Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Come on, man.

I was confident that someone would point it out and thought why not me.

Bark louder, little dog.

When we show up, we win.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

SCOTUS: It’s not “bribery” unless it comes from the Bribery region of France. Otherwise, it’s merely “sparkling malfeasance”.

Consistently wrong since 2002

So many bastards, so little time.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

I really should read my own blog.

There are a lot more evil idiots than evil geniuses.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

Republican obstruction dressed up as bipartisanship. Again.

If you cannot answer whether trump lost the 2020 election, you are unfit for office.

Let me file that under fuck it.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Conservatism: there are people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

You are either for trump or for democracy. Pick one.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

You are here: Home / Politics / Biden Administration in Action / Thursday Morning Open Thread: Happy Birthday, FLOTUS Jill!

Thursday Morning Open Thread: Happy Birthday, FLOTUS Jill!

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147Comments

  1. 1.

    OzarkHillbilly

    As we leave high school we need to make our voices heard. I was going to get up here and talk to you about TV and content and media because those are things that are very important to me. However, in light of recent events, it feels wrong to talk about anything but what is currently affecting me and millions of other women in this state.

    Recently the heartbeat bill was passed in Texas. Starting in September, there will be a ban on abortions that take place after 6 weeks of pregnancy, regardless of whether the pregnancy was a result of rape or incest. 6 weeks. Most women don’t even realize they’re pregnant by then. And so, before they have the time to decide if they are emotionally, physically, and financially stable enough to carry out a full-term pregnancy, before they have the chance to decide if they can take on the responsibility of bringing another human into the world, the decision has been made for them by a stranger. A decision that will affect the rest of their lives.

    I have dreams, hopes, and ambitions. Every girl here does. We have spent our whole lives working towards our futures, and without our consent or input, our control over our futures has been stripped away from us. I am terrified that if my contraceptives fail me, that if I’m raped, then my hopes and efforts and dreams for myself will no longer be relevant. I hope you can feel how gut-wrenching it is, how dehumanizing it is, to have the autonomy over your own body taken from you.

    And I’m talking about this today, on a day as important as this, on a day honoring the students’ efforts in twelve years of schooling, on a day where we’re all brought together, on a day where you will be the most inclined to hear a voice like mine, a woman’s voice, to tell you that this is a problem. A problem that can’t wait. I refuse to give up this platform to promote complacency and peace, when there is a war on my body and a war on my rights. A war on the rights of your sisters, a war on the rights of your mothers, a war on the rights of your daughters.

    We cannot stay silent.

    Paxton Smith
    Valedictory Address
    May 30, 2021

    ETA Because it’s Texas, some administrators are threatening to withhold her diploma for giving this unapproved address.

  2. 2.

    OzarkHillbilly

    It could be viewed as a dramatic demonstration of the concept of karma: a group of young boaters hurling homophobic abuse towards another vessel flying gay pride flags, then needing to be rescued by their intended victims when their own boat explodes into a ball of flame.
    …………………………………….
    According to an account of the incident in the Washington Post, a boater named Robbie, who did not give his last name for fear of retaliation, was enjoying a day on the lake swimming, tubing and listening to music with his brother and two friends. He said their boat was displaying a variety of gay pride and rainbow flags.

    At about 7pm he said they noticed another boat passing by with its occupants yelling at them. “I could clearly hear the words gays and flags being shouted from their boat,” he told the Post.

    The video shows a woman in the boat flipping her middle finger as they sped by, and according to Robbie the boat made a sharp turn and then circled around them at least six times, spraying water on to them and causing their boat to rock.

    The boat sped away, he said, and seconds later they heard an explosion and saw black smoke rising from the other vessel.

    “Holy crap! They blew up!” a man purported to be Robbie’s brother says on the video.

    Subsequent footage shows the three occupants of the burning boat swimming towards the one with the pride flags, and being urged to climb onboard, while one of the rescuers calls the emergency 911 service number. The woman is heard shouting: “Help us, we’re burning.”

    “The passengers were quite rude, shouting over us, ignoring my [questions] about their wellbeing when on the 911 call and smoking a vape pen on our boat without even so much as asking if they could,” Robbie told the Post.

    A second clip shows the conclusion of the incident: the rescued boaters speeding away on a friend’s boat while the crew of a police vessel attempts to douse the flames by churning up water with its propellers, then towing it away.

    “These people harassed my family because we were flying gay pride flags in Moses Lake, Washington, by racing around us and shouting gay slurs. Then, their boat literally blew up!” Robbie said in a tweet accompanied by the hashtag #KarmaIsReal.

  3. 3.

    Nicole

    I am taking far more pleasure at the demise of Trump’s short-lived blog than I should, seeing as how I’ve never visited it.  I guess he’s finding out that a lot of things are hard work, even just building a web presence, and we all know the man is as lazy as the day is long.  What’s the old saying- there’s fast, cheap, and good and you can have two out of the three, and we know which two he always picks.

    According to the Daily Beast, it was the MyPillow guy who gave Trump the notion he was going to be “reinstated” in August.  Because of course it was.

  5. 5.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Great address, but fuck those TX shits.

    In other TX news, George P. Bush will be running to unseat Ken Paxton, one of the Trump loonies. I am no fan of that family, but I hope he succeeds.

  7. 7.

    Spanky

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    ETA Because it’s Texas, some administrators are threatening to withhold her diploma for giving this unapproved address.

    I’m guessing that no college she might have an interest in would see that as an obstacle. And iirc, she’s already been accepted

  17. 17.

    Geminid

    @OzarkHillbilly: And the “pro-life” Republicans also passed a law allowing Texans to carry concealed weapons without training or permit. A University of Texas/Texas Tribune poll taken in February showed that 59% of Texas voters opposed such a law.

  28. 28.

    Baud

    Chris Matthews is doing ok talking about GOP treason. No both sides or blaming Dems so far.

  31. 31.

    Cermet

    That Rump’s blog failed isn’t really important – the idea of the Rump movement goes far beyond the rump; it has its own life as we see with so many loons kissing his ass in congress and the senate.  The movement is growing in size and strength even as the rump becomes smaller and somewhat irrelevant. It the idea these losers are embracing and that is pure fascism and the real danger.

  32. 32.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Just saw this news tidbit:

    The Queen will meet the President of the United States of America and First Lady Jill Biden at Windsor Castle on Sunday, 13th June 2021.

    Trivia: The Queen’s reign has encompassed fourteen US Presidents.

  34. 34.

    MomSense

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    Earlier they had Rachel Bitecofer on to talk about her new superpac StrikePac and showed one of her ads. As soon as her critique of the GQP went past the bullshit media preferred narrative that the problems magically appeared with trump and into a broader criticism of the party – Joe was just chomping to tey and interrupt her.  Being a pro, she pushed through to get her message out.  Should we take bets about whether she will be back?

    Also, too kids are all vaxxed and back in the studio.  They sent me a rough iPhone recording of a really beautiful and sad song.  I don’t know if youngs listen to sad songs, but this one got me.

  35. 35.

    Baud

    @Spanky:

    OH: ” ………………” “near, far, wherever you are, I believe that the heart does go on.

     
    Fixed.

  36. 36.

    Jeffro

    @OzarkHillbilly: between this and that anti-vacation pastor getting ill/hospitalized with Covid…I dunno…it’s almost like god is sending messages for those with eyes to see and ears to hear

  37. 37.

    Geminid

    @Baud: Virginia Democrats used to be afraid to push gun safety measures. But in the 2017 and 2019 state elections, Democrats made gun safety a winning campaign issue. Then the General Assembly passed a passed a gun safety package that polls showed had 75% or more approval. So as you suggest, Texas Democrats might be able to make political hay out of the crappy permitless concealed carry law.

    Ohio Republicans are also trying to push through permitless concealed carry this legislative session. The proposed law has not generated much news, which may be how the sponsors want it.

  39. 39.

    Spanky

    @MomSense: Just an old-fashioned love song, comin’ down in three part harmony.

    (No Young has ever heard this song, except maybe Neil.)

  45. 45.

    germy

    Back in 1994 there was a reboot of the old “Our Gang” series. I vaguely remember it; my kids were little at the time and I think we may have rented the vhs one weekend from blockbuster.

    Anyway, someone interviewed the kid who played Waldo, the rich kid. (A big surprise from the film is that Waldo is the son of Donald Trump.) Anyway, the kid is all grown up now, but he remembers the day The Former Guy visited the set:

    Did you actually meet Donald Trump?

    I did. And it’s very weird. It sort of made sense — you know, rich kid, rich brat, like sure, that’s the celebrity, that’s the cameo, great. The day he came to set he was extremely nervous, because I think the only thing he had done up until this point was the quick scene in Home Alone 2 where he just said one line in the lobby of the Plaza, so he’s out of his element, he’s crazy nervous.

    His first demand on set was to have lunch with the kid that’s his son — like, he demanded that. So here we are, outside at the bit catering tent in Lake View Terrace — long folding plastic tables and chairs — and on one side is me and my mom and my dad, and on the other side is Donald Trump, Marla, his wife at the time; and baby Tiffany, who is screaming bloody murder the whole time, literally an infant, to the point that my dad takes her, because my dad’s great with babies. He takes her and gets her to stop crying and walks her around the Carnival set. I remember nothing from the lunch, because he’s so horribly unmemorable in-person, but what was hilarious is that when they got him on set, he didn’t realize that the whole conversation is just over a cell phone. So he was never going to interact with me anyway — the whole thing was for naught. Well, isn’t that the perfect encapsulation of Trump as a human? That it was all for naught.

  46. 46.

    Spanky

    @Jeffro: What have you been doing that taught your phone the word “anti-vacation”. What kind of monster are you?

  47. 47.

    Spanky

    @germy:

    Well, isn’t that the perfect encapsulation of Trump as a human? That it was all for naught.

    Jury’s still out on that, unfortunately.

  48. 48.

    Amir Khalid

    @Nicole:
    When it comes to putting a blog together, TFG is no John Cole. I did take a peek at TFG’s blog. It’s well worth a miss.

  49. 49.

    Jeffro

    fwiw, Philip Bump of the WaPo has (finally) discovered Cleek’s Law: The Republican Party is Trying a New Kind of Politics

    (he’s getting dragged a bit for it on Twitter: “facism’s not new, Philip…nor are cults of personality…”)

    Trump lost the election, which you probably haven’t forgotten. But the Republican Party keeps fighting his fights anyway: against that loss, against its past policy proposals and candidates, against a largely straw-man left. The party has even renewed its battle against the debate commission, with party chair Ronna McDaniel pledging to pull future candidates from presidential debates unless the body makes changes the party demands.

    It’s a fundamental rejection of politics as usual — but not in the popular, hackneyed sense of bringing fresh faces to the scene. The past year has seen a literal rejection of how presidential campaigns are run and how they are lost.

    Another remarkable development in the 2020 campaign that’s since faded was that the Republican Party declined to actually formulate a policy platform. The practical reasons for this were obvious: Trump had no platform and would certainly not feel beholden to the GOP platform if it existed. So the party was torn between having to articulate what it stood for only to see its standard-bearer stomp all over it or simply not articulate what it stood for beyond “what Trump wants.” It chose the latter. Since what Trump wanted was often in direct contrast with what the party had in the past advocated, this was the path of least resistance.
    One result, though, is that the party almost necessarily remains beholden to that same vague aim. Last month, I noted the increasing frequency of candidates who don’t articulate any actual platform besides “the left is bad,” a central tenet of Trumpism.

    The second half of the piece details how the GQP has moved into the same far-right/fascist territory as France’s National Front and the UK’s Independence Party.

    Bump’s piece links to an earlier piece of his about “the rise of the zero-issue candidate” (like gun totin’ Mark McCloskey, or Madison Cawthorn) but it’s kind of all over the place.  Who knows, maybe the next time he files a story, it’ll be about a short, spot-on phrase he’s come up with to describe today’s conservatism…

  51. 51.

    Tony Jay

    Speaking of ‘First Ladies’, it turns out that Britain’s version has some kind of thing going on in the woodshed she’d rather not talk about. 

    But…but…but…the nation’s favourite Granny! She’s lovely in The Crown! Wills said it was all nonsense!

    Nah. They are what people say they are, only worse, and in privileged secrecy.

    In other news, General Dynamics are pissing themselves into dehydration at the British Ministry of Defence and the Tories who run it (into the ground). I always thought the idea was to field tanks that killed the enemy, not your own troops.

    Oh well, I’m sure someone made a lot of money as a middle-man. £3.5 billion for a product that does the opposite of what you want? Lovely.

    Oh, and BTW, apparently the Biden Administration is investing something in the region of £1600 per child to get them back on track after a year of Covid induced unschooling. Britain’s super-dooper, world-beating Government of can-do smartypants refuse to be shown up by a geriatric Yank, so they’re investing (checks notes, checks notes again) …….£50 per child.

    I hate these fucking people.

  53. 53.

    debbie

    @Jeffro:

    Like their hero, they are doubling down. Hopefully, they’ll meet the same fate. What’s that saying? Doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results. ?

  54. 54.

    Baud

    @Tony Jay:

    Not to excuse racism but…

    The Queen’s courtiers banned “coloured immigrants or foreigners” from serving in clerical roles in the royal household until at least the late 1960s, according to newly discovered documents that will reignite the debate over the British royal family and race

     
    I guess “at least” is doing a lot of work there.

  56. 56.

    Geminid

    @MomSense: I am glad Bitecofer is getting the exposure. She made a career choice last spring when Christopher Newport University denied her a tenure track position. A single mom with a special needs child, Bitecofer might bave chosen to keep her safe though limited job. Instead she decided to make her own way in the political-industrial complex, and seems successful thus far.

  57. 57.

    Kay

    @Jeffro:

    I think what some (but not all) historians and other observers are missing is how far down this penetrates. “Trump” is not the important element anymore. The GOP has completely adopted this world view and approach all the way down to the county commissioner level. Our city “board of public affairs” essentially run the city (because they allocate money). They spend whole meetings talking about cancel culture and how people are coming to take guns. “Trump” (a Trump-like figure) was probably inevitable on the Right. This is where they were going anyway.

  59. 59.

    rikyrah

    @rikyrah:

    Wish there was video. Would play on a loop???

     

    ?? Lauren-Ashley Howard (@LaurenAshley087) tweeted at 11:18 PM on Wed, Jun 02, 2021:
    My mom bought that house when I was in elementary school, and is, as many of you know…a judge.

    Our neighborhood officers rolled up and were like “Hi, Your Honor.”

    Idk what Karen THOUGHT was gonna happen, but long story short, she was escorted off our property. ??‍♀️
    (https://twitter.com/LaurenAshley087/status/1400305774249795588?s=03)

  62. 62.

    Jeffro

    @Spanky: no idea, honestly

    I think it needs to be amended to either

    Today’s conservatism is the opposite of what liberals want, updated hourly

    or

    Today’s conservatism is the opposite of what liberals want, updated on a rolling basis by Fox News

  64. 64.

    MomSense

    @Geminid:

    I didn’t know about what happened to her at her uni.  She’s really good at what she does and I’m glad she is away from the LP a$$holes.

  68. 68.

    Jeffro

    @Kay: yes…it is insane fascist wingnuts, all the way down to the local dogcatcher’s office…

    trump freed them all from having any sense of shame or responsibility or principles or even the slightest veneer of civility.  I guess publicly insulting a Gold Star family, a disabled reporter, (etc etc etc) and being rewarded with the nomination for, then the office of, president sent a message

  69. 69.

    Amir Khalid

    @MomSense:
    Needless to say, TFG is also no Rupert Murdoch. His talent for describing things bigly exceeds his ability to execute on a bigly scale. I reckon he got nowhere quickly with the media-empire thing, and had to scale down his plans; and now it turns out he can’t even make a blogsite work.

  70. 70.

    Kathleen

    @Spanky: Please relay to Mrs. Spanky that love for you is strictly platonic. Though I’m proud of  my restraint regarding reputed Axis Maggie meltdown.

  72. 72.

    Kay

    @Jeffro:

    As it evolves it will get more sophisticated and it will harden. They’re coming up with a kind of theory of the case against “wokeness”- because the War on Wokeness is an incoherent mess and was poorly thought out- turns out the cure for wokeness is to repeal the Civil Rights Act.

    The policy and laws will follow the cultural grievances and resentments. It isn’t going to stay in this place, where there’s no “substance”. The conspiracy theories about voting are conspiracy theories but they don’t stay there- they become voter suppression laws. “Anti-wokeness” doesn’t remain as just whining or a political tactic- it becomes “let’s put in laws banning talking about race in schools”.

  73. 73.

    germy

    SCHENECTADY – Republican gubernatorial candidate Andrew Giuliani’s late afternoon visits to an Italian restaurant and bakery Wednesday weren’t sanctioned by the businesses, their owners said.

    Giuliani, 35, of Manhattan, is an ex-White House assistant to former President Donald Trump, and son of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

    The election for governor is in November 2022, and a Republican primary to decide the party’s candidate won’t take place until earlier that year.

    Giuliani spoke to a handful of patrons of MORE Perreca’s and Perreca’s Bakery on North Jay Street at about 3 p.m.

    “I wasn’t aware that Andrew Giuliani stopped in my restaurant,” said Maria Perreca Papa, who co-owns the bakery with her brother.

    “Apparently, what happened was a frontman called the bakery this morning, not identifying themselves with the candidate or a political campaign of any kind, just very vaguely said, ‘I have a friend who’s coming to town and I’d like to show him around your business,’” Papa said.

    The owner said the worker who answered the phone said they couldn’t visit without the owner’s approval, but the frontman insisted on stopping by to say hello, and the employee didn’t object.

    When they arrived, the employees “put two and two together and realized it was a candidate,” the owner said.

    Perreca’s has a more than 100-year-old policy of not involving its businesses in politics, Papa said.

    “That’s how we ended up ‘hosting’ Andrew Giuliani,” she said, adding she doesn’t like to offer political opinions, “but if I were going to host a political candidate, it wouldn’t be Andrew Giuliani. It would be someone with more traction, to put it diplomatically. I’m at a loss here.”

    Rudy’s son, winning hearts and minds in upstate NY.
    https://dailygazette.com/2021/06/02/andrew-guiliani-stumps-for-votes-in-restaurant-bakery/

  74. 74.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Tony Jay:

    The old bat has always been a terrible person, doing nothing of genuine service to Her Subjects, and subsisting like a heartworm, burrowed in and siphoning off vitality.

  75. 75.

    Geminid

    @MomSense: Rachel Bitecofer had developed a reputation for outspokenness that may have spooked the poly sci honchos at  CNU. They may have been insecure (theirs is a new, 2nd tier public university) and wanted uncontroversial, ivory tower types on their  tenure track.

    Some people use Bitecofer’s association with the Lincoln Project against her. A look at her lively twitter account, though, shows that she is no crypto-Republican, but is as ardent a Democrat as anyone here. I think the experienced LP people just knew talent when they saw it. Like Tom Nichols, Bitecofer was an unpaid “Senior Advisor” to the Lincoln Project.

  76. 76.

    Kay

    @Jeffro:

    of candidates who don’t articulate any actual platform besides “the left is bad,”

    I wish that was true but it isn’t true. They have a platform. They’re putting “the Left is bad” into law. Hundreds of state laws that codify “the Left is bad”. The only reason they’re not federal law is they haven’t gotten them to the Supreme Court yet and they don’t have a federal majority.

  77. 77.

    Tony Jay

    @Baud:

    I guess “at least” is doing a lot of work there.

    Indeed it is. There’s one quote from the Keeper of the Privy Purse in 1968 saying that “it was not, in fact, the practice to appoint coloured immigrants or foreigners” which the Guardian, ever keen to lay soft carpets of possible excuses in advance of the feet of the well-connected, suggests could be read as 1968 being the end of the practice. Unfortunately for that reading it goes on to mention that there’s zero proof that the practice stopped and a ton of first-hand evidence that it definitely didn’t. They weren’t even required to keep records until the ’90s, and even then we’re told that after that date ‘some coloureds’ were allowed to work there.

    Nope. There’s no excuse. Lizzy Windsor has been running a White’s Only employment policy for what seems to be the whole of her reign and exploited the threat of withholding ‘Queen’s Consent’ in order to ensure she wouldn’t be breaking the law or, even worse, publicly embarrassed by doing so.

    Scum. Every one of them. I’m not surprised Meghan and Ginger-Nuts pegged it to the States.

    .

  78. 78.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay: That sure rings true from where I’m sitting, in a county that was briefly notorious for banning the NYT from the public library because a Trump imitator commissioner called it “fake news.” As you noted, the bullshit grievances are being codified.

    Here in FL, there are new “anti-riot” laws that criminalize activities that were already illegal. There are voter suppression laws addressing nonexistent fraud because of people’s “feelings” that was fraud. Edicts banning discussion of “critical race theory” in public schools, which wasn’t being discussed in public schools. Bans on trans girls participating in school sports, even though there wasn’t a complaint about that issue in Florida.

    Where this all ends, I don’t know.

  80. 80.

    Soprano2

    @Cermet:  That Rump’s blog failed isn’t really important – the idea of the Rump movement goes far beyond the rump; it has its own life as we see with so many loons kissing his ass in congress and the senate. The movement is growing in size and strength even as the rump becomes smaller and somewhat irrelevant. It the idea these losers are embracing and that is pure fascism and the real danger.

    This, all of this. I think it’s funny that his blog failed too, but don’t mistake that for his toxic influence fading. I just thank the powers that be that he’s not on Twitter or Facebook. What happened with his blog shows the real power of those social networks to amplify the message of the lazy and unmotivated beyond what they deserve.

  81. 81.

    Tony Jay

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    Yes. And she also wears terrible hats.

    There was a brief window in the late 1990s when public contempt for the Monarchy could have cohered into a genuine Republican (the clean food kind) movement, but The Firm got together with the Press and worked out a PR strategy to turn the whole thing around, and we are were we are now.

  82. 82.

    Robert Sneddon

    @debbie: ​  George P. (his Spanish family’s middle name is history, unless it becomes useful in the future) Bush is a Mk 2 version of GW Bush and it is intended he will occupy the Oval Office as his rightful demesne in due course.
    The Bush family fixers made notes when GW Bush was being dragged for his National Guard bailout from Vietnam back in 2000 and they made sure George P. Bush ticked all the boxes ensuring he had active military service in a warzone (Iraq) in his resume after which he resigned his commission and started climbing the political ladder starting in (where else?) Texas as Land Commissioner. He’ll sit out a term or two as Texas Governor before he steps up to claim the nomination as Republican candidate for President in a decade or so.​

  83. 83.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    The Ohio lawmaker who put forth the anti-trans bill couldn’t name a single incident or school where this was an issue. So here’s how it went – “anti trans talk, anti-trans talk, we all joke that they have no platform….then anti-trans law”. The new voting laws exactly track the conspiracy theories. They took whole conspiracy theories and dropped them into the state code.

    I think of it as Trump II- the legal framework that follows the grievance. They went from “cancel culture” to banning speech in 6 months.

  84. 84.

    Baud

    @Soprano2:

    the real power of those social networks to amplify the message of the lazy and unmotivated beyond what they deserve.

    So you’re saying Baud! 20XX! needs a better social media presence.

  86. 86.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    Here in FL, there are new “anti-riot” laws that criminalize activities that were already illegal.

    “Antifa is under my bed” scream the crazies. Six months later there’s a whole slew of new criminal laws around “rioting”. New criminal laws! In a country that is absolutely LOUSY with criminal laws. Florida doesn’t have a criminal damaging statute? “Theft” someone doesn’t cover looting? They needed to layer one on top of another?

  88. 88.

    Soprano2

    @Patricia Kayden: People like to claim that those on unemployment are too lazy to work, but with barely a breath between words call for those same unemployed workers to come work for them.

    It’s really insane, and I say that as an owner of a pub where the manager is having a hard time finding help (she just hired a cook on Monday, cross your fingers!). I keep asking people who say this “Do you want people who you think have been sitting on their asses at home for over a year to work for you?” No, but they want them to work for someone else. A lot of people honestly seem to believe that there is a huge group of people out there who has been collecting $600 – $800/week for over a year from unemployment! I wonder if they’ve ever actually collected it before. People just don’t want to believe this is a complicated issue – they want the simple explanation that seems logical to them. I even heard someone say it on the radio this morning, that it’s “obvious” to people that the extended unemployment is a problem. Now, there are other problems with the extended unemployment IMHO, but this isn’t one of them. When it’s discontinued in MO it’ll help at the margins, but I keep wondering in a month when they still can’t find people to hire what are these people going to blame it on? They’ll probably says it’s because Amazon and Costco are both building warehouses in this area now, and that’ll be more the truth.

  90. 90.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: “Anti-wokeness” doesn’t remain as just whining or a political tactic- it becomes “let’s put in laws banning talking about race in schools”.

    This is timely – just this morning I heard on the radio that some MO Republicans are calling for a special session to pass a law that would keep cities from shifting any money in their police budgets from the police to any other thing, like social services or assisting victims of crime or helping the homeless. They want to legislate how every city in MO handles the budget for their police department because the mayor of St. Louis is talking about using money for police overtime that was unspent on these other things. Republicans used to say they cared about “local control”, but that was always a lie – they only care about “local control” when they’re the ones in control of the locality! MO Republicans have a special hate for the city of St. Louis and the people who are elected there. Bet you can guess what skin color most of those people have.

  92. 92.

    Jeffro

    @Kay: but they’ve always tried to do that, I think.  They’re just ramping it up even further and to ridiculous extremes (outlawing shuttling people to the polls, or giving them water in voting lines).

    The GOP used to at least have some semblance of policy positions.  The GQP goes straight to tribal signaling and flat-out lying, because they have no actual policies to offer voters (not ones that would benefit those voters, anyway)

  93. 93.

    Soprano2

    @Baud: Oh yeah, I’ll probably hear about that too, although I think its effect will mostly be to help people pay for child care  – so they can go back to work!

  94. 94.

    Kay

    @Soprano2:

    I think there’s a lot of information coming out that contradicts the lazy moocher theory but I will never forget how all these people who are supposedly paid to analyze numbers reached for the lazy moocher theory as a reflex, based on their own personal bias and low opinion of working people.

    Small business starts are way up. Here’s my theory. People got a tiny fucking CRACK of economic breathing room and they started considering their options. That’s what some economic security gives you- it offers options. They don’t take shitty jobs and they look for better pay. They start businesses. They move around, they job hop. This may be the most “free” economy we’ve seen in our lifetimes.

    They’re behaving like people who aren’t at risk of falling off a cliff at any moment. Great. I couldn’t be happier for them.  It will benefit all of us.

  95. 95.

    mrmoshpotato

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    Oh god, Chris Matthews is the guest on “Morning Joe.” 

    BWHAHAHAHAHA!!!!  Were those assclowns pissing and moaning about Hillary yet when you turned it off?  When does Upchuck Toddler join them?

  96. 96.

    sab

    I am a luddite so I can’t link. Did anyone see the story about the American Legion in Hudson Ohio turning down the microphone of the guest speaker colonial who gave a speech at the Memorial Day parade? They cut his mike for the part where he talked about the contributions of Black soldiers to Memorial Day. The American Legion guy said it was not relevant to the occasion which was intended to honor only Hudsonites.

    Google Cindy Suchan or Jim Garrison Hudson Ohio. Ironically, Cindy Suchan’s mother (and Cindy herself) are descendents of John Brown. The Underground Railroad went through Hudson. She should maybe read U.S. Grant’s memoir if she wants to know more about various peoples’ contribution to the war efforts.

  97. 97.

    Elizabelle

    @Soprano2:   You would think we could start talking about how the GQP is acting like King George III.

    We fought a war against that kind of behavior.

  98. 98.

    Soprano2

    @Betty Cracker:Where this all ends, I don’t know.

    Republicans hope it ends in the 1950’s, before all those “icky” civil rights and women’s rights and voting rights and gay rights laws were passed. They want to make the world comfortable for white conservatives again.

  99. 99.

    Kay

    @Soprano2:

    That New Mexico House race we won by a mile was supposedly the “test” of whether screeching about crime waves was politically useful, and it tanked. The Republican ran on crime. The Democrat increased the Biden margin. It’s one race but it’s interesting.

  100. 100.

    Kay

    @Soprano2:

    I’m hoping they expand on their “anti-woke” thinking and really LAY OUT the plans to repeal the Civil Rights Act. They’re right. That is where “wokeness” originated. Lyndon Johnson is the Father of Woke.

    These are people who gutted the Voting Rights Act- pitched it in the trash without a second thought. The Civil Rights Act won’t be any kind of barrier.

  101. 101.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Soprano2: I’ve mentioned this before, but the Wal-Mart nearest me is offering $17.50/hr for third-shift stockers. Now it’s third shift, sure, but a regular job with regular hours at $17.50/hr, compared to evenings and weekends and random other coverage at the boss’s whim for $3.89/hr plus tips….

  102. 102.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: I think there’s a lot of information coming out that contradicts the lazy moocher theory but I will never forget how all these people who are supposedly paid to analyze numbers reached for the lazy moocher theory as a reflex, based on their own personal bias and low opinion of working people.

    Sure, but it’s not just them – it’s EVERYONE. I’m literally the only person I know (well, besides my husband) who doesn’t reflexively say this the minute the topic of the job market comes up. It’s always some version of “Well, if the government would just quit paying them to stay home they’d go back to work”. Most of them know a person or two for whom they believe this to be true, so it’s people’s anecdotal experience that drives a lot of it. FYI, I heard a story on “Morning Edition” this morning that tracks with what you say – a woman who used to work on designing uniforms who started a blog and then went from there and is now working for herself. People had money and time to think about what they wanted to do, plus some of them had to do something because the unemployment mostly ran out last July and they had to start making money. People seem to have completely forgotten that there was no pandemic unemployment from August 2020 until January 2021, except for an emergency program.

  103. 103.

    Tony Jay

    @sab:

    I am a luddite so I can’t link.

    Oh you are, are you? Have at this, chum!

    Find article

    Highlight the article’s address in the address bar up top

    Right click on highlighted article

    Select Copy

    Open a comment on BJ

    Write your comment

    Pick which word in the comment you want to turn into the link to your article

    Highlight that word

    Click the 5th Tool on the tool bar above your comment, it looks like Cyclops’ visor tilted to the right and says ‘insert/edit link’

    Paste your copied address into the box that appears, press Apply button

    Done Linkee.

    Or just write it on a rock and chuck it through John’s window. That works too.

  104. 104.

    Kay

    @Soprano2:

    Right, agreed, and the lazy “lazy moochers” theme had real repercussions- Republicans used it to gut unemployment benefits.

    It’s been exciting for me to watch because I’ve wondered for a long time what economic policy that is focused on lower and middle would look like, and I like how it looks. If we can keep this going and push back against the “economic status quo” forces – Larry Summers et al- we may be able to show people that it’s better for all of them (other than the top 1%).

  105. 105.

    JMG

    I read an article that was I think in Washingtonian magazine (found it through a Twitter link I can’t refind now) which was an interview with a man who runs an employee recruiting firm that specializes in restaurants and food service firms. He said that those businesses were having a hard time finding employees, especially line cooks and house managers (!), primarily because the pandemic shutdown led many such workers to evaluate their situation and realize they’d rather do something else for a living, something more stable (most restaurants fail), with saner working hours and a less stressed work environment, even if it meant they’d make less money.

  107. 107.

    Ken

    @Soprano2: “Well, if the government would just quit paying them to stay home they’d go back to work”.

    Probably not useful for you to point out that the same could be said of Social Security.

  108. 108.

    artem1s

    @Kathleen:

    @OzarkHillbilly: Hilllary retweeted the story and praised her courage.

    Hillary knows how a impassioned commencement speech can launch a career in public service.  She also knows what the young woman in for.

  109. 109.

    Kathleen

    @artem1s: Absolutely! Your thoughts went through my mind as I read Hillary’s tweet. I thought it was so cool that she did that.

  110. 110.

    MomSense

    @JMG:

    And it’s not just the low wages, disparity between front and back of house, etc.  The terrible hours (clopenings!) and lack of a regular schedule are terrible for your health and make it next to impossible to find decent childcare.

  111. 111.

    Poe Larity

    So, Alito in November:

    Justice Samuel Alito delivered a speech to the organization’s annual convention railing against campus censorship as well as the alleged effort “to hobble the debate that the Federalist Society fosters.”

    And then:

    On Jan. 25, Nicholas Wallace, a third-year student at Stanford Law School, sent a satirical flyer to a student listserv reserved for debate and political commentary. The flyer promoted a fake event, “The Originalist Case for Inciting Insurrection,” ostensibly sponsored by the Stanford Federalist Society. It advertised the participation of two politicians who tried to overturn the 2020 election, Missouri Sen. Joshua Hawley and Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

    So of course, the freedom loving Federalists did what?

    on May 22, with graduation looming, the Stanford Federalist Society officer pushed the school to initiate a formal investigation. Wallace did not receive the complaint against him until May 27, his last day of classes. Stanford then placed a hold on his degree, prohibiting him from receiving his actual diploma at graduation on June 12.

    Stanford lifted the hold last night.

  113. 113.

    Mo MacArbie

    @germy: Aw fuck no. I’ve been laughing at that clown from a distance, but he’s messing with Perreca’s? Now it’s personal.

  115. 115.

    artem1s

    @sab:

    Local history: Former slave Frederick Douglass made impassioned 1854 address in Hudson

    She needs to learn a lot about her and her town’s history.  This is a perfect example of why we need Critical Race Theory.   Suchan bent the knee to the local white, exceptional, car dealer, Jim Garrison because they were terrified some RWNJ, Ohio Militia insurrectionist might take offense and make a scene.

    They couldn’t imagine that their homogeneous white suburb would have any interest in what a bunch of Black people in Charleston, South Carolina did 150+ years ago.  They don’t understand the context of the lesson and how it relates to their own ancestors.  It was a perfect storm of White Supremacy, White Privilege, and White Denial of everyone’s contribution to our nation’s history.

    Suchan has probably been taught to be ashamed of her families part in freeing the slaves and bringing down the Glorious South.  Although she probably is just fine with the terrorist parts of John Brown’s story where he tries to overthrow the government by seizing the armory in Harpers Ferry – 2nd Amendment Rights dontchaknow.

  116. 116.

    rikyrah

    @Kay: 

    They’re coming up with a kind of theory of the case against “wokeness”- because the War on Wokeness is an incoherent mess and was poorly thought out- turns out the cure for wokeness is to repeal the Civil Rights Act

    Kay,

    it’s the root of their focus on the 14th Amendment.
    People think that they are obsessed with it because of birthright citizenship.
    That’s just the shiny object put forth to obfuscate their real goal.
    The root of all positive progress in this country for anyone who isn’t a straight White Male since 1954 is the 14th Amendment.

    THAT is why they attack it.

  117. 117.

    Kathleen

    @Kay: This is brilliant insight. I had not thought about framing GQP perfidy in this way but you call it out for what it is

  118. 118.

    Kathleen

    @Kay:  Because I’m feeling particularly snarky this morning I will add that I suspect a large number of these so called experts have never had a real job.

  119. 119.

    Kropacetic

    @Betty Cracker: Edicts banning discussion of “critical race theory” in public schools, which wasn’t being discussed in public schools.

    They’re opposed to all forms of critical thinking, but it’s telling that they choose to focus their ire on critical thinking about matters of race.

  121. 121.

    MontyTheClipArtMongoose

    @rikyrah: is it shocking a person (sinema) who cut her teeth as a nader 2000 stan is a white-centered fauxgressive?

    fuck, & no.

    & this is where i give the so-called “mayo” pete credit for trying to move beyond his paen to the white working class 2017 bid for dnc chair. ironically, given the reflex jacobin & intercept response to the south bend mayor as mr. mc kinsey, buttigieg made his first mark on the national stage as an #ourrevolution mouthing white nationalist. but unlike #ourrevolution, he learned there are more black people than nina turner, eddie glaude, & briannah-joy gray.

  122. 122.

    gvg

    @Spanky: You can’t get Federal Financial aid with out a high school degree or GED. their are jobs that require it too.  It is a real threat.

  123. 123.

    Emma from Miami

    @Baud: The Guardian lies (ok, let’s call it exaggerate the negatives) constantly about the Royal Family. And also about Democratic/squishy liberal politicians. It’s one of the reasons why I don’t quite trust them. The truth should be damn enough without gilding it.

  124. 124.

    Citizen Alan

    @Elizabelle: Anyone who would support Shitgibbon would also have been a hard-core monarchist had they lived in the colonies in 1776.

  126. 126.

    Citizen Alan

    1. Um, why is there a pop up video by VidCrunch offering to send me to Balloon Juice stories from 2 days ago? And which appears to have no Close button? And which covers a third of the screen? I am on an android phone if it matters.
  127. 127.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kropacetic: Here’s a direct quote from DeSantis:

    There’s no room in our classrooms for things like critical race theory. Teaching kids to hate their country and to hate each other is not worth one red cent of taxpayer money.

    Of course, no one is teaching kids critical race theory in K-12 schools — it’s a preposterous notion — and that’s not an accurate description of it anyway. But it sure does rile up the rubes!

    Some old fart in my hometown wrote a letter to the editor about it the other day that was full of lies straight from DeSantis. I wrote a response urging people to Google it for themselves instead of believing people with an agenda. We’ll see if they publish it.

  128. 128.

    a thousand flouncing lurkers was fidelio

    I probably missed the explanation yesterday, but suddenly there is a little video ad for Balloon Juice sitting at the bottom of the page display. Since I usually read BJ on my phone it takes up about a third of the screen space. I don’t suppose there’s any way to make it go away?

  129. 129.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Kay:

    They’re coming up with a kind of theory of the case against “wokeness”- because the War on Wokeness is an incoherent mess and was poorly thought out- turns out the cure for wokeness is to repeal the Civil Rights Act.

    The New Hampshire Libertarian Party has been proudly tweeting about this. Of course, this isn’t a new position for them–the Libertarians have insisted that it was tyrannical overreach for the CRA to restrict the behavior of private businesses and individuals since forever, and will talk your ear off about how only de jure oppression by governments really counts. If you want to put a “No Coloreds” sign on the door of your café, why, that’s just freedom. Freedom for the people who count, I suppose.

  131. 131.

    artem1s

    @Betty Cracker:

    Of course, no one is teaching kids critical race theory in K-12 schools — it’s a preposterous notion — and that’s not an accurate description of it anyway. But it sure does rile up the rubes!

    It’s just another way for them to bitch about Black History Month. Any history that is not White, Male, Christian centered is history not worth teaching or learning.  Their kids are learning stuff in K-12 that doesn’t cast daddy and his pals in the best light, so it must be the fault of Black Women Academics that daddy’s little girl hates him and his country club friends.

  132. 132.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

     

    It’s been exciting for me to watch because I’ve wondered for a long time what economic policy that is focused on lower and middle would look like, and I like how it looks.

     

    I agree.

    I want the Infrastructure passed – with the Democratic numbers. I think it will be game changing.

     

    Because 90% of the jobs don’t need a college degree.

    Jobs that can’t be shift overseas.

  133. 133.

    artem1s

    @Matt McIrvin:

    If you want to put a “No Coloreds” sign on the door of your café, why, that’s just freedom. Freedom for the people who count, I suppose.

    again, these idiots are ignorant of the actual history of Jim Crow laws and the need for the CRA.  It was illegal for southern businesses to serve Black and Whites in the same area.  Segregation was forced on businesses whether they wanted to serve Blacks at the same lunch counter or not.  It’s revisionist history pure and simple.  Glibertarians love to ignore the whole history of Jim Crow, Redlining and the uncountable ways that government has intervened (and is still intervening – fuck you Hobby Lobby) on the behalf of White Christian men to keep them from having to compete on a level playing field.

  134. 134.

    rikyrah

    @JMG:

    time finding employees, especially line cooks

     

    these folks are among the 600,000 DEAD.

     

    THEY HAD TO WORK SOMEWHERE.

    WHY DOES NOBODY BRING THAT UP?

  138. 138.

    J R in WV

    @debbie: ​
     

    There is nothing more glorious than a globular star cluster.

    Actually, many gaseous nebulae are WAY more glorious than the globular star clusters, although the APOD is a very sweet example, with many different coloured stars.

  139. 139.

    Soprano2

    @rikyrah: Because a significant number of them were retired and no longer working. In my county there were 471 covid deaths (so far).  Even if you double that and say there were 900 covid deaths, that’s a small number compared to the population of over 293,000 that lives here. Plus, I know from seeing the early numbers that most of them were over the age of 60. So yes, it did have a small effect, but I don’t think it’s as big as you think it is, and it’s spread out all over the U.S.

  140. 140.

    Soprano2

    @Citizen Alan: Um, why is there a pop up video by VidCrunch offering to send me to Balloon Juice stories from 2 days ago? And which appears to have no Close button? And which covers a third of the screen? I am on an android phone if it matters

    I have been wondering the exact same thing!! 

  141. 141.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @J R in WV: Absolutely agree, even the often photographed(even a hack like me has done it) Great Orion nebula is pretty glorious.

    APOD noted that it’s believed by both the concentration of stars and the age of the stars that globular cluster may be the remnants of a galaxy captured by ours.

  142. 142.

    J R in WV

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    And the globular cluster does have a great set of varied colors of stars, which can be hard to see with the naked eye. But the Pillars of Hercules and the Orion Nebula are both pretty amazing also too.

    Also too, you are mostly certainly not a hack photographically~!~

  143. 143.

    FlyingToaster

    @Spanky:  There have been several times over the past 50 years where destination universities have issued a diploma when the school district goes “political”.  (One was someone a year behind me at my HS.  Their accepting college gave them a diploma, noting “For Work Completed at [redacted].”)

    This won’t be an impediment, anywhere.  The school district will now become up close and personal with the Streisand Effect…

  144. 144.

    Gravenstone

    @Tony Jay: Had to laugh as the offending ad just popped up in the lower right column for me as a PC user. As the various thread titles scrolled across the screen, this one was first up:

    Balloon Juice: Website for illiterate morons surprisingly has few readers

    All under the baleful eye of the beloved Tunch. I know we got a good chuckle in that thread from the assumption Cole was trolling his own blog with the title, but that presentation was just *chef’s kiss* perfection.

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