Black History month, y’all:
President Donald Trump abruptly fired Air Force Gen. CQ Brown Jr. as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff on Friday, sidelining a history-making fighter pilot and respected officer as part of a campaign led by his defense secretary to rid the military of leaders who support diversity and equity in the ranks.
The ouster of Brown, only the second Black general to serve as chairman, is sure to send shock waves through the Pentagon. His 16 months in the job had been consumed with the war in Ukraine and the expanded conflict in the Middle East.
“I want to thank General Charles ‘CQ’ Brown for his over 40 years of service to our country, including as our current Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He is a fine gentleman and an outstanding leader, and I wish a great future for him and his family,” Trump posted on social media.
Brown’s public support of Black Lives Matter after the police killing of George Floyd had made him fodder for the administration’s wars against “wokeism” in the military. His ouster is the latest upheaval at the Pentagon, which plans to cut 5,400 civilian probationary workers starting next week and identify $50 billion in programs that could be cut next year to redirect those savings to fund Trump’s priorities.
Of the eight members of the Joint Chiefs, Trump fired the black guy and the woman, and is promoting an unqualified white dude. Meanwhile at MSNBC:
Joy Reid’s evening news show on MSNBC is being canceled, part of a far-reaching programming overhaul orchestrated by Rebecca Kutler, the network’s new president, two people familiar with the changes said.
The final episode of Ms. Reid’s 7 p.m. show, “The ReidOut,” is planned for sometime this week, according to the people, who were not authorized to speak publicly. The show, which features in-depth interviews with politicians and other newsmakers, has been a fixture of MSNBC’s lineup for the past five years.
In other news:
These are but three examples from the last few days and there are hundreds more. How do they relate to this blog? Because I completely understand why people of color are on edge and angry (I don’t know why but for today I hate the fucking phrase people of color) and need to be given space. But at the same time, I fucking need you all to understand that the US/THEM at the moment isn’t the divisions, however large or small, in the comments. It’s fucking us versus the nazis. And we desperately need to understand this and act accordingly.
Irons In the Fire
Elizabelle
I was just sick about CQ Brown’s firing. And Admiral Franchetti’s. And Admiral Fagan of the Coast Guard, weeks ago. (Hard to believe that was just weeks ago.)
Do wonder how Brown’s firing will play out with the rank and file. Who look more like America’s present demographics and less like the 1950s John Wayne movies. Especially Brown’s dismissal, but all of the cumulative firings.
John Cole
@Elizabelle: They are going to get rid of every black general officer if they can all while replacing the lawyers because they want to get to a point where they can use the military against the american people if necessary.
John S.
Nazi salutes also put Jews on edge. We are not accepted as White, but neither are we considered POC. Just saying.
Elizabelle
@John Cole: I think so. I wish more people could see that. It is horrifying.
Also says we should be out in public protesting now, while we still can.
Elizabelle
@John S.: And they are so blatant about it. My sympathies.
Because they know it’s a firehose of activity, the media is cowed (for now), and a lot of people are checking out for their sanity, at the moment.
(Harris’s voters were the ones that scored higher for actually following the news.)
Elizabelle
They want John Yoo calibre lawyers in the JAG.
@John S.: In Germany, swastikas are forbidden. So, some of the rightwingers are using the Confederate flag. They also used anti-vaccine activity to rally supporters.
Someone raised a Confederate flag on a military base a few years ago. Middle of the night. Do not know that they ever caught the culprit.
Marc
They aren’t stopping at 50s movie demographics, it’s getting clear that they want to go all of the way back to The Birth of a Nation.
prostratedragon
More on the Joy Reid termination:
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@Elizabelle: I also remember that the makers of the Wolfenstein games got a waiver of the no-swastika law because of how hard the games pushed the point that the proper way to debate a Nazi was with a chainsaw.
JoyceH
I’m disappointed to seeing the far right surging in Germany, where they ought to know better. I’d hoped that the meddling of the Trump administration over there would backfire.
Martin
@prostratedragon: Corporations are not our allies. None of them.
cmorenc
IIRC, hasn’t Trump been threatening to attempt cancelling the broadcast license of NBC, CBS, and ABC? I don’t recall even the slightest, most indirect hint during the Obama or Biden Admin of any threat to cancel the broadcast licenses of Fox, OAN, or NewsMax.
JoyceH
@Martin: not even Penzeys?
John S.
@Elizabelle:
I used to think that the measures Germany took to prevent the rise of Nazism were working. And then they just went ahead and enthusiastically voted for the Nazi party yesterday.
schrodingers_cat
Why is it so threatening to many white people ostensibly on our side when we speak our minds and not just be your amen chorus.
Yeah MAGAs want to kill us, and many on the left want us to be your Gungadin.
TONYG
@John Cole: Yes, they will try to do that. However, at this point, almost half of the rank and file of the US Army and USMC are non-white. Will rank and file soldiers and Marines shoot Americans on behalf of white supremacists? I guess we’ll find out.
New Deal democrat
There’s a good thread a BlueSky right now from Josh Zingher.
https://bsky.app/profile/zingherpolisci.bsky.social/post/3liuiztgxlk2i
Brendan Nyhan comments that this is “Important. If Trump were going more slowly and doing things that were more popular, the authoritarian threat would be even worse. But the odds of turning him back are increasing because he’s going so quickly and doing thing that are so unpopular.”
I think it might come in handy around here right about now, so I’m posting it below in full.
——-
Trump is trying to do two separate things: 1.) become an authoritarian leader, and 2.) implement a massively unpopular policy program. These goals conflict with each other and are hopefully self sabotaging in the end.
Pretty much all the Project 2025 policies poll in the 20% range. Republican members of Congress are already getting screamed at during town halls in friendly territory.
People don’t like the government as a whole but are broadly supportive of all kinds of government policies. People are going to start feeling the pain from lack of government services. They need to know who’s to blame here. That’s the Democrats job.
Public opinion matters even in non democratic systems. Elected officials need to feel public pressure. It’s a pretty simple organizing principle for the Democrats. Yet, right now the masses seem ahead of the elites in terms of opposing authoritarian drift. This is a problem
If the Democratic leadership can’t find its footing soon they’re at risk of a full blown Tea Party style voter revolt. I fully expect some big name Dems to go down in primaries next year.
There’s a big bright spot here, though. Trump’s agenda is unpopular and almost entirely executive focused. The Republican congress isn’t even making an attempt to do anything beyond forming a budget, and they’re playing with fire there.
A successful opposition can work! There is no electoral magic at work here. Trump’s approval is already fading, and he’s more popular than any other Republican. Stop him, or at least slow him down, and you buy time for the rest of the system to push back. There are reasons for hope.
But it’s going to take a lot of sustained effort and good leadership to push back. I think people like AOC, Pritzker, Jasmine Crockett, Chris Murphy, Maxwell Frost, and others are starting to fill the leadership void, which was gaping during the first weeks
There are plenty of conservatives who hate Trump like Pence and Cheney. This isn’t the time for purity tests. The test that matters is whether someone supports liberal democracy. A broad opposition coalition is a good thing!
All in all, the situation is bad, but there are signs of mobilization and anger. That’s good! The mass public might not care a ton about democracy for the sake of democracy, but they do care about shitty policy outcomes and they’re gonna be getting plenty of them. They need to know who to blame
Can’t get bogged down in the shock and awe. Only path is forward.
azlib
A conservative Republican friend of mine sent this to our local Republican Rep in response to Brown’s firing:
John S.
@Martin:
Since corporations are now people, I consider them to be the blowhard white guy with the Nazi tattoos and the fash haircut. You know, like Pete Hegseth.
So yeah, definitely not our friend.
TONYG
@TONYG: The Air Force is still largely white though. Maybe they’ll just bomb cities in blue states.
Lobo
Remember, we don’t have to call them Nazis. Nazis call them Nazis.
cmorenc
@New Deal democrat:
THIS. I couldn’t disagree more strongly with most of the conservative agenda of the Cheyneys, and Dick was certainly a potently destructive force during the Bush Admin. But they are at least bona fide patriots, and for the crucial immediate purposes at hand, are with us on our side, even we will once again clash with them if we succeed together in turning back the forces of Fascist authoritarianism. We need all the hands on deck we can assemble, given the gravity of the threatening situation.
Suzanne
@azlib: As someone who will maintain a deep loathing of David Schwikert to the grave, your friend’s letter gives me some life.
Ohio Mom
@John S.: Eh, some of us can often pass as white, so those of us have partial, if conditional privilege. But you are right, Jews occupy a liminal space.
I’m not going to compare any antisemitism I experience to the hate other groups experience. Most of what I experience is dumb statements from otherwise well-meaning people. I don’t feel threatened (yet).
Elizabelle
@azlib: Good letter. I suspect quite a few like that have gone out.
@New Deal democrat: Thank you. Good thread.
John Cole
@schrodingers_cat: @schrodingers_cat: I don’t think people are threatened by you speaking your mind, I think people just get tired of being yelled at and told they are shitty people.
Lily
News says Musk lost his attempt in Germany
Professor Bigfoot
@John Cole: The generals don’t plot coups.
They should worry about the colonels and the majors.
I mean, if we’re gonna be a “banana republic,” we gotta act like one, don’t we?
MattF
@New Deal democrat: Also, current RW ideology holds that big government is the root of all political evil, and Trump’s multiple power grabs are fundamentally contrary to that view. The old political dialectic is still in there somewhere— it’s become Trumpocracy vs. a disorganized and divided opposition.
John S.
@Ohio Mom:
I wish I could say the same. I didn’t do so good “passing as white” when I got jumped by a group of skinheads in high school or when I was assaulted by a homeless man who screamed slurs at me.
Professor Bigfoot
@TONYG: Maybe the officer corps (and lacking any data I don’t even think them), but the enlisted are going to be LARGELY non-white.
You can’t fly a bombing mission if your mechanics won’t keep your airplane properly maintained.
schrodingers_cat
@John Cole: I haven’t called anyone shitty. I have been called names and attacked and stalked for expressing a political opinion.
Hoodie
@New Deal democrat: When Labor regained control in the UK it was largely because of “bold” Tory policy that cratered the pound, not any great strategy by Starmer and crew. Consider that Trump got about 40-45% of the college-educated vote, which is ridiculously high given the obvious dangers his incompetence and criminality pose to their wealth and security. The US is not an economically ravaged country like Germany in the 30’s. People will soon become quite aware of what they’re losing. Some of them are already finding out.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@John Cole:
The individual soldier will probably have something to say about that. I hope.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@JoyceH:
Choose kindness.
Company produces truly wonderful spices, too.
Don’t forget Ben & Jerry’s, too.
Starfish (she/her)
This lady who worked in Tesla sales understands and describes Elon Musk more clearly than anyone else that I have seen.
Llelldorin
It would be good to have a sense of where we’re trying to go. At the moment, we have zero institutional power (yes, in principle we could play Senate Rules games, but Republicans can also go nuclear and change those rules).
I can see this playing out three ways, in increasing order of ghastliness:
(1) The Nazis fail to adequately secure their power before we’re able to get a majority in the House back. That majority, emboldened by the general sweep of popular opinion against Trump, manages to keep things from going completely to hell until ’28.
(2) The Republicans are spooked by the shift in public opinion against them, and begin to act like Congress isn’t just a really nice bus lobby. Again, this holds things back from the brink until ’28.
(3) Everything goes to hell. Secession referenda, aux armes, citoyennes, and the next Balloon Juice meetups involve our favorite recipes for squirrels cooked on curtain rods.
The problem is that each of 1-3 above requires that we do different things right now.
So what are we trying to do
EDITED TO ADD: I ask because a lot of the wrangling seems to be over elected officials doing the “wrong” thing. I don’t know what the wrong thing is, because I don’t really understand what the plan is, if any.
Marc
They are also making life hell for women, progressives, LGBTQ, disabled, and likely a select group of other minorities in the military. This has been my own problem with the term “people of color”, that has never been the full extent of the majority/minority groups that are being kept in their designated places through US history. At this point, it seems that group includes just about anyone who isn’t a conservative white (or “good” Asian) male, plus maybe a few true believer black guys and white women so they can’t be accused of being racist or sexist.
We need a better term for whole of us who are being erased from the public and corporate sphere.
New Deal democrat
@TONYG:
Not to get too far ahead of ourselves, but that is why grandmas and girlfriend-age young women should form the front line in any protest where there is fear such an order might be given.
Gvg
@TONYG: what about their flight crews and mechanics? Supply chain? They have to land.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@Llelldorin:
If our food chain breaks, my dad always said that roast squirrel was actually delicious, although raccoon was horrible.
TONYG
I agree with you about hating the fucking phrase people of color. (My wife and daughter-in-law would be classified that way in our dumb era.). I prefer to say non-“white” — with the word “white” in quotes because it’s a political, not a biological term. (My Italian ancestors were not “white” when they came to this country more than 100 years — but someone I’m “white”. Weird how that works.)
TONYG
@Gvg: Well now you’re talking about an actual functioning arm of the military. The idiots who are running the government now live in a fantasy land where nothing ever needs to be repaired and there’s an infinite supply of all ordinance. Their sheer idiocy might be the only thing that saves us.
Glory b
@New Deal democrat: I don’t see a tea party movement in the party, it would absolutely not be sustainable.
The tea party, no matter which Republican made it to the general elections, voted RELENTLESSLY REPUBLICAN, even if their chosen candidates lost the primary.
Most of a tea party type of Dem will do the “AbandonHarris” type of thing & stay home to “punish” Dems.
Say what you will about the Tea Party, they NEVER let a seat go to a Dem if they could help it.
TONYG
@Professor Bigfoot: That’s very true. But Hegseth is a drunk and the rest of them think that “Rambo” was a realistic documentary about the logistics of warfare.
Llelldorin
@HopefullyNotcassandra: Still got my old Depression-era Joy of Cooking, if it comes to that.
I’m really hoping we manage to avoid door #3, because I’m a fat 50-year-old software engineer whose basic use in a civil war would probably be as rations.
Marc
Or they could decide to follow the Sharpeville model and use the resulting carnage as a pretext for declaring martial law.
JoyceH
@HopefullyNotcassandra: I don’t even shop at Penzeys but a friend does. She bought so much once (think she does a lot of her Christmas shopping there) that she got a free jacket. She doesn’t like clothes with writing on them so she gave it to me. I love it! It’s hooded and very warm and purple to match my hair. I took it to Italy with me. I’ve got more compliments about that jacket than anything I’ve ever worn! The back says “Kindness can’t sit down just because anger has stood up.”
prostratedragon
@Llelldorin: Just this week on one of the cooking shows someone brought out their old Joy of Cooking and reminded me about the Brunswick stew (or the like) recipes there.
Another Scott
@Starfish (she/her): Wow. Every Melon fan should be forced to watch that.
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
AM in NC
@New Deal democrat: This silver-haired 57 year old will be on the barricades and bringing hot chocolate and telling them they should be ashamed of themselves.
Go ahead, shoot me. I fucking dare you to.
JoyceH
@New Deal democrat: I’m so old that I remember when the mighty Soviet Union was brought down by the unarmed citizens of Moscow. (Sigh – I sure wish their children and grandchildren remembered that too.)
NutmegAgain
@John S.: That’s an inaccurate description of the election. Yes, the AfD increased their % of votes, up to 20%. Hideous, but it also means that 80% of the German electorate voted against them. In addition, die Linke (the Left party) basically doubled its representation.
Ohio Mom
@John S.: Where did you grow up?
Maybe being a small woman offers some protection. I grew up in NYC, where Jews were um, not uncommon. And I’ve been able to disarm the occasional cat call.
One time I remember walking through an iffy neighborhood (it’s since been gentrified) in downtown Cincinnati and a Black man sitting on the sidewalk asked me, “Are you Jewish?” I shot back, “Are you Black?” and we shared a laugh.
Two weeks ago, in the supermarket, an old lady wearing a sheitel (there is a Chabad in my neighborhood) came up to me and asked if I was Jewish, I said, What’s it to you? And she offered me a pair of Shabbat candles to light — all she needed was a trench coat, really, it was like she was selling stolen watches.
I said, “I already have some, I save them for when the electricity goes off” (this is true!). I went on to tell her Jews like her were why I am completely alienated from the Jewish community, I know she voted for Trump and in doing so, U.S. putting my disabled kid’s financial supports at risk.
What were we talking about again?
I really do see Orthodox and Republican Jews as my nemeses.
cain
@prostratedragon:
Companies are not your friend and they are still interested in access journalism.
As I have mentioned to all you countless of times – stop watching MSNBC and 24 hour news. The evidence is right in front of you with the actions they are taking. None of this is surprising.
Keep in mind that every U.S. corporation is now under the heel of the federal govt. They will all work against you. Keep moving towards community supported spaces. Get rid of your windows laptop, your apple macbook – move to Linux. These folks own all kinds of data on you and the federal govt is going to leverage it.
Once they have gotten the U.S. corps they will come after the liberals.
Geminid
@JoyceH: The far right AfD party did much better in these election than the last one, and finished in second place with (I think) 20% of the vote. But a month ago AfD was on a path to win 25%, so in a sense this election was a setback for them.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@Llelldorin:
Never
Everybody buy your seeds and learn to gather. No human rations on the table ever. If banning books really was about the feelings of children, Lord of the Flies would be right out.
Do not rely on AI for gathering though. An AI had scrumptious recipes using the most deadly mushroom.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@cain:
What would this look like on a personal level?
Professor Bigfoot
@TONYG: That old saw, “amateurs study tactics, professionals study logistics” applies, don’t it?
The American military is the most dangerous in the world because of its logistics— they can literally put a battalion of troops damn near anywhere in the world, with their equipment, in 72 hours.
And then proceed to supply those troops with ammo, water, food, ice cream.
America* put that incredible power into the hands of a dictator.
Jay
@John S.:
The Reunification of Germany got hit hard and still is by the Lauffer Curve, East German reconstruction was slow and painful and the Former DDR areas are still the poorest areas of Germany.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@JoyceH:
That is lovely. The mere fact that Penzey’s exists is hopeful.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Starfish (she/her): thanks, worth watching.
JoyceH
@Geminid: so a five percent Vance penalty.
Glory b
FDRLincoln
Would US troops shoot US civilians?
Consensus among my military friends is that many would refuse the order, but enough would obey to get a lot of people killed. You could have units split apart at the company and platoon level, depending on the judgment of NCOs and low-level officers. You’d see some fragging. You’d see some units shoot, some units do nothing, and some units trying to protect the civilians that other units are shooting. It would be mass chaos.
At least that’s what my military friends think. I don’t know if they are right.
Odie Hugh Manatee
I know people don’t want to hear this but it’s going to get much, much worse in the months and years ahead. The voters have unleashed a monster that is out to destroy not only our country but the rest of the world if he’s able. Our highest court has given him a all day-four year free pass to do anything he wants and he’s hard at work taking advantage of the power that the Supreme Court has given him.
The numbers of people hurt are not enough to make a wave yet in public opinion. Our worthless press paved the way to this mess and they are happier than pigs rolling in shit with all of the mayhem that Clementine Caligula is causing. They are not going to be any help at all. In fact I think their job is to throw fuel on the fire whenever they can because you know… clicks and eyeballs is all they care about.
There’s not going to be much we can do other than make noise until some chance to change the direction of this shitty TV show that we’re stuck in. Pace yourselves. If you are in a panic now then you are going to stroke out later if you don’t back off and time out to catch your breath (and sanity).
Americans voted for this and they need a good dose of it so just maybe if we get a chance to vote for a President again that they will take a bit more interest in the choice they make. Yeah… right.
John S.
@NutmegAgain:
Inaccurate? No. Maybe hyperbolic. But I’m not really interested in parsing how much Nazism is too much.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@JoyceH:
@Glory b:
@Geminid:
Kind of wish it would have hurt them more…
I think it says a lot when even far-right European leaders, such as the French one, cancel their CPAC appearances after Bannon literary gives a Nazi salute
Elizabelle
@Starfish (she/her): Excellent video. 6 year Tesla veteran, who was enthused about the mission (environmental sustainability).
Will share it around. The nut graf, as it were (comes about 9 minutes in):
Earlier: she explains very well that he just does not know what he is doing with data. It’s pretty much driven by sales and PR concerns.
Professor Bigfoot
@FDRLincoln: I think they’re correct; may the universe send that it never happen.
But yeah, the American military has been decidedly “multicultural” for decades, now.
Baud
@Odie Hugh Manatee:
Yep. Agree completely.
cain
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Harassment, largely. Threats of federal lawsuits etc. They’ll go for the leaders not necessarily individuals.
The kind of harassment that black folks have endured. Manipulating the system to work against them.
NutmegAgain
@Marc: Everyone except the straight white christian men? Hmmm. EESWCM doesn’t really scan, does it? Surely we have some clever wordsmiths who can figure it out!
Also, to you point about life in the military for (not those guys), I immediately wonder about promotion opportunities etc for folks who are already committed to being in the military. What a crappy thing to have happen to people who are willing to do that.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@FDRLincoln:
This is obviously not the most awful consequence of something like that coming to pass, but depending on the scale of the bloodshed, that would completely destroy the US military’s reputation and respect as an institution among many or most Americans.
When thinking about this awful possibility the other day, I remembered that a major trigger of the eventual Revolutionary War was the Boston Massacre
John S.
@Ohio Mom:
I grew up in South Florida. My family largely lives in NYC. Apparently living in a so-called bastion of liberalism (not so much now in South Florida, which is part of the reason I moved to WA) didn’t shield me from hate and prejudice. But don’t tell that to Professor Bigfoot who insists on defining my Jewish existence for me.
Anyway, I know that the majority of Orthodox Jews are not our friends. And by that, I mean liberal people of any stripe. But I can’t quite think of them all as the enemy because I’m related to far too many of them. So I do what I can to push back and call things out to them that they are unaware of inside their bubble.
I used to think that cutting them off was the right thing to do, but I have come to realize that I have to stay engaged and talk to them if we have any chance of turning things around in this country.
Elizabelle
@Starfish (she/her): And the marvelous Musk explainer ends her video with the encouraging:
She will do fine. It is the rest of us who need to step up our game.
Martin
The media aren’t doing us any favors. WSJ has an article about how Elizabethtown PA has jumped on Trumps anti-woke crusade. On the surface, it’s not an unreasonable article.
But, the town has a college, which has been the economic center of the town. And the college historically was a safe college for LGBTQ students at times when it wasn’t clear what colleges would be. They have a dorm named Stonewall which is for LGBTQ students. The college is not on the fence on this issue and has not been for closing in on half a century.
The town may be all in on their pronoun crusade, but their largest employer is not on board with that and that crusade has the potential to kill that employer. Elizabethtown is in the category of colleges that have been closing at historic rates – small privates serving rural populations, and if the community around the college is deemed unsafe, the college will be deemed unsafe. The college is never mentioned in the article, which is astonishingly shortsighted, but to be expected from a NYC based publication that doesn’t understand the region. The impact on the college is therefore also never mentioned, and how losing the largest employer in town might impact the town because of some dipshit culture war crusade. Of course, elevating this to the national stage will simply harden all positions.
Suzanne
@Professor Bigfoot: So what scares me is that the military is pretty significantly conservative. Veterans are almost 2:1 for the GOP. And active service members are also significantly more likely to be GOP.
So I don’t feel any confidence that anyone in the military would refuse an order to shoot liberals.
Hell, my cousin was in the Air Force for a while, and he was pretty certain that about 20-25% of the enlisted personnel joined the military specifically so they could handle guns for their job.
cain
@cain: I might add that if MAGA even if things are bad in terms of not getting checks and the like still perceive that the system is prioritizing them in some way they’ll still support an oppressive system.
FDRLincoln
@Professor Bigfoot: they also think that active duty troops are less likely to shoot civilians than nationalized National Guard troops, especially if Trump sent the Texas NG to shoot people in Chicago or something. You could have NG units in stand offs against NG units from other states depending on what governors do.
Basically using US troops against US civilians could shatter the military, break the Union and result in civil war, although more like Bosnia than 1861 perhaps.
Elizabelle
@Martin: Are you able to add a reader comment to that WSJ story?
Tell it, though.
Education and healthcare. Big jobs in rural areas. Surprise!
Martin
@FDRLincoln: Yeah, that sounds about right. National Guard had no problem shooting students in Ohio, at least, some of them. Enough to make it a permanent part of our history. But there’s a lot of ‘The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing’ out there.
Eos
A brief German election update: no substantial surprises in the results thus far, so now it becomes a question of arithmetic.
As it stands right now, the most viable coalition combination — Union/SPD — adds up to 45%, which, ordinarily, would not add up to a majority.
But with the 5% threshold, that 45 won’t be divided by 100, but by a number that remains to be determined, thanks to two parties (FDP and BSW) hovering just beneath that magic number.
So if both the FDP and BSW fall short, their subtractions — plus the 4-5% of votes cast for other parties and independent candidates, would produce a denominator of 86. And 45/86 would produce a functional majority — admittedly, not a combination anyone will be thrilled by, but better than any of the alternatives (capitalized or no).
But if one of those two parties scrapes across the 5% line, the fraction becomes 45/91. That would be a problem (and not just because the likelier of the two is presently the BSW).
(In theory, a three-party coalition would be possible, but the example of the outgoing government has obviously deadened any appetite for more of that (if indeed any viable combination could be cobbled together).)
Martin
@Elizabelle: I cannot, unfortunately – got it off of Apple News.
Geminid
@JoyceH:
@Glory b: Another salient outcome: the “Center Left” Social Democratic Party (SDP) had its worse performance since German elections resumed after WWII.
My understanding is they could still be junior members of the next government, but I do not follow German politics very closely.
I’ll probably check out German commentator “Tender, see what he says.. Tendar is best known for his commentary on Ukraine/Russia matters, but he pays attention to German politics and has strong opinions about them.
Ohio Mom
@Martin: The eternal town vs gown war.
Raoul Paste
@Starfish (she/her): this was well worth listening to
cain
@John S.:
I will to this day will be mystified about the hate towards Jews. It’s a damn mystery. I just don’t understand it. It’s especially puzzling when I hear it from an Indian person. Like there is no reason for them to be interested in that. Jews have done literally nothing against me and my people. Yet, gentiles have done plenty and yet…
Professor Bigfoot
@FDRLincoln: Every word.
Melancholy Jaques
@schrodingers_cat:
But none of us here are either of those things, occasional clumsy phrasing notwithstanding. You believe that, don’t you?
I don’t think many of us feel threatened when someone disagrees with us. It’s more that people often feel that they are right & that if they just say one more thing one more time, other people will see that & agree.
Elizabelle
@Martin: Fair enough.
I appreciate you and Kay sharing WSJ articles, and what other jackals put up. Can access WSJ via archive.is
I do not feel badly about going around the paywall. I subscribed to them a while back, and already support a lot of publications and sites.
FDRLincoln
@Suzanne: the US military certainly leans conservative but that’s not quite the same thing as the 1938 Wehrmacht.
Don’t get me wrong, we are in a LOT of trouble. But I think it more likely that the military would fracture under such orders than it would just be a unified extension of the Orange Fuhrer’s will.
schrodingers_cat
@Melancholy Jaques: Many don’t but there’s clique here that does.
Professor Bigfoot
@Melancholy Jaques: I think one aspect of this is that white people simply don’t have any concept of how we are dealing with this; or how much trust was destroyed on November 5.
I don’t think most have any idea how deep this wound goes.
”’Tis not so deep as a well nor so wide as a church door, but ‘tis enough ‘twill serve. Ask for me tomorrow and you shall find me a grave man.”
Dan B
@cain: It’s concerning that almost all Jews have left India. Jew Town in Cochi, Kerala has almost no Jews. I believe they were big in international trade in the south of India.
John S.
@cain:
I had an Indian boss not that long ago. He was definitely antisemitic (he was a loudmouth so it wasn’t a matter of conjecture), but I chalked that up to him being one of the biggest assholes I have ever met more than anything else.
I suspect people hate Jews for the same reason they hate anyone that is something “other” than themselves.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@FDRLincoln: You’d get something like Kent State
schrodingers_cat
@Dan B: Most Jewish people left India for Israel exercising their right of return long before BJP was in power. There is a small community of Bene Israel Jews who speak Marathi and live in Mumbai. AFAIK Mumbai also has an active synagogue.
Bill Arnold
@Llelldorin:
Advocate like hell for Doors number 1 and number 2. If it comes to Door number 3:
– You can militarize civilian drones. Perhaps even fly them. AI vision models for targeting and autonomous behavior.
– Be a key resource for secure communications.
– Etc.
schrodingers_cat
@Professor Bigfoot: A commenter has accused me in the last thread of appropriating the black experience for myself. Do you or does any other black commenter here feel like I have done that?
Nothing I have gone through compares to the black experience in the US. I am stating this clearly and unequivocally.
prostratedragon
@FDRLincoln: Sounds plausible, based on former military I’ve known and what they’ve reported witnessing and doing. One former Marine would point out that many of the things they do in the field should not be done here because “people are supposed to have Constitutional rights,” this in response to those who think military is the best background for police.
Professor Bigfoot
@FDRLincoln: I’ve seen it said but have no actual data so it’s grain-of-salt time: that most of the “combat arms” troops are white, the “support” troops are largely not.
This too will affect how that horror would play out (if, in fact, that generalization turns out to be correct).
Ohio Mom
@cain: Even though there have been a smattering of small Jewish communities in India for centuries, they were extremely small, and considering how big India is, you’d think they would have mostly escaped notice.
So Indian antisemitism is a mystery to me as well, unless it is something South Asians picked up as they emigrated out into the western world. After all, we didn’t kill *your* Savoir.
Here is an intersting summary of Indian Jewry: https://www.brandeis.edu/jewish-experience/history-culture/2021/september/indian-jewish-cuisine.html#:~:text=The%20Jewish%20community%20has%20been,centers%20of%20Indian%20Jewish%20life.
sab
@Llelldorin: I am 71 and I have my grandmother’s Joy of Cooking (the cover fell off, and a friend in college put a hot pan on it and left scorch rings on said cover.) I also have my mothers’s Joy of Cooking, and two versions of my own purchased twenty years apart.
I am noticing that I mostly use the oldest version, except that it doesn’t have a pizza recipe. It does have a Bisquik recipe.
different-church-lady
@John Cole: And also because they get their jollies from being racist.
schrodingers_cat
@Ohio Mom: Indian antisemitism? This is the first time I have heard of it. Can you share the link? Thanks.
Jay
@Geminid:
https://nitter.poast.org/Tendar/status/1893781444360863907#m
Professor Bigfoot
@schrodingers_cat: <eyeroll> of course not.
It’s only that UNLIKE THEM, you SEE the Black experience and how it affects the daily lives and choices of Black people.
They consider themselves “normal,” not “white,” and therefore see nothing they need interrogate about themselves, their lives, and their choices.
At least, it certainly seems that way.
sab
@Ohio Mom: When I went to Israel with my Jewish first husband back right after the first Gulf War, my husband’s Israeli Hebrew School mentor (subsequently a professor of social anthropology in Be’er Sheva) introduced us to a bunch of Jewish Indians from Goa. They looked just like other Indians but they had been Jewish forever. The Jewish diaspora is amazingly diverse.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Martin:
The vast majority of the comments on that video, even the replies, are horrified and are outraged that nobody tried intervene and instead cheered. It’s one thing to be too scared to intervene, but to cheer…
This asswipe, however, is all over the comments spewing this:
And in another reply this person made, in response to another person pointing out they didn’t see any badges, telling her why she’s being arrested, reading her Miranda rights:
Can any lawyers chime in and fact check this?
TBone
Obligatory pugilism by Cheap Perfume. I have this song as a subconscious brainworm in the background a lot!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=-sOSr7n_8YU
It’s catchy!
different-church-lady
Christ almighty, what the hell happened here today?
schrodingers_cat
@sab: The principal of my mother’s school (where she was a student) was a Jewish Marathi woman married to Muslim man. David Sassoon was one of the founding fathers of Mumbai. They have always been a part of Mumbai since its earliest days. India is complicated.
Mumbai’s Jewish synagogue
A Ghost to Most
@Professor Bigfoot:
Except that now, a sizable portion of the military has their loyalties elsewhere.
Baud
@different-church-lady:
People got antsy waiting for tonight’s Medium Cool.
TBone
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): IANAL but she should have been (a) protected by more people in that crowd and (b) swiftly receiving offers of voluntarily, pro bono representation for the assault charges she should be pressing immediately.
TBone
@Baud: bwahahaha!
sab
@schrodingers_cat: Are you sure they weren’t talking about another commenter?
There is a commenter from Texas who has argued with me that my experience watching Indian classmates and their parents’ experience in Florida in the 1960s was nothing like what he remembers of his experience as an Indian immigrants’ child in Texas. He also pointed out that what I saw was not necessarily the same as what they experienced.
Not disagreeing with you. I am just saying they might be referring to someone else, although quite possibly they were referring to you.
FDRLincoln
@Professor Bigfoot: without support troops the combat arms would wither more quickly than people think, especially trying to control a country this size.
Bottom line: I think civil unrest bordering on war and destruction of the union as we have known it is more likely than a successful nationwide fascist government. The country is simply too big, too diverse, and our fascists too stupid and clumsy to replicate the Nazis or the USSR, although they will try.
Least likely of all is a return to politics-as-we-have-known-it. Biden tried that and it didn’t work. The rot was too deep.
Ohio Mom
@schrodingers_cat: It was Cain at comment 88 who mentioned Indian antisemitism
@cain:
The Indians in my life have all been acquaintances, and now that I think of it, mostly in professional capacities: Ohio Son’s school OT, my onc, my opthamologist, my rheumatologist.
And a few of Ohio Son’s old school mates and their moms, now scattered.
So I have not experienced any antisemitism from Indians, and as I said before, most everything from anyone else has been thoughtless remarks. I think Ohio Dad worked with some antisemetic fundament Christian engineers in his day but those two offices were snake pits in general.
emjayay
Please replace this commenting system with one that at least puts replies to comments where they belong right below the original comment.
This is a mess that sabotages any useful conversations. It’s stupid and unuseable. If anyone agrees with me they could click on the thumbs up. Oh wait it doesn’t have that either.
schrodingers_cat
@sab: Maybe. So I asked them whether they were referring to me. But the same commenter seemed to be blaming me for Kash Patel not that long ago. Hence I thought they were referring to me.
Dan B
Miki
@FDRLincoln: Sounds pretty much like what I knew about/would expect from my fellow troops in the mid 70s.
Not a monolith, for sure, but lots of impressionable, mostly uninformed males.
Some things never change ….
schrodingers_cat
@Ohio Mom: Some Indian RWNJs have been hanging out with white supremacists and maybe that antisemitism rubbed off? IDK.
ETA: AFAIK even RSS types love Israel and see it as an example to be emulated.
cain
@schrodingers_cat:
No link, my grandfather’s youngest brother is a straight up antisemitic asshole. But his granddaughter is super liberal.
I don’t know where the fuck he learned that shit. But I know this stuff exists amongst some of these older people. Probably rubbed off from the British.
FDRLincoln
Put another way, over the last month the fascists have turned the heat up too fast and the frog is noticing the boiling water now.
If they had gone more slowly and consolidated power before implementing their insane economic plans and mass firings, they would have a better chance to pull this off. Hitler didn’t deliberately make the German economy WORSE when he took power.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
I’ve stated many times that I was a civilian intel officer. For 11 years. I am also a civilian graduate of the USMC Command & Staff College (Distinguished Graduate, only one in the class with a scruffy beard and ear rings), one of 7 total civilians in a class of around 225.
I bring that up to highlight the fact that I’m a person who has had first hand experience with the US armed forces literally up to the highest levels (I’ve briefed SecDefs, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Joint Chiefs and more 2-3 star officers than I can remember), not some peripheral “I know someone who thought such and such…” experience.
Can all of the hitherto speculation about specific worst case scenarios happen? Sure, weak people abound in all walks of life. Will they happen? Maybe. But the broad brush treatment of people in the military and their perceived views of “The Libruls” is about as uninformed a take on the institution as anything I’ve seen uttered in here over the last 20 years.
I was a liberal among conservatives as a rule, both in the Pentagon and particularly amongst the Marines during my year in Quantico. Thing is, particularly there, the amount of respect everybody had for each other over rode everything else. Every officer there respected and defended the Constitution first, everything else was secondary. And by the time officers like that reach that level of O-4 to O-6, they’ve come into contact with enough people to know that not everything is black/white/left/right. Thus, I don’t subscribe to this painting of the military as some vapid tool of a demogogue like Hair Furor.
Has that fundamental ethos survived all these years later? I believe so.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@FDRLincoln:
I’d prefer something like Portugal’s Carnation Revolution to happen in a situation like that
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@TBone:
I agree. She’s looking into suing them
John S.
@cain:
That asshole boss I was referring to was born and raised in the UK, so maybe there’s something to that.
NutmegAgain
@sab: Apparently they did away with how to prepare small game. I used to read those instructions (squirrel, racoon) to my pre-teen kid & friends because they cracked up laughing. (It’s nice to get that response out of a gaggle of preteen girls). Pretty sure my sister has my mom’s copy, and I have one that I probably bought in the late ’70s. It has the best recipe for hot fudge sauce (the kind that hardens on your ice cream) yum yum.
schrodingers_cat
@cain: IDK read my experience above. Mumbai’s Bene Israeli Jews are considered Marathi by Maharashtrians.
Professor Bigfoot
@A Ghost to Most: Y’know, that’s something I really expected of the professional military officer corps.
Ignoring reality in the name of some “political calculus” is a good way to get your people killed. It’s not coincidence that the Five Sided Building started thinking about climate change as a national security threat decades ago.
I hang onto the idea that they take their oaths to the Constitution seriously.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@cain:
Thanks for the answer. It’s going to be an “interesting” next couple of years to say the least
Professor Bigfoot
I think you’re right about that.
The Unmitigated Gaul
@prostratedragon: “We live in an era of tremendous and profound cowardice. Just shocking cowardice.” (Joy Reid)
More proof.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@Odie Hugh Manatee: Only 63% of us voted. Only 49% of that number voted for dismantling the American experiment for this GOP sponsored grift-a-thon. Of that 49%, the number who actually support the grift-a-thon by incompetent, pathetic sadist types remains to be seen.
The recent angry GOP town halls suggest the number supporting the GOP grift-a-thon and dismantling of America is small indeed.
Timill
@different-church-lady: Small earthquake on the Front Page; not many dead.
sab
@Professor Bigfoot: My husband has limited military experience. He served in the Coast Guard during Vietnam.
He thinks that Trump caters to the enlisted and sneers at the officers, which a lot of enlisted men probably like. So who Trump attracts are the enlisted, not the officers.
Professor Bigfoot
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Thanks for a bit of “voice of reason.”
I remember Joe Biden telling them, “remember your oath!”
I think most definitely will.
Timill
@HopefullyNotcassandra: Most of the 49% support sparrows and curtain rods only for others, not for themselves. Sad, really…
sab
@schrodingers_cat: I never said you were wrong. You probably were right.
pajaro
@prostratedragon:
This is, of course, totally on brand for MSNBC, which cancelled its highest rated show, Phil Donohue, at the start of the Iraq war, because he had the temerity to question the Bush Administration’s policies.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@FDRLincoln:
The folks rummaging around in America’s top secret drawers appear to hate us 🇺🇸 very much. The folks authorizing the rummaging have said our country is a dump and failure.
The facts so far suggest strongly these folks plan to strip us down and sell us to the highest bidder for chump change.
Professor Bigfoot
@pajaro: My, you just took me back in time— I remember arguing with my fellow engineers (all white dudes) who were all for it.
This would have happened at the company where I experienced the worst and most blatant racism, of course.
The Unmitigated Gaul
@Professor Bigfoot Great post.
FDRLincoln
Speaking of stupid fascists, I think Hegseth is underestimating how difficult it will be to decapitate Pentagon leadership. The Trump people seem to be setting the stage for martial law in response to protests this summer as the economy collapses, and I don’t think they will have consolidated ideological control that soon.
TBone
@Dan B: Wikipedia does not list a date of death as of a minute ago.
Spanky
@Dan B:
No worries, Elon is on it.
hells littlest angel
At this point I think a military coup is the best thing that can happen.
Starfish (she/her)
So as I was talking about South Asians usurping Black identity, the person that I was really thinking about was Saira Rao. This lady who ran for Congress in Colorado was on Twitter yelling at every white person for being racist (on Twitter) while both her parents were Indian physicians, and I am pretty sure she is married to a white man.
The behavior she was engaging in was not improving conditions for any racial minorities. It was a highly educated Indian American attempting to use discussions of racism for personal gain. Some of the behavior here was reminding me of that.
Anyway, there is a section in Saira Rao’s Wikipedia about accusations of anti-Semitism, and is she anti-Semitic, or is our definition of anti-Semitism so expansive that it is silencing voices critical of the behavior of the government of Israel? I think there is a little bit of both going on in the discussion on the Wikipedia page. When she is criticizing the government of Israel, I think that is fair. When she is discussing “Zionist medical professionals,” that gets racist really quick.
And these ideas cannot be reduced to Twitter-length soundbites. Reducing ideas to Twitter-length soundbites is what got us here, and surely it is not going to get us out.
We have to learn to both walk and chew gum.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Dan B:
@TBone:
He’s in critical condition and has “mild” kidney failure but is still alert from what I’m seeing
cmorenc
@FDRLincoln: Another somewhat unexpected source of resistance if the economy goes into the toilet the next few months will be several million otherwise predominately R-voting folks whose 401k retirement savings are crashing, who see their presumed economic security being vaporized. Nothing will undo Trump better and faster than a deep recession
HopefullyNotcassandra
@Timill: Many of them do not think there will be sadism at all. They are deluded by the news vacuums and disinformation mills in which they dwell.
These are the people who believed President Biden was letting in criminals for who could say what reason. None of the GOP narratives make any sense.
A public school cannot hand out aspirin without parental consent already and for decades. Yet, some gop voters believe teachers are handing out puberty blockers. Some voters believe teachers are even forcing puberty blockers for (again) no-one can say what reason. It is mind boggling that level of delusion. It is also real. It is cruel too; nonetheless, the deluded are not sadists. They are anxious, terrified, deluded, lonely people who have been so freaked out they can hardly hear sense spoken anymore.
We are in an information war.
Geminid
@Jay: Thanks. Tendar impresses me as an astute observer.
I like the header picture on Tendar’s social media account. It’s a scene from the movie Gettyburg, showing Union troops rallying on Cemetary Ridge to turn back Pickett’s Charge.
schrodingers_cat
@Starfish (she/her): Sairo Rao is a fucking loon. Are you comparing me to Saira Rao? Why because I was born in India
So being a bigot wrt to South Asians/Indians is okay because we have our share of morons and unsavory characters
Suzanne
James Carville sucks. Please retire, dude.
Spanky
@NutmegAgain: There’s always Kephart’s Camping and Woodcraft.
Baud
@Suzanne:
Finally something we can all agree on.
cain
@schrodingers_cat:
Yeah, see that’s why I’m puzzled when I see/hear it. It’s a big WTF but also my grand-uncle did his education in the U.S. in the early 60s – so you know, he’s picked up a lot of stupid shit from back when.
cain
@schrodingers_cat:
One of my wife’s friend is Indian and was encouraging everyone around her to note for Kamala because of Palestine. We were so angry with her.
John S.
@Starfish (she/her):
Anybody can be racist. Anybody can be a bigot. There isn’t one group of people on this planet that is exempt from wanting to find someone to hate.
bjacques
@Llelldorin: The intersection of those two ideas…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=JvFj1hkwFUA&pp=ygUMUmVtbmFudCBzdGV3
cain
@cmorenc:
The thing is by this time the courts will also be helpless because the executive branch is not going to enforce anything related to Trump. So, it’s going to be chaos for quite some time and they can yell at their rep all their want but nothing is going to happen.
The next step is to yell at Democrats and Dem voters.
Eventually, they are going to go for their guns and that’s when the 2nd amendment is going to be dropped.
Another Scott
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Thanks for that.
There are indeed all kinds of people serving the DoD, enlisted and civilians and contractors, all over the world.
I’m reminded of Adm. McRaven’s 2014 UT Commencement Speech – If you want to change the world, make your bed (19:26). It’s a great speech, and is especially applicable now, I think.
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
cain
@Professor Bigfoot:
My wife wants to leave the U.S. but I’m not seeing how that’s going to escape consequences due to the global reach of the U.S. and even more they can do exactly what they please and will fund right wing politics everywhere. They will take the whole world with them.
In other words, there is no safe space. It’s up to us to resist this govt.
Chris Johnson
@FDRLincoln: Correct. Mind you, there’s every reason to expect the MSM reporting that he has opened fire on American citizens and the entire military is on board even if it DID NOT HAPPEN.
Because the purpose isn’t even to kick off a massacre, the purpose is to promote the idea that such a massacre has happened and that the military is hopelessly compromised.
I think the best outcome continues to be ‘military sits on their hands and does not. damn. interfere’ and that includes interfering against Trump, directly. I’m not sure how strongly I believe that seeing as I really do think he’s run by Putin, meaning he’s an enemy agent of a global adversary. But in some ways even then it’s down to us to get our shit in order, or to rebel when it’s ugly enough in practice (it’s long past ugly enough in theory).
Pro tip: blame everything on Elon Musk. Everybody hates him. To the point that of the volume of spam I get, it’s been DAYS since any spammer tried to trick me by claiming they are Musk here to give me some great opportunity.
Can only mean people hate Musk so bad you can’t even spam in his name anymore. That’s encouraging.
Baud
@Chris Johnson:
Agree about Musk.
Professor Bigfoot
@Starfish (she/her): I’m reminded that “those who hate Jews, seldom hate only Jews.”
Professor Bigfoot
@Baud: SO SAY WE ALL.
Eolirin
@Professor Bigfoot: Conversely, if someone hates any group, they probably hate Jews too. (Jews excepted)
Baud
@Eolirin:
Buy one get one free.
Jay
@Baud:
Yes and no. While the /r/LeopardsAteMyFace/new/ Reddit is full of MAGgot’s blaming Swasticar Boy, Swasticar Boy will get underbussed when it is time, and Dolt 47 will walk away unscathed.
It’s important to tie Swasticar Boy, Dolt 47, and Project 2025 together with unbreakable bonds.
Professor Bigfoot
@Chris Johnson: I don’t see no holes in your analysis.
It just makes me think that if the 1789 Constitution is to survive, it will have to be because the military take their oaths to it with utmost seriousness.
May the spirits of Winfield Scott and David Farragut prevail.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Suzanne:
I dread to ask, but what did he say this time?
sab
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Have you noticed that texting STOP back never stops him?
different-church-lady
@Eolirin: I don’t mind most religions. But sea lions? I could do without sea lions.
Jay
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
It’s not important, it’s just Carville being Carville.
Chris Johnson
@different-church-lady: AHEM
XD
Ohio Mom
@cain: My feeling as well. There may be countries that would be safer and more pleasant but they don’t want Ohio Family.
Darkrose
@John S.: The support for AfD is heaviest in the east, which is also the part of Germany that never had the reckoning with the Nazi past.
Alce _e_ardillo
@HopefullyNotcassandra: I’m doubling the size of my garden this year, and if it goes well I will double it again.
Elizabelle
@Bruce K in ATH-GR: Not familiar w Wolfenstein, but chainsaws were the approved method of dispatching Nazis?And then our DOGE Nazi shows up at CPAC with a chainsaw?!
You cannot make this shit up.
no body no name
@Bruce K in ATH-GR:
Lurker who’s posted on and off with different nyms starting with the ramp up to Obama but watching the current pie fights and sighing in all directions. I wanted to hit on this.
As one of those Jewish atheists who had a parent survive the holocaust and not much else I enjoyed the hell out of Wolfenstein. I was never offended by it and nor was my family. You spend the entire game slaughtering Nazis. Wolfenstein is very direct on how to kill Nazis and it’s only gotten more over the top with each release.
Then Columbine happened and id Software got blamed for that because Doom was Satanic.
John S.
@Darkrose:
I get that, but Germany has been reunified for decades now. Then again, we’re 150 years past the Civil War, and we still have to reckon with the segregationist South voting for MAGA.
danielx
@John S.:
Haven’t lived in Manassas VA in decades, but when I lived there there were still a lot people who acted like the Civil War (War of Northern Aggression, War Between the States, etc) ended last year instead of 150 years ago.
Still pissed because they lost.
schrodingers_cat
@cain: Headdesk.
LAC
I took the afternoon to paint and focus on something else. Besides cooking, baking, and swimming, painting is my way to lose myself for a couple of hours. I am trying some mixed media paintings.
I am tired of being othered in my own damn country. The attack on DEI, the attack on federal employees…yeah, imma gonna take that personally, so sorry if it offends. I am trying help friends who were not lucky like me to retire before the full fuckery went down. I am calling our reps and supporting my union. I am trying to swallow down the rage of being dismissed as a DEI hire, and watching the firing of qualified people being framed that way too. And on top of that, we have to explain shit over and over again and try not to upset so called allies, who have no problem talking down to us. And get huffy when we clap back. This is exhausting.
no body no name
@Ohio Mom:
I’ve found that passing as “white” is dangerous. You learn to shut up about Jewish remarks especially if you are one of us dreaded “liberal atheist Jews”. You’re a nano second away. It also does not stop people from hunting down your relatives at their place of worship. Even if, as in my case, those relatives also waft and in and out of Episcopalian and Unitarian circles. You don’t trust people outside that circle with who you are.
My wife’s family is Roman Catholic. We lied for years that I was an Episcopalian as that was the dog food they would eat. I know some of them know what the truth is now and are fine with it. But we are still lying to the rest and sort of OK with it because they want to be lied to. It’s still a horrible existence. It’s denial of self. So I do get other groups that suffer it.
Make no mistake though our space is conditional. To the extent we are liked it’s often for reasons that are not in our interest.
If pogroms started it would take one look at my rather public family history and it would be over. It just almost never comes up because I’m blonde, blue, tall, athletic, and the Aryan ideal. But google me and it’s over in a second. I’m extremely aware of that fact.
Elizabelle
@sab: I have my mom’s 1964 Joy of Cooking. Might be one of the last to have a recipe for raccoon. “Take one raccoon…”
it seems people were Betty Crocker or Joy of Cooking cookbook families. And I guess Julia Child came along a little bit after that.
Elizabelle
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Great comment.
sab
@Elizabelle: My grandmother’s was early forties.
I must admit I hadn’t looked for raccoon recipes. Our garbage company got good biins. Racoons have been very lean since. Probably eating our outdoor cats instead of garbage.
no body no name
@schrodingers_cat:
Speaking as a Jewish person who works in IT no. Indians are just as bad as the white Christians. They gleefully join in and have put a caste system into it as well. I get why they did it. But they do not get a pass on this at all.
Again, not all Indians and not all white men. But there is a class, caste, race chauvinism there and Indian men are some of the biggest issues. My wife works in a hospital as a nurse and she’s a Latino and Asian mix who moved here form Dubai and she has horror stories about the class issues with male Indian doctors. They don’t have the power or numbers as white male doctors but they rival them for the horror. It’s a huge issue. You don’t want to hear it but as someone who’s Jewish I see it constantly. So does my wife. I don’t want to hear that you are saints.
no body no name
@Ohio Mom:
My mother has been pleading with us to move to Canada as we can claim citizenship. My litter sister is going to run as she is raising a child. I’m a combat vet and I have every intention of staying and not being run off.
A parent and two uncles of mine survived the camps. They were all that did. They are gone but they all immediately joined the military in the US as soon as possible once they could in the US. Of course they arrived as teens so it took a bit. They all went off to war and did pretty well even if one was constantly in trouble. After having gone through what they had, they decided it was just better to be one of the guys with the guns damn the risks than without one.
I never grasped how much we hid what we were till I caught crap for being a “Jew” till it hit me like a freight truck in my teens. I’d never though of myself as one and never realized we were hiding from it. Eye opening. I saddled up and joined the service as I saw the logic in it. It’s better to be the one than be dead. I hate that this brings this out in me but it is what it is. I will not be moved. I’m not easy to move. And I have their number. I can pass as one of them till they bother to check but most won’t.
These past several years have made me a worse person. I hate that. But I drink more than I should, I’m mean to people I shouldn’t be, I take offense at things I should not. It’s because I’m angry and scared and I know that but knowing that and handling it correctly aren’t the same thing. It’s never that easy. I could close ranks around me and mine but that leaves us smaller and weaker. I could tout my issues but my issues don’t move the needle so I shut up and focus on the issues that will move it. Mine can come after shit is unfucked.
I want Elon gone more than Trump. That’s the threat. And that does require a laser focus on economics. I won’t say the attacks on Sanders are well… you know what I could call them, and in a way they are, but there is something we have that most don’t. We don’t focus on the Jewish aspect because we know that does not win the fight. We focus on the economic aspect and shut up about what we are worried about because that’s the way to win and then get a safe space to take care of things later. It pains me that people do not see that in Sanders. You make allies and win where you can even if that requires a bit of silence and sucking it up. Then you move in the calm and go forward.
I wish more saw that logic. I take heart that AOC and Crockett do.
Now I feel like crying.
schrodingers_cat
@no body no name: Indian people are saints, when did I say that? I have authored guest posts here taking on the RWNJs here and in India. And also casteism and patriarchy.
I guess BJ is taking Normalize Indian Hate to heart.
I am out.
John S.
@no body no name:
As I’ve commented on this thread, “passing for white” ain’t always all that it’s cracked up to be. I appreciate seeing someone else with similar experiences.
Darkrose
@John S.: Germany has been reunified, but there’s still a disparity between the east and the west economically. There’s also a difference between people my age (mid-50s) who grew up in the east versus the west in terms of what they learned about WWII in school.
John S.
@Darkrose:
I get that. The parallels to the rural areas in this country are all too familiar.