Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

These are not very smart people, and things got out of hand.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

Dumb motherfuckers cannot understand a consequence that most 4 year olds have fully sorted out.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

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

The current Supreme Court is a dangerous, rogue court.

He really is that stupid.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

One way or another, he’s a liar.

They punch you in the face and then start crying because their fist hurts.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

You are here: Home / Elections / Biden-Harris 2020 / Open Thread: Joe Biden Live on Economy

Reader Interactions

231Comments

  2. 2.

    Elizabelle

    K-shaped recovery.

    Interesting term. Agree; the wealthy are banking it. Seeing articles about real estate being snapped up. The market has been bipolar.

  3. 3.

    Elizabelle

    “If Trump just did his job.”

    If Comey just did his job, we would have President Hillary.  We’d be in recovery, and maybe even welcome to travel to other countries.

    (On that note:  FYI from me:  Costa Rica has opened its borders.  To Americans from select blue states —  East Coast, none south of Virginia.  And Maryland, which is a Democratic state with a moderate and sane GOP governor.  Colorado residents will be allowed into Costa Rica beginning September 15.)

  5. 5.

    Yutsano

    Uncle Joe is PISSED the whole way around. It’s a delicious j’accuse of the current administration.

    “He just doesn’t care.” DAMN!

    EDIT: stock market down about 350 right now.

  6. 6.

    trollhattan

    @Elizabelle: Home sale prices are up 10% over a year ago in our area, and inventory is down by about half. Loan broker spouse is busiest of any period during herr Trump’s reign. Weird times.

  7. 7.

    Elizabelle

    Joe, please bring up that the REPUBLICANS will not pass another COVID financial relief bill.

    It’s not just Trump.  It’s the whole ghastly party.  All of them.

  8. 8.

    Elizabelle

    @trollhattan:   Interest rates, and the haves have the money.  And may not trust the stock market.  Better to park their money in real estate.

    Bigger homes.  Second homes.  Vacation homes.  Investment properties.

  10. 10.

    Elizabelle

    “There’s nothing beyond our capacity.”

    Such a counterargument to the “we can’t do fuck — everything is too expensive” Republicans.  Can’t do for anyone but themselves and their donors.

    Now taking Q&As.  First one is about the article.

  12. 12.

    Elizabelle

    Joe just called the behavior DEPLORABLE.

    Yea!  Resurrect that word.  Dare Maggs Haberman to twist that one.

    Biden ends:  “Deplorable.  Absolutely damnable.  A disgrace.”

    Second Q is about QAnon.

    Biden:  “I’ve been a big supporter of mental health.”  Talking about the planeload of people with weapons, flying around.

    Anyone found that plane??

  15. 15.

    Yutsano

    DEPLORABLE! DRINK!

    How many breathless columns are going to get written over this?

    OH SNAP HE JUST CALLED THE QANON FOLKS MENTALLY ILL!!!

  17. 17.

    Elizabelle

    I am great with Biden calling out the QAnon pukes.  They are fools, and no one we need to coddle.

    Mental health is right.

    I imagine Peter Baker and Maggs Haberman and Mrs. Greenspan are furrowing their brow over calling QAnon supporters mentally disordered.  Suck on it, enablers.

    “The words of a president matter.  Even a lousy president.”

  18. 18.

    Elizabelle

    @Yutsano:   That’s perfect.

    Now they can go even crazier.  They’re already bugfuck there.  Make it even more obvious.

    I am liking Biden with NFLTG.

    One wishes Hillary could have been more like this, but I understand why she wasn’t.

    Amy Chozick, the misquoting hellhound on her trail.

  19. 19.

    Yutsano

    “I’m a smart fella. I  listen to scientists.”

    CAN THE ELECTION BE NOW PLEASE???

    EDIT: “He’s a bad attorney general but he’s a really lousy intelligence officer.”

    Also: “what’s he so afraid about Vladimir Putin?” DRAG HIM!

  20. 20.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Joe on Barr: “He’s a lousy enough Attorney General, but he’s a really bad intelligence officer!” LOL!

  21. 21.

    Elizabelle

    Q about wearing a mask.

    Now Q about Barr and his lie about China being more of a threat to elections than Russia.

    “He’s a lousy enough Attorney General, but he’s a really bad intelligence officer.”

    Thwack!!

  23. 23.

    Elizabelle

    @SiubhanDuinne:   You gots an echo.

    This speech was SO worth turning in to.

    We can have Biden O’Clock and Harris O’Clock, as we drew succor from Cuomo O’Clock.

  24. 24.

    jonas

    @Yutsano: How many breathless columns are going to get written over this?

    Hot damn! Cilizza just paused working on another post on Nancy’s haircut to get right on this!

  26. 26.

    Elizabelle

    Jennifer Rubin is loving this too.  You know she is.  Her next column or two is going to be LIT.

    ETA:  And Alexandra Petri.

  32. 32.

    Elizabelle

    Getting down in the gutter like the President does …. saying things (that should be said behind a barn??)

  36. 36.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Elizabelle: I see they’re opening up to Mainers on Sept. 1 but us Massholes only on Sept. 15. The Mainers better watch out, their state government won’t like them interacting with people from Massachusetts in Costa Rica.

  37. 37.

    Elizabelle

    “It’s almost pathological.”

    Mimics Trump’s voice:  “I’ve never said anything like that.”

  39. 39.

    Elizabelle

    @SiubhanDuinne:   Wouldn’t it be great if someone along the lines of Sarah Cooper handled a Trump speech in real time?  Maybe some already do.

    The comedian in the small box; the clown president at the podium.

  45. 45.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Omnes Omnibus: The only even remotely observable issue is when he has to pause to find a work around word because of his stutter.

    But the President’s campaign people and surrogates will edit stuff to highlight every stammer or word switch out and then blast it out on social media to micro target people with the message that Biden is demented.

  47. 47.

    zzyzx

    @jonas: Newt Gingrich explained today that the haircut means that Republicans will have a massive electoral win everywhere. I saw the headline (Newsweek of course) in my Apple News feed and I had to click just to see who wrote it.

  48. 48.

    wvng

    Seems to me that Joe has found exactly the right tone in response to questions about Trump. Sad, disappointed, angry at specific actions, FRAUD on his biggest lies.  Very impressed.  Also, right now, he is challenging the press to do better in covering Trump. “I can’t believe you don’t feel the same anxiety….this has moved beyond Democrat and Republican”

  50. 50.

    Martin

    @Yutsano: That’s probably fairly accurate. There’s been quite a few studies that suggest that conspiratorial thinking is a byproduct of stress and anxiety.

    Which of course begs the question – if we’re stressed and anxious and not falling into the QAnon well, how stress and anxious are his supporters? And why are they so stressed and anxious?

  51. 51.

    Gravenstone

    @Elizabelle: 

    One wishes Hillary could have been more like this, but I understand why she wasn’t.

    This is a clear example of the privilege inherent in being an older white male. Hillary could not speak in these tones because she’d have been labelled as “hysterical”. Obama could not speak in these tones because he’d have fulfilled the “angry Black man” trope to a T. It’s not fair, but we all recognize that it exists. So Joe is leaning into it, hard. Good to see him taking full advantage of the privilege afforded to him and those who look like him. And I hope his words drive Trump to an incapacitating stroke before he’s able to do any further damage to our country.

  53. 53.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Omnes Omnibus: I was honestly irritated in 2016 whenever people said “I wish Biden was running” after knocking Hillary for stuff Biden was also guilty of to an equal or greater degree. It always seemed like they were being graded on a skewed curve. But I guess we’re on the advantageous side of it now.

  54. 54.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @zzyzx: how are we still saddled with that land-bound blobfish? much less having his … wife… embarrassing us as Ambassador to the Vatican?

  55. 55.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Elizabelle:

    Remember Obama’s “anger translator”? Maybe somewhere out there is a Trump “bullshit translator” just waiting for their big chance.

  56. 56.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Wow. Even the usually clueless Chuck Todd is in amazement at the way Biden, and I quote, “eviscerated” Trump.

  59. 59.

    Elizabelle

    @SiubhanDuinne:   Their chance has been there for 3-plus years now.

    Biden handled that last question very well.  Kosovo-Serbia agreement with Israel; he’s not seen the details.  Supports countries/states with Muslim populations.  Reaffirmed support for Israel as a Jewish state, and hoped it would work toward a two-state solution.

    Says he has been to Kosovo many times.

  60. 60.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    Joe was great not only in the prepared remarks but also in the Q&A. Not doddering at all.

    Last time, Trump tweeted they gave Joe the questions ahead of time and he read the answers. I don’t think that’s going to fly.

  61. 61.

    Amir Khalid

    @Elizabelle:

    Sarah Cooper says it takes her hours to prepare a 90-second lip-sync video with pre-recorded Trump audio. On the fly with live audio doesn’t strike me as doable.

  62. 62.

    Elie

    I certainly was not a Biden proponent up until about a month ago but I was sold with his speech three days ago bringing the wood to Trump about “law and order”. I now hear a solid leader with solid ideas and REAL integrity and character. He aint afraid — of this country’s problems and definitely not the orange thing in the White House. He is in command of himself. Love it. He is the leader for this time — the one we have been waiting for. Not perfect — and many things might still happen — but he is a for real leader doing what his soul and intellect tell him to do. AND he cares about us — about this country. Nuff for me.

  63. 63.

    Elizabelle

    @SiubhanDuinne:   Weirdly, C-Span segued immediately to Trump’s acceptance speech on the White House lawn, with him calling Biden some awful name.  (Not borne out by the press conference we just saw.)  Closed the window immediately.

    Bye bye C-Span.

  64. 64.

    Elizabelle

    @Amir Khalid:   Yeah.

    And the sheer press of the firehose of lies.  Would be difficult.

    Even for a fact checker.  I don’t honestly know how they can do that at a debate, when it’s a gish gallop.

  65. 65.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @SiubhanDuinne: James Atamanuik would be good for that, since his trump is kind of wheedling and befuddled. Trump’s insecurity translator, “this is all cause daddy never told me he loved me…

    I was looking for the one that imagined if trump were never president, with Kathy Najimy IIRC as an embittered Queens-housewife Ivana, but I don’t see it on the youtube

  66. 66.

    Subsole

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Maybe, but it’s true.

    Those folks are swivel-eyed barking at the moon bugfuck crazy.

    And frankly, I am just kind of enjoying SOMEONE that can actually speak out and be repeated by the autocastrati in the press-corps saying what should have been said in 2015.

  68. 68.

    Elizabelle

    One cannot imagine previous Democratic nominees being that dismissive and derisive towards the incumbent, but these times, and this fool in office, call for the truth.

    Trump got dissed, up and down.  Called deplorable.  Suggested his QAnon supporters need mental health care.

    It was.  Perfect.

  69. 69.

    Elizabelle

    @Zinsky:   With an underflavor undercurrent of laughing at Trump. And at the most deranged of his supporters.

    That will get noticed.

  73. 73.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Subsole: Oh, I know one of them, and it is indeed like their brain got gradually eaten by worms over the past several years. They went from a single-issue anti-abortion conservative (dismaying in itself, but you could see the internal logic of the position) to saying stuff that just doesn’t make any sense–I mean, you can’t even argue against it because it’s not clear what the argument even is; what Pauli would call “not even wrong”. Really shocking to see.

    Though I’m not sure it’s a diagnosable mental illness because it’s a sort of memetic infection with social support.

  74. 74.

    Elizabelle

    Leaving aside Deplorable Trump, I really liked hearing that Joe sees the economy that working and middle class Americans face, vs. the economy on steroids that the rich enjoy.

    Inequality is a real problem; detrimental to democracy, and I do think Joe and Kamala (and Elizabeth) have it front and center.

  77. 77.

    Another Scott

    … gradually, and then suddenly…

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-falwell-legacy-insight/how-jerry-falwell-jr-mixed-his-personal-finances-with-his-universitys-idUSKBN25V27L

    […]

    Falwell, who took over as president of Liberty in 2007 after years as a lawyer handling its real estate interests, intertwined his personal finances with those of the evangelical Christian university founded by his father.

    He put his two sons – and their wives as well – on the university’s payroll. He arranged the transfer of a multi-acre Liberty facility to his personal trainer. He enlisted a friend’s construction company to manage an ambitious campus expansion costing hundreds of millions of dollars.

    And before becoming school president, Falwell set up two companies that enabled him to cut property deals with one of the many nonprofit entities affiliated with the university, Reuters found. In each of the deals, Falwell played multiple roles with potentially conflicting interests: He was an officer of the university, a board member for the nonprofit selling the land, and a private developer who could profit from the transactions.

    “It’s very worrisome to have these sorts of financial arrangements going on and they deserve intense scrutiny,” said Michael Bastedo of the University of Michigan School of Education.

    In 2001, property records show, Falwell set up a private company while he was a lawyer for Liberty, used it to buy an undeveloped tract of land from the school, and then developed a strip mall on the plot. The company sold the property five years later at a significant premium.

    […]

    This is my shocked, shocked face.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  78. 78.

    Mary G

    Joe Biden today: "It's almost like he doesn't care [about testing], it doesn't affect him because it doesn't affect him or his class of friends. Anyone with a big enough checkbook can get rapid tests on demand."— Jeff Stein (@JStein_WaPo) September 4, 2020

  80. 80.

    Elizabelle

    @Elizabelle:   Although saying the QAnon people need mental health services is not Joe laughing at them.

    I laugh at them.  I think he pities them, and sees their craziness as people on the edge.  (Although it’s also people who love to conspiracy-monger so they think they’re a real special, unusually smart IN group.  Of the rightest of rightwingers.)

    So:  mental health or some kind of intervention is warranted.

  83. 83.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Elizabelle: And as was the case with the UAE-Israel deal, as the details dribble out, what we’re going to find is:

    1. It’s really an arms deal
    2. Despite Israel’s longstanding policy of opposing the US selling weapons to Muslim and Arab countries, Bibi knew and agreed to it without telling anyone (this news came out regarding the UAE deal earlier this week)
    3. The Saudis and the Emiratis are throwing in a ton of cash to induce the sides into the deal, so it is basically a bribe
    4. The whole point of the deal was the arms sales I reference in item 1 and getting another embassy moved to Jerusalem.

    A Biden administration is going to have to move the embassy back to Tel Aviv and reestablish the Consulate General in Jerusalem rather than have it absorbed within the US mission to Israel (which is both the oldest US diplomatic mission and outpost and the de facto US diplomatic mission to the Palestinians). And despite the fact that over 90% of the US embassy in Israel, both personnel and functions, are still in Tel Aviv the point of the move, despite it being smoke and mirrors, is to create a political crisis for any administration that does the right thing and moves it back. Getting another embassy in Jerusalem as part of this deal is intended to increase the pressure that can and will be brought to bear on a Biden administration as they try to fix this mess.

  84. 84.

    Elizabelle

    @wvng:

    right now, he is challenging the press to do better in covering Trump. “I can’t believe you don’t feel the same anxiety….this has moved beyond Democrat and Republican”

    Yeah.  That was excellent, and fairly aimed.

  85. 85.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Which was a lie. The woman who said she was going off the notes she was given was from a BLM group in Kenosha and the group had prepared the questions for her. It wasn’t something the Biden people gave her or that Biden even knew was coming whether she’d asked what her organization wanted or winged it.

  87. 87.

    greengoblin

    Loved how Biden stood up for Kamala when that reporter said she wasn’t doing anything.  Don’t know who he is but what a crappy thing to say. ?

  88. 88.

    dmsilev

    Incoming trainwreck alert:

    Trump announced he’ll be holding a 5 p.m. news conference at which he is likely to be asked again about the accusations.

    (WaPo)

  89. 89.

    Kay

    Truck Mack
    @88NCDT
    Come back Nov. 4 #Trump2020Landslide

    The Q map has Trump carrying California and Massachusetts- oddly Biden retains Illinois.

    83 Biden, 455 Trump. That’s the call.

  91. 91.

    JPL

    Brianna  Keilar just showed a series of clips of trump when he disrespected someone’s military career.    It was brutal and at the same time so lovely.    She also interviewed Tammy who btw has a RBG doll on her book shelf.

  92. 92.

    Subsole

    @Matt McIrvin: Sorry to hear it. Had a couple acquaintances fall into the conspiracy community. Not quiiiite, qanon, but the whole jade helm enigma babylon one world government thing.

    Not fun to watch otherwise decent people get driven mad.

    Like your friend, the common thread/gateway was religion. Gay marriage in this case, rather than abortion. Otherwise rather liberal people for the region.

  93. 93.

    Kay

    Trump also takes NY and Maryland in their prediction, but not NJ or CT. It’s a strange realignment- very specific.

  95. 95.

    trollhattan

    @Adam L Silverman:

    US-Israel relations are bogglingly complicated but I am primarily interested in how we distance ourselves from the toxic Likuds, especially Bibi, and yet maintain a working relationship while pressing a two-state solution. Is there any possibility there of a moderate-liberal backlash against Likud, or are the opposition parties hopelessly muddled?

  96. 96.

    Jeffro

    I’m thinking of having some t-shirts (blue ones, of course) printed up:
    “Nancy’s
    Haircut
    Won’t
    Save You”

    What do y’all think ? Too much inside baseball there? ???

  101. 101.

    Elizabelle

    @dmsilev:   Ooh.  Usually avoid Trump pressers like the plague he is, but that might be worth watching.

    Especially if he gets asked about Slow Joe Biden’s comments today.

    Although:  don’t we usually get a tranquilized Trump reading some staffer’s talking points?

  103. 103.

    MattF

    Guardian names two people who confirm Atlantic story:

    Both Elizabeth Neumann, a former assistant secretary of counter-terrorism in the Department of Homeland Security, and Miles Taylor, a former chief of staff in that department, said the account was true, asserting that Trump’s low opinion of soldiers killed and wounded in combat was well-known inside the administration.

  104. 104.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Adam L Silverman:

    His Secretary of State is going to need to be almost superhuman to undo all the damage of the last four years — and the SoS and Biden are going to have to select really extraordinary ambassadors. Not just Israel, but US missions around the world.

  106. 106.

    Elizabelle

    @MattF:   The Guardian works fast. They’ve already incorporated Biden’s press conference remarks.

    Trump defenders included the secretary of state [Pompeo] and the president himself, who dismissed the report as a false attack meant to damage his shot at re-election. The Atlantic report was “totally false”, Trump told reporters at the White House on Friday.

    Asked if he should apologize for his reported comments about fallen service members, Trump said: “No, it’s a fake story.”

    But a visibly angry Biden called the alleged comments “disgusting” and said Trump was “not fit to be commander-in-chief”.

    “When my son volunteered and joined the United States military – and went to Iraq for a year, won the Bronze Star and other commendations, he was not a sucker,” Biden said, his voice rising, in remarks in Wilmington, Delaware. His son Beau, who died of brain cancer in 2015, was deployed to Iraq in 2008.

    “If these statements are true, the president should humbly apologize to every Gold Star mother and father and every Blue Star family,” Biden said. “Who the heck does he think he is?

    “I’m always cautioned not to lose my temper,” Biden said. “This may be as close as I come in this campaign. It’s just a marker of how deeply the president and I disagree on the role of the president of the United States of America.”

  110. 110.

    Elizabelle

    @MattF:   And we know one source is a John Kelly friend, who is also a retired 4-star.

    That leaves only one mystery source.  It is fun to speculate.

  111. 111.

    Kent

    So I’ve been thinking about some of the Dem hand-wringing about Trump’s “October Surprise” vaccine announcement that the evil genius is apparently planning and telegraphing.

    I think the proper way to address that full-on is with derisive mockery.  Like with Al Gore and “inventing the internet”  Democrats should be saying something like the following on repeated loop come October:

    “Trump is trying to claim credit for the tens of thousands of hard-working Americans who have been working night and day to find a solution to this virus?  When did he cure Covid-19?  In between his tweeting and golfing and cowering under the bed in terror of Antifa?   Trump cured Covid?   Bwah ha ha ha….what is he going to do next? cure cancer?”

    Just endless repeated mockery of the notion that it was actually Trump that had anything to do with curing Covid.  Which, will of course, drive him to Twitter and the TV cameras to make increasingly outrageous claims about how he was singularly important in the Covid vaccine development effort.  And keep repeating the cycle.

    Make “Trump cured Covid” into the “Al Gore invented the Internet” of 2020.

    That is how the Republicans would do it.  And the media would gleefully help them.

  115. 115.

    dmsilev

    @Elizabelle: I’m sure his staff will try to give him a script with talking points, but I predict that will last roughly 30 seconds before he starts ad-libbing and airing his grievances.

  116. 116.

    Adam L Silverman

    @trollhattan: No. The whole thing is broken. Bibi purposefully turned it into a partisan political and religious sectarian issue in the US to break it. Because it being broken benefits him and his coalition partners, but especially him.

  117. 117.

    James E Powell

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Though I’m not sure it’s a diagnosable mental illness because it’s a sort of memetic infection with social support.

    It’s a folie à deux, only it’s a folie à deux à la 26e puissance. The things they are afraid of are either things that aren’t going to happen or things that when they happen aren’t going to hurt them and may even make their lives better.

  118. 118.

    Baud

    @greengoblin:

    Loved how Biden stood up for Kamala when that reporter said she wasn’t doing anything. Don’t know who he is but what a crappy thing to say.

    “I pre-wrote a story about how Harris was elbowing you out and taking over the campaign.  Can you tell me when I’ll be able to run it?”

  120. 120.

    Adam L Silverman

    @SiubhanDuinne: The whole point is to break everything beyond the point of fixing and doing it in such a way that any attempt to fix it will be perceived as partisan and used by the GOP to win the 2022 midterms.

  123. 123.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Baud:

    Our very own homegrown (GA) QAnon candidate for Congress, Marjorie Taylor Greene, posted a photo of herself on FB yesterday or today* holding a gun and said she was going to “go on the offensive” against “these socialists” AOC, Rashida Tlaib, and Ilhan Omar.

    *I didn’t see the post; just read about it on CNN or somewhere.

  125. 125.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): No. The deal was garbage. Bibi has the ability to call for new elections as soon as the prime ministership would switch from him to Gantz. I explained this at the time: the deal was hot garbage, Gantz got played.

  126. 126.

    Ken

    @Kent: In between his tweeting and golfing and cowering under the bed in terror of Antifa?

    “Cowering in the bunker” would both be more accurate and remind everyone of that incident.

  128. 128.

    Ken

    @Adam L Silverman: to create a political crisis for any administration that does the right thing and moves it back.

    Can’t they just announce that Sheldon Adelson hadn’t kept up the payments donations, so the deal is off?

  129. 129.

    jonas

    So Pompeo and Sarah Huckabee Sanders have now both gone on the record stating that they were on the trip with Trump in France and they never heard him say that stuff. Both are also completely non-credible Trump toadies.

  130. 130.

    Marcopolo

    Just dropping in for a sec to say I like Joe Biden when he is angry. More of this please.

    That is all, everyone have a great day.

  133. 133.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Adam L Silverman:

    I’m sure that’s true, but even so, it shouldn’t deter or dissuade Biden from appointing excellent people and trying to mitigate as much damage as humanly possible — and I don’t think it will.

  134. 134.

    Adam L Silverman

    @SiubhanDuinne: I saw the post. Depending on what Greene says and does, as well as Kevin McCarthy, Pelosi may have to decide whether or not allow Greene to be seated come January.

  136. 136.

    Elizabelle

    @jonas:   Yeah, and Huckabee was for sure throwing the White House aide (the Coast Guard guy) under the bus at the time.  For keeping Trump from the Belleau Wood cemetery.

    Made me think, though:  you are not stitched to Trump’s clothing, as far as we can see. You do not hear his every utterance, every conversation.

    All the Possum Queen and Pompeo can say is that they never heard that said in their presence.

    And even that is a stretch.

  138. 138.

    Kay

    @Matt McIrvin:

    They’ve gotten so far from Q’s teachings, though :)

    I don’t see it holding together as a cult. It’s too big and complicated. I don’t think any one of them understands the whole thing at this point. The whole Kennedy tangent alone could be a free-standing cult.

  140. 140.

    Barbara

    @Another Scott: I had a friend in college whose car was destroyed when a truck with an open back turned over and lost its load of tires, one of which got rolling onto the hillside below and eventually (like half a mile away) smashed into her car.

  143. 143.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Well then, isn’t he still facing corruption charges?

    And anyway, fuck the people who will get their parties in a twist over the move. Can’t we just ignore them? Or just tell them in so many words to go fuck themselves? It’s worked for Trump and the GOP

  145. 145.

    Barbara

    @dmsilev: Wow, he must be really worried about this.  The problem for him is that it’s too easy to go back and find things he did say in the public record that will no doubt contradict his “strongly worded denial.”

  147. 147.

    trollhattan

    @Another Scott:

    OMG. It didn’t need to be smoking but I admit, the perfect touch.

    Recall driving on the interstate and a wheel shot past me going my direction, luckily it kept on going and wandered out of the adjacent lane. Will never know what strange event occurred to set that in motion.

  148. 148.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): As long as he’s PM, he’ll stay out of prison. If he has to, he’ll call a snap election and when it drags on for four months and deadlocks again because no one can claim a majority, he’ll call another one, and another one, and another one. It doesn’t matter that he’s just a caretaker PM, the key is to remain the PM.

  150. 150.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Baud: Considering I was briefing this about Iraq and Afghanistan as far back as 2007, some of us have known it for a long time.

  151. 151.

    Calouste

    @jonas: Has any reporter actually checked the weather for the day of the war cemetery visit? Wait, that’s 5 minutes of work, so too much for them. There was probably a light drizzle, nothing more.

  152. 152.

    Elie

    @Elizabelle:

    Besides, there has been not a peep from John Kelly or the other general (Dempsey?) who were supposed to be in a position to defend Trump.  None of the military (Generals) has said squat.  Its been over 24 hours.

  153. 153.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Then perhaps it’s time we placed sanctions on the Israel. And if the fundy/Republican nutjobs want to whine about it, then they can be told to go fuck off.

  156. 156.

    topclimber

    @Kent: I disagree. “Congratulations to the Trump Administration and thousands of dedicated researchers in the government and private industry. The President failed us on many counts in responding to the pandemic, but did get this one thing right. When he leaves the White House in January, he can proud of that.”

    You don’t want to look overly political about a development that many folks are hoping for, many desperately. You want to be non partisan and keep the focus off claims that “libtards would rather Trump fail than that a vaccine makes him look good.”

    But you don’t pretend doing one thing right balances the scales. Blind squirrels, broken clocks, etc.

    Of course, if they rush a vaccine without proper vetting, then you bash the hell out of him for putting America at risk again.

  157. 157.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Kay: I don’t think there’s really anything to understand. None of it holds together by even ridiculous moon-logic connections; it’s just a big grab-bag of ludicrous random assertions that keeps growing. I’d guess that would actually make it more robust, since there isn’t really a creed to keep track of or be declared a heretic if you disagree with it, just association with a group of people who pass this stuff around.

  158. 158.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Why not?

    If they won’t do that, then what are the odds of the Dems amending the Judiciary Act to pack the Supreme Court? Because that’s what we need to do to ensure long term victory

  160. 160.

    germy

    @Adam L Silverman:
    The Moral Principle and the Material Interest 

    A Moral Principle met a Material Interest on a bridge wide enough for but one.

    “Down, you base thing!” thundered the Moral Principle, “and let me pass over you!”

    The Material Interest merely looked in the other’s eyes without saying anything.

    “Ah,” said the Moral Principle, hesitatingly, “let us draw lots to see which shall retire till the other has crossed.”

    The Material Interest maintained an unbroken silence and an unwavering stare.

    “In order to avoid a conflict,” the Moral Principle resumed, somewhat uneasily, “I shall myself lie down and let you walk over me.”

    Then the Material Interest found a tongue, and by a strange coincidence it was its own tongue.  “I don’t think you are very good walking,” it said.  “I am a little particular about what I have underfoot.  Suppose you get off into the water.”

    It occurred that way.

    (Ambrose Bierce)

  161. 161.

    Kent

    @Ken:“Cowering in the bunker” would both be more accurate and remind everyone of that incident.

    Sure.  The point is mock the hell out of him for trying to steal the credit from hard working American scientists who were toiling away 24/7 while he was golfing and tweeting.  If there’s one thing Trump can’t take it is mockery.  Especially if it is about his secret strategy to flip the election.  It will drive him to absolute distraction.

    And then every time some Trump lackey tries to talk about how Trump cured Covid we can mock them mercilessly too, and make the whole thing into an absurd joke.

  163. 163.

    Geminid

    @Calouste: I saw photographs this morning of John Kelly and wife, JCS Chairman Milley and Mrs. Milley at the cemetary that day. They had come by car. I could not see much rain.

  164. 164.

    germy

    An Intrusion

    Morality put her toe into international politics and it was promptly chopped off.

    “A thousand thanks,” said Diplomacy, with an engaging bow; “we will keep it in memory of a most distinguished honor.”

    And Morality has limped a little ever since.

    (Ambrose Bierce)

  167. 167.

    Mallard Filmore

    @Elizabelle:

     

    The comedian in the small box; the clown president at the podium.

    If the clown is in the small box, the lip sync would not have to be perfect.

  171. 171.

    Kent

    @topclimber: That’s not how it will play out.   Maybe with another president, but not Trump.  They will make increasingly absurd and outlandish lies about how Trump single-handedly “battled the deep state” bureaucrats to bring you a vaccine that the Democrats didn’t want to see developed, because they would rather keep you masked and locked in your homes to take away your “freedumb.”  They will politicize the fucking hell out of it 24/7 with lies and distortions that will be too numerous to even contend with.  Polite congratulations for a job well done will just play into their hands and get instantly recycled into the propaganda stream.   That is the sort of thing they count on Democrats doing.

    This is a battle for the inattentive undecideds, not for the partisans who talk about things like “liberal conspiracies to make Trump look bad”

  174. 174.

    ronrab

    @Adam L Silverman: And I knew an internet cartoonist writing about it around 2001. The GOP’s plan has been ‘break it, blame Democrats when they can’t fix it instantly’ for quite a while.

    And why shouldn’t it be? It works, apparently.

  176. 176.

    germy

    @geg6:

    Atamanuik says he sent an audition tape to SNL and was turned down.

    And then Lorne MIchaels showed the audition to Baldwin to give him pointers on how to imitate trump.

  177. 177.

    Gravenstone

    @SiubhanDuinne: I’m curious what Georgia’s mechanism for replacing a member of Congress is? Because her ignorant ass will never be seated in a House controlled by the Democrats. Especially if she goes all in on record like this threatening her would be future colleagues.

  179. 179.

    Gravenstone

    @trollhattan: Had an errant wheel come bounding over the median on I-94 in Milwaukee some years ago. Actually hit my front fender, but by then it had lost enough energy it just left an angry scuff mark on the paint.

  180. 180.

    LuciaMia

     The Atlantic report was “totally false”, Trump told reporters at the White House on Friday.

    This really illustrates how he does just say what comes into his head that very second, without  any regard whats gone on before. They have him on tape. Hell, they have a whole litany of tapes!

  181. 181.

    cain

    @jonas:

    @dmsilev:  Oh God, that’s going to be lit. Tom Nichols had better have a stiff drink handy.

    Yes,it’s always good to wander over to Chez Nichols to get the twitter framing of the crazy. It’s the only sane way to handle these press releases. I don’t know how he does it.

  182. 182.

    LuciaMia

    It sure is easier to break things than build them.

    Heck, even Spock agreed with that. (Wrath of Khan)

  184. 184.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @LuciaMia: That’s the thing about narcissists, reality is whatever want it to be at any given moment—even if that’s 180-degrees opposite of what it was 60 seconds ago.

    It’s not even necessarily gaslighting, often the narc genuinely believes what they’re saying because there’s no reality outside their own head. It’s one of the things that’s most madding for people in a relationship with one.

  185. 185.

    JPL

    hahahah     trump saves Stars and Stripes.     As soon as the story received national attention, I knew he’d deny having anything to do with it.   What a phony.

    Also if you want to see someone totally destroy trump, watch Brianna Keilar.   It’s seven minutes of pure bliss.   link 

  189. 189.

    topclimber

    @Kent: Yes it is about the so-called undecideds. Why give credence to their “both sides do it”  syndrome by not giving Trump a small amount of credit for developing a vaccine? I think Biden would.

  192. 192.

    J R in WV

    @Gravenstone:

    Had an errant wheel come bounding over the median on I-94 in Milwaukee some years ago. Actually hit my front fender, but by then it had lost enough energy it just left an angry scuff mark on the paint.

    Many, many years ago, coming home from the Navy, wife was driving our old Plymouth and I drove the U-Haul. North from the MS coast, into AL, into KY.

    In KY the Interstate was straight, but long, long gentle hills up and down. Suddenly there was a bang under the right front side, and something whizzed up from under the fender. It was the right front tire.

    The whole (big!) truck slowly tipped towards the now missing wheel, while I locked up on the steering, expecting bad shit to happen. Then the front axle hit the concrete, and a huge shower of sparks filled the right half of what I could see. Things started slowing, gradually. The truck cut a groove half a mile long in the concrete!

    Once things were a whole lot slower, I eased the steering toward the right, onto the shoulder. I didn’t have a clue where the wheel went. Once the truck had ground to a stop, I just sat and breathed deeply for a while, until wife came up and was all “What did you do?”

    The rest is mundane, she went in the Plymouth to call UHaul for help. UHaul insisted on finding the wheel, which had punched a hole in the fence beside the highway and come to a stop in a pasture. He helped us move our stuff into his new truck.

    What happened was the Jesus nut that held the wheel on the axle lost it’s cotter pin which kept it from turning… once it rotated far enough, the tire pressure bounced that puppy many feet into the evening sky. I was pleased not to have died. Not touching any of the pedals was evidently the correct thing to have done. Winter of 1973.

    One more death defying event…

  193. 193.

    Immanentize

    Let’s reperspectivize:

    Trump is losing and his loser stink is growing:
    Trump v. USPS — USPS in three rounds
    Trump v. Stars and Stripes — Trump KO’ed in one round
    Trump v. active military and vets — This is the title round. Still slugging it out, but it looks bad for Trump.

    Loser leaves town.

  195. 195.

    Mary G

    @SiubhanDuinne: Too lazy to look it up, but Ilhan tweeted at Facebook that she considered it a death threat, and maybe take it down? One of their PR flacks tweeted back that of course, they took it down, so sorry they missed it. Then another person chimed in that they had reported it to FB hours ago and been told the image didn’t violate their terms of service.

  197. 197.

    Elizabelle

    @JPL:

    Trump’s tweet:  although you know he was fine with it ’til it blew up:

    The United States of America will NOT be cutting funding to @starsandstripes magazine under my watch. It will continue to be a wonderful source of information to our Great Military!

  198. 198.

    J R in WV

    @geg6:

    Not a blow-out, the wheel came off the axle on the right front side of the truck. Yes, it was very scary.

    The tire was still holding air when we found it off in a pasture a long way from the highway. Big truck wheel/tire.

  199. 199.

    germy

    WASHINGTON (AP) – Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s transition team has signed a memorandum of understanding with President Donald Trump’s General Services Administration to begin planning for a potential handover of power.

  201. 201.

    raven

    President Trump overrode his defense secretary and vowed to continue funding Stars and Stripes, the military’s editorially independent newspaper which covers issues relevant to members of the armed forces, after news the administration ordered the organization to shutter leaked to the public.

    Trump tweeted Friday afternoon that the US “will NOT be cutting funding” to the outlet. The President’s tweet came as he faces significant uproar over a report in The Atlantic that said he disparaged military members.

  202. 202.

    raven

    @J R in WV: I was at a thing at Oglebay Park, up the road from John. You know how bad that interstate from Pittsburgh to Wheeling is? A car bottomed out, the transmission came off and the flywheel flew across the highway and went through an windshield and killed the driver.

  203. 203.

    Elizabelle

    @zhena gogolia:   Probably.  Or one of the other psychos in his administration.

    I wish we could reverse the damage done to the VOA, but that may have to wait for President Biden/Harris.

  204. 204.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Adam L Silverman: Apparently the House is constrained by a 1969 USSC decision(Powell v. McCormack*), they have to seat any duly elected candidate(they can refuse to seat if the election is contested).  After the member is sworn in, they can expel the member by a 2/3’s vote of the House.

    *Though I was a wee one at the time, I actually remember this; Powell was Adam Clayton Powell.

  205. 205.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    My brother was captured in Laos in September of 1974 and executed by the North Vietnamese on December 14, 1974. Fuck you, Donald Trump.
     

    — Howard Dean (@GovHowardDean) September 4, 2020

  206. 206.

    MisterForkbeard

    @raven: So he’s blaming the Stars and Stripes thing on his defense secretary, when the order actually came from himself? I are unsurprised.

  207. 207.

    mrmoshpotato

    Good times indeed.

    Remember when pointing out that a non-trivial number of Republicans are deplorable was an extinction-level even in the same media that is now shocked as hell that the ENTIRE Republican party is a shitpile of bigots and imbeciles?Good times.— driftglass (@Mr_Electrico) September 4, 2020

  208. 208.

    Elizabelle

    Trump is up.  Reading some statement about China and others “pillaging” us.

    Pillaging.  More projection.

    Democrat party.  Antifa.

    Biden appeasing domestic terrorists …

    sounds like they have not gotten to The Atlantic article yet, which is the only reason to tune in to this shitshow.

    Which does not even belong on the same thread as our valiant Joe.

  210. 210.

    Elizabelle

    Peace and order and safety.  Violent mobs.  Chicago and cities doing such an incompetent job.

    Their numbers are going down rapidly —  He just said NY had terrible crime, and segued right to Mayor Bowser.  Caught himself in a while to say she was in DC.

    [Easy to remember. That huuuuuge BLACK LIVES MATTER.  Bowser.]

    it’s the usual TrumpShit.

  211. 211.

    Elizabelle

    On the Jy-naa Virus Front …

    Checking out.  Have better things to do.  The lowlights will be on C-Span later.

  212. 212.

    dmsilev

    @Elizabelle:

    Reading some statement about China and others “pillaging” us.

    He probably just spent the afternoon watching the new version of Mulan. I’m sure he was very disappointed at the lack of wise-cracking dragons.

  214. 214.

    Barbara

    @J R in WV: A long time ago I was driving my friend’s Mustang late at night to Seneca Rocks, WV, a last minute decision with no fixed ideas about where to stay.  With my BF beside me and everyone else in the car asleep, we started to hear a rubbing noise and we both commented on it.  His brother woke up and started yelling at us to pull over — he knew instantly what it was, and as I pulled over and was mostly stopped the back wheel flew off the car and down the road, at which point the owner — named Foopy — woke up and said, “Oh, I must not have tightened the lug nuts well enough.”  And so they got out, found the wheel and the nuts and put it back together. I was kind of pissed.  I actually have an even better WV roadside near catastrophe story, maybe some other day.

  215. 215.

    Elizabelle

    @dmsilev:  Mulan!

    Or Mule – On in this case.

    With apologies to donkeys, upstanding animals they be.

    @mrmoshpotato:

    Resting butthole mouth.  Funny.

    ===

    It’s warm but nice breeze here.  Gonna go walk a bit and catch you (and C-Span) later.

    RButtholeMouth was reeling off names of operations underway.

    Legend something for fighting the Democrat mobs.  (Legend in their own minds.)  There were at least two code names.  C-Span transcript will have them.

    Trump likes being a wartime president.  Sad for us, it’s war on truth and democracy and decency.

    Out!

  218. 218.

    Kent

    @topclimber:@Kent: Yes it is about the so-called undecideds. Why give credence to their “both sides do it”  syndrome by not giving Trump a small amount of credit for developing a vaccine? I think Biden would.

    My point is that they are going to try to turn Trump achieving a vaccine into Eisenhower spearheading the Allied invasion of Europe and make his “vaccine leadership” into their singular talking point in late October.  They have already openly signaled that it is their planned hail Mary.  The lies and distortions are going to be breathtaking in their scope and volume.

    Sure, let Biden damn him with faint praise while everyone else laughs at the idea that was Trump who single-handedly brought us the TRUMP® Vaccine and not the 24/7 work of hundreds of thousands of ordinary Americans.

  220. 220.

    J R in WV

    @Barbara:

    Seneca Rocks, WV,

    Well, that IS a long way from everywhere. Losing a wheel/tire out there would be serious. And where would you stay, in the middle of nowhere?

    Lovely countryside, though! Huge rock wall, white water river below, just beautiful country up there.

  221. 221.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    I have little use for John Kelly, but this seems like possibly poking a sleeping wolverine

    Tom Nichols @RadioFreeTom
    Trump is now dumping a whole truckload of shit on John Kelly.

    So, Trump is basically confirming that John Kelly was a source.

    Kaitlan Collins@kaitlancollins 9m
    “I know John Kelly. He was with me. He had no temperament,” Trump says when asked why his former chief of staff hasn’t denied the Atlantic story. Trump says Kelly was “unable to function” and “exhausted” by the time he left. “He was unable to handle the pressure of this job.”

  222. 222.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I think they’re remembering the inexplicable success of “Hillary is dying of the plague”. There was no evidence for that either, but it stuck in certain quarters.

    2016 seems to have caused some herd immunity to some of these tactics, and they don’t have new ones. Yet.

  223. 223.

    Bill Arnold

    @Elizabelle:

    All the Possum Queen and Pompeo can say is that they never heard that said in their presence.
    And even that is a stretch.

    Possum Queen is a liar, well documented.
    Has Pompeo been caught in a straight-up-lie yet, as opposed to clumsy and obvious attempts to mislead while not telling actual falsehoods?
    Anyway, they were not in hearing distance of Trump at all times, and Trump can be/probably is selective about who’s around when he talks stuff that should not have a large audience.

  225. 225.

    James E Powell

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    There was no evidence for that either, but it stuck in certain quarters.

    Stuck in certain quarters is a gross understatement. It was the Breaking!!! Top Story for 72 hours and accompanied by hand-wringing about how this shows why we can never trust That Woman!

  226. 226.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Kent:

    Bear in mind what terrible planners and cataclysmically incompetent organizers the Trump team are.  I think it is more accurate to say they are scrambling in a desperate hope to get a vaccine before the election.  If by some miracle such a vaccine is discovered in the next two months, Trump will not get an immediate bounce because nobody trusts him anymore, and he will fuck up the rollout so badly it will make his poll numbers drop.

  227. 227.

    Bill Arnold

    @topclimber:

    I disagree. “Congratulations to the Trump Administration and thousands of dedicated researchers in the government and private industry. The President failed us on many counts in responding to the pandemic, but did get this one thing right. When he leaves the White House in January, he can proud of that.”

    A Manhattan-project style of vaccine development, with multiple efforts in full parallel[1] and all reasonable time-overlaps being done, was being discussed in March 2020 in various places, including by famous people e.g. IIRC Bill Gates.
    Project Warp Speed was a silly name, but the effort has been the correct approach, including bulk producing vaccine before phase 3 trials complete. It was not, however, the DJT Admin’s idea.

    [1] In the Manhattan project, this was trying multiple ways of making fissionables in parallel. Ended up using gaseous diffusion for enriched uranium and reactor(s) for plutonium.  (IIRC)

  228. 228.

    catclub

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: 2016 seems to have caused some herd immunity to some of these tactics, and they don’t have new ones. Yet.

     

    i was just thinking that the media environment, in which Trump would have his rallies and get live coverage of the crowd waiting, [while another candidate was giving a live speech] is gone.

    Now Biden can give  his speech and that is the main political  event of the day.

  230. 230.

    Butter Emails

    @Kay:

    The Q map has Trump carrying California and Massachusetts- oddly Biden retains Illinois.

    That’s pretty crazy. If I recall correctly, Massachusetts was one of only a handful of states where Trump lost with white men.

     

    Has anyone looked into how it correlates with mail in voting? – it may be designed to reflect in person voting and exit polls. Bloomberg had an article earlier this week pointing out that early results might show Trump with a massive lead due to the disparity between the use of mail in voting and in person voting between Republicans and Democrats in different states.

  231. 231.

    Another Scott

    @Bill Arnold: Pompeo and Mary Louise Kelly of NPR had a dustup during her interview with him and afterwards.  He was clearly lying in the “explanation” afterwards.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

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