Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

If a good thing happens for a bad reason, it’s still a good thing.

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

This fight is for everything.

It’s all just conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

The republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

Anne Laurie is a fucking hero in so many ways. ~ Betty Cracker

An almost top 10,000 blog!

You cannot love your country only when you win.

They were going to turn on one another at some point. It was inevitable.

If you cannot answer whether trump lost the 2020 election, you are unfit for office.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

When they say they are pro-life, they do not mean yours.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you do not.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

“woke” is the new caravan.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

People identifying as christian while ignoring christ and his teachings is a strange thing indeed.

The fight for our country is always worth it. ~Kamala Harris

You are here: Home / Elections 2024 / Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Interesting Times, Dammit

Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Interesting Times, Dammit

by | 400 Comments

This post is in: , , , ,


Mark your calendars:

… Biden will speak to “Good Morning America” and “This Week” anchor George Stephanopoulos for the interview. A first look will air on the Friday, July 5, edition of “World News Tonight with David Muir” with portions airing on Saturday and Sunday on “Good Morning America.”

The extended interview will air Sunday, July 7, on “This Week” and Monday’s episode of “Good Morning America.”…

Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told MSNBC on Tuesday that the president had “a bad night,” but added, “He has judgment. He has strategic thinking and the rest.”

Democratic Sen. Bob Casey, who is running for reelection in Pennsylvania, threw his support behind Biden Monday afternoon when asked about the president’s debate performance, telling reporters he is confident Biden can run a strong reelection race and serve a second term.

“No, I don’t worry about that. Look, he had a bad night in the debate, but I think people know what’s at stake,” he said.

Reader Interactions

400Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    The media didn’t invent the email server, but they sure obsessed the hell out of it.

  2. 2.

    Eyeroller

    @Baud:  They will never, ever admit their role in turning “concerns” into a full-blown crisis.  They have done this multiple times.  Somehow nearly always to Democrats.

  3. 3.

    Another Scott

    The navel gazing in the political press is just astounding, but expected.

    I can’t wait for the day-after coverage of Bibi’s speech to Congress on July 24.  Biden will surely have to resign then and surrender to Gitmo, amirite??  I mean, it’s clearly what all The Democrats want!!??

    [ groucho-roll-eyes.gif ]

    Eyes on the prizes.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  5. 5.

    Baud

    @Eyeroller:

    Whatever happens in November, we need to think seriously about what to do about the media landscape. That’s not a role for government because of the First Amendment. I just don’t think we can keep going on like this though.

  6. 6.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    Trump’s Project 2025 leader: “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be”

    Oh dear god

  9. 9.

    WereBear

    I see it as the pressure of stunted corporate minds scrambling with the concept that First Law is, “There shall be a horse race, and you protect profits by playing with the odds, just like the bookies down at the track.”

    The only way to cover up tRump’s loss is to pretend Biden’s are the more “concerning.”

  10. 10.

    OzarkHillbilly

    I had to take break from the news after the debate. Same for this place for a few days. My heart was about to explode from the blood pressure.

  12. 12.

    Citizen Dave

    The Onion?  No, just CNN:

    RFK Jr. denies eating a dog while sidestepping sexual assault allegations in Vanity Fair article

  15. 15.

    Eolirin

    @Baud: We won’t.

    When either Trump or another Trump like Republican ends up finally winning the white house, they’ll be some of the first people rounded up.

  16. 16.

    WereBear

    @Baud: It is a rule in labeling law. If we are to consume content like peas in a can, the can must not have toxic slime when it is labeled with photo and words that are peas.

    Fox News. If you label it as journalism you will be held to proper journalism standards. Then, class actions.

    How many people died because they watched Fox “News” and listened to Tucker? More than just a few.

  17. 17.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Citizen Dave: Well, this could be a real problem for trump. If rfk jr. can split the scumbag, misogynist, rapist vote, trump might even lose Misery.

    eta: //s in case somebody doesn’t get it

  21. 21.

    Eyeroller

    @WereBear: That’s why Fox doesn’t label their shows as journalism.  They are “opinion” and “entertainment.”  They’ve won at least one lawsuit over this.  The only reason Dominion won was a pattern of very specific lies.

  22. 22.

    Another Scott

    @Baud: People have choices.  People need to think about what they read and consider the author’s intended reaction.  Especially these days, the mass media is working on the assumption that the only way to survive is to get readers and viewers upset and scared and angry – often all at once.  They are in the business of manipulating readers and viewers.

    “Republicans don’t lie to be believed – they lie to be repeated.” – LOLGOP

    That doesn’t mean, of course, that we have to ignore their dangerous actions and their dangerous plans.  But we don’t have to repeat their memes.

    Unsubscribe, don’t click, don’t forward, and support real fact-finding and real journalism – ProPublica, Froomkin’s Presswatchers.org, Guttmacher, SPLCenter, and on and on.

    As someone smart said long ago:

    THINK

    This stuff isn’t easy, and it’s not going to be quick.  But we can do this.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  23. 23.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Even if Biden wins reëlection with landslide-level numbers, I predict it’ll be a matter of mere days until the MSM starts routinely referring to him as a lame duck president.

  24. 24.

    Anne Laurie

    @Citizen Dave: I’m willing to accept the defense that RFK Jr’s ‘joking’ photo actually shows a grilled goat… mostly because I’ve been informed by knowledgeable anthropologists that barbecuing is *not* the preferred culinary method for preparing meat-eating animals.

    (Yes, I have material for a late-night post, but… y’know, other news… )

  26. 26.

    p.a.

    Maybe as warning shots Joe should 1) Pardon Hunter, 2) instruct IRS to do thorough audits of all gvt employees not covered by mandatory, enforceable financial & ethical rules: not singling anyone out you see, just covering a little loophole.

  29. 29.

    Tony Jay

    Daily reminder.

    When bad people are elevated to positions where they can do bad things, they will do bad things, because they are bad people.

    You’re not responsible for that. You’re not to blame for that. You often can’t even do anything to fix that, except try to stop them being elevated in the first place or, if that fails, loudly scorn and call them out for it, and then get to work ameliorating the harm they’ve inflicted in whatever way you can.

    In November, though, you all get a chance to send the bad people a message. I’m confident you’ll make it count.

  30. 30.

    Baud

    @Another Scott:

    That’s all good, but I think dedicated people need to find a way to give ordinary people a framework for what to look out for. Our criticisms are valid but too all over the place to be helpful to folks.

  32. 32.

    3Sice

    The best part of “Ol ‘ Joe”?  It’s being flogged by Tradmed shitheads with 20 year old headshots as their social media avatars.

  34. 34.

    Ladyraxterinok

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    Saw searches for Project 25 increased immensely after a performer at the BET awards told audience how bad it is and that they must check it out for themselves and tell friends and family to do that also

  36. 36.

    pinacacci

    Finally canceled my NYT subscription after checking the headlines this morning.  All anti-Biden.  Nothing about the felon. Nothing about the lawless supreme court.  Fuck them I am not going to pay them to feed me bullshit

    I am still paying for Wapo but I don’t know how long that will last.  They’re…not egregious so far.

  40. 40.

    New Deal democrat

    I have my concerns, but I continue to hit the theme of asking people to chill out a little bit.

    If Biden really has a new or accelerating dementia issue, it will be apparent in the Stephanopoulos interview.

    If he nails the interview, end of story, continue on. If he turns in another really poor performance, there will be enormous pressure to step aside, and quickly, for Harris. She continues on. End of story,

    In the meantime, enjoy the Holiday, just don’t get COVID

    ETA: by the way, as Dan Guild predicted, the post-debate polls so far have generally barely budged.

  41. 41.

    Another Scott

    @Baud: As with campaigning, the message has to be tailored to the local circumstances.  AOC’s message would be a disaster in Marie Gluesenkamp Perez’s district.  And vice-versa.

    We’re a big country.  As Kay says, we won’t all agree – that’s fine.  It’s impossible for a single message to work for some huge majority.

    AAAS.org:

    Intended Audience: The Public

    The ultimate goal when talking to a journalist is to convey your core messages to their readers, viewers, or listeners. When preparing for an interview, ask the journalist questions about their audiences. Tailor your core messages to those audiences to improve the odds of successfully reaching them. Public affairs (or public information) officers at most institutions and organizations can provide advice and information to help you prepare for encounters with journalists and to tailor your core messages to their audiences.

    (Emphasis added.)

    Good public spokesmodels are worth a lot, because it’s a really tough, really important job.

    If one’s media outlet is tailoring their messages to make one upset, then they’re not providing needed information in a way that informs sensible action. And people need to think about that and find other outlets. FTFNYT does not have some god-given right to be the nation’s top-of-the-heap news source that decides the “line” of the day.

    Yes, it’s not simple or easy. Yes, everyone likes pointing and laughing at the other guys at times (me too). But there are consequences if it interferes with focus on the important job.

    “Let’s Finish the Job!” – Joe Biden

    My $0.02.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  42. 42.

    pinacacci

    @Baud: I felt that the “reason why you are cancelling” form had a character limit spoke volumes.

    But at least they had a form.  I tried to cancel last year and I remember they tried to make you speak to a live person.  NYT your respected reputation has turned into cable television’s.

  43. 43.

    Chris

    @Baud:

    That’s all good, but I think dedicated people need to find a way to give ordinary people a framework for what to look out for. Our criticisms are valid but too all over the place to be helpful to folks.

    Does anyone have a list of “safe for normies” news sources that they share with people?  I mean, it’s not like I can just tell unengaged Democrats “read Balloon Juice” or something in that vein; they’d just instantly dismiss it as left-wing propaganda and therefore, while not necessarily wrong, unreliable.  Trouble is, I have trouble thinking of any news outlet (even actual news outlets) that haven’t been tainted with that brush.

  45. 45.

    New Deal democrat

    @Tony Jay: Very little to cheer about in my country right now, but tomorrow night in between cheeseburgers and fireworks I hope to cheer on yours.

  47. 47.

    Shalimar

    Finally read the RFK Jr Vanity Fair article and get why he didn’t bother denying the sexual harassment.  It’s pretty clear there have been so many harassed babysitters over the years that he doesn’t even remember that specific one.  What an evil piece of shit he turned out to be, beyond all the creepy stuff that was already known about him a year ago.  Running for president was not a good idea.

  48. 48.

    Baud

    @Another Scott:

    That’s fine, but that’s not what I’m talking about. Wherever you are, you shouldn’t obsess over anti-Dem opinions offered by anonymous sources. Also, don’t take headlines at face value.  That sort of thing.

    Make people understand that the elites are trying to bring us down psychologically and give people tools to see when that’s happening.

  53. 53.

    Baud

    @Chris:

    Satby has some sources.

    Most of the stuff I’ve seen are really punditry tailored towards young people using online tech. I just don’t think that serves as a replacement for corporate media. But maybe it can.

  55. 55.

    karen gail

    I read a comment; don’t remember which blog I was reading it could have been here or StoneKettle Station or Heather Richardson Cox but the person was wondering what happened to Justice Roberts to change him from a moderate to full force maga idiot. My thought was that he hasn’t changed just no longer felt the need to hide what he is and what he believes.

    Personally, I believe that maga’s red hats have been a signal that one no longer needs to hide what you are but can let everything hang out for all to see. The same thing I believe is true for the keyboard “warriors” who lead with hate and accusations, it was always there but they didn’t feel free to express themselves in public.

  56. 56.

    Starfish

    @OzarkHillbilly: I went back to read a thread from last night, and it was exhausting.

    The way that people want to paint a minor disagreement as “the other person in this conversation is THE ENEMY.”

    I know this happens every election year, but I have less patience for it this year.

    We had so much social splintering due to the pandemic, that this feels like we are extending bad things that we should be recovering from.

  57. 57.

    Chris

    @Baud:

    Yeah, I’m looking for stuff that’s credible to people who follow corporate media, and I don’t know what the fuck that is.

  58. 58.

    Kay

    The Supreme Court decision that immunizes Donald Trump from criminal charges for all past and future offenses is WILDY unpopular – 70% oppose it.

    We can grab it like we did Dobbs and use it politically. 70% opposed is more opposed than Dobbs was. It’s more than anything I can remember. Don’t use law professors or lawyers to do this – use normal people. The public got it immediately. No explanation needed. It’s absolute dynamite.

  60. 60.

    Shalimar

    @rikyrah: All we have to do is wait a year and the Trump administration will have scientists researching how to give Parkinson’s disease to Trump’s enemies.  But at least Biden won’t be old anymore.

  61. 61.

    Josie

    @Chris: ​
     I recently subscribed to ProPublica and have found them to be evenhanded and thorough, although not a daily news sort of setup.

  62. 62.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    Biden did good speaking out against it then. Glad to hear that so many understand. That’s close to the crazification factor.

  63. 63.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: We can learn from the Indian example. There is a Peabody winning documentary called While We Watched that documents this descent into hell. Godi media was like Pravda + Fox combined so unless you were in the cult their bias was obvious. NYT and the like are more insidious wolves in sheep’s clothing.

  64. 64.

    Another Scott

    @Baud: Agreed on all that.

    But if one is still subscribing to FTFNYT, still reading them every day, still spending time thinking about and forwarding their latest, etc., then one is giving them attention while they do their best to try to destroy our chances for continued progress.  One shouldn’t do that.  Even if one can see that their headlines are slanted, that anonymous sources have an agenda, etc.

    People need to make better choices, and we need to encourage them to do that.

    [/dead-goat/dog/horse]

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  65. 65.

    Baud

    @Josie:

    Them and TPM are probably the best pure news we have right now.

    Unfortunately, I can’t say the same for MSNBC. Or the Guardian.

  66. 66.

    moonbat

    @Baud: There are services like Ground News that evaluate news sources to show what their bias is. I’m hoping it is successful and more apps follow suit. It might act as a corrective on the so-called liberal (not really) news sources that are always gaslighting us.

  67. 67.

    Josie

    @Kay: ​
    Yes. Also it can be linked to Dobbs, by pointing out rights have been lost by the people and given to the Executive.

  69. 69.

    Mousebumples

    @SiubhanDuinne: Even if Biden wins reëlection with landslide-level numbers, I predict it’ll be a matter of mere days until the MSM starts routinely referring to him as a lame duck president.

    I think his birthday is after the election (December? January?), so I’m sure that will bring about an extra set of conniptions, too.

  70. 70.

    Baud

    @moonbat:

    Good to hear.  I think there are things out there that might turn into something, but still too much noise for regular folks to take advantage of. That’s my impression anyway.

  72. 72.

    Belafon

    “Come with me if you want to live.”

    “Just because you won’t kill me isn’t a good argument. I’m gonna sit right here.”

  75. 75.

    WereBear

    @Baud: I’m impressed with Meidas Touch, who have commenters from all walks of life, and snag some high level interviews.

    Media Matters is from a former Republican, which can sway others who are skeptical.

  77. 77.

    Baud

    @schrodingers_cat:

    We need centralized sources the people trust. Following individual people works for the tuned in, but I don’t think it’s viable for the masses.

  78. 78.

    zhena gogolia

    @Chris: I really don’t know if their news coverage is any good, but at least they said the right thing at the height of the panic. Trump is the one who should step aside.

  79. 79.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Eyeroller:

    Yes. I remember them doing that to Jimmy Carter with the “killer rabbit” attack. Al Gore sighing. Birth certificate. Butteremailz. Etc.

    The media go into an absolute feeding frenzy when they detect–or create–a sign of weakness, especially with Democrats. They create a narrative and then feed it, and then report that people have “concerns.” Fucking fifth columnists, they are

    ETA: It’s time for us to get smarter about not buying into or amplifying their distorted narratives.

  81. 81.

    Bupalos

    @Eyeroller: This is getting to the level of right-wing conspiracy on this one. Which btw if you haven’t sampled some of the choice nuggets from that side, you should. Tons of them are convinced this whole thing is somehow a play by the shadowy forces behind the scenes to… ??? Somehow screw them over and harm Trump.

    The only semi coherent version I saw of this was that the plan was to withdraw Biden all along (they’ve all been convinced of this) and that this whole foofaraw is an attempt to raise people’s sensitivity to arguments about age decline, so that when Biden’s gone and Trump is the old man….. “You’re sacrificing your old man to take down our old man!”

    Which… I mean, it could actually work out that way for us a bit. You’d think that might make them think. But of course, it’s just more of their rejection of a world not governed by shadowy forces. Someone or something is in control. The more hopeless you get, the more that’s attractive. There’s some of that happening to us too I think.

  82. 82.

    Kay

    @Josie:

    Media didn’t cover Dobbs either. They never would have mentioned women were bleeding out in hospital parking lots without the Texas women bringing a lawsuit. We successfully prosecuted Dobbs without them and won a bunch of elections on it. Dobbs can be a template.

    Peoples untutored gut when they heard that immunity decision was “oppose”. We don’t even need to persuade people – they’re already there. The only thing media will do now is chip away at that 70% oppose number by trotting out Right wing and/or ass kissing careerist legal experts to minimize it. We don’t need media for this at all. “The Republicans on the Supreme Court made Donald Trump a king”.

  83. 83.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Starfish: I’ve always had limits but these days I reach them much sooner than I used to. Not sure if that is the environment or me. Probably me.

  84. 84.

    artem1s

    This crisis of faith in Biden’s capabilities is not a media creation; Democratic party officials are the ones driving this conversation

    this is bullshit. Tim Ryan is not  a Dem party official. He’s a hack who lost a critical Senate race in Ohio because he wouldn’t go door to door in Black neighborhoods in Cuyahoga and Summit county. He thought he could do a better job than Nancy Pelosi. That the kind of ‘Democratic party officials’ the MSM is listening to so they can amplify this BS horserace.

    Biden Replacement Theory

    Democratic “insiders” don’t give the President advice through the media. They speak directly to him or to the people in his immediate circle. Anyone you see publicly calling on the President to step down is not close to him and does not have his ear.

    This needs to be at the top of every single post from now until election day.

  85. 85.

    Geminid

    @Chris: I have found Laura Rozen to be a good aggregator of responsible political reporting. A lot of it relates to foreign affairs but she covers US politics as well.

    Rozen posts on Twitter and Blue Sky. I think she’s on the board of of the organization Just Security, and she publishes her own pieces through Diplomatic Substack. I learned of Rozen through Cheryl Rofer.

  86. 86.

    Mousebumples

    @Kay: The Supreme Court decision that immunizes Donald Trump from criminal charges for all past and future offenses is WILDY unpopular – 70% oppose it.

    We can grab it like we did Dobbs and use it politically. 70% opposed is more opposed than Dobbs was. It’s more than anything I can remember. Don’t use law professors or lawyers to do this – use normal people. The public got it immediately. No explanation needed. It’s absolute dynamite.

    Absolutely! Easy way to introduce the topic* –

    “How do you feel about living in a monarchy?” 

    Unless they’re politically connected, they will ask what you’re talking about and you can talk about how the corrupt Supreme Court said presidents ARE kings, etc.

    *Credit to a normie friend I saw last night who asked me that question. He knows I’m hyper political. He’s on my Remind to Vote list.

  88. 88.

    jonas

    @rikyrah: As always, Republicans’ superpower is their shamelessness. Our weakness is that we give a shit about competence and governing. I’m always reminded of Zod in Superman II discovering Superman’s ultimate weakness (from a supervillain perspective): “He cares. He actually *cares* for these Earth people.”​

  90. 90.

    Mousebumples

    @Another Scott: I was close. XD

    I will say, I love that Biden has the record for youngest Senator elected and oldest President elected. Nice bookends. Just need to extend out that record in November…

  91. 91.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @artem1s:

    Democratic “insiders” don’t give the President advice through the media. 

    This. Especially the legendary unnamed insiders.

    So far, the named deserters are center to center-right Congresscritters: Doggett, Golden, Gluesenkamp-Perez. Plus Ryan. I’m detecting a pattern there, too.

  92. 92.

    JPL

    @OzarkHillbilly: I’ve had the imps since they don’t have camp this week.   Fortunately they are arriving late today since yesterday afternoon i pulled a groin muscle.

    no time for trump

  94. 94.

    Leto

    @OzarkHillbilly: combination of both; the onslaught since 2015, and it’s simply grown each year since. I know for me, my patience/tolerance for it has shrunk. In practical terms, I recognize much sooner when I need a break. Including just closing the ipad/iphone, and doing anything else. Walk the dog, go out in the yard and look for weeds, read, just doing something else. Not consuming as much “news”. I need my mental health for the long game.

  95. 95.

    jonas

    @Kay: ​
      Yep — here’s hoping that that decision comes back to bite Republicans in a major way. We have plenty of footage of all kinds of GOP pols and pundits the past couple of days basically going full Sideshow Bob:

    “Your guilty conscience may force you to vote Democratic, but deep down you secretly long for a cold-hearted Republican to lower taxes, brutalize criminals, and rule you like a king!”

    Funny on the Simpsons. In real life? Not so much. But that’s what Trump’s running with.

  96. 96.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Baud: I’ve been in anger management counseling for a year or so. There are times when I feel like it just ain’t working.

  97. 97.

    Starfish

    @OzarkHillbilly: You have been through a lot lately with your wife’s health.

    I think this type of thing was going on all through the pandemic too. There were particular people having a rough go in their day-to-day reality, and then there was all the politics on top of that.

    During the pandemic, my younger sister had a large cancer, and she was avoiding the doctor due to the ongoing pandemic, so by the time she went to the doctor, it was really bad.

    She has been cancer-free for 3 years now, but the nature of our lives and our relationship with each other has changed.

  98. 98.

    p.a.

    NDD:
    ETA: by the way, as Dan Guild predicted, the post-debate polls so far have generally barely budged.

     

     

    This is excellent news as time has passed and the MSM’s attempt to turn it into a thing is failing.  Now to breaks some thumbs on Dems or Dem-proximates who keep twexing abt it.

  99. 99.

    Cacti

    I see the Tammy Wynette contingent of BJ is still holding strong.

    I’m willing to give JB the benefit of the doubt pending the Stephanopoulos interview on Friday.  If he faceplants that, he needs to step aside and throw his support behind Harris.

    And naturally, he will listen to my every word.

  102. 102.

    Kay

    When the media lawyers and media say “well, Donald Trump is not technically a King because we still have habeas corpus (so you may still petition for a hearing on why Donald Trump had you arrested for political crimes) – which is what they will say, we just say “the Republicans on the Supreme Court made Donald Trump a king” and people think “that’s what I thought it meant”. We’re already on their side but they got there first, which is important.

  104. 104.

    JPL

    @OzarkHillbilly:  Give it time.   Yesterday when the carton of o j dropped on the floor, I did say damn but stopped before it.   The almost three year old and five year old started laughing.

  105. 105.

    jimmiraybob

    @rikyrah: “Republicans- Our candidate is a felon, rapist, and a tax cheat. He is our guy. We are standing by him.”

    I would only add, “And we don’t care if he has a mind at all.”

  107. 107.

    p.a.

    Here’s a site I saw on slacktivist that is needed right effing now.  For some reason copy/paste won’t work.  Feel-good stories.

    reasonstobecheerful.world

  108. 108.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @JPL: I fucked up big time on Monday when we get the girls. I was putting them in their car seats for the ride home. Addy had her 2 favorite teddy bears on her lap. I took them and put them on the car roof so I could buckle her in.

    And left them there.

    I must have spent an hour searching the roadsides in the vain hope of recovering them. Nope.

  109. 109.

    Raoul Paste

    @Kay:   This makes sense.  That’s the simple talking point I will use in daily conversation.

  116. 116.

    Geminid

    @O. Felix Culpa: Lloyd Doggett is not a center-right politician. He is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and has long been one of Texas’s most liberal Representatives.

  117. 117.

    Chris

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    The thing with counseling and therapy and the like is that all it does is address how you feel about things and how to manage yourself so that your feelings don’t burn you out.  It does nothing about whether the thing you were angry about is still out there, or whether you were right to be angry about it.

    I always think about this post I read during the pandemic from someone trying to make ends meet in a shit job that was wreaking havoc on him emotionally: sure, I go see a doctor, and he prescribes me medicine, and it changes the chemicals in my brain, and then I don’t feel so shitty.  But the real problem isn’t the chemicals in my brain.  The real problem is that the world I live in is toxic, alienating, and abusive as hell.

  118. 118.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: We need to form a  YouTube News Channel to debunk the lies of so called Liberal Newsmedia. People on this blog could do it if they put their minds to it.

    Some YT channels in Hindi debunking Godi Media have over 10 million followers.

  119. 119.

    caphilldcne

    @pinacacci: I cancelled last week. It’s been absolutely outrageous. I currently have a few people in my life I can’t engage with due to this bs.

  120. 120.

    gene108

    @rikyrah:

    Saw a NYT editorial board member on Morning Joe via YouTube post-debate. She is a black woman in her 30’s or 40’s.

    She tried to defend the NYT call for Biden to drop out, but failed at it. She kept going back to how she personally supported Biden.

    Media knows they’re messing around to promote Trump, and they do not care who gets hurt in a second Trump term.

  121. 121.

    Michael Bersin

    @Baud:

    Blogtopia (Yes, Skippy coined the phrase!) emerged because of the failures of old media in the aftermath of the 2000 election. I started with the 50 State Blog Project in 2007 – exactly for that reason.

  122. 122.

    Barbara

    @OzarkHillbilly: At least you aren’t that guy in Massachusetts who forgot the car seat with the baby in it on the top of his roof.  A woman chased him down for nearly a mile before he stopped and asked what the problem was.  Yikes.

    ETA: Sounds like a good occasion for a trip to the toy store with your grandbabies.

  123. 123.

    Leto

    @OzarkHillbilly: I can’t think of either a parent or grandparent who’s done the same. If you can get duplicate replacements for them, I suggest writing letters from “them” explaining that they decided to go on an adventure, then describe where they are. Have a short letter arrive every 2-3 days until the replacements get there.

    But that sucks, I’m sorry all of ya’ll are having to go through that, and remember that they still love ya.

  125. 125.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I’ve been trying for a long time to encourage Ms. O and several other friends to unsubscribe or at least read the NYT sceptically. It’s been an uphill battle, since these folks (myself included) grew up with the NYT as THE “paper of record” and have held on to that belief (myself not included).

    The good-ish news is that the current NYT coordinated attacks on Biden are beginning to open their eyes. They’re beginning to see the overreach and blatant propagandizing that they used to pooh-pooh when I talked about it.

  126. 126.

    oldgold

    @Kay: “We can grab it like we did Dobbs and use it politically.”

    I agree.

    The point is that with this immunity decision the only thing  standing between us and and the dystopian future of being ruled by lawless a President is the President’s character.

    We need to pair this immunity decision up with Trump’s absolute lack of character and run hard with it.

  128. 128.

    JPL

    @OzarkHillbilly:  I did that when my eldest was a toddler.   Overtime I realized that it bothered me more than him.   Take care of yourself which is easier said than done.

  129. 129.

    Eyeroller

    @O. Felix Culpa: ​ I had nearly forgotten the “killer rabbit.” That frenzy was insane. Paul Harvey seems to have been behind some of that. All that happened was a rabbit swam toward Carter’s boat. It did not attack him. Jimmy wasn’t scared and didn’t say it was trying to attack him. But “Carter’s afraid of a rabbit” was nonstop. And Al Gore sighed! The worst breach of protocol in history!

    It’s entirely reasonable for people to have concerns that need to be addressed. It is not reasonable for all these Democrats to immediately jump on the “dump Biden” bandwagon that is being pulled mostly by the FTFNYT and CNN.

  130. 130.

    Baud

    @Michael Bersin:

    I remember being excited in the old days about blogging taking on the media. But I hung out at DailyKos at the time and that place went to hell after Obama’s election. The dream died.

  132. 132.

    Leto

    @Barbara: I thought you were going to mention the guy who strapped his dog to his roof for vacay travel (Rmoney) but then it was a car seat. I know the tv show Jackass did that, but it was a doll in the car seat done for bad laughs.

  133. 133.

    Bupalos

    @artem1s: It’s bullshit both ways. It’s an avalanche of a reaction because it’s just a big fucking deal. A “can’t be unseen” kind of thing. Biden is trying to stand for stability and normalcy and a firm hand on the tiller, and he’s already running well outside the normal bounds of a working-age adult, into a period where I’d say the majority of men require nursing care or die. We were already trying something unprecedented, politically negative, and risky. That was already true and already one of the reasons why we couldn’t open a lead against a horribly unpopular and dangerous person. It was already what the opposition was running 24/7 against Biden, then a thing actually happened that simply does not happen in presidential politics, and he validated the narrative about as hard and fast as he possibly could.

    It isn’t “just the media” and it isn’t “just the insiders” and it isn’t even “just people in the United States.” Whistling away, we walked into a position where this was not at all unlikely, the risks were very high. And it happened.  There’s a faint conspiratorial whiff to this, of refusing to believe that anything “real” happened.

    There’s 4 months left. This isn’t over but we’re probably going to lose the presidency whatever we do (mostly because I think we’ll be bound by a perceived impossibility of running our strongest candidate). We probably need to start thinking about the rest of the landscape here as well. Basically how we do down ballot and how this election sets us up for 2026 and beyond. Like a team down 8-2 in the 7th, you start to balance playing for that game and setting your pitchers up for the next one.

  134. 134.

    Eyeroller

    @Geminid: That could be what we might call in math language an “uninteresting lower bound.” He represents Austin; he at least has to pretend to be liberal.

  137. 137.

    Baud

    @O. Felix Culpa:

    The good-ish news is that the current NYT coordinated attacks on Biden are beginning to open their eyes. They’re beginning to see the overreach and blatant propagandizing that they used to pooh-pooh when I talked about it

     

    Good news.

    Sometimes the goal isn’t to convince. It’s to make people aware so they can learn for themselves when they see the pattern.

  138. 138.

    Chris

    @Michael Bersin:

    The NYT’s revenge for not getting that exclusive interview.

    The New York Times has been shitting on every Democrat for longer than I’ve been alive no matter what they do.  The interview is, at best, a pathetic attempt to try to shift the blame to Biden for something they were always going to do anyway.

    Don’t get me wrong.  I’m sure they are genuinely furious at Biden for not giving them that interview.  The same way any domestic abuser is furious whenever anyone else in the household doesn’t do exactly what he wants.  But he was always going to hit that person anyway.

  139. 139.

    schrodingers_cat

    @OzarkHillbilly: I almost lost my keys ones in the same manner. But since it was the keys, I couldn’t drive so disaster averted. Spent half an hour looking for them in the parking lot and all the while they were on the roof of my car.

  142. 142.

    Kay

    The only people who support the Trump get out of jail free card are media and base Republicans.

    Just like Dobbs.

    AOC says she’ll bring articles of impeachment on it. That’s a good start. What else can we do with it? It doesn’t have to “work” as process – it just has to keep it front and center and further discredit that court, media, and Republicans.

  143. 143.

    Mousebumples

    BTW, thank you to everyone who gave suggestions and ideas last night after my frustration from my visit to the local county Dem office yesterday.

    Got an email back from the volunteer coordinator, and she’s going to put me in touch with a local candidate (who is also a Dem county chair) to talk more about postcards! 😊

  144. 144.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: That’s my tack with Modi cult members and BJP voters in my family.

    Of course I could  say #notallSavarnaHindus and act high and mighty bathed in my own self righteousness and emulate my progressive betters on BJ.

  146. 146.

    Leto

    @JPL: in 1983 or 84, my parents somehow left my sister’s ET doll at the hotel we were staying at. We only discovered it like 2 hours down the road, which idk how it took that long considering she was surgically attached to that thing for a long time. My parents contacted the hotel when we got home, yes they still had it, and yes we’ll send it to you. Def got lucky with that one, though over the years I’ve managed to lose stuff with no such happy resolution. Current item: I bought new socks to replace some of my old ones, got this nice pair of blue ones that I wore twice before 1 of them decided to go on walk about, and I haven’t been able to find it since. Literally has just disappeared from the face of the Earth. So…

  147. 147.

    Belafon

    @Bupalos: “We decided that Biden should be replaced. Don’t you guys think Trump, who is showing obvious signs of dementia, should be replaced as well?”

    “How dare you attack a man because of his age!!!”

  148. 148.

    E.

    @Baud: I don’t know why my plan for the party to form its own news site elicits such yawns. It’s not historically unusual and the party has the resources to start one if they wanted, and it could be a real news product with real standards but whose No. 1 priority is not financial return to shareholders or other sociopaths.

  149. 149.

    Suzanne

    “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be”

    Jesus Christ.

  152. 152.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Baud:

    Sometimes the goal isn’t to convince. It’s to make people aware so they can learn for themselves when they see the pattern.

    Excellent point. Thankfully, these are all intelligent people who are learners, so they’re starting to see the pattern for themselves. At this point, it’s better for me to step back and remain (fairly) silent, so that I don’t trigger defensive reactions.

  154. 154.

    Baud

    @E.:

    From my perspective, news media directly run by a party never works. Even when totalitarian governments control the media and everyone knows it, they also set it up as if the media operations are a separate thing.  I don’t know why human psychology is like that, but it seems to be that way.

  156. 156.

    Kay

    @Bupalos:

    The good news is Dems are doing quite well down ballot. It’s never mentioned in Trump-promoting media, but it’s true. Ignore the Right wing Dems in the House who are whining – Golden and whats her name, the supposed working class hero in Washington – Right wing House Dems always whine that their seats are in danger (because their seats are always in danger and they’re also whiners). Whining is Blue Dog 101. Never changes.

    Look at the Senate numbers and the congressional generic ballot. I’ve never seen a split like this before. It isn’t 2010, where we were tanking across the board. It’s different. We can use that.

  157. 157.

    Belafon

    @Cacti: I think he just needs to yell more, get chants of “Lock him up!” started at his rallies, and attack Republican tradwives for being secret dominatrixes. That’s how you cover up a decline.

  158. 158.

    Mousebumples

    @SiubhanDuinne: dumb media. Semi related – I hope we can celebrate Jimmy Carter’s 100th birthday in October! (I remember his birthday because it’s my birthday, lol)

  165. 165.

    Layer8Problem

    @OzarkHillbilly:  Been there, done stuff like that.  Because we care and empathize with their little kid minds and cares and innocence it kills us a little inside.  Don’t scourge yourself more than absolutely necessary, it will get better.

  166. 166.

    E.

    @p.a.:  My Facebook feed is loaded up with news of Biden’s collapse/bottom fell out/ implosion in the polls. Owing to the source I have no interest in running these polls down. They are cited by purity pony Bernie bros. But that nonsense is out there, in force, in the wild.

  170. 170.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    My heartfelt sympathies. Something like that happened to my younger son’s favorite soft toy, and I felt guilty about it forever. He recovered from the loss fairly quickly, though,  and is now a healthy,  functioning adult, despite my many crimes and omissions. ;)

  172. 172.

    Soprano2

    So my cat is at the vet having a bunch of fluid drained from his chest cavity. That’s why he hasn’t been eating much for the past few days. When he wouldn’t eat chicken or some of that “lickable gravy” last night, I knew something was definitely wrong. He may have to start taking lasix for his heart, the vet will know more after he gets the fluid out. He had lost two pounds, and he’s only an 8 pound cat to begin with! I thought it was stress from the dog I had to take back, and I think it could have been made worse by that stress, but the vet says this has probably been coming on for awhile. Have good thoughts for my kitty, please.

  175. 175.

    Bupalos

    @New Deal democrat: If Biden really has a new or accelerating dementia issue, it will be apparent in the Stephanopoulos interview.

    Might or might not. But the reality is that he’ll need a long string of appearances that don’t just make people say “well, maybe not so bad” but make them say “oh, OK, we were wrong.” Meanwhile, the thing that got us here continues to marche forward – time. To me, this is a “betting against the house” kind of situation. It’s very unlikely this was a one-off that just happened to emerge at the worst possible moment.

  176. 176.

    E.

    @Baud: You may be right. Maybe the American public, saturated for half a century in Walter Cronkite style insistence that the “news” is an objective thing that can be disinterestedly exposed to public view, is not ready to accept a news source that states its commitment to democratic principles on the masthead. But I think such a project could produce quality journalism that I anyway would pay for. Most of my news sites are way more partisan that what I am envisioning here already.

  177. 177.

    Geminid

    @schrodingers_cat: Well yes, Doggett is a white man. He has narrowly survived various rounds of Republican redistricting intended to make Texas Democrats a party of minority leaders and voters. But Lloyd Doggett is just one person, and he represents Doggett, not some demographic of liberal white men.

    However, Lloyd Doggett is also Co-Chairman of the House Songwriters Caucus. Now that may be a clue that fits a larger, sinister pattern.

  178. 178.

    Layer8Problem

    @Bupalos:  Fuck that ” . . . we’re probably going to lose the presidency whatever we do . . . “, Sunshine.

    ETA:  What we need is less cogitating and deep insighting and brow furrowing.

  180. 180.

    JWR

    From NBC:

    WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court’s decision to grant former President Donald Trump absolute immunity for some of his conduct in seeking to overturn the 2020 election has attracted a chorus of criticism from those who saw it as another sign of conservative justices’ abandoning their own judicial philosophy.

    […]

    “At this point at this Supreme Court, originalism is a dead letter, to be resurrected and employed only when it suits the court’s purposes,” said Michael Luttig, a conservative former federal judge.

    He’s sort of right, but Originalism has always been a dead letter.

  182. 182.

    Eyeroller

    @Soprano2: I had a cat with heart failure who took a drug called pimobendan.  It was practically miraculous.  Like many veterinary drugs, it’s only approved for dogs but vets use it off-label for cats. It is not used for humans in the US because it has potential side effects in humans with hardening of the arteries (cats and dogs do not get plaque buildup the way humans do).  My pimobendan cat did much better than another cat who got standard lasix+enalapril protocol

  183. 183.

    Captain C

    Semi-serious question:  What if Biden just bans the FTFNYT from all White House press privileges?  Sure, they’d howl, but what if he just told the others “The FTFNYT is no longer a journalistic institution, but a vessel for Pinch the Lesser’s obsessions, insecurities, and grudges.  When that changes, they will be welcomed back.”

    Yes, I would already have done this were I President.  Yes, this is yet another reason I should not be.

  187. 187.

    Geminid

    @Eyeroller: Lloyd Doggett doesn’t pretend to be liberal. He is liberal and has proven this over a 35 year career in Texas politics.

    Edited.

  189. 189.

    Suzanne

    @O. Felix Culpa: The thing is, I really just think that the core problem of American society is white men who are angry at their relative loss of social status, and they’re so enraged about it that they want to kill us all. Trump is the vehicle for this impulse.

  192. 192.

    Ishmael

    @Leto: It’s in the pocket of the corner of the bottom bedsheet it was washed with. The sheet is either on the bed or in the linen closet with the sock hanging in the corner.  Trust me on this. :)

  193. 193.

    Captain C

    @artem1s:

    Democratic “insiders” don’t give the President advice through the media. They speak directly to him or to the people in his immediate circle. Anyone you see publicly calling on the President to step down is not close to him and does not have his ear.

    …and might be someone who was either canned or blackballed for good reasons, whether incompetence, chronic poor judgement, or who knows what else.

  195. 195.

    Tony Jay

    @New Deal democrat:

    Yeeeeeaaaaaahhhhhhhh…..

    The Tories are done for, and that’s a fact. The combination of Cameron’s tranche of ‘Brown + Tory = Psychopath coming into their own, Flobalob hollowing out the parliamentary Party to complete the Hard Brexit his snarling entourage of ex-BNP/UKIP/NF infiltrators demanded, Flobalob then drinking, whoring and lying his way through COVID and its aftermath, Mad Lizzie’s brief Reign of Error, Short-Pants Sunak displaying the worst political touch since Maurice Pumpernickel III stood in Dunny-on-the-Wold for the Make Pederasts & Pepping-Toms Great Again Party and, finally, the rise of Reform to split the right-wing vote pretty much 50/50 has rendered them unelectable, but that was clear a llloooooonnnnnng time ago.

    Will newnewlabourinc get a landslide? Probably. That’s how our fucked up system works. Will they improve anything or fix much that the Tories have fucked up? I’m pretty sure the gobshites running the show would rather strip their eyeballs with paraffin fumes than betray their billionaire corporate donors like that, but I’m sure a few gristly scraps will be chucked down to the peasantry. Eventually. Maybe.

    And then in five years the Hard Right will be unified and the only ‘centre-left’ branded opposition party will be blamed by the voters for presiding over a slightly slower collapse into despair while feuding with each other over who replaces the Plastic Peer, and then were totally fucked.

    Hopefully, though, I’m completely wrong about all of that.   🤞🏻😟🤞🏻

  197. 197.

    rikyrah

    @artem1s:

    Democratic “insiders” don’t give the President advice through the media. They speak directly to him or to the people in his immediate circle. Anyone you see publicly calling on the President to step down is not close to him and does not have his ear.

     

    TELL IT

  199. 199.

    schrodingers_cat

    @rikyrah: They think we are not paying attention. They think that we will forget. How the are trying to disenfranchise us.

    सब याद रखा जायेगा
    सब कुछ याद रखा जायेगा

    We will remember

    We will remember absolutely everything.

  201. 201.

    Captain C

    @Michael Bersin:

    The NYT’s revenge for not getting that exclusive interview. You think they’re currently seething because of the ABC interview on Friday with George? I do.

    I sure hope so.  I really hope Biden gives an interview to the Pitchbot too.

  202. 202.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Mousebumples:

    I was just saying that to a friend yesterday! He is remarkable. (I wouldn’t want him to linger on if he’s in pain, though. I guess that goes without saying.)

  203. 203.

    Josie

    @Eyeroller: ​
     No, he really is liberal. I was at a house party when he first began to campaign. I have followed his career for years. I am profoundly disappointed in him and Julián Castro both. I cannot imagine what their motivation is.

  207. 207.

    Ishmael

    @Geminid: I graduated from high school in Austin in 1972. At that time Lloyd Doggett was a young Senate candidate and an honest and dedicated liberal. He was so inspiring and I was so excited to be able to vote for the first time that year.

  208. 208.

    Josie

    @Kay: I agree. I called AOC’s office yesterday and encouraged her to go for it. We need to shine a light on what they are doing.

  210. 210.

    Jackie

    @Leto:

    I bought new socks to replace some of my old ones, got this nice pair of blue ones that I wore twice before 1 of them decided to go on walk about, and I haven’t been able to find it since. Literally has just disappeared from the face of the Earth. So…

    You KNOW it’s hanging out with JC’s mustard…

  211. 211.

    Bupalos

    @Tony Jay: I think it’s likely except we won’t be TOTALLY fucked, just quite thoroughly and depressingly fucked. At least one eye-socket still intact. But delaying actions no longer demoralize me. We’ve got some world-historical forces to digest here probably for the next couple decades at least. Wreckers like Boris and Trump and the post-truth populist authoritarian oligarchic wave they surf are going to have the wind at their backs until we’ve chewed and swallowed a big steaming bite of climate change, globalization, and technology-mediated social dislocation. So I go into a bad tackle shouting BREXIT MEANS BREXIT to those Tory fuckers. It matters.

    Defense and delay is the order of the day.

  212. 212.

    TBone

    @Suzanne: it’s the old line

    “Don’t struggle.  It’s easier this way.” (*makes strangling moves)

    I used to use that line jokingly when any significant other objected to something I was doing or proposed to do

    But coming from those fucks, them’s fighting words.

  213. 213.

    Captain C

    @rikyrah: This was extremely self-serving on the part of Uncle Clarence and Alito the Inquisitor, and probably the rest of the Shitty Six as well.  “Bribes don’t count if they’re like the ones we get.”?  They might as well be putting out their hands and holding up a sign which says “will rule in your favor for vacations, RVs, and cash.”

  214. 214.

    Eyeroller

    @Josie: When I looked it up, I had left Austin by the time he was elected.  I can think of several possible motives.  1. Really bad judgement.  As I’ve mentioned, it’s reasonable to be concerned.  It is not reasonable to run to the press about it at this point. 2. Prefers Bernie? 3. Calling attention to himself and his selfless dedication to doing what’s right?

  215. 215.

    Kay

    @Geminid:

    The backstory to his statement is kind of interesting. He, like Biden, was a “youngest” in Congress. His career has essentially gone on alongside Biden. A long, long time. I don’t think he’s a bad person or a bad Democrat. He thinks he’s saving the Party from what he sees as a certain defeat that will ripple down ballot. I’m not convinced but it’s not a wacky or irrational or malicious take.

  217. 217.

    SomeRandomGuy

    EVERYONE REMEMBER TO PANIC AND FRET OVER WHAT THE REPUBLICANS WILL DO IF WE DO ANYTHING!!!

    Or, we could acknowledge that an 81 year old with a stutter isn’t the best entrant to a beauty pageant. Oh, come on, that *is* what debates are; they even feature Q&A; and everyone agrees that, as fascists go, Trump was the prettiest fascist there.

  223. 223.

    Kay

    @Geminid:

    I compare to Golden who I think really IS self interested. He is using this to promote his Right wing economic views. It’s cynical as hell. He’s pissed that Biden moved away from Reagan and now he sees an opportunity to punish Biden for that.

    Blue Dogs never learn. When you attack the gal who brung you you always lose.

  224. 224.

    tam1MI

    In other news, I see in my news feed that the trial in Massachusetts some have been following here ended in a mistrial and that a state trooper who was a prosecution witness has been relieved of duty due to revelations from said trial. Anybody got the full story on this?

  225. 225.

    Leto

    @Jackie: @OzarkHillbilly: this is probably the likeliest outcome. As long as they’re not too close to the house, or stuck out in a field, then it’s all good. Wait… where’s the mop!?!?! Nooooo!

  227. 227.

    Hunter Gathers

    Biden just rejected an awful, horrible power that the full scope of which is unknown.

    Followed immediately by calls within his own party to resign.

    And they keep getting louder.

    A mad dash for power within a party containing factions that will not hesitate make the convention a complete shitshow with THAT hanging over everything is insane.

  228. 228.

    tam1MI

    @schrodingers_cat: I see that Gaza is no longer an issue in certain leftist quarters. Genocide Joe is replaced by Sleepy Joe.

    It was always nothing more than an excuse.

  232. 232.

    Almost Retired

    Let’s see.  Enabling dictatorship, eliminating women’s bodily autonomy, disabling the administrative state to facilitate the rollback of consumer and environmental protections, providing a how-to manual on legal bribery, etc.

    The only reason to retain my NYT subscription would be if I could gather up this week’s front pages, time travel back to 2016, and waive them in the face of those fuckers who told me to shut up already about the Supreme Court.

  234. 234.

    Bupalos

    @rikyrah: The Media is not an entity with a will. It’s not a shadowy force controlling everything. It’s a bunch of people doing various combinations of journalism and making money, which are mostly at odds.

    But “They” are not “pretending to be afraid” of anything. What “they” are doing mostly is reporting on and monetizing the very real fear in other people that Biden as the candidate raises Trump’s chances of getting in.

  235. 235.

    Kay

    @tam1MI:

    The defense got the troopers text messages to his buddies in law enforcement and the (law enfocement) family where the offense occurred. He’s an absolute pig and so are his friends. They spent weeks gossiping about the defendant and rating her on whether they would have sex with her. They discussed theh case at length with potential witnesses. Just amazingly unprofessional behavior. It’s a culture too – this was not a one off. All the law enforcement on his text list are as bad as he is.

    When the defense was up they brought this absolute bombshell – the FBI are investigating that police entity for corruption. Now, the jury didn’t hear that but you’d have to be a moron not to figure it because the defense called the FBI’s experts – who were excellent – and constantly referred to that fact that they were not hired by the defense  – they were independent.

  237. 237.

    Eyeroller

    @Timill: ​For an older kitty it’s usually heart failure. Most common is hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, followed by restrictive cardiomyopathy. Dilated is rare with sufficient taurine in the food nowadays. I have lost one cat to HCM and three to RCM.

  238. 238.

    Chris

    @rikyrah:

    I KNOW, RIGHT???

    It’s always “oh dear, such a fascist threat, this is literally the end of the world [if you don’t do exactly this thing that we want you to do]!!!”  And it’s like, where the fuck was all this concern for the fascist threat for the last four fucking years, which even if we forget about all the ButterEmailz crap, you spent pretending that Donald Trump didn’t exist, pretending that he’d gone away forever, pretending that the next Republican candidate was totally going to be Ron DeSantis, and incidentally, pretending that the entire Republican Party wasn’t now going to behave in exactly the same way?  All the concern these people have for The Fascist Threat At The Door is when they want the Democrats to do something.

    They’ve gotten really good at just rolling with the implicit assumption that all the Democrats assume that they’re on the same “side,” and that nobody important ever stops and asks “what do you mean ‘we,’ kemosabe?”

  239. 239.

    Captain C

    @Almost Retired:

    The only reason to retain my NYT subscription would be if I could gather up this week’s front pages, time travel back to 2016, and waive them in the face of those fuckers who told me to shut up already about the Supreme Court.

    If you ever actually want to do that you could probably go to your local library and print out the online versions thereof.

  240. 240.

    Eyeroller

    @zhena gogolia: Running to the press immediately and very publically trashing the candidate demoralizes Democrats and confuses “normies.”  I don’t see how it isn’t even worse for downballot.

  242. 242.

    WereBear

    @Soprano2: Poor boy! Sounds like he’s getting what he needs.

    My senior boy, Sir Tristan, gets some Naked Whey stirred into his gravy dishes of cat food. They need more protein to age well, barring any other conditions.

  244. 244.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @E.: It’s hard not to notice the almost giddy enthusiasm of the panic I’ve seen from (some, not all) Progressives.  People who never wanted Biden in the first place (and always have to remind everyone of that) and have been low-key dogging him, creating limes tests they know he wouldn’t pass (M4All, GreenNewDeal, End All $ To Israel), holding him to impossible standards etc., for four years.  It feels like they are low-key excited to finally have their chance to take him down.  It’s not something I can prove but it’s a feeling for sure.  IE- most of the people clamoring for Biden to step down or do X, Y, Z better or else!, are exactly the people I would’ve expected to jump into this divisive feeding frenzy.  People who are always trying to divide our coalition.

  245. 245.

    Kay

    @tam1MI:

    The FBI investigation is inadmissible so the defense had to raise it wink wink and they were good at that – they would say to the FBI expert “now, you were hired for that other proceeding, we didn’t hire you and the state didn’t hire you”, like that. Also, the FBI hire good experts. They were engineers and biomechanical – not bullshitters. Their opinion is he probably wasn’t killed by a car. That’s the whole case.

  247. 247.

    Jackie

    Hurricane Beryl is taking advantage of the Weather Channel’s obsession with Biden to quietly blast Jamaica:

    The core of Hurricane Beryl is expected to pass through Jamaica Wednesday, bringing life-threatening winds and storm surge to the island, according to the National Hurricane Center.
    The NHC said Beryl, which weakened slightly Tuesday into a Category 4 storm with sustained winds of 145 mph, is moving toward the west-northwest at 20 mph and is expected to turn more toward the west Wednesday night or Thursday.

  248. 248.

    UncleEbeneezer

    CBS News Post Debate Reactions from Black voters:

    1. Debate Performance – Who Won: – Biden: 39% – Trump: 25%

    2. Better Debate Performance – Told the Truth: – Biden: 63% – Neither: 19% – Trump: 10% – Both: 8%

    3. U.S. Democracy and Rule of Law: – Only if Joe Biden wins: 60% – Only if Donald Trump wins: 12% – It will be safe if either wins: 13% – It will not be safe either way: 14%

    4. Better Debate Performance – Addressed Important Issues: – Biden: 42% – Both: 21% – Neither: 21% – Trump: 15%

    5. Mental and Cognitive Health: – Only Joe Biden: 38% – Neither: 31% – Both: 15% – Only Donald Trump: 16%

    6. Biden Should Run for President: – Biden should be running: 55% – Biden should not be running: 45%

    7. Trump Should Run for President: – Trump should not be running: 74% – Trump should be running: 26%

    8. Better Debate Performance – Appeared Presidential: – Biden: 42% – Neither: 27% – Both: 12% – Trump: 19%

    9. Financial Condition if Biden Wins: – Stay about the same: 54% – Financially better off: 28% – Financially worse off: 18%

    10. Better Debate Performance – Explained Plans and Policies: – Biden: 38% – Both: 23% – Neither: 25% – Trump: 14%

    11. Better Debate Performance – Inspired Confidence: – Neither: 42% – Biden: 28% – Trump: 17% – Both: 13%

    12. Better Debate Performance – Presented Ideas Clearly: – Both: 21% – Neither: 30% – Biden: 27% – Trump: 22%

    13. Financial Condition if Trump Wins: – Financially worse off: 56% – Stay about the same: 21% – Financially better off: 22%

  249. 249.

    Tenar Arha

    @OzarkHillbilly:  Oh no! I’m sure you’ll be forgiven if you haven’t already been.

    A suggestion for when replacements are obtained: perhaps air tags (or equivalent) on a ribbon around the neck of the stuffed animals like we do with more wayward pets? Kinda like the tech version promise that “Fido Toy” will never be lost again ;)

  250. 250.

    Kay

    @zhena gogolia:

    Well, he reportedly did. The Friday before the announcement. He’s in a safe seat. He’ll hold no matter what happens. I still don’t think replacement is the best way to win (although I would be fine either way) but I don’t think it was malicious or self interested.

  253. 253.

    Juju

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): That statement should scare the bejeezus out of any reasonably intelligent person. It may start with people on the left, but is certain to move to other groups, then eventually yours, if you don’t agree completely with their views.  In other words, fascism.

  255. 255.

    Emily B.

    @pinacacci: I got my last issue of the NYT this morning after canceling yesterday. The lead story on Biden’s decline made my heart sink—and then I read it.
    Would it be too much to expect on-the-record sourcing for the central allegations in the paper’s top story? Or, as you say, equal time for coverage of the frightening signs of Trump’s cognitive decline?
    The story did mention Biden’s punishing schedule in June. Nothing about the great stress he must have felt when his only surviving son was found guilty on (absurd) federal charges.

  256. 256.

    UncleEbeneezer

    PropaneJane on Xitter nails it!

    The juxtaposition of mostly White ppl lighting their hair on fire/hitting the panic button bc Biden had a cold & stuttered at the debate vs. Black ppl mobilizing the hell out of Trump’s racist #BlackJob comment tells you all you need to know about who is/isn’t on the battlefield.

  257. 257.

    Kay

    @tam1MI:

    I’m generally biased toward the defense in criminal cases because juries almost always convict so that colors my views and I had particular sympathy for this defendant because I think she suffered from societal views that women “should” cry or fall apart under stress (she didn’t fall apart at trial) – she was portrayed as unsympathetic in a way a man would not be. A tough bitch. That’s the subtext.

    She is tough. I admire it. She fought them, hard. You can’t do that nicely.

  260. 260.

    Eyeroller

    @Emily B.: On-the-record sources might not agree with their narratives.

    Anonymous sources are sometimes required to report a story (e.g. Watergate) but their use has become routine.  A lot of press critics have noted this.  Very few stories should use anonymous sources.

  261. 261.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: So that means Biden’s instinct to come out immediately and say a) this ruling was terrible and b) I will continue to respect the rule of law and not abuse my position was the correct one.

    I listened to the latest Pod Save America episode, and I was so disappointed in people who should know better. They have hardly mentioned the problem he has with his stutter, or how the Gish Gallop TCFG uses makes that worse. They’ve fallen a peg in my eyes because of how they’re handling this situation.

  262. 262.

    Michael Bersin

    @Baud:

    The problem with Great Orange Satan was that people spent all their time trying to see and be seen.

    In a grand moment of meta we covered one of their “summits” in our area, with the founder in attendance. They unveiled a new project at the summit, then asked us after the fact to not report on it. We weren’t going to do so anyway (because it didn’t appear to be particularly newsworthy). The irony of attempted prior restraint from an entity that was founded on transparency apparently escaped them.

    That, and it’s too big, with much too much noise.

  265. 265.

    tam1MI

    @Kay: My sis was following the case and she told me she was stunned it was a hung jury. She thought for sure it would be a Not Guilty verdict.

  266. 266.

    Jackie

    @Eyeroller: Sarcasm, sorry. Should have added the // afterwards.

    But… I’m sure Beryl is Biden’s attempt for distraction… //

  267. 267.

    NotMax

    @OzarkHillbilly

    “They’re visiting a teddy bear farm upstate.”

    Of course you know such a goof means you’ll now have to drop out of the presidential contest.

  268. 268.

    ArchTeryx

    Checks on Lawyers, Guns, and Money: Finds endless wankery about brokered (i.e. contested) conventions.

    Checks on the Great Orange Satan (aka Daily Kos): The usual scaremongering to fundraise, remarkably little doomerism, and a surprising number of upbeat articles about backing Joe Biden.

    Checks on this top 10,000, obsolete political blog: The Jackals, in all their glory, discussing everything and anything. Why I came and stay here.

  269. 269.

    Bupalos

    @UncleEbeneezer: There’s a shitload of normies on this bus my friend.
    I don’t sneeze at what Biden did for our coalition, it was a kind of legacy miracle (thanks Obama!) that Biden was somehow the most reassuring figure to both older more conservative whites and to blacks and thanks to his excellent governance was acceptable to our progressive and conservative wings and reenergized labor. And who knows if another candidate can inherit that.

    It’s actually a lot to give up and plenty that can go wrong moving on here.  I just think the balance of risks has tipped. And the kind of headwind he’s got with the “too old” thing is just no longer reasonably surmountable. We made fun of it here to no end with the “newsflash Biden is still old” stuff, but if we stop thinking about how the electorate should think and just take voters as they are… it’s something that can really only get worse.   He really is older every day, and declines or changes in the frequency of “bad days” at this end of the age scale are often dramatic.

  271. 271.

    Suzanne

    @Bupalos: Agree, the concern is genuine. You can think that it’s overreacting or bedwetting, and that might be a reasonable take, but, like, it isn’t fake concern. The media capitalizes on what exists, it did not manufacture this from whole cloth. Concern about Biden’s age was brought up back in 2020. Polls have indicated that it’s an issue for some people. Whether or not it’s just one of many factors that can be overcome is the more penetrating question.

    Dan Pfeiffer (one of the Pod Save O-Bros) said, “There are no easy answers. However, everyone on both sides of this internal fight operates in good faith. Everyone wants to beat Donald Trump and save democracy. They are only disagreeing about how best to do that.” I think this is important to remember.

  273. 273.

    mrmoshpotato

    EXCLUSIVE: @GStephanopoulos will sit down with Pres. Biden for the exclusive first television interview since the presidential debate. Tune in across ABC News platforms Friday, July 5.

    President Biden’s first response to George: Fuck you, George.  Donald Trump is a traitorous, racist, misogynistic sack of shit, and I had a cold.

  275. 275.

    ArchTeryx

    @Eyeroller: This surprises me exactly zero. Paul Harvey’s whole schtick was a “jus’ folks” veneer on violent right wing crankery, more or less a Reader’s Digest show. He lasted until the other Birchers decided they liked shouty better, so he was replaced with Rush Limbaugh.

  276. 276.

    Kay

    @tam1MI:

    I wasn’t surprised because my husband has done criminal defense for 30 years and prior to that he was a prosecutor. They almost always convict – not because they’re all corrupt but because most defendants are guilty and prosecutors usually only bring cases they are almost guaranteed to win. But that isn’t what the defense is for – the defense has one job – did the state prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. I don’t know if she did it. I know they didn’t prove it.

    They overcharged her, IMO, because they’re all cops and they wanted her imprisoned a long time. So tough shit. Make better charging decisions next time. They could have gotten something related to her being impaired and reckless, but no, they had to beat the shit out of her because they’re vindictive assholes. I cheered at a mistrial. That’s a good result for the defense.

  277. 277.

    Jackie

    For those clinging to their NYT subscription, latest headline:

    Biden Told Ally That He Is Weighing Whether to Continue the Race

    😡 I don’t subscribe, so no link.

  278. 278.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @schrodingers_cat: I used to watch Bloggingheads.tv a lot in the early Obama years.  One of the things I liked was all the new, young journalistic voices.  But when I look back and realize that Ezra Klein, Chris Hayes, and others who have gone on to fairly prominent positions in our media were all chummy with Meaghan McArdle, Dave Wasserman, Spencer Ackerman, Matt Duss etc., it reminds me that Klein, Hayes etc., still have a bunch of Uber-Progressive Cool Kids as well as Republican shitheads in their world.  A lot of Dem-bashing friends from the Right AND the Left) to impress.

  279. 279.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Bupalos:

    But “They” are not “pretending to be afraid” of anything. What “they” are doing mostly is reporting on and monetizing the very real fear in other people that Biden as the candidate raises Trump’s chances of getting in.

    Precisely.  Key word there is “monetizing”.  We call em Our Failed *Corporate* Media with very good reason.

  280. 280.

    Chris

    @Kay:

    I’m biased towards the defense simply because society in general is preposterously biased towards the prosecution and police.

  281. 281.

    artem1s

    @SiubhanDuinne: 

    Even if Biden wins reëlection with landslide-level numbers, I predict it’ll be a matter of mere days until the MSM starts routinely referring to him as a lame duck president.

    So what? I predict we have only seen the tip of the NFLTG Dark Brandon iceberg. His final term in the last job he’ll ever have is going to be epic. That’s why the MSM and the GOP are so afraid of this second term.

  282. 282.

    Captain C

    @Jackie:

    Any sources?  Or the usual ‘unnamed’ crap, which could mean anything from an actual Biden ally to (more likely) a disgruntled and failed Democratic operative to (even more likely) the reporter and editor pulling it out of their respective asses?

  284. 284.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    I still remember when little Ezra started his trendy blog while still in college, good ole Pandagon.  During that time frame, such ability to observe and comment, particularly given the frustration that arose with Dubya and the Iraq War, was refreshing.

    Looking back, it was basically little Ezra being a careerist of the classic DC-insider kind.  Simply burnishing his college credentials to find a “real” job and then start failing upward.

  286. 286.

    ArchTeryx

    @Baud: Thank you. I’d crack the old joke about Baud 2024, but none of this is funny any more. I’m all in for Joe Biden, same as I ever was, and working on trying to convince my young LBGTQ+ friends (particularly the transgendered ones) that they better be voting, and voting straight ticket D, this election. Because their lives depend on it. I firmly believe that’s not just hyperbole or scarmongering. I think it’s the dead truth.

  289. 289.

    Suzanne

    @Soprano2: Trump’s Gish Galloping is impossible for anyone to deal with, stutter or no stutter. I’m sorry. It’s just so batshit, and non-linear, and faster than the time you puked up that nasty burrito, and most people’s minds just don’t work like that. Like, you can’t counter it, because you’re a normal person whose mind works in logical fashion.

    Firmly believe that no one should ever debate him. There’s no way to counter him effectively in that format. Don’t give it a forum.

  290. 290.

    Eyeroller

    @Captain C: She said she doesn’t have a subscription so doesn’t know the answer.  I cancelled my subscription on Monday and I don’t want to give them any clicks regardless.  But I am betting it’s “unnamed insiders.”

  291. 291.

    ArchTeryx

    @Tony Jay: I’m sadly no Oskar Schindler, but I live in a rooming house with 4 other people, 3 of which will have immediate targets on their backs (as well as I) if TCFG is elected. So if I can’t be Schindler, I’ll be the one that stashes Anne Frank’s family in my basement. In my circle of friends, many of whom are LBGTQ+, we protect our own. If worst comes to worst, we go down fighting. I seem to recall that was your country’s response to Hitler in WWII, and by God’s green earth you won, even at terrible cost, you won. Now we need to step up like that.

  292. 292.

    stinger

    @E.:

    I don’t know why my plan for the party to form its own news site elicits such yawns.

    You have a plan? That’s great news! Deets?

  293. 293.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    IE- most of the people clamoring for Biden to step down or do X, Y, Z better or else!, are exactly the people I would’ve expected to jump into this divisive feeding frenzy.

    Yup.  I also see that the howling from that corner coincides with a lot of push back we do on certain economic policy issues.  Same people, entirely predictable.

    I will say that some of the people who occupy that same economic policy space with a national profile, think somebody like Newsome, are doing the right thing politically in all of this.  Might make my nose squeezing a little less tight when it comes time to hafta vote for him for president.  I’ll remember his stance over the last week.

  294. 294.

    CaseyL

    My Aunt, who is in a panic, just emailed me to say “high-level Democrats” are calling for Biden to step aside.  I said I knew about the House Reps listed here, none of whom are high-level, and asked her to give me names.

    I also said Carville doesn’t count; he’s just a “Democratic” version of Rick Wilson, looking for money and attention.

  296. 296.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @JPL:

    Did you ever read FireDogLake.. Talk about taking a dark turn.

    Calamity Jane and the Hamshers of the Apocolypse!
    Heh heh, talk about an inside baseball/ancient-blog-history reference.
    Another classic case of somebody wanting to be a “playuh” at a higher level, being rejected at every attempt and then taking a sharp turn into crazyland as a result.

  299. 299.

    Another Scott

    @WereBear: I don’t see them very often, but ElevenFilms seems to do good work. And I haven’t heard anything problematic about them (unlike LP and some others).

    FWIW.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  301. 301.

    Suzanne

    On the topic of missed opportunities during debates….. I occasionally think back to one of the early Republican debates back in 2016, when PLEASE CLAP Jeb! was still in the race. Trump was just laying into him, insulting the whole Bush family, just being an absolute bully and asshole in a really personal, uncomfortable way. And I turned to Mr. Suzanne and said, “The best way for Jeb Bush to win this election right now is for him to walk across the stage and punch Trump in the face”.

    I firmly believe that that would have absolutely altered the trajectory of….. well, everything.

    A missed opportunity.

  302. 302.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    Trump’s Project 2025 leader: “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be”

    Given that Felonious D has basically always been a shitty mafioso, that’s pretty much on-message:

    “Nice country y’all have here, shame if something would happen to it.”

    Yunno, I don’t own guns, never have. Been around plenty of friends and acquaintances who are along various spots of the “gun crazy” spectrum, have gone on shoots with them, etc.

    The crazy-ass right will learn real quick how the ease of buying firearms by practically anybody will come back to haunt em real quick if push comes to shove.

    JFC, I’ve never been a doomer but I do look at events thru a historical perspective and now have an inkling of what some of the societal currents that existed in the years leading up to the Civil War.

  304. 304.

    hrprogressive

    I hope you all believe the statement from the Head Fascist at Project 2025.

    They mean it.

    You’d better be ready for it.

  307. 307.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Suzanne:

    Was out running errands, so late to reply. Agreed. An unfortunately large subset of white men–young and old–are angry at losing their automatic top dog status. They don’t want to have to earn their position, like the rest of us have to, and are resentful about it. Sadly, a large subset of white women have also opted to preserve white supremacy and the patriarchy to keep their relative second dog status. We need to wave Dobbs and the threat to birth control in their faces. Some of them could end up dead dogs, so to speak, otherwise.

  308. 308.

    Eyeroller

    @rikyrah: The NYT is determined to drive Biden out.  I don’t even think that his refusal to give them an interview is the reason.  He won’t give them an interview because the team had already determined that they are hostile to him.

  309. 309.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @Bupalos: My wife buried BOTH of her 80-something year old parents last year.  We are well aware of how aging works.  FYVM…

    But the real question is: are you people going to 100% Kamala if she’s the nominee?  Are you all gonna be blindly-loyal for her campaign?  Or are you going to immediately pivot to bashing her for her strong support of Israel?  I’m extremely skeptical that ANY OF YOU are ready to become good soldiers if you get the Biden scalp you are so eager to make happen.  I don’t trust you’ll have her back any more than you have Biden’s now.

    And if Kamala loses to Trump are you all gonna take responsibility and the blame for insisting on this fucking idiotic fantasy that the Dem base currently opposes?  Or will you all run straight to the Flawed Candidate narrative and pretend you had nothing to do with fueling it, like you all did to Hillary?

    I’m sorry but I see all the most pragmatic Black Voters and voices saying “Nah, we’re with Biden” and I trust them way more than I trust people who have been hyper-focussed on criticizing Biden since the day he was inaugurated.  If they get on board, we can talk but until then all you’re doing is helping Trump, MAGA, Russia achieve their goal of dividing the only coalition that matters.

  310. 310.

    Eolirin

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage: If there’s a fascist take over, expect them to go after people’s guns eventually. The second amendment is only something to be maximally protected as long as doing so helps in the seizure and consolidation of power. It will be completely gutted the second it becomes a threat to the regime.

  313. 313.

    Kay

    @Chris:

    The truth is cops are on the state side and they lie a lot. They’re on the side of the prosecution! That’s the system. But prosecutors have an additional duty that the defense does not have – they’re supposed to consider the administration of justice which is a recognition of how much power they have and is why they shouldn’t overcharge. The charges themselves were corrupted by state bias, IMO. It was bad all the way down. I’m always interested in how women defendants are viewed. I saw “she’s a bitch” start on social media and I thought “oh, here we go. They’re mad she’s not sniffling into her hankie and begging forgiveness”.

  317. 317.

    Almost Retired

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage: Great point on the historical currents of 1860 and 2024.  Just finished Erik Larson’s excellent “Demons of Unrest,” a blow-by-blow watch-the-coming-train-wreck account of the period between Lincoln’s election and Fort Sumter.  Some of the characters seemed awfully familiar.

  318. 318.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @O. Felix Culpa:

    The good-ish news is that the current NYT coordinated attacks on Biden are beginning to open their eyes. They’re beginning to see the overreach and blatant propagandizing that they used to pooh-pooh when I talked about it.

    Not so my sister with the NYT and same with CNN and MSNBC. She’s not interested in hearing me talk about the framing of her sources. She liked Chuck Todd because “different perspectives” while ignoring him admitting (like the FTFNYT) that it wasn’t his job to challenge anyone on the facts. I have asked her more than once…do you really think any and every assertion is equally valid? Can you not see that “people are saying” is a closed loop? That “sincerely believe” is faith and not necessarily fact?

    She’s a committed Democratic voter and I love her dearly but I just don’t talk to her about this anymore.

  319. 319.

    artem1s

    @Bupalos: ​ 
    This isn’t over but we’re probably going to lose the presidency whatever we do (mostly because I think we’ll be bound by a perceived impossibility of running our strongest candidate).
    Pie for you asshole.

  321. 321.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @E.:

    ProPublica and TalkingPointsMemo already exist. I support them. It takes a LOT of money and effort to start a new journalism outlet. Now, if a billionaire on our side wanted to throw some pocket change to establish a quality media outlet, I’d be in favor.

    The days of “objective” Walter Cronkite and Huntley-Brinkley reporting are dead and gone. Not enough (older) people realize that, though. They still believe in and look for the stentorian voice of authority. Maybe that’s why so many older folks got suckered in Faux.

  323. 323.

    Chris

    @Suzanne:

    On the topic of missed opportunities during debates….. I occasionally think back to one of the early Republican debates back in 2016, when PLEASE CLAP Jeb! was still in the race. Trump was just laying into him, insulting the whole Bush family, just being an absolute bully and asshole in a really personal, uncomfortable way. And I turned to Mr. Suzanne and said, “The best way for Jeb Bush to win this election right now is for him to walk across the stage and punch Trump in the face”.

    Oh my God.  I’ve said the exact same thing.  (Well, not about Jeb.  I don’t think it would ever have occurred to me that there’s a universe where Jeb Bush might do that).

    If you really want to take Donald Trump’s political career and make it as dead as Andrew Breitbart, all you ever needed to do was three things: 1) walk across the stage during a debate and slap him in the face (not punch, if I may quibble; slap), 2) walk back to your podium while visibly chuckling, and 3) never apologize.  That’s it.  A Democrat probably couldn’t get away with this, not with the ensuing uproar: but any Republican could have done it, and he might not have walked away with the nomination, but that would’ve been the end of Donald Trump.

    Haven’t heard much about Richard Spencer in seven years, have you?  That’s because that entire cult runs on their psycho version of alpha male status games; and a person who’s been publicly humiliated like that cannot remain the leader of a fascist movement.  He just can’t.  Not when every fascist in the world, including and especially the voice in his own head, is whispering “soy boy beta cuck.”

  324. 324.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @oldgold: I had a boss who expressed his desire to run his company as a benevolent dictatorship. I told him more than once “don’t forget the benevolent part.”

  328. 328.

    Another Scott

    @schrodingers_cat: They’re a publicly-traded company.  The overall group is the “New York Times Company”.

    From their 2023 annual report (136 page .pdf):

    OUR STRATEGY

    Our strategy is to be the essential digital subscription for every curious, English-speaking person seeking to understand and engage with the world, which includes:

    • being the world’s best general-interest news destination;
    • becoming more valuable to more people by helping them make the most of their lives and engage with their passions; and
    • creating a more expansive and connected product experience that makes our products indispensable.

    Our latest audience research suggests that there are at least 135 million adults worldwide who are willing to pay for one or more subscriptions to English-language news, sports coverage, puzzles, recipes, expert shopping advice or audio journalism. Our current aim is to reach 15 million total subscribers by year-end 2027, up from approximately 10.36 million at the end of 2023. We believe that focusing on the following priorities will enable us to become an essential subscription for our addressable market and drive long-term, profitable growth for the Company and our stockholders.

    Them riling us up is part of their strategy to “engage with [our] passions” and so forth. They’re going to keep doing it as long as people keep sending them money.

    Grr…,
    Scott.

  329. 329.

    Chris

    @Sure Lurkalot:

    She liked Chuck Todd because “different perspectives”

    Amazing how “different perspective” always seems to end up meaning “someone who shits on Democrats.”

  331. 331.

    SomeRandomGuy

    @ArchTeryx: Yes – it really is *that bad*. The SCOTUS has just enabled all evil presidents, and weakened all honest and good Presidents.

    For people at risk, it’s important to think of something I read – probably Stephen King – about how Jewish families didn’t bolt as quickly as they might, because… well, they had pianos. They had a nice house, they had their piano, if they bolted, what would they do? It’s a lot of work to move a piano (without damaging it)!

    I get that. I mean, I really do, a lot of people have worries and barriers, and might want to wait to see how things shake out. Okay, but, while it’s not at the “emigrate for safety” stage, geez – step on or over any obstacles, and vote, because it becomes too late too fast.

    And too many people don’t realize it’s too late, until, well….

  335. 335.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Bupalos:

    What “they” are doing mostly is reporting on creating and stoking and monetizing [this part is true] the very real trumped up fear that they create and stoke in other people that Biden as the candidate raises Trump’s chances of getting in.

    FIFY.

  336. 336.

    Kay

    @Chris:

    Massachusetts is one of the most educated states in the country. She was lucky there. It matters in a jury. I don’t think she got knee jerk law enforcement boosters  “where there’s smoke there’s fire!” jurors- which she would have where I live. Apparently that jurisidiction has a healthy skepticism about their police due to consistent thuggish behavior over years and years, too. They went in skeptical. They’re not fans.

  339. 339.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: You should have heard TCFG’s attorney on Morning Edition today. He was waving all the concerns away with statements like “the military comes under the UMCJ, they would never obey an unlawful order”, while not at all addressing that TCFG could also promise to pardon them for what they do for him, and no one could do anything about it! He actually said that he believes that what the SCOTUS did was just codify what was already there for the past 240 years.  He’s running to be Missouri’s attorney general!

  341. 341.

    Doc Sardonic

    @Kay: I’m thinking he probably did talk to Biden or his campaign staff about the need for the President to stand down for a replacement, was summarily told to go fuck himself with an appropriately oxidated farming tool. Thus, to assuage his butthurt, ran immediately to the media.

  342. 342.

    billcoop4

    @ArchTeryx:

    @Baud: Thank you. I’d crack the old joke about Baud 2024, but none of this is funny any more. I’m all in for Joe Biden, same as I ever was, and working on trying to convince my young LBGTQ+ friends (particularly the transgendered ones) that they better be voting, and voting straight ticket D, this election. Because their lives depend on it. I firmly believe that’s not just hyperbole or scarmongering. I think it’s the dead truth.

    Concur completely. Older cisgender gay male here and I am quietly terrified. As in 1933 Berlin terrified. But I am also trying to keep calm .

    BC

  345. 345.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @JWR:

    Heh heh, let’s go down the black hole of a memory lane on early blogosphere crackpots.  Who in this case, mercifully left the scene.

    It’s funny how our Almost Top 10000 Blog here was around and thriving at that same time and is still here.  Too bad other crackpots like Cenk Uygur are still around.  Plus there is that his audience consists of 8 people on the Horseshoe Left.

    But yeah, now that you mention it, I remember that particular cockamamie idea of Calamity Jane.  I’m still chuckling that somebody here remembered that and brought it up.

  346. 346.

    BlueDWarrior

    @Doc Sardonic: I really want to know why it is White Democrats that are the most prone to blind panic? At some point I really do think it’s people who are subconsciously (or worse) upset that it was minority voters that routed all the supposed superior Dem choices in 2020 and were waiting for any opportune time to plunge daggers in Joe’s back.

     

    The only alternative at this stage that would be able to function immediately is Kamala Harris, that is why Clyburn effectively said she’s the only alternative he’d support.

    Anything else would descend the party into chaos not seen since 1968. Ironic because that is a lot of the reason it is supposed that Nixon got elected.

  349. 349.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @schrodingers_cat:

    “So far, the named deserters are center to center-right Congresscritters: Doggett, Golden, Gluesenkamp-Perez. Plus Ryan. I’m detecting a pattern there, too.”

    Our far left flank is always at the ready to knife us in the back. Let me guess, he is white.

    So one of the four mentioned is an evil progressive amid the center righties publicly calling for Biden to step aside but you”ve got to stick to your far left flank narrative.

    I grant you the horseshoe premise but throw out all the white progressives in the party and say hello to dictator Trump.

    Remember how the Blue Dog caucus hamstrung some of the more expansive coverage provisions of the ACA? How it then helped a good deal fewer people than it could have and took longer to embrace? Or other initiatives of the Obama presidency? Guess not.

  350. 350.

    Baud

    @BlueDWarrior:

    I really want to know why it is White Democrats that are the most prone to blind panic?

     

    Non-white Democrats aren’t a minority within their social cohort.

  351. 351.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    I naturally don’t trust the police.  They wanted to railroad her, and it was obvious. I was rooting for a Not Guilty verdict.  The mistrial is  fine.

  352. 352.

    Kay

    We’re going to Portugal the day after the election to see old friends. We’re bringing my little sister who is a loyal Dem – she lives in Brooklyn, NY but has already signed up to canvass in PA – and one of the funniest people I know so I just try to think about that when I get nervous – there will be a respite before I have to face whatever I have to face.

  354. 354.

    rikyrah

    @schrodingers_cat:

     

    you ain’t never lied. Remember all the stories about Kamala Harris that came out AFTER she dropped out of the race?

    Everyone else drops out and nothing ever else was written about them.

    But, they just kept on writing stories about her. It was obvious. They wanted to sandbag her chance to become VP.

  355. 355.

    lowtechcyclist

    @rikyrah:

    Will Stancil (@whstancil) posted at 9:26 AM on Tue, Jul 02, 2024:
    You have to love how Axios’s plain language summary of Trump’s platform is “He’ll set up concentration camps and jail his political enemies” – literally fascism and tyranny – but somehow this all gets sidelined in our day-to-day discourse

    How the everloving fuck does this get overshadowed by “Biden is old”?  I mean, if even Axios, the outfit that exists to make Politico look less slimy by comparison, is pointing out that this is Trump’s agenda, you’d think the WaPo and FTFNYT would gather that it’s important.

  356. 356.

    Suzanne

    @O. Felix Culpa: I still think we need to emphasize the whole team. The ensemble of the brightest-star Dems in the administration and in the states and in Congress. Honestly, we have the best team we’ve had in many years. Emphasize MVP’s leadership capability and Secretary Pete’s razor-sharpness and Sen. Warnock’s brilliance, etc etc etc. A whole symphony of expertise.

    The advantage of that is that it gives everyone who’s freaking out — and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to be freaked out — but it gives those people confidence in a backup plan. That everything will be seamless moving forward. No drama, no dropped balls.

  358. 358.

    Eyeroller

    @Sure Lurkalot:  I also assumed Doggett leaned towards Blue Dog since he’s from Texas, but he’s the Austin rep so seems to be the real deal (though he’s pretty old too–hey maybe he’s becoming demented).  I’m coming to the conclusion that Doggett’s action may have been ego-driven.  The conjecture above that he may have gone to Biden’s people in private and was told to GFY, so went to the press, is at least plausible.  Whether he spoke to anybody in private or not, he’s clearly convinced he knows what is right.

  359. 359.

    Soprano2

    @Suzanne:  @O. Felix Culpa: The thing is, I really just think that the core problem of American society is white men who are angry at their relative loss of social status, and they’re so enraged about it that they want to kill us all. Trump is the vehicle for this impulse.

    QFT

  360. 360.

    JWR

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage:

    I remember that particular cockamamie idea of Calamity Jane.

    Geez, I don’t even remember what the Hamsher-Norquist pairing was supposed to accomplish. But I’ll never forget her “Ban Hammer”. Cross her and you were outa there.

  361. 361.

    Eyeroller

    @Soprano2:  Furosemide (Lasix) is just a diuretic. For heart failure in cats, you generally need to add something like enalapril or pimobendan Dogs usually get mitral valve insufficiency (80% of CHF according to one source) or dilated cardiomyopathy, not hypertrophic or restricted cardiomyopathy.

  364. 364.

    brantl

    @OzarkHillbilly:  lately, I’ve met an awful lot of people who need their asses kicked up to their shoulder blades. If kicked that far, their heads might just pop out of their asses.

  365. 365.

    Josie

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
     I’m relieved to hear you say that. I had come to wonder if it was my own stupidity that kept me from seeing it. It is a depressing realization that took me by surprise.

  366. 366.

    brantl

    @Cacti: And naturally, he will listen to my every word.

     

    Just like all of us!! Now, where is the pie filter, again….?

  368. 368.

    ArchTeryx

    @SomeRandomGuy: It’s far worse than that if you take a look at the history. A lot of Jews that did flee in time arrived on our shores and were promptly sent back to Germany or Poland to die. A huge part of the reason they created Israel (no, I won’t get into the current Gaza situation) is to have a guaranteed bolt-hole if this ever happened again. Someplace to go where they won’t be refused entry.

    Americans are going to find out the hard way that unless they have family ties or a LOT of money, no Western nation on the planet is going to take them. That especially includes Canada. They abjectly refuse to be our refugee bolthole.

    So fleeing has far more obstacles than timing. Very, very big ones. Even the successful expats put in years of work before they were allowed in, and if there’s a sudden storm of refugees out of the USA, they’re going to quickly find themselves booted right back here to face their fate.

  369. 369.

    Kay

    @Doc Sardonic:

    I’m not really where you-all are in the bad faith analysis, except as I said for Golden because he used the problem to promote his Right wing economic views. That was blatantly self interested, but I accepted Blue Dogs in the Dem Party a long time ago. It’s a big tent and it has a Right and Left flank.

    I assume bad faith from media, not Democrats. They (media) have not earned my trust. I get where you’re at and it’s (of course) fine to think like that, I’m just not there. I think it’s a (real) problem that can be calmly dealt without assigning enemies w/in the party. IMO we should be doing better with a kind of “fundamentals” analysis and part of that is looking at how the rest of the Party is faring. There’s a divergence there that concerns me – we’re not sub 40 approval anywhere but at the top of the ticket. It’s odd and I can’t explain it other than as attributable to the candidate. When we got creamed in 2010 Obama was sub 40, that’s true, but so was the rest of the Party. It made sense to me. This doesn’t.

    If Democrats were super unpopular the generic ballot would not be even. That’s just not how it works. We’re holding everywhere but at the top.

    But I’ll work with whatever I get.

  370. 370.

    Captain C

    @lowtechcyclist:

    How the everloving fuck does this get overshadowed by “Biden is old”?

    cf. Butter Emails, when TCFG’s hate, incompetence, and record of fraud, mob ties, and general criming was right there for the FTFNYT to go after.

  371. 371.

    RandomMonster

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage:  Heh heh, let’s go down the black hole of a memory lane on early blogosphere crackpots.  Who in this case, mercifully left the scene.

    Who here remembers Larry C. Johnson? Another guy who took the exit to Loonybin.

  372. 372.

    Suzanne

    @Chris:

    If you really want to take Donald Trump’s political career and make it as dead as Andrew Breitbart, all you ever needed to do was three things: 1) walk across the stage during a debate and slap him in the face (not punch, if I may quibble; slap), 2) walk back to your podium while visibly chuckling, and 3) never apologize.  That’s it.  A Democrat probably couldn’t get away with this, not with the ensuing uproar: but any Republican could have done it, and he might not have walked away with the nomination, but that would’ve been the end of Donald Trump.

    Haven’t heard much about Richard Spencer in seven years, have you?  That’s because that entire cult runs on their psycho version of alpha male status games; and a person who’s been publicly humiliated like that cannot remain the leader of a fascist movement.  He just can’t.  Not when every fascist in the world, including and especially the voice in his own head, is whispering “soy boy beta cuck.”

     

    Yes. Yes. Every word of this is true.

    Any debate with Trump is a food fight, so it’s not worth doing it. Nothing to gain. All risk, and there’s only reward if you smack him.

    I will note that I watch that video of Richard Spencer getting punched in the face set to “Love Will Tear Us Apart” any time I need a mood pick-me-up.

  374. 374.

    Geminid

    @Kay: Portugal sounds like a nice place to visit. I always associated it with groves of cork oaks, but now there are also lines of wind generators. Portugal started developing its hydroelectric resources after tge energy crisis of the early 1970s, and between hydro and wind power they now lead Europe in renewable energy generation.

  375. 375.

    Kay

    @Doc Sardonic:

    So if the Dem in Texas had said “Biden is too far Right for me so I will therefore announce he will lose” like Golden did (but in the other direction) then, absolutely, bad faith. But he didn’t. He’s in a safe seat. He doesn’t have an agenda. I don’t think our voters or supporters who watched the debate and reacted had an agenda either, nor do I think they were somehow tricked by malign forces, or whatever. It was gut. They saw, they reacted. They’re friendlies! Don’t shoot them! :)

  376. 376.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Josie: I  missed many things that in hindsight should have been obvious. I have mostly lived in blue states, college towns or suburbs of cities so I was insulated from the worst of it. Plus I was too culturally dumb not having spent my formative childhood years here to realize the “nice” racism coming out of the mouths of some nice white women I was friends with. The Trump era opened my eyes to the subtle digs some white women make. Oh and being in a decision making authority of a non-profit was another clarifying experience.

    Black Twitter and anticaste Twitter ( I understood many of my own unspoken biases) have been a great help.

  377. 377.

    Matt McIrvin

    @RandomMonster: From TPM columnist to the Whitey Tape in a few months!

    I remember realizing there was something off about him a bit earlier, when his speculation about Bush preparing a nuclear strike on Iran got refuted by domain experts with evidence and he doubled down.

  378. 378.

    ArchTeryx

    @billcoop4: I’m not LBGTQ+ but I fly the Ally flag, and I got a target on my back too. I’m disabled. And the FIRST people the Nazis went after and started mass murdering weren’t LBGTQ+ people or even Jews. They were the disabled. Same with Pol Pot, Idi Amin and Francisco Franco. So I understand that fear

    They already tried to murder me once and came within one Senate vote of doing it. That clarifies the mind about who your enemy is – not that I needed that much convincing, but they ALREADY TRIED TO KILL ME. So yeah. The stakes are just as high for me.

  379. 379.

    Kay

    @Geminid:

    I’m excited. I’ve never been. Our friends owned a “fine dining” restaurant in the US and sold it and retired there – they love food and they rave about the ingredients they get over there. They left partly because of Trump. One of them is Japanese-American and she was horrified by the Trumper racism BUT they’re both pot smokers so that was a trade off – they were pretty excited about legalization :)

    I’m sticking in the US though. I’m very patriotic. I would never leave. I belong here. I’m also hugely combative. I’ll absolutely fight.

  380. 380.

    Almost Retired

    @Kay:   Wonderful!  Enjoy Portugal.  I’ve never been, but my new daughter-in-law is applying for Portuguese citizenship (her mother was born there).  After they’ve been married for three years, my son can apply as well.  We’re all visiting in the Fall before the election.  At the moment, we do intend to come back, but…..

  382. 382.

    Doc Sardonic

    @Kay: Maybe I’m wrong, but I view anyone that runs to the media with a “we need to replace our candidate” statement as both a bad faith actor and a non-ally. That is a giant chunk of why you are seeing the top of the ticket in the 40’s. It’s media driven, but you can probably safely bet that the ‘unnamed’ sources that they are using are these people or their staffers

  383. 383.

    Kay

    @Almost Retired:

    Oh, that’s neat. They do love it but they’re finding learning any of the language really difficult. That’s partly age related, I’m sure – I used to be able to memorize A LOT of info and now I cannot, but it’s also a difficult language, I have heard.

    My sister is renting a car which we don’t generally do overseas. My husband and I walk, public transpo or taxis. But, she lives in Brooklyn, doesn’t own a car but loves to drive (and grew up driving) so rents one everywhere she travels. I think that will be amusing all by itself.

  385. 385.

    MinuteMan

    @Baud: ​

    Whatever happens in November, we need to think seriously about what to do about the media landscape. That’s not a role for government because of the First Amendment. I just don’t think we can keep going on like this though.

    Consolidation of the media into an oligopoly is even more dangerous to us than the oligopolies that control much of our economy and everyday life. Combined with the accumulation of obscene amounts of wealth by power-crazed immoral greedheads the media becomes another way to further power and control over the rest of us. Money is truly the root of all evil.​

  386. 386.

    Geminid

    Eugene Vindman is running in the Virginia 7th CD to replace Rep. Spanberger. She’s retiring to concentrate on a run for Governor next year.

    So I looked to Vindman’s Twitter feed to see what he had to say about Joe Biden since the debate and the answer was, not much at all. But people were slamming Vindman for deserting Biden, so I looked again and it turns out that Alexander Vindman, Eugene’s twin brother posted on the night of the debate that Biden would lose “if the election were held tomorrow.” The next day he affirmed his support for Biden’s candidacy.

    Eugene Vindman’s social media account attracts a lot of Republican trolls because his and his brother’s role in the first Trump impeachment. A typical reply is, “You are a dork and your brother is a traitor.” So it could be there are people pretending to be Democrats and trying to exploit the backbitimg among Democrats over the debate and its consequences.

  387. 387.

    jowriter

    @Kay: It’s one of the great places.  So much beauty, lovely people. I first went as a young woman post-military coup in 1974.  It was beautiful but scary to see the uniforms with machine guns on street corners in Lisbon.  Went back later on a writers’ junket in 2010.  They are doing great things with renewables and it’s still a gorgeous country with warm and friendly folk.  I love the country–we were looking at the cork industry there and it was fascinating.  I still have photos of the cork growing region–Alentejo–during the harvest (July).  You’ll be too late for that but I am sure you’ll enjoy your vacation.  Portuguese wines are pretty good too, not to mention port, for which the country is well recognized. Thanks for taking my troubled mind to a nice place. :)

  389. 389.

    Soprano2

    @schrodingers_cat: The dog had to go back to the rescue because he was a danger to my cat. From what I saw the last couple of days we had the dog it wasn’t going to get any better. Thing is, I think my husband has already forgotten we had her! He kept calling her Mariah, which is a dog we had who died sometime in the mid-2010’s. The new dog looked a lot like Mariah.

  390. 390.

    Soprano2

    @BlueDWarrior: I think it’s because white people don’t have to fight for everything they have, especially the middle and upper class ones, so the minute things get a little hard for them they freak out and panic.

  391. 391.

    Soprano2

    @Mike E: I can’t fault them for talking to TCFG’s attorney. They were asking about the appeal of the NY trial verdict.

  392. 392.

    Soprano2

    @Eyeroller: I guess we’ll see, my vet is a cat-only specialist so I expect whatever he prescribes will be the best for him.

  393. 393.

    Soprano2

    @schrodingers_cat: A couple of weeks ago I told my therapist (who is a black woman) that I was from Billings (MO, not MT). Her eyes got kind of big and I said “What?” She said she had experience working out there as a nurse when she was doing in-home care, and it wasn’t good experience, and then I spent the next 5 minutes saying “I’m sorry” and telling her that’s how I know how TCFG voters think, because I grew up around them. Inside I was livid, I hate knowing that my hometown is just as racist now as it was when I lived there in the ’60’s and ’70’s.

  394. 394.

    geg6

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
     
    I saw an article a while ago that said the FTFNYT makes its money through their games, recipes and cultural stuff. That’s why I have nothing but disdain for all the assholes out there saying they can’t unsubscribe because they need recipes and Wordle. Fuck that shit. If and when the shit hits the fan, I’m going to tell them to get back into the kitchen and play a fucking game because that’s what they value most.

  396. 396.

    geg6

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
     
    You’re going to have to illustrate that for me because I’ve never seen any such thing there. Perhaps, as you say, it’s too subtle for me but I have to say I’m skeptical.

  398. 398.

    geg6

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
     
    Ah, that explains it. I never read Judis’ stuff. I understand why Josh keeps him on the staff, but he’s awful on a lot of stuff. He came from the National Journal and TNR, both awful in their own ways, especially back in the day. Which is why I don’t read his stuff.

  399. 399.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @BlueDWarrior:

    At some point I really do think it’s people who are subconsciously (or worse) upset that it was minority voters that routed all the supposed superior Dem choices in 2020 and were waiting for any opportune time to plunge daggers in Joe’s back.

    This makes the most sense to me since they’ve been bitching and moaning about Biden/Harris ever since.  And the phenomena of 1.) White People ditching or undermining the multi-racial coalition, when we get mad for not getting our way, is something that is a real and common thing, according to many of the black people I follow or know personally.  And I’ve seen it happen, irl, and have even had to try and clean up the mess, mend fences, afterwards..  It’s one of the reasons they always view white allies with extreme skepticism. They know our tendency to be Fairweather Friends.

    And a lot of the current mess fits perfectly in line with that.

  400. 400.

    Elizabelle

    400.  Stay in the fight, Joe Biden.  You’ve got this, and we have your back.

    Break Big Pundit.

Comments are closed.