Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

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

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

When I was faster i was always behind.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.

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

Not all heroes wear capes.

He really is that stupid.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

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

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

“But what about the lurkers?”

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

Giving up is unforgivable.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

President Musk and Trump are both poorly raised, coddled 8 year old boys.

You are here: Home / Politics / Republicans in Disarray! / Grab Your Mother’s Keys We’re Leaving

Grab Your Mother’s Keys We’re Leaving

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I’m still hung up on suburban voting, because I think the suburbs are going to turn on Trump in 2018 and 2020.

Imagine you’re a middle management wage earner at some corporation or small company. You and your 1.75 children live in a tract home. You and your spouse both work. Juggling day care is tough, and it isn’t getting cheaper. Your concerns are living in a town with good schools, making sure your kids do well in that school, saving for college, and paying as little tax as possible. You generally vote for Republicans because the Republican party of Reagan and the Bushes promised to cut your taxes and keep you safe. You voted for McCain and Romney. Your parents watch Fox News but you think a lot of what they’re saying is nonsense. If you watch TV at all, you’re binging Stranger Things or Mindhunter on Netflix. Mostly, you’re too busy helping the kids with their homework and juggling dinner prep to pay close attention to the news.

Your suburb is majority white, by a large margin. But the good schools also attract Muslim, Hindi, Asian, Black and Hispanic middle management wage earners. They live on your street, their kids play with your kids, they come to school events. Some of them are your friends, some are your acquaintances. They are all “good people” in your mind. You all share the same concerns.

Now imagine that your 8 year-old kid asks whether his friend is going to be deported. Imagine that your 14 year-old daughter comes home asking how you can be a member of a party that has a Senate candidate who felt up someone her age. And imagine that your Republican Member of Congress, who earned your unreflective vote last cycle, votes for a tax plan that won’t let you deduct the thousands of dollars of state tax that you pay every year.

Do you think that maybe, just maybe, you will vote for anyone with a “D” behind their name for the next few years?

Our job as Democrats is simple: give these people good candidates to vote for, and to help the suburban Democratic parties to organize and influence these former Republicans.

(I realize this sounds like a Mark Penn microtarget or David Brooks Applebee salad bar fantasy, but given what happened in my little suburb last Tuesday, there’s nothing fantastical about it.)

Reader Interactions

239Comments

  2. 2.

    Chip Daniels

    FWIW, Orange County, CA, home of John Wayne and Dana Rohrabacher, is in the process of turning into a reliable blue county. Hilary took the county last November.
    It began with just the majority-minority precincts in Santa Ana, but its spreading to the very type of white multi-cultural suburbs of Irvine, Costa Mesa, Anaheim and the rest.

    We can win this. Not just 2018, but the longer battle to become the dominant party and ethos in America. And we can do it without needing to accept the framing of “government is the problem”.

  3. 3.

    Doug

    This is very close to what I think is going to happen here. I’m in Wisconsin 6, and one of Herb Kohl’s kids is running against Glenn Grothman (who is a human pimple).

    As long as the Ds don’t get self-righteous and try and run a Raul Grijalva because purity, this district may well be in play.

    Tuesday showed that the white working class loves them some Trump but white center-right college educated folks CAN be peeled off.

  5. 5.

    rikyrah

    Your first paragraph is my point.
    These folks vote GOP because they are members of the IGMFY Club.
    Their lifestyles are funded by those taxes.
    They will not be distracted by the little Baby Jesus, or abortion, or guns.

    They are about TAXES, And the GOP reps that vote to take away those tax breaks…So that the Koch Brothers can get a tax break?

    I don’t see it. I don’t see them NOT skinning alive any GOP rep that votes to raise their taxes.

  6. 6.

    Major Major Major Major

    I think it’s entirely possible that this happens with enough people that we might be able to take the House next cycle and the rest of the enchiladas in 2020.

    It’s also entirely possible that it doesn’t.

    So I agree, that:

    Our job as Democrats is simple: give these people good candidates to vote for

    But I’m not sure what you mean by:

    to help the suburban Democratic parties to organize and influence these former Republicans.

  7. 7.

    Amaranthine RBG

    Well, number one, if you live in the suburbs because you want your kids to go to a good school, you are a racist. Just ask Erik Loomis about that ….

    But, seriously, you are absolutely correct. The task before the democrat party is to try to round up the most votes it can from whatever source. Period.

    The Virginia results underline the importance of scrapping for every vote. In 2016, Clinton won blacks and Hispanics by 88 and 65 percent, respectively. Northam’s won those groups by 87 and 67 – basically identical. But Clinton won only 35 percent of the white vote, while Northam won 42 percent. That 7 percent jump is just about Northam’s margin of victory.

    This shit isn’t complicated. It’s math.

  8. 8.

    japa21

    @Doug: The Kohl name still has power in Wisconsin. In fact, I think Herb’s approval rating went up after he sold the Bucks.

  9. 9.

    Mike J

    There was a Flip the 8th training session in Sammamish today. Dino Rossi thinks he’s going to take over the reasonable Republican mantle from Riechert, but I don’t think it’s going to play out that way.

  10. 10.

    Brachiator

    Our job as Democrats is simple: give these people good candidates to vote for, and to help the suburban Democratic parties to organize and influence these former Republicans.

    You have to offer people solutions to their problems, not just give them “good candidates.”

    Trump supporters are deluded dopes,but they are consistent in saying that they believe that Trump will fight for them. This is a lie and built on scapegoating, but there has to be an honest version.

  11. 11.

    Adam L Silverman

    He’s locked himself into Air Force 1’s lavatory and he has his phone with him. We’re doomed!!!

  12. 12.

    Thru the Looking Glass...

    Do you think that maybe, just maybe, you will vote for anyone with a “D” behind their name for the next few years?

    I read recently that 900 or so women approached Emily’s List about running for office in the 2015-2016 election cycle… since Drumpf occupied the WH, Emily’s List has had 19,000 plus ask… that’a a 2,000% increase, in one year, if I’ve got the math right…

    2,000%… I’ve never seen anything like it… could be a frickin’ political tsunami building up out there…

    I expect to see Republicans shift into complete panic mode soon and try to pass every self-serving, vile piece of crap legislation they can dream up because if that figure – a 2,000% increase of women running for office – holds up, they’re just not going to lose control of the govt to Democrats, they’re going to be answering to angry female Democratic legislators…

  15. 15.

    ant

    Yeah, I guess.

    I’m still feeling cynical.

    People are dumb.

    They’ll tell you they don’t want their guns taken away, or something.

    That’s what happened here in Wisconsin (appleton) a year ago. People I know either voted for the loquacious loquat, didn’t vote at all, or voted for nater, or what ever the fuck her name was.

    The one girl I know was politically aware enough to drive all the way to South Dakota to protest the oil pipeline, but still couldn’t bring herself to vote for “that women”.

    I’ve given up.

  18. 18.

    Brachiator

    @rikyrah:

    They are about TAXES, And the GOP reps that vote to take away those tax breaks…So that the Koch Brothers can get a tax break?

    Has any Democrat said it in exactly this way?

    The Republicans don’t care about you. They are raising your taxes to give big tax breaks to the wealthy.

  30. 30.

    Mr Stagger Lee

    Meanwhile Black women who vote loyally for the Democratic Party, who again voted overwhelming in the majority for Northam in VA, as opposed to White women. Are they going to get something out of this?

  31. 31.

    ant

    And remember, whatever Hillary’s faults are, Russ Fiengolds campaign fell on its face even harder than Clintons did here in Wisconsin.

    I still haven’t herd any plausible explanation for that, other than people are dumb.

    That shit wasn’t Hillarys fault.

  33. 33.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Amaranthine RBG:

    if you live in the suburbs because you want your kids to go to a good school, you are a racist. Just ask Erik Loomis about that ….

    The really good schools around here are the La Crescenta School(public elementary school), most of the influx into that area is Korean and Armenian. So you’d be a racist for moving there? Really?

  34. 34.

    Adam L Silverman

    @schrodingers_cat: In my best attempt to type like Einstein sounded when he talked: Zee sqvair uf zee hypoteenuz eez ekwil tu vun haf uf zee DPRK tymez Crimea difeyded by zee Lefant. Carry zee two und place under zee radeekal!

  37. 37.

    Brachiator

    Jesus, Trump on his “chemistry” with Putin. Sounds like Trump wants to Make America Russian Again.

    Goddam, he must be deep in Putin’s pocket.

  40. 40.

    Matt McIrvin

    I’m wondering what happens with the 2020 redistricting if the census is just blatantly, deliberately screwed up. “Oh, sorry, turns out California now has a population of 5,000.” Is there any conceivable way of dealing with that?

  44. 44.

    kdaug

    The GOP is now the party of pedophiles, pussy-grabbers, and Nazis.

    Complicity is endorsement. I’ll take no part.

  46. 46.

    Matt McIrvin

    (That, of course, is assuming that the population of California isn’t actually reduced to 5,000, which is also possible.)

  51. 51.

    Amaranthine RBG

    @raven:

    Look, I understand that you are butt-hurt because I had the temerity to remind you that your support of concussion ball contributes in a teensy tiny measure to the painful disablement and death of a number of football players. I get that you don’t like to be reminded of that, but it’s really poor form to follow me into other threads and try to pick fights about things I said 3 or 4 threads ago.

    I don’t follow you around from thread to thread and remind you about your complicity in disabling people, so maybe just give it a break, ummmkay?

  60. 60.

    Kay

    David Beard‏Verified account
    @dabeard
    Follow Follow @dabeard
    More
    He has never tried a case.
    At 36, he is 3 years out of law school.
    He is unanimously ranked “not qualified” by the ABA.
    Yesterday, GOP Senate Judiciary Committee members approved the blogger & #Trump nominee to a lifetime post … as a federal judge.

    It’s hard to watch. The country is committing suicide. You could deal with it if this were some kind of invasion of a hostile power, but people VOTED for this. He’s a blogger, this guy, and he’s going to receive a lifetime appointment as a federal judge.

    Where do they find them? It’s like they’re actively seeking out the least qualified people- affirmatively bad hires. Let’s search the country and find the absolute worst people. Who makes these recommendations, draws up these lists? There’s a list somewhere that some Trumpster drew up and this guy’s name was at the top.

  61. 61.

    Amaranthine RBG

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    Go over to LGM and peruse Loomis’ threads about this. Short answer, Yes, if you live in the suburbs b/c of the schools, you are a racist. Full stop.

    I mean, it is kind of hard to take anything he says seriously, given his seriously unbalanced views about ketchup, but there you are.

  62. 62.

    Ruckus

    @Brachiator:

    Goddam, he must be deep in Putin’s pocket.

    And he’s playing pocket pool with his tongue.
    And yes I know that is a massively disgusting thing to read, even typing it makes me want to sandpaper my fingers off. But……

  66. 66.

    Adam L Silverman

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Given my sinus infection, that I wasn’t in the gym this week because of it and am out for another nine days till off the antibiotics, I feel all ballooned up and not in a good way.

  67. 67.

    Spanky

    @Kay:

    It’s like they’re actively seeking out the least qualified people- affirmatively bad hires.

    It’s not like, Kay. It’s their intent. This is in service of Bannon’s (and obviously others) goal of crippling the Federal Government.

    If that ain’t treason, I don’t know what is.

  70. 70.

    MattF

    @Brachiator: I do wonder about that. My current assumption is that Trump knows from his intel briefings that Putin is extraordinarily wealthy– and so therefore, by Trump’s standards, Putin is the winningest person on the planet. And Trump wants a piece of that. More generally, Putin is the successful autocrat that Trump wants to be.

  74. 74.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Kay: He worked for Senator Strange when Strange was the Alabama AG. From there he went to the DOJ on the transition landing team. And then Senator Strange recommended him for this appointment. That’s where they found him.

  77. 77.

    dmsilev

    @Adam L Silverman: Unlike Putin (or Obama), so far as we know Trump has never posed shirtless. This is probably for the best. I have, however, obtained advance copy of what such a photo would look like:
    “It was a terrible, indescribable thing vaster than any subway train — a shapeless congeries of protoplasmic bubbles, faintly self-luminous, and with myriads of temporary eyes forming and un-forming as pustules of greenish light all over the tunnel-filling front that bore down upon us, crushing the frantic penguins and slithering over the glistening floor that it and its kind had swept so evilly free of all litter.”

  78. 78.

    Adam L Silverman

    Gonna go rub doggie bellies for an hour or so and then I’ll be back with a Veterans Day post.

  79. 79.

    Kay

    @Spanky:

    I like to imagine the people who know him “he’s a federal judge now? WTF?”

    He must be related to someone. Could be just about anyone- Trump’s bodyguard, whatever.

    They should just generate random lists of attorneys from state bar sites. You’d probably end up with a better-qualified bench leaving it to chance.

  81. 81.

    Brachiator

    @MattF: Aside from any financial connection, there is something seriously warped about Trump’s Putin fixation.

    Maybe it’s that May of the UK and Merkel of Germany are women. And China, well. Putin is one of the few powerful white male leaders.

    I really can’t recall other presidents braying like an ass over how much America needed to be in sync with a foreign leader.

    Maybe Trump calls Putin “Daddy” when they are alone.

  82. 82.

    dmsilev

    @MattF: Can’t you just see Trump oozing forth from his non-Euclidean tunnels, uttering his signature cry of tekeli-li-maga?

  83. 83.

    Another Scott

    I like to think that people are pragmatic, but too often people get stuck in ruts and just do what they’ve always done.

    I dunno if chasing hard after “swing” voters makes sense. It might make more sense to work hard on getting a well-distilled message and pushing to increase turnout. Virginia’s turnout was only 47% – the highest turnout for a similar election since 1997.

    When Democrats turnout, Democrats win.

    That means pushing voter registration like there’s no tomorrow (and their might not be, if we don’t continue to win before Redistricting). That means fighting for every vote, for every method to reduce barriers to voting, and against every voter suppression tactic they try to employ.

    As Scott Surovell says, let’s grow early voting:

    By Scott Surovell, [Virginia] State Senator (D-36) Wednesday, November 8, 2017

    The 2017 Virginia elections once again demonstrated that Virginians are choosing to vote early in larger numbers each election.

    As compared with 2013, early voting in Prince William County was up over 210 percent, 170 percent in Fairfax County, and 146 percent in Stafford County. In 2016, over 120,000 or one in five Fairfax County voters cast their votes early while nearly 44 percent of Prince William County voters voted early.

    Voting early allows voters to avoid precinct lines, unpredictable weather, job, family or health problems. Voting by mail gives voters more time to complete their ballot in the privacy of their home. Most importantly, it provides the flexibility to allow more people to participate in our democracy.

    Given its popularity, there are more things our government can do to facilitate early voting.

    First, I support no excuse early voting. However, my Republican colleagues kill it every year. Short of that, we need to use existing authority to make our current more user friendly.

    Second, local registrars could choose to provide postage prepaid envelopes for voters to return their ballots. Many younger voters do not purchase stamps or transact business by mail. Prepaid envelopes would cost our localities a fraction of their budget.

    Third, the Fairfax County Registrar has identified a company that manufacturers a recreational vehicle that functions as a Mobile Voting Precinct. This mobile precinct could be placed at locations with large numbers of eligible absentee voters such as Metro Stations, Virginia Railway Express Stations, or commuter lots. It costs only $100,000 per van plus operating costs.

    Fourth, in 2015, the Republican Speaker of the House of Delegates, Bill Howell, persuaded the State Board of Elections to allow electronic absentee ballot applications. I collaborated with software engineers to create my own application, and later that year the State Board of Elections created its own online application. This year, Win Virginia PAC and the House Republican Caucus created their own online absentee ballot applications.

    There is nothing preventing each county from having its own on their county website other than appropriating some money. Voters no longer need paper applications that must be downloaded, printed and returned. The county should create an electronic application.

    All of these simple and cost-effective steps would go a long way to promote participation in our elections and facilitate early voting.

    There are lots and lots of things that can be done to increase turnout. We need to be agitating to get them done.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  85. 85.

    Brachiator

    @dmsilev:

    Unlike Putin (or Obama), so far as we know Trump has never posed shirtless.

    Trump has Melania for that.

    Sorry. Too easy.

  88. 88.

    Kay

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Great! Connected to the Alabama mess. Does he stalk high school sophomores, I wonder? Probably hasn’t had time, what with his lifetime appointment immediately after law school. Sessions is bad but at least we’ll be rid of him for good when he has to resign. This jerk could hang around for decades.

  91. 91.

    Mary G

    I saw a chart somewhere that shows the percentage of people in each congressional district itemize deductions on their tax returns. Here in Issa-land it’s 42%. Many people who aren’t really bothered by Trump will have a cow next March when they fire up the TurboTax or visit the accountant. I think we’ve got a good chance to run the table.

  92. 92.

    dmsilev

    @Mary G: Issa’s aware of that; he had a statement out a few days ago saying that he’s currently a no on the tax bill. I doubt he’ll stick to that, but at least for now he’s scared. Good.

  93. 93.

    Kay

    I would literally bet 50 dollars there’s more on Moore. I’m trying to imagine what could be worse but I can’t.

    The problem Republicans have with him is not only is he a deviant who pursues children, he’s also a liar. They can’t even defend him on his habit of “dating” teenagers because he LIES and says he didn’t.

  94. 94.

    Raoul

    Not really a representative demographic, but the BJ for Doug Jones at ActBlue has already raised $11,565 from 257 people. Doug said he may raise the goal above 10K, but that first increment got passed quick. People are pissed at the GOP, and somehow Republicans are completely ostriching the results from last week.

  95. 95.

    Betty Cracker

    @Another Scott: I’ve been registering voters for about 10 years, and it’s easier to get folks to sign up now than it has been at any point in the past decade. Still way too much apathy, but it seems like there’s less than there was.

  96. 96.

    H.E.Wolf

    @Mike J:

    There was a Flip the 8th training session in Sammamish today. Dino Rossi thinks he’s going to take over the reasonable Republican mantle from Riechert, but I don’t think it’s going to play out that way.

    Oh, Dino Rossi. Bless his heart. He’s an almost 60-year-old white man. He’s deservedly notorious for his dodgy real-estate activities, for omitting financial assets from disclosure paperwork in previous campaigns, and (less well-known, because he keeps it on the down low) for his deeply Dominionist right-wing religious beliefs.

    None of that’s a good look right now.

  98. 98.

    debbie

    John McCain on Trump:

    “President Trump today stated that he believed Vladimir Putin is being sincere when he denies Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and reiterated that he hopes to cooperate with Russia in Syria,” McCain, a strong critic of the President, said in a statement. “There’s nothing ‘America First’ about taking the word of a KGB colonel over that of the American intelligence community. There’s no ‘principled realism’ in cooperating with Russia to prop up the murderous Assad regime, which remains the greatest obstacle to a political solution that would bring an end to the bloodshed in Syria. Vladimir Putin does not have America’s interests at heart. To believe otherwise is not only naive but also places our national security at risk.”

    https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2017/11/11/politics/john-mccain-donald-trump-russia/index.html

  100. 100.

    MattF

    @Kay: Note that Larry Hogan (popular R Governor of MD) has said publicly that Moore is unfit for office. So disavowing Moore is not beyond the capabilities of Republican politicians. They (mostly) just don’t want to.

  101. 101.

    dmsilev

    @Kay: I certainly wouldn’t bet against you on that. The interview Moore did with Hannity, where he said he “generally” didn’t date teenagers? Yeah, that’s a bit of a tell.

  102. 102.

    OGLiberal

    The white, not rich, educated suburban voters I know think a) the Dems are keeping the browns poor on purpose, b) the browns are too stupid to realize this, c) I will be rich some day, I know it, so tax cuts for the one percent are great…in fact, I think I’m in the one percent already (you aren’t…not even close) and d) we spend half our budget on foreign aid.

    You can’t change these folks’ minds because you can’t undo racism.

    Just convince the people who agree with us to vote and don’t worry about John/Jane not flying the Confederate flag but also “some of my best friends are…” assholes…they’re not worth it…even if you get them for one cycle they’ll revert to their norm, which is lazy brown people are preventing the government from giving me free shit.

  103. 103.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: Moore telegraphed additional shoes to drop when he went on Hannity’s show. As you probably saw, the assistant DA who worked with him while he was pursuing kids in the 70s said everyone knew about it and thought it was weird. More people will talk.

  106. 106.

    dmsilev

    @MattF: For some schadenfreude, check out this, where GOPpers try and figure out what to do.
    First off:

    “I don’t remember ever dating any girl without the permission of her mother,” Mr. Moore told Mr. Hannity. Asked by Mr. Hannity if he ever dated teenagers when he was in his 30s, Mr. Moore equivocated, replying, “Not generally, no.”

    McTurtle looks for a way out:

    Mr. McConnell and Senator Cory Gardner of Colorado, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, spoke with Mr. Strange about the prospect [of running as a write-in] immediately after the Moore news broke on Thursday, according to Republicans familiar with the conversation. And Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who won re-election in 2010 as a write-in candidate, was planning to discuss logistics with Mr. Strange this weekend.

    Asked Friday if he thought Mr. Strange should run as a write-in candidate, Mr. McConnell said only that “you’d have to ask Luther what his intentions are, given this development.”
    […]
    Then there is the possibility that if Mr. Moore stayed in the race and won, the members of the Senate would deny him a seat.

    While sidestepping a question about whether he would support such an extraordinary step, Mr. McConnell recalled how, as a relatively junior senator, he pushed to oust Senator Bob Packwood, Republican of Oregon, a long-serving and powerful figure, after a throng of women came forward to accuse Mr. Packwood of sexually harassing or abusing them.

    Maybe election fuckery is the answer:

    One approach that Republicans are considering, according to people briefed on the deliberations, would involve asking Gov. Kay Ivey to order a new date for the election — sometime early next year — and giving the party time to ease Mr. Moore from the race.

    (she has, so far anyway, ruled that out)

    I’n sure this will solve everything:

    Scott Jennings, a Republican strategist close to Mr. McConnell, said presidential intervention was needed to bring any order to the situation in Alabama. He suggested that President Trump could personally nudge Mr. Moore out of the race and back a write-in campaign by Mr. Strange, or perhaps Mr. Sessions, a popular figure with Alabama Republicans. “You’ve got a wild-card politician, who may or may not support your agenda, who’s now got horrific allegations of molestation of a child,” Mr. Jennings said, referring to Mr. Moore. “It strikes me that the people of Alabama would listen to the president.”

  107. 107.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    God, I’ll say. They’re destroying the whole concept of “merit”. Anyone can be anything in the Trump Administration.

    ANY-one.

    I could wake up tomorrow and the lady at the dry cleaners could have been appointed Secretary of State. People wouldn’t blink an eye. “Carol is the Secretary of State now and she’ll do fine, I suppose”.

  108. 108.

    MattF

    @dmsilev: I’d say that appealing to Trump as the preeminent moral authority here is a stretch, even for Alabama. But, I’ve been wrong before.

  109. 109.

    AndoChronic

    @Mike J: Vote for us? After they voted for this shitshow? There’s not a Dem. centrist in existence that could quench their bloodlust, except perhaps Hillary! Will she be running again?

  112. 112.

    Tilda Swintons Bald Cap

    Here’s one:

    Bill Clinton Was A Horrible President
    He really was. 20 years later I am tired of people defending him. Impeachment was bullshit but he was a bad man and a bad Democrat and a bad president.

    Obama was pretty shitty, too.
    by Atrios

  113. 113.

    Kay

    @dmsilev:

    Oh, there’s more. There were a whole bunch who didn’t want their names used and an assistant DA who worked with him is saying everyone knew, because of course they did. It’s fucking weird to go after 14 year old girls- it got their attention. They remember that about him. People know all kinds of things. I know one of our asst prosecutors is married to a diabetic. I don’t know why I know this but I do. That was probably a very small legal community. They know him WELL.

  117. 117.

    Baud

    @Kay: I wonder if delaying the election will only make it worse for them. Moore won’t step down and the delay allows more info to come out.

  118. 118.

    Patricia Kayden

    @Mr Stagger Lee: Not having Gillespie who ran on a blatantly White Supremacist agenda in the Governor position is huge. Northam has promised to advocate for healthcare which I’m sure is beneficial to Black women and their families.

  119. 119.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Raoul:

    and somehow Republicans are completely ostriching the results from last week.

    It sounds now as the Republicans may hang on to Virginia House of Delegates control by the slimmest of margins (could be 51-49, thanks to massive gerrymandering). As long as they can say they didn’t lose, they can keep insisting that things are fine. Just like all the special elections over the past year in which a Democratic challenger did unexpectedly well in a red district, but didn’t quite win.

  122. 122.

    TriassicSands

    @ant:

    I still haven’t herd any plausible explanation for that, other than people are dumb.

    Bingo!

    And that is why the answer to this question:

    Do you think that maybe, just maybe, you will vote for anyone with a “D” behind their name for the next few years?

    …will be “NO!” for most Republicans.

    Will raising their taxes be enough? Not if they don’t know (or believe) their taxes have been raised. Fox will tell them the “truth” and that will be enough.

    The Republicans in DC have been screwing their base for decades and it hasn’t made a difference.

  124. 124.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Bill Cassidy‏Verified account
    @BillCassidy
    2h2 hours ago
    More
    Based on the allegations against Roy Moore, his response and what is known, I withdraw support.

    “What is known” is interesting. It’s like he wants to put down that marker quick before “what is known” is worse :)

  134. 134.

    Another Scott

    AL.com:

    Roy Moore defense: Unbuckling the Bible Belt

    John Archibald | [email protected] By John Archibald | [email protected]

    on November 11, 2017 at 7:00 AM, updated November 11, 2017 at 12:48 PM

    Take it off, Alabama. Take it aaaaall off. You’re naked as the day you were born, naked as porn, clothed in the manner of the emperor.

    In nothing but audacity and deceit. And hypocrisy.

    Buck naked. Or as they say down in Sipsey, butt nekkid.

    You’ve shown the world the stuff you used to have enough decency to conceal. You’ve shown even to yourself that what you say is a lie and what you believe is as flexible as the moment demands.

    You’re a poser, Alabama. And the Bible Belt is down around your knees. You stamp yourself with the label of God and good and morality, and it means nothing to you.

    Not more than politics. Or ideology. Or your own lack of shame.

    Remember when the good grandpa governor Robert Bentley held all the credibility he needed to win the state over? He was a Baptist deacon, a vocal Christian who spoke of high moral ground like he lived there.

    Until he was caught talking dirty to a lady who worked for him. Until we found he wanted to do things in the office that would make his secretary Wanda blush. Then you cared, Alabama.

    People like State Auditor Jim Zeigler made it their life’s ambition to punish his iniquity and his waste. People like Rep. Ed Henry zeroed in on his sins, launching investigations and searching for clues – seeking the infamous “Wanda’s Desk,” which bore witness to unspeakable things.

    Oh, that desks could speak.

    But now, now you can see it.

    Jim Zeigler is naked. Ed Henry too. You can see them laid bare. Sorry if you can’t unsee them.

    Because neither one of those guys had the decency to question whether reports that Senate candidate Roy Moore hit on teenage girls when he was in his 30s were true. That didn’t seem to matter. Neither one had the propriety to want to know more, or rebuke it – even in the safe, milquetoast manner of so many others – with the caveat if it is true.

    Zeigler invoked God when he said there’s nothing wrong with hitting on the youngsters. It was fine when old man Joseph hooked up with teenaged Mary, he told a reporter. The result was … Jesus!

    Jesus.

    That blew the top off Christianity Today writer Ed Stetzer, who stripped Zeigler bare.

    “Bringing Joseph and Mary into a modern-day molestation accusation, where a 32-year-old prosecutor is accused of molesting a 14-year-old girl, is simultaneously ridiculous and blasphemous,” Stetzer wrote.

    “So, let’s be clear. No. Normal. Evangelical. Believes. This. About. The. Bible,” he went on. “As Christians, this should provoke anger.”

    But in Alabama it provoked anger at the press that reported it, and at the women themselves.

    Henry went so far as to say Moore’s accusers – four women were named in the Post story and 30 other sources were used – should be prosecuted for lying or interfering or … something. He said the women are, because of their long silences, accomplices to any crimes that may have been committed.

    To the victims goes the blame.

    This is a guy who began impeachment proceedings against Bentley for issues of “moral turpitude,” among other things.

    He’s willing to look the other way rather than entertain the possibility – the possibility – that Moore was an assistant district attorney who stripped with a little girl. As for Moore, he told Sean Hannity he didn’t “generally” pursue underage girls, and never dated teenagers unless their mothers knew.

    Ew.

    Naked.

    And so is all of Alabama. And all who base their morality on party, and persuasion, and political convenience.

    We like to think we are clothed in the finery of God. But everybody knows the truth.

    We stand naked before the world, the Bible Belt around our ankles and our sizable hypocrisy on display for all to see.

    That’ll leave a mark. Unfortunately, Moore and his followers are too brain damaged to realize it…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  135. 135.

    dogwood

    @H.E.Wolf:
    Several years ago I read an interview with John Harwood that was interesting since it was a pretty honest evaluation of the problem with journalists being required to invent balance. In 2004 he wrote a piece about Barack Obama as the most promising young politician in America. The WSJ liked the piece, but wouldn’t publish unless he found a young republican to tout as well. He scrambled around and came up with Dino Rossi. He knew they weren’t equally talented, interesting, or significant, but he had no choice.

  139. 139.

    Citizen Alan

    @Amaranthine RBG:

    Wow. I mean, there’s a pretty good argument that you are taking advantage of an inherently racist system if you move to the suburbs for the schools. But on the other hand, I think it’s asking a lot of even the most moral, ethical, and race-blind people to say that if they don’t go out of their way to disadvantage their own children, it means they are racists.

  143. 143.

    Tilda Swintons Bald Cap

    @Kay: Moore went walkabout in Australia in the 80’s apparently, so folks are wondering about that.

  144. 144.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    They are so completely insane. The prospect of a Democrat is so horrible to Republicans they will back LIT-erally anyone.

    Normal people can make this comparison because they are reading about this shit every day. I don’t think 3 months go by here without someone being accused, arrested, fired, or otherwise implicated in some underage solicitation thing. So they’re looking at regular people getting hammered for this SAME behavior. It doesn’t have to involve even physical contact! Kids are savvier now so they tell an adult. Just the solicitation is enough.

    I cannot imagine an assistant prosecutor approaching a litigant and asking to “watch” her teenage daughter. It’s WAY out of the norm. It gives me the creeps because it’s so grossly paternal- as if he is somehow “rescuing” these girls from the threat of modernity. I mean, honestly, why is it any of his fucking business that she’s sitting with her mother at a custody hearing? Is he the Father of the World, monitoring the womenfolk? Just keep walking buddy. We’re FINE.

  146. 146.

    AndoChronic

    @Major Major Major Major: It’s perhaps just a personal thing. They need to really feel this one, not just intellectually but really FEEL it. After that, then maybe we can talk about it and see what happens.

  148. 148.

    JPL

    @Kay: I think he did ask the mother’s permission for those teens he met in a high school, but the ones he met in the courthouse, probably not. He’s a creep that belong in jail, but will be rewarded with a senate seat instead.

  149. 149.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: I am just tired of the inability of not being able to take joy in the great night we had this Tuesday, and yes-butting it. Pundits have been doing it all this week, do we have to follow their lead too?

    edited

  157. 157.

    Another Scott

    @Major Major Major Major: The comment section there is bizarre. Maybe 0.001% of the comments are on topic, the rest is all kinds of weird inside-Eschaton-baseball stuff.

    I tried to pushback a little on that post of his, but it was quickly buried (625 comments at the moment).

    I think he’s right about SUPERTRAINS and reserved parking in cities and self-driving cars and the failure of 401Ks and the importance of increasing Social Security benefits, but if Clinton was HORRIBLE and Obama was PRETTY SHITTY, then what were Reagan and Bush and Trump??!?

    It’s a weird position to take on a mostly kinda-sorta sensible lefty blog. I thought he was trolling, but maybe he’s just in a cranky mood or something.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  158. 158.

    Gin & Tonic

    @BBA:

    Bad man, though, is undeniably true.

    I will deny it. He is, as many powerful men are, complicated and contradictory. Certainly there are aspects of his behavior which are “bad”, but how do you weigh that against those aspects of his behavior which are “good”?

  159. 159.

    Tilda Swintons Bald Cap

    @Another Scott: Sometimes I think he’s just playing the hipster above it all type part. I used to go there all the time years ago, but it is a weird place now.

  161. 161.

    Brachiator

    @Betty Cracker:

    The only explanation that fits the facts is that Trump is comprised. Seriously, nothing else makes sense.

    Yeah. He is comprised, but there’s something else at play here that may also fit the facts. He has a huge ego, and has never been deferential to anyone other than his daddy, even when he was tangled up in botched business deals.

    There is something desperate in his attachment to Putin.

    But who knows. We have had presidents who were blind to corruption going on around them, but few whose own wealth and business dealings could be involved in malfeasance on a massive scale.

    And I don’t think that Trump is so smart that he could conceal his own involvement for very long.

    Still, there is something…off…in the way he defends and excuses Putin. And his defense is easily contradicted by intelligence. The GOP leadership has got to be bone stupid to defend Trump without some assurance that things won’t blow up big time.

  167. 167.

    J R in WV

    @Amaranthine RBG:

    You mutherfucking piece of crap!!

    It IS NOT the democrat party!!!

    It’s the Democratic Party and that’s how we all know YOU are not a Democrat!!! You can’t even say the name of OUR party correctly!

    Fuck you with a rusty barley scythe.

  170. 170.

    frosty

    @J R in WV: Yeah, I saw that tell too, and ignored everything after it. But “rusty barley scythe”! A new oxidized farm implement to put in my toolshed.

  171. 171.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Another Scott: Atrios is a shitty blogger who has been unhappily going through the motions of his nominal job since about 2003. Josh Marshall, Matt Yglesias, Kevin Drum, Ezra Klein, Amanda Marcotte: they’ve been at it about as long and at least _appear_ to enjoy themselves. Atrios has been a miserable git for a decade and a half.

  172. 172.

    BBA

    @Omnes Omnibus: @Gin & Tonic: I’m saying, if you reexamine his record in the face of the current wave of sexual harassment scandals, Clinton ranks somewhere around Louis CK in terms of awfulness. Not nearly as bad as Trump or O’Reilly or Weinstein, but still awful. And if we’re not going to tolerate it any longer, as well we shouldn’t, we might as well be consistent about it.

  173. 173.

    Major Major Major Major

    @Another Scott:

    I think he’s right about SUPERTRAINS and reserved parking in cities and self-driving cars and the failure of 401Ks and the importance of increasing Social Security benefits

    And it would be great if he wrote about those. Or about anything! His median post is shorter than a tweet.

  176. 176.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Another Scott:

    It might make more sense to work hard on getting a well-distilled message and pushing to increase turnout.

    I think we overstate the importance of “message.” What I take away from the Virginia results is that it truly might be enough to have the message be “I’m not a dick, but my opponent is,” especially when you can follow it up with “and, good God, have you SEEN the president?”

  178. 178.

    Bill Arnold

    @Adam L Silverman:
    The timing of those tweets freaked me out a bit. (reasons) Where was he exactly?
    Anyway, he’s prompting more 25th amendment talk with those tweets.

    Every time AF1 changes time zones he gets to start sundowning all over again!

    It’s possible. Felt a glitch in the matrix about an hour ago. :-) :-( :-) …

  180. 180.

    sdhays

    @Baud: If they delay the election, I assume they’ll have some cunning plan for pushing him out. If they can do that, their voters who are balking at voting for Moore will breathe a sigh of relief, Moore’s supporters will howl with screams of rage, and they’ll all vote for whatever nasty moron they get to replace him and the Republicans will hold the Alabama Senate seat.

    Right now, I’m hoping that they dither long enough to the point where changing the date of the election is no longer an option, because I think it’s their only realistic way of getting out of this mess and they will definitely do it if they become convinced they’re going to lose. We are tantalizingly close to the election so that people will be voting just as more and more shit hits the fan (if Kay wins her bet, and I think she will). Even with that, I won’t bet that Doug Jones will win, but it makes it much, much more likely.

  182. 182.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Betty Cracker: While I doubt we’ll find out about it, and I can’t prove it, but I think it is reasonable to accept that he didn’t just start this behavior in his early 30s after he got out of the Army and started working in the local DA’s office. I would put money on the fact that he did this with teenage Vietnamese girls while he was deployed to Vietnam as an MP company commander. And he was able to do so and get away with it because 1) he was an MP, 2) it happened in Vietnam, and 3) he was preying on Vietnamese teenage girls.

  185. 185.

    J R in WV

    @Amaranthine RBG:

    Every time, every thread, you type things that are repellent, hateful, despicable. Again, fuq you with a barley scythe!! A rusty one!

    I really really need to re-pie you again.

  186. 186.

    mainmata

    @Baud: When the Constitution creators made their hopelessly compromised document, they were trying to persuade southern slave states to agree to a stronger federal government that would be a positive “national” structure. The wealthy plantation owners, many of our most admired founders, were skeptical and so voting rights were strictly reserved to the states and the Senate was skewed to small population states and the Electoral College was clearly anti-democratic. The US began as an oligarchy (initially only white, male substantial property owners could vote nationally; state laws were different). Democracy in the US has always been a struggle against oligarchy and economic oppression. With the exception of a few episodic exceptions, like the New Deal, it continues to be an ongoing struggle.

  191. 191.

    Ruckus

    @Baud:
    Maybe the governor is hoping for exactly that, Moore information to come out. He’s toxic now what if you could make him radioactive?

  194. 194.

    Ohio Mom

    I live in a suburb and I would say that most of my white* neighbors are racist, though very unself-aware about it. They are aware they are afraid of Black people but think that only makes sense.

    I don’t think you can separate out that racism from the good schools angle. It is too intertwined. In this respect, I agree with Loomis.

    That said, people move to the suburbs for a variety of reasons. For my family, I admit it *was* the schools, because if you have a special needs kid, you need a district with deep pockets.

    We’ve had plenty of company; during my kid’s days in elementary school, the school had over three times as many autistic kids enrolled as the national prevalence rate would suggest. Also, the trend in our district is that the number of kids with severe disabilities is increasing rather dramatically. We are families that are using the results of a racist system for our own extenuating circumstances.

    Also, there are some surprisingly affordable pockets here in the suburbs, especially in contrast to formerly affordable neighborhoods in the city proper that are becoming gentrified. I look at the rents in some of the areas I would like to move to after we are done with the school system, and if an area has a walkable business district, the rents are usually more than my mortgage.

    * There are a fair number of Asian immigrants here, but I don’t know them well enough to gauge their feelings about American minority groups.

  196. 196.

    mainmata

    @Matt McIrvin: This will not last. We are MD-ers but have a farm in the heart of Shenandoah Co., which is very conservative voting but which is also rapidly changing economically, especially in the towns and cities. There is a real grassroots movement for eco-agriculture and renewable energy that the local GOP doesn’t understand. This is partly because of immigration from blue states and actual immigrants. It will take a couple of electoral cycles but this region will flip given the current GOP. (And its current highly reactionary rep. Bob Goodlatte has decided to retire.)

  197. 197.

    scott (the other one)

    @Brachiator: Someone who’s a billionaire makes $25,000…in interest.

    I feel like that’s a fact which should be pointed out to WWC voters A LOT.

  198. 198.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @dmsilev:

    You know what’s more than “a bit of a tell”? “Didn’t date anyone without permission from her mother.”

    You know who you don’t have to get Mom’s permission to date? Women age 30, which was about Moore’s age when all this was happening.

  201. 201.

    J R in WV

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    There are different scythes for different grains, depending on how hight they grow, whether you intend to bundle shocks, etc. So I was inspired. I’ll be having a barley-based beverage in a few minutes, too.

    U Miami is beating Notre Dame 34-0 right now!

  203. 203.

    Gelfling 545

    @raven: Been doing it for 5 years now. I’m in better shape now at 67 than I was at 50. If there’s a branch of the Taoist Tai Chi Society in your area I can heartily recommend it. If not, there’s probably a decent martial arts school that has good instruction. It doesn’t really take too long to notice improvements.

  204. 204.

    Uncle Ebeneezer

    @Citizen Alan: “I want what’s best for my kid” is a super-easy way to rationalize White Flight and continuing inequality in areas like education. It perpetuates systemic racism no matter how hard we try to deny that fact. Is there an easy solution…no, absolutely not. And that’s part of why the problems that White Supremacy cause are so difficult to address/fix. But the bottom line is White people wanting what’s best for their child often results in making things worse for Black/Non-Black children of color. People might want their kid to have 2 slices of pizza at the school party but if that results in another kid getting none, no amount of good intentions changes the moral calculus. Confronting our privilege is hard. Sacrifice is hard. Etc. But until White people start getting comfortable with making sacrifices (yes, even for their kids) all we do is raise the playing field without ever actual balancing it.

  207. 207.

    Amir Khalid

    @Sab:
    That’s the deal with this commenter, whose nym is essentially a wish for a liberal Supreme Court Justice’s expeditious death.

  208. 208.

    J R in WV

    @Raoul:

    I signed up using Doug’s tool, but when I got to Act Blue, I went weekly on the donation. I don’t think any of the subsequent donations have registered on Doug’s “Thermometer.” But Doug Jones is getting the money, anyway!!!

  209. 209.

    Bill Arnold

    @Gelfling 545:

    If there’s a branch of the Taoist Tai Chi Society in your area I can heartily recommend it. If not, there’s probably a decent martial arts school that has good instruction. It doesn’t really take too long to notice improvements.

    I haven’t found a good instructor in my area. (There was a high level guy, wrote a bunch of books, but he died a few years ago. Have examined the books…). However, even doing the kata (or appropriate word for a non-japanese style) for other martial arts (or any motion, hard or soft, for that matter), in the dark with eyes closed, helps a lot to develop proprioception.

  217. 217.

    Aleta

    Change in confidence in US leadership from Obama to Trump
    Germany: -75%
    South Korea: -71%
    France: -70%
    Canada: -61%
    UK: -57%
    Australia: -55%
    Japan: -54%
    Russia: +42%
    Source: Pew Research

  219. 219.

    NobodySpecial

    Yeah, no. White flight in the 60’s and 70’s and 80’s to the suburbs was exclusively for one thing: Getting away from the ‘thugs’ and the ‘bad schools and the taxes that supported those ‘welfare queens’. Those folks are now in their 60’s to 80’s, their kids grew up in white enclaves and most of them are terrified of any place full of the Angry Negroes. It’s why all your city cops and firefighters move to suburbs or rural areas. They are absolutely consistent in this, especially in the Midwest. Low taxes and racism, the bedrock of American conservatism. You’re not peeling off any significant numbers of white voters there.

  222. 222.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Uncle Ebeneezer:

    But the bottom line is White people wanting what’s best for their child often results in making things worse for Black/Non-Black children of color. People might want their kid to have 2 slices of pizza at the school party but if that results in another kid getting none, no amount of good intentions changes the moral calculus. Confronting our privilege is hard. Sacrifice is hard. Etc. But until White people start getting comfortable with making sacrifices (yes, even for their kids) all we do is raise the playing field without ever actual balancing it.

    Speaking as a parent, I think the problem here is that they’re not seeing it as “making sacrifices for their kids”, they’re seeing it as “sacrificing their kids”.

    The fear is that maybe 95% of children in this country are completely doomed, doomed to short lives of poverty and degradation as the middle class hollows out. 5% of them might be able to get on a lifeboat that comes with wealth and privilege. And if you can get your kid on that lifeboat, to keep them from being incinerated in the doom that’s coming… forget it, any notion of fairness goes out the window. The sacrifices you make will be to get your kid on the lifeboat, instead of somebody else’s kid.

    That’s a huge part of the reason strong social safety nets and decent jobs for the masses are so important. That fear needs to be reduced.

  223. 223.

    DHD

    I think the obsession about “good schools” certainly has racist origins, but it’s perfectly capable of existing without racism, because of the simple fact that the way schools are funded in North America, based on property taxes, is practically designed to prevent social mobility.

    To whit: up here in Canada, the island of Montreal is sliced into three school boards (well, actually five or so counting the English-language ones but whatever) – the CSMB, the CSDM, and the Pointe de l’Île. The CSDM’s buildings are like centuries older than the other two and they are full of asbestos and mold. Its territory is also conveniently drawn to exclude all of the old-money neighborhoods and demerged suburbs in the west of the city, including Outremont (where politicians live) which is literally surrounded by CSDM territory.

    On top of that, for historical reasons, the provincial government subsidizes private schools, which are allowed to selectively admit students. The result is a “death spiral” in the public school system in the East End of Montréal (CSDM), though locally we call it “ségrégation scolaire”, which has basically nothing to do with race (arguably the CSMB and Pointe de l’Île territories are more ethnically diverse…)

    Probably in the US race is still a factor, but I have a feeling IGMFY is an even bigger one. Funding for schools is like the quintessential social good yet we treat it as if it were some kind of weird accessory to the housing market.

  224. 224.

    Matt McIrvin

    @DHD: Even if non-racist in individual intent, it’s racist in the sense that it contributes to a racist system (this is the distinction that kept people going around and around in Erik Loomis’s threads on the subject on LGM). And it tears me up in that I can see my own decision processes being affected by the system.

    I live in a working-class suburb in Massachusetts that has an underfunded school system, much worse than average for the state–if I lived closer in to the city the schools would actually be better. The schools my daughter has gone to so far are actually not bad, but opportunities for advanced students are limited, and the high school has a pretty bad reputation. So the question is whether to move, or put her in a private school… or keep her there and maybe foreclose some of the educational opportunities I had growing up in NoVa and make her whole life harder going forward in the name of social justice. It’s a hard thing to accept when you know you have another alternative.

  225. 225.

    msdc

    The question every parent in your situation faces is, what would making their kid’s life harder actually accomplish in terms of social justice? I mean, I suppose sending your daughter to a bad high school would incrementally improve the high school for the four years she’s there, but how much of a lasting benefit would it have – and would it be worth the potential restrictions it places on her future opportunities?

    Expecting individual parents to “solve” racism through individual school decisions makes about as much sense as expecting individual taxpayers to solve shortfalls in anti-poverty programs through charitable contributions – or expecting individual homeowners to solve climate change through lightbulb purchases. (It’s actually more ridiculous in that it asks the kids to bear the brunt of the parents’ decisions.) In both of the latter examples we recognize that collective problems require collective solutions. Schools are no different. Unless you can get an entire neighborhood (at least) to buy into a course of action, your local schools’ problems are better solved through political action.

  226. 226.

    Another Scott

    @msdc: It’s a both/and problem, but you’re right, individual parents usually are going to try to give their children every advantage and that means trying to get into the best schools possible (if all else is equal).

    This reminds me of TNC’s ‘The Case for Reparations’. The quality of neighborhoods and neighborhood schools was set on its path long before the white-flight of the ’60s and ’70s – but that did have a profound effect, of course. But “redlining” as an official government policy was a huge factor.

    My high school was involved in “school busing” in the late ’70s in Dayton. My side of the street didn’t have to ride the bus to our “home school”, but the other side did. In my last 2 years, I rode the bus to the “magnet” school on the other side of town. It was a huge disruption (too long on the bus every day, missing out on activities at the home school) for too many students, but it did help to get students (and teachers) to see a much more diverse population of students. And it didn’t cause sudden equalization of the quality of facilities and educational opportunities – ultimately the system needs to be fixed in tangible ways rather than just moving a few of the students around.

    “Follow the money” is a good mantra, but it doesn’t work well when there is such a huge difference in the quality of the physical plant and economic circumstances of a new, rapidly growing suburb and a 200 year old shrinking inner city neighborhood. I don’t know what the solution is, but relying primarily on city- or county-level property taxes has been a failure.

    It’s a tough problem, but it’s a solvable one.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  227. 227.

    Adria McDowell

    Is it racist for people of color to move to the suburbs for good schools? Or send their children to private schools?

    The increasing gentrification in the cities has started pushing people of color out of their neighborhoods, because they can no longer afford to live there. We need to remember that people of color live in suburban and rural areas, and not necessarily by choice.

  228. 228.

    Matt McIrvin

    @msdc: There’s also the possibility that the school isn’t actually all that bad and people don’t like it because it has black and brown people in it and they’re racist. But it’s definitely underfunded and crumbling and has had some well-publicized violent incidents.

  229. 229.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Adria McDowell: Yeah, to some extent the Seventies white-flight narrative is obsolete–“drive till you qualify” reversed it to some degree. People now flee to the suburbs because they can afford to live there. That’s part of the reason Prince William County in Virginia turned deep blue.

  230. 230.

    Lurking Canadian

    @msdc: The interesting thing is that on Loomis’s other hobby horse issue (industrial conditions and worker rights in the context of global trade) he gets this. He says over and over that buying your own clothes in thrift shops, or even sewing your own clothes at home, don’t have any practical effects except making one consumer feel better.

    However, on schools, he thinks individuals deliberately putting their own children into schools known to be “bad” is the way forward. I suspect the fact that Loomis does not, himself, have children is related.

  231. 231.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Lurking Canadian: Well, I also get a definite sense that Loomis thinks affluent parents having children in the modern West is a bad, selfish thing for them to do anyway, because the kids will inevitably have a massive carbon footprint, contribute to inequality at home and the exploitation of workers overseas, etc. So he’s not going to have a lot of sympathy for these parents to begin with.

    As a corrective to supposedly environmentalist tut-tutting about Third Worlders increasing the surplus population, he has a point. (Though the people who do this often aren’t even aware of how much of the less-developed world has gone through the demographic transition already–they’ll believe India still has a gigantic total fertility rate.)

  233. 233.

    Marcia

    @debbie:

    I guess “Little Rocket Man” was a term of endearment?

    That vocal burp from Dolt45 was just plain odd. “Rocket Man” basically means “astronaut.”

    Can you imagine someone using that in a moment of rage? “I’ve had it with you! You know what you are? An astronaut! That’s right, an effing ASTRONAUT!!!!”

  234. 234.

    msdc

    @Another Scott: Agreed. Reforming the way we fund schools would do far more good (which is to say, any amount of good) than expecting individual kids to desegregate our schools for us. So would reforms to housing policy generally.

  236. 236.

    Matt

    Said middle-management person has likely been getting fucked in the ass by the GOP every day of their adult life; why would they suddenly develop an objection to it?

    Also, this idea that people can vote for the Moores or Trumps of the world and “not be racist” is garbage – like posing for the commemorative photo at a lynching but insisting *you* were only there to have a nice afternoon out. They knew exactly what those guys are, and they picked them up anyways.

  237. 237.

    WaterGirl

    @Matt:

    They knew exactly what those guys are, and they picked them up anyways.

    For all the ones I know who voted for Trump, they knew exactly what Trump was, and it was still better than voting for the lying bitch. In my opinion, anyone who thinks a racist hateful sociopath like Trump was better than a lying bitch must be pretty comfortable with racism and sexual assault and is okay with a sociopath as leader of the free world. I am having trouble seeing those people in the same way again.

  238. 238.

    burnspbesq

    @Chip Daniels:

    You must be new here. Here’s the view from the Orange-Tustin border, where I’ve lived since 1991.

    There are no potential Democratic candidates with enough name recognition to pose a serious threat to Rohrbacher, Royce, or Walters. Applegate will probably beat Issa, but that’s because of Oceanside, not San Clemente.

    Democratic candidates will carry OC in statewide elections in 2018, but the Congressional delegation and (arguably more important, because this is where you grow your future Congressional candidates) the Board of Supervisors are going to remain blood red for the foreseeable future.

    OC will turn blue at about the same time as places like WilliamsonCounty, Texas (north suburban Austin) or Suffolk County, New York (eastern LI).

  239. 239.

    burnspbesq

    @Lurking Canadian:

    I guarantee that if push ever comes to shove, Loomis will behave exactly like the parents he loves to hate. His children will never set foot in a Providence public school. He’ll move to whatever suburb has the best public schools, or they’ll go to Moses Brown.

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