• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Before Header

  • About Us
  • Lexicon
  • Contact Us
  • Our Store
  • ↑
  • ↓
  • ←
  • →

Balloon Juice

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Republican also-rans: four mules fighting over a turnip.

Trumpflation is an intolerable hardship for every American, and it’s Trump’s fault.

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

If America since Jan 2025 hasn’t broken your heart, you haven’t loved her enough.

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

Roe is not about choice. It is about freedom.

These are not very smart people, and things got out of hand.

75% of people clapping liked the show!

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

Fight them, without becoming them!

This chaos was totally avoidable.

Giving in to doom is how we fail to fight for ourselves & one another.

If you don’t believe freedom is for everybody, then the thing you love isn’t freedom, it is privilege.

Wake up. Grow up. Get in the fight.

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

They are not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

With all due respect and assumptions of good faith, please fuck off into the sun.

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

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

Mobile Menu

  • 4 Directions VA 2025 Raffle
  • 2025 Activism
  • Donate with Venmo, Zelle & PayPal
  • Site Feedback
  • War in Ukraine
  • Submit Photos to On the Road
  • Politics
  • On The Road
  • Open Threads
  • Topics
  • Authors
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Lexicon
  • Our Store
  • Politics
  • Open Threads
  • 2025 Activism
  • Garden Chats
  • On The Road
  • Targeted Fundraising!
You are here: Home / Elections 2024 / Thursday Morning Open Thread: Proud to Be A Democrat

Thursday Morning Open Thread: Proud to Be A Democrat

by Anne Laurie|  September 26, 20249:37 am| 103 Comments

This post is in: Elections 2024, Kamala Harris for President

FacebookTweetEmail

Whoopi gave him his flowers. Beautiful. https://t.co/A907aghVrd

— 🪷 Madam Auntie VP Kamala Harris for PRESIDENT! (@flywithkamala) September 25, 2024

As campaigns and election efforts target millions of the youngest voters in battleground states, new poll shows Vice President Kamala Harris has a strong lead among that age group. https://t.co/NrPXhhfPi9

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) September 26, 2024

Donald Trump tried to water down IBEW apprenticeships when he was president. We stand with the candidate who shows up and supports union workers. https://t.co/RHIhpgesRb

— IBEW (@IBEW) September 25, 2024

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz will campaign in Ann Arbor, Mich., on Saturday, attending the football game between the University of Michigan and the University of Minnesota. https://t.co/HmtgdDsQGl

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) September 25, 2024

It seems odd if you don't realize that he's fundraising. I mean, Fox News is blasting Walz because they saw that he visited Alex Soros in Soros's Manhattan penthouse. So they know what he's up to.

He's also doing debate prep. https://t.co/EPMYJJlcni

— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) September 25, 2024

I'm still amazed at how little most 10 or 20 year journalists know about campaigns that a 22 year old junior staffer on a Congressional campaign knows after 5 days on the job. https://t.co/AIkKwV7tsk

— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) September 25, 2024

This election may go down in the history books (among other titles) as The One That Broke Traditional Media (and no sooner than time)…

https://t.co/MhktGDR2To pic.twitter.com/5cjp0xFJtC

— The Concept of an Andy (@trtx84) September 23, 2024

Narrator: It works

— Jen "We aren't going back " Rubin 🥥🌴 (@JRubinBlogger) September 23, 2024

FacebookTweetEmail
Previous Post: « Bright Dawn Open Thread: Jimmy Carter Awaits His 100th Birthday
Next Post: Hakeem! Leader Jeffries vs. 'Squeaker' McCarthy»

Reader Interactions

103Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    September 26, 2024 at 9:40 am

    Brian Young

    @BrianYoung

    If there’s one thing people outside politics don’t understand it’s just how many things a candidate has to do and how limited their time is. Everyone is just like “he’s not doing interviews!” when he’s gotta do a million other things

    Internet political junkies are kind of like mainstream media. They won’t a stream of content to talk about, and they take it out on the candidates if they’re not doing the dog and pony show.

  2. 2.

    caphilldcne

    September 26, 2024 at 9:43 am

    Sorry Gov Walz but Go Blue!

  3. 3.

    Baud

    September 26, 2024 at 9:44 am

    Also, too, re-upping my “proud to be a Democrat” comment from yesterday.

    Via reddit, proud to be a Democrat

    Elon Musk’s popularity plummets to 6% among Democrats, poll finds

    The poll shows that public views of Musk are increasingly polarized, with Republican support rising while Democratic support falls.

  4. 4.

    Baud

    September 26, 2024 at 9:44 am

    @Baud: won’t = want

  5. 5.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 9:48 am

    Reposting this worthy read:

    heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/september-25-2024

    For all of us here on Earth 1

  6. 6.

    Chief Oshkosh

    September 26, 2024 at 9:49 am

    @caphilldcne: Oh, he blasted right through blue and ended up purple!

  7. 7.

    MattF

    September 26, 2024 at 9:50 am

    Got my Maryland ballot yesterday. Voted, signed, sealed, and mailed today.

  8. 8.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 9:52 am

    A good roundup recap of the latest NYC indictment, for all who celebrate:

    wonkette.com/p/mean-fbi-wont-stop-stealing-cell

    🪅🎉🥳

  9. 9.

    OId Man Shadow

    September 26, 2024 at 9:52 am

    “I never fully believed the assertions that somehow there was this overwhelming reluctance of my running again…my polling was about…always within range of beating this guy I didn’t sense that….I was confident. I would beat Trump.”

    Your polling should have been much higher.

    Americans are stupid.

  10. 10.

    Percysowner

    September 26, 2024 at 9:53 am

    For anyone who wants to listen to a fun take down of Glenn Kessler and his so called “fact checking” the podcast If Books Could Kill has posted 30 minutes of their episode Glenn Kessler Retire B*tch [TEASER] (link to Apple) It’s really funny and absolutely NAILS him. The whole episode is available under their Patreon, but even the teaser is well worth a listen. I love the podcast in general, but this episode is special for all of us who don’t think Glenn’s fact checking is fair.

  11. 11.

    rusty

    September 26, 2024 at 9:57 am

    This election clearly demonstrated how little many of our so called political reporters actually know.  We are supposed to be relying on them to an extent they can focus on the politics and the process.  They were calling for replacing Biden in a way that was completely impossible.  A convention floor fight was too late to allow anyone to effectively campaign, there was insufficient access to money.  The only realistic alternative was Harris.  With even the lowest level of understanding if it wasn’t Biden, it was Harris unless you were going to completely give up winning (even staying with Biden would have been better.)  The vast majority of our political pundits completely didn’t get it, although people who actually ran past presidential campaigns were saying this within a day or two of the debate.  The pundits put there absolute incompetence on public display.  Why would you trust them for rational direction after this?

  12. 12.

    Baud

    September 26, 2024 at 9:59 am

    @OId Man Shadow: It is a black mark. Not as bad as the outcome in 2016, but in some ways worse because Biden did a great job steering this country in the wake of Trump.

  13. 13.

    ...now I try to be amused

    September 26, 2024 at 10:04 am

    The interview is reflective of her media strategy going forward: Engagement with local media in key states, some nontraditional digital media, limited national media

    In short, engagement with media who don’t have a massive sense of entitlement, and properly appreciate face time with a presidential candidate.

  14. 14.

    BR

    September 26, 2024 at 10:06 am

    I’m so glad the NYT showed their hand in the Biden-must-drop-out episode so Dems know they can’t be trusted. Because this is the kind of garbage they’re writing as straight news — not op-eds — about Harris (her interview with Ruhle):

    Instead of offering any explanation for why Mr. Trump polls better on the economy — a matter that has vexed Democrats as President Biden has overseen a steadily improving economy – Ms. Harris instead blasted Mr. Trump’s record.

  15. 15.

    p.a.

    September 26, 2024 at 10:06 am

    @TBone: Heh.  Harris really busting out the programs to grow small businesses which will then… vote conservative to protect their economic niche & keep their employees under their thumb.🤷🏻‍♂️

    What ya gonna do… it is what it is.

  16. 16.

    Elizabelle

    September 26, 2024 at 10:06 am

    I hope this campaign season does kill Big Pundit and Big Media. They are cancers on our democracy.

    Glad to see more and more voters and others learning up that too much of the MSM is a biased shambles.  Their goal is money and eyeballs, not truth or accuracy.  Fuck ’em.

    I am now the last person I know with a NY Times subscription.  (I know, I know.)

  17. 17.

    caphilldcne

    September 26, 2024 at 10:06 am

    @Chief Oshkosh: haha yep, I think he also still roots for Big Red.

  18. 18.

    lowtechcyclist

    September 26, 2024 at 10:09 am

    @Baud:

    Also, too, re-upping my “proud to be a Democrat” comment from yesterday.

    Thanks, I missed that yesterday!

  19. 19.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 10:09 am

    @p.a.: I don’t anticipate that we’re gonna let who actually does what be forgotten this time around.  I know I’ll be blaring a bullhorn about it for the duration of Madam President’s tenure.  I’m not gonna let anyone forget what huge losers the wingers are.  Even if  I have to rejoin them in the social media sewers to do it.

  20. 20.

    Elizabelle

    September 26, 2024 at 10:11 am

    I have really appreciated everyone sharing all the interview and rally links here.  One stop shopping!

  21. 21.

    Baud

    September 26, 2024 at 10:12 am

    @BR: Yep. Could have been an RNC tweet. But, unfortunately, still not nearly enough Dems have learned not to trust the NYT.

  22. 22.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 10:13 am

    @Elizabelle: your HRC plus post on the page below deserves a reboot here IMO.  It’s great.

  23. 23.

    Starfish

    September 26, 2024 at 10:13 am

    @BR:

    The correct response to the NY Times saying that people prefer Trump on economic issues is the We’re All Trying to Find the Guy Who Did This meme.

  24. 24.

    BR

    September 26, 2024 at 10:14 am

    @p.a.: ​

    I’ve read (and believe) reports that a huge fraction of those under 40 want to start their own businesses and/or have a portfolio career. It makes sense — if a big company job no longer provides security, better to work for yourself. I doubt they would be as cynical about her small business plans as the older generation of small business owners.

  25. 25.

    Omnes Omnibus

    September 26, 2024 at 10:15 am

    @TBone: Not everyone chooses to spam every thread with the same comment.

  26. 26.

    No One of Consequence

    September 26, 2024 at 10:16 am

    Props to Whoopi. Bigger pair than most anyone on that show or their guests.

    Thank you Joe, you are a good man. I wished my fellow citizens saw that.

    -NOoC

  27. 27.

    Elizabelle

    September 26, 2024 at 10:16 am

    @BR:  Reid Fucking Epstein. Colleague of Peter Fucking Baker.

    White male assigned to cover Kamala’s campaign.  Yes, this dipshit worked at Politico.  And the Wall Street Journal.  Started at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.

    Your Vichy Times as work.  Can you smell the Putz Sulzberger?  Eww.

  28. 28.

    p.a.

    September 26, 2024 at 10:18 am

    @TBone:

     

    @BR:

     

    🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻

  29. 29.

    Elizabelle

    September 26, 2024 at 10:18 am

    @TBone:  Thank you.  Am thinking a front pager will highlight that Hillary op ed.

    Interesting on how to reach out to those who have been programmed.  And it’s not just white supremacists, as we sadly know.  Fox News, all the misleading and disinforming media.

  30. 30.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 10:19 am

    After Donald J. Trump bizarrely claimed without evidence that President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris’ comments had inspired the latest assasination attempt, someone shot at Harris’ Tempe, Arizona, campaign office early Monday morning, making it the second gun attack in a week.

    crooksandliars.com/2024/09/harris-az-campaign-office-hit-gunfire

  31. 31.

    Ramalama

    September 26, 2024 at 10:19 am

    @TBone: Nice, thanks.

    But this makes me want to gripe:

    “Kamala Harris, Reagan Democrat!” conservative pundit Bill Kristol posted on social media after her speech.

    Dear Bill Kristol, cafeteria capitalist: Reagan was notoriously anti-union.

  32. 32.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 10:20 am

    @Elizabelle: it is a commendable super power we should promote and celebrate!

  33. 33.

    Josie

    September 26, 2024 at 10:22 am

    Rick Perlstein writes an excellent article based on a new book on polling. Nate Silver’s ears should be burning about now.

    prospect.org/politics/2024-09-25-polling-imperilment/

  34. 34.

    Elizabelle

    September 26, 2024 at 10:23 am

    I wonder if Shannon Foley Martinez, the former white supremacist now working to deprogram others, will be comfortable with a lot more attention.  I hope so.

    Here’s a free article on her from Yes! Magazine.
    Deradicalization in the Deep South

    How a former neo-Nazi makes amends.

  35. 35.

    Baud

    September 26, 2024 at 10:23 am

    @Ramalama: Relatedly, I’ve noticed an uptick in propaganda on Reddit designed to discourage more progressive voters from voting for Harris.

  36. 36.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 10:25 am

    For attractive lips, speak words of kindness.
    For lovely eyes, seek out the good in people.
    For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry.
    For beautiful hair, let a child run his fingers through it once a day.
    For poise, walk with the knowledge you’ll never walk alone.
    …
    We leave you a tradition with a future.
    The tender loving care of human beings will never become obsolete.
    People even more than things have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed and redeemed and redeemed and redeemed.
    Never throw out anybody.

    Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, you’ll find one at the end of your arm.
    As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands: one for helping yourself, the other for helping others.

    Your “good old days” are still ahead of you, may you have many of them.

    Sam Levenson, In One Era & Out the Other

  37. 37.

    jonas

    September 26, 2024 at 10:27 am

    @rusty:  The vast majority of our political pundits completely didn’t get it, although people who actually ran past presidential campaigns were saying this within a day or two of the debate.

    Oh, I think they understood perfectly well that some kind of huge battle royale at the convention would have been a complete clusterfuck and handed the election to Trump. They didn’t give a shit. They just thought it would be awesome to cover it. In their beautiful minds, it’s always 1968 and they’re there, on the floor of the convention, in a fedora with a prominent “Press” tag stuffed into the band, chomping on a cigar, and banging out a huge scoop on a portable manual typewriter: “Dateline: Chicago! Momentum swinging toward Buttigeig! According to this reporter’s sources, the delegation from Colorado, after a tense meeting, has thrown its support behind…”

  38. 38.

    Trivia Man

    September 26, 2024 at 10:29 am

    @caphilldcne: Blue no matter who?

  39. 39.

    BR

    September 26, 2024 at 10:32 am

    @Ramalama: ​

    I think the never Trumpers are trying to talk themselves into be enthusiastic for Harris. It’s good, even if they’re confused.

    Harris like Biden is solidly in progressive economics — basically Warren’s agenda (minus the wealth tax, sadly, which the supreme court has basically ruled isn’t allowed).

  40. 40.

    rikyrah

    September 26, 2024 at 10:32 am

    Good Morning Everyone 😊 😊 😊

  41. 41.

    lowtechcyclist

    September 26, 2024 at 10:33 am

    @BR:

    That is SO DUMB!!!!

    I mean, why should Harris know or care why Trump polls better or worse on a given issue?  Ignoring that and instead attacking his record is EXACTLY what she should have done!

    I know these bozos are trying to sabotage Dems and sanewash the GOP loonies, especially Trump, but goddamn, are they ever stupid.

  42. 42.

    Matt McIrvin

    September 26, 2024 at 10:34 am

    @Ramalama: They have to tell themselves something to get past the identity-based barriers to voting for a Democrat. Particularly a Democrat who is black and a woman, which is just rubbing it in–but a lot of those non-MAGA neocon-ish types probably imagined that the first black or woman President would have to be a Republican.

  43. 43.

    3Sice

    September 26, 2024 at 10:35 am

    Someone mentioned Frank Rizzo earlier, and I thought this was an interesting read:

    religionlab.virginia.edu/projects/the-citys-salvation-frank-rizzo-and-white-christian-nationalism-in…

  44. 44.

    Scout211

    September 26, 2024 at 10:40 am

    This is so cool! Another non-traditional way to campaign.  Nice!

    In the weeks before Election Day, a loose-knit group of women are organizing online to blanket their communities with pro-Kamala Harris messages — not on yard signs or fliers, but on sticky notes.

    The idea is simple: Take a pad of sticky notes, write messages and post them wherever women may see them — bathroom stalls, the backs of tampon boxes, bathroom mirrors, the gym.

    The messages vary slightly, but a typical one reads something like: “Woman to woman: No one sees your vote at the polls. Vote Harris/Walz.”

    No one really seems to know who started the trend. But women from across the country told NBC News they were inspired to borrow one another’s ideas, sharing advice and pictures of their messages for inspiration through social media, particularly pro-Harris Facebook groups.

    A Harris campaign spokesperson denied that the campaign is involved in the initiative.

    “I gave somebody the advice when she’s like, ‘I don’t know where to put it,’ and so I said my favorite thing to do is to put them on tampon boxes, birth control boxes, diaper bags, [that] kind of thing,” said Susan Visser Saez, 61, of Bella Vista, Arkansas.

  45. 45.

    Geminid

    September 26, 2024 at 10:40 am

    @jonas: The idea of a compressed primary process by which to select a Biden replacement was so obviously unsound that I knew it would never happen. It was just a shiny object for lightweight pundits and would-be operatives to chase and for Democrats to freak out about, so I never paid it much mind.

  46. 46.

    Jackie

    September 26, 2024 at 10:41 am

    O/T Eric Adams charged with acting as an unregistered foreign agent for accepting foreign donations during his campaign for mayor.

    Sources told The City that New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D) is being charged with acting as an unregistered foreign agent for taking actions in his official capacity after receiving donations from foreign sources.

    Details on the charges are still unclear, but sources told the New York Times it is part of a larger probe that looked partly into his 2021 campaign for mayor.

    Oh, and this!

    Rudy Giuliani has been officially disbarred in Washington D.C. over his false claims the 2020 election was stolen for Joe Biden.

  47. 47.

    BR

    September 26, 2024 at 10:42 am

    @lowtechcyclist: ​

    If she gave the real answer they’d scream even louder: the real answer is because for 8 years now they have trumpeted good economic news and headlines for Trump and constantly talked about Biden’s admin like a recession was looming. Identical jobs figures under Trump were reported as “booming economy” vs as “anemic” under Biden.

  48. 48.

    Falling Diphthong

    September 26, 2024 at 10:45 am

    J Rubin: Narrator: It works.

    I saw a bit this morning in which the NYT was fuming that Slippery Kamala didn’t answer the question “Why do some voters give the edge to Trump on the economy?” and instead talked about facts regarding the economy under Biden and under Trump. She was supposed to speculate about the thoughts of a subset of poll respondents! That was the question! How dare she give an answer that focused on policy and facts?!!!!

  49. 49.

    schrodingers_cat

    September 26, 2024 at 10:45 am

    @Baud: You are describing internet tankies who are never satisfied with anything Ds do.

  50. 50.

    sixthdoctor

    September 26, 2024 at 10:47 am

    Certainly no room for complacency, but the latest WP poll for Maryland Senate shows Alsobrooks up 51-40: washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2024/09/26/maryland-senate-poll-alsobrooks-hogan/

    Hogan continues to outpace Trump (Harris 63-31 in same poll).

  51. 51.

    Matt McIrvin

    September 26, 2024 at 10:49 am

    @Falling Diphthong: This whole genre of “why don’t people like you?” question is just fishing for a “basket of deplorables” type slip where the candidate just says some Kinsley-gaffe thing like “those people are horrible dipshits, Bob”.

  52. 52.

    Another Scott

    September 26, 2024 at 10:49 am

    @sixthdoctor: 👍

    (In before Baud??)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  53. 53.

    lowtechcyclist

    September 26, 2024 at 10:50 am

    @jonas:

    In their beautiful minds, it’s always 1968 and they’re there, on the floor of the convention, in a fedora with a prominent “Press” tag stuffed into the band, chomping on a cigar, and banging out a huge scoop on a portable manual typewriter

    How old ARE these guys?? I’m 70, which means I was 14 in 1968. How many more years will it take before all the media hippie-bashers are either dead or in nursing homes??

    1968 was a long fucking time ago, and our politics hasn’t been like that for ages upon ages. Why are there still people around and employed by the media who see things through the lens of that era, and why aren’t they either enjoying a blissful retirement, or pushing up daisies?

    I would have thought they’d be gone by now, but you’re right, they’re still all too present and influential in setting the media dialogue.

  54. 54.

    Darkrose

    September 26, 2024 at 10:52 am

    @Percysowner: Thank you! I know what I’m listening to on my commute today!

  55. 55.

    3Sice

    September 26, 2024 at 10:54 am

    Trump’s economic go to is the promise of the glorious past. Furniture in western NC, autos in MI, coal and steel in PA.

    This is not “better on the economy” in any meaningful way, but speaks to fears of change and mortality. Like a Bob Seger song stewed too long in FOX News.

  56. 56.

    Josie

    September 26, 2024 at 10:54 am

    @Josie: ​
     I must correct myself. The book is not new but was published in 2020. It is W. Joseph Campbell’s Lost in a Gallup: Polling Failure in U.S. Presidential Elections.

  57. 57.

    rikyrah

    September 26, 2024 at 10:56 am

    @Elizabelle:

    I hope this campaign season does kill Big Pundit and Big Media. They are cancers on our democracy.

     

    They prove themselves everyday.

    Everyday, we get more evidence and receipts.

    Being in their bubble, they don’t fully grasp that many folks out here are DONE with them.  Just completely DONE.

  58. 58.

    Torrey

    September 26, 2024 at 10:56 am

    @caphilldcne: ​
     

    Sorry Gov Walz but Go Blue!

    I came here to say precisely this.

  59. 59.

    Matt McIrvin

    September 26, 2024 at 10:59 am

    @lowtechcyclist: There are a lot of Alex P. Keaton types my age who have no actual memory of that world but absorbed the right’s mythology of it with their Sugar Pops as small children.

  60. 60.

    Belafon

    September 26, 2024 at 11:01 am

    @Ramalama: Yeah, that points out a misunderstanding of Democrats. Most of us are capitalists – the market can be a better decider of what to produce than a central authority – but we expect it to be highly regulated because greedy people screw it up. If we didn’t think the free market worked at some level, we would be socialists.

  61. 61.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 11:06 am

    @Jackie: I predicted yesterday that would be among the charges (I rarely prognosticate but that was another easy one).

    Hopefully™ that disbarment is a first step in a long line/list of well deserved Finding Out for Rudy.

    Shaye Moss and Ruby Freeman need to be paid.

  62. 62.

    RaflW

    September 26, 2024 at 11:07 am

    @Elizabelle: I’m incredibly frustrated with the major dailies, but losing them would still be worse than our current situation.

    Maybe I’m naive, but I hope this political cycle – and our growing awareness of how shitty the paper’s politics desks are – will result in changes going forward.

    I’ve become one of those cranks who writes pretty frequent letters to the editors, and sometimes even look up and write to section editors directly, since I have specific complaints that aren’t just seeking opinion page publication. They won’t change because of my bsky skeets.

    I still subscribe to both the FTFNYT and WaPo, the latter at $2/mo so Bezos ain’t getting nothing off me. BF, a former reporter and copy editor, was so mad at the Times recently he came close to agreeing to my semi-regular urging that we cancel them, they ain’t two bucks :/.

  63. 63.

    lowtechcyclist

    September 26, 2024 at 11:10 am

    @Matt McIrvin:

    There are a lot of Alex P. Keaton types my age who have no actual memory of that world but absorbed the right’s mythology of it with their Sugar Pops as small children.

    Sure, but for them to put that mythology ahead of their personal experience of the world they’ve actually lived in…that’s bizarre. No comprendo.

  64. 64.

    SatanicPanic

    September 26, 2024 at 11:12 am

    Without commenting on the above tweet, am I the only one person who thinks Whoopi is an undercover airhead? Like she’s consistently saying the most vapid, clueless things but no one ever suggests she might actually be pretty dumb.

  65. 65.

    Elizabelle

    September 26, 2024 at 11:14 am

    @RaflW:  The Vichy Times is driving down its revenue with its shittiness.  Existing (digital) subscribers are learning they get a greatly reduced price if they will just keep the sub.

    Makes me happy to be paying less to Putz and his shambolic political team.  Although.  Still recorded as a “subscriber.”

  66. 66.

    Michael Bersin

    September 26, 2024 at 11:14 am

    Old media types:

    1. They’re bored. A candidate or office holder who possesses message discipline says pretty much the same thing at every appearance to get their message out to the masses. Old media resents this.
    2.  Even though the “stars” are well paid, there’s that book somewhere in the future. They’ve got to deliver something “new” or it quickly ends up in the remainder bin at the chain bulk store – if some publisher decides they need a loss leader. Old media resents this.
    3. They resent everything.

    I’ve had the fortune/misfortune for two decades to observe national/regional/local media behavior in politics – both as a political activist/volunteer and as a z-list political blogger with media credentials. Old media has not changed one bit.

    One of these days – maybe if I write a book (!) – I’ll tell the whole story about the time, years ago, I ever so briefly contemplated dropping my full frame camera with a heavy telephoto lens off the back of a main press riser on to the head of a now disgraced conventional wisdom old media “golden child” gasbag sitting at the press table about ten feet directly below me. I did not proceed, not because of any possible moral or ethical compunction, but because I didn’t want to lose or damage thousands of dollars in camera gear. Besides, my acting skills are deficient, and I knew my “Oops, sorry about that!” wouldn’t be convincing.

  67. 67.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 11:15 am

    @SatanicPanic: I’m guessing you don’t watch her regularly (I don’t either) and that you haven’t seen yesterday’s full episode of The View with President Biden.  But I know she’s not stupid.

    youtu.be/8cb6QpEyaWo

    She came down hard, got the last word about the filibuster.

    What she is, is gracious for her audience.

  68. 68.

    rikyrah

    September 26, 2024 at 11:15 am

    Mueller, She Wrote

    @MuellerSheWrote

    WOW: INDICTMENT: Eric Adams accepted foreign and corporate contributions through multiple straw donors, then used those to defraud New Yorkers through the City’s small donation matching fund. Adams applied for the matching funds on KNOWN straw donations …
    x.com/MuellerSheWrote/status/1839318898879189141

  69. 69.

    SatanicPanic

    September 26, 2024 at 11:19 am

    @TBone: I don’t watch her regularly. I never understood why she was considered funny, but ever since the Ted Danson blackface thing and her defense of Roman Polanski, of all people, I have considered her very suspect. She seems like someone able to sound reasonable at times, but can’t help herself from saying something really dumb at times.

  70. 70.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 11:20 am

    @SatanicPanic: check out where she commends President Biden’s ability to evolve over the years. To learn. To do better and be better.

    PS I’m not defending her past remarks that you rightly point to.

  71. 71.

    H.E.Wolf

    September 26, 2024 at 11:22 am

    @SatanicPanic: ​
     I’m volunteering my time and energies daily, to help elect a Black woman. Why would I engage with someone denigrating a Black woman.

  72. 72.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    September 26, 2024 at 11:23 am

    @TBone: My wife, formerly somewhat of a normie, is now the political junkie in our house. Her “Do Something” takes the form of postcarding, which she has roped me into. I dutifully write down the prescribed message in careful printing. I’ve done 40. She does artistic calligraphy and layout, blew through her pre-printed stack of “Your Vote, Your Voice” postcards and did another stack of cards of her own design from card stock laying around the house.

    Most recently, we joined a 24-hour postcarding marathon sponsored by the Downtown Nasty Women which had all sorts of political celebrity guests drop by. One of them was Robert Hubbell, author of the Today’s Edition substack. To your point:

    I don’t anticipate that we’re gonna let who actually does what be forgotten this time around.

    Hubbell made a general point that the volunteers who stepped into the breach when the Democratic party machinery as a whole was not fully meeting the challenge, were not going to go away. Just as my wife has suddenly been activated as a volunteer who is no longer just to vote and send money to campaigns, the same has happened to millions of us. That toothpaste is not going into the tube. It’s a glorious thing to be a Democrat.

  73. 73.

    SatanicPanic

    September 26, 2024 at 11:24 am

    @H.E.Wolf: Whoopi is no Kamala Harris

  74. 74.

    UncleEbeneezer

    September 26, 2024 at 11:26 am

    @rikyrah: More evidence of that feckless Merrick Garland…the same one whose DOJ just quickly and secretly, re-indicted Trump a second time to adjust for the SCOTUS Immunity ruling…

  75. 75.

    wjca

    September 26, 2024 at 11:28 am

    California’s sample ballot arrived here yesterday.  The passel of propositions on the ballot (as usual) will take time to wade thru — although who is arguing for and against can speed things up a little.

    But running thru the candidates for Federal, state, and local offices (far fewer than some elections) didn’t take long.  Voted for a bunch of Democrats and one Republican.  Why a Republican, you ask.  Well, it might be more accurate to say I voted against the Democrat.  Given the makeup of California’s legislature, one Republican more or less will have zero impact.  Even if he turns out to be a RWNJ — I haven’t bothered to check yet.

    It’s like this.  I still remember my Assemblywoman’s initial campaign.  Let’s just say that she displayed an embrace of the truth rivaling Donald Trump.  And I don’t say that lightly.  Anything I can do to shortstop the political career of someone like that is worth doing.  Sad but true.

  76. 76.

    wjca

    September 26, 2024 at 11:36 am

    @OId Man Shadow: Your polling should have been much higher.

    Americans are stupid.

    Americans who respond to telephone calls from polling companies are, on balance, stupid.

    Rather a different thing.

  77. 77.

    Torrey

    September 26, 2024 at 11:39 am

    @RaflW: ​
      One of the main problems is the loss of the smaller news outlets, so there is no talent pool pushing the “majors” to do better.

  78. 78.

    wjca

    September 26, 2024 at 11:42 am

    @Ramalama: “Kamala Harris, Reagan Democrat!” conservative pundit Bill Kristol posted on social media after her speech.

    If it gives psychological cover to union members and others who would, apparently, otherwise vote for Trump, it’s all good. The enemy of my enemy is my ally — it’s hard, but try to remember.

  79. 79.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 11:45 am

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: WOO HOO!!!

    💙💙💙

  80. 80.

    Fair Economist

    September 26, 2024 at 11:51 am

    @Baud: I’ve also seen some of the fake left anti-Dem propaganda on Mastodon. My standard action is to post a couple of the spectacular things the Biden/Harris administration has done (there are lots, as we know), with links. I almost never hear back. I assume they block me as I’m contaminating their propaganda with truth.

  81. 81.

    Erin

    September 26, 2024 at 11:53 am

    @Fair Economist: They are automated, run by bot accounts, there’s no human being to respond. But it’s great for you to post the responses anyway, so that other people see the response and not just the original post.

  82. 82.

    Matt McIrvin

    September 26, 2024 at 11:54 am

    @lowtechcyclist: I grew up around these guys. They edit their personal experience to match the mythology. In their minds, liberals are crazy, deranged people itching to tear down the world and always will be.

  83. 83.

    Matt McIrvin

    September 26, 2024 at 11:56 am

    @Fair Economist: I see a lot less of that on Mastodon than I did back on Twitter because there’s no algorithm pushing it at me unbidden.

    But there are one or two people I follow, who are themselves all on board with electing Harris but very much refuse to stop making left critiques of Democrats when applicable (I admire this combination, personally). But sometimes THEY repost stuff from people who to me are clearly just horseshoe-left annoyances, and that’s probably the worst of it.

  84. 84.

    prostratedragon

    September 26, 2024 at 11:59 am

    @lowtechcyclist:  Not to mention that cigar-chomping fedora-wearers were all but extinct by 1968. [2 years older than ltc]

  85. 85.

    Matt McIrvin

    September 26, 2024 at 12:03 pm

    @3Sice: Kay has been talking about manufacturing actually reviving in the upper Midwest–with some return of jobs! I wonder how much of the perception of current economic devastation is a kind of cosplay.

  86. 86.

    stinger

    September 26, 2024 at 12:08 pm

    @SatanicPanic: Maybe your time would be better spent doing something other than watching The View.

  87. 87.

    caphilldcne

    September 26, 2024 at 12:15 pm

    @Trivia Man: That’s my motto. It works well for me in politics and college football. Not so much in my other sports.

  88. 88.

    Torrey

    September 26, 2024 at 12:16 pm

    @SatanicPanic: ​
     

    am I the only one person who thinks Whoopi is an undercover airhead? Like she’s consistently saying the most vapid, clueless things but no one ever suggests she might actually be pretty dumb

    I don’t know if you’re the only one, but I definitely disagree. Whoopi is an actress, performer, an entertainer, and a writer, a constellation of specialties that can require quite a lot of intelligence, although a different genre of intelligence (carefully using the term “genre” to avoid the terms “type” or “category”) than that displayed by a Kamala Harris or a Drew Gilpin Faust or a Eugenie Scott or [etc., etc.], and indeed intelligence that is inevitably displayed differently than the intelligence displays you’ll find in a lawyer, a politician, a legislator, a philosopher, a historian, a scientist, etc. When Whoopi Goldberg was a young unknown, she wrote and performed a one-woman show in which she represented a variety of characters via a series of monologues–it was how she got discovered. And I’ve seen her bring a keen emotional (and intellectual) intelligence to her onscreen roles. Tell me the woman who played Celie in The Color Purple didn’t understand that book at least as well as most of the graduate students who wrote papers on it.

    I don’t generally watch The View–I only see the segments that are flagged on this blog or in other contexts–but in every case I’ve seen, she does a masterful job of managing a challenging interactional context. She knows her audience and her context and adjusts her way of speaking within that context. (I don’t mean to suggest that the audience for The View is at all unintelligent; rather, it’s not an “intellectual” context–when one is watching the View, one is relaxing, not looking for a TED talk.)

    Anyway, them’s my thoughts.

  89. 89.

    caphilldcne

    September 26, 2024 at 12:18 pm

    @Torrey: cheers!

  90. 90.

    Scout211

    September 26, 2024 at 12:22 pm

  91. 91.

    Hoodie

    September 26, 2024 at 12:25 pm

    @Matt McIrvin: IIRC, the Haitians were invited to come to Springfield to take manufacturing jobs that were unfilled because of a labor shortage.

  92. 92.

    TBone

    September 26, 2024 at 12:29 pm

    @Torrey: 🎯 exactly what I was clumsily trying to say by using the word “gracious.”

  93. 93.

    Hoodie

    September 26, 2024 at 12:32 pm

    @lowtechcyclist: I imagine that Woodward and Bernstein is the most formative image with the current generation of journalists.   Of course, that’s another late 60’s/early 70’s story, but the main thing is that it posits journalists as protagonists, which they eat up.

  94. 94.

    Torrey

    September 26, 2024 at 12:39 pm

    @TBone: ​  As it happened, I wanted to get my comment in before the conversation had totally moved on, so I just skimmed down, and I’m afraid I missed your response to SatanicPanic, which (your response, I mean) was spot on. In fact, had I read your reply, I would have pointed out that you had presented in outline the main points I was hitting. Anyway, in the spirit of “woulda, shoulda, coulda, but, alas, didn’t,” can we just call it tag-teaming?​
     
    Edited for clarity.

  95. 95.

    Trivia Man

    September 26, 2024 at 12:47 pm

    @caphilldcne: but never BYU – in that Holy War i am all red

  96. 96.

    Kristine

    September 26, 2024 at 12:48 pm

    @TBone: I may get a paid subscription just because of this line (to Wonkette, not the FTFNYT):

    The New York Times has an explainer here, and they keep updating it all the fucking time because dear God this administration is leaking like a storm-tossed boat built from a colander and cheesecloth.

  97. 97.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    September 26, 2024 at 12:55 pm

    @Torrey: I remember reading about The Color Purple before the movie was released. One thing I remember reading was that Whoopi was a personal choice of Alice Walker, on the basis of her standup character monologues.

  98. 98.

    Emily B.

    September 26, 2024 at 1:27 pm

    @TBone: Heather Cox Richardson’s summary is clearer, more detailed, and more informative than yesterday’s WaPo article on the same speech.

  99. 99.

    RevRick

    September 26, 2024 at 2:28 pm

    @BR: The Never Trumpers are in shock that they are no longer relevant to the party they believed they controlled. Through the Romney campaign, they were in the driver’s seat, taking the votes of the base, but basically directing the policy aims. But Trump has unleashed the power of the base’s seething resentment towards and fears of black and brown people. And they aren’t going back.
    Except the base wants to hurl all of us back to the nostalgic dream of the 1950s, while others long for the 1850s, and still others, the 1450s.
    The Trump mob in Western PA the other day chanted, “Send them back, send them back,” which pretty much sums up their white supremacy. And Trump and his minions tell them their plans to round up and deport 11-20 million human beings. But what happens if the countries to which they are supposed to be deported to refuse landing rights? Will we end up with our very own Gulag Archipelago?

  100. 100.

    satby

    September 26, 2024 at 4:27 pm

    @Omnes Omnibus: oh, right on!

  101. 101.

    JustRuss

    September 26, 2024 at 5:32 pm

    @Falling Diphthong:  I saw a bit this morning in which the NYT was fuming that Slippery Kamala didn’t answer the question “Why do some voters give the edge to Trump on the economy?”

     

    Props to Kamala. “I’d have responded “Because A. they’re idiots and B. the media has been predicting a recession–which has yet to arrive–since the day Joe Biden took office.” Guess that’s why I’m not running for POTUS.

  102. 102.

    The Lodger

    September 26, 2024 at 10:05 pm

    @Michael Bersin: Old media “stars” never deserve to be hit over the head with anything expensive.

  103. 103.

    Kayla Rudbek

    September 26, 2024 at 11:03 pm

    @lowtechcyclist: too much TV on the part of the GenXers (I say this as a GenXer who hated most TV shows growing up; one of the best things about tablets is that if only one person wants to watch something, they can do it on their own device and not be blaring it out into the entire house).

Comments are closed.

Primary Sidebar

On The Road - lashonharangue - Mayan Ruins and the Sacred Monkey River [3 of 4] 6
Photo by lashonharangue (1/22/26)

Mary Peltola Alaska Senate

Donate

Order Your Pet Calendars!

Order Calendar A

Order Calendar B

 

Recent Comments

  • Old School on Sometimes Everything Goes Right (Jan 22, 2026 @ 2:37pm)
  • Professor Bigfoot on Jack Smith Testifies Today at 10 am Eastern (Jan 22, 2026 @ 2:36pm)
  • Omnes Omnibus on Jack Smith Testifies Today at 10 am Eastern (Jan 22, 2026 @ 2:36pm)
  • Erin on Sometimes Everything Goes Right (Jan 22, 2026 @ 2:36pm)
  • WaterGirl on Sometimes Everything Goes Right (Jan 22, 2026 @ 2:35pm)

Balloon Juice Posts

View by Topic
View by Author
View by Month & Year
View by Past Author

Featuring

Medium Cool
Artists in Our Midst
Authors in Our Midst
On Artificial Intelligence (7-part series)

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo, Zelle or PayPal

Calling All Jackals

Site Feedback
Nominate a Rotating Tag
Submit Photos to On the Road
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Links)
Balloon Juice Anniversary (All Posts)
Fix Nyms with Apostrophes

Balloon Juice Mailing List Signup

Social Media

Balloon Juice
WaterGirl
TaMara
John Cole
DougJ (aka NYT Pitchbot)
Betty Cracker
Tom Levenson
David Anderson
Major Major Major Major
DougJ NYT Pitchbot
mistermix
Rose Judson (podcast)

Mary Peltola Alaska Senate

Donate

Site Footer

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

  • Facebook
  • RSS
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Comment Policy
  • Our Authors
  • Blogroll
  • Our Artists
  • Privacy Policy

Privacy Manager

Copyright © 2026 Dev Balloon Juice · All Rights Reserved · Powered by BizBudding Inc

Share this ArticleLike this article? Email it to a friend!

Email sent!