In a rare formal interview, the president discussed X/Twitter under Elon Musk, MAGA’s takeover of the GOP and the threats to democracy he sees posed by Donald Trump’s 2024 candidacy.https://t.co/P0IeNgRLOv
— ProPublica (@propublica) October 1, 2023
Well worth your twenty minutes to listen!
Excellent interview. Good on John for owning that he was wrong about 2020.
Biden notes that Dems did better than predicted in 2022 too.
We must hustle hard in 2024 cause it won’t be easy. But pessimism doesn’t help. We’ve been here before and we actually can win this again. https://t.co/5dlReeLiDr
— Renee (@PettyLupone) October 1, 2023
Truth
@Lawrence pic.twitter.com/ABH4JppzlX— Susan ?????????? (@SusanInDelaware) October 1, 2023
J. Arthur Crank (fka Jerzy Russian)
Hmm, I think that’s Susan person from the last tweet just failed the cognition test. However, she passed the hilarity test with flying colors.
CarolPW
@J. Arthur Crank (fka Jerzy Russian): Did you actually read the text in her black box? If so, why is it funny?
ETA: It is amusing but I do not see how it is not smart.
RedDirtGirl
That was a great interview. I didn’t know John Harwood was connected with ProPublica.
ETA: I see that he left CNN in Sept 2022 because of it’s rightward tilt, so that makes sense.
Alison Rose
The problem is that TIFG has to make every interview completely about him. He doesn’t know how to respond to any questions where he is not the center of the answer. It’s like how his staff had to be sure to put his name throughout any memo or paper they needed him to read, because if he didn’t see his name, he’d get bored and stop reading. He is the most self-obsessed creature on the planet.
Alison Rose
@J. Arthur Crank (fka Jerzy Russian): Why do you say that?
Chetan Murthy
@Alison Rose: “…. camera tv”
Nukular Biskits
Okay, this counts as a First World problem and totally OT, but it should be illegal for a hotel to charge +$5 for a Corona.
Nukular Biskits
@Nukular Biskits:
Oh, and excellent interview.
Why can’t we see more like this in the so-called “liberal” media?
Alison Rose
@Chetan Murthy: I mean…she’s making a little jokey joke to make a point?
Parfigliano
@Nukular Biskits: It should be illegal to charge anything for a Corona.
Chetan Murthy
@Alison Rose: winner winner chicken dinner
Ohio Mom
I especially enjoyed those moments when you could see in Biden’s face what he would have liked to reply — sometimes his eyes twinkle — then he takes a moment, and answers diplomatically.
This is a man who thinks on his feet, no matter what the “he’s too old” crowd wants to convince everyone.
J. Arthur Crank (fka Jerzy Russian)
@Alison Rose: I was trying to make a Funny. She failed the cognition test that T***p “aced” since the last two words were changed. However, I personally think the changes are very funny, hence the high score on the hilarity test.
Anyway, this demonstrates why I don’t do standup comedy…
Nukular Biskits
@Parfigliano:
LOL!
I agree but I ran out of Yuengling so I had to go to the front desk “store”.
Wapiti
@J. Arthur Crank (fka Jerzy Russian):
What’s funny to me is that one can find the cognition test online, in a pdf. The 5 words that Trump spouts are not the words in the test.
Bupalos
Only part way through but this really doesn’t feel like effective communication out of Biden and isn’t reassuring. I’d hate to see the transcript on this. And I think the answer on the question about the inability to accomplish popular policies like raising taxes on the wealthy is at best half an answer, at worst mostly wrong. We need to acknowledge the ways democracy is failing to accomplish effective governance in order to understand how it is threatened and how to strengthen it. I think one of Biden’s real weaknesses is that he really does think everything is O.K. if we can just get back to a kind of political normal.
I’m worried. I have a very hard time seeing Trump winning an election. But I also have a hard time seeing this coming election changing the course of democratic decline.
Chetan Murthy
@Wapiti: He was telling a person who was a man who was interviewing him using a TV camera, and there was probably a woman there as a production assistant, or his own assistant. He’s such a goddamn imbecile there’s no way he could remember those five words from his medical exam. No. Way. Like everything else in his life, he was faking it.
Alison Rose
@J. Arthur Crank (fka Jerzy Russian): Okay. I guess I misread the tone!
dexwood
@Nukular Biskits: They should pay you five to drink it.
Steeplejack
@J. Arthur Crank (fka Jerzy Russian):
Also, the original was “person, woman, man, camera, TV,” so words two and three were transposed.
I presume the scrawny little joke has been beaten to death now.
RevRick
@Nukular Biskits: Sad to say but Dick Yuengling is a MAGA billionaire.
smith
@Chetan Murthy: Those exams use unrelated words to test the person’s recall over a short time. In the standard Mini Mental Status Exam (MMSE), they use three words:
Then later:
I’m assuming that’s the test he was referring to — it’s a very simple test for an adult with normal cognitive function because it’s designed to pick up dementia or other deficiencies. There is no way an examiner would use person, man and woman together in that exam because of the associations inherent among them.
So, yes, he was both faking it, and inaccurately making it out to be some kind of high-level intelligence test.
moonbat
That was a good interview. No stupid gotcha questions, but still addressed a lot of serious issues.
Biden did a good job of laying out the moral, practical, and honorable case for protecting democracy and he even managed to keep those Ohio diner patrons in the conversation.
More of this, please.
ETA and I should have said I am super happy that Biden is rewarding, so to speak, the excellent reporting that ProPublica has been doing lately by giving them an exclusive.
HumboldtBlue
@RevRick:
Yeah he is, and it truly sucks having that shitty beer as the beer sponsor for the Phillies.
NotMax
@Nukular Biskits
Are there separate prices for the vaccinated and unvaccinated?
//
Turgidson
If the media were full of more people like Harwood, we might not be in this dreadful place. Plays it straight, but not in the vacant both-siderist sense. The “I’m not a partisan but I know damn well when shit is fucked, and will describe it accurately” way.
KrackenJack
Glad to see Biden supporting a real media outlet. [Disclosure: I throw some dollars their way every year even though I often find the reporting too depressing to actually read.]
Nukular Biskits
@dexwood:
What’s interesting is that I’ve had Corona down in Mexico and I’d swear it is far superior to whatever is sold as “Corona” here in the states.
Nukular Biskits
@RevRick:
Damn.
I wish you hadn’t told me that. I may have to take out my non-existent AR-15 and shoot up a case or two of it.
Nukular Biskits
@NotMax:
I didn’t ask.
Steeplejack
@KrackenJack:
Same.
NotMax
@Nukular Biskits
“Who gets the Corona?”
;)
RandomMonster
It’s shitty beer anyway in my opinion.
eclare
@Nukular Biskits:
This doesn’t apply to Corona, but Coke in Mexico uses real cane sugar not high fructose corn syrup like in the US. So it’s very possible that the brewers in Mexico use different (better) ingredients.
jonas
@Nukular Biskits: Virtually any beer is going to taste better closer to where it’s produced as opposed to the stuff that’s been shipped hundreds (or thousands) of miles and has sat in a warehouse for several months before making it to the grocery store shelves.
tokyokie
That’s cheap for either a typewriter or a premium cigar . Although why you’d need the former escapes me.
Geoduck
@eclare: It is possible to buy Mexican Coke in American stores, my local very standard Safeway supermarket has it.
eclare
@Geoduck:
Some Mexican restaurants here have it too.
tokyokie
@Wapiti: The way the test works is that the examiner tells the patient to remember the three or five words he/she is about to say. Then several minutes later, the examiner asks the patient to repeat them. It’s a test of basic cognitive function, and all it may show is that the patient’s short-term memory may be intact.
Smith at #22 offers a more complete answer.
Nukular Biskits
@eclare:
I’ve encountered the same thing in Japan w/ respect to Coca Cola.
wjca
Perhaps it’s like tea. Tea in the rest of the world doesn’t taste like the tea you’ve had. Why? Because in the places in SE Asia where they make tea, the stuff they sweep up off the floor at the end of the day (both reject leaves and dirt, etc.) is what goes into the tea bags you get here. In a word, dreck.
Real tea goes to people in places that actually know and care about tea. Ask anyone elsewhere in the world what they think of American “beer” (not counting craft beers in most cases).
Nukular Biskits
@tokyokie:
Desperation + A week at sea + Availability.
wjca
For the win!
Nukular Biskits
@jonas:
Generally, I like to try local brews when I’m on travel.
But, sometimes, going with the familiar is more expedient. Kinda like using the Keurig instead of the French press.
Nukular Biskits
@wjca:
Bingo!
Soprano2
I’ll have to listen to the interview tomorrow. God it’s so good to have Colbert back live!
HumboldtBlue
@wjca:
Ted Lasso has thoughts.
eclare
@Soprano2:
It is!
eclare
@HumboldtBlue:
Hahaha…someday I’ll subscribe to Apple TV and watch it.
mrmoshpotato
@Soprano2: 🤦♂️🤦♂️
I totally forgot about late nights returning! After jonesing for a week!
Time to check YouTube before bed. 🤦♂️🤦♂️
mrmoshpotato
Tomorrow is bacon and eggs (and toast, of course, you monsters) and a President Biden interview.
Wait, I also have breakfast sausage…
HumboldtBlue
@eclare:
Just take the free week. It’s surprisingly easy to do, and to unsubscribe is simple, you don’t have to jump through hoops.
It’s a lovely show.
JoyceH
Seems that Gen Kelly has gone on the record confirming all those stories about Trump’s contempt for the military. I’m sure we all believed them but now there’s the eye witness confirmation. The Post and CNN are giving it good coverage. His cult won’t believe it, of course, but will it make a difference to the wafflers?
Dopey-o
Coke and other bottlers persuaded the Mexican government to subsidize sodas made with cane sugar, which is supposedly nutritious. So Coke and many other beverages are muy barrata.
eclare
@HumboldtBlue:
I’ve heard that’s it’s really good, I go back and forth between Hulu and Netflix now.
AlaskaReader
@Bupalos: Yeah, nope, …it’s nonsense to posit that stopping the fascists is not changing the course of democratic decline.
NotMax
@mrmoshpotato
You a link or a patty man?
Also, what, no hash browns?
AlaskaReader
@Dopey-o: Got a link about these subsidies?
Reason I ask is because Mexico taxes sugary soft drinks.
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
@mrmoshpotato:
No toast here, just add a tortilla and cheese for a breakfast burrito.
eversor
@wjca:
I don’t think that’s entirely true….*
In most major cities your going to have Asian grocery stores and also dedicated Asian stores that sell said tea. It’s not hard to find at all. I have it at home.
The issue is it comes with real tea prices. So you are going to pay 20-2000 bucks for a bag of the stuff. The mugs they sell are going to be a hundred bucks or so as well. The kettles are priced at higher sticker shock.
Most people are cheap for obvious reasons and Americans are the god kings of penny wise but dollar foolish. But if you are willing hurl a couple hundred bucks at a tea kettle and mugs that will last for generations and drop say 40 bucks on a bag of loose leaf tea you can get perfectly good tea at home. Of course this requires an initial investment in tea and is not as simple as hurling a bag into a coffee mug and pouring way to hot water over it. But it’s also not that costly in the long run and it’s a much better product.
Along the same lines you can buy Mexican coke in any internation supermarket and in the ethnic area of many American supermarkets. It just costs a bit more and comes in a smaller bottle which is made of glass.
For beer you can get actual German beer by following the same rules. I can go get it just a few miles from there. Also actual sausage, live suarkraut (with the probiotics not that shit you get at Safeway), and proper pickled fish.
People just don’t do it because it costs more. So it’s fancy pants educated lib shit. But all that stuff is right here in any major city and the burbs around it.
*My family are immigrants as is the SO’s family so we all shop at international stores and Wegmans/Whole Foods is slumming it for us. So we are probably more aware of where to go for what than most.
mrmoshpotato
@NotMax:
Both. Aldi’s pre-cooked frozen patties are pretty good. I have some Johnsville links in the freezer currently. (Their maple links are soooooo good!)
Do you take me for a cannibal who also shreds his own?
JWR
Wow! Watching tonight’s A Closer Look, and we’re already on our 3rd station break! Seth’s really giving it to us good and hard tonight, and I’m so there!
eversor
@mrmoshpotato:
The two things I do like from McDonalds are the egg mcmuffin and the hash brown. Both of which can be had for a grand total of $3.50 even in DC if you use their app.
There’s one three blocks from one of the offices I work out of. I keep hot sauce at my desk so I get this meal 2x a week and then drown it in scotch bonnet hot sauce (Go Navy!) and it is good. I usually skip lunch after as good god does it fill you up.
Bupalos
@AlaskaReader: I think it’s very much possible to win an election and come out the other side with democracy itself in worse shape or a worse position than you went in. I’d say that happened in 2020. This is in no way to say losing said election isn’t far worse. It’s a critical vs chronic thing as well as a leaders vs. polity thing. Carl asked a couple very potent questions related to this that went basically unanswered. Essentially “how can American democracy survive with one party opting out- or worse?”
Bupalos
@moonbat: I think the questions are way beyond just being free of political gotchas and attempts to make news. They have a deeper quality than you really ever see in American media.
eclare
@eversor:
Those two products from Mickey D’s are good, and all things being relative, the Egg McMuffin isn’t that bad for you. Lots of protein, not too many calories or sodium for a meal.
Anne Laurie
@eversor: I made the mistake of telling the Spousal Unit about Upton Tea, on the Blogmaster’s recommendation. S.U. is totally hooked on his favorite blend, and he’s got all the proper paraphernalia to go with (electric kettle, strainer / infuser, et al.)
Their selection is vast, their prices seem reasonable (as best as I have been able to compare), and the customer service / shipping speed is top-rate!
Craig
@mrmoshpotato: I watched John Oliver last night. Glorious. Whip smart funny, and totally infuriating at what assholes his subject matter are up to. That show is so great, he spent a lot of time talking up the writers.
Craig
@HumboldtBlue: the shows unrelenting positivity got me through 2020.
Uncle Cosmo
@eversor: FTR you can also get authentic bottled Budweiser, i.e. the brew brewed just outside of České Budějovice, in some US liquor stores – but you have to know what to look for.
What is known in most of the world as Budweiser Budvar cannot be marketed here under any name containing the letters B-U-D, owing to legal disputes with the St Louis-based so-called brewery (now owned by Belgians IIRC). In the Untied States ;^D Budweiser Budvar is sold under the name of “Czechvar.”
I ran across a 6-pack with this between-two-linguistic-stools label some years back at what is now a Total Wine & More** store in the Baltimore suburbs. Upon further examination I found it was “brewed in České Budějovice” and took a six home. It’s a reasonably pleasant brew; I don’t go out of my way to stock it but it does make an interesting gift for friends who have never been to the Epicenter of Beerdom aka Czech Republic.
** Co-owned by Democratic Congressman David Trone (MD-06) who FWIW is spending a shitpile of his own $$$ running in the primary to succeed outgoing Senator Ben Cardin. Don’t know much about Trone but am seeing a lot of ads for him on UToob.
eversor
@Uncle Cosmo:
I will look for this thanks for it!
eversor
@eclare:
Yerp.
@Anne Laurie:
The SO is Asian and is VERY picky about tea. We get ours from a local joint run by a bunch of old Chinese lady’s (old being relative they range from age like 50 to are you vampires?) who retired. In their retirement they all got bored and go back home periodically and sample the local stuff and what they like they import back here and pack up. Also bring back various hand made items to consume and make the tea.
It makes them happy to do this and everything they have is top notch. This is them https://www.meimeitea.com/ in case you like tea and don’t have sticker shock. Also if you want to support a female minority owned small business. I will totally vouch for them and their customer service. It’s not primarily a profit making venture it’s more a love of tea. I’ve been to the owners home and she has probably six figures worth of tea related things there and is obssessed. She’s in Fairfax VA. She made us tea for hours with the traditional Chinese gaiwans and changed out little porcelin animals and knew all about the teas and how the different brews (with a gaiwan it’s not one and done you brew it three times) affect the flavor.
Just be aware if you go for the higher end stuff can blow a grand .5 on a tea cake (fermented brick of it) fast and about 7k on a kettle. But she has stuff in the 20 buck range for tea and the 80 buck ranges for wears.