New kind of scammer email just dropped. pic.twitter.com/XqU6QAuJKH
— Kirstin Munro (@kmunroutrgv) October 28, 2021
I understand why the conversation has been about what’s not in the bill, but what’s in the bill is like three productive congresses worth of stuff. Seriously. https://t.co/eKHoBoUu7e
— Brian Schatz (@brianschatz) October 29, 2021
In a country as large and diverse as ours, progress can often feel frustrating and slow, with small victories accompanied by frequent setbacks. But once in a while, it’s still possible to take a giant leap forward. That’s what the Build Back Better framework represents. pic.twitter.com/ouKhRRz6qP
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) October 28, 2021
The White House's new framework is out:
*$555 billion on climate
*CTC extended a year
*Corporate and global min tax
*Universal pre-K
*Child care funding
*Expanded ACA subsidies, including Medicaid in red statesTons of new reporting/analysis here:https://t.co/nWuVzWZGh9
— Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) October 28, 2021
Indeed. For all their messiness and internal division, at least most elected Democrats are TRYING to change people's lives for the better. Republicans are doing literally nothing but shoring up Trump's ego, preventing people from voting, promoting COVID spread and banning books. https://t.co/NzNTYTAXD5
— Joy-Ann (Pro-Democracy) Reid ?? (@JoyAnnReid) October 28, 2021
If this deal goes thru, Dems will have passed nearly $5T in domestic programs (ARP, BIF, BBB) in the ten months since their surprise victories in Georgia. And all with a tenuous 50 seat majority. Pretty wild.
— Igor Bobic (@igorbobic) October 28, 2021
There are 50 GOP Senators refusing to support the paid leave American families deserve. I blame them. https://t.co/Lz9IRRM5Ml
— Joyce Alene (@JoyceWhiteVance) October 28, 2021
NotMax
An interlude with a humerus slant to nudge into the holiday frame of mind.
Spanky
Some rando on the internet was shouting yesterday that there is no Build Back Better bill.
Baud
News suggests final vote will be next week. My understanding is that they are still negotiating in things, so let’s hope for even better.
Spanky
Has Sinemanchin shut up, or has the courtier press gotten bored with them?
Spanky
@Spanky: Having them shut up would seem to indicate that things are finally moving ahead, and mostly for the better.
Gin & Tonic
WaPo headline: “New budget deal marks the biggest climate investment in US history.”
Thanks for accentuating the positive, AL.
New Deal democrat
My big criticism of Nancy Pelosi is that, while she is a master tactician, unlike Mitch McConnell she is a poor strategist.
Which is an intro to say I think Dana Houle is right about this:
mobile.twitter.com/DanaHoule/status/1453757104968323075
The best – and maybe only – way for the reconciliation bill to pass, is for Nancy Pelosi to deliberately bring up the infrastructure bill, and let it go down in flames. Maybe with a few progressive speeches about how In the bill West Virginia gets a cornucopia of special favors and the rest of the country gets crumbs.
After Joe Manchin spends a few days wailing like a stuck pig, it will begin to sink in that his hardball tactics have gained West Virginia, and him, precisely *nothing.* Then he can come back to the table and start committing to things the rest of the country can get in the reconciliation bill. Then he can vote for it, and then and only then the House can give him his “Precious” infrastructure bill. Or maybe the House incorporates the infrastructure bill into the reconciliation bill, and passes one big bill.
P.S. There is some commentary about how the Congressional shenanigans are dragging down Terry McAuliffe next door in VA. The only thing dragging down McAuliffe is he made an absolutely awful gaffe in the last debate in which he essentially said he didn’t want parents to have any say over their kids’ education.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone ???
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
Spanky
Cnn.com is telling me that Biden is meeting with the Pope “as his presidency hangs in the balance”.
Sadly, a shit-ton of readers don’t understand hyperbole, and how much headline writers put thumbs on the scale.
mrmoshpotato
Wow. Wood or aluminum?
Bash their fucking brains in – in self defense.
terraformer
I’m probably paranoid, but I keep thinking McConnell has something else up his sleeve (beyond the “debt limit” nonsense that will come up again just before Xmas)
Baud
@Spanky:
I look forward to the headlines about how the Biden presidency is saved when this bill passes.
Feathers
It was all I could do last night to not flame the holier than thou Bernie types to STFU about “corporate” Dems. Honestly, Sinema ran on having been a Green. She’s one of yours, assholes.
Baud
@Feathers:
I’m ok of they want to name them specifically. When they say corporate Dems, they mean the entire party outside of the progressive caucus.
Another Scott
@New Deal democrat: Nancy and Chuck aren’t going to have a vote on the final bills until they have the votes for passage. This isn’t like the performative voting rights votes earlier that lay the groundwork for killing the filibuster.
The Senate calendar indicates they are in session the first and third weeks of November. Presumably the votes will happen one of those periods.
We’ll see!
Cheers,
Scott.
Cheers,
Scott.
mrmoshpotato
@NotMax: Get your bones together, man!
Baud
@Another Scott:
A double cheery day to you too, sir.
Starfish
@Baud: The vote will be in a Friedman Unit.
Percysowner
@Spanky:
Yesterday Daniel Lipinski wrote a huge editorial about how the Pope isn’t on Biden’s side. He also is furious that he lost his primary and is grousing that it is all because he is pro-life and the Democratic Party just HATES RTLers and drove him out. Somehow the fact that his constituents didn’t like his positions seems to be offensive and Lipinski thinks he DESERVES a lifetime job as Senator.
Gin & Tonic
I’m not going to click the link, but the top item in my Google news feed right now says: “POLITICO Playbook: Why Joe Biden already won”
Another Scott
Weird bands of rain moving through NoVA now. Coming from the south south east.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic:
That’s a refreshing change.
mrmoshpotato
@Feathers:
Would Vermont Jesus have given everyone their own interstate highway too? These fucking kids…
Geminid
@New Deal democrat: What Terry McAuliffe said was pretty valid, but perhaps impolitic. It lends itself to attack ads which do not show context. McAuliffe’s friend Bill Clinton probably would have said it better.
The “failing to pass the infrastructure bill hurts McAuliffe” argument strikes me as “inside baseball” stuff. At this point, I don’t see how it hurts McAuliffe among Virginia voters.
I miss the good old days, when the Virginia Governor’s race attracted little national attention. Now I see it over-analysed constantly. This will end if and when McAuliffe is elected. But one of the many reasons I hope Youngkin doesn’t win is that if he does, I’ll never hear the last of it.
Another Scott
@Baud: Ack. I should remember to always scroll the editor box on my phone…
Cheers,
Scott.
SiubhanDuinne
@NotMax:
That was great! Thank you!
In return, and in keeping with the holiday spirit, I give you:
youtu.be/5xH4uKPDAEE
Kay
@New Deal democrat:
It’s a national, lavishly funded Right wing campaign. They’re flooding the whole country with it. Blaming McAuliffe for it is off base, IMO.
They banished her and they’re reviewing all the other candidates to ensure they’ll march along lockstep. The usual process is the governor submits the state board and they’re approved by rote. The furthest Right members of the state leglslature have grabbed the process and they’re packing it with Right wing nuts. It’s happening all over.
It started in Virgina because they wanted the VA governor’s race. He just happened to be at ground zero.
mrmoshpotato
@Percysowner:
Is that state Senator or US Senator?
debbie
Speakings of scams, here in Columbus OH, there’s an issue on next week’s ballot which would take $87 million from the general fund (which is 10% of the city’s budget) and allocate it to four entities that would dole the money to nebulous, green energy projects. With zero accountability to anyone.
No one’s been able to find or speak to any of the five “petitioners” who got the issue on the ballot. Until yesterday, when a local reporter interviewed the attorney and one of the issue’s originators. Maybe it’s me, but I smell scam. Either the guy was poorly prepared to explain himself or he was juar hired and not coached well enough to pass for someone genuinely interested. And the lawyer sounds like I don’t know what.
Oh, and they’ve already started the process of getting the issue added to the next election’s ballot.
Starfish
@Percysowner: Someone, fetch me the world’s smallest violin so that I may play it for Dan Lipinski’s career.
jonas
Khalifa Shamoon? Top assassin?
Do you get a certificate at assassin school or something when you graduate from being just a mid-level assassin? Inquiring minds want to know. Especially if we’re going to pay you to call off the hit on us.
Betty Cracker
Rep. Jayapal seems really optimistic, so that’s good news!
She says she has the president’s assurance that the two caucus outliers in the Senate will vote for the eventual reconciliation bill.
Kay
@New Deal democrat:
Starting it in VA was deliberate. Three of the four paid leaders of Parents Defending Education, the Koch backed national group, are Virginia Republicans. They launched in VA for the governor’s race.
Starfish
@mrmoshpotato: The real lefties and the centrists get along better than the commenters of this blog do about candidates that ran against each other in the last primary. It has been about two years. Get over yourselves.
Republicans are out here painting Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer as the Radical Left, and you all are still here on your nonsense.
mrmoshpotato
@Another Scott: Are they singing in Korean?
Another Scott
@Geminid:. Yup. I’m not seeing anything to indicate that VAs blue shade has changed much.
BlueVirginia – Record early voting continues in Blue / Purple areas.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Betty Cracker: Jayapal has impressed me during this.
Kay
@New Deal democrat:
We already have one of the Right wing activists here. She’s in a tiny district, rural low income, not a real strong school and she’s launched a crusade that is supposedly about “CRT” but is 100% gay bashing.
That school has bigger problems than kids putting rainbows on their lockers, but VA just caught the launch of a national campaign. They were unprepared, as one would be, when a wildly wealthy family launches a giant political campaign out of nowhere. Didn’t see that coming. I sure didn’t.
Soprano2
Hmmmm, does Ian MIllhiser read Balloon Juice? He tweeted this:
Starfish
@Kay: All the schools have real problems this year like the substitute shortage and stuff having to do with the nuanced details of how they are doing quarantines, but instead of talking about any of that, we are stuck with this garbage.
Soprano2
@Another Scott: Strangely enough, it looks like that’s part of the storm that’s been dumping on us for the past 3 days.
Betty Cracker
@Geminid: I think it’s entirely possible that the dithering and sniping over the two bills (and the awful coverage thereof) drags Democrats down across the board, as does other random and not-so-random stuff, like the coronavirus surge that made us have to go back to masks, inflation, broken supply chains, etc.
With a highly polarized electorate, it seems like the least informed people decide close elections, so it’s sort like musical chairs with the national mood. Luckily for Dems, we have a year to go until the next national election, and things could improve. Unluckily for McAuliffe, his is happening now. Here’s hoping he wins anyway.
Gin & Tonic
News from Europe’s longest-running war. Russian forces in occupied Ukrainian territory shelled Ukrainian-held territory with a 120mm artillery piece. So Ukrainian forces used a Turkish-made Bayraktar UACV (unmanned aerial combat vehicle, sometimes called a drone) to destroy the 120mm gun. Following this event, Germany condemns … Ukraine. WTF?
New Deal democrat
@Geminid: The VA governor’s campaign may have been the Koch test run, but McAuliffe sure stepped in it. Saying something “true but impolitic” is, well, impolitic.
Hopefully he wins anyway, but his nearly 100% anti-Trump campaign reminds me an awful lot of Hillary’s.
mrmoshpotato
@Starfish: I’ll take Bernie caucusing and voting with the Democrats, but fuck him for his Hillary ratfucking after she beat him like a drum in the primary.
Fuck him for that beyond the end of time.
Gin & Tonic
@Starfish: My daughter is an elementary school teacher. She says that pre-pandemic they’d have a serious problem with a kid acting out (i.e. disciplinary issues) maybe once a month. Now it’s more like once a day. Teachers are at their wits’ end.
Geminid
@Betty Cracker: I think if these two bills had passed a week ago McAuliffe maybe could have taken advantage of them. The effect might have been marginal, but in a close race that can make a difference. It wouldn’t have hurt if the “bipartisan” infrastructur bill had been passed yesterday, though. I wish it had.
Soprano2
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Me too. I heard Cori Bush on Morning Edition today. After saying she was disappointed that things like paid medical leave didn’t make it into the final bill, she was enthusiastic about the things that are in there, and really talked it up. They’re all getting on board. I even think in the end the process may help us, because all the reporting is about how the bill was “cut in half”, which we all hate but the average person will probably see as reasonable. No matter how you look at it, what these two bills will do is historic, and we should celebrate them when they pass.
Soprano2
It’s completely different circumstances. In 2016 lots of people saw Trump as that businessman on the Apprentice, so they didn’t have any idea what kind of president he would be; now we all know how he actually governed. It’s two different things. That said, you do have to push your accomplishments and what you plan to do if elected some, it can’t all be about your opponent and his ties to Trump and MAGA world.
Nicole
McAuliffe is right; the vast majority of parents don’t have a background in childhood education, and grousing that, “It’s not the way we were taught when we were kids” is the stupidest argument imaginable- you’re right, because we’ve learned more about how the brain learns since then. Would they like their oncologist to have stopped learning anything new after 1982, saying, “Well, it was good enough for the Reagan years”? But parents have a knee-jerk (and probably misogynistic) reaction to teachers, convince they, the parents, know better than (mostly) women who have goddamn masters’ degrees in what they’re teaching. And it’s easily weaponized by the Right Wing for things far beyond how kids are learning to multiply and divide today.
If I had a nickel for every parent I’ve talked to who has complained about their school’s curriculum, but, when pressed, can’t articulate exactly what it is they have an issue with. BECAUSE THEY DON’T ACTUALLY UNDERSTAND IT.
Spanky
@Soprano2: ALL RIGHT WHICH ONE OF YOU GUYS COPYRIGHTED “TIRE RIMS AND ANTHRAX”?
Starfish
@Gin & Tonic: What grade does she teach? I have heard of more problems with the youngest students in some schools. For example, all the kindergarteners who never had any preschool and all the youngest middle school kids
Also, there have been a few high school student suicides in the past few years, and I can’t tell if that is normal or not. It is sad though.
Baud
@Soprano2:
Whatever campaign a Democrat runs, someone on the Internet says they should have run the opposite. Run on the issues, someone claims not enough attack ads. Run attack ads, someone claims not enough about the issues voters care about. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, of course, but collectively, everyone’s opinion cancels each others out.
frosty
@Betty Cracker: This is the first time I’ve listened to Rep Jayapal. Wow, she’s good. She hit on all the good things the bill will do, as we’ve been asking for. A great salesperson!
Frankensteinbeck
@New Deal democrat:
Pelosi is a fantastic strategist, which is why we have two bills at all. Her moderates only wanted one. If Manchin does not get his way on the BBB, he will not feel pressured to vote for a better bill. He just won’t vote for any bill. I would go so far as to say thinking Manchin can be strong-armed is silly. He has no record of going “Oh no, I failed to bring pork for my constituents!”, no other Democrat can win his seat, and his constituents prefer him to brag about giving the middle finger to the Democratic establishment.
Also, WTF focusing on Pelosi and not Schumer here? That reeks of misogyny.
Omnes Omnibus
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
She has impressed me as well.
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus:
Fourthed or fifthed.
Omnes Omnibus
@Soprano2: Cole’s been harassing him on Twitter over this.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Soprano2: If he was a jackal, it’d be tire rims and anthrax.
Starfish
@mrmoshpotato: People are still trying to dig up dirt on Hillary Clinton. (Joke)
Baud
@Soprano2: Just like a liberal. No respect for other people’s intellectual property. Harrumph.
frosty
@Soprano2: That’s funny. If he had said anthrax instead of arsenic I’d be positive he read it here. I’ll give him a pass on tire rims; nails are easier to understand.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Spanky: It was Baud.
jonas
@Nicole:
We live in a pretty decent school district and my one complaint is that English classes — except for the advanced or AP courses — have by and large stopped teaching literature. Not just controversial stuff — everything. It’s just graphic novels and film strips these days. I’m told students just refuse to read, or write, anything longer than a paragraph, so they’ve just given up.
Gin & Tonic
@Starfish: She teaches 1-6. I haven’t asked about the age distribution of the kids with issues.
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: Cole has noted that everything here is Creative Commons. No copyright to assert. But a h/t would probably be nice. Or at least a “to paraphrase an eccentric crank on the Web…”
?BillinGlendaleCA
I’m headed out to see if I can catch the last of the fall color in the local mountains, but I’ve had a few days to work with the new version of Lightroom with it’s improved masking, it is really good.
satby
@mrmoshpotato: He was a Congressional rep, and an awful one who basically inherited his seat when his father, the previous rep, died. Every year he ran we had Greens and multiple Dems splitting the votes in his primary. Finally the anti-Lipinski folks got smart and joined to support one primary candidate to throw his ass out.
Nina
As I see it my job is to bitch about what’s not in the bill as long as there’s a hope of getting it, then cheer for what we did get once we get it.
Kay
@Starfish:
They do. I have a close friend who is a 3rd grade teacher- probably 30 years experience- and she (jokingly) told me “they’ve gone feral”. She means the kids. They were out of their routines a long time. They’re sashaying in 2 hours late, “oh- did we have school today?”
Soprano2
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Maybe, but it was so close! Perhaps he didn’t want to completely steal it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Nina: Hey, if you do the second, I’ll have no issues with the first. I am still inclined toward talking up the good points on this side of passage too, but it takes all kinds.
Starfish
@Kay: I just got an email from the principal of my child’s school yesterday because the kids are playing Red Light/Green Light on the playground and calling it “Squid Games.” And he is like “I AM NOT SURE WHICH OF YOU IS LETTING YOUR CHILD WATCH THIS, BUT IT IS COMPLETELY INAPPROPRIATE FOR ELEMENTARY SCHOOL KIDS.” He said it in a more reasonable and principally way, but that is what he said.
boatboy_srq
Why, yes. Yes I am.
Now, how were you told I was bad?
Omnes Omnibus
@boatboy_srq: Oddly, I am bad in a different way. But thanks for asking.
Geminid
@satby: It took Marie Neuman two tries to beat Lipinski. She almost pulled it off in 2018. A little outside help would have made a difference. Some people questioned Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez flying to Kansas that July to help Sharice David’s primary opponent. The two would have done better to stop at Chicago and help Neuman. But Neuman had been a Clinton supporter.
Another Scott
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Enjoy!
Cheers,
Scott.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: I will be an outlier on this and say that I will judge her by the results she gets.
So far her achievement has been to obstruct the passage of the infrastructure bill. I will join the cheerleading squad after the bills get passed.
zhena gogolia
@Starfish: Maybe those kids just read the New York times. they have several articles on this piece of trash show every day.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Starfish: So the kids are executing the losers of Red Light, Green Light?
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
Right, if nothing passes, it’ll be devastating. But part of leadership involves choosing to take risks and then seeing it through. So far, he’s conducted herself well, and if this gets through, she deserves her share of the credit.
Omnes Omnibus
@schrodingers_cat: The whole plan is no infrastructure bill unless it is paired with BBB. Otherwise, BBB is dead in this water. Jayapal is working with Biden, Pelosi, and Schumer to make that happen.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Sure after both the bills get passed. So I am in the wait and see mode on Pramila J. I haven’t forgiven her for being all giggly sitting next to Rashida Tlaib booing HRC on stage.
*Interesting anecdote: Pramila is the name of one of my grandaunts. She is a lovely woman and these days she lives in Seattle with my cousin and her grandson. For all I know Pramila P may be Pramila J’s constituent.
Omnes Omnibus
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Playgrounds can be harsh places.
Ken
Wait, what? All of my brilliant bon mots plus the other 99.93% of my comments have lost copyright? More importantly, Tony Jay’s diatribes are now free for the taking?
WaterGirl, can we get a notice about this in the comment box? Maybe something like
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Another Scott: This all sounds like just a repeat of the Cal Recall were the press was going by the likely voter poll numbers and ignoring how early voting trashes that.
burnspbesq
@Soprano2:
And start planning to get the rest of it ASAP.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat: I don’t need to connect the present with that past episode. I’m not judging her whole life, just her present actions. I’m glad she’s chosen to work with Biden and act positively toward the Democratic Party, and portray the holdouts on the right as the outliers here. It’s a different and better approach than attacking the “Establishment” IMHO.
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: I thought your comment was a reply to SC’s comment just above. Works just as well.
lowtechcyclist
I’d tell Lipinski to fuck that ‘pro-life’ shit. You know how I’m pro-life? I support mask and vaccine mandates. That’s being pro-life for the people who are already born. There’s no argument about their personhood. Once their lives are reasonably safe, maybe we can talk about fetuses.
Leto
@Kay: this popped up on my news feed yesterday: A look at the groups supporting school board protesters nationwide
Some of the usual right wing funded fucks are behind it (Kochs being usual contributors) but we also have former Trumpov staffers, and other right wing groups who’ve launched these groups. The article talks about Poway Unified School District, in San Diego County, Calif., and the right wing cranks there. Usual anti-crt/LGBT/inclusion, mask/vaccine mandates… but then how it escalated from there to threats of violence. But yeah, here’s more groups to add to the list.
Baud
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Early vote is hard. As we saw last year, our voters vote early while the GOP voters tend to vote on election day.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: She was very good during one of the impeachments, I think the first one.
Kay
@Another Scott:
God, I hope so because Democrats wil get spooked if they lose. The Right and Centrist Democrats will bolt. I don’t think (some) want the BBB bill at all and are looking for an excuse to kill it. It’s why I wanted them to move it along quicker. You know how this narrative works.
Leto
@boatboy_srq: good lord, at least let me finish my second cup of coffee before BJ After Dark fires up… :P
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: That episode makes it difficult for me to trust her. That said I will be the first in line to sing her praises if her strategy pays off. We will see.
Another Scott
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: It seems more like Terry’s last race to me (“It’s Tied!!11…Terry wins by 9.”) But there are so many difference that it’s really hard.
I’m not seeing a drop in Democratic voting. I’m not seeing a drop in party unity (Barack, Joe, Kamala, Jill, Cory, … have all campaigned here for him). I’m not seeing a lack of money and campaign spending (Terry and Team D is trouncing the GQP on and off-line). All the evidence says that Team D is doing what it needs to win, and has a compelling story to tell on why staying blue is good (good economy, good on fighting COVID, good state budget, etc., etc.) and why the GQP’s attempt to muddy everything up with fear and anger isn’t working.
It’s not over until it’s over, but I like our position.
Forward!!
Cheers,
Scott.
Barbara
@New Deal democrat: You mean, sort of like letting TARP fail when it didn’t get Republican support? Yeah, no, that won’t work here as a matter of strategy or tactics.
I am the child of someone who was pathologically “glass half empty,” and it sometimes takes everything I have to push against the learned or inborn pessimism that permeated my childhood. I have two siblings whose emotional lives have been crippled by the same trait. I use actual strategies to defuse negative thoughts.
So as someone who has had to cope constantly with pessimism, I admit that it can sometimes be hard to differentiate a setback from a defeat, and I do get tired of fighting, but I just don’t think the foot soldiers on the right are going anywhere. It’s okay if you don’t feel like fighting anymore, but for God’s sake, it’s better to let others who are still in the mood to keep fighting than spend the rest of your energy tearing down the progress that has been made.
Feathers
@Starfish: You are not seeing the lefties I am. They think they won the election last year, why aren’t the promises being kept. It’s all BidenSchumerPelosi’s fault for not “forcing” everyone to support the most expansionist form of the bill.
I’ve even seen fantasies of how Bernie would have gotten this done. And this is not Rose Twitter.
We have a serious problem that people are just primed to shit on Democrats. It seeps over to our own side as well. And it is terrible.
Betty Cracker
@jonas: I suspect screens have rewired our brains in ways we don’t yet fathom.
Baud
@Betty Cracker: I feel perfectly normal.
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: So the process of becoming a normie has worked?
Baud
@Barbara:
That’s what gets me. I completely understand getting frustrated and giving up or moving on. Done it myself, and not just with respect to political things. What I can’t understand is why people stick around and say things that bring other people down rather than just taking a break.
Subsole
@Gin & Tonic: Where does Germany get its heating gas from?
@mrmoshpotato: Not terribly thrilled he tried it on Biden, either. You don’t get to pull Tara Fucking Reade out of your back pocket, never apologize for that egregious little fuckup, and then tell everyone to just move on.
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus: It’s tougher than it appears, but I’m making progress.
schrodingers_cat
@Feathers: They are also baying for Garland’s head because Orangeman isn’t in an orange jumpsuit yet.
Kay
@Leto:
They’re focusing on wealthier districts, which is probably why I only have one freelancer. It’s just so clearly a coordinated campaign to win back suburbs. God, it has everything, doesn’t it? They can combine the anti vaxx nutters and the anti-gay and the racists along with their general hatred of public schools and teachers unions. No wonder they’re rolling it out nationwide.
I do think it can be won though. I think Democrats could come out on top of it, mostly because they can’t control their base and it’s already expanded to banning books and firing GOP heretics. It’s a full blown panic. But some Democrats will get caught in it until they get their feet back under them.
Subsole
@Soprano2: I honestly never even thought of it like that. It probably does sound reasonable to the non-obsessed.
frosty
@Baud: Ah ha! As BC suspected. Solid evidence that screens have rewired Baud’s Brain!
ETA fixed stupid autocorrect: rewired not required. Sheesh.
Soprano2
@Starfish: I know about Squid Games, and I haven’t watched it at all. They don’t have to be watching it to know about it.
schrodingers_cat
@mrmoshpotato: This!
Starfish
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: It sounds like they were just playing Red Light/Green Light and calling it Squid Games.
My son said that the principal put an end to it anyway.
The principal said that he will let them continue playing Red Light/Green Light, but he will put an end to it if it looks like anyone is going to execute anyone else.
The Moar You Know
@Gin & Tonic: nasty bit of realpolitik there. Germany is going into winter and cannot have their supply of Russian natural gas interfered with. One would hope the Germans would figure out an alternative but apparently that is not going to happen anytime soon.
You’d think, given their…unstable history with Russia, that would be national priority number one.
Soprano2
@burnspbesq: Yes, I get discouraged by the “This is the only chance we’ll have for the next 50 years to do anything, panic if we don’t get it all” crap.
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat: As I said yesterday, they’ve decided now that Sally Yates is their savior. But I doubt she would be doing anything differently from Garland.
Leto
@Starfish:
Is this before or after the gallows are built?
“Principal Skinner, the children are building a gallows!”
“Well, they could be playing a realistic game of hangman. Let’s see what they do…”
Subsole
@jonas: Is the paragraph 280 characters, by chance?
zhena gogolia
@jonas: Oh, that’s depressing.
My students (college-level) are able to read less and less every year.
The Moar You Know
@Starfish: the first episode of Squid Games is literally a version of Red Light/Green Light. Where the losers are shot if they twitch.
Soprano2
That is driving me crazy. They want Garland to act like Bill Barr did. I don’t think there’s anyone on the Democratic side who would satisfy them.
MomSense
@Spanky:
There is no bill yet. There just isn’t.
Also, too we need to keep some of our elder Senators in bubble wrap until they do have a bill and the votes are cast.
Subsole
@Feathers: Bernie may not be all to blame, but him handing his megaphone to the absolute worst pack of scumfuck internet trolls and podchodes, twice, did NOT help.
Also, I think the wound keeps festeting because I only ever saw the Clinton side admit to culpability or flaws. The Bernies (all online, to be fair) were abusive little shits when they started, and just got worse.
Not one that I am aware of ever stood back and said, “yeah, maybe we should have listened to arguments about the supreme court.” Nope, just slimy fucking self-righteous 4chan-grade abuse.
Hard to bury the hatchet when the other party never fucking let go of it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Subsole: If I were forced to choose, I would take good behavior today over a mea culpa.
ETA: I am easy on Manchin and Sinema right now. More so with the Bernie Bros who are being team players.
Baud
@MomSense: I am more worried about incapacity more than I’m worried about them reaching a deal on a bill.
MomSense
@mrmoshpotato:
St. Bernard ran for president in 2020 with a 1 Trillion infrastructure proposal that was touted as generationally transformational. That seems to have slipped down the memory hole.
I also like to remind the Bernistas that he is a key negotiator so the results are absolutely a statement on his political capital and ability. The case he made for his presidency in 2016 and 2020 was that he could tap his movement to pressure Congress into enacting his proposals. He even included McConnell as if he would somehow be amenable to protest and pressure. Where the fuck is his his movement? Why aren’t they following Manchinema around 24/7?
It was always nonsense.
UncleEbeneezer
@New Deal democrat: McAuliffe is right. While parents should have SOME input into suggested curricula, this country has a LONG history of right-wing parents trying to hold our education system hostage by demanding shitty science (Creationism), white-washed history (Lost Cause), sexual ignorance (Abstinence Only) and complete lack of any Black/Brown/Latinx/Indigenous perspectives. This is the reality of what “parents decide” looks like in much of America. Curricula should be determined by actual educators, not by Flat-Earth, Anti-Vax parents.
schrodingers_cat
@Soprano2: Its mostly resistance grifters with large accounts like Sarah Doomzior, Amy Siskind and Rick Wilson who are the behind this. But a large part of leftie Twitter eats their Democrat bashing takes with a spoon.
UncleEbeneezer
@The Moar You Know: If we were still kids, we would all have heard about Squid Game and we would all be doing this. This is hardly something to freak out over.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’d send them to FL, GA, NC etc. (or just their local sites) to register the young voters they are said to speak to and for, armed with arguments about $500B green package
Ken
@UncleEbeneezer: We were shooting one another, but called it “Cowboys and Indians”. And the lucky kids had cap pistols — more than a few eardrums needed attention.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@UncleEbeneezer: I was late to the Sopranos and Breaking Bad, I may eventually watch Squid Game but… I don’t know. I had to bail on Dexter and Shameless because they were just too dark, which is out of character for me. Probably just started them at the wrong moment.
Subsole
@Omnes Omnibus: Fair point. I just think that’s where a lot of the bad blood came from.
Omnes Omnibus
@Ken: I had a revolver that had a plastic ring of bang-bangs that went into the cylinder. It was about 10x louder than the red paper strip caps, about half as loud as the real thing. It was the shit.
Gin & Tonic
@Subsole: Would it have cost Germany just to STFU? Every sovereign nation has a right to defend itself against attack.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Starfish: ah, just saw the context of the Squid Games discussion. I suspect the real culprits are those malevolent creatures known as “Older Siblings”. I survived four of them.
UncleEbeneezer
@Starfish: When we were kids all we did was play Cops & Robbers, Cowboys & Indians, and numerous other games that fantasized about violence/killing. It’s hardly new and really doesn’t portend in any way that the kids will turn into mass shooters or gun nuts. Toy guns were totally my thing, yet I have never owned or even fired a real gun and would love to see the 2nd Amendment abolished. Play/fantasy are exactly that. And they say very little about what are adult values will be. Heck I was always a COP when playing Cops & Robbers and yet now I work regularly on police reform.
Gin & Tonic
@The Moar You Know: As I said in the other reply, Germany could just have remained silent.
Besides, V.V. Putin has said publicly that Russia would never use gas supplies as a weapon, and if you can’t trust him, whom can you trust?
Fair Economist
@Geminid: If the bipartisan infrastructure bill passes before BBB, we’ll never get BBB. BIF is the only thing Sinema seems to care about. That will hurt us WAY more than losing the VA election would.
PAM Dirac
@Ken:
Since Creative Commons has created a standardized set of copyright licenses, just saying “Creative Commons” isn’t specific enough to determine the license conditions and it most definitely isn’t the same as public domain.
Subsole
@Ken: We just threw M-80s.
How on Earth are any of us still alive??
Betty Cracker
@schrodingers_cat: I don’t assume Yates would be more aggressive than Garland. IMO, there’s not enough evidence on that one way or another. But it isn’t just the dirtbag left and anti-Trump justice grifters who are wondering if Garland is the man for this moment. Adam Schiff has also expressed doubts:
Source.
As of two days ago, it’s too late to prosecute Trump for the Stormy Daniels payoff. Trump’s minion Michael Cohen went to jail for that. Why wasn’t Trump, aka Individual-1, also prosecuted? I’m not a lawyer, but I think these are legit questions.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Look, mate! If you had any idea how irritating you little shits could be, you be surprised how many of you made it to adolescence, let alone adulthood.*
*And my little brother was one of the good ones.
Omnes Omnibus
@Subsole: How on earth aren’t we more fucked up than we are?
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@Baud: Conflict drives engagement – just ask Zuck!
Gin & Tonic
@Subsole: My best friend Raul and I would order chemicals from those teeny ads at the back of Popular Science and make our own explosives. I’m amazed I still have 10 fingers.
Subsole
@Gin & Tonic: Don’t know. I suspect Russian dark money/gray Adam has told us about has sloshed its way into German pockets, too.
Spanky
@Omnes Omnibus: Colt revolvers with actual brass cartridges with little springs that shot plastic bullets. Topped off by a Greenie Stick’em Cap, that was the shit.
By Mattel! It’s swell!
Ken
It’s a version of the anthropic principle. The ability to ask the question means that we were not the kids who died playing with M-80s, BB guns, tire swings, abandoned quarries, chemistry sets, or the Gilbert Atomic Energy Lab.
I think the most dangerous toy I ever played with was my grandfather’s model train set. It was one of the old kinds, with a transformer with the ceramic posts, asbestos insulation, and a suspicious burning smell every time it was turned on. For all I know the thing didn’t have a transformer, and was just delivering a rectified 80 VDC to the tracks.
Fair Economist
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
The Cali Recall polling showed a strong trend showed a strong trend towards Newsom, and the “tied race” for a while was due to one outlier poll. The VA polling is much less favorable.
I woke up in a panic last night and sent a donation to McAuliffe (I’d donated to VA leg fund earlier). I know it’s late, but I had to do *something* to sleep. Then I sent a donation to Maggie Hassan to try to scare off Sununu, who would be a dangerous opponent for an important seat.
What I really hate about this ongoing attempted fascist takeover is that there are a lot of cool things I want to do with my life, and I’m having to spend it worrying about these Republican monsters and trying to figure out what I can do or write to stop them.
Subsole
@Omnes Omnibus:
@Gin & Tonic:
God, I have no idea how I’m not 75% scar tissue just from the fireworks alone.
I think part of it is knowing precisely how much trouble we’d be in if we blew our finger off. The amputation would be the LEAST of your concerns when mom and dad got home.
Sure Lurkalot
@jonas: If the teens won’t read anything longer than a paragraph, that’s something to put on parents, not educators
Remember when cell phones became ubiquitous? That’s when I started seeing parents ignoring their children in restaurants, eating and chatting on the phone. Shortly thereafter, parents giving their toddler the cell phone in the grocery cart. And so on.
Technology is useful but it’s also a drug and we should have learned from the science fiction we read.
Quiltingfool
@Nicole: Preach, sister! Former teacher here. I can tell you that not only do parents not know the curriculum beyond, “Hey, my kid’s learning about life science!” I worked with teachers who didn’t get the nuances of science curriculum. Mostly elementary teachers as they got very little instruction on science in college. (Lima bean germination, anyone?), but some high school teachers weren’t so good, either. It’s sad when you have former students tell you they learned more science in your 8th grade science class than in high school science courses.
Story here – had a parent wander in my room the day before school started (open house), looked at the periodic table poster on the wall and made the comment that his science teacher in junior high had the students memorize the entire table. I guess he thought I would be impressed, but I poured cold water on that when I said, “Well, I think that’s a complete waste of time.” Then I explained to him that the periodic table is a tool, much like a ruler or balance; we use the information on it to do all sorts of things.
Parents do need to have an idea of what will be taught – but teachers can and should be able to articulate to parents why a topic is being taught, how it will be taught, how the learning will be assessed, and what will be done if the student struggles with the learning.
It’s no wonder we can’t get people to pursue teaching as a career.
And to think that when the schools were shut down and parents had to monitor their child’s learning, they started to realize the importance of teachers. Now, not so much.
Jeffro
This describes my household, mostly. =(
Another Scott
@UncleEbeneezer: It’s worse than that. The people disrupting and threatening school boards don’t care about CRT and all the rest. They don’t even know what CRT is. It’s “death panels” and “flag burning” and “drugs in Halloween candy” and “Ebola” all over again.
They’re being driven into a rage by the same old playbook of fear by the GQP. Those that aren’t GQP actors, anyway…
School boards have no obligation to listen to bad-faith arguments and disingenuous screaming any more than hospitals or law offices or churches or AF bases or farmers do. We don’t allow deranged screamers to tell other professionals how to do their jobs.
I assume all of this stuff will fade into the background again – it never goes away – after the Virginia elections next week. Then the screaming about empty shelves and $350 raspberries and Democrats stealing Christmas will start up again.
We know what they’ll do because they keep doing the same things over and over and over again. We need to keep our wits about us and keep pushing forward.
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
My two cents. Cohen pled guilty to 8 charges:
Only two of those relate to Trump. Because Cohen pled guilty, the prosecution never had to test its evidence of those two charges. If they went after Trump, Cohen would probably not be a credible witness, so they would have to rely on other evidence. Now, if DOJ is looking into Trump for more serious crimes, it makes sense not to try to get Trump on these crimes and risk an acquittal. If DOJ is not looking into Trump, then I’m not so sure.
Omnes Omnibus
Worth every goddamned penny too!
Jeffro
Good question! When I was a pre-teen, some of the older boys in the neighborhood used to duct-tape pads and pillows to the ends of broomsticks, then beat the crap out of each other.
They also used to put on shop goggles and play “1-pump”: ie, they’d play soldier/army/guns and shoot each other with BB guns, but you could only crank them up with one pump (so that they wouldn’t have enough pressure built up to break the skin)
Subsole
@Ken:
Good point. Do they still sell those little “build your own rocket” kits, with the electrical trigger and the powder launching charge?
That train set sounds absolutely nuts. Like, I get wanting realism, but I don’t need an actual third rail with my train, thanks.
Subsole
@Sure Lurkalot: I think we expected Orwell or Huxley.
Funny tweet I saw:
“If you were born after 1980, you were never promised flying cars and moon colonies. You were promised Snow Crash. Here you go.”
Another Scott
@Baud: Tribe was poo-pooing Garland’s answers to Whitehouse at a hearing yesterday, but I thought it was excellent.
Basically Whitehouse asked him if the DOJ was doing more than charging the rioters who got inside the Capitol on 1/6. Whether he was following the money and every lead.
Garland said (roughly) – As you know I have to be very careful here, but we are using all the tools of law enforcement, including ones that are past your time, to follow the money, etc. He’s being careful and that’s what’s necessary to build a strong case.
We’ll see.
Cheers,
Scott.
Jeffro
Excellent point (and one that smart school divisions will make pro-actively and stand behind).
“CRT is not taught in our PreK-12 schools. And if you’re going to take 40 terms you don’t like and call them CRT, well, that’s your issue. NEXT!”
James E Powell
@New Deal democrat:
Well, Hillary did win the popular vote in Virginia (and the nation) so maybe not such a bad plan?
Quiltingfool
@Kay: My teacher friend (7th grade science) told me the more kids (than normal) last year were just plain mean – to each other, the teachers, everyone. I do think shutting schools down in March 2020 had a profound effect on kids, and it may take a year or so to calm things down.
I remember talking to people during that time who were extremely frustrated that they couldn’t get their kids to do school work at home. I told them that was not surprising; kids know what is expected in the classroom, that’s where you learn. Home is where you do “not school” stuff. Expecting kids to instantly adapt to a huge change in a learning environment is ludicrous.
Subsole
@Quiltingfool: It takes a lot of brains to teach someone else to use theirs…
frosty
@Gin & Tonic: Yes, some comic book had the formula for gunpowder in the back, something like 5 parts sulfur, 7 parts saltpeter, 5 parts charcoal. We bought sulfur at the hobby shop (chemistry set replacements), saltpeter at the corner store, and ground up charcoal briquettes.
Later we just mixed saltpeter and sugar which flared up real good and used it to sink our model ships in the crick behind the house.
Subsole
@Another Scott:
Steven King said it best.
One of his characters is talking to the local Devil-Equivalent.
“You know, you really aren’t that smart. You only have one, maybe two, tricks. And those only work because people forget.”
Ken
@Another Scott: I’m still hoping someday that a Senator or Rep will ask a question at one of these hearings, and Garland or whoever will answer “The Department of Justice does not discuss the status of ongoing investigations with the subjects of those investigations.”
Ksmiami
@Fair Economist: Rt there with you. Hell, we couldn’t even celebrate Biden’s win. I just want to destroy the Republican Party for making us all paralyzed with existential dread.
Subsole
@Jeffro: Hey, at least they put on shop goggles.
A Christmas Story must have done some good.
Edmund Dantes
@schrodingers_cat: there is no reason “unindicted conspirator-1” shouldn’t have already been charged in the stormy Daniels case. Especially since the statute of limitations was passing soon (and now may have already passed).
so yeah. They have dropped the ball. There’s going slow to make sure you get it right. And going slow to actually not do anything at all for soemthing already teed up.
Baud
@Ken:
As long as we’re dreaming, it would be cool if someone got arrested while Garland was testifying before them. Just like in the movies!
Ruckus
@Feathers:
That constant right wing bullshit works. On righties it works up front. On marginal lefties it works a bit more subtly. They might began to wonder. We all are creatures of our environment. And if you read most newspapers, watch too much TV news commentary (or any at all) you often get bombarded with this, which is the way the right wing works, repeat crap over and over and that becomes the entire premise, instead of any actual thought or reflection.
We call it propaganda.
Kalakal
@Ken: That train set sounds very hairy. School chemistry lessons were great when the teacher was distracted. we had a huge fully equipped old school lab with jars and jars of stuff.
mix’n’match could get Really exciting as a bunch of idiot kids tried the time honoured “hey we haven’t tried nitric acid with this lumpy stuff yet” approach.
Happy days
Omnes Omnibus
@Jeffro: My best friend and I made swords and axes out of sheet metal using tin ships and then fight with them. I mean literally swinging pieces of sharp metal at oneanother’s heads.
Subsole
@frosty: Thank god we never got hold of styrofoam and gasoline…
Though we did figure out what happens when you put pool cleaner in a plastic coke bottle…
jeffreyw
@Ken:
We had a set of lawn darts. I remember playing with them.
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: Biden has been in office for less than a year. I too wish that the Orange Tyrant see justice and soon. But I am willing to wait till the AG has a water tight case.
Subsole
@Ruckus: Minor correction:
We used to call it propaganda.
I believe the modern nomenclature is marketing.
Uncle Cosmo
@Gin & Tonic: The good news is that you still have 10 fingers.
The bad news is that, since (presumably) you, like me, came of age during Peak Strontium 90, they’re distributed among 4 hands…
(jk – never can resist a shot at a bon mot. ;^p)
frosty
@Kalakal: One of my friends with a chemistry set wanted to get some pure sodium, so he fired up the little furnace, melted some salt, stuck in some electrodes to separate the ions* … and sent chlorine gas through the house.
Dad was not impressed.
* It’s been a long time, I think this is how it worked.
Edmund Dantes
@Betty Cracker: thank you. Hadn’t gotten here yet before I replied to the other.
The Stormy Daniels case was right there. And they can’t say “they needed more time to get ducks in a row” “they want to get it just right”. The case was already all there and investigated. Not even an indictment. Just let it slip out the back door.
jeffreyw
@Another Scott:
Patriot Act?
Fair Economist
@Edmund Dantes: I think the problem with prosecutions of Trump and Trumpists is that the FBI, like law enforcement in general, is lousy with Trumpists. Garland is limited in what he can do without specifically demanding a prosecution, which he is not actually supposed to do.
Kent
@Betty Cracker: Jayapal has been a revelation in this process and a definite rising star.
MomSense
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
They couldn’t even be arsed to show up to vote when their hero was on the ballot.
Another Scott
@Ken: [ snort! ]
Cheers,
Scott.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
It works on the Hard Left because these Wingnut bullshit storms support Hard Left’s own narrative that the Middle Left sold out, so the Hard Left is justified in undercutting moderate Liberal leaders to teach the squishy libs a lesson.
lowtechcyclist
@Nicole:
Since my wife and I are both math geeks, we attended presentations on the common core for math when our kid was in elementary school.
When other parents would bitch that math should be taught the same way it was when they were kids, we’d unkindly remind them that few of them finished school actually liking math – mostly, you hear adults being almost proud of their dislike of it. So perhaps we ought to try something different, maybe?
Just Chuck
I saw that assassination scam a few times ~10 years ago while I was working in anti-spam. So not new, but not common, and always entertaining.
Belafon
@New Deal democrat: Manchin has stated that he thinks it’s too early to pass this stuff because of inflation. He doesn’t personally need it to pass. Unless Democrats find a way to convince him that he will lose two years from now if he doesn’t vote for it, and that switching to an independent won’t save him, there are no other levers.
Baud
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
There’s also the theory, most recently popularized by Susan Sarandon, that wingnut victory hastens the backlash that will bring the Hard Left into power.
jeffreyw
@Edmund Dantes:
You don’t take down a President of the United States with the equivalent of a parking ticket. That was always a bridge too far.
Kent
@frosty: Science teacher here. Chemistry sets sold by toy companies have been completely neutered of anything interesting or potentially dangerous for at least 50 years. But one can go back and see what was sold in student chemistry sets in say the 1930s and it is pretty amazing.
As for childhood dangers. By far the most dangerous things I had to play with as a youth were firearms. Actual real ones. Had a 22 for shooting gophers and a deer rifle since at least maybe age 13?
Go-carts were also incredibly dangerous. We made them with old lawnmower engines. I had a 2nd cousin who got decapitated driving a go-cart. Was driving it down a country farm road, rounded a corner and slammed into the rear of a truck at maybe 40 mph. The truck’s metal bumper was exactly neck high to a go-cart rider.
Ruckus
@Ken:
I had the toy guns, the chemistry set, and thought fire was cool. (not the temperature kind of cool) But we knew that the guns weren’t real and that there really wasn’t a lot of damage you could do with the chemistry set. (unless you had the super duper big time set…) Or unless you actually ingested stuff. By the time I was an adult I disliked guns because I understood what they could do, understood what a lot of chemicals actually did and had a healthy respect for fire. That’s what is supposed to happen, you learn, you grow up and play with reality, not toys. But that takes an education to understand how to understand stuff. And some never learn. And some are never given the opportunity to learn actual real life stuff.
zhena gogolia
@jeffreyw: The lack of common sense around here is breathtaking.
Kay
Although you’d be crazy to be a public school teacher and talk to a reporter now. One wrong word, anything less than groveling, complete deference to the loudest parents, and you’re getting punished.
It’s a full blown witch hunt. They sanctioned an award winning Texas teacher for having one of the banned books in her classroom library. Not assigned. Not required in any way.
So maybe continue to interview exclusively Republican activists. Anyone else is vulnerable.
Can you imagine planning the civil rights section of any class? Teacher may talk about civil rights movement but not WHY there was a civil rights movement. It’s fucking impossible. It’s “how many bubbles are in this bar of soap?”
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Stalin ordered the German Communist to oppose the Christian Democrats who were trying to stop the Nazis in ’33, for the same reasons. And Green politicians have told me that.
cain
@Starfish:
haha – sure – I got flamed by that very group of Bernie types on Imani’s twitter feed because I had the temerity to say that there are good things about this bill and we need to stop getting on the Dem’s case.
I can tell Bernie types because it’s once again “all or nothing” bullshit they’ve always been sprouting.
I do think though that it is unfair to hammer Bernie himself who has proven himself to be a team player. But his fans are assholes and we should all admit that. They are more interested in punishing the Democrats and sticking a shiv in them than actual progressive goals. The fact that they are angry that we are only getting part of a deal instead of everything just shows how idiotic they are.
Baud
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Oh yeah, it’s not a new theory on the left.
sdhays
Unless you’re that crazy-ass judge in Ohio who ordered a hospital to give a MAGAt lady’s husband ivermectin because that’s what she wanted them to do.
zhena gogolia
This is hilarious. People are comparing the pictures of the Pope with Biden to an amazing picture of him scowling next to TFG and Melania and Ivanka in Addams Family costumes. Someone did this:
Patricia Kayden
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
Why are Melania and Ivanka dressed on black? What was the event?
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Again, not a lawyer, but the hush money charge seems pretty solid. Cohen had no independent reason to pay Daniels off, and he was reimbursed by Trump for the amount he fronted. There are audio recordings of Cohen and Trump discussing the situation. Daniels is willing to testify that she received the money in exchange for her silence. Now, if the DOJ ignored this to pursue a bigger charge, this may all make sense. But ignoring this charge sends a message all by itself.
@jeffreyw: He’s not the president now. He’s a private citizen who committed a crime and got away with it.
Omnes Omnibus
@zhena gogolia: Not even counting the childhood death stunts….
Just Chuck
@Baud: Someone just keeps needing to reply “Nach Hitler Uns” every time she opens her mouth. Of course she’s dim enough that she’d probably think people were calling her Hitler.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
I don’t know the details of the evidence. I’m sure Trump wouldn’t plead guilty.
Baud
@Just Chuck:
Maybe it’s the normification process, but I haven’t heard her say anything in a while.
Frankensteinbeck
@sdhays:
Going to speak up for the judges on this one. It was because they already had a prescription and the hospital didn’t want to fill it because their wingnut doctor should not have prescribed it. That’s a bit more complicated, especially legally, than just because the patient wanted it.
Fair Economist
@Baud:
I’m confident Sarandon’s “lefty” intentions are as genuine as Roseanne Barr’s were. She still won’t admit it was a mistake to let Trump in over Clinton.
Barbara
@Baud: There is a whole sartorial protocol for what can be worn when meeting the Pope — the default for women is black plus some kind of hat/hair covering. Indigenous dress and reigning monarchs have their own codes. I read it at the time of this visit, but it’s why both the ladies are wearing black with lace on their heads, and it’s why the empress of Japan wore a ceremonial kimono in traditional colors when the imperial couple met the Pope.
Baud
@Barbara:
Thanks! I didn’t know that.
Baud
@Fair Economist:
Yeah, she had no credibility with me.
Kalakal
@Baud: They should ask Ernst Thalmann how that worked out
germy
I’m optimistic.
bostonglobe.com/2021/10/28/metro/gen-z-college-students-voted-historic-rate/?utm_source=newsletter&#…
College students set record for voting in 2020 election
Small donations competing with the corporate donors, and more young people voting. Maybe we can continue on a path away from trumpism/mcconnellism/reaganism towards sanity.
Baud
@Kalakal:
I’m sure Earnst would dutifully see no difference between Hitler and Hillary.
germy
Baud
@germy:
That is good news. Younger people have the numbers to seize power from the wingnut old. If only they would exercise it.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: The DOJ also let The National Enquirer publisher off the hook in a payout scheme for another woman who was involved with Trump. They admitted they colluded with the Trump campaign to pay off McDougal and agreed to “cooperate.” AFAIK, the only person held accountable for any of this has been Cohen.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Didn’t know about that one. Was there a cooperation deal?
germy
@Baud:
They seem to be exercising it:
I don’t know if this trend will continue, but I hope it does.
misterpuff
@mrmoshpotato: US Rep
Starfish
@cain: People who are arguing on Twitter are not fighting actual people but avatars of what they expect the other side to be.
The local olds have taken to calling other people “wokester” for reasons I do not understand.
I replied to them and said Wokester #701 reporting for duty. I agree with you on this particular issue (refusing to ban fur inside city limits), but I still think that the oppression of people of color and LGBTQ folks is bad.
Kalakal
@Baud: I can just see him in Buchenwald proudly announcing that any moment now the contradictions would be heightened enough.
Geminid
@Fair Economist: Alot of people say this about the physical infrastructure bill and the BBB bill, and it may have been true previously. But my understanding is that Speaker Pelosi wanted to pass the infrastructure bill yesterday, before the weekend, even without a final text of the BBB bill. Was she trying to trick the Progressive Caucus? Was she herself being tricked?
Aziz, light!
@Ruckus: My favorite childhood toy was Jarts (by Whammo!), circa 1960. Incredibly lethal sharply pointed steel rods with arrow vanes that you could launch into the air toward your best friend’s cranium.
jeffreyw
@Betty Cracker:
True, but the same reasoning applies. In the scheme of things the offense was trivial. I thought so at the time and think the same now. Go after the bastard for the non-trivial shit he’s done.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: They announced that there was a deal, but I don’t know what came of it. This was around the time Cohen was sentenced. I think it’s too late to prosecute anyone else for related crimes. So one henchman went down, and a publisher who colluded to help a presidential campaign and the candidate/president got away with it. I don’t know all the background and have no legal expertise, but as a citizen, I think this sends a terrible message.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: I guess women are always supposed to wear black when they meet the Pope.
Betty Cracker
@jeffreyw: You’re basically saying he’s above the law then. I disagree. I do agree they should go after him for more serious crimes, if they can. I hope investigations are ongoing. We’ll see.
Kay
@Betty Cracker:
We had the tri county Dem dinner last night and I had a funny, but sad, encounter. One of the D bds of election members said “I read Giuliani got charged today”. So I’m “Giuliani?” I realize he means Cuomo.
Because of course he does.
trnc
CNN currently saying that Biden is gambling with the bills by leaving for the summit. Not sure what else anyone thinks he can do after his marathon meetings with MOC yesterday.
cain
@frosty: My uncle hates Jaypal cuz she dared to criticize what Modi/India did with Kashmir. Apparently none of us Indian born immigrants here can ever criticize India. lol. Which is why I troll my uncle by siding with Jaypal – he knows well enough that he can’t use the arguments he uses against her against me. I am very much the very liberal he rages against – but he loves me too much to say otherwise. :-)
cain
@trnc: shiiiit.. STFU CNN – Dems are united here. If this is about Biden not reaching out to Republicans – they can go FUCK THEMSELVES repeatedly.
Baud
@trnc: Media loves to fear-monger about Dem failure. Of course, if something goes wrong and the votes aren’t there, then they can blame Biden for going on this trip.
Bill Arnold
@The Moar You Know:
Germany has been shutting down nuclear power plants over the past decade.
There are other costs, too (10s of millions of human lives, in the fullness of time):
Germany ‘set for biggest rise in greenhouse gases for 30 years’ – Increase means country will slip back from goal of cutting emissions by 40% from 1990 levels (15 Aug 2021)
jeffreyw
@Betty Cracker:
You are putting words into my mouth. I am saying that the prosecutors, in this instance, used their discretion wisely.
Nicole
@jonas:
I’m skeptical that that is the actual reason. There has definitely been a drift towards less reading of an entire work and more towards shorter (and often non-fiction) essays, so it’s not just your school district and it’s not a throwing in the towel on kids’ reading, it’s a current trend towards the kind of writing they’re teaching kids. There are plenty of things I dislike about it; I hate the “stop and jot” thing kids do in the lower grades because I think it interrupts the flow of a story. I also don’t see the point of writing down predictions about a book early on; can’t a kid just read and see how the story comes out? That said, I don’t have a degree in English or Education, and a lot of the things they do now are building blocks towards more advanced things. Parents at my school were very hot under the collar about the kids not memorizing the multiplication tables in 3rd and 4th grade, even though the school hosted a curriculum evening where they demonstrated how they taught third and fourth grade math and why they don’t teach memorization any more. And yeah, it has made multiplication slower in elementary school, but the explanation of how the way kids are taught strategies now will help once they hit the higher maths was pretty persuasive (also, they said that eventually the kids end up with the tables memorized anyway; it’s just not part of what they teach in class).
All of THAT said, education, like everything else, goes through trends and fads, too, and some of them prove not to be great. But for it to make it’s way into a curriculum, there’s usually a reason based on how we currently understand how kids’ brains learn.
Geminid
@Bill Arnold: I read that a provision in the BBB bill would help U.S. nuclear plants keep from shutting down early. It’s one of the several tax credits that are directed at fostering clean energy.
I found a lot about this bill when I looked up “clean energy.” I’m waiting for the final version to be passed before I dig in and take notes. But clean energy is an encouraging subject to look up because there is a lot happening in the field, at all levels of government and in the private sector.
NotMax
@SiubhanDuinne
And thank you for that right back atcha!
Kay
@Baud:
This concerns me though:
I think Nancy Pelosi is a uniquely talented individual and we won’t see as good again in our lifetimes but if she’s tied to the anchor of Schumer and he can’t get it done there’s not a thing she can do about it.
She and Biden can’t do it by themselves. They need a leader on the senate side.
Bill Arnold
@Jeffro:
Maybe print out the wikipedia page, which is long and detailed.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_race_theory
and ask them what in that wikipedia page is being taught to children.
Maybe ask them about the opinions about essentialism vs. anti-essentialism.
germy
Betty Cracker
@jeffreyw: Okay, I’ll use a direct quote from your comment at #193:
Why not? I know it’s complicated to prosecute a sitting POTUS, but why shouldn’t Donald Trump have been charged with the same crime his minion was jailed for, now that he [Trump] is a private citizen? Isn’t the law supposed to apply to everyone equally?
Omnes Omnibus
@Nicole: Memorizing multiplication tables was one of the worst things about elementary school. I just hate rote memorization. That being said…
OF Man’s First Disobedience, and the Fruit
Of that Forbidden Tree, whose mortal taste
Brought Death into the World, and all our woe,
With loss of Eden, till one greater Man
Restore us, and regain the blissful Seat,
Sing Heavenly Muse…
In high school I could do the whole first bit through to “And justify the ways of God to men.”
Baud
@Kay:
Nothing’s done until it’s done, but that’s a third-hand paraphrasing of what Schumer said, so who knows? I heard earlier today that the Senate wanted to vote next week, so it could just be a deadline thing.
Omnes Omnibus
@Kay:
Could anyone do better than Schumer is doing?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Baud:
That’s my thought. He’s trying to set a deadline to get the framework finalized
Omnes Omnibus
@Betty Cracker: If you come at the king… I know he isn’t president anymore, but when they come for him it’s going to need to be bulletproof.
sab
Tooling around in the car yesterday listening to NPR and they mentioned that a lot pf the BBB money is for affordable and low income housing. Why hasn’t anyone talked about that before? We have spent all summer screeching about outrageous housing prices, and here is help in the BBB bill.
Fair Economist
@Kay: What’s concerning about Schumer saying Democrats have about a week to negotiate alterations to the framework? There are some substantive, possibly soluble, issues that have come up, notably parental leave. The implication is that the passage process starts in a week, which would be good.
I’ll grant Schumer’s not as much of a genius as Pelosi but what Senate Majority Leader has done better with a majority of none? Even just COVID relief and the BIF makes Schumer’s current terms as successful as any in recent history, and nobody else had to do it with such a narrow majority and crazy resistance from the other side.
Fair Economist
@sab:
Because it makes the BBB more desirable to most Americans, and the media owners don’t want that. SATSQ.
WaterGirl
@Ken: Serious request?
Baud
@sab:
We’ll probably learn of a lot of good things in the bill that no one talked much about. People only focus on the politically active items and ignore the rest.
sab
@Omnes Omnibus: I didn’t learn all my multiplication tables. I learned 1 through 6 in third grade. I was supposed to learn 7 through 12 in fourth grade, but we moved and the new school had already learned them in third. My mother felt that all kids besides the firstborn were on their own. 1 through 6 works for most of life. If you need to go higher just add two of the lower ones. It works, but slowly. Slows you down on math tests. Then they invemted 10 key calculators. Woo woo.
Omnes Omnibus
@Fair Economist: Harry Reid was seen as a squish until people realized that he good at herding up to 60h cats. Schumer will be seen the same way with 50. Herding fewer cats is actually harder.
Geminid
@Kay: I think the Senate needs to stop tinkering with this bill. Every change they negotiate has to be negotiated again with House leaders.
Speaker Pelosi aptly compared the end game on this bill to a nine-person teeter totter. No matter what is put in it, something will be left out. Some legislators may be getting too used to kicking the ball around. I want to see votes on both bills by Tuesday.
different-church-lady
@Spanky:
Either he is going to continue to be president or… he’s going to continue to be president. WHICH WILL IT BE???
Omnes Omnibus
@sab:
My mom was a third grade teacher so she had the little forms with the cut outs to drill for speed. I think I actually did them “too slowly” as a minor rebellion. Rote stuff brings out my uncooperative side.
germy
@different-church-lady:
Everything in the media is overly dramatic. The presidential debates are covered like the super bowl. Same noisy sound effects and over the top graphics.
Every day of Biden’s presidency is covered like he’s a man walking a tightrope over a river of lava.
Ksmiami
@Fair Economist: I really hope we change the language around low income housing to more friendly and appropriate terms like starter housing and workforce housing. Low income housing brings up the cinder projects of the 60s/70s and gets nimby
owners up in arms
different-church-lady
@Another Scott: Most of the people stunned by raspberries at $3.50 a pint are driving $35,000 vehicles to pick them up, after ordering them on their $950 phones which they pay another company $95 a month to enable in a way that they can order the raspberries while driving their $35,000 vehicles.
different-church-lady
@germy:
If the debates were like the Super Bowl, then halfway through there’d be a confusing or lacklustre music performance.
Brachiator
Bless the Democrats.
Fuck the Democrats.
Expanded Child Tax Credit for one additional year is bullshit.
I will take what we can get.
When the Republicans developed the Tax Cuts and Job Act, a small group drafted the bill. Many Republicans, including moderates, were simply frozen out. The goal was to maximize tax cuts and benefits for business and the wealthy and to lie that the bill would pay for itself. Democrats were totally excluded.
More goodies were tossed to the rich in GOP Covid bills.
By contrast, some Democrats are worse enemies than the GOP. I don’t expect blind obedience, but it would be nice if the Democrats secured broad agreement early on and stuck to it.
Double fuck Manchin and any other Democrat claiming that Biden’s bill was too expensive or who oppose modest tax increases to pay for the bill.
Kay
@Fair Economist:
Because they announced it as a framework and negotiations in or out at this point leave framework up for grabs.
The whole point of a framework in negotiations is bounds. It means negotations must stay inside the framework. So, how to pay for dental care. Not dental care (as an example). If they’re still adding and subtracting in or out of the framework than it’s not one.
It’s a fence. Or not.
jeffreyw
@Betty Cracker:
Prosecutorial discretion is a real thing in the real world. Don’t make me go looking for the TBogg fairy gumdrop thing.
Omnes Omnibus
@jeffreyw: Hey, I linked to that just yesterday.
Ken
@WaterGirl: No :-). When I make a serious request, it will be email.
germy
@different-church-lady:
Instead we get pharmaceutical commercials.
Ruckus
@Subsole:
It’s still propaganda, some call it marketing. They are the ones that know it’s actually propaganda (also known as bullshit) and so they call it marketing. Which is part of marketing, calling bullshit anything else so people might think there might be some truth in it and not that it’s just bullshit. I worked in the packaging industry and we had a customer from another country and that countries government set the price of the commodity that they were selling below cost. They had to make the containers slightly smaller so they could sell the food product at cost rather than at a loss on every container. They didn’t mind not making any money but taking a loss at every sale adds up, they would have been out of business in six months and then there would be even less of that necessary food product. Governments can be smart, they can be incredibly stupid, in every country run by humans. I personally find that conservative governments are by far, dramatically stupider because there is zero logic in what they think, say and do.
Ruckus
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Yes.
Chief Oshkosh
@Betty Cracker: Agreed.
Garland was one of the very few personnel mistakes Uncle Joe made, IMO. He’d be OK, maybe, in normal times. We’re not in normal times. Garland is letting DOJ attorneys charge 1/6 miscreants with relatively light crimes. Even some of the involved judges are commenting, which is very atypical. Maybe it’s business as usual mentality, maybe it’s holdovers being bad players, but I don’t care. The position calls for Barr-level focus and aggressiveness. This is not be be confused with Barr-level mendacity. The position calls for Barr-level focus and aggressiveness in pursuit of justice.
jeffreyw
@Omnes Omnibus: I saw that and that’s what prompted my reply to BettyCracker since I was pretty sure the ref would be quickly understood.
Baud
@Kay:
The framework isn’t comprehensive. There could be negotiations over other things.
WaterGirl
@Baud: Once we get BBB and BIF through the sausage mill, and maybe voting rights, too…
Then I think Biden declares a Climate Emergency. He uses all the powers that come with the emergency declaration, and all the youngs vote for him because he gets it on climate.
opiejeanne
@SiubhanDuinne: Oh, thank you for posting Der Erlkonig. Brilliant and creepy.
Baud
@WaterGirl:
Do you have a link to that proposal? I don’t know what powers come with a climate emergency.
Ruckus
@jeffreyw:
And it seems there are much bigger issues that can be in play. Catching him in the Stormy case was small potatoes and would have made it harder to do anything about the real issues. Like saving the concepts the nation was supposedly founded upon.
This is a complex issue and there are a lot of side roads and blind alleys galore to make it tougher. The only thing TFG was in any way semi proficient at it was misdirection. And he’s not at all good at that.
WaterGirl
@Baud:
Yes, we will.
WaterGirl
@Ken: Oh good, because then I think we’d have to have an addendum that explains what Creative Commons is, and then an addendum to that…
Ruckus
@germy:
For an old geezer he’s pretty good at that tight rope gig. I think mostly because he sees the rope as a path, not an obstacle.
Ksmiami
@WaterGirl: dude it’s not looking promising from Manchinema Rt now. They are coordinating to tank the bbb.
WaterGirl
@Baud: Of course I don’t have a link. It’s my own private theory. Once I write that up, I will share it with you. :-)
But the former guy declared an emergency at Border, I believe, and that allowed him to do all sorts of shit like take money from military bases and use it for the wall.
So I don’t believe there is a thing called “Climate Emergency” that gives him special powers relate to climate.
But I believe the president can declare something an emergency and there are powers that come along with that.
Jinchi
The phrasing of that is a bit misleading as it implies Germany is undergoing massive increases in emissions, rather than doing very well in real terms.
Germany has already cut 37% from it’s emissions relative to 1990. The ‘biggest rise in emissions’ is due to going from a covid dominated environment last year back to a more normal one this year.For perspective Germany’s per-capita CO2 emissions have dropped steadily by about 37% since 1990. America’s have dropped more haphazardly by about 20% over the same time period.
Baud
@WaterGirl:
I don’t know. It sounds like the sort of “one neat trick” that the internet gets excited about and then gets disappointed in when it doesn’t happen or doesn’t produce earth shattering results.
Kay
Just an amazing review of actual K-12 history textbooks.
Not just the south either. If you were in a public school Connecticut in 2016 you learned that people in Connecticut just had “one or two slaves” and they treated them like family and taught them to read and write. OMFG. I had no idea how bad it is.
Betty Cracker
@jeffreyw: So now it’s a “fairy gumdrop” thing to believe presidents should be subject to the same penalties as the minions they order to carry out crimes in their name? Fuck that entire load of cynical horseshit.
And while we’re on the subject of prosecutorial discretion, maybe we could use a little less of that. The rich and powerful aren’t subject to the same legal penalties as regular folks, and a lot of that seems to come down to prosecutorial discretion. It minimizes political risk for the few while maximizing cynicism about the justice system for everyone else. It’s not a good trade for a society.
Kay
As it turns out, the current curriculum is designed not to educate them but to make white children feel better. It’s skewed all right- just not in the direction we were told. We’re the snowflakes.
jeffreyw
@Betty Cracker:
I wasn’t the one who said:
I think my cynicism is calibrated correctly. I am not mad at you for feeling differently.
Baud
@Kay:
You ever notice that snowflakes are white? Just sayin’.
Kay
@Baud:
Part of critical race theory is the idea that systemic racism will never go away, because “equality” doesn’t move enough. It will never lap racism. It can’t meet and surpass. Hence, anti-racism. Back the other way. Not attempting parallel and forward (where equality is always behind) but pushing racism back. Honestly, they have the better argument.
sab
@Kay: I am so white that I had ancestors that just missed sailing on the Mayflower. I also have Black grandchildren. Tim Miller appointed by DeWine to the State Board of Education from Akron is a sort of nephew in law. He is about to not be our insurance guy any more.
Bill Arnold
@Jinchi:
Germany has been OK. Certainly better than the US; the US, China and India will be the top gigadeath criminals in the fullness of time. Germany would be doing better if they weren’t shutting down nuclear power plants. Compared with the global heating effects of coal or even natural gas, nuclear plants are white-glove clean, and should be in the mix along with other carbon-free sources of power, and storage to cover for short-term supply (and demand) variabilities.
misterpuff
Mitch McConnell, Senate Minority Leader, announced the hiring of Miss Khalifa Shamoon, legislative assassin, to work with the Democrat majority. Miss Shamoon, who also goes by the nickname Phillia Buster, said she is looking forward to her new work in the Senate
Kay
@sab:
I just like that there’s a theory that says “the arc of history bends toward justice? No, I’m afraid it doesn’t”
Why can’t we have both sides? Maybe it doesn’t.
Betty Cracker
@jeffreyw: I didn’t say that either, so I’m not sure why that comment is relevant to our conversation, but regardless, we know societies can continue for centuries with multi-tiered justice systems. We’re living in one where the rich and powerful are rarely held to account, where people of color fare worse than whites, etc., so the proof is in the pudding.
But a rot sets in. Just think how things might have turned out differently if Cy Vance had held the Trump Org accountable for a blatant real estate scam they were pulling 10 years ago. Prosecutors from that office claim they had the goods, but Vance decided to use his prosecutorial discretion and dropped the case, and here we are.
Baud
I feel like I should be above the law.
Fair Economist
@Ksmiami:That’s a good idea. Why don’t you call a Congresscritter about it? Have any Ds repping you?
jeffreyw
@Betty Cracker:
That was a comment to me made in reply to a comment I made replying to you. As it was an indirect criticism of you, I thought it might have set the tone early on in our arguments. If you did not see the original comment in context I apologize for the irrelevancy it introduced.
As for prosecutorial discretion, one can easily find instances of its abuse going both ways – from the Florida AG’s taking campaign donations from Trump and then dropping a solid case to the Texas AG putting the woman away for five years for voting as an ex-felon. I can’t see these as reasons not to give prosecutors the option lest the whole system collapse into gridlock from jailing and trying every offense. Publicize the abuses, castigate the abusers, vote them from office, but do not take away something needed to make the system we have work. I think we are in general agreement in all but the one specific instance.
Ksmiami
@Fair Economist: Colin Allred (who we supported early)… but he’s inundated I’m sure
Geminid
@Ksmiami: What do you think of Representative Allred?
rikyrah
Been busy, but the Illinois Dems sent forth at 14D, 3R redistricting plan.
I can live with that :)
Geminid
@rikyrah: Adam Kinzinger already announced he won’t run again. I wonder if Rodney Davis will survive.
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: @Geminid:
We have been trying to get rid of Rodney Fucking Davis in my district since forever, and he is like the zombie who won’t die.
Please please please let this be what gets him out of office, one way or another.
WaterGirl
@Geminid: Why? Because of how they drew the area around him? Or because he figures he can’t get elected again since he is seen as a traitor to Republicans.
Ksmiami
@Geminid: I like him a lot – even if he’s too polite to our arch enemies in the GOP.
Geminid
Norman Ornstein on the Build Back Better bill:
Geminid
@WaterGirl: I don’t know the details. If he’s been put in a redder district, Davis might not survive a challenge from the right. Gerrymandering seems to favor the more radical Republicans.
But I can tell that, deep down, you’re going to miss ol’ Rodney.
Old School
@WaterGirl: I read that the new districts would likely make Kinzinger and Darin LaHood run in the same primary.
Geminid
@Ksmiami: Thanks. I followed Allred when he won in 2018, part of the same wave that flipped three suburban seats here in Virginia. It’s good to get a first hand appraisal.
Ksmiami
@Geminid: we met him super early at an east dallas coffee when it didn’t seem possible he could win
Geminid
@Ksmiami: I think Republicans believed they had drawn a safe district there. Same with the Virginia seats flipped by Wexner, Spanberger, and Luria that year.
WaterGirl
@Geminid: First choice: Rodney Davis is no longer a representative at all. Second choice: He no longer represents my district. Ugh.
Geminid
@Ksmiami: Colin Allred was a White House Fellow in the Obama administration. So was Sharice Davids (KS-3), who also won that year.
Cameron Webb was our candidate in the Virginia 5th last year. He had been a White House Fellow, and I hoped Allred and Davids’ luck would rub off on him. But the Republican’s drew the 5th well enough that Webb’s loathsome opponent got a five point win.
Webb’s White House Fellowship ran into the trump administration, and when those goons showed up Webb was given a desk in a hallway. But Webb toughed it out and got a better desk and at least a little bit of input before he moved on to U. Va. Medical Center (he’s an MD). Webb’s African American parents grew up in segregated Virginia and I expect they counseled him to stand tall.
Webb was an excellent political candidate, I thought. Once the novel, creaky redistricting process produces a new 5th District he may well run again next year.
Ksmiami
@Geminid: gerrymandering is just theft by another name…
Another Scott
@jeffreyw: +1
Well said.
Cheers,
Scott.