I don’t go into town much these days, but on my last three grocery runs, I encountered a mini-Trump rally each time:
The folks above were at the downtown stoplight a few weeks back. Saturday, I saw two or three dozen waving signs on a somewhat desolate stretch of highway. Last week, there was a small crowd by the roadside waving signs and flags at passing cars and a Trump boat parade underway on the lake.
It wasn’t a very impressive boat parade, maybe a dozen or so pontoon and bass boats. But boat parades have become Republican shorthand for “Trump will win because of enthusiasm.” Peggy Noonan is hedging her bets with a nod toward the enthusiasm at Trump’s battleground state super-spreader events:
“You might say, ‘The Democrats aren’t having rallies because they are more careful about the virus.’ Fair enough, but in a lifetime watching politics, sometimes up close, I have never seen crowds keep away from someone they love.”
Noonan, who once fantasized in print about cradling Ronald Reagan’s foot in her arms, has never covered politics during a pandemic until this year. But the “enthusiasm gap” is real in a sense: there’s a cult of personality around Trump that is unparalleled in modern American politics, as far as I know.
The Trump “movement” is remarkable to me primarily because its object is such a petty, peevish vulgarian. That said, Noonan could consult her own wingtip-deification experience to see how this works in her party. Republicans are almost always more enthusiastic because they’re motivated by spite. Even in a losing year for them, Republicans went ga-ga for that empty-headed numpty from Alaska — allowing her to briefly reach escape velocity from her home state as a D-list celebrity.
Trump has made us the spite voters. I’m not saying there isn’t genuine enthusiasm for Biden — plenty of commenters at this very blog are fans, and as the candidate himself might say, God love ya. But I sense a different quality than the Democratic enthusiasm for then-candidate Obama in 2008. There’s more of a “fuck you” to Trump and his enablers. When people — even in his own campaign — enumerate Biden’s best qualities, it’s an implicit rebuke of Trump: Biden is decent, kind and competent; he believes in science.
Rich “Starbursts” Lowry of National Review says Trump is the “only middle finger left” that conservatives can raise against the “cultural Left.” Well, tens of millions of us are marking our ballots for Biden as a gigantic FUCK YOU to Lowry and the MAGA hordes. Some of us are temporarily swallowing misgivings we may have about Biden’s “don’t spook the middle” strategy so that the FUCK YOU might be as big as Texas. Literally, as the candidate himself might say.
I’ve seen an un-Democrat-like discipline this year that rivals the focus of gun fanatics and anti-choice zealots. What Democrats seem to have in 2020 is the “determination” edge. This year, you can see the determination when people stand in hours-long lines to vote in Texas and Georgia. I got lucky; I didn’t have to wait in line when I brought my defective mail-in ballot to an early voting location and exchanged it for a crisp new one.
But as I filled in the oval next to “Joseph R. Biden Jr. and Kamala D. Harris” on my ballot, I was never so goddamned determined in my life. While methodically obliterating every trace of white inside that oval, I wished my pen could scribble out the last four years, extirpate the harm, annihilate the stupidity, eradicate the fecklessness and wipe out the deadly incompetence. But what’s done cannot be undone. So I completed my ballot, fed it into the machine, collected my sticker and went home.
“Enthusiasm” isn’t the right word to describe that feeling. It’s too weak and rah-rah-sports-adjacent a word, so the Trump assholes are welcome to it. Voting this year felt more like a harrowing but necessary task, more a rescue in a stormy sea than a water-borne political rally on a sunny day. We’ll see which translates into more votes, but I suspect determination beats boat parades, eight days a week.
Open thread.
BethanyAnne
I’m so ready for this election to be over. Mom called my sister this morning to talk with her, and sister said “Well, I either have to vote Trump or a pedophile”.
Ohio Mom
Printing the photo in black & white is a nice touch — conveys how antediluvian that crowd is.
schrodingers_cat
When your entire existence is threatened it does give you a sharp focus. Also, I counted 11 people, that is pretty sad for a “rally”.
Phylllis
Exactly the way I felt filling in the oval for Jaime Harrison and Adair Burroughs (running against Joe Wilson, R No You Lie).
Eural Joiner
WOW! Great commentary…I so needed to hear this. Thanks :)
BethanyAnne
I keep telling Mom that the motivation for Republicans is spite. She’ll ask why they follow every dumb thing Lord Smallgloves says, and I say “because it pisses us off”.
germy
Kristine
Thanks, Betty–I needed to read that.
The thing that shook me the most over the last four years was seeing the outright viciousness of so many people. Maybe I knew on an intellectual level, but seeing a crowd cheer Trump as he mocked a disabled man was the sockful of rocks upside the head. Then, every week, every month, year after year of shit, and learning there were people I knew who loved it. I don’t know what policies or changes to their lives can alter that perspective.
ETA: I also agree with how you felt about filling in the circles on your ballot. I was so careful and thorough. I didn’t want any mistakes.
Searcher
Determination, rather than enthusiasm?
Johnny Gentle (famous crooner)
@BethanyAnne: Unfortunately, this election won’t be over even after it’s over. If this is how violent and paranoid trump’s cultists are when he’s in power, just imagine how dangerous and unhinged things will get if Biden wins, or if Democrats actually sweep Congress as well. I’m seriously concerned. It’s not like a mass hysteria that will dissipate; this is who republicans are now.
Additionally, even after trump leaves office you know the media won’t be able to quit him. Biden represents competency and good governance…things that are extremely boring to cover. Trump has given the media an endless buffer of wacky and controversial things to cover all day, every day. How can they live without that?
What’ll happen is everything Biden does will still be filtered through the lens of what trump tweets about it. And of course, he’ll be frothing and tweeting over even the most mundane policy actions because he’ll still desperately need the attention. And the media will run with it because, hey, you’ve got to “cover the controversy”!
scav
Also, I very much doubt they love Trump. They love the middle finger to other people, but he is merely their middle finger magnified, a brash dayglo orange megaphone.
Crashman06
@Searcher: Grim determination maybe?
Argiope
Yard sign seen in a famously progressive northern OH college town: “Settle for Biden 2020”. I admit that I laughed. But if the yoot here are putting up signs like that, it clearly fits your thesis, Betty.
Searcher
Avalune
Such a good post.
Omnes Omnibus
A vote from a resigned or determined voter counts exactly the same as the vote of a wildly enthusiastic one.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Since Peggy Noonan is still around and making herself talked about, let’s remember her prediction for the future of the Democratic Party in 2004. Let us savor.
I actually read the column, and am struck again that this woman is as bad a writer as she is a TeeVee pundit, where her mugging and vocal affectations I find incredibly grating but NBC producers apparently find somehow appealing.
There is also a reference to George Soros trying to “buy” the election, and the column ends with a kiss blown to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingram.
Litlebritdifrnt
What Noonan and her ilk keep failing to mention is that many of the people that attend Twitler’s rallies are the SAME people, they are like Greatful Dead fans going to every concert. They brag about the fact to reporters (some of who report on it). Of course that is great for stroking Twitler’s massive ego but does not translate to votes. You would think that Peggy would have learned her lesson from the Romney yard sign debacle but I guess not.
jc
These Trump supporters want to make America great again by taking the country back to the era before color photography.
VOR
@Kristine: I agree, it was disturbing to learn about the previously hidden racism, misogyny, and just plain meanness of relatives, neighbors, and acquaintances. People who are perfectly okay with police killing unarmed fellow citizens. People who are okay with kids in cages. Okay with bigotry on so many levels. Trump taught them it was okay to say the ugly parts out loud.
It always floors me when MAGAts then claim to be the true victims.
BethanyAnne
@Johnny Gentle (famous crooner): Yeah, I read the NY Times article about talking with relatives who have fallen into conspiracy theories. And the BoingBoing article about the same thing a month or so back. Looks like I’m in for a long road if she’s actually gone deep into it. And she lives in rural Arkansas – which to me says that she’s probably surrounded by folk that mostly agree with her on some level. Blech.
zhena gogolia
@Kristine:
Same.
geg6
I have described it to friends and family as having grim determination. That’s how it feels. We’re on the edge of the apocalypse and only those votes can keep us from going over.
germy
“Limbaugh’s softly combed back hair… swoon!”
The Enderville Phantom
There was a gaggle of these types lining an intersection in downtown Shelton. I drove through that area the other day. “Freedom!” “Trump forever!”
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
@Johnny Gentle (famous crooner): You are probably right. Which is why, though it makes me a terrible, vengeful person, I wish Trump would have long term COVID-19 side effects and have a massive coronary after the inauguration of Biden next January. I know it’s a horrible thing to hope, but I never want to have to hear about that racist, sexist, bullying narcissist ever again. And I hope if his horrendous spawn ever run for any office they get well and truly trounced at the poll (With Votes!)
rp
Well said.
matt
I got my ballot in the mail a week ago Saturday. Voting was my top priority for the weekend. By Sunday night I had read all the relevant voter guides for all the minor positions, had everything 100% filled out, correct, and had it in my outbound mail Monday at 7 am, ready for pickup.
A couple of days later I checked our state website and verified my ballot had been received.
fancycwabs
I’m consistently baffled by Republicans leaning on “herd immunity” for a disease that you can catch more than once.
germy
I’ve had to interact with alcoholics over the course of my life, and two media people give me “functioning alcoholic” vibes: Ms. Noonan and Ms. Pirro.
(Guiliani and Bannon give me a “sloppy drunk” vibe, which is different.)
Baud
Most of our voters aren’t “enthusiastic for Biden.” They are enthusiastic about saving their country. I actually hope that all of us will start moving away from cult of personality politics.
Hoodie
My wife and I were originally planning on voting election day, as the precinct is across the street from our house and rarely takes more than 10-20 minutes to vote. However, we went ahead and waited in line an hour to vote early on Sunday, probably out of the same sense of determination you’re talking about.
Gin & Tonic
@Johnny Gentle (famous crooner):
Quoted for truth. It will be like this for as long as DJT is breathing and capable of manipulating his stubby thumbs.
Oklahomo
Every morning on my commute there is a huge display along I40 that features a giant Ten Commandments billboard, 5 to 6 (depending on what the wind wrecks) trailers/golf carts with huge trump signs; Trump flags along the fence line and atop the big billboard. Last spring this dickhead mowed TRUMP 2020 into the I40 right-of-way; I laughed when the state made him till it under and replant it.
waspuppet
I’ll never forget that Ann Coulter named Sarah Palin the Conservative of the Year for 2008. Even in a big Democratic year, there were hundreds of Republicans who pounded the pavement, ate the rubber chicken, laughed at the unfunny jokes, and won elections. But the conservative of the year was someone who joined a ticket that was leading, complained for three months and lost.
I always knew conservatives were stupid, but that’s when I realized the goal of conservatism was to not have to try to get a real job in the economy that they themselves created.
And while we’re at it, aren’t boat parades an explicit admission that their God Emperor failed at dealing with the virus?
germy
The B&W photo above of the Trump fans. No masks.
I remember seeing a photo of a long line of early voters. My pessimistic nature told me “But maybe these are Republican voters!” But then I saw they were all wearing masks. And my optimistic side said “Nope. Democrats.”
A Ghost to Most
Greed, bigotry, and spite are the fuel they run on. I find none of this surprising. I’ve been expecting it, and worse, for many years. Buckle up.
Nicole
I felt the same way, Betty; thank you for expressing it so eloquently.
I was excited to vote for Obama in ’08 and I cried when he was elected.
I was excited to vote for Clinton in ’16 and I cried when I filled out my ballot. I even dressed in white before I went to the polls.
This time, I wasn’t excited, nor did I cry. I didn’t dress up; I staggered out in my sweatpants and the Tshirt I had slept in (“2020: One Star, Very Bad, Would Not Recommend”). I was grim, and felt like filling in my ballot was picking up my sword and heading out onto the battlefield. But I’m okay with this feeling. I like Biden and Harris just fine and have no problem voting for them; I don’t even resent Biden for his (slight) pandering to the red states. He’s run a very good campaign and I trust him to continue running a good campaign. But 2016 broke something in me. I’ll never view our country the same way again.
Which is probably good. I saw this morning that a Democrat has already announced a challenge to Ron Johnson’s seat two years from now and I thought, “Okay, order postcards to voters now so you have them for 2022.” The fight will never end. And that’s okay.
Kay
I’ve seen two of the Trump car parades here, just the tail end of one of them as they convened in a parking lot.
I heard a funny story though. One of our magistrate’s grown sons was on US 6 and came up on one of the lines of Trump cars. They were going really slow and he couldn’t get around them so he was pissed and called 911 to report “an obstruction on the roadway”. He was just furious. Nothing happened to the Trumpists but I feel like their complete disregard for others who may want to use the road for something other than worship ceremonies is just typical.
Leto
@Ohio Mom: agreed. Basically the same people who were against Loving and Brown v Board. No different from the crowds of white students yelling at the black kids trying to attend school. It’s 60 years later but they’re trapped in time.
Fuck’em.
Ramiah Ariya
Since open thread, I posted this in FB for mainly Indian relevance. Some of you may be interested in what social media led chaos has meant here from my perspective:
FB and Twitter are bending over backwards in the US to accomodate the US govt. They regularly remove entire troll farms and accounts as interference from foreign countries.
There is a big divide between what they do for the US and European govts; and what they do for the rest of the world. Indian social media is also filled with various state actors and non-state actors from abroad – and yet I have not heard of any attempt by FB or Twitter to control them.
All the literature on “fake news”, “disinformation” and hate speech are from the West. Even the experts there are entirely focused on the very specific American problem of polarization and the 2016 election interference. When they study the Indian landscape rarely, they bring with them their understanding of the liberal/conservative divide.
Indians need to study these phenomena from their specific angles – in our case media is not as trusted as it was in the West. Our prejudices are more nakedly felt and experienced, thanks to our vast diversity.
Every political party in India uses bot armies and misinformation – our politics’ standard is not very high anyway. Lying in politics is standard in India, and therefore fact-checking does not have a lot of meaning here. All political parties would gladly bribe their way to power – this is much different from the landscape in the West.
In the media landscape, things are similar – our newsrooms were already low quality, with low ethical standards. Facing financial pressures, a proliferation of online newsrooms (The Wire, Newsminute, Scroll) have risen. These are mediocre too and have no finances for local reporting. Therefore they have come close to trolling, depending on outrage and divisiveness to generate revenue. (It should be noted that some of these are seen in the West as “liberal”.)
Given the low standard of our politics, corruption and the mediocrity of media, what we face is very different from what the United States faces. We need our own expertise in these fields.
Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.)
Since this is an open thread, I’m looking for beta readers. I have a story, just over 80,000 words, and I’ll be trying to find an agent soon, so I want to get things as good as I can get them before that. Magical realism. I don’t know how to get people to answer me; I don’t know if leaving my e-mail address here is frowned upon. But if anybody has any interest, maybe you could say something in the thread.
Matt McIrvin
I have no trouble believing that Trump will absolutely crush Biden among the demographic of boat owners.
rm
Well said. There is a one-woman Trump rally on the one-block downtown of my little Kentucky town today. I guess it’s a coordinated thing? It is kind of pathetic. I mean, the evil guys will still win Kentucky, but pathetically. And young people are all early voting this year like we’ve been wanting them to forever, so maybe . . . maybe . . .
Leto
@Kay: Being a self centered asshole is a prerequisite for being a Trumper. Everything flows from that.
cope
Awww, a mini trump rally. Bless their little hearts.
When I took our ballots to our voting station a week ago today, the only active group of people with signs and hopeful looks were the local Democrats. There were no obvious trump supporters in sight.
Charluckles
Just received word that the Fox News loving in-law voted Biden this year. Or at least claimed that she did. Yeah to a more harmonious holidays.
J R in WV
I usually do a lot of research before election day, going in with notes and all. This year it’s going to be so easy. Straight Democratic all the way down.
Doubt there will be any line at the early voting center, there wasn’t for the primary. Masked up to the max, of course. Planning to go in this afternoon.
matt
@germy: The party numbers for early voters this year are insane.
trollhattan
@BethanyAnne:
Uh…
Shouldn’t that be “I’m voting for Trump and a pedophile”?
Bruce K
Not that anyone cares what this random dink thinks, but you know what this election feels like to me?
D-Day.
Victory is uncertain, but if we can regain the initiative in this war – and it is a war, one they declared – we can break them. It’ll be a long, hard fight, but we can breach their redoubts – the Southern Strategy, the Supreme Court, the Federal courts, Fox News, and Citizens United – and drag them out of their strongholds and cast them out before the world like they did to the Nazis at Nuremberg.
The war’s not over by a long shot, but eight days from today … FSM willing, the tide begins to turn.
matt
@Charluckles: See, that’s the real way to get along with your conservative relatives for the holiday.
Gravenstone
@Searcher: Resolve. The word is resolve.
trollhattan
@cope:
Where do these people find the time? Seems somewhat…shiftless and lazy to be out holding signs and flags instead of being at work.
BethanyAnne
I was so grimly focused and angry this year, I barely read the candidates’ names. I did for the first 3: Biden, MJ Hegar, Lizzie Fletcher. After that, I just looked for the D, and voted for them. All the way down the line.
Matt McIrvin
Well, the only good bits of news for Trump in today’s polls are Rasmussen up to their usual bullshit, and a YouGov one in Texas. Sure doesn’t look like he’s closing strong.
Kay
@Leto:
I noticed one interesting thing at the Trumpist rally in the county. We have a hotly contested race for sheriff btwn the Republican and a fake Independent who is also a Republican. The Trumpists had a law n order theme at their rally and they had to get a former sheriff from Indiana to appear- the candidates for sheriff declined.
J R in WV
@germy:
OK, what’s you take on Justice Kavanaugh as a “functioning alcoholic” — or is he just a drunk?
BethanyAnne
@trollhattan: Heh. Yeah, that’d probably save me 3 years of work talking to her.
germy
West of the Rockies
Ah, so I wasn’t the only one filling in that Biden oval with the fervor of a religious zealot…
I think Trump looked like a buffoon in his 60 Minutes interview. Biden was focused, sharp, and not the whiny pisswilly that Trump was.
Tim
Trump supporters cannot be talked to or reasoned with. They’ve already checked out on being good citizens. One can only vote the narcissistic incompetent fool out of office and make sure that when he leaves he takes his mail order bride and his dimwitted spawn with him. Wife and I filled out our mail in ballots the day we got them and dropped them off at the board of elections. It was a ray of sunshine in both our lives.
Dupe1970
It was unlikely I was ever going to consider a Republican for any office in my lifetime but after waiting four hours in line to vote in Texas the GOP can consider me officially never voting for them again.
germy
@J R in WV:
He seems to like beer.
As a hard partying teenager, probably a blackout drunk. Now? Probably just a steady drinker of beer, to wash down lunch, dinner, and various snacks during sports TV time.
Betty Cracker
@Nicole: Every word of that. Plus, I want one of those t-shirts.
Kent
Anyone read the cheerleading article in the NYT today in which they all pat themselves on the back about how the WSJ new staff didn’t take the bait on the Trump campaign’s ridiculous Rudy Giuliani Hunter Biden smear and as a consequence, media gatekeepers are recovering their role?
I almost puked. Talk about a fucking low bar to set for yourselves. I swear, for half the stuff these people write, their audience is themselves.
Kay
Anyone who thinks big crowds at rallies win elections can look at the crowds at Obama rallies in 2010, when he was trying to stave off midterm losses.
He had big crowds. We still got creamed.
Kent
@J R in WV: Lindsey Graham also. As far as media people, most definitely Tweety.
J R in WV
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.):
I would be happy to take a swing at it. I’m not like a gifted editor, but I’m into reading and willing to take a look. Watergirl has my email address and could give it to you or forward the file to me.
I even often enjoy magical realism as a fiction type!
Kent
@Kay: Big crowds are easy in any election. There are always plenty of partisans on both sides. But elections are won at the margins.
Kay
@germy:
I’m so glad Biden is focusing on Trump’s gross, corrupt attitude with Democratic states because Republicans have been doing a version of this for 20 years and it never should have been accepted. I want to make it so when the next Right winger runs on bashing Dem states and refusing to serve D voters that’s a fucking career killer. It never should have been normalized. It’s outrageous. Really. How dare these people kick the larger portion of the country OUT of the country. Who said they define “American”?
Imagine the flip side of this, where a Democratic President said he wouldn’t provide emergency help for Oklahoma because it’s a red state. It would never happen. It needs to end.
germy
Yutsano
So…you want enthusiasm? In about 15 minutes Brian Tyler Cohen will be interviewing Beto about the state of Texas. Should be a fun one.
Kay
@Kent:
Two words- Bernie Sanders. Big crowds, a lot of enthusiasm, yet they lost. Twice.
WaterGirl
@Charluckles: You are having holidays with extended family this year? i am certainly not because of COVID.
The Moar You Know
@Kristine: You’re not alone on this one. Turns out a lot of folks who I liked and had respect for were just covering an utter inner vileness with a thin veneer of decent behavior. In stripping that away, Trump in one sense has done us a very painful but needful service; there are a whole bunch of motherfuckers I’ll never speak to again, and the few where that is not an option are locked out of every aspect of my life, and I don’t even regret it, because everything they sold themselves to me as was a complete and utter lie.
Calling them “deplorable” is far too polite. We’re talking about people, about 40-45% of Americans, who would gleefully shoot a stranger in the head just because they were asked to. Not even any gain in it for them personally. Just because someone on the internet said it would be a nice thing.
Kay
@germy:
Women cannot win this. We’re either joyless, over prepared witches or frivolous. They shouldn’t play the game at all. It’s rigged.
Harris should do whatever she wants. She’ll be criticized by the Noonan’s of this world either way.
Nora Lenderbee
There’s been a small Dump rally on a highway overpass the last few weekends. Last time I went by, there was a BLM group at the far end of the overpass.
Yesterday, in Livermore (CA), we passed a house flying an American flag and a gigantic Dump flag. It was blue, haha.
Baud
@germy:
I watch this show called The Outpost, and they refer to people who get infected as plaguelings.
It’s probably too late now, but I wish we had used that term for Trump and his acolytes.
Mai Naem mobile
A disabled Hispanic neighbor stuck a Trumpov/Pence sign on Friday(WTF???) followed by the Jehovah’s witness neighbor on Saturday. The JW neighbor i am not surprised with – white couple with a bunch of kids who come across like fundies. Nobody else has signs up yet.
Joey Maloney
The question is, can determination beat election tampering?
Shakti
Betty, you weren’t kidding about Noonan:
Holy shit, she’s worse than Quentin Tarantino and she picked such an unworthy subject to be a lickspittle to.
piratedan
@trollhattan: that’s not the first time I’ve seen the Biden is a Pedo theme trotted out, which illustrates how the GOP disinformation machine operates…
first we have the dubious Guilliani reveal that they have something incriminating (NY Post)
then someone else says the revelations will be mind-blowing (Gateway Pundit)
then someone else says its child pornography (pick a skeevy source of your choice)
then being Biden’s son, means you get to blame his dad about him being a Pedo… aka Biden himself is likely a Pedo because he taught his son to be one
make another vague Pizzagate crack to bring it all full-circle to include all Dems…
all neatly done with no charges, no proof, all aided and abetted by someone at the NY Post who pushed this out to start the entire process rolling.
Almost Retired
OTOH, here in the magical land of Ted Lieu’s District, I just always assumed that my neighborhood was relatively Trumpster-free. But a 1000 car parade down Pacific Coast Highway yesterday defiled the neighborhood and deflated my liberal bubble. They’re out there……but I’ve convinced myself that those 1000 cars contained absolutely every Trump supporter in the South Bay, so there’s no need to worry. https://easyreadernews.com/trump-supporters-rally-in-redondo-beach-parade-through-the-beach-cities/
WaterGirl
@Betty Cracker: Check your email, please.
Delk
A thousand points of spite.
Mai Naem mobile
There was a car rally on the freeway a couple of weekends ago and apparently one of the Cardinals’ players flipped off several rally attendees. Its a story trending on the local news. Freaking snowflakes can’t handle a football player flipping them off.
germy
@Kay:
The “functioning alcoholic” vibe I get from Noonan is the upper class woman who misplaces something during a memory fog, and then upon sobering up accuses the staff of theft.
Jeffro
About 40-45% of eligible voters.
We all know it’s only 27% of all Americans ;)
J R in WV
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.):
I’ve asked Watergirl to send you my email address, please take good care of it!
.. ;-)
The Moar You Know
@J R in WV: I won’t speak for germy but I’ll speak for myself as someone who survived an upbringing in a family chock full of legit alcoholics (and some fake ones too, that’s an interesting phenomena of its own).
Kavanaugh is not an alcoholic.
He’s an asshole with zero impulse control. His screaming fit at his confirmation was not an act.
Roger Moore
@Argiope:
I’ve seen a fair number of “Any Functioning Adult 2020” signs. There’s definitely a lot of Trump fatigue around me.
KrusherKing
There’s one of those in Dunedin in front of the Publix every Saturday, about 15 to 20 jackasses waving giant trump flags, hollering and honking. My friend Ruth shoots them the bird every time she passes them. Trumpers are extra trumpy in FL.
KenK
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.): @#42 – Love to help.
So, Front pagers, how do LF(…) and I get in touch with one another?
germy
That’s like seeing a “Fox 2020” sign on a henhouse.
Baud
@germy: Haha. Excellent metaphor.
Kelly
It’s been weirdly depressing to see “Trump 2020 No More Bullshit” banners in front of homes burnt out by the Beachie Fire. This is timber country that has been convinced for generations that any regulation of the timber industry and any limits on logging state or federal land are bullshit. The feelings predate but were intensified by the spotted owl wars. The wingnuts here are completely convinced that the feds could have stopped the fires thus the feds bullshit is the reason their homes burned. Not much notice of 5 drought years and the doubling of the length of fire season.
Kay
This is a good story. It’s about Elissa Slotkin who is a D incumbent in a Trumpy district. She’s in good shape for re-election but she’s an analyst and she goes into a lot of detail about the threats she sees from Trump creating chaos, contesting results, etc. I found it comforting that so many people in government are thinking about it and planning for it, because, really, we can’t do shit about it other than protest if it happens. We just have to hope there are enough good people to defend us.
Roger Moore
@jc:
FTFY.
MazeDancer
Dukakis had huge crowds during his last week.
Me, I would like Mr. Biden wrapped in bubble wrap, rolled up in PPE, and locked in his basement until Jan 20th.
No, COVID, for you, my fine fellow. Keep up the good work.
Calouste
@Bruce K: By D-Day the war in Europe was already won (the Allies had liberated Rome the day before, the Eastern front was closer to Berlin than Stalingrad), it was just to distract Nazi troops from the Eastern front and speed things up.
AliceBlue
There are 3 or 4 people who sell Trump garbage at an intersection a few miles from my house. I was driving through on Saturday and they were carrying their flags and waving at cars. This intersection isn’t busy so I slowed down, rolled down the window, yelled “Biden Harris motherfuckers” and gave them the middle finger. Childish I know, but it was fun.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
Or Don Jr will announce his run for 2024 and the media will prop him up right to the end to get their next horse-race narrative.
Jeffro
As I mentioned in the earlier thread:
So…as many of you have noted upthread, these dumb boat parades and pitiful rallies don’t mean a thing…plenty of folks with fanatical followings have had big rallies and lost, big time. We just need to show up and help a friend show up and work that GOTV all the way through the finish line.
Like Bruce K said, it’s “D-Day”…it’ll be tough, but we will roll these malicious clowns all the way back to Berlin.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@KenK: Suggestion for WaterGirl if she gets bored: an email forwarding service?
Enhanced Voting Techniques
“Enthusiasm” is just this elections “my gut tells me”; merely an emotion based argument.
I love my parents and that’s why I keep my distance from them to avoid the possibility of infecting and killing them. Love is no excuse for not thinking, Noohan is an idiot.
Baud
@Kelly:
Or the person who was in charge of the feds, apparently.
Immanentize
@Kelly: Could you please do me (and some others) the favor of linking to that aerial picture of how close the beachie fire got to your house? I was trying to explain your great garden chat pics to a friend, but needed the proof. Thanks!
FelonyGovt
One of the few Trump banners I’ve seen around here was on a boat at the Redondo Beach marina. There’s just something about those boat owners.
And I filled in the Biden/Harris oval WAY more carefully than I ever did on any of my Scantron exams in school.
Baud
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
WaterGirl is our Lily Tomlin as switchboard operator.
eric
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: here is the interesting part…..putting aside self-pardons, or other pardon shenanigans, there are still plenty of potential state law claims possible against Trump. Every word that guy says after November 3 can and will be used against him in a court of law. trump’s (and his kin’s) continuing penchant for spouting off will likely disclose further crimes that he and his kin committed.
Kent
@Roger Moore: Was doing a college visit with my daughter to the red side of Washington State yesterday (Whitman college in Walla Walla). We saw a great big lawn sign in (I assume red) Walla Walla
“I’m a Republican, not an Idiot: Biden Harris 2020
Surprisingly I didn’t see any Trump signs anywhere along the highways in eastern WA for the 200+ mile drive. Lots of local signs and signs for our “constitutional sheriff candidate for governor, Culp. But no Trump signs at all in Trump land
But then WA is something like +28 for Biden right now so maybe they have given up.
FelonyGovt
@Almost Retired: That must be what I heard when I was in my yard gardening yesterday morning (I’m in Manhattan Beach). I almost called the police.
Nicole
@Betty Cracker:
2020: One Star Very Bad Would Not Recommend T shirt
(You can actually find them several places, but I like Tee Public)
japa21
@Matt McIrvin: Whenever I need a good laugh, I check out Rasmussen. Normally Trump would be crowing about their results, but even he knows how crazy it is that they have him at 52% approval.
Crashman06
@Kay: I thought this article was going to scare me but it was kind of reassuring. Hopefully none of that stuff will have to be called in, but at least they’re thinking and planning and getting ready.
The Moar You Know
@japa21: Wow, they just can’t quit their bullshit, can they?
Like clockwork, those fuckers.
Leto
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Don Jr and Javanka. It’s not enough that we get rid of the cancer, but we need to be thorough and get rid of the tendrils moving out. I’m hoping NY AG Laticia James’ investigations into the family is enough to ruin them, forever. Although now that they’ve tapped into the old wing nut grifting platform, they’ll probably be around for a while.
JaySinWA
@germy:
That’s a recipe for gout.
KithKanan
@Almost Retired: Most of them may be from even farther out – at least, the ones in the Bay Area are. Driving into the most liberal areas they can think of to Piss Off The Libs is the entire point of these things.
Immanentize
@The Moar You Know: I think their goal is to keep the poll amalgamations from running away from Trump. They get included, so they effect the bottom line of aggregation.
Leto
@eric: and this time he won’t have dumb dumbs signing court docs saying: “Do not take the presidents tweets seriously. You can ignore those as they don’t mean anything.” I don’t see how that’s even legal, but ok.
Mai Naem mobile
@pitedan: the pedo thing has been running since at least last year. The first time I saw it was one of those RWNJ women on Twitter that was clips of Biden hugging women and/or girls slowed down to look inappropriate. The first time I saw it was also when I figured they were going to use this in the election. Such projection.
Kelly
@Immanentize: Here you go. We’re the blue roof. Note the riverbank behind our house is burned. https://photos.app.goo.gl/NabdEBc2ibPM8KP78
JaySinWA
The divide isn’t just between states, eastern WA has a constant refrain about Democratic western WA getting all the benefits of taxes, even though the relative money flow is actually West to East.
Leto
@Kelly: oh man, that was close. Glad you’re safe!
Charluckles
@WaterGirl: not in person this year.
kindness
Bless you Betty. We have idiot Trumpers out here in CA too but they are mostly staying under the radar this time. I’m thankful of that.
RobertB
@Mai Naem mobile: I think this was mentioned here a few weeks ago. They had a Trump car parade here in Columbus, and held it on the west side of I-270. This backed up traffic, since you don’t normally see parades on the interstate. A trucker got into a pissing contest with one of the Trump folks, and the Trump guy pulled out his took some shots at the trucker. They hunted down the Trump guy, whose story was that he was afeared for his life because the trucker was going to run him over.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@KrusherKing: @AliceBlue:
When you pass Trump rallies, it isn’t helpful to flip them off. It only confirms their feeling of being victims at the hands of hostile liberals. Instead, roll down the window and yell, ‘GET A JOB, YOU DEADBEATS!’ They won’t be able to tolerate that.
Kent
Every single state has red and blue areas. If you shrank Portland down to the size of say Boise, then OR politics would look a mot more like Idaho.
And even the reddest states have blue urban areas.
It’s really an urban/rural divide in this country. States that have enough urban population like OR and WA lean blue. States that don’t like Idaho, lean red. Swing states like WI and PA are those that are pretty median for rural vs urban populations. Take away Philly, and PA politics would be pretty indistinguishable from WV. Double it in size to be more like NYC and PA is as blue as NY.
Kelly
@Immanentize:
@Leto:
Here’s the view off our back deck
https://photos.app.goo.gl/xA1tZ3mhqNmva6DU9
Yarrow
@Kay:
Yep. In 2016 Samatha Bee did a good segment on “The most important election – the one Democrats didn’t vote in, 2010.” I’m already talking to people about the importance of voting in 2022. “Never miss a midterm!” I’m sure most people here voted in 2010 but we all probably know people who didn’t.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@J R in WV: with what little I’ve seen of Kavanaugh he’s got that dry drunk vibe to him. Angry and self pity.
Kent
@RobertB: They are everywhere. I ran into a Trump car/truck parade here in western WA a couple weeks ago that was at least 3-4 miles long. Couldn’t find any mention of it anywhere in the news. Even in a state like WA, and especially here in western WA where Biden is probably leading by over 30 points, there are still hundreds of thousands if not millions of Trump supporters.
Roger Moore
@BethanyAnne:
I usually vote straight ticket Democrat, but I made an exception this year. When my State Senator, Anthony Portantino, was threatening to kill SB50 (which would have made it much easier to build more homes near transit and in job-rich neighborhoods) I swore I wouldn’t vote for him if he followed through. He did, and I kept my promise. I refuse to vote for the Republican, though, so I left my state senate space blank. Of course I can do this safely because there’s no chance of the Republican winning- this is a solid blue area- so it’s purely a protest vote.
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
“One ringie-dingie … Two ringie-dingies … [primp, snort] … Is this the party to whom I am speaking? … [snort] … Mr. William Fbuckley?… [snort, smirk]”
Loved Ernestine.
A Ghost to Most
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony: Yea, no. I usually give them a nazi salute and a hearty “fuck you”.
Leto
@Kelly: First, really jealous of the view you have right off the back deck! Second, that was too close!
Almost Retired
@FelonyGovt: I was on my way to my office (in Manhattan Beach…yes….on a Sunday), and passed by the parking lot at the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center, where they were gathering. A plague of locusts, clearly.
Yarrow
@Kent: One thing I wonder about as a longer term effect of the pandemic is how it’s going to affect more rural areas and smaller towns. The fastest growing real estate areas in a lot of places are the farther out areas – outer suburbs and exurbs – as people who are working from home realize they don’t have to be close to an office and want more space. If professionals who can work from home move to those areas it may change the nature of them and possibly affect their voting patterns.
Bill Arnold
@Ramiah Ariya:
Yes. I looked briefly at Indian political influence operations activity in 2019 and found the complexity and just shear numbers made it impossible for an American (with no connections to India) to properly understand without at least several months of focused concentration. (estimated; did not do it, just did some basic study.) And worse, some of it <em>appears</em> to be market manipulation without regard to any consequences but personal gain.
There are a few papers; spotted this twitter-focused basic discussion paper just now in a google scholar search:
Digital propaganda, political bots and polarized politics in India (Taberez Ahmed Neyazi, 6 Dec 2019, National University of Singapore)
emmyelle
@Johnny Gentle (famous crooner):
I’d just like to add to this spot-on comment, a question. Or two.
a) When the violence comes, how confident are you that your local police force will act in the interest of the citizenry of the duly elected government and protect them from those who refuse to accept the election results?
b) When the violence comes and the military leadership does what is necessary to ensure a peaceful transition of power, how confident are you that the average 18-25 y.o. yahoo enlisted person will follow their commanders?
Happy Monday.
J R in WV
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Surely plenty of anger and self-pity… wonder what he has to feel self-pity about? That he had to stop the beer? So sad…
PPCLI
@germy: Never mind dancing! The guy did an imitation of a woman having an orgasm in order to smear someone he hated.
Very presidential behaviour in Noonan’s eyes, I must assume.
Gin & Tonic
@PPCLI: I suspect he’s got plenty of familiarity with women imitating orgasms.
Gin & Tonic
If WaterGirl’s around, there was a 522 error resolving this page before, but didn’t look like a Cloudflare error.
Ruckus
@The Enderville Phantom:
That freedom they cherish is the freedom to be out loud, the shitty humans they are inside. Normal people try to be and often succeed in being better, they just want to shout from the rooftops that they hate, well, everything but them. And they can’t understand why people don’t want to be them or be around them. They like Hitler because he got in power being a version of them. They like trump because he says out loud the parts that they have been keeping quiet for decades.
WaterGirl
@KenK: I can send him your email address. I will take this as a request from you to do that. :-)
Bill Arnold
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.):
I might be interested. (Fan of @ctrlcreep’s twitter microfiction.)
my nyn, lower case and with a dot, at gmail.com (a year-zero gmail address.)
(Got a C. Stross novel (“Dead Lies Dreaming”) queued up in a few days. And election gets attention too.)
Ruckus
@Gin & Tonic:
My screen stated that it was a Cloudflare error.
WaterGirl
@AliceBlue:
That wasn’t childish, it was gratifying to hear about. Especially with the motherfuckers.
wenchacha
You know, people who supported President Obama were accused of worshipping him, as if he were the Messiah. Which, no. We didn’t really. I sure thought he was head and shoulders above Dubya, though. Who didn’t? Republicans who told us all manner of Dubya’s strength and virility, I guess, but they didn’t grow much about him after he was done.
We were never a cult for Obama.
Ken
@Kelly: Richard Feynman is somewhat famous for buying flood insurance after a major forest fire upslope of his California home. You might want to look into that, and see if it includes mudslides.
John S.
@Mai Naem mobile: Jehovah’s Witnesses are apolitical. They are expressly forbidden from participating in politics.
If they have a sign in their yard, they aren’t a real JW.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@J R in WV: Well think about as a guy, can you imagine crying in public like he did during the hearings?
Brachiator
I think this may be true for many vocal Balloon Juice people. They are spite voters who loved Warren or Harris and kept talking about crawling over ground glass to vote for any Democrat. I liked Harris early on as well. But primary voters were definitely enthusiastic for Biden, and let this be known in every state throughout the primary season. It’s funny that the dedicated political junkies had to be pulled along.
And I am not interested in sending a “fuck you” to Trump and his enablers. They are too far gone to care or to change. If the country as a whole regains their sanity I expect the national GOP to react like the California GOP did to political rebuke. They will cling to their values and beliefs and become a sullen minority. And they will seize any opportunity to regain power.
I also note that Biden has largely risen to the occasion. His too simple qualities, decency, sometime fumbling honesty, integrity lets him deflect Trump’s attacks and leaves the Orange Buffoon looking played out and desperate. It may be the political equivalent of Muhammad Ali and his “rope a dope” strategy.
One thing I am not happy to see. I recently saw the political ad by former wrestler and “Guardians of the Galaxy” star Dave Bautista happily and (to some) surprisingly coming out for Biden. I was struck by how often Bautista emphasized how Biden was the “right MAN” for the job. This was totally the right tone for the add, but it still made me feel that we still have a ways to go in getting over sexism. And yes, Clinton won the popular vote, but I will be looking at the voter demographics to see if more men vote for Biden.
I don’t care whether Trump is vulgar. Never have. I want him out because he is an incompetent, ignorant fool, a brutish third rate criminal, a thug and con man, and a psychological cripple who is using the nation to work out his insecurities and resentments.
Also, Trump’s people love him because he is exactly as petty and stupid and vulgar as they are.
ETA. Got Cloudflare error earlier
WaterGirl
@Baud: I’m going to have to work on a more nasal sound when i say “how may i help you?”
Elizabelle
@wenchacha: The “Messiah” stuff was pure projection. It’s not the way Democrats think.
It’s straight up evangelical sheeple; the language was a dead giveaway.
Kelly
@Ken: The thought crossed my mind but if anything slides it’ll slide into the river. We’re about 50 feet above river level.
Ruckus
@J R in WV:
I’d say Kavanaugh is a drunk rather than a functional alcoholic.
Soprano2
I find it pretty amazing that the only reason they want to re-elect Trump is to give the middle finger to liberals. When you ask them what they want Trump to do in his second term, they say something like “more of the same”. There’s a house a couple of blocks down that has one of those “re-elect Trump, make liberals cry again” banners, and all I can think is “that’s why you want to vote for him?” There’s no positive agenda, just hate and pettiness.
Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.)
Thank you all for your help! It’s going to make my undertaking much easier.
mrmoshpotato
Ugh. Not going to read. Just going to wonder how sloshed…
prufrock
@KrusherKing: I’ve seen those morons many times. The average age is well north of 50.
Fair Economist
Trumpsters are using car rallies because they have so few people. Cars are incredible space hogs. Just one parking spot provides enough space for a small cafe’s seating. It’s the main driver of the inefficiency and expense of surburban layout. Even a tiny demonstration looks big in cars.
Eunicecycle
@wenchacha: I love Obama and would vote for him again but I never worshipped him. He is a very gifted person who is also a charismatic leader. I do think we have to realize he is probably a once in a generation politician and not hold others up to that standard. Joe will not inspire us like Obama did, but he is intelligent, a hard worker, experienced, and has our country’s best interests at heart. He may be a little more conservative than I am, but I can live with that.
RedDirtGirl
@Kristine: Same thing went through my mind as I was filling them in.
The Moar You Know
@emmyelle: Interesting:
a: they’ll be buried one way or another. Our local law enforcement is wholly inadequate for that kind of violence.
b. The military will not do anything to “ensure an orderly transfer of power” NOR SHOULD THEY. That’s banana republic shit there. Our military does not and will not get involved in domestic politics. They have a really good thing going. If they take that step that good gig is gone forever.
Dread
Conservatives assumed that they could push us and bully us and we would always be nice. Hell, if they hadn’t spent the last four years destroying all of our political norms in the pursuit of naked power and taxpayer dollars, they might have been right again.
But they pushed too far. Now we’re angry. Now we’re ready to start pushing back. Now we’re ready to take our agenda and shove it down their fucking throats for real this time and if we have to fight as dirty to win the zero sum game they’ve created, we’ll fucking do it.
smedley the uncertain
Here in WNY, political signs are popping up like mushrooms; touting candidates all the way down to village officials. So the yards are full. What is interesting is, the Republican yards as full as they are lack Trump signs. Are they ashamed? I don’t know. Biden signs appear on Dem lawns.
Matt McIrvin
@Fair Economist: It’s also a suburban COVID-era thing–“car parades” have become a way to do isolated public celebration, and this is a political extension of that.
Anoniminous
@japa21:
Rasmussen trots out their fake polls to feed the RW propaganda machine and to move the needle rightwards on poll average/accumulators like 538.
Ruckus
@Kelly:
I must be doing something wrong, your photos won’t load for me.
RedDirtGirl
@Baud: What will that do to your chances?
FelonyGovt
@Dread: I’m not sure they assumed we would be nice. They assumed we were all latte-drinking effete coastal elites who were too weak to fight back. They will have another thing coming.
RedDirtGirl
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.): I would be happy to give it a read. Not a professional, but have a good eye. Anne Laurie has (had) my email in the past. Also WaterGirl.
WaterGirl
@Kelly: I have been really annoyed the few times in my life when we have really needed rain, and I can see it raining across the street but the rain is not falling on my side of the house.
Crazy to think that the fire burned and burned and then stopped “just across the street” from you. I guess the fire had to stop somewhere, but it’s kind of mind-boggling.
LuciaMia
And let us remember in the rundown to the election day of Obama vs. Romney, her breathy musings. She of course predicted a definite win for Romney due to all the new lawn signs she’d suddenly been seeing. And “All the vibrations are right.” How so? Romney is “stealing” the thing while “we’re not really noticing because we’re too busy looking at data.” Now thats science!
Kent
I don’t think it will last. We have lived in those sorts of places. They tend to be no good for kids. You have to spend hours in the car driving to every damn thing from piano lessons to soccer practice to swim practice to back and forth to school and so forth. Long term, rural areas will continue to be depopulated of everyone who isn’t old. Sure there are nice exurban areas around big cities that will thrive, mainly because they are just the outer suburban fringe. But that’s probably only % of rural America. Get further out and the long term trends aren’t going to change, at least i don’t think so.
Kelly
@WaterGirl: Wildfires seem to be incredibly random. In our neighborhood of about 2 dozen homes 8 burned. The homes that survived had fire on 3 sides. Half the homes that burned had fire safe steel roofs.
Kent
Exactly. 1000 people outdoors is basically a JV football game crowd around here. Or one suburban church on an ordinary Sunday But 1000 people in cars and trucks produces a 3 mile long parade.
Humanities Prof
@Fair Economist: Not when there’s only three or four of ’em. Saw my first Trump car “parade” on Saturday. I’m pretty sure there were four cars.
Given that our county is overwhelmingly Republican, I almost felt bad for them. Is that the best they can do?
Kelly
@Ruckus: I dunno they are Google photos links if that helps.
Yarrow
@Kent: I guess we’ll see. If a bunch of well-paid professionals moved to a more rural area or a small town, then they could keep a local piano teacher busy and rejuvenate the local swimming pool and have enough kids for a local team. I am imagining a sort of a gentrification, but instead of people moving into inner cities they move to rural areas and small towns. I might be wrong but current real estate trends indicate it might be something to watch.
Gin & Tonic
@Yarrow: Those rural areas don’t have hospital capacity, and that trend is accelerating.
Redshift
Based on my ~17 years of active involvement in political campaigns, I love seeing an opposing campaign talk about how they’re going to win because they have bigger crowds, because the term for campaigns like that is “losing.” (And I learned that lesson the hard way on my first, the Dean campaign.) It’s not that winning campaigns can’t have big crowds, but they just let them generate news on their own. The only reason you have to point to them as the sign you’re winning is when you don’t have more reliable data to point to.
That’s not to say that the people in the crowds can’t become a force in politics after the candidate loses if they stay engaged (again, the Dean campaign), but it doesn’t mean they’re winning.
Boris Rasputin (the evil twin)
“Winning by enthusiasm”? As I recall, that was the plan in Europe, 1914- spring 1918.
It didn’t go very well.
Yarrow
@Gin & Tonic: True. But in many locations the hospital buildings are there and trends can be reversed. Not that things will happen overnight. Just watching trends.
Ruckus
@Eunicecycle:
I believe that Joe also learned from being VP under President Obama, got a wider exposure than he had as senator, as well as a different viewpoint. I likely would not have voted for Joe prior to his being VP but he learned and he grew. I never saw him as a bad person, just didn’t see him as the person he’s proved himself to be.
Given the situation we now face, I’d have crawled over broken glass to vote for Joe, even if in the primary he wasn’t my first choice.
Another Scott
@Kelly: Big G may want Ruckus to login to his google account.
(I have no issues seeing the pictures – beautiful setting, I’m glad the fire stopped!! But I’ve got 3 gmail tabs open all the time.)
Cheers,
Scott.
Ksmiami
@Tim: I think they are venal stupid people who should die from Covid. I used to be a nice person
Roger Moore
@wenchacha:
We were never a cult for Obama, but I will say I hated the stuff about asking people to sign his or Michelle’s birthday card or similar stuff. It seemed closer to “Dear Leader” than I was really comfortable with, even if it was mostly an attempt to harvest people’s names and emails for campaign purposes.
WaterGirl
@Gin & Tonic: Yeah, the entire data center that feeds BJ was down for a bit. I made a note in the most recent thread, but I didn’t think to come back one thread and say something here, too.
Gin & Tonic
@Yarrow: Suzanne is infinitely more qualified to comment on this, but I have to imagine that a hospital building that’s been dis-used or converted to something else and hasn’t been a hospital for 10 years is pretty much useless for rehab into a current hospital.
WaterGirl
@RedDirtGirl: I sent email to both you and Lord Fartdaddy.
catclub
I am not sure. There was a lot of commentary that having Trump win gives them permission to act out, that is suppressed if he is not winning.
Betty Cracker
Deleted a comment (my own) because it came across as kind of mean-sarcastic rather than exasperated-at-the-situation sarcastic. Apologies!
catclub
When Obama is getting criticized by his side for the own goals of his admin, there is no cult. Trump is praised by his side for whatever he does – as better than anyone else could have done, no matter how badly he has fucked up.
Roger Moore
@Ken:
I hadn’t heard that one. I live in Pasadena, and I have gone by his house numerous times. It’s reasonably safe from debris flows, at least today. There are debris basins uphill from him and a lot of houses between him and the nearest canyon mouth, though it’s possible a lot of that has been built since he made that decision. One of my friends grew up on the same block and carpooled to school with his and Murray Gell-Mann’s sons; I’ll have to ask her about that story.
Roger Moore
@Soprano2:
Conservatism by its very nature has no positive agenda. I don’t know that it’s always been as spiteful about it, but at its core it has always about keeping things the same by blocking liberal and progressive ideas rather than advancing some positive idea about social progress. That’s the essential nature of conservatism; it’s fundamentally about saying “no” to the future.
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
Not that long ago there was a big fire north of Santa Rosa CA, where a good friend of mine lives. She had to evacuate for over a week but they stopped the fire a bit away from her place. The recent fire to the east of her was stopped at the highway about 1/4 mile east of her house. I went up to visit after the first fire and you’d see burnt out houses and next door, nothing singed. A fire like this moves fast because it finds easily ignitable sources. In the chaparral all around CA it’s the brush itself, at the homes it can be anything. 30 yrs ago we had a brush fire come down the hills to the houses across the street from us and I thought we’d lose our home, but none of the houses burned, one of the firefighters told me it was because of the way the houses were built, no wood roofs, the embers landing on the non wood roofs didn’t do any damage. And I saw some big embers on my roof, and a garden hose did almost nothing to put them out. I should have known, my firefighting training in the navy showed that a lot of water is necessary. A LOT of water. But if the fire has nothing to burn or changes direction, it can pass right on by.
Jess
I love your writing, Betty! Brilliant post!
Ruckus
@Kelly:
I even have a google account and it seems to try to open them but the wait, loading arrow just keeps circling. And circling and …..
It’s probably the way I have my system set up. I just tried on my phone and they loaded right up.
Roger Moore
@FelonyGovt:
Which is weird, because they also know that the Democrat (sic) party is full of scary minorities and union members. It’s just bizarre that they can be simultaneously afraid of us and treat us as too weak to be a threat.
catclub
@Ruckus: those expensive to build stone and concrete houses (with terra cotta roofs) I saw in Europe may reflect a desire not to get your house burned down.
catclub
@Anoniminous: What I remember being reported on rasmussen was that many months out, their polls were heavily biased in favor of republicans, but as the election drew near they got more accurate.
Otherwise, there would be the election result to show how far off they were, and they would not get hired again.
So if they are NOT doing that this year, it is a change in their MO
polyorchnid octopunch
@BethanyAnne: I know I’m late to the party, but… something has become deeply fucked up with white wing America.
Deeply fucked up.
Don’t you folks think that the Rest of the Western World has not noticed how deeply fucked up they’ve become. It’s not the hate… it’s the delusion. “Trump or a pedophile” says that white wing America is in the grips of a deep mass psychosis. The rest of the world is giving you guys serious side-eye right now.
Quaker in a Basement
Did you mean to use your outside voice for that, Rich?
MisterForkbeard
@polyorchnid octopunch: Hell, WE’RE giving us serious side eye.
I have liberal friends who are convinced that Biden is an open pedophile, raped whatshername, and cheated Bernie twice in some way they can’t articulate.
And they’re angry at Trump, too. But they want you to hold their hand and congratulate them repeatedly on holding their noses or they’ll threaten not vote. And they’re offended when you call them on it or ask them to defend any of their assertions.
It’s a huge privilege thing. And that’s the far-left – anyone to the right of Joe Manchin is just flat fucking insane at this point.
evodevo
@Gin & Tonic: Yeah..just the mold mitigation and infrastructure upgrade alone would make it a loser of a project…you could bulldoze it and use the lot to build a new one easier…
Roger Moore
@Ruckus:
It’s true that it’s possible to make a house very fire resistant, but it’s harder than it sounds. You really have to cover every possibility, since even a tiny chink in the exterior can give embers a way into the flammable interior. Of course it isn’t as simple as some houses being fireproof and others being tinderboxes. The more things you close off the better your house’s chances of surviving. I think that’s part of what happens in those neighborhoods where some houses are fine and others are burned to the ground. If they’re all slightly vulnerable, some of them will get lucky and avoid any source of ignition, and some of them will get unlucky and catch fire. If the firefighters aren’t staying in the neighborhood to fight the house fires, any house that gets unlucky will be a complete loss.
evodevo
@catclub: Yep…those tile roofs not only don’t burn, they are good insulation and don’t peel off in a windstorm…Europeans build to stay
Kelly
@Roger Moore: Friend of mine works for a window company. He explained glass windows are a weak point that you can’t do much about except keep the flames far away.
Roger Moore
@catclub:
Stone and terra cotta are not good materials to use in areas worried about earthquakes; concrete can be OK as long as it’s well made and reinforced. It’s probably easier to make a wooden house fireproof than it is to make a stone house earthquake proof.
PST
@Hoodie:
The way I like to think of that is that the hour we wait today may reduce the wait time for someone whose work schedule, or childcare obligations, or physical health might make it impossible to stay in line for long. Heck, even if it just keeps someone less persistent and dedicated from getting bored and walking away it helps.
catclub
@Kelly: steel hurricane shutters?
Kent
What does that even mean? They are butthurt that they can’t be overtly racist anymore and get away with it like they used to?
Capri
@smedley the uncertain: I’m seeing the exact same thing in Indiana. Dem houses have signs for everybody. Rep houses have signs for everybody except Trump. Then there are Trump houses that have tons of Trump stuff but nobody else.
Tenar Arha
@germy:
That woman in the pink cowboy hat holding her flag is bopping to the beat inside, & it shows in her knee keeping time.
jackmac
@Oklahomo: Here’s an exercise for those fanatic Trumper golf cart folks (and Bible-thumping evangelicals for that matter). Just how many of those 10 Commandments has the Orange Fart Cloud broken? All of them?
Kent
Like I said. I have my doubts. There is just way too much infrastructure that is lacking in rural areas and it depends on density. Maybe you find on piano teacher but you don’t get the complete density of youth stuff without having the density. Same for shopping, restaurants, etc. etc.
I do think medium size cities are due for a comeback. Places like Grand Rapids, Des Moines, etc. Because they are cheaper but they are still urban not rural, and already blue. And that is not due to covid per se, but the realization that you don’t need to be living in Manhattan or Silicon Valley to be part of the creative class.
jackmac
@Roger Moore: Spotted a sign in front of an asshole’s house, smack in the middle of a suburban neighborhood filled with families and kids: “FUCK ‘EM BOTH: 2020”
(I can imagine the conversation between a 5-year-old and parent: “Daddy? What does Fuck mean?”
TiredOfItAll
Saw this lawn sign a few weeks ago and it remains my favorite: “BIDEN and the lady who made Brett Kavanaugh cry 2020”.
I am really hoping, if Dump loses, that no deals will be cut to remove him from office, no quarter given. Not only does he deserve punishment, but his acolytes need to witness that. “Deplorable” is too mild an epithet.
prostratedragon
On spite plus existential urgency as a generator of enthusiasm:
lgerard
Best summation of Lady Noonan’s view of trump
Roger Moore
@Kent:
Pretty much, except you should include all the other kinds of bigotry they’re upset they aren’t allowed to parade in public anymore: sexism, hatred of LGBTQ people, religious bigotry, and so forth.
LivingInExile
NotMax
@Kent
Heresy! Try and find a decent bagel in Des Moines.
:) //
Ruckus
@catclub:
Also the building materials in the area. You don’t have a lot of wood to spare and you have rock, etc, that’s what you build with. We have a fair amount of wood between us and Canada. In Mexico a lot of buildings are adobe because that’s what they have.
Ruckus
@polyorchnid octopunch:
A good portion of white America is giving the rest of white US serious side-eye right now.
Ruckus
@Roger Moore:
You can’t make a wooden house fireproof. You can make it fire resistant, even highly fire resistant. But it gets hot enough it’s going to burn.
dr. luba
Floridah man:
Residents in a predominantly Black neighborhood in Haines City, Fla., knew something was off on Saturday when they saw a young White man driving a bulldozer on the street. As he made his way down the block, the man began running over every lawn sign in sight supporting Joe Biden.
“This man came onto my property, took the two Joe Biden signs I had in my yard and then came back with a bulldozer to run down my fence,” Adam Burgess, a local homeowner, told Bay News 9.
The man, later identified by police as 26-year-old James Blight, was charged with grand theft auto and trespassing, according to the outlet.
A Ghost to Most
@Kent: It means they’re moving on to Stage 2
“We have always been at war with Democratiana.”
Miss Bianca
@Roger Moore:
It’s the flip side of how the MAGAts out here pack their pistols on their hips to show what tough guys/gals they are, and then piss themselves into a foamy lather worrying that Antifa or BLM is coming to our tiny rural valley to kill them all in their sleep or at least steal their chickens. And oh, man, let’s not forget the scary wildlife out here that needs to get blasted into oblivion, like mountain lions or wolves.
Roger Moore
@jackmac:
Hmm, let’s see:
By my count, that makes 7 he’s unquestionably broken, 1 where I don’t know enough to be sure, and 2 where he’s probably in the clear unless you adopt a very strict standard.
Ian
@The Moar You Know:
They used to try to maintain their integrity by bringing the numbers closer by election day. I guess they figured there is more money in outright propaganda polling.
SteverinoCT
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.):
You can count me in, if you see this. My nym, and the domain is qmss.com.
Chris T.
Noonan was swooning over Limbaugh’s back hair?
tybee
@Lord Fartdaddy (Formerly, Mumphrey, Smedley Darlington Mingobat, et al.):
what’s the subject?