Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Bark louder, little dog.

Americans barely caring about Afghanistan is so last month.

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

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

The words do not have to be perfect.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the GOP

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

Peak wingnut was a lie.

A Senator Walker would also be an insult to reason, rationality, and decency.

Presidents are not kings, and Plaintiff is not President.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

I did not have this on my fuck 2022 bingo card.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

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

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

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

I was promised a recession.

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It’s the political tipsheets that got small…

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Is it a distortion caused by my media bubble, or are the Beltway gossip columnists collectively moving on from Trump?

There’s a piece in Vanity Fair about Pence’s political resurrection (despite having been lightly killed politically by Trump) and his willingness to run in 2024 as a “stealth frontrunner” even if Trump is in the race. There’s a CNN article about Trump’s inability to get Republicans to “disavow” Mitch McConnell and how that shows the limits of his power. There are a few “let’s you and him fight”-flavored pieces about Trump calling DeSantis “gutless” on the down-low. That’s all just from today.

Maybe they’re preemptively scrubbing the Republican Party’s Trumpism stains in anticipation of the upcoming election. Maybe I’m imagining things. Just wondered if anyone else had noticed a trend.

Open thread!

Reader Interactions

143Comments

  2. 2.

    debbie

    Maybe the better ones are moving on. Already, I’ve heard three separate NPR reports on Steve Inskeep’s “interview” with TFG, who hung up on him after nine minutes.

  3. 3.

    Old School

    Maybe.  When they were teasing the “Trump hangs up on NPR” interview yesterday, I assumed I’d be reading about it a lot today.  But it hasn’t been much of a story from what I can tell.

    Edit: @debbie: Except on NPR, I guess.

  4. 4.

    germy

    Maybe they’re preemptively scrubbing the Republican Party’s Trumpism stains in anticipation of the upcoming election. Maybe I’m imagining things. Just wondered if anyone else had noticed a trend.

    They want a Republican.  Just not that Republican, apparently.

  6. 6.

    debbie

    This comes as a pleasant surprise to this Buckeye:

    ?VICTORY?Ohio’s Supreme Court has overturned the gerrymandered state legislative map plans drawn by Ohio Republican lawmakers that sought to manipulate maps to enhance their own power. Bravo to NRAF (our affiliate) who supported Ohio voters in these cases! pic.twitter.com/z7AIAyF20b— NDRC (@DemRedistrict) January 12, 2022

  7. 7.

    Old Man Shadow

    I think the MSM has been desperately clinging to the notion that the GOP is just fine and Trump is the problem and they would very much like Trump and the MAGAts to go away and stay quiet so they can sell that fiction easier to the masses and go back to focusing exclusively on “how is Joe Biden failing you today” or “Kamala Harris is so shrill” or “we asked this diner in Ohio what they think of Critical Race Theory” stories.

  8. 8.

    Chetan Murthy

    And it seems like TFG is losing a step, extolling vaccines and such.  [RWNJ] Electoral lunacy, that.  Maybe he really does have dementia.

  12. 12.

    Betty Cracker

    Just read a crazy Florida road rage shoot-out story in The Orlando Sentinel. A board member for the state’s pension fund was allegedly shot and killed after he escalated a traffic accident dispute by ramming the other car and opening fire on its driver:

    Florida Politics cited unnamed sources who said the incident began when Kuczwanski’s BMW veered out of its lane and hit the Prius, after which both drivers pulled into a parking lot.

    The driver of the Prius confronted Kuczwanski, and then got back into his car to wait for law enforcement to investigate the accident, the sources told Florida Politics.

    The exchange then escalated dramatically as “Kuczwanski rammed his BMW into the Prius on the driver’s door, and began pushing the car sideways in the parking lot,” according to the account. “Kuczwanski then shot a gun at the white Prius, according to the sources.”

    The Prius driver, who also had a gun, shot and fired back into Kuczwanski’s windshield, striking him, the sources told Florida Politics.

    Florida, where even the Prius drivers are packing!

  13. 13.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Old Man Shadow: Yep, and that’s why I think he’s lost a step.  Wilhoit’s Law demands that The Base be unconstrained, unbound.  And pushing vaccines on them is not that.  It’s one thing to go slagging your opponents; but if you do it by pissing-off your base …..

  16. 16.

    feebog

    Trumps hold on the GOP is already slipping.  This latest kerfluffle with Sen. Rounds is illustrative.  Note the Turtle came to Rounds defense.  As did Romney.  You’ll know it’s over when the gutless Susan Collins breaks it off.

  17. 17.

    Barry

    Remember that we also just saw two pair of allegedly high-functioning Beltway genius’ talk about Clinton and Elizabeth Cheney being on the 2024 presidential ticket.

    I would say that it’s like a discussion in a college dorm room at 2 AM Sunday morning, when everybody is both drunk and stone, but those discussions are far more intelligent.

  18. 18.

    CaseyL

    GOPers don’t need Trump.  They got what they wanted: SCOTUS, monstrous tax cuts for the wealthy, and a hollowed out Executive Branch.  They really don’t need the crazy.  I think what they’d like is an authoritarian Unified Executive that will be more… palatable, shall we say, to a majority of voters.

    Pence fits.   White, male, Christian paleocon, and not noticeably insane.

  19. 19.

    trollhattan

    This LGM post about Dick Durbin using his most un-Democrat tungsten spine in telling Republicans to fuck right the hell off trying to resurrect the Judiciary blue slip “rule” they abandoned while they were in charge, and confirming Biden’s judgeship nominations is the best thing you’ll read today. Marsha Blackburn is sad, yo!

  21. 21.

    Jeffro

    I think both the media and establishment Republicans (but I repeat myself) are reading the writing on the wall with the Jan 6 commission and all the other investigations of trumpov & Co that are going on.  They are straining to find ways to assert the obvious: the former guy is an utter crook, complete imbecile, election loser, and soon, defendant.

    I love that they think he’ll go quietly.

  22. 22.

    Ken

    @Betty Cracker: You might want to audit the state pension fund. I’m not saying all the money’s been spent on cocaine, but it’s not inconsistent with that report.

  28. 28.

    Lofgren

    Too good to be true.

    But then I’ve always thought that whatever brings Trump down will seem totally random. Could be getting booed for getting his booster by his own followers has given a few people the window to try to steal his spotlight. Getting booed is the new wrinkle here, if anything. It’s not as though there haven’t been periodic attempts to swivel away from Trump. The pundits and politicians won’t be the ones who decide when that happens.

  29. 29.

    Matt McIrvin

    There’s a piece in Vanity Fair about Pence’s political resurrection (despite having been lightly killed politically by Trump) and his willingness to run in 2024 as a “stealth frontrunner” even if Trump is in the race.

    Is it me or does this seem like a ridiculous fantasy based on neverTrumper-conservative wishcasting?

  37. 37.

    NotMax

    There’s no one left but thee and me
    And we’re not sure of thee
    –     Chad Mitchell Trio, “The John Birch Society”

  38. 38.

    Scout211

    Yes to all of that, Betty. But to me it seems less likely that  the media is driving this turn away from Trump and more likely that this is a planned slow-walk by the leaders of the Republican Party.  These media people only print what they have been told by their sources.

    Starting with Mike Rounds’ “stunning statement” that Trump lost. Trump was triggered and tried to bully Rounds. Republican colleagues of Mike Rounds “came to his defense.” It’s like it was planned. And I think it was.

    I predict that we will see a slow and steady stream of these stories making Trump look weak, triggering his attack of Republicans and then Republican colleagues circling the wagons to keep Trump out. It will slowly make Trump more and more of an outsider.  And loser.

    Or I could be completely wrong.  Again.

  39. 39.

    VOR

    @Old Man Shadow: Agreed. I think there are plenty of media people who want to pretend Trump is the problem, not just a symptom of any underlying condition. If Trump went away the right-leaning media could get back to business as usual.

    Except IMHO this is completely wrong. Trump did research and figured out which way the GOP base was going. They wanted conspiracies, he gave them conspiracies. They wanted saying the quiet part loud, he did that too.

  40. 40.

    randy khan

    The press does love its intraparty fights, and maybe this is a sign they’re tired of the Dem fights, which honestly are pretty boring because nobody really calls anyone nasty names.

  41. 41.

    Hunter Gathers

    They are greasing the skids for a Trump led fascist government. These people are all upper class twits who want their low tax rates permanently locked in and are also wondering if fascism will knock a few minutes off their Door Dash delivery times. They know that Trump being off major social media means ‘he’s gone, hurrah!’ to brain dead moderates and centrists.

    If they convince all the dullards in the middle that Trump’s upcoming run in 2024 is all Biden’s fault -‘Trump was gone, but BLM/CRT/inflation/2020 school closures/whatever the moral outrage of the moment is brought him back and it’s all Biden’s fault so I’m being forced to vote for Trump’, then we’re Hungary – a white trash Christian fascist country with low upper class tax rates.

    It’s what the upper class wants and they are doing everything they can to bring it about.

  42. 42.

    Geminid

    @debbie: I will be interested to see how Trump’s rally in Florence, Arizona goes this Saturday. I think he intends to start his comeback there, and the unusual NPR interview was part of the preparation. Joe Biden has been hitting Trump hard this past week, and Trump will want to come out swinging. He could end up punching himself, though.

  43. 43.

    Ruckus

    @Chetan Murthy:

    Maybe he really does have dementia.

    MAYBE? It may not be traditional dementia but it is what I call idiot dementia. It isn’t that his brain has stopped normal functioning, it’s because it was never actually in a normally functioning human.

  44. 44.

    Jeffro

    @Mike in NC:

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Pence, perhaps more than any other Republican, would draw trumpov’s ire/fire/dementia-addled raving and ranting to his hardcore base more than any other R (or should I just say ‘RINO’, because that’s what trumpov would and will say).

    On top of that, there are so many utter lowlifes like Pompeo, Cruz, Cotton, etc etc, who are more than willing to ‘question’ Pence’s loyalty to trumpov er I mean the Republican Party in order to try and position themselves as the heir apparent.

    Never say never but Pence seems like a non-starter for many, many reasons.

  45. 45.

    debbie

    @debbie:

    The more I read, the better it gets.

    Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor was the key vote, breaking with her party to rule against the maps. O’Connor, a Republican, joined the court’s three Democratic justices and the three GOP justices dissented.

    O’Connor, who has served in statewide office for 24 years, suggested an alternative to the commission, which she called out for its partisanship.

    “Having now seen firsthand that the current Ohio Redistricting Commission – comprised of statewide elected officials and partisan legislators – is seemingly unwilling to put aside partisan concerns as directed by the people’s vote, Ohioans may opt to pursue further constitutional amendment to replace the current commission with a truly independent, nonpartisan commission that more effectively distances the redistricting process from partisan politics,” O’Connor wrote in a concurring opinion.

  46. 46.

    MazeDancer

    Big Deal – if real.

    Schumer and Pelosi are going to try to pass Voting Rights by a “Message Between the Houses” scheme. It’s a reconciliation process that happens when both chambers pass a bill but need to work out language. It can’t be filibustered. And after it’s done 3 times, it’s set.

    Democrats in the House will take a bill that has already undergone messages between the Houses 3 times, substitute the bill’s language for the #FreedomToVoteAct and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, pass the legislation and quickly send it to the Senate. #JLVRAA

    Here is along thread explaining it.

  47. 47.

    Bill Arnold

    @Old School:

    Maybe. When they were teasing the “Trump hangs up on NPR” interview yesterday,

    Somebody sent me a link, and I watched 1/2 of it before getting bored. Mr DJT appears to genuinely believe that he actually won the election, or at least that’s his working belief system ATM.
    He will continue to flail himself (and flail his most gullible followers) against the reality that he lost, and lost really badly in the popular vote.

  50. 50.

    MisterDancer

    RE: Voting Rights. And they (we!) have a plan: (EDIT Credit to nick-alike @MazeDancer as well!)

    Senator Schumer announces plan to push through filibuster and proceed with voting rights legislation using a procedure known as “messages between the Houses” in a caucus memo.

    What does it mean?

    Democrats in the House will take a bill that has already undergone messages between the Houses 3 times, substitute the bill’s language for the #FreedomToVoteAct and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, pass the legislation and quickly send it to the Senate. #JLVRAA

    Fascinating. I heard the “messages” term used before, yet this is the first I recall anyone using it in this way, if all this is true (I’m looking for a 2nd source on all this).

    Again, if true: This falls right in with how Schumer  and especially Pelosi have used their (relative) depth of knowledge of Congressional rules to beat back some of the worst effects of the GOP’s excesses — remember how we got Garland in because the GOP forgot what happens when they just walk off the “create a media circus” job without closing up the shop, the right way?
     

    I guess we’ll see what happens.

  52. 52.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @debbie:

    Oh, he dissented from the majority opinion. Because of course he did:

    Here’s a good write-up from the Columbis Dispatch:

    Justice Sharon Kennedy, a Republican who is running for chief justice, wrote in a dissenting opinion that the court did not have the constitutional authority to send the maps back.

    She and Justice Pat DeWine, who signed on to her dissent, argued that the section in Ohio’s constitution that says no plan “shall be drawn primarily to favor or disfavor a political party” doesn’t have the same enforcement mechanisms as other sections. Pat DeWine is the governor’s son.

    “The majority today, though, finds the constitutionally imposed limits unduly constraining, so it chooses to disregard them,” Kennedy wrote.

    Chief Justice O’Connor was the key vote. She actually called out the Commission as blatantly partisan and disobeying the will of the voters. Dem Associate Justice Melody Stewart wrote the majority opinion

    ETA:

    @debbie:

    You beat me to the punch. Pretty good, right?

  53. 53.

    Old School

    @MazeDancer:

    It can’t be filibustered.

    As I read the tweets, it is the motion to proceed that can’t be filibustered.  Republicans could still filibuster the final bill, so a carve out would need to be approved.

    Still, it’s nice to see movement.

  54. 54.

    AWOL

    When one converses with Ten Bears, one converses with an entity who believes quite strongly that “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion” was a conspiracy created by “The Jews” to somehow form the nation of Israel.

     

    And I will never let the readers of any blog this entity posts on NOT know this.

  55. 55.

    Ruckus

    @Mike in NC:

    My opinion is that Pence’s lack of a personality is better for them because when they pick republicans with a personality it is always a worse choice than Pence. Not that he’s a good choice mind you, but less poisonous is still less poisonous. Their big problem is that any of their choices is poisonous for the country and the voters. Including Pence.

  56. 56.

    whomever

    @Lofgren: I mean look what’s going on across the pond.  After everything Boris has done, it looks like he’s going down because of…a few parties during lockdown.

  58. 58.

    dopey-o

    @debbie: Maybe the better ones are moving on. Already, I’ve heard three separate NPR reports on Steve Inskeep’s “interview” with TFG, who hung up on him after nine minutes.

    i seem to recall something ….. heat ….. kitchen …. Harry Truman …..

    which makes me all the more eager to see Schiff / Maddow / Cole take TFG up on his debate challenge.

  61. 61.

    sab

    @debbie: The decision was for the state senate and house districts, not for Congress. Maureen O’Connor voted with the three Dems.DeWine voted with the other two Repubs.

  63. 63.

    Edmund Dantes

    @trollhattan: nah. He should have done this long ago. They should have been putting out both red and blue state judges the entire time. Otherwise you have one senator suddenly pushing up daisies and you’ve wasted time and no longer get to put forth nominations at all.

    but yay for finally doing what should have been done as soon as Dems were in power and control of the process.

  65. 65.

    debbie

    @sab:

    Understood, but those maps gave the GOP an 81% to 19% advantage when the actual voting runs closer to 54% to 46%. Seitz himself called the new maps “constitutionally consistent.” Compared to what, I’d like to know.

    ETA: These are the maps that will determine whether all vaccines become unmandated, whether the Ohio legislature can overrule election results, etc. This is a big deal.

  66. 66.

    azlib

    @Geminid:

    It is somewhat ironic the rally is in Florence which is where several state prisons are located. In fact the prisons are most of Florence’s GDP.

  67. 67.

    trollhattan

    @Ruckus: St. Mittens of Mittlandia would like us to reconsider the role of this “personality sham” in presidential politics. And from the far past, Mike Dukakis.

  71. 71.

    West of the Rockies

    @Jeffro:

    I suspect he could win a race for mayor or possibly even a House seat for Indiana, but probably nothing higher.

  72. 72.

    MisterDancer

    @Old School: Right, that’s what I’m finding from the Axios article:

    Regardless of this new tactic, the Senate would still need to lower the 60-vote filibuster in order to pass the Freedom to Vote Act and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Acts in the face of Republicans’ total opposition to the bills.

    They also note it’s a similar tactic to the one that got the debt ceiling in position to be passed. That one, though, I don’t know as much about the details on how it all went down, rules-wise.

    I’d not be shocked if this move is why McConnell has been lying like a rug around this situation for a few days, now.

  74. 74.

    moops

    GOP has gotten all they wanted from TFG.    A country ready to slide into minority rule through election tampering and all power in the hands of a partisan supreme court and the wealthy even wealthier.

     

    TFG is not going to usher in a new theocracy.

  75. 75.

    mrmoshpotato

    and his willingness to run in 2024 as a “stealth frontrunner”

    Dense vs Dump!  Let them fight!

  78. 78.

    Ruckus

    @Bill Arnold:

    Look at SFB over the long haul.

    He has always had a completely illogical, idiotic, childish opinion of himself because every functioning adult human sees him as nothing more than a useless sack of poisoned protoplasm.

  80. 80.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @debbie:

    Hah!

    Another related tidbit from the linked article:

    As part of those lawsuits, Dr. Kosuke Imai, a professor at Harvard University, created 5,000 possible district plans. None was as favorable to Republicans as the one adopted by the Ohio Redistricting Commission.

    “The fact that the adopted plan is an outlier among 5,000 simulated plans is strong evidence that the plan’s result was by design,” she [Stewart] wrote.

  81. 81.

    West of the Rockies

    @debbie:

    I think that Trump’s whining about the election will eventually play like a 60-year-old man saying, “Back in ’79, we should have gone to the state championship, but the coach played another guy, and everybody knows I woulda ran it in for the touchdown!”

  82. 82.

    mrmoshpotato

    Maybe they’re preemptively scrubbing the Republican Party’s Trumpism stains in anticipation of the upcoming election.

    We (Democrats) – and Pepperidge Farm – remember – that the GOP has been a shitpile long before the more skillful, orange conman oozed down the escalator.

  83. 83.

    Roger Moore

    @germy:

    They want a Republican.  Just not that Republican, apparently.

    It’s a variant on the general principle.  How failures are treated depends on who fails.  Failures among people like Us are always personal faults, while failure among Those People are always a reflection of how bad the group is.  It’s just that this time Us is a political party rather than a race or gender.  No matter how many Republicans fail in the same way, it’s always a personal failure and never a reflection of a problem with the party.  Whenever a Democrat fails, it’s a sign that the Democratic Party has a problem.

  84. 84.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @artem1s:

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    I was happy to vote for her in 2020. She seemed like a fair person and she had done a good job as Ohio SOS. She’s the one who introduced no excuse vote-by-mail IIRC. Her victory was one of the few bright spots in Ohio for that election.. Too bad O’Donnell wasn’t also elected instead of Sharon Kennedy, who wrote the dissent for this redistricting case

  85. 85.

    cain

    @CaseyL: But they have invited the crazy into their house and they have taken over. They are not going to be able to continue without having to appease them. But the thing is, they are being replaced by crazy conspiracy theorists and soon the money bag people will have no one to lean on because it’s completely controlled by right wing crazy framing.

  87. 87.

    Baud

    @MisterDancer:

    Senator Schumer announces plan to push through filibuster and proceed with voting rights legislation using a procedure known as “messages between the Houses” in a caucus memo.

    Is there anything more arcane and complicated than the rules of the House and Senate?

    I’ll take it though.

  90. 90.

    MazeDancer

    @MisterDancer:

    J(EDIT Credit to nick-alike @MazeDancer as well!)

    Did you propose? Wouldn’t MisterDancer be my spouse? And if so, are you going to write lots more PostCards?

    Ot maybe MisterMix and I had a love child. Only been here since 2008, might have missed it.

    Thought Woodrow was a nice nym.

  97. 97.

    sab

    @debbie: Absoulutely it is a huge deal. I hope it augurs well for the case on the Congressional map.

    I have had the feeling for a while that O’Connor was getting disgusted with the GOP abandoning even a pretense of following actual laws.

  101. 101.

    Woodrow/asim

    @MazeDancer: Oh, no proposals here! Just a neat coincidence. Thanks for the compliment on my name; I kind of wanted an actual nym, not just my name(s).

    And, hilariously, there’s someone who (used to?) post here under the nym “WoodrowFan” — completely unrelated. Never did find out what that was for…

  102. 102.

    Shalimar

    Pence’s main problem is the talk radio mindset that he was a part of helping to create for so many years.  The base never forgets even the smallest slight, and they remember people based on one-sentence caricatures of the worst thing they have ever done.

    Pence will always be “that guy who we tried to hang.”

  106. 106.

    TriassicSands

    @debbie:

    I’ve long disliked Inskeep. He has been one of the worst of the bothsiderists. It’s good and a little surprising that Trump would hang up on him. Maybe 1/6 was too much for Inskeep.

  107. 107.

    trollhattan

    @Betty Cracker: Those Prius drivers, they’re feelin’ frisky.

    Two people were killed in a high-speed, single-vehicle crash early Wednesday morning on Interstate 80 in Sacramento, according to the California Highway Patrol. A Toyota Prius struck a tree around 1:10 a.m. on the eastbound I-80 off-ramp at Raley Boulevard in the Del Paso Heights area, CHP North Sacramento spokesman Officer A.J. McTaggart said.

    The Prius, traveling at “an extremely high rate of speed,” veered off the roadway and struck “several” trees along the freeway exit, McTaggart said. The driver, whom McTaggart said was a 35-year-old Sacramento man, and an unidentified male passenger were each ejected from the vehicle. Both were pronounced dead at the scene. The Sacramento County Coroner’s Office has identified one of the victims as Sukhjit Singh, 35, of Sacramento. The identity of the second victim will be released pending notification of family.

    https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article257253177.html#storylink=cpy

    “Prius” and “extremely high rate of speed” are not an obvious pairing.

  108. 108.

    trollhattan

    @Lofgren: I assume that if a library is present, Melanie knows she can hide from him there.

    Speaking of, any plans yet for the Trump Casino and Library-Thing Tower?

  109. 109.

    David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch

    Pence is a bore.

    More importantly Dump’s cult wants to hang him, so no, he’ll never win a nomination

    The Village loves to build up republican bores. Remember how they touted Fred Thompson and the 5’2″ Mitch Daniels as presidential, then they went all in on Christie and later Lil’ Marco. I’m old enough to remember when they declared Guilliani the presumptive nominee in 2007 and then he failed to win a single delegate. And don’t get me started on their putrid love affairs with ¡Jeb! and Kasich.

    The Village suffers from a collective Stockholm Syndrome.

  110. 110.

    Roger Moore

    @CaseyL: ​
     

    GOPers don’t need Trump.

    Very much this. Trump got ahead by seeing what the Republican base wanted and giving it to them. They made him, and they can and will unmake him the moment he stops giving them what they want. The idea that Trump is some genius and the only person who can satisfy the base is Trumpist nonsense. It’s possible that nobody else will be as effective at motivating them as Trump was, but what they want is obvious and there are plenty of people willing to give it a try.

  115. 115.

    Peale

    @Baud: I’ve been trying to make my corpus easily available for years. Most lawyers I’ve dealt with have been begging me to explore those arcane procedures. Like covering up with a kaftan.

  117. 117.

    burnspbesq

    @West of the Rockies:

    Pence is only mostly dead!

    I thought the Coroner of Munchkin Land had thoroughly examined him, and pronounced him Really and Sincerely Dead.

    Seriously, though, it doesn’t matter what any formerly mainstream Republicans or Beltway chatterers want to believe. Unless he’s dead or in prison, Trump will be the nominee.

  119. 119.

    Roger Moore

    @debbie:

    Understood, but those maps gave the GOP an 81% to 19% advantage when the actual voting runs closer to 54% to 46%. Seitz himself called the new maps “constitutionally consistent.” Compared to what, I’d like to know.

    IIRC, the Republicans claim that since they won about 80% of the statewide elections, they should be allowed to let themselves win 80% of the districts.

  120. 120.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Gin & Tonic:

    I don’t think I’d be able to do that. It takes a special kind of person to push themselves to go that fast.

    One thing about the Autobahn, it does give people who own supercars the chance to use them to their full potential

  121. 121.

    Baud

    @Peale:

    : I’ve been trying to make my corpus easily available for years. Most lawyers I’ve dealt with have been begging me to explore those arcane procedures

     
    Bad flashback to Rudy Giuliani in that Borat movie.

  123. 123.

    Jinchi

    The Pence 2024 stories are ridiculous. He was never popular. He was only elevated to the national stage because TFG needed a stooge. He’s most famous for being completely obsequious to the most despised president in US history.

     

    He’s nothing without TFG and TFG literally sent a mob to kill him.

  128. 128.

    Jinchi

    @trollhattan: “Prius” and “extremely high rate of speed” are not an obvious pairing.

    My first car was a Hyundai and it was literally impossible for me to speed on the highway.

  129. 129.

    Roger Moore

    @Lofgren:

    When I was in college, I worked in the faculty club, and one of the dining rooms was called the library.  It was generally similar to the other dining rooms except the walls were covered with book shelves to make it look classy.  The books were bound with color-coordinated covers so they’d look nice on the shelves, which was obviously far more important than the contents. I don’t think I ever saw anyone take one off the shelf in the 3 years I worked there.  I could totally imagine Trump in that kind of library.

  131. 131.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Jinchi: Chris Hayes made a funny the other night about being a short, awkward, fourteen-year-old benchwarmer and realizing that however much he loved basketball, he was never going to realize his dream of playing in the NBA. He said Mike Pence needs to have the same kind of awakening about a political future.

  133. 133.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Gin & Tonic:  Nuremberg to Munich was mostly wide open was I was there.  100-120 mph is comfortable for long distances.  Much faster and the degree of hyper-awareness needed became tiring after a few minutes.

  134. 134.

    NotMax

    FYI.

    A Washington man was sentenced [Tuesday] to 84 months, or seven years, in prison for his role in a plot to threaten and intimidate journalists and advocates who worked to expose anti-Semitism.

    Kaleb Cole, 25, a leader of the Neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen Division, was convicted by a federal jury in the Western District of Washington of one count of interfering with a federally protected activity because of religion, three counts of mailing threatening communications, and one count of conspiring with other Atomwaffen members to commit three offenses against the United States – interference with federally-protected activities because of religion, mailing threatening communications, and cyberstalking. Source

  135. 135.

    Jinchi

    @Betty Cracker: “Kuczwanski rammed his BMW into the Prius on the driver’s door, and began pushing the car sideways in the parking lot,” according to the account. “Kuczwanski then shot a gun at the white Prius, according to the sources.”

    That’s an interesting combination of the state’s original “Stand Your Ground” law with the new Desantis  rule legalizing vehicular homicide.

  140. 140.

    Ramalama

    @Roger Moore: his library is going to contain books he’s ‘written’ plus fake books with Photoshop covers like the fake Time magazines hanging in his office. Winner of the No-bell prize. Winner of 9 Pulitzers.

    The way to enter the library will be to climb the walls, like honky Kong of Jan 6th.

  141. 141.

    yellowdog

    @Ten Bears: What happens to TFG is irrelevant. The voter suppression, gerrymandering, and vote nullification at the state level are already sufficiently in place to insure a permanent GQP majority.

  143. 143.

    Geminid

    @yellowdog: Actually, despite Republican gerrymandering in states they control, the new Congressional map will come out as a wash, maybe slightly positive for Democrats. If the Ohio Supreme Court strikes down tbe state’s Congressional maps like it did the state’s legislative map, redistricting may be two or three seats better for Democrats.

    Of course, nothing will be decided for sure until this November. But I like our chances to hold the House this year, and maybe even expand the Democratic majority.

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