Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

These are not very smart people, and things got out of hand.

Rupert, come get your orange boy, you petrified old dinosaur turd.

Of course you can have champagne before noon. That’s why orange juice was invented.

The world has changed, and neither one recognizes it.

So many bastards, so little time.

Someone should tell Republicans that violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, or possibly the first.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

SCOTUS: It’s not “bribery” unless it comes from the Bribery region of France. Otherwise, it’s merely “sparkling malfeasance”.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

The revolution will be supervised.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

Giving up is unforgivable.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Dumb motherfuckers cannot understand a consequence that most 4 year olds have fully sorted out.

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

I like political parties that aren’t owned by foreign adversaries.

You are here: Home / Democratic Response to Trump 2.0 / TGIFriday Morning Open Thread: Communicating

TGIFriday Morning Open Thread: Communicating

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TGIFriday Morning Open Thread 18

(Jeff Ohman via GoComics.com)

Last-minute reminder, in case anyone has a free lunch hour:

SO MANY STAND UP FOR SCIENCE EVENTS TO CHOOSE FROM—153 and COUNTING!
To get more information on our local events and to register your own, head to www.standupforscience2025.org/local-event-information/ ??????

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— Stand Up for Science 2025 – DC and Nationwide! (@standupforscience.bsky.social) March 6, 2025 at 2:14 PM

Donald Trump is lying to you.

[image or embed]

— JB Pritzker (@jbpritzker.bsky.social) March 4, 2025 at 11:37 PM

Trump take job

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— Nick (derogatory) ? (@slothropsmap.bsky.social) March 6, 2025 at 1:34 PM


This is not a winning message lmao

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— Schnorkles O'Bork (@schnorkles.bsky.social) March 6, 2025 at 11:47 AM

BOLD STRATEGY COTTON

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— Schnorkles O'Bork (@schnorkles.bsky.social) March 6, 2025 at 12:25 PM

lmao I just fucking can't.
Lets do the "prices are too damn high" election and win by promising to lower prices, and then.. *waves hand at everything*

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— Schnorkles O'Bork (@schnorkles.bsky.social) March 6, 2025 at 12:25 PM

First Trump take egg, now Trump take stock

— Vituperative Erb (@vituperativeerb.bsky.social) March 4, 2025 at 4:25 PM

I can't believe when I started the TRUMP TAKE EGG push people were like "uh what are you gonna do when egg prices go back to normal and everything's fine" instead of realizing that shit like this was gonna happen instead:

[image or embed]

— mtsw (@mtsw.bsky.social) March 3, 2025 at 4:05 PM

'trump crash plane' and 'trump take egg' aren't the messages themselves, they're the strategy. the messages are the repetition of the images

[image or embed]

— BeijingPalmer (@beijingpalmer.bsky.social) March 4, 2025 at 2:49 PM

Reader Interactions

224Comments

  4. 4.

    J.

    Secy of Commerce Howard Lutnick was on CNBC yesterday, talking up Dear Leader, saying how the Orange One was going to bring back manufacturing and steel production to the U.S. and create millions of jobs. But as my husband pointed out, the reason manufacturing and steel production went overseas is because American consumers don’t want to pay a lot for that muffler or whatever. So you can talk all you like about tariffs and returning manufacturing to the U.S., but the same MAGAts who supposedly support that are going to scream their heads off about high prices. Oh, and those millions of jobs Lutnick promised? They’re going to go to robots.

  5. 5.

    satby

    Pritzker is a great governor.

    There’s a Stand Up for Science demonstration scheduled near me that I’m going to today. Other than that, I got nothin.

  6. 6.

    satby

    @J.: All true. Some of the silly shit people say about what will happen, or on our side what people should do, always makes me wonder if they’ve ever met “Americans”.

  8. 8.

    schrodingers_cat

    The elite media and the left demands perfection from the Democrats and not even the barest minimum from the Republicans, that’s why we  are where we are. Just like the society at large gives white people a pass but expects non-white people to be perfect every time. This is the political version of it. A black person or a woman with Trump’s history could never ever have become the President.

    I don’t know how to change this. Even talking about this makes people uncomfortable.

  9. 9.

    Suzanne

    Access to cheap goods isn’t the essence of the American Dream.

    The essence of the American Dream is being able to work hard on a fair playing field, achieve on your merits of diligence and intelligence without limitation of class or race or upbringing, earn and invest for the future, so your children do better than you did. None of which the GOP provides, either.

    #fuckthatguy

  12. 12.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Baud:

    Thanks! It was indeed my birthday.  I’m now 71, just one more number to ridicule as meaningless.

  14. 14.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Suzanne:

    Thanks!

    Yeah, I was catching up this morning by reading the front page of TPM, and it was really kind of overwhelming.

    I ate a bit too well last night, so I’m hoping my stomach settles down in time for me to go into DC for the Stand Up for Science rally.

  16. 16.

    Suzanne

    Spawn the Youngest woke up earlier than normal and it’s amazing how she can just start having entire conversations, singing entire musicals…. without coffee. Damn.

  21. 21.

    MagdaInBlack

    Apropos of nuthin, there is a cardinal outside my window singing his big old cardinal heart out. Must be the season of LUV in the cardinal world.

  22. 22.

    WereBear

    @Professor Bigfoot: Yes, which is also what they were promised. Why aren’t they loud and proud about all the 2025 things they are doing? “See, we keep our promises.”

    Now between the devil and the deep blue sea. It’s beyond repair, they must pick one.

    What will they pick? That is the question before me.

  23. 23.

    WereBear

    @schrodingers_cat: It’s all assumptions of superiority to make up for a lack of the real thing.

    If they tick me off, I tell them. But then, I’m sick and permanently unemployable. I got something out of the deal :)

  24. 24.

    SFAW

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I agree those two groups do it, but I think for two different reasons. For the nominal left/liberals, I think it’s a variant of Murc’s Law: they know Rethugs will ignore them, so they focus on their own group, thinking/hoping change will happen that way. For the elite media, I think it’s a combination of getting clicks and owners wanting Rethugs to be in power, plus maybe some other TBD (meaning I’m not sure) stuff.

  25. 25.

    sab

    @MagdaInBlack: The robins have arrived back after winter down south somewhere. Surprised the geese aren’t here yet. I hope avian flu didn’t get our whole flock of visitors.

  26. 26.

    satby

    Good dialogue between Paul Krugman and autocracy expert Kim Schepple about the parallels between Orban in Hungary and the felon’s attempts to emulate him here:

    One thing you’re starting to see now, and especially the more government just screws up on stuff everybody took for granted and/or didn’t attribute to government, the more you’re gonna start getting pushback from red state areas. Because I mean, as you know, better than anyone, the United States is a giant redistributive project in which the blue states are subsidizing the red states. And as government starts to fall apart, the places that are going to feel it the worst are actually going to be the red states long-term. And so the question is, Which is first? The red states suffer and then they have a political awakening. They’re not going to become blue state liberals, but they’re at least going to become anti-Trump Republicans.

  27. 27.

    Betty Cracker

    @MagdaInBlack: Aww, the big red lug! The birds around here are all going nuts too.

    That reminds me — I need to make some nectar and get the hummingbird feeders up this weekend. They usually show up again around this time of year. The flowering plants in the yard are making a comeback after the flood, but there aren’t any blossoms yet, and the hummies have to eat!

  29. 29.

    Betty Cracker

    Cool AP story about a dolphin that landed in a 16-foot fishing boat in New Zealand and how the fishermen returned it to the sea. Happy ending for fishermen and dolphin!

    Our crappy little Jon boat is a 16-footer, a 1980s-vintage relic of the rental fleet at the business my dad sold when he retired in 2020. I’m trying to imagine a dolphin and three people in a boat of that size. Dolphins are BIG!

  30. 30.

    JCJ

    @lowtechcyclist: Someone here a bit ago wrote that when their age was a prime number they would declare that they were “in their prime.”  So hardly a meaningless number – you are in your prime!

  32. 32.

    Jackie

    Censoring Green isn’t enough for MAGA:

    “The House Freedom Caucus is planning to offer a resolution to strip Rep. Al Green (D-TX) of his committee assignments in the wake of his outburst during President Donald Trump’s speech to Congress,” Punchbowl News reports.

    “In a statement, HFC Chair Andy Harris (R-MD) said Green needs ‘real consequences to demonstrate that no one gets to disrupt the People’s business in lame attempts to derail President Trump’s agenda.’”

  34. 34.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Baud:

    All numbers matter.

    ETA: You should know that if you’re standing up for science.

    All numbers matter, but when a number claims to be my age, it becomes the object of my ridicule. I’m not gonna let some cheap-ass number define me!

  35. 35.

    YY_Sima Qian

    The MAGA to Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution parallel has gone mainstream (gift link to NYT opinion piece below):

    Many Chinese See a Cultural Revolution in America
    People in China are expressing alarm at what looks like a familiar authoritarian turn in the United States, their longtime role model for democracy.

    By Li Yuan

    March 6, 2025

    The view represented here are those of Chinese liberals, which is a marginalized breed, unfortunately now further discredited w/in the PRC for advocating following the West’s example (& the U.S.’ specifically) through the decades. The trade war, the tech war, & the Cold War 2.0 cratered their support.

  36. 36.

    schrodingers_cat

    @SFAW: These two groups I mentioned are not overtly racist but there are these unspoken assumptions that are like the air we breathe.

    white == good and default

    non-white=weird and not as good

    Democratic party is the part of the weird and not so good people.

  40. 40.

    sentient ai from the future

    @Jackie: well to be scrupulously fair, I remember Obama doing the same thing when joe Wilson yelled “you lie”…hold on

    *finger to ear*

    so anyway

  42. 42.

    lowtechcyclist

    @MagdaInBlack:

    Apropos of nuthin, there is a cardinal outside my window singing his big old cardinal heart out. Must be the season of LUV in the cardinal world.

    Haven’t seen the cardinals yet, and there’s a bush outside my window where they love to hang out.  But lots of robins already.

    And thanks for the birthday wishes!  I had a very good day – dinner was at a place called Jesse Jay’s which does Cuban Mex, for lack of a better term.  And along the way, I won an auction for a used but still functional Craftsman table saw to replace the one I had that died.  And my wife gave me the Chappell Roan CD. :-)

  43. 43.

    Josie

    @MagdaInBlack: ​
     I drive to my son’s house very early to sit with my granddaughter until time to take her to school. The cardinal in one of his trees always sings while it’s still a bit dark, but this morning he was super loud and persistant. Must be something in the air.

  45. 45.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Geminid .

    Since 71 is a Prime Number, if anyone asks you your age you can tell them you are in your Prime.

    Happy Birthday, mathematician!

    Thanks!

    Some are mathematicians, some are carpenters’ wives
    Don’t know how it all got started, don’t know what they do with their lives
    -Dylan, of course

  46. 46.

    schrodingers_cat

    @sentient ai from the future: High unemployment is not good for consumption. That’s where Trump’s policies are going to lead us.

    Biden did not get the credit due for achieving what economists considered impossible, low inflation and full employment. It took a while to get there but he got zero credit for it by both the left flank and the media.

    With the exception of a few economists like Wolfers and Krugman.

  47. 47.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Baud:

    Heh, we break that rule before even thinking about breaking that rule and then go on to break that rule.

  50. 50.

    different-church-lady

    @schrodingers_cat:

    A black person or a woman with Trump’s history could never ever have become the President.

    They’d be in jail if they tried a fraction of it.

  51. 51.

    TBone

    @Suzanne: I used to awake like that too, never needed coffee.  Then Lyme hit like a dead weight. And I got old.  Can’t shake the exhausting fatigue today, used up way more than my 12 spoons over the last few months of stress and intensive cat nursing.  Coffee is utterly useless today.  Noah and Katrina and I are all snuggling in for a couch potato day, much needed continued Spring cleaning will wait.  So it goes.  I’m hoping to go to a protest tomorrow on the Court House steps of a nearby college town.

  53. 53.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    @Betty Cracker:

    Back in Central Misery, one could literally set their calendar as to when the hummers would show up, obviously much later than where you are.

    The scouts would show up on 14-15 April, yes, one of those two days.  Then a week later, the horde shows up.  Right along with the chimney swifts and Baltimore Orioles.  I swear they all fly up together.

  54. 54.

    sentient ai from the future

    @schrodingers_cat: yeah, there’s definitely a caveat to the consumption thing about “when things aren’t fundamentally terrible or expected to become so”

    and re:Biden, you are absolutely preaching to the choir. My life and that of my child were meaningfully and directly helped in concrete terms by his policies and I will never fucking forgive those whose free floating pessimism borne of privilege allowed people to ignore or disregard what was basically a fucking economic miracle

  64. 64.

    Spanky

    @lowtechcyclist: Haven’t seen the cardinals yet? We’re crawling with them over here, and they’ve been here all winter.

    Happy birthday, belatedly. And if you won’t consider it prime, consider it indivisible.

    The Craftsman or the Delta?

    Reading fail.

  65. 65.

    different-church-lady

    I’m almost certain Sid Vicious wasn’t thinking about his actions from a career perspective…

  70. 70.

    TBone

    It is 35 actual degrees here, 28 with wind chill.  The fireplace and the hot cocoa are of great comfort.  The sun is out but the birds are subdued.

  73. 73.

    Baud

    Via reddit

    Powerful Speeches From Trans Dems Flip 29 Republicans, Anti-Trans Bills Die In Montana

    Transgender Reps Zooey Zephyr and SJ Howell delivered powerful speeches on the Montana House floor on Thursday. Republicans defected en masse to join them in voting against anti-trans bills.

  74. 74.

    Jeffro

    the Times, more than a little late to the party today: trump’s policies have shaken a once-solid economy

    what was it Jay Rosen was saying all through 2023 and 2024: tell people the stakes, not the odds?

    yeah, well…

     

    President Trump inherited an economy that was, by most conventional measures, firing on all cylinders. Wages, consumer spending and corporate profits were rising. Unemployment was low. The inflation rate, though higher than normal, was falling.

    Just weeks into Mr. Trump’s term, the outlook is gloomier. Measures of business and consumer confidence have plunged. The stock market has been on a roller-coaster ride. Layoffs are picking up, according to some data. And forecasters are cutting their estimates for economic growth this year, with some even predicting that the U.S. gross domestic product could shrink in the first quarter.

    Some commentators have gone further, arguing that the economy could be headed for a recession, a sharp rebound in inflation or even the dreaded combination of the two, “stagflation.” Most economists consider that unlikely, saying growth is more likely to slow than to give way to a decline.

    Still, the sudden deterioration in the outlook is striking, especially because it is almost entirely a result of Mr. Trump’s policies and the resulting uncertainty. Tariffs, and the inevitable retaliation from trading partners, will increase prices and slow down growth. Federal job cuts will push up unemployment, and could lead government employees and contractors to pull back on spending while they wait to learn their fate. Deportations could will drive up costs for industries like construction and hospitality that depend on immigrant labor. everyone

    (I gave them a little help with that last part)

    FO: it’s not just for Dems anymore!

  75. 75.

    Soprano2

    @schrodingers_cat: Actually, it’s white Christian straight (or Christian-professing) men who get a pass. White women or gays or non-white people or religion other than Christian are subject to the “must be perfect” rule too. It’s because white male is seen as the “default” person in this country, so they can be any way they want. Everyone else is supposed to conform to a rigid idea of how they should be in order to be acceptable. I’ve pointed out to more than one person that the people who paint their bodies to go to football games aren’t less crazy than people who dress up for sci-fi conventions. People don’t like that comparison, but it’s true.

  76. 76.

    Matt McIrvin

    @satby: Will they become anti-Trump Republicans? Or will they just find scapegoats (trans people and foreigners took everything) and attack them even harder?

    During the Great Recession it seemed like there was a concerted effort to find the level of government that had a Democrat in it and blame them for everything. And that Republicans were working to immiserate their own constituents so they could then do that.

  79. 79.

    Suzanne

    @Soprano2:

    I’ve pointed out to more than one person that the people who paint their bodies to go to football games aren’t less crazy than people who dress up for sci-fi conventions. People don’t like that comparison, but it’s true.

    People also didn’t like when Vivek told them that they should spend their weekends at the Science Olympiad rather than the football game.

    Man, I need some more of that comedy. That was funniest thing that’s happened in politics in months.

  80. 80.

    TBone

    In other shocking news from The Inky

    The voice recorder that could have solved the mystery in the fatal Northeast Philly medical jet crash likely hadn’t worked for several years, investigators say.

    And

    A former Mount Laurel police officer has pleaded guilty to hacking social media accounts of multiple women to obtain and then publicly post their nude photos, prosecutors said Thursday.

  81. 81.

    artem1s

    Unfortunately the federal government will stop reporting unemployment or fudge the numbers. But the state governors who have to deal with reduced revenue from payroll taxes, sales taxes, fees, tourism, gas taxes, etc… they are going to freak – except Mike DeWhinge who will no doubt find a way to weaponize the state government against ‘woke’ even more. He’s already made it even harder for the health care industry to keep clinics and hospitals open in rural Ohio.

  85. 85.

    Suzanne

    @different-church-lady: LMAO, RIGHT?!?!

    Vivek forgot what party he’s in. The nerds that spend their weekends at the Science Olympiad are a lot more likely to be Democrats. He’s in with the Hold-My-Beer-Americans now!

  86. 86.

    different-church-lady

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Will they become anti-Trump Republicans? Or will they just find scapegoats (trans people and foreigners took everything) and attack them even harder?

    They will pause, then move on to the next demagogue.

  88. 88.

    Jeffro

    conversely, here’s Michelle Goldberg on the right’s trumpov derangement syndrome (ie, pretending they don’t see his obvious insanity and corruption):

     

    In the four years Trump was out of office, an eerie amnesia about his erratic rule settled over the country, allowing people to project onto him hopes that were utterly untethered from reality. You might call this phenomenon, to appropriate a phrase, Trump Derangement Syndrome.

    The right invented the term Trump Derangement Syndrome to dismiss analysis of Trump’s autocratic tendencies, compulsive lying and generally detestable character as liberal hysteria. For conservatives who don’t want to engage with substantive criticism of their leader, it functions as a thought-terminating cliché, a term often used by people who study cults to describe ideological formulations that short-circuit critical thinking.

    Trump Derangement Syndrome implies that if someone tells you something about Trump that you don’t want to hear, that person must be crazy.
    But the real derangement lies in either the refusal or the inability to see Trump clearly. A few months ago, if people had predicted that Trump would cut off intelligence-sharing with Ukraine, destroy U.S.A.I.D., free all the Jan. 6 convicts, put his lackey Kash Patel in charge of the F.B.I. and turn us into a despised enemy of Canada, they’d have been accused of unhinged political hatred. As Nick Catoggio wrote in The Dispatch, Trump’s second term is “shaping up to be what doomsayers thought his first term would be.”

    I’d argue that the doomsayers were also right about Trump’s first term, which was full of sadism, incompetence and corruption, and culminated in a coup attempt. But if it wasn’t as catastrophic as it could have been, it was because establishment figures often restrained him. The periods of relative stability provided by the adults in the room lulled people into complacency about how much damage an unfettered Trump could do.

    Now the adults are gone, but Trump’s defenders are still pretending — perhaps to themselves as well as to the rest of us — that there’s order amid the chaos.

  89. 89.

    Soprano2

    @Baud: I kind of wonder if a lot of people in the press are secretly revelling in the dismantling of the federal government, since that’s the kind of thing that has happened to their industry. Lots of people really do believe all of the government is bloated an inefficient. I told our department director that when he talks to groups about why their sewer bills are going up, one fact he should cite is that until the mid-2010’s we were maintaining the sewer with the same number of crews we had in the 1980’s, while the system grew by “x” amount of miles. We previously had a director who thought it was good to keep rates the same because it was politically popular, and now we’re paying the price for that because we have to have 5%/yr increases to try to get the rates where they need to be to pay for the things we have to do.

  90. 90.

    UncleEbeneezer

    @YY_Sima Qian: Shout out to the fucking Uncommitted assholes (and everyone who defended their bullshit) for helping make this happen.  No fucking way this would be happening if Harris or Biden was President.  Maybe THIS should’ve been the focus of the Gaza messaging for the election: Trump will actually punish/persecute protestors, Harris (or Biden or any other Dem) won’t.

    Some of us saw this coming a mile away and tried to stop it, but all the “GenocideJoe” shitheads simply didn’t care.  And now here we are…

  91. 91.

    different-church-lady

    @Jeffro: Like I’ve said: the first time was for kicks. This time is for revenge. He’s not going to have even a single person around him who won’t do revenge for him.

  92. 92.

    p.a

    I wonder how minority military recruitment might be affected by the obvious path of the current confed federal gvt, especially given drumpf’s firings.  But given the anti-economy being built, any job is a good job.

  93. 93.

    Soprano2

    @Suzanne: It’s like this idea that having RFK Jr. is going to automatically get Americans to eat a healthier diet. I want to ask them, have you met the average American?

  95. 95.

    TBone

    @Jeffro: I was hopped up on Trump Denouement Syndrome for far too long, and am suffering serious withdrawal symptoms as a result.

    Now I take Fuckitol.

  96. 96.

    different-church-lady

    @Jeffro: I mean goddamn, anyone who thought something other than this was going to happen was a fuckin’ exponential dumbshit.

  97. 97.

    WereBear

    @different-church-lady: They would love to, but they can’t. Reality is, Trump can’t pretend to be sentient much longer, they are likely giving him pills to mask the issue but is also making it worse.

    Musk? Vance? MTG? All these wannabes don’t mesmerize the MAGAs. He’ll die and there is no successor. Just a lot of Prince John’s laying waste to the kingdom.

    I’ve long hoped it would fracture like every other cult who suffers unexpected loss of the leader, with no sub-leaders. These spineless R politicians don’t have any pizzazz of their own.

    And the menace spent decades that in the press and on TV. The faith parasites in their mega churches are scandal ridden too. They are in a corner with no one to lead them out.

  98. 98.

    Suzanne

    @Soprano2:

    I want to ask them, have you met the average American?

    Right?! Like, do you think that there’s a large cohort of Americans who really want to be eating more organic Brussels sprouts?!

  100. 100.

    Matt McIrvin

    @p.a: What minority military recruitment? Surely they won’t be doing any. They’re purging the brass of minorities. What they want is people who are eager to shoot minorities.

  101. 101.

    different-church-lady

    @WereBear: I agree it won’t be easy to find another fix like they have now, but I can guarantee they’ll look for it.

  102. 102.

    SFAW

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Qualified agreement: I don’t think libs are necessarily racist (in the white == good sense), but it was kind of appalling to see Bernie’s unacknowledged (or is it unrealized?) racism when he bad-mouthed the SC primaries (and by extension, Jim Clyburn).

  103. 103.

    TBone

    @WereBear: I don’t misunderestimate the power of the cult to hypnotize the rubes into falling under the spell of a Dear Leader imposter replacement.  BoJo is still alive.

    Some of ’em think that English accent means he’s smart.

    Boris Johnson’s rumoured comeback plot would leave Nigel Farage facing a “huge threat” as the Tory Party’s “trump card” risks sinking Reform UK, allies of the former Prime Minister have told GB News.

    msn.com/en-gb/politics/government/boris-johnson-comeback-plot-leaves-nigel-farage-facing-huge-threat…

  104. 104.

    WereBear

    @different-church-lady: Actually, it’s QAnon. They don’t care if anyone’s dead. One “prophet” of their’s has already predicted this is the THIRD Trump robot/Reptilian/crisis actor recruited for the job.

    I’m not saying it makes sense. I’m saying the ones sticking with it will have to become psychotic. And they are up for it!

  105. 105.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Soprano2: Any diet initiatives he introduces are going to be crazy-fueled. Keto for everyone! Next week, the diet where you consume nothing but raw milk and Soylent.

  109. 109.

    WereBear

    @A Ghost to Most: Science kicks religion’s ass.

    Which is why we are seeing the collapse of fundamentalist religions, who hate science the most. But I doubt their sincerity, when the Amish are having escapees, and having to soften their rule to keep them.

    The barn can have all the electrical stuff. I’m sure that is written in a holy book somewhere.

  110. 110.

    schrodingers_cat

    @SFAW: Its subconscious. They get defensive when confronted with it.

    I have been there myself. When I took to Twitter after Modi’s second that was my reaction initially when confronted with many instances of casteism in India. It made me ponder and question everything. I learned a lot about myself and India’s history.

  111. 111.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Jeffro: The right loves power–their instinct is to suck up to the biggest bully. Trump’s kind of insanity is all in the service of bullying so they instinctively love it. They’ll parrot lies because the point of the lies is to prove that they can make you pretend to believe them–it’s bully control over reality, like O’Brien telling Winston Smith the Party can make the Earth flat.

  112. 112.

    Soprano2

    @WereBear:   they are likely giving him pills to mask the issue but is also making it worse.

    Honestly I’m dubious about this, it’s more likely “Hollywooding” if he does have dementia. You’d be surprised how normal a person with dementia can seem if they’re performing for someone else. He also could be in the early stages of Alzheimer’s and getting the drugs that prolong the early stages (but they don’t stop it). Drugs can have unpredictable effects on older people. It’s possible that they’ve discovered a cocktail of stuff that helps him seem more normal for short periods of time, but like you say that can’t last.

  113. 113.

    Matt McIrvin

    @WereBear: Non-fundamentalist religions are hurting more than fundamentalist ones. For a while there, fundamentalist religion was exploding while all other kinds were in decline. Now, the rot has gotten to the fundies but their bad reputation mostly repels people who don’t have the fundie instinct from religion entirely, with the damage hurting the less obnoxious religions more than the most obnoxious ones.

  115. 115.

    Soprano2

    @Matt McIrvin: They think the only reason young white men haven’t been flocking to sign up is because the military is too “woke” (which to them means has way too many women and minorities). They’re going to be surprised…….

  118. 118.

    Matt McIrvin

    @WereBear: Trump’s parents were fairly long-lived. I’ve been assuming he will live to 100 just to avoid getting my hopes up. Robert Mugabe ruled Zimbabwe until he was 95.

  125. 125.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Soprano2: I think they can probably recruit some white supremacist kids by telling them they’re going to get to mow down protesters. The armed forces are going to be useless for any traditional military roles (like invading Canada or Greenland) but they’ll still be pretty good for killing unarmed civilians in the United States.

  126. 126.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Soprano2: May be when compared to white men, white women are not the default but they are still preferable to ooga booga non white people.

    See for example how Nazi Barbie Doll Leavitt is treated compared to Jean-Pierre.

  130. 130.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @lowtechcyclist:

    Happy birthday! Wishing you many more.

    I hope very much to make it to 2031, when my birthday that year will make my age both a Prime and a Fibonacci. And I hope I still have enough mental acuity to recognise the significance of the number in the moment.

  131. 131.

    Phylllis

    @Soprano2: This reminds me of my superintendent many years ago dressing down the city council member who proudly stated ‘we haven’t raised city taxes in years’ at a public meeting about the school budget. She quickly shot back ‘that’s fiscally irresponsible’. He turned a shade of red I didn’t think possible in a human. He also shut the hell up.

  133. 133.

    WTFGhost

    @Suzanne: “And on the 9th day, God bred his chosen warrior with Vivek Ramaswamaunctuousness, and found someone in shrimping boots that was even *less* attractive, so….”

  134. 134.

    different-church-lady

    Fibonacci… Denouement… Demagogue… We are clearly not dumb enough for this country.

  138. 138.

    WereBear

    @Matt McIrvin: The less obnoxious religions are easier to let go if someone prefers secular activities. But I agree that “Christian” has become generally obnoxious, thanks to the fundamentalists’ own efforts.

    Part of the complaints about “being persecuted” is that they are more and more obviously not right.

  139. 139.

    jonas

    @Suzanne:  Access to cheap goods isn’t the essence of the American Dream

    Can you imagine the five-alarm media and political shitstorm that would have ensued if this had been Janet Yellin’s response to someone asking about inflation a couple of years ago? JFC, the mind reels.

    Also #fuckthatguy and a super #fuckthemsm

  140. 140.

    Ohio Mom

    @sab: I have not yet seen a robin but I am certain they are about. My other reliable harbinger of spring, the croci, are nowhere to be seen, some varmint must have dug up and eaten all the bulbs.

  141. 141.

    Spanky

    Boo hoo.

    LONDON (Reuters) -Hedge fund stock pickers and multi-strategy funds gave up around half their average yearly gains in Thursday’s tech-driven equity selloff, a note by Goldman Sachs ( GS ) showed.

    Wall Street shares have been hit this week by a darkening U.S. economic outlook uncertainty over President Donald Trump’s tariff policies, with the Nasdaq on Thursday confirming a correction since peaking in December.

    Stock plunges were felt acutely in the parts of the markets where hedge funds held long bets such as on technology, media and telecommunications companies.

    Global hedge funds were mostly long these stocks coming into this week, said a separate note from JPMorgan ( JPM ) on Wednesday. A long position expects an asset value to rise whereas a short bet hopes it will decline.

    Technology is the second worst-performing S&P 500 sector year-to-date with about an 8% loss, after consumer discretionary stocks which have tumbled just over 9%.

    Hedge funds were caught in crowded trades that sold off leaving those which pick stocks with a 1% average return on the year so far, said the Goldman Sachs ( GS ) note sent to clients on Thursday and seen by Reuters on Friday.

    U.S. stock pickers finished down 1.4% on Thursday, taking their yearly performance to negative 0.5% for 2025, so far, the note said.

    Hedge funds that employ different kinds of trading strategies also had “a challenging day,” said the Goldman note.

    This kind of hedge fund which for the last three years has produced consistently positive returns has this year lost money 18 out of 29 days since January 27th, said Goldman.

    This negative investment streak was one of the worst performances for this kind of hedge fund that the bank had ever seen, said Goldman.

    Multi-strategy hedge funds are designed to offset the losses of one strategy with another.

    (Reporting by Nell Mackenzie; Editing by Dhara Ranasinghe and Louise Heavens)

  144. 144.

    jonas

    @WereBear: Part of the complaints about “being persecuted” is that they are more and more obviously not right.

    Mostly because what they mean by “persecuted” is “my opinions are no longer automatically deferred to because I wave a Bible around.”

  145. 145.

    Sure Lurkalot

    My good friend Frank from college sadly departed at the beginning of Trump I, but for the election, had red caps made with the logo “Make America Grateful Dead Again” which he gave out (literally liberally).

    Trump’s “policies” are going to deaden a lot of people, I’m not so sure that’s not part of the plan. Some may be gratefully dead to avoid the pain inflicted upon them, but that’s not what my dear friend meant by his hats.

  147. 147.

    Suzanne

    @jonas: Maybe it’s because I was brought up by my extremely Protestant grandparents on my mother’s side….. and my grandfather’s mother died young and his father was a drunk, and he had to drive a truck at age 12 to earn money to feed himself….. but I remember the value of thrift being a core part of that American ideal. Entitlement to cheap shit was, at no time, part of the core expectation.

  149. 149.

    jonas

    @Spanky: Hedgers who were betting on “Trump will make everything awesome” (or even “won’t rock the boat too badly given that we’re doing really well here”) have lost badly. On the other hand, it would be interesting to know who the characters are who started shorting the shit out of everything in January and are now incredibly wealthy.

  150. 150.

    Matt McIrvin

    @WereBear: But you also see the claims of antirationalist ideologies getting more and more assertively absurd. It’s not enough to say that humans were intelligently designed, or that the universe was created 6000 years ago–now, the universe is only the size of the Earth and it’s a flat-floored dome like a cake cover. The cosmology of Ptolemy is a newfangled liberal innovation that has to be rejected.

  152. 152.

    Spanky

    Let’s see how the True Americans (aka farmers) are doing. From this weeks Lancaster Farming:

    Agriculture groups are calling for President Donald Trump to quickly resolve trade disputes after he placed tariffs Tuesday on top export markets.
    The National Corn Growers Association, International Dairy Foods Association and other organizations said the levies on Canada, Mexico and China will cost farmers and threaten market access.
    “We are already facing significant economic uncertainty, and these actions only add to the strain,” said Rob Larew, the president of National Farmers Union, in a statement.
    The tariffs make export-heavy industries such as grain, pork and dairy vulnerable to reciprocal tariffs, which the affected countries have started to announce. The levies will also increase costs for crop inputs and livestock that cross borders.
    Farms in Minnesota and Iowa, for example, may have to pay more for young weaned pigs from Canada.
    “We have a very integrated industry. We work well together and (are) certainly concerned with any type of disruptions and retaliatory tariffs that might come our way,” said Lori Stevermer, the president of the National Pork Producers Council.
    Most Montana beef feeders go north to be finished, and many come back to the U.S. for processing.
    “These tariffs would have a very adverse impact on the cattle ranchers of Montana,” said Walter Schweitzer, the president of the state’s Farmers Union.

    Hmmm! Well! Anything else?

    Net farm income is expected to rise 26% this year after two years of steep decline.
    The predicted increase depends on more than $40 billion USDA has promised to pay farmers for disaster relief and economic hardship.
    Dairy and livestock markets look to remain relatively strong, while crop margins will stay tight, said Seth Meyer, USDA’s chief economist.
    Meyer gave USDA’s annual forecast Feb. 27 at its 101st Agricultural Outlook Forum in Arlington, Virginia.

    Yeah, good luck with that. Anything else?

    Lindsey Shapiro is one of thousands of small-scale farmers faced with losing federal conservation funding, and her off-farm job may also be on the line.
    Shapiro, a first-generation farmer who grows produce with her husband at Root Mass Farm in Bally, Pennsylvania, also serves as Pasa Sustainable Agriculture’s Farm Bill campaign organizer.
    The couple had hoped to use USDA grant funds for deer fencing, but the money is stalled as the Department of Government Efficiency attempts to make significant spending cuts.
    “Despite the fact that there are very clear environmental and economic benefits for erecting deer fence, there’s not a lot of cost-share support in any other conservation
    programs, or really any other programs that currently exist,” Shapiro said.
    While some states, such as New Jersey, have deer fencing cost-share programs, Pennsylvania does not.
    Shapiro said she will move forward with her project but will have to take out a substantial loan and will likely have to pass some of the cost to customers.
    “We just spend so much time trying to protect our crops from deer pressure,” she said. “And we see really devastating impacts on our cover crops as well.”
    Dominoes Fall
    Pennsylvania-based Pasa Sustainable Agriculture was awarded a USDA Partnerships for Climate-Smart Commodities grant with a funding ceiling of $55 million in September 2022.
    The funds were earmarked to help small to mid-sized farms implement conservation practices such as fencing cattle away from streams, planting perennial crops to prevent erosion, and installing water lines.
    Pasa has funded 143 farms to date, some with multiple projects, and has another 882 applicants across 15 states from Maine to South Carolina.
    About two-thirds of the projects require environmental review. The goal of the grant was to serve 2,000 farms.
    In mid-February, DOGE announced on the social media platform X that it had secured $445 million in savings by canceling contracts the agency claimed had a ceiling of $2.1 billion.
    Specifically mentioned was an $8.2 million contract for “environmental compliance service for implementation of pilot projects developed under the partnership for climate smart commodities.”
    A subsequent post identified the Clark Group in Montpelier, Vermont, as the contractor, initially claiming savings of $0. An amended post put the total contract value at just over $10 million, claiming a savings of just over $2 million.
    The environmental evaluation process is required when farmers use federal funds for certain conservation projects. This is to make sure the conservation practices comply with environmental laws and regulations.
    The Clark Group was awarded a three-year contract in fall 2022 around the same time Pasa received its grant, which spans five years.
    Now that DOGE has canceled the environmental review contract, the Clark Group can’t complete the work — for which it had been billing USDA as projects were reviewed — and projects that have not been reviewed cannot move forward.
    President Donald Trump’s administration put a freeze on federal grant funds shortly after he took office, a move contested by the attorneys general of 22 states and the District of Columbia.
    A federal judge granted a temporary restraining order with a final ruling expected any day.
    Pasa said that despite the temporary restraining order, which it said should have resumed payments, the nonprofit has received no payments since late January and has had no communication about when they might resume.
    Farmers Disappointed
    Shapiro said she’s not the only farmer feeling let down.
    “I think there just is a general feeling of disappointment and also a renewed sense that the USDA isn’t particularly interested in finding solutions that work for smaller-scale, diversified farms,” she said.
    “Part of the genesis of Pasa’s climate-smart program was trying to address some of the gaps in conservation funding, and we had long heard from farmers in Pasa’s network that there just weren’t a lot of opportunities to do the things that they wanted to do on their farm.”
    The program was funded through the Commodity Credit Corp. — a pool of dollars the secretary of agriculture can use at their discretion — during President Joe Biden’s administration.
    As to whether DOGE was aware of the fallout from the Clark Group contract being canceled, even if USDA funds start flowing again, Shapiro expressed doubt.
    “They’re just using a chain saw to make these cuts,” she said.
    The dollar amount of the contract, coupled with the fact that the description involved environmental evaluation and had a regulatory bent to it, probably made it an attractive target, Shapiro said.
    “I don’t necessarily know that they were fully aware of the repercussions for what it means to the Climate-Smart Farming & Marketing Program,” she said, giving the full name of Pasa’s project. “It’s very possible that they were. I think it’s just as likely that they were just targeting something that had the word ‘environmental.’” Funds disbursement was structured so that farmers received 75% up front and 25% upon completion of conservation projects. Pasa has so far honored all those agreements out of its general operating expenses — to the tune of $1.85 million — but has not been reimbursed by USDA.
    (Another $20.4 million was earmarked for future conservation projects.)
    “That puts us in a pretty precarious situation,” Shapiro said.
    With funds frozen, Pasa’s coffers draining, and no one waiting in the wings to complete the required environmental work for two-thirds of its projects, the nonprofit will begin a phased furlough of most of its staff beginning April 1.
    Executive Director Hannah Smith-Brubaker said she hopes to bring back staff as funding allows.

    Is are farmers learning?

  154. 154.

    Suzanne

    Speaking of thrift…. I want to note that Half Price Books posted on their social media that they have supported DEI since their founding in the 70s and will continue to do so!

    So, go trade in some books, y’all.

  155. 155.

    Geminid .

    @Baud: It’s striking to see the difference in the attitude of Europeans towards Turkiye five years ago and now. Some of their former distrust was due to longstanding prejudice, but some also was due to Turkiye’s stubborn and undiplomatic President R.T. Erdogan.

    Now however, Erdogan has a very capable and trusted Foriegn Minister in Hakan Fidan. Fidan started making a difference as soon as he took the post in June of 2023. In recent years,Turkish warplanes had been rattling and breaking Greek windows all over the Aegean Sea because of a feud between Erdogan and Greek Prime Minister Mitzotakis.

    That Fall, Erdogan visited Athens and he and Mitzotakis signed a number of confidence-building agreements. Erdogan proclaimed that the Aegean was now a “Sea of  Cooperation and Peace,” as the Greek window industry took the hit.

    Turkish-French relations were at low because they backed opposite sides in the Libyan civil war that reached a critical period 2020-2021. At one point when a French frigate intercepted a Turkish freighter carrying arms to the UN-recognized government, two Turkish frigates intercepted the French frigate and bluntly warned it off. The French did not take this well:

    French: Mon Dieu! How could you treat a NATO ally like that!!?

    Turks: Our sailors extended every maritime courtesy due a valued NATO partner.

    French: But they took the covers off their guns!

    Turks: We have no idea what you’re talking about.

    The French got over it, and events over the next few years justified Turkiye’s Libya policy. The intervention engineered by Hakan Fidan– then Erdogan’s intelligencd chief– prevented the Russian Wagner Group from taking Tripoli on behalf of Benghazi-based warlord General Hiftar, and thereby locking up billions in oil revenue.

    Five years ago Erdogan had just every Arab leader mad at at him also. Now, Turkish-Arab relations may be the best they’ve been since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the formation of the Turkish Republic in 1923. Turkiye is also ten years into an extensive  build-out of its defense industry, an initiative the Europeans have only now taken.

    And the prospective settlement of the 40-year conflict between the PKK and the Turkish state promises to remove a longstanding irritant in Turkish-European relations. It could a very big step forward for Turkiye itself.

    So now Le Monde and others see Turkiye in a different light. Also, as a Black Sea regional power, Turkiye is very much involved in the diplomatic manouvering around the prospect ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia.

    There is a picture I’ve seen a lot lately on Middle East news sites. It was taken when President Zelensky visited Ankara last month, and shows Presidents Erdogan and Zelensky posed at the entrance to Turkiye’s presidential palace. Erdogan had just escorted Zelensky from his limousine, past an honor guard of Turkish soldiers.

    It happened to be rainy day, so Erdogan was holding a big umbrella that shielded both men. That was fortuitous symbolism; we will get to see what substance lies behind it in coming months and years.

  156. 156.

    Mel

    @TBone: It’s cold here, too. We had snow pop up night before last. This weekend is moving weekend, in the bitter chill,  and the cats are going to be significantly displeased about it, I am sure.

    We assembled their new cat tree at the new house, and have their toys ready, but their royal felinenesses will absolutely make us pay for inconveniencing them…

  157. 157.

    TBone

    @Spanky: not where I live.  But the Commonwealth paid for extensive deer fencing inside the Bald Eagle State Forest boundaries about 9 or 10 years back.  Where they can be conveniently hunted.

  158. 158.

    Hoodie

    @JeffroIt’s not necessarily unfettered Trump that’s the problem, it’s that he’s now fettered by people who have very bad agendas and use his stupidity and primitive desire for revenge to drive those agendas. This tariff shit is probably coming from loons like Navarro, who fantasize about returning to some sort of  late 18th century economy. Vance/Theil are probably driving foreign policy for white nationalist reasons. Josh Marshall has a piece out on Vance’s Nazi social media reading list, which includes a lot of stuff that aligns with things that Theil has espoused. Musk shares some of the same views and is gutting the admin state because he want to be able to do whatever he wants without constraints and, perhaps, to commandeer government funding for his space and other ventures as Tesla – his principal source of wealth and power – declines in the face of scaling issues and increasing commoditization of the EV market by firms like BYD.  Trump himself is not the origin of these world views, he’s too stupid and disordered for that, which is why he vacillates so much. But he is intensely manipulable. None of these guys would have gone anywhere in their own without Trump . They need Trump’s brand and ability to shamelessly lie and tap into the deep stupidity and resentment in a large part of the electorate.

  159. 159.

    jonas

    @Suzanne: Right. Because back then, there *was* no cheap shit. Shoes had to be made by a shoemaker. Your clothes cost a lot and you mended them at home for as long as you could. For the first decade or two, TVs were very much an upper middle-class luxury appliance. What free trade and (esp) cheap labor from China and elsewhere did over the past generation or two was enable working-class Americans to acquire the accoutrements of that upper middle-class lifestyle — flat screen TVs, nice clothes, cheap toys for the kiddos, tchatchkis for your living room, etc.  So yeah, nowadays cheap stuff *is* more or less part of the American dream because if that goes away, the standard of living for a *lot* of Americans is going to go way down. Republicans aren’t touting austerity because they want us to return to our thrifty Protestant roots, it’s because they want to give more tax breaks and deregulation to billionaires.

    We’ll see how many people think they voted for that.

  160. 160.

    Baud

    Via reddit

    Images of “Enola Gay,” the aircraft that dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima in Japan are among those targeted by the U.S. military in an initiative to eliminate content related to diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI).

     

    They are among a number of photos unrelated to DEI that have been mistakenly flagged, including those from an Army Corps of Engineers dredging project in California, seemingly because an engineer in the image had the last name “Gay.”

  161. 161.

    TBone

    @Mel: oh you have my best wishes for a smooth as possible transition for all concerned without the obligatory vomit!

    We had a bit of unpredicted snow here too yesterday and more predicted tonight after some rain.  I’m bone achingly wishing for Spring!

  162. 162.

    Suzanne

    @jonas: What eats me up is that we have cheap consumer goods, but the cost of the stuff that we genuinely need to thrive — quality housing, quality education, safe and effective transportation — only gets more expensive and out of reach! The cheap TV and the fast fashion serve to placate.

    You know who wrote a book about this issue? Elizabeth Warren. Smart lady.

  164. 164.

    Josie

    @Suzanne: ​
     I really don’t like Vivek, but that particular rant came very close to the truth. I should know; I was a nerd, and two of my three sons were also.

  166. 166.

    Mel

    Ask the Amish women whose teeth are pulled out when they are teenagers so they won’t “burden” their parents or future husbands with the cost of dental care if they would prefer a little medical science over abuse in the guise of religion…

    Hubby represented some former Amish,  while doing public interest law. Heartbreaking.

  167. 167.

    Geminid .

    @Baud: This is a good example of what you get when you team up Artificial Intelligence with Real Stupidity.

  168. 168.

    moonbat

    @Geminid .: Glad to read this. If we’re not going to help protect Ukraine having a close neighbor like Turkey taking a leading role in helping them (and protecting their own interests on the Black Sea) is a definite plus.

    Tangentially happy to hear that things have cooled down between Greece and Turkey as well.

    A bright spot.

  169. 169.

    gvg

    @satby: The red states taking from blue states is also not totally correct. The US is one country and one economy. In order to function it needs roads and telephone lines and other such things. Things/goods have to move between places and so do people. Those roads and the law and order that makes them safe are costs that get counted as red or blue, but the benefits go to all of us multiple times.

    Those roads are a big cost. They connect our country. The farms could not sell to us if they did not exist, nor get loans, seed, equipment and exist with out the loans, the courts, the safe banking.

  171. 171.

    Suzanne

    @Josie: Vivek isn’t wrong, not at all. Vivek is hilariously misjudging the company he keeps, though! Man, did he really think the GOP was the party that wants to hear about instrument lessons and studying?! We’re talking about the party that wants to elevate dimwit white dudebros who listen to Luke Bryan.

  172. 172.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Sure Lurkalot: In the backwash of Fennario, the black and bloody mire
    The Dire Wolf collects his dues, while the boys sing round the fire

    Don’t murder me
    I beg of you, don’t murder me…

  173. 173.

    lowtechcyclist

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I hope very much to make it to 2031, when my birthday that year will make my age both a Prime and a Fibonacci. And I hope I still have enough mental acuity to recognise the significance of the number in the moment.

    May you realize both of those hopes!

    The next Fibonacci after that one is, of course, waaaay out of reach.

  175. 175.

    catclub

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
     

    High unemployment is not good for consumption. That’s where Trump’s policies are going to lead us.

    What if it ends up with eating the rich?

  177. 177.

    jackmac

    @MagdaInBlack: Cardinals are a constant near my house. I have now mature trees (planted when we moved in) and the birdies  appreciate them. Cardinals are loud, but I love to hear their songs.

  178. 178.

    jonas

    @Matt McIrvin: The actual problem is that a large percentage of young white men with just a high school diploma or GED who might theoretically be eligible for recruitment are simply nowhere near the standard — they’re either overweight, have substance-abuse issues, disciplinary issues, or other incompetencies/pathologies that won’t pass muster. The Marines aren’t interested in a twitchy 19yo methhead, even if he is covered in white power tattoos. So recruiters turn to much more viable recruitment pools: smart, young women looking to finance a college degree and immigrants looking for a way to serve their country. These people are hungry and will train and will fight. Pete Hegseth’s imagined military of blonde, blue-eyed SS troopers simply doesn’t exist in the modern world and if he succeeded in turning the Army or Marines into just that, they would suck ass.

  179. 179.

    Geminid .

    @A Ghost to Most: I’m curious: has Colorado Rep. Brittany Pettersen held her town hall yet, and did you attend? If you’d care to make a report, I’d be interested. On-the-ground reporting can be valuable.

  180. 180.

    schrodingers_cat

    Trump’s win and the Republican trifecta at the Federal level is the triumph of stupidity over reason. And it was engineered by your so called liberal media

  181. 181.

    jonas

    @Matt McIrvin: That’s exactly the problem — these people are locked into an information bubble that will tell them over and over not to believe their lying eyes and they’ll buy it. They’ll be sitting atop a smoking pile of rubble that used to be their lives and somehow, it will still be the fault of them durn libruls.

  184. 184.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Soprano2: I’ve been seeing Trumpsters insist that the government was heading for disaster because of its unsustainable waste and bloat and that the pain from cutting it is a necessary sacrifice. They’ll insist that the shittier private services owned by Elon Musk and his friends that rush into the gap to offer less for more are far superior. The websites will probably look flashier.

  185. 185.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @jonas: I’ll also point out that combat arms MOSs tend to be the whitest and most male.  Eliminating women and minorities mean that the other guys don’t get fed, don’t get ammo, don’t get refueled, don’t get paid, etc.

  186. 186.

    p.a.

    @TBone: On that first link abt Perkins Coie, the EO (or whatever it is🙄), uses the word “hearby”, which some internet wag notes the Orange Shitstain seems to consider a magical legalosity making every document an official honest-to-upside-down-bible totes enforceable scripture.

  187. 187.

    catclub

    @p.a.: On that first link abt Perkins Coie, the EO (or whatever it is🙄), uses the word “hearby”

     

    Wasn’t that a magical VW?

  189. 189.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Suzanne: A lot of this is Baumol’s cost disease, right? Or something similar. Industries that could benefit from technological productivity gains and globalization were competing for skilled workers with market segments that could not, and it drove up the cost of professional services while things previously regarded as luxury goods got cheap. And they’re not making more desirable land, either (not here, at least).

    Now, the tech and media barons are thinking that technology has gotten to the point that they can actually do without skilled workers. Maybe that changes things.

  191. 191.

    Soprano2

    @schrodingers_cat: Oh yeah no doubt, just pointing out that white women have to be pretty near perfect most of the time too. Perfect for them is just a lower bar than for all other women. For example, white women don’t get a pass for being too unattractive or too fat the way white men do. No one makes a sitcom about a fat woman being married to a hot man.

  193. 193.

    evodevo

    @MagdaInBlack: they go by photoperiod not temperature. Several species around my house are into spring bird territorial singing right now, even though it just snowed.  I guess the early bird who shows up gets the breeding territory lol

  194. 194.

    NotMax

    @TBone

    Almost always have ginger ale in the house. Great for settling a roiling tummy.

    And none of that vile diet stuff, also too.

  198. 198.

    Suzanne

    @Matt McIrvin: Yes, it’s absolutely Baumol’s cost disease! Cheap crap from Walmart covers it up while the things we really need to improve our society and ourselves get further out of reach.

  202. 202.

    Captain C

    @schrodingers_cat:

    MSM was more upset with Hillary’s emails and Biden’s shoes than it is over all the horrible things done by their favorite in just over a month.

    “Hey, our clicks are way up and I’m not in a concentration camp (yet).  Life is good!” — an editor from the MSM, probably

  203. 203.

    Professor Bigfoot

    @SFAW:

    There is no horseshoe. There is only white people who are at best uncomfortable with any power being held in Black hands. Those white people are at all points of the ‘left-right’ spectrum.

    Including whatever political power someone like Jim Clyburn has in the Democratic Party.

  204. 204.

    tam1MI

    @Jackie: Censoring Green isn’t enough for MAGA

    Might be kind of nice if there was an organized effort to give money to Green’s campaign on the day this came up for a hotel. The old Ron Paul tactic.

  207. 207.

    TBone

    @NotMax: wow, it’s like they know me hahaha!  How do you do that?  I was missing you yesterday, glad you’re back and thank you!

  208. 208.

    artem1s

    @schrodingers_cat: A black person or a woman with Trump’s history could never ever have become the President.

    Don’t temp fate. The GOP and MAGA voters are more than happy to elect some pretty awful people. Remember Walker in GA. Warnock only won in a runoff. I’m not sure that would have come out the same in 2024.

  209. 209.

    TBone

    @NotMax: I’ve always been a lover of the real deal but as a rule do not indulge more than occasionally in any type of soda (and especially never diet).  This year is different, I decided to treat myself while on nursing duty and now I’m hooked!  It’s like crack soda!

  212. 212.

    TBone

    @p.a.: he’s so fucked in the head.  Gobsmackingly stupid.  Like a black hole vortex of stupid.  So. Fucking. Dumb.

  213. 213.

    Ruckus

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Even talking about this makes people uncomfortable.

    Which is WHY it has to be part of the discussion.

    And no, not because it makes some uncomfortable, because it is a part of the entire concept of their bullshit. Which is that they are the only humans in this country, everyone else is a crook. It comes from having their heads located in a very dark, smelly body orifice. Their’s or someone else’s – makes no difference – it’s located in a dark, smelly place that allows no concept of anything except dark and smelly.

    Now this may seem crude but then look at who we are talking about, those who want never have to recognize that anyone that doesn’t look like them, bland and stupid, can possibly be a citizen.

    And they are 100000% wrong.

  215. 215.

    Ruckus

    @J.:

    @Van Buren:

    They get hungry enough they will. (brought to you by your conservative “friends”)

    We have to understand that many of these people, who want to make America Great Again want to, or at least seem to want to, bring back slavery. Maybe they don’t actually, obviously think that, but in the not all that far back parts of their “brain” they do. They want to be officially be seen as better than some group that doesn’t look like them. They don’t get the actual concept of humanity. That we come in differing sizes, 2 not so solid walled genders, and equality. Back 150+ years ago, before radio, TV, the web, your community was maybe 40-50 miles wide, and mostly looked like you. Crossing the states took weeks, and I’ve driven it in 3 1/2 days by myself. Decades ago. And I’m an old, 3/4 of a century old. Humanity has changed a tad in my lifetime, and mostly for the better. But not all of it has changed all that much, not in the bits and pieces that matter most. Of who we are and who EVERYONE ELSE IS. That word respect often gets decimated in the minds of many humans. Or more likely completely ignored.

  216. 216.

    tam1MI

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    Shout out to the fucking Uncommitted assholes (and everyone who defended their bullshit) for helping make this happen.  No fucking way this would be happening if Harris or Biden was President.  Maybe THIS should’ve been the focus of the Gaza messaging for the election: Trump will actually punish/persecute protestors, Harris (or Biden or any other Dem) won’t.

    Some of us saw this coming a mile away and tried to stop it, but all the “GenocideJoe” shitheads simply didn’t care.  And now here we are…

    What will be hilarious is when vast portions of the native born Gazassholes discover that the FBI has files on them and are more than willing to update said files by calls to prospective employers…

  217. 217.

    tam1MI

    @NotMax:

    Almost always have ginger ale in the house. Great for settling a roiling tummy.

    As a proud Michigander, I must take a moment to push the awesome Vernor’s Ginger Ale for this purpose. Good and good for you!

  218. 218.

    Ruckus

    @WereBear:

    What will they pick? That is the question before me.

    Well I’d bet it’s the worst possible answer for any question.

    They want superiority, they’ve earned zip, nada, nothing, especially in a country in that everyone is supposed to be equal. Their concept is that they are far superior to everyone else. It’s bullshit, and the only people that can’t see that in a country that supposedly recognizes everyone as an equal is – them.

  219. 219.

    NotMax

    @TBone

    Never been big on soda. Might take a year or year and a half to finish a six-pack of ginger ale.
    ;)

  220. 220.

    bluefoot

    @schrodingers_cat: A Black person with FFOTUS’s history would be in jail or dead.​
     
    Ta-Nehisi Coates once said that part of racism is who gets the benefit of the doubt and who doesn’t. I was once in a leadership development program for minorities in my industry, and it was amazing to me to hear how similar our experiences were despite working in different parts of the sector and all over the country. About how we don’t get second chances, how we have to constantly prove our competence now matter how long we’ve been successful in a role/job, etc etc…

  222. 222.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Geminid .: IIRC, Erdogan also used to lean very hard into Pan-Turkism, & employed Turkish intelligence & the Grey Wolves toward that end, causing concerns in countries w/ sizable Turkic minorities from Syria to the PRC.

    Like the PRC, India, KSA, the UAE, etc., current Turkish FP is largely amoral, cynical,  self-interested, & certainly not above brutally suppressing dissent at home & abroad. However, they also value stability, predictability, order, & are all developmentally minded.

  223. 223.

    Geminid .

    @YY_Sima Qian: I think Turkiye’s goal of stability has a morality in its own right.

    The Gray Wolves were the “youth wing” of the MHP party which has been AKP’s coalition partner since 2015. The Gray Wolves were major and malign actors from the 1960s through the 1990s, I’m not sure they have been during the Erdogan’s tenure which began in 2003.

    Fun Gray Wolves Fact: Austria banned the Gray Wolves hand sign. Its made by extending the index and pinky fingers up like wolf’s ears, and formiing a wolves muzzle with the thumbs and middle fingers.

    Germany does not ban the Gray Wolf sign, but last fall a Turkish footbal player received a two-game suspension for flashing it after scoring a goal in the Euro championship.

  224. 224.

    chemiclord

    @schrodingers_cat: ​
      Oh even we expect perfection (or more accurately our individual definition of perfection) from Democrats while expecting nothing from the GOP.

    Hell, we delight in eating our own. Bashing each other is apparently far more fun than fighting the common enemy.

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