As I mentioned the other day, I’ve developed an allergy to hot takes in the wake of the election and have mostly tried to avoid offering my own. I realize we need to figure out what happened and what can be done about it.
Discussing theories and next steps is essential, and I’m grateful mistermix and others are doing that. Talking through it is helping me shake off the apathy and plan ahead.
But it’s gross when people use a horrible situation like 11/5 to proclaim their pet theories vindicated and attack coalition members they’ve always despised. I’m trying to avoid that myself.
A rush to judgment that confirms priors can also lead to jaw-droppingly dumb pronouncements, like this turd of an essay from Caitlin Flanagan in The Atlantic:
It’s paywalled, but that’s just as well since the entire premise is thunderously idiotic. Democrats have a billionaire problem?
Christ on a cracker, while Dems were collecting record small-dollar donations, the nation’s billionaire scumbags like Musk, the Uihleins, Adelsons, Mercers, et al., dropped pallets of cash on the Trump campaign for the express purpose of shaping policies to protect their obscene wealth and use levers of the state to punish their personal enemies.
It’s true that Hollywood celebrities skew left, like Ruffalo, whom Flanagan mocks in the piece, maybe even sometimes deservedly. But sweet tap-dancing Christ, how can anyone write this paragraph with a straight face?
But it’s not the trans athletes or the immigrants or the wokeism that lost the Democrats this election. It’s the rigged economy that has had its boot on the throat of working people for decades. Billionaires, even our very special Democratic billionaires, care about all kinds of things—and many of them peel off a lot of dollars for worthy causes, no doubt—but their political involvement usually comes with a specific price: that the party leaves alone the tax code that safeguards their counting houses.
Flanagan is right about one thing: The economy is rigged in favor of the wealthy. Gilded Age levels of wealth inequality are a real problem, and I don’t doubt that economic components like inflation played a role in the 2024 outcome.
But only one party has ever even tried to address wealth inequality, and it’s not the party of Donald Fucking Trump, for chrissakes. Democrats ran on making the rich pay their fair share. Jesus, they’ve been running on that for decades. And Dems are thwarted at almost every turn in that endeavor by Republicans forming human bubble-wrap around their rich donors.
But yeah, Hillary Clinton gave a speech at a Goldman Sachs conference a decade ago, as Flanagan notes. So it doesn’t matter that Biden championed policies to reverse Reagan’s trickle-down con or that Democrats engineered an enormous and durable downward transfer of funds and significantly increased access to healthcare coverage via the kludgy ACA in the Obama years.
Missing from Flanagan’s piece is a single mention of Elon Musk bouncing around the stage at a Trump rally like a dipshit (thanks, Tim Walz).The richest wretch on the planet bankrolled Trump and unleashed a shit tsunami of lies on the social media platform he personally owns, but Flanagan says it’s Dems who are tainted with billionaire cooties?
Flanagan doesn’t mention the grotesque billionaires and wealthy sex pests Trump is installing in cabinet positions or the fact that Trump is himself a billionaire sex pest whose signature achievement during his first term was a huge tax cut so skewed toward the wealthy that it was unpopular with most Americans, a first as far as I know. It’s just a deeply stupid and dishonest take. I apologize for highlighting it.
***
I’ll be spending Thanksgiving with some wingnut relatives, who will hopefully have the good sense not to bring up politics. None of my relatives are Trump cultists, but I’m sure they voted for the worthless piece of shit three times (and DeSantis twice). Knowing that makes me angry and sad, but that’s nothing new.
Anyway, if one of them does bring up politics, I’ll share my prediction that we’re going to see the most repugnant carnival of corruption and self-dealing we’ve ever witnessed over the next four years. A white collar crime wave is gathering momentum, and the scale of the inundation will make Jared Kushner look like a piker for his sleazy $2B deal with the Saudis.
Trump will make the cash rain down on himself and the greedy fuck-squib hangers-on who already have more money than they and their worthless offspring could spend in a dozen lifetimes.
And the boot will remain firmly on the throat of working people. That’s what happens when a so-called “populist moment” results in electing a government by robber barons for robber barons.
***
Are any of y’all commissioned to bring side dishes to a Thanksgiving feast? I’m bringing stuffing/dressing and homemade cranberry sauce. Probably a bottle of wine. I’ll need it.
Open thread!
Baud
My hot take on hot takes is this:
If you say the Dems lost because they failed a certain group of people, then you’re calling those people monsters because you’re accusing them of allowing Trump to win.
Ramalama
Same. But I’m not there yet figuring out.
My aunt joined some kind of class run by a nun and I am guessing it’s going to involve a lot of protests. Hard to do much from my lair in the Quebec mountains.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Incredible projection going on in that piece. Hell, it’s a longform of DougJ twitter posts.
These lengthy essays about what’s going crazy with politics *never* address the rightwing wurlitzer and Faux “News”, Rogan and the rest. They never address the real problem is that the Republican base is radicalized and retrograde, maybe because it would seem to be a problem with an actual solution? They just talk about the crazy, no compromise politicians sent to DC or completely twist around the association of high profile billionaires with certain political parties.
Kay
The breathless coverage of the Trump tariffs is hysterical. AFTER the election.
Always a day late and a dollar short, our media. By design.
I’m hosting Thanksgiving but just my immediate family so no Trump voters but I do get the smiliest 9 month old you will ever meet. She’s just a doll. I got her a tiny little fisherman’s sweater in Portugal.
TBone
@artcandee.bsky.social
Trump names his speechwriter, Vince Haley, as the Director of the Domestic Policy Council.
Bro wrote speeches to give to people with the comprehension of 4th graders.
Sounds qualified to direct domestic policy.
Baud
Also too, another example of white people dominated politics, where the only legitimate question to ask is whether the Democrats are good enough (narrator: and they never are).
Republicans, and the idea of making imperfect adult choices, are erased from the picture because, at bottom, the influencers leading the charge really aren’t going to suffer the consequences, and many will benefit from the social status that Republicans can provide them.
Kay
I miss my mother in law lately. A blunt, plain spoken blue dog Democrat who was well off but not greedy and gross, she fucking hated Trump.
geg6
I’m still ignoring all political news and may continue that for the foreseeable future. I just can’t with everything else going on in my life.
The good news for me is there are no MAGAs in my life or family. So tomorrow’s meal will be peaceful. I’m bringing, by massive request, my honey and sea salt roasted carrots and, an experiment, roasted Brussels sprouts and pancetta glazed with a mustard and maple syrup glaze.
Anne Laurie
Caitlin Flanagan is one of a handful of people on my Health-Alert Block List — reading her output is bad for my blood pressure. She’s the Mean Girl Queen Bee version of Megan McArgleBargle.
Many crimes against logic in her work, but the final straw for me was a long article where she said her grandmother probably died from a botched Depression-era abortion, which left her existing children permanently scarred… collected a wealth of further detail on how anti-abortion laws killed and crippled women & the people around them… and then finished with a brief paragraph explaining that, on the other hand, her own adorable boy-twinsies were just Too Cute, so she was fine with keeping anti-choice laws on the books. Because what’s a certain percentage of dead women & ruined families, against the potential social clout value of Moar Upper-Class White Babies?
The Thin Black Duke
@Baud: This.
Their complexion is their protection.
Kay
Republicans are saying Mexico and Canada have met all of Trumps demands due to his tariff threat. This isn’t true but they all believe it.
I just don’t know what Democrats are supposed to do with that. No matter what he does they will be told it’s a success and they’ll parrot that. Tell me what “messaging” fixes that. I’m stumped.
Josie
Did no one read BC’s last question? I want to hear about food, not politics. I’m bringing my special carrot casserole that uses mayo, onions, a dab of horseradish, and cheese to surprise everyone with its yum. Also potato rolls and gluten free dinner rolls. I’m the designated bread person in the family.
geg6: Just read your comment. Sounds really delicious.
mappy!
sweet tap-dancing Christ, the unrepentant dung-beetle rolling media, sweet tap-dancing Christ …
JMG
It’s a two person Thanksgiving for Alice and me. We’ll zoom with son, daughter-in-law, and grandson in Brooklyn and daughter in France, where it’s not a holiday. Smaller turkey, mashed potatoes, oyster stuffing (my grandmother’s recipe), green beans with shallots and a dash of sherry, cranberry sauce, apple pie. White and red burgundies available for wine choice. My father would only have white wine with turkey, my mom only red, so we always have both available out of habit.
@Kay: You have touched on the paradox of Trump’s second term. The less he does substantively, the better he’ll do politically. Just say he’ll do something to fix a. “problem” then say the next day the problem’s solved. Never has to face the reality of his proposals.
Chief Oshkosh
@Kay: Welp, it could be an indicator that Trump (or more likely, the money boys) are willing to ‘take the win’ of coming into power while the economy is doing remarkably well by not actually fucking things up. The price of not totally impoverishing various segments is to let Trump take the credit for the hard work and smarts of Biden and the Democrats. If this extends to other aspects of Herr Witless’ reign, I guess we have to count ourselves lucky
ETA: JMG said it much better.
Suzanne
There’s this trope going around social conservative communities about how successful liberals “don’t preach what they practice”. They’re annoyed because liberals are better at being married and having kids and being generally functional and prosperous than conservatives, and they resent it.
I don’t think Trump voters give a shit about billionaires. I think they are super fucken annoyed at their cousin who went to a university and got a good job and has a nice wife.
something fabulous
My sweet and kind T-giving hosts are fans of those odd weird sweet Hawaii rolls, so I am tasked with bringing those. I found a huge stash at my local supermarket on Sunday and figured I’d better grab them then, since last year they were nowhere to be found. Looked up whether/how to freeze them and their site informs me “If you plan to eat them within a week, you don’t have to freeze them – just store your Hawaiian rolls in a cool, dry place.” YIKES. So be it, I guess! https://kingshawaiian.com/faqs/
HinTN
@Josie: We’re hosting friends. I’m brining and roasting the turkey plus making the gravy and some cranberry sauce.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@something fabulous:
I have a smash burger recipe, make my own Big Mac-like sauce.
But the key to it are those Hawaiian rolls.
The Thin Black Duke
@Chief Oshkosh: What are the odds that Trump won’t do something castropically stupid in the next four years? Another pandemic? Shooting protesters? As James Baldwin said, the mistake people keep on making is believing there’s a bottom, so things possibly can’t get worse.
In Trump’s world, there is no bottom.
Josie
@HinTN:
I’ve never brined a turkey (or anything else). What do you put in your brine solution?
Elizabelle
These hot takes. It’s all just noise. We are living in a nation that Limbaugh and Murdoch enshitified. No gratitude to either of those cretins.
mrmoshpotato
@geg6:
Interesting glaze. The Brussel sprouts and pancetta sound great by themselves.
David Fud
The standard private equity terms for Kushner would be a 2% management fee and 20% of the profits of the money he is running. As you can see, that is $40MM/year fee plus a chunk of whatever profit he can scrounge. Not a bad fail-up if you can get it.
sentient ai from the future
“shellacked” is a willful misreading of the map we were facing and a willful avoidance of facts that emerged since the either/or was clear
these fucking people
Suzanne
As for side dishes…. I am making, at Spawn the Younger’s request, macaroni and cheese. I love baked mac and cheese with the breadcrumbs on top, but she wants basically a good version of Kraft. So I am making the ATK recipe for stovetop mac and cheese. I have made it before and it is admittedly delicious.
Betty Cracker
@Kay: That’s such a great age! They are smiley and curious and affectionate but usually not great at walking yet (if they even are at all), so the need for exhausting vigilance hasn’t yet begun.
@geg6: Both of those dishes sound excellent!
DFH
Betty, I love the ascerbic angle you have.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@The Thin Black Duke:
No matter how low the bar is set, he’ll find a way to slither under it.
Probably the only thing he’s ever said that was 110% accurate was the Fifth Ave shooting comment.
sentient ai from the future
@Suzanne: you mean “people who understand things about the world and people and are capable of genuine love and kindness”?
Because conservatives, by and large, arent., IME
BC in Illinois
I just found out last night what my post-Thanksgiving assignment is.
Thanksgiving, my assignment is to get self, Mrs BC, and her sister to the daughter’s house, where a bacon-wrapped turkey will have been prepared. I will carry containers of whatever else has been prepared.
But Saturday, the Scouts have a Christmas tree sale, and my daughter’s two oldest daughters* have a three-hour shift, where they need an extra adult. As a septuagenarian, I qualify as an extra adult. It is scheduled to be in the upper twenties, with a chance of lightly blowing snow. Oh, well.
*It is intriguing to me that among my g’kids and g’nieces/nephews, there are three Eagle Scouts. Two of them are girls. On Saturday, I will be there with the next two Scouts.
I don’t think they’ll let me set a tree on fire for warmth.
WereBear
They have to come with us if they want to live.
And I’ve concluded a lot of them don’t want to. Believing in the Rapture is soothing, but has a death wish embedded in it, hidden as “you won’t have to die.”
The essential wrestle of sentient maturity… and they are still dodging it.
Nope, don’t know how to fix people who refuse to grow up, and refuse to see that’s the cause of all their current troubles, too.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊 😊 😊
Chief Oshkosh
@The Thin Black Duke: Oh, I entirely agree. He’ll fuck up more than once and on a massive scale. All I’m saying is that if he, or more likely his handlers, realize that the less they do, the better off they are, then we’re that much ahead.
Chris T.
@The Thin Black Duke:
Zero. I put the odds at four to one that he averages six catastrophically stupid things per day. Of course we have to haggle on the specifics of “catastrophic”…
Baud
I’m not going to take responsibility for Trump caused damage, but I’m also not going to pray for damage in the hopes that people will again temporarily turn to us to fix everything immediately.
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
WereBear
@Chief Oshkosh: Please. They don’t think anything touches them. They could short the entire global market and think they will wind up winners.
They don’t understand economics. They understand how cons work.
Soprano2
Border crossings are down by a record amount, of course they’ll take credit for that. Isn’t he demanding that they stop fentanyl? That’ll never happen, but they’ll probably lie and say it did, and the MAGAs will believe them.
The only thing I know to do in the face of all this lying is to keep repeating the truth, over and over again. Like you said yesterday, keep pointing out his promises and asking if he actually did those things for you. I kept hearing from people that it was insulting for the Biden administration to say the economy was good because they knew from their own experience that the price of everything was high. I have to believe that this will still be true, that even if they keep telling people everything is great if prices soar people will know it.
NotMax
One Adelson. Sheldon sleeps with the fishes.
rikyrah
My thing is…these hot takes always wind up with some variant of we need to throw away this part of the Democratic Party coalition to chase after muthaphuckas that haven’t voted for us, as a majority, since 1964/1965.
And refuse to flatly state WHY THAT IS 🤬🤬🤬
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@BC in Illinois:
Why aren’t we invited? And why have I never heard of this brilliant idea? That sent me down a rabbit hole:
https://www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-a-bacon-wrapped-turkey-237557
JoyceH
After 9 days racketing around in a bus with a couple dozen people, I’m having a Hermit’s Thanksgiving. With all the Boomer convenience foods. Stovetop stuffing in a box, gravy in a jar, and cranberry sauce in a can.
Planetjanet
Like you, I have developed a severe allergy to hot takes. I am avoiding the TV news and opinion pieces. The self assured attitude of some is grating. Major pronouncements of massive failures and rethinkng our entire values in the face of a 1.5% loss is silly. Giving side eye to major media outlets is easy. It is harder when it is here in my refuge. Flanagan deserves a good point and laugh. Theissen has served up a couple of howlers. One thing that helps me is to meditate on one teaching of a great philosopher, the Big Lebowski.
https://youtu.be/j95kNwZw8YY?feature=shared
Splitting Image
@Anne Laurie:
I recognized the name but I had forgotten why I had remembered her as a dishonest hack worth ignoring. Now I’m thinking “Ah yes, the liberal pro-life advocate”.
The simplest explanation of how the Democrats lost is probably contained in the oft-quoted phrase “When abortion is on the ballot, we win”. The Republicans successfully took abortion off of the ballot by flooding the zone with bullshit. And then they won.
Add some words about inflation hurting incumbents around the world and you probably have covered 90% of what needs to be said about the election. No real need for hot takes.
Suburban Mom
Greetings from my temporary outpost in San Diego. My daughter, who is hosting, is a vegetarian so I’m roasting a dry-brined chicken with fresh herbs and handling any sides that involve meat. It is just 5 of us, including a vegetarian and a toddler. We’ve committed to collards, mashed potatoes, gravy, roasted mushrooms, and whatever looks beautiful at the farmers market. Desserts have been purchased from Azucar, a wonderful Cuban bakery.
Geminid
Sacramento’s KCRA reports that returns from Merced and Stanislause Counties havegiven Democrat Adam Gray a 182 vote lead ovr Rep. John Duarte. in California’s 13th CD. It looks like the composition of the next House of Reps. will be 220 Republicans, 215 Democrats.
rikyrah
@Kay:
That they threw Canada in there…when , not one of the border stories on Fox …ever mentioned Canada .none of those GOP muthaphuckas took a fraudulent trip to the Canadian border to look tough
They have never given two shyts about the Canadian border before yesterday 🤬🤬🤬
AM in NC
Flanagan has ALWAYS been a “cool girl” willing to attack women and feminism to sit with the bros at the Jock table. That she would continue to knock Democrats for “reasons” is no surprise.
I see her name and know I can ignore whatever the “hot take du jour” is being peddled. Why the Atlantic keeps platforming her is a mystery (Dear Reader, it is no mystery). I let my subscription lapse years ago and was thinking about picking it back up. Not any longer.
Ebony
@Suzanne: How about those of us who are single and don’t have kids? I went to a good University and I have a nice job, but I am single and don’t have kids, does my relationship status cancel my hard work out. I am tired of the latent disrespect people give single people.
Bruce K in ATH-GR
Thankfully I can avoid wingnuts over Thanksgiving (it helps that it’s only my immediate family celebrating here, and it’s not a big deal, although Black Friday has penetrated here). Christmas may be another matter. I do plan to voice my opinion on punching fascists, though (namely that you should use a baseball bat instead).
WereBear
Of course that cousin got bullied for good grades and met the wife at University if he was considered poor dating material as a result. So he didn’t get his high school girlfriend pregnant.
The best book about working class sociology I ever read was by a woman, who said most lower class people saw nothing in their future. So they would be determined to party until they wind up married via pregnancy. And they don’t use birth control, because boys don’t want to and the girls, often desperate for love, vaguely want someone to love.
One of the reasons I left that hometown is that I didn’t want to see the carnage unfold in real time, helpless.
I’m out of town and out of the mindset.
Kay
@Betty Cracker:
It is a great age. She’s tiny – I worried about her a little because daughter and spouse do “child led weaning” which means breast milk until she eats enough table food to replace it. My inclination is to FEED her but I have to say I think their way is better – their 4 year old is really healthy and she’ll eat anything you put in front of her.
NotMax
@Kay
Dolt 45 touted the NAFTA revision as the greatest thing since sliced sunlight.
Dolt 47 now whines that it sucks.
Suzanne
@sentient ai from the future:
Yeah.
It kind of blows my mind, though. Like, the constant bleating from MAGAts is about how college was pushed on everybody and trades are disrespected, but then they want educated libs to preach at them more?
They legit cannot fathom that we don’t want to preach at people, that we can mind our own damn business and we would like them to do the same.
Soprano2
@rikyrah: I’ve become increasingly frustrated with all the coded language out there. When a TCFG white voter says “He cares about people like me” I wish the reporter would dig deeper. “What specifically about you is it you think he cares about?”, is the kind of question they should ask. The truth is, these people think TCFG cares about white people like them, and that Democrats don’t care about white people. Full stop, that’s what it means, but they don’t want to say that out loud.
The idea that Democrats got “shellacked” is ludicrous. It’s true that we didn’t win, but we didn’t lose by that much either. “Shellacked” would be TCFG winning the popular vote by 3-4% and R’s having 40+ more House seats. Those things didn’t happen. It was basically a 50-50 election. I believe if she had a couple of more months to campaign she could have won.
WereBear
@rikyrah: Deadly ingenuousness. It’s on purpose.
Kay
@rikyrah:
So true. They’re completely mischaracterizing the letter from the Mexican President. We’re already at the point in this country where you have to read the source document – you can’t trust coverage of what’s in it.
Layer8Problem
@Chief Oshkosh: It’ll make for easier news generation. Acres of headlines in the Times and the Post saying “Trump Wins Again!” on the daily. Why? Because he said so without evidence, and they don’t analyze the news, they just transcribe. Actually they will analyze, in the thought-pieces asking how come Biden and the Democrats didn’t succeed as much as he does.
stinger
@Anne Laurie:
Bet you anything you like she has a nanny, to ensure that she doesn’t have to spend too much time with them or do too much of the not-fun stuff.
zhena gogolia
@sentient ai from the future: They never referred to Biden’s 2020 victory in such terms. Never.
AM in NC
Oh, RE: the Thanksgiving sides
Oyster dressing (stuffing, actually, but we call it dressing)
Sweet potatoes with praline topping
Rice and gravy
Green salad
Blueberry pie
The bread for the dressing was set out yesterday to stale; the turkey giblets are about to start boiling for stock, and my two sons and hubby will be helping me cook this afternoon and evening. YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Missing my Mama so very much.
NotMax
@comrade scotts agenda of rage
Served only once at a gathering of our gaming group years ago.
Sliced salt lick on a plate.
Jeffg166
The reason 11/5 happened was once again the Democrats didn’t turn out in the numbers they have to win every election. The coalition is great. The candidate was great. The platform was great.
Kay
On my most recent trip women from other countries were commiserating with me about how backward the US is on women’s rights. Most of them mentioned the Mexican President. Americans can’t really sneer at Mexico – we’re behind them. Love how she’s standing up to the douchebag, misogynist American Right wing and media.
Suzanne
@Ebony:
Instead of being resentful/envious, they seem to be deeply hostile toward people who don’t have kids, as well as single people who are financially independent and do things like go on nice vacations.
JML
@Josie: lot of variety in brine recipes, I think. salt (obviously), bay leaves, garlic, black peppercorns, and sugar are most common, but coriander, orange peel, and rosemary are frequent contributors as well. People play around with it.
My BIL is great roasting a bird, been doing it for over 20 years now, and never a dry one. Brining does make a difference.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@rikyrah:
Yup.
There are so many ways to slice the proverbial electoral pie when it comes to “finding” votes from various slices/sources, but the only one that seems to matter to Our (White) Media Betters is that particular one.
Chasing after them, 60 years after they fled, is reinforcing failure.
This kind of article, from that kind of “writer” is all too typical of the Atlantic. They’re all essentially variations of “Rich establishment conservatives like me would rather go fascist than tolerate brown people.” The reasons offered might differ but ultimately, it’s always looking for ‘reasons’ to continue justifying the Orange Fart Cloud’s political existence.
Hildebrand
@rikyrah: Exactly. The legacy media will continue to search for every reason (all mostly fictional) other than the most obvious.
It’s a willful ignorance that Occam shouted down almost a thousand years ago – Entia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatem – entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity. In this case – yes, it was the racism and sexism.
mrmoshpotato
@something fabulous:
You King’s Hawaiian hater! :)
My brother-in-law’s family are fans, and I’m sure a big bag will be around – along with Italian beef, a ham, a turkey, and more sides than I can list.
BlueGuitarist
Love all y’all.
Dorothy A. Winsor
I’m working on NOT letting Trump live rent-free in my head. When I wake up thinking about him, it’s time to do something different. So I watch/listen to a limited amount of news (a lot of it here) and then force myself to think about other things–something I read, my to-do list, which friend I haven’t talked to for a while and should call today.
Speaking of something I read, I just finished reading Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan. It’s short, maybe 80 pages, and set in Ireland in the 80’s. Part of the story is about the main character’s love for his family and the small pleasures he takes in his daily life with them in the lead up to Christmas. But the local convent is a Magdalen laundry, and on Christmas morning, the guy stumbles on a girl locked in a shed and has to decide what to do. Really, really well done
lowtechcyclist
@WereBear:
It’s one thing for them to believe that the Bible says there will be this Rapture event sometime in the indefinite future, but I just don’t grok believing that it’ll arrive in the next few decades, even. Even if the Rapture were a thing, why should this time be the special time?
Maybe it’s that I first heard about the Rapture back in the summer of 1971, and the vast majority of people who were alive then have since died of conventional causes.
Back when most people knew who Jimmy Hoffa was, I used to joke that the Rapture had already happened, and Hoffa was the only person Raptured, which is why his body has never been found.
Anyway, with another four years ahead of doing worse than nothing about global warming, I figure they get the Tribulation instead, and it won’t last for just seven years.
Layer8Problem
@BlueGuitarist: We love you too.
NotMax
Made a chocolate-chocolate chip sour cream cake yesterday.
Today will be sweet potato casserole and the cranberry relish. Contemplated making creamed spinach but looking in the fridge* realized there will be no space to keep it.
Will be puzzle enough to fit in the cake, cranberries, taters and pork chops in order to have leftovers.
*Would the abode had room for a full size refrigerator. C’est la viw.
WereBear
There is no fixing stupid. They believe in nothing and fall for anything.
One angle is that there has been some promise with early intervention for children with anti-social tendencies. They can easily be raised in group homes because family life has no effect on them, anyway. What does is consistent rewards for pro-social behavior, in clear and simple ways they can understand. Once they understand that things they value are actually at stake, like their own prestige, money, and freedom, they can be very motivated.
These are extreme examples of things we can scan for now, and I’m not saying anything should be decided upon them. But scan and behavior — we have some fixes for that now.
If such extremes can “see sense” by presenting it as something good for them, even these very challenged people can manage. They want to be admired. That turns out to be a powerful tool in the right hands.
We’ve been trying to teach MAGA that a modern and liberal life raises all boats. But they think anything we have must have been taken from them, and anything we do to actually help them only creates more resentment.
And what is the point of their boat being higher… if someone else’s boat isn’t full of holes?
They might have to suffer, and blame us, and suffer and blame us, until they get tired of it. This is the first time I’ve seen a PANIC.
They know. Deep down, they know they live a lie. But to admit that is existential anxiety that only those who deconverted from a Rapture cult understand.
They have no inner core to cling to. Never got a chance to build one. Now what? We can’t package that with Temu.
Baud
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Good attitude.
JML
@Ebony: I feel you. single people with no kids are often treated as second-class citizens for sure. Always presumed to be able to change their schedule at the last minute to accommodate everyone else (“you’re single, you have plenty of time!”), expected to adjust your vacation schedule at work to cover the people with kids, and if there’s a tax break for single people with no kids I can’t remember it.
I vote for all the school bonding issues, and I support help for families. But it is occasionally exhausting to have society treat my life as being lesser. (I had to put my foot down with my sister last year: no, I’m not extending my stay an extra day so your kid can get a free ride back to college because they don’t want to go back until sunday. If they want to ride with me on Sat, fine. But I need to have a sunday to catch up or my week is a mess and I’m not spending another night in a hotel to accommodate your kid.)
Soprano2
@Kay: I think it’s hilarious that they act like Mexico doesn’t have a say in anything. “We’re going to reinstate the ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy”, they say, forgetting that Mexico actually has to agree to that!
Cheryl from Maryland
I stopped reading anything with Caitlan Flangan’s byline in the early part of this century when she started writing essays about how career women exploit domestics, but it was okay for men to exploit their wives performing the same activities and that women lose something when they give up household work to others. She did admit that she experienced self-loathing since she hated household chores such as. making beds. She is an entitled asshat.
p.a.
I think they, as a group, have to get to and past “Army Group Steiner” territory via reality. Unfortunately that means the whole country has to collapse to that level as well. The cardboard box/sparrow/curtain rod meme; gotta get nearly there for Dems to get enough crossovers to win national elections. Post Noxin/Ford (Watergate and a semblance of media effectiveness), post HW (12 years of R, a sharp recession), post W (9/11/Iraq/Katrina/SS privatization/the Great Recession), post tRump/covid.
The hardcore want the full cardboard box society.
Kay
Our new Gen Z lawyer asked me to read a document he wrote to file in a case. He misunderstood the whole premise of this document so I wrote him a quick instruction about what it’s for and how to think about it. I can’t Just edit it – its too far off. This is fine, btw. I wouldn’t expect him to know this. He just texted me a pix of my note and asked if he could PAY me to write it. I don’t think he understands how any of this works. I’m not responding to this text. Its due on 12/2. He’ll either file it or he wont. This is how I feel about the US electorate. Sink or swim.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Since the last I heard was the President of Mexico telling Trump he could go fuck himself on the tariff, sounds for those keeping score, so far this the third defeat Trump has had and he hasn’t even taken office yet; Gaetz, Trump only needing one day to end Russo-Ukraine War, and now tariffs.
My bet is immigration and that Neo-Nazi he wants to head the DoD is next. I suppose the on going Russo-Ukraine War means the US-China war will be postponed.
Take the victory and consider the irony that it’s the billionaires who are saving our asses.
Anyway, I really think our side needs to sort of out stuff like immigration were it’s the really the rich’s problem, and stuff we really want, like say trans-rights (and even then, rich people have trans kids, I mean look at Emo Musk)
Rose Judson
@Anne Laurie:
Gotta agree with AL here: I try to forget Caitlin Flanagan exists, although in my case the health risk is that I might grind my molars into splinters.
I had a subscription to The Atlantic because I wanted to support Adam Serwer and Ed Yong, but I got tired of having to wade through 50,000 articles about woke students at elite colleges for every one of their thought-provoking pieces.
beckya57
@Anne Laurie: I’ve loathed her for years, your description is quite accurate. I finally got fed up and cancelled the Atlantic after the election. I’ve completely cut off the MSM, they’ve become thorough enablers for the corrupt oligarch/GOP class.
TBone
@mrmoshpotato: I have a roasted brussel sprouts glaze recipe that is simply drizzling them with good balsamic vinegar and honey and EVOO. Surprisingly delish.
mrmoshpotato
@NotMax:
Wait a minute. Why are the fishes also burning in Hell?
linnen
In all honesty, I rather doubt they understand how cons work beyond “Look! A Squirrel! *proceeds with mugging*” and MLM/Ponzi scams.
Another Scott
@Kay: “You just tell them and they believe. They just do.” – JDT.
His superpower is convincing the MSM that every utterance and every mouth noise he makes is news.
As you say, it isn’t.
Reality distortion fields only work if people hear them and believe them.
We have agency. We don’t have to listen to that noise. Reality always gets a vote, and we can work to make a better reality (and slow down and prevent a worse reality).
It’s going to be a long slog. Eyes on the prizes. Hang in there, everyone.
Best wishes,
Scott.
BlueGuitarist
“Shellacking” was Obama’s term for losing 63 seats in the US House.
Republicans lost house seats in 2024, despite stealing 3 via gerrymandering N.C.
Cook Political Report’s National Popular Vote Tracker has Trump at 49.83%
AP has him at 50.0%
omitting write-in votes to reduce the total.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Cheryl from Maryland:
That’s a requirement to write for the Atlantic.
mrmoshpotato
@BC in Illinois:
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Now I want a bacon-wrapped turkey leg at 8AM! 😠😋
Scott
Yes, but Trump will not take his 400K salary. So it’s even.
Kay
CNN has “ Musk threatens to cut federal workforce, terrifying workers”
You can almost FEEL how much they enjoy the prospect of terrified workers – media fucking LOVE these douchebags. They’re thrilled Donald Trump and his corrupt crew will be knocking some heads together.
It reminds me of how they were all fist bumping when they lied us into invading Iraq. “Fuck yeah! Slaughter some Iraqis!”
I read CNN viewership is down 40%. Good. They can talk to each other.
Betty Cracker
@Anne Laurie: I find Flanagan frustrating because she’s not stupid and she’s a talented writer, and yet she’s devoted her career to peddling nonsense. McArdle is genuinely dumb and a hack, so her I understand. But when Flanagan writes about topics other than politics, e.g., dealing with cancer and getting older, she can be insightful and funny. So I suspect she must know reflexive contrarianism is cheap bullshit. I guess the pay is good though.
Soprano2
So as for Thanksgiving, I’m making a German chocolate cake because that’s the cake mix I have on my shelf. :-) We’re going to my niece’s house, and it’ll be chaos because the stuff his family does is always like that. I’m used to it now. We had Thanksgiving at our house when there were fewer of us because we wanted to control the madness, but now I don’t have the bandwidth for that (and I’m afraid to let him cook a turkey now, who knows if he can actually remember how to do it. His turkey was great). There are too many of us for that now because our house is too small to host 20 people at a sit-down dinner. It’s my oldest niece’s first holiday season since her hubby died in May, that’s going to be tough for her.
I made two kinds of cookies for our work dinner today – chocolate chip and cookies with Heath Bar toffee in them. That batter is dry and stiff because it only calls for 1/2 cup of butter instead of a full cup. Maybe that’s because of the toffee, I’m not sure.
catclub
Put that kid to work early!
Leto
@Soprano2: You know who does that, does the follow up questions? Jordan Klepper, from the Daily Show. He does it in that disarming way that just has them keep talking, letting their own words/thoughts come out on the subject. He’ll also point out the contradiction, and you can see their brain break in real time. But just as quickly the programming kicks back in and they’re back on script.
Food: Avalune and I are heading out in just a bit to pick up the turkey breast (just the two breasts on the carcass, no legs/thighs/wings) from the farmers market. I ordered it last week. Sides: going super simple this year. Mashers, my bechemel mac’n’cheese with guanciale, and green beans. I picked up a small ham to cut up and put in the green beans (along with onions and garlic), and because the kid doesn’t like turkey (@suzanne) and just wants ham. Have King Hawaiian rolls at the ready, bottle of Chianti, and both an apple crumble pie and pecan pie, with accompanying Tillamook vanilla bean ice cream, and moscato.
There are times I miss hosting all my airmen for Thanksgiving, because I did like having a full house, and I loved making sure they had a great meal and a good time. But I’m also thankful that I don’t have spend half the day cooking.
Edit: I’m brining the turkey for 24 hours using Alton Brown’s ultra-reliable recipe. I’ve used that for almost 30 years now and no reason to change excellence now.
Scamp Dog
I’m bringing Brussels sprouts to my friend’s dinner tomorrow. First they go into the pan with butter, then add salt, spices and a little chicken broth.
@JoyceH: I did the gravy from a jar last year, when I was making Thanksgiving for my mom who was in a long term care facility. I tarted it up with the drippings from the chicken thighs that I had baked, and it was great. I did a box of Stovetop as well, since I was making the meal all on my own for the two of us, and was great too.
So I’m sure you’ll have a wonderful meal!
WereBear
@Betty Cracker: Someone has to be paid to diaper those cute toddlers. She has a big important job!
There’s selling your talent, and then there’s selling out, as they say.
Soprano2
It’s such an article of faith among the public that people who work for the government don’t actually do anything important. Most of them have no idea what we actually do, or how important we actually are. What do they think restaurant kitchens would be like if there were no health inspections? Who would pave and maintain the streets? It’s so idiotic, government workers are just like workers everywhere else. The dirty little secret, as someone else said here in the past couple of days, is that they’ll contract out that work for more money and less control over it. People think the private sector solves everything, but it doesn’t.
Speaking of, I’ve got work to do, see ya later.
sab
Caitlin Flanagan is why I didn’t renew my Atlantic subscription after reading it for years.
WereBear
I’m doing a chuck roast, because delicious and easy, and a specialty strawberry shortcake from the baker, and cheese sauce on cauliflower, pre-made but good quality.
That’s my idea of holiday cooking. And brisket is better the second day, anyway :)
NotMax
@Kay
Bet the shivering tiny fisherman was not pleased .
:)
Anyway
One of the wingnuts at my workplace stopped by my office to say happy Thanksgiving and added isn’t it wonderful that Trump’s victory has made a peace-deal between Hezbollah and Israel possible. That was never in the cards before. Kill me now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Soprano2
@Leto: I love Jordan Klepper, and that’s why. I think it works for him because most of them think he’s one of them, so they’re not on guard. It’s beautiful, what he does. I wish the real press would do more of it. I remember the WaPo article I read a few years ago where the female prison guard told a reporter that she didn’t think TCFG would hurt “people like me”. There was no follow-up question “Who did you think he was going to hurt?”, which seems to me to be the most obvious follow-up question in the world!
WereBear
@Anyway: It helps me to remember that, deep down, they do know what the truth is.
All I have to do is look at them and they look away. Let them lie to themselves.
Don’t lie to me.
Soprano2
@Anyway: Unfortunately he’s right about that, because Netanyahu was never going to agree to a peace deal unless TCFG won the election. You know he deliberately kept the wars going just to hurt BIden and Harris.
Omnes Omnibus
T-day in my family is at my brother’s place. My parents bring the stuffed turkey, a cranberry-apple relish, and the pies. My brother and s-i-l do the veggies* and the set-up/clean-up. I am going up to my parents’ house later today. I’ll help my dad get the turkey and stuffing ready.**
*Mashed potatoes, roasted heirloom carrots, and some version of roasted Brussels sprouts.
**The divorced, out-of-town guy isn’t expected to bring much other than charm and the ability to open bottles.
Suzanne
@Soprano2:
Amazing how they just want to hurt everyone they’re mad at.
It’s pathological.
Rose Judson
Man, I miss being at home for Thanksgiving. It was possible to go back until The Child started school; you can get fined for taking kids out of school in term time without a good reason, and apparently “visiting your immigrant mother’s family for a national holiday” is not sufficient.
I’m going to a Friendsgiving on Saturday, though. One of my grad skool classmates is dating a nice Italian-American boy from Seaside Heights, NJ. I’m going to make a cheesecake with gingersnap crust and buy some toffee sauce from a local shop. Brownies for the kids (this, BTW, is my favourite recipe).
Doc Sardonic
@Kay: Media has been doing that for the last 50+ years at least. I remember as a teenager my father, who never swore much beyond the occasional shit or damn, was listening to Jimmy Carter’s State of the Union and relapsed into his rarely seen WWll Army Air Corps persona. This occurred when I think, Roger Mudd, came on to give his take on what President Carter said. At that point my father lost his mind and launched into profanity laden rant about Mr. Mudds family background and the fact that he was probably in the front row of the church picking at his rear end while his parents said their vows, then alluded to the fact that he was likely his own uncle or grandfather. This was because dad had listened to the entire speech and a respected journalist was completely distorting the entire speech. Then after the rant he apologized and gave me a piece of advice that I have followed to this day, always check the source material, that way you know what is happening and don’t need someone to tell you.
Another Scott
I heard a bit of a “news story” by one of the NPR political “gurus” a few days ago on one of their top-of-the-hour reports. Breaking news!!11ONE He was talking about the difficulty in extending DJT’s electoral wins to a post-DJT world. He was getting way, way ahead of his colleagues in the hot-take race!!
Biden is still president for 54 days, but they want us to be thinking right now about the GQP difficulties in a post-DJT political world.
[ head-desk, head-desk, head-desk ]
Too many of them want us to think that Democrats are powerless, that mostly all that matters is DJT, that all is right with the world again with the GQP “rightfully” in power. Don’t fall for it.
—
Thanksgiving? We’re doing the easy thing again – https://meals2go.com/browse-menu/Ready-to-Heat – Holiday Turkey Meal. It was pretty good last year, and no mountain of leftovers.
Hang in there, everyone. Enjoy the holiday!
Best wishes,
Scott.
Leto
@Josie: Here’s a 20 min video on it. It’s really simple, not a lot of work. Brian Langerstrom roast turkey brine video. He shows a version at the end where you brine day of, and it’ll still be good. I do a 24 hour brine which is, imo, is plenty. Enjoy!
mrmoshpotato
@Scott:
That was found to be bullshit, wasn’t it?
I vaguely remember something about donating it to charity which would’ve been illegal, or something like that.
Betty Cracker
@Omnes Omnibus: My hubby is having TG at his mom’s place with his siblings, nieces and nephews, etc. I asked him if they’d requested a side dish from him, and he said, “Of course not. I’m a man!”
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Anyway: That wingnut showed up explicitly to say that to you. That’s who they are.
Layer8Problem
@Kay:
Great, presumably that will translate into viewership, since they apparently think we’re all dying to hear about “What have those rascals done today? We’re on the scene filming the bodies and the maimed but moving.”
Has Fox seen corresponding big big increases, since teevee news must be a zero-sum game? Rhetorical question, I don’t intend to look. Did the Post get back those who canceled? Has the Times lost readers? I figure the Times won’t deign to tell, just say readership isn’t the important thing for The Newspaper of Record. If the Times starts touting their new Page 6 Girl feature we’ll have a clue.
sab
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I love your reading suggestions. Once again, thank you.
mrmoshpotato
@Kay:
Too early in the morning for CNN to fuck themselves with rusty pitchforks?
Layer8Problem
@Soprano2: I thought Biden kept the wars going just to hurt Biden and Harris.
NotMax
@Another Scott
Heresy.
Leftovers are the best part of the meal!
@Leto
You’re in Reading, right?
Suspect Shady Maple (more or less in the area) will be packed to the rafters.
;)
Another Scott
@Layer8Problem: No, no. Obama and Harris kept the war going so DJT could get his Nobel Peace Prize. Something something all the same.
HTH!!1
[ obama-shrug.gif ]
Best wishes,
Scott.
Kay
@NotMax:
She will be so snuggly in it. Sometimes when her parents go out I feed her baby cereal because I love feeding them (and she might be starving). My daughter knows immediately, just from my face when they ask if she ate. Child led weaning sounds fishy to me :)
Ramalama
@rikyrah:
Canadian news was saying just that. Which makes me think Trump wants Canada and Mexico to go to war or just stop being in any kind of alliance.
Leto
@NotMax: we are! We went there a few months ago just to experience it, did the breakfast buffet. I mean, it’s a buffet. Nothing particularly special, or good, about it. But it was interesting to see.
evodevo
@Suzanne:
Yes, this…the relatives who stayed in Eastern Ky will constantly diss the family member who migrated to Cincinnati/Northern KY, got an education and a good job, married well etc. etc. They are jealous to the core about his “good luck”, and talk about him deserting the home place… Seen it tons of times among my husband’s Appalachian bunch…
Anyway
I see maybe two movies a year but some friends talked me into going to see Wicked tomorrow. it’s the early showing then back to my place for filet mignon with chimichurri, twice baked potato, creamed spinach, salad, cabernet — my (two) guests are bringing dessert. No leftovers was my main objective in designing the menu – I’ll be out of town most of December and don’t want anything in the fridge when I’m gone.
Kay
One woman dying of a miscarriage in Ireland after she was denied medical care due to religious dogma on abortion rallied that whole country – and changed laws.
Women die due to medical care being denied every week in the US now – media doesn’t even cover it. Backwards, far Right country. Just about every other country beats the US on metrics for women.
Sink or swim. Looks to me like we’re sinking. Call me to volunteer again when voters get their heads out of their asses. I’m not their mommy.
Geminid
The lead story on the 9am CBS radio news described bumper-to-bumper traffic in southern Lebanon. People are heading back to their homes in the wake of the ceasefire that went into effect at 4am local time.
Both the Lebanese and Israeli armies have asked them to hold off until the Lebanese Army can deploy, and Hezbollah and the IDF withdraw from lands south of the Litani River, but evidently the residents think the ceasefire will hold and they aren’t waiting.
frosty
No mention that anti-choice laws means D&Cs are illegal which means women miscarrying die?
ETA: We’re bringing a coconut cake (purchased) and a bottle of wine. My brother cooks two turkeys and his in-laws bring more snacks, appetizers and side dishes than you can imagine. There’s not a lot of extra room on the buffet table for us to do much.
Starfish
@Ebony: Republicans are jealous of Oprah also. They resent her for telling them to read, but they might like the quacks she floated on the world.
NotMax
@Leto
Thing that most made the mouth water upon seeing videos about the place was the tray of duck legs at the lunch and the dinner buffet.
Lived for a time during the 1970s on a sprawling farm (mail address RFD Infinity) in the wilds of Sinking Spring. Used to frequent the frozen foods factory outlet (in Wyomissing?).
Wishing you and yours a happy pagoda.
:)
Betty Cracker
@NotMax: Another thing to be thankful for — appreciate the reminder!
BellyCat
Have to get rid of Citizens United. Somehow.
But…. We lost due to high interest rates. So, too, has every other incumbent globally under the same condition in the past 100 years. It’s really that simple.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Layer8Problem: It doesn’t surprise me that MSNBC has lost viewership in the last few weeks. We’re not watching it as much, but that’s not because we disagree or disapprove of what they say. It’s because we can’t stand watching ANY news right now.
@sab: I hope you like it. I was surprised by how much it engaged me.
Geminid
@BlueGuitarist: I want to go examine the various House seats we won and lost this year. I think we picked up some we’ll keep, like Janelle Bynum’s in OR05 and Derek Tran’s in CA45.
Mary Peltol’s loss in Alaska hurts though. She was one of the Class of 2022 Demorats who impressed me the most. But it looks like Watergirl new Congresswoman, Nikki Budzinski has a firm grip on IL13. Budzinski is another impressive Class of ’22 member.
dr. luba
Our family is a mix of carnivores, vegans, vegetarians and a nephew with celiac. We have a potluck; those coming bring the salads, desserts and sides usually. I have no idea what the menu is, as I’m not hosting, but I have been assigned roasted garlic and peanut noodles. I make two batches of the noodles, regular and with rice noodles.
Unfortunately, we also have a mix of Trumpers and normal people. There is a no politics rule at family gatherings, but we do have one cousin who usually breaks it if he’s around. He now lives in Wisconsin, so I’m hoping he’s not there. And, if they start up, I am fully prepared to leave.
Geminid
@Soprano2: I think Netanyahu kept these wars going to save his own ass, and his domestic political position dominatied his decision making. A Donald Trump victory wasn’t going to help him much there, and I don’t think it will.
Soprano2
@Kay: When I do see those stories, there are always comments from the antis that it’s because of malpractice, because obviously the law doesn’t say they have to let people die, or they blame it on the woman because she took the abortion pills and then needed help. They have convinced themselves that these laws only prevent the “bad” women who want abortions for the “wrong” reasons from getting one, and that the “good” women who need an abortion for the “right” reason can still get one. They are completely clueless about how the law actually works.
This country doesn’t think women’s problems are important, or else this would be covered a lot.
RevRick
@Baud: The narrative that Democrats got shellacked in this election doesn’t stand the smell test. Let’s not forget that a black/Asian woman was a last minute rescue attempt substituting for a white man, and she has garnered the third highest vote total ever, and only trails Trump by less than 2.4 million votes and 1.55%. That does not constitute a shellacking.
There were three drags on the Democrats this year:
1). Inflation . Yeah, I know it’s moderating, but the effects and memory still linger, and few incumbent parties escaped the wrath of voters;
2). Crime. Yeah, again I know it’s moderating, but the trauma of the huge upsurge in 2020, which got pinned on Democrats, has shaken affected communities;
3). Immigration. There’s a thoughtful piece over at Dailykos under today’s Abbreviated Pundit Roundup, which points out that Democrats have made a decade-long category error in not more forcefully opposing illegal immigration. We lost Latino voters, because in this their sentiments align with the general public. While our message has strongly been a pathway to citizenship, for Latinos it comes down to first stop illegal immigration, then provide a pathway to citizenship. Trump had a huge credibility advantage on this issue. Latinos favor building a fence along the border!
The article goes on to say that Democrats need to be careful with how they respond to Trump’s mass deportations. If he only rounds up and deports criminals amongst the millions who have come here across the border, Democrats should applaud and note this continued what the Biden administration was trying to do. Democrats should hold there fire until the Republicans overreach and start deporting refugees who fled violence and breaking up families. Defend only the clearly defensible, because that aligns with Latino voters and the general public.
Soprano2
@Geminid: Sure that was a lot of it, but he didn’t want any kind of a ceasefire that would help the Biden administration, because he wants TCFG back as our president.
Kay
@Soprano2:
The Israeli public also overwhelmingly support Trump – they are one of the few countries polled where the public hoped Trump won. Joe Bidens blank check got him absolutely nothing, other than a horrible humanitarian legacy.
Geminid
The Harrisonburg, Virginia radio station’s lead item was the approval of 900 new residential units, 46 single family and the balance multi-family units.. “Quarry Heights” is an infill project built around the defunct Frasier quarry, which will be turned into a lake.
dc
Who reads idiots like Flanagan? I’ve never understood why she has a job writing anything.
dc
@mrmoshpotato: These assholes don’t know what charities are. Everything is a grift for them.
Omnes Omnibus
@dc: She gets rage clicks.
Kay
@Soprano2:
66% of Israelis supported Trump when polled in October. An outlier internationally. Netanyahu knew exactly what he was doing. He’s more popular than ever – he’ll probably remain firmly in power another 17 years. They’ve had more democratic backsliding than the US, which is saying something. One corrupt leader for 17 years should have been a red flag. Prime Minister For Life.
Anyway
@RevRick: Obama administration deported large numbers of undocumented people with criminal records without any positive mentions from MSM, RThugs and even Ds. of course they did it in a thoughtful and careful manner but large numbers were deported to their home countries.
I know people here hate doomers but I don’t now any other way to respond to this election. I read here so often that all the legislative victories of the Biden administration and the clownish misbehavior of the R-led House would cost them seats, win us the House and losing that really hurts. Having control of the House and Senate is a huge win for Cheetolini – the margin is immaterial.
different-church-lady
Say, this Flanagan woman sounds like an idiot.
mrmoshpotato
@dc:
Oh, I know. I just don’t want to look up the details about how donating the salary was bullshit.
Llelldorin
@Suzanne: A thousand times this. They’re all Willy Loman, trying to understand why Bernard’s a lawyer and resenting every minute of it.
UncleEbeneezer
@dc: She bashes Dems. That’s it. There’s a substantial market for that sort of thing. From what I remember from some earlier jaw-droopingly bad takes during Trump 1.0, she’s very much in the class-not-race camp in her critiques. IE- scared of the “woke” boogie-man in the same way Republicans are. But I could be mistaken. I tuned her out long ago.
mrmoshpotato
@Dorothy A. Winsor: You want to hear MSNBC idiots flapping their jaws for hours about Dump’s cabinet nominations?
Leto
@NotMax: we live right on the boarder of Readinf and Wyomissing. Sinking Springs is about 10-15 away. Don’t think the frozen factories are still there, but we have three good farmer’s markets so can’t really complain. You have a good one as well :)
RileysEnabler
I’m still avoiding all MSM of any flavor. Just can’t. Not yet. Also trying to form the habit that just because it slops outta the Orange Turd’s gob does not make it a necessity to hear. Nope.
Doing a Friendsgiving this year to avoid familial MAGATs. I’m bringing cranberries in Port with orange, cream cheese mashed potatoes and a new-to-me recipe for bacon wrapped green beans. Bananas Foster bread pudding for dessert. I can’t wait! Good friends, decent wine and yummy chow- and not a WORD of politics.
Starfish (she/her)
@Dorothy A. Winsor: My book group read that, and I found it so difficult to read. The wife wanted the husband to look after the family that had numerous children, and the husband looked like he was out wandering the world. And no one was happy in this land that didn’t have abortion.
marcopolo
Just seeing who the author of that piece was was enough for me. She’s been on my not worth reading list for at least half a decade now. I only have so much time & she’s not worth mine. Similar to Megan McCardle (and many others).
Have a nice T-day everyone.
Paul in KY
@The Thin Black Duke: I’m damned scared there will be another pandemic.
Paul in KY
@rikyrah: I wonder why….
Paul in KY
@AM in NC: She has the ‘Maureen Dowd Chair’ at the Atlantic.
Gretchen
The name Caitlin Flanagan at the top of the piece is a guarantee that it will be a stupid take. She’s never had a good one
Paul in KY
@lowtechcyclist: It’s because they all (mostly) have mundane humdrum lives and they are also narcissists, so of course this monumental miracle would happen during their worthless lives.
Dave
@sab: For me it was Micheal Kelley. I did tell them it was a shame to lose the HUMMV and driver though
dnfree
@Anne Laurie: Absolutely agree about Caitlin Flanagan. I have very rarely agreed with her on something, and most of the time I wind up ranting incoherently after reading one of her articles. She doesn’t make me smarter, she just makes me mad.
Shantanu Saha
I made a double batch of cranberry chutney, half to bring to my school’s staff potluck this past Monday, the other half to bring to my parents’ house tomorrow. This year my son did most of the cooking (I did all of the prep work).
dnfree
@BC in Illinois: DO NOT set any kind of pine tree on fire, ever. One year we decided to burn our tree in the garden after Christmas—thought that might be fun. No kidding, the flames shot at least 20 feet in the air instantly, and it’s lucky the garden wasn’t near the house. Never did that again.
Paul in KY
@evodevo: In general, you have to be a dipshit to want to stay in Eastern KY. My dad was from Pike County and got the hell out as soon as he could.
Paul in KY
@Kay: I don’t think Pres. Biden gave them a ‘blank check’ like TFG will.
frosty
@Anne Laurie: I subscribed to The Atlantic from the 70s until the early 2000s when the articles were getting a bit weird. The one that pushed me over the edge was something about how torturing Gitmo prisoners was a good idea. Sleeplessness, loud music, extreme temperatures etc.
I read good articles here and elsewhere and think I should subscribe again. Then I see your comment and all the others here and nope out again. I don’t need to pay to get pissed off.
RevRick
@Anyway: Oh, I know it hurts. But all those legislative accomplishments are meaningless if the general public doesn’t know. We need to market them the way Coke markets itself. Publicly and relentlessly.
As for Obama deporting millions that seldom registered, because it was always done with the sense of “well, if I have to.”
The fact is, Democrats this year were facing tremendous headwinds around the issues of inflation, crime and immigration. Harris made a valiant attempt to get herself on the right side of these.
prostratedragon
Just me this year, so I’m doing Cornish hens. Made cranberry jam last night. Was supposed go be fresh cranberries, but left them to simmer for a few minutes, which turned into more than half-hour while I persuaded myself that I was just smelling the rich after-aroma. Saved it just before it turned into caramel, and with a little water stirred in wasn’t half bad on yogurt. I might, howwver, try again tonight, with a timer alarm.
That and the bird joined by cornbread dressing and grilled asparagus. Turnovers for dessert.
AnonPhenom
Dems have a billionaire problem all right…the problem is our billionaires aren’t opening their wallets and funding an actual Liberal Media.
As far as campaign donations go…
Top 7 donors this cycle were all in the GOP camp.
Kay
@Paul in KY:
I don’t know what this means. 20,000 children are dead. Gaza is being ethnically cleansed – right now. Universities and hospitals are gone. A tiny trickle of humanitarian aid gets in – they’re starving. The US has thumbed their nose not just at international laws of war but also US law. We have zero credibility on this in huge swathes of the world. At a certain point these comparisons just become offensive. It’s very, very bad and it will ripple for generations.
Kay
@Paul in KY:
It’s bad enough that some Democratic Senators finally acted to cut off funding. It’s too late – the damage has been done and there weren’t enough of them anyway but that’s how bad it is. US media cover only a small fraction of what international media do.
prostratedragon
@frosty:
I think I remember that article. For a while that magazine and I were going in opposite.directions, but the move from Boston to DC in 2005 was like a deathknell to me.
Bill Arnold
Ten pounds of mashed potatoes.
Butter (at least 2 sticks), milk (low-fat is OK; butter compensates), onion flakes, garlic powder, salt, pepper. Basically, the Joy of Cooking recipe.
(Probably won’t bring all ten pounds, though.)
Seanly
A couple of things –
First I want to say f*ck E1on for singling out some female Federal employees on his Nazi-adjacent social media site. Of course, it’s women coz only women get odd sounding senior positions. If you look at one or two positions out of context, of course they are going to seem very niche & hard to understand their point.
Example – I’ve worked in 2 of the largest engineering firms in the world over the last 13 years. My current company only recently got someone into an admin position to assist with our regional district’s efforts to work with Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (DBE’s, minority or women-owned, can also be veteran owned). Many of our public clients (DOTs, Federal) require DBE’s get a percentage of our contracts (15% becoming the norm). Many of my coworkers in my Boise office are conservative & of course poopoo having a DBE Coordinator but then bitch & moan about not be able to find qualified DBE partners for projects. So before we go around punting Fed employees based on odd-sounding job titles maybe we should look at things. But the point is to sow chaos and stop the “wrong” people from having jobs or from getting funds/loans/assistance from the government.
2nd item – Thanksgiving. I have a long running D&D group (several campaigns over the last 8 years) & invited a few over for dinner. One guy is a later child of a big Mormon family & is an election refugee. Plus another 2 folks & 1 partner from the group are also coming over. My wife said she was going to butcher the turkey & I said isn’t it dead already? She laughed & said she wants to try where the different parts are cooked for different times so white meat doesn’t get overcooked. When my Mom was a later-life grad student, she’d have fellow grad students over for Turkeyday so it’s a welcoming tradition my wife & I honor in our way.
We’ll be watching football games and also playing card games. If it’s okay, I would like to make a pitch for a Rummy style game called Five Crowns – it is our go-to when we’re not able to play D&D. OMG so much fun. Hard to shuffle the 100+ cards but lots of fun.
Sloegin
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Don’t bite the hand that might feed you someday.
Avalune
We are not going anywhere for Thanksgiving because we have plans to visit for Christmas but I did take my cranberry pear compote to the work Friendsgiving – my husband won’t let me make any other kind. And I usually make Paste deli Mandorla for desert with candied cherries because the poor gluten free people at work usually get screwed on desert.
Misterpuff
@Planetjanet:
The thing I found most disheartening at the time (and even now to a degree) is that the calling of the states went so early and with almost dispassionate calm in the MSM. That made it seem like it was a blowout and to us progressive political nerds a unbelievable shock. Now we know it was much closer than the perception, but we all are suffering from PTSD in regards to the result.
Juju
@Rose Judson: I glanced at the recipe for the best brownies but stopped when I read the words white chocolate. It’s not chocolate and it’s an abomination and an insult to actual chocolate. Also I do realize I could leave that out, but I already have an excellent recipe for brownies, which I’m not in the mood to eat anyway. I’m not usually that way, but there ya go.
Juju
@Ramalama: I think Trump’s issue with Canada is that the Third Lady has a thing for Trudeau the hottie.
AM in NC
@frosty: Same here (although I started my subscription in the early 90s). I was thinking of re-upping, but I won’t support garbage takes like this.
Just stop, real-world media. Just. Stop. Platforming. Asshole. Bad. Faith. Actors.
It isn’t edgy or cool. It’s fucked up and harmful.
UncleEbeneezer
@Rose Judson: I hate the anti-Woke bullshit there too. Which is frustrating because there are some very good writers at The Atlantic on Israel/Palestine who manage to be:
1.) pro-Israel and
2.) willing to criticize the toxic Anti-Zionism/antisemitism of the Left, while also
3.) advocating for 2SS, peace and self-determination for Palestinians.
A perspective I would like to see much more of among Dems (Kamala did this very well, imo). But then it also hosts a bunch of authors who peddle the anti-Woke/DEI/CRT shit too, which is frustrating.
Paul in KY
@Kay: Just wait, Kay.
TBone
Holee crap, this is just how Jesus would want us to celebrate, right?
https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/27/24307517/walmart-roku-channel-jingle-bell-love-christmas-shopping-movie
I am already bah! humbugging. Had to go out to get some home goods (water filters for fridge, new calendar, other assorted crap) today and all the stores were out of red velvet bows for my outside wreaths (current bows faded from sun) and it’s not even December yet. Michael’s craft store even out of red bows? Yup! Crikey, my last stop, Big Lots, had a few wrinkled specimens left…now extra wrinkled because the checkout clerk stuffed them into a too small bag.
I’m not leaving the house again until January.
StringOnAStick
@Geminid: I’m happy to have Janelle Bynum as my representative now, I invested the majority of my political giving and activities in her campaign.
prostratedragon
@Suburban Mom:
The lady sang, “¡Azúcar!”
Citizen Alan
@Suzanne: Except for the wife part, you have just described my sister to a T. She bitterly resents the fact that she spent 25 years as a 4th grade teacher while I quit teaching after 3 years for law school and my first law job (a low-paying shit job with the MS supreme court that I started b/f passing the Bar) paid more than a 30year teacher with a doctorate made at that time.
Geminid
@StringOnAStick: Janelle Bynum has an interesting biography. She was born Janelle Sojourner Irick in Washington, D.C. and earned a degree in Electrical Engineering at Florida A&M. Then she went to work for GM and earned an MBA at the U. of Michigan.
Bynum was working in Japan at the beginning of the century, but a few years later she and her husband moved to the Portland area to help with his mother’s McDonald’s franchises. That’s when Bynum started getting involved in politics.
Citizen Alan
@Suzanne: I actually start with kraft mac & cheese to make my baked mac & cheese. Prepare the box as normal and then add actual cheese in addition to the powdered crap plus dried mustard and a tempered egg before putting it into a 9×9 greased pan and back it. Add a mix of bread crumbs, parmesan, Italian seasoning and butter for the topping.
Or does your daughter want Kraft because she specifically wants it “cheesy.” Because the texture of gooey M&C is just gross to me. YMMV.
Citizen Alan
@WereBear:
Shorter WereBear: The GOP is a fucking death cult.
Citizen Alan
@AM in NC: There has been nothing in the Atlantic of any value since Ta-Nehisi Coates left, IMO. It’s the magazine that first gave Megan “Jane Galt” McArdle a platform. I am still proud of getting banned from the Atlantic comments section for 30 days for calling her a sociopath.
Miss Bianca
@Kay: This phenomenon is literally (well, close enough anyway) making me crazy. I am this close from putting a tea cozy on my head and declaring myself to be a teapot.
Citizen Alan
@lowtechcyclist: I have this embryonic idea for a satirical novel that parodies Left Behind, only the Antichrist is Trump because God thought it would be funny to pick as the Antichrist the dumbest, most repulsive, and most blatantly in-your-face immoral person he could find but package him in a way that sanctimonious, self-righteous RW Christians would be the ones to propel him to power. The Mark of the Beast came in the form of a red MAGA hat.
Citizen Alan
@Kay: Am I to understand that a new hire at your firm is offering to pay you to do a job assigned to him because he doesn’t know how to do it? What, out of his own pocket? Which of you is going to bill for those hours? Not doubting you that it happened, but such a strange request.
Citizen Alan
@mrmoshpotato: They were sinful fishes.
Citizen Alan
@Anyway: In a way, Trump’s win has made a peace deal possible. I absolutely believe that the desire to see Trump back in office was a factor in the decision-making of both Netanyahu and, to a lesser extent, Hamas.
Citizen Alan
I can top that. My D&D group is having a Friendsgiving tomorrow. We’re gonna eat around noon and then play D&D for six hours or so.
RevRick
@TBone: The loudest bah-humbugs were made by Boston Puritans, who banned the celebration of Christmas from 1659-1681. New England Puritan colonies generally imposed fines for refusing to work on December 25th, if it fell on Monday-Saturday. And they were mostly meh about it until the mid 19th century.
TBone
At various stores today, I stuck both arms/hands up in the air at checkout and declared that I was the victim of a stickup. Many laughs ensued and one lady said to hubby “Assume the position!”
Hubby also tried on a red fuzzy cowboy/bush hat with white furry trim edging and a black belt & buckle for a hatband. I guess you had to see it but I almost plotzed. He looked like Crocodile Dundee on a bender!
TBone
@RevRick: well then, that settles it – I am a product of my ancestry!
MEH I say!
PS never bring a marriage license to a stickup!
TBone
@Miss Bianca: I think you’re on to something there. I’ma be a pothead with my stock pot.
Emily B.
Haven’t read this piece, but I’ve read Caitlin Flanagan before. If she tells you to do something, do the opposite.
sab
@Paul in KY: Your comment made me laugh out loud.
Martin
@RevRick: I think the real problem on 3) is that Democrats still stereotype latino issues rather than engage directly with them. Say what you will about the makeup of the democratic base, the consultants that produce the campaign policy and strategy are still relatively well-to-do white guys that live politics.
Lily
How many political writers, podcasters, TV guests, etc spent the last 2 years opining and influencing, coming up w their own slant. Appearing on each others’ platforms.
Seemed like a glut. Of course they were working on their own careers, so likely not seen helping out a campaign or election site.
Now that the same glut is rushing out explanations (though too early for accuracy) and harsh criticism without enough info, I don’t notice any of them writing about what *they* should have done differently. What they might have spent energy and time on more productively, instead of promoting each other and making their own product entertaining.
Without self-examination, their critiques are meaningless to me, self-interested, seem like avoidance.
Lily
@TBone: I have 2-3 red bows I could send you, nice ones sitting around, left from wreaths my relative made last year.