Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

We will not go quietly into the night; we will not vanish without a fight.

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

The Giant Orange Man Baby is having a bad day.

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

This really is a full service blog.

She burned that motherfucker down, and I am so here for it. Thank you, Caroline Kennedy.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

Giving in to doom is how authoritarians win.

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Anne Laurie is a fucking hero in so many ways. ~ Betty Cracker

’Where will you hide, Roberts, the laws all being flat?’

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

I really should read my own blog.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Shut up, hissy kitty!

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Dear Washington Post, you are the darkness now.

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

You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Open Thread: Fake Wall, Real Suffering

Open Thread: Fake Wall, Real Suffering

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By Anne Applebaum (hardly a bleeding-heart liberal squish), via the Washington Post:

… The hard truth is that the wall has no function. Its only purpose is to serve as a talisman, as a fairy tale, as a mythical, “beautiful” piece of concrete that will be paid for by Mexico. The only difference between the wall and the now-forgotten, equally mythical “caravan” that we discussed during the election is that construction will cost real money. We, not Mexico, will pay for it in taxes and, therefore, in lost productivity. Or we will pay for it in interest on the national debt. Or we will pay for it by sacrificing spending on fighter jets or health care or roads.

It will make our nation weaker and poorer — $5 billion poorer. That’s why this isn’t a debate about border policy. It’s a debate that tells us which of our politicians cares about the real world inhabited by real Americans and which prefer to live in a fantasy world created by the president’s imagination. For the future of the country, it’s important that reality wins.

Reader Interactions

123Comments

  2. 2.

    artem1s

    I seriously hope the new House Majority Leader decides to have a full investigation on who was going to profit on this wall deal. No way does this Idiot keep whipping this horse unless he believes there is a payout at the end of it. Either the Trump family or someone they owe money has game in the outcome of this particular agreement. Not the previous funding (most of which has gone unspent) but this particular agreement. Like that ridiculously, narrowly defined tax write off that was written to benefit Ross Perot.

  3. 3.

    dmsilev

    @Yarrow: The line to piss on his grave will be long. Selling tickets would probably be quite a lucrative endeavor.

    Jared, call me, we can do a deal.

  6. 6.

    BC in Illinois

    Not like the mighty woman with a torch
    Of world-wide welcome — No! the fear-washed voice
    Calls us to cowering hide behind a wall
    With golden letters of the words, “Not you!”
    The light of freedom then is hid away
    From huddled masses yearning to breathe free.
    Too wretched are the homeless, tired, poor
    Who might bring down our city on the hill.

    And yet the woman with the torch still cries;
    To us, not to the ancient lands, she speaks;
    She lifts her lamp to people, who are gifts!
    She looks, not up to gleaming cities high,
    But valleys filled with exiles sent — like us
    The sons and daughters still of immigrants.

    December 20, 2018
    BC

  7. 7.

    Schlemazel

    @Yarrow:
    I have mentioned it here before & tweet it to people who need to hear it.
    Dump’s Burial site will be YOOGE! There will be very long lines to get in. The Guiness people will certify it as the worlds largest public urinal

  8. 8.

    Gin & Tonic

    13 or 14 years from now my grand-daughter will be a junior in high school taking something like what is now called US Government. If I’m still alive, I expect her at some point to look at me and say “WTF?”

  10. 10.

    plato

    If this is true, will his bigoted base see the fraud that the fraud is perpetuating on them?

    BREAKING: NJ AG has evidence that managers at Trump’s golf club gave fraudulent green cards & Social Security numbers to employees. When evidence was uncovered the AG didn’t trust Sessions, so they contacted Mueller. Now the FBI & Mueller are investigating the immigration crimes.

    — Scott Dworkin (@funder) December 29, 2018

  15. 15.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @artem1s:

    No way does this Idiot keep whipping this horse unless he believes there is a payout at the end of it.

    Trump was once willing to pay for a full page ad in the New York Times to declare that five brown-skinned teenagers should be executed, with no expectation of material or social reward. He’s a white supremacist, quite possibly a Nazi. He believes all this bullshit about brown hordes and drugs and terrorists, sincerely believes it. Throw in pride and a baby’s tantrum that he knows Mommy is about to come home and spank his ass, and no payout is required to make him passionate about the issues. Bonus points that McConnell and Ryan didn’t let him sneak out of this by signing something on the quiet, like previous occasions.

    EDIT – Full disclosure, I don’t think the bit about not being allowed to sneak out is a bonus. I think it’s critical. He previously got handed budgets he said he would veto, and could do it without publicly admitting he was backing down. Now he’s being forced to say it, and he can’t.

  16. 16.

    Anne Laurie

    @debbie: I checked behind the curtain. Not only is the A-word forbidden, your comments using it didn’t even get caught in the spam filter — they were dumped directly in the Trash bin!

  17. 17.

    Punchy

    It’s almost funny to watch the daily, inexorable negative progression of blaming and name-calling by the Orange Asshole. It”s clear he’s never been told “No” before and has no idea what to do about it now that it happens day after day. Today he blamed Dems for the border deaths of 2 kids; tomorrow they’ll be blamed for pancreatic cancer. By Tuesday he’ll be accusing them of genocide of Hopi Indians. If peeps weren’t sweating their next mortgage payment, this would be hilarious.

  18. 18.

    Ruckus

    @Schlemazel:
    I can see it now, it will look like a stage show, everyone pisses at the same time, the pee tape will look like amateur hour.
    @Gin & Tonic:
    She isn’t saying this now? Because I am. And I know WTF the cause is.

  19. 19.

    Jay

    @artem1s:

    Poll after Poll, focus group after focus group, shows that less than 2% of Gullibillies, Deplorables and Nazis believed that Wall was anything more than election retoric, that Wall would ever be built, that Wall would ever be real.

    The only people who really care about Wall, are Faux and Fiends, KKKCoulter, 88Hannity, Trucker Speed Jones and Ilsa the She Wolf Ingrahm.

    Faux and Fiends dictate what the Great Orange Bloat does on Wall.

  20. 20.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    A grown man using “soooo” is very sad. The president using it is pathetic. How can anybody be his supporters? That’s a rhetorical question btw.

  24. 24.

    dmsilev

    @Punchy: To me, what’s even more amusing is watching Mr. Master Dealmaker steadily lowering and lowering the amount of Wallcash he’s asking for, with his desperation becoming more and more obvious with each passing day.

    But, as you rightly point out, there’s a real cost to the shutdown which is hurting real people, so the amusement is bittersweet at best.

  27. 27.

    jl

    Wall did start as a joke, or at least a game for Trump to get more cheers out his rally crowds when things got quiet. One of Trump’s cronies suggested it would play well. Even a person as ignorant and dumb as Trump thought it was a stupid idea. But it riled up his crowds when he tried it out, and a BS campaign promise and policy was born. So, it did start as a game, and I think every news report should mention that it started as a joke to get more crowd noise at Trump rallies.

    Trump tweets are getting increasingly despicable. The US had a good policy that worked very well for undocumented families before Trump that did not involve locking them all up.

    I heard a news interview a week or so ago with a physician representing health care workers group. So, she said interdisciplinary teams of health professional volunteers have offered basic first aid and medical services for months, for free. Trump administration always turned them away. I heard a news report a day or so ago that finally, Trumpsters will do basic first aid medical exams when these people are taken into custody. I would say WTF!?, but it was obvious since the first child’s death that they weren’t even doing that basic minimum. Trump and his flunkies are responsible for the deaths and exactly not one other person on this earth is responsible for them.

  28. 28.

    debbie

    @dmsilev:

    After reading the tweets up top, I want someone to ask him to explain the financial wisdom of putting $587 billion trade at risk.

  34. 34.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @plato:
    It’s a sad day in America when you can’t trust the Attorney General of the United States.

    OT: I looked up why Eisenhower ran as a Republican. It was something I’d always wondered about. He ran to counter the isolationist wing of the GOP and to moderate the party. He had always considered himself a moderate conservative that cherished civil rights and the legacy of Lincoln.

    When Eisenhower won, the Congressional Republicans introduced 107 amendments to the Constitution to be voted on. At least one of the proposed amendments would repeal the New Deal and another would have gotten rid of the separation between church and state.

    Some like to speculate when the GOP went crazy. They’ve always been horrible. Nearly two decades of being in the political wilderness (from FDR’s first election in 1932 to 1952 with Eisenhower’s victory) didn’t change them.

  35. 35.

    jl

    @plato: Trump idiot racist base will think it’s great. First Trumpster I met, right after Trump announced, was a drunk staggering out of a convenience store mid afternoon. He said I was a white man (true) and therefore oppressed. He showed me some cheatp trinkets and candy bars in his pockets he said he filched from the store. He was going to vote for Truimp gawdammit. He was just like Trump, he knew how to work the system. Then he staggered off.

    When I think about how die hard Trumpsters react to whatever vile or stupid senseless thing Trump does, I think about the drunk and how he would think about it.
    I think I’ve typed up this story before, but i just happened to have a up close and personal experience with a Trumpster and it left an impression. Maybe that is why I don’t bother to look at the corporate media interviews trying to peer into the minds of the die hard Trump voters.

  38. 38.

    James E Powell

    At this point I don’t think the wall is about anything but showing his base and the Village Courtiers that he still owns the libtards. He really doesn’t have any policy goals, just performances.

  39. 39.

    jl

    @NotMax: Eisenhower’s work to save the GOP was less successful and long lasting that his effort on Europe. But he gave both a good shot.

  40. 40.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @jl:
    There are far-right people out there that like to hold themselves to some pretentions of intelligence. They seriously think that their ideological opponents are communists and that Antifa are “terrorists”. That the entire political left in the US are communists. Whenever anybody talks about “communists” in a modern context like above, it just goes to show that they’re all deeply out of touch with poltical mood of this country and the problems of real people.

  41. 41.

    jl

    Apparently Trump thinks the Nancy Smash boogie-woman with lady parts scary monster will still scare people, even after the display he himself has put on for the last two years. I am thinking that, well, times do change. Can’t keep living in yesterday. Dogs need to learn new tricks. Outside the hard core Trump base, I think most people who got irked or worried about Pelosi ten years or so ago will have a different perspective now.

  42. 42.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @debbie:
    His constant lying bothers me more, but I sympathize. In that section you quoted, he claims that Democrats are unwilling to give him any funds for border security when this is plainly false. Dems have made offers, just ones that don’t include money for a stupid, racist boondoggle of a wall.

    Also too, I’m so glad “wall” has become a meme. Nielson is good for at least one thing.

  43. 43.

    Ohio Mom

    @NotMax: I just googled this because I had no idea the Democratic Party ever asked Ike to run. I found out that both parties tried to recruit him, but (and I am condensing the story here) he always identified as a Republican. I can’t see this as a loss for our side.

  44. 44.

    NotMax

    @NotMax

    To elaborate a bit, Truman dithered on whether or not he was going to run again for so long (it was the end of March 1952 when he made the formal announcement that he would not be a candidate) that the Rs had Ike sewn up already.

    Trivia: Truman had secretly entreated Eisenhower to run as a Democrat in 1948 and when that didn’t pan out, decided to run himself.

  45. 45.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @NotMax:
    I do wonder if he ever would have run as a Democrat and what effects that would have had on the political landscape of the last 60 years.

  47. 47.

    Baud

    @NotMax:

    Trivia: Truman had secretly entreated Eisenhower to run as a Democrat in 1948 and when that didn’t pan out, decided to run himself.

    Source? I recently read that a bunch of New Dealers who were upset at Truman (think Bernie Bros) wanted to support Ike blindly. But I’ve never heard that Truman wanted Ike to run in 48.

  48. 48.

    NotMax

    @Ohio Mom

    Good short read on Ike and the ’52 campaign here.

    …at the time of his nomination, Eisenhower was not even a registered Republican (or a registered voter for that matter). For many, Eisenhower as the World War II hero seemed to be “above politics.”

    Though running nominally under the Republican ticket, Eisenhower co-opted many of the traditionally liberal positions that his opponent, the Princeton-educated Adlai Stevenson, had already staked out. As political theorist Russell Kirk reflected, Ike was not a conservative, “he was a golfer.” Though not exactly progressive, Eisenhower’s beliefs had little in common with the rest of the 1952 GOP party platform: he agreed with most of the progressive legislation of the 1930s and 1940s, from social security to various labor laws, and he vowed on the campaign trail “not to turn the clock back – ever.” Indeed, Henry Wallace, the leader of the Socialist-backed Progressive party, would decide in 1952 to endorse Eisenhower over Stevenson, claiming that Eisenhower advocated most strongly for the progressive platform.

  49. 49.

    Schlemazel

    @jl:
    Remember that Ike buried us in Vietnam (first USMC sent in 1957 to disrupt the free elections that would have unified the nation under Ho)
    Overthrew the democratically elected government of Iran and installed the Shah
    Overthrew the democratically elected Government of Guatemala which gave the Soviet Union the opportunity to gain power

    There were other things but internationally he laid a lot of landmines we were going to trip over

  50. 50.

    Karen

    @jl: Once the investigations start, Trump won’t cooperate or deal with her. He’ll degrade her by not taking her seriously and constantly tweet about her.

    I totally admit I don’t know how Congress works. Can Nancy SMASH Trump?

  51. 51.

    Ruckus

    @Gin & Tonic:
    OK sorry. I was figuring maybe 4. And 4 is old enough to know that something in OZ isn’t right. And it’s the asshole who is playing the character of president. And playing rather badly at the very least. But 3 is just too young to know or even care.

  52. 52.

    Geeno

    @John Revolta: “Are there no prisons?” asked Scrooge.
    “Plenty of prisons,” said the gentleman, laying down the pen again.
    “And the Union workhouses?” demanded Scrooge. “Are they still in operation?”
    “They are. Still,” returned the gentleman, “I wish I could say they were not.”
    “The Treadmill and the Poor Law are in full vigour, then?” said Scrooge.
    “Both very busy, sir.”
    “Oh! I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course,” said Scrooge. “I’m very glad to hear it.”
    “Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude,” returned the gentleman, “a few of us are endeavouring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?”
    “Nothing!” Scrooge replied.
    “You wish to be anonymous?”
    “I wish to be left alone,” said Scrooge. “Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer.”

    Dickens was brilliant at describing that state.

  53. 53.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @NotMax:
    And then just over a decade later, the Republicans nominated Goldwater in 1964.

    I guess my source was a little wrong.

  54. 54.

    NotMax

    @Baud

    It’s footnoted at the link offered Ohio Mom in #48 above. Different citation:

    Harry Truman always denied that while in the White House he entertained the idea of having Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower run for president in 1948 — with Truman as his running mate.

    But a newly discovered diary written by the nation’s 33rd president reveals that Truman did make the offer while talking politics one summer afternoon with Eisenhower. Truman worried that Gen. Douglas MacArthur would run for president on the Republican ticket.

    “I told Ike,” Truman wrote, “that if he (MacArthur) did that he (Eisenhower) should announce for the nomination for President on the Democratic ticket and that I’d be glad to be in second place, or Vice President.” Source

  56. 56.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @Schlemazel:

    I’ve always thought his farewell address warning about the MIC was always odd given his foreign policy record.

  58. 58.

    plato

    Questions about vampires in Poland and vegetarian sausages are among the most bizarre phone calls made to consular staff, the Foreign Office has said.

    It has compiled the strangest calls from Britons abroad in 2018 in a bid to remind people its helpline is meant to be used in an emergency.

    It received more than 330,000 calls from people asking for help.

    But some of the other odder queries to the Foreign Office included:

    A man checking whether there were vampires in Poland because a woman he met online had asked what blood type he was before they met for their first date

    Another man requesting the Foreign Office speak to a massage parlour in Bangkok on his behalf, as he fell asleep during a massage and felt he shouldn’t have to pay for it

    A caller in New Delhi asking what time the British High Commission opened, as he’d heard it sold vegetarian sausages and he wanted to buy some

    A Foreign Office spokesman said: “I can regretfully confirm that the Foreign Office isn’t able to offer advice on vampires, rogue stray cats or Strictly contestants.

    “And our capacity to deploy veggie sausages remains sadly lacking.”

  60. 60.

    Gelfling 545

    @Ruckus: This is why I favor the Trump Memorial Urinal at the southern border somewhere. Accessible from both US and Mexico. It could even include a couple of feet of wall.

  61. 61.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @NotMax:

    Thanks for the source by the way! Like that article said, there is no final verdict for history.

  62. 62.

    plato

    File it under voting matters.

    Brazil’s incoming far-right president has said he will seek to issue a decree loosening the country’s gun laws.

    Jair Bolsonaro, who takes over on 1 January, had made the pledge a key part of his presidential campaign.

    Brazil currently has strict gun ownership laws, requiring any prospective owners to undergo psychological tests.

    But Mr Bolsonaro has said more guns would allow “good people” in Brazil help combat violent crime.

    Mr Bolsonaro, a former paratrooper, is an avid supporter of America’s National Rifle Association, and the door of his campaign office was emblazoned with the slogan: “If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns.”

    Reuters reports that shares in Brazilian gun maker Taurus Armas SA climbed by about 88% year-on-year amid expectation gun rights would be relaxed.

  63. 63.

    Matt McIrvin

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??: I’d say the Republican Party probably had the relative moral high ground up until about the Rutherford B. Hayes administration… then again, a whole bunch of them got hip deep in the Credit Mobilier swindle as early as 1867.

  67. 67.

    NotMax

    On a whim, added some white pepper to the challah ingredients currently doing their thing in the super duper bread machine.

    May have gone a little overboard. House smells wonderful, but with decidedly peppery tang.

  70. 70.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @Matt McIrvin:
    I (think) the ideology of the GOP when Lincoln was president very pro-business. Another interesting alt-history what if: what Lincoln’s second term would have been like.

  71. 71.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @Baud:

    Honestly, up until the 1930s, the ideologies of the two political parties was mostly unrecognizable from today. I couldn’t imagine voting for any of the parties from the 1850s and earlier for example.

  73. 73.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @NotMax:
    That really didn’t leave the Dems a lot of time to draft anybody, let alone Eisenhower.

    @NotMax:
    So would Robert Taft, for that matter.

  76. 76.

    Martin

    @Baud: MacArthur was a political lunatic. He’s the one who decided to send tanks in to support the removal of the Bonus Army. Lots of desperate options would have played out had MacArthur run.

  77. 77.

    Matt McIrvin

    @NotMax: I’m surprised that they were surprised. Truman was quite unpopular at this point (maybe the Korean War had something to do with that), he’d served almost two full terms, and the only reason he wasn’t term-limited out was the grandfather clause in the 22nd Amendment. He was just returning to general practice pre-FDR.

  79. 79.

    Jay

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

    Under Ike, the Cold War “infrastructure” started to take shape, the MIC that dominates the US to this day.

    And it was during Ike’s Administration that the Monster first demonstrated that it had a mind of it’s own, it’s own Agenda, the ability to corrupt men, and an insatiable demand for money, men and power.

    ie. The Bomber Gap.

  82. 82.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Ruckus: The Watergate scandal played out when I was 4-6 years old. I actually knew vaguely that it was happening by watching TV news, but I was naturally unclear on the details and was firmly pro-Nixon even though my parents very definitely weren’t, because I’d somehow developed the idea that the President was by definition a good guy.

    I also recall having an argument with my uncle Jim about who was the Vice-President. Jim said it was Spiro Agnew and I said it was Uncle Sam. How exactly I’d come to believe that Uncle Sam was the Vice-President, I don’t know, but I may have figured that this fellow in the star-and-stripes costume had to be some high official and knew he wasn’t the President, so concluded he must be the Vice-President by a process of elimination.

  83. 83.

    James E Powell

    Is there any doubt that Georgia and Ohio State would have given us better games than Notre Dame and Oklahoma?

  84. 84.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @Major Major Major Major:
    Well, there were the War Democrats during the Civil War.@Matt McIrvin:
    True. Which is another reason I never would have voted for them.

    @Jay:

    So his farewell speech was some admission that he’d fucked up horribly by allowing this infrastructure to develop?

  87. 87.

    Jay

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

    There’s a lot of things that President’s don’t control. There’s a lot of things that the House and Senate control, lot’s of things the Generals, Admirals and Alphabet Agencies control, and a lot of things that money and Corporations control.

    At the end of WWII, the US started demobilizing, but the start of the Cold War, deColonialization and other events, changed all that. The reality is the last shot’s of WWII conflicts were fired in 1958, and the “settlements” ending WWII sparked new wars, which continue to this day. As an example, the OSS was as “out of control” under Roosevelt, as the CIA was under Truman, Ike, Kennedy, Nixon, or since Bush 1.

    Reigning in the US MIC requires every arm of the Government to make common cause with the voters.

  89. 89.

    Redshift

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

    In that section you quoted, he claims that Democrats are unwilling to give him any funds for border security when this is plainly false. Dems have made offers, just ones that don’t include money for a stupid, racist boondoggle of a wall.

    That one seems to be straight out of the right wing noise machine rather than originating with Trump (though he’s obviously using it.) They all pretty much simultaneously started using the lie that the wall = border security, and therefore Dems are against border security. It doesn’t seem to be working as well as it used to, though; everyone knows this is about Trump and his wall.

  91. 91.

    jl

    @Schlemazel: Yes, Eisenhower had great faults. But not sure he stands out as especially egregious wrt to foreign policy compared to other GOP and Dem presidents. But, yes, he learned some wrong lessons from covert operations in WWII, among other problems.

    I was also going to type that Eisenhower did screw things up domestically, because he did want to scale back what he considered ‘big government’ programs that were not needed. He had a free market fanatic agriculture secretary who he had to fire after attempts to reinstate a mythical golden age of unregulated free market agriculture. That didn’t work out, especially for small farmers. Point was not that Eisenhower was perfect or even close to it. Just miles better than the mess the GOP turned into.

  92. 92.

    Jay

    @Redshift:

    Reichwing Nosemachine + Wall = Treason Twitler’s “policies”.

    There are lot’s of Treason Twitler’s policies that can be substituted for Wall.

  94. 94.

    Redshift

    @Jay: Well yeah, I know most of his “policies” are “act on whatever Fox is ranting about today,” but in this case I was referring to the Wurlitzer’s dictating a script about how to talk about what they’re doing, rather than dictating policy. For example, Lindsey Graham started using the same language at the same time a few days ago. (Which I actually think undermines the effect; when the script gets parroted by people who the Village thinks better off, like Graham, the robotic quality becomes obvious even to them.)

  96. 96.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??

    @Jay: @Major Major Major Major:

    Fair enough and point taken
    @Redshift:

    It doesn’t seem to be working as well as it used to, though; everyone knows this is about Trump and his wall.

    Which is why in recent polls, he’s being blamed the most for the partial government shutdown. He actually thinks he can win this by bullying which is how he’s “solved” every problem in his life.

  97. 97.

    Redshift

    @Jay:

    They all “trapped” in the Reichwing Noisemachine. It used to parrot them back in Newt’s day, now they parrot it.

    Yeah, and it’s pretty frickin’ scary. Hard to believe things were better back when the electeds knew it was just BS for the rubes. They moved up to greener ($) pastures in wingnut welfare and speaking engagements, and left running for office to the rubes, and now the entire party is high in their own supply.

  98. 98.

    joel hanes

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Both parties behaved generally genocidally toward Native Americans.

    … pretty much from birth until Obama became President.

    viz. : creation of the Oahe Reservoir in 1948-1960 by flooding essentially the only habitable parts of the Cheyanne River and Standing Rock reservations. Or the theft of the “Indian Trust Fund”, 122 years of continuous fraud by the US Government, finally resolved by Obama and settlement payments not really starting until 2018.

  99. 99.

    frosty

    @Mike in NC:

    MacArthur was a malignant narcissist long before Trump arrived on the scene.

    Agreed. I just finished Halberstam’s The Coldest Winter and I kept getting echoes of Trump in both MacArthur and Kim Il Sung. FSM save us from narcissists in charge.

  100. 100.

    Suzanne

    It’s an open thread, so RANT.

    I have been experiencing severe sinus congestion for the past few weeks. I have had sinus problems for years, but usually manage it well. Anyway, the past few weeks have been really hard. I am a side sleeper, and when I sleep on my right side, my right turbinate swells shut. So I roll over to the left, and the left one swells shut instead. (ENT wants to do surgery but I am very freaked out by that.) I have Flonase and Zyrtec, and usually that is sufficient, but it is not cutting it this season.

    So I went looking for a pillow that would keep my head from flopping around when I lie on my back, so hopefully I could sleep in that position. I found some suggested products and purchased one that has a neck pad and some pads on the side to keep my head from flopping around. All of them advertised themselves as “anti-wrinkle” pillows. This is such beauty standard bullshit. I just want to fucking sleep and breathe.

  102. 102.

    Mike in NC

    @frosty: I have it on the shelf but have yet to read it. But I have read many other books on MacArthur and he would have loved being as esteemed in America as was the Emperor of Japan in his country.

  103. 103.

    Chris T.

    @Suzanne:

    I am a side sleeper, and when I sleep on my right side, my right turbinate swells shut. So I roll over to the left, and the left one swells shut instead. (ENT wants to do surgery but I am very freaked out by that.)

    I have the same problem, but the Flonase (now available as a non-name-brand at Costco!) does the trick.

    I have considered turbinate reduction surgery but worry about “empty nose syndrome”. The RF ablation method seems the simplest and safest, but still… errgh.

  106. 106.

    chopper

    @debbie:

    trump is like that awful office manager that puts quotation marks around words and phrases that do not in any way need it.

  107. 107.

    frosty

    @Mike in NC: You should take it off your shelf and read it, not just for the MacArthur stuff. The Korean War is totally forgotten, it’s amazing how our military had faded just a few years after WWII. And like many other wars, it took too long and too many lives to get the useless bullshitters out of command and put officers in charge who knew how to fight and how to avoid disasters. MacArthur and his sycophants in Tokyo were the former.

  109. 109.

    Ruckus

    @Suzanne:
    I bought a down pillow and that has mostly solved my back sleeping problems. It actually supports me far better than I thought it would. Not cheap but I sleep a lot better.
    Now my main issue is not now as you describe but it was one. My docs put me a while back on loratadine (the active ingredient in Claritin) once a day. This can be bought online/some drug places far cheaper than Claritin. Like 300 for around ten bucks. Works great.
    ETA loratadine is the generic

  110. 110.

    (((CassandraLeo)))

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)  ??: Lincoln was at least bordering on socialism.

    Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.

    And the Radical Republicans such as Thaddeus Stevens were to his left at least on matters of race and arguably overall. Of course, there was much wider ideological diversity among the party during those days than there is now.

  111. 111.

    Suzanne

    @Luthe: There are multiple kinds of turbinate reduction surgeries. Some involve radiofrequency, the one my ENT suggested involves electrocautery. I am very ehhhhhhh on that. I think the balloon is another method. At this point, I am tempted to shove fucking bendy straws up there.

    I am Flonasing it up right now but it ain’t doing shit for me in the past six weeks.

  112. 112.

    Suzanne

    @Ruckus: Claritin used to work for me, but in the past three years or so, I have had much better luck with Zyrtec. Never had much effect from Allegra. Costco sells generic Zyrtec and Flonase, which is waaaaaay more affordable. Problem is that even these trusted friends have been failing me for the last six weeks or so. I’m getting goddamn desperate. I have been a stark raving lunatic for the past three days because I’m really tired and full of snot and my face hurts.

  113. 113.

    Mike in NC

    @frosty: OK. I am currently finishing up “The Road to Verdun” by Ian Ousby and will be glad to take a break from all the WW1 material for a bit.

  114. 114.

    Ruckus

    @Suzanne:
    I used to find that switching around every once in a while helped. And I stopped the loratadine for a couple of days once when it stopped working and that was all it seemed to need. But we are all different when it comes to these things. But I would suggest a change or stopping for a day or two if for no other reason to see if it’s no longer doing it’s job.
    Whatever happens good luck, not being able to breathe is not a fun way to go through life.

  115. 115.

    Ruckus

    @Suzanne:
    I’d bet you have but have allergies ever been discussed?
    For example there is only two soaps I can buy in stores that don’t make me itch. Neutrogena and Safeguard. Satby sent me some great hypoallergenic samples and they made me itch. And yes I know I’m weird.
    But it’s entirely possible that some common thing around you is causing a reaction. Some cats block me up in minutes, others don’t bother me at all. Stuff like that drives one up the wall looking for them and ends in rarely getting good answers.

  116. 116.

    suzanne

    @Ruckus: I am allergic to everything. Was tested for the fifty most common environmental allergens in my area—and I reacted to forty. Dogs and cats, summer and winter grass, all the trees in my yard, dust mites and mold spores. So, you know, everything that surrounds me all the time and that I cannot avoid. Normally I do okay, but this season has been terrible.

  117. 117.

    Ruckus

    @suzanne:
    I figured if you are a long time sufferer then you’ve been tested but damn that’s a rough level. I have over the years figured out what most of mine are because I don’t have the rashes or anything like that, I just do like you, lose the ability to breathe and rather rapidly. And I found out about bees as a child, by getting stung and not knowing what it was, didn’t see the bee. But he left his stinger and to save everyone I won’t describe the gory details except to say, the ER doc was nice, he pulled out the stinger and gave me a shot. Fun times.
    Anyway good luck with finding something that works. Decades ago snow was good for clearing me up but it also wasn’t the best medicine, what with the side effects/end results and is still rather illegal.

  120. 120.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    I think it’s a official, Trump is literally so dumb he couldn’t pour piss out of a boot with instructions on the heal and that damn idiot is president. We’re going to have a recession thanks who his incompetence.

  121. 121.

    debbie

    @suzanne:

    I am allergic to everything too. Astel*zine has worked for me in regard to nasal/sinuses; what I can’t get to improve is the lungs/asthma stuff.

  122. 122.

    Mart

    Change the law to imprison Trump and his ilk for hiring people withot the right papers and problem solved.

  123. 123.

    SWMBO

    @debbie: I take Breo Ellipta (once a day inhaler) and generic Singular. I still have to watch myself but it has cleared up my breathing to the point that I don’t have bronchitis 3 or 4 times a year.

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