Shorter House: our work is done here. https://t.co/uAirCOHIt4
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) October 13, 2023
Buck tells reporters they announced breaking for the weekend and floor vote Tuesday https://t.co/SYQYIDkHCO
— Olivia Beavers (@Olivia_Beavers) October 13, 2023
if you're in line to run for speaker, STAY IN LINE https://t.co/EcwBwI9kOF
— Liz Charboneau (@lizchar) October 13, 2023
Josh Marshall, at TPM, on “The State of the Speaker Debacleship Going into the Weekend”:
… Today, with Scalise out, Jordan scrambled to pull together 217 votes. He failed. At mid-day Rep. Austin Scott of Georgia, who I’d literally never heard of before, decided that he might as well run. So in the afternoon the GOP caucus held another vote and it was Jordan 124 to Scott’s 81. (Needless to say, Scott was functioning as a stand-in for opposition to Jordan.) Jordan then asked for another vote with just him where the question was not whether members supported him but whether they would vote him on the floor of the House since he was the GOP nominee. He got 152 votes – 55 votes short. The House eventually decided they’d put in a hard day’s work and recessed until Monday.
The upshot of the last ten days of nonsense appears to be that McCarthy, Scalise and Jordan each have a significant group of members now committed to never, ever voting for them for Speaker under any circumstances. As we discussed yesterday, they’ve now collectively demolished the principle that a caucus vote is binding. After all that’s what a caucus is. But that’s out the window.
I am not saying it’s likely. But after today I’m for the first time thinking that this may end in some kind of cross-party agreement with the Democrats to elect a new Speaker. It’s difficult to convey the sheer weight of factors arrayed against such an outcome. But the first time it seems like there may literally be no way to elect a Speaker with Republican votes alone. And that leaves only one alternative.
That would leave the question of what Republicans could possibly offer and what Democrats could plausibly accept to effect such a compromise. The only thing that seems plausible to me is some form of enhanced or supersized discharge petition. How this could be given force or made meaningful in the context of parliamentary rules I don’t know. But a key, perhaps the key power of the Speakership is what gets a vote and what doesn’t. There’s overwhelming support in the House for Ukraine aide. But a relatively small number of hardliners are preventing such a vote from even happening. That is despite the fact that between 2/3rds and 3/4s of the House would vote for it. The various debt ceiling and government shutdown standoffs can only happen because the GOP Speaker can’t risk accepting a compromise that passes with Democratic votes. Of course, McCarthy ended up doing that twice, at the very, very, very last moment. And that’s why he’s gone.
In other words, what I’m talking about is a way that the minority could force votes in these cases when a majority or in many cases an overwhelming majority supports a bill. How you actually make such a concession operative in parliamentary rule-making I really don’t know. But in principle something like that seems like a concession that would be worth Democrats lending their votes to elect a Republican Speaker…
Sucks to win popular vote but be denied power by a tiny group of freaks who mostly represent land, right? https://t.co/NgGqr60Ud1
— L O L G O P (@LOLGOP) October 13, 2023
A competent reporter would have grasped the magnitude of what Pelosi meant & respected the hell out of her & her caucus. https://t.co/6Hb33ha03S
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) October 13, 2023
I hope everyone gets now that the turmoil in the House is all about Trump trying to install a Speaker of the House who would definitely help him try to steal the 2024 election.
— L O L G O P (@LOLGOP) October 13, 2023
Hakeem Jeffries shreds Jim Jordan "House Republicans have just elected a speaker nominee who in 16 years in congress hasn't passed a single bill, because his focus has not been on the American people, his focus has been on peddling lies and conspiracy theories and division." pic.twitter.com/SgmTqW76ER
— Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) October 13, 2023
Fun fact: @hakeemjeffries is actually the leading candidate for Speaker of the House and has been this entire time with 212 certain votes
Only needs 5 more https://t.co/HCotV3avPR
— Lindy Li (@lindyli) October 13, 2023
Nina
Is there anything that prevents the ballot for Speaker being a secret ballot? Jeffries would win for sure.
Baud
PSA: I will be posting much more sporadically after today until mid-November. Do not email Cole.
Quantum man
Dumb caucus.
Professor Bigfoot
Five Republicans who vote for Jeffries are sure to get death threats from the cultists.
But how about five republicans who vote “Present?”
Would that do the job?
Jackie
@Baud: You’d better flag WaterGirl!😉
Jackie
@Professor Bigfoot: A multitude of our Dem House members have been receiving death threats and being doxed since J6, and before.
The Repugs are more concerned about threats of being Primaried by TIFG or Gym Jordan.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
They should have a vote for “I will never vote for any candidate for Speaker.” I’ll bet that’s a solid 50 votes.
japa21
@Baud:
Not worried. We can always send out an APB for slightly confused, pantsless man.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Baud: Campaign heating up?
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊 😊😊
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: If not Cole, who do we have to thank for this blessed respite?
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@Baud: Are you planning on going to Washington to lobby the GOP Klown Kaucus for the Speaker’s job? Will you be wearing pants? If you get the job, will you wear pants?
JPL
@rikyrah: Good morning!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
So basically this is the month the GOP died.
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
Wonder what the count would look like if one of them said “my platform is that everything gets a vote. Chips will fall where they may, I’m not gatekeeping, and if we don’t have the total to do something by our agenda, it shouldn’t pass.”
lowtechcyclist
@Professor Bigfoot:
No, you’d need 10.
There are 221 Rethugs and 212 Dems in the House.
If 5 Rethugs vote with the Dems, that gives the Dems a 217-216 win.
If 5 Rethugs skip the vote, there are 216 Rethugs and 212 Dems.
10 Rethugs skipping makes it 211 Rethugs and 212 Dems: a Dem majority.
(AIUI, the Speaker candidate needs a majority of those present to be elected Speaker. If that’s correct, then Rethugs voting ‘Present’ don’t bring the Dems any closer to a majority. They’d need to be missing.)
Danielx
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg:
Inquiring minds want to know!
Frankensteinbeck
Actually, LOLGAP, I read this turmoil the opposite, that Trump is a tiny factor in the GOP drifting into such ‘fuck you, my way or nothing’ space that they can’t work together on the simplest things. It was Scalise vs Jordan with a chunk on either side who would never accept the other before Trump spoke, and no sign Trump moved the needle.
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
New Deal democrat
And there we go.
I’d give things about one more week. If GOPers can’t elect a speaker this week, I think we’ll see serious discussions with Jeffries.
On a side note, the fast-growing list of people who have defied Congressional subpoenas shows that Congress’s de facto delegation of enforcement to the Courts is not working. Until 1848, Congress enforced its subpoena power itself, with a jail beneath the Capitol. It will only take one or two examples to revive the power, and unfortunately it is imperative.
Matt McIrvin
@Jackie: Yeah… people keep talking about how Republican legislators are afraid of being killed or of their families being killed if they won’t toe the party line, but I keep wondering if they’re actually in more danger than, you know, any Democrat–especially one from a red or purple state.
Baud
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
I’m not letting Cenk run away with the nomination without a fight!
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud: I hope all is well and that you’re using the current House GOP chaos to further your Baud! 202_! campaign.
Also, are we not supposed to email Cole about anything?
Or is it that you’re really John Cole? It is odd that I’ve never seen the two of you at the same time in the same room…
lowtechcyclist
@rikyrah:
Good morning!
Got my Covid and flu shots yesterday afternoon, so I’d have the weekend to recover. Good thing I did, I’m feeling a bit chilled this morning.
Got the flu shot in my left arm and Covid in the right arm, so:
Flu in the left of me, Covid in the right, here I am, stuck in the middle with you
If I’d thought about it, I’d have sung that for the tech who jabbed me, only the last part would have been “stuck with a needle by you.”
Another Scott
All respect to Josh, but Qevin isn’t gone because of the debt ceiling and CR votes.
He’s gone because he let a stupid concession on one guy calling a vacate-the-Speaker vote be policy, over explicit agreements with Democrats and the President on the shape of the FY24 budget. He would still be Speaker if he had kept his word to people with the votes to protect him, rather than surrendering to crazy people who just want to burn everything down.
Qevin’s gone because he didn’t know how to count votes, and how to get votes that he had to have.
“But the GQP caucus would have thrown him out if he didn’t do what they wanted!!1” They threw him out anyway.
“He’s a prisoner to the RWNJs” is lazy thinking and takes away his agency. And Josh should know better. Giving in to the bomb-throwers won’t change their behavior. And it hasn’t thus far.
Cheers,
Scott.
Matt McIrvin
There is an alternative, though: just have no Speaker. Either get by with some sort of motion to empower Patrick McHenry to do stuff as acting Speaker, or (and I’m sure the Freedom Caucus regard this as either a best-case scenario, or at least viable) just do nothing through 2024, let the government shut down and decay from lack of funding and hope the resulting chaos hurts Joe Biden more than it hurts Republicans.
OzarkHillbilly
So, the sheriff and the entire jail staff are currently in jail for endangering the fetus. Right? Right? Stop laughing dammit, this is not a pro-life joke.
Another Scott
@Matt McIrvin: Yeah, I expect they’ll make McHenry Speaker just to get this stuff out of the news. Something something possession is 9/10 of the law. But it’s still going to take a while (no sooner than next Friday, probably later – it’s still too far away from the drop-dead date of Friday November 17 when the CR runs out for the bomb-throwers to give up).
“We can too get stuff done! We’re a serious political party with POWER! See, we elected a Speaker! You don’t see the Demonrats doing that, do you??!! Vote for me, 2024!!”
The House will still be mostly dysfunctional, even with a GQP Speaker. We’ll just be back to where we were before Gaetz called the vacate vote.
Cheers,
Scott.
Jackie
@Matt McIrvin: The GQP are a cowardly lot; and, ironically, any threats they get will be from the SAME group already targeting Dems: TIFG supporters.
trnc
@lowtechcyclist: Bah-da-BING!
I don’t generally have any reaction to vaccines beyond the soreness around the shot, but I felt pretty lousy a couple of years ago after I got the flu and shingles shots at the same time so now I spread out any shots by at least a week.
lowtechcyclist
@Another Scott:
At the time, everyone said it was a 45-day CR. 11/17 would be day 48. I’m confused.
Danielx
@Another Scott:
Speaking of Gaetz, little asshole has been keeping a pretty low profile in the last few days, at least by comparison with the last few weeks. I’m getting the feeling he’s pretty damn unpopular with his colleagues at the moment.
trnc
Wouldn’t that rule change require as many votes as actually electing him speaker?
WaterGirl
@Baud: A whole month?
I thought there was a law against cruel and unusual punishment.
WaterGirl
@Jackie: haha. i wrote my comment below before seeing your comment.
EarthWindFire
That Lindy Li is so cute. She hasn’t figured out that law and order is for the little people./GOP
@Matt McIrvin: Them not having a speaker and shoveling the shitshow to Joe is what I’m afraid of. Our populace has short enough memories that it could work.
hueyplong
@Danielx: Gaetz’s continuing existence is probably why GOPers have not yet let Jordan have it. Who knows, maybe offering the No voters Gaetz’s head is Jordan’s path to victory.
Ten Bears
The upshot of the last ten days is they have effectively shut down the government
Almost as if that were part of a plan …
NotMax
Might prove an interesting diversion for some. A short history of automotive coachbuilding.
Or, as the narrator so aptly puts it in relation to the 1930s, “aerodynamic pornography.”
Mousebumples
PSA – postcards and music thread tonight! 8pm blog time.
I’ll be out of town at a brewery tasting and tour, but happy writing to those that can make it. 😊
Another Scott
@lowtechcyclist: Yeah, the 45 day number was lazy. The bill – HR-5860 says through November 17.
October 1 – November 17 = 47 days (48 days if you count November 17).
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: Republicans Dan Newhouse and David Valadeo voted to impeach Trump and they are still walking the Earth. In fact, they are walking the House floor. Four other Republican Impeachers lost primaries and four others retired rather than face primaries.
So I think political survival, not personal survival, is the issue for prospective Republican defectors. And I wonder just how big an issue a Speaker vote will be in the upcoming primary season. In saliency, It will fall somewhere in between a vote passing the Debt Ceiling bill and a vote for Impeachment.
But it will be a fairly big issue, which is why I think the pool of potential defectors is limited to members planning to retire and the few running in jungle primary states. I think Don Bacon (NE) is in the former group and there probably are others.
Valadeo (CA), Duarte (CA) and Newhouse (WA) are in the latter group. Those three would probably benefit by defecting from this chaotic caucus.
gene108
@Matt McIrvin:
I don’t think it’s about the politics of the state a Democrat is from that determines the intensity of death threats, rather it’s the negative attention the Democrat gets from right-wing media that is a deciding factor.
AOC’s talked about security measures she takes due to the death threats. Eric Swalwell, IIRC, posted some of the death threats his office has received online.
Nancy Pelosi’s husband was actually attacked by someone wanting to hurt her.
lowtechcyclist
@Another Scott:
Thanks for clarifying!
Ksmiami
@OzarkHillbilly: the Federal government needs to arrest every single one of the miscreants that enabled this to happen. She deserved protection under the law and got torture.
Anyway
@OzarkHillbilly:
This story makes me soooo mad. Locking her up in miserable conditions without access to medical care under the pretext of concern for her baby is so messed up. Can’t believe it happened.
Anyway
@Ten Bears:
How so? Government is funded through Nov 17, executive branch and courts are working… New funding for Israel and Ukraine is held upthe but that’s next year’s $$$ they have previously approved current funding. House doesn’t do THAT much …
Pete Mack
This is good news for John McCain.
Another Scott
Meanwhile, …
+1
Cheers,
Scott.
Lacuna Synecdoche
Olivia Beavers via Anne Laurie @ Top:
Wikipedia:
I’m old enough to remember when Republicans said abortion should be regulated “state by state,” not “by the Supreme Court.”
It’s almost feels like you can’t believe anything a Republican ever says.
Professor Bigfoot
@lowtechcyclist: ahhhh. Thank you.
obligatory “…fuckin’ Republicans…”
OzarkHillbilly
@Lacuna Synecdoche: How can you tell a Republican is lying?
Geminid
@Anyway: Yes, it’s one of two houses of Congress that is shutdown, not the “government.” This is a potential funding problem, but it is not an emergency. That’s why I think House Democrats should hang tough and not buy into the idea of empowering McHenry as a temporary Speaker with powers beyond enabling a Speaker vote.
And Dems should also refrain from helping Republicans put a member from this sorry Republican caucus into the Speaker’s chair. If Republicans can’t fill it by themselves, then Democrats will fill it with the help of Republican defectors.
NotMax
@Another Scott
Go fish. ;)
RSA
I was wondering about the possibility of one of the least conservative Republicans running for Speaker, arranging for power-sharing with the Democrats, and getting D votes plus a dozen more R votes. But then I looked at rankings of House members with respect to ideology. I don’t think there are any good candidates.
SteveinPHX
@Chief Oshkosh: I’ve never seen either one of them in any place at any time.
prostratedragon
OzarkHillbilly@27: “What’s Candyman?”
Another Scott
RollCall.com is in the running as champion of gaslighting its readers.
None of these guys have any history, you see. They’re all just oh-so-serious lawmakers who are just having some difficulty earning support as a consequence of another chaotic week. Once the stars align, raw feelings are soothed, and the Oracle makes their pronouncement next week, everything will be fine with puppies and gumdrops and rainbows and champagne wishes and caviar dreams.
(groucho-roll-eyes.gif)
Grr…,
Scott.
Barbara
@lowtechcyclist: There is no law that says they have to be there at all when the vote takes place. They can miss their flight, have an unforeseen illness, etc.
“Just hop on the bus Gus, find a new key Lee and get yourself free.”
It takes courage and these people are fucking cowards
Another Scott
@NotMax:
I very vaguely remember that now!
Batman was so subversive – teaching kids about the weirdness of English and such.
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
schrodingers_cat
Am I the only one who is tired of these creepy malevolent clowns?
Barbara
@schrodingers_cat: No. My hope is that the prolonged high decibel chaos will increase the number of people who are similarly tired.
schrodingers_cat
@Barbara: I hope they either vote against Rs or at least stay home.
OzarkHillbilly
Suspected bomb on Panama City flight actually a diaper, police say
I did not have that one on my 2023 Headline Bingo card.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Are you running to be the next Speaker? Compromise candidate Baud.
Geminid
@schrodingers_cat: This Republican caucus is like a clown car towing a flaming dumpster down a steep grade. They’re pumping the failing brakes as they pass the sign saying, “DANGEROUS CURVE AHEAD.”
schrodingers_cat
@Geminid: Yeah but that fast car is hurtling towards us. We are in its path of destruction.
Ken
@Another Scott: @NotMax: XKCD had a fun variant of that, where he explains how to pronounce a word: “T as in buffet, U as in minute, …”
schrodingers_cat
@OzarkHillbilly: My pencils got here this week! They are gorgeous. What should I do with them first, landscape or portrait.
Speaking of art. From Hannah Karlzon’s Daydreams
My work in progress. Some final details still to be added.
Geminid
@schrodingers_cat: I think it’s the clown car that is facing destruction, not us.
Ken
@schrodingers_cat: So it’s a variation of the trolley problem. Would you throw the switch, knowing it would send the entire Republican House conference hurtling off a cliff to flaming dumpster-fire death? Or would you let the clown car hurtle on and destroy the United States?
Hmm, this needs some work to turn it into an ethical dilemma (as Miss Bianca notes below).
zhena gogolia
@Baud: Can we contact the FBI?
Miss Bianca
@Ken: Wait, that’s supposed to be a dilemma?
ETA: That’s not even a *choice*!
SiubhanDuinne
@Ken:
There is an alphabet picture book for kids (“Worst Alphabet Book Ever”) called P is for Pterodactyl.
Geminid
@Ken: Republicans have the option of jumping off the car before it hurtles off the cliff. The Democratic bus is traveling a safe distance behind, and will stop and give rides to the defectors.
Ken
@Miss Bianca: Sorry, I must have edited after you saw it — I’ve added the choice, and a note that it needs work.
H.E.Wolf
@Baud:
Strength to your sword arm. See you when you get back!
SiubhanDuinne
@Baud:
Not even in ALL CAPS?
Ken
@Geminid: That sounds more like it, though it’s moving away from the trolley problem into prisoner’s dilemma territory.
Come to think, it’s rather similar to the Georgia election interference trial, where the first few co-defendants to turn state’s evidence can expect much better deals than the later ones.
OzarkHillbilly
Hooray!
Whatever strikes your fancy. Have fun with them.
Ken
How about one of those clever ambiguous drawings that’s one thing in portrait, and another when you turn it to landscape?
Anyway
Quordle in six! Yeah. Good going for a lazy gray Saturday. I put some grass seed (“guaranteed to grow in shady spots”) down last week and am hoping for rain.
Steeplejack
@schrodingers_cat:
Excellent! Very subtle tonal variations.
WaterGirl
@Anyway: It’s almost like they care about punishment and control and not women and babies.
Where was this woman’s lawyer in all of this?
WaterGirl
@Anyway: I have the best luck with grass seed when I put down a small layer of “lawn soil” and then sowing the seeds.
schrodingers_cat
@Ken: I am not that talented 😭.
New Deal democrat
@Ken:
I think it is more like an “avoidance-avoidance conflict.”
To wit, “in psychology, aoidance-avoidance conflict is defined as times when an individual wants to avoid making a decision between two or more options that are all objectionable.”
Human beings, like all animals, are hard wired to avoid recognizing an actual loss. This is the same idea why gamblers sometimes double down after losing a bet.
There is no alternative open to the GOP which does not involve accepting an actual loss. There will be much gnashing and writhing before the least worst choice choice is taken.
OzarkHillbilly
@WaterGirl: If she had a public defender, they were probably in court representing one of their other 377 clients.
schrodingers_cat
@Steeplejack: Thanks so much for your thoughtful critique.
Geminid
@Anyway: I’ve got a 100 sq.ft. bare spot that I hope to seed today. It’s still a good time to plant grass in Central Virginia, as the ground shouldn”t get too cold before mid-December at the earliest.
I have some annual rye grass seed that I’ll mix in with the fescue mix. The rye grass will jump up in five days and give some cover to the fescue, which sprouts more slowly.
I rode over to Harrisonburg Thursday with my friend Debbie and we visited the Rockinham Co-op. I got 2 lbs. of rye grass seed there for 92 cents. They were out of crimson clover seed, but I’ll pick some up later. Crimson clover will make good Christmas presents for my gardening friends.
Shalimar
@Another Scott: The 45 days wasn’t lazy. It was a lie to “honor” Trump. I assume you mean they knew he and his followers would be too lazy to check the actual bill language. Which they have been as far as I have read.
schrodingers_cat
@OzarkHillbilly: Most likely it will be a portrait or a nature study. I am too impatient to do a landscape with pencils alone
p.a.
Any deal with Rethugs won’t be worth the paper it’s written on, even if there are “enforcement” clauses. So IDK what a solution would look like.
Another Scott
@schrodingers_cat: @Ken:
I vote for kinda both – maybe the Mirror Room.
(from Trick Art Museums, via Akiyoshi’s Illusion Pages.)
Have fun!
Cheers,
Scott.
Chief Oshkosh
@SteveinPHX: That cinches it. They’re both someone’s dogs posting on the internet.
Ken
@New Deal democrat: Thank you, I didn’t know “avoidance-avoidance”. I will file it next to “Buridan’s Ass“, the situation where there are two equally good choices.
Something else I just learned: when you type “ass between two” into google, the suggested search completions cannot be unseen.
Ksmiami
@p.a.: Republican seppuku. This is the way.
lowtechcyclist
@OzarkHillbilly:
Has a pulse?
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat: Wow! Gorgeous!
OzarkHillbilly
@Shalimar: Whoooosh! It went right over my head, just like all the rest of their penny ante celebrations of that disaster.
Geminid
@p.a.: Yes, it it would be hard to make an enforceable agreement here. But Republican defectors can ratify an agreement with Democratic leaders by casting votes for a mutually acceptable Speaker.
OzarkHillbilly
@lowtechcyclist: That involves physical contact, something I try to avoid.
bjacques
@Ken: MULTI-TRACK DRIFTING!!
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/multi-track-drifting
WaterGirl
@OzarkHillbilly: You would think one might especially watch out for your pregnant clients in prison!
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: Thanks! I tried pointillism with markers!
@OzarkHillbilly: I also got Crayola’s Colors of the world in markers and pencils, so I will do a portrait with Crayola and Derwent pencils. Portrait it is. May be a pet portrait or not.. I suck at drawing animals. I think I need some anatomy drawing lessons before I can attempt a realistic pet portrait.
Geminid
@OzarkHillbilly: It flew over a lot of people’s heads, probably because 45 days is frequently used as a time limit in such matters.
WaterGirl
@OzarkHillbilly: Flew right over my head, too!
Yarrow
@Barbara:
I’m sick of them but then I see tweets like this and wonder wtf is going on.
This tweet was part of a larger discussion about how governments that were in charge during the pandemic have largely been tossed out when they stand for reelection. Canada, France and Greece were noted as exceptions. The thread started with a tweet about NZ voting against their Labour government and electing their most conservative government in years.
lowtechcyclist
@OzarkHillbilly:
It may have been just a diaper, but I bet it was loaded!
louc
Speaking of clown cars, read/listen to this and point and laugh at Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: I don’t know how accurate the polling is. There was some polling showing Biden behind that had oversampled Rs. Plus how many people actually answer their phone for pollsters? I don’t. Let’s assume that the polling is accurate. Most people are not paying attention to politics right now. The election is more than a year away. A lifetime in politicis. People like to blame however is in charge for their woes.
Wasserman and other MSM concern trolls can stuff it as far as I am concerned. When Obama was running for reelection I remember being inundated by such think pieces as well.
Mr. Bemused Senior
Lips move. [c’mon that is an old one! ETA: as is proved by the fact I remember it]
zhena gogolia
@schrodingers_cat: My phone just flashed at me: “The Kamala Harris problem, and why the White House won’t talk about it.” WHY AM I GETTING CONCERN TROLL ALERTS ON MY FUCKING PHONE? I almost smashed it to smithereens.
OzarkHillbilly
@WaterGirl: PDs are generally overwhelmed by their case loads, for most just keeping track of their court dates is a full time job. A friend of mine was a PD in the Southern District of Illinois. She lost heart when she came to the realization that she was doing little more than placing bandages on gaping wounds and that that was all her job would ever be.
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat: None of us know how accurate the polling is until we see actual results. Recently it’s seemed to be all over the place. Wasserman has an interesting thread right now on who the electorate will be. People are pushing back on some of what he’s saying. We can’t get too comfortable because of the special election results, that’s for sure.
schrodingers_cat
@zhena gogolia: I had totally abandoned watching TV News for almost 2 years until Ds retook the House because I was afraid I was going to smash the damn TV everytime the grotesque orange ogre showed up on the screen.
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: Both Wasserman and Amy Spiky Hair love Republicans and their talking points. I am not complacent about our chances most Ds have PTSD from 2016 but I sometimes think that the MSM is actively trying to put its thumb on the scale for the Racist Party.
This doom talk is to depress the turnout among Ds. No matter what you do you are fucked so just die already is what these journobros and their sisters, seem to be broadcasting. They really piss me off (DW and AW)
Mike in Pasadena
@OzarkHillbilly: Pro life. Ha ha ha ha ha ha..
OzarkHillbilly
@Geminid: 45 days seemed strange to me because it wasn’t 30 or 60 days, it wasn’t 4 or 6 or 8 weeks either. To me it is natural to pick one of the 5 I’ve noted, not 6 weeks and 3 (or 5 or 6) days.
OzarkHillbilly
@Mr. Bemused Senior: I think most of us know the punch line, folks were just having a little fun with it..
Mr. Bemused Senior
@OzarkHillbilly: I’m just playing along. I applied for the job of “straight man” for Baud 20XX but I never got a response. [probably filtered by an AI.] So I’m still working at it.
schrodingers_cat
@Another Scott: Thanks interesting links. I will bookmark them.
OzarkHillbilly
No no no, it’s abstract art!
To be a little more serious, it can’t hurt.
CaseyL
Since this is an open thread: Anyone interested in following or seeing (safely) today’s annular eclipse? YouTube has quite a few channels following it. All, alas, have voiceovers – but you can easily turn off the sound
ETA: You’re absolutely not supposed to watch it directly.
Matt McIrvin
@Yarrow: But Trump was also in charge during the pandemic, and got tossed out once already, in part over that. So people are going to vote him back in now?
It makes a kind of sense. People are nostalgic for the time before the pandemic and the last few years before it were in Trump’s administration. But it’s not as if he can turn back time.
When Trump was first elected, a lot of people went stomping around loudly announcing that liberals and women and minorities were going to have to shut up now, ’cause Trump was in charge and the hammer was coming down! I imagine some of those same people imagine that anyone telling people to be careful about COVID or get a vaccine is going to have to shut up when Trump comes back in. And, you know, he’ll end all the lockdowns and mandates that don’t exist anyway.
Geminid
@OzarkHillbilly: Forty five days is half of 90, and is used a lot in contracts etc., I think. Considering how much time the two houses are in session, I might call 45 days a “Congressional Month.
And I think there was a time period written into the Debt Ceiling deal whereby 2% spending cuts kick in 90 days after the fiscal years ends on Oct. 1. The 45-day period would be the halfway point..
OzarkHillbilly
That could be a tough gig. He plays it straight so often he’d be stealing all your lines. :-)
Mr. Bemused Senior
@OzarkHillbilly: I like a challenge.
OzarkHillbilly
I don’t due contracts, that’s what I had a union for. Your comment got me to thinking that about all the number combinations I used quite naturally as a carpenter, such as 16, 32, 48, onward, or the 3-4-5 rule, or a 4/12, 6/12, 12/12 pitch, etc etc.
Another Scott
Meanwhile, … FastCompany.com:
(Emphasis added.)
And that’s just one company that has been stashing profits overseas.
Tens of billions here, tens of billions there, pretty soon you’re talking about real money…
Cheers,
Scott.
Geminid
@OzarkHillbilly: I think the standard measuring system you describe is well-suited for contruction because it is so easily divisible. Roof pitches are not exactly divisible, but I think it is easier to lay out rafters for an 8/12 pitched roof if those proportions are used rather the equivalent angles in degrees.
I know builders use the metric system in other countries and in larger projects here. But for houses and other small structures, I don’t think we lose by not using the metric system and probably gain some.
Ruckus
@Lacuna Synecdoche:
That almost is doing a hell of a lot of work here…..
More than I believe Websters gives it credit for…..
Geminid
I look at the question of whether the 45-day CR was a sinister Trump tribute as a case of the dog that didn’t bark. If this was some kind of homage to Trump, he and his adherents has been uncharacteristically quiet about it.
Ruckus
@schrodingers_cat:
No, but I wouldn’t rate it as tired, more like amazed that they can actually continue to breathe with brains of mostly moldy mush.
bbleh
@Nina: yes. It’s gotta be a floor vote, and anyone can call for the yeas and nays (ie roll call). That could change *IF* they changed the rules.
Subsole
@Frankensteinbeck:
That’s an interesting angle.
It will always sadden me that I am reduced to practicing Kremlinology on my fellow Americans…
@Matt McIrvin:
Well, I certainly didn’t have enough cash to hire professional security when I was working in the Basin. I mostly just had to shut up and blend in. And I was someone who could actually blend in.
So, that’s gonna be a nope from me, dawg.
No, when it comes to danger levels, these sniveling little pukes are not even in the same solar system as the folks they routinely whip up hate trains against.
Subsole
@Baud:
Get his ass, Baud.
Ruckus
@Geminid:
I thought that they were mistaking the gas pedal for the brake pedal.
Barbara
@Yarrow: Dave Wasserman is problematic. Not incompetent, just kind of not necessarily applying logical deduction in an evenhanded manner.
On the larger issue, of post-pandemic governments, we sometimes see trends that aren’t actually there — it’s not unusual for democratically elected governments to swing back and forth whether there is a pandemic, economic distress or whatever else is going on. Claiming to discern patterns is an annoying habit pundits like Wasserman have. What’s especially annoying about him is that he claims to base his analysis on data.
TS
@schrodingers_cat:
Just had to fix that – Been actively promoting the GOP since at least the 1968 election – probably since forever.
Ruckus
@Geminid:
When the clown car blows up there will be collateral damage…
Clowns everywhere.
West of the Rockies
It’s hilarious (and ludicrous): Jackass Jordan braying that “America wants him” when his own damn party in the House does not.
Also curious how we’re suddenly hearing zilch about Hunter or (cue scary music) the impeachment. They’ve shredded anything resembling momentum on those issues.
Ruckus
@New Deal democrat:
That always happens when a group of people think their greatness exceeds the lowest possible positive value when it actually is a large negative value.
Mai Naem mobile
@Another Scott: the article also says Microsoft.is going to now appeal the amount because they’re saying the IRS is inflating it by $10 billion. The appeal is supposed to take several years. So if you say another 4 years on appeals, that’s 15 years for Microsoft to finally come up with the money. In 15 years they would have made the money probably twice over. Where’s the deterrence in that?
Kathleen
@schrodingers_cat: The Beltway Political BobbiIng Heads of Pundlandia are all in the tank for the fascists and nothing will convince me otherwise. I refuse to watch any national “news”. They want to destroy Democrats and democracy and I loathe and despise them.
Matt McIrvin
@Subsole:
A Republican congressperson vs., say, a trans woman or a Palestinian-American in the same district… yeah.
Another Scott
@Mai Naem mobile: Yup.
The penalties and fees for dragging it out need to be much more onerous.
Grr…,
Scott.
Barbara
@Matt McIrvin: I won’t link, but there is a WaPo article about a transwoman’s experience belonging to a sorority at the University of Wyoming. Along with events that are infuriating and humiliating, there have been doxing and actual threats. She has no personal security detail. It is heartening that she has also received a lot of support from the community, including alumni.
Sure Lurkalot
@zhena gogolia:
If you follow/subscribe, turn off notifications for FTFNYT, the Atlantic and CNN who all have had “Kamala flailing” headlines this week. The fix is in.
Shalimar
@OzarkHillbilly: We had some discussions here when it was first proposed about whether 45 was just a convenient number to prevent a shutdown before the Virginia elections or a specific nod to Trump. Or both. That they kept referring to 45 days even after the bill was written with 48 made it obvious what they were doing.
Ruckus
@OzarkHillbilly:
Would it help to know that the last job I did as a machinist the tolerance was +/- 25 millionths of an inch?
Mai Naem mobile
@schrodingers_cat: i think Wasserman is just a numbers guy. His numbers may nit be right but I think that’s just because polling still hasn’t caught up with cell phones and social media. Amy Walters on the other hand is definitely an R fluffer.
Ken
@Ruckus: Working on the Tesla Cybertruck, I assume?
zhena gogolia
@Sure Lurkalot: I think it’s “Apple News”? I never signed up for it.
Steeplejack
@zhena gogolia:
Did you watch Mad Men via Apple TV? Maybe that. (I know it’s on AMC, but I think there is an Apple TV gateway.)
Barbara
@Mai Naem mobile: Wasserman pretends to be “just” a numbers guy, but he was also one of those who predicted a red wave in 2022. I don’t know his actual thinking of course, but it seems like he’s one of those people who is determined to prove that he is neutral even if it means he ends up being wrong.
@Sure Lurkalot: I think that primaries and contests are addictive to the media, even if pushing a narrative that sets up a contest for who will replace Kamala Harris seems more like sniffing glue than doing powdered cocaine. But I assume that’s what is motivating it, probably pushed by those whose livelihoods depend on having lots of those kinds of contests.
Mai Naem mobile
@zhena gogolia: the Kamala thing has been going on since she was in the primary. I honestly don’t know if its because expectations for her were so so high(female Barack Obama) or because her campaign infrastructure was supposed to have been a bit of a shitshow. There were the Russian bots that specifically went after her. This continued into the Veepship. She’s come a long way. She’s a much better speaker than she was.
Ruckus
@Ken:
I beg your pardon!
No actually not.
I’ve never actually done any work in any way for that clown nor would I buy one of his cars. I dislike grown ass adults who act like children still in diapers and think that’s normal.
Shalimar
@Sure Lurkalot: It isn’t even just politics. The gamergate racist misogynistic assholes have had major hate against Brie Larson for years, so because i like games and movies I have to frequently weed out trolling stories about how her movies are going to tank or Disney is replacing her in Marvel movies. It’s pathetic how many outlets they have catering to them with these stories.
Steeplejack
In useful audio news, I was this week years old when a friend showed me that if you press the microphone in Google’s search function you get a screen with a “Search a song” button that is amazingly fast and accurate for identifying what you are listening to—much better than the website version of Shazam that I was using.
(Tested on my Android phone. Can’t find a similar function in Google on my Win11 computer.)
Mai Naem mobile
@Barbara: I remember some polling person saying that it’s going to take a few cycles post 2016 for the polling industry to figure out how to do polling correctly. I don’t think right now you could even depend on the last pollster who got it right because it’s just dumb luck that they got the polling correct for that particular election for that particular set of events.
Steeplejack
@Shalimar:
That’s sad. I’m not a big fan of the Marvel superhero movies—they’re generally clunky and simple-minded—but Captain Marvel was by far one of the best, and Brie Larson was excellent in it.
zhena gogolia
@Steeplejack: No, I bought it on Amazon Prime.
Steeplejack
It’s gray, rainy and barely 60° here in NoVA. I might grab a catnap before going out on my Trader Joe’s run later. Ideal weather for it.
Ken
@Ruckus: Sorry. I was riffing on some reporting from a month or so ago, where the latest unveiling of the Cybertruck* didn’t go well, because people immediately noticed that the body panels didn’t align. Like, by a quarter inch or more. So Musk sent off instructions to the factory that they needed to work to “sub 10 micron accuracy”, and was justly mocked.
* It’s up to something like 5 unveilings over the last decade. They should rename it Salome.
Eyeroller
@Mai Naem mobile: Polling caught up with cell phones years ago. What they may not be able to overcome is the apparent fact that hardly anybody answers their phones anymore for an unknown number. And pollsters don’t leave voicemails.
Mai Naem mobile
@Eyeroller: if you’re down to people answering phones you’re probably down to mostly older people with landlines which would probably skew more conservative.
Steeplejack
Listening to WBGO (Newark, NJ) as I nod off. Lisa Stansfield with one of the all-time great FAFO songs: “All Around the World.”
mrmoshpotato
Suck on that, Kevin.
Eyeroller
@Mai Naem mobile: Even older people have cellphones now and many have gotten rid of landlines (I finally did). My assumption is that older people are more likely to answer the phone. But I would think pollsters could adjust for that also; they ask about age. I think it comes down to increasing difficulty getting a good sample that is truly (nearly) random. I read somewhere that the number of calls they must make before somebody answers has gone up a lot. And regardless of age, people who answer the phone are likely to be demographically different from those who don’t.
Matt McIrvin
@Steeplejack: Well, it looks like the sequel, The Marvels, is definitely happening, in which she teams up with Iman Vellani as Ms. Marvel and Teyonah Paris as Monica Rambeau. Looks like fun though it may go over the heads of much of the target audience since two of these three characters are from Disney+ TV shows.
Matt McIrvin
@Mai Naem mobile: It’s only a matter of time before they decide the right thing to do is to feed a wad of polling and election results data into a large language model and believe whatever prognostication it farts out. That will be the fad for one cycle.
RevRick
@RSA: In the Senate, there’s a chasm between Joe Manchin and Susan Collins. In the House, there’s a chasm between Jared Golden (ME) and Brian Fitzpatrick (PA).
A House coalition would have to figure out how to bridge that chasm. And perhaps it would require a minimalist approach to doing the work. Pass a CR for the rest of the fiscal year and funding for Ukraine and Israel. And that’s it.
Steeplejack
@Matt McIrvin:
I’ll be interested to see how it turns out.
SFAW
@Baud:
” … but if you do, make sure you DO IT IN ALL CAPS. He LOVES THAT.”
wjca
Has it occurred to them that, if they set up their phones with a Caller ID that said something like U-GOV POLL, they might get more people picking up?
Soprano2
@OzarkHillbilly: I’m shocked that they did that to a white woman.
Soprano2
@schrodingers_cat: No, you are not.
Soprano2
@WaterGirl: People still tell me I’m wrong when I say that the anti-abortion movement is actually about controlling people’s sex lives, not saving “babies”.
Mai Naem mobile
In other really important findings I finally figured out Irish Spring soap has been shrinkflating. I thought it was my imagination but I found an old pre pandemic 3 pack stashed in the back of a drawer. Definitely bigger. I mean visibly bigger. Wtf? These companies are shameless. I am wondering when they’ll reduce the bars to the hotel size tiny soaps. Also, jockey underwear. The quality has gone down the toilet. The fabric is so thin how I could probably flush it down the toilet and it wouldn’t clog up the toilet.
Mai Naem mobile
@Soprano2: not people’s sex lives. Women’s sex lives and women’s lives. No birth control = multiple kids = woman hanging onto baby daddy out of necessity.
sdhays
The phone system is horribly broken. The vast majority of calls I get are from unknown numbers from all over, almost certainly spoofed to engage in some kind of scam. I never answer anything from an unknown number.
Like email and regular mail, it’s like being buried in shit.
lowtechcyclist
@Mr. Bemused Senior:
That punch line is out of date – they might be posting stuff online (e.g. tweeting). Plenty of ways nowadays to lie without moving one’s lips!
Hamlet of Melnibone
I think people are expecting more accuracy from polling than it has ever been able to give. A 3% polling error is really normal. The polls for the last few cycles have been about that far off. Those aren’t major polling errors, they are just the nature of polling.
Mai Naem mobile
@OzarkHillbilly: more on Etowah County here. I wonder how much this has to do with the money they get for jailing these women.
https://www.al.com/news/anniston-gadsden/2023/07/one-alabama-county-pledged-to-crack-down-on-pregnant-drug-users-ten-years-later-has-it-gone-too-far.html#:~:text=Police%20in%20Alabama%20can%20arrest,2015%20to%202023%20involved%20women
Mr. Bemused Senior
@lowtechcyclist: my grandchildren inform me I am “so old school.”
2liberal
I’ve gone on a news blackout, it’s just so horrible out there. That includes BJ where I’m usually on multiple visit per day lurk mode.
smith
@2liberal: I managed that for 3+ years after the Asshole Apocalypse in 2016, but was eventually sucked back in by first the pandemic, then the insurrection, then the war in Ukraine. I keep hoping to go back to semi-blissful ignorance, but the existential threats just keep coming.
lowtechcyclist
@Shalimar:
Not sure how referring to 45 days even though it’s 48 days made anything obvious. Can you elaborate?
The only thing 45 v. 48 was doing that I see was to ensure that the shutdown happens on a Friday night rather than a Tuesday night. Friday gives them that weekend cushion, an extra 2 days after the CR expires, to pull things together. If it had actually been Tuesday (which I thought it was until corrected by Another Scott – thanks again, guy!), then the next day would have been a work day, so no leeway at all.
The Virginia election would be before the shutdown, if there is one, regardless of whether the CR is 45 or 48 days. So that doesn’t seem to make a difference.
And if it was supposed to be some coded praise of TFG, like Geminid said, it’s the dog that didn’t bark.
smith
Before we leave the topic of the crisis in the inability of pundits to do simple math, how come so few of them were able to correctly perform 217 minus 152 after the second vote on Gym Jordan? Every time I try it, the answer turns out to be 65, but our media betters rarely give that number, preferring apparently, anything from 50 to 60.
And while I’m in curmudgeon, mood, how come I keep seeing that Congress has to approve “aide” to Ukraine?
Ruckus
@Ken:
They should just give up on this ugly POS that I doubt will ever turn a profit if they do sell any. It’s ugly for ugly’s sake and in no way meets the Actual needs of people who NEED a pickup truck. And the people that almost never carry anything in the bed of their pickups but spend mid to upper 5 figures on them would never purchase one because it isn’t “manly” enough. And yes I’ve owned work pickups for yes, actual work.
Ken
@smith: For the first question, if you give up treating reporters as, well, reporters and treat them as a kind of parrot, much will become clear.
For the second question, copy editors cost money.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@OzarkHillbilly: i know, I know (jumping up and down with my hand in the air). Their lips are moving.
Juju
@sdhays: I especially love the phone calls that come in with the ID, United States. That narrows things down so much. I’m waiting for the one that comes in under the ID Planet Earth.
catclub
No. The government is the executive branch when it comes to shutting down.
lowtechcyclist
@Steeplejack:
Same here in Calvert County, except I already had a pretty good nap in the late morning, so probably not doing another this afternoon.
Felt like death warmed over this morning, in the wake of yesterday afternoon’s flu and Covid shots, but I’m feeling almost back to normal now. This was a good day to be the day *after* the vaccinations, since it was going to be a lazy Saturday any which way.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan): welcome to the club.
NotMax
@Juju
Cell phone is shut off 99% of the time (broke down and finally got one a year ago for use on the annual NY trip). Landline at home does not have caller ID, however it is plugged into an answering machine. Anyone who knows me also knows if I’m at home I’ll pick up when I hear them beginning to leave a message.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Mr. Bemused Senior: exactly! Me too.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Mr. Bemused Senior: ah, you see me :-). Seniors unite!
Ken
@Ruckus: Something I read at one of those sites that reviews bad movies has stuck with me: “They violate rules of cinema that you might not even realize you knew, until you saw them broken.”
I have seen much the same sentiment in reviews of the Cybertruck, involving the unwritten standards for automotive design. (Plus of course quite a few written standards, such as those regarding the bed size and shape for compatibility with camper shells.)
Juju
@NotMax: I didn’t know they still made landline phones without caller id. Is your landline phone a rotary dial?
lowtechcyclist
@Soprano2:
There’s 8 billion people in this world who everyone agrees are persons, are human lives. And the “pro-life” contingent doesn’t give a damn if any of them live or die. Given that that’s the case, why should anyone believe their supposed concern for fetuses has anything to do with reverence for human life?
And the laws they’ve been passing in red states in the wake of Dobbs spell it out in unavoidable terms: just like you say, it’s all about controlling women and their sex lives.
Buncha worthless liars, they are. Unfuck ’em, as George Carlin would say.
Ruckus
@Eyeroller:
I’m an old and I haven’t had a land line for over 20 yrs. And the only reason I had one for about 5 years prior was because I couldn’t get internet at that location without phone service, the phone company provided internet. I can’t remember ever using that phone. I probably did once or twice.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@OzarkHillbilly: and then there are the natural numbers associated with computers and programming, mostly variations on 16, 32, 64, 128 etc.
Yarrow
@Juju: You can still buy old fashioned phones with cords.
NotMax
@Ken
L’Oeuf Électrique, custom runabout from the 1940s.
;)
Geminid
@Hamlet of Melnibone: This polling discussion got me to look up the Wason Center poll (of registered Virginia voters) for the 2021 Governor election. The election was November 2, and the Center published their last poll October 27. It showed McAuliffe leading Youngkin 49-48%, with a margin of error +/-3.5%. Youngkin won by a little over 2% I believe.
Trend lines from an August 6 poll through an Oct. 8 poll to the one published Oct. 27 showed Youngkin gaining on McAuliffe. So maybe the snapshot taken right before Oct. 27 did not capture voters who broke late. It might show that trend is maybe more signicant than the actual numbers stated, which I believe.
The last 2022 Wason Center poll for Rep. Elaine Luria’s 2nd CD race against Jen Kiggans showed the tied at 45% each. Kiggans won by 3.4%, or by 10,119 out of 296,000 votes cast.
I think Elaine Luria might not run next year. A few weeks ago, a Ms. Smazol entered the race on the Democratic side. Smazol was endorsed by a number of Democratic officeholders including local heavy-hitters Senator L. Louise Lucas and Delegate Jay Jones. My guess is they checked with Ms. Luria first.
If Ms. Smasol wins she will be the 3rd retired Navy officer to represent the 2nd District since 2018. The Congressman before them was a retired Navy Petty Officer.
I can see why Elaine Luria wanted to take a break. She retired after 20 years as a Navy Surface Fleet officer not that long before she began her 2018 campaign, and has fought two close races since. She deserves some rest and recreation..
Yarrow
@lowtechcyclist:
It’s about controlling women. Period. Their sex lives are a means to control them because if they can’t access birth control or abortion, then they’ll be stuck with kids they maybe don’t want or can’t care for, and more tied to the baby daddy. And less able and likely to pursue education and a career.
It’s the keeping women in their place that’s the goal. Controlling sex is just one avenue to do it.
WaterGirl
@Soprano2: Shaking my head. They need to pay better attention!
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Eyeroller: i still have a landline, mostly because we live in a rural canyon and the cellphone coverage is weak (no sight lines to a cell tower). I need electricity and internet for my cellphone to work at home. And I need electricity for the internet to work. So I need a landline to call PG&E to report an outage. Our power went out 3x this last week. I think because of fire danger the lines cut out if anything falls on them. It’s a tradeoff I’m glad to make, even being a PITA.
Anyway, the landline calls are mostly auto-dialed solicitations, and I hang up if there isn’t a human answering me in a second or two. So even being an old liberal, I’m probably useless for polling. Plus I live in N CA so who cares what another liberal thinks.
NotMax
@Ken
Cybertruck not even all that original a design. A direct (albeit more perverse) descendant of the 1980 Citroen Karin.
lowtechcyclist
@Yarrow:
True. I was employing ‘and’ in its usual ‘both A and B’ meaning.
Geminid
@NotMax: The Cybertruck looks like an origami project that someone screwed up and neglected to throw away.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan): these days, also very large primes.
Juju
@Yarrow: I know that. I have a landline in the house. My mother prefers it because it is something more familiar to her than her iPhone. She never really understood the concept of touch the number means you’ve dialed the number, and with her dementia things are even worse. FaceTime and the text app look the same to her. I haven’t seen any phone that didn’t have some sort of caller id for at least 20 years.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Juju: that reminds me of many of the Final Jeopardy categories: Art history, Europe, etc. That narrows it down! Whereas the regular Jeopardy and Double Jeopardy categories are reasonably specific.
Geminid
@Geminid: If Tesla had put out a small pickup based on the Model 3 platform I bet they would have cleaned up.
Mai Naem mobile
I have a landline only because I remember way back during some emergency event that a landline will generally work even if other stuff won’t. It’s bundled in with the internet so it’s pretty much free.
Yarrow
@lowtechcyclist: I prefer to focus on “it’s about controlling women” and stop there. Everything else they do is support towards that goal.
When we separate out “it’s about controlling women’s sex lives” then it can leave the impression that Republicans and their supporters don’t want to control women’s ability to be independent, their access to education, their work, etc. But they do. That’s really their whole goal. I focus on the root issue.
It’s kind of amazing to me how many shocked looks I get when I say it. I explain and, at least with women, you can see the awareness dawn. It’s powerful.
lowtechcyclist
My wife and I still have a landline. It’s got its advantages, like ringing at phones scattered all over the house. I’m not yet at the point where my cell phone is glued to my hip.
But we may not have a landline much longer. I’ve had to call Verizon four different times since May for three distinctly different service interruptions – no dial tone, crackling on the line that made it hard to hear the other party, and loud tones on the line that made it impossible to hear the other party.
While I’ve probably lost less than a month of service between all these things, the underlying problem is that when you have that many service interruptions, you can’t rely on it anymore so you stop using it. OTOH, I still like having a non-cell number to give to businesses, so that few people besides friends and family have my cell number. On the other other hand, I’m paying $100/month for the landline, because Verizon won’t let me have the phone line without the Internet bundle, which is crazy.
Maybe I need to get one of those ultra-cheap, limited-data cell phones to replace the landline. But I need to see how my wife feels, I think she likes having a land line.
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Mai Naem mobile: yes! Landlines do not depend on electricity, whereas just about everything else does. In an emergency, or just a power outage, this can be usefu
Also, my husband, who is hard of hearing, can hear people on the landline but not on a cellphone for whatever reason.
Yarrow
@Mai Naem mobile: That’s only true if you have the old copper wire landline. If it’s bundled with the internet then it’s VOIP and if power/internet goes out your landline is out too. Unless you’ve got battery backup.
Copper wire landlines were great. They worked after disasters when other things didn’t. Don’t need power to make them work.
lowtechcyclist
@Yarrow:
I’m really not worried about the extent of my ability to influence others about this issue. I’m gonna talk about what I see, and controlling women’s sex lives is very specifically important to that crowd.
lowtechcyclist
@Yarrow:
Our service is bundled with internet, but we have had recent power outages where our land line still worked.
wjca
If the polling companies were being forthright, they would never, ever, say “X has 57% support.” They would say “Support for X is between 54% and 60%” (or whatever one standard deviation gives you). Even better would be to never give numbers which didn’t end in 5 or 0. Otherwise, it suggests precision which they know isn’t real.
Note that giving ranges like that also makes more obvious what “within the margin of error” never really got across. (Especially since, by the time it was reported, we didn’t see anything about what the margin of error actually was.)
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@Yarrow: our only problem with our landline is that it goes out every so often and the cause is always an animal got into one of the boxes and … built a nest, chewed the wires, whatever. When I report an outage, AT&T goes through a whole thing about if we have dogs on our property or locked gates, and I’m always, no, check the boxes on the line to find the problem.
Citizen Alan
@OzarkHillbilly: The problem with policing in this country is that too many people went into law enforcement because there were no jobs available as nazi concentration camp guard.
Citizen Alan
@schrodingers_cat: Is there any other kind?
Geminid
Saturdays are a slow time for AM radio, so third-tier radio show hosts like Larry Kudlow get a chance to hit the airwaves. I tuned in to Kudlows show for ten minutes and caught two good laugh lines:
Kudlow: “Jim Jordan is Hakeem Jeffries’ worst nightmare.”
*****
Guest: “Republicans have such a great chance for a blowout election in 2024!”
Yarrow
@lowtechcyclist: Luck you. Copper wire bundled with internet is absolutely not offered as in my area as far as I can tell. I have tried everything I can think of. But no.
Citizen Alan
@wjca: Not really a long term solution. It would take about a day at most before all the telemarketers just switched their own systems to identify as some polling outfit.
Citizen Alan
@Ruckus: For the last eighteen months that I lived in mississippi, I had phone service simply because you could not get internet service without it. But I did not have a phone plugged in anywhere in the house because in all that time, I never got a call except from a telemarketer.
Uncle Cosmo
For a coupla daze about a year ago I kept getting calls from a specific number and caller that I knew for certain were spoofed – because it was my own name and number (i.e., the very phone I was answering)!
(I have also gotten calls purporting to be from a phone with the same area code and prefix [next 3 digits] to make it seem like someone from the neighborhood that might fool one into thinking it was an important message [e.g., you left your car trunk open]. Yeah, I don’t answer them either – they can leave voice mail.)
Finally: Last week I got a call purporting to be from my bank, which I answered. When the caller asked for the number of my bank account I said, You’re calling me, shouldn’t you know that already? and when she stammered, I hung up and called the supposed originating number. Turned out no such call had been placed. Next time I got a call on that number I told the caller I would call the bank myself, and hung up. Haven’t gotten another call like that since.
Nor do I – if it’s legit they can leave voice mail and a number for a callback. It’s the instances like those above, where the caller pretends to be from some institution you’ve had dealings with in the past, that can be dangerous. Volunteer nothing. If they seem to be phishing around for sensitive information, hang up and call the alleged originating institution and determine it wasn’t bogus before you share anything that could be used to hack your accounts.
Geminid
@Citizen Alan: Now that you arer a Fresno resident, do you hear much news about the California Senate race? I think that’s one of only three contested Democratic Senate primaries this year. The Maryland and Delaware races may not be too close, but California’s is somewhat “up in the air.” And with California’s jungle primary system it’s not exactly a party primary.
lowtechcyclist
@Yarrow:
Lucky me? I don’t think so. I don’t know jack shit about the wire, just that when I was still using their broadband, it was pathetically slow. And it had enough problems that my wife and I finally said screw it, let’s get Internet through Comcast. But I still have to pay for Verizon’s broadband as part of the package, even though I never use it, in order to have a land line.
That they sell Product A as a package with Product B doesn’t always tell you anything about either one.
Matt McIrvin
@Hamlet of Melnibone: “Margin of error” is misleading, too, because it is just the expected statistical sampling error that is a pure function of the sample size. It doesn’t take any systematic errors, like a bias arising from some particular issue like phone sampling or a bad turnout model, into account, and most of the time, those are what really sink polls.
You can bring random sampling error down by aggregating a lot of polls, which is what people like Nate Silver and Sam Wang realized a while back. But if they’ve all got a systematic error that leans in the same direction, you’re still screwed. And that seems to be basically what happened for presidential state polls in the Great Lakes region in 2016.
Shalimar
@lowtechcyclist: What I mean is talk radio hosts and columnists were saying it was 45 days because Trump was our 45th president. And even after it turned out to be 48 days for the practical reason you mention, these same propagandists were still calling it a 45-day compromise even though that number was incorrect at that point. Because their audience already associated the compromise with Trump and saying 45 days helped the propagandists sell it as not a terrible thing.
Hamlet of Melnibone
@Matt McIrvin:
Yup. Nate Silver’s model was pretty good at showing that risk to people who were paying attention in 2016 though. If I remember right, it gave Trump about a 25% chance of winning that election, while a lot of other people were saying it was a lock for Clinton. Polling is a very rough estimate and always has been. 538 is pretty good about showing the range of outcomes that their model predicts. Given how close most recent elections have been, polling isn’t going to give any real certainty of an outcome.