Only you need to know who you vote for. Just ask Melania. pic.twitter.com/gdMyXZXYjj
— The Lincoln Project (@ProjectLincoln) October 28, 2024
Remember, jackals: Sharing is caring!
What a beautiful crowd of 21,000+ people in Ann Arbor, Michigan gathering in support of Vice President Kamala Harris. This is democracy. This is why we will win.
— Victor Shi (@Victorshi2020) October 29, 2024
Their closing argument is hate and division.
Our closing argument is unity, joy, and the future – a new way forward. pic.twitter.com/KGdyFhQ0l0
— Tim Walz (@Tim_Walz) October 26, 2024
Doug Emhoff’s closing argument to Jewish voters:
“We should never have to wonder whether our leaders are praising Nazis behind closed doors… So when Donald Trump says something unhinged, do not roll your eyes. Roll up your sleeves.” https://t.co/wyHnqNgHRw
— Jacob N. Kornbluh (@jacobkornbluh) October 28, 2024
JD Vance has the pop jawed nerve to say this after he got so angry about us telling jokes about him fcuking a couch.
Apparently the only acceptable jokes are the ones where privileged white men get to punch down at women, minorities, LGBTQ and immigrants. Weird innit https://t.co/mjHHTNFGw0
— Ragnarok Lobster ?? (@eclecticbrotha) October 28, 2024
Anita Hill: The Smearing of Kamala Harris https://t.co/2FAfAl4TX5
— Janet Johnson (@JJohnsonLaw) October 28, 2024
Another public endorsement I didn’t expect (but I’m happy to see): Anita Hill, at the NYTimes, on “The Smearing of Kamala Harris” [gift link]:
It’s not easy to remain calm and collected in the glare of intense public scrutiny, especially when the opposition is set on denying your integrity, competence and accomplishments. But call it grace, poise or dignity, Kamala Harris has managed to make a positive case for her candidacy every day since President Biden endorsed her to take his place on the Democratic ticket. Think about it: No presidential nominees in modern history have faced such a direct challenge to the authenticity of their identity and by extension their qualifications to be the president.
I can tell you with confidence that the various and sundry racist, misogynist and sexist insults hurled at Ms. Harris must sting. They are a reminder of the disgraceful lengths that Republican senators took to shame me when I challenged Clarence Thomas’s fitness to be appointed to the Supreme Court. What helped me stay composed was knowing that I was not the first woman to have her sanity, truthfulness and virtue falsely impugned. Even now, when I am attacked, my mother’s firm but gentle admonition rings in my ears: “You know who you are and what you can do.” Lesson learned: Never let the people who despise you define you.
One key to surviving under such pressure is to forcefully embrace the value of your own capabilities and principles. “Don’t be confined to other people’s perception about what this looks like, and how you should act in order to be,” Ms. Harris said this year. That posture is evident in the clarity and directness with which she states her qualifications for the presidency. During their debate last month, when Ms. Harris exposed Donald Trump’s weaknesses without lowering herself to his level, the strength of her dignity was made even more obvious. She told us that she knew “Donald Trump’s type,” and she proved her point without self-congratulations…
Truth be told, “dignity” and many similar words are loaded. We rarely talk about men’s grace, particularly in the political arena. We often save that conversation for women, perhaps because a man’s leadership worthiness is assumed, while a woman has to prove herself highly competent to lead. In today’s politics, hubris, dissembling, anger, fearmongering and personal grievances are brandished and accepted as proof of power, confidence and competence. Equanimity itself is preyed upon as a sign of weakness….
In her nomination speech, Ms. Harris paired dignity with housing policy and reproductive health care. On the stump she touts workplace safety and wage policies as her effort to fight “for the dignity of all working people” and to allow every senior to “retire with dignity.” She has also shown how maintaining respect for her constituents figures into her policies and vision for the future.
By focusing on the humanity of people whom her domestic policies will affect — women seeking abortions and other reproductive health care, people struggling to afford a home down payment, workers struggling with the cost of living and taxes — Ms. Harris creates chances for more dignity for everyone, regardless of party. Perhaps that same focus on humanity will shape Ms. Harris’s international policy to address the plight of people around the globe suffering from devastating droughts, displacement and armed conflicts…
Since the making of the U.S. Constitution, people in this country have voiced their yearning to enjoy the rights, privileges and immunities it offers. Their appeals make up a uniquely American songbook that each American president has inherited. It is filled with lyrics that reflect the sovereignty claims of Indigenous populations and the freedom petitions of those who arrived from other continents, some in chains. In time, the rights movements grew, led by those whose ancestors suffered the incomparable indignity of chattel slavery and those who were denied full citizenship and enfranchisement because of their race, gender, ethnicity, gender or sexual identity. And today, those drawn to the American democracy to escape violence and political and economic death add to the appeals. As the poet Langston Hughes reminded us, they “too, sing America” and have a common theme of the recognition of human decency.
If Ms. Harris is elected president, she will be in a unique position to ensure that all of these songs are reflected in our democracy and the structures that govern it.
And whatever the result of Election Day, she has already introduced an American political future that promises a recognition of human dignity as its bedrock. She has earned the opportunity to make that future a reality.
And a closing wish…
mackenzie scott should buy the washington post from jeff bezos
— GOLIKEHELLMACHINE (@golikehellmachine.com) October 25, 2024 at 2:12 PM
New Deal democrat
Puerto Rico’s largest newspaper endorses Harris:
https://nitter.poast.org/ElNuevoDia/status/1851113009151631740#m
And Puerto Rico’s bishop demands a formal apology by Trump himself:
https://bsky.app/profile/lethalityjane.bsky.social/post/3l7mks6uxyw24
Trump is scheduled to do a rally in an arena located in a Puerto Rican neighborhood in (Allentown?) PA in a couple of days. I think he would spontaneously explode into flames if he actually apologized (so he won’t).
schrodingers_cat
Who are these women that are petrified of their husbands and defer to them about voting decisions?
Phylllis
I voted yesterday, and while there’s never been a question as to who, I still felt a palpable relief. On the one hand, it won’t make much difference here in too large for an insane asylum land. On the other, f*ck you, assholes.
The Audacity of Krope
MTG’s head in the tree in photographic quality is a nice touch.
OldDave
@Phylllis: Bless the memory of James Louis Petigru. He nailed it in 1860, and it’s still true today.
Kirk
@schrodingers_cat: domestic abuse exists.
Chief Oshkosh
@schrodingers_cat: I have concerns in this regard for a few women I know among acquaintances and one family member. I don’t know how prevalent this issue is, though.
A Ghost to Most
Selfish and self-righteous people caused this. Fuck the self-righteous.
Kosh III
We voted yesterday! I won’t say who we voted for but…..
Fuck Trump, Stein etc
Fuck Marshamarshamarsha Blackburn (US Senate)
Fuck Scott DesJarlais (US House) He coerced his mistress to get an abortion but runs as anti-abortion and still gets elected. WTF is wrong with y’all?
Fuck Janis Bowling (State Senate)
Fuck whoever was running unopposed for State Rep.
The Audacity of Krope
@Kirk: You’d think the party that wants to protect domestic abusers would be a little more open to the idea of mail-in ballots.
The domestic abuse scenario is the one reservation I have about voting by mail. Of course, it took a Democrat to point it out; as this is both real and requires compassion to identify as a problem.
schrodingers_cat
@Kirk: Yes it does. However I find it hard to believe that every woman who votes R is a domestic abuse victim
I mean are we seriously supposed to believe that all the Karens who yell at people for speaking in a language other than English and call cops on black people for existing are demure domestic abuse victims petrified of their husbands.
Kosh III
@schrodingers_cat: Who are these women that are petrified of their husbands and defer to them about voting decisions?
If you said my mother was petrified of my father, you’d be in for a serious hurting LOL Her father was a GOP House Rep from 1937-39. When my parents married in 38 she switched from R to D.
Scout211
Re: the tweet with Vance doing his regular schtick of “who ya gonna believe, me or your lying eyes?”
I read about that last night. Democrats just can’t take a joke. We are too sensitive and should really just laugh when we are threatened with violence and smeared with racist, misogynist and horrid “jokes.”
And as discussed downstairs, Ryan Girdusky is now banned from CNN for his thinly veiled “joke” threatening Mehdi Hasan on air.
And like clockwork, this morning Girdusky tweeted.
Jokes. We just don’t get them, amirite?
Kosh III
@Kosh III: It was a different time.
My maternal grandfather was a GOP House Rep for one term in what was called a Floterial District. It was half D half R and they had a “gentleman’s agreement” to switch out each term.
The Audacity of Krope
@schrodingers_cat: Having concern that victims of domestic abuse may be abused in terms of their vote does not equate to every woman that votes for Republicans.
Plenty of them do it voluntarily.
schrodingers_cat
@Kosh III: I like your mom! We would jokingly refer to my paternal grandma as Indira Gandhi a mere look from her and you fell in line.
schrodingers_cat
@The Audacity of Krope: Exactly. If I were to hazard a guess, the percentage of women who vote for Rs under duress is much less than those who vote R willingly and enthusiastically.
The Audacity of Krope
@schrodingers_cat: That’s a fairly safe bet. Doesn’t make the victim group any less deserving of our care.
JML
Just got into it with a Jill Stein voter, who couldn’t understand why we thought they sucked (they’re in CA and so they said their protest vote against Harris didn’t have any impact on the election). Do we need a clown like them repeating the “Kamala is a Kop” nonsense or accusing her of genocide or any of the other litany of sins they’ve made up in their head about Harris for daring not to agree with them on every single issue since birth? No. No we do not.
hueyplong
@schrodingers_cat: We met one in line to vote last week in NC. She told us her husband was at home. The spouse took it as an invitation to take over the process of telling her how to vote and talked her into voting against a pair of repugnant ballot initiatives (one statewide and one in the county). We didn’t press our luck on “partisan” stuff and suspect that the husband got mad if she were so indiscreet as to tell him how she voted on the initiatives.
I stayed out of the discussion altogether, for obvious reasons.
Another Scott
@The Audacity of Krope: During the Pandemic, Virginia’s legislature required mail-in ballots have a second signature. To prevent “fraud”, you see. The fact that it made voting more difficult (especially for singletons), and the fact that it created yet another pressure point for coercion, was purely unintended consequences.
Purely.
Democrats got rid of the second signature requirement.
There are still far too few drop-off boxes and their hours are too limited. There are still too few early voting places and their hours are too limited. But progress is continuing.
Elections have consequences.
The benefits of mail-in ballots, and everything else to expand access and reduce friction, far outweigh the dangers. But we have to be vigilant. The details matter.
Cheers,
Scott.
HeleninEire
@New Deal democrat: LOL. The last line of the Bishop’s letter to Donald Trump is “May you be blessed with wisdom.”
schrodingers_cat
@The Audacity of Krope: Agreed.
The Audacity of Krope
Slap it on a billboard.
SFAW
@schrodingers_cat:
There was a news item in the last couple of weeks re: a woman who hadn’t voted in ages, because her recently-deceased husband didn’t want her to. She remedied that, now that he’s dead. I think she is around 80.
ETA: In other words, it exists. Doesn’t have to be the majority of women, for it to matter.
p.a.
You lieberals just can’t take a joke!
I think politicians who praise Nazis and kiss ass in off-the-record talks to America’s most dangerous opponent should rot in jail.
*Just kidding!*
ETA: Original version was “hang from a tree” but fbook wouldn’t let me post it. Are they editing the “Second Amendment Solution” cruds?
H.E.Wolf
Sending up the GOTV signal to @narya – Your example inspired me to write 10 extra postcards yesterday and today. Since I usually write 5 per week, you were a big inspiration! Thank you.
catclub
I like that Lincoln project ad. quiet.
Of course, if the vote in his precinct is n-1 for Harris and 1 for Trump, he will know.
Soprano2
@Scout211: I would love it if a panelist on Maher’s next show asked him if the set the comedian at TCFG’s MSG rally did is his idea of the kind of thing comedians aren’t allowed to say that they should be able to say. I’d love to hear his answer.
Another Scott
@JML: I voted for Anderson and Nader before I grew up.
“We are who we pretend to be.” – Anon.
Life is about choices. When we refuse to make a decision and make a choice between either of two overwhelmingly likely outcomes, we are still making a choice.
Voting for Stein is enabling her. It pushes off the day when her enabling of malevolent actors ends. And in close elections, her votes matters.
Be a better citizen by pretending to be a better citizen.
[/soapbox]
Cheers,
Scott.
SFAW
@Another Scott:
Re: drop boxes: for some reason, I get daily e-mails from RWMF news outlets. One of them last night blamed the Vancouver and Portland box burns on “Antifa.”
hueyplong
@SFAW: I saw that too. Agree with others that we’re talking about a mere, small subset of the (white) women who vote GOP, but such people in fact do exist.
As in the last few elections, I’m counting on Dobbs to be the issue decider in this general election. Far from being irritated that it isn’t being given enough attention by the chattering class, I’m pleased that a winning issue isn’t being treated as damaging enough for the GOPers to “correct.” Keep driving that tank through the GOP strategic hole.
hueyplong
@SFAW: Not sure what you’re talking about. Portland and Vancouver were burned to the ground several times and no voters live there anymore.
The Audacity of Krope
Always with the “allowed,” no one is disallowing anything. These profiles in courage that seem uniquely situated among Republicans and past-their-prime comedians simply refuse to say what they really feel because they are afraid of consequences.
In the end, Bill Maher knows his secret, most deeply held opinions are repugnant.
TBone
Bernie Sanders stumping for VP Harris video. Excellent points. Reminds me why I was a Bernie Bro (who voted for Hillary because duh).
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Vf5MThSniiY
TBone
@SFAW: gah, I actually encountered a RWNJ in the wild yesterday who tried that “entire cities burned” bullshit on me. 🙄
Aimai
@schrodingers_cat: Lots in the evangelical community. Lots in every community.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@p.a.: I prefer the euphemism “de-platformed, Nuremberg Tribunal style”.
New Deal democrat
@HeleninEire:
Clearly, as a good Catholic he believes in miracles.
lowtechcyclist
@schrodingers_cat:
Please make up your mind who you’re talking about. It’s hard to respond if one moment, you’re asking who are these “women that are petrified of their husbands and defer to them about voting decisions,” the next it’s “every woman who votes R” and in the same comment it’s “the Karens who yell at people for speaking in a language other than English and call cops on black people for existing.”
If someone opens your box, will the waveform collapse and resolve who and what you’re asking about?
SFAW
@hueyplong:
Since I always need something to worry about:
What concerns me is that the Dobbs backlash will be severely mitigated (with women) because it’s TCFFG on the ballot. [As opposed to some no-name legislator/Congressperson.] I guess we’ll see whether my concerns are justified; I sure hope they’re not.
catclub
I am somewhat surprised that anyone who supports a drop box has not put up a camera covering it. After the 2020 election, wouldn’t you?
Albatrossity
Maybe even folks in red red Kansas are getting tired of Trump. This survey shows a good trend. I hope the trend continues, and that it is nation-wide.
SFAW
@hueyplong:
I had completely forgotten about that. Since the REAL Portland — i.e., the one in Maine — is still standing, I tend to forget about the pretend-Portland. Thanks for reminding me.
AWOL
@Another Scott: That quote is generally attributed to Kurt Vonnegut from his novel, “Mother Night.”
lowtechcyclist
@HeleninEire:
It’s good to know that the Bishop still believes in miracles.
catclub
@New Deal democrat: The duty to see the dignity in _every_ person, that is in the baptismal covenant, is an extremely high bar.
satby
Scout211
Another good ProPublica report with The Texas Tribune.
. . .
As always, read the whole thing.
Kay
It feels like a winning campaign.
Now no one jinx it! :)
schrodingers_cat
@lowtechcyclist: You made a physics joke, how precious.
Another Scott
@catclub: Around here, some/most the drop boxes are inside government buildings. Which makes them more secure, but adds more friction in using them.
In a country of 330M, it only takes half a dozen people to cause problems. And statistics say there will always be half a dozen people willing to do so.
Stationed watchers might help. Putting the drop boxes in well-lit places under video cameras where people have to walk to them might help. But it adds expense and friction for the rest of us.
It’s an annoying balancing problem.
Something something have nice things.
Grr…,
Scott.
trnc
Please keep telling hundreds of thousands of people they’re not allowed to be offended when a simple walkback might do.
Remember when republicans would complain that Obama was arrogant?
Another Scott
@AWOL: 👍
Cheers,
Scott.
SFAW
@catclub:
I’m too lazy to check, but I thought at least one of them had a camera.
If that’s correct, I’m sure the photos/vid will show a black sedan, with the words “Top Sekrit Antifa
VehikVehiculeCAR” painted on the side.rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊 😊 😊
cmorenc
@schrodingers_cat:
I served one morning last week as a D outside poll observer / hander-out of D voter guides at a very busy early voting site in Wake County, NC. It was quite frequently common to see husbands and wives walking into the voting site together, and though my encounters watching them walk in were too brief and superficial to make any firmly accurate conclusions – nonetheless I did not get the vibe of “husband-dominated woman gonna vote for who he says or else”. What was interesting is that more than half the voters walking in, whether alone or with their wife/husband, refused voter guides from either D or R reps and said “I have all the info I need already”. Some wives accepted my offer of a D voter guide even when their husbands didn’t.
Bottom-line is that IMO in most cases, it’s impossible to tell from superficial impression when couples walk into the voting site together, whether there’s going to be any coercive pressure exerted by either spouse on the other once inside the voting site.
Starfish
@TBone: FEMA is broke because it had to restore all the cities that were burned to the ground.
General Sherman was the first true lefty anarchist, and it is good that the RWNJs know history and are afraid of having their cities burned to the ground. /s
Kosh III
@schrodingers_cat: Yes, many moms have perfected the “look” which gets us in line pdq.
dmsilev
So, apparently Trump is going to meet with reporters in about an hour, to try to I guess do damage control from his hate rally on Sunday. Or at least that’s the ostensible plan. Can a press event be described as going off the rails if the rails never actually existed and instead were merely concepts of rails?
TBone
@Starfish: 😆
zhena gogolia
@Scout211: I love that Vance “hasn’t seen the joke” and “isn’t going to get into the specifics of the joke.” It’s a one-liner. It takes 3 seconds to hear it, and no time at all to “get into the specifics.”
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
catclub
@SFAW: lol
TBone
TIL there is a PA beast called the albawitch. It means apple witch and the Susquehannock Indian tribe was known to have a depiction of her on their shields. Similar to Sasquatch but smaller. PA Deutsch appropriated the legend and insisted she would steal their apples and throw the apple cores at them when she finished devouring. So now I have to reconsider my Halloween costume.
arrieve
I voted yesterday, and was astonished by how long the line was. I did not expect so many people on a weekday afternoon in Manhattan–around the corner and all the way down the next block. The poll workers were amazingly efficient and the line moved quickly but I didn’t mind.
I’m taking it as a very good sign that in a place where the Democrats are guaranteed to win every race whether I vote or not, so many people were eager to vote early. (We only have one week of early voting in NY.)
NotMax
Coming up on the time for my next COVID shot. I stick with a schedule of every six months. This past May the local Costco wasn’t offering them so had to go to Long’s (CVS). Pleased as punch to learn the local Costco is offering them again so scheduled an appointment for the end of next week, when I’ll be going into town anyway for a bunch of errands.
Meantime, here’s an AI-generated mystery voter.
;)
Kosh III
@SFAW:Since the REAL Portland
Of course you mean Portland TN
Layer8Problem
@dmsilev: Jeez, I wonder if he’ll follow the script?
TBone
@NotMax: 💙😁
dmsilev
@Layer8Problem: That presupposes the existence of a script….
RaflW
Vance: “Maybe it’s a stupid racist joke. Maybe it’s not.” He has no convictions. He has no beliefs. He has only the lust for power, and then what he does with it is subject to the most moral depravity, because he has no convictions, no center.
I posted a think the other day that one of Vance’s wife’s college friends said that ended “maybe she’s a sociopath.” I think that’s the glue that binds Trump-Vance. Kinda makes sense if JV married someone as empty and morals-less as he.
K-Mo
@schrodingers_cat: tone deaf much?
pat
My mom and dad joked about their votes cancelling each other. Heh.
Scout211
I wonder if he even lets the reporters ask questions. Maybe he’ll allow one and then the script that is “weaved” into his brain will come spewing out, as usual. I’ll wait for the rerun.
Shalimar
@schrodingers_cat: Of course every woman who identifies as Republican isn’t in an abusive relationship. But even if it’s only 5%, that is enough to swing the election if they vote how they would choose.
NotMax
@zhena gogolia
Weirdo McBeardo is squishier than a road apple. Plus, he was there as a speaker.
SiubhanDuinne
Just heard that Barbara Bush, one of Dubya’s twin daughters, has endorsed MVP. Don’t know a thing about her, but if there are people who follow her and may vote Harris as a result, then good news and good for her.
On another topic: does anybody know what happened to today’s OTR?
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@catclub: I had the same question since we have cameras on our dropboxes here in Delaware County PA.
But one link I followed said there was in fact a camera on it.
Also there were fire-suppression devices in it, but they didn’t work for some reason.
schrodingers_cat
@K-Mo: Why because I haven’t joined the amen chorus praising poor little women who only vote R supposedly because their husbands compel them to do so
schrodingers_cat
@SiubhanDuinne: Good for her!
WhatsMyNym
@SFAW:
@catclub:
They showed a picture of the car on one of news channels last night. Also said they already had leads on the suspect.
robtrim
@Scout211: JD Vance is far ahead of Trump on the psychopathology scale. His dysfunctional childhood, which he chronicles in his best seller, obviously left scars. His idea of “the Truth” is to lie. Thus, he must be attracted to a man (Trump) whose entire life is a lie.
Fealty to Trump, whether by Vance, or the average MAGA cultist, is a response to a deep distrust of the world and its vagaries. Trump is emotional therapy for (especially) men who feel deeply minimized.
schrodingers_cat
@Aimai: Nice to see you again! Have missed you.
Ken
@Layer8Problem: Cynical me thinks the more important question is whether the reporters will follow the script.
In a way I’d welcome headlines like “Trump Pivots in Final Week”, or “The Day Trump Became President”. It would make it clear(er) which media sources are in the tank for him.
Geminid
@arrieve: I hope there’s that kind of enthusism in the suburbs and upstate. I think New York has 3 or 4 Republican Congressional seats in play, and Democrats could flip all of them with a strong turnout.
RaflW
@schrodingers_cat: Freelancer Talia Lavin wrote a very strong piece for MSNBC the other day about Tuckum’s and his “daddy’s gonna spank you” moment. The whole thing is good, but here’s where women who are controlled by men come from, and it’s still very much happening:
I agree with her conclusion, too: “The best way to rebuke authoritarianism, to break the tyranny of the strict father, is to not just rebuke it, but to defeat it and make it look ridiculous and weak.”
TBone
Do it for Stuart Rhodes’s estranged wife and children:
https://www.wonkette.com/p/estranged-family-of-oath-keepers
They don’t deserve anything less.
Starfish
Sorry for the Washington Post link, but some artist in DC is mocking Trump and his basket of deplorables.
Ken
Like Vance listens when someone else is talking.
And I say recognizing that I have a bad tendency to use the time to think of what I’m going to say next.
sdhays
@SiubhanDuinne: I mostly don’t keep tabs on Presidential children (because they deserve to live their own lives and we already have too many celebrities) but I was under the impression that both daughters were liberals now that they’re adults.
I wonder if W will vote for Ted Cruz. I don’t really care, but I idly wonder.
RevRick
@Scout211: “We have to stop being offended at everything” = “Quit your bitching about injustice, and especially when we let you know who’s boss.”
BlueGuitarist
Seven Days
here’s something better from Madison Square Garden then the not-sees!
From Bob Dylan 30th Anniversary Concert:
Ron Wood w/Booker T, Steve Cropper, et al, Seven Days
https://youtu.be/gckGvo3SWok?si=gSNwkfRR5Gp4D43o
TBone
@RaflW: my beloved Gramps tried to spank my mother during an argument about Nixon and Viet Nam. It was the only time I’d seen him even get angry. He was my respected and fanatically adored male role model after my bio dad was gone. I was 4 y.o. and I told my mom we needed to get out of that house and get an apartment.
The Other Bob
@schrodingers_cat:
I know of one woman, a family member, who is voting as instructed by her twice fired violent, alcoholic ex cop husband.
This is why I never want mail-in voting as our only option.
Dave
@schrodingers_cat: Yes; I don’t think anyone anywhere is claiming otherwise. That it does happen isn’t in dispute even if it’s only 1% well that matters in close states and elections and beyond the utilitarian reasons it is an issue on it’s own merits. People should be free to vote their conscious.
lowtechcyclist
@Another Scott:
Someday I will write at length about why voting for Anderson had little in common with voting for Nader or Stein. Suffice it to say I remain proud of voting for Anderson and being part of his campaign.
Wapiti
@Scout211: Ha! I suspected some number of the people that got disenrolled were not non-citizens, but shit-citizens who claimed to be non-citizens to skate on jury duty.
TBone
@BlueGuitarist: 💙
Omnes Omnibus
@schrodingers_cat: No one is saying that every woman who votes for Trump is compelled to do so by their spouse. Lots of shitty women out there. That said, there are women in abusive relationships who are deserving of our sympathy. You sound a bit like I did when I first learned of battered woman syndrome in law school. “Why doesn’t she just leave?” It’s real, they don’t believe they can, and that wasn’t my finest hour.
schrodingers_cat
@RaflW: The way the media treats white people compared to any other group has been instructive since Trump came on the scene.
White person commits acts of terrorism, its qualified as stochastic terrorism
White women voting R: Are infantalized and their lack of agency is explained away by saying oh their husbands tell them how to vote.
No other group gets this grace.
How Trump is normalized by the news media is the best example of this phenonmena.
Its nice to be a member of the default group so you are never wrong but can only be wronged.
schrodingers_cat
@Omnes Omnibus: I am not talking of a specific abused woman and I have acknowledged that abuse exists. Just noting how various demographics are covered in the media and on blogs, social media etc.
schrodingers_cat
@The Other Bob: Agreed.
satby
@lowtechcyclist: I was another Anderson voter. And in the end it had everything in common with voting for Stein or Nader no matter what our intentions were, because Reagan got elected. Voting third party in our system is voting for the opposite of whatever you want.
Kirk
@schrodingers_cat:
Your first statement to me implied absolutism. Implying no women were petrified of and deferring to their husbands on domestic choice.
Your second actually negates your whole point. Some women will vote for the other guy because they believe. But some women will vote for him because their husbands tell them to do so – and they have been socialized in such a way they do not believe they can do other than what they are told.
We don’t know how large either of these populations are, but we know they exist because we have found some of each.
Dave
@RaflW: It’s not exactly fascinating to me but I can’t help but notice that the people that wail the loudest and convert to the most reactionary versions of religion that promise ethical and moral bedrock are the emptiest people that most lack those qualities. For all JD rails against the modern ethos he is himself the worst product of it. Additionally he confuses the curated nihilism of the VC set with the entirety of the modern world. An completely pathetic human being.
TBone
Glory holes at Mar-A-Loco conference room🤭
https://digbysblog.net/2024/10/28/trouble-at-campaign-headquarters/
Their own operatives are so afraid of being bugged that they’ve actually searched the room for listening devices.
K-Mo
@lowtechcyclist: and sick burns
frosty
@dmsilev: I understand that there’s a concept of a script.
Dave
@Omnes Omnibus: Truthfully I’m not sure the initial question is bad in and of itself as long as it’s actually open to a genuine answer. On the surface it seems like the obvious move so why doesn’t it happen is a good question for someone who has encountered the dynamic or grappled with it before.
Kirk
@schrodingers_cat: When did anyone mention race in this thread?
I know of at least four hispanic women who are likely in this voting situation. Same of two indian (asian) women.
This has nothing to do with race, it’s gender. More specifically, it’s related to misogyny. And while victims can be terrorists – indeed, there’s more than a little evidence that some so-called terrorism is the vulnerable group striking back the only way they can – it’s not so common (yet) in gender relations.
Another Scott
@lowtechcyclist: In my case, I liked some things about Anderson very much (like the $0.50 (over 5 years) increase in the gas tax), but he wasn’t going to be elected. Everyone knew that. I was refusing to choose between the two were going to win. So, it was the same as voting for Nader or Stein or Buchanan or … I was refusing to choose.
I just looked at the numbers in the 1980 race again – Anderson’s total wouldn’t have given Carter the popular vote win. But counterfactuals are fun…
YMMV.
[ edits… ]
Cheers,
Scott.
trnc
This is another thing that could just go away if journalists would do their jobs.* The response should always be “Here’s a clip of the quote, and whether you heard it when it was first said doesn’t matter.”
*It looked like Vance was speechifying and not talking directly to a journalist. Which is actually worse because it means he could have looked it up but chose not to just so he could plead ignorance.**
**Of course he had seen the clip by that point. Fucker.
SFAW
@Kosh III:
Since it’s 450-plus miles from the Atlantic, it’s clear that they named it after Portland, Maine. [Although, in fairness, “Drakes Creek” apparently runs though or near it, so I guess it served as a port for … canoes, I guess. Or maybe kayaks. Or maybe those pontoon-type one-person fishing getups.]
Ken
@TBone: From the whistleblower:
Did they not see the name “Donald Trump” on the campaign’s signs and paperwork?
BC in Illinois
I learned about husband-wife politics from my parents, who regularly told each other “Well, I just cancelled your ballot.” Mom more D than Dad, though neither of them could take Goldwater.
Dave
@trnc: They basically run on what my father would, call not exactly calmly, being “cute” which is at it’s core weaponized bad faith with a side of gaslighting.
Great way to have civilization you damned losers.
Glidwrith
@Scout211: Apparently the dude was writing speeches for Nazi Spencer
NotMax
@SFAW
Or perhaps a winery that produces port.
:)
Harrison Wesley
Off to SOE office to smile at voters for a few hours. Then back home to lapse into my normal scowl. The sacrifices I make for Democracy!
SFAW
@schrodingers_cat:
Good job doubling down.
SFAW
@NotMax:
Then it should be on the left side of the country.
TS
@Omnes Omnibus:
It’s not only they don’t believe they can in some instances. They leave, the abuser finds them and kills them. They are told this will happen – hence many do not leave.
Phylllis
Hah hah/nelson.
K-Mo
@schrodingers_cat: If you’re mad about a thing don’t take it out on a separate group of people. In this case, with ugly blame-the-victim overtones.
lowtechcyclist
@Albatrossity:
Interesting! As an aside, I didn’t know there was a Docking Institute of Public Affairs until clicking on the link. The Dockings were friends of my mom’s family – they lived in Arkansas City, and my grandfather was a big fish in that particular small puddle. Tom Docking was my age, and we’d play together when my family was out there on visit when we were kids. (The late Tom Docking, I’m sad to say. Seems like the men in that family were fairly short-lived.)
Omnes Omnibus
@TS: True, but going into detail like that would have ruined the beauty of my sentence structure.
NotMax
@Harrison Wesley
Let a smile be your numbrella. The old song came so close to getting it right.
;)
Phylllis
@arrieve: Early voting here has been off the charts. I was sort of tempted to wait until election day because it seems like there won’t be anyone left to vote that day.
SFAW
@trnc: The “I haven’t seen the [whatever]” is the go-to excuse when any Rethug politician wants some cover to weasel out of answering the question.
TBone
@Ken: willfully blind until they are personally affected, as is always the case with Nazis.
SiubhanDuinne
@sdhays:
Nor do I and yes they do and yes we do. I had MSNBC on in the background a while ago, and they announced this item, so thought I’d share in case anyone here was interested.
As for GWB, I’m guessing the man who said of TCFFG’s 2017 inauguration speech “Well, that was some weird shit” is probably not pulling the R lever for the top of the ticket. Down-ballot? No idea.
TBone
@Dave: my dad used the word cute in that same exact way. His favorite holiday was Halloween and I’m really missing him today although I’m glad he didn’t have to witness these *waves hand* times.
Betty
@satby: Another one who worked for Anderson. My Dad explained that it would be a vote for Reagan, but I was acting on my principles, of course. Live and learn. I think we perhaps believed Regan couldn’t win just like we believed Trump couldn’t win.
Kay
So true. I think he’s so, so bad for young men. His self pitying, grievance-based approach is just not going to work for them in their lives like it works for Right wing celebrities.
K-Mo
@Kay: 💯
Expletive Deleted
Such a strange conversation happening here. Clearly the LP thinks its common enough in conservative circles for women to feel coerced into their vote that they cut this ad.
We know the statistics for domestic violence are eye-poppingly bad, we know coercion and controlling behaviour is also widespread. We know magaland is aggressively patriarchal and embraces all of the above.
But some folks are enthusiastically expending their energy on despising the women we can all agree are terrible and can be attacked without worry. Weird choice.
TBone
@TS: that is why I posted this
https://www.wonkette.com/p/estranged-family-of-oath-keepers
Dave
@TBone: My parents are mid-eighties but doing ok; they despite some conservative leanings are aware enough to have both fear and contempt of Trump and MAGA in general. My brother is driving me nuts though. He is in the tech-bro group literally a single degree of separation from Musk and he is fully of the opinion that Democrats are actually more off the rails than Republicans in general though he does think Trump in particular is just a bit worse than the Democrats.
Classic case of being brilliant in a few areas doesn’t mean you know shit. The corrosive impact of wealth (not sure how well off he is not billionaire money but very well off and has friends that are in that category or least close to it) and the tendency in those circles to value things over the silly concerns of people.
TS
@Omnes Omnibus:
Of course – but I have been involved with two young women who lost their lives to abusive partners & I am lost for how, as a community we can stop domestic abuse. Having politicians and religious leaders who appear to either endorse it, or pretend it does not exist, is a major hurdle to overcome. The intense fight to control women’s reproduction, to legislate against women’s health care is just another form of abuse of women.
frosty
@satby: I was an Anderson voter too. It was my last non-YellowDogDemocrat vote.
lowtechcyclist
@schrodingers_cat:
An example, please?
Harrison Wesley
@NotMax: And if we lose a smile will be my tumbrel (nonsense doom-posting).
TBone
@Dave: I’m glad to hear about your parents and hope you are able to simply thumb your nose at tech bro. ArchTeryx gave me a great idea yesterday – send a very sarcastic sympathy card after we win the election 😆
At Xmas I have been known to sign cards “I donated to Planned Parenthood in your honor!”
cmorenc
@satby:
This is why ranked-choice voting would be a vast improvement to our political system – 3P votes as first choice with preferred major party as second choice would make 3P voting empowering rather than the self-defeating exercise it now is. It would make it much more difficult for a major party who narrowly ekes out a win to effectively ignore the actual numerical majority of the country who did not vote for them – see Bush in 2000, who gave Nader voters zip consideration in how he governed.
HeleninEire
@Phylllis: And she’s still voting for Trump. They just don’t get it. They just don’t.
Belafon
@RaflW: That might explain why so many of my fellow GenXers gravitate towards Trump.
Scout211
Yeah, that was a kicker at the end of the report. Plus, she thought she had filed all the correct paperwork and was still denied. She learned that from the reporters that interviewed her.
And very worrisome was that the investigative reporters found that to get reinstated as a voter depended on the county where you reside. Not all counties would have reinstated her even with the Secretary of State’s office guidance that should have been the end of it.
But yeah, she didn’t blame Trump. 🙄
Captain C
@JML: My (so far notional) response to those (like your Stein voter) whose argument is “well, unlike you, I have principles and I stick to them [so I’m better than you]” is, “yeah, but your principles suck.”
Kosh III
@SFAW: That’s kinda like how there is a neighborhood in a nearby town called Indian Lakes even though there is not and never has been any lakes there.
TBone
For those among us who love to read (especially while waiting!), Tom Sullivan hits another home run:
https://digbysblog.net/2024/10/29/adolescence-usa/
louc
@Scout211: I love the kicker: She’s still voting for Trump. Let the leopard eat her face
edited to add: I didn’t see the other responses commenting on the same thing.
ArchTeryx
@schrodingers_cat: Evangelican women.
Captain C
@RaflW:
Leading to 40 years later, “Why won’t my kids visit me or even call me in the nursing home?!?”
trollhattan
Did not see this one coming.
sdhays
Absolutely! I said that only as a hedge to what I was saying – I’m not an expert on the W daughters.
NotMax
@Kosh III
Sadly, no town, village nor hamlet named after this tributary.
;)
p.a.
@satby: I too voted for Anderson. My 1st Presidential vote. And I knew RI would go to Carter. At the time I actually thought deficits mattered. I got better…
lowtechcyclist
@satby:
OK, what would I have wanted, if Anderson had not been running? Carter? I’d never voted for a Democrat in my life, and wasn’t going to start doing so after his four years of incompetence. (I’d seriously considered voting for him in 1976, but four years of his Presidency blew that thought away.) If someone had held a gun to my head and said, “Carter or Reagan?” it would have been the latter.
At the time, surveys showed that at least half of Anderson’s support came from Republicans. A lot of us left the party with Anderson. Was that a bad thing? Hell no, it was a good thing! Maybe we weren’t ready to vote for Carter, but it was a step towards voting Democratic in the future. It was better than continuing to be a Republican, and it was better than throwing up our hands and saying, “both parties are fucked, screw politics.” It gave us a reason to stay involved rather than to just give up.
Same thing happened with Perot in 1992: his candidacy was similarly a bridge out of the GOP for a lot of former Republicans. This is one of the differences of a third-party candidacy of the center as opposed to one of one extreme or the other.
Voting for a far-left candidate empowers the right, and voting for a far-right candidacy empowers the left, by pulling votes away from the party on your side of center. And if it changes the political landscape in any meaningful way, it does so by weakening one’s own side.
But third-party candidacies of the center (back when there was an actual center, as opposed to now when there isn’t even the theoretical possibility of one) create an easier path to cease identifying with one party and ultimately start voting for the other. And in the case of both Anderson and Perot, it seems clear that the bulk of that movement, in both cases, was from the GOP to the Dems. It seems absurd for Democrats to have a problem with that.
Dave
@trollhattan: Honestly the Bush girls came out pretty well all considered; Laura and George with whatever flaws they have never struck me as bad parents.
Peale
@Captain C: probably because of all the participation trophies they got at school. It has to be the schools. Nothing I did.
SFAW
@Kosh III:
Maybe it was originally settled by Cowsills fans?
Captain C
@Peale: When they ask “what did I ever do?” they want the answer to be “nothing, you are perfect, they’re bad people.” Kind of like that Simpsons meme.
NotMax
@Peale
“And the award for eraser clapper goes to….”
SFAW
@lowtechcyclist:
Contemporaneous polling showed Perot drew votes away equally from Bush and Clinton.
Jeffro
OT but it’s pretty clear that we need some sort of new national ‘newspaper of record’ since the NYT and WaPo have utterly surrendered to right-wing billionaires.
Suggestions?
NotMax
@SFAW
Chance to again recommend Family Band: The Cowsills Story, a pull no punches documentary (currently available on Prime, IIRC).
Harrison Wesley
@Jeffro: Philly Inquirer
SFAW
@Jeffro:
Well, if Fuckhead wins, the New York Post will probably be the only one allowed to publish, so there’s that possibility.
But otherwise: maybe the Philadelphia Inquirer or the Cleveland Plain Dealer? Unfortunately, they’re pretty small (in terms of reach/market).
Mr. Mack
Popping in to say that I LOVE the Strip District in Pittsburgh. Took the food tour reluctantly but was so pleased to find out it featured real blue collar food. Pepperoni rolls, salt sticks, sausage from Parmas. I like the whole vibe here. I learned about Penzys on this here blog, so I had to stop in and support. They have some great stuff. That’s all, love me some Pittsburgh .
Velocifowl
@Kirk:
It’s not just women.
I’ve seen my sisters in law put up Trump flags and cross flags, convert their husbands to catholicism and dragoon their relatives and daughters into the March For Life despite knowing they are pro choice.
It’s hard dealing with family over this and most people will either go along or shut up to retain the peace. Conservatives are masters of emotional abuse to control those around them. The entire GOP is giving the green light to torment your family members and it’s been getting worse for 9 damn years.
mapanghimagsik
I’d read the NYT link, but they want my identity. FTFNYT
SFAW
@NotMax:
Not a phrase I expected to read with respect to the Cowsills.
TBone
@Harrison Wesley: seconded
NotMax
@SFAW
Daddy was, to put it bluntly, a piece of work.
TBone
@Mr. Mack: I am given to understand that pepperoni rolls originated in West By God Virginia.
https://www.pittsburghmagazine.com/rolling-pepperonis-doughy-delicious-dialogue/
(Disclosure: I am not partial to them in any state. I was spoiled by delicious, delicate kolaches in Galveston, TX.)
Chris
@Harrison Wesley:
@TBone:
Is it actually good, as in less prone to defaulting to a “both sides do it, but liberals are worse” baseline than the NYT and WaPo, or did it simply have a few shining moments in this election? I’ve never read it much.
Spanky
@Jeffro: The Onion.
Mr. Mack
@TBone: According to our guide, they were found in mining communities due to the fact that they were shelf stable and could be carried in a pocket and eaten for lunch.
NotMax
@Jeffo
Do kids still go door to door selling subscriptions to Grit?
:)
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Another Scott:
Oh so true but, the people who continue to vote for her would simply find another Leftier Than Thou candidate to vote for next time around.
TBone
@Chris: it’s got a Philly ‘tood, is not meant to be national, and sometimes (similar to most of us from that area) will piss you off but come back with something so lovable that you forget why you were pissed. It’s not perfect – it’s great.
UncleEbeneezer
Jim Kessler on Shitter:
tam1MI
@Jeffro: I have heard that USA TODAY is, astonishingly, pretty good.
Peale
@TBone: The reality is that under Trump, we’re all going to live that way. That’s how they want us all to live. They’re just trying it out on themselves first.
Another Scott
@Captain C:
Thank you for the opportunity to repost this:
Yeah, but your judg[e]ment sucks.
Grr…,
Scott.
TBone
@Mr. Mack: that’s exactly what the article I posted is about!
narya
@H.E.Wolf: Hah! And I’m sitting here trying to talk myself into writing some today; PtV has a handful of races, and everything has to be mailed by close of business today. (Yesterday I just could not, but today . . .)
Honestly, that’s what I was going on about when I was thanking my fellow jackals: there are the postcard writers, and the phone bankers, and the behind-the-scenes data cleaners, and . . . I’m not much of a “joiner,” but it does feel good to have done SOMETHING (h/t Ms. Obama), and to know that we inspire each other to just do a little.
TBone
@Peale: 😆
I dissent!
(Your comment is true and I’m trying to stay positive.)
Quiltingfool
@Velocifowl:
This. If a person does not like to deal with drama or controversy, they will keep their piehole shut and do what they want with no fuss. I don’t discuss my politics with anyone I suspect roots for the other party. I don’t want to argue, period.
Do you want to win the battle, or do you want to win the war?
TBone
@tam1MI: also seconded
Peale
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Good. She’s occupying the space of someone else. That person could be worse. Could be better. I’d like to roll the dice.
UncleEbeneezer
Signed up to canvass in CA-27 this Saturday through SwingLeft. Even moved my tennis lessons to Sunday, in order to do it. Michelle and Kamala made me do it :)
Quiltingfool
For the first time in my voting life, I’m a one issue voter – reproductive rights. Fortunately, the party that embraces that also embraces a bunch of other rights that I support, so, win-win!
I read a comment over at LGM that, for me, sums up the insane anti-abortion laws: “State sanctioned murder of women.”
Nelle
@schrodingers_cat: In my neighborhood, one woman is a nurse practioner, one a vetenarian. Both professional woman. One will only talk to me by stepping outside, closing the door, and whispering. After I saw the husband of the other explode, I only talk to her if I run into her in a neutral place and he isn’t there.
Jeffro
@NotMax: ha! no, as far as I can tell…
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@SiubhanDuinne:
She’s also been a public supporter of Planned Parenthood.
Phylllis
@NotMax: For a palate cleanser and primer on how to be a supportive parent (albeit bittersweet), go for The Bee Gees: How Can You Mend a Broken Heart. Available on HBO Max.
Jeffro
Josh Marshall at TPM:
Kirk
@Mr. Mack: A very long time ago I started researching pocket foods – the meals in all cultures I could find that were tucked into a pocket or bag and carried by laborers and travellers for a mid-day meal.
I’m distractible so I didn’t finish, but I was also just getting swamped with how common it was.
Every culture had laborers that worked far enough from the food preparation and storage area that too much was lost going back for mid-day. Solutions were found – and they’re all delicious.
catclub
I would not. I think that if Trump went on an apology tour that was about three days long he could get back a LOT of squishy republican voters. I also think this is incredibly unlikely. Which is better for Harris.
CAM-WA
The Lincoln Project ad brought tears to my eyes…I watched it twice (and shared it, though all the women I know are voting for Harris anyway)
zhena gogolia
@trnc: It sounded as if it was a kind of town hall situation, where someone had asked him about it. So probably no opportunity to challenge him.
catclub
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Meanwhile, fearless Shrub has said nothing.
catclub
@CAM-WA: I just thought that quiet recognition among all the women was great.
TBone
@Jeffro: I am not careening, I have been overtaken by a wonderful sense of calm, along the lines of the “peace that surpasses all understanding.”
I hope to remain in this state for the duration (but don’t really expect that).
Peaceful does not mean lax.
Another Scott
@lowtechcyclist: Thanks for your perspective.
Ultimately, though, people persuade politicians by voting for them. That’s the way you get a seat at the table. That’s the way you get face time. That’s the way you get considered for positions in the campaigns. That’s the way you get to affect policy.
I don’t support you, so you better do what I want doesn’t work.
Making the tent bigger, getting a foot in the door, etc., is the way to mold policy. Did you want to try to mold Reagan’s policies or Carter’s? That was the choice.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
Chris
@Spanky:
I mean, it’s sad, but political comedy actually does do a better job than straight media on quite a bit. Though the Onion may be stretching it.
I know millennials get shit for having treated The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, and Last Week Tonight as news sources, but the plain fact is, they are. In between the jokes and pop culture references, there is a plethora of genuinely useful shit on these shows that you would never in a million years find on a “serious” news show, and that even a printed newspaper would bury far beneath the front page. (I’d call it “investigative reporting,” except I’m not sure if that applies when so much of what they talk about is easily available in the public domain, they’re just looking for it and putting it together in a way the big punditry considers beneath them). And reporters know this – “serious” reporters have told told the likes of Colbert and Oliver a million times that they’d love to be able to get away with calling a spade a spade like they do, but Journalistic Standards don’t allow them to.
That’s more of a commentary on the extremely low quality of “serious” political news than on the high quality of parody and satire: nevertheless, there you are. And we just saw it illustrated again by the Washington Post, where the only journalist able to pull off an endorsement was the newspaper’s humorist.
catclub
@Another Scott:
So I have a free subscription to the WAPO.
One gets it with a .gov email ( which is now no more, but the WAPO sub still is.) I primarily use it to read Alexandra Petri and Jennifer Rubin.
I do not plan to cancel my subscription.
KatKapCC
@schrodingers_cat: No one is saying it’s “every woman who votes R”. But some of them. And they are not the ones who deserve your scorn.
K-Mo
@TBone: 💙😂
The Audacity of Krope
@schrodingers_cat: So only white women are in abusive relationships now? I’m getting still more confused.
KatKapCC
@Dave: It’s not a good question because it proves the person asking it to be an ignorant dipshit.
The majority of women killed by an abusive partner are killed when they are trying to leave. Or their pet or kid or sister or mother is killed in retaliation. This is not rocket science. And anyone who acts all wide-eyed innocent about it doesn’t deserve to be part of the conversation.
jonas
@New Deal democrat: Admitting that the joke was anything other than “perfect” would violate the Roy Cohn Code: Double down. Never admit you’re wrong. Hit them back harder. He’ll probably tell the Puerto Rican audience that not only is their island garbage, they’re also ugly and their mothers are whores.
cmorenc
@catclub:
True, but nonetheless the fact that not a single former GOP nominee or Vice-President nor other living GOP ex-President has endorsed nor even appeared with Trump is of itself pretty damning. And we know the late John McCain would be in that group of non-endorsers, non-supporters if he was still alive.
Contrast the D side: we have united support from our former Presidential office-holders and candidates, plus many surprising names like the Cheneys coming over from the GOP side.
Jeffro
@TBone: is this related to my TPM quote? or some other?
Melancholy Jaques
@cmorenc:
Isn’t that how we got New York Mayor Eric Adams?
I am suspicious of work-arounds to improve outcomes. My mind isn’t closed, but I’m suspicious.
Baud
@Melancholy Jaques:
We got Mayor Adams because he got the most votes. He might have gotten the most votes under some other system as well.
Dave
@KatKapCC: It’s a good question if someone has genuinely for whatever reason not come across this or been prompted to think about it before.
Don’t get me wrong it’s usually asked in bad faith or perhaps more with a sort of dismissive assholishness but by no means is that universal. Neither of those are admirable or ok though the second can be at least potentially be addressed fruitfully.
It is part of the reason that the entire enterprise of bad faith is so corrosive it means we are all on the lookout for it and that a question posed in genuine ignorance is treated the same as one posed to be by a bad-faith dickhead.
You are conflating the wide-eyed cute bad-faith bullshit with people who have been lucky or sheltered or whatever enough to simply have never thought about these subjects and as ridiculous as it seems to us those people do exist. No one is obligated to provide domestic abuse 101 to others but particularly in academic setting it seems that as long the question is genuine that it should be answered without inherent prejudice (with the caveat that if it becomes clear the person asking is full of shit that it should be rapidly shut down).
And the answer to that is basically what you laid out. Leaving is the most dangerous that people in abusive situations have been conditioned to feel (sometimes correctly) that they lack agency.
Bill Arnold
@TBone:
The Camp Fire (2018) burned four towns down during the Trump administration, notably Paradise, CA.
That was related to human-caused global heating, though, or maybe poor raking, or a greedy sociopathic electricity supplier, or Jewish space lasers.
Not communist fascist antifa operatives, though I’m sure such were blamed.
The Audacity of Krope
@Melancholy Jaques: If ranked choice voting produces a Mayor Eric Adams, he legitimately had the broadest base of support among voters. The system wasn’t the problem there.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
“What keeps you from raping and murdering? I’d certainly go on a rampage if I wasn’t worried about God looking over my shoulder.”
I’ve seen variations of that so many times in online forums. What kind of person thinks that way? It’s a sign of no internal moral compass. Isn’t that the definition of sociopathy?
Melancholy Jaques
@Baud:
Our current system has poorly informed voters deciding outcomes. Giving them more choices isn’t likely to improve their attention to self government or their decision making.
KatKapCC
@Dave: Sure, fine, it’s a good question if the person is incredibly stupid.
It is not complicated to suss out the reason on one’s own. “Gee, let’s see: He beats the shit out of her if she drops a fork or doesn’t laugh at his joke or just because he wants to. He tells her she belongs to him, he doesn’t let her see her friends, he drinks, he owns a dog that would scare off the House of the fucking Baskervilles. Now, hmmmmmmmmm whyever might she be worried about leaving him? WHAT A PUZZLE!!!”
Anybody who is either unwilling or incapable of making that Grand Canyon-sized leap of logic does not get to be part of the discussion. Because either they have the brain capacity of a slug or they are a bad-faith jackass.
Baud
@Melancholy Jaques:
The number of choices they have depends on the number of candidates running. No voter has to rank every candidate.
Kosh III
@jonas: they’re also ugly and their mothers are whores.
and their fathers smelt of elderberries
The Audacity of Krope
@KatKapCC: This is all very true. I extend a little grace to people not understanding this where this doesn’t describe any relationship they’ve ever witnessed.
Cheryl from Maryland
@schrodingers_cat: I think so. An abused person often looks for someone else to abuse to maintain some sort of self-image. Their self-loathing at not fighting for themselves bubbles up into anger and agression.
lowtechcyclist
@Another Scott:
As just one individual voter, the notion that I was in a position to mold anyone’s policies was the farthest thing from my mind. If you’d put it like that to me in 1980, I’d have just looked at you quizzically.
Not to mention, even if that had made sense to me, I wouldn’t have been able to see the point of molding Carter’s policies; I regarded him as ineffectual. And I couldn’t see Reagan’s people listening to people like me.
The thing is, there’s always another election. (Or at least, until now we had always had that expectation. That’s one big thing that makes fence-sitting in this election decidedly different from doing so in all past elections.) Anderson’s candidacy, at least in my case, made a difference down the road. I voted for Chuck Robb for governor of Virginia in 1981, though it was a tough decision for me at the time. Absent Anderson, would I have even considered that? I don’t think so.
Dave
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: Very similar to how they view sexual ethics they really don’t seem to parse in a value ethical but instead in a form and appearance.
Reads to them like we are full of shit if I say multiple consenting adults engaged in a total freak-fest regardless of it’s my cup of tea or not is more wholesome and ethical than a married het couple having the blandest possible lights out under the covers missionary sex if it’s occurring under dubious circumstances.
Genuinely just doesn’t parse for a subset of the population.
lowtechcyclist
@SFAW:
They decided it was a scene they should make with their little ones.
(What are Cowsills lyrics from nearly six decades ago doing, cluttering up the attic of my mind?)
TBone
@Jeffro: it is – he used the word careen so I riffed.
Melancholy Jaques
@Baud:
I understand it, I just don’t see it as as a solution to anything.
schrodingers_cat
Nowhere have I said that spousal abuse is imaginary or does not exist. Stop attributing stuff to me that I haven’t said. The existence of spousal abuse is not a get out of jail free card for Trump voting women in the absence of any coercion.
Dave
@KatKapCC: What’s obvious to us isn’t always obvious to others even if we think it should be and even if it really should be. If someone is genuinely a total numpty but not malignant better to inform without shaming.
With full acknowledgment that the if and but of that statement are doing a lot of load bearing work.
Captain C
@jonas: What’s Jon Stewart’s excuse?
Geminid
@Melancholy Jaques: Under New York City’s old voting laws, Eric Adams almost certainly been forced into a runoff because only ~32% of voters ranked him first and he had to exceed 40% to advance.
Kathy Garcia, the former Sanitation Commissioner who ran as a competent technocrat, ran second and when all five Ranked-choice votes were allocated, Adams was ahesd of Garcia by only (I think) one percentage point.
A runoff between Garcia and Adams would have had a new dynamic and might have produced a different result. But I think New Yorkers will stick with RCV for a while because many people like the principle and the convenience.
I also am an RCV sceptic, and I’m glad the system is being tried out first on a local level in places like NYC, and state level in the case of Maine. People need to see the drawbacks and unintended consequences before they adopt RCV.
Captain C
@Melancholy Jaques:
That was, IIRC, partly because people didn’t realize they could leave him off their list (or put in fewer than five if they only liked, say, three candidates).
TBone
@Bill Arnold: oh, great point to bring up if I encounter this bullshit fantasy about BLM and/or Antifa EVER again!!!
“That’s a stupid lie, but guess what DID really happen!!”
Ken
@KatKapCC: You’re reminding me of one of the more powerful episodes of WKRP in Cincinnati.
It ties in with the conversations above, how comedy shows can address things that the press won’t touch.
JiveTurkin
@Captain C: What’s Jon Stewart’s excuse?
A classic example of bothsiderism. A comedian telling racist jokes is just like Beyonce giving a speech endorsing Harris.
Dave
@schrodingers_cat: The point isn’t that it’s that you conflated what is probably a small group of people that is being discussed with somehow people making excuses for all or at least many Trump voting women (you singled out white women which I do get but there is nothing about that dynamic that requires the person to be white though in this case I assume it is more likely to be the case).
It seems that you read it as excusing a group when instead it’s about awareness of a dynamic and an issue that is real and that might be an unfortunate unintended consequence of mail in voting or least a bit more likely to occur with mail in versus in person voting.
Chris
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
And the tell is that they do in fact murder, rape, and go on rampages. They’re not looking to repress that impulse, they’re just looking for institutions that can channel it in socially acceptable directions. Or, more honestly, institutions that don’t channel it at all, but make it socially acceptable by association.
(Exhibit A: the police).
A lot of the more sociopathic pathologies you see from right-wingers come from this. The death penalty. Putting children in cages. Making people through welfare jump through a Kafkaesque set of degrading hoops in order to justify every penny. Every police murder they’ve ever defended. It’s all about them taking their impulse to murder and abuse people, and then obsessively searching for people whose failure to dot an I here or cross a T there justifies them unleashing that impulse on them as cruelly and disproportionately as possible.
Captain C
@JiveTurkin:
Anyone who actually believes this and/or pushes it on others deserves to get tire rims and anthrax topped with shit in place of their spaghetti marinara. After all, same thing, right?
lowtechcyclist
@catclub:
Many library systems give their cardholders access to a variety of newspapers and periodicals. One can, for instance, read the WaPo for free with a library card from the Southern Maryland system (Calvert, Charles, and St. Mary’s counties).
TBone
@Ken: 💜
When I worked at law offices that included handling divorce cases in Media, PA, we had to say things in code about the womens’ shelter located in a townhome in the law office business district because its location is a strict secret. “Let me know if you need the Blue Door.” That’s the only identifier.
I thank God I never needed to go. Of course I was abused too many times as a petite female, but since I had protectors as well as a keen fighting spirit, I was never in a position where I had to vacate from home, luckily.
schrodingers_cat
@Dave: White women are the only demographic among women voters that vote majority Republican. I didn’t single them out, their voting patterns did
White women can end Republican domination tomorrow. They are the biggest voting group
Prediction: Incoming barrage of excuses and qualifiers.
#notallwhitewomen
The majority always demands grace from the marginalized that they don’t extend to the ones not in their group
Dave
@Chris: After all everyone must be as bad and actually worse than them so those are satisfying and necessary actions to keep the obviously even worse masses in check.
Not a group with a solid sense of awareness of others.
Capri
@UncleEbeneezer: I recently heard that what the Civil Rights Act did for Southern States, Dobbs has done for a generation of women. I think that’s right. Also, the pundits and poll takers haven’t realized that yet. It’s why the 2022 midterms were such a suprise to everyone predicting a red wave.
Dave
@Capri: Very much hope this is the case and it is as durable as the counter reaction to the Civil Rights Act.
Mel
@TBone: A dear friend volunteered at Planned Parenthood and worked at a University student health clinic during the Bush era.
For Christmas one year, she had matching t-shirts made for us, emblazoned with “Keep your Bush OUT of my bush!”
Best gift ever.
Gvg
@schrodingers_cat: there are minority women victims too. Are we supposed to sympathize with only the minority not the majority who are victimized exactly the same way, or treat them the same? I submit that there is no chance for justice if people can not see domestic violence is wrong. Don’t derail discussion by making the 2 sets competitors. Stick to discussing how to prevent it usefully without making more problems than it solves, including minority victims.
TBone
@Mel: 💙💙💙
KatKapCC
@schrodingers_cat:
Yeah, fucking duh. But guess what? No one is saying we should excuse Trump-voting women who are doing so because they are bigot pieces of shit. But just because bigot pieces of shit exist does not mean that women who are afraid their husbands will beat the crap out of them if they don’t vote for Trump deserve the same scorn as the bigot pieces of shit. You however, seem to think they do. And the “not all white women” thing here feels pretty gross, because you’re using it to be an ass to battered women. Look, most of the time I have zero problem singling out white women as a major issue in electoral politics, because unfortunately, we as a group have been aggravatingly wrong many times. But in this case, when you keep snarkily using that phrase, it really feels like you’re saying that if a woman is white, she doesn’t deserve sympathy for being abused. If that’s not what you mean, I’ll stand corrected, but you might want to think about how you’re communicating.
Ksmiami
@Ceci n est pas mon nym: most humans are undeserving of consciousness
Ksmiami
@Quiltingfool: and they want to go further and outlaw birth control. Fuck the GOP
Kirk
@schrodingers_cat:
#notallpalestinians, #notallisraelis, #notallmen, #notallyoupickthegroup
You have a hook for your scorn but I’m hoping the above additions show it’s a common excuse.
For all these it appears to me the question is: if not all, how many? The ancillary question is how many do we tolerate?
louc
@lowtechcyclist:
This! I grew up Republican and my 1st election was Carter/Reagan/Anderson. I voted for Anderson because his $1.50 gasoline sales tax made a ton of sense to me. From that baby step, I transitioned to a full-fledged Dem. Of course, seeing George McGovern preach at a Methodist Church helped it along but that’s another story.
K-Mo
@Dave: re your brother: this dynamic is so frustrating and yet somehow intriguing to me. A couple of weeks ago I watched this Bukwark interview with Jason Calcanis who is I guess some sort of “reasonable, independent-minded” tech bro.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hgymNGBNRdU
I haven’t stopped thinking about it since. Basically a very successful person who clearly has a good head on his shoulders. Yet when asked to explain his non-support of Kamala Harris, he kept falling back on either non-sequiturs or outright fantasy. Basically he agrees that Trump is a dire threat to civilization but he thinks Kamala insufficiently deferential to rich guys, and he can’t seem to puzzle through how to combine these things to make a decision.
At one point he offers an opinion that Kamala isn’t smart, which is a real head-scratcher given the choice here. And he expresses confidence in Trump’s approach to (powerful?) cozying with Americas enemies, which he seems to think is better than what the vast range of experienced people think. . . the whole thing is mystifying and yet I assume this is a better quality of thought than you get from most of these guys.
Planetjanet
@schrodingers_cat: It is sad the number of times that I knock on a door for the campaign where a man answers and refuses to let me speak to the woman on my list. Patriarchy is real and they feel threatened.
schrodingers_cat
@Planetjanet: I too have had that experience when out canvassing.
schrodingers_cat
Deleted.
Another Scott
@lowtechcyclist: I love that song. Tied up with a high-school crush. (sigh)
I was surprised by the main guy’s opinion of it in the movie. (!)
It’s a good show – well worth watching for anyone who knows a song or two of theirs.
“Hair!”
Cheers,
Scott.
Manyakitty
@Scout211: and get to the end to learn that she’s still a terrible person.
Citizen Alan
@BC in Illinois: Many years ago, Dear Abby published a list of her funniest comments from readers, one of which was:
I was a kid when I read that and it was my first introduction to the idea of Goldwater voters being nuts. And yet they would all be sober, principled, and respectable by 2024 standards.
prn
@RaflW: Yes, thank you for that article!
My mom was an evangelical and I was forced to go to church as a kid. My dad wasn’t, but he was raised in a very religious home, and it was just a given that men were natural bosses over women
My mom had a copy of Dare to Discipline, I was spanked, had to cut my own switch, had my mouth washed out with soap, etc. That didn’t bother me near as much as the fact that my dad considered me less important just because I was a girl
Weird thing is, I kinda consider my mom a proto-feminist. She had a career, her own investment accounts, was very pro-birth control, always told me that I needed to be able to provide for myself. She had been forced to take care of her five younger siblings at age 13 when her mother died. She absolutely hated that she didn’t have a choice in the matter
She almost always voted republican, and just accepted their bs as truth. She has severe Alzheimer’s now, but didn’t like Trump, and may have actually voted for Kamala if she could, without telling my dad
I’m not sure, but I expect my dad will fill out her ballot (yup, voter fraud!) and not think twice about it. I don’t know who he’ll vote for, Trump is someone he would normally despise, but voting for a woman Prez would be so outside his idea of normal
Ugh
Citizen Alan
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Indeed. I despise Jill Stein, but if she were not running, Cornel West would have ore traction, and if he weren’t running, it would be someone else. I remember being flabbergasted when I asked a former friend in 2016 who he was voting for, and he said “Eugene Puryear.” And after 2 minutes on Google, I realized he was a fanboy for a guy from the Party for Socialism and Liberation who was running for Vice President (along with some other PSL kook) despite being only 28 and thus too young to take office even in absurd scenario where the PSL ticket one. (It was only on the ballot in, like, five states, IIRC.)
Citizen Alan
@Quiltingfool: My RWNJ sister likes to play this game where she is allowed to go into screaming hysterics if I say something she doesn’t like. Whereas if I remain calm and let her vent, it shows I don’t care, but if I even show even a hint of anger, her response is to accuse me of wanting to hit her.
Citizen Alan
I consider this to be the single most prescient and trenchant piece of political reporting of the last twenty years.
Citizen Alan
And in that vein, I would add that most of the “Southern” Protestant Religions literally only exist because wealthy antebellum plantation owners demanded preachers who would reassure them that God was perfectly find with chattel slavery, no matter how cruelly it was operated, up to and including a license to rape their female slaves and sell their own bastard children at the auction block for profit.
Chris
@Citizen Alan:
Huh. I was sure that link was going to turn out to be the 2000 “Our Long National Nightmare Of Peace And Prosperity Is Over.”
Dave
@K-Mo: I’m going to listen to it and I’m probably going to regret it.
Dave
@K-Mo: Made it fifteen minutes and the self assured shallow search for justifying why their greed in particular is special and good actually became too much to take.
Chris
@K-Mo:
Everything you describe them saying reeks of rationalizing, and/or adopting what everyone else is saying (“Harris isn’t very smart”) to justify a predetermined conclusion.
Which is often about justifying race or gender prejudice, but it doesn’t even have to be that. A lot of the time and especially with the techbros, I suspect it’s as simple as “my social environment supports Trump, I go with the flow.” Basically, their vote matches their peers for the same reason their dress or their hobbies do.
columbusqueen
@schrodingers_cat: No, but there a lot more elderly women like my MIL who have been verbally bullied for decades & just have no spirit or spine left.
Gloria DryGarden
@SFAW: we still ovulate every month. That doesn’t go away, unless health or age comes to change it. I think people very much care about dobbs.