Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

“Facilitate” is an active verb, not a weasel word.

Oh FFS you might as well trust a 6-year-old with a flamethrower.

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

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

Weird. Rome has an American Pope and America has a Russian President.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

You passed on an opportunity to be offended? What are you even doing here?

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

How stupid are these people?

When you’re a Republican, they let you do it.

Jesus watching the most hateful people claiming to be his followers

Michigan is a great lesson for Dems everywhere: when you have power…use it!

We’re watching the self-immolation of the leading world power on a level unprecedented in human history.

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. keep building.

You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

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Reader Interactions

63Comments

  1. 1.

    Hungry Joe

    Sometimes two autoplays at the same time — which in a way is better, because when they’re talking over each other I can’t understand either one.

  3. 3.

    Suffern ACE

    The good news? NBC might pull the plug on David Gregory. The Barium Shits might be a good name for the potential replacements.

  5. 5.

    Karen in GA

    Mentioned this at the very end of the last open thread, but if anyone’s interested in how to solve the “I want a couple of extra fonts in my WordPress blog” problem — the BlogPad Pro app.

    That doesn’t mean Iggy’s going to have a cast like the set of Ben Hur — it’s just nice to have a couple more tools available if I need them.

    And I really should go to sleep. Probably won’t, though.

  7. 7.

    piratedan

    @Karen in GA: out of the frying pan and into the fire…. gotta love the idea of replacing a good looking GOP water carrier with more of an everyman GOP water carrier.

  9. 9.

    mai naem

    I have been getting the autoplay ads quite often.
    I’d take Chuckee Cheese over Dumbass Dave.

  10. 10.

    Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)

    Saw an awesome band name tonight on a machine at one of my job sites: Chicago Pneumatic.

    Okay, maybe only a good name for a Steve Albini project….

  11. 11.

    different-church-lady

    I dunno about autoplay, because I use Flashblock. But I can tell you that something takes over the ENTIRE page on occasion — not just a pop-up, but a overall replacement of all content.

    When it happens I refresh and it’s gone on the second load. I’ll take better notes next time it happens.

  12. 12.

    Anoniminous

    has anyone else been getting autoplay ads when you load the front page?

    Yes. (Firefox)

  13. 13.

    The Dangerman

    @David Koch:

    “Barium Shits” is slogan of Rick Perry’s 2016 campaign.

    Close; it’s “Bury Them Shits” (preferably across the border)

  14. 14.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Suffern ACE: The Barium Shits is certainly a more attractive name than “David Gregory”.

    Just got back from a delayed (obviously) showing of the Monty Python reunion show, and it was very good indeed. Lots of singing and dancing, classic skits, and great live moments like Terry Gilliam losing it in a skit, he just could not keep a straight face. Palin and Cleese had problems staying in character during the parrot sketch as well…it was delightful.

  16. 16.

    Tommy

    I just got a Jawbone Up wrist bio-metrics thing. Fuck technology is out of control! Short of the thing knowing when I take a #2 it knows everything else about me. I kind of want that or I would not have bought the thing, but still stunning. Strange times we live in ……

  18. 18.

    Tommy

    @Amir Khalid: It measured sleep rates/cycles. I don’t sleep well. Maybe 3-4 hours a night. I am not a fitness nut but I do work out. I don’t need an app to tell me about this. But that this thing might monitor my sleep, well that is the ONLY reason I got it.

  20. 20.

    David Koch

    @Suffern ACE:

    NBC News’ chief White House correspondent, Chuck Todd, and Morning Joe’s Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski are jockeying to replace the moderator of Meet the Press.

    Talk ’bout going from bad (Pumpkinhead) to worse (Dancn Dave) to horrible.

    I don’t think the hosts are the problem, it’s the demographics. It basically appeals to seniors who don’t know how to log on to a computer.

    I think the more interesting question who is planting the news and stabbing Dave in the back. I would be morning blow who had a long history as a leaker when he was in congress.

  22. 22.

    Amir Khalid

    I don’t have autoplay issues. But only because I had to re-enable Adblock Plus, which blocks ads from appearing at all: Firefox started to hang while trying to load an ad from a server. I no longer get John Cornyn’s campaign ads or the hilarious Newsmax headlines, which makes me haz a sad.

  24. 24.

    Arclite

    I’ve been getting autoredirect ads on occasion. Redirects me to a completely different website. No, I don’t have a virus or trojan. Don’t have the site handy right now, but I’ll post it the next time.

  25. 25.

    Fred

    No autoplay ads happenin’ here on the euro side of the pond. But thanks for asking.

  26. 26.

    bago

    The autoplay is likely a GNIDA style flash hijack. Those words make sense to someone, likely anyone who has had to debug ActionScript, the Adobe js variant.

    Re: alcoholism, If your heart is fine at your age, the worst things you have to worry about are hydration, not freaking out about the deeply personal audio, visual, and haptic hallucinations, and always being in a place where it is safe to fall down. No mops for you mister! Staying up for a week can be a bit maddening, but keep calm and carry on.

    I’ve quit alcohol about 5 times in the past 5 years let me tell you, the drugs they give you aren’t just aspirin (Seriously, who would give a person hitting their liver that hard aspirin?) Suck it up, be grateful you can do things like “sleep”, and carry on. Then find a relapse buddy.

  30. 30.

    J R in WV

    John,

    Sorry you’re having problems getting treatment. Mrs J R has medical issues and sees obstacles every time anything changes. Just prescriptions can be hard to keep consistent! I tried to get a refill for one of her regular treatment pills, it was goonna be $1000 for 90 days without pre-approval, which was seeming impossible ’cause the new insurance (AARP of all things) wouldn’t return calls.

    Here in Charleston there is a private mental health hospital called Highland Hospital – they just built a new facility a couple or 4 years ago. Thus they may have room for you.

    Highland would be a option your Dr and insurance people should check, we’re not that far from the northern panhandle. I can’t believe the P’burgh doesn’t have any facilities good for you, it’s a big city and all. But maybe the bigt city part guarantees a big crowd of patients?

    Best of luck! Do call Highland, they have a good rep.

  32. 32.

    Shazza

    Hi Everyone,
    Just wanted to give you an update on that adorable black kitten that Annie posted last month. I wish I could attach a photo but I don’t know how. Well we met the lady who took care of the kitty at our vet where Smokey got checked out. He was too young (though the vet wasn’t sure his age) so we took him home, keeping him away from our other 3. We went back last Friday where he got his first vaccinations and tested negative for FLV-yay! We’re now trying to get the kitties used to him (cuz he has NO problem running up to them to play only to get hissed at) He is adorable, fearless and such a bundle of energy. In other words, typical kitten. Thank you again, Annie for bringing this little cutey into our lives!

  34. 34.

    Keith G

    @Shazza: Yay for you. Yay for Smokey.

    AL used to regularly post rescue and other adoption stories. Always were a great way to start a day.

  35. 35.

    Schlemizel

    @Karen in GA:
    Mourning Joe is said to be begging for it too.

    Press the Meat could go from horrible to worse given the potential replacements mentioned.

  36. 36.

    sm*t cl*de

    @bago:

    I’ve quit alcohol about 5 times in the past 5 years let me tell you, the drugs they give you aren’t just aspirin

    The Gazoogle informs me that paraldehyde is no longer in wide use. You kids don’t know what you’re missing.

  37. 37.

    Keith G

    I wish Meet the Press would go back to a format closer to the one with which they started

    If you chose to follow the link, note Kennedy’s comment at the 3 min mark and note that there where several minutes of follow up questions. BTW, I love how not-TV-ready most reporters on television were at that time.

  38. 38.

    Specialed5000

    I’ve always thought that Souvlaki Vomit would be a great name for a Greek punk band

  39. 39.

    Bobby Thomson

    Not just the front page, and not very single time, but most of the time. Annoying as all hell.

  43. 43.

    MomSense

    Excellent name for a band, John. Sorry to hear about your trouble with rehab but pleased your test results were good. That is a really good thing and I hope you will take those good health results as a gift you can build on. Having been through rehab many times but only as the family member I can say that guilt, regret, negativity are all poisons, as bad as the substances often. Try and be positive and think about the changes you are making as being kind to yourself.

    I’ve also found that religion is often a part of the recovery mix even in non-christian programs. We just substitute Dog for God and it helps.

    So good luck getting into rehab but once there and after–it’s not luck as you know. Hard work and learning to accept help. None of us can manage this crazy thing called life without support.

  44. 44.

    J R in WV

    @raven:

    My Grandma grew up in Louisa, which is about 40 miles west of us here at home. Of cource she was there from 1895 or so til 1915 when she set out to make her own life. It was still a little rover boat town, where everything came in by sternwheeler from the big port cities like Louisville.

    Unusually for that time, she and her sisters were educated to the point where they could earn their own living if necessary. Bookkeeping, typing, business school classes after “normal” school. G’Aunt May was a school teacher and Grandma Grace kept a store after working for the coal company in WV.

  45. 45.

    J R in WV

    @raven:

    My Grandma grew up in Louisa, which is about 40 miles west of us here at home. Of cource she was there from 1895 or so til 1915 when she set out to make her own life. It was still a little rover boat town, where everything came in by sternwheeler from the big port cities like Louisville.

    Unusually for that time, she and her sisters were educated to the point where they could earn their own living if necessary. Bookkeeping, typing, business school classes after “normal” school. G’Aunt May was a school teacher and Grandma Grace kept a store after working for the coal company in WV.

    My Great Grand Dad was a farmer and workman around town, and may have also been a U S Marshall, too. Back when times were really rough and crime was actually common, notlike today where a single crime gets reported across the whole continent so repeatedly that everyone thinks it heppened next door.

    We plan to go over to Louisa and drive around for a day or two to see what that part of KY is like these days, so as to compare it with the stories we heard as kids, listening to the adults talk about the good ole days.

  46. 46.

    gnomedad

    Also, has anyone else been getting autoplay ads when you load the front page? If so, I need to nip that shit in the bud.

    FSM bless Cole — always looking out for his kids.

  49. 49.

    RoonieRoo

    I instantly turn down the sound when I hit Balloon-Juice due to the auto-play ads. It’s been going on for a while for me.

  52. 52.

    shelley

    ugh. Barium. Had some digestive issues when I was a little kid (I’m in my fifties now )and remember having to gulp down that goop for the X-rays. Assumed in this age they’d moved on to something less gross.

  53. 53.

    cdmarine

    I’m getting auto-redirects about 80% of the time I come here. Sometimes it happens upon loading the site, but most often, it happens upon leaving it to go elsewhere. It happens on all devices (phone, laptop, tablet), and only on Balloon Juice, which makes me pretty certain that the problem is the site, not my devices. Sometimes it’s a full-page interstitial ad with a countdown timer to return to the page, but most often it’s just a full-on redirect to another page (lately, it’s been popping up Myspace). That’s in addition to the auto-play video business. Basically, I think your ad networks are serving up shenanigans.

  55. 55.

    Sublime33

    I had a barium enema about 30 years ago. As a bad joke, the clinic stocked the world’s roughest toilet paper in the bathroom next to the x-Ray table.

    As for the barium shits, it felt like crapping a milk shake. I kept expecting the fiery burn but the barium acted like a synthetic lube.

  57. 57.

    Jill

    Been getting autoplay ads as well. And again, good luck on the journey you about to embark on.

  58. 58.

    CaseyL

    I have AdBlock, which apparently prevents autoplay – on this site, at least. So no problems here!

  59. 59.

    moderateindy

    Has anyone had the fun of having a colonoscopy? They give you stuff meant to make you crap all night until your movements are free of any color. They call the stuff Go Lightly, which is both the most, and the least appropriately named product ever. Anyway, they literally make you drink a gallon of the stuff, within a short time period, and the stuff is disgusting in both taste, and texture.
    A couple years ago when I was in the hospital I took it, and after a full night, and morning of explosive diarrhea, my movements finally cleared enough to go get the procedure, but my temp had increased to 99.5, so I was informed that they couldn’t do the colonoscopy, and I would have to endure another round of the Go Lightly that night. Just one of many things that were part of a debacle laden 2 month stay in the hospital in ’12.

  60. 60.

    MattF

    @moderateindy: This year has been my ‘learn the names of surgical outpatient procedures’ year. I’ll spare the details, except to note that urinary procedures are all in the “You’re going to put a what… and put it where?” category.

  61. 61.

    Mnemosyne

    @moderateindy:

    I get to look forward to that in the next couple of months. Fun! They decided that since I’m only 5 years shy of the baseline scan and my dad had a kidney tumor (among the MANY other complications he had from 50 years of smoking), I may as well get one.

  62. 62.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Mnemosyne: Mine with the VA was a bit different than moderateindy’s experience, but in essence the same…drink the goop for several days to clear out your system, then they do the thing. The most uncomfortable part, by far, was the entire prep for the actual procedure…all that drinking of the stuff to clear out your system and then the actual clearing process (aka the diarrhea). The procedure was a total piece of cake in comparison. I was under an anesthetic, but fully conscious the whole time. Didn’t feel a thing, watched the probe on a TV screen as it moved around in my colon, asked if they were recording this and if I could have a copy (yes, and no!) as I thought it would be hilarious to slap the recording into a DVD player at a party and announce “You’re journeying into a dimension of sight…”

    Anyways, after they were all done, and I was pronounced totally healthy in colon, if not in mind, it was into recovery to end my fast and let the more disorienting effects of the anesthetic wear off…as a precaution, no driving etc for the next 12 hours.

    Not an experience I want to undergo more than once every ten years, but not as bad as I’d been led to believe.

  63. 63.

    Mnemosyne

    @Villago Delenda Est:

    My husband’s first question when I told him was, “Wait, I don’t have to watch, do I?” No, no you don’t.

    I’m a little nervous about the anesthesia because I found out the hard way that general anesthesia makes me puke, but the gastro said that they don’t use that kind. I guess we’ll find out. It turned out that getting a root canal wasn’t as scary/painful as I had always been told, so I’m hoping the colonoscopy will be similar.

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