Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

If you are still in the GOP, you are an extremist.

Second rate reporter says what?

Let there be snark.

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

This really is a full service blog.

Fuck the extremist election deniers. What’s money for if not for keeping them out of office?

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

Eh, that’s media spin. biden’s health is fine and he’s doing a good job.

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

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

Consistently wrong since 2002

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

No one could have predicted…

“But what about the lurkers?”

Why did Dr. Oz lose? well, according to the exit polls, it’s because Fetterman won.

The words do not have to be perfect.

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

I did not have telepathic declassification on my 2022 bingo card.

You are here: Home / Past Elections / Election 2016 / I'm With Her / Tuesday Morning Open Thread: HRClinton Book Tour Is Announced

Tuesday Morning Open Thread: HRClinton Book Tour Is Announced

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She’s also coming to Boston, on November 28. (I signed up for pre-sale ticket notification, but I’m not yet sure whether I’ll be able to attend.) From her publisher Simon & Schuster’s website:

… Visit www.HillaryClintonBookTour.com beginning today to see what cities she will be visiting and how to get tickets. To find out where she will be signing books, visit www.hillaryclintonmemoir.com/events.html#book-signings

Appearances in Fort Lauderdale, New York and Canada, are on sale as of today. Washington, DC, will go on pre-sale August 29 and on sale to the public August 30.

Additional events in Ann Arbor, MI; Chicago, IL; Milwaukee, WI; Atlanta, GA; Boston, MA; Philadelphia, PA; Seattle, WA; and Portland, OR, will go on sale on September 18. Special Presale tickets will be available to only those with private presale codes officially beginning September 6; and tickets for the general public are on-sale September 18.

From today, August 28, through September 4, anyone interested in purchasing the Special Presale Tickets can register at www.HillaryClintonBookTour.com, to receive an invitation along with the presale password to purchase tickets before the September 18 general public are on sale…

***********

Apart from party planning (maybe folks will want to do a meet-up before or after some book signings?), what’s on the agenda for the day?

Reader Interactions

162Comments

  9. 9.

    Phylllis

    I sent her a thank you note after the election and received a lovely response a few weeks ago. I’m sure it was done by staff, but still a gracious gesture.

  10. 10.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    Welp, back to not reading here on my mobile. I now have a choice between the pie filter and a font of readable size. Hope autocorrect hasn’t made too much of a mess of this between not being able to read what I’m typing and having the flyout to the next post engage when I try to select something in the edit box.

  11. 11.

    Amir Khalid

    You just know it’s going to happen: when her book tour starts, there’s going to be the usual crew howling, “Why is Hillary hogging the limelight now?“

  13. 13.

    Anne Laurie

    @Amir Khalid:

    You just know it’s going to happen: when her book tour starts, there’s going to be the usual crew howling, “Why is Hillary hogging the limelight now?“

    Oh, the usual crew of HRC-haters are already busy complaining about the tour, just as they complained about the book behind the tour. This is not the time to “awaken” the sleeping giant of “all those normal decent voters who hate HRC almost as much as we do!!!”

    Heck, I’m waiting for the tongue-firmly-in-check op-ed congratulating HRC for taking the burden of negative publicity upon herself, so that the ‘bros will be distracted from attacking Chelsea for a brief respite.

  21. 21.

    Amir Khalid

    Interesting, this: there’s a Huffington Post story on a group in Austin, Texas that wants Robert E. Lee Road renamed to honour music legend (and former Austin resident) Robert Plant.

  26. 26.

    Baud

    @debbie:

    Wish I’d come here sooner because you shit for brains can’t seem to make adult decisions on your own.”

    Fixed.

  30. 30.

    bystander

    Won’t people be surprised when Clinton just recycles her supersecret, off the record, quid pro quo-laden bankster speeches? Hillary is a master criminal and won’t pass up the opportunity to rip people off.

  32. 32.

    debbie

    @bystander:

    Can’t see because I won’t unblock my ad blocker. Are they saying that there was zero truth to Cruz and Cornym’s claims?

  35. 35.

    different-church-lady

    @Baud: That’s my point!

    Who haven’t we gone to war with… France? Iceland? Antartica?

    OK, maybe we can name it after a geological rock formation… no, wait, we’re currently at war with science…

  36. 36.

    different-church-lady

    @bystander: “SHE’S TOO CLOSE TO WALL STREET! Here, buy this hat Trump was wearing in the situation room the other day…”

  37. 37.

    Kay

    Really striking to compare political media’s approach to covering Trump in a crisis and Obama in a crisis:

    MARA LIASSON: The president announced several steps to address the environmental catastrophe in the Gulf and the political fallout. He extended his moratorium on deepwater offshore drilling for another six months. He accepted the resignation of Elizabeth Birnbaum, the head of the Minerals Management Service, and he held his first solo press conference in 10 months. The goal of the president’s appearance in the East Room was to send the message that the buck stopped with him, and to correct the impression that his government wasn’t doing enough to stop the oil from coming ashore.
    President BARACK OBAMA: The purpose of this press conference is to explain to the folks down in the Gulf that ultimately, it is our folks down there who are responsible. If they’re not satisfied with something that’s happening, then they need to let us know.
    LIASSON: But the public disapproves of the president’s response to the spill. Louisiana’s Republican Governor Bobby Jindal has complained bitterly about the lack of timely assistance from Washington as the oil oozes on to his state’s shores and marshes.

    They have a lower standard for Trump. There are all these demands Obama “take responsibility” for the disaster response and they started almost immediately. Compare with Trump, who wasn’t even in DC for the hurricane response.

    I know it doesn’t matter and it isn’t going to change but I feel like it’s important to look at it and note it- to stay tethered to the reality of what we’re in here- we’re in some Trump-created world where the standards are lower.

  38. 38.

    bystander

    @debbie: A detailed refutation of their assertions of a pork-laden bill. Three Pinnochios!

    @rikyrah: I was pleased to see Katy Tur get in Cruz’s vile mug.

  39. 39.

    Betty Cracker

    @bystander: Not wrong at all — they should absolutely be shamed for their hypocrisy by their senate colleagues. Saw that Cruz interview at the WaPo link yesterday, and I knew the sumbitch was lying about the Sandy bill. That should also be rubbed in his face — Cruz went on TV and told bald-faced lies to excuse his inexcusable and hypocritical behavior. The Democratic senators should bring charts and graphs and video clips onto the senate floor and expose these lying pricks.

  41. 41.

    OzarkHillbilly

    This long but very good read has been up at the Guardian since Sunday, meant to post it yesterday.

    The lawsuit, filed by Southern Poverty Law Center on behalf of the mothers, is about quality of education, but there is also a broader context reflected in the make-up of the student population in the two schools that JS has attended. The pupils at Raines School pupils are 99% black. The pupils at Madison Station school are 70% white. And in a state where, in the years after Brown v Board, the landmark 1954 US Supreme Court decision that outlawed segregation in schools, public officials in Mississippi considered shutting down public schools all together to avoid integration, race is never far from view.

    “This case is about quality of education and making sure that quality is uniform no matter what color your skin is or where you live,” said Will Bardwell, an attorney for SPLC. “Mississippi gutted education rights over years and years to avoid integration, to the extent that they are now non-existent. We want to change that.”
    Mississippi Goddam

    By virtually any metric you choose, Mississippi has among the worst education systems in the US. In a July study, researchers using a 13-point quality rubric ranked the state 49 out of the 50 states and Washington DC. Mississippi is also, by both median income and poverty level, the poorest state in the country. This is no coincidence, of course. Because US public school are almost exclusively funded by state and local tax dollars, the amount of resources any given school has is almost wholly a function of how wealthy the people who live nearby are.

    The Madison Station elementary school where JS began his student career is, by car, about 20 minutes north of Raines – but it is a universe apart. Elaborate gated mansions with circular driveways dot the road to the school which passes through expansive stretches of verdant green Mississippi pasture. Near the end of the school day, a fleet of immaculate saffron and black buses pull up to the building. The environment mirrors the performance. In 2010 Madison Station was a National Blue Ribbon School, a Department of Education designation made to high performing schools. Some 72.6% of students are proficient in reading and 70.5% are proficient in math – well above the state average. In 2013, less than 9% of the school’s teachers were in their first year of teaching.

    Down the road at Raines, 20% of teachers are in their first year. Only 11% of students are proficient in reading and just 4% in math.

    The stark difference in racial makeup of the student populations is nothing new in the US of course, and nothing particularly specific to Mississippi. US schools are, on balance, more segregated today than they were 45 years ago. “Resegregation is not a Mississippi specific problem. It’s a nationwide problem, and that’s part of the reason this case isn’t really about segregation. It’s more about disuniformity,” Bardwell said. The suit itself never actually mentions the term “segregation” and instead zeroes in on the language enshrined in the state’s first constitution, ratified in 1869, and approved by the US congress:

    “It shall be the duty of the legislature to encourage by all suitable means the promotion of intellectual scientific moral and agricultural improvement by establishing a uniform system of free public schools by taxation or otherwise for all children between the ages of five and 21 years.”

    That was then. But this bold promise of “uniform” compulsory education is no longer a part of the state’s constitution. The language has been progressively eroded in each of four updates over the ensuing 120 years. The most recent revision in 1987 has no mention of any commitment to a “uniform” quality of education – instead it promises “the establishment, maintenance and support of free public schools upon such conditions and limitations as the Legislature may prescribe”. In other words, the promise amounts to virtually nothing – when it comes to education, the state legislature can do literally whatever it wants, so long as there are some free public schools.

    This change to the language – and the nature of the promise the state makes about education – is at the heart of the suit and goes to the core of Mississippi’s troubled racial history and its relationship to the union. Concerned that the former Confederate territory would pass one type of constitution to reenter the union, and then modify it to deny rights to black Americans as time went on, the US congress passed the Mississippi Readmission Act. This was passed specifically to target any prospect that Mississippi would slip-slide on its obligations to its non-white residents once it had reentered the union. The readmission act, which technically remains federal law, states that:

    “The constitution of Mississippi shall never be so amended or changed as to deprive any citizen or class of citizens of the United States of the school rights and privileges secured by the constitution of said State.”

    Bardwell says that, insofar as the state once guaranteed uniform schools, and now does not, it has been in violation of the Readmission act. “The point that we have made in this lawsuit is that regardless of the racial composition of your school is, federal law required Mississippi to provide the same opportunity at every school and that’s just not happening.”

    And if the historical record is clear about one thing, it’s that the changes to Mississippi’s constitution after readmission were intended to do one thing: disenfranchise the state’s black citizens. “There is no reason to equivocate or lie about the matter,” said former Mississippi governor James Vardaman of the 1890 constitutional convention that amended the constitution and first modified the educational guarantees. “It was held for no other purpose than to eliminate the nigger from politics.”

    Well worth it to read it all.

  42. 42.

    Kay

    It’s really stunning, the difference. Here’s the usual Obama “damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t ” analysis.

    You just don’t hear any of this for Trump. A coupla Tweets and a visit is plenty, more than anyone expected really, so he gets an A+++ just for checking in.

    Claiming control carries its own political risks for Obama, because any failure to stop the gusher will then belong to the president. But he could suffer politically if his administration is seen as falling short of staying on top of the problem or not working hard to find a solution.

  45. 45.

    different-church-lady

    @Kay: The difference is the framing: with Obama, they always framed it as “he’s right on the edge of doing something wrong.” With Trump, it’s always, “He’s right on the edge of doing something right!”

  48. 48.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: I’ve long believed that public education in this country should be federalized, with schools being fully funded nationally and the curriculum uniform throughout the country. You know, like other first world countries do it.

  50. 50.

    bystander

    @Kay: IIRC people saw through the media-bashing about the oil spill. I remembered thinking, “If only Obummer had been a better petroleum production engineer, this would have never happened.”

    The coverage during the Ebola outbreak was equally reprehensible. If only Obama knew better than all the experts in epidemiology, he would have seen that all travel from Africa needed to be halted, according to epidemiology expert Joe Scarborough.

  51. 51.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    They did this crazy comparison, where they compared Obama’s actions to Jindal’s as if Obama was supposed to be tooling around for weeks in a boat. One is a governor and the other is the President. It’s two completely different jobs.

    Have you seen any comparisons between the governor of Texas and Donald Trump? How he’s much more “engaged” than Trump?

    I think whoever challenges Trump in 2020 has to grapple with this- I don’t know how to do it but they’ll be operating in a completely different metric. It’s a real dilemma. Your opponent will have no standards he’s measured by and you’ll have the ordinary very high standards. It’ll become apparent almost immediately because whoever challenges Trump will release their tax returns and it’ll just go from there. As a contest it’s a dilemma. Two sets of rules. I suppose it can be managed but it’s different.

  53. 53.

    Baud

    @Kay: This is why division on our side hurts so much more than the mere numbers would suggest — because we start off operating on an uneven playing field.

  54. 54.

    Kay

    @bystander:

    The ebola coverage was arguably worse because they were stoking fear, but I agree. I remember watching Campbell Brown (before she got fired) complaining that Obama hadn’t distributed flu vaccine in NYC. She had a public health person on as a guest who patiently explained to her how government works- that there’s federal distribution down to state down to county then to city. Brown was looking to the wrong level- she has to call her county health department if she wants flu vaccine distribution in her neighborhood.

    There was this insistence on “accountability!” that Obama be “held responsible” as if they started with this assumption that he would be given a pass, that they were enforcing high standards. There’s just none of that with Trump. The standards have gone out the window.

  56. 56.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    It’s seriously an issue now though. It’s 2020 and the Democratic challenger tells a lie. Say it’s a minor lie- an exaggeration, the ordinary kind of campaign lie. What happens? Outrage? A 3 day news story? How is that presented? Trump lies every day, several times a day. It became clear yesterday that he blatantly lied about Russian contacts during the election. That’s not a small lie! How do they hold his opponent accountable for an exaggeration when the President tells lies like this on a daily basis? It will be laughable. They’ll be breathlessly covering some “gaffe” of his opponent and Trump will be traveling the country spewing lies and hatred.

  57. 57.

    mai naem mobile

    You guys are assuming he ll be around for 2020.I doubt it. I think Pence will survive even though I think he’s caught up in the Russia thing. I think there may be a political decision made for government stability to have him survive. I mean stability for the economy so the world doesn’t go into another major recession.

  59. 59.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @satby: There’s a reason education is financed the way it is in America. Jim Crow has many faces in many locales.

  61. 61.

    Baud

    @Kay: What if our candidate accurately calls bigots deplorable?

    What if our candidate has actually earned his three Purple Hearts in Vietnam?

    What if our candidate never claimed to have invented the internet, but did a lot to help its development?

    Not sure why you are looking to the future like there will be something new.

  62. 62.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    We taking bets on whether Deadbeat Donnie shows up to Texas in that poorly fitted blue sack suit and red tie, along with a bullshit trucker hat?

  63. 63.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Imagine a slightly hinky or suspect business loan uncovered re: Trump’s opponent. Can they cover that as a 3 day scandal? They don’t even know what Trump owns or what he owes. It will be a ridiculously uneven playing field. The rules will apply to only one of two in the race.

  64. 64.

    germy

    @Kay: Campbell Brown had a definite agenda: “Criticize Obama”

    Republican mole. Charter school advocate. etc.

    Wikipedia: “In an August 2008 article, Brown addressed charges that her marriage to Senor, who at the time was working as an advisor for the Mitt Romney presidential campaign, represented a conflict of interest for her as a journalist. “

  66. 66.

    different-church-lady

    @Kay: And they’ll exaggerate that one lie out of a sense of “fairness” — like a basketball ref trying to even out the foul count late in a game, except they’ll do it from the start of the game. It will be utterly perverse because they’ll feel like they need to even out the coverage, so a hundred Trump lies will get the same amount of cumulative air time as that single Democratic candidate’s lie.

  67. 67.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: I agree, and not just Jim Crow; keeping those dirty non-WASP immigrants out of schools attended by the elite was and continues to be why people so vociferously defend local control. For wealthy areas, it’s more of the typical Republican IGMFY.

  68. 68.

    Kay

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    I don’t know why people listen to him. It’s a waste of time to listen to liars. Nothing he says is credible and he’s always telling the same story- I’m great, everyone else sucks, things are going great. What’s the point of him speaking at all? It’s all self-aggrandizing bullshit and it’s always the same.

  69. 69.

    different-church-lady

    @Kay:

    Can they cover that as a 3 day scandal?

    With one candidate they covered it as a 30 year scandal

  71. 71.

    lapassionara

    @Kay: Thank you, Kay, for reminding us of the way the press treated Obama. It is easy to forget the flack he took because he was so gracious and humane, no matter the circumstances.

  72. 72.

    Kay

    @different-church-lady:

    It feels like a collapse to me, that some lower level has been breached and there’s no going back. I don’t know how you go UP from here. How that works, as a practical matter.

  73. 73.

    Kay

    @different-church-lady:

    I’m not panicking, I’m not saying blood will run in the streets, and I’m not giving up- I’m helping with a state political event tonight, but I feel it’s important to think thru how bad this is, the loss of any kind of standards. It’s bad. We’ll pay for this. It’s bedrock damage- deep.

  74. 74.

    Betty Cracker

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: My guess is he goes with his “Top Gun” ensemble: he’ll replace the baggy suit coat with a flight jacket featuring the presidential seal and “CiC” embroidered in gold, topped off with a blocky MAGA or USA ball cap (only $40 dollars at his campaign site!). He wore a similar get-up at the launch of a Navy ship a while back. Looked like the mean old drunk everyone avoids at the VFW fish fry.

  76. 76.

    Another Scott

    @Kay: That’s a perfect illustration of what Mara does. It’s not about a Democratic President transferring information to the People, it’s about what he’s “trying” (but not succeeding), or his “goal” (but unable to accomplish), but nobody believes him (because he’s a liar), etc., etc. She (almost) always tries to attach a loser stink to a Democratic politician in her stories. It’s so automatic with her that she might not even realize she does it…

    Grr…

    I refuse to listen to her now and change the channel for a couple of minutes whenever she’s giving her commentaries/wisdom on NPR in the morning.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  78. 78.

    Kay

    My oldest son and his wife are picking up an exchange student today. They live in Chicago so this Danish 17 year old will live in Chicago for the equivalent of his junior year in high school. My son is panic-buying breakfast foods. He seems to have decided that breakfast is the most important meal of the day. He says he’s “going” to the kid’s first day of school. I just told him he can’t “go”- he can’t follow a 17 year old class to class all day but I love the mental picture of him as hovering helicopter parent to this nearly-grown Danish person.

  84. 84.

    satby

    @Kay: oh, they’ll have fun! My first exchange student was a girl from Denmark, 26 years years ago, who I still am in contact with. The girls last year were my 29 and 30th exchange students (several years I had two at a time). Can’t recommend it enough!

  86. 86.

    Another Scott

    @Baud: When I was growing up, my great aunt explained that “dinner” was the big meal of the day and when they were on the farm “dinner” was around noon. In that case “supper” was the evening meal (and usually was little more than a snack).

    Dunno what the Danish kid will expect. At 17 he probably has a hollow leg and will be able to eat everything put in front of him no matter the time of day. I expect he’ll tower over most of his classmates, also too.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  88. 88.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Amir Khalid: That’s okay. If she can be of any encouragement to the resistance, that would be a great thing as we move into 2018 elections. Ditto President Obama and VP Biden. All hands on deck, so to speak.

  91. 91.

    Kay

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    His wife is Danish so they’re making an effort to expose him to ‘Merica. I told him the kid’s actual parents trusted him enough to put him on a plane to Chicago so my son has to be at least as brave as they are, and let him go to high school by himself. It should be interesting for him- it’s a solid public high school – a fairly good city school- they live in a nice neighborhood, but it’s an urban school and this kid is from the suburbs. The kid plays soccer so that will help- sports really are universal.

  92. 92.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Kay:

    The standards have gone out the window.

    Hell, Trump is able to throw the standards out the window himself. Look at how he is violating the Emoluments Clause with zero push back from the MSM or even the opposition party. When Trump said he could shoot someone on 5th Avenue and not lose any support, he wasn’t just talking about his awful supporters.

  93. 93.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    Trump lies every day, several times a day. It became clear yesterday that he blatantly lied about Russian contacts during the election. That’s not a small lie!

    No. Not a small lie in the least. It goes to the heart of his campaign.
    This is why I do appreciate Maddow and her long azz opening segments of background. Yesterday’s was instructive, as always. With this Russia story, she always tries to connect as many dots as possible.
    Often, while I watch these segments, and my blood pressure rises at the disgust I feel….

    I say..

    ” What if 44 had done this?”

    You say that the bar has been lowered Kay, and I never disagree with you. I just put it under:
    “the curve for unqualified White Men is REAL!”

    Because, I listened to Maddow last night, as she linked story after story of banks and the Trump Crime Family…..
    and, I just sigh…thinking about what would have happened if JUST ONE of these stories had come up during the time of 44.
    JUST.ONE.

    THIS is why they have to go to jail. The entire lot of them. Not only will their vote for this clown be held against any Dolt45 voters…we must be able to snidely and with condescention, tell them, that they are bad judges of character. I have no interest in ‘moving on for the sake of the country’.

    Uh uh.

    These people must be beaten over the head with the Dolt45 club.

    The Maddow segment:

    THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 8/28/17
    Trump sought Moscow business deal while campaigning for president
    Rachel Maddow reports on the myriad ties between Donald Trump and Russia that have come to light in contradiction of Trump denials, with the latest being the pursuit of a real estate deal backed by a state-run Russian bank while Trump was campaigning for president.

  98. 98.

    MomSense

    @Kay:

    They have a lower standard for Trump. There are all these demands Obama “take responsibility” for the disaster response and they started almost immediately. Compare with Trump, who wasn’t even in DC for the hurricane response.

    I heard Nooners on MSNBC (spit) say yesterday after the presser that it was helpful to Dolt45 because he stayed calm. Jesus. All that asshat has to do is stay calm and not shit himself or go off in an unhinged rant to be successful. It’s pathetic.

  100. 100.

    gene108

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Trump, in part, just overwhelms the senses with all the lies. But saying the media is overwhelmed by all the lies does not excuse the media.

    The media can decide how they critically frame a politician for viewing by the public. They could very easily just set the framing as Trump is lying until proven otherwise, but they don’t. They keep giving him the benefit of the doubt that no other person on the planet is given.

  101. 101.

    Jeffro

    @OzarkHillbilly: Great article, thank you. I have long thought that suits need to be brought against states and localities that severely shortchange their students, not just in terms of facilities but by not spending what it takes to train, recruit, and continue to develop a professional teaching force. Until the courts determine that students’ and parents’ rights are being violated and set amounts that states – not communities – must raise and spend on their education systems, not much is going to change.

  102. 102.

    Mnemosyne

    @MomSense:

    It really is like spending Thanksgiving with a raging alcoholic’s family where they’re grateful that Daddy passed out drunk, because last year he threw the turkey out into the street and pissed on it because he got mad that they made sourdough stuffing instead of cornbread.

  103. 103.

    Jeffro

    Btw a good quick read here: Houston is Drowning In Its Freedom From Regulations

    Want some basic security and common sense in a fast-changing world? Better vote for the Democrats, up and down the ballot

    Speaking of which, NoVA folks (specifically Fairfax County residents): GET OUT AND VOTE TODAY! We have a chance to pick up a formerly R school board seat with a solid D, Karen Keys-Gamarra. Go Karen!

  104. 104.

    MomSense

    @Mnemosyne:

    It really is like the whole country is suffering through an abusive relationship. Sadly, most of the pundits and just under half the country are enabling this abuse.

  106. 106.

    Jeffro

    @MomSense:

    I heard Nooners on MSNBC (spit) say yesterday after the presser that it was helpful to Dolt45 because he stayed calm. Jesus. All that asshat has to do is stay calm and not shit himself or go off in an unhinged rant to be successful. It’s pathetic

    and it wasn’t just her, the whole panel – including Lawrence Frickin’ O’Donnell – agreed with her and thought it was awesome that Orangemandias wasn’t acting out.

  107. 107.

    rikyrah

    What Trump doesn’t understand about his own border wall idea
    08/29/17 09:23 AM
    By Steve Benen

    Over the weekend, Donald Trump, who continues to insist that Americans pay for a giant wall along the U.S./Mexico border, said that the Mexican government will eventually “reimburse” us for the cost of the project. Mexico’s Foreign Ministry said soon after, “Our country will not pay, under any circumstances, for a wall.”

    Which, naturally, led the American president to again say yesterday, “One way or the other, Mexico is going to pay for the wall…. We may fund it through the United States, but ultimately, Mexico will pay for the wall.” I assume Mexican officials will respond in kind again soon.

    But while the back and forth is tiresome, especially about a project Congress is highly unlikely to approve, Trump also explained why, exactly, he thinks the wall is so necessary.

    “We need the wall very badly. As you know, Mexico has a tremendous crime problem – tremendous – one of the number two or three in the world. And that’s another reason we need it. And the – just to add on, tremendous drugs are pouring into the United States at levels that nobody has ever seen before. This happened over the last three to four years in particular. The wall will stop much of the drugs from pouring into this country and poisoning our youth.”

    No, it won’t. Perhaps the president hasn’t had time to read up on his signature issue, but there’s no reason to believe the wall would serve as some kind of anti-drug barrier. “A wall alone cannot stop the flow of drugs into the United States,” Christopher Wilson, the deputy director of the Mexico Institute at the Wilson Center, recently told Vox.

    A Washington Post report added, “[E]xperts on the drug trade say a border wall, even one as big and beautiful as Trump promised, would be near-impotent in stemming the supply of illegal drugs.”

  108. 108.

    MomSense

    @Jeffro:

    Lawrence was all pissed that the Marc Rich pardon opened the door for justifying bad pardons with bad pardons or some bullshit. This is why my neighbors periodically ask me if I’m ok. They have seen me in my car yelling at my radio a few too many times.

  109. 109.

    rikyrah

    Texas Republicans have a new perspective on federal disaster aid
    08/29/17 08:00 AM—UPDATED 08/29/17 08:15 AM
    By Steve Benen
    It’s hard to blame New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) for blasting Texas Republican as “hypocrites.” The Republican governor, reflecting on Texas GOP lawmakers’ opposition to relief aid after Hurricane Sandy in 2012, hasn’t forgotten how his state was treated.

    “We were the disaster that was the longest, in waiting in terms of getting federal aid, and I hope that that’s not what happens to the folks in Texas with Harvey,” Christie said yesterday.

    On MSNBC yesterday, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) told Katy Tur that his vote against disaster relief four years ago was justified.

    Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, defended his 2013 vote against a Superstorm Sandy relief bill for the New York-New Jersey area on Monday as Hurricane Harvey ravaged parts of his home state and officials turned to the federal government for support.

    Cruz stood by his controversial vote when pressed in an appearance on MSNBC, saying that the aid bill for Sandy rebuilding was bloated with “unrelated pork” and “two-thirds of that bill had nothing to do with Sandy.”

    The Washington Post ran a detailed fact-check piece on Cruz’s defense, and found that the senator’s argument is plainly untrue.

    Nevertheless, Cruz is not alone. When it came time to approve emergency aid for areas affected by Sandy, most Senate Republicans – including both of Texas’ GOP senators – voted against the bill. In the lower chamber, most House Republicans – including 20 Texas Republicans – also opposed the disaster relief.

  111. 111.

    rikyrah

    Trump turns back the clock on police access to military equipment
    08/28/17 03:32 PM—UPDATED 08/28/17 04:05 PM
    By Steve Benen
    The 2014 crisis in Ferguson, Missouri, shook the nation in a variety of ways, but as regular readers may recall, one of the lasting debates focused on the militarization of local law enforcement. Many Americans weren’t just shocked by the unrest; they were also surprised to see police officers carrying weapons of war while confronting American civilians on domestic soil.

    In the wake of the violence, there was considerable interest on Capitol Hill about reforming the Pentagon’s “1033” program that makes military equipment available to police departments. Though most of the support for changes was spearheaded by Democrats, even some Republican lawmakers agreed it was time to take another look at the policy.

    Congressional action never materialized, but the Obama administration followed through, banning the transfer of at least some types of military weapons to local police.

    Donald Trump has turned back the clock.

    Reversing an Obama-era policy, President Donald Trump Monday removed restrictions on the kinds of surplus military gear the Defense Department can turn over to local police departments.

    The issue has been a sensitive one since the Justice Department concluded that tactics used by police during 2014’s violent street protest in Ferguson, Missouri inflamed tensions and created fear among demonstrators.

    Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the change, first reported by USA Today, in a speech to the Fraternal Order of Police in Nashville on Monday.

    The new policy takes effect immediately.

  112. 112.

    Immanentize

    @Kay: I have the same concern. And I think Baud has said it too. There really is no recovery from this — at least not in the spring-back to what was (even with it’s flaws) way. There is no media to police the borders and really no institution willing to do so. I suspect the Gorsuch court will just add to this collapse.

    The one thing that might help reset (as far as possible) really is public-backed prosecution with serious prison consequences. It really could work.

    Oops, I just fell over laughing at my own naivite.

  114. 114.

    rikyrah

    The Republican Party’s Forty-Year Assault on Civil Rights
    by Nancy LeTourneau
    August 29, 2017

    ………………………………..

    The first real assault on the ability of the Civil Rights Division to enforce these laws came with the Reagan administration in the 1980’s. As has been the case with Republican presidents, he nominated someone who had no experience in this area, William Bradford Reynolds. Here is how the New York Times described him at the time:

    Mr. Reynolds, a lean, wiry man who seems eager to roll up his sleeves and get down to work, has spent most of his career in commercial litigation, matters ranging from simple breach-of-contract suits to complex antitrust cases.

    Asked what qualified him for his new post, he cited a general legal background that he said would permit him to take a ”hard, fresh look at the issue of remedies in the civil rights arena.”

    In writing about John Robert’s tenure at DOJ, Ari Berman said this about Reynolds’s tenure at the Civil Rights Division:

    The Reagan administration had already embarked on a radical makeover of the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division, which enforced the VRA. The assistant attorney general for civil rights, William Bradford Reynolds, believed that “government-imposed discrimination” had created “a kind of racial spoils system in America” favoring historically disadvantaged minorities over whites, an argument that no head of the Civil Rights Division had ever made before. During Reynolds’ tenure ending busing became more important than desegregating schools, dismantling quotas became more important than integrating the workforce or academia and preventing proportional representation became more important than achieving a multiracial government.

    In that description you can hear the groundwork that was laid during the Reagan administration for the kinds of attacks we hear on civil rights enforcement to this day. It was chronicled in a book by Raymond Walters titled, “Right Turn: William Bradford Reynolds, the Reagan Administration, and Black Civil Rights.”

    Once that had been accomplished, Republicans became emboldened to fight the expected return to enforcement via the smearing of Clinton’s nominee to run the division, Lani Guinier. It is worth noting that the strongest Republican opposition to presidential nominees, other than Obama’s naming of Merrick Garland to fill a position on the Supreme Court, has come in their response to potential leaders of the Civil Rights Division—both Guinier during the Clinton administration and Debo Adegbile during the Obama administration.

    Following strong leadership from both Deval Patrick and Bill Lan Lee during the Clinton administration, the Bush years brought us back to a decimation of the division that had begun under Reagan. It was under the leadership of Alexander Acosta (who is now the Sec. of Labor) that this happened:

    While leading the division, he allowed Bradley Schlozman to make decisions on hiring. A report by the Inspector General and the Office of Professional Responsibility later found that Schlozman illegally used his authority to give preferential treatment to conservatives and made false statements to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

    Bradley Schlozman is the guy who once said that he wanted to “gerrymander all of those crazy libs right out of the [voting] section.” It was within the Civil Rights Division during the Bush years that the focus changed from promoting voting rights to voter suppression via allegations of fraud. Here is what Joseph Rich, former head of the voting rights section of the division wrote about that:

    It has notably shirked its legal responsibility to protect voting rights. From 2001 to 2006, no voting discrimination cases were brought on behalf of African American or Native American voters. U.S. attorneys were told instead to give priority to voter fraud cases, which, when coupled with the strong support for voter ID laws, indicated an intent to depress voter turnout in minority and poor communities.

    In order to refocus the division back on its mission to enforce civil rights laws, Barack Obama and Eric Holder initially turned to Tom Perez and then Vanita Gupta (who served to the end of Obama’s term as acting director after Republicans blocked the nomination of Debo Adegbile).

  119. 119.

    Patricia Kayden

    @schrodingers_cat: Wow. Trump is going all out for his White Supremacist aka “economically anxious” supporters, ain’t he? He has zero interest in appealing to anyone but his narrow racist base.

  120. 120.

    cmorenc

    @Jeffro:

    I have long thought that suits need to be brought against states and localities that severely shortchange their students, not just in terms of facilities but by not spending what it takes to train, recruit, and continue to develop a professional teaching force. Until the courts determine that students’ and parents’ rights are being violated and set amounts that states – not communities – must raise and spend on their education systems, not much is going to change.

    Unfortunately, this exact issue was decided by SCOTUS against your proposition in San Antonio vs Rodriguez (1973) with one of Nixon’s appointees (Lewis Powell) writing the opinion. And the five members of the conservative faction on the 1973 edition of SCOTUS were far less extreme than the five members of the 2017 version. The chances of the current version of SCOTUS revisiting this issue and overturning the San Antonio decision are only slightly better than the prospects for success of a project to terraform Mars into a habitable planet within the next couple of decades.

  121. 121.

    rikyrah

    NEW VIDEO: Arpaio Pardon and tweeting about The Wall during Harvey proves it. Trump meant “Make America WHITE Again” pic.twitter.com/fk6S3LtcR2
    — Keith Olbermann (@KeithOlbermann) August 29, 2017

  125. 125.

    rikyrah

    If you’re a member of the disability community affected by Harvey, you can call 800-626-4959 for assistance with evacuations.
    — Tom Perez (@TomPerez) August 28, 2017

  127. 127.

    Patricia Kayden

    @rikyrah: The police are being given carte blanche to assault minority protesters. We saw how they stood back while White Supremacists attacked anti-racist protesters in Charlottesville and that they’ve only now made a few arrests because of videos. We also saw how many scores of protesters were arrested in Ferguson, including members of the media and how Native Americans protesting the pipeline in the Dakotas were brutalized. Sessions is making it plain whose side he is on.

  128. 128.

    rikyrah

    Texans: be sure to file for #Harvey relief before Sept 1. #TXlege passed a bill making it harder to dispute weather-related property claims.
    — Joaquin Castro (@JoaquinCastrotx) August 28, 2017

    Filed my ins. claim & FEMA assistance from my phone while evacuating. Special Session is needed before Republicans hurt more Texans. #Harvey
    — Nerds on the Left (@NerdsOnTheLeft) August 28, 2017

  129. 129.

    rikyrah

    List of shelters currently open in Houston. Pease retweet for those who may be in need. ❤️ pic.twitter.com/RT44RcmR0O
    — Waltrip Cheerleading (@waltripcheer) August 28, 2017

  130. 130.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Patricia Kayden: Everything old is new again. That’s exactly how the colonial police force under the British treated non-violent protestors. They were beaten with batons and sometimes even shot at. People died from the concussions they received from the lathi (lathi = long stick) charges. The stuff you saw in the movie, Gandhi was mostly tame stuff sanitized for western audiences.

  131. 131.

    rikyrah

    @Patricia Kayden:

    @rikyrah: The police are being given carte blanche to assault minority protesters. We saw how they stood back while White Supremacists attacked anti-racist protesters in Charlottesville and that they’ve only now made a few arrests because of videos.

    yep.
    You don’t lie.
    Those camera videophones are important for so many reasons. Yes, they just stood there as that racist pulled out the gun on the protestors. JUST STOOD THERE.
    And, let’s not get into the beating of that young man.

  134. 134.

    Jeffro

    @cmorenc: ‘s okay, I’m always good with tilting at windmills ;)

    It’s one of those issues that’s worth pounding the table about constantly while continuing to bring suits and win elections/nominate judges until the right thing is done for these kids.

  136. 136.

    schrodingers_cat

    In other news, Mumbai is deluged with a torrential downpour, 30cm in 8 hours, people are stranded, trains derailed, roads are flooded. My SIL is stuck in her lab but safe.

  137. 137.

    Steve in the ATL

    @debbie:

    Or, for her opening line: “Wish I’d come here sooner.”

    Or, “I hope the Russian bots who swung the election are buying my book”

  144. 144.

    different-church-lady

    @rikyrah:

    Because, I listened to Maddow last night, as she linked story after story of banks and the Trump Crime Family…..
    and, I just sigh…thinking about what would have happened if JUST ONE of these stories had come up during the time of 44.

    Hillary was made to seem unelectable because she gave a speech to bankers. BY OUR OWN DAMN SIDE.

  145. 145.

    different-church-lady

    @MomSense:

    I heard Nooners on MSNBC (spit) say yesterday after the presser that it was helpful to Dolt45 because he stayed calm.

    This is the same kind of rationalization victims take towards abusers: “At least he didn’t hit me today.”

    PS: Now that I’ve read further down through the thread, I see a lot of us picked up on that same thought.

  147. 147.

    Steve in the ATL

    @schrodingers_cat: on my way. My sources tell me that the weather is fine there.

    Talked to me nephew in Houston. They live on high ground, but he and his dad went to a friend’s house to watch the fight, and the friend lives across a bayou from them. Bad idea! Took 24 hours to get home, but in their defense nobody was expecting the fight to last 10 rounds so they thought they would beat the rain.

  149. 149.

    satby

    @schrodingers_cat: yes, it’s already having an effect on applications from foreign students to come to universities here. My girls last year had both won highly competitive State Department scholarships that were designed to build bridges between our country and Muslim countries and I have no idea if they’re even doing that program this year. And if I were a parent in a predominantly Muslim country, I doubt I’d allow my high-schooler to come to this country. Imagine how we look to someone considering sending their child here for a school year!

  151. 151.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @schrodingers_cat:

    In the words of a famous child of Mumbai.

    Mother of Cities to me,
    But I was born in her gate,
    Between the palms and the sea,
    Where the world-end steamers wait

    Not sure I have ever seen you quote Kipling with approbation ;-)

  152. 152.

    Cheryl from Maryland

    Sec Clinton’s appearance at the 1,800 seat Warner Theater in DC is already sold out. Suck it, Trump. Tickets were gone the movement I found out about them.

  154. 154.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Cheryl from Maryland:

    Sec Clinton’s appearance at the 1,800 seat Warner Theater in DC is already sold out. Suck it, Trump. Tickets were gone the movement I found out about them.

    The Fox Theatre in Atlanta seats 4,665. There isn’t a scintilla of doubt in my mind that every one of them will be filled on November 13.

  156. 156.

    Citizen Alan

    @mai naem mobile:

    What’s in the wedding of Campbell Brown and Dan Senor that Bush was attending in California while Katrina was happening? I know there was some incident where Bush blew off some national crisis just for the wedding of those two assholes.

  159. 159.

    Neldob

    @Kay: I’m going to borrow some of your ideas and write a few letters to different eds. This fries me if I think on it too long. Arg!

  161. 161.

    Mandarama

    @OzarkHillbilly: Thank you so much for sharing this article. I grew up in MS, and was a lame product of its dubious school system. I forwarded this to my sister and brother, and we all instantly could picture the sense of superiority the white people at the wealthier school are enjoying–and yet, the better-off ones are still crappy schools in a crappy system! It is still Mississippi. I am so happy to see those young mothers being activists and I hope their case makes headway… but I still wish I could tell the white assholes in my home state* that my kids’ diverse urban high school is kicking their little enclaves’ asses daily. Not one school from back home can hold a candle to the one my kids go to now, and we are in freaking Tennessee.

    * I mean, I guess I could tell the white assholes that, if I went back on Facebook. But I gave it up because of all the white assholes I know. ?

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