I don’t want to jinx anything or speak prematurely, but it feels like the Democrats in Washington, as a whole, showed a little bit of resolve and fight today. The RFK confirmation was brutal for him, and the Dems did well grilling him. Now let’s see if they can manage to kill his confirmation. Sheldon Whitehouse better not shit the bed.
This was my shirt today:
Got quite a few compliments and one old white dude shook his head at me but I had on my mirrored sunglasses and didn’t even let him know he his displeasure had been seen. Yell into the void you nazi fuck.
On a serious note, while wearing shirts like that are a lazy lazy lazy form of activism, I find it important to wear them in public. Lot of vulnerable people can’t who would like to can’t because they will be targeted or assaulted, but as a 6′ to 6’1″ stocky guy who walks like a cop with a permanent grimace, people tend to just leave you alone. All my friends know I am a big wimp who cries when he runs over animals in the road, but the rest of the world doesn’t, though.
In other news, this came to me this morning during the testimony and I can not shake it.
Hrmmmm
UNCANNY
— John Cole (@johngcole.bsky.social) January 29, 2025 at 11:34 AM
Freakish. See yinz tomorrow.
MCat
Good on you, John. RFK is a monster. A monster among monsters.
zhena gogolia
Great shirt. I have no idea where that movie picture is from.
Jackie
OMG. That photo. RFK jr and the FFOTUS are one and the same.
Chetan Murthy
@zhena gogolia: First version of movie Total Recall.
zhena gogolia
@Chetan Murthy: Okay. Never seen it. I kind of vaguely know who that actor is, but not really.
WaterGirl
Oh my god, I love that shirt. Wherever did you find it???
zhena gogolia
I’m trying to figure out what to put on my lawn. I think I’ll just put my Harris-Walz sign back up. The solidarity signs are all full of text that is too hard to read. But I don’t want it destroyed by a snow plow, so for now I’m going to put it up near the front porch.
ETA: I wanted to do one that was “AMERICA’S HITLER.” — J. D. VANCE, but I figured it would go over a lot of people’s heads.
Chacal Charles Calthrop
@zhena gogolia: the mutant in the picture is not the star of Total Recall. That would be Arnold Schwarzenegger who plays opposite Sharon Stone. Classic 80’s SF schlock although upon checking teh Google it came out in 1990.
Ohio Mom
I’ve been wearing my old pink pussy hat since Friday. I’ve been out and about, shopping, runnng errands, ate out once, and not a single person has reacted to the hat. No one has done a double take or scowled at me
I don’t know whether to chalk it up to older women being invisible or that no one remembering what pink pussy hats are.
Mr. Bemused Senior
Don’t forget “SH”. As in рашист.
I will not link to the [spit] FTFNYT article where I first encountered this word.
Chetan Murthy
I couldn’t figure out how to say it, so I said nothing, but this is accurate. I liked the flick, but I would never mistake it for “film”. Still, fun flick.
RaflW
Sen. Tina Smith did a great job grilling freakzoid RFK Jr.
VFX Lurker
To add to Chetan Murthy’s info upthread, the actor was Marshall Bell. The characters are George and his conjoined brother Kuato, the mutant leader of the Martian resistance in the 1990 film.
Nukular Biskits
Cole, where did you get that shirt?
I WANT ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
SuzieC
@Nukular Biskits: Me TOOO!!!
Another Scott
Small plane and helicopter collided in air at DCA this evening.
:-(
Best wishes,
Scott.
Sister Golden Bear
Ugh. A regional jet from Wichita on approach to DC’s National airport (I refuse to call it Reagan National) just collided with a U.S. Army Blackhawk helicopter. Unlikely to be any survivors. Aside from being tragic, it’s a major, major fuck-up—DC’s airspace is the most tightly regulated in the nation (and probably the world), so much so that commercial pilots have to receive special training and certification to land there. Having these two aircraft close enough to collide is inconceivable.
John Cole
teepublic
Lyrebird
Thank you Cole for buying and wearing that shirt!!
YES to the first part, and THANK YOU for rocking the shirt. (ETA can’t confirm the second part as an average sized female)
@Nukular Biskits: thank you in advance, Nuke!
Eolirin
Democrats cannot, by definition, kill RFK Jr’s nomination. Only Republicans can do that.
Can we stop Murc’s Lawing ourselves here?
Bupalos
If you want to win you have to be better than what you’re fighting.
you have to go outside, hook up with whoever, and be better than the opposition. You have to have something better to give.
MobiusKlein
For why the Ds have waited an entire week to get solid pushback? It’s much easier to push back against actual EOs, not nebulous campaign stuff.
The Medicare Portal went dark, FFS. A concrete thing that shows the total chaos.
Just like we predicted.
Chacal Charles Calthrop
@Sister Golden Bear: I guess we’ll find out if the people managing DC’s airspace were fired and/or quit today.
seriously though I hear you when you say you feel like you’re screaming into the void, the media will not cover what is going to happen. Please post to this blog re anything you can think of that will help the trans community.
Bupalos
Of all the things I’d consider saving Trump from in the name of stability…. RFK isn’t one of them.
we should absolutely saddle Trump with RFK and his followers. Politics 101. If I could move anyone into Trump’s orbit, it’s RFK.
I PROMISE YOU Trump wants this nom sunk. Do not expend energy here,
Nukular Biskits
For those interested in
wearwhere Cole got that cool shirt:TEEPUBLIC: Anti Trump, Trump Is A Racist T-Shirt
I’m ordering one as we (figuratively) speak.
ETA: Fixed spelling … but it worked as originally, if I do say so myself.
Sister Golden Bear
@Sister Golden Bear: A little hard to tell from video, since telephoto flattens depth, but it sure looks like the Blackhawk either flew into the passenger jet or immediately ahead of it.
Obviously the NTSB investigation will eventually conclude what happened, I’m just baffled, since it seems like the helicopter had a clear view of the jet ahead of it. One of those situations where even if you think you have the right of way, as the more maneuverable aircraft I’d call an emergency and stay the fuck away. (FAA lets you violate any flight regulation to avoid a collision.)
Jackie
@SuzieC:
@Nukular Biskits:
Me THREE or WHATEVER # we’re at!!!
Sister Golden Bear
@Chacal Charles Calthrop: Thank you.
Librarian
I’m seeing on Bluesky posts that Trump abolished an FAA air safety advisory commission last week and froze hiring of air traffic controllers.
Jackie
@Nukular Biskits:
Thank you!
Bupalos
If Trump gets to say “I wanted RFK wellness… but the Dems said NO so oh well EAT PLASTIC….
do the maths. Make him there’s’ not our’s
Eolirin
@Bupalos: Making the political calculation that it is better to have tens of thousands of dead and crippled kids if it means you’re back in power is not something we should be engaging in.
It makes you a monster.
MobiusKlein
@Bupalos:
Hard disagree. Fuck RFK, and his know nothing shithole skills. Make an example of him, and say out loud how much death he will cause.
If he is shot down, then that’s a stain on the trump administration.
If he’s confirmed by the R’s alone, then they own the outcome.
Bupalos
@Eolirin: sorry we’re there. Past there,
MILLIONS will die and more importantly the planet will be rendered increasingly sterile.
Time to quit pretending we’re in control.
Chetan Murthy
@Eolirin: Thank you for saying this. There are lots of posts that I’d rather saddle Trump with (SecDef comes to mind) but the leader of the organization that helped put one of the four horsemen of the Apocalypsere in the ground? Nah, I think we need to keep that run by sane adults.
Eolirin
@Bupalos: We can’t stop them so we should encourage dead kids is fucked up. Please go away forever.
Gretchen
@John Cole: I heard that the podcast episode on whooping cough rips into West Virginia politicians pretty hard. I haven’t listened to it yet.
tobie
@Sister Golden Bear: My mother just called me to tell me about this. I’m assuming all Blackhawk helicopters are military. Military and civilian aircraft must share some communication channels to prevent catastrophes like this.
ETA: Sorry I see you addressed this in comment 17. I missed that comment when I posted.
Gretchen
@Eolirin: He’s the one permanent fixture of my pie filter.
Bupalos
@Eolirin: Nope.
you’re in denial. RFK is literally the least bad of Trump’s nominees, most especially because it’s a complicated political coalition for him, these nature wellness freaks, nothing in common.
trump succeeds or fails. JFK in his house makes him more likely to fail
Nukular Biskits
@Jackie @Lyrebird @SuzieC:
Already ordered, paid and confirmed mine.
Librarian
https://bsky.app/profile/golikehellmachine.com/post/3lgwlfrf36c2p
frosty
@Eolirin: I’ve got that commenter pied for a reason. I toggle occasionally and confirm that it’s better to see pie than the comments.
Chetan Murthy
@Gretchen: he used to be in mine too. no matter, he’s back in there!
ETA: oh hm, ISTR that the pie filter is implemented using cookies? And (haha) I cleared my browser caches recently in order to debug a problem with my bank’s website. That’s why he wasn’t in there.
Eolirin
@Chetan Murthy: We probably can’t keep it run by sane adults. We don’t have power here. But that’s different than seeing that and then playing politics with it and cheering on mass murder because it might win us some points.
Chacal Charles Calthrop
@Sister Golden Bear: I’m not on the blog every day (this is why I read dead threads) but this is a wonderful community and I find your comments always thoughtful, valuable & informative
Trivia Man
@VFX Lurker: I saw the movie but forgot the word kuato until the rick & morty episode beat the word into the ground. Enjoyed the episode
Librarian
https://bsky.app/profile/abbyvesoulis.bsky.social/post/3lgwjnagkz22g
Chetan Murthy
@Eolirin: You might be right. OTOH, a firestorm of pushback might be enough to convince some R Sens to downvote, and the next nominee might only be as bad as the sort of cretin that Trump put in back in 2017. There are many agencies where fuckups can be bad news; this is a big one, b/c the enemy (Pestilence) is implacable.
Bupalos
Personally I think focus on JFK is silly. He’ll marginally spread some disease because of his personal debilities… yes. So will any other option in there. The thing about JFK is he’s an alliance Trump didn’t choose, doesn’t like, and has nothing in common with aside from grift.
JFK IS LITERALLY THE BEST NOMINEE WE’RE GOING TO GET. Because tactically he will be a problem for Trump.
That’s where we are.
MobiusKlein
@Eolirin:
Opposing batshit noms is going to win points, whether they are confirmed or not. And cost is minimal.
Not like Dems only have three tokens to use on confirmation hearings.
Opposing crap sets the narrative – Dems want sane government.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@zhena gogolia: I hope you approve.
Nettoyeur
@Librarian: They are gonna be looking for a memory hole…..
Bupalos
JFK in Trump’s house makes him more likely to fail.
argue against that I’ll listen. Be like “but people will die”
guess what. MILLIONS ARE GOING TO DIE, the planet will carry millions or billions less humans because of nov 2024. We have to do what we can.
Trivia Man
The Aviation subreddit in Reddit has done very specific updates on the accident, including news on casualties.
Leto
@tobie: Blackhawks are the nomenclature for Skikorsky military helicopters. They do not directly communicate aircraft to aircraft as that would be highly chaotic. All communication runs through the air traffic control tower, as they, and the Radar Approach Control (RAPCON), have operational control of the airspace, as well as the overall air picture. Maintaining this infrastructure was part of my first assignment in the Air Force.
Like OSHA regulations, aircraft/flight regulations are written in blood. We need to wait for the NTSB.
Sister Golden Bear
@tobie: As Leto said, all communications is done between pilots and air traffic control. ATC tells all aircraft exactly where to go in “controlled” airspaces, especially around airports with control towers.* Pilots can make requests to ATC, but they’re required to follow the ATC instructions. Aeronautical charts and chart supplements clearly indicate where controlled airspaces are, as well as specific info about landing approaches.
BTW, just a reminder Felon 47 disbanded the FAA’s air safety advisory commission last week.
*For small, low traffic, airports without control towers, there’s shared radio channels that pilots are supposed to (but not required to) use to indicate where they are and what they’re doing.
sentient ai from the future
i saw a nissan leaf with the vanity license plate “WOKE”
well played, friend, well played.
Eolirin
@MobiusKlein: I’m responding to someone else saying we should back RFK Jr because it’ll ultimately do more damage to Trump if he’s part of the inner circle than we’ll benefit if he somehow fails to get the nom.
I was saying we may not be able to prevent the nom but also that we shouldn’t be sociopathic in trying to take advantage of the situation consequences be dammed. It’s how McConnell would do things. You can’t trust people who would make that kind of call with power. They’ll abuse it without a thought, and only ever use it for themselves.
Leto
@Sister Golden Bear:
Well, ofc he did. Fuck. I know his malevolence isn’t the cause of this, but it’ll be that malevolence that hinders proper lessons from being learned and corrective actions taken.
Yeah, the small airports usually have those radio systems you chirp to get the lights to turn on, or other information. Then you have the weapons ranges that have their own ATC systems/people. We maintained those as well. “Stop smoking in the cabin, dammit!”
sentient ai from the future
@Bupalos: https://youtu.be/4T8m_sEBYCc
tobie
@Leto:
@Sister Golden Bear: You two know tons about aviation. This is very impressive. It’s just so stunning that an accident would happen right over DC. National (what I also call the airport) is not in the suburbs. It’s in the city.
Renie
@Bupalos: Please be careful and stop writing JFK. He’s RFK Jr. We don’t want to smear Pres John Kennedy or AG Robert Kennedy. Thank you.
Matt McIrvin
@Another Scott: Not as small as you’d think if you heard “small plane”. It was a CRJ, a commercial regional jet with about 60 people on board.
sentient ai from the future
@Eolirin:
https://youtu.be/4T8m_sEBYCc
frosty
@tobie: Technically, National is in Arlington County, VA, not DC. But yes, in the middle of an urban area.
Leto
@tobie: one of the byproducts of my former job. You spend a lot of time around the controllers, and you talk about all sorts of stuff. Basically, “How does this work?” Ofc I have a lot more detailed knowledge about what happens on the equipment side, but know enough about the general ops to be able to speak about it.
Eolirin
@sentient ai from the future: 🙄
Matt McIrvin
This reminds me of the Air Florida Flight 90 crash in 1982–on a snowy day in DC, a plane taking off at National with inadequate de-icing hit the 14th Street Bridge and went into the river. 74 people died. A terrible day. A half hour after the accident, the DC subway coincidentally had its first fatal crash–I recall there was some difficulty getting emergency services there.
MobiusKlein
@Eolirin:
Not chirping at you Eolirin, sorry it seemed that way.
Eolirin
@MobiusKlein: I mostly didn’t want there to be any confusion. Between the pie filter and people coming in at different places it’s really easy for context to get lost.
I’m not upset with your comment at all. I agree with it completely even. ❤️
Sister Golden Bear
@Leto: There’s those radio systems, but I thinking about CTAF (Common Traffic Advisory Frequency) that’s used for pilot to pilot communication at airports without control tower. Although it’s not really pilots talking directly to each other (unless needed), rather it’s more of publicly announcing where you are, and what you’re doing. I.e. I’m 10 miles from the airport, I’m entering the approach pattern, I’m on final approach, I’ve landed and moved off the runway.
When I did my drone pilot license training I was a bit shocked to learn that it’s recommended that pilots do this, but not required. I mean, I get that it seems silly if there’s no one else around, but the point is to give a heads up just in case there’s another aircraft you didn’t see.
FWIW, the class instructor who sometimes flies his drones within restricted airspaces near airports for work (with the appropriate FAA approval) carries a scanner to monitor ATC/CTAF channels as an extra safety measure so that he knows what’s happening around him. Drone pilots aren’t allowed to talk with air traffic control, so he’s strictly listen-only.
Ohio Mom
This article is about the aviation safety committee being disbanded: https://apnews.com/article/coast-guard-homeland-security-priorities-committees-trump-tsa-d3e4398c8871ada8d0590859442e092c
Once again, I am stunned by the detail attended to by this wrecking crew. The committe wasn’t exactly high-profile yet they knew it was there and easily done away with, so why not?
Spanky
Runway 33 is a short, maybe 6000? foot runway used, I think, for landings only. Final approach is to fly up the east edge of the Potomac, make a sharp 30 degree left turn, and pancake onto the runway and slam on the brakes.
The east edge of the Potomac is also where all the military helicopter traffic is, and there’s a lot. I’m more surprised it took this long for this to happen than anything else. My guess is the Blackhawk was cleared to proceed when he shouldn’t have been. We’ll see, though.
Eolirin
@Ohio Mom: The pettiness is staggering, honestly.
prostratedragon
… or is that a confession?
Sister Golden Bear
@tobie: I wouldn’t say I know tons, but I do have a drone pilot license from the FAA, and the certification test covers much of the same core topics as a regular pilot license, including things like learning about airspace regulations, learning about airspace regulations, understanding aeronautical charts and their associated info, knowing how to read airport weather reports/forecasts, basic airport procedures, etc. Plus drone specific regulations. Much of the former honestly was mostly informational, since drones are only allowed to fly up to 400 over ground* and airplanes/helicopters are required to fly at least 500 feet except for take-off landing — the FAA airspace system is carefully designed to keep things in the sky separated.
*With a few exceptions, such as flying right next to radio towers, etc. usually do inspections.
Matt McIrvin
@prostratedragon: Whenever there’s an online discussion of an airline crash there’s someone claiming it was “DEI” regardless of where it happened in the world. Maybe the firing of the aviation safety committee was to help them impose that kind of narrative when desired.
Sister Golden Bear
@Spanky: ATC audio recording indicate the helicopter was told to pass behind the passenger jet. My best guess is that the helo pilot confused that jet with another jet — which is all too easy to do. Part of my drone pilot training included night flights and I’ve done it a couple times. It’s really hard to gauge distances in the air, especially at night. Plus there’s “night illusions” that can cause objects to appear to move in ways that are different than they actually are. (This contributed to last year’s drone panic.)
The latter is one reason aircraft have so many lights on them. There’s anti-collision lights which are red flashing ones on the top/bottom of fuselage (or top of the tail), the red flashing light, and the flashing white on the wingtips.
But that’s also “positional” lights, red on left (port) side of the aircraft, green on the right (starboard), and a white at the tail. (Similar to nautical navigation lights.) Depending on the combination of lights visible, you can figure out which direction the aircraft is facing, and therefore which direction it’s moving. E.g. if I see a solid red light and a flashing red light that means I’m seeing the left (port) side of the aircraft and therefore it’s moving from my right to my left. If I see the both the red/green lights, the aircraft is headed toward me.
(People not understanding how these lights change as aircraft turn also contributed to the drone panic, e.g. landing lights are really bright when facing you, but “wink out” as the aircraft turns away from you. The landing lights can be bright enough to mess with your night vision, so it can be harder to see the other lights immediately after looking at them or why people thought the “drones” suddenly disappeared or intentionally turned off their lights.)
Plus there’s the landing light, and potentially other optional lights (like the “logo light” on the rudder of most passenger airline planes).
Nettoyeur
The Trumpers dismantled some oversight. Who needs experts? They might not be loyal enough to Trump. A week later, people die in a stupid crash. Seems like a metaphor for the next few years.
Sister Golden Bear
@Spanky: Also, as you probably know, there’s been numerous concerns raised about how busy the airspace is, and that there haven’t been sufficient numbers of air traffic controllers for the amount of traffic. Unfortunately, last year Congress voted (over the objections of VA’s two senators) to increase the number of flights in/out of DCA. Congress critters apparently decided “give me convenience or give me death.” Except that it’s other people who ended up dying.
Sister Golden Bear
@Nettoyeur: Just wait until RFK Jr. dismantles food inspections and people start dying from flour that’s been diluted with chalk, etc. Yes that was a thing before food regulations/inspections.
VFX Lurker
I didn’t know that bit of history. Holy living cats.
Chetan Murthy
@VFX Lurker: Remember just a few years back, when baby formula in China was getting adulterated with melamine (toxic), and so any Chinese parents who could afford it, were traveling outside China to stock up? Yeah, when that happens here it’ll be good times, good times.
And I’m reminded of Upton Sinclair’s _The Jungle_, which was (IIRC) one of the key spurs for the founding of the FDA. B/c the shit Sinclair documented (sure, it was fiction, but ripped from reality) was pretty damn vile.
Alice
I am heartsick. I am a big figure skating fan. Apparently there were a number of young skaters, their families, and coaches on the plane returning from the US Figure Skating Championships in Wichita.
Leto
@Sister Golden Bear: with regard to this comment, something I was thinking might be at play here is spatial disorientation during night flight. A lot of military aviation crashes, and mishaps, that happen at night are due to this. Pilots losing their bearings and as a result having a mishap. Quite a number of them are fatal. What you’re describing sounds like that, but that’s just me theorizing.
I’m also thinking about what type of flight it is (training exercise/routine), who was in command, more specifically on the stick, as well as all involved pilots familiarity with the airport. Again, thinking about common factors to previous accidents I’ve known. Class 1 mishaps. Fuck.
For all: military class 1 mishap results in damage in excess of $1M, and/or total loss of aircraft, and/or loss of life. Just, not a good day.
Leto
@VFX Lurker: look up the history of white bread, and why it was so white. Ugh.
Redshift
@Spanky:
Ms. Redshift reminds me that decades ago, there used to be flights from Bolling AFB, across the river from National. They were discontinued and the activity moved elsewhere when increasing air traffic confession made it too risky.
Chetan Murthy
@Leto: In the 90s I remember there was a scandal where some French winemakers were adulterating their wine with ethylene glycol b/c it made the wine sweeter, and was harder to detect than added sugar. So hey, easier to get past the inspectors, and deadly too! Win-win!
There are so many ways that shit can go wrong in a complex society with many difficult-to-understand-and-yet-critically-important technical nuances just -everywhere-. John Mulaney’s “Trump is a horse in a hospital” stand-up bit is relevant here, I guess.
John Cole
I’m just sitting here laughing at how you olds kept referring to RFK, JR as JFK and repeating it and no one correcting it because you were all so heated up.
NotMax
@Redshift
Military helicopter returning from an emergency delivery of bourbon to the Pentagon?
//
NotMax
@Leto
Also too, look up Roman Meal bread and sawdust. Really.
NotMax
@John Cole
Every time I see someone here refer to RFK Jr as JFK (or as JFK Jr) I wince. It’s not only unnecessary and wrong, it’s stupid.
Jay
@NotMax:
“Smart” alkies don’t drink at work publicly, they will have a water bottle of vodka, not a bottle of Jack.
Chetan Murthy
@NotMax: Oh heck, I understand that it’s perfectly legal to put sawdust (ok ok ok “cellulose”) into store-bought ground Parmesan. Today.
Lily
@Sister Golden Bear: thanks for explaining this
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@Chetan Murthy: If we can ever rid ourselves of the Trumpists, we’re going to have to put in place a lot of new regulations that have a first draft written in blood (as cited above by Leto).
danielx
In another life about ten thousand years ago I used to fly in and out of National frequently. I hated the place because it was so confined or seemed so to me. Not the first time a plane has gone in the river either – way back in January 1982 an Air Florida 737 clipped the 14th Street bridge right after takeoff and went into the Potomac killing a bunch of people.
danielx
@John Cole:
Trust me, Cole – I’m an old and I ain’t gonna make that mistake. JFK had charisma and style although a flawed person, and history would be immensely different in a good way if RFK senior had not been murdered.
RFK jr is a shithead who is going to get a lot of people killed.
Geminid
@Sister Golden Bear: That helipoter didn’t need to be flying along the Potomac anyway. My understanding is it was headed from Langley to Fort Belvoir. If so, a straight line flight would have taken it miles to the west of Reagan Airport.
Geminid
@Geminid: “helicopter”
Gretchen
@Jay: Hegseth isn’t a smart alkie.
Jay
@Gretchen:
Apparently not.
“Smart” alkies will take a couple of “gulps” while at work to quell the DT’s so they can keep functioning, they won’t get black out drunk and pass out in a washroom at work. When the DT’s start to hit again, they will take a couple more gulps, the DT’s will pass in 5-10 minutes. They will never be “impaired”, never reek of alcohol, and will remain effective and functional, until they are off work.
If they are “ugly drunks” they will be more of an a-hole, if they are “happy drunks” they will be more sociable.
sab
@Gretchen: Raping isn’t smart? WTF is wrong with you.////
Got him this far (Faux News then running a huge government agency astronomically beyond his competence.)
Hoping he goes down in flames with the next Congress. My hopes are often dashed.
Meanwhile I still have my house, planning for my garden and two of my three stepkids own their own house. Progress for us. Now working on progress for granddaughters.
sab
Meanwhile, nobody with Federal funding even knows if they are getting another paycheck (already voted on and approved by the last Congress.) The Founders thought the executive was the third not the first branch of government.
We need to rethink the Supreme Court. Roberts wants a legacy. Maybe it will be that he destroyed the Supreme Court’s authority. Captured by oligarchs.
VeniceRiley
Apparently a bunch of figure skaters and coaches returning from training camp were aboard the flight l.
sab
@VeniceRiley: I want to swear, but in respect for those kids and their families and coaches I won’t.
sab
When you are the only one posting it is high time to go to bed.
sab
Warm fuzzy rescue mom just threw the dog off the bed because she (the dog) seemed about to barf.
Warm fuzzy has its limits.
columbusqueen
@Bupalos: You really are becoming a batshit crazy creep. Just stop, will you?
VeniceRiley
@sab: I love our St. Berdoodle, but miss our old teacup Yorkie because tiny barfs and tiny poops!
sab
@Bupalos: All the JFKs I have heard of are dead.
Says a lot about your informed comment.
sab
@VeniceRiley: How big is a St Berdoodle.?
We had an amazing St Bernard mixed with a Great Pyreenees. Very tall dog but actually tiny. Long long legs but only weighed eighty pounds. She tangled her long legs up on walks. It was funny because I am not a nice person. She was a nice person and even she thought her tangling legs was funny.
We adored her. But we got her at nine years from a rescue and she died of cancer about two years later.
Just a wonderful dog. I very much wish she hadn’t been bounced so much between homes. She did not deserve that.
Layer8Problem
First he says “do the maths”, then he says “JFK” five times instead of RFK Jr. Where is Bupalos from again?
sab
@Layer8Problem: I am guessing. He has said exurban NE Ohio. With a college. Hiram maybe?
VeniceRiley
@sab: He’s about 40 kilos. Very sweet and kind and smart. Also gorgeous and has long legs as well. Its a sight to see how much runway he needs to get up to speed!
sab
@VeniceRiley: He seems like our mixed (St Bernard/ Great Pyrenees.) Same weight. Our girl was very tall, but not much mass there.
She was such a sweetheart.
Baud
@Eolirin:
QFT. I’m seeing crap on Blue sky about whether Dems will “let” Republicans do something. And we say MAGA needs to take civics.
@MobiusKlein:
Agreed. But waiting isn’t entertaining content.
brantl
@Bupalos: This is the dumbest thing I’ve heard in a while. Whether ratficker gets confirmed or not, we saddle him on Stumpy REGARDLESS, SINCE HE NOMINATED HIM.
You’re guilty of attempting bank robbery, even if you were stupid enough to forget the bullets.
Baud
brantl
@Eolirin: We HAVE A WINNER!!!!!!!!!!
sab
Hoping teesport gets a shockingly large increase in sales.
Their cat stuff was funny. Their dog stuff was meh ( I am team large dog) except their rainbow pitbull was amazinfg
Elizabelle
Wow, we have apparently not had a fatal passenger jet crash in US for 16 years, and actually feels like longer. Very sad. Early reports said “small plane”, and it’s a shock to wake up and find out it was a scheduled passenger jet. Plead cruelty to hoping some Trump nominees or officials were aboard said “small plane,” which turned out not to be so small.
Beautiful clear night last night, and warmer than it’s been.
Baud
@Baud:
Matt McIrvin
@Elizabelle: I’m dreading the reports of noted casualties: my wife is a huge figure-skating fan and had been watching the US championships.
Elizabelle
@Matt McIrvin: I am so sorry. Reminder of that Sabena crash in Belgium years and years ago. (Winter 1961.)
Sports relies on aviation.
montanareddog
@Elizabelle:
Munich Air Disaster
Among the passengers were the Manchester United football team returning from a match in Belgrade. 8 players and 3 backroom staff were killed.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
raven
@Elizabelle: My brother is an attorney and he worked in airline aviation for a decade. 20 years ago he said “planes stopped crashing” and he went in a different direction.
Princess
@Alice: And the Russian 90s pairs champs, Shushkova and Naumov
Gloria DryGarden
@Baud: I just saw that on blue sky, about the skaters in the plane crash.
I am a huge figure skating fan.
I was a figure skater, learning to do some of those skills. I loved it. I watch a lot of it.
This is going to rock the skating world. World champion pairs skaters.
I’ve been crying and yelling at the on screen news articles.
This firing of FAA head and air safety staff is going to piss off a lot of people, including Russia. They take incredible pride in their figure skaters.
This is very upsetting.
Gloria DryGarden
@Alice: It’s so very saddening.
Baud
@Gloria DryGarden:
Gloria DryGarden
@Nukular Biskits: can we get that tshirt in the bj store?
Gloria DryGarden
@Baud: Im reading that musk backed him into resigning. But also, that musk got rich, so fucking rich, from all his government subsidies and contracts.
20 feeling words. I might need to throttle a towel.
And then, back to crying.
Gloria DryGarden
I’m thinking they were coaches, but their son was a competitor. And several other skaters were on this flight. 1994 Olympic pairs long program
different-church-lady
NOOOOOOOOMINATED!!!!
Chris Johnson
@Gloria DryGarden: That’s capital D dark, right there.
Is Russia going to declare war on us on the grounds that we killed their figure skaters?
This is consistent with other takes on who’s running Trump’s show, but it’s a hell of an escalation. Very interested in how this gets played by the media who’re under the control of Trump’s people. What’s the spin? Ex-spy and spy-fiction writer John Le Carre made a big fuss about how, in one of the Smiley books after British Intelligence had been gutted by a Russian mole, they could ‘take the back-bearings’ and identify vulnerabilities by what had been protected.
Right now, seeing how the media spins this could be very significant even while actually not trusting them an inch. They’re captive. So what are they instructed to do with this?
The Thin Black Duke
Congratulations, Muskrat, you neo-Nazi fuck. You just handed Putin a hammer he’ll use to bludgeon America with. How long before the talking heads on Russian TV are talking about how the incompetence of the United States got their Olympic athletes killed?
different-church-lady
@Bupalos: Heighten those contradictions, friend.
prostratedragon
@Gloria DryGarden: I do remember them from the Olympics; very elegant. This is very sad of course, but the possibility that it was also needless will be enraging to their friends and family, if an experience I had a while back is a guide. This lot keep fucking around, they will be finding out eventually.
BretH
@Matt McIrvin: you are correct. There was about 4” of snow in the ground and there was a near-simultaneous Metro crash that pulled resources away. As a motorcycle messenger (switched to a car to finish the last deliveries that day) my partner and ran from the DC side near the mint building to the VA side. I helped them get a flight attendant from the helicopter to a Metrobus as all ambulances were full. Crazy day.
in the hills
@Chetan Murthy: just to be annoying,it was a German wine maker,
specifically Schloss Vollrads.
the owner ,Griffinclau was later found dead by suicide in his vineyard.
Gloria DryGarden
@NotMax: I remember that!
Gloria DryGarden
@prostratedragon: absolutely, it’s enraging for them.
and for a lot of USians, I imagine. We don’t like when airplane safety is compromised. We don’t like international incidents.
and if it’s true what I read about the plane carrying a cargo of kittens and puppies- I’m starting to cry again- we won’t be happy about that. Kristie Noem needs to go with Pete and don to toss paper towels to the crying families at the airport.
FO, might be coming sooner than they anticipated.
The only sympathy statement I’ve seen on bluesky directed to this situation was from Elizabeth Warren.
Miss Bianca
@Ohio Mom: I have a pink pussy hat that MomSense knitted for me. It’s nice and warm, been thinking for some time that I’ll pull it out from the closet and start wearing it again!
Miss Bianca
@Bupalos: *JFK*? As in “Jesus Fucking Khee-rist, you’re an idiot”?
Jim Brown
Talk about unwelcome news recently for British Intelligence what with Philby, Blunt and the Queen but it’s hardly surprising given that even Ian Fleming didn’t know what a secret agent really was! Ian Fleming dubbed James Bond a “secret” agent yet simultaneously depicted 007 as an employee on MI6’s payroll. Given Ian Fleming’s background in British naval intelligence in World War 2, that contradictory classification of 007 was about as absurd as calling a Navy Seal a Coastguard as noted in this news article – https://theburlingtonfiles.org/news_2024.09.13.php. If only the Cambridge Five had been able to read Bill Fairclough’s fact based spy thriller, Beyond Enkription in TheBurlingtonFiles series, they may not have been caught!