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Disappointing to see gov. newsom with his finger to the wind.

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It’s all just conspiracy shit beamed down from the mothership.

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

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

Consistently wrong since 2002

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Let the trolls come, and then ignore them. that’s the worst thing you can do to a troll.

Not loving this new fraud based economy.

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Hi god, it’s us. Thanks a heap, you’re having a great week and it’s only Thursday!

Let’s bury these fuckers at the polls 2 years from now.

Bark louder, little dog.

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Jack be nimble, jack be quick, hurry up and indict this prick.

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You are here: Home / Democratic Response to Trump 2.0 / Opposition to Trump-Musk / If You Are Feeling Like I am, I Recommend Injecting Maxwell Frost Into Your Veins

If You Are Feeling Like I am, I Recommend Injecting Maxwell Frost Into Your Veins

by | 130 Comments

This post is in: , ,

I really needed Maxwell Frost today, perhaps you do, too?

Rising star Democrat @maxwellfrost.bsky.social just outlined the two things we need to do to stop authoritarianism. Watch:

[image or embed]

— Keith Edwards (@keithedwards.bsky.social) April 7, 2025 at 8:51 PM

.

Elon was finally right about something!

[image or embed]

— Maxwell Frost (@maxwellfrost.bsky.social) April 6, 2025 at 11:18 AM

.

Rep. Maxwell Frost: If we are quiet, if elected officials are quiet, then we are complicit. We cannot be complicit in the tearing apart of Medicaid, of Social Security, of food stamps and nutritional assistance, of the things that we fought for and earned! #HandsOff @frost.house.gov

[image or embed]

— Social Security Works (@socialsecurityworks.org) April 5, 2025 at 4:50 PM

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Rep. Maxwell Frost: “They test the bounds. They push the limits. They break the law. And then they look at the public, to see if they’re quiet or if they’re loud.” 🗣️

[image or embed]

— NextGen America (@nextgenamerica.bsky.social) April 5, 2025 at 12:28 PM

Youth.  Energy.  Passion.  Hope.

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

130Comments

  1. 1.

    WaterGirl

    I also recommend clicking on today’s sidebar photo and stopping to take a deep breath while you look at it.

  2. 2.

    WaterGirl

    The last video clip is really great.

    We can’t be, and are not, the minority party.   We must be the opposition in this moment. And then in less than two years, we will become the majority.

  7. 7.

    Raoul Paste

    More like this, please.   I was just sick yesterday when I saw that the US Marshalls  had deputized Musk’s wrecking crew

  8. 8.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    I went to see Penguin Lessons this afternoon. It’s set in Argentina in 1976 when people are being disappeared off the streets. The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo demonstrated, demanding to know where their missing were

  9. 9.

    cain

    This is exactly the kind of thing we need. Bring legislators like these to the front. Let the legislator nerds hang in the back and do their thing. This is not their time in this moment.

  10. 10.

    chemiclord

    The big problem is that the public is never loud enough, fast enough.

    Which is why we need BOTH the people screaming to fight, AND the people who believe “Never interrupt your opponent when they are making a mistake.”

    That is a very thin needle to thread.

  14. 14.

    frosty

    Damn, he’s good! He gets it!

    (and I bet he’s been called Frosty all his life too)

  15. 15.

    Jay

    @Eric S.:

    It’s not new. DOGEShit has not been deputy dogged by the US Marshalls. Some of Edolf’s now 100 Personal Security Team members were, several weeks ago, “Deputy Dogged”* by the US Marshall’s Service so that they could carry guns in places where only the US Marshalls, the Secret Service and Capital Police can.

    Apparently anti-Edolf assassins now lurk in the halls of the Federal Government Buildings, all Ninja like.

    *do not look it up on PornHub.

  16. 16.

    Ohio Mom

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Your comment inspired me to google to refresh my memory about how Argentina threw off the junta, which was in power from 1976-1983.

    Apparently it took a cratering economy, losing the war with England to seize the Falkland Islands, and then “the military leaders, with some convincing from the U.S. and others, stepped down; the general election on October 30, 1983 — and the surprising defeat of the Peronist party — marked the return of constitutional rule. Over 85% of eligible voters participated.”*

    I don’t know how much of that is applicable to us — who is going to play the part of the U.S. and (unspecified) others?

    *from https://adst.org/2014/10/argentinas-dirty-war-and-the-transition-to-democracy/

  20. 20.

    different-church-lady

    I just had a thought so simple I feel stupid for not figuring it out until now.

    Trump only won about half the electorate. In a binary system, that means we’re out of power. But it doesn’t mean that half can’t be LOUD about how fucked up it is.

  21. 21.

    different-church-lady

    @Ohio Mom:

    Apparently it took a cratering economy, losing the war with England to seize the Falkland Islands, and then “the military leaders, with some convincing from the U.S. and others, stepped down; the general election on October 30, 1983 — and the surprising defeat of the Peronist party — marked the return of constitutional rule.

    Gosh, I’m so looking forward to the next four years…

  25. 25.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @different-church-lady: Cratering economy, MAGA has that covered.

    Losing a war, the only scenario I can imagine is a losing effort defending Taiwan from a PRC invasion, one MAGA probably helped to precipitate by crossing Beijing’s long standing red lines. Caveats: I think the odds are now better than even that Trump simply abandons Taiwan even if his own recklessness helped to precipitate the PRC invasion; the U.S. remains the world’s preeminent military power, though the military balance across the Taiwan Strait had become unfavorable a decade ago & now the same in the Westerner Pacific & trending even more unfavorable in both, but Trumpian misrule in terms of “anti-Woke” purged, rampant corruption, & possibly getting sucked in to interminable & fruitless wars in the Middle East, will undermine what edge the US military still enjoys. There is that faint echo of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution again.

  28. 28.

    Jay

    @Baud:

    As the Billionaire’s Boy’s Club is in the FO stage, their common plaint is that “we didn’t think DJTdiot 2.0 would be worse than DJTdiot 1.0.”

    So much for money = smarts.

    The MSM’s continued sane washing of Sundowning Grampa is still having a yuuge impact.

    Yes, some Dem’s were not on message, eg.Fetterman.

    I take refuge in the r/Leopards Eating Faces threads.

  29. 29.

    Baud

    @Jay:

    Yeah, I’m pretty detached, even though my life has been personally affected by the election. We go where society take us.

  30. 30.

    Geminid

    @Ohio Mom: When the Greek military junta fell in 1974, it was in the aftermath of Turkiye seizing northern Cyprus. Those events do not exactly track the Falklands War but the result was similar; a military junta falling after a military setback at an island the junta hoped to claim.

    Cyprus has been a sore point for Greeks ever since 1974, but the divided island is now one of the most peaceful “conflict zones” in the region or elsewhere.

  33. 33.

    Glory b

    @Jay: Know who would have been on message?

    Conor Lamb.

    A shame that so many people seem to have voted in the primary based on who wore a Hoodia & shorts and who wore a suit.

    But Lamb had an impeccable voting record in Congress.

  34. 34.

    Soapdish

    @Jay: Is there any reason to believe that if the 35% voted they wouldn’t break down along the existing 33%/32% results?

  35. 35.

    Scout211

    @Baud: Still better than voting for a chick.

    I’d vote for a baby chick.  They are so cute!  Also too, I’d vote for The (formerly Dixie) Chicks any day.

    But really Baud, the 1940s called and wants that word back. ;-)

  36. 36.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Redshift:

    I was there when he spoke at Hands Off! in DC, and I can confirm he was one of the best!

    I’m sure I was there, but I and my companion were too far back to hear the speakers very well.  Lots of “blessed are the cheesemakers” moments, when we could even hear them that well.

    We were between the Washington Monument and the stage, but about twice as far from the stage as from the Monument. The sound system could’ve used some help.

  37. 37.

    Baud

    @Geminid:

    I wish we had a military junta because

    (1) It would be more sane than what we do have, and

    (2) Junta is a cool word and it would be great to be able to use it more often.

  38. 38.

    Jay

    @Soapdish:

    There is some evidence based on past votes, that the breakdown had all shown up, amongst the people who didn’t vote, that 67% would have voted Harris, 33% DJTdiot, but I have not seen detailed info on how that would have effected the Electoral College.

    In the US, it’s not a popular vote that decides things, it’s where you won.

  39. 39.

    PatD

    Two things Dem politicians and leaders should be firm and loud about.

     

    1) El Salvador is a small country. Our memories are long and they should consider that future sanctions and consequences are coming for their facilitating rendition of Americans or those who reside here.

    2) Trump will pardon many of his administration’s criminals. But the vast majority of those who engage in every day misconduct and abuses will not get pardons. They, for example, ICE and Border Patrol officers, will face consequences.

    They should do this to influence what’s happening now.

  40. 40.

    zhena gogolia

    @Baud: I do like the “Hands Off” framing, because people can make it mean whatever they’re most concerned about. It’s a good unifier.

  41. 41.

    Jay

    @Baud:

    You can’t have a Junta.

    It’s a Spanish and Portuguese word from the feminine juncta, a root of jungere, so it’s DEIA and thus banned.

    You will have to settle for Military Dictatorship.

  45. 45.

    PatD

    @Jay: We have nothing to fear from El Salvador. They should at least be made aware that taking US citizens and residents and subjecting them to extrajudicial punishment will have real consequences.

  46. 46.

    Ohio Mom

    @Jay: I’ll be dead by then. I mean, I’m happy for everyone who will experience the liberating of the U.S., but two generations too long for me.

  47. 47.

    Another Scott

    Meanwhile, … Phys.org:

    Well into the late 19th century, the U.S. retail sector was overwhelmingly local, consisting of small, independent merchants throughout the country. That started changing after Sears and Roebuck’s famous catalog became popular, allowing the firm to grow, while a rival, Montgomery Ward, also expanded. By the 1930s, the U.S. had 130,000 chain stores, topped by Atlantic and Pacific supermarkets (the A&P), with over 15,000 stores.

    A century onward, the U.S. retail landscape is dominated by retail giants. Today, 90% of Americans live within 10 miles of a Walmart, while five of the country’s 10 biggest employers—Walmart, Amazon, Home Depot, Kroger, and Target— are retailers. Two others in the top 10, UPS and FedEx, are a major part of the retail economy.

    The ubiquity of these big retailers, and the sheer extent of the U.S. shopping economy as a whole, is unusual compared to the country’s European counterparts. Domestic consumption plays an outsized role in driving growth in the United States, and credit plays a much larger role in supporting that consumption than in Europe. The U.S. has five times as much retail space per capita as Japan and the U.K., and 10 times as much as Germany. Unlike in Europe, shopping hours are largely unregulated.

    How did this happen? To be sure, Walmart, Amazon, Target, and other massive chains have plenty of business acumen. But the full story involves a century or more of political tectonics and legal debates, which helped shape the size of U.S. retailing and the prominence of its large discount chains.

    “The markets that we take as given, that we think of as the natural outcome of supply and demand, are heavily shaped by policy and by politics,” says MIT political scientist Kathleen Thelen.

    Thelen examines the subject in a new book, “Attention, Shoppers! American Retail Capitalism and the Origins of the Amazon Economy,” published today by Princeton University Press. In it, she examines the growth of the particular model of supersized, low-cost, low-wage retailing that now features so prominently in the U.S. economy.

    […]

    Most antitrust theorizing since the 1960s “valorizes consumer welfare, which is basically defined as price, so anything that delivers the lowest price to consumers is A-OK,” Thelen says. “We’re in this world where the large, low-cost retailers are delivering consumer welfare in the way the courts are defining it.”

    That emphasis on prices, she notes, then spills over into other areas of the economy, especially wages and labor relations.

    “If you prioritize prices, one of the main ways to reduce prices is to reduce labor costs,” Thelen says. “It’s no coincidence that low-cost discounters are often low-wage employers. Indeed, they often squeeze their vendors to deliver goods at ever-lower prices, and by extension, they’re pressing down on wages in their supplier networks as well.”

    […]

    The economic system we have in the US is not something that arose from the immutable laws of physics. We have the system we do because of the way we constructed and enforced the rules. And we can change those rules to make things better.

    Worth a click.

    Best wishes,
    Scott.

  48. 48.

    Martin

    @Jay: Yeah, this is that data that I was seeing prior to the election telling me that the problem wasn’t drawing contrasts to Trump, but addressing why they weren’t voting.

    The same polls will show that an overwhelming number of voters from both parties feel that government isn’t meeting their needs, with the implication that voting won’t change that. That’s what Democrats needed to address, and they didn’t do that. This was a very status-quo platform, which polling shows isn’t what voters want.

    I don’t know if Democrats can find a positive message in 2026. They’ll definitely hold a referendum on Trump, but it needs to be more than that. They need to do more than just say how they’ll put things back the way they were, but talk about how they’ll put them back better now that there’s more room to do that.

  49. 49.

    Harrison Wesley

    @PatD: Don’t you think they’re kinda being put on the spot? The current US government is the one squeezing them to incarcerate people. Tell Trump to take a flying fuck at moving roller coaster and hope the next administration (if such comes to pass) will look kindly on this? What happens in the meantime?

  50. 50.

    Ohio Mom

    @Jay: There were a few fractions of a percentage point voting for either the Green or Libertarian parties; add those votes to Harris’s total, and Trump didn’t even win half of the votes cast.

  51. 51.

    Jay

    @PatD:

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvadoran_Civil_War

    The United Nations (UN) reports that the war killed more than 75,000 people between 1979 and 1992, along with approximately 8,000 disappeared persons. Human rights violations, particularly the kidnapping, torture, and murder of suspected FMLN sympathizers by state security forces and paramilitary death squads – were pervasive.[31][32][33]

    Guess who’s side the US was on and trained the Death Squads, c’mon, guess.

    https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP90-00552R000404170002-5.pdf

    Guess where.

    Yup, School of the America’s, Fort Benning, Georgia.

  53. 53.

    Jackie

    @Jay:

    Looking forward to the yuuuge North KoreanDJTdiot’s military parade on June 14th.

    I’ll be studiously avoiding any media coverage. I had four years of June 14 being just MY birthday, and I’m pissed to be reminded it’s a 34 times convicted felon’s bd, too. Best gift for me would be him being buried 6 feet under that day – if not sooner.

  54. 54.

    Martin

    @Another Scott: That seems like a rather shallow paper that is just coming to discover the concept of a natural monopoly, or just noting that US economists try to pretend they don’t exist.

  55. 55.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Ohio Mom:

    @PatD:

    Timely

    White House floats deporting U.S. citizens. Justice Sotomayor just warned about that: Press secretary Karoline Leavitt mentioned potentially deporting American citizens who are violent repeat offenders “if it’s legal.”

    Responding to a question at Tuesday’s daily briefing, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt mentioned President Donald Trump’s “idea” to potentially deport “violent” and “heinous” U.S. citizens, adding a seemingly important caveat: “If it’s legal.”

    It’s not.

    But that doesn’t mean it can’t happen. Indeed, Justice Sonia Sotomayor warned just a day earlier of the possibility.

    Dissenting from the Supreme Court’s decision to grant emergency relief to the government in a case about deportations, Sotomayor wrote that the implications of the Trump administration’s legal stance is that “not only noncitizens but also United States citizens could be taken off the streets, forced onto planes, and confined to foreign prisons with no opportunity for redress if judicial review is denied unlawfully before removal.”

    The possibility also lurks in another appeal pending before the justices, in the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was erroneously deported to El Salvador. Despite conceding an “administrative error” in sending him to that country, the government has resisted remedying the error. Supporting his return, constitutional scholars wrote to the high court that, if the government’s position were correct, then “the Executive Branch would possess a shuddering degree of power — power that the President could wield in extreme and extraordinary ways, including against American citizens that the President simply disfavors.”

    Leavitt’s comments thus reinforce the importance of the court’s forthcoming decision in Abrego Garcia’s case, whose consequences could inform just how far this administration will go.

  56. 56.

    Jay

    @Ohio Mom:

    It’s not the votes, it’s where they voted. The Electoral College decides who wins, sort of like in Canada, where is is not the number of votes won, it’s the number of Ridings won.

    It is why many Canadians have switched to strategic voting, not to elect a Government, but to prevent the “wrong” Government.

    In my Riding, I’ll probably vote for the Dipper, (NDP), because they are leading, and will for the most part, make common cause with the Liberals. If a Liberal or Green were leading, I’d vote for them instead, even though, as a Red Tory, I am more Dipper than Lib, and the Greens are a one trick pony.

    It’s ABC voting, anybody but the Conservative.

  58. 58.

    Jay

    @Jackie:

    June 15th should be lit with all the roads, mains, bridges, and the early estimates of the billions of dollars of damages.

    Sadly, it won’t be like the 2024 Red Square Parade with one lone WWII T-34 bought from a Serbian Museum.

    Or the 2022 Red Square Parade where the T-14’s broke down mid parade.

  59. 59.

    Melancholy Jaques

    @Jay:

    DJTdiot “won” roughly 33% of eligible voters Madame VP won roughly 32% of the eligible voters, roughly 35% of the eligible voters, did not vote.

    This is supposed to make us feel better? 33% voted for Trump & 35% had no problem with Trump being president again.

  60. 60.

    Another Scott

    Meanwhile, 47 had some coal-related dog and pony show at the White House…

    ( via https://bsky.app/profile/cultureoftruth.bsky.social )

    Amanda Weaver‬ ‪@amandaweavernovels.com‬
    4h

    Just me banging on again that BROADWAY employs more people than coal.

    ‪wesinjapan‬ ‪@wesinjapan.bsky.social‬
    3h

    There are more yoga teachers in America than there are coal miners

    ‪Aaron Rupar‬ ‪@atrupar.com‬
    4h

    Trump is doing a White House event right now to hype coal

    Best wishes,
    Scott.

  62. 62.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Ohio Mom:

    A lot of leftists, liberals, and progressives own firearms. There’s even a subreddit r/liberalgunowners that’s 249k members strong.

    I just think, especially if the Administration wants to expand this, somebody’s going to fight back and possibly kill ICE Agent(s) if they keep wearing plains clothes and face masks like they have been. Who the hell knows if they’re really federal officers if they hide their identities with masks, don’t wear uniforms etc, and not human traffickers or something worse?

  63. 63.

    different-church-lady

    @Jay: ​Yes, I screwed that up: roughly half of those who voted, not half of those eligible.

    Any rate, what I’m getting at is there’s no reason the losing half has to be quiet about it.

  64. 64.

    Jay

    @Melancholy Jaques:

    35% had “reasons”.

    Not voting in a solid Blue State, because it’s the Electoral College, not the popular vote, Baby.

    No time off to vote.

    Voter suppression.

    Gerrymandering,

    8 years of the MSM sane washing  DJTdiot and memory holing his first term. Eg. Covid.

    DJTdiot’s denial of 2025 while bringing the authors into his Admin, ignored by the FLMSM.

    The DJTdiot’s 47 will be the same as DJTdiot’s 45 , with out noticing that all the guardrails, from Admin, Institutions to the Courts were gone.

    And a sad tell, despite warning and exposing what would happen under a Dolt47 term, the Democratic Party, made no effort to create an “insurgent” policy, a Plan B if you will, the “We Got This” policy with no “Oh Fuck Policy”,

  66. 66.

    Timill

    @Ohio Mom:

    losing the war with England to seize the Falkland Islands

    Ahem. Britain. Notably, the Welsh Guards took the brunt of Bluff Cove and the Sir Galahad attack.

    An Englishman writes…

  67. 67.

    Martin

    @WaterGirl: I agree it’s a good start, but Democrats either need to accept that the new battleground is going to be over which flavor of libertarianism we embrace, or they’re going to have to come up with a positive theory of government that voters will accept and a formula for how to run it. And they’re going to have to find some unity in the party around that.

    And I’m not sure most vocal Democrats are going to be on board with anything other than a return to the status quo.

  69. 69.

    Glory b

    @Martin: BUT we already have a theory of government,  it’s called the constitution.

    It takes a long time and a big lift to change it

    And “voters?” How many?

    Lest we forget, Democrats haven’t won a majority of white voters since the passage of the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts.

    Still. To this day.

    And the Republicans have made a generational project of restricting the ability to vote.

    Most recently, it’s proposed that Indigenous Americans can’t use tribal IDs to vote.

  70. 70.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Baud: Nope, at this point, the military junta would be the suddenly promoted mid-tier officers most acceptable to Pete Hegseth. Probably all dudes with white-power tats.

  71. 71.

    Jay

    @different-church-lady:

    If TSHTF, I can and will accommodate up to 18 refugees, American or not, from the US, in our 1BDR, as long as they are willing to sleep on an air mattress on the floor and adhere to a bathroom schedule.

  73. 73.

    chemiclord

    @Martin: The problem is that you have multiple ideas of how the Democratic Party should proceed and what they should be, and increasingly more and more of those groups are deciding, “If I can’t get everything I want, then I am fine with nobody getting anything.”

  74. 74.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Jay:

    The DJTdiot’s 47 will be the same as DJTdiot’s 45 , with out noticing that all the guardrails, from Admin, Institutions to the Courts were gone.

    I encountered somebody who deluded themselves into this. She was retired admin staff for the county prosecutor’s office. She was honestly glad Trump won because she thought Trump would protect Social Security, “because he did during his first term.” I told her that the people and groups that restrained him were largely gone. She didn’t say anything and walked away

  75. 75.

    Jay

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Historically, most Military Coups, (like I said, you can’t use Junta, too DEIA), are Junior Officers pissed off with the Military Command and the Government. Both left and right.

  76. 76.

    Glory b

    @Jay: I have no idea what kind of policies you’re talking about.

    How do “we got this” if we are in the minority?

    For better or worse, in a democracy, the majority gets the government they want.

  78. 78.

    Jay

    @Martin:

    The same polls will show that an overwhelming number of voters from both parties feel that government isn’t meeting their needs, with the implication that voting won’t change that. That’s what Democrats needed to address, and they didn’t do that. This was a very status-quo platform, which polling shows isn’t what voters want.

    Since forever, no Provincial Party has “addressed” my needs.

    Joe Clark was the last Fed to “address” my needs. 1980. 45 years ago. Lost, Party destroyed, Reform.

    And I am a white, old, male, settler living on unceeded hən̓q̓əmin̓əm lands.

    I vote for the people who will either keep things the same, or make them slightly better and against the people who will fuck it all up.

  79. 79.

    Martin

    @Glory b: The constitution is not the theory of government, it’s the rules of government. Surely we’ve seen how the interpretation of the constitution has changed as the theory of government has changed. Indeed how the theory of government has changed the constitution itself 27 times. This is a trite and losing answer.

    While restricting the ability to vote is a problem, it’s not why 35% of the public isn’t voting – you’re making an excuse. It doesn’t explain the generational change in voting. It doesn’t explain why states with stronger voting rights don’t have significantly higher turn out than states that don’t. You have to give voters a reason to vote. And both parties have a tendency to set that up as a threat rather than an incentive.

  80. 80.

    Jay

    @Glory b:

    Jeff Tiedrich, pre November 2024, had a column up entitled “We Got This”, laying out that the Harris/Waltz Campaign were sure of winning.

    That was the “thing” going in, Blue Wave.

    Did not happen.

  81. 81.

    Melancholy Jaques

    @Jay:

    Pretty good list of grief & lame excuses. Voters have agency. Not voting is a vote of sorts, that is, a vote for whatever happens. If a person did not vote against Trump, then they were at the very least okay with Trump.

    They knew he was a corrupt, lying bigot, adjudicated sex assailant, convicted of financial fraud, who incited a mob to attack the Congress in an attempt to overthrow democracy in America. And they did not have a problem with any of that. Fuck those people.

  82. 82.

    Martin

    @Jay: That’s great. But a lot of people are falling behind whether it’s Dems or the GOP running the show and they need to see more, because they’re dying under the idea of keeping things the same. Why do you think that POC and the LGBTQ population have been so critical of the Democratic Party so frequently – because they supported the party with the NEED for things to get better, only to have to settle for them not getting worse. You think the trans community is okay with Gavin Newsom right now, who can probably be trusted to maintain the status quo? Pretty fucking sure they’re not okay with that.

  83. 83.

    Princess

    @Jay: I gotta say, though he wears a liberal jacket, Mark Carney is as much of a Red Tory as any politician I’ve ever seen. He’s like the second coming of Robert Stanfeild and Joe Clark.

  84. 84.

    Jay

    @Melancholy Jaques:

    Sadly, most knew him from “The Apprentice”.

    When I was at Raider Hansen, I was taking a Zoom course at the head office, by a guy out of Alabama, ( so, 5 am start) on how to calibrate, diagnose and repair Personal Toxic Gas Monitors.

    Wound up that my breaks, lunch, lined up with the Admin breaks for coffee. Got to talk with the staff, and it was just after Edolf bought twitter. I said how it would go.

    A few less than months later, they emailed me with “how did you know?”.

  85. 85.

    Ksmiami06

    @Martin: we just need to update FDR but broaden who it applies to: a fair deal and the ability to rise while being left to your own pursuit of happiness is pretty appealing.

  86. 86.

    Jackie

    @Melancholy Jaques:

    They knew he was a corrupt, lying bigot, adjudicated sex assailant, convicted of financial fraud, who incited a mob to attack the Congress in an attempt to overthrow democracy in America. And they did not have a problem with any of that. Fuck those people.

    Yes.

  87. 87.

    Sally

    @Martin: I think the Dems did address that. Tim Walz said you mightn’t be interested in politics but politics is interested in you. Take for granted the safe food you eat – politics delivers that. Take for granted the internet, the roads, the safe meds you take, the weather forecast, the safe factories you work in, the light switch working, the money in your bank account. All that and more delivered by politics. I can’t abide people who don’t vote, or at least try to.

  88. 88.

    Jay

    @Martin:

    I vote, and have voted since the 1980’s for the “things not getting worse Party” in my riding. Never not voting. It’s not rocket science.

  89. 89.

    Jay

    @Princess:

    Yup, but the Lib in my Riding is a joke, the Green is nothing, the Dipper is an incumbent, and while not great,……………….

    Whom ever can take this riding, other than the Con, get’s my vote.

  90. 90.

    frosty

    @Jay: ​Hmmm. At our age, the bathroom schedule could be an issue LOL. Thanks for the offer but we’ll probably need something different.​

  93. 93.

    Jay

    @frosty:

    There are gaps, I am also old.

    It’s more showers than toilet.

    No 2 hour baths with candles and music.

    That’s what the group affirmation meetings are for.

  95. 95.

    frosty

    @Jay: Showers? We’ve been minimizing gray water in the trailer while camping with no hookups. We don’t need no steenking showers!

    Oops, may not have phrased that quite right!

  96. 96.

    Jay

    @frosty: Sponge bath?

    Did 4 years of that. Unhoused.

    Luckily it’s BC, we have water, not far from a river or creek, but the water is cold.

  97. 97.

    PatD

    @Jay: Always good to refresh on history but it’s utterly unrelated to the point I was making. I’ve never justified or would make excuses for our past. So maybe don’t put words in my mouth.

  98. 98.

    Jackie

    Heh! “I rebuke you in the name of Jesus!”

    NOTUS is reporting that emotions are running high in Republican meetings over a GOP budget threatening to add up to $5.8 trillion to the nation’s deficit and potentially raise the nation’s debt to 214% of gross domestic product (GDP) by 2054.

    Republicans typically run on lowering national debt and the deficit under Democratic administrations, and a few of them are apparently having a difficult time switching gears for President Donald Trump, who also significantly raised the deficit under his last administration.

    House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) met in a closed-door meeting with House Republicans on Tuesday, with a handful of lawmakers pressing Johnson to conference the House and Senate Republican budgets. Johnson allegedly opposes a conference because he is in a hurry to pass the budget. Johnson hopes to fast-track the budget through the Senate’s “reconciliation” process, in which budget-related legislation can pass with a simple 51-vote majority.

    Parts of the budget, according to NOTUS, include an unpopular executive action agenda that halts funding for many public services and investments while hollowing out and politicizing civil service divisions. In addition, it includes sweeping tariffs that the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities claims will “cost low- and moderate-income families hundreds if not thousands of dollars, more than offsetting whatever modest tax cuts they may receive from tax legislation.”

    The rising tension between GOP members over the controversial budget and the recent battle over a petition allowing new mothers to vote by proxy is prompting Republican infighting. At one point,  Rep. W. Gregory Steube (R-Fla.) called Speaker Johnson a liar and said, “I rebuke you in the name of Jesus!”

    AMEN!!!

  100. 100.

    Jay

    @PatD:

    Yeah, you missed it entirely.

    El Salvador’s current government is Reichwing, supported by the “War on Drugs”, billions of  US dollars.

    No different than the past, just swap “drugs and gangs” for “Communists”.

    The actual people there, have memory. The US doesn’t.

  102. 102.

    PatD

    @Jay: No, you missed it. I don’t disagree with a damn thing you said except that none of it is particularly relevant to them accepting US citizens and residents in their prisons in exchange for money in 2025.

  103. 103.

    Glory b

    @Martin: Huh? Americans did better under Buden than they had in decades, with more of the benefits going to lower income and younger voters.

    So, if voters are rational thinkers, why did they turn against him so decisively?

  104. 104.

    Interesting Name Goes Here

    @Martin: I’m sorry, but if you have to be given a reason to vote in the year 2025, you have deep issues no one, not even Jesus Christ Himself, will ever be able to fix.  If you’re “looking for a reason to vote”, you are either apathetic to an absurd degree or you’re unwilling to stand for what you want to vote for because it’s screwed up beyond all known levels of morality.

  106. 106.

    Jay

    @PatD:

    It’s a Reich wing Government you put into power, no different than supplying Pinochet with helicopters to throw people out of.

    Too bad, so sad, they might be “Mercan citizens.

    Actions have consequences.

  107. 107.

    Jay

    @Glory b:

    The average ‘Mercan is functionally illiterate, reading to a Grade 4 level.

    The average ‘Mercan tests at 97 on an IQ test, globally rated as “cognitive impaired”, the old non PC term is “retard”.

  109. 109.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Jay:

    Come on, Jay. You know better than that. You know as well as I do that the vast majority of the people that the Trump admin has and will try to send to the El Salvadoran gulag had nothing to do with that. The people they will want to disappear are the most vulnerable and/or politically opposed to what you’re talking about. That’s not fair to them, like Abrego Garcia.

    PatD was referring to the El Salvadoran government

  110. 110.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @frosty:

    You’re welcome lol, but honestly I probably should cut back on that. You never know what crazy you’re talking to these days

  111. 111.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Matt McIrvin:

    One 300-kiloton warhead could reduce my whole state to an irrelevancy.

    I have my doubts that even this crew would use nuclear weapons on US soil

  112. 112.

    Timill

    @Glory b: They didn’t. They decided that while they (all races) could support a white guy, they couldn’t support a black lady. So they stayed home, and we are where we are.

  115. 115.

    Martin

    Trump said he’d raise tariffs on pharmaceuticals, targeting Indian made generics at the Republican meeting today.

    Consider buying up a supply now as we’d likely get shortages around the time it’s implemented.

    He’s also threatening a 100% tariff on TSMC, which is kind of odd since they don’t really sell anything.

  116. 116.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    @Jay:

    Look, I can condemn what the US government has done in the past and still doing as well as what the El Salvadoran government is doing by accepting US citizens and residents unlawfully renditioned to their gulag. I am under no illusions the current US administration are the “good” guys.

    ETA: We’re in agreement about the awful US policies wrt to Central and South America that has created right-wing governments like the one in El Salvador. That still doesn’t make what El Salvador is doing okay or mean that those sent to their prisons “deserved” it. Innocent people, meaning people that are not apart of the establishment shaping that policy at the highest echelons of power especially, should not pay for the sins of America’s foreign policy

  117. 117.

    RevRick

    @Jay: The US has had poor turnout in Presidential elections since 1904. From 1840-1900, we routinely had over 70% of the eligible voters turnout, except for 1852, when it was only 69.6%. Following Progressive voting reforms, it fell from 73.2% in 1900 to 65.2% in 1904, and has only been greater than 1904 in 1908 and in 2020. 2024 is tied for fourth highest turnout % with 1960 at 63.5%. 1964 was just 0.1% less.

    The worst turnouts were 1924 at 48.9%, 1920 at 49.2%, and 1996 at 49.8%

  119. 119.

    Jay

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):

    meaning people that are not apart of the establishment shaping that policy at the highest echelons of power especially, should not pay for the sins of America’s foreign policy

    Couple of hundreds of of millions. mostly dead. More to come.
    Yes, they died to pay for your sins.

  120. 120.

    YY_Sima Qian

    A dangerous moment for the world:

    rick waters@watersrick

    There is little chance we will see a Trump-Xi call anytime soon. This has implications beyond trade – the longer the two sides go without channels, the more miscalculation risks grow.

    Many Chinese have a misplaced confidence that senior US military channels will be used proactively if misunderstandings arise, as occurred in the fall of 2020. They appear to underestimate the political repercussions of former CJCS Milley’s decision to do so.

    I am also starting to wonder if the Chinese economic team would be to answer a call from US counterparts if financial risks emerged as a result of the trade war. Probably. But would they do anything to help

    Bill Bishop’s take: “I do not remember ever being this pessimistic… we are in an even worse place (than 2019) with no obvious off-ramps or even desire to walk things back. (Trade) is the linchpin… and as it breaks we should expect other areas to see more stress.

    A quiet backchannel would be a good first step to ensuring a trade war stays just that.

    Rick Waters was the point person on the PRC at the State Department during the Biden Administration. Of course, the Biden team also pursued a strategy of little substantive communication w/ the PRC for the 1st 2 years, preferring to “shape the environment” in which to pressure the PRC, instead. That did not change until the last year of Biden’s Presidency, w/ the spy balloon fiasco delaying things for about 6 months.

  122. 122.

    YY_Sima Qian

    Trump totally making it tenable in their domestic political environments for the foreign negotiators (if any) to make concessions (video through the link):

    Jeffrey J. Hall @mrjeffu

    President Trump on the tariffs: “These countries are calling me, kissing my ass, they are dying to make a [trade] deal…’please please sir let me make a deal, I’ll do anything, I’ll do anything sir.'” Japan is one of the countries that recently called.

    Meanwhile, TechBros & FinanceBros on X are having fever dreams about Trump coercing everyone in line (& committing economic seppuku in so doing) to isolate the PRC, & thereby preserving the US hegemony in perpetuity, & suggesting that the other countries will reluctantly submit because there is no alternative to US hegemony.

    The hyper-financialization of the US economy & the deeply engrained American Exceptionalism have unmoored people’s brains from the physical reality.

  124. 124.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Martin: I assume assessing 100% tariff on any TSMC made content in any product imported into the US. Not sure if this is on top if any import tariff already assessed.

    Contra the TechBros & FinanceBros, I don’t think there is any thought out (let alone well thought out) plans or strategies or conspiracies here. It is just policymaking by vibes.

    Different people around Trump may also be trying to accomplish different objectives w/ the global trade war (screen caps through the link):

    Joe Weisenthal@TheStalwart

    THE WORST DEFENSE OF THE TRUMP TARIFFS In today’s Odd Lots newsletter, I wrote about how there are so many different arguments being put forth to explain or defend the tariffs. But the stuff about countering China’s strategic tech dominance has to be the most egregiously bad.

    And read @tracyalloway on how 2025 is almost precisely the opposite of 2008.
    https://bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2025-04-08/the-worst-defense-of-trump-s-tariffs?srnd=phx-oddlots

  125. 125.

    Martin

    @YY_Sima Qian: The hyper-financialization of the US economy & the deeply engrained American Exceptionalism have unmoored people’s brains from the physical reality.

    That’s been true for quite some time.

  126. 126.

    YY_Sima Qian

    Van Jackson’s unifying theory for the global trade war MAGA is currently waging:

    Part II: A “Hard Break” with China is Far-Right Accelerationism
    The idea of decoupling from China forsakes democracy. For the far right, that’s the point
    UN-DIPLOMATIC
    FEB 06, 2024 ∙ PAID
    …
    In this post, I’m focusing more squarely on the far-right accelerationist logic of decoupling.
    There are two aspects to this—1) the amplification of militarism and the increased likelihood of war that follows from a “hard break,” and 2) the consolidation of reactionary political power that “hard break” policies facilitate. And, of course, war and far-right power consolidation feed each other.
    …
    Without economic entanglements to temper nationalist fervor and discipline hawkish policy constituencies (in both the US and East Asia), the pressures for war become much harder to hold back. And the harder (more abrupt) the break from China, the greater the pressures toward war.
    For war-obsessed strategists and politicos, that is all as it should be—decoupling is part of war preparation. They implicitly discount the pacifying effects of economic interpenetration, and explicitly prioritize war optimization over war prevention.
    …
    So a “hard break” with China is either a self-fulfilling prophecy of the supposed inevitability of war, or it increases the likelihood of war by feeding the momentum that takes us through the following sequence:
    The militarist games nations play —>Enduring rivalries that justify those games—>Crises as tests of our performance in those games—>War.
    …
    For military fatalists, who see war with China as inevitable, the prospect of militarized violence is no reason to avoid the most dramatic version of economic war. Best to act now—rip American firms out of China and rip Chinese capital out of American business.
    Curiously, this is not only precisely the same position that Steve Bannon types have adopted. The Steve Bannon types—who very openly understand the struggle with China in civilizational terms—were the original champions of this “hard-break” argument. Why might that be?
    …
    Containment toward China is already happening—it’s just a form of containment focused on the military balance of power and mediated by the realities of a deeply interconnected world that relies on Chinese production and markets. Given the context of China’s centrality to Asia and America’s diminished share in Asian economic life, Washington is doing rational containment, which is to say containment circumscribed by the constraints of our own vulnerabilities and power limitations.
    Hard-break decoupling, by contrast, is sharp, unmediated containment—it hurdles us immediately toward both a Great Depression and militarized conflict. The hard-break argument is thus asking us to do something utterly irrational, unless war-inevitability is your guide…in which case you are not rational.
    …
    The far right wants decoupling for at least three reasons.
    First, a hard break is intrinsic to threat-mongering about China, and the China threat is narrative glue for far-right politics.
    …
    Second, the economic consequences of decoupling favor their political project.
    …
    Desperate people are more vulnerable to the demagoguery of racial, religious, and patriotic animus. An external enemy is the ultimate reason to either not redistribute wealth and political rights at home, or to redistribute them to some at the expense of others. The J.D. Vance-, Bannon-type fascists would have a Herrenvolk social democracy—that is, an economic democracy for the privileged race and gender (and perhaps religion) that denies the franchise to all others.
    Third, economic downturns are bad for labor, and economic immiseration makes it harder for workers to mobilize for economic democracy—they’re too busy figuring out how to survive.
    …
    We need to re-embed policy conversations in their political context. That’s not a call to “politicize” policy arguments; it’s a call for more complete analysis, by recognizing the political consequences of policy arguments. Who benefits from what is proposed, who must be harmed by it, and who must be exposed to the risk of harm?
    In foreign policy, we never—and I mean NEVER—ask such questions. And that’s to our collective shame. It’s not just that we’re never going to get to a better, fairer world without asking such questions. It’s also that our policy analysis is always going to be somewhat impoverished if it doesn’t take seriously the distributional consequences (of power, of wealth, and of violence) of policy choices.
    That call to consider the political aspects of policy is a general call, but as I’ve tried to argue above, it’s an urgent one when it comes to the politics of China policy and the far right.
    …

  127. 127.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Martin: Yes, a big part of the reason we are where we are. Deeply engrained racism, chauvinism, xenophobia, toxic masculinity, & money worship on the part of large segments of the citizenry is the other big part.

  128. 128.

    Martin

    @YY_Sima Qian: Man, this is really overthinking it too much. Here’s my unifying theory for the global trade war, from Trumps own mouth:

    I’m telling you these countries are calling us up, kissing my ass.

    This is simply a dominance play and has nothing to do with economics whatsoever. Putin doesn’t get tariffs because Trump isn’t looking for dominance over Putin. China gets extra tariffs because Trump is looking for dominance over Xi.

    This looks like a complex situation not because the individual motives are complex, but because Trumps motives are so transparent and easy to appease, that he is surrounded by people that have their own motives – Musk to enact his RAGE philosophy, Navarro for vengeance against his critics, Putin to divide the west. These all operate independently, often in contradiction, and so finding an overarching theory that accommodates all of these requires wild contortions whereas the individual elements are very simple.

    There aren’t a lot of complex politics in kindergarten. Billy wants to make a house out of the blocks. Mary wants to make a bridge out of the blocks. Bobby wants Mary to play catch. Hitting and yelling results, but there is no political state of the room, just impulsive children who haven’t learned how to share yet. We just can’t imagine the most powerful nation on earth operates that way, so we fill in complicated theories. Look at the tariff rollout – nonsensical formula, tariffs on entities with no people, contradictory reasons. There is no sense here. The whole thing is the product of 30 minutes of actual effort at most. It’s just a gun that can be pointed without care or concern of the consequences.

  129. 129.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Martin: I think what you describe is accurate for Trump, Navarro, Musk & Putin, but not Vance, Thiel & the people behind Project 2025.

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