Hey guys, we are about halfway to meeting the external matches for Arizona and Nevada. Our external match hopes to get their funds to Four Directions somewhere around April 25, which is just under 2 weeks from now.
Reminder: we have an external match and we have Balloon Juice Angels for both AZ and NV, which means that anything you donate up to $50 will turn into 4x the amount you donate.
To count toward the match, let us know about your donation in the comments, or you can drop me an email message if you prefer. Let me know which state or state in the comments.
ARIZONA
NEVADA
I think everybody knows what the stakes are, and I’m pretty sure most of us are aware of Four Directions activities organizing the Native vote, but let me know if you want more information here.
Open thread!
WaterGirl
If you want to be matched, let me know about your donation in the comments, or you can send me an email message.
Up to $50 gets multiplied by 4!
thruppence
Just donated $25 each to 4DAZ & 4DNV.
WaterGirl
@thruppence: Appreciate it!
Another Scott
Matchy, matchy makes clothing outfits boring.
Matchy, matchy makes fundraising much more effective!
+$50 for NV.
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
WaterGirl
@Another Scott: Yes! This may be the one place where matchy-matchy is a good thing!
Quantum man
Iran has launched drones and maybe missiles at Israel.
randal sexton
Ok I just did 50 for AZ and 50plus 5 (tip) for NV. May our Brandon’s be dark.
BenInNM
Put in $50 for Nevada since they seemed to be lagging just a bit!
WaterGirl
@Quantum man: I wouldn’t put it past Bibi to have done the attack on Iran just so he would draw the US in and make it harder for Biden to cut off weapons until Bibi stops acting like a madman on a killing spree.
WaterGirl
@BenInNM: Yes, NV is the underdog!
And so is Vicky Rosen, the NV senator whose seat we need to hold on to.
H.E.Wolf
I am beyond excited about these twin fundraisers to GOTV the Democratic vote in AZ and NV this year.
I have a dear friend in AZ whose rights (along with her daughter’s) are now abrogated by the recent statewide abortion ban.
I spent 3 summers in NV, where labor unions (particularly in the hospitality sector, i.e., casinos) are a huge voting bloc.
The personal is political. When I see these fundraising posts, I see in my mind’s eye the faces of people I know.
WaterGirl
WaterGirl
Geminid
@WaterGirl: I’ve been seeing a lot of Jacky Rosen ads on the Twitter accounts I follow.
gwangung
@WaterGirl: Keep a watchful eye on this, but folks should remember that there was no way Iran was going to sit on its hands after Bibi’s deliberate provocation.
Drones seem…to be on the lower end of responses.
Another Scott
@WaterGirl: I’ve seen stuff that says “hours” = 9 hours. Pokey things. Who knows what else may be on the way later though…
I hope that Biden acts on the very real difference between protecting Israel and protecting Bibi and his henchmen.
Grr…,
Scott.
New Deal democrat
@gwangung: According to Israeli media, cruise missiles were also launched.
No information as to whether the intended targets are military or not.
Now for the directly worrying part, as to the U.S. According to CNN, “The US will attempt to intercept any weapons launched at Israel if it’s feasible to do so, two US officials told CNN.”
That would appear to make the US a direct belligerent vs. Iran.
Geminid
@gwangung: Iran has plenty of cruise missiles and ballistic missiles it can fire later in this attack. A big question is the target. Hitting IDF forces in the Golan Heights would be less escalatory than say, hitting the airbase within Israel proper from where the Damascus attack was staged.
Two other variables: will Iran launch more missiles from Houthi-controlled Yemen, and will Hezbollah will join in and how hard. I guess we’ll know by midnight.
Kirk
I’m seeing a lot of “Israel says” and a bit of “the US says”.
Has Iran’s leadership said anything, or is this weird 9 hour slow march (and seizing the ship in the straits, and the maybe cruise missiles) it?
Honestly, it seems weird.
delphinium
Donated $50 for NV.
Maxim
$25 to each state.
gwangung
@Geminid: Yes, the additional attack and the target will be illuminating.
Not sure I’m concerned about other actors, but the exact response from Iran is what I’m looking at.
Another Scott
@Kirk:
TimesofIsrael.com:
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
WaterGirl
This is a nice summary of Trump’s week. The only thing I don’t know about is the joint presser. What did I miss there?
Jeffro
@WaterGirl:
Y’ALL
Y’ALL
RWNJ Dad just called me in a near-panic. He was watching the Master’s when the news broke about the Iranian missiles.
Actual quote: “I know we don’t talk politics anymore, but I’m scared…I just don’t trust this administration to handle the situation…”
(jaw drop)
(couple moments of silence)
“Dad…you’re saying that between the orange moron, the guy whose own Cabinet officials called ‘a fucking moron’ and ‘a toddler’…and Mr. Gazillions of Years of Experience…you’re worried about Joe. Biden.’s ability to handle this crisis? You’d rather have the ‘fucking moron’???”
These people, I swear. Full faith in the guy with not only no qualifications, but a 110% track record of epic failure. No faith in the guy who has handled crisis after crisis for our country for years now, and handled them with grace. Unbelievable.
(The conversation didn’t last much longer than those quotes, btw)
Sister Golden Bear
@WaterGirl: Speaker Johnson did a press conference to announce he was introducing a bill to ban undocumented immigrants from voting in federal elections, but which is already illegal. During it Johnson mentioned criminal
brown people”illegals” and appeared to point his thumb back at Trump.Freudian slip?
Another Scott
@Sister Golden Bear: +1
And 1000 memes were born…
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
9 hours? The train would have been faster.
Baud
@Jeffro:
“Sucks to be you, dad.”
cmorenc
The Israel we pledged to support in the first couple of post-WW2/Holocaust still a recent memory is vastly different from the nature of the current fundamentalist Zionist regime with a rabidly apartheid agenda to force Palestenians out of the West Bank and much of Gaza, led by a ruthless, corrupt, manipulative true believer in that mission with a self/interest in keeping hostilities going to avoid being kicked out of office and into jail.
Biden needs to firmly tell bibi to take some iranian tats for the israeli tits and not further counter-retaliate or else lose us support
Another Scott
The USAF tanker that was doing laps in Iraq is apparently heading back to base in
BahrainQatar. FlightRadar24 has it showing code “7700” which is reserved for “general emergencies”.:-/
Doing military stuff is often dangerous, even in “peace time”.
Fingers crossed,
Scott.
WaterGirl
@Jeffro: That’s awful. I imagine your dad is a smart guy, and I simply can’t understand how intelligent people get sucked in by Trump.
This is assuming your dad isn’t an out-and-out racist, rape-supporting, keep “those” people in their place guy.
I truly don’t get it.
Jeffro
@Baud: “sorry to hear that Fox hit your FEAR button so hard and so often that it’s stuck, but…what can you do, amirite?” (shrug)
WaterGirl
@Sister Golden Bear: Freudian slip is right.
edit: Except I think Mike Johnson is really slick, so I imagine the was planned. What that gets him, I do not know. Credibility with the non-MAGA republicans?
Jeffro
Fox headline right now, btw: “Israel on high alert as Islamist regime launches swarms of drones towards Jewish state”. (Italics mine)
for contrast
WaPo headline right now: “Israeli military says multiple drones launched from Iran now headed toward Israel”. (No italics needed.)
WaterGirl
Clearly Bibi wants a regional conflict. I sure as hell hope Biden can figure out a way to avoid that.
Jeffro
@Sister Golden Bear:
@WaterGirl:
I’m the last person to make excuses for MAGAts like Mike Johnson, but in this case, when he gestured over his shoulder towards trump while referring to “hardened criminals”…I took it to mean “hardened criminals…like trump is always talking about”.
ie, he was trying to give trump credit, in his own whipped-dog way.
Geminid
@Another Scott: The U.S. has military missions in western Iraq and eastern Syria, and a third one in the Kurdish Region in northern Iraq. That tanker may have supported fighters protecting those American forces.
Baud
US intelligence has been predicting this for days. They are really top notch.
cmorenc
@WaterGirl: Johnson knows that he is in a precariously unsustainable position as speaker with no room to maneuver anything successfully, unless he persuades Trump to help get the Freedom Caucus to back off, at least temporarily. Otherwise, Johnson’s fall from speakership to back-bencher is inevitable well short of November.
Another Scott
@Baud: “We have a significant intelligence capability.” – POTUS
Cheers,
Scott.
TBone
@WaterGirl: repost of my earlier comment from this morning
This is a really great Freudian slip 😆
https://twitter.com/American_Bridge/status/1778909711695311275
Complete with slo mo instant replay. Worth my click to see it.
Mike S. (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!)
Thanks WG. I just donated $50 each to AZ and NV.
Kirk
@Another Scott: Thank you.
MazeDancer
$20 – 10 for each state. Can’t resist thise good matches
4 Directions brought in more new votes in AZ ,last election, than Biden won by. Every penny is like making votes happen.
May they do the same again. And for NV, too.
wjca
@WaterGirl:
Think of it as an acknowledgement of the effectiveness of Israel’s Iron Dome defense system. The only way to get anything thru it is to flood it.
dc
$20.00 for each state.
Geminid
@wjca: Iron Dome is the first layer of Israel’s anti-missile defense. There are two other systems designed to intercept longer range and speedier ballistic missiles.
It sounds like the IDF is going after the slower drones with fighter jets. Reports are that US fighter planes have intercepted some and that Jordanian and Saudi air force jets are engaging others. Also, that Royal Air Force jets have scrambled from a British base in Cyprus.
Baud
@Geminid:
That’s interesting.
JPL
@WaterGirl: If memory serves me, Bibi is closer to Putin than he is to Zalenski.
strange bedfellows
teezyskeezy
@Baud: Bet it makes the Palestinians feel like chopped liver. Not pulling for Iran, of course, but this is some ugly business from all angles.
Baud
@teezyskeezy:
Everything in the Middle East is ugly business from all angles.
Dan B
@WaterGirl: Word from a psychologist is that it’s a subconsciously steered action where your body tells what you actually believe. There’s a different name than Freudian Slip but it’s just the physical manifestation of the disconnect between your words and your body. Johnson pointed at Stinky (TFG) as he said “criminal”.
New Deal democrat
@WaterGirl:
My initial thought when the IDF attacked the World Kitchen convoy on the same day or only one day apart from bombing the Iranian consulate was, “Israel has decided to go for broke.” Similar to the way the Corleone family decided to “settle all of its accounts” at the end of the Godfather.
WaterGirl
@wjca: That makes sense.
WaterGirl
@Dan B: Ooh, I like that. I hope someone knows what that’s called.
So we should look for Donnie to be shaking his head “no” when he says he wouldn’t sign a national abortion ban,
WaterGirl
@New Deal democrat: Interesting take. You could be right.
Oh, and fuck Bibi.
Dan B
@WaterGirl: Ill try to find it.
lowtechcyclist
@Sister Golden Bear:
Hey I know! We agree to a deal on this: if they allow a floor vote on Ukraine funding, we’ll allow this bill to pass the Senate. Sounds like a fair deal to me!
Baud
@lowtechcyclist:
That would be a very Dark Brandon move.
Tony Jay
@Jeffro:
Fixed that for ya. Sorry.
Sister Golden Bear
@WaterGirl: There’s also the Kinsley gaffe, coined by Michael Kinsley, who said, “A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth — some obvious truth he isn’t supposed to say.” Though that’s verbal not physical, is is accidental, since the politician didn’t intend to admit it.
WaterGirl
@Dan B: Thank you!
lowtechcyclist
@Jeffro:
Not to mention, courtesy of Obama and Biden, we had a functioning agreement with Iran to keep them nuke-free, with strong verification provisions. Ask your dad if he knows who pulled us out of that deal.
(And that was history repeating itself, dammit: Clinton had a functioning agreement with North Korea to keep it nuke-free, and Shrub pulled us out of that deal, and soon after that, they had nukes.)
The world would be a better place if NK didn’t have nukes, and it would be a good thing for the world if Iran doesn’t get nukes. That would seem to be toddler-level obvious, but apparently the GOP is the Not Ready for Kindergarten Party.
WaterGirl
@Sister Golden Bear: Like when Barack Obama talked about people clinging to their guns and religion.
That was dicey for a couple of days, but then people got over it.
Kayla Rudbek
$25 each for AZ and NV. I have good memories of visiting the Grand Canyon and Las Vegas when I lived in Silicon Valley.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: It’s called West Asia now. I guess you don’t teach at a university.
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
First I’ve heard of it. Sounds woke.
Is it something the people of the Middle East/West Asia wanted, or something some Westerner came up with?
lowtechcyclist
@Geminid:
Too bad they won’t let Ukraine have it. Ukraine could really use it.
Zelenskyy asked for Iron Dome all the way back in early 2021, nearly a year before Russia’s current invasion.
It’s hard for me to have much sympathy for Israel these days.
lowtechcyclist
$50 for AZ, and $50 for NV.
Eyeroller
@Baud: Geographically, “West Asia” is Europe. Most of the Middle East is on the African continent, or on the Arabian plate but still more closely allied with Africa.
Bex
Sirens going off over Jerusalem. Seems like no one predicted that.
CTlurker
12.50 for each.
Jeffro
I could ask, but I already know the answer, unfortunately. Well, I should say, his answer.
I was genuinely floored (on multiple levels) that he called. Primarily because he knows I don’t talk politics with him and RWNJ bro since J6. And to be worried about how the Biden Administration will handle it? Like, seriously??
Ah well, now he and all the trump enablers can get a taste of how it felt (for completely legitimate reasons) to have a incredibly stupid, Putin-owned unhinged maniac in the WH for four long years.
WaterGirl
@CTlurker: Thank you!
zhena gogolia
@Baud: I have no idea!
kalakal
$25 for each
stinger
$50 for Nevada.
WaterGirl
Big thanks to everyone who is donating to either, or both, of these two key states.
Dean G Fitzgerald
$10 each for arizona and nevada four directions. Not entirely sure how to track down your email, Watergirl.
WaterGirl
@Dean G Fitzgerald: For future reference, you can send email to my nym at balloon-juice.com
If that’s too cryptic, check out Contact Us in the white menu bar up top.
Thank you!
WaterGirl
We’re currently at $552.50 for the current Nevada Angel match.
We’re currently at $777.50 for the current Arizona Angel match.
Thanks again, everyone! I’ll check back in the morning.
WaterGirl
PSA: If you’re interested in the Einstein zoom this Wednesday (4/19 at 8 pm Eastern) send me email to RSVP so I can send you the zoom link.
WaterGirl
One last thing. If we had a different president, I would be very scared and anxious about Israel and Iran. War mongering presidents are the worst. As we can see if we look to Russian or Israel, for instance.
War should be a last resort, not the means to a political end. We need to win it all in November.
It’s a comfort to have someone so experienced at the wheel. Seriously, I cannot think of a single person who is more prepared to handle something like this. Not even Obama, though he would be a close second.
Avalie
$25 to NV
JaySinWA
@WaterGirl: I wish I could be as sanguine about this, but this is escalating at a very dangerous rate. Hamas provoked Israel into a disastrous response, Israel has provoked Iran into what looks like an over response.
Biden has limited options to cool this down. Better him than Trump, but this is not good for anyone, anywhere
ETA Not that you were saying this is good.
JaySinWA
@JaySinWA: And $25 for NV Four Directions. I did AZ last time, so time to spread things around I guess.
wjca
Hard to know for sure, until we get the damage reports tomorrow. But so far it looks more like a proportionate response. What matters is not how many missiles, drones, etc. were launched, but how many got thru and what damage was done.
WaterGirl
@JaySinWA:
Exactly.
I am not sanguine. Not in the slightest. I am very uneasy.
But if we had any Republican president, I would be afraid that they would jump at the chance to stir up a regional conflict. They would be plenty happy to go to war to put all that war money in the pockets of their friends, and maybe even take a cut of that for themselves.
Sharon
Just donated $25 each to 4DAZ & 4DNV.
WaterGirl
@Sharon: Thank you!
That brings us to $627 and $802 toward the current $1k angel matches!
Paul W.
I’m in for 50 in NV, haven’t donated for races in this state yet and looks like we’re gonna need it!
WaterGirl
@Paul W.: We certainly are. The Republicans are gunning for Jacky Rosen!
WaterGirl
I am no longer checking this thread for matching donations – there is a more recent fundraising thread. Thanks!