The depths of Trump’s new bestie, the useless nepo-baby RFK, have yet to be plumbed. His daughter Kick is dating Ben Affleck, and independent reporter Marisa Kabas took a look at Kick’s Instagram, and found this:
There’s a lot more, including Bobby Jr with roadkill, Bobby and fam with a shark, etc. Then there’s this:
Let’s not forget his nutcase running mate, Nicole Shanahan, who said the RFK Jr/Shanahan ticket shouldn’t endorse Trump until he apologizes for Project Warp Speed. Of course, Bobby Jr did endorse and withdrew in the battleground states, but he kept his name on the ballot in other states in hopes of being a spoiler, and also to provide him masturbatory fodder when he looks at how many votes he got.
The Trump campaign is like a bowling ball thrown down the alley by a three-year-old when they have the bumpers up. James Carville is far from my favorite, but he has it right when he says “they go from one stupid jackass thing to another stupid jackass thing”.
Succession is starting to look like a documentary. It would all be funny if the anti-vax nonsense hadn’t killed or injured thousands of children.
Maxim
Yeah, weird is a wholly inadequate term for the fuckedupness that is RFK Jr.
OT ETA: Got an email from Spoutible in case any of y’all are interested:
NobodySpecial
The Kennedys are, to me, Exhibit A on why you should never let political dynasties happen. JFK was, in the end, a mid President, Ted Kennedy managed to wreck his own career by not keeping it in his pants, and now they’ve devolved down into the American Hapsburgs. The only saving grace for them is that there’s enough Trumps around to take the #1 spot the first time a kid or grandkid goes for office.
sab
I personally would like to completely ignore his existence, but it is probably a useful public service to draw attention to how extremely weird he is so that voters don’t associate anything about the Kennedy name with him
ETA : I do like “American Hapsburgs” as a reminder.
rikyrah
Uh huh
Uh huh
scary lawyerguy (@scarylawyerguy) posted at 8:41 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
You’ll be shocked to learn the same guy who wrote “Joy Is Not A Strategy” ridiculed Hillary Clinton’s laugh. Apparently, such misogyny is tolerated at the Paper of Record™ b/c this guy went from being a beat reporter to Deputy Opinion Page Editor 🙃 https://t.co/7z2h1U84Nb
(https://x.com/scarylawyerguy/status/1827702887880765816?t=Te0UrypW8nyMsC-F0NgPTQ&s=03)
sab
@NobodySpecial: Also too the Bush family.
Jeffro
I don’t think RFK Jr’s endorsement is gonna help trump the way trump thinks it will.
I’m expecting that Harris/Walz will carpet bomb the swing states with ads highlighting the anti-vax nuttiness. It should push more than a few parents of school-age kids firmly into Camp Blue.
rikyrah
Without his name and money,
RFK Jr would be starring in his own episode on the ID CHANNEL.😒😒
Baud
@Maxim:
I didn’t realize Spoutible was still a thing.
geg6
@NobodySpecial:
Pretty unfair to all the Kennedys who aren’t RFK, Jr. Most of them are accomplished and not crazy, worm brained addicts. And Teddy didn’t ruin his career. He ruined his presidential aspirations but you don’t get eulogized as the Lion of the Senate if you ruined your career.
rikyrah
Brianna Wu (@BriannaWu) posted at 9:15 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
A lot of Trump supporters have asked what policy is leading us to vote for Kamala Harris. I want to answer in good faith.
I think it’s fair to critique the Harris campaign for not getting very specific on policy. However, elections are about choosing between two options, and the truth is, we know exactly how Donald Trump would govern based on his first term.
Here are five issues that make voting for him a non-starter for me, personally.
1.THE PEACEFUL TRANSFER OF POWER: Trump’s involvement with January 6th and his refusal to accept the outcome of the election is a hard line. There’s no issue that matters to me as much as democracy—not abortion, not trans rights. Without democracy, there is no point to any election.
I understand that Republicans believe a completely different narrative about these events, but it’s simply not true.
2.OUR STATE DEPARTMENT: I think Rex Tillerson could have actually been an excellent Secretary of State, but he resigned because he didn’t think Trump took the presidency seriously. He couldn’t do his job. Contrast this with Blinken, who I think has been an outstanding Secretary of State.
3.NATO: More than any domestic policy matters, NATO prevents World War III. No issue matters more than this. There is every reason to believe Trump wants to dismantle or severely weaken NATO.
I know Republicans believe a completely different narrative, suggesting he just wants other countries to pay more, but that’s not true. There has been plenty of reporting on his intentions to radically reshape and weaken NATO.
4.FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY: Reagan ballooned the debt, as did Bush II and Trump. In contrast, Democrats are typically the ones to pay down what was put on the credit card.
The amount we pay in interest is staggering, and we get nothing in return. America simply cannot afford a Republican president right now.
5.JOB CREATION: As Bill Clinton noted recently, since the 1980s, Democrats have created 50 million jobs, while Republicans have created only 1 million.
There is a clear track record of building the economy and infrastructure, which is extremely appealing.
Personally, I expect a Harris presidency to be an extension of Biden’s policies. In my estimation, America has been on the right track for the past four years.
(https://x.com/BriannaWu/status/1827711373926613463?t=qRZFXCUK38d-w-Y1UFuclA&s=03)
rikyrah
Acyn (@Acyn) posted at 9:43 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
Welker: You’re calling it a sarcastic comment, women felt like it was a gut punch to them. Do you regret making that comment?
Vance: I have a lot of regrets but making a joke is not on the top ten list https://t.co/hfMKG9lyGd
(https://x.com/Acyn/status/1827718557259731098?t=z4YgMDz322JJwMdbZ2ogOQ&s=03)
3Sice
EarthWindFire
@rikyrah: (Narrator) It wasn’t a joke.
rikyrah
scary lawyerguy (@scarylawyerguy) posted at 5:06 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
What’s pissing off reporters is not Harris’s lack of policy specifics or not doing a press conference. No, it’s that influencers got preferential treatment at the DNC while reporters were stuck in the cheap seats. I’ve seen too many articles like this to conclude otherwise 🙃 https://t.co/bhBVzo7oCl
(https://x.com/scarylawyerguy/status/1827648653680373938?t=jajKQQ3XTKlKiESvW5rtPQ&s=03)
dmsilev
RFK Jr.’s brother torched him in the LA Times today:
Etc. Etc.
Next family reunion is going to be …awkward.
rikyrah
@EarthWindFire:
I know it wasn’t a joke. Seen too many interviews with him saying the same offensive shyt 😡
SatanicPanic
@rikyrah: reporters should work on their social media skills 🤷♂️
EarthWindFire
@rikyrah: Yeah. That he thinks he can get away with it and Welker will let him do so…it’s appalling as hell.
geg6
@SatanicPanic:
🤣🤣🤣Truth!
MagdaInBlack
@rikyrah: He really does win the 5-star asshole award, doesn’t he?
Dadadadadadada
@NobodySpecial: Exhibit B: the Bushes. An openly Nazi-sympathizing senator spawns a CIA director turned mid (at best) president spawns a horrific president, a mid governor turned hilariously failed presidential candidate.
Harrison Wesley
@Jeffro: Maybe Trump sees a new marketing opportunity for Bobbie’s Bear Cub Breakfast Links.
Dadadadadadada
I highly, highly recommend the Behind the Bastards podcast, which recently did a four-part series on RFK Jr. that a) reveals a whole lot of other weird shit about him, and b) explains a whole lot of it.
opiejeanne
Just found out that Brainworm Bob will still be on the WA ballot in November.
West of the Rockies
@rikyrah:
I bet he was caught immediately off-csmera saying, “Why are women always so sensitive about stupid shit? They’re so humorless. They just can’t take a joke!”
West of the Rockies
The Atlantic has a story up today about how pollsters are probably over-stating Kamala’s lead.
danielx
@rikyrah:
I’d like to say I’m surprised, but such is not the case.
Piss on Patrick and his opinions.
Nettoyeur
@3Sice: The rich are not like you and me…..
schrodingers_cat
Nepo baby RFK Jr bores me. *Yawn
Leto
@Dadadadadadada: John Oliver did a segment on him, about three weeks ago now, that was similar. Very informative, and brief at 30 mins.
Elizabelle
@rikyrah: Patrick Healy is an asshole.
The Vichy Times is just trolling us.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@West of the Rockies:
Of course The Atlantic has a story up like that. There’s as predictable in their “reporting” as the Wa(com)Post, FTFNYT and of course, Totebagger Radio.
Just another billionaire-owned media piece spouting libertarian/plutocrat propaganda.
Elizabelle
@geg6: Teddy should never have run against Jimmy Carter. Although he did have a solid Senate career.
CliosFanBoy
@West of the Rockies:
I’d bet good money he made a comment about “time of the month” as well.
oldster
@rikyrah:
Jesus f’ing christ. Vance is going to learn what happens when you first make a “joke” about rape, and then tell women that they should lighten up because they can’t take a joke.
Why exactly is he so loathsome? What is the secret to his anti-charisma?
I hate to engage in looksism — god knows I’m no beauty — but whenever I see him he reminds me of the Grinch. I hope someone will do a mashup of his face and the Grinch’s face.
Percysowner
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:In some ways articles like this can become a positive thing. We can’t get complacent and being told that Harris isn’t really ahead should make us work harder. Is that their intention, Hell NO!, but it is how we need to proceed.
@oldster:
The real question is why the HELL didn’t Tim Ryan find and exploit all of this when he ran against Vance?
Thor Heyerdahl
@West of the Rockies: okay then. Time to do the work and run the score up even higher.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@West of the Rockies:
Do you think their reporting on this is credible?
West of the Rockies
@oldster:
For me, Vance’s repugnancy is pretty subjective. I think he appears smug and inauthentic. The way he stands even in the doughnut shop, arms akimbo, preening, claiming social space… it so smacks of toxic vanity.
schrodingers_cat
@oldster:
Potato face thinks he is god’s gift to women. He has that smug self satisfied grin.
danielx
@oldster:
First thought: I saw “Gingrich” instead of “Grinch”. I don’t know which is more disgusting.
schrodingers_cat
@danielx: Gingrich. Doesn’t Grinch learn the error of his ways and change?
West of the Rockies
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
The Atlantic did have a full-scale “Don’t Vote for Trump” issue. The reporting in polls article didn’t strike me as something done to buoy Trump.
Baud
@Thor Heyerdahl:
👍
trollhattan
If there were no family political dynasties, how on earth would the Philippines have Bongbong Marcos as president right now? Unwarranted Ferdinand and Imelda erasure!
(Now, imagine living where Bongbong Marcos represents a notable improvement over his predecessor.)
When’s the last time a Kennedy had a meaningful impact? Teddy and ACA I imagine, although there is the role zombie JFK Jr. continues playing in certain Republican heads. RFK’s addled kid will have zero impact on the election’s outcome. None.
Leto
@danielx: Gingrich, as the Grinch realizes the error of his ways and works to undue the harm. The Gingrich continues to pedal the same destructive bullshit that helped kickstart the initial hyper partisanship that we’re dealing with now.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@West of the Rockies:
Don’t they have a history of concern trollery with Dems, though? I remember commenters mentioning that here before about the Atlantic
Baud
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
All media do.
RaflW
RFKjr isn’t an eccentric environmentalist. Too many dead animals in his backstory. He’s just f–ing weird.
schrodingers_cat
@West of the Rockies: Was that before or after he became the Republican nominee?
Ruckus
@rikyrah:
First – Well done.
Second, I agree with your opinion on how and what she will be like as a leader. Her perspective is different – and it’s about time we have a leader in this country that gives us that perspective. This is not a male society, this is a human society, and it takes both sides of humanity to make it a human society. Our leadership should reflect that. IOW – It’s about damn time.
Greg
That’s their ‘hook’ in the second paragraph, but really it’s about polling changes and the difficulties of getting representative samples. If polling was being done the same way as it had been in 2020 _and_ got these results, _then_ they’d be over-stating Kamala’s lead.
But they’ve adjusted for what they think they got wrong in 2020, so that’s not likely to be the case. I found it to be a fair and interesting article, actually.
matt
@rikyrah: common sense would dictate that they spend a couple of extra bucks buying nicer kibble for the idiot reporters.
Tony Jay
Every story I hear about Rat Fucking Kook 3 just screams out “This prick must have been a nightmare for The Help.”
Whale juice in the car upholstery? Bear brains in the turn-ups of Sir’s expensive pants? Fish tank water slopped all over the state-of-the-art home entertainment system?
Not Sir’s Problem. He’ll just walk away laughing and when he comes back it’s all miraculously fixed or cleaned or replaced without him having to spend a single brain-cell on anything as mundane as ‘consequences’.
Decent people can come out of that kind of upbringing, but it’s not a natural outcome.
matt
@Percysowner: my bet is Ryan ran on the centrist weenie we go high when they go low kitchen table issues loser agenda.
Harrison Wesley
@oldster: He’s in some sort of negative-charisma contest with Ron DeSantis.
Villago Delenda Est
@rikyrah:
His parents made the joke.
mrmoshpotato
So true.
Nettoyeur
@rikyrah: Policy wonks lose. Just ask Hilary, Al Gore, Jimmy Carter, and Adlai Stevenson. Morning in America and Hope for the Future win every time. Ask FDR, Ike, LBJ (1964), Bill Clinton, Obama.
West of the Rockies
@schrodingers_cat:
I don’t recall. The article came out at least a few months ago.
Villago Delenda Est
@Leto: Can I get an amen to your post?
Nettoyeur
@RaflW: Weird is too weak. He’s a creep. Like Trump and JD Four Names.
Maxim
@Baud: Yeah, they’re staying well under the radar, but I get semiregular emails. I must have signed up at some point.
West of the Rockies
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
My take is that The Atlantic is pretty staid and old-school conservative, but decisively anti-Trump.
I agree with Greg above that it was an interesting piece. And Thor above is right: we need to GOTV.
Villago Delenda Est
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: This to the Nth degree. It’s why I have my nym.
matt
@rikyrah: I’d just say she’s a Democrat and not a fascist, so Ukraine, reproductive health care, progressive taxation and free and fair elections. I like your point about a jobs-centered economic policy too. I think we might want to say something about ethics reform for the courts too. I’d probably call the policy ‘No More Sugar Daddies for Judges’.
Gretchen
Trump has always longed to be accepted by the old money social set like the Kennedys. The real Kennedys want nothing to do with him but he may be tempted by acceptance by the crazy one.
Suzanne
@Jeffro:
Agree.
Also think the value of the Kennedy name is almost gone. Might as well be Kardashians at this point.
RobertB
@matt: Ryan ran as Republican Lite. A lot of ads were, “Trump and I both agree on x!” And since JD Vance had zero political experience and wasn’t going Full Trump, he had nothing to be attacked on.
Kent
They aren’t done. Although Trumpism put Bushism on pause. But there are Bushes waiting in the wings for when the MAGA fever fades: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_P._Bush
Villago Delenda Est
@Gretchen: TCFFG/PAB’s attempts to insinuate himself into Manhattan high society have failed regularly. His aura has always been nouveau riche, and he wears it proudly, not realizing that it works against his desire.
Ken
@rikyrah: I am so hoping that the first thing the Harris White House Press Secretary announces is an essay contest to see which reporters get to sit in the big boy chairs. “The documents for the proposed policy are available for download, submissions will be accepted until midnight tomorrow, and your work will be judged on accuracy, completeness, and staying on topic.”
Get Walz to organize it, he’s got practice.
Villago Delenda Est
@RobertB: And for that Ohio Dems should exile him forever to a small island in Lake Erie where he can contemplate his fail.
SW
Just a super high profile example of the consequences of gun violence. There are hundreds of thousand of families who deal with this crap every day with no media attention. Generational dysfunction rippling out from the original atrocity.
Kent
I’m 60 and have no good memories of a Kennedy. I was in the womb when JFK was assassinated. And I was 4 when RFK was assassinated. My actual political memories of Kennedys are:
Ted trying to primary Carter and helping give us Reagan
A few socialites like John Jr. and Caroline who were mostly well-behaved but irrelevant outside the tabloids where they were a staple in the 80s and 90s
Arnold’s wife Maria Shriver who also seemed decent but irrelevant
Some pipsqueak in Boston who tried to challenge Ed Markey.
And now the horror show that is RFJ Jr. with a decade of anti-vax idiocy culminating in his endorsement of Trump.
And that’s about it. But on the other hand they are very much of a Northeast dynasty and I’m from the Northwest so I don’t pay any attention to what this or that minor Kennedy is doing. I’m pretty politically informed and if I don’t know about any other Kennedy’s then they aren’t making much of an impact.
matt
@RobertB: Yeah, that’s even worse – when they go low, we hug them. Vote for the Gimp!
Andrew Abshier
The other two-person dynasty I can think of is Birch Bayh, followed by his son Evan Bayh. The latter was a replacement-level Senator who liked DLC type politics a little too much as I recall.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Kent:
A thousand times this. It’s why Liz Cheney has remained on the sidelines, just waiting to get back in when, in the estimation of the Bushies, the insanity has passed.
Problem is, it might not ever pass and if it does, well, we’re dealing with the same agenda only presented “better”.
Starfish
@West of the Rockies: Why are men pissed off at women when they fail at being funny? It’s like men don’t know how humor works, and somehow that is a woman’s fault.
Suzanne
@Kent: I am 44 and I (vaguely) remember Ted in the Senate, and that’s it. SuzMom was in middle school when JFK was shot. I couldn’t tell you one thing about RFK. I have abstract awareness of some of the various kids as extremely minor celebrities and that is all. If I ran into any of them on the street, I wouldn’t recognize them or be able to tell you anything about them.
Kent
There are others. The Udalls out here in the west.
And don’t forget Andy Beshear in Kentucky. He is the son of a former Kentucky governor.
And of course the Romney clan. Mitt was the son of a former governor.
steve g
Mitt Romney is laughing and saying “that thing with my dog on the roof of the car doesn’t seem so bad now, does it” and we are all stunned that he’s right about that.
Suzanne
@Starfish:
I read an inadvertently hilarious-yet-revealing piece about this some years ago. Researchers polled men and women about what they mean when they say they want their partner to have “a good sense of humor”. Men, by some amazing percentage, defined “having a good sense of humor” as “laughing at my jokes”, and women defined it as “making funny jokes”.
trollhattan
@Suzanne: Ironically, Kardashians could sway more votes than this lunatic.
KatKapCC
@Suzanne: Eh, I think most people who already had neutral-to-positive feelings about the Kennedys won’t lose that over the one idiot. The vast majority of the family are lightyears better than him. I mean, earlier this year, they put out a video endosing Biden in which one of them said “When I think of modern politicians in our country in this century, I think Joe Biden is the RFK of his generation” — which is quite a thing to say when the actual RFK Jr was also running, ROFL.
Lyrebird
Yep, and iirc Chris Cillizza still gets paid to offer his opinions on the tee vee or something.
ugh
RUN UP THE SCORE!
RobertB
@Villago Delenda Est: Nah, some of those little islands are pretty nice.
Suzanne
@KatKapCC:
I don’t think the Kennedys are bad — just messy like every family ever.
But, like:
If someone said this to me, I would stare at them blankly. Is this a positive thing? I have zero frame of reference (and I follow this inside baseball a lot more than most). This is what I mean when I say that the Kennedy name doesn’t have much value.
trollhattan
@Kent: George Romney was a pretty good guy and in contrast to Reagan and Nixon, a Republican who would have done zero criming had his presidential ambitions been realized.
As chair and president of American Motors he serially turned down big raises because he felt it inappropriate to earn too much more than production workers.
He was also born in a Mormon cult compound in Mexico, which would explode a few brains today.
Mittens inherited approximately zero percent of his dad’s moral compass.
rikyrah
Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) posted at 10:52 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
I’m getting the sense that JD is still Trumps running mate in the sense that Melania is still his wife. Just kind of a we shan’t speak of it again kind of thing.
(https://x.com/joshtpm/status/1827735922839887926?t=QHIUuDI_AqhacxHqEMW3Bg&s=03)
rikyrah
Uppity Black Faerie Gothmother of Metal 🖤 (@FountainPenDiva) posted at 11:07 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
#mouthypolitics101
Thank you @Lawrence for calling out the foolishness.
VP Harris has been doing the work from the time she was DA and as VP doing EVERYTHING above and beyond the job description. The legacy media simply chose to ignore that.
(https://x.com/FountainPenDiva/status/1827739582672380213?t=NpTsc-FCFBOtvRBGekx1eA&s=03)
rikyrah
chris evans (@notcapnamerica) posted at 8:10 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
.@Lawrence points out the people who were calling for Joe Biden to step down wanted a chaotic mini-primary or open convention. By immediately endorsing Kamala Harris, Joe Biden and The Clintons had her replacement nomination sewn up within a day. https://t.co/GMTG8nu7TH
(https://x.com/notcapnamerica/status/1827694955860836808?t=zRxDATudD8b6F4zRyizr8Q&s=03)
RobertB
@Andrew Abshier: Arch Moore (three-time governor of WV) and Shelley Moore Capito, US Senator and Arch Moore’s daughter.
Arch Moore had to serve time for corruption.
trollhattan
@Kent:
California has the Browns. Jerry’s dad was governor and sister Kathleen became state treasurer. Her later run for governor was stymied by vampire Pete Wilson.
Jerry has no kids and Kathleen has several, none of whom are active in politics as far as I know. Think our dynasty is sunsetting after two generations.
dmsilev
@rikyrah: One thing about Trump’s particular brand of sociopathy is that he attracts horrible people into his orbit and systematically humiliates them. We might as well enjoy watching that.
scav
@Kent: Their dynasty isn’t that old either — well, for this puddleside it’s decent, but golly Joseph Sr seemed to be a heat-seeking missile for wooing the upper classes, gaining attention and politics. I mean, FDR and McCarthy and fairly Nazi-adjacent. Better at business than TCFG, but no entirely more scrupulous — although he switched to crafting enforcement when his bread was buttered on that side.
UncleEbeneezer
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Absolutely. They are hit and miss. You can count on them to write stupid shit about “wokeness” and fretting that the Dem coalition is leaning too progressive on issue x, y and z etc. And that shit is maddening, truly. But that said, I gotta say they are about the only major publication nominally on the Left side of the US political aisle that has featured articles about Gaza that represent the mainstream Dem position that Kamala basically laid out in her acceptance speech. Over the past ten months it’s been hard to find articles that weren’t either 1.) Genocide!! Colonizer! River to the Sea! or 2.) Palestinians R All terrorists! But The Atlantic has featured several writers like Yair Rosenberg who support a two-state solution with self-determination for Palestine, but also that Israel has a right to exist, Anti-Semitism/Islamaphobia are wrong and should have no place in either side’s protests etc. and have been willing to ask some uncomfortable questions about casual Anti-Semitism on the Left and on university campuses. I would never look to The Atlantic to guide my overall politics (just as I also wouldn’t look to Salon, The Nation etc. either) but I think they have been good at presenting Liberal Zionist/Two State perspectives that were very much in the minority when the Gaza protests were all the rage. That said, I’m sure they also published some terrible, pearl-clutching, Palestine-bashing, Islamophobic takes too. But of the Jewish voices that I respect and listen to (Josh Marshall, Yair Rosenberg, Gershom Gorenbergh, @JewishWonk, Michelle Goldbergh etc.) it’s notable that the good, mainstream articles they share are most often ones that ran in The Atlantic. It’s 100% true that The Atlantic can be problematic AF on many things, but I do think they publish some valuable stuff about Israel/Palestine.
Chris
@rikyrah:
I have two excellent and extremely policy based reasons to vote for Kamala Harris. One, she’s not a Republican. Two, she’s a Democrat.
On the first point, the GOP has been a nakedly fascist party for fifteen years at minimum, and anything is better than fascism, yes, policy wise, as in their policies kill, enslave and otherwise harm fewer people, and they have policies other than “kill, enslave, and otherwise harm people.” The British Empire was better than fascism. The Soviet Union was better than fascism. Chiang Kai Shek’s China was better than fascism. It isn’t just that Kamala Harris has better policies than a fascist; El Chapo Guzman would have better policies than a fascist, and if he were running against Trump, we all should vote for him too.
On the second point, Democrats are, however, pointedly not El Chapo Guzman (or communism or colonialism or military dictatorship). They’re not just a lesser evil, they’re a positive good. I would never claim they don’t have plenty of warts and blind spots, but on the whole, the way they approach political issues – internationalist foreign policy, bottom-up economics, and “mind your own business” social issues – is the right one. Have been for most of the last century. So yes, being the Democratic candidate in fact comes with a whole rafter of policies that make me support her.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@rikyrah: the guy sounds like an anger addict to me. Maybe less of misogynist and more of a misanthrope kind of weirdo.
Betty
@Suzanne: If you are in Boston with some extra time, a visit to the Kennedy Museum would explain why both John and Bobby meant so much to older people. They ended up not accomplishing much as both lives were cut short, but their speech making was inspirational to many. The museum has many recordings with messages that still resonate.
Villago Delenda Est
@Suzanne: You’re young enough to have no memory of RFK talking to a crowd the day MLK was assassinated. RFK was truly a unifying figure, fiercely anti-racist, anti-Vietnam war. The world would be a much different place if Sirhan-Sirhan missed.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Open thread? I have a post in my publisher’s blog about writing a series of novel vs. sequels in novels. The best part is that my editor added a chart with arrows pointing in all directions that made laugh.
JiveTurkin
@Ken: I am so hoping that the first thing the Harris White House Press Secretary announces is an essay contest to see which reporters get to sit in the big boy chairs.
Maybe a multiple choice test focusing on the Constitution and current political events around the world.
One of my all-time favorite things on Youtube was when Wolf Blitzer was on Jeopardy and he ended up with a negative score. Andy Richter, Conan’s sidekick, had $68,000 which was a Celebrity Jeopardy record. He basically knew everything.
rikyrah
D’Epitomee of Democratic Shills 🐝🖤🧡💛 (@epitomee) posted at 0:11 PM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
As a bad Democrat, I held my thoughts & words on the free 🇵🇸 thing because something didn’t feel authentic about their protests. I’m glad that I used discernment.
Now these clowns are pushing “abandon Harris” but no “abandon Trump?” Yeah, Black people clocked their bs. Time to https://t.co/r5kDhMfM24
(https://x.com/epitomee/status/1827755760182612350?s=03)
Kay
JD Vance said in an interview today that his wife has three beautiful children. They just don’t talk like normal people.
UncleEbeneezer
@West of the Rockies: Yeah I wouldn’t call them Libertarian at all. They favor abortion access/reproductive rights, higher taxes on the wealthy, gun regulations, green energy, LGBTQ Rights (generally), pro-Ukraine etc. They just aren’t as far Left as most of us, on most issues. But when people talk about them being a Republican rag I can only laugh, because you’d have to be pretty in denial about the current Republican Party to believe that most GOP voters agree with The Atlantic on much.
Villago Delenda Est
@UncleEbeneezer: Unfortunately, Likud is Islamaphobic and Hamas is militantly antisemitic. So here we are.
rikyrah
Portia ♍️ McGonagal (@PortiaMcGonagal) posted at 11:02 AM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
One of the moments from the #DNCConvention2024 that hit my nerdy feels was when @RepSlotkin reminded us: 1/
“You are here because you love your country. Do not give an inch to pretenders who wrap themselves in a flag but spit in the face of the freedoms it represents.”
(https://x.com/PortiaMcGonagal/status/1827738451674087675?t=6BRlZGLwN8toUnJ8wuCWzw&s=03)
Gretchen
@Suzanne: Here’s the RFK speech the night MLK was assassinated:
https://youtu.be/GoKzCff8Zbs?si=kfipglkXgFY-OQ9F
This was a spontaneous speech, with off the cuff references to Greek philosophers. That night many cities burned. Riots were very common that summer. He mentioned his own pain at losing his brother and mourned with the crowd, and Indianapolis was peaceful.
He was a terrible husband, but an empathetic politician who cared about the suffering of regular people and wanted to make things better.
piratedan
politics as a family business in the US isn’t uncommon. We had the Adams family (John and John Quincy) earlier in the history of the nation, the Roosevelt’s and regional/national ones like the Tafts, Freylinghuasens, et al. Some of it is honest public service, others are likely less so.
you know the old saying, sometimes the acorn doesn’t fall far from the tree and sometimes its a case of that’s no acorn, that’s a fungus and we need to nuke it from orbit.
Starfish
@UncleEbeneezer: Are you seeking out any Palestinian voices on the issues with Gaza?
Electronic Intifada is on that extreme pro-Palestine end of things that I learned about from a book by a contrarian Jewish lesbian that right wingers were latching onto because she was opposed to “Trigger warnings.” The book is “Conflict is Not Abuse” by Sarah Schulman. In this book, she was attempting to normalize the violence of some same-sex relationships by classifying it as “conflict” and not “abuse” which was wild. I am pretty much in the “when people are hitting each other to the point of injury, that is abuse” camp. Electronic Intifada was so far in the Palestinian camp that it made me a little uncomfortable.
Just Security has been doing some good work on making the issues related to Palestine visible in a way that centers more middle eastern voices. I was reading them before anyone said anything about Palestine. It just happened that they picked up on this issue.
Frankensteinbeck
@rikyrah:
And this is how you know the pundits are huffing their own farts. In what universe was Biden going to do anything else? Personal decency and loyalty to Democrats winning both demanded Harris and no one else.
I guess it also points to their ingrained racism/misogyny. Harris clearly was unimaginable to most of them, a nonentity who didn’t need to be considered. Classic woman-in-the-workplace bullshit.
Attapooch
@Kay: JD Vance just isn’t very good at being a human being. From his body language to the way he speaks he acts like he learned how to be a person from reading an instruction manual.
Prometheus Shrugged
@Starfish: There’s no possible comedy when the broader point you’re trying to make is way more deeply offensive than any “sarcastic comments made in service to that broader point”. It’s actually good that Kristen Welker let him continue to hang himself with that rope.
I thought the lady filling his doughnut order had the best reaction: a perfectly delivered, verbal side eye “OK” to his preening.
SW
@Betty: Suggest the American University “peace speech” for any youngsters who would like a taste of why many of us old bastards will go to our graves with affection for Jack Kennedy.
Suzanne
@Villago Delenda Est: The thing is….. I’m young enough to not remember that (MLK, Jr. was assassinated 12 years before I was born)…… but fully half of voters this year are younger than me and have even less knowledge. That’s what I mean about the Kennedy name not meaning much any longer. None of that is to say that they weren’t good people.
As for political dynasties….. former FLOTUS Barbara Pierce Bush was a descendent of Franklin Pierce. Which means that GWB was a descendent of two presidents. Richard Burr from NC is related to Aaron Burr.
karen marie
@rikyrah: They complained the DNC did not give them as much space as the RNC did. I saw video of the RNC convention. There was enough empty space for every journalist in the country to have attended.
Frankensteinbeck
@Starfish:
It’s been awhile because my friend group has crystallized, but I used to have bi- women friends emphatic that women are just as inclined to domestic abuse as men, and they got exactly the same shit from lesbians as men. Including cliches like “just needs a good fuck.”
Having been physically abused by a partner who knew I would never hurt her back, I find it entirely believable.
Evil knows no gender divide, alas. It is only looking for a power imbalance to exploit.
Villago Delenda Est
@Suzanne: Yup. You’re right. Which is why we old farts need to educate the young (and compared to me, you are but a child! :D) about what the Kennedy name once meant, and how degraded it has become thanks to Bobby the Infinitely Lesser.
ljt
@Villago Delenda Est: This is the speech RFK made the day MLK was assassinated. One of the best political speeches I’ve ever seen. ETA: only 5 minutes long; well worth watching. (And I see Gretchen beat me to it.)
sdhays
Oh, yeah! She’s my hero. First, she says she doesn’t want to be on video, then the reaction to him telling her he’s running to be VP was just awesome!
It’s too bad she couldn’t have later said, “Hold up, are you the guy they’re saying fucked a couch?”
Starfish
@Frankensteinbeck: Exactly. A lot of the trans-exclusionary radical feminism (you know, the anti-trans feminists who are real cozy with the rightwing bathroom police) rests on blaming men for ALL violence.
Suzanne
@Villago Delenda Est: Remember that there are new voters this year who think Nirvana is cool vintage music!
scav
@Villago Delenda Est: & contrariwise, good for the elders to know that, preexisting definitions aside, a bus in a computer is not a rolling little yellow thing entirely without seatbelts.
trollhattan
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yes, and yes.
It was a speech for the ages, wading into a very fraught situation and as memorable as it was extemporaneous.
Had he not been murdered he could well have won the nomination and beaten Nixon. Humphrey didn’t lose by much while Wallace was grabbing a swath of the South that would later become Republican territory.
BR
@rikyrah:
I do find it interesting that Harris knew to go to the Clintons for support after Biden. I would not have expected that (in either direction). I would have thought she would have talked to the Obamas. (I mean, maybe she did and they mutually decided that they should not speak publicly until the base got on board.)
sdhays
@Kay: Sounds like someone wants a paternity test. Or has seen one.
M31
for years fark.com replaced the CNN icon logo with a picture of Wolf’s Jeopardy score “-3600” hahahahaha
sdhays
@sdhays: Also implies he’s a worthless human being by his own fucked up logic. But I don’t disagree, though for other reasons.
patrick II
@rikyrah: I can believe that a gut punch to women is not on his top ten list of regrets.
Ruckus
@Tony Jay:
Decent people can come out of that kind of upbringing, but it’s not a natural outcome.
Agreed but there is more to it than that. We are, as a group, responsible for our own lives. Some have a much harder time finding the ability to be a responsible human but decency is a part of each human that can go either way. And it is actually the individual that makes that choice. Now each individual may not have the same paths in front of them, the road may be steeper and more winding but it is still a road that the vast majority have to manage from their own perspective. There will always be those that can’t manage it, those that never really had much if any perspective in front of them. RFK jr may be one of those who needs hand holding to find that perspective. At his age, really who is going to be able to hold that hand – and make any difference? We all live with the hand we are dealt – some do exceptional, some just survive. And some don’t. And every shade in between.
karen marie
@Attapooch: The only question he could think to ask any employee in the donut shop was “how long have you worked here.” For him, their identity begins and ends with that.
There doesn’t appear to have been any thought about what they hoped to accomplish by going in there. The purchase of donuts was an afterthought, an excuse for being there. So why were they there? Were they hoping the Underpants Gnome would help them out?
Tim in SF
they go from one stupid jackass thing to another stupid jackass thing” and it’s still going to be a coin flip.
Steve in the ATL
@Suzanne: Barb, a godawful human being, is the descendant and progenitor of two of the worst presidents in American history.
cain
@Villago Delenda Est:
The Palestinian protesters are now trying to leverage Black experience and Black Twitter is having none of it.
They continue to try to de-platform Harris while saying nothing about Trump. Whose people are literally writing ‘finish the job’ on missiles.
That it didn’t outage them tells me how serious they are about Palestine liberation.
karen marie
@sdhays: The video of the donut shop on cspan does not have the reluctant server blocked out. I don’t even know how or why it is on cspan. Very weird!
Ruckus
@West of the Rockies:
Being as how we belong to humanity, we ALWAYS need to Get Out The Vote.
As the saying goes, it takes all kinds. We want reasonable, logical, rational, we have to be those things and we have to work at it and get as many as possible to join in the fun.
Librarian
@Suzanne: Also I suggest looking into RFK’s visit to the Mississippi Delta in 1967. Joseph S. Clark’s and Robert F. Kennedy’s tour of the Mississippi Delta – Wikipedia
BR
@rikyrah:
That’s such a good analogy.
Uncle Cosmo
In 1964 MD elected Democratic US Senator Joe Tydings over GOP incumbent J. Glenn Beall. Joe, the adoptive son of US Senator Millard Tydings, who was a thorn in FDR’s side in the 1930s, was in turn turned out after a single term by J. Glenn Beall Jr, funded by some of Nixon’s dirty ITT money.
We also have retiring Representative John Sarbanes, son of Paul Sarbanes, who was a pretty dang good Democratic Representative from the same district and then US Senator.
Last in this compendium but definitely not least, former MD Lieutenant Governor Kathleen Kennedy Townsend[1] under Governor Parris Glendenning. She got the Democratic nomination for Governor in 2002 when Glendenning was term-limited out, and proceeded to run the most inept campaign in modern MD history, saddling our state with GOP Representative Bob Ehrlich as Governor for the next four years.
(NB If you can’t find anything else good to say about Martin O’Malley, note that he kicked Ehrlich’s ass in 2006 and again in 2010, restoring the Democratic trifecta here in the Old Line State.[2, 3])
[1] RatFuckingKook’s older sister. Who just FTR never won elective office on her own.
[2] O’Malley considered running for the guernatorial nomination in 2002, but rumor has it he was told by the national Democratic Party that it was KKT’s turn and if he challenged her he’d never get a penny from the Party, then or ever. MOM may have been “a young man in a hurry” but he knew how to win elections – IMO if he’d gotten up on a debate stage with KKT it would have been obvious who had “the Kennedy charisma” and it wouldn’t have been the one with the bloodline – and he might have saved the state from GOP rule. It is arguable, though impossible to prove, that even though MOM declined to run that year, the powers-that-were remembered he’d even dared to consider it & made sure he was starved for cash in his brief run for the Presidential nomination in 2016. Heck, it’s even conceivable that the HRC campaign went out of its way to stomp him while ignoring Bernie, who proved to be much more of a thorn in her side.
[3] I have been heard from sources inside the O’Malley governor’s office that offers of help from MOM were repeatedly rebuffed by Lt Governor Anthony Brown during his 2014 gubernatorial run. Brown,NB, lost to Larry Hogan that year, in perhaps another lost opportunity for MD Democrats, which might bite the party in the arse bigtime, as it could lose control of the US Senate if their nominee Angela Alsobrooks can’t defeat Hogan this November.)
Betsy
@Tony Jay: That’s what I was thinking! With every one of these strange incidents, he has “people” to whom he hands off the dirty work. That’s a big contributing factor to smuggery and fatheadedness.
StringOnAStick
Speaking of weird, a cybertruck passed us on the highway last night. Indeed the first thing you think is Cubist Dumpster. It has two western saddles and a mountain bike that was an e-bike hybrid. These things could barely fit in there and the bed is too short to make the bike parallel with the vehicle even without the two bulky saddles.
All I can think of when I see those is how the lack of safety bumpers means one of those idiots is going to decapitate a pedestrian. The rest of their tribe will probably describe that event as “rad, bro!”
Snarki, child of Loki
Cut off a whale head with a chain-saw?
Was there no dynamite available?
Ruckus
@Villago Delenda Est:
There is so much he doesn’t know/isn’t capable of learning.
In his case IQ does not stand for intelligence quotient. He opened the wrong door and went into the idiot quotient office. His Idiot Quotient is not off the chart but it isn’t near minimal either.
dnfree
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): The Atlantic magazine doesn’t really take a stance per se. They publish articles and commentary by a wide range of individuals. Some people here seem to think of them as monolithic, but it’s really more of a collection of thoughts and insights that you as an individual may agree with or not.
SW
That previously mentioned JFK speech for anyone interested. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XJ8mUglSx0Y
Geoduck
@Lyrebird: Cillizza got the boot from his regular CNN gig. He doesn’t appear to have a current employer, but runs his own blog or whatever the word is these days.
Uncle Cosmo
@StringOnAStick: If anyone in driving distance of Prague has a Cybertruck, I’d suggest s/he bring it to Jungmannovo Square and park it beneath what is arguably the world’s only Cubist lamppost. It would make for an interesting photo op (my money would be on the lamppost) and a 30-second walk to the U Pinkasu beer hall for refreshment.
divF
@trollhattan: The Browns are an example (possibly the only one) of a dynasty that thrived on the ideal of public service. Pat Brown started out in politics as a suiccessful District Attorney for San Francisco. As Governor, he used government to build much of the infrastructure for the postwar economic dynamo in California – the California Water Project, the Master Plan for Higher Education. Jerry Brown, Pat’s son, served four terms as Governor, plus serving as Mayor of Oakland and State Attorney General, and ran for several other offices (President, Senator). Never did he stop to make money, nor did he use his time in office to enrich himself or sell out to moneyed interests.
Villago Delenda Est
@Suzanne: Dang, that makes me feel so old. It’s like Gen Xer’s looking at you with wonder in their eyes that Paul McCartney was in a band before Wings.
zhena gogolia
I hope everyone’s read the Vanity Fair article about RFK, Jr. It is excellent and eye-opening. Not a good man.
S Cerevisiae
@Snarki, child of Loki: Where is the Oregon DOT when you need them ?
Uncle Cosmo
@Geoduck: Sillyzilla is the Dunning-Kruger (or arguably the Freddy-Krueger) poster-child of go-pound-it pundits. He consistently reminds me that opinions are like arseholes: everybody has one and it usually stinks.** Barstid should be forced to live on public assistance for a good long while.
** Including one’s own. I’m not quite so arrogant as to think otherwise.
Ruckus
@Suzanne:
Politics became a bigger deal in this country when I was a kid. Not that it wasn’t a reasonably big deal before but TV played a role and it came out realistically about 70 yrs ago. However if you are old enough you know that TV 70 yrs ago sucked donkey parts. And it was relatively very expensive and limited. Today the electrical and physical parts are dramatically better and relatively far cheaper than it was then. Sure a nice, large flat screen isn’t cheap, but in 1950-1955 dollars it is cheaper than it was and dramatically better than the early 50s 9 inch B&W we had in our house. But then what isn’t?
trollhattan
@Ruckus:
As a kid I’d tune into the conventions because 1. summer and home from school and 2. actual relief from the soaps and game shows that 100% comprised daytime teevee.
Did I learn anything? Probably, when Cronkite and others took time to explain the process and unfolding events. Actual machinations of the floor were beyond me.
Geminid
@Starfish: The Israeli site +972 has good coverage of Palestinian affairs. It was established 10 or so years ago and its staff includes Arab Israelis and at least one who lives in the West Bank. That is in addition to left-wing Jewish Israeli reporters. They serve an international audience so the reporting is in English.
The site is named after the International dialing code for both Israel and the Palestinian territories. +972 broke the story on the IDF’s notorious “Lavender” targeting program.
Mike E
@Villago Delenda Est: gen Z-ers arguably have a much better grasp on the Fabs than gen X-ers ever have (who are the worst Beatle trolls imo)
Villago Delenda Est
@trollhattan:
My memories are pretty much the same. My family got its first color TV during the 68 DNC; all those baby-blue cop helmets!
BR
On YouTube, TikTok, and maybe elsewhere, I noticed something in the last week — the level of pro-Trump troll comments has skyrocketed. A week ago there weren’t too many such comments, but now every pro-Harris video is flooded with them.
trollhattan
@BR:
Lots of idle hands there in St Petersburg.
Ruckus
@KatKapCC:
As an old fart, I’ve seen the Kennedy family rise and now fall, or at least stumble. Most of them have been decent people wanting to do good. RFK Jr to me seems like he is trying to gain the attention that his father and uncle did. But he doesn’t have the adult concept of who they actually were as grown men because he was a kid when JFK was shot and a teen when his father was. Hell I’m not a lot older than he is and I was a teen when they were both murdered.
hueyplong
@patrick II: In Vance’s own mind, actually apologizing for a gut punch to women would in fact be on his top ten list of regrets.
And he just demonstrated the accuracy of the above.
Ruckus
@Suzanne:
A name has very limited value if one can’t make it mean something. JFK and RFK did that. They were different people but both decent. RFK Jr has not come close to doing that in any way, shape or form. To me he seems like he thinks the name is the value, when for his uncle and father it was what they did that counted, what made the name what he seems to think it is.
SatanicPanic
@StringOnAStick: I saw a Rivian truck yesterday with two bicycles sitting comfortably in the truck bed and thought- I bet they’re glad they didn’t get a cyber truck.
hueyplong
@SatanicPanic: I saw a guy driving an old K car and thought, I bet he’s glad it’s not a cybertruck.
SFAW
@Kay:
On the other hand, when either of our kids does something “unhelpful,” I talk to my wife about “your daughter” or “your son.” [I think she does the same to me.]
But she knows I’m joking. J Divans? I’m guessing he’s just a dick.
trollhattan
@StringOnAStick:
They’re becoming common here and look as weird as the first sighting. I have never seen one with the bed uncovered (“what, and get it dirty?”) so have zero idea what they can hold.
Many, many monster-size pickups here seem to have short beds that can’t really haul much, plus they’re pristine, reinforcing my notion that most owners had been hit on the head with a club on their way to buy a Camry.
SFAW
@Suzanne:
Unprecedented!
[NB to pedants: no, I have no idea if it is. Just decided to attempt a joke. Deal with it.]
Villago Delenda Est
@SFAW:
My parents did pretty much the same thing. I was for the most part not “your son”; my sister did enough terrible things to be “your daughter”.
Eunicecycle
@SFAW: Trump sort of does that, too. Several times he’s talked about “Melania’s son” or “Melania has a son.”
BR
Speaking of Vance awkwardly talking about his kids, his griping about his kids talking about Pokemon could have been a relatable story but he doesn’t know Politics 101.
Just this morning I was talking with my kid about Pokemon for a half hour straight. More he was talking about it and I was asking generally clueless questions because I can’t keep the hundreds of different Pokemon straight in my head whereas he can. I can understand being a bit tired of talking about Pokemon, but it’s a sign of both poor parental instincts and poor political instincts to handle it the way Vance did.
Baud
Where do you guys go to get Harris swag?
Eunicecycle
@BR: Yes when he told that story about telling his son to shut the hell up, I thought “Is that a story you really want to tell?” It sounded mean and bullying to me.
lowtechcyclist
This discussion of dynasties reminds me that I actually knew members of one such political dynasty: the Docking family in Kansas. George Docking was governor of Kansas from 1957-1961; his son Robert Docking was governor from 1967-1975, and his grandson Tom was lieutenant governor from 1983-1987.
George Docking was mayor of Arkansas City, KS before he was governor, and my grandfather was a big fish in that particular small puddle which was how I knew them. We’d go over to visit when we were in town for Christmas, and Tom and I were the same age so we’d play together when I was over at their house.
piratedan
@Baud:
I’m checking this out
https://www.bonfire.com/white-house-rock/
trollhattan
@hueyplong:
You saw a moving K car? Boggled, I yam. Be on the lookout for Vegas. (That’s the plural of Vega, in case of any confusion.)
Gretchen
@Ruckus: I think it was Bob Cesca who speculated that Jr. is so into conspiracy theories because he had two close relatives murdered at an impressionable age and could never make sense of why that happened.
One of the Kennedy sons was alone in a hotel room and saw the assasination on live tv. Nobody remembered to check on him for hours. I think that was the one who died of a drug overdose.
Their mom was pregnant with her 11th at the time. It sounds like she was good at having babies but not very good at being a mom to so many kids.
BR
Now this is a different kind of signboard truck than we’re used to:
https://cdn.xcancel.com/pic/orig/media%2FGV18r4RXwAEOxw4.jpg
I love the stencil spray painted letters.
SatanicPanic
@trollhattan: they can’t fit a bike. One wheel has to be hanging off
trollhattan
@Gretchen: I think it can all explained by drugs and steroids, which I guess are also drugs. The brain worm is a peculiar freebie.
His family openly repudiate everything he believes and pushes, so they made out of the bubble more or less intact.
Sure Lurkalot
@steve g:
No, it WAS bad. Then there was the thing about trees being the right size, which was weird. And the 47% who just want handouts comment which apparently was an election bid killer.
Romney is just as unlikeable as JD or DeSantis, he’s just old school.
trollhattan
@SatanicPanic: How very…uh…useful. Sheesh.
Do the groceries have to go on the passenger seat? NB to Cybertruck owners: don’t even think of going to Trader Joe’s.
Frankensteinbeck
@trollhattan:
Someone did a study, and something like 90% of pickup truck owners don’t use the flatbed. It’s a cultural marker, a penis substitute, and a weird variation of stolen valor. “I’m a strong, hard-working farmer and cowboy kind of guy who does outdoor physical stuff!”
Uncle Cosmo
Getting back to the thread title, I suggest to the Harris-Walz campaign and Democratic campaigns in general that somewhere around the second week of October, in the final runup to Halloween, they all pivot in describing their opponents from “weird” to creepy. “Weird” can be, um, weirdly charming in certain contexts, while “creepy” is inescapably, unforgivably bonded to a subtext of crawling flesh and critters crawling along it; there is absofuckinglutely nothing within a megaparsec of “charming” about it.
Thuglicans are creepy and their platform is creepy and their party is the Original Unraveling Creepshow. Pin all this to them with a nailgun!
Anoniminous
@Kent:
The ease with which Trump pushed JEB! aside tells us the Bush Era is over. Also too ditto Georgie P’s defeat for the Florida Attorney General in 2022.
Kay
@SFAW:
And people say “my kids” when they could say “our kids” but no one says “my wife has three children” when the children are also theirs.
Ksmiami
@cain: they deserve to be ignored- they were never serious about humanitarian concerns for Palestinians- they just want Republicans to win.
piratedan
@Kay: shouldn’t this statement lead to rampant speculation by the media as to just “who or whom’ fathered those children?
If we can speculate that a guy filing his retirement papers months before orders come down for overseas duty, was trying to avoid going overseas after 24 years…
hueyplong
@trollhattan: No, I didn’t actually see one. Was just playing on a prior cybertruck comment, but pleased that the reference to K cars hit the mark.
Greebe
@Dadadadadadada: (@23) if you look for this weekly podcast on Apple’s Podcasts, the RFK Jr Episodes are in four parts, starting 7/23/24.
SatanicPanic
@trollhattan: lol I think you can fit groceries in it. There’s a whole genre of videos of cybertruck owners “doing truck things” that consist of owners doing stuff you could easily do in a station wagon
Frank Wilhoit
@Nettoyeur: Bush II campaigned on impending economic disaster. Do we forget so quickly?
BR
This guy wrote a banjo song for Tim Walz:
https://xcancel.com/RuralVotePac/status/1827088469698736534#m
SatanicPanic
Oh so RFK jr will be sharing his stuff
Doc Sardonic
@Anoniminous: We have enough problems in Florida without another Bush. That turd George P. Is in Texas.
Kay
@piratedan:
Oh, I don’t think it’s that. He’s just odd.
BR
@BR:
Yet another Harris truck, this one in the Trump flag truck tradition:
https://xcancel.com/maddenifico/status/1827792021525839967#m
It would be weird if this became a thing.
Anoniminous
@Doc Sardonic:
Oh hell, that’s right.
ETA: but it doesn’t invalidate my point; may even make it stronger.
David 🐝KHive🐝 Koch
@Anoniminous:
It was Texas and he got crushed 68 to 32. Oooof.
Dubya is a dirty word with the base.
David 🐝KHive🐝 Koch
Mo money, Mo ammo.
BR
The creativity of the mixes people have done with the DNC speeches is great — this user’s videos are amazing:
https://www.tiktok.com/@casadimusic
KatKapCC
@Kay: Incredibly odd, and yet he seems to want people to think he’s the epitome of normal.
Jeffro
Yup. Anecdotally, I can tell you that Fro Jr was like “so…he has a famous family or something?” For realz
(similar to what you said at #116) =)
Another Scott
@Baud: I got a couple of car magnets on RedBubble. They’re fine, but I’ve also got an order in for some official stuff.
Cheers,
Scott.
Leto
I think a big reason why the Kennedy name has receded into the background is the fact that most of the older, living ones saw 3 of the 4 brothers die. One in WW2 in a bad experiment, the one who replaced him and became president was assassinated, the next in line was also assassinated, and the fourth had his own troubles but simply stayed in the Senate (yes, 1980 run). I think that probably scarred them, and kept most of the rest of the clan out of politics. They still do plenty of worthy philanthropic work, but it’s all out of the spotlight and in the background.
The exception to this is Brainworm Bobby, and it’s a fucking shame to the legacy his father/uncles laid before him. It’s why the family absolutely distances themselves from him, supported Biden, and supports Kamala. Personally I’m glad that I don’t know more about them. They gave enough. Let’em fade into the background. It’s the exact opposite of how the Trumpov klan is doing things now, with every fucking member writing a book, going on the tv shows, laying out every piece of dirt. I didn’t want to know these people, their family history, or what absolute shit people most of them are. But here we are!
Gin & Tonic
@Gretchen:
Well, he had 11 children, so he was good at at least part of the job description.
Leto
@Jeffro: do they not teach history in school anymore? Idk what age Jr is, but I also know how kids from age 6-18 treat/consider history.
Fair Economist
@SatanicPanic: That’s so sad. My Chevy Equinox can carry a bike. The cybertruck is evidently a very *small* dumpster on wheels.
Leto
@Fair Economist: My Honda Accord can carry a full size bike, with the seats laid down. I don’t do that, but it can!
Regarding old age: How kids think we grew up in the 80s versus how we actually grew up.
Another Scott
Meanwhile, …
I’m shocked, shocked.
(via MuellerSheWrote)
Cheers,
Scott.
Jeffro
@Leto: they do! Fro Jr’s not much of an English or history guy, though. And geography? hoo boy…
(personally, I think his brain’s storage capacity is already full with the ins and outs of a gazillion video games and ‘Magic: The Gathering’ card info)
Gretchen
There was young Joe Kennedy III who thought he could beat Ed Markey for the Senate MA primary in 2020. He was in the House, and challenged Markey, lost, and hasn’t been heard from again.
Uncle Cosmo
Can’t dig this up by googling, but IIRC there was a World Series back in the 1980s in which one team (maybe it was one player) struck out so often some wag suggested augmenting the usual spiffy car awarded to the series MVP with a special award for striking out, which of course would be a K car.**
** “K” is shorthand on a baseball scorecard for a batter striking out on a called third strike. A strikeout on a swinging third strike is represented by a backwards “K”. (I believe that’s true for any of the standard scorecard coding systems – at least the two I know of.)
Uncle Cosmo
@Another Scott: Crooked Nitwits’ Network strikes again with a yoooge thumb plopped down on the scale. What else to expect from the bosses of Jerk Shtupper?
Leto
@Jeffro: Sounds like our kid, and he’s 28. BUT the past few years he’s been here, he’s gotten more of an education just through sheer repetition of the material we talk about/watch. You can see some of it starting to sink in/get through.
JMG
@Frankensteinbeck: Here on Cape Cod, there are many pickup trucks whose drivers bought them because they also own boats. Good for hauling. So the flatbeds are used to carry boating and especially fishing gear.
Baud
@Another Scott:
Liberals who continue to trust the media are chumps.
Princess
@steve g: I don’t know — at least the whale was dead and couldn’t suffer!
Leto
@trollhattan: @hueyplong: @Uncle Cosmo: My parents owned both a Vega and a K car. I was there with them when they bought their 1981 Dodge Aries, and traded in the Vega. That Aries served our family well. In 1992 it became my first car. Had it through high school, college, early years of marriage, and tech school. We traded it back to my parents in 1998 for their van, and my sister then wrecked it 2 years later. RIP you battle tank you.
Fun fact: it was the only K car I ever knew of that had a 4 speed on the floor. Every other K car I knew about, both in person, in the military (there were still a few roaming the flight lines), and in the movies/tv shows all had automatic shifters mounted on the steering column. I’m proud of my unicorn car :)
Princess
@Kay: There is a gaping hollowness at the core of Vance. No wonder Trump picked him. No idea why Usha did. Maybe she figured he was going places.
divF
@Uncle Cosmo: It’s the other way around. Backwards K is striking out without a swing.
cw moss
@Snarki, child of Loki: We Oregonians know that dynamite is the only correct way to dispose of a dead whale on the beach
sdhays
@Princess: I think there’s almost certainly a gaping hole there too. I don’t think she’s a victim or “tricked”. She subjects her children to this awful, toxic man.
JR
— Thomas Paine
wjca
Perhaps he knows something about their actual parentage that we do not…?
sdhays
I don’t know how anyone can be a good parent to that many kids. I don’t doubt that some do. I just don’t know how they do it.
trollhattan
@wjca: “Three beautiful and two uggos.”
trollhattan
@sdhays:
Definitely qualifies as a passel.
“Quite the passel of kids they got there.”
“A-yep.”
Leto
@sdhays: Here’s a list of some of their names.
Starfish
@Geminid: Thank you. Despite my take in the comments here being more pro-Palestinian than most, usually when it comes to news about the Middle East, I am so skeptical of most because there is so much disinformation that has gone on in that space for all my adult life, really.
You are better informed than so many people on all of it, and I am so appreciative when you share resources.
sdhays
@Anoniminous: I’m still kind of stunned at how little Jeb(!) fought Trump for the nomination. Trump waltzed in and Jeb(!) almost literally rolled over and piddled himself.
I remember thinking, “Damnit, man. Don’t you have ANY self respect?” Obviously, the answer was “no”.
japa21
@sdhays: Neither did any of the others, most specially Cruz.
Scout211
@Leto
@trollhattan:
Reminds me of the Simpsons episode with Cletus’ kids.
Yep, a whole passel.
karen marie
@Anoniminous: That’s Texas, not Florida. I know they’re easily confused but …
@Kay: He doesn’t seem to be emotionally attached to his kids.
Emphasis mine.
This was not a “bring your child to work” situation. Vance used him as a punchline in his effort to stop aid to Ukraine and the bipartisan border bill.
Princess
@sdhays: Jeb! never had to fight for a single thing his whole life. Just slid by on the affirmative action of generational wealth and family influence. No wonder he wilted.
sdhays
@japa21: None of them did. But the nomination was Jeb(!)’s to lose, so it was pretty revealing how he never even attempted to really challenge Trump, even as Trump was eating his lunch right in front of him.
Nepo-baby froze when the going got tough.
Geoduck
@cw moss: I posted this in a previous thread, but since you bring it up again…
Soprano2
@Kent: The Ashcrofts in MO, the son of John Ashcroft has a state office here in MO. He ran for governor but lost the primary.
The Audacity of Krope
Republicans are creatures of instinct and Jeb was used to the background. Doesn’t surprise me in the least.
Lyrebird
@Geoduck: Thanks! I thought I had remembered something… thanks for getting me up to speed.
Obvs I haven’t totally gotten over how long it took for him to lose that spot, especially compared to Melissa Harris Perry (fmr Lacewell) …not that I always agreed with her, but oh the comparison.
I am glad I skipped most of the photos in this post, but I am thankful for the post anyhow!
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Soprano2:
In that context, the Carnahans as well.
I still think of “dynasty” as encompassing more people in the family than these duos that have been discussed.
Another real state dynasty would be the Byrd family in VA. They’re one that didn’t rise to national prominence but dominated the state for decades in a variety of political roles.
Frankensteinbeck
@Leto:
Right. That photo on the left is the 90s.
Jaybird
@JMG: This is precisely the reason we have a truck. We’ve had sailboats for almost 30 years, and various other boats as well. Current inventory includes a rowing boat and a couple of kayaks. The truck tows various toys, and can haul a (literal) boatload of stuff.
Captain C
@Attapooch: Like a Dollar General MittBot.
tam1MI
The Kennedy that ran against (I think) Markey in Massachusetts thought the Kennedy name was going to sweep him into office. He learned the hard way that the Kennedy name ain’t what it used to be.
AWOL
@cain: The most racist contingent in Northern Manhattan are the scrawling, nocturnal tankies blaming a “Black Woman puppet” for genocide in Gaza.
They’d rim Trump’s arse if they could.
tam1MI
I recall the TV coverage of Ted Kennedy’s funeral. As the procession made it’s way through the white working class sections of Boston, people by the score came out to the street to pay their respects. That was the last time they gave such treatment to a Democratic politician.
sdhays
@Princess: Yep. It was still kind of breathtaking to watch.
prostratedragon
Need a movie break? The Apartment upcoming on TCM, followed by Double Indemnity (Fred MacMurray day).
Gvg
@Anoniminous: I think George P lives and ran in Texas, not Florida, so he never ran here.
Leto
@Frankensteinbeck: late 80s, early 90s. The only show I can think of that really had something like that was Saved by the Bell. Idk, maybe Miami Vice but that was a whole other audience.
Harrison Wesley
@Gvg: Is George P. one of the ones whose granddaddy referred to them as “the little brown ones?” Always thought that was a bit weird, referring to one’s descendents as rabbit shit.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@prostratedragon:
It’s always great to see MacMurray in sleezy roles like those two particularly if you grew up watching him in the ‘Flubber’ films or ‘My Three Sons’. Totally opposite.
‘The Apartment’ remains an absolutely brilliant film.
David 🐝KHive🐝 Koch
@prostratedragon: So its a Billy Wilder double feature. not bad. Robinson steals Double Indemnity
“One, Two, Three” and “The Front Page” would be more appropriate for our current political season
trollhattan
@prostratedragon:
Having “met” Fred MacMurray as dad on My Three Sons I was quite unprepared for Fred MacMurray, the film actor.
Gvg
@Harrison Wesley: Part Mexican. Racist grandma I believe, not grandpa. Not positive though. Nothing to do with rabbits. Still means son stood up to parents and wasn’t racist that way.
zhena gogolia
@trollhattan: Me too. He’s so fantastic as a bad guy.
“How fast was I going, officer?”
David 🐝KHive🐝 Koch
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Its funny, I never liked The Apartment until recently when Paul Thomas Anderson remade it with his phenomenal Licorice Pizza and it opened my eyes to the original source.
zhena gogolia
@David 🐝KHive🐝 Koch: It took me about three viewings to get The Apartment.
I adore Billy Wilder, but I wonder if I’ll ever warm up to The Fortune Cookie.
David 🐝KHive🐝 Koch
@zhena gogolia: I don’t like Jack Lemon’s melancholy role, but Walter Matthau is so good, chewing up the scenery its a must see for him alone.
Marcopolo
@Gretchen: Biden appointed him as our special envoy to Northern Ireland or something. Which afaik he is still doing, the word doing doing a lot of work there.
Marcopolo
@West of the Rockies:
So, I saw a couple folks assuming this was a biased article because of the way this is framed. The article is actually about whether or not pollsters will do a better job polling in 2024 than they did in 2016 & 2020. It’s a pretty good read, explaining what pollsters think went wrong in the last two elections & how they are trying to be more accurate. Bottom line, though, is who knows if tge fixes they’ve made will help & don’t think that a Harris (or Trump) lead will actually be what happens on Nov 5.
rikyrah
ALMA SUONO – Jimeesha Cantore Hurricane Hunter (@AlmaSuono) posted at 2:09 PM on Sun, Aug 25, 2024:
Idk who needs to read this today but if you are not a United States citizen, You. Cannot. Be. Apart. Of. Any. Political. Movement. In. This. Country. Or. Any. Country. You. Do. Not. Have. Active. Citizenship. In.
You are not apart of the “American Left” you don’t even fuckin go here.
I will call you out every time for meddling in American ass business ESPECIALLY if you are engaging in voter suppression.
Personally as a tax paying ass American citizen who has voted in every election since I was eligible the shit is weird and kinda insulting. We don’t need yalls opinions on our election. Yall are obsessed with what goes on in this country and not in a good way. Like K Dot and Future said once upon a time.
“You’re not a GANG MEMBER you’re a TOURIST” enjoy our country for all its wonder and take yalls asses HOME.
(https://x.com/AlmaSuono/status/1827785359788290503?t=Rog4IEPJ5D9YAAuTiyRonQ&s=03)
Shana
@karen marie: he also didn’t seem too familiar with donuts.
Can I just add: what kind of a name is Kick? I assume it’s a nickname but of what? I’m mystified
The Audacity of Krope
@rikyrah: We have people living here their entire life who aren’t yet citizens. They still have a right to an opinion what is happening in their community and with their taxes. Even if they can’t vote, saying don’t use your voice is counter-productive. Non citizens have rights living here.
Chet Murthy
@Shana: Given name Kathleen.
TBone
Another “this fucking guy” on the list. The big one, a literal Robber Baron:
https://www.commondreams.org/news/timothy-mellon-trump-rfk-jr
scav
@Shana: It was originally the nickname of Kathleen Kennedy, the one that married the Cavendish heir. (Both died.) Must have been passed down either as a nick or actual name.
kalakal
@rikyrah:
I’m not a citizen but I’m certainly not a tourist, I’ve been here for years and I’ve been paying taxes all those years. Seem to recall something about “no taxation without representation”. Hah, if only
zhena gogolia
@Chet Murthy: And I think it goes back to JFK’s sister who died in a plane crash.
karen gail
Don’t know if someone else mentioned this or not but thought would share a link; it appears that Vance is under impression that Jr Kennedy speaks for all Kennedy’s. Or that he has a bigger impact by having Kennedy name.
Vance says he’s ‘thrilled’ to have support from ‘Kennedy Democrats’ (yahoo.com)
sab
@The Audacity of Krope:
@West of the Rockies:
Good. I don’t want any sense of complacency. So many people thought Hillary was a shoo-in in 2016 and didn’t bother to vote. I don’t that to happen again.
scav
@kalakal: Yeah, and the Shut up the rest of the entire world, you’re not allowed to have an opinion of us beyond “wow!” and handing over tourist dollars is quite the look.
StringOnAStick
@SatanicPanic: Doing truck things? I hauled 340 pounds of flagstone in one load in my Prius!
That cybertruck I saw yesterday with the saddles and a mountain e-bike is laughable just for the kind of bike. The USFS does not allow them on mountain bike trails here and the local sporty enforcement(via bro culture) has a very dim view, dare I say labelling as much worse than not cool, anyone illegally using those on the local trails. This town is a destination mountain biking mecca, and the locals are protective. This guy (it’s always a guy) is going to get into a bro down if they catch him illegally on the trails.
prostratedragon
“Madalena”, Macedo e Amorim. The chorus recurs in The Apartment as a theme for C.C. Baxter.
Jeffro
I got this amazing t-shirt off of TeePublic.
I may never take it off. Harris/Walz + 90’s alt-rock? genius!
StringOnAStick
@BR: i saw a typical jacked up truck here today with two flags: one MAGA and the other the Israeli flag. Interesting
sab
@kalakal: Green card holders are considered citizens for tax purposes.
I know green card holders who love America but aren’t citizens because they don’t want to lose citizenship or rights in their birth country because they have family ties in both.
VeniceRiley
@Chris: Dude I want this translated into Spanish and made a radio AD.
Chet Murthy
@The Audacity of Krope: I’m reminded of the old quip “Opinions are like assholes, everybody’s got one ….”
Perhaps what the tweeter is trying to say is that noncitizens have no political rights (though obvs. they have many other rights as persons in our country). To have political rights, one has to sign up with the polity — it entails rights but also responsibilities. In that sense, noncitizens are not part of the “gang” — they haven’t been initiated.
used-to-be, I subscribed to this reading of our laws and customs pretty much without reservation. But since 2016, I’m less sure. I -want- to believe that the dividing line (between citizens and everybody else) is sharp, is crystal-clear, but then I remember that in fact it isn’t, and lot of citizens also lack effective political rights too.
Jeffro
@karen gail: more likely, the latter…wishcasting with all his heart that by having a ‘Kennedy’ openly supporting the ticket, Dems just won’t know what to do! We’ll be bleeding support to the GOP any day now!
As with so many MAGA fantasies, they really ought to double-check what they want to happen with what is likely to happen.
kalakal
@sab: I know, I’m officially a “permanent resident”, basically I’m a citizen and have the same rights except I can’t vote. If I come into the country I go in the US Citizens line rather than the Contemptible Foreigners one. I have family both here and in the UK. I’m actually in the process of obtaining citizenship at the moment. I took my time over because I’m cheap, I paid for a 10 year card and wanted my full moneys worth
Chet Murthy
@sab:
Uh, I have to ask: is that really true? That is to say, are there any persons in the US (aside from diplomats) who are treated differently than citizens regarding taxation? I use the word “persons” specifically b/c IIIUC that is the Constitutional term of art for people with rights in the US, that don’t depend on citizenship. I didn’t think green card holders and other noncitizens were treated differently, except that a green card holder has a permanent visa. So for instance, I remember a case of a green card holder returning from overseas, who was denied re-entry. Such a person can hire a lawyer and petition for redress, but from what I remember they have no presumptive right to residence in the US: just a permission granted by the US government that can be withdrawn at any time.
But IANAL and I sure don’t know how actually works.
SW
@Shana: Kick was one of JFK and RFK’s sisters who died in a plane crash near the end of WW 2.
The Audacity of Krope
To my mind, rights are presumed and universal. That includes things like speech. Privileges are for citizens. Things like voting.
Many non-citizens are highly invested in this country and even doing amazing work on our behalf. If they have not yet earned their vote, the least we can do is offer an ear toward their perspectives.
And if anyone is upset with a particular group of non-citizens and, so, lashing out at all non-citizens, for shame.
JaySinWA
@Sure Lurkalot: Being caught with a sick live dog or a dead whale head on top of your car should be a political career ender. Apparently not immediately.
Makes you wonder if being caught with a live boy or dead girl in bed with you is still even half true now.
Chet Murthy
@The Audacity of Krope:
That seems like semantics. There are rights that all -persons- have in the US, and rights that only citizens possess. For instance, a citizen cannot be barred from re-entry to the US. That’s a big one.
The Audacity of Krope
@Chet Murthy: Which is entirely aside from my point that demanding a code of political silence from our non-citizen residents is uncool.
ETA: And, frankly, we could be a little better about non-citizens moving around and SNAFUs during the immigration process.
kalakal
@Chet Murthy: The one I’m aware of is that I am restricted in how much time I can spend outside the US. It’s not particularly onerous and not unreasonable. I assume if I was convicted, not sure how serious the crime would have to be, I’d probably be deported along with a “never darken our doorstep again”
Chet Murthy
@kalakal: Oh, I’m sure that whatever the rule about crimes is, it’s (1) pretty racist and (2) for those in the wrong category, pretty draconian. I have a vague memory of some kid who was brought to the US at age, like, 2 or something, and he got deported for a drug crime misdemeanor (like, marijuana possession).
It’s pretty heinous.
kalakal
@Chet Murthy: I’m sure you’re right.
As far as expressing opinions go I most certainly am going to express them on political events that affect not only me, but my wife, stepchildren etc who are US citizens
villiageidiocy
@tam1MI: Teddy lay in state at the Capitol building. When his body left to fly out of Andrews Airbase, the motorcade took Suitland Parkway, the primary road used by any VIPs going to Andrews from DC. Folks started lining up a few hours in advance of the motorcade, most of them were African American, and considering the location, local to the DC area.
Some memories are long.
tam1MI
Worse, many people assumed it was “safe” to throw away their vote on a third party candidate. My state would have gone into Hillary’s column if even half of the Jill Stein voters had done the right thing.
Geminid
@zhena gogolia: I wonder if Billy Wilder’s outsider viewpoint is what made The Apartment such a good movie. Wilder was a double outsider. Wilder grew up poor and Jewish in post-WWI Austria. Then he got a start in the growing Berlin film industry, only to have to flee to France. Then he fled once again, to the US.
Wilder made The Apartment about 16 years later. He was at his strongest as a director then, and also as a scriptwriter (Wilder co-wrote his scripts with an American-born partner).
The Apartment is set right at the end of the 1950s, and that’s when New York City was at its strongest as a cultural, social and financial center. And also as a business center, and the culture of that post-WWII corporate world is a big part of Wilder’s story.
So how does a guy who came of age in Central Europe during the Interwar period, and then lived 15 years in Southern California, make such a good movie about late 1950s Manhattan? My guess is: because Wilder had an outsider’s perception.
Chet Murthy
@kalakal: I don’t know what triggered the person in the tweet that @rikyrah: posted, but over the years I’ve seen many times non-Americans lamenting that the decisions Americans make in our political system have so much impact on non-American lives, and yet they have zero say in them. It is accurate to say that we are an empire and those not in the metropole have almost no say at all in how it is run. I do wonder if part of the reason that poster was so incensedIs that they could feelJust howClose to the edge Our democracy is,And it wasn’t a good feeling.When you’re about to lose somethingThat you really really valueIt’s possible that people getirritable, angryBecause of the impending loss.
Misterpuff
@Ken: You’re on to something Ken, but think bigger.
Open Press Room: The Reality Show.
All the reporters must get a Rose from Madame President, those who fail to get a rose are sent back to the City Desk.
It’s what the Press Boys and Pundits wanted for the DNC, why not the same for the Press Corp.
sab
@Chet Murthy: I said for tax purposes.
Villago Delenda Est
@karen gail: This guy has never learned the first rule of holes.
Chet Murthy
@sab: You made me look it up. It turns out that, yes, permanent residents -are- treated differently than other visa holders. A PR is automatically a tax resident; other visa holders must pass the “substantial presence test” in order to be deemed a tax resident.
So being a PR is different from holding other visas, when it comes to taxes.
Harrison Wesley
@JaySinWA: It’s called “Progress.”
kalakal
@Chet Murthy:
Absolutely, I’ve also seen it. Far too many Americans have absolutely no idea just how much what happens in America affects the rest of the world. I’ve no idea what set that person off, probably someone being interviewed in ( insert name of country here). If it was some pompous blowhard like Piers Morgan that would certainly explain it. It could well be they’re scared but I’m pretty sure if you told them that they couldn’t have opinions about anywhere outside the US borders they’d be outraged
Chet Murthy
@kalakal: “if you told them that they couldn’t have opinions about anywhere outside the US borders they’d be outraged”
I didn’t read the original tweet as saying “you can’t even have opinions” but rather “take your opinions on the heel-and-toe, we don’t want ’em, we don’t need ’em, we got our own, and ours are the ones that count!!!”
Ohio Mom
@Villago Delenda Est: The Ohio Dems probably could not see that through.
If you watched the Convention’s state roll call, you might remember how lackluster and half-hearted Ohio’s delegation was in announcing the Buckeye State’s vote tally.
I don’t know what the matter is, Kay would.
Chet Murthy
@kalakal: “I’ve no idea what set that person off, probably someone being interviewed in ( insert name of country here).”
I’m going to guess based on this
that it was about Israel/Palestine.
scav
@Chet Murthy: Eeeh, she did tell them to shut up and enjoy the wonder of this country so she did work herself up to thought policing. That and telling them all to “go home!” rather entirely ignores all the ones legally living here. Basically Love it or leave it.
sab
@Chet Murthy: When I was a foreign exchange studentin the UK I kept my political opinions to myself out of politeness. But I think my PR relatives who live in this country have every right to express opinions.
Ohio a few years back passed (by referendum) a constitutional amendment that non-citizens cannot vote even in local elections. I find that outrageous. They still have to pay property taxes, school taxes and city income taxes so they should be allowed to vote on the levies.
Darkrose
@Chet Murthy: As Rikyrah and Schrodingers_Cat have noted, there is once again a serious ratfucking push from the uZual suspectZ, trying to peel off Black folks from the Democratic coalition. The Kamala is a Cop thing isn’t working–thanks DL Hughley!–so they’re focusing on Gaza and trying to use it as a wedge issue. The tell is always that the non-US leftists are generally completely clueless about the Black experience in the US, or what issues are going to matter to us, and why sitting this one out because Harris isn’t perfect on every issue is simply not an option.
kalakal
@Chet Murthy: That makes sense.
kalakal
@sab:
Also the case in Florida
Uncle Cosmo
Not the way Dad (a pretty fair semipro shortstop before I was born) taught me, but who knows, he may have had it wrong, but consistently wrong in the scorebooks he kept from our Little League games and the O’s games we went to.. I’ll google it in a bit and get back to you.
Jacel
@Ruckus: On Air America Radio, RFKJr was titular host of a weekend show called “Ring Of Fire” (2004-2010). Even then, I was happy when I tuned in and heard Mike Papantonio and/or Sam Seder at the mic, because it was going to be a more focused show.
Darkrose
@Uncle Cosmo: Backwards K is strikeout looking. Regular K is swinging strikeout–including a hit by pitch if the ball touches the bat.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Apparently this person hasn’t heard of the East India Company.
Jacel
@Fair Economist: It’s a dumpster that a raccoon can aspire to call its own, and not share.
Kayla Rudbek
@Fair Economist:
@Leto:
my Honda Fit can carry a tandem bike inside (although the wheels on the bike do have to come off).
Uncle Cosmo
@Leto: Legend has it that for some years the top brassholes at Chevrolet were puzzled at how poorly their flagship compact car was selling in Latin America – until someone pointed out to them what “Chevy No Va” means en español…;^D
Uncle Cosmo
@divF, @Darkrose: FTR this “Guide to Baseball Scoring and Scorecard Abbreviations” gives “K” for called third strike and “Ks” for swinging strike 3.
In any case it doesn’t look much like the system Dad taught me, which was based on an imaginary diamond inside the scorecard square for any given batter/inning combination. We would draw a solid line to indicate a runner’s progress around the bases, the line crossed for every base he gained by getting a hit, and other means written in the triangle between base path and the boundary of the square. When the runner was put out there was no line but the means was indicated in the space where the line would have been (e.g., “6-4” for a forceout shortstop to second baseman). If the runner scored the number of the run was written in the center where the pitcher’s mound would have been.
This system made it fairly easy to follow the progress of every half-inning. It’s what I learned as a kid. YMMV
Glidwrith
@Fair Economist: My Prius can carry a bike!
Sally
@kalakal: I know that the UK allows non citizens to vote. One of my (our!) sons was there on a four year student visa, and received a letter explaining to him how to register and vote in the upcoming election. Other than POS taxes, he didn’t even pay (income) tax. “No taxation without representation” indeed.
Denali5
I am surprised that the Cuomo name hasn’t surfaced in the family dynasty discussion. Mario Cuomo was an extremely popular Governor in New York. Andrew, his son, …….wasn’t.
Paul in KY
@schrodingers_cat: No doubt! Newt is ever so much more loathsome than The Grinch at his grinchiest.
Paul in KY
@Andrew Abshier: Sen Gore the Elder in TN, followed by Sen/VP Al Gore.
Paul in KY
@Suzanne: RFK was the best Kennedy.
Ruckus
@SatanicPanic:
I live in LA county and have seen 1 Rivian. I also have seen one cybertruck. There really is no comparison. The Rivian looks like pretty much any other pickup. Sure the details are different but it has a cab and a bed. The cybertruck looks like a 6 or 7 yr old designed it – while stoned. I’ve owned pickups for my business and would never had bought one of those things because while it may not be totally useless it comes damn close. The Ford is still a pickup truck, just without a fuel tank and with battery. If I was still working I might consider one.
Ruckus
@trollhattan:
I believe it is closer to minimal maleness – therefore requiring a massive/expensive/toy to prove their masculinity.
Ruckus
@Gretchen:
but not very good at being a mom to so many kids
Having 11 kids seems more like being a grade school teacher than a mom. Mine had a difficult enough time with 3. I had an aunt that had 5 and she did OK.