If only he were rational and grounded in reality enough to aspire to emulate an actual person.
I am afraid the truth is much more pathetic. He wants to be Tony Stark. https://t.co/MFNH7DMCZI— Slava Malamud ???????? (@SlavaMalamud) January 6, 2025
When I was a kid, new issues of Iron Man (then in its double digits) were always the last to sell out at the corner store. Every Stark story seemed to involve the invention of new high-tech war machines, which would inevitably blow things up, always in elaborate detail and yet with the emotional affect of a slipstick-driven slideshow presentation.
When I was a teenage comix nerd in the early 1970s, a long-forgotten source said that Iron Man was the superhero of choice for those who subscribed to Playboy not for the pin-ups, or even ‘the articles’, but for the advertising: Fast cars, name-brand booze, and expensive home technology (hi-fi systems & waterbeds).
From the Wikipedia entry for Iron Man (fictional character):
… Iron Man is the superhero persona of Anthony Edward “Tony” Stark, a businessman and engineer who runs the weapons manufacturing company Stark Industries. When Stark was captured in a war zone and sustained a severe heart wound, he built his Iron Man armor and escaped his captors. Iron Man’s suits of armor grant him superhuman strength, flight, energy projection, and other abilities. The character was created in response to the Vietnam War as Lee’s attempt to create a likeable pro-war character. Since his creation, Iron Man has been used to explore political themes, with early Iron Man stories being set in the Cold War. The character’s role as a weapons manufacturer proved controversial, and Marvel moved away from geopolitics by the 1970s. Instead, the stories began exploring themes such as civil unrest, technological advancement, corporate espionage, alcoholism, and governmental authority…
Iron Man was created in the years after a permanent arms industry developed in the United States, and this was incorporated into the character’s backstory. The character was introduced as an active player in the Vietnam War. Lee described the national mood toward Vietnam during Iron Man’s creation as “a time when most of us genuinely felt that the conflict in that tortured land really was a simple matter of good versus evil”…
Lee modeled Iron Man after businessman Howard Hughes, invoking his physical appearance, his image as a businessman, and his reputation as an arrogant playboy… When first designing the character, Lee wanted to create a modernized Arthurian knight Kirby initially drew the Iron Man armor as a “round and clunky gray heap”, and Heck modified the design to incorporate gadgets such as jets, drills, and suction cups…
Stan Lee was a two-bit hustler, and nothing he said could be taken as truthful without independent verification, but he does seem to have predicted (manifested?) the rise of a certain South African soutpiel immigrant and the incels who love him.
"He is a genius!"
"He invented space!"
"He made cars go vroom vroom!"
"The smartest man alive!"
"So much money! Literally Tony Stark!"
"History's most important innovator!"The cult of money is insane. We elevate childish morons to positions of power and eminence. https://t.co/9PJRIOCOdI
— Slava Malamud ???????? (@SlavaMalamud) January 6, 2025
Tuesday Late Night Open Thread
lurker
first, apparently, which means I am overdue to get to bed..
hope you all are having a good new year, for whichever calendar you may observe…
NotMax
What happens if you give a nine-year-old $300 billion dollars?
//
Trivia: The original Incredible Hulk was also gray, but gray was difficult for comic colorists of the time* to produce in a form which would pass minimal muster in print, hence the changes in both that character and in Iron Man.
*Primarily a task performed by women working at a concern in Connecticut.
TBone
Instead of being named “comic,” this one should be named Tragic.
Central Planning
This morning was the second time I woke up to the sound of my neighbors (not sure which ones) rolling their garbage and recycling down do the street. And they kept doing it. And doing it. And doing it.
Then I realized it was the plow guy clearing our driveways. It’s both amazing and surprising to me my brain thinks steel scraping on asphalt sounds like plastic rolling on asphalt. And that it wants to wake me up to let me know that.
NotMax
Weren’t around beforehand to see copies of Linda Carter, Student Nurse sadly slumping over on the spinner racks, huh?
;)
Bruce K in ATH-GR
Put Elon Musk in a cave with a box of scraps and he’d never get out alive.
Betty Cracker
Was awakened in the wee hours by a sudden sneezing fit and am now watching Martha Stewart and a French guy cook pot au feu on the Roku channel (free with obnoxious ads). It’s not something I would ever make but is interesting to watch. Martha reports that coyotes ate several of her peacocks. She’s pissed about it!
Horrible news out of Southern California with the wind-driven fires. I hope all in the path escape unharmed and that property loss is minimal. Looks bad though.
eclare
I hope all of our fellow jackals in Southern California are safe.
NotMax
@Betty Cracker
Mentioned earlier that Murdoch Mysteries will be leaving Prime later in the month but AFAIK will still be accessible on the Roku channel. Forget whether it is 16 or 17 seasons there.
Jeffg166
@Betty Cracker:
I was doing dishes the other day when out of the corner of my eye I saw the hindquarters of a red fox coming into my back garden. I am use to raccoons and possums in the back garden but the foxes are new. I didn’t expect to see foxes in Philadelphia PA.
The fox was heading for the cat food I put out for the two cats that live in the back garden. I chased the fox away.
The two cats that live in the back garden were frozen in place looking very nervous about the fox. Looking it up foxes will eat cats.
Now I wait until about 9 in the morning to put the cat food out to hopefully avoiding feeding the fox.
Baud
Via Reddit, photo of the fire.
eclare
@Baud:
Wow.
NotMax
@Jeffg166
(Much) lesser Peter Sellers movie with theme song by The Hollies.
;)
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
@Betty Cracker:
@eclare: I’m OK here in Glendale, we just had a very long power outage(about 6 1/2 hours). We have a line of sheds for sale at the edge of the parking lot, one completely blew apart, several others have moved to the south about 5 feet. One moved to the opposite curb and then moved west down the parking lot. I saw a house burning on the TV in the break room, so there is loss of property. Since the power was out, I decided to go out and get a burger, and you could see the fire from the freeway(the 134), it is massive. I know Uncle Ebenezer is in that area, hope he and his are ok.
ETA: The burger place was closed, I suspect they may have also had a power outage. About 5 minutes after I got home the power came back on.
Jeffro
@NotMax: I didn’t know that’s why both were switched from gray to green and gold, respectively!
(just thought both looked cooler in the new colors =)
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: It is worse now, I’m pretty sure it is at the top of Mt. Lowe now. We have had almost no rain this season and these winds are really strong and it is extremely dry.
Baud
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA:
Wow. I can’t imagine 100 mph winds with fire.
Betty Cracker
@Jeffg166: I’d be surprised too! Foxes are so beautiful.
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: Glad you are okay.
eclare
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA:
Thanks for checking in!
frosty
Deleted. Irrelevant.
Jay
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA:
Uncle Ebenezer, his wife and their cats have all evacuated to a safe place away from the fire.
Betty Cracker
It’s 33 degrees here, which is ridiculous. We have the heat on but can still feel the chill in this drafty cabin. Pete keeps throwing me baleful glances, like I’m responsible for the cold snap.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Snow bird Pete.
Professor Bigfoot
@Baud: Holy crap.
TBone
I am just not in the mood for fresh hell today.
Jay
@TBone:
It’s only the 8th, 4 more years and 12 days of hell to go.
TBone
@Jay: right? Got my hip waders and some good vape and buttery popcorn. And the power of the collective soul.
On that note, the Stones are my wakeup call
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wyVs9HSXiJM
MagdaInBlack
@Betty Cracker: I am in the process of assembling several layers of clothing, because: Chicago in January, and I admit I’m kind of envious of Pete all snuggled in that plush blanket. Not envious of the reason being 33 degrees, tho, that sucks for you guys.
MagdaInBlack
@TBone: Jeez, I had that album on 8 track….god I’m old
This one of theirs seems appropriate, plus Lady Gaga
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrIVE9DJpUw
Eta: how da f does she do that in those shoes??
p.a.
Look on the bright side: I don’t think he’ll make it to the end of his term. Now you may say “but Vance will actually be worse”, and you may be right, but personal animus against that human piece of shit overcomes rationality for me.
TBone
@MagdaInBlack: I love that about you. Old is not uncool, it’s scrappy. Especially in layers.
Excellent choice of follow up
frosty
@Betty Cracker: The polar vortex is messing up our Snowbird Road Trip -Arizona instead of Florida this year. The route takes us through OH, KY, and TN. All with sub freezing temps so I can’t drain the antifreeze out of the trailer water system so no sink, shower or toilet. I’m busy changing camping reservations to hotels. We should be OK in Arkansas!
p.a.
This weekend Narragansett Brewing will feature a peanut porter on tap to honor J Carter for legalizing home brewing in 1978. Usual suspects, Mississippi & Alabama, were the last states to legalize it, well into the 2000s.
eclare
@Jay:
Thank you.
Josie
@MagdaInBlack: Many years ago, I visited my middle son where he was in college in Evanston, north of Chicago, in January, It was absolutely the coldest I have ever been in my life, even on skiing trips to New Mexico.
eclare
@Betty Cracker:
That is just too cute
Why do I hear Winnie the Pooh in the background?
NotMax
@p.a.
Home brewing: the realm of witches, don’tcha know.
;) //
Citizen Scientist
Saw someone point out this morning that Trump’s ridiculous press conference the other day was to distract from the arrival of President Carter’s body in WDC. And the press fell for it. Makes complete sense since he’s always got to be the center of attention. Anyway, have a good day y’all.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Glad to hear UncleEb, family and pets are away. Hope their place survives.
It’s 11 here. Ain’t running till the sun comes out as a result.
MomSense
The temps have been running from low single digits to low teens. Sadly, we don’t have any snow.
My old house has radiators powered by oil heat and those suckers work so much better than my heat pumps. They continue to keep the house warm even when the furnace isn’t running.
I need to find out if there is something besides oil that can generate enough heat/steam to run them because they are amazing.
frosty
@MomSense: We had gas-fired steam heat in Baltimore; oil-fired hot water in Towson, and gas-fired hot water here in PA. All three kept the house warm, at least as warm as it could be in a drafty pre-WWII house.
I liked the steam heat best because of the noise. It sounded like you were getting warm!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Citizen Scientist: Yes, but Trump did come across as mental ill in the press conference.
JML
Heck, Idiot Elon even appeared in the Iron Man movies (Iron Man 2, specifically, arguably the worst of them but that’s probably just an amusing coincidence). He absolutely wants the world to see him as Tony Stark: genius billionaire playboy philanthropist. He craves the attention, believes he’s smarter than everyone, thinks that rules apply to others, and that we should be grateful for all that he’s “done for us”. If he actually had 1/10th of the technical skills he likes people to believe he has, I’m quite certain he’d be trying to make Ultron in his garage.
Kay
@Citizen Scientist:
NY Times is over the moon to have their hometown boy back.
They have four “explainers” where they sane wash his delightful maverickness.
I said yesterday we’re about 6 months away from their reporters inventing a threat posed by Denmark that would justify an invasion.
NotMax
@Enhanced Voting Techniques
Ya think announcing Hannibal Lecter ambassador to Denmark is crazy?
//
Baud
@Kay:
Judith Miller is waiting by the phone for the NYT’s call.
Kay
I like that all the tech billionaires are now aligned against Democrats.
They’re absolutely horrible, shallow, unlikeable people who are also power-mad authoritarians so hopefully we can run against them.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@NotMax: More “looks sick, was babbling” kind of crazy from what I saw. During the election Trump sounded like he usual does but looked like death warmed over, now he looks and sounds like he should be in an assisted care home.
NotMax
@Kay
Operation Havarti Ultra?
//
Dorothy A. Winsor
@TBone: I was sure that link would go to Start Me U
ETA: My news of the morning is that I actually sold 3 books from the tiktok shop and tiktok did not tell me. I’ve got them ready to ship when things open up.
Rose Judson
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: It was only 25F yesterday morning but Britain, for reasons that remain mysterious to me after almost 20 years here, resists treating frosted/iced surfaces.
I tried running on my way back from dropping The Child at school, but it would’ve been more of a skating exercise. There was not a single inch of salted sidewalk other than next to the train station.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Kay: It’s a point of pride that we are the billionaires enemies
NotMax
@Rose Judson
Old Russian proverb.
“It’s a long walk to the church and the roads are icy; it’s a longer walk to the tavern but I’ll be careful.”
;)
Baud
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
All our enemies are great enemies for moral people to have.
I just wish more people felt that way.
Kay
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Clarity. They’re all on the MAGA side now. Good fucking riddance.
The Heritage Foundation is going after Wiki though. I really think we’re watching the ramping up of censorship and far Right control of information. I wish like hell we had a plan for this. I don’t know what to do. We need a space we can protect from their censors.
MomSense
@frosty:
The radiators in my childhood home were so clanky when they came on, but these are very quiet. I’ve had to turn them down except for the rooms my mom is in because she has a hard time staying warm.
I’ve been sewing floor to ceiling blackout/thermal lined draperies and they really make a big difference.
I’d love to have a geothermal system. Out of my price range unfortunately. I need to do some research on options.
Kay
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Kevin O’Leary, another far Rightist, is putting together a bid for TikTok.
Facebook, Instagram, X, The WaPo, the Los Angeles Times, NBC, CNN, ABC and now TikTok. They’re all MAGA. We are going to need a place for any kind of resistance.
NotMax
@MomSense
So chilly earlier tonight I seriously thought about dusting off the space heater and switching it on.
Fortunately, warmed up here since midnight. Go figure.
Splitting Image
Karl Marx, or thereabouts.
Trivia Man
@NotMax: I worked with clothing dyes at one pint, and grey was the hardest shade to nail consistently across batches. If the store reorders, you better give that exact shade again or they wont match the last of the old stock on their shelves. And people can instantly tell side by side.
I am proud of my solution. It was water based dye so very easy to dilute the concentration. Our black was REALLY strong so it might have been something like 1 oz for 20 gallons of water for one medium grey shade. Too light? Add more. Oops. Better add more water. Oops, too much.
So started making super diluted grey concentrate. Instead of 1 oz to 20 gal, we’d do 10 oz or 20 oz or 40 oz. For a verified grey concentrate shade. Then it was less precision needed to use that grey concentrate as starter for the production batch.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊 😊 😊
schrodingers_cat
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: Glad that you are safe.
schrodingers_cat
Double comment deleted.
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
Papa Boyle
Comic book Tony Stark had thicker skin than his supposed real world counterpart.
p.a.
@MomSense: If there’s room between radiator & wall a wooden frame covered with reflective material will add a bit of heat back into the room. We did this in an old victorian when I was in school and the engineering students crunched some numbers and said “well it’s more probable it helped than that it did nothing, and it definitely didn’t hurt.” We lib arts students were, “well psychologically it feels proactive.”
If there are water pipes in the wall feeding another floor don’t do it. Water pipes shouldn’t be in an outside wall in cold zones, but shit happens (shit happened ; ) )
Trivia Man
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I was guessing Cant You Hear Me Knocking. Great wake me up song.
Gin & Tonic
@Kay: I occasionally mention Michael Dell, of Dell Computers. He’s the world’s 10th richest man, by some measures, and appears to be politically silent. He and his wife established a charitable foundation 25 years ago, and are huge donors to a variety of non-political causes.
I don’t know him and have no stake in any of his businesses, just pointing out that there is, apparently, another path than being a fascist asshole.
Shalimar
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: Elon might manage to build some kind of AI sex toy.
Kay
And Musk is intervening in elections elsewhere. There will now be Germans and Canadians and people in the UK who loathe him and want to resist his parasitical, authoritarian efforts in THEIR countries. They will need an unbought and uncensored site to share information too.
RevRick
@NotMax: As I replied to Elon on X, his reaction reminded me of stuff I heard on the 4th grade playground. It screams both of immaturity and self-hatred, because those who can’t take criticism or correction do so, because they see themselves as worthless and unlovable. I suggested he get therapy.
His having a gazillion dollars at his disposal says we’d all be better off if he took my advice.
Fair Economist
Personally safe here in OC CA but the winds are borderline gale force, higher than the 25 mph predicted, so not good for those facing fires.
My mom called me in the middle of boardgaming last night to inform me the Getty Museum was on fire – but it was actually the Getty *Villa* (a smaller satellite location) and it wasn’t on fire, just part of the (extensive) grounds, which has happened before. Gotta love the media’s hard work at avoiding sensationalism /s.
p.a.
@Trivia Man: Looking at auto touchup paint one time, I was surprised there were actually so many shade of “white”, and I’m talking just “white”, not oddballs like “ice”/”snow” etc. There was Chevy White, Toyota White etc, and all distinguishable.
RevRick
@Kay: Retreating into our own cocoons does us no damn good. I say meet MAGA head on and do some stabbing on their territory.
artem1s
@Bruce K in ATH-GR:
The problem in our Bizarro World version of Iron Man, Tony didn’t make it out of the cave and
ElmoObediah Stane took over Stark Industries and renamed it X. And now all their products blow up and kill the customers.NotMax
@p.a.
Also, if they are to be painted, go with black or a very dark brown.
White paint is white on both sides and reflects heat.
RevRick
@NotMax: It was an easy stroll to the pub, but the trip back was staggering.
TBone
@Trivia Man: howsis?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=V_M6lccMzek
Kay
@RevRick:
Agree wholeheartedly, but I’m talking about censorship. This is a scenario where our content would be removed or throttled. They’re not buying these outlets to put together an ideological mix of experts for the Marketplace of Ideas. They’re buying them to control information. Heritage wants to censor Wiki. They don’t want to improve it. They want to stack it with hacks who lie constantly and purge all the liberals.
montanareddog
@Baud: @Kay:
I think it will be Ken Vogel, not Judith Miller, who will launder reports on the threat posed by Denmark’s LMDs*.
Obligatory – FTFNYT.
*LMD – Lego of Mass Destruction
Quiltingfool
@Trivia Man: As a quilter, I agree that gray is not a simple color! As with any color I use, gray can lean towards blue tones or yellow tones.
I like working with gray fabrics. They make a great background color when you use bright colors (in quilts).
sab
@Kay: Amy Acton is tjrowing her hat in the ring for Governor of Ohio.
On the other side I had hoped the utter corruption of the Republicans in Ohio would damage them, but apparently corruption is now seen as a way to own the libs.
Kay
@montanareddog:
Danes were horribly offended last time and they will be more so now. It’s a country of 6 million people. Half the size of Ohio. The giant belligerent bully demanding Greenland because we want it doesn’t amuse them. They’re appalled.
RevRick
@Kay: If they censor me, that’s out of my control, but until then I refuse to concede an inch of ground.
frosty
@MomSense: A couple of years ago I covered some of the windows with the kit that uses clear plastic sheeting stuck with double-sided tape, which helped a lot. Too lazy to do it this year. I should have got off my butt: last month’s gas bill was $700. I shudder to think what the next one will be.
RevRick
@Kay: I suspect more than the Danes are appalled at Trump’s bullying attempts to reduce them to vassal states where might makes right.
Geminid
@MomSense: I have only knowledge a bout radiator systems like yours but I’ve read about various types of conversions. So research might show some good options.
These conversions are likely more common in New England because that system was prevalent up there. An HVAC contrsctor in your area might tell you the options and give you an estimate. You might want to be sitting down when they do, or you could ask them to email the estimate.
It would free and practical information though, and could inform further research.
Kay
@RevRick:
Theres this whole history between Denmark and Norway and Greenland that goes back to 1300. Trump saying “people don’t know” why Denmark has Greenland is really insulting to all three parties. “People” know. Americans like Donald Trump and major media employees just don’t know.
NotMax
@Kay
Appalled enough to alter the Danish royal coat of arms for the first time in 500 years to now display a polar bear for Greenland and a ram for the Faroe Islands.
A Nordic middle finger directed to you know who.
Soprano2
@frosty: Did you know they’re forecasting 6″ of snow for Little Rock this Friday? It’s one of those weird winter storms where it’s going to be worse in the south than up here. Dallas is preparing for the snow!
sab
@MomSense: We have had our boiler back on for a week after they finally got the tiny new fuses in. The repair guy slightly altered the wiring so that everything wasn’t running through one place (luddite here so don’t know the terminology.) That means the cats in the basement are limited to the 66° we have for the rest of the house instead of the 70° they prefer, but to bad. Otherwise it is quiet heating with out all the ductwork in the ceiling. No clanging hot radiators like my parents’ old house. No loud fans like our old house. Just lovely heat.
I agree with you about the usefulness of good curtains.
Soprano2
Of course they did, who cares about a 100 year old president who died, we have a crazy man’s press conference to cover!!! I wish that were sarcastic.
Kay
@RevRick:
Heritage bullying Wiki freaked me out a little because Wiki is an amazing and wonderful thing. Unbought. Run by volunteers. It’s priceless.
The rest I knew were for sale to the highest or most powerful bidder, so they’re less valuable to me.
p.a.
@Kay: It’s not beyond belief that the idjit doesn’t know it’s not green like, say, Ireland, and is looking to create a golf travel venue or two.
MomSense
@Kay:
I’m liking crooked media. For subscribers there are additional podcasts, email briefings, and interactions with other subscribers. I like that the hosts have campaign and government experience. They aren’t just broadcasting assumptions based on their biases or virtue signaling. There is at least discussion of what we could do to change opinions and expand our voting base.
I am going to scale back in the other independent media I support because too much of it is just broadcasts out of a bubble without the experience.
I will continue to subscribe to HCR’s Letters from an American.
TBone
@NotMax: a dick measuring contest, hahahaha the Dane is victorious
sab
@p.a.: I used to know an architect who did Gap stores in California, and he said they used eighteen different shades of white throughout the stores to create the sense of depth and lighting that they wanted.
Kay
@NotMax:
Americans really don’t want to get into the whole Norway/ Denmark thing. An intra Viking squabble. It’s complicated. But that’s where the Greenland/ Denmark treaty came from.
artem1s
@Citizen Scientist: The stock market is closed today due to the National Day Mourning for JC. The press can try all they want to ignore JC but Biden isn’t going to let them.
MomSense
@p.a.:
Water pipes! Mine run inside the rooms and are painted to match the walls/ceilings! I’m doing a total renovation on my kitchen and one of the water pipes runs through the kitchen cabinet! It was fun seeing the kitchen designer, carpenter and plumber all tilt their heads to the side simultaneously when I pointed that feature out!
I’m getting so excited about my kitchen. It’s going to be amazing and I plan to be at home as much as possible starting in a few weeks. My oldest son’s SO painted one of my favorite places as a Christmas gift. It will fit perfectly on the exposed chimney behind the cooktop and island. The colors are so beautiful. On Christmas I got teary just thinking about the creativity in my family.
Kay
@MomSense:
I like Crooked Media too although I only listen once a month or so. I have to be in a podcast mood because I read faster than they talk so I prefer print. I use audio if I’m doing something else while listening, but even that has a downside. I’ve found over the years that “multitasking” doesn’t work for me. I do both tasks less well than I would if I just did one at a time. Especially listening. Really listening takes effort- it’s its own task.
Soprano2
@Kay: It certainly clarifies things, doesn’t it?
p.a.
@MomSense: Sounds cool! Good luck!
MomSense
@frosty:
I priced purchasing quality thermal/blackout draperies and decided to make my own. The cost of the fabric for my whole house was less than ordering one room of drapes. I’ve got a couple glass doors I am going to make Roman blinds mounted at the ceiling and going down to the floor. Those might be an option for you since you can assemble them without a lot of sewing. I found a tutorial on the spruce. I’m going to make one as my weekend project.
MomSense
@Kay:
There are many print options on their site. I think you can do a free trial or maybe just purchase one month and see if you like it. Their foreign policy coverage is good, too.
Soprano2
That’s part of the dictator playbook, get control of the flow of information. When they say “censorship” what they really mean is “someone said I was wrong” or “someone said this isn’t true”. This is what Karl Rove was talking about when he said they “create reality”.
Scout211
Do you mean tomorrow for the national day of mourning? All federal offices are closed tomorrow.
MomSense
@NotMax:
There are so many ridiculous videos from MAGATs and the other weather manipulation conspiracists (major overlap). They apparently do not understand the jet stream or polar vortex so of course the ebil gubmint is creating the cold front to hurt republicans.
I think we are getting just a taste of how crazy people will get as climate change worsens.
Soprano2
@MomSense: We had radiator heat in the first dorm room I lived in. Sometimes it would get so hot we’d have to open the windows – in January!
Soprano2
@Kay: Once they get control of them, they’ll make hay out of the fact that they aren’t actually government entities, so the 1st Amendment doesn’t apply, even though now they act like the 1st Amendment applies to all of social media.
NotMax
@MomSense
At the time felt like I was one of maybe three people who noticed Carter’s cardigan speech was made in the Oval Office — at night, in winter — with the drapes on all the windows behind him wide open.
cmorenc
@p.a.: re: possibility Trump doesn’t make it to end of term: both an upside and a downside to Vance becoming POTUS is that Vance is not batshit insane.
MomSense
@NotMax:
You’re right!! My grandmother was one of the others because she said the same thing. She hand sewed drapes for my childhood home. My fabric taste is a lot more modern but it’s the same idea.
They will work in summer too when I need to block the sun.
Geminid
@Kay: Trump has a 5th grader’s knowledge of history. One other thing that stood out in his news conference was when he talked about Syria and said the Turks have wanted Syria for 2,000 years.
That caught a lot of attention in regional social media. The many anti-Turkish accounts were quick to point that the Turkic peoples were living in Mongolia 2000 years ago, and to advocate sending them back there ASAP.
There was a serious question involved though, about the future of US support for the Syrian Democatic Forces (SDF) in Northeast Syria. Trump wouldn’t disclose any plans in that regard.
The Biden administration has also been very reticent about this question. It’s an acute problem right now, with Turkiye threatening to intervene directly against the SDF if Syria’s interim government does not reach a satisfactory agreeement with the largely Kurdish organization. Fighting between Turkish proxy forces and the SDF accounts for most of current armed conflict in Syria.
Kay
@Soprano2:
X announced it would be only “uplifting” content from now on – full court press to promote Dear Leader.
It’s not just Musk though. All of the “struggling middle class” and “invasion at the border!” coverage has just magically disappeared from media.
Happy days are (apparently) here again, with absolutely no change in material conditions.
I watched this (inadvertently) funny clip from a MAGA host on TikTok. He “interviews” various morons, all white men like him, and they marvel at the genius of Dear Leader. So the guest was going on and on about how things are already better and host said “you know Joe Biden is still President right?” – it was like reality intruded for a second, a pause, then they resumed Daily Adoration Affirmations as if it hadn’t happened.
Kay
@Geminid:
USA Today did an exit interview with Biden. Not one foreign policy issue in their “7 takeaways” piece. Not Ukraine, Russia, Israel, Gaza, Lebanon or Syria. But an EXTENDED part about Hunter Biden.
We’re dumb because they’re dumb. They produce garbage and feed it to us.
NotMax
@Soprano2
Occupied an apartment in Queens in a small (three story) building where the steam was turned up so high it was necessary to do that.
On the other side of the coin, a corner dorm room in college was so distant from the furnace that it had 14 steam radiators along the two outside walls. Warm was aspirational.
oldgold
Trump is now appealing to the U.S. Supreme Court to stop the “sentencing” scheduled for this Friday on the NY money laundering case.
Given the “sentencing” is not going to include incarceration, probation or even a damn fine; and, Trump’s appeal rights remain intact, I do not fully understand why this sentencing charade is being so hotly contested.
Kay
@Geminid:
Read it yourself. It’s garbage. I didn’t count words but by paragraph count commercial media in the US believe Hunter Biden news is one of the top five issues facing the country.
It’s the MAGAfication of all media. Trump is a fucking drug-addled dolt so they’ll dumb it down even further not to anger him. Trump told them Hunter Biden was the most vital issue of the last 6 months and so they just adopt his preferences, even in an interview with Joe Biden.
We are going to need both a real news source and a place where anti MAGA dialogue won’t be censored. Propublica alone isn’t going to cut it.
tobie
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: Glad you and Uncle Ebeneezer are safe. Can’t imagine what it’s like to breathe right now in SoCal.
It’s been frigid cold in MD, I’m almost out of propane, and I used up the half-cord of seasoned wood I had. Tonight it’s supposed to go down to 19. That might be downright tropical for the midwest but in an 1850 house it feels like a circle of hell.
evodevo
@frosty: Yep…here in Central KY we are having a MN winter – it’ll be 0 tonite and high of 20 tomorrow, with everywhere paralyzed by the 9 inches of snow with an inch of ice on top, and more predicted for the weekend. Good times! We haven’t been able to make it out our driveway yet…
tobie
@oldgold: Habit. He’s the boss and no one dare touch him. That’s his whole shtyck.
Kay
@oldgold:
Because it’s humiliating for him. He and his supporters are not subject to laws.
Raven
“three flights up” Nanci Griffith
In the winter, a-chatterin’ cold
While the building shook like rageweed in the wind
Stories from the heat pipes
We were told
But now they only leave me
With a half-enchanted grin
https://youtu.be/rhxf-Rz2avg?si=14JKmxrKXonxytqj
Soprano2
I wouldn’t say that it’s completely disappeared, but it’s dialed down a lot from what it was six months ago. You’re right that they’re thrilled to have the chaos agent back (even though he didn’t ever actually go away). I can’t believe how much they cover him compared to how much they covered the Biden administration, and he’s not even president yet! Breathless hanging on his every utterance, even if it’s totally batshit crazy.
frosty
@Soprano2: We won’t get there until the 18th. Fingers crossed!
Otherwise, oh hell this switch to the Southwest may have been a huge mistake.
Soprano2
@Kay: Wow, that’s so stupid. Hunter Biden should have been a couple of sentences, tops. They really are dumb.
oldgold
@Kay: He is receiving no punishment. He doesn’t even have to attend the “sentencing” in person.
All this does is keep it in the news that he has been convicted of committing 34 felonies. In a word, this strategy is – counterproductive.
tobie
@Geminid: Hasn’t Turkey already intervened actively and directly in Syria to bomb the living shit out of Kurds and deny them water? It’s not a hypothetical. It’s been happening this winter, though reports of cutting off water supplies to Kurdish areas date back to 2020 at least.
Geminid
@Kay: I’ve pretty much stopped following Middle East news on U.S. media. I guess Axios and Barak Ravid are the exception.
Otherwise I mainly follow regional sources like Middle East Eye’s Ragip Soylu and Daily Sabah, and Clash Report which has acquired more depth since they brought security analyst Levent Kemal on board.
Rudaw English and Medya News present a Kurdish point of view and are good complements to the Turkiye-based media sites. Rudaw English is baseded in Erbil, Iraq and reports on events in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region of Iraq in addition to regional developments like those in Syria to the west and Turkiye to the north.
Al Arabiye also seems to be good source, although I keep in mind that it’s sponsored by the Saudi goverment and reflects its policies.
Anne Laurie
@MomSense: I grew up in a Bronx apartment building so old it used *coal* — a truck would stop by & send dusty chunks of anthracite down a chute to the basement. And, of course, we had cast-iron steam heat radiators, which got hot enough on some days to be a burn danger to small children!
One of the things I remember from early days on the covid beat: Those steam systems were designed during / right after the Great 1918 Influenza pandemic! The idea was to improve ventilation — the radiators were supposed to pump out enough heat to warm the rooms even if the windows (right above them) were open! And, yes, they worked well enough… much to the displeasure of our building superintendent, who had to shovel the coal into the boiler.
Geminid
@tobie: So far, Turkiye has mainly acted in Syria through its intelligence agency M.I.T and its proxy Syrian National Army (SNA). They haven’t yet sent their army across the border which is the kind of intervention they are threatening now.
Last week Turkiye did send a couple F-16s to bomb SDF forces contending with SNA fighters for control of a strategic dam on the Euphrates River. Considering they could have sent 50 F-16s this was more of a warning. The Turks are not “bombing the shit” out of the SDF, at least not yet. Ed. although they are widening their assaults on infrastructure as you say.
The Turks would argue that their beef is with the SDF and its YPG militia component, and not Syria’s Kurdish population which is controlled by the SDF.
Ed. They still want the matter resolved through negotiations between representatives of Syria’s Kurds and the Damascus government but are not ruling out force.
There are some important developments happening in Turkiye itself regarding that nation’s relations with its Kurdish citizens. There is a deal in the works to resolve the 40-long war with the PKK and reach a settlement with the Kurdish DEM Party regarding Kurdish rights, and so far it seems to be progressing.
Daoud bin Daoud
@Papa Boyle: a newborn baby has a thicker skin than Phoney Stark.
Jager
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA:
My wife decorated some window boxes with Christmas greens, ribbons, etc. One blew away last night. I found it a block away this morning.
She was in New York over the weekend for her Dad’s birthday, on the road back to Camarillo from LAX yesterday afternoon, 405 at 35-45 mph from 10 to the 101. PCH is a nightmare.
Trivia Man
@TBone: awesome! I am not familiar with that one
MomSense
@Anne Laurie:
That is so cool!