Nothing less is at stake in this election than our Democracy — and all that we care about and all that we believe in.
We don’t agonize, we organize. And when necessary, we unionize to get the job done! -NP pic.twitter.com/e7SVcTGtpp
— Nancy Pelosi (@TeamPelosi) October 19, 2023
Sharing is caring:
We cannot and will not let terrorists like Hamas and tyrants like Putin win.
I refuse to let that happen. pic.twitter.com/Ywjviuw3gF
— President Biden (@POTUS) October 20, 2023
Bidenomics!
Curious how “Biden” ends up in the first headline but is conspicuously absent from the second! https://t.co/a7qh7ptCXU
— TJ Ducklo (@TDucklo) October 18, 2023
one more in long list of data points demonstrating that Americans’ poll responses about the economy are mostly not about the economy
they’re about other sources of anxiety/concern/worry in our national life https://t.co/e5IwwHUZIr
— John Harwood (@JohnJHarwood) October 18, 2023
Things are far better in America than is understood, part a million.
Inflation adjusted median net worth jumps 37% over past several years, more than doubles for young people. https://t.co/YDleFplXAh
— Simon Rosenberg (@SimonWDC) October 19, 2023
*snickers*
After just two days, the Biden campaign already has more followers than the Trump campaign on Truth Social pic.twitter.com/I6oafmDcwb
— Parker Butler (@parkerpbutler) October 18, 2023
On The Road – Kabecoo – The Skyline Trail, Olympic National Park, Post 3
Bruce K in ATH-GR
Whoever’s managing the Biden-Harris campaign account on Truth* Social had better be getting hazard pay plus generous insurance subsidies to assist with maintaining mental health.
*Warning: contents of package may not resemble image on packaging.
randy khan
Last night my wife and I hosted a fundraiser for a local Democratic candidate in Virginia’s elections. (Not so much a fundraiser for her as a fundraiser for the House of Delegates elections – her seat is safe and she’s spending her time and campaign funds helping other candidates.) The special guest was a Dem member of Congress, who did a great job talking about how the Virginia election matters both for Virginia and in terms of its likely effects on 2024. It was a great reminder that every election is important. (There was not so much talk about the Speaker situation – I think the guest speaker is getting tired of the clown show, but who isn’t?)
OzarkHillbilly
Me. Tho it does suck having to run into town every other day for more popcorn and scotch.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊😊😊
Chris Johnson
I’m pleased to see Biden tying Hamas to Putin, because it seems like Israel is flipping out and blaming Russia for what happened.
Which is very likely correct… and I just wonder if they in turn can be any aid in the ginormous behind-the-scenes shitshow WE have, stoked constantly by Russia.
I don’t like Israel revenging itself on Palestinians in a genocide. But I would like Israel to revenge itself by going after and exposing all the Russian corruption in the United States, whether it’s TFG or Tucker Carlson or indeed Elon Musk pulling strings. If they figure they are so clever and plugged in, but got tricked by Hamas, let them show how clever they are by exposing the stuff WE seem slow to pick up on, and bringing it to light. They’re entirely correct that Russia is behind it all.
BlueGuitarist
@randy khan:
awesome!
Yay for you and candidates sharing resources and knowledge!
Mousebumples
Good morning!
Reminder – postcards (for Ohio and Virginia, I believe) and music thread tomorrow night at 8pm blog time!
I will probably not be there – hoping to be at a cookout, but my 4 year old has a viral something. If we end up not going, I might show up after her bedtime.
Hope some of you can make it, though!
BlueGuitarist
@rikyrah:
good morning!
BlueGuitarist
@Mousebumples:
yay postcards!
and the fundraising thermometer needs a little more to reach the goal.
OzarkHillbilly
@Chris Johnson: Israel won’t do that. Sometimes Republicans win elections and they just might need their votes in Congress/WH.
Geminid
@Chris Johnson: I not sure how many Israelis are blaming Russia for the Hamas attack. But yesterday a Likud MK really went off on Russia and its involvement, and that may say something about broader public opinion.
Yarrow
The Today Show teaser things they do at the very top of the show talked about the problem electing a Speaker because of the “Republican civil war.” At least they’re talking about it.
Matt McIrvin
@Chris Johnson: Biden can’t do it, but I’d like to also see somebody put some emphasis on the extent to which Likud was intentionally propping up Hamas to discredit the whole idea of Palestinian statehood. But when there’s a war on, a lot of these details get lost.
H.E.Wolf
@Mousebumples: ”Good morning! Reminder – postcards (for Ohio and Virginia, I believe) and music thread tomorrow night at 8pm blog time!”
@BlueGuitarist: “yay postcards! and the fundraising thermometer needs a little more to reach the goal.”
* * *
And as Mousebumples reported yesterday, PostcardsToVoters.org has relevance to both, because it’s currently providing addresses to write GOTV postcards for Kimberly Pope Adams!
There’s about two weeks more of prime writing time – a great moment to try it out, if you haven’t yet. Many of these groups allow for volunteers to do small amounts… and those small amounts really do add up.
Jesse
Love to see that great economic data coming in.
Is there any accountability for these kinds of “US economy bound to suffer any day now” stories, which we’ve been hearing for the last couple of years? (j/k I already know the answer)
bbleh
The Dark Brandon thing is both brilliant and entirely unforeseeable.
Didn’t the visual image originate as anti-US Chinese propaganda? (“See? Biden won’t buy American, no no, he gets his memes from the Communist Chinese!“)
Betty Cracker
TPM’s Kate Riga is on Capitol Hill covering the GOP speaker shit-show. She says Jordan’s press conference a while ago was super short — basically all he said is that their weekend plan is to get a speaker elected. Since he mentioned the weekend, it doesn’t sound like he’s too confident he’s about to nail down the speakership in the vote that’s set to commence in about an hour.
Ken
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: If I recall, the Truth Social platform is a (possibly-illegal) Twitter clone from about 2020, so would still have the features that Musk has ordered removed — like blocking. That could help your hypothetical campaign staffer’s sanity.
On the other hand I doubt it has anything resembling content moderation, so the vileness is off the charts. Hmm, it occurs to me someone with a strong stomach might browse through Truth Social and see if there’s any content that’s actually illegal — Facebook has, and Twitter had, a team dedicated to keeping child porn off the platforms.
dmsilev
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: I suspect they’re treating it as a write-only account. Never never read the replies.
Matt McIrvin
@bbleh: I was initially a bit uneasy with it because “joking” use of movie-bad-guy imagery is such a violent-right hallmark, but I think everyone gets that it’s a parody of the genre at this point.
Yarrow
@Chris Johnson: Netanyahu has been cozying up to Putin for awhile. Under his leadership Israel didn’t support Ukraine against Russia. I don’t see him going after Russia.
Ken
@dmsilev: The Biden-Harris account might be just what the Truth Social denizens have wanted. There are several social media platforms catering to conservatives that haven’t done well, because the site doesn’t provide what they want — liberals that they can yell at. This would explain the surge in followers.
BruceFromOhio
@Jesse: The recession has been six months away for almost two years. Its a re-implementation of The Friedman Unit.
E.
I am not on board with the Truth Social trolling. The reason that hellsite was failing is because it was populated only by rage enthusiasts, and without us libtards, they could only yell out into the atmosphere. But when we start joining in, they love it, and suddenly the platform starts looking viable. I’m staying the F away.
mrmoshpotato
WEAK. SAD. POOP.
Matt McIrvin
@Yarrow: Maybe he won’t, but publicizing how badly Russia is fucking them over right now can’t be bad.
BlueGuitarist
@Betty Cracker:
Aaron Rupar: “ “I’m not sure what the purpose of the press conference was” — Fox & Friends’ Lawrence Jones was not impressed with Jordan’s bizarre press conference “
Betty Cracker
@Yarrow: Arguably Israel’s current right-wing government has a lot more in common with Russia than it does with Ukraine, what with the illegal land grabs, kleptocratic leaders and co-opting of religious fanatics and ethno-nationalists to hang onto power.
TS
@Betty Cracker:
That’s the Jordan friendly version of what he said. He spoke about the Wright Brothers, breaking the sound barrier and putting a man on the moon.
He said the American people need a speaker so the House of Representatives can do its job. This was also the answer to every question he was asked. Because of having no audience microphones we couldn’t hear the questions and he wasn’t going to repeat them – just repeated the one answer.
Ken
If anyone cares about the Sam Bankman-Fried trial, both Molly White and Coindesk have been publishing daily recaps. TL;DR version: it’s looking very bad for him. Though this was kind of expected going in, what with four of his associates pleading guilty to the crimes in exchange for testifying.
There is much speculation over whether Bankman-Fried will take the stand. Everyone agrees it would be a very bad idea, and his lawyers should surely want to prevent it. But they also point out he might see this as the one way to avoid prison, and that he has a (screwed-up, in my opinion) idea of tradeoffs and risk analysis as well as a (screwed-up, in my opinion) belief in his own superiority that would push him to testify.
(How screwed-up an idea of risk analysis? An example that he’s actually used: Say you could flip a coin, and heads would destroy the world, while tails would make it more than twice as good as it is now. You should flip the coin, because the expected value is more than the current value.)
Gin & Tonic
In which world-renowned historian shows himself entirely incapable of comprehending current events:
BruceFromOhio
@E.: This. No clicks, not happening. Anything that lends even a whiff of legitimacy is not a runner. Good luck to BH campaign peeps! I happily follow on Threads!
satby
@E.: They don’t want other people to join, they’re trolling with truth, using Republicans’ statements themselves. It’s pretty brilliant.
zhena gogolia
@Gin & Tonic: Oh, Gawd. Yes, let’s go back to 1919. There haven’t been any international agreements on this topic since then, have there?
Dorothy A. Winsor
I missed that Jordan’s press conference was going to be so early. Why?
Layer8Problem
@Ken: Truth Social was a swipe of Mastodon’s open-source code and was violating Mastodon’s license by not making their derivative code available to anyone. Big Open Source went after them and Truth Social caved and made the code available.
Matt McIrvin
The savvy-people take on economics and politics has always been that the administration has really very little control over these things, and the timing of the last several recessions with Republican adminstrations has been pure luck of the draw for Democrats (with the down side that they always get blamed after two years when they can’t fix everything immediately).
I’ve always assumed that that is more or less true.
Maybe it’s not true? Or not entirely true?
We’ve had economic dislocation, of course–an inflation/supply-chain scare that seems to have been a combination of COVID-pandemic disruptions and Ukraine-war disruptions, and some slack periods in the tech industry that somehow don’t spread to the wider economy. But the problem now seems to be that the economy is perceived as terrible regardless of the actual situation.
NorthLeft
I guess that the 100% probability of a recession in the next year is another example of the “rampant” inflation at that time.
If there was a responsible media organization around you might think they would go back and challenge these doomsayers regarding their catastrophically wrong predictions about the economy.
In the long term, this could be a serious integrity issue if people no longer believe what our economic gurus are telling us. Personally, they lost me sometime back in the Obama administration when their constant harping on the deficit and potential inflation rise were a) laughable, and b) WRONG.
Scout211
Rolling Stone has an article up about Team Trump’s reaction to Sidney Powell’s plea deal. Team Trump Never Dreamed Sidney Powell Would Flip on Them
Matt McIrvin
(From the big economic indicators it still looks to me like we could be heading into some kind of real recession sometime over the next couple of years. But these things are impossible to time in advance. I’m hoping it holds off long enough that the real pain is at least after the next presidential election, but maybe we won’t be that lucky.)
Ken
@Gin & Tonic: I’m mildly curious what Luttwak means by “plebiscites (1919 rules)”. As I recall my history, in 1919 Russia was in the middle of a civil war, and not having many plebiscites. Though there were any number of cases where an army group entered an area, found the local plebes didn’t support their side, and killed everyone.
bbleh
@Dorothy A. Winsor: House scheduled to re-convene at 10; maybe that explains it.
Another Scott
@TS:
It sounds like Jordan was going through the motions to get his adult merit badges.
The smarkets.com betting line looks pretty stupid to me, but might be entertaining to watch over the next few hours/days.
Cheers,
Scott.
Gin & Tonic
@zhena gogolia: “Disputed regions.”
BlueGuitarist
The odious Scott Perry, chair of the freedom-denying caucus, says reports of threats against Rs not supporting Jordan are a “red herring.” Trump carried his district, PA-10 by only 3 points. Lots of Democrats running in the primary to take on Perry. Democrats will almost certainly pick up an overlapping state senate district (PA-S-15) and have a very good chance to flip an overlapping PA House district (PA-H-88).
Ken
One of those statements that make you say, “He was so close to getting it.”
Layer8Problem
@Gin & Tonic: And off to the side Bill Murray tells Luttwak “That oughta do it, thanks very much Ray.”
OzarkHillbilly
Making him an even bigger idiot than trump. trump talks the talk but is smart enough* to know not to walk the walk.
*(so far anyway, I need to remind myself that his growing dementia might put his under oath foot in his mouth)
Omnes Omnibus
@zhena gogolia: The best thing about the Treaty of Versailles (and the other chateau treaties) is John Cale’s Paris 1919 album.
Omnes Omnibus
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Just lucky, I guess.
OzarkHillbilly
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Because nobody would be watching him humiliate himself again?
NotMax
@Dorothy A. Winsor
Bid to monopolize time on Morning Joe and whatever couch slugs are on Fox at that hour.
cain
@Chris Johnson: oh.. that’s gonna be a bit awkward for the Russian orthodox Jews in Israel.
Jeffro
Hey y’all, the NYT did another one of those GOP focus group thingys and out of a long article’s worth of nonsense about how great trump is and a ton of ‘both sides’, here’s just one little quote that should give you a grin, or possibly make you want to jump off of a cliff.
This is in response to the question, “Is there anything that would make you reconsider your support for trump or no longer make him your first choice?”
‘another’ J6
because a single J6 wasn’t enough to get this guy to be anti-trump
hoo boy…
Anne Laurie
Usually everyone in Congress goes ‘home’ from Friday through Monday. I’m guessing Jordan’s handlers wanted to get today’s (probable) humiliation out of the way before half the GOP caucus slipped out the back to catch the next flight.
Geminid
@Jesse: I attribute a lot of the good economic news to the four big spending bills passed by the last Congress: the American Rescue Act, Feb. 2021; the Infrastructure bill, Nov. 2021; the Chips+ bill, July 2022; and the Inflation Reduction Act, August 2022.
States and localities are still spending money from the ARA, and money from the other 3 bills is just starting to go out. Much of that leverages private investment.
You could say that Democrsts got their counter-cyclic spending in early; also, that Joe Biden is proving that “trickle up” economics works. And much of this spending is judicious investment that will pay off for years and even decades.
A lot of the credit for this goes to Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, for their skillful handling of their spare majorities. A lot also goes to their caucus members and their teamwork.
And a lot of credit goes to the voters of Georgia, who on January 5, 2021 replaced Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue with Senators Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock.
cain
@OzarkHillbilly:
Didn’t Bibi do a full throated support for Trump? I also thought they did some fundraising or something.. Bibi really wanted that. I’m sure he’s changed his mind now.
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
Cannot be alone in blearily misreading that as John Cole’s Paris 1919 album.
;)
Matt McIrvin
@cain: I was struck by Putin just openly taking the “it’s all Israel’s fault and it’s all the US’s fault for supporting Israel” side. He just completely screwed over his Israeli allies, pure chaos troll energy.
(It also made me wonder if that was actually for US domestic political consumption, to try to drive intra-left wedges by agreeing with the US foreign-policy left the way Putin often does. But that might be a too US-centric take.)
OzarkHillbilly
@Scout211: So, shoving all the blame for everything on her head wasn’t such a good idea after all. Hoocudanode?
cain
@Betty Cracker: He’s gonna do a lot more bullying over the weekend. He doesn’t really know what else to do. He’s as subtle as a slap in the face.
Omnes Omnibus
@NotMax: Awfully early for you to be that drunk.
cain
@Gin & Tonic: Wow, fuck that guy. Like any country would give up land peacefully especially when they are practically winning the conflict.
I wonder how much he’s getting paid by Russian oligarchs.
Jeffro
wait, I thought he was innocent and the election was rigged and all?
shouldn’t all of his co-conspirators present zero risk to his defense, since they’ll all tell the truth, have nothing to hide, and were only working to overturn a corrupt election?
LOLOLOLOL
cain
@Layer8Problem: So, finally the Biden campaign is on Mastodon!
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@Gin & Tonic:
The hell? As I recall, Ukraine had one back in the early-mid 90s, and it settled the issue.
narya
I am not unhappy that Sidney flipped–she can do math, and had no desire to spend any time in custody–but I also wonder just how valuable her testimony would be. She was in various rooms and can testify to those conversations, but everyone, including TIFG, thought she was batshit crazy. I don’t think batshit crazy is necessarily helpful testimony in a trial, but, of course, IANAL.
Frankensteinbeck
@BlueGuitarist:
My strong guess is that Jordan thought he would deliver a speech that would echo through history and his opponents in Congress would be deluged with their constituents demanding that they vote for Jordan. He didn’t even think he had to do much preparing, he thought he was just that good.
The process of finding out you’re Not All That is slow and painful, and we’re watching Jordan go through it in front of our eyes.
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
TGIF. Take Gin If Flustered.
;)
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@Geminid:
For all the whining about The Squad, they did the hard work of effective compromise and set a lot of good things in motion to build on.
OzarkHillbilly
Well yeah, but trump was in the WH then. Bibi was also among the first foreign leaders to congratulate Biden on his election victory in 2020. Which trump continues to hold a grudge over.
Foreign leaders (especially allies) aren’t likely to take sides in American politics no matter what they believe. The risks are too high for them. So they go with who ever won the last election and with whoever wins the next election.
Omnes Omnibus
@cain:
I don’t think you need to posit Russian bribes as a explanation. There are still people who view international politics through a 19th Century Great Powers lens. “I mean, does it really matter if Alsace is part of France or Germany? The lives of the Alsatians won’t really change….”
Scout211
A few excerpts from the NBC News live updates:
Chaos reigns, it’s raining chaos, someone needs to rein in that chaos . . .
Its still raining chaos . .
Frankensteinbeck
@OzarkHillbilly:
As I recall, there was a brouhaha because Bibi supported Romney against Obama.
Another Scott
@Matt McIrvin: My take is a little different.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
OzarkHillbilly
Wow, Jim Jordan and I agree on something. I mean, he did get reelected in 2020. That’s problematic to me.
satby
Even Republicans are totally sick of other Republicans (and I’m enjoying the hell out of my Bulwark subscription right now 😂😂).
Omnes Omnibus
@narya:
She may have been batshit crazy but she was in the relevant rooms as stuff was happening. If she can describe what was happening and who said what, that works. The fact that she thinks that we have pink air and all the trees are red is irrelevant.
zhena gogolia
@satby: Yes, I think it’s more of an information-spreading device, and I approve.
H.E.Wolf
The always excellent Electoral Vote blog concluded its Friday post with a detailed essay on Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, written by “Z”, the Civil War historian of the two bloggers.
electoral-vote.com/evp2023/Items/Oct20-6.html
Today’s post, as a whole (half-a-dozen feature articles), is very representative of their work. Until tomorrow, it’s at the top of their home page: https://www.electoral-vote.com
bbleh
@narya: @Omnes Omnibus: Yes. I’d also guess that, being technically a lawyer and perhaps crazy but not really stupid, she knows how to testify effectively.
zhena gogolia
@Ken: It doesn’t matter. The boundaries of the country were set by international agreement in 1991.
OzarkHillbilly
@Frankensteinbeck: I don’t remember that but it wouldn’t surprise me if he did do something that stupid. He’s an Israeli RWNJ with an affinity for American RWNJs and an overinflated opinion of himself. If he did do something that stupid, I suspect his advisors gave him Holy Hell for it afterwards.
Of course, he might have just been banking on Obama’s staying even keeled and not taking offense at every slight that came his way. Which were many and daily.
rikyrah
@Chris Johnson:
Because Hamas got the intelligence information for its attack from Iran.
Iran got it from Russia.
Still going back to how Russia got Israeli intelligence information.
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: Ha, I don’t know that!
Geminid
@cain: I don’t think Netanyahu made a full-throated endorsement if Trump in our 2020 election. He definitely used his connection to Trump in one of the recent Knesset elections, maybe the one in November of 2020. There were large billboards featuring a smiling Netanyahu and a smiling Trump, captioned: “Netanyahu. A Class Above the Rest.” He actually lost that election.
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: Just give her enough Diet Coke and let her talk.
Omnes Omnibus
@zhena gogolia: Paris 1919 (title track)
Geminid
Gonna get some rain today in Central Virginia. We need it.
JaySinWA
It certainly colors her perspective. /s
To be serious, her rationality and ability to report her perceptions are questionable. She better have tangible evidence to support anything she claims to be true, and so far she has been less than successful in courts.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
Hugo Chavez is still dead? Stop the presses.
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: thanks!
Geminid
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg: There was plenty of whining about the Blue Dogs too, and the Democratic members of the Problem Solvers Caucus. But they were every bit as supportive of Speaker Pelosi as the “Squad” was, maybe more.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
The headline, itself, says the House has to vote. Chaos isn’t speaker yet.
narya
@Omnes Omnibus: That’s what I was figuring. I assume she’ll be coached w/in an inch of her life, and that some of the crazy will still leak out, but if all they’re using her to do is confirm certain conversations, that might be enough.
@bbleh: Oh, good point. Still gonna be crazy, though.
Omnes Omnibus
@JaySinWA: Her ability to to report what she saw and heard may be different than her ability to draw conclusions from it. A person may be able to testify that “I saw three chickens and two pigs in the farmyard” even though their conclusion that it means “it will rain meatballs this evening” is stark, staring bonkers. But, yeah, she’ll need some corroborating evidence.
Matt McIrvin
@Geminid: The only real movement to challenge Pelosi was from the right wing of the party, but it didn’t last long.
Omnes Omnibus
Plea deal watch for the Cheese (Twitter link).
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: Nice song!
RandomMonster
They need to make that Malarkey Ends Here. into a t-shirt.
Scout211
@Omnes Omnibus: Ooooh, I was waiting for that. I was thinking he would take the plea deal (that he initially rejected) after Powell took her deal yesterday. But I was thinking it would be on the day of his trial next week.
Omnes Omnibus
@zhena gogolia: Better than the treaties, n’est-ce pas?
Daoud bin Daoud
@Ken: I suspect there’s a lot of child porn (or at least links to child porn) on Antisocial Lies. Considering the audience, it’s inevitable.
narya
@Omnes Omnibus: Okay, now THAT one will be useful. He had his hands in every damn thing, apparently. And it sounds like the “I was just a lawyer throwing out ideas, it wasn’t political” claim is belied by him saying “this is political” in one of the emails. He and Clark are two of the bigger keys, IMHO.
ETA: and Eastman.
Daoud bin Daoud
@Yarrow: Bibi and Daddy Vladdy both believe in invading and genociding their neighbors. They have a lot of notes to compare!
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: Oh, yes!
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: That challenge was over by January, 2019 and the ringleaders- Seth Moulton, Kathleen Rice, and Tom Ryan- were a few members of the New Democrat Coalition. I think their beef was institutional, not ideological.
The Blue Dogs stayed out of it, with the exception of a few freshman like Xochitl Torres Small, Mikie Sherrill, amd Abigail Spanberger. Unlike Moulton and company, who caved and voted for Pelosi, these freshman did not vote for Pelosi and she did not seem to mind, either.
satby
Happy Birthday Madam Vice President.
Brit in Chicago
@Matt McIrvin: “The savvy-people take on economics and politics has always been that the administration has really very little control over these things…”
I make no great claims to being a savant, but my take is that this is mostly right—but that the Inflation Reduction Act may make it a bit less right than usual. Turns out the act is a BFD, perhaps bigger even than its proponents realized at the time it passed.
Matt McIrvin
@H.E.Wolf: Someone here compared the Gettysburg Address to a tweet–it’s too long to be a tweet, but it just occurred to me that it’s short enough to fit into a post on the Mastodon instance I use. It was amazingly short even for a major political speech today and certainly for the time. A miracle of rhetorical economy.
SteveinPHX
@Another Scott: Thank you. I’m going to read this over several times. Like what I’m reading.
Warblewarble
Luttwak or is that nutsack calling for Ukraine to commit plebicide.
Betty
@Scout211: I read that he rejected the plea deal because it required him to plead guilty to a felony.
Matt McIrvin
@Brit in Chicago: The COVID relief acts were a big deal economically–those passed under Trump, but with Democratic support, and the Democrats were making a major sacrifice just by letting Trump take credit for signing them. In the 2020 election, many low-information voters thought the money they got was coming directly out of Donald Trump’s pocket. But I’m pretty sure they were a large part of the reason that the vicious COVID recession of 2020-21 was so short and things returned to a kind of boom afterward.
Then, of course, some of the economic reverberations of that probably contributed to the complaints about inflation and supply-chain trouble under Biden. But it’s what you have to do when there’s a pandemic that requires most of the workforce to stay home for a while.
narya
@Betty: Yeah, I read that too, but he’s not dumb, just craven. Fingers crossed . . .
moonbat
Has it been suggested that Jordan is going through this slow motion humiliation over and over again is that he, like Trump, believes that high office will save him from prosecution? I mean the closer Trump’s J6 trial gets, the higher the probability that Jordan, that dick from PA, and other congress critters get caught up and get special little indictments of their own.
Matt McIrvin
@moonbat: It’s been suggested. Also that he might think he can somehow hold off prosecution until Trump gets back in office and can pardon him (though of course that only works for federal crimes).
moonbat
@Matt McIrvin: I keep expecting it to play a larger part in the analysis of this shitshow. I mean, Jordan was standing up there THIS MORNING saying the 2020 election was stolen. And a not insignificant percentage of the Rs are voting to give that mook more power?
E.
@narya: This has been my concern too. She’s completely bonkers. But I am holding out hope that the prosecution has a lot of documentary evidence that just needs a few pieces to make it a clear picture. Like an email that says “See you at three” and she can say, yes, that was x saying he would be at the meeting, and he was.”
Paul in KY
@Ken: I think the way it was actually handled in 1919 was that the Cheka came in and supervised all the plebiscites/voting…
Paul in KY
@Jeffro: I guess we all get one ‘Jan 6’. That’s all.
Paul in KY
@Omnes Omnibus: TFG’s minions will be trying to paint her as uber ditzy and thus nothing she says can be taken at face value, due to her 11 on the ditzymeter.
Paul in KY
@Matt McIrvin: A complete masterpiece, IMO.
Westyny
@Omnes Omnibus:
or late! ; )
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@cain: LOL
Was sorta surprised by the very low follower numbers on TS. TFG has less than 20,000 followers. On “his” platform!
Ruckus
@Chris Johnson:
They’re entirely correct that Russia is behind it all.
When you have nothing to show for what you do, you have to blame others for your poor and crappy efforts at being a nation.
Ruckus
@Frankensteinbeck:
The process of finding out you’re Not All That is slow and painful, and we’re watching Jordan go through it in front of our eyes.
I’m not sure he can 100% figure that out. He seems pissed at the world for some reason and I’d bet it’s because he’s finally starting to figure out what everyone else knows. Or even just somewhat being able to admit it to himself. Of course he’s been pissed at the world for some time so maybe he’s just slow on the uptake. Or doesn’t understand cause and effect.
StringOnAStick
@Another Scott: Thank you for that summary; you are always a voice of calm and reason, and I enjoy your comments.
206inKY
Biden changed the formula for income-sensitive payments to make it actually affordable, so the resumption of student loan payments is having a much more mild impact than many feared. Raised the threshold to 225% of poverty line that’s shielded and dropped the percentage to 5% for undergrad and 10% for grad for all income over that threshold. Also finally allows married filing separately to only count borrower’s income. Massive under-the-radar policy victory.
Juju
@Paul in KY: And yet Trump wanted to appoint her as special counsel in regard to the stolen 2020 presidential election. I am sure that fact will be put forward during any trial.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@Geminid: There was a challenge to Nancy from a few “moderate” Dems in 2019 (I think) that went nowhere and eventually cost Rep. Schreader (OR-5) his primary in 2022.
Marmot
@Omnes Omnibus: I see what you Planet Claire there.
Geminid
@Formerly disgruntled in Oregon: The challenge was Nov.-Dec. 2018, after the midterms. Moulton and the others backed down and voted for Pelosi when Congress met in January.
I’m not sure if Kurt Schrader participated. His committee and floor votes over the next two Congresses are what did him in, I think. District Democrats thought they could elect someone more liberal and knocked him out in the 2022 primary. The more liberal candidate fell a couple points short in November, but I think Democrats will retake that seat next year.
Paul in KY
@Juju: His lawyers will probably try to argue with a straight face that TFG appointing her validates her cray cray.
H-Bob
@Yarrow: I had the impression that a substantial bloc of Likud supporters were Russian emigres. As a result, there may be some backchannel communications or links between Likud and Putin. It’s likely that there is a lot of mutual wariness as well.
Geminid
@H-Bob: There are probably some 1st and 2nd generation Russian immigrants in Likud. There is also party run by former Rusdian bar bouncer Avigdor Liberman called Yisrael Beitanu- “Israel is Our Home”- that attracts a lot of Russian votes, and usually elects 5 or 6 MKs.
Liberman and his followers do not like Netanyahu’s government because its two Ultra-Orthodox parties support religious authorities who discriminate against Russians in areas like marriage. And like many Israelis, Lieberman resents the Ultra-Orthodox as free riders who collect welfare while dodging the military draft.
Also, Lieberman served under Netanyahu in previous governments and hates the PM’s guts.
In the latter 1970’s, Likud came to power on the votes of another, larger immigrant group: the Mizrachi. They came to Israel from the Mideast and North Africa. One reason the Mizrachi flocked to Menachim Begin’s Likud party was that they felt discriminated against by the “Sabra,” Ashkenazi establishment that ran the dominant Labor Party.
Social scientists studying the wave of Russian immigrants of the 1990s found that contrary to the hopes of rightwing politicians, the new citizens tended to vote for Left or Center parties as much or more than Right parties.