Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Come on, man.

The willow is too close to the house.

He imagines himself as The Big Bad, Who Is Universally Feared… instead of The Big Jagoff, Who Is Universally Mocked.

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

People are weird.

Battle won, war still ongoing.

When you’re a Republican, they let you do it.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

Putin dreamed of ending NATO, and now it’s Finnish-ed.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

They were going to turn on one another at some point. It was inevitable.

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

It could be worse. Vance could have said “post-menopausal sows.” Waiting for that audiotape to surface.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

President Biden is doing good where he can, and getting it done.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

“Cheese and Kraken paired together for the appetizer trial.”

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

Democrats are back in array!

The gop couldn’t organize an orgy in a whorehouse with a fist full of 50s.

You are here: Home / Civil Rights / Wednesday Morning Open Thread: MMIW Day of Awareness

Wednesday Morning Open Thread: MMIW Day of Awareness

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Not exactly the usual optimistic early-morning topic, but…

From AP, “Families, advocates mark day of awareness for Native victims”:

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — From the nation’s capitol to Indigenous communities across the American Southwest, top government officials, family members and advocates are gathering Wednesday as part of a call to action to address the ongoing problem of violence against Indigenous women and children.

U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland and other federal officials are expected to commemorate the annual day of awareness as a caravan of female motorcycle riders hits the streets in Phoenix, advocates take to social media, and families prepare for a night of candlelight and prayer vigils.

Haaland, the first Native American to lead a U.S. cabinet agency, called May 5 an unfortunate tradition.

The former Democratic U.S. representative from New Mexico remembers hearing families testify about searching for loved ones on their own and bringing clothing to congressional hearings that represented missing and slain Native Americans.

Haaland will display a red shawl on an empty chair in her office Wednesday to symbolize those who have disappeared and honor the movement that rang the alarm. She said she believes the nation has reached an inflection point.

“This year more than any, I feel we are ready to solve this crisis,” she told reporters Tuesday. “Everyone deserves to feel safe in their communities, but the missing and murdered Indigenous peoples crisis is one that Native communities have faced since the dawn of colonization. For too long, this issue has been swept under the rug with the lack of urgency, attention and funding.”…

Reader Interactions

151Comments

  14. 14.

    debbie

    @Baud:

    Local news last night said that guy photographed carrying the Confederate flag was expected to turn into an informant.

  20. 20.

    John S.

    @rikyrah: My wife is a 7th grade science teacher at a charter school where most of her students are POC. I have literally met many of her former students (now adults) over the years who remember her, and what she did for them. I am so proud of her.

  21. 21.

    Baud

    On Monday, Colombia’s ombudsman said at least 19 people had died during a week of unrest over proposed tax reforms.

  22. 22.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Baud: ​
     

    I hate when I agree with Tom Friedman.

    I know. I always feel the need to go take a long, hot shower, to get rid of the oil and grime. Or start drinking.

  23. 23.

    JPL

    From the NYTimes        Lying under oath seems like a big deal..

    A federal judge in Washington accused the Justice Department under Attorney General William P. Barr of misleading her and Congress about advice he had received from top department officials on whether President Donald J. Trump should have been charged with obstructing the Russia investigation and ordered that a related memo be released.
    Judge Amy Berman Jackson of the United States District Court in Washington said in a ruling late Monday that the Justice Department’s obfuscation appeared to be part of a pattern in which top officials like Mr. Barr were untruthful to Congress and the public about the investigation.

  26. 26.

    Baud

    Earmark intrigue splits Senate Republicans
     
    At least six Senate Republicans plan to submit earmark requests despite a longstanding ban, and more than a dozen others are still considering it.

  29. 29.

    Betty Cracker

    Friedman:

    On Monday, CNN quoted Cheney as telling Republican donors and scholars at a retreat for the American Enterprise Institute in Sea Island, Ga.: “We can’t embrace the notion the election is stolen. It’s a poison in the bloodstream of our democracy. … We can’t whitewash what happened on Jan. 6 or perpetuate Trump’s Big Lie. It is a threat to democracy. What he did on Jan. 6 is a line that cannot be crossed.” A “peaceful transfer of power must be defended.”

    She could not be more right. And without a war of ideas inside the party, one that is won by principled Republicans, we run the real risk of a political civil war in America over the next election.

    Things are not OK.

    Unless more principled Republicans stand up for the truth about our last election, we’re going to see exactly how a democracy dies.

    If Friedman is right, we’re screwed because “principled Republicans” are as rare as hen’s teeth. But I’m not sure he’s right. Isn’t it also possible that Trump’s relevance continues to fade and the whole thing eventually gets memory-holed?

  32. 32.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Baud:

    Earmarks are how extreme partisanship breaks. If you can assure retention of office by prioritizing what really matters most to you in order to get the goodies your constituents want, then ideologues lose their sway.

  34. 34.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    No one knows.  Could go either way.  I don’t listen to any predictions. I prefer listening to people who emphasize doing the right thing.

  35. 35.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    emptywheel

    @emptywheel

    ·
    50m

    Area SubStacker who gleefully ran cover for GRU leak of John Podesta’s risotto recipe is OUTRAGED that anyone would report on stolen private citizen communications at The Intercept.

  36. 36.

    JPL

    @Baud: Barbara Comstock on CNN just said woe to any woman who wants to be a handmaiden to this lie..    John Berman just brought up Elise Stefanik, and Comstock did no back down.

  38. 38.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    I think it’s a real threat. It’s not the voter suppression, which we’re accustomed to and can surmount, it’s the subversion of the vote-counting administration and apparatus . They’re changing the rules to allow Republican Party actors and operatives to remove election officials who get in their way.
    We came really close last time, IMO. Closer than people are comfortable admitting. The last line of defense was local and state officials who bucked Party demands to install Trump, and judges. This would leave judges as the only defense. They’ve given themselves power to remove anyone who doesn’t follow orders to install Republicans.

  39. 39.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    Search timeline

    Glenn Greenwald

    @ggreenwald

    ·
    12h

    This is repulsive. The Intercept was founded during the Snowden story to defend privacy rights & oppose the security state. Now, the liberal DNC hacks who “edit” it are boasting they got personal data from Gab users & are sorting through it, doing FBI’s work to find “extremists.”

  40. 40.

    Geminid

    @Ken: The Wason Center regularly polls Virginia registered voters. They released another one recently. On the question, should all immigrants currently in country be given a pathway to citizenship, 73% said yes. There was 94% support for citizenship for so-called “Dreamers.”

    Demographically, Virginia is not a typical state. It has greater-than-median African American, college educated, immigrant, and military, civilian federal employee populations. But I don’t think it is that much an outlier on immigration questions.

  41. 41.

    debbie

    @Baud:

    We know because we know Trump will not go away and we know Trump will never acknowledge he lost. I don’t think Trump cares if he returns to the presidency; at this point, I think he only cares  about holding on to his cult and their adoration.

  42. 42.

    satby

    @Gin & Tonic: @mrmoshpotato: Just as in previous generations, they’re probably fucking like rabbits; just not producing litters any more. They have no confidence that they’ll achieve their parents standard of living even with both partners working. And many think  that pollution and climate change will result in a world not worth living in or inflicting on a next generation.

  43. 43.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    This is the difference:

    At stake is something I never expected to worry about in the United States: the integrity of the vote count. The danger of manipulated election results looms.

    It’s a big escalation. All the efforts prior to this last round focused on making it harder for certain people to vote. The new laws focus on the vote counting and certification itself.
    You’ll start seeing a refusal to certify counts they don’t like and the winners not being seated.

  46. 46.

    sab

    @Betty Cracker: I wish I was still on speaking terms with my RWNJ brother because he is clued into these odd people. I could shrug off Anthony Fauci created the Corona virus in  a lab in China, but Mike Pompeo is God’s gift to America was a bridge too far. So we do not speak anymore.

  47. 47.

    Kay

    No one has to “believe Tom Friedman” to believe the integrity of elections is at stake. Election law experts are saying it and have been saying it. That’s where he got it.

    He’s valuable only in that he’s repeating what is nearly a consensus view at this point.  Only self-interested Republican lawmakers and operatives disagree that it’s a threat. There’s no mainstream election law expert who says “oh, this is fine”.

  48. 48.

    Ken

    @mrmoshpotato: Personally I blame the over-40 set. If you look at the birthrate statistics, their numbers are way lower than those for other age cohorts.

  49. 49.

    sab

    @Kay: This is actually old hat. Jim Crow, but moving north. Jimmy Carter used to talk about it, voting in Georgia in his youth.

    ETA I never thought it would get to Ohio, but here we are.

  50. 50.

    Geminid

    @JPL: There is an article in Politico about Kevin McCarthy pushing Elise Stephanik for Cheney’s Conference Chairman job. Some other ambitious Republican Representatives want the job, and are grumbling that they are being discriminated against because they are men.

  51. 51.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Ken:

    Personally I blame the over-40 set. If you look at the birthrate statistics, their numbers are way lower than those for other age cohorts. 

    Haha, cool.  I’m off the hook.

  55. 55.

    Cheryl from Maryland

    @Baud:  This is website for the latest insurrection arrest news re the rioters – seditiontracker.com (sorry, link addition wasn’t working this am on my iPad).

  58. 58.

    sab

    @debbie: Yes it is. I found a story by my high school crush. Had no idea what had happened to him. Serious mistake on my part to have lost touch with him. He dodged a bullet.

  59. 59.

    JPL

    @Geminid:   I hope Elise hears about Comstock calling her a handmaiden.    She’d probably take it as a compliment.

  60. 60.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    Glenn Greenwald in 2025, after the first glorious purges of the Gaetz Administration:

    ”Certainly, there were some irregularities to be noted in the 2024 election where it appeared that former President Biden and Congressional Democrats commanded a massive electoral victory in raw vote totals, but processes wisely put into place by Republican legislators to combat neoliberal voter fraud and manipulation led to a massive reordering of the House and Senate and a mandate-level electoral college that will allow President Gaetz to fully address the evils that the neoliberal, warmongering hacks of the DNC have continuously foisted on the public. Already, the pretrial detention of former President Biden and Vice President Harris are welcome, and the revision of statutes of limitations combined with the empaneling of special prosecutors to look into the crimes of Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Kerry will finally lead to the justice they deserve.

    With President Bolsonaro still in power here in Brazil, our work is not done. Please support my Substack and Patreon generously, and don’t forget to check out my five volume ‘Securing Democracy’ book set.”

  61. 61.

    RandomMonster

    Question of the (upcoming) hour: Will FB’s oversight board allow TFG back on? After all, there are a lot of rubes to be fleeced for everyone.

  63. 63.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Baud:

    “Operators are standing by – don’t delay. Only your bitcoins will help me get rid of Bolsonaro.”

  65. 65.

    sdhays

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: All of this will commence once President Gaetz has himself been released from the Federal Prison from which he ran his election campaign following the Supreme Court’s wise overruling of his conviction under the doctrine of “boys will be boys”.

  66. 66.

    germy

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    Glenn Greenwald cosplays as an intellectual, but when you scratch the surface, he's a mediocre blogger who coasted on Laura Poitras's journalism, and who now spends his time sneering at people online and catering to white nationalists while pretending that's not what he's doing.

    — ⚓️?Imani Gandy ?⚓️ (@AngryBlackLady) May 5, 2021

  68. 68.

    germy

    @sdhays:

    …following the Supreme Court’s wise overruling of his conviction under the doctrine of “boys will be boys”  “do you know who my father is?”

  69. 69.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @mrmoshpotato:

    “My wages are shit, my student loans are six figures, houses are impossible for me to even think about affording, I’m housesharing or living with parents, and every industry’s management tiers are infested by ticks who won’t or can’t retire. I think I’ll have some children!”

  72. 72.

    Ken

    @germy:  “boys will be boys”  “do you know who my father is?”

    Used-car dealer in central Florida, if I recall correctly.

  73. 73.

    Jeffro

    @Bex: daughter of Tony Hillerman, I take it?

    If so, interesting how some of these big name authors’ kids take up the ‘family business’.  =)

  74. 74.

    Kay

    @sab:

    This is actually old hat

    I think it’s a mistake to analyze it that way. It’s not the restrictions on certain people voting- that is old hat- it’s the efforts to put control of election administration- the count and certification- exclusively in the hands of motivated, partisan actors.
    It didn’t get better after the insurrection- it got worse. They put in new state law to make it easier to overturn valid election results. No one has to speculate anymore- the question of whether they would get worse has already been answered. New state law is worse. They didn’t have it when Trump and most congressional Republicans tried to overturn the election and they do have it now.
    They have another new tool. They have a majority of SCOTUS justices who are endorsing the idea that only state legislatures may interpret state election law. Where that ends up is here: they’re trying to get to a point where the people in a state don’t choose the Presidential candidate, a majority of the state legislature does. They could get there fast, too. That’s what “only state legislatures may interpret state election law” means, as a practical matter. The state legislature my pick the “winner”. That’s where that ends up.

  75. 75.

    Kay

    @sab:

    This is actually old hat

    I think it’s a mistake to analyze it that way. It’s not the restrictions on certain people voting- that is old hat- it’s the efforts to put control of election administration- the count and certification- exclusively in the hands of motivated, partisan actors.
    It didn’t get better after the insurrection- it got worse. They put in new state law to make it easier to overturn valid election results. No one has to speculate anymore- the question of whether they would get worse has already been answered. New state law is worse. They didn’t have it when Trump and most congressional Republicans tried to overturn the election and they do have it now.
    They have another new tool. They have a majority of SCOTUS justices who are endorsing the idea that only state legislatures may interpret state election law. Where that ends up is here: they’re trying to get to a point where the people in a state don’t choose the Presidential candidate, a majority of the state legislature does. They could get there fast, too. That’s what “only state legislatures may interpret state election law” means, as a practical matter. The state legislature my pick the “winner”. That’s where that ends up.

  76. 76.

    Baud

    I don’t know if it’s in his column, but one nice thing Friedman said on MJ is that Dems aren’t going to take minority rule lying down, and that it would lead to civil war.  It’s nice to hear a centrist moderate describe the Dems as fighters.

  80. 80.

    Geminid

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Greenwald is now picking fights with a lot of people on the left. A local anti-fascist moved from Charlottesville to Germany after death threats and serious harrassment in the wake of the Unite the Right rally. A month ago, she listed Greenwald among ten people she was removing from her notifications, as part of her spring cleaning. Name-checker Greenwald jumped in and accused her of homophobia and antisemitism, and then of course his twitter-minions piled on.

    First I thought, there goes that misogynist Greenwald again, punching down a woman. But then I considered Emily Gorcenski’s credibility in the anti-fascist and IT communities, and decided that Greenwald was actually punching up.

  81. 81.

    germy

    @Ken: 

    Donald Jay Gaetz is a Republican politician who served as a member of the Florida State Senate from 2006 to 2016, representing parts of Northwest Florida. He was Senate president from 2012 to 2014.

  82. 82.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Hopefully, she got her tubes tied.

    It was difficult to tell which of Baud’s two consecutive posts you were replying to. I thought, for a moment, you were referring to the elephant.

  85. 85.

    Kay

    @sab:

    Jim Crow was more successful in barring black people from voting, so they didn’t need to control the counting. It’s an escalation- a change in tactics because the prior tactic no longer works.

  87. 87.

    Kay

    @sab:

    With Trump’s effort there was a sober, concerted refusal to accept his lies and it was broad- all of mainstream media refused and as it continued we saw large companies growing concerned and stepping in to make it clear to Republicans that there would be repercussions if it escalated.

    We had that last time. We may not have it next time. If the election had been closer- one state or two states- we wouldn’t have had it at all.

  88. 88.

    NotMax

    Oh my. Struck me that this month marks the 50th anniversary of my boycott of McDonald’s.

    That ol’ tempus sure do fugit.

  91. 91.

    RandomMonster

    Suspension upheld. Good. He won’t be able to leverage that medium as effectively.

  92. 92.

    germy

    .@EliseStefanik isn’t an anomaly. From Marge to Madison—Gosar to Jordan, the worst of Trump’s sycophants are representing rural America. I’m working to change that. If we want to get rid of these seditionists, we need to fight for every seat. ⬇️ https://t.co/r2vgt6ttgl

    — Tedra Cobb (@TedraCobb) May 5, 2021

  93. 93.

    Lapassionara

    @Kay: Yes. This is the difference that the new laws are making. People need to focus on this, not on the “no water to people in line” issue.

    States are no longer the laboratories of democracy. They are the breeding grounds of fascism. Look at Missouri, where the voters chose Medicaid expansion, and the legislature ignored them.

  94. 94.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    It’s welcome news. I thought they would wuss out and reinstate him, especially since the “independent panel” is apparently not very independent. Whew.

  95. 95.

    sdhays

    @Steeplejack (phone): Wow. I was not expecting that.

    Although apparently they’re calling for the decision to be “reviewed” in 6 months. I don’t really understand what that’s about – didn’t they just review it? Is they idea that “I don’t know, maybe this insurrectionist fountain of shit may have moderated himself in the next Friedman Unit and we can let him get on with puking down our users’ eyeballs”?

  97. 97.

    Kay

    @Geminid:

    Greenwald is more incoherent than usual. He’s arguing that he can and has aligned with Tucker Carlson on certain issues, and that shouldn’t be any reflection on him because it’s not “Tucker Carlson” he’s endorsing, it’s certain ideas.

    Later, the same day, he insists no liberal may agree with Liz Cheney without endorsing Liz Cheney’s whole career and set of views.

    He’s just not that smart.

  99. 99.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @Steeplejack (phone):

    Uh-oh, maybe not so clear-cut. Guardian live feed (link above):

    “It is not permissible for Facebook to keep a user off the platform for an undefined period, with no criteria for when or whether the account will be restored,” the board said in its decision.

    “In applying this penalty, Facebook did not follow a clear, published procedure. ‘Indefinite’ suspensions are not described in the company’s content policies. Facebook’s normal penalties include removing the violating content, imposing a time-bound period of suspension, or permanently disabling the page and account.”

    The board instructed Facebook to complete a review to determine whether Trump can return to the platform.

    “The Board insists that Facebook review this matter to determine and justify a proportionate response that is consistent with the rules that are applied to other users of its platform. Facebook must complete its review of this matter within six months of the date of this decision,” the board said.

  100. 100.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Geminid:

    I lost at least two Twitter accounts (including my first one, which was a real name tie-in to my business website) due to bogus swarm reporting after dunking on Greenwald. Some of them went so far as to deface my Google reviews; my website SEO folks at the time said to not worry about the Twitter loss, because the industry by then viewed Twitter as an unreliable dumpster fire and actually devalued click-ins via Twitter, because they were so manipulable.

    I’ve noticed that the ecology of tweets that respond to Greenwald has changed and isn’t anywhere close to the fawning levels of adoration he got in 2015-2017.

  101. 101.

    RandomMonster

    @Lapassionara: Soon to be posted: “A cabal of radical leftists and international financiers controlling Facebook have chosen to ban me…”

  102. 102.

    Kay

    If Glenn Greenwald can agree with Tucker Carlson on whatever that word salad on the “deep state” is, while rejecting Tucker Carlson’s racist views, then liberals can agree with Liz Cheney on the importance of democratically elected leaders without endorsing her views on wars, etc.

  103. 103.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: I agree election integrity is being undermined in an alarming way. I’m not convinced only “principled Republicans” can pull us back from the brink, which seems to be what Friedman is saying. Maybe I’m just in denial because the chance of that happening is so vanishingly small.

  104. 104.

    germy

    @Lapassionara:

    Everyone’s dunking on Trump’s new “blog,” but I think it’s kinda cool in that it shows that everyone can speak on their own websites and don’t *need* social media to speak. (Also, the terms of service on his site are fun). https://t.co/SDDWHT31dN

    — Mike Masnick (@mmasnick) May 5, 2021

  105. 105.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Steeplejack (phone):

    So January 6, 2021 was the Beer Hall Putsch, social media is the publisher of Mein Kampf, and the main act is yet to come.

  107. 107.

    Nelle

    @Jeffro: Anne Hillerman’s continuation of the series is quite good.  I was initially sceptical, but she won me over.  She develops a female tribal officer quite well.  We just detoured off I-40 to drive through the lava beds of New Mexico (we came to see vaccinated daughter in Phoenix), which are a setting in Cave of Bones. I had been surprised by their existence when we had flown over them a few years ago (husband is a pilot).  Then I read her book and wanted to see it on the ground.  Hillerman makes the places come alive.

  108. 108.

    Geminid

    @Lapassionara: The Missouri has once again refused to fund Medicaid expansion. It’s possible that proponents will get relief in state court. At least they will try to.

  109. 109.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @germy:

    Rural electrification was a mistake. I blame FDR.

    Also, privatize TVA so that the most fervent advocates of conservatism get to enjoy the benefits of unaccountable free enterprise….

  110. 110.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    I think it’s true in that they still control big swathes of states.

    Election administration regulation is really a better front for (federal) Democrats. There’s more constitutional authority to intervene and it’s boring. They could put up HR1 as the target for all the rage and screaming and then put in election administration protections below the radar.

    No one attacks the “Help America Vote Act” (HAVA) although it’s just as important to free and fair elections as the VRA :)

  111. 111.

    Jeffro

    @Geminid:On the question, should all immigrants currently in country be given a pathway to citizenship, 73% said yes.

    Which puts the ‘no’s at…yup…27%

  112. 112.

    Ken

    @sdhays: Although apparently they’re calling for the decision to be “reviewed” in 6 months.

    So every six months, just when the emotional scab’s about to come off, they tell TFG he’s still banned?  This decision gets better and better.

  113. 113.

    Geminid

    @Kay: I don’t agree with Liz Cheney’s politics, but it’s good to see her standing up to that tinhorn fourflusher trump. Lynn and Dick Cheney did not raise her up to be a Lindsey Graham, and I’m glad of that.

  116. 116.

    Another Scott

    @Steeplejack (phone):  I was about to post the same thing from AlJazeera – https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/5/5/facebook-oversight-board-upholds-trumps-suspension

    How long until Z reverses it? After all, he knows who his users are…

    The top-performing link posts by U.S. Facebook pages in the last 24 hours are from:1. Ben Shapiro2. Ben Shapiro3. Ben Shapiro4. Franklin Graham5. The Pioneer Woman – Ree Drummond6. Ben Shapiro7. NPR8. Ben Shapiro9. ForAmerica10. Ben Shapiro

    — Facebook's Top 10 (@FacebooksTop10) May 3, 2021

    Grrr…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  117. 117.

    RandomMonster

    @Ken: So every six months, just when the emotional scab’s about to come off, they tell TFG he’s still banned?  This decision gets better and better.

    Apparently inciting a riot and spreading disinformation in an attempt to overthrow a legitimate election aren’t grounds enough for a perma-ban. Fuck FB.

  119. 119.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @sdhays: NYTimes pitchbot “Accusations that President Gaetz murdered rival drug dealer while in prison denounced as partisan attacks.”

  120. 120.

    germy

    Facebook shouldn’t have this much power. They began as a site for rating how hot or ugly women at college are. It never changed. It’s toxic.

    — Xeni Jardin is fully vaccinated (@xeni) May 5, 2021

  121. 121.

    Ken

    @germy: Unless TFG recently bought an amusement park, the terms of service for his blog are in violation of Florida’s new social media law. Well, to be precise, they will be in violation if anyone other than TFG is ever allowed to post there, and any of their material is removed.

  124. 124.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Another Scott: Facebook property WhatsApp is wreaking havoc in India. BJP has used it successfully to spread vicious lies that comes from the people you know. Talking to affected people is like talking to cult members.

  126. 126.

    Baud

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I feel like social media has generally united the right and fractured the left (recognizing that many parts of the left have used social media to good end).

  127. 127.

    Geminid

    @Jeffro: I was disappointed in Lee Child’s latest Jack Reacher novel, a collaboration with Child’s son. Child’s formerly taut narrative is somewhat loose. And compared to the laconic Jack Reacher of other novels, the new Reacher is like a chatterbox.

  129. 129.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Bad as it is here, in India the malign influence of social media is worse. BJP is more vicious and cruel and it has the support of over 90% of upper caste Indians (the equivalent of WASPs here in political influence, you know the default although they are barely 5 to 20% of the population).

    Though they are small in number compared to other demographic groups their influence on the discourse is outsized. It has become impossible for me to talk to most of my family and friends about this. BJP plays to their prejudices and in addition they are being continuously lied to by the traditional media which is under the BJP sway.

  132. 132.

    Brachiator

    @Betty Cracker:

    If Friedman is right, we’re screwed because “principled Republicans” are as rare as hen’s teeth. But I’m not sure he’s right. Isn’t it also possible that Trump’s relevance continues to fade and the whole thing eventually gets memory-holed?

    I keep seeing polls which suggest that a majority of Republicans believe the Big Lie. They may be deluding themselves, but it gives them a way to stay angry and alienated.

    Also, it is not only about Trump. Some Americans have crossed over a line by declaring that they no longer need or want a democracy, and there may be no going back.

    Meanwhile, red states continue to pass laws that suppress votes. And more right wing malcontents openly express the idea that only certain people should have the right to vote.

    Trump helped set this in motion, but some other autocrat might reap the benefits.

  133. 133.

    sdhays

    @Kay: To be fair, I don’t think Glenn Greenwald disagrees with Tuckum’s (thank you, Joy Reid!) racist views. He certainly isn’t bothered by them.

  134. 134.

    Kay

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    Well, Hasen suggests relying on Congress’ constitutional authority to regulate federal election administration – a focus there, rather than on “voting rights”, per se. One way to look at it would be to think of “voting rights” as applying to individual voters and “administration” as applying to state or local officials who oversee elections.

    Of course one is essential to the other- a “right” without a process to make it count isn’t a right at all, but there’s a division there in how people think about it.

    There’s overlap too. The Voting Rights Act also regulates some process, but it’s broadly two categories.

  135. 135.

    Kay

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    Congress has a legitimate and constitutionally protected interest in how states conduct federal elections. How elections are administered. They have authority to intervene there.

  136. 136.

    Geminid

    @Geminid: I meant to say the Missouri legislature had rejected funding Medicaid expansion. A lawsuit will be filed after July 1, once the date set by the constitutional amendment passes and a qualified applicant is denied.

    By refusing to appropriate $130 million, the Republican legislators are holding back over $1.6 billion in federal money. Politically, a losing issue, I think. Virginia Democrats made Republican opposition to Medicaid expansion a winning issue in the 2017 election, going from down 35-65 Delegates to down 49-51- on a Republican drawn map. Then ten Republican delegates and three Senators crossed over to push expansion through.

    Missouri is a tougher state for Democrats, but I think there are state legislative elections next fall and I hope Republicans pay a price.

  137. 137.

    Kay

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    It hasn’t been our focus. “Motor voter” was mostly about expanding access to the ballot – voters.

    HAVA came closer. That’s mostly about election administration. Hillary Clinton’s focus, so you know, she knew what the fuck was coming down :)

  140. 140.

    Soprano2

    @Geminid:  The Missouri has once again refused to fund Medicaid expansion.

    Their justifications for this are something else, too. They don’t seem to have any idea that people who don’t work due to a) being in a nursing home or b) disability or c) being homeless are ALREADY ON MEDICAID! One idiot R said he didn’t want to make more people dependent on the government. I wonder if he thinks people on Medicare are dependent on the government, or if veterans are dependent on the government. Their real objection is that it helps the working poor, and they hate that. I think about people like our cook who hurt his knee; it took him a long time to go to the doctor for it, because he has no insurance and as a single working man doesn’t qualify for Medicaid. It’s people like that who they don’t want to help, not the lazy poor they think are going to be helped. It’s infuriating!!

  141. 141.

    Gravenstone

    @Steeplejack (phone): imposing a time-bound period of suspension

    100 years, starting from date of initial suspension. There, a nice, neat, fully defined interval of ban. Next?

  142. 142.

    catclub

    @Baud: ​
     

    I hate when I agree with Tom Friedman

    .

    William F. Buckley loved Bach’s St Matthew Passion.

  145. 145.

    Captain C

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Someday, we’re going to find out that Glem a) has been an informant for years for the FBI/CIA in addition to being a paid catspaw for the GRU/FSB/Republican Party, and b) that he has a dungeon full of unwilling victims in his Brazilian McMansion, aren’t we?

  148. 148.

    J R in WV

    Wife and I decided in the long ago not to have kids. Her parents were 1) narcissistic mother 2) binge drinker father, so no good examples there. Plus I feared and expected the plutocrats on one side or the other of the cold war to create a specially radioactive planet glowing in the dark and no longer conducive to living creatures. Also environmental damage in the ’60s and ’70s was pretty terrifying.

    So we’re not contributing to over population anywhere. I can’t fuss at the youngs making the same decisions we did 45 and 50 years ago.

  149. 149.

    sab

    What with my coloring, I do not own anything red.  So I need to go shopping to buy what I look horrible wearing.

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