I’m generally very much against enforced decorum, but last night, it would have been nice to see a squadron of burly bouncers dispatched to the floor to forcibly eject Reps. Boebert and Greene from the SOTU speech. I watched on MSNBC, and the camera pool did a pretty good job of minimizing the puerile pair’s idiotic antics, though you could occasionally hear their nonsensical shrieking in the background.
The thing is, camera crews shouldn’t have to prevent a constitutionally mandated presidential address from devolving into a Jerry Springer episode. Boebert and Greene’s repulsive stunts were as tacky, brainless and grotesque as you’d expect the distilled essence of Trumpism to be. And while the stupidity of millions of our fellow citizens compels us to endure some levels of that toxic bullshit in public life, we can and should draw lines, in my opinion.
I submit that presidential addresses to congress are an appropriate place for such a line. The deplorable duo and their many fellow travelers in the Republican caucus aren’t obligated to respect the president or any other politician as an individual. Their right to be trashy and unpleasant on public property should be upheld outside of formal government occasions — for as long as the majorities in their districts are dumb enough to send such contemptible clowns to congress.
But last night, Boebert and Greene disrespected the occasion, embarrassed the democratically elected government of the United States and brought shame on the people of this country. I’m not sure what it would take to create and enforce rules imposing the minimal behavioral standards expected of tweens in middle school assemblies on elected representatives, but we need that in congress. Now.
Remember when thumpingly dumb Republican Rep. Joe Wilson yelled, “You lie!” at President Obama during a joint session speech? It was a big fucking deal, and at least one or two of his fellow Republicans called on Wilson to apologize, which he did. There’s no big outcry for an apology now, as if everyone assumes it would be like asking for a mea culpa from a pair of feces-flinging baboons in a zoo.
Boebert and Greene’s foolishness is receiving a fraction of the coverage Wilson’s stupid outburst got. That’s understandable in one sense because attention is what they crave, and it would allow them to derail focus on the speech, which is their intent, as far as the emptyheaded twatwaffles are capable of forming intent. But the danger there is that their brand of toxic, performative bullshit becomes normalized. Enough. It’s time for the grownups in congress to put a stop to it.
Open thread.
PS: Does anyone recognize the unfortunate chap seated between the pair of bellowing garbage gorgons? He must have been cursing the seating arrangements!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
The black dude has that “oh, she’s drunk” expression.
Also weren’t they shouting some dubass Wingnut slogan that only Wingnuts understand.
stinger
I agree 100%, Betty Cracker. If they disagreed so much with what they must have known he’d say, they could have stayed away. Lots of Repubs did. They shamed themselves, their institution, and all decent adults.
Every institution has rules. I have no idea why the House sergeant at arms didn’t hustle them right out of there.
louc
It looks as though someone standing behind him put a reassuring hand on his shoulder.
The Moar You Know
This is all the Republican Party has left to offer. A couple of screaming lunatics. I’m totally fine with letting them show what they’ve got as an alternative to reasonable government and behavior.
schrodingers_cat
Were they raised by wolves? Apology to wolves..
Ohio Mom
Eh, if he’s on that side of the aisle, isn’t he a Republican? I enacted a policy of no empathy for Republicans quite awhile ago.
topclimber
Oh, did they say something? I don’t pay attention to tantrums unless they’re my own.
different-church-lady
Too late.
The Dangerman
Unacceptable in a HS classroom, but if that’s what it takes for the Right to get off or get attention, hey, whatever.
matt
These trash are the visible manifestations of America’s decline. This behavior wouldn’t be tolerated in an elementary school.
lee
@schrodingers_cat:
If you are looking for some seriously weird SciFi, try the HBO show by that name.
NobodySpecial
The person in between appears to be Byron Donalds (R-FL). Garden variety wingnut. Evidently Skeletor (Rick Scott) likes him.
Bostondreams
Just want to throw this out there that an address to Congress on the SOTU is not actually a constitutional mandate. Presidents can actually just send a letter/report to Congress. But that would not work in the modern day I suppose.
In any case, thought it was a good speech!
Leto
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: they were chanting, “Build the wall”; what I want to know is what the fuck they said when Biden was talking about his son potentially getting cancer from burn pits. That was largely unintelligible, and at least got pushback from people there. But def agree with Betty here
Another question: why was Papa Blacklung sitting in with the Republicans? Is seating somehow random, or what?
Ten Bears
David Brooks can retire comfortably to his young. blonde wife (if he can keep her) …
There’s a new Bobo in town!
TaMara
Again…I apologize for the insanity that is CO3. Hopefully they will rectify this situation, it sounds like most are as disgusted as the rest of thinking Coloradoans. I can’t speak for the cult members.
Johnny Gentle (famous crooner)
Joe Wilson also fund-raised off the “You Lie” bit and went from unknown back-bencher to republican “hero.” All republicans–and especially these two–crave these performative viral moments. There can be no shaming them because drawing that kind of condemnation is their intent. They draw their power from it. Trying to provoke the “libs,” the media, the “establishment” or whatever other phantoms dance in their brains is the sole reason they exist. An entire political party of little fucking children.
schrodingers_cat
There are ongoing assembly elections in some important states in India. I have been following an official Twitter handle of an opposition party. They have been hilarious!
Punny and with a biting sense of humor
This country needs a pradhan (prime) mantri (minister)
Instead we have a paridhan (costume wearing) mantri (minister)
zhena gogolia
@Ohio Mom: Yeah, me too. He doesn’t look disapproving.
Betty Cracker
@Leto: Boebert yelled something about 13 US soldiers killed in Afghanistan when Biden was talking about military health issues connected to burn pits.
@Ten Bears: If you’re suggesting I’M the new Bobo, go fuck yourself. If not, never mind. ;-)
cmorenc
I am in Grand Junction, Colorado this week, which is in Rep Bobert’s 3rd Congressional district (my older daughter lives here). What’s especially confounding is that face-to-face, most of the people I’ve interacted with here do not go about their day acting like this ass-clown a majority (54-46%) in this district elected to be their congressional rep, but are quite reasoable and sensible away from political topics. Same with back home in NC, where the heavily gerrymandered 10th Congressional district rep, David Rouzer, doesn’t conduct himself daily as a flaming ass-clown, but his Trumpy hard-right voting record is little different from Bobert or MTG’s record. It’s as if I’m walking around in some real-life version of Pleasantville, where the regular folk of the district act day-to-day as pleasantly civil, sensible-seeming people, superficially covering up a host of monstously sociopathic, uncivil secrets buried not far under the surface, which only reveal themselves if you dig 6 inches under the surface.
That said, it’s important to keep in perspective that even in most districts that elect ass-clowns, somewhere in roughly the 42-48% range of voters did *not* vote for these ass-clowns, and if we could only change the minds of 5% of the population, abruptly there would be enormous D majorities in congress and the US Senate.
The Dangerman
Seems to me that the look on their faces is going to lead to some truly unfortunate photoshop jobs involving blowup dolls of Putin or Trump.
zhena gogolia
@Betty Cracker: I think people have been calling Boebert Bobo.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Yes, that still is some beyond the Wingnut Event Horizon narrative no one can else understand. Perhaps they think Migrant Workers gave Biden’s son cancer, somehow?
Speaking of the Mexican border, apparently Abbot was rambling about how the Texas National Guard is on the border to stop the Russians.
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: I don’t know whether you saw it, I found you a video in English on how to prepare banana flowers.
Geo Wilcox
They look like a pair of howler monkeys.
zhena gogolia
This is unfuckingbelievable.
Cassandra
I remember when Al Gore got slammed for sighing during a debate…Democrats didn’t know how to act, etc. It’s almost like it was all bulls**t.
oldgold
Today driving to work I tuned in a big midwestern AM radio station to see what their take on the SOTU speech was. The Limbaugh wannabe and his callers were focusing on Kamala Harris’s outfit. They were really getting riled up about it. The racism fueling this was palpable.
Hillary Clinton had it right. They are deplorable.
ian
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Boris Rasputin (the evil twin)
@schrodingers_cat: Wolves are better parents. They set order, discipline, and a hierarchy.
TaMara
dmsilev
@zhena gogolia: It’s entirely believable given the FTNYT’s history.
It’s also objectively wrong; the population in 1939 was something like 40% of what it is today and that was right at the tail end of the (not-noted-for-high-job-growth) Great Depression, so the chances that Biden’s claim was not literally accurate are basically zero.
citizen dave
I wish this post could be front-paged to our nation. Great writing, Betty you’re a national treasure!
bluegirlfromwyo
@Cassandra: Democrats are expected to defer politely to their conservative betters, no matter how they behave.
dmsilev
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Too many re-watches of Red Dawn?
TaMara
@Betty Cracker: No, no one would ever call you that! But it is what they call Boebert.
Betty Cracker
@schrodingers_cat: I did not — thanks for the heads up! :)
jnfr
@oldgold:
What was wrong with Harris’ outfit, other than it was her wearing it?
I loved seeing her and Pelosi up there together. Gave me a big happy.
Leto
@Betty Cracker: yeah, I heard something about “13 killed” but had no idea what those skanks were saying. Just… ugh…
cope
@cmorenc: We moved from GJ and all my immediate family lives there. Those still waters run very deep indeed.
West of the Rockies
No one in that photo is expressing discontent. All it takes for evil, less-than-mediocre white women Republicans to succeed is for garden-variety Republicans to do nothing.
Sure Lurkalot
@zhena gogolia: I’d advise you stay away from Kessler’s “fact check” column in the WP as well.
RaflW
Baud
That raining shit ad is looking better all the time.
RaflW
@dmsilev: Abbot continuously treats the Texas voter as if s/he is an idiot. Alas he may still have a 52% chance of being correct.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@ian: I see, so it’s Rainbow Dawn in the Wingnuts minds, were fabulous Brazilian transvestites are overrunning the US and it’s up to a bunch of badly dressed old white guys to stop them
@dmsilev: screaming “WOLVERINES!” is sure a way to pretend all the sucking up to Putin didn’t happen.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
?
Jim Appleton
@louc:
No. Zoom in. Some guy in a dark suit has gotten out of his seat and appears to be ensuring his mug would not appear in the sightline. we see his back and prominent left hand as he exits. Possibly the only sentient (won’t go so far as “smart”) person in frame.
Sure Lurkalot
@Geo Wilcox:
Yes, they do look like howlers!
dexwood
Man, that photo. They’re inner-ugly is blinding.
Leto
@Sure Lurkalot: seems like a majority of the time those “fact checks” are just bothsider attempts. Paaasssssss….
schrodingers_cat
@Boris Rasputin (the evil twin): Hence my apology.
Ella in New Mexico
@RaflW:
Sadly, Fred, Members of Congress appear to be literally immune from legal consequences of their behaviors
Immanentize
@dmsilev: shit, if Red Dawn was remade today, the Wolverines would cheer and fight shoulder to shoulder with the Ruskies.
Betty Cracker
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: I’ve heard Abbott’s border stunt is turning into a huge political debacle for him. Hope that’s true.
WaterGirl
@TaMara: Jen Psaki did not say “white trash, said what?”
This is why she is press secretary and I am not.
Baud
@Immanentize:
Truth.
scav
No doubt we’ve accumulated enough similar photographs of the standard bearers of GQP femininiteeeeee to make quite the calendar (can’t omit the background turkey slaughter for Miss November). Could make a killing, both to the actual worshippers of the godly endorsed beacons of decorous pulchritude and those of us needing a giggle. Getting the former to fund the campaigns of their worst nightmares would be a bonus.
Ten Bears
@Betty Cracker: No, fergoddesssakes – Lauren “Bobo” …
Immanentize
@jnfr: Ok, totally snarky comment on Mag’s outfit — that is two sizes too small and her stomach-framed belly button is not screaming “CrossFit” to me.
Mike in NC
I believe that today our governor has instructed state liquor stores to take Russian vodka off their shelves.
burnspbesq
They look like a couple of dance moms losing their shit because the judges gave their babies the scores they deserved.
Baud
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
“I can see Russia from my wall.”
Johnny Gentle (famous crooner)
@Immanentize: No, those were the old, bad socialist Russkies, not the cool, new nationalist Russkies.
Steeplejack
Anybody know why valued tweeter @Rschooley “protected” his account? Happened last night.
scav
@The Moar You Know: Absolutely. Put a loop of their greatest hits and play it incessantly on every TV in every yacht club and private 19th hole for decades.
Chief Oshkosh
And who is the chuckling chuckle-head sitting in front of the two aping morans? She seems to be enjoying herself.
Benw
@Sure Lurkalot:”A picture is worth a thousand incoherent howls.”
Ella in New Mexico
@Immanentize:
Snark away–it’s fun and a stress reliever :-D
I really think she and Bobert carefully dress to subtly sexually arouse their uber-masculine R audiences. Bobert only wears tight, tight tight and 5 inch heels to every speaking engagment she goes to, keeps moving in all directions to make sure even the truck driver guys in the back get a great view of her “hot hot” bod. It’s like watching a Hooter’s server without shorts.
Marge is in competition with her–she’s trying so hard to be “THE Hot, Sexy Congresswoman” But everything she wears is 2 sizes too small and exagerates all her worst features, which to be honest are all of them. She really shouldn’t go sleeveless until she drops like 40 lbs. and her hair looks like mine–hasn’t been cut or styled in 18months, needs to STAY in that pony tail.
Not hot. :-D
different-church-lady
@Ella in New Mexico: Subtly?
Betty Cracker
@Ten Bears: Okay, sorry for responding as if you were a common Russian Warship! ;-)
different-church-lady
@RaflW:
You gotta give the people what they want.
Lacuna Synecdoche
@cmorenc:
You misspelled “Bobert”.
There should be another “o” in the first syllable.
Immanentize
@Steeplejack: I read from him (yesterday?) that he really needed to step away for a bit — so that is probably why his account is protected?
different-church-lady
@Betty Cracker: Look, if they’re going to do the rebuttal in real time, then take away the post-speech rebuttal. It’s only fair.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Ella in New Mexico:
I regret to admit that Boebert is of the type that has always been very much in my wheelhouse, along with that extra special spiciness of crazy to make her irresistible for a long weekend before I run off.
it is a major weakness and character flaw on my part. I’m sorry….
different-church-lady
@oldgold:
For the nine hundred and thirty second goddamned time: Hillary was trying to say these people were reachable despite appearances. She was utterly, tragically wrong about it.
Miss Bianca
Repeated from thread below: Ladies and gentlemen, my so-called representative.
I wonder if my publisher will let me do an op-ed on this one. Although I would be hard-pressed to match Betty Cracker’s level of invective.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
Ukrainian rep to the UN just shamed the shit out of the UN.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
Russian thug is sounding like a character from an Allen Drury novel.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
Holy shit – Russia blaming Ukraine military for “using civilians as human shields”.
germy
some reactions to Boebert & Taylor Greene:
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Heard in the Bihar assembly
Janata DaL MLA to the BJP MLA, shut up Gandhi’s murderer.
Indian politics make US politics look tame.
MLA (member of the legislative assembly)
The Thin Black Duke
@different-church-lady: I don’t know why, but most (white) people are incapable of recognizing that monsters like Boebert and Greene cannot be salvaged but it’s essential that everybody else pretend otherwise.
Kay
They’re reality tv stars. It’s exactly the same dynamic.
germy
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
“I can fix her.”
Steeplejack
@Immanentize:
Okay, I missed that. I thought I had read all of his stuff the last couple of days. He did say last week that he might step back if Ukraine Twitter got too weird.
germy
There’s no big outcry for an apology now, as if everyone assumes it would be like asking for a mea culpa from a pair of feces-flinging baboons in a zoo.
The Thin Black Duke
@Kay: They belong in a circus biting the heads off of chickens.
Omnes Omnibus
@germy: No, not that. It’s more like “I can survive one weekend without hospitalization.”
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@germy:
No, I know that is impossible. It has everything to do with the transitory fun one can have with the sort of woman who has probably keyed a car this week.
sdhays
@dmsilev: He should have watched more Red Dwarf.
Soprano2
@Ella in New Mexico: Marge is desperately in need of some Spanx with that dress. No woman could successfully wear that dress without them.
lowtechcyclist
Indeed! I’d rather dance with wolves than with either of those two.
different-church-lady
@The Thin Black Duke: Because also being a monster is fun for the whole family?
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@lowtechcyclist:
A wolf will take the time to read the room and act accordingly.
Immanentize
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: really TMI.
trollhattan
Objection, assumes capacity for shame not in evidence.
It’s as though those two mean girls in junior high simply got older and got themselves AK47s and some bad drug habits.
different-church-lady
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: “The room is filled with other wolves. I’m good here.”
jnfr
@Immanentize:
Gee, I didn’t even see her belly-button. Think I didn’t want to look that close.
@Ella in New Mexico:
Stupid is never hot.
germy
Boebert has a future in show business
https://youtu.be/BNsYzbYMibQ?t=14
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@The Thin Black Duke: or passed out in a puddle of their own vomit behind some random DC bar.
Kathleen
germy
Roger Moore
@Ella in New Mexico:
It’s literally written into the Constitution that members of Congress are free to say whatever they want on the floor and can only be held accountable by Congress for it. It’s the “Speech or Debate clause“.
trollhattan
Between them, how much in fines did the gun moll twins accumulate for not wearing masks into the capitol? Guessing it’s up to six figures by now?
different-church-lady
@germy: There is not a doubt in my mind that asshole is going to give the chamber back to McConnell because of his fee-fees.
Kay
Boebert has an ad or something where she’s striding through the woods with a handgun strapped to her thigh.
She is going to blow the head off a squirrel, or maybe blast a bluejay.
Just ridiculous people. They’re cartoons.
AWOL
I see the Ursidae who thinks the Jews planned their own genocide by writing the “Protocols of the Elders of Zionism” in order to create Israel is back on BJ.
This blog deserves better.
Kathleen
@Immanentize: Rethugs def need to step up their Perfect Aryan Specimen Game. Exhibit 1 Steve Bannon.
Kay
@germy:
Then he did interviews trashing Biden’s agenda, with Mitt Romney beside him nodding like a bobblehead.
I wonder what happened to Manchin and Susan Collins “reform of the electoral count act”? I knew they were full of shit but they got two weeks of credulous media coverage out of it. Is anyone going to ask them where it is?
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Kay:
I mean, they do piss me off about how the act around the birdfeeders.
Ruckus
@TaMara:
Those two do not want to solve problems. That takes away the only voice they see as important, the voice of ass. They are classless, clueless, corrupt human beings. They don’t want government, reality, humanity, freedom. They want to be able to tell everyone else how to live, how not to live, how to be good little puppets for those who think that a democracy means they and their paymasters can have all the money and power. Their idea of what it means to have a government, is exactly the same as what vova thinks, the strong should be in charge and able to financially rape the country and it’s people.
debbie
I hate MTG so much, I must fat-shame her. Bitch needs Spanx.
BC in Illinois
@zhena gogolia:
Joe Biden:
NY Times:
Wikipedia:
NY Times:
ETtheLibrarian
My best friend had some neighbors who used to make a lot of noise that she referred to as howler monkeys.
I think I will now think of these do in that same vein.
But Obama wore a brown suite and had a bad shoe once…….
Are their assigned seats? I remember once during Obama that there was talk of all the jockeying to get on the aisle so they could get his attention.
dww44
@Kay: What do you and other BJ’ers think about Steve Schmidt’s wish a couple of nights ago on tv that MTG should be removed from her seat by Pelosi for her support of the white nationalist movement? What are the grounds for removal, other than sexual misconduct and misappropriation of monies?
FYI, everyone, yesterday Federal judge in Georgia just approved the GOP redrawn maps that gives the Republicans another likely seat (by forcing McBath and Bourdeaux to run against each other) on the grounds that it’s too close to the elections, which are, themselves, finely calibrated processes. We Democrats are not gonna wrest majority control from these folks until we are able to wrest control of all these super majority Republican statehouses.
Kay
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:
I know when I go for a hike I put on really tight jeans and heels and then strap a handgun to my leg in case I encounter a turtle that needs killing.
This person doesn’t spend a lot of time outdoors.
Edmund Dantes
@germy: and then shitting all over Biden’s agenda, but Tlaib giving a response was the end of the world.
https://twitter.com/alexanderbolton/status/1498861738934083586?s=21
Almost Retired
@debbie: I have never heard of spanx before. I learn so much on this blog. Nothing very useful, mind you, but I do learn stuff.
tybee
post it please. some of us do have access to banana flowers occasionally and have no idea how to prepare them.
germy
I didn’t watch Tlaib. Did she say anything against Biden or his agenda?
different-church-lady
@Kathleen: “WHERE’S YOUR FUCKING CHIN?”
Kay
@dww44:
It’s cynical, but I think the craziest and most awful Republicans in Congress help Democrats in a broader national sense, so I wouldn’t waste any time at all removing her if I were a Democrat. Not my job to police them. It’s kind of nice because they do so much self promotion no one even has to do that for them.
Democrats should say over and over that MTG is a white nationalist and represents the GOP in the House, because it’s true. That’s all they have to do. Just let the public draw their own conclusions from there. We don’t have to supply the solution. “MGT is a white nationalist”. Then stop.
Baud
@BC in Illinois:
The problem is “partially true” suggests it’s partially false, not that it’s technically unverifiable. If the NYT is going to play that game, they should have a label for things they can’t confirm.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Repulican stupidity?
Cheese-eating surrender monkeys? If this were 2007, I’d say 2002 called and wants its mouth-breather rhetoric back
Jim, Foolish Literalist
First of all, I was annoyed that he put that burden on Pelosi, and a political professional should be aware that expulsion requires a two-thirds vote and so not encourage teh kind of righteous green-lanternism that is all too common these days.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: The last time France fought Russia, its troops got pretty damn close to Moscow.
Kay
@dww44:
I think some Democrats suffer from Rachel Maddow Syndrome. You don’t have to lead people every step of the way- people resist that kind of, frankly, manipulation. It’s controlling, right? They feel that.
We say “MGT is a white nationalist” (a million times) and then trust them enough to get to the “what to do about it” part themselves. See what happens.
brendancalling
@zhena gogolia: Glenn Kessler’s was another must (not) read for me.
Those fuckers can all go die in a fire so far as I care.
Roger Moore
@The Thin Black Duke:
I think there’s a feeling that we can’t afford to write White people off as a group, and that unfairly extends to people not wanting to write off any individual White person.
BC in Illinois
One thing to remember about Boebert and Taylor Greene — they are, when it comes down to it, dependable Republican votes. Like many other dependable Republican votes.
Most of you have never heard of my Congresswoman, Ann Wagner(MO-02). There’s no reason why you would ever have seen her name mentioned. She is as invisible an occupant of her office as can be imagined. But my candidate to replace her, Trish Gunby, just put out a tweet in which she uses “Heritage Action” scorecards on how reliably members of congress support the Republican position:
Some are more visible than others. All are worthless.
brendancalling
@germy: he’s an asshole, and I’d pay good money to see him airlifted to Ukraine and dropped off wearing an “I Love Putin” tee-shirt.
hueyplong
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: We could legitimately question whether DeSantis would do anything if Putin made a move on Florida.
My guess is that Florida would be just like 1940-44 France. Some Floridians would resist, but DeSantis and his fellow Vichyites would be enthusiastic collaborators contributing forces to whatever Waffen group Putin set out to do ill elsewhere in the world.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: lolol
Soprano2
@different-church-lady: I thought she was saying that half of them are deplorable and the other half are reachable. I think she got the proportion wrong – maybe 5-10% are reachable. Those people became the never-Trumpers. The rest are not, like the ones who keep saying we should “reopen” the Keystone XL pipeline – you know, the one that was never even completed. I’ve taking to telling them all that would do is dump crude oil directly on the ground
ETA the actual quote:
“You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right?” Clinton said. “The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic—you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up.”
She said the other half of Trump’s supporters “feel that the government has let them down” and are “desperate for change.”
“Those are people we have to understand and empathize with as well,” she said.
Brantl
@AWOL: What does that mean?
Baud
@hueyplong:
Except airlift Betty Cracker to safety, of course.
debbie
@Almost Retired:
? I’m all about the un-useful!
Baud
@Brantl:
I think it refers to an old commenter who appeared on the overnight Ukraine thread.
Brantl
@debbie: 2 pair, one over that fat behind and 1 over her jowly head.
zhena gogolia
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: TMI
sab
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Six days into it and you only just noticed?
ETA Sorry for the snark. I know you have a day job unlike retired me.
Soprano2
@Kay: I wish you could become a TV pundit, because you nail things so completely and succinctly. That’s exactly it, they’re reality TV stars! If you think about it that way, everything they do makes a crazy kind of sense.
SFAW
@dmsilev:
May have already been commented on, but: the civilian labor force in 1939 was around 55M; in 2019 it was around 160M. So it seems pretty unlikely that job creation was 12 or 13 percent of the workforce (higher percentage before 1929-1930, of course) occurred. Of course, it only took me 30 seconds to find the BLS stats from 1929-1939, so I can see why the FTFTFNYT had a tough time.
Morons.
trollhattan
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Guessingassuming he had no point, but WTF is DeSantis chiming in on war in Europe? He’s a fucking governor of an evidently ungovernable state.Has he complained about the Oscar nominations yet?
Betty Cracker
@hueyplong: Sounds about right.
trollhattan
@BC in Illinois: Never heard of Ann Wagner but because she’s listed with those two, assume she’s a piece of human garbage. Sorry Ann, sit somewhere else in the cafeteria.
Kay
@Soprano2:
I can’t tell the difference between “Boebert” and the character she plays – who knows- but MGT is dumber and duller so not as good at it- she’s a stone cold racist in real life. That’s why she keeps getting into trouble- not because it’s an act but because it isn’t and she’s sloppy.
sab
@Kathleen: MTG and Steve Bannon. Definitely makes me proud to be white of NW European persuasion.
Mike in NC
People living in The Villages would welcome Putin with flowers and candy and golf clubs.
NotMax
Have yet to scan through the comments so dunno if anyone else has this quibble.
Constitutionally mandated duty, or constitutionally mandated message, or constitutionally mandated report. There is no requirement it be delivered in person, and indeed has not always been done so in that manner.
/inner editor
As a sidebar, in fact it is only by tradition an annual event, “He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union” being the only applicable requirement delineated in the Constitution.
Ken T.
@Immanentize: Yes! It is so childish, but they seem to be teflon, so I fall back to gradeschool antics and talk about their looks and clothes… Jeez, can they not just go away? Too much gravy on the grifter train!
Raoul Paste
@Kay: i’ve never heard of Rachel Maddow syndrome before, but you’ve expressed precisely what I found annoying about that show, but couldn’t put into words.
Don’t get me wrong, she’s an amazing person fighting the good fight, but a slight change in style would be welcome
Geminid
@germy: There is an opinion piece in the Daily Beast that gives a critical review of Tlaib’s speech. It’s by Eleanor Clift, and is titled “Rashida Tlaib’s State of the Union Response is a Gift to the GOP.”
Baud
@Geminid:
Did you watch it? Any thoughts?
I don’t care about pundit opinions.
artem1s
The SOTU is a House event and the President can’t even come in uninvited. There are rules of decorum for debate.
Refrain from speaking disrespectfully of the Speaker, other Members, the President or Vice President.
It’s a matter for the Ethics Committee to take up.
JMG
@NotMax: It wasn’t until Woodrow Wilson that any President gave the State of the Union address in person. Until then, they just sent over.a copy which the House clerk read aloud. And when Wilson first did it, it caused a big sensation, with lots of harrumphs about breaking with tradition, loss of presidential dignity, etc.
Ken T.
Look at that photo in the bottom: Cathy Morris something or other from Spokane, WA. She is as bad as the other two.
Baud
@JMG:
Washington did it in person, then Adams stopped that. Wilson brought it back.
different-church-lady
TMP puts their finger on it:
sab
@Raoul Paste: She is young, and what is remembered by us olds is new and news to her. So she reports it. I am okay with that, and her ratings show lots of others are too. Lawrence O’Donnell is the guy whose show I watch.
Hoodie
@Geminid: I imagine Eleanor was one of the few watching it.
Kay
@Raoul Paste:
I think it’s really easy for people who are trying to persuade to tip over into what are attempts to manipulate. She doesn’t have to give me the conclusion. In fact, I’m LESS likely to accept it if she feeds it to me. You find yourself “yeah, that, or this other thing I thought of myself! Could be that!”
She doesn’t trust her viewers. She won’t let them take it and go where they will with it. It’s controlling.
trollhattan
@Mike in NC:
“Welcome Vlad, we took up a collection and are pleased to present you this golf cart, in the shape of a Russian tank!”
Omnes Omnibus
@Raoul Paste: Maddow’s show isn’t for obsessives like the people who frequent this blog. It is for people whose heart is in the right place but don’t have the time or inclination to follow everything in politics everyday. Maddow gives a good backgrounder of why something is important and how it came about. Yeah, you and I already know the background and just want to hear what’s new, but my mom, my brother, and my sister-in-law don’t. They get that stuff from Maddow. Sometimes my brother calls me with questions; do you really want me to be his sole source of analysis about the political world? Yeah, I didn’t think so.
Gin & Tonic
Hey, for you bargain-hunting investors, I think you can pick up Sberbank shares on the London exchange for about a penny. (Russia’s largest bank, whose share price has dropped by ~95%)
Omnes Omnibus
@Gin & Tonic: But what will they be worth tomorrow?
trollhattan
@Ken T.:
Spokane, Paris of the eastern scrub. That’s where police uncovered the bomb placed to go off during the MLK Day parade. I assume it’s where Idaho Panhandle Nazis drive to Sam’s Club.
Roger Moore
@Omnes Omnibus:
You’re forgetting about the Crimean War.
dm
So, I guess I’m going to disagree with Betty on the House Bouncer. Partly because I enjoy the rumbling, drunk-sounding dissent I hear whenever I hear recordings of the British Parliament.
But mostly because I don’t need to listen to a constant stream of “Biden the snowflake couldn’t even tolerate some dissent”.
Also, Boebert and Greene just want attention, and doing that would mean they got it.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic:
Would I have to root for Russia?
misterpuff
@Raoul Paste: For the political junkie, Rachel’s opening each night seems slow and turgid, I get it. But to a large portion of her audience, who are not political junkies, she creates a narrative (sometimes starting far away from the day’s top news) that pulls in points from history or non political aspects and then pulls these all together to reveal a picture that is much like we see by aggregating all the info we glean from these posts. She lets her audience make the connections and figure out what is apparent to us and impossible for the nightly news casts to declare without sounding “biased”. As such, she does a service, one that gets good ratings (TRHS ratings have dropped 30% since she went on her hiatus) but is actually informative to Dem and progressive viewers who don’t live here in the blogosphere
Edit: What Omnes said.
sab
Cleveland Ohio. Construction guys dug up some bones. Called police, who came. Bones turned out to be very old pig bones. Only newsworthy aspect was that police in Cleveland came when bones were found. New mayor in town.
Librarian
@Baud: I believe it was Jefferson who stopped it, because it reminded him too much of the king addressing Parliament.
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
There are times when it seems she reaches back to the discovery of fire.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: So we’re at the “No! You are the Putin appeaser” stage with the Republicans as the forget everything they said the last ten years.
Geminid
@Baud: I did not watch Tlaib’s speech, I generally don’t read op-ed pieces myself. The author is very mistrustful of the Working Families Party on whose behalf Ms. Tlaib spoke, and made sure to include the revealing statement WFP National Director Maurice Mitchell made last month:
Mr. Mitchell and his party seem to want to help our party get smaller and more coherent. Then we can get really big.
Gin & Tonic
Here’s Russia’s “negotiating” position: we may stop bombing you if you give us everything we want.
Omnes Omnibus
@Roger Moore: Don’t bother me with unimportant details when I am talking about the Emperor. What is wrong with you?
Baud
@sab:
Reminds me of an episode of Bones I once saw.
Betty Cracker
@NotMax: Of course at least one other commenter beat you to that quibble. Where do you think you’re posting? We should rename this hellhole Pedant Juice! ;-)
Roger Moore
@NotMax:
I practice, though, the way things are done becomes codified so it is not practical to change. If a president failed to give a SOTU in person, he would need a damn good excuse. If he just blew it off for a year and said the constitution doesn’t require it on any specific schedule, people would blow a gasket. It doesn’t matter that the SOTU is mostly useless except as theater, so not having it at all wouldn’t affect the way Congress operates one jot. Failing to give it would be a BFD.
matt
@Geminid: Wow, Eleanor Clift is still alive.
Ksmiami
@germy: he’s such a scumbag. Pull his committee assignments
Baud
@Geminid:
“We need all Democrats except AOC to lose their seats. Then we strike!”
Yeah, that’s one dumb statement.
Central Planning
@different-church-lady: Are we doing Rocky Horror? Awesome!
dww44
@Omnes Omnibus: I actually think that Rachel’s moderateness is a plus. If she were as obviously leftist as some who opine on those shows, she wouldn’t have made fans of many people like my spouse who has no quarter for extreme positions on either side.
She is genuinely a nice and gracious person and makes an effort to be open to those on the right. As in her remarks last night after the post SOTU analysis and just before the cutaway to the Republican rebuttal, asked viewers to stay tuned with an open mind. Our only left leaning cable news outlet will be far less when she decides to go off and do other stuff.
Mallard Filmore
@Jim Appleton:
I see it now! That is the palm side of his (left) hand. The seat color behind the hand made my brain flip it around.
Geminid
@Betty Cracker: Bring on the pedant hoards!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@dm: Yes, they got attention, but in those dresses?
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
Blue pencils matter.
:)
Roger Moore
@JMG:
This is apparently not true. At least according to Wikipedia, Washington and Adams gave the SOTU in person. Jefferson thought it was too much like a speech from the throne, and changed to sending the SOTU as a written message. Wilson was the one who started delivering it in person again, but not all addresses since then have been in person. It was given in the form of a letter as recently as Jimmy Carter’s final SOTU.
dww44
@Kay: Well, the only effective rebuttal to Manchin is to render his presence moot. We gotta increase our majority by 3 or 4 seats. We work towards that because a GOP majority, or even one where Manchin and Sinema still have the say-so over the Democratic agenda will further erode our little “d” democracy.
NotMax
@different-church-lady
Himmler chin.
If the jackboot fits….
//
KSinMA
The mot juste. [chef’s kiss]
Thanks, Betty!
Baud
@dww44:
?
Betty Cracker
Regarding SOTU response speeches, I put myself through the torture of watching the GOP rebuttal by Iowa Gov. Reynolds. Good lord, what a load of tedious, boilerplate horse shit. Maddow dunked on the successor to Rubio and Jindal thusly:
Exactly.
Also, I read that ostentatiously centrist Dem Rep Josh Gottheimer gave a “No Labels” sponsored SOTU response after screeching like a scalded ferret about Rep Tlaib giving a response. Shockingly hypocritical.
FelonyGovt
I really wish we could get back to seeing our politicians behaving like adults rather than a rowdy middle school class with a substitute teacher.
Mart
Back in the day the SOTU dissenters were mannerly. Remember USSCJ Alito politely mouthed “you lie” at Obama. So much more civil.
topclimber
From maximalist to merely outlandish.
Progress!
Baud
@Mart:
Alito shook his head. It was a GOP rep who said “you like” out loud.
raven
@Kay: She can quit with the “GREAT STATE OF” bullshit too,
Geminid
@matt: I had to check myself, but sure enough, that is the Eleanor Clift born 1940, in Brooklyn. She got a job at Newsweek as a secretary in 1963, then moved up to reporter through a internship. Her first husband, William Brooks Clift, was actor Montgomery Clift’s older brother.
different-church-lady
@Central Planning:
Preacher. I screwed up the quote slightly. There’s a chin quote in Rocky Horror?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Geminid: she was a mainstay on the old McLaughlin group (Eleanor, Gee I Think You’re Swellenor Clift! in Dana Carvey’s imitation), I think I’ve seen her on MSNBC but not in a while
Mart
@Baud: sorry brain dead, meant to say Alito mouthed “Not true” which is close…
WaterGirl
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Do you have a link for that?
Miki
@Roger Moore: The Now & Then Podcast with Joanne Freeman and Heather Cox Richardson had a great piece about the State of the Nation clause yesterday. Really interesting, highly recommend.
Baud
@Mart:
Yes, that sounds right. He’s the worst.
sab
@matt: She isn’t that old. Only 81. Aged herself unnecassariy by being on that awful McLaughlin report. Good paycheck but bad public latform.
tam1MI
@matt: Wow, Eleanor Clift is still alive.
And still dumb as a post.
Baud
@sab:
Yeah that’s like the median BJ age.
NotMax
@raven
Yes, yes, yes. Affectation which drives me bonkers (granted, in my case it’s more like a short walk).
Why not also “the great territory of Puerto Rico.”
;)
sab
@Baud: I think we are a bit younger. Cole is our median. Lots of Gen- xers, which drives me crazy. ( Ignorant young twerps.)
Even Goku is almost thirty.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@sab: Jack Germond said he tendered his IIRC one-sentence resignation letter the day he wrote his youngest kid’s last tuition check. His irritation with the host, his co-panelists and the whole format was often the best part of the show
Baud
@sab:
Holy crap. Little Goku is almost 30??? The time does fly.
Kelly
You don’t need to declare captured Russian tanks and APCs as income, Ukraine’s tax authority advises.
https://twitter.com/nycsouthpaw/status/1498980339183726596
Omnes Omnibus
@sab: Physically or emotionally?
matt
@sab: 81 seems pretty old for punditing to me. I just remember her being Novak and Robertson’s punching bag what seems like 50 years ago.
debbie
Quick question: My work is matching employee donations for a fund to help Ukraine (WCK, UNICEF, etc). There’s a warning at the bottom of the page that says if I use a credit card (which i will), foreign transaction fees may apply. Would those fees take much out of the amount I donate?
sab
@Baud: Yes it does. My oldest stepchild (still a child with her own child) is actually forty.
bbleh
@matt: Those trash are representative of their constituency. Depressing, yes, but not sure it was ever any better.
@Leto: Boebert was yelling some wingnut nonsense about Biden killing the soldiers killed during the withdrawal from Afghanistan. Manchin was doing some kind of performative reach-across-the-aisle thing. Both are just juvenile attention-getting.
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Agreed. He was the best of them all.
Baud
@Kelly:
Tax cuts do solve everything.
S. Cerevisiae
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I loved the SNL spoof of that show, hilarious and spot on.
sab
@matt: If you actualljy work with equipment and machines you age out young.
Newspaper pundits at their desks often last well into their nineties.
debbie
@Mart:
Are you referring to Kevin McCarthy’s mouthing last night? What did he say? I couldn’t tell.
raven
@NotMax: I think she picked it up from that awful Greta Van Susteren who she assured us we’d all love!
mrmoshpotato
I too want a bounce house.
sab
@sab: With Goku I think that is physicaly. I hope he decides what to do with his life soon. As a stepmother I have gobs of advice. Life can be short, so you must decide and move forward.
Kay
@raven:
She not only takes you through the video she just showed, she tells you “the visual is important” (just in case you missed that) and then she goes through the exact sequence of what the viewer’s mental and emotional process will be.
She won’t let you do anything.
RaflW
@matt: My favorite line from the SNL spoof of McLaughlin and his silly pet names was “Eleanor, gee I think you’re swellinor”.
Yarrow
George P Bush is pathetic. I wonder how dad Jeb! feels about this?
Background: Texas primaries were yesterday. George P. Bush and several others ran against indicted-with-felony-charges sitting AG Ken Paxton, who got TFG’s endorsement. Now George P and Felon Ken are in a runoff.
FelonyGovt
@debbie: Hope someone way more knowledgeable comes along to answer, but the Google tells me foreign transaction fees typically run 1% to 3% of the value of the transaction.
JoyceH
@NotMax: Re Maddow, I get a kick out of some of those Maddow reach-backs in time. She’ll start out with something like, “In 1926, John Whosit was Calvin Coolidge’s Secretary of the Interior…” – it’s sort of like a mystery – how soon will you catch on to the connection she’s making to today’s headlines?
Omnes Omnibus
Name this band.
I went with Prussian Blue.
jnfr
@dww44:
Amen.
Calouste
Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich is putting his English football club Chelsea up for sale and donating the net proceeds to a charitable foundation “for the benefit of all victims of the war in Ukraine”. I got no clue how much that is going to be, considering he is also writing off 1.5 billion pounds in loans he made to the club.
NotMax
@raven
Yup. She was also unaccountably obsequious and uncritically fawning to Pat Buchanan.
Yarrow
@Kay: Have you seen any of Ros Atkins of the BBC’s videos? They’re like the opposite of Maddow. Relatively short. Factual. Deadpan. They’re wonderful. You can click through here for his series on Ukraine.
They’re also on YouTube if you don’t like Twitter.
Yarrow
@Omnes Omnibus: The Karens.
They try to do punk music but it’s really awful. Their friends tell them it’s great.
Mike in NC
I copied that passage from a blog called “Politics NC” because it was just so fitting a description of the SOTA last night.
debbie
@FelonyGovt:
Thanks. Google says they’re not charged if I use my debit card, but no way.
NotMax
@Yarrow
Obligatory “no such person.” George P. G. Bush.
trollhattan
@matt:
Yeah, she’s got a decade on Peggy Noonan, only without the daily pitchers of martinis, which I propose puts them at the same level.
Remember hate-watching McLaughlin Group for the shitshow, even pre-Carvey, because of the spectacle wrapped in supposed respectability. “Which is worse, Brezhnev on the accordion or Tip O’Neil with a banjo, Mor-tahn!” “I’ll go with Brezhnev.” “Wrong!!!”
Entire show was constructed around him belittling the panel.
dexwood
@debbie: When I made a donation to WCK earlier this week, I was given the option to include the transaction fee as part of the credit card charge. $2.50 for a $50 donation.
lowtechcyclist
Good piece on what happened to the Mig-29 jets that it looked like Ukraine was going to get:
Is Poland Sending Fighter Jets to Ukraine? – New Lines Magazine
Subtitle: The short answer is “maybe.” But, well, it’s complicated
trollhattan
@RaflW: Ten quatloos for the Turtles ref.
debbie
@dexwood:
Okay thanks. I wanted to make sure the fees didn’t eat too far into the donation.
Calouste
@Kay: Maddow is a college professor who’s teaching to a class of students who are either too hungover or too busy checking out members of the opposite* (or same) sex to pay proper attention. But she would still like them to learn and pass exams.
*) I know this phrasing is hetero-normative, but I couldn’t come up with anything that wasn’t convoluted. Does anyone have a snappy all-inclusive suggestion?
NotMax
@trollhattan
McLaughlin’s shtick was insufferable but pales before Barbara Walters’ “If you were a tree” interrogatory.
lowtechcyclist
Same place as all of Trump’s infrastructure bills, of course.
But yeah, they shouldn’t be able to step outside their offices without being asked about it.
dexwood
@debbie: Yeah, I covered the fees, I was charged $52.50.
debbie
Or Diane Sawyer’s leaning-in, squinty-eyed question, “But how do you really feel?”
debit
@Gin & Tonic: If you open up the door, we’ll all come inside and eat your brains.
Geminid
@bbleh: Boebert beat Democrat Diane Mitsch Bush in 2020 by ~215,000 votes to ~190,000, or 51.27% to 45.41%. So you could say that Boebert is representative of little over half of her Colorado 3rd constituency.
Fun fact: the Libertarian came in third with 9800 votes, and Critter Milton of the Unity Party came in last with 4100.
JoyceH
@Calouste:
How about ‘checking out members of their preferred sex’?
Miss Bianca
@Gin & Tonic: OK, that’s just more insult on top of insult to injury.
Scout211
potential sexual partners?
Mallard Filmore
@FelonyGovt: Sounds about right. Credit card companies typically slice that amount off each transaction to cover the expense of moving money through the banking system.
An additional fee might come from converting Dollars to something else.
JustRuss
@germy: Nice “don’t fuck with me, I do what I want” signaling by Manchin. I hate that prick, but he’s got game. I’d happily sacrifice a testicle for the Dems to pick up a few Senate seats and then tell him where to get off.
JoyceH
@lowtechcyclist:
It’s a shame they’re not going to get them, but it’s not as if they’re ground-bound without them – they DO have airplanes. I was just reading a news article about that ‘convoy’ coming under attack from the Ukrainian Air Force and ground units.
Though since the ‘convoy’ has been stationary for two days, maybe we should start calling it an ‘encampment’. A really long encampment.
And though commentators explain the ‘convoy’s’ bewildering slow progress to supply and equipment problems, is it too soon to start speculating about mutiny?
Gretchen
@trollhattan: Im horrified to learn that Peggy Noonan is only 3 years older than me. I thought she was ancient! And Maureen Dowd is my age!
Gin & Tonic
@JoyceH: The defense editor of The Economist, not often known for hyperbole, tweeted that he has confirmation from someone at US DoD that some Russian soldiers have drilled holes in the fuel tanks of their equipment.
Cacti
Let’s call it what it is.
The House White Trash Caucus.
Tarragon
@different-church-lady:
Messing with Crim’s chin is a common bit of audience participation. I don’t specifically recall a “where is” bit, but audience lines can be very regional.
Strangely enough even though I knew of the Preacher bit but I also went to Rocky Horror first.
Calouste
@JoyceH:
@Scout211:
Thanks for the suggestions!
trollhattan
@Gretchen:
Peggy is almost literally the encyclopedic example of “rode hard and put away wet” and it would be folly to try a comparison based on orbits around the sun. I’ve never recovered from her reverie over St. Ronny’s shoe.
sab
MTG. There is a reason why in the olden days when women wore dresses they also wore slips and sometimes even girdles. We really shouldn’t know where your navel is when you are wearing a dress. Didn’t anyone teach you that when you were about twelve years old?
ETA I hate to speculate, but apparently her only undergarment was a thong. Really, this dressing for polite company is quite basic.
Central Planning
@different-church-lady: I screwed it up too. The shoutouts are about the Narrator’s neck. But the sentiment was there :)
Years ago, we went to see RHPS at a theatre that offered “special” tickets – at the end of the show you got to go up on stage and sing and dance the TimeWarp. It was great, especially because a friend was one of the leads.
NotMax
@sab
So it was an inappropriate navel maneuver?
sab
@NotMax: The only part I can comment on is inappropriate and navel.
Gin & Tonic
@NotMax: You’re going straight to Hell. You know that, right?
James E Powell
Sadly, it’s already been normalized. In fact, it’s the most common & most effective way for an unknown Republican to become a celebrity.
Geminid
@Yarrow: I just got a surprise when I checked out the Texas primaries. Last night challenger Jessica Cisneros was leading incumbent Henry Cuellar by five points, in the 28th Congressional District primary. It looked like she might hit 50% and avoid a runoff. Today the Texas Monthly says the final count was Cuellar 48.5%, Cisneros 46.8%. Now the two will face off in a May 24 runoff.
Cisneros lost to Cuellar by 4 points in 2020. The 28th runs from San Antonio to Laredo.
AWOL
@Brantl: Ten Bears believes the Jews conspired to write that anti-Jewish book as a ruse to create the State of Israel.
sab
@Gretchen: Well, you are older than me but not by much. They shot to the professional top and just stalled there for decades.
MaryRC
@NobodySpecial: If he’s Byron Donalds, he’s cheering them on.
Kathleen
@different-church-lady: ???
Baud
@Geminid:
Oh wow.
Raoul Paste
@Omnes Omnibus: I didn’t think my. comment would generate this much discussion. Mine was sort of a “your mileage may vary“ comment, and as you say, it reflects my “get to the chase”mindset
If Maddow’s ratings are great, she must be doing something right
azlib
@Omnes Omnibus:
The Grand Army actually did get to Moscow, but could not hold it.
Kathleen
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@AWOL:
So the update of the Conspiracy theory that the Jews invented Capitalism because it would result in a Communist Revolution so Jewish men could date Catholic women. And people wonder were Flat Earthers come from.
matt
They’re the white Diamond and Silk.
prostratedragon
Bloomberg news surveys the vodka market. Smirnoff and Stoli are no longer produced in Russia — Smirnoff in Illinois! — and there are several Ukrainian brands out there.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-02/vodka-drinkers-are-changing-brands-in-wake-of-ukraine-invasion?srnd=premium
trollhattan
@prostratedragon: Pretty sure Smirnoff was always an American brand. Been around a loooong time. Stoli was an exotic thing at a time we were just beginning to thaw relations with the Soviets.
Roger Moore
@Calouste:
I think the standard on USENET was MOTAS: member of the appropriate sex. You could also say something like “they’re too busy checking out all the cuties to pay attention in class”.
Leto
Fresh off her rebuttal to State of the Union:
Iowa’s state auditor again called for Gov. Kim Reynolds to return nearly $450,000 in federal coronavirus relief funds that were used to pay for 21 governor’s office staff members for three months in 2020
Leto
@Gin & Tonic:
Finland doing its bit for Ukraine
Dan B
@trollhattan: Spokane is liberal compared to the surrounding area. It’s elected some great pols.
AWOL
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: She/He/They was a regular on the fairly decent Democratic blog, linked, and used to spout shit like that.
But I always thought the Jews invented Communism in order to enrich the fluoride industry. //
The Rectification of Names (yastreblyansky.blogspot.com)
Geminid
@Baud: It is a little surprising. Last time Speaker Pelosi campaigned with Cuellar, but this year the Democratic House leadership more or less left him to his fate. Also, last month the FBI searched Cuellar’s home and office as part of an investigation into involving Azerbaijani businessmen. Many people thought he was a goner.
The third place candidate, Tannya Benavides, also ran to Cuellar’s left, which isn’t hard to do. Logically, her votes will go to Cisneros. But some Democrats may decide that Cisneros is too far left to win in November, whereas Cuellar has a good chance.
This will certainly be a close runoff, followed by a close general election. Both elections will be closely watched.
a thousand flouncing lurkers was fidelio
@Kay: MGT is sloppy in part because she’s never had to be discreet. Money, connections, and too many of the other white people in her environment have given her a pass.
Geminid
@azlib: In those days a nation usually sued for peace when their capital was taken. In this case the Russians wouldn’t fold, and left Napoleon stranded with nothing to show for his hard won victories. He lost most of his army getting back to Poland. By then the nations he had beaten before were rising in concert against him.
Cameron
I really don’t like the designation ‘MTG.’ Reminds me too much of shitty drugs I took in the 70’s.
WaterGirl
@Cameron: I prefer to call her “Marge”.
debbie
@Cameron:
Well, she is certainly a bad acid trip.
geg6
@different-church-lady:
Actually, that’s not quite right. She said half of them were the deplorable assholes like Green and Bobert and the other half of the GOP were possibly redeemable. She was wrong on the proportions, but not wrong in principle.
Yarrow
@Geminid: I’m not surprised. I’m also torn about the two of them. Not a big fan of Cuellar but do not trust the Justice Dems so kind of want Cisneros to lose because of her association with them.
StringOnAStick
@sab: Goku has pretty immature, useless parents, which means he’s basically raising himself, something I’m familiar with. He’s having to do it in a world of social media, sly propaganda and a recognition that global warming is going to make the rest of his life hard and likely shorter than it would be otherwise. I wish people here would cut his some slack and be bit more supportive.
Sandia Blanca
@MaryRC: He did exactly that on his twitter feed. They deserve each other! https://twitter.com/ByronDonalds/status/1499068670198358021?s=20&t=wy9PXWhGqKdT-ZnLj_PXqQ
NotMax
@Gin & Tonic
Can we make a quick stop to pick up a snowball first?
:)
Gravenstone
@dmsilev: Don’t forget the Cubans, with I think some Nicaraguans sprinkled in for good measure.
bluegirlfromwyo
@WaterGirl: I call her Soylent Green.
Gin & Tonic
@Geminid: You’ve probably seen this, but this graphic of Napoleon’s advance and retreat is a favorite of Edward Tufte’s
Geminid
@Gin & Tonic: That’s a cool graphic! I knew that the campaign ended with Napoleon in a carriage with a cavalry escort hustling him to Paris, while the remnants of his army straggled behind.
fancycwabs
I’ve not been in the houses of congress, but are there not bottles of water with which a person of good will could douse an attention-seeker?
Geminid
@Yarrow: I also am very wary of the Justice Democrats. At this point I guess I’m hoping that Cuellar wins the runoff, holds the seat in November, and then gets indicted and resigns. Then a more regular and loyal Democrat can take his place.
germy
This photo:
chopper
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
the guy between em has this “why the fuck did they give me this seat” look
Martin
Inching ever closer to President Camacho’s State of the Union.
Palindrome
Late to this – on the road but as an unfortunate constituent of the f***in Boebert I’m writing yet another letter expressing my disappointment in her behavior. God, I’m so embarrassed!
Steeplejack
@Omnes Omnibus:
Miss Bee
@bluegirlfromwyo:
Maybe soilin’ Green–from swallowing too much gestapo?
Geminid
@Palindrome: Will you be in the new Colorado 3rd? Another 3rd District jackal was pardoned by the Redistricting Commission.
J R in WV
@AWOL:
I’m pretty sure it was actually written by the Tsar’s security forces long before WW I and the Russian Marxist Revolution, in the mid-1800s or so. Could have been before that, even.
The idea that it has anything to do with Jewiish authorship is clearly Nazi fantasy. Anyone alive today who believes that is a Nazi, for sure. Or really, really stupid. Or both, as Nazis tend to run stupid. Look at Spencer, Miller, Trump, etc.
trnc
@different-church-lady:
No. Two groups – deplorables, and people who could be reached.
“Half” was certainly an overestimate. My guess is she knew that when she said it, but you don’t make that kind of statement and make it sound like you’re only talking to 10 people.
Ruckus
@SFAW:
You actually took any time to look.
FTFNYT didn’t spend 1/20th of a second looking.
Because they didn’t spend 1/100th of a second thinking.
Ruckus
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yep. I’m thinking a penny a share is way overpriced.
Would this be the first stock that has to pay people to take it?
XpatLg
@louc: the visible hand of the invisible man?
Timill
@Ruckus: But if you buy enough it might come with the chance to foreclose on TFG…
sab
Boebert and Greene own bars with liquor licenses. They know legal rules of decorum in their jurisdictions. Hold them to those rules.