Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

President Musk and Trump are both poorly raised, coddled 8 year old boys.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

People are weird.

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

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

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Bark louder, little dog.

Marge, god is saying you’re stupid.

Rupert, come get your orange boy, you petrified old dinosaur turd.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

You are either for trump or for democracy. Pick one.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

Everything is totally normal and fine!!!

Jack be nimble, jack be quick, hurry up and indict this prick.

Sitting here in limbo waiting for the dice to roll

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

How stupid are these people?

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you do not.

If you thought you’d already seen people saying the stupidest things possible on the internet, prepare yourselves.

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / More of This, Please and Thank You

More of This, Please and Thank You

by | 252 Comments

This post is in: 

We are fighting on every front.

Social Medai.

In the Department of Justice.

In the Courts.

In the Senate.  In case you missed this gem from Betty Cracker in her post yesterday.

I might just set that to replay.  So good.

We are not your father’s Democratic Party.

 

Reader Interactions

252Comments

  1. 1.

    Elizabelle

    Yes indeed. Jared L. Wise worked in the NY Field office. You knew that was coming, no?

    FTF NY Times link:  GIFT LINK:

    Former F.B.I. Agent Charged in Jan. 6 Riot

    Prosecutors say the former agent, who worked counterterrorism in the New York field office before leaving bureau in 2017, called police officers Nazis and illegally entered the Capitol.

  2. 2.

    Almost Retired

    I hope the MAGA right feels outnumbered, outsmarted, out-litigated and outmoded.  I want them out of office.

  3. 3.

    different-church-lady

    Been an arrest in the Harvard bomb threat case. Charged with conspiracy and extortion, but not yet terrorism.

    Guess the color of his skin

  4. 4.

    CaseyL

    The Fightin’ Dems!

    I like this.  I like this a lot.  I like it so much I want to marry it.

  5. 5.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @Almost Retired: I hope the MAGA right feels outnumbered, outsmarted, out-litigated and outmoded.  I want them out of office.

    They are all those things. How they feel is immaterial.

  6. 6.

    Elizabelle

    From the NY Times story.  Sadly, Wise is only facing four misdemeanor counts.  For now.  But he is a deplorable, for sure.  I hope DOJ can use him to untangle some threads between the NYC field office and other bad actors.

    From 2004 to 2017, Mr. Wise worked on counterterrorism matters at the F.B.I. in the New York field office. He was briefly detailed to Libya to help agents investigate the terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, in 2012, that killed four Americans. Mr. Wise left the bureau after his supervisors became unhappy with his work, and his career had stalled, a former senior F.B.I. official said.
    Mr. Wise later joined the conservative group Project Veritas under the supervision of a former British spy, Richard Seddon, who had been recruited by the security contractor Erik Prince to train operatives to infiltrate trade unions, Democratic congressional campaigns and other targets.

    At Project Veritas, according to a former employee with direct knowledge of his employment, Mr. Wise used the code name Bendghazi and trained at the Prince family ranch in Wyoming with other recruits. Mr. Wise took part in an operation against a teachers’ union and apparently left Project Veritas in mid-2018, the former employee said.

  8. 8.

    Elizabelle

    More from the NY Times story, on law enforcement who participated in J6:

    Over the past two years, scores of rioters with military experience** have been arrested in connection with the Capitol attack. But Mr. Wise is the rare former federal agent to have been charged. The F.B.I. said agents first found Mr. Wise living in New Braunfels, Texas, before he moved to Bend, Ore., in June.

    Thomas E. Caldwell, a member of the Oath Keepers who was convicted in November of felony charges stemming from the Jan. 6 riot, had once worked with the F.B.I. And Mark S. Ibrahim, an active-duty agent for the Drug Enforcement Administration, was charged in July 2021 in connection with the riot. His case has not yet gone to trial.
    The Justice Department’s investigation of the Capitol attack, already the largest it has ever conducted, has resulted in more than 1,000 arrests, with the possibility of many more to come.

    I love that final sentence.

    ** Weirdly, the NY Times never mentions former and then current police as J6 participants.  Some were definitely there; in some cases already convicted.

  9. 9.

    WaterGirl

    @Elizabelle: That was my first thought when I saw the news – was he in the NY field office?  No surprise there

    I thought those were bullshit charges, too.  Chanting the equivalent of let’s kill the police, and he gets charged with the equivalent of loitering?  Hopefully more charges will be added.

  10. 10.

    Elizabelle

    @schrodingers_cat:  Yes indeed.  Which is why I hope the current four misdemeanor charges are enough to entice Mr. Wise to cooperate.  Wonder if they can lay on some felony charges as well.

    Also curious about what the previous FBI supervisors, who became disenchanted with his work, have to say.  Appears they may have been Obama-era supervisors.

    The former agent, Jared L. Wise, was arrested on Monday and faces four misdemeanor counts, including disrupting the orderly conduct of government and trespassing, after agents received a tip in January 2022 that he had been inside the Capitol, according to a criminal complaint.

  11. 11.

    JWR

    I caught the end of this story on this mornings news and just had to find out what it was all about. Turns out it’s just Tucker being Tucker:

    New York CNN — In a newly revealed text message, ousted Fox News host Tucker Carlson made a racist comment and said he found himself briefly rooting for a mob of Trump supporters to kill a person.

    “A couple of weeks ago, I was watching video of people fighting on the street in Washington,” Carlson texted a producer. “A group of Trump guys surrounded an Antifa kid and started pounding the living s**t out of him. It was three against one, at least. Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously. It’s not how white men fight. Yet suddenly I found myself rooting for the mob against the man, hoping they’d hit him harder, kill him. I really wanted them to hurt the kid. I could taste it.”

  12. 12.

    Elizabelle

    @WaterGirl:  Oh yes.  Hoping there will be a lot of people who want to spill about Jared Wise.  And his associates.

    Bendghazi! [sic]

  13. 13.

    Elizabelle

    I love Zooey Zephyr’s twitter handle.  @ZoAndBehold.

    Clever, and easy to remember.

  14. 14.

    japa21

    @JWR: ​
     

    It’s not how white men fight.

    WTF? Wait, he may be right. White men appear to prefer shooting people rather than actual fighting. And yes, I am white. (And not necessarily proud of it right now).

  15. 15.

    Wapiti

    Regarding the Zooey Zephyr case, I’ve been playing this over in my head a bit:

    State reps gerrymander districts to give one party an outsized majority

    Outsized majority removes remaining members of the other party

    Gerrymandered majority can do whatever they want, like raising the voting age, or limiting polling places to one per county. Democracy be damned.

    So either we need strict bans against gerrymandering, or strict limits of what a gerrymandered legislative body can do.

    “Nothing wrong with partisan gerrymandering” /John Roberts court

  17. 17.

    rikyrah

    Keep fighting  Rep. Zooey Zephyr

     

    Keep on fighting.

     

    did you see the story of her supporters taking time to occupy a bench so that she can have access to it.

    A bunch of Karens came yesterday and blocked her.

  19. 19.

    Elizabelle

    @JWR:  The FTF NY Times’ “breaking” story about the Tucker Carlson texts struck me as whitewashing the whole thing.  Those texts were hardly the main reason Carlson was fired, as much as Fox News executives and its mouthpieces want to get that out via the willing FTF NY Times.

    Seriously, the story somewhat humanized Tucker Carlson. The guy has a moral code.  3 against one, and killing the Antifa, would be going too far!  Several other reader commenters noticed that too.

    They don’t believe it was the “white guys fight” text that was the final straw.  Keep digging.

    Here’s the FTF NY Times story.  Not a gift link.

    Carlson’s Text That Alarmed Fox Leaders: ‘It’s Not How White Men Fight’

    The discovery of the text message contributed to a chain of events that ultimately led to Tucker Carlson’s firing.

  20. 20.

    Citizen Alan

    @Wapiti:

    “Nothing wrong with partisan gerrymandering” /John Roberts court.

    Is in a 5-4 opinion That would have gone the other way if merrick garland had been on the court or even if it had been 4-4. Everyone who mocked the importance of the federal judiciary and supreme court nominations as a reason to vote for hillary instead of voting third party or just staying home should burn in h*** along with the republicans they enabled.

  21. 21.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @rikyrah: One of the Karens was allegedly the mother of the chief GOPer.  They are getting their moms to come in and be petty little shits.

  22. 22.

    Elizabelle

    Here’s the whole text, from the NY Times link.

    Thinking the video was from the earlier BLM protests in DC.

    EXHIBIT 276

    Tucker Carlson January 7, 2021 — 04:18:04 PM UTC
    A couple of weeks ago, I was watching video of people fighting on the street in Washington. A group of Trump guys surrounded an Antifa kid and started pounding the living shit out of him. It was three against one, at least. Jumping a guy like that is dishonorable obviously. It’s not how white men fight. Yet suddenly I found myself rooting for the mob against the man, hoping they’d hit him harder, kill him. I really wanted them to hurt the kid. I could taste it. Then somewhere deep in my brain, an alarm went off: this isn’t good for me. I’m becoming something I don’t want to be. The Antifa creep is a human being. Much as I despise what he says and does, much as I’m sure I’d hate him personally if I knew him, I shouldn’t gloat over his suffering. I should be bothered by it. I should remember that somewhere somebody probably loves this kid, and would be crushed if he was killed. If I don’t care about those things, if I reduce people to their politics, how am I better than he is?

  25. 25.

    Elizabelle

    @japa21:  A NY Times reader commenter agrees with you.

    Interestingly, it turns out that it IS the way white men fight — at least those who embrace Trumpism, which is all about cowardly mob violence, as we learned on Jan 6.

  26. 26.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @schrodingers_cat: What you see as worse and what Fox sees as worse; these are different, no?

    I’m still not buying the excuse, though. It was probably the lawsuit they lost or the two pending lawsuits.

  27. 27.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Yeah, I remember him saying that “neighborhood fathers” should beat up trans people during the whole Boston Children’s Hospital episode. I don’t think it was this

  29. 29.

    Alison Rose

    @schrodingers_cat: Yeah, when I read that yesterday, I was like…okay this actually almost makes him look good??? He’s second-guessing his initial shitty reaction, he’s questioning himself and his thought processes. I mean…he obviously didn’t have a come to Black Jesus moment or anything, but that single text was hardly the shocking damning thing they made it out to be. “Not how white guys fight” isn’t even in the top ten of most racist things he’s said.

  30. 30.

    JWR

    @Raoul Paste: It gets worse, if that’s even possible. Per The Guardian:

    Leaked video published on Tuesday showed the fired Fox News host Tucker Carlson describing an unnamed woman as “yummy”, referring to his fans as “post-menopausal” and attempting to discuss sexual technique with British journalist Piers Morgan.

  31. 31.

    Elizabelle

    @schrodingers_cat:  Yes.  Exactly. But it’s what Fox is shoveling out to the disingenuous NY Times. Its partner in whitewashing its actions.

    Jeremy Peters, Republican whisperer, is the lead writer.

  32. 32.

    Geminid

    @schrodingers_cat: I can see how these messages as a whole might disturb Fox News executives. It may be that no one thing made Fox fire Carlson, just an accumulation of actions. I think Carlson’s embrace of Russia in its war on Ukraine might have been one of them.

  33. 33.

    Jay

    Dear Russians, you seriously want us to buy that this soap opera is genuine? C’mon.. you could have added at least a Putin, who in the last moment drags a completely wasted Medvedev into safety and saves the day.The worst false flag attack in human history. Don’t even dare to… pic.twitter.com/CZaqBsXiJf— (((Tendar))) (@Tendar) May 3, 2023

  34. 34.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @Alison Rose: “Not how white guys fight” isn’t even in the top ten of most racist things he’s said.

    Look again from the perspective of someone who only notices racism when race is explicitly mentioned.

    The excuse is full of shit. We know it. Fox executives know it. But they really only need to sell it to Fox viewers.

  37. 37.

    Dr. Jakyll and Miss Deride

    Grateful to both front-pagers for linking to Sen. Whitehouse’s statement.  I hesitate to click on links to politicians’ remarks because they usually contain more bloviation and playing to the gallery than useful content, but Whitehouse showed exactly how it should be done:  perfectly organized, not a single wasted word, just deadly fact after fact.

  39. 39.

    Elizabelle

    @schrodingers_cat:  And they’ve got their big guns on it, too.

    Jeremy Peters, Michael Schmidt (national security), Jim Rutenberg (media).  Three white guys, two were assigned to the White House press corpse.

    Waiting for Peter Baker to weigh in.

  41. 41.

    Burnspbesq

    A number of years ago, Piers Morgan had the audacity/stupidity to jump into the nets (the cricket equivalent of a batting cage) with legendary Australian fast bowler Glenn McGrath. He ended up with a  broken bone in his elbow.

    Never forgiven McGrath for letting him off easy.

  42. 42.

    Alison Rose

    Speaking of, uh, racism I guess, and since it’s an OT per the tag, I wonder if the hive mind has any thoughts on this. Yesterday I was writing a review for a book set in the 1860s in which one character is a British member of Parliament who is working to abolish the Atlantic slave trade. I started to mention that in the review, but that phrase gave me pause, and I wondered if there was a better alternative. For example, I don’t say “slaves” but rather “enslaved people”. “Slave trade” just sounds…I know it’s accurate but it feels so dehumanizing to the people it refers to. I tried googling but most of the results were just about the “slaves vs enslaved people” topic. Plus, it’s a little uncomfy to keep googling semantic questions about slavery. I know “human trafficking” is technically correct, but it also obscures the specifics.

    I could very well be overthinking this and maybe the term is totally fine to use, but if there are any alternatives that have been coined, I’d be interested to hear.

  43. 43.

    Jackie

    @Omnes Omnibus: I’ve been thinking along those lines, too. Tucker didn’t get fired for one reason; it was a compilation of many reasons. He finally added one straw too many.

  44. 44.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I don’t know how the appeal process would go.

    But she could appeal to an inexplicably male hominid God  and have God declare he is ok with Trans folks. The next day all Republicans will be aetheists.

  46. 46.

    Ruckus

    @JWR:

    He really is one disgusting piece of shit.

    Humanity really does run the gamut, from pure shit to actual humans. At least we know which end of the scale fucker carlson fits in.

  47. 47.

    Baud

    @Alison Rose:

    Slave trade” just sounds…I know it’s accurate but it feels so dehumanizing to the people it refers to

     
    Slavery tends to be dehumanizing.

  51. 51.

    Chief Oshkosh

    @Elizabelle:

    Prosecutors say the former agent, who worked counterterrorism in the New York field office before leaving bureau in 2017, called police officers Nazis and illegally entered the Capitol.

    Yep. Every member of that stinking NYC FBI office needs to be investigated to the absolute limit of the law and prosecuted if warranted. Separately, unit members should be moved to other offices, isolated from one another and placed in positions where they can do least harm. Since there’s nothing in them, maybe each should be assigned to hand-transcribe all of “her emails” over and over and over until retirement. Sure it’s a waste of my tax dollars, but at least they wouldn’t be actively harming the nation.

  53. 53.

    Ruckus

    @japa21:

    It’s not someone’s skin tone that’s the problem, it’s the shit inside the skin. Especially when someone is full of it.

  54. 54.

    Elizabelle

    @Delk:  And Fox’s insurers not wanting to take another hit.  Which would be coming.  Smartmatic is waiting in the wings, licking its tiger lips.

  56. 56.

    Jay

    I think that the video that Fucker Fishsticks was commenting on was the Charlottesville Garage attack on DeAndre Harris,……..

  57. 57.

    kindness

    Senator Whitehouse was the Democratic senator next in line when Senator Leahy retired.  He was supposed to take over the committee but Senator Durbin used his seniority, pushed himself on to the committee and took over the lead.  Whitehouse had stated he would continue to use Republican rules which eliminate Blue Slips for judges.  Durbin instead re-instated the Blue Slip rules for District Courts, many of which now are unfilled as (surprise!) Republican Senators are refusing to return the Blue Slips.

    The shots coming from inside our house hurt worse than the wounds we get from our opposition.

  58. 58.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @The Kropenhagen Interpretation:

    But she could appeal to an inexplicably male hominid God and have God declare he is ok with Trans folks. The next day all Republicans will be aetheists.

    Ha! That’s exactly what would happen

  59. 59.

    Baud

    @Alison Rose:

    Of course. But there’s no language that completely gets rid of dehumanization when the subject matter is about dehumanizing people.

  65. 65.

    Baud

    @Alison Rose:

    To your question, I agree with Omnes. Since “slave” refers to the trade rather than people’s identity, I think slave trade is not offensive.

  66. 66.

    trollhattan

    Manbaby decides he has been wronged, crafts revenge.

    For weeks, Elon Musk applied his top-notch middle-school bully tactics to NPR on his failing social media network, Twitter. First Musk tagged NPR as “state-affiliated media,” which is not, and never was true. This resulted in NPR having the same label as actual state-owned propaganda sites such as China’s Xinhua News Agency or Russia’s RT. When it was pointed out that Twitter’s own rules used NPR as an example of public media companies that were not state owned, he took the obvious step of ordering someone to rewrite the rules, removing the reference to NPR. Then, under a flood of complaints, Musk changed the tag on NPR to “Government Funded Media,” which is also a lie. Less than 1% of NPR’s funding comes from the federal government.

    All of this appears to be just Musk causing trouble to justify what he wanted to do in the first place—remove all the warning labels that previously pointed out genuine propaganda that justified Russia’s wars and China’s human rights abuses. And following this debacle, NPR announced that it, along with all its programs, would no longer be using Twitter to spread news stories or update the public. So Musk not only managed to make the world safer for the worst propaganda outlets, he also diminished the ways in which people can access genuine news. For Musk, that’s got to be a very good day.

    Only now Musk is feeling bad that he doesn’t have NPR around to pick on anymore. So he chased them down to send them a fresh threat. As NPR reported on Tuesday evening, Musk sent a series of emails to NPR reporter Bobby Allyn, threatening to give NPR’s Twitter handle, @NPR, to “another company.”

    https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/5/3/2167232/-Elon-Musk-has-a-new-hostage-Your-Twitter-handle

    North Prairie Rodeo very excited at the opportunity.

  67. 67.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Wapiti: IIRC, the people who have studied this tend to think that banning gerrymandering itself is hard–the mathematically fairest districts often look every bit as absurd as a partisan gerrymander, and any formula you apply is going to be met with suspicion.

    I think what you want to do is either mandate that it has to be done by a bipartisan/multi-partisan committee, or go to some structural voting reform to lessen the effect, like proportional voting with multi-member districts.

  69. 69.

    japa21

    @Alison Rose: Not you doing the dehumanizing by using the term.  It was the slave traders doing the dehumanizing.  And, in fact, it is important to make that clear, that humans were treated as less than human.  Like the Holocaust, something that should never be forgotten, because we are seeing it happen again, right here (USA) right now.

  70. 70.

    JWR

    @Elizabelle, @schrodingers_cat:

    Seriously, the story somewhat humanized Tucker Carlson.

    Hey, that’s why the NYT is there! Reminds me of the time our media betters went all in for Fox, demanding that one of their guys, who’d been singled out or banned from covering the daily briefings, be reinstated. Aside from Late Night hosts, they actually take Fox seriously.

  73. 73.

    rikyrah

    @Alison Rose:

    It’s called the Transatlantic Slave Trade

     

    That’s what it’s called.

     

    Now, we can go back and forth about enslaved people vs. slaves. I understand the point of the new choice of enslaved people.

  75. 75.

    different-church-lady

    @Alison Rose: Are we sure the second guess wasn’t the final straw? If he had stopped at “I could taste it” they might have kept him on.

  79. 79.

    different-church-lady

    @Alison Rose:

    I know it’s accurate but it feels so dehumanizing to the people it refers to.

    Yeah, that’s what slavery was all about — dehumanization. Refer to the activity that way.

  80. 80.

    Geminid

    @Matt McIrvin: I just want to see topographically compact districts that divide cities and counties as little as possible. Something a computer could spit out. And then let the chips fall where they may.

  81. 81.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @japa21: Ganging up on someone and using angry mobs of supporters is precisely how white men have fought throughout our history.

  85. 85.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @UncleEbeneezer: Ganging up on someone and using angry mobs of supporters is precisely how white men have fought throughout our history.

    I remember a recent secret taping of some legislative body recording the members’ lamentations that such methods aren’t available to them anymore.

  90. 90.

    JWR

    @Jay:

    the Charlottesville Garage attack on DeAndre Harris

    That’s the one the text was referring to. Srsly, one wonders how old, (read: mature), TC really is. 10, maybe 12 years old?

  94. 94.

    different-church-lady

    Eventually we’re going to figure out the precisely correct way to refer to slavery, And when we do, innocent blacks are still going to be shot by cops day in and day out.

  95. 95.

    hueyplong

    @Alison Rose: Probably not a bad guess to say that Fox’s carriers are in it to the policy limits one way or the other.  A real question could be whether Fox at trial risked the kind of findings that could call coverage into question.

    Some of the factors that lead to settlements don’t get explored in news accounts

  96. 96.

    Jay

    US investigation uncovers two 10-year-olds working at Kentucky McDonald’s

    Investigation also found three franchises in four states employed a total of 305 children working more than legally permitted hours

    Michael Sainato
    @msainat1
    Wed 3 May 2023 15.38 BST

    A US department of labor investigation uncovered child labor violations at three McDonald’s locations in Kentucky, which included finding two 10-year-olds working unpaid, sometimes until 2am.
    The three McDonald’s franchisees cited in the investigation own a total of 62 locations across Kentucky, Indiana, Maryland and Ohio, and were found to employ 305 children working more than legally permitted hours and performing job tasks prohibited by law for their age.
    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/may/03/kentucky-mcdonalds-child-labor-us

  100. 100.

    Another Scott

    @Alison Rose: @Elizabelle: @The Kropenhagen Interpretation: What gets me is – who sends a text like that to colleagues at work??  Normal people, when they get to the end of stream of consciousness like that, probably delete the whole thing and so not press Send.

    That’s what’s damning about it – the fact that he sent it.  It shows that he thought he could say anything he wanted to colleagues without any repercussions at all.  Without any thought at all of how they would react.

    Isn’t having a sociopathic colleague one of the signs of a hostile work environment??

    Yeah, FTFNYT was whitewashing and GQP-splaining away the thing.  I think it “contributed” to Rupert firing him as much as my weight “contributes” to the mass of the Earth.

    Grr…,
    Scott.

  101. 101.

    randy khan

    @Elizabelle:

    I personally like the general hypothesis that he had annoyed Murdoch so much that Murdoch wouldn’t put up with him any more.  And I would guess there wasn’t any one precipitating event, even though we’ve seen what seem like dozens of stories suggesting this or that particular thing as the justification.  Something obviously was the last straw, but that doesn’t mean that it was *the* reason.  (I will admit that the story I like is that Murdoch may have fired Carlson because of Carlson’s overt religiosity, which he discovered when Murdoch, his now-ex-fiance, and Carlson had dinner together and Carlson joined in with the ex-fiance’s Bible stuff.  There’s also a hint of revenge on the ex-fiance there, as apparently Carlson was her fave.  But I don’t know whether this is the actual story or not.)

  102. 102.

    The Moar You Know

    Isn’t having a sociopathic colleague one of the signs of a hostile work environment??

    @Another Scott: not remotely so, but it’s a sign that you should find another job ASAP.

    “Hostile work environment” is a very specific legal term.

  105. 105.

    different-church-lady

    @The Kropenhagen Interpretation: ​
      It’s just something that drives me nuts lately: sociopathic racist shitheads wreak havoc on oppressed groups. The response is decent people get themselves tied in knots about every tiny little aspect about sensitivity and inclusivity, and the sociopathic racist shitheads just go right on being sociopathic racist shitheads.

    If I had my way I would replace every “Black Lives Matter” signs with “STOP BEING SHITTY TO BLACK PEOPLE, YOU ASSHOLES” signs. Cut to the goddamned point.

  106. 106.

    New Deal democrat

    @rikyrah: A year or two ago I learned the entymology of the word “slave.”

    It comes from the word “Slav.” 1000+ years ago, the Vikings would raid Slavic villages in what is now Ukraine, Belarus, or Russia, and sell their captives to the Islamic caliphate to the south, where there was a huge demand for non-Muslim, well, slaves.

  107. 107.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @The Moar You Know: as is this

    Shannon Watts @shannonrwatts 13m

    BREAKING: Multiple people have been injured in an “active shooter situation” in Midtown in Atlanta. Georgia police said the shooting unfolded inside a building on West Peachtree Street between 12th Street and 13th Street.

    I’d ask what’s it gonna take, but….

  108. 108.

    JWR

    @JPL:

    Another day in America.

    Yawn.

    But srsly, that’s NOT my reaction, it’s America’s, apparently.

  109. 109.

    different-church-lady

    @Omnes Omnibus: Yeah, but we’re reaching a point where nobody’s allowed to be referred to as anything without someone figuring out a way to take offense. In the meantime, shitheads go right on figuring out new ways to be shitheads.

    (P.S. I should clarify: I’m not saying being sensitive to language is meaningless, I’m just saying we focus far too much on it.)

  110. 110.

    randy khan

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    Probably, but the result probably won’t change.  It’s really hard to get courts to intervene into internal discipline of a legislative body, and they were careful not to prevent her from voting on legislation.

    The visual of her sitting outside the chamber (or, yesterday, standing outside the chamber while the Republicans filled up the bench she’d been using) actually may be more helpful than the lawsuit, particularly if it goes the way I expect.  But I think she had to file it.

  111. 111.

    Another Scott

    @Matt McIrvin: Virginia “tried” to go the bi-partisan route (with some special sauce via appointments by the legislature), and amended the state constitution to do it, but the fallback was to send it to the state supreme court.  As you might suspect, and was totally predictable by opponents who did predict it, there was no agreement in the commission and it went to the GOP-leaning state supreme court.  While the map isn’t horrible, it’s not as good as it probably should be.

    Bi-partisan is a bad solution, IMO, but it can be incremental progress.  Ultimately, it should be Non-partisan and should be based on clear mathematical constraints that are reasonable (reasonably compact, respect for communities of interest, etc.).  The process is only hard if people make it hard by trying to make it unfair.

    We don’t have battles every 10 years over Zip Codes…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  112. 112.

    JustRuss

    @Elizabelle: Interesting.  I have an old friend in the FBI, he spent quite a bit of time investigating Benghazi. Wonder if he knew Wise. I probably won’t ask…we don’t talk politics. He despises Trump, so not totally hopeless.

  113. 113.

    artem1s

    @Jay: ​ 

    Charlottesville Garage attack on DeAndre Harris,……

    I’ve always thought Charlottesville was the organizer’s inspiration for planning the J6 attack. They all thought the Local LEO’s would stand around while they pounded the shit out of BLM and Antifa protestors. I’m kind of surprised they didn’t have vehicle/s ready to help ram the Capitol. But maybe they did and then decided they didn’t need it when sane people decided to stay away and they didn’t have anyone to run over.

  115. 115.

    sdhays

    @Another Scott: I find myself still oddly leaning towards the “uppity Christianist” theory that was thrown out there. I totally believe that old Rupert is a cynical atheist who holds anyone who actually subscribes to any religion in any form in contempt, and I think it’s weirdly plausible that he would be appalled that his on-air “talent” was straying into thinking he was God’s agent and “too big to be fired”. He may have already had other reservations and this tipped the balance.

    At least, that’s the most plausible theory I’ve seen floated so far. I wouldn’t be at all surprised that the real reason has yet to drop.

  116. 116.

    hueyplong

    If you back away far enough into overview, it looks like whenever a 8 pm Fox megastar has gotten so big for his britches that he’s started to tell his employers what to do, Murdoch has canned him. Yes, they’ve had scandals, but it’s possible that what happens is that turf-sensitive Rupert simply has enough of asshole #3 and decides not to protect him anymore and instead leaks and discloses not only to support the firing but also to make that asshole unemployable by any network big enough to be a bother.

    As the Irish mobster says at the beginning of Miller’s Crossing, “You’re only as big as I let you be and don’t forget it, ever.”

    This made up scenario sort of fits Beck, O’Reilly and Carlson.

  118. 118.

    Paul W.

    @WaterGirl: You should add “In Texas!” Now that Collin Alred announced!

    I donated, I don’t think it should be one of the spotlights for this site’s fundraising in 2024 but maybe for the first day we boost so he can get some encouraging numbers?

  121. 121.

    The Thin Black Duke

    Who cares if Tucker had a temporary glitch in his programming and actually experienced a moment of compassion? He shook it off and went right back to cosplaying Goebbels on Fox. Fuck that noise.

  123. 123.

    cain

    @trollhattan: I hope all of this is helping to destroy the myth of genius that this cry baby has. I mean look at this guy who talks about freedom of speech but it is acting like an absurd authoritarian.

  124. 124.

    randy khan

    @Alison Rose:

    It does seem kind of wrong now, even though it was the accepted term for a very long time (and may still be).  I would wonder if there’s any recent scholarly work on the topic that you can look at.  I did do a quick look at the site for the Smithsonian National Museum of African History and Culture and didn’t see any references to the slave trade, but did see something about slave ships, for what it’s worth.

  125. 125.

    different-church-lady

    @trollhattan: ​
     
    1) He’s picking a fight with an organization that has the ability to expose and highlight every bit of shittiness he’s ever engaged in. Smart dude.

    2) At some point one of his stunts is going to cause the feds to step in.

    Keep putting that target on your back, SpaceBoy.

  128. 128.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    As far as Tucker goes, I’m a simple man: he cost Rupert money, and with Abby Grossman is almost certainly going to cost him more. The rest is commentary.

  129. 129.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Wapiti:

    So either we need strict bans against gerrymandering, or strict limits of what a gerrymandered legislative body can do.

    Such a legislative ban shouldn’t even be needed: the Fourteenth Amendment says, “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States” and gerrymandering one’s vote into meaninglessness damned sure abridges one’s privileges.

    And though the Fourteenth Amendment gives Congress the power to enforce the particulars of the Amendment with legislation, we know Roberts & Co. were perfectly willing to shitcan the Voting Rights Act which did exactly that.

    Roberts’ argument was that the Year of Jubilee had arrived, and laws to guard against discrimination were therefore outmoded.  I’d love to see a case brought up under the shitcanned parts of the VRA on the basis that it’s clear as day that there’s rampant discrimination in this country having to do with voting rights, representation, and the whole nine yards.

    If nothing else, that would force the SOB to argue that everything having to do with race in America continues to be hunky-dory, and demonstrate how completely out of touch he chooses to be.

  131. 131.

    Jay

    @Another Scott:

    Elections Canada, a branch of the Civil Service, maps out both Federal and Provincial ridings, based only on census data and municipal lines/regional districts. Past and present political votes don’t enter in to it.

    They also run the mechanics of voting with the aid of paid volanteers.

  138. 138.

    Jackie

    @UncleEbeneezer: I saw that on CNN! Speculation was it was unprecedented for Smith to sit in a deposition  – but thought it could be a show of respect from Smith due to Pence’s former status. Maybe Smith’s presence helped loosen Pence’s tongue 😉

  141. 141.

    sstarr

    I like the Veterans ad, but I think it’s not wise to waste money trying to specifically defeat Bobert.  Use the money elsewhere in closer races.

  143. 143.

    Amir Khalid

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    You mean Abby Grossberg. But I agree with the general idea: Tucker was let go, by Rupe or possibly some other Murdoch,  because he had the potential to become an even bigger liability to Fox than he was already.

  144. 144.

    JPL

    @Lobo: feels like it.    One dead and four hospitalized.   Three of those are in critical condition.   The shooter is still at large.

  145. 145.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Baud:

    Yeah, it’s not like Greene’s district that will vote for anyone with an R after their name. I think she only won by like 500 votes

  148. 148.

    Dr. Jakyll and Miss Deride

    @lowtechcyclist: Unfortunately, there’s a good reason why nobody cites the privileges and immunities clause in constitutional litigation:  in the “Slaughterhouse Cases,” which the Supreme Court decided in the 1870s and has never repudiated, the court reduced that clause to empty verbiage.

  150. 150.

    trollhattan

    Exporting our culture needs a rethink.

    A teenager who killed eight fellow students and a security guard in a Serbian school planned the attack for weeks and had a “kill list”, according to police.

    The 13-year-old was arrested following Wednesday morning’s attack at the Vladislav Ribnikar primary school in central Belgrade. Another six pupils and a teacher were also injured in the shooting.

    The motive for the attack is still being investigated, police said.

    Officers in helmets and bulletproof vests cordoned off the area around the school, located in the central Vracar neighbourhood, shortly after 08:40 (06:40 GMT). The suspect, named by police as Kosta Kecmanovic, is alleged to have used his father’s guns, both of which had legal permits. He is also said to have gone to a shooting range more than once with his father before the killings. The boy’s mother and father have since been arrested.

    In a televised address to the country, President Aleksandar Vucic described the attack as “the most difficult day in the modern history of our country”. He said the suspect would be sent to a psychiatric clinic. Under current Serbian law, he cannot be held criminally responsible as he is under 14.

    Mr Vucic has suggested that the age of criminal liability may be lowered to 12 in the wake of the killings.

    He has also proposed several other reforms, including an audit on firearms licences and a tightening of the rules around who can access shooting ranges.

    Police say the suspect planned the attack a month in advance and that he had carried a “priority list” of children to target and which classrooms he would go into first.

    Trust me dude, prosecuting 12 YOs as adults isn’t what you need here.

  152. 152.

    Suzanne

    @JWR:

    attempting to discuss sexual technique with British journalist Piers Morgan 

    :::::VOMIT:::::

    Piers Morgan is still salty that Meghan Markle turned him down. Both Carlson and Morgan are repulsive.

  154. 154.

    Geminid

    @sstarr: Boebert is probably a good target for this ad, considering she almost talked herself out of a safe Republican district last time.

    I’m hoping VoteVets runs a similar ad against Jen Kiggans (VA 2nd). Her Virginia Beach-based district has an exceptionally high percentage of active duty and retired military.

  155. 155.

    Gravenstone

    @Omnes Omnibus: They are getting their moms to come in and be petty little shits.

    To be fair, those moms appear to have raised petty little shits themselves. So they’re used to the role.

  156. 156.

    misterpuff

    @CaseyL:

    We shall fight in the courts, we shall fight in the state legs and the Capitol, we shall fight in the blogs and on the twitter, we shall fight in the polls; we shall never surrender.

  157. 157.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

     An ex-FBI supervisory special agent has been arrested for storming the Capitol on Jan. 6.

    I always wondered what happened to Skinner

  158. 158.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Jay:

    Investigators also determined two of the minors were unpaid 10-year-old children who sometimes worked as late as 2 a.m.
    The 10-year-olds prepared and distributed food orders, cleaned the store, worked at the drive-thru window and operated a register. One child was allowed to operate a deep fryer, which is prohibited for workers under 16 years old.

    Those fuckers shouldn’t just be fined.  They should be forced to sell their franchises and never be allowed back into the fast-food business.

  159. 159.

    JWR

    @trollhattan: Yeah, why don’t they look into the guy’s “Mental Health™”, which we all know is what’s behind all these killings, and not the guns. (Nudge nudge, wink wink.)

  162. 162.

    gvg

    @Alison Rose: I don’t know, finding a nicer term seems like letting the evil slave traders get whitewashed.

    I personally always remember the time as a young teen when I read a clear description of the conditions slave ships kept the captives in, the box size space, no clothes, no way to move, the months of sailing, the food and water, how many usually survived the voyage, what was done with the bodies, the smell of the ships when they arrived in port….to keep them under control with a small crew. Then the kind of plantations that needed to buy more because they couldn’t keep enough alive to breed a new worker generation in other words dangerous jobs in terrible conditions. That one factual article has never been forgotten my whole life since and I don’t care about the various terms you choose to call it. The bad reflects on the enslavers, not the slaves or captives.

  163. 163.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Geminid:

    I’m hoping VoteVets runs a similar ad against Jen Kiggans (VA 2nd). Her Virginia Beach-based district has an exceptionally high percentage of active duty and retired military.

    Yeah, that would be a very good place to run an ad like that.

    BTW, thanks for your response in the morning thread.  Due to a busy day, I only saw it just now.  I’m bookmarking the Blue Virginia site.

  165. 165.

    pluky

    @Alison Rose: It speaks well of you that even the words offend you. But there are times when euphemism just will not do. This is one. Ugly words for ugly truths.

  166. 166.

    Geminid

    @lowtechcyclist: I anticipate a rematch between former Rep. Elaine Luria and Kiggans. Luria has not yet said she is running. I expect she is enjoying some free time now. She’d been out of the Navy less than a year when she started campaigning for the 2nd CD seat she flipped in 2018.

    Both Luria and Kiggans are retired Navy Lt. Commanders.

  167. 167.

    JWR

    Free Speech my… well, just my something.  (From Politico)

    TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Republican senators in Florida gave final approval Wednesday to a sweeping education bill targeting how teachers and students can use their pronouns in schools, sending to Gov. Ron DeSantis a proposal meant to strengthen state’s parental rights law panned by critics as “Don’t Say Gay.”

    The expansions to one of the most controversial bills of 2022, which lawmakers passed on a 27-12 party-line vote, are set to widen a ban on school lessons about sexual identity and gender orientation that GOP lawmakers argue should take place at home — not in the classroom. The wide-ranging measure also requires schools to yank challenged books within five days of someone flagging it, a shift opponents equate to “book banning.”

    More like a sweeping mis-education bill.

  168. 168.

    Betty Cracker

    @UncleEbeneezer: That violent creep lived in a nearby town, so I’m extra glad he got scooped up. Sounds like the charges are serious, and since he already has a conviction for violent crimes, maybe he’ll do some serious time.

  169. 169.

    LibraryGuy

    I wonder if Jared Wise can talk about Charles McGonigal and his years at the NY Office. It’s only been five months since this: “Former Special Agent in Charge of the FBI New York Counterintelligence Division Charged with Violating U.S. Sanctions on Russia”​

  170. 170.

    Betty Cracker

    P.S. There’s not a single word about the arrest of the violent J6 goon referenced at #135 in the paper that covers my town and the town that dude lived in. No big surprise there since it’s a shitty paper that exists to fluff Repub politicians and sell ads to realtors.

    There was a recent “controversy” about the county sheriff posting a pic of a hat that said “I’d rather be an American than a Democrat” on his Facebook page. A former reporter for said shitty partisan paper runs a blog that could give “both sides” lessons to the NYT. His interpretation of the sheriff posting the hat photo is that it wasn’t intended to denigrate Dems but rather a harmless jibe to let Repubs know “he’s one of them.”

    I have to limit my local media take for my own peace of mind. It’s infuriating.

  172. 172.

    different-church-lady

    @pluky: ​
     

    It speaks well of you that even the words offend you.

    I’d like to co-sign this. Especially to help ensure my comment earlier is not taken as being aimed at Allison.

  174. 174.

    ...now I try to be amused

    @Kathleen:

    FREEDOM FROM CHILDHOOD! Free to marry, give birth and support gramps and gran when Rethugs gut Social Security and Medicare!

    The GOP has been neo-Dickensian since Gingrich (a Dickensian name if ever there was one) if not before, but abolishing childhood is a new frontier for them.

  175. 175.

    different-church-lady

    @JPL: ​
     

    [√] Black
    [√] Against gun violence

    The effort to expel him should begin any minute.

  177. 177.

    SiubhanDuinne

    There have been so many shooting episodes across the country recently that I’ve become almost numb to news of another, but this one hit closer to home: it took place only a block from where I worked for nearly 20 years.

  178. 178.

    Ksmiami

    @Another Scott: Hmm. Appreciate your optimism, but tbh America is a failed state. I really don’t see the Union lasting past 2030. Not in its current form.

  180. 180.

    JPL

    @raven: That was awful.   All the victims in this case were females, but I don’t know if they were targeted.

    One person told the news that while awaiting an appt., he was watching the TV and found out about the shooting.   He was on the 7th floor and the shooting was on the 9th

    The shooter entered a waiting room and started shooting.

  181. 181.

    Ruckus

    @sdhays:

    With a rich person, and rupert is fucking richer than rich, it is best to always look towards the monetary end first. fuckercarlson was likely in some way costing rupert money. First, does anyone here watch anything on the faux nutwork? I do not and I imagine there are others. How many have asked to have faux nutwork taken off the waiting room, workout room tvs? How many have told the doc or staff that they are changing docs because they won’t change it? I’d bet quite a few. Tell them their shit stinks doesn’t bother them, take money out of their pockets and that does. How many have told companies that they won’t purchase anything that is advertised on faux? I’d bet some.

  184. 184.

    Ruckus

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    In this case that’s a pretty low bar. But I bet you knew that…..

    It’s so low that I’d bet you wouldn’t know if you stepped on it….

  186. 186.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Alison Rose: My own experience: I’ve never seen/heard anyone take issue with “Slave trade” and I wouldn’t hesitate to use it.  Leading Black Academics still use it all the time.  But I do use “Enslaved” instead of “Slaves” when referring to the actual people, because that distinction does seem to matter to people, especially in that context.

  187. 187.

    Suzanne

    @SiubhanDuinne: Hugs.

    There was a shooting last year in Mesa, AZ, at a nightclub in a shopping plaza that I used to work in. Teenage Suzanne was there all the time with friends. It was incredibly upsetting.

  190. 190.

    tam1MI

    @gvg:

    @Alison Rose: I don’t know, finding a nicer term seems like letting the evil slave traders get whitewashed.

    I personally always remember the time as a young teen when I read a clear description of the conditions slave ships kept the captives in, the box size space, no clothes, no way to move, the months of sailing, the food and water, how many usually survived the voyage, what was done with the bodies, the smell of the ships when they arrived in port….to keep them under control with a small crew. Then the kind of plantations that needed to buy more because they couldn’t keep enough alive to breed a new worker generation in other words dangerous jobs in terrible conditions. That one factual article has never been forgotten my whole life since and I don’t care about the various terms you choose to call it. The bad reflects on the enslavers, not the slaves or captives.

    For a certain generation it was watching the accurate depiction of the Middle Passage in the TV miniseries ROOTS that did the trick.

  191. 191.

    tam1MI

    @Betty Cracker:There was a recent “controversy” about the county sheriff posting a pic of a hat that said “I’d rather be an American than a Democrat” on his Facebook page.

    Let me guess.  It was Grady Judd.

  192. 192.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Ruckus:

    With a rich person, and rupert is fucking richer than rich, it is best to always look towards the monetary end first.

    Why?  Money is less important to them than to us.  It’s a bauble rather than a necessity.  And the shelter from consequences wealth has given them gives ego, bigotry, stupidity, and general malice free rein.

  194. 194.

    Baud

    @Betty Cracker:

    but rather a harmless jibe to let Repubs know “he’s one of them.”

     
    If that was his intent, he’d have said he’d rather be Russian than a Democrat.

  195. 195.

    Nelle

    @Ruckus: I told a restaurant I wouldn’t stay unless the channel was changed.  They changed it.  There was a lot of applause from other customers.  I had wondered how they were eating with all that bile being spewed at them.  I guess they hadn’t thought to speak up.

  196. 196.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Suzanne:

    Yeah, it’s funny (funny-peculiar, not funny ha ha) the way we react to even slight or long-ago connections. My grandmother was born in Uvalde, TX, and I think I was upset out of all proportion at the school shooting there just because of that (it was, of course, an objectively horrifying event, but my mind kept clinging to the personal link, however tenuous). And then I feel guilty for numbing out sometimes at news of shootings where I don’t have a connection.

  197. 197.

    mrmoshpotato

    NEW: An ex-FBI supervisory special agent has been arrested for storming the Capitol on Jan. 6.

     

    “Kill ‘em!” Jared Wise yelled as the mob attacked officers he called Nazis, per FBI.

    “Kill ‘em! Kill ‘em! Kill ‘em!”

    Punch him in the nuts!  Punch him in the nuts!  Punch him in the nuts, Lady Justice!

    And then throw his white trash, Dump-humping, Nazi shit ass in prison!

  199. 199.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @SiubhanDuinne: ​
      I went to Newtown Middle School in CT. That one hit hard. I couldn’t watch any of the coverage. Oddly, my mom and my brother couldn’t turn away because of the personal connection.

  200. 200.

    Suzanne

    @SiubhanDuinne: I felt really bad that whole weekend. There were mass shootings in Philly and Pittsburgh, near my office and in the next neighborhood over…..as well as in Phoenix (near where Spawn was living with his dad at the time) and the one in Mesa. It just all felt too close.

  201. 201.

    Steve in the ATL

    @raven: we lived and worked in Buckhead at that time.  Was not a good day.

    Wondering about the motive today for shooting up a hospital waiting room.

  202. 202.

    JWR

    @tam1MI:

    Just Google “Wikipedia slave ship” to see the “floor plans” of the ships and the conditions those people were forced to endure. And that’s just how it was planned. Just think about what it might be like when things didn’t go according to the damn plan.

  203. 203.

    oldgold

    Today Trump is being eviscerated in the Carroll/ Trump trial.

    They played the Hollywood Access Tape for the woman from People Magazine who claims Trump assaulted her at Mar-a-Largo.

    Stoynoff says she was “sick to my stomach” when she saw that tape, then thought: “Oh, he does this to a lot of women. It’s not just me. It’s not something I did.”

    She tearfully adds: “I worried that because I didn’t say anything at the time that other women were hurt by him.”

    Carroll’s lawyer shows Stoynoff a video of Trump’s remarks about her at a rally:

    Trump told the crowd: “Look at her. Look at her words. You tell me. What do you think. I don’t think so.” Asked what she thought Trump meant by that, Stoynoff answered: “I’m assuming he means that I am unattractive.”

  204. 204.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    I didn’t realise you had Newtown connections. That was so tough for all of us, but especially so for people like you and your family.

    And not to diminish anyone’s experience, but these mindless shootings — random, targeted, “self-defence,” mass slaughter, “stand your ground,” cops, whatever —are so widespread and prevalent that damn few of us can’t identify with a locale or scenario.

  205. 205.

    JPL

    @Omnes Omnibus:  My OB/GYN was just up the road from there, but I lived in Ridgefield at the time.

    That day haunts me, because it can happen anywhere.  Warnock said that today on the floor of the Senate.   No where is safe because of our gun laws.

  206. 206.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Suzanne: My sister lives in Highlands Ranch, CO so she has memories of Columbine AND the mass shooting in Highlands Ranch from a year or two ago (thankfully she/her family wasn’t directly impacted by either).

  207. 207.

    JWR

    @Baud: Remember the “Better Red Than Dem” tee shirts at TFG rallies? And those clowns were proud of the message they were sending.

  208. 208.

    catclub

    @Omnes Omnibus: ​
      I was just wondering if there still was such a transatlantic trade in the 1860’s. I thought the last ship to the US was early 1850’s

  209. 209.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @oldgold: I was just reading up on the TWENTY-SIX women who have accused Trump of sexual assault/harassment and there is definitely a repeated pattern of behavior.  It’s his MO.  Namely, cornering them when nobody else is around or can see, groping them, forced kissing etc.

    (Trigger Warning for Rape/Assault/Misogyny etc.)

  210. 210.

    smith

    @Frankensteinbeck: But that’s the essential pathology of the ultra-rich. Even though they have stockpiled more money than they or their descendants to several generations could usefully spend, they are still willng to go to extremes just to add a few more meaningless dollars to their money pile. As, for instance, funding the demise of democracy so they won’t have to pay taxes.

  211. 211.

    Jackie

    @Steve in the ATL: One reporter said he had a medical appt there for mental reasons. He reported the suspect had been in the Coast Guard and after his term came home with *issues.* His mother was with him for the appt.

    Let me hasten to add, I only heard this one time from a local reporter reporting to CNN, so imo, it’s speculation until confirmed or debunked.

  212. 212.

    JPL

    @Jackie: The mom is cooperating with the police.  Would be nice to have red flag laws here, but Kemp is hell bent on decreasing laws that prevent good guys with guns from owning them

    oh the good/bad guys should own guns.  It’s the American way.

  213. 213.

    Suzanne

    @UncleEbeneezer: That grocery store where Rep. Giffords was shot….I used to shop at that store, because I worked down the street. It was so freaky to watch the news coverage that day and see all these places that were essentially my neighborhood in my college days.

  215. 215.

    JPL

    @Suzanne: My son and wife take the imps out for supper frequently because work gets in the way.   I did text and say maybe not tonight.   There’s a search going on not far from where she works.

  220. 220.

    Ruckus

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Money defines them.

    Money allows them to do things that you might never even think to do.

    If money  was less important to them they wouldn’t have to have a lot of billions of it. So many billions in fact that they really can’t ever spend it all. You worry about how much you spend for food, rupert never, ever worries about how much a meal costs. He might worry about how much a shitty newsperson is costing him but he never worries about money in the way you or I do. I bet he spends more for dinner at a restaurant than I make in a month. He still worries about money and what he worries about it is having more than most anyone else. Have you never met anyone with a lot of money? I have. Not rupert rich but a lot of money. They often worry about it more than you or I do. Money is the crux of their entire lives. They don’t live for a good meal, they live to have more than enough money to afford that meal that costs more than either of us makes in a month. They are better humans because they have more money, just ask them.

    Regular people can be OK with just enough money. I am, and I live off social security. rupert spends more than you and I make in a month to do anything. And so does every other rich asshole on the planet. They do it because they can and because you and I can’t.

    Doesn’t think about money – get outta town.

  222. 222.

    trollhattan

    Beginning to think Mr. Bowtie has anger management issues. First the “Antifa kid” now…lawyers?

    Tucker Carlson called a lawyer for Dominion Voting Systems a “slimy motherfucker” who “triggered” him in a lengthy deposition last August.
    The now fired Fox News host made the comments in new on-set footage published on Wednesday by Media Matters for America, a left-leaning media watchdog critical of Fox News which has published a string of such videos.
    Carlson made the comments on set, wearing the same clothes he did on his 26 August 2022 show, the day he was deposed in the Dominion case, Media Matters said.
    “Holy shit, 10 hours,” Carlson says in the video. “That slimy little motherfucker sitting across from me. The amount, it was so unhealthy … the hate that I felt for that guy.”
    Carlson adds: “It’s totally bad for you to feel that way. But that guy, he triggered the shit out of me. ‘Where are you now? Where do you live?’ The amount of times I had, ‘First of all, fuck you,’ on my lips was like, it was unbelievable. Suggesting that I was – that I was cheating on my taxes?”
    A Dominion spokesperson declined to comment.
    https://www.theguardian.com/media/2023/may/03/tucker-carlson-video-fox-news-dominion-lawyer

    Pretty sure it’s not cheating on your taxes that gets you in trouble with Republicans.

  225. 225.

    JWR

    And another one bites the treasonous dust. (From NBC)

    ‘The Donald’ forum user convicted of assaulting officers on Jan. 6
    Jose Padilla said his violent rhetoric about killing politicians and overthrowing the government was for “internet cool points.”

    WASHINGTON — A member of the pro-Donald Trump online forum “The Donald,” who espoused violent rhetoric and advocated for overthrowing the government, was convicted on 10 counts on Wednesday for repeatedly assaulting law enforcement officers at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.

    Jose Padilla, who was arrested in Georgia in February 2021, was convicted after a bench trial before U.S. District Judge John Bates. Video shows Padilla repeatedly attacking officers on Jan. 6, including by pushing up against officers and hitting an officer with a flagpole. He has been held in custody since his arrest.

  226. 226.

    cain

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Read a NYT article about her. Jeezus – that network is literally like working in the 70s for women. I can’t imagine why you would want to work there.

    I guess if you are a college educated conservative woman – that’s the place to go, huh?

  227. 227.

    JWR

    @cain: My psychoanalyst, (I suffer from Anxiety Disorder, or whatever it’s called, and spent 11 years with her!), has two daughters. One works at Fox, and is quite happy there. The other daughter is normal.

  228. 228.

    PAM Dirac

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    I haven’t watched it yet but there’s a Netflix documentary on that which looks really good.

    I notice that Questlove is the executive producer. I assume that the documentary got made at least in part because Questlove is a descendant of one of the enslaved persons on the ship. He was on an episode of “Finding Your Roots” and they traced him back to that ship. When emancipation came there was still a lot of people from the ship together and they founded a town, Africatown.

    ETA: I thought I remembered more of the story and Wikipedia confirmed. The slave ship’s voyage was due to a bet the one rich southern asshole had with another that he could import slaves despite the ban.

  229. 229.

    cain

    @JWR:

    @cain: My psychoanalyst, (I suffer from Anxiety Disorder, or whatever it’s called, and spent 11 years with her!), has two daughters. One works at Fox, and is quite happy there. The other daughter is normal.

    I assume there are normal parts of Fox. I assume that this is Fox News, it could be 20th Century Fox which would be a normal place to work.

  231. 231.

    cain

    @trollhattan: I must admit that I probably would also have choice words if I was stuck in a deposition for 10 hours and with repetitive questions.

  232. 232.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @raven:

    Also, a really long time ago, there was that guy who shot up the Food Court at Perimeter Mall.

  234. 234.

    JWR

    @cain:

    I assume there are normal parts of Fox. I assume that this is Fox News, it could be 20th Century Fox which would be a normal place to work.

    Yes, it’s here in SoCal, probably 20th Century Fox, and as normal as one might expect, but she’s definitely a fan, which is just one of those family issues my Psychoanalyst has to deal with.

  236. 236.

    trollhattan

    Am of course happy the caught the (most recent) Texas spree-killer, happier still he was hiding under a pile of laundry in a cupboard, but ultimately am distracted by the nearest town being Cut and Shoot, Texas.

    On brand, or over the top? Going with both.

  237. 237.

    Ruckus

    @cain:

    Please tell me you wouldn’t be in a deposition for being a completely racist shit like fucker c…..

    fucker c fucked around and found out. And now he’s pissed because someone in charge of something found out as well. Not that it’s that difficult to see that fucker c should have found out a long, long time ago. But that’s the way the world sometimes works, some get to fuck around openly and not pay the price for a long time, like till they find out they do have to pay the price. Poor fucker c.

  238. 238.

    JPL

    @SiubhanDuinne: A neighbor hid under her table.   After that they passed laws making it difficult to buy arms if you were mentally ill.
    Since then they decided they needed north Georgia’s votes

    Those were the olden days.

  240. 240.

    Geminid

    @WaterGirl: That would be the entire caucus. The five voting against said they wanted deeper cuts.

    I guess a digital ad could be run against all of them without too much expenditure. I’d run more against the 30 most vulnerable. But there could be 40 or more vulnerable Republicans by Fall of 2024, and they all will likely have capable Democrats running against them.

  241. 241.

    No One You Know

    • @Alison Rose: There’s something to be said for clarity. Avoiding the succinct and accurate term can be read, or worse,  believed, as whitewashing.
  242. 242.

    Elizabelle

    @trollhattan:

    Cut and Shoot.  I saw that.

    You really cannot make so much of this stuff up.  Real life exceeds fiction.  Regularly.

  247. 247.

    Jackie

    Donny loses again:

    “A New York judge has tossed out Donald Trump’s lawsuit against The New York Times, and ordered the former president to pay all attorneys fees, legal expenses, and associated costs,” the Daily Beast reports.

    “Trump filed the lawsuit in 2021, alleging that the newspaper, three of its reporters and his niece Mary Trump engaged in an ‘insidious plot’ to obtain his private records for a Pulitzer-winning story about his tax issues.”

  251. 251.

    James E Powell

    @catclub:

    I was just wondering if there still was such a transatlantic trade in the 1860’s. I thought the last ship to the US was early 1850’s

    The transatlantic slave trade continued to move enslaved people to Brazil even after it was outlawed, continuing illegally into the 1880s.

  252. 252.

    cain

    @JWR: I’m still trying to figure out how you can write a bill that dictates what pronouns you can use in a building? Just on the merits, I can’t see the govt making a case of harm here – (eg fire in a theater) – it’s a clear first amendment violation.

Comments are closed.