turned me off the TV series is that the gratuitous violence has been amped up from the book. There is one scene in particular that absolutely ended any interest I had in watching anymore. I really struggled to understand why this scene was added. It’s not as if we did not know how cruel and awful the perpetrator was already. The scene had absolutely no redeeming value. Misogynistic violence porn. There, no spoiler.

    The scene you’re talking about is far more violent in the book. They left out way more than they added.

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