Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

Shut up, hissy kitty!

This blog will pay for itself.

I swear, each month of 2025 will have its own history degree.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

A norm that restrains only one side really is not a norm – it is a trap.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

We still have time to mess this up!

Second rate reporter says what?

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

If rights aren’t universal, they are privilege, not rights.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

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

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Our messy unity will be our strength.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

Sometimes the world just tells you your cat is here.

Since we are repeating ourselves, let me just say fuck that.

Donald Trump found guilty as fuck – May 30, 2024!

… gradually, and then suddenly.

There are a lot more evil idiots than evil geniuses.

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  • AM in NC
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    146Comments

    1. 1.

      Martin

      Bangs on drum louder.

      The trade deficit with China in the current tariff war is overshadowing another important shortfall — our country’s education deficit with China.
      As the Trump administration threatens American universities, guts crucial research programs, slashes education spending and threatens to kill the Department of Education, Chinese leaders are steaming ahead to improve their vast nation’s education standards and outcomes. And China is doing this with a laserlike focus on programs around science, technology, industrial innovation and AI

      I worked with a number of Chinese universities on a few initiatives and they generally fell apart because American universities (including mine) could not focus on the task and make strides sufficiently quickly. They had a constant sense of urgency.

      Reply
    2. 2.

      WaterGirl

      @Martin:

      Even the liberal New York Times.

      Even the Republican ass-kissing New York Times

      Where are the serious people in the Republican party?

      Reply
    8. 8.

      Martin

      @WaterGirl: More than the minorities.

      The salient fact of American politics is that there are fifty to seventy million voters each of whom will volunteer to live, with his family, in a cardboard box under an overpass, and cook sparrows on an old curtain rod, if someone would only guarantee that the black, gay, Hispanic, liberal, whatever, in the next box over doesn’t even have a curtain rod, or a sparrow to put on it.

      Reply
    11. 11.

      Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

      @Baud:

      One of the morons’ signs: “Trump 2028”

      Literally unconstitutional.

      But these are probably the same people who have “We the People” decals on their trucks

      Reply
    15. 15.

      Nukular Biskits

      Did anyone attend any protests today?

      There was supposed to be another one in Gulfport today but I was trying to wrap up the play center project (adding a sand box) so I didn’t go.

      Reply
    18. 18.

      Nukular Biskits

      @arrieve @Martin:

      From a reply on Bluesky about the one in Gulfport:

      We were at the Gulfport protest. It was well attended and the crowd heard a strong speech from Ty Pinkins.

      Ty Pinkins ran against Roger Wicker for the US Senate seat.  He’s now runing against Cindy Hyde-Smith.

      Reply
    19. 19.

      Old Dan and Little Ann

      I took my soon to be 10 yo daughter to her 1st MLB game on Thursday in Pittsburgh.  60 degrees and not a cloud in the sky.  We sat high above straight back from home plate. What a view!  I could not hide my excitement and was talking to the usher who wiped our seats.  He found us a few innings later and gave my daughter a ball from BP.  She was ecstatic.  It was THE perfect day.  Oneil Cruz hit a lead off homer in the top of the 1st and that’s all she wrote. Pirates beat the Nationals 1-0.  I love baseball.

      Reply
    20. 20.

      brendancalling

      @Nukular Biskits: there was one in Philly, but I couldn’t make it, too many errands. On my way home from the dispensary—walking distance of PATCO—I saw several people coming back from the city, carrying signs. So that’s hopefully a good omen.

      Dropped off my Martin for a partial fret job (no work needed above the 7th, I’m a rhythm player). $300 or so for what’s essentially 7 strips of wire (that require a LOT of specialized skill to remove and replace).

      Reply
    21. 21.

      sab

      I didn’t go to our protest in my Akron city because a rainy side of a bigger thunderstorm rolled through and the wind was howling and the heavy rain was blowing sideways. I am an old.

      All our local media (newspapers and our cable company)  did cover that these protests were happening ahead of time, with locations. Big change from previous protests over the years.

      Reply
    22. 22.

      AM in NC

      @Nukular Biskits:  I was at the rally in Durham, NC and there were around 1,000 people there.  Lots of supportive honking from people driving by, and good local news coverage (of both Durham and Raleigh – same media market).  I might send photos of some of the signage to Water Girl.

      My personal highlight was starting the chant:

      No kings, No Nazis.  MAGAs got to go.

      After I couldn’t listen to “Tell me what Democracy Looks like? This is What Democracy looks like” one more time.

      Reply
    23. 23.

      JoyceH

      Well, that’s promising. Apparently yesterday a couple buses left the detention facility in Texas – and then turned around and returned. It does sound like the administration isn’t yet willing to openly violate a Supreme Court order.

      Reply
    24. 24.

      trollhattan

      @AM in NC:

      Have to believe NC Dems have a decent ground game. When I was there election week I howled at the Trump-Musk and JD billboards with their giant mugshots and labeled “WEIRDO.”

      Didn’t see anything like that in California.

      Reply
    25. 25.

      Baud

      @AM in NC:

      No kings, No Nazis. MAGAs got to go.

       

      Jesus Christ. That doesn’t even rhyme!

      After I couldn’t listen to “Tell me what Democracy Looks like? This is What Democracy looks like” one more time.

      Same. I’m not going to be wet blanket except in quiet rooms, but to me, democracy looks like turning out to vote.

      But really glad to hear about the turnout.

      Reply
    27. 27.

      Mike in Pasadena

      About five hundred people with lots of excellent signs/posters protested a block from Pasadena,CA City Hall on Colorado Blvd. No tump supporters, no counterprotest. 

      Best poster I saw featured trump’s mugshot behind bars with the words Make America Great Again underneath him.

      Reply
    32. 32.

      cmorenc

      @AM in NC: If large NC rallies start spreading from blue Raleigh to lighter blue wilson to reddish goldsboro and kinston, it will be a sign the resistance is eating into disaffected voters who leaned Trump in 2024.

      Reply
    34. 34.

      HopefullyNotcassandra

      @Martin: Perhaps.
      nonetheless, we, Americans, always crush everybody else on the ability to think outside of the box.

      I sorely hope this president is not screwing with that skill which I believe is absolutely crucial to getting humanity alive to experience the next century

      I would also like to note that this regime is now saying that ridiculous letter it send Harvard was “not authorized”.
      Despite this claim, Harvard says the White House is increasing its attacks

      https://www.reuters.com/world/us/harvard-says-trump-administration-doubled-down-after-sending-letter-reported-2025-04-19/

      Utter and complete silly persons occupy our highest executive offices.

      Reply
    36. 36.

      lowtechcyclist

      @Mike in Pasadena:

      I think we had close to a thousand today in Annapolis. Favorite sign: “Damn right we’re snowflakes. Winter is coming.”

      My wife says she heard that they had 100-150 protesters in LaPlata. That won’t mean much to many of you, but that’s seriously red territory in southern Maryland.

      Reply
    38. 38.

      SpaceUnit

      Speaking of sports, one of the websites I check out every couple of days is a joint called Pro Football Talk.  It’s a blog run by a guy named Mike Florio for NBC.  Mike Florio has always made a point of never discussing politics, but I know from the days when comments were allowed that his audience is a lot of dudebros with a good dose of MAGA mixed in.  Today Florio published a full throated condemnation of the trump administration.  And he doesn’t pull any punches.

      Don’t know what the suits at NBC’s corporate office are going to think but screw ’em.  Good on ya, Florio:

      A Quick Break From Football.

      Don’t bother watching the embedded video.  It’s not about politics.  It’s just Mike Florio coming to his senses that Aaron Rogers sucks and that Pittsburgh does’t want anything to do with him.  Which I’ve been saying all along.

      Reply
    39. 39.

      Matt McIrvin

      @HopefullyNotcassandra:

      nonetheless, we, Americans, always crush everybody else on the ability to think outside of the box.

      Yes, well, that’s how we elected Trump twice, so maybe it’s not such a great skill.

      Reply
    40. 40.

      Another Scott

      @HopefullyNotcassandra: Thanks for the pointer.

      I don’t see that the DNC itself should be doing those things she advocates, many of which make lot of sense, and many of which are probably already happening, but the Democratic Party needs to be seen as being on the side of those who are doing those things.

      Thanks again.

      Best wishes,
      Scott.

      Reply
    41. 41.

      AM in NC

      @cmorenc:  Exactly.  I think Hillsborough may have had a rally. They did on President’s day to protest the attempted theft of the NCSC seat.

      Go Mebane! Go Tarrboro! Go Silva! Go Dunn!

      Reply
    42. 42.

      Mike in Pasadena

      @Mike in Pasadena: I’m not good estimating crowd size. There could have been many more than 500.

      trump proposed to limit birthright citizenship to people born to parents who are both citizens at time of birth. Barron trump was born March 20, 2006. Melania was naturalized a US citizen on July 28, 2006. So, it’s off to Slovenia or El Salvador for Barron, I guess. Sauce for the gander, sauce for Barron. Or something.

      Reply
    44. 44.

      Matt McIrvin

      @Baud:

      Same. I’m not going to be wet blanket except in quiet rooms, but to me, democracy looks like turning out to vote.

      Voting’s just part of it! Protest is part of it too. It’s a system that needs to extend far beyond elections. Our resident standing-on-bus-PA-dude had that chant going for a little while back on April 5.

      Reply
    45. 45.

      Baud

      @Matt McIrvin:

      Voting’s just part of it! Protest is part of it too. It’s a system that needs to extend far beyond elections.

       
      I just want more people to extend it to voting. We don’t chant at election time..

      Reply
    46. 46.

      HopefullyNotcassandra

      @Matt McIrvin: I don’t think that was outside of the box thinking.  It certainly felt like this president got an absurd amount of assists from our MSM.   At least, those reporters are not bored anymore.

      Reply
    49. 49.

      Another Scott

      @HopefullyNotcassandra: People have different buttons.  (I give monthly to the DNC, DLC, DCCC, DSCC and other groups.)

      Lots of us, and lots of politicos, have argued that Democrats can’t just campaign 3 months before an election; Democrats must have a 50 State Strategy; Democrats must run everywhere; Democrats need new blood and more young people; Democrats must do more on new media; etc.

      All that stuff takes money.

      As long as we don’t have significant public funding of elections, then those of us who can must put up with the annoying letters and texts and calls from unknown numbers and e-mails and do what we can to make sure that our party can reach people where they are.

      Cheney surely understands this.  I assume her complaining about being asked for another $15 was mostly a literary trick to get people to read the rest.  ;-)

      My $0.02.

      Thanks.

      Best wishes,
      Scott.

      Reply
    51. 51.

      Nukular Biskits

      @Baud:

      Same. I’m not going to be wet blanket except in quiet rooms, but to me, democracy looks like turning out to vote.

      Point well taken, but democracy is far more than voting, although I’d agree it’s the most important.

      Reply
    53. 53.

      Phylllis

      @Old Dan and Little Ann: The Pirates spring train in my hometown. I’m a diehard Braves fan, but the Bucs have a special place in my heart. I’d love to go to a game at PNC. What a great memory for you and your daughter.

      Reply
    55. 55.

      MoCaAce

      @Baud: what percentage of protesters would you estimate get out and vote… I would guess upwards of 90%. So yeah, get em fired up and protesting. The voting will come.

      Reply
    57. 57.

      HopefullyNotcassandra

      @Another Scott: True. Yet, would it not be nice to get a different sort of text?  A text offering action?

      I am still ruminating on what Liz Cheney wrote.  I do agree with her that we need to welcome any and all defectors.  Otherwise, I suppose I am dithering.

      Reply
    59. 59.

      JaySinWA

      @WaterGirl:

      How much power will these power-crazy people have when the country is in ruins?

      As long as it is more than we have, they will think they have won.

      Reply
    63. 63.

      Sure Lurkalot

      @Steve LaBonne:

      It is better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.

      Take that up with Achilles (The Odyssey):

      “By god, I’d rather slave on earth for another man—
      some dirt-poor tenant farmer who scrapes to keep alive—
      than rule down here over all the breathless dead.”

      Reply
    67. 67.

      HopefullyNotcassandra

      @Baud: Western Kansas?  That would be especially meaningful.

      This president appears to want to incinerate rural America.  He has already royally screwed farmers (again) twice and he has not been in office four months.  The proposed Medicaid cuts will be the final nail in the coffin in what remains of our rural hospitals.  He slashed the federal jobs that help rural America keep functioning.  He even killed our federal investigations into why our pollinators are dying.

      Reply
    69. 69.

      JaySinWA

      @JaySinWA: missed my edit window. I see I was kind of late in response, and I am kind of wrong in my wording. They will never think that they have “won”, maybe that they are winning, but there is no end state of victory, happiness or satisfaction for them. Just like there is no amount of money that will sate the greedy billionaires.

      Reply
    70. 70.

      WTFGhost

      @HopefullyNotcassandra: So long as it’s not “you’re still a Nazi? That’s FINE!” I’m okay with not harshing on stupid people, or mildly evil people, or both stupid, and mildly evil people, because, geez, what else would you do all day, amiright?

      Still, me, I’m a grown-ass adult, and if I had been wrong about global warming, I would be ashamed to call myself an adult, if I couldn’t say “yeah, I was wrong about global warming, now, I’m on your side.”

      So I don’t see some need to be too welcoming. If some former asshole comes in, saying s/he’s a believer in global warming, used to be wrong, but now understands, well, I’m mostly done.

      I’m not going to sit there and make them eat feces all night over having been wrong, but I do expect them to come bearing apologies for, e.g., saying “Democrats are trying to destroy this country, so the Chinese Communist Party can take over the world, because they’re evil and unpatriotic!” because, dude, that’s not respectful disagreement and debate, and never was. And, I mean, if a person is too ashamed to own their past, well, they  get to sit at the kiddie table until they man or woman up, and take responsibility.

      Kiddie table sitters are certainly welcome… and no one harshes on them, because they’re just kids.

      Reply
    71. 71.

      Ruckus

      One of the big problems of this shitty person in the WH is that he seems to delight more in screwing over everyone else – with the help of the world’s richest asshole than he does in anything else in the universe. The rest of us go on with breathing in and out, mostly not fucking over others and just living a life. But these fuckers think that in a supposedly free country that they are free to fuck over every other human. And that ain’t the point of this country, never has been, and never should be.

      How do we fix this? Because I’m an OLD FART and I may have 20-25 years left, or days. None of us know but why should we have leaders who don’t give a rats ass about any of us? And BTW that is ANYTHING BUT LEADERSHIP. What it is – is absolute pompous arrogance. And it’s not just the normal working class that is going to suffer. Their bullshit could easily destroy this country. Now the overly wealthy can leave but the vast majority cannot, and that includes people that supported dumbshit and his buddy. I earned what I get from Social Security by paying into it for 60 years. It’s not a freebee. It is earned by all of us that worked.

      Reply
    74. 74.

      JaySinWA

      @Ruckus: I suspect he takes more pleasure from exacting revenge than just general mayhem.

      Conan (Arnold Schwarzenegger): “To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women!”

      Anyone hurt along the way is not so much collateral damage as they are bonus points.

      Reply
    76. 76.

      West of the Rockies

      @SpaceUnit:

      I see a quote today that “Aaron Rodgers is undecided on his future…”

      Hmmm… maybe the future is already decided on Aaron Rodgers (and it ain’t promising).

      Reply
    79. 79.

      Gretchen

      @Martin: NYU has a Shanghai campus. Chinese students would be insane to start an education here now.
      Mid range state universities like U Kansas rely on international students to pay out of state tuition to help subsidize in state students, since legislatures don’t think it’s worthwhile to fund their own children’s education.

      Reply
    83. 83.

      dnfree

      @Baud: My congressman is Raja Krishnamoorthi.  Whenever he posts on Facebook about any political issue, however anodyne, there are several commenters who pop up to tell him to go back to India, he’s an evil Hindu.

      Reply
    84. 84.

      Nukular Biskits

      Sorry. Gotta rant for a second.

      MS’s State Auditor, Shad White, is arguably MS’s biggest dick (and that’s saying a lot) and Elon Musk’s # fanboi in the Magnolia State. He has for months cheered DOGE and tried to make the case he is MS’s version of Musk running “MOGE”, identifying “wasteful spending” (which generally anything that doesn’t align with his ideological beliefs).

      Anyway, he was on Shitter today asking for input as to whether he should get a vanity license plate that says “MOGE” or one that says “MS Musk”. Yes, seriously.

      That little asshole is cheering on unbelievable suffering and death via Musk and DOGE, all because he’s got the Governor’s mansion in his sights come 2027.  And by “unbelievable suffering and death via Musk and DOGE”, I mean shit like this:

      Could polio be poised for a comeback?

      The world is so close to wiping out polio. But in 2025, there are signs that the virus is not quite ready to go the way of smallpox — the only disease eradicated by humans.

      Two countries are seeing an increase in cases caused by the wild polio virus, which can cause paralysis and even death, particularly in infants and young children.

      And the cuts in USAID contracts that support polio vaccination raise concern that other countries will see a resurgence as well.

      NYT: Trump’s Aid Cuts Hit the Hungry in a City of Shellfire and Starvation

      The children died one after the other. Twelve acutely malnourished infants living in one corner of Sudan’s war-ravaged capital, Khartoum.
      Abdo, an 18-month-old boy, had been rushed to a clinic by his mother as he was dying. His ribs protruded from his withered body. The next day, a doctor laid him out on a blanket with a teddy bear motif, his eyes closed.
      Like the other 11 children, Abdo starved to death in the weeks after President Trump froze all U.S. foreign assistance, said local aid workers and a doctor. American-funded soup kitchens in Sudan, including the one near Abdo’s house, had been the only lifelines for tens of thousands of people besieged by fighting.

      These people are fucking monsters.

      Reply
    87. 87.

      Jay

      @dnfree:

      That’s no surprise, the internet has been a vile swamp, where people can let their worst out.

      That’s why there are only a few places where I read the comments.

      Reply
    88. 88.

      comrade scotts agenda of rage

      @Miss Bianca: ​
       
      Just got back from Coors Field as the Nats are in town.

      Whoever thought it was smart to build an open air stadium here should be maimed. April baseball here sucks. Today it was 43, cloudy and friggin cold. And that after the snow postponement yesterday.

      And July/Aug games here are no fun either given climate change.

      Still, first game of the season for me with two more tomorrow, again, Nats are in town. So grateful I don’t give a shit about the Rockies because their owners suck and they’ve been run like a AAA club for close to 20 years now.

      Reply
    91. 91.

      Chetan Murthy

      I went to the 50501 rally/march today at SF’s Union Square.  It was a not-great location, and you couldn’t tell how big the crowd was.  I thought it was kinda small.  But then when they started marching, you realized it was a lot bigger than you thought.  So that was good.  Lotta great signs.  I remember this one:

      YASS QWEEN

      NO KINGS!

       

      Ha!

      Reply
    95. 95.

      Jackie

      @SpaceUnit:

      I have no idea why any team would want to bring that miserable and self-absorbed football princess into their locker room.

      Ticket sales?

      I’m no Rodgers fan – he’s a sicko. Remember RFK Jr contemplated offering him the VP slot when he was still running as independent! Tells ya everything right there.

      Reply
    96. 96.

      schrodingers_cat

      Just came back from dinner. Thanks to all the condolence messages in the morning thread. The friend who passed away got an MD after he finished his PhD in physics. He was one of my closest friend’s husband. A kind and gentle soul and whip smart. I miss him. We all used to go hiking together in the summers.

      Would it be okay if I send my friend a care package along with my condolences?

      Reply
    99. 99.

      Martin

      @HopefullyNotcassandra: Define ‘we as Americans’. The last 3 major technological advantages the US secured I can think of – nuclear weapons, spaceflight, and computers, were all accomplished with HUGE assists by immigrants. The who’s who of the Manhattan Project had large number of immigrants. The Apollo program was led by an immigrant (and Nazi), and the semiconductor revolution was also very heavily reliant on immigrants.

      The reason the US crushes everyone is we were always VERY fast to immigrate people with good ideas – even former enemies. And that meant we had the benefit of the entire planets educational system. We didn’t rely just on US born people attending US schools.

      But that’s a very different thing from manufacturing. That’s not a question of thinking outside the box or having the best idea. That’s a question of cranking out lots of skilled workers with specific skills. Why do you think every major semiconductor design comes out of the US (Apple, Intel, Nvidia, AMD, Qualcomm, Broadcom, etc.) but is manufactured elsewhere. We imported the good ideas, but can’t import the sheer volume of labor to implement it.

      Ideas are the easy part. Implementation is hard – and that’s where the US educational system breaks down. Yeah, we throw off fantastic PhD, but it’s the army of people with 2 year degrees, trades, etc. that are the problem, along with the failure to offer the training programs that align with the national goal. We’ve dumped billions into onshoring semiconductor manufacturing and there isn’t a single semiconductor technician program in the US at the associates or bachelors level. Like, c’mon people. I tried to build programs like that but there weren’t any federal or state grants to fund that endeavor, and they’re really expensive to build, so I never built one because there way no way to even break even on it.

      Reply
    102. 102.

      Phylllis

      @geg6: I spent a week in Pittsburgh in 2014 for a training & absolutely loved it. We were on the South Side & I got some great photos from the Duquesne Incline.

      Reply
    104. 104.

      Jackie

      @zhena gogolia:

      Inspired by Betty C. I think I’m going to get a NO KINGS IN AMERICA car magnet.

      Me, too. I live in the red part of blue WA. I wrote down BC’s oh so excellent reply to a MAGAt begging for a fight, so I can memorize and use when applicable. LOL!

      Reply
    105. 105.

      Another Scott

      @comrade scotts agenda of rage: A few decades ago a bunch of us from work went to see an early spring game at RFK Stadium in DC.  April 1993?  Pittsburgh vs Baltimore?  Something like that.

      Anyway, as I remember it was supposed to be 65F, so I went in a short-sleeve shirt and no jacket and thought nothing of it.

      The seats, though, were in some sort of wind tunnel!  It felt like there was a 30 mph wind blowing the whole time, so I practically froze to death!!

      It was a fun time, though.

      Live baseball in April can be challenging almost anywhere!  ;-)

      Best wishes,
      Scott.

      Reply
    109. 109.

      BlueGuitarist

      @Baud:

      We don’t chant at election time..

      Barack Obama and Edith S. Childs:
      Fired Up! Ready to Go!
      Is, imho, the best chant!  Evergreen.

      better than the chants at the protests I went to today, but was glad to have gone anyway.
      Lots of fired up people!
      Both demonstrations primarily had folks lined up on both sides of a main road. Lots of passersby; mostly positive, a few haters, and a guy who slowed down like he’d never seen anything like this before, with a puzzled expression, peered out the driver’s window at the signs, and then gave a thumbs up.

      Reply
    112. 112.

      Dorothy A. Winsor

      @Another Scott: Friend told me the story of the only baseball game his wife ever went to. It was an evening game but early in the year so it was chilly. And of course, the game went into extra innings. I mean 11, 12, 13 innings. His wife started saying she was cold and wanted to go home. He kept saying we can’t give up now. It was finally suspended at 1 or 2 am, to be resumed the next day. His wife never went to another game.

      Reply
    116. 116.

      MobiusKlein

      @Chetan Murthy: ​
       
      I was at the Civic Center protest earlier, didn’t do the Union Square one.
      The CC protest marched up to the tesla dealership, and joined a different ongoing protest there. Was smaller than the April 5th one, but still fairly big.

      Reply
    118. 118.

      BlueGuitarist

      @Chetan Murthy:

      nice!

      Some signs I saw

      Don’t be a chicken in a coup

      Eggs are so expensive because all the chickens are in congress

      (I prefer more focused on criticizing Trump, Musk, Republicans, but United front against fascism….)

      New today: a lot of signs re Due Process,

      didn’t see anything specifically referencing 250th anniversary of the American revolution.

      Reply
    120. 120.

      Chetan Murthy

      @Chetan Murthy: I should have added that there were a lot of signs about Mr. Abrego Garcia.  Probably more of those than about anything else.  Which, !good!  He’s why I went to the protest in the first place!

      Reply
    121. 121.

      FastEdD

      I got back from the weekly protests outside our Tesla showroom. A cop on a motorcycle pulled over a lady driving a Model Y right in front of us. Big cheers from the crowd! A couple driving a Toyota Bz4X was stopped at the stoplight in front of me, but they were honking and giving us the thumbs up and smiling. I started a chant, “BUSY FORKS! BUSY FORKS!” Sometimes protesting can be fun. I don’t know if we are changing anybody’s minds, but it is good to show the maggots we aren’t going away.

      Reply
    122. 122.

      caphilldcne

      @Dorothy A. Winsor: I once went to a ballgame in August in Candlestick Park. We had to leave after 3 innings and watched the end of the game from our hotel. Brutally windy and dropped into the 50s.

      Reply
    123. 123.

      MobiusKlein

      @Chetan Murthy: ​
       
      Driving around SF afterward, there are always tons of things going on in the City.
      Cherry Blossom festival in Japantown, Beach Volleyball at Ocean Beach, Ballet opening day, etc.
      I’m wondering when things get bad enough that the city gets seriously focused. We have a long way to go until we get serious normie participation.

      Reply
    124. 124.

      Martin

      @Gloria DryGarden: Restoring their cultural veto. Being able to make sure that gay culture stays in the closet, that black culture never seeps out of BET, that men return to being the default beneficiaries of everything, and that we never need to consider anyones religious liberty but evangelicals.

      That’s been the fight since Obama was elected. White christians are no longer the majority, and they want that back along with everything that goes along with it.

      That’s why the ‘vote against their interests’ arguments are so misplaced. Republicans have been telling us for ages they will forgo economic benefits for cultural ones. Why do we think that Mississippi, the state with the largest share of black residents, is the poorest state in the US. Economic benefits are routinely sacrificed there to hold onto a fragile white majority.

      It’s why devout Christians will support Trump, because the ends justify the means, and Trump is willing to restore the order they are desperate to see. They cannot conceive of an America that they aren’t the ruling class of because they’ve been marinating in the lie that the US was founded to be a white christian nation. If they lose that, they lose everything, and they’ll support the most horrible person in the world to get it.

      Reply
    128. 128.

      Timill

      @sab: Born 1942 IIRC, so may or may not have been OK under Donald’s plan.

      I think only Tiffany of his children would still be a citizen were it to be enacted retroactively.

      Reply
    130. 130.

      zhena gogolia

      @artem1s: Although I loved her in the J6 hearings and was happy that Kamala campaigned with her, I agree heartily with your sentiment about this latest выходка. Sorry, can’t think of an equivalent English term.

      Reply
    131. 131.

      lowtechcyclist

      @frosty:

      One year in the early 80s it snowed on Opening Day for the Orioles.

      In 1979, it snowed in DC (and presumably in Baltimore as well) on the morning of the first World Series game at Memorial Stadium.

      Reply
    136. 136.

      HopefullyNotcassandra

      @WTFGhost: I get the point.  I do see this differently.   

      A lot of the people supporting this regime have been lied to repeatedly, in some cases for most of their lives.  The lies are on their radio stations, Fox News and even their local tv stations.  The things otherwise sane, kind people have assured me are true (when they most certainly, demonstrably, are not) would shock you.  Disowning these lies is a bit like disowning their entire lives.
      I want to reach them with the truth and keep them standing in one piece.

      I truly wish I knew how to do this.  I don’t.  I keep looking.  Sending people facts just annoys them.  You start sounding a bit like a yapping dog.  Some call you liar, others brainwashed and finally a few say (rather funny really*) woke.

      Sometimes you do breakthrough and the sadness this brings is awful.  Nonetheless, we must do it.  The fear and anxiety the gop creates with these lies is quite actually killing our friends, neighbors and fellow citizens long before their time.  It destroys minds and limits lives.

      imho

      We all see the world through our own lived experience.

      * I mean does anyone truly want to sleepwalk through life?

      Reply
    137. 137.

      Another Scott

      @HopefullyNotcassandra:

      Eleanor Gordon-Smith’s Stop Being Reasonable is a series of essays on how people really change their minds about important things.

      GoodReads.com:

      What if you’re not who you think you are?

      What if you don’t really know the people closest to you?

      And what if your most deeply-held beliefs turn out to be…wrong?

      In Stop Being Reasonable, philosopher Eleanor Gordon-Smith tells gripping true stories that show the limits of human reason. Susie realises her husband harbours a terrible secret, Dylan leaves the cult he’s been raised in since birth, Alex discovers he can no longer return to his former identity after impersonating someone else on reality TV. All of them radically alter their beliefs about the things that matter most.

      What makes them change course? What does this say about our own beliefs? And, in an increasingly divided world, what does it teach us about how we might change the minds of others?

      It strikes me that she’s on to something there.

      Another kinda related book that I found to be thoughtful is Dannagal Godthwaite Young’s Irony and Outrage:

      Abstract

      This book explores the aesthetics, underlying logics, and histories of two seemingly distinct genres—liberal political satire and conservative opinion talk—making the case that they should be thought of as the logical extensions of the psychology of the left and right, respectively. One genre is guided by ambiguity, play, deliberation, and openness, while the other is guided by certainty, vigilance, instinct, and boundaries. While the audiences for Sean Hannity and John Oliver come from opposing political ideologies, both are high in political interest, knowledge, and engagement, and both lack faith in some of the United States’ core democratic institutions. This book illustrates how the roles these two genres play for their viewers are strikingly similar: galvanizing the opinion of the left or the right, mobilizing citizens around certain causes, and expressing a frustration with traditional news coverage while offering alternative sources of information and meaning. However, the book proposes that these genres differ in a crucial way: in their capacity to be exploited by special interests and political elites. The book concludes that due to the symbiotic relationship between conservative outrage and the psychological and physiological characteristics of the right, conservative outrage is uniquely positioned as a mechanism for successful elite propaganda and mobilization—in a way that liberal satire is not.

      Both of these works talk about how the words and stories we hear and tell ourselves shape our thinking and our pictures of who we are and how the world works. And vice versa.

      S.I. Hayakawa’s Language in Thought and Action (first published in 1939) covers similar ground in some ways.

      Not knowing the vocabulary of others or knowing the cultural nuances of things like “bless your heart” means that you can be talking different languages and not be able to make a connection with others. Making that connection is the first step in understanding and persuasion and learning.

      Something something separated by a common language applies in a lot of spaces!

      Thanks.

      Best wishes,
      Scott.

      Reply
    138. 138.

      RevRick

      @sab: The whole family was/is dysfunctional and is a walking textbook of Murray Bowen’s family system theory. Let’s not forget that grandpa Drumpf came to the United States as a broke ass shoemaker and left behind a fortune of $600,000 when he died in the flu pandemic. He made his money running saloons /drug dealing/gambling/brothels.

      Reply
    139. 139.

      Ruckus

      @WaterGirl:

      I believe you ask a question that has zero answer.

      Serious people actually have a concept of what they believe that can be explained. No one currently in the leadership of the republican party can give any concrete answer to you because there are no serious people left in the republican party. The people in charge do not want an actual democracy, what we supposedly have in this country. At the very least they want a monarchy, and not a good one. At the very worst they want a dictatorship. Which may be a reason that a lot of people seem to be leaving the republican party. In my decades it has often seemed that the republican party wanted not what this country was founded on but pure control over everything. That is NOTHING like a democracy. NOTHING.

      Now I know that the above may take a hard line but look at the hard line that the republican party is now taking, where they get everything they want, in the worst way. And look at how many people that used to be in the republican party are walking away.

      The picture of the wind torn flag on the right, NO KINGS IN AMERICA explains it all.

      Reply
    143. 143.

      Lyrebird

      @Nukular Biskits:These people are fucking monsters.

      Quoted for truth.

      And to hold a candle up a little longer, not that it does much, for little Abdo’s bereaved mother, and the others.

      Reply
    145. 145.

      NightSky

      @HopefullyNotcassandra:

      Thanks so much for citing this from Liz Cheney. I’ve been wondering along the same lines. Her list of resistance ideas seems worthy of being widely shared with our reps in govt as well as many others, from activist groups to  local postcard writer-friends. Get the ideas out there immediately and help make significant actions happen.

      Reply

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