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You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2020 / Repub Stupidity Open Thread: Cue the Nano-Violin Orchestra!

Repub Stupidity Open Thread: Cue the Nano-Violin Orchestra!

by Anne Laurie|  July 13, 20206:26 pm| 178 Comments

This post is in: Election 2020, Grifters Gonna Grift, Open Threads, Proud to Be A Democrat, Republican Venality, Republicans in Disarray!, Trump Crime Cartel, Riveted By The Sociological Significance Of It All, Schadenfreude

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Not the biggest thing in the world right now but in the Before Time I don’t recall campaign managers describing other folks in the campaign as “anonymous cowards” in an on-the-record statement. https://t.co/iuoDkWf8yz

— Daniel W. Drezner (@dandrezner) July 12, 2020

They’re just… bad at their highly-compensated jobs. Parscale at least has the excuse, such as it is, that he’s too busy grifting to put any real energy into his work. But his detractors (hi, Jarvanka!) sending out ‘anonymous leaks’ about how Dear Leader totally sees through that terrible Death Star dude is just… amateur. If only they’d had the luxury of hiring a real campaign manager, and not just some code jockey bent enough to serve as a conduit for the GRU!

And when the Permanent GOP Party — as embodied by Steve Guest — decides to step in and Show How It Is Done… Well, in a climate where the old rules applied, the Biden campaign would have to cite Guest’s tweets as an in-kind contribution.

First, Mr. Parscale’s problems, per the Washington Post:

Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale had an unusual cameo in the president’s first television ad of the year: Sandwiched among images of President Trump and Vice President Pence, the bearded Parscale appears twice, taking a selfie with supporters and hugging girls in red ball caps.

It was an unprecedented use of an ad — one that cost $142,655, according to the firm Advertising Analytics — to promote a campaign staffer. It sent a clear message to Trump’s orbit: Parscale, a colorful and outspoken public face of Trumpism, was the leader of the campaign.

But the image concealed a more complicated reality. As Trump’s reelection effort struggles, Parscale, despite his self-promotion, increasingly finds himself out of favor with his boss and hemmed in by newly hired staffers and recently promoted advisers, according to people familiar with the campaign.

A political novice who became a Republican celebrity after running Trump’s online ad effort in 2016, Parscale has long operated without a campaign manager’s usual autonomy, as Trump family members exert their influence.

Now Parscale’s role is being further threatened. Trump has made clear his displeasure with Parscale, especially after a disappointing rally in Tulsa, and the campaign has expanded its senior team in ways that diminish his role, according to multiple campaign and administration officials.

Trump’s new kitchen cabinet, a combination of White House and campaign employees led by White House senior adviser Jared Kushner, includes Parscale’s recently promoted deputy, Bill Stepien, and two communications aides from the 2016 campaign — Hope Hicks and Jason Miller, who was recently hired by the campaign and is increasingly seen as its principal strategist…

Parscale, 44, has long occupied a unique spot in Trump’s orbit. At 6-foot-8 with a dramatic red beard, he cuts a brash figure and is given to statements such as comparing the Trump campaign to the Death Star, a superweapon in the Star Wars movies. In many ways, his self-promotion and aggressive style mirror Trump’s.

In a statement for this report, Parscale denied any weakening of his position and rejected criticism of his performance.

“This is the same tired story being shopped every week by the same lowlife anonymous sources who are putting their own personal interests ahead of the president and his campaign, in a misguided attempt to weasel their way in to resurrect their failed and disgraced careers,” Parscale said.

But campaign and White House officials say Parscale does not always appear to understand the political dynamics of crucial swing states. In a recent meeting at RNC headquarters, an official said, Parscale asked questions about the reelection budget that suggested he did not fully grasp it. Trump and Kushner have begun interrupting him more frequently when he speaks, this person said.

Allies of Parscale say that he maintains the trust of the Trump family — including Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law — and that he continues to advise the president and travels weekly to the White House. Many on the expanded team, they said, work well with Parscale, and he is largely responsible for the massive reelection operation, with its million-plus volunteers, nearly $300 million in cash and extensive data operation.

[Translation: They can’t let him go until he releases the database passwords, not to mention the account numbers on both the ‘official’ and the actual campaign accounts.]

“Brad is absolutely the right man for the job,” said House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.). “His work ethic and command of what it takes to run a successful campaign in 2020 is second to none.”…

[And Kevin McCarthy is being set up as a fall guy, since he’s too dumb to understand his plight in time to sell out to the authorities.]

The official said the most important people in Trump’s orbit still trust Parscale. “In this town, you have a lot of people who are the political consultants who are always trying to position things,” the official said. “That is not Brad. We know he has the same intention as the family.”

That confidence, however, has not prevented internal complaints about Parscale’s frequent absence from campaign headquarters. Parscale lives in Florida, while the campaign is based in Northern Virginia. Staffers say that when they talk to him, he is often by his pool in Fort Lauderdale…

[Skilled grifters know: Never take a day off; somebody might go through your desk drawers and find the keys.]

Parscale added, “These anonymous cowards have no valid criticisms of the job I’m doing, so now they’re attacking where I sit.”

The dissent comes as several longtime Trump advisers are trying to lift the president out of his dismay over the state of his campaign.

Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie recently sent Trump a lengthy memo explaining that the president could not run the same campaign in 2020 as in 2016 and offering various ways to improve his standing. Other informal advisers, such as Chris Ruddy, the chief executive of Newsmax, have counseled the president to change course in ways that would appeal to independent-minded voters…

The amount of money that Parscale has personally earned from the campaign is undisclosed in Federal Election Commission reports, because the reports do not distinguish between the money that goes directly to him and the payments that go to his firm, Parscale Strategies, for pass-through costs.

Between September and May, those accounts paid Parscale Strategy an average of $100,905 a month. Still, the payments included multiple salaries for other people, including campaign adviser Lara Trump, who is the wife of the president’s son Eric Trump, and Kimberly Guilfoyle, a campaign fundraiser who is dating Donald Trump Jr., according to a person familiar with the situation…

That’s the problem with being a criminal enterprise like the Trump family: The only way to safely fire underlings is to have them killed. And IMO one sign that Putin isn’t as invested in the Trump / GOP campaign this year is that none of the various ‘traitors’ to the Squatter-in-Chief *have* been ‘disappeared’… yet.

Also, terrible as Parscale’s ‘Death Star / Trojan horse’ ads might be, they’re still an improvement over those of Mr. Guest, political publicity understander and Trump supporter:

Ah, @SteveGuest deleted it. Here it is for posterity. The picture was taken not long after Biden’s wife and daughter died in a car crash in the early ‘70s. Anyone with a baseline knowledge of Biden’s history knows this. The voters will remind you, Steve. pic.twitter.com/WOlWUZXguP

— Charlotte Clymer ?????? (@cmclymer) July 13, 2020

Hey @SteveGuest, why did you delete this Tweet? Don't worry, we saved it for you. pic.twitter.com/6ckd3X70mG

— MeidasTouch.com (@MeidasTouch) July 13, 2020

Trump’s camp hastens to reassure him: No way will his opponents be able to find a picture of Mr. Trump cuddling any of his young offspring! Heck, he didn’t even hold Ivanka until she was old enough to fondle inappropriately, right, sir?…

hey joe biden are you still a redskins fan pic.twitter.com/efowU483a7

— kilgore trout, suburban female understander (@KT_So_It_Goes) July 13, 2020

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Reader Interactions

178Comments

  1. 1.

    Martin

    July 13, 2020 at 6:29 pm

    How long before Haberman’s scoop that Parscale is under consideration to replace Pence?

  2. 2.

    Matt McIrvin

    July 13, 2020 at 6:30 pm

    I had that identical stocking cap at that age.

    The team still needs to change its name. Well, a lot of things need to change, but that’s beside the point.

    And, damn.

  3. 3.

    Kay

    July 13, 2020 at 6:31 pm

    Gary Fineout
    @fineout
    ·36m
    A week after his education commissioner issued an executive order that says brick and mortar schools have to be open 5 days a week (absent health officials saying otherwise)
    @GovRonDeSantis
    now says “I am not going to dictate” what school districts do. ????

    Everything they say is bullshit and that now extends even to governors. They think this is a game.
    Just chaos.

  4. 4.

    Alison Rose

    July 13, 2020 at 6:33 pm

    They’re fucking ghouls. It’s disgusting

     

    (ETA that I did not mean that f word as a verb. However, I wouldn’t put anything past these people.)

  5. 5.

    NotMax

    July 13, 2020 at 6:34 pm

    150% in favor of putting wunderkind Jared in charge.

    “An iceberg is just water, right? Give me the helm and I can ram this sucker right through it.”

    //

  6. 6.

    debbie

    July 13, 2020 at 6:38 pm

    Wow. I guess they literally checked their humanity at the door when they joined Team Trump.

  7. 7.

    Chyron HR

    July 13, 2020 at 6:38 pm

    Heck, he didn’t even hold Ivanka until she was old enough to fondle inappropriately, right, sir?…

    The girl in that picture doesn’t look anything like Ivanka, you lying libs.

  8. 8.

    NotMax

    July 13, 2020 at 6:39 pm

    @Alison Rose

    However, I wouldn’t put anything past these people.

    Ghouls just wanna have fun.

    :)

  9. 9.

    debbie

    July 13, 2020 at 6:39 pm

    @Chyron HR:

    That she is caressing her father’s chin is beyond creepy.

  10. 10.

    MattF

    July 13, 2020 at 6:40 pm

    If Parscale had any sense, he’d walk out. He was successful in 2016, he’s had his NYT Magazine cover article, he’s made a ridiculous amount of money— and from this point it’ll only be downhill. But he’s been sucked in, and he’s getting tied irrevocably to Trump.

  11. 11.

    mrmoshpotato

    July 13, 2020 at 6:41 pm

    @NotMax:

    Dump: Jared is tremendous at icebergs, but a total loser compared to me!  I’m the bigliest at icebergs!

  12. 12.

    dmsilev

    July 13, 2020 at 6:43 pm

    @Chyron HR: Never mind fondling his daughter. The real perversity in that photo is the bird sculpture. Somehow, Trump decided ‘two parrots fucking. That’s what’s needed here’ and managed to find a sculptor to execute that vision.

  13. 13.

    mrmoshpotato

    July 13, 2020 at 6:44 pm

    To hell with all the Trump trash!

    That is all.

    It’s burrito construction time!

  14. 14.

    The Moar You Know

    July 13, 2020 at 6:44 pm

    “odds are that this is Hunter Biden.  Or might just be some other person’s kid I’m about to smear.  Whatevs.”

  15. 15.

    rikyrah

    July 13, 2020 at 6:44 pm

    ???

    .@SenTedCruz, my dad just tested positive again for COVID after his wife, my stepmom, died last Friday from it.As you know, the virus is surging in Texas. It would help all of us if we all wear a mask in public. Will you please wear a mask out of courtesy to others? https://t.co/8Ngy1qix9F— Joaquin Castro (@JoaquinCastrotx) July 13, 2020

  16. 16.

    lamh36

    July 13, 2020 at 6:44 pm

    Lordt…today was the WORSE day for me at work since this COVID pandemic began. It had begun to taper off a bit but today was as bad as when this shit began. I was so glas when the evening shift came in and I could go home.

    My job run 2 COVID test in house. Both are considered “rapid”. One is 15 min, the other is 50 min. Two different specimen types, one more accurate than the other (the 50 min one). The 50 min test we have 8 modules for testing, so we can test at least 8 specimens (individually) at any given moment. The 15 min test we only have 2 modules, so we can only do 2 tests at a time.

    ER specimens are considered STAT and all others are mostly first come first serve. Usually the ER orders the 50 min test. We have less kits for that, so we mostly save them for ER or STAT high risk in-house patients. Occasionally, the ER will order the 15min test and in that case, the ER specimens bumps any other specimen in the line.

    Well over the weekend, the GOV mandated mask up and closure of restaurants and bars for in-house dining. Today, the damn ER was ordering the 15 min COVID test like crazy and we only have 2 mini-instruments! We were getting at least (4) 15min specimens like every hour after 12pm! That’s not counting the (2) 50min COVID test every hour from the ER. Also, we’ve got outpatient COVID specimens that had to be packaged and gotten ready for shipping to the reference lab, AND outpatient 15min COVID testing!

    All that’s not even counting the regular culture and test that are non-COVID we have to do!

    ER runner said they believe folks heard our hospital had the 15 min test if you came via the ER…so the ER was doing the 15min test for triage patients and leaving the 50min test for patients with symptoms.

    So these folks coming thru the ER for COVID testing.  Like dontcha realize ya’ll gonna have to pay for the ER visit.  The drive thru testing sites are free.  Of course our hospital pop is mostly older people and locals so they likely have medicare or medicaid and likely don’t won’t be paying for ER visit anyway, but you are getting more exposure to COVID by sitting in the ER than you would have just driving thru.  So guess what, you might be negative today, but sitting in the ER for at least 1 hour will involve exposure hto so many more people who possibly have COVID…smh.

    Ya’ll…I’m tired

    https://media.giphy.com/media/FqdruC6cJYXxC/giphy.gif

  17. 17.

    dmsilev

    July 13, 2020 at 6:45 pm

    @Kay: I think it’s more a sense of panic than anything else. Ignoring the virus clearly isn’t working, they’ve tried offering it a tax cut, and now what?

  18. 18.

    Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.)

    July 13, 2020 at 6:45 pm

    In other news, I just saw Senator Thom [sic] Tillis say that he’s confident Republicans will win this fall because people are going to remember how great things were in January.  I guess he’s hoping to wrap up the just-woke-up-from-a-ten-month-coma demographic…

  19. 19.

    L85NJGT

    July 13, 2020 at 6:46 pm

    Nobody in that campaign has the first clue on how to get to 270.

    The real issue is control of the fund raising, and the spend.

    Quality hires, all the way down.

  20. 20.

    Alison Rose

    July 13, 2020 at 6:47 pm

    @NotMax: I have a feeling sex with these people would not be much fun.

  21. 21.

    call_me_ishmael

    July 13, 2020 at 6:48 pm

    “Anonymous cowards”, eh? Who know that Parscale was an OG Slashdotter?

  22. 22.

    NotMax

    July 13, 2020 at 6:49 pm

    @mrmoshpotato

    Channeling Dagwood Bumstead?

    ;)

  23. 23.

    rikyrah

    July 13, 2020 at 6:49 pm

    @Kay:

    Not a game, muthaphucka ?

  24. 24.

    rikyrah

    July 13, 2020 at 6:50 pm

    @Kay:

     

    I just….???

     

    That phucking clown ?

  25. 25.

    Jeffro

    July 13, 2020 at 6:51 pm

    Am I correct that trumpov had a press conference at some point earlier today where he alluded to a US Senator (he said a Dem; I seriously doubt it) who was “compromised”?

    I saw the clip on Twitter and he was hinting very strongly that this person should get in line/quit asking questions.

    I did not have “trumpov openly blackmailing a US Senator on TV” on my 2020 bingo card.

  26. 26.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    July 13, 2020 at 6:52 pm

    @debbie: I had forgotten about that part of the pose; yeah, creepy.

  27. 27.

    rikyrah

    July 13, 2020 at 6:52 pm

    @L85NJGT:

    I THOUGHT the people working for Willard in 2012 were there just for the check…

    Those folks were pikers compared to this group. They are scamming 24/7/365??

     

    And, they have no talent.

  28. 28.

    Mary G

    July 13, 2020 at 6:53 pm

    I’m disappointed you didn’t also front page Steve Guest’s even worse retort to all the “triggered libs” who objected to his tweet that the child Biden is holding in the Redskins hat is probably Hunter Biden, a crackhead thrown out of the Navy for cocaine use who took millions of dollars from the Chinese Communist Party. He deleted that one too.

  29. 29.

    NotMax

    July 13, 2020 at 6:54 pm

    @Jeffro

    Turn the card over. There’s gobs of small print on the back.

    :)

  30. 30.

    Nicole

    July 13, 2020 at 6:56 pm

    I imagine there are a lot of middle aged right-winger white guys who follow Steve Guest drinking themselves into blackouts and breaking things tonight because that tweeted photo of Joe Biden is a reminder that their own dads never, ever, ever, held them like that when they were little.

  31. 31.

    cmorenc

    July 13, 2020 at 6:59 pm

    I am trying to suppress the vote.  I truly am!

    There is a person named “Katheryn” who is apparently not yet registered to vote, whom the GOP/Trump campaign organization seems to think would be a likely Trump voter, if they can get her to turn out- judging from the repeated text messages they are sending to her phone.   Only one problem: the GOP/Trump campaign mistakenly has her phone contact # wrong and their messages to Katheryn are going to me instead.

    The first time I received one of these, I was sorely tempted to text back something along the lines of “FUCK YOU ALL WITH A RUSTY PITCHFORK”, but then it dawned on me that if they received that message, it might tip ’em off they inadvertently sent it out to the wrong person – and they might be able to get in touch with Katheryn and persuade her to come out to vote for Trump.  And so, I’m going to let ’em keep on sending their messages in futile ignorance, precisely to reduce the chances likely-voter Katheryn won’t register and turn out.

    Aren’t I a terrible person?  NO.

  32. 32.

    Baud

    July 13, 2020 at 7:00 pm

    @Nicole: Just like their children will do.

  33. 33.

    rikyrah

    July 13, 2020 at 7:00 pm

    ????

    Breaking News: About 5.4 million Americans lost health insurance in the pandemic, more than have ever lost coverage through job losses in a year, an analysis found https://t.co/qyiOMUHeMm— The New York Times (@nytimes) July 13, 2020

  34. 34.

    Yutsano

    July 13, 2020 at 7:00 pm

    @Alison Rose: Too late. You put the damn concept in my head. R34 by night’s end. And no I am NOT Googling it!

    Well that was a fun first day back! But I got into almost everything. I hope. Anyway. And now I get to have a Mormon work on torturing me right after. No I’m not a masochist why do you ask?

    EDIT: Jewish privilege was trending on Twitter yesterday and I just couldn’t even be bother to figure out why. At least Velma came back for a positive reason.

  35. 35.

    rikyrah

    July 13, 2020 at 7:01 pm

    In Fauci we trust.Mask on, DC.— Mayor Muriel Bowser (@MayorBowser) July 13, 2020

  36. 36.

    Chyron HR

    July 13, 2020 at 7:03 pm

    @Nicole:

    I imagine there are a lot of middle aged right-winger white guys who follow Steve Guest

    Why would anybody follow Steve Guest?

  37. 37.

    MagdaInBlack

    July 13, 2020 at 7:05 pm

    @Nicole:

    Let us hope.

  38. 38.

    Calouste

    July 13, 2020 at 7:08 pm

    “kitchen cabinet” Appropriate description of their combined IQ there WaPo.

  39. 39.

    Yutsano

    July 13, 2020 at 7:08 pm

    @Chyron HR: That’s because you don’t know what it takes to be an Alpha Manly Man! You’re just a weak little libtard! Checkmate!

  40. 40.

    JMG

    July 13, 2020 at 7:15 pm

    In the bad at their jobs department, the state legislature Republicans of Florida had a big fundraiser last Thursday and Saturday nights. One night was attended by a lobbyist who just tested positive for Covid-19. Were there masks and social distancing at the fundraiser? Of course not! So about 8 state reps are now in for quarantine, not to mention a bunch of Republican donors.

    Ordinarily I would file this under Muntz, Nelson: Ha-Ha, but here’s the kicker. The fundraising event was at the Ponte Vedra Inn and Club in Ponte Vedra Beach outside of Jacksonville. That’s where my parents retired. They were members of that club. I first stayed at the Inn at age 16 in 1966, and even after my parents died, Alice and I still try to go there once a year (not this year, obviously). I consider some of the staff there dear family friends, and the idea they may have been exposed to the virus by this asshole fills me with total rage. These people fuck up everything, even places that LIKE Republicans.

  41. 41.

    mrmoshpotato

    July 13, 2020 at 7:16 pm

    @lamh36: (hugs) You’re doing good, essential work.

  42. 42.

    mrmoshpotato

    July 13, 2020 at 7:19 pm

    @NotMax: Shaggy and Scooby but with burritos.

  43. 43.

    Barbara

    July 13, 2020 at 7:20 pm

    @lamh36: Wouldn’t it ultimately be faster to use the 50 minute test if you get backed up on the 15 minute test? Maybe I don’t understand how it works.

  44. 44.

    Patricia Kayden

    July 13, 2020 at 7:20 pm

    Your daily reminder the Trump administration has no plan to contain the corona virus and wants to send your kids back to school without providing them with masks and gloves; while ignoring social distancing guidelines from the CDC and world health organization. #IStandWithFauci— Aaron Black (@BlackCatUnloads) July 13, 2020

  45. 45.

    geg6

    July 13, 2020 at 7:21 pm

    @NotMax:

    Yep, I fully support Jared being in charge.

  46. 46.

    lamh36

    July 13, 2020 at 7:22 pm

    @lamh36:

    I’m so tired from work and it was so busy, I never had a chance to prep possible interview answers for my Skype interview tomorrow.

    Now I’m home and I’m so tired, but I I’ve got to do this prep work…cause I want and need to do well on this interview so I can progress forward.

    I gotta get out of hospital lab work…smh

  47. 47.

    Patricia Kayden

    July 13, 2020 at 7:23 pm

    @lamh36: Thank you for doing such hard, exhausting work during this Coronavirus pandemic.  You deserve a long holiday when this is all done.

  48. 48.

    Barbara

    July 13, 2020 at 7:23 pm

    @Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.): Where do they find these people? Yeah sure, we’ll be like Dorothy waking up from a dream.  There’s no place like the Republican party, there’s no place like the Republican party . . .

  49. 49.

    L85NJGT

    July 13, 2020 at 7:24 pm

    @rikyrah:

    It’s the campaign equivalent of the Fyre Festival.

  50. 50.

    Baud

    July 13, 2020 at 7:25 pm

    @lamh36: Good luck tomorrow.

  51. 51.

    lamh36

    July 13, 2020 at 7:28 pm

    @Barbara: both test are PCR test.  the 15 min one is a POCT w/shorter replication cycles which makes it quicker, but not as sensitive as the 50min test and it uses a nasal swab, not as optimal.  The 50 min test is about the same PCR, just more cycles (35 min more cycles) and it uses the optimal specimen (Nasopharageal swab) it’s more sensitive.

    Therefore the 15 min test has an issue w/false negatives.

    Beside which, the 15 min test is  $100s less than the 50 min test.

    The other issue is that the we are allocuted less kits for the 50min test than the 15, we use the 50min test for inpatient or ER admissions purposes.

  52. 52.

    Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.)

    July 13, 2020 at 7:29 pm

    @Barbara:

    Where do they find these people?

    Fuck if I know.  Under rotting logs?

  53. 53.

    geg6

    July 13, 2020 at 7:30 pm

    @lamh36:
    You are truly an essential worker and I thank you for that.

    And best of luck tomorrow.  They will be lucky to get you.

  54. 54.

    Patricia Kayden

    July 13, 2020 at 7:30 pm

    It wasn’t @ProjectLincoln that cashed government checks from the PPP fund Senator, it was the Kushner family, Trump/RNC donors, and lobbyists … https://t.co/VjQiGyxPJr— Kurt Bardella (@kurtbardella) July 13, 2020

  55. 55.

    lamh36

    July 13, 2020 at 7:31 pm

    @Patricia Kayden: goodness, I need me a vacation for sure, but there’s no dang where to travel…smh.

    I usually relieve stress by taking a trip away from the city…but can’t really do that at this time.

  56. 56.

    lamh36

    July 13, 2020 at 7:31 pm

    @Baud:

    @geg6:

    thx.

  57. 57.

    Barbara

    July 13, 2020 at 7:33 pm

    @lamh36: Well, I hope you can decompress a little tonight.  I feel pretty useless most of the time but I know it must be really hard to go into the equivalent of a hurricane every day. Please take care of yourself.

  58. 58.

    Miss Bianca

    July 13, 2020 at 7:35 pm

    Open thread? Fine, great, how you all doing? I just found out that the Artistic Director of my theater got exposed to the ‘rona, he’s still waiting on his test but he’s showing all the classic symptoms, and CAN YOU HEAR ME SCREAMING FROM HERE???

    FUCK FUCK FUCK all the goddamn mouth-breathing morons who run this county and insisted we had to be OPEN FOR BUSINESS for every goddamn plague rat tourist and gun nut we can drag into town for Fourth of July and the goddamn rodeo. We had had only two – two!! – positive tests for MONTHS now, so what does that mean?

    As Shel Silverstein wrote in “Uncle Shelby’s ABZs”: “Q is for Quarantine. Ooh, that’s a big word! Do you know what it means? It means:

    COME IN KIDS – FREE ICE CREAM!”

    And that’s exactly what these fuckers decided. Now, wouldn’t it be loverly if *they* were the ones getting sick? But no, oh. no – IT’S MY FRIENDS AND COWORKERS who are getting it.

    I swear, I am just about to go fucking postal. I am so goddamn worried and enraged about Chris and his crew right now, about my other friends who got it from exposure at Ace Hardware, where I used to work, because OF FUCKING COURSE, it’s the biggest retail outlet in town and we have idiot tourists and locals coming in who won’t wear their fucking masks –

    FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK our fucking redneck shitheel county commissioners and sheriff and the assholes at the Sentinel who fucking INSISTED on having their white supremacy temper tantrum over Fourth of July. May they all go straight to Hell where they belong.

    Ugh. Rant off. I am going to go home and drink beer and weep. In some order or other.

  59. 59.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 13, 2020 at 7:37 pm

    New Biden ad. A lower key than the Lincoln Project stuff, it probably won’t give Joe and Mike the thrills up the leg, but I think it’s direct hit.

  60. 60.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 7:39 pm

    @debbie: My first thought, too.  That was a very sexual chin cradling.  shudder.

  61. 61.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 13, 2020 at 7:43 pm

    and now… along comes Mary….

    John Santucci @Santucci 1h
    MARY TRUMP NEWS – A New York judge has rejected the Trump family’s attempt to stop Mary Trump’s book, scheduled for release tomorrow via @AaronKatersky & me

  62. 62.

    Evap

    July 13, 2020 at 7:44 pm

    @JMG: we lived in Jacksonville for two years in the 60s when I was a youngster and we were members of that club!  I remember how much I loved spending the day there, which always started with a hamburger and fries at the restaurant.  Ah, memories.

  63. 63.

    Evap

    July 13, 2020 at 7:44 pm

    @JMG: we lived in Jacksonville for two years in the 60s when I was a youngster and we were members of that club!  I remember how much I loved spending the day there, which always started with a hamburger and fries at the restaurant.  Ah, memories.

  64. 64.

    Nicole

    July 13, 2020 at 7:46 pm

    @lamh36: Sending you all of the good thoughts for your interview tomorrow.  You’ve got this.

  65. 65.

    dmsilev

    July 13, 2020 at 7:50 pm

    Local headline: Orange County considers reopening schools without masks or increased social distancing

    Idiots.

  66. 66.

    David Koch

    July 13, 2020 at 7:51 pm

    Who?

  67. 67.

    cain

    July 13, 2020 at 7:53 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    @NotMax: I have a feeling sex with these people would not be much fun.

    you had to go there, didn’t you?

  68. 68.

    L85NJGT

    July 13, 2020 at 7:53 pm

    Biden won Puerto Rico and Louisiana, leaving only Connecticut on 8/11 to close out the presidential primaries.

  69. 69.

    jl

    July 13, 2020 at 7:54 pm

    I’m available for the job, and I’d like enough easy dough to buy a second home and some fancy cars.

    And howdy, lemme tell ya, that job would be super easy for me, and the more Trump yelled at me the more I’d like it. I wouldn’t last long, but long enough to get some nice loot and buy some rich man’s toys.

    How do I apply?

  70. 70.

    MattF

    July 13, 2020 at 7:55 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I mentioned this in an earlier thread— Dahlia Lithwick puts on her thinking cap and figures out what Mary Trump is doing in her book. Very much worth reading.

  71. 71.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 7:56 pm

    @lamh36: I hope tomorrow goes great.  In the end, if you have to choose between more prep and being tired and not on your game tomorrow OR less prep but feeling bright and alert, I suggest door #2.

    Before you leave in the morning, look at the beautiful glass piece from CaseyL and the beautiful hand-painted poppy from Kattails and remember how much you are loved here.  That ought to put some pep in your step for the interview tomorrow.

  72. 72.

    JMG

    July 13, 2020 at 7:59 pm

    @Evap: Great burgers and fries at the golf club! Lunch there is a treat. Too old for a burger for lunch, but the BLTs are great, too.

  73. 73.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 8:00 pm

    Dammit, James Taylor just sent me an email asking me to donate $14 to Biden.  How the hell am I supposed to say no to James Taylor in his sweet little cap?

    I have already donated 3 times this month and I’m running out of donation money.  Bastards!

  74. 74.

    Elizabelle

    July 13, 2020 at 8:00 pm

    @lamh36:   Hugs (at 10 feet), lamh.

    And if you are a little tired at tomorrow’s interview, that just gives you cred.  Says your priorities are with your commitment to your job, during a pandemic.

    Wishing you well, and some relaxation and a good sleep tonight.

  75. 75.

    Comrade Colette Collaboratrice

    July 13, 2020 at 8:02 pm

    @cmorenc:

    “FUCK YOU ALL WITH A RUSTY PITCHFORK”

    I hope you have a calendar reminder set up to text this to them at, say, noon on November 3.

    Repeatedly.

  76. 76.

    HalfAssedHomesteader

    July 13, 2020 at 8:02 pm

    That rough patch… are they talking about the one on his head?  WTF is that?  Is there a cream that will remove it?  It looks really uncomfortable.

  77. 77.

    Alison Rose

    July 13, 2020 at 8:02 pm

    @dmsilev: I just want to know why these people hate children so much.

  78. 78.

    Alison Rose

    July 13, 2020 at 8:03 pm

    @cain: Hey, don’t blame me, I’m ace, but sometimes innuendo just can’t be ignored.

  79. 79.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 13, 2020 at 8:04 pm

    RWNJ Mom finally wore Dad out.

    This weekend, wife and I had a 30th birthday party for oldest daughter.  All daughters were in attendance, oldest and youngest brought their partners. It was sweet and sentimental.

    My mom called her to stop by today, that they had a gift for her (some ugly bracelet, as it turns out). While they were there, Dad seemed agitated and starts blurting out random comments to her partner about the need to vote Trump while liberally invoking the N word.

    He’s never been like that. I probably didn’t hear that word from his mouth more than a few times, ever, and only when prompted by my maternal grandfather who yammered on and on. He’d stopped that probably 45 years ago, and spent his career working around coaches, teachers and athletes of color. Wasn’t his way.

    Shes been marinating him in Fox fear, particularly during COVID.

    The woman knows how fragile we are, what we’ve lost due to her voting choices of a lifetime.

    Anyway, oldest daughter was genuinely upset. I’m upset, but am damned if I can figure out what to do.

  80. 80.

    Comrade Colette Collaboratrice

    July 13, 2020 at 8:07 pm

    @L85NJGT: Sincere question, while acknowledging you might not be the right person to ask:

    Why on earth would any state even bother holding a primary so late in the year? In any year, not just this incredibly weird and crazy one?

  81. 81.

    Baud

    July 13, 2020 at 8:09 pm

    @Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:

    May be other elections on the ballot.  Many states have late primaries for lower offices.

  82. 82.

    Ladyraxterinok

    July 13, 2020 at 8:11 pm

    @Patricia Kayden:

    Have you seen/heard the Jerry Brooks videos all over google? The ones I’ve watched were about schools opening.

    One was his phone call to DeVos. Second was discussion of jobs kids in class could sign up for.

    Funny. But so sad they’re depicting our reality!

  83. 83.

    Ruckus

    July 13, 2020 at 8:11 pm

    @debbie:

    That’s giving them credit that they may have had some humanity to check at the door. My premise is that they never had any, otherwise they never would even consider working for shitforbrains in the first place.

  84. 84.

    zhena gogolia

    July 13, 2020 at 8:13 pm

    @Baud:

    It’s not usually this late. It was moved because of Covid.

  85. 85.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    July 13, 2020 at 8:13 pm

    @Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: It was rescheduled from April 28th.

  86. 86.

    Baud

    July 13, 2020 at 8:13 pm

    @zhena gogolia:

    For all offices?

  87. 87.

    Jay

    July 13, 2020 at 8:14 pm

    @lamh36:

    you got this, take care.

     

    @Miss Bianca:

    every day, I take 1 second out, for mourning 100 of the people we have lost.

    The store has started doing it on the PA, in 15 minute increments, when the tills stop, and the Associates go silent.

     

    One way of beating the stupid out of people

  88. 88.

    hedgehog mobile

    July 13, 2020 at 8:16 pm

    @lamh36: Echoing many…get some rest, best of luck tomorrow, and thank you, many times over.

  89. 89.

    FelonyGovt

    July 13, 2020 at 8:19 pm

    @lamh36: Thank you for the wonderful, important and stressful work you’re doing. All the best of luck for tomorrow.

  90. 90.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    July 13, 2020 at 8:20 pm

    @lamh36: Good luck with the interview.

  91. 91.

    japa21

    July 13, 2020 at 8:22 pm

    @WaterGirl: Maybe John will give you an advance.

  92. 92.

    Joy in FL

    July 13, 2020 at 8:23 pm

    @cmorenc: I think you are a patriot.

  93. 93.

    germy

    July 13, 2020 at 8:24 pm

    Your ability to get healthcare should not be tied to your employment. If 5.4 million Americans losing healthcare insurance in three months during a pandemic doesn’t make that clear, I don’t know what will. https://t.co/dZyEuj4qJN

    — Ida Bae Wells (@nhannahjones) July 13, 2020

  94. 94.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 8:27 pm

    @MattF: That was really interesting!

  95. 95.

    SiubhanDuinne

    July 13, 2020 at 8:28 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Book should drop at, or very shortly after, midnight. I think I might turn in early tonight and wake up at 12:00 so I can download it instantly to my Kindle app and read until dawn.

  96. 96.

    Kay

    July 13, 2020 at 8:30 pm

    @MattF:

    It really is great.

    but the moment you put him in your pocket, you become his slave. It is impossible to escape his orbit without having to admit a spectacular failure in moral and strategic judgment, which almost no one can stomach. Donald Trump’s emptiness is simply a mirror of the emptiness of everyone who propped him up. It’s that reflection that becomes unendurable

  97. 97.

    piratedan

    July 13, 2020 at 8:31 pm

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: I can only offer a suggestion and as many others here who have relatives who support what we allude to as the “Dark Side” is that you speak with them, either thru e-mail or the phone and you tell them that you’ve disavowed them.  Suggest that until they stop feeding off the propaganda, that they are no longer allowed contact with you as long as they continue to bring up anything political.

    If they can’t abide by those rules, then you can tell them to write you and your spouse out of their wills because you refuse to interact with them anymore.

    You don’t have to raise your voice, in fact its better if you don’t.  Let them know that you’ve applied all of the lessons of your youth and learned to seek out the truth and to examine information from all sides and that you reject lying and racism in all its forms and as such, you can’t agree with them and who they support.

  98. 98.

    Jay

    July 13, 2020 at 8:32 pm

    Best response to Chance the Rapper’s stupit twit,

    angela davis is voting for joe biden, what do you know that she doesn’t know— ziwe (@ziwe) July 13, 2020

  99. 99.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 8:33 pm

    @japa21: That was laugh-out-loud funny!  

    It’s not helpful, however, that my summer client is a no-go because his summer business is a no-go this year because of COVID, so there goes that 20k for this year.  Oh, well.

  100. 100.

    Salty Sam

    July 13, 2020 at 8:34 pm

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: I’m upset, but am damned if I can figure out what to do.

    I’ve got similar issues with my mom and step-dad.  I finally decided that cutting off communication is the best for all involved.  Painful in some ways, blessed relief in others…

  101. 101.

    germy

    July 13, 2020 at 8:34 pm

    Here’s a thread about someone’s mom believing anti-mask propaganda. A retired nurse:

    My mom got a pulse oximeter.She asked me to put a mask on and check to see how my blood oxygen lowers.

    I put a mask on at 98% oxygenation, and it stayed at 98% while I told her that as a former nurse she should fucking know better.

    — ‏بوكيبلينكي (@pookleblinky) July 13, 2020

    I cannot overstate that she was an RN. She took college courses, she got hired, she got paid, to understand the basics of modern medicine. She's smelled C Diff. She's intubated people. She's kept charts.

    All of that knowledge and experience is gone.

    — ‏بوكيبلينكي (@pookleblinky) July 13, 2020

  102. 102.

    germy

    July 13, 2020 at 8:36 pm

    It's gone, as surely as if she had alzheimers. It's been replaced with whatever nonsense the last angry guy in sunglasses screaming at his camera from his driver's seat screamed.

    — ‏بوكيبلينكي (@pookleblinky) July 13, 2020

  103. 103.

    James E Powell

    July 13, 2020 at 8:36 pm

    @WaterGirl:

    Dammit, James Taylor just sent me an email asking me to donate $14 to Biden.  How the hell am I supposed to say no to James Taylor in his sweet little cap?

    I got the same email asking for $50. He’s got some great songs, but I was always Team Carly.

  104. 104.

    debbie

    July 13, 2020 at 8:37 pm

    FB is telling me that Business Insider is reporting that Biden is considering Jamie Dimon for a position in his administration. Just no.

  105. 105.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 8:38 pm

    @germy: That phenomenon is not only mind-boggling, but it’s also frightening.  How is it even possible that otherwise bright people believe all the lies.

  106. 106.

    germy

    July 13, 2020 at 8:38 pm

    .@edyong209: “A country that, 7 months into a pandemic, still cannot ensure that its healthcare workers have enough gowns and gloves and protective equipment is not going to be able to distribute a vaccine in an efficient way. It simply isn’t.” pic.twitter.com/9e0foFoCO3

    — Christiane Amanpour (@camanpour) July 13, 2020

  107. 107.

    germy

    July 13, 2020 at 8:39 pm

    @debbie:  Jamie doesn’t belong anywhere near government.

  108. 108.

    SiubhanDuinne

    July 13, 2020 at 8:40 pm

    @lamh36:

    I hope you get a good, restful night’s sleep. Sending you virtual hugs and very real best wishes for your interview.

    And thank you. You’re doing yeoman work at a singularly challenging time.

  109. 109.

    Kay

    July 13, 2020 at 8:40 pm

    @MattF:

    I think I see this in Trump supporters too:

    And what she reveals is a devastating indictment of all the alleged adults who stick around Donald Trump, who came together to fail America, to leave vulnerable populations to fend for themselves, and who continue to lie and spin to pacify his ego. They do it because they can’t admit the payoff is never coming, and to save themselves from the embarrassment of having to admit they were catastrophically wrong.

    What do they call that in economics? Sunk cost fallacy?

    This is harsh but I learned it practicing law and I think it’s true. Not all people who have been conned are sympathetic characters. You listen to enough of them and you realize some got conned partly because they thought they would get an edge- an unfair advantage- over others. There’s a mean edge to it that doesn’t inspire sympathy.

  110. 110.

    Comrade Colette Collaboratrice

    July 13, 2020 at 8:43 pm

    @debbie:

    FB is telling me

    I think I see the problem.

    I sincerely hope that’s not true. I mean, I’m still Team Broken Glass, but I’m not looking forward to the “sensible compromises” Biden will be urged (or will not need to be urged) to make to appeal to a mythical center

    ETA: a myth that is propped up by rich people who want tax breaks, and their media lackeys.

  111. 111.

    Elizabelle

    July 13, 2020 at 8:43 pm

    Matt F put up a link to an excellent Slate article by Dahlia Lithwick.  It’s Kay-bait, and Dahlia is way more incisive than the usual reviewers. READ THIS ARTICLE. IT IS PHENOMENAL. (Sorry for the shouting, but it is amazing. First thing that made me want to buy the book)

    Slate: Mary Trump’s Book Shows How Donald Trump Gets Away With It

    … Mary Trump begins from the assumption that other analysis tends to end with: Donald Trump is lethally dangerous, stunningly incoherent, and pathologically incapable of caring about anyone but himself. So, what Mary Trump wants to know is: What the hell is wrong with everyone around him? As she writes in her prologue, “there’s been very little effort to understand not only why he became what he is but how he’s consistently failed up despite his glaring lack of fitness.”

    The book is thus actually styled as an indictment not of Donald Trump but of Trump’s enablers.

    …. She blames [Trump’s] family that propped him up (also her family, it should be noted), and then in concentric and expanding circles, the media that failed to scrutinize him, the banks that pretended he was the financial genius he was not, the Republican Party, and the “claque of loyalists” in the White House who continue to lie for him and to him in order to feed his insatiable ego and self-delusion. Even the phrase “too much and never enough” is perhaps deliberately borrowed from the language of addiction … not just her uncle’s addiction to adulation, fame, money, and success, but a nation’s—or some part of a nation’s—unfathomable addiction to him.

    [Lithwick’s italics.]

    …. the most interesting assessments she offers are reserved for those inside the “institutions,” the people who might have saved us and certainly have not, from the nuclear family, to the Trump businesses, to New York’s bankers and powerful elites, to Bill Barr, Mike Pompeo, and Jared Kushner. They all knew and know that the emperor has no clothes, even as they devote their last shreds of dignity to effusive praise of his ermine trim and jaunty crown.

    …. In describing Fred’s growing realizing that his fair-haired boy, Donald, was a fraud, Mary explains that ….. as it became clear that Donald had no real business acumen … Mary realized that Fred also depended on the glittery tabloid success at which Donald excelled. Fred continued to prop up his son’s smoke-and-mirrors empire because, as Mary writes, “Fred had become so invested in the fantasy of Donald’s success that he and Donald were inextricably linked. Facing reality would have required acknowledging his own responsibility, which he would never do. He had gone all in, and although any rational person would have folded, Fred was determined to double down.”

    Mary Trump’s words there could just as easily be true for John Kelly, Kellyanne Conway, John Bolton, Mitch McConnell, Susan Collins, or Melania Trump.

    And — the dignity wraith explained:

    …. Trump’s superpower isn’t great vision or great leadership but rather that he is so tiny. Taking him on for transactional purposes may seem like not that big a deal at first, but the moment you put him in your pocket, you become his slave. It is impossible to escape his orbit without having to admit a spectacular failure in moral and strategic judgment, which almost no one can stomach. Donald Trump’s emptiness is simply a mirror of the emptiness of everyone who propped him up. It’s that reflection that becomes unendurable. This pattern, as Mary writes, “guaranteed a cascade of increasingly consequential failures that would ultimately render all of us collateral damage.”

    …. because [Mary Trump] was ousted rather than being forced to remove herself—that allows her to see clearly why everyone else stuck around. …. They do it because they can’t admit the payoff is never coming, and to save themselves from the embarrassment of having to admit they were catastrophically wrong.

    Elizabelle here: I would say that Trump’s voters are addicted to grievance and ugliness, which is personified through him. It is not the majority of us who are “addicted” to Trump. We are afflicted with him. But Mary Trump’s book seems superbly timed to maybe do something about that.

  112. 112.

    prostratedragon

    July 13, 2020 at 8:44 pm

    @germy:  Stepping back from it for a moment, that really is a tragedy.

  113. 113.

    Elizabelle

    July 13, 2020 at 8:46 pm

    @MattF:   I saw your link to the Slate article — loved it — and put up a lengthy excerpt.  Lithwick’s analysis is spot on, and she’s the first to take that tack rather than — “hey, did this dead guy really take the exam for Trump?  His widow says no …”

  114. 114.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    July 13, 2020 at 8:47 pm

    @WaterGirl: They appeal to a hook, it could be “you’re taxed too much” or “they’re getting T-bones on your dime and you’re not” or “think of all the children getting killed”…  Once they got the hook in, they can make you believe anything, especially as you get older.  It’s a lot like a substance abuser, the first hit is free and you keep going back for more cause it makes you feel good.

  115. 115.

    Elizabelle

    July 13, 2020 at 8:47 pm

    @Kay:   I did not describe Lithwick’s article as “Kay-bait” for nothing!

    You guys started discussing it while I was still cut and pasting.  LOL.  I am emailing that one off to my friend the clinical psychologist.  She is sick of all things Trump, but quite sure she will read this one.

  116. 116.

    Benw

    July 13, 2020 at 8:47 pm

    Those Guest tweets and that Trump image. EWWWWWWWW

  117. 117.

    Barbara

    July 13, 2020 at 8:48 pm

    @Kay: I don’t necessarily agree with this spin, not totally.  She makes it seem as if embarrassment is the most powerful force keeping them in his pocket.  I think Kelly and Mattis are in this camp. But she overlooks the power of being invested in the dream, the way his dad was, and the idea that it’s possible to extract gold from shit if you play your cards just right.  That would be Bolton and most Republican senators.  And of course, there are those whose desires are just as debased as Trump’s, like Barr, Bannon and Miller.

  118. 118.

    James E Powell

    July 13, 2020 at 8:49 pm

    @Kay:

    It is impossible to escape his orbit without having to admit a spectacular failure in moral and strategic judgment, which almost no one can stomach. (emphasis added)

    That really is the heart of the matter. CNN will never express regret for giving him billions in free air time. NYT will never admit that their constant smearing of Hillary Clinton coupled with their failure to use their own assets to tell the truth about Trump was a mistake. MSNBC will never admit that making “whatever Trump said or did” the top story nearly every show is what put him in the White House.

    None of the elites that not only allowed this to happen, but worked hard to make it happen, will ever admit they did anything wrong. Cf. Invading & occupying Afghanistan and Iraq.

  119. 119.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 8:51 pm

    @debbie: No, Joe, don’t do it.  Terrible mistake.

  120. 120.

    Kay

    July 13, 2020 at 8:51 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    You know me so well!

    But even that’s not an excuse, because everyone has done this. Everyone has fallen in with someone who is terrible and it’s hard to admit you were wrong, but you do and you go on.

    How big are their damned egos that they can’t admit they were wrong? Honestly? They’re really going to drag the rest of us down with them rather than admit that?  They’re not that important. 99% of people won’t even know or care if they admit it.

  121. 121.

    zhena gogolia

    July 13, 2020 at 8:52 pm

    @WaterGirl:

    I don’t care whether he does or not.

  122. 122.

    Baud

    July 13, 2020 at 8:52 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: This.

  123. 123.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 8:53 pm

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Only if you love to hate, and to be afraid.

  124. 124.

    germy

    July 13, 2020 at 8:54 pm

    Sunk Cost Fallacy

    We had young neighbors.  A young lady and her boyfriend.  The boyfriend was horrible.  Loud, screaming arguments.  He’d cheat on her, they’d split up, and then she’d take him back.  This went on literally for years.  She kept taking him back!

    Finally, he dumped her, and they both moved away.

    I was reminded of what Dorothy Parker asked her friend with marital problems:  “Is the fucking you’re getting worth the fucking you’re getting?”

  125. 125.

    Baud

    July 13, 2020 at 8:56 pm

    @debbie:

    Story from March.

    https://www.businessinsider.com/who-joe-biden-will-appoint-to-top-cabinet-positions-axios-2020-3

  126. 126.

    SiubhanDuinne

    July 13, 2020 at 8:56 pm

    @WaterGirl:

    I can hardly imagine that Elizabeth Warren — reportedly one of Biden’s closest and most trusted advisors — would support this.

  127. 127.

    Kay

    July 13, 2020 at 8:57 pm

    @James E Powell:

    The NYTimes would have done it again. They were well on their way to promoting the bogus Biden/Ukraine scandal. The whistleblower halted it, but that was going to happen. But for that whistleblower we’d be on Week 16 of the fake Joe Biden scandal. They already had the earnest reporter all cued up to explain why the “questions” were legitimate.

  128. 128.

    Achrachno

    July 13, 2020 at 8:57 pm

    @cmorenc: I think it would be appropriate to thank them for writing.  And perhaps ask for copies of their digital literature show your sincere interest.

  129. 129.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 8:58 pm

    @Baud: I can’t read it because I refuse to turn off my ad blocker in order to see their article.

    Does it seem like blah-blah-blah bullshit, or like they have a serious source and Biden is actually interested in someone like Jamie Dimon?

  130. 130.

    germy

    July 13, 2020 at 8:58 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne:  The purpose of facebook amplifying that old article is to scare progressives away from voting Biden.

    They need to do this, to counteract Chomsky’s and Angela Davis’s recent endorsement.

  131. 131.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 8:59 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: That’s a hopeful thought!

  132. 132.

    James E Powell

    July 13, 2020 at 8:59 pm

    @Kay:

    Every day I pray for the demise of the New York Times. I’ve hated them since the 90s.

  133. 133.

    trollhattan

    July 13, 2020 at 9:00 pm

    @MattF:

    Great piece by Lithwick and her highlighting of the unique aspect of this book’s perspective seems on target (says person who has not read it).

    Having dealt with full-bore narcissists I know better than to put one in charge. The shame lays heavy upon those to do so, gladly, then defend their poor choice to the bloody end. Their choice, our blood.

  134. 134.

    Baud

    July 13, 2020 at 9:01 pm

    @WaterGirl:

    Blah blah blah.

    It was an Axios story that BI re-reported

    https://www.axios.com/joe-biden-cabinet-vice-president-picks-b17882ac-3953-450f-8afb-38a3c8dcda57.html

  135. 135.

    Kay

    July 13, 2020 at 9:01 pm

    @James E Powell:

    I maintain that if Donald J Trump had been a strip mall developer from Arkansas the NYTimes would have had very little interest in propping him up. The geography mattered.

  136. 136.

    Baud

    July 13, 2020 at 9:02 pm

    @germy:

    The purpose of facebook amplifying that old article is to scare progressives away from voting Biden

    Same with Trump’s tweets in the OP.

  137. 137.

    tom

    July 13, 2020 at 9:02 pm

    @lamh36:  A good friend of mine is a lab tech for a large hospital system here in Michigan, and shares similar stories. Y’all are saints.

  138. 138.

    raven

    July 13, 2020 at 9:04 pm

    We just finished season 4 of “Better Things”. It was really enjoyable and, about two weeks ago, I asked my LA SIL if she knew all the music because I was clueless. She said she knew a lot but not all of it. The last song of the last episode was Nightswimming by the homeboys!

  139. 139.

    Captain C

    July 13, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    @James E Powell: NYT will never admit that their constant smearing of Hillary Clinton coupled with their failure to use their own assets to tell the truth about Trump was a mistake.

    FTFNYT may not even think it was a mistake.

  140. 140.

    Elizabelle

    July 13, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    LOL.  A little further down the page from Mary’s Trump’s book:  Amazon’s suggestions:

    Donald Don’t Grab that Pussy is a beautifully illustrated 24 page book finishing up with an activity where your child names animals. Through the guidance of Michelle Obama and her animal friends, young Donald Trump learns to use his tiny hands in a kind way that promotes the importance of treating life with respect and care. Your children will love this fun spirited accessory for any library or coffee table. Animals Donald meets: Pussy Cat Rex the Dog Hamster Pony (At the Covfefe Ranch) Bird Now with a Pot Belly Pig!!!

    Yeah, it’s for kids.

  141. 141.

    WaterGirl

    July 13, 2020 at 9:06 pm

    @Baud: Glad to know that.  Germy’s theory makes sense, too.  Dampen the enthusiasm of progressives for Biden.

    The trouble is, the other alternative is Trump, and any true Democrat, let alone a progressive, isn’t about to stay home this year.

  142. 142.

    James E Powell

    July 13, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    @MattF: 

    Dahlia Lithwick puts on her thinking cap and figures out what Mary Trump is doing in her book. Very much worth reading.

    Has Trump tweeted anything about this book?

  143. 143.

    Elizabelle

    July 13, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    @Captain C:   The Sulzbergers loved it!

    Clinton Derangement Syndrome is a must for hiring onto their political reporting desk.  We were treated to it recently with the article about how Donald Trump handled the Access Hollywood tape.

    Surprise!  Article was all about Bill Clinton and HIS accusers.

  144. 144.

    Kay

    July 13, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    @James E Powell:

    May of 2019:

    But new details about Hunter Biden’s involvement, and a decision this year by the current Ukrainian prosecutor general to reverse himself and reopen an investigation into Burisma, have pushed the issue back into the spotlight just as the senior Mr. Biden is beginning his 2020 presidential campaign.

  145. 145.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 13, 2020 at 9:08 pm

    @Baud: I’m sure there are people around Biden who think Dimon would a humdinger of an appointment, and they’re just the sort of people who would have an Axios reporter on their speed dial under “Off The Record.”
    Biden’s superpower seems to be finding the center of the Democratic Party, over the course of almost fifty years. I don’t think he’s going to name Dimon to anything more influential than a blue ribbon commission, and I’m not gonna freak out if he does. Especially if Warren is at Treasury (the only position I would want to see her leave the Senate for, and even as I type that I’m less convinced.)

  146. 146.

    Captain C

    July 13, 2020 at 9:13 pm

    @Kay: “…Even though the last week has seen confirmed footage of a) Putin handing Trump a briefcase full of cash, and b) [unspeakable horrors involving Trump and {choose a victim}], we have to ask, is that really worse than the still-unconfirmed rumors coming out of the Ukraine involving Hunter Biden?” — alternate universe Maga Habs and Glenn “Harrassment is Cool” Thrush

  147. 147.

    Elizabelle

    July 13, 2020 at 9:13 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne:   We await your verse about the redoubtable Mary Trump’s book.

  148. 148.

    Captain C

    July 13, 2020 at 9:14 pm

    @Kay: If Trump had been a strip mall developer from Arkansas, he’d either be dead from bad eating habits or on his third prison term for fraud by now.

  149. 149.

    Ruckus

    July 13, 2020 at 9:15 pm

    @Salty Sam:

    I have a close relative that I’ve cut off all communications/contact with, not because of politics, although that’s quite probable a secondary reason. It’s for my mental health, which is important to me, there are no longer any family members to act as a buffer, which we used to do for each other. This situation has been going on for decades and I didn’t do this for a long, long time until I asked myself one day, to list the priorities for and against remaining in contact. The only for was blood relative. Every other reason was an easy and strong negative. Sure we have a concept in humanity for always remaining there for each blood relative. But what exactly does that mean? How far does yes – contact, no – my mental health and well being extend? If the other person(s) have made a choice(s), especially that has strong potential to end up harming you, are you obligated to continue contact? My answer is of course it depends, on the person, on the reason, on the downside. For me the downside was remaining in contact. It won’t be that for everyone, it won’t be depending on who the other person is and the rest of the relationship.

  150. 150.

    Ruckus

    July 13, 2020 at 9:18 pm

    @debbie:

    I second that NO vote for Jamie Dimon having any position, input in the next administration.

  151. 151.

    Kay

    July 13, 2020 at 9:20 pm

    @Captain C: 

    I was really naive. I thought “this is their backyard! They’ve known this guy for 50 years- they’ll uncover the dirt and bury him with it”
    Then….nothing.

  152. 152.

    James E Powell

    July 13, 2020 at 9:26 pm

    @Captain C:

    FTFNYT may not even think it was a mistake.

    I am certain they do not. I’ve never seen anything other than NYT employees insisting they did a great job.

  153. 153.

    Ruckus

    July 13, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    @debbie:

    I just went to the BI website and didn’t see any thing about this. I’d bet I didn’t look at every page/word written but I saw zip. Of course someone else will go and see it in the first 30 seconds……

  154. 154.

    James E Powell

    July 13, 2020 at 9:28 pm

    @Kay:

    If I recall correctly, right before the whistleblower’s report, that guy Vogel was teasing ‘big story coming’ – Is he still on campaign coverage?

  155. 155.

    Ruckus

    July 13, 2020 at 9:34 pm

    Also on the BI website was an update on the navy ship fire in SD. One of the high officers stated that they will save the ship. But they now have 400 sailors fighting and they can only spend about 15min per as the heat is over whelming. Also something I hadn’t considered is that work hoses/lines/cables are running all through the ship so no watertight doors can be closed and the ship is listing to one side due to all the water being pumped in. An admiral who has captained one of these ships, or been involved in some way says they aren’t getting it back, it’s 23 yrs old and the cost to fix it after this would basically be good money wasted. He said build another newer model and be done with it. After reading that and seeing the pictures I’d agree with that assessment.

  156. 156.

    Another Scott

    July 13, 2020 at 9:43 pm

    @dmsilev: Obligatory – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9T1vfsHYiKY&t=0m37s

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  157. 157.

    jnfr

    July 13, 2020 at 9:46 pm

    @lamh36:

    Thank you for taking the time to write it out. Take care as best you can, please.

  158. 158.

    SiubhanDuinne

    July 13, 2020 at 9:47 pm

    @Elizabelle:

    Ha! I’m not sure whether it’ll lend itself to lazy doggerel/parody, but if I’m inspired I might come up with a quatrain for you.

    :-)

  159. 159.

    SiubhanDuinne

    July 13, 2020 at 9:53 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I don’t think he’s going to name Dimon to anything more influential than a blue ribbon commission, and I’m not gonna freak out if he does.

    Even so, I think I’d want Katie Porter as a member of that commission to serve as a counterbalance.

  160. 160.

    debbie

    July 13, 2020 at 9:55 pm

    @Baud:

    Still, I’ll feel better when Biden’s dance card is filled with other names.

  161. 161.

    joel hanes

    July 13, 2020 at 10:01 pm

    @cmorenc:

    I got a text message today that said it was from Newt Gingrich.   It said he hadn’t heard from me, and wanted to make sure that I was going to vote for Trump, because (lies).

  162. 162.

    Citizen Alan

    July 13, 2020 at 10:04 pm

    @Baud: Ya know, after actually reading the article, I think it would be kjind of hilarious to see Jamie Dimon working at Treasury under Secretary of Treasury Elizabeth Warren.

  163. 163.

    joel hanes

    July 13, 2020 at 10:05 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    The Association saw what you did there.

    One of their better songs, too …  Cherish is so mawkishly saccharine.

  164. 164.

    joel hanes

    July 13, 2020 at 10:11 pm

    @debbie:

    Business Insider says a lot of shit.

  165. 165.

    Elizabelle

    July 13, 2020 at 10:15 pm

    @joel hanes:   Yeah.  Do recall: Business Insider are the ones who bit on Tara Reade’s story (remember that one)?

  166. 166.

    artem1s

    July 13, 2020 at 10:16 pm

    @Kay:

    Not all people who have been conned are sympathetic characters.

    I found it’s pretty true that you can’t con an honest man

  167. 167.

    Gvg

    July 13, 2020 at 10:16 pm

    @SiubhanDuinne: I had to go google Dimon. So much has happened and i’m Not good with names. Wiki says he had some kind of heart surgery in March and is still recovering, not running the Bank. It doesn’t sound like he’s up for any big jobs. FWIW

  168. 168.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 13, 2020 at 10:27 pm

    @Elizabelle: they had a lot of company: Chris Hayes, Rebecca Traister, Elizabeth Breunig…. a veritable organic co-op of some of the finest hipster progressives in Brooklyn!

  169. 169.

    Ken

    July 13, 2020 at 10:31 pm

    @Ruckus: I’m assuming it was arson for the insurance, but that’s just because Trump is nominally in charge of the military.

  170. 170.

    Tehanu

    July 13, 2020 at 11:14 pm

    That’s what Brad Parscale looks like? Yeesh, what a creep.

  171. 171.

    Brantl

    July 13, 2020 at 11:28 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: It’s too cerebral for the American public. I have to admit, it scared the crap out of me.

  172. 172.

    Ksmiami

    July 13, 2020 at 11:43 pm

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: cut your parents off for awhile- it tends to have an effect

  173. 173.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    July 14, 2020 at 12:16 am

    No way will his opponents be able to find a picture of Mr. Trump cuddling any of his young offspring!

    Ok, I didn’t need to see that.

  174. 174.

    NotMax

    July 14, 2020 at 12:36 am

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Rare footage of him with one of his sons.

    ;)

  175. 175.

    Captain C

    July 14, 2020 at 1:01 am

    @Kay: I suspect it was a combination of “hey, everyone knows what a crook and a joke this guy is!” while not quite realizing that the rest of the country knows him only from The Apprentice, WWE, Robin Leach, and Howard Stern bragfests (maybe a few with vague memories of the USFL), with the FTFNYT being what it is, the Post being a perpetually money losing Murdoch mouthpiece, and the News probably not being that well known outside the Tri-State area.

  176. 176.

    Amir Khalid

    July 14, 2020 at 3:18 am

    @WaterGirl:

    You’ll have to scrounge something up, because no one has the heart to deny Sweet Baby James.

  177. 177.

    WaterGirl

    July 14, 2020 at 7:34 am

    @Amir Khalid: No kidding!  He’s their secret weapon, apparently.

  178. 178.

    J R in WV

    July 14, 2020 at 3:35 pm

    @Ruckus:

    Admirals always want to bet on the dunk cost fallacy, that’s part of why the Navy is so messed up right now. The senior decision makers are not clear thinkers… they spend a to of money on science fiction BS — which is why the USS Ford is a joke — and they can’t afford to properly crew their front line warships.

    The Bonnehomme Richard is as dead as any ship we have ever seen that wasn’t lying on the bottom of the Pacific!! Ships in the yard are totally vulnerable, welder cables, hoses, all that. I spent a year on a 1944 sub tender that was in service until…1980! IN ’72 it spent nearly a year in Mobile Bay for hull work and Ingalls at Pascagoula MS.

    We watched another ship across the bayou burn for hours when a welder started burning rods above a bilge full of waste bunker fuel. It was handled in just a few hours, but was quite a mess. This ship is a total wreck. Just replacing all the electronics, the bridge, the radars, the missile launchers — nope she is done for.

    Rename one of the ships in the construction pipeline. If it wasn’t for the million gallons of fuel in the bunkers I would think they should tow it out and sink it right away.

    And which admiral decided to send a ship to the yards full of fuel? Pennywise, pound foolish, just like sending those destroyers out short handed! Should be cashiered! Never the correct decision to cut corners in the military, never ever!

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