Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The arc of the moral universe doesn’t bend itself. it’s up to us.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

Since we are repeating ourselves, let me just say fuck that.

There are more Russians standing up to Putin than Republicans.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

Trump should be leading, not lying.

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

There are a lot more evil idiots than evil geniuses.

Balloon Juice, where there is always someone who will say you’re doing it wrong.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

I am pretty sure these ‘journalists’ were not always such a bootlicking sycophants.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

Dear Washington Post, you are the darkness now.

The Giant Orange Man Baby is having a bad day.

It’s not hopeless, and we’re not helpless.

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75Comments

  1. 1.

    rikyrah

    The Great Land Robbery
    The shameful story of how 1 million black families have been ripped from their farms

    I. Wiped Out
    “you ever chop before?” Willena Scott-White was testing me. I sat with her in the cab of a Chevy Silverado pickup truck, swatting at the squadrons of giant, fluttering mosquitoes that had invaded the interior the last time she opened a window. I was spending the day with her family as they worked their fields just outside Ruleville, in Mississippi’s Leflore County. With her weathered brown hands, Scott-White gave me a pork sandwich wrapped in a grease-stained paper towel. I slapped my leg. Mosquitoes can bite through denim, it turns out.

    Cotton sowed with planters must be chopped—thinned and weeded manually with hoes—to produce orderly rows of fluffy bolls. The work is backbreaking, and the people who do it maintain that no other job on Earth is quite as demanding. I had labored long hours over other crops, but had to admit to Scott-White, a 60-something grandmother who’d grown up chopping, that I’d never done it.

    “Then you ain’t never worked,” she replied.

    The fields alongside us as we drove were monotonous. With row crops, monotony is good. But as we toured 1,000 acres of land in Leflore and Bolivar Counties, straddling Route 61, Scott-White pointed out the demarcations between plots. A trio of steel silos here. A post there. A patch of scruffy wilderness in the distance. Each landmark was a reminder of the Scott legacy that she had fought to keep—or to regain—and she noted this with pride. Each one was also a reminder of an inheritance that had once been stolen.

    Drive Route 61 through the Mississippi Delta and you’ll find much of the scenery exactly as it was 50 or 75 years ago. Imposing plantations and ramshackle shotgun houses still populate the countryside from Memphis to Vicksburg. Fields stretch to the horizon. The hands that dig into black Delta dirt belong to people like Willena Scott-White, African Americans who bear faces and names passed down from men and women who were owned here, who were kept here, and who chose to stay here, tending the same fields their forebears tended.

    But some things have changed. Back in the day, snow-white bolls of King Cotton reigned. Now much of the land is green with soybeans. The farms and plantations are much larger—industrial operations with bioengineered plants, laser-guided tractors, and crop-dusting drones. Fewer and fewer farms are still owned by actual farmers. Investors in boardrooms throughout the country have bought hundreds of thousands of acres of premium Delta land. If you’re one of the millions of people who have a retirement account with the Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association, for instance, you might even own a little bit yourself.

  2. 2.

    rikyrah

    ??????

    “The Trump administration released a regulation Monday that could dramatically cut the number of legal immigrants allowed to enter and stay in the US by making it easier to reject green card and visa applications.” https://t.co/S4YcWm6HXP

    — Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) August 12, 2019

  4. 4.

    rikyrah

    People need to stop hedging when asked if you’re going to vote for Trump.

    The racism is a dealbreaker for you or it’s not. Pretending that Liz Warren is going “too far” and that you can’t vote against a white supremacist to save the nation is a choice. pic.twitter.com/ypM6FznzjK

    — Zerlina Maxwell (@ZerlinaMaxwell) August 11, 2019

  8. 8.

    TenguPhule

    @rikyrah: Basically if you need assistance like public housing, food stamps or other low income support, the government is going to make it harder or impossible for you to get citizenship.

    F this timeline.

  9. 9.

    rikyrah

    This is how people talk to me now.

    Kamala wrote the bill on Maternal Health last fucking year.

    Warren’s bill is nowhere near as good.
    She’s not a Black Woman, and Liz has never done SHIT for my community.

    Y’all, back the fuck off with this condescending bullshit. https://t.co/w2HXNybX5g

    — Brave Black Woman (@Wonderbitch81) August 11, 2019

  10. 10.

    zhena gogolia

    @rikyrah:

    No great fan of Tom Nichols, but this tweet is right on:

    Ham Sandwich (D-Deli) has my vote and without any equivocation.
    Tom Nichols added,

    @davethul
    I respect @RadioFreeTom but to commit 15 months out to vote for the Dem to keep Trump out is short sighted. Voting Dem should be the fallback position once all other good options are exhausted.

    https://twitter.com/RadioFreeTom/status/1160733224773005312

    (except for Tulsi)

  11. 11.

    TenguPhule

    A bear broke in. Police responded. Then it punched through a wall ‘like the Kool-Aid Man.

    The thieves cased the area around the McGregor Mountain foothills, on the hunt for vehicles with unlocked doors — which helps you open them if you don’t have opposable thumbs and you are also a bear.

    Local black bears in northern Colorado have channeled fictitious velociraptors, opening car doors to swipe food so often that they break into vehicles without smelling food just to see if they get lucky.

    On Saturday, one bear tried its luck in a home in Estes Park, attracted by the scent of trash in the area, the town’s police department said in a statement. The bear slipped into the house through an unlocked door, and officers were dispatched to respond.

    The bear was not having that. It turned tail and ran when officers arrived, paying no mind to a wall blocking its way. The bear “forcibly breached a hole in the wall like the ‘Kool-Aid Man,’ and made its escape,” the department said on Facebook.

  12. 12.

    Duane

    @rikyrah: Everyday forces me to add more names to the list of people who should DIAF.
    That means you Ken Cuccinelli. And FFDT.

  13. 13.

    NotMax

    @rikyrah

    Carrying the concept of gated communities to its extreme. The cynic in me suspects Dolt 45 minions tasked with finding/creating loopholes to exploit limiting or otherwise curtailing travel between the states.

  14. 14.

    rikyrah

    #National Dem Primary, RCP Average:
    Biden 30.8%
    Warren 18.3
    Sanders 16.5
    Harris 8.3
    Buttigieg 6.5
    O’Rourke 2.0
    Booker 2.0
    Gabbard 1.3
    Yang 1.3
    Klobuchar 1.0
    Castro 0.8
    Steyer 0.5
    Bullock 0.5
    Delaney 0.5
    Ryan 0.3
    de Blasio 0.3
    Bennet 0.3
    Gillibrand 0.3
    Williamson 0.3
    Inslee 0.3

    — Political Polls (@Politics_Polls) August 12, 2019

  19. 19.

    rikyrah

    Dont be intimidated of vetting candidates.

    We need everything out in the open about EVERYONE.

    This is the time for that.

    Trump will not be removed otherwise.

    This isn’t just about a Primary. It’s about winning a General Election and mitigating disinformation NOW.

    — Amene (@Ange_Amene) August 12, 2019

  21. 21.

    BC in Illinois

    @rikyrah:

    #National Dem Primary, RCP Average:
    Biden 30.8%
    Warren 18.3
    Sanders 16.5
    Harris 8.3
    Buttigieg 6.5
    O’Rourke 2.0
    Booker 2.0

    I’m mildly surprised at a few names that didn’t make the top seven, but I would perfectly willing to work from this list. I don’t think that Biden and Sanders will top the list by the time the Missouri Primary rolls around in March.

    ETA — To make myself clear, I expect to be choosing between Warren and Harris. I will look for momentum from Beto, Buttigieg, and (maybe) Booker. I don’t see any upside for Biden or Sanders.

  23. 23.

    TenguPhule

    We have finally found the road too far for Trump’s evangelical base!

    Some of Trump’s evangelical supporters, a key constituency for the president, were distraught after a recent rally, when he repeatedly used the word “goddamn.”

    Oddly, they did not express similar concerns about a racist “Send her back!” chant that broke out about Representative Ilhan Omar during the rally.

    Apparently using their lord’s name in vain was too much to stand.

  26. 26.

    hedgehog mobile

    Open thread?
    Waiting for flight to Dublin with mr h. Worldcon is there this year. Good excuse to travel. Taking a tour of Ireland after the convention. Taking a breather before coming back to the fight.
    hedgehog currently in the ORD

  27. 27.

    rikyrah

    @TenguPhule:

    Apparently using their lord’s name in vain was too much
    to stand.

    But, children in cages, falls within their guidelines for Christianity…..
    NOTHING BUT FRAUDS!!!

  29. 29.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    @TenguPhule: To be fair the UK Government does not even allow you to stay in the Country unless you sign a declaration stating that you will never apply for any benefits and therefore be a “burden on the public purse”. The anti-immigrant people who were all for Brexit have no idea that this in in the rules because they don’t bother to look it up.

  30. 30.

    Roger Moore

    @MattF:

    There’s a Commandment about that, so I hear.

    Though that commandment is about swearing false oaths- like Trump did on January 20, 2017- not about saying words like goddamn.

  31. 31.

    Ohio Mom

    @TenguPhule: There is so little new public housing assistance at this point that it hardly exists.

    But your broader point certainly stands.

  32. 32.

    Citizen_X

    @MattF: So the coveting and the adultery and the getting kids killed didn’t count for the fundegelicals? Figures.

  39. 39.

    dmsilev

    @MattF: Commandments that Trump has violated? Let’s see:

    “Thou shalt have no other gods before me”: Trump worships himself first and foremost. Check.
    “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image”: Puts his name up in huge letters, includes portraits of himself wherever possible. I think that counts as idolatry. Check.
    “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain”: Apparently ‘Goddamn’ counts. Check.
    “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy”. Does golf count? Undecided.
    “Honour thy father and thy mother”: He honors his father, who was a racist cheating asshole.
    “Thou shalt not murder”: “I could shoot a man on 5th Avenue and get away with it”. Aspirational goal, so far as we know. Half credit.
    “Thou shalt not commit adultery”
    “Thou shalt not steal”
    “Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour”. Full credit for these three. He violates these on a regular basis. Hourly for the last one.
    “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife/house/stuff/etc.”: Check.

    I make it 7 unequivocal violations and a couple of half-points.

  40. 40.

    Martin

    @Citizen_X: Y’all are reading this wrong. Conservatives pick their religion to match their politics. If they’re criticizing Trump, it’s because they’ve turned the corner on the politics.

    The bible is not a book to live by, it’s a book to judge by. Always has been.

  42. 42.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: We do too. The only exceptions are children and people over 65 or with a disability. Becoming a permanent resident is difficult even without these rules.
    I have a suspicion that is a tactic to approve almost no GC petitions on flimsy grounds.
    ETA: And I speak of permanent residents here. Most permanents unless they are children or over 65 or can prove that they are disabled do not qualify for food stamps or other means based benefits for the first five years after getting a GC.

  45. 45.

    mrmoshpotato

    @kindness: I just saw “on the language of violent racism on Fox.” and said, “Oh look – an article the Times should’ve written in 1996!”

  46. 46.

    (((CassandraLeo)))

    @Martin: Probably worth pointing out that most of them haven’t even read it. It’s been joked that the Bible has created more atheists than any other book in history. I’m not sure if that’s really accurate, but if these folks have read it, they don’t show any signs of it; they don’t demonstrate any understanding of its actual message, which implies three options: they haven’t read it; they’ve read it, but didn’t understand it; they understood it, and are simply lying about its contents. I’m sure there’s some of all three going on, really, but given the reading rates among America’s populace generally, I’m gonna go with option one being most prevalent.

    See the previous comment thread for my exegesis of the Sheep and the Goats, where I delve into this further.

    Ceterum censeo factionem Republicanam esse delendam.

  47. 47.

    Baud

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I have a suspicion that is a tactic to approve almost no GC petitions on flimsy grounds

    Probably not, unless most GC petitions are by relatively poor people (which are statistically less white). The new rule shouldn’t directly affect applicants who have some income and savings, although it might affect them indirectly if they have parents who might need assistance.

  48. 48.

    TenguPhule

    @Baud:

    The new rule shouldn’t directly affect applicants who have some income and savings

    How much you want to bet this will be used as another tool to weed out more people of color?

  50. 50.

    TenguPhule

    Russian scientists have indicated that they were working on miniaturised sources of nuclear energy when a rocket engine exploded last week, increasing scrutiny of the possibility that the accident occurred while testing an experimental cruise missile powered by a small reactor.

    The explosion last Thursday at a military testing ground in Russia’s Arkhangelsk region killed at least five people and caused radiation readings in neighbouring cities to spike to 20 times their normal level for half an hour.

    Russia’s defence ministry said the explosion had taken place during testing of a rocket engine, but the country’s nuclear agency, Rosatom, later confirmed that several of its employees had been killed during testing of an “isotope power source in a liquid propulsion system”.

    Let me get this straight, they wanted to use a MINI NUCLEAR REACTOR TO POWER A FUCKING CRUISE MISSILE.

  51. 51.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Many international students who have children get assistance from the WIC program. What happens to their applications after they graduate and apply for a GC down the road. Will they become ineligible to apply for a GC.

    ETA: Someone who is poor as say a student or a grad student is not necessarily going to be poor even after they graduate. But this rule could penalize such people for example. Poverty is not an immutable characteristic, circumstances change.

  55. 55.

    Baud

    @schrodingers_cat:

    The rule is squirrelly because it doesn’t say anyone is per se ineligible. The rule does say that WIC is excluded from consideration.

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Again, supposedly benefits for citizen children are supposed to be excluded from consideration.

  56. 56.

    rikyrah

    @schrodingers_cat:

    @rikyrah: It was never about the “illegals” just like the abortion debate is not about the “babies”.

    It was never about CRIMINAL ILLEGALS….

    Never forget…that’s how they sold immigration to those who wanted to vote for him.
    Those of us on the other side, knew it was ALWAYS about LEGAL IMMIGRATION…
    AND TO MAKE AMERICA WHITE AGAIN.

  58. 58.

    TenguPhule

    @Baud:

    supposedly benefits for citizen children are supposed to be excluded from consideration.

    /rolls eyes

    Sure they will. //s

  59. 59.

    Patricia Kayden

    @MattF: I hope Rick Wilson and other Never Trumpers refrain from voting for any Republicans again. Let the GOP rot away or be replaced by actual moderate conservatives.

  60. 60.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Seeking asylum is legal but they have closed ports of entry, forcing the asylum seeker to enter illegally. Then the T admin uses this “offense” to separate asylum seekers from their babies, even infants. I am sure the Tanton thinktankers seeded in the immigration bureaucracy will find a way.

    This is already in the courts. So it won’t take effect immediately.

  61. 61.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: If US citizens apply for a GC for their parents they have to show that they can take care of them financially. A friend of my mine did this. It was a process that was several years long. She had to go to India and sell his property and use the proceeds to make that I-130 air tight. Dealing with bureaucracies of two countries that love paper work was not easy.

  63. 63.

    MattF

    @Patricia Kayden: Rick Wilson et al. are small minority in the party. And a minority within that minority (probably not including Wilson) are abandoning ‘conservatism’. I think a lot of the never-Trumpers are seriously disoriented right now.

  65. 65.

    Brachiator

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I suspect that immigrant parents will be penalized for seeking federal assistance for their citizen children.

    Yes, I think you’re right about this.

  68. 68.

    J R in WV

    @TenguPhule:

    Let me get this straight, they wanted to use a MINI NUCLEAR REACTOR TO POWER A FUCKING CRUISE MISSILE.

    Yes, Vladamir Vladimirovitch Putin has bragged about their nuclear power cruise missile for some time now… no matter how bad an idea that is, his scientists have to work on building it until several of them blow up and all the scientific team is dead. Then they will probably stop.

  71. 71.

    debbie

    @rikyrah:

    Perhaps someone else has already suggested this, but I think the authorities need to review the children of immigrants and immediately deport any found to have cheated on their taxes.

  72. 72.

    SFAW

    Off-topic, but: I saw Molly Jong-Fast retweeted something from D’Douche D’Felon. I refuse to give him clicks (or the functional equivalent), but it appeared to be a “Suck it, Libtards!” tweet about global warming in Australia, and probably showed snow (ergo no AGW, because Australia is supposed to be hot). Basically, it appears to be Inhofe-style insanity.

    For someone who (allegedly) graduated Dartmouth, he’s pretty fucking stupid.

  73. 73.

    SFAW

    @debbie:

    need to review the children of immigrants and immediately deport any found to have cheated on their taxes.

    Even white immigrants (with shitty hairdos) from Scotland? Even if the immigrant parent came to the country 70-plus years ago?

  74. 74.

    CaseyL

    @SFAW: He’s kind of the moron’s moron. He makes a paramecium look smart.*

    Australia is south of the equator, so its seasons are opposite ours. IOW, it’s WINTER there now.

    *No offense to the paramecium intended.

  75. 75.

    SFAW

    @CaseyL:

    IOW, it’s WINTER there now.

    Yeah, that was kind of the point.

    He’s kind of the moron’s moron

    Well, in fairness, he’s also an “intellectually” dishonest, smug, lying motherfucker, with ein Backpfeifengesicht .

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