The true measure of strength is based on who you lift up, not who you beat down. pic.twitter.com/3pezvMSXYQ
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) April 30, 2024
I’ve seen people on social media sneering about this — Oh, of course Drew Barrymore wants Kamala to be her mommy! — but Vice-President Harris is right. People choose leaders, including Presidents, because we know we can’t, as individuals, protect ourselves from every single threat. Trump voters want a ‘strong daddy’ to protect them; of course, they can’t (or don’t want to) tell the difference between a ‘strong daddy’ and an ‘abusive thug’, and Trump is only interested in protecting his own narcissistic self. Democrats have been branded as the Mommy Party… let’s be the fierce protector the country needs!
Speaking of which…
The Biden administration will forgive $6.1 billion in debt held by 317,000 former students of the defunct for-profit chain the Art Institutes, marking one of the Education Department’s largest group discharges of federal student loans. https://t.co/N4RDIpEy8i
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) May 1, 2024
This is more than debt relief. It's restitution from scammers. https://t.co/vsUE1eulH5
— zeddy (@Zeddary) May 1, 2024
Economic opportunity is the power to build the life you want.
President Joe Biden and I are building an economy where every person has the freedom to thrive. pic.twitter.com/v78WRJg547
— Vice President Kamala Harris (@VP) April 30, 2024
Biden to travel to North Carolina to meet with families of officers killed in deadly shooting https://t.co/GnyYMhByRv
— The Associated Press (@AP) May 2, 2024
Biden administration continues push to replace lead pipes nationwide https://t.co/aES4bDYnKC
— Post Green (@postgreen) May 2, 2024
Baud
I can’t believe people on social media were sneering.
Melancholy Jaques
I think it’s more that they want a strong figure to injure and scorn the people they hate.
Other than tax cuts for the rich, the Trump administration was about cruelty.
Elizabelle
Mommy Party vs the Predator Party.
There are much better models for masculine behavior than anything the GOP is doing.
Baud
@Elizabelle:
Good point. We shouldn’t denigrate daddies.
NotMax
Media mentions.
Strongly recommended in the past, the entire first season (13 episodes) of Homicide Hills is included with Prime throughout May, in the “TV and movies to sample this month” category. A++ for entertainment value. German with English subtitles, but don’t let that put you off; give it a go. Individualistic, tenacious female big city police detective, in line for a promotion, is farmed out to be chief of a tiny police department in a sleepy backwater. Not a strict parallel but will appeal to fans of quirky stuff on the plane of Northern Exposure.
Meantime, on Netflix, there’s Boiling Point, a dramatized kitchen-eye view of the travails and tolls inherent both inside and outside a high-end restaurant. This BBC mini-series is a follow-up to the film of the same name but stands on its own merits without backstory familiarity. Especially if you like shows such as The Bear, check it out.
narya
The continued push to replace lead pipes is one of those quiet efforts with huge downstream good. We tend to think in terms of big catastrophes, but the little deadly accretions are every bit as–sometimes more–important.
Mousebumples
Re – bottom tweet, I’ve seen signs advertising that the lead pipe replacement project was funded by PRESIDENT BIDEN’S Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill. Take credit for things. So happy to see that kind of information out there.
dmsilev
@Baud:
Truly, that never happens.
Baud
@narya:
It’s why we need more consistency in government leadership.
OzarkHillbilly
Israel tells U.S. it will punish Palestinian Authority if ICC issues warrants
The beatings will continue until morale improves!
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊 😊 😊
rikyrah
@Melancholy Jaques:
The cruelty IS the point
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
Ken
@Baud: They were probably on one of those sites, not one of the the nice, polite social media sites.
Which reminds me of Molly White’s latest, where she quotes Tom Eastman: the web has rotted into “five giant websites, each filled with screenshots of the other four”.
eclare
@Baud:
TBF there have been some strange discussions on Barrymore about mothers. Aubrey Plaza told Drew “be my mommy,” and there was a comment Drew made that some construed as Drew wanting her mother dead.
Just weird stuff. I don’t watch the show but those snippets made the entertainment tabloids.
Baud
@Ken:
Heh. The only one I frequent is reddit, and that observation is very true.
Baud
@eclare:
Thanks for context.
narya
@Baud: Totally agree. There is SO! MUCH! CLEANUP! and I don’t even mean “make everything like the Democrats want it.” EVERYONE should have schools, roads, and healthcare. And the right to vote. And no toxic dump in their community.
Baud
@narya:
I’m not sure everyone wants those things anymore. Except maybe roads.
Kay
Suzanne says that people belittle entertainment that is female-coded (a show like Drew Barrymore’s show) but not at entertainment that is male-coded ( Joe Rogan, the horrible anti woke aging comics). I think there’s truth to that.
NotMax
@Baud
Web needs a bluedit.
:)
narya
@Baud: Oh, I think everyone wants those things, they just don’t want to pay for OTHER people to have them.
Gin & Tonic
For the one or two of you who might be interested in what is happening in Georgia (the country) and still read Twitter, this thread is a good explainer:
As I wrote in Adam’s thread last night, the actions taken by GD strike me as very similar to the tack taken by Yanukovych in November of 2013, that sparked the Maidan/Revolution of Dignity movement.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@narya: Removing lead from paint seems to have had an impact on children’s learning.
Baud
@Kay:
I see plenty of people belittling Rogan these days, but that is likely because of my own info bubble.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Kay: This is true in books too. Genres such as romance and YA get dissed partly because their audiences are not respected.
Scout211
Thank you for these positive morning threads, AL. They are really a breath of fresh air. Kamala is such a good VP.
And in contrast, my pick for the Trump’s VP (J.D. Vance) is on his PR tour to raise his profile and sidle up to Trump and his delusions. Ugh.
I vote for blaming Donald Trump for everything bad said by Republicans. Yes, I do, J.D. Vance.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic:
I don’t know if you saw my question the other day, but do you see an upside for Ukraine?
Ohio Mom
@narya: I completely agree, though it is difficult if not impossible to trace results.
Children exposed to lead lose IQ points, can develop learning and behavior issues, but how could you prove years later that less lead exposure resulted in better behaved and smarter children? I don’t think you would be able to.
I’m not saying, don’t take lead out of pipes. I’m saying don’t expect any lasting recognition or gratitude. Sigh.
eclare
@Kay:
The ultimate was when Samantha Bee, the correspondent for The Daily Show with the most seniority, was passed over as host when Jon retired. The execs went with someone most people had never heard of and had never lived in this country, to host a show mainly about US politics.
Baud
@Ohio Mom:
That’s printed on the back of my Democratic Party ID card.
Baud
@eclare:
I stopped watching by that point, but he was really popular.
ETA: To clarify, he seems to have done a good job as host.
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: No.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic:
That’s unfortunate. Thanks.
lowtechcyclist
For the past fifteen years at least, the Dems have been the Mommy Party AND the Daddy Party. The GOP is the drunken uncle at Thanksgiving dinner who talks way too loud, won’t shut up, and tries to feel up your twelve year old daughter when he sees her alone in the kitchen.
Soprano2
@Kay: Oh this is absolutely true. Anything oriented toward women is belittled as small and unimportant. You see the same thing with other stuff – belittling sci-fi conventions and people doing cosplay there, while dressing up in paint and all kinds of outlandish gear to cheer on your favorite sports team is seen as completely normal.
Kay
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Oh, I bet.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: 😂
Soprano2
@Scout211: Except that people like J.D. Vance tar every Democrat with everything radical ever said by a liberal. It’s absurd how they try to downplay something we all saw happen with our own eyes.
I also want to say thanks to Anne for these threads, it’s good to see that positive news about what the Biden administration is doing is getting out there. The press makes a choice about whether or not to talk about it.
Leto
If my decade long experience on Imgur has taught me anything, it’s that there is a significant subset of men (and women) who are looking for a “strong mommy”. I’m eternally happy that we have smart, competent leaders who surround themselves with smart, competent people. They may not get every decision correct, but they do try to course correct when needed. Also I know that their first instinct/response to an issue isn’t out of being an evil, malevolent asswipe.
So +1 for “Mommy Party”.
eclare
@Ohio Mom:
Friends of mine went through this with their two yo who was exposed to massive amounts of lead when the apartment company removed paint on the outside using flames before they repainted. Cost to replace everything they had to destroy, which was pretty much everything, lawyers could get a dollar figure and sue. Future loss of iq points in their child? How do you quantify that?
It took years, but they eventually got something. And their daughter just started at NYU, but who knows how much, if any, permanent damage it caused?
eclare
@Baud:
I agree he seems to have been popular, but what a slap in the face.
Omnes Omnibus
Is that particularly oriented toward women? I wouldn’t have thought so, but I have never been to one. I would have said that this was rooted in traditional jock/nerd high school hierarchy thinking.
sixthdoctor
@lowtechcyclist: I’m writing that down and will give you credit when I slam that down in arguments like an Uno wild draw four.
Soprano2
@Baud: Trevor Noah was interesting as the host, he brought a different viewpoint to that show. His comparison of TFG to African dictators was one of the most unintentionally chilling things I saw in 2016. I wish everyone could have seen it, the similarity was striking. The only thing he didn’t do was wear a fake military uniform.
I watched Samantha Bee’s show, and while I thought it was OK I wasn’t a huge fan of it. I can’t tell you why, it just didn’t resonate that much with me.
Leto
@eclare: we loved Sam Bee’s show. It was really good. She also made a point of highlighting that exact fact: trying to be a woman host was virtually impossible and that absolutely pissed her off. It was also one of the only shows to primarily highlight women’s issues. Now that I think about it, it was probably the only show.
Her interview with Anita Hill, during the Christine Blasey Ford hearings was very good. Sad, but good.
Kay
@eclare:
I didn’t know that.
It’s so funny you say that because I just listened to a podcast interview with her that was hysterical. She tells a story about how she picked a pantsuit to wear to prom in the 1990’s – “my Golden Girls prom pantsuit”. Her stylish grandmother told her she looked fabulous.
Soprano2
@Omnes Omnibus: No, it’s not really oriented toward women in particular. I was only making the comparison at how one type of dressing up because you’re a fan is looked down on and mocked, while the other is seen as normal, although I would say the sci-fi cosplay thing is probably seen as a lot more normal now than it was when I was young.
Scout211
I agree. Trevor Noah and his writers were on top of every US story and did the research. He typically read the books of the authors he interviewed, too.
I loved Samantha Bee as a TDS correspondent but found her show unwatchable because her delivery of the monologues was hard for me to follow. She talked so loudly and so quickly that I missed most of what she said. I eventually gave up because I just couldn’t listen.
But I assumed that my opinion was an outlier.
eclare
@Leto:
I liked it too. Her piece on how food stamps don’t cover diapers (noted by Eminem decades ago) was very good. I bet that interview was infuriating, I don’t think I saw that.
Leto
@Omnes Omnibus: I’d say yes, and for some of the usual reasons. If they show too much skin they’re still labeled “whoring for attention”. Especially depending on the character they’re cosplaying. If they use too much Photoshop that’s a complaint. If they alter too much of the original character costume.
I mean I get the Photoshop one; there’s a point when it becomes just too much. Ofc that’s my personal opinion and I respect the artists choice with their work. A lot of the others are just people being assholes (familiar). But I do know that cosplaying has become a pretty big industry over the past 20 years. So many conventions (both national and local), so many big names that earn quite a paycheck for their work, absurd number of YouTubers doing tutorials/showing off their work… there are some cosplays that are so elaborate, and g-d amazing, that you simply go, “Wow…”
Like many things: get the fuck out of high school/your small town, and you’re generally doing much better.
Melancholy Jaques
@Soprano2:
It isn’t just people like him; the political media do the same thing.
Scout211
The Biden-Harris campaign has a new, updated campaign ad
gene108
@eclare:
Drew’s childhood was very public and messed up. Her mom was a large part of it.
*************
Kamala Harris looks younger than her age. She’s either turned or will turn 60 this year.
Elizabelle
I am glad to see the item about the four dead North Carolina law enforcement officers. Mostly US marshals, I believe? When the Washington Post has done a story on that (preventable) tragedy, the top comments are always about the prevalence of guns.
You cannot protect anyone against a military grade weapon (this was an assault rifle) in the wrong hands.
Big election year in North Carolina. Do you really want your law enforcement-adjacent family members at risk from high power weaponry?
We cannot stop these mass shootings. But we could reduce their incidence, with the right leadership and laws that are thorough and enforced.
Cowards Scalia, Thomas, Alito. Never had to serve a warrant, or respond to a domestic violence call.
Chief Oshkosh
@Ohio Mom:
Years ago, CalPundit (Kevin Drum) presented a retrospective analysis that suggested a strong correlation across generations of humans. Prospective animal studies have shown that, if you examine closely enough, even the lowest amounts of lead cause some neurotoxicity.
SiubhanDuinne
@NotMax:
Have not seen The Bear, but I gather it is a cooking/restaurant show? I might give it a try. Is it the source of the phrase “I choose the bear” that I’m suddenly seeing everywhere? Absent context, the line makes no sense to me.
cain
@Elizabelle:
I was going to compare the mommy party with the dead beat dad party.
eclare
@SiubhanDuinne:
I loved The Bear and don’t recall that line. If you do watch, it is intense. It isn’t violent, but it had me on pins and needles multiple times.
You’ll understand why it has won so many awards.
Leto
Just because we’re talking about strong women: Heart covers Led Zeppelin’s “Going to California”on the Stern show
Mousebumples
Nope. That’s in response to a book (article?) about if you’re a woman alone in the woods… Would you rather run across a strange bear or a strange man
Eta – Agree the show The Bear is good. There’s a lot of restaurant scenes, but it’s also about family and adversity.
Omnes Omnibus
@SiubhanDuinne: It is an internet question for women: If you are walking alone in the woods would you rather encounter a bear or an unknown man?
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
@Mousebumples:
Viral tiktok I believe.
ETA: Another what color is this dress type of thing, except in a battle of the sexes frame.
Soprano2
@Scout211: I feel the same about her as I do about the woman who’s on “The New Abnormal” podcast now – I always feel like she’s yelling at me. It’s not about women, because there are a lot of women I like – I love Diane Rehm’s interviews. If I feel like you’re talking really fast and yelling all the time I don’t want to listen to you. I can’t hear the content because the delivery is turning me off. I feel the same way about men doing that, too.
Anne Laurie
… And that’s why Repubs are *against* it!
Too tired to look it up, but I remember posting a clip w/a GOP lawmaker complaining ‘we’ shouldn’t have to pay taxes to keep other peoples’ kids from eating paint chips. Because, IIRC, free market! Deserving people, who actually care about their own kids, will simply choose not to live in run-down housing… and people who have no other housing options shouldn’t have had kids in the first place…
Baud
@Soprano2:
Everyone yells these days. It’s one reason I don’t watch cable news anymore.
TBone
@Leto: I liked that show also.
Leto
@SiubhanDuinne: @eclare: second The Bear. Such a good show. Grapples with family/interpersonal dynamics within the context of the restaurant business. Some heavy topics lead the series off. Apparently people who worked in the service industry thought the first season was very realistic. Just overall great acting and writing. Oh man, the second season episode when Carmy sends Richie off to do the matre d training… so good.
UncleEbeneezer
Good thread (on the Xitter) about The Intercept and Mehdi Hasan:
SiubhanDuinne
@Soprano2:
Yup. Also:
Men are chefs. Women cook supper.
Men are doctors. Women are nurses.
Men create art. Women do crafts.
Obviously these stereotypes have shifted a lot, but for older generations I fear they are still pretty baked in.
eclare
@Leto:
The Christmas episode in the second season…one of those pins and needles episodes for me.
Jamie Lee Curtis, wow.
cain
@Soprano2:
It would have been a better show if she had access to the writers of TDS.
UncleEbeneezer
@Leto: The second season really only had two good episodes tho. That one and the one focussed on Marcus’ training. And that holiday episode was just so over-the-top, it was almost unwatchable. Loved the first season but it really went downhill in the second.
leeleeFL
To keep in step with the Man vs. Bear meme that’s causing so much excitement, might I say that I would pick a Protective Mama Bear, over a thuggish Papa Bear all fucking day.
Baud
@SiubhanDuinne:
A few weeks ago, I observed that there was no reason men should dominate religious leadership. There’s a historical reason men dominated political leadership because of warfare, but I couldn’t think of any reason why people should give exclusive control over religion to men.
catclub
Every day, it is the psychology of Authoritarian followers. go read “The Authoritarians”
gvg
@lowtechcyclist: Mommy AND Daddy because daddy is a deadbeat absent dad. Plenty of people relate to that.
Not that it’s that realistic an analogy. Mommy or Daddy I mean. Politics and events and policies just aren’t that related to gender roles IMO.
I think the Republican party waited too long to modify their strategy. The demographics made it clear decades ago that they needed to change. I think if they had trained their electorate differently, the voters would not have trapped them into the box canyon of impossible contradictory uncompromising demands. They could have won elections differently.
UncleEbeneezer
@eclare: I once went to a friend’s family’s, extremely dysfunctional house for the holidays because I was alone in LA away from my family, and it was a lot like that. And my own family used to have some huge blow-ups at holidays too. So that episode wasn’t amusing to me. All I could think was “why do any of them still show up for this shit?” In reality, a lot of us learn to walk away and it’s the best decision we ever made. The fact that your relative also has a good side doesn’t mean you wanna spend your holiday navigating their tantrums and abuse.
SiubhanDuinne
Okay, thanks to everyone (too many to link, but you know who you are) who [a] recommended The Bear, which I shall watch ASAP, and [b] explained the source of “I choose the bear,” which makes much sense.
eclare
@UncleEbeneezer:
I didn’t find it amusing at all, I came away thinking thank dog I did not grow up in a family like that. I came away grateful.
And I agree about the Marcus episode, the invisible cat was a nice touch.
Ken
@SiubhanDuinne: Not just older generations; the gender assumptions are baked into the translation algorithms. There was an interesting study of this.
Hungarian has only one third-person pronoun ő for both “he” and “she”. The study translated Hungarian sentences of the form “ő is an X” to English, and the translation software turned them into “he is a doctor”, “she is a nurse”, “he is a professor”, “she is a teacher”….
Baud
@gvg:
I don’t know. They probably set back social and economic change three to five decades with their strategy. That’s basically an adult lifespan. Not a bad outcome for the party’s supporters.
Elizabelle
@Baud: Yes. A good dad is invaluable. We have one in the Oval Office now, happily.
Good Second Gentleman dad too.
Kay
In the House passage of the “Antisemitism Awareness Act” 5.9 % of Representatives that voted Yea are Jewish. 6.6% of the Representatives that voted Nay are Jewish. We might want to let Jewish people into this discussion of antisemitism. They seem to have their own thoughts on it :)
OzarkHillbilly
@Soprano2: Same here, and I feel the same about John Oliver, his delivery leaves me flat.
SiubhanDuinne
@Ken:
Now that is really interesting. Thanks.
(Carly Simon voice: “Perpetuation … Per Pet U Aaaaaaa-tion….”)
Uncle Cosmo
“Seems” seems ;^D to be doing a lot of work there.
My understanding is that removing lead from gasoline (in the form of the anti-knock additive tetraethyl lead) has had a far greater impact. In the bad old days, exposure to lead-laden exhaust fumes was a lot harder to limit than chewing on windowsills with peeling lead-based paint. Gnawing is optional and a risk for a brief period of a child’s life; breathing is mandatory for human beans of all ages.
Kay
@Ken:
entering class of 2023 for med school was the first majority women class in the US – 55%. That may not hold because women drop out of med school more – I think probably pregnancy related. But still.
That’s why we’re seeing backlash and regression on womens rights. They’re succeeding. They gotta strangle that in the crib.
Baud
@Kay:
Maybe med school should teach where babies come from in the first semester.
:-)
Ken
@SiubhanDuinne: Found a screenshot showing the translation test: https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/m9uphb/hungarian_has_no_gendered_pronouns_so_google/
lowtechcyclist
@gene108:
Will turn. Something Doug Emhoff and I have in common is that we’re both married to women who were born on October 20, 1964.
Cacti
@UncleEbeneezer: Wow, that was quite the softballing of the very serious problems with Anat Schwartz and her propagandizing on behalf of the Israeli government in the pages of NYT.
OzarkHillbilly
All 3 have been tightly woven together throughout history. How many politicians are avowed atheists? How many times has warfare been waged on religious grounds to justify it? That pattern continues today.
Jackie
This interesting; Dan Pfeiffer discusses pretty much what we’ve speculated about the news gap between us (news junkies) and normies and how it might benefit TIFG:
Baud
@Jackie:
Makes sense to me. Historically, I think the right had a better grasp of normies than liberals did. But I think the right has gotten worse. I’m less sure if we have gotten better.
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud:
We have perhaps gotten less worse?
Kay
@Baud:
ha ha. They have new bluetooth breast pumps that are just amazing. Women now pump when they’re driving, which cracks me up.
Once they become the majority in a profession then they encounter the second line of bias- which is that they’re directed to the lower paying areas of practice. Same in law.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
Exactly
Men prefer the company of men. But then they pretend it’s merit based.
Leto
@UncleEbeneezer: I think it’s only over the top if you’ve never had a family dynamic like that before. I know people who described that scene as “fairly accurate” of their holiday gatherings, minus the grand finale part with Jamie Lee. S2 still gets a 99% critical review, and 93% audience review, on Rotten Tomatoes. There are reviews there that echo your sentiments, so as with all art: it’s subjective!
S2 of Hacks starts today!!! Another badass female driven show.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Jackie:
I wonder if this might be why political campaigns are still so closely tied to “legacy” forms of advertising, ie., TV ads, etc.
I don’t think anybody’s figured out “effective communication stategies” yet. We’ve become such a stovepiped society, the old ways aren’t as effective.
Actually, GOTV is always effective.
Chief Oshkosh
@Uncle Cosmo: Absolutely, getting lead out of gasoline was the biggie, as was semi-removal from various industrial applications. However, lead in old paint actually can become airborne (think dust). As to chewing being an issue during a relatively short life interval, that’s true, but the importance of that interval to neural development is the driver, not the length of time that a child might be a paint chewer. :)
And as mentioned, animal studies indicate that no amount of lead is safe wrt to neural development and homeostasis.
different-church-lady
“BUT WHY WON’T BIDEN DO ANYTHING ABOUT STUDENT DEBT??2?”
Leto
@Baud:
Female Roles in Leadership and the Ideological Texture of 1 Timothy 2: 9-15
I agree with you, btw. I think this is one of those issues which is helping to decrease enrollment in the church, as a whole.
Kay
@UncleEbeneezer:
Understand something though. By the US helping to block investigation and prosecution of Israeli government war crimes we are also blocking investigation and prosecution of Hamas war crimes.
Blocking the uncovering of the truth never benefits victims. They have absolutely nothing to fear from an investigation.
Uncle Cosmo
What that Thug was really complaining about was that landlords were having to pay the costs of lead removal from their rental properties out of their own pockets. Before housing units can be registered as rental property, localities now routinely require the putative landlord to pay inspectors to identify all sources of lead, pay contractors to remove them, and then pay for re-inspection to verify the removal.
Jackie
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Absolutely! GOTV and BJ postcard writers ROCK! 👍🏻😊
OzarkHillbilly
@Chief Oshkosh: Way back when they still used lead solder, I knew a plumber who got lead poisoning because he spent all day/week (I can’t remember) with his head in bathroom and kitchen cabinets hooking up water lines to sinks. He spent several days in the hospital and had side effects for some time after.
Nasty stuff.
Kay
@Leto:
I could never do it. I picked it up at 6 years old that girls were “less than” boys in religion and that was just it for me.
But obviously not true of all women. My daughter belongs to a (liberal) Methodist church that she loves and I’m happy for her.
gvg
@different-church-lady: By the way, forgiving the debt because the school was fraudulent has been a part of the rules for at least 25 years. There used to be regular announcements of the findings. It was never common, but it did happen and there was a process to handle it. What Biden is doing is not arbitrary. He is just following the rules, which apparently were being circumvented routinely before. DeVos was notorious very quickly within the financial aid community for NOT following the law….just not. Just like public service forgiveness was always a part of the rules
Ksmiami
@eclare: the good news is that sounds like a one time type of exposure vs the perpetual exposure from leaded gas etc. The body can recover from almost any brief exposure – it’s the repetitive kind that can be super damaging.
Torrey
@Gin & Tonic:
Thank you! I wasn’t able to link to the thread (I’m not on the site formerly known as Twitter), just the original post. In the former Twitter, I was generally able to access threads. Does anybody have any recommendations?
BTW, I think that absence from or failure to comment on the Ukraine threads doesn’t mean people aren’t interested. I (to take a totally random example) had to take a break from consistently keeping up and from any commenting for a variety of reasons, having nothing to do with any lack of interest in what is happening with regard to Ukraine in particular and that part of the world in general.
eclare
@Leto:
Yes! Love Hacks.
Kay
@OzarkHillbilly:
Why do plumbers and electricians choose residential? It’s baffling to me. Commercial/industrial pays more and they don’t have to deal with the public.
UncleEbeneezer
@Leto: I did have a family a lot like that. Not my immediate family (me, M/D, Sis), but it was totally the dynamic when we visited my Aunts, Uncles, Grandparents. It was accurate AND over-the-top.
Kay
@OzarkHillbilly:
I told you my son was using smiley/frowny stickers with his apprentices – he has to check their work before he signs off and he is not a talker so he puts a frowny on anything they have to do over. “Oh, a frowny! WTF is wrong with it?!” Now he bought them all matching t shirts so the other cranky old journeymen know they’re part of his crew and won’t bug them. They’re all IBEW so one of the older IBEW guys said “you can’t do that- you can’t make them wear your uniform” – lol.
Soprano2
@UncleEbeneezer: Hassan forever lost credibility with me by claiming that Biden could just pick up the phone and get Bibi to quit bombing Gaza. How can I take anyone who believes something asinine like that seriously?
Soprano2
@cain: Probably. I hate the stereotype, but she was strident to an unpleasant degree. I understand about being outraged, but if you’re yelling at people all the time after awhile they start to feel attacked and tune you out. At least that was my reaction.
catclub
@Kay: Less demanding/knowledgeable customers?
Other MJS
LIBERALZ ARE COMING FOR YOUR LEAD PIPES!!
Kay
@catclub:
Good point. Probably true.
Eyeroller
@Baud: Historically it was not true that men dominated religion to the extent they do now. Many ancient religions had priestesses. The key factor seems to have been powerful female deities. Hinduism is the only surviving major religion that comes to my mind that still has goddesses, but S.C. will have to explain whether there are priestesses associated with those since I just don’t know enough about it.
wjca
If you’ve got 4 wheel drive (even if you’ve never used it), you’ve got an off-road vehicle. So why do you need roads? The fact that you’ve never taken it (or anything else) off road, and so have no clue what that might entail, is beside the point. Because . . . reasons.
Kay
newsmax
Oh, we taught them right from wrong. That’s why they’re protesting.
Citizen Alan
@OzarkHillbilly: I would submit that where Israel is concerned the religious views of fundamentalists and evangelicals plays a greater role in shaping US foreign policy than any other single factor. The republican party has been effectively captured by that portion of the electorate that sees israel as the launching pad of the apocalypse. And while most republicans probably don’t believe that and cynically use the issue for votes, I guarantee that mike johnson and ithers takes that shit seriously.
Kay
This lie is interesting to me because it’s so obviously untrue. Does Ernst think IU and OSU and MUS are “elite”? Or does she just not actually read and follow news but instead promotes poltiical narratives?
Rhetorical question. The “elite universities” and “coddled” is central this conservative/media narrative which actually has little or nothing to do with the reality of these protests so I know the answer.
Cacti
@Kay: Or how many of these phony “just folks” Republicans went to fancy east coast schools in the DC to Boston corridor.
My personal favorite is Senator Kennedy, who went to Oxford, and plays Foghorn Leghorn in public.
wjca
At least 20 years too late for that. Whether it’s obvious yet or not.
Kay
@Cacti:
I’m amused that more Jewish lawmakers voted against the (ridiculous) anti semitism bill than voted for it.
We’re now at the point of this ludicrous narrative cycle where people who are not Jewish are telling Jewish people what they should be offended by. Just clown show.
I’m embarrassed and ashamed of the Biden Adminsitration reaction to the protestors. I think they have both abandoned them and abandoned basic liberal principles of the freedom to political speech and they’re doing ot shuit down debate on their shitty I/P policy.
But I disagree with you that it will hurt him. All of Right wing Democrats and half of the centrists will be thrilled that police are busting hippie skulls. They’ll eat it up.
We should bet. A hundred bucks. I say it helps him. It sucks that it will help him but this country really has no patience or affection for young people. We want them to shut up and follow orders.
“Sister Soulja!” I’ve seen this movie before – Clinton’s two terms.
Mike E
Link/cite?
Kay
@Cacti:
The same Democrats and liberals who signed the dumb, pompous “Harpers Letter” and started a national panic over “wokeness” will eat up Biden “cracking down” on protestors. They wanted BLM shut down and Occupy before that. This has been like their dream – crushing the students. They’re getting their wish.
Kay
@Cacti:
The same Democrats and liberals who signed the dumb, pompous “Harpers Letter” and started a national panic over “wokeness” will eat up Biden “cracking down” on protestors. They wanted BLM shut down and Occupy before that. This has been like their dream – crushing the students. They’re getting their wish.
JAFD
@Baud: My PCP came back from maternity leave a couple of years back. First appointment, I said “Heard you had the Egyptian Flu – dreaded condition, takes a young lady, and turns her into a mummy.”
She’d never heard that before. ‘Twas current when I was teenaged in the ’60’s.
Kay
@Mike E:
Here’s the count.
Mike Johnson and Right wing Democrats are going to give him a stern lecture on how to be Jewish properly. Embarrassing. It gets dumber every day.
Cacti
@Kay: I think he is likely to pull a repeat of 2016, where the Dem wins the popular vote and loses the EC.
In 2020, the youngs turned out +11 points over their 2016 turnout. I think the kids aren’t going to show up for him in states where the margins will be thin and it’s going to cost him in the EC.
Your wager intrigues me.
Melancholy Jaques
@catclub:
Can I skip the reading and just use your notes for the exam?
Melancholy Jaques
@Cacti:
Which state or states that Biden/Harris won in 2020 are they going to lose in 2024, according to your thinking?
And keep in mind, no Comey letter, no Trump win in 2016.
Do you really think he is more popular in the Biden/Harris states now than he was in 2020?
Kay
@Cacti:
Let’s! 100 dollars. I’m good for it.
I think Balloon Juice tends to downplay the role of centrist and Right wing Democrats in the Democratic Party because so many of you-all live in liberal areas.
They’ll love students getting beaten up.
I have a son and grandchild in Denmark and I’m semi retired so I spend quite a bit of time in Copenhagen now. Danes have their downsides (they’re xenophobic, for one) and we’re cold people – that’s true- not touchy feely- but they genuinely love children and young people. I walk around with my 3 year old grandaughter and I’ll get told over and over how great she is in Denmark. They have an entire national holiday where new high school graduates have a whole day of celebration. It shows in Danish policy. Kid friendly.
Americans are really stingy with and resentful of young people. We don’t much like them.
Kay
@Cacti:
Denmark has a program where they take city kids to the country – “woods school” (loosely translated).
They can get on a bus and go frolic in the woods for a day. We won’t even subsidize college.
I think that’s one thing that’s changed since the Vietnam student protests. Our students are now borrowing 100k to pay the college adminstrators who are setting the cops on them. “Spoiled” my ass.
Mike E
@Kay: I guess I don’t see where more Jewish reps voted against it, that’s my query… not that it matters in the no votes but if so I would applaud their independence on the subject matter (it would refute “JFK will be controlled by the Vatican!!” type of nonsense)
Kayla Rudbek
@Leto: I refuse to worship any deity that treats me as a second class citizen
Gloria DryGarden
@narya: oh like abortion. The well off get them for family members and mistresses, but they don’t want others to be able to have them.
grrr.