Tiny New Mexico town shuts down program that gave New York hedge fund manager Robert Mercer a badge https://t.co/7l6Kt8ldh5 w/ @zekefaux
— Zachary Mider (@zachmider) April 10, 2018
Okay, maybe us ungrateful American peons don’t understand what the Mercers so generously offered to do for us, but at least there are other nations where globe-trotting oligarchs of strong familial bonds are properly appreciated. And while Putin’s fading kleptocracy — and his noisy WH figurehead — might be hogging the headlines right now, it’s China where forward-thinking empire builders really have room to grow. The NYTimes, committing actual journalism:
… The revelation last month that Cambridge Analytica improperly acquired the private Facebook data of millions of users has set off government inquiries in Washington and London, plunging Facebook into crisis. But it has also battered the nascent political network overseen by Ms. Mercer, 44, and financed by her father, Robert Mercer, 71, a hard-line conservative billionaire.
Ms. Mercer’s standing in Mr. Trump’s circle had already declined following the departure last year of Stephen K. Bannon, her family’s former adviser and President Trump’s former chief strategist, according to Republicans with close ties to the president’s political operation. A pro-Trump advocacy group controlled by Ms. Mercer has gone silent following strategic disputes between her and other top donors. Plans to wage a civil war against the Republican establishment in the 2018 midterms have been derailed.
And last month, after reports on Cambridge in The New York Times, The Observer of London and The Guardian, Facebook banned the company from its platform, a major blow to any political or commercial targeting firm. Not a single American candidate or “super PAC” committee has reported payments to the company since the 2016 campaign, according to federal records.
Several Republicans in Ms. Mercer’s orbit or with knowledge of Cambridge’s business said that fallout from the Facebook scandal — combined with widespread doubts about the accuracy of Cambridge’s psychological profiles of voters — had effectively crippled the firm’s election work in the United States.
“They’re selling magic in a bottle,” said Matt Braynard, who worked alongside Cambridge on the Trump campaign, for which he served as the director of data and strategy, and now runs Look Ahead America, a group seeking to turn out disaffected rural and blue-collar voters. “And they’re becoming toxic.”…
In recent years, the Mercers have become among the most prominent and highly scrutinized political donors in the United States. In the early years of the Obama administration, they began doling out tens of millions of dollars to an eclectic array of conservative groups — many of them outside Washington’s mainline Republican establishment. Mr. Mercer invested $10 million in Breitbart News, the nationalist website, bringing on Mr. Bannon as chairman, while Ms. Mercer joined the boards of leading conservative think tanks.
The Mercers were critical of the Republican Party’s existing data apparatus, which was controlled by the party officials and consultants they hoped to disempower. Mr. Mercer bankrolled Cambridge Analytica in 2014, and Ms. Mercer encouraged candidates and PACs that took the family’s money to also hire the family’s data firm. Early in the 2016 presidential campaign, the Mercers backed Senator Ted Cruz of Texas, putting millions of dollars — and Cambridge Analytica — behind him.
But after Mr. Trump prevailed in the primaries, the Mercers switched candidates. In summer 2016, Ms. Mercer helped orchestrate a shake-up that put Mr. Bannon at the head of the Trump campaign. After Mr. Trump won the presidential election, he attended a costume ball at the Mercer estate on Long Island.Ms. Mercer secured a slot on his transition team and prime seats at his inauguration. As Mr. Trump took office, she sought to take a leading role in America First Policies, a nonprofit formed to back the president’s agenda…
The Facebook scandal has hit just as the Mercers appear to be expanding their business in the world of big data. Public records show that Ms. Mercer, her sister Jennifer and Mr. Nix serve as directors of Emerdata, a British data company formed in August by top executives at Cambridge Analytica and its affiliate, SCL Group, according to British corporate records.
Incorporation documents state that Emerdata specializes in “data processing, hosting and related activities.” An SCL official told Channel 4, a British television station, that Emerdata was established last year to combine SCL and Cambridge under one corporate entity.
Exactly what ambitions the Mercers, who joined the Emerdata board last month, have for the company is unclear. Another Emerdata director, Johnson Ko Chun Shun, is a Hong Kong financier and business partner of Erik Prince — the brother of the education secretary, Betsy DeVos, and founder of the private security firm formerly known as Blackwater. Mr. Ko, who declined to comment, is a substantial shareholder and deputy chairman in Mr. Prince’s Africa-focused logistics company, Frontier Services Group.
Mr. Ko and Mr. Prince have links to the Chinese government: Another major Frontier investor is Citic, a state-owned Chinese financial conglomerate that for decades has employed the sons and daughters of the Communist Party’s elite families…
While in Hong Kong in September to speak at a conference, Mr. Nix told Bloomberg that Cambridge Analytica was looking into China for commercial ventures. “We’ve been scoping this market for about a year,” he said. “We see huge opportunity to bring some of these technologies to advertising and marketing space brands.”
Corner Stone
HAHAHAHAHA!
These people are clearly dangerous, but they are also deranged. They are arrogant and just can’t help themselves from over reaching.
Barbara
@Corner Stone: That may be but there is nothing to stop them form changing names and corporate vehicles and starting all over again.
debbie
Why haven’t the Mercers been arrested yet?
Roger Moore
I’m still not convinced Cambridge Analytica was anything but a front group for Russian intelligence.
Corner Stone
@Barbara: That seems to be Erik Prince’s specialty. Well, that and killing civilians.
I am still unsure how Betsy DeVos did not suffer for the sins of her brother during confirmation.
debbie
@Corner Stone:
Right. They really didn’t have to do anything. The Establishment seems to be resigning on its own.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Republican congress critter’s anonymous confession to Son of Erick
(link)
JPL
In the olden days, a female accusing the Governor of Missouri of physical abuse and sexual abuse would be news. just sayin
Corner Stone
I, for one, just don’t care for hearing anything Erick Erickson has to say about anything. And I certainly do not care what a chickenshit cowardly anon Congressman has to vent about Trump if he’s not putting his name on it.
Roger Moore
@JPL:
This has been news, and I expect the new report to be news, too. It may not take top billing, given the ongoing Trumpnado, but it will get mentioned.
JPL
@Corner Stone: yup!
JPL
@Roger Moore: When you read the report released today, it was rape. It was much worse than just a sexual encounter.
tobie
@Roger Moore: I agree. There’s no way CA could have done the sophisticated data mining they did without the help of Russian intelligence.
TenguPhule
@Barbara:
I’m certain a tumbrel ride could fix that.
Roger Moore
@Corner Stone:
So much this. I’m tired of all the Republicans who decry Trump in private but are too afraid to do anything about it in public. It’s bullshit, and you know it. What good does it do you to maintain the good opinion of people who aren’t willing to recognize evil when they see it? Do your job properly and let the chips fall where they may.
TenguPhule
@JPL:
The days when Republican Rapists were surprising news are long behind us.
trollhattan
Holy hell, getta load of Trump judicial nominee Wendy Vitter. Yes, of those Vitters.
No wonder hubby lurves him some hookers.
Roger Moore
@tobie:
That isn’t the big thing that makes me question them. It’s certainly possible for small companies to do sophisticated data mining. In practice, most of the real breakthroughs are pioneered by little guys who then get bought up. There are two things that make me deeply suspicious of CambAnal:
1) Their spiel about their psychographic profiling sounds like a load of bafflegab. That may be because they were trying to conceal how much data they had, saying they could profile people based on just a few responses to hide they were mining data they weren’t supposed to have, but when I think somebody is bullshitting me about one thing, I have to start questioning the other things they’re saying.
2) They were offering the kind of dirty tricks- entrapment, etc.- that spy agencies specialize in but data analytics companies don’t. Maybe they were lying to impress a potential customer, but maybe they actually can deliver those things because they have the resources of a spy agency to do those things.
Barbara
@JPL: I read it and my foremost thought was that Greitens was not a novice in this arena. He had clothes prepared for the occasion. I see divorce and resignation in his future.
JPL
@TenguPhule: I guess the idea of pulling a female off the stairs while trying to escape and forcing her to have oral sex is a bridge to far. They were fine with the bondage, but even for them, it was horrifying.
JPL
@Barbara: I hope they put his ass in jail. He is a good looking guy who was a navy seal, and you could see females falling for that.
I am furious that the news is not leading with the story, because it won’t end until they do.
Adam L Silverman
@Corner Stone: There isn’t a Republican member of the Senate she hasn’t given a ton of money to.
Barbara
@trollhattan: Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski could stop this.
TenguPhule
@JPL: I remember when Republicans trying to force their own wives to have sex with other men for their own enjoyment was considered new and shocking.
TenguPhule
@Barbara:
But they won’t. Because they’re Republicans.
Fair Economist
@Roger Moore:
I’m thinking all that “psychographic info” would be useful for phishing and password guessing.
TenguPhule
This is where we are today.
Chip Daniels
@TenguPhule: I’m old enough to remember when calling your own daughter a “piece of ass” was considered improper.
beef
I think it’s more likely that Russian intelligence couldn’t do such sophisticated data mining without some help from Robert Mercer. He’s one of the pioneers of the subject. (Expertise in one thing apparently doesn’t generalize to other things.)
feebog
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
I’ll take really stupid analogies for $400, Alex.
Corner Stone
@TenguPhule:
Considering that dude was married to Jeri Ryan, Seven of Nine, pure smokin’ hotdom I always wondered what went wrong in his life that that was his desired outcome.
Adam L Silverman
@Chip Daniels: Or dialogue from a niche type of adult video.
Roger Moore
@Fair Economist:
I don’t think you need “psychographic” info for that kind of thing. What you need is personal info: who does the person know and communicate with regularly, what are their interests, and that kind of thing. And yes, Facebook profiles would be a goldmine for anyone trying a spearphishing attack.
BruceFromOhio
Arm the insurgents, and then bet the farm.
Oops.
efgoldman
@Adam L Silverman:
Nobody here would know anything about that
BruceFromOhio
@TenguPhule: When you put the fucking arsonist in charge of the fire station, that becomes the new standard for success.
Roger Moore
@beef:
That strikes me as highly unlikely. Even when the USSR was lagging behind the US in other areas, they were always amazingly good at the kind of abstract mathematics used in data mining; they just lacked our hardware. I have little doubt the Russian government has access to very good data mining capabilities.
Mary G
The Mercers also have refused to pay taxes in the sum of 6.8 BILLION dollars. They all need to go to jail. They are traitors to this country.
efgoldman
@efgoldman: Help above, Mistyped email
BruceFromOhio
@trollhattan:
Ewww! There’s MORE OF THEM?
Need bigger boots to stamp the little bastards out.
TenguPhule
@Mary G:
Organ harvesting. I don’t think jail provides sufficient punishment here and I sure as hell don’t believe in rehabilitation for them.
TenguPhule
@Corner Stone: I got nothing. Guy was just completely fucking nuts AFAIK.
Mary G
@TenguPhule: I’m afraid we might find that they have no hearts.
Jay
@tobie:
Nope, that’s where Facebook, Aggregate IQ, the RNC, and other companies like Palantir come in, they turned Facebook users into “products” and created the target maps and sets.
Russian Intel then provided the hacks and leaks, Assange and Wikileaks, the first rounds of fake news and fake ads, and the trolls and bot’s to push them up the Social Media food chain, in collusion with Briebart and the 101st Fighting Keyboarders.
Then the FTFNYT and others piled on chasing non-scandals, non-leaks and risotto recipies, which provided cut, hype and paste templates for further targetted fake news and fake ads, while scammers from Macedonia to California piled on chasing the monetization of Fake News on social media.
SiubhanDuinne
@Fair Economist:
And I’m thinking all those special-occasion “frames” and “what celebrity/historical person do you resemble” would be useful for gathering biometric information.
Adam L Silverman
@efgoldman: Freed!
tobie
@Roger Moore: The other thing CA would need would be a lot of granular information about what districts and even precincts to target. This has always been the connection I’ve seen between Republican operatives, CA and Russian intelligence.
Oops….I didn’t see Jay at #44. I’m essentially in agreement.
TenguPhule
@efgoldman:
We hoped. In vain.
TenguPhule
@Mary G: Touche.
Mandalay
Speaking of “dealing a blow”, this is what the Republican Governor of Missouri has (allegedly) been up to:
Of course it’s all a “political witch hunt” according to the governor, but the report released today strongly suggests that he’s just a slime bag who likes assaulting women.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/22/us/eric-greitens-indicted.html
TenguPhule
@Mandalay: I dunno, he might still be re-elected. The days when sex scandals guaranteed resignations are behind us.
debbie
@trollhattan:
Frankly, this ticked me off a lot more about Vitters:
This is some dangerous shit and should automatically disqualify them for any position of power. Period.
Corner Stone
This sycophantic whitewashing of Saint ZEGS by the media is fucking nauseating.
Adam L Silverman
@SiubhanDuinne: Some of the biometrics can be pulled from pictures posted of oneself. Either alone or with others. Relative height, weight, body type, etc can be determined from the photos. As can hair and eye color. And obviously sex. It’s not quite the same as doing retinal scans, collecting finger prints, and taking a hair sample for DNA, but it’s a start.
?BillinGlendaleCA
OT: A picture for y’all, fisheye looking northeast from the US Bank tower in DTLA.
different-church-lady
@Corner Stone: There is only one politically-related hit for “ZEGS” on Google, but it is the number 1 hit.
debbie
@TenguPhule:
Hell, he won’t even call it “CFPB”!
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
CNN keeps saying Drumpf may not testify to Mueller.
But what they refuse tell their viewers is he can only do that by pleading the 5th.
Just say it: Drumpf is may decline to answer questions on the grounds they could incriminate him.
Just say it. Stop soft peddling it. Stop covering for him. Stop normalizing him.
Imagine if a Dem decided to plead the 5th – the media would treat it as if was Pearl Harbor redux.
Corner Stone
@Adam L Silverman:
Wwwhhhaaattt??! NO!!
Adam L Silverman
@Mandalay: Here’s the link to the actual report:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/10DAJM1LW2a2Uei5Dfv4b9yP9kiyGCvNg/view
What the MO legislative investigative committee detailed is that Governor Greitens committed a rape in 2015. Unless there’s something screwy with MO state law, this is still prosecutable within the statute of limitations.
Hoodie
@Corner Stone: Just suffered through Kasie Hunt on MSNBC. She made me want to throw up with her fervent account of the trials of St. Paul. You could tell Chris Hayes was ready to purge, too.
Adam L Silverman
@Corner Stone: Ayep.
Jay
@Roger Moore:
Anal’s claims on microtargetting, are actually not “their claims”. They are actually the claims of Dr David Stillwell and Dr Michal Kosinski, first made in 2007, based on their “mypersonality” app research, conducted by The Psycometrics Research Center at Cambridge University.
https://www.google.ca/amp/s/motherboard.vice.com/amp/en_us/article/mg9vvn/how-our-likes-helped-trump-win
It was turned into Apply Magic Sauce, a predictive app,
Then the data, the research and the apps were stolen by Russian Researcher Aleksandr Kogan, ( nee Dr. Spectre), who may or may not have modified the OCEAN profiling, to include the Dark 5, ( Fear, Anger, Hate, Racism, Resentment), before selling it to Cambridge Analytica.
Roger Moore
@TenguPhule:
He’s going on trial next month for the felony invasion of privacy and blackmail aspects of the case, so his primary worry has to be staying out of prison. I remember when politicians would resign in the face of felony indictments.
Corner Stone
@Hoodie:
That was beyond pathetic. A complete misread of everything Ryan related. I wish just once a pundit would risk being excommunicated and right after Kasie stopped talking said to Hayes, “Chris, I completely disagree with that garbage portrayal Kasie just falsely laid out. Paul Ryan is a fraud and a coward and has been a fraud for his entire career.”
Adam L Silverman
@Jay:
JPL
I find this amusing
@Peter KInder
Why such sadness..
TenguPhule
@debbie: She’s on a fast track under McConnell.
Jay
@Roger Moore:
Mercer was big in developing and adopting algorythmic trading and microtrading, to beat the normal movements of the markets.
Roger Moore
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Unfortunately, it’s not high enough resolution that you can see my house. I can see the tower from my balcony, so with a high enough resolution image you should be able to see my balcony from the top of the tower.
Ohio Mom
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: I saw that earlier somewhere else on the internet. The part that did not pass my smell test was roaming the aisles of a supermarket, cursing.
This congresscritter was not afraid he would attract attention with his rant? Or that nobody would recognize him?
Government is THE local industry in DC — a lot of the inhabitants work for the government in one capacity or another and as such, are likely to be aware of who is serving in Congress. For example, maybe your spouse works for the Bureau of X and you keep loose tabs on the congressional committee with oversight of X.
Maybe there would be no one in Safeway who would know who you were if you were either of the fellows in the story but I don’t think you’d take that chance.
So as much as I would like to believe this is true story…no.
efgoldman
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
I’m not sure that’s true. Existing precedent is from a civil suit. If Weasel Face had halfway competent lawyers (facts not in evidence) they could tie it up for years on the executive privilege issue.
Roger Moore
@JPL:
It’s sad when our leaders let us down.
PJ
@Jay: Isn’t Kogan more Dr. SMERSH?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Good god, the first half of the Hayes show was an absurd waste of time
Mandalay
@Hoodie:
She is slowly but surely sinking to the bottom of the bowl, desperate to not offend anyone having got her own show.
She spews pablum effortlessly (“Hope was like family to the president..”), regurgitates the meme of the day, and says absolutely nothing of value.
She should resign and offer to work for April Ryan for nothing for a year to raise her game.
Jay
@PJ:
When Kogan got married in S’pore, he and his wife legally changed their last names to Spectre, he changed his name back to Kogan when they seperated.
According to some rumours, even while married, his wife maintained a flat in Portsmouth, with a steller view of the Naval Base, and is suspected of being a Russian “illegal”.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Roger Moore: Yeah, it’s 10mm fisheye, so you can’t see much at a distance. I also had my 50-200mm zoom and took some shots.
ETA: I got the annual pass, so I have 11 more visits.
schrodingers_cat
@Jay: RL Elizabeth Jennings?
Mary G
@Ohio Mom: I thought the claim that either the congress guy or Erick shopped for groceries to be unlikely to be true.
ETA: edited out my brain freeze where I said something that was completely different from what I meant to say.
Thoughtful David
Paul Waldman has a pretty good take-down of ZEGS:
FTFWaPo
Best comment (paraphrased): “Paul Waldman just did something that would seem to be impossible: he eviscerated an empty suit.”
Ksmiami
@Corner Stone: All Republicans are pond scum and a mortal threat to the us and the world. Just keep repeating over and over
Roger Moore
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
I think you’d need something a bit more than 200mm to pick out individual buildings in Pasadena from DTLA.
schrodingers_cat
Tired of all the horrible happenings, I amuse myself with beauty
If there is paradise on earth, here it is
-Amir Khusro a 13th century poet who wrote in Hindavi (Hindi/Urdu’s predecessor) and Farsi, said about the Kashmir valley.
Haminastu
Thoughtful David
@Ohio Mom: Same here. Doesn’t pass the smell test.
Jay
@Ohio Mom:
It really doesnt matter if it happened, happened elsewhere, or never happened,
It’s Eric Erricson, so the story is being fed to the Republican base, you know, RWNJ’s. Will that cause them to demand “loyalty oaths” from their Sen’s and Rep’s? Will that cause them to primary anybody not full Trump? Will that cause them to curl up in a closet moaning over and over, we’re doomed? Will that cause the to dump Trump in the hopes of Dense Pense?
Who knows, I don’t speak Wingnut.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Roger Moore: I could if it was a really clear day, also it’s a cropped sensor so it’s more like 350mm full frame equivalent.
Jay
@schrodingers_cat:
Don’t get the reference,……..
schrodingers_cat
@Jay: Elizabeth Jennings, whose is a Russian illegal, deep undercover Soviet spy from the TV show Americans, played by Keri Russell.
Adam L Silverman
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Worst episode of Hollywood Squares ever!
Barbara
@Mary G: The claim about having an animated off-color discussion in a supermarket struck me as unlikely. The notion that pundits and pols shop at WF is totally likely. They are no different in their lifestyle preferences from the average well-paid urban professional. They are just hypocrites who hide these sorts of details from their readers and constituents. Remember that story about the $600 bottle of wine Paul Ryan enjoyed with some lobbyists? Just another day in paradise.
Another Scott
@schrodingers_cat: Beautiful. Thanks very much.
Cheers,
Scott.
JMG
No politics, watching Adventures of Robin Hood on TCM right now. Gosh, Olivia deHavilland was a beautiful woman. Not that the Flynn guy was bad looking.
MomSense
I’m really just so exasperated by this whole mess. On the one hand, I would like to relish that the Mueller investigation is accelerating and closing in on trump’s inner circle however I cannot escape the worry that he will do something f terrible. I feel like we are in perilous times.
Anyone else’s fight or flight triggered right now?
Jay
@schrodingers_cat:
Nope, Christal Ying Chen,
Funny thing, The Americans,
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegals_Program
Jay
@MomSense:
Nope. Treason Tribble’s most impotent when he’s rage eating.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Adam L Silverman: Ha! I will resist the urge to match the pundit with the 1976 B-list celebrity. Partly because I can’t think of anyone who was ever on Hollywood Squares as unlikable at that Burgess bloat from Texas
Mandalay
@Ohio Mom:
The parts that did not pass my smell test were the numerous lengthy quotes.
Either Erickson recorded the conversation with the other person’s consent (very unlikely), or Erickson recorded the conversation without the other person’s consent (very unwise), or Erickson is massively embellishing a possibly half-true story by fabricating stuff and putting quotes around it to give it a veneer of credibility (very likely).
Mnemosyne
@SiubhanDuinne:
So Facebook knows I’m actually a cat?
Intriguing. ?
(IOW — some of us use frames but don’t use photos of ourselves.)
Yarrow
@MomSense: I’m choosing not to worry about it and instead enjoy the hell out of the obvious panic among Republicans and especially in the White House. There’s not a lot I can do about what’s happening, so I’m choosing to spend my energy in that manner. And it’s just delicious to watch.
Mary G
@Mandalay: I think they were at a bar. They are both the kind of men whose wife shops for groceries, or they send the help. I would be astonished to find out that Erick Erickson knows how to pick out a ripe avocado.
JPL
Rachel just mentioned the Governor of Missouri. Thank you Rachel.
Elizabelle
@MomSense: I don’t like all the press questions and punditing about Mueller being fired — and here’s how to do it, Trump! — and wish we were already out in force, protesting to let the Mueller investigation run its full course, wherever it leads.
Make Trump focus on something other than what Fox & Friends & Shit tells him.
Mandalay
@JMG:
And she remains a beautiful woman at 101!
Near the end of this recent NYT article there is an absolutely stunning photo of her face.
Elizabelle
@Corner Stone: It’s NBC. They’re liars, if they want to advance.
MomSense
@Elizabelle:
I’m putting NK out of my mind temporarily but the situation in Syria is so tense and requires a steady hand. We have a raging asshole who feels cornered by his legal woes just looking for an outlet for his narcissistic injury.
Corner Stone
@Jay:
Mmmmmm….rrrraaagggeee eating…
Citizen Alan
@TenguPhule:
I’ve always been astonished when I stop and think that Barack Obama might never have become a Senator and then President had Jeri Ryan from Star Trek Voyager been open to Jack Ryan’s desire that they engage in public sex acts in swinger clubs. I think that was my first clue that the election of Obama to the White House might usher in perhaps the weirdest damned era in US history.
schrodingers_cat
@Another Scott: You are welcome. I love Amit Trivedi’s compositions, he does amazing work. Fitoor’s entire sound track is magical.
I have posted this before, music composed and sung by Trivedi.
Pashmina* from, Fitoor. An adaptation of The Great Expectations set in Kashmir.
Pashmina is the fine wool from Kashmir.
MomSense
@Corner Stone:
I’m stress cooking tonight – not so much the eating part. Let’s just say the kid and my mom are very happy.
eclare
@MomSense: Friend of mine and I consider Colbert to be therapy for these times…
Elizabelle
@MomSense: Yes. Syria, indeed. I guess maybe Trump can find it on a map by now. Maybe. His generals will tell him.
JPL
Adam, Is this possible?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-chooses-impulse-over-strategy-as-crises-mount/2018/04/11/884e33c2-3d9d-11e8-974f-aacd97698cef_story.html?utm_term=.5f4622e86491
I know I shouldn’t make light of the situation, but what else do you do.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@JPL: My god. I can’t pack to go to France for a week in 48 hours.
J R in WV
@Barbara:
“Remember that story about the $600 bottle of wine Paul Ryan enjoyed with some lobbyists?”
Yeah I do remember it. I believe it, because they’re dumb enough to pay that for good wine. But I’ve done small high-end vineyard visits in Europe, and drunk a lot of Champagne, and $600 is way more than you need to pay for great wine. I really doubt Ryan could tell the difference between $600 wine and $90 wine, which is pretty good stuff.
TS
Robert Costa still talking about bringing back the “real republican party”.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@TS: He came from the NRO. I think he’s a good reporter, and mostly plays it straight, but I think there’s a reason he’s so well-sourced.
clay
Rachel was just absolutely brutal to “the myth of Paul Ryan.” Absolutely took a sledgehammer to it, and all the pundits who fell for it.
JPL
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): Have a wonderful trip, and although it might be tempting to stay, come back.
Baud
@TS: Should we tell him?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@clay: That was good. I think Michelle Goldberg also came pretty damn close to sarcasta-quotoing Kasie Hunt word for word.
matt
You can see why these plutocrats hate democracy so much.
eemom
@Mandalay:
Olivia de H was indeed beautiful, but my favorite movie of hers is The Heiress, where they managed to make her look unbeautiful.
I wonder if it’s lonely to be the last one alive, when all the others of her era have been gone for decades….
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@eemom: Kirk Douglas is still with us. I don’t know what kind of shape he’s in, but not too many years ago I saw Michael Douglas on a talk show saying he got in trouble with Kirk’s wife for letting him order a second martini when they were out to dinner without her.
Elizabelle
@TS:
You mean the “centrist” Democrats? Or Charlie Dent (retiring), party of one?
rikyrah
@Adam L Silverman:
Yep. , Rape
rikyrah
In moderation, please help
Jackie
Why is there only 3 or so new threads per day? No exciting new topics?
Lapassionara
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): of course you can. Just gather yourself and find your passport. It is all you need.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@JPL: @Lapassionara: Sadly I’m going to France only in my imagination. Just like US troops can leave Syria in 48 hours only in Trump’s imagination.
Now I want to go.
JPL
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): lol We live in strange times. If it weren’t for Mr. Finch, I could leave in twelve hours.
patrick II
@Adam L Silverman:
Your various references in these comments amaze me. You must have the larges, best organized bookmarks collection in the world. Or you have an unbelievable memory.
Elizabelle
@Jackie: We’s been abandoned. Not a pet or fowl in sight.
Corner Stone
Hooooo…Joy Reid teeing the fuck off on Paul Ryan on Larry O.
Corner Stone
@patrick II: The man likes what he likes.
JMG
@J R in WV: My daughter works for a high end wine negociant (middleman) in Bordeaux. She’s at the fourth and final stage of the French wine expert examination process. And she has said many times that after you get to the 100 euro ($130) a bottle level, you’re not buying taste, just reputation. Mind you, selling the reputation is her job.
eemom
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Kirk was wheeled in at the end of one of the awards shows earlier this year. He’s, I think, 100 to Olivia’s 101, but looking, well…..knock knock knockin’ on heaven’s door, to put it discreetly.
Jackie
@Elizabelle: I has a sigh… ?
eemom
@Jackie:
@Elizabelle:
Maybe the FPers all have the common sense to be building underground shelters. Not even joking.
Corner Stone
Charles P Pierce
Paul Ryan Will Retire as the Biggest Fake in American Politics
“Instead, he’s going back to Janesville to be the Dad he’s always wanted to be, home to his 5,786-foot Georgian mansion on Courthouse Hill, and its 13 rooms, six bedrooms and seven bathrooms, the little house on the Wisconsin prairie that Ryan was able to afford because he married money, the one that’s on the National Register of Historic Places. Paul Ryan has somehow amassed a fortune of between four and seven million dollars without holding any job except “Congressman” for the past 20 years. “
Jackie
@eemom: ?
Barbara
@JMG: The point wasn’t about whether it was a good wine.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Corner Stone: Maybe in one of his farewell interviews will finally ask if his wife’s trust fund is a “disincentive to work”
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone: Have you been to Janesville? Since the auto plant closed, it’s a wreck. I doubt that Ryan is as beloved in in Janesville as he is in the vast rural parts of his Frankensteinlyngly gerrymandered district.
Adam L Silverman
@JPL: Yes it is quite possible. In fact I wrote a post about it last week.
rikyrah
@clay:
Felt so good to watch ?
Steeplejack
@Corner Stone:
Yeah, between her and Rachel earlier my rage over Kasie Hunt’s tongue bath is subsiding.
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus: Never had the pleasure.
Calouste
@Corner Stone: If you draw a Congressman’s salary for 20 years and you never spend a penny of it because your wife and the lobbyists pay for everything, you’d probably end up with $4 million. Bit of stock trading on “tips” from “friends” will get you further.
Btw, are we sure that the family he is going to spend more time with is his current one? His wife stayed in Wisconsin, and all that excitement from starving grannies has to find a way out somehow.
Corner Stone
@Steeplejack: I love me some evening Joy, 10/10.
Steeplejack
@Corner Stone:
Plus, I think, Ryan will be able to cart home about $10 million in unspent campaign and PAC funds.
Adam L Silverman
@Jackie: I was busy today. So I didn’t get to the Syria stuff till just now. That type of post can take almost two hours to put together, so…
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone: He won’t come back “home.”
Steeplejack
@Corner Stone:
Amen to that.
Aleta
I think Ryan might be gearing up to run in 2020.
Primary T if he needs to, but wants to be prepared for the “you’re fired” finale.
Does anyone have recommendations for where to eat really good food in Providence RI?
Dev Null
@Mandalay:
I don’t know whether it’s real or imagined or half-real or what, but Samantha Bee has written up a glorious investigation into who Schrödinger’s congress-critter might be (no, the other Schrödinger, the guy with the cat.)
https://medium.com/@fullfrontalsamb/we-used-all-our-detective-skills-to-figure-out-which-congressman-delivered-the-profanity-laced-b182447a29e1
Even if (ahem) Father of Erickson Ericksonson made it all up, the “list of alternative epithets for Erick Erickson” is worth the price of admission.
different-church-lady
But hey, he can’t put you in jail so no biggie, right?
Omnes Omnibus
@Aleta:
Who has done well after leaving the field for a couple of years?
Adam L Silverman
@patrick II: I am a master of google fu!
Omnes Omnibus
@different-church-lady: Oddly, it seems that your monomania is proved vaguely not wrong. Well done, you.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I don’t think he has the guts* to take on trump, or his voters, directly. If for whatever reason Pence is president, then maybe. 2024? Probably.
* Kasich might have that combination of guts/ego. Might. I can’t think of any others, except maybe some old folks out of New England who don’t seem to draw much attention (added)
Omnes Omnibus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I will repeat my question from above: Who has done well after leaving the field for a couple of years?
different-church-lady
@Omnes Omnibus: I dunno, I never thought it took any special skill to smell bullshit. But I guess it’s an aroma a lot of people find pleasant rather than repulsive.
Corner Stone
@different-church-lady: This seems like a really poor take. I guess there is some “hur hur hur” involved.
Sm*t Cl*de
@Jay:
The whole five-factor model is no better than phrenology, though.
different-church-lady
@Corner Stone: Hur hur hur may be the only thing left at this point.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Omnes Omnibus: Depending on how you define your terms (doing well and leaving the field): Romney? And there’s no accounting for the ego of politicians, especially youngest son of an Irish mother (and I can say that for reasons you may guess), one who’s been fluffed by Meet The Press types for a good chunk of his adult life. I would be more surprised if Ryan is done with electoral politics than not. I wouldn’t even be surprised if Christie makes a run in ’24.
And of course… we did have Richard Nixon to kick around some more.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Romney lost. Nixon is the counter-point. OTOH, Ryan has half (he is a fellow Delt, so i am being generous) the intellect of Dick Nixon.
Another Scott
@Omnes Omnibus: Jimmy Carter.
But that was 40+ years ago, and he camped out in Iowa, and he was the first to do it. And he had the benefit of the other political party being tied to a corrupt president who was forced from office.
Somehow, I don’t think ZEGS would have those benefits.
I don’t know why he thinks he could be elected President (if he actually does), or why he would want to be (given that the Congress is highly likely to flip). This “he’s going to run for President” stories seem to be standard pundit boilerplate to me. But ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Cheers,
Scott.
JR
@Dev Null: That was great.
I hate Forrest Gump, too. Damn, I hate to share anything with numbnuts like Erikson and King but there you have it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Another Scott: Okay.
Mnemosyne
@different-church-lady:
I see you caught my dead thread comment yesterday. ?
Still the dumbest Snowden defense ever.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I didn’t say I think Ryan (much less Christie) can win, I think they think they can win. As opposed to Santorum, for whom it’s a business model at this point.
The only evidence of smarts I’ve seen in Ryan is figuring out that he has to lie about his agenda to get anywhere
Aleta
@Omnes Omnibus: Won’t the campaigning for 2020 start up as soon as the 2018 election is over?
On the other hand, to me he doesn’t seem like the kind who’d run without direction from big backers.
SgrAstar
@schrodingers_cat: thank you, Madame Cat! That was wonderful.
dww44
@debbie: LOL. Truly, an establishment with not guts and little spine.
Omnes Omnibus
@Aleta: He won’t be in office. Will he?
different-church-lady
@Mnemosyne: Actually, still the dumbest Facebook defense ever.
Not that I was cool with what the NSA was up to. It’s just that it wasn’t up to the exaggerated stuff the cult of Snowden thought it was up to.
In the meantime, who did more damage to our democracy, FB or the NSA?
KS in MA
@JMG: How many times have I seen that movie? I just never get tired of it!
dww44
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Agreed. Costa’s sources have always been stellar. Believe the DT calls him frequently. I long ago figured our that, at the very least, he’s a Republican. But then if he’s a really good journo,no one will ever know his political preferences.
r€nato
@Mary G: Erick Erickson is sock puppeting, I’d bet serious money on that. The whole story just doesn’t have the ring of truth. It takes a writer with much better chops than those of a political blogger, to write dialogue coming out of characters’ mouths that’s believable. What Erickson wrote sounds very much like a brain dump of his own thoughts.