Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

“Facilitate” is an active verb, not a weasel word.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

People really shouldn’t expect the government to help after they watched the GOP drown it in a bathtub.

Radicalized white males who support Trump are pitching a tent in the abyss.

I am pretty sure these ‘journalists’ were not always such a bootlicking sycophants.

No one could have predicted…

The real work of an opposition party is to hold the people in power accountable.

The willow is too close to the house.

The lights are all blinking red.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

’Where will you hide, Roberts, the laws all being flat?’

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

You are here: Home / Civil Rights / LGBTQ Rights / LGBTQ Rights Are Human Rights / Friday Morning Open Thread: And What A Week It’s Been

Friday Morning Open Thread: And What A Week It’s Been

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If there *is* a Friday Doc Dump, I’m not sure the weakest among us will survive!

Friday Morning Open Thread: What A Week It's Been

(Mike Luckovich via GoComics.com)

Reader Interactions

444Comments

  1. 1.

    gene108

    Philly meet up went well yesterday. Hopefully proof of life pictures will be submitted to WaterGirl.

  2. 2.

    Dr. Jakyll and Miss Deride

    Confirming one of the basic laws of the internet, when Dr. Roger Marshall denounces the White House’s incompetence he misplaces the apostrophe.

  4. 4.

    Baud

    I don’t know if this is just because of your selections, AL,  but it seems like a lot of Biden’s tweets feature him with Harris. I think it’s nice.

  5. 5.

    Lapassionara

    Good morning, jackals. Scary comment I saw recently on the hell site indicates the right thinks it is winning the war against trans. Tell me it isn’t so.

  8. 8.

    OzarkHillbilly

    I am LMFAO: ‘Lunch of suffering’: plain ‘white people food’ goes viral in China

    Under a photo of processed cheese, ham and crackers packed neatly in plastic, a Weibo user writes that to eat this for lunch is to “learn what it feels like to be dead”.

    The post is part of a trend among Chinese social media users who are recreating “báirén fàn” or “white people food” to better understand – or poke fun at – western packed lunches made up of plain ingredients such as raw vegetables and sliced meats.

    The social media platforms Weibo and Xiaohongshu have been inundated with photos and reviews of cold sandwiches, raw carrots and canned tuna. Many are from Chinese international students surprised by the simple lunches eaten by their peers overseas.

    There’s a new trend in China where people make and eat spiceless “white people lunch”, as form of self torture.

    And their commentary has me crying 😭 pic.twitter.com/aRfK3VStaD
    — Del Walker (@TheCartelDel) June 13, 2023

    …………….
    Another blogger opined that these lunches are “not for enjoyment, but to find guilt”.

    “In this way, I can always remind myself that I am here to work.”

    I am not a fan of overly spicy food but they do have a point.

  9. 9.

    p.a.

    I saw a US flag today with several alt color stripes; green, orange, something else (was driving so just a quick look.). Not the standard red or blue alt stripe.  It wasn’t the full rainbow-striped US flag, just a few white stripes replaced.  Still a pro-inclusion flag?

    It’s great if it is, the usual boot-in-the-face suspects can’t be allowed to define the flag as their property.

  12. 12.

    Amir Khalid

    Just some idle wonderation: Would there be a rightwing freakout reaction if that photo showed Judge Nusrat Choudhury in a hijab?

  15. 15.

    Anne Laurie

    @mrmoshpotato: Assclown Husk can rebuke a horse’s behind.

    At least one of his kids took the opportunity, as soon as they were old enough, to change their name and repudiate Musk.

    Was it a coincidence that child is transgender?

  18. 18.

    satby

    @Baud: I think it’s also very nice that almost every picture of them both shows them smiling. Happy, normal people in charge doing good things for all of us.

  19. 19.

    rikyrah

    @Lapassionara:

    They believe passing these anti-trans laws is winning. But, we have to fight and be allies to the trans community. This is their latest hate campaign

    They are using anti-trans to go after their real target: the larger LGBTQ+ COMMUNITY

    IT’S OBVIOUS that is their goal.

  23. 23.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @mrmoshpotato: Diffrent strokes for diffrent folks. I cant help laughing. I mean, “When I first came to Australia, I saw a woman who bought … raw sliced ​​mushrooms in the supermarket and sat down to eat it,”

    I’ve done stuff just like that.

  24. 24.

    Jeffro

    Just picture a national snooze media that has this as its (collective) headline: trump has a polling problem, and it’s getting worse

    Gee, I wonder how repeated felony indictments + 16 more months of ranting and raving like a lunatic will impact this already-noticeable trend?

    On first glance, a central message seems to be strong and continuing support for Trump — because a majority of Republicans said that the charges were not serious. Most Republicans also said that he should not have been charged with a crime and that the indictment was politically motivated.

    Media headlines have emphasized these pro-Trump majorities. At a dinner with Democratic donors this week, Jill Biden said that she had just read one of these headlines and found it “a little shocking.” Republican voters, Biden said, “don’t care about the indictment.”

    To be clear, Trump’s enduring support among Republicans is an important story. If it continues, he is likely to become the party’s nominee. That support is a sign that political polarization in the U.S. has become so intense that most Republican voters appear to care more about loyalty to Trump than about the possibility that he damaged national security by allowing sensitive intelligence to circulate.

    But the existence of an enduring pro-Trump Republican majority is not the only important conclusion from the recent polls. A couple of subtler patterns in the data are more worrisome for Trump.

    A decisive minority?

    First, look at the relative sizes of the minority opinions in each category in that chart above: There are considerably more Republicans who consider the charges serious than Democrats or independents who do not think they’re serious. The indictment divides Republicans more than it divides Democrats.

    A basic lesson of politics is that you win when the public debate is focused on issues that divide your opponent’s supporters and unite yours. Affirmative action, for example, is a problematic topic for the Democratic Party, even though most of its voters support the policy, because there are more Democrats who oppose it than Republicans who support it. (The Times recently explained how this dynamic led to a landslide defeat for an affirmative-action referendum in California.)

    For similar reasons, undocumented immigration creates political trouble for Democrats.  Problematic subjects for the Republican Party, on the other hand, include health care access, the minimum wage, same-sex marriage and, especially, abortion bans. The recent polls show that Trump’s behavior also falls into this category.

    Republicans who think he should have been charged with a crime outnumber Democrats who think he should not have been. “Trump splits the party,” says Jonathan Bernstein, a political scientist who writes for Bloomberg Opinion. “No, not evenly, but even an 80/20 split is a real split.”

    Another problematic sign for Trump is that the number of Republicans bothered by his legal problems seems to be growing. So is the number among independents. More voters are bothered by the case against him — on charges of taking classified material and trying to conceal that he did — than by the earlier New York State charges related to hush money for a sexual encounter.

    The 2024 election is still almost a year and a half away, and the prosecutors trying to hold Trump accountable will need to keep making their case not only in courtrooms but also to the public if they hope to convince most Americans of the seriousness of the charges. But those prosecutors do not need to convince most Republicans in order to succeed.

    Just look at what happened in the 2022 midterm elections. A small slice of Republican voters was unhappy enough with Trump’s anti-democratic behavior (and the Supreme Court’s abortion ruling) to defect from the party, helping Democrats keep control of the Senate. The last two presidential elections offer a similar case study: Trump lost the presidency in 2020 partly because 11 percent of typical Republican voters supported Joe Biden, up from 9 percent who voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016,

     

    This is why the GOP/No Labels/same thing is so desperate to split the Democratic vote with Kennedy, Manchin, etc.  They know their own party is split and it’s going to get worse.

  26. 26.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Lapassionara: The haters are gaining power right now– we have corporations with performative diversity campaigns backing down against violent threats, states passing odious legislation and trans people streaming out of red states.

    But I also think the overreach is starting to cost them politically. DeSantis has made this his whole brand and even Floridians don’t approve any more. Part of it is that they cannot resist extending it to anti-gay agitation and gay rights is far more popular.

  27. 27.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @p.a.: Now you see, I like Miracle Whip but can understand why others do not. What I do not understand is the love of the absolutely tasteless mayonnaise one gets in the store. My wife makes a homemade garlic mayo that is to die for and I love it but that stuff on the shelf??? Fuhgedaboudit.

  28. 28.

    Tony Jay

    @Kay:

    He’s gaining popularity with the all important “People who like to mock tenuously human charisma voids” demographic.

    Surely FTFNYT can find some of them in a diner somewhere to interview?

  29. 29.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: The first time I made oatmeal for breakfast with a Chinese exchange student, he nearly choked to death trying to simultaneously not spit it out as disgusting and not swallow it. While my kids merrily scarfed it down.

  30. 30.

    Ken

    I assume the replies to Marshall’s “abuse of the flag code” tweet are full of pictures of Trump humping the flag at campaign events, and/or people flying their “Trump” flags above their US flags.

  31. 31.

    mrmoshpotato

     

    @OzarkHillbilly: I cant help laughing. I mean, “When I first came to Australia, I saw a woman who bought … raw sliced ​​mushrooms in the supermarket and sat down to eat it,”

    There must be a whole lotta chef’s salad (and other salads) hating going on.

  32. 32.

    Kay

    @Tony Jay:

    Not well liked, and his entire campaign has been built around anti trans, anti gay, racist themes. Now, maybe he’s just a loathsome person and that comes through DESPITE people liking his hate agenda. That could be true.

    Embarrassing for Musk that Musk promoted him though and he’s gone straight down since then.

  33. 33.

    Kristine

    @OzarkHillbilly: I also like Miracle Whip. That’s what my mom used in potato salad etc. To me, it’s always had way more flavor than store-bought mayo, which to me is oily mouthfeel and nothing else.

    I will say that I tried my hand at making homemade mayo once and still didn’t like it.

  35. 35.

    Scout211

    Twitter is ‘the most dangerous platform for LGBTQ people,’ GLAAD says

    Is this even a little bit surprising to anyone?

    SAN FRANCISCO — All major social media platforms do poorly at protecting LGBTQ users from hate speech and harassment — especially those who are transgender, non-binary or gender non-conforming, the advocacy group GLAAD said Thursday. But Twitter is the worst.

    In its annual Social Media Safety Index, GLAAD gave Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and Twitter low or failing scores, saying the platforms don’t do enough to keep their users safe. That said, most improved from a year ago.
     
    Twitter, which was acquired by Tesla CEO Elon Musk last October, was the only exception. GLAAD’s scorecard called it “the most dangerous platform for LGBTQ people” and the only one that saw its scores decline from last year.

  36. 36.

    Kay

    @Jeffro:

    I think it’s worse for them than it looks right at this moment too. Everyone talks about Biden’s 70% w/Democrats (admittedly too low) but there’s weakness on their side too.

    It’s harder these days because there used to be at least a couple of Republicans or conservative political people who would admit when they were trending down, but there aren’t anymore- they culled all the real analysts from the Party. It’s liars all the way down. They all brag all the time now that they’re wildly popular, no matter the reality so any real analysis comes from outside GOP circles.

  38. 38.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kristine: ​ I am the taste tester in our house. My wife is always asking if a thing has too much salt or not enough. She also takes my word on whether her mayo has enough garlic. Try making it with garlic and a little salt, that’s what she does.

  40. 40.

    Steeplejack

    Wordle 727 Fri.

    🟨🟨⬜🟨⬜
    🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

    Yee-haw. This is as good as it gets for me. Hitting it in one is pure dumb-ass luck.

  45. 45.

    Tony Jay

    @Kay:

    There’s just something about RoDS that defies anyone’s attempts to human him up. He’s given the MAGOPs a state-sized prototype for the kind of exclusionary Craptardia they’re always saying they want, but just because he’s as charismatic as a saran-wrapped bowel extrusion and shows his belly every time Trump huffs in his direction, they’re just not warming to him.

    Maybe he should wear whiter boots. That’ll do it.

  46. 46.

    SFAW

    I realize it adds to my “bad person” cred for thinking this, but every time I read the insane/evil drivel from the RWMFs, my thoughts go to Kevin Uxbridge.

  48. 48.

    Kay

    Alanna Vagianos
    @AlannaVagianos
    ·17h
    NEW: Twitter blocked promotion of a Democrat’s campaign video because it expressed support for abortion rights.
    “The mention of abortion advocacy is the issue here,” a Twitter employee told North Carolina candidate Rachel Hunt.

    The bitter Right wing middle aged men who make decisions at Twitter censor women.
    They allowed her back on, but only after an outcry. How much other pro choice content are they censoring?

  49. 49.

    Ohio Mom

    You know how I know that the Pride flag is not a breach of the U.S. Flag Code? Because I know the White House staff includes all sorts of experts on etiquette and protocol. The White House is not Biden’s fiefdom, and he has lots more to do than micro-manage the decor.

  50. 50.

    Frankensteinbeck

    A little more confirmation that Musk’s Twitter takeover and increasing displays of hard right politics are motivated by his resentment of trans people.  He treated his daughter so badly she changed her name, so yeah, I bet he has strong feelings that children should be their parents’ property.

  51. 51.

    Lapassionara

    @Matt McIrvin: I’m in one of the states that families with trans youth are leaving. The stories are heartbreaking. I do not see how anyone can consider having the government control a person’s medical decisions is a “conservative” position.

  53. 53.

    SFAW

    @OzarkHillbilly: ​
     

    HA! I love oatmeal, I have it once a week or so.

    Well, that explains a lot.
    I always wondered why you greet each morning post with “Blech.” Now I understand.

  54. 54.

    Jeffro

    @Kay:I think it’s worse for them than it looks right at this moment too. Everyone talks about Biden’s 70% w/Democrats (admittedly too low) but there’s weakness on their side too.

    It’s worse for them than it looks…and it can only get even worse for them, no matter what (knock on wood) happens.

    • trump is going to rack up more felony indictments (fake electors, GA election interference, J6)
    • across the next 16 months, trump is going to look worse and act worse and sound like even more of a complete lunatic than he already does
    • trump is determined to run even if it’s from a prison cell, which tells me that at a minimum he’s going to keep braying away all through Election Day (even if he’s not the nominee)
    • the GOP field is already too crowded for there to be a single, significant challenger to trump (and DeSantis has already blown it, both with the GOP primary field AND future general election voters which is really remarkable when you think about it!)
    • most of the crowded GOP field is, weirdly, pro-trump (to include being pro-trump-pardon)…NOT very strategic as these indictments mount
    • and some significant portion of GOP voters (20-25%?) won’t accept anyone BUT trump

    I don’t see how they avoid disaster, unless trump keels over (and soon).

  55. 55.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kristine: I have a couple of Breakfast Bake oatmeal recipes with either blueberries or strawberries. Wonderful stuff.​

  57. 57.

    Kay

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    Why are they so idiotically obtuse about about “our children”?

    Of course he doesn’t mean the children are literally his sons and daughters. It’s not a title claim, you nitwits.

    They must have so much trouble reading fiction or poetry or hearing song lyrics. They’d be screaming every 30 seconds “another lie!”

  58. 58.

    Bill Hicks

    Like it or not, kids are legally property (kind of puts the whole abortion thing about fetuses being adult humans in the dust), albeit with some rights, kind of like pets (but completely unlike corporations which have more rights than adult humans). I’ll side with Biden over Musk in the child property debate in this instance, but they are still property.  Adult humans can also be property in the U.S. if they break the law or enlist in the military among other things. How to decide whether parents, legislators, cops, doctors, judges, or someone else gets to decide who is property is the question. In defense of Musk (personally I think he is a turd and does not have a good argument in this case), I worry when the state has too much control over whether we are property. I have to admit I am still shocked at how fast my father who died of Alzmeimer dementia was allowed to be rapidly turned into property of the state in his last weeks. I know I have explored the Hemlock Society in case I go down that path, and I hope to move back to Oregon when I can retire. Sorry for the rant, I guess it is important to realize that personal autonomy is a fundamental issue. I generally prefer the state to have less of a role in this in regards to children, but I had decent parents and my experiences as a child and adult have been illuminating (I used to have long hair in the 80s and 90s and regularly got to experience harassment by police and private businesses). So Musk is being a turd that really doesn’t care about the issue, but we do need to be very careful to support the rights of the individual and try to make sure that they are helped and not harmed. There is no perfect solution, but the current state of our penal system and child welfare system is scary and it is hard to determine whether the shitty parents or shitty system are better.

  60. 60.

    Tony Jay

    @mrmoshpotato:

    They have to fake human feeling in a way that RoDS is clearly incapable of.

    He’s more attuned to the Real Doll market. Niche, but he’s a Republican, he won’t have to look that far for kinkonnoisseurs,

  63. 63.

    Lapassionara

    @Ohio Mom: what the photo does not show is the American flag flying above the White House, and above the three flags pictured. So you are correct, there is no violation of the flag code.

  65. 65.

    Jeffro

    @Jeffro: I’m also encouraged by things like this, where the Republicans’ national disarray is spreading to their state parties:

    Keep trying to “out-MAGA” each other, Republicans!  You’re soooooo good at that!

    The GOP schism in Michigan, like those in other battleground states such as Arizona and Georgia, comes as Trump dominates Republican presidential primary polls and taps into the anger of a base in an uproar over his recent indictment for his handling of classified documents after leaving the White House. Over the weekend, Michigan Republicans approved rules that are likely to make it easier for Trump to win the nomination in the state. He has cheered on the state’s party for its commitment to promoting misinformation about the 2020 election.

    At least four county parties in Michigan have been at open war with themselves, with members suing one another or putting forward competing slates that claim to be in charge. The night before an April state party meeting, two GOP officials got into a physical altercation in a hotel bar over an attempt to expel members. The state party’s new chairwoman, Kristina Karamo, has struggled to raise money and abandoned the party’s longtime headquarters.

    Michigan Republicans were trounced in last year’s midterm elections, suggesting that they have a broad set of problems heading into 2024. Internal struggles will make it even tougher to win next year’s presidential race in the crucial state, veteran party activists say. The discord, along with the hard-line positions many Michigan candidates have adopted in recent years, could also influence the balance of power in the Senate. When Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) recently talked up his best prospects for winning a majority, he didn’t mention Michigan, even though the state will have an open seat next year.

  66. 66.

    Ella in New Mexico

    @Kay: I find it interesting DeTesties recently signed a law outlawing  Tesla’s direct to consumer sales of its exploding crash boxes and am looking forward to Elon flipping on his endorsement, like he does all his dictates

  69. 69.

    Kay

    @Jeffro:

    They have to be getting nervous with Trump and no back up. DeSantis was the back up and he’s a flop. I suppose if Trump really cratered they could roll out DeSantis again, but he just doesn’t seem to have it- whatever it takes to be a natioal candidate.

    Of course, WE’RE a little precarious too- Biden’s polling with Dems is too low and his age adds risk – like it or not- but I still think we’re better positioned.

  70. 70.

    Jeffro

    @mrmoshpotato:Can we have a GOP disaster and Dump keeling over?

    Probably!  It’s hard to picture the GOP coming together after trumpov kicking the bucket (but let’s not jinx it!)

    You’d have half the party wanting to move on from trumpism, and half wanting a true heir to his (barf) legacy.  I don’t see too many GOP pols with the skill to bring those two sides together.

  71. 71.

    Matt McIrvin

    I don’t suppose it matters much, but the display is not a violation of the Flag Code–the passage being used here refers to display of flags on staffs. And there’s a US flag on a central staff above all this that’s cropped out of the picture. It’s completely dishonest.

  73. 73.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Kay:

    Of course, WE’RE a little precarious too- Biden’s polling with Dems is too low and his age adds risk – like it or not- but I still think we’re better positioned.

    A reaction from a progressive I know has me worried that Cornel West in the Nader/Stein slot is going to do real damage.

  74. 74.

    Kay

    @Matt McIrvin:

    That these people have the nerve to question anyone else on flags is amazing. They don’t even fly the US flag anymore! They have the Trump flags and the Gadsden flag and the confederate flag and the cop flag.

  75. 75.

    JPL

    The ass from Florida calls the pride flag, the trans flag.   If anyone was hesitant to call him homophobic, they might change their mind.

  76. 76.

    p.a.

    “Cains, our own New England mayonnaise”- ad copy from 19xx…

    Now distributed by Bay Valley Foods LLC, Oak Brook, Illinois 🤷🏻

  78. 78.

    Baud

    @Kay: To be fair, Musk’s kids have probably told him more than once that they wish Biden were their dad.

  82. 82.

    Kay

    @Matt McIrvin:

    “Progressives” tend to overstate their importance as far as numbers, which centrists love because then they can claim progressives cause all losses. AA turnout was down in the last midterm and Democrats have lost ground with Latinos- not as much ground as media claims but some ground. I bet Biden is much more concerned about that than whether Climate Action endorses him or whatever.

  84. 84.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    “Progressives” tend to overstate their importance as far as numbers, which centrists love because then they can claim progressives cause all losses.

    QFT.

  86. 86.

    Dr. Jakyll and Miss Deride

    @Matt McIrvin: But can he beat out RFK Jr. for that slot?  Naomi Klein (in the Guardian) thinks he’s the one we have to worry about.

  89. 89.

    James E Powell

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Duke’s is available on amazon.

    We don’t see it in the stores out here in southern California, but my brother in law is a chef who grew up in Georgia and insists that there are recipes for which Duke’s is required. The macaroni salad is a standout. We also use Best Foods (called Hellmann’s back east) & I’ve seen Miracle Whip from time to time.

  90. 90.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    IMO there really is a clear divide among parents between those who think their children belong to them and those who think their children are independent people. That belief informs every decision after it. Musk is definitely in the “I took title of the new baby today” camp. It’s two distinct camps.

    But Biden just means “our” as in “American”, part of our country- that’s too complex and nuanced for this dope.

  94. 94.

    James E Powell

    @Jeffro:

    @Kay:

    DeSantis has already blown it, both with the GOP primary field AND future general election voters

    As much as I would like to believe this, it’s never over till it’s over. If Trump is out for some reason or reasons, who else is likely to the front? There are still billionaires & many media people who want DeSantis.

  95. 95.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @James E Powell: We have Hellman’s and …. Another brand I can’t recall, as well as Walmart’s cheap shit.

    We have a Schnuck’s coming to town and waiting for it is killing me. I generally have the palate of a raccoon but there are some things I’ll spend the extra for and Schnuck’s will carry them. I think.

  96. 96.

    JPL

    @Baud: Musk doesn’t even acknowledge the one that’s gay.  Afterall, how could suck a manly man have a child who is gay.

  98. 98.

    satby

    @Kay: Why would you ever imagine that Musk or any other right wing argument is made from their real feelings instead of being in complete bad faith? The parent’s rights, the anti-LGTBQ+, the voting fraud, et al: designed to divide, distract, and conquer so that the pillaging of the U.S. can continue. It’s all bad faith argument.

  100. 100.

    James E Powell

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    A little more confirmation that Musk’s Twitter takeover and increasing displays of hard right politics are motivated by his resentment of trans people.

    Did Grimes hurt him so bad he wants to see the world burn?

  101. 101.

    Miss Bianca

    @satby: I feel for this student – I eat oatmeal for breakfast almost every day, for health/economy reasons, but I can see it promoting a gag reflex in someone who’s never had it before – hell, it promotes a gag reflex in *me* sometimes!

  106. 106.

    Bill Hicks

    @Omnes Omnibus, I disagree, although I am defining legal property as an entity that has strict controls by another entity in a legal sense (so not an employer who pays you to do a task, but you can decide whether you want to do it/contractual, while slavery would be property). I also include children, prisoners, soldiers, mental patients, and folks in border crossings as legal property, that is not meant to be an exhaustive list. Certainly those under a certain age in the U.S. (sometimes 18) are legal property of the entity who is in charge of them. I realize that many legal definitions of property include the ability to dispose of the item, but I think that is mostly semantics. Once you have legal control, it makes it a much easier task to dispose of an entity even through something as simple and hard to detect as lack of attention/help.

    Cornell’s law website (picked only as the first of the standard definitions that came up) defines property as: Property is anything (items or attributes/tangible or intangible) that can be owned by a person or entity. Property is the most complete right to something; the owner can possess, use, transfer or dispose of it.

    If that is the definition you are using, it is stricter than mine; although, I think it also fits.

  108. 108.

    Quiltingfool

    @OzarkHillbilly: Our WalMart does cute things, like getting rid of products that I buy frequently.  I could go to three or four grocery stores to find everything I like, but I hate grocery shopping, so I just suck it up and do without!

  110. 110.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @satby: I lived for a while with a bunch of Indian students. Their version of breakfast oatmeal might have had a different effect on your Chinese student.

    I like oatmeal OK. I’ve never ordered it in a restaurant, I can’t see paying for it. My Mom made a lot of “cream of wheat” which I actually kind of liked. She also made something called “wheatena” or “wheatina” which I detested.

    She also, having started her life in the south (NC), tried to periodically introduce us to grits. That never took.

  112. 112.

    rikyrah

    @Jeffro:

    As long as the cult follows Dolt45, it’s not our problem. Let the GOP, who has enabled this parasite, deal with him.

    They have had numerous chances to rid themselves of him, and they were too cowardly to do so.

    I don’t give a phuck how long Dolt45 stays in this race.

  113. 113.

    satby

    @Bill Hicks: under your own quoted link, children are not property. When the rights and safety of a child conflict with a parent (or the state) there’s recourse for someone else to be named to act in the child’s best interests.  It’s not a perfect system, but it definitely doesn’t treat children as property of either their parents or the state.

  114. 114.

    Kay

    @Steeplejack:

    Pro choice people tagged free speech warrior Matt Taibbi with the news about Twitter censoring pro choice views and he took offense- “what does this have to do with me?”

    The irritable, bitter middle aged Men of the Left

  119. 119.

    Redshift

    Okay, oatmeal lovers. I want to like oatmeal because I know it’s good for you. So tell me how to make it good other than by loading it up with sugar, because so far without either straight sugar or enough fruit to add up to a lot, it’s like eating unflavored tofu.

  120. 120.

    JWR

    Abbott’s latest adventure in human trafficking:

    LOS ANGELES (KABC) — Southern California agencies and nonprofits have stepped in to help the 42 migrants — 10 of whom are minors — who arrived in L.A. from Texas on Wednesday as state officials say criminal charges will be investigated in the case.

    […]

    ABC7 has learned some of the migrants are toddlers, and at least 10 of the 42 migrants are minors. Another is a nursing mother.

    The Coalition of Humane Immigrant Rights — who helped assist the migrants upon their arrival in L.A. — believes the migrants weren’t provided food or drinks on the 23-hour long bus ride. Some of the migrants also have court dates planned in another state.

    Most of these families are already where they intended to go. L.A. was ready for this.

  123. 123.

    Kay

    @Bill Hicks:

    It’s just that this is whole, huge area of law- the area I work in- and you simply can’t just decide that children are legally defined as property to make a point. That’s not true. They’re not defined as property.  You have oversimplified to the point of deception.

    It’s agonizingly difficult to work out the parameters of when parents decide and when the state intervenes and decides. No one WANTS to jump in there – courts and laws HAVE TO. They really, really don’t want to make decisions for parents – everyone concerned would rather parents decide. Elon Musk imagines courts and offocials want to decide for his children- no, they don’t. It’s hard. They’d rather not.

    But to just take this issue that people of good faith have been struggling with for 150 years in this country and reduce it to “children are property” is both insulting and untrue.

  128. 128.

    frosty

    @Kristine: ​I was raised in a Miracle Whip family; my wife comes from Hellman’s. I loved my mom’s potato salad. Early in our marriage my wife suggested I make it with Hellman’s.
    Damn! It was better.​

  129. 129.

    satby

    @Redshift: It helps to have been raised on it, but I like dark whole fruits like blue or blackberries with maple syrup added to my oatmeal. Or adding cinnamon, nutmeg, and maple syrup. You need to add spices and other flavors to not have to add a lot of sugar.

  130. 130.

    Redshift

    @Bill Hicks:

    I’ll side with Biden over Musk in the child property debate in this instance, but they are still property.

    Category error. Musk is making an argument about property (in bad faith to provoke outrage, too), but Biden isn’t, so it’s not a “child property debate.”

    Biden is making a caring and empathy statement, that we all care about these children and should want them to do well. It’s not a “debate,” because only a complete asshole would debate that, which is why Musk can only respond in bad faith (if he wants to convince anyone to be in his side, that is.)

  131. 131.

    Ken

    @satby: One of the many funny scenes in To Say Nothing of the Dog has the time-traveling protagonist staying at an English country house in 1888, and eagerly anticipating a nice English breakfast of eggs, sausages, and toast. It turns out the master of the house was stationed in India, and the breakfast offerings include kedgeree rice with smoked fish, and deviled kidneys in chutney.

  132. 132.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    We know that Twitter is trash. They let right-wing hate proliferate unfettered.The harassment of Black folks has expanded exponentially since Apartheid Clyde took over.

  133. 133.

    Steeplejack

    @Kay:

    I saw that. Plus someone threw him a labeled photo of an ear of corn—a callback to the famous dril tweet:

    “im not owned! im not owned!!”, i continue to insist as i slowly shrink and transform into a corn cob

  135. 135.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I have to say, and I don’t know if this true of other women, but the “natalist” thing on the Right gives me the fucking creeps. Elon Musk talking about population growth is just creepy and controlling as hell, because obviously the Men Battling The Woke are talking about someone else having these children they’re demanding as some kind of right. Just gross.

    It does not surprise me at all that Musk’s authoritarian employees pull down pro choice content.

  136. 136.

    rikyrah

    @Jeffro:

    The 1/6 and the Georgia indictments are NOT going to be Trump alone. They are going to be multiple Republican officeholder’s involved. It’s gonna read like a John Grisham novel.

  137. 137.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Kay: I reconnected with a neighbor/friend from HS who is doing her best to be anti-racist, is very pro-LGBTQ, Feminist and has a passion for raising money for victims of sex trafficking.  In general, I really like her.  But she’s also extremely religious and chooses to home-school her kids.  It really gnaws at me.  I just can’t get how a person can be so aware of social justice issues and inequality etc., but then literally build her life around indoctrinating her kids with her own beliefs, undermining public schools and effectively keeping her kids in a privileged silo of whiteness.  It’s especially weird to me because I’ve suggested some great books to her (and she loved them) that rather specifically call out how white people fleeing to private/charter schools and homeschooling was a direct reaction to school integration and is a big factor in why the US is still so racially segregated.  All of which is to say that the Kids = Property mentality is very common even among people with pretty progressive values.

  138. 138.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Ken: At this stage in my life I’ve discovered that the best “English” breakfast might be the one the Irish give you, the “full Irish”. Eggs, Irish bacon, a fried tomato, black pudding and white pudding (these are sausages, and don’t ask what’s in black pudding), beans on toast, and probably more I’m forgetting.

    My understanding is that beans-on-toast is something often associated with being poor in that part of the world, but for an American it’s a nice switch.

  144. 144.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Quiltingfool: Oh Dawg, they do that to us all the time. Between that and their “just in time” deliveries which are always a day late, I feel lucky to find anything I want.

    @Ken: Ha! No, that one is a real throwback to the early walmart days. If I have to get groceries in Cuba, I go to the Mace store. They actually have a pretty good selection of South of the Border groceries due to the Latin American communities that are scattered about the hills and hollers there.

    The one we go to most frequently is in Sullivan, which to all appearances is a regular walmart. But the grocery dept…

  145. 145.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @gene108:

    @Suzanne:

    I had a great time. I’m just sorry it was too loud to hear both tables, I could barely hear my own. Also I don’t remember anyone’s real name or who goes with which nym, except Suzanne and rekoob, so I’m looking forward to the pics to sort that out.

  146. 146.

    Ken

    @Redshift: As you can tell from the rest of the thread, the best topping for oatmeal is mayonnaise. Or perhaps Miracle Whip.

    (Actually… Now I’m wondering. I like butter on oatmeal, and butter and mayo are basically high-density fat-delivery systems. And the Miracle Whip adds sugar, or maybe HFCS…)

  147. 147.

    randy khan

    @Ohio Mom:

    And if you look at the section of the Flag Code on displaying the flag, it’s not what you’d call obvious that it’s a violation at all.

    Anyway, the same kind of person who talks about something like this as a Flag Code violation is just fine with the blue line flag, which is a definite violation.

  148. 148.

    rikyrah

    I happen to love that we can discuss Mayo/Miracle Whip and Oatmeal/Cream of Wheat in a thread.

    It’s so normal…and relaxing…

    None of which was possible between 2017 and 2021

     

    I’m not going back to that.

     

    BIDEN/HARRIS 2024!

  150. 150.

    Redshift

    @Kay:

    Cream of Wheat is a little blander and smoother than oatmeal so I prefer it.

    Umm, to each his/her own, but “not bland enough” is not the problem I’m trying to solve.

  151. 151.

    randy khan

    The Senate confirmed a judge.  I guess J.D. Vance didn’t get around to putting that hold he promised on all judicial nominees.

  156. 156.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @Kay: my personal favorite is creamy buckwheat (Bob’s Red Mill) with butter, nuts, and a savory spice mix from Penzey’s. That reminds me that I should check and see if I have any creamy buckwheat on hand.

  158. 158.

    BlueGuitarist

    @Kay:

    Wait til they see the 51 star flag!
    they probably wouldn’t notice if the flag kept stars in rows, but there’s a great design with the stars in a circle, like a disco ball with a peace sign:


    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:US_flag_51_stars.svg#/media/File:US_51-star_alternate_flag.svg

    there would be a lot of whining about tradition from people who don’t know the Betsy Ross flag had the stars in a circle.

    DC statehood is difficult, but essential.

  159. 159.

    Dr. Jakyll and Miss Deride

    @Kay: Thank you for making that point.  As someone who worked on hundreds of juvenile dependency cases at the appellate level, I can confirm that courts really don’t want to get into these things before they have to.  “The child’s best interest” may be the standard, but parental rights also get constitutional protection, so erring parents get every chance to shape up and then some.  But this isn’t the same as saying that children are anybody’s property.

    Things get even messier where the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA), which the Supremes affirmed yesterday, is involved.  On the one hand, it’s highly protective of Native American rights, in that it triggers a duty of inquiry when a parent claims ancestry in a specific tribe, no matter how vague or uncorroborated, and if someone claims correctly that that duty wasn’t properly done the appellate court has to send it back for a do-over — even where the kids have already been placed in an adoptive home and the court thinks it’s damned unlikely there’s any real Indian heritage.  On the other hand, if Native American parents have screwed up and there are no available Native American foster parents, the law prefers the children to be in a non-native home where the foster parents are good at parenting and commit to maintaining the children’s ties with their tribe(s).  So, like everything else, it’s a difficult balance.

  163. 163.

    Kay

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    I think homeschooling can be done well. It’s discredited by the huge numbers of people who don’t do it well though so IMO the bad outweighs the good. I support truancy laws. I think Kamala Harris was 100% correct on truancy and the need for regulation around schooling. The fact is there’s a state interest in children attending school.

    But I agree that there are many progressive parents who treat children as property. The whole “crunchy” anti vax Lefty group who seem to have little or no concept of “society”.

  172. 172.

    Kay

    @Dr. Jakyll and Miss Deride:

    So, like everything else, it’s a difficult balance.

    I’m always amused that people on the Right think we want their children. No, we don’t. I absolutely insist you raise your own children but you have to provide rock bottom minimum care or the state has to step in. Like judges are clamoring for these impossible fucking cases with 20 different sets of rights that have to be balanced and it’s impossible to do it perfectly. Yeah. Sure.
    We also don’t want your aged parents. Take care of them, please. By all means.

  173. 173.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Kay:

    Why are they so idiotically obtuse about about “our children”?

    They’re not.  Musk is saying, and his audience is hearing, that parents should have absolute power over their children and neither the government nor the children themselves should have any say in the matter.

    Being conservative, if their absolute power over their own children – say, making sure that child doesn’t know gay people exist – interferes with another parent’s even moderate power over their own children, fuck you, the conservative’s viewpoint is the only one that matters.

    @Bill Hicks:

    I assure you, the government’s major role in children’s affairs is to reduce parental power for the purpose of reducing abuse.  That is even a major part of public education, which is why evangelicals hate it.  Parental power over children is way overboard in America, and conservatives still want even more because they’re failing to beat their kids into a Stepford Family.

    @satby:

    The parent’s rights, the anti-LGTBQ+, the voting fraud, et al: designed to divide, distract, and conquer so that the pillaging of the U.S. can continue. It’s all bad faith argument.

    This is utterly wrong.  Yes, the rich are as bigoted as the poor.  More so, because they face less restraints.  There is no other reasonable explanation for Musk spending 44 billion plus crashing his stock values for Twitter.  He’s a bigot promoting bigotry.  Trump is a white supremacist.  The Hobby Lobby shits are Christian dominionists.  And on and on and on.

    It’s not economic anxiety for the rich, either.  We don’t live in a meritocracy where being rich magically makes you promote your material self-interest over the satisfaction of being an asshole.

  174. 174.

    Chris T.

    @Baud:

    Musk probably views his kids as intellectual property.

    And here I was thinking his view was “replacement parts”…

  176. 176.

    Jeffro

    @rikyrah: that’s a good point

    1/6 is an easy dozen R legislators and GA is at least a half-dozen.  “GOP lawmakers arrested for sedition, complain about ‘weaponizing government’; opinions differ” – snooze media.

    Plus I think Jack Smith is looking at Michigan and Nevada’s fake elector slates, too, right?

  177. 177.

    Redshift

    I like mayo on some sandwiches and on potato salad, but not to the point where I’d be inclined to say “mmm, I like mayo!” (I grew out of my peanut-butter-and-mayo-sandwich phase as a teenager.)

    I got introduced to Miracle Whip by a friend much later, and yeah, it’s good, but then I looked and found out it’s because high fructose corn syrup is high up in the ingredients list. It has a few spices, too, but you’ll never convince me that’s not the main reason. I’ve got quite a sweet tooth, but I don’t need it on my sandwiches.

  179. 179.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Suzanne: The irony of this is that DMB has one of the most phenomenal drummers on the planet (Carter Beauford) and they can get extremely funky at times, but because the mix of instruments and Dave’s voice ends up making the finished product super-white.  Same is pretty much true of Phish.  Their rhythm section can actually get down and get extremely funky (and often does) in their live shows.  In musical feel, they are actually significantly less-white sounding than DMB.  The absolute whitest of all the famous jam-bands, would be the Grateful Dead.  As drummer Billy Cobham put it, the reason he never was into the Dead was that there was never/rarely any back-beat in their songs.  Their approach is more hippie-drum-circle, which is kind of the exact opposite of a funky groove.  That’s why I was never much of a Dead fan either, but I did love Jerry Garcia Band which had a much funkier/backbeat approach to their music.  All of them I’d still classify as extremely-white bars tho, based just on their fanbases.  Anyways that’s my $.02 as a pretty funky drummer who also is a fan of jam-bands.

  181. 181.

    craigie

    “Muslim American”? I’m not fan of religion (to put it mildly) but that seems like a very unnecessary label. We don’t talk about Jewish Americans or Christian Americans do we?

  182. 182.

    Gin & Tonic

    So South African President Cyril Ramaphosa decides to go to Ukraine and Russia, along with other African heads of state, on a “peace mission.” Things go poorly.

    First, they spend 24 hours on the tarmac in Warsaw (no air service to Kyiv, as you know) because he’s traveling with a Special Forces detail, and the Poles have an issue with their weapons. Reportedly proper permits were not secured. Eventually they get to Kyiv, yesterday Kyiv time, and spend the night – a night during which the russians bomb Kyiv, multiple air raid sirens go off, and local Reuters reporters see the SA delegation heading to an air raid shelter (there are no SA reporters with the delegation.) Today the Presidential spokesman says there were no sirens and no explosions.

    ETA: To make everything better, the head of SA’s Presidential Protection Service accuses the Polish authorities of racism. The plane and its passengers and crew are still on the tarmac in Warsaw.

  183. 183.

    Redshift

    @rikyrah:

    To be more precise, “The former president relied on advice from the head of a conservative judicial group who is not a lawyer instead of his attorneys.”

    In case anyone needed more explanation for why he can’t get a lawyer…

  185. 185.

    kalakal

    For those of you wishing to know more of sad plight of Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson, the once and future cyst here is

    Jonathan Pie to keep you up to speed

  186. 186.

    Tony Jay

    @frosty:

      Cosplaying the green M&M?

    If Trump has those pictures it would explain a lot about RoDS’ policy of ‘curl up in a ball and whimper’.

  189. 189.

    Bostondreams

    @JPL:

    his child is trans, and she has herself disowned him. Says he is a horrible person. Good on her. He seems like someone who would happily deadname and claim ignorance.

  190. 190.

    Citizen Alan

    @OzarkHillbilly: In mississippi, it’s helmens or blue plate. I have never seen dukes on a shelf down here. But i’ve heard enough good things that I will probably try a jar when I finally get to civilization next month. Is thirty days and counting.

  192. 192.

    Betty Cracker

    @R-Jud: Hahaha! Thank you — that’s handy.

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: My gran from South Carolina used to make cream of wheat for us, topped with a sprinkle of brown sugar, butter and cream. It was good with all that stuff on it, but I suppose that defeats the health benefits.

  194. 194.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Frankensteinbeck: Musk also famously is estranged from his Transgender daughter and blames her Trans identity for it.  So Occam’s razor is: YES he really is Transphobic (and sexist and racist etc) and not just playing some 11-dimensional chess to be politically divisive or make $.  The idea that rich, famous people who spout bigotry are just pretending is silly.  Sure they may have decided to do it now because of opportunistic reasons, but I guarantee the sentiments are real, they just finally found a reason to stop holding them back.  All of the isms/phobias we see from Musk are extremely common among rich, white, cis, het men.

  195. 195.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Redshift: ​ (I grew out of my peanut-butter-and-mayo-sandwich phase as a teenager.)
     

    I’m still in my Peanut butter and dill pickle phase.

  196. 196.

    Citizen Alan

    @gvg: I’m curious to see how that car valve is designed and whether it can withstand a lawsuit by the other car companies.

  197. 197.

    Kay

    @Betty Cracker:

    We ate it with canned peaches. Which don’t taste like peaches but instead are just a different delicious food :)

    I do like white foods though- the white foods category.

  201. 201.

    Kay

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    I feel like we always go thru this with these people “he’s not REALLY X or Y” then inevitably and eventually we all have to admit he IS really.

    The not really stage.

  202. 202.

    Viva BrisVegas

    The breakfast thing sounds a lot like it might be part of the campaign by the Chinese government to ridicule and demean Western influences to their youth.

    If can you make the West look ridiculous, you make things like democracy and liberty look ridiculous.

    Nobody likes to associate with the uncool kids.

  203. 203.

    Miss Bianca

    @rikyrah: I mean, sure…Whitmer could be a contender. But if Harris is in for 2028 (and why wouldn’t she be?), I am all in for Harris.

  206. 206.

    Citizen Alan

    @Redshift: I wish that were true. But between the treatment of LGBT children and the story discussed elsewhere in these comments above the immigrant toddlers shipped on a bus for twenty four hours without food or water (presumably because Abbott couldn’t find any cattle cars), It seems clear now that the question  “Should decent people care about the health and safety of children?” is now a partisan issue.

  207. 207.

    Tony G

    @Matt McIrvin: The executives who run corporations, by definition, care primarily about their own financial compensation.  They also care about increasing corporate profits, because their compensation depends upon those profits.  That’s all.  Their performative diversity efforts were done only to increase profits, and when right-wing protests and intimidation threaten those profits they’re find with shelving the performative diversity.  It’s all about nothing else but money.

  208. 208.

    Another Scott

    I wonder if the RWNJ trumped-up panic about teaching, and learning from, real US history is a consequence of research being easier in some ways now, because so much is on-line. They’re trying to keep things bottled up while they can…

    ProPublica.org:

    Sitting at her bedroom desk, nursing a cup of coffee on a quiet Tuesday morning, Lauren Davila scoured digitized old newspapers for slave auction ads. A graduate history student at the College of Charleston, she logged them on a spreadsheet for an internship assignment. It was often tedious work.

    She clicked on Feb. 24, 1835, another in a litany of days on which slave trading fueled her home city of Charleston, South Carolina. But on this day, buried in a sea of classified ads for sales of everything from fruit knives and candlesticks to enslaved human beings, Davila made a shocking discovery.

    On page 3, fifth column over, 10th advertisement down, she read:

    “This day, the 24th instant, and the day following, at the North Side of the Custom-House, at 11 o’clock, will be sold, a very valuable GANG OF NEGROES, accustomed to the culture of rice; consisting of SIX HUNDRED.”

    She stared at the number: 600.

    A sale of 600 people would mark a grim new record — by far.

    Until Davila’s discovery, the largest known slave auction in the U.S. was one that was held over two days in 1859 just outside Savannah, Georgia, roughly 100 miles down the Atlantic coast from Davila’s home. At a racetrack just outside the city, an indebted plantation heir sold hundreds of enslaved people. The horrors of that auction have been chronicled in books and articles, including The New York Times’ 1619 Project and “The Weeping Time: Memory and the Largest Slave Auction in American History.” Davila grabbed her copy of the latter to double-check the number of people auctioned then.

    It was 436, far fewer than the 600 in the ad glowing on her computer screen.

    […]

    Not even 200 years ago. It’s not ancient history.

    There’s still a lot to learn, and we have to be free to learn it…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  211. 211.

    RaflW

    I’ll be very interested in the details, but apparently the City of Minneapolis has agreed in principle to a consent decree with AG Garland. Our cops have been notoriously resistant to reform for over five decades, so it’s gonna be a tough row to hoe. But maybe the Feds can put some spine in our useless prettyboy mayor (I think you can guess I’m not optimisitc).

  213. 213.

    Citizen Alan

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: I know what is in black pudding. And I don’t care, because it tastes fucking amazing. The black pudding I had at a restaurant in new york city was one of my favorite culinary memories of my time spent there, much to my own surprise.

  215. 215.

    JWR

    @rikyrah: Ha ha! Wasn’t Tom Fitton the guy whose election advice TFG took over people who actually knew something about election law? From your HuffPo link:

    The Post, citing seven advisers to the former president, said Trump was extraordinarily stubborn when it came to negotiating with government officials. When one of his attorneys, Christopher Kise, suggested meeting with the Justice Department to negotiate a settlement that could avoid charges, Trump reportedly rejected that plan. Instead, he listened to the advice of Tom Fitton, the president of the conservative group Judicial Watch, who told him he could keep the documents and that he should fight Justice Department efforts to see them returned.

    […]

    Some advisers added that the FBI and National Archives’ insistence that Trump return the government documents only made him want to keep them more.

    Mine mINe MINE!!1!

  217. 217.

    Miss Bianca

    @Omnes Omnibus: I was introduced to that one by my adored Uncle Freddy at a tender young age. However, I drew the line at peanut butter and mayo, because ewwww.

  218. 218.

    cain

    @Kay: I look forward when they implode and the florida legislature is the one that is forced to reckon the anger of voters. I don’t think any of those assholes are going to show up to any public forums any time soon.

    All those laws they pass at the behest of DeSantis (what hold does he have on those folks?) is going to boomer-rang back at them hard.

  220. 220.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @cain:

    (what hold does he have on those folks?)

    Well, I think 9/10ths of it is that when DeSantis goes, “Hey, I have an even more sadistically bigoted idea!” they go “Shit, dog, that’s awesome!  I wish I’d thought of that!”

  222. 222.

    different-church-lady

    @JWR: ​
      Guy who just says shit is taking his legal advice from a guy who just says shit? Hard to believe…

  224. 224.

    O. Felix Culpa

    From WaPo (should be a gift link, where there’s more. It’s nice having a DOJ that’s interested in, you know, justice):

    Minneapolis police engaged in pattern of misconduct, Justice Dept. says

    The Minneapolis Police Department engaged in the systemic use of excessive force and discriminated against racial minorities in the years leading up to the police killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in 2020, federal authorities said Friday.

    In a scathing 89-page report released following a more than two-year federal civil rights investigation, the Justice Department excoriated the Minneapolis police force as an agency that put officers and local residents at unnecessary risk and failed to act upon repeated warnings about biased behavior.

    Specifically, the report criticizes the Minneapolis police for: using “dangerous tactics and weapons” — including neck restraints and Tasers — against people for petty offense or no crimes; punishing residents who criticized the police; patrolling neighborhoods differently based on their racial makeup; and discriminating against those with behavioral health disabilities.

    The report called the department’s accountability structures “fundamentally flawed,” with internal misconduct investigations getting lost in an “opaque maze” as senior managers dismissed legitimate complaints without investigation and routinely mischaracterizing the allegations.

    “Our investigation found that the systemic problems in MPD made what happened to George Floyd possible,” the report stated.

  225. 225.

    UncleEbeneezer

    This would be a great article for a FP post, imo, for Juneteenth and Pride (note the historian defines “drag” differently than the Shakespearean practice):
    The First Self-Proclaimed Drag Queen Was a Formerly Enslaved Man: In the late 19th century, William Dorsey Swann’s private parties attracted unwelcome attention from authorities and the press

    In the late 1880s, a formerly enslaved man named William Dorsey Swann started hosting private balls known as drags, a name possibly derived from “grand rag,” an antiquated term for masquerade balls. Held in secret in Washington, D.C., these parties soon caught authorities’ attention.

    As the Washington Critic reported in January 1887, police officers who raided one such gathering were surprised to encounter six Black men “dressed in elegant female attire,” including “corsets, bustles, long hose and slippers.” The following April, the Evening Starreported on a raid that targeted men in “female attire of many colors,” as well as “gaudy costumes of silk and satin.” On both occasions, authorities arrested the party guests and charged them with “being suspicious characters.”
    …

    Forging a place for himself in the city’s queer Black community, Swann held parties that Joseph deems the first documented “drag balls” in American history. Held in secret, they provided a safe space for gender expression but were risky to attend. “A large but undetermined number managed to flee during the police raids, but the names of those arrested and jailed were printed in the papers, where the men became targets of public scorn,” wrote Joseph for the Nation in 2020. “In post-Civil War America, there was very little patience for men who subverted gender norms.” Sentences for those charged with attending drag balls ranged from around three to ten months.

    At Swann’s gatherings, guests donned women’s clothing or men’s suits and danced to folk music. The balls included a competitive element, a “resistance dance” that hearkened back to the antebellum era, says Joseph. Known as a cakewalk, the contest was originally held by enslaved people on Southern plantations. Coupled dancers “executed walking steps and figures in precise formations as if in mimicry of the white man’s attitudes and manners,” writes Richard Kislan in The Musical: A Look at the American Musical Theater. Enslavers, seemingly unaware they were being mocked, judged the contest and gave the winning couple a cake as a prize.

  226. 226.

    Hoodie

    @OzarkHillbilly: Lunch seems to have become a lost art in the US.   When I started working construction in the south in the 70’s, there were a ton of “meat and threes” that offered hot homestyle lunches. Quality varied, but some were quite good, if you like southern style food.  These joints would load up with working folks at mid day.  Several would only serve breakfast and lunch.  A lot of them have been killed off by fast food chains, the more general death of a lot of small town commercial districts and, probably, the increasingly overscheduled, always online nature of a lot of work.

    I also remember that school lunches we had back then, while not great, weren’t bad.   We had a full kitchen staff in our HS, they’d make standbys like collards, pinto beans and cornbread, etc.   My wife teaches middle school here, the lunches they serve now are godawful reheated crap.

  227. 227.

    different-church-lady

    @cain: what hold does he have on those folks?

    It’s all fun and games until the boot stomping on a human face, forever! puts your eye out.

  229. 229.

    kalakal

    @Tony Jay: It’s beyond awful, It’s not that they’re vile it’s that they can’t be bothered to hide it.

    I am enjoying Dorries living down to her level of competence. I’ve never heard of anybody who can’t even manage their own resignation. And I love how she’s accusing the honours system of being corrupt because she didn’t get one.

    But it was this document that got me, it’s utterly damning. They’te complete and utter bastards

    https://twitter.com/SamCoatesSky/status/1669276567866863617?s=20

  230. 230.

    Mike in NC

    A quick review of the Friday newspapers indicates that every Republican running for president in 2024 has pledged to pardon Trump for whatever crimes he committed, or may have committed, including all those we don’t yet know about. Thirsty Marco Rubio sez Trump probably didn’t give or sell Top Secret documents to the Russians or Saudis, so let’s just let bygones be bygones.

    Each and every one of them will quickly fall in line because that’s how fascists operate. They’re 100% behind installing the fat fucker as dictator for life.

  231. 231.

    cain

    @Scout211: Not surprising – and the only platform that is going to be safe is mastodon.

    Once we sort out the various folks and how they want their experience to be – I expect mastodon to continue to rise.

    As you can see with Reddit, companies are exploiting human conversations for profit – now of course, they have to pay the costs for ux, upkeep and infrastructure – but we are what makes these platforms attractive to begin with when you hit critical mass.

  233. 233.

    RaflW

    @O. Felix Culpa: From our local StarTrib “The city will now begin the process of negotiating a court-enforceable consent decree with the Justice Department. Per the state’s agreement, the federal decree will take precedent if any of the state’s terms conflict with it.”

    TV reporter Jana Shortal  indicated there’s some sort of agreement in principal, which I guess means the City has acknowledged that they must negotiate this consent decree and not fight it.

  234. 234.

    catclub

    @Lapassionara: I’m in one of the states that families with trans youth are leaving.

     

    I do not understand how any Ob/gyn docs, or docs in training, can go to those states.  They should know they have a target on them for doing their jobs. or how med schools can be  accreditied there.

  235. 235.

    different-church-lady

    @Mike in NC: ​

    including all those we don’t yet know about.

    “I will pardon Trump for anything he might have done!”
    “Tell me more about these things he might have done.”
    “….”

  240. 240.

    Baud

    @Jackie: Fox is still the devil, and we’ll never know if the guy is a scapegoat for some higher up’s decision, but that was the correct response in this case.

  243. 243.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Kay:

    You remind me of one of my favourite passages from Murder Must Advertise (Dorothy L. Sayers). Two copywriters at an advertising agency are talking:

    “I think this is an awfully immoral job of ours. I do, really. Think how we spoil the digestions of the public.”

    “Ah, yes—but think how earnestly we strive to put them right again. We undermine ’em with one hand and build ’em with the other. The vitamins we destroy in the canning, we restore in Revito; the roughage we remove from Peabody’s Piper Parritch we make up into a package and market as Bunbury’s Breakfast Bran; the stomachs we ruin with Pompayne, we re-line with Peplets to aid digestion. And by forcing the damn-fool public to pay twice over—once to have its food emasculated and once to have the vitality put back again, we keep the wheels of commerce turning and give employment to thousands—including you and me.”

  247. 247.

    Tony Jay

    @kalakal:

    And of course, right now, as we speak, editors across the land are demanding that their crack journalistic talents explain how all of this was able to stay a secret for so long.

    I keed, I keed. We know exactly why. I just wonder how long its going to be before the Omerta breaks and the names of the journalists who attended parties at Downing Street are leaked.

    ETA – I’ve actually got a brief explainer about all this ready to post once I’ve removed all of the excess commas and full-stops.

  248. 248.

    different-church-lady

    @Jackie: ​
      God almighty before this is over they’re gonna have nobody but the cafeteria staff left to run that joint.

  249. 249.

    Citizen Alan

    @Chris T.: IIRC, the comment that once got me banned from the Atlantic was a response to a Megan mccardle column in which I suggested that she was a sociopath and the only reason she would ever have children as if she thought she might need a kidney transplant in the future.

  250. 250.

    AM in NC

    @Kay: “The irritable, bitter middle aged Men of the Left”

    Yep. It’s a real problem.

    (apologies to the irritable, bitter, middle-aged men of the left here who don’t choose to go full fash – and you KNOW who you are).

  251. 251.

    Kay

    Dean Baker
    @DeanBaker13
    ·Jun 14
    Hot story tip for business/economics reporters: Unemployment is near a half-century low. We have seen the strongest real wage growth for the bottom quintile in fifty years. The Conference Board says that worker satisfaction has never been so high.

    I think they don’t write about the success of Biden’s economic approach because the strongest growth has been in the bottom quintile – also the gap between AA and white employment has disappeared. It’s an especially good economy for African Americans.

  252. 252.

    Jackie

    Instead of GAINING lawyers… 😂

    “Jim Trusty, who dropped off of Donald Trump’s criminal defense team last week, is now withdrawing from Trump’s lawsuit against CNN, citing “irreconcilable differences” with his client.”

    Like, “I’m NOT LISTENING TO YOU AND YOU CAN’T MAKE ME!!!” (Foot stomp!)

  254. 254.

    Citizen Alan

    @Betty Cracker: Sort of like my response when a college roommate persuaded me to try a rice cake, which he was into for health reasons.

    “You know, these would be all right if you put some chocolate frosting on them or something.”

  255. 255.

    different-church-lady

    @Kay: ​
     

    It’s an especially good economy for African Americans.

    No wonder the GOP wants to destroy it.

  257. 257.

    MattF

    Re: Oatmeal. You can cook good (i.e., steel cut) oatmeal in a rice cooker, no stirring, no mess. And then add all that other stuff. I bought my sister and BIL a (Zoji) rice cooker and they never use it for rice— just for daily oatmeal.

  259. 259.

    Citizen Alan

    @Kay: I will refer to your knowledge, but I was actually ripping off an old eddie murphy bit from saturday night live.

  262. 262.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    I just don’t want to hear it when unemployment goes up. We have a good economy. People just decided to whine all the way thru it. They’ll get a bad economy eventually – then they can whine about that.

    You’re not getting ridiculously low food and energy prices and full employment. That’s never happening. They can go back to a dollar for a dozen eggs and 12% unemployment. Dopes.

  263. 263.

    James E Powell

    @Kay:

    Why are they so idiotically obtuse about about “our children”?

    Remember when Hillary Clinton wrote It Takes a Village?

  264. 264.

    AM in NC

    @Kay: I was raised on Cream of Wheat and oatmeal in the winter time (odd since I grew up in New Orleans where “winter” is not really a thing).  Cream of wheat was the salty/savory one (made with milk, salt, and a pat of butter). Oatmeal was sweet (made with water, salt and sugar and a splash of milk at the end).

    I still eat them both, and eat oatmeal a TON. After 50 years of eating oatmeal “regular”, I finally, just a few months ago, started adding fruit and nuts, and I wonder why I waited so long to do this. It’s amazing!

    My mom, who cooked us these breakfasts while getting ready for work herself, would always call us to breakfast with “oatmeal’s (or whatever’s) on the table, Grable!”. My mom died last summer and my brother and sister and I were just talking about how we use the same phrase with our (now adult) kids whenever we make oatmeal or another cooked breakfast.

    Thanks Mama; you were the best!

  267. 267.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    Yep. That’s why I’m not sweating the next election. Not because we’ll definitely win, but because we deserve any loss that isn’t the result of antidemocratic actions.

  268. 268.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Kay: I think there are a lot of Americans today who have gotten accustomed to gay/lesbian rights but think trans rights is “going too far”, especially if you lie about it to them. The Republicans see an opportunity to do the Bush 2004 playbook there, but demonizing trans people this time. They are managing to do horrific damage along the same lines as all the anti-gay political agitation back then.

    But they can’t manage the job of splitting this off from opposition to gay rights. And we shouldn’t let them, regardless of what shills like Andrew Sullivan think. Nobody goes under the bus.

  269. 269.

    Citizen Alan

    @Layer8Problem: I have often thought that the only useful purpose of lettuce is to provide something for the blue cheese dressing to stick to so you can eat it with a fork.

  271. 271.

    Manyakitty

    @Ohio Mom: hey! In case you see this, I am on board with a meet up while you’re in Cleveland. Find me on Instagram by my nym and send me a message!

  272. 272.

    pat

    Raw oatmeal with sunflower seeds and a few raisins mixed in, then raw blueberries , jogurt and a bit of milk.   Every day.

    Going to live forever.  Ha.

    Do not like it cooked.

  273. 273.

    NotMax

    Full disclosure:

    Have never been offered, mush less tried, oatmeal. Nor Cream of Wheat. Nor Cream of Rice. Nor Corn Mush.

    Do like grits with copious infusion of cheese and garlic, though.

  276. 276.

    NotMax

    Headline up top makes me fondly hark back to That Was the Week That Was, colloquially known as TW3.

  278. 278.

    randy khan

    @Raven:

    LOL.

    I didn’t look at that section, but I know the answer because I was a Boy Scout – preferably burning, but burial also is acceptable as a “dignified” method of disposal.  (I recall seeing articles in local newspapers about periodic VFW ceremonies to burn damaged and worn out flags when I was younger.)

    And you also shouldn’t use the flag to make clothing – so, for instance, those annual Old Navy 4th of July t-shirts are in violation – and it never should be carried flat or horizontally, the way you see it during the Star Spangled Banner ceremonies at major sporting events.

  279. 279.

    JWR

    @Jackie: Wow! The biggest kid on the block eventually attracts the biggest bad trouble. I srsly doubt he’ll make it to the next election, either by way of legal troubles, or lack of interest on the part of his most fervent supporters once they finally realize just how deep in the sh*t he’s in. Maybe explains why there are so many Rs willing to jump into the 2024 race. Because if Rs can smell anything, it’s blood in the water. ;)

  280. 280.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @rikyrah: amen! I want boring sane politics and lots of funding for basic science, medical and technology research! I want more inventors and more entrepreneurs! I want Yankee ingenuity and creativity back!

  283. 283.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    I think they don’t write about the success of Biden’s economic approach because the strongest growth has been in the bottom quintile – also the gap between AA and white employment has disappeared. It’s an especially good economy for African Americans.

     

    They don’t want to write about it, Kay. They truly resent the competence of 46 and his Administration.

  286. 286.

    scav

    Savory takes on oatmeal are also fun — I forget all the details, but I made one that included sautéed onions for a while.  Probably varied with other additions at whimsy or availability, but with spices characteristic of sausages or meat.

    Quick switch. Speaking of the boiled sweet, HOW can Tony Jay, Jonathon Pye et all keep up, let alone squeeze in long screeds / rants?  Bojo’s not only just had to return to a former venue of lying (journalism) but already been rebuked as breaking Parliamentary rules.  All seemingly within two mere hours.

  288. 288.

    Bill Arnold

    @rikyrah:
    Yeah. seriously laugh-out-loud. Tom Fitton as a Force For Good!
    This is a good example of how echo chambers can cause people to make serious mistakes.

  290. 290.

    JWR

    @Scout211:

    From the Politico link:

    In a filing with the U.S. District Court of Southern Florida, Trusty indicated his intention to withdraw from Trump’s pending defamation lawsuit against CNN. The longshot lawsuit, which Trump filed last October, accuses the network of maligning him as a “‘racist,’ ‘Russian lackey,’ ‘insurrectionist,’ and ultimately ‘Hitler.’”

  291. 291.

    Ken

    @Citizen Alan: I had the exact opposite of a rice cake at a Korean dinner. It was a drink, cloyingly sweet and syrupy, that had soaked and swollen grains of barley in it. Drinking it was a little like swallowing pills.

    I don’t know the recipe, but given that it was brought in a 5-gallon bucket that had held corn syrup, I have my suspicions.

  293. 293.

    smith

    @rikyrah: They also know that R’s depend on the votes of a portion of that bottom quintile to elect more R’s for another round of tax cuts. If you can convince those people enjoying higher pay and more job satisfaction that we’re in a dire recession, it may prompt them to turn old incompetent Joe out.

  295. 295.

    NotMax

    @Ken

    Gaijin* Special for table six!
    :)

    *Don’t know the equivalent word in Korean and too dang indolent to go seeking it.

  297. 297.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Baud:

    Not because we’ll definitely win, but because we deserve any loss that isn’t the result of antidemocratic actions.

    Who is “we”? After a quarter century I have yet to figure out how to sway the minds of progressives who get the third-party-voter bug.

  298. 298.

    Bill Arnold

    @Chris T.:

    And here I was thinking his view was “replacement parts”…

    When humans (high odds China is first) start doing human “cloning” to make young genetic twins of adults, that’ll become a major mainstream concern.
    Musk is def in the “children are property of their parents until the age of 18” camp, though.

  299. 299.

    Delk

    “Our household is a Christ-centered household,” DeSantis told CBN News. “My son, he was four for Christmas this year, he wanted a sling to be like David slaying Goliath and so that really warms our hearts when we see that.”

  302. 302.

    Ken

    @NotMax: This was a dinner held by a Korean congregation that was using our church for a service. I operated the sound which was why I was at the dinner. Most people were drinking the stuff with every sign of enjoyment — in fact I had to come up with something nice to say when they asked what I thought.

    The home-made bulgogi and kimchee, on the other hand — delicious.

  304. 304.

    Tony Jay

    @scav:

    Oh, it’s been a few days. Plus, y’know, hate and disgust are strong emotions and set a fire within.

  305. 305.

    Anyway

    @Kay:

    I think they don’t write about the success of Biden’s economic approach because the strongest growth has been in the bottom quintile –

    This. CNBC/WSJ  care about asset inflation/appreciation and stock market gains – not so much about the plight of the workers. There have been stories about many sectors of the economy targeting high-end consumers at the expense of the “middle”. They (plutocrats, MOTU types) are ok with hollowing out the middle class in the country.

  308. 308.

    Another Scott

    @Delk: Yet more evidence that it’s all just mouth noises to them.

    (David was around 1000 years before Jesus.)

    “Two Corinthians, right? Two Corinthians 3:17, that’s the whole ballgame….”

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  309. 309.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Anyway:

    I remember when the big phrase going around politically was ‘cutting entitlements’.  The pundits, and I think sincerely, almost universally agreed that the middle and lower class had it too easy and needed to learn to make do with less.

  310. 310.

    Josie

    @Geminid: ​
     I have long respected the knowledge and opinions in your comments, so I feel so much better seeing this. I will quote you the next time my sons fuss at me about my love of butter and cream. I can give up almost anything else but not those two.

  311. 311.

    NotMax

    @lelk

    “So we agreed to be budgetarily practical and utilitarian about it and bought him a selection of thong underpants.”
    //

  312. 312.

    Ruckus

    @rikyrah:

    Their goal is to reduce everyone that doesn’t not think like them to nothing. The only way they can justify their bullshit to themselves is to remove every other option. They believe that their way is the only way, but to justify that asinine point of view they have to eliminate every other point of view. I’m old enough to have seen that this concept was their view when they had more power, especially at the low end of the power structure. IOW when I was a lot younger and there were a lot fewer humans in this country they could control a lot more. A far higher percentage of people went to church every week, there wasn’t as much communication between people, TV didn’t exist, a lot of the jobs we do today didn’t exist, even healthcare was relatively non existent. Technology is one of the things that has changed so much that it has changed life and the people that think they want to live as they see life have to have everyone else in their world as well or it all falls apart. Look at how they communicate/justify their asinine views to themselves. They want everything back to the simple times when one group, one gender was in charge, when everything seemed simple – like they are, when being simple justified their lives, their lack of thinking. When their world was one color, white. A rainbow flag? People can be DIFFERENT? Sunday isn’t church day if you don’t want it to be. To their simple minds, none of this makes sense and their world is going away. Calculators were a BIG deal, now you carry in your pocket a device that can talk to anyone/anywhere in the world, without even a cord. Change is here and they can’t understand it. Skin color is not disqualifying. Their world, one of control, of simplicity is gone. The world is a far better place for this. But it is not the world they do or want to live in because to them it makes them smaller. To me it gives me more possibilities of friends, more discussions of life, more to life, more possibilities.

  313. 313.

    NotMax

    No idea how strike-through sneaked in there. Fix.

    @Delk

    “So we agreed to be budgetarily practical and utilitarian about it and bought him a selection of thong underpants.”
    //

  315. 315.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @Kay:

    I think they don’t write about the success of Biden’s economic approach because the strongest growth has been in the bottom quintile – also the gap between AA and white employment has disappeared. It’s an especially good economy for African Americans.

    Hardly even worthy of mention on MSNBC, which is basically 24/7 Trump. It’s fucking unwatchable.

    Recently, I asked two family couples, all lifelong Democrats, what they thought of the job Biden was doing, prefaced with how he was at the bottom of my list of 2020 candidates but may turn out to be the best president of my lifetime for all he’s accomplished, and I got at the most a lukewarm “he’s okay.” My sister and BIL watch MSNBC for hours every damn day and they are horribly poorly informed about any good done by Democrats. My sister fucking cried over Chuck Todd’s firing. “We like hearing both sides”, they crooned.

  316. 316.

    Bill Arnold

    @Viva BrisVegas:

    The breakfast thing sounds a lot like it might be part of the campaign by the Chinese government to ridicule and demean Western influences to their youth.

    Rule of thumb is that anything that induces strong emotions in the target audience should be suspected as being intentionally manipulative.
    Could be just Chinese influencers in this case, working within strict censorship rules that allow criticism of the West.

  321. 321.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Lapassionara: Sadly too many of the 450+ anti-trans bills they introduced just this year in more than half the states have passed in. So yes, trans genocide laws are winning — at least until they hit the courts, where we’re starting to see them overturned.

    An estimated 120,000-260,000 trans people plus their families have already fled red states with these laws, seeking safer places to live, and another 1 million are actively considering doing so.

    So on that front they’re winning. But they’re losing the overall battle, since public opinion strongly opposes these sorts of laws, despite their enablers (looking at you FTFNYT) trying to stoke a moral panic about trans people.

    We ultimately will win in the long-run (although I don’t expect to see that within my lifetime), but the question how at what cost, and how many trans people will have their lives upended, will die unnecessarily along the way.

  322. 322.

    Bill Arnold

    @Jackie:

    “Tucker Carlson’s former producer at Fox News is out at the conservative network after a caption aired calling President Joe Biden a “wannabe dictator.”

    Wow. Wish the purge had gone all the way up the management chain, but even this will be clarifying for remaining FNN employees.

  323. 323.

    mrmoshpotato

    @satby:

    Kewpie mayo from Japan or bust! 

    Haha!  Never tried it, but I know Sam The Cooking Guy swears by it.

  324. 324.

    Roger Moore

    @p.a.: ​
     

    I saw a US flag today with several alt color stripes; green, orange, something else (was driving so just a quick look.). Not the standard red or blue alt stripe. It wasn’t the full rainbow-striped US flag, just a few white stripes replaced. Still a pro-inclusion flag?

    I think that’s a flag celebrating all first responders. The thin blue line flag was so popular (blech) that people came up with copies with other colors to represent other first responders: red for firefighters, white for medical personnel, gold for dispatchers (who knew how much bravery it takes to be a glorified call center employee?), etc. So now they’ve come up with one that has all the colors to represent all the kinds of first responders.

  325. 325.

    Kay

    @Sure Lurkalot:

    My sister and BIL watch MSNBC for hours every damn day and they are horribly poorly informed

    THat’s been my experience w/IRL Democrats too- the biggest handwringers and bedwetters watch cable. It’s supposedly “social media” that is making people insane but for older people it’s cable news.

  326. 326.

    Baud

    @Matt McIrvin:

    We is our potential coalition.  Like it or not, in an age of fascism, we are a team, and like any team, we are only as strong as our worst players.

  327. 327.

    JWR

    More Florida/DeSantis edumucation news. (From Politico):

    The College Board has rejected changing a high school Advanced Placement psychology course’s lessons on gender and sexual orientation, in a direct challenge to Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration that could reignite conflict between the education giant and the presidential hopeful.

    Florida school districts had raised questions about an AP Psychology “learning objective” that covers gender and sexual orientation, the College Board acknowledged Thursday, after the DeSantis administration expanded restrictions and regulations on classroom instruction in April.

    But the college admissions nonprofit suggested it would hold its ground after a separate scrap with DeSantis entangled its planned African American Studies course in political controversy this spring. It is unclear whether Florida will now block the AP psychology course from classrooms, the College Board told educators.

  328. 328.

    Kay

    @Sure Lurkalot:

    I lost my temper at a Sherrod event last week. One of our local Democrats – who is an absolute sad sack and also watches MSNBC 24/7-  approaches me the SECOND I arrive to tell me she’s disappointed at turnout. Okay first off it’s bad manners to ignore the people who COME in favor of moaning about the people who didn’t bother to come – that’s not what you do as a host- but I called probably 25% of the people who were there to “remind” them to go. If she’s worried about turnout she could call some people too.

  330. 330.

    Redshift

    @Miss Bianca:

    However, I drew the line at peanut butter and mayo, because ewwww.

    I just remembered, I was introduced to that by a friend who made peanut butter and banana and mayo sandwiches. Is that better? 😜

    His family was from North Carolina. Maybe it’s a Carolina thing, I don’t know.

  333. 333.

    Citizen Alan

    @Matt McIrvin: Eh, it’s mostly (a) cranks who would ever vote Dem and who would stay home if there were no third party candidates and (b) young voters who are more idealistic than sensible and want to “make a statement.” I think the latter group wises up after the first time it leads to disaster, but there’s no way to teach them except experience. I know because that was me. At 31, I voted for Nader as a protest vote. At 53, I consider it one of the biggest regrets of my life.

  338. 338.

    Roger Moore

    @Jeffro:

    I think this gets back to Josh Marshall’s comments on the Republicans’ nonsense debt.  The basic idea is that they’ve accepted so much nonsense, they can no longer reject it when someone comes in and uses the same nonsense.  In this case, it’s Trump’s election denialism.  Once you accept that the losing candidate can always challenge any election on specious grounds, you can’t stop, even when it’s party internal politics.  It makes it effectively impossible to hold elections anymore, because the loser never has to accept the results.  It’s utter nonsense, of course, and in this case it hits harder for party internal matters because a large fraction of the people have already accepted in principle that elections can’t be trusted.  There aren’t Democrats and independents around to stabilize things by generally accepting elections absent compelling evidence of fraud.

  339. 339.

    Redshift

    @Sister Golden Bear:

    We ultimately will win in the long-run (although I don’t expect to see that within my lifetime)

    Absolutely not disputing that the laws and their effects are horrible, but I’m not so sure about the time scale. It was a surprisingly short time from when Republicans were putting state constitution amendments banning same-sex marriage on the ballot solely because it was a winning issue for them to marriage equality being the law of the land and a winning issue for us. I know the parallels aren’t exact and nothing is inevitable, but it gives me hope.

  340. 340.

    Tony Jay

    STAFFER – “Okay, Governor. The Press gaggle is waiting out front. You’re clear on today’s pressure-points?”

    RoDS – “Absodiddly.” (Big Wink)

    STAFFER – “That’s… what? Why are you doing that?”

    RoDS – “Heartland Christian Outreach. Speak their language. Possitivelydoodley.”

    STAFFER – “No. No! This isn’t… Who told you to..?”

    RoDS – “Is not Godly? Need moustache?”

    STAFFER – “No, you… Back up… No moustache. Just you, reaching out to Christian voters. Faith. Family. Give them an anecdote. A nice story. Something family based to let them know you share their values.”

    RoDS – “Biblespeak!”

    STAFFER – “Yes! Biblespeak. Uh… good. They’re ready for you now.”

    RoDS – “Faith. Family. Story. Bible.”

    STAFFER – “That’s right. Let’s go. You’ve got this nailed, Governor.”

    RoDS – “Godly Greetings, Press Faces. Inquiries?”

    PRESS – “Governor De Santis. Hal Burnham, Indiana Catholic Journal. Are you looking forward to celebrating Christmas.”

    RoDS – “The Festival of Jesus and Presents fills my family with light moods. Small beta male has completed four Sol orbits and loves recitation of Christ tales.”

    PRESS – “What’s he asked for?”

    RoDS – “Beta male has requested issue of nails and hammer to imitate Christ sacrifice. My Wife and myself greatly pleased by inspiration of Bible. Family dog less so.”

    (Performs simulated barking laugh noise and turns slightly to deliver Big Wink to horrified Staffer, turns back to Press)

    “Okaydiddleydokilly. Subsequent inquiry?”

  341. 341.

    Jackie

    As Trump is arrested, Republicans honor the insurrectionists

    Donald Trump could not have asked for a nicer arraignment-day celebration.

    During the very same hour in which the former president surrendered to federal authorities in Miami, his Republican allies in the House were, in their most visible and official way yet, embracing as heroes and martyrs the people who sacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, in hopes of overturning Trump’s election defeat.

    In the Capitol complex, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), with sidekick Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and four other far-right lawmakers, held a “hearing” that honored participants in the riot, family members of Jan. 6 rioters and organizers of the attempted overthrow of the 2020 vote.

    Technically, Gaetz couldn’t call such a hearing, because he isn’t a committee chairman. But House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, who is trying to win back the support of extremists such as Gaetz, let it happen anyway.

    Gaetz did his all to make the proceedings look official. There were congressional seals on his nameplate and on the big screen behind him. A meeting room in the Capitol visitor center was arranged to appear like a committee room, with lawmakers facing the witnesses. Gaetz advertised the “field hearing” as part of how “the 118th Congress is investigating the weaponization of the federal government.”
    He impersonated a chairman — “you are recognized,” “thank you for your testimony,” “I’ll recognize myself [for] questions,” “her time has expired” — and the others played along (“Thank you for the opportunity to testify,” “I yield back”). Gaetz said testimony could be used “for the official record [of the] House” or for “work in the Judiciary Committee, upon which I serve, or the Oversight Committee.” C-SPAN carried the proceedings live.
    Much, much more at the link: undefined
    I am LIVID!!!

  347. 347.

    Mr. Bemused Senior

    Wordle 727 3/6*

    🟩🟩⬛🟨⬛
    🟩🟩🟩⬛🟩
    🟩🟩🟩🟩

    Drat, 3. So close.

  348. 348.

    Miss Bianca

    @Tony Jay: Christ on a cracker, you are going to kill me one of these days, TJ. But I’ll die laughing, so it will be worth it.

  352. 352.

    Jay

    @Bill Arnold:

    a lot of Foreign Students in North America, are “homestays”.

    The idea is, they live with a North American family, get skilled in the language and culture, while going to school.

    They are “cash cows”. Back in the 80’s, my Ex and I got $800 a month, per student. It paid half our mortgage.

    All we had to do was provide breakfast and dinner, and quite often, didn’t even half to provide dinner because often, they would hang out until curfew with their classmates, ( or later).

    It’s one of those YMMV sichs.

    We had a great time with some of our homestays, meh with others.

    I always provided a cooked breakfast, a bagged lunch and a good dinner. I like good food. I also liked to provide “comfort food” a couple of times a week. Ours were Japanese, so sushi even though I don’t like it, or smoked eel soup.

    But, they are a cash cow.

    My Fundi Brother, (millionaire) on the other hand, loads his house up with homestays in every available room, Sometimes as many as three, ( even though he has five kids). The family eats cheap crap, so the homestays are fed cheap crap. One recently was a vegan, and they lied and just said “it’s vegan”. When he has 3 in the house, that’s $3500 a month, and you know damn well, he’s not declaring it on his taxes. They also have chores, so “free labour”.

  353. 353.

    Geminid

    @Matt McIrvin: Those folks are very exasperating because they should be voting Democratic. And they are so voluble its easy to overestimate their numbers. They used to worry me, but now I compare them to a tall, foamy latte. If you let it sit for 10 minutes, you have to look over the edge to see an inch of milky coffee.

  354. 354.

    Scout211

    @Jackie: Thanks, but the paywall cut me off. :(

     

    @JWR: Okay, thanks.  No paywall.  :)

    You’d think that he would have withdrawn that lawsuit with the adoring Trumpfest they hosted a few weeks ago on CNN.  Maybe Trump just can’t quit lawsuits.

    But apparently his attorneys can.  LOL

  356. 356.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: But…but….but….I’ve been told that Musk is a “free speech warrior”. Are you saying that’s not actually true? *falls on fainting couch* /s/s/s/s/s/s

  360. 360.

    Roger Moore

    @Redshift:

    I remember when I was in elementary school, we had an assembly where a “futurist” predicted what was going to happen during the Reagan Administration.  The prediction I remember most clearly was that Puerto Rico would become the 51st state, and the new flag would have three concentric circles of stars.  I don’t think any of his other predictions were any better.

  362. 362.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: I’m sure if it had been anti-abortion views being censored he would have gotten right on it!

  364. 364.

    Fair Economist

    @Redshift:

    I want to like oatmeal because I know it’s good for you. So tell me how to make it good other than by loading it up with sugar, because so far without either straight sugar or enough fruit to add up to a lot, it’s like eating unflavored tofu.

    I have oatmeal as a savory dish. I make it in chicken broth, add an egg and whatever spices tickle my fancy that day. I got the idea from a curried oatmeal recipe; I’m not a big fan of curry so I took it out and changed the spices.

    Oatmeal needs flavor, but it doesn’t need to be sweetened.

  366. 366.

    different-church-lady

    @Tony Jay:

    Small beta male has completed four Sol orbits and loves recitation of Christ tales.

    “Noommmmmmmmmmmmmmmm… MINATED!”

  367. 367.

    Soprano2

    @OzarkHillbilly: I’m lucky because I live in a bigger city, so I have several WalMarts to choose from, plus other stores. The one we go to every Saturday quit carrying a couple of soups I like for lunch at work, so I have to get them at other places, but that’s pretty easy for me.

  372. 372.

    kalakal

    @Tony Jay: The day the press cracks will be the 12th of Never. They’ll throw a few people under the bus, announce that lessons have been learned, and merrily carry on enabling the Tories.

    You said in another post that DeStupid is a terrible liar, true, but most people don’t see it. They just see ( very ) edited bits of him speechificating or see it/read it once its passed through the media filter. It’s bollocks either way but once it’s been filtered it’s well presented bollocks

  373. 373.

    Jeffro

    @Roger Moore:I think this gets back to Josh Marshall’s comments on the Republicans’ nonsense debt.  The basic idea is that they’ve accepted so much nonsense, they can no longer reject it when someone comes in and uses the same nonsense.

    it’s a good point.

    Greg Sargent (WaPo) is noting the same kind of thing about the blessed “weaponization of law enforcement, broadly speaking, against the entire MAGA base”.  Even the (somewhat) non-MAGA GOP candidates are now nodding their heads and bemoaning the ‘deep state’ as if it’s really a thing, and really a thing that’s out to screw MAGA voters on an individual level.

    No, MAGA, we don’t want anything to do with you.  We just want your maggoty orange leader behind bars.

  374. 374.

    different-church-lady

    I have just discovered that my favorite song is whichever one comes on immediately after Blind Melon’s “No Rain.”

  376. 376.

    Ruckus

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    Monied people often have the concept that the fact that they have money makes them better. I imagine that having the most money might make one think they are the best in every way at every thing.

  377. 377.

    pieceofpeace

    @Shalimar: I agree.  Just found it in northern CA grocery store.  It didn’t move well, so not sure what’s going to happen.  A cleaner, not as heavy taste.

  379. 379.

    different-church-lady

    @Ruckus: ​
      See, I wonder about this. Does money turn you into an asshole, or is there something about already being an asshole that money flocks to?

  380. 380.

    Ken

    @Jackie: I’m imagining the conversation in the Capitol Police headquarters next time there’s an incident.

    GUARD: (looking at security camera live feed) Boss, looks like we have an intruder with an automatic weapon!

    BOSS: Call a code red! Get all available officers to that location. Where is he?

    GUARD: Entering the Republican caucus room. And they’re all in there for a meeting!

    BOSS: …. Stand down. Say, do we have any more of those hazelnut coffee creamers?

  382. 382.

    Matt McIrvin

    @billcinsd: It isn’t because they’re not being flown, they’re being hung vertically. The only flag being flown is a US flag that is out of frame.

  384. 384.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @billcinsd: No, because as others have pointed out, there’s another American flag flying on top of the WH, so above all three. However, that flag was edited out in order to make a false point. Surprising, I know.

  385. 385.

    different-church-lady

    @Ken: BOSS: “BOBERT! HOW MANY TIMES DO WE HAVE TO TELL YOU TO CHECK THAT THING AT THE DOOR?”

  388. 388.

    Jay

    ❗Kherson Update, One of my guys in the hospital, another, Marek was 400m away at the time and survived the blast, this is by far the most angry I have been since the beginning of the invasion.ruzzians posted this boasting about killing those rescuing dogs/cats & people. pic.twitter.com/QrE3pajaX9— Front Line Kitchen 🇺🇦 (@frontlinekit) June 15, 2023

  390. 390.

    Redshift

    @Jeffro: It’s of a piece with the way wingnut politicians play off of any criticism or accusation — telling their supporters that they should be outraged because “when they accuse me of being a lying scumbag because of all my lies, they’re really attacking you because they hate people like you for no reason!”

    It makes no sense, but they have the advantage that for outrage addicts, outrage blocks any thought about whether it makes sense.

  391. 391.

    Fair Economist

    @NotMax: Oh, absolutely. Mushroom soup would be great as a base too (and , to be precise, I actually use Better than Broth for my chicken broth, because it’s so much easier to use, and there’s less packaging waste). Oatmeal is a lot like rice – it has a very mild flavor itself, and can “get along” with almost any flavor or flavor combination. There’s a recipe for an oatmeal “risotto” in one of my cookbooks, even.

    I should mention that even if you want a “sweetened” oatmeal, you can just add a lot of berries (blue-, straw- rasp-, whatever) which are fairly low-sugar for fruit and very tasty. No need for extra sugar.

  392. 392.

    Jay

    @different-church-lady:

    we have lot’s of examples, often in the Entertainment and Infotainment industries, where reaching the “I’ve got mine” level of wealth, immediately turns someone into an asshole.

  393. 393.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Redshift:

    Well, sure, but if the Deep State™ can come after TIFG for stealing, retaining, and lying about retaining US property that happens to be confidential, then it can come after YOU for stealing, retaining, and lying about retaining US property that happens to be confidential! Be afraid. Be VERY afraid!!!

  396. 396.

    Tony Jay

    @NotMax:

    RoDS – “Are they saying..?

    TACKY O – “Let it go, Ron.”

    RoDS – “But Power Stance: Dubya enhances manly commander aura…”

     TACKY O – “For God’s sake…”

    RoDS – “…and contours rear disembarkation chute for regulated containment…”

    TACKY O – “It’s like talking to an abortion!”

    RoDS – “…their claims are factually incorrect and disruptive to optic lactation ducts…”

    STAFFER – “No, it’s not… they were saying… Hey… uh… Hey More RoDS. Hey More RoDS!”

    RoDS – “Confirm?”

    TACKY O – “Yeah, sure. Whatever.”

    RoDS – “Success! Encore for RoDS! Victory Awaits!“

    (returns to stage, Tacky O sighs, Staffer shrugs)

    STAFFER – “It’ll be over soon.”

    TACKY O – “Fox better be worth this.”

  397. 397.

    different-church-lady

    @Jay: ​
      But does it turn people into assholes, or were they always assholes but kept it hidden until they had enough money to let their asshole flag fly?

  398. 398.

    Roger Moore

    @Ruckus:

    Monied people often have the concept that the fact that they have money makes them better.

    For a lot of them, I think it’s the reverse; they believe they have money because they’re better, not that having money makes them better.  They worked hard to get where they are, so anyone who isn’t as successful as they are must be less successful because they didn’t work as hard or made dumb mistakes along the way.  It’s the classic case of the person who was born on third base and thinks they hit a triple.

  399. 399.

    Jay

    @Fair Economist:

    I used to do my rolled oats, boiled in a pot, (lot’s of extra water), poured into a sieve, drained and rinsed with boiling water, usually with frozen fruit of some kind.

    Camping, used to use dried apricots.

    I don’t do cinnamon/apple ever, because all through Scouting, the Quaker Instant,………blech, ( a stolen blech),

    These days we microwave our rolled oats. 1 part oatmeal, 1 1/3rd water, shake of salt, frozen fruit de jour, 1/2 a teaspoon of sugar, 90 seconds in an 800 watt microwave.

  401. 401.

    Tony Jay

    @kalakal:

    This is true. The very first thing I do after seizing power is catapult every single ‘senior political editor’ in the country into a volcano.

    From then on it gets quite strict.

  402. 402.

    Roger Moore

    @different-church-lady:

    But does it turn people into assholes, or were they always assholes but kept it hidden until they had enough money to let their asshole flag fly?

    There’s probably some of each.  Being surrounded by lackeys is bad for a person’s soul, but the damage is much easier if the soul is damaged to start with.

  403. 403.

    James E Powell

    @Matt McIrvin:

    After a quarter century I have yet to figure out how to sway the minds of progressives who get the third-party-voter bug.

    It’s a waste of time & effort. If they didn’t get it after 2000, they are never going to get it.

  404. 404.

    JoyceH

    Wow this thread has gotten long! I just skimmed, but on the subject of Wordle, does anyone else think the word selector person is somewhat older than middle-aged? I mean, when I was a kid, I had a BALSA wood airplane, and down in the basement laundry room was a box of “Twenty Mule Team BOROX”, but that was in the 1950s! Has anyone under 40 even heard of those things?

  406. 406.

    Jay

    @different-church-lady:

    not sure, take Ryan Renolds for example, or Dolly Parton,

    and then you have so many other examples.

    My Fundi Brother was a reasonably nice guy for years, and then he got his Microsoft windfall and with in less than 6 months, became an asshole. The key thing that seems to be my brother’s driver of being an asshole, is the fear that the various and opaque “they” are going to “take” what he’s “got”.

  410. 410.

    Mr. Bemused Senior

    @Jay:  Ha’ ye nae heard o’ haggis?

    [very bad Scots imitation, I know, but I couldn’t resist]

  411. 411.

    Ruckus

    @Another Scott:

    I’ve tried to answer you here but I can’t.

    We had slavery in this country less than 3 average lifetimes ago.

    My great grandfather was alive when we had slavery.

    We’ve come a long way since but we still have a couple of state governments shipping human beings as little more than cattle. 

    I am incredibly pissed off that there are governing entities that really haven’t moved/evolved/learned a damned thing, have no idea or concept that this shit is wrong on every level, that their absolutely shitty concepts of humanity trump everything else. And yes I used that word very specifically.

  414. 414.

    Ruckus

    @different-church-lady:

    The answer is yes. Some were always and some become assholes.

    Money can buy things and one of those things is shitty human behavior. Some will sell their humanity for 10 cents on the dollar, because some will sell anything that is of no use to them for cheap.

  415. 415.

    NotMax

    @Joyce H

    20 Mule Team Borax still to be found in the laundry aisle. Even, so I’ve been informed here in the past, at Walmart.

  416. 416.

    Scout211

    @Layer8Problem: Folks, if we apply ourselves there’s a tbogg unit within our grasp.

    Good point!

    I will apply myself to this important endeavor.

    Oatmeal:  NO! Ugh.

    Quaker Oatmeal Squares: YES! Yum!

    The end.

  417. 417.

    Jay

    @Mr. Bemused Senior:

    Ate more than my fair share of Haggis, (which is something one can say even if they only had, and didn’t finish one serving).

    My Dad’s side was Scottish to the point of having albums of Pipe Bands.

    I still have my family tartan kilts* and a sporran.

    *casual and formal dress

    My Grandad made “oatmeal”, which was cooked down into a porridge over several hours.

    Congee is way better than that wall paste.

  418. 418.

    Layer8Problem

    @Scout211: “Quaker Oatmeal Squares: YES! Yum!”
    I can’t leave that as the end, because, yes, I do have to agree with you on the yum part.

  419. 419.

    Chris Johnson

    @Kay: Taibbi is absolutely not left. He’s kind of alt-right, kind of tankie, very much in the ‘horseshoe theory and also lived in Russia and gave them lots of lovely kompromat’. Just because Elon scorns him doesn’t make him left :)

  420. 420.

    Tony Jay

    @Miss Bianca:

    For your entertainment, I dropped a small UK centric rant in the Open Thread above this one and ran away.

    RoDS will return! Until he drops out of the race due to Tacky O hiding his rehydration syrup.

  422. 422.

    Jay

    @Jay:

    ETA, I have also had fish and brewis, more than a few times.

    It’s a Newfoundland breakfast dish of oatmeal mixed with cod cheeks, topped with either a chunk of lard, or leftover bacon grease.

    Takes away the kitchen party hangover the next day.

  424. 424.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Redshift: I absolutely hope you’re right. My pessimism is that the Clerical Six on the SCOTUS will uphold these laws.

    But if so, if we must fight without hope, at least we’ll go down fighting for the future, and make the battle easier for those who come after us. Same as Black folks battled for centuries for their rights.

  425. 425.

    NotMax

    @Jay

    Big fan of fresh haggis here, although too skittish to attempt the canned versions available in the U.S. through Amazon.

  426. 426.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @billcinsd: Except that they conveniently cropped out the U.S. flag flying on the roof of the White House, which was actually the highest flag.

    But hey, they’re not gonna let facts get in the way of a good moral panic, amirite.

  428. 428.

    kalakal

    @Jay: I am Scottish and will admit to liking haggis. On the other hand I have had far more than my fair share of oatmeal and as a consequence  have a very bitter and twisted view of existence.

    If you think porridge is bad, do not, as you value your soul, try mealie puddings

  429. 429.

    satby

    @Jay: I didn’t get paid for my high school homestay students. Don’t assume they’re all “cash cows”. The best programs don’t pay and actively try to weed out people doing it for profit, in my experience. I’m actually really offended by that.

  430. 430.

    Jay

    @NotMax:

    haggis is offal, (don’t hate the pun, hate the punner)

    There is so much more that can be done with offal than stuffing it with oats in a sheep’s stomach and boiling it.

    Had some in Scotland, it was okay, but here, blech.

    When I used to commute to Milwaukee, I found a bunch of ethnic restaurants, that if you were nice, got to know the owners and staff, and then asked, you could get the “family food”, the same stuff the kitchen staff ate, not the watered down stuff they served out front.

    Here, you could get “Chinese” food as take out or sit down, but a short bus ride downtown, you could get real Chinese food.

    There is no “Scottishtown” here.

  432. 432.

    NotMax

    @Jay

    Also a major fan of stuffed derma from kosher delis. No gravy, please, prefer it better plain.

    Among the first delectables I seek out on NY trips.

  434. 434.

    mrmoshpotato

    @kalakal: I have had far more than my fair share of oatmeal and as a consequence have a very bitter and twisted view of existence.

    Wow.  Traumatized by oatmeal.  My sympathies. 😁

  435. 435.

    Jay

    @satby:

    Here, they are Foreign Students at either a “for profit” highschool or first year Uni, as a Foreign Student paying tuition 3x what a Canadian pays.

    There are a few Charities here that bring in Foreign Students, but, they arn’t altruistic for the most part. Most are about Christian conversion.

    The money is supposed to pay for food, transportation and housing.

    The last student my Ex and I had was Mika. Lovely girl, here to finish her highschool and master English. Always helpful, happy we didn’t care about curfew, as long as she was safe, was amazed we gave her a key day 1, took her fishing half a dozen times, she always greeted and played with Sugar, just fit in. Her Dad was the VP of Toshiba.

    Thing is, most of them, they pay, (through the nose) to come here.

    You can treat them like a cash cow, or you can welcome them into the family, and sadly some of them turn out to be over privileged a-holes. Have stories.

    It’s not charity.

  437. 437.

    kalakal

    @satby:

    Good haggis is, as you say, surprisingly good. Glasgow is a much maligned city ( and I say that as very non-Glaswegian) Bad haggis is horrible

  439. 439.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Sister Golden Bear: And the Pride flags were not being displayed on staffs, but hung vertically, which the relevant section of the Code is not about at all

    This is all arrant pedantry, but this flag stuff is all about that.

  442. 442.

    dnfree

    @Redshift: As I said above, add ripe bananas, walnuts, and cinnamon. Or you could do blueberries, pecans, and cinnamon.  The nuts add protein.

  444. 444.

    Robert Sneddon

    @satby: ​
      That might have been haggis pakora. Was the pub over by the west side of Sauchiehall Street? There was a pub there that did fusion food including a lot of non-Indian pakoras like haggis as well as Guiness stews.

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