Doocy asked one of the most disgusting questions ever and Karine made him pay for it.
— Scott Dworkin (@funder) June 4, 2022
I don’t know if Doocy seriously underestimated the new WH press secretary, or if he misses getting verbally slapped around that much. Maybe both!
Missouri expat, now living in Singapore:
Senators wrangling over a measure to reduce gun violence are considering ways to improve school safety, expand background checks and 'red flag' laws to allow police to seize guns from people deemed dangerous https://t.co/nhI6d1GUjt pic.twitter.com/aXWoMvPfly
— Reuters (@Reuters) June 5, 2022
======
In other news:
The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection will begin public hearings this week. The committee plans to present unseen documents and provide new witness testimony about the Capitol attack. @GeoffRBennett talks to @hugolowell to learn more. pic.twitter.com/frw2PjQ4G1
— PBS NewsHour (@NewsHour) June 5, 2022
debbie
I can’t think of a time Liz Cheney has lied or blatantly exaggerated as some of her co-partyists have, so I’m very much looking forward to the hearings.
Baud
I don’t know if it’ll impact the public, but I’m glad the Jan 6 committee has done the work to get the facts out there.
zhena gogolia
@debbie: Liz. Lynne is her horrible mother.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Good for Karine. I love the way she cringes at his question
I hope Raskin is right and that the roof will be blown off. My fear is that people will shrug and move on
debbie
@zhena gogolia:
Thanks, fixed. I need to finish my coffee before doing anything else.
germy shoemangler
Jamie Gorelick, a member of the 9/11 commission, said she met with the committee at the outset of the investigation and provided three central recommendations. In a meeting that also included Tim Roemer, another member of the 9/11 commission, Gorelick advised investigators and lawmakers to write the report in an accessible way; not to rush into hearings without sufficient findings; and to “build the case from the bottom up.”
Wasn’t Gorelick a lawyer for Kushner at one point?
NotMax
“Where da rock?”
Right continent, wrong latitude. Self-driving “Mayflower” makes landfall.
sdhays
@Dorothy A. Winsor: And by “people”, primarily the media because after the hearings are over no one will be “forcing” them to cover anything about it and then SQUIRREL!!1!!
Another Scott
(Repost from downstairs)
No confidence vote on BoJo expected soon.
There’s some speculation that his Tory replacement could be worse, but he needs to go for a thousand reasons.
(via gavmacn)
Cheers,
Scott.
Kay
I hope we don’t plow hundreds of millions more into “school safety”. The school safety ideas are bad and a waste of money and we’ve spent close to a billion dollars on them since 2018.
Some conservative states are re-routing money that was intended for educational expenses to school safety contractors, so directly ripping off students and forcing them to pay for this expensive, gimmicky junk.
SFAW
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Not to worry, the DoJ will be there to go after the minions.
Baud
@sdhays:
I hate to tell you this, but I bet the same is true with liberal social media. The right has always managed to sustain focus over the long term than the left.
sdhays
@NotMax: At least it’s not running down pedestrians or attempting to burn its drivers alive.
SFAW
@germy shoemangler:
Yes, and … ?
germy shoemangler
The House select committee will hold its first public hearing this week, on June 9 at 8 p.m. ET. Sources told CNN this hearing will be a broad overview of the panel’s 10-month investigation and set the stage for subsequent hearings, which are expected to cover certain topics or themes.
While the setup of the hearings has been a work in progress and evolving, sources note, the presentations will likely feature video clips from January 6, as well as some of the roughly 1,000 interviews the committee has conducted behind closed doors.
Baud
@Kay:
I agree. As a taxpayer, if we’re not going to do anything meaningful on guns, I don’t want my tax dollars wasted on cosmetic measures that only make the daily lives of kids worse.
Brachiator
In the alternate reality of the Fox News Fantasy Universe, Doocy-bag is regularly schooling the obviously black press secretary.
Quick OT
Big Apple product announcements coming…No, wait..
From the Guardian and elsewhere
The fun begins from 6 pm to 8 pm UK time.
Lacuna Synecdoche
Anne Laurie @ Top:
The first time I skimmed that skimmed, I scanned the last clause as:
Should we call that: A Freudian Skim?
NotMax
‘@Kay
Harden laws, not schools.
germy shoemangler
@SFAW:
that’s my question. Is there any significance to Kushner’s lawyer (or ex-lawyer) advising the committee?
Or is it just an example of the old Sid Perelman quote: “There are no strangers in the aristocracy of success.” ?
SFAW
@Another Scott:
Tony Jay might disagree with you.
But only with regard to the number.
Lapassionara
Today is a DDay anniversary. I think the 78th. For some reason, I find the history of DDay engrossing and profoundly moving. The planning for it was remarkably detailed, and even then, many of the components of the invasion went wrong. That we prevailed was not foreordained, as it may appear in hindsight. And the anniversary is even more significant to me, given that many in the US are openly cheering for fascism.
Frank Wilhoit
@germy shoemangler: “…to write the report in an accessible way; not to rush into hearings without sufficient findings; and to ‘build the case from the bottom up.'”
Yes, Yes, and No. There is no time for #3. It has to be presented like you would write an executive summary: you have 15-20 seconds to grab and hold their attention. Start with the big headlines and then unpack them, two layers deep. The rest is “details on request” (or, in this case, “in report”).
SFAW
@germy shoemangler:
Jamie Gorelick served in the Clinton administration, I believe the DoJ. Among her CV (so to speak): she was a target of the RWMFs for 9/11. They tried to pin the blame on her for the various intelligence agencies not talking to each other. It was a bullshit “theory,” but it helped distract from looking at Condoleezza Rice, who, as National Security Advisor, actually did have the responsibility for getting the agencies to coordinate.
germy shoemangler
@Frank Wilhoit:
The impression I get is that the DOJ has been building cases from the bottom up, but that the Jan. 6 committee will be talking about everyone, top and bottom.
Kay
@Baud:
It’s particularly offensive because it comes along with bleating about the “mental health” of students.
Stop turning their schools into detention centers. Put that money into making them nice, productive, positive spaces. They’ll be happier. How many parks and swimming pools and ball fields could you build with a billion dollars? How much could you plow into music programs or field trips or summer camp tuition?
Frank Wilhoit
@Another Scott: By definition, the next Tory leader will not have a cult of personality, which will make it possible to focus on the party instead of the person of the leader. My USD0.05 is on Jacob Rees-Mogg (after a large number of ballots, because there will be a large number of entrants, including some that only the most addicted Parliamentary observers have ever heard of. [The wonderfully-named] Sir Bill Cash, anyone?)
germy shoemangler
@SFAW:
Gorelick, a former head of the D.C. Bar, said she doesn’t “put my clients through a political litmus test.” Indeed, people and businesses in serious trouble gravitate to her like flies to a light bulb. BP hired her after the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster. She represented the Clinton Foundation against conservative gadfly Larry Klayman. The student loan industry brought her in to lobby against the Obama administration’s drive to overhaul the business.
Frank Wilhoit
@germy shoemangler: That doesn’t sound like Perelman. Source?
germy shoemangler
@Frank Wilhoit:
I came up with the quote from memory. I remember it from one of his later books. Here’s the actual quote:
‘in the aristocracy of success there are no strangers’
Google SJ Perelman and that quote.
Geminid
@Brachiator: Bookmakers have Jeremy Hunt as the favorite to succeed Johnson. On the news from the 1922 Commitee Hunt jumped right in with a tweet criticizing Johnson’s leadership. Another potential PM, Foreign Minister Liz Truss, tweeted:
From Politico Europe via this morning’s Politico Playbook.
Brachiator
@Another Scott:
That ain’t speculation. That is pretty much straight up fact. BoJo himself purged a number of Conservative MPs who might have had positive qualities. He stocked his cabinet with dolls who would never challenge him.
Still, the last thing I heard from the stupidly biased British media was that Boris had largely succeeded in getting a key number of Tories to withdraw their letters. Oops. They got that wrong and then got distracted by the Jubilee celebration.
Right now, there is a fair amount of shock and confusion among British pundits. The conventional wisdom was that hardliners were not happy with Boris, but could not find anyone within their ranks who could disguise their utter contempt for the common man as well as Boris did. Well, most of the time.
If BoJo survives the NoCo vote, he can hang around another year and do some real damage to the economy.
There are some local elections in two areas, which the Tories might lose, which makes it more curious that this possible action was not delayed.
It will be interesting to see what Tony Jay has to say about this.
Percysowner
Well, I do think Doocy underestimates Karine Jean-Pierre for the most obvious reason. I also have to wonder about what his kinks are, because he just keeps coming back to be humiliated and PWNd.
NotMax
‘@Lapassionara
The Longest Day may be more cinematically polished, but note is made that the fine documentary D-Day at Pointe-du-Hoc is available on Prime. Includes many narrative recollections from survivors. Worth checking out.
germy shoemangler
@Percysowner:
In the conservative media universe, Biden’s press secretaries are the ones being humiliated by Doocy.
It’s the same fictional genre where Ben Shapiro demolishes everyone he debates, or Trump wipes the floor with HRC during their debates.
Conservatives see what they want to see.
Betty
@zhena gogolia: I like to remind people that Lynne is every bit as bad as Dick. She had two mentors.
kalakal
That really was a revolting display by Doocey.
I’m in two minds over Johnson and the no confidence vote. I’d like to see him trashed and watch the Tories shred each other and become electorally toxic or I’d like to see him narrowly win ( at which point May & Thatcher resigned but he won’t because he’s a git ) and watch the Tories shred each other and become electorally toxic
Ken
They must not have opted for the performance package.
Brachiator
@Geminid:
Hunt and Truss are ambitious idiots, as confirmed by their messages of support, which are really saying “We can’t wait to dump Boris and fight over his dead political corpse.” Truss supposedly has been taking glamor photos to hand out to potential supporters. And this isn’t sexist, just a measure of her narcissism.
Chancellor Richie Sunak believes he has a chance, if he can only convince potential voters that someone who was recently named as the 228th wealthiest Briton is a man of the people.
What a farce.
no comment
@Kay:
@Baud:
I saw a local TV news report about some company providing some sort of security product for local schools. (I was only half listening while cleaning the house, so I don’t remember any details.) It did occur me that the company profits from school shootings, just like the gun industry does.
There was also a report about someone acting suspiciously around a school. The person was identified as a parent testing out the school’s security.
Betty
@Percysowner: In a way he did Karine a favor by letting her give such a clear and convincing case for Biden’s address. Certainly not what he intended.
germy shoemangler
Liminal Owl
Gun sales increasing after a shooting suggests to me that far too many people have bought into the myth of the “good guy with a gun.”
Or, rather, that they have fantasies of being the bad guy with a gun, which they sublimate (at least for public consumption) into the more socially acceptable version
Also, I plan to write something (for my own blog, which I’m trying to reactivate) about the way mental illness is being targeted in the gun violence discussion. Spoiler alert: no, that’s not the answer.
Ken
I’m trying to decide if this is a politician’s way of announcing she’s stabbing Johnson in the back, and inviting her colleagues to join her.
lowtechcyclist
@sdhays:
Since this is supposed to be the first of six hearings, they won’t be able to break away from the subject for too long.
rikyrah
@Baud:
I agree. Things we suspected being validated in black and white
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
Geminid
@NotMax: Omaha Beach turned out to be the toughest of the five landing zones. At one point it was so rough that General Bradley debated whether or not to send in follow up units. But the impasse was broken midmorning by U.S. Navy destroyers that maneuvered into shallow waters a half mile offshore and blasted German positions. After that, courageous units from the 1st and 29th Infantry Divisions were able to fight their way off the beach and capture the bluffs above.
In his a message that evening, Bradley said, “God bless the U.S. Navy!”
Ken
Maybe this vote of no confidence* is a slightly-belated gift for the Queen?
* I’m trying to phrase a tabloid headline that uses “Bo Jo No Co”.
lee
That first image of a tweet (the second tweet) is jacked up. Since it is an image and not a link, you can’t embiggen the image that is actually in the tweet.
thanks,
lee
no comment
My comment disappeared. It was my first one here since the display of 365’s incompetence, so it had to be moderated. Spam filter maybe?
Edited to add: It reappeared, so never mind. Weird.
NotMax
‘@kalakal
“What a revoltin’ development this is.”
– Chester A. Riley
;)
kalakal
@Brachiator: All the wannabees are dire mediocrities. The problem for Truss & co ( other than that they are very, very stupid) is they have all the charisma of damp lint and will have a hell of a time getting the rank and file to believe that they are *The One*. Any leadership election is going be nasty, long & drawn out with multiple rounds and a real voter turn off.
Jay
@germy shoemangler:
only a matter of time until there is a Country Song about “my truck done left me”.//
Jay
RFE has a great series on corruption when Pootie Poot was St. Petersburg’s Deputy Mayor,
https://www.rferl.org/a/putin-cocaine-connection/31855099.html
debbie
@Liminal Owl:
Just think how much gas these clowns could put in their vehicles if they hadn’t paid for so many guns.
Please let us know when your blog’s up. This label of “mental illness” is really ticking me off.
Starfish
@germy shoemangler: You are right.
Jay
@debbie:
me too,
debbie
@lee:
Only so many tweets can be embedded in a thread now, but here’s the link to the tweet on Twitter.
https://twitter.com/mgerrydoyle/status/1533601346519433217?s=20&t=v6lPBD60ghUVd2hXKoBu-A
Sanjeevs
@Brachiator: I hope Johnson is gone today. He poses a real threat to peace in Northern Ireland.
Starfish
@Liminal Owl: A mass shooting is an advertising event for the gun manufacturers. I hate to think how much Daniel Defense has made off of their guns being used to kill little children, but they have probably cashed in. Everyone has been sharing their ad with a picture of a child in it. No one has cracked down on using children in advertising guns.
Brachiator
@germy shoemangler:
One of the rare times that a rhetorical reversal might be correct.
And the nerds are trying to figure out why rogue vehicles don’t obey Asimov’s law of robots. (They have mad car disease).
debbie
@Sanjeevs:
I’m listening to a discussion on the BBC how there’s no one to replace him.
Starfish
One thing that no one here has been discussing has been people really trying to grapple with the sexism and racism in journalism. Over the weekend, David Weigel retweeted some sexist nonsense, and one of his coworkers called him out on it. After that, another Washington Post reporter accused her of “scoring points” and said that he supports women in journalism, but he was trying to stand up for Weigel’s sexist garbage to which their editor told them all to settle down instead of dealing with important Washington Post reporters retweeting garbage.
Here is the thread.
Kay
The school security industry are all going to donate to Republicans because Republicans are throwing huge wads of public cash at them just like all the gun companies donate to Republicans, so the public will be paying to make things worse. We’ll just have another GOP dominated industry profiting off shootings and working to elect more Republicans. On your dime.
cmorenc
@Baud:
…in part because progressive focus is diluted over dozens of issues, each most important to one faction or another, RW focus is concentrated in only a half-dozen or so. RW sloganeering also tends to be much more potently concise, whereas progressives too often struggle to articulately frame issues in less than short-paragraph form. We have yet to come up with anything so potently pithy as “Make America Great Again” – even though the RW’s notion of what would make America great again is in large part toxic bullshit, RWers understand what feral pack of dogs being whistled is by “MAGA”.
Kay
Regulation would cost the public something in money, but nowhere near what “hardening” costs and the cost would be shifted to gun owners (like all regulation) in the form of fees and fines.
The benefit of that approach- billing gun nuts for their hobby/fashion accessory – is we don’t have a brand new industry that works to elect Republicans because Republicans are providing the public money that wholly supports the brand new industry. The only people who win with billions more in school security are bullshit “security contractors” and Republican incumbents. Everyone else loses.
debbie
@Kay:
Democrats have to be sure to point that out very loudly in every one of their speeches.
Baud
@cmorenc:
Agree. You could write a treatise talking about our problems. In the end, though, the bottom line is that we have a hard time doing what I think we need to do to be effective and successful IMHO.
Also, I would suggest the first point you made contributes to the second.
O. Felix Culpa
@Liminal Owl: @debbie:
Seconded (or thirded). My SO worked in the mental health field, and blaming “mental illness” for our nonstop mass shootings is harmful in multiple ways.
EarthWindFire
@debbie: What particularly ticks me off about the ones blaming mental illness is anyone with two brain cells to rub together knows they plan to do nothing about mental health. Even if it were the answer, they don’t care. They’re fine with this gruesome status quo.
debbie
@EarthWindFire:
It’s second to “Muslim” in scapegoating.
UncleEbeneezer
@germy shoemangler: Oh god, I just realized that as much as I’m looking forward to these hearings, the immediate whining, and second-guessing of the GarlandMustResign crowd is going to be even worse than it has already been (and it’s been very, VERY bad thus far).
The armchair
quarterbackinglawyering by people who have very little interest in how investigation/prosecution works but are 100% confident that they know what DOJ is/isn’t doing, is gonna be downright relentless.JPL
@debbie: Is that the same BBC that did not realize how unpopular he was?
hmmm
Soprano2
@Kay: They’ll do literally anything other than admit that easy access to firearms is the real problem. When a friend tells me “Laws won’t work because criminals don’t follow laws”, I a) point out that these shooters usually get the firearms they commit these awful crimes with legally, and b) they’re making an argument for repealing all laws against crime! Laws don’t actually stop crime, this is true, but saying they’re useless is an extremely dumb argument. Laws, like locks, keep honest people honest, and allow us to punish people who break them. That’s their function!
narya
@Lapassionara: It always makes me think of Yogi Berra, oddly enough. He was part of the invasion force (and maybe the only MLB player who was?).
debbie
@JPL:
They were blinded by his rascaliness, I guess. //
O. Felix Culpa
@debbie: Yes. And magically lets GQP legislators and executives off the hook because they don’t intend to do anything about either guns or mental health. Win!
NotMax
‘@Baud
Competent governmenting is hard. Obstruction and misdirection ain’t.
Q.E.D.
Baud
@Soprano2:
Besides, there are statistics that show laws do work (unless you define “work” to mean gun deaths immediately fall to zero.)
O. Felix Culpa
On another note, I was persuaded to re-up my online subscription to WaPo, so was greeted this morning by the following headlines:
A palate-cleansing decent–and true–one near the bottom:
Apart from that one, BLECH. The press really are setting the Dems up for failure, aren’t they. Hopefully we give them a November surprise.
Jinchi
The Mayflower missed it’s destination, too, so maybe the bot is performing better than expected.
Soprano2
@Starfish: That was gross. Also, Adam Davidson has been tweeting about Jeffery Epstein all weekend, which has been interesting. He says everyone around Epstein had to know what he was doing, and that we shouldn’t let any of them off the hook. I think he was compelled by Bill Gates’ current “rehabilitation tour”, which he is disgusted by.
OzarkHillbilly
@Soprano2: Laws influence the incentives behind behaviors. DWI laws incentivize driving sober. Outlawing the possession of certain weapons or limiting the capacity of a magazine would incentivize getting rid of them.
Sure, some people still drive drunk, but not as many as there would be without DWI laws. And just as surely some folks will keep their assault rifles and expanded round magazines, but how many will bring them out in public? Nobody is going to bring an AK-47 with a 100 round drum magazine to the shooting range. Not if they want to stay out of prison.
Kay
@debbie:
I think the trick is to make it to the central point of ONE higher profile Democrat and that person would have to keep hitting it. The public should resent gun nuts. They have reduced our quality of life and they refuse to cover any of the costs of their hobby/costuming/play acting. I don’t want to pay their way anymore. If they can afford 10,000 in guns they can afford a 25 fee to register the gun annually.
These school security companies are a brand new industry that is wholly paid for by the public. They lobby for more and more money and Republicans cannot shovel it out to them fast enough, knowing they’re cultivating a whole new set of industry donors to elect Republicans just like the gun makers.
Regulation is almost cost free for the non-gun nut public.
Soprano2
@Baud: That’s their dumb argument, that because whatever law is proposed won’t be 100% perfect to fix whatever the topic of the law is, it’s useless to pass it. To which I reply, well then let’s repeal all laws because none of them 100% prevent whatever crime they’re designed to punish. It’s just a stupid argument that I call out every time I see it. They usually get huffy about it, but at this point I don’t care.
Elizabelle
@O. Felix Culpa:
The new executive editor of the WaPost is hot garbage. Sally Buzbee. Formerly of the AP. (Ron Fournier-Land.) She is shit.
Disaster hire. Wish they would can her. So much for “Jeff Bezos wouldn’t interfere in the Post’s journalism.”
Baud
@Soprano2:
I haven’t really followed the Epstein saga, but blanket statements like “everyone had to know” set off my radar. I prefer actual evidence.
Soprano2
@OzarkHillbilly: What’s funny is that in one breath they claim laws don’t work, and in the next breath they get huffy that they would be “penalized” by a law criminals don’t follow! It’s like they’re mad there might be a law they don’t like that they have to follow.
Chris
@Lapassionara:
Being half-French, half-American, a history nerd, and somebody whose prime directive when sorting political options is “anything is better than fascism,” June 6th is basically my own personal national holiday.
UncleEbeneezer
@cmorenc: I think “Stronger Together” was a perfectly good, concise slogan. As was “Hope/Change” and Biden’s battle for the “Soul of America” slogan/framing. I think the bigger problem is that too many people in our coalition:
1.) have an unrealistic belief in the power of messaging. Like these aren’t magical words that will suddenly make Nazis embrace tolerance and equality. And
2.) they think that you can somehow convey specificity on dozens of issues while also pushing a grand vision and do so all in a bumper sticker-length slogan. And
3.) they reflexively blame Dems for everything, ignoring the extent to which our civically unengaged electorate: pays very little attention, is already primed to hate Dems, and is heavily influenced by isms/phobias.
Like, we have endless amounts of comments about how Dems are always messaging wrong (and quite a few commenters who bring it up at every opportunity). Do Republican voters spend anywhere near as much time doing that? My guess is that they don’t. They say “fuck it, it ain’t perfect, but I wanna WIN” and move on and support their party.
I know way too many Dems/Progressives who seem to craft their whole identity on resisting the Dem consensus and criticizing the party/leaders. They are a significant part of our coalition. It makes messaging much more challenging for our side.
O. Felix Culpa
@Elizabelle:
Agreed. WaPo wasn’t perfect under Marty Baron, but it was a hellalot better. Are there any decent newspapers worth giving my money too? I can’t stomach the FTFNYT’s political desk either.
ETA: I want to support journalism, but I want it to be honest journalism, not a constant flow of GQP-framed headlines that DougJ could have written.
Soprano2
@Baud: You’d have to read the tweets, he makes a pretty compelling case that if you were around Epstein at all you couldn’t avoid seeing that he had near-naked and naked teenage girls around him all the time, and that he had pictures of naked girls posted on the walls of his houses, and so on. He’s calling out the people who spent a lot of time with Epstein and yet claim they had no idea he was sleeping with multiple teenage girls, like Bill Gates. He says no one can possibly be that stupid and unaware.
Baud
@UncleEbeneezer:
I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
Timill
@narya: What I’ve found so far is:
“Thirty-five Hall of Fame members and more than 500 Major League players served in World War II, according to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Many of them served as fitness trainers, morale officers or in other non-combat roles. But among the sailors and soldiers participating in the D-Day invasion were future Hall of Fame baseball players Yogi Berra and Leon Day.
On D-Day, while Leon Day was landing on Utah Beach with an Army amphibious unit, Berra was on an LST participating in the Normandy invasion, then went off the LST onto a 50-foot rocket-launcher boat that went within 20 yards of the beach.”
http://mlb.mlb.com/content/printer_friendly/mlb/y2004/m06/d06/c762644.jsp
Leon Day was a Negro Leagues pitcher who never played in MLB that I can see.
NotMax
‘@Elizabelle
And the new honcho at CNN is promising to bring on “more Republicans and conservatives.”
head/desk
Baud
@Soprano2:
I’m not that interested to do the research.
Kay
@Soprano2:
They don’t want to pay anything for the huge public cost of their hobby/fetish object- which is an understandable deadbeat opinion, but not one that should be accepted by the public who are picking up the cost for them. The answer is “no”. We won’t pay their way anymore. We’ve paid enough.
EarthWindFire
@Soprano2: I had someone tell me that any gun law that didn’t have consensus wasn’t going to work. My response: Really? Since when do bank robbers approve robbery laws? That got an immediate retreat into how complex an issue this was. It truly is anything but the guns.
Geeno
@Lapassionara: I wondered why I wasn’t hearing so much about it this year. That must be why.
Chris
@O. Felix Culpa:
I have never seen the press this bad. Not on partisan terms anyways. It’s been 100% wall-to-wall doom-posting since last August.
It’s the early Obama years on steroids: their last Republican darling had fucked everything up so catastrophically that even they had to admit it in their coverage, and the shock nearly killed them. Now that they have a Democrat in the White House to blame for everything, they’re recovering from their trauma by doing exactly that.
O. Felix Culpa
@NotMax:
Gaaah. Good thing I never watch CNN. Sounds like watching that channel could lead to violent acts of despair and outrage. ;)
Chris
@UncleEbeneezer:
“Messaging” depends heavily on media, and the media is in the tank for Republicans.
Baud
@Kay:
Tax guns and ammo to pay for the hardening.
Kay
@EarthWindFire:
We can fine them then. If they don’t pay the fines we’ll do the ordinary state collection process- garnish wages, take it out of tax refunds, etc. The criminal system is expensive and it won’t reach ordinary irresponsible gun scofflaws anyway. If we collect enough fines maybe we can eventually be made whole just on the massive public financial penalty we’re all paying on their behalf. And we will connect enough fines. There is a story a week in my local paper about how some “responsible” gun owner casually tossed his weapons somewhere and someone else got hurt. We don’t have any evidence at all that “most” of these people are “responsible”. How would we know? Where does this bullshit talking point come from?
Starfish
@Soprano2: Yeah, I saw one of those Bill Gates interviews, and piss on the philanthropists. These people need to pay their taxes.
We don’t need billionaires with ideas squandering money because they have educational theories about a public education that neither they nor their kids participated in.
satby
Picky, picky, picky
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: Epstein liked to collect public intellectuals as part of his circle, people like Marvin Minsky, Steven Pinker, Joi Ito and Daniel Dennett. I have to say it’s lowered my general estimation of many of them.
Baud
@Elizabelle:
I’m sorry to hear that WaPo has turned to garbage. They were so much better than the NYT for many years.
Starfish
@Elizabelle: Yes, she was the one writing to her reporters and telling them to play nice on Twitter when male reporters were engaging in sexist garbage.
Kay
@EarthWindFire:
For some reason we have limited this discussion to two methods of regulation- criminal penalties or private actions (suing gun nuts or gun makers).
There’s an entire civil system for regulation that focuses on fines and fees. Use that. There’s already an entire group of state lawyers who administer and enforce it. Works like a charm.
O. Felix Culpa
@satby:
LOL. That said, I think it’s probable that evidence of Epstein’s *proclivities* was visible to all with eyes to see. Willful blindness is a thing.
Starfish
@Baud: You are reading a summary way too closely.
Basically, Davidson said that there were A LOT OF GIRLS and a lot of people around Epstein on occasions where he was molesting girls, so they had an idea that something was up.
The girls are not talking because they have seen how the lives of women who have spoken up have been wrecked. These are also very rich and powerful men.
Someone was trying to corner Davidson to get him to say that Bill Gates absolutely engaged in shady behavior, but Davidson did not want to be sued for defamation.
After the Johnny Depp and Amber Heard fiasco, we see that in US civil court, the person with the most money wins.
cmorenc
@UncleEbeneezer: @UncleEbeneezer:
“Stronger together” comes across as a slogan written by the “People’s Committee of the Progressive Proletariat”.
Matt McIrvin
@UncleEbeneezer: There’s an impatience among liberals and progressives, a “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” idea that if you just show people the truth or espouse it with passion, evil will melt away, and if that hasn’t happened yet something must be seriously wrong on our side. But a lot of the real work is an effort of decades of pushing to alter general opinion.
And there are also all kinds of lags in the political system that can make the situation practically worsen even as the opinion changes are happening under the surface. For instance, we’re losing right now on abortion rights even though public opinion on the subject is probably better than it was 25 years ago. Why? Well, the balance of opinion from 25 years ago is now affecting the courts today. It takes that long.
Baud
@Starfish: Oh wow. That’s awful.
O. Felix Culpa
@Starfish:
FIFY.
satby
Just wanted to see that part again.
Starfish
@cmorenc: “Yes We Can” was straight up stolen from “Sí, se puede.”
cmorenc
@NotMax:
“Saving Private Ryan” is of course historical fiction, but survivors of the D-Day Normandy Beach invasion say its comes as close to capturing what the experience of the event was actually like for the soldiers storming the beac as anything they had ever seen .
EarthWindFire
@Kay: I’m on board. Also, let’s have these responsible gun owners pay for liability insurance on their toys. If they’re truly responsible, they won’t mind.
satby
@Chris: But they’re getting a heavy assist from our side. On Twitter especially, which may not reflect real life but is where they glean their ideas of “what people are thinking and talking about”
JPL
ugh I think the court is so political that they will drop both the Roe decision and gun rights decision on Thursday. They don’t want the attempted coup getting much news time.
Brachiator
@cmorenc:
So what? Make America Great Again is simple minded. The idea is to come up with a simple way to identify your party. Then you can provide a more detailed message.
“Bernie Sanders” is his own slogan. You know he is going to deliver his version of progressive flapdoodle.
JPL
@satby:The media has some responsibility to report the news correctly. When most people think that the economy is doing poorly, including 40 percent of democrats, something is seriously wrong.
jnfr
@kalakal:
As long as the Tories shred each other and become electorally toxic, I’m good to go with any scenario.
UncleEbeneezer
@cmorenc: This is exactly what I’m talking about. There is nothing more corny than “Make America Great Again.” But do you see Republicans all rolling their eyes and saying their party is so lame and “this is why we lost in 2018/20” Etc.? No. They understand and accept the fact that much of political messaging is hyperbolic, overly simple and corny. Whatever. They just wanna win.
Stronger Together is a simple, historical fact. See: Heather McGhee’s The Sum of Us for just one excellent example.
Everything good and right that we value and are trying to protect/expand came as a result of a multi-racial coalition. It’s the ONLY way we’ve ever been able to have nice things for everybody in this country. Lincoln said the same thing with his “House Divided” terminology. And there is evidence that Race/Class narratives that emphasize unity, are the ones that actually work with our voters, whether or not you or I find them cheesy.
satby
@JPL: Not unlikely at all.
Biden has been pretty successful and the push is on all fronts to undermine him and Democrats in general before the next election: ursurios gas prices, increasing terrorism with no intent to rein it in by Republicans, an out of control SCOTUS with an agenda, and a media intent on divorcing context from reporting. And a Greek chorus of supposed allies kvetching about everything Biden, the DOJ, and Congress doing not being enough.
Elizabelle
Someone on last night’s BG in Chicago/Fascism thread mentioned William Shirer, the amazing WW2 foreign correspondent. Eventually wrote The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, a lot of other good books. He wrote one on Gandhi, too.
I have been collecting his books; now on “The Nightmare Years” now (about the rise of Hitler and Fascism, although he touched — succinctly and informatively — on the Spanish Civil War too, in passing).
Makes me cry that we no longer have journalists of his caliber. He was observant, had a strong moral sense (decency, right and wrong), and was educated well enough to be able to synthesize what he saw. Not fancy universities, which are now where originality goes to die.
We need the Shirers. Who might be tweeting now, but we need the longform.
We get the buckraking ass-kissing Woodwards and Habermans and all the pundit panels.
We have a public that settles for broadcast news, what little they watch (between commercials). Where you need to read (many, many words and articles and sources) to be able to understand the danger of where we are, and how we got there. How we might get out.
ETA: Shirer was a creature of radio, during WW2. The broadcasts from Berlin, colleague and friend of Edward R. Murrow. But he started as a newspaperman, and became a skilled author and memoirist. Kept a journal throughout his eventful life and postings.
satby
@UncleEbeneezer: Thank you, you said it better than I could.
Layer8Problem
@Elizabelle:
@Starfish:
With regard to Sally Buzbee’s editing, keep an eye on Margaret Sullivan’s status. If she’s suddenly retasked to easy home repair tips or the Colorful Local Eccentrics beat for instance, or worse. She was too critical for the FTFNYT after all.
germy shoemangler
Much louder and insistent whining will come from Trump and his allies. Jim Jordan, Gaetz, the whole gang on conservative media, etc. They’ll be shrieking like banshees through this whole thing.
satby
@Elizabelle: We have them, but they work for smaller outlets with limited reach like ProPublica. This is a great investigative threadroll about profiteering during the pandemic.
Elizabelle
@Layer8Problem: I love Margaret Sullivan. No question she knows there’s a real problem at her own paper. The WaPost reader commenters are unsparing at how the Post is failing in some major ways (although it puts out a lot of good journalism, too).
Good suggestion.
Rugosa
@no comment:
Oh, great. We leave the teachers and students to hang out and dry, so parents step in to do what they think will help. The scene is set for another would-be good guy – a gun-toting teacher or well meaning parent – the security tester gets shot and the RWMFs have another tragedy they can blame on anything but guns.
germy shoemangler
I try not to spend too much time monitoring conservative media, but they’re constantly complaining about each other. This one’s a “traitor” that one’s a “traitor” … just constant infighting. They’re so warlike, they can’t help but fight even each other.
They’re not the monolith we think they are. The bickering between them is constant.
Starfish
Here is an opinion on why Democratic messaging is so complicated. I love the way they say to name some villains, and then the writer chooses Jeff Zuckerberg combining Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg and then says the Democrats won’t do it because they are afraid of donations drying up.
satby
@germy shoemangler: but that’s newer, and at the end of the day they are a monolith on voting, and that’s the key idea.
debbie
@Elizabelle:
Agreed. Shirer was a journalist back when that meant something. When readers could believe the facts as presented were actually the facts. Most journalists now are like drone pilots; off at a safe remove, where they can construct “stories” that sound good.
germy shoemangler
@Starfish:
UncleEbeneezer
@Brachiator: Exactly. One of my fave Black podcasters talked about this a while ago. To paraphrase his frustration he said something like:
So Pelosi and House Dems get dressed up in kinte cloths for a symbolic gesture, that was suggested by the CBC and immediately all my very online, Black Progressives are dunking on it and mocking how lame Dems are and this is why we lose etc…meanwhile all my Black Aunties at church, who ALWAYS vote and are the backbone of the Dem Party are like “isn’t that nice. This is why I like Biden/Pelosi etc. That’s why I ignore them Twitter fools.”
Obviously he’s talking about his own community, but it is every bit the same and probably even worse among mine (White Progressives).
The language of love, truth, righteousness etc., is CORNY AS FUCK!! There’s no way around that. But it also works. Republicans seem to get this much better than our side. We can’t even utilize a vague slogan like MAGA because too many of us reflexively would have to jump into writing twitter threads or medium think pieces about how Well Actually…America was NEVER Great…(and I’m as guilty of that myself).
It’s just another way that we routinely tie one hand behind our back in fighting the GOP. Republicans say “fuck it, I know what he meant“, we spend six years arguing about semantics while the rise of Fascism threatens everything we care about.
germy shoemangler
@satby:
True unfortunately. They fall in line on election day.
My hope is that the candidates they vote for in their primaries are too insane to win their general elections.
But then again, I said that when Trump won his nom.
UncleEbeneezer
@germy shoemangler: I’m not gonna pay ANY attention to that shitshow.
lowtechcyclist
@Baud:
That’s unquestionably true over the long haul, and to change that even somewhat (because we really wouldn’t want to think and act in lockstep like them), we’d have to build the sorts of institutions they have that help maintain that focus.
Right now, though, we just have so much shit, so many major issues, that are all hot-button at once. Climate change. Money to deal with Covid-19. Voting rights. Abortion. Guns. The insurrection. Ukraine.
I think the only way to tie them together is to make the point, repeatedly, that all of these issues are devastatingly important, and the Republicans are on the wrong side of every last one of them. And most of them shouldn’t even be issues.
Baud
@germy shoemangler:
What they almost never do, however, is pretend that there’s no difference between a Republican and a Democrat.
Kay
@EarthWindFire:
Insurance is fine but I want to get away from the idea of individual solutions. This is a public problem and a public burden and cost. Put it in with the rest of the fines and fees that are collected by the state. The First Amendment survives although people have to get permits for public protests – ordinary, garden variety regulations that shouldn’t raise constitutional issues at all. It would shift the public perception to the PUBLIC good and put the burden where it belongs- on the owners of the weapons.
I know they don’t want to pay for their hobby. I don’t care. Being a deadbeat isn’t a valid “position”.
germy shoemangler
@Baud:
I thought they invented the term “RINO”
The latest I read is that Paul Ryan is being attacked for being critical of the Orange One.
UncleEbeneezer
@lowtechcyclist: The only way to protect, expand, address any/all of these issues is by electing more Dems. PERIOD.
It’s not a magical/guaranteed solution, by any stretch. But it is a prerequisite for any possible solution. This is why #ElectMoreDems is not some condescending oversimplification. It’s the simple, honest truth and always has been.
But of course, when Biden, Obama, Hillary etc. say this they will get roasted and we will go into another round of And Here’s Why Dems Suck.
satby
@UncleEbeneezer: You are on fire with truthbombs today, and I’m so here for it!
Baud
@germy shoemangler:
For primaries. Name a Republican who lost a general election because he or she was a RINO.
ETA: Arguably, the first Bush, because he agreed with the Dems to raise taxes.
satby
@germy shoemangler: and again, irrelevant; because if the RINO wins the primary, that’s who Republicans vote for.
@ Baud: psyche
Elizabelle
@Kay: Hadn’t thought about the “harden the schools” grifters, another GOP constituency and beneficiary of government largesse. Thank you for informing us there. Ted Cruz is certainly protecting those scammers.
Would be interested in any articles you see on this topic. Might be fun to share them around.
Baud
@UncleEbeneezer:
QFT. Especially the bolded part.
germy shoemangler
@satby:
I wish they’d get discouraged enough some time to stay home.
Elizabelle
@debbie: Journalists as drone pilots. That is a good observation! The view from 30,000 feet. The view from nowhere.
Soprano2
@EarthWindFire: Too many of them are absolutely convinced that they need to be heavily armed because BLM/antifa/immigrants/hordes of non-white people from the cities will soon be coming to take everything they have, rape their daughters and burn down their houses. Then there are the apocalyptic ones who think society is on the verge of a breakdown, so they’ll need to be able to defend what they have from everyone else. Then there are the ones who think a civil war is around the corner. These people are totally invested in the idea that any problem caused by ready availability of firearms is caused by literally any other reason other than the ready availability of firearms!
Elizabelle
@UncleEbeneezer:
#ElectMoreDemocrats.
I like it.
Soprano2
@Starfish: It’s amazing how willing they are to experiment on other people’s kids while they carefully shelter their kids from all of their experiments. I’d be more convinced they think they have the answer if they were willing to send their kids to these schools, but they never are.
Betty Cracker
@UncleEbeneezer:
Agreed, but it’s important to look at why people find that formulation condescending and oversimplified instead of hash-tagging their concerns away. Let’s stipulate that there are trolls and divisive, bad-faith actors in the mix — there definitely are.
Even with that said, our coalition is frayed to the point that we stand a real chance of losing to honest-to-Christ fascists who will destroy our democracy. Would you agree we have to address that somehow?
Elizabelle
@satby: Yes. ProPublica. Need to check out better (and newer!) sources.
The Pale Scot
We could use a man like Smedley Butler again…
Gee our old La Salle ran great….
Kay
@Elizabelle:
We had one pitch us locally. His one “qualification” was military service, which he lied about. One of the reporters from the local paper is a veteran and asked him some questions about his claimed service and thought the answers were dodgy and hinky- sure enough. Invented.
He wanted a contract to train school employees.
Florida has spent 400 million on school hardening since Parkland. Which side do you think those contractors donate to? The school security windfall crowd or the cheaper and more efficient regulation crowd?
We have a choice. We can regulate and bill gun fetish people for public costs or we can regulate and bill everyone else. We’re billing the wrong people.
Soprano2
@Kay: I like that idea, actually. It has the benefit of not denying anyone their “right” to own a firearm. I think the reason it’s not talked about as much is because these are local and state fines and fees, so there is no “national” solution. People always look for one big, sweeping idea to fix things, when the truth is that it’s always many smaller things that have the biggest effect. For example, although it wouldn’t fix everything, I like the idea of raising the age to buy a firearm to 21. They would probably have to exempt hunting rifles, but even if they did that it would help. The headlines say over and over that these people get these firearms legally; Texas had just recently lowered the age to purchase this weapon from 21 to 18. Incremental steps work if people have the patience for them. We need to quit acting like there is one “big” solution that will fix our gun problem, because that plays into the hands of people who don’t want to do anything.
Elizabelle
@Soprano2: If I could, I would make it 25. Let that prefontal cortex mature.
Also, 25 year olds may be less susceptible to pleas for guns from adolescents. 21 is still not that far removed from 18.
And I wish we could ban assault weapons. Once the assault weapon is in a school or crowded place, it is over. You cannot police against that once the gun and shooter are in place.
Elizabelle
@Kay: We’re billing the wrong people. That’s a good slogan, too. Who wants to pay for others’ fetish play? Maybe not you, John and Jane Q. Public. Who should not have to worry so about students’ safety on campus.
Soprano2
@O. Felix Culpa: Also I think it’s a jury vs. judge problem. Usually a judge will decide based on evidence; too often, I think a jury in a case like this one decides based on who they like best (plus they weren’t sequestered from any of the social media crap or news reporting). I think that’s basically what happened with the Heard vs. Depp trial, because the evidence was overwhelmingly in her favor according to people who actually understand the law. People expect victims to be perfect; if there is any little discrepancy in anything they say, people shriek “see, they’re lying about everything!”. Makes it really hard on victims.
debbie
@Elizabelle:
It came to me this morning after finding yet another stupid tweet from Michael Tracey:
He gets soundly pummeled in the comments like always and then he comes back with something else stupid. ♀️
Kay
@Soprano2:
They’ll screech incessantly if they’re forced to pay anything. I was reading gun nut Twitter a couple of nights ago and they’re (of course) insanely opposed to red flag laws because they are being PUNISHED for CRIMINALS. They’re the whiniest fuckers on the planet. The idea that any of these crybabies are going to protect anyone from anything is a joke.
Stipulate that no one wants to pay for anything. Got it. Objection noted- gun nut, a deadbeat, expect me to pay the massive costs of your hobby. Objection over ruled.
Baud
@debbie: It’s all a game to him, and partly to the people who are responding to him.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: One of the bad sort of thoughts I struggle with in myself is just the mirror image of their fantasy–that I have to start collecting weapons and preparing for civil war because THEY are coming to attack my family.
I don’t think it leads anywhere good, though.
Citizen Alan
@Soprano2:
This. The majority of republicans and nearly all libertarians secretly fantasize about being a Somali warlord only white.
Elizabelle
@debbie: I wish I did not know who Michael Tracey was. What a dipshit.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
The assumption is that it’s addressable. I had hoped the Trump experience would change our culture enough to be a dominant force, but so far it seems like it hasn’t.
Soprano2
@JPL: I honestly believe this is about high gas prices and high prices in the grocery store, full stop. Those are things most people have experience with every week, if not more often, and when they see those prices going up and up and up they feel like things are bad, even if the truth is that things aren’t that bad overall. People don’t pay much attention to “economic indicators” and what they say; they pay attention to what’s happening to their pocketbook. I have a friend who used to work for us who now runs her own restaurant; she says a bag of scallops she paid $73 for two weeks ago was $100 last week. Gasoline is higher here than it has ever been. These are the kind of things that make people say the economy is bad. We need to quit denying that this happens.
rikyrah
@Kay:
They should also have to get liability insurance…FOR EACH GUN
rikyrah
@Lapassionara:
They knew that the only good Nazi is a dead one. They got that right.
debbie
@Baud:
Except it feeds into Zelenskyy’s detractors’ storyline, maybe even VVP’s. Shit like this should not be a game.
Matt McIrvin
@Elizabelle: I do worry a little that the “let the prefrontal cortex mature” arguments are going to be turned back on us to restrict voting rights. “If you can’t have a gun then you can’t be trusted to vote!”
Not that 18-to-21-year-olds vote that much anyway.
rikyrah
@Lapassionara:
What always fascinated me is that Ike had ready the letter, in case we lost. It really was never assured that we would win.
Baud
@debbie:
Right. That’s what they do. It should not be a game, but it is.
Matt McIrvin
@rikyrah: The saying is that no battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy. You can prepare all you want but you never know.
debbie
@Matt McIrvin:
You know what, if it cuts down on gun violence and mass shootings, maybe it’s worth it for now.
Kay
@Soprano2:
But to say they aren’t being influenced by the constant drumbeat of media is ridiculous. It’s a neat trick they have going here- they focus exclusively on inflation for months and then point to public opinion polls where inflation is the top issue. We’re all swimming in the narrative they create.
If the exclusive focus had been on the unemployment rate people would think the unemployment rate was important. Wait till it ticks up. It will immediately become important again. They managed to spin low, low unemployment rates as a “jobs crisis”. Apparently there is absolutely no upside to what is now and has been for months “full employment”. That’s ridiculous and not true.
Elizabelle
@Matt McIrvin: In that case, maybe we could remove millions of insane GOP voters from the rolls. They are too damaged to vote. What cognitive abilty they had was whittled away by Fox News and the conservatards in their social circles. Goes both ways.
Too old and selfish and stupid to vote.
Benw
@rikyrah:
Pedantically, the bullets do the damage: liability and damage insurance on every bullet, renewed every 6 mos, and they have to carry a little paper proving registration and insurance for every bullet, plus annual safety inspection… on every bullet at $37 a pop. lol
Elizabelle
@Kay: I agree. The corporate news media wants Biden to fail.
They are too stupid and selfish to remember history, and what comes after.
ETA: The FTF NY Times just did an exquisite series of articles on the profiteering debt laid upon Haiti, which had to repay its former slaveholders. Of course, they jumped on the 1617 bandwagon too.
They excel at looking at decades old crimes. The Sulzbergers utterly suck at realizing how their negligence and misdirected focus abets new crimes today.
Baud
@Kay:
Agree on all points.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@O. Felix Culpa: Thank you for the correction. Depp-Heard was not about who had the most money. It was decided by misogyny.
rikyrah
I honestly don’t want to read anymore about Democrats and messaging.
The GOP is a White Supremacist Party.
Period.
THAT is their ideology. All their messaging tailors to it.
When you have White Supremacy as your core, and the rest is just window dressing..you seem to be giving them credit for the window dressing while ignoring the core.
rikyrah
@Kay: it was all baby formula all the time..
without pointing out that Dolt45 created the shortage due to his incompetence..
but once 46 and his Administration tackled the problem..
not one more phucking word on baby formula..not even to give credit to 46 for resolving it.
Elizabelle
@rikyrah: True that.
And we are swimming in covid tests. And have lots of vaccine available. Crickets.
Hoodie
@lowtechcyclist: Maybe we should stop talking about having issue conflicts with Republicans, when the reality is that Republicans are saying is just crazy. When we speak as having issue differences with Republicans, it indirectly legitimizes their nonsense as merely political differences. They’re not political differences, because political differences should lie somewhere in a spectrum of reasonable alternatives and recognize that politics is not a winner take all proposition, not bugfuck crazyness. For example, it is not reasonable in a modern state to have unfettered access to assault weapons and have people walking around carrying weapons capable of murdering dozens of people in a manner of a few minutes. IT is not reasonable to fixate on doors and cops when you have mass shootings every day. You have to give the public the hint to step back and realize what mainstream Republicans are now saying are things that would have been crazy to mainstream Republicans 20 or 30 years ago. What they are proposing is now largely nonsense fueled by fantasy, paranoia and denial. They are not on the wrong side of issues, they’re in a whole other dimension.
Brachiator
@UncleEbeneezer:
Totally agree with you here. But I also think that instead of moaning about the media, Democrats need to do more to go around the media. Yeah, easy for me to say.
But in following BREXIT in the UK media I soon saw pretty clearly that there are strongly biased newspapers and media outlets that never reported accurately and fairly. And the Labour Party never get a fair break. Never.
And the British have a long tradition of media that plays to a particular class or party. Everyone knows this and picks their poison accordingly. Even the BBC is problematic. They will generally report news and facts accurately. Background info is good. But analysis is worthless.
Disagree a bit here. The GOP exploit lies and anger. They don’t care. And they push propaganda. And their base want to be lied to.
This makes things much easier for Republicans.
I don’t see an easy equivalent for Democrats.
Kay
@rikyrah:
The reporting was an absolute gift to Abbott, the formula maker. They somehow managed to hold the private sector completely harmless while making Joe Biden responsible for running baby formula factories.
Every corporation in the country must have been taking notes and celebrating.
“The Biden Administration should have known it woud be a problem”
Did the grossly overpaid managers at Abbott not know? It’s their product.
Buttigieg said it and I could have hugged him. He said this is an industry failure and Joe Biden is not actually responsible for every private sector management failure.
It was pro-Abbott propoganda. They couldn’t have paid for that coverage.
Ruckus
@Baud:
It doesn’t matter that they are better focused if what they are focused on is propaganda and bullshit. They aren’t trying to govern, only to rip off everyone, monetarily and politically. They focus on the bullshit because it’s bullshit that they can scream against and it makes money for them in political and bank balance terms. They don’t give a damn about the lives of their constituents, only the life of their bank account. I haven’t seen one of them with any skill other than being horrible humans. That’s all they are good at, lying and bullshit. And they aren’t actually good at either of those.
Kay
@rikyrah:
I’ll tell you one thing. There isn’t going to be any more regulatory actions for baby formula makers. Our idiot media shifted responsibility from the private sector actor to the public sector, so now all they have to do it threaten a shortage and there can be rat shit in there- the regulatory agencies will keep the lines running regardless.
I’d buy German or Swiss formula myself. They apparently don’t have morons running their media so actually regulate safety and quality. The US product will be shit.
JMG
Political scientist and Bloomberg columnist Jonathan Bernstein’s theory is that the media ALWAYS has a bias towards the negative when reporting on the economy. He’s not far wrong. The really relatively mild slowdown of 1990-1991 was presented in dire terms that helped Bill Clinton get elected. Nobody is going to read/watch a story about some family who thinks it’s doing OK no matter what conditions are. So the public’s bitching about something like inflation, a genuine concern, is translated into a crisis because stories don’t focus on the majority for whom it is an annoyance, but on the minority for whom it does pose a significant and harmful issue.
Brachiator
@Kay:
Uh, no. People in other countries have burnt down government offices because they didn’t think the government was doing enough about inflation. Inflation worries have had a huge impact on national elections all around the world.
Gas, fuel, food. The issue is simple. The issue is real, even if solutions may be complicated.
Geminid
@cmorenc: One of my favorite books on the Second World War is a short one, Ralph Ingersoll’s Top Secret (1946). Ingersoll was a well-known journalist before the war, but when he was drafted in 1942 the Army allowed him to serve in a non-journalist role, as he had requested.
Ingersoll was with an engineer unit in North Africa, and then in 1943 he was assigned to serve under General Devers in England. Devers had been sent to command U.S. Army forces in England when the intended commander and his staff died in a plane crash. Ingersoll served as liaison to the largely British planning group for Overlord. Because of his background in the Engineers he was part of a team that investigated the disaster at Slapton Sands, where hundreds of GI’s were killed when German E-boats attacked landing craft carrying Engineers practicing an amphibious assault. The team had to verify that none of the few officers read into the larger invasion plan had been captured. Improbably, all their bodies were found.
On D-Day, Ingersoll was in the third wave at Utah Beach as part of Task Force Raff. That unit was charged with driving inland to link up with the 82nd Airborne Division. The task force took a day and half to reach the 82nd, unloaded ammo and medical supplies, and proceeded to load up wounded paratroopers.
Ingersoll described how he was standing with a small group of officers discussing the situation with the 82nd’s commander, Matthew Ridgway, when he heard a loud CRACK!. It was the sound of a dreaded German 88mm cannon. Ingersoll hit the ground and hugged it . When he looked up, he saw that everyone else was on the ground too except for General Ridgway, who pointed at a distant grove of trees and calmly said, “I think it came from over there.”
Ingersoll went on to serve with the 12th Army Group staff under General Bradley. His account in Top Secret of the campaign across France and into Germany is fascinating.
JPL
@Ruckus: DeSantis went so far to say that the factory should not have been shut down.
Baud
@JMG: I don’t recall the media focusing on negative aspects of the economy during Bush II or Trump.
Baud
@Ruckus:
Focus does matter if you want to build something that lasts beyond one election cycle.
Baud
@rikyrah: This is how I feel too.
Lapassionara
@NotMax: Thanks. The pointe du hoc part so the invasion is so mind boggling to me, given that the gun they were scaling the cliff to disable had been moved somewhere else, for maintenance as I understand it. In other words, I’m not sure they had to undertake that mission in the way it had been planned. I would like to see that documentary.
Brachiator
@JMG:
I honestly don’t understand why some commenters here think inflation is largely an annoyance? What is a serious problem?
In the UK, the Conservative Party had to enact a windfall profits tax, which the French had already done, to help deal with rising fuel costs.
The inflation components are a little different here, but the problem is just as real here, as far as I can see. What else should be the focus of the government ‘s attention?
O. Felix Culpa
@Soprano2:
Especially those of the female and non-white persuasion.
Brachiator
@Baud:
Love your snark. I thought that a lot of the 2008 election came down to voters believing that the Democrats would better handle the financial melt down.
Tony Jay
A LETTER FROM BREXITANNIA
“Justice! Like Treacle”
Breaking News – Due to popular demand, an intensely unpopular Prime Minister and the populist nature of the modern Conservative and Unionist Party, these most wonderful, ebullient, absolutely 110% authentic Jubilation Celebrations in honour of Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth the Second’s fortunate origin as the most successful emission from the previous Royal edition, have been extended by a further day in order that they may include a No-Confidence Vote in the continued ‘leadership’ of everyone’s least favourite oligarch hand-puppet and odd-smelling stain on the nation’s historical tapestry, Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson MP.
It was a journey, but we got there in the end.
I say ‘the end’, but it’s not, not really. There are 359 Tory MPs currently squatting in the Houses of Parliament, down from the 365 voted into office back in the glory days of late 2019 when Johnson was the flaxen-haired Heathcliff to the Media’s Cathy, toxically entwined in a co-dependent relationship that left no room at the inn for anything as twee as honest reporting on the issues the country faced or the solutions offered by the disgracefully un-clubbable Leader of the Opposition. They are the only ones with a vote on this awful man’s future, and let’s face it, if you were picking the worst 359 people in the country to judge the suitability of a national leader then this line-up of self-serving gutterclowns and balled-up motel tissues would be at the front of the queue.
So how did we get here?
No, no, I’m not going to regurgitate the 100,000 word long rant I’ve subjected you all to before, that would be cruel and only a bit funny (to me). I’ll be saving all of that for my tell-all book “Scum, Bigotry and the Neo-Fash – Flobalob Johnson and My Part in His Downfall” available from all vanity online publishers in time for Christmas. Instead, let’s just look at the last few days.
It would be nice and rather poetic to think that the triggering event occurred on the steps of St Paul’s Cathedral on Friday morning, when Flobby and his current matrimonial placeholder arrived to attend some Jubilee-related bollocks only to greeted with spontaneous boos and jeers the moment they stepped out of their car. It was a marvellous sight, proper soul-food for the silenced majority. Bully Bunter kept on fixedly grinning like a baboon with its spaffer lodged in a venus flytrap, but Sweet Christmas, that look of pure, malignant glee on the face of Carrie ‘Antoinette’ Goldsmith-Johnson née Symonds will haunt me to my grave. Before she moved on up from mere Minister’s concubine to her current posting Carrie worked in political PR, so she knew instantly how incredibly damaging it was for a Conservative Prime Minister to be openly, venomously scorned by a crowd made up of the kind of fluff-brained ‘patriots’ who happily camp out overnight in central London just to catch a fleeting glimpse of a minor-league Windsor. These are the kind of people who send gushing letters of support to Prince Andrew. Who buy and proudly display those awful commemorative plates ‘celebrating’ the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s visit to Torbay fire-station. People who own their own bunting, FFS. You couldn’t get a more staunchly ‘conservative’ crowd if you dug up the Duke of Wellington and dressed him in Cardinal’s robes. In football terms, it was like the manager being booed by his team’s season-ticket holders at a testimonial game being held at their own stadium, on his birthday.
And the booing was apparently even worse when they left the Cathedral! By then, of course, the BBC and Sky had got their act together and edited the disapproval out of their footage (Gawd Bless the Independent Media – Ed) but the damage had already been done. The mockery levels only intensified when Johnson’s loyalist sycophants surged online to argue that it was all a conspiracy! The far-Left had infiltrated the crowd and were hogging the Bolshevik Broadcasting Corporation’s mikes! They personally knew people who had been there, honest, and they reported only orgasmic cheers! It was a group of Japanese tourists, and everyone knows that those people pronounce “Boris!!” as “Booooooooo-Riz!”. Sadly, it was all for naught. Every contradictory theory of why there was no booing/some booing/only the booing of anarchists was greeted with uniform LOLs and by evening the spin had switched to “Oh yeah, well, every politician gets booed and only partisan propagandists would make too much out of a series of isolated events”.
We should have known the nails were going into the coffin when the likes of Deputy PM Dominic Raab (Voted Mr Beach-Brain 2003 by For Him magazine) and Home Secretary Priti Patel (Voted most likely to proudly put her name to a range of ‘special’ leather lampshades) were sent out to tell the News Media that the chances of a Vote of No Confidence were very remote and that any MPs even considering calling for one should “forget it!” (ooooh, so tough). There’s not a partially sentient fungal lifeform on the surface of Toomagi-3’s sole habitable moon that doesn’t know that Raab and Patel (like all the rest of Flobby’s Cabinet of Losers, I’m talking about the likes of Liz Truss, Jacob Rees-Mogg, Thérése Coffey, and – of course – the absolutely demented Nadine Dorries) know they wouldn’t get within a hundred nautical miles of a Ministerial position under any credible Tory PM.
Not that this stops them from simultaneously seeing themselves as potential future Supreme Leaders of Tory Britain once he’s out of the way. They’ll give him their total, complete, absolute and unshakable loyalty right up to the moment they walk into the 1922 Committee room and post their anonymous vote, at which point they’ll happily plunge the knife in if they think there’s enough votes to kill the Great White Fail. Well, maybe not Dorries. She’s a proper devoted fangirl who’ll probably scrawl pink hearts with ‘BJ Luvz ND’ all over her voting card and Tik Tok it under a breathy rap ballad about ‘her’ PM’s “length of service”. She’s that kind of crazy. Majorly Traitor Greene with a crush.
According to whispers from inside the Tory Party there were already at least 54 letters on the desk of Graham Brady before the interminable Jubilee Weekend started, but the excuse for holding off on announcing it is that enough of them included a postscript requesting that Brady didn’t consider them ‘active’ until after the Queen had enjoyed her massively expensive festival of hereditary privilege. That’s the old-school tie way leadership issues within the UK’s premier far-Right movement are brought out into the open. Brady himself heads up the 1922 Committee (basically the Trade-Union for backbench Tory MPs) and those who have lost faith in the current Party leader send him a letter saying so. If 15% of the Party’s MPs send in letters, Brady informs the Party leader and, 24 hours after that, informs the Press. That in turn triggers a No-Confidence vote in which the leader officially requires 50% of the vote plus 1 to survive.
Of course, any Tory Party leader who only has the backing of a bare majority of his fellow MPs simply can’t survive. Theresa May had the backing of 2/3 of Tory MPs in her VONC and she was a dead woman walking from then on. Flobalob is the kind of shameless turd who would undoubtedly try to cling on, but that’s just who and what he is, and everyone around him knows that. For the last year or so the real question for Tory MPs has always been when they boot him, not if. The decision to move him aside was made way, way above their paygrade by the very rich and influential VIPs who ultimately decide who is and who is not acceptable as the face of Conservatism in each country, as MPs their role has always been to juggle the various pros and cons of when it would be best for them and their future careers to send him out to fertilise someone else’s field with his endless bullshit.
Will they? Weeeeeellllllll, that depends. A lot of them clearly want him out, but the word on the wind last week was that they wanted to wait until after the Tories had lost the two upcoming Parliamentary bye-elections (thus putting a death shroud over the cooling corpse of Johnson’s electability argument) before risking a No Confidence Vote. I said at the time, you can’t control these things once they get rolling, and since you’re depending on lifelong Tory political operatives to play by the rules… yeah, good luck with that. It’s one thing to get rid of a known quantity like Bully Bunter, but then there would be a leadership contest and who the hell knows what would happen then?
Flobalob’s main attraction in 2019 (other than the fervid intensity of the News Media’s desire to protect him from all harm) was that he really is a shape-shifting creep who all the Party’s factions could see something familiar in. The far-Right saw a Populist demagogue who could sell racism to the common masses, the corporate-Right saw an ethics-free zone who absolutely loved being treated and bribed by the Masters of the Business Universe, the centre-Right saw a liberally inclined celebrity who had managed to sell himself to cosmopolitan London, twice, while still making Conservative rural housewives get all gummy in their collective undertummies. No one else in the Party can straddle all those divides, so what they’re potentially looking at is a recipe for civil-war two years max before a General Election.
Chances are, he survives the Vote. Probably narrowly. That’s been complicated by the firm forward step towards a leadership challenge taken by Jeremy ‘We know what it rhymes with’ Hunt, the de facto ‘King in Exile’ of the Not Actually Insane factions within the Tory Party, and the ludicrously aggressive Twitterscreed launched against him in response by Nadine Dorries. According to the BBC’s Chief Tory Mouthpiece, Chris Mason, this has pissed off a LOT of wavering MPs who see it as just another example of Johnson giving licence to his minions to publicly lash out at anyone regardless of the damage it does to their careers the Party. Meanwhile one of the Daily Mail’s acolytes of hate has been keeping a tally of Tory MPs who are openly pro-Flobalob and comparing it unfavourably to the tally Theresa May had on the day of her VONC, while the Conservative Home website has polled its members and found a majority of them want rid.
Who the fuck knows what’s going to happen? The rancid tub of solipsistic lard is right at this minute giving a speech to Tory MPs behind the locked and bolted doors of the 1922 Committee rooms where he will no doubt promise everything to everyone and hope to charm/frighten/seduce enough of them into giving him their votes… but so has every other Tory leader who has lost a VONC.
One thing’s for sure. Whatever the result tonight, this ain’t anywhere near over.
Baud
@Brachiator:
Soprano2
@Kay: Oh, I don’t deny that they’re being influenced by the way the press reports on it. I’ve read that there’s a gas station somewhere in SoCal that has the highest price in the state; they all use a picture of the prices at that station when they write about high gas prices. So yes, the way it’s reported has an effect. However, people’s real lived experience has an effect too. When you got a 4% raise but it’s costing you twice as much every week to fill your tank as it did a year ago, you’re going to notice that even if the press never says a word about it.
Kay
@O. Felix Culpa:
I read the Rotten in Denmark essay on it and then the comments from Depp’s defenders beneath it and they’re talking about these You tuber “analysts” they watched for trial commentary so I looked at them and it’s a joke. It’s like a huge red X thru Heard’s face with “LIAR!” as the visual. Yes. Completely unbiased and rigorously factual. Bring on the “body language” woo woo expert!
My favorite is “some of the you tubers ARE LAWYERS”
Really? Say no more. That’s all I need! :)
Sidney Powell is a fucking lawyer. So was the Obama birth certificate truther. “Lawyer analyst” is not the slam dunk they think it is.
Geminid
@rikyrah: And strict liability for damage caused by a gun transferred outside of legal reporting and background check requirements, no matter who uses it. That would cut down on the number of guns sold in Wisconsin and Indiana that then turn up in Chicago.
Baud
@Brachiator:
Well, that was hard to ignore, but it was also on the tail end of Bush’s term. It wasn’t a constant drumbeat.
Kay
@O. Felix Culpa:
I read the Rotten in Denmark essay on it and then the comments from Depp’s defenders beneath it and they’re talking about these You tuber “analysts” they watched for trial commentary so I looked at them and it’s a joke. It’s like a huge red X thru Heard’s face with “LIAR!” as the visual. Yes. Completely unbiased and rigorously factual. Bring on the “body language” woo woo expert!
My favorite is “some of the you tubers ARE LAWYERS”
Really? Say no more. That’s all I need! :)
Sidney Powell is a fucking lawyer. So was the Obama birth certificate truther. “Lawyer analyst” is not the slam dunk they think it is.
Soprano2
@rikyrah: Even worse, they complained that the things he did “weren’t enough” or were “too late”. It’s never enough for them, no matter what Biden does.
I think they got mad about Afghanistan; all of the consistently bad press dates from last August. They have decided they want to hurt him for whatever reason.
kindness
Fox sends Doocy to the press conferences to try to create/reinforce what ever meme they are pushing at any one moment. That and just to bag on the administration at every level as that is an ongoing meme all it’s own. It seems Doocy is a bit more condescending with the new Madame Press Secretary than the old one. I wonder what could be different there?
Soprano2
@rikyrah: This is absolutely true, but if you say it watch out! People get highly offended that you would even suggest that white supremacy has anything to do with why they support Republicans, all while they prominently display their Confederate and “Blue Lives Matter” flags.
The Moar You Know
@Kay: that’s a good question. It is bullshit, at least in my experience. I know some folks that are very responsible with their guns, but more where I just cringe – if I’m seeing you be an idiot at a public range, and I’ve seen that a lot, just how bad are you when you are not in public?
O. Felix Culpa
@rikyrah:
AMEN. While I’m sure it could be better, it’s been decent and sometimes excellent. Too many Dems and True Progressives™, including some on this here top-10K blog, leap to criticism no matter what.
Also too, the messaging conversation tends toward Green Lanternism and diminishment of voter agency. “If only Dems used just the right words–i.e. magic formula–then the world would be put to right.” Of course Democratic leadership needs to sound the alarm about impending fascism, but if our voters can’t/won’t see and act on the dumpster fire blazing in front of them, no amount of messaging will fix things for us.
O. Felix Culpa
@rikyrah:
AMEN. While I’m sure it could be better, it’s been decent and too many Dems and True Progressives™, including some on this here top-10K blog, leap to criticism no matter what.
Also too, the messaging conversation tends toward Green Lanternism and diminishment of voter agency. “If only Dems used just the right words–i.e. magic formula–then the world would be put to right.” Of course Democratic leadership needs to sound the alarm about impending fascism, but if our voters can’t/won’t see and act on the dumpster fire blazing in front of them, no amount of messaging will fix things for us.
Soprano2
@Baud: Guess you forgot about 2008, huh?
Elizabelle
@Tony Jay: Would you ever consider condensing some of your comments into an executive summary, for someone who does not want to read through hundreds of words when a few well reasoned paragraphs would do?? Maybe just include a summary, at top?
You’ve just put up over 1,800 words.
The Washington Post’s article on the same subject, with photo captions and interspersed headlines and “advertisement” slots, rolls in at just over 1,100.
I enjoy your more pithy comments, and you have some sharp humor and wicked turns of phrase.
Executive summary, please. Life is short.
Soprano2
@Kay: I read that Depp’s lawyers ran a defense that makes the defendant into the victim in the eyes of the jury, and makes the victim into the perpetrator. This never works on judges, who look at the actual evidence, but almost always works on juries if they do it right. Then there’s the problem that people expect victims to be perfect, especially if they’re not white men (I’ve always said the perfect rape victim is a 70-year-old nun who always wears a habit!). I think in these cases juries decide who they like best and then rule that way if there is any possible way to do so. The fact that the jury wasn’t shielded from any of the online shitshow is a travesty, too. How could you not be influenced by that? I read lots of social media platforms obsessively pushed news about the trial on people’s feeds, in such a way that they couldn’t get away from it at all.
Tony Jay
@Elizabelle:
Yeah, but they get paid to be concise, I just rant about whatever takes my interest. Plus I’m aware that a lot of reading takes place on the toilet, so leisurely is the key. 8-)
OTOH
Flobalob unpopular
Tory MPs cowardly
Vote tonight
Result unclear.
News Media super excited.
That about sums it up.
Ruckus
@Brachiator:
Disagree a bit here. The GOP exploit lies and anger. They don’t care. And they push propaganda. And their base want to be lied to.
This makes things much easier for Republicans.
I don’t see an easy equivalent for Democrats.
There isn’t any equivalent. There can’t be, because republicans make up lies and bullshit. So many examples in this post alone. It would be simpler to list the truths they speak. Let me do that – NONE. They lie about everything. They have figured out that they can lie about everything as long as they constantly lie. And they have to lie because otherwise they have no policy, no plan, nothing honest they can list or discuss. Their only problem is that they have run out of anything resembling reasonable to lie about. They have to be outrageous liars because they have nothing else. If they admitted the truth, it is very likely all those weapons would be aimed at them.
Captain C
@Percysowner: Doocy is not here for the hunting.
Soprano2
I listen to “The New Abnormal” podcast, and they tend toward this attitude. I like most of their interviews, but this tendency drives me crazy!
Anyway
@Tony Jay:
Most excellent, give me a cigarette!
Nailed it – especially the Corporate-right part. Sadly there’s no other “corporate” anymore.
The far-Right saw a Populist demagogue who could sell racism to the common masses, the corporate-Right saw an ethics-free zone who absolutely loved being treated and bribed by the Masters of the Business Universe, the centre-Right saw a liberally inclined celebrity who had managed to sell himself to cosmopolitan London, twice, while still making Conservative rural housewives get all gummy in their collective undertummies
Baud
@Soprano2:
I don’t do podcasts but the attitude drives me crazy too. If people think they have a message that works, go out in the real world and prove it. There are tons of elections in this country. You don’t have to start at the president.
Kay
@Soprano2:
I don’t know but I do know pointing me to “umbrella man” for trial coverage is not persuasive as to your unbiased analysis.
He/she is a mental health professional!
Okay so an expert witness who didn’t testify but did “analysis”?
I’m not convinced.
If you want to lead with blatantly sexist coverage that starts with “lying scheming gold digger with a 9 year diabolical plan to ruin this person” I’ll need more than umbrellaman
Geminid
@O. Felix Culpa: I find some of the “Why vote?…Earn my vote! etc.” arguments very maddening, but I really don’t have a handle on how much effect they have. You have more experience in organizing and I am interested in your opinion, if you care to give it, as to the effectiveness these arguments have on motivation, particularly that of younger people. I know you’ve said in the past that cynicism is a problem for that group.
Elizabelle
@Anyway: @ Tony Jay:
But see, Anyway pulled out a very informative segment. Which makes your points very well, memorably and descriptively. And which I would have totally missed, because I was not going to wade through 1,834 words.
Maybe these novels in progress need to roll out in segments. Be Dickens there. Even *shudder* roll them out as in tweet form.
Others apparently really like your essays, and have the time to read through. That’s great. I wish there was a Cliff’s Notes version too.
raven
@Lapassionara: I just finished it. They move the arty because they were pretty sure the Allies knew where they were so the moved them back. Fascinating how one guy with thermite grenades disabled five of the six.
JPL
Fox News must be concerned about the hearings, because they are back to caravan coverage.
brantl
@debbie: Listen to her talk about her daddy’s torture campaign, she can lie with the best of ’em. That she hasn’t been lying for the last 18 months is the change of pace.
Burnspbesq
@Sanjeevs:
Flobalob isn’t nearly the threat that the DUP is.
Soprano2
@Kay: It helps you that you’re an attorney. I think it’s easier for average people to be taken in by stuff like that. It’s been interesting for me to do our damage claim memos, because it’s taught me some stuff about how lawyers think that’s different than how people who aren’t lawyers think. Most people think “if the sewer was stopped up and it backs up in your house then the city is responsible”, but that’s not how it works at all. There’s the whole issue of whether we did our “due diligence” in maintenance, plus the fact that sewers are an open system where anyone can pour anything down there, and we can’t control that. Learning about this stuff helps me think a little differently about legal stuff now.
Tony Jay
@Elizabelle:
I take your point, I really do, but I’m also aware that I’m trying to condense sometimes weeks of political and cultural activity from a foreign country into something comprehensible to (usually) American readers. It might look like I’m just blathering on, but I really do try to force-feed relevant factoids into every scattalogical reference so that it’s not just ‘English bloke ranting about people I don’t know doing things I don’t understand‘.
That said, I like your suggestion of a Cliff Notes version. That could be useful for me too. It is taken onboard.
Villago Delenda Est
Doochy is the paragon of Faux Noise propagandistic criminality.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: Yeah, I think the Democratic victories in 1992 and 2008 were both very much influenced by bad economic times really reflecting badly on a Republican President, and the media did help make that stick. Probably 2020 as well–but there, the economic troubles were all bound up in the COVID pandemic that was story 1.
The eternal story, of course, is that when the new Dem President can’t heal everything immediately, they pay in the midterms. But it’s interesting that things had gotten better enough by 1996/2012 that the President could get reelected. For 2024, who knows. Biden seems to be in a worse position than Obama in 2010, maybe not a worse position than Clinton in 1994.
Soprano2
@Baud: Molly Jong-Fast is particularly bad about this; she seems to think that whatever works for liberals in NY City will work for all Democrats everywhere! She’s also one of those “why hasn’t Merrick Garland arrested TFG yet?” people.
ETA – Geez, just heard her say “All the women in GA who voted for Biden, all they wanted was for him to protect voting rights, and he didn’t do it!”. Keep in mind, she’s talking to other Democrats mostly on the podcast!! No nuance at all, just “he didn’t do it”. Aaarrrgghhh….
Soprano2
@Matt McIrvin: I think that if TFG had handled Covid even half-competently he would have been hard to beat in 2020.
Baud
@Soprano2:
How did Eric Adams become mayor again?
ETA: I do wonder how many online liberal influencers are fairly comfortable blue state/blue city denizens who are are somewhat shielded from the outcomes of national elections.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: Maybe. Biden being at least half-competent at it hasn’t helped him that much, since the virus has gotten wilier and people want total magic solutions.
Soprano2
@Matt McIrvin: True, but they are different situations. Just imagine if TFG had been onboard with ramping up testing and even marginally supportive of other Covid measures, things could have been very different. His total resistance to doing anything about the worst crisis of his presidency contributed a lot to why he lost.
Soprano2
@Baud: My guess is A LOT. That’s a totally unscientific opinion based on what I see on Twitter. But you see it even here, where people are in denial about how upset people are about the effect inflation has had on their lives in the past year. When it costs twice as much to fill the tank each week now as it did last year, people notice that even if the press never said a word about it!
Uncle Cosmo
Immaterial. You, I & everyone here knows full well that Fux Noise will slice, dice & edit that response into a gotcha that makes the Administration sound senile and/or criminal. And their captive audience will swallow it hook, line & sinker.
Kay
@Soprano2:
Well, apparently he’s got another trial coming up where he allegedly hit someone at work and that person may be harder to portray as SCHEMING LIAR! :)
We’ll have to see how his “body language” plays out.
Soprano2
@Kay: The truth is a lot will depend on whether it’s heard by a judge only or by a jury.
Baud
@Soprano2:
What gets me about inflation is that the media tries to put the blame on Bidenm’s recovery checks, and I hear no one who supported giving people money having his back. I doubt the Dems will take the risk next time.
Also, inflation is a real story, but the media can still overdo it. The Today Show almost literally has the same inflation segment every morning.
debbie
@brantl:
Agreed. I’d bet the 1/6 riots totally fractured her belief system. How else to explain her behavior since then?
Elizabelle
@Tony Jay: Thank you! Because I do enjoy your pithier comments in threads. To the point of laughing out loud sometimes.
You haz a gift.
Geminid
@Baud: Adams, the Brooklyn Borough President, got 32 or 33% of 1st choice votes. He did best in the outer boroughs, worst in more liberal Manhattan. When all the ranked choice votes were allocated, Adams squeaked past former Sanitation Commissioner Kathy Garcia by (I believe) 8,000 votes.
This was New York City’s first use of ranked choice voting. Ironically, under the former system Adams would have faced a runoff because he did not exceed 40% of the primary vote. He might not have won that runoff.
trnc
Her response was fine, but I didn’t think she handed Doocy’s ass to him. I was expecting something more along the lines of “Do you honestly believe that the only reason people are thinking about the multiple mass shootings is because the president gave a speech about it?”
ian
@debbie:
Liz Cheney on defense lawyers working for detainees at Gitmo
https://www.politico.com/blogs/ben-smith/2010/03/cheney-group-questions-loyalty-of-justice-lawyers-025414
She can and will lie just like the rest of them. She’s on our side about J-6, and very little else.
Soprano2
@Baud: Totally agree with you on all of this. Whatever inflationary effect the pandemic benefit checks had is long since gone, and is irrelevant to what’s happening now, but it’s like their other favorite hobby horse “No one wants to work because the government gave them some money”. My particular hobby horse is how they almost completely ignore how oil companies are being open in the business press about how they’re suppressing production in order to drive up the price so investors will come back to them! They’re telling everyone “We’re keeping gas prices artificially high”, yet almost no one in the mainstream press even mentions this as a cause of high gas prices!!! It’s insane that it’s not the first thing they say in every story about this. I saw where someone pointed out that when oil was at the same price per barrel as it is now the last time, gas was around $3.20/gal! Other expenses haven’t gone up that much.
J R in WV
@Baud:
An excess profits tax for companies price gouging, raising retail prices while wholesale bulk prices are going down.
It is as bad as pharma companies raising the price of drugs necessary to keep customers alive!!! Killing to make a slightly higher profit, to boost annual profit sharing bonuses. Really ~!!~
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: I do think it’s entirely possible that electing Republicans will bring gas prices down and mitigate inflation for the same reason that handing your wallet to a mugger will keep you from getting shot.
“Vote for my people and I’ll stop hitting you” is a kind of pitch.
JPL
@Tony Jay: Thank you for all the information. A reporter for the Guardian said they expect him to eke out a win, but with considerably less power. If he does, he’ll probably ignore the margin and act like he’s king for a year.
JPL
@ian: I’m okay with that and never expected more. If she is replaced, it will be by a person who doesn’t believe in democracy.
MisterDancer
Agreed. When the bottom dropped out of the economy in 2008, there was wall-to-wall coverage making Obama look real good, and McCain…not so much.
Geminid
@Soprano2: I’ve also heard people say that oil industry executives know that high gas prices hurt a Democratic administration that wants to push the clean energy transition, and this provides more motivation to keep prices high. I think these people could be right.
Kay
My mother in law died this weekend. She was 96 and had a good life so no one should feel bad but I will miss her because she was funny. She had three husbands – outlived all three – and she wanted to be cremated and have the ashes interred with the 3rd husband (good choice!) but it’s 3000 dollars to do that so she wouldn’t pay. She told me to “sprinkle them around him” with a wave of her manicured hand so I had this picture where I would wear a big coat and just casually TIP the urn in my pocket and hope no one notices that I’m dribbling ashes. She fucking LOVED this idea, delighted at planning the crime, probably hoping I would get caught :)
She also stayed a Democrat even after she got rich (the husbands) and would happily spar with anyone in the nursing home about politics, at any time. She has a “Yankee” accent because she was raised in Connecticut and she’d be “you like your Medicare, though, don’t you?” That was the kill shot.
ian
@Soprano2: That thread was annoying. His first tweet storm said he couldn’t publish the information because ‘annoying legal reasons’. His second tweet storm on the same subject said he couldn’t publish because he was protecting victims. Either his rational changed very quickly, or else he considers protecting victims an annoying legal reason.
Tony Jay
@JPL:
Probably. OTOH, he’s just spent less than half an hour making his case to often hostile MPs and shocked quite a few onlookers by declaring (about the Partygate lawbreaking exposed by the Sue Grey report) that “I’d do it all again!”
This could go any way.
Matt McIrvin
@MisterDancer: I remember that at one point Obama and McCain both went to the White House for an emergency summit about the financial crisis, and Obama rattled off all these things he was planning to do, turned to McCain and said “so what’s your plan?”
All McCain really had was this stunt where he’d meaninglessly “suspended his campaign”. Not a good look.
He was coming off a post-convention bounce where for a fleeting moment, when Sarah Palin had been the new shiny focus of attention, he’d actually been beating Obama in some polls. That did not last long.
Baud
@Geminid:
Those are the numbers. The question is why the “messaging” didn’t work for his competitors.
Baud
@Kay:
My condolences.
JPL
@Tony Jay: Ha..
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Gas prices will go down even if Dems pull out a miraculous victory. Supply and demand will stabilize.
debbie
@ian:
Also agree, but at the moment, my concern is J/6. She’s welcome to return to being an asshole after that; in fact, I expect her to be.
rikyrah
@Elizabelle:
THIS
People whining about why we should support 46…
YOU ARE PHUCKING ALIVE.
He made testing and vaccines available on practically every other corner in this country….
and, you don’t think your LIFE is worth a vote for him?
debbie
@Kay:
Your MiL sounds like she was a great person. Expected or not, I’m sorry for your and your family’s loss.
Villago Delenda Est
Doochy is Reek without the heroic ending of Theon Greyjoy.
Kay
@Baud:
People were a little afraid of her because she could be really cutting, but it was all kind of an act. Last Thanksgiving the nursing home didn’t have enough staff to do a sit down dinner for Thanksgiving and she wouldn’t go to the buffet so she called me to tell me she was having a “handful of Cheezits” for dinner. I told her “have a whole bowl! It’s Thanksgiving!” and she laughed. She was not really committed to Queenhood.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay: Dang, she was a delight. I know you’ll miss her, but she did live a very good and long life.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Maybe you’re right and nothing can be done. I don’t think that’s true, but it’s just an opinion.
Immanentize
@Kay:
Perhaps, maybe you yourself learned a thing or two from her? Perhaps?
I can tell she will live on in the retellings.
satby
@Tony Jay: uh, no. Every time you put up a comment like that my reaction is “edit please” and I skip it.
Elizabelle
@Kay: Godspeed to your mother in law. Wonderful woman. My condolences to all of you.
Glad she got to see the grands, and the great grands.
Matt McIrvin
@Brachiator: I think it’s an overreaction to literal decades of economic reporting that acted as if inflation was a serious looming problem when it was simply not happening. (I remember my libertarian friends crowing about how Zimbabwe-level hyperinflation was around the corner, or was even actually currently going on, during the Great Recession recovery. It was simply not an issue. But the prices of some goods went up and it was possible to point to them and say it was general inflation.)
Now it is happening. The situation on the ground is different. That said, we’re not in a 1970s stagflation situation where all the traditional tools to control it have failed–they haven’t really been engaged yet. The Fed has only just started to hike interest rates.
Tony Jay
@satby:
And that’s fine. It’s not an exam text.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
It’s a possibility, which is why I don’t get mad at the Dems for not finding the secret sauce of messaging that will woo over everyone who is wooable.
During Obama, the critique was always “why aren’t Dems winning with working class whites?!” Trump showed us why. Winning them over was never really in the cards and won’t be absent a major cultural shift
ETA: It’d be one thing if the messaging reflected an undesireable policy shift – like promoting states rights on voting rules or something crazy like that. But usually the criticism is about style rather than substance.
satby
@Kay: Condolences to you, your husband, family, and all who loved her.
satby
@Tony Jay: yeah, because exam texts are concise.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: I’ve said for a while that we know the messaging secret sauce that will win elections. It’s not a secret at all. The problem is, it’s basically to become the Klan. We mustn’t do it.
Betty Cracker
@Kay: She sounds like a character in the best sense. A great mother-in-law is a rare blessing. Sorry you lost yours.
Tony Jay
@satby:
Uh Huh. Okay then. Thanks for the clarification.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: I’d guess something like 1/3 of the country is unwinnable, but I think we could do a better job of correcting the view of tens of millions who think it’s pointless to vote.
Villago Delenda Est
@Matt McIrvin: Libertarians are dipshits who talk about the “Free Market” but have never read that book about it by some obscure 18th Century Scotsman.
Elizabelle
@Betty Cracker: There you go.
And many are people who would be sympathetic to Democrats, but they are low information and not avidly following the news. They see all the shit-tastic and noninformative headlines and soundbites.
This describes my neighbor’s boyfriend. And we are working on him! Committed to it!
Elizabelle
@Villago Delenda Est: He was the answer to a recent New Yorker crossword puzzle clue.
Betty Cracker
@Tony Jay: FWIW, I enjoy your long comments and posts. Very funny stuff and educational too for those of us who follow UK politics casually. I’ve quoted you in real life!
Betty Cracker
@Elizabelle: Good for you — it’s so important to reach out to folks you know like that. I try to do that too and have had some success at it. Other times, not so much, but it’s important to try.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
We can always do a better job. I guess the question is, do all the liberals on social media and elsewhere who debate the ins and outs of Dem messaging, whether to criticize of defend, have any influence on the public’s perception of Democrats and, if so, is that influence positive or negative? (There’s a whole other level one could consider relating to the emotive content of the debate, apart from the substantive discussion).
I can’t tell what the effect is because I’m a committed voter regardless. All I know is I have a negative reaction to it, and I find it jarringly out of step with our dire warnings of the fascist threat that the GOP poses to this country.
Elizabelle
@Betty Cracker: Incidentally, one reason I love Balloon Juice is jackals putting up links to well written stories that inform readers.
Keeping a list of good articles for reachable low information voters. If not about Democrats per se: this is what actually went on with Abbott Labs. (Additional Hint: we should allow import of EU-approved baby formula — the EU has stricter standards. That could be a lightbulb moment.)
This is why we are seeing inflation. Worldwide. In accessible language.
This is what Europeans get for the higher taxes they pay. Does it look good to you?
Etc. etc. etc.
Remove the curtain from the corporate-friendly MSM screaming “baby formula shortage! Inflation! Taxes! Oh noes!”
Geminid
@Baud: I remember a poll taken in the runup to the NYC primary. Violent crime was the leading problem cited by potential voters. Adams emphasized the need to clamp down on rising violent crime, and did best in Black and Latino neighborhoods. These voters may not have believed Garcia and Maya Wiley would be as effective as Adams, a retired police captain.
I sometimes follow “Mr. Weeks,” @WonderKing82 on Twitter. He’s a school counselor in the Bronx, a gay Black man who went away to school at Hampton University and then returned home. By then he had lost his estranged father to gun violence, and one of his brothers had been severely wounded.
When the subject of “Defund the Police” came up again a couple months ago, “Mr. Weeks’s” emphatic opinion was that this slogan was rejected by the larger Black community. He also said that he believed that Maya Wiley would have been a very good Mayor and was his first choice, but that when she started talking about defunding police he knew she would lose.
Elizabelle
@Geminid: Yeah. “Defund the Police” was a fucking nightmare.
Refocus the police: you might be getting somewhere.
BC in Illinois
Sixty-some years ago, I read JFK’s Profiles in Courage. I had to go back to the bookshelves to see who he (and his co-writers) held up for admiration. The one paragraph I have always remembered is the example of Congressman John Steven McGroarty of California, who wrote a constituent in 1934:
cmorenc
@Brachiator:
If “stronger together” is effective progressive sloganeering, then why is it so common to come across RW people prominently flying “MAGA” banners and flags at their houses, whereas it’s vanishingly rare to come across any progressive people flyinlg “stronger together banners or flags at their houses? OTOH, you are correct that many people did fly “Bernie” banners, signs etc at their house. The problem with “stronger together” isn’t that it doesn’t concisely represent a key concept, but rather that it doesn’t seem to evoke people’s passions on a visceral level.
As important as the concept of working/building for the common good is (which is the key notion under “build stronger together”), we haven’t found a pithy way to express it that packs a visceral emotional punch. It’s frustrating that by contrast, the simple “Bernie” DID viscerally work so effectively for a lot of progressives, but the key thing here isn’t accuracy or complexity or logic, but what actually reaches people on a visceral level, even if it’s glibly simplisitc.
Baud
@Geminid:
I’ll assume most of the candidates (not Yang) would have made decent mayors. I think the point is that messaging, especially for a diverse coalition, is hard, even in a place like NYC.
Baud
@cmorenc:
The answer is that the Dems aren’t a cult. I don’t think there were “New Deal” banners being put up outside of maybe election season.
Tony Jay
@Betty Cracker:
Cheers, Betty. That’s quite something coming from the blog’s resident snarktastic wordsmith.
I’m not put out at all by Elizabelle’s comment, btw, it’s a perfectly rational response to glaze over at the Wall of Text approach, never guessing that it really has been edited down to only the most salient points (and dick jokes). She’s not to know that she’s missing a dragon’s horde of wonders within. /s
JPL
@Tony Jay: So what’s happening now?
Elizabelle
@Tony Jay: See, I read that one. LOL.
Citizen Alan
@Matt McIrvin:
My favorite song lyric from Evita:
” We have ways of making you vote for us. We have ways of making you abstain.”
O. Felix Culpa
Biden used Build Back Better. Not my fave slogan, but he won, which is a reasonable measure of success. Dems might not be the in-your-face, flag-flying types, so I’m hesitant to use waving cloth as a meaningful indicator.
What do you think would work viscerally for Dems and–especially–low info normies
ETA: Matt M’s point at #311 is well-taken. The most typical left-leaning banner and signs I’ve seen are rainbow, BLM, “Immigrants are welcome here,” and similar messages. Issues and supporting “out groups” seem to be the most visible motivators for our crowd.
Kay
@Immanentize:
A deliberately, maliciously bad cook. My husband would be “this is…inedible” and I would tell him “stop making her cook. She likes restaurants. Obviously. She wants an old fashioned and some peanuts for dinner” :)
Matt McIrvin
@cmorenc: The progressive-aligned banners I see people flying most often have been “Black Lives Matter” and rainbow flags. It seems like justice for marginalized groups really is a motivator, even if it’s pure “virtue signaling” as the other side says. It’s less vague than a general statement of collective striving, I suppose.
O. Felix Culpa
@Kay: LOL. I like her and can see why you’ll miss her. Condolences to you, your family, and all her friends.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: But we are motivated to that kind of signaling by campaigns for the rights of marginalized people. e.g. “Black Lives Matter”, LGBT-rights flags. It’s the thing that does it for liberals. That’s also another reason why we can’t actually go full bigot to recapture some sector of white people.
Soprano2
@Matt McIrvin: If TFG had been re-elected, Saudi would be doing whatever they had to in order to keep gas prices low. Of this I am sure.
Tony Jay
@Elizabelle:
Ha! I do listen!
But I warn you in advance, if they vote that grotesque lamprey out tonight I’m going to post over 10,000 words and they’ll all be joyfully obscene.
Soprano2
@Geminid: I think that could be part of it also, but mostly I believe they lost a bunch of money and investors in 2020, and are trying to make that money back and lure investors back. They don’t care how much damage they do to the economy in order to get what they want.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: Yeah, I was thinking of how gas prices actually stayed low for a while after 9/11 while Bush was doing his warring, because he’d specifically gotten the Saudi monarchy to play ball. Of course that offer didn’t last forever.
However, the situation has actually changed a bit since the US isn’t as dependent on foreign crude as it used to be–the Saudis have less of a lever than they used to.
O. Felix Culpa
@Tony Jay: Hehe. If that happens, and you do write your celebratory, logorrheic tome, I promise to read–and relish–every word. ;)
Geminid
@Elizabelle: I respect the learned experience of the activists who coined the slogan, and there is some merit to their presription. It was unwise, though, for some politicians to simply take it up and amplify it.
One of these was New York State Senator Allesandra(sp?) Biaggi, a very “progressive” politician. I read that when she decided to run for Congress this year, Biaggi scrubbed her Twitter account to eliminate references to the slogan. There probably are screenshots, though, that will be used against her in her campaign against incumbent Sean Patrick Maloney in the 17th CD.
Tony Jay
@JPL:
Tory MPs are voting. We’ll know how they voted in a couple of hours.
JPL
New York Times Pitchbot
@DougJBalloon
Many political observers say that UK voters have turned decisively against Boris Johnson. But in this Mayfair private members’ club, they aren’t so sure.
rikyrah
@Tony Jay:
I wish that BJ would do a regular with you
Dispatches from TJ from across the ocean.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@O. Felix Culpa:
Those headlines might not be things we want to see, but it’s still news and it’s happening. It’s real
Gasoline at some stations where I live has hit over $5/gal. That’s insane! What’s the government planning on doing to fix this?
Gravenstone
@UncleEbeneezer: It’ll just be another day ending in -y. This place has its share, but some other sites, like TPM are just awash in the “woe are we, for we are doomed by Garland the Meek” crowd. So fucking tiresome, and no handy ignore feature like our beloved pie filter.
rikyrah
@Kay:
She sounds like a fun lady. Still, my condolences.
O. Felix Culpa
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
The problem is in the framing, which actively and intentionally shapes reality and the perception of what’s real. But you already know that.
ETA: I understand that you have a vacation coming up and that you’re concerned about November election outcomes. Here’s the link to Tim Ryan’s volunteer sign-up page. You might consider helping out with his campaign. He has a reasonable chance of winning and your work, however much or little, might just help tip the balance in his favor.
Elizabelle
@Tony Jay: Fine by me! Just provide us slackers with an Executive Summary.
About a Brexecutive. Who got pantsed.
rivers
@Betty Cracker: I’m with Betty. A Tony Jay comment whittled down to the bone would be someone else’s comment entirely. I love the overstuffed sentences because the stuffing is so tasty. Keep rambling, Tony!
Elizabelle
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Take away all of our cars?
MisterDancer
We don’t. I think “Dem messaging” is a thing we can debate because it’s a situation everyone feels we can wrap our minds around. There’s a strong and growing desire to have some amount of control, of input, on an situation that looks more and more out of our control — and “hey, go say it this way and we’ll do better!” is one of the bigger ones.
Yet the situation is far more complex. For one: The Conservative Movement can pay for people to figure out slogans full-time, and that’s been true since before the World Wide Web was a thing. Someone (you?) posted an article with other reasons.
Or, on the flip side — can anyone who has a Democratic Senator, tell me the campaign motto for their last election? What Abrams’ motto when she ran last time was? What her motto this time ’round, is?
I’ve got GOP Senators; I have no idea what their mottos were.
But I know full well what they stand for. And in a polarized environment, that’s what matters. “Messaging” only matters in the margins, and only if you have the grassroots+ funds to get that message out. If you don’t, your awesome campaign motto is useless.
Soprano2
@Kay: She sounds like a delightfully fun person. Condolences to you all for her loss.
Soprano2
@Matt McIrvin: I know, but if they really turned on the spigot the price would come down.
Elizabelle
@Kay:
I would be so happy if that turns out to be the secret to a long (and cognitively aware) life.
It might not be that far off. Consume your main meal earlier in the day. Enjoy every cocktail. And peanut.
Paul in KY
@Betty Cracker: Tony, I’m cool with them too. You have a wonderful way with descriptive insults.
NotMax
‘@raven
And trekked back to where the bulk of the remaining Rangers were gathered in order to restock on grenades, then back again to the artillery!
Chilling that in aerial views of today (well, several years ago when the film was made), although now covered in grass and shrubs the area still resembles nothing so much as a (green) moonscape.
Anyway
@Tony Jay:
I’m still shocked that they edited out the boos from later TV coverage. I don’t expect much integrity from political media but that seems so brazen — when there were so many witnesses to BoJo’s pantsing …
Paul in KY
@cmorenc: ‘Death to MAGA Scum’ works for me. Maybe too pointed, though.
O. Felix Culpa
@Paul in KY:
“Lock MAGA Up,” if death seems a tad harsh?
raven
@NotMax: I saw some doc where they were able to take drones with some kind of scanning device, fly over the area and, on the images, strip away layers of earth and find emplacements
Hidden Side of the D-Day Invasion Revealed by LIDAR Drones Smithsonian Channel
Ahead of D-Day, the Normandy coast was bristling with German defenses, now obscured beneath 75 year’s worth of vegetation. Now archeological teams are using LIDAR drones to uncover these hidden sites.
Villago Delenda Est
@Tony Jay:
Tony, you slay me.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Elizabelle:
Wasn’t there a deal with OPEC to increase oil production to bring prices down? What happened with that? I’m aware it won’t change things overnight
Baud
@Matt McIrvin: True, our side tends to have more people who go all out on specific issues, rather than identifying with the political party per se. I’m personally not very demonstrative, even when it comes to issues.
NotMax
‘@raven
Ground penetrating radar?
Years ago came across a whole bunch o’ pix using that tech in aerial photography done over some sites in Egypt which revealed tantalizing clues to what lay beneath.
Betty Cracker
@Baud:
My guess is it’s a wash: the Dems on social media who complain about the Dems full time, and the Dems on social media who focus on shutting the former group down. I think they might zero each other out. Or maybe it’s just me who finds them both annoying.
Geminid
@MisterDancer: You are right on these points. But as it happens, I do know Stacey Abrams’ campaign motto or theme this time: “One Georgia.” I think it’s a good one, especially in the way she uses the theme as a pivot to her proposals to better all Georgians’ lives.
Ruckus
@Matt McIrvin:
The people want magic fixes because they do not want to be bothered by anything that gets in their way. They don’t want to do the work of being a democracy. They like the idea but not the effort it takes. OTOH the right wants everything turned back a couple hundred years, without touching their bank accounts, so that they don’t have to give up anything – hate, racism, money, guns (Which they seem to like because they can’t actually earn anything so they think they need guns to insure that whatever they steal they can keep – I’m not being very charitable at the moment.)
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
I find the nature of that debate annoying, but I do have a preferred side and I’m glad some people are putting in the effort to push back.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@O. Felix Culpa:
I don’t know about Ryan. I don’t appreciate his China-baiting he’s done on this campaign, even if I strongly dislike the CCP. Obviously, he’s better than any Republican. I’m not certain he can win. I don’t think he has the name recognition that Sherrod Brown has and he’s also not running in a cycle that favors Dems as much as 2018 did, where nearly all statewide Dems lost, aside from Brown and an OSU justice candidat
I suppose I see your point about framing, but then how do we know the situation isn’t just that dire and the coverage reflects that?
Baud
@NotMax:
Aliens?
germy shoemangler
I see stuff like this in local media and I wonder if local conservatives appreciate it. I know I do.
Thank you President Biden and Democrats.
O. Felix Culpa
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
So you’re not going to support the credible Democrat running for Ohio Senator because quibbles about China policy? Oh, and he might not win? Best not do anything to make a difference, for sure.
I hope that not all Ohio Dems choose preemptive defeat.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@O. Felix Culpa:
No, I’m going to support him anyway, by donating money and voting for him this November. I’m just not confident he’s going to win based on history and the general mood of where things are
NotMax
‘@raven
May have since been removed but when in Scotland during the mid-1970s the beach at Stonehaven (outside Aberdeen) was still replete with hedgehog tank traps.
Geminid
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Is Tim Ryan really China baiting? I’ve only seen one of his ads referencing China, and he seemed to invoke China more as a challenge than a threat. His point was that Ohioans needed to invest in their state’s human capital as well as its infrastructure to compete in the 21st century, which I think is true.
I would add that playing even a small active role in the Ryan and/or Whaley campaign would be to the benefit of your community but just as importantly to yourself.
O. Felix Culpa
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
One doesn’t have to be confident about outcomes to volunteer. First, the work might help change the hypothetical outcome. Second, it might lay the groundwork for future victories.
Fighting for democracy under threat requires more than a little cash and a vote, as good as those things are. Consider writing postcards to voters in your spare time if you’re not comfortable with door-knocking or phone calling (which I don’t enjoy either). Campaigns also need help with reminding volunteers about their schedule commitments, providing snacks, putting up signs, etc. It can be a fun activity and a way to meet like-minded people. I encourage you to try it. Beats helpless worrying by a mile.
Tazj
@Baud: People who wanted Biden to give people money wanted more money given out and they’ve moved on to other criticisms of Biden. He didn’t pass BBB, he needs to forgive more loans, he’s not strong enough in reaction to the Republican assaults on reproductive rights, etc. I do understand the criticisms and many times this can result in action by the administration but I don’t know now.
Today on a pop radio station I listen to in the morning they were talking about the gas prices again. Fine,that effects everyone. But then they added people are starting to connect the dots ever since Biden became president gas prices have sky rocketed. Really? Biden raised worldwide gas prices? And NPR is relentless on their coverage of a coming recession and how Presidents never fair well during these times.
What’s the Republican solution. Rick Scott has terrible ones but the press acts like he’s not a member of the party. McConnell says he won’t say until they win and they let him get away with it.
I’m so sick of everything right now.
Villago Delenda Est
@Baud: What they should do is tax at 100% all income, earned or unearned, of Awl Cumpny Execs.
Tony Jay
You’re all very kind.
@Anyway:
And the maddening thing, by today they’d segued right past their pro-Flobby editing decision and we’re using the original footage to batter Tory Ministers who denied Johnson’s unpopularity.
Part of me actually wanted Dominic Raab to turn around and say straight to Victoria Derbyshire “I don’t recognise that footage. The BBC reports I saw had cheering. Are you saying your fellow BBC journalists deceptively edited a news report?”
But it’s Raab. Remembering not to look straight into the sun is the limit of his mental capacity.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Baud:
All of that money probably didn’t help. Is it the sole cause? No, but in combination with zero interest rates and unprecedented QE. Inflation is often caused by too much money chasing too few goods and services. That’s what is happening now, with supply chain disruptions, which I’ve read aren’t likely to be resolved anytime soon. The increasing costs of diesel fuel will only contribute to price increases, which are squeezing many people. Unfortunately, this forces the Fed to raise interest rates and do QT, likely resulting in a recession sometime next year
Soprano2
Here’s Matt Bai, telling Democrats it’ll be a blessing if they lose the midterms. Aaarrrggghhhhh……does anyone tell Republicans it’s a blessing when they lose?
lowtechcyclist
@UncleEbeneezer:
You’re absolutely right, but how do you get people to turn out in a midterm to do that? Just tell them “elect more Dems”?
You don’t need to give me a reason to vote: I haven’t skipped an election in decades. But the thing about midterms is that a lot of people who voted in the most recent Presidential election don’t show up for the midterm. And a lot of them are people who are all but certain to vote Dem – IF they vote.
I don’t claim to have the secret sauce to get those people to the polls this November. But I’d think one key ingredient in that sauce would be to make sure they know what’s riding on it.
O. Felix Culpa
@lowtechcyclist:
Vote or Die? A little stark, but the truth.
Elizabelle
@Soprano2:
And Bai had to type it with one hand, too. Fucker.
Why yes. He is a white male. A Jeff Bezos lookalike, in fact. Why do we ask?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@O. Felix Culpa:
I might do those postcards, thanks : )
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: “It’ll actually be better for us if we lose this one” is a thing I have heard some genius come up with in EVERY. SINGLE. ELECTION. CYCLE since I started paying attention.
I don’t think conservatives have this concept–they do know that winning is winning and losing is losing.
Matt McIrvin
@Tazj: The Republican mythology is that it’s the fault of environmental moves by the Biden admin–killing Keystone XL, not drilling in nature reserves, whatever. DRILL BABY DRILL will fix it. You can explain until you’re blue in the face that it doesn’t work that way but the dots sound superficially connectable.
NotMax
‘@Matt McIrvin
That last part, not so much now.
//
NotMax
‘@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
“There is no
trymight, there is only do.”– Blue Yoda
;)
O. Felix Culpa
@NotMax:
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
‘@NotMax:
@O. Felix Culpa:
No thumbs up for me? ; )
Zelma
@Tony Jay:
I too love your long posts. Really give me a feel for the horrible cast of characters that comprises Boris’s administration. I always wonder if there are any competent people who could form a semi-sane government. Or have the Tories gone the way of the GQP?
O. Felix Culpa
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): For sure, when you do.
StringOnAStick
@Tony Jay: Hey, I’ve learned so much from you about how the British government and elections work, don’t start holding back now! If it’s too long for some people, they can scroll past.
Tony Jay
@Zelma:
There are not. If they were decent, they would’t be Tories, and if they tried to be decent, they wouldn’t stay Tories. And while they don’t have a Q-anon conspiracy to cling to, Brextremism fills that hole quite nicely.
UncleEbeneezer
@lowtechcyclist: I think the best move might honestly be “Want more Trump? Because that’s what you’re gonna get if the GOP controls Congress and State Govs/AG’s etc. come 2024.”
Everyone who voted, volunteered etc. in 2020 to get Trump out of the White House needs to find that same energy for 2022, because the GOP has made it quite clear that they intend to burn it all down to try and rig elections to get him back in power in 2024.
Tony Jay
@StringOnAStick:
Oh they’re never going to get shorter, but I’ll certainly consider an index of bullet points for those who don’t spend that long on the loo.
karen marie
@Starfish: That is rank bullshit. Both Heard and Depp are garbage fires. Heard lost because it’s obvious she was looking to make a career of playing victim. In a just world, that career path would now be barred to her. Unfortunately, that’s not the case.
Another Scott
@Tony Jay:
Here’s hoping this part of the nightmare is over soon.
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@karen marie:
Umm. That’s not what the UK court found.
You might want to read this:
NCADV Appalled by Depp/Heard Verdict, Concerned for Future of #MeToo and #SurvivorSpeaks
Another Scott
@Another Scott: Well, so much for that.
Sorry Tony Jay (and all the sensible people in the UK). Here’s hoping that the monsters rue the day.
Grr…,
Scott.
Soprano2
@Matt McIrvin: The ultimate in stupidity for that argument was the one about how it might be better for Democrats if TFG won in 2016 for stupid reasons. I knew that was an idiotic argument; I could tell he was dangerous right away. I couldn’t believe ANYONE could seriously make that argument.
Soprano2
@Matt McIrvin: I’ve started asking them how much more oil we would have if the extension of Keystone was 50% completed at this point. PIPELINES DON’T PRODUCE OIL, IDIOTS!! I want to shout.
Soprano2
@karen marie: And yet somehow when a judge in the U.K. looked at the same facts, he ruled for her, and it wasn’t even close. You’ve been duped.
Geminid
@Soprano2: That was a very misleading op-ed. Charitably, Bai just wanted to get something published. Less charitably, Bai was trying to stir up strife among Democrats, tossing in a crabapple of discord.
Another Scott
@O. Felix Culpa: I donate to ProPublica.org (they do great long-form investigations) and support my local NPR station because they have a good local news desk.
I don’t know about traditional newspapers anymore.
McClatchy had an excellent reputation, but I don’t know if they’re local to you or if they’re who they used to be.
Cheers,
Scott.
SWMBO
@Tony Jay: @Tony Jay:
I confess I really enjoy your screeds. Short or long. (I prefer the long ones actually.) Please don’t let the snarling jackals of Balloon Juice inhibit you. If they don’t want to read them, they can scroll past. I do want to read them. All of it.
Tony Jay
@SWMBO:
Believe me, all rumours of my pithyness have been greatly exaggerated.
There’s just sooooo much to get ranty about.
J R in WV
@satby:
I actually really enjoy Tony’s rants about Alexander Boris de Piffle Johnson…
By the way, Tony, did you know that in the American countryside one’s Johnson is one’s penis? Prime Minister de PIffle Penis~!!~
Tony Jay
@J R in WV:
I did know that! I’ve always found it really fitting for the flaccid whale-foreskin.
Also, whalers used to pull off whale foreskins, turn them inside out and wear them as waterproof jumpers.
Do with that fact what you will. 8-)
Liminal Owl
@debbie: > Thanks, Debbie. I will. My thoughts, such as they are, may be short enough to post in an open thread here.