Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

We’re watching the self-immolation of the leading world power on a level unprecedented in human history.

You are so fucked. Still, I wish you the best of luck.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Nothing says ‘pro-life’ like letting children go hungry.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

Dear Washington Post, you are the darkness now.

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

Republicans: The threats are dire, but my tickets are non-refundable!

You come for women, you’re gonna get your ass kicked.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

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

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

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

Someone should tell Republicans that violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, or possibly the first.

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

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Sweetness, I Was Only Joking When I Said…

Sweetness, I Was Only Joking When I Said…

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Man, this fucker is just a gold mine, and by “gold” I mean “shit”. If you can’t watch the video, it’s basically Vance responding to a hypothetical about George Soros sending 747’s to Columbus to pick up “predominantly black” women for abortions. He said then that he’s open to “some kind of federal response”. Now, he knows how Joan of Arc felt.

I don’t know whether JD being roasted every day on social media is going to make a difference in November, but it sure can’t hurt.

Speaking of gold, this ad popped up in Xitter underneath the tweet above.  The website for this looks legit, who knows? I’m not advocating clicking on that link, btw.

Sweetness, I Was Only Joking When I Said...

Speaking of the failing owner of that failed site, Elon’s trans daughter Vivian has spoken out about what a piece of shit he is.

This post is all over the place, but they can’t all be bangers, people.

Reader Interactions

242Comments

  2. 2.

    trollhattan

    Those George Soros Bucks are so very powerful and omnipresent. Now they’re flying planes, big ones, full of the wimmenfolk!

  3. 3.

    Origuy

    So this happened in Paris today. If you can’t or don’t want to go to Xitter, BBC presenter quotes a Snoop Dogg song. The Olympic torches look like giant blunts. They knew what they were doing.

    Oh my god @BBCMaryam.

    Snoop Dogg is a torchbearer: “Luckily, whilst he was carrying the torch he didn’t drop like it’s hot, drop it like it’s hot.” pic.twitter.com/Fkkg9zeikj
    — Scott Bryan (@scottygb) July 26, 2024

  4. 4.

    Mike in NC

    Vance (or whatever his name is this week) is going to be the gift that keeps on giving through November.

  7. 7.

    rusty

    It’s great to see the Harris campaign out in front of the news cycle and controlling the narrative.  It helps there is an army of younger people to project the message, and are generating their own memes and all.  In the end, Twitter and online is a small, closed community.  But the media is disproportionately on-line and so it does have a ripple effect.  The new people donating and signing up for zoom calls and all are good signs.  If you have donated or been active, you are more likely to vote so that all helps.  Let’s keep up the momentum!!

  11. 11.

    Kelly

    JD Vance couch fucking on the politics internet. 10 and 12 year old grandkids staying with us giggling at fart jokes. What a week 🤷

  12. 12.

    Almost Retired

    My guess is he’ll be gone by the Ides of August, given Trumps’ penchant for loyalty.  The flames rose around his roman nose and his veep career started to melt.

  13. 13.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Mike in NC:

    JD Vance is the Sarah Palin of Dan Quayles (a line I’m gonna overuse between now and November).

    It’s kinda hard to say how his pick will play out, it’s still early, but the early returns certainly suggest it’ll hurt their campaign.  When you become a laughingstock/buffoon…

  17. 17.

    oldster

    I feel sad for Musk’s daughter, but it sounds like she has come out of the ordeal with a good attitude and a healthy sense of self-protection.
    Musk is such a poisonous individual. I’m very glad to see Tesla’s profits falling. The sooner he is bankrupted, the less damage he can do.

  18. 18.

    Leto

    Reposting this from below because it’s directly related:

    Kevin Roberts, architect of Project 2025, has close ties to radical Catholic group Opus Dei

    Kevin Roberts, the Heritage Foundation president and the architect of Project 2025, the conservative thinktank’s road map for a second Trump presidency, has close ties and receives regular spiritual guidance from an Opus Dei-led center in Washington DC, a hub of activity for the radical and secretive Catholic group.

    Roberts acknowledged in a speech last September that – for years – he has visited the Catholic Information Center, a K Street institution headed by an Opus Dei priest and incorporated by the archdiocese of Washington, on a weekly basis for mass and “formation”, or religious guidance. Opus Dei also organizes monthly retreats at the CIC.

    In the speech – which he delivered at the CIC and was recorded and is available online – Roberts spoke candidly about his strategy for achieving extreme policy goals that he supports but are out of step with the views of a majority of Americans.

    Outlawing birth control is the “hardest” political battle facing conservatives in the future, the 50-year-old political strategist said, but he urged conservatives to pursue even small legislative victories – what he called “radical incrementalism” – to advance their most rightwing policy objectives.

    Roberts gained notoriety this year as the leading force behind Project 2025, a foundation plan backed by more than 100 conservative groups that seeks to radically upend a broad range of policies if Trump gets elected again, from limiting abortion access and LGBTQ+ rights and dismantling the Department of Education, to ending diversity programs and increasing government support for “fertility awareness” programs, like ovulation tracking and practicing periodic abstinence, instead of more reliable contraception.

    But Roberts’ personal ties to Opus Dei and the significance of his affiliation, has received far less attention.

    Gareth Gore, the author of a forthcoming book on Opus Dei, called the Catholic organization “a political project shrouded in a veil of spirituality”. The group’s founder, Saint Josemaría Escrivá, saw his followers as part of a “rising militia”, Gore said, who were seeking to “enter battle against the enemies of Christ”.
    “Like Project 2025, Opus Dei at its core is a reactionary stand against the progressive drift of society,” Gore said. “For decades now, the organization has thrown its resources at penetrating Washington’s political and legal elite – and finally seems to have succeeded through its close association with men like Kevin Roberts and Leonard Leo.”

    While Baptists/evangelicals look at Catholics as heretics, they’re still united in the same vile goals for this country.

  23. 23.

    KatKapCC

    Soros is gonna shuffle off this mortal coil in probably very few years. What are these weirdos gonna do when their favorite boogeyman is gone? Who is next in line?

  27. 27.

    $8 blue check mistermix

    @oldster:

    Musk is such a poisonous individual. I’m very glad to see Tesla’s profits falling. The sooner he is bankrupted, the less damage he can do.

    SpaceX will be nationalized when he goes bankrupt…I hope

  28. 28.

    hueyplong

    @FDRLincoln: I can’t think of anything less likely than JD Threenames cleaning up his own mess. Women’s work (no natural children required).

  30. 30.

    sab

    An NPR show referenced the couch jokes today and then went off on another with more gleeful puns.

    It may not be true, but this couch thing has more legs than a centipede.

  32. 32.

    OId Man Shadow

    So he wants to really for reals create the Female Body Inspector as a law enforcement agency and have creepy fucks at airports, trains, and border checkpoints inspect your vaginas.

    Yeah… that tracks with the incel couch fucker vibe.

  33. 33.

    E

    He said the idea that someone would help an Ohio woman get an abortion is “really creepy.” Guy is so weird he doesn’t even know how to use the word creepy.

  35. 35.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @twbrandt:

    This doesn’t get discussed enough.  Everybody talked about how Pence was chosen for the talibangical vote, undoubtedly a factor, but there was no way that barely sentient, animatron was ever gonna upstage Felonious D, and that was probably a bigger “qualification” in his small mind.

    Same thing here in that regard–I guess the “strategic” analysis that Uday and Qusay brought to the selection process was that he’d “fire up the base more” given they already have the vote of the American Taliban, KKK and others on the right that make up the “base”.

  36. 36.

    BellaPea

    @Leto: I saw that article in The Guardian. Very scary stuff. We can only hope that Kamala pulls the election off and these retrograde POS crawl back under their rocks.

  38. 38.

    KatKapCC

    @West of the Rockies: Not technically (Jews do not name children after living people), but he does have five kids. I wonder which one of them gets the nod. Probably this poor guy:

    Jonathan Tivadar Soros (born September 10, 1970): A hedge fund manager and political donor. In 2012, he co-founded Friends of Democracy, a super PAC dedicated to reducing the influence of money in politics.

    The right will insist the “reducing the influence of money” thing is just a trick.

  39. 39.

    Delk

    Sweetness, sweetness
    I was only joking when I said by rights
    You should be bludgeoned in your (sofa) bed.

  44. 44.

    Flanders Other Neighbor

    Winning in November is job #1, but assuming that happens, I am most interested to see where the criminal trials go for TFG.

  46. 46.

    dmsilev

    @sab:

    It may not be true, but this couch thing has more legs than a centipede.

    It may not be true, but it is truthy, which probably explains why it has caught on. I am also bound to report that ‘truthiness’ has its own Wikipedia page.

  47. 47.

    Tony Jay

    @KatKapCC:

    Instaflip to loud fearmongering about ‘The Soros Networks’ of distributed Cultural Marxist socio-sabotage cells that exist in every city, hamlet and insufficiently Klannish school board.

  52. 52.

    Suzanne

    @dmsilev:

    It may not be true, but it is truthy, which probably explains why it has caught on.

    Every genuinely good joke lands because it hits on something real.

    I was discussing this with Mr. Suzanne this morning….. I feel like the Trump in 2016 would have seen the grossness in Vance. Trump was always devastatingly good at seeing someone’s weakness and pushing right at it. I wonder why he seems to have missed it this time.

    ETA: Maybe he’s declining. Better give him a neuro exam.

  57. 57.

    Ken

    @KatKapCC: It’s a tribute to the fine political instincts of Donald J. Trump, who has sold everything from steaks to shoes at his campaign events.

  62. 62.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    @Suzanne:

    Trump was always devastatingly good at seeing someone’s weakness and pushing right at it. I wonder why he seems to have missed it this time.

    Maybe because Vance wasn’t a threat to him personally? The last couple of times Trump ran, Vance was no more than maybe a rising star in the extremist right.

  64. 64.

    Anoniminous

    Trump is stuck with Vance unless there is a vacancy caused by “death, declination, or otherwise.”  Under Rule 9 the GOP can reconvene its national convention or go with a vote of Republican National Committee members.  And there’s not a bunch of time left.  Filing deadlines are looming and some states start voting in September.

    So it looks like he is going to be the gift that keeps on giving.

  69. 69.

    Hoodie

    @Anoniminous: They won’t dump him.  If they did, it would just reinforce the “Trump is surrounded by chaos” narrative.  The only way he goes is if he happens to get flattened by a meteor.  I imagine he’ll be relegated to low profile events, like tweeted clips reviewing the merch available at Trump rallies.  Real presidential timber, like a guy giving you the rundown of sale items in the produce department.

  71. 71.

    SatanicPanic

    @raven: Going to try to go to the LA Games. I don’t really like the Olympics but I am excited about Womens Skateboarding, hopefully the tickets aren’t too insane.

     

    There was a lot of controversy about hosting surfing in Tahiti because it’s on a reef and building infrastructure there to host might harm the reef. But it should be decent surf. Unless they really luck out, summer LA surf is going to be absolutely pathetic. Surfing would make more sense as a winter sport but I can see why they don’t do that.

  73. 73.

    dmsilev

    @Hoodie: I still think Trump will have him whacked and then will claim that the Supreme Court gave him immunity for official Presidential Candidate actions.

  74. 74.

    rk

    Why is George Soros only flying out black women to California for abortions? Why not white women, or jus women. I genuinely don’t understand the (Republican) logic of this.

  75. 75.

    catclub

    @Ken: It’s a tribute to the fine political instincts of Donald J. Trump, who has sold everything from steaks to shoes at his campaign events.

     

    “who has sold everything from shoes to steaks that taste like shoes, at his campaign events.”

     

    FTFY

  78. 78.

    Steve LaBonne

    VD Jance really helps what is clearly becoming a Harris campaign tactic- pointing out over and over that Republicans are weird until it sinks in with normies. “Othering” liberals has been an effective Republican tactic since Nixon, and it’s about damn time we turned the tables on these mofos.

  79. 79.

    M31

    @Ken: lol and the only deviant perversity that isn’t implied in “I got it from Agnes” is couchfucking

    time for old Tom to get back in business

  80. 80.

    Kay

    I thought the audio was really chilling. Play that as much as possible.

    I’d also just remind everyone how wrong JD Vance is about Ohio. Ohio outlawed abortion, that’s true, but the moment it went to a ballot iniative the public overturned the legislature and governor, and by a very wide margin.

  82. 82.

    p.a.

    I have no positive feelings towards Mike Pence, but I think he may be laughing his ass off right about now.  (Despite no public evidence that he has a sense of humor.)

  84. 84.

    scav

    @Anoniminous: Ah, if only the R’s believed in sciencey stuff!  Their little burden clearly has an angular position north or south of the celestial equator.  Especially so if launched into orbit!

    Big red trebuchet with couch attachment, that might capture a news cycle . . .

  85. 85.

    Gretchen

    @dmsilev: A librarian on Twitter is saying that the couch anecdote is in the hardcover first edition, but was removed in later editions. So people checking the Kindle as the factcheck aren’t seeing it but it was there. I don’t have a hardcover so can’t check, but others have photographed the page.

    And even if it’s not true or can’t be verified, like the DeSantis puddingfingers thing, these stories summed up the weirdness of both men.

  87. 87.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @KatKapCC: You have remember that, even though the majority of white men vote GOP, there are a lot of white men.  Forty percent of a shitload is still a lot of people.  The call should do well.

  88. 88.

    Villago Delenda Est

    In reference to the link to Vivian Musk, it will come as a total shock that she calls him a narcissist.

  89. 89.

    Chris Johnson

    @Suzanne: Vance is a creepy right winger so he blends right in, and more importantly he’s Peter Thiel’s guy and Thiel has money in a way that Vladimir Putin simply doesn’t any more.

    That sounds like a weird thing to say, but this is after a lot of fighting in Ukraine, and Trump now has to give money TO Putin as well as military secrets, and it’s still not enough, and so it makes perfect sense that he’d align with Thiel. Politically, Thiel is down with the darkest Project 2025 stuff as long as they’re not applied to him personally, in particular the virulent misogyny and racism.

    It doesn’t surprise me a bit. It’s not a winning strategy, but it fits.

  90. 90.

    Anoniminous

    Posted for general merriment & glee

    Wall Street Journal Headline:
    Wall Street’s Masters of the Universe Are Masters of None in 2024 Race

    The financial world’s heavy hitters fear being marginalized in Washington after former President Trump chose a running mate openly hostile to Wall Street.”

  91. 91.

    Josie

    @Gretchen: ​
     A responsible journalist should be able to track down a copy of that first edition and break the story. Oh, but wait,…….

  97. 97.

    WereBear

    @Gretchen: Someone is going to find one.

    Internet research is RELENTLESS. And this can rope in the true crime people, who have a network that is unbelievable.

    Did they pull and pulp? I mean really, how DID it get into what was sold as a literary memoir. Did they think this was the real gritty?

  99. 99.

    Matt McIrvin

    @dmsilev: “Truthy” and “falsy” even became computer-programming terms, to describe the property of evaluating as true or false in a JavaScript boolean expression.

    (The value “1” is not the same as “true”, but in JavaScript, if you make something conditional on it, it will evaluate as if it were “true”; therefore it is truthy. “0” is falsy, as are several other things such as “null” or an empty string. The behavior is complicated enough that it needed specific words to describe it, and Stephen Colbert gave them the key.)

  100. 100.

    Anoniminous

    @rk:

    One Republican propaganda line has Democrats using Abortion as a means of reducing the black population.  Like most Republican propaganda it doesn’t make a lick of sense, but there it is.

  102. 102.

    WereBear

    One thing that turned red Kansas around was how Brownback ruined their schools. That is a point of civic pride in the state. They threw him out and started rebuilding.

    If I still spoke to people who want to vote for Trump, the Project 2025 abolition of all public schools might reach them. Most of them can’t afford the Christian academies of the rich, and the most religious homeschool.

    But for normies in the middle, it means their children will get no education at all.

  105. 105.

    different-church-lady

    I’m starting to worry that all this news about Vance being repulsive is taking attention away from Trump being repulsive.

  107. 107.

    Kay

    Vance on his ‘childless cat lady’ remarks: I know the media wants to attack me and wants me to back down on this Megyn, but the simple point that I made is that having children, becoming a father, becoming a mother, I really do think it changes your perspective in a pretty profound way…I don’t think we should back down from it Megyn. I think we should be honest about the problem

    It’s so weird to identify a huge group of people as “the problem”. Honestly, what nerve. Why don’t JD Vance and Megyn Kelly mind their own business and stop discussing whether they demand people have children? How is this the role of government?

  109. 109.

    dmsilev

    @Suzanne: My opinion of dolphins has just gone down. Hopefully the performers were well compensated for appearing with Vance.

    Or is that not what you meant?

  110. 110.

    Geo Wilcox

    @Gretchen: Did anyone photograph page 21 with the M&M wrapper up his butt while his pal in drinking had a penis drawn on his face? I swear I saw and read that earlier today on a twitter page.

  112. 112.

    David 🐝KHive🐝 Koch

    164,000 participants, making it the largest Zoom in history.

    $2 million+ raised in less than 90 minutes.

    Tens of thousands of new volunteers registered and ready to elect @KamalaHarris in just 100 days.

    She. Is. Going. To. Win. #AnswerTheCall2024 #AnswerTheCall

    — Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) July 26, 2024

  114. 114.

    different-church-lady

    @Kay:

    I really do think it changes your perspective in a pretty profound way… I think we should be honest about the problem

    You have kids, then it’s your problem.

  115. 115.

    RevRick

    @sab: I don’t get why this matters very much. It’s weird, but when it comes to sex, humans do all sorts of weird stuff. I mean, women have admitted that they have gotten off using dildos and vibrators and pillows and water from shower heads. All I can say is, good for them.
    Of all the things we can say about JD, this I find to be the most human about him.

  119. 119.

    WereBear

    @Kay: And he cuts out step-parents.

    I swear, there are so many good ones and yet they are the Shane of families.

    Ride in, fix the town, take all the shots, ride into the sunset.

    I’m deeply offended. I’ve put so much into children who were not my own, and I’m far from the only one. All I asked is that they were better off than if I hadn’t been there, and both of them said that to me in many ways.

    But it offends people who have lost children, or adopted, or any number of ways we nurture.

    They are so weird.

  120. 120.

    rikyrah

    Morning Joe (@Morning_Joe) posted at 7:17 AM on Fri, Jul 26, 2024:
    “Tough talk is this guy’s calling card. And now there’s this extraordinary show of weakness… he agreed to this specific debate, on this specific network, on this specific date, and now he’s pulling out. It shows that he’s afraid.”

    — @PeteButtigieg on Harris-Trump debate https://t.co/bltqZdm2nU
    (https://x.com/Morning_Joe/status/1816810111526166884?t=St47R16kVjd6K0Yw8q-1aA&s=03)

  124. 124.

    different-church-lady

    Editor’s Note: This headline and story have been updated to reflect that there’s no definitive proof Sen. J.D. Vance searched for “dolphin porn.”

  126. 126.

    rikyrah

    CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP

    The New York Times is the #VichyPress (@Needle_of_Arya) posted at 11:00 AM on Fri, Jul 26, 2024:
    “We’re not going back” resonates with my parents’ generation, Silent Generation, and with Boomers, especially Boomers of (all other) color(s)( ethnicities) who remember the bad old days of segregation.

    We’re not going back to that, even though Trump wants to take us back there.
    (https://x.com/Needle_of_Arya/status/1816866229996650652?t=Bb2cR6MAGCpkehGBo0MxPw&s=03)

  127. 127.

    Frankensteinbeck

    I told you that Musk bought Twitter out of transphobia.  Glad he admitted it, I guess?

    @rk:

    Why is George Soros only flying out black women to California for abortions?

    This isn’t random!  Most liberals seem unaware, but this is one of the foundations of the anti-abortion movement.  Bigots don’t just hate, they have mythologies.  Conservatives believe black women have irresponsible sex and that most abortions are had by black women as an easy way to escape the consequences of their irresponsible behavior.  I heard this gross shit growing up in the South.  Sarah Palin said it out loud sometime in the last few years.

  130. 130.

    sab

    @Kay: Of course my stepchildren of the last 24 years mean nothing to me, including the adopted one out of foster care who had one mother die, an adoptive mother reject her and wants me to be her mother not her step-mother.

    Families are so complicated and the kids need whoever steps up to the plate, not just those who pass the bloodtest.

    My ex-step-son-in-law has six kids by five women or seven kids by six women. Never paid child support. Won’t come to their school events. And he is a better parent than me the lowly step-mother with cats?

  131. 131.

    Kay

    @WereBear:

    Because they’re weirdos who focus obsessively on “blood”. “Mother” or “parent” is also a verb, dumbasses.

  132. 132.

    different-church-lady

    @WereBear: I think the amazing thing about this is we’re not even driving it, we’re just sitting here enjoying it.

  133. 133.

    hueyplong

    @rikyrah: Love Marshall’s point and hope it plays out that way. Harris is certainly doing her part.

    I’m a broken record on this, but anyone worried about Harris’ ability to wield a scalpel could check out some questioning she did of Jeff Sessions when she was a senator.

  134. 134.

    Suzanne

    @dmsilev: I’m so tired, LOL!

    There’s another Kamala call on Sunday night, that’s for everyone. I signed up and now can’t find the link. Can anyone help me out?

  135. 135.

    WereBear

    @WereBear: I <3 NY and Seneca Falls was the birth of women’s rights, and started with a successful multicultural coalition.

    While it broke under extreme pressure, the potential was still there and the gains continued.

    I hope we’ve all learned our lesson. :)

  136. 136.

    BR

    @Kay: ​
    Yeah, the key to the audio is “Vance wants to stop women traveling between states.” That’s just a mind blowing concept to anyone who isn’t deep in the anti-abortion sheriff world.

  141. 141.

    sab

    OMG that fisrt shot of the French bridge was so French. Boom and colored smoke that makes a vivid point. My Irish American husband doesn’t understand why I love the French so much.

  142. 142.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Geoduck:

    Heh heh, as did Palin.

    Actually, all these references and side references have won elections…except Hair Furor.

  145. 145.

    WereBear

    @rikyrah: I discovered it is some kind of mythology the MAGAs have.

    Donald Trump is heroic if he was hit by a bullet. If it was shrapnel, he’s not.

    And no, I have no idea how to explain that one. Probably a divinity intervention rule or something.

  147. 147.

    hueyplong

    @rikyrah: It’s pretty unlikely Jackson treated Trump. So a measured response would be something like STFU, with the conclusion being their willingness to die on the hill of proving a bullet struck Trump.

  148. 148.

    kindness

    I feel for Musk’s daughter.  Bad for what Musk put her through, but impressed.  She knows she’ll never see a cent of Elon’s money when he dies for speaking up and yet she made her statements anyway.

    And yea, that Olympic torch Snoop is carrying sure does look like a joint.  I thought that was great who ever arranged it.

  149. 149.

    Scout211

    @different-church-lady: I’m starting to worry that all this news about Vance being repulsive is taking attention away from Trump being repulsive.

    I think that is okay for now.  If it can be spread far and wide that Vance is repulsive, it will hurt the ticket.  Why did Trump pick this creep?

    OTOH, Trump has always been repulsive and a creep but MAGA sees it as a badge of . . . well, a badge of something.  I like the more subtle “weird” that the Democratic strategists are using now to make people question whether Trump is in his right mind but it’s not a direct attack or smear that would produce angry defensiveness.  It’s a good strategy psychologically. 

    Vance is repulsive.

    Trump is weird.

    There’s something wrong with both of them.

  152. 152.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Anoniminous: Is this for real? Vance isn’t hostile to Wall Street at all. He just occasionally makes noises about poor people and then advocates and votes for horrible pro-corporate shit.

    Back in 2009, there was a lot of talk about how the banks and corporate bros not only require that they get their way and screw you, they also require that we publicly genuflect to them and thank them. They were upset with Obama saving their asses because he also made some pretty mild comments about how they’d fucked up in the first place. I think it’s the same dynamic with Vance.

  155. 155.

    BR

    @MisterForkbeard: ​

    I think the idea is Vance is beholden to West Coast VC money, not Wall Street. Two big pools of money and power, different ideologies. West Coast VC money wants to push bitcoin and bypassing Wall Street.

  156. 156.

    Kelly

    @rikyrah: Bullet or shrapnel being shot at and wounded is a big fucking deal. Insisting it’s a bullet using dubious proof seems kinda silly.

  158. 158.

    WereBear

    @Chris Johnson: Trump and his band of weirdos don’t know that.

    And most of his audience prides themselves on knowing their guns & bullets, as I recall.

    This is the kind of cognitive dissonance that messes with their identity.

    Maybe for the first time since Trump appeared, a reality show brilliant businessman before people caught on to how fake it all was.

    Now, they know a lot more embarrassing things. The real danger is how a cult leader has to keep upping the circus content, keep them from thinking about all the holes in the story we are building around them, like a frantic writer’s room when their budget just got slashed.

    This was the point where Manson and Jim Jones had to up the ante. Under pressure from the authorities and losing control of the group.

  159. 159.

    MisterForkbeard

    @BR: That makes sense. But I repeat: Vance will do whatever he can for finance and corporate rich people. If he’s owned by the crazy Thiel and Musk’s of the world but openly works for the normal set of corporate finance bros, there’s no real difference there.

  160. 160.

    Eyeroller

    @rikyrah: I saw a video of some amateur ballistics testing.  Several white guys looking like stereotypical gun nuts shot an AR-15 at a mannequin.  The shooter put the bullet right through the mannequin’s upper ear.  It didn’t quite blow away the whole ear like I’d thought it would, but it punched a huge hole in it.  It did seem to be possible for a graze against the most prominent part of the lower ear to just scrape that away, but most of the blood was on his upper ear and if that got a direct hit, it would have been severely damaged.

  161. 161.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Kelly: It’s so dumb. All Trump has to say is: “I was shot at. Someone tried to kill me. Are you really freaking out whether it was a bullet or something else that wounded me while I was on that podium?”

    But they can’t really do that, because they made a big deal that it was a bullet. Even though the evidence appears to show that this is extremely unlikely.

  164. 164.

    Wapiti

    Peeve: shrapnel is the fragments from an exploding (artillery) round, named after the inventor, Henry Shrapnel. Fragments from a shattering bullet are not shrapnel.

  165. 165.

    WereBear

    I also think we are overlooking some of how President Biden played the Convicted Felon, and how that can be contributing to Trump falling apart.

    It looks like some kind of Biden/Harris master plan, as his veep becomes a multi-continent joke and his opponent morphs into something they are forbidden to attack with their only weapons.

    Whatever mix of fate and cunning went into this, the result has spooked Trump into worse behavior and more pressure. That makes his brain work on an even lower level.

    They have to keep putting him out there, that’s what will make their dreams come true, but he’s not going to last 100 days.

    He might be his own October surprise, I’m saying.

  167. 167.

    Eyeroller

    @Wapiti: It wouldn’t even have come from the bullet, but from something else that it winged.  Maybe a teleprompter, maybe something else.  “Flying debris” is the most correct term, probably.

  169. 169.

    WereBear

    @Eyeroller: That would be even worse to a wingnut. “Debris” is not how their god sends them Q messages, or whatever the latest route might be.

    Also, I wonder if some are now looking for reasons to bail from the gilded calf statue. They may just push out their lower lip and stay home and that is FINE with me.

    They have never backed a loser before. And they didn’t want to admit it in 2020. NOW, it’s a really heavy lift.

  171. 171.

    Keithly

    @Gretchen: As it happens, I’ve checked out a first-edition hardcopy of “Hillbilly Elegy” from my institution’s library.  I will look for J. D.’s—or whatever he calls himself this week—little anecdote, but any guidance on where to look would be greatly appreciated.  Just by skimming the pages I found the peter-puffer passage, if I may couch it in those terms.

  172. 172.

    hueyplong

    @Kelly: Exactly, which indicates that Trump himself insists upon it, and we should let him fornicate that chicken for as many news cycles as possible.

  173. 173.

    Kelly

    @WereBear: Biden has been in politics for a looong time. Exiting the race probably wasn’t Plan A. He’s thorough and knows his health might not last so he certainly had a Plan B. This looks to me like an expertly executed Plan B

  174. 174.

    rikyrah

    He’s so good at this. This is an example of why he’s vaulted to the top of the VP picks for me.

     

    Inside with Jen Psaki

    @InsideWithPsaki
    WATCH–
    @Tim_Walz
    on the Trump-Vance agenda: “You know there’s something wrong with people when they talk about freedom: freedom to be in your bedroom, freedom to be in your exam room, freedom to tell your kids what they can read. That stuff is weird.”
    https://x.com/InsideWithPsaki/status/1816636419382870340

  175. 175.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Scout211: Vivian Wilson specifically changed her last name because, as she told the judge, she doesn’t want to be associated in any way with her father.

    FWIW, Wilson posted on social media earlier this week that she was looking good and very much alive.

  178. 178.

    Rusty

    @WereBear: Abolishing public schools also means abandoning all special needs students.  They are expensive and harder to educate.  Private schools won’t be able to educate them for the amount vouchers provide.  It will also lead to even further atomize people from eachbother, school serve a cohesive community function.  Finally, private schools will have no standards (part pf the push for vouchers where I live in New Hampshire) is to make sure there is no accountability for the education provided.  We will be literally throwing away a generation of children in a great failed experiment of right wing mania.

  179. 179.

    Martin

    @MisterForkbeard: There’s a bit of a difference. Regular finance people are just greedy. Tech bros are greedy but also have a specific agenda, where regular finance people are kind of all over the place.

    Tech bros reject social solutions to problems, and assert that all social problems need technological solutions. That gives them license to reject all social solutions. You don’t need to think about a fair abortion policy, just create an app that will let you put your unwanted baby up for people to swipe left or right on, and make a few bucks in the process. That’s where Vance comes from and who he works for.

    I mean, Bill Ackman is an absolute piece of shit, but he does believe in social solutions to problems. He will put money behind various Democratic groups because he wants to see those policies implemented. But the tech guys like Musk and Thiel just want everything torn down so they can sell a technological solution into the resultant space.

  181. 181.

    Kelly

    Harris for President email list is the first campaign email list I want to be on. They are fire 🔥

  183. 183.

    Soprano2

    I’ll repeat what I said in another thread, JD Vance is absolute poison to women voters. Even conservative women won’t agree with a lot of what he has said. In this day of the internet he can’t hide the things he’s said in the past.

  185. 185.

    Suzanne

    @rikyrah: I’ve often thought that Dem politicians should praise “the old American tradition of minding your own business”.

  186. 186.

    Steve in the ATL

    @Omnes Omnibus: rap is a thing EVERYWHERE now. I’ve heard local rappers in Egypt, Türkiye, Germany, Netherlands, Chile…the list goes on.

  187. 187.

    Leto

    @Rusty: Conservatives have wanted to throw away all special needs people since forever. It’s why they complain so bitterly about the ADA, and anything having to do with providing equal access. Fuck them forever, with every rusty implement in existence.

  191. 191.

    Matt McIrvin

    @WereBear: I don’t think this was in the works for a long time–I think Pelosi and Obama genuinely convinced Biden to step down at the 11th hour. But I think some people were nursing contingency plans that they put into action. The last stories I read suggest to me that a lot of this might have been Kamala Harris’s contingency plan–not that she had any designs on Biden, but that she knew she might have to do this and was ready to go when it happened.

  194. 194.

    Matt McIrvin

    @John Cole: Ever notice how Morrissey’s songs always have these really self-absorbed, petulant narrators? They’re often described as depressing but they strike me more as whiny–the character is always feeling ignored or betrayed for what are often unreasonable or immature causes, if you step back. Often it’s that the girl he wants won’t date him, or barely knows he exists, or actually is his girlfriend but has to work. Adults don’t understand him, his town is boring, people are jealous of him etc. etc. And there’s often this sense that he’s owed something he’s not getting.

    And that’s the truth of how young people think much of the time, so it works. But I think it’s also reflecting an essential petulance in Morrissey himself that he never outgrew.

  195. 195.

    Leto

    @John Cole: Boomers, amirite??? Idk man, so many people who seem to have been at least decent have simply shown their true selves, their complete asses. I have a list a people who I’ve gone, “Aww, seriously?” Over shit they’ve said/done. It’s disappointing but it’s better to know the truth.

  196. 196.

    Geminid

    @Steve in the ATL: I saw a Houthi propaganda video showing two of their fighters standing on a ship they’d captured. The music started and the two guys started rapping.

  197. 197.

    Keithly

    Thread’s probably dead by now, but pp. 179–180 of J.D.’s Bildungsroman—at least in the hard-copy first edition—just regurgitates fairly anodyne anecdotes from his freshman year at The Ohio State.

  202. 202.

    Sister Golden Bear

    @Chris Johnson: Being hit by a bullet without major damage is impossible. Being grazed is entirely possible—Snopes had a close-up of one of the photos immediately afterwards that appeared to show torn tissue on the front and back parts of Trump’s outer ear that would be consistent with a billet or fragment passing parallel along his ear.

    So technically Trump could say he was hit, but saying he survived being grazed doesn’t have the same effect. So course he’s going to go for the dramatic.

  203. 203.

    caphilldcne

    @KatKapCC: oh his son Alex who largely controls the fortune is still running around plus he’s engaged to Huma Abedin of Hillary Clinton aide (and ex of Anthony Wiener) fame. That’ll get them nicely revved up.

  204. 204.

    Martin

    @Matt McIrvin: Yeah, I couldn’t stand Morrissey because all I could ever hear was constant whining, and I fucking hate whiners. There’s a difference between introspection and being an incel, and Morrissey always sounded like an incel (though I didn’t have that term to apply to him until much later).

  206. 206.

    Geminid

    @matt: I think Vance looks like the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Like they gave the Grinch a makeover and dressed him up.

  207. 207.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Martin: I’ve heard the explanation “well, it’s ironic, he’s gently mocking immature kids by putting on these characters.” But as the years go by and he continues to show his ass I really wonder if that’s the case.

  210. 210.

    Scout211

    Trump was photographed at his meeting with Netanyahu.  CNN has a report and a video up  but I am linking to the CNN article to show this odd still photo of Trump at the top of the page (a still of the video).

    Did Trump forget his hair dye?  (His hair looks white).  Did Trump forget his makeup?  (His face looks like a normal old person’s face, not a face with pancake makeup).  Does he look tired?  Does he look old?

    Just asking questions . . .

  211. 211.

    JoyceH

    @Sister Golden Bear: I’ve been skeptical of the bullet from the beginning. Even if it was just a graze, wouldn’t that have moved the head? Trump just slapped his hand to his ear, looked more like a reaction to a buzzing mosquito, not even as significant as a bee sting. A sliver of glass is much more likely.

  212. 212.

    Citizen Alan

    @rikyrah:  People really need to understand: When conservatives talk about “Freedom,” they mean they should have the freedom to do whatever they want with no accountability and no restraint while the rest of us live in a god-damned police state.

  215. 215.

    Gloria DryGarden

    @rk: I really like this idea, flying plane loads of women needing/ choosing abortions. Great use of money! Thank you mr progressive billionaire.
    Every state w bans needs this. If it’s only a joke or a fake rumor, it’s a great idea!

    meanwhile, tax any churches w connections to politics! Opus dei seems so harsh and mega creepy.

    a charming meme from Facebook today:

    ” CHINGATUMAGA

    No Mas  Naranja, 2024”

    love it.

    if anyone needs help w this Spanish, just ask.

  217. 217.

    Eyeroller

    @Gloria DryGarden: He meets with leaders who want him back.  Recall that shortly before the Vance pick, he met with Orban who was visiting from Hungary, right after a stop in Russia to chat with Putin.  Technically this is illegal for a private citizen to conduct foreign policy, but it’s essentially unenforceable, especially for an ex-President.

  218. 218.

    Captain C

    @Suzanne: I am betting Usha did not sign on for dolphin porn and couch fucking memes being associated with her husband until the end of time.

  219. 219.

    Liminal Owl

    @sab: You’re not thinking like a Great Replacement eugenics supremacist. If “childless” women care for stepchildren and adopted children (except, maybe, those of pure Aryan bloodline), they’re still betraying the white “race,” and it doesn’t count.

  220. 220.

    Chris Johnson

    @Sister Golden Bear: So we’re going to disagree, I think, on this, which hopefully is okay. Lord knows I’m not gun boy. I’m a nerd who’s been interested in mythbusters and slo mo guys and who’s paid attention to what glancing blows from bullets do.

    I’ll just reiterate: big difference between a slower moving fragment (or, indeed, a ‘blading’ concealed sharp thing), and a bullet from an AR-15. I don’t contest that Trump could have sustained a wound, though that also seems questionable given recent pictures such as with Netanyahu? not even counting the golf course?

    What I’m saying, and I’m pretty confident is, he claims it was a bullet wound and it can not have been a bullet, even as a graze, because a delicate impact just barely from a bullet at AR-15 speeds doesn’t make a slice, nick or cut (or a nothing). It vaporizes anything with water in it such as flesh, and whatever is struck turns into its own projectile at AR-15 speeds because the energy is transferred, and it’s that energy that makes your ear explode in a spray of gore if a bullet strikes it. Under no circumstances can you get a neat hole or a bullet-shaped divot neatly taken out, because the material struck takes on the velocity of the bullet as it gets out of the way of the heavy flying object.

    So I must disagree: Trump can’t even say he was grazed by a bullet. He wasn’t. It’s a lie, backed repeatedly by effing Ronny Jackson, and where the heck did that guy come from?

  222. 222.

    Eyeroller

    @Chris Johnson: No. No no no.  The bullet is traveling at close to Mach 3.  Impossible for whatever it hits to get out of the way that fast.  What does happen is that some to a lot of the kinetic energy of the bullet is transmitted to the target.  That displaces the material and can tear/shred it.  If the target is dense it will rapidly decelerate the bullet.  That is what does the damage since that dumps a lot of energy into the material.

    The tissue of the outer ear is thin and does not offer a lot of resistance to the bullet.  In the video I saw, in a direct hit on a mannequin with a gel model of the ear attached to a head, the bullet just punched a big hole in the ear and kept going with hardly any effect on its speed.

  223. 223.

    BritinChicago

    I could hardly believe that Vance really endorsed that idea (preventing women traveling from states where they could not get needed medical care to states where they could), but it does fit, doesn’t it?

    The idea reminds me vividly of the Fugitive Slave acts, the Feds intervening to make sure that people oppressed on one state cannot avoid the oppression by going to another.

    On a different topic: I read Vance’s book soon after it first came out (as soon as my local city library had it: didn’t send any $$ his way). (I don’t know whether it was the first edition. I think I would recall mentions of couch-fucking but I may have been skimming by then.) I didn’t much like it. I would recommend a much better book (by  Very Much Better person) on a somewhat similar theme: Tara Westover’s Educated.

  225. 225.

    Quadrillipede

    Speaking for myself, I found the Smiths much more enjoyable before I discovered the lead singer is a roaring asshole.

  227. 227.

    Dave

    @Kelly: Just another ridiculous set of BD that throws up an incloud.

    He was shot at and it was close regardless of anything else.

    This also doesn’t suddenly make him fit to lead anything let alone the country.

    That’s a reasonably big deal I’ve been there. Remember very vividly as multiple bursts of PKM fire  bracketed me and came within six inches on both sides.

    Seared into the brain if you will. Didn’t suddenly qualify me to be President of the US and if I had been hit by either fragments or a round (it’s a high powered round so no thank you) it wouldn’t have suddenly qualified me for the role either.

    Unfortunately ridiculous bullshitters have to ridiculously bullshit on principle so here we are having a very dumb conversation about it.

  228. 228.

    Dan B

    @Frankensteinbeck: It seemed to me that white people shaming black people for being sex positive reflected poorly on white people.  You take away their money and then want to shame them for something wonderful, self affirming, and body positive?  Who wants to be around miserable people like that.  If anything the young have chosen pleasure and rejected abuse.  Get a clue prudes (and bigots).

  229. 229.

    Eyeroller

    @Dave: ​ Yeah, nobody denies it was an assassination attempt. Well, except for a few kooks. Why the need to embellish it to make it seem like he “took a bullet” for America?

    What was really depressing was that Trump’s approval rate skyrocketed after that while Biden’s was sinking due to the media telling everybody he was demented. Just disgusting. Why should I approve of somebody more because he got lucky? He’s still a horrible person. Maybe too many people really did believe that a deity intervened. Uggh.

  230. 230.

    Jay

    @Eyeroller:

    Yeah, nobody denies it was an assassination attempt

    Nope. it was just another random mass shooting,

    In America, that’s a day ending in Y.

  231. 231.

    Dan B

    @Scout211: The “weird” term comes from Tim Walz, Governor of Minnesota.  He’s brimming over with shade that sticks.  He’s wondered on national news why these GOP guys, “Want to be members of the He-Men Women Hating Club.”  That’s so sticky.  How do the extremists get that tarring off?  He does it with appropriate emotions, often smiling as he applies the stank.  And his accomplishments are miraculous.

  232. 232.

    Dave

    @Eyeroller: Man I’m not superstitious by nature at all but after that I did spend thirty seconds wondering if he really does have a dark pact with some particularly twisted malevolent entity.

    This ignores that how easy it is to miss a shot particularly if you aren’t an experienced marksman. And is silly not serious thought just idle musing.

    The brain does seem to like a good narrative though.

  233. 233.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Eyeroller:

    What was really depressing was that Trump’s approval rate skyrocketed after that while Biden’s was sinking due to the media telling everybody he was demented. Just disgusting.

    I recall the reporting being he didn’t really get much of a polling bump from it

  234. 234.

    Jackie

    Has this been posted?

    Move over, Taylor Swift!

    USA Today: “Last September on National Voter Registration Day, Swift set a record by encouraging more than 30,000 people to register in a single day.”

    “But in the first 48 hours after President Joe Biden bowed out of his bid for reelection and Harris announced she was running in his place, more than 38,500 registered, according to Vote.org, a nonpartisan platform that encourages voter registration.”

    “As of Friday morning, the figure had surged past 100,000.”

  235. 235.

    Dan B

    @rikyrah: Im with you on Walz!  He’s as skilled as a brain surgeon and has massively successful e governing accomplishments.  One other thing was the way he framed free school breakfast and lunch as an investment in kid he’ll fight for and a huge savings for parents.  On top of that he included a picture of dozens of happy elementary school kids as he’s absolutely giddy that they’re all hugging him.  It’s a simple message that he loves kids, their parents, and loves delivering good things.

  236. 236.

    Geminid

    @Dan B: One thing I’ve noticed about Walz is that most people here like him. The only objection I’ve seen is implicit in the argument that the pick needs to be substantially younger than Harris. I’m not sure I buy that one though..

  237. 237.

    Dan B

    @Suzanne: MYOB is something Giv. Walz would say.  Pete’s version would come across as leave me alone.  That’s why Biden’s support of Marriage Equality was so powerful.  He had no direct stake in the game.  It was about fairness.

  238. 238.

    SomeRandomGuy

    Given how people won’t listen to word one about Trump being, not merely an a-hole, but 100% a dick, I think JD Vance’s truckload of manure is going to help. If I Xitted, I’d probably recommend everyone have a family of “JD Vance is 100% a dick,” and end with “I can’t see why TRUMP would pick such a loser!” to remind everyone that Trump’s the same way.

  239. 239.

    Scout211

    @Dan B: The “weird” term comes from Tim Walz, Governor of Minnesota.  He’s brimming over with shade that sticks

    Walz really ran with it but it actually is a Democratic Party messaging strategy that many of the surrogates are using quite effectively now.  It’s the “new party line.”

    Democrats’ new line of attack on Republicans.  You’re being weird.

    The calling Republicans “weird” strategy conspicuously stands apart from the Democrats’ usual “when they go low, we go high” modus operandi.

    Caitlin Legacki, a Democratic strategist and former Biden administration official, told ABC News she expects it will be an effective message that cuts straight to the heart of the matter.

    The dig appeared to be a callback to what Harris once said she would do, according to CNN, if Trump followed her around the debate stage like he did to Hillary Clinton in 2016.

    Harris reportedly said she would turn around and ask him, “Why are you being so weird?”

    After the anecdote circulated widely online, more Democrats began leaning into the “just call them weird” strategy.

    Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz adopted the new party line in an MSNBC interview on Tuesday.

    . . .

    Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz also picked up on it. In an X post on Thursday, he shared a clip of a 2021 speech by Sen. JD Vance, in which the now–Republican vice presidential nominee said Americans without children should not get “nearly the same voice” in elections as those who do have children.

    “This is quite weird,” Schatz wrote. “Like, a very very bad idea, but also weird. And presumably, unpopular.”

    . . .

    The calling Republicans “weird” strategy conspicuously stands apart from the Democrats’ usual “when they go low, we go high” modus operandi.

    Caitlin Legacki, a Democratic strategist and former Biden administration official, told ABC News she expects it will be an effective message that cuts straight to the heart of the matter.

  240. 240.

    Geminid

    @Scout211: I think the “weird” line of attack can work with voters. At this point it could also get under Trump’s thin skin, and that may be in part the design.

  241. 241.

    Dan B

    @Scout211: Interesting background.  I don’t think pointing out the obvious is going low.  If a friend shows up to a party with messed up hair or mud on their shoes you could say that their hairdo is “interesting” or weird, to alert them.  It’s not helpful to ignore a glaring issue.  Right wingers have had weird obsession with immigrants, POC, LGBTQ, etc.  It’s been far beyond simple prejudice for years.

  242. 242.

    SomeRandomGuy

    @Suzanne:

    Every genuinely good joke lands because it hits on something real.

    I was discussing this with Mr. Suzanne this morning….. I feel like the Trump in 2016 would have seen the grossness in Vance. Trump was always devastatingly good at seeing someone’s weakness and pushing right at it. I wonder why he seems to have missed it this time.

    ETA: Maybe he’s declining. Better give him a neuro exam.

    See, here, I run into a problem.

    “Because Trump doesn’t see his own grossness as a weakness – Vance has the same grossness.”

    Sometimes, people are being rhetorical. And sometimes, if you state the obvious, they think you’re being insulting.

    Trump’s grossness is now called “masculinity” by Republicans, and they don’t think masculinity can ever be toxic, which is why so many of them suffer from spontaneous human combustion after they place themselves within a chamber containing 100% oxygen.

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