Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

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

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

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

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

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

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

Live so that if you miss a day of work people aren’t hoping you’re dead.

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

The current Supreme Court is a dangerous, rogue court.

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

You are so fucked. Still, I wish you the best of luck.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

If you can’t control your emotions, someone else will.

Republicans firmly believe having an abortion is a very personal, very private decision between a woman and J.D. Vance.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

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

Consistently wrong since 2002

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Chugging Along

Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Chugging Along

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177Comments

  10. 10.

    MattF

    @rikyrah: Trump really really really doesn’t want those documents released. Twitter sez the appeals court can’t act until the lower court makes a decision.

  12. 12.

    rikyrah

    Yep ??

     

    ??⚖️ Kenneth of House Pfizer™?, 1st of His Name (@Needle_of_Arya) tweeted at 11:12 PM on Mon, Nov 08, 2021:
    Reporters are glossing over the fact that Aaron Rodgers was not only unvaccinated, but also been mingling out amongst the population unmasked as if he had already  been vaxxed–attending parties and otherwise behaving as if he couldn’t spread it.
    (https://twitter.com/Needle_of_Arya/status/1457939248779235328?t=l128ZCtNYYkjDQjR2c1Rzw&s=03)

  19. 19.

    Geminid

    I’ve been checking out twitter feeds of some of the 89 Progressive Caucus members who voted for the Infrastructure bill. Veronica Escobar (TX), Katie Porter (CA), Joe Neguse (CO), and Jamie Raskin (MD) seem to show unfeigned enthusiasm for this legislation. Some emphasize particular benefits to their districts. Joe Neguse touts the extra funds for fighting wildfires, for instance.

    Raskin describes the bill as a major step forward for America’s working class, a group that often is described by “progressive” and “moderate” Democrats alike as a priority.

  20. 20.

    Math Guy

    Good morning. The juxtaposition of tweets featuring both Biden and Obama started me thinking about the similarities and the differences in their styles of governing. Somehow, I feel, Biden learned a lot from Obama while serving as his Vice President about the need to aim high. In some way, Biden does Obama better than Obama did.

  21. 21.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @The Thin Black Duke: Bottom line, the ethos of White Supremacy is it’s an affirmative action program for mediocre white people. In the real world, they couldn’t be the assistant a.m. manager at the local Mickey D’s.

    True words. Pretty much every conscious racist, if that’s the word, I’ve worked with was always on the Boss’ short list for the next lay off.

  24. 24.

    stinger

    Always glad to see Obama, but where is Roving Climate Ambassador Kerry? And why isn’t Nobel/Oscar/Emmy/Grammy winner Gore being tapped for some of this stuff?

  25. 25.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    Does this make sense to you?

    Acquaintance who just sat through a book club meeting with us with no mask on: We were in Florida for two weeks and no one wore masks and it was wonderful. And a friend went to Arizona and it was the same. And it’s ridiculous we still have to wear these masks. And someone who wasn’t vaccinated got COVID and is fine and someone else who got COVID who was vaccinated and they’re fine too. And it’s not really a vaccine because with a vaccine you never have to get it again.

    Friend: Are you vaccinated?

    Acquaintance: Of course. I’d be a fool not to get vaccinated.

  27. 27.

    Baud

    @Geminid: Thanks!  Correctly identifying the groups and players involved is important, and oftentimes broad labels like “progressives” and “moderates” aren’t up to the task.

  31. 31.

    Baud

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    We were in Florida for two weeks and no one wore masks and it was wonderful. It is nice not wearing masks. And a friend went to Arizona and it was the same. Same. And it’s ridiculous we still have to wear these masks. It is, but blame the antivaxxers. And someone who wasn’t vaccinated got COVID and is fine and someone else who got COVID who was vaccinated and they’re fine too. Statistics and probability are not based on anecdata. And it’s not really a vaccine because with a vaccine you never have to get it again. Made up bullshit.

  32. 32.

    germy

    Q: What type of personality would marry Mitch McConnell

    A: https://t.co/PtGawInqbQ

    — Dennis Butterball Hooper (@dennisbhooper) November 8, 2021

    Former Secretary of Labor @ElaineChao just said on @BloombergTV that workers have “a patriotic duty” to take jobs companies can’t fill. What about an employer’s patriotic duty to provide jobs with decent wages and benefits? (Cricket sounds here.) pic.twitter.com/ndocwpawZX

    — Eve Tahmincioglu (@EveAsks) November 8, 2021

  34. 34.

    sab

    I love Joe Biden but today is our 20th wedding anniversary and I wanted to spend it on us, not his agenda. LOL He just alienated 1/365  of electorate ( probably a lot smaller. Not everyone is married, and not everyone is a Democrat.)

  43. 43.

    lowtechcyclist

    @The Thin Black Duke:

    Good morning, everybody. Here’s my rant calm and reasonable analysis of the latest GOP lunacy.

    I clicked through, and it was worth the read.  Nothing wrong with a good rant when it’s written that well.

    I picked the wrong century to give up drinking.

    Yeppers. Nuts to warning Marty McFly away from 2020, it’s the whole freakin’ century so far.

  44. 44.

    burnspbesq

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    it’s not really a vaccine because with a vaccine you never have to get it again.

    Might have been interesting to ask her how many tetanus shots she has gotten.

  46. 46.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @germy: Former Secretary of Labor @ElaineChao just said on @BloombergTV that workers have “a patriotic duty” to take jobs companies can’t fill.

    Lots of patriotic jobs available for Elaine Chao and her husband.

  50. 50.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Math Guy: In some way, Biden does Obama better than Obama did.

    Obama would certainly say that’s a good thing.

    He’s got an ego, sure — but from everything I’ve read and know about the man, he’s happy to see Joe succeed where he couldn’t/didn’t.

  52. 52.

    Kay

    This was really interesting, by Buttigieg:

    Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said Monday that his agency will use about $1 billion from President Joe Biden’s public works legislation to remedy racial inequities in U.S. highway design, such as roads that were built to separate predominantly minority neighborhoods from White communities.
    The program, called “Reconnecting Communities,” in some cases will tear down or rebuild highways and overpasses, he said. Federal officials will consider local desires as they identify projects, he said at a White House briefing.

    He used some specific examples that are historically accurate (and well documented) – the reaction on the Right was to put it in the “woke” basket and either deny it happened or jeer at him, but it was kind of beautiful to me, to see the thing handled so well by someone on “our side” and he didn’t have to wade into the Andrew Sullivan abstractions at all- he’s talking about roads and bridges.
    The roads and bridges are there- they exist- they were designed to keep people out. It’s much, much different to see a…concrete example than to natter on about “CRT” and “wokeness”. It makes the anti-CRT and anti-woke mob look silly and unserious.

    He’s very good at this. Talented. Ignoring the media and Right’s “anti wokeness” narrative and using examples in a talk about roads and bridges? Smart.

  54. 54.

    lowtechcyclist

    @germy:  Here’s some nightmare fuel in one thread:

    I decided over forty years ago that while I liked caving, and while I liked diving, I had no interest in putting the two together.  The combination of the two is far, far more dangerous than either one by itself.

  55. 55.

    Geminid

    @germy: Have you seen Blue Hole in Santa Rosa, New Mexico? It looks like Jacobs Well might look if it were filled with water. Blue Hole is a destination for scuba divers.

    Santa Rosa is a nice town on I-40, with a state park nearby on the Pecos River, and a good restaurant called the Comet II.

  57. 57.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @germy: For some, that’s the stuff dreams are made of. I did some hairy shit over the years, stuff most people wouldn’t dream of, but I never did any cave diving. Too much of an investment, of both time and money. I have friends who did, including one who made the deepest underground dive in the world (at that time, I’m sure it’s been topped in the years since). Not for me tho. I already had a full plate.

    Shadow Divers is a great book if you are interested in learning more about that kind of on the edge diving (wreck diving, which in some ways is even crazier than cave diving). It is heart stoppingly good.

  61. 61.

    Ken

    @stinger: I admit I dug no farther into it than reading the tweets in this post and then complaining!

    That’s how I get all my news and 90% of my social interactions.

  62. 62.

    Woodrow/asim

    @rikyrah: there is a large percentage of white folks that simply don’t want to dismantle racism.

    I’d go further — first, there’s a large percentage of White folx that need to actually grasp what racism is. Until we can all get on the same page about that, we’re gonna have real issues.

    You can see this in Unjustice Roberts’ assertion that (structural) racism is dead, and thus no need for the Voting Rights Act’s Section 5. You can see it in how CRT so easily misleads people, right now.

    And you can see it in the historical record, over and again, even unto the Lost Cause that literally shaped Civil War scholarship — and the ideology of millions — for generations.

    It’s a lot of work, to make racism even something we can actually discuss in whole, much less dismantle.

  63. 63.

    Tenar Arha

    OT Anyone use the  DuckDuckGo browser on their phones? Anyone else having the following problem?

    The Tweet embeds aren’t loading any photos, graphs, thumbnails nothing. just text & the links. But ONLY in this browser. I double checked the site in Safari, Chrome, & Firefox, everything shows up. I’d think it was a setting that I’d forgotten I’d changed, but the photos of Angkor Wat loaded fine.

    currently: iOS 14.8.1 DDG 7.64.13.0

  66. 66.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    They went immediately to whether the individuals involved were themselves racist. The jury is still out!  Because examining the inner thoughts of long-dead people is much easier than looking at those roads and bridges.

    Mayor Pete to the rescue. I thought I would lose my fucking mind listening to the anti-woke discourse. Back to the real.

  68. 68.

    Ken

    @Geminid: I see that Jacobs Well is full of water, like Blue Hole near Santa Rosa.

    Yes. Where they differ is that Jacobs Well has the swinging blades, while the Blue Hole has the Tentacle Beast.  Not that either deters cave diving enthusiasts!

  70. 70.

    burnspbesq

    @Kay:

    Welcome the recognition and the initiative, but unfortunately in many places there will be little that can be done. Still worth looking at, but I’m going to manage my expectations.

  71. 71.

    OzarkHillbilly

    I found out yesterday what the 9 stitch incision was all about. I had a complete tear of the subscapularis muscle. He had to make the large incision so it could be reattached. Kinda surprised me. I would’ve thought I’d have had a lot more pain than I did with such a tear, also I suppose it would have shown if I’d just looked in the mirror. Oh well.

    PT is gonna be a mother. It starts on Friday.

  72. 72.

    Ken

    @Kay: They went immediately to whether the individuals involved were themselves racist.

    BUTTIGIEG: “As it happens, I have here the diary of one of the people who selected the route, and he writes….”

    (Reality is never as neat as reality TV.)

  73. 73.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Woodrow/asim:

    You can see this in Unjustice Roberts’ assertion that (structural) racism is dead, and thus no need for the Voting Rights Act’s Section 5.

    The evidence sure has piled up since then that Roberts was totally wrong about that, and that the existence of Section 5 was what kept people from violating it, rather than any sort of, um, wokeness in the body politic.

    There ought to be a way to take a case to court to force the courts to reconsider and (hopefully) reverse that decision, in that way that Brown v. Board of Education reversed Plessy v. Ferguson.

  74. 74.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Kay: The biographer Robert Caro called Robert Moses the most racist person he had ever met, so I’m pretty sure that’s a yes.

    Sometimes this stuff is actually not that complicated.

  75. 75.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @stinger: ​ I’d read about them being recommended a couple years ago and forgotten all about it until our DiL asked us to get it. She asked like she was afraid we’d refuse. That’s our timeline now.

  76. 76.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Tenar Arha: DuckDuckGo’s browser is likely aggressively blocking the Twitter links that allow embeds to load. I see the same lack of load when I run my Hardened Firefox browser over here.

    You’ll need to turn off privacy protections in DDG to load those, is all. I don’t know how it’s done on iOS’ version; on my android DDG browser it’s “Disable Privacy Protections”.

    (PS the blocking is because, even post-ads, there’s still some trackers running, including how Twitter tracks usage through those embeds.)

  77. 77.

    burnspbesq

    @Kay:

    They went immediately to whether the individuals involved were themselves racist

    I don’t think there’s much doubt about Robert Moses or Sam Yorty, and I’m certainly not giving the benefit of the doubt to those who determined the routing of I-35 through Austin.

  78. 78.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Ken: I know of one cave with a gate called the “Turnstile of Death”. It consists of a center pole with circular saw blades welded to it.

    eta positioned in a narrow constriction of the passage.

  79. 79.

    Baud

    From the more accessible Wikipedia.@Matt McIrvin:

    Moses’s reputation for efficiency and nonpartisan leadership was damaged by Robert Caro‘s Pulitzer-winning biography The Power Broker (1974), which accused Moses of a lust for power, questionable ethics, vindictiveness, and racism.[6] In Moses’s urban planning of New York, he bulldozed primarily Black and Latino homes to make way for parks, chose the middle of minority neighborhoods as the location for highways, and deliberately designed bridges on the parkways connecting New York City to beaches in Long Island to be too low for buses from the inner city to access the beaches.[7]

     
    That last thing is particularly depraved.

  80. 80.

    Woodrow/asim

    @lowtechcyclist: The evidence sure has piled up since then that Roberts was totally wrong about that,

    My opinion is that Roberts sincerely believes there’s no racism in America today worth the name. I suspect he “knows” on some level he’s wrong, but is ignoring it because it doesn’t meet the criteria he’s convinced himself, for decades, is the right one to judge race issue by.

    And what he cannot ignore, he justifies because, hey, Affirmative Action! What more do we Ni-CLANG want from the great United States? In his mind, I’m sure we Black folx done been handed stuff for decades, now.

  81. 81.

    bluegirlfromwyo

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    it’s not really a vaccine because with a vaccine you never have to get it again.

     This person’s never had a tetanus booster? JFC, this country is stupid.

  83. 83.

    Geminid

    @Baud: Secretary Buttigieg is definitely a plus communicator, able to speak in clear, concise paragraphs. Another Democrat with this skill is Congressman Hakeem Jeffries of Brooklyn, House Democratic Caucus Chairman.

  84. 84.

    sab

    @Baud: We had hoped to avoid politics today. Of course Joe Biden has high hopes and a busy schedule.  So for him, his interests prevailed, because he didn’t know that two of the 330,000,000 people in his country who voted for him happened to have a 20th anniversary today. I was joking. I thought you might get the “//” but apparently not.

    JFC: lighten up guy

    ETA I did not think that you of all people couldn’t get a joke, especially after the explanatory “//”! Your jokes are usually funny. Mine often fail.

  87. 87.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: It’s compartmentalized thinking–the person was at least smart enough for self-preservation to kick in, but they’ve adapted to social interaction in environments where most people around them have a farrago of anti-vax/anti-masker ideas.

  89. 89.

    hueyplong

    @Woodrow/asim: I’ve worked with lots and lots of people who have expressly verbalized the second paragraph of Woodrow/asim’s #80, likely because  I make Casper the Friendly Ghost look tanned.  [The position is invariably paired with an out-of-context quote of MLK.]  It’s extra widespread and constitutes the “moderate” position among Republicans.

    Whether Roberts is sincere or cynical really doesn’t matter.  Both attributes are leading to the same result.

  90. 90.

    Soprano2

    @OzarkHillbilly: I read an article in WaPo yesterday about why there are so many people saying they can’t find jobs when there are so many unfilled jobs. The short story is that people don’t want the jobs that are available, and continue to look for their dream job that has exactly the hours they want and allows them to work exactly the way they want all the time (and yes, I know this is not all people, I’m talking about what the article said). This is fine, but then don’t turn around and whine that you don’t have a job and your unemployment is about to run out. Those of us who are adults in that situation take a job that might not be our ideal but pays the bills, and continues to search for something better. IT also said that some employers still have unrealistic ideas about their jobs (like not being willing to schedule around people’s lives and expecting them to be available for work literally every hour of the day), and aren’t willing to adjust at all, which is dumb too. It sounds to me as if some people think employers should make their jobs conform to exactly what each job seeker wants, and some employers don’t understand that the job market has changed. It was revealing to me to read it.

  92. 92.

    Jeffro

    I feel like the DNC needs to be putting out a daily reminder of what trumpov was doing on Day X of his “presidency” as compared to what the Biden Administration is doing on its Day X.

    Just to keep the comparison fresh for goldfish-memory Americans, ya know? And to keep the media honest er I mean less dishonest

  95. 95.

    sab

    @Woodrow/asim: I also thinks he lives in a very pampered white world. My family is very white British background. My grand-children are African American. I think of my sister’s Asian bi-racial kids as kind of white, not living in my grand-children’s world at all. My sister’s kids don’t agree with me at all. They got out of the Mid-West to California as fast as they could.

  96. 96.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Soprano2: Everybody wants the perfect job. I never knew anyone to get it. I still object to Elain Chao telling me or anyone else that it’s our “patriotic duty” to work at shit jobs with shit pay for shitty people. Let her do it. She’s not doing anything worthwhile just now anyway.

  97. 97.

    Woodrow/asim

    @hueyplong: Whether Roberts is sincere or cynical really doesn’t matter. Both attributes are leading to the same result.

    To some extent, yep– and the flip side is true, as well. In many ways, it didn’t matter if Truman, Senator Byrd, and/or LBJ were racists “in their hearts;” they voted for Civil Rights legislation that helped many of us get out of a homegrown Authoritarian scheme that literally made the Nazis proud.

    I cannot live my life concerned about what’s in someone’s heart — just as I understand countless Women can’t put themselves at Risk over if a guy is “really nice,” or not. I have to, day-by-day, look at how they treat me, keep myself safe, before I can look at why.

    That said, when we step away from that, and have the space and grace? It does matter why: without the why, we cannot address that poison, cannot root it out  of society. We’ll need, at some point, to dissect and engage these questions in fullness…

    …it’s just hard to do that when the opposition uses those questions to distract from the work needed now.

  98. 98.

    bluegirlfromwyo

    @Kay: Because examining the inner thoughts of long-dead people is much easier than looking…

     Isn’t this the basis of originalism? That our conservative betters can examine the minds of dead people and tell us what Thomas Jefferson would do?

  101. 101.

    Geminid

    @bluegirlfromwyo: I always thought that the basis of “Originalism” was optical: reactionary Constitutional scholars needed a new brand after “Strict Constructionism” became too toxic.

  102. 102.

    WaterGirl

    @Baud:

    …deliberately designed bridges on the parkways connecting New York City to beaches in Long Island to be too low for buses from the inner city to access the beaches.

    Reading that puts me at risk of spontaneous combustion.

  103. 103.

    brendancalling

    I am still waiting for my tax refund.
    On September 13, the IRS sent me a letter (finally) saying they’d be depositing my refund in 4-6 weeks.

    It’s been 8 weeks now. I’ve been leaving messages for the taxpayer advocate (who never answers the phone) and have made my third request to my Congressman for constituent assistance. I guess I have to call my senator’s constituent assistance office now too. Calling the IRS is useless, no one answers the phone or returns messages.

    What’s galling is that the Trump tax cuts left ME with a $2000 tax bill, which, with penalties and interest, cost me nearly $3000 after I finished paying it off. I can cut the IRS slack for the processing issues—between Bush and Trump their budget was decimated. But I filed electronically, and the IRS HAS my direct deposit information. This shouldn’t be two weeks late.

    TL/DR: Biden should fully fund the IRS.

  104. 104.

    narya

    Since we’re talking about roads, bridges, and racism, there was an extraordinary PBS special called “Driving While Black: Race, Space, and Mobility in the US.” It ties some aspects of this back to slavery (of course), in monitoring the movements of black folks, and, in addition to documenting the racism that necessitated the Green Book, it documents the building of those roads and bridges–how those efforts destroyed vibrant communities, while simultaneously making parts of the city out of reach to the folks who (had) lived in those communities. TW: And it leads to video of multiple police shootings, which are horrifying in themselves, but also are effectively tied into the whole narrative.  Good on Mayor/Secretary Pete.

  106. 106.

    Cameron

    Does anybody here have some inside info on what’s happening with Federal voting-rights legislation?  Last I heard was we would need an end run around the filibuster, as no Republican senators would support such laws.

  107. 107.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @Soprano2: With all due respect, you recently dissed one of your employees who quit for a day job because his spouse didn’t like him working nights, because he took the job knowing it meant working nights. Seems to me he may have been one of those who took a job to support his family until something more suitable to him and his family came along.

  108. 108.

    Woodrow/asim

    @Geminid: I always thought that the basis of “Originalism” was optical: reactionary Constitutional scholars needed a new brand after “Strict Constructionism” became too toxic.

    That was my understanding, as well. Same with how “state’s rights” popped back up, under similar circumstances.

    I didn’t know the game was up until one of my old sparring partners, after I did my usual “Throw the Federalist Papers” at ’em” approach to those debates, informed me he was more a fan of the anti-federalist papers/opinions.

    He was ex-Special Forces, which made me really wonder what he meant when he gave his oath, yanno?

  109. 109.

    gene108

    @MattF:

    Trump really really really doesn’t want those documents released. Twitter sez the appeals court can’t act until the lower court makes a decision.

    Trump never wants any documents released. Like lying, it’s just a habitual reflex with him.

  110. 110.

    hueyplong

    @Woodrow/asim: I guess my take is that the day in which we get to say it matters whether Roberts is sincere or cynical does not appear to be imminent.

    I was initially ok with the worst of the worst letting their freak flags fly over Trump.  But then I realized that there would be no repercussions for doing so.  They were “economically insecure” instead of dyed-in-the-wool racists who should be shunned.  Which, of course, has only encouraged them.

  113. 113.

    Geminid

    @Cameron: I think the idea of Democratic Congressional leadership is to pass the BBB bill first, and deal with the Debt Ceiling second. Then comes the showdown over Voting Rights, probably in December.

  116. 116.

    Tenar Arha

    @Woodrow/asim: Thanks. I updated a bunch of apps & a security patch on the iOS in the past 24 hours. DDG must have fixed something bc I was getting the Tweets before.

  117. 117.

    Spanky

    Comrade Secretary Chao is reminding the Peasant Class that the Ruling Class still rules, and is using AmeriSpeak to prompt them back into obeyance, “patriotic” being one of the Yang holy words.

  119. 119.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @sab: Sorry, your “joke” was incoherent/confusing. Maybe missing some words or punctuation? I didn’t get it either, but decided it  wasn’t worth commenting about at the time.

  120. 120.

    japa21

    @OzarkHillbilly: After my shoulder surgery and subsequent rehab, I came to a conclusion concerning physical therapists.  They are required to take a psychological exam and must score high on the sadism scale. Of course, you already know this.

    Wishing you the best.

  121. 121.

    Subsole

    @rikyrah:

    What kills me is these very same folx spent DECADES snarling at my generation about participation trophies…and they turn around and excuse this garbage.

    To borrow a phrase from a wise woman:

    Lips. Pursed.

  127. 127.

    Kristine

    Is The Atlantic the magazine version of the FYNYT? I ask because three of the headlines in this morning’s newsletter are all Deathknells for Democrats. They’re calling the infrastructure bill “just one policy freed from gridlock.” Also, Biden needs an immediate course correction to salvage his presidency.

    I subscribed because Ed Yong is their staff science writer, but lately I’ve been scanning their newsletter headlines and deleting because dammit.

  128. 128.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @japa21: Since torturer has dropped off the formal career path, most candidates for that formerly respected medieval job have chosen instead the physical therapy route.

  129. 129.

    PsiFighter37

    NYT has an article out with DCCC head Sean Patrick Maloney. The dude is clueless. We’re definitely going to lose the House in 2022 if that clown’s advice is followed.

  130. 130.

    Fair Economist

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    Counterintuitively a complete tear is generally less painful than a partial because there’s no additional damage being done while with a partial the end of the tear is subject to additional injury. If it can be properly fixed, long term a complete tear tends to have better long term results because scar tissue and muscle have different elasticities, so with a partial tear there’s always excess strain right at the juncture. So at least that part of your shoulder problem has an excellent chance of eventually being fully functional.

  131. 131.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kristine:three of the headlines in this morning’s newsletter are all Deathknells for Democrats.

    That’s the way it is everywhere, doesn’t matter what you read. DEMs are doomed if they don’t do this. They are also doomed if they do the opposite.

  138. 138.

    lowtechcyclist

    @sab:

    We had hoped to avoid politics today. Of course Joe Biden has high hopes and a busy schedule.  So for him, his interests prevailed, because he didn’t know that two of the 330,000,000 people in his country who voted for him happened to have a 20th anniversary today. I was joking. I thought you might get the “//” but apparently not.

    I knew you were joking, but couldn’t for the life of me figure out about what.  Did it have something to do with that virtual grassroots event tomorrow?  Nope, can’t be that, that’s tomorrow.  Their anniversary’s today.  OK, what else is going on today?  Racked my brains, couldn’t come up with anything.

    Finally I noticed the date stamp on the tweet, and realized that the ‘tomorrow’ in the tweet was today.

  139. 139.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @frosty: A dear friend and former colleague died of pancreatic cancer shortly after Trump’s election. One of my friend’s last words was, “At least I won’t live to see Trump be president.” Sad, but true.

  140. 140.

    Ken

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    People who early learn the right way to choose a
    dentist have their reward. Professional superiority
    is not everything; it is only part. All dentists talk
    while they work. They have inherited this from
    their professional ancestors, the barbers. The dentist
    who talks well–other things being equal–is the
    one to choose. He tells anecdotes all the while and
    keeps his man so interested and entertained that he
    hardly notices the flight of time. For he not only
    tells anecdotes that are good in themselves, but he
    adds nice shadings to them with his instruments as
    he goes along, and now and then brings out effects
    which could not be produced with any other kind of
    tools at all. All the time that such a dentist as this
    is plowing down into a cavity with that spinning
    gouge which he works with a treadle, it is observable
    that he has found out where he has uncovered a
    nerve down in there, and that he only visits it at
    intervals, according to the needs of his anecdote,
    touching it lightly, very lightly and swiftly, now and
    then, to brighten up some happy conceit in his tale
    and call a delicate electric attention to it; and all
    the while he is working gradually and steadily up
    toward his climax with veiled and consummate art–then
    at last the spindle stops whirling and thundering
    in the cavity, and you know that the grand
    surprise is imminent, now–is hanging in the very
    air. You can hear your heart beat as the dentist
    bends over you with his grip on the spindle and his
    voice diminished to a murmur. The suspense grows
    bigger–bigger–bigger–your breath stops–then
    your heart. Then with lightning suddenness the
    “nub” is sprung and the spindle drives into the raw
    nerve! The most brilliant surprises of the stage are
    pale and artificial compared with this.

    Mark Twain, “Europe and Elsewhere”

  141. 141.

    Quiltingfool

    @OzarkHillbilly: All jobs have 2 aspects – things you like and things you don’t.  The trick is to get a job that has more things you like than dislike.  I taught school longer than any other job because I never got bored, I could exercise creativity and was busy all day.  Kids are not boring!  However, the things I didn’t like, say, stupid administrators or pay commensurate with my work load and education, well, the good outweighed the bad.

    Now I have a great job!  I get to be creative, have more projects I want to do than I have time, a few people will buy my stuff so I have money to buy more project materials AND I can do this in the comfort of my own home!  Retirement is wonderful!

  142. 142.

    Geminid

    @Subsole: Santa Rosa’s Blue Hole is charming, especially in comparison to Jacob’s Well. The water surface is just a couple feet below ground level. There is a low rock cliff on one side, and trees all around. It’s in a city park 5 minutes off of I-40, and is a nice restful stop on your way to or from Wilmington, North Carolina and Barstow, California.

  143. 143.

    frosty

    @Tenar Arha: ​
     I’m not getting any Tweet pictures or graphics in the B-J post this morning – HP laptop / Win 10 / Duck Duck Go. It’s good when I link to the tweet though.

    They’re coming through on the iPhone – SE / iOS15.1 / Firefox.

  144. 144.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Kay: It’s ironic because I remember when extremely online, Twitter activists were branding Pete as history’s greatest racist for his poor handling of policing when he was still a mayor.  I always felt that was a bullshit smear devoid of any nuance/context, which of course makes it perfect for Twitter activists.  See also: Biden/crime bill.  We were assured that Biden and Buttigieg were clear enemies of Black People and nobody who cared about Racial Justice should vote for them.

  145. 145.

    Kay

    @Another Scott:

    I loved The Warmth of Other Suns for just that reason. I couldn’t put it down. So, that approach is effective for me. I want to know what happened. I’m less interested in what the engineers of the thing were thinking or feeling. I’m not on a journey to “understand” the individual architects of it. That seems like a detour.

    The kind of deliberate obtuseness of the conservative responses, where they’re really invested in not understanding what he said, is revealing to me. They won’t make the jump- I mean, it’s obvious where this has to go – it’s the definition of systemic, deliberate exclusion and bias- but they just won’t go.

  146. 146.

    narya

    Hey! Physical therapy has been an absolute godsend for my mom! her cervical vertebrae are compressed, and she was in excruciating pain; the PT has eased the pain significantly (strengthening the neck muscles), and she continues to do her exercises at home. Side benefit: she gets my dad to get up and walk around the house for 10 minutes while she’s doing her exercises.

  148. 148.

    p.a.

    It’s a sideshow to the big current issues but not minor long-term: any movement towards ditching DeJoy?  Or USPS banking?

  149. 149.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Woodrow/asim:

    My opinion is that Roberts sincerely believes there’s no racism in America today worth the name. I suspect he “knows” on some level he’s wrong, but is ignoring it because it doesn’t meet the criteria he’s convinced himself, for decades, is the right one to judge race issue by.

    No question. But at the very least, he should be forced to confront the evidence that he’s wrong about Section 5.  I figure whatever bullshit reasoning he came up with for not reversing himself would be so pathetic that at a minimum, his own words would make it easier for a later Court to skewer, if we ever get a decent SCOTUS again.

    And there’s always a chance he might recognize the indefensibility of his reasoning.  A slim chance, maybe, but you gotta play to have any chance at all.

  150. 150.

    Kay

    @narya:

    It worked wonders for me. I was really skeptical too, but it was either drugs that were making me addled and stupid or surgery everyone admitted only works half the time or PT. So, I went, reluctantly. It’s slow though and you have to stick with it.

  151. 151.

    Steeplejack (phone)

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    My initial thought is that Acquaintance is lying about being vaccinated. Even if they have been, you’re at more risk around them because of what they might have picked up. Hopefully their appearance at the book club was a one-off.

  153. 153.

    lowtechcyclist

    @p.a.: It’s a sideshow to the big current issues but not minor long-term: any movement towards ditching DeJoy?

    I’ve been wondering about that myself.  I just put a check in the mail, and I was thinking about the odds that it would reach its destination this week, given DeJoy’s ongoing efforts to sabotage the USPS.

    It seems to me that this should be a fairly high priority, given that the U.S. mail affects a lot of people.  So it would be good to see an update of where we are, and what the path to getting rid of that asshole looks like.

  155. 155.

    Kattails

    Just hopping on to say that if I were a staffer for Gosar, I would have put in my resignation letter, posted to the office door with a large knife, and signed in blood. And he’d be lucky it wasn’t his sternum. For making ME look like a white supremacist shit head by association. How anyone can work for these monsters is beyond me, clearly no one of any integrity or moral character.

  157. 157.

    lowtechcyclist

    @narya:

    Hey! Physical therapy has been an absolute godsend for my mom! her cervical vertebrae are compressed, and she was in excruciating pain; the PT has eased the pain significantly (strengthening the neck muscles), and she continues to do her exercises at home. Side benefit: she gets my dad to get up and walk around the house for 10 minutes while she’s doing her exercises.

    I’ve been through PT three times, and I have nothing but good things to say about physical therapy.

    Once after rupturing my Achilles tendon and having it repaired, once for a rotator cuff problem which had greatly limited what I could do with that arm pain-free (PT totally restored normal movement, no surgery needed), and once for some back problems where things were happening like it would be painful to straighten up after bending over the sink to brush my teeth (my back’s fine now, again without surgery).

  158. 158.

    Woodrow/asim

    @lowtechcyclist: But at the very least, he should be forced to confront the evidence that he’s wrong about Section 5.

    Oh! My musings aren’t a recommendation around overall Court strategy, please don’t get me wrong!

    It’s just my opinion on why he rules the way he does.

  160. 160.

    Ladyracterinok

    @Kay:

    The discussions of the Tulsa Race Massacre showed freeways help destroy the Greenwood area in Tulsa.

    It was clearly deliberate!!!

  161. 161.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

     

    He used some specific examples that are historically accurate (and well documented) – the reaction on the Right was to put it in the “woke” basket and either deny it happened or jeer at him, but it was kind of beautiful to me, to see the thing handled so well by someone on “our side” and he didn’t have to wade into the Andrew Sullivan abstractions at all- he’s talking about roads and bridges.

     

    We have plenty examples all over the country. Look at where there was a successful Black neighborhood in 1950 and it didn’t exist in 1960. Likely, there’s a highway there.

  162. 162.

    Scout211

    Updating a comment that I posted  last night in the Big Foot thread, Governor Newsom’s office finally responded to the media and the many stories speculating where he has been for almost two weeks and what the “family obligations” were that caused him to cancel his trip to the climate conference and withdraw from the public.  Wild speculation ranged from COVID for him or for one of his kids to a very severe reaction to the booster shot that he got on live camera on the October 27th.  The fact that he withdrew from the public immediately after his COVID booster (Moderna after J&J) has fueled speculation more recently that it was a severe vaccine reaction.   Supposedly, last night a “source” leaked to a media outlet that he was treated at a local hospital for the vaccine reaction.  All wild speculation, no facts.  But with no official statement, the story reached national news in some outlets.

    I guess his office decided to finally respond.  Here’s an update from the Sacramento Bee.

     

    Newsom’s last held a public event on Oct. 27, when he received a COVID-19 vaccine booster at an Oakland clinic. No events were canceled because of the booster shot and Newsom did not have a reaction to the vaccine, his spokesman Daniel Lopez said. Although he was out of the public eye, Lopez said Newsom was still working last week. “Last week Governor Newsom worked in the Capitol with staff on urgent issues including COVID-19 vaccines for kids, boosters, ports, the forthcoming state budget and California’s continued economic recovery,” Lopez said in a statement. “He will have public events this week related to the economy and vaccines.” Over the weekend, Vogue reported Newsom attended a wedding for Ivy Love Getty, the great granddaughter of J. Paul Getty, in San Francisco. Photos from the wedding show Newsom wearing a mask during the ceremony. Lopez confirmed Newsom and Siebel Newsom attended the ceremony but not the reception. He said the wedding was not one of the family obligations that prompted the Newsoms to cancel their Scotland trip.

     

    I am glad he will be more public now and hopefully, the wild rumors and speculation will end.  (Yeah, sure they will).  If he did actually have a reaction to the booster (BIG IF) I don’t really blame him for waiting until he is better to reveal this to the public. Everything is political these days when it comes to the vaccine.  I guess more information will follow in the future.

  163. 163.

    Ladyracterinok

    @japa21:

    The physical therapist who I thought was ‘sadistic’ ,(I called her my marine drill sergeant) never gave sympathy but always said come on you know you can do it so do it.

    I went from hardly able to do anything to being able to live in assisted living. IE able to do everything she wanted me to do and even do it better than what she said I should do.

    Thank God for demanding physical therapists!!!

  164. 164.

    scav

    Patriotism is clearly the very lowest priority of each and every CEO, Upper Management and Corporate Board Member needing such enticements as a gazillion-times Minimum-wage salary plus perqs, a corner office and golden parachute. True Flag-loving CEOs manage three companies while haunting the food bank for snacks. Funny how that argument’s not brought up more often by team the stockholders deserve everything always.

  166. 166.

    Matt McIrvin

    @hueyplong: It’s an article of faith among white people that any moderately academically inclined black person gets a free ride through college. They’ve got all kinds of fantastical ideas about the affirmative action goodies not available to them.

  167. 167.

    Matt McIrvin

    The current focus of quibbling on Twitter seems to be that race wasn’t specifically mentioned in Caro’s paragraph about the overpasses, but only in the next paragraph about Moses keeping black people out with park permits. CHECKMATE LIBS

  169. 169.

    Zelma

    @burnspbesq:

    Late to the thread, but in Pittsburgh, they destroyed the vibrant Black neighborhood to erect a monstrosity known as the Civic Arena.  The Hill District never recovered.

  171. 171.

    Zelma

    Somewhere I remember reading that many interstate highways were routed through Black neighborhoods because the people living there lacked the political power to oppose them.  A counter example: Rt 376 which links the PA Turnpike to Rt 95 south of Philly is still called the “Blue Route” because for decades it was nothing more than a blue line on the maps.  It was routed through some of the ritziest Philly suburbs and the citizens fought it like hell.  It was finally erected, but the whole road has the most elaborate system of sound barriers that I have ever seen,

  172. 172.

    japa21

    @Ladyracterinok:  My comment about sadism was in no way meant as a complaint against physical therapists.  Although I did accuse my therapist of getting a kick out of my shrieks of pain.  Let’s just say that a softy like me would never be able to be an effective therapist because I would feel guilt over my client’s pain.

  173. 173.

    gvg

    @Zelma: ​
     That has to be true, just out of practicality. Also a fact, due to racism, homes and land in black neighborhoods cost less to condem IE for civic authorities to buy to build something on. The cost of the land is a big part of if a road can be afforded. Poor areas are always more likely to be in the path of development. Its when the roads go through prosperous black neighborhoods, that the racism is most blatant. If racism ever becomes less powerful and black owned land becomes just a valuable as white owned land, then the roads will become…somewhat more fair. Also, they can route these things between neighborhoods with underpasses instead of just screwing things up for spite.

  176. 176.

    Ruckus

    @germy:

    Unknowns of unknowns, Los Angeles County has commuter trains. Several routes of diesel/electric and several of all electric. I ride east-west all the way across LA, with a first/last mile(s) bus ride. Pre Covid the trains would be standing room only at rush hours. And it’s faster than driving during our never rush anywhere hours. Right now it’s more people than one might wish with distancing, but no where near standing room only. I actually live between 2 routes, one diesel/electric and one all electric, both of which end up at downtown Union Station. That’s one ride half way there. And if I still live here they are building out the subway line that will end at the VA hospital, and that would be one transfer that would take me the 45 miles there. At that point my trip would take roughly 15% longer than driving in light traffic and about 40% less time than driving rush hours.

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