Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

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

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Putin dreamed of ending NATO, and now it’s Finnish-ed.

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

If marriage is the equivalent of selling yourself into slavery, women with self respect should reject the offer.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.

Dear Washington Post, you are the darkness now.

Israel is using food as a weapon of war. Unforgivable.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

This country desperately needs a functioning Fourth Estate.

You are here: Home / Politics / Biden Administration in Action / TGIFriday Morning Open Thread: Bring On the Campaign

TGIFriday Morning Open Thread: Bring On the Campaign

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TGIFriday Morning Open Thread 6

(Joel Pett via GoComics.com)

Reader Interactions

150Comments

  2. 2.

    Jeffro

    SO glad to be on the right side of all of the above!

    “This is not your father’s Republican Party” = “can you beLIEVE the crazy shit these people are up to?”

    Play Rufo’s comments about banning er um ‘recreation’ on a loop for a week, Dems!

  3. 3.

    Baud

    Manchin and Sinema are the only reasons we don’t currently have an abortion rights and voting rights law.  And they’ll be gone.

  4. 4.

    Suzanne

    Mr. Suzanne and I were just discussing watching Nikki Haley and Tommy Tuberville utter complete and total nonsense about IVF. He said of Tuberville, “There’s two pigeons strutting around where his brain should be.”

  6. 6.

    Baud

    Speaking of amazing work, I want thank AL again for the positive news morning threads she’s put together since 2021.  It’s a nice balm against the usual media narrative.

  7. 7.

    Suzanne

    @Baud: Has Sinema been squishy on an abortion rights law? Historically, that’s been one thing about which she’s been pretty outspoken. I haven’t seen anything about her tanking anything.

  8. 8.

    Jeffro

    “And by ‘the crazy shit these people are up to’, I mean craaaaazy shit.  Like, when did the GOP become pro-measles?  What in the actual fuck??!?” – President Biden, I wish.

    Instead of following what he acknowledged was the “normal” recommendation that parents keep unvaccinated children home for up to 21 days — the incubation period for measles — Ladapo said the state health department “is deferring to parents or guardians to make decisions about school attendance.”

    PARENTS’ RIGHTS!!  TO GET YOUR KID DEATHLY ILL BY NOT VACCINATING THEIR KIDS!!1!

    Ben Hoffman, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said Florida’s guidance flies in the face of long-standing and widely accepted public health guidance for measles, which can result in severe complications, including death.

    Because measles virus particles can linger in the air and on surfaces for up to two hours after an infected person leaves the area, up to 90 percent of people without immunity will contract measles if exposed. People who have been infected or received the full two doses of the MMR vaccine are 98 percent protected and very unlikely to contract the disease. That is why public health officials typically advocate for vaccination amid outbreaks.

    The measles virus is extremely contagious, and infections spread rapidly. Young children are especially vulnerable because the first dose is not given until a child is 12 to 15 months old. The CDC recommends two doses of MMR vaccine, with the second dose at 4 through 6 years old.

    About 1 in 5 unvaccinated people in the United States who contract measles is hospitalized, according to the CDC. As many as 1 out of 20 children develop pneumonia, the most common cause of death from measles in young children. About 1 child out of every 1,000 with measles will develop swelling of the brain that can lead to convulsions and leave the child deaf or with an intellectual disability. For unvaccinated babies who contract measles, 1 in 600 can develop a fatal neurological complication that can lie dormant for years.

    Way to go, Republicans!

  10. 10.

    John S.

    100 years from now, the historical view of this time period should be interesting:

    In the early 21st century, corporations and embryos were deemed to be “people” and given more rights than actual people.

  11. 11.

    SFAW

    Morning nit-picky whine from WATB SFAW re: Joel Pett’s comic: the embryos that are now “unborn children” (per Alabama) don’t look like his depiction, they look more like an unformed mass of cells.

    Nitpicky whining because said depiction lends credence to the evil mofos on the Alabama SC.

  13. 13.

    Suzanne

    @Baud: Okay, fair.

    She sucks so much. Uggggghhhhhhh. I knew this when I voted for her.

    Sorry, y’all. I feel responsible.

  17. 17.

    Baud

    @Suzanne:

    Look, she’s still better than having a Republican in that seat. Same with Manchin. It’s frustrating, but that doesn’t make it wrong.

  26. 26.

    p.a.

    I can’t understand Republican belief in American Exceptionalism ™ when their whole un-and-anti-scientific ideology is to turn us into just another underdeveloped country.  For Jeebus!

     

    Well… I guess I can understand it 🤬

  29. 29.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Baud:

    I always felt that way when pulling the proverbial lever for good ole Feckless Claire McCaskill back in Misery.

    Yeah, people like me were her biggest critics, wouldn’t give her a dime of money, but always knew the alternatives (as we’ve seen in all it’s gory) were a shitload worse, thus, it was hold your nose and pull.

  31. 31.

    Kay

    I follow abortion very closely and I did not know that all Republicans (now) have adopted “fetal personhood” as a required belief. Obviously codifying fetal personhood has been a big part of anti choice lobby work, but the anti choice lobby are not mainstream – they’re the far Right edge. This decision, and the whole GOP endorsing the decision, is a further lurch Right and a big reveal for normal voters.

    Just consider the ramifications of fetal personhood – it will affect virtually every area of state law and policy. It’s a massive shift.

  32. 32.

    John S.

    @TBone: Good point. I don’t imagine that will age any better through the prism of time than embryos and corporations being given personhood.

  36. 36.

    Another Scott

    WhiteHouse.gov:

    […]

    The American people and people around the world understand that the stakes of this fight extend far beyond Ukraine. Ten years ago, Putin occupied Crimea, and created puppet regimes in Ukraine’s Luhansk and Donetsk regions. Two years ago, he tried to wipe Ukraine off the map. If Putin does not pay the price for his death and destruction, he will keep going. And the costs to the United States—along with our NATO Allies and partners in Europe and around the world—will rise.

    Today, I am announcing more than 500 new sanctions against Russia for its ongoing war of conquest on Ukraine and for the death of Aleksey Navalny, who was a courageous anti-corruption activist and Putin’s fiercest opposition leader. These sanctions will target individuals connected to Navalny’s imprisonment as well as Russia’s financial sector, defense industrial base, procurement networks and sanctions evaders across multiple continents. They will ensure Putin pays an even steeper price for his aggression abroad and repression at home.

    We are also imposing new export restrictions on nearly 100 entities for providing backdoor support for Russia’s war machine. We are taking action to further reduce Russia’s energy revenues. And I’ve directed my team to strengthen support for civil society, independent media, and those who fight for democracy around the world.

    Two years into this war, the people of Ukraine continue to fight with tremendous courage. But they are running out of ammunition. Ukraine needs more supplies from the United States to hold the line against Russia’s relentless attacks, which are enabled by arms and ammunition from Iran and North Korea. That’s why the House of Representatives must pass the bipartisan national security supplemental bill, before it’s too late.

    This bill provides urgent funding for Ukraine. It also invests in America’s own defense industrial base. It passed overwhelmingly in the Senate, and there is no question that, if the Speaker called a vote, it would pass quickly in the House. Congress knows that by supporting this bill, we can strengthen security in Europe, strengthen our security at home, and stand up to Putin. Opposing this bill only plays into his hands.

    History is watching. The failure to support Ukraine at this critical moment will not be forgotten. Now is the time for us to stand strong with Ukraine and stand united with our Allies and partners. Now is the time to prove that the United States stands up for freedom and bows down to no one.

    ###

    Good, good.

    Here’s hoping for a big turnout at the 2nd Anniversary DC Rally on 2/24 and on the Pass the Supplemental Rally on 2/28.

    Slava Ukraini!!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  37. 37.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    Also too, what Jeffries said:

    Nancy Pelosi is the greatest speaker of all time.

    If we have a functioning democracy in 25-50 years, the historians will rate her highly.

  39. 39.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Oh, don’t get me wrong, I agree.  She was never a preening attention-seeker like either of those two. In fact, it was always great when her daughters would sometimes go public with their criticisms of Mom.  It somehow made her more relatable.

    I was simply providing a voter thought process in terms of voting and thinking “This is the best selection I’ve got?” while knowing the dire alternatives.

    As we used to say “Suck it up, Princess, life ain’t fair, do what you can with what you got.”

  40. 40.

    gene108

    @Jeffro:

    Ladapo said the state health department “is deferring to parents or guardians to make decisions about school attendance.”

    As a non-medical professional, I WANT DOCTORS TO TELL ME WHAT TO DO IF I GET MEASLES.

    Or any other communicable disease or a sprained ankle or kidney failure or so many other things, I probably do not know exist.

  41. 41.

    New Deal democrat

    @Baud:

    Manchin and Sinema are the only reasons we don’t currently have an abortion rights and voting rights law.  And they’ll be gone.

    Unless a bare Democratic majority in the Senate is willing to nuke the filibuster, not a single one of the four promised enactments in Kamala Harris’s Xeet is going to happen. Sorry to be a downer, but that’s the simple truth.

  42. 42.

    Kay

    The Alabama decision is interesting too, because it implicitly acknowleges this slipperly slope Republicans are careening down. In the decision (which you can tell no one in the GOP or media read) the justices declare that if Alabama criminal law treats abortion as akin to murder (the provider is the murderer) then it only makes sense that all civil process and law treat life as beginning at conception – after all, the standard in civil is lower than criminal. This is TRUE. It’s logical. It’s inevitable. If your position is that life begins at conception then ALL laws have to be grounded in that truth – you can’t pick and choose.

    But for the whole GOP to adopt this? Wow.

  45. 45.

    Central Planning

    In Alabama, can people use those frozen embryos as dependents on their tax forms?
    Also, could I buy some frozen embryos and get some other deductions because they would clearly be residents of Alabama?

  50. 50.

    Kay

    “We” (pro choice people) always focused on the Right criminalizing abortion – which of course they did so that wasn’t in error – but we did almost no thinking on the civil side ramifications of “life begins at conception”. This is actually much, much bigger than abortion.

  51. 51.

    gene108

    @Another Scott:

    Current sanctions don’t seem to be doing much good. I doubt 500 more will make an impact.

    Other than impounding and inspecting any naval vessel headed to Russia for contraband, there’s not much to do to stop Iran and North Korea from supplying Russia. They can send everything via railroads. Same with third parties sending goods via China.

    Dropping the hammer on any U.S. company, whose components are found in Russian weapons might work, but I doubt that’s politically feasible.

  53. 53.

    Trivia Man

    From last nights litany of dumb stuff TFG said, a memorable moment for me was a rally in Nevada. “Most  people don’t  know, it’s actually pronounced Ne-VAAAAH-Da.” At a rally in Nevada..

  54. 54.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    In a way that it’s easy for normies to understand too! You see people getting it immediately – “does this mean they’re tax dependents? Will there be child support? Do the mother and the fertilized egg need a passport? Are they counted on the census?” – all questions I’ve already seen.

  59. 59.

    John S.

    @gene108:

    Dropping the hammer on any U.S. company, whose components are found in Russian weapons might work, but I doubt that’s politically feasible.

    It relies too heavily on the heads of these US corporations having a crisis of conscience. That may have worked as a plot device for Tony Stark in Iron Man, but only after he was abducted by terrorists and forced to live with the consequences of his actions.

  61. 61.

    Kay

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    gtconway3

    “Republicans are getting worried about Trump’s fundraising machine — it is propelled by those small donors — because fewer from the Maga horde are ponying up.“Trump’s campaign and affiliated Super Pacs (groups that can receive unlimited contributions) went into the election year with 224,000 fewer donors than four years ago, according to a [FT] analysis of the latest data (free to read). Republicans will be feeling the need to make up the numbers ASAP amid flashing signs of donor fatigue.

    This goes to what you and I have observed in RubyRedLand- the MAGA’s aren’t as enthusiastic as they were.
    Biden may not get people all excited, but either does Trump. His fans are dropping off the rolls.
    An interesting political story would be to go out and find Maga’s that are no longer interested – got bored, wandered off, are tapped out and tired of Donald Trump living high off their Social Security checks- but no one will do that story.

  62. 62.

    Kay

    @Suzanne:

    She’s one of those people who thinks clothes and a “persona” (“I like wine! I run marathons!”) are a personality and world view. Just a centimeter deep. Take away the silly clothes and the “cool” hobbies and there’s just nothing there.

  63. 63.

    TBone

    Grrrrr, Schuylkill County PA Catholic Church cancels trans drag show that was set for tonight. FFS.

  65. 65.

    TBone

    Ukrainian P.M. on GMA with George Stephanopoulis made a great case to the people using David and Goliath, with David needing more stones for his slingshot.  When asked about territorial compromise, he said “Would you give up part of a state to an invader?”

  66. 66.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Kay:

    I read something years back that I wish I’d bookmarked.  It was by an ex-Morman woman, maybe 5-7 years older than Sinema.

    Her take was that Sinema was like a ton of ex-Mormon women who hit their 30s and have left the church and begin acting and dressing like 14-year olds.  This writer had gone thru the same thing and had networked with a ton of other woman who’d gone thru the same thing.

    They all indicated it was a “making up for lost time” thing in that 14-year old girls go thru that phase which, in the Mormon church, is repressed as all git-out.  Basically, the ability to act out is taken away.  Thus, when ex-Mormon women leave the church, a ton tend to do that.

    Dammit, I’m not doing the piece justice, wish I had it.  But when I read it, it all made sense.

    Now, Mansion is simply a preening douchebag.

  68. 68.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Kay: An interesting political story would be to go out and find Maga’s that are no longer interested – got bored, wandered off, are tapped out and tired of Donald Trump living high off their Social Security checks- but no one will do that story.

    Maybe if they went to an Ohio diner?

  70. 70.

    Betty Cracker

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage: I helped reelect fake astronaut Bill Nelson (D-FL) several times for the same reason. Until real space alien Rick Scott kicked him out of the Senate. McCaskill would have been a huge upgrade over Nelson. At least she’s funny.

  71. 71.

    Suzanne

    @Kay: This is very true.

    I volunteered for lots of campaigns in my many years of living there, including that of David Schapira, who also ran for the AZ-9 seat when it first was drawn into existence (first election was 2012). Schapira got some attention recently when he went on a podcast, right after Sinema officially became an Independent, and he talked about how she snubbed him during that campaign. All I can say is….. her politics are not great, but it almost doesn’t even matter. She is completely careerist. She has no personal ethics and everyone there knows it. A good friend (actually for former third-grade teacher) is chair of the Dem Party for the LD I lived in, she knows everyone in state politics, and she got, like, everyone to come to our LD meetings. Everyone knows she sucks. But she managed to thread a needle….. good constituent services, just enough “independent” persona to make normies not feel icky about voting for a Dem, Mormon-adjacent in a district where that matters. It was really depressing.

  72. 72.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @TBone: It’s the American Catholic Church which, regardless of Pope Francis and his inclusive preachings is still stuck in the 14th century.

  73. 73.

    zhena gogolia

    How is the American Association of University Professors like the Mafia? Neither will let you resign.

  74. 74.

    Ken

    @Kay: I imagine the airlines are salivating at the prospect of requiring pregnant women to buy two tickets, but only having to allocate one seat.

    And by “pregnant”, I mean “Have you had intercourse recently? Well, then, you might have a fertilized egg.”

  76. 76.

    Suzanne

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage:

    Her take was that Sinema was like a ton of ex-Mormon women who hit their 30s and have left the church and begin acting and dressing like 14-year olds.  This writer had gone thru the same thing and had networked with a ton of other woman who’d gone thru the same thing. 

    Oh absolutely true. I made that point here in the comments a while back. She is a deeply familiar type. And the district that she comes from includes part of the Phoenix East Valley, which is the second-largest LDS community in the world (after Salt Lake City).

    Jeff Flake lives not far away. He is also a deeply familiar type.

    Mormon politics are really important to understanding Arizona.

  83. 83.

    Baud

    @Ken:

     “Have you had intercourse recently? Well, then, you might have a fertilized egg.”

     

    “Only anal, Delta. I’m good.”

  84. 84.

    TBone

    @OzarkHillbilly: a local church converted into a public venue space said no, we cancel.  We are stuck in the Dark Ages here in too many PA locales. 🤬 I know this happens in too many other locales too but it’s on our local news today with NO PUSHBACK.

  85. 85.

    Kay

    @Ken:

    Right. Commercial applications too. I hadn’t even thought of that. The fetal personhood theory kind of ran alongside far Right politics while Roe was in place – they thought of it as a legal lever to try to outlaw abortion. But now that Roe is gone the application is much, much broader.

    But their position always had to lead here. “Life begins at conception”, legally, means a lot more than just banning abortion or even banning birth control. It changes everything. And it was inevitable.

  86. 86.

    Suzanne

    @Suzanne: I will note that I wrote that Sinema SHIVVED Schapira, and DYAC changed it to “snubbed”.

    She sucks, and she’s dishonest.

    ETA: And it “corrected” Schapira to Shapiro, and I had to edit this comment, and get fucked, autocorrect.

  88. 88.

    zhena gogolia

    @Baud: I wish to resign. There is nothing on their website that allows you to. If you google, you get “You can cancel your membership at any time by e-mailing [address].” I have sent four messages to that address, starting on Tuesday, and received no reply. If you call them, they ask you to leave a voicemail. I have left four voicemail messages starting on Tuesday, and received no reply. A colleague sent me a set of weird steps you can follow on the website to cancel your membership. Then you get a message that says, “Are you sure you want to cancel your membership?” with the options “Cancel” or “Confirm.” Does “cancel” mean “cancel my membership” or “cancel my cancellation”? No matter, I tried both. It still shows me as ACTIVE. They are a scam organization.

  90. 90.

    TBone

    @Baud: mistake by me who thought you were referring to Ukrainian Prime Minister on GMA.  I think a converted church is the perfect place for a trans drag show.

  91. 91.

    Kay

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage:

    Her take was that Sinema was like a ton of ex-Mormon women who hit their 30s and have left the church and begin acting and dressing like 14-year olds.  This writer had gone thru the same thing and had networked with a ton of other woman who’d gone thru the same thing.

    We have the same thing here with fundamentalist Christian girls at the high school. The non fundie students comment on it – how the girls raised in those households can’t manage more freedom – they don’t know how to handle autonomy or agency so go to extremes.
    All fundie religions are the same though- they all subjegate women and girls. It’s what they have in common. It’s why I reject the whole lot – none are “better” than any of the others. Amish are horrible to girls and women – they have no power in those families and they’re denied an education. There’s a lot of sexual abuse too.

  94. 94.

    Soprano2

    @Jeffro: That is insane! C’mon, Republicans, take the position that we need to get rid of contraception so people can’t have sex just for pleasure, and see how a position supported by probably less than 10% of the American public helps you.

  95. 95.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    I feel we need to start and evangelize a liberal religion. The Unitarians seem like they’re asleep at the wheel.

  98. 98.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Baud:

    Manchin and Sinema are the only reasons we don’t currently have an abortion rights and voting rights law.  And they’ll be gone.

    Manchin will probably be replaced by a hard-right Republican though, so that’s not a net gain. Can’t say what the situation will be with Sinema.

  99. 99.

    zhena gogolia

    @Baud: I think that’s what I’m going to have to do. It doesn’t come due until Sept 1, so there’s time for that. I just want out NOW and they won’t let me.

    ETA: There’s something very fishy about an organization that doesn’t make it easy for you to cancel. Even the NYT doesn’t do that. I know, since I’ve cancelled it many times!

  100. 100.

    Soprano2

    @Jeffro: If you were vaccinated for measles in the late ‘60’s or early ‘70’s you should have your doctor check your immunity. I read that some of the vaccines used then eventually wore off, so I had my doc check mine, and sure enough my immunity had waned so I got a booster a couple of years ago.

  102. 102.

    Harrison Wesley

    I didn’t know Republicans believed in fetal personhood; I thought their long-standing belief was in fecal personhood.

  104. 104.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Baud: The United Church of Christ is popular here in the Northeast.

    The problem is that liberal religion is fundamentally incompatible with the hard-sell evangelizing that seems to be necessary for a religion to even come close to thriving in the current environment. It’s not competing with insane cracker religion, it’s competing with “no religion”.

  106. 106.

    Layer8Problem

    @Central Planning:  “Also, could I buy some frozen embryos and get some other deductions because they would clearly be residents of Alabama?”

    Think of doing this at scale and it’s kinda like some weird Red State 21st century version of Gogol’s Dead Souls.

  108. 108.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Kay:

    But their position always had to lead here. “Life begins at conception”, legally, means a lot more than just banning abortion or even banning birth control. It changes everything. And it was inevitable.

    They’re not even taking it seriously, really–if they did, it would require social changes so broad they sound like some weird 1970s dystopian science fiction. If it’s taken seriously, the primary cause of death in human beings, dwarfing cancer and heart disease, becomes “natural failure to implant in the uterine wall”.

    We would need to drop basically everything in favor of a moonshot program to make sure as many fertilized eggs as possible develop into babies. And that would probably mean eliminating women’s rights almost entirely in an incredibly intrusive (and absurdly expensive) way–basically every time someone with ovaries and a uterus has sex, they’d need to immediately become a prisoner in a laboratory, subject to microscopic examination.

  110. 110.

    Another Scott

    @zhena gogolia: Is there a “chapter” at your school that you can contact directly?

    E.g. RutgersAAUP.org:

    CAPS in original, for some reason…

    Termination of Membership. YOU MAY TERMINATE THIS MEMBERSHIP AGREEMENT AND YOUR MEMBERSHIP AT ANY TIME BY CONTACTING US AT [email protected] AND CANCELING YOUR MONTHLY PAYMENTS THROUGH THE ACCOUNT ESTABLISHED FOR YOU WHEN YOU SIGNED UP. YOUR CANCELLATION WILL BE EFFECTIVE PROMPTLY UPON THE RECEIPT OF YOUR CANCELLATION REQUEST.

    Maybe they’re yelling because they get lots and lots of requests to cancel??

    Good luck!

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  112. 112.

    Suzanne

    @Matt McIrvin: The liberal denominations also seem to be really loath to be impolite and it can read as squishy. Both in PHX and here in PGH, I see the same thing…. no one wants to call out their co-religionists. I get it: it’s, IMO, one of the worst tendencies of right-wing evangelicals and fundamentalists is that they tell other Christians that they’re going to Hell. But, like, it doesn’t come across as differentiating.

    Plus, the congregations are majority old people, the kind of people who get up early on a Sunday morning and willingly put on a blazer. The youth groups often suck. Megachurches really do a good job with midweek evening services, large youth groups with lots of activities, etc.

  114. 114.

    Suzanne

    @Matt McIrvin:

    basically every time someone with ovaries and a uterus has sex, they’d need to immediately become a prisoner in a laboratory, subject to microscopic examination. 

    Don’t give them any ideas.

  117. 117.

    Ken

    @TBone: AND as many sperm?

    We’d need a lot more eggs, or a lot fewer sperm. Either of which gets back to Matt’s “weird 1970s dystopian science fiction”

    EDIT: Huxley’s Brave New World had the Bokanovsky process, which caused eggs to bud and produce up to a hundred identical embryos. But that only worked on fertilized eggs.

  122. 122.

    danielx

    @Kay:

    Could it be they’re tired of paying a billionaire’s legal bills?

    I was gonna add something about incompetent legal talent. But Johnnie Cochrane and F. Lee Bailey combined couldn’t help a client who a) prosecutors have dead to rights on so many issues and b) is his own worst enemy.

  123. 123.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    Just consider the ramifications of fetal personhood – it will affect virtually every area of state law and policy. It’s a massive shift.

    Another way to justify taking away birth control.

  124. 124.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    n a way that it’s easy for normies to understand too! You see people getting it immediately – “does this mean they’re tax dependents? Will there be child support? Do the mother and the fertilized egg need a passport? Are they counted on the census?” – all questions I’ve already seen.

     

    I’ve seen people ask about life insurance.

  126. 126.

    rikyrah

    @TBone:

    When asked about territorial compromise, he said “Would you give up part of a state to an invader?”

     

    Phuck George for even asking that question. I mean that. Phuck him.

  127. 127.

    RaflW

    @gene108: Yeah, but now lots of people can Do tHeIR OwN ResEaRcH by watching a few yahoos on YouTube tell them measles is [insert insane, unfounded gibberish] so it’s fine that kids get it. Fine. Really

    YouTube videos are every bit as valid as a 4 year pre-med degree, medical school, residency, and years of clinical practice, if you’re some unfathomable fraction of the citizenry.

    (I do not like this digitized return to dark ages theories.)

  128. 128.

    RaflW

    @TBone: I’d give The Villages to Miguel Díaz-Canel if Cuba invaded Florida. But the logistics of carving that out seem complicated.

  129. 129.

    Quiltingfool

    A couple of days ago I participated in a political survey (I still have a landline, just for my dad, who doesn’t like to call me on my cellphone, don’t ask).  Big focus was on Lance Kunce, who is running against That Goddamn Traitor Josh Harley.   I did tell the survey guy my opinion about Hawley and it wasn’t nice.  I apologized for my not-asked-for opinions but he was okay with it.

    When asked what my greatest concern in re our country, my reply was Dobbs; taking away rights from half our population.

    At the end of the survey, I told the guy I was disappointed they didn’t have this answer choice, “I hate Donald Trump with the heat of a thousand suns.”  He chuckled, and told me they do surveys in a lot of states and when they have a survey that has questions negative to Trump, the Trumpies get very, very upset. Imagine that.

  132. 132.

    Quiltingfool

    @Jeffro: I think measles was the reason my husband’s father was deaf.   His mother was deaf, too, but she was born deaf.

    His dad’s life was sad, really.  He never got an education; his wife taught him how to sign his name, and my husband said his dad couldn’t do simple math.  He was a hard worker, and he got cheated out of money by his own brothers.

  135. 135.

    Jeffro

    @Soprano2: since it was Christopher Rufo pushing to “end recreational sex”, I’m surprised the NYT didn’t jump all over it.  Normally they just take his ‘take’ and run with it.

  137. 137.

    Soprano2

    @Jeffro: Somehow I don’t think the NY Times is going to promote that position. I wish they would write about him advocating for it, though.

  142. 142.

    TBone

    @RaflW: like a vasectomy.  Which should now be mandatory for any male who wants a driver’s license (both are reversible too).  They should all need a permission slip signed by a responsible female, an attorney, and a doctor to get a reversal kinda like a license suspension being removed.

  143. 143.

    rikyrah

    @Jeffro:

    My sister caught a serious case of the measles when she was 5 or 6. This was pre-vaccine availability. Almost killed her. My mother forever believed this is why she was such a sickly child growing up.

  147. 147.

    Ruckus

    @Soprano2:

    Same here. I can not remember what vaccines got updated and really do not feel like looking back at my health record to find out but yes, a couple of years ago a couple of my very long ago vaccines got updated.

  148. 148.

    Ruckus

    @rikyrah:

    Smallpox was the only vaccine available when I was born.

    I personally know of two woman who had polio in their legs, one is a current neighbor. Two school friends moms had iron lungs in their front rooms because their polio was in their lungs. I was around 5 when we got the sugar cube for polio vaccination. Every other vaccine was after that. And yes I’ve since had at least a couple of them up dated.

  149. 149.

    2liberal

    @Baud: @kay    I feel we need to start and evangelize a liberal religion. The Unitarians seem like they’re asleep at the wheel.

     

    Humanism has many of the social functions of a church.

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