From the #IAforWarren team that brought you classics like “Who do we stan? A woman with a plan!”, comes a brand new cinematic experience:@ewarren Catching Your Volunteer Taking a Selfie Without Her—A Story in Four Parts pic.twitter.com/cN1AbLQQY0
— Eli Seo (@Seo_Train) June 12, 2019
Yes, I would be embarrassed by my obvious selection bias, but right at this moment in time it’s easier to find interesting stories about Warren than about her worthy competitors. So, if you have links to share concerning Harris, Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Booker, O’Rourke, Gillibrand, et al — even Joe Biden! — please leave a comment, or contact me at annelaurie (dot) bj (at) gmail (dot) com, TIA.
(Besides, the alternative for today’s early-morning uplift was the Steve King / Diamond & Silk ‘press conference’ fiasco.)
Paul Waldman, at the Washington Post, “Why Elizabeth Warren is surging”:
… Overinterpreting small movements in polls is always dangerous, but if she does continue to rise — and right now she looks like one of the only Democratic candidates who is gaining support — there are some particular reasons why, reasons that may help us understand what primary voters are thinking and how the media are shaping the race…
… Warren, a senator from Massachusetts, is drawing some of the largest crowds as she campaigns across the state. Those attending her events testify to her skill in winning people over, her ability to describe policy challenges through effective storytelling, and her seemingly inexhaustible energy and enthusiasm.
Then there’s the role of the media. For a variety of reasons, Warren has become the favored candidate of the liberal opinion-writing elite. Even those (such as myself) who aren’t endorsing any candidate have been complimenting Warren for a while, writing and talking about her in ways that may be having an impact on how everyone else sees her and her candidacy…
There’s something else Warren has that wins respect from those who have covered lots of campaigns, and winds up producing better media coverage in subtle ways: A clear, coherent message of the kind most of the other candidates are lacking.
A successful presidential campaign message tells voters three things: What the problem with America is, what the solution is, and why the candidate is the right person to bring us from the first to the second. In Warren’s case, she argues that the system is distorted by the interests of the rich and powerful, and she wants to reorient it both politically and economically in the direction of everyone else. She’s the one to do it, she argues, because she understands what’s necessary and has already figured out how to go about it (see: the plans).A coherent message not only persuades voters, it also gets you good reviews from journalists covering the race, whether they personally agree with it or not. That’s not only because they respect a skillfully designed campaign but because it creates a kind of narrative coherence to the candidates’ actions and voters’ responses to them, one that makes easier the difficult task of writing about the contest every day…
I found this interesting, too. Warren's "second choice" and "actively considering" numbers give her some soft room to grow into.
Harris, too, could see a surge with a good moment or two in the early debates. https://t.co/MzQ8W52mBW
— Dan Lavoie (@djlavoie) June 9, 2019
This probably helped, too:
The #MuellerReport made it clear: A foreign government attacked our 2016 elections to support Trump, Trump welcomed that help, and Trump obstructed the investigation. Now, he said he'd do it all over again. It's time to impeach Donald Trump. https://t.co/yk25iGYpmC
— Elizabeth Warren (@ewarren) June 12, 2019
On the Road and In Your Backyard
satby
Good morning! Glad to see Warren rising and Sanders sinking. And that Harris and Buttigieg are hot on Wilmer’s heels. He needs to fade into his well earned irrelevancy ASAP.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
?
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone ???
Betty Cracker
Here’s how much I like Warren: I’ve started answering calls from unrecognized phone numbers because I know Warren randomly calls donors, and I don’t want to miss a chance to talk to her. So, I’ve subjected myself to dozens of marketing pitches and wrong numbers just because there’s a TINY chance it could be Liz on the line! I have no idea what I’d say to her if she did call. I hope I wouldn’t fangirl out and embarrass myself!
OzarkHillbilly
Congratulations to all the long suffering STL Blues fans. Enjoy your moment.
Raven
I mowed yesterday and didn’t even sweat. . . in June in Georgia! It’s supposed to be 55 tomorrow night!
OzarkHillbilly
@Raven: The weather has been all but perfect this week. It’s 52 right now, gonna see a high of 73. Why do I get the feeling we’re gonna pay for this come July?
JPL
@Raven: That’s on my to do list today.
Raven
@OzarkHillbilly: @JPL: It’s good for my old pups so I’ll take it!
Barb 2
Warren is real. She cares and she listens. This is how I select a doctor and we need a doctor to fix the disease that is Trump.
Men have done a real bang up job of messing up the government.
low-tech cyclist
@Betty Cracker:
You too, huh?
Fortunately, about half my junk calls are from repeat callers, but if the caller ID is unfamiliar, I’m right there. I’m also good at hanging up on a marketing pitch in the middle of the first sentence, so I don’t feel like I’m wasting a lot of time.
But damn, if Liz calls, I SO want to talk to her, to thank her for running. Even if I sound like a blithering idiot. Which I almost certainly will.
low-tech cyclist
The latest YouGov national poll (6/9-11, 454 RV):
Biden 27, Warren 16, Sanders 12
Also Buttigieg 8, Harris 7, Beto 3, Booker 2, everyone else 1 or 0 (link, p.105-6)
Betty Cracker
It’s been raining here every day this week, and I hear thunder in the distance, so more is on the way. We needed it — the river was getting so low I was afraid the cows in the county on the other bank would start crossing it!
zhena gogolia
I wish Harris had more momentum. I just like her affect better than Warren’s.
Gin & Tonic
So we get to the meat of the matter:
Because we’re not smart, and filing an 800-word article every day on deadline is so hard that we can’t do it without a plot line even dummies like us can understand.
Can’t fucking sleep, even though I want to….
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
For some reason, she seems to have less energy in the MSNBC interviews I’ve seen. Including last night.
Duane
Of course Sen. Warren is happy. The picture proves her time travel machine works and she’s now visiting herself from the past.//
OzarkHillbilly
@Gin & Tonic: You too, eh? Too late for me now with the sky lightening. I’ll probable get a nap in at some point.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Warren has a plan for that.
plato
Across the pond, the game of groans has started for tory ‘leadership’.
Betty Cracker
@Gin & Tonic: That was my initial reaction too, but we all know that’s the way it works; he’s just honest enough to say it out loud.
Baud
Via Reddit, elephant childbirth.
https://v.redd.it/63llaa13d1431
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: Mmm, burgers.
MJS
@Baud: I saw that too, and thought the same thing. I also didn’t like the way she seemed to dance around the impeachment question. It does not present well when contrasted with Warren’s unequivocal statements.
Baud
As if in queue.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-trade/as-democratic-voters-warm-to-free-trade-white-house-candidates-struggle-for-positions-idUSKCN1TE19X
She hasn’t done health care yet. That’ll be interesting.
Kay
I so enjoy that the polling bothers them and he has to instruct them to lie. With a good economy they would be more popular if they weren’t such nasty, mean-spirited petty assholes but it’s their nature so they can’t behave differently even if doing so would benefit them.
Baud
@MJS:
I missed that part. Kamala has come out in support of impeachment. So that’s strange. Maybe she doesn’t want to undercut Nancy.
debbie
That ABC interview is clear evidence of Trump’s willingness to collude. Why didn’t George bring that up?
Baud
The circus is coming to town.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/13/uk/julian-assange-extradition-order-us-gbr-intl/index.html
debbie
@Kay:
Colbert last night quoted Trump saying that farmers cried because he alone supported them and that these were men who hadn’t even cried when they were babies. Kill me now.
satby
@Betty Cracker: raining here with a high of 60° today. No outside work getting done today, but at least I got most of the lawn mowed yesterday.
Tony Jay
@Baud:
Uh huh. Nothing at all to do with Javid wanting to showcase himself as the tough, no nonsense Friend of America to balance out his complaint that he was shut-out of Trump’s State Dinner despite being Home Secretary and the number one Yankophile in the Cabinet, with the implication that it’s because he’s très dusky and Donnie don’t like dat.
satby
@debbie: he’s clearly insane, and each time he talks it gets worse.
SFAW
Meanwhile, in the “Liberal? That’s SO Last Millennium” Boston Glob, there is yet another op-ed by columnist Joan Vennochi, # 4,783 in her continuing series “I Hates Me Some Strong Wimmins.”
Today’s installment: “Have Massachusetts Democrats lost faith in themselves or in Elizabeth Warren?” [Because Biden leads Warren in the MA polls, apparently.]
Disclaimer: I did not read it — I may choose to read the dead-tree version at the Library, but I refuse to give John Fucking Henry any more clicks than absolutely necessary — but unless Vennochi has had an epiphany, it’ll be more of her usual schtick re: women.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: It’s not really true that Warren hasn’t tackled trade. She provided a framework for an approach in a speech in Detroit last week.
Regarding Assange, although I certainly consider him a loathsome piece of shit, I am worried about the Trump admin using the particular charges they brought to undermine the work of actual journalists. From what I’ve read, the charges all stem from the material Manning leaked.
Kay
@debbie:
Farmers did better under Obama. Whether Obama “supported” them in his heart of hearts I do not know, but they did better when he president. Facts don’t care about their feelings, as they themselves might say :)
They know it. They complain constantly so it can be difficult to tell when they’re actually having a bad time of it as opposed to saying they’re having a bad time (every year) but at the end of the day they have X in and Y out, so they know.
We haven’t seen land values drop much here, which is how they measure their wealth, but we will. They had the highest per acre value – selling or leasing- under Obama that I have ever seen.
Patricia Kayden
I wonder when Trump will figure out that calling Senator Warren “Pocahontas” is not a winning strategy. Good to see that her campaign is on fire. The contrast between her and Trump on a debate stage will be huge.
https://mobile.twitter.com/ewarren/status/1138936754654851072?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet
I love how she has a policy to address pretty much everything.
Baud
@SFAW:
I’m sure the article is trash, but that’s a fair knock. She really should be leading in her home state.
Ken
@plato: What do you mean by “started”? They’ve all been shoving knives in one another’s backs for two years now.
Baud
@Kay:
Economically. Not emotionally.
debbie
@Kay:
You’re once again absolutely right. I think farmers were the first group to deliberately lower expectations so they’d look better at the end. I still want to know why they never cried as babies. I’ve never heard of this magical thing.
satby
Nice digest on where the candidates are on various issues here.
Edited: they update it in spite of the fact that the dateline is Jan.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Maybe that’s why Reuters doesn’t think she’s addressed it.
OzarkHillbilly
Parliament out of options to stop no-deal Brexit, says Letwin
plato
@Ken: Today, they get to stab in front.
debbie
@Baud:
Knowing Massholes as I have with all their underlying prejudices, I’m not surprised she’s behind. Trump’s bullshit is particularly appealing to them.
debbie
@satby:
Great link! Thanks!
Betty Cracker
@Baud: I guess that’s the downside of staking out the “wonk” role in the race; everyone expects fully baked proposals on every issue.
Kay
@debbie:
It’s amusing. They complain constantly. We really didn’t do them any favors turning them into Americas mythical “hardest workers”. It is hard work but give me a break. If you’re inheriting 600 acres you’re not downtrodden. If anyone should know that it’s Donald Trump. The truth is the land isn’t worth anything put to another use, or they would have sold it already somewhere along the line- one generation or another. There are 30,000 people in this county. They can’t sell it to a developer. And build what? A mall? An apartment complex? It’s either valuable as farmland or it isn’t valuable.
No One of Consequence
@Barb 2: as a member of the less-fairer sex: I concur with your statement.
For the record, I stand with George Carlin, Who once said that he was certain the God was a man, because no female would fuck things up this badly.
Peace,
– NOoC
debbie
@Kay:
Yep.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
It’s why I try to keep people’s expectations of me as low as possible.
Patricia Kayden
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: I wouldn’t waste time piling on Sanders. He’s not going to be our nominee.
rikyrah
White guy goes to a Black cookout for the first time
???? ?? ?
https://youtu.be/1v9KZTt5D8k
SFAW
@Baud:
Yeah, whatever. And Kamala Harris is trailing Biden in CA, according to Quinnipiac. And Al Gore shoulda won in his home state in 2000, etc. So?
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
Assange hated Obummer and did everything he could to get Dump elected. Yet Obummer vetoed attempts to charge Assange, while Dump is doing everything he can to put him in supermax.
Patricia Kayden
@OzarkHillbilly: What a mess. They should hold another referendum — this time without foreign interference.
Baud
@SFAW:
Nothing. It’s just a knock. Not the ballgame. Same goes for Kamala.
Patricia Kayden
@Baud: Not necessarily. Plus, we’re early yet. Biden has had a few fumbles so I wouldn’t be shocked if Warren overtakes him in the near future.
Baud
@Patricia Kayden:
Sure. The field is wide open. No one is dominating and we haven’t even had the first debate yet.
JPL
@Baud: Now they are patriot farmers.
Another Scott
@Baud: I glanced at Biden’s climate change plan a couple of days ago.
It needs an editor (too much repetition), but it’s not bad. Lots of good stuff in fact.
But it seems to me it’s got some pandering stuff in there too, like “small modular nuclear reactors”. I could see some investment in continued research, but there are still far too many problems with nuclear power to be talking about deployment. Wind and solar and storage and smart grids and wireless distribution and using electric car batteries for interim grid storage, etc., etc. already are making decent gains and don’t have issues with waste that still haven’t been effectively solved.
Similarly with the ethanol pandering that the candidates feel they have to do to get Cargill and the big farming interests on board. :-/
And $400B/10 years for new research is almost nothing compared to the size of the problem and the size of the US economy. It needs to be bigger.
Getting more plans out there is good. And the plans will change once the Congress gets ahold of them, of course. But there’s still room for bigger plans.
Cheers,
Scott.
Gin & Tonic
Since I know many of you have been lamenting the lack of English-language coverage of the ongoing political crisis in Moldova, your friends at Ziarul de Gardă have helpfully launched an English version of their site.
Baud
@JPL:
Bankrupt Patriot Farmers would be a good band name.
Kay
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
I think the Assange charges are dangerous. I was okay with the first set but not the second.
What’s really revealing about Assange and Wikileaks to me is that there haven’t been any exposes or revelations about Trump. I don’t think that makes any sense – it’s like Obama left office and then Clinton lost and they shut down.
I, however, was never a fan. They’re not at all transparent themselves. The thing itself is secretive and opaque and governed by a tiny set of mysterious insiders who are accountable to no one. It contradicts itself.
Betty Cracker
@rikyrah: “Meat sweats,” LOL!
Gin & Tonic
A long time ago I recall an on-line quiz to see if you can determine which picture of human female breasts show natural vs “enhanced.” Here’s a more interesting, and definitely SFW variant – see if you can tell an AI-generated face.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic:
Do you have a link to the earlier quiz?
Kay
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
The innocent explanation for Wikileaks exposing only Democratic Presidents and Democratic candidates is their sources are opposed to Democrats. Which is an obvious way for them to be captured. What they GET. And who gives it to them and who doesn’t. The selection is on the front end. The sources.
Another Scott
@debbie: As ddale8 points out on Twitter, the “strong men crying” trope is one of Donnie’s lying tics. Another is his quotes involving people calling him “sir”. Another is just about any claim with a specific number. Anytime you hear any of those things, you know he’s lying.
HTH! ;-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Another Scott:
Also, when you see his lips moving.
Betty Cracker
@Kay: I initially thought the concept of a clearinghouse for government whistle-blower information had merit, but Wikileaks was always a secretive cult of personality. A truly honest broker would need an accountable and trustworthy method of receiving and vetting information to protect sources and ensure innocent parties weren’t harmed, and obviously Wikileaks failed spectacularly on that score too. We’re just supposed to trust that fucking guy? Nope.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay:
With an administration that leaks like a sieve, I ain’t buying it.
Another Scott
@Kay: Wikileaks is/was hosted on Russian servers.
They existed to weaken the US under Obama. They are/became a Russian disinformation outfit.
They were never about “transparency” and all the rest.
Assange going to prison isn’t an attack on the press. It’s part of a long fight against a cyber-criminal outfit.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
Patricia Kayden
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: Serves Assange right. May he get everything he deserves. He is a fascist who also tried to get LePen elected in France. He fooled quite a lot of progressives.
plato
Of course, boorish boris wins the first round and both the ladies lose out making it it’s all men’s show from now on.
Baud
@Patricia Kayden:
John Edwards. Assange. Greenwald. Trump. .
Progressives are easily fooled, it seems.
zhena gogolia
@rikyrah:
That’s great! I love the comments.
David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch
I pulled my hamstring yesterday watching World Cup on television.
Sports injuries are the worst.
Betty Cracker
@Another Scott: You’re right about the nature of Wikileaks, but that doesn’t mean the specific charges under the Espionage Act can’t be used (particularly by this administration) to undermine legitimate publishers. There’s a reason the Obama administration didn’t choose that path.
Tony Jay
@plato:
So Boris wins the first round of voting with almost exactly the same number of votes (114) that went AGAINST Theresa May (117) in the leadership challenge last December.
He’s got the No-Deal/ERG fanatics sown up, but we already knew that. Can he expand from that base?
Another Scott
@Betty Cracker: Yes, you’re right.
We’ll have to see how the US DoJ handles it if/when the time comes.
I haven’t checked closely. Would he come to the US before the Swedish charges are resolved? I know a court ruled that he doesn’t need to be extradited to face the charges in Sweden (he can be questioned in the UK) but if he were questioned and re-charged would he go to Sweden before going to the US?
I could see this dragging out for another few years before any US trial got under-way, so maybe Donnie’s minions won’t get a bite at the apple before they’re gone. Dunno…
Cheers,
Scott.
JPL
@rikyrah: Damn right I’d go back.
SFAW
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
I breathlessly await your tale of your “service injury” — when you fell off the bar stool while watching the Army-Navy game.
chopper
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch:
if it’s harris, i’ll crawl over broken glass to vote for harris.
if it’s warren, i’ll crawl over broken glass to vote for warrren.
if it’s bernie or biden, i’ll crawl over broken glass to vote for the democrat.
chopper
“not you, bernie”. love it.
plato
@Tony Jay: So, who will get the losers’ votes? Definitely not boris?
Betty Cracker
@Another Scott: I’m not sure who gets first dibs on extradition. Hopefully the case will drag out past Trump’s term, not because that would be good for Assange (to hell with him!) but because it would limit the Trump administration’s opportunity to damage the press.
chopper
@Baud:
“we’re the Bankrupt Patriot Farmers Who Never Cried Even When We Were Babies! 1! 2! 3! 4!….”
Major Major Major Major
Now that the race has settled a bit, the polling from California is not saying what we used to see. Harris is now showing up in third or fourth place, behind Biden, Sanders, and now Warren who has climbed to second in the most recent poll. This isn’t a perfect time series since they’re a few different pollsters, but Warren’s rise and Harris’s decline in the golden state is a reasonably clear trend: https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2020-primaries/democratic/california/
tobie
I’d vote for a paper bag before I would vote for Trump. For the primary, though, I’m sticking with Beto, polls notwithstanding, because I think his policy proposals are among the most substantive of any candidate I’ve seen and they’re on issues I care a lot about (immigration, climate change, electoral reform). I also like his commitment to participatory democracy.
From the start his campaign slogan has been “Listen and learn,” and he did that with his climate change policy, adding a full section of agriculture after meeting with Iowa farmers. Now he’s done the same thing with his LGBTQ policy. In March, he met a trans activist in Detroit who asked him what he would do to protect trans women in color. He asked if he could contact her to talk about policy. Well yesterday he released his proposal and it turns out Jeynce Poindexter provided input. Here’s the video of their original meeting. He kept his word.
Baud
@Major Major Major Major:
Sucks for Harris. She has time to recover, but she risks Gillibranding herself if she doesn’t do something fairly soon.
Tony Jay
@plato:
McVey and Leadsom were both No-Deal to varying degrees, so yes and maybe. Harper’s will go to one of the anti No-Deal candidates.
I actually sent off a possible guest-post on this contest to Anne-Laurie this morning but I’ve had to edit it twice to account for the bloody voting so I don’t know if it’s going to be worth it and/or she thinks I’m e-stalking her.
Sorry, A-L, my timing sucks rotten skunk balls.
Tenar Arha
@Baud: Massachusetts isn’t a liberal paradise. Everyone thinks we’re sooo progressive here, but that early 20th c movement included paternalism on steroids. So what we’ve really got is white patriarchal liberal paternalism. “We really do know better what’s good for you all” could be an alternative state motto. Anyway, that’s one reason why Elizabeth Warren will always have to work hard for acceptance here, she’s not a man..
Major Major Major Major
Oh, and confirming AL’s hunch, Warren is #2 in cable news mentions last week, followed closely by Sanders and Harris. The haters will be happy to note that Mayor Pete is back down in the also-ran cluster with Beto and Booker. https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/which-democratic-presidential-candidate-was-mentioned-most-on-cable-news-last-week/
Baud
@tobie:
That’s a nice testimonial. I agree about ignoring the polls. Especially this early.
Steve in the ATL
@Tony Jay: hmmm. I was expecting your timing to suck rotten hedgehog balls. Will update your dossier accordingly.
Dorothy A. Winsor
I can’t resist. I’m sure the whales are cringing.
Tony Jay
@Steve in the ATL:
I’m an eclectic gourmand, and skunk balls are just that little bit tangier.
tobie
@Baud: It seems like everything is happening at such a feverish pitch right now and yet we have 8 months to go till the Iowa caucus. I sort of fear we’ll burn out if we, political junkies, keep up this level of intensity. On the other hand it’s nice to be able to dream of a future with a Democratic President at the helm. Eagerness-fatigue is better for one’s health than outrage-fatigue.
Baud
@tobie:
Wise words.
jeffreyw
@SFAW:
Shit, that ain’t no thing, man. I was killed by a sniper while watching Flags of Our Fathers. Got a Purple Heart out of that.
Steve in the ATL
@tobie: and that’s when Baud steps in!
Sometimes you have to take a break from politics, including political threads on this blog. Fortunately, we have an abundance of grammar pedantry threads which are just what the doctor ordered! Well, if your doctor is named Mengele.
JPL
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Patriotic Whales.
Betty Cracker
@tobie: Plastic, even!
raven
@jeffreyw: My now retired boss was a Infantry Officer who spent his time at Benning writing 79 manuals. He hurt his knee playing hoops on post and get a check every month!
OzarkHillbilly
@tobie:
But suffering from both can be fatal.
tobie
@Betty Cracker: And if, FSM willing, 70 million Americans vote for ‘plastic bag’ over Trump, I hereby pledge to walk the country till the end of my days cleaning up the plastic pollution to which I have so shamelessly contributed!
Villago Delenda Est
Elizabeth Warren’s clear coherent message should scare the living shit out of the .01% parasites.
Idiots, open up your history books and read about 1789. Jefferson tried to avoid this issue, and you’ve done every thing you can to thwart Jefferson’s plan.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@JPL: I don’t usually like to rag on him about spelling because it’s twitter, there’s autocorrect, and he could be dyslexic. My very smart brother can’t spell. But I am so over his whiny criminality that I can’t stand it.
rikyrah
Trump unchastened by Russia scandal, still open to foreign help
Rep. Adam Schiff, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee talks with Rachel Maddow about a new video in which Donald Trump says he would accept information about his opponent from a foreign power and calls FBI Director Wray wrong for saying the FBI should be called in such a circumstance.
tobie
@OzarkHillbilly: What’s fatal are all the dairy products I’m eating in Germany right now. (Here for work.) The butter’s so good, I smear it thick on my bread. The yogurt’s delicious. The gelato is to die for and then there’s white asparagus, which tastes great with butter. My doc’s going to be furious with me when I get home.
rikyrah
CONSIDERING?
We are well past the time for ‘considering’.
Schiff considering subpoena for FBI on Trump counterintelligence
Rep. Adam Schiff, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, explains to Rachel Maddow why he is considering using a subpoena on the FBI to find out what became of the counterintelligence investigation into Donald Trump.
JPL
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Yesterday he criticized Chris Cuomo for a typo. His aide’s obviously felt he needed to clean up his statement, but his current tweet has nothing to do with the question that was asked of him. The fox crowd will love it though.
rikyrah
Openness to illegality exposes Trump to risk of being compromised
David Laufman former chief of the DOJ’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, talks with Rachel Maddow about how a foreign power might take advantage of a candidate who accepted illegal campaign assistance.
rikyrah
Flynn signals pardon Hail Mary with new Mueller-bashing lawyer
Rachel Maddow looks at disgraced Donald Trump NSA Michael Flynn’s new lawyer, a Robert Mueller-bashing Fox News pundit, and posits that Flynn is counting on Fox News posturing to earn himself a pardon from Trump.
rikyrah
House to investigate Secretary Elaine Chao corruption allegations
Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, chair of the House Marine Transportation Subcommittee, tells Rachel Maddow that he has been given the green light to investigate corruption allegations against Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao for using her position to benefit her family’s company and her husband, Senator Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
germy
This reader comment over at The Root made me laugh (because it’s probably true):
susanna
@debbie: Hmmmm. Maybe his agreement for interviews disallows some follow-up questions, which would obviously challenge his train of thought and throw his monorail mind into chaos?
OzarkHillbilly
@tobie: You only live once. Make the most of it.
rikyrah
????
China is listening.
Russia is listening.
North Korea is listening.
Let’s speak the truth: this president is a national security threat. https://t.co/wsPYTzq0u0
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) June 13, 2019
Amir Khalid
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
I see no reason whatsoever to refrain from mocking Trump’s spelling. It is a reflection of his disgraceful and dangerous ignorance about the world.
Also too as well, Der Scheißgibbon doesn’t seem to understand that, unlike him, the Queen is head of state but not of government. He wouldn’t be talking government stuff with her or The Cetacean Heir. Dear God, how does a President of The United States not know these things?
NotMax
Ugh, horse race reporting. Blech².
SFAW
@Tony Jay:
How do they say “Eewwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!” in Old Blighty?
jeffreyw
That ABC News interview with Trump is a perfect illustration of why they never allowed him to be questioned by Mueller.
Tony Jay
@SFAW:
The same way, but we’ll cap it with “You do chips with that, mate?”
schrodingers_cat
So thanks to Rs our Orange King who can’t spell is above the law?
SFAW
@rikyrah:
And Traitor Bill Barr says to his minions “Find whatever dirt you can on this Laufman guy.”
Three years ago, I would have been joking.
BlueGirlFromWyo
@JPL: Patriot farmers is the new freedom fries.
germy
WATCH: Rep Steve King, Diamond and Silk Introduce the “Diamond and Silk Act”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3nYS_-JswA
rikyrah
.@maryhui says Hong Kong’s proposed extradition bill will be a vehicle for Chinese retaliation. “There’s really no trust of the Chinese government,” she says, adding that government assurances regarding the preservation of freedom of speech and assembly “don’t hold any water.” pic.twitter.com/Ml9UWP6LtE
— Democracy Now! (@democracynow) June 13, 2019
rikyrah
I have a problem w/ the @DNC using the # of donors to pick which candidates make the debates. They know well that this lets white ppl do the picking. Poorer ppl – including blk ppl – don’t donate as much. Blk donations didn’t even increase in 2008 for Obama. In fact, they FELL.
— Charles M. Blow (@CharlesMBlow) June 13, 2019
Ivan X
@Gin & Tonic: thanks for this; I read it with interest, having toured there last year. I was surprised that in an article describing Moldova’s political conflicts that Transnistria wasn’t mentioned, but my experience was that the Moldovans prefer to pretend it doesn’t exist, so maybe that’s why.
SFAW
@Tony Jay:
Effing Brits, why can’t they speak English proper-like?
And I thought “mate” was more of an Aussie thing? I thought you Brits would do something like “old chap, pip pip and cheerio!” And, of course, the ubiquitous “What ho, Squiffy?”
plato
@Tony Jay: How long before the loonies in the party (and the country) start calling boris YOU TRAITOR?
Amir Khalid
@SFAW:
I think you’ve seen too many movies set in the Great War.
tobie
@rikyrah: good point. I hadn’t given much thought to who donates but Blow’s critique seems spot on.
SFAW
@Amir Khalid:
All Quiet on the Western Front and Paths of Glory weren’t about the Brits.
And “What ho, Squiffy?” is WW2
trollhattan
It’s like watching two trains about to collide in super-slow motion. Great Britain has signed a suicide pact with itself.
I’m sure Boris will be just fine.
Betty Cracker
@rikyrah: I like how Harris consistently centers truth when making her points. It’s a great rhetorical strategy to implicitly contrast herself with the lying shitbag POTUS.
chopper
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
trumps out of his league here. he’s talking with a guy who’s way above his cetacean.
BC in Illinois
@OzarkHillbilly:
A late last night report from a not-do-devoted St L Blues family (my g’kids):
rikyrah
Bernie world built infrastructure for four years, and affiliated acts have built mini careers backing him in the hopes of fame and prestige as he glided into the white house. Those dreams being shattered now. There will be another old wwc whisperer in the 2020s im sure
— Marcus H. Johnson (@marcushjohnson) June 13, 2019
rikyrah
Trump on Don Jr.: This is a good young man.
Don Jr is a 41-year-old man with five children.
Stop allowing this man to infantilize these GROWN people!
Stop infantilizing white men when they do wrong, while adultifying black BOYS (and girls) when they do wrong.
— Charles M. Blow (@CharlesMBlow) June 13, 2019
rikyrah
Warren is going to have to find an answer for this. It’s not going to go away, and it’s a problem.
……………………..
But, she did. She described herself as a minority in the Harvard Law professor’s directory for several years. Harvard also billed her as their 1st WoC professor in an article called Intersectionality and positionality: Situating women of color in the affirmative action dialogue.
— The Notorious RBF (@NotoriousRBF20) June 13, 2019
Steve in the ATL
@BC in Illinois: does this mean that St. Louis sports radio will now talk about something other than the baseball Cardinals for a few minutes?
rikyrah
So,
Nobody is reporting on Bernie’s big speech?
BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Patricia Kayden
@debbie: Lol! Trump’s philosophy is obviously: “Lie outrageously and lie often”. It’s worked for him all his life but may have disastrous consequences once he leaves office.
Waynski
@JPL:
Then they should pay taxes. Conservatives/Farmers always bitch about Federal taxes, but if you own a working farm, you get Federal deductions all over the place, you may get subsidies, your probably making money from the Feds. Even if you home school and rail against the local school district, you still need police and firefighters, but I’m guessing they’d say, “I got guns. I got an industrial hose. And I’m stocked up on all the medicine I need.” Not all farmers are like this obviously, but a clear majority seem to be.
low-tech cyclist
@Major Major Major Major:
And here’s that most recent poll, the third this week to show Warren with better numbers than Sanders (still statistically tied, of course):
Biden 22, Warren 18, Sanders 17, Harris 13, Buttigieg 10, nobody else above 3%.
Mo MacArbie
This thread has given me an earworm.
rikyrah
???
I’m surprised very few of you fail to realize none of y’all should actually want me asking the question, “when did Elizabeth Warren realize she was White?”
Y’all shouldnt want me asking that question. pic.twitter.com/81l2N5fBfe
— Amene (@Ange_Amene) June 13, 2019
Patricia Kayden
@Another Scott: Agreed. The fact that Assange has not lifted a finger against Trump is a dead giveaway.
rikyrah
This ?is?huge ?
Judge rules that St. Louis jails can’t hold people who can’t pay bail: https://t.co/2XvMYhs5W0
— Sister Helen Prejean (@helenprejean) June 13, 2019
Major Major Major Major
@rikyrah: I maintain that her handling of this—and also its existence at all—is the most baggage any candidate has right now. And I say that as a big Warren fan.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@chopper: Out of his weight class even!
Brachiator
@rikyrah:
This kind of nonsense is just sad. I guess this stupidity is not going away, but I hope more people don’t fall for this crap.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@Major Major Major Major: Yep – this an unfortunate truth.
I want Warren’s policies, but I want to win back the White House and the Senate more (and that’s obviously a prerequisite for passing Warren’s policies anyhow…)
Dem President or bust!
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major:
Worse than Biden and his Hyde Amendment flip flops? Or the lingering anger over the Clarence Thomas hearings?
Brachiator
@BC in Illinois:
That’s funny stuff.
Miss Bianca
@David ??Merry Christmas?? Koch: This is where I am at right now. Team Dem, and fuck the opportunist.
Tony Jay
@SFAW:
We only say Spiffing at Christmas to describe what Granny does after too much sherry and What-Ho is actually Olde English for “Wherefore art thou, working girls?”, which puts a whole new spin on Jeeves and Wooster.
True story.
Tony Jay
@plato:
Literally seconds after he gets forced to acknowledge even 1% of the Real World.
Miss Bianca
@Baud: I have been skipping through Kate Manne’s “Down Girl: The Logic of Misogyny” (highly recommended, if depressing/rage-inducing read), and I no longer wonder why a smart woman candidate isn’t leading in the early polls, even in her home state. I wonder instead how, given the deeply-baked-in misogyny in our culture, any of them are getting as much traction as they *are*.
Leto
@Tony Jay: One of the things I miss most about the U.K. are the sayings/colloquialisms. You guys have so many kooky sayings, and it was so much fun to learn them and then properly apply them :)
Omnes Omnibus
At this time in 2007, weren’t we looking at an Edwards v. Giuliani race?
Steve in the ATL
@Tony Jay: this is a quality post. Well played, old bean
Miss Bianca
@Gin & Tonic: I am unnerved by the fact that I am apparently so easily fooled.
JR
@Patricia Kayden: mostly Biden just hasn’t been that visible. I suppose that’s a front runner luxury but you don’t want to Fred Thompson the thing.
Major Major Major Major
@Brachiator: yes.
The Lodger
@chopper: Clearly Trump is talking out of his blowhole here.
SiubhanDuinne
@rikyrah:
Probably because of the St Louis Cardinals mention a couple of comments earlier, I read
as
Dead thread, I know, but am only now catching up on BJ.
Mart
@tobie: I had a job that sent me to the Netherlands and Germany for ten years. Yes, the butter is the thing isn’t it?
Just One More Canuck
@David Merry Christmas Koch: a friend of mine just broke his collarbone while gardening
gvg
@tobie: I disagree.
That criteria is IMO meant to weed out the self funded millionaire who can’t actually get any votes. In addition, black voters may be a very important part of the democratic coalition, but they aren’t the only part. Nobody can win with only black votes. So you do still have to appeal to some white voters, and most hispanic and most black and gays….etc. There are no perfect proxies for who will be a good enough choice to get in the debates, but this is a pretty good one actually. At the least it shows a minimal organizational ability. Its only going to wash out some of the no chance vanity candidates. Then they have a chance to show themselves off in the debates. that will change the dynamics alot. It hasn’t actually washed out any good black preferred candidates, so what is the problem?
mg_65
@rikyrah: That video is super cute! But the best part is all the Black folks commenting. So funny and sweet.
J R in WV
@Kay:
While this is true, neighbors of ours have family back in N Dakota where they farm wheat. Rick loves to visit them and do big farm work, and last New Year’s eve he told me that last summer he disked 600 acres before lunch, started right at the crack of dawn. IIRC they farm something like 2500 acres.
And you’re right, if the land in farm country isn’t valuable for growing crops, it’s functionally worthless. Here in SW WV there’s no real cropland, and what little land is level in the bottoms or on the ridges is valuable for building houses. We’re within easy commute of the state house…
debbie
@Another Scott:
Thanks! This will certainly help! ;)