• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

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

This really is a full service blog.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

Rupert, come get your orange boy, you petrified old dinosaur turd.

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

These are not very smart people, and things got out of hand.

If rights aren’t universal, they are privilege, not rights.

We can show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

When I was faster i was always behind.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

He seems like a smart guy, but JFC, what a dick!

Text STOP to opt out of updates on war plans.

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

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

Bark louder, little dog.

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

Mobile Menu

  • Seattle Meet-up Post
  • 2025 Activism
  • Targeted Political Fundraising
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • COVID-19
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • 2025 Activism
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • Targeted Fundraising!
You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Nancy Nailed It

Nancy Nailed It

by Betty Cracker|  February 5, 201910:33 am| 238 Comments

This post is in: Foreign Affairs, Immigration, NANCY SMASH!, Open Threads, Politics, Republican Stupidity, Assholes, General Stupidity

FacebookTweetEmail

We’ve never had a president who is more needy and attention-seeking than Trump, so Nancy Pelosi’s move to deny him an invitation to deliver the SOTU during the government shutdown was brilliant, as most of us appreciated in real time. A report from The Times yesterday reveals for the record just how significant a role Pelosi’s use of the SOTU as both carrot and stick played in reopening the government:

Mr. Trump, aides said, views the speech and all of the pomp and circumstance that accompany it with some reverence, and aides said he puts more time into his script because it is one instance where he usually sticks to it. For all of the president’s fabled norm-busting, there are aspects of the conventional presidency that appeal to him, none more so than standing in the hallowed halls of Congress, with all eyes on him speaking to the nation…

In fact, the dark-wood venue and the history of the address appeal so much to Mr. Trump that his reluctance to deliver the speech in an alternative venue — something that was briefly discussed in the White House after Speaker Nancy Pelosi initially canceled the speech because of the partial government shutdown — was part of Mr. Trump’s calculus for reopening, at least temporarily, the government.

Take that in for a moment: Trump abjectly surrendered on the shutdown — humiliating himself politically, infuriating creatures like Ann Coulter, underscoring his entire party’s capitulation to its leader’s stupidity and irresponsibility — all so he could flap his gums and wave his stubby fingers in front of official Washington, DC and live on all the networks.

I’ve read reports that McConnell and Co. were ready to pull the plug on the shutdown anyway since Trump’s and the rest of the GOP’s approval ratings were cratering and they feared the damage would haunt them next year. Well, that’s to Pelosi’s credit too since she held her caucus together.

But from what we know of Trump — his addiction to adulation, his disregard of collateral damage inflicted on anyone not named Donald J. Trump, his craving for unearned respect — my money’s on the SOTU as the chief factor in the shutdown cave. Well played, Madam Speaker.

Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight? We may or may not — it’ll be a game-time call for us, depending on our mood at 9 PM ET.

According to The Times report linked above, it sounds like xenophobic incel goon Stephen Miller is wrestling with more conventional GOP turd-polishers over the tone of the speech. So, it might be interesting as a rhetorical artifact to watch the theme ping-pong between white nationalist scaremongering and pseudo-lofty pablum.

Open thread!

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « My Views On Nuclear Power
Next Post: Cardiac prevention saves money and lives »

Reader Interactions

238Comments

  1. 1.

    dmsilev

    February 5, 2019 at 10:37 am

    He’s harping on Wall again this morning:

    Tremendous numbers of people are coming up through Mexico in the hopes of flooding our Southern Border. We have sent additional military. We will build a Human Wall if necessary. If we had a real Wall, this would be a non-event!

    A “Human Wall” sounds like a phrase where he’s convinced himself that more border agents or whatever “counts” as a wall and therefore he wins.

    And I’m pretty sure that I won’t be watching tonight. If Pelosi brains him with her gavel, I can watch the footage after the fact on YouTube.

  2. 2.

    moonbat

    February 5, 2019 at 10:37 am

    The fact that he so desperately wants the eyes of the nation on him is reason enough to skip listening to whatever racist idiocy falls out of his stinking pie hole, imho.
    Instead, Mr. Moonbat and myself are going to celebrate the culture and cuisine of Mexico with some rice and beans and avocados.

  3. 3.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    February 5, 2019 at 10:41 am

    all eyes on him

    the fate of our Republic in four words

    I can’t watch him talk that much. I want to see Stacey Abrams, so I’ll probably set the DVR and fast-forward through clips of The Beast. If I could, I’d place bets on how he’ll ad lib– at least one shot at Nancy Pelosi– and how he’ll screw up– I’d put a hundred bucks on his messing up the name of the family who’s tragedy he’s exploiting to spread his blood libel. And if the parents of that kid who’s being bullied for being named trump thinks this is going to help… not how I’d handle it.

  4. 4.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    February 5, 2019 at 10:42 am

    Here’s hoping his ratings are terrible.

  5. 5.

    Ajabu

    February 5, 2019 at 10:42 am

    I don’t know. I might watch Shitgibbon on mute so I can be ready when Stacey Abrams does her rebuttal but, my wife can’t even stand to look at him so… separate rooms?
    We’ll see.

  6. 6.

    BroD

    February 5, 2019 at 10:45 am

    It’s a quirk of mine that I’m ‘major speech!’ & ‘big game!’ averse. I’ll take special pleasure by avoiding this one.

  7. 7.

    Ajabu

    February 5, 2019 at 10:45 am

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:
    Perfect solution. Thenks for reminding me of technology.

  8. 8.

    schrodingers_cat

    February 5, 2019 at 10:45 am

    I will not watch. I cannot stand to hear his voice or see his growling rage contorted orange face belching out one lie after the other.

  9. 9.

    Lapassionara

    February 5, 2019 at 10:45 am

    I don’t believe for one minute that Trump views the SOTU with “reverence.” He is incapable of revering anything or any being other than himself.

    I do think that Madam Speaker’s tactics regarding the scheduling issue had some effect on him.

  10. 10.

    The Dangerman

    February 5, 2019 at 10:46 am

    Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight?

    There aren’t many things in life that have zero chance. This is one of them.

  11. 11.

    Highway Rob

    February 5, 2019 at 10:47 am

    I figure oughta-been-Gov. Abrams will be elsewhere on the internet without me having to sit through the opening act. But if Madame Speaker does something innovative like holding up a cue card that says “Bullshit” every so often, somebody give a shout on the liveblog because I’d most definitely tune in to see that live.

    ETA: Or what Jim said about DVR.

  12. 12.

    wvng

    February 5, 2019 at 10:48 am

    Well, I wasn’t going to watch, but Miss Betty may have won me over with this: “it sounds like xenophobic incel goon Stephen Miller is wrestling with more conventional GOP turd-polishers over the tone of the speech.”

    The lady certainly can turn a phrase.

  13. 13.

    Yarrow

    February 5, 2019 at 10:48 am

    Not going to watch it. If there’s anything really worth seeing I’m sure it’ll end up on countless clips I watch see later.

  14. 14.

    jacy

    February 5, 2019 at 10:49 am

    Not watching Trump. Will watch Abrams. Pretending that Sanders doesn’t exist in the hopes that he’ll just go away.

    I’m glad that having a grown-up in the room again (Pelosi) means that I can occasionally breath. Remember the good old days when you didn’t have to wonder what horrifying shitshow each new moment would bring? Good times.

  15. 15.

    OzarkHillbilly

    February 5, 2019 at 10:49 am

    Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight?

    You couldn’t pay me enough to watch it. Warren Buffett could, but you don’t have the resources.

  16. 16.

    randy khan

    February 5, 2019 at 10:49 am

    I stopped watching SOTUs years ago, as they’re rarely remotely interesting, even when someone I like is giving the speech.

    I am as unsurprised as everyone else here that Pelosi taking away his shiny toy was a factor in his decision to cave. The spectacle is very important to him; it’s one of the characteristics of authoritarians that they like the pomp and circumstance.

  17. 17.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    February 5, 2019 at 10:50 am

    another bet I’d place if I watched CNN more often: Which professional centrist pundit will declare this year’s version of “tonight, he became President of All of Us!” I gather Fournier’s been brought out of storage

    In other news, Joe Biden continues to prepare a juggernaut for 1996

    BIDEN TALKS TO FINK — Via The Atlantic’s Edward-Isaac Dovere: “In January, [Biden] went to the New York offices of BlackRock, the major investment firm, for a meeting with Larry Fink, the CEO. They talked about the state of the world and the country, about what’s going on in the markets. Toward the end, Fink said to Biden, ‘I’m here to help,’ according to people told about the conversation. Biden took it as an offer to sign on with the campaign.” Read more.
    Revolving Door Project’s Jeff Hauser: “I wonder if VP Biden’s team understands how dangerous it is for Biden to be accentuating how close he is to the financial sector by highlighting his close friendship to the Wall Street firm with the greatest political influence”

    I honestly wonder if he’s talking to anyone under 70 and not named Biden. And, again, I like him.

  18. 18.

    Ramalama

    February 5, 2019 at 10:50 am

    My partner insisted on watching Trump speak while the shutdown was in progress because she wanted to see with her own eyes his announcement of a National Emergency.

    She’s like that, attracted to terrifying events like the collapse of the Soviet Union (she was in Moscow briefly when it was ‘happening’ and knew enough to travel with cans of food since I guess everything collapsed and all Russians were scrambling like mad just to eat), and she was in Baghdad just before or just as the first Gulf War got started.

    He disappointed that part of her that wanted theatrics. But I was angry that she even gave him those 11 or so minutes. His minutes were in our house.

    No farkin way am I going to witness, live, his mouth hole choking out word turds now. I’d rather watch Meet the Press and all of their soft-spoken right wing arse kissing than the SOTU. Which means streaming something else while he pollutes the airways. Or maybe reading something that nourishes my mind, a kid’s book like “Does It Fart.”

  19. 19.

    Gin & Tonic

    February 5, 2019 at 10:51 am

    After a night and day of travel, I hope and expect to be asleep rather than watching.

  20. 20.

    trollhattan

    February 5, 2019 at 10:52 am

    @dmsilev:
    It sounds like he’s deploying Cirque de Soleil to the border. “Take that, MS13!”

  21. 21.

    geg6

    February 5, 2019 at 10:53 am

    Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight?

    No fucking way. There is nothing that can make me watch it. Literally, nothing.

    There’s a Pens game tonight and plenty of viewing pleasure in the DVR. I have much better options.

  22. 22.

    donnah

    February 5, 2019 at 10:53 am

    Like most everyone else, I’m going to skip his speech. He is just going to ramble after delivering a few self-congratulatory brags and then I’m sure he’ll soak up the applause from his adoring supporters. I could almost endure it just to watch Nancy Pelosi’s expression as he talks, but I’m going to skip it anyway.

    But I’ll turn it on for Stacey Abram’s rebuttal.

  23. 23.

    The Moar You Know

    February 5, 2019 at 10:54 am

    Trump abjectly surrendered on the shutdown — humiliating himself politically, infuriating creatures like Ann Coulter, underscoring his entire party’s capitulation to its leader’s stupidity and irresponsibility — all so he could flap his gums and wave his stubby fingers in front of official Washington, DC and live on all the networks.

    Of course he did. Any narcissist would. The attention is what they live for. I think Pelosi, at least, has figured that out. What she needs now is a way to figure out how to permanently keep his tiny nuts in a vise.

  24. 24.

    JPL

    February 5, 2019 at 10:56 am

    Not me! I’ll find Stacy’s speech tomorrow morning.

  25. 25.

    Sab

    February 5, 2019 at 10:56 am

    @jacy: Your prints came. Wonderful. Thanks.

  26. 26.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    February 5, 2019 at 10:57 am

    @Ramalama: “Does It Fart.”
    You just know It Farts in Cabinet meetings and then says things like, “Mike, did you have cabbage for lunch? Betsy, open a window”

  27. 27.

    The Midnight Lurker

    February 5, 2019 at 10:58 am

    I will watch it! In the immortal words of Rust Cohle, “I will not avert my eyes again.”

    I can’t wait for the First Immigrant… er, uh First Lady to bring out her special guest, a little boy who has been mercilessly bullied all because his last name is Trump. Ten bucks says her first choice was Nick Sandmann, who is apparently too busy suing libtards to attend.

    And the rebuttal by Ms. Stacy Abrams? Oh, man… I’m elbowing my way to the front of the line.

  28. 28.

    ChuckInAustin

    February 5, 2019 at 10:59 am

    The Amazing Acro Cats are in Austin tonight, so I may just go see that instead. ;)

  29. 29.

    feebog

    February 5, 2019 at 11:01 am

    I found a really good series on Prime, “The Killing” and I just have enough episodes to get me through the evening. I’ll put it on pause and watch Ms. Abrams once the Shitgibbon is done flinging poo all over the congress.

  30. 30.

    Betty Cracker

    February 5, 2019 at 11:01 am

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Same. Biden was an excellent VP. Someone who loves him should tell him that’s a great legacy and he shouldn’t do anything to tarnish it now.

  31. 31.

    The Moar You Know

    February 5, 2019 at 11:01 am

    Am I going to watch it? FUCK NO, NONE OF IT.

    I can’t watch Trump. His voice grates and his mouth literally looks like a rectum. He makes me sick.

  32. 32.

    Ramalama

    February 5, 2019 at 11:02 am

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Thank you for that.

  33. 33.

    gvg

    February 5, 2019 at 11:03 am

    He craves attention. I hate him, so I won’t give it too him. Hope his speech is the lowest rating ever and the media talks incessantly about that for weeks afterward.
    He also can’t talk sense. I can’t follow what he thinks he is saying. Therefore there is little point in listening to him directly, ever.

  34. 34.

    Betty Cracker

    February 5, 2019 at 11:03 am

    @The Moar You Know: I just hope her would-be successors are studying up.

  35. 35.

    BC in Illinois

    February 5, 2019 at 11:10 am

    I am looking forward tonight to a speech that clearly addresses where we are as a nation, the challenges we face, and the ways that we can move forward together.

    Until that speech, I will scan through various live blogs — the Guardian, TPM, whatever you have here.

    That’s how I’ll know when her speech is about to begin.

  36. 36.

    Mike in NC

    February 5, 2019 at 11:11 am

    Posted before that Fat Bastard will try to turn SOTU into a lengthy Airing of Grievances session. Could not pay me a million bucks to sit through it. Hope the Dems bring lots of rotten vegetables to throw at him.

  37. 37.

    joel hanes

    February 5, 2019 at 11:17 am

    @Lapassionara:

    Exactly.

    The FTFNYT used “reverence” where they meant “relish” or “eagerness” or “anticipation”.

  38. 38.

    MCA1

    February 5, 2019 at 11:19 am

    I’m with most of y’all. Fuck that guy and his constantly lying cat’s ass face. To spite his desperate craving for my attention, even though unnoticed by all but me, is plenty of motivation to not watch or listento a single second of this or any other “speech” he gives, live or in clips later. I cringe and then start going into a rage anytime I have to hear his voice, so haven’t tuned in to something featuring him since the RNC in ’16, and never will again. Unless it’s a live broadcast from a courtroom.

  39. 39.

    MattF

    February 5, 2019 at 11:19 am

    No, I’m not watching. Keeping count of his lies would be a marginally relevant thing to do, but I’d rather take a nap.

  40. 40.

    FlipYrWhig

    February 5, 2019 at 11:20 am

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Which professional centrist pundit will declare this year’s version of “tonight, he became President of All of Us!”

    My prediction is that he is going to chide Ralph Northam (probably on the advice of Ivanka and Kushner) and the pundits are going to say “you can’t deny that was a meaningful moment.” They are DYING to give him credit for something unifying.

  41. 41.

    kindness

    February 5, 2019 at 11:21 am

    I refuse to watch it with Trump as President. Even the Cliff Notes versions I will see will piss me off. Gotta be careful not to stroke out with this administration.

  42. 42.

    BC in Illinois

    February 5, 2019 at 11:21 am

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:
    @Betty Cracker:

    Joe Biden came to St Louis in 2016 for Jason Kander.
    He was here in 2018 for Claire McCaskill.

    Yeah, they both lost, but Joe Biden’s speeches were among the high points of the campaigns. He knows how to talk to a crowd. He can speak about what we stand for as Democrats in a straight-forward way that makes you glad to be on his side.

    I want him to be there in 2020. On the side.

    On the of our candidate for President, on the side of our candidates for Senator, Governor, Congress. Pay his airfare and send him around the country. Use his legacy and the love people have for him to introduce and support candidates from coast to coast.

    And we should do the same thing with a number of other speakers that I could name.

  43. 43.

    Chacal Charles Calthrop

    February 5, 2019 at 11:24 am

    @Ramalama: Is your partner heading to London at the end of March, by any chance?

  44. 44.

    zhena gogolia

    February 5, 2019 at 11:24 am

    @MCA1:

    Tell us how you really feel.

  45. 45.

    jacy

    February 5, 2019 at 11:27 am

    @Sab:

    Yay! Glad you like them. (I wish I could just make art all day. Unfortunately there are other things….)

  46. 46.

    Ramalama

    February 5, 2019 at 11:28 am

    @FlipYrWhig:

    They are DYING to give him credit for something unifying.

    Have they learned nothing from Hunter Thompson? That’s who they should be emulating.

  47. 47.

    AxelFoley

    February 5, 2019 at 11:28 am

    Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight?

    Does a bear shit on the toilet?

  48. 48.

    Frankensteinbeck

    February 5, 2019 at 11:29 am

    McConnell and Co. were ready to pull the plug on the shutdown anyway

    In the end, this was all that was required. Trump is too much of a coward to veto, and I maintain he was hoping from a few days after the shutdown started that when Nancy came to power she and McConnell would hand him a bill he could sign on the quiet and then complain that the world is unfair to him. It’s also the reason why future crises are unlikely. McConnell holds that power, not Trump.

    Trump abjectly surrendered on the shutdown

    But this happened and it is amazing. Publicly surrendering is anathema to a narcissist. They much prefer to lose and then whine that they were cheated.

    @Lapassionara:

    He is incapable of revering anything or any being other than himself.

    Yes, that’s why he reveres the SOTU. As far as he’s concerned, it’s one of the greatest celebrations of himself possible.

  49. 49.

    Brachiator

    February 5, 2019 at 11:31 am

    Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight?

    Nope. I will probably catch up on past episodes of the latest season of Star Trek: Discovery. I’m mixed about this show, but am still curious to see how boldly it is going.

    I will check out Stacey Abram’s response later on. Looking forward to this.

    I also understand that Bernie will be giving his response also. To this I say, fuck Trump, and double fuck Bernie Sanders.

  50. 50.

    Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.)

    February 5, 2019 at 11:32 am

    I won’t be watching it. Somebody I know said that since he’s so sensitive to ratings, we should all just not watch it until later. We should tune in to listen to Abrams instead. I know it’s hard to get enough people to do that to make a dent in the ratings, but wouldn’t it be great if we could? The thing living in the White House would be beside himself.

  51. 51.

    Ramalama

    February 5, 2019 at 11:34 am

    @Chacal Charles Calthrop: ah no! But she should. That’s sure to be a shitshow. Plus she can abscond over to the Republic of Ireland when things get really bad. Unless she can’t because “The Troubles!” has been made into a sequel. Or would it be just a ‘rerun’?

  52. 52.

    germy

    February 5, 2019 at 11:34 am

    Trump to be opening act for Stacey Abrams' State of the Union response https://t.co/YHvDyY7n5z #StateOfTheUnion #SOTU— Oliver Willis (@owillis) February 5, 2019

    True.

  53. 53.

    a thousand flouncing lurkers (was fidelio)

    February 5, 2019 at 11:34 am

    Watch the Circus Peanut ?? I’ll pass; there’s a hockey game on tonight, and Nashville has supposedly been working on their power play, so I’ll have a chance to see if they’ve upgraded from Dire to merely Bad in that area. Also Carl Filip Anton Forsberg may do something flashy with the puck, and possibly even score a goal.

  54. 54.

    MrSnrub

    February 5, 2019 at 11:34 am

    Stopped watching 12 years ago.

  55. 55.

    a thousand flouncing lurkers (was fidelio)

    February 5, 2019 at 11:36 am

    @a thousand flouncing lurkers (was fidelio): Help! I misspelled myself and now I am in moderation.

  56. 56.

    Yarrow

    February 5, 2019 at 11:38 am

    Jerry Nadler says he may subpoena Matt Whitaker: "In an abundance of caution—to ensure that Mr. Whitaker both appears in the hearing room on Friday morning and answers our questions cleanly—I have asked the Committee to authorize me to issue a subpoena to compel his testimony."— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) February 5, 2019

    Are they going to put a towel under Whitaker to protect the furniture and floor?

  57. 57.

    RedDirtGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 11:38 am

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Regarding not watching the mango-hued shitgibbon, I may have read here that having the TV on one of the stations showing the SOTU and then switching to another, or turning the TV off sends more of a message than not watching at all. For what it’s worth.

  58. 58.

    a thousand flouncing lurkers (was fidelio)

    February 5, 2019 at 11:38 am

    @MCA1: My cats deeply resent this comparison.

  59. 59.

    Gelfling 545

    February 5, 2019 at 11:39 am

    @Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: I’ve signed up with Pantsuit Nation to be among those who skip Trump and tune in for Abrams, the goal being to give Abrams higher ratings than Narcissist Man. Goes without saying that I won’t watch Sanders.

  60. 60.

    germy

    February 5, 2019 at 11:41 am

    @Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (formerly Mumphrey, et al.):

    I know said that since he’s so sensitive to ratings, we should all just not watch it until later.

    Is that how TV ratings work?

    How many Nielsen families here?

  61. 61.

    gene108

    February 5, 2019 at 11:43 am

    No need to watch someone lie to my face. No need to watch media coverage trying to assess the difference of what is a lie, a misstatement of fact, some facts that may have been exaggerated, etc.

  62. 62.

    germy

    February 5, 2019 at 11:44 am

    Hi Joshua Trump. I'm sorry you get bullied at school for your last name. My name is Ben Joseph Siemon. "Semen" or "BJ Semen." I didn't visit a porn set to feel better. You don't need to go to the State of the Union.— Benjamin Siemon (@BenjaminJS) February 5, 2019

  63. 63.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    February 5, 2019 at 11:44 am

    @RedDirtGirl: I see he’s scheduled to be back in the car at 9:55 Eastern. It’s hard to imagine this won’t run long, they always do, but he’ll also be eager to get home to his TV and his twitter. I plan to set the VCR for 10 pm to pick up Abrams

  64. 64.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    February 5, 2019 at 11:45 am

    Speaking of Dumbass Donny, Tonight had the interview Trump did before the Superbowl- Trump looked totally out of it. I wonder if what was keeping Trump going was Kelly forcing Trump to pay attention along with Roger Stone trolling Trump and now that’s gone.

  65. 65.

    West of the Rockies

    February 5, 2019 at 11:45 am

    Coulter really does seem like something non-human (you called her a creature, AL). Maybe a lizard overlord in a skin suit).

  66. 66.

    Rommie

    February 5, 2019 at 11:47 am

    I’m starting to feel *very* lucky that my tax refund didn’t change much with Mr. Cheeto’s new rulez. I’ve been seeing a lot of stories about big swings from refunds to owing a lot of tax this year, OR those in the upper end and/or have a business connection getting paid like everyone knew they would.

    Getting hit in the pocketbook is one of the few ways to get through to a Redhat that they’ve been played for suckers.

  67. 67.

    low-tech cyclist

    February 5, 2019 at 11:48 am

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    You couldn’t pay me enough to watch it. Warren Buffett could, but you don’t have the resources.

    I’m cheaper than you – if someone paid me $1000, I’d watch it.

    But I’d get very very drunk first.

  68. 68.

    Brachiator

    February 5, 2019 at 11:48 am

    @AxelFoley:

    Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight?

    Does a bear shit on the toilet?

    If a bear shits in a toilet, does anyone smell it?

    ETA: speaking of wild animals and the wild outdoors, it’s too bad that this guy could not be invited to the SOTU as a guest:

    Man survives attack and kills mountain lion on Colorado trail

    A runner fought for his life after he was attacked by a mountain lion on a trail in Larimer County Monday afternoon.

    The man said he was running on the West Ridge Trail in Horsetooth Mountain Open Space when he heard a noise behind him. As he turned around to see what it was, a mountain lion lunged at him. The man tried to fight the animal off as it bit him in the face and wrists. During the struggle, he got the upper hand and suffocated the mountain lion. Colorado Parks and Wildlife confirmed his account Tuesday following a necropsy on the animal.

    This is one lucky mofo!

  69. 69.

    MazeDancer

    February 5, 2019 at 11:49 am

    Absolutely no reason to subject oneself to the agony of Trump speaking as it will be impossible to avoid clips during news shows.

    Not sure if I’ll bother following on Twitter, which can be quite amusing. And that way I can be on time for Stacey. Want to see her live from the top/

    Though, not a SOTU response goes by that I don’t recall Bobby Jindal creeping onto set. Such a disaster from the get go. Stacey is smart, hope she has every camera detail nailed down.

  70. 70.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 11:50 am

    @Gelfling 545: I love that idea. Recording on a DVR gives him more viewers.

    I will be watching the internet to see when she is about to speak and that’s when I will turn the TV on.

  71. 71.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 11:50 am

    @germy: I love that; I literally laughed out loud.

  72. 72.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 11:53 am

    @MazeDancer: Yeah, I love the idea of her doing the rebuttal, but it’s been such a disaster for nearly everyone who has ever done it. So I’m a tiny bit nervous in spite of my faith in Stacey Abrams.

  73. 73.

    West of the Rockies

    February 5, 2019 at 11:53 am

    @Brachiator:

    I really want to like Discovery. I find it very dark, overloaded with plot lines (too many Klingons), and that problems are solved too easily: “Hey, look, I just happen to have an anti-interdimensional-spore eradicate!” (Sadly, that line is not delivered in a Marvin the Martian voice.)

  74. 74.

    Ian G.

    February 5, 2019 at 11:56 am

    Watch Shitgibbon? The sound of his voice makes me physically ill. Not a fucking chance I’d watch. Plus, the Islanders are playing the Bruins tonight.

    On that note, I recently discovered that one my favorite Twitter personalities, The Hoarse Whisperer, is an Isles fan. My man crush on him is ever bigger now.

  75. 75.

    FlyingToaster

    February 5, 2019 at 11:56 am

    Nope. Not gonna watch — though I haven’t watched a SOTU since Carter. “A great deal of noise and confusion, signifying nothing”, to paraphrase the Bard.

    Since WarriorGirl doesn’t have school tomorrow, I suspect tonight we’ll be watching all the TiVO’d Dog Bowl/KittenBowl/PuppyBowl episodes, or I’ll stream something offa Amazon Prime (Grimm?)

  76. 76.

    schrodingers_cat

    February 5, 2019 at 12:00 pm

    @gene108: That was the main reason my JS voter and T voter friends are no longer my friends. I just couldn’t with the lies anymore.

  77. 77.

    The Moar You Know

    February 5, 2019 at 12:02 pm

    Publicly surrendering is anathema to a narcissist.

    @Frankensteinbeck: I should start by saying I was raised by one. And my dear mother, the malignant narcissist, is a Trump supporter, of course.

    She was utterly disgusted by how he folded. She said, direct quote “If I were him I’d have shot myself rather than cave to Pelosi”.

    Everyone laughed. I didn’t. I knew she was utterly serious. She is willing to take any situation in which she is not getting her way and escalate it into a situation where someone would have to literally kill her to win. They back down, always. Few are willing to murder to make a point.

    She’s now in her mid-70s, so it has worked as a life strategy. One that made everyone around her miserable, true, but those people don’t count. There is only The One that counts.

  78. 78.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    February 5, 2019 at 12:02 pm

    I won’t watch. Luckily we’re having dinner with a friend tonight. That will be much better.

  79. 79.

    Brachiator

    February 5, 2019 at 12:02 pm

    @West of the Rockies:

    I really want to like Discovery. I find it very dark, overloaded with plot lines (too many Klingons), and that problems are solved too easily: “Hey, look, I just happen to have an anti-interdimensional-spore eradicate!”

    Ha! This is endemic to a lot of Trek, especially Next Generation, where a technobabble solution was typically whipped out in the last 10 minutes of the episode.

    And yeah, too many Klingons.

    If only the country’s problems could be solved as easily. And instead of a Captain Picard, we’ve got a President Blowhard.

  80. 80.

    hueyplong

    February 5, 2019 at 12:04 pm

    I would not watch if offered $1000 to do so.

    Might do it for $2000.

    Have not heard his voice since November.

    Getting pretty quick with a remote.

  81. 81.

    JGabriel

    February 5, 2019 at 12:06 pm

    Anne Laurie @ Top:

    According to The Times report linked above, it sounds like xenophobic incel goon Stephen Miller is wrestling with more conventional GOP turd-polishers over the tone of the speech. So, it might be interesting as a rhetorical artifact to watch the theme ping-pong between white nationalist scaremongering and pseudo-lofty pablum.

    That’s pretty much just a slightly broader version of the standard Trump performance – generalized platitudes with specific racism, insults, and petty resentment.

  82. 82.

    The Moar You Know

    February 5, 2019 at 12:08 pm

    I’ve been seeing a lot of stories about big swings from refunds to owing a lot of tax this year

    @Rommie: I’m one of them. My wife’s a teacher. They got rid of ALL teaching-related deductions in that tax hike bill, and our accountant warned us last year we were going to get nailed for about 11-12k.

    Which we don’t have. My wife is a teacher and I’m a fed contractor, IT tech. We’ve never had 12 thousand bucks to spend on anything. We’ve spent money on two “luxuries” in ten years: fixing the drywall that was peeling off the ceiling in the living room, and getting a dog.

    The bill was written to fuck over a very specific group of people: blue state residents who work in education or government jobs. Kind of a weird feeling to have the government deliberately coming after your ass.

  83. 83.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 12:09 pm

    Watching the SOTU: not only no, but hell no. I will check out Stacey Abrams’ speech later on, online.

  84. 84.

    Obdurodon

    February 5, 2019 at 12:10 pm

    It’s bad enough *reading* all of the lies, exaggerations, and insults that Mangolini can’t seem to forego. Actually *watching* them is painful, and watching them at the slower pace of a SotU with all of the fake applause would be absolutely intolerable. I might watch the Democrat response, but sure as hell not the speech itself.

  85. 85.

    Yarrow

    February 5, 2019 at 12:10 pm

    It’s so easy just to keep an eye on the Twitter accounts of some political media people or follow the hashtag on Twitter and you’ll know when Cheetolini is done. Then you can turn on the TV and wait for Stacey Abrams to start. You don’t even have to have a Twitter account to do it.

  86. 86.

    different-church-lady

    February 5, 2019 at 12:11 pm

    McConnell and Co. were ready to pull the plug on the shutdown anyway since Trump’s and the rest of the GOP’s approval ratings were cratering and they feared the damage would haunt them next year.

    It’s still going to.

  87. 87.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    February 5, 2019 at 12:12 pm

    @The Moar You Know: That is really shocking. This administration is evil.

  88. 88.

    different-church-lady

    February 5, 2019 at 12:13 pm

    @The Moar You Know: So why does anyone still associate with her?

  89. 89.

    MazeDancer

    February 5, 2019 at 12:17 pm

    @WaterGirl:

    So I’m a tiny bit nervous in spite of my faith in Stacey Abrams.

    As are we all. Knocking wood Stacey shifts the dreaded energy of response.

  90. 90.

    Mike in NC

    February 5, 2019 at 12:19 pm

    Netflix just added “Ant Man and Wasp”. Enjoyed the original “Ant Man” because he was portrayed as a bit of a dick instead of your usual superhero.

  91. 91.

    Comrade Scrutinizer

    February 5, 2019 at 12:20 pm

    I shall spend the time reorganizing my vast porn collection.

  92. 92.

    Keith P.

    February 5, 2019 at 12:22 pm

    @Mike in NC: The sequel is a lot of fun. “It *is* truth serum!”

  93. 93.

    sdhays

    February 5, 2019 at 12:23 pm

    I don’t hate myself enough to watch the ASSet speak, but I may check out Stacy Abrams.

  94. 94.

    Brachiator

    February 5, 2019 at 12:23 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    I’m one of them. My wife’s a teacher. They got rid of ALL teaching-related deductions in that tax hike bill, and our accountant warned us last year we were going to get nailed for about 11-12k.

    I don’t know. Possible, but it seems kinda high.

    The bill was written to fuck over a very specific group of people: blue state residents who work in education or government jobs. Kind of a weird feeling to have the government deliberately coming after your ass.

    The bill was primarily written to benefit the very, very rich, but a lot of folks get kicked in the teeth, including people who voted for Trump. Some people with a lot of union related expenses (dues, work clothes, etc), truck drivers who are not self-employed, teachers who spend a lot on education related expenses.

    I wonder if Trump will make any magical claims about the tax cuts in his SOTU. It might be a hoot.

  95. 95.

    The Moar You Know

    February 5, 2019 at 12:23 pm

    So why does anyone still associate with her?

    @different-church-lady: She’s a CEO, of course! (God, that makes me want to cry – it’s the vicious and amoral people who always win) Has money, power, employees and jobs. Her husband is terrified to leave, afraid she’ll put him in the poorhouse in a divorce settlement.

    He should be. That would be the best-case outcome were he to choose that course of action, frankly.

  96. 96.

    Yellowdog

    February 5, 2019 at 12:23 pm

    I have much more important things to do tonite than watch his speech. Trivia Club meeting tonite! ( By the way, our team is called Red Menace.) I WILL record Stacey Abrams.

  97. 97.

    J R in WV

    February 5, 2019 at 12:24 pm

    @Brachiator:

    A runner fought for his life after he was attacked by a mountain lion on a trail in Larimer County Monday afternoon.

    Humans can and do fight mountain lions to the death. I saw a photo in CO of a man holding up a dead mountain lion that attacked his beloved dog in their back yard. He killed the lion with a piece of 2×4 construction lumber that was lying by the back steps.

    I was once stalked by a lion, close enough to smell it, here in AZ. Now I sometimes carry a .45 1911 style pistol when I’m in the wilds of the AZ mountains. Not downtown, particularly, just in lion country.

    Yesterday was unusual on my wilderness Dragoon Mountains foothill, at 5500 feet. The wind roared so loudly I thought the A-10s that train in this desert mountain area were right outside, but it was just the wind in the low growing trees.

    I had a nice warm fire to combat the weather, I even had to crack windows to keep from overheating.

    And my solar plant is fully operational again after half a ton + of new batteries were installed last week!! Yay!

    Will not watch Trump nor Sen. Sanders tonight. They compete for most obvious Russian puppet. May watch a live stream of Gov Abrams give the real state of the union speech, or (most likely) just read by the tiny woodstove.

  98. 98.

    opiejeanne

    February 5, 2019 at 12:26 pm

    @germy: I don’t think they use those boxes any more, probably gather data from the cable companies. We were a Nielsen family in the late 1960s. Dad tried to only watch the local stations and avoid the big networks during that period, out of spite.

  99. 99.

    stardus614

    February 5, 2019 at 12:31 pm

    I may watch it on mute tomorrow, to watch Pelosi’s facial expressions and Pence’s lack of them.

  100. 100.

    ruemara

    February 5, 2019 at 12:35 pm

    @Brachiator: Damned lucky.

    Hey, I wouldn’t watch it for less than a million. And I hope y’all deny him his ratings because literally that’s what it’s about. he needs to feel loved, because he’s a shit human and he knows it. I enjoy his disappointment

  101. 101.

    MisterForkbeard

    February 5, 2019 at 12:35 pm

    @Mike in NC: In the comics, there’s another ant-man who’s a huge asshole – basically, it’s about what happens if a lazy, chauvinistic amoral fucktard with some heroic instincts gets the Ant-Man suit. It’s called the “Irredeemable Ant-Man” for a reason.

    It’s actually pretty good – outside of some early super cringeworthy scenes about him sneaking into a women’s gym shower (I think he was accidentally carried in while hiding in someone’s purse) and enjoying the view, it’s a pretty decent book about what happens if you give your average 28-year-old dudebro super powers and then watch him try to live up to them. And he does, eventually. I should re-read this, though – it’s been about 10 years and I might feel very different about it now.

    @MazeDancer: This. I probably won’t watch the SOTU or the response (I’ll be driving) but I hope Abrams does a great job. The response is historically super awful, because you don’t know what you’re responding to until the last moment. Trump is a little different, because it’ll largely be yakking and blaming Democrats for things and whining about the wall, but it’s still pretty nebulous. It also doesn’t matter for people like Sanders, who will give the same speech he always does ‘in response’.

  102. 102.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    February 5, 2019 at 12:36 pm

    What do you think goes through Pence’s head as he sits through one of these things, looking adoringly at Trump?

  103. 103.

    schrodingers_cat

    February 5, 2019 at 12:38 pm

    @ruemara: How goes your citizenship application?

  104. 104.

    Just One More Canuck

    February 5, 2019 at 12:38 pm

    @West of the Rockies:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuUJfYcn3V4

  105. 105.

    chris

    February 5, 2019 at 12:39 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Air.

  106. 106.

    JPL

    February 5, 2019 at 12:40 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Are you my Mother?

  107. 107.

    chopper

    February 5, 2019 at 12:42 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    I won’t watch. Luckily we’re having dinner with a friend tonight. That will be much better.

    oh, and here you are totally bragging about having a friend. WE GET IT ALREADY!

  108. 108.

    StringOnAStick

    February 5, 2019 at 12:44 pm

    @The Moar You Know: The tax bill was certainly written to fuck over people in states with high home prices, which is another way of saying “blue state”. I got into an internet tussle with a frequent poster at LGM when the tax law was about to be passed; he was thrilled that the mortgage interest tax deduction was severely curtailed because in his view all that bit of tax policy does is encourage suburban sprawl, thus causes more global warming, etc. That was funny to me because some of the most expensive home prices where I live are in the urban core of Denver, not the suburbs (mostly, there are some gated communities that are pricey but the big demand and building response is expensive urban units).

  109. 109.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 12:44 pm

    “views the speech and all of the pomp and circumstance that accompany it with some reverence, and aides said he puts more time into his script because it is one instance where he usually sticks to it.”

    Remembering the commemorative term Betty C coined, teleprompter recital. It’s perfect in many ways.

  110. 110.

    ruemara

    February 5, 2019 at 12:44 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: I have a 13 month wait. According to USCIS. Before the shut down ever occurred. I don’t even know what I’m waiting for. Is that the duration that should include the test & interview? Is that to even have the interview? Why is it 13 months? You took my money fast enough and then told me to show up for biometrics less than a month later. So I won’t get to vote in the 2020 elections if that’s accurate and I’m gonna try to be patient but I will probably forget I even applied.

  111. 111.

    chopper

    February 5, 2019 at 12:45 pm

    @StringOnAStick:

    places with high state income taxes and high home costs. oh yeah, and teachers, definitely teachers.

  112. 112.

    germy

    February 5, 2019 at 12:46 pm

    I like this A.P. headline:

    Trump squabbles with Democrats before speech on unity

  113. 113.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 12:47 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: empty thought bubbles?

    @chris: @JPL: @chopper: : ) lol

  114. 114.

    Bill Anrold

    February 5, 2019 at 12:48 pm

    According to The Times report linked above, it sounds like xenophobic incel goon Stephen Miller is wrestling with more conventional GOP turd-polishers over the tone of the speech. So, it might be interesting as a rhetorical artifact to watch the theme ping-pong between white nationalist scaremongering and pseudo-lofty pablum.

    This is why I’ll be watching it, carefully, and then reading the transcript. Lots of cooks in the kitchen, with knives, fighting. (One hopes. :-)
    And yeah, NP (& team, if somebody else hidden deserves the credit) nailed the DJT SOTU neediness lever.

  115. 115.

    JPL

    February 5, 2019 at 12:50 pm

    @Aleta: You might be right, because the key word is thinking.

  116. 116.

    Gravenstone

    February 5, 2019 at 12:51 pm

    @chopper: /golf clap

    Well played.

  117. 117.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 12:51 pm

    @chopper: hahahahahaha

  118. 118.

    bemused

    February 5, 2019 at 12:51 pm

    @germy:

    Heh. No need to read the piece. The title is a winner.

  119. 119.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    February 5, 2019 at 12:52 pm

    @chopper: OK, I actually laughed out loud at that.

  120. 120.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    February 5, 2019 at 12:54 pm

    @BC in Illinois:

    Thanks for reminding me: @ddale8’s live blogging of the speech might be the way to go. I keep forgetting about him since he took a selfish and unwarranted vacation around Christmas.

  121. 121.

    rikyrah

    February 5, 2019 at 12:54 pm

    Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight? We may or may not — it’ll be a game-time call for us, depending on our mood at 9 PM ET.

    Nope. Gonna watch the new BET mini-series about the creation of Soul Train.

  122. 122.

    Kay

    February 5, 2019 at 12:57 pm

    I’m not. I’m going to see my middle child in his new place. In a weird coincidence, it is across the street from a place I rented when I was a mere 2 years older than he is.

    I get it. They’re nice little 1950’s brick duplexes – I too was sold on the fact that they have a kitchen door! :)

    I’m oddly invested in his LIKING this rental. If he doesn’t it’s like he’s rejecting my life story.

  123. 123.

    opiejeanne

    February 5, 2019 at 12:57 pm

    @J R in WV: Not watching that asshole with his mouth that looks like a cat’s anus lie and self-aggrandize.

    And, Oh my! I saw you got up a couple of times on Sunday night to put wood on the fire. It was 14 degrees at 8 am here, so it must have been colder overnight. I’m just glad we don’t have ice cubes coming out of the kitchen faucet. Seattle is a mess, icy hill streets are closed and Uber and Lyft have jacked up their prices. My daughters are both stranded because their cars are parked on hills and the city won’t bother to de-ice their little side streets. They’re describing a lot of cars sliding into other cars or ending up stranded on the sidewalks. We have nearly a foot of snow here and it’s pretty outside.
    We think we can get down our driveway, but getting off of our hill may be tricky where the road gets steep at the city limits. We won’t see a snowplow for a week here.
    But we have enough toilet paper!

  124. 124.

    Bill Arnold

    February 5, 2019 at 12:57 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I’d put a hundred bucks on his messing up the name of the family who’s tragedy he’s exploiting to spread his blood libel.

    Another (more amusing) possibility is that his speechwriters manage to convince him to use “Democrat party” then quickly correct himself as a conciliatory gesture, and then he screws it up anyway somehow, perhaps by being too obvious about it.

  125. 125.

    stinger

    February 5, 2019 at 12:58 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Dorothy, just FYI, I’ve left a comment/question on your blog, How to Be a Tiresomely Successful Published Author.

  126. 126.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 12:58 pm

    OT, but I listened to the Pod Save America Podcast last night and they had a couple of excellent conversations about revelations about the governor in Virginia.

    There were two excellent conversations about this on the podcast last night. One was the guys talking among themselves; the other was an interview with Adam Serwer. They really got to the heart of the matter.

    It’s really worth a listen.

  127. 127.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    February 5, 2019 at 1:00 pm

    @stinger: I answered this morning. Not too tiresomely, I hope. :-)

  128. 128.

    Bill Arnold

    February 5, 2019 at 1:00 pm

    According to The Times report linked above, it sounds like xenophobic incel goon Stephen Miller is wrestling with more conventional GOP turd-polishers over the tone of the speech. So, it might be interesting as a rhetorical artifact to watch the theme ping-pong between white nationalist scaremongering and pseudo-lofty pablum.

    This is why I’ll be watching it, carefully, and then reading the transcript. Lots of cooks in the kitchen, with knives, fighting. (One hopes. :-)
    And yeah, NP (& team, if somebody else hidden deserves the credit) nailed the DJT SOTU neediness lever.

  129. 129.

    Bill Arnold

    February 5, 2019 at 1:00 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I’d put a hundred bucks on his messing up the name of the family who’s tragedy he’s exploiting to spread his blood libel.

    Another (more amusing) possibility is that his speechwriters manage to convince him to use “Democrat party” then quickly correct himself as a conciliatory gesture, and then he screws it up anyway somehow, perhaps by being too obvious about it.

  130. 130.

    West of the Rockies

    February 5, 2019 at 1:01 pm

    @Just One More Canuck:

    That’s the one!

  131. 131.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 1:02 pm

    @Steeplejack (phone): The google was kind enough to bring up Daniel Dale as the first link, even though I googled “David Dale twitter”. I knew it was a D name, and I apparently guessed wrong. Google to the rescue.

  132. 132.

    West of the Rockies

    February 5, 2019 at 1:03 pm

    @JPL:

    “Are you my mommy?” (asks a small child in a gas mask.)

  133. 133.

    trollhattan

    February 5, 2019 at 1:03 pm

    Jabberharpy Kellyanne was on my radio this morning telling me that I should listen to the message, and not the messenger. What in the everloving hell is that supposed to mean. “The medium is the message” mean anything to you, Trixie?

  134. 134.

    trollhattan

    February 5, 2019 at 1:04 pm

    @West of the Rockies:
    Just saw that episode last month. As creepy as weeping angels!

  135. 135.

    schrodingers_cat

    February 5, 2019 at 1:04 pm

    @ruemara: My biometrics date was in early March and the interview date was in early June and the swearing in was on July 4th. 13 months seems excessive.

    ETA: It took an extra month for my friend who applied last year (Jan 18 to August 18). Is the California office extra busy or something?

  136. 136.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    February 5, 2019 at 1:05 pm

    Shirley Zilberstein @ SZilberstein
    AP: Bill Weld changes his party registration back to GOP as he mulls Trump challenge

    he’s kind of low-energy for the task, but he has nothing to lose, and he has much to atone for

  137. 137.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    February 5, 2019 at 1:05 pm

    @trollhattan: “The medium is the message” mean anything to you, Trixie?

    I don’t know why, but “Trixie” strikes me as fitting nickname for that one.

  138. 138.

    CaseyL

    February 5, 2019 at 1:09 pm

    Watch Dolt45 fling feces at everyone? Only if it were non-metaphorical, and even then, only to see GOPers gobble the feces up and praise the flavor.

    I want to hear Stacey Abrams’ response, but am not sure if I’ll tune in for it live or wait for the Balloon Juice post.

  139. 139.

    Matt McIrvin

    February 5, 2019 at 1:10 pm

    @Mike in NC: “Bit of a dick” is kind of a Marvel movie formula in itself by now, isn’t it? Iron Man, Star-Lord, Dr. Strange and Ant-Man are all sort of obnoxious man-children in different ways.

  140. 140.

    Denali

    February 5, 2019 at 1:19 pm

    I am proud that I can’t think of enough money to induce me to watch.

  141. 141.

    rikyrah

    February 5, 2019 at 1:20 pm

    @StringOnAStick:

    The tax bill was certainly written to fuck over people in states with high home prices, which is another way of saying “blue state”\

    Nothing but a scam, and folks told them this is how it would be.

  142. 142.

    NotMax

    February 5, 2019 at 1:20 pm

    @Mike in NC

    Religious right fuming that WASP doesn’t get top billing on the marquee. Even if an icky girl.

    ;)

  143. 143.

    Tata

    February 5, 2019 at 1:23 pm

    Watch that speech? I’d rather have a rash. I’ll watch Stacey Abrams tomorrow, though, because she’s genuinely important.

  144. 144.

    Luciamia

    February 5, 2019 at 1:27 pm

    Any interesting counter programming tonight? Maybe theyll show Titanic again

  145. 145.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    February 5, 2019 at 1:29 pm

    @Luciamia: or a double feature of The Producers (“I found the worst candidate, the worst vice president, the worst campaign… Where did I go right?… You fat fatty!”) and All The President’s Men (“Follow the money… the truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand…” )

    ETA: Can you imagine the trump imitation Zero could have given us?

  146. 146.

    Steeplejack

    February 5, 2019 at 1:33 pm

    @WaterGirl:

    Pro tip: Any Twitter @nym, you can just go to, e.g.:

    https://twitter.com/ddale8

    ETA: You don’t even have to remember the https prefix. Browser should fill it in.

  147. 147.

    dww44

    February 5, 2019 at 1:33 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: If Stacey Abrams does approximately as well as she did in this recent speaking appearance at Families USA that was broadcast on C-Span, she will hold our interest and speak with real knowledge about the issues that she’s spent the last few years addressing. And, hopefully, abstain from political platitudes. Bonus: the person who introduces her is Sister Simone.

  148. 148.

    Ben Cisco

    February 5, 2019 at 1:33 pm

    Not watching.
    1. Greedy Amin is gonna lie.
    2. Stacey Abrams will be much more compelling and truthful.
    3. Orange Foolius gonna lie.
    4. Punditubbies gonna fall all over themselves trying to prop up the Angry Circus Peanut. (Betty, you’re aces!)
    5.Treason Tribble Head gon LIE!

  149. 149.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    February 5, 2019 at 1:34 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    What do you think goes through Pence’s head as he sits through one of these things, looking adoringly at Trump?

    “Boy howdy do I love shredded wheat for breakfast.”

  150. 150.

    NotMax

    February 5, 2019 at 1:35 pm

    Drinking game shortlist cheat sheet for tonight, words or phrases to be on the lookout for:

    Big
    Beautiful
    Great
    Best [X] in history
    Everybody’s talking/saying
    Wall

    Dark horse entries:

    Emergency
    Ivanka
    Democrats

    Longest of the long shots:

    Covfefe
    Mueller
    Russia
    Peace

  151. 151.

    Steeplejack

    February 5, 2019 at 1:36 pm

    Everybody’s getting in on the SOTU guest thing!

    Melania has invited 12-year-old Joshua Trump, who’s been bullied due to his last name, to the SOTU. To make his life easier, he’s changing his name to Joshua Stalin.#JoshuaTrump

    — Paul Rudnick (@PaulRudnickNY) February 5, 2019

    I can’t wait for Joshua to meet Low IQ Maxine Waters, Crying Chuck Schumer, Crooked Hillary, Pocahontas, Da Nang Blumenthal, Lyin Ted, Little Marco, and Kenyan Born Barack Obama. Be Best!

    — Tony Posnanski (@tonyposnanski) February 5, 2019

    Having only one ticket, I invited one of two guests for the State of the Union tonight, #sotu Lynnette Hardaway & Rochelle Richardson, otherwise know as Diamond & Silk. Diamond won the coin toss. Both will be my guest speakers at COS in the morning. pic.twitter.com/bCutypAOoJ

    — Steve King (@SteveKingIA) February 5, 2019

  152. 152.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    February 5, 2019 at 1:39 pm

    Are y’all going to watch the shit-show tonight?

    No way in hell. And though I’m dying to hear the Democratic responses (yeah, I’m going to try to listen to the Spanish one), I’m not going to wait through any of his speech to catch them, even with the sound off. Not sure I even want to read a live blog, I hate him and every word out of his mouth so much.

    So maybe I’ll check in here after 10 to see what’s doing and see if I can get a status update without direct exposure.

    And I’ll probably look for the responses tomorrow on YouTube.

  153. 153.

    Steeplejack

    February 5, 2019 at 1:39 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    No, Steve, you do not have black friends.

    — Bee Team (@b_tay) February 5, 2019

  154. 154.

    JoeyJoeJoe

    February 5, 2019 at 1:40 pm

    @dmsilev: @Luciamia: The Kids are Alright is a good show (ABC) on at 8:30. It’s similar to the Wonder Years, but there’s 8 kids not 3 and the family’s catholic.

  155. 155.

    rikyrah

    February 5, 2019 at 1:41 pm

    Kamala Harris, Truancy and the Fauxgressive Left’s Desperate Attempt to Criminalize School Attendance

    “Kamala is a cop.”

    Since it’s been speculated that Kamala Harris, US Senator from California a badass Trump-nominee-squirm-causer, might run for president, we’ve been hearing the above over and over again from a particular corner of the “left” media and intelligentsia. Since she declared she was running for president a week and a day ago in front of a 20,000+ crowd in Oakland, California (with overflow crowds everywhere), the pushers of this insidious line have gone into high gear. In what they believe is their silver bullet against Harris’ candidacy, they are targeting an anti-truancy program she led when she served as the District Attorney for the City and County of San Francisco.

    It’s pretty ridiculous, when you think about it, why anyone – least of all anyone claiming to be a liberal – would oppose a program mainly centered around community resources for parents to bring kids back to school and keep them off the streets, but I quite suspect Kamala Harris’ failing to be an underachiving, 40-year career politician, septuagenarian Caucasian male from a 93% white, rural state has something to do with this.

    In my view, there are three parts that make up this attack’s appeal: (1) the reinforcement of Harris being a law enforcement officer (a “cop”) and of law enforcement being evil, (2) the idea that truancy enforcement is bad for poor people and communities of color, and (3) a callous disregard for the wellbeing and safety of children.

    ……………..

    When it comes to think of it, the program’s very success may be a threat to those who are looking to vilify all law enforcement. The anti-truancy program that Harris helped run was humane, depended primarily on investments in community resources, and effective without actually having to imprison anyone. But admitting that law enforcement can be – and has been – a force for good in a community, that law enforcement can work – and has worked – hand in glove with schools and community resources to have a positive impact on getting kids back to school and off the streets is antithetical to demonizing the very profession of law enforcement and tarring and feathering anyone in it with that paintbrush.

    If you admit that, you may have to face the complex world where law enforcement is often a force for good and yet the criminal justice system is in dire need of reform. You may have to admit that giving people of color a seat at the table and the power to make decisions often improves the system rather than getting those individuals sucked into a system that is still in many instances whitewashed. And if you admit all that, you might have to admit your own responsibility to improve things in your community rather than just tweeting angry rants.

  156. 156.

    germy

    February 5, 2019 at 1:41 pm

    @Luciamia: From 8:00 to 9:00 we’ll be watching “Finding Your Roots” on PBS.

    From 9:00 to 10:00 one of our PBS stations (the one NOT showing the SOTU) will show “A Ballerina’s Tale” – Misty Copeland makes history as the first black female principal dancer with the American Ballet Theater.

  157. 157.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    February 5, 2019 at 1:43 pm

    My predictions for Trump’s speech

    * The US is now the Greatest Country EVER (thanks to Trump)

    * The Us is an utter failure as a country because of the Democrats.

    * Who knows if the US is winning or losing?

    * Immigrants are coming to murder us in our sleep if we don’t get a wall.

    * Shout out to his wife for being brave in the face of paranoid nativist bullying.

    * Who knows if immigrants are good or bad for America?

    * The rest a stream of consciousnesses based on what was on Fox in the last 24 hours.

  158. 158.

    NotMax

    February 5, 2019 at 1:45 pm

    .@Dorothy A. Winsor

    “I’d do her.”

  159. 159.

    tobie

    February 5, 2019 at 1:46 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: In the last two weeks or so of the 2016 campaign, Weld turned on his running mate Gary Johnson, recommended voting against the ticket and came out and gave the most full-throated endorsement of Hillary I heard on any news program. I think that’s why I’ve never been angry at him in the way I should be. Obviously he signed on to a ticket that did real and permanent damage and his come-to-jesus moment came way too late.

  160. 160.

    vtr

    February 5, 2019 at 1:46 pm

    I dreamed last night that at 9:15pm, on Speaker Pelosi’s signal, every Democrat in the Chamber will yell “YOU LIE!”

  161. 161.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 1:55 pm

    @Steeplejack: Well, if I’d seen the “8” and not just the ddale part, that might have helped! :-)

  162. 162.

    Mike in NC

    February 5, 2019 at 1:56 pm

    What do you think goes through Pence’s head as he sits through one of these things, looking adoringly at Trump?

    Thinking about what flavor of Jello “Mother” is going to spoon-feed him before going to bed at 8:30 PM?

  163. 163.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    February 5, 2019 at 1:58 pm

    According to The Times report linked above, it sounds like xenophobic incel goon Stephen Miller is wrestling with more conventional GOP turd-polishers over the tone of the speech. So, it might be interesting as a rhetorical artifact to watch the theme ping-pong between white nationalist scaremongering and pseudo-lofty pablum.

    I suppose it would be interesting, in the abstract, to see how Miller tries to sell us “compassionate kidnapping of children and white supremacy”, but that’s still not enough to get me to watch.

    It occurs to me that having Abrams crush him in the ratings tonight would make for some nice morning schadenfreude. So maybe I will make more of an effort to try to find a way to stream the responses in real time rather than seek them out tomorrow.

    Still don’t want to see his face though. Not even a still.

  164. 164.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 1:59 pm

    I am hoping that Stacey Abrams plans to give a real State of the Union address, rather than rebutting Trump and what he has said. Talk about the actual state of our union, Stacey, all of it. Infrastructure, health care, climate change, voting rights, everything. As if you were the real president, instead of the disgusting orange creature.

    edit: I don’t care much for giving speeches, so if I were doing it, I would go with:

    The state of our union is fucked up. (drops the mic)

  165. 165.

    MattF

    February 5, 2019 at 2:00 pm

    And, um, WaPo columnist Ed Rogers, holding down the rightward end of his little tent, offers advice for the Speaker:

    Many in her caucus will expect her to somehow demonstrate their dissatisfaction with the president. The speaker should resist all that and mostly do nothing. She should give Trump a hearty handshake, smile, nod and applaud when appropriate. That’s it.

    Ha ha ha.

  166. 166.

    Brachiator

    February 5, 2019 at 2:03 pm

    @germy:

    From 8:00 to 9:00 we’ll be watching “Finding Your Roots” on PBS.

    Heard a great interview with Henry Gates on Fresh Air recently.

    Ahh. Here it is. Historian Henry Louis Gates Jr. On DNA Testing And Finding His Own Roots

    I may dip into the show. I’ve been watching YouTube clips of a similar British show, “Who Do You Think You Are?” Very interesting stuff.

  167. 167.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 2:05 pm

    Neomi Rao and her hearing today, w/ some of her replies to Senators, from Mother Jones

  168. 168.

    NotMax

    February 5, 2019 at 2:05 pm

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym

    “Enhanced babysitting.”

    Or new program announcement: Small People In Care.

  169. 169.

    Steeplejack

    February 5, 2019 at 2:05 pm

    The Battle of Algiers (1967) is just starting on TCM, for those who want to see some really gritty resistance (against the colonial French).

    TCM is going into the dark today. Ingmar Bergman at 4:15 EST (Through a Glass Darkly), then I Vitelloni at 6:00. Lightens up slightly with Viva Zapata! at 8:00. Palate-cleansing Lust for Life at 10:15.

  170. 170.

    Doug R

    February 5, 2019 at 2:10 pm

    @Brachiator: The addition of Captain Pike and some involvement of Jonathan Frakes has improved things this season.

  171. 171.

    Steeplejack

    February 5, 2019 at 2:10 pm

    @WaterGirl:

    Oops.

  172. 172.

    NotMax

    February 5, 2019 at 2:12 pm

    @Steeplejack

    Speaking of art films….

    :)

  173. 173.

    frosty fred

    February 5, 2019 at 2:16 pm

    @Brachiator: Did not know that was available, thanks for the heads up. My impression is the US version of Who do you Think you are? has gone down hill and is less interesting/well done than Finding your Roots.

  174. 174.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 2:18 pm

    So: The Richmond Times Dispatch widened their photographic display of Ralph Northam’s medical school yearbook. To the two facing pages. ETA: the link: https://www.richmond.com/news/virginia/government-politics/northam-s-med-school-to-hold-news-conference-on-its/article_2a8f9fc3-0345-57fa-85e1-3b65bca06619.html

    And — yup — the guy in the top left corner has a photo in blackface too. Had you heard that? It hits you right away as soon as you see it. Why did that not come out earlier? How many other photos like that, in 1984 and at other times? That school has a culture problem, probably along the lines of Covington Catholic.

    From chiefton.com: Pueblo doc was in blackface at Va. medical school

    Parkview Medical Center confirmed Monday that a Pueblo doctor also wore a “blackface” costume in a photo from the same yearbook where Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam has been accused of wearing a similar costume during a medical school party in 1984.

    The hospital confirmed in a statement that Dr. Stephen Nafziger, a Parkview Medical Center administrator, was dressed as one of The Supremes singing group in a photo in the Eastern Virginia Medical School yearbook from that year.

    A picture has circulated on the internet of Nafziger that shows three people dressed in blackface. The entry in the yearbook is one page before a page dedicated to Northam in which there is a photo of a person in blackface standing next to a person dressed in a Ku Klux Klan robe and hood.

    In a statement released to The Pueblo Chieftain, Parkview Medical Center officials said they have “no formal comment on the discovery of a nearly four-decade old photograph of Dr. Steven Nafziger, vice president of medical services, dressed and performing as one of The Supremes at a Halloween party during medical school.”

    “Dr. Nafziger’s service to Pueblo, including his medical residency, his time as an outstanding primary care physician, and his tenure with Parkview Medical Center is without reproach,” the hospital said.

    The statement went on to say that Parkview would like to have the last 35 years of Dr. Nafziger’s life and his outstanding service and commitment to the community speak for itself.

    WTF was up with that med school? They’re supposedly doing a press conference at this very hour.

  175. 175.

    LuciaMia

    February 5, 2019 at 2:20 pm

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: Re: Tom Tomorrow- “Must keep smiling…”

  176. 176.

    geg6

    February 5, 2019 at 2:28 pm

    @rikyrah:

    Oooo, that sounds good. Is this the start or have I missed half of it already?

    This white girl loved her some Soul Train back in the 70s and early 80s. It’s where I learned the hot new dances and got ideas for cool clothes.

  177. 177.

    jimmiraybob

    February 5, 2019 at 2:29 pm

    It would be more constructive to watch a rerun of one of the “Dictator’s Handbook” episodes on PBS.

    The morbid fascination of watching Individual-1 wore off during the debates. He really is the puppet. He will still be the puppet tomorrow. And the next day……..

  178. 178.

    NotMax

    February 5, 2019 at 2:35 pm

    @rikyrah

    True story.

    One grandmother, probably in her mid-eighties then, kept asking what time it was after she dragged me out to the Early Bird Special at a restaurant in Florida while I was visiting. The reason? “I want to get back in time to watch Soul Train.”

  179. 179.

    Brachiator

    February 5, 2019 at 2:41 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    The Battle of Algiers (1967) is just starting on TCM, for those who want to see some really gritty resistance (against the colonial French).

    Recording this for later. Love this movie.

    @Doug R:

    The addition of Captain Pike and some involvement of Jonathan Frakes has improved things this season.

    I’m wondering whether the addition of Pike might both improve and doom the show. I’ve only seen the first episode of the season, but Pike was so much fun that he kinda overwhelmed the other characters the series is supposed to be about. And once they really start focusing on Spock, why bother with anybody else?

  180. 180.

    ruemara

    February 5, 2019 at 2:42 pm

    @schrodingers_cat: The offices has 8 people in it when I went.@Matt McIrvin: Have you met many men?

    I keep barely putting a toe into the dating waters and then running back out because it feels like over 40 & single male = good lord what a dick.

  181. 181.

    Gravenstone

    February 5, 2019 at 2:44 pm

    @Steeplejack: One wonders how comfortable “Diamond” will be in the company of such an open and virulent racist. Or maybe she won’t really care, since he seems to focus his public hatred on the Brown more than the Black?

  182. 182.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 2:48 pm

    Interesting cartoon Purl written/directed by Kristen Lester, produced by Gillian Libbert-Duncan (8.5 minutes)
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=480&v=B6uuIHpFkuo

    It’s from a Pixar series SparkShorts, for (their words) new storytellers, new storytelling techniques, new production workflow experiments. (Not new anim techniques, a sort of old-fashioned dimension (maybe used for contrast?) )
    Lester: “It’s based on my experience being in animation,” (a 1 minute vid that also shows one drawing)
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nK6mSsO6M8

    Funny, this is new: my computer is suddenly getting hung up at every attempt to embed a link.

  183. 183.

    rikyrah

    February 5, 2019 at 2:49 pm

    The plan to keep Trump’s taxes hidden
    The Trump administration wants to drag an expected Democratic request for the president’s tax returns into a quagmire of arcane legal arguments.

    By NANCY COOK 02/05/2019 05:02 AM EST Updated 02/05/2019 12:56 PM EST

    The new House Democratic majority is widely expected to test one of Donald Trump’s ultimate red lines by demanding the president’s personal tax returns — and the Trump administration has been gearing up for months to fight back hard.

    Trump’s Treasury Department is readying plans to drag the expected Democratic request for Trump’s past tax filings, which he has closely guarded, into a quagmire of arcane legal arguments.

    At the same time, officials intend to publicly cast the request as a nakedly partisan exercise. The two-pronged scheme was developed by a handful of top political appointees and lawyers inside the department — with the ultimate goal of keeping the president’s past returns private, according to four people familiar with the administration’s approach.

    The strategy will hinge on an argument that politically motivated Democrats will inevitably leak Trump’s tax information — a felony in and of itself — if the IRS hands over the documents. So because Democrats can’t be trusted to keep the documents private, they shouldn’t get them in the first place, officials will insist. Treasury officials have been waiting since early January for a top Democrat to make the request.

  184. 184.

    stinger

    February 5, 2019 at 2:53 pm

    @JPL: (And Chris and chopper; sorry I don’t know how to link to more than one comment) I’m at work. Ya’ll really need to stop making me laugh out loud.

  185. 185.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    February 5, 2019 at 2:53 pm

    @Elizabelle: Wow, and the Northam picture really stands out in the way it’s so casually presented. Likes it’s so routine for the students to act like racists jerks that no one thought twice of including it.

  186. 186.

    Gravenstone

    February 5, 2019 at 2:57 pm

    @rikyrah:

    argument that politically motivated Democrats will inevitably leak

    Always, ALWAYS projection with these fucks.

  187. 187.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 2:58 pm

    To go with movie talk (especially for Tamara, Lauren Bacall w/cat)
    Four cat photos with Donna Reed, Kim Novak, Isabelle Huppert, Bacall.
    https://twitter.com/SabinaStent/status/1092504685615960064

  188. 188.

    Gravenstone

    February 5, 2019 at 2:59 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    the guy in the top left corner has a photo in blackface too

    Rather minimizes the potential that the photo on Northam’s page was placed there “in error”, doesn’t it?

  189. 189.

    stinger

    February 5, 2019 at 3:00 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Just saw it, thank you! If we do get a group going, I’ll let you know how things work.

  190. 190.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 3:05 pm

    @Elizabelle:
    From a good article by JAMIL SMITH in Rolling Stone yesterday
    https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/blackface-is-just-one-part-of-the-problem-789635/
    1/2

    …
    I want Northam to resign not merely because he can no longer credibly govern the state. Every moment he stays in office advances a misconception that racism is merely about imagery.

    “Even if the governor resigns [because] of this picture from ’84, that doesn’t heal racism,” Reverend Barber says. “The courts are finding, over and over again, that these voter suppression tactics — from gerrymandering to photo ID to blocking same-day registration — are full of racism. They’re ruling that! They ruled that the [North Carolina] legislature had targeted blacks.”

    What this Northam controversy should point us to is the episodic lens through which we view racism in this country — a series of flash-points sparked by a horrifying image, a spoken slur or a bad tweet.
    …
    Only if we’re lucky does a conversation about blackface in a medical school yearbook expand to touch upon disproportionate rates of black maternal and infant mortality, and why doctors trained in dangerous racial stereotypes may very well employ others when they have African-Americans in their care.

    Barber feels that what we keep missing is that racist laws and policies come before the ignorance on display in that photo. “Or even economics that say the means justify the ends,” he adds. “Or heretical ontology that says God intended for people to be separated. You know, the laws, the desire to legally engage in racism against people came first. And then all the ignorance, the blackface, the Sambos, came as a result of the laws.”

    As long as racial slights are limited to the strictly observable, two central problems emerge: people can be told not to believe what they see, and we cannot effectively target what disproportionately silences, disenfranchises, miseducates, segregates and even kills people who are not white and therefore most insulated from America’s design flaws.

    “In Virginia, there [will be] a pipeline going through a black community,” Barber says. “That’s racism. I want to know where he stands on that!”

    (Info on that in next comment)

  191. 191.

    Fair Economist

    February 5, 2019 at 3:05 pm

    @rikyrah: I have had experience with both the California truancy system and Child Protection. They would *never* put somebody in jail unless there were an incredibly good reason. Even the threat of jail (what Kamala did) is only deployed in pretty egregious cases. She improved a number of children’s lives with those carefully targeted threats.

  192. 192.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 3:07 pm

    @Aleta: Cont. from above, same link.
    2/2

    Dominion plans to build a high-powered compressor station mere yards from homes, which the

    https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/blackface-is-just-one-part-of-the-problem-789635/

    Chesapeake Climate Action Network complains “would run 24 hours a day and emit sounds comparable to a jet engine.”

    Worse than being a nuisance, the CCAN argues that the station would pollute the community’s air with all manner of gases and particulates that could lead to ailments as serious as cancer. In perhaps a fitting bit of historical irony, the station’s planned site is on the grounds of a former slave plantation. Opponents of the pipeline have decried Dominion’s plans as environmental racism, but the state’s Air Pollution Control Board voted unanimously in January to approve a permit for the compressor station.

    Two months ago, Northam came under heavy criticism from environmental groups for removing two members of that board who had raised concerns about the energy company’s plans. The governor claimed at the time that he replaced those members, Samuel Bleicher and Rebecca Rubin, because their terms had expired in June — but what sense did it make for him to do it suddenly in November, right as they were asking questions? (Northam’s office did not respond to Rolling Stone’s request for comment on the issue.)

    Northam’s two replacement picks didn’t vote in January on the compressor station permit, and a third member abstained due to a conflict of interest. Had they all voted against it, that wouldn’t have been enough.

    But imagine if Northam had stood with his Union Hill constituents against Dominion, throwing the weight of his office behind their protest. Could he have made a difference? [note: Union Hill residents strongly requested that he use his power but he stated he wd leave it in the hands of the state regulators–to my mind a dodge in favor of his big donor,]

    Instead, he sided with Dominion, apparently in violation of a campaign promise to require individual stream permits for pipeline companies. His administration emphasized that the compressor station won’t damage the health of residents. The AP reported that Dominion has also offered $5 million to help “improve” Union Hill. But Northam not only disempowered the board that ultimately made the call on the very thing they sought to block, but took pains to show his indifference. “As far as the pipeline,” Northam said in a recent radio interview, “there’s not a lot of middle road on that issue,” adding, “I’ve tried to be as fair as I can.”

    That sentence echoes the foreboding threat that Dr. King warned us about in his letter from that Birmingham jail cell. The civil rights icon cautioned us against the white moderate “who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice” and “who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace.” Northam’s desire for fairness, as he sees it, may doom a historic black community to being poisoned for fossil fuel riches that largely won’t benefit them. Oh, what a sight it would be to see wall-to-wall coverage of the damage wrought by white moderates who told black people that they were on our side!

    By his own logic, Northam was astonishingly racist or stupefyingly incompetent. However, I’d argue that his actions in the Union Hill drama are also disqualifying, for it suggests a comfort with the system as is that should be unsuitable for every African-American not just in that community, but throughout the state and country. This is why he as to go. Northam, so desperate to hold onto his power that he would rather sit impotent in his seat than give it up, seems all too willing to wait for the “more convenient season,” as Dr. King put it in his letter, when black folks can finally enjoy full equality.

  193. 193.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    February 5, 2019 at 3:07 pm

    @rikyrah: Makes you wonder what he’s hiding. Why is he fighting tooth and nail to keep his tax returns out of sight?

  194. 194.

    The Midnight Lurker

    February 5, 2019 at 3:11 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    Having only one ticket, I invited one of two guests for the State of the Union tonight, #sotu Lynnette Hardaway & Rochelle Richardson, otherwise know as Diamond & Silk. Diamond won the coin toss. Both will be my guest speakers at COS in the morning. pic.twitter.com/bCutypAOoJ

    — Steve King (@SteveKingIA) February 5, 2019

    What? Kanye is too busy?

  195. 195.

    MazeDancer

    February 5, 2019 at 3:11 pm

    Kamala Harris is giving a pre-SOTU speech. On FaceBook.

    So dumb.

    Looks Bernie-grabby. Like she’s trying to steal Stacey Abrams thunder.

    Pretty much 3/4 of the replies to the announcement say exactly that.

    Going to be a long fall from potential if she keeps up these kind of moves.

  196. 196.

    The Midnight Lurker

    February 5, 2019 at 3:12 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    Makes you wonder what he’s hiding. Why is he fighting tooth and nail to keep his tax returns out of sight?

    Sex aids written off as medical expense?

  197. 197.

    rikyrah

    February 5, 2019 at 3:13 pm

    We’re supposed to get an ‘ice storm’ this evening.
    So, I have a question..

    Do you put out the salt that you would use with snow..

    BEFORE the storm or AFTER?

  198. 198.

    Frankensteinbeck

    February 5, 2019 at 3:14 pm

    Jesus Christ. It’s Trayvon Manning’s birthday, and the gun that was used to murder him just sold for $250,000. Even with the callouses of having lived all my life among these hateful assholes, their dedication and joy in spite sometimes makes me nauseous.

  199. 199.

    Immanentize

    February 5, 2019 at 3:14 pm

    @The Midnight Lurker:

    bullied all because his last name is Trump.

    I saw it reported that the kid’s first name is “Barron.”

  200. 200.

    Frankensteinbeck

    February 5, 2019 at 3:16 pm

    @rikyrah:

    BEFORE the storm or AFTER?

    I just looked it up. Since an ice storm is rain first, then the rain freezes, you’re stuck with salting after. If the rain is more than an inch or so, it’s likely to wash away the salt.

  201. 201.

    opiejeanne

    February 5, 2019 at 3:16 pm

    @rikyrah: That punishment of blue state homeowners is why Orange County, CA turned blue in the midterms last November.

  202. 202.

    The Midnight Lurker

    February 5, 2019 at 3:16 pm

    @rikyrah: Half before, half after, but only on the places where you walk.

  203. 203.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 3:16 pm

    Aleta: I don’t like that pipeline either, and will be very glad to see it fail. I would not guess the route was chosen so much for racial reasons as “poor people.” Which, sadly, is very often people of color. Will give you that.

    Very honestly, Northam raised my eyebrows and many others’ with shenanigans connected with that pipeline. I think he may have replaced some of its opponents on a board. Not an issue I follow carefully, but I was thinking “WTF?” over the thing. Follow the money, I think. Business as usual that probably should not be business as usual with a Democratic governor.

    I really have not read up on it much.

  204. 204.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 3:18 pm

    @rikyrah: Ice storm. My sympathies.

    I think before, for sure, and after.

    As the phrase goes, porque no los dos?

  205. 205.

    rikyrah

    February 5, 2019 at 3:21 pm

    Thanks for all the suggestions. I’m going to keep an eye out and do a some before, during (right before I go to bed), and then when I wake up in the morning to see the true aftermath.
    I cannot begin to explain to you how much I hate ice.

  206. 206.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 3:22 pm

    @rikyrah: Ice is dangerous. Do you have any exterior steps to deal with? That’s treacherous.

    And I think you are just after an injured ankle?

  207. 207.

    rikyrah

    February 5, 2019 at 3:24 pm

    @Elizabelle:
    My ankle is back to good…
    Only have the one step, but a path to get to the car that has to be salted.
    Also gotta make sure that I bring in an ice scraper into the house so that I’ll have it in hand before I try and get into the car.

  208. 208.

    Gravenstone

    February 5, 2019 at 3:28 pm

    @rikyrah: After. If you put it down early, too much potential to be washed away if it starts as rain before turning to ice.

  209. 209.

    Tokyokie

    February 5, 2019 at 3:29 pm

    I don’t plan to watch it, but I’m not so noble as to contend that you couldn’t pay me enough to watch the bastard. It’s just that I cannot envision any circumstances under which that might happen.

  210. 210.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 3:30 pm

    @rikyrah: You don’t even want to know the temperature in central VA at the moment.

    Good to hear the ankle is good.

  211. 211.

    NotMax

    February 5, 2019 at 3:32 pm

    Still chilly weather, so space heater doin’ its thing. Again.

    The next electric bill may require extra postage in order to be delivered.

  212. 212.

    The Midnight Lurker

    February 5, 2019 at 3:33 pm

    @rikyrah: Salt the steps before and after! Dead grass v broken hip. You can figure it out.

  213. 213.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 3:34 pm

    @Aleta: Another thing about that compressor: My understanding is that pipeline construction called for building 3 compressors at different locations in VA along the pipeline. The plan Dominion submitted (approved as of Jan 8) is to instead build one giant compressor on a a large parcel in Union Hill, an old farm it purchased. Besides residences, the noise and pollution of the compressor would be very close to an historic AA church and its parishioners and right on the boundary with another farm that’s in operation.
    Previously a location on land in the US Forestry Dept. system was rejected after the Forestry Dept said it would harm wildlife.

    Below is from the WaPo:

    Dominion and DEQ presented survey data based on broad Census Bureau information that claimed the area was sparsely populated and no more than 39 percent minority.

    An anthropologist affiliated with the University of Virginia, however, submitted the results of several years of door-to-door research showing that about 200 people live within a one-mile radius of the site and that 83 percent of them are minorities.
    …
    Greg Buppert, a senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center who has represented a number of advocacy groups, said he needed to review the case with his clients before deciding whether to challenge the air board’s decision in court.

    He pointed out that work on the Atlantic Coast Pipeline is currently suspended because SELC lawyers have won several related cases in federal court. Last month a panel of federal judges vacated permits for the pipeline to cross two national forests and the Appalachian Trail, finding that federal agencies issued them hastily and without proper review.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/virginia-regulators-approve-permit-for-pipeline-compressor-station/2019/01/08/

  214. 214.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 3:34 pm

    @Tokyokie: I have my price. It’s five figures, in front of the decimal. High five figures, if I can get it.

    For that, will even take notes.

  215. 215.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 3:42 pm

    @rikyrah: We do it after.

    We buy children’s sandbox sand w/o salt or chemicals which works well for us. But we also put creepers on our boots, which are fantastic. Runners use them on their shoes here too.

  216. 216.

    trollhattan

    February 5, 2019 at 3:45 pm

    @NotMax:
    Planning on having my butt kicked next A/C season, as our utility is doubling the summer rate 5-8 p.m. Ugh.

    “Stupid ‘smart’ meters!”

  217. 217.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 3:46 pm

    @Aleta:

    Here’s a better link. For whatever reason, yours is not working. For me, at least.

    WaPost: Virginia regulators approve permit for pipeline compressor station

  218. 218.

    Brachiator

    February 5, 2019 at 3:55 pm

    Today’s google doodle promotes the Lunar New Year, the Year of the Pig, but underneath is a link reminding everyone

    Watch President Trump’s State of the Union address. Tonight on YouTube at 9p ET

    I will take this as google obliging the president who likes to complain that tech companies like google are biased against conservatives, and personally hate Trump. But it is also nice that they point out that he is a pig.

  219. 219.

    Mandalay

    February 5, 2019 at 3:56 pm

    Nothing to see here. Move along…

    President Trump and his entourage cost taxpayers a combined $13.6 million for just four trips over one month to his private Mar-a-Lago resort, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office.

    From February 3 to March 7, 2017, Trump visited his private resort in south Florida four different times. That cost government agencies approximately $10.6 million for operating costs of government aircraft and boats and $3 million for temporary duty costs of government personnel supporting Trump’s travel, according to the report.

    The GAO, a nonpartisan government watchdog that works as Congress’s investigative arm, found that the government paid about $60,000 to the Mar-a-Lago directly in these four trips, money that goes towards further enriching the Trump family.

    The watchdog said the trip costs detailed in the report were approximate because the White House refused to respond to requests for information about travel.

  220. 220.

    NotMax

    February 5, 2019 at 4:00 pm

    @Brachiator

    Lunar New Year means it is time to hop on to WoW and kick some gargantuan demon doggy butt.

    ;)

  221. 221.

    rikyrah

    February 5, 2019 at 4:06 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    thanks for the link

  222. 222.

    Ruckus

    February 5, 2019 at 4:11 pm

    @geg6:
    What if I told you he was going to set himself on fire?
    Not that he’s capable of that, being the big chicken shit that he is.

  223. 223.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    February 5, 2019 at 4:12 pm

    @rikyrah:
    That’s pretty hilarious, given their White House leaks like a sieve

  224. 224.

    Ramalama

    February 5, 2019 at 4:15 pm

    @WaterGirl: I’m a pretty new fan of Pod Save America, but I’ve caught up on most of their pods. Such great conversations. I really love how profane and profound they can be.

  225. 225.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    February 5, 2019 at 4:16 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck:
    You mean Trayvon Martin, right? Unless the Mannings have another brother nobody knows about.

  226. 226.

    Patricia Kayden

    February 5, 2019 at 4:17 pm

    infuriating creatures like Ann Coulter,

    LOL. You have such a way with words, Betty. And no, I won’t be watching Trump preen and lie for close to an hour tonight. I’ll watch Leah Rehmini’s excellent expose of the Church of Scientology instead like I always do on Tuesday nights.

  227. 227.

    chris

    February 5, 2019 at 4:17 pm

    This might be a good way to do it.

    This is the link for the #SOTU podcast ⁦@AshaRangappa_⁩ and ⁦@CIAspygirl⁩ are doing. Please listen at your own risk. https://t.co/GHMwUgkoAy— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) 5 February 2019

  228. 228.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 4:18 pm

    rikyrah, I too really hate ice now . The ice cleats make a huge difference. We get ice cleats or ice creepers at sporting goods stores or runner’s shoe stores or Target.

    There’s different levels — the spike ones are too extreme. They don’t work well if a a thin layer of snow is lying on the ice, or on thin ice. Because they can’t grab on.

    The simplest ones (like in the stabilicers brand) are good, and cheapest. Their only disadvantage is they can be very slippery on slick floors. (Like linoleum, or inside a store, or in the hallways of office blds. Esp if the floors are wet from other people coming in.) For safety you need to take them off when you enter a building. May rust and break. I’ve used mine for years.

    I just got nanospikes on sale and like them. If possible I would try them on for size over boots or shoes before buying. My soft sided boots got pulled in too much by their M size, so I had to exchange them. (They pulled up the toe, and bit into the heel.) Harder boots don’t have that problem.

  229. 229.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    February 5, 2019 at 4:26 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    In an earlier statement, Zimmerman said he planned to use the money from the sale to fight “Black Lives Matter” violence against law enforcement officers and to counter “Hillary Clinton’s anti-firearm rhetoric.” He also said money would be used to “ensure the demise of Angela Correy’s (sic) persecution career.” Corey was the special prosecutor appointed to investigate Martin’s death.

    […]

    In his listings, Zimmerman wrote that he was “honored and humbled” to put the Kel-Tec PF-9 pistol up for auction.

    “The firearm for sale is the firearm that was used to defend my life and end the brutal attack from Trayvon Martin on 2/26/2012,” he wrote.

    In his interview with The Daily Beast, Zimmerman showed no remorse over the killing, and for the first time publicly blamed Trayvon’s parents for the incident.

    “They didn’t raise their son right. He attacked a complete stranger and attempted to kill him,” Zimmerman said of Trayvon.

    “Sybrina Fulton and Tracy Martin did everything they could to capitalize on her son’s death,” he said. “She was never a mother figure to him. Tracy Martin couldn’t have cared less about their son. He treated him like a dog without a leash.”

    Nobody who kills in self-defense talks like this. They usually feel guilt and remorse, even if they were justified in defending themselves. Zimmerman is a sociopath who murdered Martin in cold blood.

    Zimmerman has had several run-ins with the law since the shooting, including domestic abuse charges and an alleged road rage incident.

    I’m honestly surprised he hasn’t either gotten himself killed by now or somebody else hasn’t tried to kill him.

  230. 230.

    chris

    February 5, 2019 at 4:27 pm

    @Aleta: I like my ice trekkers. Pricey but worth it because I do a lot of walking in a freeze/thaw climate. It was -16C Sunday morning and it’s 13C right now. Back in the freezer tonight.

  231. 231.

    Ruckus

    February 5, 2019 at 4:30 pm

    @different-church-lady:
    This.
    I’m sorry but hanging around after someone has proven to be one of the worst human beings is only going to show that you are not and the problem is that you can become one of them by doing so.

  232. 232.

    WaterGirl

    February 5, 2019 at 4:31 pm

    @rikyrah: @Gravenstone: I am on team “after” as well.

  233. 233.

    Mandalay

    February 5, 2019 at 4:38 pm

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

    Nobody who kills in self-defense talks like this.

    Exactly right. But someone who listens to Trump talks like this:

    He treated him like a dog…

  234. 234.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 4:46 pm

    @Elizabelle: Thanks.
    This is a from a good article about the history and importance and beauty of Union Hill.
    (HuffPo in 2017 https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/echoes-of-a-dark-past-at-virginias-standing-rock_us_596d21c0e4b010d77673185a )

    Buckingham County, Virginia was a majority Black county before, during and after the Civil War and it was home to many freedmen who had purchased their freedom even before the end of slavery. The Freedman’s Bureau office for the county took up residence at the Buckingham County Courthouse, an historic building designed by Thomas Jefferson and it established a Freedmen’s school there, known as the Lincoln School.

    For the past three years, a consortium of companies led by Dominion Energy, Virginia’s powerful and politically connected energy monopoly, has sought approval for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline. … The potential harm that the pipeline would have on the ecology, tourism, economic development and property values of the rural counties through which it would pass has been well documented.

    Compressor stations … are a major industrial endeavor, posing health risks to the surrounding community and producing noise and the threat of leaks and explosions. They run 24/7 and “regularly release toxic emissions such as methane, nitrogen dioxides, particulate matter and volatile organic compounds (VOC’s) in the air with ‘blow-down events’, or ‘venting’ which cause elevated contamination of the air.” Pipeline companies usually place compressor stations every 40-70 miles along a pipeline route. But Dominion proposes to build one massive compressor station to service the entire length of the pipeline in Virginia some 200 miles in each direction.

    Union Hill is a beautiful place surrounded by mountain views and lush green forests fed by clear streams and tributary rivers of the historic James River.

    Union Hill also is “a mostly African-American community that was founded by slaves freed after the Civil War” and the families of those freedmen still live there. The community is home to two historic Black churches, one of which, Union Hill Baptist Church, was founded in 1868 and traces its lineage to the outdoor arbor Mulberry Grove Baptist Church where slaves gathered to pray prior to emancipation.
    …
    Within a one-mile radius of the proposed Variety Shade site, the population is 85% African American, according to the findings from a door-to-door household population and cultural resource study conducted by Dr. Fjord and teams of local community members and volunteers.

    At least one-third of those residents are the descendants of freedmen who either purchased their freedom before the Civil War or were freed as a result of the war.

    In addition to the two historic Black churches, this community’s historic resources include the sites of two Black schools, a large unmarked slave burial site and many cemeteries with freedmen burials as well as recent family burials. The household cultural resources study and interviews with former residents with long-time family history in Union Hill uncovered this largely forgotten history

    The site name “Variety Shade” was a plantation. … Many [people] lay buried today in cemeteries that are as yet unmarked. Dominion now seeks to build its only massive fracked gas compressor station complex there, in what remains an agricultural district, threatening the health, safety, property rights and property values of today’s residents, many of whom can trace their lineage back to those who previously labored there as slaves.

    Given this history, it is no surprise that Dominion’s plan for historic Union Hill has generated “community outrage.” … Charles White, a Buckingham County historian and publisher of The Informant, a local African-American newspaper, has noted that “people are saying it would disproportionately affect black people” but “from what I can see, it affects everybody.” Carlos Arostegui, whose 184-acre Whispering Creek Farm lies one mile from the proposed compressor station site, notes that he gets a “double wammy” because Dominion proposes to run the pipeline up against his dairy farm and use his land as a work area and then “I get to live the rest of my life with a compressor station.”

    Rev. Paul Wilson, pastor of the Union Hill Baptist Church and Union Grove Missionary Baptist Church, which have a combined membership of 250 people, has noted that the churches are “within walking distance of the compressor station.”
    …
    In May 2016, Preservation Virginia, a non-profit whose mission since 1889 has been “perpetuating and revitalizing Virginia’s cultural, architectural and historic heritage,” listed Union Hill as one of Virginia’s “Most Endangered Historic Places.”

  235. 235.

    Aleta

    February 5, 2019 at 5:06 pm

    @Aleta: correction of comment #213
    I wrote “My understanding is that pipeline construction called for building 3 compressors at different locations in VA along the pipeline. The plan Dominion submitted (approved as of Jan 8) is to instead build one giant compressor on a a large parcel in Union Hill”
    The 2017 article (link at #234) says

    Less well known is the specific threat posed by Dominion’s three proposed compressor stations, one of which would be in Virginia. … Pipeline companies usually place compressor stations every 40-70 miles along a pipeline route. But Dominion proposes to build one massive compressor station to service the entire length of the pipeline in Virginia some 200 miles in each direction.

  236. 236.

    Elizabelle

    February 5, 2019 at 5:24 pm

    @Aleta: Sure doesn’t sound like Dominion tried very hard to find another site, either. Adequate space and a willing seller: goodbye any other considerations.

    I am not sure this pipeline is a done deal.

  237. 237.

    RobNYNY

    February 5, 2019 at 7:19 pm

    @West of the Rockies:

    Someone said: Skinned a normal woman and stretched the hide over a horse’s skeleton.

  238. 238.

    Original Lee

    February 5, 2019 at 11:18 pm

    @Aleta: The 3-compressor plan went away because one of the compressors was proposed for a site across the river from Mount Vernon.

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

Image by HinTN (5/22/25)

Recent Comments

  • Professor Bigfoot on Open Thread (May 22, 2025 @ 12:12pm)
  • Geminid on House Bill Passes (Open Thread) (May 22, 2025 @ 12:11pm)
  • WaterGirl on Proof of Live – Ohio Meetup (May 22, 2025 @ 12:10pm)
  • Paul in KY on Open Thread (May 22, 2025 @ 12:10pm)
  • Professor Bigfoot on One Big Bad Bill and the ACA (May 22, 2025 @ 12:09pm)

PA Supreme Court At Risk

Donate

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
War in Ukraine
Donate to Razom for Ukraine

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Meetups

Upcoming Ohio Meetup May 17
5/11 Post about the May 17 Ohio Meetup

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)
Fix Nyms with Apostrophes

Hands Off! – Denver, San Diego & Austin

Social Media

Balloon Juice
WaterGirl
TaMara
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
DougJ NYT Pitchbot
mistermix

Keeping Track

Legal Challenges (Lawfare)
Republicans Fleeing Town Halls (TPM)
21 Letters (to Borrow or Steal)
Search Donations from a Brand

PA Supreme Court At Risk

Donate

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Copyright © 2025 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!