Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

One lie, alone, tears the fabric of reality.

“Perhaps I should have considered other options.” (head-desk)

This chaos was totally avoidable.

The desire to stay informed is directly at odds with the need to not be constantly enraged.

You are either for trump or for democracy. Pick one.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

If you’re gonna whine, it’s time to resign!

Weird. Rome has an American Pope and America has a Russian President.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. keep building.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Well, whatever it is, it’s better than being a Republican.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

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

Second rate reporter says what?

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

Rupert, come get your orange boy, you petrified old dinosaur turd.

DeSantis transforming Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Open Thread: Does Amtrak Love Joe This Much?

Open Thread: Does Amtrak Love Joe This Much?

by | 253 Comments

This post is in: 

Does Amtrak love Joe enough to be making a reference to Vance and the couch?

Open thread.

Update: In the spirit of talking about the DEI hire for *downwardly mobile white guys, I’ll share this tweet from SC.

*h/t Suzanne for the DEI phrasing

Reader Interactions

253Comments

  1. 1.

    nomokesh

    Come on, this is Amtrak. That’s like wondering if Meemaw just made a skibidee toilet joke.

  2. 2.

    bbleh

    LOL!  Is it irresponsible to speculate?  The story’s Out There now, after all.

    (*IF* that just went up, I would not be surprised if some social-media person at Amtrak, who almost certainly would be young, slipped that in praying it would fly under the editorial radar and … it did.)

  9. 9.

    SatanicPanic

    Guys I thought we weren’t kink-shaming. Fucking sofas isn’t really that bad. At least it’s not pee-pee stuff like his boss.

  32. 32.

    Jackie

    Has this been posted yet?

    “Former President Barack Obama and Vice President Kamala Harris have been in close touch since she announced her presidential candidacy Sunday, having multiple conversations this week as she kicks off her campaign,“ NBC News reports.

    “Obama privately has fully supported Harris’ candidacy and plans to endorse her soon.”

    I haven’t seen the definition of “soon,” but I really hope it’s soon!

  34. 34.

    TBone

    @Jackie: I read that and someone said the strategic drawing out of the timeline is good for keeping Kamala in the headlines.

  35. 35.

    Old School

    The Harris campaign just sent out a press release with this headline: "Statement on a 78-Year-Old Criminal's Fox News Appearance."— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) July 25, 2024

  37. 37.

    KatKapCC

    WOW. This story in Jeff Tiedrich’s newsletter today.

    Fred C. Trump III — Mary Trump’s brother, by the way — has a developmentally disabled son, William, who was born with a condition known as a KCNQ2 mutation. William requires constant care.

    in January 2020, Fred III visited the White House, where he and other disabled rights advocates met with his uncle Donny. after the meeting ended, Fred was called into the Oval Office to have a private chat with Donny, and the following fun exchange took place.

    “Hey, pal,” Donald said. “How’s everything going?”

    “Good,” I said. “I appreciate your meeting with us.”

    “Sure, happy to do it.”

    He sounded interested and even concerned. I thought he had been touched by what the doctor and advocates in the meeting had just shared about their journey with their patients and their own family members. But I was wrong.

    “Those people . . . ” Donald said, trailing off. “The shape they’re in, all the expenses, maybe those kinds of people should just die.” 

    why is it that everything Donny does, the Nazis thought of it first?

    so, how did Fred III take having this said to his face?

    I turned and walked away.

    later that year, Fred called Uncle Fuckface to ask for some help.

    I got him up to speed on what Eric had told me. I said I’d heard the fund for William was running low, and unfortunately, the expenses certainly were not easing up as our son got older. In fact, with inflation and other pressures, the needs were greater than they’d been … “We may need your help with this. Eric wanted me to give you a call.”

    Donald took a second as if he was thinking about the whole situation.

    “I don’t know,” he finally said, letting out a sigh. “He doesn’t recognize you. Maybe you should just let him die and move down to Florida.”

    Tiedrich goes on to remind everyone about Trump mocking the disabled reporter and not wanting wounded veterans around. But Lord…no matter how horrid Trump gets, he can always get worse.

  39. 39.

    Dangerman

    Shit. Just received a text from DJTjr. One, California, motherfucker. Two, well, CALIFORNIA, motherfucker. Their operation has issues.

  40. 40.

    rikyrah

    Ed O’Keefe
    @edokeefe
    JUST IN: In a forceful statement,
    @VP

    @Kamalaharris
    denounces protests at Union Station in Washington on Wednesday that defaced Union Station.

    She calls them, “despicable acts by unpatriotic protestors and dangerous hate-fueled rhetoric.” Adds later “Pro-Hamas graffiti and rhetoric is abhorrent and we must not tolerate it in our nation. I condemn the burning of the American flag. That flag is a symbol of our highest ideals as a nation and represents the promise of America. It should never be desecrated in that way.”

    She concludes: “I support the right to peacefully protest, but let’s be clear: Antisemitism, hate and violence of any kind have no place in our nation.”
    https://x.com/edokeefe/status/1816489828243972426

  44. 44.

    tam1MI

    @schrodingers_cat: BTW Gaza protesters that had disappeared for about month during the PUSH JOE OUT campaign are back just as Ds are coalescing. Coincidence?

    Not hide nor hair of them to be seen during the Republican convention, but what do you want to bet they will be all over the Democratic one?

  53. 53.

    Geminid

    @schrodingers_cat: I think there are fewer protests and protesters now. There were never that many go begin with. This movement was never able to enlist the many millions of other Americans appalled by the bloodshed and destruction in Gaza. It’s almost like they never wanted to.

  57. 57.

    Mr. Suzanne

    Yes! Way to give the people what they want: Suzanne references on the front page!

  59. 59.

    Doc Sardonic

    @schrodingers_cat: Naw… Pumpkin/Couch Boinker 2024. Actually, I think I like Pumpkin/Couch Rocker 2024, cause you know in JD’s mind he rocked that couch’s world.

  60. 60.

    Geminid

    @Omnes Omnibus: I think “Bibi” is staying into the weekend. I know he has meetings scheduled in Miami Friday, and I bet he stays put during the Sabbath. I’m like, how can we miss if you won’t go away?

  61. 61.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @KatKapCC:

    No matter how low the bar is set, Hair Furor or his family will always find a way to slither under it.

  62. 62.

    hueyplong

    @KatKapCC: There is a poster here who has repeatedly stated that Trump thinks this way and it’s a good bet that some of us thought the concern might be slightly (but only slightly) overstated.

    Apparently it isn’t. It’s totally fair to speculate that he’d put such thoughts into practice.

  65. 65.

    Ken

    @lamh47: Trump on Fox & Friends claims that he’s instructed his supporters not to vote: “My instruction — we don’t need the votes. I have so many votes.”

    Planning to “win” the election 6 to 3?

  70. 70.

    Eolirin

    @hueyplong: The disabled are nearly invisible, and many people don’t even want to see us, which makes us extremely vulnerable.

    Yes, anyone who thinks we wouldn’t be very high up on the list isn’t paying attention.

    It’ll start with rolling back protections and supports so that we can’t continue to survive independently or function in society, and then they’ll start rounding people up “for their own good” in response to the consequences of those supports being removed.

    And then we will disappear completely and no one will notice or care except for our friends and loved ones, who will be facing an impossible choice of trying to support us and not being able to or letting us get taken by people who will probably kill us anyway.

  71. 71.

    Misterpuff

    @Dangerman: Cali Money spends just like Red State Money (especially for legal fees).

    Seriously, there are a ton of Trumpers in California, they are just overwhelmed by Dem Good Vibrations.

  74. 74.

    rikyrah

    @schrodingers_cat:

    BTW Gaza protesters that had disappeared for about month during the PUSH JOE OUT campaign are back just as Ds are coalescing. Coincidence?

    I don’t believe in coincidence…

    Do you?????

  77. 77.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @TBone:

    Rafael “Calgary!” Cruz: Has a face only a mother could punch.  Anyone else would use a crowbar.  He’s like the Sheldon Cooper of assholes.

    Great quotes about him, first from Al Franken:

    “Here’s the thing you have to understand about Ted Cruz; I like Ted Cruz more than most of my other colleagues like Ted Cruz. And I hate Ted Cruz.”

    And then an always-classic from Charlie Pierce:

    “Tailgunner Ted Cruz is a messianic and friendless theocrat whose policies are a mix of the Book of Revelation and The Fountainhead, and anyone who looks at him thinks of the skeevy uncle whom they tell their kids to avoid at Thanksgiving, and anyone who listens to him who isn’t already lost in Jesus wouldn’t trust him to park their car.”

  79. 79.

    Ken

    I am reminded me of G. Harrold Carswell, one of Nixon’s nominees for the Supreme Court. One of Carswell’s supporters, Sen. Hruska, reminded his colleagues that although Carswell was mediocre, there are a lot of mediocre people out there, and they deserve representation too. That made him the most famous example of how DEI works for white males, though I think he’s been unseated several times since.

  80. 80.

    tam1MI

    @rikyrah:

    Ed O’Keefe
    @edokeefe
    JUST IN: In a forceful statement,
    @VP

    @Kamalaharris
    denounces protests at Union Station in Washington on Wednesday that defaced Union Station.

    She calls them, “despicable acts by unpatriotic protestors and dangerous hate-fueled rhetoric.” Adds later “Pro-Hamas graffiti and rhetoric is abhorrent and we must not tolerate it in our nation. I condemn the burning of the American flag. That flag is a symbol of our highest ideals as a nation and represents the promise of America. It should never be desecrated in that way.”

    She concludes: “I support the right to peacefully protest, but let’s be clear: Antisemitism, hate and violence of any kind have no place in our nation.”
    https://x.com/edokeefe/status/1816489828243972426

    Welp, there goes the Gaza vote…

  81. 81.

    eclare

    @hueyplong:

    I always believed he wanted disabled/unemployed whatever people dead.  Ever since Blue Eyed Granny Starver had a kegger on the Capitol grounds celebrating the House repeal of the ACA.

    I have insurance through the ACA, and saw a dr yesterday because of it.  Yeah, I will never forget them celebrating my death.

    That is what they want.

  82. 82.

    TBone

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage:

    💜😆 someone here posted an EPIC rant sent to his office.  Of course, I stole it!

    Eat shit, Tedward. You’re a seditious cuck and even your heroes hate you. Resign and fuck off. And to the staff member that will delete this before he sees it, quit your job holy shit. Working for Ted fucking Cruz? During a pandemic? This doughy fuck hates you as much as he hates me. You can do better.

    I wish you a very stub your toe, Raffy. Eat my entire ass.

  90. 90.

    Anoniminous

    Nazi genocide started in Germany with Aktion T4 “mercy killings” (sic) of handicapped people deemed to have lives “not worth living” and to protect the “integrity” of the German people and country.

  91. 91.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @TBone:

    LOL.

    I love trotting out “Calgary!” Cruz material from my clip file when any opening is provided.

  94. 94.

    Ruckus

    @KatKapCC:

    Not only can but DOES GET WORSE. And will continue to do that to his last day because he knows no other direction or process.

  97. 97.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    Or…Netanyahu gave a speech to Congress to rapturous applause, a speech that everyone has known was coming for 3 months including  pro Palestinian protestors?

    I just don’t think it’s healthy for the only remaining rationalgovernment entity, the Democrtic Party, to attribute all dissent to malicious conspiracy. This is a bad road.

    Or that.

  99. 99.

    Geminid

    @schrodingers_cat: The media loves that stuff. It played into the “Dems in Disarray” narrative despite the fact that not many of the voters were Democratic voters to begin with. I think many Democrars sympathized with their cause but the movement could bever bring them in. I suspect this was because the pacifists in the movement were drowned out by the haters early on.

    This war has been a stressor for the Democratic Party, though. I’ve always been wary of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict’s potential as a wedge issue, and I could see that dynamic at work during the 11 day war Israel fought with Hamas in May of 2021. But I think that overall, the Party will come out of this war without permanent damage. But it’s not over yet so this has to be a tentative judgement.

  100. 100.

    BR

    @Kay: ​
    More than half the Dems in congress didn’t attend, and many that did, including some of the most senior Jewish members of congress, completely trashed Bibi’s speech in interviews yesterday. I think Dems are aligned on this in a way they weren’t before, in the right direction. The key will be getting the grassroots to realize that elected have come around and to take the win — rather than what the too-cool-for-the-rest-of-us folks like to do which is always be attacking Dems.

  101. 101.

    Kay

    I also don’t like OMalley Dillon going on tv and saying polls don’t matter

    lets not do this again. Let’s not follow the plan of not doing any swing state polling for 2 months because we didn’t like the numbers.

    Harris is holding up really well. Every swing state is back in play. Does that guarantee she wins? God no.There is risk. But it’s good! That’s  the state of play. Let’s say that.

  106. 106.

    Kay

    @BR:

    my God don’t say that! Don’t do a roll call count. Ten balloon juicers will swear to you that only problem with that fucking obscenity in Gaza is 20 year old protestors drawing attention to it.
    They know it’s a disaster. That’s why they boycotted.

  108. 108.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @TBone: Settle down yourself.  If you take every comment I make on this site seriously, you will find yourself very confused.

  109. 109.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Kay: Among people with actual expertise in russian disinformation, their involvement in Western pro-Palestinian protests is no secret. On electoral politics, you often counsel people here to listen to the actual experts; when it comes to russian info ops, I’d counsel you to do the same.

  110. 110.

    Kay

    @BR:

    Again, my suggestion is we look to the single  best political strategist in either party – Nancy Pelosi. She trashed the speech. That’s all you need to know about the politics for Democrats.

  111. 111.

    CaseyL

    The “downwardly mobile” men (mostly men) largely grow up in localized cultures where education isn’t considered of value.  Schools suck, nobody reads unless they have to, and religion truncates any inclination they might havefor independent thought.  Plus, the patriarchal culture forbids any son from being “better” than his father.

    People outside that culture, when economies go south, do what they can to cope: they get re-trained, they move if they have to, they change fields.  Sometimes they thrive; sometimes they tread water.  But they adapt.

    These guys, though… they have no adapting skills at all.  They’re ignorant, proudly so.  Their universe, by socialization and training, is narrow and shallow.

    Do this for a generation or two, where the ones who can adapt get the hell out, and you have a society composed of bottom feeders whose only response to their lives being shit is to insist that everyone else’s lives also be shit.

  112. 112.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    @TBone: Wow, haven’t seen that one in years. Jonathan Winter too, right? I remember Alan Arkin. I think he was the Russian commander. He actually was so dedicated (I read somewhere) that he took Russian lessons so he’d get the accent right.

    I didn’t know Carl Reiner was in it.

  113. 113.

    Old School

    @Kay:

    Let’s not follow the plan of not doing any swing state polling for 2 months because we didn’t like the numbers.

    You keep saying this, but that doesn’t make it true.  I doubt there’s a campaign out there not doing polling.

  114. 114.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @CaseyL:

    You have literally just described that attitude of everyone around me when I was in red, rurl, Central Misery.

    Toward the end of our decades there, I could literally point to the sun rising in the east and say “The Sun Rises In The East” and most people there would say “But that’s what the experts say, it’s probably not true.”

  116. 116.

    Kay

    @Gin & Tonic:

    But to continue to ignore the facts on the ground in Gaza and focus exclusively on the protests is avoidance of a real issue.
    Gaza is a humanitarian disaster on a huge scale that the US is backing. That is REAL. The tens of thousands of dead civilians are just as real as in Ukraine. Israel blowing by every red line for 9 months IS REAL.
    There’s never any discussion about Gaza! I think I know why that is. It’s much, much easier to blame the fucking protestors for the disaster they are protesting than LOOK at the disaster. That’s  not reality.

  117. 117.

    BR

    @Kay:

    Oh I agree. I think there has been Dem movement on it.

    But we’re probably no more than a week away from The Intercept or whomever creating a new slogan that’s anti-Harris regarding Gaza, ignoring the fact that she and the party have shifted strongly against Bibi. We need to be ready to shut down and/or drown out that attempt at division. I know division and debate is healthy in normal times, but we are now in the 100 day final sprint.

  119. 119.

    BR

    @Kay: ​
    It is a little bit no-win now for the administration. They do put out press releases from USAID and DoD talking about food distribution and such, pretty much every week for the last couple months. But each of those is drowned out by responses that say “too little too late” — which, yeah, it is, but I don’t know what else the admin can do right now (and politically position it).

  120. 120.

    Kay

    @Old School:

    I hope so because there’s credible reporting that Bidens campaign wasn’t doing any for 2 months prior to w/drawing

    I would be more comfortable if an Obama person or two were in there. I want to go back to using data. We fucking invented using data in campaigns. It’s ours. I’m not giving it to Donald Trump.

  121. 121.

    BR

    @Old School:

    Apparently Biden’s campaign didn’t do swing state polling for 2 months — supposedly (and I don’t know if I trust the reporting), while Pelosi had congressional polling, Biden’s campaign only gave him new polling this past weekend, and that tipped the scales.

  124. 124.

    BR

    @Kay: ​
    Yeah. I hope they bring in Plouffe, even if he’s become a bit of a grouch. The guy knows data, and he’s not a true believer. A realist is needed.

  125. 125.

    rikyrah

    @Eolirin:

    @hueyplong: The disabled are nearly invisible, and many people don’t even want to see us, which makes us extremely vulnerable.

    Yes, anyone who thinks we wouldn’t be very high up on the list isn’t paying attention.

    It’ll start with rolling back protections and supports so that we can’t continue to survive independently or function in society, and then they’ll start rounding people up “for their own good” in response to the consequences of those supports being removed.

    And then we will disappear completely and no one will notice or care except for our friends and loved ones, who will be facing an impossible choice of trying to support us and not being able to or letting us get taken by people who will probably kill us anyway.

    You are not exaggerating

    You are not being overdramatic.

    You are not being melodramatic.

    You are being REAL.

    People need to take these muthaphuckas at their word. They are telling us what they intend for all of us who aren’t White, Straight and Male.

  126. 126.

    Kay

    @Old School:

    In the campaign. Obama people are corporate assholes and neoliberals but they use real data. We need some of that. I don’t want to hear the only poll  that matters is Election Day again or have people pointing to crackpot Lichtmam and his “keys” or whatever.

    Let’s hire the assholes for politics and just not hire any of them for governing. Sound good?

  129. 129.

    BR

    @rikyrah:

    Yeah, and the details that are coming out about Trump and Vance are really damning (and I didn’t think that was possible).

    Trump was telling his team during 2020 that people who were disabled or sick should just die and that would be cheaper.

    Vance is heavily influenced by a tech bro far right self-styled philosopher who talks about making biodiesel out of disabled people and such.

  132. 132.

    Jackie

    No surprise, but nice to see in print:

    Donald Trump’s gains with Black voters have been wiped out since Kamala Harris became the likely Democratic nominee.

    Recent polling has suggested president Joe Biden was losing support among Black voters, who had been crucial to his 2020 election win, but new polling taken after he exited the race showed they overwhelmingly backed the vice president over the Republican nominee, reported Newsweek.

    “[The] swift shift in support for Trump to Harris among Black voters tells you something about how fickle Trump’s support was among these voters,” said Costas Panagopoulos, a political science professor at Northeastern University.

    “Once they had a viable alternative that also happens to share their racial identity, they jumped ship from Trump almost instantly.”

    Isn’t Newsweek considered a conservative outlet?

  133. 133.

    Josie

    @Kay: ​
     Either the polling wasn’t being done, or the results weren’t being passed along to President Biden. Either way, whoever was responsible for that screw up needs to be fired or demoted. The denial of real time information to the candidate is a major offense. I certainly hope that Harris has people who will handle things more responsibly.

  134. 134.

    BR

    @eclare:

    Yeah. But when Plouffe was asked he seemed somewhat dismissive of it. I don’t know what that was about. In fact he seemed really sort of negative about the whole current situation, at least that was my read.

  135. 135.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    Or…Netanyahu gave a speech to Congress to rapturous applause, a speech that everyone has known was coming for 3 months including  pro Palestinian protestors?

    I just don’t think it’s healthy for the only remaining rationalgovernment entity, the Democrtic Party, to attribute all dissent to malicious conspiracy. This is a bad road.

    Or that.

     

    That you continue believe that the protesters are sincere is amazing to me. Whatever they started out as, it’s obvious that it’s nothing but a ratphucking operation now, taken over by completely insincere paid for stooges.

  137. 137.

    TBone

    @Omnes Omnibus: sorry, my snark detector missed that one!  Apologies!

    PS The subject of this front page caused me to have to look up why everyone was talking about couches yesterday, everywhere.  I resent having to spend those moments of my life 😆 on a couch.

  141. 141.

    MomSense

    @lamh47:
    She was one of his first surrogates in 2007 when he ran for president.  His endorsement is a timing thing.  I can’t believe anyone seriously doubts it.

  142. 142.

    TBone

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: I haven’t seen it in a long time either, so am looking forward to it with fresh eyes tonight!

    I simply adore Arkin in everything.

    Oh and billcoop posting The Gray Champion by Hawthorne last night was *chef’s kiss too!

  143. 143.

    Old School

    @Kay:

    I hope so because there’s credible reporting that Bidens campaign wasn’t doing any for 2 months prior to w/drawing

    I haven’t seen that.  I guess I’ll try to find your source.

    Is it Politico?  That’s the only thing Google turns up.

    When the campaign commissioned new battleground polling over the last week, it was the first time they had done surveys in some key states in more than two months, according to two people familiar with the surveys. And the numbers were grim, showing Biden not just trailing in all six critical swing states but collapsing in places like Virginia and New Mexico where Democrats had not planned on needing to spend massive resources to win.

    That says some key states – not all swing states – but doesn’t identify which ones.  Perhaps Virginia and New Mexico?

  149. 149.

    SatanicPanic

    @Gin & Tonic: Russian disinformation works best when it targets something real. And whether or not we think everyone came to the opinion organically, there really is something very bad happening in Gaza and there really are people on the left that are very upset about it.

  151. 151.

    Citizen Alan

    @CaseyL:

    My father passed away over ten years ago. And I loved my dad and believe he loved me (albeit in an aloof fashion as befits a man who I suspect lived his whole life with undiagnosed and untreated neurodivergence). But at the time of his passing, I had three degrees including a JD, and I always had the sneaking suspicion that we would have been much closer if I’d never gone to college and instead had been a farmer. Or, more accurately in the case of my dad and my extended family, had a 9-5 blue collar job that subsidized my farming hobby.

  152. 152.

    lamh47

    Chile…I haven’t watched political news shows in ages. Up until Biden’s announcement I only consumed limited lcips and hours.

    I’m a bit back on the higher consumption train, but now I’m even MORE critical and likely to call out bullshit…LOL.

    I say that to say…da nerve of Andrea Mitchell talking about Biden’s decline…it’s actually truly painful to watch her.

  154. 154.

    Kay

    @Gin & Tonic:

    Russia has exploited divisions in the US to the extent that an anti Ukraine Senator was elected in Ohio. Ohio, where you see little old ladies in late model sedans in suburban Cleveland with “Fuck Putin” bumperstickers.

    But that doesn’t change the reality of what’s happening in Ukraine does it? The civilian deaths? The destruction of whole swathes of Ukrainian infastructure? The attemped destruction of “Ukraine” as both a country and a people?

    The protestors did not create the disaster in Gaza and the protestors can’t make it go away either, anymore than JD Vance can wish away Ukraine.

  155. 155.

    rikyrah

    from the TRUMP VOTER FOCUS GROUP that they did on VP Harris (lips so pursed)

    Stardust (@Jeannie_Hartley) posted at 6:57 AM on Thu, Jul 25, 2024:
    Elise Jordan: “Why do you think she’s not that bright?”
    Focus Group: “Because she hasn’t done anything in the time that she’s had. She’s not real smart.”

    Here are just some of the things @KamalaHarris has already accomplished as @VP #KamalaHasMyVote @KamalaHQ https://t.co/WKasVW0EjD
    (https://x.com/Jeannie_Hartley/status/1816442629741322557?s=03)

  156. 156.

    Eolirin

    @Old School: Polls in the summer have very little predictive value. I could see a campaign opting to ease off until closer to the election and spend the money somewhere more productive.

  157. 157.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    People who know:  Does this mean that the 11th Circuit is expediting Jack Smith’s appeal of Cannon’s dismissal of the stolen documents case?

    On Thursday, Kyle Cheney of Politico shared a post on X, formerly Twitter, showing a briefing notice from the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. The document said that Smith’s appeal is due on August 27, 2024.

  158. 158.

    cain

    @tam1MI: Yes, funny how they don’t show up at the RNC. But will go full court press at the DNC. They dont want to change minds at the RNC.

    The whole thing is ratfucking – including defacing monuments, burning the flags – it sends ‘libs are out of control” to conservatives.

  163. 163.

    Kay

    (((Harry Enten)))

    @ForecasterEnten

    3h

    Kamala Harris is doing SIGNIFICANTLY better than Joe Biden is among Black and Hispanic voters. Why is that important? It means that while Biden had really one path to win the electoral college, Harris has multiple. Specifically, she can win in the Sun Belt (AZ, GA, NC, & NV).

    This is just a beautiful thing to watch. We could really be seeing something special with Harris. It’s too soon! But boy is it welcome. We’re back! :)

  164. 164.

    Suzanne

    In case you were wondering, hmmmm, who are the worst Dems in our party right now?

    Democratic Reps. Jared Golden (Maine), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (Wash.), Yadira Caraveo (Colo.), Don Davis (N.C.), Henry Cuellar (Texas) and Mary Peltola (Alaska) all voted for a resolution ‘strongly condemning the Biden Administration and its Border Czar, Kamala Harris’s, failure to secure the United States border.

  165. 165.

    Kay

    @Dorothy A. Winsor:

    I have an older Ukranian couple alng my route to work – a seven minute ride so this whole thing is conducted at 25 miles an hour. Well, 30.

    Little tiny neat brick house, meticulously maintained, I see them out in the yard all the time. GIANT Ukrainian flag alongside the door with the US flag on a pole in the yard. I smile every time I pass.

  166. 166.

    tam1MI

    @rikyrah: That you continue believe that the protesters are sincere is amazing to me. Whatever they started out as, it’s obvious that it’s nothing but a ratphucking operation now, taken over by completely insincere paid for stooges.

    There are still a lot of sincere ones in there. The ratfuckers need them out front to be the ones on the business end of a nightstick, so the ratfuckers can tell them their injuries are all the fault of Genocide Kamala or whoever.

    The tell here is that there are a bunch of Arab-Americans running for Congress on this exact issue and they are being left to twist in the wind.

  168. 168.

    Bill Arnold

    @SatanicPanic:

    there really is something very bad happening in Gaza and there really are people on the left that are very upset about it.

    Yes. Massive war crimes are being continuously committed by Israel (“allegedly”), and many of those anti-Israel people on the “left” are focused on helping to elect racist felon Donald J. Trump, who’s platform, if he is allowed to seize power by the USA polity, would end up killing, in the fullness of time, hundreds of millions of (mostly) darker-skinned humans through reductions in global heating mitigation including international effects.
    Loosely paraphrasing Noam Chomsky, of course rational people vote for less evil; it signals a preference for less evil.

  170. 170.

    JaneE

    I like the phrase “downwardly mobile white guys”.  It pretty much sums things up, and most of that is a direct result of Republican governance.

    In some parts of the South before the civil war it became illegal to teach a slave to read or write.  Considering that skilled slaves worked as carpenters and masons they probably could do sums better than the average white guy.  Certainly there were skilled slaves who were relatively educated, if only in certain areas, but it was considered too dangerous to have a literate slave class.  I wonder why. /s

    Black people have valued education because it was something they were denied.  Ditto for the vote.  When Brown v. Education was decided, it became possible for Black students to be educated as well as white students by virtue of being in the same classrooms.  Education, free public education, good free public education (at least for white students) had been a very important part of the state and local budgets.  Teaching was a respected profession.  Now, the opinion started to shift, and the cost of education became a real issue.  There was a choice to be made – educate every student at the level white students always had been, or educate every student to the level black students always had been, at a much lower cost.  Guess which way most states went.

    California used to have a really good public school system, ranked near or at the top for years.  Then the courts ruled that all schools (meaning including minority schools) needed to have the same level of funding.  Until then it had been based on property taxes and property values in white areas were much higher.  (I wonder why /s).  Enter Prop 13, which lowered property taxes all over the state and made it almost impossible to add new ones.  I can’t prove that one reason for it was to defund education, but that is one of the biggest changes it made.  Net result decades later – more crappy schools than not.  Now of course we get charter school “options” set up in a way that is nothing more than a theft of public assets.  The kids still aren’t learning.   <rant off>

    Now the white kids are not getting a good education, and they can’t rely on their skin color being an entry to a decent job without competition.  Asians especially have a reputation for wanting their kids to excel, and Blacks and Hispanics have always valued education as a way up.  When they could get it.  So now we have motivated and educated minorities competing on a more level basis with the white guys who thought they would always get a preference anyway.

    Where the parents really care, education improves.  And it improves for all students.  Not everyone is content to do the same job their parents did.  My parents wanted me to have a better job, and get an education.  If I had to be better than the guys I worked with, well I was.  That was true for women and minorities, and a minority woman had to be supergirl.  Quite a few of them were, as we learned when affirmative action came into play in the 70’s.

    If the bigots were not so adamantly against raising minorities up instead of letting their own kids down, we would not have all those downwardly mobile white guys.

  171. 171.

    Scout211

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: IANAL, but here’s some information

    Law and Crime

    “Pursuant to 11th Cir. R. 31-1(a), the appellant’s brief is due August 27, 2024. The appendix is due 7 days after the appellant’s brief is filed,” the 11th Circuit’s briefing notice said on Thursday. “The appellee’s [Trump’s] brief is due within 30 days after the service of the last appellant’s brief. The appellant’s reply brief, if any, is due within 21 days after the service of the last appellee’s brief. This is the only notice you will receive regarding the due date for briefs and appendices.”

    Of note, Smith doesn’t have to wait until Aug. 27 to file the brief, so keep an eye on that space. It also bears watching whether the special counsel moves to expedite the briefing schedule.

  172. 172.

    Ridnik Chrome

    @rikyrah: ​  My response to people like the OP in that tweet is if someone like you can take away my “man card” (whatever that is) then it wasn’t worth having in the first place.

  173. 173.

    OId Man Shadow

    @tam1MI: Doesn’t seem like it should be that much of an ask for folks who sympathize and empathize with the innocent Palestinian civilians being killed and imprisoned by the IDF to not cheer for a terrorist organization that also hurts innocent civilians.

  174. 174.

    CaseyL

    @Suzanne: ​

    I think these are all Democrats representing very purple districts. I know that’s true of Marie Gluesenkamp Perez, who barely – barely! – beat out the very incredibly loathsome Joe Kent (who is gearing up to run against her again this year).

    I tend to cut those folks some slack – I know Pelosi did, and suspect Jeffries is as well. They have to placate their voters to some extent.

    It’s rough, but I try to always keep in mind that the worst Democrat is better than the best GOPer. Because that’s we’ll get Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker rather than Mike Johnson.

  175. 175.

    SatanicPanic

    @Bill Arnold: I think there are a lot of idiots on the left for sure. There are too many that think there’s no difference between the two parties. Just not sure I subscribe to the idea that they’re coordinating to only sink Democratic presidential nominees.

  176. 176.

    Geminid

    @TBone: Have you seen Alan Arkin in Wait Until Dark? I thought that was a good movie. Arkin played a very convincing bad guy.

  178. 178.

    Suzanne

    @Belafon: To me, the worst thing that any Dem can do is to win power and then be a total asshole with it. Like, what the hell does a congressperson from A L A S K A have to offer her constituents about the southern border?! Like, why not just be quiet?

  179. 179.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @SatanicPanic: There are too many that think there’s no difference between the two parties.

    You can start with that utter jackass Ralph Nader.

  180. 180.

    Suzanne

    @CaseyL: You’re absolutely right, and I hate it anyway. God. Especially when the left side of the caucus gets crapped on so much. At least they’re not signing on to this absolute stupidity.

  186. 186.

    Soprano2

    @KatKapCC: That story was on the Time web site yesterday. Will even one reporter ask him or any of his campaign staff about it? Highly doubtful.

  187. 187.

    Trollhattan

    Kamala is breaking our heatwave! Today is the last triple-digit one for the next week. Thanks, madam vice president!

    (True fact, we have endured the hottest July in our history and #2 isn’t even close. Ugh.)

  190. 190.

    Subsole

    @Kay:

    The situation is complicated by the swarm of malicious actors who now latch on to every movement, however organic it may (or may not) be.

    It doesn’t help that so many protest movements don’t seem to do a very good job putting daylight between themselves and malicious actors.

    Same thing happened to Me Too, if I recall.

  191. 191.

    Suzanne

    @CaseyL: Sure.

    What gets under my skin is, when the left gets dumb, we dump on them (rightly). When the right gets dumb, we say, “Oh well, gotta hold the seat”. And then they shiv us anyway, like Sinema and Manchin. It feels like Stockholm Syndrome, electoral-style.

  192. 192.

    Darkrose

    @schrodingers_cat: I suspect that was due to the school year ending and people going away for the summer. A week after commencement the encampment on our campus was gone.

  193. 193.

    Soprano2

    @hueyplong: TCFG seems to be disgusted by anyone who doesn’t look like a “normal” white person, and they have to be at least somewhat attractive to boot.

  194. 194.

    TBone

    @rikyrah: 😆 “champ” reminds me of having to speak to a certain Chief of Police at the law office representing FOP and calling him Chief.

    “What’s up, Chief?”

    😆

  195. 195.

    Soprano2

    @Eolirin: I think I understand this a little bit better now since my husband has dementia. I’m sure people like him would also be targeted as a “drain” on society. It’s a scary and sobering thing to think about.

  196. 196.

    OId Man Shadow

    @Bill Arnold: Loosely paraphrasing Noam Chomsky, of course rational people vote for less evil; it signals a preference for less evil.

    But it doesn’t give me that satisfying sense of being better than everybody else.

  199. 199.

    MomSense

    @Kay:
    And this is another reason why my biggest worry is with the competence of the campaign.
    If it’s true that they didn’t do any polling of swing states for two months that is gross incompetence.  If they were shielding him from polling as was also reported when Pelosi and others were trying to get through to him that’s really upsetting. He deserved to be fully informed.

  203. 203.

    Eolirin

    @Suzanne: Peltola isn’t representing a purple district, she’s representing the entire state of Alaska, which is blood red. The others have more room to do things, maybe, but Peltola needs to throw scraps to the right leaning parts of the state or she’s not going to be able to be reelected. 

  204. 204.

    Soprano2

    @CaseyL: Boy, this was my school in a nutshell. Of the 30 students in my graduating class, 9 of the top 10 were girls, and the one boy had moved here and his father was the school superintendent. Most of the bottom 15 were boys. The boys saw good grades and doing well in school as “sissy”, something that only girls did, because they were going to work in a factory like their dad or be a farmer or something else where they assumed they wouldn’t need much of an education to make a good living. It was sad, because they weren’t stupid, just unmotivated.

  208. 208.

    Geminid

    @HumboldtBlue: Welk grew up on a North Dakota farm. His family were of the Volga Deutsch who had migrated from Germany to Russia arould the time of Catherine the Great

    Many of them moved again in the latter part of the 19th century, to the northern Prairie states and nearby Canada. Senator Tim Daschle was Volga Deutsch, as was John Denver.

  213. 213.

    Darkrose

    @Trollhattan: This has been brutal. Coming back from Toronto’s high 70’s to this last week was rough. Of course, so was getting off the plane at 12:30 EDT to 73 degrees and 88% humidity, which made me appreciate our dry heat.

  215. 215.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @TBone: That’s the glory of film.  You can always watch him perform again and remember how you fell in love with his craft in the first place.

  217. 217.

    Trollhattan

    @Darkrose: You picked a great time to be…anywhere else. :-)

    Yard looks like we’ve been napalmed. And I ain’t pulling weeds in this heat, yet they’re the only things that are happy. (Okay, the wisteria is happily attacking the house–its the honey badger of plants.)

  218. 218.

    HumboldtBlue

    @Jackie: ​ 

    Someone here mentioned a day or two ago, that to keep sucking up all the oxygen in the media tent, a dribble of endorsements spread out over several days is preferable to a flood, it keeps the focus and drama on Harris and away from the rapist, and combined with the pending announcement of a running mate, keeps us all waiting for news and discussing the possible choices.

  220. 220.

    TBone

    @Villago Delenda Est: 💜 I told my cable TV provider when we moved that, no, I am not paying extra for TCM and, if you won’t put it in my Basic package where it’s always been, you lost a customer to streaming.  I got it right away, no added fees or tier bump-up necessary.

    I can’t take too many more Marvel universes.  I need better cinema, like air to breathe!

  221. 221.

    TBone

    @WereBear: oh yeah!  The Inlaws! 😆

    Wait Until Dark is such a great suspense film!

    I adore Audrey Hepburn in everything. And Kate Hepburn while we’re at it.

  222. 222.

    zhena gogolia

    @TBone: Wow, I had no such luck. I was paying through the nose for TCM. I finally gave it up when there was no way to keep TCM while also getting rid of Fox News.

  224. 224.

    TBone

    @zhena gogolia: 😓🫤😡

    That sucks.  I have to put up with a plethora of snoozemax and other bullshit on our channel lineup here in Red country so we just NEVER even stop on those channels even for one second.  Except for Fux which I check in on periodically to see what Pooty is up to next in the propaganda dept.  But never for longer than 15 mins. if that.

  226. 226.

    Subsole

     

     

    @rikyrah: Yep.

    The extra-special secret none dare speak is that’s also what they intend for whites who don’t toe the line.

  227. 227.

    Citizen Alan

    @Villago Delenda Est:  TBF, there really is no difference between the parties if you come at it from the perspective of a cosplay Marxist whose primary political goal is to abolish capitalism.

  228. 228.

    Bill Arnold

    Glorious Cat Valente rant, as usual. Optimistic.
    If You Think You Know How This Ends, You Haven’t Been Paying Attention – The only thing we can predict about this election is that we cannot predict goddamned thing about this election–and we cannot forget that now (Catherynne M. Valente, Jul 24, 2024)
    Random section:

    What the fuck am I supposed to do with hope? Hope? Fucking gross. I can’t afford that shit. It’s the hope that kills you! Like, ALWAYS. Graphically. Explosively. I barely remember what hope feels like. I think the last time I felt it was when we were dancing in the streets because Biden had won. Even on my little Maine island, dancing in the streets, kids, grandparents, so many of us. I don’t want to hope. For the length and breadth of my entire political life, every time I think I’m as cynical and jaded as I possibly can be, America finds a tiny little ember of stupid sunny Disney princess bluebird-alighting optimism deep down inside me and then strangles the fucking life out of her. I’m used to grim white-knuckled bracing for whatever comes. Hope feels like a dress that’s too big for me now. It hangs funny. It’s not fashionable anymore. It gapes and billows in weird places that show too much for public wear.
    But what the hell. I got a lot of belts and a sewing kit.

  231. 231.

    Ken

    @lamh47: MVP Harris appearance on RuPaul’s Drag Race. Recorded before the announcement of her candidacy for President!

    I wish this meant that RuPaul knew about Harris taking over before the announcement — if only because that would cause the NYT columnists’ heads to collectively explode.

    “Yeah, we also told Beyoncé and Taylor Swift.”

  232. 232.

    Kay

    @MomSense:

    Its now coMing out that they had a single person in charge of tv ads and he’s the one who spent 100 million in swing state ads to stay even.
    They’re hiring people right now. Reportedly they got 2000 resumes immediately. This would be a career making campaign – if they pull this off it will have never been done before. 

  236. 236.

    MomSense

    @Suzanne:

    Golden is a hold your nose and vote for him situation.  His district has gone for trump the last two elections and given trump 1 ECV.

  238. 238.

    MomSense

    @Kay:

    I just remember how brutal Messina was in 2012 – far more rigorous than 2008.  We had such a narrow path and a lot of campaign positions were unpaid to save the $$ for the swing states.  Messina is terrifying but fucking brilliant

  241. 241.

    WaterGirl

    @Suzanne: We contributed to the campaigns of almost all of those people.  Which means that they had very very very close elections.

    I am much more likely to forgive folks who are in that situation.

    As Nancy Pelosi said, Just win baby!  Maybe all of them are trying to save their seats, which we will need in November.

  248. 248.

    laura

    @Eolirin: My recollection that the I in DEI is Inclusion as in full mainstreaming of dis and differently abled. Please correct me if I’m mistaken. I share your fears and concerns that the attack DEI is the whole ballgame- no diversity, massive institutional exclusion and no inclusion in schools, jobs, public life. That’s some bullshit and a fight worth winning.

  249. 249.

    Kay

    @MomSense:

    Messina is terrifying but fucking brilliant

    That’s what we need. The more I look at it the longer I think we went essentially undefended. I think Biden didn’t get any credit for the economy because there was just a gaping hole where the main messenger would have been. Obama was able to hold his approval rating at 40 and still win because they defended, every day of his administration. Obama was out there every day defending. We just didn’t have that.
    But this is exciting and without precedent. They have to stand up an entire campaign in like 14 days. We have a lot of talented marketing type people – creatives. We can do this.
    Just don’t hire any of the Obama people to run economic policy after :)

  251. 251.

    MomSense

    @Kay:

    I completely agree.  I was talking with my oldest and he was saying that communication is half of the job of being president and that includes campaigning.  We continued our conversation and I was saying how frustrating it was that people not only didn’t know Biden’s record but had the opposite understanding.  They think unemployment is high, the economy is bad, etc.  It was over the phone but I could hear the head tilt in his voice as he said Mom, it’s the same problem.  He’s right.  I admit I was ignoring and excusing the issues that kept coming up because I’m a nerd and knew his record.  We have had a problem for a really long time and as tough as this has been, it needed to happen.

  252. 252.

    Dadadadadadada

    I propose calling Vance et al “HUE hires, for homogeneity, unfairness, exclusion. They only get hired to keep more-qualified people of other identities out.

  253. 253.

    WaterGirl

    @Kay: And this is one reason why it makes more sense to donate to boots on the ground than to candidates who will spend much of the money on TV ads.

    Most people don’t watch TV ads anyway, they fast forward.

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