Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

Thanks for reminding me that Van Jones needs to be slapped.

DeSantis transforms Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

American History and Black History Cannot Be Separated

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

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

Spilling the end game before they can coat it in frankl luntz-approved dogwhistles.

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

People are complicated. Love is not.

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

I really should read my own blog.

The willow is too close to the house.

We’ll be taking my thoughts and prayers to the ballot box.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

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

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Reader Interactions

143Comments

  3. 3.

    The Midnight Lurker

    Can I stay here with you a little while Mr. Cole?

    Between the hot mess in VA and that hot wombat love thread… I’m scared.

  4. 4.

    Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho

    Thank you for the open thread. Have a nice visit with Tammy and Samantha.

  7. 7.

    jacy

    And for those of you following along at home:

    1) Mouse has gotten fat. I mean fat. You wouldn’t think such a scrawny kitten would gain weight SO fast. So he has to go on a diet, which will be agony for everyone. He is convinced that he’s never been fed, ever, not even once and he manages to make us believe it half the time. (I think maybe some of it is due to his disability and the fact that he can’t jump and run and like “normal” cats, although I am sure most of it due to the fact that we are suckers who just keep feeding him constantly.)

    2) Custody paperwork has been filed so I sent a letter telling the ex that the kid has been accepted to the school he wants to go to and that I think it is in his best interests. 48 hours and no response, so I don’t know if he is moping or plotting. I did not tell him about the court petition yet, but he’ll be served some time next week and he’ll find out then. So, still waiting, but the anxiety is a few degrees less.

    3) Still waiting to hear back from the mtg co and whether I can modify further, but I did get my valuation on my house back and it’s gone way up since I bought the house, to that’s good, I think. I’m within about $2,000 of what I need to pay off everything, and I have until the 25th to wire it, so I feel good about it, and far less panicky than a few weeks ago when everything seemed impossible. (And the peeps here are working at keeping me organized and taking on some of the burden things, so that helps a lot.) Thanks to everyone again for the help and kind words and good thoughts. It’s amazing the difference it makes. Y’all are the best.

  8. 8.

    The Midnight Lurker

    @Ruckus: I’m with you, pal. I love this blog! But for right now, I’m just going to sit in the corner and watch Star Trek with dad.

    My phaser is set to stun and I’m ready to beam out!

    They still do that, right?

  9. 9.

    Ohio Mom

    In my front yard, the daffodils are just beginning to break through — there are half inch tall leaves showing — and yesterday a robin was hopping around my neighbor’s yard.

    It really lifted my spirits to see signs that this winter may actually end.

  10. 10.

    Suzanne

    I am feeling very stressed out, somewhat irrationally, but also about an absolute shitshow that went down while I was on a work trip this week. One of my colleagues went missing for a period of some hours, then turned up saying that he had been drugged at a bar and taken to a stranger’s house. Other details in his story around these events were easily disprovable lies.

    It has been a week.

  13. 13.

    Kay

    With filing season officially under way, a growing number of taxpayers are realizing that the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act might be a double-edged sword.
    The White House said in October 2017 that the average family “would get a $4,000 raise” when it was pushing for passage of the law. Now that the new filing season has begun, some taxpayers are finding out that the tax man giveth — but also taketh away, especially as it pertains to their annual refund.

    Early filers have been taking to social media to express their ire at finding that their refunds were a fraction of what they anticipated or — worse yet — that they would owe an unexpected bill to the IRS.
    “That campaign promise was one of the only two reasons I voted for you,” wrote Twitter user Dee Nelson. “Rethinking that decision now.”
    @realDonaldTrump just did my taxes and thanks for increasing mine!! No change in income and got back $400 less than last year. That campaign promise was one of the only two reasons I voted for you. Rethinking that decision now.

    I’m slightly curious what her other reason was.

    I hope it wasn’t The Wall :)

  14. 14.

    B.B.A.

    For the two or three people who haven’t pied me yet, I posted an explanation of my behavior on the other thread, which I’m not going to repeat.

    For I am Costanza, king of the idiots.

  15. 15.

    Jeffro

    Lucinda Williams and the DBTs tonight in DC…semi-ashamed I knew next to nothing about Ms. Williams prior success, but hey now I am a fan. ?

    Considering the time of year, would be great if the DBTs opened with “Feb 14” ❤️???

  16. 16.

    jacy

    @B.B.A.:

    Temperatures are running a little high, and the world is a remarkably stressful place right now. For my part, I am cutting EVERYBODY a little slack. If I find myself getting annoyed with anything, I just take a breath or go do something else.

  18. 18.

    Suzanne

    @Ohio Mom: About the same. Colleague situation is some absolutely crazy shit. Third colleague and I were incredibly concerned and upset…..then the dude just reappeared, completely unconcerned, as if nothing had happened…..but said he was given a roofie and essentially kidnapped. And then he acted like that was just HILARIOUS, and he told us “that’s my story and I’m not changing it”.

  19. 19.

    Ruckus

    @The Midnight Lurker:
    As long as you weren’t sitting in the corner sucking your thumb and waiting for dad to come home, you probably are OK.
    Technology has come a ways since Star Trek so maybe phasers and beaming out are now classique. I’d assume that in the future that Apple will make an overpriced gadget that will do both, much simpler, smaller and far more expensive. Probably Apple Watch 12.

  21. 21.

    Ohio Mom

    @Suzanne: I haven’t worked outside the home in a while so my memory might be fuzzy, but that doesn’t fit what I remember about professional behavior.

    Is he the boss’s son-in-law or something?

  23. 23.

    Ruckus

    @Suzanne:
    That must be what I got a whiff of, even at this great distance and with a smeller that doesn’t work at all. It’s #2 colleague bullshit from where you work.

  24. 24.

    Yarrow

    @jacy: Glad things are looking a bit better in your life.

    Here’s the link to jacy’s GoFundMe to save her house,in case anyone was still wanting to contribute.

    @Kay: NBC Nightly News did a segment on how people are upset they’re not getting refunds and/or having to pay taxes this year. Elections have consequences, bitches.

  27. 27.

    Yarrow

    @Kay: Also, when the tax law comes up I like to mention this comment from the turtle:

    Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) looked ahead to the 2018 midterms with some confidence. “If we can’t sell this to the American people, we ought to go into another line of work,” he said at the time.

    Yes. Yes you should.

  28. 28.

    Sab

    @Kay: I do tax prep. I am really curious about how this tax season will go. First horror story (not a client; I would never discuss a client on a blog) a co-worker of someone I know has a wife and eight kids. He didn’t think to adjust his withholding because he’s just a normal guy who goes to work and doesn’t think about stuff like that. He was expecting a refund. But of course he had lost ten personal exemptions (him, wife, eight dependent kids) which is worth more than $40,000 off his taxable income that he isn’t getting any more. So he had to borrow to pay his taxes. Plus he has to readjust his withholding so his take home will be less going forward. Net effect of the tax bill for him: no refund, new debt, less take-home pay.

    Next election a lot of people may be bitter.

  29. 29.

    Suzanne

    @Ohio Mom: It’s completely fucking weird. Obviously, if he really was drugged, then that is serious and a crime. But I am skeptical. He told us that he only had one drink, even though I personally saw him get fairly intoxicated earlier in the evening and be kind of a drunken asshole. Plus some other lies. Then he changed his flight and made a fairly quick escape.

    @Yarrow: I just met the guy for the first time on Sunday, because he works in a different office in my company. Three of us flew in from different offices for a recruiting event. So I don’t know him well enough to say.

  30. 30.

    poleaxedbyboatwork

    @B.B.A.:

    I don’t pie nobody, but that’sa personal choice of mine. People usedta threaten to pie me, which is certainly their prerogative (I, perhaps fatuously, likes to think like Zora Neale Hurston on that score: “Why would anyone deny themselves the pleasure of my company?”) Chin up, don’t mean nothing.

    Read your post mentioned on previous thread. At the risk of sticking my oar in where it ain’t wanted, got the impression you’re mostly confused about how best to proceed by the roiling crosscurrents of our times. Which, if so, to me is totally understandable. We gotta criminal preznit of these here United States gaslighting the entire fucking country, ratfuckery is afoot far and wide, and we’re all getting a lurid object lesson that retrograde views on race and gender are not limited to the GOP. It *is* confusing.

    But: fwiw, wouldn’t recommend flagellating yourself over it. Only seems likely to exacerbate the state to which you mentioned being prone to.

    One thing I try’n allus keep at the forefront of my mind as the sole saving grace of the Trump maladministration and its exponential evils (providing we make er thru, course): The Trump era has ripped the scab offa most every false piety ever invoked in these here United States and revealed the oozing pustulence to the world.

    It now falls to alluvus to determine if we are equal to surmounting that.

  31. 31.

    NotMax

    Monthly trek into town complete. Bills paid, groceries obtained and now all unpacked and put away. Time to collapse.

  32. 32.

    Kay

    @Yarrow:

    We’ve heard complaints. The drops are really large- going from 5k to 500. They’re pissed. They plan on getting that money.

    Don’t quote me on this but I would be willing to bet Donald Trump did not know people wait for those all year, and put off big purchases and expenses until they get them. It’s like withholding is a kind of savings account. For a lot of them it’s the only big chunk of money they get all year. They didn’t (and wouldn’t) notice the extra $2.11 they got weekly, or whatever pittance he threw their way, but they will notice the lower refund.

  34. 34.

    Yarrow

    @Suzanne: Hmmm….that does sound weird. Sounds like something is definitely going on there. Not really the kind of person you want representing your company at a recruiting event. Are you and the other person going to report him or do anything about it?

  35. 35.

    Ohio Mom

    @Suzanne: Am I to understand the other office sent this paragon of judgement to an event where job candidates are screened?

    Well, I guess I can understand that they wanted a break from him.

  36. 36.

    AThornton

    @Kay:

    Early filers have been taking to social media to express their ire at finding that their refunds were a fraction of what they anticipated or — worse yet — that they would owe an unexpected bill to the IRS.

    In times of stress it’s always good to relax with the classics

  37. 37.

    Bess

    Interestingly the pro-family, birth them all party wrote a tax reform package that harms large families. Older blind folks also got shafted.

  38. 38.

    Yarrow

    @Kay: Trump doesn’t understand anything that doesn’t impact him directly. He probably thinks everyone has accountants who figure out how to keep them from paying anything in taxes.

    The idea of getting a refund in the three or four digits category and actually needing or wanting that money to pay for things would never even enter his head.

  39. 39.

    Sab

    @NotMax: Yeah. How did they not see it as a bomb? I sure hope it takes out my R senator. He’s not up for a couple of years, but people with big families maybe won’t see him as so family values next time.

  42. 42.

    Ohio Mom

    @Sab: I hope Democratic candidates will address that bitterness clearly and frequently. Spell it out: this is what Republicans did to you.

    They need to be very direct, there are too many people like your friend’s friend, the dad of eight, who don’t have the wherewithal to follow the news closely.

  43. 43.

    jacy

    @Yarrow:

    Any con can only last so long. The Republican con has lasted a long time — mostly because RACISM — but they have shitty, unworkable ideas that, once implemented, are shown to be shitty, unworkable ideas. A good conman knows when to get out, but a bad one just keeps pushing for another score. Republicans, in the end, are bad conmen.

  45. 45.

    Yarrow

    @Ohio Mom: It shouldn’t be that hard to do since Republicans crowed about their tax bill and in the last election Dems talked about how it gave money to the rich. It’s already out there. People just have to be reminded that yes, this is what we meant by that. Republicans screwed over everyone but the very rich. They screwed you.

  46. 46.

    Kay

    @Mike in NC:

    I bet Republicans in Congress did it deliberately, front loaded the tiny benefit and put off the big refund cut. Because that’s the kinda people they are.

    I’d blame Trump but he has no earthly idea what’s in that law. I bet he’s shocked to discover people get refunds. Or, used to get refunds.

  47. 47.

    Kent

    @Mike in NC:

    @Kay: Good to hear about MAGAts who got screwed by Trump’s fake tax cuts.

    They weren’t fake at all if your last name was Koch or Devoss or Trump or Kushner or any of their ilk.

  49. 49.

    Yarrow

    @Kay: Cue up all the times he said the tax law was great for everyone and was going to put money in everyone’s pockets.

  51. 51.

    Kent

    @Kay:

    @Mike in NC:

    I bet Republicans in Congress did it deliberately, front loaded the tiny benefit and put off the big refund cut. Because that’s the kinda people they are.

    I’d blame Trump but he has no earthly idea what’s in that law. I bet he’s shocked to discover people get refunds. Or, used to get refunds.

    I think it was the Trump-appointed political leadership in the IRS that goosed the withholding tables in an attempt to increase people’s take-home pay before the 2018 mid-terms. Of course no one noticed that. But now they are noticing the missing refund they used to use for that vacation to Vegas or whatever.

  52. 52.

    Suzanne

    @Yarrow: We did report it, because there is also the issue of $1400 in additional unexpected costs due to his disappearance that I didn’t mention. (Seriously, this story is complicated and weird.) He also disappeared with all of the work product the three of us accumulated over the trip, and said that he could not get back to the office until next week.

    @Ohio Mom: Yes, they did. I don’t know how long that will last. He was directed not to go to the next event, which was yesterday and today. My company is trying to figure all this shit out.

  53. 53.

    Sab

    @Yarrow: What is weird is this wasn’t Trumps tax bill. He just signed it. It was Mitch McConnell’s and Paul Ryan’s. Ryan was already planning to exit to wing-nut welfare. But why did McConnell go along with a plan that would torch the base?

  54. 54.

    cain

    @Suzanne:

    I am feeling very stressed out, somewhat irrationally, but also about an absolute shitshow that went down while I was on a work trip this week. One of my colleagues went missing for a period of some hours, then turned up saying that he had been drugged at a bar and taken to a stranger’s house. Other details in his story around these events were easily disprovable lies.

    The man must be having a psychotic break to start telling tales like that.

  56. 56.

    Kent

    @Yarrow:

    @debbie: But teachers get screwed because they can no longer deduct expenses.

    Really? I’m a teacher and just did my taxes on TaxCut. The $250 deduction for classroom expenses was still there. We have never been able to actually deduct actual expenses which, for most teachers, is much more than $250.

  57. 57.

    debbie

    @Yarrow:

    True. Most people do get screwed. Congress voted to get rid of the 65/blind deduction, but someone somewhere must have had second thoughts.

  60. 60.

    Steeplejack

    @Sab:

    But why did McConnell go along with a plan that would torch the base?

    Because McConnell’s base is the plutocrats and millionaires. The rubes back home are just the saps who can be counted on to vote for him because reasons.

  61. 61.

    Kay

    @Yarrow:

    Oh, it was way more specific than that. People were all getting a “4,000 dollar raise”. That’s what they promised. Democrats can do a lot with that. You would think they would know better than to put a number on it.

    Democrats did a good job attacking the tax bill though. It’s unpopular. Most people think it benefits rich people, which is good, since it does. So they can just stay the course, but now with examples! :)

  62. 62.

    Millard Filmore

    @Kay:

    I bet Republicans in Congress did it deliberately, front loaded the tiny benefit and put off the big refund cut.

    There was some discussion here that the Republicans timed the whole thing so that the tax cuts were before the 2018 elections, and the refund hit came after the elections.

  63. 63.

    Sab

    @Kent: You lost the miscellaneous itemized deductions above the 2% floor, which probably never benefited you anyway unless you have a tiny income and huge expenses and you itemized.

  65. 65.

    Salty Sam

    @Jeffro:

    Lucinda Williams and the DBTs tonight in DC…semi-ashamed I knew next to nothing about Ms. Williams prior success, but hey now I am a fan. ?

    You’re a lucky man, Jeffro- “The Saint of White Trash” has been a fave of mine for a long time, and not well appreciated in wider circles. Glad you got to see her.

  66. 66.

    Ruckus

    @Sab:

    Incompetent conmen.

    That’s the name of the rethuglican band.
    They play as good as they do everything else. Very, very badly.

  67. 67.

    Renie

    @Kay: I read that when trump was told about SALT by Dan Freedman trump thought it only affected wealthy people. He didn’t realize it also affected middle class people. It is greatly affecting me as a resident of NY.

  70. 70.

    cain

    @Kay:

    We’ve heard complaints. The drops are really large- going from 5k to 500. They’re pissed. They plan on getting that money.

    On the upside, Trumpers are going to have a hard time spending any money on anything related to politics. Churches are going to be pissed too as well groups like Focus on the Family. I would imagine that it might be hard to spring for cable.

  72. 72.

    zhena gogolia

    @Sab:

    I think maybe the point is only MAGAts expected that their taxes were going down under this conman. The rest of us expected the worst.

  73. 73.

    ellie

    @Suzanne: You really never know people. I used to supervise this guy who seemed incredibly normal. Until I attended a work conference with him. Come to find out he was a very aggressive drunk who liked to invade everyone’s personal space. He was let go in a round of cuts. Many years later, I found myself next to him at another work conference (he landed a job with a company in our industry) and he drunkenly hit on me. He is married. I am married. If you talked to him during a work day he is as steady and sober as anyone but let loose, he is a monster.

  75. 75.

    jl

    My Friday evening thoughts: the ride to the peak wingnut asymptote will be wild. How can they go even more absurdly nuts in public? Is the country so messed up politically that these abject lunatics will drive us off a cliff? All of them, from Trump on down. Too many links to put in a comment without getting bounced (I think, is there a limit now?)

    And why doesn’t the spell checker of a full service almost top 10,000 blog know ‘asymptote’?

  76. 76.

    Mike J

    Today brought the revelation that the lt gov of MS was in Kappa Alpha, an explicitly pro confederate college frat. There are pictures that won’t surprise you.

    Wiki says:

    Ku Klux Klan founder John Lester claimed that the Klan’s initiation ritual was based on a popular collegiate fraternal order. Allen Trelease makes the connection that “Kuklos Adelphon (KA) almost certainly provided the model” for the early Klan.

    My first college roommate pledged KA. His replacement and I shared Smiths and Echo & the Bunnymen albums and drove to Baton Rouge to see REM (where we got sidetracked by a girls dorm at LSU). So I traded up in the roomie department and hoped it was the last I ever had to think of KA.

    However, other people might want to look at the lists of prominent KA members at Wikipedia or at various chapter sites. The current gov of West by God Virginia was a member!

  78. 78.

    JaySinWA

    @Suzanne: Sounds like an alcoholic episode. Although I think they usually last longer. Had a co-worker disappear for a week or so. He fessed up and got treatment.

  79. 79.

    Ruckus

    @cain:
    They had one chance to screw everyone for their paymasters and this was it. I can’t imagine what life in this country will be like in another couple of months when most people find out how badly they got fucked.

  80. 80.

    Sab

    Why I love this blog. We start with John’s feet and Lily, and now we are discussing tax policy, and the whole drift from one to the other was sort of organic.

  81. 81.

    J R in WV

    @Suzanne:

    I have to say, I wonder who put a roofie in who else’s drink… it’s probably not your co-worker who got drugged, that happens to women, not guys. Just being paranoid. Glad he doesn’t work anywhere near you!

  82. 82.

    Martin

    Californian’s paid $12B more in taxes than before the law. People are pissed. We wouldn’t mind if it was helping balance the federal budget, or if the feds weren’t constantly fucking with our own part of federal spending, but the deficit is getting worse despite us paying more, suggesting that someone is paying MUCH less than us.

  84. 84.

    Renie

    @Kay: Hope the Democrats talk this #TaxScam up big time for the next election. People seem to forget issues quickly but this one hitting their wallets will hurt a lot. It’s a perfect issue to use against GOP.

  86. 86.

    Kent

    @cain:

    On the upside, Trumpers are going to have a hard time spending any money on anything related to politics. Churches are going to be pissed too as well groups like Focus on the Family. I would imagine that it might be hard to spring for cable.

    I think this is really under-reported. I have a LOT of extended family who are heavily into their church life. Based on roughly guessing at their mostly lower middle class financial status I gotta think that most if not all of them have lost their ability to deduct their tithing. Unless you have a MASSIVE mortgage, most middle class Americans are not going to get close to the $24,000 standard deduction for married filing jointly. So all those annual write-offs for church donations? Poof. They are gone.

    I haven’t really been looking for it, but I have to wonder what the long-term effect will be on a lot of these grifter churches.

    Of course it’s going to afffect college and universities as well. But their donor class is usually of a somewhat higher financial level.

  87. 87.

    J R in WV

    @jacy:

    If things get close, you come back here to the Jackals and we’ll try to do what needs to be done for you.

    Best of luck, I’m thinking fighting you is to much like work for you ex, who sounds like a lazy ass, too lazy to keep up an attack on you. Plus your kid is old enough to tell the judge who he wants to live with and why. Judges should be listening to kids that age!

  88. 88.

    Kent

    @cain:

    On the upside, Trumpers are going to have a hard time spending any money on anything related to politics. Churches are going to be pissed too as well groups like Focus on the Family. I would imagine that it might be hard to spring for cable.

    This has really been underreported. All those lower middle class churchgoers are no longer going to be able to write-off all their tithing every year which I expect has been a MAJOR source of fraud to begin with in the past. How are all those grifter churches going to survive?

  89. 89.

    Sab

    @Kay: Kay, you are a national treasure, although nobody but jackals, your family and your county dems realize that. It is still a fact.

  90. 90.

    jl

    Preparing to crawl out from under the bed and brave the world zooming towards peak wingnut asymptote.
    But, forgot to say thanks to Cole for petpic.

  92. 92.

    J R in WV

    @Jeffro:

    Lucinda Williams has been in WV on Mountain Stage, a nation-wide live music show, several times. She is a wonderful singer/songwriter. We have several of her albums. Not quite country, not really pop, just gritty good music.

  98. 98.

    Aleta

    @Sab: And didn’t Mnuchin go around in public telling lies about it, especially the summer and fall when they were trying to get vote commitments? There was “fit on a postcard” and the old Rumsfeld (I think) “this war tax reform will pay for itself” (in economic stimulus & corporate reinvestment). He also said it wouldn’t significantly reduce how much people at the top pay (because deductions would be limited). What else…there was more I think.

    We were supposed to be reassured that it wasn’t just Trump’s plan—Mnuchin had worked it out.

    He promised to show his work, but I’m not sure if he ever released the figures he claimed he had worked out.

    Someone like Mnuchin will pay hundreds of thousands of dollars less than before (on paper at least) I believe. Susan Collins’ family will feel some tax relief joy too.

    Now might be a good time for some billboards if there were actual estimates of savings for the 1%.

    There may be mistakes in what I remember — this shouldn’t be treated as facts. Exhausting day.

  100. 100.

    RedDirtGirl

    So, check this. I was just perusing OK Cupid, and one fellow I stop to read about happens to mention Balloon Juice in his profile! A member of the jackaltariat! How cool is that!

  101. 101.

    poleaxedbyboatwork

    @J R in WV:

    I have to say, I wonder who put a roofie in who else’s drink… it’s probably not your co-worker who got drugged, that happens to women, not guys …

    Unless it’sa guy who wants to rape a guy.

    Embarrassing lil vignette: Distinctly remember my gram warning me as a wee tot growing up in Flint that boys get raped, too. As a naive know-it-all sprite of nine, I had no idea what she was talking about. I remember trying to line out the physical complexities of a woman raping a man in my ignorant brain and deciding that gram, bless her heart, didn’t know shit about the world. Thankfully, I ain’t young enough to know everything nomores.

    That said, it sure sounds onnit’s face more like what another commenter said: an embarrassed cover story to make sense of a black-out bender.

  102. 102.

    J R in WV

    @Steve in the ATL:

    Jeeze, that’s why you’re a famous lawyer, and I’m just a retired guy hiding out in the woods.

    Or on a high desert mountain range foothill. Fire is burning well… I’ll have to add more wood come bedtime. It’s only 9:43 here now.

    I’m lucky to know what a roofie is, really, from reading those progressive online magazines, warning women not to look away from their drinks. Glad I mostly drink at home now!

  104. 104.

    Suzanne

    @J R in WV: I think there is much more to the story that I don’t know about. All I know is that, on the day we were supposed to fly out, dude disappeared and scare the living shit out of us. We were calling police, having hotel staff wellness check his room, changing our flights, etc. Then dude texts us with a crazy story that doesn’t add up, and shows no regret or concern…..before beating a very hasty retreat. It was very emotional and weird.

  105. 105.

    Kent

    If Dem’s don’t take advantage of this they are practicing political malpractice. The ads I would run?

    Make wanted-style posters of the Trump Cabinet and main boosters and flash them across the screen with ominous music.

    Betsy Devoss: $450 million tax cut that YOU paid for
    Wilber Ross: $975 million tax cut that YOU paid for
    Jarrod Kushner: $150 million tax cut that YOU paid for
    Koch brothers? $2.1 billion tax cut that YOU are paying for.

    And so forth. I just made up those numbers but they should be easy enough to estimate based on public information.

    Run a new set every week. Every week release the new set of Trump Billionaire tax savings.

    Do the same thing for corporations.

    GM: $2.8 billion in tax savings. 95% of it kicked back to shareholders, 5% to workers. and so forth.

  106. 106.

    Kay

    @Sab:

    Thanks. I’m amused that the GOP and Trump didn’t know “planning how to spend and then spending the tax refund” is a cherished American tradition. The majority of these people will never have had a federal tax bill in their lives, because all they pay is payroll and sales taxes and fees and such. They don’t actually make a payment to the IRS on income. Of course they’re outraged.

  109. 109.

    Kay

    @Sab:

    That’s true. My middle son’s on again/off again GF told me at Christmas how she was going to spend hers and I was thinking about her reading the tweets. She has a 3 year old. She not only didn’t vote for Trump, she canvassed for Sherrod so she doesn’t deserve this.

  112. 112.

    Sab

    @Kay: LOL. My whole adult life in accounting (40 years) the tax pundits have said don’t overwithold. The IRS gets your money interest free. My response has always been: have you never been married? Every penny in our checking account gets spent by one or the other of us within the week. The only way we save is through overwithholding.

  113. 113.

    Ohio Mom

    @Kent: Your ad also needs the contrast of Joe Blow with eight kids who had to take out a loan to pay his taxes when he used to get a refund.

    Don’t assume everyone is going to be able to draw a line between Mr. Fat Cat’s tax cut and their own missing refund. For that matter, don’t assume they are going to recognize any of the fat cat’s names you mentioned.

  119. 119.

    Barbara

    @Suzanne: He hooked up with someone would be my guess. Most made up excuses have at least a passing connection to what actually happened.

  127. 127.

    Kay

    Adam Davidson
    ‏Verified account
    @adamdavidson
    Follow Follow @adamdavidson
    More
    Ivanka says she’s not scared of Mueller because her family never did business with Iran.
    They did! They have admitted to working with known money launderers for Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps.

    Ivanka’s on one of her media tours. This is one is a bad idea because she sits for interviews now rather than just releasing statements to the NYTimes thru her publicist about how she’s not a racist. In the interview format you find out she lies as much as her father does.
    I can’t imagine who the Ivanka Constituency is. What group of voters are just dying to hear from her?

  129. 129.

    NotMax

    @Kay

    Ivanka says … her family never did business with Iran

    Trump to English translation: We did business with Iran.

  134. 134.

    Bess

    Ones who work for trucking companies are employees and the trucking company covers expenses. I was assuming the discussion was about independent truckers who are basically contract workers who have very short (usually single load) contracts.

  135. 135.

    Jay

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    A lot are, some arn’t. Most companies that hire drivers as employee’s require hours. Most companies that contract drivers don’t. Trucking used to be a good middle class blue collar job, now, you might not be able to pay off your rig. With the advent of high speed diesels, trucks don’t last any where as long and are much more expensive to maintain.

  136. 136.

    poleaxedbyboatwork

    @Kay:

    Ivanka’s on one of her media tours. This is one is a bad idea because she sits for interviews now rather than just releasing statements to the NYTimes thru her publicist about how she’s not a racist. In the interview format you find out she lies as much as her father does.
    I can’t imagine who the Ivanka Constituency is. What group of voters are just dying to hear from her?

    Ivanka: “Sure, I work for unapologetic racists. And no, I damn sure don’t do fuck-all-nothing to stop them. And true, I wouldn’t say shit if my mouth was fulluvit. But how fucking DARE you intimate that *I’m* a racist.”

    Spoilt rotten fruit borne of a poison tree, our sweetheart of the rodeo, Ivanka. Distinction w/o a difference poster-chile.

    Ivanka’s constituency? The silently complicit. The whistling-past-the-graveyard ignore-it-and-it’ll-go-away fence-straddling ass-covering chickenshits of the world.

    (Which is a surprisingly and depressingly large constituency, foremost a which reside in the inner sanctums of the press corpse.)

  138. 138.

    poleaxedbyboatwork

    @Jay:

    Work in progress, brother. Lemme warm to the subject first, mebbe I’ll get there eventually.

  139. 139.

    Bess

    @Jay: Look for the trucking world to get a good shaking up later this year as he whose name shan’t be mentioned starts selling battery powered trucks. Opex should be considerably lower.

  140. 140.

    Jay

    @Bess:

    Works for short haul, the most covetted jobs in trucking.

    There’s a small side industry here, rebuilding old trucks, ( 2×6 as well), making them BCCAR compliant, and putting them back on the road. A simple truck that can run 1million+ miles beats a slightly more fuel efficent truck that’s dead and useless at 350k miles.

    Here, aboot 60% of truckers are close to retirement age, and the youtes arn’t doing well due to debt exceeding income.

  141. 141.

    Bess

    The first battery powered T-semis will be for short haul work. Later a semi with a 100% charge range of close to 600 miles will make long hauls possible. With rapid 80% charging a 550 mile range truck would give a 440 mile range between charging. About 7 hours at 60 MPH.

    The T company has already started the process for three truck convoys with only the lead truck having a driver. The second and third truck would follow along like baby ducks.

  142. 142.

    joel hanes

    @B.B.A.:

    Everybody plays the fool
    Sometimes
    There’s no exception to the rule
    [Listen, people]
    It may be factual may be cool
    [I aint’ lyin’]
    Everybody plays the fool

  143. 143.

    poleaxedbyboatwork

    @joel hanes:

    Been awhile since I seen you, but wanted to sez tx. for recommendation of Holst Suite. Really enjoyed it, specially the intermezzo second movement.

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