Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

“But what about the lurkers?”

Not rolling over. fuck you, make me.

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

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

This fight is for everything.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Jesus watching the most hateful people claiming to be his followers

Humiliatingly small and eclipsed by the derision of millions.

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

Stay strong, because they are weak.

He really is that stupid.

Find someone who loves you the way trump and maga love traitors.

Those who are easily outraged are easily manipulated.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Let’s bury these fuckers at the polls 2 years from now.

After dobbs, women are no longer free.

They were going to turn on one another at some point. It was inevitable.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

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

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Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Once More Unto the Breach…

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  2. 2.

    Albatrossity

    Sadly, the more they talk about this stupid action, the harder it will be for them to walk it back. Just like the election fraud bs, they know that this is crazy, but they are going to keep repeating the lies until they actually believe them.

  3. 3.

    Baud

    There are no good Republicans.

    Agreed.  The only question is whether they are seditious or not, not whether they are good.

  4. 4.

    Jeffro

    30 second address to the nation tonight, plz:

    President Biden: “We don’t negotiate with terrorists…especially not ones who were fine with raising the debt ceiling three times during the former fucking guy’s term. Do your job, or resign.”

  6. 6.

    debbie

    I say we lower the debt by ending programs Republicans like and depend on. And we freeze their salaries. Overall, it may not add up to much, but it would symbolize what refusing to raise the ceiling would mean to Americans. Let’s just see how sanguine they are about that.

  12. 12.

    The Thin Black Duke

    After the insurrection on 1/6, every member of the GOP who didn’t resign or change their party affiliation, is seditious.

  14. 14.

    Kropacetic

    I’m still of the mind that this debt limit brinksmanship should be considered open warfare against the United States.

  16. 16.

    John S.

    Republicans refuse to facilitate the most irresponsible and reckless spending spree in American history.

    Says Pat Toomey, the piece of shit that had no problem voting for tax cuts that exploded the deficit and then voted to raise the debt ceiling when a Republican sat in the Oval Office.

    The headline should read “Republicans are giant hypocrites and domestic terrorists who gamble with American lives when they don’t get what they want”, but we won’t see that headline — despite the fact that it happens to be true.

  25. 25.

    Benw

    It’s much too early in the morning to stretch my sinews, but I might conjure up the blood here in a bit

  30. 30.

    narya

    I read the title as “Once More into the Blech.” Upon reading those tweets, I will insist that was a correct reading. I am so, so, so tired of these assholes.

  35. 35.

    Geminid

    @rikyrah: President Biden also said that the U.S. will return to compliance with the JCPOA regarding Iran’s nuclear program if Iran does the same. Iran’s Foreign Ministry said that it expects formal talks to resume “in a few weeks.”

  36. 36.

    Kay

    Nice story out of a 62% Trump county:

    But no one was more unhappy about this book “freeze” than the kids at Central York High — the ones who some of their parents claimed they were protecting from dangerous ideas. At first, five students staged a daily protest in school, and as the new school year progressed, hundreds more joined their group which they dubbed the Panther Anti-Racist Union (”Panther” is the school mascot). The group showed up at school board meetings and grew increasingly vocal.

     

    “They are fearful for the teachers they love and wonder if by deliberately or inadvertently defying the ban those teachers are in danger of losing their jobs,” Patricia Jackson, a language arts teacher at Central York, told me. “One student pointed to a poster of Maya Angelou on my classroom wall and asked, ‘Ms. Jackson, are you allowed to have that? Aren’t you afraid you’ll get in trouble or lose your job?’”
    But on Monday night, the kids won. The Central York school board met and voted unanimously to end the book freeze, just a couple hours after about 200 pro-book parents and students had rallied outside the meeting. “It has taken far too long,” school board president Jane Johnson said in a statement — implying that the real “freeze” in Central York wasn’t on literature but among school leaders so fearful of a vocal minority.

  37. 37.

    Eolirin

    @horatius: Yes, this. I think defaulting on our debt might be an actual bridge too far for Manchin and Sinema. Schumer should make the death of the filibuster the only other alternative to a cloture vote if the infrastructure bill can’t be made ready in time. Using one of our reconciliation slots for it is not acceptable.

  38. 38.

    mrmoshpotato

    how about “republicans are fucking deadbeat clowns who no responsible business owner should ever provide services for”? these fucking people are absolutely worthless and would be better at the bottom of the sea as detritus for bottom feeders

    BottomFeederHatingMachine!

  41. 41.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Baud:

    The media’s coverage of the French sub makes me miss the media’s coverage of Afghanistan. 

    Subs?  For breakfast? ?

  42. 42.

    Kay

    Odd that there aren’t 5000 editorials decrying this, like there were for “cancel culture”

    State Rep. Randy Fine marked Constitution Day last week by taking to Facebook and affirming his devotion to the 233-year-old document.
    That’s what he says.
    But here’s what the Brevard County Republican did:
    Fine has introduced a bill in the state House that contains some of the most sweeping government-imposed speech restrictions we’ve ever seen in a piece of legislation.

  47. 47.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Baud:

    Agreed.  The only question is whether they are seditious or not, not whether they are good.

    Voting to default on our debt answers that question, AFAIAC.

    If I were represented by one of those people, I’d be calling up their office and asking, “Why does Congressperson Soandso hate America?“

  48. 48.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    Yay, kids! It is well past time the country’s governing bodies start listening to the majority over the tyrannical, vocal, bullying minority. ?

  50. 50.

    Rusty

    @Baud: I think this almost entirely within the D.C. beltway and on twitter.  I can’t see the party ginning up sympathy for the French, the same party that for decades as having called the French, cheese eating surrender monkeys.  All Joe needs to do is point out that the subs are built here in a America by American workers.  Jobs for Americans or sympathy for the French?  Outside of D.C. this is a no brainer.

  51. 51.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Rusty:

    Yeah, I can’t bring myself to care about the France/Australia submarine story.  My attitude towards France in such situations was summed up by Tom Lehrer in “Who’s Next?”:

    France got the Bomb, but don’t you grieve
    ’cause they’re on our side (I believe)

  53. 53.

    danielx

    @MC:

    Count your blessings – during TFG’s reign there was a manufactured crisis damn near every day, sometimes more than one. Generally induced by TFG’s inability to keep his mouth shut.

  54. 54.

    Geminid

    @Rusty: Congresswoman Elaine Luria probably likes the Australian sub deal. A lot of her constituents work at the Huntington-Ingalls* shipyard, one two U.S. shipyards producing nuclear subs. Those paychecks help keep Luria’s 2nd VA Congressional District prosperous. Virginia Senators Warner and Kaine likely are for the deal too.

    The shipyard’s founder was 19th century rail baron Collis P. Huntington. Those tracing the origins of the military-industrial complex would note that in his time  Huntington was considered “the most hated railway man in America.”·

  55. 55.

    Ken

    @Baud: I hope Joe puts Obama’s face on the platinum coin.

    Or TFG, since about a trillion of the debt was during his term.  Plus, there would be no way the RW could argue against it, without getting screamed at by Mr. Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

  59. 59.

    Tony Jay

    @mrmoshpotato:

    Nope. Sorry. Small island absolutely packed to the gunnels with gobshite ‘reporters’ trained to fellate anything ‘conservative’ like they’re six fathoms down and breathing through a tube. We can’t fit any more in, especially ones trained at the knee of Maureen ‘I so am a real-life Lois Lane’ Dowd.

    She’s all yours, I’m afraid.

  60. 60.

    Peale

    I guess we could go with the idea that government shutdowns are just a normal part of every administration because we are a stupid people who has decided to continually throw sand in the engine because we’re just bored.

  61. 61.

    sab

    OT completely. I live in Akron Ohio, hometown of Rita Dove. My hairdresser is a very cool intellectual guy. He went to her high school. About the same age. I finally asked him if he knew her. He said yes, he carried her books home from school most days. A huge stack. She asked him where his books were. He said “in their locker, where they belong.”

  62. 62.

    Tony Jay

    @sab:

    Have you seen the state of British ‘journalism’? With garbage coverage like that she’d be up for a prime slot in the 24 Hour Infotainment Machine before you could say “Our resident expert on American politics”.

  64. 64.

    danielx

    @Geminid:

    Collis Huntington’s most famous quote:

    Whatever is not nailed down is mine. What I can pry loose is not nailed down.

    He does sound a first class prick.

  65. 65.

    Peale

    @Geminid: Yeah. I don’t quite understand why the US press corps would be mad about a deal that brought jobs to the US. Maybe because its Australia’s navy that would use it. If the “Deal” were for the US to invade Australia, occupy it, and give them 2/3rds of a sub that can only be used when the US navy says so. That kind of arrangement they could understand. If we promised to spend the next 20 years “training” Australian submariners to be dependent on the US navy, they’d be all for it.

  67. 67.

    sab

    @sab: Her father had a Ph.D. in chemical engineering, and only got a job decades later. My father in law got his job in a tire company doing chmical engineering right out of high school. My grandfather got his job in chemical engineering  right out of college. White entitlement is a real thing.

  68. 68.

    Tony Jay

    What is the current state of British Political Journalism? Roughly as depicted in this (only slightly fabricated) slice of red-hot reportage from some time in the non-too distant future.

     

            “Eyebrows were raised this evening as sources close to Prime Minister Johnson hinted at the possibility of another surprise Cabinet reshuffle later this week, one which could potentially see a number of very prominent names eased out of front-line Ministerial posts and replaced with what some are calling “inhuman wraiths hungry for the souls of the living”. As you can see just behind me, beyond the abandoned Police cordon and the impaled bodies of environmental protestors, Downing Street itself is bathed in an eldritch un-light which seems to sap all happiness and joy from the world. What little movement we’ve been witness to has consisted mostly of shadowy figures dancing wildly around emerald fires that burn but do not warm and a literal conveyor belt of Deliveroo drivers, so no clues there.

        So far this evening we’ve been unable to get any firm confirmation of the Prime Minister’s plans, but the voices whispering in my ear have suggested that some names in the frame – and I stress, this is only conjecture so far – might include the Witch-King of Angmar being promoted from Defence to the Home Office, which some would argue has been on the cards for a while now, and could hint at a relaxation in the  contentious ‘Law and Order’ posture favoured by the current Home Secretary, Ancalagon the Black. Gothmog, Lord of the Balrogs, moving to the Education brief; that’s widely seen as a sop to members of the right-wing Udûn Research Group and the wider Tory faithful after Lord Gothmog’s incendiary speech at last year’s Party conference in Torquay, in which you may remember he promised to “Kill, kill, and kill again for the glory of his Master, Sauron the Magnificent” and compared himself to the character played by ex-Eastenders actress Martine McCutcheon in the film ‘Love, Actually’. But most interestingly, and some might say controversially, we’re hearing that Khamûl the Easterling could be on the verge of taking over at the Foreign Office. That would represent the first time that a person-of-colour has been the face of the United Kingdom in international negotiations, and certainly Twitter is alight this evening with too-and-fro arguments pitting the Party’s more nationalistic elements, who have what they term ‘serious reservations’ about Khamûl’s rumoured affinity for the culture of his ancient lost homeland, against more moderate, modernising voices who have made a big deal of the fact that, whatever his heritage, Khamûl’s ideological and philosophical loyalties have rendered him very pale indeed.

         Whatever happens tonight and over the following days, we can be sure of one thing, the Prime Minister’s refusal to confirm or deny these rumours is the clearest indication yet that the long-promised Free Trade Agreement between Britain and the Dread Empire of Mordor could be back on the cards and closer than we think, which can only strengthen Boris Johnson’s hand before next month’s mini-Budget and a series of Parliamentary votes on legislation ranging from the banning of non-British flags in public to the authorisation of Total-War against the rogue state of Valinor. Exciting times.”

                  “Thank you, Laura. Exciting times indeed. That was the BBC’s Chief Political Correspondent Laura Kuenssberg reporting live from her cage outside Downing Street. We’ll be back with her for more Breaking News as soon as Our Dark Lord deigns to cast his Eye down upon us. And now with all the weather news for the week ahead, it’s Thomas Shafferknacker. Thomas, endless blood-rains and darkness at Noon? We’re really in for it, aren’t we?”

    Extracted from “You Had One Jobbo, Blobbo” A People’s History of Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson and the End of Great Britain, Volume XVII ‘The High Price of Victory Gin’: 2018-2024

  70. 70.

    Geminid

    @sab: Possibly. Collis Huntington emigrated from New York to California after the Gold Rush,and was one of “the Big Four” who built the Central Pacific Railroad. He then came east to develop the C&O Railroad. Huntington, West Virginia was named after him.

    An abolitionist, Huntington and his wife Arabella were married by Henry Ward Beecher. After settling near Norfolk, Virginia, Huntington supported African American educational institutions including Hampton Institute and the Tuskegee Institute.

    Archer Huntington, Collis’ son, kept a 10,000 acre estate south of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. It is now Huntington Beach State Park, and is a really nice place to camp.

  71. 71.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: I think that these bullies who are showing up at school board and city council meetings count on the fact that most people have better things to do with their time than show up at public meetings to fight with them. Most people count on these usually unpaid public servants to quietly do their jobs, and are totally unprepared for the insanity that has happened over the past year. If more people who are in the majority had the time to show up at these meetings and make their voices heard, I think some of these bullies would back down, and it would stiffen the spines of the members of the boards so that they could stand up to the bullies.

  73. 73.

    RaflW

    The GOP are the party of deadbeats. Totally unwilling to pay the bills, just like Donald.

    Meanwhile they’ll lecture us all about how we should run government ‘like a business’! But the secret is out: Run it like a Trump Organization – shaft the banks and contractors, live in your penthouse on the grift.

  74. 74.

    Geminid

    @Peale: The only problem I have with the submarine deal is that we apparently did not give the French sufficient notice before it was announced. The press may be exaggerating the problem, but the French probably have good reason to be mad. Competing with an ally is one thing, embarrassing them is another.

  76. 76.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Ken:
    TFG, since about a trillion of the debt was during his term.

    So, over the course of a little less than 4 years, the United States added roughly $7.733 trillion in debt.

    source.

  77. 77.

    Matt McIrvin

    @RaflW: They do this through mystification. The “debt ceiling” sounds like a credit limit, a limit on borrowing, but of course it’s not a credit limit–it’s about servicing debt that we already incurred. But they can simultaneously pretend that it’s a credit limit, to sound like the responsible party trying to rein in spending, and use the fact that it’s not one to hold the country hostage and force the other party to play the role they’ll paint as irresponsible.

    Of course, the whole drama is null and void when Republicans are in the White House.

    One thing I am seeing this time around is a certain amount of refusal to play the rhetorical game from non-Republicans. This isn’t some opportunity to be responsible about spending and some media people and Democratic politicians are recognizing that it’s dangerous to pretend it is. It’s gone through too many cycles.

  78. 78.

    WaterGirl

    @debbie: Pod Save the World (podcast) talked about the submarine deal and the reaction from France in great detail.  It’s definitely worth a listen.

    Shorter: yeah, this is a blow to France economically because they lost the submarine deal, but the French subs are not nearly as good, and the reaction from France is the like soccer player who has been fouled and rolls around on the ground for 3 minutes, pretending to be writhing in pain, to get the officials to call the foul.

    Apparently France didn’t even recall the Russian ambassadors after Russia was interfering with their elections.

    Even shorter:  yeah, France is pissed, but this is performative in the hopes of getting something/s from the US as a consolation prize.

  79. 79.

    sab

    Bookkeepping madly today. Rest of the week madly knitting a new cat hat for Oct 2. Tiny kitten ears, or giant German shepherd ears? I am a dog person myself

    ETA We were furious in 2017. We need to show them we are still furious. I am.

  80. 80.

    Tony Jay

    @sab:

    Gawd no! Our Infotainers lurve them some Atlantic dialect. To them it smacks of ‘real News’ and makes them feel they’re on an episode of The West Wing.

    Call it ‘The Reverse Sullivan Effect’.

  81. 81.

    RaflW

    @Albatrossity: One can be fairy certain that, should there be a GOP majority in either chamber while Biden is president, the U.S. will at least partially default on her debts. It won’t last long, because the moneyed class will swoop in and demand a fix, but it will be ugly and continue to erode our status on the world stage.

    The GOP will have two or possibly three very tough questions asked on the Sunday shows, and then for a long time after, it will be Beltway’d as “that time under Biden when we damn near collapsed the economy.” (we being of course the beltwayers, but they’ll never see it that way.)

  82. 82.

    rikyrah

    Someone in the replies said that this was the new ‘ economic anxiety’.

    Anything to avoid labeling these people as who they are.

     

    Looking for the lie

    Eric Boehlert (@EricBoehlert) tweeted at 6:43 AM on Wed, Sep 22, 2021:
    “Millions of conservative Americans are being brainwashed about the pandemic, and thousands are killing themselves in the process. Yet the media downplay the huge story, framing it simply as “vaccine hesitancy.””

     

    Eric Boehlert (@EricBoehlert) tweeted at 7:44 AM on Wed, Sep 22, 2021:
    “the press shies away, nervous about offending conservatives by portraying them as mindless zombies being easily duped about a miraculously safe and effective vaccine

    Instead of calling them out, the press coddles them depicting them as “vaccine hesitant” and “vaccine skeptics”
    (twitter.com/EricBoehlert/status/1440658180518735884?s=03)

  84. 84.

    sab

    @Tony Jay: Knd of like us accepting Australian accents. Instead of

    ” Where are you from!” we get “Are you a sophisticated Brit.”

    I t is sophisticated, and frankly quite embarassing from our side.

  85. 85.

    debbie

    @Geminid:

    I’m pretty sure the Huntingtons of banking fame are not related. The grandfather I met had a pretty heavy German accent. I think they came over later.

  88. 88.

    Another Scott

    The MotU have been pretty quiet about the debt limit. When you start seeing screaming headlines at the WSJ, Forbes, The Economist, the FT, then you know that the deadline is close. Yellen said that it is sometime in October, IIRC.

    Moscow Mitch will keep up his act until the last moment, as he always does.

    Something will happen. We won’t default. When? Dunno. Maybe there will be another shutdown (though I doubt it). But the GQP must not be rewarded for their stunt.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  89. 89.

    Mandarama

    @sab: I’m a poetry teacher, and I love Rita Dove so much. So thank you for sharing!

    P.S. My students always love her, too.

  91. 91.

    rikyrah

    They definitely resent 46’s competency.

    And, they are mad that their Dolt45 books don’t mean shyt anymore.

     

    Sam from Delacroix, LA (@Kennymack1971) tweeted at 7:57 AM on Wed, Sep 22, 2021:
    It’s so blatantly obvious that the Beltway Media REALLY resents Joe Biden for defeating Donald Trump. He stopped so many bags by denying Dolt 45 a second term and they are salty man.
    (twitter.com/Kennymack1971/status/1440661615368552454?s=03)

  92. 92.

    frosty

    @Kay: ​
     My old high school, the one John Fetterman graduated from too. Good for them.
    One of our precinct captains told me during one of Obama’s elections that if York County went 34% D then the Ds would win PA. I checked all the numbers back to 1988; he was right. Then I realized how horrifying it was that we were outnumbered 2 to 1!

  93. 93.

    lowtechcyclist

    @rikyrah: It’s like Jonestown, only it’s happening here.

    Would be fine with me if the death toll didn’t include a lot of innocent bystanders – kids too young to be vaxxed, people with unrelated health problems who can’t get treated in time, etc.

    Also their own kids that they leave orphaned. That part absolutely breaks my heart.

  94. 94.

    mali muso

    Thanks to those of you in the late night thread for your sympathetic words at the loss of my grandfather.  This morning I’m feeling low-key ragey because, imo, he probably had at least a few good years left that were stolen from him by the irresponsibility of the anti-vaxx crowd.  He lived in Louisiana and although he got a shot (he had been dealing with some heart issues), my grandma did not and I’m guessing most of their peer group didn’t either.  Typical white, conservative religious folks.  Both he and grandma came down with COVID last month and even though he recovered, he had been frail and not himself ever since.

  98. 98.

    The Moar You Know

    Are you okay with how Joe handled the sub deal with Australia?

    @debbie:  Joe didn’t handle anything with this save for approve the paperwork; this was an Australian decision.

    The reality of the situation was this:

    1. the French don’t make anything like the best subs.
    2. they were way behind on delivery.
    3. because they were trying to sell Australia a converted version of one of their nuclear subs, one without a reactor (per the Aussies request), in other words, extremely modified, the cost just kept climbing and deliveries kept getting pushed out into the future.
    4. Australia realized they were going to be paying at least American prices for a far inferior product, and given their proximity to China, they could not afford to have an inferior product.

    So they went and bought the best of the best instead.  Can’t blame them for that.  Can’t blame us for taking the deal when it was offered.  France and the EU can howl about it all they want, but if they want to get and stay in the advanced armaments game they are going to have to start spending a lot more money.

  99. 99.

    Sean

    @Eolirin: If we’re relying on Manchin and Sinema to bail us out of a debt ceiling crisis, then I think we’re in real danger of defaulting. I keep trying to figure out if there can be a carve out specifically for the debt ceiling, because I still feel skeptical they’ll end the whole deal. They’re on another planet politically.

  100. 100.

    Another Scott

    @Another Scott: I see that TheHill has a decent roundup of corporate mewling that “congress” needs to fix it.

    Business groups haven’t called out Republicans in the debt limit battle, instead urging both sides to come to an agreement. Corporations are wary of angering congressional Republicans, who have vowed to take revenge on companies that denounced state-level GOP voting laws and Republican attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

    Even the Chamber of Commerce, which spends millions of dollars on ads backing Republicans’ reelection campaigns, drew backlash from GOP lawmakers like Sen. Tom Cotton (Ark.) after it endorsed several House Democrats in the 2020 election.

    “Corporate America talked a big game about not donating to the campaigns of Republican politicians who voted to overturn the Electoral College result, and yet most of them in the end came around because they believe Republicans will be in the majority after the 2022 elections,” Kabaservice said. “On some level they think Republicans will still support their interests, whether it be tax cuts or deregulation.”

    Yeah, this is fine.

    Maybe the corporate types are slowly getting a clue?

    “Well, we could support the party that is controlling the pandemic, keeping the markets stable, putting us on a path for sustained long-term growth, breaking out of the too-low-inflation bubble (so we actually have prospects of being able to increase our prices over time), and making it possible for us to recruit motivated workers again. Or, we could support the crazy people who want to do the opposite and who want to crank up the culture wars. What to do??!”

    Hint, MotUs – the GQP can’t do anything vengeful to you if they don’t have the majority.

    (sigh)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  101. 101.

    AnnaN

    Looks like the Republicans have doubts about how well their disenfranchisement efforts will work and are going to go whole hog on “it’s the economy stupid”.  If they crash the US economy, they know their diehard contingency will still vote for them as will every other low info voter who is in deep financial straits and thinking “well, a republican admin can’t be worse than what I’m currently experiencing”

  102. 102.

    RaflW

    @Soprano2: I’ve been wondering about a kindly, friendly postcard campaign to bolster some of the school board and town council type folks who’ve been bombarded by right wing nuttery of late.

    I’m not keen to be indoors with the yelling anti-mask freaks, but would gladly send hand written postcards of support and thanks to the volunteer electeds.

  104. 104.

    rikyrah

    @Sean:

     

     If we’re relying on Manchin and Sinema to bail us out of a debt ceiling crisis, then I think we’re in real danger of defaulting.

     

    But, they are always whining about fiscal responsibility. Why we can’t have all the nice things we want as Democrats.

    Why would they be in favor of defaulting?

  105. 105.

    RaflW

    @AnnaN: It is mind boggling to me that corporate donors still give to the GOP. They’ll cancel your tax incentive if you cross them. They’ll blow up our full faith and credit and our global reputation to score a very temporary ‘win’ against Biden. They install radical judges who, for all we know, might just as well rule randomly on your torts and contracts because they’re careless hacks.

    But mah taxes!

  106. 106.

    rikyrah

    @AnnaN:

     

    Looks like the Republicans have doubts about how well their disenfranchisement efforts will work and are going to go whole hog on “it’s the economy stupid”.  If they crash the US economy, they know their diehard contingency will still vote for them as will every other low info voter who is in deep financial straits and thinking “well, a republican admin can’t be worse than what I’m currently experiencing”

     

    Uh huh

    Uh huh

  107. 107.

    Matt McIrvin

    @AnnaN: The best economic argument for voting Republican has always been similar to the argument for handing over your wallet to a mugger: if we don’t put them in power, the minority will use what power it still has to wreck everything out of spite.

    But Republican leadership has been disastrous enough that even that doesn’t really hit like it used to.

  108. 108.

    WhatsMyNym

    @sab: I was interested about Rita Dove’s father career and looked him up.

    Education: BS, chemistry, 1947, and MS, chemistry, 1953, University of Akron

    No PhD.Another obituary states that he started at Goodyear in 1946.​
     

    ETA: His full name Ray Allen Dove.

  109. 109.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @The Moar You Know: I didn’t even know those details and I thought the French response was an overreaction– recalling the ambassador? really?– and the media efforts to make this a crisis is pretty absurd

  110. 110.

    J R in WV

    @rikyrah: ​

    Lil Nas X did a cover of Parton’s Jolene.

    Amazing. Sums up the changes in culture since that song first came out, too. Great baritone voice, and he makes a great point by being a black guy singing those lyrics unchanged. I love it too.

  111. 111.

    Sean

    @rikyrah:  i don’t see them as in favor of defaulting, but instead, paralyzed by the inaction of whatever imaginary bipartisan heroics they believe they’re accomplishing by steadfastly defending the filibuster. If anything pushes them off the ledge, I guess it’s this but given the fantasy world they live in, I don’t know.

  116. 116.

    Soprano2

    @RaflW: I’ve been wondering about a kindly, friendly postcard campaign to bolster some of the school board and town council type folks who’ve been bombarded by right wing nuttery of late.

    I don’t think that would help. The only thing that would help is if the other side shows up in force in person at the meetings to push back on the nuttery. But see, they know that even though you’re fully vaccinated a lot of people like you are reluctant to come anyway, thus they get the floor and make it seem like they’re in the majority. That’s what they count on, and unfortunately in way too many places it’s working.

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