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Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Celebrate the fucking wins.

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

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

Never give a known liar the benefit of the doubt.

One way or another, he’s a liar.

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

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Innocent people do not delay justice.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

The republican speaker is a slippery little devil.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

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

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

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You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Reminder Open Thread: Trump Is What He Is What He Is

Reminder Open Thread: Trump Is What He Is What He Is

by Anne Laurie|  January 28, 201910:53 pm| 170 Comments

This post is in: Dolt 45, Excellent Links, Open Threads, Republican Stupidity

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This is with full employment.

People fundamentally do not like him, never will in the aggregate and are eager to hear alternative visions for the future. https://t.co/CzvdIfosKT

— Zeddy (@Zeddary) January 27, 2019

Elect a "businessman," you get the business. And you get it good and hard. https://t.co/o3RXoo1rz3

— Stonekettle (@Stonekettle) January 26, 2019

Like many other sports reporters, David Roth is underrated as a political commentor. At Deadspin:

… What most bears repeating and is most readily forgotten about Trump, even after his shutdown stole paychecks from 800,000 government employees and more than a million contractors for reasons even he never seemed to understand, is that he has no idea what he’s doing. There were certainly ways in which Trump’s shutdown reflected both traditional reactionary values—bullying and stiffing vulnerable working people are core to both Trump and his party—and Trump’s unique determination to leverage his every ugly belief to the max, but also there was never the sense that any of this was happening by design. On Friday, he agreed to the same deal that he rejected 35 days ago for the same reason that he rejected it then, which is that he decided it was the right thing to do. The belief, however inchoate and incoherent, is the thing…

This is also true, and maybe even especially true, when Trump is obviously lying. Even before he banged his own personal left turn and began his full-tilt drive into the desert of cognitive decline, Trump was not an especially nuanced or strategic person. His mind is not what it was, and at its peak it was more of a Magic 8 Ball than a supercomputer. He can’t learn anything because he can’t listen to other people if they aren’t speaking from inside a television; he can’t remember what he hears there because he can’t really care unless it’s about him. These deficits are clear when Trump is extemporizing on furloughed workers cutting deals with the milkman or imagining cartoon coyotes piloting sedans full of duct-taped women across the Rio Grande, but they are even clearer when he tells knowing lies. The former tend to be about other people, and so tend to be both lurid and half-assed; he only really ever applies himself when the lies involve himself.

This gives these lies the advantage of being heartfelt, but it also strips them down. The stories he tells about workers gladly giving up their paychecks for his drowsy racist fantasies and the villains working against him are mostly just sounds he makes to keep himself interested; he might have noticed that they drew louder-than-usual hoots from the seething grandparents and dead-ender rubes at his rallies, but he also might not have. His lies, though, are more elemental. They are never anything more than the opposite of truth. If Trump keeps insisting that he’s not being investigated for his relationship to Russia in gratuitous and unconvincing ways, it’s not because he’s trying to leverage some advanced placement Dealpoint or exploit some hidden businessman’s trick or angle. It’s because he’s literally fucking being investigated for his relationship with Russia and because he very much wants people to think he’s not, and because that’s honestly the best he can do because his brain is an old donut bobbing around in a toilet.

Trump is so relentlessly dishonest and so plainly diminished and so sorely overmatched that, at this point, he can only be taken at his word. This isn’t to say that you should believe what he’s saying, although you surely don’t need me to tell you that. It just means that what he does, from here until whenever his helicopter leaves the White House lawn for the last time, will never be anything but what it appears to be.

If he appears to be confronting an emerging truth that makes him look bad with a flailing childish insistence that Actually The Opposite Is True, it’s because he is. If it looks like he’s numbly ventriloquizing the rancid words of one of the aspiring genocidaires tasked with writing his more high-flown addresses, it’s because he is. If it appears that he is taking some cruel promise made idly at some point in the past and then spinning stupid stories to justify seeing that promise through, it’s because that is just what he’s doing. Trump repeats the same five or six phrases like a defective Teddy Ruxpin not because he’s trying to brainwash or brand but because he can only hold like 175 words in his head at one time and is just kind of mushing the button that seems most appropriate for the situation over and over again. There will be no new work done until he’s out of this job, not just because the venal and idiotic criminality that has defined his life belatedly appears to be catching up with him but because it simply isn’t in him to do new work, and because his current job transparently doesn’t matter to him at all. He’ll believe that he’s getting away with it—that he’s winning and commanding and leading—until the cuffs close or the lights go out, and he will always act that way. He will spend the rest of his life trying to demonstrate that he was right about whatever it was that he said or did before.

There is no reason to overthink any of this. Trump himself surely is not. He will not fix any of it, of course; that’s not what he does. Instead he will just say that it is not broken, or already fixed, or that it was always supposed to be that way, or that someone else did it. Nothing will ever matter more to him than that work, and yet he’ll never work any harder at it than he is right now…

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Reader Interactions

170Comments

  1. 1.

    Jeffro

    January 28, 2019 at 10:58 pm

    The sports guys (and gals!) know how to twist the knife like no one else.

    “…his brain is an old donut bobbing around in an toilet…” – I don’t care how much Dem candidate X or Y excites me, he or she is NEVER going to put it that succinctly, much to our democracy’s detriment.

    Alas. Thanks, though, Anne Laurie! I’ll be a-forwardin’ this far and wide…

  2. 2.

    Jacel

    January 28, 2019 at 10:59 pm

    That was how Keith Olbermann was underestimated. Damn good sports AND damn good political reporting.

  3. 3.

    Mnemosyne

    January 28, 2019 at 11:07 pm

    Lawyer types, I have a question for you about a meme I keep hearing about Kamala Harris’s choice of law school. People keep sneering that UC Hastings is a “third-rate law school,” but AFAICT, it seems like a feeder school for California politicians, kind of like how Cal Poly San Luis Obispo is the engineering school for people who want to be engineers in California and don’t care if other schools out of state are more highly rated.

    What say you, o advocates? Is Hastings really a terrible law school, or is this more factually challenged anti-Harris bunk?

  4. 4.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    January 28, 2019 at 11:07 pm

    New NBC/WSJ poll: Right track/wrong track (28/63%) now at the worst level in Trump’s entire presidency

    with unemployment at 3.9%

  5. 5.

    plato

    January 28, 2019 at 11:10 pm

    What Roth is saying has been known ever since the totus thug took office. What is so special about his ‘spin’?

  6. 6.

    chopper

    January 28, 2019 at 11:12 pm

    6 billion, yeah right. the last one in 2013 was pegged at $26 billion and that one lasted half as long.

  7. 7.

    Mart

    January 28, 2019 at 11:13 pm

    @Mnemosyne: She went to Hastings! Oh damn, there goes my vote. What a loser. FFS Where does this shit bubble up from?

  8. 8.

    chopper

    January 28, 2019 at 11:14 pm

    28% think the country’s on the right track. there’s the crazification factor again.

  9. 9.

    bluehill

    January 28, 2019 at 11:15 pm

    And yet Trump is smart enough to try to goad Schultz into running. That should tell him something if his ego steps aside.

  10. 10.

    Jay

    January 28, 2019 at 11:16 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Bunk,

    UC Hastings is rated (2018) as the 57th top Law School in the US with a 76% pass rate for it’s students at the California Bar, which is a hard Bar to pass.

  11. 11.

    plato

    January 28, 2019 at 11:17 pm

    A lot of white people need to work harder at assimilating into the human race.

    — God (@TheTweetOfGod) January 28, 2019

    LOL. True.

  12. 12.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:20 pm

    @plato: He writes purty!

  13. 13.

    Ben Cisco

    January 28, 2019 at 11:20 pm

    @Mart: Stupid people gonna stupid.

  14. 14.

    sdhays

    January 28, 2019 at 11:20 pm

    @Mnemosyne: I can’t answer your question, but I think it’s pretty ridiculous that it’s something we’re supposed to care about. Kamala Harris has been a DA for a large, important American city and the AG for the biggest state in the Union. Who gives a shit what the lawyers pecking order says about her school?

    She has an actual record that can tell us her skill in law. Having a degree from Harvard wouldn’t change that.

    (Rant not directed at you for asking about the school, but at those who think it’s a meaningful slam against her.)

  15. 15.

    dmsilev

    January 28, 2019 at 11:21 pm

    28% percent, huh? Within error bars of the Crazification Limit. I’ll allow it.

  16. 16.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:21 pm

    @Mart: Sock puppets of a lawyer guy who lives in Brazil.

  17. 17.

    bluehill

    January 28, 2019 at 11:21 pm

    @Mart:Hmmm Obama went to ivy league schools, so he was elitist. Harris went to state schools, so she’s not good enough. Maybe it’s not the schools but something else. Let’s see Mike Pence went to … Indiana University, Indianapolis?!?!

  18. 18.

    dmsilev

    January 28, 2019 at 11:22 pm

    @Mnemosyne: Let me guess: This comes out of the same roots as the demands to see Obama’s college transcripts because reasons.

    I guess we should be grateful that nobody is demanding to see her SAT scores.

  19. 19.

    burnspbesq

    January 28, 2019 at 11:23 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    Hastings is a perfectly good school. Number 7 in CA, and in the 50-60 range nationally. Not a good bargain anymore, because it’s behind all four of the other UC law schools.

  20. 20.

    Jay

    January 28, 2019 at 11:23 pm

    @Mart:

    Bots and trolls, bot’s and trolls.

    Then they use the ratio to decide which hits are landing and which are hard misses,

    Then they double down on the hits that land and get them out into the punditocracy.

  21. 21.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:25 pm

    @Mnemosyne: @sdhays: And building off of sdhays comment, one of the major we have in American politics, especially at the Federal level both for attorneys working in appointed staff positions in administrations and nominated for and confirmed for the Federal judiciary, is a concentration from two few law schools. This means too many people, year in and year out, administration to administration, talking too each other from a too narrow law school culture. They all had the same professors. Or they were professors for the more junior attorneys and judges. Or they clerked for the judges. Etc.

  22. 22.

    JGabriel

    January 28, 2019 at 11:25 pm

    @plato:

    What Roth is saying has been known ever since the totus thug took office. What is so special about his ‘spin’?

    Well, “…his brain is an old donut bobbing around in an toilet…,” is a nicely descriptive and accurate turn of phrase.

  23. 23.

    plato

    January 28, 2019 at 11:26 pm

    Obama went to Harvard = Bad
    Harris went to lesser known college = Bad
    Why are we debating these numbskull rw/loonyleft points? Wasn’t goku roasted in the last thread for doing this?

  24. 24.

    The Dangerman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:27 pm

    Trump Is What He is

    So, to Trump, that would be “I yam what I yam”; at long last, that explains the color.

  25. 25.

    plato

    January 28, 2019 at 11:28 pm

    @dmsilev: Bingo. The ratfuckers even ‘drudged’ up Obama’s school records. Have they gone birther on her yet?

  26. 26.

    eemom

    January 28, 2019 at 11:29 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    It’s not a top tier law school. Whether it’s good or bad on its merits is something you’d have to ask the folks who went or teach there.

    The value of a law school’s rank begins and ends with resume cred. It has exactly jack shit to do with the quality of lawyers it churns out.

    Law schools don’t even teach the practice of law to begin with, and should be one year or at most two, not three. It’s a scam, like so much else about the dear profession.

    Also too — U of American Samoa Law School FTW.

  27. 27.

    Mai Naem mobile

    January 28, 2019 at 11:29 pm

    If Josh Kraushaar is saying that about Trumpov related polling, Trumpov is screwed with the RW media.

  28. 28.

    Jay

    January 28, 2019 at 11:29 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Violent Serial Gang Rapist “Bart” Kavenaugh,
    There’s a list,

  29. 29.

    Mnemosyne

    January 28, 2019 at 11:30 pm

    @plato:

    I’m not repeating the talking point, I genuinely didn’t know the answer since I’m not a lawyer. “She went to a state school” seem like pretty weak tea as a slam, frankly.

  30. 30.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 28, 2019 at 11:30 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    1. Law school ratings are bullshit.

    2. Hastings is a fine; in almost any other state it would be the second or third ranked law school, or first in Mississippi and such.

    3. Ivy League schools tend to select highly intelligent and accomplished students, most of whom have focused so much on getting into Ivy League schools that they are unable to function normally and usefully in society.

  31. 31.

    Viva BrisVegas

    January 28, 2019 at 11:31 pm

    @dmsilev:

    the demands to see Obama’s college transcripts because reasons

    The college transcripts were required to prove that Obama was an affirmative action beneficiary. That all his achievements were in fact illusory and he was given a free ride through college.

    Libtards had claimed that Obama was smarter than W. Which obviously couldn’t be true since he was black.

    Not racist at all.

  32. 32.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:32 pm

    @Jay: Burp!

  33. 33.

    Amir Khalid

    January 28, 2019 at 11:33 pm

    @dmsilev:
    As I recall, one reason for demanding to see Obama’s college transcripts was the (faint) hope that they might contain codes classifying him as a foreign student.

  34. 34.

    Mai Naem mobile

    January 28, 2019 at 11:33 pm

    @Mnemosyne: I hadn’t heard the law school shit yet. I was more concerned about the Willie Brown stuff a while back but since the RWingers elected Trumpov, as far I am concerned, no moral shit matters. You have to just defend whoever the nominee is because they’re going to pick on stupid little nothingburger shot anyway.

  35. 35.

    burnspbesq

    January 28, 2019 at 11:33 pm

    @eemom:

    Just whatever you do, don’t go to Chapman. Hugh Hewitt teaches Con Law there.

  36. 36.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:34 pm

    @Steve in the ATL: When I was in academia the shorthand was if we hired someone who’d just recently graduated with a PhD from Harvard or Yale, then we’d have to assign them a grad student for at least 2 years to both do their teaching and teach them how to teach at the same time. Including how to design a proper syllabus, organize a large introductory lecture course and run that lecture hall, organize a small upper level seminar and run a seminar, design tests, grade tests, things like that. I’m not sure if they had to be taught to dress or feed themselves.

  37. 37.

    Mnemosyne

    January 28, 2019 at 11:35 pm

    @eemom:

    The value of a law school’s rank begins and ends with resume cred.

    That’s kind of what I was trying to say by comparing Hastings to Cal Poly SLO. If you’re an aspiring politician in the Bay Area, Hastings seems to be the school to go to. Aspiring corporate lawyers go to Stanford or Berkeley.

  38. 38.

    different-church-lady

    January 28, 2019 at 11:35 pm

    Which law school did Trump go to again?

  39. 39.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:38 pm

    @Amir Khalid: And the codes could only be read if you were wearing these glasses:
    https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/nationaltreasure/images/8/85/9517c_picture2jzt.png/revision/latest?cb=20110124193439

  40. 40.

    burnspbesq

    January 28, 2019 at 11:38 pm

    @different-church-lady:

    Which law school did Trump go to again?

    Saint Alfonso’s, where he stole the margarine.

  41. 41.

    dmsilev

    January 28, 2019 at 11:39 pm

    @plato:

    Have they gone birther on her yet?

    Jacob Wohl, one of this year’s contenders for Stupidest Person on the Internet, tried that one on for size a week or so ago. The argument, if you want to call it that, was that her parents hadn’t lived in the US for long enough for her to “truly” be a natural-born citizen. It’s based on a crackpot reading of the 14th Amendment.

  42. 42.

    Ben Cisco

    January 28, 2019 at 11:40 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    from two few law schools

    Well done.

  43. 43.

    David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch

    January 28, 2019 at 11:40 pm

    Hastings is not as good as Trump University or Burlington Community College.

    Those are the best. Tremendous.

  44. 44.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:40 pm

    @Mai Naem mobile:

    He's just trying to remain relevant, kind of like Tomi here. He's trying to take credit for her career, even though she wasn't elected to anything until many years after they had split up, and what he said was pretty carefully worded. "Yes, I may have influenced her career."

    — Brooke Binkowski (@brooklynmarie) January 29, 2019

    But then again… it's not so sad that I'm not laughing ?

    — Brooke Binkowski (@brooklynmarie) January 29, 2019

  45. 45.

    Redshift

    January 28, 2019 at 11:42 pm

    @Mai Naem mobile:

    You have to just defend whoever the nominee is because they’re going to pick on stupid little nothingburger shot anyway.

    And very important, don’t defend on their ground by feeling you have to disprove the bullshit. You just waste your time because they’ll just make up more bullshit. Instead, just call BS, or just laugh and go on the attack.

    In a way, we have it particularly easy this time around, because whether an attack comes from a wingnut or troll, or from a pundit, we have the ready response “compared to what Trump has done, why should I care about any of this?”

  46. 46.

    NotMax

    January 28, 2019 at 11:42 pm

    Government by transitory whim; practice makes perfect deficient.

  47. 47.

    Jay

    January 28, 2019 at 11:42 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    LGM has written for years about the Law School Con.

    The way to “judge” a Law School boils down to:

    – How many graduates pass the Bar,
    – How hard is the Bar exam,
    – How many graduates become Lawyers or have a Law Career
    – How expensive/inexpensive is the School

  48. 48.

    burnspbesq

    January 28, 2019 at 11:42 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    It’s endemic in law schools that many of the most brilliant scholars can’t teach for shit.

  49. 49.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:43 pm

    Looks like there’s gonna be a run on tiki torches!

    WH spox via pool: The President is attending the 2019 MAGA Leadership Summit, hosted by the Great America Committee. honorary chair is Pence

    — Laura Rozen (@lrozen) January 29, 2019

  50. 50.

    Fair Economist

    January 28, 2019 at 11:44 pm

    @Jay: I am going to guess Hastings specializes in getting students through the Cali bar, because that’s a great pass rate. That would explain why a lot of Cali pols go there.

  51. 51.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 28, 2019 at 11:47 pm

    @Ben Cisco: indeed! When I was getting my JD at Princeton, I felt like we didn’t even have a law school

  52. 52.

    Formerly disgruntled in Oregon

    January 28, 2019 at 11:48 pm

    @plato: Yes

  53. 53.

    Zelma

    January 28, 2019 at 11:48 pm

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Oh, that is so true about Ivy League graduates. Which is why when I was in charge of hiring, we didn’t make any offers to Ivy Leaguers unless they had taught elsewhere. I actually wrote to my own graduate program and suggested that most of their students were not going to end up in the Ivy League (like me) and a dose of reality would be useful. And none of the law school grads could pass the bar. Looks like Harris did just fine with her law degree.

  54. 54.

    burnspbesq

    January 28, 2019 at 11:50 pm

    @Fair Economist:

    The Cal bar is easy to prepare for, because relatively few subjects are in play for the two days of essays. The top schools always have astronomical pass rates, but once you get below Hastings its drops off precipitously.

    New York is a stone bitch to prepare for; you need to know shit nobody studies, e.g., UCC Article 9.

  55. 55.

    howard appel

    January 28, 2019 at 11:51 pm

    @Mnemosyne:

    As a Cal Berkeley Boalt Hall grad (class of 91), I would rank UC Hastings as definitely a top tier law school, good students, good program, good rep in the legal community.

  56. 56.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 28, 2019 at 11:51 pm

    @burnspbesq: luckily, you can back into the New York Bar if you have been practicing for a few years by going through the DC Bar, which has reciprocity with everyone

  57. 57.

    burnspbesq

    January 28, 2019 at 11:52 pm

    @Steve in the ATL:

    Dartmouth and Brown are the same way.

  58. 58.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:52 pm

    @Ben Cisco: That was purely a happy accident given that I’m talking about two: Harvard and Yale. Sometimes it is better to be lucky than good.

  59. 59.

    Fair Economist

    January 28, 2019 at 11:53 pm

    @burnspbesq: Hugh Hewitt teaches there ?! No wonder Chapman had such a hard time getting accredited.

  60. 60.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    January 28, 2019 at 11:54 pm

    Josh Marshall @ joshtpm
    Haven’t been hanging in every word but in the last 48 hrs of his pre-campaign I’ve heard @HowardSchultz attack Medicare 4 All, higher marginal rates, attack social security, embrace fiscal austerity. I’ve heard him say he doesn’t support a wall. He’s running as an anti-Democrat.

    The only rational response to HowardSchultz is to boycott and hopefully destroy the company he built Starbucks. The cash you’ve been laying out for years for bitter coffee is going to help fund four more years of Trump. There’s GradysColdBrew. So no real loss.

    I imagine whoever took over for Schultz is really pissed right now

  61. 61.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:54 pm

    @Jay: Don’t forget: does the coffee shop in the College of Law’s lobby make a decent cup of coffee and have a decent selection of pastries?

  62. 62.

    PJ

    January 28, 2019 at 11:54 pm

    @eemom: Go Land Crabs!

  63. 63.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:55 pm

    @burnspbesq: Same in the rest of the university too. Also, the one’s that are most famous, regardless of whether they’re actually that brilliant, won’t because they don’t have to. And you can’t make them!

  64. 64.

    Jay

    January 28, 2019 at 11:55 pm

    @Fair Economist:

    That’s the thing, you ain’t a Lawyer or going to have a Legal Career, unless you pass the Bar.

    Law Schools should teach the Bar just like Engineering Schools need to teach Engineering or Medical Schools teach Medicine.

    Put all LGM’s short points on Law Schools up, and UC Hastings is probably in the top 10 Law Schools in the US.

    Remove the top two “brands” for their proven track record of producing inbred amoral sociopathic violent gang rapist Nazi traitors,

    Probably top 8.

  65. 65.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:56 pm

    Ruh Roh!

    JUST PUBLISHED: Mueller team signals to Roger Stone associate another indictment may be in the works (and this comes after Whitaker comments today). via @SaraMurray and me: https://t.co/Bla9uVcaLi

    — Katelyn Polantz (@kpolantz) January 29, 2019

  66. 66.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 28, 2019 at 11:57 pm

    I have a question for you fine folks. How the fuck do you derail an open thread? Is it even possible? Aren’t they by definition open to any topic one would bring up?

  67. 67.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 28, 2019 at 11:58 pm

    @Fair Economist: That’s the case with Stetson in Florida. It’s well known as the law school you go to if you want to pass the Florida bar and practice in Florida.

  68. 68.

    burnspbesq

    January 28, 2019 at 11:58 pm

    @Fair Economist:

    They love John Yoo at Chapman; when he visited there a few years back, the students actually learned something.

  69. 69.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 28, 2019 at 11:58 pm

    @Jay:

    Law Schools should teach the Bar just like Engineering Schools need to teach Engineering or Medical Schools teach Medicine.

    Or, better yet, make the bar exam actually relevant to the practice of law.

    Eff the rule against perpetuities!

  70. 70.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 29, 2019 at 12:00 am

    @Adam L Silverman: I’ve worked with only one Stetson law grad, but by extrapolation it’s clear that they are all smoking hot yoga queens.

  71. 71.

    Wag

    January 29, 2019 at 12:00 am

    Hunter S Thompson would have been proud of some of the turns of phrase in that piece. Especially the line about donuts in the toilet. Except he would have had the guts to call them turds, and wouldn’t have waffled with a lore polite descriptor.

  72. 72.

    Brickley Paiste

    January 29, 2019 at 12:00 am

    @Mnemosyne:

    Hasting’s reputation has waned in the past decade or two. When she attended it was a top 20 school (barely.)

    If you want to go to law school in California and you can’t get into Stanford or Berkeley, it’s the next choice.

  73. 73.

    Redshift

    January 29, 2019 at 12:00 am

    @plato:

    What Roth is saying has been known ever since the totus thug took office. What is so special about his ‘spin’?

    “Has been known” is doing a lot of heavy lifting there. It’s still sadly commonplace to read speculation, both from pundits and from nervous Democrats, that Trump secretly has some clever plan when he’s really just blundering around, reacting, and channeling Fox. An ongoing supply of amusing writing that hammers on that is welcome.

  74. 74.

    PJ

    January 29, 2019 at 12:01 am

    @Steve in the ATL: Or maybe make the law school curriculum relevant to the practice of law.

  75. 75.

    burnspbesq

    January 29, 2019 at 12:01 am

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

    You just did.

  76. 76.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 29, 2019 at 12:02 am

    @PJ: or both!

    ETA: I have yet to use the holding from Pierson v. Post in my practice, but that’s my fault for not bringing in more fox hunting clients

  77. 77.

    Brickley Paiste

    January 29, 2019 at 12:02 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    I’m missing something here. Stetson is a punchline.

  78. 78.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 29, 2019 at 12:02 am

    @burnspbesq:
    But it’s an open thread.

  79. 79.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    January 29, 2019 at 12:03 am

    @Adam L Silverman: WH spox via pool: The President is attending the 2019 MAGA Leadership Summit, hosted by the Great America Committee. honorary chair is Pence

    and that’s at the DC hotel? So the rubes are keeping his business afloat again ?

  80. 80.

    burnspbesq

    January 29, 2019 at 12:03 am

    @Brickley Paiste:

    Your lack of current knowledge is showing. USC, UCLA, Irvine, and Davis (yes, Davis) have all surpassed Hastings.

  81. 81.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 29, 2019 at 12:04 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: they are all open threads

  82. 82.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 29, 2019 at 12:05 am

    @Steve in the ATL:
    Apparently not for some people. I guess I’m an evil disruptive troll who has a “subtle pattern”. Thanks satby!

    ETA: Everybody just ignore this. I’m just pissed is all.

  83. 83.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 12:05 am

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

    The give and take here, even in open threads here ususally has several distinct “conversations” happening other than the ones where we are just checking in and updating, or pissing and moaning.

    Once those threads have developed, coming in a doing a “drama, drama, drama” bomb throw and deny, derails the threads as many of those conversations stop and pie starts to get thrown,

    And that’s a good waste of pie,

    Except bananna cream.

  84. 84.

    burnspbesq

    January 29, 2019 at 12:06 am

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

    Don’t do it again.

  85. 85.

    Amir Khalid

    January 29, 2019 at 12:08 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
    As a jackal, you will (or should) develop a feel for how open a declared “open thread” really is.

  86. 86.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:09 am

    @Jay:

    Inbred Amoral Sociopathic Violent Gang Rapist Nazi Traitors

    That’s the name of my fusion hillbilly skinhead Norwegian death metal cover band.//

  87. 87.

    burnspbesq

    January 29, 2019 at 12:11 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Do they sound like the Hedwig Mollestad Trio? Imatiently waiting for her new album to come out on Friday.

  88. 88.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:12 am

    @burnspbesq: Did he teach his pro-seminar on how to crush children’s testicles?

  89. 89.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:13 am

    @Steve in the ATL: I had a friend who is now married and his practice is in Chicago, but he went to Stetson and originally practiced in Florida and that was his description of the place.

  90. 90.

    oldgold

    January 29, 2019 at 12:13 am

    @Jay:

    Law Schools should teach the Bar just like Engineering Schools need to teach Engineering or Medical Schools teach Medicine.

    Is this snark? Or, do you really mean it?

  91. 91.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 29, 2019 at 12:14 am

    @Jay: @Amir Khalid:
    Sure, but how is it my fault if those conversations get dropped if a bunch of commenters find my remarks interesting and reply?

  92. 92.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:15 am

    @Brickley Paiste: I’m not a lawyer, not been to law school, never even considered it. But I’ve been told that if you want to pass the Florida bar you go to Stetson because the curriculum is geared to getting their students to pass the bar. If you want to learn actual law and go to law school in Florida you go to UF.

  93. 93.

    eemom

    January 29, 2019 at 12:16 am

    @Steve in the ATL:

    luckily, you can back into the New York Bar if you have been practicing for a few years by going through the DC Bar, which has reciprocity with everyone

    I took the NY bar and waived into DC. Turned out to be a smart move, because the combination makes me exempt from CLE requirements in both places. ?

  94. 94.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:16 am

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yep. Also, Roger Stone is staying at the Trump International Hotel in DC tonight ahead of his arraignment in Federal district court in DC tomorrow.

  95. 95.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 12:17 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Do you sell posters and tshirts at your shows?

    Do you rip off Amir’s riffs and speed them up and add wa wa pedals?

    Does the guy with the mandolin live, or is he like a Spinal Tap drummer?

  96. 96.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:17 am

    @Steve in the ATL: Also, everyone down here floats.

  97. 97.

    burnspbesq

    January 29, 2019 at 12:18 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    That was Judge Bybee’s part of the syllabus.

  98. 98.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:18 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Take a deep breath. You’ll be fine. Also, stay away from the Zima!

  99. 99.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:19 am

    @burnspbesq: I’m completely tone deaf, we crank everything to ten, so all you hear is raw noise. Which is good, because my singing makes people’s ears bleed!

  100. 100.

    Major Major Major Major

    January 29, 2019 at 12:19 am

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

    Everybody just ignore this.

    ✅

  101. 101.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 12:19 am

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

    Reaction isn’t conversation, it’s just trolling.

    If you are getting ratio’d in a thread,…….

  102. 102.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    January 29, 2019 at 12:20 am

    Josh Marshall is feeling rather salty tonight

    Josh Marshall Retweeted Sally Quinn
    More than anything this is simply a dumb statement. Near non-sequitur level.

    Sally Quinn @ sallyquinndc
    Tom Brokaw isn’t capable of saying something racist. He’s one of the most empathetic people I’ve ever met.

    ETA: and Tom Brokaw is smug, dim-witted, self-regarding, over-rated oaf

  103. 103.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:21 am

    @Jay: In all honesty, I’m completely tone deaf. Couldn’t carry a tune to save my life and can’t play any instruments. And because I’m completely tone deaf, even if I could, I couldn’t get them tuned!

  104. 104.

    PJ

    January 29, 2019 at 12:21 am

    @Steve in the ATL: Clearly you’ve gotten hold of the sticky end of the wicket. As an old lawyer once said to me, to do well in the legal profession, first thing you should’ve done was to make sure you went to a prep school with a lot of rich students and become friends with them. Second thing would’ve been to move to hunt country and marry well. Probably too late now, old boy, to get in on the fox hunting business, but you can still scrape together a living from the plebeians.

    One day, if someone is in peril, and my timing is good, I will get to say, “Release the hounds!”

  105. 105.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 29, 2019 at 12:21 am

    @Adam L Silverman:
    I care about my virtual friendships, so I guess I don’t like it when my motives and intentions are questioned. I wish this blog had a private chat feature so I wouldn’t “disrupt” threads so easily.

  106. 106.

    Brickley Paiste

    January 29, 2019 at 12:21 am

    @burnspbesq:

    I see that you overlooked the words I wrote about how it’s reputation has slipped in the past decade or two.

    Good thing for you that you don’t do any kind of work that pays attention to detail or reading words in context!

    Dumbass.

  107. 107.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:21 am

    @burnspbesq: Right, sorry, can’t keep the justifiers for each type of torture straight.

  108. 108.

    eemom

    January 29, 2019 at 12:22 am

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

    Once again, I will offer my cybermama advice: stop taking this place so seriously.

    And to the rest of y’all, my cybermamabear growl: stop picking on the young ‘un.

  109. 109.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 29, 2019 at 12:22 am

    @Jay:
    I didn’t mean just reactions, I meant people chiming in and commenting on my original comment, staring conversation.

  110. 110.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:23 am

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: But he invented World War II!!!!!!

  111. 111.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 12:23 am

    @oldgold:

    I’m Canadian, so it’s a lot different up here.

  112. 112.

    PJ

    January 29, 2019 at 12:24 am

    @eemom: How did you work this?!! Asking seriously. CLE is a racket.

  113. 113.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 29, 2019 at 12:24 am

    @eemom:
    Thanks for the advice I guess. BTW, didn’t you used to hate my guts?

  114. 114.

    Major Major Major Major

    January 29, 2019 at 12:27 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: omg dude chill

  115. 115.

    PJ

    January 29, 2019 at 12:27 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Worrying about whether anyone on the internet hates you or likes you is probably the biggest waste of mental energy you will make in your life, short of becoming a lawyer.

  116. 116.

    burnspbesq

    January 29, 2019 at 12:28 am

    @Brickley Paiste:

    Your statement was typically, and woefully, incomplete and lacking in context. It was completed and placed in context.

    Fuck you.

  117. 117.

    Fair Economist

    January 29, 2019 at 12:30 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: If it’s past the fiftieth comment you have to get a “new topic” approval from John Cole first by email. Remember to use all caps!

  118. 118.

    PJ

    January 29, 2019 at 12:30 am

    @PJ: @eemom: ETA: DC has no CLE requirement, but I would be glad to get rid of NY’s.

  119. 119.

    Fair Economist

    January 29, 2019 at 12:32 am

    @PJ: Somebody should update that famous xkcd with “somebody on the internet is acting like they hate me”.

  120. 120.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 29, 2019 at 12:32 am

    @Major Major Major Major:
    But I don’t want to freeze to death! ?

  121. 121.

    Amir Khalid

    January 29, 2019 at 12:33 am

    @Fair Economist:
    Now, now; don’t be teasing the young’un.

  122. 122.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:35 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: It’s going to happen. It occasionally happens to every one. Even me. I’ve popped into comments thread, replied to comments or dropped one of my own, and gotten no hits. I just meander on. The comments of those particular post are not conversations for me. Don’t let it get you down.

  123. 123.

    eemom

    January 29, 2019 at 12:35 am

    @PJ:

    Well, I’m not entirely sure how….I just know that when I get done checking boxes on the license renewal apps for both jurisdictions I end up CLE-free. I think it’s that
    NY doesn’t require CLE for attorneys who don’t practice in the state, and DC exempts attorneys from CLE who are exempted from it somewhere else. Or something.

    Anyway, it’s the only time in my life I’ve ever managed to beat any system, so yeehaw.

  124. 124.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 12:36 am

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

    Think of threads like a house party, that you have arrived late to.

    Groups have already formed, convesations are already developed, there are people in the kitchen, dining room, living room, a line for the bathroom and if it’s BJ after dark, a couple people making out in one of the bedrooms.

    Joining, changing, sparking conversation “rules” are pretty much the same here,

    except, this is a mostly political/animal/life/the willow is too close to the house, house party filled with trauma survivors with PSTD.

    As the comics say, learn to read the room.

  125. 125.

    Fair Economist

    January 29, 2019 at 12:37 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Roger Stone is staying at the Trump International Hotel in DC tonight ahead of his arraignment in Federal district court in DC tomorrow.

    Just like bin Laden!

  126. 126.

    joel hanes

    January 29, 2019 at 12:39 am

    @eemom:

    The kid is morally useful to me : excellent material on which to practice detachment,
    or at least to fake detachment by ruthlessly suppressing every urge to reply.

  127. 127.

    Mary G

    January 29, 2019 at 12:42 am

    In terms of Hastings, there is still the “East Coast good, West Coast bad” mentality. Stanford gets grudging acceptance at times.

    I have a question: the teen housemate came home drunk off his ass and we have major drama now. He was doing extremely well, but he ditched his last two periods today, so will probably be expelled and we are back to the military school in Guatemala the rest of the family want his mother to put him in.

    It is so hard to get him affordable help. The school gave us a packet with all kinds of resources, but they are almost all full or cost a fortune. One of her clients has spent a month googling with no luck. I found a couple of Alateen meetings and volunteered to drag him to those. Does anybody have any experience or wisdom to share? He is at the same time a great kid and a giant pain in the ass, but I am very attached to him.

  128. 128.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    January 29, 2019 at 12:43 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    It occasionally happens to every one. Even me. I’ve popped into comments thread, replied to comments or dropped one of my own, and gotten no hits.

    That’s not what bothered me. What bothered me was being accused of disrupting threads and that it was a pattern. satby wasn’t the first to point this out and I’m concerned that maybe I do derail threads sometimes. And maybe I’ve alienated people that used to be friendly and I regret that. I’ve never done it intentionally.

  129. 129.

    PJ

    January 29, 2019 at 12:44 am

    @eemom: Ah, ok. I live in New York, so cannot escape the requirement. (BTW, when I joined, there was no DC CLE requirement, and now there is only a DC practice requirement just for new lawyers, so, like MD, it is still basically CLE free.)

  130. 130.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 12:45 am

    @Fair Economist: Bin Laden’s in room 2221. It’s a king bed suite with a jacuzzi tub.

  131. 131.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 12:46 am

    @Mary G:

    Alanon is often helpful, for highlighting the path that lies ahead and that the substance abuse is self medication for other issues,

    Just a symptom.

  132. 132.

    Karen

    January 29, 2019 at 12:48 am

    The government will shutdown on the 15th and the Big Orange Fart Cloud will declare a national emergency then hopefully he’ll be sued into the ground. What is really concerning me is that I live in an apartment complex for the elderly and the disabled. It’s also Section 8, and they’re depending on its payment from HUD. Everyone of the residents are subsidized, They told us that they haven’t got their payments in three weeks and they’re a little behind.

    Now I want to make clear that I’m worried for the federal workers who may get their paychecks late, especially in the DC area where I live. But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t worried about the possibility of the subsidy stopping when the government has its shutdown on Feb 15 and will that affect whether I can stay or we’re kicked out.

  133. 133.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 12:48 am

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

    That’s why some of us still talk to you.

  134. 134.

    PJ

    January 29, 2019 at 12:50 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: In order to gain acceptance, Grasshopper, you must first give up your attachment to obtaining acceptance.

  135. 135.

    SWMBO

    January 29, 2019 at 12:56 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: You are young. That’s part of what is getting to you. You haven’t had enough experience to know it is ok to just let shit go. Most of us olds on here have learned to just walk away from an unintentional gaffe. Just apologize and drop it. You don’t have to flail around trying to make up for something. An apology is sufficient. Then go reread the thread and see what to do/not do next time. You’ll be fine. Just stop trying to “fix” it after it’s done.

  136. 136.

    Sab

    January 29, 2019 at 1:06 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: You realize that satby probably went to bed hours ago?

  137. 137.

    Sebastian

    January 29, 2019 at 1:08 am

    @Jay:

    Thank you for putting it so eloquently. Didn’t want to be the bad guy this time.

  138. 138.

    Adam L Silverman

    January 29, 2019 at 1:10 am

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Everyone is on edge right now because everything is unsettled. Just ease up on yourself and everyone else and you’ll be fine.

  139. 139.

    sukabi

    January 29, 2019 at 1:15 am

    his brain is an old donut bobbing around in a toilet.

    A perfect description.

    As is the rest of his piece.

  140. 140.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    January 29, 2019 at 1:17 am

    @Jay:

    Law Schools should teach the Bar just like Engineering Schools need to teach Engineering or Medical Schools teach Medicine.

    That’s what bar exam prep courses are for. BTW, I know for nursing in particular that getting a BSN doesn’t teach you how to pass the boards, you have to take a prep course before you take the boards.

  141. 141.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 1:19 am

    @Sebastian:

    And here I thought someone would pie me about the bananna cream comment.

    Instead I got elequent.

    WTF is wrong with this place? Are the willow roots already clogging the drains?

  142. 142.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    January 29, 2019 at 1:20 am

    @Adam L Silverman:

    I’m completely tone deaf, we crank everything to ten

    Obviously, you’re unfamiliar with Balloon Juice tradition, we crank EVERYTHING to 11.

  143. 143.

    joel hanes

    January 29, 2019 at 1:22 am

    @Jay:

    pie starts to get thrown

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDJQ7zn3-2g

  144. 144.

    Sab

    January 29, 2019 at 1:24 am

    OT. I am turning 65 this month. Signed up for medicare, and my card did come. Signed up for supplemental and plan D However I haven’t heard a peep about paying the medicare premium. I wont’t be getting Social Security for a couple more years, so they can’t deduct it.

    How does this work in normal times (without shutdowns?)

  145. 145.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    January 29, 2019 at 1:26 am

    @Adam L Silverman: Well, I believe it’s the closest hotel to the courthouse.

  146. 146.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 1:27 am

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    Here, you don’t go to law school, or medical school, you first put in 2 years or more in “University”, then you go to Law School or Medical School, in total, a 6-8 year process.

    In your last 2 years, you “specialise”.

    After that, Lawyers have to pass Law Society Exams in their field, Doctors intern.

    If for example you spend your last 2 years studying tax law, and pass the Boards, you can’t hang out a shingle as an Immigration Lawyer, with out getting your law lisence pulled.

  147. 147.

    NotMax

    January 29, 2019 at 1:27 am

    @Sab

    In my case, receive a quarterly bill in the mail. Be aware there is a relatively short time frame between the time it arrives and the due date.

  148. 148.

    Sab

    January 29, 2019 at 1:31 am

    @NotMax: Thanks so much. I have been panicked.

  149. 149.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 1:34 am

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    Yeah, I know, what happened to Tradition, !!!!!!!! ( full Teyve here),

    Mandolin Player as Spinal Tap Drummer got crickets!

  150. 150.

    NotMax

    January 29, 2019 at 1:34 am

    @Sab

    If you’re truly flustered, call ’em up and ask.

  151. 151.

    NotMax

    January 29, 2019 at 1:36 am

    @Jay

    Tradition is nothing but a series of bad choices.
      – Orson Welles

  152. 152.

    Jay

    January 29, 2019 at 1:48 am

    @NotMax:

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gRdfX7ut8gw

  153. 153.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    January 29, 2019 at 1:50 am

    @Jay: Ok, for MD’s, after you get your degree(usually 4 year undergrad, 3 years med school), intern, you have to pass your medical boards. Lawyers(4 years undergrad, 3 years law school), you have to pass the bar to practice. If you want to specialize you probably also need to get a MLL.

  154. 154.

    Sab

    January 29, 2019 at 1:55 am

    @NotMax: Now that they are back.

  155. 155.

    eemom

    January 29, 2019 at 2:16 am

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    If you want to specialize you probably also need to get a MLL.

    It’s LLM, and no you don’t. Most people end up specializing, as the only real “general practitioners” are small town lawyers — and even they specialize in the kinds of things that come up in a small town practice, like real estate transactions, wills and estates, etc. LLMs are mostly for people looking to academia.

  156. 156.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    January 29, 2019 at 2:20 am

    @eemom: I sit corrected. I believe that for some specializations you do need a LLM.

  157. 157.

    Mnemosyne

    January 29, 2019 at 2:26 am

    @Mary G:

    Ugh. I wish I had some advice, but I only have sympathy. It sounds like he’s gotten in with the proverbial bad crowd, unless he skipped school to go get drunk by himself (which would be a REALLY bad sign of alcoholism already).

    Alateen is probably a good place to start. Has he ever been evaluated for learning disabilities like dyslexia, ADHD, etc? Sometimes smart kids with learning disabilities run into a wall in high school because their previous strategies to get by don’t work with the increased workload, and some of them decide to flame out spectacularly rather than admit they have a problem.

  158. 158.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 29, 2019 at 2:27 am

    @eemom:

    It’s LLM, and no you don’t

    I was about to say those exact words

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: I have been a labor and employment lawyer for longer than I care to remember and yet I never took that class in law school. You learn the actually useful stuff by doing, not by studying.

  159. 159.

    Steve in the ATL

    January 29, 2019 at 2:28 am

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: helpful for tax lawyers and foreigners who went to non-US law schools and want to practice here.

  160. 160.

    Yellowdog

    January 29, 2019 at 6:29 am

    @plato: Yes. Saying she isn’t eligible because her parents were not in the US long enough to be naturalized. However, she was born in Oakland.

  161. 161.

    trnc

    January 29, 2019 at 6:52 am

    @Mnemosyne: Top ranked law school Harvard produced Ted Cruz, so maybe law school ranking isn’t as important as the person’s actual record post-law school.

  162. 162.

    PST

    January 29, 2019 at 8:21 am

    @Sab:

    I am turning 65 this month. Signed up for medicare, and my card did come. Signed up for supplemental and plan D However I haven’t heard a peep about paying the medicare premium. I wont’t be getting Social Security for a couple more years, so they can’t deduct it.

    This may be too late in a dead thread to help, but I was in this situation and got billed for the premium. I recall paying for several months in the first bill.

  163. 163.

    VOR

    January 29, 2019 at 9:59 am

    @Yellowdog: Yes. Her parents could have been on a layover at the airport, but if she was born on US soil then she is a US citizen. That’s how it works. For example, the actress Saoirse Ronan was born in the US to Irish parents and has dual citizenship. The exceptions are for people on diplomatic missions so if you are a Russian diplomat and have a baby at a US hospital, then your child would not be a US citizen. Ted Cruz was a US citizen even though he was born in Canada. John McCain was born in Panama.

    The fact they are pulling this crap on Harris shows they fear her. Good.

  164. 164.

    laura

    January 29, 2019 at 10:09 am

    @Steve in the ATL: I got my LLM in 2001 (McGeorge represent!) In Government & Public Policy and was one of 2 assigned to the CPUC admin law division. Loved it! I was tasked with reviewing all the divestitures of power generating -well above book value, to see if there was any way to undo the sales as energy prices skyrocketed (they were, of course, gamed/Enroned). Reviewed all the PGE ring fencing documents as they peeled off the profitable portions of the company and left rate payers holding the bag. I expect that the current bankruptcy filing contemplates doing the same.
    Fun fact, most of the Administrative Law Judges were CPA’s and the bulk of the work was rate-setting.
    As a Union Thug, I have used my law degrees strategically as most employers don’t expect you to know squat nor diddly. When you know more about the agency’s budget that your employer counterpart, fun.

  165. 165.

    Miss Bianca

    January 29, 2019 at 10:29 am

    @Steve in the ATL: ooh, there’s fox hunting case law?! (running to Google).

  166. 166.

    Kayla Rudbek

    January 29, 2019 at 11:34 am

    @Steve in the ATL: or even better, have the law schools actually teach law such that diploma privilege could be used in more states than Wisconsin. I went to law school in Wisconsin and wound up moving around the country, and I was surprised at how awful the stories were from my colleagues who had gone to law school in other states were.

  167. 167.

    karen marie

    January 29, 2019 at 3:10 pm

    his brain is an old donut bobbing around in a toilet.

    I AM SCREAMING! HAHAHAHA.

  168. 168.

    karen marie

    January 29, 2019 at 3:16 pm

    @Amir Khalid: Obama’s college records were relevant but Trump’s tax returns are not. It’s amazing how the lizard brain works.

  169. 169.

    WaterGirl

    January 29, 2019 at 5:58 pm

    @eemom: I’m all for not picking on people, as well.

    It’s also true that it’s not a good thing when someone is super high maintenance. Young pups learn from people with more experience, and all learning is not fun. I’m reminded of the greeting card that says “You, you, you, it always has to be about you, doesn’t it? Happy Birthday!”

    Oh, if only someone had only told me when I was 18 that tons of makeup and my purple crushed velvet pantsuit was not a good look…

  170. 170.

    WaterGirl

    January 29, 2019 at 6:07 pm

    @Mary G:

    He is at the same time a great kid and a giant pain in the ass, but I am very attached to him.

    I wish I had some words of wisdom for you.

    The only thing I know is that many teenagers lack a bigger perspective and can’t draw the dotted lines from their actions today and negative consequences in the future. Those who are not rule followers and do not wish to follow the rules.. will not follow the rules. Not for long, anyway. I’m sure it must be maddening and heartbreaking.

    It seems to me that you’re brining love, and a caring nature, and a good deal of patience to the situation, and you surely serve as a buffer that makes a lot of things better in what appears to maybe be a dysfunctional family.

    Sending hugs even though I don’t know how to help.

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