Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Petty moves from a petty man.

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

The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it is not glory.

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

Not rolling over. fuck you, make me.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

Fight them, without becoming them!

In after Baud. Damn.

I like political parties that aren’t owned by foreign adversaries.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.

Radicalized white males who support Trump are pitching a tent in the abyss.

Find someone who loves you the way trump and maga love traitors.

A fool as well as an oath-breaker.

Let me file that under fuck it.

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

Rupert, come get your orange boy, you petrified old dinosaur turd.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

She burned that motherfucker down, and I am so here for it. Thank you, Caroline Kennedy.

Nothing says ‘pro-life’ like letting children go hungry.

The current Supreme Court is a dangerous, rogue court.

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On The Road – Albatrossity – The past is not dead, it’s not even past.

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Happy Monday!  Looks like a great week ahead!

On The Road - Albatrossity - The past is not dead, it's not even past. 10

Albatrossity

In late August I took a long road trip (nearly 3000 miles) from my home in eastern Flyover Country to see some birds in the mountain ranges/sky islands of southeastern Arizona. I had some recent health news that was not good, and it seemed like a fine time to hit the road. I enjoyed the trip, I enjoyed the destination, and you all will see some bird photos from that photo walkabout in the next few Mondays.

But I beg your indulgence today, as this post is not about birds. As the election season looms, and we face a stark choice between a government that can work for all of us and a government that wants to deport some people and immiserate many others, I chose to make this Monday morning post about history and what it can teach us. The lesson I took was that we cannot, must not, go backward.

On other trips west, I’ve stopped to see the site of the Amache Camp in eastern Colorado (aka Grenada War Relocation Center), one of the 10 sites where Japanese-Americans were interned during the years 1942-1945. I spent more time there on this trip; if you have not visited one of these historic sites, I’d recommend it. Bill had a lovely post about a more famous camp, Manzanar, a while back, and there are a couple more easterly ones in southeastern Arkansas. Amache is not as scenic or mountainous as Manzanar, it is barely west of the KS/CO border, a mile south of US-50 in a flat and hot part of Colorado. It’s not exactly a touristy part of that state, but if you ever find yourself in the area, take an hour or so to visit it. But since most of you will never get there, here are some photos from my most recent visit. Most of them are unreadable on this page, but much larger versions are available by clicking through the links provided.

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On The Road - Albatrossity - The past is not dead, it's not even past. 9
Amache CampAugust 21, 2024

This is a map of the camp. Even though the War Relocation Authority preferred not to use that word, it was basically a camp modeled after military POW camps of the era. During the time it was in operation, it held approximately 7300 citizens, and had 560 buildings which were mostly demolished after the war. Generally just the foundations remain today. Most of them were flimsy barracks buildings, poorly insulated and with no cooking or toilet facilities. The entire camp was surrounded by barbed wire, with guard towers, searchlights, and armed sentries. Click here for larger image.

Late Night Open Thread: Trump & His Sundown(ing) Towns

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And at one of those sundown town rallies…

Associated Press update, last night — “Police say a man will face charges after storming into the press area at a Trump rally”:

… The incident Friday came moments after Trump had criticized major media outlets for what he said was unfavorable coverage and had dismissed CNN as fawning for its interview Thursday with his Democratic rival Kamala Harris and her running mate, Tim Walz.

It was not immediately clear what motivated the man or whether he was a Trump supporter or critic.

The man made it over a barrier ringing the media area and began climbing the back side of a riser where television reporters and cameras were stationed, according to a video of the incident posted to social media by a reporter for CBS News. People near him tried to pull him off the riser and were quickly joined by police officers and sheriff’s deputies.

The crowd cheered as a pack of police led the man away, prompting Trump to say, “Is there anywhere that’s more fun to be than a Trump rally?”

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Sunday Night Open Thread

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Another long day- five hours on the tractor cutting fields, then I went home and showered, hopped in the grocery getter and traveled across four counties delivering boxes of signs and stuff to various county HQ’s and contacts. I am pooped.

Rosie is doing fine, still hiding and not happy about things, but we are getting there.

I wish I had more to say but I am too tired. Happy Labor Day tomorrow if I forget.

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War for Ukraine Day 921: Kharkiv!!!!!! And Sumy!!!!!!

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Painting by NEIVANMADE. It has a white background an in the center are Soldiers in green doing air defense by firing at incoming Russian missiles in the upper right. The missiles are red and yellow. In the upper left, written in green, is the text: "SAVE THE BRAVEST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD!" Below the Soldiers, also written in green, is "SUPPORT FOR KHARKIV"

(Image by NEIVANMADE)

Rosie is doing fine. Thank you for all the good thoughts, well wishes, prayers, and donations.

Kharkiv has been under attack all day. Including a Russian Iskander missile double tap on first responders. Part of the reason this keeps happening is that NOT A SINGLE DAMN PIECE OF AIR DEFENSE that was promised at the NATO summit, nor that has been in any US announcement of military supplies for Ukraine since they finally got the Ukraine aid supplemental to pass, has actually been sent to Ukraine!

Germany just made an update and then announced the update of everything it’s sent to Ukraine. The only air defense system still on that list is the IRIS-T it sent a long time ago.

There is clearly a logistics break down. I have my own suspicions about what that is, but since I can’t prove them, I’ll keep them to myself for now.

Because the Danish PM has now told us, we now know that she wanted to send her F-16s to Ukraine in FEB 2022! But she was prevented from doing so by Denmark’s allies. Ukrainska Pravda has the details:

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen has confirmed that Denmark does not restrict the use of F-16 fighter jets that it has provided to Ukraine.

Source: Mette Frederiksen at the GLOBSEC conference in Prague, reports European Pravda

Details: Mette Frederiksen believes that Ukraine received Western fighter jets later than it should have.

Quote: “I’m sorry that it took so long. I was ready to deliver them from the beginning of the war. But, once again, we had quite long discussions about whether it was a good idea or not.”

Frederiksen did not specify who exactly was holding up the delivery of the F-16s but expressed her belief that the task remains to ensure that Ukraine receives all the weapons it needs from the West.

Quote: “You cannot win the war without military equipment. The only way of winning this war is to give Ukraine what they need.”

Frederiksen also confirmed that Denmark has no restrictions on using donated weapons, including aircraft.

Quote: “We are not putting restrictions on F-16s. It has to be according to international law. We have given these jets with no restrictions, then according to international law.”

Background: The Czech president also supported the use of F-16s against targets in Russia. The Netherlands, which also provided the fighter jets, is not against using F-16s for strikes against Russia.

There is only one state that could prevent Denmark from sending its F-16s to Ukraine or place limitations on their usage by the Ukrainians is the United States. This is because of the end use agreements in the foreign military sales contracts between the US and Denmark that dictate what Denmark, as the purchaser, may or may not do with them.

Here’s the video of her remarks if you’d like to watch them.

While I’ll have the rest of the Kharkiv material after President Zelenskyy’s address, for want of the same nail combined with the lack of a spine by President Biden and his National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, the Russian’s just dropped a missile on an orphanage in Sumy!

❗️A 7-year-old boy and a 13-year-old girl are among the victims as Russians have just bombed a center for psychological rehabilitation of children and an orphanage in the city of Sumy.

Ukraine is forbidden by it’s allies from striking the Russian airfieilds and launchers where these attacks originate.

Video credit: Suspilne

And in just the past 20 minutes (it’s 6:05 PM EDT when I type this) there was another significant strike in Kharkiv!

More on this after the jump as well.

Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier today. Video below, English transcript after the jump.

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Medium Cool – Travel!

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Medium Cool is a weekly series related to popular culture, mostly film, TV, and books, with some music and games thrown in.  We hope it’s a welcome break from the anger, hate, and idiocy we see almost daily from the other side in the political sphere.

Arguments welcomed, opinions respected, fools un-suffered.  We’re here every Sunday at 7 pm.

What do you do to get the feel for the local culture when you are traveling?  When I say “traveling”, I don’t care if it’s it’s the state next door, the county next door, or traveling around the world.

Is it the food?  Museums?  Shops?  Cultural events?  Wandering through neighborhoods?  Talking to random people in the street?

If it’s the food, I hope it doesn’t look like this!

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Excellent Reads: What Happened At Arlington Cemetary

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Mr. Charles P. Pierce, at Esquire:

…When the former president* of the United States profaned this place the way he did this past week, he didn’t merely commit an unconscionable breach of simple humanity, something we are used to coming from him by now, but he also defied one of the last conventions in our politics that he hadn’t yet broken. Electioneering is forbidden within a certain distance of a polling place in every state in the Union. This is not only to give the voter a quiet place to make a decision, but also to avoid having adherents to one campaign or another attempt to persuade the voter with baseball bats. If you can’t bum-rush voting booths in firehouses and elementary schools, you shouldn’t be able to use Arlington National Cemetery as a campaign prop. Nevertheless, because he wants what he wants, the former president* ignored not only the cemetery’s policy, but also clearly stated federal law, to grab some video at gravesites in Section 60. To do so, he had his entourage rough up a female cemetery worker, whom they slandered as mentally ill in the aftermath…

If he cared, he’d apologize publicly to the woman, to the Army, to every family of everyone buried at Arlington. He’d track down the relatives of William Howard Taft and apologize to them. He would apologize to the families who’d invited him to be there for how his thuggish compatriots threw them and the memories of their fallen loved one into this kind of media jackpot. If he cared, he’d be embarrassed, but he doesn’t, so he isn’t.

Arlington is where it is because of the indomitable patriotism of one man, General Montgomery Meigs, the Army’s quartermaster during the Civil War. Meigs was a brilliant engineering student from Georgia who went to West Point because that really was the only top-flight engineering school in the country at the time. Secession infuriated Meigs and, when the federal government seized Robert E. Lee’s mansion and estates in 1864, Meigs was tasked with building a new national cemetery on the grounds. One of Meigs’ first acts was to raise a 12-foot high monument over a grave containing the undifferentiated body parts gathered from battlefields around Washington in the middle of Mary Lee’s rose garden. Montgomery Meigs had a gift for grand gestures of contempt…

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We Speak in Past Tense and Talk About the Weather

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I don’t have anything big to post about, just a comment about the post-Labor Day election.

We’re all political junkies here.  That means, in general, we are out of touch with how the “average” voter (the common clay of the West, if you will) is perceiving the election.

I just looked at Kamala Harris’ and Tim Walz’ various TikTok feeds, and even factoring in  how confusing (to me) TikTok is, it’s clear that the content they choose to share there is less (volume)  than, and curated differently than, the content they share on Xitter.  So what the “average” youngs are consuming versus what I consume is a mystery.  Similarly, apparently battleground states are being inundated with mailers, and I’m sure at least Harris/Walz have bought a lot of TV time, so, again, what the “average” olds are seeing is another mystery, since I don’t watch broadcast/cable TV and don’t have a mailbox in a battleground state.

Acknowledging that I, a smart politics knower in my own head, don’t know shit about the most important segment of voters in this election is difficult, but I’m not alone. The demands for “more interviews” and “more press conferences” by the DC media is just their demand to be relevant in an election where their importance is diminished to a level unimaginable when The Boys on the Bus was written in 1972.  The voters that Harris/Walz need to get are not watching the DC media, and they’re not reading this blog.  I hope to respond to that fact with a little more dignity than the NYT, WaPo and CNN, but we’ll see.

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