This local NBC affiliate’s report about an ICE/US Marshals/FBI raid on a family of U.S. citizens in Oklahoma is infuriating. But if you haven’t already seen it, I encourage you to watch it and share it widely.
Goddamn it. The federal agents or rent-a-cops or whichever band of armed thugs it was who did this needs to go to jail for a long time and be forced to pay restitution to this family.
All 20 of the lawless shitheads also need to be barred from ever having a job in law enforcement or any related field ever again, including jobs as janitors mopping up piss and vomit and shit at a county lockup. And Democrats should say so, if they haven’t already.
Rachel Maddow highlighted that report on last night’s episode to illustrate the incompetent, fascistic character of the Trump regime. She also pointed out that local journalism like the reporting above is stepping up in a way many in the national press aren’t.
So are people in cities and towns across this country, who are responding to similar depredations on their neighbors by taking to the streets and demanding answers and action to stop this authoritarian bullshit. Many local outlets are reporting on that too.
On the other side of the media ledger, there’s Politico and similar outfits. There are the simpering celebrities who gathered at the recent WHCA event to build brands and peddle books as the country gets dragged down deeper into the right-wing kleptocracy’s dumpster fire.
Like most folks who still bother trying to remain connected to reality, however tenuously, I’m used to reading astoundingly dumb and cynical political coverage. But if there’s ever a museum devoted to America’s decline and fall, this paragraph from today’s Politico Playbook should be chiseled into petrified dinosaur shit and hung for display so that future generations might marvel at the sheer fecklessness:
In adjacent paragraphs, the contributors shrugged off an interview in which Trump referenced a crudely photoshopped image of a kidnapped U.S. resident’s knuckles as proof of gang membership. See, what’s important is whether the lying piece of shit’s lies are politically effective.
As the saying goes, if only there were some group of people whose fucking job it is to describe what’s actually happening in this country and explain who is responsible for the shambolic shit-show. But you know what, fuck those assholes.
Thanks to local reporters and the few with national reach who have courage, we can keep score, at least for now. We are obligated to bear witness because there must be a reckoning.
Open thread.
Baud
I have noticed more and more good reporting from alternative local outlets. I hope that’s a silver lining to all the horror.
Baud
Doll Nazi says No Dolls for You!
rikyrah
WHERE IS THEIR MONEY?
WHERE ARE THEIR ID’S.
Mai Naem mobile
I saw the Oklahoma clip yesterday. Wtf? Anybody would be scared. Why aren’t ICE agents at least leaving their Supervisors name or something with their victims? The way it looks to me a bunch of criminals can just get dressed up as ICE agents and break down a door into some ‘foreign’ looking and sounding brown person’s house and rob them and take off. The vehicles they use are just big black SUVs.
Old School
Heck, Trump still blames Obama for things. Blame Biden has plenty of life left in it.
rikyrah
ABC News (@ABC) posted at 9:21 PM on Tue, Apr 29, 2025:
LATEST: Unaccompanied children will not have to navigate U.S. immigration courts on their own after a federal judge Tuesday evening blocked the Trump administration from canceling a contract that provided lawyers for tens of thousands of children. https://t.co/fahSlknp26
(https://x.com/ABC/status/1917404027064627283?t=Y3FLxframzjHPVBE-gOYIg&s=03)
JerseyBeard
US citizens getting rounded up and it’s not even May. As the orange asshole’s numbers sink further, the brutality will increase. This is a time for neighborliness.
As we move forward I will have zero time for people pushing a “we must look forward not back” agenda. Tried that shit in 2009. Was stupid then. Is a suicide pact now. Truth and Reconciliation are the only way we come out of this as a country. Not every Dem will be on board for that. They must go.
rikyrah
James Surowiecki (@JamesSurowiecki) posted at 11:33 AM on Wed, Apr 30, 2025:
There are many cringey things about Trump’s 2nd term. But nothing is as cringey as watching these Cabinet meetings where Trump’s appointees kowtow to him and slather him with praise like they’re courtiers to a king. It’s repulsively un-American.
(https://x.com/JamesSurowiecki/status/1917618338814996598?s=03)
Mike Rothschild (@rothschildmd on blu sky) (@rothschildmd) posted at 0:31 PM on Wed, Apr 30, 2025:
He made them sit behind MAGA hats while they top each other with praise for his greatness. Most of the men are wearing red ties identical to his. It’s a cult and a race to the bottom of who can undignify themselves the longest and hardest.
(https://x.com/rothschildmd/status/1917632890403446858?s=03)
Baud
The problem isn’t timing. The problem is he’s blaming Biden for things he’s doing.
The recession Obama inherited from Bush lasted well past 100 days. That didn’t make it Obama’s fault, except to partisans.
rikyrah
Robert Reich (@RBReich) posted at 1:21 PM on Wed, Apr 30, 2025:
The so-called “moderate” GOP position on Medicaid cuts is no cuts above $500 billion.
Hello? That would mean 18 million children and 2 million adults with disabilities lose health care coverage, according to the latest estimates.
What’s “moderate” about that?
(https://x.com/RBReich/status/1917645426418716882?s=03)
rikyrah
Ed Krassenstein (@EdKrassen) posted at 0:31 PM on Wed, Apr 30, 2025:
Marco Rubio just essentially admitted that the Trump Presidency is a Dictatorship.
He was asked if he would ask El Salvador to return Abrego-Garcia after ordered to facilitate his return by the Supreme Court.
“Well I’ll never tell you that, and you know who else I would never tell? A Judge… And no one will ever make us discuss it.”
Authoritarianism is here.
Is this what you voted for?https://t.co/qXG5xcQA1S
(https://x.com/EdKrassen/status/1917632881612185953?s=03)
Hoodie
Gee, I remember a bunch of people whining about jack-booted thugs and FEMA camps just a few years ago. It’s all too clear that DHS, ICE, CBP, FBI and other agencies are full of meatheads all too eager to do this shit, so reforming them will be like cleaning out the Augean Stables.
Kelly
It isn’t just Trump. Cops have been this way for long time.
One of my Dad’s fishing buddies when I was a child was an Oregon State Police officer. I have a cousin that is a now retired Salem police detective. I’ve been on dozens of whitewater trips with cops. They were the good guys.
Goddamn this is hard for me. Not all cops are bastards but most are and the good ones aren’t going to rein in the bad ones.
E.
I am reading a book that is persuasively arguing that the human understanding of the “self” is changing very quickly right now. Since about the 17th Century we have thought of the self as a thing we can form and make into a unique and personal thing. But lately, and not only because of social media, we are adopting “second-order observation” as a replacement for direct observation/connection with our environment. In other words, we look to what is being said about something as a cue to decide what we think about it.
That has been going on forever of course but the authors of the book say what used to be a useful tool for sifting information has blossomed in the new social environment to the point where it is no longer a tool but the dominant way of making decisions, and this has radical implications for the “self.” Basically they say the self is now something that gets curated and expressed outwardly, not an essential, autonomous, consistent and inward collection of thoughts and values.
So when Politico doesn’t look at the thing but looks at what is being said about the thing, or whether the thing is politically effective, that’s second-order observation. It’s making me think.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
From what I’ve seen of his cabinet they are the biggest group of non-entities and fail-sons of both genders I’ve ever seen. There is not much dignity to lose there.
Baud
@E.:
Interesting! Appreciate the summary.
New Deal democrat
@Baud:
Every time Xi hears Trump say something like that, he vows to inflict more pain on the U.S.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@rikyrah: Is kissing up to Trump seriously the best option these people have for living their lives?
Steve LaBonne
During the Canadian election campaign I gained the impression that their media aren’t a whole lot better. I read so much crap about how Poilievre was an “effective communicator” who “addressed” average voters’ concerns about things like the cost of living and the housing shortage. But I don’t remember anyone at a mainstream site pointing out that that his “solutions” are pure bullshit with no connection to the real world whatsoever and that the man himself, a career politician since his early 20s, has not demonstrated the skills to run a lemonade stand. Vacuous horserace coverage seems to be irresistible to political reporters in other countries not just the US.
Betty Cracker
@E.: Fascinating. Would you mind sharing the name of the book?
Old Man Shadow
I want Truth and Retribution.
Old Man Shadow
@Kelly: Cops that police other cops generally end up being forced out, sidelined, or other negative things.
Police culture is gang culture.
Old Man Shadow
“Trump is running out of time to blame Biden.”
Yeah, it’s funny how the economy was doing just fine until the day Trump started fucking around with tariffs and switching back and turning them on again but double secret tariffs on you! and mouth shitting about firing the Fed chair for not cutting rates to spur inflationary growth.
Almost like all of the, ahem… “Smartest guys in the room” realized they had put a moron in charge of a very important thing and said, “Oh, fuck…”
Professor Bigfoot
@Old Man Shadow: American police culture was born in antebellum slave patrols and is propagated in police union halls today.
It is not coincidence that FOP were Trump’s first major endorsement; and of course we see exactly what Trump’s DOJ is doing with any investigations of police misconduct.
”Protect and Serve” is marketing.
”Control the Negroes” is reality.
hells littlest angel
I’m sure they’ve got an Emmanuel Goldstein model ready to roll out.
Matt
Sure we could have pushed to reduce the scope and power of these lawless paramilitary organizations when people were outraged by their behavior in 2020.
But on the other hand, have you considered that hippies smell?
Guess we’ve got no choice but to scream “FUND THE POLICE” while getting stuffed into a railroad car.
MattF
A link to Beth Mole’s piece at Ars Technica on RFK Jr.‘s disbelief in germ theory.
Ten Bears
I’m looking forward to reading accounts of neighbors forcefully interfering
Someone busts down my door without identifying themselves I’ll shoot them
I’m looking forward to reading accounts of neighbors interfering …
Professor Bigfoot
@MattF: Three hundred years of scientific consensus, the source of all the medical advances humans have made… and this stupid motherfucker doesn’t accept it and has the power to fundamentally affect all of American health science.
Oh well. This is what Americans* voted for.
rikyrah
Michael S. Schmidt (@nytmike) posted at 10:45 AM on Wed, Apr 30, 2025:
NEW: The Trump admin recently sent a diplomatic note to officials in El Salvador to inquire about releasing Abrego Garcia but Bukele govt said no. All this adds to increasing confusion from the Trump admin about whether it is really trying to comply with court order to return
(https://x.com/nytmike/status/1917606201904464056?s=03)
sentient ai from the future
@New Deal democrat: more likely he thinks “what shall I achieve with all the additional leverage this dipshit just handed me?”
Trollhattan
BBC did some Trump fact-checking.
Pretty muchexactly what you’d expect.https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy5rd35wg4ro
Gretchen
@Mai Naem mobile: that’s what I have been wondering since the Tufts student was kidnapped. What stops any criminal from saying they’re Homeland Security and grabbing a pretty girl off the street?
Citizen Alan
@Hoodie: All those complaints about FEMA camps were projection. The fools were terrified that Liberals once in power would do to them the sorts of things that they fantasize about doing to Liberals and everyone else they mindlessly hate.
Melancholy Jaques
@E.:
It seems we also look at who is saying it. And just to decide what we think about it, but whether to think about it at all.
Baud
@Citizen Alan:
Agree. The right’s subliminal thought process is:
They Call Me Noni
I watched it last night and cried. Cried for that terrified woman and her daughters and for what this country has become. Beyond shameful.
Harrison Wesley
@Ten Bears: You’d be fully justified under Florida stand-your-ground law.
LeftCoastYankee
I don’t think his “Blame Biden” reflex has any awareness of the space/time continuum.
IIRC one of the first things he said at the debate with Biden was that the pandemic lockdown was Biden’s fault but he fixed it.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@Mai Naem mobile: exactly. This regime is creating increasing opportunities for all kinds of crime
it also strikes me that this president’s thugs at DOGE and whatever/ rent-a-cops? all believe they have a sacred right to privacy; meanwhile the Supreme Court has eviscerated privacy for the rest of U.S.
Parfigliano
@Kelly: There are no good cops. The allegedly good cops won’t stop the bad cops thus making the allegedly good cops bad cops. They act as any street gang member would.
Parfigliano
@Old Man Shadow: I want firing squads.
HopefullyNotcassandra
@JerseyBeard: let us succeed at ending the corrupt clown crew’s reign first
HopefullyNotcassandra
@rikyrah: the gop has become death
this is no longer a surmise. The grand old party just does not care even about their own voters, much less this country.
TurnItOffAndOnAgain
@E.: I’m reading a book by Steven Hassan about cults and that’s all this sounds like.
It doesn’t have to be purposeful; anything that interrupts how you naturally think and tries to shove something else in there (for political gain, for advertising, for personal gratification, whatever) at best works very closely to how cults do.
Jay
@Gretchen:
https://www.newsweek.com/florida-woman-latrance-battle-ice-agent-detain-ex-boyfriend-wife-2062962
already happening,
HopefullyNotcassandra
@E.: just another way of saying if the gop pushes “alternative facts” with sufficient repetition and vigor, the gop can change our view of reality.
This is not a new concept, I don’t think. We can read about doublespeak in 1984. This is an information war and the reality based community needs to win it for humanity to survive.
...now I try to be amused
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Really. Many if not most of these people have fuck-you money. What’s the point of having fuck-you money if you don’t say “Fuck you” to people who clearly deserve it?
Miss Bianca
@E.: verrrry interesting.
WTFGhost
Well, when no one has to tell the truth, and when telling the truth is economically disadvantageous, we see a huge weakness in a capitalist society. No one will tell the truth, because it will mean losing too much money, and not being able to continue to “play a role in providing meaning to an increasingly confusing world,” as if they weren’t causing the confusion.
I’m really not sure what the answer is. People pay other people to swear that the current President was “attacked” by “lawfare,” when, in fact, he was treated better than any criminal defendant facing similar accusations in US history, including a Get Out Of Court, Free card from the SCOTUS.
Miss Bianca
@Steve LaBonne: Maybe it;s because *actual* horse racing has experienced such a decline in American culture that they just don’t have enough excitement in their journalistic lives.
Or maybe they’re all just as dumb as maggoty old stumps, I dunno.
Raoul Paste
@…now I try to be amused: You really do have to wonder what their motivation is. America really is being weakened profoundly on so many fronts.
Omnes Omnibus
@…now I try to be amused: This is a stunningly good point.
frosty
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
Hegseth? Bondi? Rubio? Yes, kissing up to Trump is the best option they have. Rubio in particular hit the wall on electoral office. He either sinks back into do-nothing Wingnut Welfare or he kisses up to Trump.
Me, I’d pray for an ice floe if I had that choice.
Omnes Omnibus
@Miss Bianca: I am going to go with maggoty old stumps.
Miss Bianca
@rikyrah: Did they really say “no”, tho? I have a hard time believing that if this administration said, “uh. no, seriously, we mean it this time,” that the government of El Salvador wouldn’t miraculously discover that they *could*, in fact, do that.
Suzanne
@…now I try to be amused: They didn’t get fuck-you money by saying “fuck you” to anyone. They don’t know how.
Betty Cracker
@…now I try to be amused: I think they are using their “fuck you money” to say “fuck you” to democracy.
rikyrah
The United States versus Elon R. Musk (@Needle_of_Arya) posted at 11:58 AM on Wed, Apr 30, 2025:
right-wing America, desperately trying to racially segregate an already deeply racially integrated world
(https://x.com/Needle_of_Arya/status/1917624728665350415?t=Hb-2hbf8y-QtR4LfmIt10g&s=03)
Harrison Wesley
@…now I try to be amused: They’re enjoying it.
rikyrah
Not A Drag Queen.
LongTime🤓FirstTime👨💻 (@LongTimeHistory) posted at 1:22 PM on Wed, Apr 30, 2025:
Head of Utah charter schools distributed—possibly produced child porn.
Jared Buckley had over 10,000 images of child sexual abuse material—told undercover agents he could produce & sell more “original” material.
He is Director & Superintendent at Leadership Learning Academy in Ogden & Layton, Utah since 2014.
Jared Buckley was 1 of 15 individuals arrested during an online sting operation on April 15-17.
Because of his years of access to children, additional victims are urged to call the Utah State Police—even if it is anonymously.
#DemVoice1 #wtpBLUE #DemsUnitedhttps://t.co/sC3DspjD1D
(https://x.com/LongTimeHistory/status/1917645648330973417?t=BhlzvrGJsLX5QIPvqMgDZg&s=03)
comrade scotts agenda of rage
No he’s not. He’ll never run of of time to blame Biden because the idea isn’t to speak truthfully, it’s to blather lies, then more lies, then more on top of that until the cows come home.
It’s the Firehood of Falsehood in action 24/7/365.
...now I try to be amused
@frosty:
The lifetime sinecure that is a Senate seat is not a bad wall to hit, IMO.
rikyrah
The Atlantic (@TheAtlantic) posted at 3:00 PM on Tue, Apr 29, 2025:
The former NIH director Francis Collins tells @JeffreyGoldberg he fears the U.S. is losing a generation of scientists.
“We have depended so heavily on being the place that everybody wanted to come to to do research,” Collins says. “And now we’re driving those people away.” https://t.co/eVH4pxETAd
(https://x.com/TheAtlantic/status/1917307971060593038?t=psKmXpi_EI34x7E63mIhIg&s=03)
Jay
@Miss Bianca:
It’s squid ink. A different lie every day. The idea is that if the pile of bullshit is tall enough, you will never find the pony inside.
Basically a variation of Schrodinger’s Immigrant.
Lazy bum taking all the welfare and social security,
while at the same time, taking all the jobs.
frosty
@Parfigliano:
I’m tired of hearing this bullshit. Here’s a good cop:
https://www.today.com/news/news/florida-trooper-blocks-speeding-driver-saving-thousands-running-10k-rcna19107
frosty
@…now I try to be amused:
But Rubio gave that Senate seat up. Putz.
FNWA
https://medium.com/@OfcrACab/confessions-of-a-former-bastard-cop-bb14d17bc759
Josie
An excellent question.. They are terribly short sighted.
Citizen Alan
Cokie’s Law is still in effect, I see.
Harrison Wesley
@frosty: I had a couple of cop drinking buddies who were (are) good guys. One of them was the guy who figured out how to track down the Center City Rapist.
Captain C
@frosty: Now he gets to travel the world on the taxpayer’s dime doing nothing of consequence, which apparently beats sitting in Washington D.C. doing the same thing.
Betty Cracker
@frosty: Thanks for flagging that story. I remember hearing about it at the time. People are complicated.
JiveTurkin
People are always saying that the media normalizes Trump and his behavior. It has taken me a long time to realize that the American people normalize his behavior. The media report on his corruption, how he is literally selling access to the presidency if you buy his crypto coin. He and Bessent literally provided insider info to investors, and Trump even bragged about how much money he made for his buddies. I think a plurality of people don’t care. They care about how they and their family are doing, maybe some of their friends too. A very large number of people will accept living in an authoritarian state so long as it is not in their face, they are left alone, and it is other people who the government goes after.
Betty Cracker
Speaking of Marco Rubio, who was unanimously confirmed in the U.S. Senate:
One of André Leon Talley's Fifty Pieces of Monogrammed Louis Vuitton Luggage
@frosty:
That’s great. It’s also from March 2022.
Peale
@Betty Cracker: And hopefully, we’ll be doing the same some day for the likes of former Administration officials, because fuck it if they are going to be sent into exile in some swank country like Switzerland.
p.a
Grew up w 3 guys who became cops. 2 bullies who would have been voted most likely to push a kid in a wheelchair down the school stairwell. 2 older generation cops in the neighborhood (no relation to the 3 above), mild mannered at home– no idea about at work, but I do know in 40ish years of employment, only one gun drawn, not fired.
Can’t shake the feeling today’s cops all steroided up nuts.
...now I try to be amused
@frosty:
Heh. No Secretary of State has gone on to the Presidency since James Buchanan, over 30 Presidents ago. For what it’s worth, no former cabinet secretary became President since Herbert Hoover (Secretary of Commerce). I wonder if Rubio knew that before he gave up his Senate seat and what dignity he had left.
Steve LaBonne
@JiveTurkin: And they don’t know enough history to know that the not coming after themselves part is unlikely to last.
Steve LaBonne
@rikyrah: It rarely fails, does it.
raven
@frosty: this
JiveTurkin
@p.a: One would think that being a LEO was worse 40 years ago. Both total crime rate and violent crime rate are about 50% lower in 2025 than in 1985.
Professor Bigfoot
@Harrison Wesley: There are definitely good cops.
The problem is that they are the exception, nowhere near the rule.
Your rights are exactly whatever the first cop on the scene decides they are; and while once upon a time there might be consequences for him shooting someone unncessarily, but at this point “law enforcement” have been given carte blanche to do whatever they want with impunity.
Repatriated
@Peale:
Well, maybe some swank country like the Netherlands. And not so much “exile” as “extradited”.
Captain C
@p.a:
I also wonder how many of them are Iraq War vets with untreated PTSD and/or experience in the torture chambers.
Elizabelle
@Repatriated: The Hague is lovely in most seasons.
sab
@Professor Bigfoot: I am sure you already know this: back in the early 20th century when Akron Ohio was the fastest growing city in America, we needed to enlarge our police force. So where did we go to recruit? Alabama. That culture has been baked into our city police culture ever since.
Bill Arnold
@MattF:
Anyone who claims to fully understand the immune system is lying, but I would bet a large amount of money that Mr. RFK Jr has not even read a medical school level immunology textbook or equivalent. He certainly has no clue about the adaptive immune system, e.g. he would be seriously alarmed about measles-caused immune amnesia if he did.
Gretchen
@MattF: Yikes! That’s crazy! Why didn’t his disbelief in germ theory come out in the hearings?
Jay
@Gretchen:
https://www.wonkette.com/p/here-it-is-the-rfk-jrdr-phil-interview
Suzanne
@p.a: I grew up with a dude who wanted to become a cop. (He dated one of my good friends, who regrets dating him more than anyone else she’s ever dated…. and her first ex-husband is teeth pointed so he can cosplay as a werewolf. So: FOR COMPARISON.)
He was the worst. A controlling freak even in junior high school. I remember that he said he wanted to become a Senator one day. I don’t know if we dodged a bullet there.
Professor Bigfoot
@sab: not know that, thank you for that little tidbit of information. It seems to be everywhere.
frosty
@Betty Cracker: There was a PA State Trooper who did the same thing, but I can’t find the story. Swung his car in front of a minivan and blocked a driver going the wrong way.
Sometimes “To Serve and Protect” means exactly that.
Steve in the ATL
@raven: on a related note, how awesome is it that Dangerous Dan Jackson was drafted ahead of Quinn Ewers?
frosty
@Betty Cracker: All content aside … fucking blue suit and red tie. WTF is wrong with these people?
David Collier-Brown
@Steve LaBonne: All the newspaper chains and the leading papers are owned by well-to-do investors. Even the “leftist” ones.
I was amused that the Globe and Mail publicly detests Mr Poilievre. The Globe has a very conservative worldview and readership, so when they say someone is worthy of contempt, that’s the right kicking the far right in the face.
Andrew Abshier
Oklahoma City used to be a conservative media wasteland, but since Eddie Gaylord died the local paper, The Daily Oklahoman, has become much better. KFOR did a very good job on this story. I hope they keep the screws turning.
rikyrah
This is a great Video about the Orange Menace voters, and why they are happy. The poster absolutely nails it.
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZP861nHFM/
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Betty Cracker:
It’s hysterical to see our two milquetoast Senators, Bennett and Hick, still not get it when it people point out they voted for him. In fact, Hick’s getting shit right now for being the Dem Senator who voted to confirm the most of Hair Furor’s trolling Cabinet picks.
#1 in that category? Fetterman. Yeah, that’s great company to be keeping.
jonas
That was basically all his cabinet meetings during his first term as well. Made you just throw up in your mouth.
O. Felix Culpa
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: A friend in Philly says there’s serious talk about primarying Fetterman. I think he was questionable from the start and has become worse since his stroke. Still better than Oz would have been, but that’s a low low bar.
Trollhattan
@O. Felix Culpa:
They should have elected Fetterman’s wife. She seems great.
Trollhattan
Consequences are just for little people, I guess. Ugh.
Life and death stuff.
Baud
Trollhattan
Just shoot me, now.
jonas
@O. Felix Culpa: A lot of folks seem to think that given his health issues and everything, it’s unlikely Fetterman will run for a second term. That said, what other reason could he have for trying to outflank himself on the right if he didn’t think it was some strategy for shoring up the vote in Pennsyltucky?
Note to Fetterman: MAGA is not going to vote for MAGA-lite if there’s some bona fide MAGA lunatic on the ticket, which there will be. And Dems will hate you forever for going MAGA-lite. IOW, congratulations, you just played yourself.
Baud
@Trollhattan:
I’ll join you in a murder/suicide pact.
JiveTurkin
@Trollhattan: Tara Palmeri hosts a debate between James Carville, 80, and David Hogg, 25, on the future of the Democratic party.
My first thought was that this is an Onion article. The fact that this is real makes me question the future of the Democratic party. Can we just sell the party and the mailing lists to Bezos and Zuckerberg? At least we might get some bucks out of the deal.
Suzanne
@Trollhattan:
And the world imploded into a supernova of annoyingness.
I would rather rub shit in my hair than watch that “debate”.
Baud
Betty Cracker
@JiveTurkin: A sorting is upon us, and it’s not along ideological lines. I’m not usually an optimist, but I think we’ll emerge stronger.
Professor Bigfoot
@Trollhattan: Would it be impolitic to note that it’s white dudes, again?
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
Former valued commenter Jim, Foolish Literalist noted that people are often moved more by affect than policy. Fetterman might be a good example of that. Anyway, I agree with you. Political realignment is upon us.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: He wasn’t wrong.
Mart
Heard a conservatish lawyer on the progressive Sirius/XM channel saying that since Federal agents there will likely be very little restitution. He said he avoids all these types of cases for that reason. The agents are shielded by law. Sounds right to me. ETA – Although he is wrong a lot of the time. He thought the Alan Bragg case was the weakest of the felons’ (thanks Bragg) and should not be tried. Their conservative brains work in mysterious ways.
Suzanne
@Baud: He was right about that. And I don’t know why this reality isn’t readily apparent to everyone. Only politics nerds vote on policy!
Baud
@Suzanne:
They also scold people for losing because they adopted the wrong policy.
Baud
@Mart:
Yeah, both are hard but federal is harder.
sab
@jonas: Or he is looking for a safe landing after politics, and the left doen’t have many such spots.
frosty
@Baud: That’s great news which I never expected. Do we know if he finished his naturalization?
Jay
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/30/kristi-noem-kilmar-abrego-garcia-deported
Baud
@frosty:
Don’t know.
Arclite
Is it just me, or are Dems not fighting against Trump like they did in his first term? Or are they fighting and the media isn’t covering it? Is it a cynical ploy by the Dems to let Trump run wild to improve chances next election? Confused and disappointed.
Baud
@Arclite:
What do you remember the Dems doing during the first 100 days during the first term?
Jay
@Arclite:
Some are, some aren’t. There really wasn’t a plan and there is no unity.
zhena gogolia
@Baud: thanks for that. I need this kind of content
Jackie
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Really? He’s also still blaming Obama!
ExPatExDem
The lady who was mobbed/harassed/threatened by the group of Zionist thugs in Brooklyn released some of the footage from her own camera of the incident:
The loudest cheers came when a fellow in a baseball cap threatened to have someone bend her over and rape her.
Chilling
Baud
@ExPatExDem:
Hope there are some IDs and arrests.
ExPatExDem
@JiveTurkin: Harris ran a Carville dream campaign and he predicted a comfortable victory.
Carville is the face of what’s wrong with the Dem party in present form. Old, conservative, corporate, 33 year Beltway insider.
Baud
@ExPatExDem:
The fact that people believe that makes me despondent for the future of Dems.
ETA: I don’t do predictions, but my guess is that the horseshoe will close into a full circle over the next decade.
Jay
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/apr/30/israel-has-no-duty-to-allow-un-aid-agency-into-gaza-says-us-state-department-lawyer
The Audacity of Krope
@Jay: No one ever talks about Palestine’s security needs.
Jay
@The Audacity of Krope:
Of course not, that’s a one way ticket to a Concentration Camp in El Salvador.
persistentillusion
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Fellow Coloradoan here. I agree and why I want Weiser, not Bennet, to be our next governor. Hick’s a dope and Bennet’s a former Anshutz retread. Yuck.
Ruckus
I’d bet that the major paper reporters are under a bigger gun – the paper owners – than smaller paper reporters. The major papers, in my opinion, are more likely to think in a monetary fashion than smaller paper owners. They do make a lot of money selling their papers to a lot of people and I’d bet they do not want that to change. Now if the smaller papers get big enough they may become more like the major papers – money can do that. But a smaller paper has to SELL paper to stay in business, the major papers have to screw up badly to lose money. It’s a different perspective from the top of the pile rather than the base of the pile. And I’d bet that the major papers have a lot of customers who are more on the wealthy side than average readers.
Harrison Wesley
@Trollhattan: I dunno. Some serious hallucinogens and a case of beer…… I could probably get into it.
Betty Cracker
@Ruckus: You are correct, sir. The operation of media outfits like CBS News are a rounding error for parent companies such as Paramount, which has merger business that is subject to the whims of President Crazypants. Hence the principled resignation of Bill Owens, former “60 Minutes” producer.
Geminid
@sab: Fetterman doesn’t need a safe landing in politics. His father is a wealthy man who subsidized the son and his family while Fetterman was Braddock mayor with a nominal salary. I think the father would do that again.
I’m one of those who thinks Fetterman won’t run again. I’m not sure about that, but I get impression that John Fetterman is not comfortable with a politician’s life.. Most politicians thrive in the role of Senator, and Fetterman had the ambition and drive to get there. The question is, will he want to stay there? I don’t know the guy, but I sense an indifference, like he doesn’t give a shit.
Matters of attitude aside, this is not a physically healthy man. I believe Fetterman has problems a pacemaker won’t fix. And while being Senator is a low-stress job if a Senator wants to make it one, Fetterman could well decide he needs a no-stress job.
Betty Cracker
@Geminid: I think you are right. The man went into weeks-long inpatient treatment for depression shortly after assuming his role in the Senate. I give him credit for recognizing that he needed help and for sharing his experience widely to counter the stigma attached to getting help. But I don’t think he’s out of the woods yet. A life-threatening illness can fuck with you in ways you never imagined.
Medicine Man
I was thinking about this on the way home today. Americans are paying a high price for the fact so much of your political elite has no idea what their power is supposed to be for — either behaving like it is a sport/game or just for their own enrichment.
Kayla Rudbek
@rikyrah: yeah, Rubio is smart and dangerous.
Betty Cracker
@Medicine Man: You are not wrong.
am
Oklahoma and the Texas panhandle are truly the American Waziristan.
cmorenc
@WTFGhost: Trump also got, in addition to the SCOTUS get-out-of-jail-free card for anything he did while President 2017-21, a fantastic stroke of luck in drawing complete partisan hack Aileen Cannon as the Federal District Court Judge in the classified documents retention & concealment case, which criminal charges were for actions when Trump was no longer President and not covered by immunity. Had any other federal district judge drawn the case, Trump would have been convicted of a crime that would have crippled his ability to successfully run for President.
Arclite
@Baud: i remember much faster responses to Trump’s illegal activities and a much higher rate of success. Everything was challenged. This time challenges feel half hearted and coming weeks or months later. Jeffries even said, ” We have to pick our battles,” which sounds like excuse making. So is it really a case of Dems being overwhelmed, or is it an intentional pullback to let the Americans who voted for him to FAFO?
Paul in KY
@Gretchen: Maybe only the money it would take to rent the convincing getup, big black suv, mirrored sunglasses, etc.
Beyond that, not much.
Paul in KY
@Omnes Omnibus: They must feel they’ll get a lot more ‘fuck you’ money if they keep being toadies.
Paul in KY
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: It’s the gish gallop dialed up to 12.
Paul in KY
@Arclite: Never interrupt your enemy when he is in the process of making a mistake.