Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The lights are all blinking red.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

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

Peak wingnut was a lie.

There are a lot more evil idiots than evil geniuses.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

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

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Trump’s cabinet: like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

One of our two political parties is a cult whose leader admires Vladimir Putin.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Dumb motherfuckers cannot understand a consequence that most 4 year olds have fully sorted out.

Petty moves from a petty man.

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

I’m more christian than these people and i’m an atheist.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

You are here: Home / Music / Monday Morning Open Thread: Examples for Us All

Monday Morning Open Thread: Examples for Us All

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Per the Washington Post:

… Parton, who is estimated to have earned millions of dollars in royalties for writing the song in 1973, revealed this week how she spent her money from the songwriting credit for Houston, who died in 2012: She invested in a building located in a historically Black Nashville neighborhood.

“I bought my big office complex down in Nashville, and so I thought, ‘Well, this is a wonderful place to be,’ ” Parton said Thursday during a wide-ranging interview on Bravo’s “Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen.”…

Parton purchased the 6,317-square-foot Mission-style complex in Nashville in February 1997, according to property records. David Ewing, a longtime Nashville historian, told The Washington Post that Parton’s investment came when many recording artists did not look toward the Sevier Park neighborhood, now known as 12 South, to set up their businesses.

“We’re just hearing now, because of the Black Lives Matter movement, how down for the cause Dolly has always been — even when others in the music industry weren’t,” Ewing said. “Dolly Parton could have built and bought any piece of property in Nashville. But you would have to have gone out of your way to buy in the 12 South neighborhood, because no Realtor would have shown Dolly that lot to buy.”

At the time, the neighborhood was “African American funeral homes, businesses and churches,” Ewing said. Now, 12 South is one of the hottest neighborhoods in Nashville, he said.

“But it really kind of all began to be put on the map when Dolly quietly invested in the area,” Ewing said…

Country music legend Willie Nelson led more than a thousand spectators in singing “vote them out” Saturday from the steps of the Texas Capitol during a rally wrapping up a four-day march in support of Democratic state legislators who bolted for Washington two weeks ago to block GOP-backed voting restrictions…

The march began Wednesday and ended Saturday when participants walked up to the doors of the Texas Capitol building in a rally sponsored by activist group Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival. It was led, in part, by Beto O’Rourke, the former Democratic congressman and presidential candidate who has not ruled out a run for Texas governor in 2022. Earlier this week, O’Rourke and marchers shut down the frontage road of Interstate 35 during the morning rush hour, funneled between restaurants and cut a path from Republican-controlled statehouse districts to Democratic ones…

… On beam, however, Biles’s routine does not include many twisting elements. Her eponymous dismount is a double-twisting double tuck, but even if she chooses to perform a simpler skill instead, she could still be a medal contender. For Biles, this routine might be less about a medal and more about ending her time in Tokyo on a positive note…

After Biles received a flood of encouragement and empathy on social media, she tweeted, “The outpouring love & support I’ve received has made me realize I’m more than my accomplishments and gymnastics which I never truly believed before.”

In the qualifying round, Biles earned the seventh-highest score on beam (14.066) after she took several steps backward out of her dismount. Even with that mistake, Biles’s mark was fewer than two-tenths of a point away from the third-highest score. At the 2016 Games, Biles won a bronze on beam in addition to four golds in other finals. She is a three-time world champion on the apparatus. Biles will compete in the final alongside teammate Sunisa Lee as the gymnastics competition in Tokyo concludes.

During all of the individual finals, Biles has cheered from the stands with the other U.S. Olympians who weren’t competing. Lee won the all-around gold medal and a bronze on bars, and MyKayla Skinner, a close friend of Biles, earned a silver on vault. Skinner thought her gymnastics career had ended a week before when she didn’t advance to any finals, but Biles’s withdrawal opened up a spot in the medal competition that Skinner filled as the alternate.

“She’s just been so awesome the last couple days,” Skinner said. “After everything she’s gone through, it’s really cool to see how strong she’s being.”

Reader Interactions

96Comments

  5. 5.

    Geminid

    Willy Nelson hit the right note with “vote them out.” It’s always good to run on a positive policy platform, and I expect Texas Democrats will next year. But “turn the rascals out” can be a potent rallying cry. Voter suppression measures offend all but the most partisan Republicans. These, and the perilous state Republican leaders left Texans in during February’s freeze, will produce anger among Texans that Democrats can tap into next year.

  8. 8.

    Low Key Swagger

    A local Progressive I know commented that Dolly’s purchase was really just gentrification.  Not sure what to do with that, except it would have happened anyway, since builders here will throw up a building on any patch of grass they can find.  Anywhere.

  10. 10.

    debbie

    …even when others in the C&W music industry weren’t wouldn’t ever, ever support anything by those people.

    Fixed.

  11. 11.

    NotMax

    While TCM’s “Summer under the Stars” has long since passed its sell-by date, will mention that this Thursday (6 a.m. through to 6 a.m. Friday, Eastern time) is movies with Margaret Rutherford (of varying quality, needless to say, though she’s never a minus). Includes a real odd duck, one of those betwixt and between movies which can’t decide what it wants to be, an antic vehicle for roustabout Frankie Howerd or a trifling mystery, The Runaway Bus at 5 p.m. on the 5th (also includes a young Petula Clark).

  15. 15.

    Baud

    @Low Key Swagger:

    I think gentrification requires displacement of traditional residents.  Not sure if that’s the case here, but mere investment doesn’t cut it.

    ETA: Autocorrect is kicking my ass this morning.

  18. 18.

    Low Key Swagger

    @Baud: Well the article said that prior to the purchase, the neighborhood consisted of African American businesses, funeral homes (why the distinction?  It’s also a business) and churches.  You may well be right about displacement, I’m just quoting the article.

  20. 20.

    Low Key Swagger

    @satby: Let me be clear that this person did not frame this in a altogether negative way.  She asked the question, and I think it’s fine to discuss how investors tend to swoop in, buy everything in sight, and raise rents to a level that drive poor working folk out.  As I said, it would have happened, eventually, regardless of Dolly’s actions.

  21. 21.

    Low Key Swagger

    @Baud: Well, I don’t go there much (hell, I don’t go anywhere much) but it is a trendy neighborhood now.  Restaurants I wouldn’t like, specialty shops I wouldn’t frequent.  But it is completely transformed.

  22. 22.

    Kay

    Historically segregated blocks of Philadelphia saw crime rates drop by nearly 22% after even just a single home on the block received city-funded repairs, according to research from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania.
    Published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the research found that when a home got a structural fix such as a roof rehab through Philadelphia’s Basic Systems Repair Program, total crime dropped by 21.9% on that block. As the number of repaired houses on a block increased, instances of crime fell even further.

    It’s because people move back in once the houses are repaired, so the houses are no longer vacant.

    They’re starting to look at whether the increase in murders (shootings, really) in the last two years are due to the pandemic-induced cessation of all of the anti-crime measures that are NOT just “throw more funding at police”. Apparently a lot of the community-based programs were paused during the pandemic, and that might have contributed to the uptick in murders.

  23. 23.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    Fascinating.

    The 1992 crime bill has become somewhat infamous, but IIRC a part of that bill involved community based crime prevention measures.

  24. 24.

    germy

    Last year:

    If a little Hillbilly singer like my big sister Dolly can invest in the vaccine then why the hell can’t some of you old moldy politicians pitch in a few million yourselves? I noticed you started getting vaccinated right away while people are starving and dying you Aholes.

    — Stella Parton (@StellaParton) December 19, 2020

    I haven’t heard of one Televangelist donating one damn cent to the research fund but they sure can fleece the flock and try to cast out demons when they are possessed themselves!

    — Stella Parton (@StellaParton) December 19, 2020

  26. 26.

    Cermet

    First we find out she had helped with the mRNA vaccine development, and now this investment in helping revitalize an African-American neighborhood.  She is an absolute treasure.

    Dolly once remarked she’d like a three-way with Jennifer Anderson … well, I don’t know Anderson but I do know a Jennifer (my girlfriend. ) So I’d certainly be willing and I know my girlfriend would love the chance, as well.

  29. 29.

    Baud

    Caelab Dressel seems like a really nice guy.  I hope we don’t find out later he’s a Trumper.

  32. 32.

    satby

    @Low Key Swagger: Parton bought the building in 1997, almost 25 years ago. Been a couple of boom/busts in real estate since then. But speaking as a person who has lived in mostly poorer /working class neighborhoods most of my life, anything that helps improve the value and living conditions in them is mostly welcomed by people there. We point out that people in small towns in red states are angry when their lives and towns seem devalued because no one wants to live there,  so why is making an urban area a place where people want to live and work a bad thing? As long as there’s provision made for lower income housing for current residents who might be priced out of the market, which has been lacking for renters.

    I wish someone would gentrify the abandoned house across from me where I feed the ferals. The ceilings have started to fall in in the front rooms.

  33. 33.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Right and they wouldn’t have a baseline because the programs have been around so long- to see the effects you’d have to pause them. So shootings “would have been up 10%” (perhaps) w/out the programs and we got that experiment. They’re personal contact intensive – “high touch” – so a pandemic would make the whole approach impossible.

  36. 36.

    rikyrah

     

    What I am most bitter about today?
    The dispatches from the Children’s Hospitals around the country that are filling up with children who are COVID infected and couldn’t get the vaccine. My rage knows no bounds when I try think about them. When I realize that, even if they make it through, CHILDREN
    CHILDREN
    Could be inflicted with life-long COVID symptoms.?

  37. 37.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    to see the effects you’d have to pause them.

    We should thank Republicans for advancing the cause of science.

  39. 39.

    raven

    I got a lot of helpful feedback last night when I posted that we were thinking about adopting a dog. After great input from the jackalariat we deduced 1. we need a smaller dog, 2, we need to wait until after a mid-sept wedding that we could not take it to, 3. we’re going to foster a doggie that’s in a vet right now

     

    Holy shit I just found out this little thing was in the paper last week for being extremely, and I mean extremely, abused.

  42. 42.

    satby

    @Baud: The 1992 crime bill has become somewhat infamous, but IIRC a part of that bill involved community based crime prevention measures.

    It did. It’s how I became a Vista volunteer, during the Summer of Safety push to establish community policing Chicago.

  45. 45.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Woohoo! Washington County made the front page of the STL Post Disgrace:

    In this rural Missouri county, the vaccination rate is low and opposition high

    As the coronavirus has picked up pace in recent weeks, she is among only 23% of Washington County residents to be fully vaccinated, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. That’s among the lowest county vaccination rates in Missouri, where just 41% of the population is fully vaccinated.
    ………………………
    On Wednesday, the large sign in front of the health department didn’t mention the vaccine was free and available, Monday through Friday at 520 Purcell Drive. Another sign out front by the road advertised a farmers market that’s meeting every Wednesday in a nearby pavilion.

    Mark Stevens, 46, was over there, selling sweet corn, watermelons, green beans and tomatoes out of the bed of his pickup. He wouldn’t walk across the parking lot to get a COVID-19 vaccine.

    “You’d have to drag me dead or alive,” said Stevens, who’s 6 feet 2 inches, weighs 340 pounds and throws around a lot of other numbers he’s gleaned from Newsmax, a conservative cable network and website. Stevens said he watches less of Fox News since it started leaning too far left.

    “Why trust your life in the hands of an administration that lies about everything,” he said as one of many reasons why he’s not getting vaccinated.

    Exhibit A, he said, was the presidential election results, followed by lots of hypocrisy. “(President Biden) supports abortion. … Your body, your choice. But he wants to make us get the vaccine?”

    Debbie Boyer, one of his customers, said she got vaccinated after her sister-in-law died from COVID-19. Now, she’s having second thoughts. She’s upset with the priorities of the federal government championing vaccination while ignoring other hot-button issues.

    “They are so afraid of COVID, yet the border is open,” she said. “Are they vaccinating those people? No. They are letting them go anywhere they want. It’s not that I am this dead set Trumper. It’s that this is so blatantly in your face.”

    “We’ve got half of America that agrees with us,” Stevens said.

    Home sweet home.

  47. 47.

    germy

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    “They are so afraid of COVID, yet the border is open,” she said. “Are they vaccinating those people? No.”

    And she’d be angry if they did.

  49. 49.

    raven

    @rikyrah: This is new ground. I think I’m glad I didn’t realize this pup was the one in the paper when we decided to give it a whirl. The person placing her works closely with my wife on the dog parade and it really committed to pet issues (she’s also a law prof).

  51. 51.

    Immanentize

    @rikyrah: He is doing great! ? Thanks.

    Next Sunday or Monday we are setting off on our road trip from Boston to Houston to get him (and my old car) back to college. I’m looking forward to it!

  55. 55.

    Low Key Swagger

    @satby: I don’t disagree, but “As long as there’s provision made for lower income housing for current residents who might be priced out of the market, ” is a heavy lift and rarely happens.  In my rural community, I’ve seen this again and again.  Affordable rentals are bought up by builders/investors.  House is torn down, nicer house is built.  Rents tripled.  We have trailers renting for 1000 a month.  Not even nice trailers.  I haven’t lived in an urban area for quite some time, so I don’t have any first hand observations, but yes I do tend to believe that proper investment in a neighborhood as a whole would indeed be welcomed by most residents.

  56. 56.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    It’ll be nice if they get some credit- if the reduction in crime over the past two decades was partly due to their slow, steady neighborhood level work rather than the “one neat trick” explanations of lower blood lead levels or “broken windows” policing.

    The much-maligned midnight basketball may make a comeback :)

    Our juvenile delinquency is way, way up. I thought it would be. They don’t have anywhere to go so they get into trouble. People bitch about public schools sports funding but even if they’re not stand out players it keeps them busy and they need to stay busy. I can’t wait until they ramp up the whole list of after school programs again. They were missed.

  66. 66.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Baud:

    ETA: Autocorrect is kicking my ass this morning. 

    Autoincorrect never sleeps.  It just waits patiently, then BAM!

  70. 70.

    Betty Cracker

    It’s somewhat amazing that Dolly Parton’s spouse has managed to stay so resolutely out of the spotlight. I watched a documentary about her recently. (Maybe on Netflix? Can’t remember…) Anyhoo, it suggested that he’s always been very supportive of her career and is happy to hang out with Dolly’s celebrity friends when they visit, but he wants nothing to do with the spotlight himself, and she supports him in that. Good for them!

  72. 72.

    Suzanne

    @Low Key Swagger: My neighborhood seems to be on the upswing a bit, and I don’t think everyone is happy about it. It is a historically Italian and working-class neighborhood, and there are still a few long-timers. My neighbor across the street is an old man, speaks next to no English, and maintains his property immaculately. However, two doors down, there’s another longtime family who has let their detached garage fall into terrible condition. It’s probably a fire hazard and we’ve seen animals in it. Anyway, the neighborhood is becoming simultaneously more middle-class with more professionals, and more diverse, with a small-but-growing Latino population and Muslims. Property values are going up and the business area is changing to hip restaurants and yoga studios and video gaming. Our neighbor two doors down is not happy about it. He’s an asshole. But as these houses get improved, there is going to be more pressure on him to clean up his property or leave. I don’t want to drive anyone out, but I also want him to clean up his shit.

  75. 75.

    zhena gogolia

    @rikyrah:

    JL Cauvin did a funny bit on that, but since I’m being accused of being mentally ill for linking to him, I won’t.

  76. 76.

    zhena gogolia

    @Baud:

    News flash, all you society rejects, full of rage; Trump lost the election by 10 million votes. Sleepy Joe beat his a** hands down. Grow a pair and get in line and get the F**k over yourselves!— Stella Parton (@StellaParton) August 1, 2021

  78. 78.

    Kay

    Jane Mayer has more of (her usual) great work on the continuing threat to election systems:

    Many experts on democratic governance, however, believe that efforts to upend long-settled election practices are what truly threaten to rip the country apart. Chad Campbell, a Democrat who was the minority leader in the Arizona House of Representatives until 2014, when he left to become a consultant in Phoenix, has been shocked by the state’s anti-democratic turn. For several years, he sat next to Karen Fann when she was a member of the House, and in his view she’s gone from being a traditional Republican lawmaker to being a member of “Trump’s cult of personality.” He said, “I don’t know if she believes it or not, or which would be worse.” Arizona, he added, is in the midst of a “nonviolent overthrow in some ways—it’s subtle, and not in people’s face because it’s not happening with weapons. But it’s still a complete overthrow of democracy. They’re trying to disenfranchise everyone who is not older white guys.”

    The Big Money Behind the Big Lie. Viewing this as “fringe” is incorrect, IMO. This is the majority of the Republican Party and they have serious financial backing. The warnings should be taken seriously.

  80. 80.

    Kay

    Richard Hasen, a law professor at the University of California, Irvine, and one of the country’s foremost election-law experts, told me, “I’m scared shitless.” Referring to the array of new laws passed by Republican state legislatures since the 2020 election, he said, “It’s not just about voter suppression. What I’m really worried about is election subversion. Election officials are being put in place who will mess with the count.”

    Richard Hasen is not generally considered to be an alarmist. He’s like..an election law nerd :)

  81. 81.

    Low Key Swagger

    @Suzanne: Can the neighbor afford to fix that garage?  If so, and they just don’t do it, I would think the city would eventually fine them or make them tear it down or repair it.  Could be wrong tho.

  82. 82.

    Another Scott

    @Betty Cracker:

    MY MAN: (comes home)
    ME: (nervous) how was the store
    MY MAN: fine
    ME: oh thank g —
    MY MAN: ran into jolene
    ME: oh no
    MY MAN: she mentioned you left kind of an intense voicemail

    — Rob Dubbin (@robdubbin) July 28, 2019

    (via Popehat)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  83. 83.

    glory b

    @Baud: It absolutely did, job training, and anyone remember midnight basketball? It was part of keeping activities available for longer periods of time, giving younger people something to do in a controlled environment.

    One of the worst things that happened in 2016 was the demonization of the crime bill, PEOPEL WHO LIVED IN THOSE NEIGBORHOODS WANTED IT! DEMANDED IT! Russian bots did more harm than a lot of us realize by telling young black people to teach Hillary a lesson and refuse to vote. A lot of our media betters (Eddie Glaude, Michael Harriott, etc.) got caught up in that.

    I was so disappointed that the MSM didn’t report on the actual history of the bill. Also, hanging it around Hillary’s neck (who was the first lady at the time) and ignoring that Sanders actually voted for it, along with the vast majority of the Congressional Black caucus. Too many blacktivitsts acted like it was used to just round up and throw into jail a bunch of black people.

    I am old enough to remember that our neighborhoods were like war zones, getting the crime rate down did A LOT of good for us.

    Also, the economic improvements wrought by Clinton increasing taxes on rich people. I remember companies doing job fairs at prisons, the guys in there got educations and they were telling them to come get hired when they got out.

    The crime rates dropped exponentially after it was passed. I remain infuriated, especially in light of the things Allan spoke of earlier.

     

    Have I had too much coffee today? Maybe…

  84. 84.

    Another Scott

    ObOpenThread – CNN:

    (CNN)If you’ve been watching the Olympics this year, you may notice an unfamiliar abbreviation, ROC.

    It stands for the Russian Olympic Committee, and it’s essentially a loophole that allows Russian athletes to compete in the Olympics while their country is banned from the Games because of its doping scandal.

    There are some specific rules the ROC has to follow to make clear it is not representing the country of Russia.

    Oh.

    Well that seems perfectly sensible and fair and not corrupt at all. //

    (sheesh)

    Cheers,
    Scott.
    (“Who is probably the last person here to notice this.”)

  85. 85.

    gvg

    Gentrification is complicated. If a historically black neighborhood has depressed values, then the residents don’t have an asset to finance moving for better opportunities, or retirement or give their kids a stake. They can only hang on and they are trapped. They also don’t have equity and banks can’t make loans against a valueless property. It’s a trap.

    If the neighborhood has decent values, then the owners can make normal choices which does mean take the money/profit and move somewhere cheaper or more expensive their choice. That inevitably means after a while, some different people will live their than before. also if values go up, so do property taxes. This means fixed income people may need to move.  The thing is, that happens everywhere, and is normal background in say a white middle class neighborhood. You need to keep that in mind when reacting to the word gentrification.

    It is a problem if their is a physical limit to houses and a larger number of people who desire to live their such as New York City or San Francisco. It can be made worse by out of date building codes and plans. Only building high end houses causes problems too. I believe they are more profitable for the builders, but we need all levels of house.

  86. 86.

    Low Key Swagger

    @gvg: Yes to all of this.  It is a very complicated issue and I like discussions about it.  Could be some workable solutions will come about.

  87. 87.

    Another Scott

    @gvg: +1

    Neighborhoods always change (unless they become “historic districts” or something).  What matters is what happens to the people.  Zoning and housing assistance has to change with the times or there will be other costs…

    I’ve mentioned before that my MIL came to DC from MN to get a job in the summer of 1941.  She lived with several friends in a boarding house on P Street for several months, maybe even a few years, until she could get a place of her own.  (Housing in the area was very tight in the buildup to the war, and during the war.)  The building is still there – it’s nice apartments or condos now.  I occasionally see houses around here in NoVA that seem to be rented to several young workers (lots of cars) for a few months before they’re sold.

    People have to be able to find a way to live somewhere affordable reasonably close to where they work.  If localities refuse to provide the infrastructure for that, then landlords will rent rooms.  If localities don’t want that, then they need to lobby for housing assistance so that people can pay the market rates.  Either way, something must be done – economies can’t work without workers.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  89. 89.

    MontyTheClipArtMongoose

    @glory b: the crime bill was hillary’s until it was biden’s.

    #ourrevolution & justice democrats can’t even be consistent in their ratfucking.

  92. 92.

    Low Key Swagger

    @MontyTheClipArtMongoose: Nah, didn’t refer to her as a troll.  Just that she brought it up as a question.  It was actually a friend of mine, well, online friend who isn’t a “shit on Democrats” kind of Progressive.

  94. 94.

    Origuy

    @Low Key Swagger: Funeral homes, barber shops, and beauty salons were traditionally businesses that African Americans could open without competition from white-owned businesses. White people didn’t want to learn how to deal with black hair or touch black bodies, dead or alive.

  95. 95.

    Ruckus

    Does anyone know anything about  The Defense Post?

    They followed me on twitter and I have no reason or understanding as to why. I get very, very few followers that I haven’t had any comments with or about and I’ve never heard of them. My bit of research has really given me nothing other than they have a website.

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