Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

You are so fucked. Still, I wish you the best of luck.

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

Second rate reporter says what?

Happy indictment week to all who celebrate!

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

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

“That’s what the insurrection act is for!”

An unpunished coup is a training exercise.

Fuck the extremist election deniers. What’s money for if not for keeping them out of office?

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

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

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

I was promised a recession.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

He really is that stupid.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Cake Is Coming Open Thread

Cake Is Coming Open Thread

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I haven’t really been able to follow the news – but it sure seems like cake is coming.  Maybe today or maybe tomorrow?

Insert the Airplane I guess I picked a bad week to quit smoking / drinking / snorting coke / meme here.

But seriously, it’s great to get to know my Australian cousins!  I like them very much and I will be sad to leave tomorrow because it’s unlikely that I will see them again.  But maybe!

Yesterday I had to stay home from the big outing because I was still behind on work for one of my clients.  But I worked for 10 hours yesterday and got to a point where I feel fine not working until Saturday when I will wake up again in my own bed.

Open thread.

Update:  Since I was staying back, I offered to have my niece’s pups stay here because they are terribly afraid of storms, and I knew that big storms were coming yesterday.  So I cranked up Jimmy Buffett on the stereo and worked for hours, singing to the pups when the thunder got too loud and especially when Skye got so scared that he climbed up in my lap.  He has to weigh maybe 80 pounds>  I adore Skye and Stella, so I was happy to have them with me.  I sang so much yesterday that my voice is a bit croaky this morning.  Totally worth it!

Here’s the file I created when they went home after staying with me for 10 or 14 days when they were just 4 months old!

Skye and Stella

Reader Interactions

35Comments

  3. 3.

    Gin & Tonic

    Re-posted from downstairs.

    Sy Hersh, who once was a journalist, now completely beclowns himself on the regular.

    Yes Hersh, this is definitely something a U.S. official told you and not just one of your many fever dreams or your Russian handler. pic.twitter.com/8mg8G7bOCM— Oliver Alexander (@OAlexanderDK) July 27, 2023

    You’ll have to click through for the full quote, where supposedly an unnamed “US official” refers to Zelensky as a “poor waif in his underwear.” I guess you’re supposed to skip over the fact that this is a phrase never used by Americans, but is a literal translation of the common russian phrase “мальчик в трусиках.”

  5. 5.

    Ken

    I will repeat by comment from the previous post: I’m pretty sure there was such a meeting a few weeks ago, because I remember being disappointed by the lack of indictment cake*. But, I’m OK with Smith tormenting Trump with these meetings, because it seems to goad him into confessing more crimes.

    * German chocolate, in my case.

  6. 6.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    I’ve always been curious about Australia, but I don’t think we’ll ever get there at this point. We’re not happy air travelers at the best of times.

    Just making the final reservations for our own overseas trip in September that was originally going to happen in June 2020, and we’re dividing up each trip into 3 separate legs. Not specifically to break up the flights, it just kind of worked out that way because using an Icelandair voucher kind of constrained us.

    We’re spending a couple days in Iceland at the end of the trip and I’m hoping to see the aurora, a lifelong dream.

    Hotels got crazy  expensive in the last 3 years!

  7. 7.

    WaterGirl

    I added a doggie update up top, if anyone is interested.

    We are about to head out on an outing to downtown Kalamazoo for some sightseeing and shopping.  Our last full day together.  I get on the train in the morning and my Australian cousins pick up their rental car and head to Niagara Falls.

  8. 8.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @Ken: But, I’m OK with Smith tormenting Trump with these meetings,

    I’ll take what I can get. One reason trials are scheduled so far out, I’ve learned from internet lawyers, is that there are all kinds of motions that go back and forth, hearings with the judge on various minutiae, etc. And every one of those is an opportunity for TFG to lose in court yet again.

    So he’s getting lots of reasons to be mad at lots of judges, months before the actual trials.

    It’s my fond hope that he no longer has any good days. They’re all spent in either rage or abject fear, or both.

  9. 9.

    WaterGirl

    @Gin & Tonic: I have seen almost no news since Sunday, but I did see that the fucking Russians mined the nuclear power plant.  It made me sick to my stomach.

    I have no words for how out of control Russia is; they are like a mad dog.  I don’t know what else we can do, but anything we can do can’t be enough when war is being waged by a madman.

  11. 11.

    WaterGirl

    @Jeffro: Since I am visiting today and will be on the train all day tomorrow, I won’t be able to bake a cake or make a sour cherry galette if we get news before the weekend.

    But I will definitely be eating ice cream!

    I’m sure it sounds dumb, but I miss you guys.

  12. 12.

    Burnspbesq

    Happy 75th birthday, Marvin the Martian. The lovable (?) little guy first appeared in a Bugs Bunny cartoon released on this date in 1948.

  16. 16.

    Alison Rose

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    It’s OK, I’m used to looking like an idiot.

    Rotating tag.

    I thought the same thing, don’t worry! I was going to say that I was jealous she gets to see koalas even though a friend told me they smell really bad. I don’t care, they’re adorable.

  18. 18.

    lowtechcyclist

    Here’s how Mitch would be replaced until an election can be held for his seat:

    The state GOP gives a list of three persons that they’d be OK with to Gov. Beshear, a Democrat.
    Beshear picks one of the three, and that person becomes a Senator until the next election.

    I’ll avoid the ins and outs of when that election would be (looks to me like November 2024), but in the meantime:

    Suppose Beshear simply doesn’t pick anybody?  The law is silent on that.  It would be great if Beshear was able to keep McConnell’s seat vacant until November 2024. Would be exactly the same sort of shit the GOP pulls all the time; would be great to give them a taste of their own medicine.

    Alternatively, it could be used as a bargaining chip to fill Feinstein’s seat on the Senate Judiciary Committee with another Dem if she were to resign from that committee.

  19. 19.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    Hey, here’s a nice times thingie! There’s an amazing organization near us, the Chester Children’s Chorus, and their next concert this weekend is going to be livestreamed. We know the founder / director and what he has built in Chester, PA, one of the poorest cities in the US, is just amazing.

  20. 20.

    Jackie

    @lowtechcyclist: “It would be great if Beshear was able to keep McConnell’s seat vacant until November 2024.”

    Which is EXACTLY what McTurtle did following Scalia’s death refusing to let Obama replace him.

    That would be sweet justice, indeed!

  25. 25.

    Juice Box

    I’ve had my split of champagne waiting in the refrigerator for a couple of weeks now. I thought I might be opening it for the Georgia indictment first, but either way, a champagne to toast to Trump prosecutors is always a treat!

    I typed “Trump pr” and Apple’s predictive algorithm offered me “prosecution” and “prosecutors”. That made me smile. The words go together so nicely.

  27. 27.

    Robert Sneddon

    I thought it was traditional in America for big prosecution news drops like indictments to happen on a Friday, time to bury the headlines in the weekend so that Monday starts off with a fresh set of scandals and distractions.

  28. 28.

    CapnMubbers

    Re Cornel West:  It wasn’t just the lack of personal invitation to the inauguration that he’s miffed about. When he first came up I remembered an interview with Amy Goodman on “Democracy Now” after the election  in 2008. He wanted to be Frederick Douglass to Obama’s Lincoln. http://democracynow.org/2008/11/19

  29. 29.

    Sister Golden Bear

    I’ll have at least a slice cake today: Trump’s Lawyers Have Been Told Indictment Is Coming

    Former president Donald Trump’s legal team was informed that they should prepare for yet another indictment against him during a meeting with federal prosecutors on Thursday. The federal indictment is expected to pertain to Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into his role in the January 6 Capitol riot as well as efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

  30. 30.

    Gin & Tonic

    I’m still following up on this, but the story appears to be that in the World Fencing Championships, Ukrainian Olga Kharlan defeated “neutral” (but russian) Anna Smirnova 15:7. After the match, Smirnova proferred a handshake, but Kharlan refused to shake hands, offering the alternative of touching sabers (I’m not an expert, but believe that’s acceptable.) Smirnova pretended to be offended and sat in her chair for 50 minutes to drive home her charade.

    As a result, Kharlan was disqualified from the championships.

    I’m sure it’s a coincidence that the head of World Fencing is russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov.

  31. 31.

    Kent

    @Burnspbesq:Sy Hersh rivals Cornel West for the crown of “most unfortunate descent into self-parody.”

    They have a lot of company down there.

    RFK Jr., Kirsten Sinema, Glem Greenwald, etc.

  35. 35.

    bleh

    @Robert Sneddon: news reports say this GJ has met Tuesdays and Thursdays, and it met today.  So it’s possible that they’re voting on indictments today and they’ll be handed up late today or tomorrow.  (I dunno how much after-the-fact processing there is once they’ve voted.)

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