To recap for the day shift, Florida went ahead and Floriduhed in the special elections yesterday, but by less than the usual Mildew State margins, so there’s a thin reed to hang your optimism on. I’m especially grossed out by the elevation of the odious Randy Fine to national politics.
Fine is a toxin best contained at the statehouse level, a petty, misogynist, self-important jerk. It’s unfortunate that he’s now America’s problem, but his margin of victory was small compared to that of his dumbass predecessor (Signal Waltz) and orange overlord.
Maybe Weil can make another run and oust the sumbitch after Trump and his bumbling clowns fully tank the economy, turn the U.S. into a pariah state and expose us all to epidemics in the coming year. In Florida’s baboon-ass red districts, maybe that’s what it takes.
But huge kudos to the Badger state for kicking Musk’s big fat ego to the curb.
As someone said on Bluesky, for Musk, it must be like getting booed off the stage at the Dave Chapelle show, only this time, it’s an entire state.
***
Trump is staging some kind of Rose Garden Pavement ceremony to announce tariffs today. Last I looked, Dow futures were down nearly 300 in anticipation.
But who knows what the twitchy sociopaths on Wall Street will make of it? We are subject to the whims of insane people in just about every sphere.
***
To make up for introducing these topics, I wanted to share these breakfasting birds I saw this morning. The Sandhill is hollering its head off on the sandbar right now. It’s a good thing I’m an early riser.
Just a couple of dinosaurs having breakfast on a Wednesday morning. #birds
— Betty Cracker of Florida (@bettycrackerfl.bsky.social) April 2, 2025 at 8:41 AM
Open thread!
Baud
WI and NC are two states that have been on the cusp of breaking free for a long time. Here’s hoping.
schrodingers_cat
What happened to the WTO? Are we still in it?
JerseyBeard
Just so proud of Sen Booker. I hope his performance inspires more. Already liking the holds coming from other Senators. More. More!
Betty Cracker
CNBC: Tesla reports 336,000 vehicle deliveries in first quarter, 13% drop from a year ago
FAFO, motherfucker.
Steve in the ATL
A good excuse to post a song by Pavement
oldster
Gloat ’em while you got ’em, kids!
This is a time of few victories, so we need to get better at taking victory laps when we can.
And in times to come, there will be more victories. For truth, for justice, and for the American way.
Mousebumples
For the morning crowd – thanks to all of you who helped GOTV in Wisconsin. Whether it was postcards, canvassing, phone banking… I appreciate your help!
Next 2 years we have conservative Justices that could be replaced with a Liberal… So this 5-4 liberal majority is locked in until 2028. 🤩
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Betty Cracker:
Oof. That’s lower than the 350,000 analysts were predicting. On the one hand, I feel bad for Tesla workers who don’t deserve what Musk is doing to them by hurting his own company, but at the same time, it’s the only way to really hurt him
pajaro
Tesla futures down 5% this morning. Market indexes are also off some, in anticipation of the tariff reveal later today. On Friday we will get the March Jobs report.
I’m still waiting on the frozen concentrated orange juice numbers.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Fewer deliveries in a growing worldwide EV market.
Nice coda to Wisconsin.
prostratedragon
Meanwhile, in Budapest:
jonas
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): How were other EV sales? The one thing that would spook Tesla investors is if everyone *but* Tesla were doing fine.
frosty
This is unexpected good news. Wisconsin is going to need that majority in the next four years. I hope my state can do the same. The Democratic majority in PA is on the line this year.
The postcards I like from Etsy are only available in quantities of 1,000. Between PA and VA, I expect I’ll be using that many this year.
suzanne
@JerseyBeard: Cory Booker moved me to tears yesterday, and I have a small, shitty heart. Genuinely inspiring.
Mr. Suzanne and I were discussing it yesterday. He said, “I know this election really made you scared for the kids’ safety, and you’ve wanted to be really ‘underground’….. but let’s be more visible and active”.
Princess
Would Elon like some cheese with his whine?
Also: good for Hungary!!
stinger
I hope somebody will do a video montage of Booker’s best moments. Until then, here’s the Senate’s Congressional Record for March 31. Booker’s speech begins on p15 and runs through p44 (presumably around midnight).
The Congressional Record for yesterday, with the second half of his speech, isn’t available yet.
Betty Cracker
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I do feel bad for Tesla workers (not just for the current downturn but also because they work for a toxic asshole). I also feel bad for people who bought a Tesla before Musk went fascist and now find it hard to unload a vehicle they bought in good faith to reduce their carbon footprint.
AFAIK, this situation is unique in history. There have been brands that fucked up royally and lost market share through stupid actions before. But has a CEO ever so deliberately alienated his customer base like this? If there’s ever been an analogous situation, I can’t recall it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mousebumples: 4-3 majority. Only seven on the WI supreme court, but, other than that, right on.
Geminid
@Baud: Arizona is another state that’s gone from red to purple and is hovering there. This Morning’s Politico Playbook had an item about next year’s Tuscon area 6th CD race.
Republican Rep. Juan Ciscomani won AZ06 narrowly the last two cycles. Democrat JoAnna Mendoza has already raised $800,000 for her campaign challenging Ciscomani. Mendoza is a Navy and Marine Corps veteran.
Trump carried AZ06 by less than 1% last year. Last night’s Florida and Wisconsin results must have Ciscomani wondering: will Republican voters turn out when Trump is not on the ballot? It looks like Democrats will.
YY_Sima Qian
@schrodingers_cat: The US is just about ready to leave the WTO. However, Trump 45 left the WTO completely dysfunctional by blocking any attempt to fill the vacancies on the Appellate Body of Dispute Settlement to arbitrate disputes between members. Unfortunately, Biden kept it dysfunctional by continuing Trump 45’s policy wrt the WTO.
Ironically, the WTO (& its predecessor the GATT) formed a key part of the post-WW II/post-Cold War “rules based international order”, ostensibly championed by the US.
Geminid
@Geminid: Politico Playbook also had an item about a Senate vote expected today, on legislation introduced by Senator Tim Kaine that would block tariffs on Canadian imports. Republican Senators Murkowski, Coins and Paul say they will vote for the bill.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Betty Cracker:
Ah, I haven’t had time to troll thru my EV news feed to see how that shakes out compared to the other EV makers.
As many of us suspected would happen, GM’s EV sales skyrocketed:
https://insideevs.com/news/755280/gm-ev-sales-q1-2025/
Now the #2 EV maker in the USofA.
Belafon
@Betty Cracker: I saw on bsky that Tesla isn’t taking their cybertrucks for trade-in.
JerseyBeard
@suzanne: It doesn’t “fix” anything, but actions like Senator Booker’s help reshape the space where fixes can come from. I don’t underestimate the value of inspiration in times like these. He delivered a truck ton of it. Not sufficient, but damn sure necessary.
Soprano2
@pajaro: LOL, I love that movie!!
Raoul Paste
@JerseyBeard: Well said.
YY_Sima Qian
I’ve mentioned this before, but when Sinologists & Chinese interlocutors draw parallels between Trump 47’s reign to the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (& the Great Leap Forward), it should be taken seriously as to the deleterious impact on the US:
Gift link to an article in the Economist:
Gift link to an article in the FT:
schrodingers_cat
Speaking of Tesla, late last year I was in the market for a used EV. And a used Tesla was at the upper end of my budget. But I didn’t even consider it. It did look nice in the dealer’s parking lot. I am sure there are many more people like me. I ended up with a 2023 Leaf. Thanks Biden for generous Fed rebate and thanks Healy for the state rebate.
Betty Cracker
So much for the nonexistent mandate: (Vanity Fair)
Wait until the masses find out the hard way the extent of damage these morons have wrought in such a short time. Right now, the median voter is unaware that Trump-appointed kooks are destroying our ability to keep food and medicine safe, decimating biomedical research capabilities, pulverizing agencies millions depend on, etc. They’re in for a rude awakening.
Steve in the ATL
@YY_Sima Qian:
How do you say “no shit, Sherlock” in mandarin?
RedDirtGirl
Has anyone heard from Tbone lately?
Belafon
@Betty Cracker: Kind of ties into how a country as wealthy and powerful as ours just decided on a whim to destroy all of it. Find another country who did the same thing.
Baud
@Steve in the ATL:
TIL policymakers in Beijing read Balloon Juice.
Baud
@RedDirtGirl:
Was put in a time out and decided to stay away. She’s at Mistermix’s place.
RedDirtGirl
@Baud: Oh wow. Missed the drama. Thanks.
Baud
@RedDirtGirl:
I missed it too. Got the info from others.
prostratedragon
@Belafon:
I just happened on that, here.
RedDirtGirl
@Baud: All hail the mighty grapevine.
Steve in the ATL
@RedDirtGirl: plenty of other drama you can catch up on. Or if you prefer to start your own, I suggest writing a post that includes the word “performative”.
Ruviana
@Baud: I thought that was Kay.
karen gail
I was on Stonekettle and someone from Northern Wisconsin commented on the number of confederate flags they are now seeing along with signs of massive support for Trump; that person was shocked at how red that part of state has become.
Soprano2
@Baud: When did that happen, I guess I missed it.
Baud
@Ruviana:
Kay left, but I don’t think she was ever in a time out.
Danielx
@Belafon:
Color me unsurprised. Who’d want one?
Omnes Omnibus
@Ruviana: No, Kay just decided that she didn’t want to be here anymore.
Geminid
@Ruviana: Kay is posting some good stuff at Mistermix’s blog.
Baud
@Soprano2:
Days blur. I think sometime last week.
frosty
Brexit? Germany, 1933? Of course, Germany needed the help of the US, Russia, and the British Empire to complete the destruction.
Parfigliano
@Steve in the ATL: Pavement fan…clap clap
suzanne
@JerseyBeard:
Agreed 100%. Now we need to keep the momentum going.
schrodingers_cat
@Steve in the ATL: Performative and neoliberal.
frosty
@Soprano2: March 22. I scrolled back through posts when I heard about it.
YY_Sima Qian
Maybe North Korea is a good parallel, too:
schrodingers_cat
@Geminid: Just checked my calendar to see whether it was the first of April.
JML
The win in WI and refutation of The Electric Fool and The Current Occupant reminded me of a Ron Luciano story from his umpiring days. During an argument, the manager (Dick Howser) paused to contemplate the boos showering down from the crowd and screamed at Luciano, “You hear that? They’re not booing the call, they’re booing your whole career!”
I think WI just booed the Electric Fool’s whole career.
Gin & Tonic
@Betty Cracker:
I know these aren’t your words, but a “conflict” is when your teen-age son wants to borrow the car and you refuse because he brought it back on E last week. People are dying; it’s a war.
Baud
@YY_Sima Qian:
They do know how to do the bread and circuses thing very well.
Omnes Omnibus
@karen gail: If they actually from northern WI, they shouldn’t be that shocked. The two main motivators of voters there for a long time have been guns and resentment of Madison and Milwaukee.
ETA: Crawford did win Douglas, Bayfield, and Ashland counties. The three northernmost in the state.
Gin & Tonic
@YY_Sima Qian: I really think Americans would learn a lot by reading a good history of the Great Leap Forward.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Trump completely upending the Republican orthodoxy on both economics and foreign policy but still retaining most of his Republican vote share shows that the biggest thing that the R voters want is racism and bigotry.
Baud
@schrodingers_cat:
I think so too. All other principles are secondary, including patriotism and respect for the military.
Steve in the ATL
@schrodingers_cat: @Baud: now, now—let’s not forget misogyny!
Soprano2
@Baud: Must have been over the weekend, I’m not here as much then.
Ohio Mom
@Baud: Kay left at least once before but she didn’t have an alternative landing spot then. Now she does.
I miss her. I guess I could bookmark mistermix’s site and keep up with her there. Inertia is a powerful force, at least in my life.
Professor Bigfoot
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: But didja notice that the General’s two most popular EVs are built in Mexico?
Sounds to me like today’s tariff announcement is President Musk shivving his biggest competitor…
Soprano2
@Omnes Omnibus: Yes, some people weren’t able to disagree without personal attacks. I miss her, she added a lot to the comments.
Mousebumples
@Omnes Omnibus: damn, whoops. Thanks for the catch. Math is hard.
Danielx
@schrodingers_cat: Starting to wonder when somebody is going to form a new party in reaction to Trump’s road to hell and the imaginary leftist hordes.
Geminid
@schrodingers_cat: Not a joke. Kay and I clashed plenty but I’ve always respected her.
Deputinize America
I’m rewatching the Ken Burns Vietnam War series, and certain aspects of that history ring true to me today. It led me to start feeding the scenario to AI. In each instance, it led to a national fracture. Here’s one scenario, but all come to some similar result:
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@YY_Sima Qian: With Trump it would be “The Biggly Leap Forward” and WWE wrestlers instead of Red Guards. I can see Trump signing an Executive Order to kill all birds.
Betty Cracker
@Geminid: She is. I’ve learned a lot from her perspective over the years. Someone said this country is too big to know itself, and I think there’s truth to that, so it’s good to have insights from different regions.
Geminid
@schrodingers_cat: New Lines Magazine published an article recently on Trump’s “America First” ideology. I haven’t had a chance to read it through, but when I do I’ll excerpt some and try to link to it.
@Baud:
Danielx
@Deputinize America:
Thanks, I wasn’t planning on sleeping tonight (or possibly ever again) anyway.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Baud: Yes but notice they delayed Trump’s announcement until after Wall Street closed
Dorothy A. Winsor
@schrodingers_cat: Absolutely. It’s very clarifying
Belafon
@karen gail: In 2008, far too many white people saw a black man for the first time, and have been freaking out about it ever since.
oldgold
This a good development. Judge Ho has dismissed the charges against Eric Adams with prejudice so Trump can’t hold them over Adams’ head.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Professor Bigfoot:
I saw that, yes. That piece provided a good, detailed look, at what this could mean not just for GM but for every automaker who sells here, EV or no EV.
This piece:
https://cleantechnica.com/2025/04/02/us-carmakers-crush-it-on-q1-ev-sales-except-you-know-who/
says that right up front, all auto sellers are gonna have massive issues with this.
One thing now that we finally have quarterly EV sales from *all* automakers here, Edolph is doing a damn fine job of ruining the Tesla brand.
Sure, the free hand of the market is having a say in all of this but as we’ve seen with the Honda Prologue EV (built and mostly designed by GM), auto brand loyalists, will stick with what they know and apparently like/love; and this example represents that by generation of entitled, white professionals (as opposed to the old school Big Three brand loyalty those of us of a certain age saw in spades growing up), showing they are little different than their parents when it comes to cars.
That’s my longwinded way of saying that Tesla spent the last 10+ years building up a lot of brand loyalty among a certain demographic, not unlike what Honda’s done, and in no time at all, Uncle Edolph’s pissing that away.
Good.
Ohio Mom
@Deputinize America: I continue to believe AI is overhyped.
I think things will get bad, I think we will become a much poorer country and people, the U.S. will be ostracized by the world, in some ways a lite version of North Korea, definitely a version of Hungary, but I really don’t see guerilla war-style armed conflict breaking out. Black Panther-style self-help networks forming, maybe.
If it turns out I’m wrong, I’ll try to remember to apologize to you, if we are both still around with the same nyms.
cmorenc
@Baud: NC has been the blue state of the future since 1990. In federal elections always coming up 2-3% short.
Ohio Mom
@Betty Cracker: It turns out that was British actor/musician Hugh Laurie who said America is too big to know itself.
Makes sense, he’s from a small country and has spent lots of time in various parts of ours.
Chetan Murthy
@Ohio Mom: fry & Laurie, kickin’ ass: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlrtcsBU40w&t=3s
Betty Cracker
Judge Ho dismissed the federal case against NYC’s crooked mayor with prejudice. (PDF) Excerpt:
Acknowledging that the DOJ is corrupt on the downlow…
ETA: oldgold got there first at #78
WaterGirl
@Geminid: So is mistermix! Our loss.
UncleEbeneezer
@Geminid: Let me guess: we should all be blaming Democrats?
Hard pass…
catclub
The thing that hurts Musk would be the Tesla stock price. And it would have to go down tremendously before he would feel any effect. How much would it have to go down for him to be worth ONLY $20B ?
H.E.Wolf
@Mousebumples:
Thanks for your kind comment on last nights Late Night Open Thread. Same back atcha! :)
I’ll keep my yeeting hand… ahem… my writing hand in practice for the 2026 WI Supreme Court election.
Baud
@oldgold:
Good. That was the right outcome of Trump wasn’t going to prosecute.
JML
@cmorenc: NC and Georgia are complicated. NC elects democrats for governor, not so much for president or senate in this generation. GA flipped blue in 2020 and we have both senate seats. Neither state is there yet, but the demographics are trending the right way and both states could end up being a bit like CA where once they flip all the way, they’re blue for a generation if not longer. Remember, CA was THE republican stronghold post WWII until Clinton. Now, the GOP doesn’t even contest it…or gets laughed at when they do.
There’s great potential in both states, which are also ones that are growing, not shrinking.
WaterGirl
@Mousebumples: Math is easy, numbers are hard. :-)
Professor Bigfoot
@Danielx: THAT is a true ROFLMAO development— when has ANY manufacturer refused to take their own vehicles as trade-ins on new ones? EVER?
My schadenfreude runneth over.
“Suffer, you pricks!”
Belafon
@Ohio Mom: There’s a large part of the US that reminds me of my home town of Abilene, TX. Abilene never wanted to be a big city (120K, which is big if you look at the next city closest to it that size is 150 miles away), but was forced to be by the Air Force base. It would rather be small, and have a sheriff that is the law and where people know their place, and not have to deal with outside stuff.
Chetan Murthy
@Professor Bigfoot: I know a current Tesla owner who wants to buy a Wankpanzer. He’s otherwise a really nice guy (and very liberal too). I hope this development will go some way to convincing him to not do it. Sigh.
Omnes Omnibus
@Deputinize America: My guess is that AI predictions of the future are as useful as haruspicy.
catclub
yes. Obama won in landslide year 2008 but lost in 2012. Biden did not carry it either.
Librettist
Complete wipeout in suburban Chicago:
https://bsky.app/profile/uncrewed.bsky.social
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Judge not happy with DOJ.
Professor Bigfoot
My dad was a Chevy guy, and to this day I imagine him tut-tutting me for driving a wretched Ford. :D
(ps— j’suis d’accord on your “longwinded” comment; not that long ago it was a BMW 3-series that the upwardly mobile technocrat loved)
Chetan Murthy
@Baud: IIRC this isn’t the first time Judge Ho has crossed Trump. And he was -appointed- by Trump. I remember when he was one of the baddies, and lookie-lookie it seems like Trump’s gone too far for him already. Sigh.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Professor Bigfoot:
Precisely. I talked about the hugely important aspect of ‘brand loyalty’ in auto sales. GM and Ford really know that and work that angle hard.
I know from Bolt world that Bolt owners are damn near courted in terms of trade in value by GM over the last year as they (GM) have been pushing Blazer and Equinox EV sales.
And yet, Tesla won’t. That goes back to it’s board and main public figure, still treating the entire enterprise as a meme stock when in fact the company has turned into, at least for now, a legitimate automobile maker. They still don’t see it that way which is a contributing factor as to why its sales are tanking.
And like others have said, that needs to translate into stock pricing, otherwise, they’ll still manage the company like a meme stock figuring there’s no downside to that.
catclub
Whim??, ummm, they had 47% unemployment in 1932. [I also think they were driven crazy by the Gothic font used by their newspapers.]
Brexit is more like it.
Miki
@Omnes Omnibus: And racism. See, e.g., Treaty Beer – Hate in a Can
RaflW
@Betty Cracker: Speaking of “brands that fucked up royally and lost market share through stupid actions … has a CEO ever so deliberately alienated his customer base like this?”
Target has now reported 8 consecutive weeks of dropping foot traffic after their DEI walkback/disaster. Costco has reported 13 consecutive weeks of increased traffic.
My response yesterday on Bsky: At this point, Target refusing to change course in the face of the evidence looks less like stubbornness, and more like they really are opposed to DEI.
H.E.Wolf
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Thank you for your insightful comment late last night: “Writing post cards helped a lot when I was mad or frustrated….”
Me too! It helps keep me grounded, and gives me a little dose of tranquility and strength – all of which I greatly need in order to live my life and continue to help others, in both the personal and political arenas.
As Mousebumples replied: “We can’t fix everything, but we can make a difference.” YES.
On which note, I’m headed offline for a while. Best to all here, and happy Wisconsin Victory Day!
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Chetan Murthy:
Tell him that when driving one, it’ll immediately identify him to everybody around him as a Ginormous Douchebag.
He might not be but that’ll be the message he sends.
One of my best friends, liberal enough, wanted a Wankpanzer. That’s when it was the bullshit concept Edolph was selling, aka a $50K EV truck with a 500 mile range. He’d never pay $80+ K for one now.
I was skiing with him yesterday and gave hime the Wankpanzer/Perceived Douchebag analogy and he chuckled.
He’d probably still buy one for $50K although his circle of friends might be the first ones to vandalize it.
Geminid
@WaterGirl: I think Kay is a good influence over there.
Professor Bigfoot
@Chetan Murthy: I’m gonna be honest… I thought about getting one myself.
BUT only if I could get it in red desert camouflage and put Martian Congressional Republic Navy sigils on it, and an MCR flag on the hood. (#TheExpanse ;) )
Gin & Tonic
@Omnes Omnibus: I learned a new word today. Truly a full-service blog.
Belafon
@RaflW: I haven’t bought anything from Amazon since the inauguration, and I haven’t stepped into a Target since then. Still working on ditching Walmart, which is harder.
Professor Bigfoot
@Omnes Omnibus: Thank you for teaching a new word today.
And I’d say you are 100% correct.
Omnes Omnibus
@Miki: Oddly enough, that fight over Native treaty rights regarding hunting and fishing implicates both guns and resentment. And, of course, racism.
Ksmiami
@Belafon: same. Canceled Prime, avoiding all unnecessary spending.
Miss Bianca
@Gin & Tonic:
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yeah, I knew what it was after I looked it up, I just never knew there was a specific word for it!
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus:
Nominated!
jonas
@schrodingers_cat: “Small government” has only ever meant “keep the federal government out of my state’s/locality’s right to implement bigoted policies”. It was never a principle, only a cudgel.
Geminid
@catclub: Obama carried North Carolina by .32% in 2008. Romney arried it by 2% in 2012, and Trump carried North Carolina by 3.67% in 2016.
Biden came close in 2020, losing by 80,000 votes or 1.24%. Last year Trump won by 3.21%.
I still consider North Carolina winnable for Democrats. Demographic trends there are similar to the ones that helped turn Virginia from red to light blue in this century, and they’ve elected Democratic governors three times in a row now.
Ksmiami
@Deputinize America: yeah, that’s where my predictions end up every time. We don’t share enough commonality anymore esp with people who want to live in the dark ages.
BlueGuitarist
@Chetan Murthy:
different Judge Ho.
Trump appointed Judge James Ho to 5th circuit, Tx Louisiana
Biden appointed NY judge Dale Ho, formerly ACLU.
wenchacha
@pajaro: I see what you did there.
Gretchen
@frosty: what are the postcards that you like? I expect that I will be writing a lot too.
catclub
@jonas: …. but keep sending all those juicy federal contracts and military bases.
Ksmiami
@Belafon: yep. Complete superpower suicide. By our own hand. We are a developing country in all but name, parts are actually third world.
WaterGirl
@Gretchen: I wondered about the postcards, too.
BeautifulPlumage
@H.E.Wolf:
All the best to you while you’re offline!
Thor Heyerdahl
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) @Betty Cracker: and of the 336K in Tesla deliveries I wonder how many of those were from the bullshit Canadian numbers “sold” (cough) for the tax credit.
I see Tesla is not commenting to CNBC about those Canuck vehicles
catclub
@Miss Bianca:
No love for cracked turtle shells.
Gretchen
@prostratedragon: My 6 year old grandson loves the Cybertruck, probably because it looks like something he could bill out of Legos. Unfortunately for Tesla, 6 year olds don’t have the money to buy them, and people who do have the money have outgrown the 6 year old aesthetic.
Professor Bigfoot
@jonas: They want “small government” because the Federal government, granted in fits and starts, has been the ONLY guarantor of the rights of Black people since the end of the Enslavement.
With the passage of the Civil Rights Acts and especially the Voting Rights Act which gave the USG the mechanisms for that defense of rights, well, conservatives have argued for “small government.”
Pfui.
Gretchen
@Danielx: That’s hilarious. They won’t take their own cars back for trade-in?
Bill Arnold
@Omnes Omnibus:
Mostly true, especially on years+ time scales, but not in all domains. For example, AI-based medium range (> 10 days) weather prediction is starting to look pretty good relative to numerical methods.
BlueGuitarist
@suzanne:
Mr. Suzanne seems awesome.
Also got that impression from previous comments….
To be expected, of course.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Thor Heyerdahl:
The numbers associated with that are, currently, around 10K.
I can’t quickly find 1Q Canadian Tesla sales but do know that in Jan 25, their sales were off 70% when compared to Jan 24. And there’s nothing in the news to indicate that Canadian buyers suddenly over the next two months decided they needed a Tesla.
This piece has a nice graph showing how 1Q sales break out in Yurp where the decline has been the most:
https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/tesla-set-report-drop-q1-deliveries-weak-demand-musk-backlash-2025-04-02/
Another interesting analysis:
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2025/04/tesla-sales-and-production-slumped-heavily-in-q1-2025/
Shows that entering 2025, Tesla’s profit margin was half the industry average.
That being said, despite the stock price decline, it still needs to go a long way before real (bad, bad-as-in-good) things happen to Edolph.
Tom Levenson
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: He probably can buy a very lightly used one for 50K, if not now, then soon.
I looked at Cars.com for used CTs near me. There weren’t many (MA is not prime CT territory. I wonder why…) Sellers are still delusional. Very low mileage CTs — but used — for asking prices above new right now. (Can’t tell about options and all that.) My guess is that there’s a helluva gap between bid and ask, and as you can get a brand new one for 72K after the federal rebate a 50K one with, say, ten thousand miles, could be found pretty readily.
prostratedragon
@Betty Cracker: Wow.
Hoodie
Kara Swisher thinks Musk may try to merge Tesla with XAI to pump up the company’s value due to an AI-hyped overvaluation of XAI. My son has a theory that Musk’s loans to buy Twitter, which are secured by Tesla stock, may be at risk of having some loan-to-value covenants getting triggered if Tesla stock falls below a certain value. This quarter’s crappy sales volume (even with a ton of incentives being offered) is a pretty good indication that the upcoming earnings report will be godawful, which may hammer Tesla’s stock.
I wonder if Musk’s empire is at risk of unraveling because it’s too leveraged on over-valued Tesla stock. He may have been hoping Trump would bail him out by (1) tariffs on other automakers making Tesla more competitive and (2) some sweet government contracts for SpaceX/Starlink and, possibly, XAI. This debacle in Wisconsin opens up the possibility that his ties to Trump may sour as he begins to look like a political liability. You know Trump probably can’t stand him and only wants him for his money and would ditch him the minute he becomes a liability. He wouldn’t be the first idiot to self-immolate by tying his fortunes to Trump.
Miss Bianca
@Hoodie: No, but Musk’s the idiot whose fall from Trump’s so-called grace would afford me the greatest amount of gratification.
RevRick
@Omnes Omnibus: But what if those entrails belonged to the billionaires who are disfavored here?
suzanne
@BlueGuitarist: You’re so kind, thank you. Mr. Suzanne is indeed awesome. He is actually the one who introduced me to this blog, back when we met on the night of the Iowa caucuses in January 2008. He remains a longtime lurker!
Barbara
@Hoodie: My daughter actually knows the value at which the loan to value covenants kick in and has further noted that when it comes close *someone* buys enough to kick the value back up. That someone could be a few someones — Saudis who like the idea that they might be able to influence Trump through Musk, or just influence Musk’s commercial dealings (Saudis have actually invested in various EV ventures, including Lucid). Or even the “market makers” that might hold the rights to the loan to value covenant — because they don’t actually want it to kick in and show the world their big fat ass and how stupid and incompetent they were to give loans to Musk to buy Twitter in the first place.
There are also “index of the future” funds that operate like bigger index funds but with a different universe of stocks — i.e., companies of the future, and Tesla is usually one of the companies that is part of that index. Typically, these funds would be constantly rebalancing and buying when certain pricing metrics are triggered, so they could just be on autopilot for now in buying Tesla when the price gets low enough.
WaterGirl
@Gretchen:
Dear Tesla customers,
“Fuck you!”
Signed, Tesla
(it boggles the mind)
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Tom Levenson:
Heh heh, I don’t want to encourage him. When we ski together, he drives and I won’t be caught dead in a Wankpanzer.
Your comment sent me down a rabbit hole here in Denver. Cheapest used Wankpanzer is $79K (didn’t look at features, etc).
WaterGirl
@suzanne: I would SWEAR that when you first told the story of your first date, you discovered that you both were readers of Balloon Juice.
frosty
@Gretchen: They’re from StoneMavenDesigns on Etsy. She’s going to be printing them again for smaller quantities in the near future. They’re “Lady Liberty” with the artwork all on the front. There is another version where you write the address on the front. I preferred the others because the recipient could put it up on the fridge.
Lady Liberty
Geminid
@RevRick: I like how the Romans used to do it. They’d have a committee stand on a tower and count buzzards and note the quandrant of the sky they saw them flying. Bonus points for eagles!
Then they’d pull out a book and argue about what it all meant; a much cleaner process than checking entrails.
Booger
@pajaro: ISWYDT.
They Call Me Noni
@Gretchen: I think there has been a recall on all those ugly cybertrucks.
Sure Lurkalot
@Soprano2:
Kay was more than able to dish it out herself and could be relentless as a puppy with its favorite chew toy. She was fierce in defending her opinions even (especially?) if unpopular.
Every once in a while, my inner voice would scream “Kay, let it go, already!” but I agree, she was a net positive to the commentariat here and is rightly missed.
frosty
@Gin & Tonic: Can you recommend a good history of the Great Leap Forward?
suzanne
@WaterGirl: No, he was the BJ reader. But we talked about the politics blogs that we each read a lot at the time! We were gently feeling one another’s politics out, because it was rare in AZ at that time to find anyone of our persuasion!
Baud
And TSLA is up nearly five percent.
Clearly some haruspicy going on among investors.
A Ghost to Most
Those Sandhill Cranes sure get around. Are they year-round, or do they migrate?
H.E.Wolf
Thank you for the good wishes! I had a very offline and relaxing breakfast. :)
And now I’m offline again for awhile. (Several hours.) Meetings and errands and phone calls. Busy day.
Gin & Tonic
@suzanne:
B-J After Dark already? It’s not even lunch yet.
Hoodie
@Barbara: Seems like some of those potential backstops might disappear if Musk starts to be a problem for Trump and other Republicans. The Wisconsin result doesn’t help him in that respect. That race was more of a blowout than expected and a lot of that seems to have been due to negative reactions to Musk.
Swisher and Jen Psaki were debating on Swisher’s podcast from the other day whether Trump would hold on to Musk or walk away from him. Swisher didn’t think so because of the money and because Musk serves as a sort of “heat shield” (kind of like Tom Wambgams being a “pain sponge” in Succession) for Trump. Psaki didn’t agree.
Gin & Tonic
@frosty: I’d suggest Frank Dikotter’s Mao’s Great Famine or Jasper Becker’s Hungry Ghosts.
Deputinize America
@Baud:
Again, this is from NASDAQ, and is weird AF. Some huge money is flying in to try and kill the TSLA shorts, as if there are big institutional interests or major sovereign funds with in interest in propping up Captain Apartheid (Saudi Arabia, Russia, oligarchs).
Deputinize America
@Deputinize America:
Up about a half a billion in the course of a few minutes.
Sure Lurkalot
@Belafon:
I believe in the power of boycotting while also recognizing that it’s not always possible to avoid doing commerce with bad actors. There’s still a lot of good done by incremental reduction, as is evidenced by what’s happening with Tesla and Target. The message has been sent, the message those companies hear and act on, time will tell.
Baud
@Deputinize America:
As long as the right people lose their shirts at the end of this…
Barbara
@Deputinize America: See my above comment. There clearly are sovereign investment funds and other institutional interests that are backstopping Tesla. The issue is when the counter volume is high enough that even they can’t justify the losses.
Sure Lurkalot
@Gretchen: The Cybertruck totally looks like a child conceived it. But I’m finding most vehicles sold in the US these days very ugly. I don’t get the oversized lid and grill stuff. Pedestrian killers.
frosty
@WaterGirl: See my reply at #144. She has dozens of other designs, too.
schrodingers_cat
@Hoodie: Wasn’t Swisher a techbro cheerleader in general and a Muskette in particular.
Librettist
@Baud:
On rumors floated by Politico he is getting booted from DOGE.
The utter lack of shame is breathtaking.
prostratedragon
FYI, Sen. Jim Banks of Indiana:
Please take under advisement.
jonas
@Hoodie: From what I’ve been reading, he’s definitely leveraged a lot using Tesla stock, but the share price would have to fall by quite a bit before he starts getting margin calls. Here’s hoping!
Professor Bigfoot
@Sure Lurkalot: It’s that they’re all SUVs of one flavor or another.
I’m driving one of the last full-size sedans Ford made. Being a bit of a Ford guy, when Mrs. B was looking for a new compact we took a look at the Ford Ecosport and it was just shite from end to end— she ended up getting a Soul (which leads to another funny story that I’m not gonna tell here;).
I hate ‘em, especially the Yukons and the Suburbans and all the latest “3-row” monsters, and especially the trucks with the front ends so enormous the driver cannot see the road thirty feet in front of him and most are driven by clueless, thoughtless…. <shakes himself> yeah, I don’t like those things.
Betty Cracker
@A Ghost to Most: In Florida, we’ve got year-round resident Sandhills that are joined by migratory birds during the winter, more than quadrupling the population. The bird pictured is a local — the transients are probably nesting up north by now. I’ve seen a few hatchlings around here already.
jonas
It started with the big Ram pickups in the 90s. It’s so men with poor self-esteem can feel like they’re driving semis.
Another Scott
@Deputinize America: I’m not seeing those kinds of numbers on Google Finance. It looks like daily volume is ~ 1-20M shares a day (e.g. 5 days graph). Is someone mixing up their millions and billions?? Google tells me TSLA has 3.22 B shares outstanding.
Thanks.
Best wishes,
Scott.
Hoodie
@schrodingers_cat: Yeah, but she’s changed her tune on him since outing himself as a winger. She says her kids think he’s an asshole and she agrees. She’s also been pretty harsh lately on Zuckerberg, Altman and other techbros. She said in an interview a few months ago that Elon dresses like a caricature of a 1990’s lesbian.
gvg
@schrodingers_cat: Some of it is also wanting conformity and tribalism. Which involves kicking the designated others that they often never see. They feel they have no where to go if they get cast out. For a lot of them this includes ability to work not just socialize or family. If Trumps cuts and Tariffs do enough damage that whole communities rebel together, it can really cut into GOP dominance in certain areas. I wonder if we could be ready?
Danielx
@Omnes Omnibus:
Haruspex and all?
Ohio Mom
@Belafon: Which is an outlook completely foreign to this NYC born and bred gal.
Trivia Man
@Betty Cracker: a british jewelry chain store. Addressing industry peers he said, “our product is cheap crap and our profits are amazing!”
Instant drop of 90% of sales.
(disclaimer: to the best of my recollection, dome details may vary
ETA: Gerald Ratner. The wikipedia gives the story
BeautifulPlumage
@H.E.Wolf: Oops, I thought, somehow you meant offline for a longer period of time! Anyway, hope you’re doing well.
hitchhiker
@Betty Cracker:
The one that comes to mind is the Susan G Komen foundation. Remember them? They were absolutely everywhere, and then one day announced that they were going to stop funding Planned Parenthood.
Blammo. They reversed that decision, but I don’t think they ever recovered from lost brand appeal.
Hoodie
@jonas: These are the cash loans he took out to buy Twitter, secured by stock. The banks got burned in that deal. With Tesla faltering, he’s running out of games to play because he doesn’t have any other ways of generating value, whether real or perceived. Grok is not a serious contender in AI. SpaceX is limited by what it does – government contracts and a relatively small Starlink user base. X doesn’t make any money.
It’s hard to understand why nominally successful people associated with Trump do this kind of self-destructive shit. Musk has a strong brand in Tesla and is pissing it away with X, support of Trump and stupid edgelord projects like Cybertruck.
Ohio Mom
@Professor Bigfoot: My BIL the MBA worked his way very far up the Ford ladder. Way up.
One of the percs he enjoyed was a free new leased Ford vehicle every year (I once pointed out that the execs would have a better feel for their customers’ experience if they kept the cars long enough to start needing repairs. For one, BIL never had to buy new tires and decide among the various options and price points).
He must be retired at least seven years by now. I notice all their cars since have been Hondas.
Professor Bigfoot
@Ohio Mom: One of the reasons I bought a Ford (other than knowing for a fact they’d pay through the nose for anything my company could do to improve their warranty numbers) was that their manufacturing engineering organization was the single most diverse engineering organization I saw in my entire career.
Women, Sikhs, Black people… mostly great people to work with, too… and I do love this great bloody beast of a sedan. ;)
NickM
For some stupid reason I can’t figure out, Tesla stock is soaring today — up $14 or more. WTF? They just announced terrible sales figures alongside BYD’s great sales. I don’t get it.
Nor do I get the stock market rallying today when they’re announcing the end of the economy at 4pm today. Are they fleecing the last of the sheep? Can anyone explain this insanity?
NickM
Maybe I figured it out — Trump apparently said Musk is stepping back. (1) I’ll believe it when I see it – he’s addicted to the attention and adulation and no-one outside of MAGA gives it freely and (2) Who really thinks that when Musk “steps back” Tesla goes back to normal?
Belafon
@NickM: As long as DOGE is around, so is Musk.
Betty Cracker
@hitchhiker: Right, that was a giant rake step!
@Trivia Man: Hadn’t heard of that one. Jeez, what a self-own!
BlueGuitarist
@frosty:
I like those cards and some of the others from the same artist.
Expect to be writing a lot more postcards.
my memory increasingly fails me, also too google-fu, but looking at the paisley vote cards reminded me that someone posted here about zentangle, was that you?
frosty
@BlueGuitarist: Yes, that was me. Ms F saw some work a friend did, then researched it, bought some art supplies and dove in. The tangles are beautiful and the process is meditative.
Mousebumples
Rebecca Bradley may not appreciate it. But I do. 😅
Omnes Omnibus
@Geminid: That’s augury. It is different.
WaterGirl
@Gin & Tonic: Up, out, prepositions matter! :-)
Gloria DryGarden
@Steve in the ATL: dead thread, but you made me flash on a line from a song
paved paradise, and put up up a parking lot
Rev Rick
fascinating image, reading the entrails of_____. Nice tangential, glancing blow. Thank you.
Chief Oshkosh
@Professor Bigfoot:
Made me look it up. Great series, but I haven’t watched all seasons yet.