Speaking of must-see tv:
We're thrilled to announce @VP Kamala Harris will return to The Late Show for an exclusive interview with @StephenAtHome on Wednesday, March 15th!
Watch on @CBS & @ParamountPlus at 11:35/10:35c. #Colbert pic.twitter.com/kGNQSj3JZH
— The Late Show (@colbertlateshow) March 10, 2023
Kamala Harris will travel to Iowa for 1st time as @VP. Her office says she “will travel to Des Moines, Iowa to meet with local leaders to discuss the fight to protect reproductive rights” on Thursday.
— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) March 14, 2023
Vice President Kamala Harris will spend a week in Africa at the end of March as the United States deepens its outreach to the continent amid global competition, notably with China. https://t.co/I0MzFWY9wP
— AP Politics (@AP_Politics) March 13, 2023
VP Kamala Harris and 2nd Gentleman Douglas Emhoff “will travel to Accra, Ghana; Dar es Salaam, Tanzania; and Lusaka, Zambia from March 25 to April 2,” her office says in a statement. She’ll meet with the 3 presidents to discuss democracy, economic growth, food security, Ukraine. https://t.co/WO67snuiKO
— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) March 13, 2023
Mad props, literally:
An Iraqi journalist gained fame for hurling his shoes at President George W. Bush in a news conference to show his anger at the corruption and chaos that followed the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. He is still furious https://t.co/KmkL5X7Kht
— Reuters (@Reuters) March 14, 2023
Meanwhile…
early 2023 and the animating issues for Republicans are:
1) a war in which no American troops have fought
2) an environmental disaster that has claimed no lives
3) a recession that does not exist— post malone ergo propter malone (@PropterMalone) March 14, 2023
Baud
I appreciate all the Harris news, AL.
bbleh
Perhaps, but the real animating issues for Republicans are Those People mooching off My Hard-Earned Tax Dollars™, with a side of Icky-Sex People molesting The Children.
It’s the old favorites that always get ’em out on the dance floor.
SiubhanDuinne
I woke up from a dream in which I had just determined the Three Best Names for Geese:
Jolene
Mabel Lou
Dorcas
I haven’t changed my mind. You’re welcome
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
Just say no to drugs, Subaru.
eclare
@bbleh: No one goes to a Billy Joel concert to hear cuts off of a new album.
montanareddog
@SiubhanDuinne: And the ganders?
NotMax
Media note. Links are to trailers on YouTube.
While neither could be deemed a blockbuster, two films of meticulous construction new (AFAIK) to Prime to check out, each of a decidedly different tone yet both finely, even affectionately, produced. And not a screaming car chase nor cloud-scorching fireball in sight.
Secure in being modest, a cozy, of the old school little diversion: Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris.
While there is brief mayhem near the end, it’s something (like Chekhov’s proverbial gun) always lurking in the background and entirely in context: Dinner Rush. Must have been a continuity nightmare, seeing as it mostly takes place inside a very crowded restaurant.
Ken
@Baud: I do wonder where Harris finds the time to secretly run the country. Maybe she delegates her cabal duties to Hillary Clinton when she’s out of the country?
Baud
@Ken:
One of the good things about being woke is that you don’t need a lot of sleep. More time for despotism.
NotMax
@SiubhanDuinne
All female geese are named Lucy, all male geese Lysander.
:)
Geminid
@bbleh: Younger people don’t seem that interested in dancing to those Republican tunes. The issues you mention may seem like “Golden Oldies” before too long. It’s like they are being generated by a think tank located in Branson, Missouri.
Soprano2
I went to a luncheon put on by my bank for investors last Friday. The guy who did the presentation is a pretty straight shooter; he’s not infected by the Fox “News” crap. He thinks we’ll have a recession at the beginning of next year. He pointed out something interesting; almost all recessions since the 1920’s have happened in the first and last year of a president’s term. There have been no recessions in the third year of any president’s term in that time period. He didn’t know why that was, he just knew it was a fact. He also thinks crypto is pretty much a scam, because I asked him how the collapse of so much crypto would affect the markets.
Baud
@Geminid:
Yeah, but we need them to actively oppose Republican tunes like John Lithgow in Footloose.
NotMax
@Geminid
“TikTok? That’s what John Cameron Swayze hawked on TV, right?”
Geminid
@Soprano2: Did this analyst express any thoughts as to the size and duration of the projected recession?
SiubhanDuinne
@montanareddog:
Bernie Ganders
Huckabee Ganders
Michi Ganders
NotMax
@Soprano2
Correlation is not causation.
Q.E.D.
SiubhanDuinne
@NotMax:
You dream your dreams, I’ll dream mine :-)
NotMax
@Geminid
A recession is always a Friedman Unit away.
//
Geminid
@SiubhanDuinne: I bet its a pretty morning in Stone Mountain. That’s pretty country to begin with.
Shalimar
@Baud: Also Republican toons like Christopher Lloyd in Who Framed Roger Rabbit.
Jeffro
Mr. Al-Zaidi, I’m right there with you in being still furious about the Iraq War.
The Post had an article up a few days ago that noted where all of the nation’s $31T national debt came from. $4-6T of that was courtesy of ol’ W’s great Mesopotamian misadventure. I think his tax cuts were another $2.5T. Unreal.
Soprano2
@Geminid: You assume that there are people who could run a think tank in Branson. I am here to assure you that there probably aren’t. They’d be in Springfield! LOL
NotMax
@SiubhanDuinne
And then there’s Zeus, who throws the whole schmear into a cocked hat.
:)
.
Soprano2
@Geminid: He thinks if it happens it will be relatively shallow and not that long. I think they’re all bumfuzzled by the economy right now because it’s not behaving in a normal manner – inflation is high, interest rates are going up, but consumption is still going gangbusters and unemployment is at historic lows. I also pointed out to him that no one could have predicted in 2019 what would happen in 2020. I think he cringed a little bit when I said that.
Soprano2
@NotMax: Sure, but I thought it was an interesting factoid.
Betty Cracker
@SiubhanDuinne: Excellent geese names! A neighbor down the road keeps geese, who often charge the fence and honk angrily when I walk past. I will start calling them by these names and see if that changes their attitudes toward me.
Jeffro
Btw if any front-pager wants to post it, Anand Giridharadas (author of Winner Take All and The Persuaders) has a funny Tweet thread up about how awesome it is to do business with “woke” banks. The replies are also hysterical.
Sample:
”When I apply for a mortgage at my woke bank, there’s none of the usual paperwork. They just give you a quiz about the history of redlining. If you pass – mortgage!”
”One down side: the lines are long because there’s always a bunch of burly men waiting to take out their money for sex change operations”
“Another down side: every debit card’s PIN at Woke Bank is 1619, and you can’t change it”
LMAO
Baud
@Jeffro:
Ha. That’s great.
ETA: Their use of woke for SVB shoes that woke has jumped the shark.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
I’m all for the Republicans running on these issues. Once any individual voter sees Republicans are running on bullshit nightmare fantasy, they can’t easily unsee it.
Geminid
@Soprano2: That’s kind of encouraging. I think a mild recession would not impair Biden’s chances for reelection, especially if we start to come out of it by Summer, 2024.
And there might not be a recession at all, or even a spell of flat economic growth. My amateur political-economic theory is that Democrats got their counter-cyclic spending in early, with the Infrastructure, CHIPS+ and “Inflation Reduction Act” legislation.
Betty Cracker
@Soprano2: You’re right about people being bumfuzzled about the economy because historical patterns are broken, which makes prognostication challenging. As we’ve discussed here, the same holds true in politics recently, and probably in other spheres too. The past isn’t predictive, yet poor pattern-seeking creatures that we are, we keep looking to it for clues in the Age of Uncertainty.
Jeffro
@Baud: “When you apply for a commercial loan at Woke Bank, you don’t even have to tell them how you plan to make money – you just mutter the letters ‘ESG’ and you’re approved!”
”I get a bonus 0.001% interest rate for every tree I plant! I’m 30% of the way to reforesting the Amazon!”
Ok, I’ll stop. But still…mocking the shit out of the wokety-woke-woke boogeymen is fuuuuuuun! 😁
NotMax
@The Kropenhagen Interpretation
Unfortunately, in their alternate universe it’s like the smoldering ruins of Seattle.
“The media refuses to report it.”
Predicating sense (or sensibility) to RWNJland is a fool’s errand.
Baud
Jesus Fucking Christ! Tony Blinken just fucking hands the GOP the keys to the castle in 2024.
Old School
…
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
@NotMax: All it takes is a glimpse outside the mirror universe.
SiubhanDuinne
@Geminid:
Yes, it’s lovely today. I have a whole bunch of birds feeding on the deck, and the shy little feral cat is wondering when I’ll put out treats for her. (She completely ignores the birds, and they ignore her right back.)
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: JFC indeed. Can you imagine using the word “font” when you actually mean “typeface”?
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: Come on, they are just changing it from the Comic Sans that the Trump admin had been using.
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
Pareidolia. Used to include a frequent coda about that phenomenon on my late blog under the heading “Pareidolia On Parade.”
“That rust stain is the spitting image of Jesus!”
:)
.
Dorothy A. Winsor
I just filled out my mail-in ballot for the April 3 local election (school board, library board, village trustee, etc). I was aided by the postcards that right wingers sent me because they narrowed down my choices. Here’s hoping the good guys win.
WaterGirl
@SiubhanDuinne: You must be taking the good stuff!
I would definitely order that off the dreams menu.
WaterGirl
@Ken:
I can’t keep up. I thought the current media complaint was that Harris doesn’t do anything?
WaterGirl
@Jeffro: Those are good. That last one got an audible guffaw from me!
WaterGirl
@Jeffro: Can you post a link? I went to her twitter feed but she has a lot going on, and it’s not clear what thread to look at.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: Me too!
WaterGirl
@Baud: If everything is woke, nothing is woke.
These people bleat about each thing in succession, until whatever the catch word is no longer means anything.
shaking my head
edit: Apparently I am talking to myself. I see that there is a new post up. I apparently need to get up earlier.
satby
@Jeffro: mockery is the best offense.
Frankensteinbeck
@NotMax:
Don’t get me started. They really think this is true. They don’t even think it’s been covered up, they think it’s established, universally known fact.
zhena gogolia
@NotMax: We are really enjoying Mrs. Harris. Great acting all around.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊😊😊
NotMax
WaterGirl
“No substitutions!”
– Mr. Sandman’s Bar & Grille
:)
.
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: I fucking hate Calibri. My computer keeps changing my e-mail to it. Why? Why?
satby
@NotMax: Speaking of the *not* smoldering ruins of Seattle, going to mention again that I’ll be there from the night of the 3rd to the late afternoon of the 6th, and am cooking up a meetup with opiejeanne and Dan B. Any local jackals interested in joining us can email me at skinluvvers at g mail dot com so we can get a consensus of date and time that will work. Alas, not a weekend, so unlikely the legendary Yutsano can join us.
kalakal
@NotMax: Female geese should be called Lyo-Lyok
NotMax
@zhena gogolia
It is enjoyable. Plays peek-a-boo with twee carefully enough not to cross over into saccharine.
Omnes Omnibus
@kalakal: Well played.
NotMax
@kalakal
Sorry, don’t have clue #1 what that is supposed to mean.
kalakal
@NotMax: It’s from The Book of Merlyn by T. H. White. It’s a coda to The Once and Future King published after his death. It has a beautifully written part where Merlin transforms Arthur into a goose. Lyo-Lyok is the goose who shows him the world according to geese
schrodingers_cat
@Jeffro: He used to comment and pontificate about India in op-eds and even wrote a book. But since Modi was elected in 2014 he has been quite reticent on the subject.
rikyrah
With the NY Supreme Court letting that second company’s lawsuit against Fox go forward, I see the same kinds of things will be found during discovery. I don’t give a crap how much sway the Murdoch family has over that company, if you cost a company 4.3 BILLION, and that’s just the basic damages their asking for, not any additional damages that the judge can give…
Somebody’s gotta be the patsy for that. Someone’s gotta be held responsible for that. And, I mean, some of the ON-AIR TALENT.
schrodingers_cat
Okay I watched RRR and I have a lot to say. In a nutshell.
It is an attractive glossy packaging of half-truths and lies of omission, and appropriation of the struggle of India’s indigenous tribes to sell the Hindutva (BJP-RSS) version of the freedom struggle.
NotMax
@rikyrah
They’re insured up the wazoo. Not for what the entire bill might end up being but a goodly chunk o’ change won’t come from company coffers. $4 billion will be a blow to shareholders but will not necessarily impact operations an iota.
rikyrah
@Old School:
They are just rotten, awful people
rikyrah
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
You’re in Illinois.
Election day is April 4th.
NotMax
@rikyrah
It’s Illinois.
Vote early. And often.
:)
Gwangung
@schrodingers_cat: Yeah, being slickly made allows it to be swallowed by folks who don’t know. Not surprised nobody in the West takes everything on face value.
schrodingers_cat
@Gwangung: Did you see it?
Steeplejack
@Jeffro:
Link for Anand Giridharadas’s thread.
Jeffro
deleted ’cause Steeplejack got there with a link – many thanks SJ!
Jeffro
OMG – a trump PAC just hit Ron DeSantis…WITH AN ETHICS COMPLAINT!
LOLOLOLOLOL
Irony is sooooo dead
WaterGirl
@NotMax: Ha!
trollhattan
@montanareddog: “Take a gander at Dorcus.”
trollhattan
@Jeffro: Words not contained in Trump’s vocabulary: sanctimonious, ethics.
Jay C
@WaterGirl:
Well, obviously VP Harris is secretly running the country AND doing nothing. At the same time!!!
That’s what makes her so dangerous…. 😜
Soprano2
@Geminid: When he talked about how fast we recovered from the “Covid recession” as opposed to what happened in 2008-2012, and he speculated about what was different, I had to suppress the urge to yell out “Congress didn’t think everyone should have to suffer in 2020 like they did in 2009, so the government spent enough money to make sure we didn’t crash the economy”, or to say “Republicans forced Obama to do sequestration, that’s why that recovery took so long”. That would not have been a popular viewpoint in that room.
Jeffro
I’m sure she learned well from the master of sheer bumbling incompetency/ultimate supreme liberal overlord, Brandon.
oatler
@kalakal:
Memory is faint. but i think that Lyo Lyuk part is from “The Sword in the Stone” novel that White incorporated into The Once & Future King.
Jeffro
Somewhat OT but with this current banking crisis (or should I say ‘crisis’) I am thinking about Biden 2024 campaign ads:
What else am I forgetting? It’s like the guy has had to deal with a major crisis twice a month (which unfortunately means we have time for about forty more before the election, gulp) and CRUSHED IT every time.
He can either frame it as “look at all the things I did” or “for the love of heaven, can ya imagine if trump had been present during _____?” Either works equally well.
WaterGirl
@Steeplejack: Thanks so much for the link! funniest thread i have ever read, I think!
kalakal
@oatler: We’re both right, she’s in both.
A lot of The Book of Merlyn has bits from the other books. White never wanted it published in his lifetime.
It’s been a very long time since I read the books, I loved them in my teens, and I’m a little scared to read them decades later in case I don’t like them now