Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

They are not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

One lie, alone, tears the fabric of reality.

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

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

Hey Washington Post, “Democracy Dies in Darkness” was supposed to be a warning, not a mission statement.

It’s all just conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership.

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

With all due respect and assumptions of good faith, please fuck off into the sun.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Dear media: perhaps we ought to let Donald Trump speak for himself!

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

I desperately hope that, yet again, i am wrong.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

If you are still in the gop, you are either an extremist yourself, or in bed with those who are.

This fight is for everything.

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

It is not hopeless, and we are not helpless.

We can show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Excellent Links / Thursday Morning Open Thread: One (Baby) Step At A Time

Thursday Morning Open Thread: One (Baby) Step At A Time

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The corporation Spousal Unit works for replaced Columbus Day with Juneteenth on its roster of paid days off. It wouldn’t surprise me if other businesses chose the same route, since ‘Indigenous Peoples Day’ is also being proposed as a replacement for Thanksgiving…

Foreign affairs:

Tu quoque!

Reader Interactions

173Comments

  1. 1.

    Spanky

    And I should give a shit about what some random asshole (aka “Matt Walsh”) says because why?

  2. 2.

    debbie

    I have no idea who this Matt Walsh is, but checking his tweets, he’s a misguided influencer who’s lost his way. Theocratic fascist, indeed.

  5. 5.

    Baud

    I saw this the other day and forgot to share it.

    Vatican Warns U.S. Bishops: Don’t Deny Biden Communion Over Abortion

    Conservative American Catholic bishops are pressing for a debate over whether Catholics who support the right to an abortion should be allowed to take Communion.

    I thought the Church was set up as a benevolent dictatorship. What’s with the “warning”?

  6. 6.

    Anne Laurie

    @Spanky: And I should give a shit about what some random asshole (aka “Matt Walsh”) says because why?

    Walsh is among the foremost rightwing ‘edgelords’ on social media.  If he’s saying it, a myriad of RWNJ myrmidons are busy repeating it to whomever will listen — your Fox-News-watching elders, every Repub legislator, etc.

    He’s got nothing, but he (they) are gonna be ugly about their nothingness.

  7. 7.

    germy

    Wait a fking minute– Kaitlin Collins worked for Breitbart and the Daily Caller before joining CNN? No wonder tRump's press secretary (Maggie Haberman) came to her defense.

    — Baligubadle (@Baligubadle1) June 16, 2021

  8. 8.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    it’s not that they’re losing the culture wars, it’s that they’re losing them so gracelessly.

    Tell me about it, they way the press has been talking it is the end  of American democracy the last two days.

    The is awesome too, take that, Neo-confederate white trash.

  9. 9.

    Eric S.

    From a practical stand point I’m not sure how much this matters to a lot of people. Maybe I’m just jaded but I’m my 25 years in the corporate world I’ve only seen days off for holidays eliminated from the calendar.

  10. 10.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    Gosh, CRT is so bad. It isn’t as if it tries to undo anything like long term, multigenerational historical revisionism in school curriculum standards or tutorial programs that meet those standards for fifth graders in Tennessee….

    —————————————
    “5.15 Explain the contributions of Tennesseans during the war, including Nathan Bedford Forrest, Sam Watkins, Andrew Johnson, Matthew Fontaine Maury, and Sam Davis.”
    ——————————————
    “One of the most controversial figures of the Civil War is Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest. Nathan Bedford Forrest was born in Chapel Hill, Tennessee. He was the oldest of 12 children. When his father died when he was 16, Forrest took care of his mother and siblings. He took care of them by buying and selling real estate. He became a plantation owner and consequently, a millionaire. He also provided for his family by beginning a slave trade business. All of this wealth allowed Forrest to send his younger brothers to college and take care of his mother until she died.

    [Terrible Advertisement for Forrest’s Slave Trade Business]

    Forrest in the Civil War

    When the Civil War began, Forrest enlisted in the Confederate army and served with the Tennessee Mounted Rifles. He didn’t have any military experience, so he entered as a private. When he noticed how poorly equipped the Confederate company was, he bought them horses with his own money. As a reward for his investment, he was given the rank of colonel. Forrest was such a fast learner and brilliant strategist, that within a few months, he was given his own company of soldiers. His motto was, “get there first and with the most men.” Forrest’s Tennessee Cavalry Battalion would be one of the most successful units during the war, and he would eventually become a general. A cavalry division is a mobile part of an army. He fought in battles where he was greatly outnumbered and still won. Union generals referred to him as “that devil Forrest.” He was obviously a thorn in their side and was very impressive for someone with only 6 months of education and no military experience.

    The Fort Pillow Massacre

    General Nathan Bedford Forrest was leading his cavalry division around West Tennessee to attack Union supply lines. Forrest made the decision to attack Fort Pillow for horses and other supplies.

    The Union troops there were greatly outnumbered by Forrest’s men–about 600 to 1,500. The Union troops there were made up half of southerners who were Union supporters and half who were African Americans. After a short battle, the Confederates offered a truce, but the Union troops refused. There is some debate about what happened next, but Forrest’s men lost control. The Union troops eventually surrendered, but the African American soldiers were killed. Many of them pretended to be dead or ran to escape the devastation. Although Forrest did not order the massacre, his men were out of control. He has often been blamed for the massacre.

    Ku Klux Klan

    After the Civil War, Forrest returned to his plantation at Chapel Hill. He became the first Grand Wizard, or leader, of the Ku Klux Klan. However, he left the group when he saw that he could not lead it the way he led his cavalry unit.”

  14. 14.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    I’m so old that I can recall my first grade teacher in my all white elementary school referring to black people as “nigras”.

  15. 15.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Anne Laurie: Walsh is among the foremost rightwing ‘edgelords’ on social media.

    Oh, you mean that particular conservative You Tube troll with a punchable face who thinks he is a wit.  There are so many….

  17. 17.

    NotMax

    Yes, it took until we’re well into the 21st century.

    It is now illegal to pay disabled people in Hawaii less than minimum wage

    An outdated law that allowed Hawaii employers to pay people with disabilities less than minimum wage was wiped off the books Wednesday.
    [snip]
    Lawmakers say no Hawaii employers are known to pay less than minimum wage, but reports show some organizations on the mainland have paid as little as 4 cents an hour to people with disabilities. Source

  18. 18.

    Spanky

    Just a PSA to point out the ActBlue thermometer for Voces de la Frontera at the bottom (at least on Android).

    We have a ways to go.

  21. 21.

    Kay

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    Isn’t it great that people are turning all this up? Why, we’ve had ‘political correctness” and “cancel culture” all along! It just went in the other direction.

    In another context I once read questions from an exam West Virginia used for students to qualify to graduate high school. It was written by coal companies and it was just pure industry propaganda.

  22. 22.

    MomSense

    @Spanky:

    They’re doing such important work.  Voter registration, education, protection and advocacy!! Every little bit helps.

  23. 23.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @vkaramurza
    : For the first time in many years, an American president put human rights in forefront of bilateral talks. Human rights are inextricably linked to issues of security. With Russia, domestic repression & external aggression are 2 sides of same coin. #BidenPutinSummit

    To give is comment some context; not only, as has been reported here, most Russians don’t trust vaccine from their government, there are also popular conspiracy theories that the Soviet Union sill exists and the man we call Putin is actually the latest in a series of clones dating back to the 1920s. The point to examples of the details of Putn’s face changing over time.  Basically Putin created this bizzaro land of a country were no is sure of anything  and it doesn’t really work.

  24. 24.

    Anne Laurie

    @Baud: I thought the Church was set up as a benevolent dictatorship. What’s with the “warning”?

    There’s a solid, but still minority, chunk of the American Catholic Church hierarchy & membership that’s basically in the same position as the Republicans in our national politics — not *quite* powerful enough to secede and form their own religion, but dreaming of the day when that might happen.

    The global Church, under Pope Francis, is trying to discourage these cultists from doing anything irreversible, because the repercussions could destroy the entire structure.  Last I remember, the American Catholic churches provide an outsized portion of the global Church’s budget… but Americans are by and large ‘cafeteria Catholics’, choosing to ignore official Church teachings about LGBTQ+ issues, birth control / abortion, etc.

    The global ‘flock’ is growing fastest in developing countries (Africa, particularly), and most of the Churchmen in those countries would just as happily team up with the American tradCaths — but the day that happens, a huuuuge chunk of the well-to-do suburban-American parishes stop donating to Rome, and start working out affiliations with the local Episcopalians or Unitarian Universalists.

    *Most* American bishops, obviously, are siding with Pope Francis, at the moment — they don’t want to give up their comfy current careers to start over in some patchwork ‘fellowship community’, or to end up locked in an increasingly impoverished system with a bunch of arrogant nutters.

    Sound familiar?

  25. 25.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Meanwhile, the End of Slavery is now a national holiday, this is awesome.

    So is Tubman replacing that homicidal, economy wrecking lunatic Jackson on the twenty next?

  29. 29.

    Anne Laurie

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: Basically Putin created this bizzaro land of a country were no is sure of anything and it doesn’t really work.

    Well, Putin’s certainly perfected this particular form of Russian existentialism, and he’s profited hugely from it.

    But from what little I know of Russian history over the last century, can we actually say he invented it?

  31. 31.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Kay:

    This is a great point. All those Texas-approved yearbooks I got for so many years (even at my left-populist Catholic high school)  skipped big chunks of material that teachers would have to be individually interested in supplementing. As I remember the sequence, it went from abolition to Civil War by noble states rights freedom fighters who were heroic and wise while serving something questionable. It then went straight on to evil carpetbaggers.

  36. 36.

    debbie

    @MomSense:

    It’s probably heresy to say this, but I think we need our own version of ALEC that would serve to assist and advise all of the state and local groups.

  42. 42.

    mrmoshpotato

    For the past few years, Republicans in Congress have echoed Russian propaganda. On Wednesday, in Geneva, Vladimir Putin returned the favor: He echoed Republican propaganda.

    Shit.  So are the Russthuglicans still Putin’s bitches, or is Putin now the Russthuglicans’ bitch.  It’s all so confusing.  Is Russia our 51st state now?

  43. 43.

    Cermet

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: And don’t forget that he started the prison/slave state that became the norm in the South. There are countless graves of black teens/men who where illegally enslaved via trumped up charges and placed into forced work units (including mines and steel mills). They were tortured if they didn’t work hard enough with the most dangerous jobs. Forrest payed the State 1.6 cents a day so be could farm the prison inmates to company’s at huge markups/profits. Soon States’ entire legal systems geared to find, and imprison black teens and men to feed this forced slave labor system. This existed in mass till at least WWII. Slavery never ended it just became a State system allowing wealthy whites to exploit it. This is a history no one teaches even in the North

  45. 45.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @NotMax:

    It made me say “what” so many times that Samuel L. Jackson shot me.

  46. 46.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @germy:

    Bet they killed it over internal complaints that it implies that coal was ever dirty.

    Always assume evil and stupid with Appalachian conservatives.

  50. 50.

    Immanentize

    Hi all.
    I just thought I’d to share further adventures in my Plague of Death. (Which would be a good album name for my fictional band, Cobra Pope)

    Last Saturday, my nephew and Godson died of kidney disease. He was 40. As his Godfather, everytime I saw him (couple of times a year) I would ask him if he was going to church. “Nope,” he would “God told me I get a pass.” Cracked me up. He was a good fellow and a very talented musician. He would have gotten along with MomsSence’s boys, I suspect. Here he is a few years back singing a song: Waiting on a Train

    I would prefer not to be Joe Btfsplk.

  51. 51.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @germy:

    “But we spent 2.8 Mil producing it and…”

    ”Don’t care. We’ll just jack up residential rates to make it up. Kill the ad.”

  60. 60.

    SFAW

    @Anne Laurie:

    myrmidons

    AL, I luvs ya, but weren’t the Myrmidons actual warriors? Not gun-sword-humping nutjobs? [OK, Teh Google tells me the current definition changes that somewhat — e.g., comparing (sort of) Achilleus to Hitler — but I put that in the same category as “bemused” now means “amused” to some people.]

  63. 63.

    SFAW

    @mrmoshpotato:

    or is Putin now the Russthuglicans’ bitch.

    I’ll let you leave and come back in, after THAT suggestion.

    Putin being the bitch of/for any of those traitorous morons? Get real.

  67. 67.

    Shakti

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: 

    Anecdata: I HATED Forrest Gump before I knew who Nathan Bedford Forrest was. They absolutely did not teach me who this guy was in my history classes up north. And I had to memorize the Gettysburg Address.

    I went back and rewatched Ken Burns The Civil War with my parents. They couldn’t get over the piles of dead bodies and why people still flew the Dixie flag. It heavily features Shelby Foote.

    Also: holy crap, Shelby Foote just sounds like a dude who is just trying to find love on the apps and doesn’t want to be single anymore:

    “one of the most attractive men who ever walked through the pages of history”

    “he’s an enormously attractive, outgoing man once you get to know him and once you get to know more facts”.

  69. 69.

    sanjeevs

    Florida Dems in disarray

     

    MIAMI — A little-known GOP candidate in one of Florida’s most competitive congressional seats was secretly recorded threatening to send “a Russian and Ukrainian hit squad” to a fellow Republican opponent to make her “disappear.”

    During a 30-minute call with a conservative activist that was recorded before he became a candidate, William Braddock repeatedly warned the activist to not support GOP candidate Anna Paulina Luna in the Republican primary for a Tampa Bay-area congressional seatbecause he had access to assassins. The seat is being vacated by Rep. Charlie Crist (D-Fla.), who is running for governor.

    I really don’t want to have to end anybody’s life for the good of the people of the United States of America,” Braddock said at one point in the conversation last week, according to the recording exclusively obtained by POLITICO. “That will break my heart. But if it needs to be done, it needs to be done. Luna is a f—ing speed bump in the road. She’s a dead squirrel you run over every day when you leave the neighborhood.”

     

    https://www.politico.com/news/2021/06/17/secret-recording-florida-republican-threat-hit-squad-494976

  73. 73.

    WaterGirl

    @MomSense: I agree!

    At Voces, they work with people every single day on things like driver’s licenses and citizenship.  If we can raise the money to fund this field organizer position, we wouldn’t be funding those activities, but it’s that engagement every single day that gives the political arm of Voces its credibility with their voters and the ability to have a major impact on voting in Wisconsin.

    To me, just knowing that the votes they turned out in 2020 exceeded the margin of victory in Wisconsin in 2020.  We are going to need even more votes to help compensate for all the ways the Rs are making voting more and more difficult.

  75. 75.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @SFAW: weren’t the Myrmidons actual warriors?

    Do we really have to repost that picture of Breitbart, a man who died from a stroke during a internet flame war, in full fantasy armor?

  76. 76.

    Betty Cracker

    @sanjeevs: The ironic thing about this story is that Luna, the woman who was threatened, is a bona fide kook, so when she alleged that Braddock threatened her, lots of folks dismissed it. Now there’s a recording that proves it’s kooks all the way down. Hopefully this insanity lets Dems hang onto the seat. And I’m not the least bit ashamed to say that’s my primary concern.

  77. 77.

    Viva BrisVegas

    @Baud: Doesn’t Catholic orthodoxy also oppose the death penalty?

    I suppose it’s too much to expect consistency in denying communion, as that might embarrass a large chunk of the Supreme Court.

  79. 79.

    WaterGirl

    @Spanky: All 2021 Fundraising is the first item in the hamburger menu on mobile, and the Voces thermometer is the top thermometer in All 2021 Fundraising.  So hopefully that makes it easy to find, even on mobile.

  90. 90.

    Fair Economist

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    As I remember the sequence, it went from abolition to Civil War by noble states rights freedom fighters who were heroic and wise while serving something questionable. It then went straight on to evil carpetbaggers.

    That’s about what I got taught in Alabama. I was rather shocked when as young adult I read about Reconstruction and realized “wait, the carpetbaggers and scallywags were the good guys!”

  92. 92.

    WaterGirl

    @sanjeevs:

    My favorite part is where Braddock denies its his voice but still threatens to sue for having his call recorded without his permission.

    That’s just like the rape defense we would see in court when I worked with the local rape crisis service:

    “I didn’t do it, but if I did do it, it was consensual.”

  94. 94.

    Fair Economist

    @Immanentize: Oh, so sorry about your nephew. He sounds like someone we’d all like to have around. Sometimes life and death are so unfair.

  95. 95.

    Fair Economist

    @mrmoshpotato:

    Shit. So are the Russthuglicans still Putin’s bitches, or is Putin now the Russthuglicans’ bitch. It’s all so confusing.

    They’re still his, but he recognizes they need help. A good sign, actually.

  99. 99.

    Anyway

    In my corner of the corporate world we don’t get MLK , Presidents, Columbus, Easter — doubt the PTB will add Juneteenth any time soon.

    I love the word Juneteenth.

  105. 105.

    mali muso

    @WaterGirl: Thank you for sharing the thermometer, I just donated.  I was sorry to miss the live blog, but read the thread later and am excited for BJ to support this very worthy organization.

    @Immanentize: So sorry for your loss.  May his memory be a blessing.

  106. 106.

    Ken

    @Immanentize: There are times when the only words are those of the angel Aziraphale in Good Omens: “Sometimes you just had to hope that the divine plan had been properly thought out.”

  114. 114.

    MontyTheClipArtMongoose

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: i thought andy b died from some steppedon coke that the russian inteligence ministry supplied to his dealer, such that steve bannon could takeover & reposition breitbart dot com as a maga clearinghouse.

  115. 115.

    Shakti

    @Betty Cracker: Seconded. Also, I don’t understand Charlie Crist’s thinking in running for governor again.

     

    Here’s one contender for his seat:

    Michele Rayner.

     

    The link also mentions Deputy Mayor Kanika Tomalin and Eric Lynn.  I’m kind of worried Anna Paulina Luna will win.

  118. 118.

    rp

    @Cameron: Arguing in the alternative (offering mutually exclusive/competing theories) is perfectly valid in court. In day-to-day life…not so much.

  127. 127.

    Betty Cracker

    @Shakti: I don’t know WTF Crist is thinking either. Giant ego, I guess? I mean, he lost to Bat Boy! Don’t run again, FFS! But since Crist is gonna Crist no matter what we say, I hope someone good wins the nom and hangs onto that seat. Rayner would be a huge upgrade, IMO.

  128. 128.

    lowtechcyclist

    A minor point, but I’m only counting ten currently existing Federal holidays; Juneteenth would be the eleventh, not the twelfth.  The ten are:

    New Year’s Day
    Martin Luther King, Jr. Day
    Presidents’ Day
    Memorial Day
    Independence Day
    Labor Day
    Columbus Day/Indigenous People’s Day
    Veterans’ Day
    Thanksgiving Day
    Christmas Day

    At least, these are the days the Federal agency I work for gives me as a day off, without charging it against my annual leave. I don’t think they’re swindling me out of a holiday.

  132. 132.

    CaseyL

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: 

    @japa21:

    That’s two pieces of incredibly good news today:  Stacey Abrams supports the compromises that Joe Manchin will also support; and SCOTUS upheld the ACA.  (Though only on standing, not on the merits – so one assumes the bastards will try again.)

  134. 134.

    burnspbesq

    @CaseyL:

    It’s going to be difficult to find a plaintiff with standing. Who is damaged by having to pay a penalty that is equal to zero?

  136. 136.

    WaterGirl

    @mali muso:  If there is interest, we will do a zoom with them in a couple of weeks.  Staring on Sunday, they have organized a 9-day march:

    Mass March for Driver’s Licenses & Citizenship

    Join Wisconsin Immigrant Essential Workers on a historic 9-day march that takes off from Milwaukee on Sunday, June 20th to honor immigrant fathers (Father’s Day) and concludes in a final mass march and rally at the State Capitol in Madison on Monday, June 28.

    This march is to pressure the Biden Administration and Democrats in Congress to include citizenship for 11 million in the infrastructure and jobs budget bill that will be voted on this summer.

    This is a critical moment of national escalation in the struggle, and when Democratic Members of Congress need to hear from us in Wisconsin!

    Commit to a day or more, in Milwaukee on Sunday, June 20th, and/ or the final mass march and rally at the State Capitol in Madison on Monday, June 28.

    NOW is the time to achieve citizenship for essential workers, their families, and the 11 million undocumented.

    Learn more here.

  138. 138.

    catclub

    @japa21: ​
     

    The ruling means that the justices won’t rule on the merits of the lawsuit, which was the third time they’ve been asked to consider a significant challenge to the law, but instead they will allow the law to stand.

    The dissenters may have simply dissented from the ruling on standing.

  140. 140.

    CaseyL

    @Baud: No, thanks – as narrow a reed as that is, plantiffs would be able to claim a specific injury, and SCOTUS could use that to dismantle ACA.  I’ll settle for “lack of standing” with this Court.

    Can’t say for sure “lack of standing” is a trend to dismiss dangerous RW court cases, but SCOTUS also used that reasoning to avoid Trump’s election lawsuits.   So I kind of wonder.

  142. 142.

    Baud

    @CaseyL:

    They would have standing, but they would lose in the merits.  They’re whole argument is that the mandate isn’t a tax withhout a penalty.

  147. 147.

    Baud

    All the right wingers on the court hate Scalia’s opinion in Smith.

    FWIW, Barrett and Kavanaugh are positioning themselves as more moderate than Thomas, Alito, and Gorsuch.

  148. 148.

    rikyrah

    @CaseyL: 

    (Though only on standing, not on the merits – so one assumes the bastards will try again.)

    So, who would have standing to push a bullshyt case like this?

  149. 149.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    I just listened to some woman OH state legislator explain the bill she introduced that would ban the “academic” definition of CRT. These bastards must be stopped. Period.

  150. 150.

    Ken

    @rikyrah: So, who would have standing to push a bullshyt case like this?

    It looks like the next standing argument would have to be based on intangible harm, like “mental suffering at the thought that the ACA exists”

  151. 151.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Kathleen:

    I’m scheduled for a Fair Fight training call this afternoon. Strangely excited to be gearing up for more political voluntarism. And I’m taking all sorts of adult education classes online. It’s nice to have a calendar again!

  156. 156.

    Original Lee

    I’m hoping this thread isn’t dead yet. I need to consult the wisdom of the Jackals.

    My elderly mom is 6 feet tall and skinny. She has expressed a desire for a power recliner with lift chair functionality. There are many on the market, but she needs one for tall people. All of the chairs I’ve looked at for tall people are also for wide people. She lives in a one-bedroom apartment, so having a ginormous chair is not helpful in terms of floor space, plus I don’t think she’d feel comfortable in a chair that she could take a bath in.

    Are there recommendations?

  157. 157.

    Matt McIrvin

    @CaseyL: My impression (IANAL) is that US legal practice is for courts to strongly prefer to decide a case on standing rather than on the merits if they possibly can–because if there’s no standing, there’s no case. In a sense it’s a means of limiting the power of the courts: they can’t rule on the law unless they actually have a valid case before them.

  158. 158.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Ken:

    Thomas’s opinion made it clear he would have voted to strike down the ACA on the merits, but this wasn’t a judgment on the merits, it was purely a judgment that Texas did not have standing to bring the case.  By the same token, we can’t be sure what Gorsuch’s decision on the merits would have been.  One of my shocks in reading about important court cases recently was learning that conservatives on the Supreme Court aren’t complete partisan hacks, except maybe Alito.  Thomas is less a partisan hack than a nutcase, but that leans to the same thing.  Most of the time, even on important cases, the law matters.  The conservatives may have horrible interpretations of the legal system, but they do actually usually pay attention to the law.  That’s why trans rights were upheld.  The lawyer arguing for trans rights knew Gorsuch’s legal buttons, and pushed the way trans rights comply with how Gorsuch views the law.

    Again, Alito, Thomas, and the now-dead Scalia are exceptions.  The former is a raging ‘fuck you, libtards’.  Thomas is so insane he might as well just be a partisan hack.  Scalia was known for his skill in twisting the law into a pretzel to get whatever result he wanted.

    The conservatives can surprise you.  They’re awful.  A conservative majority is a bad, bad thing.  But they’re not the monolithic ‘destroy all liberal progress’ you would think from looking at them.

  160. 160.

    sdhays

    The only time in my career that I’ve gotten Columbus Day off was when I worked for a government contractor. Same for MLK Day. Veterans Day is “postponed” to the day after Thanksgiving. I hope that Juneteenth isn’t treated the same way. It should be considered equivalent to July 4.

  161. 161.

    Another Scott

    @Original Lee: Dunno.

    J’s mother was a tiny thing and we had trouble finding even a simple padded chair for her, so I feel your pain.

    Maybe browse Wayfair and get an idea of what’s out there. They specify seat width in the description, so you can have an idea of sizing as you go through them. (I don’t quickly see “recommended for 6′ tall people” there though). Other sites seem to group them by person-size. But, yeah, tall and thin will be a challenge.

    (I’ve never bought anything from Wayfair, myself. Just an example.)

    HTH a little. Good luck!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  162. 162.

    catclub

    @Baud: They’re whole argument is that the mandate isn’t a tax withhout a penalty.

     

    My understanding is that since there is no tax, which was the justification Roberts used to protect it last time, the whole law (like Medicaid expansion)  is inseparable from the tax and therefore is all illegal.

     

    NB: I sure wish they had made medicaid expansion a separate bill: “Here is the new Medicaid.”  I think the reason was that the taxes on high incomes paid for both that and the exchange insurance subsidies.

  164. 164.

    rikyrah

    @CaseyL:

     

    Ms. Abrams isn’t about the ponies and unicorns. Get FEDERAL LEGISLATION on the books. 1. You can build upon it. 2. Give the DOJ another weapon in their arsenal to defend Voting Rights.

  165. 165.

    J R in WV

    @sanjeevs: ​
     

    @Betty Cracker: My favorite part is where Braddock denies its his voice but still threatens to sue for having his call recorded without his permission.

    OK, that’s the funniest thing yet today on Balloon-Juice~!!~ What a clown this guy is…

  166. 166.

    Shakti

    @Betty Cracker:  I think he’s really counting on his name recognition in Florida and personal charm to get him this governor’s seat over DeSantis. I don’t he ever recovered from the shock of losing to Marco Rubio and wants another bite at it after serving another term as governor.

    Does he even realize every one of DeSantis’ moves is calculated to win the right wing money machine and suppress voter turnout? He’s my rep and I haven’t heard from him, really.

  167. 167.

    Original Lee

    @Another Scott: I will check out Wayfair. The sites that specialize in lift chairs will say stuff like, appropriate for persons up to 5’8”, or recommended for persons 5’10” or taller. That’s for the back support and front-to-back seat measurement and footrest length, I have to assume.

  172. 172.

    TomatoQueen

    @Original Lee:  Recent experience in ordering/receiving a power lift chair for my father, who is 90, six feet two, has COPD and congestive heart failure, and has  lost almost 100 pounds in the past year, which is a good thing as he was very heavy. He must keep his lower legs elevated for a good part of the day, so on the day his old power chair finally died, we had to replace it quickly, and were temporarily stymied by how furniture shopping works–the sample might be on the sales floor, or far more likely you will be ordering out of a book or on the net without ever sitting in the thing, and waiting as long as 12 weeks–otherwise we would’ve done LaZBoy based on past experience.  But we ended up purchasing from omg Bob’s Discount Furniture, because they had a power chair on the sales floor–nobody else did–that fit my father. Every ergonomic & shopping site I looked at said for people 5’8″ and over, don’t buy anything shorter than 40 inches from the floor to the top of the back of the chair.  My father’s chair is 42 inches and he likes it. The measurement from the floor to the top of the seat is important also (nothing like crunched hamstrings from sitting) and you want a minimum of 19″, no less, and likely 21 if you can get it.

    After my experience ordering a headboard  and frame and 1 little manual recliner, I wouldn’t order anything from Wayfair ever again as long as I live and after that they should be shot into an active volcano.

  173. 173.

    Original Lee

    @TomatoQueen: Thanks for sharing your experience. ATM, we are renting one from the local medical supply service. It’s a Golden Tech Cambridge. We figure we can try it out for a month and then decide if we want to buy it, or go LaZBoy. The LaZBoy site says 4-7 months for delivery, Golden Tech says 6-8 weeks for the color Mom wants plus the footrest extension. We might not need the footrest extension, but I do have to wonder when the model that’s supposed to be for people up to 6’2” has an optional extension for people with long legs.

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