Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

Take your GOP plan out of the witness protection program.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

If you are still in the GOP, you are an extremist.

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

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

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

Prediction: the GOP will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

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

Infrastructure week. at last.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Late Night Open Thread: Non-Person of the Year

Late Night Open Thread: Non-Person of the Year

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TIME has a (non-binding, of course) poll up, with a wide range of options. I voted for Nancy Pelosi, just in case the Oval Office Occupant has some misfortunate staffer monitoring the results. Well in the lead, right now, is a K-Pop group called BTS, which makes sense even if K-Pop fanatics don’t seem like a natural fit for TIME advertisers…

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61Comments

  1. 1.

    dlwchico

    My 13 year old niece and a friend’s 11 year old daughter are both crazy for BTS. Like, spending hours looking at pictures of them online crazy. I’m not surprised if they are winning an online poll.

  6. 6.

    Steve in the ATL

    Either that list is 95% intentional trolling by Time, or it’s actually People magazine’s person of the year poll.

  7. 7.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @Major Major Major Major:

    The Voxsplainer on k-pop is pretty good if you haven’t seen it.

    I’m having botsplainers vs firebaggers flashbacks

    I’ve always been a J-Pop man myself; specifically 80s and early 90s. That’s probably from watching old anime from that period.

  8. 8.

    Mandalay

    It’s pretty unlikely to happen unfortunately, but I can’t think of any winner more likely to blow Trump’s gasket than Colin Kaepernick.

  11. 11.

    Chetan Murthy

    I think they should put pussyhats on the front cover. Or failing that, middle-aged women (both of color, and white) wearing pussyhats. Because last year, they got angry. This year, they grabbed back.

  14. 14.

    NotMax

    Oh, must not forget the Parkland school students as worthy candidates for the top of the list.

    BTW,

    A Broward sheriff’s captain resigned and a sergeant was placed on administrative duty Tuesday for their roles in responding to the Parkland school shooting. Source

  15. 15.

    Viva BrisVegas

    @Amir Khalid:

    I notice that your PM has been uncharacteristically subdued since one of our Ministerial Morons called him antisemitic.

    Please let him know that we’d love it if he would let rip like the old days.

  20. 20.

    Chetan Murthy

    @NotMax: Heh. It’s not an accolade, so yeah, Yertle works for me. But he’s not the most important newsmaker this year. I think it’s either middle-aged women in pussyhats, or the Parkland kids. Yertle is old news. Much as I hate to admit it — it would *enrage* Shitler if Yertle got on that cover.

  22. 22.

    NotMax

    @Chetan Murthy

    Can see the tweet now.

    “Obviously would have been ME. Except I was too busy Making America Great Again to sit for a photo. Their loss, that issue would have sold a record breaking MILLIONS of copies.”

  24. 24.

    Amir Khalid

    @Viva BrisVegas:
    The Aussie MM referred to Dr M’s history of anti-semitic statements, and there were certainly quite a few of those back in the day. But he was then a youngster in his 60s and 70s, and he seems to have mellowed a bit in his 90s. (The anti-semitism may have been something learned from our Britannic colonial overlords. The Jews of Southeast Asia are few in number and have historically kept a mostly low profile. Dr M and my dad were contemporaries as medical students in Singapore, and my dad also showed signs of a similar anti-semitism.)

    You guys could have your PM call him “recalcitrant”, and see if that still gets a reaction out of him.

  27. 27.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @NotMax:
    I think you replied to the wrong comment.
    I don’t think of the 80s and 90s as being old old. “Old” is a catch-all adjective to me.

  28. 28.

    Viva BrisVegas

    @Amir Khalid:

    Unfortunately our current government is such a pathetic clown show that I don’t think that we are worth his trouble anymore.

    They’ve worked hard to make us irrelevent in the region.

  32. 32.

    Chetan Murthy

    @joel hanes: Dr. Ford did a great and brave thing. But the distinction isn’t for bravery — it’s for impact on the news. And …. well, she’s already gone, like ripples on a pond. I’m sorry for that, but it’s the truth. The wave of female legislators, of pissed-off middle-aged women voters and organizers? That’s real, and changed the election. At lesat, that’s my opinion.

  33. 33.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @Major Major Major Major:

    Leftier-than-thou types called Obama defenders “Obots” and they themselves were called “firebaggers”, probably after the blog, Firedog Lake, circa 2011-2012. Yes, I was around here then.

  36. 36.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

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

    A particularly annoying troll made up a portmanteau of “bot” and “explainer” to make the word “botsplainer”. A regular actually made that their nym for the longest time; this regular is still around, going by La Comte or something.

    I should be the local blog historian.

    A chapter of my tome shall be entitled “Unlimited Corporate Cash: Obambi’s going down libs!”

  37. 37.

    M. Bouffant

    TIME? The magazine? Are we in the time warp to ’58 again? I mean, Henry R. Luce died in 1967, & TIME is now part of some pipsqueak operation. Who under 90 could possibly give a crap?

  39. 39.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @NotMax:
    It’s crazy to think that the 80s was “only” 30-some years ago. Whenever I watch old TV shows and movies/news clips, I try to imagine what the scenes would have actually looked like through my own eyes and thinking how surreal it would be to see “old” cars still looking like they just rolled off the assembly line.

  40. 40.

    hervevillechaislounge

    Is anyone else following the Avenatti sturm und drang?

    There’s something weird going on with the photos of his accuser, Mareli Miniutti.

    All the rightwing sites have photos of a gorgeous woman in her 20s but in the only photo I can find of the two of them together (on a Bulgarian site, oddly) she’s clearly in her 40s. Her IMDB profile says she was born in 1990.

    I can’t tell if the photos on Breitbart et all are simply old images as she’s clearly had some not-especially-skillful facial tweaking to turn back the clock—but I can’t figure out if the sites are purposely running old/incorrect photos as some kind of scam.

    I’m overthinking this, aren’t I?

  41. 41.

    NotMax

    @M. Bouffant

    Up until the most recent sale only a couple of months ago, the Koch brothers were major stakeholders in the ownership since the purchase a year ago.

  45. 45.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @NotMax:
    So there were never any cars from the 80s on the show? That’s weird. Was that a specific design choice? The show premiered in 1990. You’d think a lot of cars that were just a few years old would be on the roads.

  46. 46.

    Amir Khalid

    @M. Bouffant:
    TIME’s Man Of The Year pick still gets talked about every year, albeit by fewer and fewer people outside the media. An unpopular pick can still result in lost subscriptions and newsstand sales. So someone still cares.

  49. 49.

    NotMax

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    Have but hazy recollection of the whole thing but am certain it was promoted as a deliberate choice by the producers.

    Somewhat along the lines of the decision to use only the colors printed in the original comic strip for the Dick Tracy movie.

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    Part of the Balloon Juice Moldy Oldies collection.

  53. 53.

    Suzanne

    I’ll be mildly contrarian and argue for Meghan Markle, who embodies the multicultural, modern future that pisses Trump off so much. I cannot tell you how much I love that a biracial American divorcee with her own education and career has infiltrated the British royal family.

    Policy changes law but the kind of real acceptance we’re looking for for people only comes about from a change of heart, and that is a cultural thing. Things like this are a powerful symbol of changing social mores.

    I have said before that the thing that I think pisses off Trump and his supporters the most about the Obamas is that they are absolutely loved and respected and thought of as cool and stylish and #goals, including by a sizable cohort of white people. There is a lot of discussion about how breaking down barriers is inspirational to those who are in the same class, e.g. it is inspirational to young girls to see women in leadership, etc. There has been less discussion about how, say, plenty of white people find the Obamas really inspiring, because they are so smart and wonderful. I think that pisses Trump and his cult SO BAD…..they thought that they would be considered aspirational and high-status and yet they are not, at least not by the people whose respect they secretly crave (New York high society for Trump, and “coastal elitists” for his base). Anyway, Meghan Markle is yet another example of this, in my view.

  54. 54.

    tobie

    @susanna: I saw a lengthy interview with Benioff on MSNBC over the weekend. I was washing dishes so I kept the TV running but if I hadn’t been doing that I would have turned the TV off. The guy’s preening self-regard and certainty that he, and maybe a few other of his Silicon Valley buddies, were the Masters of the Universe and deservedly so was just too much to bear. I need to look up what his company Salesforce does?

  55. 55.

    J R in WV

    I saw a Jared Diamonds ad not long ago with many proposals just the other day.

    One was a white guy proposing to his best, another guy. Others were multi-racial. That’s a real cultural change, and I think it means we win, big !!

    Anyway, I’m thankful for the changing culture, changing to be more accepting of different people from different cultures. Thankful for all you jackals, too. You guys are a big positive part of my social life now.

    Thanks for putting up with me when I vent at 4 am when the wolf of insomnia is gnawing at me. And thanks for working for the recent election. You guys inspired me too.

  57. 57.

    satby

    @Suzanne: I was thinking along those lines too.

    @J R in WV: it was only a few years ago that add like that sparked a backlash, and now if there is one the rest of society just ignores it or doubles down on inclusion. So much better! Not all the way there yet, but farther along than we were.

  58. 58.

    Suzanne

    @J R in WV: I knew gay marriage was going to be here to stay when I saw trendy kitchenware and aprons that had “Mr. & Mr.” and “Mrs. & Mrs.” for sale at Crate&Barrel. They also have same-sex couples in the catalog photos. Hallmark also has LGBT wedding greeting cards.

    I know it seems silly, but this is actually where cultural change happens.

  60. 60.

    JGabriel

    @Ladyraxterinok:

    Have seen Jamal Khashoggi suggested.

    Yes, I saw that too, over at DKos.

    I have to say, I think it’s an excellent suggestion – pissing off Trumplethinskin and MbS simultaneously is what I like to call a “win-win” situation. Now if only we could nominate someone who could piss off Putin, Trump, and MbS altogether …

    Wait. Putin, Trump, and MbS … hmmm, I think we have ourselves a new Axis of Evil, people.

  61. 61.

    Ken

    @JGabriel: Khashoggi front and center, against a tiled background of the dozens (hundreds?) of journalists who’ve been murdered in the last decade. Inside, a brief bio of each including who ordered the hit.

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