Also at the Washington Post, E.J. Dionne – “Harris’s DNC was a master class in coalition building”: [gift link]:
It all seems simple and obvious: If you want to win, embrace patriotism, talk incessantly about freedom and be joyfully hopeful. But Kamala Harris’s campaign feels entirely fresh because American politics lost the art of the simple and obvious somewhere along the way. Both come easier to a barrier-breaking politician who has neither the need nor the desire to look dissident or transgressive…
Harris recognizes coalition politics as a hard but necessary discipline that requires balancing the aspirations of groups that might not easily come together.
Last week’s convention was a preview of the campaign to come. It modeled how the aspirational progressivism of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez could share a stage with the patriotic conservatism of Republican former congressman Adam Kinzinger. It married the buoyant class warfare of United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain with the capitalist spirit of Ken Chenault, the former CEO of American Express. All were happy to speak up for Harris…
Precisely because everyone knows that Harris would be the first female president, as well as a woman of Black and South Asian descent, this unifying narrative did not need to dwell on her identity.
On the contrary, the beauty of a patriotism rooted in welcome and neighborliness is that her story becomes exceptional in the way that America itself, at its best, has always been exceptional. Make no mistake: Underlying the unifying chants and flag waving is a serious debate over how patriotism should be defined. The Harris campaign will implicitly be a running argument for the idea that embracing pluralistic democracy, not skin color or blood or longevity of residence, is the true mark of a patriot.
Similarly, Harris is defending a definition of freedom that is two-sided. Critics of an active, empowering government see negative liberty, freedom from government interference, as the freedom that matters.
Harris agrees on limits to government intrusion and nowhere more so than in standing up for reproductive rights. But she is also defending positive liberty, government’s ability to give citizens the freedom to achieve their goals. Hence her vigorous endorsement of Head Start, the Affordable Care Act and the child tax credit. Plus her convention speech’s insistence on “the freedom to live safe from gun violence,” on the right to “live free from the pollution that fuels the climate crisis” and on government’s role in helping create her “opportunity economy.”
What’s important to understand is that patriotism and freedom are not empty words recited as part of a quasi-religious incantation. They mean something specific in Harris’s telling — and her versions happen to square with the gut understandings of an American majority…
She champions the new economic consensus that President Joe Biden began to bring to life, replacing the view that markets alone, spurred by low taxes and deregulation, can save us. It is not an anti-business view — Chenault is no class traitor — but it puts business in a larger social context, to use a favorite Harris word. This, too, is a majoritarian view.
Much journalistic ink has been spilled over Harris’s supposed need to flesh out policies. Policy is good, of course, but Harris has already given us much more than vibes and flags. Her convention offered a clear sense of where she would move the country by her very definitions of patriotism, freedom and opportunity. She has found a way to use the simple and the obvious to activate a new majority not just to defeat Trump but to leap right past Trumpism.
Middle-class families, like the one I grew up in, want common sense solutions.
As President, I will create an opportunity economy where everyone has a chance to get a car loan, buy a home, and start a business.
Watch our campaign’s new ad: pic.twitter.com/FlhL80TZCt
— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) August 23, 2024
TBone
WOW
H.E. Wolf
Coalitions (and lots of work at ground level) for the win!
Starfish
Her social media team making fun of Trump wins.
It’s a video of Trump saying “they don’t get bored with me” followed by a snippet from Sponge Bob Square pants acknowledging that time has passed. Then the camera zooms in on various people behind Trump as a lullaby plays over their yawns.
This social media team is amazing.
Suzanne
Also something that is going very well this time is being aspirational. It is no surprise that most people will want to associate themselves with the people who are cooler, more successful, more attractive, more normie. That’s why every Coke ad has attractive, young, fun people drinking Coke. Nike has strong, gorgeous, talented people working out in amazing locations in theirs. We here have known for a long time that Republicans are gross, but the contrast is exceptionally stark this year. That’s why “weird” is so effective: nobody aspires to be weird. Most people aspire to be unweird! It’s a great thing to strengthen a social norm of not being a busybody.
lowtechcyclist
Good morning, y’all!
Jeffg166
Just remember 2016. Work like it is 2016. It could be.
twbrandt
Michigan republicans, still in disarray.
HinTN
@Starfish:
TRUTH – That is one hell of a hit.
JPL
FYI H.R. McMaster has a new book in which he discusses his time working with trump. He discusses Putin’s hold over trump and trump’s erratic behavior. He’ll be on Face the Nation and if his interview is similar to past interviews, he’ll state that he never discusses who he votes for. Yup another former trump hire who is a coward.
Starfish
@twbrandt:
@Kay commented on Michigan Republicans a couple of threads ago with the same article. It sounds like a hot mess.
Kay
This is Greg Sargent on how Harris is forming a “post MAGA” future for the country. I thought it was very good.
I genuinely think people want to move on from this past decade but they needed a way to imagine what that might look like in a positive sense, so not just the absence of Trump but how to move forward towards something else.
twbrandt
@Starfish: Thanks, I missed Kay’s comment. BJ is getting so active it’s tough to keep up!
Scout211
Good morning everyone.
I’m really enjoying opinion pieces by Rex Huppke of USA Today lately.
This morning’s edition:
. . .
More at the link.
Suzanne
Also…… anyone taking bets on whether or not Cheryl Hines will file for divorce? Also, why is RFK Jr. so obviously roided up?
BR
I’ve surprised myself at how much Harris’s DNC speech has been rattling around in my head these last couple of days. (As I think I’ve mentioned here, I’ve followed her career for two decades, but was never as impressed by her as others have been. I usually find her speeches hard to listen to because she speaks too slowly.)
But she showed something genuinely different in that speech. An ability to rise to the occasion. I know that half of being president is just projecting the image of being president, and I don’t underestimate how important that is. She did it in that speech.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Many tens of millions of [overwhelmingly] white ‘Murkins beg to differ. The sad thing will be just how many we’ll see implicitly say that at the ballot box come November.
And screw them.
If we pull this off (and I’m one of those who thinks it won’t be close), it’ll be significant in terms of presidential politics this century. Look at it, the two (R) presidents are Dubya and a twice-impeached, rapist, felon whereas we will have elected a black man, a black woman and an interesting 1-term old white dude who did more in his 4 years than any president in living memory.
Yeah, no difference in the parties. //
sdhays
@Suzanne: I don’t know much about her, but from what we know about him now, no one should be under any illusions she’s not pretty sick too.
Burnspbesq
Can’t be said too often:
Don’t get complacent.
dmsilev
@twbrandt: That whole party is still having a civil war between a couple of factions, right? Also bankrupt (both financially and morally).
I guess it’s the end stage of the grifting cycle. The parasites turn on each other.
Omnes Omnibus
@Burnspbesq:
Confidence does not equal complacency.
Suzanne
@sdhays: Apparently she asked him not to support TFG. And she posted on Insta in 2020 about supporting Biden/Harris. I don’t know if she shares RFK’s terrible views or if she was unaware (oblivious) to his terrible views. Neither speaks well of her.
Burnspbesq
@Omnes Omnibus:
True, but the former can become the latter far too easily.
Jackie
@Suzanne:
While reading the late night thread – ewww! I wondered the same. I guess time will tell 🤷🏼♀️
schrodingers_cat
@Omnes Omnibus: Patrick Healy had an op-ed titled Joy is not a policy in the NYT on Friday. Reminded me of Hope is not a strategy. Most political commentary can be summarized as concern trolling the Democratic party.
dmsilev
@Suzanne: She did apparently threaten, not sure how seriously, to divorce RFK Jr. if he supported Trump.
I guess we’ll see.
And yes, Mr. “pure body” is doping himself. Clearly.
Suzanne
@Jackie: I don’t get to all the threads! Sorry I missed it, don’t mean to rehash.
@dmsilev: Right?! Like, does he think anyone is fooled?!
sdhays
@schrodingers_cat: It was probably a search and replace from the previous essay.
Incredible the FTFNYT actually pays these people.
Nukular Biskits
Good mornin’, y’all!🌞
TBone
Mood music, unabashed
🎶🎇🎆
m.youtube.com/watch?v=i2FW1WJc0lg
Percysowner
Question to SC and voting abroad peeps, I was commenting on a Raw Story article saying that Trump may dump Vance for Kennedy and I mentioned that he would be hitting some deadlines for being on the ballot, if he changed VPs. Someone responded that they were living in the UK had already received their ballot from SC. The unusual part was that they are required to state their race in order for the ballot to be accepted, with no provision for “do not want to say”. Anyone out there know if SC is requiring race to be stated on voting abroad ballots, absentee ballots or all the ballots? If true this would make discarding ballots from the “wrong” race really easy.
MomSense
@sdhays:
It is also incredibly difficult to get out of a relationship with a narcissist. You end up so broken and confused. You often have no money, no self esteem and no friends. Narcissists are emotional black holes.
i hope she can get out and that she can find enough of herself to restart her life.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Open thread, from a day or so ago, I’d asked about the typical right-wing attack on children of Dem occupants of the WH vis a vis Ella Emhoff, as I’d not seen any.
Now I have.
Via twitter, some 30/40 something white dude had a photo of her, typical casual shot, not great, not awful, a couple of tattoos were visible. This asshat’s comments were to the effect of this photo showed “the greatest nightmare a parent could have” regarding a child.
It struck a chord with me more than the usual ramblings of tire rims and anthrax crowd.
No, the greatest nightmare a parent can have about a child is when she’s 14 and commits suicide between Xmas and New Years.
No, the greatest nightmare a parent can have is a newly married child at 33 commit suicide 9 months after the wedding.
No, the greatest nightmare a parent can have is their 33-year-old daughter, who’s battled addiction issues since she hit puberty, finally succumb to illnesses related to that battle at 33.
No, the greatest nightmare a parent can have is their 21-year-old son OD and die on an opioid.
It struck a chord with me because the above events are things things I’ve seen close friends endure over the last 3-7 years.
Thus, when some entitled white dude makes a statement about a child not knowing wtf he’s talking about, I want to affix his head to the end of a pike and post it at the city gate as an example to others.
TBone
@Omnes Omnibus: 💜
It sparks further, bolder ACTION.
SFAW
@Suzanne:
I think Jackie was referring to Junior’s Big Car Roof Adventure (the “ewwwww” part), not making a “we already discussed that” comment. Not going to rehash the “ewwww” part here, it’s too fucked-up for this early in the day.
BR
Speaking of NYT, I have one more failed media story to share. I mentioned the other day about NPR trying to push a narrative on me in an interview even when the facts didn’t support it. We all know NYT does this, but they’re so blatant that as we’ve seen every day they operate at the level of what stories and op-eds they even will run.
Two days before Biden dropped out, the op-ed editor for the NYT emailed a colleague and me to write an op-ed on the Crowdstrike bug/crash that was at that moment roiling major airlines and banks. In a matter of a few hours, we wrote a detailed op-ed and sent it over. Breaking news and they asked for the op-ed, so we thought they’d edit it quickly and get it up there. Radio silence. A day later we were told — in very plain language — that the NYT is expecting Biden to drop out of the race and is saving its op-ed space for that. It hadn’t even happened yet and they were saving space for it, so they weren’t sure that they could run the op-ed they asked for. Another day goes by, and Biden drops out. And then what op-eds did they run? Very few that made any sense at all.
Lyrebird
I wish I could disagree with ya on this!
So glad I can come here!
ETA:
@BR: Wow! First-hand experience of their focus on nonsense over essential info.
TBone
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: did you say it to the asshole(s) who needs to hear it? I’d have posted that reply to him in all caps with some serious emojis.
ETA and more personal insults.
Elizabelle
That’s exactly the Telnaes cartoon I was going to describe to you! She titled it ‘We Trust Women.’
Because I found this WaPost reader comment spot on.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@TBone:
Oh, he was getting hammered in the comments section.
Alas, he was also getting applause in the comments section.
BR
Kay, I saw this op-ed in the LA Times and thought of you. I’ve never read anything by Mark Ruffalo, but I was surprised it was quite sensible:
latimes.com/opinion/story/2024-08-23/mark-ruffalo-joe-biden-kamala-harris-gaza-benjamin-netanyahu
TBone
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: this is why I don’t participate – it’s like a fart in a court room. Everyone ends up smelling.
Nukular Biskits
@Elizabelle:
As an almost-60 year old white Southern male, I second that.
SFAW
@Burnspbesq:
Careful there, Eeyore.
[Yes, I’m kidding.]
Lyrebird
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Thank you.
Yup.
And my heart goes out to your friends.
ETA: one thing that feels very different these days versus 20-30 years ago is that we get to hear the voices saying, “WTF IS WRONG WITH YOU?” in response to that kind of noxious BS. I remember when Rush Limbaugh reigned without pushback, when Secy. Powell understandably felt that he couldn’t run for Prez because of how his wife (who had dealt with depression) would be treated… Never mind the successful attacks on HRC. Now we do hear pushback.
Starfish
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: I see you are upset by this, but I am a little confused about what you are trying to get at here.
The cruelty towards the children of oval office occupants has been going on since Amy Carter, from what I understand. Amy was before my time so I don’t know all the details. I know she was involved in activism.
Then, I saw it happen to Chelsea. I think Chelsea was a little protective of the privacy of the Bush daughters because she was treated so badly.
There is media-created scandal around the secret service detail for the children that grow up in the White House, but sometimes these former Presidents need more protection for their kids.
Trivia Man
@Suzanne: Steroids greatly help old men build and retain photogenic muscle mass. To that crowd the visible muscles equal virility and strength and power and thus leadership.
Baud
I lost my cyber truck virginity today. Saw the first one in the wild. They are eye catching in their ugliness.
Gloria DryGarden
JOY
is a quality. Like clarifying values, or a mission Statement, the qualities one desires, are an important aspect to creating the outcome you want.
It might be like the seasoning, or the salt that flavors your food. Without it, unjoyous policy might be like dry chicken breast. Nourishing, but it needs something. I can think of few qualities higher than joy, as a quality to steadily invoke as we go forward.
I’m saying joy is an integral part of policy and strategy. And it’s higher than hope.
BR
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
On a positive note, I’ve seen folks saying that Ella Emhoff is really into knitting and there’s apparently some popular website where people share designs. People are hoping she’ll post a Harris campaign design because they think lots of people will knit their own based on such a design.
Kay
Really remarkable how the far Right is full out running from their anti choice position.
Immediately after Roe was overturned there was a whole genre of articles by the elite anti choicers – the people who come out of fancy law schools and are paid (well!) to oppose womens rights. The brain trust. They all predicted Democrats would come around to anti choice and adopt the far Right and media framing on it. None of that has happened. Instead it’s been a full fledged political disaster for Republicans.
I keep thinking about how anti choicers tried to kill the ACA by refusing to cover birth control – how that bullshit “religious liberty” nonsense went on for months and how we were all told by media that that was a mainstream position and we all had to be very afraid of them. None of it was true. The public was always much more with us than them.
Baud
Screw all y’all. I’m enjoying my complacency. It works well with my lassitude and laziness.
Starfish
@BR: She is going to post a design to Ravelry?!
EarthWindFire
@sdhays: This. If whale juice didn’t give her get out vibes, hard to see what would. But MomSense makes great points about how narcissists get in your head and make it hard to break away too.
Kay
@BR:
Thank you – I’ll read it. I like him. He’s earnest.
Kay
@Starfish:
Ravelry is an amazing thing. HUGE. I read that two women built it from scratch.
Ksmiami
@Trivia Man: uh. RFK jr is unattractive in every way. I can’t stand even looking at him
Trivia Man
@BR: the other day i shared a link showing all her tattoos. It seems she is part of a vibrant artistic community overall. Hooray for artists.
SFAW
@EarthWindFire: The whale thing was before Cheryl. It was his daughter who told the story. [Given her age, sounds like mid-1990s; Junior and Cheryl got married in 2014.]
ETA: Or were you talking about the story, not the juice itself?
Nukular Biskits
@Baud:
TMI.
MagdaInBlack
@Baud: Cross a Hum-V with a dumpster and there you have it.
cmorenc
A fundamental insight Harris’s approach captures is anti-ideologue-ism, centered in the recognition that both pure capitalism and socialism are toxically corrosive in their pure forms, and there is no ideally correct solution to finding a healthy balance between the two. The economic, even social needs of society need healthy capitalism and entrepreneurship to thrive, but that cannot work without doing so in ways that create and maintain a healthy social foundation under the broad middle-class of society. Social security, medicare, and the ACA are prime examples of the latter sort of foundation.
Trump represents the IGMFU crab-bucket view of government and society.
TBone
@Trivia Man: all I see is a tiny 🍄 on those fellas.
TBone
@MagdaInBlack: 😎
TBone
@Nukular Biskits: 😆
EarthWindFire
@SFAW: I wasn’t aware of the timeline, but even the story is a huge blazing red flag. Can you imagine hearing that at a family dinner and not wondering what you’d gotten into?
MomSense
@Kay:
I’m friendly with one of the women who started it. Yes, Ella is a knitter and the fiber community is thrilled! Well not all but fuckem.
TBone
@Trivia Man: although I don’t do tatts meself, I appreciated your link. Hers are way cool.
MagdaInBlack
@TBone: Good Morning 🌻
Matt McIrvin
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: My kid is actually a lot like Ella Emhoff, in some ways. I love her so much. She’s the best kid someone could have. Lots of parents think that, of course, and I do too.
I think these putrid bullies are triggered by people looking in any way physically unusual or off of reactionary gender ideals. It’s pure middle-school-gym shit and it sends me into a rage, because that was me. My kid might set them off less in that regard, but not for lack of trying.
TBone
@MagdaInBlack: great day in the morning fellow citizen!
(conjured up my best Pierre Robert voice for you)
Kay
@MomSense:
My youngest son’s GF is a crocheter so she showed me. What an amazing site that is!
I love niche communities like that.
Starfish
@Kay: There are many knitting dramas that go on, and there is a YouTube channel called “Emma in the moment” that covers them. Emma has some other YouTube channel, but she had a two part series on Ravelry dramas, and they are each probably an hour and a half long.
Someone in the comments said that she was working on crocheting something very large so she was there for a YouTube video that was 1.5 hours long while she worked on the large project.
What does this have to do with politics though? If you skip half way through, you get into the part about Conservatives on Ravelry.
EarthWindFire
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: I truly hope that commenter does not have and never has children. His priorities are too weird.
Geminid
@Baud: I saw my first Cybertruck Friday, on my way home from work. The truck came around a curve and was gone in a second, headed for Charlottesville. It looked weird.
Gloria DryGarden
ravelry.com/account/login
Nukular Biskits
@Starfish:
“knitting dramas”? That’s a thing?
Hungry Joe
POSTCARD UPDATE — SERIES 2
Postcards to Swing States:
Yesterday — 14
Running total — 30
TBone
More mood 🎶 in the unabashed dept. It’s still summer! 😍
m.youtube.com/watch?v=64uikGn-q3k
BR
@cmorenc:
Makes me think of (and apologies for this) the West Wing, in two ways. One of the themes in the last seasons was the idea that a moderate Republican who advocates for positions that 60+% of the public agree with could win a landslide election. The country has moved a little left in the last 20 years, and so that’s where Harris is right now. The other West Wing reference is this idea of “the presidential voice”, which for all its faults, there really seems to be such a thing and Harris has now captured it.
Gloria DryGarden
@Geminid: we determined on an earlier thread that a cyber truck is not suitable for men or women with small children.
So if we’re trying to entice or coerce more women to stay pregnant and raise babies, the cybertruck won’t help.
I’m not sure it will help w testosterone levels either, nor w (crowd) size issues.
Kay
They were so smug and arrogant. When she’s talking about how they will use their incredible powers of persuasion to ban abortions in blue states – Democrats will see how evil they have been and repent- she says “we know what to do”.
Maybe not!
It was all bullshit. She says they will “build consensus” and back social safety net programs for pregnant women – they did none of it. They instead went immediately to screeching that 10 year olds had to coparent with their rapists and sending women out to hospital parking lots to bleed out. In the article itself she repeatedly threatens to arrest women in blue states who procure medication abortions.
She’s completely confident American women will just meekly go along with these religious edicts.
TBone
@Gloria DryGarden: 😆
SatanicPanic
@Baud: if you stay complacent you don’t need to get complacent is my motto
Frankensteinbeck
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
She’s not a pure little blossom. That’s it. The tattoos particularly in their mind are associated with someone who has sex for fun. They also make her not look like weak prey who lives under the protection of one man at a time. Oh, and her beauty standard isn’t Barbie Doll, so they suspect she’s a lesbian. This is exactly what they’re scared their daughters will be like, yes.
Baud
Complacency is actually a problem in the midterms. In the only presidential election we lost in the last 16 years, the problem was pompous people thinking they would teach the party a lesson.
Starfish
@Nukular Biskits: Oh, the more niche you get in anything, the more you have tiny power flexes involving miniscule amounts of power. Part of this is that you don’t necessarily have people with de-escalation skills to handle various situations, and no one gets paid (enough) for moderation, which is actually hard.
I was actually concerned that the recent drama here would lead to closure of the forum, and I am super impressed with how WaterGirl and John Cole navigated it.
Baud
@SatanicPanic:
That is excellent.
Kay
@Starfish:
Danes are huge knitters so they’re pressuring me into the cult – I wear a lot of wool so they recognize a possible convert :)
I’m (actually) good at sewing – following a pattern, etc. so I might enjoy it.
Frankensteinbeck
@Baud:
I think you’ve made a very wise insight there, although I think Hillary specifically was who they wanted to put in her place.
BR
@Kay:
Do you think there are women who will fall for (or talk themselves into) Trump’s newfound pseudo-pro-choice nonsense? I mean, I doubt he’ll keep message discipline on it, and I’ve heard evangelicals are already angry about it.
Geminid
@Baud: I thought complacency was a problem for Virginia Democrats in 2021, when Youngkin beat McAulliffe. I think I saw the same thing in New York and California the next year.
TBone
@Starfish: closure of the forum is not an option that ever crossed the collective mind here, methinks. It would have been weak sauce to let bullies have any sway over jackals.
Baud
@Geminid:
That’s midterm like.
SatanicPanic
@cmorenc: this is a great insight.
I’d add that I understand why Harris shifts her position on certain things. It’s just a mindset (one that I share) where you have broad end goals and staying flexible on the details is how you get there. I actually like that about her.
Kay
@BR:
Yes, because so many people really just don’t follow politics. Something like 1/3 of people believe Biden overturned Roe. That’s why I don’t think referendums are a good measure to use to predict future performance in Presidential races – ballot questions are very simple. Candidates and political parties are more complex for voters.
BR
@Frankensteinbeck:
If it’s any indication of where things are at, there are some number of folks out there like that now too: I got a message out of the blue yesterday from someone I used to mentor. Hadn’t heard from him in maybe 6 months or a year. He was a Bernie kid, wears his heart on his sleeve, very much a new agey type who is into being one with the universe. His dad is a Q anon type in Florida and his mom is new agey like him. His message to me was asking for advice because in his thinking, as far as it goes: 1) no Uncommitted speaker at the DNC, 2) …?, 3) world war 3.
Starfish
@Kay: There are some knitters and crocheters here. I took up crochet when my child was a toddler, and I started knitting a couple of years later. I am not fast, and I don’t crochet a lot of things, but I did finish four projects last year. I knit a shawl and a scarf, and I finished crocheting a doll that I started in 2017 and crocheted a tiny bag.
BR
@Kay:
Ok, well I guess we have our work cut out for us.
Baud
@BR:
“The first thing you need to understand, kid, is that birds aren’t real.”
Michael Bersin
In the very earliest days of Show Me Progress in late June 2008 two of us were granted media credentials to cover Barack Obama’s speech on patriotism in Independence, Missouri (a third of our number just entered with the audience). Obama’s campaign set up the event, and there were no campaign signs in the venue or with the crowd.
As media filtered into the press pen in the venue my associate elbowed a reporter for one of the DC papers – I can’t remember which – pointed to Scout Finch of The Great Orange Satan sitting in front of them and said, “See her? She has more daily readers than you do.”
Barack Obama in Independence, MO: the speech transcript (July 2, 2008)
Kay
@BR:
I think Dobbs helps with our base but it isn’t going to be determinative with normies, because they’re normies. Harris has the same position on abortion as Biden has but she’s picked up ten points with women. They’re aligning with her on something else- probably a whole set of “something else”.
I think Harris gives us a fresh opportunity to talk about it with a different face in front, so that’s good.
Quiltingfool
@Kay: You know that Dannelfelser, if a pregnancy emergency happened to her or anyone she cares about, well, THAT abortion would be okay.
I remember you saying that you don’t argue with Covid vaccine deniers anymore, waste of breath. I feel that way, too (about Covid) but I’m very angry at folks who want to deny reproductive health care to women. I’ve not yet encountered any anti choice conversations (probably because people around me know I’m a Democrat and don’t want to start none, I guess) but if I do, I’m going to tell them that women should be free to NOT have an abortion and if there’s a problem, they can stick to their guns, get no healthcare and face the real consequence – death.
A woman would have to be a hardcore fanatic to choose death. I don’t think there are too many of them out there.
I despise the women who are anti abortion activists more than I do the men in those groups. They seem to delight in shivving other women, and they know better.
Starfish
@TBone: I have been on the internet a long time. I have seen various forums wax and wane. What was going on here is the type of stuff that kills forums.
It wasn’t about “giving in to bullies,” but it was about the level of drama rising to a level that no one wants to moderate mess anymore.
The way that the LGM commenters were treating their front pagers made me wonder if they were aware that the front pagers could choose to give up a hobby. I don’t really read many LGM comments, but it was obvious that what the commenters were doing was stressful to their front pagers.
EarthWindFire
@Kay: Why would you think you have to persuade when God is in your side and you’re the Chosen Ones who will show the Way? Why would you actually think you have to come to a consensus when the Almighty has shown you the truth and the light?
Of course it was arrogant bullshit. That’s what the conservative morality groups are about by and large. It’s no wonder they gave up their remaining moral capital for Donald Trump. It was simply a matter of game knows game.
Kay
@Starfish:
My paternal grandmother was in the ILGWU – garment workers union. She made mens pants as a job. She sewed for us too. She once made all the womens wedding party clothes for one of my sisters weddings.
My sister went on to have …some more weddings :)
She made me doll clothes and then Barbie clothes. Barbie clothes are sort of an amazing tiny construction. They would be really stiff because she was using fabric scraps from menswear. My oldest granddaughter loves Barbie and I have a sewing machine so I thought I might try tiny clothes.
rikyrah
Good Morning, Everyone 😊 😊 😊
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
EarthWindFire
It wouldn’t even have to be an emergency. If it’s one of Dannelfelser’s own, there were reasons and her abortion was moral. Unlike those Jezebel sluts over there.
And they tell us we’re the ones playing identity politics. Nope, no one plays identity politics like the right wing.
Leto
@MomSense: Avalune showed me some of things Ella has knitted, and they’re really good! Harris crochets and Ava said, “Well, we begrudgingly accept her…” hahaha
rikyrah
@schrodingers_cat:
Nobody said that Joy was a policy.
It stems from the MSM going along with the ‘what’s the matter with her laugh’ meme that the GOP was pushing.
Rooted in misogyny.
And, Anti-Blackness.
Then , the Vice President did the Uno Reverse and made JOY a part of the campaign.
They continue to be mad about it
rikyrah
Sarah Reese Jones (@PoliticusSarah) posted at 8:30 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
Sen. Lindsey Graham claims that there really is no joy in America, “This whole joy, love fest doesn’t exist in the real world.” t.co/x51s6y50jN
(x.com/PoliticusSarah/status/1827700042590769617?t=6XSBcjCxlHo8tbLpD7gtXw&s=03)
EarthWindFire
@rikyrah: What a sad little man. Thoughts and prayers, Lindsey.
Anyway
@schrodingers_cat: Blech. FTFNYT, ‘nuff said. The USAToday op-ed posted in the comments had some good insights, I thought – would rather read that.
ETA: who’s Patrick Healey? Don’t recognize the name.
Quiltingfool
The young women I know (here in Missouri) are scared that if they have a problem with their pregnancy, they might die because of no or delayed treatment. They are normies and they don’t follow NYT (establishment media). They are social media all the way, and the people they follow are emphasizing reproductive freedom and what happens when you don’t have that freedom.
My niece has one child and only wants one. She finally was able to get a tubal ligation, but had to wait 8 years after the birth of her son (she wanted one sooner, but doctors wouldn’t do it). The doctor who performed her surgery was very supportive, and told her he was worried about his daughters; he wanted them to attend college in a blue state so they would be able to make a choice.
I think the abortion amendment will pass in Missouri, but I highly doubt that Missouri will elect Kunce over Hawley and Harris over Trump. The problem is that normies believe the amendment will be “settled” and Republicans won’t be able to mess with it. Yeh, rightttttt.
Leto
@Kay: Merino wool will become your new best fabric friend. It’s incredibly soft, but retains all the best features of wool. Avalune made a convert of me.
S Cerevisiae
@SFAW: Balloon Juice, now with whale juice!
TBone
@Starfish: oh I’m aware why you felt that way, I just believe that jackals are naturally more resilient. If there were any indication that it was truly gonna be too much for WG or JC to handle, I also believe that the ways to deal with that have been previously tested and stood up to a more frustrating test than that one was over the years. But, as always, I could be wrong!
TBone
@S Cerevisiae: blech
TBone
@Leto: my best winter socks
EarthWindFire
@Quiltingfool: Guess we’ll have to start telling them a Missouri amendment is great, but it will only last until a national ban is in place. I honestly don’t know if that’s what get through to normies though. Most of my social circle is plugged in enough that they get that already.
Mayim
@Kay: Ravelry is an amazing website. Information, community, and gorgeous pictures of knitted and crochet stuff. A valuable resource for fiber people, from anyone just picking up needles for the first time to expert designers.
I’d almost certainly buy a pattern from her.
TBone
@rikyrah: 😆🤡
Quiltingfool
@Kay: Your grandmother has my undying approval for making Barbie doll clothes! That is true love!
I made Barbie clothes once for a niece. Never again. I used to make all my clothes, but tiny clothes? Nope.
My sewing is strictly quilts. I greatly admire miniature quilts, making them is a whole new level of expertise, but I’m not going to be doing that. Although, if one does a quilt trunk show, it’s much easier to haul around 30 miniature quilts as opposed to 30 normal size quilts. Ask me how I know, lol.
Leto
@Kay: @Starfish: Kay, I’m sure Starfish and Momsense (and others here) know who he is, but Olympic Gold/Bronze Medalist Tom Daley is a huge knitter. Dude knits inbetween events/while waiting. Has knitted special Olympic projects for at least the past three Olympics. Is on camera watching his fellow athletes… knitting. The special sweater he knit this year was based on his kid’s design.
This is an article from 2021, but here you go: Olympic diver and knitter Tom Daley launches his own online knitting shop
Here’s a second one: Tom Daley
Dorothy A. Winsor
@BR: He also brags about how “everybody” wanted Roe overturned and he accomplished it. Does he think we don’t hear that?
Leto
@TBone: my best running socks, which now my daily socks. Anti-chaffing, anti-microbial, anti-fungal, self-regulating via temperature… they’ve taken me through a few ultramarathons and I basically don’t wear anything else now.
Leto
@rikyrah: what an absolutely sad, sad little man.
TBone
@Leto: it’s like miracle stuff!
Quiltingfool
@EarthWindFire: Exactly. People think a state constitutional amendment will prevail over a federal law. They really don’t get that federal overrules state. And we know that the “let the states decide” Supreme Court will turn on a dime to uphold a federal abortion ban no matter what voters want.
Kayla Rudbek
@Kay: I just hopped over to the “about Ravelry” page and there are 9 million users/members. I recall that at least 3% of Iceland are Ravelry users.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Michael Bersin:
I was a dedicated reader back then!
Quiltingfool
One more rant and then I have to knock some sense into my quilting machine – it’s being oppositional defiant.
I have never been a one issue voter until now. I absolutely refuse to vote for any Republican politician because of abortion. I will not support people who belong to a party that thinks it’s okay to let women die. Or suffer. Or have permanent physical damage.
I was so disappointed this year when no Republican canvasser showed up at my house. I was going to let them know how I felt about their party.
Probably better they didn’t show, don’t want my house to get burnt to the ground (old time Camden County way of getting rid of pesky neighbors).
KatKapCC
@Burnspbesq: Fortunately, literally not one single person is complacent. No matter how times people tell us not to be, it will still be true that nobody is.
What I’m more worried about is this epidemic among the left that has people erroneously thinking a person saying “Hey I feel kinda good about this” or “Things seem to be going well” or “I think this one single thing over here was nice” means that person is totally complacent and believes the election has already been won and nothing needs to be done ever again. Y’all might wanna readjust your comprehension meters.
Mayim
@Kay: one of the benefits of knitting: it’s portable. I’ve knit in all sorts of places ~ a simple project is an excellent ADHD fidget toy.
Leto
@Quiltingfool: long arm machine?
Kayla Rudbek
@Nukular Biskits: oh hell yes, wool versus acrylic to start off with; accusations of yarn snobbery against those who hate acrylic, accusations of being environmentally damaging against those who only use acrylic (so long as they’re not allergic to wool). Supporting the local yarn stores versus supporting big box retailers or online retailers. Drama about indie dyers vanishing or faking their own deaths rather than declaring bankruptcy and going out of business. Then the Olympics tried to shut down the Ravellympics. Inclusion of Black, Indigenous, and persons of color in the community (particularly as pattern designers and indie dyers – it’s getting better but it’s still a fairly white community). Theft at yarn festivals (a lot of the festival business is in cash which makes the vendors targets for theft out of their vehicles, or theft of their vehicles with the merchandise). And then we get into all the copyright disputes…
schrodingers_cat
@rikyrah: Agreed. MSM hates Democrats. Because we are not the party of straight white men who are Christians. We are a party of all the “others”.
Kay
@Kayla Rudbek:
Lol. I like Iceland a lot. They’re really friendly for cold climate people. Maybe it’s a kind of cabin fever. They’re “thank GOD you’re here – someone other than my relatives”
I have an Icelandic sweater. I love it. It literally sheds rain. I like their muted blacks and greys and browns too.
Kayla Rudbek
@Kay: there are books of patterns like this amazon.com/Sewing-Clothes-Barbie-Stylish-Outfits/ and free patterns. Barbie dolls come in a variety of body shapes now so I’d probably make a variety of sizes.
Kayla Rudbek
@Kay: the Icelanders have an app so they can check how they’re related – it can be a problem for single people at the bars. When I went to Iceland, one of the museum exhibits had calculations that a quarter of the country was descended from one of the Roman Catholic bishops pre-Reformation.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
Agree. Also agree with your comment about about concern trolling.
kalakal
@Kay:
Well said.
Leto
@Kay: I have some sweaters from the Shetland Islands, and they’re similar in both rain wicking and my enjoyment of the color palette/design.
Kay
@Kayla Rudbek:
Thanks so much. She and I had this long discussion because she wanted an Elsa Barbie-like doll (from Frozen) but she was calling it an “Elsa Barbie” and I was concerned it wasn’t the standard Barbie size because her intent is to start a collection. We also talked about how mermaid dolls are lame because they have so few clothing options. She’s four and I have taught her to do the simplest hand sewing stitch. I used an embroidery hoop so it would be easier for her to manage the fabric and a plastic needle. She really concentrated and got it quickly. I think four years old and ten years old are the best ages and really the epitome of human development. Lovely people.
They teach knitting in Danish elementary schools, starting when they are six, so my Danish granddaughter will be a knitter. Her mother is.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay: These people will not be satisfied until the 1st Amendment and Article VI are removed from the Constitution. They want to impose their fucked up version of “Christianity” that Jesus himself would not recognized on everyone. The polar opposite of what the Founders and Framers intended.
Ken
Since Madame Defarge.
Ken
Is he aware that under the ACA, psychological counseling is covered by his health insurance?
Ken
Worked for dogfighting, didn’t it?
(NARRATOR: It did not, in fact, work for dogfighting.)
Michael Bersin
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
We’re still here!
BellaPea
Our local newspaper, the Knoxville News-Sentinel, had two opinion columns on Harris today. One was from a former San Francisco city official who had worked with her. His column was quite good and gave an honest summation of why he thought she would be a good president. The other was from our “Senator” Bill Hagerty. His column was basically an outline of Fox News talking points, including the MAJOR lie that all of Trump’s legal issues stem from Democratic officials trying to put him in jail so he could not be president. What a load of crap.
Starfish
@Leto: I didn’t know any of that about Tom Daley, but that is awesome. I found his website.
Starfish
@Kay: My mom helped us make barbie clothes when I was a kid. We made very simple stuff, and the fabric was stiff because it was quilting scraps as opposed to anything that would work well on that very small scale.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Ken:
Nor did it work for the puppy mill plebiscite. The wingnuts in Jeff City worked to get around it.
@Michael Bersin:
I stopped reading when we moved in 2018. Lemme put it back on my daily perusal list because obviously my interest in Misery politics hasn’t totally gone away.
Quiltingfool
@Leto: Yes, longarm. I’m now ready to see if it will be cooperative…
Wish me luck!
Betty
@Suzanne: His politics are only a small part of his weirdness. Can’t imagine what living with him would be like.
Citizen Alan
@Starfish: This reminds me of one of my favorite presidential trivia questions:
What did Sasha and Malia Obama have for lunch on December 7th, 2011?
The answer is sushi, which I know because the school they attended just happened to serve sushi on Pearl Harbor Day that year, and multiple news outlets, including the Post and Business Insider, felt the need to write stories about it and what it might say about whether or not the Obamas loved America.
The children of Democrats have never been off limits for the conservatives, and the media that supports them, because nothing about democrats has ever been off limits for conservatives and the media that supports them.
Citizen Alan
@Kay: I stand by my belief that the vast majority of people who our anti choice feel that way, because deep down, they know they are awful, disgusting people. Consequently, the thought of easy access to abortion terrifies them because it forces them to confront the fact that the human race would likely be much better off if their mothers had stabbed him through the heart with a coathanger while they were still in the womb.
You think JD Vance has never contemplated the fact that his mother might have been able to get off drugs and lead a more productive life if she hadn’t been saddled with a child at a young age?
Citizen Alan
@Quiltingfool: I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Conservatives are the worst, but conservative women are the worst of the worst. Women who think that all women are inferior to men and who thus hate themselves for their own femininity. Women who want to burn down the world in revenge for not being born a man and thus entitled to mastery of the earth. Sadists who truly believe that God created pregnancy primarily as a way to torture women just because Eve ate the apple.
Soprano2
@EarthWindFire: I met the woman who ran one of the abortion clinics we used to have here. She said one of the women who picketed them every weekend called and said she needed an abortion, but she wanted to come in the back door so none of her friends would see her! The clinic manager told her no, you’ll come in the front like everyone else. I think the woman went somewhere else. I know there are lots of stories like that, the “my abortion is justified but yours isn’t” thing is common among anti- choicers.
Soprano2
@Quiltingfool: Yeah, did you see that three of the antis have filed a bullshit lawsuit trying to keep the abortion amendment off the ballot? In late August they’re still trying, because they know it’s going to pass.
Soprano2
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Those weren’t constitutional amendments like the abortion legalization measure is. It will be a lot harder for the lege to mess with a constitutional amendment, that’s why they’re trying so hard to keep it off the ballot.
Princess
@BR: Maybe this is a dead thread but I definitely believe there will be some women who will hold onto the idea of a veto on an abortion ban like a literate and a permission slip to vote Trump again. And it allows the news media and fact checkers to muddy the waters.
The Lodger
@TBone: Pierre Robert? I escaped the Philly radio market a few decades ago and had no idea he was still around. Didn’t hear him, didn’t miss him.
The Lodger
@S Cerevisiae: How ’bout a morning glass of Whaleato and vodka?
artem1s
@Starfish:
residents of MO may remember this…
Mary Margaret Truman was the daughter of the Prez, la de da
She lived in the White House with her ugly mother Bess
Her social position was not very high
She was a member of I felt a thigh
Wives and daughters were always an acceptable target for the press and social set to go after. I don’t remember if Caroline was ever a target. Certainly no one ever went after JFK Jr, especially after the funeral photo. At least not until he grew up and became a threat to run for the Senate. The Bush twins and their mother kind made themselves targets to some degree but I don’t remember hate radio set going after them.
tam1MI
Sounds like a fake ballot to me.
Ksmiami
@Princess: Kamala will bring this up at the debate- that he’s proven to be untrustworthy
tam1MI
They can run, but they can’t hide. They’ve built the anti-choice brand for 50 years, it’s gonna stick.
tam1MI
I can’t be the only one who remebers the NBC reporter who basically insinuated that Chelsea Clinton was a whore and her mother her trafficker. (“Don’t you think she is being pimped out…?”).
Darkrose
@Starfish: Yeah, well, what some of the LGM front pagers were doing was stressful to the commenters. Erik Loomis literally told me that my existence was meaningless because I was mildly snarky. I was sitting in a hotel room 2000 miles from home in tears because that asshole can never admit that he’s wrong and when one person suggested that he should apologize, he said “Nah.”
I’ve never looked back, and my mental health has been so much better.
Chris T.
@Trivia Man:
Hormone replacement in general can help older adults (men and women both). They can also hurt. It’s a tricky balancing act and it’s very easy for those taking testosterone or one of its analogues to go too far.
MomSense
@TBone: I almost left and I’m still sort of hanging on here by a thread because I care about a lot of people here. I do not feel very resilient and I think that you have it reversed. The majority here bullied the handful of us who dissented from the majority opinion. Watergirl checked out and didn’t read the comments and had no idea what was happening or how bad it got. John mentioned that he was wrong and that some of us had been treated badly. Betty C said something similar.
I don’t really have another place online where people discuss politics and I am sad about leaving a place where I know about people’s lives and pets and gardens.
There has been a lot of worry about the feelings of the majority here but not about the handful of us who still see some passive aggressive comments and insults.
I feel like I was bullied and scapegoated and ganged up on. I’m hanging on for a few people but I honestly don’t know what to do. It was really bad.
sab
@Kay: In my city ( Akron, OH) the Planned Parenthood chapter was founded by very conservative Republican women who didn’t want poor people to have too many babies. My mother wasn’t of that ilk, but the right to abortion was her single most important issue, and that drove her out of the Republican Party.
Chris T.
@Kay:
So sub eis, ergo propter eos (“under them therefore because of them”) joins up with post hoc ergo propter hoc (“after this therefore because of this”) as a category of fallacy?
(Replace eis and eos with eo and eum to use “him” instead of “them”.)
Connor
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Make that ANY child dying at ANY age younger than you for ANY reason. It’s all a nightmare after that happens, even if you eventually learn to cope, which not everyone does.
Experience talking.
Kayla Rudbek
@Baud: I saw my first one live today as well, and it looked like something out of a low-budget 80s sci-fi flick. Unfortunately it’s on the street where my godson lives, so now I have to worry about it corrupting innocent children.
Ironcity
@MagdaInBlack: Saw one in the wild this am and the dumpster is a tarnished silver/gray.
MagdaInBlack
@Ironcity: I thought the one I saw this week was mat charcoal, but now you say that, it may have been tarnished. Either way, the finish sure looked bad.
Darkrose
@MagdaInBlack: I saw one that appeared to have a black wrap. It still looked like something out of Minecraft, but it was better-looking than the default.
Matt McIrvin
@Quiltingfool: Canvassers usually concentrate on known party supporters to GOTV. So they probably already know you’re not one.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: On the bright side, I’m starting to see Hyundai Ioniq 6es around. Car guys seemed to have mixed opinions about them but I think they’re beautiful cars, probably the electric I covet the most.