I wish I could remember where I saw the phrase “Two cowardly puppets and a hero” – it’s perfect. (Seth Moulton)
I am so angry and disgusted about this that I almost have no words – I am grateful to those that do.
This from Simon Rosenberg makes sense to me:
First, please read my post from this morning. It argues that while Democrats have a clear path forward on the economy, health care, and the Trump budget we need to open up a second front on Trump’s ongoing betrayal of the country and attack on the US government itself. After today that task has grown more urgent.
Here’s part of the earlier post that is referred to just above:
Little cracks become big cracks
Morning all. I don’t know how the Trumpian fever breaks, how the madness subsides, and how we return to the Constitutional order and the America we and the world has known for generations. It’s clear that in these early days Democrats have not yet found their voice on the extremism and danger of Trump – his alliance with Putin, his abandonment of Europe and Ukraine, his “off with their heads” tariffs, his unconstitutional and illegal dismantling of the US government including our global and domestic public health systems, his clear and worsening madness.
Our early, narrow focus on costs and the terrible GOP budget while tactically sound, are strategically insufficient as Trump and Musk rip apart the global order and our own government in ways that will be very hard, if not impossible, to put back together. Some of the damage being done right now to what I call the America of the Four Freedoms is irreparable, which is why in the coming weeks our leaders – all of them – must work harder to find their voice on this assault and do everything they can to stop it.
Here again is the oath every House and Senate member takes. Protecting the Constitutional order is the primary reason these Senators and House Members are here. Nothing in there about protecting the American people from $8 a dozen eggs:
I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.
What makes me hopeful we can stop Trump?
First, what he is doing is so obviously a betrayal of everything that has made America prosperous, powerful and respected in the world that we should be able to find our voice in the coming weeks. There is a “you have to be shitting me” quality to what is happening now, a recklessness, fanaticism, a “have you no decency, sir” element that is there for us to seize – if we try.
Trump’s job approval has dropped by about 8 points since his Inauguration. Here is 538’s latest tracker (one still pumped up by loads of Dear Leader GOP polls):
Two important trackers of consumer sentiment have found significant drops since Trump came to office, and his ratings on the economy today are far, far lower in every possible measure than they were in his first term. Most voters understand now that Trump = higher prices, tougher times for them and their families. It’s astonishing how quickly his sentiment has taken hold with the electorate. It is a profound new weakness for him. A new Bloomberg poll shows how much potential backlash there may be to Trump’s planned implementation of broad tariffs next week…
I have added two new rotating tags:
Giving in to doom is how we fail to fight for ourselves & one another.
Giving in to doom is how authoritarians win.
Open thread.
Wisconsin Elections on April 1 – We Have 30 Days to Make a Difference!
matt
I liked Seth Moulton’s comments. Very strong and direct.
Baud
Keep up the pressure. Make them deny it.
wenchacha
Since it’s open, I just want to plant a flag that NYC does NOT need Andrew Cuomo for mayor.
Also: who was the best mayor NYC had in the last 100 years?
RevRick
@matt: And when he ran for President in 2020, Moulton was derided as a milquetoast Democrat. A centrist not worthy of consideration.
He’s definitely in his lane here with his powerful critique of Trump’s betrayal.
RevRick
@wenchacha: Fiorello Lagurdia? He even has his own Broadway play!
Professor Bigfoot
@Baud: “So if you’re not a Nazi, what’s with the Nazi salutes? Okay, what’s with the ‘Roman’ salutes?”
matt
re the second clip, I’ve been thinking Trump is going to offer military and economic aid to Russia too.
wenchacha
@RevRick: Possibly. Trying to recall if there were stories.of him being good or bad or whatnot.
I think I was first aware of Mayor Lindsay and I don’t know much about him either.
Mike E
@Baud: Getting called a racist is the real hate crime.
Gin & Tonic
Just saw a video clip of Petro Poroshenko, the President before Zelensky. He said “lots of people thought Poroshenko would criticize Zelensky. I won’t. That’s not what Ukraine needs now. Ukraine needs unity. “
Baud
@Gin & Tonic:
Is Poroshenko Ukrainian for Bob Dole?
Also, too, good for him.
WTFGhost
Here’s a story of hope restored through retraumatization. It might be the most WTFGhost thing ever. I posted it to a dead “good luck” thread, so I thought I’d re-share:
I’m practicing medicine via retraumatization. How’s that for luck? Someone once said there’s three kinds of luck, blind, bad, and stupid, and such pessimistic people try to eliminate the blind and the bad – the stupid (remember: “stupid luck”) could go either way but it’s most likely to go to the better prepared side. Who sees the moment and seizes it.
Well, after my pain doctor triggered me a couple-three days back, then retraumatized me again on Friday (what’s with this guy, amirite?), and, my metaphorical head was smacked hard by my metaphorical hand (LONG before NCIS, “I’ll smack you upside the head” was a common expression of frustration, kids!), because I was really fucking annoyed with myself that it took retraumatization to, you know, actually get me to notice.
“I’ve been bullied all my life, and” (SMACK) I didn’t storm out of a *medical* office (SMACK) the *instant* (SMACK, plus firewords and fireworks and all that stuff the cool kids do to say it was *epic*) I didn’t feel listened too, and didn’t feel the doctor understood my concerns and fears.”
I stopped after the biggie, because even metaphorical heads need to avoid concussions.
And, you normal folks, this is one where Imma say you owe it a bit to us, because it’s easier for you, much of the time. Anytime you let a doctor steamroll your objections, doctors get the idea they can bully people like me.
Still: I recognized where my brain had gone, and why it had gone there. I chose to submit to the procedure as the easiest way out of a difficult and complicated situation. And then I beat myself up, for making it harder, you know, for the next people. Um. I hope that makes you understand the prior paragraph, if it felt a bit accusatory.
That said, now that I know PTSD does, in fact, increase perceived pain, and via cross-referencing, I might have some additional good news, sooner or later, from additional studies.
So, more good news, in addition to knowing how badly being triggered by PTSD increases my pain, I mean. And the realization that I need to ID the triggers early, and vastly improve my verbal-punch-back response.
Kind of a problem when you have a speech impediment. Meh, it happens. But at least I can act, hand a red card to the doctor, and call the doctors office the next day to explain that doctor’s been removed from my care team for a serious or repeat offense.
ETA: “WAIT! Why isn’t there a yellow/red card system for health care? Is there? Someone should start one! I’ll be out of energy by tomorrow, so I hope someone started one. WTF? Why let a good trauma go to a *single use*, amiright? I mean, this time, I’m right.”
ETA: made minor edits. I’m also pleased to note that “red card/yellow card” is valid in soccer, which is popular enough that it works, for most folks.
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@Baud:
Is there a way the pressure can be ramped up enough to inspire Musk to self harm?
You know, something along the lines of “Hitler had the common decency to off himself when his causes collapsed”, or “Goebbels whacked his whole family, kids and all – I doubt that Elon has that kind of fortitude…”
Dorothy A. Winsor
Baud
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg:
I don’t know about self harm. But hopefully Tesla’s star will continue to fall, which would be plenty harmful to Musk.
Suzanne
@wenchacha: Ed Koch was the mayor when I was a kid, and I don’t remember much about him, either.
OTOH, Mario Cuomo was the governor when I was a kid, and I remember that so distinctly, because SuzGrandfather just loathed him — because Italian — and he would scream and snark at the TV when the news showed him.
ETA: I’m so happy that Mario Cuomo has a bridge now.
Eolirin
@matt: When, not if, Trump drops sanctions on Russia, we’re all going to need to make a concerted effort as a society to reveal and publicly demonize any company that dares to do business with them.
We’ll need to make the cost of doing business with them greater than the benefit of doing business with them.
Alce _e_ardillo
@Baud: “ I’m just an Italian style Fascist”
New Deal democrat
So I am going to plant a flag here.
Democrats should get up and leave the House en Massie the moment T—-p begins his speech. Staying and listening only continues the failed strategy that Democrats are politely prioritizing “norms” while their adversaries rip the country to shreds.
The President is required to report to Congress on the State of the Union once a year. There is no requirement for Congress to sit in attendance and listen to it. In fact until early in the 20th century the President simply issued a written report.
Walking out and letting T—-p give his speech to a half empty Chamber sends a message to Ma and Pa Americans in their living rooms that we live in an extraordinary situation. It is a message that Democrats need to send. Politely observing norms is what got us T—-p 2.0. No Mas.
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@Baud:
Where’s a Charlotte Corday when we need one?
My greatest fantasy end for Musk is that he’s smiling on national TV and that shitty little demon kid of his has picked up a negligently stored handgun and plugs him between the eyes, mid smile.Bonus points if Trump is present and Damien gets him, too.
edit: The sentence that I struck out violates the comment policy. WG
ColoradoGuy
@WTFGhost: I’ve been through what you’re describing. The best advice I got from a psychiatrist specializing in CPTSD was:
“Act as if you are taking care of a three-year-old … for the rest of your life. That inner three-year-old will slowly learn to trust the adult that is taking care of it … but in turn, you must never betray the three-year-old. You are the responsible parent that the traumatized three-year-old didn’t have the first time around.”
This works, but it takes a few years. Don’t let the kid get too hot, too cold, too hungry, too thirsty, and don’t put it off with bullshit adult excuses. Take care of that innocent, vulnerable child, and never let anyone abuse it, no matter how much social pressure they use.
trollhattan
@Gin & Tonic: The guy with the private zoo? He won’t go there?
Wow, never thought I’d be placing him ahead of Trump. Good for him.
Alce _e_ardillo
@RevRick: Being wrong about one thing doesn’t mean you can’t be right about another. Thank him for being right, and tell him to shape up about everything else.
Eolirin
@Dorothy A. Winsor: This and how Canada has been responding is how it starts, and it’s very expected.
By the end of the next decade the world will be wholly decoupled from the US, and the US will be immensely impoverished by it.
The rest of the world will be stronger for it, I hope. And maybe we’re long past due for this kind of realignment, if it’s able to be pulled off successfully. It just sucks to have to be living through it.
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg: Can we please not do this kind of thing? I very much would like Musk in jail, and definitely away from any kind of power, but openly discussing how to get people, even if those people are absolute monsters, to complete suicide when more than one of us here struggle with chronic suicidal ideation is unnecessarily distressing.
Alce _e_ardillo
@New Deal democrat: I agree, but it will never happen, because “norms” and “civility. “
Baud
Via Reddit
Baud
Via Reddit, Yosemite heroes.
JoyceH
Well, I’ve solved one mystery about my failed attempts to donate to United24 – I tried several times on my bank visa and once on my credit union visa. Well, I got a call from my credit union visa, the fraud prevention hotline. I had to go through a bunch of hoops to prove I’m really me, and then verify that yes, I did intend for that $100 to go to that website. So – huh. (In my fondest imagination, my $100 will help buy the drone that burns down the Kremlin.)
On to topic – one way to lower Trump’s approval is to keep banging the dementia drum. And I think that Fracas In The Oval is a nice illustration. Yes, I agree it was almost certainly a pre-planned ambush, and an attempt to shift the blame to Zelenskyy for Trump’s inability or unwillingness to bring the war to a rapid and just ending. But that bit at the end? Trump was Out. Of. Control. Dementia was driving that carcass and it showed. No WH comms shop that ever existed would script a mention of Hunter Biden in those circumstances. And theater critic notes? NO ONE can sound Strong and Manly while uttering the line, “Russia, Russia, Russia.”
debit
@Dorothy A. Winsor: The damage these fuckers have caused is going to be around for at least a generation. Good for Norway. I hope the rest of the world follows suit.
Gin & Tonic
@Suzanne: Which approximately zero people refer to as “the Mario Cuomo Bridge.”
Lily
Musk needs to repay the US for the $38+ billion we’ve given him, give us mineral rights to all his land and always wear a suit and tie and dress shoes when in the WH. Has he ever said Thank You?
Gin & Tonic
@trollhattan: Sorry, wrong guy, you’re thinking of Yanukovych. Poroshenko is the guy Zelensky beat in the last election. He’s filthy rich, but he made his money in chocolate and cookies (really.)
TBone
Took a day of mostly rest and recharge, real homemade (leftover) mac n cheese for breakfast, actual naps, a pedicure, Noah joined me in the munching out all day, and hubby brought real cheesesteaks from home along with my nemesis, Tastykake jelly krimpets (shrinkflation really took hold at the Tastykake factory). Fat and happy Saturday.
I will diet later this week, I guess.
David Collier-Brown
I notice he didn’t object when Macron corrected him. This outrage sounds counterfeit.
E.
If Trump gives military aid to Russia against Ukraine (second clip), America is going to have some real reckoning to do. Supporting an autocrat in a war of aggression against a democratically elected, popular government on the border of Europe and risking WWIII is a Pearl Harbor moment, is it not? Which calls for Pearl Harbor-level responses? I have prepared my response if this happens, following Snyder’s advice of writing down our red lines and what our responses to them will be. We all need to start doing this. It’s terrifying.
John S.
Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte seems to think Zelenskyy should suck up to Trump:
Way to accept JD’s framing that Zelenskyy isn’t sufficiently thankful, Mark.
ETA: Mark is also clearly delusional.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@debit: And it took Trump and his minions only 5 or 6 weeks.
Suzanne
@Gin & Tonic: Even I still call it the Tappan Zee.
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@Eolirin:
Musk is a monstrously vile villain who intends the harms he wreaks upon billions of people.
Nothing is off the table for someone like him.
Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg
@John S.:
Rutte needs to take Zelensky’s lesson: never cower before or cater to the vanity of a narcissist would be autocrat. Always call the bluff, always mock the delusion of invincibility.
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
Just a quick astronomy note of an up coming event, there will be a lunar eclipse on the night of the 13th to the 14th. Totality will be around midnight for those on the west coast, about 3am for those on the east coast. You don’t need any special equipment to see it or even photograph it(a cellphone will work). Clear Skies!
John S.
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg:
I don’t think you can expect a lamb to turn into a lion.
TBone
Don’t give in, shake a bone!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ZyIG0vWGkRc
WTFGhost
@ColoradoGuy: I’ve been learning to do that most of my life – I’m the only one I trust. Yesterday, though, was the breakthrough, that the PTSD response can be halted earlier, and should have been halted earlier, so that I didn’t have to extricate myself from a dangerous situation, and rather had directly confronted the bad doctor. So: I could have avoided the avalanche, by knowing the signs.
For me, though, the other big reveal was, PTSD doesn’t actually change my pain, but it changes my perceptions of my pain – key finding, because if your perceptions are wrong, you can re-align them, you see? And it helps me understand why my pain is firing off an unusually high number of “pain->PTSD trigger->walk it off, no one cares”. And it makes “walking off” the trigger easier – “yes, it’s mixed with pain, it just *is*, you know that.”
It means I know how to talk about my problem with enough specificity that my ND word choices and mannerisms are less likely to put people off.
It also means, I have the vocabulary to use to protect that “me” inside. “Your inner child’s a hell of a special snowflake, eh?”
“Eff you mate, he’s tough as nails, but in constant pain and has PTSD, so he’s allowed a few special needs,” and that’s the asshole test in a nutshell. True friends nod in respect, and pay attention, the others might fail the asshole test at a critical moment.
Jay
https://nitter.poast.org/wartranslated/status/1895916545517531561#m
While the Virginia Class subs are nuclear powered, the need fuel for the onboard diesel generators.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg: The harm caused by the harm she caused was enormous, lasting and concentrated mostly on people similar in belief to her.
We do not need her. How about we keep what is best (already) about America, for example,
Thomas Jefferson
Andrew Jackson
RevRick
@wenchacha: Lagurdia was FDR’s favorite GOP mayor.
trollhattan
@Baud: Good one!
“In Soviet Russia, garbage drive you.”
Eolirin
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg: I’m asking you not to say things around me that make my own struggles worse.
You’re not living with a constant drum beat in your head telling you to stop and let go and cease being. I’m asking you not to make that drum beat worse.
And I don’t give a fuck that Musk is evil enough to “deserve” it. You saying what you’re saying there only hurts me, it does literally nothing to him.
He won’t see it. You can’t and won’t enact anything that’ll actually make it happen and if you did it’d be the same as calling on people to engage in violence, and you know, hella illegal. Not the kind of thing you want to be saying out in the open, especially now.
So it’s not that you saying that is about anything other than you engaging in a revenge fantasy. I’m sorry, but that’s not important enough to warrant being insensitive to how it affects the other people around you.
I am seriously hanging on by a thread depending on the day. I’m asking you not to make that any harder than it already is. Can you respect that, please?
John S.
@HopefullyNotcassandra:
Andrew Jackson may be talking the talk in that quote, but he didn’t walk the walk.
Prior to the emergence of Trump, Jackson was one of the most disgraceful presidents we ever had.
trollhattan
@Gin & Tonic:
Ah, thanks. That guy, all the spine of Lukashenko but without a nation to plunder.
Jay
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg:
It takes some people a while to adapt when their world changes in a day.
debit
@Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg: Much like jerk off scenarios, murder fantasies should be kept private. This is just gross.
HopefullyNotcassandra
I screwed up my posting
Abraham Lincoln
Each man was poisoned by American slavery.
Nevertheless, all of these men would disagree vehemently with everything about our current president
Sorry about splitting this post
matt
@RevRick: I think the last 45 days have radicalized a lot of normies.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@John S.:
Way to hand him to Trump.
He did terrible things. Jefferson whipped children so they would make nails faster. He did not do it himself. He just wrote about the efficacy of whipping children and nail making
They are flawed.
They believed in America
They believed in democracy
This president believes in neither.
Jackie
Heh. Apparently Vance is in Vermont for a skiing wknd. He was met by over a hundred protesters and fled to an undisclosed location. The protesters were unhappy with his treatment of President Zelenskyy.
eta: saw the snippet on MSNBC, but there’s probably links online.
John S.
@Jay:
I think based on what Mark Rutte said, he is wholly unsuited to adapt to the moment.
zhena gogolia
Deleted.
Scamp Dog
@WTFGhost: Red cards and yellow cards are used in fencing as well.
mrmoshpotato
@Baud: Sure, Jan. Apparently the South African Nazi thinks Nazi salutes don’t count.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@HopefullyNotcassandra:
It should be
the harm caused by Charlotte Corday
I apologize for the mess I made of this attempt to once more defend who and what we Americans have been, are and are/were? working to become.
Ohio Mom
@wenchacha: I’m going with LaGuardia as well. My mother had been a fan.
Growing up in NYC, Wagner was the first mayor I remember, though I was too young to know anything about him except his name.
I appreciated Ed Koch’s love and enthusiasm for the city, we needed a pep talk at that time. Other than that, eh.
Of course Adams makes the rest of them look like gods. Well, except for Giuliani. Oh and Bloomberg, he ruined New York, made it glitzy and took away its soul (see the old blog, Vanishing New York, Moss hates Bloomberg).
zhena gogolia
@Gin & Tonic: Thank you. That’s what I thought but didn’t want to get it wrong!
John S.
@HopefullyNotcassandra:
Sorry, but that argument doesn’t fly with me. Especially about Jackson. He was far worse than just a “flawed man for his time”.
He absolutely did not respect democracy.
ETA: No matter. Nobody can hold a candle to the awfulness that is Trump. He is going to set a standard for disgraceful presidents that I hope never gets bested.
Jay
@John S.:
As long as the US is still in NATO and US Forces are in joint deployments with other NATO Forces in Europe, Mark Rutte needs to remain diplomatic.
That said, the proper answer to that question should have been “no comment”.
trollhattan
@Ohio Mom:
IIRC one thing Mayor LaGuardia did to endear himself was reading the Sunday funnies to New York’s kids over the radio.
Can you imagine?
trollhattan
@Jay: Guessing the half-life of our NATO commitment is best measured in weeks.
“We have not received our first thank-you check from NATO and I’m running out of patience.”
Ksmiami
@John S.: I’ve been thinking that maybe we should move away from even having a President. Our country is too powerful and dangerous to be under the control of one man.
Raoul Paste
@JoyceH: I called my credit card company about the same issue, and they told me that the u24 transaction never even reached them, and that it was the website’s fault. He recommended trying a different browser to access that website. I haven’t tried it yet
John S.
@Jay:
I agree with you. But there’s a huge area for diplomacy between the extremes of A) trashing Trump and B) publicly admonishing Zelenskyy while claiming Trump is your friend and giving him sloppy wet kisses.
Ksmiami
@E.: bio warfare. Wipe our own side out
Jay
https://nitter.poast.org/Shayan86/status/1895875242645500117#m
John S.
@Jay:
How adorable that MAGA has suddenly rediscovered the Logan Act after the numerous infractions they have made against it.
Mark Twain is evergreen:
Melancholy Jaques
@New Deal democrat:
How do we avoid being labeled disgruntled losers who don’t want to accept the results of a free & fair election?
NotMax
@Ohio Mom
Trivia:
Seth Low holds the distinction of having been a mayor of the City of Brooklyn before 1898’s incorporation of it into New York City and later on a mayor of NYC.
John S.
@Melancholy Jaques:
Democrats are going to be accused of that anyway, so they may as well get something out of it and give everyone the theater they seem to want.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@John S.: He is the reason we have one person
One vote
This president likes to say he is like him
He is not
Ohio Mom
@trollhattan: I believe that was during a newspaper strike.
kindness
@Suzanne:
As someone who grew up in Tarrytown (east side of that bridge) it should still be named the Tappan Zee. In Dutch, Tappan Zee means ‘the widest part of the river’. The Hudson is 3 miles wide right there (but really shallow outside the channel). That area was originally a Dutch settlement (Philipsburg Manor) till the British came in and massacred the town during the Revolutionary War. The channel is close to the eastern shore and gun emplacements were stopping the British Navy from going up the Hudson to attack Albany. So the British did what the British do.
Steve LaBonne
@kindness: I grew up in New City. I will never call that bridge anything but the Tappan Zee Bridge.
hrprogressive
Rosenberg seems like a smart guy, so maybe he should put his efforts into convincing the Democrats to stop genuflecting at the altar of Bipartisanship and start speaking the truth to the public before it’s too late.
Musk and Trump are Russian Assets destroying the country from within.
The entire GOP is on board with burning the country down if they can rule over the ashes.
Billionaires are the only constituency DC gives a shit about. You and your family mean *nothing* to them.
Short, simple, repeatable.
Get to it.
Steve LaBonne
@John S.: The US should be unceremoniously booted out of NATO next week. We are an insider threat now.
Baud
@Steve LaBonne:
I think I’d prefer a ceremony. That would really get under Trump’s skin.
Steve LaBonne
@Baud: Friendly amendment cheerfully accepted.
Geminid
Tom Watson reposted this from PBS special correspondent Simon Ostrofsky:
Jay
@John S.:
Mark Rutte is not a politician or a diplomat, he is a Bureaucrat/Administrator.
zhena gogolia
@Geminid: They are certainly inspiring me.
Kayla Rudbek
@wenchacha: Fiorello LaGuardia without a doubt in my mind.
Baud
Via reddit, apt meme
Baud
Professor Bigfoot
@Ksmiami: That was the whole point of that “separation of powers” and “checks and balances” thing in the Constitution— to keep any one person or any one department from acquiring absolute power.
I don’t think they reckoned with the idea of an entire political faction simply abandoning the Constitution in that pursuit of absolute power.
Another Scott
Ukraine won’t give up. It’s good to see that others recognize that whatever Putin’s minions want, that will not change.
Speaking of Putin’s minions….
Something something with him, all roads lead to Putin. – N. Pelosi
Grr…
Nobody voted for all the crap they’re doing. We have to stay united and strong to defeat them.
Slava Ukraini!!
Best wishes,
Scott.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@John S.: Andrew Jackson absolutely did respect democracy (for all white men).
What Jackson did not do is respect the Supreme Court’s order to stop the state of Georgia from exiling tribes from their land in and around Stone Mountain.
The people of Georgia voted for that exile, which was an act of genocide we call The Trail of Tears. Jackson refused to send the army to stop it. So, that heinous act (which is the act for which you disdain him, I think?) was actually taken in support of democracy. Sometimes voters get it horribly wrong (see last November).
Jackson did fail to stop a crime against humanity. There is no doubt about it.
Yet, he is also the reason democrats are represented by a donkey because he fought for (& mostly secured the right of) every white man to the franchise. Before him, states could and did block men from voting who did not own property. People who hated him said he and his poor supporters were jack asses.
Jackson fought as a boy in the American revolution. He and his family were arrested and imprisoned on a British prison ship. He lost his mother, father and two brothers to the cruelties, starvations and disease on that ship. His wife was the victim of the first victim-shaming publicity stunt of which I am aware in American history. She likely died as a result of it. Her first husband beat her. It served Jackson’s opponents to call her an adulteress.
Jackson also destroyed the bank of the United States, led then by Biddle. Jackson haters claim the bank was not corrupt. I cannot tell you for certain, although it is clear the Bank was lifting six percent out of the economy for its “shareholders”* per annum. Older folks I once knew loved Andy Jackson for that little nugget. Elon Musk would certainly like six percent of our GDP.
Criticize all of our forebears for their injustices and hypocrisies, please. It is important we never forget.
At the same time though, do not discount their profound and steady belief in this people’s union, our right to govern ourselves, or our right to perfect our union as we go along. This is precisely what Trump, et al are attempting to destroy, the very things that make us great.
Please do not surrender any of our allies from the past or the present. I believe we need them all. Tennesseans love Andrew Jackson and not without good cause. There is a lot to love there, sitting right next to all there is to dislike.
There is no doubt Andrew Jackson’s Union was awash in injustice, injury and horror. There is no doubt that Jefferson’s and Lincoln’s were too. Our Union gets worse daily. I am not going to cede any of these America loving men to those trying to turn us into a nation of serfs.
They cannot have Edmund Burke either! He was for Home Rule for the U.S. and Ireland. He was the epitome of a liberal. The cons only have Townshend, and Townshend they shall have.
* the American people were not shareholders. The shareholder position was inherited. It was the oligarchic position of Andrew Jackson’s era.
tobie
@John S.: Oof…that is just an awful statement from the NATO Sec Gen. He’s calling on Zelensky to grovel and lick Trump’s boots. What is it with men sucking up to Trump? I just don’t get it. He’s a bully and there are only two things he, like all bullies, understands: vanquishing someone or being vanquished.
Do you know who the male CNN host was who was trying to both-sides the debacle at the White House? As far as I could tell, the only people who raised their voices were Trump and Vance, who rebuked Zelensky for his ingratitude.
Suzanne
@kindness: My aunt and cousins lived in Tarrytown (and others towns in Westchester County) for decades, and I didn’t realize the new bridge was named for Cuomo until I saw it on Google Maps one time. LOL.
I will note that Phoenix has a mountain and a freeway that bore a name that we non-Natives came to learn, years later, was horribly racially insensitive. And they were renamed…. and every once in a while, I use the wrong name completely by accident. It’s just…. in there, and old habits are really tough to break.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jay: Right, the longest serving prime minister of the Netherlands isn’t a politician.
Jay
@Another Scott:
Funny how all these “ruZZian Cultural Associations” keep getting caught out as spys and agents.
Another Scott
@HopefullyNotcassandra: Thanks for that.
“Something something the past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” – L.P. Hartley
Best wishes,
Scott.
bbleh
@New Deal democrat: I agree, if only because that would burn him to his core. “NOBODY walks out on ME! I deserve RESPECT!
@Baud: lol! There clearly is a … familial resemblance.
Gretchen
One thing I found interested that Elle Reeve said this afternoon (thanks, John and Water Girl for arranging) is that these people are capable of shame. Trolls were making threatening phone calls to a woman and her child, but when Elle made the voicemails public and people could hear them saying terrible things, they were upset with Elle and tried to get her to take them down. Why did they say it if they didn’t want anyone to hear it?
My Senator, Roger Marshall of Kansas, never visits the blue Kansas City suburbs, but he feels safe in the rural western areas. Not today. He cut a town hall short when they started yelling at him about veterans getting fired from federal jobs. As he was running, angry constituents were yelling “you’re not done! Come back and answer our questions!”
Another Scott
As matt mentioned in comment #1, the “two cowardly puppets and a hero” line was Seth Moulton:
YahooNews (turned up in a Google search)
HTH!
Best wishes,
Scott.
catclub
also doesn’t count that all the other nazis are cheering for him.
Gin & Tonic
Saw a report that Z got an invite to meet with the King.
Lenore
@E.: May I ask what you decided on as your response? Purely curious, no motive.
sab
@🐾BillinGlendaleCA: Weren’t all eight other planets visible last night? Of course Ohio was snowing so we missed it.
catclub
I would bet Intelligence departments of our former allies, like GB, Germany, and France, are already addressing this . Didn’t Trump end up burning some Israeli Intelligence people?
bbleh
@John S.: as to this, Zelensky is walking a slippery tight rope over a volcano filled with alligators that … okay you understand.
I think it DOES help him to be conciliatory and respectful toward the US (NOT Trump specifically), because of the importance of US aid. Even if SOME of it can be maintained for SOME time, that’s valuable to him.
OTOH he can’t be seen to “surrender,” which is what Trump clearly was trying to get him to do.
And I gotta say, he handled that ambush remarkably well, especially given that it was (1) an ambush, (2) 2-on-1, and (3) he was SPEAKING ENGLISH throughout.
So yeah, everybody is saying everybody needs to make nice, and Zelensky is making nice very publicly. All good. But it sure isn’t gonna make much difference in the WH — that fix was in before the meeting. Whether it will make a difference elsewhere … worth a try.
Baud
@sab:
Plutophile.
Omnes Omnibus
@Another Scott: Heh, Moulton called Vance a pogue.
bbleh
@Steve LaBonne: @catclub: surely there are T-shirts that say ‘INSIDER THREAT”? In like SCARY colors? I want one.
WaterGirl
@Another Scott: I read comment #1, but I didn’t connect that to the title of the post.
Finally caught that just now in your comment. :-) Updated up top.
bbleh
@Omnes Omnibus: he’s worse — he’s a poseur. He never even served.
The only thing that gladdens my heart about him — apart from his daily humiliation — is what’s going to happen when the Orange Guy passes from the scene, and the knives REALLY come out. (May that day come sooner rather than later!)
Nice to see you again BTW.
WaterGirl
@Gin & Tonic:
Yay!
Lenore
@Professor Bigfoot: The Constitution – like any idea – is only as strong as the belief in it. Get enough people in enough places that reject the idea, the idea stops working. The Supreme Court will be the first test of this.
Geminid
@Kayla Rudbek: A more recent City mayor was mentioned today. From Tim Watson:
Watson referred to Andrew Cuomo’s announcement today that he is running for Msyor. Cuomo’s pitch: the City is in crisis and “we need government to work. We need effective leadership.”
@wenchacha: Tom Watson also reposted this from reporter Sally Goldenberg:
Watson commented:
Westchester Democrat Tom Watson posts and BlueSky as guitarwatson.bsky.social. Watson seems to be an astute abd reliable observer of City and New York state politics. He describes himself as an “unreconstructed liberal.”
catclub
@Ksmiami: In principle, Article I of the Constitution describes which part of government is in charge – the legislature.
… in principle.
sab
@Baud: You are right. Seven other planets. Pluto was always too little to see, but I am a plutophile. I bought a book about the discovery of Pluto when I was in elementary school and we bought Scholastic books. I have been a plutophile ever since.
Baud
Via Reddit, CNN poll.
Baud
Via Reddit
Baud
Via Reddit, my favorite so far.
TBone
@TBone: See Jane run. Go Jane, go!
https://youtu.be/Z_v0NJ8_8ps?si=t9AchLSjmzv9Hmrg
Omnes Omnibus
@bbleh: Vance was a marine. Yeah, I said was about a marine.
TBone
@Baud: ha!
The empoorer!
Geminid
@catclub: Trump burned an Israeli intelligence agent operating in Syria. This occurred in hearly in his first term, at an Oval Office meeting with Russsan Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russia’s ambassador to the US, with a Russian TV network recording.
Trump was bragging about stopping a recent terrorist attempt, and said it had been foiled with the help of a foreign intelligence service. He did not name Israel, but Israel’s Mossad knew exactly who he was talking about and extracted their agent immediately
bbleh
@Omnes Omnibus: Ok true. He was a press officer. Overseas. For 6 months.
Grrrrr
John S.
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yeah, I don’t necessarily agree with that take either. But I’m not much in a mood these days for defending the indefensible (in this case Rutte licking Trump’s boots).
@Jay:
We’ll have to agree to disagree on this one.
Geminid
@Geminid: Tom Watson also reposted an announcement of mudician David Johanson’s death with the comments:
TBone
@Geminid: reposting here
David Johansen down.
NEW YORK DOLLS – THERE’S GONNA BE A SHOWDOWN ( VIDEOCLIP )
John S.
@TBone:
RIP Buster Poindexter
bluefoot
@WTFGhost:
My rheumatologist and I had an interesting discussion about the difference between nociception and pain. Nocicseption is the physiological process of detecting harmful stimuli, whereas pain is the perception/experience of discomfort, harm, etc. It was really helpful to me, because I was experiencing chronic pain spreading and it was getting to me emotionally. She prescribed a very short course of nortriptyline, which helped decouple the two.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@John S.:
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/445914-kellyanne-conway-dismisses-hatch-act-violation-let-me-know-when-the/
Remember this from Kelleyanne Conway in 2019?
Lauryn11
“What is actually bad about Nazis — it wasn’t their fashion or their mannerisms, it was the war and genocide,” he [Musk] added. Joe Rogan doesn’t have the nads to ask the obvious follow-up. “Why ape the fashion or mannerisms of the most notoriously genocidal people on the planet?”
Sorry, Elon. Tesla’s still going in the shitter.
🐾BillinGlendaleCA
@sab: Well, they’ve been in the sky at the same time, but the outer two are not visible to the naked eye.
Chris T.
@Suzanne:
I always thought of it as the “Tappen Sie” Bridge. German for “they tap”… dance, maybe? Or perhaps it refers to those who cross it, tapping it to make sure it’s still solid.