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Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The fight for our country is always worth it. ~Kamala Harris

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

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

Sometimes the world just tells you your cat is here.

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

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

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

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

This chaos was totally avoidable.

Michigan is a great lesson for Dems everywhere: when you have power…use it!

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

If America since Jan 2025 hasn’t broken your heart, you haven’t loved her enough.

Fundamental belief of white supremacy: white people are presumed innocent, minorities are presumed guilty.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

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

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

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

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You are here: Home / Politics / Politicans / NANCY SMASH! / Saturday Morning Open Thread: Good Sports

Saturday Morning Open Thread: Good Sports

by Anne Laurie|  July 24, 20216:23 am| 270 Comments

This post is in: NANCY SMASH!, Open Threads, Sports

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It was the most unlikely of toasts: Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi raising a water glass to Republican Liz Cheney. But the two political adversaries had a meeting of the minds as the House launches an investigation into the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. https://t.co/Mms5Wa7zzw

— The Associated Press (@AP) July 23, 2021

… Rarely has there been a meeting of the minds like this — two of the strongest women on Capitol Hill, partisans at opposite ends of the political divide — bonding over a shared belief that the truth about the insurrection should come out and those responsible held accountable. They believe no less than the functioning of America’s democracy is on the line.

“Nothing draws politicians together like a shared enemy,” said John Pitney, a former Republican staffer and professor of politics at Claremont McKenna College.

The committee will hold its first hearing next week, and the stakes of the Pelosi-Cheney alliance have never been higher. The panel will hear testimony from police officers who battled the Trump supporters that day at the Capitol. The officers have portrayed the hours-long siege as hardly a gathering of peaceful demonstrators, as some Republicans claim, but rather a violent mob trying to stop Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s election…

========

"He earned it and we’re proud of him." Fans of Milwaukee Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo watched him lead the team to an NBA title, and celebrated with champagne at a small cafe in the Athens neighborhood where he grew up. https://t.co/a5FPzvjsQW

— AP Europe (@AP_Europe) July 21, 2021

With less than a minute remaining in the game, Yiannis Tzikas was already setting out plastic cups to fill with champagne.

“It’s over. No one can turn this game now,” he said, his hands trembling slightly as he popped the cork.

Tzikas runs the Kivotos Cafe, where Milwaukee Bucks star Giannis Antetokounmpo used to grab a sandwich and juice box on his way to basketball practice as a teenager, in Sepolia, an old factory town that’s long been part of greater Athens…

In the dark of early Wednesday, Tzikas opened up to catch Game 6 of the NBA Finals and watch the Greek Freak lead the Bucks to their first title in 50 years, beating the Phoenix Suns 105-98.

Antetokounmpo finished with 50 points, 14 rebounds and five blocked shots and was named the series MVP…

Milwaukee is eight hours behind Athens, Game 6 starting at 4:00 a.m. local time and watched by night owl basketball fans, along with his supporters, friends and old acquaintances in Sepolia. Fans at the cafe sat glumly through the first half as Phoenix led. The crowd came to life as the sun came up…

It’s a few blocks from where Antetokounmpo and his basketball co-star brothers, Thanasis, Kostas, and Alex, grew up with their parents from Nigeria, who gave their four boys Greek names.

Tzikas said Giannis always stops by the cafe when he visits Greece, adding that had not changed with fame.

“He was always simple, humble, and polite and when he grew up, he never forgot where he started,” he said. “He had a lot against him. He was poor and he was a different color than the rest of us and he made it … He doesn’t owe anyone anything, it was all him and his family. He believed in his dream and he made it happen.”…

========

The design firm probably presented a bunch of better ideas and just put this one in to bulk up the presentation. Such is the nature of graphic design. https://t.co/12c3ZCbMk3

— The Hoarse Whisperer (@TheRealHoarse) July 23, 2021

Chief Wahoo replaced by…
I can dig it. pic.twitter.com/OMcHMEU0h1

— Charles P. Pierce (@CharlesPPierce) July 23, 2021

Cleveland's baseball team is being renamed the Guardians, ending months of internal discussions triggered by a national reckoning by institutions and teams to permanently drop logos and names considered racist. https://t.co/5Ox7UCf9fk

— The Associated Press (@AP) July 23, 2021

you don’t have to argue with these people because they are losing.

— World Famous Art Thief (@CalmSporting) July 24, 2021

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Reader Interactions

270Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    July 24, 2021 at 6:27 am

    you don’t have to argue with these people because they are losing.

    There’s not really anything to argue about. They like what they like. They’ll just have to deal with not winning every dispute.

  2. 2.

    Baud

    July 24, 2021 at 6:29 am

    The stories in this reddit thread about people leaving the restaurant industry are interesting. I particularly like this one.

  3. 3.

    raven

    July 24, 2021 at 6:32 am

    Ha 3 on 3 hoops!

  4. 4.

    Spanky

    July 24, 2021 at 6:33 am

    I like Robert E Lee and I like Stonewall Jackson. I don’t like traitors who hate America.

    Ummmm…

  5. 5.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 6:40 am

    @raven: 3×3 hoops is cool — fast and way high energy. I like it.

  6. 6.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 6:41 am

    @Spanky: remember: Stonewall Jackson was fragged.

  7. 7.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    July 24, 2021 at 6:50 am

    @Spanky: Yeah, I was just gonna say there’s a pretty big contradiction between those two sentences…

  8. 8.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 6:51 am

    @raven: 3×3 owes a huge debt to White Men Can’t Jump

  9. 9.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 6:52 am

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR: And that nice lady is an officer in our military!

  10. 10.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 7:01 am

    @Spanky: What unaware idiot said that?

    ETA never mind, found it.

  11. 11.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 7:07 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: How’s the shoulder?

  12. 12.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 7:11 am

    Someone needs to ask Wendy what it is that she likes about the characters on her list.

  13. 13.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 7:12 am

    @Immanentize: Slowly getting better without the “benefit” of American medicine. Unfortunately, I tweaked something in my back getting off the MRI table and now can barely walk 25′ without collapsing to the floor.

  14. 14.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 7:14 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: Oh no!!!!    Concentrate on healing so that you can play with all your grandchildren.

  15. 15.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 7:15 am

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I tweaked something in my back getting off the MRI table

    CALL: SHOW ME THE MONEY!
    Now! Our paralegals are standing by….

  16. 16.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 7:20 am

    @Spanky: I said hmmm at that same spot. Taking up arms against the elected government is pretty much the definition of traitor

  17. 17.

    MattF

    July 24, 2021 at 7:24 am

    Given that around 40% of the electorate is Republican-Trumpist and 10% is on the margin, Cheney is a crucial player. And she despises Jim Jordan.

  18. 18.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 7:25 am

    @Baud: Interesting. The chef in my building quit this week. He has another job lined up. It will probably not shock you to learn that old people can be unappreciative

  19. 19.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 7:29 am

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: you mean like:

    OP1: The food they serve us is terrible!
    OP2: Yes! And such small portions!

    Still one of my favorites….

  20. 20.

    WereBear

    July 24, 2021 at 7:35 am

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Despite a long and until recently, current, tradition of food in my family, I got my first job in the category at 14 (illegal in Florida, natch) and within weeks I crossed it off my “possibles” list.

    Low pay, tyrannical expectations, and zero appreciation. That was my assessment :)

  21. 21.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 7:36 am

    @Baud: I quit my last restaurant job over 40 years ago after going nose to nose with the chef during dinner rush. I don’t remember what started it but at one point he yelled something along the lines of, “There is something wrong with you, boy!”

    I yelled back, “You’re god damn right there is! I can’t take this fucking pressure! It drives me up a wall!”

  22. 22.

    Spanky

    July 24, 2021 at 7:38 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: So you got a job pounding things for a living. Good antedote for pressure. How’s the shoulder?

  23. 23.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 7:47 am

    @Spanky: So you got a job pounding things for a living.

    A job where almost everything can be fixed with the swing of a 24 oz framing hammer. Perfect for me.

    Shoulder is slowly improving.

  24. 24.

    raven

    July 24, 2021 at 8:03 am

    @Immanentize: I ran both a 3 on 3 and 6ft and under league in Urbana. 3 on 3 was fun but 6ft and under was incredible.

  25. 25.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 8:08 am

    @Immanentize: I once heard someone here complain that the portions were too big.

  26. 26.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 8:09 am

    OMG LOL: Anti-marijuana GOP @RepLaMalfa posted video of himself bulldozing cannabis grow operations and flexing his muscles alongside police.

    “I love the smell of diesel power in the afternoon. It smells like victory.”

    https://t.co/krWFaSkO7v pic.twitter.com/WKF9FCR7nZ

    — Tom Angell ??ⓥ (@tomangell) July 22, 2021

    I have to assume he enjoyed a nice cold beer after he was done.

  27. 27.

    JMS

    July 24, 2021 at 8:09 am

    My son has been a big Bucks fan since he was 12 which is weird since we live in the Philly area and have no connection to Milwaukee, but I watched these playoffs with more interest than any since the days of the Bulls when I actually lived in Chicago. If you read up on the backstories of these guys, it’s really a feel good story to see them win. Not a “super team” and with a lot of the basketball establishment underestimating them to the very end. And don’t forget last season when they refused to play after the Jacob Blake shooting, really kicking off NBA and sports activism.

  28. 28.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 8:12 am

    Heh. Hoarse Whisperer is right. Clients always pick the throwaway design rather than the brilliantly executed, time-consuming design.

  29. 29.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 8:16 am

    Bombshell in @politico: An attorney representing a person in the Gaetz case indicates the underage sex trafficking victim has told authorities she had sex with Matt Gaetz when she was 17. (This is the 19th paragraph.) pic.twitter.com/CBbi8gmDOq

    — Roger Sollenberger found true love, suckers (@SollenbergerRC) July 24, 2021

  30. 30.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 8:16 am

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: That’s a problem for me. I grew up in an 8 person household where one could take as much as one wanted but you damned well better eat it all. It’s taken me a long time to learn that I don’t have to clean my plate, but I still do all too often.

  31. 31.

    Ten Bears

    July 24, 2021 at 8:18 am

    Odds on Cheney ’24? The Reasonable Republican …

  32. 32.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 8:18 am

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    I remember sitting with my mother at meals after she’d moved to a longterm care facility. So much kvetching! Even one tiny grain of salt—too much!

  33. 33.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 8:19 am

    @Ten Bears:

    Reasonable by comparison…

  34. 34.

    Argiope

    July 24, 2021 at 8:23 am

    As a CLE-adjacent Ohioan I’m really happy the Guardians were the final decision. Indigenous groups have spent decades outside the ballpark protesting on game days and being heckled by racists. This win is for and because of them. I love the bridge statues that provided the name.

  35. 35.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 8:28 am

    @Baud:

    Some of this sounds disturbingly similar to pressure from the Contessa’s now-multinational employer. She booked well over 3M in travel sales in 2019, and her income is now 15-20% of what it had been. They’re putting some screws in on her going back to mostly commission pay which would be fine EXCEPT that she would lose out on her first commission checks when her travelers begin departing next spring/summer – because she’d have to pay back every month of the small, barely over minimum wage draw between now and then.

    Did I mention that they made her sign a no-compete in 2016? We negotiated some bits of it, but she’d be prohibited direct solicitation of any existing clients – they’d have to find her on their own.

    I suspect that bean counters are thinking that they’ll keep her existing “developed over a 30 year career” base of well-heeled clients, and wouldn’t be sad to lose the payroll.

  36. 36.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 8:29 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: that was my household:

    Take what you want, but you better want what you take.

  37. 37.

    Kay

    July 24, 2021 at 8:33 am

    @Argiope:

    I love the bridge statues that provided the name.

    I do too and I love that they’re the Guardians of Traffic :)

    Delightfully bizarre.

  38. 38.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 8:37 am

    @Immanentize: No sin greater than denying the household it’s rightful leftover nutrients. Ma was actually really good with left overs. A family favorite was “Garbage Stew”, made from all the leftovers in the fridge that by themselves were little more than a few bites, but made a meal when all put together.

    “Mom, this soooo good. You have to make it again.”
    “I can’t.”

    Never the same dish twice.

  39. 39.

    Argiope

    July 24, 2021 at 8:43 am

    @Kay: I was today years old when I learned they were guarding traffic and not the city ?

    Now I love them even more.

  40. 40.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 8:44 am

    @Argiope:

    History of the Guardians. I’d never heard of them, but I like the symbolism. Screw all the trolls on FB and elsewhere, bitching about the change.

  41. 41.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 8:45 am

    On an amusing note, I hate law professors. It’s fun to watch all the dunking on this one.

    It’s a murder, with octopus tentacles.

    https://twitter.com/dnieporent/status/1418643988526125062?s=20

    https://twitter.com/matthews_p/status/1418650937774821379?s=20

    https://twitter.com/AriCohn/status/1418664446441017344?s=20

    https://twitter.com/johnculhane/status/1418666004943675397?s=20

    https://twitter.com/coolbeans1255/status/1418677481570291715?s=20

    https://twitter.com/johnculhane/status/1418699466308259842?s=20

    https://twitter.com/johnculhane/status/1418667560447451140?s=20

    https://twitter.com/johnculhane/status/1418664445392441345?s=20

    This is what happens when the sophist pedants of legal academia crash into working lawyers that actually see the inside of courtrooms in first or second chair.

  42. 42.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 8:45 am

    @Kay: I’m probably the only person here who’s first thought was of the band when reading that.

  43. 43.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 8:46 am

    Your comment is awaiting moderation.
    On an amusing note, I hate law professors. It’s fun to watch all the dunking on this one.

    It’s a murder, with octopus tentacles.

    https://twitter.com/dnieporent/status/1418643988526125062?s=20

    https://twitter.com/matthews_p/status/1418650937774821379?s=20

    https://twitter.com/AriCohn/status/1418664446441017344?s=20

    https://twitter.com/johnculhane/status/1418666004943675397?s=20

    https://twitter.com/coolbeans1255/status/1418677481570291715?s=20

    https://twitter.com/johnculhane/status/1418699466308259842?s=20

    https://twitter.com/johnculhane/status/1418667560447451140?s=20

    https://twitter.com/johnculhane/status/1418664445392441345?s=20

    This is what happens when the sophist pedants of legal academia crash into working lawyers that actually see the inside of courtrooms in first or second chair.

  44. 44.

    RaflW

    July 24, 2021 at 8:50 am

    “They believe no less than the functioning of America’s democracy is on the line.” Only because it’s true. If the Trumpist-authoritarian wave isn’t blocked, soon, this whole shebang may unravel. It’s already incredibly threadbare.

    I can’t abide Liz Cheney in terms of any of her policy preferences. And she’s taken plenty of bad votes, and put up with a lot of the crap that was predicate to where we are. But I’ll grant that she and Nancy do both want to get to the bottom of all this.

    Even if Liz wants this mostly to sweep away her perceived competition, whatever. Get the 1/6 facts before the American people.

  45. 45.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 8:52 am

    @RaflW:

    She’s a disappearing breed: A Republican who puts country over power.

  46. 46.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 8:52 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: Mr DAW and I ask them to split the meal in two, whether in the restaurant or when we carry out. In the restaurant, they’ll bring you half on your plate and half in a carry out bag if you want. That works for us. Because you’re right, if it’s there, you feel like have to eat it .

  47. 47.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 8:55 am

    @debbie: Yeah, and even beyond that, this is a big job. There are two restaurants in the building, with different full menus and specials that change every two weeks.

  48. 48.

    MomSense

    July 24, 2021 at 8:59 am

    The only problem with sleeping in is the caffeine headache.  I need an IV drip, stat.

  49. 49.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 9:01 am

    @RaflW:

    Liz Cheney’s general policy preferences are awful, BUT…

    …I’m of the belief that she doesn’t believe in raw power for power’s sake, and would prefer that her shit come about from a broader consensus. Plus, she’s not stupid, recognized what was being attempted in real time and is neither OK with it or willing to sweep it under the rug.

    It was about invoking that dumb constitutional provision of “contested electoral count, so do it by house delegation”.  It really is a dumb document overall – the sainted Founders(Peace Be Unto Them) weren’t all that bright.

  50. 50.

    rikyrah

    July 24, 2021 at 9:03 am

    Good Morning, Everyone???

  51. 51.

    RaflW

    July 24, 2021 at 9:11 am

    @Spanky: Robert E Lee had to destroy America to save it. Or something. I believe these people actually accept that whole ‘war of northern aggression’ bullshit. And if you believe that, then the Confederate generals were traitors who love America. The racist ‘Merica, of course.

    And that Northern aggression of meaning, “We’re  taking away your ability to steal massive amounts of human labor and hold people in multi-generational, punishing bondage.”

  52. 52.

    MattF

    July 24, 2021 at 9:11 am

    Not, unfortunately, off-topic. In a NYT essay, Michael Wolff says he is certain that TFG will run again in 2024. Mostly in order to punish the disloyal. I find him believable.

  53. 53.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 9:12 am

    I watched a man walk around a grocery store with a cat in a front-facing backpack and I just want to know more about what happens during their day.

    — Elizabeth Hackett (@LizHackett) July 22, 2021

    A few days ago I saw a woman push a baby carriage past my house, and instead of a baby there was a small dog. I couldn’t identify the breed.

  54. 54.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 9:15 am

    I wish I lived in an Art Deco world.

    TBH, The Guardians is much more authentically Cleveland than most jokesters on this website understand

    These four statues–The Guardians of Transportation–are absolute icons in the city and familiar to anyone who has any sort of roots in the area https://t.co/8u0fx9SKI0 pic.twitter.com/vlifF39JjQ

    — josh grubbs (@JoshuaGrubbsPhD) July 23, 2021

  55. 55.

    Jinchi

    July 24, 2021 at 9:16 am

    …. I like Robert E Lee and I like Stonewall Jackson. I don’t like traitors who hate America.….

    Gotta pick one or the other.

  56. 56.

    evodevo

    July 24, 2021 at 9:16 am

    @Baud: ​
      Yep…welcome to the Postal Service, where if you complain or note deficiencies, they pile even more work on your already 12/6 week lol and bitch that you are taking too much time to do the job – and people ask me why I quit last year at the age of 74…

  57. 57.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 9:17 am

    @RaflW:

    I saw some tweet last week where some RWNJ ALMOST got the plot. Best I can remember was some whimpering about how people who make critical statements about certain historic personages and past actions while reacting negatively to the totems and talismans of national pride really hate the idea of America.

    As Jeremiah Wright said, “God Damn America”.

  58. 58.

    Sloane Ranger

    July 24, 2021 at 9:17 am

    I suppose someone’s already pointed this out but, as far as the Wendy Rodgers post is concerned, weren’t Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson “traitors who hate America”?

  59. 59.

    RaflW

    July 24, 2021 at 9:18 am

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: “I’m of the belief that she doesn’t believe in raw power for power’s sake”

    Given who her father is, that can be true and yet not all that comforting. Anyway, I’m glad she’s on the 1/6 panel, and look forward to her continued skewering of Qevin McC, who one can see she has correctly identified as a dumb ass MAGA squish.

  60. 60.

    Nelle

    July 24, 2021 at 9:23 am

    @Immanentize: My dad survived one of now-Ukraine’s infamous famines (not all our family did).  He loved food.  (His last words, after running his tongue over an ice cream bar that i held for him, were “That tastes so good.”).  My sisters and i were never told to finish what was on our plate.  We simply passed our plates to Dad and he happily polished them off (he was a big man of muscle, a carpenter who could outwork most men on the job).  I hadn’t realized how much i assumed that men just did that until i passed my plate to the man i was to marry and he looked at me in astonishment.  “Why are you giving it to me?” he asked.

  61. 61.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 9:25 am

    @germy:

    Pshaw – we’ve got a guy who walks his African tortoise (“Spike”) in a hipster neighborhood downtown here in Louisville. First time I saw it, I did a doubletake – you just don’t expect it.

    https://wkdq.com/nothing-to-see-here-just-a-ky-man-walking-his-tortoise-watch/

    Some dumbass clipped him while rounding a curve a few years ago, but the community rallied to pay for specialty vet care and Spike is fit as a fiddle.

  62. 62.

    Spanky

    July 24, 2021 at 9:29 am

    @MattF: There are already MAGA flags flying in my neighborhood. Big ones, looking like official campaign material.

    Trump 2024

    Take America Back

    No doubt given as I read it – as a threat.

    (Edited to change an unfortunate typo.)

  63. 63.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 9:33 am

    Good sports

    Asked if he is vaccinated, Cowboys QB Dak Prescott: “I don’t necessarily think that’s exactly important. I think that’s HIPAA.” pic.twitter.com/EKYI1t4A5S

    — Michael Gehlken (@GehlkenNFL) July 23, 2021

  64. 64.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 9:34 am

    @Nelle: While I never suffered thru a famine, I was once so poor that leaving crumbs on the table felt like a waste of good food. I still sweep them into my hand and down my throat.

  65. 65.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 9:35 am

    @Nelle: yes, the rules about food in my house were the products of the depression and bad nutrition leading to bad teeth etc., And the Navy where my Dad got his bad teeth replaced!

    To add, my Dad’s family had it somewhat better than many as my grandfather was a butcher and could bring scraps home for stews, etc.

    (Czech famines around WW1, not Ukrainian famines here.)

  66. 66.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 9:36 am

    @Spanky:

    Trump 2024

    Take America Back

    That’s just the usual grifting. I was seeing those flags at roadside stalls back in February.

  67. 67.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 9:39 am

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Another couple took us out on their boat last night. Saw some fucknut with a ridiculous boat with his Trump flag, a giant “Fuck Biden” banner and some other thing we couldn’t make out. So gross….

  68. 68.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 9:39 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: I read that, because of a trick of the election rules, Trump cannot spend any of the money he raised for Trump 2020 or 2024 except on his 2024 campaign. Folks say the test will be after the midterms when he has to declare what is left from 2020 and what had been raised anew.

  69. 69.

    WaterGirl

    July 24, 2021 at 9:41 am

    @Nelle: I was in a support group decades ago where a woman in the group talked of not knowing until she was in college that her father was different from other fathers.

    It wasn’t until she was in college, in a conversation with friends –  when she made some passing reference to her father waking her up in the middle of the night and making her stand in the closet for a few hours before she could go back to bed – that she found out that that was not something that happened to everyone almost every night.

  70. 70.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 9:43 am

    @Immanentize: To add, my Dad’s family had it somewhat better than many as my grandfather was a butcher and could bring scraps home for stews, etc.

    My father was 1 of 10 kids. Gramps managed to keep working through the whole depression (steelworker) but the money had to stretch pretty damned far to keep all those mouths filled. Grams was a wonder with a soup bone (she’d go to the butcher every day and buy whatever was cheapest, often as not a bone). To my old man’s dying day, Home made soup with crusty home made bread was his favorite meal.

    Mine too, now.

  71. 71.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 9:44 am

    Someone at Publix was waiting for the vaccine.  The variant is spreading in  GA, so it was nice to see.   About 3/4s of the customers were masked, also.

  72. 72.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 9:45 am

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: The roadside stalls are the one stop shop for RW assholes and will satisfy their every hateful desire.

  73. 73.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 9:47 am

    @WaterGirl: I think Nelle’s story about finishing dinner remnants is a lot more innocent that your group-mate’s story?

  74. 74.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 9:49 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: My grandfather loved his soup, too! (Add some flour, it’s stew!) He ate soup every chance he could. Even/especially in the summer:

    “Hot things on hot days,” was his saying, I’m told.

  75. 75.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 9:51 am

    @Immanentize: He raised a bunch for the “legal challenges” and I wonder how that is regulated.

    As far as these flags go, I wonder how many of them are actually official trump swag and how many are cheap Chinese Knockoffs (but I repeat myself) bought off the black market. These roadside stalls are literally fly by night operations, never in one place for more than a day or 2. I wonder how often the cops chase them off as opposed to sales quickly dropping off.

  76. 76.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 9:51 am

    @Immanentize: That was my thought also.

  77. 77.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 9:53 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: All his swag is cheap.

  78. 78.

    WaterGirl

    July 24, 2021 at 9:54 am

    @Immanentize: @Nelle:    Oh, absolutely!  Communication fail.

    Without explicitly saying so, I was riffing off the idea that we unconsciously assume that the way we grow up is the way it is for everyone.

    it’s human nature, I think.  Sorry if it appeared that I was saying anything else, or if I appeared to be maligning Nelle’s father in any way.

    I loved the image of Nelle handing her plate to the soon-to-be husband, who was perplexed!

    Sorry Nelle!

  79. 79.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 9:55 am

    @JPL: Hence, the “(but I repeat myself)”

  80. 80.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 9:56 am

    @Sloane Ranger:  Charlottesville’s statues of Lee and Jackson are now in an undisclosed location, pending the city’s decision as to their disposition. I heard a good suggestion the other day: drop them on one of the artificial reefs the state is constructing in coastal Atlantic. These are large statues of the generals atop their favorite horses. I kind of like the image of some grouper, hanging out next to Little Sorrel’s belly.

  81. 81.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 9:57 am

    @germy: These people think HIPPA is a magic word. They don’t have the faintest idea what (or who) the law covers

  82. 82.

    WaterGirl

    July 24, 2021 at 9:57 am

    @JPL: sigh.

    The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place. ~George Bernard Shaw

    I’ll take this as my cue that I should spend today working, not commenting.

  83. 83.

    Jeffro

    July 24, 2021 at 10:00 am

    “cry more and die mad” – LOL

  84. 84.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 10:06 am

    @WaterGirl: No no — it’s just that your story was very creepy. I think I will remember that poor woman for the rest of my days. Was there a reason (or even a guess?) About why her father did that?

  85. 85.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 10:07 am

    @WaterGirl: Not at all.   I remember reading the Lindbergh’s daughter had no idea her father was anti-semetic until she went to college.   I do hope that the person you knew received the help and care she deserved.

  86. 86.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 10:09 am

    Netflix has a series called High on the Hog, which is a fascinating look at the origins of black food.   The first episode is about Benin, and I found the history both fascinating and sad.

  87. 87.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 10:09 am

    @WaterGirl: Why? there was nothing wrong with your comment. Nothing in it was upstaging or denigrating of Nelle’s. In fact I found it… Illuminating and wondered at the history behind why her father would do that. Did he grow up in a really bad neighborhood with a lot of shootings? Did he live thru the London Blitz?

  88. 88.

    Jeffro

    July 24, 2021 at 10:10 am

    @MattF: I can haz GQP civil war then, finally?

  89. 89.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 10:12 am

    ObOpenThread – DW on fake images, videos, GoFundMes about the flooding in Germany. It’s still far too easy for lies and misinformation to spread quickly.

    Fact check: The fake images of the German floods
    https://p.dw.com/p/3xw8X

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  90. 90.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 10:17 am

    Marijuana farmers blamed for water theft as drought grips American west

    Of course it’s those dirty dope smoking hippies stealing the water and not those fine upstanding Amurikan almond farmers. My youngest had a neighboring landlord stealing water from their outside spigot. CJ wouldn’t have minded if the guy had asked and had a good reason, something could have been worked out, but as was his water bills went up a noticeable amount.

    This part cracks me up:

    In 2017, the Brookings Institution noted that news organizations were increasingly highlighting water theft as an issue, but added “water experts, water-focused nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), governments, and communities do not agree whether there is any such a thing as water theft”.

    According to the thinktank, the dispute largely stems from opposing beliefs that water is a basic human right that should be accessible and the idea that it should be priced for sustainability and efficient usage.

    All fine and dandy and I agree entirely, but as long as indivduals have to pay for it by the street meter, it’s theft. And the folks taking it from fire hydrants? Yeah, that’s theft too. Especially in times of drought like now.

  91. 91.

    Nelle

    July 24, 2021 at 10:18 am

    @WaterGirl: No worries!  I saw the linkage.  I make looser connections than most people and that puzzles them.  I took John Muir’s comment about everything being hitched together quite literally.  As it is really true.

  92. 92.

    O. Felix Culpa

    July 24, 2021 at 10:20 am

    @Immanentize: Some parents are disturbed, sadistic and abusive. The child on the receiving end often doesn’t learn just how abnormal that behavior is until adulthood. [Don’t] ask me how I know.

  93. 93.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 10:20 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: They are running their aquifers dry. They are getting to the levels where all sorts of nasty stuff has sunk (both natural, like metals, lead particularly, and man made chemicals.)

    Upside? It will increase the number of caves to dive in 100 years!

  94. 94.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 10:21 am

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I predict they’ll be charging us for air in less than a hundred years.

    People will be lining up for expensive bottles and tanks of purified air.

  95. 95.

    MattF

    July 24, 2021 at 10:21 am

    @Jeffro: IMO, that’s what we are seeing play out in the House. McCarthy has come down hard on the side of the Trumpists, and there is an unknown but non-zero fraction of the R caucus that is feeling homeless. And, as one could have predicted, the hard-core Trumpists have already betrayed him.

  96. 96.

    RaflW

    July 24, 2021 at 10:23 am

    @Immanentize: I worked in London for a time. Our Indian and Pakistani clients had taken up the theory that one should drink piping hot tea on hot days. Neither our office nor any of our clients had a/c, and while London is generally mild, offices would get so dang hot. And we wore wool suits!

    I would politely take a cup, manage a sip or two once it had cooled a tad, and then try to calculate how much I could leave in the cup without offending (I dislike tea, and loathe being hot).

  97. 97.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 10:24 am

    @germy: People will be lining up for expensive bottles and tanks of purified air.

    I smell a marketing opportunity and I don’t even have an MBA!

  98. 98.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 10:24 am

    @germy: They took all the trees
    Put ’em in a tree museum
    And they charged the people
    A dollar and a half just to see ’em

    Big Yellow Taxi

  99. 99.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 10:25 am

    @Immanentize: Yep, all kinds of problems. The Central Valley has a big time problem with subsidence.

  100. 100.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 10:25 am

    Thieves in California are stealing scarce water amid extreme drought, ‘devastating’ some communities.https://t.co/pWRa8L366N

    — Gary Crispin (@GaryCrispin) July 23, 2021

    Their names are Nestle, PepsiCo, and Coca-Cola. https://t.co/WT1Ll8JGme

    — The Opinionated Lab (@OpinionatedLab) July 23, 2021

  101. 101.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 10:26 am

    @RaflW: Science, it seems, is on the side of your hot tea colleagues. But it requires sweat to work….

  102. 102.

    Baud

    July 24, 2021 at 10:26 am

    @rikyrah: Good morning.

  103. 103.

    Nelle

    July 24, 2021 at 10:28 am

    I didn’t sleep when i shoulda but i slept well when i planned to get up in order to beat the heat with an early long walk.  So I’m headed out for a medium, prairie hot walk, and I’ll be thinking of how, when we are children, we assume that the world is akin to our own, particular experience of it.  How right and normal that feels to us through its familiarity.  Growing up is giving up on that myopia.  And we live in a childish nation, insisting on its childhood myths.  MAGA, indeed.  No wonder we are besieged with toddler tantrums in adult size people.

  104. 104.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 10:28 am

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Somebody’s got to make money from all those wildfires…

  105. 105.

    J R in WV

    July 24, 2021 at 10:34 am

    @debbie: ​

    Heh. Hoarse Whisperer is right. Clients always pick the throwaway design rather than the brilliantly executed, time-consuming design.

    That’s why I gave up pro photography. Clients would pick the least good slide on the light table so persistently. I guess the really great photogs just give the client the one shot they feel best about… I always felt like the slide table should be full… Nope!

  106. 106.

    Spanky

    July 24, 2021 at 10:38 am

    @OzarkHillbilly: I remember ca. 1990 or so, hearing someone saying they were getting into selling bottled water and thinking “who the hell is going to buy water in bottles when it comes right out of your tap?” Couldn’t see the market at all.

    And so I’m poor.

  107. 107.

    Matt

    July 24, 2021 at 10:39 am

    Good on Liz Cheney for bucking the party on 1/6, but let’s not lose sight of the fact that she’s still a 100% deplorable on everything else:

    • never met a war she didn’t want to start
    • standard-issue homophobe
    • in favor of first-use of nukes
    • loves TORTURE, for fuck’s sake
  108. 108.

    MattF

    July 24, 2021 at 10:41 am

    OT. This is hair-raising. The CDC is unable to make a prediction about what will happen in the Delta wave within two weeks.

  109. 109.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 10:41 am

    @O. Felix Culpa: I was glad to see that Xochitl Torres-Small has been nominated to be the Depertment of Agriculture’s Deputy Secretary for Rural Development. She seems like someone who can do some good there.

    Torres-Small represented New Mexico’s 2nd Congressional District in the last Congress. She beat Republican Yvette Harrell in 2018 by under 4,000 votes out of 200,000 votes cast. Harrell won last year’s rematch by 20,000 out of 264,000. The NM 2nd covers the southern half of New Mexico, and contains a lot of National Forest land administered by the U.S.D.A.

    Xocitl Torres-Small, 37 years old, was a water rights lawyer before entering public service.

  110. 110.

    OzarkHillbilly

    July 24, 2021 at 10:43 am

    @Spanky: Yo tambien, amigo.

  111. 111.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 10:46 am

    @O. Felix Culpa: I know, but standing in a closet is really particular. I know of a family from Hungary who told their kids to hide whenever anyone came to the door. From the parent’s perspective it wasn’t abuse (although abusive), it was practice.

  112. 112.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 10:49 am

    @MattF: In case you forgot, this is BJ and pretty much everything is OT.

    I’m back to wearing a mask and I’m not alone.   It’s just not worth taking a chance now.

  113. 113.

    rikyrah

    July 24, 2021 at 10:51 am

     

    Elect Shontel Brown #OH11 (@ArrogantNBlack) tweeted at 7:17 AM on Sat, Jul 24, 2021:
    Whew @rolandsmartin preaching this morning on @AliVelshi
    Where are Elizabeth Warren, AOC, Bernie Sanders when it comes time to protest for voting rights? Voting rights are not just a “Black thing!”
    (https://twitter.com/ArrogantNBlack/status/1418908147243233288?s=02)

  114. 114.

    rikyrah

    July 24, 2021 at 10:51 am

    @MattF:

    Protect yourself from the lying unvaccinated?

  115. 115.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 10:53 am

    @O. Felix Culpa: Of course you know who Torres-Small is. I included the biographical information for others.

  116. 116.

    NotMax

    July 24, 2021 at 10:56 am

    Repeated from yesterday, just because this kind of stick-it-to-the-customer garbage gets my goat.

    “Here’s your key, and welcome. Oh yes, one more thing. Will you be wanting light bulbs in your room?”

    Suck rotten eggs, Fort Wayne hotel.

  117. 117.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 11:02 am

    @rikyrah: Nina Turner made a big deal out of a list of policy goals she and Sanders shared, handwritten by the Senator himself. It covered about a dozen issues, including M4A and college loan forgiveness. Not included: women’s reproductive rights, gun safety legislation, and voting rights.

  118. 118.

    L85NJGT

    July 24, 2021 at 11:04 am

    Medicaid expansion – twelve holdout state legislatures are passing on supporting healthcare providers, who are a top three employer in every county in every state. Yet they bend over backwards for some fifty job warehouse with tax giveaways and sketch land deals.

  119. 119.

    NotMax

    July 24, 2021 at 11:05 am

    @germy

    It’s a Privilege to Pee.

  120. 120.

    RaflW

    July 24, 2021 at 11:06 am

    @Immanentize: Aha. Well the dew point is around 73º here this morning, so sweat is useless. But prolific.

  121. 121.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 11:06 am

    @JPL:

    I just got back from weekly errands. So many fewer masked shoppers than last week. ?

  122. 122.

    Baud

    July 24, 2021 at 11:07 am

    @NotMax:

    Will you be wanting light bulbs in your room?”

    “No thanks. I’ll just start a fire.”

  123. 123.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 11:07 am

    @Immanentize: Yup.

    It’s kinda funny though that many of the places that are known for hot beverages do not have especially low humidity. But they aren’t known for wool suits and neckties, either. ;-)

    Their answer, in short: Yes, a hot drink can cool you down, but only in specific circumstances. “If you drink a hot drink, it does result in a lower amount of heat stored inside your body, provided the additional sweat that’s produced when you drink the hot drink can evaporate,” Jay says.

    How does this work? “What we found is that when you ingest a hot drink, you actually have a disproportionate increase in the amount that you sweat,” Jay says. “Yes, the hot drink is hotter than your body temperature, so you are adding heat to the body, but the amount that you increase your sweating by—if that can all evaporate—more than compensates for the the added heat to the body from the fluid.”

    The increased rate of perspiration is the key. Although sweat may seem like a nuisance, the body perspires for a very good reason. When sweat evaporates from the skin, energy is absorbed into the air as part of the reaction, thereby cooling the body. A larger amount of sweat means more cooling, which more than counteracts the small amount of heat contained in a hot beverage relative to the entire body.

    The caveat, though, is that all that extra sweat produced as a result of the hot drink actually has to evaporate for it to have a cooling effect. “On a very hot and humid day, if you’re wearing a lot of clothing, or if you’re having so much sweat that it starts to drip on the ground and doesn’t evaporate from the skin’s surface, then drinking a hot drink is a bad thing,” Jay says. “The hot drink still does add a little heat to the body, so if the sweat’s not going to assist in evaporation, go for a cold drink.”

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  124. 124.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 11:12 am

    @Spanky:

    Did you also pass up pet rocks and canned air? The 1990s were full of that garbage.

  125. 125.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 11:13 am

    @Geminid:

    • Restore the Voting Rights Act and overturn Citizens United.
    • End racist voter suppression and partisan gerrymandering.
    • Make Election Day a national holiday, secure automatic voter registration, and guarantee the right to vote for every American over 18, including those Americans currently incarcerated and those disenfranchised by a felony conviction.

    https://berniesanders.com/issues/free-and-fair-elections/

    I don’t particularly care for Bernie, but he’s not ignoring the issue.

  126. 126.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 11:14 am

    @MattF: That seems to me to be a deeply bad take by Gottleib (sp?).  The COVID infection and hospitalization and death models are all based on certain assumptions.  If you change those assumptions, you will get different results.  That’s what models do.

    The CDC can’t know if governors are going to drop threats of lawsuits about masking and all the rest.  But the CDC modelers know that increased masking and all the rest will cause a dramatic drop in infection rates.

    Gottleib should know better.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  127. 127.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 11:16 am

    @debbie: Delta will be visiting your area soon, I fear.

  128. 128.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 11:16 am

    @Immanentize:

    It sounds like stories I’ve heard about Holocaust survivors and how their experiences affected their children. Inevitable but tragic.

  129. 129.

    frosty

    July 24, 2021 at 11:20 am

    @JPL: Moi aussi. I had a brief 4 weeks or so of going back to normal without a mask, but that’s over for now. It’ll be the same as before, mask inside, no mask outside. Meet someone for a beer if there’s outside seating but don’t go inside.

  130. 130.

    topclimber

    July 24, 2021 at 11:20 am

    @Geminid: You are usually better than this. Nina Turner is on the BJ sh-t list but she has been fighting for voting rights for a long time. Try using the Google machine next time.

  131. 131.

    WaterGirl

    July 24, 2021 at 11:25 am

    @Immanentize:   @JPL:  @OzarkHillbilly:

    We met in a general support group at church for people who were 25-35 years old.  She had been through counseling by then, perhaps ongoing but I don’t recall that detail.

    I believe the technical term for why her father did that was fucked up, controlling, sadistic, creepy, abusive father.  When we met, she no longer had any contact with him.

    We were all horrified to heat that story, as you can imagine, but it was a big deal for her to be able to share that, so the focus was on her.  There was a mom in the picture, but I have no recollection of anything she said about the mom.

    She was pretty okay when we met, as I recall, and was struggling a bit navigating the late 20s and early 30s as we all were, for one reason or another.  For me, it was the end of a relationship.

  132. 132.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 11:30 am

    @Ten Bears: I think the conventional wisdom at this point is that she needs the NWNJs to split their votes for her to win a plurality.  I wouldn’t count her out at the moment – it’s still early.

    [eta:] Oh, you said 2024.  That’s even farther away – who knows if their party even exists then…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  133. 133.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 11:40 am

    @germy: I did not say Sanders was ignoring voting rights. It just wasn’t included in the list he wrote out for Turner, as other people pointed out.

  134. 134.

    Baud

    July 24, 2021 at 11:43 am

    Anyone else disappointed that the U.S. doesn’t sweep the gold medals in the shooting competitions? It’s a little embarrassing.

  135. 135.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 11:45 am

     

     

    @topclimber: See my comment at #132. It was Turner who tweeted about and showed this list of issues written by Sanders in support of her campaign.

  136. 136.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    July 24, 2021 at 11:48 am

    @Baud: I’m gonna guess that most ammosexuals are much too enamored with the fantasies sold to them about firearms by the gun mongers to properly deal with the realities of firearms, e.g. it takes an awful lot of skill and practice to hit exactly what you’re aiming at. An AR-15 ain’t a precision instrument.

  137. 137.

    topclimber

    July 24, 2021 at 11:49 am

    @Geminid: I think your implication was that these issues are not important to her. I apologize if I was wrong about that.

  138. 138.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 11:49 am

    @Baud:

    I think they unfairly limit the number of rounds you can fire. We’re not used to that.

  139. 139.

    NotMax

    July 24, 2021 at 11:49 am

    @Baud

    “Can I move?”

    ;)

  140. 140.

    Citizen Alan

    July 24, 2021 at 11:50 am

    @debbie:  I really don’t think that’s true at all. I think   Liz and the other never trumpers are perfectly fine with a fascist dictator as long as the dictator is one of their people rather than a low class grifter like TFG.   Then again, we did team up with Stalin to beat Hitler after all.

  141. 141.

    JPL

    July 24, 2021 at 11:51 am

    @Baud: ?‍♀️?‍♀️?‍♀️

  142. 142.

    MattF

    July 24, 2021 at 11:52 am

    @Baud: They prolly don’t allow automatic weapons in the Olympics.

  143. 143.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 11:53 am

    @topclimber: No apology needed. Turner and Sanders are basically on the right side of these issues. But they don’t emphasize them like they do the Democratic wedge issues they push as insurgents.

  144. 144.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 11:56 am

    @NotMax:

    Good old Strother Martin. He was the Dub Taylor of Jack Elams.

  145. 145.

    There go two miscreants

    July 24, 2021 at 11:57 am

    @Nelle: …when we are children, we assume that the world is akin to our own, particular experience of it.

    Yep. I still remember how disappointed I was when I found out that not every place had their seasons at the same time we did! (Winter in particular, for some reason.)

  146. 146.

    Citizen Alan

    July 24, 2021 at 12:00 pm

    @Nelle:  I had the exact opposite problem growing up. I attribute my current morbid obesity to the fact that whenever I finished my plate before my parents did, they would dump half of what was on their plates onto mine rather than just let me leave the table early.

  147. 147.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 12:06 pm

    Nothing says “common man of an Appalachian background” more than a Peter Thiel ally wholeheartedly embracing Latin mass….

    https://twitter.com/JDVance1/status/1418595149739872263?s=20

  148. 148.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 12:11 pm

    Good speech by Biden at the Terry McAuliffee event in Virginia yesterday. Sums up everything very well.

    […]

    We have never walked away. And we keep — every administration, we keep moving that needle further and further.

    Look, folks, we’re going to have to go out and win — win this thing, win races up and down the ticket. We got to protect your majority in the House of Delegates. (Applause) We got to re-elect Mark as Attorney General. (Applause.) We got to re-elect Hala as your Lieutenant Governor. (Applause.)

    We got to elect Terry back as Governor. (Applause.) He’s been here before. He knows what to do to. He knows how to get things done.

    Virginia, we did it in 2020. In the battle for the soul of America, the people voted. (Applause.) Democracy prevailed. The Constitution held. We have to do this again. (Applause.)

    I’ve said, time and again, no matter what, you can never stop the American people from voting. And they’re trying like hell. We have to decide. The power must always be with the people. (Applause.)

    Fifty — I promise you this — fifty years from now — fifty years from now, our children and grandchildren will look back and know that it was at this moment America won the 21st century again. (Applause.)

    And it starts now. Virginia, it starts with Terry. It starts with you. (Applause.)

    God bless you all. And may God protect our troops. (Applause.) Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you. (Applause.)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  149. 149.

    Citizen Alan

    July 24, 2021 at 12:11 pm

    @Baud:  Maybe that’s why everyone needs an AR15: because no one has taken the time to learn how to aim properly.

  150. 150.

    mrmoshpotato

    July 24, 2021 at 12:12 pm

    Definitely a basketball jones post.

    Oooohhhh baby oooohhhh oooohhhh oooohhhh

  151. 151.

    WereBear

    July 24, 2021 at 12:13 pm

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: I read that book a while back, and by the end of it I loathed him :)

    But the NY Times didn’t ask ME to write a review.

  152. 152.

    Nelle

    July 24, 2021 at 12:14 pm

    @There go two miscreants: One of the novelties of living in New Zealand for a chunk of years was going from having a spring to an autumnal birthday.  Valentine’s in summer? Easter in autumn?  It made me realize how so much of seasonal metaphor and allusion was Northern Hemisphere based and gave me a small, small smidgeon of a tiny taste of what it may be like to be in a minority in a  culture.  Generalized statements all have an “except” or a “but” to make them true to one’s own experience.

  153. 153.

    Mallard Filmore

    July 24, 2021 at 12:18 pm

    @Ten Bears:

     

    Odds on Cheney ’24? The Reasonable Republican …

    Will she be the last Republican that is NOT in jail?

  154. 154.

    trollhattan

    July 24, 2021 at 12:22 pm

    @germy:

    Super-fancy way of saying “nope.”

    Fuck that guy (which, TBF applies to anybody who’s a Dallas Cowboy).

  155. 155.

    Kay

    July 24, 2021 at 12:29 pm

    Nina Turner was sort of THE voting rights advocate in Ohio as recently as 2014. She was the liberal-side expert at voting rights panels in the state, including one I attended where the chairman of all of the bds of elections for the 88 counties meet annually in Columbus. I would say she probably qualifies as an election process and administration “expert”, if there were a qualification for such a thing.

    This year’s race is all about about voter rights, access to the ballot, reforming the way voting districts are drawn and which candidate is the champion of the electorate.
    “I am running for secretary of state to protect and expand access to the ballot box,” said Ohio Sen. Nina Turner, D-Cleveland. “I believe that the ballot box is the greatest equalizer that we have, where your socioeconomic status, gender, race, ethnicity does not matter. When you go vote you are equal.”

    My view is we’re on new (and less favorable) ground on voting rights. We’ve had some profound losses and there’s now really bad precedent. With the tools we have right now we won’t be able to get it done – we’re going to need really creative thinking and lawyering. I don’t think the new approaches will come out of the DOJ. I think they’ll come from methods and approaches developed by privately-funded advocacy groups but on the bright side I think there’s a lot of passion there and a genuine renewed interest in the sense that it’s now a thorny legal problem to solve.

  156. 156.

    Barry

    July 24, 2021 at 12:30 pm

    @germy: “I have to assume he enjoyed a nice cold beer after he was done.”

    Given right-wing politicians, likely he enjoyed snorting cocaine out of the belly button of a stolen child.

  157. 157.

    scav

    July 24, 2021 at 12:30 pm

    @germy: Ah Dak.  Word order is important.  You necessarily don’t think.

  158. 158.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 12:33 pm

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    One thing that always gets me is that when you look at the comments and “More Tweets” to some RWNJ’s post you are almost always dropped into a mind-bending parallel universe. From the thread you posted:

    Jim Jordan: “Make groceries cheap again.”

    Lauren Boebert: “In a capitalist society, there are doggy daycares and spas. In a socialist society, dogs are food.”

    Dan Crenshaw (responding to Adam Schiff’s “The Republican Party is a shell of its former self”): “We ain’t perfect . . . but your party believes men can be pregnant and ‘real socialism hasn’t been tried.’ So there’s that.”

    WTF.

  159. 159.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 12:35 pm

    Tuckems has a sad. Poor baby.

    After years of lying about me and my family, @TuckerCarlson is losing his mind that I won’t return his calls. Sorry, Tucker, I’m just not that into you. Who knows what lie he’ll tell next? #TuckerTantrum pic.twitter.com/vwX7AfwJ1Z

    — Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) July 23, 2021

    He’ll keep doing what he does until he faces consequences. Good of Swalwell to (finally) recognize that and start shunning him.

    (via Popehat)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  160. 160.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    July 24, 2021 at 12:36 pm

    @Another Scott: Poor Tuckums.

  161. 161.

    Kay

    July 24, 2021 at 12:39 pm

    So you could maybe start seeing new routes explored, like this one:

    Article I
    Section 4
    Clause 1
    The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of choosing Senators.

    We can’t just bring what we had “back”. They cut off or narrowed the well-trod legal routes. The way forward will be different. It could be revitalizing, right? A real challenge.

  162. 162.

    Raven

    July 24, 2021 at 12:39 pm

    Korean TV and bad imagery at the opening ceremony!

     

    https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tv-station-inappropriate-tokyo-olympics-ceremony-captions_n_60fbe7dce4b0d017f834cfff

  163. 163.

    MagdaInBlack

    July 24, 2021 at 12:40 pm

    @Steeplejack: Oh you have to be prepared before you go too deep into those threads, it gets really weird really fast. I find some of the strangest stuff. I learned that both Hillary and Comey have been executed. The tribunals are on going at Guantanamo.

    Whole different reality tunnel

    Eta: “When the going gets weird, the weird go pro” Hunter Thompson (?)

  164. 164.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 12:40 pm

    @Steeplejack: It’s “The Algorithm” trying to push your “Engagement”.  There used to be ways to turn that off, but it’s not showing up for me.  I think I did so with uBlock Origin, but I don’t recall the details.  (I use a browser and don’t have a Twitter account.)

    Nothing like software that intentionally riles up the user, is there??

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  165. 165.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 12:41 pm

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    Also, @Zeddary:

    Just incredible to switch to a rigidly structured, centralized religion in your mid-thirties and immediately start saying “Well, it’s great, but the Vicar of Christ is kind of a soft pinko, yeah?”

    You converted 23 months ago, you dork.

    Daredevil Season 3 has been Catholic longer than you.

  166. 166.

    Kathleen

    July 24, 2021 at 12:41 pm

    @Ten Bears: I think Kasich was hoping to wear that mantle.

  167. 167.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 12:43 pm

    @Raven: Last night, I saw a bit of the US athletes marching in the stadium.  Lots and lots of white faces.  Lots of close-ups of particular white male faces making a show of pulling down their masks and hamming it up for the camera.

    It was infuriating to me.

    I hope the sensible athletes do well and don’t get infected.  But I’m not optimistic.

    :-(

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  168. 168.

    MagdaInBlack

    July 24, 2021 at 12:43 pm

    @Ten Bears: I thought that when she first stepped up.

  169. 169.

    NotMax

    July 24, 2021 at 12:51 pm

    @Another Scott

    Well, you know what they say.

    ;)

  170. 170.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 12:53 pm

    @Another Scott:

    I don’t have a Twitter account and just use my browser. It appears that the “algorithm” tries to populate the “More Tweets” section with things that are (nominally) related to the top post. Usually they’re mildly informative or just plain boring. But with the RWNJ posts they go nuts! I don’t think I’ve ever seen that level of craziness when I’m looking at some far left/​rose Twitter/anarchist/​tankie/​whatever post.

  171. 171.

    Just Chuck

    July 24, 2021 at 12:56 pm

    @Ten Bears:

    Odds on Cheney ’24? The Reasonable Republican …

    “Reasonable” is the very trait that disqualifies her.  Do you see the GOP caucus moving anywhere in the direction of “reasonable” and away from “bugfuck insane”?  They seem to be backpedaling on vaccines, but they’re still about auditing ballots with ultraviolet auras or whatever the fuck.

  172. 172.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 12:57 pm

    It looks like COVID severity is correlated with severity of cognitive effects. Even without long Covid.

    Great. :-(

    LONG COVID THREAD:

    The people running the BBC Horizon "Great British Intelligence Test" challenge on over 80,000 people took the opportunity to see if they could detect any differences by whether people had had covid or not…

    — Prof. Christina Pagel (@chrischirp) July 23, 2021

    (via IamHappyToast)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  173. 173.

    NotMax

    July 24, 2021 at 12:57 pm

    @MagdaInBlack

    Amazing, isn’t it, how flawlessly JFK Jr. in drag can pass for Hillary?

    //

  174. 174.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 12:59 pm

    @Kathleen: If John Kasich runs in 2024, I think he will have to fight Chris Christy for the “reasonable Republican” lane. Maryland Governor Larry Hogan will be trampled by them.

  175. 175.

    Uncle Cosmo

    July 24, 2021 at 1:01 pm

    @JPL: IIRC a Delta Airlines marketing slogan from the previous millennium was

    Delta is ready when you are!

    File that under the heading What goes around, comes around…

  176. 176.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 1:01 pm

    I find that I have no interest in watching the Olympics. There are various programs on various channels at all hours, but I don’t feel like researching and exploring. I need some source to “curate” it all and tell me what’s what. There probably is one, but I’m not that interested. Maybe partially the result of the pandemic damping my interest in sports in general over the last year. Plus no spectators and the games being on the other side of the planet.

    And I think the idea of having the games during the pandemic—especially with some athletes unvaccinated!—is very bad.

    Rambling on: Here in NoVA it’s partly cloudy, 83°, humidity 45%—pretty nice for summer in the DMV. Going up only another degree or two, supposedly. Hotter tomorrow, over 90°. But we’re almost to August, and I have to say that this has been a fairly mild summer so far. Except for (probably) lack of rain. I haven’t been tracking that. But we haven’t had any once-in-a-century flooding or catastrophic firenadoes. ?

  177. 177.

    MagdaInBlack

    July 24, 2021 at 1:05 pm

    @NotMax: ??

  178. 178.

    sab

    July 24, 2021 at 1:05 pm

    @Immanentize: I had never realized that, and I am 67 and have heard about him my whole life. Imm you are an an excellent educator.

  179. 179.

    JMG

    July 24, 2021 at 1:07 pm

    Permanent residents of my Cape Cod town are between 85-90 percent fully vaccinated. Of course, in July-August we are outnumbered 5 to 1 by non-permanent residents, a/k/a “summer people.” In just the last week I have noticed that mask wearing has been on a significant increase both in indoor places like stores and on the crowded main street. Also, last night at the town’s most popular hangout bar/restaurant, the back patio (part of their parking lot) had a one hour wait for tables while the indoor bar and restaurant, while busy, had no wait for a seat/table (unprecedented in summer before the pandemic). Since the median age of permanent residents is 60, we have a lot of careful people.

  180. 180.

    eclare

    July 24, 2021 at 1:10 pm

    @Steeplejack:  A good friend of mine was saying the same about the Olympics.  He usually loves them, watches as much as he can, and he just has no interest this year.

    I think the pandemic has done a lot of damage to our collective mental health.

  181. 181.

    Uncle Cosmo

    July 24, 2021 at 1:10 pm

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR: An AR-15 ain’t a precision instrument.​

    Which is why there’s a setting for a 3-round burst, in hopes your target will at least emulate the Ancient Mariner and “stoppeth one of three.”**

    ** Not, it should be noted, a reference to former MLB first basement Dick Stuart.

  182. 182.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 1:10 pm

    @sab:

    Jackson was shot by accident. Fragging is not accidental. I assumed Immanentize was making a joke.

  183. 183.

    dkinPa

    July 24, 2021 at 1:12 pm

    @OzarkHillbilly: Yikes!  Please take care.  Hope you feel better soon!

  184. 184.

    sab

    July 24, 2021 at 1:18 pm

    @Steeplejack: I very much want to boycott the whole enterprise, but my husband was a track and field star in high school and he is still obsessed with track and field, so here we are.

  185. 185.

    sab

    July 24, 2021 at 1:19 pm

    @Steeplejack: Darn. I wish it was true.

  186. 186.

    Martin

    July 24, 2021 at 1:19 pm

    @debbie: I hate to break it to you but those were from the 70s.

  187. 187.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 1:22 pm

    @sab: Stonewall Jackson definitey was mortally wounded by his own troops at the battle of Chancellorsville. It’s not clear that this was intentional, though. Jackson and staff were on horseback, riding back into the Confederate lines after reconnoitering a line of attack. It was nighttime by then, and Union cavalry had been operating in the area.

    Similarly, Confederate general James Longstreet was badly wounded by friendly fire almost a year to the day later, at the Wilderness battle in a place within a mile of where Jackson was shot. This happened in daylight, but the overgrown thickets of the Wilderness reduced visibility to just  yards outside the few clearings and roads.

    Longstreet survived, and returned to command in time to surrender to his old friend Ulysses Grant at Appomattox.

  188. 188.

    Martin

    July 24, 2021 at 1:23 pm

    @Ten Bears: We should be rooting for that one. Watching the Cheney dynasty fight to the death with the Trumpists cannot possibly have a bad outcome for us.

  189. 189.

    sab

    July 24, 2021 at 1:25 pm

    @Just Chuck: Also too she  is only reasonable on one issue (1/6/2121). On everything else (voting rights, USA forever wars) she is as nutz as the rest of them.

  190. 190.

    Martin

    July 24, 2021 at 1:27 pm

    @Another Scott: Shit, you mean Republicans are going to get even dumber? Like, irrigating the crops with Brawndo dumb?

  191. 191.

    Martin

    July 24, 2021 at 1:32 pm

    @sab: ATM, that’s a big fucking issue, though.

  192. 192.

    Just Chuck

    July 24, 2021 at 1:33 pm

    @sab: Oh she’s definitely an unreconstructed neocon, I have no illusions about that.  But she denies the divinity of The Orange Savior, and that’s enough for them to cast her out.  She can also speak in complete sentences that contain on average less than one conspiracy theory, so there’s also that against her.

    Otherwise we can barbecue her on voting rights.  There’s also the faint hope that being exposed to all those godless libs on the commission might sway her on other issues.

  193. 193.

    Another Scott

    July 24, 2021 at 1:37 pm

    @Martin: Inorite??

    We may get to look forward to millions of Crazy Covid Man (ala Toxoplasma gondii)* if things don’t change.

    * – though that link says T. gondii causing crazy cat ladies is not a thing. :-/

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  194. 194.

    CaseyL

    July 24, 2021 at 1:44 pm

    Cheney’s been grifting and trading on her family name for a long time, was terrible to her sister, and spent most of Obama’s terms actively hoping for a terrorist attack that would “prove” her Daddy wasn’t a war criminal after all.

    It’s very strange to think about rooting for her now.  It’s very strange to try figuring out what motivates her now – but it could come down to two very simple propositions:

    One, successful grifting means being more of a symbiote than an outright parasite.  The modern GQP is outright parasitism that will kill off the host.  The Cheneys want there to be a host still worth grifting off of.

    And two, being Emperor (or Grand Vizier)  is no fun if there’s no Empire worth ruling.

    The idea that there is some abstract, ideal “United States of America” and she is stepping up to protect that ideal… just doesn’t jibe with her history, and her family’s history.

    I mean, I welcome her onto the Jan 6th Committee; I’m glad she’s decided to make common cause with the Democrats on this.

    But I’d use a very long spoon. I’d hire a taster.  And I’d never turn my back on her.

  195. 195.

    Raven

    July 24, 2021 at 1:46 pm

    I love football, the Olympics and THE BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT with the Elam Ending. Screw all you grumpy fucks.

  196. 196.

    CaseyL

    July 24, 2021 at 1:52 pm

    @Another Scott: Ouch.  My Aunt is pretty sure she had Covid – possibly before the pandemic was recognized as such – a mild case, but still; she says her brain fog has not lifted.

    Thanks for sharing that thread.

  197. 197.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 1:59 pm

    @Geminid: Regrettably, I learn most of my history from historical fiction or drama. As I was reading your comment, it occurred to me that there aren’t many recent novels set during the Civil War. Hm. Maybe there are some about women spies during the war? I guess I’ve missed whatever there is.

  198. 198.

    Haydnseek

    July 24, 2021 at 2:00 pm

    @Uncle Cosmo: I remember Dick Stuart well, and loved his nickname – “Dr. Strangeglove.”

  199. 199.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 2:02 pm

    Interesting thread from @Rschooley:

    Indoor masking in a brutal surge is only controversial because the people that refuse to get vaccinated don’t like it. It’s nuts.

    Government officials are doing a lot of tap-dancing to avoid saying that “no masks necessary for the vaccinated” rule failed because the anti-vaxxers are liars.

    The decision to resume indoor mask mandates is being treated as a political hot potato when that call should be easy and the actual urgent debate at this point should be about wide adoption of vaccine passports.

    Ashley Mandelkehr: How could anyone imagine they wouldn’t lie in the first place?

    RP Noonan: That’s what I’ve been saying! They kept talking about using the “honor system.” WTF evidence do we have, from the past 18 months, much less the past five years, that we are capable of using an honor system? It was all horseshit. They were afraid the unvaxxed would revolt.

    As for myself, I carry a mask and wear it inside most places (grocery store, usually). I always check the staff to see what they’re doing. In a lot of places they’re still masked. I assume that some percentage of the unmasked customers are unvaxxed lying shitbirds, and after a year it’s not a big deal to wear a mask, so why take a chance, especially with the delta variant looming? I have indulged in occasional sit-down meals in restaurants, but at non-peak times of low traffic (during the day, no dinners). But I am okay with easing back on that if circumstances warrant.

    I worry about my niece and nephew returning to school in a month or so. Nephew (age 5) will be starting kindergarten, and niece (6½) will be starting first grade. I think in Arlington County (VA) they will wear masks, but I’m not sure. And of course any close collection of kids and teachers is going to be a potential hot spot. Plus I haven’t seen any information about whether the delta variant might affect kids more than “regular” COVID.

    We’re not out of the woods yet, not by a long shot.

  200. 200.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 2:05 pm

    @Steeplejack: If people aren’t worried enough about COVID to get vaccinated, they’re sure not worried enough to wear a mask. And yes, I assume they’d lie. Why not

    ETA: Actually they usually don’t even have to lie. No one asks them if they’re vaccinated. They just stroll on in without a mask

  201. 201.

    Kay

    July 24, 2021 at 2:05 pm

    Nathan Bernard
    @nathanTbernard
    · Jul 23
    The state lawmaker leading Maine’s Covid denier movement is now deathly ill with COVID. He refused to wear a mask inside the state house and frequently claimed Covid was an overblown hoax before catching the virus.

    The refuse-to-wear- a- mask in the workplace people are the absolute worst, IMO, because the people they’re infecting have to be there and have to work with them.

  202. 202.

    MomSense

    July 24, 2021 at 2:14 pm

    @Kay:

    He’s an asshole.

  203. 203.

    JoyceH

    July 24, 2021 at 2:14 pm

    @MattF: ​
     

    OT. This is hair-raising. The CDC is unable to make a prediction about what will happen in the Delta wave within two weeks.

    But not particularly surprising. The last time we had a surge, it was a milder variant and there were a variety of mitigating protocols in place – masking, social distancing, remote work, etc. This is a much more transmissible variant, and it showed up just as those mitigating strategies were being cancelled nationwide. And it looks like we lack the national will to reimpose any of those protocols, and haven’t vaccinated enough people to make up the difference. And when the unvaccinated catch Delta, it tends to be a much rougher illness too. This could very well turn out to be as bad as January. Brought to us courtesy of the GOP.

  204. 204.

    Steeplejack

    July 24, 2021 at 2:16 pm

    @Kay:

    Comment: “Tested negative for sympathy again today.”​

  205. 205.

    JoyceH

    July 24, 2021 at 2:16 pm

    BTW, not sure if you folks have seen this – anti-maskers protesting outside a breast cancer clinic.

    https://www.vice.com/en/article/pkbxmg/breast-cancer-patient-attacked-anti-mask-protest?fbclid=IwAR007AfIYkJMG8TJ7TKRr1_pjyvJewz2iutV4DndFLJyZWHG_2H_L42DAaM

    I don’t have the words to express how much I hate these people.

  206. 206.

    mrmoshpotato

    July 24, 2021 at 2:18 pm

    @Kay: I have no sympathy.

    1. It’s a fucking piece of cloth!  Would we all like to not wear them?  YES!  I also want 600K+ men, women and children to still be alive in the US.  I also would’ve liked having a President running the Executive branch for the past 4 years, but 63 million Trump humpers and at least 78000 selfish, shithead children made that impossible.
    2. There are not 1!, not 2! BUT 3 VACCINES AVAILABLE!
  207. 207.

    Just Chuck

    July 24, 2021 at 2:21 pm

    There were anti-maskers in 1918 as well.  Wonder what Wilson did with ’em.

  208. 208.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 2:22 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: William Safire made journalist and political influencer Anna May Carroll a principle character in his civil war novel Freedom. Carroll was a Marylander, a poorer relation of the wealthy Carroll family. She was an active pampleteer, and an early advocate of the offensive up the Cumberland and Tennessee rivers that won the Union control of Kentucky and most of Tennessee in the spring of 1862. Before the war, Carroll had been active in the American (Know Nothing) party, which in 1860 dissolved itself in favor of the new Republican Party.

    Even though Safire’s book covers only events from Fort Sumpter to the issuing of the Emancipation Proclamation January 1, 1863, it is quite long. The author researched a couple of dozen real participants, and came up with a good book that is well worth reading if one has the time..

  209. 209.

    JoyceH

    July 24, 2021 at 2:27 pm

    @Just Chuck:

    There were anti-maskers in 1918 as well. Wonder what Wilson did with ’em.

    I don’t know, but when Typhoid Mary repeatedly refused to follow the simple instructions that the medical authorities gave her (‘lady, do NOT get employment as a COOK!’), they quarantined her – for the rest of her life.

  210. 210.

    dnfree

    July 24, 2021 at 2:29 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Having the staff split it is a good idea.  Long ago I read the advice to cut your meal in half (or whatever proportion seems appropriate) before starting to eat.  It makes a difference to decide up front and then only eat that amount instead of mindlessly eating the whole thing, or most of it.  Plus, free meal later!

  211. 211.

    JMG

    July 24, 2021 at 2:29 pm

    There is no realistic way to get vaccination totals up to what’s needed except sanctions on the unvaccinated. No, you can’t eat in here. No, you can’t get on this plane. Most of all, no, you can’t work here. Will people howl? Sure. Will they comply? Almost all of them. At the restaurant last night, I saw a table of young women all carded by a bouncer. None complained, nobody thought it exceptional. Make it the same for proof of vaccination. I saw that deBlasio urged NYC employers to enact vaccination mandates. NYC has what, a workforce in the hundreds of thousands? Why doesn’t he do it?

  212. 212.

    MomSense

    July 24, 2021 at 2:32 pm

    @mrmoshpotato:

    I’ve been wrestling with whether my complete lack of sympathy means I’ve become a terrible person.  Fuck if I know, but the reality is that the anti maskers and now anti vaxxers are not just hurting themselves.  They are willfully and knowingly putting us all at risk.  They can all go to hell.  This is about survival.  I guarantee you that a big part of their calculation, at least here in Maine among the Republicans, was that somehow their white, rural asses were immune and they were happy that they thought this was afflicting mostly people of color.

  213. 213.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 2:39 pm

    https://www.propublica.org/article/dont-you-work-with-old-people-many-elder-care-workers-still-refuse-to-get-covid-19-vaccine

    They are two sisters in two states. Both are dedicated health care professionals who watched in horror as COVID-19 swept through the nation’s nursing homes, killing a staggering number of residents and staff alike.

    One sister is now vaccinated. The other is not.

    “Dude. Get vaccinated!” Heidi Lucas texted her sister Ashley in May from her home in Jefferson City, Missouri.

    “Nope lol,” Ashley Lucas texted back from Orbisonia, Pennsylvania.

  214. 214.

    JoyceH

    July 24, 2021 at 2:40 pm

    @MomSense:

    I’ve been wrestling with whether my complete lack of sympathy means I’ve become a terrible person.

    I’ve decided I don’t care if I’ve become a terrible person in this instance. When people are harassing CANCER PATIENTS for wearing masks, eff em, I say. When one of these COVID-denying ‘influencers’ catches it and dies, all I feel is grim satisfaction.

    I’ve got a tee shirt that says, “I’ve stopped fighting my inner demons. We’re on the same side now.”

  215. 215.

    mrmoshpotato

    July 24, 2021 at 2:43 pm

    @MomSense:

    the reality is that the anti maskers and now anti vaxxers are not just hurting themselves.  They are willfully and knowingly putting us all at risk.  They can all go to hell.  This is about survival. 

    Yeah.  And you could potentially be killing someone else because this virus is, now sit down for this, contagious!

    And then there’re the friends and family affected even if only your maskless, vaxless ass dies.

    I guarantee you that a big part of their calculation, at least here in Maine among the Republicans, was that somehow their white, rural asses were immune and they were happy that they thought this was afflicting mostly people of color.

    Same mentality expressed in that recent Faceberg post from that Alabama doctor who COVID-19 patients were begging for the vaccine.  COVID-19 doesn’t care about your pasty ass skin.

  216. 216.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 2:47 pm

     

     

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: William Safire’s novel Freedom that I commented about above came out in 1987. I’ve probably read a dozen civil war novels published since, but none were very good I thought. There probably are good ones out there I haven’t run across.

    There are a lot of good history books written about the Civil War in the last 150 years, though. Grant’s Memoirs is one of the best. It covers his childhood, and his adult life up until the end of the Civil War. Grant’s Memoirs are well written, and you really get sense of the man who wrote them.

  217. 217.

    germy

    July 24, 2021 at 2:51 pm

    @mrmoshpotato:

    “They cry. And they tell me they didn’t know. They thought it was a hoax. They thought it was political. They thought because they had a certain blood type or a certain skin color they wouldn’t get as sick. They thought it was ‘just the flu’. But they were wrong. And they wish they could go back. But they can’t. So they thank me and they go get the vaccine. And I go back to my office, write their death note, and say a small prayer that this loss will save more lives.”

    https://www.al.com/news/2021/07/im-sorry-but-its-too-late-alabama-doctor-on-treating-unvaccinated-dying-covid-patients.html

  218. 218.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    July 24, 2021 at 2:54 pm

    @germy:

    OF COURSE the antivax sister is a CNA. I’ve yet to meet the CNA that doesn’t think that they run the hospital, that they’re smarter than the RNs and MDs, that their medical knowledge is greater in all instances.

    My attitude on them generally runs to “that’s nice, now go wash out that bedpan”.

    This one is on facilities that don’t insist on vaccinations and daily testing. They should be shuttered.

  219. 219.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 2:55 pm

    @Geminid: I appreciate the Safire suggestion.

    My niece lives right by the Gettysburg battle field, and her husband (James Hessler) is a docent. He’s written a couple of histories of the battle which I thought were pretty good, particularly the one about Sickles.

  220. 220.

    MagdaInBlack

    July 24, 2021 at 2:56 pm

    @MomSense:  I admit there is a part of me that is very much ” I got mine, fu.”  towards those folks. Not impressed with that in myself, but there it is.

  221. 221.

    tybee

    July 24, 2021 at 3:05 pm

    @Raven:

     

    34 days to go

  222. 222.

    Elizabelle

    July 24, 2021 at 3:09 pm

    @Kay:   I hope Satan calls Maine politician Chris Johansen (R-Stupidity and Selfishness) home.  No tears, no particular concern for him.

    Nor for this fool.  The late Stephen Harmon, dead at 34 in a COVID ward.  Militant to the last.  Member of the Hillsong “church”, whose founder says vaccines are a personal choice.

    AP:
    California man who mocked COVID-19 vaccine dies of virus

    Three days before his death, Harmon tweeted: “If you don’t have faith that God can heal me over your stupid ventilator then keep the Hell out of my ICU room, there’s no room in here for fear or lack of faith!”
    Before his hospitalization, Harmon had made fun of vaccination efforts on social media.

    “I got 99 problems but a vax ain’t one,” he said in a tweet last month.
    On July 8, he posted: “Biden’s door to door vaccine ‘surveyors’ really should be called JaCovid Witnesses. #keepmovingdork.”

    Congratulations on your Darwin award, Stephen.  FWIW, he was a person of color.  Recklessness comes in all shades.

  223. 223.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 3:09 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier is set in Civil War times. But it’s more a “The Night they Drove Old Dixie Down” white person story than a Civil War story.

    By the way, people who say that T.J. Jackson’s shooting by his own troops was an ‘accident’ are the same Southern myth makers involved in the lost cause narrative like Shelby Foote. No one knows for sure why Jackson was shot, because we don’t know who shot him. But we do know he was a self-righteous religious, harsh Calvinist, proselytizing bastard who regularly belittled first his students at VMI and then his troops. I think today we would call him a sociopath.

    And the myth making around his alternate nickname, “Old Blue Light” makes me want to holler.

  224. 224.

    Uncle Cosmo

    July 24, 2021 at 3:12 pm

    @Haydnseek: In his Wiki entry you will find that some modestly literate sportswriter (probably more literate than whoever was writing op-eds at the time) dubbed him “The Ancient Mariner” because “he stoppeth one of three.”

  225. 225.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 3:13 pm

    @Steeplejack: I pretty much follow the path you are on. Where I live — the vaccine rate is high! Nearly 80% of those able to do so. But when I go into a grocery store like the Stop and Shop and 90% are not wearing masks, including the staff, I know someone is lying.

  226. 226.

    Elizabelle

    July 24, 2021 at 3:15 pm

    @Steeplejack:

    I assume that some percentage of the unmasked customers are unvaxxed lying shitbirds,

    I like the way you talk.  They are exactly that.

    Why do we need to tiptoe around them, and treat them with such respect when trying to discuss vaccines, when they clearly don’t care if they put everyone they come in contact with at risk?

    Public health is public health, and an honor system does not work.  Deal with it.

  227. 227.

    JoyceH

    July 24, 2021 at 3:18 pm

    @Immanentize:

    But we do know he was a self-righteous religious, harsh Calvinist, proselytizing bastard who regularly belittled first his students at VMI and then his troops. I think today we would call him a sociopath.

    He did seem like a mighty unpleasant person. And yet, there is a black church in Winchester with a stained glass window dedicated to him. Lovely pastoral scene, with Jackson’s last words: “Let us cross over the river and rest in the shade of the trees.”

    The church was founded after the Civil War by the descendants of the slaves Jackson taught to read. Not that he was anti-slavery, just a religious fanatic who thought that everyone ought to have the ability to read the Bible. And yet – the gift of literacy, not to be sneezed at.

  228. 228.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 3:18 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Thank you for the suggestions. I keep meaning to spend some time at Gettysburg. I’ve only stopped there once, travelling from Virginia to Cortland County New York. But I think I just need to stay near there overnight and spend six hours on the battlefield. It’s about four hours away from me.

  229. 229.

    JoyceH

    July 24, 2021 at 3:21 pm

    @Elizabelle: ​
     

    Why do we need to tiptoe around them, and treat them with such respect when trying to discuss vaccines, when they clearly don’t care if they put everyone they come in contact with at risk?

    Public health is public health, and an honor system does not work. Deal with it.

    The Post had an article about how the public is ‘losing patience’ with the unvaccinated. Good, if you ask me. If these people had just masked up when they were supposed to and got the shot as soon as they were eligible, we’d be past all this by now, back to normal by early summer and on our way to righteously vaccinating the rest of the world.

  230. 230.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 3:23 pm

    @JoyceH: Winchester where?

    I agree, any gift is a great thing, especially the gift of literacy. But gift giving is not the same as living as a good person.

    ETA, I think that dying statement might be apocryphyl as well, as a created yet much needed statement of faith regarding a scary loss to Southerners during the middle of the war. Like Lee’s supposed statement that Jackson lost his left arm but that he (Lee) had lost his right hand. But Jackson certainly was a man of his type of faith.

  231. 231.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 3:30 pm

    @JoyceH: I think people trying to do right by themselves, their families, coworkers, and strangers even are just about fed up being told we have to tolerate and listen to the anti-vaxxer/maskers.

    I know I am. My givashitter is broke on this issue.

  232. 232.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    July 24, 2021 at 3:32 pm

    @Immanentize: I’m increasingly suspicious of much of the scant Civil War knowledge that’s managed to lodge in my brain. Frex, somewhere I picked up the idea that Grant was a drunk. I’m doubtful.

    The lack of Civil War fiction is interesting compared to the flood of WWII novels. There are so many right now that one of my book clubs picked on for next month and I’m not sure I can force myself through it.

  233. 233.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 3:38 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: We were told in school Grant was a drunk! Brilliant General sometimes, but what a lush!

    Grant was no teatotaler, and drank, and his administration was as corrupt as any and more than many.  But the Grant was a drunk narrative was part of the Southern (and Northern) push to stop, then undo, reconstruction and federal intrusion in the Treasonous states. And look how successful loser propaganda was!

  234. 234.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 3:40 pm

    @Kay:

    I never thought I could be unsympathetic to a dying person, but this is where the country is now.

  235. 235.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 3:43 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: WWII novels:

    The Naked and the Dead,
    Catch 22,
    Slaughterhouse-Five, and
    The End of the Affair.

    What more novelization does one human need regarding WWII?

  236. 236.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 3:45 pm

    @Geminid:

    I read his memoir for a paper in college and surprised myself liking it (and him) so much.

  237. 237.

    James E Powell

    July 24, 2021 at 3:50 pm

    @Geminid:

    I would really like to get New Mexico’s 2nd district back in 2022. Does anyone have any insight on that race?

  238. 238.

    JoyceH

    July 24, 2021 at 3:50 pm

    @Immanentize: Whoops, I was wrong, it’s in Roanoke. The 5th Avenue Presbyterian, which is NOT on Fifth Avenue.

    As for the dying words, I thought it was more a matter of delirium than a statement of faith, thinking he was still back in the saddle leading troops rather than dying in a bed.

  239. 239.

    Elizabelle

    July 24, 2021 at 3:59 pm

    Wait for it.  The late Stephen Harmon, COVID denialist who died of it …

    lived in Corona, CA.

    https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2021/07/23/hillsong-church-stephen-harmon-dies-covid-19-unvaccinated/

    Died of an extremely preventable disease.  WTG, dude.

  240. 240.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 4:02 pm

    @JoyceH: Yeah, the whole quote sounds like delirium, except for the last, come to the alter, line. I have no doubt he had an unpleasant final week. Did you ever read the very odd letter he wrote to his wife about the hanging of John Brown? He was there because he was teaching at VMI then, which is where they hung the body of John Brown.

  241. 241.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 4:06 pm

    @Immanentize: Ullysses Grant drank enough whiskey to be an average army officer in this respect.

    I remember reading a Union officer’s account of meeting Grant one night during the Battle of the Wilderness. The officer was visiting a pre-war friend who was now a medical doctor in the Army of the Potomac. Their conversation was interrupted when Grant walked into the tent. Without a word, the doctor poured Grant a large cup of whiskey. Grant downed it and left, probably to get some sleep. The officer chanced to meet Grant after the war, and reminded him of their first encounter. “Ah yes,” Grant replied, “I don’t think I ever needed a good drink of whiskey as I did that night!”

  242. 242.

    Immanentize

    July 24, 2021 at 4:10 pm

    @Geminid: I believe Grant was right.

    To add — the amount of spirits soldiers and sailors drank in the 18th and 19th century was staggering. But, especially the sailors, how else could one bear that work?

  243. 243.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 4:12 pm

    @James E Powell:  I know that New Mexico Democrats will control redistricting this year, and are expected to try to make the 2nd District more winnable by a Democrat.

  244. 244.

    A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)

    July 24, 2021 at 4:14 pm

    @WaterGirl: Wait, WHAT?!?

  245. 245.

    trollhattan

    July 24, 2021 at 4:20 pm

    Digby posts this tale of marriages going south because spouses have decided the vaccine is evil incarnate. A couple snippets:

    Among other delusions, Shane is now steadfastly convinced that the COVID-19 outbreak was orchestrated by government-allied forces, the coronavirus is no more harmful than the flu, and the vaccines alter recipients’ DNA — condemning them to slowly perish.

    Shane also believes that those who’ve been vaccinated can “shed” deadly toxins onto unvaccinated people in their vicinity. He fled the house when one of Lucy’s vaccinated adult sons from her previous marriage came to visit around Memorial Day of this year. Since returning more than a week afterward, he has confined himself to the basement and insisted that Lucy’s children never come back, lest they “shed.”

    He still doesn’t know Lucy is immunized; she hides her vaccine card in a safety deposit box.

    “Everything fell apart last year,” said Lucy, who also snuck her mother out to get her shots behind Shane’s back. “I don’t even know who he is anymore.”

    …

    He wasn’t always like this. Hannah, 38, met Rick when she was a senior in high school. He was four years older, and at six-foot-two, he towered over her with more than a foot between them. She liked his blue-green eyes and the way he dressed, like he was in a boy band. They married a few years later and now live on the West Coast with their two daughters, who are 9 and 5. Both received all of their regular childhood vaccines and annual flu shots — until the pandemic hit.

    That was when Rick, like so many other Americans, suddenly decided the coronavirus shots contained secret location-tracking microchips and were designed to kill people en masse. When his wife mentioned that she was planning to get vaccinated, he threatened divorce.

    “Not only does he not want me to get [the vaccine], he wants me to tell everyone I know not to get it,” said Hannah, who secretly got her Pfizer shots on her way to pick the girls up from day care in April and May. “I sat there thinking to myself, ‘I guess I’m getting divorced.’”

  246. 246.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    July 24, 2021 at 4:33 pm

    @debbie:

    I just got back from weekly errands. So many fewer masked shoppers than last week.

    I think I’m starting to see more people mask up

  247. 247.

    scav

    July 24, 2021 at 4:40 pm

    @Elizabelle: Looks like his Lord and Savior is better at shutting down hard Covid-denialists and Propagandists than Twitter or The Book of Faces.

  248. 248.

    CarolPW

    July 24, 2021 at 4:50 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Last Saturday my grocery store had about 1/4 of staff wearing masks and maybe half of the shoppers. Today all staff and the majority of shoppers were wearing masks. Our vaccination rate is low and case rate high (eastern Washington). I mask even at the outdoor farmers market.

    At the ER a week ago a guy and his wife came in and I heard her say the urgent care place sent him over because his blood oxygen was 80% and all I thought was fuck you and I was happy I had on a N95 mask. Evolution in action.

  249. 249.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 4:50 pm

    @Immanentize: In the 1920s, British stategic theorist and historian W. H. Fuller wrote a very good book about Grant, The Generalship of U.S. Grant. Fuller dedicated the book to the youth of America, that they could learn from Grant’s moral example. Fuller is the only Grant biographer I’ve read who did not (gingerly) treat the question of Grant’s drinking. Fuller surely knew the stories, but he gave them no countenance. Fuller himself had probably drunk his share of whiskey as a British Army officer.

    I believe that Grant’s reputation as a hard drinker came from an incident in the early 1850s, when Grant was stationed at a California post. His superior was incensed to see Grant tipsy one day when the soldiers were mustered for pay, and said he would put Grant before a court martial. Grant’s brother officers told him he would beat the charges. But Grant really missed his wife, and his children who were growing up without him. Between the hazards of the journey and the high cost of living in California, Grant could not bring them out. So he resigned his commission, borrowed money*, and returned to the Midwest.

    The “Old Army” was a gossipy place, and Grant’s reputation may have caused some problems for him early in the Civil war. On several occasions, a senior officer or a War Department official was assigned to Grant’s command to check him out. Two of them, General John McPherson and Assistant Secretary of War Charles(?) Dana, became Grant’s biggest advocates once they got to know him.

    * The man who lent Grant $100 for his trip home was fellow officer Simon Bolivar Buckner. Grant was finally able to repay the money when he captured Buckner at Fort Donelson in February, 1862.

  250. 250.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 4:59 pm

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    You must live in a smart part of the country. Here, it will only get worse. Sports is back and they’re in one section of downtown, with tons of people milling about. Lose-lose.

  251. 251.

    Matt

    July 24, 2021 at 5:07 pm

    @Sloane Ranger:

    The Lee & Jackson fanboyz consider “MERIKA” and “white supremacy” the same thing, so no.

  252. 252.

    karen marie

    July 24, 2021 at 5:15 pm

    @Immanentize:   I’m pretty sure the exact phrase is “take all you want but eat all you take.”

    My mother was a complete bitch when it came to food, and she only had three kids.  I’m 63, and to this day I have trouble believing I deserve to eat.

  253. 253.

    Jackie

    July 24, 2021 at 5:20 pm

    @CarolPW: I think I’m in your neck of the woods (Tri-Cities.) I went to Costco early this morning and saw about a dozen kids under 12 ALL UNMASKED! I saw exactly one child wearing a mask. Staff and seniors were wearing masks while a good 90% of the younger customers were maskless. I was stunned – given our region’s Covid numbers are going up rapidly.

  254. 254.

    Kathleen

    July 24, 2021 at 5:24 pm

    @Geminid: For some reason Kasich started playing Kinder Gentler Republican well before he left office. I always felt he saw something in those tea leaves. I didn’t think there were any other Rethuglicans who take that lane.

  255. 255.

    Kathleen

    July 24, 2021 at 5:25 pm

    @Martin: They’re already there with the Brawndo.

  256. 256.

    James E Powell

    July 24, 2021 at 5:28 pm

    @Jackie:

    Whenever is see or hear Tri-Cities I think of SCTV, serving Melonville & the Tri-City Area.

  257. 257.

    James E Powell

    July 24, 2021 at 5:29 pm

    @Kathleen:

    Kasich is an a hole of the first order, but he refused to attend the RNC in his own state because he cannot stand Trump.

  258. 258.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 5:30 pm

    @Martin:

    It’s all a blur…

  259. 259.

    Jackie

    July 24, 2021 at 5:34 pm

    @James E Powell: LOL! When my daughter lived in TN, I used to fly from Tri-Cities, WA to Tri-Cities, TN. That was always weird.

  260. 260.

    CarolPW

    July 24, 2021 at 5:37 pm

    @Jackie: Specifically Richland. Yokes early this morning was fine. Fred Meyer’s has been crap. I’m contemplating going back to curbside pickup for most things, and Bisket likes it better because she doesn’t get left in the car alone.

  261. 261.

    Mousebumples

    July 24, 2021 at 5:47 pm

    Thanks for the Giannis article. It wasn’t one I’d seen yet. I think he’s amazing, though I know I’m more than slightly biased as a huge Bucks fan. ???

  262. 262.

    Elizabelle

    July 24, 2021 at 6:11 pm

    @Mousebumples: and now we are all huge Mousebumples  fans.

    Yes.  Giannis sounds like a great guy.

  263. 263.

    Elizabelle

    July 24, 2021 at 6:16 pm

    @scav: Praise the lord.

  264. 264.

    karen marie

    July 24, 2021 at 7:16 pm

    @debbie:   Oh, come on.  You don’t actually believe that, do you?  Cheney is merely doing what’s best for Cheney.  If she thought she could profit from doing something else, that’s what she’d do.  It’s merely coincidence that her interests align with those of the country

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:   People are really tying themselves in knots to make Cheney seem like an upright person rather than the opportunistic weasel that she is.  Amazing.

  265. 265.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 7:22 pm

    @Kathleen: If Chris Christie runs, he won’t present himself as kinder and gentler, but rather as a tough-minded realist ready to move on from trump. The former guy wants to freeze the field, but Christie may break the ice when he announces.

    It’s hard to see Christie beating a more conservative field. But he could run well in blue states like New York, and they get their delegates. I can see Christie winning in Virginia, my state. Virginia has open primaries, so independents will get their say.

    As for red states, Cristie was a consistent supporter of trump as president, so he would not be anathema like Liz Cheney if she runs (I don’t think she will even if she holds on to her Congressional seat next year).

    Christie may not even run. But Chris Christie seems to believe in Chris Christie, and I think he will.

  266. 266.

    James E Powell

    July 24, 2021 at 7:47 pm

    @Geminid:

    Christie is going nowhere. He went nowhere the first time because the majority of the right-wingers will never forgive him for being nice to the black president who was delivering aid to his state.

  267. 267.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 8:27 pm

    @James E Powell: Water under the bridge-gate.

    More seriously, you may have a longer memory than the typical Republican voter. A lot has happened since Sandy, and a lot more will happen by 2024. Next year will tell us a lot. I think that the fate of Cheney, and that of midwest impeachers like Upton (MI), Meijer (MI), Kinzinger (IL), and Gonzales (OH) will tell us something about the direction of the party, at least outside of Dixie.

    And the overall result in next year’s general elections will be consequential in Republican politics. If they do well, they’ll keep running hard-right candidates. A setback may induce some desire to change course. It will probably take more than one losing cycle for the party to come around, though.

    That’s fine with me. As long as we can keep Republicans from stealing elections, I think Democrats are well positioned to hold Congress and the Presidency for the rest of this decade, and the radicals who have the upper hand in the Republican party are going to help.

  268. 268.

    debbie

    July 24, 2021 at 8:58 pm

    @karen marie:

    Disagree. I don’t like her, but I’m happy for anyone who speaks out against the GQP.

  269. 269.

    Geminid

    July 24, 2021 at 9:55 pm

    @debbie: I don’t much like Liz Cheney’s politics. But I’m glad Lynn and Dick Cheney did not raise their daughter up to be another Lindsey Graham.

  270. 270.

    columbusqueen

    July 24, 2021 at 10:16 pm

    @Geminid: Ron Chernow deals with Grant’s drinking in his recent bio, & argues Grant’s efforts to control his drinking was a sign of his inner strength & character. It also shines a light on Grant & Sherman’s friendship; they came to rely on each other for help with their mutual depression issues.

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