Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

When do the post office & the dmv weigh in on the wuhan virus?

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

You can’t love your country only when you win.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

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

Today’s GOP: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

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

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

White supremacy is terrorism.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

You are here: Home / Past Elections / Election 2018 / Thursday Morning Open Thread: Never Stop Fighting

Thursday Morning Open Thread: Never Stop Fighting

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  3. 3.

    Cermet

    Good morning Jackals; things are looking up, a bit. The orange fart cloud in chief is losing it and even the media is noticing. The damage will take many years to fix, and we will have to get rid of any DINO’s who refuse to aid this process – specifically, until three new supreme court justices are added to the current inferior court so as to both replace the seat stolen, and shift the court back to the non-crazy side of the force.

  7. 7.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    A lot of people, myself included, said nothing changed after the president was implicated in a criminal conspiracy.

    I think it’s:

    A) being implicated by his personal lawyer

    B) Manafort verdict

    C) McCain/Flag-gate

    D) gas prices hitting 4 year high

  9. 9.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Gordon missed my son so it’s coming by here to give me a big wet sloppy kiss the next couple days. What with flash flood watches sure to turn into warnings depending on where the rain falls, it will be a good wkend to hunker down with a good book. I’m about a 1/4 the way into The Cloud Forest. I dopn’t think it will be enough. Good thing I have several “to read” piles available to choose from.

  13. 13.

    FelonyGovt

    Good morning to all. Going to be another exciting day, I guess. Looking forward to watching the 8 minute video of Kamala Harris lambasting Kavanaugh yesterday.

  14. 14.

    satby

    I’m going to go help out at my old place of employment today after the market. The doctor texted me last night. My former nemesis is on vacation ?

  16. 16.

    JPL

    Good Morning
    Do we still have a 25th Amendment? I’m confuse because un-elected senior advisors are running the country.

  17. 17.

    Immanentize

    Meanwhile, I have found fruitworm in some of my tomatoes. They bum me out — so maggoty — but I just usually cut them out and use the good parts of the ‘maters for sauce. That’s Blech worthy.

  20. 20.

    Immanentize

    @satby: Oh well, I’m with you on that. Hard to believe it so I wonder if everyone is just in shock? Or is this going to lead nowhere? Such an odd odd thing.

  21. 21.

    Betty Cracker

    @FelonyGovt: Harris had Kavanaugh squirming like a two-bit grifter caught on video swindling someone’s grandma out of her Social Security check. “Nothing further, your honor.”

    I think the Democrats are doing a damn good job of making Kavanaugh look like a second-rate partisan hack. You can tell from the Republican hysteria that they’re leaving a mark.

    To me, it’s vindication of their decision not to stage a walk-out from the outset, though I still hope they’ll walk out as a group when it’s time to vote for the second-rate partisan hack. Best of both worlds.

  22. 22.

    satby

    @Immanentize: I do that too. I cooked a fresh war of corn in the microwave and inadvertently cooked some poor corn worm. I felt bad for a couple of seconds before I cut that piece off and ate the rest of the corn.

  27. 27.

    bystander

    @satby: According to Mad Magazine the correct spelling is “bleccch”.

    Glad to watch Moanin’ Joe crew pushback on the supposed nobility of the Times’ Anonymous Source op/ed.

  29. 29.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker: Truth be told, I’m skeptical of the efficacy of legislative walk-outs, at least in the U.S. Maybe if they had firmer history of succese in state legislatures, I would be convinced.

  31. 31.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    expected high on Sunday is 71. The low that night is 58.

    that’s starting here tonight. I can’t tell you how relieved I am. I’m fact it’s 71 right now and that’s the high for the day AND the heat index temp! It’s supposed to rain for the next two hours and has been for the last several hours. So the river could get back to flood stage soon.
    I also had my first hummingbird stop by my feeder last night. Haven’t seen one since I moved here and I really missed them.

  32. 32.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    Any of the big brains here have any experience with a recent Macintosh virus called WeKnow.ac? Bro’ Man asked me for help a few days ago. I almost had it nailed, but now I’m stymied. I’ll save the gory details until I get a bite.

  33. 33.

    OzarkHillbilly

    At one time, Theranos was worth more than $10bn and Holmes was the youngest self-made female billionaire. But an investigation by the Wall Street Journal two years ago found that Theranos’s technology was inaccurate at best, and that the company, based in Palo Alto, California, was using routine blood-testing equipment for the vast majority of its tests.

    My my my. How far they have fallen.

    Theranos was unable to sell itself and is now looking to pay unsecured creditors its remaining cash of about $5m in the coming months, according to an email the Wall Street Journal obtained that the CEO, David Taylor, sent to shareholders.
    ………………
    Prosecutors allege Holmes and Balwani deliberately misled investors, policymakers and the public about the accuracy of Theranos’s blood-testing technologies going back to at least 2013. If convicted, they could face prison sentences that would keep them behind bars for the rest of their lives, and total fines of $2.75m each.

  35. 35.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @satby:

    I also had my first hummingbird stop by my feeder last night. Haven’t seen one since I moved here and I really missed them.

    That sucks. We’ve been fluctuating between 30 and 40 all summer.

  36. 36.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    Early notice: Trump is holding a rally in Billings, Montana, at 9:00 p.m. EDT tonight. Should be off the hook, what with all the revelations this week!

    As always, @ddale8 on Twitter is the way to follow for reporting and ringside commentary.

  37. 37.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    This is, uh, reassuring.

    Kim Jong Un of North Korea proclaims “unwavering faith in President Trump.” Thank you to Chairman Kim. We will get it done together!

    — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 6, 2018

  39. 39.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: I guess that depends on how you define “efficacy” in this case. Obviously, a walkout before the vote won’t stop the confirmation, but it can underscore the two messages the Senate Democrats have been sending all week, i.e., “This process is a sham since we and the public were denied access to Kavanaugh’s records, and this cheap partisan hack doesn’t deserve our consideration.”

  40. 40.

    Kay

    He’ll stump for Ohio gubernatorial hopeful Richard Cordray on Sept. 13, Cordray’s campaign announced Wednesday.

    This is good. It’ll help. I knew he would, though. If Cordray wins Ohio gov he’ll be a presidential candidate after that.

  43. 43.

    debbie

    @FelonyGovt:

    Me too! I’ve heard about it on the news, but I’d like to see Kavanaugh’s face as she grills him. She appears to have one hell of a marker to lay down against him.

  44. 44.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    I noticed the cheap partisan hack line of attack too, and, lo and behold, he is:

    But shortly after the Senate report was released, Mr. Kavanaugh convinced Mr. Starr to reopen what he called a “full-fledged” investigation of the Foster matter, telling his colleagues, as justification, that “we have received allegations that Mr. Foster’s death related to President and Mrs. Clinton’s involvement” in Whitewater and other alleged scandals.
    Who were these unnamed, presumably reliable sources on whose word the case should be reopened? Mr. Kavanaugh’s files in the National Archives make clear that they were some of the most ludicrous hard-right conspiracy-mongers of the time.

  45. 45.

    debbie

    @Betty Cracker:

    I still hope they’ll walk out as a group when it’s time to vote for the second-rate partisan hack.

    An empty futile gesture. Especially with Kamala’s questioning, Dems should stick it out and demonstrate that they’re not going anywhere ever.

  48. 48.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    Kay, are you seeing many of the anti-Cordray ads up where you are? I know his attorneys have asked that they stop airing, but they’re really abominable, especially the ones from the RGA PAC.

  49. 49.

    Patricia Kayden

    I had to laugh when Morning Joe played a clip of Trump boasting (lying) about his ratings being “through the roof”. He really thinks that we’re all idiots, doesn’t he? Yet, despite his plummeting ratings, the GOP stands behind him even though many of them know dang well that he is not qualified to hold the office of the Presidency and that he is dangerous domestically and internationally. This morning, Trump tweeted his love for the North Korean dictator, for goodness sake.

  50. 50.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: I think it might send a slightly different message. Voting “no” means voting against Kavanaugh. Walking out is saying the process as so corrupt that one can’t even vote.

    I think it is too subtle a message for about 65% of the electorate but at this point, what’s to hurt by trying?

  57. 57.

    Matt McIrvin

    Looks like the House primary in my district is headed for a recount–Lori Trahan and Dan Koh are separated by about 50 votes, provos haven’t been counted yet, Trahan declared victory early and Koh is petitioning for the recount. The Boston Herald is of course gloating that it “may burn Democrats”.

  58. 58.

    Kay

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I read the book and the sainted Mattis doesn’t come off well:

    Mattis not only served on Theranos’s board during some of the years it was perpetrating the fraud after he retired from US military service, but he earlier served as a key advocate of putting the company’s technology (technology that was, to be clear, fake) to use inside the military while he was still serving as a general.

    Luckily, there were professional people inside the military- actual physicians and scientists- who cared a lot that Theranos was planning on testing their cheap, fake snake oil on soldiers, and blocked it. They risked damage to their careers by asking questions about the blood testing because the idiots on the board were all smitten with Theranos bullshit about “disruption”.

    Once the professionals inside the military blocked her experimenting on soldiers Holmes took her crap product to impoverished areas of foreign countries, to experiment on people there. She’s going to prison and she belongs there. If it weren’t for a few individuals who asked basic blood science questions she would have killed people.

  59. 59.

    debbie

    Trump Claims There Are ‘100 Pictures’ of Mueller and Comey ‘Hugging and Kissing Each Other’

    President Donald Trump claimed in an interview that there are “100 pictures” of Special Counsel Robert Mueller and former FBI Director James Comey “hugging and kissing each other.”

    Trump spoke to the Daily Caller on Wednesday, and the website released a full transcript of the interview on Wednesday morning.

    …

    It is not clear, in the slightest, what Trump means by his claim that he could give the Caller “100 photos” of Comey and Mueller “hugging and kissing.”

    It’s just getting too silly.

  60. 60.

    rikyrah

    @Patricia Kayden:
    They are TRAITORS ALL ? ?

    Kay made an excellent point yesterday. The person or people behind that op-ed are every bit as treasonous as the craven sycophants around Dolt45. They are going against the rules of law. They aren’t saving this country for a noble cause. They have no noble cause. They have as much contempt for the public as Dolt45 does .

    Goes back to my original point:

    TRAITORS ALL ??

  62. 62.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Roy Moore sues Sacha Baron Cohen for $95m over Who Is America? stunt

    During last year’s Senate race Moore faced accusations he pursued romantic and sexual relationships with children as young as 14 when he was a prosecutor in his 30s. He has denied the misconduct allegations.

    Larry Klayman, founder of the conservative group Freedom Watch, is representing Moore and his wife Kayla in the lawsuit. The complaint also names CBS and Showtime as defendants in the case.

    Klayman said in a statement: “Sacha Baron Cohen, who is not only low class but also a fraudster, will now, along with Showtime and CBS, be held accountable for his outrageous and false, fraudulent and defamatory conduct which callously did great emotional and other damage to this great man and his wife and family.”

    I can’t wait for discovery.

  65. 65.

    Kay

    @debbie:

    No but I honestly no longer watch tv. I watch streaming services. I really soured on tv news. I just can’t bear it.

    I saw a good ad on the internet against DeWine. It will be on tv. It’s about ECOT. I (probably delusionally) take credit for this ad because it says ECOT is the biggest scandal in state history and that is true- it is. I realized that and told a hundred people- wouldn’t shut up about it – I literally told every candidate I encountered “this is the biggest scandal in state history” so I take credit for them adopting that line :)

    Add it up! True! In dollars it’s the biggest. It’s much bigger than Coingate.

  66. 66.

    Patricia Kayden

    @rikyrah:

    The person or people behind that op-ed are every bit as treasonous as the craven sycophants around Dolt45.

    The “Senior Official” who wrote the NYT op-ed made it clear that he or she doesn’t want Trump to be impeached or kicked out of office. That says it all. He/she is not a hero. He/she is a coward who doesn’t care that this country is being run by a despot.

  67. 67.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kay: “disruption” is the latest MBA buzzword. They love it because it justifies the destruction of anything in pursuit of profits. (some things need to hit the scrapheap of history but money alone should never be the end all reason for anything)

  68. 68.

    Matt McIrvin

    @rikyrah: I have no idea, honestly, even after the whole primary campaign. Professionally and policy-wise they’re pretty similar (each was previously chief of staff to a prominent Massachusetts politician named Marty). I’d happily vote for either one in the general, though neither was my primary choice.

  69. 69.

    NotMax

    So after the NYT thing, what’s delaying announcement of the reinstatement of the tariff on newsprint, only this time at 10,000%? //

  71. 71.

    Kay

    My youngest got a weekend job at Taco Bell. I know from my work that the local Taco Bell has a problem with employee drug use but I asked a probation officer and he said “Taco Bell, Kentucky Fried, they all do”

    So if he wants to pursue his career in fast food he will be encountering some users of illegal drugs.

    My first high school job was working at a tropical fish store. Alone. Besides the owners I was the only employee and they gave me way too much responsibility. It was clear even to my 16 year old self that they weren’t making any money. There is nothing sadder than a dying small business.

  73. 73.

    Ken

    @Kay:

    So if he wants to pursue his career in fast food he will be encountering some users of illegal drugs.

    Does it help to think of it as preparation for a Wall Street career?

  76. 76.

    Kay

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    This was really slick. Theranos talked about “incumbents” in the industry. I thought the word was interesting- very hip, unseating “incumbents”

    Every time anyone would ask questions she would sigh and say “the incumbents (big testing companies) are protecting the status quo” All the dopes on the board fell for it. Also- let’s not forget greed. They were seeing dollar signs- blood testing is a huge industry.

    I took it kind of personally because I was once misdiagnosed and a blood test cleared it up. I have an overactive thyroid, which I did not know and that was the reason for my symptoms. It doesn’t require treatment. At my level it’s just a thing some people have.

  78. 78.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: I’m skeptical that there will be benefits, and really skeptical that there is a downside. It hasn’t happened in a long time (if ever) and it will be impossible to ignore. The media will be interviewing DEMs left and right and getting on TV is the first battle. Free air time. In an election where all the #s are in their favor.

  79. 79.

    Kay

    @Ken:

    He’s excited, poor baby. I fear it will be disappointing. I guffawed when I saw “slip resistant shoes” on his list of requirements. He’s sort of vain and he’ll hate wearing ugly shoes. He also has long hair. Wait till they tell him about the hair net.

  80. 80.

    jonas

    @Patricia Kayden: It’s widely believed on the right that all the polls on election day 2016 showed Hillary with a commanding lead and then the plucky Trump won, proving all the polls were a bunch of liberal fake news. Of course that’s not the case — Hillary won the popular vote by roughly the amount predicted in the polling and lost the electoral college by virtue of a few thousand votes in a couple of states. Trump’s base has convinced itself that it represents a huge electoral majority, whereas in reality all they represent is the deluded vanguard of deplorability, which as we all know is down around that magic 27% mark.

  81. 81.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kay:

    So if he wants to pursue his career in fast food he will be encountering some users of illegal drugs.

    If he wants to pursue life he will be encountering some users of illegal drugs.

  82. 82.

    NotMax

    Earlyish TCM heads-up.

    Sunday, 2:00 a.m. – Ship of Fools. Dripping with Stanley Kramer’s signature in-your-face portentousness, yes, but also chock full of bravura performances from the likes of Vivien Leigh, Lee Marvin, Jose Ferrer and the redoubtable Michael Dunn.

  84. 84.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Trump boasting (lying) about his ratings being “through the roof”.

    Oh yeah, Shhhhhhhh…. don’t anyone tell him the Hurricane Mueller flipped his house upside down.

  85. 85.

    OzarkHillbilly

    A government photographer edited official pictures of Donald Trump’s inauguration to make the crowd appear bigger following a personal intervention from the president, according to newly released documents. The photographer cropped out empty space “where the crowd ended” for a new set of pictures requested by Trump on the first morning of his presidency, after he was angered by images showing his audience was smaller than Barack Obama’s in 2009.

    The detail was revealed in investigative reports released to the Guardian under the Freedom of Information Act by the inspector general of the US interior department. They shed new light on the first self-inflicted crisis of Trump’s presidency, when his White House falsely claimed he had attracted the biggest ever inauguration audience. The records detail a scramble within the National Park Service (NPS) on 21 January 2017 after an early-morning phone call between Trump and the acting NPS director, Michael Reynolds. They also state that Sean Spicer, then White House press secretary, called NPS officials repeatedly that day in pursuit of the more flattering photographs. It was not clear from the records which photographs were edited and whether they were released publicly.

    The newly disclosed details were not included in the inspector general’s office’s final report on its inquiry into the saga, which was published in June last year and gave a different account of the NPS photographer’s actions.

    I am shocked, shocked I tell you!

  86. 86.

    Jeffro

    @Betty Cracker:

    To me, it’s vindication of their decision not to stage a walk-out from the outset, though I still hope they’ll walk out as a group when it’s time to vote for the second-rate partisan hack. Best of both worlds.

    I agree. Show the country you mean business, Dems! Make your statement and step on the gas – November is just around the corner!

  87. 87.

    Matt McIrvin

    @jonas: There really were polling failures, but they were in the state polls used to project electoral counts, and they happened consistently across a bunch of critical swing states. The models used to calibrate the polling data were wrong, though as far as I know there is still disagreement about precisely how they were wrong. The biggest fails were in the northern Midwest.

  88. 88.

    NotMax

    Three weeks and three days until the end of the fiscal year. Here we go again with shutdown roulette.

  89. 89.

    Kay

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    True. My other son had an apprentice overdose on the job site. They’re drug tested so they did an investigation and apparently he had begged off a test by pleading with the instructor, who liked him and didn’t want him booted. Really sad. 20 years old.

    I’ll watch him – he can’t stay working there if his grades slip, is the deal so hopefully he’ll handle it. he navigated the whole “minor job permit” process in Ohio by himself – they have to get a sheet signed by the school to work, it’s part of the state code- so that’s encouraging. I found it online and printed it off for him and he had already done it. As you know parenting is one big worrying event. It would be easier to keep them in the basement but probably not better for them.

  91. 91.

    Haroldo

    @OzarkHillbilly: That wretched concept (and phrasing) has been around for far too long – I’m glad I’m finally away from Corporate USA. (And I worked for one of the ‘good’ ones!)

  93. 93.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kay: I know that when I was in high school, all the best drugs were to be had in the school smoking area. They don’t have smoking areas anymore so these days it’s probably the bathrooms. Either that or the teacher’s lounge.

  94. 94.

    Elizabelle

    @Kay: That’s tragic. Did the apprentice survive the OD? Sad to have a “likeable” kid who was trying to take up a profession fail like that.

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