Lovely weather at Kent State, Thursday…
wearing diapers to own the libs, classic move https://t.co/4M5mGcRsVB
— halloween sucks (@kath_krueger) October 19, 2017
the best part of capitalism you ask? the #brands pic.twitter.com/sUxZt0hBb1
— KRANG ?? NELSON (@KrangTNelson) October 19, 2017
"I can't get laid because the stuck-up bigot libtard girls won't date Republicans" pic.twitter.com/iH2TTB102F
— Kilgore Trout (@KT_So_It_Goes) October 20, 2017
“Free” expression of political ideas…
… Charlie Kirk founded Turning Point USA in 2012, when he was 18 years old. Mr. Kirk claims that his dream was to attend the US Military Academy but got rejected, and blamed this on affirmative action. He continued to live in his parents’ home until 2015. Charlie Kirk has compared Turning Point USA to the efforts of MoveOn.org, a progressive 501c4 organization.
Turning Point’s allies include Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner and billionaire Foster Friess. Friess also serves on the organization’s advisory council, alongside Ginni Thomas, wife of US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas…
Groups that are aligned with Turning Point include Project Veritas, the Heartland Institute, Freedom Works, and the National Rifle Association.
Charlie Kirk has disavowed any relationship with alt right groups. However, he has written for Breitbart News, and has been associated with Breitbart chairman Steve Bannon for several years. Turning Point has also shown support for former Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos, including when the organization sponsored him at University of Colorado and Miami University…
Friday night:
We wanted to make sure everyone saw the statement about the @TPUSAatKent event — let’s keep educating in the fight against safe spaces! pic.twitter.com/pmh77gn455
— Turning Point USA (@TPUSA) October 20, 2017
Still beats getting an honest job, right, Charlie?
(Yeah, yeah, at least they’re not shooting at their classmates. Yet.)
Corner Stone
I am completely confused right now.
Mike in NC
“Mr. Kirk claims that his dream was to attend the US Military Academy but got rejected, and blamed this on affirmative action.”
But of course it had nothing to do with him being an whiny imbecile.
lollipopguild
Just another right wing grift. The conservative movement has become a never ending Ponzi scheme.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
Perpetual virgin, chicken legs.
Snarki, child of Loki
I’m sure there are some aged hippies that can wax nostalgic about their younger days of sex, drugs, rock’n’roll and massive street protests wearing adult diapers to STAND UP TO THE MAN.
Well, lots of them are old enough now to be doing that, I guess.
Nicole
I’m kind of thinking these young men were just trying to come up with some way of going public with their personal fetish. Look, fellers, it’s okay. The great thing about safe spaces is that, when you’re in them, you’re safe to be yourself, even if you’re wearing a diaper. Picked pockets and broken legs and all that inclusionary stuff Thomas Jefferson talked about.
hitchhiker
I’ve had to turn away from all the politics news … something about the Kelly speech felt like the bottom fell out. It’s just free fall right now, and I don’t see how to locate a platform to stand on or a ledge to cling to. These people are evil.
I think our institutions still allow us to remove them, though the process is way too slow. In the meantime I have to break from Trump’s endless, soul-killing game of “let’s you and him hate each other.” So, thanks for the open threads & the sportsball talk & the pet photos. This is a haven.
Mnemosyne
I dunno, that “safe space” looks like it was pretty fun until the creep in the adult diaper showed up to ruin it for everyone.
Oh, wait, that’s pretty much the opposite of what they intended, isn’t it? ?
Major Major Major Major
Oh, hell. Your future Republican leadership, everyone.
Though I guess there’s a picture of Al Franken in diapers so BOTH SIDES!!1
Open thread?
The writing tools website I’ve been working on for a few weeks is nearing the preliminary release, which is great! It’s only missing a couple features before I start wider user testing (email verification, reordering chapters, and exporting works to documents), but you can sign up, sign in, and poke around if you’d like. I’d love feedback. (Don’t put anything you care about in there, though. I’ll probably be wiping the database in a couple days.)
Baud
@Corner Stone: That was my reaction.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Well, he certainly looks like the kind of man people would want to follow into battle
Mnemosyne
@Baud:
It comes across like, Don’t do fun things! Fun things are for children! Adults should never have fun!
Probably not the message they were aiming for.
Corner Stone
Former GE CEO Jeff Immelt used to have an empty private jet fly next to his — just in case there were delays
“The news comes as current GE CEO John Flannery prepares to cut costs, including laying off thousands of employees.”
Someone tell me confiscation of wealth is not becoming a viable answer.
Baud
@Mnemosyne: I suppose I should read the article, but I really don’t care.
@Corner Stone: Ok, I’ll ask the stupid question. Why didn’t he just take the private jet?
ETA:. I see. Two private jets, in case one broke down. Like a spare tire.
Major Major Major Major
So why exactly is Depends down with this? Do we need to start boycotting Depends, lol.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I heard on the radio that the featured act for that fund-raiser is Lee Greenwood, which I guess means he’s still with us. I don’t follow country music, but is he that big? Wouldn’t Willie or Dolly be a better choice?
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
I think they were snarking. At least, I hope so.
I need to put on some pants if I’m going to go check out the local authors’ showcase at the library. Libraries tend to want their patrons to be fully clothed, even if they don’t always get what they want.
schrodingers_cat
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: That outfit adds another 30 pounds to his already not so slim figure.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@schrodingers_cat: occurs to me I could have stayed on-topic by tossing in a “also wearing diapers” joke
Mnemosyne
@Baud:
I only looked at the photos. Basically it’s a bunch of college kids doing stuff like blowing bubbles in a mock playpen. Which, again, looked like a good time to me, which means their messaging was a little bit off, to say the least.
“I’m blowing bubbles, but I’m doing it IRONICALLY!
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Remember when it was the worst crime ever that Obama ditched his press pool to go to one of Malia’s soccer games?
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: See, this is why digital libraries are the future.
Duane
There’s going to come a day when that guy will seriously regret that picture. Could be today. His problem (well, one of them), is the picture is forever.
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
My other reluctance is that local author fairs seem to have a high proportion of self-published weirdos who want to tell you all about their self-help book.
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: Yeah, everybody who self-publishes is super weird.
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
INORITE?! ?
But, seriously, local author fairs seem to attract the weird ones.
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: hey, can you take a look at that website I made for a few minutes? Just a quick impression.
Barbara
@hitchhiker: I feel much the same way. I did some canvassing today but I seem to feel tired all the time. And Kelly — asking us to take seriously the idea that Congresswoman Wilson exemplifies a deterioration of standards, a couple days after Trump shamelessly tried to exploit deaths of American military personnel to burnish his record vis a vis prior presidents, which would be crass even if it were true, but as we could likely have bet money on, was completely and utterly a lie, which everyone who worked at the WH knew right away. And Kelly went way above and beyond the pale to protect his boss, by attacking Ms. Wilson — with bare faced lies.
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
I can do it later this afternoon once my laptop is charged back up. Or I also have my Chromebook, if you want me to see if it behaves oddly on that?
Suzanne
@Mnemosyne:
So they were all rolling.
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: huh, I don’t see why it would (it does use a cookie for logins if you have that turned off) but let’s stick to one failure point for now and use a normal laptop. Thanks!
AdamK
TPUSA? On my shopping lists “TP” never stands for “turning point.”
zhena gogolia
@Barbara:
The Kelly thing has just unutterably depressed me. Somehow his saying that he would only take questions from journalists with military bona fides is the most terrifying thing that has happened yet in this terrifying administration.
Frankensteinbeck
@Major Major Major Major:
Oh, yeah. Freakshows. When I got a publisher, boom, suddenly I wore pants everywhere. Like, on the lower half of my body, even. And I totally stopped speaking in – okay, I mostly stopped speaking in tongues. It went way down.
Wag
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Just like Neidermeyer from Animal House.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Major Major Major Major:
Forkin’ A, the site looks solid!
Mnemosyne
@Frankensteinbeck:
I have in this very apartment a fantasy novel someone handed me at the Festival of Books about a guy who falls in love with a talking sea sponge at the bottom of the ocean. If you show up at the next LA meetup, I’ll bring it.
Major Major Major Major
@West of the Rockies (been a while): thanks!
@Mnemosyne: I’ve certainly heard of worse.
hitchhiker
@zhena gogolia:
Right.
The other spirit-killing thing was the obvious glee at having found a black woman in a cowboy hat to sneer at.
I’m watching Treme on amazon prime. It’s David Simon post-Katrina, and it’s making me long for him to be working on a post-Trump show.
Barbara
@zhena gogolia: That was ugly. But it’s the lies that really disgust me. He stood there and demanded respect for his special honor and dignity even as he was proving just how debased he actually is — and he must have known that it was a lie, all of it.
Frankensteinbeck
@Mnemosyne:
If writing Sweet Dreams Are Made Of Teeth did not strip me of any right to call anyone else’s books weird, Metal, Candy, Flesh did.
MomSense
@hitchhiker:
Yeah the Kelly presser hit me very hard as well. I think we have to make sure we take care of ourselves as much as possible and look for beauty and kindness around us. I have to take mini breaks away from news to try and recharge.
Jeffro
Let me get this straight: they want a “fight”…against. safe. spaces. ? Safe spaces are somehow a huge threat to…who, exactly? Safe spaces somehow shake the foundations of Western civilization…how, exactly?
Instead of wearing diapers, I wish these RWNJ clowns had set up their own “danger spaces” instead: beds of coals, tubs of broken glass, flaming swords to swallow, and so on. And then, Republikids, you could just GO FOR IT!! ‘DANGER SPACE’ YOUR PRECIOUS SELVES RIGHT THE DARWIN-FUCK OUTTA HERE!
I think half the problem with this country is the kids just aren’t busy enough…if you have time to slap on a diaper and protest other folks’ safe spaces, then you clearly need your professor to assign you another paper or twelve.
Baud
How do safe spaces work exactly?
El Caganer
Well, shit, fool, no wonder West Point didn’t want you. Come into your interview in a goddam diaper or breechclout or whatthefuckever, and announce, “Big Pampers reporting for duty, Sir!” What did you think they were going to do?
Frankensteinbeck
@Jeffro:
Their right to be asshole bigots. This is front row central to conservatism right now. ‘Religious liberty’, Trump’s popularity, coddling Nazis, gun rights, we are seriously fighting a war for survival of our democracy because more than half of whites would rather burn down everything than lose their precious right to be mean shits.
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: Kelly has not changed, its just that the spotlight on him has become brighter.
Gin & Tonic
@Duane: I can’t tell you how many times I have thanked my lucky stars that the Internet did not exist in any usable form when I was in college.
Major Major Major Major
@Baud: well, you go inside them, and you don’t feel threatened by assholes, which assholes see as a threat.
MomSense
@Major Major Major Major:
Just signed up. I like the site. I’m going to play around on it a bit.
The Lodger
@Baud: Well, this one apparently encourages David Vitter cosplay.
Shana
@Mnemosyne: That sounds like it would be really good. /s
Matt McIrvin
At Kent State? I suppose safe spaces would be a threat to any National Guardsmen who want to shoot protesters.
The Lodger
All right, I didn’t read the thread title.
Major Major Major Major
@MomSense: thanks, remember that none of it’s going to be saved for long.
Brachiator
@Corner Stone:
A jet and a spare. Okay. Then, there is the story I saw about Fox setting aside $32 million for sexual harassment claims against Bill O’Reilly and then renewing his deal for $25 million. You have a problem with that? Why do you hate America?
These modern day oligarchs make the Gilded Age look like a dreary day in the slums.
I think they need some tax cuts.
Seriously, though, I wonder how long it will take for the goobers to wise up and stop supporting GOP policies that encourage this shit.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I gotta start recording the Joy Reid show
Baud
@Major Major Major Major: So it’s like a cordoned off physical space somewhere? Pop up or permanent?
debbie
@Mike in NC:
Remember that kid whose dad was a Hollywood producer who shot some people and then made a pre-suicide tape blaming the girls who wouldn’t date him?
apocalipstick
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Willie smokes weed, so…. nope. Dolly’s kind of off-the-radar right now; hipsters really like her so….. nope. Greenwood? His profile is absolutely basement-level, but the awful whiny dirge of his is guaranteed to shake the change out of a certain segment of wallets.
Jeffro
@Frankensteinbeck: Sorry – rhetorical question there ;)
Baud
@debbie: And afterwards, we had people wondering what his motives were.
MomSense
@Major Major Major Major:
Got it. I’ll put in a character from a finished story.
debbie
@Corner Stone:
GE is concerned they may actually have to pay taxes.
Frankensteinbeck
@Jeffro:
I probably should have guessed, yeah. I’m a natural lecturer, and this is THE core of current politics, so it’s hard to shut up about it.
Major Major Major Major
@Baud: you just like put up a thing that says “this is a safe space for [whatever]” and people are supposed to respect it or else get kicked out.
debbie
@schrodingers_cat:
It could have been worse: his tennis shorts.
Baud
@Major Major Major Major: Thanks!
Duane
@Jeffro: I don’t understand the contempt for safe spaces either. Are conservatives against emergency phones and campus security, too? I’m sure they have children attending college. Wouldn’t you want their time there to be safe as possible.
I realize conservatives don’t understand a lot of things, but safety is an easy one, even for them.
Jeffro
@debbie:
Why would GE pay taxes? What is this, frickin’ communist China or something?
debbie
@hitchhiker:
Dave Clark wouldn’t do?
Brachiator
@zhena gogolia:
Not taking questions from people without military bona fide. Wouldn’t that automatically exclude a lot of women reporters?
The Kelly sideshow disgusts me, but I dismiss it out of hand. Kelly made a fool of himself to play Trump’s attack dog, but couldn’t even get his lies straight. He is also a disgrace to his former profession as an officer.
Also, we do not have a case system in America, and certainly not one in which citizens are subservient to the military.
Kelly’s pathetic little shit show does not depress me; rather its pointless meanness and incompetence fires me up.
debbie
@Baud:
It’s a place (literally or figuratively) where a person is safe from whatever has been harassing or frightening them.
Jeffro
@Frankensteinbeck: I totally get that, I’m the same way!
There’s so much going on that’s tied to white backlash these days, it’s kinda unbelievable. And most of the GOP, plus wackaloons like Bannon, plus pot-stirrers like Putin…they keep it going ’cause it’s all they’ve got left to offer.
trollhattan
@Duane:
Cleek’s Law. It always comes back to Cleek’s Law, which is why many hoped Obama would declare that drinking bleach is hazardous and we should not do so.
Too bad idle student sign-makers didn’t know of the playpen ahead of time, because several “National Guard, aim here please” arrows would have elevated the theatrical value bigly.
Baud
@debbie: Right. I’m just trying to figure out how it’s different from a home, church, library, etc. where you can go to get away from others.
Major Major Major Major
@trollhattan: I still don’t get why everybody focuses on bleach. I wanted Obama to say not to drink drano.
Major Major Major Major
@Baud: cuz these ones are for queers and stuff.
Baud
@Major Major Major Major: Didn’t most colleges have gay organizations before safe spaces became a thing?
SiubhanDuinne
@Corner Stone:
@Baud:
Make that three of us (at least three; haven’t scrolled through the rest of the comments yet). Are the diaper-wearers the good guys or the bad guys? Whose side are we on here? Is this about White Supremacy or what? All I ask for is a nice quiet Saturday Night Open Thread….
Major Major Major Major
@Baud: when I was a youth I first and only encountered safe space signage in LGBT spaces.
Jeffro
@Baud: @debbie: It can be an actual space for people to go to (like a dorm lounge, or a room in the campus center, or wherever) or people can use it in kind of a declarative sense (Prof: “Let’s talk about issue X or Y…and remember, this is a safe space here” – which means different things to different people, but typically means we’re going to try and be sensitive to others’ concerns, backgrounds, etc)
Trumpistas (even young ones) hate it because then they have to actually watch what they say – as Frankensteinbeck rightly noted above, it interferes with their ‘rights to be asshole bigots’. They have to come up with actual reasons for their concerns, and they’re not really good at that. So they just jeer others…and are willing to wear diapers, I guess…rather than join in the debate.
Personally, I’m shocked that High Commander Soros didn’t pay for better marketing when coming up with the terms “safe spaces” and “micro-agressions” and what not. “Respect spaces” and “Subtle bigotry” are somewhat harder to argue about (not that wingers wouldn’t try). But I just cash my SorosChecks and keep my lip buttoned…
Tenar Arha
@Baud: Yes & no, they can be both.
This right here is a safe space for a certain form of jackal-curious internet community. A safe-space could be classified as anywhere there’s rules & a ban hammer/bouncer/social sanctions to eject the obnoxious.
When it’s used in an academic context, particularly for classes, it usually means there’s a highly charged topic being discussed that requires extra care with the ground rules. So, you’re discussing Weinstein’s swift downfall due to the sheer weight of women telling their stories, & you have a class where you want to facilitate the women & occasional men who’ve lived through sexual harassment to actually talk, and if they’re willing, share their experiences without being interrupted or disbelieved, you need a lot of rules.
ETA As I understand it, this tends to infuriate all the usual suspects. Somehow being required to be polite to facilitate the comfort of other people is a terrible thing.
SiubhanDuinne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Lee Greenwood or no Lee Greenwood, that’s pretty amazing. Jimmy Carter and GHWBush are going to be there? Wow, that sends a powerful statement. I honestly didn’t think we’d see the Previous Five in the same space until the next Presidential funeral (which I suppose, by definition, would make it the Previous Four, but I digress).
Adam L Silverman
@Mike in NC: Kirk is a moron. There are no affirmative action admissions to West Point. The student body demographics are set by the Department of the Army. Here’s the link to the application information page:
https://www.usma.edu/admissions/SitePages/Apply_Nominations.aspx
Here’s the link to the admissions guide:
https://www.usma.edu/_layouts/AdmissionsGuide/
And here’s the link to the admissions process page:
https://www.usma.edu/admissions/SitePages/Steps.aspx
Baud
@Major Major Major Major:
@Jeffro:
@Tenar Arha:
Thanks! I get the issue in the classroom context, where people have to attend but lose their right to be assholes. Outside the classroom, I don’t get it, unless people are designating the entire campus as one big safe space.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@SiubhanDuinne: I’m assuming GHWB will be appearing remotely?
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne: Yes. Even the awful presidents will be there. I almost wish Trump wanted to attend so they could tell him to fuck off.
patrick II
Watching the Trump White House is like watching the movie “The Thing”. People who look normal, and people I thought were actuaL human beings suddenly display signs of being alien to all human thoughts of honesty, honor or compassion. We should ask Kurt Russell what to do.
Percysowner
It’s certainly not a shock, in fact I kind of expected this, but Crooked Media just published a leaked memo from the Trump White House. Short version, “Ladies if you don’t want babies, keep your knees together” Leaked Memo Reveals White House Wish List
Baud
@patrick II: I don’t think Trump looks normal.
Baud
@Percysowner: No aspirin?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Mnemosyne:
Reason #1545 you won’t see Baud in a library.
Felony Govt (formerly Old Broad in California)
@Major Major Major Major: I just signed up on your writing site. I’m not much of a writer (at least not since school), but it looks really valuable.
Major Major Major Major
@Baud: I think I’ve seen people try that and I think it’s dumb.
Baud
@?BillinGlendaleCA: E-books FTW!
Baud
@Major Major Major Major: Agree. We need a space to be assholes too.
SiubhanDuinne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I’d have thought so. But that’s not what the tweet says.
ETA: “Gather” implies “in person.”
debbie
@Adam L Silverman:
Five bucks says he never even applied. This is all just an excuse for him to be a dick.
NotMax
@Major Major Major Major
Outsider quibble.
Pathfork a little too reminiscent of Pitchfork. Maybe something like Pathmaster?
debbie
@Baud:
I take my space with me wherever I go, so I can always be an asshole.
Baud
@debbie: Nice try, but we know you’re too sweet for that.
SiubhanDuinne
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
I miss my library, and it has nothing to do with pants. They are undergoing a huge renovation and expansion, and are closed to the public throughout the month of October. Can’t wait until they reopen for the next phase. Entire project won’t be completed until next spring or summer. But from what I’ve seen of the plans, it will be well worth the wait.
http://www.forsythpl.org/sharonforks/
Matt McIrvin
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Associating the smarmy patriotic anthem that is that guy’s one well-known work with taking care of Puerto Rico is actually kind of sly. It’d be the best deployment of it I’ve ever heard of.
Mary G
Joy Reid has a really great article on NBC news “Think” site.
Best explanation of the “whitelash” I have seen so far.
Dread
You know, I spent my college days studying for a degree and ordination at a religious college where we spent our free time reading, playing chess and card games, drinking coffee, discussing theological minutia, and walking in the local woods.
Being deconverted now, I look back on that and wish I had spent time at a normal college drinking, studying, and having sex with girls.
Even still, my college experience is still light years cooler than that of college Republicans.
Baud
@Dread:
Chicks dig theological minutia.
Matt
@Duane:
Two reasons:
* general “if liberals like it then we hate it” assholishness – see also “rolling coal”
* every conservative knows That One Guy (no relation to My Canadian Girlfriend, a similar pseudo-entity) who went to a “safe space” and got into trouble for loudly telling people Babby Jeebus was going to send them to Hell
trollhattan
@Major Major Major Major:
Cant afford to piss off Liquid Plumr?
Steeplejack
@NotMax:
Sentimental value: reference to Borges’s “The Garden of Forking Paths.”
Major Major Major Major
@Felony Govt (formerly Old Broad in California): Well, I’m just showing it right now to get a general feel for things, so please don’t start writing on it yet, since the database is going to need to change before I release it for real.
@NotMax: Mm, no, I really like the name. The Garden of Forking Paths is one of my favorite stories.
And ‘pathmaster’ makes me think of ‘assmaster’ ¯_(ツ)_/¯
schrodingers_cat
@Dread: No longer a comrade?
schrodingers_cat
@debbie: Brain bleach, stat.
sharl
Evolution of U.S. conservative thought leadership, depicted in the form of a photo montage
It’s Merlin Sickness, but with generous dollops of racism and economic elitism, sometimes wrapped in a vocabulary of high-falutin’ words and delivered via slick presentation.
Tenar Arha
@Baud: Well, that’s, AFAICS & IMHO, the usual case that what was well intentioned shorthand terminology has been corrupted by mockery by the right wing.
An example of a safe space outside a classroom would be one of those dedicated lounges in certain student centers for various clubs. They do have rules for students who wish to use them. An example I can think of would be the LGBTQ Straight Alliance. Anyway safe space would have been a good shorthand way to indicate to everyone under that umbrella to watch what they say & how they say it in that room. The objection always seems to be a combo of don’t tell me what to do, I don’t care if I’m hurting people’s feelings, or why must I attempt to get along with different people or express empathy?!
You know the funniest thing about the safe space convos and the reactionary response? A lot of the private Christian universities are the ultimate safe spaces. Restricting not just social interactions, but subjects that can be taught and more.
NotMax
@Dread
(No presumption you or your school subscribed to this sort of drivel. Presented solely for purposes of amusement.)
zhena gogolia
@Tenar Arha:
So much of this is just common sense and common courtesy.
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack:
I love that story.
chris
More on safe spaces for your shit. Make that moron.
zhena gogolia
@NotMax:
Robertson Davies does some good riffs on that in the Deptford Trilogy.
Which I keep meaning to reread any day now.
zhena gogolia
@chris:
I’m starting to see a theme here.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@SiubhanDuinne: They just finished the renovation of the Glendale Central Library, it’s quite nice. Though a recording studio, really?
Matt McIrvin
@Mary G: Reid is totally correct. I think there’s something else going on, too: the minority of whites who actually stuck with Obama became far more vocally aware about the realities of race in the US, and started echoing things that black people had been saying all along, and that completely freaks out the rest of the whites. From their perspective the rest of us have gone completely insane.
I should add that this effect didn’t start in 2008. It started around 2012 and built in the following couple of years.
Major Major Major Major
@NotMax: Want.
JPL
@zhena gogolia: I reacted just the opposite. My reaction was to realize that these assholes have no intent of saving our democracy. It was like having water splashed on my face. We have to save our democracy.
Patricia Kayden
@Adam L Silverman: Kirk sounds like Becky with the bad grades who sued University of Texas for not letting her in supposedly because of Blacks and Browns. Some folks just can’t admit that they didn’t get into their favorite college because they’re mediocre.
SiubhanDuinne
SS
Sean Spicer?
Sarah Sanders?
Schutzstaffel?
debbie
@Mary G:
Looking at you, Cornell West.
NotMax
@chris
Will they be stamped WATB across the back?
@zhena gogolia
Gave up on Davies after slogging through What’s Bred in the Bone. Maybe should give him another go.
SiubhanDuinne
@zhena gogolia:
Love Robertson Davies, and it is high (past) time for me to reread all three of his trilogies.
Fair Economist
@Jeffro:
Safe spaces are a threat to bullies, harassers, and extortionists, and that’s who opposes them.
Tenar Arha
@Baud: This is kind of an ETA addendum to my reply above.
@zhena gogolia:
I’ve started to get really pissed off about the abuse of certain terms by people making fun & with an axe to grind. It’s like any number of terms that, often women academics, have come up with to describe a complex social thing that happens in just a word or two. Suddenly it seems to be used everywhere because “FINALLY I know what to call this or say!” And then the reactionaries and hot take essayists come to take it away by mocking it.
I mean, really cui bono from destroying helpful terminology?
Mike J
@?BillinGlendaleCA: The Magic Shop closed last year. I wonder who got the Neve?
MomSense
@Tenar Arha:
Thank you so much for that explanation.
Major Major Major Major
@Patricia Kayden: Lol, Becky with the bad grades.
Mnemosyne
I just get back from the local authors thing and there weren’t too many weirdos. ? Mostly mystery writers, but also a fair number of fantasy and YA. I didn’t stay very long because I was on only one crutch, which was a mistake. Now I’m back at home and icing my knee.
When I was at CVS, they gave me a free bag of beauty samples, which was cool, but one of them was conditioner without the coordinating shampoo, which seems really weird to me.
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: Well I’m glad there weren’t a lot of self-published types then.
JR
Looks like a winning Tinder profile!
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
People who self-publish need better book designers. Their covers mostly look like crap, and I’m someone who’s used to seeing covers with half-naked men prominently featured, so I clearly don’t have particularly high standards.
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: I agree! So many things wrong with people who self-publish!
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
Why are you trying to make people hate me? ?
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: I’m just saying what everybody’s thinking.
schrodingers_cat
@Mnemosyne: Are you going to self publish?
Jeffro
@Matt McIrvin:
I heard it put this way, once: 2008 was the GOP getting its due for W’s Iraq War and then the Great Recession. 2012 was supposed to be a ‘restoration’ of sorts. When that didn’t happened, the Repubs really freaked out. A ‘third Obama term’ won by a woman (especially one they’d demonized for over three decades) would have meant that all hope was lost. (Which is silly of course but whatevs)
patrick II
@Baud:
Me neither. I was thinking of the various surrogates who I thought I might hope to find signs of humanity in. There was never any signs of common humanity in Trump from the beginning. I don’t think it’s so much infectious, but but a blossoming of the latent — that being near Trump gives each person the impetus to be their worst selves.
Mr Stagger Lee
@El Caganer: It would be good this moron(Lt. Niedermyer) did not stand with the Long Gray Line. He would have ended up with a grenade rolled into his pup-tent.
Jeffro
@Patricia Kayden:
Exactly. In their view, mediocre’s supposed to be good enough if they’re white.
SiubhanDuinne
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Well, why not a recording studio? Personally, I think that’s a great addition to a public or academic library.
I came so close to pursuing an MLS in Music Librarianship in the 1970s, but because of a complex of personal/financial considerations at the time, did not. I often regret that decision, but wevs.
Funny thing about the Sharon Forks Library, my default place to spend most afternoons working on My Thing: I don’t even live in Forsyth County. I pay $60 bucks a year to be a member of the FCPL, but it is so much better as a facility than either of the Gwinnett County or Fulton County libraries near me that I am happy to pay the extra just for the privilege of using the space!
NotMax
@Mnemosyne
Doublet rippers?
debbie
@Mnemosyne:
Or they need to spend some time in a bookstore, looking at covers to get a feel of what works, looks inviting, etc.
debbie
@Tenar Arha:
I wish “treat others as you’d like to be treated” would come back in style.
Jeffro
Speaking of Republican stupidity/open thread: why would Mr. Innocent Man, the Non-Colluder, agree to pay $430,000+ of his aides’ legal fees in the Russia probes if he were innocent? Especially THIS cheapskate? Why isn’t he howling bloody murder on behalf of his poor aides and demanding that their legal bills be paid by the witch hunters? Hmm? Hmm?
It’s hush money, pure and simple. They wouldn’t tow the party line if they were going to have to pay their lawyers themselves.
This – as is being noted on the twitters – is one of the major things that brought Nixon down as well.
*ETA: it is a Trumpov PLEDGE to pay at least that amount for their fees…and we all know how those work out…(!)
Major Major Major Major
@Jeffro: I saw that too, it’s completely insane, can you imagine if a Democrat etc.
Mnemosyne
@schrodingers_cat:
No idea yet. I have to finish the darn thing first.
Right now, I would prefer to traditionally publish since I have a day job and self-publishing is basically a full-time job in itself, but we’ll see.
SiubhanDuinne
@debbie:
My bookstore-owning mother and grandfather heartily approve of this message!
JanieM
@SiubhanDuinne:
If the current imposter holding that title were to happen to leave the scene before the previous five, they might still all gather at the next funeral.
Mnemosyne
I can’t remember, did BillInGlendaleCA already share the new K-Pop-style PSA that the Los Angeles Metro did? It is genuinely adorable.
Corner Stone
@Dread:
You may want to sit down. Because I have some bad news for you.
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
Those are the male-male romances.
(Actually, I don’t know if they’re called that, but they should be!)
Ruckus
@Jeffro:
There you go, trying to use logical thought in the situation where an adult man child wears a diaper in public with no other pants on to fight against something that only hurts those who are looking to hurt others.
rikyrah
Kyle GriffinVerified account @kylegriffin1
The White House is now rush-delivering letters from Trump to Gold Star families after his false claim this week.
rikyrah
DeVos rescinds 72 guidance documents outlining rights for disabled students
October 21 at 12:12 PM
The Education Department has rescinded 72 policy documents that outline the rights of students with disabilities as part of the Trump administration’s effort to eliminate regulations it deems superfluous.
The Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services wrote in a newsletter Friday that it had “a total of 72 guidance documents that have been rescinded due to being outdated, unnecessary, or ineffective — 63 from the Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) and 9 from the Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA).” The documents, which fleshed out students’ rights under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and the Rehabilitation Act, were rescinded Oct. 2.
A spokeswoman for Education Secretary Betsy DeVos did not respond to requests for comment.
Advocates for students with disabilities were still reviewing the changes to determine their impact. Lindsay E. Jones, the chief policy and advocacy officer for the National Center for Learning Disabilities, said she was particularly concerned to see guidance documents outlining how schools could use federal money for special education removed.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/education/wp/2017/10/21/devos-rescinds-72-guidance-documents-outlining-rights-for-disabled-students/?hpid=hp_hp-more-top-stories_ed-devos-1255pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.adcfa6aa2e79
Major Major Major Major
@rikyrah: that is… even worse. What an insult.
Dave
@Matt McIrvin: I hadn’t thought of it in those particular terms. It makes much sense.
rikyrah
@Jeffro:
Here is the thing
1. He has the rubes who donate to his campaign and the RNC paying for his AND Jr’s legal bills
And this is AFTER
2. He has AT LEAST FIFTY MILLION unaccounted for from the Inauguration.
•
Mnemosyne
@Major Major Major Major:
If I can’t be a little curmudgeonly when I have a sprained knee, when can I be?
NotMax
@debbie
Former DC Comics editor Mark Waid*:
*better known as a prolific and successful writers of comics
Major Major Major Major
@Mnemosyne: It’s a freeish country.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Mnemosyne: Looks more Japanese to me. Gal’s cute though.
Tenar Arha
@Mnemosyne:
??
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
There is a truism (or urban legend) among fashion magazines that you never put a green dress on the cover, because that will be your lowest-selling issue of the year.
debbie
@NotMax:
I worked at Charles Scribner & Sons way, way back. The arguments over the cover were usually the fiercest.
Mnemosyne
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
You would probably know better than I would, though I thought that K-Pop was more fashionable right now.
And that’s a very authentic-looking Metro subway car.
Steeplejack
@zhena gogolia:
Ficciones is one of my favorite books, both as a book and as a physical object. You are of an age where you will remember this particular edition. Lost my copy in the terrible fire of ’02, alas.
Jeffro
@Ruckus: true, true…
I just don’t know how else to fight Diaper Man. What would the counter-protest look like? Maybe just standing there with a huge list of other things DM could be doing with his time? That’s one heck of a list.
NotMax
@debbie
The rather rococo Scribner’s bookstore was a semi-regular hangout when I worked in NYC. Maps, atlases and globes to die for upstairs.
@Mnemosyne
Thus (one supposes) green will never be the new black.
:)
Jeffro
@NotMax: i thought the key was to always have Wolverine on the cover? (Although nowadays that would be Deadpool, I guess)
Ruckus
@zhena gogolia:
Which is of course why these dipshits don’t like it. They lack both of those. Which by the way would be much more common if they had even a smidgen of either.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Mnemosyne: The Kanji as opposed to Hangul is a sure tipoff.
ETA: Hangul is an alphabet, the letters are put together in syllables so they sort of look like characters.
rikyrah
BILL O PAID A $32 MILLION SETTLEMENT
https://twitter.com/emilysteel/status/921789922318671879
Gretchen
@Mnemosyne: Cute ads. But they caused my husband to come in from the next room and say WHAT are you WATCHING?
NotMax
@Jeffro
Used to be a running gag among fandom that picturing a gorilla riding a flaming purple motorcycle while jumping over a pack of dinosaurs would smash all sales records.
Gretchen
@Ruckus: That’s the whole objection to political correctness too. They cherish the right to be rude, insensitive assholes, and anyone pointing that out is mean.
Matt McIrvin
@Jeffro: I heard somewhere (maybe here) about some white guy literally yelling “a black guy, OK, but two terms of a black guy and then a woman? That’s too much!“
Ruckus
@Gretchen:
Can’t have anyone else being mean, that’s all they’ve got. Without the meanness they are nothing, dust, an empty McDs wrapper blowing by the side of the road, zilch, zero, the square root of jack, at best a small pile of dried cat shit under the throw rug in the back bedroom.
Mnemosyne
It’s been a crappy week, and I want a big slab of red meat at a retro restaurant for dinner. I just can’t decide between Damon’s and the Tam O’Shanter. ?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Mnemosyne: Tam.
Shalimar
@Jeffro: I saw that, and I can see that point. It is basically hush money. On the other hand, they wouldn’t need lawyers if Trump himself had ethics and hadn’t ordered illegal acts. They’re all being investigated because of him. Paying the legal bills is the least he can do for his minions.
Matt McIrvin
@Dave: I was looking at some results from this Pew survey. Note the rise in people saying racism is a big problem in society. However, the number’s also been high at other times in the past, as you can see there.
Mnemosyne
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
The one thing holding me back is that the Tam has a live band tonight. But they should be in the Sandwich Bar.
zhena gogolia
@SiubhanDuinne:
Yeah, I have a feeling there are copies of them in the attic somewhere, but I just lazily ordered Deptford on Amazon (via BJ, of course), and will get around to Salterton and Cornish soon.
Mnemosyne
@Matt McIrvin:
Cynical me wonders how many of those respondents think that racism against whites is the real problem.
Shalimar
@Gretchen: Every time hear someone bitch about political correctness, I say “you don’t understand. political correctness is for your benefit, so normal human beings don’t realize how much of an asshole you really are and avoid you because you’re a jackass.”
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack:
Wow, no, I’ve never seen that, although of course I’m old enough. Mine was in a different edition.
Duane
@Matt: Okay. So 1) Cleek’s Law. 2) Typical Republican horse crap.
I’m learning not to assume they’re capable of simple reasoning, but damn, the stupid.
Ohio Mom
@Mnemosyne: A story about a guy who falls in love with a sponge living on the bottom of the ocean?
Does the sponge live in a pineapple in a place called Bikini Bottom and work at a fast food restaurant? Is his best friend an intellectually challenged star fish named Patrick?
Corner Stone
@Ohio Mom: There is nothing quite so calming to the psyche of an adult as having their child move beyond the Nickelodeon Universe on TV.
Mnemosyne
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Okay, we can’t get a reservation at the T until 8 pm and I’m hungry now, so that decides it. Damon’s it is.
Ohio Mom
@Corner Stone: I particularly despise Sponge Bob. I compare his obsequious manner to the cartoon characters of my youth –Yogi Bear, Bugs Bunny, etc. — who were dedicated to upending the established order. Sponge Bob meekly accepts his lot in life and is a terrible role model.
Just One More Canuck
@Baud: that would seem a little out of character for Jimmy
Corner Stone
@Ohio Mom: I always thought the series would end with law enforcement finding dozens of dead bodies buried somewhere on Patrick’s property.
Jeffro
@NotMax: But would they print up multiple foil, holographic, and retro variant covers? THAT is the question…
Tenar Arha
debbie: I dunno. I have begun to think safe space has an extra step beyond do unto others as you’d have them do unto you. It’s maybe more: find out and then do unto others as they’d prefer to be done by you. Or something like it.
Ohio Mom
@Corner Stone: I always assumed Patrick had a borderline IQ, I never got any sinister vibes.
Maybe I would be one of those people saying,”Well, he was quiet. I’m shocked, really.”
barb 2
@rikyrah:
This creep DisVoid claims to be a christian???????? Probably one of those “posperity type idiots”.
Really you do not think or understand about handicapped until it happens to you. Damned folks with their disabled signs who can park close to the entrance, ramps — those are the visible handicapped accessible changes due to empathy for others.
Now I’m handicapped — could be temporary or for the rest of my life. Doors are damned hard to open in a wheelchair. All the stuff that used to be easy — isn’t. Now a bitch who hates anyone not “perfect” will make life harder for thousands — in little ways and big ways. These “christians” are the money changers in the temple that Christ evicted from “his father’s house”.
Read : “Thieves of State: Why Corruption Threatens Global Security” by Sarah Chayes — get the narrated by author version. All the creeps Trump has nominated are morally corrupt and evil. All are haters. How much damage can they all do together? Putin is winning the war.
Matt McIrvin
@Mnemosyne: They asked another question I can’t find the results for now, about whether people agreed that it was mostly black people’s fault if they couldn’t succeed. In the 1990s, majorities of both Republicans and Democrats agreed. Since about 2012, the number of Republicans agreeing has actually gone up, but the number of Democrats agreeing plunged like a rock. It’s become this huge divide between the parties.
I actually think Obama getting elected the first time was much less of a watershed than Trayvon Martin was (and all the events that followed, including Obama saying that if he had a son he’d look like Trayvon).
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Corner Stone:
It’s simple: bored, lazy entitled young white guys making fun of people who actually have to live lives and do adult things.
Another Scott
Late to the party, but I wanted to comment.
@Jeffro: It’s a RWNJ talking point now.
A University of Chicago Dean sent a letter to incoming students that angered a lot of people (me – an alum – included).
Cheers,
Scott.
J R in WV
@SiubhanDuinne:
The diaper-wearers are the bad guys.
They’re against safe spaces for anyone but themselves. And No One can attack them verbally or by remote controlled drone, lest they cry like babbies when afrightened.
But they can attack anyone else for any reason what so ever, at any time or place. Especially women or anyone of less than totally normal sexual perspective, however different they may be from white straight normal Republican men.
These guys elsewhere and at other times are Men’s Rights Activists, because men in today’s society are sorely oppressed and downtrodden underfoot by the women and teh gheys and the transmutational peoples. Which is so obvious to them that they can’t understand why anyone would be against their uprising to take control of the world.
Personally, I think these Red Pill guys need a place like Disney World, only with no one but cis republican males allowed in, evah, and named Men’sRightsWorld. That way they can go to Men’sRightsWorld, be convinced they are wonderful, and not bother the rest of us. Also, they will have a lot of trouble reproducing, and Darwinian biology tells us that shortly after they all go there, the number of them as a % of the population will plummet, and the rest of us can go on to build a world with equality first and foremost, a world in which Hillary would have won the election by 3,000,000 votes, which would have made her President, and all the Men’s Rights guys would have left the country for Russian, where men are men and sheep are nervous.
EOF
;-)
Happy Saturday Night, B J bloggers!
Gravenstone
@Corner Stone: Just remember, you brought this on yourself.
Spongebob as anime.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Barbara:
Doubt it, powerful white guy is the very definition of “safe space” You can’t bet none of Kelly’s staff is allowed to challenge Kelly’s word views and the only people he socializes with are more dick wagging old white guys.
Corner Stone
@Ohio Mom: Are you kidding me? He had a hair trigger temper, no short or long term memory and was easily offended. He preferred to cheat where possible as long as it benefited him and made fun of people he felt were even dumber than he was. He had no ties to society beyond a tenuous grip on reality that centered on a sponge with the mentality of an adolescent. He couldn’t even identify his actual parents!
The guy was a classic serial killer.
Ithink
@Matt McIrvin:
Oh God, THIS. Of course our beltway press considers this to be a radically left wing phenomenon equivalent to the revanchist right wing supermajority over the U.S. government right now, but I digress from them.
Ohio Mom
@Corner Stone: That is an interesting analysis. If the opportunity to view more Sponge Bob ever arises, I will watch Patrick with new eyes. But I am sure not going to seek out the show.
J R in WV
@SiubhanDuinne:
My first college, where I went in 1968, in a previous century, built a new library, and when it was ready to receive books, the whole campus did a book walk, students carrying small loads of books with a destination card to guide them to the section, unit, shelf where their load was expected. It took all weekend, but that’s a lot quicker than your branch hiring commercial movers and spending most of a month on it.
And college libraries tend to be larger than public libraries, even at small colleges.
J R in WV
@Adam L Silverman:
My nephew is nearly a 4.0 student majoring in math and physics, graduated, applying (accepted I think) to OCS and nuke school in the USN. Tried to get into a military academy, no luck. One smart kid about school. Don’t know about his politics, his dad (my bro) is rock-ribbed Republican.
If I had kids, and Trump was president, or anyone was keeping the endless war on terror going forever, they would get into any military thing over my dead body. I wouldn’t want to spend 20 years nurturing and supporting and educating a kid just to have political leaders latch onto them and pour their blood out on the sands of the desert somewhere.
They’re planning to recall 1000 pilots who are retired For FQs Sake !!! These guys aren’t supposed to be planning to fly in combat, they’re supposed to be teaching and flying commercial flights, fighting fires, doing commercial imaging flights, etc. Not shooting to kill. If the USAF needs 1000 instant pilots, that means Trump is planning to attack somewhere, probably both Iran and DPRK, which is orders of magnitude more stupid that GWBush ever was!!!!
Another Scott
Sorry to be Debbie Downer, but …
Van Jackson:
(via LOLGOP on Twitter)
Navy Times:
(Emphasis added.)
Presumably Donnie won’t attack until after he’s back home (his trip is scheduled for November 3-14). Yay?
:-(
Cheers,
Scott.
J R in WV
@NotMax:
That Devil’s Bible / deck of playing cards is so F’ing stupid, they should have found someone willing to help them who had at least seen all 52 cards. The “CLUB card” – there are 13 club cards, and they’re the lowest suit of cards. All of those “definitions” display complete ignorance of the deck of cards and how they’re used, or not used.
Most card games the Joker is put aside and not used at all. Bridge, Spades, Hearts…
So sad, how ignorance is ruining Christianity. Most of them don’t even understand their own “Holy Book” nor the history of their religion. Sad! I was around Unitarian-Universalist and they took their theology seriously. Fundamentalists on the other hand, are inclined to believe any ludicrous nonsense a respectable shouter spouts on Sunday. And for sure Jesus never condemned cards, because they weren’t invented for a thousand years after his death and ascension to heaven.
Sorry if that offends anyone, but it’s my observation.
jl
I don’t get what these wingers are trying to do.
I remember when I was a kid, one of my older friends had a right wing uncle who grew half of his hair long to show how dumb these dang hippies with their dumb long hair looked. But everyone just made fun of the dumb uncle. Is that it?
Corner Stone
@Another Scott: I, for one, am just ready for us to get it on. Like a pot of neckbones.
Another Scott
@Corner Stone: Catchy tune.
Cheers,
Scott.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@J R in WV:
Isn’t that’s what World of Warcraft is? lol
One my Second Life game one of the Conservatives started lecturing me about how movies today are nothing by Western Culture bashing. I replied “well, beyond murdering in cold blood 90% of the native populations of the Americas and Australia, what has the West ever done that was that bad? What an absurd notion” That left our little Culture Warrior at a loss for words since this person intellectually honest enough not resort to Alternative Facts.
Come to think of it it is a lot easier to deal with conservatives who are willing to think, so I suspect the real problem is modern social media has exposed a lot of rather dumb conservatives so some uncomfortable ideas.
Ruckus
@jl:
Pretty much.
Problem is that racist fucking morons might know they are racists but because they are morons they don’t realize that their view of the world is a lot different than normal people or that their attempts at humor to humiliate are neither funny nor humiliating to the targets. Said attempts are stupid to every one but them and humiliating for them, or would be if they had any shame. But being morons, they won’t get that. At some point they might come to understand that everyone is laughing at them, not with them. But I doubt it.
Matt McIrvin
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: The big WoW players I know personally are female and liberal. I imagine they have to put up with a fair amount of shit.