Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

Trumpflation is an intolerable hardship for every American, and it’s Trump’s fault.

Jack be nimble, jack be quick, hurry up and indict this prick.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

When tyranny becomes law, rebellion becomes duty. ~Thomas Jefferson

Stay strong, because they are weak.

The only way through is to slog through the muck one step at at time.

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

Republicans don’t lie to be believed, they lie to be repeated.

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

Celebrate the fucking wins.

Also, are you sure you want people to rate your comments?

He wakes up lying, and he lies all day.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Wait, what?

Disappointing to see gov. newsom with his finger to the wind.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

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Cold Grey Pre-Dawn Open Thread: Iowa Caucus Vivek Heel-Turn!!!

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There’s always been a strong WWE flavor to Vivek Ramaswamy’s candidacy — copied, along with much else, from his ‘idol’ TFG — so a last-minute heel turn was an obvious last-minute arc.

Reasoning has always been that Vivek was running (a) for a chance, however slim, to become Trump’s new VP candidate; and (b) to increase his right-wing media visibility and boost his payouts for future speeches, promos, and outright scams. Neither Trump nor Ramaswamy can be trusted to be truthful — quite possibly neither of them can tell what’s true from what they choose to believe right at this very moment — so Vivek’s last-minute “Save our ancient, failing god-emperor from an ignominious electoral death, vote ME!!!” stratagem will just have to go into the history books as a farcical footnote to the various GOP October Surprise sagas…

Per Bloomberg, “Trump Turns on Ramaswamy, Telling Iowans ‘Don’t Get Duped’”:

Former President Donald Trump trained his sights on rival Vivek Ramaswamy, casting him as a threat to his Make America Great Again movement in what appeared to be a shift in strategy two days before the Iowa caucuses.

“Vote for ‘TRUMP,’ don’t waste your vote! Vivek is not MAGA,” Trump said as he arrived in Iowa on Saturday night. The comments, which appeared in a social media post, ended what had been an informal marriage of convenience with the 38-year-old Ohio entrepreneur and first-time political candidate…

An Iowa State University/Civiqs poll this week found that Ramaswamy was getting only 8% support but was the second choice of 30% of Iowa Republicans. Ramaswamy has campaigned aggressively in the state, visiting all 99 counties at least twice in a feat he called the “Double Grassley” after Iowa’s senior senator.

With Trump boycotting primary debates, Ramaswamy had served as a stand-in for Trump’s policies during bouts on stage with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley and former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.

Trump allies praised Ramaswamy after his performances — as they trained attacks on DeSantis and Haley — fueling speculation that he could be Trump’s running mate.

But no more.

“Vivek started his campaign as a great supporter,” Trump told followers on his platform Truth Social. “Unfortunately, now all he does is disguise his support in the form of deceitful campaign tricks. Very sly, but a vote for Vivek is a vote for the ‘other side’ — don’t get duped by this.”…

Tension had been building between Trump and Ramaswamy for weeks, according to people familiar with Trump’s thinking. Ramaswamy told NBC News earlier this month that Trump was “wounded” and it was time for the party to look for new leadership, raising the president’s ire.

But the final straw came a little more than an hour before Trump’s broadside, when Ramaswamy posted a photo on X, showing him with supporters in T-shirts saying, “Save Trump. Vote Vivek.”

Are any of these dudes even old enough to vote?

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Late Night Open Thread

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These little stories are from an article about people who are making a difference, and I thought little pieces of it might make good late night posts.  A little bit of inspiration, perhaps, at the start of an open thread.

But talk about whatever you want!

In a year that made many of us want to give up, these unsung activists found a way to help others.

h/t hazmat

🌼

The Librarian for Teenagers

Ricci Yuhico says the teenage students who study and socialize at her branch of the New York Public Library have formed real friendships there.Credit…Brittainy Newman for The New York Times

Covid has cast an especially long shadow on teenagers, both in terms of academic outcomes and social emotional development. Ricci Yuhico, who manages the Teen Center at the New York Public Library’s newly renovated Stavros Niarchos Foundation branch on Fifth Avenue in Midtown, has been there to help. The center operates essentially as a full-service joy machine, where kids can connect over studying, produce a movie or a song in the recording studio and media lab, get help with college essays, dance and make crafts.

Students come from all over the city, Ms. Yuhico said, some from nearby homeless shelters. Others might use the center as a stop-off point to do homework when they attend a charter school in Manhattan, say, but live in the far reaches of Queens. There’s a strong cohort of teenage volunteers from which real friendships have emerged, Ms. Yuhico said. She and her team see as many as 100 students a day, and one of their greatest successes this year was a building-wide Halloween party.

“The day after, one of our regulars came in and I asked him what the best part of the party was,” Ms. Yuhico recalled. “He said, ‘Just having fun with people I didn’t know.’”

From Six New Yorkers Who Made the City a Better, Cooler, Fairer Place in 2023.  Written by Ginia Bellafante, who writes the Big City column, a weekly commentary on the politics, culture and life of New York City.

In a year that made many of us want to give up, these unsung activists found a way to help others.

h/t hazmat

Open thread!

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War for Ukraine Day 690: The Air War May Have Heated Up

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Going to keep tonight’s update short(ish).

There are as of yet unconfirmed reports that the Ukrainian Air Force brought down a Russian A-50 over the Sea o Azov. The A-50 is an early warning and control aircraft similar to the AWACs.

A few hours ago, someone apparently attacked two Russian aircraft over the Azov Sea: A-50 early warning and control and Il22-M command and control aircraft. The former is claimed to now be scuba diving, while the latter, well… the following audio recording emerged which apparently demonstrates the Il22-M requesting urgent landing in Anapa, calling for ambulance and fire crews.

Numbers in the recording are quite challenging to decipher. Information in Russian channels is scarce. But the events have most likely taken place and Russia lost at least one very expensive and valuable flying asset.

By the way, yesterday, Russian channels claimed destruction of a Patriot AA system in Western Ukraine. But didn’t provide any evidence whatsoever.

Eternal fishing!

 

Rumors are rumors, I think by this point in the war everyone should already understand this, but still a warning.
Ukrainian media are actively spreading claims about the downing of Russian A-50s and Il-22M near the coast of the Azov Sea. Allegedly, the tail number of the A-50 and Il-22M11 are known, (RF-50601) and (RF-75106).
https://rbc.ua/rus/news/zsu-pidbili-dva-rosiyski-litaki-azovskim-1705266536.html

Hopefully we’ll get confirmation of just what happened soon.

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

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MLK Day Preparations Open Thread: Toxic Seepage Alert

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Charlie Kirk, who first came to national attention prancing around a college quad clad only in a diaper, finds a new way to monetize his humiliation fetish for the benefit of his GOP sugar daddies. Per Wired — “How Charlie Kirk Plans to Discredit Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Act”:

… In December 2023, speaking before a group of students and teachers at America Fest, a political convention organized by Turning Point USA, Kirk struck a different tone.

“MLK was awful,” Kirk said. “He’s not a good person. He said one good thing he actually didn’t believe.”

For decades, conservatives have pointed to King and his idea that people should “not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character” as a model for equality.

“For a while, Dr. King’s stock was very much on the rise in conservative circles and the Republican Party,” says John Wood Jr., a Republican activist. “It’s been understood on the right that even though Dr. King wasn’t really one of us politically, he was still a ‘good liberal.’”

For Kirk, the shift on King wasn’t an offhand remark, but a glimpse into his broader strategy to discredit the civil rights leader and the landmark legislation most associated with King: the Civil Rights Act of 1964…

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Sunday Night Open Thread

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Got the tv situation sorted. Bought a 60″ used one off Facebook Marketplace for 125 bucks. Some young 25-30 year old kid whose bf cheated on her so she was selling all their shit and moving to California. Why do I know this? Because she told me and I asked no more questions and drove directly over.

The color isn’t perfect and the hue is off but it works and we can both see it and it was the right price. Joelle’s glasses are usually so smudged it wouldn’t matter if the picture was perfect anyway, and I don’t care because I can handle watching it for a couple months a year.

One of the things I am having a hard time getting used to is everything is 15-30 minutes away, but when you get there, it still feels like you are in the same place. That’s weird for me. Where I live in WV you drive 15-30 minutes in any direction and you are looking at radically different terrain. From where I am I drive ten minutes in any direction and I’ve crossed at least 2-3 named ridgelines and descended through and around several hollows and crossed at least one or two creeks. It’s very difficult to get used to.

Also you have been screaming for pet pics. Here is a picture of Maxwell Edison, who dangles, although against his will and against my better judgment:

Sunday Night Open Thread 1

Surprisingly and somewhat miraculously, no humans were hurt taking this picture.

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Medium Cool – Dorothy A. Winsor: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Mystery & Thriller

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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.

🌼

I asked Dorothy Winsor to share some of her recent book reviews with us for discussion on Medium Cool, a few at a time.  If this goes well, we’ll do some more in a couple of weeks.  Do you have thoughts on that?  Please send me an email message.  ~WaterGirl

Dorothy A. Winsor: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Mystery & Thriller

In my experience, people are happier if they’re working on a project. I’ve blogged about this before. By project, I mean some set of actions that people undertake freely. It’s what collectors do, for instance, or quilters, or runners training for a marathon.

When Goodreads published their list of finalists for best book of the year in fifteen categories, I saw a potential project. I decided to read one book from each category. I thought such a project would help me discover some new books and read a little more widely, even in categories such as romance or horror which I usually walk right on by.

Link to my blog post about this project.

WaterGirl asked me to share some of the reviews. Maybe you’ll find something you want to read. You’re also welcome to talk about these books or books of your own choice that you think fit the category. I’m still reading, so I’m going to give you only a few at a time.

The first three categories are Fiction, Historical Fiction, and Mystery and Thriller.

Fiction

Yellowface by R. F. Kuang

Told in first person by a writer who steals a dead writer’s manuscript and publishes it as her own, Yellowface has every bit of horrible behavior you’ve ever seen in writing and publishing. The unreliable narrator is so well done that you start to feel sorry for her, right before she does some other awful thing. It’s like a horror story for writers. I loved it. I’m leading a book club discussion on it in February. We’ll see if the non-writers in the club like it as well.

Historical Fiction

Weyward by Emilia Hart

The story of three women in the Weyward family: Altha in the early 1600s, Violet in the 1940s, and Kate in the contemporary world. All three have a sensitivity to nature that marks them as both healers and witches, categories that slide close together particularly in Altha’s world. Indeed, she’s formally tried for witchcraft. As is common in books with several point of view characters, one gripped me more than the others, that being Kate’s relationship with her abusive husband. Altha was my second favorite, followed by Violet. Eventually, I was drawn in by all of them and found myself eager to learn what happened next with each.

My one quibble with this book is that most of the men are violent and evil. Violet’s brother was an exception, as was Simon, a kind neighbor of Altha. But in general, these women needed to stay away from men if they were to be safe. That seemed to cast a wide generalization about men and the possibility of a relationship that’s close and yet allows women to keep control of their own world.

Mystery and Thriller

The Last Devil to Die

Amazon.com: The Last Devil to Die: A Thursday Murder Club Mystery eBook : Osman, Richard: Kindle Store

The Last Devil to Die is part of Osman’s Thursday Murder Club series. I love this whole series about old people investigating murders in the retirement community where they live. I think this book is possibly the best since the first one.

Elizabeth, Ron, Joyce, and Ibrahim investigate the murder of an old friend. That’s intriguing. But what I really liked about this book was the further character development that takes place. It’s hard to keep showing new sides of a character in a long-running series, but Osman does a wonderful job here. Joyce looks more bold. Ibrahim reveals a sad part of his past. And Elizabeth suffers a loss.

Additionally, the book is lovely blend of serious and comic.

Yay for old people! Books don’t have to be about the young to speak to a wide audience.

Summary / Discussion

As I look at the three categories I’ve finished, I enjoyed my choices from Fiction and from Mystery & Thriller. I was less satisfied with the Historical Fiction category. I think that when an author chooses a historical era to explore, that choice is often laden with unspoken reasons. The book resonates with a reader if the reasons resonate too.

I move on to the Romance category with some trepidation. I don’t usually read romance. But then, reading more widely is one of the goals of this project. Onward!

You’re welcome to talk about these books or books of your own choice that you think fit the category.

What say you? What kind of review would you give whatever you’re reading?

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Fani Willis Fights Back With a Letter to God

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Fabi Willis fights back, in church. I say good for her!

🌼

🌼

Your thoughts?

Open thread.

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