On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
More than a thousand people in Longmont. A MAGA rolled coal on the protesters . When he came back and did the same on the other side of the street, the police pulled him over immediately. A $100 ticket. Huge cheers from the crowd.
And since his truck carried the logo of his tattoo parlor in town, he is collecting one-star reviews.
Burrowing Owl’s sign
schrodingers_cat
I don’t think it has anything to do with guts. This is giving Rs a lot more credit than they deserve. They do what Trump wants because many of them want it too.
WaterGirl
I love that first sign so much!
P.S. I had never heard the term rolling coal until this week. That must be a thing that assholes do, but no one does that around here.
DebG
@WaterGirl: The Front Range of Colorado has a weird mix of crunchy granola types and MAGAs who live to pwn them. Good on the Longmont cops! (I drive through Longmont two days a week on my non-WFH days.)
RevRick
In The Atlantic today, David Brooks confesses that he should have seen it coming and that Trump’s authoritarian nihilism is stupid. That it is the very definition of stupidity.
Jeffg166
@RevRick:
Dave lives in his own little world.
Trivia Man
1st star reviews may help, but i bet a protest on the sidewalk in front of his parlor would be faster. Politely ask everyone going in if they know what they are supporting. Bet: mire than a few will change to a different parlor.
”remember the gay cake ruling?”
RevRick
@WaterGirl: The thing about rolling coal is that you have to make your truck engine less efficient in burning fuel to produce the sooty emissions. You have to go out of your way to modify your engine — and the expense that entails— just so you can make someone else’s life unpleasant.
Socolofi
I imagine the party line from Johnson is, “Nobody here needs to think about losing their seat for 15 months, but if any of you blink, we will destroy you.”
That said even the dumbest one there probably gets that it took massive job losses coupled with massive wealth losses to elect a Black guy as President.
RevRick
@Jeffg166: Oh, he admits he deluded himself and was naive about where the GOP was headed.
Baud
@Socolofi:
And Booker just gave a hell of a speech.
robtrim
Rolling Coal has been around for a long time. Mostly done by pickup trucks. Some modified to make the diesel (usually) exhaust more obnoxious. MAGA obviously adopted it to own the libs.
Baud
@RevRick:
“The leopards weren’t supposed to eat my 401(k).”
comrade scotts agenda of rage
David Fucking Brooks, the Republican Testicle Cozy, is simply, for the millionth time, channeling his Republican Detachment Disorder (Driftglass coined that term).
Brooks continues to peddle the notion that he had nothing to do with the general madness growing within the GOP during his decades as a party functionary and water carrier. He continues to sell Hair Furor and the MAGAts as some inexplicable anomaly that popped into existent a decade ago instead of what this is really about: the natural, predicted end-state of where the GOP has been heading for 50+ years.
Brooks is simply embarrassed that the id of the modern GOP has been given a second chance with a ravenous pack of like-minded people in Congress.
His piece is another in a long-series of him busily ejecting clouds of ink to obscure the fact that his decades of mainstreaming the worst impulses of the GOP helped create the shambling monster now ravaging their castles and 401Ks with the pitchform and torch-wielding villagers at the monster’s side.
RevRick
@Socolofi: Until Lehman Brothers blew up McCain was in an essential tie with Obama.
cmorenc
A car around Grand Junction, Co has a state-issued license plate that reads:
ROLCOAL
…the plate is on a Nissan Leaf auto (which is an electric car). Gotta love the owner’s sense of humor.
schrodingers_cat
@RevRick: David Uriah Heep Brooks is a liar. He is just giving himself plausible deniability.
brendancalling
@Jeffg166: I love it when David starts in with the pronouncements about morals. SO funny. I wonder how his new, much-younger wife that he left his family for is doing? I wonder if she’s still hot, or if he’s looking around for a new one yet?
RevRick
@Baud: In Brooks’ case it’s the leopards weren’t supposed to devour my self understanding. He’ll only have to cut his caviar consumption to twice a week.
OGLiberal
Rolling coal douchbags are the biggest cowards in the USA – figuratively giving the finger while speeding away.
cope
@cmorenc: I’ll have to keep an eye out for that car so I can give the driver a thumbs-up.
Parfigliano
@RevRick: Brooks trying to get his brand on the right side of history. Nothing more. He’s still a piece of shit.
AM in NC
@RevRick: How very big of Mr. Brooks. For years (since Trump first descended onto the scene) I’ve been commenting on his NYT columns that HE and his entire REPUBLICAN PARTY got us Trump. Given their policies, ideology, and actions over the past FOUR DECADES, there was no other place for the REPUBLICAN PARTY to end up. And David Brooks played a big role in normalizing all that REPUBLICAN destruction and degradation for “normal, centrist Americans”.
Brooks owns this as much as Gingrich, Cruz, Limbaugh, Murdoch, Hawley, or Trump own what the GOP is. And I make sure to let him know that a lot of us know it.
trollhattan
@cmorenc:
Not only ironic fun, keeps it out of the mitts of an actual illegal diesel driver.
Guessing CO does not have biennial smog inspections ala California.
Burrowing Owl
@schrodingers_cat: That is true for many I’m sure. The hope is that there are enough who will stand up when the pain increases and they hear it in their districts and their bank accounts.
Shalimar
Wall Street reverses course after Hassett’s comments on tariff pause
I do not understand how “let’s do it again in 90 days” gives anyone any certainty that the insanity will end, but that is why I could never be a financial genius.
Also, too, why in the fucking hell would anyone believe anything Kevin Hassett says? He’s like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.
Eunicecycle
@AM in NC: oh yes. No one smeared “liberal ideas” more than David Brooks, contributing to the “tax and spend” narrative that haunts Democrats to this day. It’s why people in places like Ohio vote for the candidates with the R after their names on the ballot, no matter what.
schrodingers_cat
@Burrowing Owl: I hope you are right.
AM in NC
@brendancalling: Also, the fact that this supposed “public intellectual” arranges his books according to color is completely telling. His zoom interviews from his palatial library/living room during COVID revealed his totally hack-tackular nature – books for decor not for actual reading/learning.
He’s a paragon of something, all right.
lowtechcyclist
@Parfigliano:
He’s an excellent examplar of how totally secure a job it is to be an op-ed columnist for a major paper. If he didn’t already have that privileged perch, even dumb-asses like editorial page editors wouldn’t give him one. But because he’s already there, he’ll be bloviating on the NYT op-ed page until either he dies, or the op-ed page goes away.
Burrowing Owl
@DebG: The MAGA did it right in front of their cruiser, which was sitting in the median to remind protestors to stay on sidewalks and to keep business driveways clear. And with all the traffic (so many supportive honks!) the MAGA was easily stopped.
twbrandt
trollhattan
re. Coal-rolling, this is a thing that happened locally. Think good thoughts for the former EPA, an agency that has made America better but now?
A Ghost to Most
Burrowing owls are fun to watch. They inhabit the park across the street.
lowtechcyclist
@Eunicecycle:
He’s got a ways to go before he catches up with George Fucking Will, who’s got a head start of a decade or two.
Baud
@twbrandt:
Nice.
Libs on layaway!
Baud
OCIG
Burrowing Owl
@trollhattan: I think counties have their own requirements, but Boulder County requires every two years for cars from 2018 or older. If you haven’t driven by a roadside monitor and passed in that time, you need to visit an emissions testing center.
I don’t know what coal rollers do to get around it. Maybe drive more recent pickups?
Baud
Don’t know if this is real, but I hope so.
Needs a Trump “I did that” sticker.
Baud
Snarki, child of Loki
DAMN IT!
The sales of my “Rolling Coal for
CyberTrucksDorkenPanzers” has been disappointing. And it’s super-inexpensive and easy to install!Okay, okay, it’s just a heavy cable that shorts out the battery. But there’s smoke! (Flames also too)
Beware BJ readers: don’t breath the toxic lithium battery smoke. MAGAts? Smell the freedum!
Ruckus
@RevRick:
just so you can make someone else’s life unpleasant
Well if you see no way to make your’s better – and want to be on top then you have to make their’s worse. Or at least unpleasant.
I’m not in any way saying this is good or right, just that a lot of people seem to have the need to be higher up the food chain, without any concept of who, what, how, etc. Which means that they can’t actually get/be higher up so they have to place/believe that person lower than them. It’s asinine and in no way positive for either side but then it is a segment of humanity, who really has nothing else to show for their breathing in and out. All humans are created equal, some just fail every growth spurt on the mental side.
trollhattan
@Burrowing Owl:
With the caution I do not know how the diesel cheat technology works, it could be as simple as disabling the control box plus any related equipment for the test, then switching them back on afterwards. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
The VW scheme was utterly cynical in that they knew exactly how the US DOT emissions test was conducted–same for every car–and programmed the controller to recognize it and engage proper, compliant emission controls. The cheat disabled it to give better fuel mileage while not complying on emissions.
Some big rig truck makers did the same thing: disabling the NOX controls to run very lean at highway speeds, increasing mileage and NOX emissions at the same time.
Somebody’s always cheating. Now, who’s watching for that?
coin operated
@Burrowing Owl:
Diesel tuners. I have a moderate tune on my Dodge 3500 when towing the 5th wheel, but I have to revert it to stock tuning to pass a smog test. My tuner will not get the engine to ‘rolling coal’ levels, but I’m certain there are tuners out there that will.
Baud
Extinct animals are back!
Anonymous At Work
Don’t JUST leave 1-star reviews but give his poor consideration for safety and health as a reason. Bad tattoos end up yellow and green, even if they don’t use ink in those colors.
geg6
Here in ruby red Beaver County, PA, the owner of a local fine dining restaurant spent his time during the protest (600 strong, amazing!) driving around with his wife in his Nazi dumpster truck flying Cheetolini flags and screaming their MAGA slogans. HUGE backlash on FB. I guess he forgot who his customer base was because few MAGAs of my acquaintance have ever stepped foot in his restaurant (that he inherited from his dad, a Republican but never loud about it because he knew what side his bread was buttered on), would pay what a meal costs there and who would be asking where is the Franzia listed on their award-winning all domestic wine list if they ever went there. Most clientele were local professionals and upper middle class and aren’t MAGA. I’ve been there many times but will never go back now. The people on my FB feed and community group feeds were all saying same thing. Cutting off his nose to spite his face.
WaterGirl
@RevRick: Yikes, that is the definition of asshole.
WaterGirl
@Baud: A new speech, of the 24-hour one?
trollhattan
@geg6:
Up in California’s Eldorado County was a cafe on CA 50 that during the pandemic had the owner on the news for her…uh…freedumb-loving ways, including forbidding face masks on patrons. It was certainly one way to stratify your customer base, but I can’t help but think the wealthier folks going to and from Tahoe were not well represented there.
Baud
@WaterGirl:
The 24 hour one.
WaterGirl
@Baud: Ah, I wondered if he might have done an “elevator pitch” version. :-)
Burrowing Owl
@Baud: OCIG?
Office of Counsel to the Inspector General?
You lost me.
JoeyJoeJoe
@RevRick: I am reminded of this Onion article from late 2012, after Obama’s reelection:
https://theonion.com/after-obama-victory-shrieking-white-hot-sphere-of-pure-1819595330/
Even then, people could see where the party was headed
JetsamPool
@Burrowing Owl: Is it state or county level? I just had my emissions inspection as part of my registration renewal. The postcard they sent me has the text Colorado Vehicle Registration Renewal, but the return address is for the Boulder County Clerk.
Anyway, someone rolled coal at me some years ago while I was biking to work. I held my breath and turned at the next corner to get out of the cloud, but I was still coughing the rest of the day. That stuff is nasty, and a $100 fine seems low, seeing as how the coal roller is basically trying to hurt people and can potentially cause an accident.
frosty
@geg6: I just checked County population statistics. If you got 600 for HandsOff in Beaver County we should have had 1,600 at the same ratio instead of the 700 the local paper reported. Good for you!!
Hoodie
@Baud: Can’t get any fairer than that! Seriously, it’s almost like they don’t want a resolution. Heard Nutlick complaining the other day about European regulations on US meat. I wouldn’t be surprised zero tariffs won’t be enough for them because they really don’t want a deal, they want submission. It’s possible that Murphy is correct, the goal is to give Trump a lever for exercising corrupt patronage. Zero tariffs means zero leverage for Trump.
Cheryl from Maryland
@Eunicecycle: Brooks continued to smear the Democrats in today’s article. It’s partially their fault he is a moron and believed Trump. No, David, it’s all on you.
Kelly
@Burrowing Owl: The coal rollers have control over when the truck pukes out black smoke. Maybe a switch or perhaps it happens when they stomp on the throttle. If they behave at the testing station it might be hard to tell if the engine was modified.
Burrowing Owl
@JetsamPool: Gah, that is awful. I’m sorry someone did that to you.
Looks like requirements vary by county: “Emissions testing of gas‑ and diesel‑powered vehicles is required when registering or selling vehicles in Boulder, Broomfield, Denver, Douglas, and Jefferson counties, and in portions of Adams, Arapahoe, Larimer, and Weld counties“
Burrowing Owl
@Kelly: They do have control. I get it sometimes when I’m driving because it’s apparently necessary to roll coal on a Prius. More often than not I can anticipate and switch to cabin air. Rolling on protestors was gross.
Gvg
@RevRick: McCain also made IMO a big mistake in admitting he didn’t know much about economics AFTER the economy crashed and the banks blew up. It was honest. He had a record of that attitude, but it was just one more weight on the scale that he wasn’t the guy we needed at that time.
One of his popularity points was that he bucked his own party from time to time. Not often, but sometimes. Republicans went famously obstructionist on Obama. In an alternate history I think they might not have been a lot better for McCain. Then again, he might have been able to change their course, but not heal the economy. He wuld have over reacted to 911, maybe not gone into Iraq, not forgotten Ben Laden, not tortured…. Too many differences. I don’t know what would have resulted. But all Congress people and all candidates for the Presidecy need to understand economics.
Kelly
I take some comfort while watching my IRA evaporate that Trump is also destroying medical research so I probably won’t live as long anyway. It all balances out.
catclub
@Burrowing Owl:
redo the programming.
Matt McIrvin
@schrodingers_cat: These people are into all the toxic masculinity. Saying it’s cowardice hits them where it hurts.
Matt McIrvin
Only ever saw a coal-roller in action once, over in Plaistow I think, and that was years ago.
I drive a hybrid car that gets Prius-like MPG but you can’t tell it’s one unless you get close enough to read the nameplate.
trollhattan
Here’s a thought: maybe don’t let pee-paw loose in the sticks with a rifle.
I’m feeling safer already. Plus, who knew it was turkey season? BAM!
Mustang Bobby
I lived in Longmont from 1987 to 1990. Very nice suburban Republican city and hometown to my late partner and his family. I’m so happy they were able to rally in that number, and the MAGA coal roller learned that karma, thou art a righteous bitch.
Burrowing Owl
@Mustang Bobby: Longmont is no longer a Republican city. I’ve only lived here since the late 2010s but things have clearly changed and they are outnumbered—not as much as Boulder, but decidedly lopsided Dem now.
The Boulder County Republicans often have a float in town parades. I finally decided to turn my back and shun when their float goes by. Boos would just make them feel more righteous and victimized.
RandomMonster
Rolling coal is attempting to poison people with toxic fumes. A $100 ticket is way too low. The last ticket I got (speed trap along a 55mph zone) was more than that.
Dorothy A. Winsor
The White House has cancelled the joint press conference they had scheduled with Netanyahu today
Geminid
@trollhattan: It’s Spring Gobbler season here in Central Virginia. Last Thursday evening, a neighbor came by the farm I caretake scouting for turkey.
Todd’s turkey call was a slate disk inside a plastic cover with three differently shaped holes on top. He’d poke a wooden dowel through a hole and scrape the slate with it. The sound wasn’t very loud but evidently turkeys have good hearing.
Todd said that sometimes coyotes are fooled into coming to look for the turkey they think they’ve heard.
chopper
nelson muntz: HA HA!
Mustang Bobby
@Burrowing Owl: That is so good to know. We lived on the 600 block of Bross Street and loved it, and now that it has become enlightened, I miss it even more.
Geminid
@Dorothy A. Winsor: So Netanyahu flew from Hungary to DC on short notice and all he got was his picture taken with Trump with no joint press conference.
An odd visit. I guess I’ll be looking at the coverage in Axios (Barak Ravid) and Israeli sites to find out more.
Jay
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_coal
The simplest method uses a switch activated fuel injector, tapped into the exhaust, just before the muffler or into the exhaust manifolds.. It injects raw diesel onto hot metal.
Here it’s a $1500 fine, and your vehicle is classed as not roadworthy, until it has been removed and confirmed by an inspection.
Supertuning is modifying any engine to produce greater horsepower, torque, acceleration, or fuel economy, and since OBD1 and OBD2 requires either the modification of the OBD computer with software changes, an alternate OBD computer, or in some cases, just a programmed chip change. These changes result in the exhaust no longer meeting the OEM emission standards when running in the supertuned mode. It applies to all ICE engines, no matter the fuel.
Back in the day, certain Mitsubishi cars were very popular grey market imports amongst the Fast an Furious crowd. Using a PC or laptop, running diagnostic software, along with “standard” mods, (new air filter set up, headers, oversized exhaust, free flow muffler, new cams), the V6 engine could be “tuned” up from the stock 240HP all the way up to an insane 785HP. YMMV, because amping the engine over 280HP required extensive modifications to the driveline, suspension and chassis if you wanted it to stay in one piece.
Subaru WRX’s became popular amongst the “go fast” crowd, in particular because, you could legally in areas, illegally in others, buy either a Factory Rally Chip, or a grey market one, and adding 40HP, became a “plug and play” modification.
While it’s guaranteed that almost any engine mods* that effect the fuel load/timing of the engine, will take it out of OEM spec, it might not take it out of the CARB spec for the class of vehicle.
Air cleaners and intake mods, cams, headers, oversized exhaust will usually result in a cleaner running engine, because the goal is to get all the fuel to burn in the engine, where in many stock engines, combustion is incomplete.
As the Drifter, Rice Racer crowd has been finding out, the “blap, blap, blapping” of their exhausts when they take their foot off the throttle and “diesel” the engine rather than using the brakes to slow down, doesn’t just annoy suburbanites, urban dwellers and other drivers, it attracts Police attention.
Gary, a young guy I once worked with, thought it would be ultra cool to overpay for a 5L Mustang, modified into a drift car. One evening, he attracted the wrong attention, and thus began an epic 3 year project to find all the stock parts that were missing, (like ABS brakes, brackets and sensors) and remove all the mod parts. In the process, he learned that both his front and rear bumpers, were just the ABS plastic skins, held in place with epoxy and zip ties. The crush panels, steel bumpers and brackets had been removed. You can’t get those in a wrecking yard, because,……..5L Mustang.
Jay
@Geminid:
They were “preselling it” as Bibi being the first of the alleged 50 Leaders groveling before DJTdiot for Sanctions relief.
Did he wear a suit? Did he say “Thank You” often enough to please the Couchfucker? Will we see vid from inside the White Supremacy House?
I have questions,………………………….
Bupalos
@geg6: What’s the restaurant? Since my wife is always trying to find new interesting options on our way through to see Pittsburgh Opera, I wouldn’t want to accidentally land there.
Bupalos
@Geminid: I think they were planning to use him to stop the market slide, just make motions like they were negotiating great dealz. Then I think Trump decided he likes this and wants to do another day of it at least.
Socolofi
@Gvg: Nah, McCain was toast and he knew it. Republicans had been running things for 8 years, they were the party of business and wealth and properity and all that. They owned the meltdown, and the nation knew they owned the meltdown, and promptly punished them for it.
Democrats had done really well in 2006, retaking both chambers in Congress, and was part of an overall view that it was time for a change as Iraq / the Global War on Terror was just not going well. Try as McCain and the GOP might to say that the GOP could fix the meltdown and the Democrats were the cause, nobody bought it.
Geminid
@Bupalos: I read that the idea was to use Netanyahu as an example of how foŕeign leaders would run to Washington and beg for sanctions relief. The two guys had plenty else to talk about, but an Israeli official was quoted by N12 news yesterday as saying the meeting was planned for next week and he didn’t know what the hurry was.
I am interested in the non-tariff subjects– Gaza, Iran, Syria etc.– so I will try to find out more.
Netanyahu must have been disappointed not to appear before the press, side-by-side wth Trump. Of course he’ll lie about the meeting because that’s what Netanyahu does, but the story will come out I think. I expect Trump’s people will at least leak their version.
dnfree
That sign is GREAT! It’s exactly what I’ve been saying for what, ten years now? This is entirely on Republicans. Any other candidate would have been rejected BY THEIR PARTY for mocking a handicapped reporter, mocking the looks of his fellow candidates, or certainly for the “pussy tape”.
dnfree
@Shalimar:
“He’s like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.” NOMINATED!
Citizen Alan
@robtrim: What makes it particularly stupid/funny is that by modifying their trucks (and it’s always trucks) to roll coal, it typically voids the warranty on the vehicle.
PatD
As we watch our retirement accounts crater, here’s a reminder that the CR Chuck Schumer insisted Dems had to accept gave away Congressional leverage over the very tariffs that Trump just put in place.
Geminid
@Geminid: It turns out Netanyahu did get to sit next to Trump at a short Oval Office press availability. There were four Israeli officials at one side of a coffee table with four Trump administration official including the VP facing them. It sounds like Trump did all the talking.
Israeli journalist Noga Tarnopolsky said she’s “never seen such humiliation,” but Tarnopolsky may have been over-exuberant as she sometimes is. Ed. But if Netanyahu was hoping for a joint press conference he was disappointed.
Trump said that direct talks with Iran about their nuclear program would commence soon, at “almost the highest level.” Iran had been holding out for indirect talks.
Trump also spoke on a conference call with France’s Macron, Egypt’s al-Sissi and Jordan’s King Abdullah just before today’s meeting with Netanyahu. The three leaders held a summit meeting in Egypt today.
David Collier-Brown
@Citizen Alan: A few years back I had a Mercedes 300 coupe with a turbocharged diesel. You could accidentally generate a ton of black smoke by letting the revs fall right off at speed (eg, on a downhill). If you then needed to nail it, you got a black cloud until both the revs and the turbo RPM got back up.
Did that by accident… to avoid _joining_ an accident
rikyrah
Rachel Bitecofer![]()
![]()
(@RachelBitecofer) posted at 4:25 PM on Sun, Apr 06, 2025:
I shit you not, Trump took Harriet Tubman OFF the National Parks Underground Railroad memorial and instead centered it around White people.
Read it yourself!!![]()
![]()
https://t.co/VbF3u4TMQ0 https://t.co/iPO29okDFG
(https://x.com/RachelBitecofer/status/1908994540964602047?t=WGRiRTGQhqgxg9bLioiLbQ&s=03
Matt McIrvin
@cmorenc: It might also be a reference to the old talking point that electric cars are “coal-powered vehicles” (true if your local electric grid is coal-powered, which used to be common but is increasingly rare, to a degree that the people who throw this around seem not to realize).
Matt McIrvin
@RevRick: Well, *right before* Lehman Brothers blew up he was in an essential tie with Obama. He had been trailing for most of the year but he’d just had his convention bounce, with the excitement of his choosing Sarah Palin as his VP nominee, before she was generally regarded as a joke. And then it all fell in.
lowtechcyclist
@Baud:
Don’t murder me, I beg you, you don’t murder me, ple-ease don’t murder me
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: I think coal’s share of US electrical generation is down to ~17% now. A lot of states still have coal plants though, and some have 2 or 3.
Timill
@Geminid: 15% in 2024, per https://ember-energy.org/latest-insights/us-electricity-2025-special-report/
wolf parade
The bumper sticker in the 90s said “Don’t Boulderize Longmont” but it looks like a decisive victory for Boulder. Glad to see the Dairy Queen is still there.
Elizabelle
@rikyrah: I never thought it was going to be this blatant, this stupid, and this bad.
Burrowing Owl
@Mustang Bobby: It’s been a pretty great place to live, and the block where you lived is lovely, right near the park.
A reporter says Longmont had more than 3,000 people at the rally, and has pictures and video here: https://yellowscene.com/2025/04/06/from-denver-to-boulder-hands-off-protests-draw-thousands-in-colorado-with-photos-from-the-ground/#prettyPhoto
I know people were on both sides of Main for four blocks.
Chris T.
@Jay:
Yep, it’s like when young men (it’s almost always young men…) take a lot of steroids and lift super-heavy weights within a few months of getting on their cycle, before their tendons have caught up…
(Biceps or pectoral tendon tears are probably the most common)