Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

There are times when telling just part of the truth is effectively a lie.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

“Alexa, change the president.”

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

Celebrate the fucking wins.

Beware of advice from anyone for whom Democrats are “they” and not “we.”

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

White supremacy is terrorism.

So many bastards, so little time.

This chaos was totally avoidable.

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

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

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

Disagreements are healthy; personal attacks are not.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

Also, are you sure you want people to rate your comments?

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

Let me file that under fuck it.

We will not go quietly into the night; we will not vanish without a fight.

America is going up in flames. The NYTimes fawns over MAGA celebrities. No longer a real newspaper.

The “burn-it-down” people are good with that until they become part of the kindling.

I like political parties that aren’t owned by foreign adversaries.

You are here: Home / Politics / Biden Administration in Action / Wednesday Morning Open Thread: President Biden Knows How Many Beans Make Five

Wednesday Morning Open Thread: President Biden Knows How Many Beans Make Five

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  5. 5.

    germy

    Are Republicans Finally Standing Up to the Proud Boys?

    Although most of the news from Nevada right now stems from mainstream Republicans fighting back against Proud Boy influence, it’s significant that the pro-Trump cause in the state might have invited such out-there allies into the RINO-hunting purge they undertook. It says a lot that you can’t tell the thugs from the regular Trump fans without an actual investigation.

    https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/05/proud-boys-involved-in-censure-of-nevada-secretary-of-state.html

  6. 6.

    Spanky

    So this is what I’m paying the WaPo for now? Democracy Dies in Bullshit too, assholes.

  7. 7.

    Chief Oshkosh

    Up and at ’em! Was greeted by our two cats at the food bowl area. Bowls upside-down, mats askew, old food strewn about. They look at each other, then stare at me. After a half-paws, the big one says,
    “It’s infrastructure week, motherfucker.”

  8. 8.

    Spanky

    @germy: Trump has weakened enough that there’s a lot of recalculating going on.

    All We Are Is Fingers In the Wind.

  12. 12.

    Baud

    I hear Biden also supports the election of Democrats.  So much for bipartisanship.

  13. 13.

    Geminid

    Speaking of beans, a commenter in an earlier thread was skeptical of Biden’s method in these infrastructure negotiations, and compared it to 11 dimensional chess. I think a better analogy would be the game of Go. In this political game, the territory and opponent’s stones that Biden and company are steadily surrounding represent 2022 and 2024 voters.

  16. 16.

    MomSense

    @Baud: 
    The onus is always on democrats to be bipartisan. The media can’t stop trying to normalize the Republicans no matter how crazy and seditious they become.

  18. 18.

    Baud

    @MomSense:

    I didn’t click, but the tweet said this was an opinion piece.  I assume by one of WaPo’s conservative pundits.

    Trashing Biden is what they get paid to do.

  20. 20.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Don’t ever change Bentonville:

    A school principal in Arkansas has apologized for “political inaccuracies” in a yearbook falsely stating that Donald Trump was not impeached and that last year’s racial protests in the US were “Black Lives Matter riots”.

    Josh Thompson, principal of Bentonville’s Lincoln junior high school, admitted that some of the contents of the yearbook, which also included a photograph of the deadly 6 January insurrection in Washington DC captioned: “Trump supporters protest at the Capitol,” were “both biased and political”.

    In a letter sent to students and parents, Thompson said the yearbook “does not represent our values nor meet LJHS and Bentonville Schools’ standards for quality and excellence.”

    The letter did not address how the false statements and political opinions came to be published, but promised the school would “evaluate its vetting process for all yearbook content to ensure future publications are of the highest quality”.

    It’s a mystery how these things happen.

  24. 24.

    Skepticat

    @Balconesfault: I hadn’t been paying much attention, as I thought not much would be visible in The Bahamas, but I was greeted by almost half of a huge red moon this morning. It set very soon after, but it still was pretty impressive.

  26. 26.

    Sparkedcat

    The younger cat brought me a mouse this morning. A live mouse which was rescued to live another day. The older cat cried until his dish had the food he wanted. Cats. The middle one is going to the vet today with a deep gash in his back. Cats.

  28. 28.

    Baud

    @debbie:

    He’s one of their worst.  Almost not worth mocking.

    ETA: The number one job of all right wing media is to call Democrats good faith into question.  They don’t want their voters to seriously consider what we have to say.

  29. 29.

    hueyplong

    @MomSense: When GOPers are in control, there is never talk about whether they are being bipartisan.  Instead, the stories focus on whether Democrats will have defections to the GOP side of a vote (“can they hold their caucus together?”) or else their general helplessness if holding the line means that they lose anyway.

    The best thing Biden has done is to shift the focus on “bipartisanship” to whether a majority of the country supports what he’s doing.  If it turns out that a significant majority simply isn’t Republican, well that’s just too bad for the GOPers.

    I like to think of Nazis as a minority of Americans anyway.

  31. 31.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Long ago, I traveled there to try and sell books into Walmart. I was a bit concerned, but the book buyers were actually normal, sweet human beings!

  32. 32.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Spanky: His disgusting orange face doesn’t mean he’s done, but we can still punt them all into the Sun.

  33. 33.

    Spanky

    @Baud: Well, I actually looked and  Jebus  it’s by Marc Fucking Thiessen.

    So now I know not to care.

  34. 34.

    AxelFoley

    @rikyrah: I was telling my mom about Bernie’s fuckery being the reason we can’t just get rid of DeJoy.  Of, course, I didn’t use that language when explaining that to her.

  35. 35.

    OzarkHillbilly

    This is pretty cool stuff: How a ranger stumbled upon one of the largest fossil finds in California history

    The discovery began last summer, when Greg Francek, a water district ranger, spotted a funny-looking rock with markings vaguely resembling bark, while on a routine patrol of 28,000 acres of EBMUD land on the eastern rim of California’s Central Valley.

    It turned out to be a petrified tree. Francek poked around further and found a whole grove of petrified trees and then realized the area was scattered with thousands of bone fragments.

    “It started with me being at the right place at the right time and having an eye for something that was a bit out of place,” said Francek, who has been a ranger and naturalist with the water district for 10 years. “I didn’t realize what I was looking at was actually the remains of great beasts that had walked this area millions of years before.”

    Soon scientists were unearthing fossils from a whole zoo of prehistoric animals that existed in the time period known as the Miocene Epoch. It was more than 50m years after dinosaurs roamed the continent and it would be millions of years more before humans appeared. It was an age when the mastodons wandered North America. Volcanic activity and shifting geologic plates had not yet formed the Sierra Nevada and most of southern California was still under water.

    Russell Shapiro, a geology professor at California State University, Chico, said when Francek first took him to the area, spread over several miles on land that is closed to the public, he was amazed at how many different animals’ fossils appeared in one place.

    “Greg was showing me these spots and we were like “Oh my God, that’s a horse; that’s a camel; that’s a rhinoceros; that’s a tortoise,” he said. “It was all right there.”

    The EBMUD has even set up a website for the find: Mastodons Among Us

  37. 37.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    Hard to believe the Chancellor of Dump University is being investigated for fraud.

  38. 38.

    Spanky

    @Spanky: I see I dawdled long enough to not be the first to find it.

    The WaPo also tells me that former Senator and Mr. Liz Taylor, John Warner has died. My reaction: he was still alive?

  39. 39.

    Fair Economist

    Got a very nice view of the blood flower eclipse here in OC CA. Overcast – except for the southern and western skies, where the moon was. The city light reflected off the clouds even lit up a path near my house I would not normally want to take at night. The clouds finally moved over the moon right before totality ended, which is kind of a nice narrative ending. It was weird though because I looked up at the sky after walking a bit and the moon had just disappeared! The clouds hiding it were not really visible due to atmospheric effects.

  40. 40.

    NotMax

    Beaming this in from an earlier dead thread because some might find it amusing too.

    Well, that’s passing odd. Printed on a product’s shipping carton received today, along with the usual company name and the model and item description, is the following:

    “The contents are subject to change without prior notice.”

    Maybe if I wait for a time before opening it will change into something even better.

    ;)

  41. 41.

    Baud

    What’s funny is the infrastructure bill will probably fail because the GOP wants to raise the gas tax, and Biden wants to raise corporate taxes.  In a world without racism, that alone would cause the Dems to sweep the 2022 elections.

  44. 44.

    Geminid

    @Amir Khalid: They say that as the dejected Lindell walked away, he was heard singing a Jackie Wilson song:

    My heart is crying! crying,                      lonely teardrops.                                     My Pillow’s never dry of,                          lonely teardrops.

  47. 47.

    hueyplong

    GOPers can safely ignore/sit on Pillow Guy because he doesn’t control any potentially violent Storm Troopers.  So he’ll spout his nonsense on social media and OANN but never get video ops with the heavy hitters.

  48. 48.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Where did all this dust come from?

    Lea Rose Fiega bought the $30 Diamond Millions scratch-off ticket in March at the Lucky Stop convenience store in Southwick, near where she works.

    “I was in a hurry, on lunch break, and just scratched it real quick, and looked at it, and it didn’t look like a winner, so I handed it over to them to throw away,” she said.

    The ticket lay discarded behind the counter for 10 days until Abhi Shah, the son of the store’s owners, was going through the trash and found the ticket that had a number not scratched off. He scratched it off to reveal a $1m ticket.

    “We had mixed emotions,” Shah told the Washington Post. “We didn’t sleep for two nights, but I don’t know what happened. My inner soul told me: ‘That’s not right. You know who that person is. You should give that ticket back to them.’ And that’s exactly what I did.”

    Shah went to see Fiega at work.

    “He came to my office and said ‘my mom and dad would like to see you,”’ Fiega said. “I said ‘I’m working,’ and he said ‘no you have to come over.’ So I went over there and that’s when they told me. I was in total disbelief. I cried, I hugged them.”

    Fiega said overcoming a near fatal bout of Covid in January was like “winning the lottery” – so she feels doubly fortunate.

    “I mean, who does that? They’re great people. I am beyond blessed,” she said.

    The store gets a $10,000 bonus from the state lottery commission for selling the winning ticket. Fiega said she gave the family an additional reward. She’s saving the rest for retirement.

  52. 52.

    Geminid

    @Spanky: Yeah, John Warner was still kicking. He was probably the most popular Virginia politician in my lifetime. Warner never formally left the Republican party, but he was endorsing Democrats for statewide and national office the last few years..

  55. 55.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Spanky:

    (from the Wikipedia entry on John Warner):

    Following the death of Larry Fortensky in 2016, Warner was the last surviving of Taylor’s seven husbands.

    For those of us old enough to remember leafing through Look and Life magazines at wedding photos of Elizabeth Taylor starting with Nicky Hilton in 1950, this factoid strikes me as a slightly poignant moment in American pop-cultural history.

  56. 56.

    Scout211

    I knew there had to be a reason why I woke up at O’Dark Thirty this morning. The eclipse was awesome. The moon is now about 50% again and looking orange and bright as the sun is starting to rise.

  60. 60.

    Kay

    I keep telling people that anti-abortion laws are going to reach into  monitoring and regulating all pregnancies in all stages but I suppose we all have to watch it happen.

    If your goal is controlling women you don’t stop at “women specifically seeking abortion” because how can laws regulating and monitoring pregnancy make that distinction?  They can’t.  We already know this- what part of “life begins at conception” do people not understand? Miscarriages, prenatal care, women’s actions during the entire term of the pregnancy, all of it subject to review and monitoring by far Right religious nuts using state power.

    These people are going to be so far into each and every pregnancy we’ll be amazed we missed the forest for the trees.

    What Roe really said is “the state can go THIS FAR but no further”. With that fence removed there’s no stopping them.  The nutjob Right runs the GOP now and they’ll be running pregnancy. All pregnancies.

  61. 61.

    germy

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I remember being about eleven years old and sitting in a classroom, listening to a nun go into an extended, very angry rant about Elizabeth Taylor going to hell for all her divorces.

    I barely knew who Taylor was, knew nothing about her marital history, but the subject was obviously something that was eating at the nun.  She’d just finished a lecture on mortal sin, with a large circle on the chalkboard representing the soul.

    The empty circle was the pure soul.  Each time she’d mention another sin, she’d scribble more spots into the circle, until it was full of sin.

  65. 65.

    Kay

    There is no functional difference in these laws between a woman presenting at a health care provider with a potential “medical miscarriage” and a woman presenting seeking an abortion.

    If “life begins” at 6 weeks pregnancy that’s all pregnancies. People talk about criminal laws and that’s certainly a concern but there’s another whole set of laws that apply to children and parents- abuse, neglect and dependency. If the fetus is a child those apply- they have to.

  67. 67.

    Soprano2

    @OzarkHillbilly: I heard that story this morning on the radio. I call bullshit on the idea that it was all just an accident. I guarantee you it was deliberate to pacify all the MAGA parents that live down there.

  69. 69.

    Ramalama

    @rikyrah: ah beat me to it.

    I’m super grateful to Don Winslow for saving the career of crime fiction author Adrian McKinty, whose work I adore. And who was at one point going to stop writing because he’d become homeless.

  71. 71.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Ugh. I just think most people don’t know how profound and far-reaching this is. It’s limitless.  They’re all grandstanding too, so the laws are junk. They’re poorly-reasoned thrown together garbage. Imagine the practical application of “the heartbeat law” to a woman presenting at a medical facility with a medical emergency while pregnant.

  74. 74.

    germy

    @rikyrah:

    I saw him in 1985.  He had the audience spellbound.

    I didn’t know about the incident with Richard Pryor’s son until after he passed, though.

  75. 75.

    hueyplong

    @Kay: And don’t forget the selective enforcement of laws designed to enable then to go after anyone.

  77. 77.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    @Ramalama: I love McKinty’s Sean Duffy series, the one set in Belfast during the troubles. I’d read about him giving up writing. He’d written a bunch of books and won awards and still couldn’t earn enough to support his family.

  81. 81.

    Amir Khalid

    There was a collision on the Light Rail Transit’s Kelana Jaya line yesterday. A train that was being taken on a test drive and one that was full of passengers. No fatalities, thank God; but 213 people were injured, 47 of them seriously. The chairman of state-owned transport company Prasarana Malaysia Berhad, Tajuddin Abdul Rhman, gave a media conference yesterday, where he announced RM1,000 compensation for all injured passengers. (I hope that’s on top of Prasarana paying all medical costs, especially for the seriously injured.)

    But the media conference didn’t go well. It didn’t help that Tajudin gave it wearing an upside-down face shield and no mask, or that he was rude and condescending to the media. The police are now investigating him for the Covid-19 SOP violations — it shouldn’t take long, there’s video of the event, and he’s facing a potentially hefty fine  — and Government sacked him today.

  82. 82.

    Danielx

    I have lost the feeling of existential dread with which I used to wake up every morning during TFG’s reign. You know, that thought “what new disaster did that crazy bastard provoke while I was asleep?”.

    Which is good.  But I’m still browsing the am news and having the phrase “these fucking people…” running through my head.

    Every morning.

  85. 85.

    SFAW

    @Balconesfault:

    Just saw the eclipse while visiting LA with Eileen!

    Liar. Here near Beantown, I’m looking straight at the sun, but I don’t see any bleedin’ eclipse.

  86. 86.

    Honus

    @Geminid: John Warner was OK. As far back as 1994 he refused to endorse Oliver North for the Senate.  We named a road here in Charlottesville for him after that.

  87. 87.

    Steve in the ATL

    @SiubhanDuinne: I used to have to a photo of him and Liz at W&L alumni weekend

    He and I were fraternity brothers, and I met him a couple of times.  Good guy.

  88. 88.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Honus: John Warner was OK. As far back as 1994 he refused to endorse Oliver North for the Senate.

    Fuckin’ RINO.

  89. 89.

    Ken

    @SFAW: This was the other kind of eclipse. Someone linked to a tweet last night that diagrammed the three kinds of ‘lipses:

    • Moon between Earth and Sun = Solar eclipse
    • Earth between Moon and Sun = Lunar eclipse
    • Sun between Earth and Moon = Apocalypse
  90. 90.

    Steve in the ATL

    @rikyrah: love Beto, but he’s on video telling the people of Texas “we’re coming for your guns”. I don’t like his chances….

  91. 91.

    SFAW

    @Kay:

    The nutjob Right runs the GOP now and they’ll be running pregnancy. All pregnancies.

    They’ll be even busier after they get Griswold overturned.

    No, I’m not kidding about Griswold. I might be wrong re: whether it happens in my lifetime, but it’s been one of their goals for awhile.

    I guess they’re not yet bold enough to call Heidi Cruz “Ofted” (for example), but they’re counting the days until they can. Enslavement/subjugation takes time, after all.

  92. 92.

    coin operated

    @Danielx:

    I have lost the feeling of existential dread with which I used to wake up every morning during TFG’s reign. You know, that thought “what new disaster did that crazy bastard provoke while I was asleep?”

    +1.  Started this month for me too.  I am finally able to get a full nights rest without waking up at 0300 and my heart trying to make an Alien-style escape from my chest.

  93. 93.

    debbie

    @Ramalama:

    Anything we thought would sell, from kid’s board books to wall calendars to best sellers. I could create shrink-wrapped packages just for their stores, like a back-to-school promotion with Elements of Style, etc. packaged together. It was great fun because it was brand new territory, almost like having a field of unpissed-on snow all to myself.

  94. 94.

    germy

    @coin operated: …waking up at 0300 and my heart trying to make an Alien-style escape from my chest.

    That’s how the Republican base felt during the eight years of Obama.

  95. 95.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    This PA law (which won’t pass- they have a strong D governor who sticks to his guns)  is the first state anti-abortion law I’ve seen that specifically includes miscarriages, but we’ll see many more and it doesn’t really matter anyway- there’s no “intent” analysis- ‘abortion’ = ‘miscarriage’. I don’t have to intend to end a pregnancy to come under the laws.

    There’s no wiggle room in “life begins at conception” and that’s the anti-abortion position. Either it does or it doesn’t, and if it does the whole suite of laws that apply to children apply to the entire term of every pregnancy. It’s a massive expansion of state reach. It goes much further than the laws did prior to Roe. Those laws just banned abortion. These laws regulate and monitor pregnancy from 6 weeks. Six weeks! They demand to know the status of your pregnancy before most women tell anyone.

    The whole idea that it will “go back” to pre-Roe is really naive. Pre-Roe was a ban on a specific act. These are affirmative pregnancy regulation and monitoring and a redefinition of “person”.

  100. 100.

    p.a.

    @Kay: I’ve felt this for a while.  Restrictions on travel to states/countries w freedom of choice, monitoring, tip  lines.  What Ceausescu did in Romania.

  101. 101.

    dave319

    @Baud: Marc Thiessen, fascist adjacent, torture apologist, upper middle class white man and a loving father and husband active in civic life

  102. 102.

    Percysowner

    @SFAW: I’ve always said Griswold was the real goal. Now I think it is getting closer. Frankly, I’m expecting a couple of judges to do a concurring opinion stating that abortion shouldn’t be left to the states because it’s murder and the “unborn child” has RIGHTS and declare that any and all abortion is unconstitutional. They will also throw in that life DOES start at conception, so any form of conception is murder as well.

    Condoms, of course will be exempt because they are a disease prevention and because MEN get to make those choices.

    @Kay Yep and I would have been in deep shit when I was of child bearing years. I had a genetic condition that led to 4 miscarriages out of five pregnancies. Once I found that out, I would have had to opt to be sterilized and never have kids, which would have meant my wonderful daughter would not be here.

  103. 103.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    Most women would be better off it they had put it in the criminal frame. There at least they could only intervene on a specific set of facts, “X went here and did this”. Obviously I don’t support criminalizing abortion but the criminal frame at least has clear boundaries and rigorous requirements and civil liberties and rights protections. This is just endless. There’s no fence around it all.

    Roe was the best answer to an impossible question- “between HERE and HERE you may not go”. It’s a clunky answer but it gets the best grade just because all the other responses are terrible.

    Now they can go anywhere in a pregnancy they want. Predictably, because the Republican Party is packed to the gills with crazy people, they will go as far as possible.

  104. 104.

    satby

    @Kay: My goodness, won’t PP and NARAL be surprised?

    That this is the rights goal has been clear and on the radar of activists for pretty much ever; 20 years at least that I personally have been telling young women their BC was in danger from the loons, but the average person tends to think rights obtained once last forever, and IIRC, there was some pushback by lefties about ” not blackmailing them with the Supreme Court”. So here we are. But it’s also 20+ more years of taking that freedom for granted, and blowback against RWers will be fierce.

  105. 105.

    Spanky

    Breaking: Amazon Buys MGM in Blockbuster Deal

    “Blockbuster” threw me there, for a little while.

  106. 106.

    Geminid

    @satby: I am hoping a reporter will ask Glenn Youngkin, Virginia Republican candidate for Governor, whether he supports a fetal heartbeat bill. Youngkin wants to run a thematic campaign, and to skate past hard questions on gun safety and women’s rights. His side is very much in the minority on these issues.

  107. 107.

    Kathleen

    @Kay: The city of Lebanon, Ohio declared itself a sanctuary city for fetuses and passed law banning abortions. Welcome to Son of Gilead, Ohio’s new tourist attraction.

  108. 108.

    Butter Emails

    @Spanky:

    Trump has weakened enough that there’s a lot of recalculating going on.

    It’s not about Trump weakening and recalculating. The Proud Boys and assorted ilk are trying to wrest control and kick out the Republican establishment from leadership. The establishment is simply trying to maintain their positions and power.

    This is a fairly predictable result of the narrow focus of the Republicans long game to gain and consolidate power. Their efforts to hold onto power through the ever increasing radicalization of their base coupled with voter suppression leads to the replacement of the current establishment with a combination of more shameless grifters and crazier shithouse rats.

  109. 109.

    Kay

    @Percysowner:

    Women seem to be relying on the impeccable Republican reputation for moderation and humility and deference to privacy and rights. They’ll self police!

    My ass they will. These abortion laws are a poorly drafted, religion-based brand new regulation scheme for pregnancy conceived and drafted by the most extreme elements on the Right, which we have NEVER done in the US, let alone done within the lifetimes of women walking around now.

  110. 110.

    Geminid

    @Kay: I read that when Chief Justice Warren Burger saw there was a court majority to vindicate abortion rights, he chose fellow Minnesotan Lewis Blackmun to write the opinion. Burger knew that while in private practice, Blackmun had represented the Mayo clinic. So Blackmun consulted the doctors there, and devised the simple, pragmatic approach taken in Roe..

  111. 111.

    Kay

    @Kathleen:

    The city of Lebanon, Ohio declared itself a sanctuary city for fetuses

    Guffaw. I’m thinking of the “moderate” well off Republican women here who have assured me repeatedly the goal was very narrow– just things like banning late term abortions for the murderous sluts.
    BROAD. Limitless. You’ll be submitting your pregnancy test stick for recording and they’ll hold it in the evidence room. Life. Begins. At Conception. Life. Much, much broader than “abortion”.

  112. 112.

    PST

    @Kay:

    Roe was the best answer to an impossible question- “between HERE and HERE you may not go”. It’s a clunky answer but it gets the best grade just because all the other responses are terrible.

    I agree, even though it seems weird that the Supreme Court stumbled onto a rule so specific and fact-driven as a constitutional principle. I don’t think we have any possible alternative to treating abortion as sui generis. The results of following to its logical conclusion either the premise that “life begins at conception” or that “a fetus is nothing but a part of a woman’s body until the moment of birth” are simply unacceptable. Almost everyone not constrained by a religious doctrine would agree that a blastula should be treated differently from a full-term baby not yet born. That makes it impossible to avoid some messy line drawing. Roe did a pretty good job, and the best we can hope for in this divided era is to hang onto it and fight both erosion or reversal of its holding.

    Edit: I just read Geminid’s comment 110. That helps explain where the holding came from. Interesting.

  114. 114.

    Soprano2

    @SFAW: No, I’m not kidding about Griswold. I might be wrong re: whether it happens in my lifetime, but it’s been one of their goals for awhile.

    I keep telling people this, that they want to do away with all safe, effective hormonal birth control (and all IUD’s) on the theory that it causes abortions. Lots of people don’t believe you when you tell them this. Conservative evangelical Christians want to take us all back to the time when it was really hard for even married people to get contraception, because they want the sluts to have to be punished for having sex by getting pregnant. They really don’t like other women controlling their fertility, even though their wives do it too.

  115. 115.

    Ruckus

    @Baud:

    Republicans in any political role want complete compliance, so that they can have complete control. Conservatism has never been about anything less than complete control of everything so that the leaders can get and remain better off economically than everyone else. It’s about ownership and power, economically, racially, legally, in every way, shape and form. Conservatives around the world have been losing as communications has exposed them to more and more eyes of what they are about and they have been going all in for the last 3 or 4 decades because they are losing. The effort to control, to steal power and money was always there, there ability to keep it less obvious is what is gone. Now the ability to control and profit from those are what needs to end. That is the basis of racism, it is the basis of conservatism, the basis of control of every one and every thing. They can’t stand that everyone is supposed to be equal, because it limits what they can lord over everyone else, it makes them feel small and powerless.

  116. 116.

    zhena gogolia

    @rikyrah:

    I said the other day, where has this guy been all my life? I can’t believe I didn’t know him. His sketches on Dave Chappelle are hilarious.

  118. 118.

    Old School

    @Spanky:

    Breaking: Amazon Buys MGM in Blockbuster Deal

    As Stephen Colbert pointed out last night, this means Jeff Bezos now owns the outtakes from The Apprentice.

  119. 119.

    Ruckus

    @Soprano2:

    They want to control everyone else, they don’t want themselves controlled. They want power over others, it makes them important, which they otherwise won’t be, they’d just be like everyone else. They can’t make themselves better, they can’t be better if everyone is equal. They can’t be better if they lose the ability to control at least something. It isn’t the world that is the problem, it is their world that is the problem. They need some form of control. Absolute democracy takes that away from them.

  120. 120.

    Kay

    @Geminid:

    Right. I know the backstory really well. I keep going back to it because it’s such a hard question. I always end up where they did, with a wall, because there’s no where else to go.

    The lack of real thinking thru the repercussions and implications is shocking on the Right. It’s junk. It’s either weepy Hallmark card sentimentally about mommies and babies or a delusion that it will fall in a neat, narrow criminal frame. It’s a hard question. No one has solved it because you can’t, you have to balance and some rights have to give way to other rights, and it’s tiered in time because that’s the medical model for pregnancy, but they don’t even grapple with it at all on the Right. In law school they’d just fold their arms and say “it’s a baby”. Ok, thanks. I can tell you’ve been up nights puzzling thru this.

  121. 121.

    satby

    @Geminid: The trouble with the ruling in Roe is that it rested on viability of the fetus outside the uterus, at the time (which was about 24-25 weeks gestation, IIRC). 10 years ago they saved my foster granddaughter, born at 24 weeks gestation; they can save babies born even earlier now, though it’s still dicey. So Roe is out of date based on that. At the same time, “fetal heartbeat” bills aren’t referring to an actual heart, which hasn’t formed at 6 weeks gestation.

  122. 122.

    Soprano2

    @p.a.: @Kay: I’ve felt this for a while.  Restrictions on travel to states/countries w freedom of choice, monitoring, tip  lines.  What Ceausescu did in Romania.

    This is exactly what they want to do. It’s forced pregnancy – deny safe, effective birth control and deny abortion. Investigate every miscarriage as if it could have been an illegal abortion, at least if it’s a non-white and/or poor person. I don’t know if they can get all the way there, because their wives want good birth control, but I think they’ll try. It’s why they’ve been lying about hormonal birth control for 40 years, saying it causes abortions.

  123. 123.

    Just One More Canuck

    @Sparkedcat: our cat (Elsa the wonder nut) gifted us with a snake  yesterday. Our previous ruler used to catch chipmunks on a regular basis

  124. 124.

    zhena gogolia

    @rikyrah:

    Oh, that’s hilarious! You just know that that’s what the Repugs saw playing in their heads whenever Obama gave a press conference.

  125. 125.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Old School: There was some discussion of the LA development forum about Amazon and Apple needing to actually buy studio property.  Amazon seems to be buying the MGM catalog(does Bazos get the Lion too?), which is probably worth the 9B, but the old MGM studio is now Sony studios.  Maybe Apple will buy Warner or either of these two will buy some smaller studio property(there are a number of smaller studios in LA).

  126. 126.

    Kay

    @PST:

     Roe did a pretty good job,

    Roe specifically and deliberately chose a medical model because there are a set of facts available in a medical model. They needed limiting factors. I think they probably realized early on that this was going to have to align to something- time, development, something or they would be lost in the wilderness forever debating the nature of life.
    Conservatives haven’t even started this analysis. They haven’t even tried to start it. Instead they shut down any possibility of a debate with “life begins at conception, we’re done here, adjourned”

    It isn’t going to work. The repercussions they ignored will still happen.

  127. 127.

    Geminid

    @Kay: I figured you knew the story of Roe well, and I put it out there for general information. I’ve seen conservative legal scholars sniff at what they describe as Roe’s lack of intellectual underpinnings. They ignore it’s sound pragmatic basis. These are mostly male intellectuals, who are so smart they are stupid.

  128. 128.

    Jeffro

    @Geminid:I am hoping a reporter will ask Glenn Youngkin, Virginia Republican candidate for Governor, whether he supports a fetal heartbeat bill.

    YES.

    That, or asking him what he thinks of Texas’ recent “no license, background check, or training required to buy a gun” law.  Or any of the “sure it’s ok to run over BLM protestors” laws recently passed around the nation.

    Speak up, Glenn, speak up.

  129. 129.

    Ken

    @Old School: Probably not the sole reason for the acquisition, but it couldn’t have hurt. I wonder if the outtakes series will only be available on Amazon Prime, or if they’ll upload everything to YouTube as a public service?

  130. 130.

    Ken

    @Jeffro: Aren’t there some western Virginia counties that want to secede and become part of West Virginia?  That seems like a very pertinent question for someone wanting to become governor of Virginia.

  131. 131.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: Guffaw. I’m thinking of the “moderate” well off Republican women here who have assured me repeatedly the goal was very narrow– just things like banning late term abortions for the murderous sluts.
    BROAD. Limitless. You’ll be submitting your pregnancy test stick for recording and they’ll hold it in the evidence room. Life. Begins. At Conception. Life. Much, much broader than “abortion”.

    What’s funny is that when you confront them with this, they just deny it. They refuse to grapple with the real consequences of writing it into the law that life begins at conception. What about the fact that many conceptions never implant? Are they going to do what Romania did, and force women to undergo monthly pelvic exams to make sure they aren’t pregnant? Are we going to have “miscarriage police”, whose only job is to investigate miscarriages to make sure they weren’t actually abortions? How will they even tell the difference? We’ll have to write into law who to save in the event of a life-threatening event for either mother or fetus, because if each has absolutely equal value as a “life” how do we make that decision? They’ve declared that the woman and the doctor can’t make that decision, so who’s left – the law and the courts!

    I remember that “LA Law” did a story line about a case like this, where the hospital wanted to save the pregnant woman’s baby but the husband wanted them to save his wife. It was based on a real-life case, but the TV show cheated by having a happy ending where both mother and baby survived. In real life, both died after the husband had to fight the hospital so long that it was impossible to save either. It’s stunning to me that people who advocate these things are blind to what will actually happen if they get their way.

  132. 132.

    Just Chuck

    @Soprano2: It’ll largely be enforced on poor people and blahs, so they’re willing for some white people to take the hit too.  Of course, _other_ white people that is, gotta break a few abstract eggs to make your perfect obedient society omelette.

    Actually, though I was a teenager then, I’ve been on the other side of this, so I can assure you they not only don’t care, they don’t trouble their perfect god-fearing minds by even thinking about it.  They go to quite some lengths to not think about a lot of things.

  133. 133.

    Jeffro

    @Ken: I think that is an issue that comes up from time to time (said times usually coinciding with whether or not there is a Democratic governor =)

    I’m happy for someone to ask Youngkin that question.  He’d alienate about 10k VA voters with every word of his response.

  135. 135.

    Geminid

    @satby: I think the timeline expressed in Roe could be modified without throwing that decision out the window. “Pro-life” advocates could possibly achieve this result if they were not intent on pursuing maximalist goals.

  136. 136.

    sanjeevs

    @p.a.: Ireland passed a constitutional right to life in the 1980s.

    In 1992 they had the X case where an underage girl was prevented from travelling to the U.K.

    So they had another set of referenda in 1992 to allow a right of women to travel and another amendment on their right to information (since the government  had started to censor British publications carrying abortion ads or information ) plus a failed amendment to allow abortion in case of a suicidal mother.

    After the death of Savita Halapannavar the movement to just abolish the right to life clause became unstoppable.

  137. 137.

    Ruckus

    @Butter Emails:

    This is a fairly predictable result of the narrow focus of the Republicans long game to gain and consolidate power. Their efforts to hold onto power through the ever increasing radicalization of their base coupled with voter suppression leads to the replacement of the current establishment with a combination of more shameless grifters and crazier shithouse rats.

    Their game has always been at odds with democracy. The only way they could succeed is with more shameless grifters and crazier shithouse rats. Part of the problem is that the shameless grifters and crazier shithouse rats don’t know that’s exactly what they are.

  138. 138.

    Geminid

    @Jeffro: Youngkin will try to campaign so as to avoid tough questions from journalists. He can’t avoid a debate with his Democratc opponent, though. That will be one more reason Democrats will pick Terry McAuliffe in the June 8 primary. McAuliffe seems like a ruthless fighter. “Below the belt? What belt?” McAuliffe would say.

  140. 140.

    cmorenc

    The poor dear. Mr Pillow is clearly a Republican, but what made him think he was a governor?

    Lindell is governor of Pillowkota – the less-well known Dakota after North and South.

  141. 141.

    trnc

    Washington Post wants their editorial page to fail.

    “Let’s hire Thiessen.” Mission accomplished.

  142. 142.

    Kay

    @Soprano2:

    I had a delivery that “fell off a cliff” and I instructed my husband to not let anyone but him make decisions in case I passed out. The night before I had some nutjob religious nurse in my room and I felt she was one of the “women are martyrs” weepy ones. “Specifically- her– nowhere near me”.

    I’ve spent my life avoiding eye contact and hoping I don’t have to deal with them. The LAST people I want in an emergency.

  144. 144.

    Matt McIrvin

    @hueyplong: I remember thinking back when that song was on the radio that I was pretty sure the earth wasn’t going to last forever and I wasn’t entirely sure about the sky either.

  146. 146.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Soprano2:

    They refuse to grapple with the real consequences of writing it into the law that life begins at conception.

    Some of them are just profoundly bizarre to the point of science fiction, if you actually try to think them through. One consequence is that the majority of human beings who ever lived were microscopic organisms–we big bipeds are the minority. And the leading cause of death for Americans by far would be failure to implant in the uterine wall, meaning that there would be an urgent public-health need to immediately start an Apollo-level program to replace natural gestation with something more reliable.

  147. 147.

    Mike in NC

    The ‘joy’ of flying, for the first time in almost two years. We’re going from Myrtle Beach, SC to Washington, DC, then turning around to head for Fort Myers, FL. A small bottle of water from a vendor is $3.50 and a bag of chips is almost ten bucks! Oy.

  148. 148.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Mike in NC:

    A small bottle of water from a vendor is $3.50 and a bag of chips is almost ten bucks! Oy. 

    I know airport prices are insane, but that’s highway robbery.

  149. 149.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Just Chuck: ​

    they don’t trouble their perfect god-fearing minds by even thinking about it. They go to quite some lengths to not think about a lot of things.

    This. On all kinds of issues, people keep asking how conservatives (or anyone) can justify how their philosophy is obviously factually wrong. They don’t. Not thinking about a conflict you don’t want to think about is a natural human behavior. They don’t have to answer that abstinence-only education increases the abortion rate. They only have to dismiss it, which is incredibly easy.
    Humans are not rational animals. We are animals capable of reason. If we don’t want to reason, we can just not bother.

  150. 150.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @Soprano2:

    It’s stunning to me that people who advocate these things are blind to what will actually happen if they get their way.

    I don’t know about being blind to the pernicious outcomes. What I’ve seen over and over again with fundies for a variety of issues, but especially abortion, is that once the discussion gets to the level of outcomes that they are uncomfortable with, outcomes that they would not want happening to them (like state-required monthly pelvic exams), then their brains default to: “God will take care of the difficult, smelly stuff.” So, they acknowledge the problems, but the answer is always “some things are too difficult for mere man to figger out, so the Lord’s will be done.” Somehow the Lord’s will always jibes with their childish world views and the belief that the Lord’s will is gonna happen to somebody else.

    Fuck ’em. John Brown had his idea’s about the Lord’s will, too.

  151. 151.

    MontyTheClipArtMongoose

    @Baud: tom cotton doesn’t know whether he’s a martyr in the cancel war or the benedict arnold of freedom.

  153. 153.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    I see “There never was a Trump administration” has started with the GOP; 30 Republican House Representatives sent a letter to the Secretary of Defense complaining our military has gone soft because of Woke policies.

  155. 155.

    Ken

    @Matt McIrvin: an Apollo-level program to replace natural gestation with something more reliable

    All conceptions will be in-vitro, after which the fertilized egg will be implanted in an artificial womb, which will be surgically grafted into the father, since obviously we can’t trust women to get this right.  Viola, all problems (other than minor technical issues) solved.

  156. 156.

    Benw

    Today I’m going to watch the NY Marine Rescue Center release a rehabbed seal named Jimi Hendrix!

  160. 160.

    Another Scott

    I think Biden is pretty transparent on what he wants. He wants the best package he can get that can get 50+ votes. There’s no grand strategery here. Sinema and Manchin are in the path, so they have to be satisfied. He’s not silly enough to think that he’ll get GQP votes to get to 60 without also getting them first. He expects the GQP to continue to drag it out and not actually vote for the final bill, so S&M will decide.

    He also knows that this isn’t the last and forever infrastructure bill – more is possible (though probably not on this scale) before 2022, and even more after the election if/when Team D adds more seats. Success breeds success.

    The AP has a headline that the GQP “ready $1T infrastructure counter-offer”. Since Moscow Mitch has said that taxes on the MotU can’t be touched, I’m not sanguine. But if it gives S&M cover to vote for a bill that gets the ball rolling, that’s probably Ok.

    Progress is incremental. It’s very easy in the Senate to do nothing.

    Restaurant workers had a min wage of $2.13 plus tips in 1991.

    Restaurant workers have a min wage of $2.13 plus tips today.

    In 1991, average rent was $600 a month. Now it's $1,600.

    I don't know, but this might be part of the explanation for why restaurants can't find workers.

    — Dan Price (@DanPriceSeattle) May 24, 2021

    Yup.

    We need to move the ball forward with the best bill we can get, even if it’s far short of what we know is needed. Pushing for provisions that can’t get the votes doesn’t get it done.

    (via LOLGOP.)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  161. 161.

    opiejeanne

    @OzarkHillbilly: EBMUD, or East Bay Mud as we called the water company when I lived near Oakland. That was startling to hear when we were moving there and asked about the utility companies. The MUD stands for Municipal Utility District, of course.

  162. 162.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    Dead thread?

    I usually google from the search window, without bringing up the google home page. I just happened to today, so I saw that today’s Google Doodle is about the Savoy Ballroom in New York. The behind the scenes video is pretty interesting. One of the ladies they interview was a dancer there in the 1940s and they show footage of her.

  163. 163.

    Ramalama

    @germy: Oh ya. I’m a longtime fan of his blog and used to comment aplenty until he stopped all comments. I get it. But still it was a nice little community.

  164. 164.

    Ramalama

    @debbie: Don’t eat the yellow snow is a phrase uttered round there parts here in Canadia (as my ‘merican family calls it).

    Actually sounds like a creative endeavor. Whatever you can package in shrink wrap for the kiddies? Sounds fun. Could you offer joke supplies too, like fake blood?

  165. 165.

    Ramalama

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: I love the Sean Duffy series. Just re-listened to the audible version of Gun Street Girl. So artful while also being crime, you know: action-packed. There isn’t a book of his that clunks. I started to listen to the big US hit The Chain. But could not bear the narrator. I’ve been spoiled by his last reader, Gerard Doyle. So I guess I’ll have to use my eyes for his latest. You can read his trajectory via this Guardian piece.

  166. 166.

    Another Scott

    @Kay: +1.  But it’s worse than that.

    What Roe really said is “the state can go THIS FAR but no further”. With that fence removed there’s no stopping them. The nutjob Right runs the GOP now and they’ll be running pregnancy. All pregnancies.

    Roe was quite clear, and the vote wasn’t close (7:2). There was a dividing line at viability (28 weeks). But subsequent state legislation and court rulings in too many places have erased that clear standard, and the RWNJs on the SCOTUS have been gleeful about it.

    “Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.” – Voltaire

    When an appellate court just starts routinely ignoring or overruling precedents, it effectively just starts functioning as a 9-member legislature with life tenure and black robes that ultimately undermines its legitimacy https://t.co/Eogk4QKQt7

    — Senator Scott Surovell (@ssurovell) May 23, 2021

    We have separation of powers for a reason. The SCOTUS and the rest of the federal courts must be reformed.

    tl;dr – Post-Roe is an important example of how the federal courts are broken and must be fixed.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  167. 167.

    debbie

    @Another Scott:

    It’s not just restaurant workers. It’s also the teachers in OK who didn’t get a raise for 10 goddamn years. It’s every level other than the tippy-top tiers.

  171. 171.

    SFAW

    @Soprano2:

    I keep telling people this, that they want to do away with all safe, effective hormonal birth control (and all IUD’s) on the theory that it causes abortions.

    That’s merely their fig-leaf “justification,” which they’ll use to get to the things you noted in the rest of your comment. Oh, I believe some of the proles actually believe that BS, maybe even some of the elected RWMFs too. But I think the RWMF power structure will use any convenient bullshit “reason” to get their subjugation wet dreams enacted.

  172. 172.

    Scout211

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Yes, that is so amazing and only a few miles from where we live.  In fact, the reservoir for EBMUD is less than a mile from our property.

    I am surprised that it only now is getting national news coverage because it is really a remarkable discovery

    ETA:  International coverage actually, after I read your news link.

  173. 173.

    Peale

    @Soprano2: The laws are very clearly being written that the state must side with the fetus, so there isn’t any “women and fetus have equal standing”. The key metric they want is an increase in the number of women who die during pregnancy. Since they believe in miracles, terminating any pregnancy to save the mother is unjust since at any time, God can just step in and save the day.

  174. 174.

    smith

    If RWNJ dreams of Gilead are realized, there will be a big increase in women who can afford it getting their tubes tied. There is already a significant trend for choosing childlessness among the middle class, and preventing access to either birth control or abortion will just accelerate it. So much for preventing white replacement.

  175. 175.

    Another Scott

    GovExec/Route50:

    MAY 26, 2021 12:29 PM ET

    Lawmakers in both parties are framing the legislation as a potential step toward a broader infrastructure deal. A new, $1 billion program for bike and pedestrian projects was added to the bill during a markup.

    A Senate committee on Wednesday unanimously approved a nearly $304 billion measure to set federal spending levels and policy for road, bridge and highway programs over the next five fiscal years.

    The bill would increase funding levels by about 34% compared to the last five-year authorization and by around 22% compared to baseline spending projections from the Congressional Budget Office. Lawmakers from both parties have touted the level of spending in the bill as significant. But it is just a fraction of the much more expansive infrastructure investment package, in the $2 trillion range, that President Biden and many Democrats have been pushing for.

    Still, both Democrats and Republicans have framed the bill as a step toward achieving a broader compromise on public works spending.

    […]

    Things are moving, slowly as (nearly) always.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  176. 176.

    Citizen Alan

    @smith: ​
     

    I was under the impression that there were laws in most states that forbade women from having their tubes tied unless they were both married and had already had one child.

  177. 177.

    Ruckus

    @Danielx:

    shitforbrains is the symptom, not the disease.

    That’s why you still notice the smell and the mess. The most noticeable symptom is going/gone away, the disease is still here. Most of the work still has to be done.

  178. 178.

    smith

    @Citizen Alan:  I hope not:

    Voluntary tubal ligation is legal in the USA for any informed woman above 18 years, who is mentally capable to understand the alternatives and consequences. In some states, the minimum age is 21 years. There is no official number of children requirement. While some states have spousal consent laws, these federal law deems these laws unconstitutional and are therefore not in effect.

  179. 179.

    Mike in NC

    Been a long time since we used National Airport. Never felt the need to use that other name. Wife thought about getting a yogurt but figured it would cost $20!

  181. 181.

    Kay

    Michael Tackett
    @tackettdc
    ·1h
    OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter announces resignation, cites ‘personal matters that are becoming public.’

    I love that phrasing.

  182. 182.

    WhatsMyNym

    @smith:

    So much for preventing white replacement.

    As a very white guy, I have to say white skin isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Unless you’re a dermatologist treating white folk, there’s a reason they’re in demand now.

  183. 183.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: We have a Catholic-owned hospital here, which unfortunately I may have to deal with someday because it’s our preferred provider. They do all kinds of contortions to provide “female” services because they couldn’t survive if they didn’t – no insurance company would make them a preferred provider. I knew someone who said she’d rather die in a ditch than ever go there for treatment. I wouldn’t go that far, but I agree I don’t want those religious fanatics anywhere near my medical care.

  184. 184.

    Soprano2

    @Another Scott: *sigh* OK, I’m tired of seeing this thing about servers making $2.13/hr. In MO that is definitely not true. Right off the MO Dept of Labor web site: https://labor.mo.gov/DLS/MinimumWage/tipped

    Tipped Employees must be paid half of the state minimum wage rate or $5.15 per hour.

    However, if the tipped employee does not make up the other half of the minimum wage in tips, the employer is required to pay the difference so that the tipped employee is paid $10.30 per hour. Employers not subject to the minimum wage law can pay employees wages of their choosing. Read more about owed Wages.

  185. 185.

    VeniceRiley

    Wondering if one can just shoot oneself in the baby on a stand your ground law basis./s

  186. 186.

    Soprano2

    @Citizen Alan: I was under the impression that there were laws in most states that forbade women from having their tubes tied unless they were both married and had already had one child.

    I don’t think so. I did it, and I’m married with no children. I was 41 when I got the surgery, so that probably helped some.

  187. 187.

    CaseyL

    This may be a dead thread, but I want to share a funny: Karine Jean Pierre gave the WH Press Briefing today. (More soft-spoken than Jen, but just as good at staying on point.)

    At the very end, after she ended the briefing and was headed back through the Blue Door, someone kept asking if President Biden would fire Dr. Fauci (don’t ask). Jean Pierre ignored the question, but before the Blue Door closed behind her, she uttered a very audible “Oh My God.”

    I’m not sure if the OhMyGod was directed at the idiot asking about firing Dr. Fauci, or a comment on her first foray into the lion’s den, but either way it made me giggle.

  188. 188.

    satby

    @Soprano2: When I was in Catholic nursing school at a Catholic hospital, the standard was to attempt to save both mother and endangered fetus, but if that was not possible (such as in a tubal pregnancy) the life of the mother was paramount. That’s one reason why the Savita Halapannavar case was so outrageous; it violated actual Church teachings. The Evangelicals have perverted the discussion on abortion like they have everything else: with anti-science, magical thinking and bad faith arguments they never would apply to themselves or their families.

  189. 189.

    J R in WV

    @Percysowner:

    … I would have had to opt to be sterilized and never have kids…

    OH, no, Percysowner, that procedure would be outlawed straight away.

    Only Dawg can control when you get pregnant, and any medical procedure that interferes with pregnancy is a mortal sin, burning at the stake evil! So my Aunt BG who had an ectopic pregnancy would have died young, and my cousin B would never have been born. Monsters!!

    There is no limit to the evil of the Theocracy, since everything they do is required by their fictional Baal like god and all the rest of their sadistic delusions.

  190. 190.

    Another Scott

    @Soprano2: I think the point he was trying to make in that tweet was – not that the rate is higher in particular states and localities, but that the federal minimum cash wage hasn’t changed in decades even though the cost of things like rent have moved upward a lot.

    DOL says as of January 1, 2021, the federal tipped combined minimum wage is $7.25 including the “maximum tip credit” – which seems designed to invite abuse. (E.g. TFG’s proposed Tip Stealing rule).

    Thanks.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  191. 191.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Kay:

    OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — Oklahoma Attorney General Mike Hunter announces resignation, cites ‘personal matters that are becoming public.’

    I love that phrasing.

    Some very familial family values, no doubt….

  192. 192.

    ...now I try to be amused

    @CaseyL:

    At the very end, after she ended the briefing and was headed back through the Blue Door, someone kept asking if President Biden would fire Dr. Fauci (don’t ask). Jean Pierre ignored the question, but before the Blue Door closed behind her, she uttered a very audible “Oh My God.”

    I’m not sure if the OhMyGod was directed at the idiot asking about firing Dr. Fauci, or a comment on her first foray into the lion’s den, but either way it made me giggle.

    Reminds me of Janey Godley’s voiceover videos of Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon’s press briefings. (See YouTube.) Godley says what Sturgeon wishes she could say.

  195. 195.

    J R in WV

    @smith:

    If RWNJ dreams of Gilead are realized, there will be a big increase in women who can afford it getting their tubes tied. There is already a significant trend for choosing childlessness among the middle class, and preventing access to either birth control or abortion will just accelerate it. So much for preventing white replacement.

    No there won’t.

    That will be as illegal as the actual abortions are. Because it interferes with Gawd’s Will, which could make those women pregnant even after their total hysterectomy, if the Theocratic God was really in charge.

    It’s already pretty difficult for young women to procure a tubal ligation if they’re of child-bearing age, absent a compelling medical reason. Makes male OB-GYN squirm too much.

  196. 196.

    Ruckus

    @CaseyL:

    That is about the best way to do that. It can be said in so many directions that it’s impossible to actually attribute it to any particular thing, and yet there it is.

    She’ll probably get talked to about it.

  198. 198.

    Seanly

    The shitty writer of the WaPo opinion piece noted that Obama’s spending bill was $787 billion. First, serious economists thought it was too low – the argument was if it was 2/3 or only 1/2 of what was needed. Second, Obama went in low hoping to get Republican support. But when you start negotiating with your lowest offer, you don’t have anywhere to go.

    Go alone, Biden. Let’s fix our shitty infrastructure and put people to work.

  199. 199.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Seanly: econd, Obama went in low hoping to get Republican support. But when you start negotiating with your lowest offer, you don’t have anywhere to go.

    Yeah, no… that’s not what happened.

    When Rahm Emanuel threw out the $800 billion number in a now-infamous meeting of President Obama’s economic team, he didn’t get it from the back of an envelope or a poll. It was the number that Congressional leaders told him was the largest package they thought could pass. As Politico reporter Michael Grunwald reported in The New New Deal, his book on the Recovery Act:

    “The overall number was getting way too big to manage,” says Begich, who had just been elected and did not want to give a reckless first impression. “The goal was to get a lid on it. We said, under 800, no more, we cannot go above that.”

    Mark Begich was not a Republican. Neither were Evan Bayh, Kent Conrad, Mary Landrieu, Mark Pryor, Claire McCaskill…. I could go on for a while

Comments are closed.