I know you're not allowed to say this, because it isn't fake-savvy-pundit sounding, but the Democrats actually are offering a lot of serious and ambitious answers to Trump's racism and nationalism tonight.
— Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) September 13, 2019
My opinion: Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris both did really well (although Warren will no doubt be dinged as ‘too wonky’ and Harris as ‘insufficiently specific’). Buttigieg, O’Rourke, Booker, and Klobuchar all had good moments for their future campaign ads. The two old guys at center stage did a credible parody of Statler & Waldorf… okay, that’s mean, but Biden’s dental implants seemed to be giving him problems, and Sanders was not only hoarse even before he started shouting but his old-man jowls are slipping back down around his jaws…
gotta say the three hours went by pretty fast. it was like a fellowship of the ring three hours and not a hobbit three hours
— Steadman™ (@AsteadWesley) September 13, 2019
It's also the debate that most strongly simulates what these candidates are like on the trail… not much criticism of each other, being judicious about when to talk about Trump
— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) September 13, 2019
too many questions in the Democratic Primary take Republican talking points as their starting point https://t.co/3iqyixBJwC
— Steadman™ (@AsteadWesley) September 13, 2019
Viscerally angry at that question.
"uhhh the Amazon is burning and Bolsonaro says climate regulation would hurt the economy. Would you tell Iowa hog farmers to go vegan?"
— Dylan Parson (@DParson252) September 13, 2019
He is younger. Bernie was born two months before Pearl Harbor, Biden was born during the Battle of Stalingrad. https://t.co/R9GLU6wBiY
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) September 13, 2019
If you’re for Biden, it’s like Shakespeare: you don’t understand every word and don’t need to. The sense is enough. He was told to look like a fighter and he did. The camera wasn’t on Warren much but she didn’t lose anybody. Like I said for Sanders, wind him and he goes. https://t.co/qL0jerXK9M
— Richard M. Nixon (@dick_nixon) September 13, 2019
The Guardian liveblog finished with a pretty good “key takeaways from the debate” summary — and not just because I generally agree with it.
#DemDebates #DemDebate3 #DemocraticDebate main takeaway: Joe & Kamala made up and Bernie is persona non grata, as it should be. pic.twitter.com/tJhTNVyAcQ
— ✨Peaches & Nemesis & Jane✨ (@CausticBitchNC) September 13, 2019
I will have more about last night’s debate, if only to highlight my two favorite candidates’ performances. But here’s a couple immediate OMG moments that the media will be gumming over right now. First, Beto continues his ‘Fvck it, y’all know I’m right about this’ tour:
O'Rourke w/ a mid-debate spin on @ewarren's slogan > https://t.co/z9tCXIZurz
— Patrick Svitek (@PatrickSvitek) September 13, 2019
‘Earned media’ (free publicity) from Repub moron!
This is a death threat, Representative. Clearly, you shouldn't own an AR-15—and neither should anyone else. pic.twitter.com/jsiZmwjMDs
— Beto O'Rourke (@BetoORourke) September 13, 2019
(Twitter actually removed Cain’s tweet for violating its no-threats-of-violence rule, which is notoriously rare.)
Oh look a Republican state representative threatening a presidential candidate. Not a great look. @BriscoeCain pic.twitter.com/Cf0hm9HgtE
— Molly Jong-Fast (@MollyJongFast) September 13, 2019
trump said Obama literally founded ISIS but the media acts more scandalized when dems point out that a guy who wanted to shoot as many Hispanic people as possible had reason to believe the president would approve of it https://t.co/O0ba1NwFbC
— local jack please ban the nazis person (@pleizar) September 13, 2019
And then, Castro picks on Biden — MAH PEARLS, THEY ARE *CLUTCHED*!!!!
.@JulianCastro again goes after @JoeBiden, says "he wants to take credit for Obama’s work but doesn’t want to answer any questions." Pushing back, Biden says he stands w/Obama through the "good, bad and indifferent." #demdebate
— Jasper Scherer (@jaspscherer) September 13, 2019
Hell yeah- his responses played really well at the watch party I was at! He looked strong and with it ??
— sabu (@iaiten) September 13, 2019
A lil Streisand effect and he might go up 10 points in the polls…??
— Perrin Aybara (@BitterSonicsFan) September 13, 2019
he should fundraise off this https://t.co/5F6N2dPG8T
— Elon Green (@elongreen) September 13, 2019
It literally is how Trump won the GOP primary.
— Alex (@themurth_) September 13, 2019
Also, the inevitable Protestors (during the last wrap-up question round):
WATCH: Protesters once again interrupt the #DemDebate. #DemocraticDebate pic.twitter.com/cNehHaNVVT
— MediaResearchCenter (@theMRC) September 13, 2019
Note for future protestors:
Practice syncing up your chants.
No one could tell what they were saying. #DemocraticDebate
— Gene Wu (@GeneforTexas) September 13, 2019
I interviewed the protestors that interrupted the @ABCPolitics #DemDebate – they said they chanted: “We are DACA recipients, our lives are at risk, save DACA.” They said that none of the 2020 candidates adequately addressed their issue tonight and wouldn’t support any of them. ?? pic.twitter.com/56GSJgjpCj
— Ben Pu (@BenPu_nbc) September 13, 2019
An interesting aside: of the four, one gave me her ethnicity as Mexican. The other three? South Korean. They also came from places as far away as Chicago and DC for this protest. Their uniting factor? #DACA
— Ben Pu (@BenPu_nbc) September 13, 2019
Some numbers for the beancounters:
How long each candidate spoke, and what they spoke about, at the Democratic debate. https://t.co/F5HVknsZac pic.twitter.com/dDBLs5OdhF
— NYT Graphics (@nytgraphics) September 13, 2019
rikyrah
Good Morning,Everyone ???
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
OzarkHillbilly
So I didn’t miss anything.
JPL
The few clips that I saw after the debate ended, Bernie was greeted by his family but the other candidates shied away from him. So Joe is saying that Castro attacked Biden for something that Biden didn’t say… Anywho I’m glad that I decided not to watch because the one they should be attacking is trump.
Kraux Pas
So I was over at the FTFNYT and it looks like their headline writers didn’t even watch the debate, just pulled out some stock confrontation verbiage.
Must have been a good football game I missed.
OzarkHillbilly
trump has lost his “African American”:
Baud
@Kraux Pas:
Meme testing.
Nicole
Good morning! I thought that debate was… not terrible, actually. Even with ten freaking candidates. The questions, eh, but that’s par for the course.
For fun, I posted on FB comments about the white male candidates that are things I’ve heard about women and I was all the way to the 4th one before my FB friends really caught on (I ended up doing five because one friend then requested that I do de Blasio, too, even though he wasn’t on the stage).
Also, Wonkette’s liveblog was really funny.
Kraux Pas
@JPL: This debate actually was a lot less confrontational overall and all the candidates came across very well.
But of course disagreements will happen and there’s nothing wrong with people pointing out inconsistencies.
And Biden has been coming across kind of dishonest in these debates. Here about whether people would have to opt in to his public option (thus confusing the very definition of option) and in the last debate how he portrayed Harris’s plan as not allowing choices for consumers. He’s the only person running whom I like less and less as the campaign goes on and he already wasn’t very high in my esteem to begin with.
satby
@rikyrah: Good morning ?!
So the DACA protesters “won’t support any of the 2020 Democratic candidates”? Best of luck to them as they work on getting their issue resolved in another Republican administration. Dumbshits.
Jinchi
Media coverage is all about expectations, but I won’t believe Biden is ready for prime time until I stop reading “Biden wins by not imploding on screen” hot takes from the political press.
OzarkHillbilly
@Nicole:
What were they?
WereBear
Proof, if more was needed, that Biden is actually the guy they WANT to vote for but these are not necessarily Democrats, knowwhatImsaying?
We need Joe Biden to “bring us back to the center”? I keep hearing that from ashamed Republicans.
Oh, wait, the guy WE’RE supposed to vote for. Got it.
Baud
@satby:
Whether they support anyone in the primary is largely irrelevant.
Kraux Pas
@OzarkHillbilly: OMG I thought this was referring to Don Cheadle.
Baud
@WereBear:
If I were an ashamed Republican, I’d want Biden too. He was the least liberal person in the stage.
OzarkHillbilly
@satby: I assumed a “yet” at the end of that statement.
rikyrah
@Baud:
Where is Kay?
They are garbage??
rikyrah
@satby:
Yeah….They don’t make any sense??
Kraux Pas
They can’t be all that ashamed if they’re looking to Biden. “Uhh, we regret how this race stuff got out of hand but I still really like the corporate sector’s boots on our collective throats.”
Baud
@Kraux Pas:
They do like that, and that’s not what they’re ashamed of.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kraux Pas: Sorry ’bout that.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
Yeah, Don Cheadle is still a solid Trumpster. :-)
JPL
@OzarkHillbilly: He hardly knew the guy and anyway only he can help the black community. Yesterday trump was asked about that and his response was he hardly knew the guy and anyway only he can help the black community.
WereBear
80% of Trump voters worship a demi-god who can’t golf in the rain because it ruins his hair.
They just aren’t thinkers, these people.
Nicole
@OzarkHillbilly: For full effect, imagine them posted individually, about a half hour between each:
Bernie’s so shrill. I don’t think I can listen to that voice for four years.
Biden looks tired. I don’t think he has the stamina for this job.
Beto’s so strident. It’s very off-putting. He should try to be more likable.
Buttigieg comes across like such a know-it-all. The average voter doesn’t like that. He should be more warm and nurturing.
de Blasio probably didn’t make the debate because he’s so negative and aggressive. It’s very unattractive. Also, what the hell was he wearing last time? Had he gained weight? I think he’d gained some weight. If he can’t control what he puts in his mouth, how can he run the country?
WereBear
@Nicole: LOVE it.
satby
@Baud: @OzarkHillbilly: honestly, the more I engage in conversation with the common clay of my neighbors at the farmers market, the more I want to flee the country. Yesterday I was between a Bernie-stan organic farmer with the ugliest, most over-priced produce ever and a dingbat “Republican because of abortion” microgreens grower. Both of whom are close to 40 years old and have the political sophistication of three year olds. At least my RWNJ neighbor has a coherent (though abhorrent) worldview. I really despair most of the time these days.
Nicole
@WereBear: (blushes)
I’m not sure what to interpret from how long it took friends to catch on while I was posting them last night.
debbie
@satby:
I wasn’t watching. Did they look like PUMAs? //
PaulWartenberg
The thing I’m seeing on Twitter this morning is sheer outrage that a Republican PAC that aired anti-Dem ads on ABC during the debate showed an ad of AOC’s photo burning up while displaying other images of mass skulls and other scenes of terror. Pure Holocaust fearmongering crap. ABC should apologize and that PAC should get shut down for this BS.
debbie
@Nicole:
Politics teaches us that men can be as shrill as women. //
Baud
@Nicole:
Haha. I especially hated Booker’s cackle.
OzarkHillbilly
@Nicole: Heh, I like. Thanx for the share.
satby
Example, just because it annoyed me so much: the Bernie-stan made a laudatory statement about how thanks to the saint of Vermont, Burlington reserved the area around Lake Champlain for parks and green space, which clearly wouldn’t have happened without his stewardship. I asked her if she’d ever been to Chicago*.
* Where, for those who don’t know, the lakefront was preserved as park and green space in the early 1900s. I assume Bernie helped.
satby
@debbie: I didn’t watch. Binged on Good Place. Far better use of my time.
OzarkHillbilly
@satby: I don’t take them seriously, at least not when it comes to politics. We here are outliers.
Cracks me up, Percy snores like a chainsaw.
Leto
@Baud: Eh, I still think that honor goes toYang. Tech bro libertarian who somehow got on stage.
@Nicole: Glorious :)
OzarkHillbilly
@PaulWartenberg:
Bullshit is the base business model of pacs. If they couldn’t spout BS they’d be speechless.
Nicole
I know I only picked on the white men, and I’m not saying I’d never vote for a white man, I’m sure there’s a white male candidate out there I’d really like but I just am not into these white men. I can’t explain it; it’s a gut feeling and I always vote based on my gut so don’t ask me any specific policy questions because I don’t know I mean I’m really busy and we have to agree to disagree and I have to go now byeeeeee….
Baud
Today show of course starts off with the Castro -Biden squabble.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@satby: My very thought.
JPL
@PaulWartenberg: I attempted to watch it, and couldn’t finish it. Did it run just in NYC or nationwide?
germy
I watched the debate on ABC TV, but didn’t stick around for the talking heads’ analysis afterwards. I don’t care what Jon Karl or Rahm Emanuel think about it.
Baud
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
OK, I just posted a kitten update that seems to have gone into the ether. Comment number 7402436, if anyone wants to check the database.
Gotta run; I’ll repost it this afternoon if it can’t be found and freed.
Steeplejack
@rikyrah:
Good morning! ?
germy
The pundit of all pundits speaks:
Gin & Tonic
@satby: It’s a real shame the big cities, like New York, never thought of preserving large, green, open areas for recreation in their centers. I’m glad Bernie was able to show the way in over-crowded, smoggy Burlington.
Baud
@germy:
Haha. I bet.
glory b
Here’s what a number of African American women I’m acquainted with think about Warren and Bernie:
1) Why isn’t anyone going to explain his numerous pro-gun votes? If others have to apologize for previous mistakes, how does he get away with merely saying he now has an “F” from the NRA?
2) Warren was a Republican long after the Southern Strategy came to light. Why did she look away from that?
Also, black women worked HARD for Clinton, she seemed to hand wave that away when she said the DNC rigged the primary against Bernie. Why does she think that happened? She never explained.
I’ll also note that lots of educated black people work for government agencies, significantly higher percentages than other races. Most are happy with their health care coverage. I saw Steve Ratner on msnbc a few minutes ago, he said 85% of allpeople with employer provided coverage like it and want to keep it.
Kay
She should say Mexico will pay for it. They all accepted that answer from Trump.
Only Democrats have to pay for things. Did you know the giant rich people tax cut isn’t paid for? It’s not. The promised revenue increase from it never materialized. Not paid for.
Immanentize
@Gin & Tonic: The Emerald Necklace in Boston — Olmstead designed in 1894.
satby
@Gin & Tonic: another idiot comment from the Bernie-stan: did you know that because of that activist that climbed the flagpole that South Carolina got rid of the Confederate flag?
I mean all props to that woman because that was great, but the boycott by organizations moving their conventions and sporting events elsewhere did more. But when I pointed that out, her response was it was because of that woman that the boycott happened (untrue, they had started first).
It’s just like debating a Trumplestan.
WereBear
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: I will be watching for it!
Did I mention we named the new kittens? Bud and Lou, Abbott and Costello. They do make us laugh all the time.
Gin & Tonic
@glory b: Bernie’s pro-gun votes are because he owes his career in politics to Wayne LaPierre. In 1990, Bernie ran for the House against the incumbent Republican Peter Smith, who was seen by the NRA as squishy. He won thanks to NRA support, including ads such as “Bernie Sanders is a more honorable choice for Vermont sportsmen than Peter Smith.”
schrodingers_cat
I don’t get all the Warren love, I am just not that into her. I don’t agree with her about trade. At this point I like Beto and Kamala H the best. Bernie and Yang can go home.
schrodingers_cat
@Nicole: Actually DeBlasio can pack the pounds and it won’t show because he is tall. His tone though, that would be problem, and he should learn to smile more and whine less.
mrmoshpotato
@Nicole: Hahaha, that’s great.
Kay
The judge asked “if you have people requesting rides but no drivers, how would that work?” That stumped the Uber attorney and it was pretty much over.
OzarkHillbilly
@Nicole: White men deserve to be picked on, at least that’s what my wife thinks (judging by how often she picks on me)
Butter emails!!!
@schrodingers_cat:
What aspects of Beto’s and Harris’ trade policies do you prefer to Warren’s?
Ken
@Jinchi:
That’s the new standard for President, or at least for old white guy presidents. Remarkable how it took the media less that two years to be trained to the new standard.
mrmoshpotato
@satby:
❤️ September 26th draws closer.
schrodingers_cat
@Butter emails!!!: I don’t buy into Warren’s protectionist trade policies. I like how KH and Beto speak compared to Warren. I will vote for her if she wins the nomination but I am not excited about her at this point.
YMMV.
mrmoshpotato
@germy: The cornerstone of the Democratic party speaks!
Starfish
@schrodingers_cat: A lot of people are working for companies that have gone to crap because they are owned by finance bros. They want to see Warren stick it to the bankers, finance bros, and billionaires. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was the first thing that was done for people in a long time.
Amir Khalid
@Baud:
What happens to the kids who got into college with the fraudulent applications?
schrodingers_cat
@Starfish: I can get behind that and I agree with her about the regulation of Wall Street.
But not protectionist trade policies.
Baud
@Amir Khalid:
I haven’t heard.
David C
Maybe it’s not a good idea to invoke the names “Robert Francis” when threatening gun violence.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
Warren’s trade policies are what Democrats have always said about trade– it’s how they were different from Republicans on trade. Democrats said they would use trade as a lever to make human, civil and labor rights part of any deal. Then they didn’t do it. Or if they did get some of those protections they didn’t enforce them. It isn’t about “tariffs”- that’s Trump. It’s about regulatory regimes. Countries without them are at a competitive advantage if the only measure is economic.
Democrats have to answer the question – how are they different from Republicans on trade? Not just Trump- the entire Republican Party?
Mr. Mack
Question for the Jackals: Has anyone here heard of or read James W. Douglass?
Kathleen
@satby: I’m thinking they were agents whose purpose was to create discord and illusion that Dems are bad on immigration. We will see alot of this activity going forward.
bemused
@germy:
Oh Meghan, bless your heart.
glory b
@Gin & Tonic: Huh, thanks for tge info.
Now, the remaining question is why no pressure for an explanation.
Also, I remember that when the Dema did the sit in gun protest when Paul Ryan was speaker, Bernie waved at them but didn’t join in. He always talks about protesting. He looked pretty petty.
Professor Bigfoot
@Nicole:
Gonna need your address for the invoice for this keyboard with the mouthful of coffee spewed into it.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
All the side agreement says is the country has to to enforce its own labor standards. It’s meaningless. It also makes the US “the gold standard” on all these rights and protections and the US isn’t the gold standard – in the case of NAFTA, Canada has higher standards than the US. US workers would have been better off having Canada as the “gold standard” in that deal.
Another Scott
@Baud: I thought Amy was running for quasi-old-school-Republican what with her “these liberals up here don’t love America as much as me and I’m from the heartland” comment. (groucho-roll-eyes.gif) I hope she didn’t mean to say that, but that’s how it came across.
Biden’s running as an old, old school Democrat. He’s more lefty than Amy, I think.
Cheers,
Scott.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
Warren is worried about a race to the bottom on regulatory regimes. Not the “market effect”- not some natural and inexorable rush to cheaper markets. A deliberate race to the bottom. Led by the US. If you put the US standards at the tippy top (where they aren’t and shouldn’t be, but even if we accept that fiction) then when the US drops standards the whole system drops down. US conservatives actually try this- it’s not a theoretical threat. They tried it immediately after NAFTA. They attempted to gut US standards. How conservatives compete is not insisting other countries raise standards- it’s lowering ours. This is supposed to be the fundamental difference between Republicans and Democrats on trade- they race to the bottom, we insist on meeting existing US standards. Warren is saying we have to actually do it.
Soprano2
I couldn’t watch last night, but I’ve gotten the gist from Twitter, here and the morning coverage. What I keep trying to remember is whether or not the moderators in 2016 used Democratic talking points for the questions in Republican debates. You know, questions like “Your proposed tax policy is projected to increase the debt by “x” and the deficit by “y”, and the cuts you propose will gut many programs that people depend on. What is your answer for critics who say that your plan is too radical?”. Somehow I don’t think any questions were framed like that. OTOH, they seem to believe a clever question about climate change is whether or not we should all become vegan. /smh I think they should ignore stupid questions like that by turning it around, saying something like “If you’re asking what the most important thing we can do to fight climate change is, here’s what I would propose” and then talk about that. Republicans get away with completely ignoring the question all the time, why can’t Democrats, especially when the question is a stupid Republican talking point?
And yes, someone should say Mexico will pay for it. They didn’t challenge Trump on that. Did anything about how Trump is illegally diverting billions of dollars from other parts of the government to pay for his stupid wall come up?
Baud
@Another Scott:
I don’t think she meant it in the way it came across, but it was a flub.
Baud
@Soprano2:
Republicans can lie about the effects of their policies or even about what their policies are.
Dems can’t.
Baud
@Soprano2:
And there’s too much wrongdoing by Trump for all of it to come up at one of our debates.
chris
@OzarkHillbilly: FYI Just listened to an interview with cave diver Dr. Jill Heinerth, author of Into the Planet, on The Current. Y’all are nucking futz!
Should be on this page later today.
Kay
@Soprano2:
I thought there was much less of that, which made it a better debate. Democrats are right to say that the moderators in the past debates set themselves up as opponents. There’s no reason for that. That’s not the moderators role. They’re not the proxy for the Republican Party. Republicans aren’t there. That debate comes later. Chuck Todd doesn’t need to play the role of the opposition. There was much, much less of that and so we got more real answers to real questions. I really think it’s ego. The moderators weren’t in the competition- they weren’t trying to score points.
MomSense
@Kay:
Warren came out in support of tariffs back in 2018.
Another Scott
@glory b:
Polling questions like these are going to be the death of us all.
“like” is doing a massive amount of heavy lifting in that sentence.
Sure, people like employer-provided health insurance. They don’t see the full cost of it in their pay stubs, they like that it provides some peace of mind.
But they don’t like arguing with their insurance company about denied coverage. They don’t like having to cover the annual deductible before out-of-pocket coverage kicks in. They don’t like that if they actually need to use it for something serious like a hospitalization that there’s a good chance that they will get hit with some BS bazillion dollar charge from some doctor or medical outfit that they didn’t know wasn’t part of their “network” (and didn’t choose anyway), etc., etc.
We have BCBS through work. J has a stack of files about a foot high from her dealing with them over coverage payments.
Grrr…
“85 percent of residents of Abaco and Grand Bahama like the weather there…”
Grr…
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Another Scott:
“Like” is irrelevant. The question is whether voters will support our proposals to redo the system. Who knows?
trnc
If dems aren’t already responding to this with “Let’s set aside the republican talking point you’ve bought into and talk about the facts,” they need to. They need to do the same thing in interviews, and they need to ask interviewers if they ever expect republicans to listen to their liberal constituents.
Baud
@Kay:
I like that it was one night. Sad that October will be two nights.
Quinerly
@glory b: Good post.
Another Scott
@Baud: But the framing in the press does matter.
I think one of the reasons why Obamacare made it through Congress (barely) was that GM was screaming for years before the Great Recession that health benefit[s] were costing them about $2000 per car and it wasn’t sustainable. They couldn’t continue to compete with Japan and Germany and South Korea on a playing field where those countries didn’t have those huge costs baked into every car sold.
Yeah, by the time the votes for passage were finally taken it wasn’t talked about much. But it was in the background and was part of the reason why it had the momentum to pass, I think
If the background noise is “85% of people like the current system” based on an ambiguous, overly broad polling question, then people on the edge that need to be persuaded won’t be very persuadable.
Framing matters and we should work on making it work for our policy objectives.
Cheers,
Scott.
Leto
@Another Scott: This. I like the fact that I have health insurance. I hate the fact that two years on, I still don’t have a primary care doctor because my region is starved for doctors. I like the fact that I have health insurance. I hate the fact that I only have 75 annual visits for physical therapy; I still need, at minimum, another year of PT for my inquiries. When I called and asked BCBS what should I do when I run out of visits, basically they said, “Pay for it yourself.” (I’m lucky that I have a very good human being in my PT; we came to an arrangement) We recently had to buy another filing cabinet to deal with the paperwork that came about just because of my accident, hospitalization, and all the damn follow on bullshit resulting from it.
Most people “like” their employer provided coverage because they’ve never had any other type of system. They don’t understand/know first hand the benefits of a universal coverage system like the ones the Scandinavian countries have. It also doesn’t help that we have Republican scare mongering as the default mode setting when talking about healthcare systems.
Immanentize
@Baud: I am not sure they have yet settled on 2 nights. And someone could drop out before then. Unlikely, but possible.
Karen S.
@satby: I’m sure Daniel Burnham would have welcomed Bernie’s input. Haha.
trnc
@satby:
Can’t help but wonder if they’re paid agitators.
PaulWartenberg
@WereBear:
kittehs!!!
Starfish
@Soprano2: Last night was not nearly as bad as the second debate.
I think part of what made it better was the candidates. The top candidates did not attack each other. Harris kept her attacks on Trump. I think it was okay for the lower candidates like Castro to come after Biden, but that is “punching up.” It is less so when top tier candidates are being terrible to one another.
Booker did what you said. He took a moment and spoke about farming, and he pivoted to what I think was Veteran’s healthcare.
Baud
@Another Scott:
Sure, framing matters. But we can’t stop the media or Republicans from framing our policies negatively. We have to address the framing, and IMHO it’s weak to address the framing by complaining about framing.
chopper
@germy:
i think she misspelled “messed”.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Trump finally got on twitter just one minute ago and burped out three hysterical tweets about how great he was and how bad his enemies are and how can you impeach such a great president????
Why do I look at that? It just irritates me, and I already know what he’s like.
WereBear
@PaulWartenberg: kittehs squared!
Another Scott
@Leto: J and I were vacationing in Vancouver a few years ago, staying at a B&B. Another couple from Texas was there, and one morning at breakfast he looked pretty bad. The hostess called up a local doctor, got him seen that morning, and the doctor fixed up whatever was bothering him. There was little if any cost to him, no “OMG you’re a foreigner and your health insurance is no good here, here’s your bill for $14,892.34” BS.
I accompanied J to a conference in Budapest a few years later. On the flight over, J developed severe ear pain and as soon as we landed she had to find some way to get relief. The concierge at the hotel called a local clinic, we walked over an hour later, waited a few minutes. Went into an office with about 5000 different scary pointy stainless steel tools on the counter. We tried to explain what the problem was as J sat in a chair and was examined. Then the assistant gently held her head in place while the female doctor used one of the scary pointy tools to take care of the problem. All done and all fixed. The doctor then went away for a few minutes and came back extremely apologetically that our insurance didn’t work in Europe so she needed to charge us something like the equivalent of $15.
That’s how things work in civilized countries. We really don’t know how bad we have it here. :-(
I’m sorry you’re having to fight so much to get the coverage you’ve paid for. I hope it gets better soon.
Cheers,
Scott.
Kay
@MomSense:
But you heard the tariff question last night. The free traders aren’t defending their position, and there’s a reason for that.
Republicans in the Senate voted for it. You know how Republicans passed NOTHING Obama put up, but they did pass this. Sp the question becomes how do Republicans and Democrats differ on trade? Democrats have answered that for 30 years by saying they are the race to the top party. If that’s true then why did Mitch McConnell and the majority of the GOP Senate easily pass authority to pass O’s trade deal?
If Republicans and Democrats ARE the same on trade – and they sure seem to be- then Democrats have nothing to say on trade, and they sure seem not to have anything to say, since they’re saying the same vague things about “strong protections” they’ve been saying for 30 years. Trump threw a wrench into this bipartisan consensus but it was always a problem for Democrats. They never really could explain it, and the free traders among them still can’t.
JGabriel
@Nicole:
I’m not suire there’s much to really draw out of that. The first joke, about Bernie being shrill, remindced me of “Paul Krugman is shrill.” The second, about Biden looking tired, seemed more like a comment about his age, at first glance. In other words, neither come across as specifically gendered comments. It’s not until you get to saying Beto ‘should be more likable’, that a gendered direction in the ironic commentary becomes noticeable.
At least, that was my reading. YMMV.
bupalos
@Baud: The framing of “you get to keep it” vs. “you’ll lose it” is the entire problem here. Dems need to simply frame their presentation around “here’s what you get with our plan, it’s obviously better for 90% of our country and that’s why we are going to do it” and stop doing this “if you like it you can keep it, but if you don’t, you can have this alternate plan-b thing instead.” I get why it’s tempting to sell it that way, but it’s ultimately dishonest in a system this complicated, and being perceived as dishonest on this issue makes the political lift insurmountable.
Amir Khalid
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
That must mean he’s really really worried about impeachment.
Baud
@bupalos:
You wouldn’t like Warren’s response last night then because she said you get to keep your doctor.
OzarkHillbilly
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Self loathing.
Kay
@MomSense:
Partly the race to the bottom was rhetorical. The trade issue was always framed as “high standards! here in the US we do not imprison labor organizers for years without trial, as they do in Vietnam!” That’s the “gold standard”? They set expectations SO LOW anyone could meet them, and even those incredibly low standards weren’t mandatory and weren’t ever enforced. Worker and human rights are one thing, but this also matters a lot for consumers. If the exporting country has rock bottom regulatory standards you get things like garbage drywall and poisoned dog foods and tainted medicine and defective automobiles and fish that is sold as one type of fish but is actually another. People will care about that, even if they don’t care that Vietnam imprisons labor organizers.
Yarrow
@satby: Ask the Bernie-stan which of the bills that are now laws that, in his 30 years in Congress, Bernie shepherded through Congress and have his name on them are his favorite. When they can’t come up with any and start in with the excuses you can say, “Well, I like people who can get things done.” Could provide some entertainment anyway.
JPL
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I’m disappointed that Castro didn’t go after trump’s actions instead of Biden’s.
trump is losing it and the tweets confirm it.
Leto
@Another Scott:
More Americans are figuring it out. I know Reddit can be a shitshow, but it’s also a great melting pot for people to experience other nations healthcare stories while seeing the insanity of ours. I’m hoping that it helps move the needle. Avalune and I have a few stories about utilizing the UK and Italian health systems, hardest part being the language barrier with the Italians. But like you and J, it was sorted, and we moved along with our lives.
It’s getting better. Every day is progress. It’s the slow but steady variety, but it’s progress.
@bupalos: What they’re describing is the German system. Everyone has universal coverage, but if you want extra/chose your own specialist doctor, then you get private insurance and go from there. UK has a similar system, same as Canada. The system is this complicated because it was built this way. Doctors hate it, nurses hate it, medical professionals hate it, insurance companies hate it, patients hate it… everyone hates it, yet we’re told that we can’t change it. Bullshit.
Kay
It does solve a mystery, though. We have discovered Ivanka Trump’s constituency- it’s rich GOP donors. How many people is that? 10,000? 20,000?
bemused
@WereBear:
I’m on the fence about getting breakaway kitty collars with bells for our indoor cats. What is your expert opinion?
NotMax
As no one else brought it up, Happy Friday the 13th.
Take a broken mirror to lunch.
Kay
@Another Scott:
I have private health insurance and I’d ditch it in a heartbeat for Medicare. I know I will pay for Medicare, but I also know I pay for health insurance, unlike all of America’s debate moderators, who apparently believe they receive free health insurance because they’re just fabulous.
Gelfling 545
@Jinchi: Worked for Trump.
glory b
@Baud: I agree, the question should be some iteration of whether or not they’ll support exchanging it for something else. For better or worse, lots of black folks are more invested in keeping what they have rather than going with the unknown.
The lack of enthusiasm black people have for Warren hardly ever gets mentioned. Steve Kornacki said she’s been stuck in single digits with us. 10% is the best she’s done.
I’m not sure what would happen if we had a candidate who swept in on the white vote, but did that poorly with people if color.
Jinchi
@Nicole:
I’m guessing it was the Beto comment when they all caught on. The Bernie and Biden ones are pretty much on target.
geg6
@schrodingers_cat:
Your feeling about Warren has been my feeling about Harris from the start. I don’t see what so many here see in her. I think she’s a bit of a lightweight in many policy areas and she flip flops and walks back things she says in debates and interviews an awful lot. She does not impress me. I really like Warren and Booker. Beto is somewhere in third of fourth place for me.
Kay
I know it’s controversial but I am enjoying watching Warren refusing the accept the premise of their questions and explaining instead. She didn’t get permission from media to do this, but she’s doing it anyway. She’s insisting on running the narrative around her own plans, and in my view that’s fair play and allowed. We’ll have to see what voters think about it. If they accept it then we’ll have to ask who were these questions for?
JPL
@Kay: Wow.
rp
My employer-based healthcare kinda blows, and it’s completely ridiculous that (a) I’ve had to learn completely new systems a few times over the last 5 years because I’ve changed jobs a couple times, and (b) I would be completely screwed if I lost my job or decided to become an independent contractor/consultant.
Of course, I’m not saying anything that hasn’t been said a 1000 times before.
bemused
@Kay:
I’ve changed my mind about long prison time for the trump family. I think taking away all their ill-gotten wealth and possessions and make them live like we commoners in rural/small town america on $50,000 or less a year for the rest of their lives.
Amir Khalid
@Kay:
Ivanka could be telling the truth here. We all know her daddy’s a crooked, lying, cheating, philandering, abusive, lazy, entitled so-and-so. And I think we have her on lazy and entitled, at least.
Jeffro
Folks, Josh over at Talking Points Memo has a clip up in his ‘Dear Leader’ Watch section. It’s quite unbelievable. Lou Dobbs spends a minute telling his viewers that trumpov is ‘focused and high-energy’ and ‘there’s a smile on the face of everyone working in trumpov’s White House’. Straight-up North Korea propaganda stuff and totally crazy.
(Sorry I am bad with links on this iPad)
schrodingers_cat
@glory b: I am with my black sisters in not being too impressed with her plans. They are good goals and they sound good but I don’t think she can pull it off.
1. I doubt that she can convince people who are not in her fan club. I am talking about other Ds not Rs or the TV punditry.
2. I find her speeches and her delivery boring and hectoring, you can throw brick bats at me but she reminds me of my not so favorite teachers in school.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Kay: Ivanka is a ridiculous person. She’s all polish and no substance.
Kay
@JPL:
In my opinion, and based solely on a small town law practice where one encounters “crazy liar” about once a month, there’s nothing you can do with these people. They lie. It IS their center. There’s nothing else. You have to get around them. There’s no fixing it. Here’s the thing- they believe it. You’re then arguing with beliefs, which is a waste of time. You have to rely on the fact that MOST people are not crazy liars so this person will be sidelined eventually and become irrelevant, other than in a head shaking “there she is again!” way. But is sometimes takes a lot of time and a lot of damage.
Baud
@Kay:
I agree.
@glory b:
I think it’s a dilemma for Warren and other progressives. On one hand, you’re saying how corrupt Washington is, but yet your asking people to trust Washington to redo the health care system because “it’ll be different when I’m in charge.”
That message works for me, but I’m already in the fold. I’m not sure how it’ll play more broadly.
rikyrah
@satby:
This is some purity pony bullshyt. If you aren’t smart enough to know that every candidate on that stage is Pro-DACA, then you are too stupid for words. Take your azzes over to Moscow Mitch and see how you’re treated.
chris
@Another Scott:
The other 15% are the people who are actually dealing with it.
schrodingers_cat
@geg6: I find KH reassuring and warm. As for policy prescriptions, many of these pie-in-the sky policies are not going to survive the harsh realities of the Congress. They can promise us the sun, the moon and the stars and I would be happy if they can deliver a fraction of what they are promising. I like Beto because he says what needs to be said aloud about immigration and race. He speaks passionately about the demonization of immigrants and for that alone I am glad that he is on that stage.
Nicole
@Professor Bigfoot: There is no greater honor conferred than the accusation of liquid spilled onto a keyboard. Thank you.
Kay
@Baud:
I think we have to remember that they are talking to a lot of voters. They talk to voters all day long, and have for months. The candidates are much more the experts on what voters care about than the moderators. Warren wants to present this as “health care first, then how we pay for the health care”. She said this- she said “voters care about health care, they don’t care about health insurance”. In so many words. It’s her case. She should be allowed to present it in the order she feels is best. If VOTERS start demanding answers on specifics she’ll get there, but maybe she knows that’s not what they’re asking.
It’s like Biden with the gaffes. I don’t think his supporters give a shit and maybe he knows that.
Sister Golden Bear
Good Morning/Evening fellow jackals.
At the airport in Taipei waiting for the midnight flight to
GeorgiaSan Francisco.A bit of low-key visit since I listened to my body and took it easy. I did have a chance to something unique — an I Ching reading and knife massage.
Yes it’s exactly what it sounds like. Sounds gimmicky, but it’s actually a practice that’s more than 2,000 years old.
Olivia used a pair of (blunted) cleavers to drum away on my body. (I did have a towel placed over wherever she was working on to soften the blows.) It was both extremely relaxing and energizing.
Followed it with an I Ching reading afterwards. I’m skeptical of woo stuff, but she did so surprisingly accurate observations that I couldn’t chalk up to “cold reading.”
This travel blogger did a good write up of what the experience is like.
geg6
@schrodingers_cat:
Everyone sees people differently. I just can’t take Harris very seriously on anything other than legal/police issues. I don’t see the warmth at all and I don’t find reassuring a candidate who can’t seem to figure out where she stands on a great number of issues. And where you see Warren as every teacher you hated, I see her as every (few) teacher I adored. I like Booker’s passion and smarts. And Beto is growing on me because of his complete ability to find his own passion since the El Paso shooting. I really don’t care about any of the rest. For me, right now, it’s Warren, Booker and then Beto, I think. None of rest resonate at all for me and some of them actively turn me off.
ETA: Not that it matters what I think. By the time the PA primary rolls around, I’ll just have to take what I get. But if Warren’s in there, based on my feelings right now, she has my vote.
hueyplong
@bemused: Agree. Piggy-backing on what someone here said in 2016, I’d like to see the Trumps living in apartment complexes outside Orlando, working at some service-oriented job (don’t care what) at which they’re under the thump of a petty, turf-conscious supervisor. Each of them. For as long as they live. Welcome on no cable network of any kind, however marginal.
About this, they say I’m a dreamer. But I’m not the only one.
glory b
@schrodingers_cat: I agree, we’re putting the mean girls’ table back together again!
Kay
@Baud:
I wonder about Trump with this. He never talks to voters, even his own. He gives shouty speeches and watches Fox. He’s really isolated. They say they track their online supporters obsessively, and I’m sure they do, but what percentage of Trump voters are online political fanatics? 3% of the 40% he has? I keep thinking about the FEC record I searched for this county. He has 3 donors who make repeat donations. One woman makes up 80% of his local donations. This is a 70% Trump county and there are twice as many Act Blue donors as Trump donors. Would he even know if he was losing touch?
Amir Khalid
@schrodingers_cat:
I haven’t seen or read anything about either Harris or Warren to make me doubt their capacity to be a fine POTUS — in absolute terms, let alone in comparison to der Scheißgibbon. Or to doubt either woman’s electability or fitness for office. So at this stage I have no preference between them, and I await the judgement of Democratic primary voters next year.
cmorenc
@Jinchi:
Not imploding on screen in a debate worked for George Bush, in part because he seemed like the guy more people would like to have a beer with. OK, so you’re annoyed that the “beer with” criteria is even a consideration and besides, he isn’t who you’d pick to have a beer with – but the beer question is just a variant of the who you’d be comfortable having (on TV) in your living room question, which is important to many voters.
Gelfling 545
@Leto:
This, I think, is plain truth. Many have experienced no insurance & some more or less good insurance. They can’t imagine a system in which they don’t have to stress so much about it.
Baud
@Kay:
Sure. They do what they think is best. I just don’t presume anymore to know how voters who are unlike me will react to all of it.
geg6
@Kay:
After reading your earlier comment about doing these searches, I did the same for my county. And the results were pretty much the same as yours. A variety of donors on the Dem side to a variety of candidates and organizations such as ActBlue. On the GOP side, two donors made every single donation I saw. Kinda weird, I thought.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
The highlights of her mother’s professional life were a cameo appearance in a movie about bitter divorces and retracting a rape accusation against Ivanka’s father in order to maintain a divorce settlement.
Jeffro
@Kay: I wonder how many folks in that constant 38-40% who keep saying they support trumpov are really going to turn out for him this time. I wonder how many are just saying “yeah, he’s my guy” because there’s no alternative for them/to ‘own the libs’/to stick it to the media/whatever.
I mean, his ‘strong support’ number is around 25%; his ‘strongly oppose’ number is at 48%. That’s HUGE. And he will just keep getting crazier and more repellent across the next year, while unifying the Dems (and maybe even getting us to the 50% ‘strongly oppose’ mark. That’s it. That’s the ballgame right there.
germy
They’re worried.
Elizabelle
NPR at the top of the hour. In last night’s debate, lots of topics, but there was not one question about the economy.
Just fuck them. It would seem most of the topics touch on the economy. At least the Democrats live in the real world.
germy
germy
Baud
@germy:
Ted Cruz thinks Ed Rendell is far left.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Elizabelle: it is astounding to me that health care is treated as somehow distinct from “the economy”– also, do people who “like” their employer-provided health care never worry about losing their jobs?
germy
Omnes Omnibus
@satby:
What country is going to be better if you live in its Indiana?
germy
Citizen Alan
@Kay:
So Ivanka admits to being a greedy, thieving, lying, bigoted rapist?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@germy:
schrodingers_cat
Elizabeth Warren let herself get goaded into taking that stupid DNA test by that Orange Clown. KH knows how to stare down bullies and will not let the Orange Clown rattle her, she has a life time of experience dealing with this, being belittled, of people mangling her first name and not being taken seriously because of what she looks like.
Steve in the ATL
@satby: #RedStateLife
Many others of us feel the same pain. I look at it as an opportunity to vote the correct way in a state/county/city that will eventually flip to the party of decency, versus being just another democratic voter in California or New York.
Stay strong!
bemused
@hueyplong:
I entertain myself with just dessert fantasies for trump and all his vile sycophants that will never happen but it is entertaining to imagine these priviliged clueless people trying to navigate let alone survive what tens of millions of americans do every day.
Jeffro
@germy: “Kick the Crazies to the Curb: Vote Democratic” almost fits on a bumper sticker and could be used in any race from dogcatcher to prez.
Maybe “End the Insanity: Vote Dem”? “Tired of Tweets? Vote D”?
Kraux Pas
@bemused:
$50, 000 sounds awful generous. I would love to try to live on that.
Yarrow
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: She had a perfume line. Who could forget this story from 1996:
schrodingers_cat
@glory b: Right on, sister friend. I liked KH’s blouse and her pearls too. Elizabeth Warren is pretty but she always plays down her looks, she still dresses like a woman in academia.
Steve in the ATL
@Baud:
I like your strategy of skipping the debate so no one can find anything negative about your bearing. Will be helpful when you’re in the final three candidates and primary voters have bad feelings about Moscow Tulsi and Chakra Con but you’re a tabula rasa.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: More proof that he is an idiot or a liar or both.
Kay
@geg6:
Isn’t it though? One thing I found out was kind of nice- there’s a retired judge here who used to be involved in D politics. I haven’t seen him in years. He is our single largest D donor, still :)
His wife (who is a lovely person) has a chronic illness so maybe he sticks close to home. I haven’t seen him since O’s first race but he’s still involved, still donating. He has to be in his 80’s.
burnspbesq
I’d like to see Beto sic the FBI on Briscoe Cain.
bemused
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Easy to be powerful with fat bank accounts and privilege. Then again, trump and family believe they “worked” their way up. Morality is a whole different issue.
Steve in the ATL
@schrodingers_cat: I suspect that Cruz is a liar more than an idiot. I think he’s an “end justifies the means” type who is getting increasingly desperate as he realized that his disgusting countenance is likely to prevent him from ever becoming president.
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat: I’m a fan of women dressing in the way they feel comfortable and that suits them. I thought they all accomplished that last night. I did like Harris’s blouse–shiny!–and pearls.
Can we critique the men’s clothing choices? One of the men’s suit and tie didn’t fit very well but now I can’t remember which one. Beto? Joe? Hmmm….now I can’t remember. Men definitely have it easier in the clothing department.
germy
@burnspbesq: He did contact the FBI.
Yarrow
@burnspbesq: Briscoe Cain sounds like a made up name. It’s hard to believe it’s real.
Jeffro
I see Biden’s weird word salad (record players? Venezuela?) during his education non-answer answer is getting some more scrutiny this morning.
As is trumpov’s “Mike Pounce” comment.
These things are related…
bemused
@Kraux Pas:
I know but that would be less than chump change for them.
Yarrow
@Jeffro: Mike Pounce?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Yarrow: also, the guy whose parents named him after a cowboy in a movie they saw at the Lubbock drive-in is making fun of O’Rourke cause his Anglo parents gave him a Hispanic-sounding nickname when he was a toddler
rikyrah
@glory b:
UH HUH
UH HUH
Good points.
The Moar You Know
I don’t know what is going to end up happening to Beto but we all owe him: he has gotten the right conversation on guns started.
The “we’re taking them and fuck you, you don’t have the right to terrorize and kill your fellow Americans” conversation.
I am a gun owner and will happily NOT be one the day the government bans the fucking things.
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: Bernie always looks like he just rolled out of bed. People (including me) commented on Paul Ryan’s ill fitting suit at the press announcement after Romney picked him. People have also been commenting on Biden’s bright white teeth etc.
Whether you like it or not we do judge people on their appearance, especially politicians.
Steve in the ATL
@Yarrow: I thought so too. Didn’t Bo and Luke have a run in with Briscoe Cain in a “Dukes of Hazzard” episode?
Jeffro
@Yarrow: During the speech he gave in Baltimore yesterday (which was another rambling, shambling mess). He called him “Mike Pounce”. Twitter’s having a field day with the memes, as you might imagine.
I think he slipped and used Pence’s ‘adult movie’ name. LOL
rikyrah
@Kay:
BWA HA HA H AH HA HA HA HA
Oh Kay….
Butter emails!!!
@schrodingers_cat:
I’m going to defer to Kay’s comments on this, but my impression is that Warren’s trade policies are not protectionist so much as they are in line with her domestic objectives and policies. You can’t protect workers, the environment, etc. if you don’t also promote and require some level of commitment to these from your trading partners. What’s the point of passing tougher environmental controls, if the firms just offshore and dump their waste in different rivers. What’s the point of protecting labor if the jobs just get sent overseas where labor has no such protections?
germy
https://www.newsweek.com/texas-beto-orourke-briscoe-cain-gun-reform-1459074
germy
This is Briscoe’s response to Beto:
Butter emails!!!
@Jeffro:
I think it means he feeds Pence cat treats if he’s been good.
Omnes Omnibus
@The Moar You Know:
Is there a reason that you want to keep them until they are banned? It sounds like you are currently opposed to al gun ownership or do you just oppose the ownership of military type weapons? No one is making you keep them.
germy
Kay
@Jeffro:
In a way he’s lucky it was word salad. It’s a really bad answer. He was trying to talk about the “word gap”, which is when upper income college educated parents talk to their children more and engage them in a back and forth. What researchers have found is this teaches them how to think- how to ask the next question, persuade, make their case. And people used to make fun of this! Conservatives actually made fun of it. It was “permissive parenting”. The idea was children need short direct orders and the back and forth gives them too much power. But what it really does it make them think and “use their words” to negotiate conflict which we want them to do so they don’t hit each other. But you don’t get there by leaving a record player on. It’s a dialogue with a real person. That’s the advantage.
rikyrah
@Kay:
love that :)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I don’t know whose email list Kamala Harris got hold of, but I’ve gotten about 200 emails from her in the last 72 hours. I don’t think I’m getting any from any other presidential candidates
germy
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat: We do but women are always judged more on appearance than men are. Just part of the culture. I think that’s shifting but it takes time. I’m glad to see several women on the stage wearing various types of professional attire. They each seem to know what suits them and what makes them feel comfortable. I’m all for that.
@Jeffro: Oh, that’s funny. Thanks.
Leto
Interesting article regarding Sen. Warren and POC: Warren Has Lagged With Voters Of Color. But She Has Strong Support In Boston’s Black Community
Church leaders and local organizers support her and think that her plans will help the black community. But the potentially overriding factor? Getting rid of Trumpov.
Kay
@rikyrah:
Uber also says the drivers aren’t the things because there will be driverless cars. But the drivers purchase and insure and do the upkeep and storage on the car. So…Uber buys a massive fleet of cars? Who pays for the fuel? The insurance? What do they do with the cars that are not occupied or in use? They will no longer be getting free storage in the owner’s garage.
I guess the plan is YOU buy Uber the driverless car. It has to be.
Kay
@rikyrah:
To me, if they can’t make money while off-loading 95% of the costs of their business on both the public and the drivers they aren’t going to make money when are DISALLOWED from doing that. I bet they see this as a problem. It is. But it isn’t the public’s problem. It’s that they aren’t paying the costs of their business and they are DEPENDENT on that. They can lobby all they want. This thing is doomed.
bemused
@germy:
OMG
rikyrah
@Gelfling 545:
Reading this takes me back to a twitter thread that I saw months ago from an American who lived overseas in Europe, and thought that they had ‘ found a lump’.
Reading through that thread, and how easy it was for them to deal with it. Made me so mad to read that thread, because we don’t have anything comparable in America. I read that thread, but, think about all the folks who didn’t, and if you told them that it was possible to have that kind of easy experience with such a serious health issue, they wouldn’t believe you. They don’t think it exists.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kay: I hadn’t thought of those complications just because I find the idea of driverless cars kind of creepy (yes, Luddite). Do they take themselves to the gas station? are we gonna have Murph back at the ol’ 76? Park themselves when not in use?
Another Scott
@Baud: Everyone who doesn’t enthusiastically vote GOP is “far left” to these people. Everything’s binary to them. Or so they talk – it’s probably just regurgitated talking points with people like Ted.
Grr…
Cheers,
Scott.
Omnes Omnibus
@schrodingers_cat: From the tenor of your comments on trade during this primary season, I am getting the impression that you oppose any trade restrictions. I may be reading too much, too little, or both into your comments, but no trade is completely free and there are often good reasons for trade restrictions. For example, putting high tariffs on imports of/providing subsidies for products from a sector that is necessary for national security – agriculture, aviation, etc.
ETA: If I have been reading you incorrectly, then just ignore the rest of this comment.
Leto
@Kay: I was listening to a report yesterday regarding grocery stores making food deliveries to people’s homes. Similar argument. Before, the customer took care of most of the work: went to the store in their vehicle, picked the product off the shelves, packed it, took it back to their homes, took it inside, and put it away. With food delivery, most of those tasks are now being done by the store, and those extra costs add up. Customers don’t want to pay extra because they’re used to cheap food, but now the store has extra costs (vehicle fleet, extra employees, etc…)
I see this as sort of the reverse of the Uber issue.
rikyrah
@germy:
yess!!!!!!!
Another Scott
@schrodingers_cat: Warren is a reasonably quick study. And I don’t think the DNA thing has legs anymore myself. She apologized in April. And she apologized again in August.
It’s hard to see that it’s damaging to her when she got a standing ovation.
An African American friend told me last night that he’ll “never” support Harris because of her record as a prosecutor and “I know her type”. He didn’t go into details and we kinda dropped it. I found it curious, though, that he has such a visceral dislike of her. People have different perspectives now (and maybe going forward).
As I keep saying here, it’s still very early. Lots will happen between now and when we actually vote. I’m mostly keeping my powder dry, myself, though I did donate to Warren, Harris, and Castro last night. We’ll see what happens.
YMMV. :-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Leto
@rikyrah: I think I saw that same thread. There’s also numerous Reddit threads of the same vein. I 100% understand people’s fears because I had the same fears when moving from a universal coverage system (the military) to a private insurance system. And most of my fears were well founded and came true.
But at some point this system has to change. It’s untenable and produces horrible results for the money spent. How we persuade the rest of the country to move that way is still the question.
StringOnAStick
@Another Scott: I “like” that I was able to get both knees replaced this year at the facility that is also the U.S. Olympic medical center, because the prior insurance plan we had did not include that practice group. I “hate” that since that point I get letters every fucking day from the insurance company that are copies of all the harassment they are using against providers to dispute as much as they possibly can, and include a statement that “you may be responsible to pay X”. My PT says they get more of this crap from my insurance company than any of their other patients. I love having insurance that fixed my knees, but I truly hate the endless deluge of letters in hostile corporate -speak that is all about contesting, delaying payment, dumping stress on us as we try to figure out what it will finally cost us. I’m betting it will be over a year before all claims are settled. This kind of inefficiency has to increase costs throughout system.
One of the mango menace ‘s stupid and out of touch statements included the term “their beloved insurance companies”; yeah, everyone who has had to deal with health insurance companies over the care they received will use a lot of words about the experience but I can guarantee that “beloved” will not be one of them.
Another Scott
@Yarrow: Biden’s suit was so immaculate it looked like it had some sort of internal framework holding him up. It was too perfect.
I LOLed about the remark last night about Bernie’s shoulders being 6″ higher than everyone else’s. Too true…
Cheers,
Scott.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@glory b:
I fret about this a lot, though I’m not sure what to do about it. I am firmly convinced that black people, especially the black women are the heart and soul and future of our party. I really want to know why there is this enthusiasm gap, and though I’m firmly in the Warren camp, I would hate to see her take the White House without closing that gap.
Steve in the ATL
@Kay:
Pet peeve (pointing at Stuart Rothenberg, not Kay): this is not how the “not” joke works. The movie “Borat” is partly to blame, as the “comedy coach” in it explains it incorrectly. On the other hand, Mike Myers used to do it properly in “Wayne’s World.”
The word “not” must be added to the end of a sentence, thereby changing its meaning. The word “not” is not appended as its own sentence fragment. Were Mr. Rothenberg doing this correctly, his tweet would have read “Warren explains how she will pay for her health care plan. She really did…NOT!”
I know that explaining has been helpful and interesting to you all. Not! Uh, never mind….
Elizabelle
@Leto: The LA Times had a marvelous article. Do share it among your friends.
LA Times: Americans’ struggles with medical bills are a foreign concept in other countries
Whole thing is worth a click. Lots of memorable points. Concrete examples. UK: prescriptions capped at $12, no matter what the drug. Etc etc.
There has to be the political will to stop gouging patients and insurers for out of control costs.
rikyrah
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
How can she take the White House, if she can’t get out of the Southern primaries?
waratah
@Elizabelle: Beto said on twitter and not one question on women rights. Not his exact wording but my understanding including the right to make decisions on her own body. Beto is very strong with woman’s rights.
Elizabelle
@Steve in the ATL: To me, the will to reform a system is way more important than how you pay for it. The details can be worked out. With more available health care, costs will come down in the long run. Not to mention the lives saved or improved.
Rothenberg, and all those blonde TV bots who zing candidates with “but how will you pay for it?” have it ass-backwards. On purpose, it would seem.
schrodingers_cat
@Omnes Omnibus: I think you are reading too much into it. Tariffs contract the size of market, and the consumers of the country that imposes the tariffs ends up paying more. So tariffs act as a tax. This Econ 101 stuff. Wealth of Nations stuff. That’s exactly what is happening with T’s tariffs.
United States spent a lot of political capital getting GATT and its successor WTO passed. And now saying that we will become protectionist if you don’t agree to our demands is not that different from Orange T. Also these deals are negotiated for years Warren lead the charge against the TPP. She was also among those who said that Ds had cheated Sanders in 2016.
I am not shall we say a huge fan or stan or whatever the new jargon is.
Amir Khalid
@Steve in the ATL:
She didn’t? I thought Warren’s flaw was that she explained everything, like an overzealous schoolmarm.
Leto
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: From the article I linked above:
From the reporting, and from the people there, it seemed that Warren was the best received. The group included Sanders, Harris, Booker, Beto, Castro, and Klobuchar. Is it her clothing as Cat suggests? The fact that she was a former Republican? Pragmatic approach of, just beat Trumpov? I don’t know.
Elizabelle
Yea newspapers, particularly the Washington Post: breaking news: WaPost:
It’s a start.
Aleta
This part is very important. Tell the children to pass it down.
(not sarc. btw What’s the opposite of the sarc mark?) —
Leto
@Elizabelle: Thanks, will do!
Another Scott
In other news, GovExec:
She knows who butters her bread, amirite??
Grrr…
I see an Emoluments case is back on as of this AM. Probably means that the SCOTUS is going to rule on it eventually. Will we get another IOKIYAR ruling?
Grrr…
Cheers,
Scott.
jeffreyw
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: I don’t know why they are not big fans of Warren but I am sure that they will vote for her in overwhelming numbers should she be the nominee.
Major Major Major Major
Still love Warren, still think Biden is slipping, still think Castro is bizarrely mean during debates, still find little appealing with Harris, still like Pete but he needs to move past/expand his shtick, for the first time I liked Beto, Bernie was surprisingly good but I will always think he’d be a bad president, there were other people on stage too.
So I guess what changed for me is that I like Beto now. I did think this debate clarified and solidified the rest of my thoughts though.
ETA: Since we’re talking trade, I don’t like Warren’s trade policy. But I also think as a polity we are pivoting towards trade idiocy en masse and I can’t imagine any candidate running on (properly managed) free trade in either the primary or the general. So I guess I just have to live with this.
trollhattan
@Yarrow:
Heh.
As a side comment, Donny evidently made up the Ivana as Olympic skier story, as their records show no trace of her being on the team or competing for the country.
He has always been a compulsive liar and nothing and nobody is ever good enough and thus, requires embellishment.
jeffreyw
@Kay: I think this may be the correct take on it. People will buy timeshares in electric vehicles. The organizing company probably won’t be Uber, and the time shares will be in a service, not an actual vehicle – just rides in a vehicle. The company employees will be in sales, acquisition, maintenance, overseeing garage/charging facilities.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@rikyrah: Good question, and I hope one that Warren’s people take seriously.
glory b
@schrodingers_cat: yes, mean girl moment! I am so sick of Elizabeth Warren wearing the black pants, black top and colored jacket. Change up your wardrobe girl!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Major Major Major Major: pretty much where I am, I just wish Warren hadn’t gone all-in on single payer, which I think will be a drag on her and on down-ticket races
Jim, Foolish Literalist
also, as a dumb guy on the internet offering advice to experienced and accomplshed politicians with track records and shit, wouldn’t it be a good idea to start talking about trump’s corruption on the stump? Not necessarily impeachment or the dread ‘process’ but, “And I can guarantee you this: I’m not running for the White House to make money out of it!”
James E Powell
@Leto:
Exactly. Most people will say they like what they have when it is compared with something they do not know or understand. And the way the question is phrased might have a great deal of influence.
trollhattan
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
My start would be to promise, here and now, that no Nazis or Klansmen will be part of my administration.
Then with guilt by association in mind, not one judge from the Federalist Society will be considered for nomination.
Major Major Major Major
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: yeah I think that’s an understandable decision for her as a politician but it’s still a bad one.
schrodingers_cat
@glory b: High five! And a shade of lipstick that is not the palest pale neutral. That bright red jacket was just making her look ghostly pale. I do like her glasses though. She should borrow AOC’s red lipstick.
ETA: We need to have a RL meetup. Are you in NJ or I am mixing you up with someone else.
gvg
@Kay: My suspicion, hearing these results with so few individual Republican donors, is that the rest are giving in some untraceable, unregulated way. To pacs that don’t disclose for instance, but happily at least some of it gets diverted to grift. I don’t trust such odd results.
gvg
@James E Powell: After seeing how the GOP has attacked the ACA and all kinds of healthcare coverage the last 10 years, I am afraid to try to build something radically new. The current system made allies of already existing institutions and people. I think it would be easier for a backlash to develop for something totally new and the backlash elected do a more effective job of screwing people to death. I really would be afraid, more afraid than before ACA, to “get rid” of the current system. We need to improve, not reinvent the wheel.
I am sorry about that, because our byzantine system drives me crazy, but we are 10 years on, and I guess I have learned people don’t appreciate new things like they logically should.
The Moar You Know
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: They’re backing Biden. People here might want to think about why that might be.
And on the subject of Biden, damn, Castro is an asshole. If I wanted that kind of behavior out of the person I vote for I’d just vote for Trump because he is far better at it.
schrodingers_cat
@gvg: It was not until 2011 that ACA went online and TBH I liked Massachusetts system way better than I like the ACA. Overhauling the entire payment structure for one of the biggest sectors of the economy is not going to be a cakewalk, even if everyone was in agreement.
sheila in nc
@geg6: Re lack of T donors in the database: Perhaps a higher percentage of R’s are donating to PACs rather than candidates.
glory b
@Leto: @Leto: Yes, but that warm, fuzzy feeling didn’t translate into more overall support.
And, as I understand was reported in the FYNYT, black people are simultaneously the most reliable and most conservative dems.
glory b
@schrodingers_cat: I’m in Pittsburgh, work in geg6’s turf. Beaver, Butler, Lawrence and Mercer counties.
glory b
@The Moar You Know: here’s another thing, I don’t think people realize how many people have good paying jobs in the health care, insurance and banking Industries. In Pittsburgh, there are platoons of Millennials and younger people, of all colors, catching buses into downtown office buildings or working in suburban office parks who don’t have degrees but managed to make a good living working in those Industries. I have two friends and a relative who moved from customer support positions (none of them have degrees either) into management. One became a VP, with 2 years of college. I think that no one is thinking about how those folks are going to vote. Will they vote for somebody who will do away with their jobs?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@schrodingers_cat:
IIRC it was fall 2013.
Cacti
@Amir Khalid:
For all of the plans she has, her healthcare plan is cribbed from Bernie.
If she had one of her own, she could probably articulate it better.
J R in WV
@Nicole:
Ok, so now you’re bragging about your treasonous sharing of thoughts elsewhere than B-J??? Twitters? Wonkette?!?!?!?
LEast you can do is repost them here~!
//s
;-)
J R in WV
@Nicole:
OK, NOW you are forgiven. That’s hysterical.
Omnes Omnibus
@schrodingers_cat: Thank you for the Econ 101 lesson. I understand that there are few economic justifications for trade barriers. There, however, are many non-economic reasons for trade restrictions. Politics, human rights, national security, etc. All it takes is a decision that the other reasons for trade restrictions be seen as more important than the drag on the economy. Some these decisions are good and others are not.
Trump doesn’t understand either international trade or international politics. His decisions on the subject will always be stupid.
J R in WV
@Ken:
“Less than two years to be trained!”? It took twenty minutes after inauguration!
schrodingers_cat
@Omnes Omnibus:
Agreed 100% and on this happy note of agreement, we can close this discussion.
@glory b: I have been to Philly several times but not to Pittsburgh.
J R in WV
@Baud:
That only applies to the 57 people who have a family doctor, though!
NY Robbin
@Kay:
I don’t doubt it, but I don’t know that that’s anything to brag about.
sigyn
@bemused: @geg6: Same!……Huh!!?!
MisterForkbeard
@Major Major Major Major: I’m in the same position except that I also really like Harris. I do have some concerns about her campaign’s inability to control the narrative and/or media attention, and I’m also concerned about the extremely high amount of trolls and wankers I see on her facebook/twitter threads.
For some reason, rightwing trolls seem REALLY triggered by her. They’re far more racist, sexist, and otherwise deplorable than they seem to be with other candidates.
Dan B
@Kay: Thanks for your comments on Warren’s trade policy. Protectionist seemed out of character for her but I could see protecting unions and human rights as in sync. It would make sense if there were a misinformation campaign by a Koch/right wing or Russian FSB outfit(s). Makes more sense . A “Protectionist” label would divide Democrats.
smintheus
@glory b:
DWS was doing her damnedest trying to smooth the way for Clinton’s coronation. You’d have to have been blind not to notice that.
Dan B
@Soprano2: Response to “Should we all go vegan to combat climate change?” You mean like Tom Brady and Gisele Bundchen? Lets have a serious question. Can we Americans address the climate crisis and keep a great economy? Yes we can, we’re Americans! We’ve taken on challenges before. In fact the future economy will be in green energy. Green careers are the big growth opportunity and careers that are, unlike fossil fuels, resistant to automation.
smintheus
@schrodingers_cat: If O’Rourke and Harris had offered remotely as many specific policies as Warren has done, you’d almost certainly find something they favored that you don’t. But they’re running mostly on their personalities with a lot of hand waving at policy and things they (supposedly) did or stood for in the past. Unlike Warren, their actual records in the past don’t line up all that well with their current public iterations, but I guess that’s not really important as long as they speak well.
Michael Cain
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Most of that. For an outfit like Uber, they head back to the nearest giant Uber warehouse where they get vacuumed, refueled, and park themselves until they’re needed. Run themselves through the car wash once a week. Stop at one of the repair bays when the central computer tells them to. If the cars are small electrics, refuel turns into recharge inductively while they’re parked, and most of the repair bays go away.
smintheus
@schrodingers_cat: Oh FFS, as a private person Warren stared down Obama repeatedly with regard to holding financial institutions accountable as his Wall St. whizzes tried and failed to co-opt her. What bully has Harris ever stared down? Yes, we’ve seen her posturing at hearings and debates, but that’s a rhetorical display. Point us to some substance where she’s actually done something to back up the word pictures she paints of herself.
smintheus
@Leto: The great majority of people who have private insurance, at any given time, have never had to use it except for relatively normal and modest medical issues – particularly because insurance plans change all the time. So their opinions about their own plans are largely useless: what they’re really saying is that they’re happy to have the appearance (or feeling) of having good insurance. When people do have to rely upon private insurance for something big or prolonged or expensive, often their attitudes change in a hurry because their earlier perceptions about their plans turn out to be overly optimistic.
JAFD
@Michael Cain: Interesting bit about trials of driverless vehicles in London
http://diamondgeezer.blogspot.com/2019/09/capri-mobility.html
(Note: if you’re interested in English transport, etc, ‘diamondgeezer’ is first-class timesink.)