Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

Whatever happens next week, the fight doesn’t end.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

Republicans don’t trust women.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

In after Baud. Damn.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

The words do not have to be perfect.

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

Joe Lieberman disappointingly reemerged to remind us that he’s still alive.

This really is a full service blog.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

This blog will pay for itself.

In short, I come down firmly on all sides of the issue.

DeSantis transforms Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

The revolution will be supervised.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

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Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Plugging Away

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Test 2:   Potus at AFLCIO

Reader Interactions

217Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    I’m a little cynical when it comes to labor, but I appreciate Biden putting in the effort.

  2. 2.

    debbie

    “Look, I believe in bipartisanship, but I have no illusions about this Republican Party, the MAGA party.

    Jesus, finally.

  5. 5.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Baud: yeah, whenever I hear “Democrats abandoned labor”, I think somebody’s got subject and object backwards, at least with the (white guys in) hard hats that most pundits are thinking of when they talk about “labor”

    also, in inflation fighting news:

    Phil Mattingly @Phil_Mattingly 1
    Pres. Biden sends letters to 7 major oil refiners – an area of intense focus at the WH due to capacity issues.
    -Energy Sec will convene emergency meeting
    -Companies asked to provide reasons for reduced refining capacity and “any concrete ideas” to address issues

    Matthew Yglesias @mattyglesias 1h
    New White House letter makes several good points:
    — Rise in gas price much higher than rise in oil price
    — Gas explained by the decline in refinery capacity that happened under Trump
    — Calls on refining industry to say what it needs to reverse course

  7. 7.

    debbie

    @Baud:

    Labor may not be the major force it was previously, but there’s still plenty of votes there

    ETA: I agree Biden’s their best president.

  8. 8.

    JPL

    OT The NYTimes had an article about Herschel’s secret child, but because they are the NYTimes they did point out that Senator Warnock’s wife wanted to recalculate child support.   Both sides you all!!

  9. 9.

    Baud

    @debbie: 

    Right. Dems and Labir attached at the hip. No question. I’m just saying Labor as a whole hasn’t lived up to its full potential when it comes to political power. Maybe that’ll change, but I haven’t seen much evidence except a few glimmers here and there.

  11. 11.

    Geminid

    @Baud: Political power is very fragmented these days. Organized Labor is one of the larger fragments and its numbers can give it substantial grass-roots organizing clout, even if unions can’t neccesarily deliver all their own members.

    I recall the November 1, 2020 Politico article, “Inside the machine to turn out Latinos-and turn Arizona Blue.” It described a campaign to register and mobilize Latino voters. Its volunteers had visited hundreds of thousands of homes in Latino neighborhoods. This was a coalition of community groups and labor unions, and it may well have made the difference in Joe Biden and Mark Kelly’s victories in Arizona.

  12. 12.

    Baud

    @Geminid:

    Political power is very fragmented these days. Organized Labor is one of the larger fragments

     

    Agree. Compared to other parts of the Dem coalition, Labor is one of the stronger forces. When it comes to the U.S. as a whole, I feel like Labor underperforms. I don’t have hard evidence, obviously. It’s just a sense.

  14. 14.

    Ken

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Just yesterday I was thinking how we’re continually fed the message that capitalism is good and government shouldn’t interfere with the markets.  Until capitalism does what it does, and then the same people are asking why the government doesn’t intervene in the markets.

    I was thinking of it in the context of baby food, but gas prices works too.

  15. 15.

    sdhays

    @JPL: Hershel Walker claims he was an FBI agent and police officer, except he hasn’t ever been either of those things, but Warnock misspelled something in a memo (probably) so, you know, both sides.

    I’m waiting for Walker to tell us about his trip to Mars before the end of this race.

  19. 19.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Some good news

    Christy Walsh @ChristyWalshDC 17h
    Great news out of Texas today. Renewables keeping the lights on and AC running during the heat wave.

    Wind and solar power are ‘bailing out’ Texas amid record heat and energy demand
    But unlike previous extreme weather events in Texas which led to deadly blackouts, the grid is holding up remarkably well this week. Several experts told CNN that it’s owed in large part to strong performances from wind and solar, which generated 27 gigawatts of electricity during Sunday’s peak demand – close to 40% of the total needed.

  27. 27.

    Immanentize

    @Baud: Regan divided labor (or maybe it was Nixon?) The very fact that the AFL which was a conservative pro-white laborer branch of the UAW is now a partner to the anti-racist, (more) progressive CIO is like a Janus coin.

    The power is there to be tapped. But the consensus is not.

  30. 30.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: In my experience, Labor goes with whoever brings home the bacon. They endorsed Blunt every time he ran because he was always putting Misery in for big federal projects. It didn’t matter that the GOP was trying time and again to turn Misery into a Right to Work for less state.

  31. 31.

    Geminid

    @Baud: The midterms should be a good test of organized labor’s political capabilities, at least in states and districts where unions are strong.

    Dina Titus, for instance, will need labor’s help to be reelected in the redrawn Nevada 1st CD. Marcy Kaptur (OH) is now in a R+3 district, and I think unions will play an important role in her campaign.. Someone in Kaptur’s district could give a more knowledgable opinion on this.

    Labor can potentially make substantial contributions in the Senate campaigns of Catherine Cortez-Masto, John Fetterman, and Tim Ryan. We’ll be able to better gauge labor’s impact after the next few months.

  33. 33.

    Jeffro

    So…who wants to talk about Lauren Boebert and Ted Cruz?

    I said “talk about”, not “think about”.

  34. 34.

    Immanentize

    @Baud: GOP = CTE?

    Really not too far off. A few COVID denier-to-the-end brain dissections might tell a story?

  36. 36.

    debbie

    @Jeffro:

    Over on Twitter, it’s thought the same group that ended Cawthorne’s career is behind this Boebert/Cruz stuff.

  37. 37.

    Immanentize

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: My inlaws moved to a house in a subdivision west of Sugarland (which is southwest of Houston). The HOA had lots of stuff, but included was — roofing must be black and no rooftop (or yard) solar allowed. That is insane, but the deal with the oil boys was solid.

  38. 38.

    OzarkHillbilly

    New data has revealed extraordinary rates of global heating in the Arctic, up to seven times faster than the global average.

    The heating is occurring in the North Barents Sea, a region where fast rising temperatures are suspected to trigger increases in extreme weather in North America, Europe and Asia. The researchers said the heating in this region was an “early warning” of what could happen across the rest of the Arctic.

    The new figures show annual average temperatures in the area are rising across the year by up to 2.7C a decade, with particularly high rises in the months of autumn of up to 4C a decade. This makes the North Barents Sea and its islands the fastest warming place known on Earth.

    Recent years have seen temperatures far above average recorded in the Arctic, with seasoned observers describing the situation as “crazy”, “weird”, and “simply shocking”. Some climate scientists have warned the unprecedented events could signal faster and more abrupt climate breakdown.

    It was already known that the climate crisis was driving heating across the Arctic three times faster than the global average, but the new research shows the situation is even more extreme in places.

    Those Chinese are really going to far with this global climate change hoax.

  39. 39.

    eversor

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    An issue with labor is that the jobs are very stratified by ethnicity/race/sex.   So one sector union can have nothing culturally in common with another.  There really isn’t any solidarity between unions.  It’s each service sector scrapping for their own slice and many unions are staunchly socially conservative and culture will always decide votes before economics.

    One of the strengths of organizing a union for say Amazon warehouse workers is that doesn’t really apply.   It’s a fairly diverse group and while they are all doing different things they are all stuck in the same facility together.   Ditto for a possible Tesla union or Starbucks.

    I get the feeling the reason Bezos, Musk, Schultz are all so massively anti union (outside the normal reasons) is they see the diversity of job work and workers they have and realize if one of them falls the jig is up and things could turn around.

  41. 41.

    Kent

    @Baud: Some of the industrial unions have been pretty disappointing as of late, and too damn MAGA-curious frankly.

    But Labor is larger than that. The teacher’s unions have been pretty damn loyal, for example. Despite being pretty betrayed by the Obama Administration with the selection and regime of Arne Duncan who was a complete horror frankly. With all the promotion of the charter school fraudsters.

    Around here it is the teacher’s unions that often get candidates over the bar. In my county there isn’t much else

  42. 42.

    Kay

    @Baud: 

    Their great strength as an ally is they are pragmatic. They know what they want and they are less likely than other D groups to collapse into infighting, because they have a heirarchy- a structure- within labor unions and they elect their own leaders. It’s a negotiation and you have to be comfortable with that to work with them. You won’t get everything you want- they don’t focus on a lot of our issues and don’t pretend to- but you’ll get a lot. They can be great on imposing discipline on the rest of the groups when there’s something they want and they think D groups are dragging it off track. So like a minimum wage ballot initiative. It isn’t going to be voting rights, womens rights and minimum wage. It’s going to be minimum wage. That makes people mad sometimes.

  44. 44.

    Ken

    I feel so virtuous. I got my vote-by-mail primary ballot yesterday, and actually sat down and researched the candidates as I voted.  Well, for those few races with more than one.  Now I just have to remember to mail it sometime in the next week.

  47. 47.

    Baud

    @Kent: Right.  My observation is about labor as a whole, at the 50,000 level where the unevenness gets smoothed out.

  48. 48.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    If these 100+ degree days don’t convince them climate change is real, what will for chrissakes? There are neighborhoods here who have had their power cut off which won’t be restored until Friday.

  51. 51.

    Ken

    @debbie: ended Cawthorne’s career

    I heard about the videos and such here on BJ, but I missed the part about his career ending. Did he resign? Lose a primary?

    (I suppose I could google it, but that might serve up his picture, and I’m working on my blood pressure.)

  56. 56.

    Immanentize

    @Kent: The SEIU is big and growing in the Northeast. I think they took some hits in COVID as a lot of their peeps were laid off in the service industry. But it seems they are having a bit of a (quiet) resurgence in this tight back-to-business recovery.

  59. 59.

    Immanentize

    @Kay: I am hoping Marty Walsh, who totally speaks the language of labor, can find out what issue that is right now and get labor into the 2022 game.

  63. 63.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    one of Obama’s campaign gurus said the UAW kept Ohio and possibly MI in his column in 2012 due to the rescue of the auto industry and “Let Detroit Go Bankrupt”

  64. 64.

    Ken

    @debbie: I assume that’s the end of his Congressional career.

    On to the Senate! Or perhaps a lifetime appointment as a judge somewhere.

  65. 65.

    debbie

    @zhena gogolia:

    I’ve never heard of this PAC, but they apparently were behind Cawthorne’s misfortunes:

    BREAKING: The American Muckrackers PAC alleges that Lauren Boebert used to be an “unlicensed, paid escort” and met clients using a sugar daddy website — allegedly her escort work led to her having an abortion. The facts are still unconfirmed. RT IF YOU THINK THAT IT SOUNDS TRUE!
    — Occupy Democrats (@OccupyDemocrats) June 14, 2022

  70. 70.

    Immanentize

    @rikyrah: Here is my take. Although the focus is on Boebert right now, the more interesting story of the “modeling agency,” run by an Israeli it seems, who had a number of now-dialed-in Republican women as clients. Including Candace Owen and the woman who testified with Rudy! in Wisconsin (I think).

    The GOP Daddy Caucus (still run, I presume, by Dick Cheney from his basement) is seeing the J6 committee as a critical moment for the party. Some of the House members were neck deep in the actual insurrection, and who those people are is probably known to the GOP elites (both Trumpers and anti-Trump folk).

    Boebert is one of them. It would not be a bad time to move her along with information seemingly unrelated to the actual J6 events, while at the same time take a big swipe at the GOP Trump grooming agency that is just a bit too crazy for the old guard. They are trying to get the monster back to the lab.

  72. 72.

    dww44

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:   At the risk of being labeled a conspiracy theorist,  I think there is a good possibility the price of gas has been, in part, deliberately manipulated by our corporate masters to undermine Biden and Democrats.  They only want to put the GOP back at the helm so that they can continue to turn the country into one ruled by oligarchs.

    They do not believe in true democracy. Like the party they support, there is an obvious sense of entitlement and belief that the country should always be ruled by them.

  73. 73.

    O. Felix Culpa

    Elon is taking us to the mountaintop over the cliff:

    Tesla vehicles running its Autopilot software have been involved in 273 reported crashes over roughly the past year, according to regulators, far more than previously known and providing concrete evidence regarding the real-world performance of its futuristic features.

    The numbers, which were published by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for the first time Wednesday, show that Tesla vehicles made up nearly 70 percent of the 392 crashes involving advanced driver-assistance systems reported since last July. 

    WaPo

  76. 76.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @dww44: not a doubt in my mind that MBS and teh other Gulf state rulers want trump and Jared back in power

  78. 78.

    Betty Cracker

    The PAC that took down Cawthorn and is going after Boebert is run by Republicans, I think. Good. Let them tear each other to pieces. I don’t even care about their motives. I hope they do Gaetz next.

  80. 80.

    NotMax

    ‘@dww44

    A string of Illuminatiesque bridges too far. Oil and gas price spikes are a worldwide phenomenon.

  81. 81.

    Immanentize

    @O. Felix Culpa: The super scary detail in the auto drive issue at Tesla seems to be that the auto drive feature spontaneously disengages about 1 second before each collision allowing Tesla to say that the auto drive software wasn’t being used at the time of the crash.

    That sounded too crazy to be possible, but I asked the Immp (who has historically been a Musk fan) and he said, certainly the software could be programmed like that, but it would not always be reliable depending on the sudden or unexpected nature of a crash. So, the investigation continues

  83. 83.

    Kay

    @Immanentize: 

    You just have to take them for what they are and don’t expect “liberals” or even particularly ideological.
    They approach this as a negotiation. If you appreciate the clear lines of that, and I do, you don’t have to do a whole lot of analysis on what they aren’t.
    If it benefits them the issues can intersect, but only if it benefits them. So in Ohio they did a campaign to repeal an anti-labor law and they also took on a voting rights effort at the same time, because there’s a clear connection there. They may or may not be racist but they’ll pick up voting rights if it nets them 7000 more votes in Columbus for the labor initiative. Everyone involved understands this because they’re not hiding it.

  87. 87.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Immanentize:

    If I understand correctly, that auto-disengage feature means that the crash rate could be even higher than reported. Yikes!

    Elon tends to be popular among young engineering males. The son of one of my closest friends recently got an internship at Space-X, and is over the moon about it. I swallowed my tongue about Musk and just congratulated the young man for his not insignificant achievement.

  89. 89.

    germy shoemangler

    @Immanentize:

    Not me, the Koch family.  Muckraker keeps calling her an “unlicensed” escort which makes it sound like most escorts are licensed, like they renew every year after an inspection or something.

    It sounds like the Boebert/Koch thing (if it’s true) was a sugardaddy situation.  But who knows?  The more I try to understand the story, the more nauseated I feel.   People can do whatever they want with their personal lives, but it’s disgusting that Boebert won an election.

  90. 90.

    Soprano2

    @O. Felix Culpa: Several years ago I got into an unexpectedly heated exchange with a co-worker when I simply observed that I believe true self-driving cars are a lot further off than some people think. He was quite heated in defending the idea that they’re just around the corner because they’re safer, blah blah blah. No acknowledgment of the huge infrastructure that would have to be built in cities to support them, no thinking that perhaps we’d better make sure they work right before we unleash them on the world. It surprised me, the ferocity of the belief.

  91. 91.

    NotMax

    ‘@>a href=”https://install.local/wednesday-morning-open-thread-plugging-away/#comment-16302″>O. Felix Culpa

    “You can’t make an omelet without smashing eggs.”

    // // // // //

  92. 92.

    Ken

    @Immanentize: the auto drive feature spontaneously disengages about 1 second before each collision

    Nice, but I’ll still have to give the programming award to the clever team at Volkswagen who programmed their vehicles to detect that they were undergoing emissions tests, and only then turn on the emissions controls. And to think that Volkswagen tried to denigrate that accomplishment as a “bug”. Maybe in the sense of “undocumented feature”…

  93. 93.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Soprano2:

    It surprised me, the ferocity of the belief.

    It appears that Musk has a cult following, supported by rabid bots.

  94. 94.

    germy shoemangler

    .@RepRaskin is a greater statesman, Congressman, human being than most of us. History will remember him. Tommy was a remarkable person and testament of his parents’ love.

    Gaetz is a bad haircut in a cheap suit, a feat of mediocrity given that he’s here on papa’s money. Bye https://t.co/3S2cX40nO1

    — Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) June 9, 2022

  95. 95.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    US Retail Sales Unexpectedly Drop in May as Inflation Weighs on Spending

    U.S. retail sales registered a bigger-than-expected drop in May as record gasoline and food prices prompt households to cut back spending.

    The Commerce Department said Wednesday that retail sales fell 0.3% last month, down sharply from April’s downwardly revised 0.7% increase. May’s print also marked the first decline in five months. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg expected the latest data to show a rise of 0.1%.

    Excluding autos and gas, the pace of retail sales slowed to a 0.1% gain in May, compared to 0.8% the prior month.

  99. 99.

    Betty Cracker

    Last night Elon Musk tweeted that he’s leaning toward supporting DeSantis in 2024, in case there’s any remaining doubt that Musk is okay with authoritarianism as long as it benefits himself.

  102. 102.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Baud:

    Yes, which is why my friend’s son was so eager to get the Space-X internship and why I’m happy for him. He’s had a longstanding interest in space exploration and there are limited opportunities to work in that field.

  103. 103.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    It’s becoming clearer and clearer though that they are rehabilitating the Republican Party. Obviously that’s part of what Cheney is doing. They hope to keep the good parts of MAGA and discard the parts that harm them with moderates. Right now that works for Democrats but just so everyone is clear that’s what’s going on here. Cheney hopes to isolate Trump and draw a distinction between him and the mainstream party. That won’t work for Democrats politically. It works right now but that won’t last.

    I’m really interested to see what she does with the GOP House and Senate pieces of this – I assume she will try to isolate them as unwanted and unrepresentative radicals too, where Democrats won’t want that, right? Democrats want to say “the Party is ultra MAGA”. This marriage of convenience is going to be very short :)

  105. 105.

    Baud

    @Kay: She has to win her primary first.

    ETA:

    Democrats want to say “the Party is ultra MAGA”.

    They do, but I’m not sure it’ll work.  The GOP, being the white person’s party, gets the privilege of not being subject to guilt by association.

  108. 108.

    Baud

    @JPL: What does that mean?  Either he said or did something anti-trans or he didn’t. (Besides supporting the GOP).

  114. 114.

    eversor

    @germy shoemangler:

    From it what it seems in Colorado you have to get a license to escort to do it legally.  I would assume this is like the system in Europe where prostitution is legal, but they have to get licensed and there is a set way to go about it to keep the sex workers safe (from STDs bad Johns), and also monitor for any sort of illegal activity.

    In other words.  A licensed sex worker is known by the state, getting STD checks, paying taxes, of legal age, volunatarily doing this, and a known entity.   A unlicensed sex worker could be an illegally trafficked minor, with who knows what STDs, the traffickers are taking the money, could be getting raped/recorded, and who knows what else.  So dodging the license even if you think you don’t need it is the sort of thing that puts kids at risk and helps give cover to traffickers.

    The Boebert thing stinks to high hell and given these people took down Cawthorn is probably true.  I wouldn’t be shocked if she was hooking, Republican men were paying, she was having abortions, maimed her family and ran from the scene, and if that’s the case I’d be 100% certain she didn’t bother to do any of it in the above board way you’re supposed to!

    We also know MTG was having affairs with a tantric sex guy at her gym, that came out and was proven a while back.  I wouldn’t be shocked if she has some roid rage incidents as well.

    It also seems that poor Madison Cawthorn was right about those cocaine orgies after all.   And I wouldn’t be shocked now if Cruz and Boeberts names came up in them!

  119. 119.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    She’s a Republican through and through though. All this bullshit about her great patriotism. She has an objective. She’s also trying to cleave the MAGA voters from Trump. “He lied to you and robbed you” – they’re being presented sympathetically because TO HER they are GOP voters and you don’t attack your voters. I don’t resent it or oppose it. I just think it’s strategic. Even if she loses her primary she can come back as an ordinary far Right Republican in the next iteration of the GOP. She’s got plenty of time. In a long game way of thinking she will have rescued the Republican Party from the radicals.

  121. 121.

    Immanentize

    @Ken: Both stories tell the same story — programmers are super smart, but not necessarily moral actors.

  123. 123.

    Leto

    @Immanentize:  NHTSA Upgrades Autopilot Investigation to Engineering Analysis, Finds Disturbing Signs

    Very informative article, but this part stood out:

    In October 2021, the Netherlands Forensic Institute (NFI) revealed at the European Association for Accident Research that it had decrypted Tesla’s data storage system. That allowed its investigators to retrieve more information about crashes than Tesla was willing to share.

    Curiously, one example they presented about how crucial it was involved a Tesla on Autopilot rear-ending another car. NFI said the driver was attentive and regained control of the vehicle immediately when Autopilot warned them to do so. However, Tesla did not disclose that Autopilot was tailgating the car ahead, something they discovered by decrypting the data. If the system follows a vehicle so close and disengages when there is no time to do anything but brace for impact, who’s to blame?

  124. 124.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    Nixon notwithstanding, I think it’s hard for Republican losers to come back, especially when they are seen as betraying the party.

  125. 125.

    eversor

    @germy shoemangler:

    Elon Musk’s family owns(ed?) an emerald mine in South Africa.  That’s how he got his seed money.   He’s always been a wingnut but that got overlooked because “electric car good, good for earth, green energy, green future” and totally missed that he’s a psycho.

  126. 126.

    dww44

     

    @NotMax:  Not necessarily that far.  Secretary Granholm  was on TV this morning pointing out that while oil prices are a global issue, all of the gas price rises are not necessarily so.   She noted that the price of crude in March was close to the price now,  so why have gas prices gone so much higher?

    Are the refineries the issue here?  My take is that, like the escalating prices in my grocery store, some of this is deliberate price gouging.  Greed is a basic component of unfettered  Capitalism, compounded by the desire to enable the greed politically.

  129. 129.

    germy shoemangler

    elon doesn’t understand the difference between gender and sex, so let me explain:

    gender is a person’s internal perception of themselves, whereas sex is what a trans woman is having with his wife right now https://t.co/04IMgTI4Th

    — ellie (@misandryinc) June 12, 2022

  130. 130.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Baud: agreed, she has a weak home-base (Wyoming) and there are too many De Santis and Hawleys and Kemps out there for her to come back. She’s 55 YO and soon to inherit half of a fortune I believe of a couple of hundred million. My bet is she becomes a regular panelist on a Sunday show for a while and her obituary will provoke a lot of “Oh yeah, I remember her

    ETA: Maybe the Cheney Institute for Politics and Patriotism  will be at her alma mater, Colorado College, a bit more cachet than UW Laramie. With offices in Virginia

  133. 133.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    The Republican Party’s relationship with Donald Trump is purely transactional. Hugely cynical, right, but purely transactional. Trump is also purely transactional. They’re hoping they can keep the judges and the white voter gains and jettison the overtly corrupt and embarrassing MAGA electeds. He wants to stop them from doing that, if for no other reason than he expects to benefit from what he gave them. They’re not getting it free from Donald Trump.

  134. 134.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    Cheney can try all she wants, but she’ll never peel MAGATs away from TFG, if only because they’ll refuse to look like they’re admitting they made a mistake in the first place.

  135. 135.

    Baud

    @Kay: 

    I agree that the GOP would love to move beyond Trump while keeping his supporters. I just don’t see any way for Cheney to benefit from that, even if the GOP is successful.

  136. 136.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I don’t think they will keep the white voter gains without MAGA racism, because without that you get Lindsey Graham cutting Social Security and no MAGA anywhere wants that to happen. Those people will just go back to not coming out.

  137. 137.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @debbie:

    This. It’s hard for people to admit they were duped. It would mean having to take responsibility for the harm they’ve caused

  138. 138.

    Kent

    @O. Felix Culpa: If you want to get involved in cutting-edge space flight engineering your choices are SpaceX, Boeing, or Jeff Bezos’s company.  Of the three I’d go with SpaceX any day.

  139. 139.

    Scout211

    Since this is a Tesla adjacent thread, this was news a few days ago in Sacramento. A Tesla that was in a recent accident caught fire in a wrecking yard and the fire department had a difficult time getting the fire out. It kept re-igniting.  They ended up having to dig a trench, fill it with water and move the car into the water to get the fire out.  Watch the video posted by the fire department in the tweet embedded in the article. As the fire truck approached the car, you can hear the fire fighter say, “Oh, it’s a Tesla.”

  140. 140.

    Baud

    @Kay: 

    That’s the hope. What the GOP (and we) don’t know is how much they can lie to their base and get away with it. Can they end SS and successfully blame Dems for ending it? No one knows until they try.

  141. 141.

    lowtechcyclist

    Biden: “Look, I believe in bipartisanship, but I have no illusions about this Republican Party, the MAGA party. I’ve been able to bring some Republicans along on parts of my plan, but the fact is Republicans in Congress are still in the grip of the ultra MAGA agenda.”

    This is the right way to play it.  Kudos.

  142. 142.

    Kay

    @debbie:

    But it’s more than “Cheney”, right? She’s not actually out there alone. She represents a group in the Republican Party who have ridden this tiger as long as they think it benefits them and are hoping to avoid the downside and get back to “reforming entitlements”. They want to get off. They think they wrung every bit of benefit out of it they can.

    Every time I see Trump now I think of that movie line “I will not be IGNORED” – he’s not going anywhere. He’ll fucking attempt to destroy all of them before he’ll “give them” all he’s given them. He wants a HUGE cut.

  143. 143.

    Nelle

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Where does Liz actually live?  Remember, Dick lived in Texas when he chose himself to be W’s VP.  He hot around that petty point that the president and vice-president had to be from different states by going back to claim he was from Wyoming.  Maybe Liz can claim to be from one of their other homes.  It’s all very flexible…Romney, Gov of Mass, Senator from Utah.

  145. 145.

    NotMax

    ‘@dww44

    Certainly refineries (or attrition thereof) a significant factor.

    “I’m afraid we’re not at the end of the road yet,” said GasBuddy analyst Patrick De Haan. “We have very little margin for error this summer. We need every barrel of refining capacity we can get.”

    The pandemic led to refinery closures that have caused U.S. refining capacity to drop by about 800,000 barrels a day since the start of 2020, according to government figures. That has put pressure on remaining refiners to run hard to meet rising demand.

    Refiners have been reluctant to invest in new facilities because the transition to electric vehicles is casting doubt on long-term demand for gasoline. The owner of one of the nation’s largest refineries, in Houston, announced in April that it will close the facility by the end of next year. Source

  146. 146.

    Kent

    @Soprano2:@O. Felix Culpa: Several years ago I got into an unexpectedly heated exchange with a co-worker when I simply observed that I believe true self-driving cars are a lot further off than some people think. He was quite heated in defending the idea that they’re just around the corner because they’re safer, blah blah blah. No acknowledgment of the huge infrastructure that would have to be built in cities to support them, no thinking that perhaps we’d better make sure they work right before we unleash them on the world. It surprised me, the ferocity of the belief.

    It is part of a larger anti-public and anti-transit campaign from the right.  Every time there is any kind of regional proposal for transit, light rail, etc. etc. there are a whole bunch of rabid folks who show up shouting about how self-driving cars are the future and therefore we shouldn’t invest in old 20th century technology like mass transit.  I expect it is part of a larger anti-transit conspiracy funded by the Koch’s or something.  But the whole self-driving car fanboy thing is really tied into a larger right-wing campaign to defund public infrastructure in transit.  Seriously.  So they are probably getting a lot of that sort of propaganda from the usual social media sources where they feed.

  147. 147.

    Kay

    @debbie:

    Its weird because I don’t know who to root for. I go back and forth. Is it better for Democrats if Trump destroys the Cheney wing or if the Cheney wing destroys Trump? Dilemma! I don’t want any of them!

    But it’s not within the control of Democrats. They couldn’t game this out if they tried. So they should do the next right thing, which is continuing to prosecute Donald Trump.

  148. 148.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @NotMax:

    If anybody knows, would it be possible to invoke the Defense Production Act to speed up oil processing?

  150. 150.

    Betty Cracker

    @Baud: That sounds about right to me. IMO, the best case scenario for the GOP is try to engineer a transfer of MAGA enthusiasm to someone like DeSantis. (I don’t know if it would work nationally, but it sure has worked in Florida.) The best-case scenario for us is that Trump takes offense at being tossed aside and goes after DeSantis and the GOP, wrecking party unity.

  153. 153.

    JPL

    Scotus is going to release opinions soon. I wonder what rights they will take away today. Maybe the right to regulate firearms?

  154. 154.

    Anyway

    @Kent:

    Yes, Uber, Lyft etc were funded by VCs and their business plan never showed them running without huge subsidies from VC – but they had the effect of killing transit funding increases in large cities. They also dropped demand for ZipCars and the like. Now VCs are pulling back some of the subsidies and Uber, Lyft rides are no longer as attractive a proposition.

  155. 155.

    Kent

    @Baud: Exactly.  If there were some critical component to gasoline production that was in short supply because it was being used for other things like say plastics production then Biden could use the defense production act to re-route that component to refineries instead. But that isn’t the problem.  The problem is that refineries just shut down.

    And frankly, for the sake of the planet they should just stay shut down despite the short-term political loss for Biden due to high gas prices.

  156. 156.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    I’m with Cheney. She’ll never win, but I’m rooting for the injuries to last as long as possible. I want blood. I’m thumbs down in the Coliseum.

  158. 158.

    Kay

    @debbie:

    I don’t think they can give him what he wants, which is a second term. It kills him every fucking day that he was a one term President. He will not accept that.

  159. 159.

    germy shoemangler

    @Kay:

    Because Obama had two terms. A Black man got more years than him and it’s killing him.

    And it’s killing him that he lost an election to that Black man’s former VP.  It hurts!

  160. 160.

    zhena gogolia

    I’d never seen Peter STRZOK talk before that tweet AL posted last night. He’s impressive.

  162. 162.

    Soprano2

    @O. Felix Culpa: I don’t think this guy was a ferocious Musk supporter; more like a ferocious automation supporter. Musk’s name never came up, although I can see him liking the guy.

  163. 163.

    Paul in KY

    @Kay: I’d rather have the Cheney Wing than the MAGAs. The Cheneyites are (in general) rational actors.

  164. 164.

    eversor

    @Scout211:

    That’s because of the batteries.  You see that with laptops as well, also cell phones.  If the battery goes up in flames you can’t really put it out.  Which is why you have metal containers full of sand and you have to chuck the whole thing in there and burry it in sand.   You cannot put out a battery fire really, if it goes up you are either burying the whole thing or standing by till it burns itself out, and anything else around it.

  167. 167.

    NotMax

    ‘@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    It’s not as if they’re operating at 50% capacity. Physical plant and its concomitant output is finite.Too, what you propose would have about zero impact on mitigating the initial contract cost of crude, presuming there’s any reliable excess of supply available in the first pace.

  168. 168.

    eversor

     

     

    @Anyway:

     

    They also killed taxi’s and regular food delivery services.   Now that they are monopolies they are going to raise rates.

  169. 169.

    Elizabelle

    @Kay:   He just about killed us by being a one-term “president.”  And that was a sketchy Electoral College win.

    No sympathy for TFG. Neither he nor we deserved that presidency.

  170. 170.

    Ramona Rosario

    What amuses me to no end is that Trump has to watch these hearings. He has to watch Barr denigrate him and know that millions are watching this as well. In theory nobody is forcing Trump to watch but of course he can’t resist watching much as it must be driving him into a blind rage.

  171. 171.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: Cheney hopes to isolate Trump and draw a distinction between him and the mainstream party.

    To me the problem with this is that there aren’t enough of them to have a divided political party like this. IMHO there is no way to separate the cultists from TFG. I agree that’s what she’s trying to do. It’s interesting to see her sharpness on the committee vs. some Democrats’ squishiness, like Thompson pre-emptively saying “oh, we aren’t going to recommend any prosecutions” which Cheney  (rightly, I might add) quickly publicly contradicted. Why do Democrats sabotage themselves like that? It makes me crazy!! “This is the worst incident against our government in our nation’s history, but we aren’t going to recommend that anyone be prosecuted for it” is a dumb, dumb message to the American people.

  172. 172.

    Kay

    @Paul in KY: 

    I guess I would too, because cutting entitlements and abolishing public schools are genuinely unpopular.
    We also need the Cheney wing because as political opponents they make Democrats better, not worse so the conflict is beneficial to the country. Trump, true to his completely negative and toxic influence has not made Democrats better, where George W Bush did.

  174. 174.

    Elizabelle

    @Ramona Rosario:   I smile every time the Committee or a witness says “He lost.”  Knowing TFG is watching too.

    And they say it constantly.  It’s the whole point.  They cannot say it enough.

  175. 175.

    germy shoemangler

    @Ramona Rosario:

    It happened very quickly, but during the second hearing they played a clip of Barr talking about election results.  Trump did “weakly” in areas where other republicans did better, in Barr’s words.

    That word “weak” must have raised Trump’s blood pressure.

  178. 178.

    Kay

    @Soprano2:

    I think the “recommend prosecutions” is a red herring that media have stupidly seized on. It’s not a real thing. The DOJ is independent. There’s no “recommending” outside of contempt of Congress, which is specific to Congress. If I were on that committee and asked that question I would not accept the question. It’s bullshit. It always amazes me they think they have to answer every question. I just wouldn’t do it.

  179. 179.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: Every time I see Trump now I think of that movie line “I will not be IGNORED” – he’s not going anywhere. He’ll fucking attempt to destroy all of them before he’ll “give them” all he’s given them. He wants a HUGE cut.

    He’s Cartman, full stop.

  180. 180.

    eversor

    @Soprano2:

    Democrats are happy with the status quo and are conflict adverse.  So they will avoid doing anything until they are lined up against the wall and shot.   And right before the trigger is pulled when they get their last words they will say “when they go low we go high, non violence always works, don’t get mad vote!”.

  183. 183.

    eversor

    @Soprano2:

    I dunno Cartman was more grounded in reality.   Cartman had actual friends as well.  This is sort of an insult to Cartman.

  187. 187.

    Ramona Rosario

    @germy shoemangler: I  remember that! Barr was citing Trump’s poor showing relative to other Republicans on the ballot as evidence that there had been no tampering with the election.

  188. 188.

    Geminid

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

     

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: The Saudis and the oil companies definitely want a Republican Congress, and they want to see a Republican President elected in 2024. The fossil industry’s future will be conditioned by how hard or softly the U.S. leans into the clean energy transition, and a Republican administration will make a big difference for the industry.

    I’m not sure that the Saudis and thr oil companies care about trump. These are cold blooded realists, not enthusiasts, and I think they see trump as a worn out tool.

  189. 189.

    Kay

    @Soprano2:

    Members of Congress have no more authority to “recommend” charges outside their purview than anyone else does. They’re not a grand jury. There’s no “sort of a grand jury” that issues, like, advisory opinions. Thank God. That’s a disaster.

  192. 192.

    Immanentize

    @zhena gogolia: I had to look that up. I got a warning before I could proceed to the translation!

    I completely support your comment and give it a “10”

  193. 193.

    NotMax

    ‘@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    While not a solution, could serve to put a temporary damper on wide swings in the world market.

    (Incidentally, KSA is hellbent for leather in investing in and promoting solar-on-the-sands for their own infrastructure.)

  195. 195.

    Betty Cracker

    @Kay:

    Trump, true to his completely negative and toxic influence has not made Democrats better, where George W Bush did.

    Interesting. I never thought about it like that, though I agree that in general, a healthy democracy requires opposition parties with a commitment to governing who compete on different policies and philosophies. I think you’re right.

  196. 196.

    Immanentize

    @Baud: Not too much. Demand has not really decreased since prices have been rising. People have laid off other consumer goods, but not gas.

    That was a weird reactionary spasm from you. I don’t think Biden would ever do it, but he could. There were no gas shortages when Nixon set price limits. And the gas shortages under Ford/Carter were driven by foreign OPEC supply, which we really don’t have to be too bothered by these days

  199. 199.

    Baud

    @Immanentize:

    I’m no economist, but I’m not a big believer that setting prices solves more problems than it creates.  Besides, if Biden were to do it, he’d also have to figure out how to prevent the oil companies from exporting more gas to foreign markets, and from shutting down even more production.  I think there will be a bunch of cascading effects that will just prolong the misery.

  201. 201.

    NotMax

    ‘@Immanentize

    Institutional complacency also plays a part, an “It’s always been a license to print money and will always be so” mindset.

    More unwieldy to turn that around than for a supertanker to do a one-eighty.

  202. 202.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I guess I don’t. I think Trump set them back on their heels and they have scrambled to counter. I don’t blame them- it’s bewildering. I don’t know that anyone could have done better but I don’t usually go to alternate, fantasy versions of the Democratic Party.

    Opponents can make you better. Sharper. More focused. George W Bush made Democrats better and Donald Trump did not.

  203. 203.

    eversor

    @Elizabelle:

    It’s not my fault they refuse to fight and then take consequences off the table.   I remember when Bush and co get let off.   And I’m sure they’ll do this again.  And then when Trump gets elected in 2024 they’ll blame their voters.

  204. 204.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @eversor: right, the people who impeached trump twice and unanimously voted to remove from office and got a record number of Rs to vote the same way (the second time) are to blame for the lack of consequences

    and yes, while it seems to be an idea that confuses more people here than just you: Voters do matter in elections

  205. 205.

    Elizabelle

    @eversor:  blah blah blah

    Your presence has added NOTHING to the blog.  It’s all “I hate religion” and “I despise Democrats.”

    Fuck off.  You are both delusional and a bore

    ETA:  on the other hand, the thread is quite colorful, with all the lovely cookies and Avalune’s Eeyore drawing.

  206. 206.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    I guess I disagree.  Aside from the diabolical duo in the Senate, the 2022 Dem party is the best I’ve ever witnessed.

  207. 207.

    Geminid

    @Baud: We are still beginning the clean energy transition.  So far this Congress has delivered only modest legislation in this area. Some of the legislative efforts are significant, though. The Infrastructure bill’s funding of local mass transit, AMTRAK, electric school buses and other clean energy intitiatives will add momentum to the transition.  The head of AMTRAK noted that the $60 billion investment in that rail service exceede investment since its founding, and said it would be “transformative,”

    Decisions by the Biden administration will have an impact also. I’m not sure if anyone has put out a summary of the executive branch’s initiatives (Ron Klain, are you lurking?). But the different Departments put out their own summaries, and some are quite long.

    So I guess I’m saying that we fight  the oil companys by electing Democrats. And it’s possible that we make the clean energy transition a good issue for us. As in the cases of gun control and abortion, combating climate change is an issue where Republicans are on the wrong side of majority opinion.

  208. 208.

    Ksmiami

    @Baud:  the best thing long term is high oil and gas prices… that is what will foster innovation and alternatives. Unfortunately it’s political cyanide

  209. 209.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    The counter of saying over and over “these are all lies” (true) takes them out of the frame where they can get better and win to another frame – a place where the skills they have are not valuable, don’t matter.

    Think of the pro-democracy lawyers in the post election litigation. They didn’t “get better” v Sidney Powell. She wasn’t an opponent that made them really work with the skills they have. There’s nothing to work with. It’s just a bunch of lies. So they shot down some Sydney Powell lies and they were lucky enough to be a forum where that matters and they win. But Democrats aren’t in a courtroom.

  211. 211.

    Geminid

    @Ksmiami: Yeah, I agree. If it wasn’t for the political ramifications I’d want the current price to be a floor that increased 7% a year, indefinitely. I guess my hope right now is for pump prices to fall a dollar by September, and then increase slowly.

  212. 212.

    Eolirin

    @Ksmiami: If we had a friendly media environment we could be placing the blame squarely on the oil companies and their republican enablers while passing legislation in the house that we know will die in the senate to force more refineries to get built.

    People will buy price gouging as a reason. There’s no love of the oil companies in the places we need to win. But we’d need to be able to drive that narrative and it’s not one most media outlets will push. Especially not in the constant sort of way we need.

  213. 213.

    Eolirin

    @Kay: I think we got that in 2018. But it was more in response to the Republican held legislature than Trump specifically.

    The party is far more unified in messaging and values than it was before Trump, but I do think a lot of that has to do with push back against attempted congressional action in 2017-2018 rather than anything else. Lessons learned around the success of the health care fight.

    Unfortunately those lessons only work when we’re out of power. So they’re not going to be so relevant to anything except maybe abortion rights, where we can credibly make the case that we need more Democratic wins to protect something.

  216. 216.

    Soprano2

    @Immanentize: Oh God No, I don’t want gas stations running out of gas before the end of the month. In 1979 I drove with my BF between MO and Corpus Christi at the end of June. There wasn’t an open gas station in Oklahoma on that day – they were all out of gas.

  217. 217.

    Formerly disgruntled in Oregon

    @eversor: last words they will say “when they go low we go high, non violence always works, don’t get mad vote!”.

    I guess we can put you down for “going low”, violence, and not voting. Good to know. Will keep in mind…

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