Climate activist Greta Thunberg ethered misogynist douchebag/criminal Andrew Tate, a failed reality TV figure turned hard-right “influencer” whom I’d never heard of before this morning:
Then the douchebag and his douchebag brother got arrested for human trafficking and organized crime in Romania. See Rolling Stone for details and a bonus perp-walk photo here.
Open thread!
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊😊😊
rikyrah
That whole Tate situation…if a screenwriter had put that situation in a script, it would have been returned to them marked
“TOO INCREDIBLE”
Never fails….
TRUTH IS STRANGER THAN FICTION 😒😒
BlueGuitarist
@rikyrah:
good morning!
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
BlueGuitarist
So is Duke in Glass Onion a parody of Tate?
Baud
But Dems and LGBT folks are.groomers….
It’s all projection.
Jertian
I think you have it backwards.
OzarkHillbilly
Before this morning I had never heard of Andrew Tate. If only I could turn the clock back to my blissful state of ignorance.
Soprano2
Karma in action, I love it, plus a dangerous guy is off the streets now.
NotMax
Jumping the gun, already scribbled in 2023 on the first few fresh checks in the checkbook.
Post-dinner nap stretched from 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. (huzzah for sleep!). Is mixing up a martini at 4 in the morning gauche?
Shantanu Saha
I read that the rant video that Tate put out in response gave the Romanian cops the evidence that he was in country and thus easy to arrest. In front of him was a pizza box with the name of a Bucharest pizza joint. Genius criminal, he was.
NotMax
@Shantanu Saha
Cometka Ping-pongescu?
//
Dorothy A. Winsor
@BlueGuitarist: It’s a sad state of affairs that we have a hard time picking which horrible person is the model for horrible movie characters.
Donatellonerd
surprised Betty has never heard of him — obviously most people haven’t, but those who have are often — like me and Betty Cracker iirc — mothers of young adult or teenaged daughters, often unable to avoid his vast online presence (until a few months ago — and now again on elmo’s toy with his permission).
mali muso
One of the best parts of the whole story is that he was only let back on Twitter by genius Melon Tusk. Which is the platform where he couldn’t resist trying to rile up Greta, leading to the whole chain of events. Schadenfreude!
Kay
@Baud:
Completely acceptable on the Right. He is regularly photographed with Right wing politiicians in the US and UK. This is an association they seek out and promote.
Steeplejack
Chaser:
Ken
I guess he’ll now find out whether the flipside is an absolutely draconian and largely unchecked response when the police do act.
I could easily see that, if the “lax approach” is due to bribery of the local cops. Once the arrest is made, they’d be eager to separate themselves from him, as would those further up the chain (plus perhaps some payback for not being included in the original bribes).
Kay
@Donatellonerd:
The central role of misogyny on the Right is underplayed and underexplored, IMO.
Baud
@Kay:
I wonder if DeSantis will offer him asylum in Florida.
Kay
@Baud:
Women who are around him just seem to accidentally get their jaws broken.
Another rabid Right winger imported from the UK. This one specializes in hatred of women.
Spanky
@Kay:
I didn’t know Mattie Gaetz’s thumbs could move that fast.
sab
I was thinking Greta Thunberg was too young for such jokes. Then I googled her and she is 19. Kids grow up so fast these days.
NotMax
@Baud
And then send him to Martha’s Vineyard?
“It’s off-season. You should be able to find a place cheap.”
//
sab
@Kay: Instead of being all hyperalert about our southern border we need to be keeping a better eye on our international airports for Brits coming in.
Betty Cracker
@Steeplejack: Hahahaha! Only a fool would tangle with Thunberg online. ;-)
Steeplejack
Recycled from last night: someone had some fun with Tate’s Wikipedia page.
Starfish
The whole “recruiting youth to misogyny and right wing extremism” pipeline is not great.
There was a Twitter hack a while ago where a bunch of big accounts on Twitter got hijacked to steal crypto. The person who did that was 17 years old. He had gotten his start through scamming people on Minecraft when he was 14.
This was nuts, and it made me a little squirmy about accounting for the underdeveloped brains of minors in sentencing.
Ken
@Baud: In the late-night thread, I speculated that Bolsonaro might get a job at Mar-a-Lago (since TFG has a history of hiring foreigners at his places). Maybe Tate can also find something there
EDIT: This is reminding me of a science-fiction short story, name forgotten, where people abused time-travel technology to create parallel universes with strange or ironic twists on our history. Like a Bavarian hotel that circa 1940 was staffed entirely by the men who, in our timeline, were the heads of the Nazi party. Goering as headwaiter, Goebbels as a bell-hop, Hitler at the front desk…
geg6
@Shantanu Saha:
Read the same. Karma, she’s a bitch.
Gin & Tonic
@Ken: I dunno about “lax approach,” but I’m thinking Romanian prison is a place you don’t want to be.
NotMax
@Starfish
Maturity is no requirement for hackery. In point of fact it may be an impediment thereto.
PST
I see that this Andrew Tate guy is a native of Chicago and spent his early boyhood in Goshen, Indiana. I wonder if he is still a U.S. citizen entitled to consular help after a foreign arrest. I, too, didn’t know about him until yesterday and hope to forget him tomorrow.
Soprano2
The other day, in a thread that was dead, people were talking about solutions for chapped lips and hands. I found that Laniege Sleeping Mask lip balm is a miracle substance for me. I’ve tried so many things for the perpetually chapped lips I have in the winter, and this is hands down the best thing I’ve ever used. I put it on at night before I go to bed, and it’s still on my lips when I get up in the morning! Amazing stuff, a little pricy but if you can afford it worth the money because it actually works!
rikyrah
@OzarkHillbilly:
For me it was yesterday until Greta sent that tweet.
NotMax
@PST
Beat the rush. Join me in forgetting about him today.
;)
Jeffro
The entire Fro family was laughing about this at breakfast this morning.
Biggest self-own (self DOUBLE own, actually) in the history of self-owns.
Karma, she is…she is tough!
Soprano2
@Kay: To Republicans “freedom” is “being able to do whatever I want to whoever I want to do it to”. It’s disgusting.
Ken
@PST: Apparently he keeps changing countries so that he can ignore the laws, so it would be totally in character for him to now scream for the protection of the law.
Jeffro
@Kay: ol’ Tucker spent at least one episode earlier this year decrying the “hate on the Left” for Tate.
shocking, I know
Soprano2
@Kay: Conservative men hate hate hate that now they have to compete with women for better, higher-paying jobs. They think they alone deserve to have those jobs, and women should go back to being housewives, teachers, nurses and secretaries before they have children.
Karen S.
PizzaTate. What a vile creature.
Anyway… Brava, Greta! Brava!
DrDaveChemist
@NotMax: Depends on whether you consider it this morning or still last night.
One of my sons needed a ride to the airport at that sort of ungodly hour earlier this week, but thankfully the other one has shifted his sleep schedule so much that he just stayed awake, saving me the trouble of having to get out of a sound sleep to act as chauffeur. I will do a lot for my sons, but a one hour drive each way in the wee hours of the morning is pushing the envelope…
Kay
@Soprano2:
It’s just funny that they’re all so worried about “the children!” when it comes to drag shows but this violent, criminal, Right wing misogynist has a HUGE platform where he recruits boys and young men into a hating and abusing women club (at 9 dollars a month) and there’s not a peep out of the protectors of children on the Right. Twelve year old boys are children. He’s literally grooming them to attack girls and women.
NotMax
@Soprano2
The canard that the only real reason women attend college is to get an MRS degree is persistent.
AM in NC
@Kay: Yeah, we have just a slight misogyny problem. But if we all smile and look pretty, I’m sure they’ll treat us fine.
STILL wondering (not wondering) why we haven’t seen Epstein’s Big Black Book.
Dave
@BlueGuitarist: Duke was in reality a muted relatively anodyne version of these dudes.
indycat32
OT – two more kittens (both female) are back from the clinic and hiding under my neighbor’s deck.
oldgold
Over the past few days, I have scanned over a few of the transcripts released by the January 6th Committee.
One of my take always is that the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution that limits a President to two terms needs to be tweaked.
During the Trump / Biden “transition period” and until this day Trump has done things intended to damage the Biden presidency. Trump has done so, besides being a malignant narcissistic flaming asshole, to enhance his chances of being elected President in 2024. The poison a toxic former President, operating in bad faith, can inject into the body politic, as we have witnessed, is enormous; particularly, if they are not legally a lame duck. The fact Trump could once again be President, is in large measure, what empowers him.
Although it would not solve the problem completely, I think the 22nd Amendment should be tweaked to state a President defeated in an election for a second term should be precluded from ever running in the future for a second term.
NotMax
@AM in NC
Not to instigate a storm but it’s not all purely based on hatred. There’s also the misbegotten belief entrenched in some quarters that they are an inferior model of the species.
Baud
@oldgold:
No more Grovers!
p.a.
@NotMax:
Not if you use gin.
NotMax
@oldgold
Grover Cleveland on line one.
:)
Suzanne
@NotMax:
No way. I want to enjoy his misfortune through the weekend, at least.
#pointandlaugh
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@oldgold: there’s almost too much to digest in these transcripts
and, not for the first time, where the hell were these people, the Gina Haspels, the John Kellys, Silent Jim Mattis, the alleged “national security professionals”, during the second impeachment trial?
WaterGirl
@Steeplejack: That’s too funny!
Suzanne
@Kay:
You know that’s because hating and abusing women is what they consider their male birthright, and they are pissed AF that that has been threatened.
oldgold
About the only things Grover gave us, not directly, but indirectly, was a bunch of phony states that plague us to this day and the Baby Ruth candy bar.
JR
One of the weirdest aspects of the Tate story is that his dad was a famous chess grandmaster.
WaterGirl
@indycat32: So 3 out of 4, and the 4th one (Houdini) has disappeared?
Gin & Tonic
@p.a.: If you use anything else it is not a martini.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Shantanu Saha: OK, some of the obscure jokes are starting to make sense now. I had heard that some guy got pantsed by Greta Thunberg, but hadn’t bothered to chase down the details. And I saw something about “I can recommend a pizza place in Romania” but had no idea what that was supposed to mean.
NotMax
@oldgold
CYA myth, that. It was rushed to market to compete with an extant Babe Ruth candy concoction which was eating into Curtiss’ bottom line. Curtiss previously attempted to woo Ruth to lend his name but his asking price was deemed too exorbitant.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
Aside from the rampant criminality, why is it that Republicans seem to think that you can put any random intern into positions of enormous responsibility, so long as they’re loyal? It’s like they don’t even recognize there’s such a concept as “competency”.
Which, judging by the A team of Trump lawyers, is probably true.
I still remember hearing about random 25-year-olds being shipped overseas after W’s Iraqi misadventure and being told, “congratulations, you’re now the Minister of Education”.
Baud
@oldgold:
@NotMax:
Ruth came well after Grover, no?
Betty
@Donatellonerd: I was wondering who it was he was influencing. Glad he is out of circulation for now.
Omnes Omnibus
@Gin & Tonic: This is correct.
Ken
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Maintaining awareness of all internet traditions is hard work.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@oldgold: reminds me of an old SNL skit, Dan Ackroyd as Nixon old:
the sage of Yorba Linda plotting his comeback with the slogans: “Can a country really be free if a man can only be President twice?”
and
“The New Dick!” It’s short, it’s sweet, and everybody wants to see it!
Jane Curtain’s Edward Albee inspired Pat, sneering and holding a martini: “It’s short and sweet but I don’t think anybody wants to see it” Wild stuff for NBC in 1975
NotMax
@Baud
Yup. Both the slugger and the candy. Coincidental kismet regarding the name of Grover’s child.
Betty
@AM in NC: No need to wonder. It contains too many important names. Won’t see the light of day.
frosty
Since this (and all others) is an Open Thread, here’s a link from Wonkette. A great story!
… this is an absolutely delightful read on the comeback of … Barnes & Noble? And all the company needed was a CEO who loves books!
https://tedgioia.substack.com/p/what-can-we-learn-from-barnes-and
NotMax
@Jim, Foolish Literalist
Remembering the slogan “Nixon’s the one” from ’68.
And its timely rejoinder, “And Agnew’s another one.”
;)
Geminid
There has also been no fresh news about the Moore County power grid attack that cut off power to 45,000 residents December 3rd. Last week somebody did hang a banner on an overpass there contained neo-Nazi slogans. A local citizen spotted it, took it down, and then notified police. Two similar banners have been hung in the county this past year.
Moore County citizen-journalist Cheryl Christy-Bowman wrote up the incident and its aftermath on her blog Moore Voices. Her article is titled, “A Pattern of Racial Hatred and an Unconcerned Sheriff and Newspaper.”
A (fingers crossed) link:
https://www.moorevoices.net/post/a-pattern-of-racial-hatred-and-an-unconcerned-sheriff-and-newspape
Ms. Christy-Bowman has been blogging since 2018 on Moore County politics, in particular the radical takeover of the Republican party there and its malign effects. The December 3rd grid attack prompted her to begin a five-part series on local radicalization. She released “Timeline of Terror-Part 1” a couple weeks ago. It covers events 2014-2018. Later parts will vover events up to the power grid attack and its aftermath
Christy-Bowman became involved in her county’s politics as a public education advocate. I encountered her on twitter at @moorevoicesnc.
Donatellonerd
@Kay: born in the USA, i believe
NotMax
No edit. Amendment to #73:
And its timely Delphic rejoinder, “And Agnew’s another one.”
kalakal
Tate seems to have hung around with some prize specimens in Britland. Photo ops with Nigel Farage, racist & Islamaphobe criminal Tommy Robinson (head of the English Defence League, which is exactly what it says on the tin) who is a “solid guy” with a “good heart”.
“doing his very best to protect England from Islamisation.” according to Tate*.
Since news of the arrest broke the usual vile right wing media motor mouths like Julia Hartley-Brewer are desperately deleting their messages of support and attacks on Thunberg.
He’s a vile bastard who’s made a lot of money out of hate, I hope he rots in jail for years
Here’s a very good & very funny takedown of his idiot video
https://twitter.com/wsebag/status/1608742310413475840?s=20&t=yhtmZbVc7DzCyzstTmRZ7Q
*Tate used to turn up with Robinson’s other goons to threaten journalists at their homes in the early hours of the morning
Frankensteinbeck
@Suzanne:
Recall the Kavenaugh hearings. Republicans absolutely lost their shit that democrats thought committing rape was a disqualifier. They were offended, outraged, vomiting bile about it.
I just erased a much longer comment about it, because the topic is just too vile.
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: Well, G&T ought to know.
Suzanne
@kalakal:
In the contemporary era, one of the best parts of sending loathsome criminals to prison is that they can’t tweet.
Improving public safety + a modicum of peace and quiet = Serious twofer
Sherparick
@Steeplejack: peffect Chef’s 💋
PaulWartenberg
I am proud to note that I blocked Andrew Tate on Twitter months ago.
Who wants pizza today!!!
oldgold
@NotMax: Not as clear cut as you state. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_Ruth
Suzanne
@Frankensteinbeck:
100% correct.
I said at the time, they believe he did it, absolutely everybody believes he did it…..they just don’t think it’s a big deal. And why don’t they think it’s a big deal? Because every one of them either did it or wishes they had.
kalakal
@rikyrah: If only he’d had a getaway car
AM in NC
@NotMax: Yeah, I’m using misogyny broadly here to mean hatred of and the other constellation of feelings behind oppression of women.
Whether it’s recognizable as hatred or just the fucked up belief that not being able to grow or feed another human being with your body makes you a better person, it’s all bad.
Not sure what term covers all the varieties of ways women are degraded, penalized, attacked, preyed upon, etc. by a patriarchal culture.
Steeplejack
@Geminid:
Thanks for keeping tabs on this.
Omnes Omnibus
@zhena gogolia: He may seem a bit biased. I thought confirmation from a non-gin-nymed commenter might be warranted.
PaulWartenberg
@Ken:
One of the people arrested in conjunction with the Tate brothers was a woman (?!) police officer as part of the “conspiracy to start a criminal enterprise”.
NotMax
@Suzanne
Wait until Musk announces Slammerlink.
//
Soprano2
As Atrios would say, “Some of your faves may be in it”. Way too many powerful men in there for it to ever see the light of day, and I suspect their political affiliations are all over the map.
oldgold
Back to main point, after Grover won in ‘84, the GOP recognized a solid Democratic Dixie could spell electoral and Senatorial problems for them in the future. Their solution was South Dakota, North Dakota, Wyoming, Montana and Idaho.
That was bad, but manageable; however, now that Dixie is politically aligned with these false states, we have a real and enduring problem.
Geminid
@Steeplejack: As the youngs say, “no problem!”
I am very impressed by Ms. Christy-Bowman’s efforts. She is an efficient reporter/historian. And while she focuses on her own county, Christy-Bowman believes the phenomena she reports on are common to many other rural/exurban counties elewhere, and I think she is right.
Soprano2
That was one reason the Iraq Occupation was so fucked up; a bunch of people who had never been in charge of anything were put in charge of rebuilding a country because they worked at the Heritage Foundation! R’s have a long history of often not caring that much about competency. They care about loyalty more.
Steeplejack
Redacted.
Soprano2
@Suzanne: They think all women should want to have sex with them, and can’t understand that there are women who don’t. Thus this attitude.
Boris Rasputin (the evil twin)
OT, but this has been bothering me for a few days.
George Santos, is not 1) college educated, 2) Jewish or descended from Holocaust survivors, 3) gay, 4) a financial whiz, 5) add your own here – I can’t keep it straight.
Is there any proof this lying shite is a real person, and not a GQP hologram?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Soprano2: the Libertarian Terrarium experiment. Almost twenty years later, I forget if that was critical snark or aspirational cluelessness from one of the think-tank cheerleaders
Baud
Looking forward to the Andrew Tate inspired episode of FBI International.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Boris Rasputin (the evil twin): I saw a mastodon post from someone asking if Santos had used up all the lies so the rest of us will never be able to tell one again.
NotMax
@oldgold
You left out Washington (admitted 1889).
Washington, Montana, Idaho and Wyoming were already nominal geographically designated territories. Only Dakota Territory was split. That Montana wasn’t remains somewhat a puzzlement.
Geminid
@Soprano2: Also, procuring under-age sexual partners was only a part of Epstein’s influencing/ blackmailing/espionage(?) operation. Many if not most of the people named in this book probably had no part in Epstein’s criminal exploitation of girls, although some may have had first hand or second hand knowledge.
Epstein drew many wealthy and/or powerful people into his web over 35 years, and while there was a wide range of knowledge and involvement they would not escape the guilt by association, whether or not it was deserved.
Soprano2
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: The Republican neocons had so many crazy ideas about Iraq, like the one where we depose Saddam, they fly in Ahmed Chalibi and install him as the new leader so Iraq will recognize Israel and all the other Middle East countries will follow them, Middle East crisis resolved! As if the Iraqi people didn’t exist and wouldn’t have anything to say or do about it. This was the crux of the problem, because everything else they did depended on installing Chalibi, and when that didn’t happen they tried to do everything else anyway. I read Rick’s book about this, the military people had plans to use the Iraqi military people to rebuild buildings and infrastructure that had been damaged; they were shocked when the order came down to disband the Iraqi military. IMHO that was the absolutely worst decision of many incredibly bad decisions made by the Bush administration about Iraq (with the first bad one being to invade and occupy it in the first place). Lots of the things we’re dealing with in the world now related to terrorism started with this decision.
kindness
Greta’s reply tweet was funny as hell. I hadn’t seen humor in her before. Bravo Greta. And then to have the Bros get arrested & perp walked? Masterful karma on display. The only thing nice I can say for the Bro is the Bugatti is a really nice car that I will never own.
Steeplejack
@Geminid:
I agree.
Jackie
“If she [Kari Lake] had won this race, if she had become governor, yes,” said Barrett Marson. “But now — you can be a lot of things in Trump World, but you can’t be a loser.”
Snippet from The Hill article speculating Lake’s future that caused me to spew coffee.
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/3792214-gop-doubts-grow-over-kari-lakes-future-in-arizona/
NotMax
@Geminid
Hey now, that was a catchphrase mouthed frequently on Parker Lewis Can’t Lose, which first aired over 30 years ago.
;)
Betty Cracker
Gin tastes like Pine-Sol-infused vodka, ergo, vodka martinis are better. I said what I said.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
again, almost too much to digest
Ken
Personal experience? “I started as an intern at Dad’s company, and within three years I’d worked my way up to CEO,” that sort of thing.
Ken
I was going to say that surely both Santos and Lake wouldn’t be holograms, then I remembered how lazy the writers have been lately.
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: Right.
cliosfanboy
@Ken:
I want to read this story! Does anyone else here remember it?
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: Bush’s occupation authority in Iraq was in many ways the model for the Trump Administration in the US. Bush’s clown brigade was just barely too smart to actually do it in their own country.
Betty Cracker
@Soprano2: Those of us who lived through the W admin as adults really did have every reason to believe we were surviving the dumbest, most hubristic clusterfuck in the history of the U.S. and that its mind-bogglingly arrogant fuckery was unlikely to be rivaled in our lifetimes. A mere eight years later, we saw another GOP admin plumb new depths. I don’t know if the country could survive another Republican president. Let’s not find out, okay?
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
Heh. “So far, our relationship has been on a very civilized and friendly basis.”
:)
opiejeanne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: What is the USSS? I’m only half-awake right now. US Secret Service?
Geminid
@NotMax: It occurs to me that I probably think of Gen-Xers as “youngs.”
Now, the real youngs probably have their own phrase for, “you’re welcome.”
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@opiejeanne: the Secret Service
Barbara
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: No matter how rotten you think they are, they manage to find ways to outdo themselves.
@Jackie: So basically this is what explains Trump’s nearly psychotic denial that he lost. He CANNOT be a loser.
oldgold
@NotMax:
Yes. The were territories and should have remained so. They account for 10 Senators. Their combined population is a fraction of California’s, which has 2 Senators.
Of course, I think the Senate was a bad idea from the get go. But that is a long tangled discussion for another time.
opiejeanne
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Thanks. It finally dawned on me.
Anyway
@Boris Rasputin (the evil twin):
Appears Santos is gay.
NotMax
@Geminid
Gnarly, dude. It’s all good.
:)
Matt McIrvin
@Betty Cracker: I don’t think there’s any way we can really avoid it. Nobody holds the White House forever, and term limits mean we can’t even have an FDR-like situation where we hold it by repeatedly electing the same popular person. If the Republicans don’t take it in 2024, it’ll be 2028 or 2032.
There’s always the hope that repeated losses drive them to sanity before it happens but that didn’t really work before (or it didn’t take for long).
Ken
@opiejeanne: Secret Service, I think.
You know, the guys who offered Pence a ride on January 6, but he wouldn’t get in the car.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Good chance Tate’s misogyny is all fan service. At lot of these Extreme Fighting fans are clearly basement dwelling moma’s boys living out their tough guy fantasy threw these fighters. It’s not so much they hate women because of job competition, as they are afraid a woman might beat them up, lol
opiejeanne
@Ken: That still makes me shudder, the SS telling him to get into the car.
opiejeanne
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Did you miss the comment above that a number of women in his orbit have had broken jaws?
artem1s
@oldgold:
not entirely sure I agree with the current 22nd limit anyway. the problem is the endless running/not running for POTUS to make $. extreme campaign financing reform would be a better solution. the disruption caused by TFG is only the tip of the iceberg. take the grift off the table and there would be no reason for any of these assholes to be engaged in any of these ‘disruptions’. start with overturning Citizen’s United. put OMB style grant regulations on reporting campaign revenue and spending with an NIH type cap limit for salaries of campaign staff and that should take care of a lot of it.
NotMax
@Matt McIrvin
That’s assuming the Republican party doesn’t implode by then. Which is not a foregone conclusion.
“Go big. Vote Whig.”
:)
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: I think Iraq’s new constitutional framework that we sponsored has hobbled their democracy. Proportional representation through nation-wide party slates seems to be problematic in many ways, and Iraq has yet to have a stable or popular government. The best they’ve done is to muddle through.
NotMax
@opiejeanne
Might wanna rephrase that. Just sayin’.
;)
Barbara
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: No, they are afraid that women might laugh at them and find them ridiculous.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@NotMax: there’s a Sorkin-esque fantasy among never-trumpers and Grand High Broderists that Liz Cheney will lead an exodus of principled Republicans to a new party, under the benign guidance of Elder Willard, with the support of Manchin and Sinema. I think at least those last two would be all over it.
I still think Liz Cheney is finished in electoral politics.
Leto
(WaPo) House panel releases Trump tax returns in another setback for former president
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: Republicans may be out of power for longer than that. The Roosevelt coalition held the White House from 1932 to 1952. It might have held it longer had Harry Truman and his Joint Chiefs not let MacArthur screw up the war in Korea.
I can see the Obama-Biden coalition keeping the White House and Congress through 2036 and beyond.
Baud
@Leto:
Claiming Pence as a dependent is problematic.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@opiejeanne: Of course he is really attacking other people. They always turn into the monsters they are play acting as.
different-church-lady
@Betty Cracker: So, uh… how do you know what Pine-Sol tastes like?
zhena gogolia
@Betty Cracker: Hahaha. Have you tried Bombay Sapphire? It’s delicious.
RedDirtGirl
@Matt McIrvin: if you haven’t read Imperial Life in the Emerald City about life in the Green Zone in Iraq, it is chock full of stories about the mismanagement.
rikyrah
@Frankensteinbeck:
Nothing but truth.
Brachiator
@Geminid:
What more positive outcome to the Korean War was prevented?
In any case, presidential term limits make any one party dominance less likely. And Eisenhower might have been a lock no matter what. But who knows? Alternative histories don’t much matter.
Soprano2
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: There is no bottom to TFG’s pettiness.
raven
@Geminid: Dugout Doug, he never spent one night in Korea. He flew back to his palace every night.
Soprano2
I totally agree! I shudder to think of what incompetents would work for another TFG administration, because no one with any actual competence would get within 100 miles of that WH.
raven
@Brachiator: “Alternative histories don’t much matter.”
So why ask “what positive outcome. . .”?
Brachiator
@Leto:
Trump tax returns…
The Boston Globe has a nice graphic summarizing the tax returns. Unfortunately, they sometimes throw up an ad that covers over the site display.
Geminid
@NotMax: When the Whigs imploded many of them moved to the American (“Know Nothing”) Party. It in turn dissolved itself in 1860 and its Northern members joined the new Republican Party. Their ideological descendents remain there today and now are very powerful.
tobie
@Soprano2: Norman Lear tapped deep into the fears of white working class men with the lyrics to “Those were the days.” (Lear is 100 and still going strong. God bless him.)
NotMax
Inspired scene just now on the TV.
Two guys trying to gather evidence by listening at the paper-thin wall to the adjacent hotel room. One Good Guy trips over something, making a loud crash.
Bad Guy #1 rushes out to pound on the door to the next room.
After a short delay, door is opened by the two Good Guys, now dressed only in underwear. “What is it?”
Bad Guy #1: “Okay, fine. Now I get it.”
Bad Guy #2, sticking head out the door of the next room: “Problem?”
Bad Guy #1: “No. Just people fucking.”
Matt McIrvin
@Geminid: Biden isn’t in great shape, poll-wise. Better than several months ago, but reelection is not going to be a walk, especially if DeSantis is the R nominee and the media remain in the tank for him. Democrats outperformed general expectations in the midterms, but I don’t see a situation where a hugely popular coalition can retain power for a long time.
Granted, if it’s Trump he’s up against, Biden probably knows how to take him again.
Geminid
@Brachiator: The positive outcome would have been achieved if Truman and and the Joint Chiefs had ordered MacArthur to have his engineers select a line 70 miles or so north of Seoul where the peninsula was still narrow, and fortify it. The Chinese would not have entered the war and North Korea would have been left a rump state occupying a bunch of impovershed hills and mountains.
Jackie
@Ken: President Biden doesn’t completely trust the SS either. Per Political Wire:
“President Joe Biden was so disturbed by the Secret Service’s handling of text messages sought by the House January 6 select committee that he stopped speaking candidly in the presence of special agents assigned to his protection detail, a new book on the Biden White House has revealed,” the Independentreports.
“In The Fight of His Life: Inside Joe Biden’s White House, author Chris Whipple writes that Mr Biden’s discomfort with the post-Trump era agency began early on in his presidency, when it became clear that “some of” the agents charged with protecting him from assassination were strong supporters of the man he defeated in the 2020 election, former president Donald Trump.”
”Also interesting: Biden’s relationship with his security further strained after an agent claimed that the president’s dog had bitten him — an allegation that Biden doesn’t quite believe.“
NotMax
@Geminid
Real campaign advert at the time for the Whigs.
Brachiator
@raven:
I don’t know.
Curiosity?
Because we are all having a genial conversation, not a rigorous debate?
Because other commenters often have good knowledge of history and offer interesting insights?
I am generally extremely skeptical of political and history hypotheticals, but have no problem reading them.
Leto
@Brachiator: I think you had made this point a few days ago, but as we all know the IRS staff is just seriously undermanned. Combine that with the complexity of his criminal enterprises and here we are. This also illustrates the point we’ve made about trying to properly tax the rich.
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: I think the economic initiatives Democrats have enacted will bear fruit for the rest of this decade and I believe there will be more. Demographic change could enhance Democratic power, and Republicans seem hellbent on marginilizing themselves.
But this is a common story here: two informed and intelligent people looking at the same set of facts and drawing different conclusions.
Hoodie
Didn’t know about this guy until my son called me about it last night. Point being, not all of this is old farts in MAGA hats, there’s a younger generation of douchebags on TikTok and other media.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Jackie: the whole Ornato story– he took a “leave of absence” to work for trump, then went back to a high-ranking position, in charge of training, IIRC– should be a scandal. I think he quit to protect himself from 1/6 committee subpoenas?
There’s some fucked up shit going on with federal LEOs. Nicolle Wallace led her show yesterday with this story of the “Suspendables”, a group of FBI agents who refused to cooperate with the trump investigation, got suspended and are now lining up to be the stars of Gym Jordan’s hearings.
Betty Cracker
@zhena gogolia: Yep — cleaning product! It’s the juniper berries, I think. I can’t get past the pine taste, so I avoid all gin, cheap and pricey.
Soprano2
@tobie: Yep, absolutely. Did Lear write that song?
Betty Cracker
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: The idea that the FBI is crawling with anti-Trump liberals is so preposterous. It’s possible that one lesson from 2022 is that, outside of a few hard-right states, people don’t want extremists running things. I hope it blows up in Jordan’s face when he parades these whiners around as cancel culture victims.
Another Scott
@Steeplejack: Oooof! [ chef’s kiss ]
(Unfortunately, around here the county doesn’t take pizza boxes for recycling (I guess the cheese residue messes up the value of the paper).)
Cheers,
Scott.
Brachiator
@Leto:
The Audit division has its own problems, but more than that, the IRS is still hugely backlogged by its inability to process millions of paper filed returns, and to update customer records. This has been quietly reported, and industry insiders keep track of this, but it is a goddam scandal which may also impact the upcoming filing season.
It says much that New York state was able to nail Trump fairly quickly, once they focused on him. The GOP has not only favored the rich with generous tax cuts, but has actively impeded the IRS. This is typically deeply cynical and shameful.
Steeplejack
Chilling profile of Andrew Tate from The Guardian in August.
tobie
@Soprano2: I gather the lyrics were written by Lee Adams and the music was composed by Charles Strouse but Norman Lear worked closely with both. Adams and Strouse were famous for their collaboration on musicals.
Matt McIrvin
@Another Scott: Yeah, my impression is that even a tiny bit of food grease makes paper or cardboard unsuitable for recycling, but I was resisting the urge to “well actually” Thunberg’s magnificent joke…
Leto
@Brachiator: NY State was able to do it because they had a dedicated team just for him. They could focus all their efforts on a single entity. I don’t know how to extrapolate out how many agents we’d need for all of our mega rich, as well as companies, but I know the 88k personnel the IRS is supposed to add will help. Def agree that conservatives have actively sought to impede/dismantle the IRS, as well as every other government agency that might impede their cash grabbing schemes.
oatler
@Betty Cracker:
Let me introduce you to…retsina!
opiejeanne
@NotMax: Or maybe not, as SS sometimes seems appropriate wrt the former administration.
cmorenc
@Soprano2:
I’d say it’s more: “being able to do whatever I want….without obligation to be concerned about whether or how my actions may harmfully impact or burden others“. It’s the rejection of any collective responsibility to society. To the extent they feel bothered to justify it beyond the simplistic slogan “FREEDOM!”, their explanation always boils down to some close variation of the Randian principle that the greater good is best served by the aggregation of individual selfishness, coupled with a petulent: “you can’t tell me what to do.”
BTW: guess what the slogan is on Lauren Bober’s (still up) billboards, e.g. along 70 business into downtown Grand Junction, Colorado, in BIG letters underneath her grinning face? “Freedom“. And by “freedom”, it’s certain that her concept thereof is exactly what we described above.
oatler
@Betty Cracker:
deleted
JMG
@Leto: Most of those 88,000 new IRS employees will go to the task of processing refunds in a more timely manner. That’s important, too. I’d say for most voters, it’s way more important.
tobie
I don’t know much about federal procedures but is there any chance Biden could replace the IRS commissioner Charles Rettig? I wouldn’t mind seeing Chris Wray, Joseph Cuffari (IG of DHS) and Michael Horowitz (the DOJ IG) fired but that’s too much to ask for.
Horowtiz has bugged me for some time. He never completed the investigation of leaks from the NY field office of the FBI in 2016, and he seems to have sat on every other investigation, hoping it would die, except for the one of Andrew McCabe.
Leto
REPORT TO THE HOUSE COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN RICHARD NEAL Prepared by staff of the JOINT COMMITTEE ON TAXATION ON WAYS AND MEANS
Drunkenhausfrau
I confess i have been enjoying the Greta smackdown of this professional cretin WAY TOO MUCH. Despite trying to ween myself from twitter, this little comedy has sucked me in! Hilarious! My gen Z kids and I have been sharing the schadenfreude!
cmorenc
@JMG:
And RW media (social and mass) is busy propagating the meme that all of those 88k agents will be armed, and will be put to use as IRS SWAT teams to harass ordinary citizens.
Leto
@JMG: Agreed. Demonstrating to people, in concrete ways, that government is responsive and able to meet people’s needs goes a long way.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
his term expired last month, I believe
ETA: MSNBC just dropped the nugget that trump took his salary as POTUS in 2020, in spite of his showy pledge to donate it to charity
Leto
@cmorenc: if conservatives had their way, this is exactly what they’d do. Projection all the way down.
tobie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I will look into that! Thanks.
billcinsd
@NotMax: Yeah the Baby Ruth came out 17 years after Ruth Cleveland died
Sister Golden Bear
@OzarkHillbilly: Unfortunately Tate is incredibly popular with teen/tween boys.
different-church-lady
@cmorenc: or, to put it more concisely : “…to hurt whoever I want when I want.”
billcinsd
@kalakal:“doing his very best to protect England from Islamisation.” according to Tate*.
Because Tate became a Muslim in October 2022
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
?
I thought he would have to report his income even if he donated it all to charity. There would simply be a separate report for the charitable donation.
Another Scott
@Geminid: Something, something frog and scorpion something something it is my nature.
MacArthur wanted to be President. He wanted a big victory. Like Custer, his hubris got him and there was no other conceivable outcome with him in charge.
Beware of generals who were gigantic momma’s boys.
Cheers,
Scott.
lige
@Ken: The sci-fi story I think you are remembering is Rumfuddle by Jack Vance
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: right, just a nugget that he’s a liar and a hypocrite, nothing illegal
in 2017 at least he would make a big photo-op show of giving a giant novelty ‘check’ to a charity every quarter, and in 2020 he just pocketed the money. Maybe to make interest payments.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
My question is how MSNBC figured that out for 2020? Was there simply no line item under charitable deductions for the amount of the salary?
Burnspbesq
@PaulWartenberg:
Who better to feed young women arrested for petty crimes into the insatiable maw of the online-porn industry?
Tony G
@Donatellonerd: How does a guy like that — essentially a nobody — end up with a “fleet” of 33 luxury cars? Who is paying for all those luxury cars?
zhena gogolia
Wow. I just came across this passage in Tolstoy, Hadji Murat, about Tsar Nicholas I. Sounds so like Putler:
“The blatant, unceasing flattery of those around him had so far detached him from reality that he was no longer aware of his own inconsistency and ceased to relate his words and actions to reality, logic or plain common sense, fully convinced that all his decisions, however senseless, unjust and inconsistent they were in fact, became sensible, just and consistent simply by virtue of having been made by him.”
Bill Arnold
Baud
@Tony G:
I only learned of him yesterday, but he’s not a nobody. And he seems to have gotten rich through grift.
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
Sounds like my last employee review.
Ken
@lige: Yes, exactly! Thank you very much. I knew it had an unusual title, but my mind kept sticking on Erik Frank Russell’s “Allamagoosa”.
CarolPW
@Matt McIrvin:
Joke still works – lots of areas they get “recycled” in the compost bin.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Tony G: at a guess, pay-per-view and endorsements?
I read not long ago that every single Kardashian sister is a billionaire in her own right. Even if that’s an exaggeration, they seem to be fantastically rich from being famous for being famous. The zombie Gabor Sisters are gonna eat them first out of jealous rage.
ETA: I think one of the things trump has been covering up is how much of his money comes from that game show, a similarly popular but cheap-to-produce operation
stinger
Yawn. Online douchebags being real-world criminals is so PREDICTABLE.
raven
@Brachiator: I just wondered. If we hadn’t overextended they way we did we might have been able to prevent North Korea from becoming North Korea.
Steeplejack
@Tony G:
Per the Guardian profile linked at #167 above:
That’s almost £5 million ($6 million) a month.
Qrop Non Sequitur
Funnily, the most recent instance was a legitimately leftish individual recommended to me by a Trumpy friend arguing that Tate shouldn’t have been banned from Twitter.
I’m not a big fan of this dude’s program, but more because of format than having heard any takes that were bad in principle
Eta: His basic argument was assorted redpill man-babies and Nazis shouldn’t be deplatformed because people need experience answering their nonsense takes. This goes double for college campuses.
Geminid
@Tony G: There is a ton of money in social media for someone like Tate. A couple years ago I read about some young teenager who was making millions evaluating toys.
Podcasting alone is putting money in some peoples pockets who never made a fraction as much as straight journalists.
Baud
@Qrop Non Sequitur:
Agree. Maybe he would have gotten arrested sooner if he hadn’t been banned.
stacib
@Soprano2: It’s in the opening credits of All in the Family. If you remember Archie Bunker, the song makes tons of sense.
Kent
I assumed he was a parody of Alex Jones. But then I had never heard of Tate until yesterday when Greta defenestrated him.
Jess
@Betty Cracker: I know, right? Amazing…
topclimber
@Geminid: Was it know nothings or free-soilers that did more of the heavy lifting?
Qrop Non Sequitur
@Baud: You never know…
zhena gogolia
@Baud: NYT:
zhena gogolia
@Kent: I thought he was Joe Rogan.
Jess
@lige: Love Jack Vance. I don’t think I’ve read that story, though. I’ll have to search it out.
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
Thanks. That makes sense then.
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
Trump Foundation?
trollhattan
I had not heard of the Tate dude until Greta handed him his ballsack on a bespoke saucer. That he decided he needed to troll her to begin with (because, reasons) informs me his decisionmaking abilities are suspect. Someone had a screengrab of his Wikipedia page showing his kickboxing match record topped with a loss to Thunberg, 27.12.22, location Twitter, before it was deleted.
Delicious, the whole thing.
Oh, a troll attempted to restore his cred in LGM comments yesterday. You can guess how that went.
Another Scott
@zhena gogolia: Of course, (almost) everything he has ever said is a lie, so this is the least surprising thing today.
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
trollhattan
@Baud: Trump Foundation for Starving ArronBas.
Qrop Non Sequitur
If the theoretically true bits were in service of a different lie, they were still lies.
zhena gogolia
@Another Scott: Yes, but baud was questioning the veracity of his not donating his salary.
Tom Levenson
@kalakal: that’s my cousin! (Will, not Tate, of course.)
good on ‘im!
Kent
But the reality is we will and we can. Permanent Democratic rule is not in the cards. Never has been and never will be. We survived Nixon and Reagan and Bush and Trump who were all horrible in their own unique ways. If DeSantis wins we will survive him too, although the damage will be immense as it always is with every GOP administration.
In fact, arguably, the damage done by Reagan and Bush was greater than the damage done by Trump. Trump damaged democratic norms which is enormously problematic. B he didn’t leave much impact on actual institutions like say the EPA or DOD. Reagan and Bush damaged the actual country.
NorthLeft
Like most of the population of Earth, I had never heard of this Tate fellow.
I hope he has learned that he is not in the same weight class to mess with Greta T. on Twitter.
trollhattan
@Another Scott: The only surprising thing about Trump is when he accidentally says something true, such as Jeb!’s brother did NOT keep us safe on 9/11 (the very same day Trump Tower became New York’s tallest building, from where one could see dancing Ay-rabs celebrating the day over in Jersey).
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
More curious about how they figured that out. But if he donated nothing, I can see how that was easy to figure out.
eclare
@Brachiator: When I worked in corporate state tax we were much more worried about a CA audit than we were about being under continual audit by the IRS. NJ was ruthless, too, arguing against its own statutes.
kalakal
@billcinsd: Yeah, he was a regular member of the Engerland knuckledraggers, then did a 180 flip
eldorado
@Matt McIrvin:
if desantis is the nominee, trump is going to be on the ballot 3rd party. getting revenge on his former ‘friends’ is trump’s total reason for being
Matt McIrvin
@Kent: I’d heard that some parts of the government like the State Department were absolutely hollowed out, by positions never being filled and by frustrated people jumping ship. And a bunch of positions were converted to political ones so Trump could fire people. But by and large the civil service survived, which is what right-wingers talk about when they complain about the Deep State.
There’s a project on the Right that’s been going on for a long time to deprecate and eventually remove civil service protections completely, so that the entire executive branch becomes nothing but political appointees. The old spoils system returned. It’d basically be a bust-out of the government. Newt Gingrich is big on it, and people like Giuliani, and so was Trump. I expect them to make a serious go at it the next time they have enough of the government–from their perspective it’s rooting dangerous leftists out that have burrowed into the Deep State.
kalakal
@Tom Levenson: heh, well he’s got a great sense of humour!
trnc
I hadn’t heard of him either, but I take the opposite view. Outside of obituaries, learning about assholes because they’ve been arrested is the best way to learn about assholes, so I’m happy to be introduced to others in this way.
karen marie
@Soprano2: Better than Carmex?
Geminid
@topclimber: I would not know. That’s an interesting question though.
There were Whig remnants and Democrats in Lincoln’s coalition too.
Lincoln got around 42% (I think) of the vote in 1860. The rest of the vote was divided between two different Democrats- Douglas and Breckinridge- and a “can’t we all just get along” candidate, John Bell.
I always thought “John Bell” would be a good name to give when ordering takeout if one had an an unusual name that must be spelled out. I use a variation of it when I order. I believe that has already saved me over 2 hours total just ordering pizza!
Another Scott
@Matt McIrvin:
Schedule F is still out there, lurking…:
More at the link.
Cheers,
Scott.
different-church-lady
@Baud: It’s looking like Trump rejecting Twitter reinstatement might be one of the few smart things he’s ever done.
Kent
Yes but none of that is really permanent. You can always rehire new people. Permanent damage is changing laws and regulations to permanently undo the efforts of your predecessors. Trump and his lackeys were frankly too stupid and lazy to do that for the most part. And when they tried to do it like relaxing mining laws they did it so incompetently and bypassed so much required process that their actions were easily overturned by the courts or unwound by the Biden Administration.
The Bush and Reagan people were far more competent in their unwinding of the regulatory state. And things like the privatization of the military and other government agencies
As a former Federal employee I would argue that the Reagan and Bush left a much more lasting destructive legacy on Federal institutions than Trump did. Trump’s legacy is more in the area of breaking democratic norms and normalizing corruption. Which is, of course, bad too. But in a different way. It is like comparing apples and oranges. Different types of bad.
kalakal
@Tony G: It’s quite likely they’re rented for photoshoots etc and he doesn’t own them. ‘Influencers’ often depend on putting out a rich, successful image to attract the rubes. Rent the multimillion mansion, cars etc for a week, shoot the videos and let the suckers think that’s your normal lifestyle. Trump’s been a clown living on credit for decades but he did at least start with money
eclare
@Geminid: One of the best bosses that I ever had was named John W. Bell.
brendancalling
When I first saw this story, it was about Tater’s response to that sick burn. My immediate response was “who’s this, what’s with the robe, is he in wizard school?”
I’m sure the hardened criminals in Romania’s jails and prisons will be duly awed by Tater’s kickboxing skills, and won’t gang up on him regularly to beat the crap out of him. I’ll bet the food is great and the conditions are more than humane. And, if all else fails maybe he can use some of the spells he’s learned in wizard school.
kalakal
@Matt McIrvin: I seem to recall reading that they do recycle them in parts of Germany, maybe they do in Sweden too.
You’re restraint was right, too good a joke to be troubled with facts
Brachiator
@eclare:
Yep. I work in California and agree that the Franchise Tax Board does not fool around. They would sometimes invite the media to watch as they padlocked a delinquent business. And they often publicly identify tax cheats.
Geminid
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I think this Kardashian first monetized her name with a line of cosmetics and made her billion when she sold the company.
Bill Arnold
@lige:
Thanks! Ken intrigued me too on that one; usually good with SF story ids. Seemed Jack Vance-ish, but had not read it.
bjacques
@kalakal: Netherlands too.
karen marie
@Boris Rasputin (the evil twin): I’m trying to understand how he got a job as a “VP” (making $55k/year – wut?) at LinkBridge Investors (which, despite its name, is not a financial investment company – it hosts parties).
Matt McIrvin
@Another Scott: Finally, we’ll undo the reckless and newfangled leftist innovations of the Chester Alan Arthur administration.
Qrop Non Sequitur
@Matt McIrvin: Onice that’s squared away, can’t we all agree that the Magna Carta was a bridge too far?
Ruckus
@sab:
Greta also seems to be quite smart, well spoken and has quite a lot of experience in the public spotlight. Her views also give her a fair amount of pushback from some corners of world so I also imagine that she has grown a rather thick skin these days.
Barbara
@Matt McIrvin: My county recycles pizza boxes with composted yard waste. Also, chicken bones and meat scraps. It seems strange, but I think it’s possible because commercial composting takes place at a higher temperature and includes a lot of grinding.
karen marie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Never underestimate a Cheney.
trollhattan
@Barbara: CA made separate handling of food waste mandatory this year. Am still working on accommodating it, which largely means food waste going into the yard waste bin, but not entirely.
Too many containers!
Qrop Non Sequitur
So I shouldn’t expect especially good principles?
Geminid
@Qrop Non Sequitur: Yes. That was just the Woque Barons trying to canselle the King.
Qrop Non Sequitur
@Geminid: Next thing you know, the peasants will want a say…
karen marie
@JMG: Also, too, it’s not 88k new employees. It’s not even 87k new employees.
Ruckus
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
It’s like they don’t even recognize there’s such a concept as “competency”.
A great percentage of current day republican politicians has nothing to do with competency at anything other than raw power to institute their twisted concepts of power and control over anyone other than themselves. That is the only thing they seem to give any concept/requirement of competency. SFB was just one of the worst examples of that concept. But at least he’s too stupid not to be extremely visible at it.
karen marie
@tobie: Rettig should be investigated.
Another Scott
@Geminid: [ snort! ]
Cheers,
Scott.
WaterGirl
@Matt McIrvin: I cut the greasy/cheesy part out of the pizza box and recycle the rest.
Ken
Though I’m sure LinkBridge is a completely legitimate service, firms in that general line are sometimes cover for prostitution or — since we’ve been discussing Tate — human trafficking.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@karen marie: Her father was a successful éminence grise, her mother a B-list functionary and pundit. She herself face-planted as a Senate candidate in a state with half a million people in it, before she betrayed the Golden Turd. I won’t underestimate her ability to hate, and I appreciate what she’s done, but the idea that she’s some kind of dark political sorceress pulling the wool over our eyes strikes me as absurd. YMMV.
karen marie
@Geminid: A friend used the name “Dr. Bell” at restaurants to get seated faster.
Ken
And, I’m sure, almost immediately be reminded why the anti-patronage laws were made in the first place. Next up: repealing the time-wasting laws requiring school buses to stop at railroad crossings.
(Which I pick not just because of the horrific incidents that led to such laws, but because it’s the one they used in the Schoolhouse Rock video. So absolutely no excuse for not having heard of it.)
Ken
@trollhattan: Have you considered a worm farm? Turn food waste into rich soil! (Though it still involves extra conainers, and you’ll have to figure out what to do with the soil.)
karen marie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It wasn’t my intent to suggest Liz Cheney is a sorceress, merely that Cheneys don’t go away even if you personally stop noticing them.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Ken: only plant based foods, though, right? You can’t dump chicken bones or cheese rinds in the wormerator?
Geminid
@karen marie: Liz Cheney will stay in public life. But I don’t think she will hold public office again.
Adam Kinzinger on the other hand could make a comeback later this decade. He’s younger, an Air Force veteran, and a man.
Barbara
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Backyard composting generally can’t accommodate anything that isn’t plant refuse.
Ken
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Sadly, yes, worms are vegetarians. Perhaps someday science will produce a carnivorous worm, hopefully not resulting in the few human survivors living a precarious existence and never setting foot to soil.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@karen marie: I have no doubt she’s not going away. She’ll be a generic if anti-trump pundit on ABC or NBC is my guess (anti-trumpist, like anti-De Santis would be a bonus). I wouldn’t put it past her to stage a kamakaze run in the ’24 primary, especially if trump awakens from his current torpor. But, as I said, she’s finished electorally. She’s tainted in blood-red, trumpist Wyoming, and (though I’ll defer to locals) too rightwing for any of the leafy districts of VA or MD where she has, I suspect, drawn most of her adult breaths.
Geminid
@Ken: I’m not sad about that. Carniverous worms might make gardening problematic.
But now I see you’ve anticipated that problem.
Ruckus
@Leto:
They have also led to questions from lawmakers and others about whether Trump claimed deductions on items that may not warrant it to avoid paying taxes.
There is any discussion whatsoever?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’ve seen those movies! I think you can ride them into battle against your enemies
Qrop Non Sequitur
Or ghosts who have exploited your request for help to coerce marriage with a teenager.
laura
@Soprano2: i got errrrbody that lip mask for Christmas. Spouse calls it cookie lip. The entire skin care line is excellent- spendy, but efficacious.
Omnes Omnibus
@zhena gogolia: That’s who came to my mind as well.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Frankensteinbeck
@Ken:
I take it we’re specifically talking earthworms here? They’re detritivores. Once it rots, they don’t care what it started out as. Plants process into edible filth much faster and with less smell and bones problems, though, so for earthworm bag purposes I guess they might as well be herbivores.
Ruckus
@Leto:
Was it GWB who drastically cut back the number of IRS agents so that the returns of those that create thick returns if for no other reason than to make them much more complex and time consuming to audit and therefore could send in returns like SFB’s, with a shockingly low amount owed? If those that should pay far more aren’t having to pay much at all, doesn’t that put an undue burden on everyone else, who turn in 2 or 3 page returns after actually working for the prior year for relatively crap wages
And doesn’t it mean that the majority of tax payers might be paying a higher percentage of their WAGES in tax, than those like SFB who cheat on theirs?
Ruckus
@NorthLeft:
I think y’all are giving him too much credit in his ability to learn anything positive.
Rebel’s Dad
@sab: If we’d been that diligent when Andrew Sullivan decided to gift us with his presence in America, think of all the shitty takes we could’ve been spared.
J R in WV
@p.a.:
If you don’t use gin, it isn’t a martini~!~ And 4 am is late at night, not early in the morning. So… go for it!
I’m more a Gin and Tonic guy, but still.
WaterGirl
@trollhattan:
For us non-CA peeps, what does that mean?
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
At my apt complex we have dumpsters for trash and large covered green plastic trash cans for garbage from eatables. Everyone does this, homes, businesses, apartments. IOW it’s not just one big dumpster for everything thrown away. In my town there is a third trash can for homes so there are green, gray and black wheeled trash containers to put out in the street for pickup. At the apt complex we have dumpsters and green containers.
WaterGirl
@Ruckus: So do you guys not have “recycling”?
Here you have your garbage can and you have your recycling bin for plastic, paper, etc. You don’t have to do the recycling part, but the hauling companies are required to offer recycling pickup as part of their garbage service, at no extra charge
And it certainly doesn’t separate food waste from the paper and the other stuff that can be recycled.
SteverinoCT
”To be up after midnight is to be up betimes [early].” — Twelfth Night, Shakespeare