Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Second rate reporter says what?

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

The arc of the moral universe doesn’t bend itself. it’s up to us.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

My right to basic bodily autonomy is not on the table. that’s the new deal.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

People really shouldn’t expect the government to help after they watched the GOP drown it in a bathtub.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

Fight for a just cause, love your fellow man, live a good life.

If you’re looking for someone who’s young and athletic, go watch a fucking movie.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.

Cole is on a roll !

The jury literally has a bell they can ring to force Trump to show up on command. Greatest thing ever!

The gop couldn’t organize an orgy in a whorehouse with a fist full of 50s.

Someone should tell Republicans that violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, or possibly the first.

Let’s show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

Let the trolls come, and then ignore them. that’s the worst thing you can do to a troll.

“They not like us!” (that’s for sure!)

You are here: Home / Politics / Biden Administration in Action / Thursday Morning Open Thread: Everything Is Interconnected

Thursday Morning Open Thread: Everything Is Interconnected

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Per the Washington Post:

… President Biden on Wednesday decried Abbott’s actions as “government overreach at its worst” — announcing that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will take new actions to help transgender youth in Texas and their families.

“Children, their parents, and their doctors should have the freedom to make the medical decisions that are best for each young person — without politicians getting the way,” Biden said in a statement.

Still, while the case’s attorneys were able to secure — at least momentarily — protection from the order for their clients, they fear the ramifications the governor’s push could have for families across the state and across the country.

“They’re using the lives of vulnerable youth in their state as a political football,” Gonzalez-Pagan said. “Every family in Texas right now with a transgender youth that they support and affirm is living in fear. That’s unlawful and we will continue to fight their actions.”

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Reader Interactions

148Comments

  1. 1.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Oh brother: From Kansas, with love: like it or not, my home defies stereotypes

    One Saturday last fall, my husband and I bought an antique clawfoot bathtub in Manhattan, Kansas. After loading it from a stranger’s backyard into the bed of our truck, we walked to The Chef, a downtown diner, figuring we might be seated quickly with half the town tailgating at the Kansas State University football game.

    We drank bloody Marys on the patio among white, Black and brown diners while purple school flags waved in the autumn breeze. Our server pointed to a pile of blankets in case I got chilly.

    When we left, I handed my blanket to a trio of thick men eating bacon and wearing hunting gear. “In case you get chilly,” I said. They laughed. Then the server, who was wearing facial hair, makeup, men’s shoes, pearls and a crop top, refilled their coffee cups.

    Unfashionable places such as Kansas – “one of the square ones in the middle,” coastal acquaintances have said to me with a smile and a shrug – are often portrayed by Hollywood and news headlines as a homogenous expanse of “uneducated,” white, straight, cis-gendered conservatives who are cooking meth or terrorizing outsiders.

    Perhaps that is because most of those employed as storytellers or gatekeepers in film, television or the national media industry have led urban lives geographically removed from regions condescendingly known as “flyover country.” I have been a journalist for 20 years and have never once, to my knowledge, worked with another journalist who had direct experience of rural life or agricultural labor, not to mention economic poverty in any setting.

    Uh… Sarah? I hate to break it to you but Manhattan KS, the home of Kansas State University, is not at all typical of rural Kansas, anymore than Columbia MO or Fayetteville AR are typical of the Ozarks. You are correct that most Hollywood treatments of rural America are little better than caricatures, but your love letter to Manhattan obscures the realities of 95% rural life just as much.

  4. 4.

    narya

    Good morning, juicetariat! Modern medicine is amazing. I had organs removed on Monday. I apparently lost only 25ml of blood, I’ve managed the pain with ibuprofen and acetaminophen (it’s now maybe a 1.5 on a scale of 10), I went for a walk yesterday and am going for a longer one today. Still a lot of healing to be done, but still amazing.
    Meanwhile, gonna be supporting Chef Jose; people gotta eat and his single-minded focus on doing that is awesome.
    Also too: pled guilty to seditious conspiracy!!!

  6. 6.

    Jeffro

    “Building a Better America…by NOT negotiating with Bad-Faith Manchin for a year”.  Please, FSM, make it so.

    Hey that seditious conspiracy plea tells me something.  What does it tell MAGA nation, I wonder?

  7. 7.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    @narya: Go you!

    Yeah, I’m worried about Chef Jose

    ETA: My writer group met last night and critiqued a couple of my new opening chapters. They suggested those chapters are a little slow. On the reclining bike this morning, I thought of a way to fix that. Then I thought, well, crap, that would be a lot of work. I’m pondering.

  10. 10.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    As a longtime practitioner in Dependency, Neglect and Abuse court, it occurs to me that Texas winds up with a difficult time on a “due process rational basis test” on deeming these types of investigations to be warranted.

    They’d need to find appropriate experts with actual statistical backup to carry it through, and if Texas requires clear and convincing evidence on these, I don’t see that position ever prevailing over the sound discretion of both parents.

  11. 11.

    Soprano2

    When is the Nobel committee going to give Andres the Nobel Peace Prize? Seems to me he has more than earned it.

  12. 12.

    SFAW

    I think it’s not-at-all inconsistent that the “parents know what’s better for their children than the government does” Party — when it comes to mask mandates — are willing to prosecute parents for letting their kids be who they are.

  13. 13.

    debbie

    @narya:

    Wonderful news!

    I too am very worried for Chef Jose, but I’d bet the people he’s trying to help will do all they can to keep him safe.

  14. 14.

    Soprano2

    I don’t know what to think about these employment number revisions. Either their methodology is extremely broken or someone is deliberately sabotaging those numbers to make Biden look bad. If it’s the former, they need to do a complete rework because what they are doing obviously isn’t working.

  15. 15.

    SFAW

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes:

    They’d need to find appropriate experts with actual statistical backup to carry it through, and if Texas requires clear and convincing evidence on these, I don’t see that position ever prevailing over the sound discretion of both parents.

    You’d be worng, of course. As the saying goes: It’s Chinatown Texas, Jake Comte.

  16. 16.

    Ken

    @Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: I suspect Texas will come up with plenty of experts who will testify “This is bad for the kids.”

    They may have trouble getting the expert to stop there, and not continue with “and the kids should be enrolled in my program to pray the gay away”, or “and evolution is a Satanic conspiracy”, or “and vaccines make you magnetic”.

  17. 17.

    New Deal democrat

    *Please* don’t get excited over any one economic datapoint, like the big upward revision to ADP’s January jobs report.

    I have no idea what tomorrow’s jobs report will be like, but one thing that is right in my lane is forecasting economic trends based on leading indicators that have been tested over a very long time.

    Last year was on outright economic Boom. But consumption leads production, and more to the point businesses usually decide whether and how many people to hire based on recent sales trends. Well, real inflation-adjusted retail sales (google “FRED” and look up series RRSFS) have gone nowhere since last May. In fact they are likely to be *down* from a year ago starting this month (because there was *huge* stimulus spending in March and April of last year).

    Which means that monthly jobs gains are likely to slow – a lot – in the coming few months. By Election Day this autumn the economy is almost certainly not going to look nearly as rosy as it did at the beginning of this year.

  18. 18.

    Soprano2

    @SFAW: Yeah, whatever happened to “I don’t Co-Parent With the Government”? It’s just like abortion – personal choice and less regulation is important – except when it comes to the things the right-wingers don’t like. I think they’re particularly obsessed with puberty blockers because they make it easier for trans female teens to transition to being trans women, and they don’t like that. I think it’s revealing that they don’t seem to care too much about trans men – it’s all about trans women for them. Why is it always about men’s insecurity about their masculinity?

  19. 19.

    Yarrow

    I saw on the crawl on the TV this morning that Russia has been banned from the Paralympics.

  20. 20.

    Soprano2

    @New Deal democrat: Why do you think the initial jobs reports have been so off for the past year? It’s insane how badly they miss, I don’t remember it being that bad before Covid.

  23. 23.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Ken:

    I’d like to think that even the most moronic of wingnut judges that sit on those dockets now understand that mere conclusions don’t count, but as you say, Texas.

  24. 24.

    Betty Cracker

    @Jeffro: Politico published an interview with Manchin yesterday. Here are the first two lines of the article:

    Joe Manchin is once again setting the agenda for Democrats and says he’s willing to make a deal. They’re listening — cautiously.

    I didn’t read any further because those two lines presented me with two options: walk into the sea or stop paying attention to that shit. For now, I’m choosing the latter! ;-)

  26. 26.

    Ken

    @Yarrow: I thought they already were. Or was it only the regular Olympics where the IOC was wink-wink-nudge-nudging with “Russia is banned, but Russian athletes can participate under the Olympic flag.”

    (BTW congratulate me, I’ve managed to switch to a zero-carb diet by banning rice and pasta, although they are allowed on my plate as vegetables.)

  27. 27.

    Yarrow

    I see France is following Germany in seizing oligarchs’ property.

    French customs seize yacht of Igor Sechin, Rosneft boss, former KGB agent and Russian deputy prime minister, the closest fo close Putin cronies pic.twitter.com/XQgx6sG05W
    — Pierre Briançon (@pierrebri) March 3, 2022

    Meanwhile the UK is giving oligarchs 30 days to get their money out before sanctions take effect. How odd that the UK party that’s up to their eyeballs in Russian money is the same one that’s currently in charge.

  29. 29.

    Yarrow

    @Ken:  It was on the crawl so just shorthand. Russians have been competing as “Russian Olympic Committee” so I think that’s what is finally being stopped.

  30. 30.

    Steeplejack

    @narya:

    Good on you! I hope your recovery continues smoothly.

    I’m in a bit of a diminuendo as I prepare to go in at 11:00 to have a tooth implant installed. I have a bovine fatalism about dental work (not that I have needed much), but the firepower of the meds I’ve been prescribed gives me pause: 600mg ibuprofen and even four tablets of hydrocodone—eek! opioids! And the background of Ukraine and U.S. political news casts a background pall over my mood.

    Que será, será, I guess. I’m planning to come home and hit the rack for a siesta. Big question is when and what I will be able to eat, so I’m having a bit of breakfast now, even though I’m not very hungry.

  31. 31.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Soprano2:

    I think it’s revealing that they don’t seem to care too much about trans men – it’s all about trans women for them. Why is it always about men’s insecurity about their masculinity?

    And when it comes to homophobia, it’s always gay men that freak them out the most–lesbians are just sort of a footnote. Any time a person they perceive as a man rejects or subverts some element of what they think of as masculinity, that’s this huge violation and they imagine this person is up to no good, some kind of crime or trickery. It’s as if it’s a threat to their whole hierarchy of people and values.

  32. 32.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @OzarkHillbilly: Perhaps that is because most of those employed as storytellers or gatekeepers in film, television or the national media industry have led urban lives geographically removed

    One of my friends joined to Army to be able to get out of Oklahoma because the only job choices he had there were; work in the oil fields and be crippled by 30 or counterfeiting and be in Federal prison for life by 30.

  33. 33.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Yarrow:

    Belarus, too. This is from The Hill, filed about an hour ago:

    Russian, Belarusian athletes banned from Beijing Paralympics

    The International Paralympic Committee (IPC) reversed a prior decision and announced on Thursday that athletes from Russia and Belarus would not be permitted to compete in the Beijing 2022 Paralympic Games.

    “At the IPC we are very firm believers that sport and politics should not mix. However, by no fault of its own, the war has now come to these Games and behind the scenes, many Governments are having an influence on our cherished event,” IPC President Andrew Parsons said in a statement.

    “In order to preserve the integrity of these Games and the safety of all participants, we have decided to refuse the athlete entries from RPC and NPC Belarus.To the Para athletes from the impacted countries, we are very sorry that you are affected by the decisions your governments took last week in breaching the Olympic Truce. You are victims of your governments’ actions,” added Parsons.

  35. 35.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Yarrow: The IOC was just facing the reality that everyone else refuses to compete if Russian athletes are in. They don’t deserve any credit here.

  39. 39.

    grumbles

    Holy ever-lovin’…”Data for January was revised higher to show 509,000 jobs were added instead of 301,000 lost as initially reported” ???

    Two questions:

    – Anyone have any idea why this has been happening so consistently?

    – If whatever system they are using is initially 66% off consistently for about a year straight, would perhaps waiting a month until it actually converges on something vaguely like reality would make sense?

  41. 41.

    Baud

    @Sanjeevs:

    Ukraine has done a fabulous job with the social media war so far, but I worry that all the Internet experts will get restless and start forming the usual cults based on how they would micromanage both Ukraine’s decisions and those of NATO/EU/US.

  43. 43.

    Steeplejack

    @narya:

    It’s only four tablets. My current plan is to take just one, when I get home, then try to stick with the ibuprofen after that. But point taken.

  44. 44.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Soprano2:Why is it always about men’s insecurity about their masculinity?

    These good Christians are paranoid that hot chick on their staff at work they forced have sex with them will turn out to be Trans.

  45. 45.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Sanjeevs: Not sure why they’re risking their jets when this convoy is a perfect target for some locals in the woods in the middle of the night with Molotovs.

  48. 48.

    narya

    @Steeplejack: They gave me three prescriptions: ibuprofen (625 mg), acetaminophen (I forget), and oxycodone (9 tablets). The cheapest was the oxy, at $0.99 out of pocket, and I’ve taken exactly none of them. I mean, I’m glad I had a few handy just in case, but I really would have preferred they give me 2-3 to get through the first day, with one refill for the rest if needed; as it is, I’ll be returning the whole batch to the doc (they’ll dispose of meds, apparently).

  49. 49.

    MisterDancer

    @Matt McIrvin: Any time a person they perceive as a man rejects or subverts some element of masculinity, that’s this huge violation and they imagine this person is up to no good, some kind of crime or trickery. It’s as if it’s a threat to their whole hierarchy of people and values.

    Oh. OH!

    So — I’m a basic Cis Hetero Guy, who, because of also being a Belly Dancer, got a front-row seat to waves of homophobia for decades. Including travelling into the Rural American South for events, spending a lot of time in my 20s and 30s as both a dancer and as a Muslim persona on weekends for medieval re-creation society (think Renn Faire, but non-profit).

    It’s both better than you’d expect — I never was violently accosted in _this work_ — and worse. I pushed so many people’s buttons! I was once told to just not go to medieval events in a massive chunk of North Carolina, in fact! It seems that the “weird black kid” was “supposed” to be Gay, but kept dating (white) Women at these events, and that Wasn’t Right on many, many levels…

    It’s ugly and brutal, the assumptions your quote I’m pulling point out. Even for my long-standing friends, people I’ve known for decades, they have real trouble understanding why I’m so conformable with many aspects of modern society they have been trained to see as horrific. They thought my Belly Dancing was “just MisterDancer’s weird thing,” and don’t have the tools to make the connections to how that expereince helped shape me, overall.

    So I kind of see where people who haven’t ever met anyone like me, can end up into the ossified humans we end up having to push against. Hell, I lost a mentor to me, someone who set me right in a lot of my early fumblings, to post-9//11 Islamphobia. I think — and might write on this — we really underestimate how much of the current strain of Conservatism was launched via the White Supremacists seeing how easy it was to manipulate voters thru abusing the stereotypes that all Muslims are about to bomb innocent Americans. I really think that was the signpost that took them out of the very real doldrums that was a surprising result of the 2000 Presidential race (anyone remember that 50/50 Senate, and how Sen. Jeffords’ defection to the Democrats made it so? There was a real period where, even though they’d captured the White House, things were not looking good for the GOP…then 9/11 happened.)

    Anyway! I digress!

    A lot of what I hope to talk about here, in between crisis points, is how being Intersectional — really understanding all that “axis of oppression” stuff that gets talked about — can really matter. It took a lot of work, including  listening to activists of many stripes — sometimes after I’d fucked up! — for me to get my head straight on a lot of this, and to get on a path to being fundamentally happy. And how a lack of that is a major part of why Conservatives are like they are; they are trained to never look inward, to always project every bit of negative emotion onto The Other, and to even reject actual happiness if it doesn’t fit very narrow parameters.

    So yeah. Thanks for that comment, I’ve been meaning to say some of this for a while.

    (PS I wanted to say I’m pretty damn sure a huge part of why I wasn’t ever violently attacked as a dancer/”actor” is because I’m TALL. Add to that learning, subconsiouly(sp), esp. from actual violent incidents as a Teen how to “Clark Kent” my posture and presentation, and I could get away with a lot others cannot. It’s part of why fighting for a better world matters so damn much!)

  50. 50.

    Auntie Anne

    @Steeplejack: I’ve had three implants done.  The opioids are good for the day of once the novocaine/anesthesia wears off (dental chicken here, so I get the full anesthesia), but those 600 mg ibuprofen are really what you want/need for pain relief.  There’s some lingering discomfort for about 2-3 days they will address.  I always took one opioid and then relied on the ibuprofen.

  52. 52.

    Michael Cain

    A 200,000 error on the first “guess” at jobs added/lost is not particularly out of line.  It’s always been bad, both up and down, because of the way they get the number.  Media ought not be allowed to even publish it, or at least be required to characterize it as likely to be inaccurate.

  53. 53.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Steeplejack:

    I got my post for an implant in December (it did great), and go for the fitting on 3/18.  I guess they install that a couple of weeks later.

    On another front, a dear friend of 50 years had been in complete remission on his kidney cancer for the past 12 years, and now it’s back on his remaining kidney, having spread to the liver and lymph nodes, and is classed as stage 4. He got he scan on a whim and was feeling no illness at the time – the results came in the same week he was burying his mother.

    They’re telling him that it’s slow, and are starting immunotherapy this week, which sounds worse than chemo, with the list of side effects.  I did tell him to overcome his principles about painkillers (he’s getting his 15 year coin this year), and told him that if he goes dirty he can clean up again.  His attitude on that was incredibly healthy, I thought – he’ll stay within prescription bounds.

  54. 54.

    catclub

    @Soprano2: ​
      It was the ADP estimate that was wrong by 800k. The labor department estimate was ok.

    Given total employment is ~60M, even 800k is close to noise level.

  55. 55.

    narya

    @Gin & Tonic: Yeah, since it was a hysterectomy, they REALLY don’t want any kind of . . . straining on the abdomen. I’m getting some fabulous bruises, though! I won’t be able to truly see them until the purple surgical glue comes off.

  56. 56.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @catclub:  It was the ADP estimate that was wrong by 800k. The labor department estimate was ok.

    ADP, that explains it. lol  Thanks to ADP weirdness I have two W-2 forms to file this year.

  57. 57.

    Hoodie

    @Gin & Tonic: Must feel pretty confident that Russian air cover and anti-aircraft capability is weak or nonexistent, so better to attack from the air than exposing ground forces to casualties (also makes you wonder if they’re getting battlefield intelligence from US and EU).  I keep wondering whether the Russians are this inept, or are  they deliberately holding back  from using more advanced capabilities.  The use of shelling and thermobarics seems pretty desperate.

  59. 59.

    catclub

    @narya: They gave me three prescriptions: ibuprofen (625 mg), acetaminophen (I forget), and oxycodone (9 tablets).

     

    when I broke my collarbone, the motto at the end of the day was I like Vike. I think I took them for a week or so. Vicodin.

  60. 60.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Gin & Tonic:

    My right leg quad repair was the same way. I ended up drinking a cup of Smooth Move which led to me actually wanting to be dead, and soaking myself in sweat.

    Operation was on a Wednesday, and I stayed well ahead of the pain, quit cold turkey after taking the last pills the following Sunday. Had only minor withdrawals (shakes, mild sweating, anxiety) and was able to easily control with ibuprofen after.

  63. 63.

    narya

    @MisterDancer: OMG I love this comment so much. Thank you for sharing. Intersectionality is awesome–even when things bump up against each other in non-linear and not-easily-reconciled ways; it reminds me ALL the time to listen, to hear, and to find a way to move forward to some kind of common good. That, in fact, is what I find so disturbing about the RWNJ narratives–many are simply not interested in a point of view or way of life that deviates from THEIR idea of normal. But I love the variety; thanks for sharing yours!

  65. 65.

    Geminid

    @Soprano2: There might not be a lot of people in the area near this convoy. I read that marshes line some stretches of the road. And the Russians manning the convoy have assault rifles. Assuming they haven’t sold the bullets, they could shoot down attackers before they got close enough to throw a gasoline bomb. Anyway, a fighter jet can do as much or more damage in twenty seconds as a lot of people with gasoline bombs can.. And it could be that irregular Ukrainian forces just haven’t gotten there yet, and will move on the convoy tonight. At least, on what’s left of it.

  66. 66.

    Ken

    @Baud: I worry that all the Internet experts will get restless and start forming the usual cults based on how they would micromanage both Ukraine’s decisions and those of NATO/EU/US.

    Fortunately Balloon Juice is not susceptible to that.

    (Reads following comments.)

    Not notably susceptible to that.

  67. 67.

    Lyrebird

    @OzarkHillbilly: Thanks for some truth, OH!

    My relatives in Springfield wait eagerly to visit KC or Manhattan at least a few times a year to recharge.  *Not* typical.

    And about this part, emphasis mine:

    I have been a journalist for 20 years and have never once, to my knowledge, worked with another journalist who had direct experience of rural life or agricultural labor, not to mention economic poverty in any setting.

    Tell me your circle of other journalists is pretty narrow without telling me, right?  Yes the “flyover country” mentality is bad, but so is the white midwestern mentality of saying “East Coast elites – they’re all rich and blind to our plight!”  and treating East Coast poverty as invisible because there are so many different colors of people in poverty here.

    I mean, I’ve never worked with TaNehisi Coates or Karine Jean-Pierre either, there’s a surprise, but I’m also not going show my ignorance all over the pages of the Guardian.  Which reminds me, I should Zelle some money over to Balloon Juice.

  69. 69.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @Geminid:

    Picture a single run by an A-10 at 50 feet. Or shit, how about an A-37 Super Tweet or an A-1 Skyraider? Bet that would surprise the shit out of them…..

  72. 72.

    Roger Moore

    @Ken:

    I suspect Texas will come up with plenty of experts who will testify “This is bad for the kids.”

    The question is whether those experts can make it through a Daubert hearing.  At least in theory, “experts” are only supposed to be allowed to testify if they can show their opinions are backed up by actual scientific evidence.

  74. 74.

    Steeplejack

    Okay, I’m out. Time to don the tactical gear (pants!) and head out. Catch you all later.

  76. 76.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    There was a problem with contracting, and they work best in daylight conditions.

    The oligarch swears that heads will roll at the production facility, as the contract specs were violated and the electronics package consists of old transistor radio parts.

  78. 78.

    Matt McIrvin

    @narya: When I had my knee surgery they gave me oxycodone to take home, and I initially tried to tough it out without it but I definitely needed one or two of those at the beginning.

    After that, I was on a combination of a little bit of aspirin (to prevent clotting), and big, big doses of ibuprofen AND acetaminophen. But they took me off the ibuprofen pretty quickly because it turns out that plus aspirin made me bruise all over to the extent that it freaked out my visiting nurse.

  80. 80.

    lowtechcyclist

    @OzarkHillbilly:  Oh brother indeed.  You missed the best part:

    A few months later, I watched the HBO show Somebody Somewhere, improbably set in Manhattan, Kansas. The second episode includes a brunch scene at The Chef involving a biracial gay couple, a transgender agriculture professor wearing purple and a farm girl who returned home….
    The exquisite accuracy of the show – shocking and even moving to a resident of a region more often misrepresented, lampooned or altogether ignored in popular culture

    She even has a book:

    When my 2018 book Heartland was published, I heard from thousands of readers who were relieved and delighted to recognize in its pages their unsexy place, or a place much like it.

    So she takes one of Kansas’ few sexy places – like you say, a university town – and says, “see, Kansas isn’t what you think.”

    I haven’t been back to Arkansas City since my aunt’s funeral in 2018, but I don’t remember any places there like the one she describes.  And sure wouldn’t expect to find any.

  83. 83.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Baud: I’m supportive of Biden, but NATO is a military alliance and should be outside the scope of a Peace Prize.

    Kissinger got one for Vietnam. ‘Nuff said.

  84. 84.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @lowtechcyclist: ​Just for the record, I read the whole damned painful thing, but only quoted the first few paragraphs as the rest was a bit repetitive.  ;-)

  85. 85.

    Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!)

    @New Deal democrat:  Well in my newspaper and on TV around here in PA, The economy is “bad” because inflation and also “Empty shelves and supply chain problems” because of one empty store shelf the reporter saw found last week after much searching.

    So it all gets blamed on President Biden and Radical-Socialist leftists in Congress.

    No mention of good jobs or high corporate profits, of course.

  86. 86.

    Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    I omitted the best part – the old transistor radio parts? They’re not even connected to anything. They’re just rattling around in the casing…..

  87. 87.

    Kent

    @OzarkHillbilly: After living for over a decade in Waco TX and teaching in the public schools there I’m pretty qualified to comment on life in red America.

    Essentially much of the US is a 60/40 nation.  Large blue metro areas (suburbs included) are generally about 60/40 Democratic.  Which means Democrats largely run the place and can win most elections, especially region-wide ones.  And the entire zeitgeist of the place tends liberal because conservatives  largely have no voice despite still being around 40% of the population.

    In much of red America outside of flea bitten rural backwaters it is about the same except that the 60/40 is reversed.  Republicans run the show, especially due to gerrymandering.  But there is still roughly 40% of the population who are ordinary Democrats and liberals and such.  Especially in any town large enough to have a university.  Waco has farmers markets with hippie organic farmers, quirky used bookstores, cafes with fair-trade Guatemalan coffee, environmental activists, civil rights activists, LGBT activists, arts fairs in the streets, etc. etc. just like the most liberal northern city.  They were just in the minority and had zero representation in local government.  You can live there just fine.  But it just wears on you that the whole place is run by MAGA dipshits who are constantly pushing things in the wrong direction in a bazillion different ways.  The lack of sidewalks and bike routes was frankly my biggest frustration among many.

    Every city I have been to in “red America” is essentially the same, although some less so than others.  And much of rural America is shitty no matter how red or blue the state.  Some of the most racist MAGA backwaters you can ever find are right here in the Pacific Northwest.

  88. 88.

    Matt McIrvin

    @MisterDancer: I am also a mostly-cis, mostly-hetero guy but I’ve always presented as this asexual weirdo–I’m not actually ace, just a guy with a lot of hangups, but damn if I don’t sympathize a lot with people on that spectrum. Straight guys do a lot of this sort of performative “no homo” lusting after women that is intended for an audience of other men, and my discomfort with participating in that just freaks a lot of people out. It’s all of a piece.

  89. 89.

    Gin & Tonic

    @OzarkHillbilly: From everything I’ve read, they’re not very good. Thing is, you get not that far out from any of the major cities, and Ukraine is *rural.* I mean horse-drawn carts on the roads rural. The Russians coming in from Murmansk or wherever don’t know the area. The people who grew up there know every marsh, every forest, every path.

  90. 90.

    danielx

    @Steeplejack:

    Had four implants so far – Jeebus help me they’re expensive, but the first couple were in lieu of having a four tooth bridge, which wasn’t going to work. I went for pre-op Halcyon each time – take one an hour before procedure and you are more or less out while it’s going on. You’re vaguely aware that there are unpleasant things going on, but not awake enough to fuss about it. You do need somebody to drive you to and from appointment. However, that likely won’t help you at this point. Take the drugs as needed, it only hurts for a day or two – unless you need a bone graft (shudder) in which case it hurts longer.

    Of course, getting the crown put on is a treat too. I recall seeing a device on the dentist’s instrument tray thingy and saying “is that a freaking torque wrench?” Didn’t know they made them that small.

  92. 92.

    Kent

    @Gin & Tonic:@OzarkHillbilly: From everything I’ve read, they’re not very good. Thing is, you get not that far out from any of the major cities, and Ukraine is *rural.* I mean horse-drawn carts on the roads rural. The Russians coming in from Murmansk or wherever don’t know the area. The people who grew up there know every marsh, every forest, every path.

    And there are a LOT of marshes and swamps that will soon turn to mud preventing much in the way of mechanized travel off the paved roads which are few.

  93. 93.

    Matt McIrvin

    @OzarkHillbilly: I know someone who lives in Manhattan, KS. She describes her neighborhood as full of the most irritating Trumpy types you can imagine–really not defying any of those stereotypes at all.

  94. 94.

    Lyrebird

    @Soprano2: Thanks!  I think Springfield is a great place to hang out, but yeah, it’s not KC.

    Through my relatives I know really super and open minded people more like Ozark in more remote parts, where Springfield is seen as the Big City, so maybe I am mad at that writer bc she has some good points in there that imho she ruined with that broad brush.

    I am not as mad at her as I am mad at whoever came up with that headline about Dems being “toxic” in rural PA without placing any of the blame on the wannabe fascist Rs making it that way.

  95. 95.

    Roger Moore

    @Hoodie:

    I keep wondering whether the Russians are this inept, or are they deliberately holding back from using more advanced capabilities. The use of shelling and thermobarics seems pretty desperate.

    The consensus of expert opinion seems to be that they have some more advanced capabilities, but they have few enough that they have to ration them.  That’s also a place the sanctions are likely to bite; they may not be able to replace the smart munitions they use without foreign supplies that are now denied to them.  The net result is that they’re going to be super careful in how they use their advanced capabilities and use dumb munitions whenever they possibly can.

  96. 96.

    Dee Lurker

    Posting my .02 on the invasion of Ukraine.

    I was just a non-com, but my area of military expertise was MAAWS: Money As A Weapons System. I think the stranded convoy is a symptom of an overall logistic dysfunction. The sanctions are going to cripple the supply lines which lead to a temporary increase in indiscriminate bombing. Even that will begin to experience an accordion effect of tempo because of two factors:

    1. Quartermastering: the cost of feeding, housing, and paying soldiers will become untenable. They will begin to go without pay. This will weaken morale even more than its already dismal state. The Russian military will have no choice but to use the least expensive means of conducting the invasion: artillery.
    2. Munitions transportation: while Russia has a fuel advantage, the cost of maintenance for their vehicles will skyrocket if they keep up their pace. Manpower will become a factor here as well.

    Russia will likely try to play a diplomatic game of cat and mouse. When they have to slow down their tempo, they will dangle a cease fire, which will buy them time to temporarily get their supply line in order. I think this is why the war is estimated to last at least a decade. This will take an excruciatingly long time to wind down because of this push/pull dynamic disguised as diplomacy. The threat of nuclear exchange is what Russia hopes will prolong this enough for them to achieve some sort of decisive victory. War engaged on hope is an exercise in futility.

    There are some potential areas for hope. First, Europe and the US can recover from this two decades long Russian destabilization campaign. The sudden change in tune from right wing sources indicates, to me at least, that the dark money has dried up… potentially for good. Second, these diplomatic lulls are opportunities for NATO and the UN to push for humanitarian and military assistance. Finally, war can’t really be conducted without the approval of Russian citizens. No amount of martial law is going to improve anyone’s disposition. No amount of propaganda is going to convince someone their stomach is full.

    My gut tells me something is going to give and soon. When Russia lost its initiative and displayed a stunning lack of field intelligence, it showed (once again, to me) that something huge was bungled. They likely fell prey to the kind of stove-piping that we did in the Iraq debacle. Leaving Afghanistan has also helped on an incalculable level to free up resources for this kind of engagement.

  97. 97.

    Miss Bianca

    @catclub: Whereas I tend to like all opiates *except* Vicodin. I was given Vicodin after one of my numerous operations post-bike accident and started hallucinating that the walls and ceiling were closing in on me and going to crush me. Was pinned to the bed for hours afraid to move. After that, man…no more Vicodin. I’ve told the doctors I’m allergic to it

    ETA: Bodies are weird things.

  98. 98.

    Kent

    @Roger Moore:The consensus of expert opinion seems to be that they have some more advanced capabilities, but they have few enough that they have to ration them.  That’s also a place the sanctions are likely to bite; they may not be able to replace the smart munitions they use without foreign supplies that are now denied to them.  The net result is that they’re going to be super careful in how they use their advanced capabilities and use dumb munitions whenever they possibly can.

    Plus, Ukraine is a massive country and indiscriminate bombing serves no military purpose while making your subsequent mission to occupy and govern far more difficult.  They aren’t all stupid.  I expect Russian military leaders face much of the same problems that the US faced in Iraq in not knowing what to fire at.  Especially when they are firing from long distance.

  99. 99.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Miss Bianca: My dentist gave me Vicodin after one of my (many) root canals, which also happened to be the most painful. I remember thinking, yeah, I can see chasing this high (I didn’t). He doesn’t prescribe Vicodin anymore.

  100. 100.

    Kent

    @Lyrebird:I have been a journalist for 20 years and have never once, to my knowledge, worked with another journalist who had direct experience of rural life or agricultural labor, not to mention economic poverty in any setting.

    This is fucking egregious.  I know plenty of journalists.  Most of them are pretty damn low paid and experience more personal poverty trying to make a living than even middle class folks like public school teachers.

  101. 101.

    Ken

    @Lyrebird: in more remote parts, where Springfield is seen as the Big City

    I have Missouri relatives who think of Sullivan as the big city.

    (To get to their place, head south-southeast from Sullivan into the Mark Twain National Forest until the paved roads stop. Turn left and proceed 15 miles, then turn right and you’re there.)

  103. 103.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kent: I’ve been running around the hills and hollers all my life and living here for the past 20 years. This is the beating heart of trumpistan. I wouldn’t put any percentages to it, but there are a few liberals out here. The thing is most of them keep their heads down and certainly don’t advertise their existence. Over the years I have had a number of people walk up to me in the parking lot or turn in a store and say very quietly, “Thank You.” because I wear my liberal heart on my sleeve and all over my truck. One guy at a gas station told me I was very brave just because I had an Obama sticker on my truck.

    It’s funny because I’ve never had an argument or even words over it and only been hate honked once.

  104. 104.

    RaflW

    The Alabama lege is well on their way to passing a law very similar to what Texas did by A.G. fiat. It’s gonna be harder for the Biden DoJ to protect the kids and families in AL, I think, because unlike TX, it won’t just be based on a (corrupt, angry, evil) A.G.s opinion.

    Trans rights are the top of the GOP spear of division and hatred. They won’t stop there. I hope Madam VP engages this topic in AL. I was certainly glad the Admin hit back at Texas.

  105. 105.

    Comrade Bukharin

    Read Tom Nichols in the Atlantic. ‘Stay calm and don’t advocate for a war with Russia’.

  106. 106.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Kent:

    Mud, you say?

    This is a thread that will explain the implied poor Russian Army truck maintenance practices based on this photo of a Pantsir-S1 wheeled gun-missile system’s right rear pair of tires below & the operational implications during the Ukrainian mud season.?

    1/ pic.twitter.com/LmxW43v6gy
    — Trent Telenko (@TrentTelenko) March 2, 2022

  107. 107.

    Wapiti

    @Steeplejack: I had a implant installed a couple years back. I got by on the 600mg ibuprofen. But everyone is different and my dentist gave me the same scripts as yours.

    I had some opioid after a hernia operation and the out-of-body-bed-spins… one pill was enough. I hope I never have so much pain that I need those.

  108. 108.

    narya

    @Miss Bianca: @Jim, Foolish Literalist: For better or worse, my first experience w/ opioids taught me that (a) they nauseate me and (b) they don’t actually make the pain go away, they merely make me not care that I’m in pain. I am fortunate in not needing them to function, so NO judgment (or prescriptions for other people’s actions) on my part, but those negatives are enough for my brain to be all “Nah” about them for most things. I’m glad they exist, and I’m glad I don’t need them now.

  109. 109.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Kent: Probably also being screamed at by their superiors for positive metrics to show Putin.  Number of shells fired at random parking lots is as an easy way to do that. (“We are confident, Mr Putin, the enemy will soon be critically short of Ladas!”)

  110. 110.

    Roger Moore

    @Kent:

    The big problem for the Russians is that they’re faced with nothing but unappealing options.  They’re facing a military that’s dug into cities, which are hell to attack.  They don’t have enough smart bombs to go after the whole Ukrainian military with them.  Attacking with dumb munitions- bombs and artillery- will destroy the cities they’re hoping to capture, kill lots of the civilians, make them look bad in front of the world, and may not even work.  Sending in the infantry will lead to very high casualties because most of their infantry consists of badly trained conscripts.  A siege will take forever and lead to high civilian casualties.

    I think they really planned on taking Kyiv with their airborne attack on the first day and assassinating Zelinskyy and most of the other Ukrainian leaders.  Once those things failed, they’re in a really tough spot.  They can probably take Kyiv, but only at very high cost in troops and public opinion.

  111. 111.

    RaflW

    @Dee Lurker: “Leaving Afghanistan has also helped on an incalculable level to free up resources for this kind of engagement.” I hadn’t really thought about this point, but yes certainly, the ability of our intelligence services to focus, our DoD personnel to be engaged in one primary fight, that’s huge.

  112. 112.

    evodevo

    @OzarkHillbilly: Yeah…any more than Lexington KY is typical of the 90% of the state that is redneck MAGAt Republican…Lex in the ’70’s was a mini version of SF…the rest of the state you took your life in your hands venturing out with long hair and sandals…Oh, and if you want a literate tale of those times, read Ed McClanahan’s seminal short story of it – I can’t find a link however

  113. 113.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Miss Bianca: Bodies are weird things.

    Yep, vicodin works great for me, just enough to take the edge off w/o any side effects. Percocets make me puke my guts out.

  114. 114.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Ken: (To get to their place, head south-southeast from Sullivan into the Mark Twain National Forest until the paved roads stop. Turn left and proceed 15 miles, then turn right and you’re there.)

    So, in my neighborhood. I’ll wave when I drive by their mailbox.

  115. 115.

    narya

    @OzarkHillbilly: Maybe a nearly dead thread, but I want to thank you for your contributions, both here and in meatspace. I’d make dinner for you and yours if I could–a big ol’ feast, with lots of beverages and storytelling.

  116. 116.

    Another Scott

    @Gin & Tonic: +1

    Russia should not have been able to compete in Beijing.  Allowing a country to cheat destroys competition and is dangerous to athletes.  Kick them out.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  117. 117.

    eclare

    @narya:  I am that way too, all of those pills do a number on my stomach.  I once vomited so violently that I blew a blood vessel in my eye.

    So, no pills.  Before my last dental surgery I had some other kind of pill.  But it has been a while, and I can’t remember what it was.

  118. 118.

    RaflW

    @MisterDancer: a lack of that is a major part of why Conservatives are like they are; they are trained to never look inward, to always project every bit of negative emotion onto The Other, and to even reject actual happiness if it doesn’t fit very narrow parameters.

    I was just yesterday referring to Ben Shapiro as a joyless stub.
    It came up because it was obvious that he didn’t listen to or even remotely grasp the band Nirvana, despite their having been one of the biggest phenomena of modern rock music.

    And as I though about it, I suspected that he, like many ‘young conservatives’ likely consumes next to no culture. Has not outlets for nor sources of happiness or joy. I don’t pity him, because he’s making a fucking choice. But Hubert Humphrey’s concept of a “happy warrior” would utterly baffle most Cons.

  119. 119.

    Soprano2

    @Lyrebird: Oh yeah, my reaction was that there was a story there and they completely missed it. They seem to think it is A-OK for conservatives to terrorize liberals who live in rural areas, and to then blame that on the liberals……

    I would say that Springfield is close to that 60-40 split as far as conservative/liberal.

  120. 120.

    RaflW

    @Another Scott: I’m still aghast at the g.d. doping scandal in figure skating. The system is so sleazy.

    And then to see (unconfirmed?) reports that China asked Russia to delay invading till after the big but kinda empty-sad party in Beijing? Damn.

  121. 121.

    New Deal democrat

    @Soprano2:

    The scale of the job losses from COVID in the first several months (over 20 million!) and subsequent gains were of a scale never before seen in 80 years of reports. Even the post WW2 demobilization was only about 1/3rd of the scale of the COVID losses.

    So it threw the seasonal adjustments way off. Also, because the DOL only takes a sample of employers, and doesn’t even report all of those until the final revision two months later. So if an employer who had big gains or losses gets missed or is late reporting, the number can be way off. Again, because the scale of losses and rebound have never been seen before in 80 years, the % misses have been outsized.

    Hope that helps.

  123. 123.

    catclub

    @Dee Lurker: Leaving Afghanistan has also helped on an incalculable level to free up resources for this kind of engagement.

     

    Exactly. Pulling OUT of vietnam made  our military more effective in thee rest of the world. Opposite of domino theory.

  124. 124.

    Ken

    @OzarkHillbilly: I’ll wave when I drive by their mailbox.

    Well, that’s an interesting point. The USPS provides them daily mail service like the rest of us, and despite my crack about the paved roads ending the state and county keep up the roads that go to their place, and the school district sends a bus for their kids, and the county electric company maintains their power lines. I imagine on a per-capita basis it costs at least three times as much to provide these, than it does for people in towns and cities. Not that they don’t still complain about their taxes and government in general, of course.

  128. 128.

    Roger Moore

    @Another Scott:

    I’m at least a little bit sympathetic to the IOC.  They don’t want to punish athletes for the misdeeds of their country’s government.  It would have been unfair to throw US athletes out of the Olympics because we invaded Iraq.

    The cheating angle at Sochi was just a completely different thing, though.  When a whole country’s athletic infrastructure is permeated with cheating, it’s not possible to take anything done by those athletes at face value.  It might have been sensible to allow athletes were were Russian citizens to continue to compete if they could show they were training completely independently of their government (e.g. in another country under the same coach as that country’s athletes), but just rebranding the same cheating structure under a different name is ridiculous.  I wonder how much the Russians had to spend in bribes to get that to happen.

  130. 130.

    Roger Moore

    @RaflW:

    Just because somebody doesn’t understand the meaning of art doesn’t mean they don’t enjoy it.  Paul Ryan notoriously enjoyed the music of Rage Against the Machine while completely missing that he was part of the machine they were raging against.  It’s incredibly easy to do that kind of thing: listen to the music while ignoring the meaning of the lyrics.

  132. 132.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Roger Moore:

    Here’s a good thread in support of your conjecture that they expected to take Kyiv with airborne on Day 1:

    How is the war in Ukraine going? Today they confirmed the death of Russian General Major Suhovetsky. He’s unsurprisingly a paratrooper. So let’s discuss the role of paratroopers in Russian military doctrine. That’ll shed a light on the course of this war and why Russia lost it? pic.twitter.com/aIWsikgFnO
    — Kamil Galeev (@kamilkazani) March 3, 2022

  133. 133.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Miss Bianca: I got some Vicodin after a root canal and I tried taking one. It made the pain go away, but it also made me feel so unpleasantly weird that I would rather endure more pain than feel that again. I can’t even fully describe what it was. Not exactly nausea, just this weird sludge enveloping my brain and distorting feelings. I didn’t like it.

    Oxycodone was much cleaner–it just made the pain go away and I suspect it also shut up the worrying procedure in my brain. I could definitely see getting addicted to that and I was consequently very wary of it for that reason.

  134. 134.

    Roger Moore

    @Ken:

    It’s interesting where USPS does and doesn’t deliver mail.  I have friends who live in Estes Park, CO, which is a decent-sized town of about 6,000 people.  Yet somehow they don’t get mail delivery to their home; they have a PO box instead.

  135. 135.

    evodevo

    @Ken: And bitch like hell when the mail isn’t on time to suit them LOL (rural mail carrier for 23 years here)

  136. 136.

    Kent

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    @Kent: I’ve been running around the hills and hollers all my life and living here for the past 20 years. This is the beating heart of trumpistan. I wouldn’t put any percentages to it, but there are a few liberals out here. The thing is most of them keep their heads down and certainly don’t advertise their existence. Over the years I have had a number of people walk up to me in the parking lot or turn in a store and say very quietly, “Thank You.” because I wear my liberal heart on my sleeve and all over my truck. One guy at a gas station told me I was very brave just because I had an Obama sticker on my truck.

    It’s funny because I’ve never had an argument or even words over it and only been hate honked once.

    Well yes, but that’s because it sounds like you live in a very rural area.  There are parts of rural OR and CA that are just as Trumpy.  But I expect you will find more diversity in the larger cities even in your state.  Rural Arkansas is pretty Trumpy too.  Lord knows I’ve spent some time there. But places like Fayetteville are reasonably OK.

  137. 137.

    Kent

    @Roger Moore:It’s interesting where USPS does and doesn’t deliver mail.  I have friends who live in Estes Park, CO, which is a decent-sized town of about 6,000 people.  Yet somehow they don’t get mail delivery to their home; they have a PO box instead.

    My daughter is living and working in Jackson WY this ski season.  Same thing. I can’t send her anything via mail.  Has to be UPS or FedEx.  She needs to get a PO Box if she wants mail and apparently there are no free ones at the Post Office.  Sheesh.

  139. 139.

    Jager

    @Kent: 
    I went to high school in North Dakota, in the class ahead of me, one guy became an award-winning writer and editor for the LA Times and a woman in that class became a TV news anchor in Boston and New York. A few years ahead of me was a guy, who got his start in local TV and finished his career as a long-time anchor in San Francisco. I slipped over the wire and ran radio stations in Boston and LA. The writer of the article must have a damn small circle of friends in the business to never have met anyone with “Heartland” experience.

  141. 141.

    Repatriated

    @grumbles:

    Two questions:

    – Anyone have any idea why this has been happening so consistently?

    – If whatever system they are using is initially 66% off consistently for about a year straight, would perhaps waiting a month until it actually converges on something vaguely like reality would make sense?

    Dead thread, and I haven’t reached the end yet so this might be redundant, but…

    They do the initial estimate on incomplete data, since timeliness is important. They extrapolate from what they have, and adjust for historic trends.

    The problem is that their historic trends include the last couole of years while covid was trashing the economy, so their estimates are biased for extreme pessimism.

    The reverse happened in the ’08 crash — severely underestimated because they were projecting using assumptions from the housing boom years.

  142. 142.

    Ancient Atheist

    @Roger Moore: One thought. I read that four or five years ago Russia went to an all-volunteer military. That’s not long enough to train mission ready ground units. Also, Putin has initiated war with his least experienced troops. The heavy hitters are in rear positions so far. In Europe training exercises for a ground war usually end with tactical nuclear weapons being deployed by both sides. Russia has used tactical nuclear devices during training around the Black Sea.

     

     

    @Roger Moore:

  143. 143.

    Repatriated

    @Dee Lurker:

    Leaving Afghanistan has also helped on an incalculable level to free up resources for this kind of engagement.

    Another thing about Afghanistan: our logistics that didn’t go through Pakistan went through Russia and a few of their client ‘Stans.

    The threat of cutting those lines — not even including active support for our adversaries there — would have profoundly limited our ability to act against Russia now.

  144. 144.

    StringOnAStick

    @Wapiti: When I had each knee replaced, I was given the narcotic that is in Vicodin but without the usual additional Tylenol in the pill.  That was because they realized that you will take enough that you could kill your liver with the excess Tylenol.  The first week has a combo of pain pills as needed, a mix of Tylenol and drugs to stop blood clots, all on a complex enough schedule that I programmed them into my phone.  That first week was the worst pain ever, the second a bit better and then it got better from there.  The hardest thing I’ve done in years was going back to get the other knee replaced 16 weeks later because I knew just exactly how awful it was going to be.  Narcotics have their place.

    I’m glad I did it though.  I am skiing a lot, mountain biking, hiking, rock climbing.  I got my life back after arthritis pain took away all the fun in life.

  146. 146.

    StringOnAStick

    @Matt McIrvin: Yeah, definitely a “process”!  It’s taken almost a full 2 years to get fully back to where I was before arthritis made all my athletic pursuits an adventure in pain management.

  147. 147.

    J R in WV

    @narya: ​
     

    So glad for your optimistic and positive pot-op report~!!~

    Anything to distract from the news out of Russia and Ukraine, where all the news is bad. Take care, do what the Docs tell you, keep in touch!

  148. 148.

    Steeplejack

    For the sake of closure, I will report on this dead thread that my procedure went fine and so far I have experienced almost no discomfort. I took a second 600mg ibuprofen about 2:00 and slept for almost three hours. Soft food only for the next three to five days, no spicy or hot (temperature) food. I have a follow-up appointment in two weeks. ?

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