Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

They want us to be overwhelmed and exhausted. Focus. Resist. Oppose.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

Oppose, oppose, oppose. do not congratulate. this is not business as usual.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

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

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

I desperately hope that, yet again, i am wrong.

“A king is only a king if we bow down.” – Rev. William Barber

Consistently wrong since 2002

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

Trumpflation is an intolerable hardship for every American, and it’s Trump’s fault.

Fight for a just cause, love your fellow man, live a good life.

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

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

Peak wingnut was a lie.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Disappointing to see gov. newsom with his finger to the wind.

You are here: Home / John Cole Presents "This Fucking Old House" / Wednesday Night Open Thread

Wednesday Night Open Thread

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Wednesday Night Open Thread 9

I guess I am pleasantly surprised to see the degree to which JD Vance is getting dragged for being an imposter. Hashtags like #shillbilly and #notfromhere are trending, and it is becoming quite glorious. Good stuff.

Not much to report here. Got caught in a downpour while out mowing the soccer fields, had dinner, and that’s pretty much it.

Reader Interactions

181Comments

  6. 6.

    bbleh

    It’s funny how “carpetbagger” still has legs.

    And I gotta say, the “couch” thing has surprised me.  He’s becoming an object of mockery, and ain’t nothin’ deadlier in politics than that.

    My heart bleeds for the Republicans.  Really it does!

  7. 7.

    dmsilev

    The thing about Vance is that as off-putting and offensive his personality is, his policy views are even more off-putting and more offensive.

  8. 8.

    brendancalling

    @bbleh: well then he shouldn’t fuck couches, or be the kind of person that gets falsely accused of fucking couches BECAUSE HE’S AN ASSHOLE.

  9. 9.

    SomeRandomGuy

    I posted this on the Covid-19 thread, in response to a xit asking how people could believe a vaccine could sever one’s connection to God.

    There is an entire sect of people who believe the Covid vaccine was designed to destroy the human soul, and sever humanity’s connection to God. How do you even reach this level of delusion?

    Cognitive dissonance. I mean, take a *terrible* person, and have the GOP become just “The Republican Party – not a grand thing about ’em.” by supporting him *to the hilt*. Even to the point of pretending he was a competent, successful President, in the face of an unending flood of evil, stupidity, and evil stupidity.

    Have a global pandemic strike, and have Republicans insist that it’s *good* to kill people, to get it over with. (Don’t say “good Republican” unless they were screaming bloody murder during Covid-19, and haven’t left the party, yet, because they’re still in the “thousand yard stare” phase. I’m sorry – anyone not screaming (metaphorically – no need to harm your throat) was saying “meh, few extra stiffs is fine.”)

    Have that SAME President try to overthrow the rightful government of the United States of America, and not *only* continue to have a ‘political career’, but to have the Republicans *praise* him.

    After all that, how the fuck is it *surprising* that people are like this? THE ONLY WAY TO BE A REPUBLICAN IN GOOD STANDING IS TO BELIEVE TOTAL NONSENSE. And you think a few weird existential thoughts about *god* is unusual? Geez, some of you neurotypicals are *idiots*.

    No disrespect meant – this is a case where a neurotypical might lecture a neurodivergent, and treat them like an idiot, for not seeing something obvious. Here, to *me*, the situation is not only obvious, but trivial. It’s not I think you’re an idiot – it’s that I see something you can’t see.

    You know why that can suck? I don’t know what it’s like NOT TO SEE. I see it, I can’t not see it, and I can’t even easily imagine someone not seeing it. But, *fuck*, a little Christian end-times bullshit, after ALL THIS OTHER bullshit? That’s really nothing. That’s reality forcing Christians to go to their faith to look for explanations of the inexplicable.

    They’ve been taught that God can only be on the side of Republicans. What else *can* they believe, but some kind of crazy-ass shit about the vaccine being the mark of the beast, or whatever? If the vaccine is just a vaccine, all the best people in the world (to them – remember, these are Republicans!) are lying. How could they reconcile that?

    ETA: So, yeah, either God is on the side of Republicans, or, everything they believe is nonsense.

    Well… for me, that’s Wednesday, so far. I debug my own thinking all the time. Do you have any *idea* how annoying that makes you neurotypicals to people like me? I swear, if I saw you expose such behavior during a debate, I’d have to take a major chill pill, remind myself that most people don’t debug their thoughts.

  12. 12.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @bbleh: I get it.  My family has owned our land and cabin in northern WI for over 90 years.  My Grandfather was the first person to build by that lake.  But we don’t live there.  We are summer and weekend people.  My hometown is 60 miles south of our cabin, so we aren’t FIBs but we also aren’t real northwoods people.

  13. 13.

    Gin & Tonic

    I am astonished by his political incompetence. Given the numbers of Eastern European ethnic-Americans in Ohio, supporting military aid to Ukraine should have been a no-brainer, getting him automatic tens of thousands of votes.

  19. 19.

    Wave Function Collapse

    Did anyone see Josh Marshall’s latest screed “Thunderdome’s Last Stand?”

    Josh has always struck me as being very measured, laid back, full of unexcitable wisdom. But in this recap  of what transpired the last few weeks I sense an enormous fury at all the op-ed writers and political consultants behind the worst moments of the last six weeks.

  23. 23.

    WaterGirl

    @Gin & Tonic: There is a way to put a password on a post.  We could do that, let folks know the password, and then change the password at the end of the day.  Then you and yours would still have access, but not the scrolling bots and indexes.

  26. 26.

    Avalune

    My most hillbilly aunt, who lives in the Appalachia and often posts good memes about it has been relentless in mockery of Vance. Being from Ohio, I’m pleased to see it. Shillbilly is my new favorite word – it’s just chef’s kiss to describe him.

  27. 27.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Gin & Tonic:

    I’d be curious to know if there’s any high quality polling of Ohio Ukrainian-Americans, either registered voters or all, on JD Vance. I have to imagine there was some done in 2022

  30. 30.

    WereBear

    @dmsilev: Under his system, the husband gets a vote, and their bio children get votes for him, and the wife… I can’t see what the wife gets.

    But if Vance’s wife leaves now, she can make bank on a tell all book.

    What future does she see for herself under Project 2025? Because I see none at all.

  37. 37.

    suzanne

    @BR: Apparently, when Doug started dating Kamala, his ex told him, “Don’t screw this up”. LOL.

  45. 45.

    Martin

    So, I have a confession. I’m a regular consumer of The Bulwark, not because I agree with them on policy or anything, but it’s a useful insight into conservatives who have put their ideological allegiance aside. And I’m not really a fan of any of them, except for Sarah Longwell.

    Part of that is that I’m a huge fan of focus groups (I’ve run focus groups), and I wish we saw more Democratic focus group insight. We get some Dem pollsters like Cornell Belcher, but we rarely get the focus group view. So Sarah is pretty much my only outlet for that kind of content, and I think she’s really very good at it, and I think she’s really very balanced about her interpretation.

    She and I are largely in agreement here that while Harris will probably lose some ground from Biden with working class whites, which he did help shore up in 2020, Democrats should go for it on the generational shift, pushing to the future, and she thinks that Pete or Gretchen are the best VP options, favoring Big Gretch. She didn’t influence my thinking here – I just watched her take and was surprised we largely agreed.

    One reason why I like focus groups is they tell you a lot of things the person won’t tell you, and they contextualize their views. If you get some 19 year old who is enthusiastic about Shapiro (what a poll might tell you), and you ask them why, and they say because they were there when Shapiro emerged from an acorn, ate the magic strawberry and transformed into the magical god governor of PA, you can pretty safely discard that 18-34 sample for Shapiro, because that person is nuts, and that information can’t be extrapolated to the population. And if someone in a focus group says they don’t care about the border and then proceed to talk about immigrants for 20 minutes, you can conclude that they really care about the border but don’t want to admit it. Where people get their views from do matter because that informs you how to approach a subject, and when you can’t do anything about it. If voters are racist against Harris, you can’t fix that – you have to work around it. So run enough focus groups, and do it well, and you can get insight that a poll can’t reveal.

    Lacking Democratic focus group data and insight from them, I’m inclined to believe Sarah’s judgement that Gretch or Pete are our best options. They match my vibe here.

    That was a nice speech by Joe. That people could see Trump as good and Biden as bad really shakes my faith in humanity, and that’s hard to do.

  48. 48.

    Renie

    @Hungry Joe:  Just started and I’m up to 25.  Did your list have some addresses that were not in the state you were given?  Mine does and I’m assuming they might be college students?

  49. 49.

    Ken

    @Gin & Tonic: Given the numbers of Eastern European ethnic-Americans in Ohio, supporting military aid to Ukraine should have been a no-brainer, getting him automatic tens of thousands of votes.

    The only reason Vance is in office is Thiel wants the Trump tax cuts to be renewed when they expire in a couple years. That will almost certainly not happen with a Democratic president. Thus, Trump must be elected, and that in turn means buying into all his revenge plans, including punishing Ukraine.

  54. 54.

    Martin

    @WereBear: Oh, her future is great. The rules of fascism never apply to the insiders. Fascism always relies on people volunteering to help their oppressors in exchange for some mercy from their tyranny.

  55. 55.

    BR

    @Martin:

    I hate watching focus groups but I completely agree about their value. I hope Harris’s campaign is doing lots of them without trying to skew them towards the answers they want.

    And I also am converging on either doubling down on Harris’s strengths (I think Whitmer does that better than Pete), or getting someone as comfortable in their own skin as she is (Walz seems up to the task). My opinions don’t matter, but I don’t get the right vibes from the others on the short list — I mean they’d all be just fine, but just fine isn’t enough in this moment.

  56. 56.

    lamh47

    Thank you Symone D. Sanders Thownsend for saying what you said right in that backstabbing Jen Psaki’s face on MSNBC

    ETA: Only wish the camerman had shown Jen’s backstabbing face.

    “Joe Biden deserved better than he got from some folks in his own party”

  57. 57.

    MomSense

    @Martin:

    Joe Biden is a champion!  Back in 2012 I was an unpaid staff person (my job was paid in other states).  Joe was doing an event in New Hampshire and I was working the phones for an event the next day.  My kids wanted to go and because I was working, the state director told me that he would give them  VIP access.

    Long story short, my three boys went to the event and got a private meeting with Joe.  They told him what I was doing with the campaign and he called me to thank me.  He spent way too much time with them because they were having a lot of fun.  My kids are funny and I think he enjoyed the experience.  Since then he is always referred to as  Joe Fucking Biden – said with love and respect.

  58. 58.

    BR

    @Martin:

    I thought she might be along for the ride with Vance, but she might be a true believer — she clerked for Kavanaugh and Roberts.

  67. 67.

    Martin

    @BR: Democrats do a lot of focus groups, I just wish they’d share what they are learning. She had a really good answer on how Harris should approach the border issue – basically, Democrats are committed to a border solution that encourages the kind of legal immigration that has committed so strongly to the national fabric, and ending unauthorized immigration and smuggling. But we cannot do that when Republicans play games and lie about the issue because they want to campaign on it. Give us a Congress that can pass legislation and we’ll solve it.

    And I think that strikes the right tone. It skirts asylum, because Democrats will dump it in the legal immigration category and Republicans in the illegal one. And Democrats need to be ready that immigrants aren’t the ones who are smuggling Fentanyl across the border – that’s Americans trying to make a buck. And how you solve immigration is a different set of tools from detecting and arresting Americans bringing fentanyl across the border.

  68. 68.

    PsiFighter37

    A solid yet simple speech from Biden – well done.

    As for VP picks, I still think Beshear is the best pick, but Tim Walz has had some great soundbites recently, and he also has a much longer list of accomplishments to run on (which Beshear unfortunately lacks to the same degree because of his GOP-dominated state legislature). Those two, plus Whitmer (which would be really taking a chance IMO) are the top 3 in my book.

  70. 70.

    Ishiyama

    Just googled “J D Vance couch”; when I hit the “images” tab, it’s pretty clear that this meme is not going away any time soon.

  75. 75.

    BR

    @Martin:

    Immigration is the thorniest one of all in my book. Your answer / her answer has too many words, even for me. The GOP strategy is demagoguery but it’s simple and clear. The response that undermines their take has to be simple and clear too.

    I don’t know what the answer is, but I think maybe an analogy is the kind of thing that works here. “We all know that guy who makes sure something never gets fixed right so he can blame others for it and inflate himself. That’s Trump on immigration. Even his own party wanted to fix it, and we had a bipartisan solution. And Trump decided he wanted to make sure it didn’t get fixed, because then he couldn’t complain about it, so he forced his party to vote no.”

  79. 79.

    Steve LaBonne

    @Ishiyama: Once a politician becomes the butt of jokes to that extent, there’s no coming back. He is a boat anchor on Trump’s campaign.

  80. 80.

    3Sice

    Geoff Duncan, a Republican who served as lieutenant governor of Georgia from 2019 to 2023, endorsed Kamala Harris for president on Wednesday

  81. 81.

    Sally

    @BR: I said in a now defunct thread about Pete that I really really like Tim Walz. Smart, quick, talks over hosts to get his point across, in the nicest Minnesota way of course. Very accomplished politician (a much maligned trait), getting so much progressive legislation through with a one seat majority. Has been a Washington congress critter I believe(?). A lot like a 21 years younger Biden. Lots of experience at herding cats. I strongly advocate for him. He was on the first very short short list I saw. I hope he is still a front runner. Watch his interviews on line if you haven’t seen him in action. A different style from the gracious Pete, whom I also like, and would love to see as MI Gov.

  83. 83.

    BR

    @Sally:

    Yeah, I saw some of his recent interviews — he does well. I like his “these folks are just weird” line about GOPers. They really are — none of this stuff is normal.

  84. 84.

    Miki

    @Omnes Omnibus: Unless you live in Minnesota or Wisconsin you really don’t understand what it means to have a cabin.

    My uncle bought 40 acres of tax delinquent land on a lake in 1949 for a buck an acre. He poured a concrete slab and built a cabin on it from timber left over from the lumber company. He sunk a well and built an outhouse, but otherwise never improved it. He moved to Arizona but the grandparents and grandkids used it on and off throughout the decades. It was landlocked, and we could only get to it by boat. It was a magical place.

    He ultimately added a septic tank and electricity when he retired, and eventually sold the entire place for an amazing chunk of change. The new owner lost it when he tried to sub divide it, and now it’s pretty much abandoned. 💔

  87. 87.

    WereBear

    @Steve LaBonne: I think the word is “laughingstock.”

    And it is bad for a political career.

    But once Karma gets in gear, it seems to keep coming back.

    When you mess with the Cat Lady Tribe,

    the payback has nine lives.

  93. 93.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Miki: My grandfather bought 80 acres from the county for a dollar and acre in 1940.  The cabin began its life as a small horse barn that was torn down and moved to the site.  In the past three years, we built a real bathroom with a shower and put in a hot water heater.

  99. 99.

    Ken

    @Steve LaBonne: Once a politician becomes the butt of jokes to that extent, there’s no coming back.

    That’s what I was thinking. Remember Santorum? No basis in reality, but the — er, I was going to say “the smear stuck”, but maybe not the most felicitous choice of words.

    He is a boat anchor on Trump’s campaign.

    From your mouth to Trump’s ear.  Also, everybody remember my earlier advice: Whenever possible, remark how young and dynamic Vance is, especially in comparison to Trump.

  101. 101.

    Rusty

    @Wave Function Collapse: I wouldn’t call it a screed at all.  It’s actually a good rebuttal to the pundits desire for entertainment,  in contrast to actual Democrat voters who voted for Harris already for VP, and are more than good with her as the presidential candidate.   The overwhelming support, and campaign donations speak for themselves.

  105. 105.

    West of the Rockies

    Any chance Mike Pence’s horse fly can land on Vance’s beard and crawl into his mouth or nostril?

  106. 106.

    lowtechcyclist

    @SomeRandomGuy: ​
     

    But, *fuck*, a little Christian end-times bullshit, after ALL THIS OTHER bullshit? That’s really nothing. That’s reality forcing Christians to go to their faith to look for explanations of the inexplicable.

    That’s exactly what those people DIDN’T do. They abandoned the Bible for a crazy conspiracy theory. They chose the conspiracy theory over their faith, probably without even realizing that that’s what they had done.

  107. 107.

    Leto

    @lamh47: 100% this

     

    @WaterGirl: I’m doing better. Little by little each day getting better. Have some specific spots which are supremely tender and will take some time to calm down. Still have several weeks of recovery, which I’ll use every single day before school starts.

    Eternally grateful for Avalune, and continue to say (much like Joe): I married several tiers outside my league.

  110. 110.

    WaterGirl

    @Leto:

    I read something somewhere years ago – some researcher had done a long-term study over years, maybe decades.  And it was the people who said they were lucky to have found each other that were the couples that made it long-term.

  113. 113.

    Leto

    @WaterGirl: coming up on 29 in a few months, and as long as they keep me ticking, should make it another 29 at least. Check back in to see if she feels the same :p

  117. 117.

    Kelly

    Taught my 10 year old granddaughter to skip stones this afternoon. A fine summer day.

  118. 118.

    Shalimar

    Waiting for the 287-part New York Times series on whether Trump should keep Vance as his VP candidate.

  122. 122.

    SomeRandomGuy

    @lowtechcyclist: You’re giving me a “person” excuse, to allude to Men in Black, not a *people* excuse. Each person, in isolation, would have reason to question, but with the huge numbers, there’s a lot of assumptions that, someone would have spoken up if something was wrong.

    That’s the very problem – that we have people, who are willing to lie, in such great numbers, about things of such importance. And journalism thinks that’s fine, it’s lots of money to earn. And sure, if a lot of poors and otherses die, that sucks, it really does, but, wow, wouldn’t want to lose readership by pointing out the world is round.

  125. 125.

    FDRLincoln

    I have been watching video clips of the various VP candidates and I am very taken with Walz. Seems very genuine in the Midwest way and unapologetic about being liberal. Has done a great job as governor. I can see him helping a lot in WI, MI, and PA.

  126. 126.

    Ken

    Shakespeare is on Bluesky, and earlier today quoted:

    But couch ho, here he comes — All’s Well that Ends Well, IV.i

    The Bard has more that is perhaps relevant for today’s object of mockery:

    A couch for luxury and damned incest. — Hamlet, I.v

    And his soft couch defile. — The Merry Wives of Windsor, I.iii

    To lip a wanton in a secure couch — Othello, IV.i

  127. 127.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @lowtechcyclist: They chose the conspiracy theory over their faith, probably without even realizing that that’s what they had done.

    Their faith was always a Young Earth Creationism, a conspiracy theory that science was faking the age of the Earth.  There was nothing more to it.

  133. 133.

    SomeRandomGuy

    @SomeRandomGuy: It makes me wonder – do ordinary folks not see how hard it is to unwrap a lot of ideas?

    Like, “Trump is a hero” is based on “Republicans are good and decent” which is based upon hundreds of associations they’ve all built between each other, saying “only Republicans see what is good and decent in humanity,” interwoven with “Fox News tells us what we need to know.”

    Okay, but, but, *BUT*: Covid-19 happened. Life or death choices had to be made.

    Republicans insisted Democrats were horrible and evil, and, well, how could they *lie*? About *that? If you trusted them about everything else, assuming they wouldn’t really lie about a life and death issue is easy. And that means Democrats were lying about life or death issues. One step at a time, Republicans have stomped every bit of “humanity,” every bit of good, every bit of “godliness,” out of their caricature of a Democrat.

  138. 138.

    Anonymous At Work

    Apparently he’s also calling out Harris for not having any kids (with Emhoff) and “only” being a stepparent.  Did Ted Cruz turn down being VP?  How did TFG pick a bigger asshole than Cruz???

  140. 140.

    Rose Weiss

    @SomeRandomGuy: Yeah, I sorta get it. I think everyone processes things differently, no matter how we’re labelled by the larger society. My different gift is instantly seeing when someone is lying. Occasionally I clearly see other emotions which are not being expressed verbally. It has its upsides and its downsides. But I too have difficulty understanding why everyone isn’t seeing what’s so extremely obvious to me.

  141. 141.

    trnc

    @dmsilev: ​
     

    The thing about Vance is that as off-putting and offensive his personality is, his policy views are even more off-putting and more offensive.

    I do always appreciate those times when you CAN judge a book by it’s cover.

  145. 145.

    edgefigaro

    @Omnes Omnibus: as soon as I get home ima put in an application to be a Wisconsin Democrat worker for the cycle. I have some relatives up by eau Claire and Appleton.

    Things are lining up for me to work for the team this year, and I’m riding the kamala vibe.

  147. 147.

    MCA1

    @Ksmiami: UP, yes.  Lower Peninsula, not so much.  Not enough water and too close to both Detroit and Chicago, plus Ohio.  Most of the lakes “up North” in Michigan (i.e., above the same latitude as Milwaukee) are 4-season cottage lakes, not cabin lakes, because there’s too much money competing for the limited waterfront.  Central/Northern Minnesota and Wisconsin, on the other hand, have so much freaking shoreline per capita that it’s significantly more feasible to find an affordable lakefront plot and put up a non-winterized place.  I mean, it feels like there’s as much water within 50 miles of both Brainerd and Rheinlander as there is the entire state of Michigan, not counting Great Lakes frontage.  Even middle class families in the Minneapolis suburbs where I grew up had weekend log construction places on a lake somewhere.  Meanwhile it’s impossible to find a teardown with direct lake frontage anywhere off M22 for less than about a million bucks [ETA: I now live in Chicago and wife’s family has a place north of Traverse City, so I’ve spent a lot of time in both types of spots]

  149. 149.

    lamh47

    Are you kidding me!

    Don’t threaten me with a good time. Shoot I want to go to KAMALOT!!

    Again like there last attack…is this supposed to make us not like Kamala?

    Cause, ah…sound like a great time to me…

    @Acyn

    Kayleigh: Prepare for Kamala Camelot. It is coming your way. Prepare for Kamalot. Kamalot is coming your way. Beyoncé already greenlighted her using the freedom song. Kamalot is here. Everyone needs to be prepared.
    https://x.com/Acyn/status/1816271349087887591

  153. 153.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @SomeRandomGuy:

    Republicans insisted Democrats were horrible and evil, and, well, how could they *lie*?

    There is one little step you forgot there.  Those Republicans are their own tribe.  Representations of themselves.  It’s not even that their leaders wouldn’t lie to them.  It’s that fuck your facts, I’m always right, so anything a person who represents me says is always right.

  154. 154.

    Lyrebird

    @WereBear:

    When you mess with the Cat Lady Tribe,

    the payback has nine lives.

    I just wanna cheer or stand back and blink my eyes cat style in admiration or something…  I’m inspired by the different ways you have come back from feeling slammed!  All very creative.

  155. 155.

    Lyrebird

    @lamh47: THank you, I never thought there would be a McEnany clip I would want to see, but that’s great!  She highlighted how Kamala gave due credit to Joey O’Biden, and how the next administration might be like JFK’s, okay and worked in Beyonce, awesome sauce!

  156. 156.

    lamh47

    @Lyrebird: Right…like..uh..is that supposed to scare us.

    Like I said yesterday, ya had them posting pics of Kamala Harris when she was younger and dated Willie Brown or Montel Williams…and the reaction to that was…”are we supposed to hate her cause she was a hottie…uh she still is..”

    Chile they truly trying to throw everything at the wall at this point and the only thing that breaking through is the racist mysogyny attacks which ain’t helping them recruit true moderate voters, especially women.

  157. 157.

    Lyrebird

    @lamh47: So true.  Yesterday I was reminding myself, okay MVP is going to be surprised by exactly 0% of this stuff they are throwing around, and I think it is showing their (the GOP’s) patheticness more clearly.  They’re trying with the “underqualified” garbage when she’s more qualified than most anyone you could mention, and….  at the same time they’re trying to amp up the misogyny against women who are too smart!  And she IS sfaict a total smartypants :-) so I will agree with them on that bit only.  She is THAT smart and they SHOULD be intimidated.

    Anyhow, thanks again, and for sharing that beautiful note from Dr. Jill.

  158. 158.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Steve LaBonne:

    Once a politician becomes the butt of jokes to that extent, there’s no coming back.

    It never hurt Trump, at least politically. In fact, being this absurd creature made him an object of media fascination to the extent that the mockery seems to actually help him.

    That even though he seems to have a deep personal horror of being laughed at, since it’s a theme that comes up over and over in his rhetoric: somebody is always laughing at you or laughing at us.

  159. 159.

    Citizen Alan

    @Martin:  Sister Serena Joy would beg to disagree. And Mrs. Vance doesn’t have any of the advantages Serena Joy would have had at the foundation of Gilead.

  161. 161.

    Lily

    @MomSense: Years ago my (now-) uncle worked for him in DC.  He had to leave because bipolar unexpectedly struck.  He said Joe was wonderful to him.

  163. 163.

    Quinerly

    @FDRLincoln:

    I have totally fallen (and fallen hard) for Walz. He seems like he is everywhere the last 48 hrs. I rarely have my TV on (listen usually on Tune In app on speakers). I was so intrigued by him Mon when I heard him, I turned on the TV to see him.  I’m now a Waltz groupie.

  164. 164.

    Jay

    @Quinerly:

    It’s an LBJ strategy that has gone viral.

    “This is one of the oldest and most effective tricks in politics. Every hack in the business has used it in times of trouble, and it has even been elevated to the level of political mythology in a story about one of Lyndon Johnson’s early campaigns in Texas.

    “The race was close and Johnson was getting worried. Finally he told his campaign manager to start a massive rumour campaign about his opponent’s life-long habit of enjoying carnal knowledge of his barnyard sows.

    “Christ, we can’t get away with calling him a pig-fucker,” the campaign manager protested. “Nobody’s going to believe a thing like that.”

    “I know,” Johnson replied. “But let’s make the sonofabitchh deny it.”

    https://www.thestanduplawyer.com/make-the-sonofabitch-deny-it-the-rise-of-pig-fucker-politics/

  165. 165.

    Trivia Man

    @Omnes Omnibus: My wife lived in a small WI town. Her grandparents had lived there their entire lives. But her dad was in the military and moved his family back home when she was in early elementary school. Natives? Nope, outsiders who were considered not real citizens of the town. And the grandparents didn’t correct anyone because I suspect even they thought it was disrespectful to leave for even a little bit. Not one of us!!

  166. 166.

    Quinerly

    @Jay:

    I am so old that I remember the original. Plus, Political Science major with an entire semester devoted to LBJ.

    With that said, I think we are a little better than spreading BS. Too much true material out there. Jeb has some skeletons in his closet.

  167. 167.

    Trivia Man

    @Ishiyama: and the post that made it up followed immediately with the Arthur meme “You really think someone would do that? Just go on the internet and lie?”

    Funny how some things just take off with a life of their own.

  168. 168.

    Jay

    @Quinerly:

    Ah, going high, how did that work out for Hillary Clinton?

    Besides, we arn’t “doing it”, it’s out there are and we are just repeating the jokes.

  169. 169.

    Quinerly

    @Jay: “going high” was a Michelle Obama thing.

    Late night for me. I could be wrong, though. Check me.

  171. 171.

    Martin

    Infant mortality went up in 2022 for the first time in 20 years. Gee, anything notable happen in 2022 that might have influenced that?

  174. 174.

    opiejeanne

    @Dangerman: I first saw that on “Please Hate These Things” several years ago. Her collection of strange and hideous architectural designs and just nasty furniture is on Instagram.

  175. 175.

    Martin

    Just read a serious publication article about JD Vance fucking a couch that reveals an important point. The article doesn’t say that JD Vance didn’t fuck a couch, just that he didn’t write about it in the book. It goes out of its way to leave open the possibility that he fucked a couch and simply didn’t write about, or wrote about it somewhere else.

    Winning. So much winning.

  178. 178.

    Aussie Sheila

    @Martin:

    Heh!
    Exactly. But is the base learning?

    Fuck them all. Drench them with the truth,  but above all, go to your base, to people that don’t normally vote. Sign them up.
    Take them to the polls.

    And above all, if you win, make sure you deliver. Senate rules be damned. Just. Fucking. Deliver.

    Voting rights and federal rules regarding redistricting.

    Children’s support/benefits.

    Tax the rich.

    National health care freedom. (Abortion rights and a nominal cost federal health care plan which provides every basic health care free of charge at point of service )

    Reform the Supreme Court.

    Fuck it!  Do it live!

  179. 179.

    206inKY

    @Martin: Agree 100% that Whitmer and Pete are our best two choices. Whitmer would kick this into the stratosphere. Pete for all the reasons in Betty’s posts.

    The NYT says it’s in flux but down to Shapiro, Cooper, Walz, Beshear, and Kelly. I think all five are fine but not ideal. We need Kelly in the Senate, Shapiro tangled with campus protesters, and Beshear can snag a Senate seat in a few years. Cooper could carry NC, which allows PA to slip away if we keep WI/MI/AZ/NV, and has an avuncular air with 2008 Biden energy. I love Walz, less clear on the benefits.

    If it’s these five, I think Andy is the strongest. The 2023 campaign was flawless. The pressure of KY politics has given him armor as a moderate, but he was ruthlessly effective on Dobbs. And he has a deep-rooted kindness like Biden that’s cryptonite for sadists like Vance. He’s relentlessly friendly but a fighter with crooked teeth who can roast Vance for Hillbilly Elegy without losing his cool. He has manners. Treats people with respect, even low-level staffers at campaign offices. His daily covid updates made everyone feel safe and built solidarity. Made clear we’re Kentucky Strong no matter how you vote. Not as highly vetted as Pete or Whitmer. But damn he’s good.

  180. 180.

    Chris Johnson

    @WereBear:

    If you dare provoke the vengeance of the Cat Ladies…

    you’d better dig ten graves O_O

     

    (originally from Matt Wiggins of LoadingReadyRun, about Blofeld’s cat taking revenge. I figure if you go after cat ladies, both she and the cat will avenge themselves upon you and so…)

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