Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you do not.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

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

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

Human rights are not a matter of opinion!

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

Nothing worth doing is easy.

They are not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

One way or another, he’s a liar.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Not rolling over. fuck you, make me.

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Thursday Morning Open Thread: History (in the Making)

Thursday Morning Open Thread: History (in the Making)

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The throwing of shade, at its finest…

No matter how hard Mike Pence and his ‘family’ pray, IMO, he doesn’t have it in him to be even a second-time-as-farce Calvin Coolidge. (Although, were I Trump, I wouldn’t accept any Pence-related invitations to Alaskan cruises or seafood dinners… )
.

Also nicely done:

Reader Interactions

190Comments

  2. 2.

    NotMax

    That last tweet is beyond a strained metaphor and almost Victorian in its presumption as fact that out of wedlock children ipso facto are tainted.

    Citizens United is an abomination but the text of the tweet rubs the wrong way. Do not like.

  12. 12.

    OzarkHillbilly

    “In 18 years of practice I’ve seen some really good chess players. These folks are playing tic tac toe.”
    -Michael Avenatti

  13. 13.

    NotMax

    @satby

    Not even midnight. Nursing sinuses after mowing this afternoon. Finished up the second season of Occupied on Netflix and at the moment taking a short break from suspending disbelief with the Spanish time travelers.

    Documentary about Eadweard Muybdridge waiting in the wings on Amazon Prime which am looking forward to but have a feeling will be mediocre, production-wise.

  19. 19.

    satby

    @NotMax: I just realized the last season of Longmire was released and I missed it. Now I have to restart my Netflix subscription to watch it, and catch up on other stuff I missed.

  22. 22.

    satby

    Not sure if anyone here now had that month long virus that raven and I and a few other jackals had, but if you did has fatigue been a problem since? I’ve had good days and occasionally days where just taking the dogs out has been my major accomplishment for the day. I’m trying to ramp up my activity level. I generally walk at least about 2 miles a day so far which isn’t much, but some days I’m wiped out.

  24. 24.

    NotMax

    @satby

    Coming on the 13th is season 1 of the new Lost In Space, which fairly screams train wreck on the express track of the CGI & Schlock railroad. trailer

  26. 26.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @satby: I got a bug, which had the rebound effect, but it affected me no where near as badly as you guys. I attributed the lethargy I’ve had the past couple weeks to a winter that never really was refusing to just give it up and become spring. I needs some sun.

  29. 29.

    OzarkHillbilly

    WTF?????

    Here is Michael Cohen’s lawyer and spokesman saying categorically that Cohen negotiated agreement w/o ever telling his client DJT anything abt it and made him a party to the agreement w/o any intention of telling him abt it or having him sign it.

    -Josh Marshall

    I mean really, WTF????????????????????????

  30. 30.

    NotMax

    @satby

    To update the old saying –

    Architects disguise their mistakes with ivy, brides with mayonnaise, filmmakers with CGI.

    :)

  32. 32.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @satby: I am pretty sure that in my case it is a wee bit of SAD which never used to affect me. Getting old sucks but, so far it still beats the alternative.

  35. 35.

    NotMax

    @OzarkHillbilly

    That would be the same Michael Cohen who publicly stated he was upset at not having been reimbursed the $130k by you know who.

    Ann Miller tap danced less furiously.

  36. 36.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: I noticed that SAD is affecting me as I get older too and it never did before. I don’t mind the cold and never used to mind the gray days, but now they seem endless.

  37. 37.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @NotMax:

    I’ve restarted Justified on Prime (the writing is phenomenal) – I had missed have also been doing Battlestar Galactica.

  38. 38.

    gene108

    @NotMax:

    Your standards are too high. Looked OK to me. Miss Robbie the Robot though. Who is going to tell Will Robinson he is in danger?

  41. 41.

    TS

    Such a president – he calls up someone when a program has great ratings – but rarely calls those who lost friends and family in a school shooting. I keep thinking I will wake up and discover I have been watching big brother rather than the United States of America administration.

  44. 44.

    gene108

    @satby:

    I came down with a low grade fever Sunday. Lingered on to Monday. Pushed myself to go to work on Tuesday. That was a mistake. Basically took yesterday off again, no fever, just fatigued.

    Back when my kidneys still worked, I used to be able to shake these off a lot faster. I find it frustrating what used to be a 24 or 48 hour bug pulls me down for days.

  45. 45.

    gene108

    @Jay:

    It’s the firm of Harpo, Cheeko, Groucho, Larry, Moe, Curly and Cohen LLC.

    No love for Zeppo? Or did Cohen take his spot.

  46. 46.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @satby: The cold really gets into my joints now but other than that I still enjoy a good hike on a winter’s day. If the sun makes a showing I feel rejuvenated but in a week such as this (day 6 in a row of fugly weather) I really have a hard time getting motivated.

  48. 48.

    Immanentize

    @satby: Yes I have had the same low battery feeling. But I thought it was just from life stuff; but certainly followed the creeping coughing crud.

  53. 53.

    satby

    @Immanentize: correlation isn’t causation, but it’s the only thing different about this winter than other winters (which would eliminate the SAD factor). Seems like that was quite a bug we all got, wish I knew what it was.

  54. 54.

    Joyce H

    @TS:

    Such a president – he calls up someone when a program has great ratings – but rarely calls those who lost friends and family in a school shooting. I keep thinking I will wake up and discover I have been watching big brother rather than the United States of America administration.

    I’ve had the notion for quite a while that the upshot will be that Trump will eventually decide that he’s not having fun and it’s never going to get better, and just resign. Walking away is consistent with his track record. And I have to say, I’ve been becoming more optimistic that will happen sooner rather than later as the legal issues mount. Not just Mueller but Daniels and Zervos and whatever other women will soon be coming into the light and now the emoluments case.

    Honestly, I think the emoluments thing is going to be the one that causes Trump to throw up his hands and throw in the towel. He proved during the campaign that if he had to choose between being president and keeping his taxes and his business financials secret, the presidency could go hang. If it becomes clear to him that he can’t both be president and retain control of his totally opaque businesses, he’ll walk. The business is his real baby. And I suspect he’s stupid enough to believe he could resign and just waft back to Trump Tower and Mar A Lago and go back to the life he had before running for office. Of course, I think the truth is that Mueller has had Trump’s taxes and probably all the Trump Org financials for a very long time, and resigning isn’t going to save Trump from what’s coming for him.

  55. 55.

    NotMax

    @gene108

    And then there’s Gummo.

    Although the fourth Marx Brother in age, he was the first to make his debut, pretending to be a dummy in an act with his uncle Henry Shean (né Heinemann Schoenberg) in 1899. Milton was put into a costume with a papier-mâché head and pretended to be a dummy while Henry pretended to work him. The act may have only performed once and was not helped by Shean’s deafness or Milton’s stammer.

    Gummo, who in an interview said he never liked being on stage, left the group and joined the military during World War I. He wasn’t sent overseas because the armistice was signed shortly afterward. Gummo’s younger brother Zeppo took his place in the group. Gummo later went into the raincoat business. After his Army career he joined with Zeppo and operated a theatrical agency.…

  57. 57.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I’ll say it again: I am convinced the pneumonia vaccine I got at the end of last year saved me not only from pneumonia for the third time in three years, but from all the other bugs and viruses that ran rampant though my workplace. I had a couple very mild issues, but nothing near what others here have had to deal with. And I used to pick up every virus in the room.

  58. 58.

    debbie

    Wow, the departing head of VA is very unhappy. He won’t talk about how he found out he was fired, which can only mean it was another Twitter firing by a very cowardly person.

  59. 59.

    debbie

    @satby:

    Don’t let your guard down. There’s a resurgence of flu making the rounds, according to my local news. This time, it’s the B strain, which was included in flu shots so at least the people who got them will be fine.

  60. 60.

    Baud

    NYT headline says Trump called Roseanne because her show got good ratings. I wonder if he’ll make an appearance. I bet he asks.

  61. 61.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @debbie: My immune system has always been relatively robust. I might get ill but it was rare that it became a serious issue. Still, old age (and abuse) creeps up on us all and I started getting the yearly flu shot a few years back. This year, I didn’t. It just was never convenient. So when I caught that bug I thought I was gonna be in for it and was pleasantly surprised when it was never more than an inconvenience.

  62. 62.

    Bemused senior

    @satby: Yes. My virus led to double pneumonia, beaten with 10 days of antibiotics. I am still having periods of exhaustion. I was attributing this to the levaquin.

  65. 65.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Meet Andrew J. Ekonomou, Contingency Lawyer/Medieval Historian and Trump’s New Lead Counsel

    In other words, fifteen years ago Ekonomou’s gig was sending nastygrams to rural Christians who got bent out of shape over Sekulow’s hyper-aggressive fundraising pitches.

    Happily, a few years later, Ekonomou and Lambros were on to bigger and better things. They were making a killing working as contract prosecutors initiating forfeiture proceedings against Georgia convenience store owners accused of illegal gambling on video poker machines. Ekonomou and Lambros ended up making so much money that they started getting unwanted media attention. The press scrutiny revealed they were working on contingency. A number of Middle and South Georgia DA’s offices had hired the duo on a contingency basis, thus incentivizing them to claim as many assets as possible since they got a percentage cut of the take.

    The Georgia legislature had to pass a new law in 2012 mandating that contract prosecutors like Ekonomou could only be paid on an hourly basis, not in bounties.

    Mueller has really met his match now.

  68. 68.

    TS

    @Joyce H: I love your post – I do believe trump will not run for another term, but I wonder if his ego will stop him from resigning. He has broken so many “norms” and probably admin rules, lies most of the time and yet the GOP just smiles and carries on regardless

  69. 69.

    Jay

    Emptywheel has a must read up:

    “Mueller just revealed that at the same time GRU was implementing a hack-and-leak campaign designed to hurt or defeat Ukrainian hawk Hillary Clinton, a current or former GRU official was also conspiring to prevent or delay (until after the election) full disclosure of how GRU and Russia conspired with Trump’s campaign manager and his deputy to tamper in Ukrainian affairs.”

    “At the same time GRU was tampering in our election, GRU was conspiring with Trump’s campaign manager to hide how they had conspired to tamper in Ukrainian democracy as well. ”

    https://www.emptywheel.net/2018/03/28/mueller-prepares-to-reveal-the-first-cards-in-the-hack-and-leak-conspiracy/

  71. 71.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Baud:

    I feel as though she hasn’t been around for a few days. Did she say something last week about getting ready for a trip for her son’s spring break? I kind of skimmed, so could be entirely wrong.

  76. 76.

    bystander

    Reading this thread makes me feel like I should be taking everyone’s temperature.

    Hoping somebody on Moanin’ Joe can top yesterday’s comment about Facebook: Their business model is all business in the front and party in the rear.

  78. 78.

    Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)

    A tweet still up on Trump’s feed that includes a picture of some kind of wall portion

    Great briefing this afternoon on the start of our Southern Border WALL!

    pic.twitter.com/pmCNoxxlkH— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 28, 2018

    Buzzfeed:

    As Buzzfeed fact-checked, this was not actually the start of Trump’s wall, but a repair effort that was started back in 2009 to fix a portion of existing fence that was built in the 1990s.

  80. 80.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Joyce H:

    I’ve had the notion for quite a while that the upshot will be that Trump will eventually decide that he’s not having fun and it’s never going to get better, and just resign. Walking away is consistent with his track record.

    There was a widespread idea that he’d lose interest and quit during the 2016 campaign, and he didn’t.

    I don’t know. On the one hand, he’s obviously miserable and has a short attention span. On the other hand, he’s utterly bullheaded when it comes to avoiding humiliation, and resigning from the Presidency under a cloud like Nixon would be humiliating. My guess is he’ll just keep doing more of those “campaign” rallies to lift his spirits, and they’ll get more and more grotesque.

  81. 81.

    OldDave

    @satby:

    Not sure if anyone here now had that month long virus that raven and I and a few other jackals had, but if you did has fatigue been a problem since?

    Yes. Malaise, punked, whatever one wishes to call it – it sucks.

  83. 83.

    Matt McIrvin

    @TS: But running for President is what he really loves! He formally already started running for reelection the moment he entered office–that’s what those rallies are, supposedly part of his reelection campaign. They’re the only moments when he seems to be truly happy, surrounded by screaming, bloody-minded yahoos who adore him and want him to tell them to go kill somebody.

  85. 85.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: I would think she should be more discreet about the people she associates with. You lie down with jackals and who knows WTF you’re gonna get up with.

  88. 88.

    Baud

    Between Roseanne and the shenanigans at The Atlantic, I feel like there’s a new push to normalize Trump right now, maybe in anticipation of the midterms.

  89. 89.

    J R in WV

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I got a serious bug in Los Angeles just after returning from Baja Calilfornia, don’t know where I caught it, could’a been from a sea lion I was playing with before flying back to LA (joke!). I was pretty miserable flying from LAX -> ATL -> CRW to get home, but I’m about back now so it wasn’t the flu. Or if it was, the vaccination worked well.

  90. 90.

    Brachiator

    @NotMax:

    Coming on the 13th is season 1 of the new Lost In Space, which fairly screams train wreck on the express track of the CGI & Schlock railroad.

    Looks like it’s a reboot that is fully in the spirit of the craptastically campy original.

  91. 91.

    bemused

    @debbie:

    Has Roseanne always been a rightwinger? Maybe she was and I missed it but I was a bit surprised to read she was a trumper.

  93. 93.

    raven

    @bemused:

    espite her generally leftist views, Barr voiced her support for Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in a June 2016 The Hollywood Reporter interview. “I think we would be so lucky if Trump won. Because then it wouldn’t be Hillary.”[84]

    A July CNN story reported that she did not endorse Trump as she only supports herself for president — “I will be writing myself in in every election from now until I win.”[85] However in a now-deleted tweet to The Jerusalem Post, Barr revealed she voted for Trump.[86]

  98. 98.

    zhena gogolia

    @Joyce H:

    I’ve had the notion for quite a while that the upshot will be that Trump will eventually decide that he’s not having fun and it’s never going to get better, and just resign.

    This is what I pray for day and night. I used to pray for other things as well, but they are clearly not going to happen.

  102. 102.

    bemused

    @raven:

    I don’t plan to watch. I heard an excerpt on tv with Roseanne and Jackie sparring on trump. No thanks. I hear more than enough of this in real life.

  104. 104.

    MomSense

    @satby:

    My oldest son had it and it dragged out forever. He had a couple relapses of the active coughing and fever because he was pushing himself.

  107. 107.

    Betty Cracker

    @bemused: Barr is not only a Trumper, she went all-in on the Pizzagate lunacy, etc. She’s a raving nutjob now, whatever she might have been before. From what I’ve read about the “Roseanne” reboot, one of the goals is to bridge the divide between Trumpers and non-Trumpers. Fuck that noise, I say. I want those shitheads on the other side of a chasm from the decent people.

  108. 108.

    SFAW

    @TS:

    I do believe trump will not run for another term

    He will only NOT run if he’s in jail, has been impeached and convicted, or died.

  110. 110.

    rikyrah

    @Baud:

    Between Roseanne and the shenanigans at The Atlantic, I feel like there’s a new push to normalize Trump right now, maybe in anticipation of the midterms.

    Shenanigans at The Atlantic?
    Please explain.

  112. 112.

    SFAW

    @Betty Cracker:

    Fuck that noise, I say. I want those shitheads on the other side of a chasm from the decent people.

    Are you feeling OK? This comment seems more charitable towards those morons than you usually are. The “real” Betty would have them at the bottom of that chasm, with the proverbial metric fucktonne of hazardous waste, pigshit, and sharp objects covering them. I realize it would take a pretty yuuuuuge chasm, but that’s OK. And if we can cover over the entire lot with concrete, so much the better.

  117. 117.

    SFAW

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Let’s send them to the center of the galaxy.

    Let’s start small — send them to the center of the Sun. Tell them it’ll be OK, because we’ll send them at night.

  118. 118.

    Dog Mom

    Regarding the Rochester meet up last night: It was well attended by the interesting and intelligent front pagers, commenters and lurkers from the area. Not to say there are not other interesting and intelligent folks who were not in attendance. (That sentence just hurt my head.) Good conversation occurred – the group was comfortable enough to feel photographic evidence was unnecessary. Pictures of babies and pets were shared as well as favorite blog moments. Most if not all suggested we meet again. Thank you to John Cole for creating and keeping this place in the digital universe. Thank you to Anne Laurie for posting the meet up and reminders.

  120. 120.

    Brachiator

    @SFAW:

    He will only NOT run if he’s in jail, has been impeached and convicted, or died.

    Can I vote for “all of the above?”

  123. 123.

    schrodingers_cat

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Very Pretty. Husband kitteh would love to have that on his office wall. Can I buy/get a print?
    Kthxbai.

    ETA: Center of the Milky Way into its nursery, an inky black black hole as dark as their hearts.
    ETA2: You should go to the southern hemisphere, I have heard that the night sky there is amazing (including the Milky Way, of course)

  129. 129.

    Josie

    @satby: Haven’t read the other comments, but i totally understand what you are describing. It took forever to get over the cough, and I am still dealing with the fatigue and brain fuzz that would not go away. I have just recently started back to work on the book I am writing and halfway gotten back on my exercise routine. Some days are better than others. I don’t know if it is this particular virus or just a result of getting older, but I have never taken this long to recover from an illness. My mantra, for now, is “One foot in front of the other.” ; – )

  130. 130.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Betty Cracker: Their token minority Reihan Salam is a gasbag of hate too, who thinks that it is the white people who are the real victims of racism.

    ETA: He was one of the first gasbags to vent at HRC for her India remarks, for which she should not have apologized.

  134. 134.

    Immanentize

    @Betty Cracker:

    They hired a racist, misogynist shithead (Kevin Williamson) in the interest of intellectual diversity.

    I guess Sullivan didn’t want his old job back?

  135. 135.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @schrodingers_cat: It’s too noisy, I’ll get a better shot this summer. I’ve been to the southern hemisphere(French Polynesia), but I didn’t have a good camera and there was a great deal of drinking involved.

    ETA: As I told Baud, my chances of leaving California for the duration are slim to none at this point, my travelin’ days are over.

  137. 137.

    cosima

    Little C has made the finals of the French spelling bee! It’ll be held at Holyrood in Edinburgh, so I’m excited about that part. I’ve had to talk Little C down from the ledge over this thing for two weeks, and to be honest I was hoping she’d do well, but not make the finals, because I didn’t want her to stress any longer over this. However, we will now be practicing French every day (or close to it) until ??? when the finals are (no idea, can’t find it on the internet anywhere). That is my good news. My other good news is that my heart tests went well, no dramatic intervention needed, just meds.

    I’ve already hated on The Atlantic in the other thread, so I am staying with good news so as not to harsh my (much-needed) mellow.

  146. 146.

    WaterGirl

    @schrodingers_cat: Yesterday was my 2-week anniversary of the broken ankle. I had an x-ray where they make you put some weight on that foot to make sure everything is lined up properly. Then i saw the orthopedist who said everything lined up perfectly and that she can already see evidence of healing in the x-ray. I told her I had been doing everything she said, including eating lots of protein and fresh fruits and vegetables. She said she could tell that i had been, because x-rays don’t lie!

    I am down to one advil, twice a day, which I think is pretty good! Still I will be on non-weight bearing casts for another 4-6 weeks. I see her again in 2 weeks for a repeat of the x-ray and office visit.

    Between that and Henry’s post ACL surgery, everything is still complicated, and Tucker came home on Tuesday, which makes things more exciting, though possibly not in a helpful way. And my car croaked after my appointment yesterday, so we were stranded there for about an hour and a half, trying to jump it, arranging a tow, arranging for a ride home, etc. Apparently the universe thought my life wasn’t interesting enough. :-)

    Still, what matters is no surgery for me and the break is healing and Henry is coming along nicely. Henry does the water treadmill therapy for 30 minutes a day – by tomorrow he will be halfway through those. Thanks for asking!

  147. 147.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @schrodingers_cat:
    Another one that completely and abruptly disappeared was Jonathan Bechamel Hollandaise or whatever saucy nym he had. Can’t now recall whether he was an actual troll or just supremely annoying.

  150. 150.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Gin & Tonic: Okay, I was only passing on the wisdom I have heard, and from the astronomical documentaries shot from the southern hemisphere. I have never been to south of the equator myself.

    ETA: Sometimes the hype doesn’t live up to one’s exceptions.

  154. 154.

    Gin & Tonic

    @WaterGirl: My physical therapist recommended a supplement called Bone-Up. You can find it in Whole Foods and on line. I don’t know if it helped me but I like to think it did.

  155. 155.

    rikyrah

    Why Trump’s preoccupation with ‘central casting’ matters
    03/29/18 08:40 AM
    By Steve Benen
    Donald Trump appears to have picked Navy Admiral Ronny Jackson – the White House physician – to oversee the Department of Veterans Affairs in part because the president likes him personally. But the president recently said something else about the doctor that offered an important insight about Trump’s perspective.

    Trump’s positive impression of the military doctor had staying power, with Trump praising Jackson to donors during a fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago in February.

    “He’s like central casting – like a Hollywood star,” Trump said, according to an audio recording of his remarks obtained by CNN.

    In other words, the president has an image in his mind of what someone in Jackson’s job is supposed to look like, and Trump is impressed because the physician matches that image.

  156. 156.

    Old Dan and Little Anne

    @schrodingers_cat: About an hour north of Oswego, NY there is a place called Sandy Creek on the shore of Lake Ontario. A Friday night camping there provided one of the most amazing night skies I had ever seen. Lo and behold I spent Saturday night arguing with my RWNJ “friend” that that night’s sky was not as brilliant as the night before due to it being a bit overcast. He was convinced the skies were exactly the same both nights. Amazing stupidity these people.

  157. 157.

    The Other Chuck

    @bemused:

    Has Roseanne always been a rightwinger? Maybe she was and I missed it but I was a bit surprised to read she was a trumper.

    She ran for president herself in 2016 2012 under the Peace and Freedom Party banner, which I believe is positioned somewhere to the left of Jill Stein.

    She’s always had a “blue collar” (or at least “plain-spoken”) image, but I’m pretty positive now she’s either a weathervane or more likely cultivating an image while looking down at her audience as easily-manipulated mouth-breathing yokels. Props to her acting skill if it’s the latter.

  161. 161.

    FlipYrWhig

    @schrodingers_cat: He thinks he’s a 35-year-old with good hair and a strong chin, which is why he surrounds himself with 35-year-olds with good hair and strong chins, like Rob Porter and that “body man” guy whose name I can’t remember.

  164. 164.

    rikyrah

    Why Donald Trump is ‘obsessed with Amazon’
    03/28/18 12:56 PM
    By Steve Benen

    When it comes to the political world’s interest in tech giants, many of the key players in D.C. have been focused heavily on Facebook, especially in the wake of the controversy surrounding Cambridge Analytica. Axios reports today, however, that Donald Trump’s interests are elsewhere.

    Capitol Hill wants Facebook’s blood, but President Trump isn’t interested. Instead, the tech behemoth Trump wants to go after is Amazon, according to five sources who’ve discussed it with him. “He’s obsessed with Amazon,” a source said. “Obsessed.”

    Trump has talked about changing Amazon’s tax treatment because he’s worried about mom-and-pop retailers being put out of business…. His real estate buddies tell him – and he agrees – that Amazon is killing shopping malls and brick-and-mortar retailers.

    The piece added, “The president would love to clip CEO Jeff Bezos’ wings. But he doesn’t have a plan to make that happen.”

    There’s certainly room for a spirited conversation about the online retailer and its influence in the marketplace, but I think New York’s Jon Chait is correct when he argues that for Trump, Amazon is simply “the outlet for his hatred of the Washington Post.”

    In theory, Trump might have developed an economic theory that Amazon is inappropriately benefitting from public policy, and have drawn critical conclusions about the journalism at the Post, and it is merely a coincidence that the same person, Jeff Bezos, owns both businesses. In practice, Trump makes no pretense of obscuring any connection between the two. When he lashes out at the Post’s coverage, he segues seamlessly to Amazon. Trump has done this over and over. […]

    Whatever the merits of his case about Amazon, it has nothing to do with helping mom-and-pop shops and everything to do with his authoritarian desire to control the news media.

  166. 166.

    WaterGirl

    @Gin & Tonic: The very knowledgable woman I see regularly for my back recommended a whole bunch of supplements, which i purchased on day 2. Took photos of the bottles so I could share with the orthopedist, who promptly told me she didn’t want me to take ANYTHING like that while the bone was healing. After that it would be fine.

    I kind of split the difference – i am taking arnica and symphytum, and I sneak a vitamin D capsule every now and then. But I’m not taking the bone repair stuff – she was adamant that calcium and magnesium were NOT helpful.

    So maybe it’s a ford-chevy thing? Everyone has their biases, but no agreement on what is best?

  167. 167.

    rikyrah

    BREAKING: @GovWalker calls special elections Tuesday June 12th. pic.twitter.com/BmbuqX2xBj

    — Emilee Fannon (@Emilee_WKOW) March 29, 2018

  168. 168.

    WaterGirl

    @rikyrah:Thanks. Kind of funny to think that Henry and I are in the same holding pattern, we just have to get through the next 6 weeks, and we are both in cages of a sort.

    Still, this has completely opened my eyes to all the things I have taken for granted. My world is turned upside down for maybe 10-12 weeks. Other people have their world turned upside down forever. Perspective.

  169. 169.

    WaterGirl

    @FlipYrWhig: I remember when I turned 40 – my church at the time was creating a photo directory of all the members. I wore my favorite blue shirt and when I got the photos back, i was really thrown for a loop. I looked OLD – lines in my face that I didn’t even know were there. I still felt young but I didn’t look young anymore – I had to come to terms with that.

    Has Donald Trump never seen a photo of himself? Has he never seen the photo of himself in those light-colored pants, from behind, while golfing?

  170. 170.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Some promising news: BBC is reporting that Yulia Skripal is greatly improved, no longer listed in critical condition. (Her father’s condition is apparently unchanged.)

  171. 171.

    WaterGirl

    @rikyrah: Great news! I had read that the judge said Walker had until today to announce the special elections. At least there is some rule of law still standing.

  172. 172.

    Heidi Mom

    @satby: I’m delighted to meet another Longmire fan! The final season is stupendous. I may be the world’s only Longmire fan who was glad at the announcement that the show’s sixth season would be its last, because that knowledge allowed the writers to tie up loose ends for everyone (well, almost everyone — what can you do with Travis?!), and the results are very satisfying. And, speaking as one who often thought the show should be called “Standing Bear,” the viewer’s final look at Henry had me laughing for joy. (Spoiler? That’s not a spoiler! They were never going to kill off Henry.) Happy viewing!

  175. 175.

    Heidi Mom

    @satby: Same here. And the wind, the endless wind! South-central PA has always had its share of windy days, but this winter was something special in that regard.

  176. 176.

    satby

    Had to step away to drive my 87 year old farmers market neighbor in today, she lives 30 minutes away from the market (and me). Thanks to all of you who replied to my fatigue question! At least my misery is relieved that I have company. But, damn!

    @OzarkHillbilly: @Baud: oh you two! I likes youse bestest.

  177. 177.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @WaterGirl:

    I’m not sure a proportional response is even possible, but fully agree with your sentiment!

    And let me add my own very best wishes for a complete and relatively comfortable recovery, for both you and Henry.

  179. 179.

    Wild Cat

    @The Other Chuck: She’s had a self-admitted history of mental illness. Too bad she’s inflicting it on the rest of us, and enabling the ghouls to take mental-health care away from the poors.

    Fuck her. And fuck John Goodman, a good actor, for whoring himself out.

  180. 180.

    Brachiator

    @WaterGirl:

    So maybe it’s a ford-chevy thing? Everyone has their biases, but no agreement on what is best?

    Supplements are largely junk science. Calcium and magnesium would seem to be reasonable, so I wonder why your doctor was adamantly opposed.

    Anyway, good to hear you are on the mend.

  181. 181.

    Heidi Mom

    @satby: Have you read the books? On his annual book tours Craig Johnson makes a stop at a little mystery bookshop near here (I don’t know why, as it’s not on anyone’s radar, but there’s apparently a connection that goes way back), and I’ve seen him several times. He said that when he and his wife saw Robert Taylor’s screen test, his wife said “He walks like a Westerner.” Maybe the wide-open spaces of Australia have that effect???

  183. 183.

    Miss Bianca

    @donnah: @donnah: i had a friend recommend “Justified” to me and I am such a huge “Deadwood” fan that i jumped on it. Almost didn’t make it past the first episode, but persisted and am so glad i did. To this day, I still crack up when I remember Raylon’s boss describing him as his “hillbilly whisperer.”

  185. 185.

    Steve in the ATL

    @MomSense: loved Justified as well, but don’t waste time watching it again. There are too many other worthwhile shows to watch in the limited amount of time you want to spend watching tv.

  186. 186.

    Fair Economist

    @Joyce H: Trump won’t resign because once he’s out of office he’s just another person to flip to get at the real masterminds behind this operation, the Russians and the Mercers. He doesn’t want to spend the rest of his life worrying about polonium tea and Novichok doorknobs.

  187. 187.

    Rand Careaga

    @WaterGirl: I’m sixty-five. The guy who returns my gaze from the mirror still appears youthful to me, but the photographic evidence reveals a startlingly weathered visage. I imagine that something like this obtains for President Spanky, although he can probably draw upon profounder powers of denial than I have at my disposal.

  189. 189.

    sukabi

    @satby: it’s just as likely that he’s a shitty lawyer and the force of threats and money backing him have kept his shittiness as a lawyer out of play until now.

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