A hive of activity in the house- Tammy has been slaving over a hot stove while the kids have been helping. The pizza idea went the way of the dodo, and instead we’re having spaghetts, garlic bread, meatballs, and salad, with brownies and ice cream for dessert.
In other completely typical news for the Cole family, my sister Devon rescued a bunch of mallards today from a Rite Aid parking lot. They were walking around unattended and Devon called Humane Animal Rescue and the lady said if the mom is not within five feet she is probably dead. Devon waited a while and no mom, so she scooped them up:
They are now safe and sound at the Wildlife Rehab place. Do Coles just have animals thrown at us by the gods, or do my sister and I just notice them and do something about it?
Brachiator
When you have mallards thrown at you by the gods, you know what you have to do.
Duck.
Major Major Major Major
You’re good peoples, Coles. I used to have two ducks, ‘Bernard’ and ‘The Archduke.’ I believe they were eaten by raccoons.
In shameless self-promotion news, I’m pleased to report that chapter three has finally started on my webcomic.
@Brachiator: booo
Sis
Animals have always found my family, too. My aunt has a theory that they have a network to let each other know: these people are softies.
sukabi
Salad with ice cream & brownies… Hope it’s fruit salad…otherwise I question your choices.
Gelfling 545
Something beautiful and inspirational.
https://mobile.twitter.com/harvard/status/999690410065842176?lang=en
chris
@Major Major Major Major: Chapter 3? Woohoo!
Excellent! Read and upvoted.
Pogonip
Glad you do know what to do. In my dad’s last nursing home, a mother duck was leading her brood and something spooked them. Few things are cuter than those fuzzy little billiard balls scattering everywhere. One dived into the pond. A kindly, if misguided, urbanite rescued it for fear it would drown. (I wonder if her last name was Cole.). Mom took off with the rest of the ducklings and when she didn’t come back for a couple of days, an employee who had a farm took the duckling home.
Sandia Blanca
@Sis: As one whose home has been coopted numerous times by stray cats, I am convinced they have a secret mark they place on the doorframes of our houses.
Genine Tyson
@Major Major Major Major: Congrats!
J R in WV
Pretty cute for ducks!
Summer makes a lot of work for the compassionate sometimes. Keep up the good works.
Major Major Major Major
@Sis: My family too, especially my grandpa. He’s always nursing things back to health. He found my grandma’s beloved dog Lady quite mistreated, discarded on the side of the road. The vet said she’d been abused at a puppy mill. And then she got turned into the most spoiled dog I’ve ever met, so, good for her.
schrodingers_cat
So fuzzy and cute.
Mai naem mobile
I listened to part of NPRs pieces on Puerto Rico. Why has it taken a year to cover this shit? Its disgusting and really sad. I don’t get emotional easily but I was getting emotional listening to the stuff. We’re still the wealthiest country in the world and we don’t look after our fellow countrymen. Or we choose who is going to be taken care of. Fuck Trumpov. Also Melania, there’s something just weird about it. I wonder if the pressure if being FLOTUS just got to her and she told him she wants a divorce. I mean, all they need to do is present a photo of her doing something normal and timely and the speculation would end. They could even photoshop the pic if she doesn’t look all that great post surgery if she really had surgery.
SiubhanDuinne
As some of us in these parts are wont to ask, ¿Por qué no los dos?
You and your sister (and your other sister, and your brother, and your ‘rents) are all very good people. Thank you all for your Coleishness.
TaMara (HFG)
Clearly Devon and I are soul sisters. Glad they are safe and sound. At least she didn’t have to buy them a hut and make them part of the family. LOL
NotMax
What’s on the program for the movie night? If one may be so bold as to inquire.
Ben Cisco
@Brachiator: Your winnings, sir.
SiubhanDuinne
@schrodingers_cat:
Make Way for Ducklings!
opiejeanne
Baby duckens!!! The Coles are softies and all the animals know it.
In other bird news we have a nest of swallows in the side of our house, right where the heater vent pipes come out of the house. I can’t see how they can get through the wire mesh but I have a short video of one of them entering and leaving. Needs editing, nothing happens for the first 37 seconds.
opiejeanne
@TaMara (HFG): did you buy yours a hut? I missed that, but I hope it’s cute.
Mnemosyne
I was hanging out in the garden near my writing workshop in Pasadena and spotted a very small hummingbird enjoying the salvia. It was probably about the size of my thumb.
I only got a silhouetted photo of it, unfortunately.
SiubhanDuinne
@opiejeanne:
My own names for baby ducks and baby geese are “dumplings and goblins.” There’s an abundance of both in my front yard right now. Even in a quiet apartment complex, they can, and do, hold up traffic for 10 minutes at a whack. I don’t mind — I’m retired, I’m not going anywhere — but the commuters get annoyed.
NotMax
Slept a full seven hours, something I was beginning to think had been relegated to the past.
7 a.m. to 2 p.m. Luscious. Never have been a morning person.
Olivia
I think the universe throws things (ducks, dogs, cats, people, etc) at you because you are the person who has the unique gift to know what they need or to find someone who does.
Major Major Major Major
@Genine Tyson: @chris: Thanks!
Patricia Kayden
Lovely animal rescue story. Your family must give off good vibes to attract so many and such a wide array of animals. Cute ducks!!
raven
I managed to AGAIN leave one of Lil Bit’s seven eye meds at home and now I get to do the magical mystery tour of trying to get a prescription called in and filled down here at the beach. I specifically went to her doggie eye doctor to get extras but no Latanprost!
opiejeanne
@Mai naem mobile: There has been a lot of joking speculation about where Melania is, but now I’m starting to see some real concern even though it’s people who do not like her. I haven’t seen any RWers worrying about her welfare at all, just telling us to shut up.
Shell
Both! The gods sometimes know what theyre doing.
NotMax
@raven
Need one of those tackle box/pill box thingies with seven slots.
Patricia Kayden
@Mai naem mobile: Over 4,000 dead and scores still without electricity. Worst of all, hurricane season is just around the corner. God forbid that Trump goes down there and throws more paper towels at them.
opiejeanne
@raven: Can Costco fill veterinary prescriptions? I’ve have to call to have my prescription with them in Washington filled in California and they were great.
opiejeanne
@Patricia Kayden: someone said he had to be dissuaded from throwing canned goods at them on that trip.
Oh, and idiot Florida Governor Scott was just there and says he can’t think of a thing he could have done better for the Maria victims, than what Trump had done for them.
NotMax
@opiejeanne
Went to confession and is still listing transgressions?
Shell
I was delighted to see Netflix just added “The Kings Speech”. Finishing it up now.
raven
@opiejeanne: I know the drill since I’ve done this before. Her eye vet can call it in to a regular pharmacy on Monday. I’m so worried about her Laryngeal Paralysis, I just don’t have any sense in how badly she’s doing. She breathes really hard when she’s excited (read there is ANY chance of food) and the heat and humidity aren’t doing her any favors. She’s so sweet but I don’t know how ling she has.
NotMax
@Shell
I make a point, near the end of each month, to seek out one of those sites which list “everything” coming to and leaving Netflix the following month.
Everything in quotes because there is always stuff they either are not informed about or choose to ignore, usually of the non-English variety.
Here’s one such site for June 2018.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@Mai naem mobile:
I speculate that Trump killed her in a fit of rage after, as you suggested, asking for a divorce, and the White House is trying to cover it up. Imagine if the President murdered the First Lady and what that would do to the public. Perhaps some misguided folks in the military are also helping in some attempt to protect the office. Why not? It seems everyone else tries to bend over backwards to protect this moron.
/total conspiracy theory but one I’m proud of.
raven
@raven: long
Brachiator
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
This president? A good chunk of his supporters would volunteer to help bury the body in the Rose Garden.
NotMax
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
As she’s Catholic, asking for divorce would not seem to be high on the list of probabilities. Then again, the marriage is not one sanctioned by that church, as Dolt 45’s previously divorced wives are still living.
Shell
An upcoming film starring Clint Eastwood. Or should it be Tommy Lee Jones?
NotMax
@Shell
Christopher Walken. Maybe Billy Bob Thornton.
MobileForkbeard
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: Honestly, I’m pretty sure that either he hit her and they’re waiting for it to heal, or just that shes using this excuse to get the fuck away from him.
Spanky
@NotMax: Dennis Hopper would have made a good Trump. Sad that he’s unavailable any more.
Spanky
@Spanky: Nick Nolte?
Ken
Shell, NotMax, Spanky: Are you talking about who would play
Trumpthe hypothetical killer President, or who would play the guy trying to prove he did it?opiejeanne
@NotMax: I think the Catholic church turns a blind eye if those other wives were married outside the Catholic church. like in a Presbyterian church. Those marriages don’t seem to count and he could have married Melania in a Catholic church.
Zelma
OK. I’m old. I’ve seen too much. And this is an open thread so I’m going to vent. I have decided that the problem with the world is the human race, at least a significant part of it. The events of the last two years have turned me into a misanthrope. I had an encounter tonight with a seemingly intelligent, purportedly nice local fellow. He is active in all sorts of local organizations and makes a significant contribution to the community. (Of course, my community doesn’t need lots of contributions since the average home is worth over $1.5 million.) OK. I live in LaLa land where there are 1200 voters of whom 99 are Democrats. But I listened to a guy who, in other circumstances, I would like and respect who told me the Trump would go down in history as a great president and that until Trump he had usually voted Democratic. He confessed to being a hippie (c. 1965.) He attacked Obama as having ruined the country. And I looked at him and I saw racism personified. And I despaired of the future of my country and the world.
schrodingers_cat
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: Apparently a sitting President cannot be indicted, according to some people. So why not?
SiubhanDuinne
@opiejeanne:
I’ve noticed the same. One doesn’t have to be a tinfoil-hat-wearing conspiracy theorist to observe that a three-week radio silence about FLOTUS — any FLOTUS — is unusual, to say the least, and worthy of concern. I get that Melania’s a grownup, she knew what she was getting into, she knew who she was marrying, she went along with the birther shit — I get all that, but I honestly don’t think she’s an evil person and I hope she’s safe. Barron, too, who comes across to me as more than usually vulnerable. I wish neither of them ill.
Zelma
BTW my comment to him was “F*ck Trump.” But I’d had a little too much too drink.
SiubhanDuinne
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
Where are those WH leakers when we could really use them?
opiejeanne
@Zelma: Haha! Good for you.
I really hate what’s happened to people I used to like since Obama was elected. Some of them acted delighted that a black man had been elected, at first, but most did not and began foaming at the mouth the day after he was first elected. I can’t look at them these days, and some of them were neighbors and family. It’s gotten worse, though, since Trump.
NotMax
@opiejeanne
Could be off base but I thought it still required an annulment, for appearance’s sake. And she was brought up in the more stringent (read: hidebound) old world Catholicism, for whatever that’s worth.
rikyrah
You are good people, Cole family ?
rikyrah
Uh huh..
About Joy Reid
https://twitter.com/leahmcelrath/status/1002678868556353536?s=19
Patricia Kayden
@Zelma: What percentage of White males voted for Trump? Your story is not surprising in the least. I assume that 99% of the White men I interact with voted for him. I just don’t discuss politics with them and stick to work issues.
They’re delusional and racist so let them enjoy their Trump. I don’t see his presidency ending well so there’s that.
trollhattan
@Spanky:
Is Nick Nolte still with us? He’d make a good Trump. Divine would have been good too.
Rosie O’Donnell is my go-to otherwise.
rikyrah
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
Now, I hadn’t heard that one.?
It would be irresponsible not to speculate.
NotMax
@Patricia Kayden
Really, that’s rather an unfair assumption.
trollhattan
@Zelma:
Did he take the brown acid? Because otherwise he has no excuse.
rikyrah
Seriously though..
Phuck the NYT ??
https://twitter.com/PeterHamby/status/1002968888299016194?s=19
Patricia Kayden
@opiejeanne: The article I read said that the crowd had to tell him not to throw canned chicken (which he had just discovered) at them. Sigh.
smedley the uncertain
@Gelfling 545: Thank You.
NotMax
@trollhattan
Howzabout Robert De Niro?
dmsilev
We had some very confused ducks at work yesterday. They’re used to swimming around in a large reflecting pool, but the other day the pool was drained so that some repairs could be done. Yesterday, I see the ducks …walking around in the middle of the dry pool bed.
Guess they didn’t read the email from Facilities.
NotMax
@Patricia Kayden
“More and more people are hearing about canned chicken every day.”
:)
mattH
Doesn’t matter, just keep doing what you do ^_^
Omnes Omnibus
@NotMax: Why? Do you know where she lives? Where I am, it would be incorrect. In other places I would guess an understatement.
Edited.
opiejeanne
@NotMax: I thought the same thing about needing an annulment but they’re really hard to get unless you are willing to wait months or years, and/or have a gob of money, which our friend did not have when he married his second wife, in a Catholic church. He explained that since his first wedding took place in a Protestant church it didn’t count.
Yutsano
@opiejeanne: I’m in the “Kill them all. God will know His own” territory with these people. At least my conservative/libertarian brother hates Dolt45.
lamh36
Ok…I’m still slow from my vaykay, can someone remind me who Tammy is again?
I got back from my trip late Thursday night, and I was supposed to catch up on sleep Friday, but I came home to fallen ceiling tiles, and a wet carpet near/under the AC…ugh. So I had to get up to get to the apartment office to let them know about it and to get them started on reparing it all.
Add to that I started back at work today, so, I didn’t get to catch up on sleep like I wanted, AND my fav cousin and his GF are having a baby an had their baby shower today, and I coudn’t miss that, so I hitched a ride w/my sister and Zoe.
I’m glad I did go, cause I had a great time with the family. Oh and
Zoe loved her Koala book bag I brought for her from Australia!
And now I’m still awake trying to catch up on some things I missed, but I’m tired AF and I still have to work tomorrow and Monday before I’m off again on Tuesday & Wednesday…
So I’m drive-by commenting, and off to bed.
TTFN…BJ
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@SiubhanDuinne:
I hope she’s alright. I don’t wish death on her so much as I do on her husband and those that enable him and have a choice. Technically, she could walk away, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she genuinely fears for her life. If she were to ever publically criticise Trump or otherwise humiliate him by divorcing him, the howler monkeys would turn on her so fast.
It’s a fucking cult of personality around this creep. He’s the great white hope and white supremacy personafied. Whether his supporters are conscious of that or not, that’s why they cling to him so much. These are the same people who think POC, African-Americans in particular, are “living on a plantation” because they predominately vote Dem. Look who’s talking; they have enslaved themselves to this demented, diseased pig of a man because they can’t handle that people that look different than them have rights too (or are supposed to).
They can’t stand to see people protesting for their rights at football games of all things.
The Dead Kennedys were right: these people are just a bunch of Archie Bunker slobs waving flags. So easy to use so proud to enforce the status quo, whatever it is.
SiubhanDuinne
@lamh36:
Wait, I thought you were in Melbourne! Need to catch up!
Well, welcome home, sorry about the mess in your apartment, ugh, but glad you’re back. I look forward to detailed reports and pictures when you get back on schedule.
smedley the uncertain
@Patricia Kayden: I’m part of the 1 %…
Zelma
@trollhattan: I don’t know what “brown acid” he has taken. I’m not sure what “brown acid” is. All I know is that I live in a resort community which simply could not survive were it not for all the immigrants who do all the heavy work. The Hispanics mow the lawns, clean the houses, build the new MacMansions, cook the food, pick up the trash and contribute in a myriad of ways. And yet I think they remain invisible to the vast majority of people. The average age in the town (local residents) is close to 70 and we are 100% white. I am increasingly uncomfortable with living here, but there is something about hearing the ocean from one’s house. The house has been in the family for decades which is the only reason why I can afford to be here. The political stance of my neighbors somehow didn’t matter before Trump. But my realization that the vast majority of them voted for a racist, fascist ignoramus has changed my feelings. Which is one of the reasons I have become a misanthrope
lamh36
@SiubhanDuinne: thx…yep, I’m back…a bit sluggish, but I am back w/no major injuries or new afflictions…so that’s ALWAYS a win after such a long vacation.
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
Even in Alabama, the percentage wasn’t that astronomical.
White college grads (37% of population) Trump: 45 Clinton: 49
White, no degree (34%) 67 28
Non-white college grads (13%) 71 23
Non-white, no degree (16%) 75 20
Source
Calouste
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: I don’t think he killed her, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he beat her up.
Patricia Kayden
@smedley the uncertain: Lol! I assume that 100% of Balloon Juicers are. I work in the military (as a civilian) so yes, most of the White men I work with are probably Trump supporters. A few have stickers to make that abundantly clear.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@NotMax:
And of course that article was written before it was widely considered that the Russians could have influenced the outcome of the election or voter suppression.
rikyrah
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
Their vessel for White Supremacy is an international embarrassment.
Let them cling to him??
smedley the uncertain
@Patricia Kayden: Retired GS-15, Major Army Command Hq… Still kept my principles.
Cheers
NotMax
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
Can’t really fault them for reporting on what was known at the time.
M4
@trollhattan:
Oh my god, she would have been amazing.
NotMax
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
May it (FSM willing) parallel Nixon, when it became far easier to find hen’s teeth than anyone who would admit to voting for him.
TS (the original)
@Calouste:
My first thought when I heard she was in hospital with “kidney” issues.
And the media speculation if Hillary Clinton or Michelle Obama had disappeared in this fashion! What hold does trump have over US media people? Just weird. Surely it is not all about access.
smike
@NotMax:
“Non-white college grads (13%) 71 23
Non-white, no degree (16%) 75 20”
If I am reading that correctly, wtf?
NotMax
@M4
Sadly, died just as she was about to break into the consciousness of the mainstream/great unwashed, having been cast to play Peg Bundy’s mother on Married with Children.
NotMax
@smike
Yup. Took me aback as well. But it is what it is.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@NotMax:
I don’t either
jl
Thanks for cute kidpix.
And what a wonderful plump (English terms of venery, Wikipedia) of ducklings . I hope Cole’s sister lets Cole fuss and bother over them all he wants, and Cole can build a little duckling heaven. With a little pond, mudhole, jacuzzi, water slide, swing, wide screen TV, stereo system, fish vending machine, everything they could ever want.
Mnemosyne
@smike:
Those numbers don’t match with any other state, so they seem really odd to me. Black men nationwide voted for Clinton 80-20 (and black women voted something like 95-5 for Clinton), but in Alabama over 70 percent of them voted for Trump instead, including the college educated?
That means that, in Alabama, more non-white college graduates voted for Trump than white college graduates did by 25 percentage points. Does that seem plausible to anyone?
jl
@Mnemosyne: Those are the numbers in the link. I have to wonder if the numbers got mixed up in the article.
Edit: or the survey method was sketchy. Were those exit polls? I’ll go check the link.
A Ghost To Most
Trump’s tiny hands may have been mocked by Kim Jong-un’s over-sized letter
My favorite headline so far this year.
Mnemosyne
@jl:
Something weird happened. I could buy it if the numbers for non-white voters were flipped, but being told that a huge majority of college educated non-white voters went for Trump while he barely won with white voters?
Something smells fishy, to say the least.
sukabi
@TS (the original): it’s been documented that he liked to listen in on his guests / workers via a special switchboard installed in his suite…he also likes to see his name in print…what’s a comped room in exchange for favorable coverage….and if in the process of getting the story the reporters engage in some encouraged, questionable behaviour and Drumpf has guaranteed favorable coverage for the foreseeable future.
When access won’t work, there’s always blackmail as a backup.
thalarctosMaritimus
@Sis: Like hobo code.
Your aunt’s on to something there; I’m sure they’re spreading the word.
jl
@Mnemosyne: I checked the link. It’s not clear where those numbers come from. The link is to an article by Richard Fording, but I can’t see any corresponding numbers in that link.
I know who Richard Fording is, and he’s sent me some numbers from his surveys for research. He’s a knowledgeable and careful researcher, he knows his stats. If they are numbers from his research, that would be interesting. They would have some credibility, from what I know of him. But I don’t see those numbers in the link.
Guessing from the language in the piece, it looks like Fording did some research on low info voters and and that table shows how many subjects had a favorable versus unfavorable opinion of the candidates, and it was done before the 2016 election. Favorable opinion some indeterminate time before the election is not at all the same as how they voted. So, I think the link was sloppy about what the numbers in that table meant.
Edit: I don’t have time to follow all the links, but I think Fording designed the study so that all the subjects met his criteria for ‘low information’ regardless of education level. Fording kind of implies in a polite scholarly way that his definition of ‘low information’ is kind of also means so damn butt ignorant they need to learn some facts before they know what they are doing.
Maybe another commmenter has time to figure it out. I’ll check bck tomorrow.
NotMax
@jl
Agree the article is unclear. However it is dated nearly two weeks after the election. Citing pre-election numbers by then would be somewhat disingenuous. But neither is it out of the question.
Did a cursory look around for any later correction at the site and found nada.
jl
@NotMax: All the quotes I saw from Fording were about the study he did, not any data he gathered from the election. So, like I said, I was guessing from what I had time to read. Who knows what the reporter decided to do?
I’ll check back later and see if anyone can figure it out.
NotMax
@jl
And, frankly, even if the numbers should turn out to precede the election, they’re eye opening.
Tenar Arha
@opiejeanne: @Mai naem mobile: Today I learned it wouldn’t be the first time that a First Lady got hit in the WH.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@NotMax: I think the non-white numbers must be switched, that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
Given how non-whites voted in the rest of the country, Alabama certainly seems to be a major outlier since, according to those numbers, a small majority of white college graduates in Alabama voted for Hillary and a large majority of non-white college graduates voted for Trump. That seems … unlikely.
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
Here are some numbers from the Roy Moore/Doug Jones special election that explain why I think those other numbers are hinky — 57 percent of college-educated white women voted for Moore in December of 2017, and the numbers were even higher for college-educated white men.
But just one year earlier, a majority of those same voters went for Hillary? Really?
Lymie
@Mnemosyne: probably a hummingbird moth – the caterpillars are the big tomato eaters.
Yarrow
@lamh36: Welcome back! Hope you had a great time. I enjoyed your photos.
jl
@Mnemosyne: I have to go, so someone else needs to check the links to figure out that kinky hinky mystery table. From what I read, those numbers are from Fording’s study., and they are all from low info people regardless of educational level,. And as I noted above, someplace in the story, I think Fording said that those low info voters are so ignorant they don’t really understand what they are doing. if that is the case, and it was favorability not who the voted for, the numbers could look very funny.
Mnemosyne
@Lymie:
Nope, definitely a real hummingbird — I can see its curved beak in the silhouetted photo I took, and I got a good look at it while it was feeding. It was green and red, so possibly an Anna’s Hummingbird? I would need to look it up.
I have seen hummingbird moths in this area before, though. They’re pretty cool, if a little disconcerting.
NotMax
@Mnemosyne
No one is denying the numbers skew odd as printed.
The original point has been somewhat lost, however, which was assuming 99% of white men one encounters voted for Dolt 45 is hyperbolic.
Mnemosyne
@NotMax:
It’s very dependent on the area, even in blue California. Patricia works with the military, so the vast majority of white men she interacts with almost certainly voted for Trump. Zelma lives in a wealthy white beach enclave so, again, there is a high likelihood that any middle-aged or older white man she encounters voted for Trump.
I live in the San Fernando Valley, where a majority of middle-aged white guys hate Trump and are vocal about it. The worst I can say about the ones I know is that a couple of them voted third party.
Even where you are, I will bet you that there are at least a few areas where most or all of the white folks voted for Trump, and not just on the military bases.
Yarrow
@NotMax: I don’t see it as hyperbolic. I see it as a safety and job security issue. It’s the safe bet statistically that white men voted for Trump. It’s safer to go with that assumption and let them prove you wrong than go in the other direction and have to deal with an angry Trumper, especially an angry white male Trumper who may be in a position of power and authority and can affect your livelihood.
NotMax
@Yarrow
Shall stick with the tried and true tenet of innocent until proven guilty all the same.
John Revolta
I’m sorry but I just can’t believe that Trump beat up his wife.
Mainly because he’s a chickenshit. And I’m betting Melania could beat the snot out of him.
NotMax
@John Revolta
Yeah, the Melania speculation has gone off into la-la land.
Expect rumors any time now that she’s shacked up with Dr. Ronny Jackson on board a yacht in international waters.
Yarrow
@NotMax: I understand. I think that those who are not white men, and even those who are but live/work in places that are filled with Trumpers, are warier.
Suzanne
Multiple strays have found their way into my care—one of the damn cats I found is currently enjoying year eight at my house. Having said that, I think it also has to do with where you live.
Yarrow
@NotMax: The whole thing has seemed off from the beginning. The official explanation for her hospital visit (if that actually happened) didn’t make sense. Even the cable news channels’ medical consultants were like, “Well, it’s a bit of a long stay in the hospital for this type of procedure…” We didn’t see her go there or come back. She’s not been seen in weeks. Trump vaguely waves at a window and says she’s “looking at us” to the gathered reporters. She wasn’t. Someone tweets on her account saying she’s fine–could be her, could be anyone. The whole thing is just bizarre.
I don’t buy their official surgery explanation. It never made sense. Whatever it is, who knows. I would like to think she’s refusing to be seen in public until they renegotiate the prenup. She knows she’s causing him a problem at this point and it’s leverage. She wants money and security for her and Barron. She may be hiding until she gets it.
NotMax
@Suzanne
Landlady’s current cat showed up one day out of the blue. Possibly to fraternize with the cat she still had then. Belonged to people down the street. Fully grown. When informed they said, “Keep it.” Must be six years now that it has stayed with her. Follows her around like a puppy when she’s doing gardening.
Calouste
@John Revolta: The shitgibbon beat up (or strangled, can’t remember) one of his other wives because she made fun of his botched hair job. Or maybe he just outsourced the job to Corey Lewandowski or that other wife beater that left the White House a few months ago.
Suzanne
@NotMax:
As she married a two-time divorcé and known cheater, not to mention posed for some rather, uh, sexualized photographs, one might come to the conclusion that she isn’t a particularly devout Catholic.
NotMax
@Yarrow
For someone so invested in her outward appearance (articles have mentioned she and her staff take two hours each morning to get her hair and make-up just so), could be something as simple as having a noticeable or adverse cosmetic reaction to medication, and she finds taking the Victor von Doom mask route unappealing.
sukabi
@NotMax: no, that’s Drumpf…shouldn’t take her that long, she’s got a better canvass to work with…
Yarrow
@NotMax: It’s been about three weeks, right? That’s a long time for an adverse cosmetic reaction to medication. I suspect it’s something more than that. But who knows. The real issue is, she hasn’t been seen and the official explanations don’t add up.
NotMax
@Yarrow
Just throwing into the mix the typical recovery times for rhinoplasty.
Tenar Arha
@John Revolta: @NotMax: It’s the accumulation of ?, & her obvious disgust for him that are causing the trouble.
Yes, we don’t know what’s going on. And yes, Orange Julius is a coward. OTOH IIRC first wife Ivanka also said in a divorce deposition that he pulled out some of her hair & raped her.
It could be she only is out of the public eye for plastic surgery. But why wouldn’t they have prepared a cover story before a 3+ week public absence? And if she’s simply sick, why not say so? And if she’s working out how to divorce him, hiding her entirely from the public doesn’t help him either. Why the heck aren’t the media asking more forcefully what’s up?! The media jackals’ restraint is bonkers abnormal.
Last, the disappearing/suddenly hidden spouse is a DV red flag. If she was a woman in “my office” who disappeared wo explanation for weeks & only replied to email using her husband’s idioms & sentence constructions I’d try to catch her picking up her kid at school, or talk to her parents if I knew them, or worst case scenario I’d call the cops to suggest a well being check. YMMV
ETA “my office” bc I don’t work in a office, same idea though…
NotMax
@sukabi
Know I didn’t imagine the two hour figure but can’t find it right this minute. Meanwhile, this:
Melania Trump’s 75-Minute Beauty Routine Warrants Its Own Glam Room in the White House
Yarrow
@NotMax: Sure. And that’s the cosmetic/plastic surgery speculation, which seems to be one of the more popular ones. Would make sense because she probably has a clause in the prenup saying she has to stay looking a certain way and it was time for a tune up.
NotMax
@Tenar Arha
Presume that is a rhetorical question when it comes to these clowns.
;)
NotMax
@Yarrow
Some medication for kidney disease results in bloating and puffiness, especially of the cheeks. Gary Coleman was a prime example.
Suzanne
@NotMax: I was reading an interesting piece about the appeal of the aesthetics of certain political movements, and the sort of images associated with those movements. I found it very convincing. I have been arguing for a while that much of the reason that Trump won is because he very purposely adopts the semiotics of the WT class, who hate liberals so fucking much because liberals have all of the cultural power. Liberals are cool and stylish and lead aspirational lives, and all these shitty conservatives realize that no one wants their lives, and that many of us find them outmoded at best and grotesque at worst.
Anyway, I have been thinking about shifting beauty standards a great deal since the royal wedding. One of the major topics under discussion in the fashion press has been that Meghan Markle wore relatively minimal makeup and purposely imperfect hair, and how that indicates a shift in cultural values, where there seems to be a growing desire for freshness and authenticity. There is a growing reaction to the kind of heavily applied, intense, and expensive makeup that people like the Kardashians wear as passé, fake, and honestly…..the kind of thing that older people do when they are try-hards. Melania wears that kind of makeup and hair, and it seems like this is another cultural dividing line. Yet another semiotic way in which people who used to think of themselves as The Shit are no longer cool.
I am really increasingly convinced that the realization that other people think that conservatives are fucking LAME and that they have shitty taste is stoking a huge amount of the sTrumpets’ cultural grievance. How much of our relationships are really predicated around liking the same stuff?
NotMax
@Suzanne
Don’t get me started on Republican women in Texas and their Big Hair.
:)
And it’s about goshdarn time.
Suzanne
@Yarrow: If she really did get plastic surgery, then she HAS to stay in hiding, because she’ll have blood coming out of her whatever.
Noticeable plastic surgery, especially nose jobs and boob jobs, is another one of those increasingly passé things. I was reading just this week about how rhinoplasty is on the wane in the US, bigtime. I would like to think that’s because beauty standards have expanded and that women who are not WASPs feel less pressure to conform.
NotMax
@Suzanne
Big, big business in places like Brazil, where it costs a fraction what it does here.
Yutsano
@NotMax: Asian women still get a lot of plastic surgery, especially skin lightening. Cultural beauty standards can be hard to change, even in modern China.
Suzanne
@NotMax:
Exactly. No one who is a cultural influencer (stupid term but useful) wants to look like that. Lord, it used to be that if you went to any college campus in Dallas that many of the girls would tell you about how they got their boobs done as an eighteenth birthday present—it was such a rite of passage. Now it just looks mildly trashy.
The dominant aesthetic of a good American life is so much different than in used to be. And this is why I think that Trump hates Obama so fucking much: because BHO is COOL. He has the kind of effortless, urbane style that is very much of the moment. And Trump has never been accepted by the people he wanted to accept him…..then this young black dude with a funny name and no pedigree is beloved by Everyone Who Matters. It would be funny if this psychodrama wasn’t DESTROYING THE COUNTRY.
Major Major Major Major
@Suzanne:
Call me crazy but I imagine I would’ve found it mildly trash back whenever that was, too.
Suzanne
@Yutsano: Yes, skin lightening is very much a thing in Asia. It’s always struck me as ironic that Asian women have been trying to lighten their skin to look more white while white women in the US go to tanning salons to look darker.
@NotMax: For sure. Beauty standards are very cultural. I was trying to find a link to a story I read about how some white supremacists were recently complaining about how “their women” aren’t considered beautiful anymore, and they cited Audrey Hepburn as an example of white women’s beauty. The irony being that Audrey Hepburn would have never consorted with those assholes.
opiejeanne
@Tenar Arha: OH! That’s terrible and I had no idea! No one deserves to be beaten, to be mistreated by a spouse.
And fuck Sy Hersh.
My mother went to a tea for Pat Nixon when Dick was running for governor of California. She seemed to be a very sweet person, according to Mom. She autographed Mom’s name tag as a souvenir for me; I think I was 11.I still have it somewhere.
zhena gogolia
@NotMax:
Haha, you are en fuego, as they used to say.
Tenar Arha
@opiejeanne: The part of the article that’s sticking in my brain is that Hersh heard that, but didn’t chase down the story. because it was a private matter. And he didn’t even understand he’d heard about a crime until he was relating the anecdote years later.
Talk about massive cultural change. Just within my own lifetime, hitting your wife became a crime.
Kristine
@Major Major Major Major: Bless your Grandma!
J R in WV
OK, way late to the conversation, but there is no way that 75% of non whites in Alabama voted for Trump. I can’t imagine that segment of the population that lived through, or whose parents lived through the Civil Rights era, who followed Dr King, would have voted for a bigoted monster…
I’ma gonna look for real surely election numbers somewhere. Most sites want to report with glitzy graphics rather than tables of numbers. In Alabama there was a good image that showed a horizontal band of Democratic voting counties across the middle of the state, including Montgomery.
I believe this is what is referred to as the Black Belt of Alabama, the streak of counties with majority Black population. If this is the case, then no way a majority of Blacks of any description voted Republican at all. So I think that chart’s numbers are sheer BS. For what that’s worth, which won’t get you anything but a bathroom break at Starbucks.
Have a nice spring day where you are, today.
cwmoss
@Mai naem mobile: I think that domestic violence is more likely than the surgery/medical procedure explanations we’ve heard so far.
Yutsano
@J R in WV: If 75% of non-whites had voted for Moore he would be a Senator.
Ruckus
@J R in WV:
It sounds extremely unlikely to me as well.
To have been able to have voted for a black man for president and now an utter racist? Who says the quiet parts out loud? And proud?
2+2 does not equal 4,000,564,886.