Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

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

The “burn-it-down” people are good with that until they become part of the kindling.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

How stupid are these people?

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

Come on, man.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

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

One lie, alone, tears the fabric of reality.

One of our two political parties is a cult whose leader admires Vladimir Putin.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Books are my comfort food!

Disappointing to see gov. newsom with his finger to the wind.

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

Of course you can have champagne before noon. That’s why orange juice was invented.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

I really should read my own blog.

Speaker Mike Johnson is a vile traitor to the House and the Constitution.

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

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

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62Comments

  3. 3.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    Fuck 2022.

     

    2023, please be kind.

     

    Happy New Year.

    I think we’ve been saying this about the last few years since 2020, Cole

    Heartily agree

    Happy New Years, Jackals!

  6. 6.

    frosty

    Happy New Year to you too John Cole. Thanks for setting up this site and finding so many good front pagers to keep it rolling. Best wishes for a better 2023.

  13. 13.

    piratedan

    all I want for 2023 is a movie-like montage of indictments of GOP traitors and an asskicking of RU and their allied forces off every inch of Ukrainian soil.

     

    I’d be okay with a successful women’s revolution in Iran too and a repudiation of all RW political movements.

  14. 14.

    Wyatt Salamanca

    Happy New Year to you too John!

    2023, please be kind.

    I’ll settle for a 2023 which includes indictments for some Jan 6 ringleaders.

  16. 16.

    NotMax

    Dinner meat slid into the oven half an hour ago. Ought to take a little under two hours. Running late when it comes to matters personal, as usual. No biggie, prefer a late night chowdown anyhow.

  17. 17.

    HumboldtBlue

    I posted this downstairs, but fuck 2022.

    RIP 2022 to Hank Aaron, Vin Scully, Pele, Franco Harris, Ray Guy, Len Dawson, Daryl Lamonica, Mike Leach, Bill Russell, Bob Lanier, Pete Carril, Guy LaFleur, Mike Bossy, Borge Salming, Gaylord Perry, Bruce Sutter, Earnie Shavers, Marvin Hagler, Roger Angell & so many greats.

    That’s a lineup of extraordinary great sportsmen, gone. Time waits for no man. And death gets us all.

  22. 22.

    patrick II

    Happy New Year to you too John, and I will join in with those thanking you for establishing Balloon Juice. It is a great example of the positive contribution of good conversation.

    I may have missed this — but are you testing negative yet? Hope so.

  23. 23.

    CaseyL

    That’s the spirit!

    Good things started in 2022.  Let’s hope they keep going and growing.

    Some evil shit started in 2022.  Many fervent wishes for Ukraine to beat Russia into the fucking ground sooner rather than later; for many perp walks among the GOP – many, many more than just Trump; and for SCOTUS to suffer serious attrition to its RW flank.

    Happy New Year!

  26. 26.

    sab

    So new year here and my favorite cat is off at the pet clinic being rehydrated. I didn’t think he’d make it to 2023, but he has. Tough little guy.

  27. 27.

    Alison Rose

    I hate Facebook and its stupid algorithms making it so no one sees your posts and you don’t see anyone else’s. I put up my usual year-end favorite books post and only one friend has seen it. (Granted, not everyone who sees a post in their feed will click like, but a lot of my friends are the type to do so.) Instead of seeing our friends’ posts, we see like 80% posts from pages and groups and ads. Annoying. I WANNA EVANGELIZE ABOUT BOOKS AND I CAN’T DO THAT IF FACEBOOK COCKBLOCKS ME.

  30. 30.

    BR

    @Alison Rose: ​
    Mastodon gives me hope for 2023 that we can take back our means of communication from Facebook, Twitter, and many others. It’s been great so far, and growing at a steady pace.

  31. 31.

    Alison Rose

    @different-church-lady: Oh, I knew that a few years ago, when I got a 3-day ban for commenting on my own post, “Men are annoying.” That was it. That was all I said. In a comment on MY post. And I got whapped for “sexist language”. Meanwhile, I report people calling Zelenskyy a nazi or calling women whores and nothing happens.

  33. 33.

    Rusty

    It’s been a crap three years.  Lost my job, eventually found a new one but it required us to move out of state.  The pandemic hit, which was awful in its own right, but it also turned what was going to be a miserable 6 months of working at the new job during the week and doing a 14 hour round trip each weekend to be with the family into a year and a half ordeal.  We got financially killed on the move because housing prices went crazy.  The youngest ended up hospitalized with COVID.  My best friend of 45 years died of cancer.  One of the kids really struggled with the new school and another had to finish high school apart from us.  Lots of people struggled with mental health across the family.  This year ended with half my department leaving so I have been doing 2+ jobs for the last quarter, and my mother-in-law passed away.  I’m just fucking  exhausted.  I will be grateful if 2023 can just avoid being a shit show.

  34. 34.

    Drunkenhausfrau

    Wishing for Justice, Peace, and Health in 2023.  But I will settle for Justice.

    cheers! happy new Year from Mister Drunken and me.

  35. 35.

    BR

    @Alison Rose: ​
    Yeah, the Facebook of 10 years ago where it was mostly people talking with others that they know personally — that’s long gone. Not sure anything has taken its place.

  37. 37.

    El Cruzado

    Welcome to 2020, season 4!

    No one held high hopes for a good season 3 when it started. And the jury is still out on whether it was any good. But it sure was entertaining. Early on the War on Ukraine twist added a lot of gravity to the proceeds, while on the tail end the whole “Elon buys Twitter” plotline has provided a low effort farce that we can’t however look away from.

    Meanwhile the Big Orange Guy plot threads remain on a slow burn, maybe season 4 will be when they come back to the forefront.

  39. 39.

    different-church-lady

    I remember when I was a kid, and 1979 seemed like it was impossibly far in the future…

  47. 47.

    Redshift

    @CaseyL: My assessment of 2022 is that we’re finally no longer on the Darkest Timeline. (Any other Community fans here?)

    We’re not out of the woods, and we have a lot more work to do, but we’re solidly out of “what psychotically insane bad thing will happen today?” And that’s not nothing.

    Happy New Year!

  48. 48.

    Soprano2

    I hope 2023 is better, I’ve had too much death and death-adjacent stuff this year. The bar was strange tonight, when we got here around 8:30 it was packed, but by 10:30 there were only 40 people left. Very strange for New Years Eve. We’re open tomorrow afternoon because there’s a Chiefs game. I hope people show up for it. I’ll be splitting wood. I bet we burned 3/4 of a cord the past two weeks because it was so cold.

  49. 49.

    Chetan Murthy

    @Redshift: It’s not nothing, that instead of spending the last few months cringing in fear & horror at the latest abomination from TFG and our rulers, we spent it mostly pointing and jeering at a MoTU as he lit his reputation and fortune on fire.

  51. 51.

    Layer8Problem

    It feels better.  Anything can happen, but I feel hopeful.  Maybe the tide turned, maybe we’re more vigilant and not willing to put up with the bullshit.  Russia isn’t winning, the no-ifs-ands-or-buts take-it-to-the-bank Red Wave didn’t happen despite the best efforts of the Times, and Musk looks to be imploding.  May we all give a collective Fuck You to the Republicans in the House in the 118th Congress.

  52. 52.

    frosty

    @Alison Rose: This must be why I’m not seeing much from my FB friends and not getting many comments. I counted and at least a third of the stuff I see is crap “recommended for you”.

    I know a lot of the people who were on FB when I started have quit posting. Most of my “friends” aren’t really friends any more.

  53. 53.

    Layer8Problem

    Nobody is doing fireworks here.  Like BillinGlendaleCA, it might be too wet here.

    And so to bed.  Keep the world safe everybody.

  55. 55.

    James E Powell

    @piratedan:

    I’d be okay with a successful women’s revolution in Iran too and a repudiation of all RW political movements.

    I’d be okay with some of that right here in the US of A.

    This campaign season, it was striking how it’s still so different for women who run for office.

    The arc of the universe is not going to bend toward justice unless we grab hold of it & each other and bend it that way.

  56. 56.

    Steeplejack

    I had a quiet New Year’s here in Threadkill Lane. I took a nap in the evening and woke up a little before midnight, so I didn’t miss anything. No fireworks, just some kids’ voices chanting “Hooray!” for a few minutes. That was slightly weird but not bad. I did the Post crosswords and am contemplating the coming year. I hope it is a good one for jackals one and all.

  57. 57.

    Mai Naem mobile

    Happy New Year or Happier New Year? Whatevs. I hope its better than the previous 2 years and not just marginally better.  I hope but I doubt that 2023 will be the end of TFG legally(convicted and doing time) so that we can move beyond him.

  58. 58.

    James E Powell

    @Mai Naem mobile:

    I’m with you Mai Naem. I would like one year where instead of us celebrating the partial victories of a frenetic rear-guard action, we are just fucking winning!

  59. 59.

    Ruckus

    @🐾BillinGlendaleCA:

    Raining pretty good out in my neighborhood but that didn’t seem to stop any of the noise making. Have a neighbor about 100 ft away who likes to randomly set off things that go boom. Sun goes down, or maybe it’s a Wednesday, or the phase of the moon is right for it, or no reason what so ever, any random time – explosions. Now of course it is a bit more normal every year at this time but still.

    It is possible of course that I got over explosions while listening to large ship’s guns going off at less than half that distance while wearing an oxygen breathing rig and with a charged fire hose in case of misfire and having to use the fire hose up very close to cool off the barrel so it doesn’t explode while you are standing next to it. I may have lost all my enthusiasm for nearby loud explosions for any reason.

  60. 60.

    evodevo

    @Soprano2: Yep, same here – depleted the woodpile that should have lasted for a couple months..we gotta get back out there and cut some more, but we are both sick with a cold now…so, wishing for elves to come help lol

  61. 61.

    whatsleft

    May the new year bring aid, comfort and an abundance of schadenfreude to all Jackals and Jackal-adjacents!

  62. 62.

    BigJimSlade

    @Alison Rose: i got a comment blocked on fb for making a joke to a friend in the guise of a Foreigner song title, jokingly calling him a “Dirty White Boy”. I just had to laugh. He had mentioned the band in his post, so it was in topic.

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