Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Spilling the end game before they can coat it in frankl luntz-approved dogwhistles.

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

The willow is too close to the house.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Chutkan laughs. Lauro sits back down.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

“Let’s not pretend [Trump] wants to engage in high-minded discourse.”

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

When the time comes to make an endorsement, the pain of NYT editors will be palpable as they reluctantly whisper “Biden.”

The words do not have to be perfect.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

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

Cole is on a roll !

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

Glad to see john eastman going through some things.

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

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

…and a burning sense of injustice to juice the soul.

There’s always a light at the end of the frog.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

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

When do the post office & the dmv weigh in on the wuhan virus?

The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Back to the Grind

Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Back to the Grind

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Rich autocrats bought out the Republican party (years ago) because its utility was obvious to them: For surprising nominal sums, they could increase their own agency and decrease their tax burden. We Democrats don’t have that kind of transparent pay-for-play benefit to offer — and if we somehow found one, we’d probably no longer be Democrats. All we have is hard work, and the knowledge that we’re on the right side of history!

Reader Interactions

153Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

     All we have is hard work, and the knowledge that we’re on the right side of history!

    Wise words, AL. I hope you had a good break.

  3. 3.

    Albatrossity

    The problem for Democrats is not the lack of channels for getting the message out. It is the reality that the message for the other side consists almost entirely of lies designed to make you fearful. Lies are hard to combat quickly, and fear is a very motivating emotion.

  6. 6.

    New Deal democrat

    Below are excerpts from the statement submitted by Samuel Moyn, the Henry R. Luce Professor of Jurisprudence and Professor of History Yale University, to Biden’s advisory commission on the Supreme Court. He notes that term limits, while perhaps laudatory, would require a Constitutional Amendment; but argues that the three remedies that he suggests: jurisdiction-stripping, a supermajority requirement for invalidating federal laws, and allowing Congress a provisional override of such decisions, all could be done by statute alone:

    “The American higher judiciary has too much authority, allocated and arrogated, and this fact has been grievous for our national political experience. Not least, in recent decades, it has diverted collective political choices on a range of important issues, as well as the most momentous national elections, into a distorted and unhelpful contest about who will serve on judiciaries mistakenly empowered to face our dilemmas.

    ….

    “The assertion of judicial supremacy, and the invalidation of Congressional acts that goes with it, presents the enormous challenge of controlling essentially limitless authority, so that it does not become a political tool that factions seek — especially when they cannot win electorally. As Thomas Jefferson observed, to the extent judiciaries are empowered to make political choices for the people under the cover of constitutional interpretation, it will incentivize political actors to “retreat[] into the judiciary as into a stronghold,” including by making it a bastion of minority rule against majority power to make laws.10

    ….

    “[T]he old regime [of judicial self-restraint] has broken down. For both sides of America’s partisan spectrum, “decades of attempts to restrain th[e] Court’s abuse of its authority have failed.”

    ….

    “There need be no commitment to the extreme view that legal interpretation, as such, is politics by other means to observe that constitutional invalidation of federal legislation almost always is, especially in dramatic episodes when political actors outside the Supreme Court have in effect transferred their disputes about policymaking to it. The only answer is to transfer it back. A political court, unless its jurisdiction is managed, cannot “transcend” politics. The division of the Supreme Court itself is good enough evidence, in such cases, that there is no good cause for allowing a bare majority of justices to decide our fate, compared to majority of citizens.

    ‘’’’

    “Jurisdiction channeling and stripping are only the most obvious reforms that fine- tune court power by preempting or reassigning certain kinds of cases or protecting and shielding certain laws from Article III courts. A supermajority rule for Supreme Court decision, requiring a 7-2 or other high threshold for constitutional invalidation, can be institutionalized by statute under Congress’s substantial powers under Article III to structure the judiciary and provide it jurisdiction. The same is even true of the legislative override option. Just as Congress possesses the power to use its own statutory authority to channel and limit jurisdiction or impose decision rules, it could also reassign finality of decision to itself through a jurisdictional statute that makes Supreme Court invalidations of federal law provisional unless and until Congress passes on the result (or fails to exercise its option to do so in some time frame).”

    Full statement is here: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Moyn-Testimony.pdf

  7. 7.

    NotMax

    An amuse-bouche to begin a work week.

    122 years. That’s a lotta blood tonic under the bridge.

    …“It had such a stunning smell about it,” says Ashleigh Morley-Doidge, reminiscing about her childhood trips to Mr Fitzpatrick’s in her hometown of Rawtenstall, England. Morley-Doidge—who now owns Mr Fitzpatrick’s, Britain’s only surviving 19th-century temperance bar—recalls it as a dimly lit but enchanting place, with shelves crammed full of herbs in towering glass jars.

    …Morley-Doidge has also reluctantly banished that memorable, heady smell. A necessary evil, when she realized it was emanating from a carpet soaked with generations of spilt sarsaparilla. Source

    ;)

  8. 8.

    satby

    The Guardian has its faults, but American media quit doing deep dives like this story a long time ago. Not that it matters since facts quit mattering back in Nixon’s administration.

    OSA’s leaders and adherents oppose not only abortion, but homosexuality and same-sex marriage, in vitro fertilization, Islam, Covid-19 vaccines and masks. At times, they appear to be opposed to the modern world, railing against public school, women in positions of power, sex before marriage and birth control….

    The AAF managing director, Kat Green, said she began “recreationally” tracking extremists, sharing intel with local escorts and clinic security teams. AAF identified and collected evidence of at least 15 anti-abortion leaders among those at the Capitol insurrection, including Storms and the Arizona-based pastor Jeff Durbin, who runs the “abolitionist” social media presence.

  11. 11.

    Betty Cracker

    The Beltway press deserves the bashing they get, but I wish folks like the author of the last tweet in the OP would be specific — it’s the national political coverage that sucks. There are tons of hardworking local journalists busting their asses all over the country every day, and they shouldn’t be lumped in with the Mag Habs of the world, IMO.

  12. 12.

    NotMax

    @satby

    “…and handicapped parking spaces, and R rated movies, and LED lighting, and bikinis, and skateboards, and Chunky Monkey…”

    //

  13. 13.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    Here’s a scary twitter thread from John Pavlovitz. All of them developed COVID.

    OUR COVID NEWS: Hello Friends.Two weeks ago, we took a family trip. Three-quarters of us had been fully vaccinated since April with the Pfizer shot, with the exception being our 11-year old.— John Pavlovitz (@johnpavlovitz) July 5, 2021

  15. 15.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I think it’s that Trump’s babbling eased his supporters of their fears (he’d fix whatever they were afraid of) and freed them up to just hate, hate, hate.

  16. 16.

    John S.

    Peter Baker has been spending too much time at the Applebee’s salad bar.

    I am on vacation from South Florida for a month in very red and rural Burnsville, NC. It’s pretty obvious to see why we have been unable to hit our vaccine goals. Although I will say the people here are MUCH friendlier overall, and the scenery is breathtaking here in the Blue Ridge and Smoky mountains.

    I am fully vaccinated but I still wear a mask in indoor spaces. I was shopping in an Ingles supermarket the other day and walked down an aisle with literally the only other people in the store who were masked — a young couple.

    The guy turned to me and said, “I like your mask. It’s nice to see that someone has some fucking sense around here.”

    Not that the folks in South Florida are really any better at this point, though they’re likely more vaccinated.

  19. 19.

    debbie

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    I was one of the very few people (as in two adults and one small child) who were masked at the farmer’s market last week, and that Twitter thread is why.

  20. 20.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @debbie: Trump’s babbling eased his supporters of their fears

    I can only say that hate isn’t the reason they stormed the Capitol.

  22. 22.

    Nora

    @New Deal democrat:  I definitely agree with some of those proposals (though it might be difficult to get any Republicans on board, given their lust for power), but I would like to mention that if there had been a supermajority requirement for declaring something unconstitutional, we wouldn’t have had Griswold v. Connecticut decided the way it was.

  24. 24.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I understand it all comes from a place of fear, but having watched that 40-minute NYT video over the holiday, hate was all I saw. We can agree not to agree, as long as we agree it sucks and is wrong.

  25. 25.

    New Deal democrat

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Thanks for the compliment. I especially like that he is approaching the issue politically  (in the high sense, not partisan one) rather than just as a lawyer.

    The concept of an independent judiciary only dates from the Glorious Revolution, and the US Constitution is the first place where the experiment in judicial philosopher kings was ever tried. The framers envisioned that the Court would have to ask the Executive to enforce their decisions, and that Justices would be old men steeped in a lifetime of learning about the common law, and would be devoted to incrementalism.

    Heh.

  27. 27.

    satby

    @John S.: @debbie: it’s a losing battle. I had to get into it as nicely as I could with a patient yesterday about putting on his mask, because he was vaccinated and “doesn’t see a need”. In a doctor’s office. After passing two signs as he came in about being masked, and after being told at the time the appointment was made, and at the reminder call, that masks are required. His wife just handed him one and told him to stop. But it’s basically a daily occurrence now.

    And one of the reasons I don’t give a flying fuck what happens to the willfully unvaccinated. Edit: and I’m sorry to be so negative about it, but it has been daily battles over masks and basic decency since the end of April 2020, 6 days a week since August. fuckem

  28. 28.

    Geminid

    @Albatrossity: Negative partisanship- gaining party adherence by focusing fear towards the other side- is very real, but it is assymetrical. Republican are telling half-truths and outright lies about the Democratic party,  and diverting attention away from their own policy bankruptcy. Democrats are telling the truth about Republicans, and can finally demonstate their policy strengths.

    I think the Republicans know they are on the losing side here, and that’s making them more desperate to subvert the democratic process. If they can’t, they know Democrats will control Congress and the Presidency the rest of this decade, and they’ll be losing Governors and state legislatures throughout.

  29. 29.

    New Deal democrat

    @Nora: Moyn argues that most progress comes from the Legislatures first*, and that historically the US Supreme Court has been a deeply reactionary institution.

    *e.g., NYS passed a very liberal abortion law in about 1970. Congress passed the post-civil war civil rights acts, and the most durable progress came because of the civil rights acts of 1964 and 1965.

  32. 32.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @New Deal democrat:

    “[T]he old regime [of judicial self-restraint] has broken down. For both sides of America’s partisan spectrum, “decades of attempts to restrain th[e] Court’s abuse of its authority have failed.”

    Didn’t read the whole piece. Did he ever give examples of Republicans not getting their way in this regard? Because “both sides” sure as shit didn’t give us Gore v Bush and “both sides” sure as shit didn’t simply deny the hearing of presidential nominees (Garland).

  34. 34.

    The Dark Avenger

    @Albatrossity: The Centralists in the Party would offend the money people if they engaged in messaging that was less vague than fighting for working families and giving everyone the opportunity to better themselves.  Ask yourself why we don’t have someone like FDR calling the Republicans out, it becomes clear that such a candidate would cause pearl-clutching in many places, like Westchester County, NY.

  38. 38.

    Geminid

    @OzarkHillbilly: Sometimes I think fear and hatred are just two sides of the same coin. I see this a lot in right wing propaganda, where resentment is used to incite the two stronger emotions, which then reinforce each other.

    I guess you could say that resentment is the gateway drug, and not just in a metaphorical sense. There is  physiological dimension as well, to the extent these emotions trigger body chemistry that reinforces them.

  42. 42.

    WereBear

    @OzarkHillbilly: We’ve unbent to the point of eating inside again, since our area is quite low in the important stats and Mr WereBear’s cabin fever could melt a glacier.

    But shopping… why not keep wearing a mask? He’s concerned that we’ll look like MAGAts in a non-MAGAt space, but is that worth getting sick?

    Even a bad flu can be bad.

  43. 43.

    SFAW

    Apropos of nothing in particular:

    An LGM commenter has provided a German expression for one psychological aspect of Rethug-voting griftees: Stiefelvertiefungsehnsucht – a longing for the indentation left by a boot

    My German is not good enough to know if that’s a good translation — Google indicates it might be — and it doesn’t flow as well as (zum Beispiel) “Backpfeifengesicht,” but I thought it was interesting

  44. 44.

    NotMax

    @New Deal democrat

    It would help if our rhetoric ceased using loaded (to their ears) terminology such as gay marriage.

    It’s same-sex marriage, if a differentiation must be made at all. Gayness is not a legal requirement, just as straightness isn’t for opposite-sex marriage.

    /hobby horse

  45. 45.

    SFAW

    @WereBear:

    He’s concerned that we’ll look like MAGAts in a non-MAGAt space

    Are MAGAts now wearing masks where you are? Strange times.

  46. 46.

    Another Scott

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Thanks for the pointer.  He’s based in NC but doesn’t say where they went on vacation or give much of a timeline for some reason.

    Cheers,

    Scott.

  47. 47.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @WereBear: We’ve unbent to the point of eating inside again,

    We don’t dare do that around here. I couldn’t begin to say when we might be able to. With vaccination rates in the 20-30 percentile, it’s gonna be awhile.

  50. 50.

    Another Scott

    @Cheryl Rofer: Excellent.

    I said earlier that I thought she would stay a year before moving on, but I’m glad she’s not waiting.  TNC is also a powerful voice.  They’ll be a great credit to Howard.

    Cheers,

    Scott.

  52. 52.

    NotMax

    @rikyrah

    Lawdy, I detest it when they send up smoke signals and chest beat like that. Don’t prognosticate about it, do it. The proof is in the pudding, not in the cookbook.

  53. 53.

    NotMax

    @NotMax

    Also don’t much appreciate Schiff stealing the spotlight from the chairperson, who by rights ought to be the source of announcements regarding procedures or agenda.

  55. 55.

    ian

    I found this interesting, apparently Netanyahu’s opposition helped to sink a law designed to keep Palestinian spouses from becoming Israeli citizens.

    https://apnews.com/article/middle-east-israel-religion-business-government-and-politics-f99c3aff0368bde00eef634ef42fde7d

    Not to give any credit to Netanyahu, he is quoted in the article as saying he approves the law, but is just using the blockage of it’s renewal as a wedge to sink the current majority, but interesting look at legislation/outcomes in Israeli.  The good news is that Palestinians married to Israeli citizens can begin to apply for citizenship and entry into Israel.

  56. 56.

    NotMax

    @OzarkHillbilly

    Then it falls upon him to make it crystal clear he is speaking on the chair’s behalf.

    I’m afraid Schiff has a surfeit of ’24 in his eyes at this point.

  57. 57.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @OzarkHillbilly: that’s what I was thinking, maybe they’ve decided Schiff is the designated attack dog so that Thompson can be above it all and express his disappointment in the determination of his friends across teh aisle to be partisan. Looking over the membership, he seems the best suited to it, but there are couple of people I’m not that familiar with

    ETA:

    I’m afraid Schiff has a surfeit of ’24 in his eyes at this point.

    which race? Feinstein’s seat?

  59. 59.

    H.E.Wolf

    https://twitter.com/nhannahjones/status/1412399318032695297

     

    https://twitter.com/JoekillianPW/status/1412388863985819653

     

    First link leads to an excellent article on Nikole Hannah-Jones by a Joe Killian, a local reporter in NC who has reported much of the tenure story. Second link is Killian’s compare/contrast report of Hannah-Jones and the wealthy man who blocked her tenure offer.

    Very glad Prof. Hannah-Jones will be at Howard University. Lift every voice!

  61. 61.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @NotMax: Then it falls upon him to make it crystal clear he is speaking on the chair’s behalf.

    I disagree. It is not for me to tell Schiff what he should say or how he should say it. That is between him, the chair, and the rest of the committee.

  62. 62.

    mrmoshpotato

    Biden fell just short of his goal of at least partly vaccinating 70% of adults by Independence Day. As of Friday, 67% of adults had gotten at least one dose.

    Pete should be slapped 70% percent of the time.

  63. 63.

    NotMax

    @OzarkHillbilly

    If, as you posited, he was designated by the chair to be a public voice for the committee, it is somehow not relevant to context to communicate that status?

  65. 65.

    SFAW

    @mrmoshpotato:

    Or 100 percent of the time, but alternate between right and left hands? (I’m a righty, and my left coordination is lousy, so I figure that averages out to 70-75 percent.)

  66. 66.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Albatrossity: Yes, but fear gets harder to sustain over time.  Look what the Right is currently terrified of; a 40c increase in the prices at Chiptole and Critical Race Theory. That’s why the GOP resorting to scorched earth tactics on voting – they are trying to make it so only the most activated of conservatives can vote.

  67. 67.

    SFAW

    @Baud:

    Is that enough to achieve herd immunity?

    Hard to say. Might need to run a double-hand blind experiment, probably for three to six months.

  69. 69.

    Gin & Tonic

    @rikyrah: I took an Amtrak trip home from visiting my grandkids last Wednesday. Friday morning I developed a cold. Really bad. Yesterday morning I thought I was over the hump, but in the afternoon I developed a fever. Went to the urgent care, since everything was closed. Rapid test negative, waiting on the PCR; doc said likely bronchitis. I was fully vaccinated back in February, have been super-careful for a year and a half, was masked on the train, as was everyone else. Still hoping it’s “just” bronchitis, but we’ll see, I guess.

  72. 72.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Peter Baker is the spiritual son of David Broder. When Chait published his book arguing that the Obama presidency was far more successful than is generally credited, he tweeted that he was surprised it got a favorable review from the right-leaning Baker, and I assumed that was based in knowledge of more than PB’s published work.

  73. 73.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @NotMax: To repeat myself: It is not for me to tell Schiff what he should say or how he should say it.

    In fact, as an utter and complete asshole, wholly ignorant of politics, I am the last person to tell them how they should go about getting their message out or what it should be.

  74. 74.

    SFAW

    @Jerzy Russian:

    I need your expert opinion here:  should he be slapped with a fish, and if so what kind of fish?

    Yet another set of experiments needed, to work on that.

  75. 75.

    NotMax

    @Baud

    Herd immunity is not unfettered immunity.

    That distinction seems to be lost on too many in the media and the general public, who cling to the term as some sort of talisman.

  78. 78.

    Betty Cracker

    @H.E.Wolf: Thanks for those links. How unsurprising that a entitled fat cat donor tanked the tenure offer and embarrassed the school. Here’s hoping UNC learned a lesson.

  81. 81.

    Kathleen

    @Betty Cracker: I agree and I’ve been making a distinction between the two on Twitter. When I watched NYT video of the insurrection I marveled at the bravery of those reporters on the scene. ETA Local reporters on WLWT also do a stellar job of reporting local news and their professional demeanor communicates thst they take their responsibility seriously.

  82. 82.

    Redshift

    About 15-20 years ago people would worry journalism would go extinct because the internet made the news free and there was no money to pay journalists. But it didn’t die, it just became a hobby for rich kids who wouldn’t mind being a freelancer in NYC’s priciest zip codes.

    Wow, I was not aware that all news outlets other than the NYT had gone out of business! It is it that all the content for other newspapers across the country is for some reason being written by freelancers in New York?

  83. 83.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Baud: As the transmissibility of the virus goes up, the amount of vaccination needed for herd immunity goes up, since a smaller fraction of unvaccinated can sustain an outbreak.

    And if the variants increase the probability of mild breakthrough infections, that might figure in too, though I think that’s secondary to the effect on the unvaccinated, because these infections probably involve lower viral loads with less chance of onward transmission. The main thing is that if each unvaccinated infectee can infect more people, you need more vaccination.

    And then there’s the question of what the population of interest REALLY is. There’s no magic threshold of herd immunity if all the unvaccinated people tend to hang out with each other in the same places.

  84. 84.

    Geminid

    @ian: Netanyahu and the the opposition are doing what they can to break up the government, in this case with the help of 6 MKs from Arab Joint List. This measure failed 59-59. It was a last minute compromise brokered with Ra’am party leader Mansour Abbas. Two of the Arab Ra’am party MKs abstained. What sank it was the defection of an MK of Prime Minister Bennett’s Yamina party. This MK had very cold feet about entering a government with two left wing Zionist parties, Labor and Meretz, and the four Arab MKs from Ra’am. He voted against the bill.

    The Times of Israel has good coverage of last night’s vote and what led to it, and what the consequences may be. Bennet may have the power to replace the recalcitrant Yamina MK, but I am not sure about this.

  85. 85.

    mrmoshpotato

    @SFAW:

    Or 100 percent of the time, but alternate between right and left hands? (I’m a righty, and my left coordination is lousy, so I figure that averages out to 70-75 percent.) 

    That works too – and doesn’t tire out one hand!

  87. 87.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Jerzy Russian:

    I need your expert opinion here:  should he be slapped with a fish, and if so what kind of fish?

    LOL!  How big are barramundi?

    ETA – SFAW is completely right about needing a slapped-with-a-fish experiment.

  90. 90.

    Geminid

    @PST: I see balloons some mornings on my way into Charlottesville. It seems like a nice thing to do on a summer morning.

    If you start losing altitude, you can aim your phone up.

  92. 92.

    Kathleen

    @debbie: I think fear and hatred go hand in hand. I think James Baldwin offered the most profound statement about the dynamic of racism: ” I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once the hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.”

  94. 94.

    hueyplong

    @Geminid: Back in the 80s, those would have been Boar’s Head Inn balloons.  Landed in our yard twice when having technical difficulties of one type or another.  We were west of town not too awfully far from the horse racing place.

  97. 97.

    Geminid

    @hueyplong:  I come in from  northwest of Charlottesville and have a good view towards Boar’s Head, where I believe the balloons are still based.

    When they landed near you, did you get any champagne?

  98. 98.

    hueyplong

    @Geminid: I didn’t, and I should have.

    Just remembered Farmington was the name of the race track.  We could walk there, though we had to pass areas in which there were bulls, which terrified me.

  99. 99.

    Ken

    @Kathleen: Another version, I think from some science fiction writer, called it “baboon logic”: See the stranger, fear the stranger, hate the stranger, kill the stranger.

  101. 101.

    PST

    @SiubhanDuinne: My wife and I wed on the front porch of a B&B in Calistoga six years ago July 4. We decided to come back and celebrate, so we are floating above the vines.

  102. 102.

    Feathers

    @NotMax: Conversely, it is often preferred to let someone other than the chairperson talk to the media, as the chair can later “clarify” should a change in direction be needed. Schiff is known as a very good communicator, willing to take the heat. It’s why he’s valuable on a committee.

    The opposition is coming from people who are, well, opposed to what the Democrats stand for. What you are missing about  blander language is that it isn’t the words that matter. Even if “same-sex marriage” was the messaging, gay marriage would be what the antis called it. Avoiding the word “gay” would undercut support by making gay seem like something bad that cannot be defended.

  103. 103.

    Geminid

    @hueyplong: Actually, the race track is named Foxfield. It is adjacent to the wealthy enclave of Farminton, though. Farmington is on the north side of 250 West, while Foxfield is on Barracks Road to the north.

    The Foxfield races are still run twice a year. The Hunt Country Store opposite the track now serves up good entrees like Shrimp ‘n Grits, Lamb and Couscous, and Chicken Corden Bleu. Back in the 1980s they put out a good bowl of beans with sidemeat.

  104. 104.

    SFAW

    @mrmoshpotato:

    SFAW is completely right

    You realize you just induced (or nearly so) a cardiac event in uncounted Jackals? [Especially that Ozark guy.]

    ETA: Me, too, for that matter.

  106. 106.

    WaterGirl

    @rikyrah: Living well is the best revenge.  I hope she makes a wonderful life for herself, personally and professionally, and that UNC comes to understand the shame of their corruption, and rue the day that they ever behaved in such a way.

  109. 109.

    Nelle

    @Redshift: My daughter has done this for NYTimes, off and on, for about eight years, but quit a year or so ago.  I was stunned at how often she was asked to find someone (almost always a Trump supporter) to say such and such.  They had a narrative and just needed quotes to support the narrative.  I asked her how often she was asked to find Hillary Clinton supporters and she just laughed.  Mostly, by the end, she was just sending in the quotes and short color observations – everything was written in NYC.

    Over and over, I was appalled by how often the narrative was established before the reporters were sent out (not just the NYTimes).  She had good contacts on border issues and worked with ProPublica and BBC too.  But now, after trying to scrabble along, she’s about done with journalism entirely.

    My son also studied journalism (what can I say?  My grandfather was a writer/editor who was fortunate to escape the attempts by the Reds to arrest him in the 1920’s and get to North America).  But, after an internship at CBS Evening News, he decided he didn’t want the East Coast intensity, that it would be incompatible with the sort of life he intended to have (his dad was/is a workaholic).  He’s totally out of journalism, working in communications for the city.

  111. 111.

    laura

    @rikyrah: I was hoping that she would wait to be offered tenure and then turn it down. I watched the video of students being forced from a hearing and was livid. UNC allowed that pasty male slapdick to interfere and now they can reap the whirlwind. Great things are going to come from Howard University’s new journalism program and UNC can ponder the ignominy that brought down on themselves.

  114. 114.

    Kent

    @Betty Cracker: He didn’t embarrass the school.  They fucking embarrassed themselves.  Every school in the country has rich donors who hover around trying to exert their influence.   Harvard and MIT had Epstein for God’s sake.  The embarrassment is when a PUBLIC school like UNC with…[checks notes] a $8.3 BILLION endowment and $4 BILLION operating budget bends over and assumes the position for a rich donor who bought a building.

    Howard University wins big time here.  I’m guessing within hours of this scandal first hitting the news there were savvy administrators and supporters at Howard looking at how they could capitalize.  Getting Coates is also big.  Just don’t go overboard and get Cornel West.

  115. 115.

    Geminid

    @Miss Bianca: I believe the Foxfield Races are steeplechases, and were perhaps modeled on the Montpelier Races started by Margaret DuPont when she owned James Madison’s farm in the middle of the last century. Ms. Dupont is long gone, but I think her races continue.

    Margaret Dupont was married for a few years to Hollywood star Randolph Scott, who happened to have been born in Orange County not far from Montpelier. I don’t know if you like westerns, but if you do you’d probably enjoy Ride the High Country (1966?), with Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea. It is set in California.

  116. 116.

    syphonblue

    I don’t really think it’s controversial at all to say the Democratic party absolutely needs better messaging. We need our own Frank Luntz.

     

    Or hell, just get Frank Luntz. I bet that asshole will do anything for enough money. He absolutely doesn’t have any principles, just throw a shitload of money at him. (Please note this is a joke, don’t get Frank Luntz)

  117. 117.

    J R in WV

    @Cheryl Rofer: ​
     

    This is how we win. Good people leave the places controlled by racists.

    This is so true. If you can’t recruit and maintain good staff, no matter what you do, you can’t succeed versus organizations with the best people!

  119. 119.

    JMG

    @Kent: As I understand it, the MacArthur Foundation, which was pissed UNC dissed one of its genius grantees, rounded up the Knight and Ford Foundations to raise 75 percent of the money Howard needed to hire the two stars.

  120. 120.

    Kent

    @syphonblue: The problem with Democratic messaging is that there are way too fucking many Carville types who hover around explaining to anyone who will listen that all the Dems need to do is just tone down the social justice stuff so that they can recapture the Bubba vote in the south and all will be good again like in the Clinton days.

    You are NEVER going to out-racist the southern GOP and even trying to do so is just repellent.

    Honestly I don’t think it is really about messaging anyway.  We have good messages.  It’s about controlling the medium.  Which we don’t do.  We live in a sea of Fox News, and Facebook.  I don’t have an answer.  But I’m pretty sure it isn’t that we lack a Dem Frank Luntz.

  121. 121.

    Kay

    I like Alex Pareene. I think he’s smart and genuinely original. I ‘m interested in the “propaganda” idea and think we should try it.

  122. 122.

    SFAW

    @Geminid:

    Margaret Dupont was married for a few years to Hollywood star Randolph Scott,

    And she was great as the foil in all those Marx Brothers films

  123. 123.

    wvng

    @Albatrossity: the problem for Dems is also that the “liberal media” has a both sides compulsion that does not exist in wingnut media. It remains rare to see msm reporting that doesn’t confuse issues by trying to both sides it. The Obama “failing to reach out to republicans” who had clearly stated that they wouldn’t work with him syndrome remains a problem for Biden.

  124. 124.

    Kay

    Amusingly, the top-shelf political ad professionals the political scientists hired to make the ads were “flummoxed by the request,” because no one had ever before asked them to create messaging designed to promote the Democratic Party or to convince people to associate themselves with it. Despite how familiar American liberals are with the power of propaganda when yielded by the right, it has seemingly never occurred to the most powerful of them to do any propagandizing on behalf of their own causes and party!

    I’ve told this story before but I was up front in my office talking to a retired judge who is a Democrat – we were talking about politics. I don’t know which election it was, probably 2016, and he was speculating on whether Republican opposition to Social Security and Medicare would hurt them. After he left one of the women who works up front told me she “didn’t know” Democrats supported Medicaid. Judge said “Medicare” (actually) but she heard “Medicaid”, perhaps because she has a handicapped mother who is on both.
    We’re bad at this. There should not be a single person in this country who hears “Medicare”, “Medicaid” or “Social Security” and doesn’t think “Democrats”.
    We invented these things. How is it possible we aren’t credited with them?

  125. 125.

    Geminid

    @syphonblue: I think Democratic Congressional Chairman Hakeem  Jeffries (NY) is pretty good with messaging generally. And when Jeffries served on the House Democratic Communications Commitee with Cicciline (RI) and  and Bustos (IL), and shaped messaging for the 2018 midterms, Democrats flipped 40 seats, and I don’t think this was a coinicidence

  126. 126.

    Kay

    Here’s the thing too- we collect SO MUCH MONEY.

    We could try things. One could do some of these things on a small scale and see if they work. Take 10% of funds raised and do something experimental every cycle.

    We really have the best problem in the world. We get to figure out how to spend huge piles of money. I personally am not that creative but I am told again and again that liberals are, so let’s see some of that.

    5%. Would you go for 5%? Call it “brand building” if you must, but you don’t even have to name it. You can’t expect 30 year old single moms who work like dogs to suss out what the fuck you stand for and they have NO DUTY to become political junkies. They don’t want to obsess on politics. That’s allowed.

    Run a nice ad telling them about Democrats.

  127. 127.

    SFAW

    @Kay:

    We invented these things. How is it possible we aren’t credited with them?

    20-30 years of Rethugs “working the refs,” i.e. screaming incessantly about the MSM being biased.

  128. 128.

    Geminid

    @SFAW: If you made that joke to Ms. Dupont, she probably would have you served tea sandwiches with the crusts on, and see that you were never invited to Montpelier again.

  130. 130.

    syphonblue

    @Kent: Ehh I think the message is a problem, as well. Just look at Defund the Police. While I wholeheartedly approve of the message, and also want to desperately Defund the Police, it is such an easy phrase to scaremonger and corrupt. Go with something better like Reform the Police. Yes, Republicans are going to twist literally anything the Democrats say/do, but there’s no reason to make it easier for them.

  132. 132.

    Dan B

    @rikyrah: Saw Hannah- Jones interview with Gayle King.  The statement by the UNC Board spokesman was a master class in being an asshole.  Apparently the worst thing that could befall them are their inferiors / lessers is being uppity stepping above your station effectively criticizing and pointing out the hypocrisy of your actions.  It hurts so to share power with the dregs of society.  The spokesman condescension was incandescent.

  133. 133.

    Just Chuck

    @SFAW: Actually once you get the pronunciation, Stiefelvertiefungsehnsucht has a damn nice flow to it.  It’s also a fucking tongue-twister, which I’m sure is deliberate on the part of the Germans who coin these words…

  134. 134.

    Just Chuck

    @OzarkHillbilly: Dollars to donuts Schiff was chosen to make the statement.  When you want to say you’re investigating Republicans, Schiff is already their boogeyman in that area, and it’s because he’s pretty damn good at bluntly laying out the evidence.  May as well not give them more names they can throw around as Evil Partisan Oppressors Out To Get Us.

  135. 135.

    sdhays

    @Kent: Ain’t that the truth. Someone here mentioned the other day that OAN (OAN!) is part of basic cable where they live. Is MSNBC still a “premium” channel? And as liberal as some of MSNBC’s line up is, it’s at best a stretch to consider it a liberal equivalent to Fox News. And this is just cable news. AM radio is wasteland, and regional television stations and newspapers are being gobbled up by right-wing corporations like Clear Channel.

    Conservatives have been flooding the zone for years, and they’re just doing more of it.

  136. 136.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @SFAW: Jaime Harrison has replaced tom Perez, and somebody— the DNC or a PAC is running ads about what Biden has done on COVID and the economy and what he wants to do on climate

    i lm not sure exactly what they say or who’s running them, because like most people I mute or FF flip the channels around during commercials

    i assume they’re running on you tube and such, I know I saw them during the campaign

  137. 137.

    Just Chuck

    @sdhays:

    basic cable

    A thing that is well on its way to joining Blockbuster Video in the world of media delivery.  Maybe Hulu would carry OAN, but I’d lay slim odds.

  138. 138.

    Dan B

    @Kay: I worked for and with a few communications professionals who, even though they were not acquainted, had nearly identical communications strategies for Democrats.  They mostly boiled down to 1. Select and test a few key messages.  2. Repeat until surveys show they’re reaching some target audiences.  3. Identify, train, and groom influences and spokespeople.  4. Get them aligned for the strategic messages.  (Don’t worry about additional messages but repeat the key messages every chance.)  5. Develop progressive media.

     

    They tried to find interest in capital D democrats.  Zero progress and active hostility.  There were many different “reasons” for disinterest and hostility, mostly they didn’t like the tried methods of getting noticed – tawdry…

  139. 139.

    sdhays

    @Just Chuck: My family cut cable back in the early 90’s and I’ve never had it as an adult. Whenever I see what’s available at someone’s house or a hotel, I have absolutely no desire to get access to what is mostly absurdly worthless crap. But it’s still going to be a fairly big thing for a lot people for quite some time.

  140. 140.

    Kent

    @syphonblue: Defund the Police was NOT a Democratic message.  I don’t recall ANY Democrats using that as a message.  Perhaps a few socialist types like Sawant but they are not Democrats.  It was largely a message from the non-Democratic far left that got amplified by Fox and the right.  I’m not sure what you can do about that.  But it isn’t something you can blame on Democrats.

  142. 142.

    Kay

    Imagine an ad about Social Security/Democrats. FDR to start, then every expansion/protection against attack since. Do the same for Medicare.

    Can you imagine if Republicans had invented these things? There would be statues.

    I’m completely shameless so I would do hokey things- a celebration of Social Security’s birthday! “500 million served”, whatever it is.

    People used to bring me the paper Social Security projection statement that was sent out before everything went electronic. They would ask me (in so many words) if it was reliable, from a government agency, projected payment is something they could count on, etc. Like higher income people might look at a 401K statement. That was great direct mail in a way.

  143. 143.

    artem1s

    We Democrats don’t have that kind of transparent pay-for-play benefit to offer — and if we somehow found one, we’d probably no longer be Democrats. All we have is hard work, and the knowledge that we’re on the right side of history!

    A lot of folks can’t understand why there is still so much Clinton Derangement Syndrome so many years later.  Pointing to the usual BS from the GOP and MSM doesn’t quite explain why someone like MoDo would spend so much of her career obsessing over the Clenis and Killary.  What does offer some insights are the funders that Slick Willy got to donate to his campaign and to the party – some large corporate givers for the first time.  It wasn’t pay for play although the GOP and rose twitter would love to believe that. They both had a way of getting folks involved in politics who had never considered donating to political races prior to the 1990s.  The first time I heard the term Wonk, it was in reference to the new brand of college age kid and grass roots activist who treated politics like a calling, rather than a ‘once every four years vote for president’.  I know my political awareness was sparked during that first Clinton campaign for the WH.  And it lead to an awareness of so many other things.

    The Democrats, perhaps for the first time since the Civil Rights Act were playing on a level field when it came to fundraising – and we can pretty much thank the Clintons (not Bernie) for the call to activism that got so many involved and aware of women’s issues, gun issues, health care, and other ways that big money was influencing our laws and regulation.  The Clintons have been the party’s best fundraisers for a long time and they have been incredibly magnanimous when it comes to supporting down ticket races and lawsuits aimed at overturning voter suppression efforts.  The Carters were toxic too until Bill and Hillary replaced them as the latest target of all things horrible that are wrong with America.  Hillary never let the Party throwing her and Bill under the bus repeatedly interrupt her sense of duty to make sure funds flowed to Democratic candidates. Even their rivals who were slinging mud as they were sharing their mailing lists with them.  She and Bill found a way and not only remained Democrats, they brought a lot of people and their dollars with them to the Peoples’ Party – big and small donors.

  144. 144.

    Kay

    Signed Into Law
    On August 14, 1935 President Roosevelt signed the bill into law at a ceremony in the White House Cabinet Room

    Birthday’s coming up. Still time to order a huge tacky cake and get a DJ so our politicians can awkwardly dance.

  145. 145.

    NotMax

    @Kay

    86. May not be the best choice of number to celebrate, as that’s what the Rs want to do to the whole program.

  146. 146.

    Geminid

    @Dan B: I read that in the 2018 midterms the Democratic House Communications Commitee  troika of Jeffries, Cicciline, and Bustos advised candidates to pound two issues: (1) defending the ACA, exemplified by it’s treatment of preexisting conditions, and (2) denouncing the Republican trillion dollar tax giveaway to corporations and the wealthy.

    As mentioned above, Democrats picked up 40 seats that year.

  148. 148.

    Ruckus

    @satby:

    OSA’s leaders and adherents oppose not only abortion, but homosexuality and same-sex marriage, in vitro fertilization, Islam, Covid-19 vaccines and masks. At times, they appear to be opposed to the modern world, railing against public school, women in positions of power, sex before marriage and birth control….

    This is the problem of conservatives, their entire context is to limit change/growth of a nation and limit it to their beliefs that a world that screws people who are the slightest bit different than them is normal and correct. These obviously imperfect people demand that everyone is as imperfect and in the same manner as they are. No one can differ from their imperfect guidelines because that makes them more obviously imperfect. Also it helps them take more of the money so that they feel more perfect. That feeling is massively false.

  149. 149.

    Another Scott

    @Kent: If the Democrats have a good message, but nobody who isn’t a political junkie hears it, does it affect an election?

    When I win PowerBall 3x in a row, one of the first things I’m going to do is buy up a few outdoor advertising conglomerates and get Democratic messages out. One can easily miss OANN, Fox, and all the rest; and giving money to FB and T and Google and Disney and Clear Channel and … just makes them bigger; it’s hard to miss billboards and advertising kiosks…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  150. 150.

    Ruckus

    @NotMax:

    How many of us read a paper newspaper any more? I don’t, and the small city newspaper I delivered as a kid has gone, there used to be several small papers in the numerous smallish cities in the San Gabriel Valley area of socal, all now compressed into one paper.

    Why? Because it became less profitable to print every day, because one can get almost instantaneous news on their computer, phone and TV, 24 hrs a day and because people move more than they used to, so the local news isn’t as important to them. Besides it was mostly local gossip in any event. Even help wanted ads are now useless, and have been for a long time. Now add in ecology issues of hundreds of tons of newsprint that had to be dealt with in one way or another, on a constant daily basis.

  151. 151.

    NotMax

    @Ruckus

    Point is it isn’t only the fishwrap version going bye-bye. Any associated digital presence goes dark as well.

  152. 152.

    J R in WV

    @laura:

    I was hoping that she would wait to be offered tenure and then turn it down.

    I’m pretty sure UNC did finally offer her tenure on a split vote (9-4 or some such figures), and she did turn them down for Howard’s prestigious offer to found a new J school program.

  153. 153.

    Procopius

    @WereBear: Yes, even a “good flu” can kill you. It kills about 30,000 people in a good year, as many as 80,000 in a bad year, and that’s year after year even with widespread vaccination.

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