The more I hear the recording of Trump boasting about the Iran documents, the more I am struck by the two women laughing. I know I can count on you guys to correct me if I’m wrong, but I think that one of them is a staffer and the other was the ghost writer for the Mark Meadows book.
There I hear their laughter, the more repulsed I am by it.
So here’s my question. Nervous laughter? True Believers yucking it up with their hero? Or sycophants sucking up to the guy with power? Maybe I’m overthinking this – but maybe the two women could be laughing for different reasons, or maybe even laughing for different reasons at various points in the tape.
Either way, the laughter is gross.
Open thread!
Old Dan and Little Ann
My wife overheard me listening to the recording a few days ago. She figured they were just sucking up to the orange menace.
laura
Porque no los trejos?
WaterGirl
@Old Dan and Little Ann: That’s what I thought on first listen. Now after listening 3 times, I hear it very differently.
WereBear
I’ve always found the laughter around him to have a creepy tone.
patrick II
I was struck by the two women also, and it made transgressions seem more real to me because of the context provided by those attendees. They were so obsequious and dying to please it was disgusting. Also, this is the environment Trump created for himself, where he cold say anything and he would have the nervous “admiration” of female followers. “Hillary would have printed them all out,” said one, goading the president on. what a toxic environment.
sdhays
Well, the lady working for him is also the one joking about Hillary “printing it out”, right? So I don’t think she’s nervous. She’s too stupid to be nervous.
Scout211
Reposted from downstairs:
Bold added:
ABC has identified the
gigglersaides in the room at Bedminster where TIFG showed off the classified plans to attack Iran. And as all news stories have stated, none of these people had security clearances.. . .
OzarkHillbilly
Have not listened to it, not about to. The last thing I want to hear is that assholes voice, especially drenched in the special sauce of sycophantic laughter.
UncleEbeneezer
This is on all the stupid MFers who refused to vote for Hillary (or voted for her, but spent all of 2016 smearing her while defending third party voting). And now here we are…
narya
All of them,
KatieWaterGirl!Clearly sucking up, but also aware that the whole thing is transgressive in multiple ways, confirmed by the “Hillary” comment.
I don’t think of any of them as True Believers in any virtuous sense–more like fellow travelers wanting some of the grift and “glory.”
schrodingers_cat
The Supreme Court has termed affirmative action in college admissions unconstitutional.
narya
@OzarkHillbilly: How are you and your family doing? I know grief is a process, not an event . . .
WaterGirl
@patrick II: Yeah, I wondered if the “Hillary” person was the staffer or the ghost writer. Either way, ugh, but one would feel more “ugh” to me than the other
edit: aah, I see that sdhays said that was the staffer.
UncleEbeneezer
@schrodingers_cat: This (along with Dobbs) seemed pretty much inevitable once Trump was elected. It’s one of the reasons I will NEVER forgive the people who didn’t treat the 2016 election seriously and refused to see that Hillary really was our only hope.
rikyrah
@schrodingers_cat:
6-3?
RaflW
OT: In a no surprise whatsoever day, the Supremes voted 6-3 to nuke college affirmative action admissions.
As Angie Maxwell said about Glenn Youngkin being sued over disenfranchising 300,000 black VA voters, “Reconstruction is the key to understanding contemporary American politics.”
Yeah, Roberts blinked on some voting rights cases, but he understands that his racist goals are best met by stomping on the upward mobility of Black Americans. And in fact by being seen as “more moderate” and allowing a couple more minority seats in Congress, he can sail right into the harbor of Whites Only universities.
BigJimSlade
@OzarkHillbilly: exactly. Ugh.
BigJimSlade
What does she mean by “printed them out”? Weren’t they looking at paper documents?
Baud
@rikyrah:
Yes.
zhena gogolia
@UncleEbeneezer: sick to my stomach
WaterGirl
@Scout211: So which women did we actually hear in the recording?
zhena gogolia
But we’ll find a way
schrodingers_cat
@rikyrah: Yes.
Scout211
@WaterGirl: see my #7. ABC says that person is Susie Wiles.
I originally thought from the tape it was one of the interviewers from the book. But the familiarity of the discussion, an aide makes more sense.
Added: @WaterGirl #21: ABC only identified specifically Susie Wiles as the one he was talking to and showing the documents.
The other aides were identified by name, but as “also in the room” but not specifically what they were saying. Susie Wiles was the main one Trump was speaking with.
sdhays
@WaterGirl: Don’t take my word for it! I just assumed it was.
ETA: I only listened to it once, and that was enough for me.
Citizen Alan
@patrick II: I have been increasingly struck in the last few years by the extent to which conservatives genuinely think that merely mentioning Hillary Clinton’s name in nearly any context is inherently a slam against Democrats and per se hilarious. It’s practically a fetish with them.
Citizen Alan
@UncleEbeneezer: To be fair, none of those MFers will suffer as a result of this because very few of the cosplay Marxists would ever need Affirmative Action to get into the college of their choice. That’s what Legacy Admissions are for.
sdhays
@RaflW: It’s “hilarious” that’s it’s ok for college admissions to take into account individual experiences (like, say, their parents being wealthy alumni) but ignore collective experiences. It really is a decision along the lines of the old chestnut: “The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal their bread.”
UncleEbeneezer
@zhena gogolia: I’m enraged (in case you couldn’t tell)
Hoodie
@Old Dan and Little Ann: That’s plausible, but they came across as abject morons to me. The remarks about Hillary resemble the ignorant moron stuff you hear in Klepper interviews at Trump rallies. Also, who would want to read a memoir by an idiot like Mark Fucking Meadows? I’d only be interested in his testimony in exchange for a plea bargain.
JPL
@sdhays:
Via Mark Elliott:
While we’re talking affirmative action, 43% of white students admitted to Harvard in 2019 were legacies, athletes or related to staff/donors.
Chief Oshkosh
I’m hearing that DEI initiatives that are already well developed on many campuses may somewhat mitigate the intended outcome of the USSC shit ruling on Affirmative Action. My guess is that one-on-one interviews (whether in-person or via Zoom) will take on new importance to recruitment efforts. That said, it’s weak tea compared to what just happened.
M31
@JPL: and I’ve seen stats that of that 43% over 2/3 wouldn’t have been admitted otherwise
So it’s not like they’re picking qualified candidates from the donor/legacy bin, it’s worse than that
rikyrah
@JPL:
UH HUH
UH HUH
OzarkHillbilly
@narya: One day at a time. My brother’s wife R is much better now, which is a relief. His son has accepted it and his daughter is the bright flower everyone needs at these times. I have not talked to his Portland son but he will be coming down when the arrangements are made. R’s daughters are a big help to her.
They still haven’t released his body (which is being cremated). Memorial will not happen for at least another week or 2. There are a number of financial problems to be worked out and one major fire to be snuffed, if we can. R’s youngest daughter has taken the lead on things and she has a good head for it. Fortunately, I don’t think any of the ptoblems are insurmountable. My wife and I stay in the background as things develope and just offer to help if needed. We have the financial resources to make a difference so that at least lets me feel not useless (we paid half the cremation fee, I suspect more will be needed).
hueyplong
“Either way, the laughter is gross” applies to this and all examples of Trump “humor,” which is what they call it when called on it. Remember his imitation of the disabled reporter? And pretty much any time the crowd laughs at one of his discount Nuremberg rallies?
JPL
@M31: I wondered how many would be admittedl thank you
different-church-lady
@JPL: “It’s a big club and you’re not in it.”
hueyplong
@OzarkHillbilly: You and your wife are good people.
M31
@JPL: AND you know that the pool of applicants from the 43% pile all had excellent schooling and SAT coaches etc. etc. and STILL 70% wouldn’t have gotten in otherwise
and they probably got enough to eat when they were kids and didn’t have fucking lead paint coating their houses
Matt McIrvin
@Citizen Alan: Clarence Thomas seems to have had a deeply held belief that the mere existence of affirmative action somehow cheapened his academic degrees. So he ruined it for everyone else to make himself feel better.
Rusty
At 237 pages, to read through all the opinions for the affirmative action cases will take time. A quick scan of the dissents however found this excellent summation. “Ignoring race will not
equalize a society that is racially unequal. What was true in the 1860s, and again in 1954, is true today: Equality requires acknowledgment of inequality. ”
This is the entire fight against CRT in a nutshell, the refusal to even acknowledge inequality. Colleges will become less diverse, and since they are the gateway to positions of power, the leadership of our country politically, economically, socially, will be less diverse. What a sad step backwards.
JPL
@OzarkHillbilly: Your a good person, and please remember to take care of yourself.
Matt McIrvin
@Chief Oshkosh:
Until they get sued out of existence. One thing at a time I guess.
Ken
I am half imagining Harvard’s lawyers saying “OK, let’s show those idiots how real lawyers get exactly what their clients want without straying one iota outside the court’s ruling.”
narya
@OzarkHillbilly: Sending thoughts your way . . . When my sister died, my parents at first weren’t going to have any kind of service–atheists don’t have ready-made rituals for these things–but they eventually did have something a few weeks later. It was absolutely brutal, but also a step toward healing, a way to acknowledge that something important had happened in this community of people. I know you know all of that, and I’m glad you’re able to be there for the rest of the family, and also let them be there for you. If you were nearby, I’d invite you and your wife over to tell me all about him.
M31
@JPL: the “70% wouldn’t have been admitted otherwise” was from the same study that produced the 43% donor/legacy/athlete number, as I recall
I’ve read that colleges are now having AA for male applicants, since their scores/grades are so much worse on average than women, and schools don’t want to have a 70/30 F/M student ratio
I blame Hilary
JPL
Today’s rulings indicate that religious beliefs are more important than diversity.
PST
@Citizen Alan:
It’s just more evidence (as if more evidence were needed) that conservatives these days are talking only to themselves. This has become an unavoidable necessity if one is to succeed within the party and movement. Reaching for the center is fatal, so a kind of natural selection guarantees that only by reflecting and reinforcing the current MAGA orthodoxy can one hold on. Polling for decades has shown how widely admired Hillary Clinton is, and many of those admirers are low-information normies with no ideological axe to grind. Whipping up the troops with tired Hillary jokes serves an immediate purpose but works against persuading the undecided. Everything that lands with a thud to those who are not true believers produces pwning-the-libs laughter from those who are. It’s as stupid as it is disgusting.
Ken
@BigJimSlade: I thought they were on paper. It makes it so much worse if he was waving around scans of the documents on his phone….
schrodingers_cat
This is Reconstruction 2.0 and white voters and their adjacents (I am looking at people like Haley) are punishing us for making Obama at 2 term president.
Jinchi
On on hand: Trump was literally surrounded by true believers and sycophants.
On the other, even they were secretly recording every incriminating word the man said.
I guess thats what you get when you’re a self centered narcissist. Even your true believers will sell you out the moment it’s in their own self interest.
Sandia Blanca
Here’s what the Times article said about people present during the recording in question:
“As for the recording of Mr. Trump, it was made at Bedminster in July 2021 during a meeting attended by two of his aides — identified by people with knowledge of the matter as Margo Martin and Liz Harrington, who sat in on some of Mr. Trump’s book interviews that summer — as well as by a publisher and writer working on a memoir for Mark Meadows, Mr. Trump’s final White House chief of staff.”
Investigators in Trump Documents Case Also Focused on His Bedminster Club – The New York Times (nytimes.com)
Searcher
All laughter is gross, which is why I try to do it as little as possible.
Geminid
@Scout211: I think Trump campaign advisor Susie Wiles was shown a different document, in a different meeting than the one at Bedminster. From Trump’s remark that things weren’t going well there, maybe it was a map of Afghanistan that Wiles saw.
Wiles is a fairly well-regarded campaign professional. She worked for Ron DeSantis until they fell out, and I suspect she is the source for the pudding story.
Omnes Omnibus
@Ken: Yes, universities will be able to game this ruling . It is still a monumentally stupid ruling. It is of a piece with Roberts’s VRA rulings. He is suggesting that racism is no longer a thing in the United States. Utterly out of touch if it is his real view. Dangerously disingenuous is probably more accurate.
WereBear
@JPL: No. More important than ANYTHING else.
WereBear
No. More important than anything else.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Citizen Alan: Same kind of thing as when they show a picture of Kamala Harris and think saying “one heartbeat away” is supposed to scare us rather than reassure us that she’s standing by.
That’s probably going to figure prominently in the 2024 campaign.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Consider the social circles he participates in and the message they send him.
RaflW
@UncleEbeneezer: It’s also on Mitch McConnell, and particularly on our fascist-curious or even fascist-adjacent press who marveled at his audacity rather than condemning his anti-democratic bullshit in the Obama era.
Today’s ruling is terrible. But I’d rather we go after the central actors in this (white-) power play.
WaterGirl
@Scout211: I read #7 but I didn’t think it was clear that she was at that meeting. They said she was singled out in the indictment as having been shown a map, but it’s not clear to me that that incident is the one that was recorded.
I had read that the two women were one staffer (would that be Susan Wiles?) – a PAC person doesn’t sound like a staffer to me. I must be missing something
edit:
So someone must be sure that that’s the same meeting and same room?
OzarkHillbilly
@narya: I’ve been thru this before. First when my cousin/best friend died on my 21st birthday after 20 days in a burn ward, then when my oldest sister Peggy (my family black sheep twin) suddenly dropped dead on her front porch 29 years ago, then again when my oh so very close BiL died of colon cancer a few years later. It never gets any easier (Ma died in ’06, Pop in ’10) but habit makes it more bearable. Shit, I’m almost used to it now. /s/ heavy s//
Matt McIrvin
BlackAzizAnansi on Mastodon:
Well, it’d be nice to think they won’t, but…
Dangerman
Could be the laughter was because Trump’s pants dropped at the same time. It was Bravado Day and Commando Dsy.
WaterGirl
@sdhays: Someone needs to sue over “legacy” admissions.
Maybe a lot of someones.
Brachiator
@RaflW:
6-3?
Goddam. The conservative majority wanted to clearly step on affirmative action.
I am traveling and can’t easily check the news. Who wrote the majority opinion?
Omnes Omnibus
Weirdly, Roberts dropped a footnote saying that military academies were exempted because of “potentially distinct interests” that they present.
rikyrah
For those Asians chasing White Acceptance who attached themselves to this racist lawsuit…..
As a Black woman who has been Black in America longer than 3 days, and who graduated from not one, but, two of those Elite White Institutions….
You will never be White, dear.
Period.
And, some delusion that you have that these private institutions are about to start having demographics like the University of California system?
I’m not going to say all that I want to say, but I’ll just say this..
You are living in a delusional world if you think those White folks are going to have the demographics of these elite institutions change to look like the University of California system.
It ain’t even happening.
Matt McIrvin
@Brachiator: Roberts wrote the majority opinion. It’s the most predictable decision ever.
mvr
@OzarkHillbilly: My condolences on the recent loss. You get used to such things in a way but also the current losses bring back some of the pain of those further in the past. At least they do for me.
RaflW
@Chief Oshkosh: Alas, in many state-funded higher ed settings, DEI initiatives that are already well developed are under attack or actively being dismantled.
White supremacy culture (as in, white people get whatever the fnck they want and will step on any black and brown heads to get there — not as in KKK, hat-wearing ‘culture’) is not giving up without a monumental, multi-generational fight.
We’re in the middle of that. It may have seemed the end was closer in sight, but today’s ruling, and many recent and more to come are awful setbacks, but we carry on.
WaterGirl
@Searcher: Especially if your mouth is open wide enough to swallow a beach ball, like DeathSantis.
mvr
@Brachiator:
Roberts.
This likely explains his writing the more recent voting rights opinion that was not as bad as his other voting rights opinions.
But still the guy doesn’t believe in the literal meaning of the last line of each of the Civil War Amendments, “Congress shall have the power . . .”
Brachiator
At least one of the women seems to be going along with everything, enjoying it. She makes some joke about Hillary Clinton. It’s like, whatever Trump does involving secrets is cool, but Hillary is untrustworthy.
The exchange suggests that an infantile Trump is preening in front of adoring females. Fanning secrets is like a display of his masculinity.
Elizabelle
@OzarkHillbilly: We know you have the strength and experience to get through this. Am sure you are a lot of comfort to your brother’s family. I am sorry you are all going through this loss.
WaterGirl
@Brachiator: So all females in this meeting? Even though it’s about the Meadows book? What a sad excuse for a human – Trump.
Kay
Tracks the attacks on voting rights exactly. Same approach.
oatler
Wasn’t there a poem relating to that, about the laughter of women at Nazi functions?
schrodingers_cat
@rikyrah: Agreed. The delusion is strong with them though
Somewhat tangentially related I see ministers from Modi’s cabinet traffic in casual anti-Semitism these days with tweets about “evil” Soros who wants to destroy India. They are making common cause with white nationalists. WTF?
James E Powell
@Omnes Omnibus:
Roberts believes the way to end racism is to deny that it exists.
narya
@OzarkHillbilly: Okay, so you’re gonna be sitting on my back porch for a LONG time, telling me about all of them. :-) And I’d love to hear the stories.
OzarkHillbilly
@mvr: The same.
Betty Cracker
@Scout211: oof, Susie Wiles — now she’s a piece of work! She’s no dummy either, unfortunately, no matter how inane the giggling and comments. She helped sleaze DeSantis into office but is now persona non grata for mysterious reasons. ;-)
raven
@OzarkHillbilly: I haven’t been around as much lately so I’m not sure what’s up but I’m sorry to hear you’ve had a death in the family.
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus:
Heh.
schrodingers_cat
From Twitter
Dorothy A. Winsor
@BigJimSlade: Good question!
OzarkHillbilly
Myself, I never know, it’s always a gut punch. Then I pick myself up off the ground and start picking up the pieces.
Betty Cracker
@Geminid: I’ve heard the pudding story is the work of Wiles too, which is definitely on-brand if true. Trivia: her full name is Susan Summerall Wiles, and she’s the daughter of NFL player/broadcaster Pat.
West of the Rockies
@PST:
I wonder how many people under, say, 30 (40?) even really have a rock solid understanding of who Hillary is or what she’s accomplished. I can’t imagine they have that weird, intense hatred that some Boomers. Xers have for her. (Rage boners.)
TS
From outside of the US, it seems for the past two years there has been government by the Judiciary. No sign of anyone else setting the rules.
Now that the GOP have determined applying to the SCOTUS every time they disagree with an administrative or legislative law/rule, this is going to continue into the foreseeable future.
rikyrah
@schrodingers_cat:
no lie told.
They told us, with their entire chests, that they couldn’t be scared by us with ‘ The Courts’
They had eleven billionty reasons why they couldn’t vote for Hillary.
and no…Hell no…
They.WILL.NEVER.BE.FORGIVEN.
OzarkHillbilly
@raven: My older brother committed suicide. He’d fought depression all his life and last Sunday he just couldn’t do it anymore. A year and 5 mos older than I, we shared a bedroom for the first 18 years of my life.
Mai Naem mobileI
ProPublica will probably find a few luxury vacations taken by Thomas and Alito paid for by some Asians who wanted the two to rule a certain way on the AA case. Do they really think there’s unqualified black or Hispanic students getting into Harvard or other elite universities? You’re at the level where you’ve got at least 10 qualified people for each available spot.
Omnes Omnibus
@rikyrah: “… just not that woman.”
Brachiator
@James E Powell:
A common conservative idea. Even if racism does exist, it is just another one of life’s challenges that can be overcome by individualism and hard work. And maybe Jesus.
sdhays
@Jinchi: Was it secret? I assumed Trump knew he was being recorded since they were interviewing him for the Mark Meadows memoir (which is bizarre on so many levels, but whatever).
He’s just stupid. He assumed that he was among friends, and – critically – didn’t take his legal jeopardy seriously. “I’m not supposed to do this” or whatever – he clearly expects no more than a scolding. He can’t comprehend that even “rich” former Presidents can face real legal consequences for flagrantly breaking laws.
rikyrah
Michael Harriot (@michaelharriot) tweeted at 9:29 AM on Thu, Jun 29, 2023:
Before you begin your thinkpiece, the Supreme Court DID NOT strike down Affirmative Action
Admission preferences for legacies, donors, employee families and special recommendations are still allowed
The Court struck down Affirmative Action For everyone except WHITE PEOPLE
(https://twitter.com/michaelharriot/status/1674424753929732106?t=faQ8Oe40SNGOrG39IbwIhw&s=03)
Dorothy A. Winsor
@West of the Rockies: Like Jimmy Carter. People under 40 know him building homes for poor people and (not long ago) traveling around the world monitoring elections. They don’t understand why mentioning him is supposed to send you running to vote R.
Mai Naem mobileI
@Betty Cracker: i saw that. They also said the WH hired her daughter as some deputy deputy but she had to be let go because she couldn’t pass the background check. Also lied about graduating from college and had a couple of DUIs. TFG really did hire the best and brightest!
rikyrah
Every single person who said they wouldn’t be “bullied” into voting for HRC did this. They are why the legacy of the Warren Court is being dismantled before our eyes.
(https://twitter.com/LaurenAshley087/status/1674437317455380480?t=72MKeEzymza_UGM2wyRRqQ&s=03)
Patricia Kayden
@Rusty: Thankfully, there are still Black universities which may be able to pick up the slack. I attended one and loved it.
Today’s decision will make it much more likely that majority White universities will decline to admit Black students unless they have tip-top high grades. And given the poor state of many Black high schools, too many Black students are shut out from receiving quality education from the get go. Huge sigh.
Baud
@Patricia Kayden:
If there’s a silver lining, I hope it’ll be that the “elite” schools lose some of their prestige.
Gvg
In my experience, women laugh a lot as a defense mechanism, especially around sexist men. Even if they chose to stay in that culture it is just expected female behavior and a good way to hide whatever you really think. They may fully agree or be totally against or not really be paying attention.
Other women use laughs too, some of them not very realistic. What can i say? Giggling implies they don’t want to be taken seriously too. It disarms.
Matt McIrvin
@TS: The executive branch can do quite a bit, and it has.
But the impression of “rule by judiciary” comes to a large degree from the inability of Congress to legislate, because of the weaponization of the Senate filibuster rule (a development that more or less started during the Obama administration, though the filibuster rule is much older) to raise the threshold for most regular legislation to a 60-vote supermajority. Since the partisan divide since then has rarely been as lopsided as 60-40, and most votes of substance have been nearly completely party-line, this means the minority party can generally keep anything from happening–though Republicans started this, Democrats have little choice but to join in lest they just get steamrollered. Getting past that requires various hacks that are difficult to execute and limit the content of legislation.
The Senate could have lifted this rule during the times when Democrats controlled it… except that they’ve got a couple of “maverick” members who insist that the filibuster rule must be preserved at any cost, and would always block this unless the Dem’s majority was larger than it was.
This paralysis has effectively meant that Congress has abdicated from government, which in the long run makes everything less democratic.
Mind you, things are often better on the state level in blue/purple states. But we also have red-state governments that are beclowning themselves in terrifying ways.
James E Powell
“White women” are trending on twitter. Apparently, it’s all their fault.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Seconded.
Brachiator
@TS:
Red states have been demolishing women’s rights for some time. Some liberals ignored or downplayed this.
I will come back to this maybe in any new thread about the affirmative action decision, but this conservative court is systematically attacking federalism and asserting a new variety of states rights.
But by making states citadels of tyranny, the Supreme Court undermines the idea that ultimately the people have rights, and governments are created to support those rights. People do not simply belong to the states they might live in, to be ruled by the laws of those states.
sdhays
Clarence Thomas famously thinks that affirmative action makes his Yale law degree worthless.
If he really believed that, he wouldn’t be pretending to practice law in some capacity.
Brachiator
@Patricia Kayden:
Or are athletes.
WaterGirl
@sdhays: He really thinks that when you’re a President, you can do anything. Same for ex-President.
Let’s hope he comes to understand his error.
Roberto el oso
@Omnes Omnibus: Roberts is not just suggesting that the US is now happily in a post-racism world, he is insisting on it. As Charles Pierce describes it ‘Roberts has declared the Day of Jubilee’.
Brachiator
@sdhays:
And yet, every legacy admit I have ever known was proud that family connections got them into college.
Chief Oshkosh
@Jinchi:
I made the same mistake. Apparently in this instance the recording was not secret. This was an interview for the Meadows book and Trump knew he was being recorded. As others have noted, this just adds to our understanding of just how truly fucking stupid this guy is.
TriassicSands
I thought the decision itself was 6-2 with Brown Jackson recusing herself, but still dissenting in writing.
Baud
@TriassicSands:
There were two cases that were consolidated, and Jackson is refused from one of them.
WaterGirl
@Gvg: This laughing struck me as full-throated, all-in, sincere laughing. Like I could hear happy in their laughter. That’s what struck me the third time.
PST
There is an interesting Twitter thread by Asha Rangappa, who is an admissions officer and also a lawyer who seems to have read the opinion. This is in no way to say that the holding isn’t evil, but she thinks that it isn’t as bad as it could have been, and that people like her can find ways to work around it. It is an interesting point of view, anyway. The following is just the first couple of paragraphs:
RaflW
@Omnes Omnibus: Further confirmation of my accusation that Roberts is a nakedly obvious racist, by saying we can’t use use preferential selection for college, but can to ensure Black and other POC folks are supplied to command our increasingly Black and other POC ‘volunteer’ military (in quotes because while of course some people genuinely step up for our country, plenty of others who have had their avenues of personal and economic advancement systematically curtailed – like today, dammit! – make a choice that is between scylla and charybdis).
TriassicSands
I always liked Lani Guinier’s plan, which I think was to set minimal acceptable standards and then randomly choose a class from that pool. There may have been other features that would have helped create a balanced class make-up.
Geminid
@Mai Naem mobileI: I don’t know about Susan Wiles’ daughter, but Wiles was a good hire for Trump’s campaign.
So are some of the other campaign staffers. Former Congressman Vin Weber is an anti-trumper now and a couple months ago he commented on the Trump campaign. Weber said that he had expected Trump to be politically weaker by this Spring. He wasn’t though and one of the reasons was that unlike in his first two campaigns, he had a competent campaign operation.
Eunicecycle
@WaterGirl: He really does think that’s how Obama acted as President-that he just demanded that things happen and they happened. As if! Of course it’s because he has no idea how government works, or is supposed to work. He also has no appreciation for government work, especially the work of our intelligence services. People may have died for the classified information he cavalierly waved around and kept in boxes in a bathroom.
TriassicSands
@RaflW:
Roberts apparently hopes that the maximum number of African Americans will fight and die to protect him and his white supremacist homeland, er, Vaterland.
StringOnAStick
@Rusty: Colleges are indeed gateways to power. Via my husband we are related to a couple who went to Dartmouth, where they met. Through them we have met many of their lifelong friends from Dartmouth, and you simply can’t miss how those connections are a part of why they are all very well off. It’s a sea they swim in and don’t notice at all.
No wonder some middle class parents destroy their finances in order to get their kids into an ivy. They know that connections made their can be and often are the first step in the ladder to much greater financial success than from a state school. That they try so hard while unqualified legacy admissions just saunter in the door is truly enraging.
TriassicSands
@Baud:
Thanks, Right, she recused herself in the Harvard case. I don’t think I’ve seen that before. It seems like it means there was a 6-2 decision and a 6-3 decision. Not that it makes any difference in the outcome.
Betty Cracker
@Mai Naem mobileI: I hadn’t heard about that! Double nepo-baby!
Scout211
Well, according to ABC “sources,” she is the one to whom Trump was speaking directly and showing the documents. But ABC leaves a little wiggle room.
James E Powell
@TS:
I’d go back further than two years. The Roberts court’s right-wingers have acted as saboteurs of Democratic policies since the Obama administration.
TriassicSands
@sdhays:
Actually, Clarence is right, his law degree is worthless and we see evidence of that every time he votes or writes an opinion.
Scalia considered Thomas to be “crazy.”
JoyceH
What gets me about the audio is Trump’s tone of amazement that a plan to invade another country is “PAGES long”.
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud:
Not sure that that would be a good thing. The elite private schools, most of which already have strong DEI initiatives with long-term buy-in from all stakeholders, arguably are best placed to game the USSC shit ruling in order to continue with recruitments that maintain or expand DEI initiatives
ETA: For transparency: I’ve attended and worked at both public and private institutions.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: The great exception to total legislative paralysis was the COVID emergency relief package, which Republicans supported because Trump could take credit for it (many voters seemed to think the funding was coming out of Trump’s personal bank account), and Democrats supported because it was good necessary policy.
Of course it helped Trump come closer than he should have to getting reelected. We’re in a situation where the best argument for electing a Republican President is the mugger’s argument: “if the President is a Republican, Republican legislators will be less likely to purposefully hurt the country”.
WaterGirl
@JoyceH: The man had no business being anywhere near the Oval Office.
At least with Palin in 2008, many Republicans, and certainly Independents, and so-called Independents, realized that about her.
Kay
@James E Powell:
You can write any nasty, incredibly sexist thing you want about women as long as you preface it with “white” – you see it even here in the (supposedly) enlightened comments on BJ.
White men are, of course, blameless. It’s the conniving, scheming women! They’re always behind these schemes.
Matt McIrvin
@TriassicSands: Honestly you’d probably get a better student body out of that kind of minimum-standards-plus-sortition approach (less cultural insularity, more benefit to the society at large), and it would make the task of admission officials much easier. The population of students capable of thriving at a selective school, at this point, is far larger than the number who get in, and beyond some point you’re running on vibes and superstition to do the final selection, with all manner of potential invidious consequences–might as well let RNGsus take the wheel instead.
Edited to add: it’d potentially vastly reduce the amount of absurd gaming of the admission system that high-school students and parents have to do, too, which would be a benefit.
Guinier had all sorts of clever ideas for increasing opportunity and voice for minorities in facially race-neutral ways, which of course was why she had to be smeared as the Quota Queen.
West of the Rockies
@PST:
You’re mellowing our harsh.
Chief Oshkosh
@StringOnAStick: My experience is similar, but I draw different conclusions. The people I know who have those great connections and who went to elite schools were already swimming in that environment before entering college. The people I know who arrived at a Harvard or Yale, etc. and were from middle or lower class families rarely made those types of connections with the wealthier students that, in and of themselves, altered career courses. And even a lot of the ‘legacies’ were mid-middle class and did not develop career-making, long-term connections. From what I’ve experienced since those days, the wealth effect also occurs at prestigious state schools, particularly outside of the northeastern states.
sdhays
@TriassicSands: It’s not worthless. The credentials he obtained and the relationships he cultivated at Yale made him into a well-kept Supreme Court Justice.
Now, his legal reasoning is worthless, but that’s not Yale’s fault or the fault of affirmative action.
MaryRC
Harrison is currently an aide to Trump’s wife, Melania Trump. What does Melania need an aide for?
Omnes Omnibus
@Chief Oshkosh: I think it is quite likely that the connections made at Wisconsin have more effect than those made at Harvard if one is staying in the state.
Geminid
@JoyceH: The plan probably wasn’t exactly for an invasion. It was more likely for a bombing campaign and the ensuing conflict.. Since Iran would have retaliated against the US Navy ships in the area, there were probably contingency plans for naval action.
The Pentagon probably was trying to impress upon Trump that “taking out” Iran’s nuclear program was far more problematic than it sounded. The Pentagon wanted no part of a war with Iran, especially with the fickle Trump in command.
Geminid
@Kay: But Eve started it!
Citizen Alan
@sdhays: Perhaps his Yale degree might have more value if he’d not graduated in the middle of his class and then upon graduated been pipelined straight into the judiciary because of his intense hatred for other black people.
Baud
@Geminid:
Based on every picture I’ve seen, she was definitely white.
Citizen Alan
@TriassicSands: KBJ recused herself from the Harvard case because she was an alumni. Thomas won’t recuse himself from cases involving his own wife.
Omnes Omnibus
@Citizen Alan: She recused herself because she had served on the governing board not because she was an alumna twice over.
Citizen Alan
@Kay: I suspect the anger towards “white women” arises from the idea that Republican (white) women are voting against their own interests in a way that Republican (white) men are not. There is something simply repulsive to me about any woman knowing what Trump was like and voting for him over another woman. They all remind me of that picture of a MAGA woman wearing a t-shirt with an arrow pointing at her crotch saying “Trump can grab this any time.”
Kay
@Geminid:
The old bats, the “wine moms” who, incidentally, are a solid, loyal Democratic constiuency but also (inexplicably) an object of ridicule, the “Karens” who (gasp!) ask for Diet Coke at Mexican restaurants, the “twats”…
And that’s on “liberal” sites. Among the “enlightened”. But it’s all okay because I made sure and stuck “white” in front of the slurs and ridiculous stereotyping. It’s become a way to bash women.
Citizen Alan
@Omnes Omnibus: Okay, but I stand by my larger point. I will never get over Bush v. Gore because Ginni Thomas and Eugene Scalia were actively working for the Bush Campaign when that decision was handed down.
Citizen Alan
@Kay: Being diabetic, I ask for Diet Coke everywhere unless it’s a high-class joint and I get red wine. What do the kewl kids think we should all be drinking in Mexican restaurants?
Omnes Omnibus
@Citizen Alan: Oh, I wasn’t arguing against your larger point. That is absolutely correct.
Kay
@Citizen Alan:
If you were a proper white liberal man you would know to order something authentic in a Mexican restaurant. “Karens” ruin them with their “demands”.
It’s incredibly fucking poltically STUPID too. It alienates a huge group of Democratic voters for absolutely no reason other than the dopes think it makes them sound cool. My personal favorite is white men denouncing “white women”. Lol. Clowns. Just be out and proud sexists. I respect it more.
Geminid
@Kay: I agree, and you have done a very good job pointing this out.
I would add that some of the scapegoating of white women is because they are a reliable component of the Democratic coalition. People who deride the liberal “wine moms”* are more often than not men who welcome the opportunity to disguise their misogyny with an ostensibly political critique.
* I saw some lefty use the phrase “Panera Moms” the other day to disparage supporters of Ukraine. I almost choked on my latte.
Librarian
White women are trending because apparently they are the biggest beneficiaries of affirmative action. So this decision is actually bad for them.
Brachiator
@Chief Oshkosh:
Yeah, I agree that experiences vary. There were some people from modest backgrounds who worked hard to make political connections with legacy students. And there were students from privileged backgrounds who didn’t much care about making or maintaining elite connections.
But the thing that was interesting and maybe significant was that college brought together people who would probably not have run across each other in regular society.
ETA. Also, college let some people whose family had money, but who were not part of the social elite meet and join up with the snobby set.
Baud
@Librarian:
This decision is limited to race. Sex might be next, but it hasn’t happened yet.
Kay
@Geminid:
Did I mention it’s also clownishly elitist? They would never ENTER a Panera. Only “authentic” soup for them!
So revealing that it’s always “moms” too- as if the word “mom” is itself a slur. It’s just fucking pure sexism. It’s people that needed a socially acceptable way to demean and diminish women – it’s always the biggest assholes who grab onto it.
Ha ha. Look at those silly “moms” voting. They’re just following fads!
Kay
@Librarian:
Yeah, that doesn’t make any sense, so try again. I know this even though I am a dumb “panera mom” or a silly “wine mom”. The decision is about race based admission, so, no, it didn’t “mostly benefit” white women.
Librarian
@Kay: I went over to Twitter and that’s what they’re saying. Feel free to go there yourself and look.
FelonyGovt
@Kay: Thank you. I’ve never understood why using the term “moms” (as in “wine moms” or anything “moms”) makes things somehow diminished, or makes them comical.
Kay
@FelonyGovt:
It’s ESPECIALLY bullshit and offensive if you’ve worked on or around campaigns. The much-maligned “moms” do most of the fucking work. Good luck getting a Democrat elected without the earnest “moms”. Men only accept management and consultant roles ground level. Women do everything else.
FelonyGovt
@Kay: Exactly. The men stand around and opine and pontificate, the women do the work.
Kay
@Librarian:
Oh, it doesn’t suprirse me “that’s what they’re saying”. Most of the sexist commentary is also dumb and poorly informed. Not big readers. Big talkers, but not much on reading.
catclub
Not being likely to be admitted is not the same as unqualified.
I would guess that virtually all candidates to harvard are ridiculously overqualified. However, these legacies are not so overqualified that they would be admitted in a fair process.
Unqualified means they would not be able to finish a degree program there.
KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager))
@Scout211: Susie Wiles is the person he showed the map to in August. She was not at the Meadows authors meeting in July.
WaterGirl
@KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager)): Thank you. I was starting to feel like I was being really dense.
BCHS Class of 1980
@laura: I didn’t know Danny was involved!
Debbie(Aussie)
@OzarkHillbilly:
Hi, Ozark. This a very old thread so I doubt you will see this, but it needed to be said.
you are a wonderful person, like our host, or so many of our fellow jackals. Please accept my deepest condolences for the loss of your brother. I am glad you are sharing your experience with us. I have had very little contact with death, so personally. I am somewhat familiar with what your brother was going through. I too suffer from extreme depression and anxiety. So far (and long may it continue) my family has been enough to keep me here. Thank you for being you!