Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

This fight is for everything.

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

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

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

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

“Why isn’t this Snickers bar only a nickle?”

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

Good lord, these people are nuts.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

After dobbs, women are no longer free.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

If you are still in the GOP, you are either an extremist yourself, or in bed with those who are.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

I really should read my own blog.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Monday Morning Open Thread: Yes, Women’s Rights Are Human Rights

Monday Morning Open Thread: Yes, Women’s Rights Are Human Rights

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… Nine of the state’s 105 counties recounted their votes at the request of Melissa Leavitt, who has pushed for tighter election laws. A longtime anti-abortion activist, Mark Gietzen, is covering most of the costs. Gietzen acknowledged in an interview that it was unlikely to change the outcome.

A no vote in the referendum signaled a desire to keep existing abortion protections and a yes vote was for allowing the Legislature to tighten restrictions or ban abortion. After the recounts, “no” votes lost 87 votes and “yes” gained 6 votes.

Eight of the counties reported their results by the state’s Saturday deadline, but Sedgwick County delayed releasing its final count until Sunday because spokeswoman Nicole Gibbs said some of the ballots weren’t separated into the correct precincts during the initial recount and had to be resorted Saturday. She said the number of votes cast overall didn’t change.

A larger than expected turnout of voters on Aug. 2 rejected a ballot measure that would have removed protections for abortion rights from the Kansas Constitution and given to the Legislature the right to further restrict or ban abortion. It failed by 18 percentage points, or 165,000 votes statewide.

Reader Interactions

125Comments

  3. 3.

    brantl

    I nominated a rotating tag line, “If they want to manage a uterus, why don’t they get their own?

  4. 4.

    Baud

    Melissa Leavitt, who has pushed for tighter election laws.

    What a euphemism for the new Jim Crow.

  7. 7.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Baud:

    Today show is covering the migrant issue again. The media is scared of a blue wave! 

    Really?  The Today Show has decided to suck off Fucker Carlson?

  9. 9.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Suzanne:

    I’d be scared of waking up in an ice bath in a motel room. I put nothing past these fuckers. 

    They’d steal all of your vegetables too until they found one that went with kidneys!

  16. 16.

    Spanky

    Margaret Sullivan’s last column is in the WaPo today yesterday. A taste:

    I’m often reminded of the troubling questions raised by ABC News’s Jonathan Karl in multiple interviews late last year about what it would mean to cover Trump if and when he runs for president again. He deemed it perhaps the greatest challenge American political reporters will ever face.

    “How do you cover a candidate who is effectively anti-democratic? How do you cover a candidate who is running both against whoever the Democratic candidate is but also running against the very democratic system that makes all of this possible?” wondered Karl, a former president of the White House Correspondents’ Association. His questions hit hard, the more so because of his reputation in the political press corps as a straight shooter.

    The deeper question is whether news organizations can break free of their hidebound practices — the love of political conflict, the addiction to elections as a horse race— to address those concerns effectively.

    The bulk of her farewell is like that. Another:

    As Edward Luce, associate editor of the Financial Times, tweeted this month: “I’ve covered extremism and violent ideologies around the world over my career. Have never come across a political force more nihilistic, dangerous & contemptible than today’s Republicans. Nothing close.” Gen. Michael Hayden, the former CIA director appointed by George W. Bush, chimed in with two ominous words: “I agree.”

    Will news orgs take her words to heart? Opinions differ.

  21. 21.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Baud:

    Until WaterGirl posted a pic of her round zucchini, I thought all zucchini were schlong-shaped. 

    Stop risking an eggplant uprising!

    “We! Are the penis vegetable!”

  23. 23.

    Betty Cracker

    There seems to be an under the radar story behind several of the Christian nationalist ex-mil candidates, and you’ll be shocked to hear that grift may be playing a role. From the Orlando Sentinel in June (paywalled):

    A conservative Washington, D.C., law firm with deep political connections has emerged as the courthouse defender of much of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ culture war agenda, raking in nearly $2.8 million in legal fees and contracts from taxpayers to defend some of his top priorities.

    One of the firm’s star lawyers, Adam Laxalt, roomed with DeSantis during officer training school and is now running for U.S. Senate in Nevada with his endorsement.

    The firm bills $750 an hour, and the meter is running as DeSantis’s blatantly unconstitutional edicts run through the courts. So, fat stacks to Laxalt, win or lose. Mastriano is ex-mil too. I don’t know if he has any preexisting ties to DeSantis, but I do know he’s a Christian nationalist figure with insurgency training courtesy of the U.S. government. If y’all are aware of any reporting on the ex-mil Christian nationalist angle for these crypto-fascist candidates, drop a link!

  25. 25.

    Spanky

    Today’s APOD has an interesting visualization of the climate spiral. Wait until the end to get the 3-D view.

  27. 27.

    Spanky

    @Betty Cracker: Any relation to this guy?

    Paul Dominique Laxalt (/ˈlæksɔːlt/; August 2, 1922 – August 6, 2018) was an American attorney and politician who served as the 22nd governor of Nevada from 1967 to 1971 and a United States senator from Nevada from 1974 until 1987. A member of the Republican Party, he was one of Ronald Reagan’s closest friends in politics. After Reagan was elected president in 1980, many in the national press referred to Laxalt as “the first friend”. He was the older brother of writer Robert Laxalt and grandfather of Adam Laxalt, who served as the 33rd attorney general of Nevada from 2015 to 2019.

    ETA – I eventually got a clue.

  33. 33.

    Kay

    Amy Walter
    @amyewalter·
    20h
    I’d argue that it’s as much Jan 6th/Trump/focus on election deniers winning primaries that have boosted Dem enthusiasm. Look how high the issue of “threats to democracy” has risen as top issue.

    It’s wild how much pushback there is among pundits and pollsters to the idea that women may object to a loss of agency and fundamental rights.
    I wonder if it’s because they deemed “agency and fundamental rights for women” unimportant back in June and are afraid people may have decided differently- without their careful managing and steering of opinion.
    Couldn’t they just have left it an open question? Was it really necessary to announce ahead of time that no one cares about those things?

  34. 34.

    Ohio Mom

    The Japanese grow square watermelons using a cube-shaped mold, should be easy enough to adapt that method for zucchini.

  36. 36.

    germy shoemangler

    The misconception that there is no sound in space originates because most space is a ~vacuum, providing no way for sound waves to travel. A galaxy cluster has so much gas that we've picked up actual sound. Here it's amplified, and mixed with other data, to hear a black hole! pic.twitter.com/RobcZs7F9e

    — NASA Exoplanets (@NASAExoplanets) August 21, 2022

    i love when NASA just tweets something like “Check this out — space sounds like the wailing of billions of souls trapped forever in Hell! They are calling for your blood! Wow!” https://t.co/VSv3Meql8D

    — libby watson (@libbycwatson) August 22, 2022

  38. 38.

    Ohio Mom

    Big day today for Ohio Family. We are taking our first step toward leaving suburbia by having a real estate agent come to the house at 10:30.

    The agenda is, what needs to be done to this house to make it ready to sell and how much can we spend on the next abode. We’re looking at six months to a year and a half out, so things could change a lot by then. But we have to start somewhere.

    I’m still interested in a three or four-unit, Ohio Dad and the agent think two is plenty, one for us and one for Ohio Son. Should be an interesting discussion. I’m expecting to come away depressed by the limits of what is possible for us.

    I have to go fluff the pillows now. See you all later.

  42. 42.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    They fear a spark that will lead to a long term movement.  I don’t think they care about abortion rights one way or the other.

  43. 43.

    germy shoemangler

    The meritocracy!

    Lol imagine filming an entire video flexing about how your “tremendous writing talent” got you such “prestigious gigs” and neglecting to mention that your father is an editor for the New York Times https://t.co/1T319GR8RM

    — Zoë Rose Bryant (@ZoeRoseBryant) August 20, 2022

  45. 45.

    sab

    @Ohio Mom: My stepdaughter and her kid live in a house like that. The landlords parents bought a three story house and converted into two apartments. The downstairs was for them and the upstairs was for their autistic son. Their other son now owns it. The autistic son turned out to be high functioning so he is out in the world on his own. The lanlord’s best friend rents the downstairs, and the landord only rents the upstairs to families with autistic kid.  It’s a nice apartment with two floors and two bathrooms.

  48. 48.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    @Kay: Dana House has often said Walter, along with Josh Krausher, are the two dimmest pundits.

     

    She’s terrible.

  49. 49.

    germy shoemangler

    @Baud:

    Lena Wilson is a project manager at The New York Times and a freelance writer covering film, TV, technology and lesbian culture.

    She got her job because she is an incredibly talented 24 year old  and for no other reason that involves her father’s nytimes career.

    Lena Wilson: "I am a literal god of film criticism who descended from Mount Olympus to write for the NYT at 24 without any formal education on the subject"

    Lena Wilson's film criticism: "I saw boob" https://t.co/Wb06m8DPv4

    — Ben Macaulay (@bkmacaulay) August 21, 2022

  50. 50.

    Ken

    @germy shoemangler: As with the Webb infrared telescope pictures, there’s a lot of data manipulation involved to convert the signal to something humans can perceive. The actual “tones” take around 10 million years per cycle, and have been sped up by about a billion billion times to get something near middle C.

    If they’d chosen slightly different parameters, it would sound more like “Alvin and the Chipmunks” than “damned souls howling”.

  51. 51.

    Baud

    @germy shoemangler:

    Damn. 24.  Lucky for her father she is the most talented person in the field, or that would be awkward.

    To be fair, at 24, Alexander the Great had conquered half the known world.

  52. 52.

    germy shoemangler

    @Ken:

    Yes, but it’s still fun to see and hear, even though it’s condensed and adjusted for our limited brains.

  53. 53.

    Capri

    If you go a little deeper than just saying that midterm elections are bad for incumbents to asking why they are bad, things look quite good for democrats. The reason mid-terms tend to be bad for the party in power  is that those out of power can run on the accomplishments or lack of accomplishments of the majority party.  Obamacare is a great example.

    This year, however, two things are happening that have turned that upside down. First, the entrenched power that “outsiders” are running against is the conservative Supreme Court. Which is going to be a gift that keeps giving as they aren’t going anywhere for a long time.  The second is that there has been no backlash or response to the  recent legislation that’s been passed because the outrage over the FBI at Mar-O-Lago has sucked all the oxygen on the right. Compare the complete lack of response from the rank and file republicans right now to the town hall/death panel/Tea Party nonsense that was a response to Obamacare.

    So Yay!

  55. 55.

    Soprano2

    @Baud: Was that before or after the daily story about how high inflation is and how expensive everything in the grocery store is?

  57. 57.

    Betty Cracker

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Yep, it’s our money, and I give the Orlando Sentinel credit for reporting on that. DeSantis’s 2024-focused antics are destroying public education and undermining people’s fundamental rights, but they are also costing us untold millions in taxpayer dollars, plus the legislative time and effort that could be used to address the state’s real and urgent problems instead.

    Tomorrow is our primary election, so we’ll know which Dem will oppose him. I’m hoping whoever wins (probably Crist, le sigh) will beat that drum incessantly. I find the damage to institutions and individuals a more compelling argument against the governor’s reelection. But I’m guessing lots of people who don’t pay much attention to politics might be persuaded by the argument that DeSantis is squandering our revenue to run for president of MAGA and enrich cronies.

  58. 58.

    Betty Cracker

    @Capri: That’s a great point about drama llama Trump once again sucking all the oxygen out of the room. I’ve seen McConnell, McCarthy and sundry other elected Republicans work in a line or two about nonexistent middle-class tax hikes in the IRA, but it always seems pretty pro forma.

  59. 59.

    Soprano2

    @Spanky: Will news orgs take her words to heart? Opinions differ.

    No, they won’t. Even when they are being trucked to “reeducation” camps after they help TFG get elected again, they’ll insist that covering both sides equally was the right thing to do. “If only we had gone to one more diner, we would have figured out what they want”, they’ll say.

  61. 61.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Capri:

    The second is that there has been no backlash or response to the  recent legislation that’s been passed

    Well, there has been the “87,000 IRS enforcers” but that’s been it AFAICT.

  62. 62.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: I heard a story on the weekend NPR news on Saturday. It was two men talking about the midterm elections, and what different factors might go into how people vote. The Dobbs decision wasn’t even mentioned!!!! This is flying completely below the radar of a lot of pundits, especially the male ones. They’ve already forgotten about it.

  63. 63.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    That there wouldn’t be a viceral reaction to losing body autonomy 😒

    That, even if you are older…what…we don’t have younger sisters, daughters, nieces that we are enraged for?

    I am pissed for women in general..

    I am LIVID for Peanut in particular.

  64. 64.

    Baud

    @Soprano2:

    It was two men talking about the midterm elections, and what different factors might go into how people vote.

    “It could be migrants.  It could be inflation.  It could be CRT! “

  65. 65.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Soprano2:

    I heard a story on the weekend NPR news on Saturday. It was two men talking about the midterm elections, and what different factors might go into how people vote. The Dobbs decision wasn’t even mentioned!!!! This is flying completely below the radar of a lot of pundits, especially the male ones. They’ve already forgotten about it.

    I stopped listening to NPR back in 2016.  Thanks for the heads-up that it’s still terrible.

  68. 68.

    Geminid

    @Capri: Also, the economic conditions are good. Democrats picked up 8 seats in 1998 on the strength of a good economy, and that one was not as strong as this one.

  69. 69.

    Kay

    @germy shoemangler:

    just don’t pile on

    all that means is 10 more NYT editorials about cancel culture an an episode of Tucker Carson/Glenn Greenwald

    She will end up with an appointment as a tenured professor

  71. 71.

    Soprano2

    @Baud: Another thing I have noticed is that the long lines at coffee shops like Starbucks and 7 Brew Coffee don’t seem to be any shorter even in the face of higher prices at the grocery store. You’d think it would be easy to save $25-$50/week by making your own coffee rather than buying that expensive stuff, but people don’t seem to be doing that. Today people take it as a personal insult when you suggest that perhaps they could cut back on the Starbucks when they are complaining about how much they’re paying for gas (I’ve seen $3.09/gas in my city this week).

  72. 72.

    Soprano2

    @Baud: I guess you heard the same story I did, huh? LOL I was almost yelling at the radio “What about the Dobbs decision, you idiots?”

  73. 73.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    Morning Joe is talking about what survey respondents say is the most important issue facing the country. Loss of democracy rates high; abortion is much lower. I think I’d pick loss of democracy too because abortion fits under that. The Dobbs decision is a sign of how citizens’ opinions are being ignored. That doesn’t mean abortion is unimportant. It’s motivating. It’s infuriating. It’s visceral.

  74. 74.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    @Soprano2: All time worse was Steve konacki and Karen Tumulty condescendingly discussing campaign issues affecting black voters.

    I actually sent them as well as MSNBC emails asking them to be balanced and have a group of all blacks on to ponder what makes whites tick.

  75. 75.

    geg6

    @David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch:

    I actually sent them as well as MSNBC emails asking them to be balanced and have a group of all blacks on to ponder what makes whites tick.

    That would actually be very insightful.  Black people have been forced to study white people and understand them in order to survive.  The opposite is definitely not true.

  78. 78.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    They REMOVED a basic right to bodily autonomy that half the population had and those who are not directly affected are not the tiniest bit concerned that might ripple into areas they give a shit about?

    I have never been that confident and assured of my protected status in my entire life. I wonder what it feels like. Must be great.

  79. 79.

    Soprano2

    @Elizabelle: Scott Simon and Ron Elving. Here is the transcript from the show:

    SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

    Liz Cheney began her concession speech this week by saying, quote, “our work is far from over.” Her loss was no surprise, but still momentous.

    (SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

    LIZ CHENEY: Our nation is barreling once again towards crisis, lawlessness and violence. No American should support election deniers for any position of genuine responsibility where their refusal to follow the rule of law will corrupt our future.

    (APPLAUSE)

    SIMON: NPR’s Ron Elving joins us.

    Thanks for being with us, Ron.

    RON ELVING, BYLINE: Good to be with you, Scott.

    SIMON: What does Representative Cheney’s loss mean for her future and that of her party?

    ELVING: It means that Liz Cheney and her party are going to be going their separate ways. As you say, she didn’t just lose this week. She lost by nearly 40 points – this after having won her current office three times before by big margins. But each of those times she was on the Donald Trump train. And this time she not only stepped off that train, she laid down on the track in front of it. Now, there’s been talk of her running for president in her present party, but it’s hard to see it.

    Her party is no longer the GOP – the Grand Old Party. That acronym dates back to the Civil War, the forge of the party’s founding. Liz Cheney has been casting herself as a throwback to the era of Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant – she quoted them this week – and to the party of Ronald Reagan and the Bush family and her own father, former Vice President Dick Cheney. But today’s GOP is driven by nationalists and populist activists empowered by former President Trump, and they are not going away.

    SIMON: At the same time, we get what can almost seem like hourly updates on legal issues surrounding former President Trump and people in his orbit. What kind of danger does this perhaps pose for Republicans just a few months away from elections?

    ELVING: In one sense, we can say it’s been a boon for them. It excites the sense of grievance many of their voters have when it comes to the federal government. The party needs that going into the elections this November and beyond. But it’s also obviously a distraction. Most Republicans would much rather have the national conversation focus on inflation or the bad memories of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan just a year ago. Instead, we’re talking again about Trump and the multifront war that various legal authorities are fighting to hold him accountable for his actions in office and since. Now, the Mar-a-Lago search is just the sharpest arrow in that quiver right now.

    We heard former Vice President Mike Pence this week saying, our party stands with the men and women who stand on the thin blue line at the federal and state and local level. And these attacks on the FBI must stop. That is the old Republican Party talking. It is not clear that the new Republican Party is even listening.

    SIMON: Let me ask you about contrast with the Democrats because, of course, this week, President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act. Are they coming into clearer focus as the midterms approach?

    ELVING: We’re about 80 days out from the midterms, roughly. That’s at least 2 1/2 lifetimes away in political terms. Much is going to happen. Much is going to change. Right now, though, the Democrats are seeing remarkably encouraging polls in half a dozen toss up Senate races for this fall. So that’s happening in Arizona and Georgia, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Those are states that voted for Joe Biden in 2020. But we’re also seeing competitive races with close polls persisting in Ohio and North Carolina, where Trump won twice. By the time we get into the baseball playoffs and the fall campaign season, it’s possible that all of this Mar-a-Lago search and all of these other cases will keep grinding on, but also possible that people will get bored with all that and focus on gas prices, grocery prices.

    Republicans are gearing up to make immigration a big focus again this fall. We still expect the House will go Republican in November, if only because of gerrymandering. But the Senate is quite a different story. There are individual candidates there who might matter more than party identity. Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said as much this week, and that may have had mostly the purpose of sending a signal to Republican funders to get busy writing checks.

    SIMON: Ron, what lessons do you take from history as you look at all this?

    ELVING: We tend to look at the big midterm elections of the past, ones that really changed the landscape – 1994, 2010 – elections where Republicans captured the House. And they both happened right after a new Democratic president had taken office. But right now the polls suggest something much more modest may take place, something more like 1982, when Republican Ronald Reagan lost 26 seats in the House but held his own in the Senate. That, of course, raises again the cloud of election denialism, close races, rejecting the results, alleging some sort of nonexistent uncertainty – that kind of disruption now seems increasingly likely and has the potential to get ugly.

    SIMON: Ron Elving, thanks so much.

    ELVING: Thank you, Scott.

  80. 80.

    Ken

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: I’m a little dubious about the ranking of loss of democracy, because I suspect some fraction of that is people who think Trump won and Biden stole the election; or perhaps are angry about the DOJ at Mar-a-lago, or the IRS getting more money. But I would love to be wrong about this.

  83. 83.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    they overturned a right. “Nope- you don’t get that – granted in error and now we’re taking it away”

    Women just get substandard, low quality not best practices pregnancy and reproductive care in the United States because religious zealots on that Court decreed it’s the price all women must pay for their beliefs.

    I had a high risk delivery with my youngest. No warning. Completely normal pregnancy up until 6 hours into labor. He’s 19. I’m thankful I got proper, best practices care during the enlightened period when women were permitted high quality, science-based medical care without the monitoring by religious nuts. That could have been it for me and maybe him too. As it was I had to endure a weird whispered diatribe by a religious nut nurse who seemed to think I was being punished for something. Like something out of a fucking horror movie. You’re flat on your back waiting for a blood transfusion at 3 AM and The Angel of Death enters and starts preaching about suffering. I had to tell my husband “get her out of here”.

  84. 84.

    Elizabelle

    @Kay:  OMG re the nurse.

    These pundits and pols are way too blasé about women losing a right that other “first world” countries enjoy.  May it bite them in their asses, or on the appendage in front.

    And, I appreciate the Biden administration and Democrats trying to drag us into the first world.  We have a ways to go.

  85. 85.

    Quiltingfool

    OT – I’m taking my cat, Baby, to the vet today.  It’s time to say goodbye.  As much as I want her to get better, it isn’t going to happen and waiting a day or more is just me not wanting to part with her.   She is struggling, and I have to stop being selfish at her expense.

    We’re spending some lap time right now; the vet office is very busy in the morning, but less so midday.  I don’t want to sit with her in a big crowd.

    Many of you have been where I am today, it’s so hard to let go, isn’t it?

  87. 87.

    Elizabelle

    @Quiltingfool:  Will be thinking of you and Baby.  You are making a loving decision for her.  Wishing Baby a peaceful departure.

    I’m so sorry, QF.

  89. 89.

    germy shoemangler

    @zhena gogolia:

    I didn’t know until this morning that the NYTimes has a 24 year old reviewing movies for them but I could have told you without any more info that they were 💯 guaranteed to be related to someone powerful/important/influential just on that fact alone.

    — della~ 🍒 💣 (@della_morte_) August 21, 2022

    The number one sign you are in fact a nepobaby is making incredibly pompous tiktoks where you defensively drone on and on about how actually brilliant you think you are at everything

    — della~ 🍒 💣 (@della_morte_) August 21, 2022

  90. 90.

    Soprano2

    @Quiltingfool: I’m so sorry, and yes it is hard. We had to do this earlier this year. Give yourself time to heal from it, losing our fur babies is hard even when we know it’s the right thing to do for them.

  93. 93.

    Anyway

    @Soprano2:

    I guess you heard the same story I did, huh? LOL I was almost yelling at the radio “What about the Dobbs decision, you idiots?”

    Only “Activists” care about Dobbs. We objective MSM folk know to discount what activists think.

  95. 95.

    CaseyL

    @Quiltingfool: I am so sorry.  It is hard, and awful, and heartbreaking. And necessary.

    But there is a quote that I sometimes find comfort in: “Animals don’t know how long they live.  They know how **well** they live.”

    You may find some comfort in knowing that you gave Baby a full and wonderful life.

  96. 96.

    lowtechcyclist

    Even aside from Dobbs, I was going “WTF” at recharacterizations like this:

    Liz Cheney:

    Our nation is barreling once again towards crisis, lawlessness and violence. No American should support election deniers for any position of genuine responsibility where their refusal to follow the rule of law will corrupt our future.

    Ron Elving, NPR:

    Her party is no longer the GOP…today’s GOP is driven by nationalists and populist activists empowered by former President Trump, and they are not going away.

    Cheney: lawlessness, violence, election denial, refusal to follow the rule of law.

    NPR guy: nationalists and populist activists.

    They haven’t changed a bit in six years.

  97. 97.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @germy shoemangler: At first I thought that was one of those spoofs where you have to know the person’s a comedian, cause they sound like such a clueless fuckwit, you think it’s real, but if I understand, that really is a clueless fuckwit (Lena Wilson of the NYT) talking about how gifted she is?

  98. 98.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Gin & Tonic: ​In the immortal words of Junior Sample:

    Pi r square? NOOO! Pie are ROUND. CORN PONE are square…

    It’s (barely) possible this purl of whizzdumb was what ancient geometers who asserted the impossibility of “squaring the circle” were alluding to…:^D

  99. 99.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Soprano2:

    Another thing I have noticed is that the long lines at coffee shops like Starbucks and 7 Brew Coffee don’t seem to be any shorter even in the face of higher prices at the grocery store. You’d think it would be easy to save $25-$50/week by making your own coffee rather than buying that expensive stuff, but people don’t seem to be doing that.

    It’s weird. Even before the pandemic changed so many of our habits, I almost never bought coffee from one of those places.  A Cuisinart grind-and-brew coffeemaker costs ~$100, so if you like good coffee*, you get one of these and a good insulated coffee mug, and buy the coffee beans at Trader Joe’s or wherever.

    *I’m hardly a coffee snob, I buy TJ’s basic ‘Joe’ beans, but the fact that the beans are intact until just before you make the coffee makes a huge difference, at least to me.

  100. 100.

    Kay

    @Elizabelle:

    Well, don’t kid yourself. She’s not the first nurse/preacher I have encountered. Dentists too. I don’t think she was an RN. She’s the aide who takes vitals with the little cart. I think she was whispering because she is WELL AWARE that this is out of bounds behavior.

    “How about we just take my vitals and you go visit with someone else?”

    The hospital called me after to check on my “experience”- they do those preemptive apology calls partly to prevent lawsuits- people often won’t sue with medical errors or general fuck ups if someone apologizes an takes responsibility – which I don’t blame them- and I ratted her out. It was not anyone’s fault- just a bad delivery that “fell off a cliff” in the words of my doctor. I was fine and then I was not and everyone was running around panicking.

  103. 103.

    Soprano2

    @James E Powell: My point is that when conservatives talk about high prices and being pinched, they never suggest that middle class people might quit buying $5/cup coffee every day, but when it’s poor people they’re quick to suggest all kinds of spending changes they could make that would improve their lives. Middle class people aren’t supposed to have to make any sacrifices at all.

    I found a ration book in my mother’s stuff this weekend, and it made me think that today’s conservatives would whine and cry if they were asked to make a sacrifice like that.

  104. 104.

    artem1s

    @Spanky: ​
     

    I’m often reminded of the troubling questions raised by ABC News’s Jonathan Karl in multiple interviews late last year about what it would mean to cover Trump if and when he runs for president again. He deemed it perhaps the greatest challenge American political reporters will ever face.

    Shouldn’t be really. DO NOT GIVE HIM FREE AIRTIME.PERIOD. Also, don’t give him a debate platform without the other candidate/s there – for either the GOP primary or the general. SIMPLE. If they are too afraid of doing their jobs and pushing back when TFG spouts lies then they should let someone who has a backbone do it for them.

  105. 105.

    Ken

    @Soprano2: when it’s poor people they’re quick to suggest all kinds of spending changes they could make that would improve their lives

    Or utterly ruin their lives, because the pundits have no concept of what it’s like. I’ve attended some talks on homelessness (it’s an area our church is trying to address) and there are a lot of immediate thoughts that turn out to be very stupid.

    For example, “why do they have mobile phones?”  Because they need them for their jobs, or in order to find a job.

  106. 106.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Formerly disgruntled in Oregon:

    The “view from nowhere” is a ticket to nowhere.

    Even a ‘view from nowhere’ would be tolerable if they were able to see what was smack-dab in front of their faces, regardless of one’s view.

    Here, for instance, their description of what Cheney said is nowhere near reflective of what she actually said.

    The straw that broke the camel’s back in terms of my own NPR-listening came the morning after the 2016 GOP convention.  Their lone observer’s summary’s big points were about what a great job Manafort was doing, and how impressive Trump’s kids were.

    And sure, it’s easy to laugh now because of how terribly both of those have aged, but I was stunned right then by the absence of any mention of “LOCK HER UP!! and “I alone can fix it.”

    Right there, smack dab in front of his face.  And didn’t see either one, or acted as if he hadn’t.

  108. 108.

    Another Scott

    ICYMI, driftglass has a good piece this morning:

    How Conservatives Meatheads Blew Their Chance to Be Even Bigger Whiny Assholes by Paying Too Much Attention to the King of Conservative Whiny Assholes

    They wanted a New Fake Tea Party, but were too drunk on the dregs of the Old Fake Tea Party to cook one up in time to finish off democracy.

    From Politico:

    ‘We got rolled’: How the conservative grassroots lost the fight with Biden because it was focused on Trump

    The former president’s presence on the political landscape is making it harder to launch a modern day Tea Party movement.

    You needn’t bother reading the article. It cites most of the usual, godawful garbage people like FreedumbWorks FreedomWorks and The Mad Hatter Manhattan Institute bitching that they were so busy dying on the “Defending Trump’s Manifold Treasons” hill they didn’t have time to create a national propaganda campaign the scare the shit out people about the threat from Dirty Scranton Commie Joe Biden the same way they did with Dirty Kenyan Commie Barack Obama.

    “Everything was moving so fast, the tax provisions were being debated on the fly, so there was very little time for groups to do that in-depth grassroots pushback like we saw during Obamacare,” said Cesar Ybarra, vice president of policy at conservative grassroots organization FreedomWorks. “To create buzz in this town and for it to penetrate across America, you need more time. So yeah, we got rolled.”

    That’s right kids, they really do look back on their campaign to kill the ACA, deny healthcare to millions of Americans and sabotage the Obama administration at any cost with nostalgia and pride. And the thing about Zombie Republicans is that, as long as someone is paying them to persist, they keep on comin’:

    […]

    Maybe S&M being so obstinate was 11-dimensional chess and was an essential part of the success of the IRA and all the other things???

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  110. 110.

    Another Scott

    @lowtechcyclist: Some of the political reporters are really bad.  Elving seems to be one of them.

    But in the above cited clip, Scott Simon seems to be doing his hosting duties and the segment seems to mainly be about the GQP.  I’m convinced that Simon is one of the good guys, not least because of his clear, relentless reporting from Central America about what Reagan and the Contras were doing in the 1980s.

    There’s still a lot of good stuff on NPR stations, (On The Media; Latino USA; With Good Reason; Code Switch; The Takeaway; Fresh Air; Here and Now; The World;, etc.,) but like with anything you have to keep your thinking cap on while listening.

    FWIW.

    Cheers,
    Scott.
    (“Who still wants to throw stuff at the radio more than occasionally.”)

  111. 111.

    catclub

    @Soprano2: ​
     

    Another thing I have noticed is that the long lines at coffee shops like Starbucks and 7 Brew Coffee don’t seem to be any shorter even in the face of higher prices at the grocery store.

    another anecdata_point. Disney cannot sell enough (extremely high priced) tickets for all the people that want to go there. Falling gas prices are NOT getting coverage.

  112. 112.

    Another Scott

    @Quiltingfool: I’m very sorry.  The loss is part of what makes life so special, but it’s so very painful.

    Remember the good times.

    Best wishes,
    Scott.

  113. 113.

    Chris T.

    @Soprano2: [NPR segment transcript]

    Aha. They’re not having a discussion about what will drive the midterms. They’re having a discussion in which they tell us how and why the Republicans won the midterms so overwhelmingly. It’s not a view from nowhere so much as a view from the inevitable dystopia of tomorrow, you see…

    🙄

  116. 116.

    EarthWindFire

    @Soprano2: Or millennials are supposed to stop buying avocados so they can afford a house. I loathe these people’s entitlement and bad math.

  118. 118.

    Montanareddog

    @Elizabelle: something similar happened at The Grauniad some 20 years ago. There was an article on the travel pages by some bumptious kid – paraphrasing from vague memories, “Hi, my name is Josh, I like techno and skinny jeans. I am going to be blogging in The Guardian about my gap year travels, overland to Australia”.

    It took maybe 5 minutes for the BTL mob to spot that young Josh had the same surname as the paper’s travel editor, and the pile-on was immense. I think it was the youngling’s first and last post

  119. 119.

    EarthWindFire

    @Soprano2: I found a ration book in my mother’s stuff this weekend, and it made me think that today’s conservatives would whine and cry if they were asked to make a sacrifice like that.

    They couldn’t handle putting off haircuts, having someone else pick their plants at the garden store and deliver them to their cars, or mask wearing. Rationing would probably kill them. If I were evil, I’d be putting that in the Dark Brandon suggestion box. 😈

  120. 120.

    The Lodger

    @Another Scott: Simon and NPR have been coasting on Simon’s Nicaragua coverage for nigh onto 40 years now. As for Dobbs, it probably would have gotten a mention if they had bothered to add a woman to the conversation.

  123. 123.

    Soprano2

    @catclub: Falling gas prices are NOT getting coverage.

    Gas prices have dropped off NPR’s radar, except to mention in passing that they’re falling while talking about EXTREMELY HIGH INFLATION OMG EVERYTHING IN THE STORE IS SO EXPENSIVE!!.

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