Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. keep building.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

People identifying as christian while ignoring christ and his teachings is a strange thing indeed.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

Donald Trump found guilty as fuck – May 30, 2024!

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

The choice is between normal and crazy.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Alternative history is always a weak argument. Always.

The real work of an opposition party is to hold the people in power accountable.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

Let’s show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

I really should read my own blog.

Everyone is in a bubble, but some bubbles model reality far better than others!

Everybody saw this coming.

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

It looks like winning debates is a black job!

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

You are here: Home / Elections / Biden For President / Thursday Morning Open Thread: Vote for Joe Biden — He’s Not Criminally Stupid

Thursday Morning Open Thread: Vote for Joe Biden — He’s Not Criminally Stupid

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***********

I do not even pretend to understand bitcoin (or to sympathize with those who think they do), but anybody who fell for this latest scam pretty much deserved to be robbed:

Which doesn’t excuse Twitter for leaving this kind of security hole open, of course! (Yes, I am indeed a prolific user of Twitter embeds, but I still haven’t actually joined. And not just cuz it’s so popular, although mostly… )

Reader Interactions

183Comments

  5. 5.

    2liberal

    Selected quotes from Hunter Thompson’s “Hell’s angels: A strange and terrible Saga” which was published in 1967. Where it says “Hells Angels” I’ve been mentally substituting “Trump voters”

    Now, looking for labels, it is hard to call the Hell’s Angels anything but mutants. They are urban outlaws with a rural ethic and a new, improvised style of self-preservation. Their image of themselves derives mainly from Celluloid, from the Western movies and two-fisted TV shows that have taught them most of what they know about the society they live in. Very few read books, and in most cases their formal education ended at fifteen or sixteen. What little they know of history has come from the mass media, beginning with comics … so if they see themselves in terms of the past, it’s because they can’t grasp the terms of the present, much less the future. They are the sons of poor men and drifters, losers and the sons of losers. Their backgrounds are overwhelmingly ordinary.

    There is an important difference between the words “loser” and “outlaw.” One is passive and the other is active, and the main reasons the Angels are such good copy is that they are acting out the day-dreams of millions of losers who don’t wear any defiant insignia and who don’t know how to be outlaws. The streets of every city are thronged with men who would pay all the money they could get their hands on to be transformed—even for a day—into hairy, hard-fisted brutes who walk over cops, extort free drinks from terrified bartenders and thunder out of town on big motorcycles after raping the banker’s daughter. Even people who think the Angels should all be put to sleep find it easy to identify with them. They command a fascination, however reluctant, that borders on psychic masturbation.

    In the terms of our Great Society the Hell’s Angels and their ilk are losers—dropouts, failures and malcontents. They are rejects looking for a way to get even with a world in which they are only a problem. The Hell’s Angels are not visionaries, but diehards, and if they are the forerunners or the vanguard of anything it is not the “moral revolution” in vogue on college campuses, but a fast-growing legion of young unemployables whose untapped energy will inevitably find the same kind of destructive outlet that “outlaws” like the Hell’s Angels have been finding for years. The difference between the student radicals and the Hell’s Angels is that the students are rebelling against the past, while the Angels are fighting the future. Their only common ground is their disdain for the present, or the status quo.

  6. 6.

    debbie

    @TS (the original):

    Yeah, but would they even be following the libtard accounts? I can’t imagine they’d be caught dead following Obama.

    Last night, BBC interviewed someone who said people were really upset that Twitter hadn’t notified everyone about the hack and instead had tried to quietly fix it in the background.

  10. 10.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Houston Texans wide receiver Kenny Stills was arrested and charged with a felony during a protest at the home of Kentucky’s attorney general.

    Stills, 28, was charged with intimidating a participant in the legal process, which is a felony, according to the Louisville jail’s booking log. The log shows Stills was booked at 11:36pm local time Tuesday and was one of 87 participants arrested after marching to the home of the attorney general Daniel Cameron to protest the shooting death of Breonna Taylor.

    Stills also was charged with misdemeanor disorderly conduct and criminal trespass.

    A statement issued by Louisville Metro Police indicates protesters were “given the chance to leave” Cameron’s home before being arrested.

    All 87 protesters face similar charges, per the department statement, for attempting to “influence the decision of the Attorney General with their actions”.

    Silly BLM protesters, if they had been white, wearing body armor, and carrying AR-15s with extra mags, they would have been peaceful protesters exercising their rights to free speech, of assembly, and to petition their govt.

    ETA: also, if only they’d been rich people making campaign and Superpac donations.

  11. 11.

    TS (the original)

    @debbie:

    Yeah, but would they even be following the libtard accounts? I can’t imagine they’d be caught dead following Obama.

    Given some of the replies to President Obama’s tweets, I have no doubt that there are some deplorables following him. But my comment purely relates to the fact that there are so many people around  who were taken in by trump, I’m not surprised that this scam caught some folks.  To me trump is the biggest scammer of the 21st century.

  13. 13.

    Starfish

    @debbie: Even if you paid for a product, employees of a company can make mistakes. These online systems are complex. One thing we learned yesterday is that Twitter is of a size that the thing cannot be taken down and replaced by the failwhale as they work on it. Spearphishing attacks are highly targeted, and any of us can believe fake stuff occasionally. That’s why we train regularly on how not to fall for garbage.

  15. 15.

    debbie

    @Starfish:

    I know that. My work often sends fake emails and there are consequences if they are not reported. They’ve gotten a bit sadistic, though, sending emails from “headhunters” offering better jobs.

  16. 16.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Black Lives Matter sculpture of Jen Reid removed from Colston plinth

    Tim Burns, a charity worker, said: “Some days I wake up a feel proud to live in Bristol. Other days I feel like we missed the point? The Jen Reid statue didn’t need to be permanent but after procrastinating for years over whether to take down Colston removing this after 24 hours feels unnecessary.”

    I’m a little surprised, I thought they’d leave it up for at least a week. After all, the Colston statue stood for better than 100 years.

  17. 17.

    mrmoshpotato

    FYI

    If we get verified we'll deny it. We aren't on Twitter for accolades. We are here to give you Jurassic Park Updates.— Jurassic Park Updates (@JurassicPark2go) July 16, 2020

  18. 18.

    Ken

    @Starfish: I’ve been trying to imagine how the phishing was done.  “Hi, Twitter customer service? This is President Obama and I’ve forgotten my password….”  Surely not. Probably the phishers pretended to be other Twitter employees, but as you said, this is something that should be covered by security training.

  19. 19.

    Ken

    I do not even pretend to understand bitcoin

    It’s like currency, except it’s not a stable store of value, is not widely accepted as a medium of exchange, and does not allow for rapid or convenient transactions – the three generally-accepted attributes of currency. But it uses a hell of a lot of electricity.

  21. 21.

    Joey Maloney

    You notice the hackers didn’t pull the scam on Trump’s account? Because who would believe if you sent him $1000 he’d do anything but keep it.

  23. 23.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Oh and speaking of this @OzarkHillbilly:, I almost forgot:

    St Louis Prosecutor Slams Trump For Meddling In Gun Couple Investigation

    St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner struck back at President Donald Trump and Missouri Gov. Mike Parson (R) on Tuesday night after both attacked her for investigating the St. Louis couple that brandished their guns at protesters outside their home last month.

    “Today, both the Governor and Donald Trump came after me for doing my job and investigating a case,” Gardner said in a written statement. “While they continue to play politics with the handling of this matter, spreading misinformation and distorting the truth, I refuse to do so.”

    She also slammed Parson for speaking to Trump about her probe, saying it was “unbelievable” that the governor “would seek advice from one of the most divisive leaders in our generation to overpower the discretion of a locally elected prosector [sic].”

  24. 24.

    randy khan

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    FWIW, a friend who is a law professor in Kentucky says that the felony charges are utterly bogus.

    I know you’re shocked that such a thing could happen.

  26. 26.

    randy khan

    What strikes me about the Biden ad is that they took the trouble to take the national ad and tweak it (granted only at the beginning) for Texas.  Either he’s at least taking a shot there or the campaign has decided the ads might do some good in states that are in midst of a COVID-19 wave.

  27. 27.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @randy khan: Yeah, the laws are on the books but I don’t know how they could possibly stand a challenge. Still, I’ll bet every one of those protesters had to post bail, plus the threat of jail during a pandemic, the costs of getting a lawyer, etc

    They’ve already been punished, and isn’t that the point?

  31. 31.

    rikyrah

    Joe Biden’s strength is his inherent decency. The contrast is so stark. Nothing the GOP can do to pretend that the gap isn’t there. THEY have nothing to work with ??

  33. 33.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I’m supposed to be allocated some for pro bono (which, believe me, is a huge thing for me – I’ve long despised the notion of pro bono pleas from the bar association for both personal and policy reasons. This is different, and important).

    There is a plan, and neither Cameron not the incident commanders are going to like it. Suffice it to say, 87 trials and concomitant proceedings spread across a number of lawyers with differing schedules and lengthy asshole skill sets honed across civil and criminal practice are going to test judicial patience (deserved) and prosecutorial patience (doubly deserved).

    Plus, the AG and command staff are going to get to testify at each and every one of those. At length.

  35. 35.

    NotMax

    a prolific user of Twitter embeds

    Standalone tweets are the new equivalent of naked URLs. Absent context, they’re less than useless.

  36. 36.

    artem1s

    the scam doesn’t really have anything to do with bitcoin. It just took advantage of people who would latch onto a Ponzi type deal; who believe that there is some ‘safe’ hedge against the apocalypse; who wants to dodge taxes on their investments; or who is looking for a way to launder money.  Or they are gambling addicts.  It’s an old con with a twitter twist.   The same folks who buy gold futures as a hedge against inflation and the magic day when we get rid of the Federal Reserve.  you know, morons.

  37. 37.

    Starfish

    @debbie: Wow, that is mean. Ours sends the “Did you forget today’s Zoom meeting? Click on this link.” This is so believable.

  38. 38.

    narya

    Kitchen (no) update: Nuthin. Yesterday it was just me and a million zoomeetings. I knew there would be delays along the line–I’m actually just glad that most things have been delivered or are on the way. I’m thinking that next week may be optimistic after all.

  39. 39.

    NotMax

    @artem1s

    Rule of thumb for the come-ons is to mentally substitute “cottage cheese” for whatever is being touted.

    Then stop and seriously ask yourself if your money is best spent on cottage cheese.

    ;)

  40. 40.

    artem1s

    @debbie:

    Last night, BBC interviewed someone who said people were really upset that Twitter hadn’t notified everyone about the hack and instead had tried to quietly fix it in the background.

    translation: the conned rarely report the theft because A). they were usually partaking in illegal activity in the hopes of turning a quick profit and B) they are too embarrassed to admit they were so greedy they couldn’t spot a very obvious scam.

  41. 41.

    Betty Cracker

    Can y’all see the ad alluded to in the first tweet posted in the original post? That tweet doesn’t completely render for me on either handy device. If so, can you reply with a link to the ad source? A quick Google search didn’t turn up anything except this ad that I’ve already seen, nor did I see a new TX-specific ad in Biden’s Twitter feed. Thanks!

  47. 47.

    Josie

    Because I am not fully aware of all internet traditions, I really don’t understand what happened with this twitter kerfluffle.  Could someone explain to me in simple terms exactly how it worked? Thanks in advance,

  48. 48.

    Soprano2

    @debbie: MIne does that too, although not with job offers. If you reply to one they lock you out of your network account, and you have to call them to get back in. I haven’t noticed many since COVID started, though. I guess they’re too busy for that now.

    I’m getting a new computer at work today. I’m both looking forward to it and dreading it.  I’m always happy once it’s over, but the process itself is a PITA.

  49. 49.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Josie: Somebody got enough control of internal systems at Twitter to send out Tweets from the accounts of some well-known people. Those Tweets said, basically, “send me $1000 and I’ll send you back $2000.” People fell for that. Twitter has egg on its face

    ETA: They most likely got that control by tricking one or more Twitter employees, not by actually hacking Joe Biden’s Twitter account.

  50. 50.

    germy

    Conservatism has metastasized — it used to be they just promoted policies and actions that benefited their donors regardless of their effect on the rest of us — now it’s like they blindly follow an instinct to destroy anything that make our lives better. https://t.co/ATaSCDgDxZ

    — Roy Edroso (@edroso) July 16, 2020

  51. 51.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Soprano2: There are companies that sell that, I guess you can call it controlled phishing, as a service. So your employer just contracted with somebody to do it.

  52. 52.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    The judges are going to be presented with choices about how ethical, moral and rules based they’re going to be, balanced against how much they love those coveted FOP endorsements.

  57. 57.

    Jeffro

    Not to take anything away from Uncle Joe, but it struck me in those ads just how much he sounds like Obama.  He was always earnest and sincere and positive whenever he spoke in his pre-VP years, but he seems to have taken it to a new level this campaign.  Same speech and/or ad writers?  Or is he channeling his inner Obama after working so closely with PBO for 8 years?  Who knows, who cares, it’s great!

  62. 62.

    narya

    @WereBear: @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    A “friend” in college borrowed (then claimed he lost) my hardback copy of “Fear & Loathing on the Campaign Trail,” and in my heart I never totally forgave him, even though I’ve since replaced it w/ a paperback and of course have others’ “loaned” books in my own library. HST’s description of the VVAW march on the RNC remains one of the most searing passages in politics I’d ever read. I also go back and reread his scathing eulogy of Nixon every now & then. Drug-addled self-indulgence aside, he was capable of really penetrating insights and I miss him; his commentary on the mango menace would be a balm.

  63. 63.

    Betty Cracker

    @Jeffro: I don’t get that impression at all. Obama was often criticized for being “aloof” while Biden has always worn his heart on his sleeve. Personally, I liked Obama’s alleged “aloofness,” though I wouldn’t use that word to describe it — he had a calm rationality that appealed to me. Example.

  66. 66.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    @Soprano2: I’m trying to imagine the university doing that to faculty. In the English Dept, we’d all have been locked out all the time and utterly bewildered. But then, we weren’t doing anything confidential anyway. I’ll have to ask my son if they do that where he works. He has to work on secure computer.

  68. 68.

    narya

    @Gin & Tonic: I subscribed to Rolling Stone when I was in high school (in the 70s) and my dad used to lift it to read HST’s columns. My dad was (is) a Nixon Hater of the first order–like, back to the Pink Lady days. Perhaps we should have a feature on BJ: what was happening in the Watergate hearings on this date. (BGinChi? I know it isn’t cultcha, but . . .)

  71. 71.

    Kay

    So our new resolution to not let anyone into the law office w/out a mask was put in place 36 minutes ago and I’ve already had a refuser who sat in his car in my parking lot and called me rather than entering the office with a mask. This is why a statewide order is easier for businesses. I could just post the order and point to it. Kay Ivey know this, which is why she created a sign with the state seal for businesses to post.

  74. 74.

    Kay

    @germy:

    I was thrilled to read about the replacement because what it really means is Jared Kushner is the campaign manager.

    Fun for us! :)

    Jared Kushner believed Trump would gain Democratic voters by firing James Comey. That’s the level of brilliance we’re talking about here.

  75. 75.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Baud: There’s another reference to Texas about 2/3 of the way through. Big place, several major media centers but no significant spillover into non-Texas areas, so it works. Couldn’t do that in NYC or Philthy but could travel (mutatis mutandum et ceteris paribus**) most anywhere west of the Pecos…

    **”the necessary things having been changed, with other conditions remaining the same’

  77. 77.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @narya: Still have my h/b copy, I think. Even the vaguest remembrance of HST’s description of the antics of the Boo-Hoo on the Muskie Campaign Train in Florida still provokes uncontrollable chuckling.

  78. 78.

    germy

    @Kay:

    So much for the meritocracy.

    Biden’s team can watch and enjoy.

    (Augustus’ motto was “make haste slowly”)

  79. 79.

    Kay

    I think Jared Kushner is embarrassed of the Trump Presidency brand and believes he can re-brand Trump as an east coast Chris Christie-like figure who would attract higher income and educated suburban voters.

    I think this attempt will be a lot of fun to watch. For us. The arrogance and ego is just breathtaking.

  80. 80.

    Kay

    @germy:

    Kushner once sent an email where he wrote that he thought Christies sleazy tactic where he trapped school buses on a bridge was “badass”

    We’re in the trapping school buses on a bridge part of the Trump campaign.

  81. 81.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: So how are y’all going to handle the mask-refusers? Meet them in the parking lot and shout back and forth from several feet away? Conduct business via phone only? It’s mind-boggling that this is an issue.

  82. 82.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @narya: My dad was (is) a Nixon Hater of the first order–like, back to the Pink Lady days.

    Dad’s last stateside posting en route to Leyte, Okinawa and the Korean Occupation was San Luis Obispo, & he fell in love with California. Home again, while he reportedly tried repeatedly to get Mom to move out there (no luck, too far from her fambly in West By God Virginia), he devoured every source of information Californian – & as a result was a Nixon hater from the days the SOB Red-baited incumbent Jerry Voorhis to win a seat in Congress. That was 1946, FFS!

    Tl;dr – In our family, despising Tricky Dick was an ancient & venerable tradition.

  85. 85.

    Nicole

    So I saw “Hope Hicks” was trending on Twitter and clicked and the story circulating is that she and Brad Parscale hooked up and that’s  why Trump demoted him.  Which seems much more on-brand for Trump than Parscale sucks at his job.

    As someone said on Twitter, if true, we need to figure out how to get her to date Bill Barr.

  86. 86.

    Barbara

    @Kay: Jared Kushner is an idiot.  If he had wanted Trump to be a Chris Christie like figure he should not have ostracized Chris Christie.  No fan of Christie but he has the personality to make Trump listen. He would certainly have been better than Steven Miller.  Based on what we know about the things that Jared has influenced (e.g., firing Comey) he is not a deep thinking strategist.

  87. 87.

    Emma from FL

    @Jeffro: That is Joe being himself. When you’re second in command you defer to your boss. Biden never tried to show off or bigfoot Obama. It’s one of the reasons why AAs like him and trust him. He understood his role and never resented it.

  88. 88.

    Formica

    Jesus fucking Christ: Kemp forbids mask orders

    Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R) signed an executive order Wednesday night explicitly banning cities from enacting their own mask mandates, even as the state experiences a sharp rise in coronavirus cases and other Republican governors are turning to mask orders to try to quell the surge.

    Sorry if it’s already been posted, I did look first, I promise. Also, what the actual fuck.

  90. 90.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Nicole: I try not to judge, nor to cast aspersions, but am I the only one who gets the impression that Hope’s primary talents are not exhibited in the office? Feel free to tell me if I’m being a pig.

  91. 91.

    Roger Moore

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    I’ll have to ask my son if they do that where he works. He has to work on secure computer.

    It depends on the level of paranoia in his organization.  At the highest level, they wouldn’t worry about this because they wouldn’t be able to get outside email on their secure computer.

  94. 94.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Kay:

    Kushner once sent an email where he wrote that he thought Christies sleazy tactic where he trapped school buses on a bridge was “badass”

    “He put Daddy in jail, but on the other hand, it sure was funny when he made all those little poors late for school…” I wonder if Jared has a cousin named Mary. There’s some weird shit there, too.

    And I probably am going to break down and buy that book. One of the things that appeals to me is all the reviews suggest it’s well-written and well-edited. The Hoarse Whisperer says he read it in four hours

  96. 96.

    Sloane Ranger

    Open Thread so will post this here.

    Treachery and back-stabbing within the Tory Party. It appears Dr Julian Lewis (Brexiteer) has double crossed the PM and his grey eminence, Dominic Cummings, by getting himself elected as Chair of the Intelligence and Security Committee instead of BoJo’s (read Cummings) favoured candidate, Chris Grayling.

    What happened depends on who you listen to.

    Government story – Dr Lewis, (who has experience in related fields and was thought to be interested) gave assurances to the Whips office that he wouldn’t stand but went behind the Whips back to get support from the Opposition parties committee members. He voted for himself and was duely elected.

    Julian Lewis’ story – He received a text from the Whips office instructing him to vote for Grayling. He gave no such undertaking, considering this as interference in the independence of the committee and contrary to the custom that the Committee is allowed to elect its own Chair on a free vote and put his name forward at the last minute.

    Speculation is that the Opposition MP’s were concerned that Grayling would be a puppet of No 10 and delay the already much delayed Report on Russian meddling into the Brexit Referendum and election campaigns generally even further so they voted for Lewis.

    Result – Lewis has had the Government Whip withdrawn. The Committee met this morning and agreed to publish the Report next week unchanged.

    Apparently, the Government can activate some obscure procedure and demand the entire House vote on who is Chair and politics watchers are now waiting to see what happens next.

    We live in exciting times, unfortunately!

  97. 97.

    narya

    @Uncle Cosmo: Love it! I think the combo of my dad’s fierce intelligence and my (maternal) grandfather’s anarchism (seriously) and the whole family’s atheism (even though paternal grandad was a Lutheran deacon . . .) gave me a wildly different perspective than one might expect from a small-town working-class family. If you could see my parents, to this day they look like Respectable People. But my mom still tells me about the other democrats and atheists they occasionally find in their little community/housing development as though it’s a rare thing. Which, for that age group, maybe is!

  98. 98.

    Roger Moore

    @Gin & Tonic:

    am I the only one who gets the impression that Hope’s primary talents are not exhibited in the office?

    My impression is that she’s actually a smart, competent woman; she just has really bad taste in men.  And if it were as you suggest, I’m not at all sure she isn’t exhibiting her talents in the office; some men are turned on by the risk of getting caught.

  101. 101.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Michelle Obama @MichelleObama
    I’m thrilled to announce a new project: The #MichelleObamaPodcast with @Spotify! It’s been a tough year and I hope this podcast can help us explore what we’re going through and spark new conversations with our loved ones. I can’t wait for you all to listen on July 29!

    I wonder if she’ll do her own ads for like, Zip Recruiter and Bombas

  102. 102.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    @Formica: Kemp has apparently decided that since Confederate statues are out of favor, he’ll just take on Sherman’s tactics instead.

    @Roger Moore: I suspect that’s the situation for him. He has to have real security clearance. He figures that at least his job is unlikely to be offshored.

  103. 103.

    Barbara

    @Gin & Tonic: Yeah, it’s hard to know how to lean when you are part of not just one but two crime family syndicates, but long term, Kushner would have been better off aligning himself with someone who knew how to appeal to something other than Trump’s “base” voters.  Never has the term “base” been used in a way that so fully embodied all of its potential meanings. Trying to appeal to female suburban voters NOW would be amusing if they had not inflicted so much enduring damage on so many people.

  104. 104.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    @narya: We do the same thing here. We ferret out the secret Democrats and share political talk with one another. Also, Mr DAW and another guy share the job of switching the TV in the cafe from Fox to CNN every time they’re near the place.

  106. 106.

    Chyron HR

    @Gin & Tonic:

    They most likely got that control by tricking one or more Twitter employees, not by actually hacking Joe Biden’s Twitter account.

    And a thousand grossly overpaid assholes rose up as one and cried, “BUT HIS TWEETS!”

  107. 107.

    Kattails

    @WereBear: Hey, I ordered an autographed copy of your book yesterday, from your website, looking forward to it arriving! If the postal Service hasn’t slowed down delivery until like Christmas or something.

  108. 108.

    randy khan

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    They’ve already been punished, and isn’t that the point?

    Yep.

    It does appear that there are lawyers in Kentucky willing to take the case for free.  One of them said so in response to my friend’s post on Facebook.

  109. 109.

    Betty Cracker

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Same. There are people online whom I trust who’ve read it and reported that there’s nothing we don’t already know or suspect there (e.g., Hilzoy). But I’m not above straight-up gossip and dirt — bring it on!

  110. 110.

    germy

    @Kay:

    Kushner once sent an email where he wrote that he thought Christies sleazy tactic where he trapped school buses on a bridge was “badass”

    I’ve always suspected Jared was sarcastically trolling him.  He held a grudge about his father being locked up and decided he’d take a poke at Christie during the lowest point of Christie’s career.

  111. 111.

    Nicole

    @Gin & Tonic:

    I try not to judge, nor to cast aspersions, but am I the only one who gets the impression that Hope’s primary talents are not exhibited in the office? Feel free to tell me if I’m being a pig.

    I normally am very much a “THAT’S NOT FUNNY” among the how-many-feminists-does-it take-to-change-a-lightbulb crew, but I confess, I laughed aloud at one tweet that said “Hope Hicks is going though the White House like Covid-19.”

    So if it is a piggy thought, we’re in the sty together.

  114. 114.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    OT: I have to go deliver some paperback copies of Wysman to neighbors who asked to buy them from me. They finally arrived yesterday. I can’t believe how terrible Amazon was on this.

  115. 115.

    sdhays

    I just have to say that despite myself, I find myself gobsmacked that the governor of Georgia is banning face mask orders at this point in time. I mean, neighboring Florida is on fire and even the terrible governor of Alabama has been forced to issue a statewide mask order, but Brian Kemp overrides local mask orders instead. It’s like he thinks COVID-19 is a competition and he’s not going to let Georgia fall behind Florida.

    Add him to the list of people who truly deserve to contract the disease and die from it, right behind Jair Bolsonaro and the Lt. Governor of Texas who is so keen to shovel all the grandparents into the maw of COVID-19 to prop up the economy.

  117. 117.

    Jeffro

    @Emma from FL: Good points.

    I heard him speak ‘live’ several times back when we lived up in DE and like I noted earlier, he’s always been upbeat, earnest, sincere.

  118. 118.

    Roger Moore

    @sdhays:

    I mean, neighboring Florida is on fire

    And it’s not as if Georgia is doing a whole lot better.  They’ve been averaging over 3000 positive tests a day for the past week with a >15% positive rate.  If they don’t do something to get the spread under control they’re going to pass Florida.

  119. 119.

    catclub

    @NotMax: Then stop and seriously ask yourself if your money is best spent on cottage cheese.

     

    Cottage cheese, a slice of pineapple, a little dressing…yes I could spend money on cottage cheese.

  121. 121.

    Ruckus

    @Jeffro:

    Personally I think it opened his eyes to a wider world than DE politics. That’s likely an over simplification but I think he’s the same guy, now just with more and different experiences that his VP position and who he worked for gave him.

  123. 123.

    Betty Cracker

    Okay, this alone is enough to make me want to fork over some money to Mary Trump. (WaPo)

    Asked about the perception by some that Ivanka Trump is in some ways a steadying force on her father, Mary Trump said that was not her assessment of her cousin in the slightest.

    “I think she’s the one who disproves that on an almost-daily basis,” Mary Trump said. “She doesn’t do anything. She spouts bromides on social media, but either she tries to have an impact and fails, or just isn’t interested in having an impact. I can’t think of one thing she’s done to show that she’s moderate or a moderating influence.”

    Exactly.

  128. 128.

    catclub

    @Soprano2: If you reply to one they lock you out of your network account, and you have to call them to get back in.

     

    My organization decided to worry about the security of phone mailbox pins.  4 digits is not enough! It has to be 8. Then  a list of all the strings that are not permitted:  triple numbers, a pair of four numbers, sequential numbers, numbers that are horizontal,vertical, or diagonal on the phonepad.    I can only figure there have actually been zero cases where some malefactor got the phone pin of a drone in our organization and used it for evil.

  129. 129.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Betty Cracker: it’s utterly pointless but… Imagine if Chelsea Clinton had done a cutesy, smirking, aren’t-I-naughty advertisement for one of her parents’ donors.

    and trump later did a whole photo spread on the RESOLUTE DESK! Remember when Obama put his feet on the RESOLUTE DESK! ?

  130. 130.

    Ruckus

    @Barbara:

    My dog is a deeper thinker than Jared. And he’s dead. And was a dog. But thinking, he seemed like he could actually do that. Jared – not so much.

  131. 131.

    Miss Bianca

    @2liberal: OK, that excerpt has just prompted me to put that book on hold at the library. Never read it before.

    Need to start reading Thompson again. He was still alive when I moved to Colorado – hell, we were practically neighbors, he living in Woody Creek, and I living in the North Fork Valley, just a shortish drive away (shortish by “out West” standards) over McClure Pass.

  132. 132.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

     

    The arrogance is overwhelming.

    That this a ‘ branding’ problem.

    We are in the middle of a phucking PANDEMIC.

     

    And, time and time again, Democratic Party voters are proving, with their presence, their determination to rid us of Dolt45.

     

    A branding problem?

    People know the brand.

     

    I have said for awhile that I totally believe the poll numbers when it comes to Biden and the 65+ crowd.

    Why?

     

    BECAUSE THEY ARE INSIDE AND KNOW WHY THEY ARE INSIDE.

    They know why their families can’t see them.

    They know why, this being Summer, they can’t do anything with the grandkids.

    They know why they are scared to death to the pit of their stomachs, at the very hint of children going back to school.

    Peanut’s grandmother called me up last night and was like –

    ‘You are going to make sure that Peanut’s parents sign her up for ONLINE SCHOOL – right? There’s NO WAY that she should go into a physical school. ‘

     

    Grandparents KNOW this shyt. Doesn’t matter how much Fox News pretends otherwise.

    They KNOW their lives. They KNOW why it’s happening.

     

    And, the only thing the Democrats should be doing is doing campaign ads with scenes of grandparents meeting up with their grandchildren – FROM AROUND THE REST OF THE WORLD.

    “These countries got COVID-19 under control – and got their lives back.”

  133. 133.

    Formica

    @sdhays:

    I just have to say that despite myself, I find myself gobsmacked that the governor of Georgia is banning face mask orders at this point in time. I mean, neighboring Florida is on fire and even the terrible governor of Alabama has been forced to issue a statewide mask order, but Brian Kemp overrides local mask orders instead. It’s like he thinks COVID-19 is a competition and he’s not going to let Georgia fall behind Florida.

    Add him to the list of people who truly deserve to contract the disease and die from it, right behind Jair Bolsonaro and the Lt. Governor of Texas who is so keen to shovel all the grandparents into the maw of COVID-19 to prop up the economy.

    I had been hoping, desperately, that the Alabama mask order was a sign that at least the Trumpist officials finally understood that we need to mask up. That maybe, finally, between that and the Wal-mart decision, progress might be made. Yes, the Trumpentariat would keep screaming about face diapers and training burqas and freedumb and whatever, but we might finally be able to slow this thing down.

    Nope. The most powerful nation in the history of the world is actively accelerating its own demise to pwn the libs. The most advanced, robust, capable organization ever created to fight disease in the history of mankind has been canceled because they make the Dear Leader look bad. And the entire apparatus that surrounds that orange pigfucker is just letting it happen, actively abetting the mass murder by inaction and indifference of their own citizens for pure sycophancy.

    I just can’t.

  136. 136.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @narya: My folks escaped The Sticks in 1940 & spent most of the next >50 years resident in the world’s most populous RRRR (Redneck Refugee Resettlement Region) – Dundalk, MD, once the largest unincorporated metropolitan area in the USA (1950 population 82,000).

    When he was growing up Dad’s family was often dependent on Federally-provided sacks of flour in order to eat. (He’d get mad if Mom put pasta on the supper table more than once a week: Don’t I make enough that we don’t have to eat peasant food?) & while Mom prayed often to the Virgin Mary, Dad’s Wholly Trinity was FDR the Father, JFK the Son, and … I’ll leave it to yinz to guess who played the Holy Spirit. No GOP allowed!

  137. 137.

    Betty Cracker

    Florida reported 14K new infections yesterday and also set new records in deaths and hospitalizations. WASF.

  139. 139.

    Another Scott

    @Sloane Ranger: Thanks for the report!

    If the unedited report comes out, and it’s very bad for BoJo (presumably it’s very bad or they wouldn’t have sat on it for so long), is there any way that the next election day would be moved up?  My understanding is that the next election is fixed in stone, but it seems very, very bad that a parliamentary system cannot throw out a government in a no-confidence vote – especially if it’s been undermined by a foreign power….

    Interesting times indeed.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  140. 140.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Roger Moore: I worked in a place where a pair of employees were strongly admonished for very inappropriate behavior (and this was many years ago) observed numerous times. Kind of against type for the time, the man decided he’d better work on saving his marriage and resigned, while the female, who was relatively equal in rank, stayed on until she began engaging in similar behavior with another co-worker, and was, um, encouraged to resign. Last I’d heard she had moved to Vegas, which seemed entirely fitting.

  141. 141.

    japa21

    @sdhays: I have no doubt it is because he knows which cities would enact such mandates and how they vote. He is really counting on this killing off the Dem base.

  143. 143.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    Good. Let his azz stay in the car.

    I like him and we have a good honest relationship so he didn’t argue long- he knew he had to wear the mask to come in. I’m trying to be polite and firm so I gently cut him off when he started saying it was bullshit and then he came up with the car workaround himself.
    Here’s the thing. I know him. He had stage 4 cancer ten years ago and he’s older. He’s high risk. I’m a risk TO HIM, not vice versa.

  144. 144.

    Another Scott

    @Betty Cracker: I blame the western propaganda that “beauty” == “virtue”.

    The Walt Disney Company has a lot to answer for…  :-/

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  146. 146.

    Another Scott

    @catclub: Do they make you change them every 30-60 days as well?  And require that the new ones be sufficiently different from the old ones?

    (groucho-roll-eyes.gif)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  147. 147.

    Kay

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    “He put Daddy in jail, but on the other hand, it sure was funny when he made all those little poors late for school…” I wonder if Jared has a cousin named Mary. There’s some weird shit there, too.

    Jared and Ivanka are utterly banal. They’re conventional. What they want is Republicans like Chris Christie, people who cut taxes on rich people and yell about labor unions and public schools but don’t otherwise dabble in “social issues”.
    What they GOT is a crazy racist base 1/4 of whom invented and follow an oddball religion called “Q”
    Ivanka wants to babble about “public/private partnerships” and “opportunity” but that isn’t why Donald Trump won, which Donald Trump knows, and that’s why they can’t convince him to become an east coast, sophisticated Republican.

  148. 148.

    TS (the original)

    @Betty Cracker:

    The family birthday party in the first Chapter, says it all. They stayed at Trump hotel & travelled to the White House in a van, which the older relatives had difficulty getting into. When they arrived at the White House Trump had the sycophants around him with Mike Pence in the corner. A page later Mary says

    Mike Pence continued to lurk on the other side of the room with a half dead smile on his face, like the chaperone everybody wanted to avoid

    I’m still reading the amazon preview – 2 chapters I think. Will probably buy the book.

  149. 149.

    Nicole

    @MagdaInBlack: As I’ve said before, I don’t think he’ll ever face legal consequences for anything he’s done, so I have to find joy in the thought that, should this be true, he’s likely feeling super rejected right now.  Insert Grumpy Cat’s GOOD here.

    We find our own peace where we can. ;)

  150. 150.

    Just One More Canuck

    @germy: When (FSM willing) JarJar ends up in jail, Christie is going to visit him once a week to laugh at him, Nelson Muntz-style

  153. 153.

    EthylEster

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Kemp has apparently decided that since Confederate statues are out of favor, he’ll just take on Sherman’s tactics instead.

    He’s gonna burn Atlanta? I had not heard that.

  154. 154.

    The Moar You Know

    My organization decided to worry about the security of phone mailbox pins.  4 digits is not enough! It has to be 8. Then  a list of all the strings that are not permitted:  triple numbers, a pair of four numbers, sequential numbers, numbers that are horizontal,vertical, or diagonal on the phonepad.    I can only figure there have actually been zero cases where some malefactor got the phone pin of a drone in our organization and used it for evil.

    @catclub:  You are quite fortunate.  It’s happened at my workplace twice.   AT&T was surprisingly forgiving about the thousands of dollars in international call charges the malefactors racked up.  We had to disable most of the system’s functionality.

  156. 156.

    frosty

    @germy: I’ve got an answer for Hogan. I’m starting to speculate that the difference is the state legislature. R in PA, D in MD.

  157. 157.

    Ken

    @sdhays: I wouldn’t wish death by covid on anyone, but if the good people of Georgia do something with piano wire and a lamppost, I wouldn’t mourn.

  158. 158.

    MagdaInBlack

    @Nicole:

    You know, theres so much shit going on, I too take my little amusements where I can.

    Ridicule is cathartic ?

  161. 161.

    Kay

    I just got notified that several people I know who attended a fundraiser for a local charity at a winery were notified they were exposed.
    It would be the fancy people in this 70% Trump town who were there so I suspect we’ll be seeing less resistance to public health directives here shortly.
    They’re all freaking out but WTF? A fundraiser at a winery with a packed indoor bar? I didn’t go. Why did they go?

  162. 162.

    Kay

    My assistant just said “but you hate wine and that’s why you didn’t go”

    Guffaw. Partly true. She’s essential :)

  163. 163.

    SFAW

    According to CNN: In yet another show of “transparency” and “MY ADMINISTRATION IS DOING THE BIGLIEST WORK ON THE PETERPANDEMIC AND AIN’T I THE GREATEST SMARTEST PERSON EVER!!” the Traitor’s minions have apparently removed various data from the CDC website.

    The data includes…
    – the current inpatient and intensive care unit bed occupancy
    – Health care worker staffing
    – Personal protective equipment supply status and availability

    These fucking guys.

  164. 164.

    Kristine

    My bs Hope Hicks hypothesis is that she’s biding her time until her hero is out of the WH and she can become #4.

    Melania was the reason she was evicted–now that Mel has the prenup reworked to her advantage, she’ll be more than happy to accede to a divorce.

  165. 165.

    Sloane Ranger

    @Another Scott:

     

    My understanding is that the next election is fixed in stone, but it seems very, very bad that a parliamentary system cannot throw out a government in a no-confidence vote – especially if it’s been undermined by a foreign power….

    Interesting you should say that. It used to be that you could force a no confidence vote and if a simple majority of the House voted in it’s favour the Government resigned and an election took place.

    This was changed during the Con/LibDem coalition to stop double crossing and now it requires a massive plurality, 75% of the entire membership if memory serves, which it might not. In late 2019, when BoJo couldn’t get his way on Brexit, he tried several times to get a no confidence vote in his own Government but he was never able to muster enough votes until the LibDems betrayed the other opposition parties.

  166. 166.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Kristine: god, it’s horrific enough to think what must’ve happened to a walking Ralph Lauren ad from the Leafiest Suburbs of Connecticut to make her want to be the surrogate daughter, but if she actually does see herself as number 4…. I mean, being the Widow Trump is probably the best trump to be, but what you have to do to get there…

  167. 167.

    Brachiator

    @SFAW:

    the Traitor’s minions have apparently removed various data from the CDC website.

    The Trump administration has crossed over from being “generally incompetent” to “dangerously malignant.”

    They will no longer lie or spin to proclaim that Trump is fabulous. They will just declare it and smirk that no one can easily get the data to dispute it.

    Meanwhile, people will continue to get sick and die.

    It is so strange to watch this slow motion autocracy amass power with the consent of the Republican Party and its conservative base.

  168. 168.

    Doug R

    @Another Scott: This is where a constitutional monarchy has the wild card. Ordinarily the queen has no real power, HOWEVER she can decide to have an election if the PM no longer has the confidence of the House of Commons.

  169. 169.

    Kay

    Since January, Americans’ party preferences have shifted dramatically in the Democratic Party’s direction. What had been a two-percentage-point Republican advantage in U.S. party identification and leaning has become an 11-point Democratic advantage, with more of that movement reflecting a loss in Republican identification and leaning (down eight points) than a gain in Democratic identification and leaning (up five points).

    It would just be so, so great if they were punished for what they’ve done.

    The WSJ had a whiny editorial yesterday about how Biden will raise taxes. He will raise taxes because they’re greedy! It wasn’t fucking ENOUGH for them that they we have insane levels of inequality and they hoover up all gains in productivity and shoot it directly to top management. They ALSO refuse to pay taxes on it.
    Their insane levels of old fashioned GREED killed their golden goose. They’re gross. Excessive. Decadent. No internal monitors. Out of control. They will happily destroy this country unless they’re checked constantly.

  170. 170.

    Kelly

    @randy khan:What strikes me about the Biden ad is that they took the trouble to take the national ad and tweak it (granted only at the beginning) for Texas.  Either he’s at least taking a shot there or the campaign has decided the ads might do some good in states that are in midst of a COVID-19 wave.

    If nothing else a strong showing for Biden in Texas could help Dems in local races.

  173. 173.

    Yutsano

    @debbie: A friend of mine used to be a grey hat. Part of his job was checking spam e-mails for their origins blocking their access checking potential damage etc. I would send him some of mine. Almost all of them were IRS checking if we were doing the right thing regarding reporting e-mails.

  174. 174.

    Roger Moore

    @MagdaInBlack:

    These are the people she has chosen to surround herself with.

    This is a point that should be emphasized more.  Nobody Trump appointed got that appointment randomly.  There are unlucky souls in the civil service who had to work with him because it’s their job, but the political appointees actively agreed, and in many cases sought out the opportunity, to work with him.  They deserve no sympathy for the pain working with him causes them.

  175. 175.

    Kay

    Kevin McCarthy
    @GOPLeader
    ·3h
    Just now → I introduced the Protect America’s Statues Act to cut funding from cities and states that refuse to restore order.

    The statues are back! What does it even mean? A statue goes down they pull funding from the whole state? Aren’t a lot of those states going to be GOP states?

  176. 176.

    Roger Moore

    @Yutsano:

    My employer deployed the “phish-me-not” plugin to our email so we can easily report suspicious email.  I don’t think I’ve ever used it except for the test emails they’ve sent us to make sure we’re paying attention.  We get a little popup congratulating us for finding a phishing email when we use it on one of those test emails.  That said, I think we only get in trouble if we actually fall for the bait; we’re OK if we just delete the email rather than reporting it.

  177. 177.

    joel hanes

    Trapeze-related etymology rathole pandemic pastime :

    Looked up Trebizond and trapezium and trapezuntine and trapezoid

    A trapeze is so-called because the bar and ropes form a  geometric trapezoid

    The word trapezoid comes from the ancient Greek word for “table”  (think of a side view of a table with splayed, not vertical, legs)

    The ancient capital city of Trebizond sat on a high tableland

    I did not know about Trebizond and its famously beautiful princesses and the Komnenos family before I read Dorothy Dunnett’s  Nicolo series.

  178. 178.

    Roger Moore

    @Kay:

    What does it even mean?

    It means he’s posturing.  There’s no way his bill even makes it out of committee, much less gets passed by the House.  All the Republicans understand the only thought that needs to go into this kind of bill is how to spell out something clever with the title.

  179. 179.

    J R in WV

    @Kay: 

    I’ve already had a refuser who sat in his car in my parking lot and called me rather than entering the office with a mask.

    Surely you could just decline to represent morons like that? It’s proof you can’t trust anything they say to you, or to anyone.

    I guess even asses need good legal advice, you could start with “Wear a mask, you Ass!”

  180. 180.

    Kristine

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: I was just riffing–she could be content to remain Trump’s guiding light. But she’s definitely messed up. Tailor-made for a Vanity Fair deepdive profile sometime in the future when we have hear me God begun to extract ourselves from the rubble.

  181. 181.

    Origuy

    I get phishing traps from the Security people at work. If you ignore them, no problem. They added a button to Outlook to report them easily. If you click on a link in the email, you have to retake a security training class that they make everyone take once a year anyway.

  182. 182.

    ...now I try to be amused

    @Nicole:

    Raw Story collected some of the funniest responses on Twitter.  Enjoy.

    My favorite is this one:

    Hope Hicks has dated Parscale, Lewandowski & Porter. I know it’s gross, but hear me out… maybe she’s a double agent. Her special power is fucking evil men out of office. Kudos to her, and her sullied vagina, for doing the work no sane woman would ever do.

  183. 183.

    Ruckus

    @Barbara:

    No one has the personality to make shitforbrains listen. He’s the guy who yells LaLaLaLa…. at the top of his voice whenever anyone tries to make him listen to anything. He’s the smartest, bestest, bravest, human being on the planet, just ask him. Anyone doesn’t see that, tries to tell him different than what he wants, he throws a tantrum, like the small child he mentally is. He effectively is a 4 yr old spoiled fucking brat. In an over sized, over abused, over everything, old man’s body.

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