Vice President Kamala Harris had one job last night: show us a president. She fucking nailed it.
Brava!
Meanwhile, her opponent called in to Fox News to whine, and even the corrupt Murdoch flunkies cut him off after 10 minutes of rambling complaints and accidental keypad beeping. What a loser!
I believe we’re gonna win in November.
Open thread!
ETA: Moving photo from Reddit flagged by valued commenter Baud.
On The Road – UncleEbeneezer – Early-Summer, Eastern Sierra Adventure (Part 5-of-5): Lon Chaney Cabin
Baud
Via reddit, cool photo.
OzarkHillbilly
Squish.
@Baud: Nice.
Baud
She really has risen to the occasion in a manner that I would not have.
Jay
@Baud:
That was because she was wearing pants, and you don’t.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Updated post to include that awesome photo — thanks!
Tony Jay
@Jay:
You don’t know what’s happening behind that podium.
MomSense
@Baud:
I’ve been following Meena for years so seeing the girls last night and that photo – well I felt like a proud great Auntie seeing her niece and grand nieces. So happy for their family.
Jeffro
between VP Harris’ amazing speech, and trump’s 50+ post WATB spree (and being cut off by Fox News!) last night, I am one HAPPY camper this morning. I’ll try my best to stay focused on the former today!
GO BLUE!!
Juju.
That whole speech was a giant WOW.
VeniceRiley
Full speech on YouTube
https://youtu.be/D3AIdRf49Ss?si=aDw_kEls2vo7yNqs
OzarkHillbilly
@Tony Jay: If it was rump, I wouldn’t want to know.
Betty Cracker
@Juju.: It really was! I’m taking some powerful prescription pain meds at present and struggled to stay awake throughout the evening’s proceedings. I made it all the way to Cooper, the last speaker before Harris, and conked out. (Not his fault!) As soon as I woke up a couple of hours later, I watched Harris’s speech on YouTube — and was blown away!
oldster
She really stepped up. She can do this, and she’s good at it. We have another 10+ weeks of white-knuckle anxiety, but I feel less dread now than I have since this spring, when it became clear that Trump would not spend October behind bars.
We’ve got a shot, and I’m so grateful to Joe for making it possible.
Princess
@Jay: That’s true. You always see her in pants. Makes you think.
BretH
It’s like the soloist hitting all the notes bringing a symphony to a brilliant close.
Manyakitty
@Baud: there we go. Representation matters.
Jay
It was an amazing end to an exciting and heart warming convention.
Tony Jay
@OzarkHillbilly:
It’s the mystery that brings all the Independents to the voting booth.
WendyBinFL
What a fabulous photograph! It was captured by Todd Heisler of the NY Times. I believe the little girl is Amara Ajagu, Harris’ grand-niece. Last night Amara and her younger sister Leela offered a tutorial in pronunciation of “Kamala.”
Tony Jay
@Betty Cracker:
So you missed the interlude where they used the Tablet of Ahkmenrah to animate wax statues of all the Founding Fathers so they could perform an unscripted a capella rap diss of Trump, Vance, every member of the Sinister Six, McConnell, Pastor Mike and, in a very popular segue by John Adams, the entire musical output of Coldplay?
I’m sure you can catch it on YouTube, unless the bit at the end where Aaron Burr sneaked up behind Hamilton, wedgied him into a purple-faced coma while shouting “You sing like a Frenchman!”, then tried to incite the delegations from Kentucky and Tennessee to join him in attacking the Louisiana delegation and stealing all their ice-cream was too graphic and they’ve pulled the whole thing.
hells littlest angel
Yes, she did.
I’m glad it’s over. I’m wrung out.
K-Mo
Welp, I stayed up too late most nights this week, and I am tired.
But glad I watched Kamala last night. She has arrived. I think she established her own voice, and one that Americans can visualize and feel good about as their leader. She’s tough but tender, joyful but dead serious. She doesn’t shy from challenges. She’s got this.
Baud
@Tony Jay:
The DNC’s only bad move. Thomas Jefferson hitting on Harris was not cool.
Baud
I noted last night I don’t think her speech used the word “joy.” Thought it was interesting.
Last night was definitely aimed at normies in the middle.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Did Doug object?
Ramalama
There was some actual swearing last night by Kamala and also an F bomb by her in the video setting her up for ‘Merica. I was shocked because it felt real and good and … adult.
My wife who does not want to ever watch American politics, opted to stay up late to hear Kamala speak because French tv and Quebec tv went gaga for Michelle Obama in particular. So we watched the video, day later, and that revved her up to see what this Kamala would sound like. Blown away.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
Yeah, now there’s going to be a duel.
Suzanne
I feel asleep and didn’t see the speech yet, but these undecided voters are much less undecided!
K-Mo
@Baud: The convention as a whole was an astounding masterpiece. They hit us all week with the joy in her laugh and the love in her heart a and then she went up and said, Ok yeah, that’s true but I’m also a steely-eyed leader.
Suzanne
Oh, and I will also note that I continue to have positive interactions spurred by my KAMALA hat. One yesterday with one of the male teachers at my kids’ school.
Although the scene of two middle-aged white ladies cooing over Kamala in Trader Joe’s is probably too much of a cliche.
Ramalama
@K-Mo:
Her closing was stellar. Stella!
stinger
@Baud:
Thank you for the photo.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: What’s the over/under?
Quinerly
@Betty Cracker:
Good Morning, beautiful Betty! Thank you for this post and for all you do for Balloon Juice!!!!
Princess
@Suzanne: Big shout out in it to needing lots more housing. I thought of you.
Tony Jay
@Baud:
“You remind me of a girl I knew back when family meant something” was pretty creepy, yes.
PST
Great windup last night. I see and hear pundit comments this morning about Harris tacking toward the center, but I didn’t witness the slightest compromise of substance on any issue. Her emphasis on patriotism and national security is, I think, in the Democratic Party mainstream as well as the national mainstream. The view of American foreign policy and military power as a malign force in the world still prevails in some circles, and I have young relatives who will be severely turned off by the national security and pro-military aspects of Harris’s speech, but that isn’t the popular attitude these days. It isn’t 1968. Just look at the backgrounds of the people we have been electing to Congress in recent years. On immigration, we were stalemated for years by insistence on protection for the Dreamers as part of a grand compromise that would include issues like fixing the asylum system. That is the right and moral position, but the Democratic Party is a democratic party and we already backed off and supported the compromise bill because of overwhelming popular opinion. There was certainly no wavering on issues like voting rights, LGTBQ+ rights, or reproductive rights. These were all hammered home, not equivocated. In short, I thought Harris appealed to the middle, which she needs to do, without selling out.
The Audacity of Krope
So when Baud rises to the occasion, we’ll all know…
Quinerly
@K-Mo:
“She’s got this.”❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
prostratedragon
While we were attending to some vital business: Koch land grab in the Senegal region. They intend to exploit 7m acres of delicate, drought-prone land to grow alfalfa for export — basically exporting the rehion’s groundwater.
Baud
@PST:
It’s only “center” in that certain important topics are considered the domain of the center or the right.
Tony Jay
It’s almost a pity the Party of Hench already had their Convention. The abiding image would probably be a confused Clint Eastwood angrily berating an empty couch for an hour while Stench looked on, nodding.
stinger
@Suzanne:
Only if they own cats.
prostratedragon
@Betty Cracker: Awesome, wasn’t it? And she wore black — court dress.
OzarkHillbilly
NSW judge faces ban after scathing report criticises his handling of sexual assault trial
I mean, WTF?
stinger
I was impressed by her first few minutes behind the podium, before she even started speaking, when it became clear that she was trying NOT to exceed the length of the ovation that Joe had received.
Baud
@stinger:
Interesting interpretation. I think she was more worried about losing viewers if the show ran long.
Bupalos
She just keeps beating rising expectations. That speech was well crafted and she delivered it beautifully.
Jay
@The Audacity of Krope:
Eeeeeeeeew,….
Suzanne
@Princess: That’s one thing I am very glad she has been saying! Housing is partially a financial-security issue for individuals, but it’s also key to economic growth for us all. We have to have people able to live near where the jobs are!
And buildings have life cycles! We went on a huge wave of building in the midcentury period, and much of that building stock needs to be replaced and upgraded.
If we think of housing as social infrastructure, which it is, then it feels more logical that we need to invest in it.
zhena gogolia
@VeniceRiley: I actually might watch it again, which I never do. Still haven’t watched either Biden’s or the Obamas’, because I’m kind of allergic to the genre, but I can always watch Walz, and THIS ONE WAS PROBABLY THE GREATEST SPEECH OF MY LIFETIME
zhena gogolia
@Baud: YOu are bad.
zhena gogolia
@Suzanne: You are going to love the speech.
zhena gogolia
@PST: Yes, all of this.
Betty Cracker
The NYT description of Trump’s panicked flailing as Harris was stripping his ugly orange bark off before a national TV audience of millions:
Loo-hoo-hoo-ZER!
@Quinerly: ❤️
Fake Irishman
@PST:
So pundits are seeing a “pivot” that gives them joy when there was no signs of a pivot? And this might be working in our favor for once?
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
https://youtu.be/U-eGZ_wV0DU
Ken
I’m thinking their strategy now is to keep him as hidden as possible for the next two and a half months, and edit what they do show.
And by “they”, I mean the entire Republican apparatus — Trump’s campaign staff primarily, but also the media in their camp.
Baud
@Ken:
“Send out Vance! …… Oh.”
The Audacity of Krope
@Ken: They could always dump Trump off the ballot and quickly organize around a new prospect. Look how well that went for Democrats!
And I’m sure Ohio will be accommodating.
OzarkHillbilly
@Ken: So… No more rallies?
Ken
I’m waiting for those all-important (to some) ratings numbers. I’m hoping for a level six ketchup-throwing tantrum.
The Audacity of Krope
They’ve rented out a medium sized banquet hall and filled it with cardboard cutouts and crowd noise. He won’t notice the difference for at least 5 or 6 weeks.
Ken
@OzarkHillbilly: The media was already taking care of the rallies. A few pictures of Trump at the podium, a few crowd shots of sections that were (mostly) filled, and a brief summary along the lines of “Trump spoke today on foreign policy and economics” without mentioning the sharks, windmills, and the ten minutes where he thought Obama was the current President.
A Ghost to Most
When we fight, we win.
Quinerly
I took my first dive ever into Truth Social to read all his posts from last night. Truly the rants of someone deeply rattled by what is going on around him. Here’s a taste. Less than half his rants:
“Thank you to #BrianKempGA for all of your help and support in Georgia, where a win is so important to the success of our Party and, most importantly, our Country. I look forward to working with you, your team, and all of my friends in Georgia to help MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
“Here she comes into the Arena!”
“Too many “Thank yous,” too rapidly said, what’s going on with her?”
“WHERE’S HUNTER?”
“Walz was an ASSISTANT Coach, not a COACH”
“A lot of talk about childhood, we’ve got to get to the Border, Inflation, and Crime!”
“IS SHE TALKING ABOUT ME?”
“She wants to spend all of our money on Illegal Immigrants that are invading our Country!”
“She caused the Attack of October 7th. Iran was BROKE – Didn’t have money for Hezbollah!”
“There will be no future under Comrade Kamala Harris, because she will take us into a Nuclear World War III! She will never be respected by the Tyrants of the World!”
“Look, it’s Crazy Nancy Pelosi looking on, saying, “Where’s Crooked Joe?”
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@Betty Cracker: “Late-night comedy program”, when referring to that particular presenter, should have “comedy” in quotes. Because while they may call it comedy, I’m skeptical.
Geminid
@Quinerly: It seemed like Trump was not being sarcastic when he thanked Brian Kemp for his help in Georgia. Weird.
Quinerly
@Betty Cracker:
I went over to Fox’s website last night. (might be my first time) Looks like Brett and Martha had praised Michelle Obama and her speech at some point. That had to leave a mark.
BellyCat
Amazing convention in all ways!
Worth front paging is a graphic by FTFNYT that shows a comparison by age of donors to Biden (prior to withdrawing) and to Harris.
Very encouraging shift! Average age dropped TEN years (from 66 to 56) and the number below the average age swelled considerably.
Notably, the lower the age the less likely there is accurate polling.
Would provide link but dropped FTFNYT years ago. (Saw chart on Google News)
Betty
@Suzanne: Oh why did I watch that group of dopey guys? Oh, not enough policy. Just a backup and not ready. How do these people get dressed in the morning? Rant over.
Quinerly
@Geminid:
Very, very bizarre. That post by him seems to have come after Trump had been on the border a good portion of the day and just before Harris came out.
hrprogressive
It would be cliche to call it a “perfect” speech, because everyone is human and nobody is perfect.
But it’s amazing to me just how well she nailed it.
In my eyes, it didn’t matter which topic area she spoke of, she expressed something I both agreed with, and appreciated hearing.
I’m sure there are people On The Internet or in the media who will find things to bitch about, but that will always be true.
Standing up for reproductive freedom? Check.
Fix our immigration system and be a nation of immigrants while also maintaining national sovereignty and security at the border? Check.
Israel deserves freedom from terrorism while “ending the suffering in Gaza and giving the Palestinians the right to self-determination?” I’m sure the “real left” will hate it, but I agree with both statements, and can’t imagine why someone wouldn’t.
“An opportunity economy” where everyone can compete and thrive? Hell yes.
“Instead of a Trump Tax Hike, a Middle Class Tax Cut for 100M Americans?” Yep.
***
MSNBC was practically holding a funeral for the republic after Biden’s debate performance in June. Last night, they were all gushing about “We just saw the next POTUS”.
Damn right you did.
This is even bigger than Obama.
I think the country is ready for a Madame President, and Kamala fucking crushed it.
let’s get it done.
Betty
@Baud: That’s it exactly. It’s infuriating and past time for Democrats to make it clear that we are tired of the media’s stereotype of Democrats as unpatriotic.
Quinerly
@hrprogressive:
I think it is even bigger than Obama, too.
Ken
Heatstroke, maybe? I saw some pictures from that, and Trump did look kind of dry. Desiccated-corpse dry.
Baud
@Quinerly:
No predictions from me, but the party is in a much better place than it was in in 2008.
Spanky
@Ken:
No, this is what it looks like when a narcisstic stupid person has dementia.
(Edited to add the n word.)
OzarkHillbilly
Via OTB commenter Stormy Dragon, comes this little tidbit of news: Federal judge tosses Kansas machine gun possession case on Second Amendment grounds
Words fail.
Geminid
Yesterday CENTCOM announced that the USS Abraham Lincoln made it to the Gulf of Aden. The carrier was slated to relieve the USS Roosevelt which is scheduled to end its deployment soon, but Lloyd Austin had it hustle over from the Pacific Ocean early for a show of force.
A map of US Navy assets off the Middle East shows at least $200 billion worth of ships and carrier-borne planes in the area right now. Hopefully, the Roosevelt and Lincoln will head back to home ports on the West Coast when the Truman deploys from Norfolk next month.
Quinerly
I didn’t realize until last night that Kamala’s father is still alive. He’s 86.
I was a big fan of hers in the 2020 primary. She originally was my first choice back then. I read everything I could get my hands on in 2019/2020 about her growing up, background. Somewhere along the way I assumed he had passed away.
Quinerly
@Baud:
Yes!
And our party is much more united than it was in 2016.
TBone
Where’s Hunter? Have you checked in
Melanoma’sMelanie’s bedroom?Ken
@Spanky: Bluesky link to the picture I was thinking of.
(I don’t think that’s the thread where I first saw it, but it’s all over the place now. That thread has a pretty funny comment: Jesus, he looks like if RFK jr’s voice was a person.)
JWR
ICYMI, here’s Seth Meyers from last night. I love the way he keeps going back to his “the best Obama is stand up Obama” thing, replaying BHO talking about Trump’s weird obsession with crowd sizes. Obama’s timing is impeccable! ;)
And for those who don’t want to listen to the whole thing, here’s the link to where Obama makes his crowd size joke.
Another Scott
@hrprogressive: +1 Great speech.
The country was ready in 2016, but our antiquated Electoral College, and FTFNYT, and Comey, and butter emails, and Wikileaks, and all the rest were just enough to prevent it.
We’re more than ready now. We won’t be denied now.
Forward!!
Cheers,
Scott.
The Audacity of Krope
@JWR: I hadn’t seen the Mike Lindell thing. That was literally priceless.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone 😊 😊 😊
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
The Audacity of Krope
@rikyrah: Blech to you too.
sixthdoctor
@Betty: Not enough policy?
“Well, I’ll just vote for the insane idiot who ranted about racist bullshit for an hour with a pillow duct-taped to the side of his head.”
Sometimes I wish I didn’t have a job that frowned upon edible use.
Soprano2
I heard TCFG’s polling guy engaging in polling denial this morning on “Morning Edition”. “Oh, the polls are biased against us” he said. Funny how before Biden dropped out they weren’t saying that, huh?
The Audacity of Krope
It’s not enough to know she will build more housing and stop real estate investors from hoarding the housing to increase your costs; she must show every individual American how it will affect them to the penny.
Matt McIrvin
@Another Scott: Going by polling, Harris is still running behind where Hillary Clinton was all season in 2016–both the national and the state aggregation shows a close race with her barely ahead. The question is just whether polls are going to miss in the same direction they did then, in which case we’re fucked.
But polling misses are about changed circumstances defeating the turnout models. My gut feeling is that that’s working in our direction this time. Trump isn’t the great object of horrified fascination any more–he’s just a boring rambling old crank. There’s no drip drip of “Hillary emails” revelations keeping a nonsensical, endlessly mutating scandal story alive in the press. And our side clearly just desperately wants to turn out and vote in a way they didn’t in 2016 or even in 2020.
Geminid
One sign that Harris will win: her acceptance speech was 35 minutes long and had way more substance than Trump’s, which was almost 3 times longer.
The Audacity of Krope
@Geminid: Not a spare word in sight, much less a ramble. Tight, effective speech.
Another Scott
Meanwhile, … Snark!
Do the work, even if we’re all forgotten. Life is for the living, and making things better is the best use of our limited time. It’s important!
Forward!!
Cheers,
Scott.
OzarkHillbilly
The campaign is yet young.
The Audacity of Krope
Right. It took 22 years for the campaign against Hillary to reach that fever pitch.
Suzanne
OK, just had a hilarious interaction.
SCENE: Just after 8 AM, taking puppy for walk (woke up, drank coffee, and threw on clothes….still barely functional). Puppy starts pooping on the sidewalk. I realize, in abject horror, that there are no poop bags in the little holder on the leash. Looking around frantically for a nearby business who might be open to see if they can give me a plastic shopping bag. Spots pizza shop down the street who is receiving a shipment. I head down there, and call from the doorway.
ME: “Hey, I’m so sorry, can you help me out? Can I have a bag? My dog pooped on the sidewalk and I ran out.”
HIM: “Oh yeah!” :::gets three bags and hands them to me::: “And thank you for not leaving it there! Of course, you have a KAMALA hat, you wouldn’t do such a thing!”
—-
LOL.
Republicans: the Party of people who leave dog shit on the sidewalk.
prostratedragon
@Baud:
From Derek Guy:
Betty Cracker
@Suzanne: LMAO!
Quinerly
@JWR:
This is great. Thanks!
TBone
Second phase of campaign begins today. I hope we the democratic people pivot into attack mode, relentlessly, while the admin. joyfully continues the work of barnstorming the nation to GOTV and preparing our legal teams and voting infrastructure against rethuglican fuckery.
OzarkHillbilly
@The Audacity of Krope: Truth.
My point is only that they will try to smear her with something, no doubt many things in the hopes that one of them will have legs.
prostratedragon
@The Audacity of Krope:
This guy also had a crowd applause machine installed in his apartment, to keep him happy.
“You’re gonna love me!”
Ken
@Another Scott: I saw a cartoon similar to that; a guy on his deathbed, saying “my life is passing before my eyes”; four panels of him sitting in front of a computer screen; then a final whisper “beautiful”.
(As Terry Pratchett said, your life does pass before your eyes — it’s the part between being born and dying.)
OzarkHillbilly
That’s not the only place they leave dog shit.
TBone
@prostratedragon: let’s check the Weird Meter!
https://digbysblog.net/2024/08/22/weirdo-update
Yep, still pegged 😆 (Patton Oswalt is hilarious)
PST
@Fake Irishman:
That’s a good way to put it. I should have added gun safety to the issues on which Harris and the party doubled down rather than “pivoting” to the center. And just like reproductive rights, MAGA extremism lets us double down and still seize the center because our positions are popular. In a sense, the Republicans have spared us difficult and controversial choices by their relentless extremity. There could be real disagreements about how late in pregnancy abortion ought to be allowed purely as a matter of choice or what forms of gun ownership should be curtailed, but those disagreements can be deferred because of Republicans will not give a millimeter due to the power of their hardest core.
Suzanne
If you want to know why “affordable housing” isn’t being built in your area, it’s probably worth your while to dive into your municipality’s zoning code. Many municipalities have minimum lot sizes and then prescribed floor area ratio (FAR). There’s also usually setback requirements and height restrictions. Essentially, what happens is that the lots have to be at least a certain size (usually pretty big), then they mandate that a whole bunch of the lot can’t be built on (to make the neighborhood look spacious and keep houses from being “too close together”), and then the FAR requirement means that the house has to be at least a certain size (so it doesn’t look “too small”).
Then there is also “design review” on many projects, which is essentially a bunch of unelected people who add cost and complexity to buildings, and their approval is required before you even get a permit. “We need tile roofs instead of shingle. We want XYZ architectural style. We need more relief on this facade. We need more screening on the roof.”
Another Scott
Meanwhile, the world keeps turning…
TheWorld.org – Nearly half of Venezuelans are considering leaving the country in the coming months, poll says
Punching down and being nativist and mounting flags on pickup trucks with edgey tailgate wraps and waving foam fingers and carrying AR-15s to the dog park doesn’t do anything to address real problems. People know that a sugar high doesn’t and can’t last.
We tried that in 2016. It didn’t work. It made things worse.
There are real problems in the world that we need to address, and only America can help guide the solutions.
Return to sanity. Return to idealism. Return to thinking about what’s good and right and act.
Vote for Democrats. Make things better.
Forward!!
Cheers,
Scott.
UncleEbeneezer
@zhena gogolia: You gotta watch Michelle’s speech. It was so good and so much fun. And so wonderful to see the Black Women in the audience respond to Michelle. It was really something special.
Ken
Oh dear. I owe an apology to builders everywhere. I’ve been assuming that the modern house style — exterior walls of brick and siding and stucco and stonework, roofs of wood shingle and asphalt and copper — was a ploy to make sure all their members had repair work for years to come. Now you tell me it’s the natural result of the design being managed by a committee.
Belafon
@Suzanne: here in the DFW area, they are building like mad, but they are building giant houses on sometimes large parcels of land. This is designed to keep certain people out of neighborhoods. There is no need for 4000sqft houses on quarter to half acre lots. Most houses should be around 2000sqft. That would help with prices and availability.
Suzanne
@OzarkHillbilly: But “the people who leave dog shit on the sidewalk” are deeply known and loathed by us all.
espierce
@Geminid:
Pretty sure someone in the trump camp wrote that. The hashtag is the giveaway.
OzarkHillbilly
@Suzanne: I don’t know, I’m still pretty pissed about the asshole who left dog shit on my bus seat back in 1978.
danielx
Best political speech I ever heard. On a personal level she sounds like somebody you’d enjoy talking to in casual conversation. As opposed to SFB, who is the guy you’d start edging away from after listening to him for two minutes.
Quinerly
Been a fun week. I have watched all the major speeches twice. A bit obsessed here and way off any organized schedule of a retired person. JoJo’s hiking schedule has suffered. He is not amused. The moon has had the coyotes very vocal and he is convinced there’s a lady coyote calling to him personally. 😉
My roses that I added this year are all in full bloom and need attention. Annuals need deadheading. The house is a mess. I need to haul my trash today.
Got a guy coming today to look at my kitchen cabinets….all 38 doors and 22 drawers and talk to me about refacing/resurfacing/painting. They are pure 1993, and they are the only thing I hated about the house when I bought it. I know nothing about my options. Just know I ain’t ripping anything out and going through that mess. Need to get my head on straight from lack of sleep, lack of exercise, and come down from my DNC high.
Have a great day. Love reading all the positive posts and great links. We can do this. I just feel it. It’s BIG. It’s electric.
Ken
@Suzanne: There’s an intermediate group, “people who bag the dog shit but then leave the bag on the sidewalk”, which I cannot understand at all.
cmorenc
@Baud:
Helps that she was wearing pants. Pants that match her outfit.
Quinerly
@Ken:
Same people who bag shit and leave to the side on hiking trails.
Another Scott
@Suzanne: @Belafon:
+1
My J grew up in Concord, MA, right next to Lincoln, MA.
Lincoln had (dunno if it’s still the case) zoning that houses had to be on 2 acre lots. It put a pretty gigantic floor under housing costs. It’s intentional, and has lots of knock-on effects.
As Dean Baker reminds us many times, the US economy is a human construct. There’s no law of nature that says that people are entitled to monopoly rents, or overly restrictive patents and copyrights, or any of the other things that have gotten way, way out of hand in the US economy.
Change is hard. People really, really don’t like it when they see it coming and fear that it endangers their economic security. But lot sizes and all the rest affect much, much more than one’s personal net worth and economic security. People having to commute 2 hours a day because they cannot afford to live close to work, recreation, facilities, etc., is a huge cost (in addition to damaging the environment and sending billions of dollars overseas to people who are often monsters). It’s a giant inefficiency.
We can do better. We need to do better.
Cheers,
Scott.
TBone
@Ken: those are the “job creators.” They leave the work to someone else.
Suzanne
@Ken:
Depends. There’s bad decisions made everywhere.
But, as someone who has had to actually manage multiple projects through design review processes, I can assure you that it adds a lot of expensive bullshit. Design review came about in lots of places because people complained to their City Councils about “ugly buildings”. So in response, they added these layers of bureaucratic approval….. usually design review, then Council approval (which can take multiple tries)….. all of which is required before you can even get a building permit.
One project that I did was a senior living facility. The design review board prescribed three architectural styles that the owner was allowed to choose from (and all of them were sorta ornate). Then we designed to the budget, and there was a few rounds of back-and-forth with them — and remember that all this time and redesign adds huge cost to the project — in which they had us add more red tile roof, more shaded outdoor areas, more archways, more in-and-out detailing on the exterior. I agree that all of that stuff made it look nicer, but that’s the kind of thing that made the building more expensive but absolutely didn’t make it any more functional. So who ultimately bears that cost? The seniors who live there, in the form of higher rent.
BR
As I wrote last night, more than anything her speech was presidential. In that moment she seemed like she was the president. She didn’t try for a soaring dime-store Obama impression like Shapiro. She didn’t try to stuff her speech with one-liners or cheap attack lines like most other speakers. She didn’t even do a bunch of generic applause lines. Instead it was like she was having a conversation with us, and in that mode she seemed completely comfortable — and confident — in her own skin. I had no expectations of what type of speech she would give and whether it would work, and I certainly didn’t expect that, but it worked.
Suzanne
@OzarkHillbilly:
I deeply admire your ability to hold a grudge. Come sit by me.
VFX Lurker
That’s hilarious.
Glad the pizza shop guy helped you solve your puppy poop problem!
Kosh III
Bummed that the “Tennessee Three” were not allowed to speak. We need all the help we can get to get out of the Regressive Party hell we are in but once again the national party fails to help.
Belafon
@Suzanne: Never mind. You knew what I wrote.
Quinerly
@Kosh III:
I think they spoke. I saw them on the schedule
Edited to add: A quick Google tells me they were bumped for what looks like time constraints.
prostratedragon
@TBone: Yeah 😀😀 I had that one sitting around here too.
TBone
We the People in attack mode:
https://angrybearblog.com/2024/08/uaw-files-federal-labor-charges-against-donald-trump-and-elon-musk
They don’t even wait, they just file! 🇺🇸
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
Chris Matthews is on Morning Joe right now raving about how great the Democratic Convention was. He’s not the only one. One data point but maybe the MSM is getting to the point where they can’t completely deny reality.
TBone
@prostratedragon: 😆 ISWYDT 🛋️
Betty
@The Audacity of Krope: And the worst guy was the Black real estate guy. And shame on the UAW members who remain undecided.
Suzanne
I’m thinking back on another project, in which the design review board had us add a whole bunch of expensive precast panel systems to the exterior, because they thought the building looked too simple and plain. The comment was, “it looks like a 1970s office building”. Which it did not….. but even if it did, who TF cares?
Soprano2
@danielx: He’s the guy ranting at the end of the bar who everyone edges away from, who finally gets asked to leave because he’s making the other customers uncomfortable.
Scout211
@Quinerly: No, they were bumped.
ETA: I see you updated your comment.
TBone
@What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?: it was a feature on Good Morning America today!
snoey
@Ken: We had a MAGAT school committee member (since defeated) who kept campaign signs on her front lawn. Her neighbors used to leave the bags under the sign
BR
Oof, I am really happy I deleted my BlueSky account last night. I had a tab of it open not logged in and the griping about “cops” at the DNC and how Harris wasn’t speaking to the base from every single popular-ish poster was aggravating. It’s almost like people don’t know what the speech is for.
twbrandt
@prostratedragon: once in a while I (briefly) consider rejoining twitter just to follow Derek Guy.
Quinerly
@Scout211:
Yes, I realized that and edited my comment. Googling as I was walking out the door. I don’t think it was anything nefarious. Lots of interviews on line with them at the DNC. I guess it was all about time and getting Kamala on before 11pm.
Soprano2
@Suzanne: My sister built a house five miles outside a small town, but it was still in a “subdivision”. They had all these rules about how the house had to be built – it had to be natural materials or brick, the house had to be set back so far from the road, etc. These were all rules of the subdivision, not anything put in place by any government. I’m sure when you add that crap in it makes things even worse. She said their reasoning was they wanted the houses to look like they belonged there or something dumb like that. One reason I’ve stayed in my older neighborhood is that at least we don’t have an HOA breathing down our necks about every little thing.
K-Mo
@Ken: They are in trouble. They overinvested in the Oline and their QB can’t make any plays. That’s fine when you’re up 14 at the half but it ain’t good when you’re down a score in the 4th quarter.
sdhays
@Tony Jay: I think you mean, “While Stench nodded off.”
Suzanne
@Belafon: Yeah, I totally get it. It makes me crazy. Like….. houses are not really any different from any other product. There are cost savings to be found in simplicity and high volume and mindful use of land and materials. And that can be done profitably. But if we put these kinds of exclusionary barriers up….. then all that will get built is expensive stuff.
Like, Walmart makes more profit on clothes than Gucci.
prostratedragon
@twbrandt: I’ve been using nitter.poast.org — don’t have a twitter account. I find it interesting to read someone who has deep knowledge of some seemingly ordinary thing, plus he is often very funny.
narya
@Suzanne: There’s an empty corner lot a few blocks from me; it used to have a lovely old home on it, which was torn down a few years ago. There’s now a proposal to build a 6-story building, lot-line to lot-line as far as I can tell, with 52 units and . . . 9 parking places, in a neighborhood where parking can already be tight. It’s so annoying–it’s TOO MUCH, so of course the whole neighborhood objects, but I can’t help but think that a plan that had more parking and a smaller building wouldn’t have generated nearly as much opposition.
RevRick
CNN ran a focus group of eight undecided Pennsylvania voters and asked them if they had decided. Seven said they had… and SIX of them said Kamala! If that’s at all near to what undecideds were thinking and feeling nationwide, she’s broken the race open.
OzarkHillbilly
@Soprano2: Hmmmm… Not at all like Washington County. You can build anything you want here. Don’t even need a septic system. People can (and some do) just run a pipe to the roadside ditch and let the rain wash it into your neighbors yard or the crick down the hill.
Ain’t freedom grand?
(not making any counterpoint to Suzanne’s complaint, she is absolutely right, just noting the extremes can and do go the other way too)
Delk
@Suzanne: This is the affordable housing that is going up in my neighborhood. Took years to get off the ground.
Eolirin
@Betty: God, this isn’t meant as a knock on Harris’s speech, because I get why presidential candidates talk about policy the way they do, but I always find it so hugely disengenuous and with Trump on the ballot even more so.
In a perfect world there should be way less policy talk coming out of Presidential candidates. We’re not in a parliamentary system. The president doesn’t get to write laws, congress does. I again know why we don’t see our politicians drawing the distinction and most people don’t even know what the various executive agencies are, but I would so prefer the focus to be on what the candidate can do unilaterally and what kinds of laws they won’t let happen, because that’s real. What they want to see happen tends to run face first into the buzzsaw of our Congress, assuming there’s even a trifecta that allows for a chance of governing through legislation.
I’d also like people to stop pretending that Trump actually cares about policy or governing and that there isn’t a shadowy group of Christian nationalist organizations backed by billionaires calling the shots there. Like, the SCOTUS nominees were from a fedsoc list, Trump didn’t know who any of those people were. He didn’t know what any of the things his administration was doing or what any of it meant, except insofar as people were saying good or bad things about him, or it involved him directly. He’s not a mastermind driving us to awful consequences, he’s an easily manipulated chump being used (though not controlled, because you can’t really control him) by people with an actual agenda. His only agenda is to feed his ego.
TheronWare
Oh my god, if Chris Matthews says “hard left” one more time on Morning Joe! Ahhhhhhhhhh! Make it stop please!
Belafon
@Suzanne: And they’re building them that way 50 miles east of downtown Dallas, out at Greenville, but because demand is so high, those houses are selling for the same price as houses half the distance. So if traffic is now a nightmare way out east.
Ken
@RevRick: Not so fast, the NYT hasn’t checked with the Ohio diner crowd yet.
Scout211
I like the “show not tell” statement here, a nice contrast to Trump, who tells everyone all the time who he is, but shows everyone a very different version of who is really is.
Then a statement from Nancy Pelosi: A caution that the work is just getting started. I think I’ll bask in the joy for a few more minutes Nancy, but I get what you’re saying. LFG!
sdhays
@What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?: Just have say: Fuck Chris Matthews and fuck MSNBC for continuing to platform that misogynist piece of shit.
SatanicPanic
@BR: this is a great take. I think her speech was very modern. It was less about saying “here’s all the stuff I’ll do for you “ and more about saying “you can trust me”. That’s what people want to know.
TBone
Atrios is in attack mode (mock and ridicule) right now, using a Simpson’s screen shot to poke at Pumpkin Spice Pol Pot ending up like Howard Hughes. 👍
Princess
I feel like I watched the Simone Biles of speech giving last night. She nailed every single element especially the Israel/Palestine-empathetic-forceful-back-flip-triple-lutz-camel-spin-combination (look, I’m a skating fan, not gymnastics. Whatever.)
Eolirin
@Eolirin: I should probably make the subtext text here too; that the media keeps looking for presidential candidates to talk about legislative policy is so obnoxious. Those kinds of questions should be directed at Hakeem Jeffries and Chuck Schumer, not Harris. The media is in a position to know better. They could be reporting better. People are already deeply ignorant about how our government works and it doesn’t help when the media is constantly feeding into it.
Mousebumples
@BR: sorry it isn’t working for you. Like Omnes and others, I’ve been tightly managing my feed (including some voices that were reskeeting too many things I didn’t like), and I’m much happier there than I was on mastodon.
But to each their own. 😊
SatanicPanic
@Soprano2: I hate the way we demand every house look alike. It’s fucking weird.
Soprano2
@OzarkHillbilly: Polk County is like that, it’s north of us. She built in Christian County, which started growing like crazy about 20 years ago and finally had to institute some zoning rules because of it. I think most of the rules she had to follow didn’t come from the county, it was the people who platted the subdivision that made those rules for buyers.
Princess
@Suzanne: Harris explicitly mentioned ordinances that are preventing needed homes from being built. You gotta love it. Maybe she reads Balloon Juice!
TBone
@SatanicPanic: one reason I adore my neighborhood is that each house has a distinct and different personality of style. No two are the same.
JML
@sdhays: yeah, didn’t need his “stay away from the hard left!” analysis this morning, and the Morning Joe panel of “pander to the middle” BS.
Everyone seems to agree that Harris was great last night and the Dems had a great convention. Now the ratfucking media is out in force trying to pretend it’s because the Dems pivoted to the supposed middle (which in their minds is really wherever the DC media insiders happen to be standing) and not because we just spent 4 days proudly proclaiming our values and speaking about all the good we can do in the future.
Ken
@TBone: Why’d they use a Simpsons screencap, when the pictures from his Arizona event are available? The internet continues to rave:
“Trump looks like Bill Clinton if he had been stranded in the desert for a week.” — Kevin M. Kruse
“I didn’t realize Deadpool promo was still going on.” — Maureen
“It’s truer than the last time I said it — he looks like a handful of bleached anuses scattered on a plate of day-old polenta” — Popehat
“When you show your barber photos of Rand Paul and George Hamilton and say, “Can you do something like this?”” — A. Sharpie
“Donald Trump getting increasingly angry and panicked about the beautiful, unchanging portrait of himself he has stashed in his attic.” — Gross AND negligent
“That’s a guy who lied about the zombie bite.” — High Plains Biffster
EarthWindFire
@sixthdoctor: I watched too. The dude with not enough policy and voting for Trump used a lot of words to say he wouldn’t vote for a woman ever.
TBone
@Ken: ha! Atrios’s poke is great but those are EPIC! We the People ATTACK!
Thank you, I have no social media so I appreciate that roundup.
Stand back or you’ll get splashed while I do a cannonball into Lake Schadenfreude!
Eural Joiner
@Mousebumples: same here. It’s really about just curating your feed. I can’t recommend Kevin Kruse enough to start with – really good historian from Princeton who specializes in modern American politics and culture. Lots of great stuff all the time!
prostratedragon
Count the “I”s. CNN:
Trump’s businesses are raking in millions of dollars from Republican political campaigns
Thor Heyerdahl
There are plenty in the media who are deeply ignorant about how government works… their paycheck depends on it
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
@sdhays: Yeah I agree but he’s undeniably one of those Dems in disarray both sides media personalities and he’s gone full Kamala fanboi maybe at least some of the MSM will come along.
WaPo headlines this morning include “Harris Puts Trump in a Box and He’s Struggling to Break Out” and “Harris makes case for normalcy and 4 other takeaways.
TBone
My hubby put me to shame last night. I tried so hard to stay awake for the whole thing but failed miserably. Hubby is usually in bed, fast asleep, at 9pm. Today he is tired from watching the WHOLE THING while I had to catch up on YouTube this morning (I did see The Chicks and Pink live).
Hubby is truly excited about Kamala and Tim, and not just because he has the same last name as Tim but spelled differently. There is nothing else on the entire planet that he stays awake for. Nothing else screws with his bedtime!
TBone
@prostratedragon: it’s like they’re paying for a dive on a shoddily built submersible.
BretH
@Quinerly:
The Poop Fairy comes be each night and leaves a quarter where the bags were.
@Quinerly:
Ken
A (non-politics) meme I saw recently:
The tooth fairy is a Fae trap. They’re teaching kids it’s OK to invite the Fae into your house and sell them pieces of your body.
RedDirtGirl
@Ken: We have at least one of those people on my block.
Ksmiami
@Jeffro: If and when we win and win by a lot, Trump and his followers are going to blame the Project 25 designers and it will be glorious.
zhena gogolia
@Matt McIrvin: I was all fired up about Hillary after the convention in 2016, but that convention was a shitshow compared to this one, and that speech!
Omnes Omnibus
@Eural Joiner: Which just reminded me to go and make some adjustments.
zhena gogolia
@Suzanne: Great story!
Eolirin
@Princess: She’s from California. :P
Ksmiami
@prostratedragon: which clearly is money badly spent…
zhena gogolia
Trying to focus on work this morning is not easy!
Quinerly
The hummingbirds are keeping me on my toes this year. At least 3 nests, 20 plus hummers hanging around. Plenty of sages and agastashes, geraniums and other perennials to feast on. But….no…that’s not enough for Wainwright (if you know, you know) and his posse. Their feeders are empty so divebombing me this AM. Everybird needs to just settle down. “Hummingbird Wars.”
Ivan X
@RevRick: I saw that too. I mean, the whole premise of the thing was “we’re talking to the eight dumbest people in Pennsylvania” (because, undecided means possibly voting for Trump), but their comments were interesting and the result sure was heartening. I guess it’s an unusual situation since she hasn’t had a year of campaigning already, so people don’t know her, and some of these people just needed to see and hear that she had what it took.
I thought she threaded the needle of how to speak to the needs of voters across the spectrum really well. Unambiguous about women’s rights, protective of both Israel’s existence and Palestinian self-determination, lean into rather than run from being a prosecutor, use the border issue as a way to get at Trump and defuse “open borders” attacks. The message was “I have a big heart but I fight like hell and I will keep you safe” and I think that’s a really strong message.
Ken
@Ksmiami: But if they don’t spend the money, Trump might notice he’s not getting his cut, and nothing’s more likely to trigger him into saying bad things about the candidate.
It’s sort of like sacrifices to the volcano god; you just want to keep it quiet.
Matt McIrvin
@zhena gogolia: I remember the 2016 convention buzz as being all about the effort to rein in Bernie’s supporters, and his people expressing displeasure from the peanut gallery.
The difference this time around is that while there’s dissension over Gaza, it hasn’t coalesced behind a candidate (since the biggest primary challenger to Biden was actually further to his right on this), and we had 52 delegates voting “Uncommitted” versus over 4,500 for Harris.
Gloria DryGarden
@Quinerly: a friend yesterday posted a front cover of one of professor Harris books on economics. With a comment about Marxism.
no idea what to make of it.
Betty Cracker
@Ivan X:
Exactly right. I thought Harris managed the difficult task of communicating relatable values and familiar themes to those dumbasses while also inspiring us hyper-partisan oddballs. Not easy, but she did it.
Bupalos
@Scout211: This is an element of the Harris campaign that I profoundly agree with. I don’t think Hillary constantly referencing the glass ceiling as a motivational thing really worked. There are some truths that in an electoral context don’t do you any good to say, even when they are very true. It is a very important representational issue that we elect a woman. But making the argument out loud doesn’t actually help and may hurt.
I feel the same way about over-reliance on arguments about the existential nature of this election for democracy, which Biden was I think guilty of, but which the Harris campaign is smartly deemphasizing. There is in fact a growing existential threat to democracy and this election is extremely important in opposing that threat. But saying it out loud to get votes doesn’t help, and may hurt. It comes pretty close to “you really have no choice here but to vote for me,” which is democratically ironic.
MomSense
@hrprogressive:
It’s bigger than Obama because of the Obamas. He once said being president is like running a relay race. You do your best and you hand it to the next runner to keep running the race.
K-Mo
@Matt McIrvin: Agreed.
Steve LaBonne
@Ivan X: It was a super disciplined speech carefully designed to hit a whole series of marks. That could have made it dull, but Harris brought it to life by skillfully varying her tone and speaking with real passion when called for. Impressive performance and I think it will be really effective. She is so absolutely the right candidate for this moment.
Steve LaBonne
@Gloria DryGarden: Why would you make anything of it?
Ruckus
@The Audacity of Krope:
How?
Suzanne
@narya: So that’s a difficult thing. Six stories is kind of a magic number, because it’s usually the maximum you can build before a building becomes officially a high-rise. And high-rise buildings have some expensive additional code requirements. So the developer is obviously looking to maximize the profit potential of the land (highest and best use). And parking is actually super-expensive to build…..either you eat up more of the site with it, with a surface parking lot. Or they build a garage, which is expensive and then neighbors complain about how they look. And all that stuff adds cost to the project, which means the sale price or the rent price of the unit has to be higher to cover it.
“Affordable housing”, which is just housing….. is really only affordable if it’s simple and efficient. Boxy buildings, less ornamentation and detail, fewer amenities, smaller lots. Can still be very nice and well-constructed, and well-proportioned.
Fair Economist
@Suzanne: This is my concern with Kamala’s housing promises. The barriers to housing construction are mostly at the local level, and there’s not much to do at the state or federal level to fix it. Even barring R1 zoning didn’t do much in CA; municipalities created a thicket of absurd rules to make building the additional houses impossible. There isn’t much Harris can do to fix things.
Matt McIrvin
@BR: My one Democratic-skeptical lefty tech guy follow on Mastodon is still really mad that the Palestinian Uncommitted speaker wasn’t allowed to talk. But that’s the one note like that I’m seeing there, and I basically deliberately keep following him because he’s pretty smart and I’m uncomfortable with entirely cutting myself off from these sorts of voices.
Sometimes he reposts people who are far more irritating than he is, though (that’s usually the way).
UncleEbeneezer
@zhena gogolia: The 2016 convention was great too, and tried to do a lot of the things that this one did so effectively (like highlighting diversity, women etc.). But imo, we, as an electorate, just weren’t ready for it because we were still so consumed with Hillary hatred (and understandable fear of Trump). We could’ve been joyful and excited about Hillary, but too many people simply refused to do so. As we saw with Biden, there’s only so much a candidate or the DNC, can do when their supporters are in arms-folded, skeptical, back-stabbing mode. Production improvements aside, we could’ve brought this exact same energy for Hillary in 2016 and Biden in 2024. But many just didn’t want to do that. Go look on Twitter or FB archives and you can see people on our side who were still bashing Hillary right up until Election Day. I know people will say the difference was that Hillary and Biden were somehow lesser candidates than Kamala, and there’s some truth to that, but I don’t put the blame on them, I put it on us.
All that said, I’m thrilled that people are so excited about Kamala. But I also think many are overstating how much she’s improved since 2020. She always was this great. But many people were just so enamored with Bernie and Warren, M4All litmus tests and eating up bullshit “cop” narratives, that they just weren’t ready to let themselves see her greatness. Now they are, and that is a wonderful thing. Better late than never. We’re not going back!!!
TBone
Vox video: Kamala Harris, Explained in Seven Moments
https://youtu.be/cA5C5SIGECs
SatanicPanic
@Fair Economist: Couldn’t you just invalidate those laws at the state level? That’s what CA did with ADUs- make building by right if it meets regulations set at the state level.
K-Mo
@Eolirin: Come to think of it, Project25 is one area where Trump has been more or less honest, insofar as he’s said, he doesn’t know what’s in it and he wholeheartedly supports it.
Suzanne
@OzarkHillbilly: Those kind of requirements are much more common in urban and suburban municipalities. Which are where we need to build most of our housing.
Betty Cracker
I’m baking banana bread, and I wish y’all could smell my house! On the other hand, it’s probably just as well — two loaves isn’t enough for everyone.
TBone
@Matt McIrvin: Wonkette published a transcript of that speech today. Georgia Rep. Ruwa Romman:
https://www.wonkette.com/p/thank-you-thank-you-thank-you-friends
TBone
@Betty Cracker: mmmmm yummy
Omnes Omnibus
@Fair Economist: The federal government got Wisconsin to raise its drinking age by threatening to withhold highway funds. It has tools of it chooses to use them
Fair Economist
@JML: I say we carpe diem and say we pivoted to basic centrist American values like sensible gun control, reproductive freedom, fair taxes, equal marriage, and children getting to eat lunch. Let’s redefine centrism and leave the Republicans stranded.
Honestly, they are centrist American values, it’s just that media bothsiding has defined “centrism” as in between our normal values and goals and their crazy ones.
Matt McIrvin
@UncleEbeneezer: I recall that you could see it even on Balloon Juice–some commenters who were sort of grudgingly accepting that they were probably voting for Hillary Clinton, with these backhanded compliments about how they hoped she’d bring her disturbing supervillain energy to bear in a positive direction
(But I’ll be happier if/when I see the difference in the polls. Harris is running way ahead of where Biden was before the switch, but she’s not running ahead of where Clinton was in 2016–the poll aggregates all still show a disturbingly close race. They haven’t had time to incorporate the effect of the DNC though.)
dww44
@What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?: but he also spent a lot of words and time to point out how Kamala and the convention planners marginalized the “Hard Left”. He would not let it go. I had to hit the remote. I’m so sick of the pundit second guessing of what and how Dems should say and behave. Maybe I’m missing it but I don’t see this happening to the GOP.
narya
@Suzanne: Even six stories requires a re-zoning, which is how/why the neighborhood is up in arms. There are a LOT of apartment buildings, both condo and rental, and a fair number of (old, lovely) single-family homes, so it’s a reasonably densely packed neighborhood already. There’s a lake on one side, and a cemetery at the north end, so no expansion in those directions. I haven’t seen anyone objecting to the style of the building though–“boxy” would be fine if there were places to park, I suspect. Honestly, it’s the thing that made me object: I don’t have a car, but my friend-who-visits-on-weekends does, and it’s already difficult to find a spot sometimes. The other thing I learned is that it really sounds like it will be to the edge of the sidewalk or alley on three sides, so, IMHO, too big for the lot. I can think of at least one other lot that is bigger and wouldn’t pose these problems, too–and it’s even closer to public transportation.
Quinerly
@Omnes Omnibus:
Same with Louisiana. Actually, I think LA was the last state to cave and actually went thru a period where funds were withheld. Could be wrong. I’m going to check.
Suzanne
@Fair Economist: Agree.
To me, the biggest thing that the federal government can do is change the incentives. I would look to change the tax code to disincentivize any person or company from owning more than two single-family units. Apartments make sense owned by management companies, but houses don’t.
Also, I would look to make doling out federal $$$ for transit projects conditional on approval of new housing unit construction.
Fair Economist
@SatanicPanic: What California has found is that invalidating a given zoning law doesn’t fix things because municipalities cook up another one. What is finally getting some results (although much less than you’d think) is a threat to completely take away a municipality’s power to limit construction. But that’s not something Harris can do.
oldgold
I am not a fan of Peggy Noonan, but today, like a blind sow, she may have stumbled upon an acorn of truth.
Quinerly
@Gloria DryGarden:
Take a look at his Wiki page. I think attacks about her father and digging around about him will be the next red hot Fox/NewsMax thing.
TBone
Powell, how low will you go?
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2024/08/23/fed-jerome-powell-speech-rates-september/74911103007/
(Rate cut ahead)
https://angrybearblog.com/2024/08/soft-landing-house-construction-holds-up-with-high-interest-rates
Matt McIrvin
@Quinerly: There’s what plays on Fox/Newsmax, and there’s what the “legit” outlets are willing to euphemize as ominous clouds and shadows. “Hillary’s emails” and Biden’s age had a sufficient legitimate hook that they could show up there, even if the craziest speculations didn’t get an airing. What I wonder is if there’s anything that can get that kind of traction. There’s not a lot of time.
K-Mo
@Betty: For a long time patriotism was confused with military buildup and willingness to engage in warfare. Plenty of theories as to why. But because of our strong anti-war wing we have long suffered a baseline of distrust from certain quarters. Fair or unfair, it’s no longer relevant. The Republicans are now the party that denigrates the military and projects weakness on the world stage. Let them suffer for it.
Fair Economist
@Suzanne: Even with requirements for housing to build transit, most municipalities will say “ok, no transit then”.
I agree on the incentives idea. In those cases where the municipality wants more houses, the feds can help them get it done. And that will help. But as long as 95% of the country lives in places that are doing their best to drive up their house values bt preventing construction, we will still have a crisis
Edit: Some places in CA are now trying to limit bus services because CA law requires allowing apartment construction in certain areas near transit, including frequent bus service. It’s just nuts.
Suzanne
@narya: I get it. Your concerns are basically the concerns everywhere. My neighborhood is always having parking freakouts, too….. which is why Pittsburgh has a culture of “parking chairs”.
The other lot is probably more expensive to develop. Either a more favorable location, or infrastructure connections are further away, or there’s some sort of weird limitations on it such as an easement that limit what can be done with it.
SatanicPanic
@Fair Economist: Tweaking the rules for ADUs seems to be working though.
zhena gogolia
@Matt McIrvin: How was Biden in 2020?
A Man for All Seasonings (formerly Geeno)
@TBone:
That’s like the neighborhood I grew up in. Up and down the length of the street, there were no two the same.
Steve LaBonne
@Matt McIrvin: I think Josh Marshall was right to say that the Republicans had around 3 weeks after Harris became the presumptive nominee to define her in the public mind before she could define herself- and she won that race by a mile. I’m cautiously optimistic that they don’t have time to recover. Trump’s inability to control his senile rambling helps a lot.
Betty Cracker
@oldgold: It’s rare, but sometimes she does. Care to elaborate? I allowed my WSJ subscription to expire.
Quinerly
@Quinerly:
The loopholes in Louisiana’s drinking laws were finally closed 10 years after the minimum age was raised in 1986. Up until 1996, people under 21 could drink at family events, at home, and in other instances. As I recall LA had to close those loopholes or the state would lose federal highway money. For years, the bars in NOLA refused to enforce the 21 minimum age.
As an aside, the drive thru big gulp cup daiquiri places always made me shake my head. They were still around in the 2000’s. Might still be around. Ugh.
tam1MI
Reminds me of the news story of some weeks ago about the woman in (of course) Florida who plugged up a sewer line near her property with cement so now everybody else in the neighborhood is experiencing catastrophic floods.
And it being Florida, of course, the government is doing absolutely nothing about it.
Matt McIrvin
@zhena gogolia: Also way ahead of where Harris is now. And way ahead of how he actually did in the election, state-wise–though that wasn’t a polling miss, it was that there was this dramatic narrowing of the race right at the end that looked scarily like it might be a replay of 2016.
If Trump manages to do his October/November come-from-behind thing a third time and we’re in this position, we’re in big trouble. But these things don’t come out of the blue, they happen for reasons.
Trump’s campaign did manage to keep him relatively quiet for the last couple of weeks, both times, and kind of let political gravity operate. But in 2016, there was the Comey letter timed exactly so that it would do maximum last-minute damage to Clinton’s campaign without actually delivering any substance at all. In 2020, I think it was more undecideds breaking late for Trump, don’t think there was anything specifically damaging about Biden that came out then.
Soprano2
It wasn’t working because normal people don’t believe it. It sounds crazy and overblown to them. Thus the pivot to “weird”, which normal people definitely get.
Steve LaBonne
@Quinerly: Because “Communist” is an attack that resonates very strongly with voters whose average age is “dead”.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: She uses it in fundraising appeals to the base, which is the right place to use it.
Betty Cracker
@Steve LaBonne: Unfortunately, lots of Floridians who are still alive and voting are extremely susceptible to that bamboozle.
Suzanne
@Fair Economist: Agree. The fundamental mindset shift we have to have is that change is coming whether we like it or not. It is literally the pattern of thousands of years of civilization. We can’t sprawl outward forever. If we don’t build more where jobs exist, the only results that we will get are more people crammed into living situations they don’t like and all the discontent that comes with that, or they spend crippling amounts on rent and never build wealth, and we’ll have a worsening homelessness issue.
Matt McIrvin
@Steve LaBonne: The “Communist” smear also works with immigrant communities from left-wing authoritarian states. Trump used it in Spanish- and other foreign-language channels in 2020 with some success. There were voters worried that Biden and Harris were basically the Khmer Rouge.
Steve LaBonne
@Betty Cracker: Who knows if it means anything but the accounts of all those Villages residents rallying for Harris on their scooters were fun to read. I do think there has been some progress in getting folks my age and older to understand what Republicans want to do to Social Security and Medicare. (I’m personally scared to death of what they would do to Medicare. We’d all be forced into Medicare “Advantage” plans even shittier than the ones that exist now. If you get sick, die quickly.)
Geoduck
Both the NYT and the Post have articles on their websites grumbling that the Dem convention protests fizzled.
Steve LaBonne
@Matt McIrvin: Any serious effect is pretty much limited to Florida though. It’s the Cubans and Venezuelans who buy that stuff. And Harris is not going to win Florida short of a Reaganesque landslide.
Kent
Well, Trump’s stock is crashing
Literally: https://www.cnn.com/markets/stocks/DJT
Steve LaBonne
@Geoduck: They wanted their 1968 convention so bad they can taste it. Sucks to be them.
catclub
@narya:
I have visited Bari in Italy, which is a no-name Italian city that probably has more than a million people.
6 and 8 story apartment buildings up to the sidewalk.
Fair Economist
@SatanicPanic: Yes, we are finally getting some ADU construction, after *three* major revisions to laws dealing with local obstruction. But even now, it’s mostly in friendly municipalities like LA proper, and it’s still not remotely enough.
Roberto el oso
One of the things that struck me about Trump’s calling in to Fox and the non-stop tweeting (or whatever it’s called on his pretend platform) is the terrible alone-ness of the man. The DNC was awash in visible examples of familial love, a lot of us were watching with others, or texting friends, relatives, etc. Trump has no one. And neither his wife nor any of his children seem remotely interested in intervening on his behalf as he undergoes what looks like an increasingly rapid breakdown. He is alone and no one cares, and even the diehard fanatics at his rallies aren’t really there for him, but for some imagined creature that writhes about in their minds.
jonas
@Kent: If you bought in a year ago, you’re still a bit ahead, but if you bought in the last six months thinking you were on a rocket ride to the moon, yeah, you’ve taken a bath. Spare a tear for all the MAGAts who claim they’ve put their entire IRA into DJTM or whatever. Actually, you don’t need to do that. It’s ok to point and give ’em a good Nelson Muntz laugh. *Ha! ha!
SatanicPanic
@Geoduck: I didn’t really get that impression from the WaPo story
jonas
@Geoduck: Shorter FTFNYT: “Our ‘Dems in Disarray’ narrative failed to materialize. Curse you, Harris!”
Jackie
Didn’t RFK Jr’s wife threaten divorce if he endorsed TCFG?🤔
JWR
@Matt McIrvin:
While poking around for post-event news last night, I heard somebody say that Trump has chosen “Comrade Kamala” as his epithet of choice.
What Have The Romans Ever Done for Us?
@dww44: Yeah the obsession with the “hard left” whatever he means by that is annoying, especially when the hard right is an existential threat to the American form of government in a way that the hard left has never been and never will be.
The transition obviously isn’t complete and maybe never will be but maybe we’re approaching an inflection point where at least the mainstream left is accepted as the political norm by the non Fox news media. Or maybe I’m getting out over my skis here based on a couple examples that may just be temporary glitches.
Kay
@hrprogressive:
Well, everyone “agrees” with the Gaza statement in the speech. The issue is none of it has happened – we’re much further away from it than we were in January. US reporting doesn’t reflect this but Israeli and other foreign media do. It’s the consensus view outside US media – that no progress has been made and arguably the parties are further apart. That’s just a fact. The US media view is rosier than anywhere else. It’s the outlier.
Im driving back from Cleveland in a car my son bought that has satellite radio though and I was surprised (and pleased) CNN has an Arab American political correspondent who spoke with both Palestinian Americans in Chicago and Arab Americans in Dearborn, so at least we can hear from them directly. I confess I didn’t foresee CNN asking them, but kudos to them. Good job.
I also saw Kamala shirts on people in Cleveland – that’s a good sign – Clevelanders are pretty grounded – if they’re wearing rah rah tshirts that’s a sign to me that the enthusiasm is real.
Ken
It’s Beyoncé!
jonas
@Steve LaBonne: Older Vietnamese and Cambodians (and not a few Chinese) on the West Coast buy into that stuff as well. Why Dems haven’t been able to flip that narrative in places like FL esp. is frustrating, however. I mean, it’s Trump now who is bending over to kiss authoritarian ass around the world, but that doesn’t seem to count for some reason.
Chris
@Another Scott:
It really is spectacular how totally that country has cratered. Cuba at its worst was never close to this. Even Haiti and the Northern Triangle countries are still doing better than Venezuela on standard of living and crime rates the last time I looked, though not by all that much.
Quinerly
@Steve LaBonne:
Totally agree.
K-Mo
@Matt McIrvin: I think:
jonas
Yeah, Dave Davies on Fresh Air yesterday interviewed a rather sober-minded Middle East specialist about what the prospects for a ceasefire are, and what kind of post-war order could be established in Gaza to start rebuilding, and the outlook is…not good. Everyone there is fucked — Israelis and Gazans. Even moreso than before.
narya
@catclub: And in other areas (including in my neighborhood!) it’s like that and just fine; I just think it ends up being one more strike against this particular plan, which is unfortunate. I would definitely like to see more construction/affordable housing around here, and I hope the powers that be continue to work on it, with affordability in mind.
BR
I’ve surprised myself by watching Roland Martin’s YouTube videos often. I feel like he provides a window into the Black community that the media doesn’t show.
I was super surprised that 1) he interviewed NYC’s mayor Adams about the Middle East, and 2) Adams was actually really sensible about it — talked about how important it is to speak to the importance of all civilians who are in harms way, in Gaza, in Sudan, in Congo.
Steve LaBonne
@jonas: What are the purple West Coast states where that might make a difference?
jonas
@K-Mo: And compared to 2016 and 2020, Trump is so clearly just worn out and declining. I mean, at that presser he held with some LEOs down in AZ or TX or wherever yesterday to bloviate about his border wall, he just looked haggard. He could barely mumble what few prepared remarks he did bring with him and the rest was just the kind of slurry word salad he’s been offering lately.
Matt McIrvin
@Chris: Ronald Reagan wasn’t inherently a fan of immigration–he was as racist about Mexicans as anyone–but he wisely chose to play up the “nation of immigrants” rhetoric to welcome people from Communist countries with a lot of anti-Communist red meat, and it built his base with new citizens.
It’s struck me as interesting that today’s Republicans basically don’t do this. They’re willing to fearmonger about people who you’d think would be natural allies of the Republicans–people who often have basically conservative values and a seething hatred of Commies. The Republicans talk about nefarious Democrats letting them in, without acknowledging that the only thing that really makes them potential Democratic votes is the Republicans’ own behavior. If they just weren’t so damn bigoted against them, they could accelerate the naturalization of these people and get their votes!
And as I mentioned, they do make sometimes-successful plays for the votes of the ones who are already citizens. They just can’t get it together as a coordinated strategy because the need to be racist is just too strong.
prostratedragon
@narya: Odd that they wouldn’t provide more, since if my guess as to where that is is correct it’s not ideal for Transit Oriented Developement. Many might use the bus but one would think at least half would have cars.
oldgold
Oops forgot to paste Noonan’s acorn:
“Democratic Party has more substantial characters of recent American history to parade around on stage. The Clintons, the Obamas, Jesse Jackson, who, whatever your view of him, was there, on the balcony at the Lorraine Motel, when Martin Luther King was shot. This conveyed a party with a storied past, and if you join it you’re joining something real. The Republican Party, in its great toppling, has rejected its past. You lose something when you cast your history aside, and all you’ve got for prime time is Trump sons.”
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Good old “X-Over-1”, or as the market-rate developers here call it “Mixed Vacancy”. Another market urbanist turd of a concept that isn’t playing out the way the glibertarian-funded academics/think-tanks and their astroturf propaganda groups (bet most of you didn’t know that the first one in CA, the one that’s helped push most of it’s “have-the-exact-opposite-of-what-they-claimed-would-happen” agenda was funded by Peter Thiel) say it would.
Yup, same Peter Thiel that gets roundly beaten on by self-professed progressives are helping push and gaslight the same Reaganomic For Housing grift he continues to fund nationwide.
prostratedragon
@tam1MI: Are there no dungeons?
PatD
@Belafon: People don’t need huge pickup trucks and SUVs either but there’s a reason people keep buying them. Compact neighborhoods and reasonably sized homes are better for housing density but you can’t deny that people do seem to want all that land and space.
jonas
@Steve LaBonne: It’s not as big a deal at the statewide level as it is in FL perhaps, but in local, state, and Congressional races, conservative/anti-communist Asians are a not-at-all insignificant constituency in places like the OC in southern California.
tam1MI
In all fairness, a bunch of protest organizers wrote a bunch of checks with their mouth that their asses couldn’t deliver.
It’s on the dip shit media for falling for it, though.
Denali5
@BettyCracker,
I want some banana bread NOW. In the words of my granddaughters.
Quinerly
This fits here since we are talking about how 2016 was different from today. I was just scrolling thru FB memories and as I recall back then I had a lot of “friends” who were Bernie Deadenders, one being an ex boyfriend who was a 70 yo trust fund baby even in 2016. I must have been trolling on this day in 2017 with this post:
“12% of the Saint Bernie primary voters voted for Trump in the general. No, you don’t want to hear what I’m thinking. I’ll just leave that tidbit here.I gotta basement to finish cleaning.”
I just don’t see these old Berners voting for Trump this time. My personal experiences with them was they truly hated HRC.
Tony Jay
@sdhays:
See, this is why I need editors.
artem1s
the last 4 days have been amazing and informative for voters. HOWEVER the convention business all happens in boring meetings during the day. If the MSM really cared about policy they’d be watching those meetings on the convention website or attending them and then reporting on them. But they don’t. They are only interested in the Vegas side show parts of the convention. I’d actually prefer the two be completely separated. Let the press have their dog and pony show. The roll call can still be a show, but the rest should be boring. Nothing important or difficult in governing happens in front of a camera. Harris was my first choice in 2020 because I know as a prosecutor she understands you can’t win a case by only be writing and delivering a fancy speech. You win with prep.
But we’ve all been seduced into believing that speeches and rallies and debates are what we should judge our candidates by. That’s a poor measure of whether a candidate can actually do their job. To be honest, it’s only a good measure of how well a presidential candidate can weasel word the parts of governing they have no control over if they don’t have a majority in Congress. Harris knows legislating is team problem, not an I problem. As Pelosi noted, having a successful event doesn’t matter if come election day the fickle voters have gotten bored and decide to get distracted by some other butterfly.
It’s important to know how to interview for a job. And the Dems have demonstrated they can do that. But it’s gonna get boring now. We and the MSM is going to hear the same stump speech and the tone and messaging police will start to get antsy. Hopefully the usual suspects don’t assume that means the candidate is also boring and they start piling on the way they have been prone to do (JoeMUSTgo) when they think ‘nothing is happening’.
suzanne
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: You love to throw out that line about “Reaganomics for housing”, which I still don’t understand what you mean by that…..but what do you actually stand for? Not building housing? How would you propose housing a growing population? Are you envisioning a return to large-scale public housing? Where do you propose that goes? Somewhere Else?
prostratedragon
@oldgold: That actually is a good little nugget.
TBone
@Quinerly: when I was a proud alcoholic in my yute, I applauded that drive-thru-and-drink innovation. Because we here in Pennsylvania had only what are called State Stores and they were never convenient. I thought about starting up a taxi service (Media, PA had none back then) that doubled as a liquor home delivery service. This was all before cell phones and apps. I thought I was a genius 🙄 😆
Steve LaBonne
@artem1s: Organizing a successful convention only a month after your candidate changed is a huge test of the party organization and the Harris campaign. It would be an understatement to say that they aced that test.
SatanicPanic
@artem1s: Are you saying we should be hoping for a boring campaign?
Matt McIrvin
@suzanne: I think he means the idea of encouraging building a lot of dense housing that isn’t specifically low-income housing, even luxury condos and such, in the hope that increasing the general supply will bring prices down across the board and increase affordability. So, a basically supply-side, trickle-down approach to housing prices. I’ve seen this line from urbanist advocates who don’t consider themselves right-wingers in general. He’s saying that this hasn’t had the effect they promised where it’s been tried.
I guess there could be the same kind of induced-demand effect we see with highway construction: new building just bringing in new demand that doesn’t have any effect of unclogging the market.
Elizabelle
I think we are going to win too. Please let us take the House and Senate too. Wave election.
Which is why all the cautions about close election. Take nothing for granted.
But optimism is a powerful help and weapon.
Matt McIrvin
@artem1s: I wonder if stump speeches even make sense any more–they were a thing invented for an age before electronic media, when in-person appearances by a candidate traveling around the country were the main way people made contact with the campaign. Now, you get national media struggling to cover the same speech over and over and getting bored.
Maybe part of Trump’s appeal is just that because the guy rambles off script and relays messages from the bees in his head, he might actually say something he hasn’t said before, and that keeps him interesting to political journalists. (But his rambles are repeating themselves now.)
MisterForkbeard
@Matt McIrvin: One thing I always note is that the Biden GOTV operation in 2020 was really hamstrung by covid. Even with more support, we just weren’t able to get our people out as well because we were being very careful about accidentally killing people. The Republicans weren’t.
We don’t have that deficit this time. This time, our GOTV efforts are well funded, enthusiastic, and Republicans are basically relying on the same set of “external” grifters they rely on for everything else.
Chris
@jonas:
Bibi has made it clear that he desperately wants Trump to win and will do whatever he can to help that happen. He’s not going to sign off on a ceasefire any time before the November election.
Matt McIrvin
@Quinerly: It seemed to me that there were a substantial number of low-info voters who thought of Bernie Sanders as the moderate candidate in the race, who had been rejected by the Democrats in favor of the far more radical Hillary Clinton. All I can think is that “man vs. woman”, and perhaps Sanders’ old-Left class-first focus which deemphasized cultural issues, were the main things they were basing that on.
Quinerly
@TBone: ☺️
When I came thru in NC, 18 for beer and wine. 21 for liquor. Liquor bought and still bought from ABC stores. After undergrad and after I went to St. Louis, NC got “liquor by the drink” in bars and restaurants. Up until then, some restaurants had a “brown bag” license where you brought your hard liquor in with you and bought “set ups.” Then it was illegal to go home with an opened bottle of alcohol so people would try to finish their bottle of Crown Royal or vodka.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Everybody should note the “reply guy” behavior here, it’s what we see on Housing Twitter from “market urbanists” (they go by another name) with a national profile, again helping push a Reaganomic economic component funded by glibertarians like Thiel. People who always need to get the last word in, it’s somewhat trollish behavior designed to bait one into debating them from their point of departure. They are not honest brokers. Note that whenever links to billionaire funding (the Koch’s have also been up to their eyebrows in this for the last dozen or so years), the only answer is basically “SQUIRREL!!!!”
It’s the main reason I started commenting here after mostly lurking for all these years: I saw this crap, same crap that Lemiuex peddles occasionally at LGM, being spewed with nobody actually saying “This is nonsense”.
Glibertarians wound up a crop of mostly young, entitled white bros (but not entirely bros) who were already predisposed to be pricks and told them they were doing the work of MLK Jr on housing.
They are either people on the real estate industry payroll in one form or another (planners, builders, developers, architects, etc) or people too uninformed to know that the only folks who say these things are being paid.
And the developers are laughing at them from their mountain homes in Telluride, or Aspen, or a yacht.
I always encourage such people who live in SFH to sell and move into one of the places they peddle (or something like a 6-unit slothome fuglyplex). Some of the more prominent people nationally live quite comfortably in their SFH either in a burb with a massive garage and lots of cars or in tony, urban-core SFH ‘hoods, it’s basically “White Picket Fence For Me But Not For Thee”.
I have a million pieces on this so it’s hard to pull one that provides a succinct overview:
https://www.citywatchla.com/planning-watch-la/27952-why-the-housing-crisis-continues-to-get-worse
Here’s another one, yeah it’s Jacobin, but it brings in tons of material from across the spectrum:
https://jacobin.com/2023/09/yimby-housing-supply-land-monopoly-rent-prices/
Finally, Patrick Condon, has a book out refuting his years of pushing the market urbanism grift, Broken City. He knows his shit. Highly recommended reading for anybody wanting to see a case study, Vancouver, and how it’s proven everything wrong that been pushed by these clowns.
Finally, and I said this earlier in the year, the people here who gaslight about this crap are not honest brokers. I use the late-great Steve Gilliard’s quote on this:
Those people don’t like what I say? That’s the point. I want them to come away steaming. I don’t want them to think they will like a word I say. I don’t want them to think I will consider their opinions or viewpoints. I want them to think: boy he doesn’t like us and really, really doesn’t care what we say.
I’m tired of people acting like these people can be reasoned with or talked to. They don’t want to talk, they want to enact a neoliberal, economic policy that results in hyper-gentrification and massive displacement while taking away a fundamental component of democracy, what locals have to say about where and how they live.
I’m not writing to make them happy. I want them to hate my opinions. I’m not interested in debating them. I want to stop them….and ain’t doing a great job on that. Most days I consider myself the face of the party that lost to a bunch of racially tone-deaf fauxgressives that think because they voted for Obama and support abortion rights it makes em the most liberal people in politics.
Black folks know better.
MisterForkbeard
@Kay: I have a fair number of my leftier (but still reasonable) friends who generally really like Kamala but are currently whipping themselves into a frenzy based on not having a palestinian/uncommitted speak at the convention.
I think it made a lot of sense not to, but I understand why they’re frustrated. They’re going to vote Harris for sure, but I also think the Harris campaign has to be careful with this – they don’t want to get back into the “grudging support” with these folks.
Matt McIrvin
@MisterForkbeard: Biden himself was being as careful as he could about COVID, which led to the “hiding in his basement” attack.
Trump *got* COVID and was actually gravely ill, but after he got out of the hospital I think he did get out there, trumpeting his immortality.
Suzanne
@Matt McIrvin:
Okay, fine. I’m understanding this part just fine.
But what’s the implication? One can make a reasonable argument that building luxury housing doesn’t bring down prices, and that has been true in some places under specific conditions (when there is a slow increase in supply, generally).
But then, what does he propose to bring down prices instead? That’s always where I lose the argument. Probably because the argument ends.
ETA: Yep, the argument ended.
Greg
I agree with you about the general problem that people don’t know what the President can and can’t do, but I thought Harris’ speech last night was actually really good on this point. Several times the way she phrased things was “if they pass it, I will sign that bill”.
Quinerly
@Matt McIrvin: could be.
Back then, my circle of men were all carpenters, painters, brick masons, etc. My ex was an architect who had flunked out of 4 state side architectural schools but managed to finally finish from a school in London in the 1980’s, while playing in a band. He never got his stamp and lived off of his trust, played music, and built boats the 10 years on and off we were together. All these guys I am referencing HATED HRC. It was visceral. Most either voted for Trump (and regretted it) or wrote in Bernie. That Bernie thing was strong in 2016. I will never be convinced that he didn’t cost us the election.
Chris
@Matt McIrvin:
Reagan was working with different voters. He’s possibly the last Republican president (along with HW, I suppose) who had to deal with an electorally significant number of liberals and moderates in his coalition. It was the eighties, the great realignment was almost a done deal, but there were still a lot of Rockefeller type softies in the North that had to be appeased, the Gingrich style Republican takeover of the South hadn’t happened yet, and while the Southern Democrats might be more conservative than the Northern and Western ones, they were still kind of all over the place on where they would and wouldn’t support a Republican president. Add to that the fact that Reagan et al had all grown up in an age of liberal-to-moderate dominance and were still shaped by that to quite an extent, and there was a lot of incentive for a Republican president to maintain some liberal sensibilities.
What’s happened since then is 1994, when the Republicans finally took over the South and completed their fusion with the worst elements of the Southern Democrats, and 2006 and 2008, when the fallout from the Dubya years drove a stake through the heart of any lingering nostalgic loyalties Republicans had amongst Northern middle-class suburban moderate types. All that’s left now is their combination of Strom Thurmond style Southern racism and Barry Goldwater style Western racism, which means all the people they have to please are not only reactionary as hell, but reactionary in a specifically racial way that can’t accept even the slightest olive branch being handed to the liberals.
artem1s
@SatanicPanic: Are you saying we should hope for a Trump style campaign?
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@MisterForkbeard:
Trump’s floor support is slightly below 40% – and he’s now facing an energetic, nimble set of campaigners running a positive “hopes & dreams” campaign, something he didn’t face in 2016 or 2020.
Hillary 2016 was a really conventional campaign; it hit all the standard notes. Sadly, she erred by treating the bloated mediocrity like a normal candidate, although there was plenty of available evidence of his incompetence, sloth and greed – and relied on the media to expose the other stuff, which it refused to do. The mediots are, of course, still playing that game, but if you notice from the DNC, the Harris/Walz Campaign is taking baseball bats to Trump’s reputation and character – over and over – and including his minions. He’s not faced that before, and is reeling.
Of course, 2020 was weird because of the pandemic, and people were insulated from realizing how tiring a campaign can be for an elderly man because of so many remote events that cycle. On balance, it is really clear now that a person can do a great executive job (Biden did – he governs competently and quietly, but that doing the job while campaigning is exhausting.
I think he was just so tired from the attacks on himself, on Hunter, and the press of the job while campaigning. He knew that he needed to be more available and energetic, but time isn’t kind.
Chris
@Matt McIrvin:
He who would pun would pick a pocket.
Another Scott
@narya: I understand people being worried about neighborhood character changing, but high rises and low rises and yes even single family homes can live together in a thriving neighborhood.
Consider Rosslyn in Arlington County, Virginia.
Cheers,
Scott.
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@Ken:
They’re coming back around to retrieve it on their return portion of the walk.
We do this all the time.
K-Mo
@jonas: I agree. He has terrible vibes right now. This is essentially why I think the late-breakers and marginal non-voters could go our way. But I’m just speculating wildly at this point.
Geminid
@Quinerly: I wonder if any of your male friends voted for Gary Johnson that year. Johnson tripled his vote from 2012 to 2016, and then the Libertarian vote reverted most the way back to normal in 2020.
Captain C
@Jackie: I think endorsing TCFG is worse than texting on the list of bad ways to tell your partner you want a divorce.
Msb
@Ken: probably sweated the bronzer off to produce the pale spots. I noted recently that he looks dreadfully unwell – drawn and droopy, and his hair appears to be collapsing.
Suzanne
@Another Scott: My neighborhood is far more working-class than Rosslyn, and yet we have a mixture of high-rises, low-rises, single-family, duplex and triplex, townhomes, renting and owning. Works pretty well. The yards are very small and the houses are tight together. Parking is an intractable issue, for sure, which is to be expected in a pre-car city. But I personally fall on the side of people being more important than cars.
Bill Arnold
@Matt McIrvin:
There was the Hunter Biden laptop story, that the NY Post published but most major media willfully and rightfully ignored.
It helped that they were telegraphing (bad OPSEC by Rudy Giuliani and others) that move by late 2019 There was a low key push to make this known as a Russian op (it was, or Russia affiliated at least) through 2020 (plus the retired intelligence agents’ letter late in the cycle), and media people were thus primed to reject it.
The operatives on the right wing are still complaining about that; it was their fuck up, though. A surprise might have worked.
Quinerly
@Geminid: I was traveling a lot out here in NM in 2016. Did meet a lot of folks, especially guys, who were going to vote for Johnson. In February, 2017, I took 6 weeks off from work and did a 7000 mile drive about in NM, AZ, CO, and Utah. Met lots of Johnson voters along the way. They were already regretting it just a few weeks after inauguration. Lots of people I talked to felt HRC had it in the bag. Johnson was a protest vote. When I travel, I get my kicks out of talking to strangers and keeping a journal. Weird hobby, I guess.
I am very optimistic that we will win in Nov. I am not necessarily an optimistic/positive person by nature. No rose colored glasses. This election and campaign feels so different now that Biden stepped aside. The party is probably the most unified that I have seen it in my lifetime and I was born in 1961. More united than 2008 and I feel this year simply is no comparison to 2016.
I loved HRC but I think many are forgetting how disliked she was. I really didn’t think she should run back then. I didn’t think she ran a good campaign. There was simply no reason for her not hitting MI and PA. Political malpractice, imo. Between that, the built in HRC hatred, and Comey crap….that’s how we lost.
This is a whole different ballgame. YMMV.
Westyny
@Ken: undecided
Bill Arnold
@Suzanne:
There are people who thrive on quiet and nature/wildlife, and do poorly if contending with random human and machine noises.
Noise ordinances can help a lot with that. I rented a house in Montpelier VT via Airbnb for a weekend several years back, and was absolutely surprised and pleased about the no-internal-combustion-yard machines city ordinance. On a sunny weekend the city sounded like a quiet suburb on a rainy day. (Not exactly a metropolis though; a few 10s of K city, seat of state government.)
Kay
@jonas:
Too, they have been told no fewer than 9 times that a ceasefire is imminent.The Biden team just have zero credibility with them, understandably. I have no idea why Biden continually exaggerates progress. No one outside the US believes it and no one who follows this closely believes it.
They also objected to Harris denouncing Hamas sexual violence against Israelis while omitting the huge scandal in Israel right now, where the IDF gang raped a Palestinian prisoner. That has been widely reported in the US – it’s bizarre that Harris omitted it. The NYTimes did a long article on it. Anyone who follows this knows about it.
im not a single issue voter, so although I vehemently disagree with the Biden approach to Palestinian human rights, I still support Harris although I think she indicated she plans to stay the course with Bidens approach – a mistake, I think. But if I were a single issue voter on that I would be very unhappy. They don’t want the status quo and that’s the status quo.
Suzanne
@Bill Arnold:
Agree. And I also definitely hate the leaf blowers. But I also think that people who want to live in quiet natural landscapes can go live there. I think it would be a bit strange to expect the same level of quiet and darkness found in remote natural landscapes in urban places.
I fundamentally don’t believe that people really have much right to control what their neighbors do with their property, and that’s why I have such a problem with NIMBYism. Part of minding your own business is minding your own business. Why do you care if your neighbor builds an ADU on their property? Or tears down their house and builds a duplex and rents half of it out? We can have health and safety design and zoning rules, and there’s a lot of good-faith discussion to be had around that.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Another Scott:
“Mything Middle” is a take on a catch phrase used by these clowns, “Missing Middle” because it’s basically a made-up term used to justify the wholescale scraping of SFH (but not in suburbs because the people pushing this have parents in those burbs). Lemme be more serious for a moment.
My Dad was an Arlington Co cop for 30+ years. I lived there in the 60s, 70s, 80s and watched subsections like Roslyn massively change over that time frame.
And massively change post-1996 (or so) as the depressed housing market there (I chuckle looking back at that) finally showed signs of recovery.
The mid-to-high rise building boom in Arlington Co over the course of 20+ years did *nothing* vis a vis housing affordability. Like all other places, it had the exact opposite effect…which is counter to the gaslighting grift being pushed nationally and in here.
It’s a classic “market urbanism never fails, it can only be failed” approach, meaning, regulations must be at the heart of why these the things those grifters push never happen. Thus, they attempt typical regulatory capture in order to get something passed that they think might make up for the fact the ‘market’ isn’t working they way they want it to.
On Housing Twitter, we refer to one aspect of this approach as “UPZONE HARDER!!!!!!”, that’s what happened in Arlington earlier this year.
Not suprisingly, the main group lobbying for the Upzone-to-Oblivion in Arlington was funded by one of Thiel’s groups.
Good piece on the myth of what upzoning actually does:
https://www.villagepreservation.org/2024/07/24/getting-past-yes-a-qa-on-the-affordability-crisis-part-2/
K-Mo
@Quinerly: From your lips to Gods ears…
And SMDH about the Bernie Brigade in 2016. Serenity now…
Suzanne
I will also note that there is plenty of evidence that increased supply reduces rent prices in a city. It just happened this year in Austin, TX. Tokyo, Japan is also notable for affordability, but their population isn’t growing like ours is.
To note: Austin, more than other cities perhaps, was never as far behind on housing construction. In some cities, it would take far more than a few hundred housing units each year to bring things back in line. But, like, again….. what’s the strategy? The overall pattern of change is that more people are going to collect in cities. The specialization and services economy we live in requires it. So there has to be a strategy around it.
cain
@Ken:
Not going to happen.. his people need to see him and he needs to be seen.
It’s going to be a grim time for the GOP.
Another Scott
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: First let me say, I’m no expert on this stuff.
I suspect, though, that a site called “villagepreservation” has a strong bias toward locking the present in amber and I think that’s bad in general. I thank you for the link – I’ll read your link later.
Of course, rezoning suburbs to allow high-rises, or whatever, by itself is not going to prevent developers and realtors for pushing for gentrification and minimizing any “affordable” housing. That’s not surprising. Zoning boards have to put their feet down to demand real “affordable” housing when redevelopment happens.
This stuff is complicated. But locking neighborhoods in amber or attempting to prevent any redevelopment at all is not sustainable.
[ Insert boring old story about MIL moving to DC in 1940 and living in a boarding house on P Street NW with friends and that same building is now apartments or condos… ]
Thanks. I’ll take a look.
Cheers,
Scott.
Bill Arnold
@Another Scott:
Yeah, that piece makes it clear (this is good, not bad) that there are disagreements.
The Jobobin piece is helpful as well, at least at laying out the anti-YIMBY/upzoning argument. (No clear policy prescriptions.)
Eolirin
@Greg: I would rather see things like, “I will work tirelessly with our leaders in congress to make sure we’re making progress on solving [problem]”
It’s a subtle thing, but it makes it clearer that congress is a coequal branch and not subservient to the Presidency. We need more of that in more places so that people hopefully start to get separation of powers even a little.
brantl
@prostratedragon: There’s a surprise.
Ruckus
@Steve LaBonne:
Trump’s inability to control his senile rambling helps a lot.
Trump’s inability to act even close to human doesn’t seem to hurt his republican support though. I would agree that he has seemingly lost more control of every bit of his mental facilities in the last 18-24 months than in any time in his life. Which is saying a lot, because he didn’t have a lot to lose in the first place. The best part seems to be that his handlers seemingly let him out less often because of this.
Ruckus
@Roberto el oso:
This is not new. The level of alone-ness has increased but then he’s earned that by being the complete and utter ass that he is. Going old fart insane never helps and yes he is on that road and apparently not doing all that well.