Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

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

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

All your base are belong to Tunch.

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

After roe, women are no longer free.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Accountability, motherfuckers.

Why did Dr. Oz lose? well, according to the exit polls, it’s because Fetterman won.

Eh, that’s media spin. biden’s health is fine and he’s doing a good job.

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

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

Let there be snark.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Being the leader of the world means to be the leader of peace.

Battle won, war still ongoing.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Wednesday Evening Open Thread: Restaurant Relief (& Tacos)

Wednesday Evening Open Thread: Restaurant Relief (& Tacos)

by | 73 Comments

This post is in: , , ,

Give the man credit, he loves being a politician, in the best old-fashioned sense. From AP, “Biden touts $28.6B restaurant relief program, orders tacos”:

Setting foot in a restaurant for his first time as president, Joe Biden made a Cinco de Mayo taco and enchilada run to highlight his administration’s $28.6 billion program to help eateries that lost business because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The president went to Taqueria Las Gemelas in Washington on Wednesday and ordered lunch. The restaurant, owned in part by Mexican immigrants, was a beneficiary of a pilot version of the restaurant relief program. It went from 55 employees to seven during the pandemic, though it was able to rehire some workers through the Paycheck Protection Program that predates the Biden administration…

The White House said that 186,200 restaurants, bars and other eligible businesses had applied for the program over its first two days of accepting applications. More than half of the applicants are owned by women, veterans or people from historically disadvantaged backgrounds. The aid for eateries was part of the Biden administration’s broader $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package.

The coronavirus outbreak was especially brutal for restaurants. America lost nearly 2,700 dining establishments through last summer, according to the Labor Department. About 1.8 million food service jobs also have been lost, though the sector has been gradually returning jobs since last May…

Under the Biden relief program, which started accepting applications on Monday, restaurants and bars can qualify for grants equal to their pandemic-related revenue losses, with a cap of $10 million per business and $5 million per location.

The program has set aside $9.5 billion for the smallest restaurants and bars, and a third of the applications were filed by businesses with annual pre-pandemic revenues of less than $500,000. For the program’s first 21 days, applications from women, veterans and socially and economically disadvantaged people will have priority for being reviewed and funded…

Or, as the sad Breitbart luzers see it:

Reader Interactions

73Comments

  3. 3.

    trollhattan

    Isn’t the real message here, “Can’t figure out how to /be bothered to fill out forms?

  4. 4.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    Some people are in politics because they’re in love with policy, but they’re not necessarily in love with humans. [Biden] loves the game of it. He loves the dance of it. He loves meeting people. He loves hugging strangers.
    ~ Peggy Noonan​

  5. 5.

    Baud

    I would like to start hearing some restaurant owners attack the GOP and credit Dems.  I sympathize with their situation, but all the media has been one sided.

  6. 6.

    Spanky

    America lost nearly 2,700 dining establishments through last summer

    Did they drop a zero or two here? That number seems way low.

  7. 7.

    Mary G

    I love to see this. People who look like people I know, instead of a lineup of old, pudgy, stupid, and smug white male criminals TFG surrounded himself with.

  9. 9.

    Keith P

    “Boat Owner Tears for sale! Cures 1001 maladies from cankers to cancer! Just 1 dollahhhhh!!”

  10. 10.

    glory b

    And let’s not forget that Kevin McCarthy tweeted about it to his constituents, urging the restaurants in his district to apply for the funds.

    He didn’t mention that he voted against it.

    As Nancy Pelosi said, “They vote no, then take the dough.”

    Also, I think I won the prize as living in the deepest bubble on Balloon Juice. Yay!!

    The “b” is for bubble.

  13. 13.

    Baud

    For the program’s first 21 days, applications from women, veterans and socially and economically disadvantaged people will have priority for being reviewed and funded…

    I looked it up, and this is not a new Biden classification.  The SBA has been using it for years.

  16. 16.

    Ken

    @glory b: I can’t help but imagine a an unwritten policy in whatever Federal bureaucracy is administering the program, to slow-walk applications from McCarthy’s district.  Or even from all Republican districts.

    And I smile.

    (Won’t happen, obviously. Professionalism.)

  20. 20.

    Brachiator

    @David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:

    Some people are in politics because they’re in love with policy, but they’re not necessarily in love with humans. [Biden] loves the game of it. He loves the dance of it. He loves meeting people. He loves hugging strangers.

    ~ Peggy Noonan​

    Sounds like Peggy Noonan wants a hug.

  24. 24.

    RandomMonster

    @glory b: I looked at that bubble map for my part of Baltimore. Let’s just say that Republicans AND Independents couldn’t crack even 20% of our neighborhood.

  26. 26.

    narya

    I wonder how much the Recovery Plan will help in the midterms. Because the straight-up argument–to everyone, regardless of party affiliation–is that the help is only available because of the Democratic majority. If you vote for the treasonists, gridlock will reign supreme once again and your assistance will be whittled away.

  27. 27.

    Jeffro

    @dmsilev: we don’t need too many of them to give up on the GQP in disgust to win for several cycles.  And think what’ll happen if/when the dam breaks.

    I like our chances ;)

  29. 29.

    Brachiator

    @narya:

    I wonder how much the Recovery Plan will help in the midterms. Because the straight-up argument–to everyone, regardless of party affiliation–is that the help is only available because of the Democratic majority. If you vote for the treasonists, gridlock will reign supreme once again and your assistance will be whittled away.

    I would hope that the Democrats would easily win. But I recall seeing some poll where some Republican voters believed that the GOP supported some of these programs despite the facts.

    It’s a crazy world.

  32. 32.

    Jeffro

    @debbie: I think she knows if the GOP doesn’t get started on its Trump disinfecting process, it’s just going to take longer (or never happen) and both the party and the country will suffer.

    you do the right thing, and then you keep on going.

  34. 34.

    debbie

    @germy:

    I wish someone would rush up, rip off T****’s face, and expose the real lizard person.

    These people are nuts!

  35. 35.

    Brachiator

    A Thought for Cinco de Mayo

    When I was a school kid, I was taught a little bit about Cinco de Mayo, and the French attempt to rule Mexico, but nothing deep and nothing about what led up to this. But in reading a bit more, I came to understand how a nation can willingly try to give itself to a foreign power, for example, Trump and the Republicans doing Putin’s bidding.

    Some background about Meixo’s Reform War (1857-1860:

    Both the Catholic Church and the Army were protected by corporate or institutional privileges (fueros) established in the colonial era. Liberals sought to create a modern nation-state founded on liberal principles. The Conservatives wanted a centralist government, some even a monarchy, with the Church and military keeping their traditional roles and powers, and with landed and merchant elites maintaining their dominance over the majority mixed-race and indigenous populations of Mexico.

    In short, the liberal forces won and Benito Juarez became president. But resentments simmered, and in the end many of the Mexican elite welcomed the French, because they preferred having a foreign nation rule over them than sharing power with indigenous and “lower class” Mexicans.

    And so today it is much the same with some in the US who stew in their fears and resentments. How little times have changed.

  37. 37.

    JPL

    @Jeffro:  It’s possible that she is really concerned about our democracy, but the cynic in me thinks she is hedging her bets.

  38. 38.

    germy

    it's amusing to me how anyone assumes non-writers of means write their own books. they don't. that great celebrity memoir/influencer tome/tech bro manual you love was ghostwritten by person who was probably treated like a words butler & possibly never even thanked.— Jennifer Romolini (@jennromolini) May 4, 2021

    I once ghost wrote a book and the day I turned it in the "author" printed it out, put a picture of the printed-out manuscript on instagram, and told the whole world about her grueling writing process —including an image of where she suffered writing it— Jennifer Romolini (@jennromolini) May 4, 2021

    the book took six months to write, the source material was scant, and she didn't even thank me in the acknowledgements— Jennifer Romolini (@jennromolini) May 4, 2021

  39. 39.

    mrmoshpotato

    @germy: Oh Arizona GTrashP…  This shit is just pathetic.  You! Lost!  Get over it!  And fuck your feelings!

  44. 44.

    artem1s

    @Jeffro:

    There is much at stake now, including the ridiculous wokeness of our political rivals, the irrational policies at the border and runaway spending that threatens a return to the catastrophic inflation of the 1970s.

    she’s in the bag for blaming Dems for the out of control deficits perpetrated by the GOP.  She is a con job just like the LP. Her aim is to keep the Defense contracts flowing into the Cheney family coffers.  Cult45 will probably seize her seat in WY.  But she will alway have a seat at the table as long as Daddy’s stolen heart is beating.  I think she is setting the table for a run at the WH in 2024.  unfortunately she doesn’t have the right ‘equipment’ and likely will never be in serious contention for anything except a token cabinet position in the next Bush Crime Family puppet WH administration.  Jenna has a better chance to win the WH nomination than Liz could ever hope for.

  46. 46.

    Another Scott

    @dmsilev:  But, but, …

    WaPo in 2017:

    KIEV, Ukraine — A month before Donald Trump clinched the Republican nomination, one of his closest allies in Congress — House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy — made a politically explosive assertion in a private conversation on Capitol Hill with his fellow GOP leaders: that Trump could be the beneficiary of payments from Russian President Vladimir Putin.

    “There’s two people I think Putin pays: Rohrabacher and Trump,” McCarthy (R-Calif.) said, according to a recording of the June 15, 2016, exchange, which was listened to and verified by The Washington Post. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher is a Californian Republican known in Congress as a fervent defender of Putin and Russia.

    House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) immediately interjected, stopping the conversation from further exploring McCarthy’s assertion, and swore the Republicans present to secrecy.

    Before the conversation, McCarthy and Ryan had emerged from separate talks at the Capitol with Ukrainian Prime Minister Vladi­mir Groysman, who had described a Kremlin tactic of financing populist politicians to undercut Eastern European democratic institutions.

    News had just broken the day before in The Washington Post that Russian government hackers had penetrated the computer network of the Democratic National Committee, prompting McCarthy to shift the conversation from Russian meddling in Europe to events closer to home.

    Some of the lawmakers laughed at McCarthy’s comment. Then McCarthy quickly added: “Swear to God.”

    Ryan instructed his Republican lieutenants to keep the conversation private, saying: “No leaks. . . . This is how we know we’re a real family here.”

    The remarks remained secret for nearly a year.

    […]

    (Emphasis added.)

    Yeah, they’ll stick with TFG until he’s buried or institutionalized. They were with him before he was even elected…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  48. 48.

    Gin & Tonic

    From an article I just read about a “giant wood moth” found in Australia:

    The entomologist said little was known about the first year of the larval stage, which lasts for about three years. The adult female moths can be up to 15cm long.

    Kind of curious how that first year lasts three years, but I suppose we should just be grateful this moth isn’t venomous, like half the insects and reptiles that live there.

  50. 50.

    Bill Arnold

    @Mary G:

    TFG’s desk lost its Twitter account already:

    Don’t know who was running that account but it violated the rules.
    Should be fairly easy to write some automation that scrapes that DJT blog and searches twitter for the text in new posts, and maybe even automatically reports tweets with DJT text.

  51. 51.

    Jay

    Seems like an obvious move for Liz Cheney here is to take Kevin McCarthy’s House floor speech calling for Trump to be censured and turn it into an actual censure resolution with the exact same language and see what happens now https://t.co/XA1XmSZL7b— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) May 5, 2021

    Rooting for fatalities.

  52. 52.

    Roger Moore

    @Brachiator:

    And so today it is much the same with some in the US who stew in their fears and resentments. How little times have changed.

    If you real much in classical history, this is a constant refrain.  Most Greek and Italian city states had aristocratic and populist factions, and the big political alliances were largely based on which faction was in control of which cities.  The vast majority of the time when a city was conquered by its neighbors, it was because one of the factions opened the gates in hopes of being put in control when the city was conquered.  The biggest thing the Romans had going for them through most of the Republican era was that they refused to do this; whatever their internal disputes, they never betrayed the city to gain domestic advantage.

    Of course there are plenty of more recent examples.  The Fascist collaborators during WWII spring immediately to mind.  This was also a dominant theme of the Cold War, with both sides trying to set up friendly governments throughout the developing world.

  53. 53.

    Jinchi

    @debbie: ​
     

    Can she possibly think she’ll win?

    I’m not usually a big Cheney fan, but I understand the concept. If she loses, she loses on the right side of history and looks like a rare example of a courageous pol.

    If she wins, she redefines the game.

  54. 54.

    Jeffro

    @Another Scott:

    “There’s two people I think Putin pays: Rohrabacher and Trump,” McCarthy (R-Calif.) said, according to a recording of the June 15, 2016, exchange…House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) immediately interjected, stopping the conversation…Some of the lawmakers laughed at McCarthy’s comment. Then McCarthy quickly added: “Swear to God.”…Ryan instructed his Republican lieutenants to keep the conversation private, saying: “No leaks. . . . This is how we know we’re a real family here.”

    “The truth is about to set Liz Cheney free”, says an NYT headline.  May it be so with all of them, once the dam breaks…

  55. 55.

    Jay

    Hello! I’m not sure how many people will see this, butMy name is Zahra. My father is Dr. Hasan Gokal, the man who was wrongfully fired because he distributed expiring COVID-19 vaccines so they wouldn’t go to waste. “They weren’t yours to give away.”“Too many Indian names.”— zahra g✨ (@zahra_gk2) May 5, 2021

  56. 56.

    Roger Moore

    @Gin & Tonic: ​
     

    Kind of curious how that first year lasts three years

    I think they’re saying the larval stage lasts 3 years, and they don’t know very much about the first year of that.
    One of the things that people don’t get about a lot of insects is that they spend vastly more time as larva than adults. We tend to focus on the adult form, treating it as the true form of the species, but in many cases this is wrong. The larva is the main form, and the adult form is only there to reproduce. That’s why you’ll see weird adult forms that only live for a day or don’t even have mouths; they only have to survive as adults for long enough to mate.

  57. 57.

    Jinchi

    @Bill Arnold: ​

    Should be fairly easy to write some automation that scrapes that DJT blog and searches twitter for the text in new posts, and maybe even automatically reports tweets with DJT text.

    No need for anything complicated. Just search for any tweets including the words “Many people are saying” or references to big men, crying, followed by a quote beginning “Sir…”

  59. 59.

    Jay

    @Jinchi:

    Liz is also making a side bet that the GQP alliance is going to be torn apart over TFG and all the crimeing, and that she will wind up in charge of the Corporate/Conservative rump, while the Nazis, Qfreaks and Christofacists form their own party.

  60. 60.

    Bill in Section 147

    I saw that Brietbart headline and thought, About time,” but the article they referred to did not actually say white men had to be at the back of the line. They lie about the good things too.

  61. 61.

    Jeffro

    here is the value of what Liz Cheney is doing: she is about to (for some indeterminate period of time) force the GQP leadership to quit. having. it. both. ways. with. regards. to. trumpov.

    McConnell blamed trumpov for the 1/6 assault…then voted to acquit him during his 2nd impeachment trial.

    McCarthy was screaming at trumpov to call off his goons…and then went down to Mar-a-Lago to kiss the ring a couple weeks later.

    trumpov knows that many/most of these GQP pols have been getting laundered Russian money (and possibly other assistance) for their campaigns for years, just like he has.  He holds it over their heads and tells them, “we’re all in this together”.

    So they keep playing ball with him (even after he sent his mob to kill Congressmen in the performance of their official duties!)  They think they can ride it out, especially now that he’s reduced to open mic night duties at the Mar-a-Lago ballroom.  He’ll keel over, or people will stop listening to him, or or or.

    Liz knows; as long as the Big Lie continues to be GQP orthodoxy, the rot will only grow.  A majority of their party is off the hook with conspiracy theories and with using violence to stay in power.  THAT doesn’t end well.

    So, brava to her for speaking up and drawing the bright line here.  If the GQP had done that 5-6 years ago, it’d still be the GOP.

  63. 63.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Spanky: They dropped a zero. According to my very quickly gathered info, over 10k US restaurants closed in 2017.

    If it’s only 2,700 in 2020, that’s actually pretty great.

  64. 64.

    Brachiator

    @Roger Moore:

    And so today it is much the same with some in the US who stew in their fears and resentments. How little times have changed.

    If you real much in classical history, this is a constant refrain.  Most Greek and Italian city states had aristocratic and populist factions, and the big political alliances were largely based on which faction was in control of which cities

    Yep, but in Mexico the added animus came from the racism of the Euro-identifying elite.  You also see this most recently in Brazil, Venezuela and Bolivia. In Bolivia after Evo Morales was toppled, there was an especially vicious attempt to root out every policy and public observation that recognized the humanity and value of the indigenous peoples of the country.

    In Mexico in the 1860s, the elite were outraged that a man with indigenous heritage was president and their leader. This was intolerable.

    You see some of this same madness in the current Republican flirtation with white nationalism.

  66. 66.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @RandomMonster:

    @glory b: I looked at that bubble map for my part of Baltimore. Let’s just say that Republicans AND Independents couldn’t crack even 20% of our neighborhood.

    Piker. I did the same for my part of Baltimore and it showed the neighborhood Republican percentage at 3%. Three. Frackin’. Percent. Among other things, Thuglicans cannot possibly comprise more than a small minority of my non-POC neighbors..

  67. 67.

    Brachiator

    @craigie:

    Here is another, scarier way to look at what she is doing.

    The Vox article is useless.

    To preserve American democracy, the Republican Party needs elites who will be willing to act to defend it at key moments. The uncomfortable reality is that, for those elites to hold on to their jobs, they may need to do a whole lot of lying or at least hold their tongues before those key moments. Otherwise, they will be purged and replaced with Trump true believers or cynical opportunists — ensuring that, if and when the next electoral crisis comes around, no one will be left who will be willing to do the right thing.

    The Republican leadership is trying to thread the needle by weakly standing up for democracy while simultaneously continuing to indulge the fantasy of Trump’s base that the election was stolen.

    But it is hard to see this crowd hiding in plain sight to save a future election when red states are passing voter suppression laws and taking power away from honest election officials.

    Honest Republicans will be squeezed out even if they try to downplay criticism of the “stolen election” zealots.

  68. 68.

    CapnMubbers

    @glory b: I’m in a bubble—Nine percent of my neighbors are Democrats here in southwestern Utah. Never thought I would live here, but after Paradise burned down I chose to live relatively close to my daughter (she’s in the middle of the desert about an hour away). Now that I think about it, I’m in the middle of a red desert in more than one sense.

  69. 69.

    Ken

    @Gin & Tonic: Kind of curious how that first year lasts three years,

    They mean the whole larval stage lasts three years, and they know about the second and third, but not the first. That’s probably the period when the larva is living undetectably inside the bone, consuming marrow, before it breaks out.

  70. 70.

    J R in WV

    @germy: ​

    John Brakey, an official helping oversee the audit of the 2020 Arizona election, says auditors are looking for bamboo fibers because of a baseless accusation that 40K ballots from Asia were smuggled here. #AzAuditPool pic.twitter.com/57UOBYIehg

    — Dennis Welch (@dennis_welch) May 5, 2021

    Actually, every store that sells anything in Maricopa County sells bamboo sheets, or bamboo flooring, or bamboo towels or washcothes. Bamboo based fabric has been a big new fashion thing for at least 5 or 6 years … so this is as much a fantasy as the little children in PingPong Pizza’s non-existent basement.

    These guy need to ask their wives which set of their linens are bamboo before they make bigger asses of themselves…

  71. 71.

    Anonymous

    @Baud:

    Now I feel bad not thanking Bob for ghost writing my comments.

    That’s OK Baud, I don’t mind!

    Bob

Comments are closed.