Let’s see if The Convicted Felon decides to try and sue over ‘Mr. Boinks’…
And Mr. Charles P. Pierce, at Esquire, on The Consequences of Believing Nonsense:
As we enter upon Year Less Than Zero, there is a lot of earnest chin-stroking about why Americans seem so dedicated to believing their government to be capable of anything, why appeals to fight “the Deep State” have become popular enough to install a convicted felon into an office from which he can appoint an anti-science dead-whale collector to run the country’s public health system, and an unblinking demi-fascist to run the FBI.
Having written a book a while back about the consequences of believing nonsense, I find nothing mysterious about this. Skepticism about “the government” was the abiding concern of a good percentage of the people who gathered in Philadelphia to design a new one after the Articles of Confederation fell apart. As the late Pauline Maier wrote in her history of the ratification of the Constitution pointed out, even George Washington, whom the new nation simply would not leave in peace, despaired that the country was losing its mind. He wrote to a correspondent from New Hampshire:
Do they proceed from licentiousness, British influence disseminated by the Tories, or real grievances which admit of redress? If the latter, why has the remedy been delayed till the public mind had become so much agitated, & why yet postponed? If the former, why are not the powers of government tried at once? It is as well to be without them, as not to live under their exercise. ⟨Commotions of this sort, like snow-balls, gather strength as they roll, if there is no opposition in the way to divide & crumble them.
So some essential crankdom has been deep in the country’s DNA almost from jump. We move, then, to the 1970’s, when it seemed that every American’s essential dread about the “secret government” was being validated almost daily. Skepticism about the assassinations of the 1960’s, especially that of President John F. Kennedy, had never gone away, and the House of Representatives was preparing to launch its own probe into all of them. The Watergate scandal made almost anything believable. Congress, especially the Senate Intelligence Committee under Senator Frank Church and its counterpart in the House under Rep. Otis Pike, subsequently went to open war with what was gently referred to as the intelligence “community.”
A great deal of this information has gone down the memory hole over the last half-century, or it has been obscured by other events, some of which have fed the same barely latent skepticism that enlivened the ‘70’s. (Robert McFarlane’s romancing the mullahs with a Bible and a cake shaped like a key? Really?) Small wonder then that, sooner or later, we’d end up electing a president and an administration whose entire political raison d’etre was to engage in mock conflict against unseen domestic opponents. Watching the president-elect do public battle with his endless collection of bogeymen is like watching one of those mock sea battles in the Roman Colosseum–except, as always, there are consequences to believing nonsense, as we shall surely see. Again…
Leto
The “Finding Out” phase continues to gain momentum.
Baud
@Leto:
Glad the newspaper didn’t blame “Congress.” Put the blame where it belongs.
cintibud
@Leto: Link doesn’t wor
Edit – error msg:
{“data”:{“error”:”Imgur is temporarily over capacity. Please try again later.”},”success”:false,”status”:403}
Baud
@cintibud:
Works for me.
Nukular Biskits
@Leto:
I suspect there’s gonna be a lot more of that to come.
But, hey, the price of eggs!!!!!!!!!!!!
cintibud
@Baud: It’s my Nord VPN. Put it on pause and now I see.
I wonder is this is something common with VPN’s.
Leto
@Baud: @Nukular Biskits: MAGATs one year from now.
@cintibud:
Just give it a few secs. There’s a pinecone/acorn war going on. Don’t ask.
Elizabelle
@Nukular Biskits: Did you have any drama from last night’s storm systems?
Leto
@Nukular Biskits: oh yeah, go get some Shed bbq for me. I can’t tell you how much Avalune and I miss that place. I know the OG joint went through a fire a few years back, but hopefully they’ve rebuilt and it’s g2g.
NutmegAgain
@cintibud: I just installed Nord VPN a couple of days ago, and have found that I need to turn if off while doing domestic web stuff. (I’ve set it up so my “home” address is not in the US).
The Truffle
Here is my prediction and I am sticking to it.
This is the year MAGA jumps the shark.
Nukular Biskits
@Elizabelle:
Other than the tornado warning that went out, no.
Although the little yard flag I had out front apparently got ripped off the pole by the wind and wound up in the neighbor’s yard.
cintibud
@NutmegAgain: Mine is set for Chicago and I get ads about “Illinois homeowners report this one weird trick…” and the like but I usually don’t have that much trouble. However I have to turn it off for Ticketmaster and other shows even if I just want to see the seating chart. Lately I’ve been finding more situations in which I have trouble loading web pages. Troubling now that I feel a good VPN is more necessary
Baud
@The Truffle:
MAGA is the shark.
zhena gogolia
@The Truffle: 😂
Nukular Biskits
@Leto:
Yeah, they built back and have been in business.
There are billboards on I-10 inviting people to stop in.
I haven’t been there in a while, since I live in Gulfport, although I do drive by Exit 57 twice every work day.
The Audacity of Krope
@Baud: MAGA is the jump; the ridiculous act, not the majestic animal. Please and thanks.
Baud
@The Audacity of Krope:
I didn’t mean to insult sharks.
The Audacity of Krope
@Baud: I know you think you’re safe because you’re on dry land. I see you.
Baud
@The Audacity of Krope:
Jokes on you, I’m currently on my yacht.
John S.
@The Audacity of Krope:
That’s not a candy gram.
Leto
@Nukular Biskits: I know they have a second joint closer to where you live, but exit 57 is the only one that exists for us. Glad to hear they’re still chugging along.
Nukular Biskits
@Baud:
It could be a land yacht.
Ruviana
@Nukular Biskits: Or yacht rock!
Leto
@Nukular Biskits: I had an airman who had a 1970’s era Oldsmobile land yacht. Two door, about 400ft long, hood was like 300 of it. We called it “Otto’s Yacht.” I think he got rid of it when he and his wife got orders to move to the UK, but I don’t remember as it was near 25 years ago now. But I remember that Olds.
Elizabelle
Thank you, Anne Laurie. Always good to have an open thread Sunday nights. Great cartoon by Trudeau.
Now. With respect to the topic. Bozo did not have nukes.
Elizabelle
@Leto: Today, they could live in it.
lollipopguild
@Baud: Are you sailing to your secret island with the volcano?
lowtechcyclist
@Elizabelle:
I think we’re all Bozos on this bus.
ETA: squeeze the wheeze! 😁
Nukular Biskits
@Leto:
When I was in high school, one of my friends had a Buick Electra 225. I don’t remember the model year but, looking at the photos of Electras on Wikipedia, it must have been a ’75 or ’76, with a wheelbase of 233 inches.
That was a huge car.
Later on in life, after getting married and having our first child, we acquired the in-laws ’78 Mercury Marquis. One of my coworkers called it “The massive hurtling juggernaut of death”.
Elizabelle
May I add, my condolences to South Korea. Terrible, and very strange, airliner accident today. My sympathies to all the loved ones and friends of the lost.
satby
@Elizabelle: Bird strikes can be catastrophic.
Baud
@lollipopguild:
Who told you about the secret Island?
Elizabelle
Were we speaking of clowns? From the FTF NY Vichy Times, also a tad clownish.
General Russel Honore, genuine patriot, US Army retired. Honore speaks a lot about ties to China, but other things about Musk (launch vehicles! Starlink) worry me far more. And: endorsing Germany’s AfD — this century’s Nazis? Uh huh.
Free link: Elon Musk Is a National Security Risk
MagdaInBlack
@Nukular Biskits: One of my husbands friends in hs in ’74 had a 1970 Electra. We called them land barges. A large cooler fit nicely in the trunk.
Husbands grfather always drove a Chrysler New Yorker land barge.
Another Scott
@Leto: I was expecting this (2:03).
So many FAFOs…
Best wishes,
Scott.
Nukular Biskits
@Another Scott:
LOL! Nailed it.
Spanky
Got my license in ’70 in my dad’s ’69 Ford LTD, which was another one with a hood like an aircraft carrier deck. It also meant you couldn’t see the road 50 feet ahead of you.
Learning to drive on Pittsburgh’s roads in winter in that rear wheel drive thing was the best! I can drive in anything.
SpaceUnit
Those who think we’re all going be laughing at the clowns for the next four years are in for a rude awakening.
The Audacity of Krope
Perhaps you underestimate our determination. Or how culpable some of us hold Democrats for this state of affairs.
SpaceUnit
@The Audacity of Krope:
Determination is good. We’re gonna need it.
ETA: Democrats are not at fault though.
Another Scott
@Leto: I had a friend with a early ’70s Olds Custom Cruiser wagon with a 455 V8. As you say, the hood was verrrryyyy long. It took a while, but once that thing was up to speed there was no stopping it. In all the meanings of the word.
IIRC, the things were death traps in a crash because the gas tank was only protected by the fender panel behind the rear wheel (to make room for the hide-away tailgate and the extra row of seats).
Ah the good old days… :-/
;-)
Best wishes,
Scott.
The Audacity of Krope
@SpaceUnit: Sure they aren’t. They definitely didn’t choose bigotry and cowardice at every opportunity this year and far too frequently across most of my living memory.
SpaceUnit
@The Audacity of Krope:
???WTF???
????????
?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Audacity of Krope:
I’ll bite, how did they “choose bigotry and cowardice at every opportunity” this year?
The Thin Black Duke
@The Audacity of Krope: Americans voted for this. In the first presidential election I voted in, the downward spiral began when Americans chosen the ex-actor who pretended to be a war hero. What Carter promised sounded too much like work. Americans embrace comfortable lies. Democrats want to make Americans eat their vegetables.
MagdaInBlack
@SpaceUnit: Those of us who use humor to get through the shit, will continue to use humor to get through.
As long as I still have my sense of humor, however dark, they have not won.
Mai Naem mobile ¹
I am kind of freaking out about the next two years. I’m anxious about the four years but the first two is going to give us a very good idea what Orange Satan and his henchmen are going to do. I don’t have a lot of confidence in the Dems doing much. I have more confidence(not much!) in the bureaucracy at least setting up some minor roadblocks and slowing him down. I feel like I’m going to age 15 years in the next two years. Part of me wants to just ostrich the next two years but at the same time I know that’s stupid. For the first time in the past 9 years I’m really hoping against hope that I’m completely wrong about what I think of TFG. I really see the MAGats not holding back around here. I’ve seen more tfg signs since he won. Its absolutely scary.
H.E.Wolf
@Another Scott:
An acquaintance of mine drove something enormous and American-made. Parallel parking was accompanied by the good-humored advisory: “The Queen Mary is docking….”
SpaceUnit
@MagdaInBlack:
Yeah, I know everyone’s got to cope in their own way.
And I’m not coping very well, TBH. I’ve had a constant sick, hollow feeling in my stomach ever since the election. It never goes away.
MagdaInBlack
@SpaceUnit: I have that feeling too. I think we all do
eta: If I really sit and think about it all, I get a wave of nausea. So I can’t do that. I have to compartmentalize.
Peke Daddy
The HSCA did find this, increasing skepticism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Committee_on_Assassinations#:~:text=The%20HSCA%20completed%20its%20investigation,other%20scientific%20studies%20of%20assassination%2D
scav
Ahhh, the tourists are beginning to muster, out in (and with) force to proclaim Trump’s American Greatness has indeed arrived: Reporter allegedly attacked by man saying ‘This is Trump’s America now’
Raoul Paste
Essential Crankdom could be a good name for a…. Never mind.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Thin Black Duke:
Do you have any opinion on Martin’s theories on why the election ended up the way it did or how he thinks Dems should’ve conducted the campaign, how the Biden admin could’ve managed it’s image better, or taken more decisive actions like price controls for egg prices, tied medical debt to college debt forgiveness, etc. He thinks Dems should’ve gone on an anti-corporatist bent
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Mai Naem mobile ¹:
Where do you live? I’ve seen a lot of that stuff come down. Almost no one wears Trump gear in public anymore. NE Ohio
The Audacity of Krope
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Bigotry:
Broad acceptance of Islamophobia under cover of opposition to anti-Semitism
Encouraging stochastic terrorism against protestors of the above
Violent spasm of ageism in July with a side of ignoring the wishes of the black woman who ultimately had to try to clean up their mess
Repeat spasm of ageism in late October/ early November against a different target
Cowardice:
Consistent failure to stand as a group against any of the above
Mealy mouth coy responses in the media to not admit they were pushing a line of bigotry
CaseyL
Back in 1976 I road-tripped from Missouri to California in something – a Plymouth, I think? – old enough to still have the bench seat in front, and a back seat big enough to stretch out and sleep comfortably on. (The back seat was, in fact, wide enough for two people to lie down next to each other, which brings to mind why those old cars were so popular with teenagers.)
MoCaAce
When I was a kid my friend had a 1975 Lincoln Continental Mark V… we called it the battle cruiser. You could legit fit 6 kids in the trunk and sneak them into the drive in.
Baud
mrmoshpotato
🎵ASSES WILL SHAKE ON SUNDAY NIIIIIIIGHT!🎵
MagdaInBlack
@mrmoshpotato: ???
Elizabelle
I have a feeling Anne Laurie and others will use this title a lot in the coming years.
JaySinWA
I just bought a dozen store brand eggs for 6.99 at Safeway yesterday. Selection was very limited. There seems to be a egg price surge at the moment.
ETA they were advertised at 4.99 two weeks ago, but sold out at that price. I assume bird flu is catching up with us again.
The Audacity of Krope
Just saying it would be nice if Dems offered a full alternative rather than conceding to bullshit trying to placate a hostile Republican party and media (increasingly redundant at this point), neither of whom will ever be placated.
TS
@Leto:
They’ll find a way to blame Biden – it happened on his watch.
Jay
@JaySinWA:
Here we are paying $2.99 CDN for storebrand Large,
despite the floods drowning flocks and the culls because of bird flu.
There is a recall of a US high end brand of dry cat food, because the chicken meal included some birds that had bird flu and a local cat died.
Avoid pet foods with chicken for the next while.
Nukular Biskits
@JaySinWA:
DAMN THAT JOE BIDEN!!!!11!!!!
jonas
Except when Michelle Obama wanted to plant a vegetable garden at the White House and encourage kids to eat healthy, she was attacked as some kind of Nazi nutritionist bent on turning America’s youth into pliant, tofu-eating, gender-neutral yoga artists, but when former Democrat-turned-MAGAt Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. comes along and talks about banning vaccines and processed foods, it’s now bold truth-speaking to the evil food-industrial complex. WTF with these people?
TS
@scav: trump allows them to say it all out loud – racist bigots who have nothing so want to make sure no-one else has any more. They are sure succeeding with this administration
mrmoshpotato
@MagdaInBlack: Sunday Night Football
MagdaInBlack
@mrmoshpotato: Kinda figured. Carry on =-)
Jay
@jonas:
As we know, they ain’t smart.
I would suspect Guinea Worm infections except that Jimmy killed them all off.
jonas
@JaySinWA: You’re not imagining things. Egg prices are way up again, and yes, bird flu is to blame.
Don’t worry, though. I have it on good word that on January 21, they’ll be magically back to $2/doz because Joe Biden will no longer be controlling the egg price dial on the Resolute Desk.
The Audacity of Krope
With a name like that, can we really be surprised?
glory b
@Leto: But the majority Dems n state government will try to replace the funds. They won’t be able to completely replace them, and the 72% Republican voters in the area will say it’s all the Dem’s fault.
Progressives will blame the Dems for not doing enough and ignoring the working class, rinse and repeat.
Tehanu
The L.A. Times did not include the first two panels of Doonesbury today, so no “Mr. Boinks” was presented to its readers. They’ve done similarly before.
Nettoyeur
@Mai Naem mobile ¹: Sheer incoherence will turn everything into oatmeal. Wait til Congress sees the bills for massive but somehow selective deportation (tens of billions in hiring coats PER YEAR that won’t go away) corporate goes bonkers trying to find technically literate employees with decent work habits, growth slow, tax receipts slide, Putin nixes the famous Trump peace plan and pushes to rebuild the USSR….
Jay
@Nettoyeur:
Concept of a plan,……………………………………
Still getting nixed, by Putin, and Dolt 47 will roll over and take it up the ass and blame everybody else.
Martin
@The Truffle: Peak wingnut was first coined by Cole on 10/13/2008. There seems to be a sense that it’ll come as the result of some collective self-realization. More likely it’ll come as the result of some massive crisis.
The Audacity of Krope
@Martin: Wingnuttery won’t peak until a split second before nuclear Armageddon.
Leto
@glory b: @TS: check out post #7
RevRick
@Mai Naem mobile ¹: Now that Trump has given his blessing to H-1B work visas, I wonder how long it will be before the Homebuilders Association, the Meatpackers Association, the Dairy Farmers Association, Poultry Farmers Association, and various other groups sniff around Mar-a-Lago offering to wet Trump’s beak with barely legal bribes in exchange for them keeping their immigrant workers. If anyone can get away with massively disappointing the frothing at the mouth MAGA mob, it’s Trump. And the thing is just about all those groups have a legitimate argument for looking the other way when it comes to the legal immigration status of their workers. In the low unemployment states of the Great Plains it’s not like there are thousands of white people twiddling their thumbs waiting for a job opening.
NotMax
@JaySinWA
Saw them this past Monday at $12.79 for a dozen at the regularly horrendously overpriced chain supermarket nearest to the domicile.
$6.99 for a tray of two dozen in town at Costco, up a buck since early November.
Melancholy Jaques
@Baud:
Not to worry. Sharks are too cool to care.
The Pale Scot
Since 1980, I have yet to find this thesis wanting,
H. L. Mencken
Jay
@The Pale Scot:
Clap, clap, clap,………..
Martin
@JaySinWA: West coast is getting hit pretty hard on bird flu. So far it’s mainly a regional problem. So far.
But I think the skepticism in government is more deserved than many here are maybe willing to acknowledge. Having the government acknowledge that egg prices are too high and have no ability to do anything about it, does speak to the skepticism about the why the most powerful government on earth can’t solve such a simple problem. Of course, there will be a response that the government isn’t supposed to interfere in that, but it’s been a hot decade since anyone was really screaming about government interfering in private enterprise and I wonder if Democrats are defending against an argument that nobody is really advancing any longer.
But I also think that government is really terrible at communicating, insisting on controlled press scrums which feed a media ecosystem that almost nobody interacts with any longer. I think Pete has done an exemplary job of bringing government to where the public is. When we have questions about bird flu, where is the head of the CDC? Does anyone even know their name? Does anyone even know their gender? Why aren’t they out communicating this to the public? So when all of this stuff happens seemingly completely out of public view, of course conspiracy theories develop.
One of my criticisms of higher education was that we did a terrible job of communicating how college admissions worked, mainly because it didn’t work how people wanted it to work, and we didn’t want to defend it. But you still have to communicate that effectively. If you don’t, you get systems that appear to be arbitrary, and if they are perceived to be arbitrary, then you leave it to the public to fill in which way they expect they would be arbitrary, which almost always resolves to be discriminatory against them, and faith in the system is lost. And that seems to be pretty rampant. And the more complex these systems are, the harder it is to hold peoples attention to understand them, and the more they simply fill in the gaps the way then want them filled in.
It’s really revealing when you recognize that your own faculty don’t know how the admissions process works, at even a rudimentary level, at an institution where faculty autonomy over the institution is held in pretty high regard, where that process determines what students they will have in class, and where they all have PhDs and a vested interest in understanding the system – and they’re fucking clueless. What hope does the public have in that situation? And a lot of the complexity of the process was because we had these great computers (I was the pointy end of the spear building those tools at my institution) that could allow us to do really complex things, and there was maybe 3 people who actually understood how it worked. We got good outcomes, but we lost an enormous amount of trust.
One of the reasons why Biden killed the trans sports rule writing was because it wouldn’t be completed in time. What the public doesn’t know is that those rules go through public feedback, but they never see that, because they are so incredibly obscure, particularly in an internet era. No wonder it looks like a deep state. The feds too often still operate like it’s 1950.
RevRick
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): The NYT (I know, I know) published some exit poll date from the Presidential election. A + means a percentage shift from Biden/Harris in 2020 to Trump; a – indicates a shift away from Trump 2020 to Harris.
By age groups
18-29 y.o. Trump +7; 30-49 +1; 45-64 +4; 65+ -2
By race
Black men +2/ Black Women -2; Latino men +18/Latino women +9; White men -1/White women -2; Other races +9
By region
Rural +9; Suburban +3; Urban no change
No college degree +6; College graduate-1
As an added data point from another source
Latinos and to a lesser extent Blacks got especially hammered by inflation compared to whites in 2021-22, and Asians this year by rents.
It is a common practice here to mock eggs!!!!, but inflation did affect the demographics a lot more among those not represented here. So, maybe that mockery reflects our ignorance.
I must confess I was surprised by the shift towards Harris among whites.
The Pale Scot
@cintibud:
Change your location to Hong Kong, it does wonders for utube ads. No more idiotic drink a glass of warm water ads, just pleasant people speaking respectfully to you directly.
Can’t understand a word, maybe they are all talking about a glass of warm water
The Pale Scot
@Leto:
Did he drive ya’ll to the Love Shack?
Martin
Given that immigration crackdown and tariffs are entirely executive branch actions with barely any legislative or legal oversight, that was my expectation from the outset.
Texas, despite their ‘tough on immigration’ rhetoric very deliberately doesn’t require employers to use eVerify. They understand the game just fine. Immigration is a problem to solve only in specific ways, and to look beyond in a host of other ways. Democrats might have been better off doing the converse of what the GOP does – by going after a specific industry, like meatpacking, and creating pain there and forcing the GOP off of their strategy.
Jay
@RevRick:
Funny that,………………..
https://www.epi.org/blog/profits-and-price-inflation-are-indeed-linked/#:~:text=Corporate%20profits%20largely%20explain%20the,output%20(a%20useful%20benchmark).
RevRick
@Jay: Hmmm. The oligarchy won the election.
The Audacity of Krope
Always does. Such is the nature of oligarchy.
ETA: I don’t see a lot of denial of the fact of inflation here. I see a lot of poor attribution for its causes everywhere.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@RevRick:
Given the numbers provided and what they suggest from certain demographics, and how they counter what several people in here (the Always Wrong Chorus) have been claiming, that statement hits very close to home. That being said, the Always Wrong Chorus is Never Wrong…they’ll just move the goalposts.
Another Scott
Meanwhile, … Yonhap:
:-(
There are thousands of 737s (of various models) flying around the world every day. I assume that the issue with the one that crashed is not a design or manufacturing flaw, but something else. But time will tell.
If it is a landing gear issue, then I suppose one should be prepared for potential flight disruptions in the US (especially for Southwest which flies nothing but 737s) for inspections and possible repairs.
Best wishes,
Scott.
The Audacity of Krope
@The Audacity of Krope: Just to add: and I see a lot of poor attribution for many, many things to Presidents.
TBone
@Baud: theme song at Bear Gap Den (my former cabin) and we had a big, aquamarine Chevy from the late 60s/early 70s to pile into – jukebox at the Sportsmans’ Club down the road apiece
TBone
FAFO BlueSky has banned Loomer
https://bsky.app/profile/browneyedsusan.bsky.social/post/3leiejqftvk2b
Mr. Bemused Senior
No fear, now we have machine learning where it’s an open area of research to analyze how a model makes a choice.
I don’t hold out much hope for an answer any time soon.
sxjames
@Tehanu:
Neither did the Portland Oregonian
Leto
@RevRick:
I will simply say that there were plenty of us here talking about this, and were summarily dismissed. Continually told, “Of CoURsE PrICes go up,” and that everyone had gotten fat raises these past few years, even when the economic data didn’t support it. People simply choose the narrative which fits their preconceived notions, and this isn’t exclusive to the right.
RevRick
@The Audacity of Krope: I don’t know about always. I know the deck is stacked in their favor. But somehow progress does happen here, as fitful as it may seem.
RevRick
@Leto: That may be true, but I am not a big fan of score settling. I once had to deal with a parishioner who had a chip on his shoulder the size of Montana from keeping score.
I will be quite content with just giving it a rest.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Who exactly is the “Always Wrong Chorus”?
The Audacity of Krope
@RevRick: Elections in the US are a choice of whether you want your oligarch to wear a friendly smile.
Leto
@RevRick: that’s part of the reason we’re collectively where we are.
SpaceUnit
@The Audacity of Krope:
So you’re one of those both sides are the same people. Nice.
You’re part of the problem.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@RevRick:
Those are interesting numbers and it is surprising to see that slight shift to Harris among Caucasians. It’s sad to see those shifts. Despite everything, that’s still not an excuse to willingly and knowingly vote for evil. And yes, I said evil. And I mean it
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@RevRick:
But then nobody learns anything that way if they’re not held accountable
@The Audacity of Krope:
So was Biden or Harris the oligarch that wears a friendly smile?
RevRick
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
@The Audacity of Krope:
@SpaceUnit:
*Sigh
The Audacity of Krope
I hadn’t been “one of those.” Newly converted as of the day after the election. Democrats caved to bigotry over and over this year. Democrats won’t even consider moving us away from an economic model that turns owners into kings and employees into serfs.
No matter who won my tax money was still going to genocide and to Elon’s “obtain more power” account. And “vote blue no matter who” assholes won’t allow an honest conversation about the merits of a candidate, just cheerleading.
I’ve been voting a straight D ticket since 06. No more.
SpaceUnit
@The Audacity of Krope:
So you’ll be voting Republican now.
Got it.
Moron.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Audacity of Krope:
I’ll answer you on the ageism thing:
Both of my parents are in their 60s and watched the Biden-Trump debate in June and both were horrified. They were scared for Biden, it was that bad. And Biden never really got any better from there. The BET interview, the “Vice-President Trump” thing from the NATO press conference. I recall him sounding pretty bad right after the first attempted Trump assassination when he was doing an interview about it. He was never going to recover after that debate performance because it reinforced all of the bad reporting that had been going on for a year in the minds of tens of millions of people. And the media was absolutely relentless, they weren’t going to stop.
I can’t conceive of any way the Biden campaign was going to turn that around.
I’m not saying Biden was senile or anything, but I think that his age and the stress of the job had gotten to him. He couldn’t physically do the work of campaigning anymore.
Frankly, I’m not sure what the Biden campaign’s game plan for how they were going to win was even before the debate. I recall Kay talking about how the Biden campaign was spending millions and millions on campaign ads and it was having very little effect, just enough to keep him neck and neck with Trump in polling. The campaign wanted that debate to do a reset
The Audacity of Krope
@SpaceUnit: Look at you with your little unfounded assumptions. G
oodForYou.SpaceUnit
Unfounded?
#113. You said it yourself, fool.
The Audacity of Krope
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Biden’s work continued and still continues to be excellent. We aren’t voting for a TV personality and the very argument you are making is why I’m giving up on Democrats.
Pathological caving to the vapid money-media culture.
@SpaceUnit: Well, I don’t remember writing that and when I checked the comment I didn’t read anything like that.
Please to provide a quote?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Audacity of Krope:
The Dems used the tax code to cut child poverty in half. I don’t think the Republicans would’ve done that and they don’t
Mr. Bemused Senior
There’s plenty to criticize in the Democrats, not least the 2024 election results. As far as oligarchs go, seems to me they are clustered on the other side.
Do you have any suggestions? “Burn it all down” strikes me as a bit extreme.
[ETA I don’t mean to ascribe that to you in particular, just pointing out that meme.]
The Audacity of Krope
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Dems did that temporarily in an emergency and ended it before the emergency ended then declared the emergency over before it actually was because they wanted to protect the feelings of people who don’t believe in public health.
The latter bit of that being one of the few actions Biden took that I disapproved of.
Oh and back to the ageism thing, how did going all in on ageism against Trump the last couple weeks of the campaign work out? I guess Dems forgot voters didn’t actually respond to “Biden too old,” only donors and their lapdogs like Schiff.
SpaceUnit
@The Audacity of Krope:
The Audacity of Krope
Doesn’t stop Dem leadership from lusting after some good good oligarch money like thirsty little freaks.
Societally? That’s where we seem to be headed anyway.
Personally? Pay off any debts to people I care about them disappear.
Your proposition is deeply illogical.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Audacity of Krope:
…..Biden wasn’t going to win. I’m sorry, but that’s the hard truth, “Tonya Harding Democrats” or no. It wasn’t going to happen. He had low turnout in the primaries, indicating a lack of enthusiasm. He was unpopular and had been for most of his presidency, regardless of the good he did do. He, and Harris, fell victim to the anti-incumbent effect that’s been happening worldwide for the past few years.
I don’t know how to make it any clearer for you. I know what I and many others saw and heard and it was damaging. There’s nothing vapid about that. A big part of the job of being a leader, is communicating effectively. He sadly wasn’t able to do that any longer due to age-induced fatigue and the stress of the presidency
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Audacity of Krope:
Unfortunately, Trump doesn’t code that way for many people who don’t pay that close attention. He appears vigorous. That, and his voters simply didn’t care about his mental unfitness
1. The expanded child tax credits ended because Manchin and Senima didn’t want them to continue from what I remember
2. The pandemic restrictions were very unpopular, if necessary. This wasn’t just here, it was global. Even the PRC eventually caved to some degree because people grew tired of it. I don’t think they had any choice
SpaceUnit
@The Audacity of Krope:
So you’ll be voting for Jill Stein in 2028?
Please. Quit while you’re behind.
The Audacity of Krope
You don’t know that. You can’t know that. And even if it were true, you don’t throw out the valid results of legally held elections. And, if you didn’t notice, we lost anyway.
It was wrong. Immoral. Craven. I was far more hurt that day than when Trump won the election.
If they had lost without doing this, I would probably still support them as a party.
And all this talk about who had a better chance of winning literally makes me want to start lighting fires. Sickening.
But you’re doing an excellent job vindicating my belief Democrats aren’t worth support-by-default anymore.
Quinerly
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Very well said. Thank you.
The Audacity of Krope
@Quinerly: Hey, falsely accused anyone of death threats lately?
Quinerly
@SpaceUnit:
Thanks for speaking up. Audacity of Nope and a couple of others pretty much make the comment threads here unreadable now.
A true shame.
Quinerly
@The Audacity of Krope:
Nope. Never did.
But I do enjoy hitting your tender nerves from time to time.
RevRick
I just love how erstwhile allies tear each other up. But it’s the leftwing’s version of the sin of purity. And here I thought that the medieval debates about how many angels could fit on the head of a pin was over the top.
Please stop guys.
SpaceUnit
@Quinerly:
I don’t actually think Nopes is a troll.
Just a lost and clueless individual. We’re all in a bad place right now.
The Audacity of Krope
@Quinerly: Funny, I was pretty sure slandering me about death threats was the reason you’re literally the only regular commenter in my pie filter.
Liar. Bigot. Amoral armchair tactician.
The Audacity of Krope
@RevRick: Yeah, let’s all just hold hands and sing kumbaya and pretend no one is ever wrong.
A political blog where everyone agrees on everything sounds …great?
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Audacity of Krope:
Can I know for an absolute fact? Of course not, no one can. But I do know that campaign didn’t know what to do in the closing weeks of July. They also apparently didn’t know what to do before that. Correct me if I’m wrong, but Biden never once talked about what he would do about price gouging for groceries and the like or making homes affordable in his campaign, but Harris did. Why didn’t he do that (again, if he did, correct me)? Where was the reelection argument beyond basic defense of democracy and such?
As for the election thing, I tend to agree with you, but there was no real choice because nobody who wanted to keep their politcal career would dare run against the incumbent, Biden. I know Martin has touched on this in the past. Biden was pressured politically to drop out.
ETA:
Would you rather the Dems be more like the cultist Republicans who always support their leaders no matter what?
The Audacity of Krope
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): You’re right about all of that except one part.
They absolutely had a choice. And I truly hope the choice they made results in end of the Democrats.
RevRick
@The Audacity of Krope: And I find that the desire to be RIGHT is itself dysfunctional.
Martin
@The Audacity of Krope: True, however the increasing voter registration for Dems, the billion raised after Harris joined, the hundreds of thousands of volunteers and a climb in the polls all suggest that Harris reached voters better than Biden did.
Quinerly
@SpaceUnit:
He sure spends hrs and hrs of his days saying the same thing over and over here.
Actually, it’s kinda sad. I’m beginning to feel a bit sorry for him.
The Audacity of Krope
@RevRick: So, what, I should stop making judgments based on politicians’ actions and having opinions and quietly submit to the benevolent paternalistic leadership of the Dem money machine?
SpaceUnit
Okay, maybe it’s a troll.
Quinerly
@The Audacity of Krope:
How do you read my comments if I am the only one in your pie filter? Do you have such little self control that you must peek?
Ah….things are much clearer now.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Quinerly:
@SpaceUnit:
I haven’t been as active lately. What’s been going on with Krope? And what’s with death threats stuff?
The Audacity of Krope
@Quinerly: He sure spends hrs and hrs of his days saying the same thing over and over here.
So I was discussing various things throughout the day. Only within the last hour did this topic come up and suddenly here comes Quinerly to assert I talk about the same thing all day every day.
You lie like a rug. You lie like Trump.
He’s the only regular commenter in my pie filter because he falsely accused me of threatening to kill someone.
SpaceUnit
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
I have no idea.
ETA: But I’m starting to think we need an intervention here.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@The Audacity of Krope:
Do you have proof of this?
Jay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are different people with different life experiences. Thus, different politics
The deepest I will go into it, is my ex-Brothe, the multi millionaire, thought Capitalism was great, until his kids graduated from Uni.
They all have degrees or advanced degrees, and they are all working minimum wage jobs
My ex-Brother bought a house and a brand new sports car, one year after graduation.
PatrickG
@The Audacity of Krope:
Serious comment from a lurker: your comments over the last several threads seem to have escalated from “fighting with a few people” to “everyone on this blog is trying to silence dissent”. Which, well, it’s balloon juice. It’s FULL of cranky opinionated people.
I’ll also note that at least three recent threads are essentially you and a few others dominating threads. Maybe take a moment, step back, touch grass, or whatever? Not just you but others!
This is a terrible time and people are obviously very stressed. Fighting with people on the internet is, in my experience, not a great way to handle that. But then, that’s why I’m a lurker.
If this comment reads as judgmental, I’m sorry, not my intent. I’m reading a lot of pain and anger from you, is all, and in this thread it’s devolving into personal attacks.
Maybe a break would do you some good?
The Audacity of Krope
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I’m looking, actually. It’s not exactly easy to find a conversation from likely 5 months ago.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Jay:
Biden shifted to the left in the past 4 or 5 years, along with the rest of the party, promoting unions and similar economic policy. There’s no reason why he and his team couldn’t have shifted gears to include those topics, because unfortunately the economic gains of the past 4 years were not broadly spread out, and he couldn’t run on those successes
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Jay:
What kind of degrees did they graduate with?
Quinerly
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
He has no proof. He has been asked before.
Quinerly
@The Audacity of Krope:
I did nothing of the sort.
I expressed deep concerns months ago when “A” commenter here was wishing death on another commenter here (and that commenter’s mother).
The Audacity of Krope
I appreciate the authentic concern. I’d like to note a couple things here.
I tend to pick a couple threads when I’m here and stick to them.
I’m on my phone. So while I’ve been posting here just today I’ve shopped, cooked dinner, cleaned two rooms, got in about two hours of a game, and three episodes of a TV show. I can multitask.
I wouldn’t characterize everything I said today as “fighting.” I’ve had agreements, jokes. This has been the only conversation today id really characterize as a fight.
That said fights draw attention, as do trainwrecks, explosions, etc. They’re also messy and take up a lot of space so I can understand why some folk notice these pieces of my commentary and not others.
But I’m not here every day. And I’m really not all that upset. Thank you, but I’m fine.
ETA: And of the people I tend to have consistent disagreements with, Quinerly is the only one I have flagged for dishonesty. Seriously be careful around that one.
Jay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
President Joe Biden was the “leftiest” President of my life. He did more for the bottom 50% of all races, ever.
In part, he was not “left enough”, and of course, the Media gave him no credit, and American voters are morons.
American = Moron now.
FFS, y’all elected Apartheid Clyde President for Life.
Y’all are dumber, more apathetic, hate filled, ignorant, homophobic, misogynist and racist than ruZZians,
Meaner, too.
Y’all embrace the cruel.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Jay:
The United States is not the only country in the world that has elected a right-wing leader/government recently. Some fear that the UK is only 5 years behind us. Who knows what will happen with Canada. Incumbents seem to get their butts kicked lately. I hope you guys will defeat your version of them, but it’s a contagious disease
PatrickG
@The Audacity of Krope:
thanks for the response, and glad to hear this isn’t your only life right now :)
I’ll just note this, continuing my comment on recency:
One thing that prompted my comment is that yes, you pretty much are! At least this last week or so. Again, not trying to judge, but it’s been helpful to me in the past to get feedback from people noticing pattern changes I miss because I’m “in it”.
Will leave it there, since “stranger offering advice on the internet” is generally not something I like to do. Take care!
The Audacity of Krope
@PatrickG: Thanks again.
And, yeah, my usage may be up somewhat this week. Housesitting for my folks over the holidays. Few of my possessions and no car and my train pass ain’t gonna help either.
Quinerly
@PatrickG:
My nym seems to trigger Nope.
I was rather late to my decision that Biden should step aside after that disastrous debate performance. By the time I got around to expressing my thoughts here things were a dumpster fire in the comments.
Nope chased me around through several different threads in the course of several days back in July if I recall correctly. He was so overwrought at one point….pretty sure it was Nope….posting and hurling insults from a commute on the subway. If not Nope, then somebody else because I thought to myself that this is out of control that someone is this stirred up that they can’t even commute to work without being in the comments of an obscure blog.
Jay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Masters in Business Admin,Starbucks Mgr. 6 years.
Masters in Finance, teller at BOM. 5 years.
Computer Programming with a minor in Computer Engineering, cell phone kiosk. 8 years.
Mechanical Engineering, cashier at Home Depot. 7 years.
Doctorate in Kinesiology, Instructor at West Coast School of Massage Therapy, 3 years.
My ex-Brother made $75K per semester in his school internships, (CompSc) back when $150k bought a house in a nice suburb here. The price is now $1.6 million in the suburbs, $4.8 million for a crack house downtown.
Jay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Poilievre is at best, our Bush The Lesser, with as fake a backstory as your original.
Yeah, we will see what happens. Le Pen is under criminal indictment, Fico is polling after just a year at less than 20%, Croatia’s RW is polling less than 38%, and we will see if Georgia can make it.
But then, there is Syria,…………………………….
Soprano2
@The Audacity of Krope: Voters had been telling focus groups for over a year that they thought Biden was too old, so it’s wasn’t just elected Democrats. There’s no way to know what would have happened, but the debate in June confirmed to many voters what they already thought about Biden being too old. Hindsight is 20/20, but he never should have run for reelection. A president at 40% popularity on election day isn’t going to win, even against someone like TCFG
I think Biden did many good things; it’s amazing what he accomplished under the circumstances. It’s a shame he wasn’t 10 years younger and more vigorous.
TS
@The Audacity of Krope:
Happening everywhere. People vote in left wing governments who then follow the rules set down by the right wing. I don’t like what you are saying but it is truth. Taxes on the wealthy never go up – they are too damn scared of losing an election – and then they lose it regardless.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@TS:
Biden and the Dems tried to move away from that economic model, at least increase unionization and labor support, and they got clobbered for it. I suppose a criticism you could make was that they made the mistake of expecting the results to speak for themselves. Inflation threw a monkey wrench in that
Jay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Almost everybody over 40 embraced the Laffer Curve.
Almost everybody under 40 understands it is, was and always has been utter BS.
Sadly, some people only get it, when they get it hard and often.
NotoriousJRT
@The Audacity of Krope: Sail on!
brantl
@Soprano2: it’s also a shame that the people of America can’t recognize one hell of an effective politician doing his job and doing it goddamn well. Joe Biden did the job better than anybody’s done it in probably 50 years and yet all we care about is how he speaks. This is the dumbest fucking thing I’ve ever seen. We’ve gotta start backing people up when they do the goddamn job. We treated him like he was s nlithering idiot, for dog’s sake.
brantl
@The Audacity of Krope: Oh, grow up. Or, alternatively, stamp your feet, take your ball AND GO HOME.
brantl
@The Audacity of Krope: Can I be in your pie filter too I would consider it an honor.
brantl
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Biden communicated effectively both before and after the debate, your premise is false.