Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans firmly believe having an abortion is a very personal, very private decision between a woman and J.D. Vance.

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

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

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

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

Too little, too late, ftfnyt. fuck all the way off.

They punch you in the face and then start crying because their fist hurts.

Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

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

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

Trump’s cabinet: like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

Innocent people do not delay justice.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

The fight for our country is always worth it. ~Kamala Harris

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

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

America is going up in flames. The NYTimes fawns over MAGA celebrities. No longer a real newspaper.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. do not touch it.”

Sometimes the world just tells you your cat is here.

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Hail to the Hairpiece / Friday Morning Open Thread: TGIF, Maybe

Reader Interactions

224Comments

  2. 2.

    Kay

    Zinke took $12k charter flight from Vegas to Montana home – on oil exec’s jet – after speech to donor’s hockey team

    I love the jet scandal. It’s like a parody of how corrupt wastrels behave. They can’t really blame Trump for Price, either. Trump didn’t create that monster- the GOP did.

  3. 3.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Got to head up to STL today to pick up 15 food grade 55 gal barrels for the greenhouse. $10 apiece, not a bad price.

  4. 4.

    bystander

    Good morning, Schlemazel. Rikyrah and Baud can’t be far behind.

    Just tried to read Moanin’ Joe’s oped in WaPo today. He leads by reminding everyone of what a liar Clinton is and then laments the lack of ethics in the repub party. So he leads by lying about Clinton, then calls his fellow party members dishonest. Does lying about Clinton somehow make his despicable party better?

  7. 7.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kay: Price Will Cover Cost Of ‘His Seats’ On Private Flights, Not Full Cost Of Planes

    Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price said Thursday that he would repay the U.S. Treasury for the cost of “my seat” on a number of private charter flights.

    An HHS spokesperson later told TPM in an email that “Secretary Price will write a personal check to the US Treasury for $51,887.31. The taxpayers won’t pay a dime for his seats on charter planes.”

    Politico exposed upwards of $400,000 in taxpayer dollars spread across dozens of private charter flights in an investigation last week. Since then, the HHS inspector general’s office and the House Oversight Committee have said they’re looking into the matter. President Donald Trump said Wednesday that “we’ll see” about Price’s continued service in his administration.

    That’s mighty white of you Secretary Price.

  8. 8.

    Baud

    @bystander: Yes. In their universe, they can’t be worse than Dems. The worst they can be is as bad as Dems. It’s like the speed of light barrier that can never be crossed.

  10. 10.

    Kay

    @bystander:

    Oh, please. I’m pretty sure Clinton would not t have gotten away with blaming the failure of her health care bill on a made-up story of someone being in the hospital. This has gone beyond “lying” to “complete fantasy world”.

    I saw a headline from Politico that Jared and Ivanka have a “private server”- OMFG, get the crack NYTimes email team on it.

  12. 12.

    mai naem mobile

    @Kay: I want to know if Devos is using her own plane and is she charging her security detail to ride on her plane like Dolt45 was with the Secret Service during the campaign?

  18. 18.

    OzarkHillbilly

    The US ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, has made a second dramatic intervention in US Middle East policy, suggesting that only 2% of the West Bank is occupied by Israel and that the international community always intended for Israel to keep some of the land it seized during the six-day war in 1967.

    The comments, made in an interview with the news channel Israeli Walla, came a day after rightwing Israeli politicians celebrated 50 years of Israeli settlement building, prompting condemnation by Palestinian officials.

    “I think the settlements are part of Israel,” Friedman said, in comments that seem at odds with decades of US foreign policy.
    …….

    Resolution 242 demanded the “withdrawal of Israel armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict” while “emphasising the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by war”.

    While the figure of 2% has been used in the past by Israeli officials to define occupation as the physical footprint of settlement buildings, “area C” – the part of the West Bank under Israeli administrative and security control – accounts for 60% of the West Bank.

    In addition, reports compiled by the UN and NGOs suggest up to 39% of all land in the occupied West Bank is under the control of Jewish municipalities, local authorities and regional councils, with Israel effectively prohibiting Palestinian construction and development there.

    Lies.
    Damned Lies.
    Everything the trump admin says.

  19. 19.

    Kay

    @mai naem mobile:

    DeVos is using her own plane but the security details seats are a good question. I watched (5 minutes of) a yacht race this summer on Lake Michigan and one of the DeVos yachts was in it. I read once that they have eleven yachts. DeVos is much richer than most of the other Trumpsters- she’s serious rich. Amway has to be the longest running Ponzi scheme in history- you would think they would run out of suckers.

  21. 21.

    TS

    @bystander:

    Just tried to read Moanin’ Joe’s oped in WaPo today. He leads by reminding everyone of what a liar Clinton is and then laments the lack of ethics in the repub party. So he leads by lying about Clinton, then calls his fellow party members dishonest. Does lying about Clinton somehow make his despicable party better?

    He does it on his show ALL the time. This morning he has the day off & the panel are
    1. attacking trump for making Peurto Rico all about himself – with zero mention of the Clintons
    2. Discussing private travel gate & how this did not happen under President Obama – without once mentioning that “Hillary was the worst candidate ever”.

    There are some folks who will never stop the attacks on Hillary Clinton – this guy is Number one.

  23. 23.

    Kay

    @mai naem mobile:

    She;s using US Marshals for security and it (reportedly) costs a million dollars a month which seems crazy. They can’t make more than 80k each, can they? How many could she possibly need? Is she using them for food service on the planes, or what?

  25. 25.

    Kay

    @TS:

    Right, but they need to ask if she’s charging for seats for her staff and security detail. Price only wants to pay for his seat. This is a distinction they make, apparently.

  27. 27.

    Kay

    @TS:

    They’re loathe to admit it but the Obama Administration was really well run. The only scandals they had were made-up. It was the most scandal-free administration in my memory. We’re gonna get the high point and the low point back to back- Trump will be the worst-run.

    People are what they are and that’s consistent. Obama is prudent. Trump is not.

  29. 29.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: As I understand it, these were flights chartered by him, for him. The article does not report on his reasoning, but I suspect it is that the govt should pay for his staff and security’s flight costs.

  32. 32.

    Kay

    Remember when all of political media decided Obama was “in over his head” after he was elected?

    They don’t apply this to Trump although it’s obviously true- instead they present incompetence as some kind of mavericky personality quirk, like it’s unimaginable that he’s just a bad manager although the evidence is overwhelming that that’s exactly what he is. All of these actions they present as “Trump being Trump”? Bad managers share all of them.

  33. 33.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Kay:

    Obama is prudent. Trump is not.

    And then there’s the whole Air Force One thing where Trump thought he could do things on the cheep(buy the jets that are sitting in the CA desert) and it’s probably going to cost more than if they had just done it the normal way(have Boeing build it).

  35. 35.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: From the article:

    In a bulleted list, Price committed to cooperating with the inspector general’s investigation, ceasing all private charter flights as HHS secretary, and writing a personal check “to the US Treasury for the expenses of my travel on private charter planes.”

  36. 36.

    Kay

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    There’s a persistent myth that there’s a million ways to do things and all the people who did it before are stupid and unimaginative and it’s almost always wrong. In a long running organization like the federal government people have tried a lot of things over the years and a lot of things have failed, so they settled on one way and they didn’t settle on that way because they’re stupid – they learned from experience. It’s the biggest benefit of experience and it builds- it’s built-in value. If you come in somewhere and say “why are they doing this stupid thing that’s easy to fix?” you should resist that because it’s arrogant- you’re not smarter than the 500 people who tried before, you just don’t know what they tried. If it was easy they would have done it.

  37. 37.

    bystander

    My favorite was Price’s charter jet flight from DC to Philadelphia.

    I think the entire cabinet feels as if they can be targeted in public and face a lot of random displays of indignation and anger, if not worse. Which is kind of sad, but then you think, naaah, let ’em worry. Let them have some sleepless nights. I like the idea that DeVos has to scurry from one dark corner to another and that Price goes through the folderol and waste of time of air travel because he knows he’ll be buttonholed and excoriated on Acela.

    ETA, I like to think the title of Price’s jailhouse memoir will be “Buttonholed and Excoriated”.

  39. 39.

    OzarkHillbilly

    There is something wrong with this:

    Despite having endured lead-laden tap water for years, Flint pays some of the highest water rates in the US. Several residents cited bills upwards of $200 per month for tap water they refuse to touch.

    But just two hours away, in the tiny town of Evart, creeks lined by wildflowers run with clear water. The town is so small, the fairground, McDonald’s, high school and church are all within a block. But in a town of only 1,503 people, there are a dozen wells pumping water from the underground aquifer. This is where the beverage giant Nestlé pumps almost 100,000 times what an average Michigan resident uses into plastic bottles that are sold all over the midwest for around $1.

    To use this natural resource, Nestlé pays $200 per year.

    Just can’t quite put my finger on it.

  43. 43.

    Baud

    @OzarkHillbilly: I’m not saying the situation is kosher, but those comparisons don’t make sense. Flint residents and Nestle are paying for two separate things, and at considerable distance from each other.

  46. 46.

    TS

    @OzarkHillbilly: Sure makes a mockery of his staff have spent a week explaining how imperative it was for him to take these flights – now he will cease them 100%. Has the job changed? Why was it imperative last week & not required this week? This is 100% the GOP answer to anything – I’ll do it until I am caught in the lie.

  50. 50.

    Elizabelle

    @bystander: Interesting take on why some of the cabinet is chartering jets. They’re afraid of dealing with the public.

    I’d think it’s hubris and entitlement and poor judgement, but fear may absolutely play a role too.

    Price should be fired, and these cabinet members should repay the government, in full, if there was a reasonable commercial option available. They can deduct out the cost of equivalent coach or even first or business class seats. They will still be on the hook for a LOT of dough.

  51. 51.

    TS

    So now trump wants to talk about the costs of Puerto Rico assistance – he truly is a monster – a sane president would be evacuating thousands, if not millions from a place (part of the USA) that is virtually uninhabitable at this point in time.

  52. 52.

    Kay

    @bystander:

    I think the entire cabinet feels as if they can be targeted in public and face a lot of random displays of indignation and anger

    I do too but that makes me even madder. They don’t get to be horrible, mean-spirited assholes and also be loved. That’s not how it works. Trump ran on how everyone else is stupid and corrupt and how everything is easy. He’s arrogant and he hires arrogant people who imagine they know things they don’t know. The petulant, put-upon act is the worst part of them.

  53. 53.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud:

    Flint residents and Nestle are paying for two separate things,

    Yep, Flint residents are paying $200 a month for the privilege of having poison pumped directly into their homes for the sole purpose of flushing their toilets and then paying extra for water with which to cook, do their dishes, bathe, and drink, while Nestle is exercising it’s God given corporate right to turn a $200 per year lease on a public resource into millions of dollars of private profit. Definitely apples and oranges.

  55. 55.

    rikyrah

    Maddow is the only one asking this question;
    What happened to the money that they raised for the Inauguration?

    They say that there was an audit, but nobody can produce proof of it.

  60. 60.

    Kay

    @bystander:

    I’m sick of all of it- the bravado and bragging and “fake it till you make it” substituting for actual work and competence.

    If that’s how you’re gonna run your life then don’t also demand to be loved and respected. They fall apart on substance because there’s nothing there and they’re too arrogant to learn anything.

    He wasn’t able to create the myth that he’s popular, although not for lack of trying. He wasn’t able to do that because he doesn’t actually control the minds and emotions of tens of millions of people and he is a fraud.

  61. 61.

    Frankensteinbeck

    Question: Does the Senate even work on Saturday? Do they close up some time on the 29th and can’t reopen on the 30th unless McConnell announces it today? I just want to flush the last 1% chance of him trying something on ACA repeal down the toilet.

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    They’ve been all over the map on Israel. There is no strategy at all. Of course, that leaves Bibi free to continue his plan of slow genocide.

    @Kay:
    Racism. Like Clint Eastwood, the press never saw Obama, only their imaginary black man. Meanwhile, Trump just CAN’T be proof the Republican Party runs on racism.

    At least they’re struggling with Trump, and the scales are falling from some eyes. He’s just so damn obvious.

  64. 64.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    It’s amusing though, because I thought of it – I thought “who else was on these plane rides?” and I know KellyAnne Conway was on some of them. Price is a dick and he made a dick move- he wants to make it clear he wasn’t the only one on there.

    I’d ask if I were a reporter. He wasn’t alone on that plane. Some pretty big Trumpsters were probably along.

    Everything they do is asshole-ish. Everything. He can’t even “take responsibility” without making it clear he wasn’t alone.

  65. 65.

    Baud

    The White House has launched an internal probe of private email use, pulling batches of emails on the White House server to and from private accounts of senior aides, according to four officials familiar with the matter.

    The effort began this week after POLITICO reported that Jared Kushner and a number of other senior White House officials used private email accounts throughout the year to conduct government business.

    Delete, delete, delete.

  67. 67.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    They’ve been all over the map on Israel.

    They’ve been all over the map on everything except for how they can enrich themselves. Personal profit is their only guiding principle.

  68. 68.

    Kay

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    I miss Obama’s steadiness. It was nice. You could ignore them and know they wouldn’t do anything tragically stupid.

    People really don’t want a lot of excitement in government. They want it to be in the background. I think it’s the worst part of the private sector worship, the idea that people want government employees to act like risk-takers. No one really wants that. They want some security and for things to run according to plan.

  70. 70.

    Elizabelle

    @Kay: Yes. Follow the travel manifests.

    From the FTF New York Times, Republican whisperers extraordinaire, yesterday. Yes, it’s Haberman-Thrush, with Katie Rogers:

    …. Mr. Trump has grown incensed by Mr. Price’s liberal [!] renting of expensive planes, which he views as undercutting his drain-the-swamp campaign message [!! — who believes that?], according to several administration officials with direct knowledge of the president’s thinking. [Ivanka et al??] Through intermediaries and the media, Mr. Trump has let it be known that offering reimbursement as repentance was no guarantee that Mr. Price would keep his job.

    … the president is said to have grown particularly frustrated with Mr. Price over the past week, as Politico published a series of reports detailing the secretary’s spending.

    The newspaper said Mr. Price took at least 26 flights on private jets, including to Nashville, where his son lives, and where Mr. Price owns a condominium, and to St. Simons Island, a Georgia resort area where Mr. Price owns property and recently spoke at a medical conference. Mr. Price also booked a charter flight that included a leg to Philadelphia from Dulles International Airport in Virginia, a distance of about 130 miles. Mr. Price told Mr. Baier [of Fox News] that all were undertaken with his agency’s approval.

    Mr. Baier pressed him on the cost of that travel — which Politico estimated at over $400,000, a number that has not been disputed — and asked why Mr. Price had only offered to pay back only $51,887. Mr. Price said that amount covers the cost of his seat on the trips, and the total bill remains under review.

    On Thursday night, Politico reported that the White House approved Mr. Price flying on United States military aircraft to travel to Europe, Asia and Africa for official events, at a cost of more than $500,000.

    …. Mr. Price’s announcement that he would reimburse the government for the cost of his seats on the private flights blindsided administration officials and raised questions about whether it was legal to do so, according to two people close to the White House. Additionally, one official said Mr. Price’s offer could set a precedence for others in the administration to repay their own travels.

    Mr. Price’s office responded with a statement from a spokeswoman, who said the secretary is in close contact with the White House: “He made this decision not because there was a legal responsibility, but because as he stated in his interview earlier today, he thought this was the right thing to do.”’

    …. The travels by senior Trump administration officials — and their costs to taxpayers — has elicited a rare bipartisan outcry in Congress.

    Representative Ted Lieu, Democrat of California, on Thursday introduced the Stop Waste and Misuse by Presidential Flyers Landing Yet Evading Rules and Standards (SWAMP FLYERS) Act. Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa and chairman of the Judiciary Committee, publicly urged Mr. Trump to curb the spending of cabinet secretaries, “considering the many travel options to and from Washington, D.C.”

    Mr. Price, who was already poised to shoulder some of the blame for the failed Graham-Cassidy health care effort, may have one main saving grace: Mr. Trump has few options of people who want his job, according to White House officials.

    “Rare bipartisan outcry.” Meaning, the GOP has twigged this excessive spending will not fare well with the public.

    I’d guess Price gets fired, and then conveniently blamed for failing on the ACA repeal too.

    ETA: typo in the FTF NYT. It’s precedent, not precedence.

  71. 71.

    OzarkHillbilly

    After spending most of the month on yet another failed bid to repeal the Affordable Care Act and block-grant Medicaid, Congress is set to leave town without reauthorizing the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) or payments for hospitals that serve the uninsured – and without passing a bill to stabilize Obamacare’s individual market, leaving it vulnerable to President Trump’s whims.

    Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), who sits on one of the key committees in charge of health care, confirmed to TPM that Congress will likely allow CHIP to lapse by Saturday’s deadline, putting the health insurance of millions of children in jeopardy.

    “I’m confident the money will come but obviously it’s not going to come on time,” she said wearily.

    The Pro-Life party in action.

  75. 75.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @eclare: I live on a well. I take the use of aquifers for profit personal. I feel the same about fracking and injection wells.

  77. 77.

    germy

    Megyn Kelly’s morning show.

    She had the Will & Grace cast on and it was awkward. (Debra Messing later called it a mistake.) Then Megyn pissed off Jane Fonda, preferring to discuss plastic surgery instead of the movie Ms. Fonda was there to discuss.

    Today the ladies of SNL are guests. I don’t watch the show but various websites have been showing clips.

  79. 79.

    JMG

    @Kay: This is so true. Trump could boost his approval rating 5-10 points just by closing his Twitter account and stop holding those stupid rallies. Look how it went up when he made a few appropriate remarks and let the government do its work for hurricanes Harvey and Irma. But of course, that made him miserable because it wasn’t all about him.

  82. 82.

    Kay

    @Elizabelle:

    They’re the Trump Whisperers, at the NY Times. Their job is to explain how Trump is really a well-intentioned and fascinating individual who is often misunderstood. The whole thing is gross and broken beyond repair. Combining their Clinton hatred and their admiration of Trump is like a perfect storm.

  83. 83.

    germy

    @Steeplejack: I really like Leslie Jones. She’s been doing comedy for thirty years but finally had her “overnight” success on SNL. She’s on morning Megyn with Cecily Strong and Kate McKinnon. Perhaps it will be the most awkward show yet.

  86. 86.

    germy

    @Steeplejack: That was funny as hell.

    One thing I know: if an elder I respect looks at me like that, I’ma go sit in the dark for about an hour to just re-assess my life and ask God how I can do better at being.

  89. 89.

    Spanky

    Here are the numbers for Puerto Rico, via The Weather Channel. I haven’t seen these concatenated anywhere else, although I wasn’t really looking:

    It’s been more than a week since Hurricane Maria slammed into Puerto Rico, causing unimaginable destruction and a humanitarian crisis that is only just beginning to unfold in this U.S. territory of 3.5 million people.

    To put the tragedy into some perspective, it helps to see the numbers associated with a storm of this magnitude and the devastation it leaves behind.

    Here are a few numbers to take in:

    18 Dead
    So far, 18 people have died as a result of the storm, but with little to no electricity and stifling temperatures baking the territory this week, the elderly, the very young and the sick are at risk, so the death toll could rise in the coming days and weeks.

    124,000 Gallons
    According to a Federal Emergency Management Agency spokesperson, the Defense Logistics Agency was transporting a shipment of 124,000 gallons of diesel fuel to Puerto Rico. Despite an abundance of fuel reportedly sitting in tankers off the piers of Puerto Rico’s ports, a distribution nightmare is leading to panic among hurricane-weary residents.

    According to Puerto Rico’s governor’s office, 11,437 people are still living in shelters on the island as of Tuesday.

    80 Percent Loss of Crops
    Maria destroyed 80 percent of Puerto Rico’s agricultural industry, including banana, plantain and coffee crops, which translates into an estimated $780 million, according to the New York Times.

    4.4 Million Meals
    FEMA has sent more than 4.4 million meals, 6.5 million liters of water, nearly 300 infant and toddler kits to support 3,000 infants for a full week, 70,000 tarps, and 15,000 rolls of roof sheeting to the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico since Hurricane Maria’s landfall.

    2,400 Miles
    Hurricane Maria knocked out nearly all of Puerto Rico’s 2,400 miles of transmission lines and more than 30,000 miles of smaller distribution wires, leaving the island almost completely without power. More than a week after the storm hit the territory, 97 percent of the island remains without power.

    19 Hospitals
    Fuel was delivered to 19 hospitals Wednesday for power generators and 200 gas stations received fuel, according to FEMA.

    1.57 Million Customers
    As of Wednesday, the majority of the 1.57 million electricity customers in Puerto Rico remain without power, the U.S. Department of Energy said. The agency added that damage assessments and restoration efforts are underway, focusing on critical facilities.

    44 Percent
    About 44 percent of Puerto Rico’s population is without drinking water, the U.S. Department of Defense reports.

    3,000 Evacuees
    Royal Caribbean says it has canceled a planned cruise and is using the ship instead to evacuate 3,000 victims of hurricanes Irma and Maria and deliver supplies to Puerto Rico.

    240 Flights Per Day
    The U.S. Northern Command estimates that it will increase the number of flights bringing needed supplies to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands from 3-6 aircraft per hour to 10 aircraft per hour, for a total of 240 aircraft per day.

    100 Delivery Trucks
    With the fuel shortages leading to panic across the island, The Defense Logistics Agency dispatched 100 delivery trucks Thursday, carrying an estimated 275,000 gallons of diesel fuel to residents.

    The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.

  90. 90.

    Amir Khalid

    @Frankensteinbeck:
    This is a shocking dereliction of duty. Given the likelihood of serious political consequences*, I’m stunned that they would do it.

    *I’m well aware that they might be indifferent to immediate practical consequences like poor children not getting healthcare.

  93. 93.

    Baud

    @Amir Khalid: I may be wrong, but they probably have a few days’ time before the effects are felt. If they are coming back next week, then they may pass something then.

  95. 95.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Amir Khalid:
    Democrats complained, and even a few Republicans, but it’s McConnell’s decision. If he decides there won’t be a vote before they leave, there won’t. The unusually (even by congressional standards) feeble schedule this year is interesting. Maybe McConnell is just plain lazy. All he’s actually proven he’s good at is retreating into his shell and doing nothing when someone else wants him to work.

  100. 100.

    gene108

    @debbie:

    Kinda puts Bill’s $400 haircut to shame.

    A right-wing hatchet job that turned into the gospel truth because reporters had a narrative and went with it. Bill got a fancy haircut, but flights weren’t delayed for hours because of it. No real delays at LAX that day.

    Someone actually checked the flight records from the airport, but because this was before the World Wide Web being popular it took weeks to get the data and by then the damage had been done.

    Obama benefited from the Internet. A lot of right-wing smears could be debunked in real time, before a popular narrative set in.

  102. 102.

    Elizabelle

    @Kay: Trump Whisperers. They are that. They normalize him, as much as they can.

    Are any of you seeing good media criticism about the FTF NYTimes? We are clearly not the only people who see what’s going on. Jay Rosen, I would guess… I’d love to keep a collection on that.

  107. 107.

    Elizabelle

    @schrodingers_cat: Forewarned.

    I don’t ever watch them anymore. David Koch’s funding of Ken Burns’ Vietnam series is impossible to escape — he really gets a plug. Brave, brave PBS. Totebagger heaven.

  108. 108.

    Another Scott

    @Elizabelle: BI:

    Sens. Orrin Hatch and Ron Wyden, who head the Senate Finance Committee, reached an agreement earlier this month and introduced a bipartisan bill to extend the program for five years. However, there has been little movement and CHIP will not be reauthorized on October 1.

    Other senators on the Finance Committee are confident an extension can get done before states are stretched too thin, likely in the coming weeks.

    Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, Republican, told Business Insider an “overwhelming number of states have some money to continue to spend” and he is confident a deal can be reached.

    “So think that in other words, there’s a few days leeway — there might be a few weeks leeway,” Grassley said. “But I can’t be specific because I don’t know but it’s too bad it’s not done right now.”

    Democratic Sen. Tom Carper said ” most people agree CHIP’s a good program” and that sense of agreement is why lawmakers will move to reauthorize in the coming weeks. But Carper noted that such a timeline is unclear for the program he called “Orrin Hatch’s baby.”

    “If I told you I could say it’s about three and a half days and I’d be lying,” he said. “I don’t know what the timeline is, but I know there’s not just Democrats.”

    Most concerned with the ramifications of CHIP’s expiration was Ohio Republican Rob Portman.

    “Originally we were told it wouldn’t be until after the first of the year that we’d run out of money” Portman told Business Insider. “Now we think actually in Ohio we could run out of money in by the end of this year by December 31. So it’s an issue, we gotta get it moving.”

    When asked what was standing in the way of a CHIP reauthorization, Portman suggested the program’s high cost to taxpayers was the primary issue.

    “We’re in agreement on policy but we’re not in agreement yet on what the pay-fors will be,” he said.

    There is a graphic in an earlier RollCall story that says that 11 states start to run out of CHIP money in January so there’s apparently still time.

    The Teabagger Congress seemingly can’t do anything until the bill collectors are pounding on the door. We have to get used to it.

    Hang in there.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  109. 109.

    Elizabelle

    @schrodingers_cat: And that’s a real problem.

    FTF NYT has been odd and bad enough that I wonder how much they have been compromised. Somebody should feed a tip to NYS AG Schneiderman. Pinch Sulzberger is in his jurisdiction. Who or what has accelerated the FTF NYTimes’ decline?

  110. 110.

    germy

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I ended my boycott of that show to see the HRC interview, big mistake.

    I stopped watching after the election. I couldn’t take the smirking and general laughter. But what happened when she interviewed HRC?

  111. 111.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Kay:

    There’s a persistent myth that there’s a million ways to do things and all the people who did it before are stupid and unimaginative

    And how. This is pretty much entirely what the deployment of the phrase “common sense” means in politics. Everyone who’s done $THING before had to have been either lazy, stupid, or corrupt, because the solution is self-evident to anyone! Lest we forget, this was the original packaging they did for Sarah Palin too.

  112. 112.

    schrodingers_cat

    @germy: The questions were all steeped in R conventional wisdom, about the blessed WWC in the midwestern states. I couldn’t watch after Whory asked a question about failed Obamacare and Vt Senator’s hobby horse, single payer. This was before Graham-Cassidy abomination was dead.
    ETA: I ended my boycott only last week. Should have just stuck to BBC World News, less hacktastic especially without Katy Kay.

  118. 118.

    rikyrah

    @Elizabelle:

    Interesting take on why some of the cabinet is chartering jets. They’re afraid of dealing with the public.

    I’d think it’s hubris and entitlement and poor judgement, but fear may absolutely play a role too.

    They don’t think that they should challenged about the evil that they do.

  119. 119.

    MomSense

    @bystander:

    My favorite was Price’s charter jet flight from DC to Philadelphia.

    Even worse, it was from Dulles to Philadelphia. I mean WTF. The drive to Dulles from DC is as long as the flight from Dulles to Philadelphia.

  121. 121.

    rikyrah

    These muthaphuckas here!!!

    Trump’s Treasury Department hides inconvenient economic report
    09/29/17 08:40 AM
    By Steve Benen

    About five years ago, the Treasury Department’s Office of Tax Analysis completed a study that found workers end up paying roughly 18% of the existing corporate tax, while corporate owners pay 82%. This wasn’t exactly surprising: the results were in line not only with the assessments of most economists, but also data compiled by the Joint Committee on Taxation and the Congressional Budget Office.

    Up until recently, this analysis was publicly available through the Treasury. As the Wall Street Journal reported overnight, that analysis has now vanished – because it “contradicts Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s argument that workers would benefit the most from a corporate income tax cut.”

    The paper was available on the Treasury website during the summer, and it wasn’t clear when it was removed or whether Treasury intended to publish a new analysis. Other technical papers from 2008 through 2016 remain on its site, along with working papers dating back to 1974.

    For Mnuchin, it’s critical that people believe that a corporate tax break would benefit workers, which makes all of the evidence to the contrary quite inconvenient.

    Evidently, Donald Trump’s Treasury secretary believes the proper solution is to make that evidence disappear – even if it came from career officials at his own cabinet agency.

  124. 124.

    rikyrah

    Team Trump can’t ‘guarantee’ middle class won’t face tax increase
    09/29/17 08:00 AM
    By Steve Benen

    House Speaker Paul Ryan appeared on CNBC yesterday, in part to help promote the Republicans’ new tax plan, and the Wisconsin Republican seemed eager to boast about the outline he helped write. He and his partners, Ryan said, “made sure we did the hard lifting and the tough work” before rolling out the proposal.

    I wish that were true. It’s not. Six like-minded allies met in secret for months, writing a partisan outline behind closed doors, and came up with a bunch of tax cuts. They didn’t make any of the difficult choices about how to pay for the “plan,” and at least at this point, they’ve left all kinds of questions unanswered about who’ll win and who’ll lose if their framework is implemented.

    NBC News’ Benjy Sarlin explained yesterday, for example, that while gains for ultra-wealthy Americans and businesses are “larger and more concrete” in the GOP proposal, the “net effects on lower- and middle-income Americans are hard to determine.” If Republicans had done “the hard lifting and the tough work” before unveiling the framework, there’d be far less ambiguity.

    Indeed, one of the architects of the plan, former Goldman Sachs chief Gary Cohn, Donald Trump’s top economic adviser, talked to ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos yesterday about some of these ambiguities.

    STEPHANOPOULOS: …If I’m hearing you correctly, you can’t guarantee that no middle-class family will get a tax increase. There will be middle-class families who get a tax increase under your plan, correct?

    COHN: George, there’s an exception to every rule.

    STEPHANOPOULOS: So that’s a yes?

    COHN: Look, I can’t guarantee anything. You could always find a unique family somewhere.

  125. 125.

    germy

    @TS:

    Will everyone on NBC have to guest on the show?

    Apparently anyone with an NBC show to plug will appear. It’s part of the package.

    Debra Messing said she had no idea she’d be on Megyn’s show; she was told it was the Today Show.

  128. 128.

    rikyrah

    Here’s how the Trump tax plan would raise taxes on many middle-income families
    Josh Barro

    Asked Thursday about whether the Republican tax plan would cut taxes on the wealthy, top White House economic adviser Gary Cohn said he didn’t think Americans would care what happened to other people’s taxes — they would care about getting a tax cut for themselves.

    Cohn said a “typical” American family making around $100,000 would get a tax break of about $1,000.

    “If we allow a family to keep another $1,000 of their income, what does that mean?” he asked. “They can renovate their kitchen, they can buy a new car, they can take a family vacation, they can increase their lifestyle.”

    So. About that.

    While there are still a lot of details to be filled in, the information we have available suggests the new Republican tax proposal would raise income taxes on many families who make just a bit more than the national average.

    I’m going to lay out below one such typical tax situation. Meet Ann and Bob Smith.

    Ann and Bob don’t have a weird, outlier financial situation. They own a home with a mortgage, they have two kids, they pay income tax in a state with moderate tax rates, they give to charity in an amount proportionate to their income. They take tax deductions accordingly. And Trump’s “massive tax cut” would actually appear to increase their tax burden by about $600.

    It’s hard enough to buy a car for $1,000. Ann and Bob definitely won’t be able to buy one for negative $600.

    Let’s do Ann and Bob’s taxes

    Go to the link and see how Ann and Bob will be paying more under the Trump plan.

  132. 132.

    germy

    @rikyrah:

    “If we allow a family to keep another $1,000 of their income, what does that mean?” he asked. “They can buy a new car

    Or some tires, anyway.

    “It’s a banana. How much could it cost? Ten dollars?”

  133. 133.

    rikyrah

    THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 9/28/17
    Trump pitches tax cuts for rich as Puerto Rico languishes
    Rachel Maddow points out the awkward juxtaposition of the Trump administration presenting a plan to cut taxes for the rich while suffering continues in Puerto Rico with leadership impotent to distribute ready aid.

    THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 9/28/17
    Hospitals struggle to help ailing Americans in Puerto Rico
    Pablo Venes, a San Juan-based journalist, talks with Rachel Maddow about how the lack of internet and means of communication is hindering the ability for hospitals to treat patients in Puerto Rico as bad ideas and impotent leadership continue to hinder relief efforts.

  138. 138.

    Elizabelle

    @rikyrah: Jackass. (ETA: Cohen! Not you!!)

    How far will that $1,000 in tax savings go towards paying for college, which will get even more expensive? Or for replacing the family’s entire home, should they be NOT in a flood plain (ie. no flood insurance) and climate change comes to call?

    Fuckers. We are so much stronger spending that money well, for the public good. Infrastructure development, etc.

    Although — points for honesty — Trump admin will NOT spend it well. Still, a horrible precedent.

    We are not undertaxed in the USA. We are underserved.

  139. 139.

    manyakitty

    @Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): From my observations, your likelihood of paying for things decreases in proportion to how rich you are. That’s why people with lower incomes/less wealth pay so much more in taxes (as a percentage of income), too. Our society is carefully designed to benefit and protect people with money.

  140. 140.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @MomSense:

    I can’t even listen to NPR anymore.

    Wait, Wait is good. I also recommend Sound Opinions, which isn’t actually an NPR production but syndicated to public radio stations. My younger son is a producer for that show, so I’m obligated to listen AND I like it.

    I made the mistake of listening to All Things Considered a few days ago during a long ride home. When did the women on that show become so giggly? Blech.

  141. 141.

    rikyrah

    There Is No GOP Establishment or Base. Just Massive Resistance.
    By JOSH MARSHALL
    Published SEPTEMBER 28, 2017 12:35 PM

    In a new story at NBC News, Steve Kornacki says there is a new GOP uprising underway leading into the 2018 election. It is a replay or the next stage of similar eruptions in 2010 and 2012 and to a lesser extent in 2014. We know the pattern: establishment Republicans get picked off by increasingly radical or simply crazy ‘grassroots’ conservatives. Many end up losing races to Democrats which a more conventional Republican could have won. But some or most get through.

    That pattern allowed Democrats to hold on to the Senate through the first six years of President Obama’s presidency. And it was the GOP’s relative success at preventing primary-driven self-immolations in 2014 and again in 2016 that finally allowed them to claim the majority and hold it. Everyone who has observed US national politics in the last decade knows this pattern.

    ……………………………………….

    This is the crux of the issue. Last spring I said the Trump phenomenon was a product of what I termed ‘nonsense debt‘. Republicans had spent years pumping their voters up on increasingly extreme and nonsensical claims and promises. This worked very well for winning elections. But it had also built up a debt that eventually had to be repaid. Concretely, they were making claims and promises that were either factually ridiculous, politically unviable or unacceptable to a broad swath of the voting public. Eventually, you get elected and need to produce. By definition that’s never really possible: both because the claims and promises are nonsensical and unviable but also because a politics based on reclamation, revenge, and impulse is almost impossible to satisfy through normal legislative politics.

  142. 142.

    TS

    @germy:

    Debra Messing said she had no idea she’d be on Megyn’s show; she was told it was the Today Show.

    Some may ask a few more questions in relation to their “appearance sheet” in the future. No understanding as to why anyone would want an ex fox presenter on their network.

  143. 143.

    KithKanan

    @manyakitty: I can second this, as a programmer who once had to implement what I called the “free shoes for rich people” promotion for an online store.

    Someone had something they wanted to promote, so if you bought certain shoes and lived in certain upscale zip codes, once you finished checking out you’d see a surprise message that your purchase cost was taken care of thanks to [people/thing].

  144. 144.

    germy

    Line from Will and Grace:

    Secret Service agent to Jack: “My job’s gotten a lot easier. The nutjobs we protected the last president from are this guy’s biggest supporters.”

  145. 145.

    rikyrah

    IS.WATER.WET?

    Is Neil Gorsuch Corrupt?
    The Supreme Court Justice gave a speech for an organization associated with the plaintiffs in an upcoming case.

    by John Stoehr
    September 29, 2017

    On Thursday, the most junior justice on the Supreme Court gave a speech at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., for an organization with the same benefactor as the group bringing a case that may end up knee-capping public-sector unions.

    From the LA Times:

    The justices will hear the case of Mark Janus, an Illinois state employee who objects to paying fees to the union, which represents 35,000 state workers.

    The decision, due by next June, could prove a costly setback for public-sector unions in 22 states, including California, where such fees are authorized by law. Labor experts have predicted a significant percentage of employees would stop supporting their union if given a choice. The other 28 states have “right to work” laws that forbid requiring workers to join or support a union.

    ……………………….

    Others have noted that Gorsuch, in agreeing to speak at the Trump International Hotel, appeared to approve tacitly of the president’s blatant disregard for ethical and legal boundaries. The president, in being the owner of the hotel, is literally the renter and rentee. At the moment, I can’t think of a better definition of corruption.

    Less attention is paid to Gorsuch’s apparent corruption. His speech follows another in Kentucky last week before which Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, in the words of the Lexington Herald-Leader‘s headline writer, “shows off prized accomplishment.”

    It’s enough to wonder if Gorsuch too has little serious regard for appearing to comport himself to certain boundaries. The Supreme Court is supposed to hold itself above the partisan fray as an independent check on the powers of Congress and the president.

    Yet Gorsuch, by appearing in public with McConnell and with associates of plaintiffs in an upcoming case, seems untroubled by his troubling breach of protocol. Indeed, he seems comfortable signaling to his friend and allies that they need not worry, not worry at all.

  148. 148.

    rikyrah

    Quick Takes: Never Send Out a Millionaire to Explain Tax Cuts
    A roundup of news that caught my eye today.

    by Nancy LeTourneau
    September 28, 2017

    Donald Trump hired a lot of millionaires to work in the White House – especially in positions where their task is to work on the economy and finance. But it is always a mistake to send out a millionaire to explain how your tax plans will help the middle class. Exhibit A: millionaire Gary Cohn.

    Uh, Gary Cohn (who is worth several hundred million dollars) thinks it costs $1000 to buy a new car (or renovate your kitchen) pic.twitter.com/6IwRDgGSCN

    — Judd Legum (@JuddLegum) September 28, 2017

    Round two goes to Cohn as well.

    Economic adv. Gary Cohn: Typical family with 2 children earning $100,000 “can expect a tax cut of $1000.” #TaxReform pic.twitter.com/hIOoYigVhS

    — Steve Herman (@W7VOA) September 28, 2017

    Median income in the U.S. is $59,000.

  149. 149.

    Shalimar

    Bad Friday news for Puerto Rico:Trump is giving recovery workers the weekend off because they have done “the best job on history.” /s, I hope.

  150. 150.

    prob50

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    The news is that he is only paying for his seat. We’re on the gig for everything else.

    Well, yeah. Those other folks were probably on important gum’mint bizznezz.

  156. 156.

    rikyrah

    @germy:

    Apparently anyone with an NBC show to plug will appear. It’s part of the package.

    Debra Messing said she had no idea she’d be on Megyn’s show; she was told it was the Today Show.

    YES…They are forcing people onto her show.

  159. 159.

    rikyrah

    @germy:

    Then Megyn pissed off Jane Fonda, preferring to discuss plastic surgery instead of the movie Ms. Fonda was there to discuss.

    Jane Fonda gave her A LOOK…

    Don’t come for Jane Fonda if she hasn’t sent for you.

    From Luvvie:

    Jane Fonda’s Death Stare to Megyn Kelly Soothed My Soul

    Y’all. Y’ALL. In these times of dumpster fire, joy must come wherever we can find it and I have found glee today!
    Megyn Kelly, white privilege Barbie, has a new morning show on NBC. Those fools over there chose her over Tamron Hall, so you know I already wasn’t wishing the show well. Add to the fact that Megyn ain’t got the good sense God gave a goat and what you have is a “get busy, karma” holiday party.

    Jane Fonda got a new movie she’s starring with Robert Redford, called Our Souls at Night so she decided to grace Megyn with her presence. Sometimes, you gotta do lessers massive favors like this.

  160. 160.

    WaterGirl

    @Shalimar: Trump is completely disconnected from reality and has no idea that there will be consequences to relief workers getting the weekend off. All of them? Un-fucking-believable.

  161. 161.

    Betty Cracker

    @Elizabelle: I bookmarked it. Since Trump lies constantly, the only way to know what’s happening is to focus on what he DOES, not what he SAYS.

  162. 162.

    Shalimar

    @OzarkHillbilly: Judging by how little stock Price purchased in his insider trading scandal, I doubt he has a million dollars to repay the government with if he tried to cover the full costs.

  164. 164.

    Betty Cracker

    @rikyrah: Try as they might, NBC ain’t gonna make Kelly happen. When she finally flops for good, you’d hope the lesson NBC takes away is that it’s not profitable to try to rehab race-baiting Foxbots, but sadly, that’s unlikely.

  167. 167.

    Jeffro

    @rikyrah: I read that piece and it’s pretty on-point: they really can’t get things done, because they haven’t been dealing with reality for a long, long time.

    Or as a highly respected and beloved former president once said, “Reality has a way of asserting itself”. BIGLY.

  168. 168.

    Jeffro

    @Betty Cracker: It boggles the mind that NBC thought they’d somehow bring MK over and make her into a beloved morning show host, when all she ever did was spout Republican bullshit while being not-hard on the eyes. And then she had that Alex Jones crapola, to boot. Bye, Megyn!

    There must be several hundred other newscasters/show hosts around the country who’d appreciate a shot at the brass ring – why not do a little digging for a ‘diamond in the rough’, NBC? ‘Cause the MK thing is just not gonna fly.

  169. 169.

    Shalimar

    @Betty Cracker: Since it is NBC, and the current head of the news division is a right-wing true believer, the lesson they will take from it is that Kelly and Van Susteren combined would be ratings gold and they need a show replacing Maddow in the prime time slot.

  170. 170.

    WaterGirl

    @Shalimar: I went back to your original comment and belatedly saw the “/s”. I thought the snark tag was “//” I can’t keep up. Plus, it’s totally believable.

  172. 172.

    Betty Cracker

    I love it that Betsy DeVos is getting heckled every time she appears in public. Princess Moneybags is used to politicians kissing her ass, taking her money and giving her free reign to implement her corrupt schemes at the state level, so it must be quite a shock to get push-back from the students she’s trying to screw at the federal level. No wonder she demands to be surrounded by armed guards (paid for by you and me) all the time!

  173. 173.

    Barbara

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO), who sits on one of the key committees in charge of health care, confirmed to TPM that Congress will likely allow CHIP to lapse by Saturday’s deadline, putting the health insurance of millions of children in jeopardy.

    I am told by a reliable source that there will be a vote to reauthorize next week. The real question is why they aren’t jumping through hoops to authorize more emergency funds for Puerto Rico. Right now, it just looks like the military is jumping in on its own, along with whatever remains from this year’s FEMA funds.

  174. 174.

    WaterGirl

    @rikyrah: Wow. That clip should be playing on every channel, being played over and over and over like they did with the stupid “chickens are coming home to roost” story.

    i was raised catholic and went to catholic grade school where they drilled into us that you never take god’s name in vain. Not catholic anymore, but that has stuck with me. But all I can think after watching the mayor’s heartfelt response is Jesus Fucking Christ, what is wrong with these people?

  175. 175.

    Barbara

    @Baud: It’s not that they care more it’s that the symbolism is much less abstract and a lot easier to comprehend. Who wouldn’t want to bypass commercial flights and get a cushy private charter to wherever one has contrived to hold a meeting so that it can be written off as a business expense, or in this case, charged to you and me taxpayer. It crystallizes how little of a stake people like Tom Price and Donald Trump actually have in a government of the people. It makes their lack of caring about the ACA or CHIP comprehensible and credible.

  177. 177.

    Corner Stone

    @rikyrah:

    Those fools over there chose her over Tamron Hall, so you know I already wasn’t wishing the show well. Add to the fact that Megyn ain’t got the good sense God gave a goat and what you have is a “get busy, karma” holiday party.

    For which I hope they burn a slow, painful amount of dying death when they die. I will never watch a minute of any air she is on where she’s the primary.

  178. 178.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Barbara: Yep. I was just mostly pointing out that they had spent so much time trying to deny healthcare to people that they didn’t have any time left to ensure healthcare FOR people. Today’s GOP in a nutshell.

  179. 179.

    Corner Stone

    @Barbara:

    It crystallizes how little of a stake people like Tom Price and Donald Trump actually have in a government of the people.

    Even people who really did have the highest hopes that Trump would really do something that would help their pocketbook, all 10 of them, probably looked at each other when Gary Cohn said a family making $100,000 could buy a new car with a $1000 tax break.

  180. 180.

    Barbara

    @Jeffro: One thing that has become apparent to me over the last 18 months is just how non-diverse large media companies are. Their “talent” is still mostly white, predominantly male, and their management is basically all white men. They embody nearly the same demographic characteristics that Fox News viewers do. Now, they are not trying to mimic Fox News, but the point is, they see Kelly’s attractiveness through the same lens. They have no fucking clue that women, especially young women, see her as a smarmy beauty whose appeal to men is knowing and calculated and actually offputting. Kelly can’t change every well-honed instinct that has been cultivated to please a single demographic just by getting different guests and a studio set that looks like a living room.

    ETA: I had a roommate who had an uncanny ability to attract men. She wasn’t a great beauty but it was if every gesture and statement was calculated to get their attention and even when she was saying no it was done so as to appeal and not repel. That’s Megyn Kelly’s appeal.

  181. 181.

    Corner Stone

    @WaterGirl:

    But all I can think after watching the mayor’s heartfelt response is Jesus Fucking Christ, what is wrong with these people?

    Beyond the brown-ness of the people there, which means Trump don’t care, he has no idea how to actually run or implement anything. And their “deconstruction of the administrative state” has left the actual government in a shambolic era where alot of the institutional knowledge is just gone. Trump really isn’t a delegator, even though he’s always pawning off responsibility to anyone but himself. He doesn’t know how to manage or supervise and we’ve seen the incredibly bad hires he’s made. So this all starts from the top, natch.

  182. 182.

    Corner Stone

    However, if John Kelly really was a force for good in this WH, and any good at his job whatsoever, he would have been barking orders up and down the chain of command (on behalf of the POTUS or any other acceptable way) and gotten some rears in gear waaayyyy before now. The fact that he allowed his boss to become this exposed on a completely predictable crisis says alot about Gen J Kelly.

  183. 183.

    Jeffro

    FWIW, Brooksie managed to take all the fun out of Chance the Rapper in today’s nonsense. For that, I can never forgive him.

  184. 184.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Corner Stone: Don’t you know that he is also a constitutional expert, giving statements how T had to do what he did because DACA is unconstitutional. Just like BC proved that being a brain surgeon does not guarantee smarts, Kelly proves that being a general doesn’t make you an expert at everything.

  185. 185.

    Corner Stone

    @Barbara:

    Kelly can’t change every well-honed instinct that has been cultivated to please a single demographic just by getting different guests and a studio set that looks like a living room.

    It was clear from watching any of her on Fox that she had no appreciable skill for the job. Right wing operators on twitter were all saying that she would flop at NBC and anyone who replaced her at Fox would get about the same ratings within the margin.
    She’s not very bright and clearly holds truly awful views on a variety of things. Those weren’t just to excel on Fox. That is who she is.

  186. 186.

    Corner Stone

    @rikyrah:

    The curve for unqualified White Men is REAL

    You know what I have been enjoying? The application of the concept of “watch whiteness work”.

  187. 187.

    Barbara

    @Corner Stone: Well, I don’t know what others were saying. The few times I have watched Kelly (2012 election returns) it was clear to me that even her reputation for being “sassy” is just that — being sassy, provocative enough to intrigue but not so provocative as to alienate or rock the boat.

  188. 188.

    SiubhanDuinne (at some point in the indeterminate future to be known by my real name, Judith Mann Costello, but maybe not quite yet)

    @Barbara:

    ETA: I had a roommate who had an uncanny ability to attract men. She wasn’t a great beauty but it was if every gesture and statement was calculated to get their attention and even when she was saying no it was done so as to appeal and not repel. That’s Megyn Kelly’s appeal.

    “Scarlett O’Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were.”

  189. 189.

    catclub

    @Kay:

    Is she using them for food service on the planes, or what?

    I always thought the motto was ‘Eat the rich!’, not ‘Eat the US Marshals!’

  190. 190.

    Bookeater (formerly JosieJ)

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Why can’t they charter a fucking bus?! It’s, what, 3 hours tops from DC to Philly by road. And why the hell does he need to have such a big entourage, anyway?! Ditch some of the posse, rent a damn minivan and call it a day.

  191. 191.

    rikyrah

    Tom Price’s Truly Outrageous Behavior
    by Nancy LeTourneau
    September 29, 2017

    Over the last few days, headlines have been blaring about HHS Secretary Tom Price (as well as Mnuchin, Zinke and Pruitt) using private chartered jets to travel. A commitment to reimburse taxpayers misses the point here. In the scheme of things, the amount of money spent isn’t all that much. What is much more troubling is the sense of entitlement and the way that self-enrichment is assumed to be part of public service in this administration.

    But while that issue has been front and center, the truly outrageous actions of Sec. Price haven’t received as much attention. It has become obvious that he is doing everything humanly possible to stop people from purchasing health insurance on the Obamacare exchanges.

    November 1st begins the open enrollment period and, absent a major life event, it marks the only time during the year that individuals can sign up for coverage on the exchanges. Here is what Price has done so far to make that more difficult:

    Shortened the open enrollment period by 1 1/2 months
    Eliminated 90 percent of funding for advertising the open enrollment period and cut funding for navigators (who assist people with enrollment) by 40 percent
    Announced a plan to shut down the federal exchange for maintenance 12 hours every Sunday through the open enrollment period.

    On this latest one about shutting down the exchange for maintenance, one anonymous official suggested that it was no different than what happened in previous years during the Obama administration. Surprise, surprise…that is a lie.

    A federal report to Congress said healthcare.gov was online 99.9 percent of the time in the 2015 and 2016 open enrollment seasons.

    The Trump administration plan will have the site operating 93 percent of the time — over an enrollment period that is half as long as it used to be. In effect, instead of a 90-day enrollment season, the Trump administration has cut it to 45. The maintenance shutdowns cut it to an equivalent of 42 days.

  192. 192.

    rikyrah

    Team Trump seems to have an aversion to commercial air travel
    09/29/17 10:42 AM
    By Steve Benen

    So many Trump-era political controversies are so unusual, we lack frames of reference and historical parallels. When a foreign adversary launches an espionage operation against our democracy to help elect its preferred presidential candidate, and they may have had American confederates colluding with the attackers, it’s the kind of scandal that defies easy comparison.

    On the other hand, cabinet secretaries avoiding commercial air travel is refreshingly simple. The Washington Post has the latest example for a growing list.

    Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke chartered a flight from Las Vegas to near his home in Montana this summer aboard a plane owned by oil-and-gas executives, internal documents show.

    The flight, along with private flights during a trip to the Virgin Islands, could propel Zinke into the growing debate over the costs of travel by Cabinet secretaries, some of whom have chosen expensive charter jets and military planes at high expense to taxpayers over the cheaper option of flying commercial.

  193. 193.

    Tazj

    @Corner Stone: I was listening to NPR this morning. What can I say? I flip the stations around when I drive. Jonah Goldberg was on saying that he thought the Republican messaging on taxes was so much better than it was on healthcare. After all, healthcare isn’t really their “thing.” I had read Gary Cohn was bad yesterday, but I didn’t realize how bad until this thread. Goldberg went on to say that if the Republicans failed on tax reform people might star to think “If Republicans can’t cut our taxes why should we vote for them?” We can only hope that’s true.

  194. 194.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Kay:

    People really don’t want a lot of excitement in government.

    There are people who do. Mostly young white men. They voted for Trump because it would be funny and Hillary Clinton was boring.

  195. 195.

    J R in WV

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    That’s only proper, but the Government should only pay the cost of a commercial flight for those staff/security folks, not the cost of a seat on a private jet. It is the Republiclown choice to upgrade himself and all those other folks to private jet status, therefore it is his responsibility to pay for the whole frickin’ charter jet airplane!!

    These clowns give me a pain in my checkbook !!!

  196. 196.

    J R in WV

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Well, you can use a private train, but it isn’t faster than Acela, and it’s way slower than private jets. But more comfortable, you have a lot of elbow room, real beds, real dining room table, etc… There are people who collect private rail cars and refurbish their fancy doodads. That leather upholstery doesn’t last forever, ya know!

  197. 197.

    burnspbesq

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    It takes two to make a horribly one-sided deal. If anyone on the town council had a lick of sense and basic Excel skills, they could have figured out an appropriate amount to charge Nestle. And Nestle would have paid; its margin on bottled water would still be astronomical.

  198. 198.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Kay:From yesterday’s thread about SHS.

    The long hair is a big part of it- it sets them apart more as they get older because women tend to wear their hair shorter as they get older.

    Why do women have wear their hair short as they get older The generic soccer mom bob is so blah. Who makes up these stupid rules anyway?

  199. 199.

    J R in WV

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    Sorry Bill, you beat me to it by a country mile. I sometimes see private rail cars parked in the Valley on sidings being rehabbed, there was a huge amount of RR business here, and there are big time collectors around too. Next month there are charter trains in the New River Gorge for leaf peeping, too.

  200. 200.

    Spanky

    @burnspbesq: You don’t think Nestle eased the burden for a few members of that deciding board? Whatever they could slip under the table earned a huge return on investment.

  202. 202.

    Corner Stone

    Zinke now trying to stealsplain why he took all his private flights.

    ETA He’s speaking at The Heritage Foundation and MSNBC is live covering this part.

  204. 204.

    The Moar You Know

    Why can’t they charter a fucking bus?! It’s, what, 3 hours tops from DC to Philly by road. And why the hell does he need to have such a big entourage, anyway?! Ditch some of the posse, rent a damn minivan and call it a day.

    @Bookeater (formerly JosieJ): Someone has clearly told the entire cabinet that they’re all in danger of their lives, and they’re acting accordingly.

    And it’s ludicrous. They’re not that important, for starters, and the kind of people who kill politicians in this country are their “base” and love them.

  205. 205.

    StringOnAStick

    @schrodingers_cat: I’m 59 and I wear my hair long; its easier to care for and I got lucky in the “looks OK with little effort” department. I don’t plan on going short, ever. The people we “old and longs” get pressured by are always other women in my experience. I had a secretary once who was just disgusted that Bonnie Raitt still had long hair but never had an opinion on aging rock males who still had their signature long hair.

  206. 206.

    Spanky

    More on the chaos front, from the WaPo:

    More than half the diplomatic personnel are being yanked from the U.S. Embassy in Havana, and Americans are warned not to visit the island nation. Officials said it’s for citizens’ own safety after a string of mysterious injuries harmed at least 21 Americans stationed in Cuba. The diplomatic drawdown means no visas will be processed at the embassy because there won’t be enough people to do the work.

  207. 207.

    schrodingers_cat

    @StringOnAStick: I too have found it easier to care for long and longish hair than short hair. More haircuts and heat styling is required to make it look good in my case, otherwise I either look like a poodle or a frizzy bed head.
    ETA: In case of most women its jealousy because their can’t grow their hair long or it doesn’t look good when long. I say do what works for you.

  208. 208.

    Corner Stone

    @Tazj:

    I had read Gary Cohn was bad yesterday, but I didn’t realize how bad until this thread

    Gary Cohn was really bad, like terribad. The man’s worth about $700M and he’s stumbling over not being able to competently lie about middle class tax cuts. I saw some speculation that he was trotted out there to lie about these tax cuts as a way to get back in Trump’s favor. In any event, the Dignity Wraith struck yet again.

  209. 209.

    Mike J

    @Bookeater (formerly JosieJ):

    Why can’t they charter a fucking bus?! It’s, what, 3 hours tops from DC to Philly by road

    It’s a five minute walk from the south side of the mall (where HHS is) to Union Station in DC. Hop on an Acela and you’re in Philly in an hour and a half. Non-Acela takes two.

  210. 210.

    Mike J

    @The Moar You Know:

    They’re not that important, for starters, and the kind of people who kill politicians in this country are their “base” and love them.

    Back in the nineties libertarians were trying to be “edgy” and get noticed wrote millions of words on how political assassination wasn’t really a bad thing and how somebody needed to find a way to anonymously pay anybody who committed political violence.

  211. 211.

    catclub

    @Corner Stone: Cohn is just lying. Find me ONE person with $1M/yr income whose taxes go up on this new version relative to the status quo. Otherwise it is only a cut for the wealthy.
    Then we might talk.

  212. 212.

    Barbara

    @schrodingers_cat: Why do women wear their hair shorter? Well, in the U.S. it’s because women don’t really put their hair up, and when hair becomes less shiny and pretty “as is” they get tired of working with it. Personally, I think SHS’s hair looks okay but I don’t know how much time she spends on it, and it’s the time factor that is usually decisive. My mother in law never cut her hair but she spent a lot of time twisting it into a pile on top of her head.

  213. 213.

    bemused

    @rikyrah:

    Price and Trump are birds of a feather in thinking there aren’t any rules that apply to them, the special people. What amuses me a bit is that Trump is angry that Price is embarrassing him and his administration.

  215. 215.

    gvg

    @schrodingers_cat: time makes the rules. I still have long hair but maybe not much longer. I don’t find grey as attractive as my younger color and my hair is simply less healthy. It’s gotten brittle with age and to me always seems to look frizzy and messy. I loved my long hair for decades, but time keeps marching on. If i get perms and color, it will really get brittle and long hair means several years old at the ends so it would have several color treatments on it. when i was young i had exceptional hair, held a perm for a year, lovely color….things don’t stay the same. I haven’t decided on a new look yet, but i am actively considering it. shorter should give me some more body too. Since age does about the same things to all women, they tend to make the same choices. my mother went to very short hair when she broke her arm in her 60’s FWIW. I hope to avoid that.

  216. 216.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Barbara: @gvg: But why the dogma if a woman has longer hair she is not a serious person, is a “girl”? Its not like short hair is maintenance free either. If SHS was bald she would still be the same lying liar. Her hair doesn’t make her less serious.

  217. 217.

    bemused

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I find longer hair easier too. I can put it up in several ways and braid it even though I am now officially a senior citizen. Who cares if there is some unspoken rule about older women having long hair. I’m the one that has to deal with my hair, no one else. If I cut it short, I’d look like an old orphan annie.

    Most ladies in their 80’s and older seem to have the same hair style, the curly perm helmet. Several times I have had a hard time locating a family member or friend in that age group in a crowd of gray/white haired ladies with the same exact hair dos. They all look the same at first.

  218. 218.

    Barbara

    @schrodingers_cat: Because longer hair tends to be associated with younger women. It’s an easy symbol, just as Trump’s toupee is a very handy symbol for his narcissism and self-regard. He would still be an asshole even if he showed his baldness. Just for the record, I disapprove strongly of using personal appearance or dress as a way of attacking people, especially women (because it is done so frequently and in a spirit of misogyny). I don’t even notice SHS’s hair or attire.

  219. 219.

    Another Scott

    @bemused: “curly perm helmet”. Hehe.

    When my best friend graduated we all went outside the arena to get a picture. It was very windy. Everyone’s hair was being blown around everywhere except for his mother-in-law’s – it was perfect and remained rigid the whole time.

    :-)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  220. 220.

    bemused

    @Another Scott:

    It’s Twue, it’s twue!

    I can’t imagine preferring a hair do that doesn’t move and feels like petrified cotton candy. That would drive me crazy.

  221. 221.

    TenguPhule

    @bystander:

    I think the entire cabinet feels as if they can be targeted in public and face a lot of random displays of indignation and anger, if not worse.

    At the rate things are going, that’s actually not an irrational fear.

    They’re all trying to kill Americans.

  222. 222.

    LaNonna

    Probably dead tnread, but also an old with long hair. Got lucky in the genetic sweepstakes with truly thick wavy hair. That said I went grey in my 20s, kept it natural, only now my friends are catching up in the silvers. Put it up lots, doen when it’s not too damp or hot out, really like spray on glitter, just fun.

  223. 223.

    bemused

    @LaNonna:

    Probably really, truly dead thread but I also have thick wavy hair which has been a blessing now that it is graying on top (under the coloring I get) with the usual drying and thinning. Not letting the coloring go yet because mom and older half sister hair turned to a blah ash gray until they got close to 80. I just have to treat my hair a lot more gently now.

  224. 224.

    workworkwork

    @Kay: Yes! This is it exactly!

    I wrote an angry email to a podcast host that complained (before the election) that Hilary was the ‘boring’ choice.

    I told him that government, like banking, is SUPPOSED to be boring.

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