Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

The words do not have to be perfect.

Americans barely caring about Afghanistan is so last month.

All your base are belong to Tunch.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

You cannot shame the shameless.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

Fuck the extremist election deniers. What’s money for if not for keeping them out of office?

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

I’m pretty sure there’s only one Jack Smith.

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Hail to the Hairpiece / Friday Morning Open Thread: Striving for Equilibrium

Friday Morning Open Thread: Striving for Equilibrium

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At least you’re not the only one wishing it were the weekend already…


 
(When you just know some nervous editor demanded the suit be photoshopped in…)

Reader Interactions

128Comments

  1. 1.

    Juice Box

    If he’s not happy to be doing his damn job, then why doesn’t he just quit? Pence will pardon him for whatever.

  3. 3.

    NotMax

    “This is Canadian air traffic control. We apologize for the inconvenience but due to national security considerations we must redirect the Air Force One flight to Yellowknife.”

  4. 4.

    JPL

    @NotMax: Nice! Theresa May should cancel his plans to visit Great Britain this summer. He just wants to use the trip as a pretext to go to his club in Scotland.

  7. 7.

    Amir Khalid

    @JPL:
    I don’t know if she dares do that. May’s had a good close look at what an arsehole Trump is. But I think she feels compelled by the special relationship to be nice to him, and is trapped between that and the fact that Britons from the Queen on down despise him. Blair, as I recall, felt similarly compelled with George Walker Bush.

  8. 8.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Ben Carson says his latest proposal to raise rents would mean a path toward self-sufficiency for millions of low-income households across the United States, by pushing more people to find work. For Ebony Morris and her four small children, it could mean homelessness, as experts warn of crippling costs that many families will be unable to bear.

    Morris lives in Charleston, South Carolina, where most households receiving federal housing assistance would see their rent go up an average 26%, according to new analysis by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities thinktank. But Morris’s increase would be nearly double that.

    Overall, the analysis shows that in the nation’s 100 largest metropolitan areas, low-income tenants, many of whom have jobs, would have to pay roughly 20% more each year for rent under the plan. That rent increase is about six times greater than the growth in average hourly earnings, putting the poorest workers at an increased risk of homelessness because wages simply haven’t kept pace with housing expenses.

    “I saw public housing as an option to get on my feet, to pay 30% of my income and get myself out of debt and eventually become a homeowner,” said Morris, whose monthly rent would jump from $403 to $600. “But this would put us in a homeless state.”

    Words fail me.

  9. 9.

    Patricia Kayden

    Man Baby doesn’t like being “scolded” by actual world leaders. He’s so skin thinned that he absolutely cannot stand any criticism, no matter how minor or slight. I don’t recall foreign leaders (with the exception of Netanyahu, Putin and Duterte) having any problem with President Obama.

  10. 10.

    Patricia Kayden

    @OzarkHillbilly: Why is Carson assuming that the poor don’t work? At $17/hr, you’d only earn around $35,000 which is barely enough to live off, especially if you have children.

  12. 12.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski reveals Trump’s biggest frustration in the White House is that he can’t watch porn

  17. 17.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Patricia Kayden: Most of the people who receive rental assistance work, but that is not the established narrative from our “friends” on the right. In their telling poor people are lazy leaches (read: Black) refusing to get a job sucking tax dollars out of the pockets of hard working (read: White) Americans. The GOP does not want any attention paid to the fact that a lot of people are underpaid (minimum wage) and underemployed (25-35 hr workweek so they don’t qualify for the benefits that full time employees receive) as part of a strategy by corporate America to control labor costs.

    PS: most of the people receiving rental assistance also happen to be white, but don’t tell anyone.

  18. 18.

    JPL

    @Baud: Republicans will demand that the debt be paid off, and they will stand aside and laugh.
    Trump has been tweeting up a storm, about Canada and Schumer. Schumer didn’t solve North Korea and Iran, so he’s not in a position to give advice.

  19. 19.

    Nicole

    Ugh. That’s my first thought every morning when I browse the news.

    That said, thank you for introducing me to the Twitter feed of Paul Bronks, Anne Laurie. My seven-year-old and I have spent a LOT of time giggling over his posts together, and I hope those memories will last longer than my fury at this stupid Administration and this stupid (GOP) Congress.

  20. 20.

    evodevo

    @Patricia Kayden: They don’t MAKE $17/hr….especially not in SC. No one in Ky makes that much …I make $21/hr working for the Post Office, which is a plum part-time job here in Ky. People in eastern Ky fight over part-time PO jobs because they pay that much. Everything else pays $10-11, if you’re lucky….

  21. 21.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Nicole:

    thank you for introducing me to the Twitter feed of Paul Bronks,

    I want to second that. Hilarious.

  22. 22.

    gene108

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Those new luxury condos can’t be built, with poor people still living in low rent apartments. It would be inhumane to tear down the apartments with poor people still inside.

  23. 23.

    OzarkHillbilly

    TYNDALL, S.D. (AP) — A South Dakota sheriff waited a whole minute after polls closed to fire a deputy who undid his re-election bid this week.

    Bon Homme County Sheriff Lenny Gramkow fired deputy sheriff Mark Maggs after Maggs defeated him by a vote of 878-331 in Tuesday’s Republican primary election. Maggs posted his time-stamped termination notice signed by Gramkow on Facebook after polls closed.

    “As of this moment you are no longer an employee of Bon Homme County,” Gramkow wrote. He didn’t give a reason for the firing. South Dakota is an employment-at-will state where employees can be fired without cause, with exceptions. The state’s sheriffs also have the authority to hire and fire personnel.

    Gramkow declined to comment about the firing.

    No other candidates filed for the race, meaning that Maggs will assume office in January. But for now, the father of four is out of work. He planned to meet with the county commission on Thursday.

    A Republican, doing the Republican thing.

  24. 24.

    danielx

    Jesus wept.

    Why doesn’t he just declare victory, i.e., he’s made America great again, and resign? He doesn’t like the job and doesn’t want to do the work.

    Also too, I have found that if you don’t want to be lectured (or screamed at or punched out), a good start is to not be an asshole. But then I haven’t spent my life acting like an asshole, or so I hope.

  27. 27.

    satby

    @rikyrah: Good morning ?!

    I’m debating popping in at the market today, it’s optional on a Friday (my lease requires me to be there three of the four days it’s open). I’m more inclined to stay home, finish my orders, and mow the lawn before we get more rain tonight.

  28. 28.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    This may never happen. It takes HUD forever to do the smallest things, so my hope is there will be a new administration in place before this crap is enacted.

  29. 29.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @danielx:

    But then I haven’t spent my life acting like an asshole,

    I have. It’s a great way to keep people from bothering you, they don’t want to be anywhere near you.

  30. 30.

    debbie

    @JPL:

    Ummn, Trump hasn’t either.

    I want him to be humiliated in Quebec, and then again in Singapore.

  31. 31.

    Platonailedit

    @Nicole: He is my fav twitterati too. I just wish he didn’t throw the fuck bombs so much around so that I can share his tweets with my kids.

  32. 32.

    bystander

    @David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:

    Brzezinski reveals Trump’s biggest frustration in the White House is that he can’t watch porn

    So now we know it’s not his love of golf that compels him to Mar a Lago every weekend.

    But her emaillllssss!!

  33. 33.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @danielx:

    Why doesn’t he just declare victory, i.e., he’s made America great again, and resign? He doesn’t like the job and doesn’t want to do the work.

    He’s still waiting for the Nobel Peace Prize, it the Kenyan can get one….

  34. 34.

    Leto

    @Nicole:

    Ugh. That’s my first thought every morning when I browse the news.

    Looks like I picked the wrong time to stop drinking Drano.

    @evodevo: Just going to second this. SC has seen a large influx of major manufacturers relocating there (Boeing for example) due to the fact it’s violently non-union, right-to-work state, and they can pay $10 hr and that’s considered “good”. My mother put it succinctly: it’s a great place to retire, but not to live.

    Just as an aside, when BMW built their plant in upstate Greenville they discovered that the local populace was essentially too dumb to work at the plant. Smart by SC standards, but by German standards they had a long way to go. The initial run of vehicles, for a few years, had higher amounts of production related defects. BMW partnered with a local community college to develop apprenticeship programs so they could have the necessary workforce needed to build their vehicles to proper spec, as well as having to do a lot of additional training on that original workforce to bring them up to snuff. So yes, you get cheaper labor costs but at a significant cost to your product. Just something I thought I’d share with the class.

  36. 36.

    JPL

    @debbie: The one thing that I know will happen, is we will be humiliated. Trump is incapable of admitting defeat.

  37. 37.

    bystander

    After watching Moanin’ Joe this morning, I have to go on record with my response to their hagiography again.

    A lot of us never gave Giuliani credit for the decline in crime rates because it was the beginning of a national trend in urban areas. The decline began under Mayor Dinkins but he cannot be given credit.

    Giuliani did a terrible job in managing the inevitable emergency. Terrorists made it known that they wanted to take the twin towers down in February 1993. What foresight was there in putting the emergency control area in that building? Yet they continue to lionize him over a photo that should be the punchline in a Harold Lloyd comedy.

    We never got a full accounting of Giuliani’s use of hotel rooms reserved for fire fighters.

    Many of us remember Bernard Kerik, Rudi’s right hand man, and now a convicted felon.

  38. 38.

    Dorothy Winsor

    Good lord. Anthony Bourdain has apparently committed suicide.

    And there’s something wrong with me because while I find that sad, I also find it less disturbing than reading about the R’s continuing efforts to destroy the ACA piece by piece.

  41. 41.

    Leto

    @gene108: The section this housing is in, ain’t nobody building luxury condos there. They’d have to raze hundreds of blocks in all directions, while simultaneously building commercial development that businesses might want to move into. You’re still at least 30 mins from a usable beach (Foley), and at least 45 from any of the ones that those luxury dwellers would want to go to. But I’ll concede, maybe this is the first step that they will take on that path. It would be the first time in about 50 years they’ve shown any thought to doing something with these areas, even if it is evil. And of course it’s evil because that’s how they roll.

  43. 43.

    Baud

    This is interesting. Vox

    2018 has been a banner year for women in politics. A record number of women are running for office and winning their contests, putting women on track to potentially hold public office in record numbers in 2019. But in the private sector, it’s a different story: The number of women at the helm of the biggest companies in America is on the decline.

    The number of women CEOs at Fortune 500 companies fell by 25 percent this year, dipping to 24 from 32 in 2017, its all-time high. Women are the chief executives of just 4.8 percent of the 500 most profitable companies in the United States.

  44. 44.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @danielx: Then they probably deserve it. Most likely were a mass murderer or something in a previous life.

  45. 45.

    Baud

    @JPL:

    I didn’t follow him, but he came off as vivacious. I expect this will hit similar to Robin Williams suicide.

  48. 48.

    TS (the original)

    @Amir Khalid:

    Blair, as I recall, felt similarly compelled with George Walker Bush

    Blair was the biggest supporter of GWB in the weapons of mass destruction lie. If Blair had not supported Bush, there would have been no attack on Iraq. Blair was GWB’s BFF

  51. 51.

    Platonailedit

    Cole will love this.

    Farmers in eastern China have suspended the demolition of an old house because of a family of resident swallows, it’s reported.

    According to the People’s Daily newspaper, an old rural house was scheduled to be demolished by 5 June in the town of Zhuyuan, eastern Zhejiang province, because its location was deemed to be high risk for geological disasters.

    However, while engineers were working in the house, they heard tweeting, and found four swallow nests, and a family of hungry baby birds.

    “Four young swallows were chirping for food, with their heads peeking out from one of the nests,” Xu Zheng, the person in charge of the demolition, told the Xinhua News Agency. He added that the team had also found seven swallow eggs.

    Xinhua says that the demolition team reached out to the local Zhejiang Wild Bird Association, and were advised by conservationist Song Shihe not to move the birds.

  53. 53.

    TS (the original)

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    A Republican, doing the Republican thing.

    Quite the a.h. and he still doesn’t understand why he was defeated in the election.

  54. 54.

    SFAW

    @JPL:

    I’m not sure how we recover from the damage this administration is doing.

    A Truth and Retribution Commission would be a start. The biggest problem I (currently) see is: who’s up first? McConnell? Ryan? Lying Littledick? Jefferson Beauregard Klansman III? Pruitt?

    And, no, my name is not Katie.

    ETA: Nor Shirley.

  57. 57.

    Brachiator

    @Dorothy Winsor:

    Good lord. Anthony Bourdain has apparently committed suicide.

    When I saw the breaking news item, I had to double check to make sure this was not some terrible hoax.

    How very sad.

  59. 59.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @JPL:

    Republicans will demand that the debt be paid off, and they will stand aside and laugh.

    That’s why the Dems are saying balanced budget now if they take the House next year. They learned their lesson with GW that if the dems go along with deficte spending in a national crises under a GoP prez the GoP will blame the Dems for it.

  61. 61.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: I’ve been reading one of his books. Picked up a distinct vibe of bi-polar. Not that I’m a psychiatrist or anything.

  62. 62.

    SFAW

    @rikyrah:

    I want them to have entire conversations around him, that he doesn’t understand

    Um, they can do that by speaking English perfectly around him.

  68. 68.

    Patricia Kayden

    @JPL: I read somewhere that that Vietnamese restaurant has kept the table used by Bourdain and President Obama as a shrine.

  69. 69.

    SFAW

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Not that I’m a psychiatrist or anything.

    Yeah, about that … when a carpenter talks about a “stud” being “proud,” it’s not a comment on some PUA-wannabe talking about how many models he’s bedded (or similar). .

  70. 70.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @JPL:

    Based on that episode, the Countess and I went to that restaurant in Hanoi in January. it was everything as billed, an absolute delight. We each got the Obama Special – bowl of noodles, the pile of green accompaniments, fried seafood roll and a good local beer (Hanoi beer). Had to get more beers.

  72. 72.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @rikyrah:

    I want them to not speak English around him ?

    I want them to have entire conversations around him, that he doesn’t understand ?

    They can quite easily accomplish the latter without resorting to the former.

  76. 76.

    SFAW

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    You talk too much.

    You’re not the first person to have told me that. Why, I remember that time, back in aught-six, when ….. etc. etc.

  77. 77.

    Elizabelle

    @Patricia Kayden: Yeah. Makes you wonder about suicide contagion, since KSpade’s suicide received so much press.

    Hotel room in Strasbourg, France. Lovely little town. Very sad news.

  80. 80.

    WereBear

    @bystander: Just reading an account of taking down John Gotti (Gangland by Harold Blum) and it explains the Guiliani endangered the FBI investigation by grandstanding and moving too quickly.

    Always been a jerk.

  82. 82.

    bemused

    Bourdain and Spade both left young daughters. Bourdain clearly adored his daughter. Bourdain was a character but I really enjoyed watching his shows and reading his books. It’s unfathomable to most people how miserable a person must feel to decide to depart from an amazing life and a beloved daughter. Tragic.

  83. 83.

    SFAW

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Great minds and all that.

    OK, but that doesn’t explain me/mine.
    [And in the background, I can hear someone saying to the Stooges “Gentlemen! Gentlemen!” and Curly responding “Who came in?”]

  84. 84.

    germy

    Justice Department Seizes New York Times Reporter’s Records in Leak Probe

    Court documents allege that before he stopped working with the committee in December, Wolfe used encrypted messaging applications to contact three reporters, then lied repeatedly about those communications. He’s also accused of lying about his relationship with Watkins when FBI agents asked him about the sources for an article she wrote. He initially denied knowing her, then when shown photos of them together, he admitted they had been in a three-year relationship.

    Watkins denied that Wolfe was a source of classified information when they were dating, and says she disclosed the relationship to her editors at BuzzFeed News, Politico, and the New York Times at the time. It appears one focus of the FBI’s probe was a BuzzFeed article published in April 2017 in which she reported that Russian spies tried to recruit former Trump adviser Carter Page in 2013.

    http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/06/justice-department-seizes-nyt-reporters-data-in-leak-probe.html

  85. 85.

    Quinerly

    @lurker dean: Best friend and French chef Eric Ripert found him. I’m speechless. So loved his first book (actually all but his first is my favorite). His current girlfriend has been caught up in this Harvey Weinstein mess.

  86. 86.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @SFAW: I didn’t say great at what. We’re probably olympic medalists in the Mediocrity Marathon.

  89. 89.

    Weaselone

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:
    Dems are saying that as a defense against the attack that Dems are the fiscally irresponsible party and will spend us into oblivion especially given the budget deficit is exploding for some unknown reason totally unrelated to Republican tax policy.

    If Democrats regain control of Congress, it will probably be before the economy ends up in the crapper. Trump will still be in control of the Presidency What you should see is numerous attempts at passing popular Democratic policies funded by repealing portions of the Republican tax cuts for billionaires bill.

  91. 91.

    Immanentize

    @germy:
    oh, but Watkins probably had a book deal, so no one cared.
    (I miss you, Kay. The morning threads are safe enough)

  92. 92.

    Quinerly

    @rikyrah: thanks sweetie. Been mostly lurking and catching up at night after threads are dead. Crazy busy here after my NC trip. Waves, tail wags, and meows back at you. Have a nice weekend.

  93. 93.

    Quinerly

    @rikyrah: This piece somehow was my first early morning read. So awful. I think I have to step away from the news today. Between this piece, Bourdain’s suicide, and the piece you posted about the 10 year old CHILD, I want to pull the covers over my head and just hide.

  96. 96.

    SFAW

    @Weaselone:

    If Democrats regain control of Congress, it will probably be before the economy ends up in the crapper.

    But if/when inertia gets it there, the Dems will get blamed by the Party of Traitors and the MSM.

  102. 102.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Quinerly: is this comment specific to something that’s being reported, or just a general observation of his muddled mind?

    @SiubhanDuinne: and are republicans admitting yet that he is a Russian agent installed by Putin to destroy America?

  104. 104.

    Quinerly

    @Steve in the ATL: 20 min rant that just ended. Trump leaving the WH for the summit. Highlights… “Dennis Rodman wasn’t that tall.” Russia should be going to the summit. Overpreparation caused HRC to lose the debates. Iran is now a totally different country. Plus, he’s thinking about Muhammad Ali.

  106. 106.

    SFAW

    @Quinerly:

    “Dennis Rodman wasn’t that tall.”

    No doubt Shitgibbon said he — if he chose to play hoop, instead of becoming the world’s bestestest real estate developer — would have been a better rebounder than Rodman

  107. 107.

    Immanentize

    @OzarkHillbilly: from what I gather, some night posters pissed her off. Complaining that she was negative and a surrender monkey or something. I didn’t read all the threads because who has that kinda time? Anyway, I think she quit BJ (hopefully just for a while?)

  112. 112.

    Quinerly

    @Immanentize: pretty sure the Supremes did something on this years ago. Must Google.
    (actually I must step away from all news and internet today for my own wellbeing)

  113. 113.

    NotMax

    @Ozark Hillbilly

    Could be misremembering but do seem to recall Kay taking a B-J sabbatical before.

    Expect she’ll return as tempers, um, temper. Once you go jackal, you never go backal.

  116. 116.

    Wapiti

    @danielx:

    Why doesn’t he just declare victory, i.e., he’s made America great again, and resign? He doesn’t like the job and doesn’t want to do the work.

    Are you kidding? The Trump Organization has positive cash flow for the first time in decades. Why get off the gravy train?

  117. 117.

    rikyrah

    With Mueller Closing In, Manafort’s Allies Abandon Him
    June 7, 2018

    WASHINGTON — The special counsel’s accusation this week that Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign chairman, tried to tamper with potential witnesses originated with two veteran journalists who turned on Mr. Manafort after working closely with him to prop up the former Russia-aligned president of Ukraine, interviews and documents show.

    The two journalists, who helped lead a project to which prosecutors say Mr. Manafort funneled more than $2 million from overseas accounts, are the latest in a series of onetime Manafort business partners who have provided damaging evidence to Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 election. Their cooperation with the government has increasingly isolated Mr. Manafort as he awaits trial on charges of violating financial, tax and federal lobbying disclosure laws.

    Mr. Manafort’s associates say he feels betrayed by the former business partners, to whom he collectively steered millions of dollars over the years for consulting, lobbying and legal work intended to bolster the reputation of Viktor F. Yanukovych, the former president of Ukraine. Mr. Manafort has told associates that he believes Mr. Mueller’s team is using the business partners to pressure him to flip on Mr. Trump in a manner similar to the one used to prosecute the energy giant Enron in the early 2000s by a Justice Department task force that included some lawyers now serving on Mr. Mueller’s team.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/07/us/politics/mueller-manafort-witnesses.html

  122. 122.

    O. Felix Culpa

    As a constant reader if infrequent commenter, I miss Kay too. I always appreciated her thoughtful perspectives. The rest of youse guys is ok, but Kay is/was uniquely insightful.

    Come back, Kay!

  124. 124.

    rikyrah

    President Trump says he wants to meet with NFL players (or athletes generally) who kneel during national anthem so they can recommend people they think should be pardoned because they were treated unfairly by the justice system.

    — Ana Cabrera (@AnaCabrera) June 8, 2018

    This has everything to do with Kaep’s legal team saying that they want to subpoena him.
    Yes, Kaep…subpoena that muthaphucka.

  125. 125.

    Another Scott

    @rikyrah: She’s listed in the e-mail dropdown as a front-pager. Dunno if the address is still current, but I sent her a note, too.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  126. 126.

    Rmirth

    @Amir Khalid: I don’t get that. All these European countries (our allies) tiptoeing around and trying to keep the peace…far better if they took the fight to him and shunned him or something.

  127. 127.

    TenguPhule

    @Baud:

    Since history says Dems will only get two years to fix everything, it’ll be tough.

    Step 1. Declare a State of Emergency.

    Step 2. Declare Republicans a Terrorist Organization

  128. 128.

    Bonnie

    One of the articles is misnamed. It should read The Republicans vs. The Constitution.

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