Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

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

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

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

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

The GOP couldn’t organize an orgy in a whorehouse with a fist full of 50s.

You cannot shame the shameless.

Ah, the different things are different argument.

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

“woke” is the new caravan.

“And when the Committee says to “report your income,” that could mean anything!

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

You can’t love your country only when you win.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

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

You are here: Home / Politics / Impeachment Inquiry / Saturday Morning Open Thread: Once Again, with Feeling — Repubs in Disarray!

Saturday Morning Open Thread: Once Again, with Feeling — Repubs in Disarray!

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The things that matter!

… In this shift in strategy to defend Trump, these Republicans are insisting that the president’s action was not illegal and does not rise to the level of an impeachable offense as the Democratic-led House moves forward with the open phase of its probe.

But the shift among Senate Republicans could complicate the message coming from Trump as he furiously fights the claim that he had withheld U.S. aid from Ukraine to pressure it to dig up dirt on a political rival, even as an increasing number of Republicans wonder how long they can continue to argue that no quid pro quo was at play in the matter.

The pivot was the main topic during a private Senate GOP lunch on Wednesday, according to multiple people familiar with the session who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the meeting…

Foreign correspondent explains to bemused former colonizers:

… According to The Washington Examiner, Trump plans to push back against Democrats’ hearings by focusing his defense on the previously released memorandum documenting his conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. “At some point, I’m going to sit down, perhaps as a fireside chat on live television, and I will read the transcript of the call, because people have to hear it,” he reportedly said. “When you read it, it’s a straight call.”

Additionally, Trump plans to turn “read the transcript” into a shorthand slogan for his defenders, in part by selling T-shirts with the phrase printed on them.

Of course, this ignores the fact that Vindman and a slew of other Trump administration officials have already testified that Trump withheld $391 million worth of military aid to Ukraine.

Steve Schmidt, a veteran GOP campaign operative who ran John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign, told me that he thought Trump’s plan to read the memorandum aloud “doesn’t seem like it would be advisable.”

“It’s curious that the president thinks the language of the transcript exonerates him while most people see a quid-pro-quo, an abuse of power, and an incriminating statement,” he added.

Another Republican strategy graybeard, Everything Trump Touches Dies author Rick Wilson, was even less generous in his assessment of the merits of Trump’s latest messaging plan…

When told about Trump’s desire to sell “Read The Transcript” T-shirts to promote his latest defense, Wilson responded, “Of course he does, because he’s a f**king moron.”

“At some point, the conceit that Donald Trump is playing 37-dimensional chess and is a strategic genius was detonated by anybody who is paying attention,” he continued. “The political rule of ‘holes’ that says ‘stop digging’ [when one finds oneself in a hole] is one he clearly ignores and cannot internalize, so right now he’s doing things in a way that is going to increase his exposure to a whole variety of sanctions and legal challenges.

“The famous Watergate line that ‘these are not bright guys and it got out of hand,’ we are seeing it again in the age of Trump — but they’re even less bright.”

Asked whether he thinks Trump understands the gravity of what he appears to have done or the political peril in which he finds himself, Schmidt noted that he isn’t a psychologist and “it’s tough to read anybody’s mind, but circumstantially, I’m not sure that he does.”

Reader Interactions

123Comments

  5. 5.

    JPL

    Not the NYTimes

    As the impeachment hearings get more and more alarming for Donald Trump, with damning new evidence emerging every day, there appears to be increasing urgency in the parallel counteroffensives under way by the president’s team in an attempt to defend him………………………………………….The attorney general is focusing on the theory, aired on far-right conspiracy sites, and raised by Trump and Giuliani, that Ukraine framed Vladimir Putin over the US election in a complex triple-cross operation by impersonating Russian hackers. Trump and Barr have also been asking other foreign governments for help in investigating the FBI, CIA and Mueller investigators. The US president has called on the Australian prime minister Scott Morrison for assistance, while the attorney general has been on similar missions to the UK and Italy.

    The entire article for The Independent is quote worthy

  6. 6.

    RAVEN

    @OzarkHillbilly: I’ve probably mentioned that, when I agreed to a retirement/70th birthday party, my bride invited my family next weekend without telling me . The my genius brother made non-refundable airline reservations. The problem is that it’s a football weekend here and lodgings are mostly non-existent. Well I had to get over it and go ahead and try to figure it out. My brother ended up getting a place 40 miles away adn stepmom and sis 20. My sister and great niece were staying with us but last night she wrote that she fell and broke her elbow and they can’t make it!

  7. 7.

    NotMax

    If the past few years are any guide, Christmas decorations will appear in stores beginning this weekend. Blech.

  9. 9.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    Yay! The Government just banned fracking in the UK! Now admittedly it is a shameless reversal to curry favour with the voters in the upcoming election but it is still great news.

  11. 11.

    Betty Cracker

    @JPL: I read that article earlier this morning. Good God. I’ve been thinking that at some point, Republicans in Congress are going to have to embrace the crackpot theory Trump, Giuliani and now Barr have peddled worldwide. It will take a while, but just as Congressional Repubs are now being forced to admit the reality of the quid pro quo in Trump’s dealings with Zelensky, they’ll have to weigh in on that crazy theory too. It is inextricable from the Ukraine shake-down. I hope House Dems will tease that out in excruciating detail in the hearings…

  12. 12.

    low-tech cyclist

    “The famous Watergate line that ‘these are not bright guys and it got out of hand,’ we are seeing it again in the age of Trump — but they’re even less bright.”

    Hell, this gang makes Haldeman, Ehrlichman, Mitchell, Colson, Magruder, etc. look like fucking geniuses by comparison.

    “The Worst and the Stupidest.” Man, Garry Trudeau hadn’t seen nothing yet.

  13. 13.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @RAVEN: Not when I was around you hadn’t.

    The problem is that it’s a football weekend here

    DOH!

    Well I had to get over it

    Heh. Don’t we all, from time to time. :-)

    but last night she wrote that she fell and broke her elbow

    OW! Owowowowowowowowow…. My sister did that, very painful. Hers was a long time healing too. Than again, now that I think about it I think she rebroke it. Here’s hoping your sis has better luck than mine did.

  14. 14.

    Nancy

    Alternative Reality continues as long as Fox edits reality for trump true believers. The base and the power it appears to continue to hold over rupublican senators scares me.
    Otherwise, the trumpian delusion would be amusing.

  15. 15.

    ThresherK

    Who in the WaPo insists on using words like “pivot” and “strategy” for this Three Stooges short?

  16. 16.

    JGabriel

    UK Independent via Anne Laurie @ Top:

    “It’s curious that the president thinks the language of the transcript exonerates him while most people see a quid-pro-quo, an abuse of power, and an incriminating statement,” he added.

    … And extortion. And coercion. And … And … And …

  17. 17.

    maiXai66

    People who “spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the meeting…“ fail to grasp what comes for them next Fall. Their present anonymity will offer little comfort when they are unemployed by election, and the lobbyists who put them in office are not returning their calls.

  18. 18.

    Another Scott

    ‘morning all.

    Woke up to a cold home again. We’ve been having problems with our 18 year old high-efficiency furnace, off and on, for the last several years. We’ve had 3 different technicians out over the last 5 years or so, “well, it’s the board, and we can only get it as an upgrade kit, so that will be $1000 and about a week…” And the repairs seemed to work, until the next heating season or two.

    A few weeks ago, no heat again. I did some troubleshooting on my own. This time the igniter isn’t firing, and the igniter circuit isn’t putting out voltage, I can light the furnace with a match, so everything else “must be” Ok, so it “must be” the something with the igniter circuit on the board.

    I found a place to get a replacement board for $398. New igniter for $60. Install the new parts. Igniter fires up. Furnace runs. Yay! Fixed!!

    That was on Monday. Here it is Saturday and it’s acting up again – again the igniter isn’t firing, again it runs fine when started with a match.

    Grrr….

    We need a new AC as well (replaced at the same time in 2001) because it’s losing freon too fast (probably a leak in the cheap inside evaporator). Replacing the evaporator isn’t really an option because the AC uses a type of freon that’s being phased out because of the damage it does to the ozone layer, GHG, etc., etc.

    I was hoping to put off replacing all of this off until next spring, and but the fates may be conspiring against us.

    Maybe it’s just that the new igniter failed – I’ll check it later once I’m fully awake and J is up and about. I don’t want to be making too much noise while she’s trying to sleep…

    Mumble, grumble, … [/first-world-problems]

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  19. 19.

    What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?

    This is more apropos to the post downstairs – the Pelosi interview one, but since threads around here die long before I get to them…. McConnell has said on multiple occasions that he wants impeachment over by Christmas. That seems like a compelling reason to drag the testimony and House vote out past the new year. Maybe look into financial crimes if necessary to drag things out long enough. Messing with McConnell seems like a noble cause in and of itself.

  21. 21.

    Jeffro

    @JPL: @Betty Cracker: I’m hoping Nancy Smash and Adam Schiff…hell, EVERY Democrat everywhere…keep making that point and making it loudly:

    You’re about to go all-in for this guy, and ‘all-in’ means you’re supporting their crazy/corrupt cover story against our own intelligence agencies. You’re about to become an unwitting (or perhaps witting) ‘useful idiot’ for Vladimir Putin and Russia. Is that how you want to be remembered?

  23. 23.

    JGabriel

    Ah, I see. I was reading the period after five as a decimal point, rather than a separator in a numbered list. My bad.

  24. 24.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Another Scott:

    Maybe it’s just that the new igniter failed

    It probably is, but the next question is “What is causing the igniters to fail?” That’s the $1000 question. If you’re lucky.

  25. 25.

    Ken

    @NotMax: Most hardware stores had the Christmas decorations on display by early October this year.

    In related news, the area radio station that is (in)famous for going to an all-Christmas format ridiculously early, has turned it into a contest this year: Guess the day and time they switch over, and win a prize!

  27. 27.

    HinTN

    @Nancy:

    the power it appears to continue to hold over rupublican senators

    Yeah, their fear of being pushed off the gravy train and being forced to lobby the maroons that displaced them, or the Dems that defeated the maroons. That hold.

  28. 28.

    Chyron HR

    Normally I assume Republicans are being disingenuous in their arguments, but McCarthy sincerely believes the percentage of red on that map represents Trump’s 63 million votes, doesn’t he?

  29. 29.

    Ken

    @OzarkHillbilly: If it’s any consolation to McConnell, I’m fairly sure the impeachment will be over by Christmas 2020. Sorry, can’t help you with the magic pony.

  31. 31.

    raven

    @Another Scott: Our Hvac is over 20 years old and we can’t believe it made it through this brutal summer. We know it’s going to go sooner or later but all the Hvac guys say keep it until the bitter end because the new ones suck.

  36. 36.

    debbie

    Oh, FFS. Retweeting a photo of a dog has nothing to do with Trump. Grrr, it’s the dog, jackass, not you.

  37. 37.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Ken: I’m not so sure. A lot can happen between now and a final impeachment vote and I am fairly sure it will. I’d bet donuts to dollars Ukraine isn’t the only country he has pressured to interfere in a US election. Once one starts digging, there’s no telling what kind of dirt will be found and right now people seem to be lining up to testify.

    Besides, McConnell can’t control what happens in the Senate trial, Roberts will and as image conscious as that man with a life time appointment is, he’ll be very aware that history is watching every thing he does.

    Opinions may differ.

  46. 46.

    Butch Fries

    Someone wrote “legislative goals” and “Trump” in the same sentence and wasn’t overcome by hysterical laughter?

  47. 47.

    Baud

    how his tweet of the Baghdadi raid dog was his 2nd most retweeted post ever.

    Great. Now ISIS knows the identity of the dog.

  50. 50.

    Steeplejack

    @Betty Cracker:

    Here’s the other thing from last night that made me do a spit-take: “Testimony: Nunes acolyte misrepresented himself to Trump as Ukraine expert.”

    Basically, a Devin Nunes minion got embedded at the White House as the “Ukraine expert,” even though he has no experience at all. And apparently he’s feeding Trump documents and information from sources unknown.

    Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the National Security Council’s top Ukraine expert, told lawmakers that after attending Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s inauguration in May as part of a delegation led by Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Vindman had been looking forward to debriefing Trump and giving a positive account of Zelensky’s vision for Ukraine’s future.

    [. . .]

    But he was instructed “at the last second” not to attend the debriefing, Vindman told lawmakers, because Trump’s advisers worried it might confuse the president: Trump believed at the time that Kashyap Patel, a longtime Nunes staffer who joined the White House in February and had no discernible Ukraine experience or expertise, was actually the NSC’s top Ukraine expert instead of Vindman.

    Vindman testified that he was told this directly by his boss at the time, NSC senior director for European and Russian affairs Fiona Hill.

    Hill told Vindman that she and national security adviser John Bolton thought it best to exclude Vindman from the debriefing to avoid “an uncomfortable situation,” he said.

    [. . .]

    Vindman also testified that he was told Patel had been circumventing normal NSC process to get negative material about Ukraine in front of the president, feeding Trump’s belief that Ukraine was brimming with corruption and had interfered in the 2016 election on behalf of Democrats.

    That upset Vindman, along with Hill and Bolton, he testified, because they were constantly having to counter that narrative with the president.

    It’s still not clear what materials Patel was giving Trump, or where he was getting them. But he was not interacting with Ukraine experts at the State Department and Pentagon on the issue, and never had a conversation with Vindman, the NSC’s director for Ukraine, about Ukraine—or about anything for that matter, Vindman testified.

    [. . .]

    Patel had previously served as Nunes’s top staffer on the House Intelligence Committee and worked to discredit the FBI and DOJ officials investigating Russia’s election interference.

  53. 53.

    Just Chuck

    I don’t see quid pro quo in Trump’s call, not really. To me, that implies a fairly willing exchange. What I see Trump doing is criminal extortion, expropriation of federal funds, abuse of power, abuse of the legal system, and when you consider that all roads lead to Putin, a heaping helping of treason. And that is just the call itself.

    So naw, not quid pro quo.

  54. 54.

    TS (the original)

    @Ken: Given that trump minions look to be ending up in the SCOTUS deciding whether or not they have to obey subpoenas to appear before the committees, trump may have lost an election before the house completes the impeachment inquiry.

  55. 55.

    Tony Jay

    @Litlebritdifrnt:

    I saw that. Desperation indeed. I really do wonder what the Tories’ own private polling is telling them, because there seems to be – much – more nervousness about them than the public polling would call for.

  60. 60.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Real world will intrude during this Republican version of WWE as we saw with Turkey. I am sure Iran will pile on just to screw with Trump and they know he will back down.

  61. 61.

    mad citizen

    Good Saturday morning! Yes, I’m on board with phucking with McConnell at every step. The Dems will need to do a lot of educating, and I can’t help but think they need another, perhaps younger, member with great communication skills to do the explaining. I don’t have cable tv so don’t see these folks on the shows. Maybe a star emerges during the public hearings.

    Our high efficiency furnace and AC have lasted 23 years, so we know either are ready to go. Our AC had a part go bad a few weeks ago and the tech was selling us on a new system. Apparently if they discover cracks in the furnace legally they can’t fix it–carbon monoxide, etc. We have two CO detectors inside. Seems like the tech was giving away their game–“see that crack, you need a new system”.

  63. 63.

    mad citizen

    @Just Chuck: It’s funny and sad that when I do the computer-delivered harrassment training at work I think of our fired R agency head who practiced harrassment, and when I do the ethics training part of it is on “quid pro quo”, and I think of trumpov.

    Perhaps the Dems could lead on this and use the English phrase, “this for that” instead of the Latin. Educate americans, Dems! Please.

  64. 64.

    mrmoshpotato

    @NotMax:

    If the past few years are any guide, Christmas decorations will appear in stores beginning this weekend. Blech.

    Beat them back with a Festivus pole?

    “Back! Back! Back in the boxes until we’re at least a day after Thanksgiving!”

  65. 65.

    Steeplejack

    @debbie:

    I can’t find the source now, but a journalist on Twitter pointed out that because of Trump’s abysmal staffing choices and lack of communications security it would be easy to get people close to him who could feed him all sorts of misinformation about anything.

    So, great, we have not only a stupid president but a stupid president—and staff—working off bad information. What could possibly go wrong?

  66. 66.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @mad citizen: You are correct, they legally can’t fix it. Once you have a crack, it’s only a matter of time before somebody dies. I have CO detectors, but I’ll only know they work properly when they go off. Which they never have.

  67. 67.

    Cheryl Rofer

    LOL

    Smuggling gangs in Mexico have repeatedly sawed through new sections of President Trump’s border wall in recent months by using commercially available power tools, opening gaps large enough for people and drug loads to pass through, according to U.S. agents and officials with knowledge of the damage.

  70. 70.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Cheryl Rofer: It’s the *Ronco WallAway*! Pesky wall in your way? Not for long!

    Politicians have absolutely no idea what we construction workers do or how we do it. None.

    **otherwise known as a sawzall or it’s more powerful cousin called the demo saw. in this case probably the demo saw. Now that I think about it it could be just the old fashioned angle grinder, which now come battery operated too.

  72. 72.

    Sloane Ranger

    @Litlebritdifrnt: I understand that they’ve left the door open to restarting if ways of preventing earthquakes can be found.

    Wouldn’t surprise me if they suddenly discovered that a way did exist and started up again a few months after the election (if they win)

  74. 74.

    Immanentize

    @Raven:
    So what was supposed to be a sweet family surprise has turned into an aggravating hassle for all. Sounds like my family!

    And I am very sorry about your Sis. Hope she knits up soon

  76. 76.

    Amir Khalid

    I’m a bit mystified that Trump believes the Ukraine phone “transcript” exculpates him, when in fact it establishes his guilt beyond any doubt.

  77. 77.

    Sloane Ranger

    @Tony Jay: I think they’re scared that the Brexit party will peel off just enough votes to prevent them gaining an overall majority or, even worse case scenario for them, Labour gains more seats than them and forms a minority government with support from the SNP.

  79. 79.

    RAVEN

    @Immanentize: Yea, she’s just a year younger so these kinds of injuries are tough. It was never really a surprise, just that my brother made the travel arrangements without discussing it with me. Of course there is also the fun aspect it that I’ve not communicated with my half brother in over 6 years and his mom and sis are coming. Stepmom and I have never discussed it and it’s fine with me if we don’t but I’m sure it’s not a happy thing for her.

  81. 81.

    Another Scott

    @OzarkHillbilly: Well, I just checked. It’s acting exactly the same way as it was before I replaced the board. The week old igniter itself is fine (~ 55 ohms). The new igniter itself is fine (~ 50 ohms). It still doesn’t fire. The board isn’t putting out any voltage on the igniter circuit.

    And of course none of the description of operation of the board or troubleshooting discusses issues like these.

    Grrr…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  82. 82.

    MagdaInBlack

    @Raven:
    I always end up down a youtube rabbit hole when you post a music vid and I love it. I find things I’d long forgotten ?
    Thank you !

    Eta: today it was Dire Straits “Why Worry” live.

  83. 83.

    mrmoshpotato

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I’d bet donuts to dollars Ukraine isn’t the only country he has pressured to interfere in a US election.

    Bets on when we get to a tipping point? “This just in – Dump has now asked the majority of the world’s countries to create dirt on his political opponents. He also asked Narnia, Tatooine, Nambia, the animals of Antarctica and the talking planets and stars from the Storybots universe.”

  85. 85.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Raven: Which the cartels can get boatloads of even if we can’t anymore (w/o a license anyway, something else we can thank terrorists for… I have cave friends still hoarding there pre 9/11 stashes)( I think pre 9/11, might be pre timothy McVeigh and OK City)

    @Cheryl Rofer: TRUMP KNOWS ALL THERE IS TO KNOW ABOUT BUILDING!!! YOU PAY OTHER PEOPLE TO DO IT FOR YOU!

  88. 88.

    Another Scott

    @Another Scott: Ah, it looks like it’s the first stage pressure switch. “The control waits for the stage 1 pressure switch to close. When the pressure switch closes the silicon nitride ignitor is powered.”

    I’ve seen mention elsewhere that these switches can be problematic, very sensitive, etc., etc. I don’t think they’re adjustable, unfortunately… :-/

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  89. 89.

    JMG

    I’ll vote for the candidate who promises to create a federal law making it a crime to have Christmas music or Christmas decorations ANYWHERE until the day after Thanksgiving.

  90. 90.

    Chyron HR

    @debbie:

    Jesus, that gives Trump cover, doesn’t it? He was limited by what he was being told.

    “I only said what they told me to say in the perfect phone call! Then they gave me the pink starbursts and told me I said the words perfect!”

    Yeah, no, I don’t see that working.

  91. 91.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Amir Khalid:

    I’m a bit mystified that Trump believes the Ukraine phone “transcript” exculpates him, when in fact it establishes his guilt beyond any doubt.

    Allow me to explain – he’s an idiot.

    Thank you for attending my TED talk.

  92. 92.

    pat

    Re that igniter problem: We had to replace our water heater. The flame would ignite but the gizmo that determines that the flame is lit was not functioning, so the flame was extinguished. This would happen several times until finally it stayed lit.

    It was either clean the gizmo and wait for it to happen again, or spring for a new heater. “oh we haven’t installed that model for ten years.”

  93. 93.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Another Scott: AHA! You are now in the very expensive Weakest Link Territory. You spend hundreds of dollars fixing the weakest link, and a week later the next weakest link breaks. Fix that and a week later the next one breaks. Each costing a mere 3 or 4 hundred dollars, but by the time you are done fixing this pile of junk you basically have a brand new furnace!

    Which you could have had for half the money you’ll have spent.

    Sucks to be you.

  95. 95.

    Honus

    @OzarkHillbilly: yeah, cordless tools have pretty much made almost any wall obsolete. I guess you could build it out of reinforced concrete but for the cost of that you could bring everyone in Central America up here and give them a job.

    Wait a minute, I think I’m on to something here.

  97. 97.

    Another Scott

    @OzarkHillbilly: As I said, I’ve done that 3x… :-) I’m a fan of figuring out the reasons why things work or don’t and not just replacing parts. My father’s engineer brain at work.

    (He had a Volvo with issues with the AC temperature control. He diagnosed the problem, modified the circuit board, then wrote to Volvo in Sweden and told them what they needed to do to fix it. ;-)

    We’ll see how it goes. Thanks.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  98. 98.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Another Scott: Over my years in the trades I gained great respect for the practitioners of the other trades and learned to stick with carpentry. My curiosity only goes so far. Good luck scratching yours. ;-)

  100. 100.

    BruceFromOhio

    1. Impeachment and conviction won’t reverse the election. Hillary won’t be POTUS;
    2. Every member of Congress who votes won their elections;
    3. People vote; land doesn’t;
    4. Impeachment is a constitutional remedy that explicitly endorses removing a president for abuse of power.

    Presumes Republicans argue in good faith guided by values similar to Democrats.
    They don’t, and they aren’t.

    @noncarborundum: @JGabriel: These.

  101. 101.

    RSA

    People vote; land doesn’t;

    On the plus side, that map is a nice illustration of the phrase “dumb as dirt.”

  102. 102.

    Aleta

    He wants cheers from the world? Have the most retweets ever? “I have resigned.”

    Hate to be cynical but another potential positive about moving to Fla is there’s an excuse for sending moving vans stuffed with stolen objects, cash, records out of Trump Tower and the WH.

  104. 104.

    Cheryl from Maryland

    @Another Scott: I feel for you. Our 45-year-old electric furnace was acting up, and our regular technician was all for letting it die and forcing us to get a heat pump. My husband has osteoarthritis, and a heat pump does not produce the correct type of heat for his joints. We had to shame the technician into fixing it. We have now found other companies that sell furnaces and not heat pumps so we will be ready if it finally dies.

  105. 105.

    Tony Jay

    @Sloane Ranger:

    That’s my reading of it too, plus any move towards the far-right position will shed more moderate votes in the direction of the Lib-Dems. Be interesting to see if the Tories lost a lot more voters to Farage than Labour does.

    Fingers very crossed.

  106. 106.

    Tony Jay

    @Amir Khalid:

    And it finished the same way. Ha to the Ha!

    But we’re 1-0 down at Aston Villa. Not concerned, but it’s going to be tough.

    Oooh, Bobby goal ruled offside but VAR says…..offside. Wrongly. He was a mile on.

  107. 107.

    Steve in the ATL

    @RAVEN: non-southerners usually don’t know that you have to plan all fall activities around the SEC football schedule. It’s sad that their lives are so empty!

    Steve at Lake Oconee whose mother in Memphis called this morning to complain that there’s some big football thing going on there and traffic is so bad she doesn’t think she can get to the club for brunch #WorstDayEver!

  110. 110.

    trnc

    @RAVEN:

    Well I had to get over it and go ahead and try to figure it out. My brother ended up getting a place 40 miles away adn stepmom and sis 20. My sister and great niece were staying with us but last night she wrote that she fell and broke her elbow and they can’t make it!

    Sorry to hear about your sister, but maybe now your stepmom and other sister can stay with you and your bro can get the place 20 miles away?

  111. 111.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @NotMax: As of 30 October, the stores in metro Baltimore** were already inundated with Xmas crap. Thank doG for Halloween or the Sanity Clauses & candycanes would go metastatic the day after Labor Day…

    ** Just FTR, it annoys me to no end that so many on this blog are utterly paranoid about telling anyone where they are. I see posts that say “It’s snowing here” & I want to ask “So where is here?” but the combined forces of Jackaldom always retaliate with accusations of sinister motives. FFS, no one wants to “out” you, but without a hint of where you are within 100 miles or so, a geographically-specific post isn’t much better than a stringless kite…but I guess yinz’d rather cause confusion than reveal anything about your identities IRL. Either that, or you figure that all the Kewl Kidz know where you are & the rest of us can fuck the hell off. /rant

  113. 113.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Uncle Cosmo: my nym and frequently adjusted signatures are designed to be forthright and helpful to all.

    You’re welcome.

    Steve at Lake Oconee, approximately 90 miles east of Atlanta and near the town of Eatonton, Georgia, where it’s sunny and 60 degrees, a perfect day which I will waste by sitting inside watching a football game, but it’s a very, very important game

  114. 114.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Ken:

    Guess the day and time they switch over, and win a prize!

    Had a long talk Thursday evening with a 50ish guy working at the IKEA NE of Baltimore who said he’d worked retail most of his life. (Apparently for them it’s one of the slowest nights of the year, so we had plenty of time to chat.) He told me that pretty much everywhere he’s worked, stores put in their final orders to suppliers for Christmas stock by 2 October, & that’s it – nothing additional can be expected before 25 December, & whatever they run out of is out. Dunno if that directly applies here, but I thought it was an interesting tidbit to toss in.

  115. 115.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @TS (the original): Grandchildren (so this eternal bachelor has been told) are your reward for not having murdered your children under the all-too-frequent circumstances when any impartial jury would agree they richly deserved it.

  116. 116.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Steve in the ATL: Don’t think it’s not repreciated for its rarity around here.

    OTOH (IIUC) you’re a leagle egal paid by eeebil managements to fuck over labor unions. This brings to mind my Nanjing tailor, Yu Suk.

  118. 118.

    Dev Null

    @Uncle Cosmo: Some of us are paranoid because we don’t want our Spousal Units to guess that we’re slumming with jackals.

    IOW: It aint about you.

    /snark

    (Hmm, perhaps the phrase should be “Spousal Unit (singular)”, but … assumptions …)

  119. 119.

    Steeplejack

    @Uncle Cosmo:

    Just FTR, it annoys me to no end that so many on this blog are utterly paranoid about telling anyone where they are. I see posts that say “It’s snowing here” & I want to ask “So where is here?”

    Amen. Even just a “southeast Indiana” or “north of Houston” gets it in the ball park without compromising personal security.

    —Steep in NoVA (Falls Church!)

  121. 121.

    pluky

    @joel hanes: I won the chemistry prize in high school by successfully initiating a thermite reaction (starting from a formula in one of my army officer father’s munitions books). I knew I was close when the teacher told me to take the apparatus out to the parking lot (the deal was I could try this, but had to check in with him at each stage of the process). Quite something! Burned through the crucible, and the asphalt paving down to the dirt base!

  123. 123.

    Another Scott

    @Another Scott: If anyone is curious, …

    It turns out everything was working properly, except the igniter relay on the board. The igniter draws at least 2.5A at 120 V (55 ohms), and the relay on the board is only rated for 2.0A. So, the relay eventually (sometimes many months, sometimes a few days) burns out.

    :-/

    I installed an external solid-state relay ($11.50 from Amazon) to take as an input the IGN 120V ac signal from the board, then had the output of the SSR power the igniter (via a separate 120 V ac circuit). Then installed a new circuit board (to replace the one with the bad IGN relay). Fired up first time. Works fine. Yay!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

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