I’ve only been thinkfluencing here at the ranch for a few months, so I might not make the grade.
Meanwhile, the United States government, traditionally one of the bastions of press freedom, is about to compile a list of professional journalists and “top media influencers,” which would seem to include bloggers and podcasters, and monitor what they’re putting out to the public.
Great! Nothing nefarious to see here. Move along, folks.
If you would like to see more robust congressional oversight of these agencies, I think you know how to get it. It’s with the fund that’s split between all eventual Democratic nominees in House districts currently held by Republicans.
Update: Echo is feeling better.
Wag
Revolution is just a t-shirt away.
I can’t say how many times I’ve listened to that song since the election.
Eljai
I guess Masha Gessen and Sarah Kendzior were not being hyperbolic. Okay then, I’ll go contribute now. Let’s win this November!
RSA
I don’t really get it. This kind of information doesn’t sound unusual, hard to access or compile; further, it’s the kind of analysis you’d expect that the CIA and NSA were already doing internationally.
Yutsano
Paper ballots. Every machine. Let’s do this!
Also: still pushing for mail-in ballots. It really does work well.
Frankensteinbeck
@RSA:
It makes the Toddler-In-Chief feel like he can punish people for speaking against him. That he is not universally praised for being an asshole is torturing him. He keeps trying to hurt people who don’t give him enough respect, and like Amazon, they either ignore it or end up better off for it. He’s trying to be a dictator and failing. Pathetic, isn’t it?
RSA
@Frankensteinbeck: That makes too much sense, and now I’m suddenly more worried.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
But Obama oversaw NSA programs that had supervised retention, as Snowjob and his buddy asshat said. So Both Sides!
Jewish Steel
@Frankensteinbeck: That’s how it smells to me.
Jeffro
“Monitor”…why, Trumpov? Let’s ask him at his next press conference – remember those? I mean he hasn’t had one in over 18 months but whatever.
xjmuellerlurks
It would be interesting if this does happen and then down the road they have to start identifying some of the more “conservative” influencers as batshit crazy and outright fabulists. I don’t expect it, but one can dream.
Corner Stone
This year’s Masters just got a lot more interesting.
Eljai
@Jeffro: But didn’t our media overlords tell us that Trump is more accessible than Obama? Apparently, the definition of accessibility is inviting a reporter to Mar-a-lagofuckyourself and then having that reporter type up your lies verbatim.
Elizabelle
Echo’s gorgeous. So is Cisco.
On an internet break, but might have it installed next week. Trying to rebuild my attention span. Cheers.
bystander
Is there a word for the inverse of an axiom? For example, to the same extent that everyone who gets willfully involved with Sh*t Midas is turned into a heaping pile of manure, actively resisting and calling b/s is somehow a self-improvement.
rikyrah
Brandon Friedman
Verified account @BFriedmanDC
I’m told that Trump political appointees at VA headquarters have now *removed* all career executives from the 10th floor (where the Office of the Secretary is). The only remaining non-political staff are administrative. More changes expected in this “realignment.”
1:06 PM – 7 Apr 2018
Jewish Steel
@Elizabelle: They love to be admired. I will pass along your words.
Elizabelle
@Jewish Steel: Is Echo ill from the purloined dog treats?
efgoldman
@Corner Stone:
Fire breathing dragons on the 13th tee? The ten plagues of Egypt?
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@rikyrah: I don’t know why I keep being stunned but I do.
bluefish
I think we’ve seen where all this is going for awhile now. At some point, I’m ready to see Batman emerge and give em all the old rockem sockem. Heaven help us. They’re going full on fascist and hoping for what exactly? That we won’t notice or won’t care or something? Perhaps the tip they left us on the greasy pizza table is meant to keep us placated. This guy dreams of golden epaulets and plumed horses. In the meantime, largely Republican crickets amidst some expressions of startled, wide-eyed concern. Yeah, okay.
zhena gogolia
@bluefish:
I hope and pray that the anger this is causing leads to a huge Democrat victory in November.
rikyrah
A Muslim woman in Houston stabbed by man yelling “It’s an fucking raghead,” “sand nigger”
HOUSTON, Texas
(KTRK) — A $5,000 reward is being offered to help catch the attacker who stabbed a Houston Muslim woman during a hate-filled attack.
According to the Houston chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR-Houston), the 25-year-old victim, who is white and wears an Islamic head scarf (hijab), says she was driving home early Thursday morning from her job as a nurse when her vehicle was almost sideswiped
by a red SUV in northwest Harris County.
When the victim pulled over and got out of her vehicle to check for
damage after the near accident, the attacker made a U-turn and pulled up behind the victim’s vehicle.
The driver reportedly got out of his SUV and began shouting
obscenities and racial and religious slurs such as, “Oh my God, it’s a r**head,” “It’s an f***ing r**head,” “sand n*****” and other derogatory terms.
She believes it was because she was wearing a hijab.
lumpkin
@rikyrah:
Looks like they’re going to take a serious run at privatizing the VA
health system. On the one hand I hope they do because I think it will cause a huge backlash – this seems almost as politically toxic as cutting current social security benefits.
But on the other they might succeed.
Corner Stone
@efgoldman: Just a grand soft day coming home on the back nine.
Corner Stone
The Masters intro/exo music is an orchestral version of the band Skillet. I wonder if they know?
Yutsano
@Corner Stone: Dude…did you get your Selena cup at Stripes today?
No lie, I kinda want one…
DissidentFish
@lumpkin:
Bush and his crew always wanted to create a permanent Republican majority. This crew is much more of a cash and grab, oligarchs-take-the-spoils, kind of thing.
Another Scott
Twitler in the last hour:
How is him tweeting like this not Obstruction of Justice?? He’s attempting – at the very least – to interfere with the impartiality of a federal investigation.
The Committee – part of a separate (co-equal) branch of government – has ways of enforcing its demands for information. Why is he interfering in public like this?
Grrr.
Cheers,
Scott.
(“No need to answer – he’s either totally uninformed as to how this stuff should work, or he doesn’t care. Either way, he’s got no business acting this way.”)
GregB
I have been told the biggest threat to our freedom of speech is left leaning college students.
efgoldman
@Frankensteinbeck:
Is this really something that they want to put into effect, or just more bloviating in the Weasel Face manner? If the former, I’d expect multiple lawsuits to be filed first thing Monday morning.
Half-assed is this maladministration’s first, last and middle names
Corner Stone
@Yutsano: Not the biggest fan. But in case one does not know, South Loop and Wayside and Mo City are not the best places one may find themselves in the Greater Houston Metro Area.
BillinGlendaleCA
@efgoldman:
That might get me to watch golf.
efgoldman
@rikyrah:
Naah. He just didn't like drivers of little cars.Corner Stone
@BillinGlendaleCA: The leaderboard this year is quite the international gaggle. I am sure they are mostly libertarian type assholes, but it’s a global sense of assholdom.
rikyrah
Echo is cute ?
Roger Moore
@RSA:
It seems to me like a bigger version of the kind of thing every government agency’s media affairs department ought to be doing already: monitoring the media to see what people are saying. The problem is the same information can be used for nefarious purposes, and the Trump Administration doesn’t have the goodwill for us to trust they’re only going to use it for legitimate purposes.
Jewish Steel
@Elizabelle: A little peaked for a day. She’s feeling much bouncier now.
SiubhanDuinne
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady):
Keep on being stunned, shocked, horrified, disbelieving, incredulous.
The minute we take even the mildest of this crew’s infractions as in any way normal is the minute they start to gain control over us.
Ten Bears
Maybe someone will read my blog?
Jewish Steel
@GregB: Chait maintains that list. At no cost to taxpayers!
satby
@rikyrah: honestly, when my exchange daughters were here, I always was on the alert for any random asshole who might start some shit because they wore hijab.
And that was before the hate got weaponized by the Asshole-in-Chief.
Jewish Steel
@Ten Bears: Trump Stats Bump for Bloggers Announced!
satby
@Ten Bears: I like your blog, I have stopped by before.
schrodingers_cat
@satby: Was there any problem? BTW, how is the beached whale kitteh?
BillinGlendaleCA
@Corner Stone: No fire breathing dragons? Meh.
Jay
@Roger Moore:
Not just that, but drawing a nexus lexus between players.
Friedman’s ,(not that one) involvement in the Gate/Manifort Black Bag ops, while pretending to be a “journalist”, when he was actually an “Agent of a Foreign Government” and Lobbiest is something that would have been “nice” to know at the time.
Corner Stone
@BillinGlendaleCA: Well, Jim Nantz is involved. But that may fit better on the BDSM thread…
satby
@schrodingers_cat: there were a couple of times I caught people staring and gave them a hard look back. If the girls had negative reactions in school they never admitted it to me. But a lot of times I was prepped for hostility that never came, so that was good.
Beached whale kitty will be heading to the vet if she doesn’t have kittens by Monday, but she hasn’t even gone into labor yet. She’s freaking huge, and we’re a little worried that she’s carrying a big litter.
PaulWartenberg
We need a new Open Thread.
trump tower in NYC is on fire.
gene108
@Eljai:
Inviting reporters to parties seems to be the definition of accessible. There’s McCain and the cookout / tire-swing from 2008 or so. I am sure Bush, Jr. showed them a good time at the Crawford ranch.
Bill Clinton, on the other hand, tried to weed out fraud, waste, and abuse in the White House Travel Office and was pilloried for it.
Obama tried to point out Fox News is more a right-wing propaganda outfit than a real news organization and had a little rebellion on his hands from folks like Tapper and WHPC.
Baud
@PaulWartenberg: Protest or document destruction gone wrong?
Jay
BTW, Emptywheel has another must read up;
https://www.emptywheel.net/2018/04/06/what-did-wikileaks-do-with-the-dccc-emails-it-monopolized/
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@Baud: It’s on the 50th floor. You can see flames coming out the window.
ETA: As I recall, Trump misnumbered the floors to make the building sound taller. One of the jokes was the fire dept wouldn’t know where to go.
ETAA: And I just read that Trump says the fire is out.
The Dangerman
@efgoldman:
Too expensive; they had to settle for Conor McGregor and a folding chair.
Mike in NC
@PaulWartenberg: Burn, baby, burn!
Corner Stone
@PaulWartenberg:
(and women)
Baud
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady):
So it’s an inferno.
SiubhanDuinne
@PaulWartenberg:
Didn’t that happen a few months ago? This feels like old news.
ETA: Yes, my memory is accurate. January 8 of this year. Trump Tower seems to be exceptionally fire-prone.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2018/jan/08/fire-breaks-out-at-trump-tower-video
Bex
@PaulWartenberg: So are they burning all the records?
BillinGlendaleCA
@PaulWartenberg: Again?
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@SiubhanDuinne: There was a fire in January, but there was just one today too.
Mnemosyne
I’m liking the playlist at this Peet’s store. First it was Elvis Costello, then Bowie. I can’t quite tell what the next song is, but it sounds like soul — “Tears On My Pillow,” maybe?
Corner Stone
I hate that I want all inhabitants to not be safe and/or accounted for.
trollhattan
@Bex:
Rub two Russians together and you never know what happens next.
gene108
@lumpkin:
I don’t think you can transform something like the VA “overnight”, if the people in charge are thinking through how to privatize services.
So the effects may not be felt until after 2020.
But with Trump’s crew, I bet they try to do so fast people will get whiplash.
RSA
@Roger Moore:
This is a good point, along with the caveats you mention. Something less arbitrary than, say, petitions.whitehouse.gov.
BillinGlendaleCA
@trollhattan: BDSM thread is downstairs.
Mnemosyne
@SiubhanDuinne:
I’m guessing that shoddy construction and inflated prices were the order of the day when they were building it.
debbie
@Frankensteinbeck:
There have been precedents…
On the other hand, I’d like to see a counter-list of all those alleged public figures pimping for Trump.
debbie
@rikyrah:
Very telling that the reward’s only $5,000.
Schlemazel
@DissidentFish:
The mod calls it a “bust out” you take over a legitimate business then borrow as much as possible on the asset, but a ton of quickly fenced goods on credit & disappear. The real owner is stuck with a ruined business and huge debts while the mob has turned a tidy profit.
Bill Arnold
@lumpkin:
My guess too. This is a clearly a case where journalists, and bloggers like our David Anderson need to be doing preemptive cui bono analyses..
suezboo
Who would you reckon are the most influential lefty bloggers in the USA now ? Not ex-newspapers and magazines like Washpost etc., but individuals. Much as I admire Our Beloved Host, driftglass, digby, axios, edroso, Kos and many more, I put my money on Charlie Pierce at Esquire. You?
debbie
@Corner Stone:
Well built, my ass.
Omnes Omnibus
I love this song.
Corner Stone
@debbie:
Sounds nice.
.
.
.
Wrong thread?
Bill Arnold
@Another Scott:
Is the FBI entirely convinced that the Republican members of the House Judiciary Committee are not compromised?
Corner Stone
Am I the only one who can not discern a word Bane says? It all sounds like a low bass Charlie Brown teacher voice to me.
Mwah muh muh. Muh Muh. Mwah muh.
germy
@SiubhanDuinne:
Someone’s gotta be burning evidence up there.
Waratah
@rikyrah: I have been waiting for the veteran organizations to start screaming about what is happening at the VA.
Bill Arnold
@Bill Arnold:
Bad link due to disruptive house guests, links: cui bono analyses.., or another basic link.
Matt McIrvin
@Corner Stone: After a while the Tom Hardy Bane started to sound like some kind of twisted jolly Santa Claus to me. “People of Gotham! You have been VERY NAUGHTY this year!”
But: @bluefish: I wouldn’t assume Batman is on the good guys’ side.
Shell
What happened to Echo? (Beautiful gams on that dog, by the way)
Ohio Mom
@suezboo: I think our problem is that none of the bloggers on our side is particularly influential. Except for Cole, because his blog changed his politics.
@Corner Stone: It is simpler just refer to firemen (and women) as firefighters, but I suppose that is too sophisticated for the likes of Trump.
efgoldman
@Ohio Mom:
We don’t have an echo chamber. A mixed blessing.
efgoldman
“Hello”
:::tap tap:::
“Is this thing on?”
Steeplejack
@Shell:
Echo stole and ate a bunch of forbidden food.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
among other things…
Mr Real Estate over here
Calouste
@BillinGlendaleCA: I’d watch the fire-breathing dragons, I still wouldn’t watch the golf.
Chet Murthy
OT (but not really): I wonder if the Harry Potter books are enjoying a resurgence of interest. I read ’em back in …. 2015? 14? Before the election. And I finally broke down and started re-reading, b/c I need some comfort food, to at least somewhat erode the mounting existential dread.
schrodingers_cat
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Reihan Salam (sp?) said the same thing on the Snooze Hour yesterday. He is a really smooth liar.
efgoldman
@Calouste:
The dragons are way more interesting; a lot more action.
JPL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Doesn’t he have a fox person to dine with tonight.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Calouste: I said, “might”.
JPL
One person is dead in that well built building.
Chet Murthy
@Chet Murthy: maybe shoulda added “b/c the books chronicle a world in which all the institutions of the state have been taken over by a genocidal totalitarian dictator, and he ends up losing”. [but probably most people around here read ’em long before I did.]
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I know he lies about how tall it is, I didn’t know this
Mnemosyne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Somebody needs to post photos of the other places in DC that rent for $1500 a month. I’ll bet they don’t look much like what Pruitt was getting for his money.
Omnes Omnibus
Chemical attack in Syria?
Steeplejack
** DVR Alert (Reboot) **
Somebody’s got some ’splainin to do at Adult Swim on Cartoon Network. Their overnight schedule last Saturday-Sunday was totally verpfuscht, nuking my previous suggestion to watch the first two episodes of Cowboy Bebop.
They are (re)running the first episode, “Asteroid Blues,” at 3:00 a.m. EDT Sunday (that is, tonight) and presumably will be running one episode per week going forward (26 total).
Apologies to anyone who recorded incomplete pieces of other anime series last week.
Corner Stone
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I want someone to ask him if he would rent a place in DC for $50 a night, only on the nights it was used.
ETA, If he says Yes then ask why he charges $450+ for his hotel in DC. If he says No then ask him why this asshole got a “market rate”.
Jewish Steel
@Shell: Echo’s misdeeds chronicled here.
debbie
@JPL:
I’d hate to think that was due to a violation of the Fire Code.
RedDirtGirl
Cool! I found where everyone is! Open thread/Dog Blogging: I have always said “My next cat will be a dog.” I think when Alice shuffles off this mortal coil (she’s a scraggly 17 yo), I will dip my toes in the water by fostering a dog.
RedDirtGirl
@Eljai: “Mar-a-lagofuckyourself”…
Wow! I love that! Thank you. A little too long for a button, but maybe stickers!
Steeplejack
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
The building passed its safety inspection by Fire Marshal Ronny Jackson and has a BMI of only 29.9.
debbie
@Omnes Omnibus:
I await Trump’s tweet of condemnation.
RedDirtGirl
@Ten Bears: Just bookmarked it.
Corner Stone
@Steeplejack: Ohhhh…What did the five fingers say to the face?
SLAP!@!!@!
GregB
Germany has just excoriated US leadership under Trump and states the two nations will never share the same relationship again.
Trump is setting the world alight.
RedDirtGirl
@PaulWartenberg: And here’s his tweet:
“Fire at Trump Tower is out. Very confined (well built building). Firemen (and women) did a great job. THANK YOU!”
J R in WV
@Schlemazel:
That is the business strategy of Mitt Romney’s firm, also, too! Buy a company, use all the assets of that company to create immediate profit for you the new owner, borrow a lot and use THAT borrowed money as profit for the new owner, cash in the pension ownership of the newly bought company, use THAT money for profit, then run away.
That’s partly why Remington is bankrupt, along with their sales of a hunting rifle that unpredictably fires a round when the safety is moved. People were convicted of murder because of accidental discharges that killed people. That will cause a drop in sales as well. Between the new debt and the drop in sales, BOOM.
SiubhanDuinne
@Corner Stone:
This.
Thisthisthis.
Get these bastards coming and going, at every opportunity.
Jewish Steel
@Steeplejack: Ha! Am I the only one who thinks that Ronny James Dio is going to be the next head of the VA?
dopey-o
@rikyrah: i may know who that is. who would i contact to pass the name along?
JPL
@debbie: Trump won’t even mention the person that died and the firefighters injured saving his precious building.
Eljai
@RedDirtGirl: I was not the first to come up with that, but as soon as I saw it I knew I had to steal it!
Steeplejack
@Jewish Steel:
I think it will be Dr. Ronnie James, D.O., who is an actual (and valued) commenter on this blog.
debbie
@JPL:
Huh. I was sure he would fly up there and rush into the building with no protective clothing just to save his tenant.
Steeplejack
@dopey-o:
From the linked article:
Harris County (TX) Sheriff’s Office: 713-221-6000.
If you get the reward, let me know, and I’ll tell you where to donate $100 to cover the 60 seconds it took me to get you the information.
Villago Delenda Est
Anyone involved in privatizing ANY aspect of the VA should be subject to…bad things. Very bad things. Like being drawn and quartered.
J R in WV
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
One thing I learned from reading about today’s fire at Trump Tower NYC – there are no fire alarms to warn residential tenants to flee the building when a fire is detected.
People were warned via tweets and texts from friends and other tenants, not by a huge, HUGELY loud alarm ringing, buzzing, blaring into their ears, nor flashing lights for deaf people – NADA, that’s how Trump Tower alerts their tenants about a fire in their building.
Trump is lucky 500 people didn’t die in the absence of alarms!!! ‘Cause that would be MURDER in my book. Actually, the one death is murder, in my book.
Ohio Mom
@GregB: If we could get along with Germany after the Third Reich, they can get along with us after Trump. I get why they are unhappy but geez Louise, a lot of us here aren’t happy either.
Omnes Omnibus
@Villago Delenda Est: For once you are too kind and understated.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Jim, Foolish Literalist
sounds like something that may get more attention….
Villago Delenda Est
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Scott Pruitt may have received zero death threats, but he’s got enough of a guilty conscience to know that his actions as EPA head are deserving of death threats.
Lyrebird
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yeah, I guess inflated claims of threats from environmental activists is Orangemandias’ idea of virtue signalling. Or dog-whistling of a different sort. Creep.
Ruckus
@rikyrah:
I like that the shitgibbon is fucking up the VA. What kind of an asshole would he be if he didn’t fuck over everyone equally?
Ruckus
@efgoldman:
I’d use all assed as a description rather than half assed. Hell they’re going for the lifetime all asshole all the time award. They are trying to make the republican party seem tame in comparison. It isn’t working of course because the republican party is in on the game and have been trying to win this award for years.
pat
@Ten Bears:
I just took a quick look at your blog, and noticed a big mistake: There is about 1-3% Neanderthal DNA in modern humans, NOT 40%! I don’t know where the 40% came from, because the abstract of the paper clearly states, in the first sentence:
Leto
@Villago Delenda Est: I know this is a dead thread, and it’s basically shouting into the void at this point, but Republicans changed the military retirement system from a defined pension to a 401k and nobody (here) said a fucking word. They’ve also continued to cut/erode basic benefits to military people and nobody (here) says a fucking word about it. While I appreciate people at least recognizing the problem that will happen to VA privatization, I don’t really expect much coverage from front pagers on this issue, nor really any issue pertaining to military benefits. I guess it’s just the continued, inevitable/expected erosion of all public sector benefits.