Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

Let’s finish the job.

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

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

The revolution will be supervised.

The republican caucus is already covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

I’m pretty sure there’s only one Jack Smith.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

A lot of Dems talk about what the media tells them to talk about. Not helpful.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

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

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

Happy indictment week to all who celebrate!

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

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

Not all heroes wear capes.

The words do not have to be perfect.

This really is a full service blog.

White supremacy is terrorism.

The willow is too close to the house.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

You are here: Home / Politics / Biden Administration in Action / Thursday Morning Open Thread: To Boldly Go

Thursday Morning Open Thread: To Boldly Go

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142Comments

  2. 2.

    Baud

    I caught a bit of MJ this morning where they were finally getting around to praising the feat of evacuating so many people from Afghanistan.

  5. 5.

    germy

    @debbie:

    On my last utility bill, there was a note recommending I switch to paying online, as mail delivery of bills and checks are often delayed by weeks.

    I’m an old check-writing fart.

  6. 6.

    Jackie

    @Baud: And, they said an ADDITIONAL 200 Americans/visa holders are being allowed to leave Afghanistan today! They’re being flown to Qatar. So far – knock on wood! – the Taliban is cooperating with President Biden officials!

  7. 7.

    Kay

    @germy:

    Bloomberg Quicktake
    Mar 6, 2020 “It is being contained. Do you not think it’s being contained?” Kellyanne Conway says after a reporter asks why didn’t the Trump administration send out more tests and work to get hospitals prepared

  13. 13.

    geg6

    Not that the other two are any better (but at least they served in the military), but WTF with Kellyanne being on the board of a military academy?  Is it because she wore the toy soldier outfit for his inauguration and he thought that made her a real soldier?

  17. 17.

    Geminid

    And now Arthur Ashe is the last man standing on Richmond’s Monument Avenue. He’s not on a horse, just holding up a tennis racquet and a book.

  19. 19.

    Betty Cracker

    I’m not a lawyer, but in my uninformed opinion, a legal system in which constitutional rights can be vaporized by deputizing private individuals to enforce unconstitutional laws is not a robust legal system.

  20. 20.

    debbie

    @germy:

    As am I. I haven’t had too many issues with mailing payments. But a couple of places won’t let me transfer payments to them. Their only option is to let them withdraw from my account. Screw that shit.

  23. 23.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    I haven’t found a link to the original, but here’s an NYT headline.

    Samantha Bee Blasts Supreme Court for Allowing the Texas Abortion Ban

    Should be epic.

  26. 26.

    Baud

    A politico headline for those who are interested.

    Christie steps out of Trump’s shadow – and stokes 2024 buzz (Alex Isenstadt/Politico)

  30. 30.

    Baud

    @Spanky:

    Found this.

    Around this time, Richardson put his thoughts on paper and at City Council proposed a statue honoring a local civil rights leader on Monument Avenue, he says, and the hate started pouring in.

    “Everybody went haywire: ‘A black on Monument Avenue?’” Richardson recalls. “‘Are you out of your fucking mind?’”

    ….

    The council meeting that followed became legendary. The five-hour session was broadcast internationally. Among those who spoke against the statue was R. Wayne Byrd Sr., president of the Heritage Preservation Association based in Danville. The group’s purpose, it says on its Facebook page, is “to protect Southern symbols, Southern history, and Southern culture.”

    At the time, Byrd called Monument Avenue “hallowed ground” and suggested Ashe’s statue should go up at the Byrd Park tennis courts — a place that he wasn’t allowed to play as a child. “[It] would pay the proper tribute to a great athlete without violating the historic sensibilities of Richmond’s Confederate-American population,” Byrd said.

  38. 38.

    Betty Cracker

    @Geminid: Trump went ape-shit about the Lee monument removal. I saw his dumb statement on Twitter. He called the removal a “desecration,” lauded Lee’s military prowess with one of the stupidest comments ever made about the Civil War (“except for Gettysburg, [he] would have won the war”) and topped that with even stupider speculation that if Lee had been in charge in Afghanistan, the U.S. would have emerged victorious “many years ago.”

  39. 39.

    Baud

    NYT

    Covid Live Updates: Biden to Order New Vaccine Mandates

    In a speech on Thursday, the president is also expected to put pressure on private businesses, federal agencies and schools to enact vaccine rules.

  41. 41.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    They didn’t even get a hearing at the Supreme Court. Not only can any state take away a constitutional right, they can do it without their opponents getting a hearing.

    Absolute failure of the legal system. No real right that anyone should rely on, no remedy for the individuals affected and no due process for the immediate harm. Utter failure as to those women affected. The rights and process they were told they had were a mirage. None of it protected them, or even heard them.

  47. 47.

    Geminid

    @Baud: Besides the Arthur Ashe statue on Monument Avenue, there were statues of Confederate generals Lee, Jackson, Stuart and president Davis. A fifth was one of oceanographer Matthew Fontaine Maury, sitting in front of a large globe. Maury was influential in mid-19th oceanography, and represented the U.S. at an important international conference in 1853. But Maury later held the rank of admiral in the Confederate Navy, so his statue got the chop last year along with those of Jackson, Stuart and Davis.

  48. 48.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    We won’t hear from the women affected either. The person quoted in the article at the top of the page is Jonathon Turley. There’s not even a recognition that the right is currently being denied to actual people. They’re not even part of the discussion. The system utterly failed them and if it doesn’t work for individuals it doesn’t work. There’s no point in it if it doesn’t serve them at all. It’s completely  disconnected from the function it’s intended to serve. Hollow. A building with some few, chosen people in it who sometimes have debates.

  49. 49.

    WereBear

    @Betty Cracker: Exactly! This whole thing was devastated on today’s episode of Justice Matters with Glenn Kirschner. Constitutional rights, standing, and vigilante-ism are only the first three big problems with it.

    Should never have gotten past the first gate, legally.

  51. 51.

    Betty Cracker

    @rikyrah: I’d seen it from a car several times, but I didn’t really comprehend the scale of it either until this AP photo emerged:

    Thursday Morning Open Thread: To Boldly Go

    Maybe they’ll stick it in one of the many Confederate cemeteries in that area. Or sell it to Trump so he can put it on the lawn of his Disgraceland estate in South Florida or make it a hazard at one of his golf courses! Surely he could scam the rubes in a fundraiser for that!

    I haven’t read anything about what plans the city has for Monument Avenue now. Personally, I think America needs more gargoyles and fewer statues.

  55. 55.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: I liked a suggestion for disposing of Charlottesville’s Lee and Jackson statues: drop them into the Atlantic over one of the artificial reefs the state is building to enhance fish habitat.

  56. 56.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    I’m not usually on board with pleas that Dems should behave like Republicans, but in this case, I kind of wish we had a state that could enact the same law against a constitutional right that right wing Justices cared about.

  57. 57.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    I like the legalistic nonsense of the legal commentary cohort. “They didn’t technically overturn Roe by decree”. As to those women in Texas who were or are seeking an abortion they sure as hell did. Was there someone else it was supposed to protect? If it doesn’t protect “women seeking an abortion” then what the fuck was it for? The right they relied on was wholly illusory. It means nothing to them. The legal system failed them and continues to fail them and not even smart well intentioned people can get them a hearing or remedy their wrong. Forget “failed”- they weren’t even heard.

  59. 59.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: Would deputizing private citizens and gun safety advocates to enforce municipal gun laws do the trick? Bounties for each illegal gun recovered!

    On a semi-related note, just got a WaPo alert that Biden’s ATF nominee (David Chipman) has been withdrawn because of “bipartisan” concern about his gun control advocacy with Gabby Giffords’ organization. JFC.

  62. 62.

    Amir Khalid

    I remember reading somewhere that Shatner is not well-liked by the other surviving members of the Star Trek: TOS cast.

  65. 65.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: There weren’t any details in the WaPo piece, but that seems likely. AFAIK, Chipman is a former ATF guy who was a member of Giffords’ group, which isn’t some wild-eyed gun-grabber cabal. It’s infuriating when you think of all the not only unqualified but also disqualified  morons and crooks congress green-lighted for TFG.

  66. 66.

    Jackie

    @rikyrah: According to Amy, she has stage 1A and has already completed treatment and is (at this time) considered cancer-free. That’s wonderful news.

  67. 67.

    Kay

    I want someone to look into what’s behind the Republican Party and anti-abortion groups dropping the rape exception in their abortion bans. Was it driven by wanting to prevent statutory rape victims from getting abortions? A lot of the far Right religious groups promote girls getting married VERY young. We see it here, where I live. We’ve had girls as young as 15 tell us they were pushed into committing themselves to older men with the intention that they marry as soon as it’s legal. Was that what drove the push in the Republican Party and far Right religious extremists (but I repeat myself) to enlarge the ban to encompass rape victims? Was it to control those girls and force them to have children?

  68. 68.

    Mike in NC

    Picked up a complementary copy of USA Today in the lobby of our hotel. Cover article says, “Proud Boys Take On Masks”. What a bunch of authentic American heroes! I recall some filthy rat bastard who once advised them to ‘Stand Down and Stand By’ to serve their country. We won’t be a democracy until he and his ilk are DEAD.

  71. 71.

    Soprano2

    @Betty Cracker:On a semi-related note, just got a WaPo alert that Biden’s ATF nominee (David Chipman) has been withdrawn because of “bipartisan” concern about his gun control advocacy with Gabby Giffords’ organization.

    Joe Manchin, I bet. That’s too bad, sounds like he would have been a good head for that agency, which desperately needs one.

  72. 72.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: I want someone to look into what’s behind the Republican Party and anti-abortion groups dropping the rape exception in their abortion bans.

    Well, it doesn’t actually have to make sense, since Greg Abbott says he can prevent rapes from happening. You might be right about the motivation, though.

  73. 73.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Baud: I kind of wish we had a state that could enact the same law against a constitutional right that right wing Justices cared about.

    It would almost certainly be guns, and this SCOTUS’ll just claim that the 2nd Amendment stops States from enforcing laws to stop people from enforcing vigilante behavior at the end of a gun.

    (That aside from the fact that 2 wrongs won’t fix this issue, frankly. These asshats are showing they’ll twist law to buttress their side, way too often.)

  74. 74.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Kay:

    Was it to control those girls and force them to have children?

    The question answers itself, doesn’t it.

  75. 75.

    Amir Khalid

    @Spanky:
    I’ll start. Bruce Springsteen went on Jimmy Fallon to publicly mock him over Bridgegate. That must have really hurt Christie, who is Bruce’s biggest fan — I mean, just look at the guy..

  76. 76.

    Steeplejack

    @Baud:

    Chris Christie?! “Slowly I turned . . .” Every time I see his name or, worse, his ugly mug I get a jolt of rage. Trump groveler/​minion/​enabler, and I’m still pissed off that he totally skated on Bridgegate.

    He’s dreaming if he thinks he has any shot at the GQP nomination in 2024. Even if this is a fundraising scam, which it probably is, I can’t see it getting much traction.

    P.S. And fuck Politico, too! They have taken their game to a new (low) level lately.

  79. 79.

    WereBear

    @Kay:

    Was it to control those girls and force them to have children?

    From my study of the Quiverfull movements and other hardcore fundamentalists which took over many denominations:

    Yes.

  80. 80.

    Kay

    @Soprano2:

    No, the language they use is very specific to one set of rapes. That’s the “forcible” and “off the streets” language. The much larger set are the whole juvenile girl/male adult category. The girls know the perpetrators. The studies on rape and abortion focus much more on statutory rape because that category is much larger.

  82. 82.

    Betty Cracker

    @NotMax: It’s not surprising but it certainly is maddening, and maybe we shouldn’t get used to this bullshit and normalize it. Trump installed grifters and lobbyists to oversee the industries on whose behalf they ripped people off / shaped regulations that harmed public health, and that’s A-OK. But this guy joined the Giffords organization — not by any stretch a radical anti-gun group — and every Republican opposes him, and at least one nominal Democrat joins them. It’s infuriating.

  83. 83.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: Congresswoman Gabby Giffords was one of over 50 members of Congress who signed onto an amicus brief supporting the plaintiff’s individual right to possess firearms in the Heller case. The NRA still gave her an “F” rating in her 2010 reelection race.

  85. 85.

    Amir Khalid

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    In some particularly regressive societies, the remedy for rape resulting in pregnancy is often to marry the rapist to his victim. I wonder if that’s what the Republican party is working towards.

  86. 86.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Kay: I want someone to look into what’s behind the Republican Party and anti-abortion groups dropping the rape exception in their abortion bans.

    In my research, I think the answer is that they are freer to aim for what the anti-abortion asshats really want — a total ban on Abortions.

    Anti-abortion forces stated for decades — since the late 1980s when I started paying attention, and my research looking back into the start of their bullshit  — their goal was to make Abortion illegal in all cases.

    Because that sold badly, lobbyists and lawmakers implemented the rape/incest language exception as a legislative compromise/Trojan House. It was clear from jump that that’s all it ever was, and the only reason it ever got thru was [EDIT]inability for media to remember anything more than 10 min ago when it comes to politics, esp. right-wing (see also: Afghanistan). It’s also why they play footsie with the religious exemption bollicks, to drive a wedge for eventually getting rid of Griswold and any semblance of Reproductive Rights for people who can carry babies, but one problem at a time. :(

    Anyway: Now, they have enough True Believers embedded into these State legislators + SCOTUS that it’s no longer needed.

  87. 87.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Soprano2: since Greg Abbott says he can prevent rapes from happening.

    So it was OK before, Greg? Why were you pro-rape till now? What finally changed your mind? How do you identify rapists before they rape?

    Inquiring minds want to know.

  88. 88.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Amir Khalid: If you haven’t seen it, try to get hold of a copy of Galaxy Quest. Tim Allen (nowhere near my favorite actor) arguably deserved an Oscar for his utterly devastating smackdown of a character indistinguishable from Shatner. (The rest of the flick is pretty good too.)

  90. 90.

    schrodingers_cat

    Every fucking thing is portrayed as a Republican win and it is not just Fox News or the MSM but many liberals and lefties do it too. Also excessive attention is paid to Republican voters and their antics to the exclusion of everyone else.

    We had countless diner stories from 2016 onwards and now we have elbenty and one anti-masker stories. Even though at least 75% of Americans have had at least one shot and over 70% support masking.

    How many stories have you seen of Biden voters or those affected by the capricious immigration policies of the last administration? Even on blogs such as this one?

    RWNJs say jump and almost everyone says how high. From NYT to Balloon Juice and everything in between

    It is relentless. Every stupid thing Rs do they are portrayed as masters of the Universe or evil geniuses. On the other hand anything Ds do they get no credit even from the so called progressives because Ds are not perfect. How many anti-war people had Biden’s back after the Afghanistan troop draw down?

  91. 91.

    Geminid

    @Uncle Cosmo: Gene Roddenberry wrote a lot of Have Gun, Will Travel episodes. On a couple shows, outlaws would beat the crap out of Richard Boone, trying to get him to betray some innocent homesteader. Boone would launch into a soliloquy about the Indominatability of Man before he turned the table on the outlaws. Roddenberry recycled this story line in Star Trek, with aliens standing in for the mean outlaws.

  92. 92.

    VOR

    @Geminid: Budapest, Hungary had a problem after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Hungarian Communist government. The city had a bunch of statues and monuments honoring Soviet leaders like Lenin and the heroic Soviet troops who liberated the city in 1944. What to do?

    Their solution was to take down all those statues and put them in a field at the edge of the city. This is now known as Memento Park. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memento_Park

  93. 93.

    topclimber

    @geg6: I suspect it has something to do with making sure the Air Force Academy remains the most evangelically militant of the four schools.

  97. 97.

    Betty Cracker

    @schrodingers_cat: Can you give us an example of a post or comment here that portrays something that is not a Republican win as a Republican win?  I don’t want to be part of the problem, but I’m not seeing anyone praising Republicans or implying that they’re masters of the universe. There are complaints (including from me) about double standards, DINOs who are obstructing Biden’s agenda and structural advantages for Republicans, but those are real things that exist.

  101. 101.

    Kay

    @WereBear:

    I wonder because Texas had a judicial bypass for minors to get an abortion- that (essentially) banned abortions for minors in rape and incest but now Republicans and the anti-abortion movement have made it virtually impossible.

    Why did they target the group – minors- who are BY FAR the most likely to use a rape exception and why are they talking only about the group who are least likely (by the numbers) the stranger/forcible rape category?  It feels deliberate, like it has a larger policy goal.

  103. 103.

    Kay

    @WereBear:

    And you won’t hear from any of the girls. Juvenile cases are protected for privacy. If there are girls who are forced to carry a baby to term and that baby resulted from an unlawful sexual relationship with an older man (whether “voluntary” by the girl or coerced by a religious sect) it will be hidden and it’s the most likely rape/abotion scenario, by far. There are far more statutory rape situations than there are forcible rape cases.

  104. 104.

    Soprano2

    @schrodingers_cat: Also excessive attention is paid to Republican voters and their antics to the exclusion of everyone else.

    Boy, this is the truth. Look at the press obsession over the people who haven’t yet gotten out of Afghanistan. I actually heard one of them, a reporter, say on NPR the other day that Biden needs to do something to help them, that she doesn’t think he’s doing anything! There didn’t seem to be any pushback at all on this assertion. Biden got millions more votes, yet you don’t see anyone in the press interviewing people who voted for him about why they voted for him and why they still support him. Biden’s support in polling has dropped to what was the absolute top of TFG’s support for his whole term, yet they talk about it as if it’s almost a fatal blow to Biden’s agenda! Makes me absolutely crazy. I’ve also noticed that reporters often use the “try” framing when they talk about Democrats, which implies “fail” to me. I heard it this morning on NPR – “The Biden administration is trying to reunite children from Afghanistan who were separated from their parents”. How about they are “working” to do that instead? They do this over and over again. How about interview some of the vast majority of people who think kids should be wearing masks in schools, rather than all the anti-maskers? And on and on, it’s maddening. The press seems to be primed for the idea that whatever Republicans want is “normal”, and they stick to that in the face of a vast amount of evidence that even if this was once true, it’s not true anymore.

  105. 105.

    Steeplejack

    I’m not sure how much “pressure” was involved, but if this is true it’s good to see.

    BREAKING: PRESSURE WORKS. Merrick Garland (DoJ) WILL SUE TEXAS over the SB8 abortion law as early as tomorrow, arguing the law illegally interferes with federal issues. No further details at this time. Source in second tweet.
    https://t.co/Tfm9X9KTc7

    — Mueller, She Wrote (@MuellerSheWrote) September 9, 2021

  106. 106.

    Anyway

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I read LGM in addition to this blog (NO Twitter) and the posters and commenters there were completely pro-Afghanistan-withdrawal … They have been really good about the Texas pregnancy monitoring atrocity as well.

  107. 107.

    Ken

    @Steeplejack: Perhaps not so much “After a week of our pressure the Justice Department agreed with us” as “After a week of studying options and relevant laws, the Justice Department determined there was a case here.”

  109. 109.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Steeplejack: This is like the MSM taking credit for the withdrawal after saying that the administration would  not be able evacuate even 50,000 people.

    As if Garland is hanging on to every word of the Do Something Twitter Karens.

  113. 113.

    Betty Cracker

    Per the NYT, it was Manchin and Angus King who combined with unanimous Republican opposition to sink Chipman’s ATF nomination.

  115. 115.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    Hmm. King was on MJ talking about Manchin and the budget negotiations and was confident they’d get  something done.  Leads me to speculate about senatorial back scratching.

  117. 117.

    Steeplejack

    Zeddary:

    Guns of the South II:

    Robert E. Lee takes the Nazi time machine to the year 2017. President Trump offers him command of CSA Forces in Afghanistan. Lee immediately defects to the Taliban. In 2021 CSA and Taliban desperately try to surrender to each other at Abbottobad Courthouse.

  118. 118.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Betty Cracker: There are so many FP posts by none other than the blog father about how we are doomed. And many comments agreeing with that general premise. There was one just two days ago. A late night post IIRC. I can find a link to it if you want.

  120. 120.

    stinger

    @Betty Cracker:

    Trump:  if Lee had been in charge in Afghanistan, the U.S. would have emerged victorious “many years ago.”

    Well then, why didn’t you put him in charge, huh?  HUH??  After all, he’s done an amazing job and is being recognized more and more!!

    ETA: Or what NotMax @44 and Dorothy @45 said, sigh.

  123. 123.

    topclimber

    @schrodingers_cat: It is actually easier to abolish the Senate than to change the allocation of Senators, which can only be done by unanimous consent or (perhaps) a Constitutional Convention.

    You see, it was the original intent of our Sainted Founding Fathers to allow the population disparity between the biggest and smallest states of their time (13-1, Virginia vs. Delaware) to grow into today’s 66-1 (California vs. Wyoming).

  124. 124.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    We won’t hear from the women affected either. The person quoted in the article at the top of the page is Jonathon Turley. There’s not even a recognition that the right is currently being denied to actual people. They’re not even part of the discussion. The system utterly failed them and if it doesn’t work for individuals it doesn’t work

     

    Tell it, Kay.

     

    TELL IT.

  125. 125.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    I like the legalistic nonsense of the legal commentary cohort. “They didn’t technically overturn Roe by decree”. As to those women in Texas who were or are seeking an abortion they sure as hell did. Was there someone else it was supposed to protect? If it doesn’t protect “women seeking an abortion” then what the fuck was it for? The right they relied on was wholly illusory. It means nothing to them.

     

    Keep on bringing it.

    I’m still enraged. It hasn’t lessened one bit.

  126. 126.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

     

    I want someone to look into what’s behind the Republican Party and anti-abortion groups dropping the rape exception in their abortion bans. Was it driven by wanting to prevent statutory rape victims from getting abortions?

     

    I dunno, but, I want the answer too.

  128. 128.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @Kay:

    The studies on rape and abortion focus much more on statutory rape because that category is much larger.

    I’m not convinced that they believe in the concept of statutory rape. Look at the young men who have gotten a slap on the hand because we wouldn’t want to ruin their lives by “a little mistake” (of committing an act of violence).

    See also God’s will, she shouldn’t have worn those clothes, etc.

  131. 131.

    topclimber

    @schrodingers_cat: De-funding the police via attrition and using their budgets for other ways to lower crime is the easiest. It can be done locally.

    Abolishing ICE is tougher because it requires national action. I suggest turning it into a branch of the military so we get rid of their fascist unions and make them part of the Presidential chain of command.

    As for abolishing the Senate, of course it is hard. But you knew that. Still, even a pragma-pony like John Dingell thought it was the way to do.

  132. 132.

    Kay

    @Sure Lurkalot:

    I have seen the (very young girls) marriage concept of the most extreme religious fundamentalists sort of bleed into the larger fundy megachurch people. We’re seeing them here now- women who say they were “committed” into marriages that were set up prior to the legal age. It comes up later because of the ages of their children, you do the math and think “15?”. Yup.
    It’s just interesting to me that their legal strategy encompasses this and reaches that group in a really profound way. It could just be their sloppiness and really cavalier lack of interest in the mothers, but the Texas governor’s language seemed to deliberately exclude this recognized group of girls. Odd.

  135. 135.

    Kay

    Atrios
    @Atrios
    ·2h
    Replying to
    @LHSummers
    You are bad

    Guffaw. That’s all anyone should say to Larry Summers.

  136. 136.

    Kay

    My youngest is at college now so I texed him yesterday and he responded “I don’t have time to play with you right now”

    PLAY with me! Already insufferable.

    I did want to play, though. I might have had kids so I could play with them.

  137. 137.

    James E Powell

    @schrodingers_cat:

    We had countless diner stories from 2016 onwards and now we have elbenty and one anti-masker stories. Even though at least 75% of Americans have had at least one shot and over 70% support masking.

    How many stories have you seen of Biden voters or those affected by the capricious immigration policies of the last administration?

    Similarly, disappointed Trump voters are the most important people in America. If memory serves, disappointed Clinton voters were told to shut the fuck up and deal with it.

  138. 138.

    Steeplejack

    @Kay:

    ? Your dispatches about this kid have always cracked me up.

    There was one about him and his friends “encountering corduroy,” and I had to bookmark this one about names:

    They have this thing that makes me laugh. It took me a while to figure it out. They use names that they think are old-fashioned to refer to women (and men) my age. So they will say, “This Debbie told us to get off the library steps,” or, “A Paul told us to be quiet.” I think it’s hysterical. The first name is a group identifier for people of a certain age because they have different first names, right? They have “Conner” or “Austin” or some such.

  139. 139.

    Kay

    @Steeplejack:

    I miss him. I might call his former girlfriend, just see what’s she up to. I miss her too. She works at the library and has a rescue cat she named “Dewey” which she says is not after the Dewey decimal system but I don’t know. Seems like it is. I’ll let that go for now.

  141. 141.

    J R in WV

    @Kay: ​
     

    Was that what drove the push in the Republican Party and far Right religious extremists (but I repeat myself) to enlarge the ban to encompass rape victims? Was it to control those girls and force them to have children?

    Of course it was. The Theocrats are all about pedophilia and control of the little girls — control them right into Preacher’s bed, or couch, or on the office floor beside his big desk. Christo-Fascists same as the Afghan Sharia-Fascists marrying little girls, just different robes.

    On the way into town the other day I saw a big circus tent set up, coming home I saw it was the Local Town Tent Revival. Last night I saw they were in action, big RV parked for the preacher to rest in, generator for the bright lights, medium crowd of cars parked. SAD!

  142. 142.

    J R in WV

    @Amir Khalid:

    n some particularly regressive societies, the remedy for rape resulting in pregnancy is often to marry the rapist to his victim. I wonder if that’s what the Republican party is working towards.

    Sure and it must be~!!~ Who would want to marry a little girl without making sure it feels good for the rapist first? These people make me sick at heart, they are so disgusting, so filthy, so not Christian.

    There’s a whole sub-net of internet sites revealing the so many rapists caught in the pulpit, shocking that so many of them get away with it for so long. But No one in the “church” will speak up for the little kids being molested and raped until someone on the outside learns of the abusive crimes!

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