Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

Optimism opens the door to great things.

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

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

“In this country American means white. everybody else has to hyphenate.”

Well, whatever it is, it’s better than being a Republican.

This blog will pay for itself.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

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

One way or another, he’s a liar.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

Not loving this new fraud based economy.

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

“Alexa, change the president.”

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

You are here: Home / Elections 2024 / Heartening Read: Will Leich, ‘Made in America’

Heartening Read: Will Leich, ‘Made in America’

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Will Leich is a good and *sensible* man. This is from his (free to subscribe!) newsletter:

… [After the Biden / Trump debate] Everyone looked at Kamala Harris—in many ways for the first time. We knew who she was, of course, she was the Vice President, but those terrified by Trump, those flabbergasted by his political comeback, those desperate to keep him out of the White House and keep the Republic standing, had to look at her in entirely new, profoundly urgent way. She was no longer a person, or a politician: She was the last chance—the final stand.
 
Can you imagine that sort of pressure? An entire nation—a nation that had been skeptical of you for years—looking at you to save them? How would you handle it? Would you crumple? I think I would crumple. I think most people would.

It has been four months since that debate, and three months since Harris officially became the Democratic nominee for President. Because Covid-19 may have semi-permanently broken our understanding of time and its passing, it seems like longer than that. But in three months, with the entire planet staring at her, Harris not only risen to meet that moment, she has shown the precise qualities we should want in a President. She is better than we thought she was. She is the exact right person for the moment. She was standing in the right place, at the right time. But what she did next is what matters. I believe it to be one of the most impressive things I’ve ever seen a public figure do. She went from being a Vice President with a mostly underwater approval rating to not just uniting her own party in a way it hadn’t been even under Biden but passing nearly every single test thrown at her under unfathomable pressure. And I think it’s why she’s going to be the next President of the United States…

I don’t want to turn this into hagiography: Harris has some stances I don’t agree with, which is what is supposed to happen because she is not a cult leader to be blindly followed, and I do not think she has been perfect, because she is a human being and no human beings are perfect. But I think, independent of the loathsomeness and imminent danger of her opponent, she will be a terrific President, during a time when we will very much need one…

…There are people out there who want to blow up the entire system. I am not one of them. There are many reforms, major reforms, that need to be done, but I do not believe—nor should any reasonable person believe—that you can do these by just kicking all the chairs over and stomping fits. Harris made a commitment, early in her life, to try to work within the system, with all its limitations and systemic issues, to try to make a difference. I, as someone who tends to find bomb throwing more about self-aggrandizement than a dedication to the common good, believe this to be the correct approach. Kamala Harris is smart, skilled and rational. It’s a lot harder to find all three of those things in one person than you’d think. She has all three…

She has a relatable, fascinating background. I highly recommend the “Frontline” documentary “The Choice 2024,” which tells the stories of both Trump and (especially) Harris in a way I had not seen done before…

The documentary tells the story of Harris’ fraught, if not entirely dysfunctional, relationship with her father, and the example set by her mother, a brilliant biologist whose primary lesson was to tell her children, when they were faced with hardship, not to look for someone else to solve their problem but to instead learn from it and be stronger for the experience. Harris grew up middle class—including, briefly, in Urbana, Illinois—in a loving but transient household, and her rise was a result of her personal drive and intelligence rather than having everything handed to her. She, like Obama, had to learn how to fit in across many, many different environs, places where she, as a woman and a Black person of Indian descent, was desperately outnumbered. She has worked shit jobs, she has had to emerge from situations in which she was powerless, she has had to learn how to connect with and get along with people from entirely different backgrounds from her own. There have been rooms where she is the most exceptional person in them; there have been rooms where she’s had to sit back and learn everything she could. She has gone through many phases in her life, and she has changed and evolved and grown. She has had to discover who she was in real time—like the rest of us…

She is a woman—and a strong voice for women. It has been strategically smart for Harris, I think, not to emphasize the historic nature of her candidacy, that she would be the first woman President. Part of this is surely learning the lesson of Hillary Clinton, who put that so much at the center of her campaign that it may have caused people to overlook all the other reasons she was running. But this should not change the fact that not only would having a woman President be massively historic, it would be obviously, self-evidently, good for the country. Not only would it at last correct a historic wrong, and not only change the world for millions of women and girls across the country and billions across the world, there is also increasingly overwhelming research that women are in fact more successful leaders than men are, in just about every way. (I am not sure this is something we necessarily need research on, I’m just staying the research is there, if you want it.) Harris may not be emphasizing how much it would mean to finally have a female President. That doesn’t mean the rest of us can’t. Because it would be a big, big deal.

She’s a sensible person. I think this is what I want more than anything else, out of my politicians, out of my friends, out of anyone I come across in my life. I want them to be sensible. Obama famously said a large part of his job was “don’t do stupid shit.” We are a strong country. We are a wealthy country. We are a good country. We just need to make it better as best we can, and not do stupid shit to make it worse…

I think this is a good country. I think it can be better. But I do not think it needs to be blown up. I want someone who believes in it, who is dedicated to it, who will do everything in her power to evoke positive change in ways that are rational, sensible and sane. I know that isn’t the most stirring oratory that I could give you. Others can surely do that. I can only come from where I am coming from. If you are a normal person who sincerely believes in this country and wants it to be a place that’s stable, to be place that messes up a lot but does ultimately bend toward justice, to be a place where children can be proud of and someday raise families of their own, you absolutely must vote for Kamala Harris. This is her moment. She has met it. The notion of seeing her in the Oval Office is a deeply inspiring one to imagine. I pray we get to see it.

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Reader Interactions

157Comments

  6. 6.

    Chacal Charles Calthrop

    Amen.  This blog is keeping me sane through this horrible electrion.

    Re women leaders:  I remember reading somewhere that, out of all of humanity’s history with war, there was only one modern war where the top leadership was female, and that was the Falklands war between Argentina and Great Britain while Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister and Elizabeth II was Queen — and that, if the results were anything to go by, to win a modern war hands-down you should have it run by women.

  11. 11.

    rk

    Whether she wins or loses, there is nothing she could have done differently. I never gave her a single thought in 2020 ) Warren was my choice). I knew nothing about her during the Biden presidency other than having somewhat positive feelings for her. I knew it should be her to replace Biden, but wanted it to be a white man because we need to win and a white man would most probably get us there rather than a black woman. But passing over her made no sense.

    But, she has been amazing, has exceeded all expectations. She gets an A plus on all metrics. The country would be lucky to have her and if the fools reject her, it’s because they’re morons and will deserve everything that comes their way unfortunately dragging the rest of us down to the gutter. But there is nothing to blame her for. She has done her absolute best. Too many times it’s just the way life is.

  12. 12.

    RandomMonster

    Obama famously said a large part of his job was “don’t do stupid shit.”

    Compare that to TFG, whose only operative mode is “do the stupidest shit”.

    You could apply this to the parties as a whole.

  14. 14.

    Omnes Omnibus

    Canvassing today found a lot of people not home, but those who were were really enthused about the election and voting for Harris.

  15. 15.

    Dagaetch

    @schrodingers_cat: I ended up voting ‘yes’ on everything. Most difficult decision was actually the MCAS one since there were some decent arguments against it, but in the end I’m siding with the teachers.​

  16. 16.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @WV Blondie:

    Can’t read it w/o a subscription and Petri, although she’s beloved here, ain’t beloved enough to subscribe.

  19. 19.

    Steve LaBonne

    @rk: She was my second choice after Warren and by far my first choice to be Biden’s running mate. Nevertheless she has exceeded my expectations. The mini primary nonsense infuriated me not just because it was politically insane but because there was nobody I would rather have seen nominated even if it had magically been possible.

  25. 25.

    rk

    @Steve LaBonne:

    I agree. Even though I wanted it to be the magical white man pony, when it comes down to it I don’t know who would be as good as her. I think if it were Walz, he would be good and win it handily. He gives the warm fuzzy cuddly feelings in all. But he was nowhere in the event horizon in July. Oh well!

  27. 27.

    kalakal

    @Chacal Charles Calthrop:

    Thatcher’s ignoring intelligence and Foreign Office reports of Argentine intentions, withdrawing the garrison and putting half the Royal Navy up for sale* had a lot to do with the war happening in the first place. If Galtieri & co had waited 6 months Thatcher would have been out of office in 10 seconds

    *they had to have a conversation with Australia along the lines of

    “You know that aircraft carrier we’re selling you? Can we hang on to it for another 6 months?”

  28. 28.

    Trivia Man

    Giant naked trump spotted in Madison WI today. Hope the football fans see it in the way to the game.

    Penn State in town for 2x swing state impact.

  30. 30.

    azlib

    Musk’s ideas are a pipe dream. None of this will get past Congress which will likely have a Democratic House.

  34. 34.

    Origuy

    In case someone you know doubts that Russia is interfering in our election:

    From Wired:

    A Russian-aligned propaganda network notorious for creating deepfake whistleblower videos appears to be behind a coordinated effort to promote wild and baseless claims that Minnesota governor and vice presidential candidate Tim Walz sexually assaulted one of his former students, according to several specialists tracking the disinformation campaign.

    From CNN:

    US intelligence has assessed that Russian operatives were behind a fake video purporting to show someone destroying mail-in ballots in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, that circulated on social media Thursday.

  35. 35.

    trollhattan

    What’s left of the local paper has a profile of Kamala’s time in Sac as CA SOS. Guessing it’s paywalled to the wall, but a couple excerpts.

    While she spent far less time in Sacramento than she did in the Bay Area, the future vice president forged strong relationships in the capital nonetheless.

    The connections she did make in Sacramento were often through food. Capital eateries that she frequented in the 2010s recalled fond memories of the attorney general’s visit. Chefs and owners said Harris was a connoisseur of farm-to-fork cuisine and always generous with her time and conversation.

    “We’re excited to have someone who loves food in the White House,” said chef Patrick Mulvaney. ‘Vegan before 5 p.m.’ As one of the state’s most powerful leaders, Harris took business lunches at upscale eateries around Sacramento.

    During her tenure as attorney general from 2011 to 2016, she was a regular at two downtown favorites: The Waterboy and Mulvaney’s B&L. according to staff members who worked for her at the time. Harris “was super excited about food,” recalled Mulvaney, describing her as a “gracious,” “friendly,” and “always super generous” customer who made direct eye contact and treated staff well, he said.

    Mulvaney’s hosted one event for Harris’ Attorney General campaign where her mother, Shyamala Gopalan, who died in 2009, made sure there were samosas from her favorite Indian restaurants. “We knew … that she was super into food,” he said. Like many in Sacramento, she was interested in where ingredients were grown and where her food came from. She also kept a unique diet, once announcing to staff that she was vegan, despite having eaten meat at the restaurant before: Harris told Mulvaney that she stuck to a vegan diet during the day, but evenings were a free-for-all.

    In the restaurant’s reservation system, staff made a succinct note under Harris’ name: “Vegan before 5pm.”

    https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/the-state-worker/article293963934.html#storylink=cpy

    Know Patrick well enough to testify his remarks are from the heart.

  36. 36.

    trollhattan

    @Origuy: Guessing Vlad is nearly as disdainful of Kamala as he clearly was about Killery. Plus, the ROI on buying a Trump will always favor the investor.

  38. 38.

    hrprogressive

    I was a “Let’s not risk it by dumping Biden” guy before The Switch, because I wasn’t convinced Harris – who seemed like the logical next choice – Was “a better option than the option we already had”.

    From Day 1, she’s proven me immediately wrong. I’ve never been happier to be wrong about whether it was a good idea, or she was the right person for the moment.

    And, as a boring white dude who is 38 and a half, as far as I’m concerned, if the Democratic Party became a party full of nothing but elected women of color, I’d be fine with it.

    White dudes have had centuries to run shit and have fucked a lot of it up.

    Let the women lead. They would almost certainly do a much better job.

    I am sure Madame President Harris will do exactly that.

  40. 40.

    Suburban Mom

    @Baud: I just did.  Also Andy Kim and Sue Altman.  The early voting site was busy.  I hope that’s a good sign.

  41. 41.

    kindness

    @Steve LaBonne: The magic primary the media and several ‘important’ people pleaded for wouldn’t have helped the Democratic party.  It would only have furthered the media and several of those ‘important’ people.  No…Nancy Pelosi saved us again as I suspect she was in on Biden stepping down so long as Kamala was the nominee.  Thank God for that woman.

  42. 42.

    Suzanne

    Mr. Suzanne went canvassing this afternoon while I stayed home with the Spawns. He said most people were excited to vote for Harris, but one person was gonna vote for the Libertarian candidate. But also Bob Casey. What the fuck. People are dumb as shit.

  45. 45.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @hrprogressive:

    as far as I’m concerned, if the Democratic Party became a party full of nothing but elected women of color, I’d be fine with it.

    Same here and I’m significantly older but equally white.

  46. 46.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Jay:

    LOL at the email addy.

    See above, I did find one of the archive sites that worked as well.  Which is nice to know so that we don’t need to rely on gift links.

  47. 47.

    lamh47

    Forever my FLOTUS Michelle Obama brought the heat today at her rally in Michigan with Kamala Harris!

    @kylegriffin1

    This passage from Michelle Obama: “I hope you’ll forgive me if I’m a little frustrated that some of us are choosing to ignore Donald Trump’s gross incompetence while asking Kamala to dazzle us at every turn. I hope that you’ll forgive me if I’m a little angry that we are indifferent to his erratic behavior. His obvious mental decline. His history as a convicted felon. A known slumlord. A predator found liable for sexual abuse. All of this while we pick apart Kamala’s answers from interviews that he doesn’t even have the courage to do, y’all.”
    https://x.com/kylegriffin1/status/1850296564851347533

    Tore chump up in only the way she can!  Check out the ENTIRE speech if you can!

  48. 48.

    lollipopguild

    @Nelle: I had a teacher in college who was an ex-priest and he had married an ex-nun.  Early 70’s. Very nice man and a good teacher, he told us that some of the best priests were priests who had problems with alcohol, had recovered and related better to the people in the pews.

  51. 51.

    TBone

    Michele Obama blew the doors off it again today.  I hope she is in the Harris Cabinet in some capacity.

    I also love this post!

  52. 52.

    John S.

    @hrprogressive:

    I would love to see Canada drop Trudeau in favor of a woman PM. Then we could have women leaders in all of North America.

    That would be really interesting.

  53. 53.

    lamh47

    @lamh47:

     

    @kylegriffin1

    Michelle Obama closes with a warning on those considering third parties: “If we don’t get this election right, your wife, your daughter, your mother, we as women will become collateral damage to your rage. So are you as men prepared to look into the eyes of the women and children that you love and tell them you supported this assault on our safety?”
    https://x.com/kylegriffin1/status/1850301395355984212

  57. 57.

    Spanky

    Here’s the nut graph.

    But if I were the paper, I would be a little embarrassed that it has fallen to me, the humor columnist, to make our presidential endorsement. I will spare you the suspense: I am endorsing Kamala Harris for president, because I like elections and want to keep having them.

    But it gets better! Spoiler alert!

    Let me tell you something. I am having a baby (It’s a boy!), and he is expected on Jan. 6, 2025 (It’s a … Proud Boy?). This is either slightly funny or not at all funny. This whole election, I have been lurching around, increasingly heavily pregnant, nauseated, unwieldy, full of the commingled hopes and terrors that come every time you are on the verge of introducing a new person to the world.

    Yay! (Not yay about the nausea. )

  58. 58.

    lamh47

    @lamh47:

    @kylegriffin1

    Michelle Obama: “Can someone tell me why we are once again holding Kamala to a higher standard than her opponent? We expect her to be intelligent and articulate. To have a clear set of policies. To never show too much anger. To prove time and time again that she belongs. But for Trump, we expect nothing at all.”
    https://x.com/kylegriffin1/status/1850292608435908850

  59. 59.

    Jay

    @John S.:

    Not going to happen. There are no Liberal Cabinet Ministers or Committee leaders who are prominent enough to take over the leadership,

    and the Con’s are going all in on wingnuttia, hatred, anti-vax, Trans and LGTBQ2A hate, QAnon, you name it, and are still polling well.

  62. 62.

    John S.

    @Jay:

    That’s a shame. I can’t believe Trudeau has become so toxic that Canadians are willing to fall for that bullshit.

  69. 69.

    divF

    @Nelle: Ranks right up there with the National Enquirer Headline “Pope to Declare Elvis a Saint”. (Probably not real, but worth repeating nonetheless).

  70. 70.

    trollhattan

    @divF: The Weekly World News made me not care if the supermarket checkout line was taking forever. “Bigfoot Stole My Wife” is evergreen.

  71. 71.

    Scout211

    (Apologies if this has already been posted).

    Alexandra Petri at her best. Web archive version

    It has fallen to me, the humor columnist, to endorse Harris for president
    Isn’t this what a newspaper is supposed to do?

    We as a newspaper suddenly remembered, less than two weeks before the election, that we had a robust tradition 50 years ago of not telling anyone what to do with their vote for president. It is time we got back to those “roots,” I’m told!

    Roots are important, of course. As recently as the 1970s, The Post did not endorse a candidate for president. As recently as centuries ago, there was no Post and the country had a king! Go even further back, and the entire continent of North America was totally uninhabitable, and we were all spineless creatures who lived in the ocean, and certainly there were no Post subscribers.

    But if I were the paper, I would be a little embarrassed that it has fallen to me, the humor columnist, to make our presidential endorsement. I will spare you the suspense: I am endorsing Kamala Harris for president, because I like elections and want to keep having them.

    . . .

    Let me tell you something. I am having a baby (It’s a boy!), and he is expected on Jan. 6, 2025 (It’s a … Proud Boy?). This is either slightly funny or not at all funny. This whole election, I have been lurching around, increasingly heavily pregnant, nauseated, unwieldy, full of the commingled hopes and terrors that come every time you are on the verge of introducing a new person to the world.

    Well, that world will look very different, depending on the outcome of November’s election, and I care which world my kid gets born into. I also live here myself. And I happen to care about the people who are already here, in this world. Come to think of it, I have a lot of reasons for caring how the election goes. I think it should be obvious that this is not an election for sitting out.

    The case for Donald Trump is “I erroneously think the economy used to be better? I know that he has made many ominous-sounding threats about mass deportations, going after his political enemies, shutting down the speech of those who disagree with him (especially media outlets), and that he wants to make things worse for almost every category of person — people with wombs, immigrants, transgender people, journalists, protesters, people of color — but … maybe he’ll forget.”

    “But maybe he’ll forget” is not enough to hang a country on!

    . . .


    I’m just a humor columnist. I only know what’s happening because our actual journalists are out there reporting, knowing that their editors have their backs, that there’s no one too powerful to report on, that we would never pull a punch out of fear. That’s what our readers deserve and expect: that we are saying what we really think, reporting what we really see; that if we think Trump should not return to the White House and Harris would make a fine president, we’re going to be able to say so.

    That’s why I, the humor columnist, am endorsing Kamala Harris by myself!

     

    ETA : Blondie got there first.  I’m adding  the excerpts and the web archive free version.

  76. 76.

    KatKapCC

    @TBone: I get that this is just daydreaming, but Michelle has made it clear she has less than zero interest in being in politics and we really need to stop, even in joking blog comments, acting like her desires for her own life don’t matter.

  77. 77.

    Jay

    The most common ghosts are the ones that appear wearing white sheets and flailing their arms.

    These are the people who died while changing their duvet covers,

    and are condemned to haunt bedrooms forever looking for the duvet’s corners.

  79. 79.

    BR

    How’s the door knocking and calling going everyone? The ballot curing calling is going fine, though a bit hard to get folks to pick up. Gotta keep calling though — never know when someone will be free.

  80. 80.

    Starfish

    @KatKapCC: For someone who has zero interest in being in politics, she gives a lot of very good political speeches.

    I often ask people to stop with the fantasy Michelle Obama presidency talk, but her speeches during this election cycle have been fantastic.

  81. 81.

    Freemark

    @RandomMonster: I think that may not actually be true and is pretty sexist. What is more likely true is that the women who became leaders had to be much better at it to overcome the misogyny. Only the most absolutely incredible leaders survived. Whereas if women had the same opportunities as men women leaders would be as mediocre as male leaders.

    Nancy Pelosi is a good example. She may be the best Speaker ever. If she only had the potential to be the 10th best she probably never gets that position.

  83. 83.

    lamh47

    Aww mahn…I really want to go back to Japan Like…I never made it to Kyoto or Osaka or even some parts of Tokyo

  84. 84.

    satby

    TIL that the convict’s black and gold maga hat, black suit and gold tie in MI last night was supposed to be a signal to the Proud Boys. Those are that criminal gang’s colors.

  87. 87.

    WaterGirl

    Opinion: It has fallen to me, the humor columnist, to endorse Harris for president

    Isn’t this what a newspaper is supposed to do?

    By Alexandra Petri

    The Washington Post is not bothering to endorse a candidate in the 2024 presidential election. (Jeff Bezos, the founder of Blue Origin and the founder and executive chairman of Amazon and Amazon Web Services, also owns The Post.)

    We as a newspaper suddenly remembered, less than two weeks before the election, that we had a robust tradition 50 years ago of not telling anyone what to do with their vote for president. It is time we got back to those “roots,” I’m told!

    Roots are important, of course. As recently as the 1970s, The Post did not endorse a candidate for president. As recently as centuries ago, there was no Post and the country had a king! Go even further back, and the entire continent of North America was totally uninhabitable, and we were all spineless creatures who lived in the ocean, and certainly there were no Post subscribers.

    But if I were the paper, I would be a little embarrassed that it has fallen to me, the humor columnist, to make our presidential endorsement. I will spare you the suspense: I am endorsing Kamala Harris for president, because I like elections and want to keep having them.Follow

    Let me tell you something. I am having a baby (It’s a boy!), and he is expected on Jan. 6, 2025 (It’s a … Proud Boy?). This is either slightly funny or not at all funny. This whole election, I have been lurching around, increasingly heavily pregnant, nauseated, unwieldy, full of the commingled hopes and terrors that come every time you are on the verge of introducing a new person to the world.

    Well, that world will look very different, depending on the outcome of November’s election, and I care which world my kid gets born into. I also live here myself. And I happen to care about the people who are already here, in this world. Come to think of it, I have a lot of reasons for caring how the election goes. I think it should be obvious that this is not an election for sitting out.

    The case for Donald Trump is “I erroneously think the economy used to be better? I know that he has made many ominous-sounding threats about mass deportations, going after his political enemies, shutting down the speech of those who disagree with him (especially media outlets), and that he wants to make things worse for almost every category of person — people with wombs, immigrants, transgender people, journalists, protesters, people of color — but … maybe he’ll forget.”

    “But maybe he’ll forget” is not enough to hang a country on!

    Embarrassingly enough, I like this country. But everything good about it has been the product of centuries of people who had no reason to hope for better but chose to believe that better things were possible, clawing their way uphill — protesting, marching, voting, and, yes, doing the work of journalism — to build this fragile thing called democracy. But to be fragile is not the same as to be perishable, as G.K. Chesterton wrote. Simply do not break a glass, and it will last a thousand years. Smash it, and it will not last an instant. Democracy is like that: fragile, but only if you shatter it.

    Trust is like that, too, as newspapers know.

    I’m just a humor columnist. I only know what’s happening because our actual journalists are out there reporting, knowing that their editors have their backs, that there’s no one too powerful to report on, that we would never pull a punch out of fear. That’s what our readers deserve and expect: that we are saying what we really think, reporting what we really see; that if we think Trump should not return to the White House and Harris would make a fine president, we’re going to be able to say so.

    That’s why I, the humor columnist, am endorsing Kamala Harris by myself!

  88. 88.

    VeniceRiley

    @Freemark: As Ms. Magazine used to say back in the day “click!”

    Click was realisations to every step that leads to “woke.”

    Michele Obama is based and infinitely more relatable than her legendary husband. I’m sure she’s made him a better person. Maybe it’s my women favouring radar, but I get a high-on-their-own-supply feeling from both Joe and Barack sometimes. If you gave me an executive filled with Harris, MO, and HRC, I would move to that country, but that stock, go all in on what they want to build.

  91. 91.

    TBone

    @KatKapCC: pretty sure she doesn’t need you to defend her from me either.

    I don’t expect, nor have I expressed any wish for, Michele Obama to sublimate her own desires  for anything or to anyone.  She made her desires known in no uncertain terms, on her own terms, and is under no obligation simply because I believe she’d make a great advisor or Cabinet member.  For fucks sake, it was just a statement of admiration and hope.

    No one can make me feel inferior without my consent.

  93. 93.

    prostratedragon

    @WaterGirl:  Thanks for embiggening the title, which by itself was laugh-out-loud and -long funny to me.

    ETA That reminds me of a link to the leadt surprising headline of the week, which was sitting on my clipboard. From Michelle Price:

    Michelle L. Price
    After he spoke in Austin today, Trump greeted executives from Blue Origin, the space exploration company owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos.

  96. 96.

    Chet Murthy

    @comrade scotts agenda of rage: oof. oooooof.

    But if I were the paper, I would be a little embarrassed that it has fallen to me, the humor columnist, to make our presidential endorsement. I will spare you the suspense: I am endorsing Kamala Harris for president, because I like elections and want to keep having them.

    Let me tell you something. I am having a baby (It’s a boy!), and he is expected on Jan. 6, 2025 (It’s a … Proud Boy?). This is either slightly funny or not at all funny. This whole election, I have been lurching around, increasingly heavily pregnant, nauseated, unwieldy, full of the commingled hopes and terrors that come every time you are on the verge of introducing a new person to the world.

    Well, that world will look very different, depending on the outcome of November’s election, and I care which world my kid gets born into. I also live here myself. And I happen to care about the people who are already here, in this world. Come to think of it, I have a lot of reasons for caring how the election goes. I think it should be obvious that this is not an election for sitting out.

  97. 97.

    Scout211

    LOL!  I guess with multiple links and excerpts posted here from Alexandra Petri’s column, it is kind of obvious that we are all fans.

    Jackals have good taste.  😊

  98. 98.

    Chet Murthy

    @lamh47: i remember when Ta-Nehisi Coates said Trump was America’s first White president.  I guess one might amend that to first White Male president, but his pronouncement still fits pretty well.

  100. 100.

    Anoniminous

    While waiting for the shrimp to finished marinating I went to open the bottle of wine chilling in the refridgerator to give it a taste test* and ….

    it was’t there. I forgot to put it in this AM!!!!

    We’re going to have to drink warm Pinot Grigio with the Shrimp Scampi

    😭😭😭😭

    * for SCIENCE!!!!

  105. 105.

    mrmoshpotato

    @BR:

    Ghosty 👻‬ ‪@ghostyspook.bsky.social‬
    ·
    2h
    Imagine being this crazy rich and spending all your time worrying that some poor person might be a tiny bit less poor and actively working to make them poorer

    Well, when you’re a massive pile of shit like Musk…

  107. 107.

    mrmoshpotato

    @lamh47: Gonna watch that later.  I hope she tore into the orange shitstain at length.

    ETA – 40 minutes of Forever FLOTUS!

  109. 109.

    Peale

    @Baud: So I thought it was crazier in context that he believes that Windmills cause Whalesto beach themselves which is why he’s going to tear down all the windmills. He’s more enviornmentalist than the environmentalists.  Like he thinks that whales started beaching themselves recently. But then someone in the comments section pointed out that people in Wales complained that the windmill noise gave them headaches and so he’s conflating the Welsh with cetaceans. It wouldn’t surprise me if he thinks that Wales is full of massively large people.

  112. 112.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Peale: It wouldn’t surprise me if he thinks that Wales is full of massively large people.

    Or his syphilitic brain mush thinks Wales is populated by orcas.

  115. 115.

    Chet Murthy

    @mrmoshpotato: @Peale: I actually think he’s doing it on purpose and with deceitful intent.  It’s the same as when he brings up Hannibal Lecter when he talks about immigrants claiming asylum: it’s not that he thinks Lecter is real, but that he wants that -association- to be cemented in the minds of his listeners and viewers.  That’s the goal!  So that immigrants are viewed as evil butchers.  And the same thing here: it’s not about whether there’s some causal link between windmills and whale beachings.  If there’s even the most tenuous story that can be told, that’s enough for him to run with it: to try to establish in the minds of his listeners that the former causes the latter.  And he’s gonna say it, over and over and over.  So that, as Goebbels said

    “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it.”

  122. 122.

    KatKapCC

    @TBone: Okay, dial it back. I wasn’t trying to make you feel inferior, nor was I insulting you in any way. But liberals make comments like this about her constantly, and to me it feels disrespectful to her when she has repeatedly said she has no interest for us to keep being like “She should run for president” or “she should be in the cabinet” or “She should be on SCOTUS”. Even if it’s just silly musing, it is still not a good look to refuse to listen to and respect a Black woman’s own stated desires for her own life. And I will only add that making this about YOU and your choice to have hurt feelings over a very mild call-out is also not a good look.

  123. 123.

    MagdaInBlack

    @Chet Murthy: I think you give him far too much credit. All the things in his “weave” are connected, in the same way all the bounces of a pinball are connected.  I think of his thought process as that pinball bouncing around his brain.

  125. 125.

    Salty Sam

    @lamh47: This will make you smile!

    Oh boy, did it ever!  I could watch her flash that million watt grin all night!  SUCH great energy!

  126. 126.

    Chet Murthy

    @MagdaInBlack: Ok, so for sure, he’s losing control of his patter.  Absolutely.  But I don’t think that the -elements- he weaves into that patter are chosen randomly, and I don’t think that he pulls them out of the ether.  Remember back in 2016 when it was reported that (I think it was) Bannon (maybe it was somebody else — one of his henchmen whose name starts with a “C”?)  who tasked with listening to talk radio for like a month, in order to come up with the themes that Trump should use in his campaign?  He’s always had outlandish shit in his speeches.  We think of it as proof that he’s losing it: -I- think of it as proof that he’s doing what good salesmen do, which is to find what works and run with it, regardless of what it looks, tastes, and smells like.

    I’m NOT saying he’s not declining.  He IS declining.  His patter has gotten more repetitive, far far more repetitive, with the years.  But these ideas (like “whales dying from windmills”) — they don’t come from his own head.  They’re given to him by his staff, and he weaves them (more and more ineptly for sure) into his spiels.

  127. 127.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Baud:

    C’mon, Allred, be an American hero. 

    Ted Cruz falsely calls 2 cis teen girls “boys” in desperate search for trans athletes to demonize

    I hope enough Texans decide that Shithead Ted needs to be sent packing to Cancun.

  128. 128.

    ArchTeryx

    @Baud: It’s really up to Texas voters. They’re the ones who are gonna decide if that POS Ted Cruz gets to skate on everything just because he’s got an R next to his name. By any other qualification, the guy sucks hairy goat balls and everyone except his voters hate his ass. Even Yertle the Turtle.

  130. 130.

    MagdaInBlack

    @Chet Murthy: I do agree he has his talking points he got from folks like Bannon (i confess to having watched his Warroom as a learning wtf experience) and now those points don’t bounce the correct levers anymore. I do think he has reinforced the lie well enough his true followers just hear the trigger words. And that’s all that matters to them.

  131. 131.

    Salty Sam

    @mrmoshpotato: I hope enough Texans decide that Shithead Ted needs to be sent packing to Cancun.

    When I voted yesterday, it was a tossup as to which choice gave me more pleasure- Harris/Walz, or Colin Allred.  Call it a draw…

  133. 133.

    mrmoshpotato

    @MagdaInBlack:

    I think you give him far too much credit. All the things in his “weave” are connected, in the same way all the bounces of a pinball are connected. I think of his thought process as that pinball bouncing around his brain.

    See my comment about the orange shitstain’s campaign staff, but I also agree that this “weave” bullshit is Dump’s way of trying to deny the decaying of his drug-addled, pile of shit “brain” that’s never had to think critically about anything in his miserable, loser life

    ETA – not “agree” but that how I see Dump’s behavior.

  134. 134.

    Anoniminous

    @Jay: @WaterGirl:

    I would have put the bottle in the freezer but just flat ran out of time.  I’d already put the shrimp in the sauce to cook and went to taste the wine before I added it to the sauce and … there it wasn’t.  Also, too, I’d started the angel hair pasta* to soak up the sauce and that only takes 4 minutes.

    * pasta because SOMEONE HAD EATEN ALL THE BREAD AND DIDN’T TELL ME!!!!!

  140. 140.

    MagdaInBlack

    @mrmoshpotato: recall ever seeing pictures of a spider web woven by a spider supposedly on lsd?  There’s your “weave.” 😉🎃

    Eta: I think Elmo might be the same kind of thinker.

  141. 141.

    Gvg

    @John S.: I missed Trudeau’s becoming unpopular. What did he do? Sorry, I have been tensely focused on our politics. Even ignoring Ukraine and Gaza because I can’t do anything and it’s so awful now. Like watching a horror flick that won’t end. And I hate the genre.

  142. 142.

    Lyrebird

    @Jay: ​
     

    Made me laugh.

    I used to have a duvet with those cute little loops/bits of bias tape at the corners, so if there are snap loops on your duvet cover, you are all set. But I think one of the kids claimed that one…

    Hoping you and T are receiving ever so much support and whatever help is needed.

  143. 143.

    Betty

    A columnist at the Boston Globe calling out Bezos for bowing to Trump. I did not expect to see that.

  144. 144.

    TBone

    @KatKapCC: I quote you directly, in your choosing to direct your comment to me

    acting like her desires for her own life don’t matter.

    So yeah, I took offense that you’d have the nerve to read me like that.

  145. 145.

    Chet Murthy

    @TBone: @KatKapCC: Hey, uh, if there’s a family we’re all pretty protective of, it’s the Obamas.  I know we all cringed thru eight years, praying, just praying that he wouldn’t be assassinated.  We all have sore spots regarding the Obamas, and there’s no need to elbow each other, pull hair, about them, eh?  We all love ’em, want the best for ’em, admire ’em.

  147. 147.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Betty:

    A columnist at the Boston Globe calling out Bezos for bowing to Trump. I did not expect to see that. 

    Did they say Bezos sucks orange ass?

  148. 148.

    Chet Murthy

    @mrmoshpotato: i see people calling for boycotts of Amazon, and I am sympathetic.  I don’t have a car, and to do grocery shopping for organic food would be a serious hike across town.  Various kinds of ethnic spices and such Would again be serious hikesAcross town in different directions.  Forget getting housewares — The big stores for that sort of thing are all in the suburbs.  I suppose I could get a car, and then yeah getting rid of Amazon is completely tenable.  Since I live in an apartment With limited street parking That’s going to be a gas-powered car though.  Sigh.

  150. 150.

    Ruckus

    Kamala Harris is a good person. She takes her job seriously. She is smart, well spoken, and understands politics, human beings, and reality.

  151. 151.

    Ruckus

    @Starfish:

    Michelle Obama is a very smart human being, who understands what she wants and does not want, what she needs and what she doesn’t need.

    The fact that she is very smart and aware and has been around politics is likely one of the reasons she doesn’t want to be in office. The fact that she is very smart and has been around may also be one reason she is so well spoken. I’ve had to get up in front of audiences before, nothing like a major political event but it is a lot less stressful than many think. It is the pressure we put on ourselves that makes it more difficult. And I’ve had to do it wearing a tuxedo on occasion.

  152. 152.

    Chet Murthy

    @Ruckus: If I were she, I wouldn’t want to get any of my family into politics either.  They’ve already given their full measure of service.

    P.S. And she really is an electrifying speaker, isn’t she?  I mean just -electrifying-!

  155. 155.

    Matt

    Meh. Voting for Harris, but my expectations are incredibly low even if we somehow win the trifecta:

    • probably gives into huge pressure to pardon Trump “for the good of the nation”
    • gets zero judges confirmed because of blue slips and an un-abolished filibuster
    • no confirmed Cabinet officials either
    • austerity for everyone but cops and Israel, in the name of “bipartisanship”
    • unlimited material and political support for genocide in Palestine, up to and including ground troops
    • no national legislation on abortion, because “swing state Dems have it tough”
    • no action to unload the Chekov’s gun of fascism, because that would mean noticing it exists
    • “tough” action on the border that legalizes all the nasty shit the Trumpkins want to do

    If we don’t win the trifecta, add in periodic government shutdowns and bullshit Congressional investigations to the stew.

  156. 156.

    Jesse

    @Origuy: I wonder if this is what my mom was referring to when she blurted out that Tim Walz was a piece of shit. Totally blew me away. I’d be hard pressed to look at Tim Walz’s record and draw that conclusion, even if it were hyperbolic. But if this is circulating among the right, maybe that would explain it.

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