These guys are killing me:
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said the Senate Judiciary Committee will have a “full-blown debate” Thursday on whether to hold a hearing on a Supreme Court nomination.
“If you want to hear a full-blown debate on this issue, I think we’ll probably have one before our committee tomorrow while we’re also considering three of four judges and a piece of legislation as well,” he said.
A spokeswoman for the Senate Judiciary Committee said the debate is expected to take place during the committee’s regularly scheduled business meeting in the morning. The judges being considered are to fill vacancies on the United States Court of International Trade and the United States District Court of Hawaii.
Grassley, the Judiciary Committee chair, made the announcement during an oversight hearing of the U.S. Department of Justice at which Attorney General Loretta Lynch testified on Wednesday morning.
Grassley was responding to Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), who criticized Republicans for meeting behind closed doors and voting to block any Obama nominee without any input from Democrats.
Ya got that? They’re going to hold a debate to determine whether they should do their jobs. Try that one at your office some time for shits and giggles and see how well it goes over.
And these idiots wonder how we got to Trump.
schrodinger's cat
They are Trump except for their superficial manners.
Tim C.
@schrodinger’s cat: “YOU LIE!!!”
schrodinger's cat
@Tim C.: I speak the truth and nothing but the truth, so help me Tunch.
West of the Cascades
Grassley is setting up his reelection campaign nicely. Guy hasn’t had a serious challenge since he was first elected in 1980.
Barbara
Grassley is senile. The only question is whether he can successfully hide it from his constituents.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I don’t see how this helps them. Seems to me like the confused old coot is starting to wonder what Mcconnell got him into.
NotMax
@West of the Cascades
That might just change. Keep the old orbs peeled for the name Patty Judge.
Technocrat
If my boss stopped by every 2 years, I’d probably slack off too
Mike R
@Barbara: Well if Iowa voters can elect Joni Ernst, why not a guy with dementia.
dmsilev
Last month, it was Obama’s fault. I’m told that this month, it’s Al Franken’s turn to take the blame. I think Elizabeth Warren is on deck.
Also, too, some prime GOP stupidity in your neck of the woods:
You may not believe in Darwin, but Darwin believes in you…
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Here’s the composition of the committee
Jesus, Utah and Texas get their full goober on for the Judiciary? That makes you feel good about American, don’t it?
When Lindsey Graham and Jeff Flake are your closest-to-ready-for-primetime players, seems to me you don’t want to draw attention to it. I don’t like Schumer much but he’s sometimes good at this kind of theatre. Leahy, Feinstein and Franken, too.
goblue72
They’ll fart around for months arguing about having a debate to have an argument and then eventually hold hearing once its clear Trump is gonna destroy their party and that they need to run away as fast as possible.
J R in WV
@dmsilev:
Local news reports that Drs at the hospital say these guys had a viral problem and “no way” they got it from the milk. Neighbor works at the statehouse, she was sick and missed a couple of days not long ago, so there is a bug going around.
Not that I disrespect Darwin!!!
MomSense
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Let’s call the Republicans on the list and tell them to do their fucking jobs!
Felonius Monk
@Technocrat: Senators’ bosses only stop by every six years.
Roger Moore
@J R in WV:
This is why it’s generally a good idea to wait for the facts to come in before jumping to conclusions- not that it will stop most people from doing so.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Roger Moore:
That’s no fun!
goblue72
@Roger Moore: Agreed. Its this kind of crap that has Americans afraid of their food. Meanwhile the French continue to enjoy their delicious raw milk cheeses, store their eggs on the countertop, and wonder how the Americans got so bloody stupid.
Cermet
@Roger Moore: Yet, the report indicated that only the people who drank the raw milk are reported sick. Rather selective flu like virus … possible but not likely. Either many others there who did not drink the milk got sick and it wasn’t reported or it was the raw milk. This isn’t jumping to conclusions in any manner. Available facts indicated the single common denominator was the milk. AS for a MD claiming it was a virus with no testing isn’t anything but a guess and does not change the conclusion.
Benw
Say these assholes block Obama’s nominee. I think President-elect Bernillary should immediately nominate Obama.
Kent
I’m not a real expert on legislative process. But if the Repubs go AWOL why can’t the Dems on the committee do something like the Brits do with shadow governments. If Obama nominates someone, why can’t the Dems get their own big ornate hearing room some place and hold their own nomination hearing complete with empty chairs and name tags for all the AWOL republicans. If they can’t do it at the actual capital then someplace else equally grand for the TVs. They could spend a couple of days doing their own nomination hearing and ask all kind of interesting and softball questions and make it a big media thing. Obviously there would be no legal force but it would be a great way to introduce the nominee to the public on Dem terms and even get all the issues out on Dem terms. Every day the Dem senators could go in front of what would be a blizzard of TV cameras explaining how at least they were going to do the job the American public hired them to do even if the Republicans were not.
Seems like it would be a great media coup and loads of fun. A Dem shadow government doing what the Republicans refuse to do. And getting all their work done.
Cermet
@goblue72: Your statements on eggs (in France) do not necessarily represent the point being made about safety – chickens raised out doors produce safe to eat raw eggs that do not need to be refrigerated; the French are famous for non-factory food production – factory eggs can be deadly and should not be eaten raw. AS for cheese from raw milk – that is pasteurized by the micro-organisms that convert the milk into cheese; again, very different issue.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kent: seems to me the Dems in the House have done this. It didn’t get much media attention as I recall, but USSC nominations are in a category of their own.
Ella in New Mexico
@John Cole
But don’t you know? People want Trump because they’re ANGRY! ANGRY! ANGRY! at a government that’s not working…which is essentially the Republican led Congress.
Oh, but really they’re mad at Obama who wouldn’t just pack his bags and go home right after the 2009 swearing in ceremony.
If he’d only just done everything they told him he was allowed to do, things would be just fine…
nutella
@West of the Cascades:
And what a gift this is to the challenger(s). They can shake their heads sadly and talk about how Grassley should have been ready for an honorable retirement after many distinguished years in the Senate and that since he’s jumped right into on-the-job retirement while still accepting a salary he’s ending his career on a profoundly lazy and irresponsible note.
Dr. Bloor
@goblue72: You have Yahtzee. That whole statement might as well have read “Holy shit. That fucking yam might get across the finish line.”
Mnemosyne
@Roger Moore:
Okay, but at the risk of the thread going all “Spinal Tap,” did they actually test the vomit?
Iowa Old Lady
@Barbara: I do wonder about how sharp Grassley still is. He’s 82. But by coincidence, he and Mr IOL were recently on the same local plane flight from Chicago to Waterloo IA and he travels alone, so he’s coherent enough for that.
jl
Oh dear…
Rubio Is Speaking To A Nearly Empty Florida Stadium
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/cnn-rubio-florida-empty-stadium
Almost got enough people to fill one end-zone.
Tokyokie
@Iowa Old Lady: But can Mr. IOL say for sure that Grassley didn’t wander away from his handlers?
Iowa Old Lady
@Tokyokie: Ha! Anything is possible.
Iowa Old Lady
@jl: That’s just sad.
BillinGlendaleCA
@jl: Reminds me of this: Mitt Romney – Ford Field.
Roger Moore
@Cermet:
That’s not exactly correct. There’s basically a competition between the wild microbes (including pathogens) and the (safe) cultured ones. Given enough time, the cultured ones will eventually predominate and kill off the bad ones. For that reason, the FDA allows raw milk cheeses that have been aged for at least 60 days, which is the length of time they think will guarantee that the cultured microbes have succeeded in killing all the wild, potentially pathogenic ones. The FDA does require fresh (aged less than 60 days) cheeses to be made with pasteurized milk, which is what raw milk cheese aficionados are complaining about.
pseudonymous in nc
@Kent:
Because they end up getting a dimly-lit basement conference room in the Dirksen Senate Building, not an ornate hearing room. That’s what happened before. It sucks when you don’t control a chamber.
Better to have lots of informal meetings and photo-ops.
boatboy_srq
Figures that the GOTea, who effectively campaign on the presumption that non-functioning government is the next best alternative to no government, would have to actually debate whether governing is something they should do.
pseudonymous in nc
@jl:
“I told them ‘Marco Rubio first, Puppet Show second’.”
jl
@BillinGlendaleCA: In honor of the memory of the Romney run (and who stands like a colossus over the current GOP field), Romney got more than enough people to fill an end-zone, and IIRC, the rally was moved from someplace smaller at the last minute because of some schedule conflict (or so they said, at the time).
Isobel
@jl: Poor Rubiobot. Things like this aren’t supposed to happen in your home state.
Kent
@pseudonymous in nc:
So rent an ornate ballroom in downtown DC somewhere. Or go on the road to meet the American public
BillinGlendaleCA
@jl: Just remember, “the trees are the right height”.
jl
@Kent: I think the Congressional Dems did resort to stunts like that a few times during the W years in order to get attention.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Kent: Maybe the DNC could build a fake hearing room, make it a bit ornate.
BillinGlendaleCA
@jl: They did, but the “hearing room” was pretty utilitarian.
dr. bloor
@Iowa Old Lady:
Grassley probably thought he was on a plane to Washington.
Iowa Old Lady
@dr. bloor: You made me laugh. I think Grassley’s farm isn’t too far from Waterloo. He was probably coming from DC.
dr. bloor
@jl:
Well, he can beat the Dolphins anyway.
goblue72
@Cermet: I cannot speak one way or another as to what condition the eggs were raised – just that in all the French Carrefour supermarche I have been to – the eggs sit unrefrigerated in a big stack of eggs in the store.
According to this article – the storing eggs in fridge thing is primarily a practice confined to the U.S., Japan, Australia and the Nordics – http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2014/09/11/336330502/why-the-u-s-chills-its-eggs-and-most-of-the-world-doesnt
And comes down to whether the eggs are washed or not as part of the production process – not about the farming conditions.
As for the cheese thing, the “60 day rule” is arbitrary on the part of the FDA and set back in 1949 with very little scientific evidence, primarily to satisfy the demands of mass manufactured cheese: Origins of the Regulation of Raw Milk Cheeses in the U.S.
The French have it figured out.
Banon cheese in Provence involves raw goats milk as is aged only a few weeks. Its delicious. The finest French brie – which are pretty much impossible to find in the U.S., at least legally – are made from raw cow’s milk and aged less than the 60 days. They bear little relation to supermarket brie. And also taste delicious.
Patricia Kayden
Republicans do stupid stuff like shutting down the government, obstructing President Obama at every chance they get and announcing that they will not even consider his SCOTUS nominees sight unseen because they can. When there are consequences for their stupidity, they’ll sing a different tune.
ThresherK
@jl: How many of the attendees there were promised a minor league soccer game? Because I think a couple of hundred is a high guess for people excited to see Rubio.
Mike J
@dmsilev:
Not Sonny Bono, Fred Grandy, or Ronald Reagan?
goblue72
@Dr. Bloor: If Trump is nominated, Congressional Republicans are gonna run so fast for the hills you’ll hear the sound barrier crack. He’s gonna be like a neutron bomb of the GOP – the elected offices will remain, but no GOPers will occupy them.
The hilarious thing is watching those idiots try to rally around Cruz, consoling themselves with polls showing that Cruz is competitive with Bernillary. Not realizing that a fair number of those folks couldn’t pick Cruz out the lineup with the rest of the Stooges who have been appearing on their TV. “Kasich? Is he the black one? I like that Jersey Tony Soprano guy – Fiorina is his name I think.”
Though quite possible that they realize Cruz will be less popular than jock itch but has the benefit of not taking the rest of them with them – given how almost to a man, they’ve all gone on record already that they hate that Cruz guy too.
dr. bloor
@ThresherK: That rumor about Rubio setting himself on fire at the rally after announcing that he was suspending his campaign probably boosted attendance some. It is Florida, after all.
jl
@goblue72:
” The hilarious thing is watching those idiots try to rally around Cruz, consoling themselves with polls showing that Cruz is competitive with Bernillary. ”
What polls would those be? I think head-to-head general election polls so far, for whatever they are worth, show that Cruz is more definitively beatable than anyone in the GOP field.
So sad for the GOP, if they can avoid Der Drumpfenfuhrer, they get the Cruznado. Rubio looks like a political goner, so I guess Kasich is the last establishment hope. He has won nothing, as far as I know, but no one makes a fuss about it, since Kasich has had the good sense to make clear he is running a long shot, long haul campaign. Not an empty campaign making empty brags and bluffs like Rubio. So, Kasich a disastrous reactionary extremist like all of them, but he is more circumspect than the others, and for that reason, still has some shred of credibility.
Steve in the ATL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Did we establish conclusively which of these are Martians? All these posts are starting to run together. Or maybe is the potent mix of effects bargaining and red wine.
mclaren
Off topic, but significant: John Cole, why the hell are you accepting paid ads from the University of Phoenix?
The place is an infamous online degree mill whose students wind up with lots of debt and no employability. In 2015 the U of Phoenix got hit with an investigation of its shady business practices by the Federal Trade Commission and its enrollment dropped 54% after the revelations came out.
Seriously, Cole, accepting paid online ads from University of Phoenix is on the same level as taking ads from payday loan sharks.
There are some things from which we as decent human beings should not profit.
Mnemosyne
I know we’re supposed to cater to the hippies here, but raw milk in the US has caused several disease outbreaks. You may not believe in salmonella and listeriosis, but they believe in you.
pseudonymous in nc
@Mnemosyne:
I remember somebody putting it along these lines: the French collectively countenance a couple of dozen deaths each year from dairy products in exchange for tasty raw milk cheese, while Americans collectively accept tens of thousands of gun deaths each year because freedom.
I’m much more libertarian towards dairy than I am guns, as long as you’re not giving raw milk to your kids or sneaking young raw-milk cheese into unsuspecting people’s meals.
toine
I gotta say that so far I’m a bit disappointed at Dem messaging on this issue. These “do your job” and “doing Trump’s bidding” lines seem kinda week…
How about slamming them on breaking their oath to uphold the constitution? “They swore on the bible to uphold the constitution…”. Calling them “Oathbreakers”, saying “unconstitutional behaviour every time there is a camera nearby… Seems like it would hit them where they live a little more, no?
Shell
He’s the Romney of the future!
FlyingToaster (Tablet)
@Mnemosyne: This.
I’m pretty clear on how salmonella and listeria work. For soft cheeses, I err on the side of caution and go with pasteurized.
If you’re shipping food across a country as large as the US, you need the extra precautions.
dr. bloor
@pseudonymous in nc:
I come from a family where the seven generations prior to my father were dairymen. They wouldn’t touch raw stuff once Pasteurized was readily available. You probably weren’t going to get sick, but if you did you still had to milk those cows at 5 AM, every damn day.
“Libertarianism” is a luxury, nothing more, nothing less.
Mnemosyne
@pseudonymous in nc:
We all agree about guns here, right? Right. There’s a story down below about yet another idiot whose toddler shot her because she left her gun laying around.
As far as raw milk goes, if adults want to seek it out knowing and understanding the risks, I’m actually okay with letting some dairy farms do that as long as they’re inspected regularly. I’m not okay with selling raw milk at your local Whole Foods — there are way too many potential supply chain issues there, and way too many people who assume that anything sold on the mass market must be safe.
Same with raw milk cheeses — if local producers want to sell them to walk-in customers, okay, but mass marketing them is asking for trouble.
Steve in the ATL
@Shell:
Time for his “please clap” moment?
goblue72
@jl: I was thinking of this article.
The polling data in question in the article still had Clinton winning vs Cruz, but within margin of error or so. Not that I personally buy it. I think Cruz “chance to win” is overstated – for the reasons I stated above.
Once under the primetime lights, his human-mask will melt off and the Lizard Alien underneath will reveal itself.
He has no lips. I repeat – He. Has. No. Lips.
goblue72
@Mnemosyne: You are such a namby pamby rube. Jesus Christ on a stick.
*waves scary brie in your face* booga booga booga
Bill E Pilgrim
Some info on the cheese thing.
goblue72
@pseudonymous in nc: No but the French do sneak better food to their kids:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/lisa-stadnykwebb/a-glimpse-into-a-school-lunchroom-in-france_b_6919654.html
http://www.collective-evolution.com/2014/10/01/what-french-kids-eat-for-school-lunch-puts-american-lunches-to-shame/
Mnemosyne
@FlyingToaster (Tablet):
Also, this. The entire country of France can fit inside California. The distance from France to Moscow is about the same distance as from California to Missouri. How far do the French send their raw milk cheeses from the place they were made?
Peale
I wonder if Ken Cuccinelli backed out of the VA Supreme Court appointment because he thinks the Republicans will put him on the big bench.
Thoughtful David
@goblue72:
Cruz ain’t gonna win the nomination. If he starts getting close Trump will cry havoc and let slip the dogs of Canadian citizenship lawsuits. Lots of them. It will be a thing of beauty, to see Mr. Cruz having to defend himself from that and Mr. Trump twisting the knife.
Ruckus
@MomSense:
Unfortunately they think being total douchebags IS their job. Good luck finding a way to convince them otherwise. OK maybe a firing squad – with them up against the wall – no blindfold, wait we’re going to take the blindfold off for this.
goblue72
@Bill E Pilgrim: Your link appeared broken.
Here’s a link to NPR article on same French study.
goblue72
@Thoughtful David: Oh, I don’t think Cruz will win the nom. Just saying I could see how the GOPers in Congress – seeing the Trumpnado coming, get to thinking “crapcrapcrap – we are SO screwed man!”
And then casting about praying Cruz gets the nom, in the oft chance that Cruz only takes Cruz down with himself on the Titanic.
Mnemosyne
@goblue72:
And how many friends have you had hospitalized with food poisoning? I’ve had two.
But, hey, germ theory is just what the government *wants* you to believe.
Iowa Old Lady
Speaking of getting work, a librarian on FB posted this:
Apparently many employers also require web-based job applications even for entry level jobs. Kudos to the librarians among us.
pseudonymous in nc
@Mnemosyne:
They get eaten before they travel very far. (Actually, plenty go to Paris and London, but you’re right that the supply chains in France are tighter. You can cycle a couple of km from the middle of Toulouse and be in farmland.) But you had local dairies in places like rural Pennsylvania that only sold in-person to people the farmer knew and they still got raided by raw-milk SWAT teams.
Bill E Pilgrim
@goblue72: Oh that’s weird, thanks.
That’s actually the link I was posting, the one you did.
I’m on a new (used) Mac I just got, getting used to the differences.
Mandalay
Trump just now in an interview on CNN: “I see the Constitution as a document that says you have to sit down and make deals.”
How can you argue with that?
Steeplejack (phone)
@Mnemosyne:
One of my favorite websites says you’re (a bit) wrong. California is 77% the size of France.
TheBuhJaysus
@toine:
Oath breakers, traitors, treasonous scum…
It’s truly diabolical that the right gets to reinforce their claim that government is inefficient and incompetent by monkey-wrenching the whole process(while collecting paycheck a, padding their resumes for private sector gigs and enjoying healthcare for life.)
Baud
@Mandalay: It is interesting that GOP voters so far are supporting a “deal maker” like Trump over a “hardliner” like Cruz.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
so looks like nobody’s hate-watching the great Meeting of the Minds between Chuck Todd and Li’l Marco? I turned it on accidentally just long enough to hear Marco say (I think, missed the context) that Obama’s mistake in Iraq was to leave Maliki in charge.
Mnemosyne
@Steeplejack (phone):
Slightly bigger than California, slightly smaller than Texas (Texas is 1.25 times larger according to that site). I’m assuming you see the point, though.
Ruckus
@Iowa Old Lady:
Looking for a job when you are down and pretty far out is difficult. Very difficult. They don’t want you. They can’t schedule you at the last minute because they can’t contact you. They don’t think they can trust you, why’d you lose your last job. You don’t have credit, that’s one less way to control you and force you to accept a shitty job and pay, as well as one more way to weed out the riff-raff. And I’m just getting started.
Mandalay
@pseudonymous in nc:
I found that claim hard to believe, but google maps confirms that you are correct – or at least close enough. I’m amazed.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I predict that Rubio will win the interview by coming in second to Chuck Todd.
Mnemosyne
@pseudonymous in nc:
Right, and I would be okay with states changing their regulations slightly to allow on-farm sales to people who want to take that risk as long as the sellers agree to be regularly inspected and the state does so.
And if that happens, I don’t want to hear a single sob story from someone who got sick from doing that because they didn’t understand the risks or whatever. And if they give it to their kids and the kids get sick, they do jail time.
dr. bloor
@Mandalay: That might be the truest, most profound thing ever to dribble out of his pie hole.
goblue72
@Mnemosyne: I have no idea and a quick google search produced no immediate answers – at least in English. France is part of the European Union, which has a common market. But there are standardized regulations that products have to meet to sell into the common market, which regulations come out the bureaucratic hole that is know as Brussels – and attempts to harmonize across not only nation-state boundaries but across cultural traditions and biases. Put another way – the French like their cheese to stink- the Nordics, not so much.
There was an uproar in France as some point within last 10 years or so when Brussels attempted to require pasteurized milk for all cheeses, that was being pushed in part by the big EU dairy conglomerates in their quest for market domination. I think it was successfully resisted.
So in answer to your question – either the EU regs limit it, and French raw milk cheeses stay in France, or its ok, and France is shipping cheese further than just France. (And for geographic footprint, its easier to visualize France as size of and shape as Texas, not California, which is long but skinny)
What I DO know is that in various EU countries, you can buy raw milk from a vending machine.
Baud
@Bill E Pilgrim: Second is a little high for Rubio, no?
amk
@Felonius Monk:
Not only they stop by every two/six years, they also reward them with doing heckuva job, chuckie, bonuses.
Steve in the ATL
@Ruckus: Indeed. I’ve heard employers talk about not hiring shelter people because they assume they won’t be reliable. It’s heartbreaking to hear things like that.
Bill E Pilgrim
@Baud:
You think he could pull off coming in third or fourth in a two-person contest? Maybe! Come on Marco, you can do it!
jl
‘ Trump just now in an interview on CNN: “I see the Constitution as a document that says you have to sit down and make deals.” ‘
Shouldn’t that be ‘Great Deals’? Trump unAmerican? Or really a liberal?
Mnemosyne
@Iowa Old Lady:
People don’t realize the enormous resources that most libraries have available to the public for FREE. And the majority of librarians today are very tech-savvy, especially those working in public libraries.
/full disclosure — G is about halfway through his first semester of library school
goblue72
@Mnemosyne: I don’t expect the government to wipe my ass. If you expect to walk out your front door and experience no risks in life, then don’t walk out your front door.
As someone noted above, the number of people at risk from eating raw milk cheese is infinitesimal. And completely dwarfed by so many other risks. Like the risk of getting hit by a car. Or dying in a plane crash. Or dying in fire. Shall we ban cars? Planes? Buildings? No, of course not. That’s stupid.
And people should not have to go travel to some hippie farm in the middle of nowhere to go eat something. They should be perfectly free to stick something in their mouth without the nanny state being involved. Yes, food producers should have to produce their product in clean conditions, following appropriate reasonable safety measure. But if you want some guarantee you ain’t gonna get hurt by food in some random, freak event, you are fooling yourself.
Pardon me while I go home and have some raw milk cheese I picked up at my local cheese shop, have a glass of wine and smoke a joint.
Eric S.
@Kent: Be careful leaving town. McConnell is wily enough to schedule important votes at such times.
lamh36
This mofo –>
Bobby Jindal tells a national audience that Louisiana’s economy is ‘stronger than ever’ http://www.theneworleansadvocate.com/news/11798906-123/bobby-jindal-tells-a-national via
Adam L Silverman
@pseudonymous in nc: I lived in rural, Central PA for four years, those cheese makers were raided because they were producing short barreled, self loading, fully automatic cheeses…
Wait, which thread is this?
Bill E Pilgrim
In France, a fine cheese means a massive, dense block covered by a bright orange skin. In the US that describes our Presidential candidates. So I’d say we’re even.
Adam L Silverman
@Baud: Its partially because Trump presents deal making as zero sum. When he negotiates a win, the other side loses. His supporters are big fans of winning in a way that makes their opponents lose.
Baud
@Adam L Silverman: That’s an astute observation.
goblue72
@Mandalay: If you really want shock yourself, spend yourself tooling about on French real estate websites.
17th century French farmhouse, 4 bedrooms, Loire Valley, 1.5 hours from Paris (that’s TGV time I think), $280,000 euros –
http://www.french-property.com/vp/nv/ds/centre-eure-et-loir-nogent-le-rotrou-farmhouse/id/557452/fp/http:%7C%7Cwww.french-property.com/
$310,000 US wouldn’t buy you a 2-bedroom condo in a really crappy neighborhood in a crappy city 2 hour commute from San Francisco.
goblue72
@Bill E Pilgrim: I’m sorry but did you just propose the plan to stop Trump is to smear him on a baguette with a glass of Riesling on the side?
goblue72
@Adam L Silverman: I though when Trump negotiates a deal, the other side winds up chasing him in bankruptcy court.
Ruckus
@lamh36:
Jindal is delusional. Or…… No delusional it is.
Steve in the ATL
@goblue72:
I was tempted until I saw the case of Corona beer in the wine cellar
Bill E Pilgrim
@goblue72: Hmm, smearing cheese like that is frowned upon in France, but I get your point.
You know, I would, but I’m on a mutant-free diet.
Ruckus
@Adam L Silverman:
Had my corp lawyer once tell me that two parties reached a good deal when both hurt the same. If both sides were positive equally about the deal, lawyers didn’t need to be involved. If one side got screwed while the other got everything, they needed better lawyers.
Drumpf didn’t get good deals, he sold worthless crap (his name) for too much (any!) amount of money. That’s not a deal, that’s bullshitting to the nth degree.
Adam L Silverman
@goblue72: There’s reality and what he’s pitching and the people supporting him are buying.
Adam L Silverman
@Ruckus: That makes sense.
pseudonymous in nc
@Mandalay:
Yeah, close enough: maybe 3-4km from the absolute centre-ville before you get completely rural, but even its suburbs are often really just villages, and they host weekend markets where you can buy olives and produce and amazing cheese which carries a slight risk of death. In France (at least, outside of the Paris metro area) agriculture isn’t something that happens Somewhere Far Away, so it’s easier to treat foodstuffs as if they have some life left in them.
Mnemosyne
@goblue72:
The same Marin County-style idiots who took Jenny McCarthy’s advice about vaccinations because she knows better than the government are the ones producing, selling, and buying your raw cheese. Good luck with that.
goblue72
@Steve in the ATL: Ha. Missed that. That’s hilarious.
goblue72
@Mnemosyne: Oh JFC. You are comparing anti-vaxx to raw milk cheese?
You really are an idiot.
J R in WV
@Mandalay:
French cities are surrounded by narrow bands of high-rise apartments around ancient city centers. Just outside those high-rise apartments are the farms, which run all the way to the next city, miles away.
It seemed like a much smarter way to control urban development, to surround cities with narrow belts of apartment buildings, surrounded by farmland, vineyards, dairies, chateaus etc. Not like the miles-wide belts of suburban single-family homes that surround American cities at all. I think Spanish cities are also like this, as I suspect all of European urbanization is like this.
I live way outside the suburban belts of the nearby American cities, also, but that’s a lot farther from the city centers here in the US than in the EU.
Mnemosyne
@goblue72:
You don’t read the internet much, do you? It’s all the same crowd.
goblue72
@Mnemosyne: Oh jesus. Enough with the vacuum that exists between your ears. I stick with my prior comment. Idiot AND rube.
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne:
Not sure reading is the issue, now comprehension………
redshirt
To bring this back from cheeses, and FSM help me as per Mclaren, but what are the chances/odds/possibility Obama can just give the senate a “notice” for their consideration of his candidate and after that, just appoint him? I know nothing like that’s ever been done before, but, desperate times…
Steeplejack
@Mnemosyne:
Yes, but when you reel off snappy illustrative stats it’s nice if they’re accurate. It subtly undermines your point if a detail is wrong.
Paul in KY
@mclaren: It pays the bills. It is though, a fake university & no one with any sense should ever try to get a ‘degree’ from them.
Paul in KY
@goblue72: I just found something else to daydream about.