Our President retweeted a conspiracy theorist and a violent cartoon that seemed to support the terrorist car attack in Charlottesville this morning and then deleted them. But lots of people know to take screenshots. Other than that and a birther reference, he hasn’t done much today.
It’s feeling like a lazy day for me and the kittehs anyway. You?
schrodingers_cat
Your desk kittehs has a cute.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
How long until The Nation dies for good, or is at least rendered permanently irrelevant?
Major Major Major Major
Something tells me it’s always a lazy day for the kittehs.
Slow day at the office here, too, so slow that I’m spending my day teaching myself only tangentially-related skills.
HeleninEire
Ah, are those kittehs in love?
ET
Interesting. Not an editorial I though I would see from the National Review:
I don’t know that I believe that more of these symbols of veneration to an immoral cause and a bunch of traitors but maybe just a few more won’t be something blighting the landscape.
bemused
Our two all black long haired kitties are curled up together on our bed. I walk in and see a big mass of black fluff with four green eyes staring at me. “You’re not going to bother us, are you?”.
LaNonna
Today is Ferragosto, biggest summer holiday in Italy, beaches are crammed and many restaurants are having big blow-out parties tonight. Next door neighbors getting the bbq out and cranking up the music, we are invited over (karaoke in Italian, too), no sleep tonight, and nobody works tomorrow. A little bit of la dolce vita break from the news, I need it.
Kay
I so want the manufacturing council to be an empty conference table except for Donald, Jared and Ivanka and whatever unlucky employees they can scare up to sit for the photo.
Times like these they miss the Mooch, I bet.
Mnemosyne
My boss is out sick, so not a busy day for me, either. The biggest thing going on is a baby shower for one of my co-workers.
Cheryl Rofer
@HeleninEire: They are bonded brothers*, picked up together by Animal Control. The shelter wanted them adopted together, and I wanted two kittehs.
* Since we don’t know their history before Animal Control picked them up, we don’t know that they’re brothers, and there hasn’t been a DNA test, but just looking at their colors suggests that is the case.
Ohio Mom
Busy week here — gearing up for the start of Ohio Son’s school year on Thursday.
Looking forward to when the new routine is established, I figure that will take about two weeks. Not looking forward to 6:30 wake-ups again though.
Kay
Another betrayal and from Wal Mart- the retail arm of the Republican Party:
Mnemosyne
@Cheryl Rofer:
You never know — cats are surprisingly willing to bond with non-related cats. I used to frequent a pet store that had rescue cats (partners with a local rescue org) and two (neutered) male cats who were being kept in separate cages next to each other became so close that they ended up moving them into the same cage and adopting them out together. It was really adorable.
In my experience, two neutered male cats will get along better together than two spayed females. Not quite sure why, but I think the females are more territorial.
Chris
@ET:
Being that it’s the National Review, I can’t let it pass without still picking a fight:
No, the heroism and losses of Confederate soldiers should not be commemorated at all, full stop. And the issue is not that white nationalists often muster in their defense – the issue is that the Confederates were, themselves, white nationalists, among the worst of their day and age. The racists people who muster in their defense are entirely right when they say that defending the Confederacy is defending their heritage – it’s just that it’s their ideological and not their cultural heritage. (There’s a reason why the C.S.A. has so many defenders in the North and Appalachia).
More than that: the statues, from the day they were erected, were precisely this. Again, it’s not just that modern white nationalists use them to defend a vile ideology; it’s that they, and the cause they honor, were all about that ideology from the start.
(I’m not completely sure that this was the author’s intent, but the text seems vague enough that it can still be interpreted as “the Confederacy might not have been a terrible cause, but modern racists have appropriated it so completely that it’s now toxic, so we might as well let it go.” When the reality is that no, the two movements are basically one and the same. You should absolutely let it go because of what it represents to modern racists, but you should let it go just as much because what the institution it honors represented in its day and age).
efgoldman
TODAY WE ARE FOUR
Mommy and Daddy found a place to have the party so Mommy doesn’t have to do it at home. They have games and punch and cupcakes! All my friends said they’d come. The cat has to stay home.
In September, whenever that is, I will go downstairs at my fun school/day care to the pre-kindergarten class. I think that means the class with the big kids. I have made good friends. but my friend Maya is leaving for Russia with her Mommy and Daddy before my party. I guess her Daddy’s job got moved there. I will miss her at school and for play dates.
My cat’s name is Guybrush. Actually he’s Mommy’s cat. She and Daddy tell me Guybrush was already here when they brought me home. I was a little tiny baby and don’t remember. I think they are maybe teasing me. Mommy named him after a charac- … chara… character in the first video game she loved.
Mommy writes on the web all day. Mostly lately she’s been saying naughty words under her breath (she thinks I can’t hear. Ha!) about something called “congress” and something called ‘medical.” She writes about other things, too. She calls the FCC guy naughty names, but not when she’s writing.
Daddy does something behind the scenes for a big cable network. I think he plays with sattelites, whatever they are.
TODAY WE ARE FOUR
I have grandparants, Grammy and Grandpa, who live in a place called Rhode Island. They are Mommy’s parents. We visit them once in a while. We were there for Mommy’s big barbecue party a few weeks ago. I talk to them on video almost every Sunday. They watch me play.
He thinks I don’t know, but every once in a while Grandpa looks at me and cries. I don’t think I make him sad. Maybe he’s confused. Grammy and Grandpa buy me lots of presents, but Mommy made them stop. We live in a small apartment and don’t have room!
My other Grandfather is Daddy’s father, Papa Jim. He is a crazy man with a big white doggie he calls “Casper.” Daddy loves him, but whenever he visits he makes big messes and makes Mommy crazy. I never met my Nana. She and Mommy and Daddy had some big fights and they never spoke. Nana died. I went to her memorial. Lots of people were very sad.
On Saturdays I go to swimming lessons. I love the water. I’ve been going since I was two and just little. In summer we go to the beach in a place called North Carolina, which is a long, long drive away. This year the weather was bad and I mostly had to stay inside, We went to an acquarium and I saw lots of cool fish. When we visit Daddy’s family, he has a lot of cousins that like to spoil me. I like that. One of Daddy’s aunts raises puppies and brings the new ones sometmes. They are fun.
TODAY WE ARE FOUR
I know all my letters and numbers. I can read the words in my books but I don’t like to do it in front of other people. I have lots and lots of books. Some are too old for me. Some Saturdays Mommy or Daddy take me to the library to get more books. It is one of my favorite places. My Nana sent me boxes and boxes of Little Golden Books. Mommy took away the ones with crosses on the cover and bible stories.
Grandpa started teaching me arithmetic before I was three. We counted blueberries. Taking away was easier than adding more, plus then I got to eat the take away ones. Yum. Mommy is trying to teach me to multiply. She says I am doing very well, but I’m not sure I understand it.
Pizza is my favorite. We don’t like mushrooms in our house. Yuck. We like it plain or with pep… pepperoni. We have the best pizza store right across the street. People wait for an hour, however long that is, to eat there. I love to eat mac and cheese, too. Sometimes we go out to the diner and that’s what I have. They also have good chicken nuggets, and hot dogs. Last time we went to the diner, I was very bad. I threw a tantrum and Daddy had to take me out to the car. Nobody liked that. I have pretty good control for my age, but sometimes I just can’t help it.
Princess Elsa is my favortie. I sang the Frozen song when I was two, but I guess it wasn’t very good. I put on one of the princess dresses that Grammy got for me and dance and twirl. That is lots of fun! The first present Grammy and Grandpa got me was a big plastic dump truck full of blocks. Vroom, vroom. I have a very big plastic box full of Duplo blocks. I build lots of things. Sometimes I make pretend cupcakes and ice cream. Yum. I love birthdays.
TODAY WE ARE FOUR
My party was Saturday, at a party place. Mommy made me a beautiful cake, with rainbow decorations. It said “Happy Brthday” and my name. I could read THOSE words! She put four little candles and one big candle shaped like the number 4. I had a party at the party place with some of my school friends. Mommy said it was chaos, whatever that means. Tuesday is my real birthday. Mommy is making cupcakes for school.
I got some of my birthday presents already. Grammy and Grandpa sent me an Elsa pencil box full of a beautiful set of colored pencils. I don’t have to beg Mommy to borrow hers any more.
TODAY WE ARE FOUR
I have a little stuffed tiger. Her name is Tigey. I take her everywhere. One day, I lost Tigey in a store. I was very upset and I cried. Next day the manager called. They found her! Daddy made a special trip to go pick her up. I was very happy.
Today I got to jump from the three year old class at school to the four. I’m not sure if Mommy is happy or sad. Last week, I learned the word “ambivalent.” I think that’s what Mommy is.
Major Major Major Major
@Chris: I’ll agree with it within the context of it being a National Review article. If the GOP wasn’t completely run by Trumpists nowadays, their opinion on the matter might even be helpful.
SiubhanDuinne
CNN just alerted me that Trump is about to make remarks on infrastructure.
Litlebritdifrnt
I am flat shopping. Found one on St. Georges quay, beautiful ground floor period flat, two doors down from the Maritime Museum, right next door to the George and Dragon pub. Gorgeous views of the river Lune, exquisite period features like built in units and beautiful cornices. Have e-mailed for a viewing. Will let you know how it goes. (It has been on the market for months, methinks people are put off by the pub, for me that is a feature not a bug!). It is so exciting being home. :)
Mnemosyne
@efgoldman:
Taking dictation today, are we? ?
Kay
@Ohio Mom:
Ours start late this year because they’re finishing building a new school and it’s complicated- they all have to sort of shift one building over. They demolished the old high school.
They were giving out bricks as mementos. I asked my daughter if she wanted one and she said “eew, why? no, I don’t want a brick”. She’s so sentimental, that girl :)
Felonius Monk
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD):
The Nation is often rather garbagey, but what in particular have they done now to deserve your ire?
mai naem mobile
@efgoldman: good lord if that’s all written by her she’s one talented writer.
Major Major Major Major
@SiubhanDuinne: Perhaps this will soothe the Nazis’ economic anxiety.
Eric S.
@Major Major Major Major: I had to return home about 45 minutes after leaving for work this morning. I found a lump under the sheets on the bed. Ozzie the Cat had gone back to bed.
ET
@Chris: Definitely wasn’t everything it could have been but given the source that is a lot stronger in tone and words on this topic because normally though would have been talking around it and somehow trying to blame liberals, PCism, etc. They definitively could have been even stronger in wording (or at least left some of it out) but this feels like a baby step.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
Well, that was just a wonderful read. Happy, happy FOURTH 4️⃣ BIRTHDAY ? to my friend efg’s granddaughter.
But one sentence made me cry ? a little bit. It was this one:
Mnemosyne
@ET:
I can’t be arsed to click, but the vast majority of the memorials and statues do NOT date to the Civil War, but were put up from the 1890s to the 1920s to justify the rise of white supremacy and Jim Crow.
Chris
@Major Major Major Major:
I thought the National Review was run by NeverTrumpists? Hence that enraged, scatching, frankly really fucked up article from the 2016 primary about how the White Working Class is just a fucked-up diseased culture.
Mnemosyne
@Eric S.:
Our cat Natasha used to hide when the cleaning people came by. One time, the guy told me that she was hiding under the covers of the bed and they were both startled when he took the comforter off to change the sheets. ??
trollhattan
@LaNonna: I am SO there. Andiamo!
Chris
@ET:
Oh yeah. I’m happy to see them take steps in the right direction. But, I’ll still feel compelled, especially on a liberal blog, to point out its inadequacies.
Cheryl Rofer
@Mnemosyne: That’s an adorable story. I think my two are brothers because their coloring is remarkably similar, although their personalities, ways of meowing, and body shapes are quite different. They also seem to be the same age. But I won’t know for sure unless I have a DNA test done!
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@efgoldman: Loved it! Our little granddaughter is 3-1/2 and it’s amazing how much personality and opinion can get stuffed into those little packages. When we have family visits somehow I keep ending up being the one on the floor or chasing the butterflies with her, sometimes wondering just a little what might be happening in the adult conversation. Oh poor me!!
Repatriated
@Mnemosyne: Not just to justify it, but to symbolically reinforce it as well.
efgoldman
@Kay:
When my kid was that age, our town’s middle school burned to the ground. They had to make very quick plans to move sixth grade to one of the elementary schools, and seventh and eighth to the high school.
It was amazing how quickly they got the new middle school built in the parking lot of the old one.
Major Major Major Major
@Chris: Hence, why the National Review’s opinion on the matter is probably not very useful at the moment.
Kay
I’ve had three (sequential) rescue cats over many years. I name them after flowers and they were all females so it was Marigold, Zinnia and now Daisy. Daisy, frankly, just has a bad personality. She’s a malcontent. But 2 out of 3 isn’t bad :)
trollhattan
@efgoldman:
AWWW, making grandpa’s life better in every possible way.
Your party place reminds me of the blessed gymnastics school birthday parties of the preteen years–kids are ushered in, get guided play in the gym for an hour–FOAM BLOCK PIT!–off for cake and presents then out the door. Worn out kids and no cleanup.
Enjoy that little one.
Yarrow
No lazy day for me. Tons to do and a busy evening ahead with a group event. At least that will be a change of pace from Cheeto Puppet’s idiocy.
Amir Khalid
@SiubhanDuinne:
I look forward to the reviews. They’re not going to be kind.
Brachiator
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD):
I thought that already happened years ago.
@Chris:
?Ahh, the right wing soul mate of The Nation. National Review pretended to be the journal of the thinking conservative. They didn’t understand that modern conservatives abandoned any pretense to rational thought years ago.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@Felonius Monk: Discussed last week, but THIS FUCKING THING. In fairness it’s only four columnists (this douche, Carden, Cohen & KvH) and one section (foreign policy) that are consistently dogshit – and there’s been some pushback from some of its columnists – but this is pretty much like reading the last days of Daley’s run at Salon, and I fear that either KvH kills the magazine outright or its lost credibility fatally wounds any rebuilding efforts.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Chris: Baby steps, baby steps. The whitewashed, appease the Confederates approach has been in place for at least a century since Woodrow Wilson and the 50th anniversary commemorations. I think the nation’s tolerance for all that has just reached an interesting tipping point. Charlottesville may have created a seismic shift which will change that conversation as rapidly as the conversation on gay marriage changed.
Tenar Arha
@efgoldman: Aww, Happy Birthday!
bemused
Media is hammering Trump on fascists and won’t be deflected. Trump: semantics murder or terrorism.
trollhattan
@Chris:
I should think WF Buckley would have supported Jim Crow had it only been named James Corvid.
Major Major Major Major
@bemused: live at his statement to his face?
SFAW
@SiubhanDuinne:
Perhaps it will turn out better than his first attempt at “scheduled” remarks about opioid addiction. The one where he threatened to nuke NoKor.
PST
I was struck today by one of 538’s “significant digits”:
That’s quite a correlation with Obama to Trump voting transitions. I’ll bet those Midwesterners who have lost well paying factory jobs can’t wait to see reductions in income taxes for corporations and the wealthy. That will supposedly free up funds for investment. I wonder what they’ll invest in. More evidence that it’s robots, not Mexicans, that industrial workers should fear.
bemused
@Major Major Major Major:
msnbc now.
Yarrow
@efgoldman: Awww…that is so sweet. I hope she has a wonderful day!
Major Major Major Major
@PST: Not really productive to fear either…
@Eric S.: Sounds like my Samwise.
bemused
I’m loving the media with their teeth in his hide.
Cheryl Rofer
Trump is making sure that the coverage won’t be on infrastructure. He’s talking about Saturday’s events.
mai naem mobile
Douchebag Donnie is doubling down on his all sides. Jeezus, mofo just won’t leant. Wish he would just start wearing a swastika arm band and get it over and done with.
Cheryl Rofer
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@Brachiator: Drawing an analogy to the WH: When a storied outlet is rapidly approaching derp oblivion (h/t Joan Walsh), is it better for its reputable columnists to show effective disapproval via mass exodus, or to stay on in attempts to right the ship (or at least palliative care)?
SFAW
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
And the Mets may have started a streak which will catapult them into the World Series.
I mean, I hope you’re right, but betting on racists, fascists, and other degenerates having epiphanies, which results in them doing the right thing, is iffy, at best.
Cheryl Rofer
I’m not watching, just following Twitter. And I think I’ll practice some piano. Got a lesson tomorrow.
bemused
Trump can’t resist answering media’s dogged questions. Aides must be popping sedatives.
Chris
@Brachiator:
I think it’s pretty much always been about elitism – the magazine for the kind of people who were not only right-wing nutjobs, but also fucking snobs towards all of the other right-wing nutjobs. Back in the 1950s, it was where you went if you were basically as bad as the John Birchers, but didn’t want to be seen out in public with them.
@trollhattan:
He did support Jim Crow.
zhena gogolia
@Cheryl Rofer:
Oh, God, I hope Peter Serafinowicz is working overtime. I can’t take him otherwise.
MisterForkbeard
@Cheryl Rofer: Equating a traitorous general who fought to keep slavery legal and was directly responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of death…. to a founder and first President of our country.
Way to go, Trump. Dick.
Cheryl Rofer
This sounds bad. I’ll check out the videos later.
MomSense
@efgoldman:
She doesn’t miss a thing. That was a wonderful letter.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@SFAW: They’ve already won twice (although not in my lifetime).
@Cheryl Rofer: Not surprised, but good fucking Lord.
I also refuse to get out the boat.
bemused
He keeps repeating jobs will do great things for race relations.
Spanky
@Litlebritdifrnt: Looks nice, and with the Meadows right behind! But the woodwork certainly needs some tlc.
Don’t you just love Google Maps? Took me 15 seconds to find it.
Major Major Major Major
@Cheryl Rofer: #notallnazis
Miss Bianca
@Litlebritdifrnt: ooh, ooh, ooh! (bounce, bounce) Is this in London? Or where? Maritime Museum sounds like it might be Portsmouth…
SFAW
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD):
In my lifetime, however, you whippersnapper.
But I’m talking about THIS year, smartass.
khead
Very cute desk kittehs.
Another Scott
@Cheryl Rofer: Zooks!
Will he make it to September?
Cheers,
Scott.
Brachiator
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD):
Mass exodus. A worthy publication or journal is the guiding intelligence (editor or publisher) that pulls together columnists worth reading, knows what stories are worth pursuing, knows which writers to send on the hunt.
Once that’s gone, it’s all over.
trollhattan
@Chris:
You mean this guy?
Every once and a while I like revisiting his television meltdown with Gore Vidal.
Major Major Major Major
@bemused:
What, he’s an old-school Marxist now?
Ridnik Chrome
@Brachiator: I have a subscription to the Nation, which I read mainly for their book and arts reviews. They are surprisingly good. And they also publish Eric Alterman, Katha Pollitt, Darryl Pinckney, and Calvin Trillin, who are all worth reading. But the Bernie-boosting and Putin-apologizing do get kind of tiresome after a while.
bemused
@efgoldman:
Wow, our granddaughter turns four tomorrow and also had her birthday party saturday. We both have awesome granddaughters! Her mommy sews her adorable dresses and recently sewed several dresses that flare. Granddaughter twirls for us too!
Miss Bianca
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
From your mouth to God’s ears.
trollhattan
@Another Scott:
Trump only know how to double-down. He may fire virtually everyone in the WH but will cling to that desk as tight as his tiny fingers allow.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
This is a truly goddamned fabulous judicial “fuck you” to a wingnut lawyer – Confederate dickhead who is off on vacation and out of cell service gets the appointment to represent that murderous Nazi thug:
This is the sort of thing judges do to you when they hate your ass.
David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch
Pivot
Spanky
@Miss Bianca: Go to Google Maps, enter “saint george’s quay river lune” and you’re there.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
@Brachiator: So at this point it’s either oust Cohen & KvH, or a mercy killing. I thought Pollitt & Walsh would’ve quit by now.
dmsilev
@Cheryl Rofer:
We’ve seen a lot of those recently; like snowflakes, each Trump meltdown is unique and like nothing we’ve ever seen before.
Miss Bianca
@Spanky: oh, sweeet!
Kay
@bemused:
But no can talk about jobs with him because he lies constantly. No one is interested in talking about imaginary job numbers. The thing about his compulsive lying is it makes listening to him a waste of time. I have to listen to his lie and then read the 500 corrections. I can just skip him and go right to the corrections. We all can.
p.a.
Since Donnie has Mob contacts, I assume his tag is ‘Donnie the Shovel’: he just keeps digging himself deeper.
TenguPhule
@Cheryl Rofer:
Not enough Tums in the world for this.
Chris
@trollhattan:
Yes, precisely. (I remembered it was the National Review; I didn’t absolutely positively remember if it was Buckley himself who’d written it). The Gore Vidal interview, I don’t recall, but that article alone is more than enough for me to have ungood associations with the name “William F. Buckley.”
(I first read that article in Krugman’s “Conscience of a Liberal.” He quotes it alongside another National Review article from the same era, this one gushing over Spain’s fascist dictator Franco as “an authentic national hero.”)
Adria McDowell
Happy Birthday to efg’s granddaughter!
Has anyone heard from Smiling Mortician?
Currently, my husband and daughter are in the living room play fighting, enjoying the time until Mini-Me starts kindergarten next Wednesday. It’s all fun and games until Dad gets accidentally kicked in the testicles.
SiubhanDuinne
@bemused:
Or, more likely, both.
trollhattan
@Chris:
During the 1968 Democratic National Convention, ABC had Buckley and Vidal in studio to debate the day’s events. This particular day, it got interesting.
schrodingers_cat
@Litlebritdifrnt: You sound happy! How is your mom?
Kathleen
@efgoldman: That is so sweet. You are so lucky to be so loving and loved!!! I was glad to read this morning (on abandoned thread) that you’re seeing some improvement. I’m so happy for you. My best to you, Mrs. EFG, and your daughter and her family. What lovely people you are.
bemused
@Kay:
A friend just sent link to the HIll that Merck stock rose after ceo resigned from Trump’s business council but haven’t read it yet.
Trump claimed more jobs with much better pay will solve bad race relations…just like magic. Everything that comes out of his mouth, praise for or attacks on people is bullshit. Republican voters have to know this but a hell of lot of them don’t care.
Brachiator
@Chris:
That was part of it, I suppose. But the National Review was also seen as the intellectual journal that could rationalize being a Bircher.
Litlebritdifrnt
@Miss Bianca: It is in my beloved Lancaster , many miles north of London, we have a proud and ancient maritime history. @Spanky: I know, isn’t it wonderful! I just have to figure out two things, where I am going to park the car, and where husband can safely park his bike, Other than that walking distance to everywhere in town, I am already dreaming about how I can furnish the place. So excited.
Brachiator
@Ridnik Chrome:
I’ve bought single issues of the Nation. Never found it consistently interesting enough to subscribe. Most of the writers you mention also publish elsewhere.
Kathleen
@bemused: Sounds familiar. Where have we heard that before?
hueyplong
That Trump set of ad libs is like a test of the country. If this can’t knock Trump below 27%, then we’re a worse place than I thought.
zhena gogolia
@hueyplong:
This whole sad story is a test of the country.
Brachiator
Wow. I see that Trump is hanging tough with his own special sauce version of “both sides do it.”
Come on, Donnie, dig deeper, dig deeper!
Miss Bianca
@bemused:
Funny…that almost sounds like a view that certain “leftist populists” have been promulgating…you don’t suppose…
@Kathleen:Or what you said.
Miss Bianca
@Litlebritdifrnt: I’ve never been to Lancaster, but the Google Maps views sure look pretty! Congratulations!
debbie
Where would I find the screenshot?
John Fremont
@trollhattan: National Review also had at one time writers like Joe Sobran, Sam Francis, John Derbyshire, and in its early days , George Lincoln Rockwell.
debbie
@debbie:
Never mind. I missed Doug’s post while skimming.
J R in WV
@efgoldman:
EF:
This is the best post in the history of Balloon-Juice! No, in the history of the Innertubes!! Thank you for sharing your little grand-daughter with all of us. We have no kids, which was the plan.
But you show us something of what having a granddaughter is, and I thank you for sharing the experience with all of us. How really special, and how well written. Thanks again!
cgordon
President Trump in response to this post: “Hold my beer.”