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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Courage Personified, On the Mend

Courage Personified, On the Mend

by Betty Cracker|  July 29, 201810:35 am| 206 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads

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Representative John Lewis, national treasure, fell ill during a flight to Atlanta yesterday and was hospitalized, but he’s expected to be released today, according to a spokeswoman. Per CNN:

Civil rights icon and Georgia congressman Rep. John Lewis has been hospitalized but is expected to be released Sunday, his spokeswoman says.

Spokeswoman Brenda Jones told CNN that Lewis is under routine observation but she did not give details of the nature of his illness or where he is hospitalized.

CNN affiliate WSB-TV reported that Lewis was being treated at a hospital in metro Atlanta, and the station quoted unnamed sources as saying Lewis became ill on a flight to Atlanta on Saturday.

Wishing Congressman Lewis a full and speedy recovery. Needless to say, we can ill afford to lose a courageous, inspirational man like Lewis at any time, much less in 2018.

Open thread!

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Reader Interactions

206Comments

  1. 1.

    Schlemazel

    July 29, 2018 at 10:38 am

    So it probably wasn’t polonium.
    Hope he will live long and healthy, he deserves it and we need him.

  2. 2.

    germy

    July 29, 2018 at 10:41 am

    Spray tanning himself a color that can only be described as satanic orange, and now using so much hairspray his head looks like a dome of piss-colored cotten candy — like an evil clown, Trump's rallies have taken on a macabre tone of John Wayne Gacy entertaining children. #AMJoy— Bill Madden (@activist360) July 28, 2018

  3. 3.

    germy

    July 29, 2018 at 10:42 am

    You may disagree with Representative John Lewis. In Georgia, you may vote against him. You can send angry letters to his office. But do not fuck with Representative John Lewis. He has seen worse than whatever you have to give him, and he has handled it better than you could possibly ever begin to. Since 1959, he has stood up for his beliefs, and he has faced abuse and prison and beatings and violence for it, and not once has he ever backed down. And he is not about to start now.

    MTV (of all places) link

  4. 4.

    RandomMonster

    July 29, 2018 at 10:48 am

    @germy: That’s an awesome analogy.

  5. 5.

    cmorenc

    July 29, 2018 at 10:53 am

    It’s a shame that another great hero of the civil rights struggle a bit too soon lost his struggle to stay in good health against the ravages of age. Had Thurgood Marshall’s health held out another 15 months, we would not be burdened with his disgraceful Uncle Tom replacement, Clarence Thomas. With the likes of Thomas leading black society in the 1950s and 1960s, the south would still be de jure segregated, Brown v Board of Education notwithstanding, because the Civil Rights legislation of the 1960s would never have been passed.

    At least if Lewis is eventually forced by health to retire, his seat in Congress won’t likely fall to the likes of a black version of Mark Meadows.

  6. 6.

    SFAW

    July 29, 2018 at 10:53 am

    BC, thanks for the good news.

  7. 7.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 10:54 am

    John Lewis is a national treasure. Donald Trump is a national disgrace.

    Love the evil clown analogy for Trump. He could definitely be the scary villain in a “Halloween” type movie.

  8. 8.

    Aleta

    July 29, 2018 at 10:55 am

    National treasure x 1000. High time to honor him every day for his service to the people and the country. I should have written Rep. Lewis long ago to thank him, and I did today.

  9. 9.

    Droppy

    July 29, 2018 at 10:56 am

    The contrast between John Lewis and the current gang of incompetent, soulless, selfish criminals is too obvious to point out. But why is there that contrast? How did we allow the right wing monsters to take everything good we have managed to do – secure our independence, slowly (but steadily) work on increasing liberty and decreasing oppression, bring about more economic and social equality, the New Deal, the civil rights movement, women’s rights – and tear it all down and move backwards? John Lewis’s life and work cries out to us: how did you let this happen?

  10. 10.

    debbie

    July 29, 2018 at 11:00 am

    @germy:

    And yet, the GOP won’t stop trying. Who will be the first one to suggest there be a special election?

  11. 11.

    germy

    July 29, 2018 at 11:00 am

    The parody account is back:

    People have accused me of deleting 27,000 of my old tweets bc of Big Bad Bob Mueller. Yes I did do it but only to streamline my journalism, to focus my attention on holding those in power accountable. And more importantly, where are HIllary Clinton's 33,000 missing emails?— Glem (@GlemGreenwald) July 28, 2018

  12. 12.

    germy

    July 29, 2018 at 11:05 am

    I do think it's wrong for journalists to delete recent tweets about live debates & stories, & worse to delete old *articles* or entire websites. But here's a new @Wired article on why journalists do – and should – delete years-old tweets & how to do it: https://t.co/TgLLG46iQY pic.twitter.com/fsx6kVQLzd— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) July 29, 2018

    Unless, of course, your name is Joy Reid.

  13. 13.

    cmorenc

    July 29, 2018 at 11:07 am

    @Droppy:

    How did we allow the right wing monsters to take everything good we have managed to do – secure our independence, slowly (but steadily) work on increasing liberty and decreasing oppression, bring about more economic and social equality, the New Deal, the civil rights movement, women’s rights – and tear it all down and move backwards? John Lewis’s life and work cries out to us: how did you let this happen?

    I’m hoping that what providence intends this dark period to accomplish is to shock enough of the American public out of the thrall with the creeping Republican dominance of our nation’s legislatures and discourse by throwing the concrete implications boldly in their face – and set the stage for the beginning of a prolonged era of progressive dominance in the mold of the New Deal etc. The problem with that view is that the fiscal, strategic, and diplomatic fecklessness of the Trump Administration, combined with the Kavenaugh nomination to SCOTUS (if he’s confirmed) may so destroy the essential foundations that it will be difficult to build a progressive society and legislation anytime soon. Kavenaugh will help complete bringing SCOTUS back to the early New Deal era when the court was fiercely resisting and undermining FDR’s efforts.

  14. 14.

    Amir Khalid

    July 29, 2018 at 11:09 am

    @germy:
    Sadly, that analogy is not as far from reality as one might hope.

  15. 15.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?

    July 29, 2018 at 11:10 am

    @germy:
    Glenn, you’re not a journalist. What formal training do you possess? What J-School program did you attend?

  16. 16.

    germy

    July 29, 2018 at 11:12 am

    @? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: He also considers Julian to be a journalist.

    My cat is a journalist.

  17. 17.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 11:18 am

    @cmorenc:

    I’m hoping that what providence intends this dark period to accomplish is to shock enough of the American public out of the thrall with the creeping Republican dominance of our nation’s legislatures and discourse by throwing the concrete implications boldly in their face

    Probably won’t happen. These people are not in thrall to the GOP. Republicans are giving them exactly what they want, a populist renunciation of democracy. It’s shameful, but this group of citizens would rather have nothing than have to share the country with groups that they hate.

    – and set the stage for the beginning of a prolonged era of progressive dominance in the mold of the New Deal etc.

    The New Deal is ancient history. We need new ideas for contemporary challenges.

  18. 18.

    JPL

    July 29, 2018 at 11:21 am

    Lewis has and continues to show great courage against all odds. I hope that he is out of the hospital soon, and fighting the good fight.

  19. 19.

    Jager

    July 29, 2018 at 11:23 am

    Ditto on Hero/congressman John Lewis.

    I was talking with my agricultural commodities expert BIL yesterday, he dropped a couple of interesting facts:
    The break even number on a bushel of soy beans is between 9 and 10 dollars depending on where you farm. The price per bushel on Friday was 8.55. If the entire 12 billion dollars in trump’s borrowed money for ag was passed out to soybean growers only it would amount to a buck a bushel. That would be of little help on it’s own, but the money has to be divvied up between pork, corn and soy beans. As my BIL said on the phone, farmers are going to get a haircut, a bloody nose, they’re going to fall down the stairs and their house is going to catch on fire. He’s at an AG event in Kansas City this weekend, be interesting to hear what the growers and buyers are saying.

  20. 20.

    khead

    July 29, 2018 at 11:24 am

    Meet Kalena Bruce and her husband Billy. Kalena is the writer of several Cletus/Leopard Eating Faces op-eds that have appeared in the WaPo and other outlets. Quotes are from the second link.

    “At the end of the day, he’s a businessman,” Billy Bruce said of Trump, adding that he didn’t think the president would take actions that would harm his supporters.

    The Bruces’ optimism echoes that of the Missouri Farm Bureau, the Missouri Pork Association and the Missouri Soybean Association, which have been hopeful that negotiations could stave off the threat of additional import taxes on agricultural goods.

    The Bruces also called for Congress to pass a version of the Farm Bill, which is up for renewal this year. This legislation includes funding for welfare programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program as well as subsidies for agricultural producers.

    “We are depending on them to put a safety net in place for us,” Kalena Bruce said of federal lawmakers. “Otherwise, you’re going to see small family farms dropping like flies.”

  21. 21.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    July 29, 2018 at 11:28 am

    @khead

    : “We are depending on them to put a safety net in place for us,” Kalena Bruce said of federal lawmakers. “Otherwise, you’re going to see small family farms dropping like flies.”

    Safety nets are bad for the character Mrs Bruce, as your tribe is so very, very found of telling the urban poor. You simply need to take more personal responsibility and boost yourselves up by your own bootstraps instead of relying on handouts from the Nanny State.

  22. 22.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 29, 2018 at 11:29 am

    @cmorenc: During my adventures among racists on Friday, I heard from a woman who used to work for Thomas that he is considering retiring. I have no idea if that’s true. She could be demented. She did ask me at least twice where I grew up.

  23. 23.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 11:29 am

    @Jager:

    He’s at an AG event in Kansas City this weekend, be interesting to hear what the growers and buyers are saying.

    Definitely. I would like to think that farmers can do the math and see that the numbers don’t add up in their favor.

    Will they pressure the GOP for a better policy, since the Republicans are still the majority in Congress?

  24. 24.

    dmsilev

    July 29, 2018 at 11:31 am

    @khead:

    “We are depending on them to put a safety net in place for us,”

    But don’t you dare call it welfare. Welfare is for Those People, and We are not Those People.

  25. 25.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?

    July 29, 2018 at 11:32 am

    @Brachiator:
    I sincerely don’t think there’s enough of these people and the scales are starting to fall off of some of their eyes.

    The results of the last election can’t be used because we don’t know to what extent the results were influenced by foreign interference and voter suppression.

  26. 26.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 11:37 am

    @khead:

    “We are depending on them to put a safety net in place for us,” Kalena Bruce said of federal lawmakers. “Otherwise, you’re going to see small family farms dropping like flies.”

    Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! The irony would be delicious, if it weren’t so sad.

    Lemme see, now. Isn’t the hard nose answer supposed to be, “if small family farms can’t make it in the free market, then they should be allowed to fail.”

    Trump created this problem, and yet the dopes still believe that he will save them because he is a master businessman and White Savior.

  27. 27.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?

    July 29, 2018 at 11:38 am

    @Jager:

    He’s at an AG event in Kansas City this weekend, be interesting to hear what the growers and buyers are saying.

    How much you want to bet that the questions will be screened to prevent Trump from getting pissed and attempting to order his Secret Service detail to execute the offending farmer for being an enemy of the state.

  28. 28.

    Baud

    July 29, 2018 at 11:38 am

    @Brachiator:

    A spoonful of hatred helps the bankruptcy go down.

  29. 29.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 11:41 am

    Be well, Congressman Lewis. I hope you still have decades of work, and a rich private life, ahead of you.

    Re 2013’s graphic novel “March: Book One”, which won several awards. WaPost comics critic Michael Cavna: In graphic novel ‘March,’ Rep. John Lewis renders a powerful civil rights memoir

    … At 73, the Georgia Democrat is living history, and he knows that a graphic novel holds unique storytelling powers. “It’s another way for somebody to understand what it was like and what we tried to do,” Lewis told me. “And I want young children to feel it. Almost taste it. To make it real. . . . It’s not just the words but the action and the drama and the movement that bring it alive.”

    Lewis consented to “bring it alive” through a comic because five years ago, when Aydin told fellow staffers in Lewis’s office that he was headed to San Diego Comic-Con, he was met with some “geek” teasing. Not from the congressman, though. Lewis, many decades their senior, proved to be the hippest voice in the room in the ways of comics. The staffers stopped joking when he told them it was a comic book that had helped persuade him to join the fight for civil rights.

    As a young man, Lewis got his hands on the 1958 comic book “Martin Luther King and the Montgomery Story,” which, he said, with its poster-colored lesson of nonviolent protest, inspired many student activists. “It was about the way of love,” Lewis says. “We were beaten and arrested . . . and that comic book inspired me to make trouble. But it was the good kind of trouble.”

    Lewis, in turn, has written a graphic novel laced with life lessons. And to his credit, in penning “March,” he has hewed to King’s advice on preaching from the pulpit. “Make it plain, son,” Lewis remembers King saying. “Make it plain. And make it real.”

    And man, does Lewis make it real. This is no sanitized picture book. One of the single most striking panels depicts the recovered body of Emmett Till; the pen-and-ink image possesses a power somewhat different from the horrific archival photos. Lewis included this panel with an express purpose.

    “I often think about [how] Emmett Till was lynched in August of 1955,” he said. “I remember it so well. I was 15 years old — I was in the 10th grade. I was working out in the field. And I thought: It could be me.”

    “March” also doesn’t shy away from using the N-word, to powerful effect. The congressman said the collaborators discussed the import of this choice. “I wanted to make it real,” he said, “and not try to sugarcoat it.”

    … “March” also movingly depicts his emotions upon the first of his 40 or so arrests. “The first time I was arrested was in 1960 — I felt free,” he says. “It made me stronger.”

    Because Lewis is a man of warmth and wit, “March” doesn’t stick only to the grim. Early on, for instance, we see Lewis growing up on a farm and tending to poultry parishioners, becoming an expert in the ways of barnyard preaching. “As a little boy, I would talk to the chickens. They would sit and listen,” Lewis told me, before waiting a beat. “They tended to listen better than some of my colleagues in Congress.”

    Juicers: Mark your calendars for the Small Press Expo conference in Bethesda, MD, the weekend of September 15-16. Nate Powell, who drew the March graphic novels, will be there, among many other talented artists. $20 for entry to both days, or $15 for Saturday.

    We could put together a meetup near the White Flint metro area. After 7:00 p Saturday is open; could also just attend the conference together. Matt F and I are definitely attending SPX. Sunday evening looks open too.

    But mostly, get better, John Lewis. We have seen so much backsliding. Your work is not finished, alas.

  30. 30.

    Redshift

    July 29, 2018 at 11:42 am

    @? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: Yeah. We’re not talking about all of them, just enough. And they don’t all have to vote Democratic, they just have to be turned off enough to stay home.

    There are hard core racists who hate “those people” more than they care about democracy. But we wouldn’t be seeing double-digit swings from 2016 in special elections if that was all of them.

  31. 31.

    BellyCat

    July 29, 2018 at 11:42 am

    @Jager: Thank you for this insight on the very limited benefits of this $12 billion charade.

  32. 32.

    ? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?

    July 29, 2018 at 11:43 am

    @germy:
    His definition of journalist must be “they agree with me”.

  33. 33.

    MagdaInBlack

    July 29, 2018 at 11:46 am

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:
    Lol @ Adventures In Racism. You were being tested, to see which tribe you’re from ?
    A PC Liberal ?

  34. 34.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 11:46 am

    @? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:

    I sincerely don’t think there’s enough of these people and the scales are starting to fall off of some of their eyes.

    Maybe. But I don’t think this is a point worth debating anymore.

    It’s time to get out the vote for the midterms. Interest among younger voters is still low in some places. Some people still need convincing that they can and should defeat the foul mess that the GOP and Trump have created.

    Resistance needs to be turned into electoral action. And the people who say that the scales have fallen from their eyes can prove it.

  35. 35.

    khead

    July 29, 2018 at 11:47 am

    @Brachiator:

    They’ll beg for Trump to “do something” or say “if the czar only knew this wouldn’t be happening”.

    Just like the crabbers. And manufacturers. And steel workers.

    You can see it in all three linked articles. Same theme.

  36. 36.

    Jager

    July 29, 2018 at 11:48 am

    @Brachiator:

    The margins are so tight for farmers, even the really big operations can go down very quickly. A farm bankruptcy case in ND is just wrapping up after 6 years of negotiations with creditors. A 40,000 acre operation grossing 20 million a year when prices were stable, fell apart 8 years ago when the commodity markets had a bad case of the hiccups. The guy had 9 million in cash assets and it only paid creditors 16 cents on the dollar, of course the big lenders got all the money, the little guys like local fuel distributors, seed companies, etc got zip. Right now soybean prices are the lowest they have been in ten years, lower than the hiccup year. This kind of thing rips small towns, big towns and ag states apart. Of course, Larry Kudlow wouldn’t know that would he? I did hear a squeak or two from AG Sec Sonny Perdue.

  37. 37.

    rikyrah

    July 29, 2018 at 11:48 am

    Get well, Congressman???

  38. 38.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 11:48 am

    @cmorenc: I am with you. I think this is crucible we have to pass through, and that people are getting woke every single day. I have to think that we will prevail, and possibly sooner than the conventional wisdom whores predict now. They are slow to see something building speed under the waves.

    Inertia and complacency are a terrible thing, and Trump and what the GOP have become has gotten awful and overt enough to shock many out of it.

  39. 39.

    chris

    July 29, 2018 at 11:54 am

    “Otherwise, you’re going to see small family farms dropping like flies.”

    Those farms will be swept up by the big agricultural conglomerates that can afford to weather tough times. It’s almost like somebody planned it. Hmm.

  40. 40.

    scav

    July 29, 2018 at 11:56 am

    @khead:

    “At the end of the day, he’s a businessman,” Billy Bruce said of Trump, adding that he didn’t think the president would take actions that would harm his supporters

    Umm, haven’t you been paying attention? Ripping off and not paying smaller suppliers and subcontractors (in fact any business partner other than yourself) is practically the gold standard of idealized business behavior anymore. They tweet and preen about their prowess at same. See also personal financial history of your Trumptastic supposedly caring business deity.

  41. 41.

    The Conster

    July 29, 2018 at 11:57 am

    I remember John Lewis at the convention being booed by a bunch of dipshits in Peter Pan hats. Nothing has made me angrier in a good long time than that, and Wilmer sitting there like he’d shit in his Depends. John Lewis went to the border to demand babies be released from cages while Wilmer marched in a parade celebrating a tiny white town’s centennial near his third paid for in cash lake house. I’m in the John Lewis wing of the Democratic Party and I wish him a speedy recovery so he can continue to fight for our country, not divide it.

  42. 42.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 12:01 pm

    @Brachiator: I was appalled to see that, apparently, displaced Puerto Ricans are not registering to vote in Florida. I’m sorry, saying they’re just too busy with other things just doesn’t cut it, when it’s Trump and the GOP that are preventing a better response to hurricane damage.

    That would seem to be a project for Democrats, along with the Parkland kids, and their high and college peers in Florida. Get those folks registered, and make them see the importance of voting and increasing the margin in Congress that will give a f*ck about Puerto Rico.

    WaPost: The Daily 202: Puerto Ricans who fled to Florida after Hurricane Maria are not registering to vote

    … Because they’re already U.S. citizens, Puerto Ricans are eligible to vote as soon as they move to the mainland. The thinking last fall was that they’d be so angry at Trump that they’d be champing at the bit to vote against Republicans in the midterms. Operatives from both parties said that this could prove decisive in a perennial battleground like Florida where elections are always close.

    Once again, the conventional wisdom turns out to have been wrong. Trump appears to be defying the old rules of politics. In this case, it’s because most of the Puerto Ricans who have come to Florida are not registering to vote or otherwise getting involved in politics. At least for now.

    …. The Puerto Ricans emigres have mostly gravitated toward the Orlando area, mainly because so many other Puerto Ricans already lived there. The number of people of Puerto Rican origin living in Florida surpassed 1 million in 2015, which is more than double what it was in 2000. The sprawling settlement of expats outside Orlando is in the heart of the Interstate 4 corridor, which bisects Florida. This swingiest region of the swingiest state in America has determined the outcome of multiple presidential elections.

    But in the two Orlando-area counties with the highest concentration of Puerto Ricans, there has not been any meaningful increase in Democratic registration. In fact, because inactive voters are removed from the rolls, there are 12,315 fewer registered voters in Orange County today than on Election Day in 2016.

    … Steve Schale, a Tallahassee-based Democratic strategist who directed Barack Obama’s 2008 victory in Florida and was a senior adviser on his 2012 reelection campaign, has been closely tracking these numbers in Excel spreadsheets, which he shared Thursday.

    “The concern I’ve had for a while is that … the Maria impact was probably not going to be as significant as people initially thought,” he said. “We’ve got two-and-a-half months left for voter registration. But these numbers show it’s not going to happen organically. … This is a warning flare that there’s real work to be done. … Dems need to be registering around the clock, which they clearly aren’t doing.” [Why not? Floridians??]

    He’s not alone. Many of the savviest Democrats in Florida are growing anxious that a blue wave might sweep across America in November but bypass their state.

    State Rep. Amy Mercado (D), who is of Puerto Rican descent and represents Orlando, said that many of the folks who came last fall have been struggling to find affordable housing and jobs. “Their main focus obviously is going to be survival,” she said. “They have to contend with trying to figure out their day-to-day lives. So, honestly, the last thing they’re thinking about is politics.”

    I’m sorry, that’s a cop-out. Voting is not that hard, and Democrats will help rebuild Puerto Rico; Republicans have done very little to date.

    WaPost article is very comprehensive; well worth a click and has a lot of links. Actually, it is worth its own post, because a lot of facts and issues within.

    Good topic for Betty or Adam, or whoever, to expand on.

  43. 43.

    Matt McIrvin

    July 29, 2018 at 12:03 pm

    @germy: The parody account is too perfect a Poe; it’s an acceptable substitute for the genuine article.

  44. 44.

    JPL

    July 29, 2018 at 12:06 pm

    According to the noon news, Lewis is still in the hospital and being treated. They are hoping to get more detailed information soon.

  45. 45.

    Jager

    July 29, 2018 at 12:07 pm

    @chris:

    Small family farms are a myth. The only way a farmer can survive is to be a big, sometimes huge. family farm. I’ve said this before, my home county in ND has a population of 71,000. There are only 700 farms. That’s the case in every ag state. Big corporations in the ag business, don’t want to do the grinding, roller coaster job of farming or own farm land. They would rather fuck with the farmers who do the work on their own nickel on their own land. It’s, cheaper, it’s easier, there’s little downside and it’s much more profitable.

  46. 46.

    Shalimar

    July 29, 2018 at 12:10 pm

    @khead: I am fine with all small farms falling like flies. I believe in supports that keep food prices cheaper, but apparently the idiots who receive them don’t. Good riddance. Huge agribusinesses control almost everything now anyway. The farmers who are left will be replaced by more immigrant labor they hate.

  47. 47.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 12:13 pm

    @khead:

    “We are depending on them to put a safety net in place for us,” Kalena Bruce said of federal lawmakers. “Otherwise, you’re going to see small family farms dropping like flies.”

    I feel nothing.

  48. 48.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 12:16 pm

    @Suzanne: Not only do I feel nothing, I am mad at the media for giving only these people a media megaphone, but never any HRC voters. We simply don’t exist for them.

  49. 49.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 29, 2018 at 12:16 pm

    @Elizabelle: Ricans are not registering to vote in Florida. I’m sorry, saying they’re just too busy with other things just doesn’t cut it,

    I’m generally skeptical of the this argument, especially before the Rs really ramped up voter suppression, and skeptical also of “Dems need to step it up” screeds, which usually assume both limitless resources and that horses can be made to drink if you show them the water. But in this case, I am sympathetic to the peolple who have relocated. Think about how hard it is to move when it’s your choice and you can plan in advance. And this is something that both in terms of politics and morality, Dems should be making a priority. Tom Steyer could fund a massive voter registration drive among the newly arrived citizens, energetic young people paid to bring the paperwork to the voters, and then to the appropriate offices. I gather one of the candidates in the Dem gubernatorial primary is a mega-rich guy who’s been campaigning on the idea that he’ll open up his checkbook even if he doesn’t get the nomination. Here’s a chance to write that check now, not in a hypothetical, well-intentioned future.
    Also, from what I’ve read, this seems to be a case of the candidate making a difference. Batboy has been active and visible in the community in FL and PR– and avoiding the subject of trump, while Bill Nelson has been performing exactly as you would expect someone with his stay-under-the-radar reputation to perform

  50. 50.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 12:17 pm

    @? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:

    What formal training do you possess? What J-School program did you attend?

    While Grenface s one of the people in the world for whom I have the least respect, J-school isn’t a qualification for anything. Our daughter majored in history, took her Masters in film study, and is a working journo in DC.

  51. 51.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 12:24 pm

    @Brachiator: I agree with you. I really think that we need to move forward with a new coalition that doesn’t go after the white rural working class like the Bruce’s. Of course, we should welcome all correct-thinking people to Team Blue, but we don’t need to directly cater to their interests, either.
    I still think that we do ourselves a disservice by refusing to talk about how a strong social safety net makes capitalism work BETTER. We talk about how it is good for people (and it is), but we don’t talk about how it is BETTER for our very complicated markets to keep people healthy, housed, fed, educated, dressed, etc.

  52. 52.

    lollipopguild

    July 29, 2018 at 12:24 pm

    @Baud: Baud/Mary Poppins2020!

  53. 53.

    Tokyokie

    July 29, 2018 at 12:25 pm

    @Brachiator: I grew up in Bartlesville, OK, former home of Phillips Petroleum. Back in the mid-’80s, when Carl Icahn and T. Boone Pickens launched takeover bids that basically mortally wounded the company, my hard-core Republican mother who still lived there was certain that Ronnie Raygun would somehow rescue the company and thereby the town because it was such a GOP stronghold. I told her that every prominent Republican politician would favor the interests of a single billionaire over those of 20,000 upper-middle-class GOP die-hards.

    I was, of course, right. Raygun didn’t do jack squat, and Phillips eventually merged with Conoco and moved its headquarters to Houston. My mother was shocked and disillusioned for maybe six months, then went right back to voting for the same vermin that ruined her town.

    You can teach somebody a lesson, but it’s up to them to learn and apply the information.

  54. 54.

    stinger

    July 29, 2018 at 12:27 pm

    Thank you for the headline, Betty — it kept me from freaking out when I saw the photo. We’ll lose Rep. Lewis all too soon, whether through retirement or death, but every day that is postponed is a good day for this country.

  55. 55.

    MagdaInBlack

    July 29, 2018 at 12:28 pm

  56. 56.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 12:30 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: These shitty people in these shitty places (yes, I’m being a smug urban liberal) have had far too much cultural salience for far too long. Their votes for Dampnut are really just a primal scream to express their frustration that all of that is slipping away.

    I read Joan Williams’ book “White Working Class” to gain some understanding. And I did. It was a short but effective read. However, it underscored for me that these people, as a class……they really fucking suck. I am not interested in trying to give them what they want, policy-wise. And the country is a better place when they are not up there on a cultural pedestal, when the rest of us have to pretend that they are more moral or harder-working or respectable than those of us who live in cities and work in offices or service jobs.

  57. 57.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 12:39 pm

    @Elizabelle: The Democratic Party in Florida, and the Democrats that are involved in running it, that work on the campaigns, the candidates themselves, run the gamut of being excellent to bad on policy. But the one thing they are all uniformly terrible at is politics. What Schale, who is the exception to the rule and is very good at what he does, is describing doesn’t surprise me in the least. The state party should’ve had a plan in place to surge staff and volunteers to the areas where the Puerto Ricans were relocating. To bring them welcome to Florida packets, help them navigate the relocation – job search and placement, social services, schools for the kids, things like that, and register them to vote when doing so, and for absentee ballot voting (Florida has very liberal absentee ballot rules, it basically allows one to use absentee ballot voting as regular vote by mail). Then assigning a volunteer to each one/each family, have them check in on them every month, see if they need anything/any assistance, and remind them to vote. That’s what should have been done. It, apparently, wasn’t done.

    Apparently Senator Nelson’s campaign folks are also leaving him in jeopardy as the demographics of the state have changed a lot. The senior citizens and retirees who once supported him are dying off and have been replaced by the revanchist, white nationalist curious folks at places like The Villages. And while many of these folks are still boomers, they could care less that Nelson was an astronaut. All they want to hear is that everyone but them will be over-policed, their taxes will continue to be cut, and their medicaire and social security won’t be touched. And no amount of explaining it to them will convince them that Rick Scott wouldn’t help to privatize those last two so he could further profit. This is why the Nelson/Scott race, even though we’re not through the primary yet, is polling as very close with who is leading flipping back and forth every week or so and all within the margin of error.

  58. 58.

    chris

    July 29, 2018 at 12:41 pm

    @Jager: I agree with all you said. I was just letting my tinfoil hat peek out a little ;-)

  59. 59.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 12:41 pm

    @Suzanne:

    I still think that we do ourselves a disservice by refusing to talk about how a strong social safety net makes capitalism work BETTER. We talk about how it is good for people (and it is), but we don’t talk about how it is BETTER for our very complicated markets to keep people healthy, housed, fed, educated, dressed, etc.

    Agree 100%. Drop the shit Republican framing. We don’t have to apologize for being more realistic.

    Taxes pay for a civil society and to allow us to pool our resources to buy what we could not afford on our own, but actually do need.

    And that make life worth living. (Our national and state parks, and libraries, and schools and universities, and a fairer — and less expensive in the long run — health care system.)

    Stop apologizing. Make the Republicans and libertarians (but I repeat myself) apologize for their sheer greed, cravenness, and next-quarter thinking.

  60. 60.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 12:46 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Senator Nelson’s campaign folks are also leaving him in jeopardy as the demographics of the state have changed a lot.

    Do Nelson and his senior staff have a Crowley problem (complacency)?

  61. 61.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 12:46 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Ah yes, the fucking retirees who got theirs and fuck everybody else.

    A friend whose family lived in Arizona for years said her father was appalled at Sun City’s politics, as soon as that community sprung up.

    The state party should’ve had a plan in place to surge staff and volunteers to the areas where the Puerto Ricans were relocating. To bring them welcome to Florida packets, help them navigate the relocation – job search and placement, social services, schools for the kids, things like that, and register them to vote when doing so, and for absentee ballot voting (Florida has very liberal absentee ballot rules, it basically allows one to use absentee ballot voting as regular vote by mail). Then assigning a volunteer to each one/each family, have them check in on them every month, see if they need anything/any assistance, and remind them to vote. That’s what should have been done. It, apparently, wasn’t done.

    I wonder if it’s too late to even start with that, with the outreach. Maybe not. Two and a half months. Not a lot, but it is time that could be well used.

  62. 62.

    tobie

    July 29, 2018 at 12:46 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I generally am not swayed by anti-incumbent sentiments but I would be happy if Bill Nelson decided to retire and would be replaced by a more energetic Democrat. I remember when Zuckerberg testified before the Senate and Nelson asked pitiable questions about Facebook. Diane Feinstein may be old but she speaks with authority about judicial matters and has shown a fighting spirit in the face of Trump and today’s GOP. I’m not sure what Nelson has to offer. Then again, I’m not a Floridian so maybe I’m missing something. Right now he seems to be sleepwalking his own campaign.

  63. 63.

    tobie

    July 29, 2018 at 12:48 pm

    @Elizabelle: What pissed me off is that the Democratic party didn’t offer internships to college students this summer for something like “Democracy Summer” where they could register voters. It’s too late for that now. Students are returning to school. I kept on expecting word to come down and nothing came.

  64. 64.

    Immanentize

    July 29, 2018 at 12:48 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: I could see Thomas retiring — he is not the healthiest Justice and is not a happy guy (Alito is the most angry on the court and he could pop a vein any day). So, if I was a guy who wanted to secure my way of thinking — I would retire sooner rather than later to allow Trump (one-termer) the republican replacement pick. But even then, if the Senate flips all bets are off…. I had plenty of bones to pick with Justice “Whizzer” White (appointed by JFK), but he held on for years after he wanted to retire to let a Democrat (Clinton) replace him

  65. 65.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 12:50 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    the fucking retirees who got theirs and fuck everybody else.

    Not all retirees. Of course, we’d never move to Florida, either. We’re here in deepest blue New England.

  66. 66.

    Roger Moore

    July 29, 2018 at 12:51 pm

    @Jager:

    Small family farms are a myth. The only way a farmer can survive is to be a big, sometimes huge. family farm.

    I think this is true only of farming commodity crops like corn, wheat, soy, and cotton. Specialty crops like fruits and vegetables still have a lot of smaller, family farms. Here in California, where most of the farming is of specialty crops, nearly 2/3 of farms are smaller than 50 acres. There are some big farms growing specialty crops, but they’re much more likely to be small family operations.

  67. 67.

    FlipYrWhig

    July 29, 2018 at 12:52 pm

    @tobie: I haven’t checked this in detail, but isn’t Nelson the only Florida Democrat to have won statewide in the 21st century?

  68. 68.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 12:53 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    A friend whose family lived in Arizona for years said her father was appalled at Sun City’s politics, as soon as that community sprung up.

    My current project is out there, so I have been spending more time out there these days. What a terrible place. However, they came ***this close*** to electing a Dem in the special election to replace their resigned-in-disgrace Congresscritter (the odious Trent Franks). So there may be hope!

  69. 69.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 29, 2018 at 12:54 pm

    @tobie: judging from afar, the last couple of statewide Senate and Gov races suggest the Florida Dem bench is not deep.

  70. 70.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 12:55 pm

    More from that WaPost 202 article:

    Mercado praised groups like Vamos4PRAction (https://www.vamos4praction.org/about-us) for trying to educate the new arrivals about how the system works on the mainland. She said Puerto Rico’s elections are very different from Florida’s. “They don’t understand that there’s a soil and water board, let alone why it’s important,” she said. “They don’t always realize that the local issues affect them first, before the national issues.” [No, Ms. Mercado. That is very, very wrong when you’re looking at midterms. I am not liking this congresswoman very much, but it’s one article.]

    — Democratic National Committee officials said they are trying to make inroads with a population that’s highly transient. Chairman Tom Perez visited Orlando in May to announce a $100,000 grant for the Florida Democratic Party to register Puerto Ricans. To boost outreach, the DNC also just paid to get a list of cellphone numbers with Puerto Rican area codes that are being used in Florida. And the party is partnering with Democratic operative Luis Miranda Jr., the father of “Hamilton” playwright Lin-Manuel Miranda, to conduct focus groups of Puerto Ricans. [100K? That’s not enough.]

    — Another factor is that Florida Republicans have not taken Puerto Ricans for granted. … Scott has courted the community aggressively, traveling to the island at least half a dozen times since the storm and flooding Spanish-language media with ads. (Nelson is also running ads talking about his work to help Puerto Rico.) The LIBRE Institute, which is part of the constellation of political groups funded by billionaire industrialist Charles Koch, has been offering free “Welcome to Florida” classes to teach newly arrived Puerto Ricans how to speak English and search for jobs — with some lessons about the virtues of free markets thrown in. The RNC also hired three staffers to reach out to displaced people.

    Puerto Rico Gov. Ricardo Rosselló flew to Orlando in April to unveil a new initiative called Poder to encourage displaced Puerto Ricans to register to vote and participate in Florida’s elections. … “We’re trying to get Puerto Ricans on the mainland to get out the vote because that’s really the way we can make changes on these critical issues,” he said.

    Rosselló lamented in an interview that “upwards of 90 percent” of adults who live on the island are registered to vote there, but it’s so low in the states. …. The 39-year-old governor, an MIT-trained scientist and son of a former governor, said he is “still hopeful” that they can move the needle before the Oct. 5 registration deadline. “If you see the margin of victory in Florida in the major races over the last decade, you could see that 200,000 Puerto Ricans can certainly swing that outcome one way or the other,” he said.

    — There’s no denying that successful voter registration drives could mean the difference between winning and losing. One percentage point separated the winners from the losers in the Sunshine State for each of the past two presidential and gubernatorial contests.

    Come on, Democrats. Get your act together. You have to outwork those nasty Villages types, along with the Villager types.

  71. 71.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 12:56 pm

    @efgoldman: I don’t know. As far as I know, I don’t know anyone working on his campaign or even working for him. What it looks like from the outside, and please remember, I’m not an elections/campaign specialist, is that they’re doing what they’ve always done – slow and steady, nothing too dramatic. From the outside, I’m not sure that they’ve adjusted/adapted to the changes to Florida, as well as the changes in how people communicate and consume information and all the changed dynamics that go into and result from that. For all that he is one of the most socially awkward and least personable people (not named Ted Cruz) in politics, Scott seems to get this. And he’s got a ton of money, including his own, to plow into the race if necessary. So I don’t think it’s complacency so much as it is that things have changed, but Nelson, his people, and their approach may not have. As far as I know he does excellent constituent services, he’s seen at home, does town halls, things like that. It isn’t that he’s being out hussled, it’s that the most exciting thing about him, being an astronaut, doesn’t resonate much these days. He’s also not the most dynamic guy. My take is that the race is going to be very close. I also wouldn’t bet against Nelson, but if I was advising him on strategy, I’d be recommended a lot of things that I don’t see happening in terms of strategic communication and messaging. The ads have been out for weeks painting Nelson as out of touch, dull, way past his effective use by date and showing Scott being vigorous and decisive in dealing with hurricanes and other issues. The impression they’re trying to make is: let grandpa go have his nap and then take him to dinner around 4:30 and let someone who has the energy do the hard work.

  72. 72.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 12:56 pm

    Not sure it applies to Rep. Lewis, but one of the drawbacks of getting older is not getting thirsty, hence dehydration which presents in a multitude of symptoms. Probably natures way of cleaning the Earth of relics,

    Many believe that “healing crisis” occurs when the body is detoxifying and releasing stored toxins from the bloodstream through waste bowels. Yes, the lymph, liver, kidneys, and colons clean the toxins in normal speed of body cycle. However, when our body is controlled by other force of process such as drugs or modern medical technologies to detoxify, the speed of releasing toxins in the body will occur suddenly. Then, we feel sudden changes in our body, which appears to be a side effect or what we call a die-off reaction.

    The process of cleansing and detoxifying is a process of elimination, but without medication, the body can eliminate toxins very slowly. Thus, without modern medication, we do not feel or we cannot determine whether we are getting well or worse in a short period time. Die-off reaction can also happen as the body replaces old, toxic tissues with new tissues. Die-off reaction may resemble flu symptoms like chills, fever, body aches, headaches, and rashes. As long as these symptoms are happening during a detox protocol, they are a natural part of the healing process and should be supported.
    /snip
    We just recommend that you drink plenty of water, vegetable juices, fruit juices, or mineral water. Also, regular light exercise is recommended. These will help minimize die-off reaction.

    https://www.pyroenergen.com/articles10/die-off-reaction.htm Most of you don’t need this advice personally, but you may have neighbors and kin that do.

    Even sitting in the AC on my ass three days of the week, I notice my urine getting more yellow as the day wears on because I don’t feel thirst. Since I work out the other four I became aware of Rabdo (Rhabdomyolysis) which is a symptom of muscle death caused by trying to be bionic and pushing beyond failure, but can also be caused by statins which a lot of geezers take for high blood pressure and various and sundry aches and pains as well as diuretics. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhabdomyolysis

    Keep an eye out for your local elderly, they may be tottering along for lack of water. YMMV

  73. 73.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 12:58 pm

    @Elizabelle: I have no idea. I will say that if it was me, I’d be trying to grab, hold, and fight from as much conceptual terrain as possible – to move the metaphor from political to military campaigning. I’d be running ad after ad along the lines of “Rick Scott, stole from medicaire and medicaid, got rich, bought a governorship. Don’t let Rick Scott buy a Senate seat so he can steal your medicaire and social security too! Rick Scott, steals from you, steal from your grandparents. You, they, and Florida deserve better. Rick Scott, bad for Florida, bad for America”. Things like that.

  74. 74.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 12:58 pm

    @efgoldman: Oh, yeah. Not every retiree, for sure. I speak of the transplants, who fled snow and are now fleeing their responsibility to others. Don’t tax me, bros.

    A friend from Pinellas County has been joking (but not really) for ages that Florida should have a maximum voting age. Mind you, he’s a glibertarian engineer type, but a big believer in good schools and the environment.

  75. 75.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 12:58 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    Stop apologizing. Make the Republicans and libertarians (but I repeat myself) apologize

    Did you go back a year or two and find one of my rants?

  76. 76.

    Mike in NC

    July 29, 2018 at 12:59 pm

    Driving not too long ago from Tampa to Saint Augustine, we in fact went through The Villages and it made me think of all the stories of widespread STDs there. It was also a Tea Party stronghold when That One was in office. McCain and Romney held rallies there.

  77. 77.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 1:01 pm

    @Suzanne: I live in a fairly rural area that’s close to two college towns. Some of the towns here predate the revolutionary war by 100 years if not more. So what makes some 100 year old town in the mid-west real America but not us?
    (Most of the land in my town is protected agricultural land and 80% of this town voted against Orange Glow.
    ETA: Why doesn’t NYT send their reporters here? Ever?

  78. 78.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 1:01 pm

    @EZSmirkzz: I was wondering about dehydration WRT Mr. Lewis too. It’s pernicious.

    Summer heat, age, meds — maybe some diuretics to combat high blood pressure — and then high altitude and reduced mobility for a few hours.

    I hope it is nothing more than dehydration.

    For elderly women, urinary tract infections can spring up and become dangerous, very quickly. Reduced mobility; fear of hydrating adequately because it’s hard to be in and out the bathroom so frequently …

  79. 79.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:02 pm

    @tobie: There is no Democratic bench in Florida, which is why Marco Rubio is a senator.

  80. 80.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 1:04 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Let’s draft Betty Cracker to run for governor.

  81. 81.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 1:04 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    Drop the shit Republican framing. We don’t have to apologize for being more realistic.

    Even better: STOP LETTING REPUBLICANS HAVE THEIR RHETORICAL CORNER. They aren’t for free markets. They aren’t for more freedom. They aren’t more Christian. They aren’t more patriotic. They aren’t really supporting a culture of life. They aren’t really for making America great again.

    Take the fight right to them. Don’t cede an inch.

  82. 82.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 1:04 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: The “Go West, young man” myth. The myth of the Western frontier.

    Sorry, those towns are civilization. Urban ills. The better among us fled them.

    (Not. But there’s an audience for the rugged westerner myth. Which is a myth, because a lot of those folks did not survive on their own. They were, at one time, proud and happy to see progress arrive.)

  83. 83.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 1:06 pm

    @efgoldman: We are just relieved to have you back among jackals, ranting (and bragging on the efg girls.)

  84. 84.

    Roger Moore

    July 29, 2018 at 1:06 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    So what makes some 100 year old town in the mid-west real America but not us?

    Obviously, because people like you are living in your town, while that place in the Midwest is populated predominantly by conservative whites.

  85. 85.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:08 pm

    @efgoldman: We have fugitive retiree catchers. They’ll snag you and deliver you to either Florida or Arizona. We can pencil you in for, checks spreadsheet, the first week in December.

  86. 86.

    Jeffro

    July 29, 2018 at 1:09 pm

    @Elizabelle: we have MARCH here at the house and our kids LOVE it!

    Rep. John Lewis is coming to GMU’s “Fall for the Book” annual event this October…you can bet me & my kids will be there to meet him!

  87. 87.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 1:09 pm

    @Suzanne: How hard would it be for some Democrat to say “crony capitalism is not free markets. And that is all that Republicans have. Crony capitalism. Monopolies. Profits to the rich, losses to the taxpayer. Corporations sitting on piles of cash, not investing in workers. Having to pay CEOs 400 times the average employee’s wage just to show up for work. Folks, this is NOT a free market.

    Europe does it much better with regulated capitalism. Which Republicans and other fiction-writers call “socialism.”

    Give smaller companies a chance to compete in the market. Small and midsize companies is actually where you get your innovation. Monopolies are where innovations go to die.”

  88. 88.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:09 pm

    @FlipYrWhig: Yes.

  89. 89.

    Jager

    July 29, 2018 at 1:09 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    A pal of mine from Arizona says, ‘All Sheriff Joe had to do to win reelection was to run out to the retirement communities and scare the living shit out of the old ladies.”

  90. 90.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:10 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    he’s a glibertarian engineer type, but a big believer in good schools and the environment.

    Major disconnect there

  91. 91.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 1:11 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: The irony is that Arizona is actually a primarily urban state, in that the vast majority of Arizona residents live in the metro areas of Phoenix, Tucson, and Flagstaff……and it follows the same pattern of everywhere else in the country. Blue cities, red exurbs and rural areas.

  92. 92.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 1:12 pm

    @Elizabelle: Yeah, if I’d known getting old was going to such a pain in the ass I would’ve croaked before I was thirty like we all said we going to do. Sometimes God fools with the best laid plans of fools too.

  93. 93.

    oldgold

    July 29, 2018 at 1:12 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    There is a thin bench damn near everywhere.

    On a hopeful note, it appears Trump may have motivated women to come forward and solve this problem.

  94. 94.

    Steeplejack

    July 29, 2018 at 1:14 pm

    @? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:

    I think it’s the brother-in-law that will be in Kansas City, not Trump.

  95. 95.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:14 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: Knock yourself out.

  96. 96.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:14 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    We have fugitive retiree catchers. They’ll snag you and deliver you

    I some how missed the passage of the fugitive retiree act. Does it only apply in blue states?

  97. 97.

    Elizabelle

    July 29, 2018 at 1:14 pm

    @efgoldman: Why we are no longer dating.

  98. 98.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 1:17 pm

    @Elizabelle: No shit. Hoist them on their own petard. Play with their tactical. Like, “You don’t support a social safety net? WHY DO YOU HATE AMERICA?!?!”

    God, we suck at messaging. We suck so hard.

  99. 99.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:17 pm

    @Suzanne: I think you missed my point, which is that according to Natural law, all senior citizens must live in either Florida or Arizona or in designated retiree communities (senior citizen reservations) in other states. Your compliance is appreciated.//

  100. 100.

    Mandalay

    July 29, 2018 at 1:17 pm

    @EZSmirkzz: I’m not qualified to praise or damn the article you linked to overall, but it sure gave one piece of poor advice: drink plenty of fruit juice:

    As diabetes specialists, we see patients like her all the time, who for one reason or another believe that juice is a health food. The truth is that fruit juice, even if it is freshly pressed, 100 percent juice, is little more than sugar water. Yet many Americans believe that juice is good for them.

  101. 101.

    oldgold

    July 29, 2018 at 1:22 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    The bench is thin across the country.

    On a hopeful note, it appears women are coming forward to solve this problem.

  102. 102.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 1:22 pm

    @germy:
    He used to type long screeds that he considered journalism, he also considers himself a great thinker, and while he wouldn’t put it this way an enormous tool.

    And he’s nothing more than an ass. OK an enormous ass.

  103. 103.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:22 pm

    @Suzanne:

    God, we suck at messaging. We suck so hard.

    Yes, we do; but we don’t have our own lockstep LW noise machine

  104. 104.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:23 pm

    @efgoldman: All 50 states and the District of Columbia.

  105. 105.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 1:24 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: LOL. The real question is why do retirees want to self-segregate so bad. Sun City is hilarious….people driving golf carts on public roads (major arterials).

    There are literally no good restaurants out there. Lunch on jobsite days is a chore.

  106. 106.

    L85NJGT

    July 29, 2018 at 1:24 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    That’s par for the course on state and local party organizations. My guess on FLA is most of the migrants still think they are going back, or on to other places in the mainland, which is a significant barrier to civic engagement.

  107. 107.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 1:26 pm

    @Mandalay: Agreed. mea culpa. Most of the fruit juices are fortified with sugar, but so is Gatorade.

    I was actually looking into how the colon can affect perspiration. hard to believe the two of them are connected, and yet – ‘some people don’t think the universe be the way it be, but it do.’ Marlo from The Wire.

    Being a recovering drunk I tend towards hypoglycemia, so I can carry the extra sugar burden, or could carry, for a while. I’m moving away from that stuff now too. Never thought I’d be eating oatmeal for first breakfast either, but … see the Marlo quote above.

  108. 108.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 1:30 pm

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:
    Ahhhh. The safety net gambit. The net for me not for thee. We are hard working farmers not black people living it up in cities. We are the salt of the earth not drug dealers and gang bangers with their loud music. We deserve this money for we grow food for our country. Of course we sell most of our soybeans to other countries because we grow way more than the US needs but still, we are feeding the world.

    Did I hit all the fucking high notes?

  109. 109.

    Roger Moore

    July 29, 2018 at 1:31 pm

    @Suzanne:

    The real question is why do retirees want to self-segregate so bad.

    I don’t think it’s all retirees who want to self-segregate. It’s a particular subset of retirees. They’re the kind of retirees who:

    1) want to go somewhere warm so they don’t have to deal with snow. Warm weather is also supposed to be better for arthritis.
    2) Are white and afraid of being in places with lots of minorities.
    3) Want to be around lots of people just like themselves.
    4) Would love to be able to vote themselves low taxes, e.g. by not having to pay for any schools.

    Is it terribly surprising those communities skew heavily Republican?

  110. 110.

    El Caganer

    July 29, 2018 at 1:31 pm

    @Suzanne: I live in a 55+ community because that’s all I can afford, not because I’m so enamored with my fellow Olds.

  111. 111.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:33 pm

    @oldgold: What we’re seeing is that the Democratic Party itself is actually being remade and refreshed organically, from the bottom up. The party didn’t go out and recruit most of these folks, the bulk of the donations in this cycle aren’t being routed through the party, and the party itself is, by and large, not coordinating anything. Rather, what has happened is that the politics of Democrats has shifted, largely because it had no choice, something had to give – moved from a top down hierarchical approach, to a bottom up model that more closely resembles an enterprise model. This is likely a good thing, though it seems to have caught a lot of the professionals off guard – both the election ones and the political news ones. I like Tom Perez, but to be honest he is largely superfluous to what is going on. And, by and large, to his credit, he’s kept the DNC’s fingers out of what is going on so as not to screw it up. At the same time, and I neither like, nor trust Nina Turner (and Bernie will learn next year that he shouldn’t have trusted her either), she and Our Revolution are largely superfluous too.

  112. 112.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 1:37 pm

    @Suzanne: They don’t want to have to deal with young people, especially kids.

  113. 113.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 29, 2018 at 1:37 pm

    my neighbors have a six- and an eight year old, they have houseguests this weekend with two kids of similar age. As we enter Hour 5 of Day 3 of the Great Recreational Shrieking Contest, the idea of one of those places where, to borrow a line from Seinfeld, you pay money to able to complain about ridiculous rules (Del Boca Vista? or Del Vista Boca? Sierra Trails Ridge? or Sierra Ridge Trails?) actually sounds kind of appealing.

    Yeah, I’m that guy, but on the rare occasions they something like, “I hope the kids weren’t bothering you”, I lie about it in a very friendly way

  114. 114.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 1:44 pm

    @Suzanne: Sticking nose into other peoples business, not all retirees want to segregate themselves off from the pimply faced youth. As a primitive site camper I lug a ton of gear past rows of Winnebagos and trailers and so I’ve heard of the Bluebirds who like to segregate themselves off from the other glampers whom they deride as S(ome) O(ther) B(rand)s. It’s a status thing with a lot of boomers. Sort of like riding lawn mowers for Mcmansion yards are for the kids.

    Anyway I’m gonna get a trailer for my geezer years so I don’t have to endure the shame of wizzing in the latrine. I’m to old for digging holes in rock hard clay anyway.

    On topic, there is a cultural signal discrepancy between boomers and everyone else, We were post WWII and everyone else is post Viet Nam. Ya’ll took most of the good, and a lot less of the bad from us. By and large we’re a selfish generation, the Me Generation as Time magazine called it. Some of us never fit the mold however, and resent being pushed into it and being guilty by association.

    Life is soooo hard.

  115. 115.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 1:45 pm

    @Roger Moore: It was a rhetorical question. I understand it. The original advertising for Sun City all but read “Move here to get away from black people”. I worked on the advertising account for Del Webb for four years, and it is staggering how they sell those damn things hand over fist.

  116. 116.

    Mandalay

    July 29, 2018 at 1:45 pm

    Sean Spicer’s lawyer is taking fake news to a whole new level:

    Former White House press secretary Sean Spicer is threatening to take legal action against The Associated Press over a report from the wire service about an incident on his book tour.

    Spicer’s attorney Michael Bowe said in a statement Saturday night that the AP “recklessly republished a categorically false accusation about Sean Spicer.”

    “The claim is a lie. Absent an immediate retraction, Mr. Spicer will take legal action Monday,” Bowe said.

    The AP report, published Saturday, documented an incident at Spicer’s book signing in Middletown, R.I., on Friday during which a black man claiming to be a former classmate of Spicer’s at Portsmouth Abbey School accused Spicer of using a racial slur.

    So the lawyer isn’t arguing that AP’s reporting on what occurred was false. He’s arguing that since the accusation that someone made about Spicer was false, AP had “recklessly republished” the accusation.

  117. 117.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 29, 2018 at 1:47 pm

    OT: This fuckin’ guy

    Former White House press secretary Sean Spicer is threatening to take legal action against The Associated Press over a report from the wire service about an incident on his book tour.
    Spicer’s attorney Michael Bowe said in a statement Saturday night that the AP “recklessly republished a categorically false accusation about Sean Spicer.”
    “The claim is a lie. Absent an immediate retraction, Mr. Spicer will take legal action Monday,” Bowe said.
    Regnery Publishing publicist Lauren McCue said Spicer “can’t recall any incident” like the one the man described.
    Video of the encounter published by NewportRI.com shows the man, identified as Alex Lombard, approaching Spicer at event.
    “Sean, I was a day student at [Portsmouth] Abbey, too, with you,” Lombard said.
    “Hey,” Spicer replies. “Yes, how are you?”
    You don’t remember that you tried to fight me?” Lombard said. “But you called me a [n-word] first.”
    “I was 14 then. I was a scared kid then, Sean. I’m not scared to fight you now,” Lombard can be heard yelling.

  118. 118.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 1:48 pm

    @Jager:
    I have to ask.
    What is it about farmers who purchase/lease as much land as possible and grow huge crops, which increases supply and therefore cuts prices, go into huge crushing debt if the slightest thing goes wrong, like the price drops $.06 a bushel, and expect to be bailed out for their not thinking through the entire process.
    Would an auto mfg build a huge plant with all the machinery and employees to build a 20 ft long, 8 ft wide 2 seater with fins that gets 8 miles per gal, and expect to make money these days? No they wouldn’t, because they understand the market, they understand at least somewhat the needs of the population they serve and know that while they may sell 20 of those boats they won’t sell 200,000. Even big pickum ups don’t sell at 8 mpg any more.
    Why am I supposed to be thinking that the majority of farmers are smart?
    Why am I supposed to be paying taxes to support farmers who grow stuff to sell overseas at a profit, while people here can’t even get a reasonable food stamp budget?

  119. 119.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 1:51 pm

    @EZSmirkzz:

    Some of us never fit the mold however, and resent being pushed into it and being guilty by association.

    And some of us resent being called lazy and entitled, avocado-toast-eating, cynical, industry-killing snowflakes who expect participation trophies for putting our shoes on in the morning, but we somehow endure.

  120. 120.

    L85NJGT

    July 29, 2018 at 1:55 pm

    @Roger Moore:

    My neighbor wants to move to Eastern Tennessee – something about a lack of public sector union pension obligations making it a low tax paradise. That a bunch of retirees move to some glibertarian paradise, demand services, and blow up state and municipal budgets is lost on him. They also fixate on taxes, and ignore overall cost of living.

  121. 121.

    hueyplong

    July 29, 2018 at 1:55 pm

    Spicer desperate for publicity.

    Looking to sell more than a dozen books.

  122. 122.

    Beeb

    July 29, 2018 at 2:00 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Perhaps we can retroactively claim Charlie Crist’s two state wide victories. He was a Republican then, at least nominally, but he’s a Democrat now.

    Is there a special category for RINOs?

  123. 123.

    Mandalay

    July 29, 2018 at 2:05 pm

    @khead:

    you’re going to see small family farms dropping like flies

    “small family farms” is an odious trigger phrases where “small” = weak and vulnerable, “family” = kind and loving and “farms” = natural and good.

    There are plenty more examples of mindless but devious drivel such as “decent, hardworking Americans” who “play by the rules”. The noble twaddle “devoted himself to a life of public service” gets rolled out for the lying racist John Kelly. And I regularly get fliers in the mail from a father and son dental business which proclaims it is a “family business proudly serving your local community since 1998”.

    All barf inducing drivel.

  124. 124.

    trollhattan

    July 29, 2018 at 2:05 pm

    Supposedly “clear and hot” here today but so much smoke is overhead from the Redding fire it’s effectively overcast. Beastly.

  125. 125.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 2:06 pm

    @Suzanne: Yeah, but I don’t call you guys that stuff. Over generalizations are something I’ve never taken too too seriously, plus I’ve been online a long time and have a walrus hide when it comes to flame wars. Like I said, life is soooo hard.

    I’m just glad there are so many people that still want to make it a better place.

    Anyway I’m from the, “If you haven’t got anything nice to say about someone, don’t say anything at all.”, school. This all goes back to my comment on horizontal violence a month or so ago. It’s variation of the divide and conquer ruse the rulers have used against the masses since Ozymandias. I refuse to play their game.

  126. 126.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 2:07 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    let grandpa go have his nap and then take him to dinner around 4:30 and let someone who has the energy do the hard work.

    And just from your comment it sounds like this is spot on.
    Now not every politician can be a John Lewis or even a Diane Feinstein, not all that of a outgoing spry person herself, or my favorite, Maxine Waters. Of course just because Scott is younger and at least seems to have a heartbeat, that vile slime that flows through his veins is nothing to write home about.

  127. 127.

    CarolDuhart2

    July 29, 2018 at 2:08 pm

    For years I’ve been wondering this: as the browning of America takes place, generational cohort after generation cohort, what is going to happen to the places like the Villages? None of the people my age (im 61) seem interested in going to places like that. It means moving away from relatives and friends who provide support both fiscally and personally. And even if I had the money, I like living in an urban environment where there are things happening all the time. The Villages seem to me like an endless re-run of golf, golf, golf, and nothing more interesting than that.

    Places like the Villages have advertised themselves as haven for people who moved away from “them” so long, and where life remembles an endless Sixties rerun, that minority retirees don’t even consider places like that as an option.

    Will places like that then become low-income havens as their kids dont want to live there either?

  128. 128.

    smintheus

    July 29, 2018 at 2:11 pm

    Here’s another fatal police shooting of an apparently unarmed man posing no real threat. The Morning Call has a video of the incident from Allentown, including events immediately preceding it. The victim is black.

    He was acting strangely Saturday afternoon, hanging on car windows and walking along a major boulevard leading out of the city where there are few if any sidewalks; just businesses and a motel along that side, nothing on the other side of the boulevard. An officer stopped and talked to him. He eventually walked away slowly alongside the grass, away from the rear of the vehicle. The cop got out and shouted instructions at him. He turned around and started walking slowly back along the verge. The cop started shouting for him to get down, he just continued walking slowly and half-heartedly waved off the cop’s shouts. And the officer opened fire, shooting him 5 times and killing the man. Bystanders were shocked by the killing. The officer is now suspended pending an investigation.

    I myself walked along that grassy verge at least once a few years ago (when I pulled into the wrong parking lot and just walked back to the shop I wanted to go into). Nobody threatened to shoot me.

  129. 129.

    Gvg

    July 29, 2018 at 2:12 pm

    @Elizabelle: I’d say you aren’t doing a very good job of trying to imagine being in their shoes. From reading multiple stories about the forced immigrant Puerto Rican’s, the first issue is are they going to stay. Many want to go home, and left for a hoped for temporary time. So they don’t register because they think they aren’t going to be here. However IMO based on what I understand of the pre hurricane economy is that most of them will be. But they don’t see that yet. They are homesick. Next, if they are staying, where is their address? Many are rotating around with different relative depending on space available and shared burdens. Our voting system requires a permanent address. The homeless don’t actually get a vote. Any uncertainty, means a problem. Job uncertainty relates to it also. I have actually been thinking about this because I am staying with parents while I house hunt. I haven’t changed my official address yet because I am staying with my parents but not living with them? I also had already thought about the homeless non voter issue before. And then I also think Florida authorities would like to challenge PR’s registering to vote and they know it, so they hesitate.
    Having the actual home island government beg them to register to give them a voice is probably a good move.
    I had always hoped they would become a state but felt it had to be their choice because of our annexing ways in the past. Now I think it’s too dangerous for them not to become a full state but still don’t know about saying so to them.

  130. 130.

    Jager

    July 29, 2018 at 2:16 pm

    @Ruckus:

    As my BIL says, they think they can beat the system and they can’t. One guy with 40,000 acres of owned and rented land can’t beat Cargill-McMillan (one of the largest privately held ag companies in the US) at their game. My family operates a large medium sized farm, they are highly diversified, wheat, barley, sugar beets, potatoes, most of it is under contract to commodity buyers before it goes in the ground. No livestock, not even chickens for eggs, My baby Uncle and cousin Paul maybe MAGATS but they know how to farm. They’re not too big that that can’t weather the markets or nature and they’re not so small that it’s tough to make a living even in a good year. The farmers in my family laugh at the guys who want to be the biggest farmers around.

  131. 131.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 2:19 pm

    @EZSmirkzz:
    Getting old ain’t for sissies, that’s for sure. I thought it would be good to sit and contemplate my navel. Sit, stand, walk, lay down, none of them feel good.

  132. 132.

    Gelfling 545

    July 29, 2018 at 2:23 pm

    @cmorenc: Sadly, Providence is in Rhode Island.

  133. 133.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 2:25 pm

    @Ruckus: Commodity markets. The soybeans go in, the soybeans go out. No one can explain that.//

  134. 134.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 2:26 pm

    @Beeb: I don’t know.

  135. 135.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 2:26 pm

    @Ruckus: Yeah I know. I picked up leather working, then sewing – using a power stitcher- (boys don’t sew, we stitch :) ) Anyway found out about Crossfit Boot Camp and have been doing that for the last six months. Amazing how the energy has returned. I’ll never be young enough for the regular Crossfit sport, but the boot camp twice a week and doing the workouts at AthleanX on Youtube gives me four days of elevated heart rate and I lost the love handles and gained 3 pounds to boot. I’m shooting for functional mobility since the days of being an athlete are behind me. Highly recommended.

  136. 136.

    FlipYrWhig

    July 29, 2018 at 2:29 pm

    Look, we need food so we need farms and farmers. But sometimes I’m tempted to say we should nationalize this shit so it doesn’t have to be profitable for anyone. I don’t mind if the government is paying people to grow stuff we can eat. That’s a good function for a government. I kinda mind when the people being paid to grow stuff act like they have superior virtue because they earn it unlike most of the rest of us WHEN THEY DON’T EARN IT.

  137. 137.

    Suzanne

    July 29, 2018 at 2:30 pm

    @EZSmirkzz:

    Yeah, but I don’t call you guys that stuff.

    1) Speaking in generalities allows us to discuss salient trends and patterns of behavior in a way that talking about individuals does not.
    2) Speaking about groups of people as if individuals represent the whole is something we have done with minorities for ages in this country’s discourse, and I don’t think anyone should be immune from it if we’re going to continue on with it (and all signs point to yes).
    3) #notallwhatever is so obvious as to be useless.
    4) I didn’t even say you specifically were a selfish guilty old.

    Good Lord.

  138. 138.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 2:36 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: There’s some of the industrial agribusiness running on Depression era farm programs that goes into it too. Atrios linked to this article http://politics.co.uk/blogs/2018/07/27/this-is-what-no-deal-brexit-actually-looks-like The efficiency of the market is also a choke point which the Brits are soon to discover. I know a lot of farms around here now have their own silos which implies to me that they are doing their own brokering. Mostly sorgum, corn, rice and cotton here. Not sure if this is germane to your conversation.

  139. 139.

    Gvg

    July 29, 2018 at 2:36 pm

    @Jager: wow, you are wrong. Small family farms are not a myth. It depends on local conditions and must vary a lot by state. My uncle is a small family farm in Wisconsin and he has neighbors that are too. Historically the government grant for farms had to get bigger as settling moved further west and the climate got dryer. It took more land to be self sufficient as the climate got dryer and the government and the farmers learned this the hard way with many first settlers failing or consolidating the land of several first attempt into bigger farms/ranches. For this reason the further west you go the bigger the land grants turned out.
    Next wave of consolidation was machinery did more work than one family could have done, but the loans to buy them needed more land to work to be economically profitable. If you didn’t automate, you lost. So in the 70’s my Uncle was running himself 3 family farms with kids and accaisional outside help. They knew the families they bought out. Farmhouses unused fell apart, original farm was 80 acres, then he ran 3 of 80 acre original grants. Typical of his area and it’s dairy cows. Other areas are apples or soy or feed corn but he is dairy. There are lots of big corporations too but still families as well.
    He’ll probably lose it soon because his wife had cancer for years till she died recently and the bills not to mention the time away at the hospitals kind of screwed the finances. No idea how trade wars will add to the misery but it can’t be good.
    Anyway the whole country is a patchwork of different farming conditions. Different products and climates changed what happened in each area and it’s not the same everywhere. Here in Florida it’s also both corperate and family and some of the family ones are tiny and some are huge. Blueberries can be a few acres for instance…cattle can be one family but huge.

  140. 140.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 2:37 pm

    @Roger Moore: People like me are statistically insignificant in my town, it is over 90% white. The point I was making is that MSM is not interested in WWC from a rural town if they are not Rs.

  141. 141.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 2:38 pm

    @Gvg:
    I wrote on BJ the other day that I’m a permeant mail in voter in CA. When I moved back to CA in 2005 I went and registered to vote. I was told that my address could not be used because it was my business address, not a residential address. I asked one question, “What address does a homeless person give out so they can vote?” The woman looked at me and put down my business address so that I could vote. Every citizen is supposed to get to vote. Even if you don’t vote by mail they need an address to send your sample ballet and polling location and it shouldn’t need to be a home nor an apartment. BTW that voting thing is one reason, a small one, yes, I enlisted in 1969 rather than go to Canada. It’s what we have as citizens, it’s our voice.

  142. 142.

    Mnemosyne

    July 29, 2018 at 2:38 pm

    @Gvg:

    A lot of states do allow the homeless to vote, actually. When I helped with voter registration in Nevada, the person just had to give an intersection that they frequented most and could use that as their “home” for purposes of voting. Florida’s rules may be quite different since they don’t really want anyone to vote. ?

  143. 143.

    Jager

    July 29, 2018 at 2:39 pm

    @Ruckus:

    I retired at 70, sat on my ass for a year and went nuts. Just for the hell of it, since I’m the son of a car dealer, I talked to my friend, the GM of a Jeep store. Got a job selling cars. By the third month I was the top salesman, I did it for 15 months, 50-60 hours a week, two days a week we did “bell to bell” shifts, 8a to 9pm. I had a perfect customer satisfaction index, so good it held the store up. I sold cars to some interesting people. Movie producers, stunt men, musicians (including the guy who was the 2nd key board player for Queen when they were on the road.) You can see him off to the left of the stage in the Wembley Stadium concert video. Since I’m an old motor head I sold a bunch of high performance cars and lots of Ram trucks. Finally just before Thanksgiving, I came home after working 14 hours and told Mrs J, ‘I’ve proved something to myself.” She said “What;s that?” I told her, “I was crazy not to go into the car business with the old man when he wanted me to.” I quit the next day. Now I’m bored again.

    Hardest job I’ve ever had with the exception of working the back kitchen at the Riviera restaurant when i was in high school. And yes, some car salesman are the scum of the earth and most of the managers are total dicks.

  144. 144.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 2:44 pm

    @EZSmirkzz: I was largely being a smartass. Hence the Bill O’Reilly paraphrase and the sarc tags.

    I have a very detailed understanding of how commodity markets are supposed to work versus how they currently work in the US as a result of the major financial institutions being allowed, via waiver, to purchase the commodity brokerages and then remaking them into mini stock markets over the past 20 years or so.

  145. 145.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 2:48 pm

    @Suzanne: What I was saying about cultural signals. Don’t get your knickers in a knot. Just as

    Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.… -Winston Churchill

    so too, this fora isn’t the best way and arena for the discussion of political issues, but until we have something better…work provide anything useful to me.

    I’m not too interested in discussing generalities that may or may not have any bearing on political topics. It’s too imprecise for analysis in my mind. That doesn’t mean I disapprove of you doing so however. It just doesn’t just doesn’t provide anything useful to me to work with is all. Half the crap under discussion in America on the internet now may as well have come from the Russians for all I know.

  146. 146.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 2:52 pm

    @Adam L Silverman: Well I can be very good at not being helpful sometimes, and what I know about farmers from farmers is if you lock five of them in a room to discuss any issue they’ll emerge with seven opinions, all of them firm.

  147. 147.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 2:52 pm

    @Jager:
    Thank you.
    This is my point. I’ve been a small business owner, twice, two completely different businesses. One I inherited from my father, a manufacturing business, I owned/ran it for 16 yrs got destroyed by an earthquake. Second was a bicycle shop. Ran it for 6 yrs. I was destroyed by the not so great recession. My point is that there are enough things to ruin/destroy a business without gross stupidity from the owners. Enlarging your business without the resources, room, equipment, employees, raw materials, customers is insane. Actually any one of those can destroy you. Two of them at the same time most likely will.
    Dad tried to grow the shop, had 14 employees plus him and well, me. Not enough room for that many, often had 2 people waiting for a machine that someone else was running. Dad wasn’t stupid though and saw the problem right away so it was a learning experience rather than a disaster. A pig headed idiot would have added another employee, to get more work done and make more money.

  148. 148.

    Adam L Silverman

    July 29, 2018 at 2:54 pm

    @EZSmirkzz: No worries.

  149. 149.

    Jager

    July 29, 2018 at 2:56 pm

    @Gvg:
    In the states that grow a lot of grains, beets, beans the average farm was 480 acres when I was a kid, that number has grown to 1200 acres or more. As you noted, Wisconsin has a very different farm situation than most of it’s surrounding states, geography, climate, soil vary. My home state of ND changes dramatically after you get west of the Missouri River, farms and ranches get bigger, there’s irrigation that you don’t see in the eastern part of the state. My BIL grew up on a 30 section cattle ranch, they grew alfalfa and some wheat on it, the vast majority was pasture for the Angus

  150. 150.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 3:01 pm

    @EZSmirkzz:
    I still work. Machine shop. 3-5 days a week. It isn’t the life, the work or the sitting that is my problem. It’s health or lack thereof. As a youngster, you know between 20 and 60 I’d see a doc once a year for a physical. Sometimes more for migraines, till we got my meds right. Now I’m at the VA far more often, 2 yrs ago I went every day for 9 weeks. That was fun. As we age, some of us have, ahh, issues. Some more than others. I apparently have a debilitating disease. It’s oh so much fun. And I’m not alone, not on BJ, not at the VA, not even in Sun City, AZ. Getting old sucks. It’s only the alternative that’s worse.

  151. 151.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 29, 2018 at 3:05 pm

    OT:

    FoxNewsSunday @ FoxNewsSunday
    .jonathanvswan on Michael Cohen: I often see it stated as fact that Cohen knows where every body is buried, actually he doesn’t. He knows where like maybe like 20 bodies are buried, but there’s probably, however many more.

    as far as beat-sweetening and source-cultivating courtier-reporting goes, Swan makes Maggie Haberman look like Ida Tarbell, and this is him on Trump TeeVee arguing that trump is a far bigger crook than even Cohen knows.

    Does anyone know if Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said anything that would upset Joe Lieberman today?

  152. 152.

    Jager

    July 29, 2018 at 3:07 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Yes, she made coffee and spoke to her brother on the phone.

  153. 153.

    Citizen Alan

    July 29, 2018 at 3:08 pm

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Bill Nelson should have been Al Gore’s VP. Just sayin’.

  154. 154.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 3:22 pm

    @Mandalay:

    He’s arguing that since the accusation that someone made about Spicer was false, AP had “recklessly republished” the accusation.

    Yeah. he’ll get that onto cpurt about te same time I run a triathlon

  155. 155.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 3:23 pm

    @efgoldman: Edit window still doesn’t work. Stuck w/the typos

  156. 156.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 3:24 pm

    @Ruckus: LOL I went to the VA in 85 to see about alcoholism, and got some Antibuse. The guys waiting for doctors convinced me that the VA wasn’t an option for such a minor problem such as mine. Tried AA but the group was full of rednecks N-clanging and M-clanging so I couldn’t handle them either. in 99 I finally worked the program without the group and God got me cleaned up on my own. Amazingly my liver was in excellent health as I have been except for melanoma having been a carpenter for years. that’s been cleared up with laser surgery so now I just have to contend with falling apart incrementally. I haven’t seen a doctor for nearly 2 years which may be why I’m so healthy :o. Still I wouldn’t change a damned thing, even the warts and foibles have made me who I have become today.

    I really wish you the best with your illness’s man. We always knew these days were coming, just not so fast I guess. Like Gus McCrae I’m still looking for that last buffalo to chase over that last hill. It’s been one helluva party ain’t it Woodrow?

  157. 157.

    Baud

    July 29, 2018 at 3:25 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: That’s the second time I’ve seen Lieberman’s name referenced today. Did something happen? I tried to Google and didn’t see anything.

  158. 158.

    germy

    July 29, 2018 at 3:26 pm

    @Citizen Alan:

    Bill Nelson should have been Al Gore’s VP. Just sayin’.

    I remember reading somewhere that Donna Brazile was an advocate for Gore choosing Lieberman.

  159. 159.

    MomSense

    July 29, 2018 at 3:43 pm

    @Ruckus:

    I’m really sorry about the illnesses. I had a pity party for myself in the middle of the night and then again today had waves of anger, frustration, regret, and sadness. It’s not like me to feel this way but I’ve been away from my usual coping mechanisms for a day. I think I need to do some work and figure out what I’m going to do with the rest of my life. If only one day away from a kid, my dog, the woods, and the internet causes this much of a reaction – I definitely need to sort some things out.

  160. 160.

    Raven

    July 29, 2018 at 3:44 pm

    @Ruckus: @Ruckus: FIDO Dawg!

  161. 161.

    Mr Stagger Lee

    July 29, 2018 at 3:48 pm

    I was reading in Deadspin, that the new Atlanta Braves Stadium is such a boondoggle, that Cobb County is considering cutting or closing some of their libraries. I was also reading that this stadium was some part of some new nefarious plan called “New Urbanism” which means a new way of segregation/apartheid at its’ basest terms.

  162. 162.

    Chyron HR

    July 29, 2018 at 3:52 pm

    @germy:

    Once Brazile joined Bernie’s Revolution, she was absolved of all her neoliberal sins, just like Nina Turner and “Tad” Devine.

  163. 163.

    Baud

    July 29, 2018 at 3:55 pm

    @Chyron HR:

    Wilmer Saves!

  164. 164.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 29, 2018 at 4:03 pm

    @Baud: not that I saw, I was just riffing on this strange Concern that Michelle Goldberg pointed out last week

    In November, several outright Nazis and white supremacists will appear on Republican ballot lines. Arthur Jones, a founder of a neo-Nazi group called the America First Committee, managed to become the Republican nominee for Congress in the heavily Democratic Third District in Illinois. The Republican candidate in California’s 11th District, John Fitzgerald, is running on a platform of Holocaust denial. Russell Walker, a Republican statehouse candidate in North Carolina, has said that Jews descend from Satan and that God is a “white supremacist.”
    Corey Stewart, Virginia’s Republican Senate nominee, is a neo-Confederate who pals around with racists, including one of the organizers of the violent “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville last year. The longtime Iowa Republican representative Steve King has moved from standard-issue nativist crank to full-on white nationalist; he recently retweeted a neo-Nazi and then refused to delete the tweet, saying, “It’s the message, not the messenger.”
    Clearly, the time has come for a serious national conversation. And so political insiders across the land are asking: Has the Democratic Party become too extreme?

  165. 165.

    trollhattan

    July 29, 2018 at 4:03 pm

    @Baud:
    Green Stamps?

  166. 166.

    Raven

    July 29, 2018 at 4:05 pm

    @Mr Stagger Lee: no hitter through 8 and 2/3 there right now!

  167. 167.

    Raven

    July 29, 2018 at 4:09 pm

    It’s not just the Braves,” Bradbury said. “It is an excess expense, but the cost of a lot of things has gone up.”

    Today, Cobb is facing a $30 to $55 million budget shortfall after raiding $21 million in rainy-day funds to plug a gaping hole in the 2018 budget.

    Notwithstanding Lee’s generous predictions, County Finance Director Bill Volckmann said even though income from the stadium is on track to meet or even exceed expectations, “It’s not going to be a windfall.”

  168. 168.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 4:10 pm

    @EZSmirkzz:
    It is what it is.
    Life is what rolls your way. Some days it runs you right over and some days you catch a wave that runs seemingly forever.
    It is what it is.
    2 yrs ago a HS buddy died, he was one yr ahead of me. He was beloved by everyone. I went to the funeral and it was packed. Since then 8 other people I know have passed. Every one of them was younger than me, one by 25 yrs one by 40 yrs. My best friend of over 40 yrs, she’s gone, a man and wife I used to work with at sporting events as a hobby, their 42 yr old daughter. People close to my age. And all of this as I was being treated for cancer. It was a tough go for me. But I’m still here and I’m not giving up so easy. Life you are going to have to take me, kicking and screaming.
    The VA has changed dramatically over the last ten yrs. I knew a girl that worked there in the late 70s and it was a fucking mess. It got better along the way but better is a relative term. But guess what, about ten yrs ago it started to get noticeably better. Let’s review what happened in 2008. I know, I know, we elected a great man for the job of leading the country. He hired some good people to help him do it and asked that they do their jobs. And what do you know it worked. I hold no hope for the VA or any other segment of the government these days, we went from great and competent to scraping off the slime that’s under the bottom of the barrel. There are many good people that work for the government, that want to do a good job, but there are totally incompetent people at the top who want to fail.

  169. 169.

    Raven

    July 29, 2018 at 4:10 pm

    Three more outs!

  170. 170.

    Chris T.

    July 29, 2018 at 4:11 pm

    @CarolDuhart2:

    … what is going to happen to the places like the Villages?

    Mostly, rot and ruin.

  171. 171.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 4:11 pm

    @Raven:
    Driving like a fucking mad man!

  172. 172.

    EZsmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 4:13 pm

    @MomSense: Big ol’ internet hug MomSense!

    I don’t know you well enough to give you any advice, but remember bad days are just as fleeting as good days. Sometimes you have to as Major Freedman said in M.A.S.H. “Ladies and gentlemen, take my advice, pull down your pants and slide on the ice.”

  173. 173.

    Raven

    July 29, 2018 at 4:16 pm

    @Ruckus: it’s hard for me to fathom that my high school buddy who I spent time in the Nam with has been gone for 2 years. The cancer treatment at the HuntingtonWVA VA was going well but the deer he hit on his motorcycle coming back from treatment had other ideas. They are having a celebration of life for my 52 year old former boss down in Panama City today. Live it up, the meter’s tickin.

  174. 174.

    Corner Stone

    July 29, 2018 at 4:19 pm

    Man but his fastball is riding high.

  175. 175.

    Corner Stone

    July 29, 2018 at 4:20 pm

    Wrecked.

  176. 176.

    Raven

    July 29, 2018 at 4:22 pm

    Top of 9, three more baby!

  177. 177.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 4:24 pm

    @Ruckus: Yeah, I agree. I didn’t and don’t have a problem with the VA, they helped out. It was just so crowded with people that were jacked up that my trivial problem was just a waste of resources, as time proved out. The people that worked then were top notch, and still are from all I can gather.

    You know we can’t change the world, but we can change ourselves, and we Americans can change those who govern us. We have limited power in our system of government, but right now it is at its’ apex. Instead looking around to see who’s slighted who or voted for whom in the last cycle that’s a major waste of time and resources. We need everyone to be here now. What do we want, and when do we want it? That;s all any of us need to know and talk about, IMHO.

  178. 178.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 4:26 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    He’s not alone. Many of the savviest Democrats in Florida are growing anxious that a blue wave might sweep across America in November but bypass their state.

    Blue waves don’t happen by themselves. Democrats need to come up with voter outreach programs that speak to the Puerto Rican community. Voters came out in strong numbers to stop Roy Moore in Alabama.

    There’s more work to be done. Survival includes voting to stop people who hate you and will try to kill you. I don’t know. Maybe community activists need to help Puerto Rican voters with some of the things that they perceive as obstacles to registering.

  179. 179.

    Raven

    July 29, 2018 at 4:31 pm

    Godamnnnn! One strike away and poof.

  180. 180.

    Raven

    July 29, 2018 at 4:35 pm

    Now no shutout!

  181. 181.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 4:35 pm

    @MomSense:
    It is what it is.
    I find that dwelling on the now helps. The past is gone, some days were amazing and some were the exact opposite. The future you can’t control or predict with certainty, although if nothing else, from experience you know that certain things end up being issues, alcohol, drugs, etc, while maybe good in the moment, really don’t enhance one’s life all that much. Friends can but really just breathing, just enjoying a sunrise or sunset (depending on your sleeping habits!) can be a great experience.
    For me I think it’s beating the odds. Not in betting or trying to make the odds in your favor or more against you but in just surviving, one foot after the other. I see people every day who either can’t do that or won’t try and that seems just less to me. We all have our trials and tribulations, how do you deal with yours, how do you end up after them, do you move on or are you stuck.
    Some of us need a smooth, quiet pace, some need all out balls to the wall, I find I need a bit of both.

  182. 182.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 4:38 pm

    @Raven:
    Xactly!

  183. 183.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 4:40 pm

    @Suzanne:

    I really think that we need to move forward with a new coalition that doesn’t go after the white rural working class like the Bruce’s.

    I’m greedy. I want everyone. I agree that you don’t have to cater to their interests. But this doesn’t mean that you must dismiss all of them.

    I still think that we do ourselves a disservice by refusing to talk about how a strong social safety net makes capitalism work BETTER.

    Very true. But you can’t have a safety net at all without a strong economy. But this is where you need to have vigorous discussions about policy.

  184. 184.

    Mandalay

    July 29, 2018 at 4:43 pm

    @efgoldman: There’s method to the right wing madness. Of course there will be no legal action, but Spicer’s lawyer has already done Spicer’s dirty work by further normalizing bad behavior: if something is published that is harmful to me – even though it is completely true – then threaten a lawsuit.

    It costs Spicer nothing to do that, yet a good chunk of the public will immediately assume that Spicer is the victim of fake news just because his lawyer made an empty threat to file a lawsuit.

  185. 185.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 4:44 pm

    @Ruckus:
    Wanted to add but ran out of edit time.
    Some of us need a smooth, quiet pace, some need all out balls to the wall, I find I need a bit of both.
    As I’ve aged though I find I need a bit more of the first and a bit less of the second. Still both, just not in the same proportions as when I was half this age.

  186. 186.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 4:50 pm

    @Jager:

    The margins are so tight for farmers, even the really big operations can go down very quickly.

    Farmers have it tough. But I don’t know how to help them wise up. The Trump economic team are not conservative ideologues. They are just ignoramouses who will ultimately fuck things up.

    @Tokyokie:

    My mother was shocked and disillusioned for maybe six months, then went right back to voting for the same vermin that ruined her town.

    Great story. I don’t know how to reach some of these people.

  187. 187.

    EZSmirkzz

    July 29, 2018 at 4:54 pm

    @Ruckus: Don’t sweat the small stuff cousin. You have a good rest of the day. Enjoyed the exchange.

  188. 188.

    efgoldman

    July 29, 2018 at 4:56 pm

    @Mandalay:

    It costs Spicer nothing to do that

    Billable hours at some ridiculous rate?

  189. 189.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 5:01 pm

    @Brachiator:
    Some people can’t be reached. They don’t want to be reached. They want and like being martyrs for a cause, good bad or indifferent. They suffer from the fact that they don’t know what they know, they don’t trust anyone is isn’t exactly like them so they won’t listen to anyone unlike them. You can’t reach them. They have to have what used to be known as a come to jesus moment but that’s not going to happen without them suffering some horrible event and often not even then. In our current situation, as it’s political, they have to have that moment when the scales are ripped from their eyes, that the republicans really aren’t the people they think they are. And those are the only ones who will have that moment. The ones that know and like who the current republicans are, they are incapable of change because they know, with all their might, that they are right and everyone else is wrong. They will go to their death beds thinking this. And fox not news will be playing in the background to reenforce that view.

  190. 190.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 5:11 pm

    @Ruckus:

    Some people can’t be reached. They don’t want to be reached. </blockquote
    True enough. But it’s a numbers game. It doesn’t hurt to try to reach some of these people. And some of them voted for Obama in 2008. They might listen to reason again.

    But yeah, there are some people who would rather die than be rescued.

  191. 191.

    Brachiator

    July 29, 2018 at 5:12 pm

    @Ruckus: Pardon the format errors. Can’t edit on a mobile device.

  192. 192.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2018 at 5:13 pm

    @Ruckus: hey asshole my mother grows soybeans!

    Well, she inherited a bunch of farmland that she leases to other people, some of whom grow soybeans on it. She has never actually grown anything herself.

    Never mind!

  193. 193.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 5:14 pm

    @Ruckus: We also need to remember that the mainstream media in this country amplifies the voice of the aggrieved Rs. So they seem like a larger group than their actual numbers would suggest. We need to tune out the prestige media, especially their nth dispatch from the “heartland” of the T voters.

  194. 194.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 5:16 pm

    @Steve in the ATL: So she is a feudal landlord?

  195. 195.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2018 at 5:17 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: a benevolent one, I like to think….

  196. 196.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2018 at 5:20 pm

    @Raven: fire Snitker!

  197. 197.

    Ruckus

    July 29, 2018 at 5:27 pm

    @Steve in the ATL:
    Steve is in the house!!!

  198. 198.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2018 at 5:30 pm

    @Ruckus: in a phone booth about to change into my alter ego, Steve in the STL

  199. 199.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 5:35 pm

    @Steve in the ATL: That’s for her peasants to decide.

  200. 200.

    Steve in the ATL

    July 29, 2018 at 5:39 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: peasants get to decide nothing. Off with their heads!

  201. 201.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 5:43 pm

    @Steve in the ATL: Spoken like true landed gentry!

  202. 202.

    hugely

    July 29, 2018 at 5:46 pm

    @Suzanne: do you want a mister suzanne? Because i super heart and agree with your points and want to subscribe to newsletter etc

  203. 203.

    Ohio Mom

    July 29, 2018 at 5:47 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: I’ve known two people who inherited farmland and rented it out. Both lived in Ohio; one had a farm in Kansas, the other, Nebraska. I know nothing of the actual arrangements but they always seemed more like really absentee landlords than feudal lords (or lady, for the Kansas farm).

  204. 204.

    schrodingers_cat

    July 29, 2018 at 5:50 pm

    @Ohio Mom: I was kidding, just pulling Steve in ATL’s leg.

  205. 205.

    Ohio Mom

    July 29, 2018 at 6:09 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: He is an appealing target…

  206. 206.

    TomatoQueen

    July 29, 2018 at 6:23 pm

    Rep Lewis still in hospital “resting comfortably”, spox does not tell what’s wrong with him, no further info about release date and time, all per local (DC) news just now.
    Lord, please spare your servant a while yet. He is needed.

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