The New York Times’s new conservative columnist makes some interesting points in his latest column. Yes, yes, he refers to “illegal immigrants,” the nomenclature favored by the right, and his comments on birth rates have a faint scent of racism. But read to the end.
Bottom line: So-called real Americans are screwing up America.
Here’s a conservative speaking to people who consider themselves conservatives, using some of their language. More of them will read Bret Stephens than will read Balloon Juice, although they share a suspicion of that publication for rather different reasons than we do.
Things are going too far for some conservatives. It’s important that they speak out, and here is one part of the beginning.
tobie
You read an article like this and you just want to scream, “No shit, Sherlock.” Places that are immigrant-friendly tend to be prosperous. I thought one of the most telling statistics from the last election was the counties that voted blue make up 66% of the GDP; red counties make up 34%. Whose interest does the GOP serve? Largely elderly, white, rural and exurban Americans.
WereBear
Goody for him, but Frum had zero impact.
Amir Khalid
And have been for centuries. I’ve always wondered how Native Americans feel about the USA being described as a country of immigrants, like Native Americans aren’t even there. Especially when they think about the immigrants’ descendants who made war on their ancestors, cheated them again and again, drove them from their homes and hunting grounds, and left them in poverty.
MattF
It’s been a test for conservatives. A few have behaved honorably, a few more have attempted to back into an honorable position (I’m looking at you, David). Most have failed– miserably.
OzarkHillbilly
Read it. Good on him. Thanx Cheryl.
@Amir Khalid: Native Americans are immigrants too, they just got here a few millennium earlier than the rest of us.
eyelessgame
Blind squirrel finds a nut.
The weird thing I find is that most conservatives are at pains to say “I’m not like those conservatives” on at least one issue. The ones who aren’t religious wackaloons. The ones who accept global warming. The ones who are pro-immigration. The ones who are in favor of health care. The ones who are in favor of marriage equality. The ones who aren’t idiots about race. Every conservative proudly presents the one issue they’re not moronic on, and uses it to distinguish themselves from the idiots who make up the rest of their movement. They each cling to their one line of rationality to justify all the rest of what they are callous, unthinking morons about.
So this particular racist science-denier is pro-immigration.
Well, good for him.
Inventor
My brother in law continuously complains about immigrants. He mocks their speech and calls them all lazy criminals.
Dude doesn’t roll out of bed until about 1:00 PM and completely freeloads off my sister who provides his food, clothing, shelter, health insurance, transportation and literally everything he needs or wants.
I started calling him “Minnie” after “Minnie the Moocher”. He doesn’t get the reference.
Another Scott
Along these lines, Tom Lawler at CalcuatedRisk:
Cutting immigration, and being horrible to immigrants so that more people want to leave, has a direct and easily-modeled impact on the economy far beyond things like tourism…
Cheers,
Scott.
Sunny Raines
The interesting thing has been that there has always been room for rational discussion of conservative core ideas to solving the problems of society. The sad part has been the adoption by conservatives since reagan of a scorched Earth approach of division, using racism, misogyny, and all forms of bigotry to achieve their ends. The sad truth is that the republican base have been duped and manipulated by the greed-diseased plutocrats destroying social and economic justice
There can no common ground with conservatives unt ilthey throw off. He. Ha led of. Heir plutocrats
NotMax
Conservative, revanchist.
Po-tay-to, po-tah-to.
@WereBear
Double ditto for Larison, who has been unstintingly railing from the right against the travesty unfolding for a lot longer than the arriviste Stephens.
Another Scott
Along these lines, Tom Lawler at CalcuatedRisk:
[ blockquote containing mysterious FYWP word ]
Click on over. It’s a good piece.
Cutting immigration, and being horrible to immigrants so that more people want to leave, has a direct and easily-modeled impact on the economy far beyond things like tourism…
Cheers,
Scott.
Mnemosyne
@Inventor:
The Offspring wrote a song about him, though the video’s a little weird.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
A shifting perspective sounds good, but isn’t this actually not uncommon? We assumed Dennis Miller was probably kind of a hip if self-satisfied liberal until 2001. Playwright David Mamet shifted to the right. Lieberman shifted rightward.
Frum, Charles Johnson (among others) moved leftward.
Is this the natural plate tectonics of politics and punditry?
JPL
Personally, it bothers me when conservatives part with their party because of their personal life experiences.
We all have biases though, and that’s mine.
Cheryl Rofer
@Amir Khalid: Like any other group, Native Americans hold a wide variety of opinions about the more recent immigrants. There are a fair number of Native American news sources on the Web. Maybe I’ll do a post on them, although I’ll have to look more closely than I’ve done to figure out which I want to recommend.
And there are plenty of memes about “Homeland Security” and recent immigrants.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@eyelessgame:
Intriguing observation….
GregB
@Sunny Raines:
Sadly the response from most of the people adversely impacted by the implementation of conservative economic and social policy is to get suckered into believing that they are actually being damaged by leftist or liberal policies.
Conservatism is literally killing off their base with cigarettes, guns fast food, curbed maternal care and shitty work conditions.
Cheryl Rofer
@West of the Rockies (been a while): Seems to me like it’s a human thing. Right now, the extremists of the Republican Party are pushing far to the extreme. So others will start pushing back. What’s been notable so far is how few they have been. I welcome all changes that pull back from those who are trying to destroy our country. They are also indicators and leaders of a turn away from those destructive politics.
Cheryl Rofer
@JPL: Yeah, it’s kind of a cheap rationale, but our life experiences shape us. I’m the granddaughter of immigrants, and that’s part of my worldview.
germy
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I guess the smarter ones among them can tell when the ship is taking on water. Why there aren’t more of them, I have no clue. What are the rest of them waiting for? How many of them can really believe this will end well?
MomSense
@Inventor:
It’s always projection with these assholes. We joke about it but it is really common to project our worst qualities onto others.
azlip
The one thing Stephen left out of his column was the degree to which racism frames the issue for the anti-immigration crowd. I doubt we would be having this discussion if our immigrants were of northern European descent.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Inventor:
I just watched Cab perform that song on YouTube… oh, man, he filled that stage. What a performer!
cain
@tobie: who often than not is on the public dole. They are also the ones that throw money at hate mongers. Of course, Republicans are both closing that loophole so these older americans won’t have the money to waste on politicians and fox news advertisers. I wonder what demographic they will go after next?
cain
@Inventor: What does your sister see in him?
cmorenc
@Amir Khalid:
Well, even “Native Americans” were immigrants back 10k or so years ago, before the end of the Ice Age raised sea level sufficiently to drown the land bridge from Asia to Alaska.
debbie
I was apartment cleaning this morning, listening to a discussion on NPR about Jeff Sessions’ testimony. Hearing the clip of his protestations at accusations of wrongdoing (“Ah say, ah say! Gentlemen, your questions are scurrilous!”), I of course thought of Foghorn Leghorn, which then led me to think that, if a person lives long enough, everything will start over. I am again, as i did as a kid, watching Looney Tunes.
Mary G
Bret Stephens has had a very entertaining Twitter beef with Hannity starting last August when he called him the worst anchor at Fox News.
GregB
@germy:
If only there was a short poem by a World War II era German Christian that was applicable to the feelings Mr. Graham is feeling.
cain
@cmorenc:
At some point we should really take into account that it is a matter of degrees. To say they were immigrants 10k years ago.. I mean what are we supposed to be defending here? 10k is enough time for human evolution to change the shape and size of these immigrants. I suppose if we were to take this argument to the extreme we all are immigrants from Africa, correct?
D58826
@tobie:
And the places with the most social ills (drugs, divorcee, out of wedlock births, etc) are red and usually Bible belt. And Trumpcare will land in those same communities like an atomic bomb. But they have been voting for these politicians and for Trump so in the words of the only book they care about – you reap what you sow (then again not being a bible expert it could be something Ben Franklin or HL Menchen said).
And totally OT Alex Jones keeps (metaphorically) screwing Kelly by releasing more tapes.
And the NRA wishes every one a Happy Fathers day as it protects out society from dangerous 10 month olds being held by his Dad. The baby was shot and killed in Houston Tx. msn.com/en-us/news/crime/10-month-old-shot-dead-in-dads-arms-after-theyre-confronted-by-3-men-cops/a…
trollhattan
@Inventor:
Heh. Wonder how he’ll respond if the king of Sweden visits?
Inventor
@cain: I don’t / can’t really know. It’s only been two years and she seems to be souring somewhat on him, but her previous marriages were….problematic and he appears to treat her well personally. Her grown children avoid him.
D58826
@germy: Here Here it’s about time someone stands up for those poor Christians. Besides there is a practical side to it. Any time spend by ICE arresting a Christian is less time they can spend on MOOOSLIMs. I do wonder, however, why the good Rev. isn’t equally concerned about all of those Mexican Christian that ICE is deporting. Hmm let me think, not the right kind of Christian perhaps. It seems kind of obvious that in Franklin’s circles Catholics are only good for being anti-abortion, just like Jews are really good as cannon fodder for when Jesus returns on his flying dinosaur.
bemused
@MomSense:
And the rightwing is especially practiced at it. It’s all projection with them.
D58826
@debbie:
And why would you need to watch/read anything else to learn the mysteries of life!!!! and I always loved that Foghorn kept his feathers number for every time they wore blown off.
lollipopguild
@germy: Maybe Franklin should have a “come to Jesus” talk with his good buddy trump.
TriassicSands
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.):
The real problem is that they object to the fact that the ship is taking on water — they don’t object to the ship itself (the Republican Party)
MD Rackham
@cain:
Newcomer!
My family can trace their roots right back to the tide pools of Gondwanaland I’ll have you know.
pamelabrown53
If this has been discussed, then sorry I missed it: is anyone else angry/disturbed/upset at trump’s wholly unnecessary and brazenly stupid, reactionary roll back of Obama’s Cuba policy? Once again, for a tiny sliver of mostly older Cuban-American hardliners in Miami, we have returned to a destructive, self defeating policy. He once again has ceded leadership to Russia and China. He obviously hasn’t a clue about the concept of soft power.
That man is a one man wrecking crew.
D58826
@MD Rackham: And mine to the amino acids that were on the comet that landed in 4 billion nine hundred and fifty three BC. AT 11:30. DST
scav
@cmorenc: Go back far enough, the whole “nation of immigrants” status becomes tediously the near universal norm. “Those Beaker People invaded our homeland!” “What are those rock-knappers doing here, subverting our ways?!
Cheryl Rofer
For a Native American take with humor and bite, check out cartoonist Ricardo Cate’s “Without Reservations.” The Santa Fe New Mexican carries his cartoons, and I think other newspapers are beginning to as well. He now has a book out, and here’s his Facebook page.
Shalimar
@cmorenc: Since there were no Fox News viewers around then to complain and demand that a wall be built in Alaska, the first immigrants get a pass.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
Watching these conservative men flail around cherry picking things they don’t like about their party trying to avoid saying how their party ended up here and their own complicity in it has really gotten old. I don’t give them points for recognizing something that’s been under their nose for going on 40 years. They’re cowards.
D58826
@pamelabrown53: I did see a tweet that it was a choice between what most Cubans wanted and the small group of Cuban_Americans who didn’t want to lose the income from their black market operations. They still think they can return to Cuba, and to the cheers of the peons, move back into the old mansion. They do have a sad that they can’t drop by the club in Havana and mix with Frank/Dino and Mr. Big. But you can’t have everything I guess
WereBear
I used to think “conservatism” had some useful purpose; a kind of genetic tendency towards calmness, and considered steps towards change with more restraint.
Now, I consider it a form of mental illness, wherein fear puts them in a defensive crouch and completely disables their brain.
Suzanne
I’m glad Bret Stephens has this specific issue figured out, but I liked Kevin Williamson’s piece better.
“The truth about these communities is that they deserve to die.”
schrodingers_cat
Didn’t we use to have a Native American commenter here. I forget her name. She also had a jewelry business and had horses.
LurkerNoLonger
@pamelabrown53: Yeah, it bothers me too. I saw a headline yesterday that the changes were, like everything Trump does, mostly cosmetic. I didn’t click on the article so I don’t know how accurate it is.
Another Scott
@scav: Yeah.
But even among the Native Americans there were battles with invaders. Black Hills:
Cheers,
Scott.
(“Who isn’t making excuses or minimizing anything…”)
Thoughtful David
@D58826:
There’s an XKCD for everything:
Be sure to check out the mouse-over text on the cartoon, too.
lollipopguild
@pamelabrown53: If Obama did something the trump must undo it or something, something,something. Obama did not invade North Korea, therefore trump must threaten to invade North Korea. Obamacare must be destroyed and replaced with trumpcare so that millions of Americans will die faster! Faster!
debbie
@pamelabrown53:
I thought the most infuriating part was Trump’s patronizing attitude that only deprivation would teach Cubans to see the light and overthrow the Castro government. You like, like giving them only one scoop of ice cream.
lollipopguild
@WereBear: Fox News and all of the other right wing types have turned Conservative thought into a CON to make money.
Tom
Brett Stephens is a climate change denier, enabling the US to fiddle while the greatest threat to human survival burns. Screw him.
D58826
@LurkerNoLonger: Well Dr Fuhrer as usual, showed his concern for everyone in the decision
on KOS -http://www.dailykos.com/?page=2
Frankensteinbeck
@Sunny Raines:
They are not dupes, except perhaps of themselves. They WANT this. They want to destroy every social Good that might also help minorities. They want cruelty, and will happily give the rich the power to hurt the poor, although it’s the right to personally abuse minorities and be praised for it they want the most. They are absolutely fucking furious that liberals abet minorities and promote the idea that black lives matter. If we want to tax the rich or strengthen gun control, by White Man’s God, they will do everything they can to spite us, even if they like those ideas personally. They do believe that if they hurt others they will magically get everything they want, but they never needed the rich to convince them of that. It is a bedrock element of racism through all human history.
It is pretty damn easy for the greedy rich to ride a tiger that wants to go in their direction, but we also very much do not live in a meritocracy. Most conservative rich and politicians are the same dumbass, racist assholes as the voters. Wealth only insulates them from the consequences of being stupid.
SiubhanDuinne
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Love Cab, also love Danny Kaye’s version. Some of the best scat you’ve ever heard.
youtu.be/eC-W0dMbxww
wjs
I believe you can go broke waiting for conservatives to find wisdom, introspection, self-control, and the ability to admit they were wrong.
Articles like this are designed to allow people who are not affected by what’s going on to feel better about themselves. I’ll start to believe this crap when the New York Times runs a series of articles explaining how they had to jettison most of their political coverage reporters because their incompetence failed to stop Trump.
D58826
@Thoughtful David: xkcd.com/162/
Liked the one about angular momentum. Jst wish she would spin clockwise to sped us closer to Der Fuhrers last day in office
Frankensteinbeck
@Another Scott:
I do think this conversational focus downplays the way Native Americans are still suffering from the history of European immigration (including all of America as a nation’s actions). I also understand that nitpicking is the Balloon Juice religion, sport, and art form.
Tim C.
@wjs: Nah, those reporters are too busy stirring up the clouds that will hang over whatever Democratic politician gets nominated for any office.
pamelabrown53
@LurkerNoLonger: @49.
This morning I made a balloon run and was listening to NPR. The “report” consisted of a couple old hard-liners who were happy. THAT was the extent of the “report”. Nothing about the the bigger picture or possible ramifications. So far, not much reaction or discussion and this bothers me too. It all seems so mindless and ignorant. Yet, so far, few seem to even register it.
While, as you said, Trump’s EO was largely cosmetic, it was still antagonistic.
Another Scott
@Frankensteinbeck: I get your point. There’s no doubt that our government and people have been horrible to the natives for hundreds of years, and it continues.
I just mentioned the Black Hills because J and I vacationed there years ago (and loved it). Part of our learning experience there was learning that the BH had been fought over by Native American groups for ages and that the Lakota were fairly recent victors over their rivals. My comment was meant to add a little more historical trivia, not to be taken as whataboutery or as an excuse to minimize what we (as a people) did and continue to do.
Cheers,
Scott.
pamelabrown53
@lollipopguild: @52.
Agree. Obviously, Obama occupies prime trump-head real estate…but the rent is too high!
Villago Delenda Est
They have only themselves to blame for their obdurate, willful lack of vision.
Ken
@lollipopguild: He’s definitely reversing the Obama policy of “Don’t do stupid stuff”.
D58826
Looking the the damage photos on the Fitzgerald there is one small thing to be thankful for. If the container ship had impacted at a 90 degree angle and at any kind of speed it probably would have cut the Fitzgerald in half and the chances of any survivors would have approached 0 as both halves would have probably gone down in minutes
CarolDuhart2
@Inventor: Lazy? Fucker is ignorant. Who is it that gets up at 4 to make sure he has fresh lettuce? The guy who opened up that 7-11, food truck, or diner so that he doesn’t have to really cook his food? Those people who went to 6 years of college so they could design the I-Phone so he could play on the phone instead of getting gainful employment? All Immigrants or first Generation Americans. Even the laziest of him take jobs he clearly disdains taking, goes to school while he lazes all day, and cleans counters at midnight in a store he won’t even try to start working in either.
Villago Delenda Est
@WereBear: The very term “conservative” has been warped beyond all recognition by these people, who claim to be “Christian” and at the same time embrace dog-eat-dog capitalism. The very textbook definition of contradiction.
D58826
@Another Scott:
From what I’ve read the same can be said of many Native American tribes that the whites encountered, esp west of the Mississippi. IIIRC the Apaches occupied that barren stretch of AZ and Northern Mexico because stronger tribes kicked them out of the better real estate.
And I think Malcolm Nance on MSNBC recently said his great grand dad was one of the Buffalo soldiers in the 9th Calvary.
pamelabrown53
@debbie: @53.
Yep. Patronizing and counter productive. 50+ years of failed policy has only left the pro-Castro forces more deeply entrenched, with it’s population hurting.What infuriates me is that a clear majority of Americans, republicans too, recognize the need to not punish Cuba when we have open trade, travel and diplomacy with countries who behave worse. There is no rhyme or reason. Just a blatant stroking of a tiny sliver of population in a swing state. I live here and I’m so tired of the “slivers” dictating all the policy. That’s the result of dark money ownership.
khead
@CarolDuhart2:
Yeah, this. I’ve stopped coddling the folks I know.
Turgidson
@Inventor:
He no doubt thinks immigrants are to blame for him being a lazy freeloader and not the captain of industry he’s sure he would be if those damn wetbacks hadn’t taken all the jerbs.
Corner Stone
@schrodingers_cat: I believe you mean Aji. I haven’t seen her comment here in some time.
It looks like their art site is still online at least.
D58826
@D58826: @NotMax: Tom Nichols, Rick Wilson, Steve Schmidt (even if he did inject PAlin into the body politic), Nicolle Wallace Jennifer Rubin of the WAPO all have been critics
D58826
and max boot –
foreignpolicy.com/2017/06/16/donald-trump-is-proving-too-stupid-to-be-president/amp/
No Drought No More
The vast majority of Americans who voted to re-elect Nixon in a landslide did not regret his resignation 18 months later. On the contrary, they were relieved to see him go, for they came to recognize by August of ’74 that his law breaking posed a mortal threat to Constitution and country.
Slowly and grudgingly to be sure, they came to apprehend that threat. They drew a bead on the facts unearthed in various investigations, and reluctantly concluded The Trickster was unfit for office. Simply put, that forced his surrender and resignation. It was either that, or his sorry ass would have been impeached. Trump is in the same boat now, and is as good as finished for essentially the same reason..
D58826
well some good news on huffington
as if anyone thought they wouldn’t
Suzanne
@D58826:
As someone who was baptized, raised, and confirmed in the Presbyterian Church (USA, for those who care), it is incredibly obvious that Dampnut doesn’t know shit about shit about Christianity or Presbyterianism. If he was really a member of a Presbyterian church or had been confirmed, he would have received some at least fair religious education, and would not have derped this gigantic pile of derp. And he would also feel ludicrous guilt for being such a lazy, unproductive shit.
Mr. Suzanne and I joke about the guilt we each still feel from our religious heritage. He has Catholic guilt, I have Protestant guilt.
cain
@Inventor:
Well hopefully this gets resolved in a satisfactory manner. But right now it is an unequal marriage. Waking up at 1pm is ridiculous.
debbie
@D58826:
Trump is stupid, but the real problem is that he’s surrounded himself with even stupider people, probably thinking that would make him seem smarter. Failure!
cain
@WereBear:
That’s where I am at as well.
schrodingers_cat
@Corner Stone: Yes that’s her. Last time I remember seeing her in the comments was when I gave her the recipe of the omelet I make with cilantro,green chili and red onion.
schrodingers_cat
@debbie: He is the logical conclusion of R ideology not some aberration.
Heidi Dog
@Corner Stone: Aji also left the GOS because of computer problems, I believe. She has a website: ajijaakwe.blogspot.com She and Wings are in the process of building a house, and raising money for same.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@MD Rackham:
My people come from Ragnarok.
realbtl
@Inventor: Wrong!
“But Minnie had a heart as big as a whale”
I don’t think it fits.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Actually, I see you can’t be from Ragnarok, a series of events. My nerd cred is dashed.
efgoldman
@wjs:
Also, in reality how many of their knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing, racist flying monkey voters ever read anything from the NYT or WaPo, even second or third hand? Maybe – maybe – they’ll hear Hannity sort-of quote some of it, and then yell about it. Stevens, Frum, etc are writing for each other; one big “we’re not THOSE goober assholes, not us!” circle jerk.
Corner Stone
@West of the Rockies (been a while): Please see yourself out.
SFAW
I’m going to suggest that Baud!2020! run on a platform of “mass deplortation” — the mass deportation of Shitgibbon’s deplorables. I think it’s an idea whose time has come.
[Although “deplortation” already has its own hashtag (among other things), “mass deplortation” does not yet appear anywhere.]
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Imagine the Founding Father’s surprise when they find out that being Christian is a requirement for being American.
Tenar Arha
@D58826: I was mentioning to a friend the other day that I’ve started to simultaneously nod along with all of these concerned conservatives including Max Boot, Ana Navarro, Evan McMullen etc. while forcefully reminding myself they were, until very recently, perfectly fine with what conservative Republicans were advocating.
Anyway I’m super wary every time I nod along with or quote them because I don’t believe any one of them has addressed their complicity in the extremists’ destruction of the GOP. If we do get the VP as President, they may be happy enough with every policy choice as long as the current loud parts get quiet once again. Basically I’m waiting for their explicit mea culpas before I assume they’re more than unofficial allies. Right now we only share a few goals, like saving the Republic from kakistocracy. I can’t even say they’re totally anti-kleptocracy considering how I’m not aware they’ve ever protested Citizens United.
Basically for me they’re under permanent ? until they have public conversions that include some form of “liberals were right” and “we were super-wrong.” Because if they don’t admit how they helped turn one party toxic, I think we’re going to end up right back here again.
ETA typo
Ruckus
@Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.):
There were enough lifeboats on the Titanic.
Until there wasn’t.
Most people don’t think very far ahead if any amount at all. They look at a situation and come to a conclusion, the middle working, important parts be damned. Mainly because they don’t fit the conclusion or because they are too difficult. And they have a conclusion. There are too many guns in the hands of the wrong people, so let’s get some to even things out. Liberals want to tax me to spread out the cost of healthcare and make it cheaper for everyone, so let’s get rid of healthcare altogether.
The conclusion doesn’t fit any possible logical process, so rather than change the conclusion, let’s throw out the logic. People want their own reality and will lie to themselves to get it.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Corner Stone:
Guess I’ll eat a worm…
*sobs and turns away
SFAW
All these “My family was here before the America was created” “Well, MY family was here before the Earth was created” crap makes me think you’re all from Yorkshire.
aimai
@azlip: Yes, we would. Nativism does not have to be framed around racism. Benjamin Franklin had an extremely low opinion of the Swedes and the Irish weren’t always considered white etc…etc…etc… In fact the very phrase “anglo-saxon” as in WASP was developed at a period of intense white but not right white ethnic immigration–it was developed to make clear that there was a hierarchy of whiteness that included some factor of religion and which placed White anglo-saxon protestants over white ethnic catholics.
Mary G
Well Balloon Juice peeps, this afternoon I’ll be off on my one-week cruise from Long Beach to Cabo San Lucas. If I am not posting, it’s because they charge a fortune for what their own website says is “slow as dial-up” WiFi. I’m conflicted. Part of me thinks a week offline would be good for me. The other part fears a nervous breakdown due to imagining what Twitler and the Turtle are up to. I am bringing the 10-year-old digital camera and I I get any good shots I’ll send them in. Mostly I plan to pamper myself in the beauty salon.
efgoldman
@Tenar Arha:
You’re going to be waiting a long, long time. Several lifetimes, I’m guessing.
Corner Stone
@Tenar Arha:
Please be sure to pack a lunch. And some bedding. A change of clothes and some type of shelter will probably also be useful while you wait.
debbie
@schrodingers_cat:
In that he didn’t surround himself with smarter, more experienced (even if misguided) people, Trump is an aberration.
Another Scott
@Mary G: Have a great time. We’ll save a seat for when you get back.
Cheers,
Scott.
Corner Stone
@Mary G: Pro-tip: If you’re facing West in the morning and see a sunrise, order a double of your favorite adult beverage. Then enjoy it while you can.
Mnemosyne
@MD Rackham:
One of my friends is severely allergic to grasses (multiple kinds), so I tease her that her far-distant ancestors ended up in Scandinavia because they had to get away from those fucking savannas to someplace without any goddamned grass!
Ruckus
@D58826:
A sister ship to the one I was stationed 45 yrs ago on was hit at approx 90 deg by a much larger friendly ship which caused massive damage. The bow of the ship hit right in the area of our workshop, which was below the water line. Almost impossible not to drown, if one weren’t first squashed.
eclare
OMG, just pulled up the Washington Post, and front and center, yet another article about rural Americans and their opinions/feelings.
tybee
@cain:
correct.
Mnemosyne
@Mary G:
A week offline will be good for you and your blood pressure. The crew will be in touch with the shore, so you’ll hear about anything truly catastrophic that happens (like a war, earthquake, etc) Enjoy yourself!
Radiumgirl
@WereBear: Except the term “conservative” has been co-opted by right-wing reactionaries. A lot of what’s described as “conservatism” isn’t really. It’s authoritarian.
Mnemosyne
@schrodingers_cat:
She lived in New Mexico and was a friend of George RR Martin’s wife, too. She may still post on Daily Kos, but I don’t think she’s commented here since before 2014.
Barbara
I read this and I was not really impressed. I think Brett Stephens’s analysis is basically the same kind of Randian celebration that — even if it were true the way he presents it — is unlikely to persuade anyone with his arguments. It was, among other things, highly selective in its description of immigration and immigrants.
Obviously, the most recent immigrants are not the first immigrant waves to bring outsized energy to the task of succeeding in the U.S., but it is also the case that — at least in Silicon Valley — the disproportionate share of immigrants starting business is in part attributable to the fact that they were part of a process that selected them to come to the U.S. because they possessed the kinds of skills that are highly correlated to starting a business in Silicon Valley.
The real issue for me is, why is it that so many Americans don’t have skills that would allow them to participate within the emerging economy. Not that they would all be starting businesses but if there is a skills gap (and I know there are a lot of opinions on that) it seems an incomplete answer to just shrug your shoulders and leave increasing numbers of natives behind. I know he wasn’t doing that, exactly, but he was like most reflexive conservatives blaming people for their own failure to anticipate what the future would demand and overcome whatever economic or other issues they have in accessing training, etc.
And, of course, many immigrants, including most of those being rounded up for deportation, do not have technology skills and work in low wage occupations, and Trump’s immigrant bashing is horrifying not just because immigrants are more likely to start businesses.
hueyplong
Not sure I want to live through the event sufficiently horrific that it makes every right wing commentator immediately convert to “our” side. For that reason, and despite his other warts (climate denialism, etc.), I welcome every Bret Stephens column that nudges in our direction. It would be nice for one columnist after another to do this until the numbers get to big for there to be a sense that there are just a few heretics/traitors to the cause.
Thanks to Cheryl for linking.
J R in WV
@pamelabrown53:
“is anyone else angry/disturbed/upset at trump’s wholly unnecessary and brazenly stupid, reactionary roll back of Obama’s Cuba policy?”
I’m only surprised it took him this long to attempt to undo Obama’s common-sense relaxation of stupid rules. I guess there’s a master list of Obama’s actions, and a strict order in which the best of them are to be undone? Probably not, that would be too logical for Trump. Just flit from one to another. As Bannon thinks of a new one to go after.
Ruckus
@Mary G:
Enjoy!
Don’t worry about political shit. It will still be here to help clean up when you get back. And there may be some good news. One can always hope.
lurker dean
@Mary G: have a great time!
Mnemosyne
@Ruckus:
I watched a webinar with the woman who wrote a book about honest communications (“Fierce” something) and she used a quote from Hemingway where someone asks a character how they went bankrupt. It was something like, Very slowly, and then all at once.
The right wing is trying to hold back the tide, but once their facade starts to fail, it will collapse faster than they ever imagined, Berlin Wall-style.
Thoughtful David
@Tenar Arha:
This.
I see Jenghazi Rubin’s column pretty regularly, and she’s really anti-Trump. But you can tell that’s all; she still has to make little digs about liberals and liberal ideas.
She spent almost four years writing daily columns about how evil Hillary Clinton is. I bet she wrote 200 columns about Benghazi and emails. She suddenly realized that Trump starting a big war in the Middle East probably wouldn’t be a great thing for Israel, and turned against him.
Rubin and her ilk bear responsibility for the shitgibbon. Until I hear her apologize and say “not only was I wrong, but liberals were right all along” I’ll continue to consider as evil as the rest.
She spent 20 years convincing me that me that she’s a conservative nutcase hater like the rest. Unless she makes a convincing mea culpa, I’ll continue to believe it.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@J R in WV:
Trump knows he’s not one-hundredth the man Obama is… you’re seeing his rage and jealousy and resentment playing out in Technicolor Dolby SurroundSound.
schrodingers_cat
@eclare: Not interested. If my town that is 70% farmland can vote for Hillz (she got 70% of the vote) so can these other agrarian in area. Not interested in knowing why they found T enticing.
Suzanne
@Barbara:
This is an interesting and very complicated question, but the virulent strain of anti-intellectualism and conflation of education with elitism is certainly not helping.
Suzanne
@Mnemosyne:
Fierce Conversations.
We joke about it at work.
Ruckus
@hueyplong:
Yes, for sure, a cataclysmic event that would cause lots of conservatives to change direction all at once would be unwelcome. I do however wish the conversion wasn’t so damn slow. That the 2 watt bulb that signifies that they might be having a thought rather than a knee jerk reaction, might be able to be just a bit brighter. Say 10 watts. Still make them dim bulbs but at least they might be able to see something.
Amir Khalid
@D58826:
Anyone who was paying attention already knew Trump was too stupid (and ignorant, and lazy, and pigheaded, and crooked, and uncouth, etc.) to be a fit President, years before he ever considered running. Boot’s anecdotes would be hilarious if they hadn’t happened in real life.
Mnemosyne
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Did you read the blog post about that at Very Smart Brothas? It was hilarious.
@Suzanne:
The webinar was good — I haven’t read the book. I did read Crucial Conversations, which is a slightly different book, and I’m not exaggerating when I say it changed my life. I just wish I had read it before my dad died so we could have worked through more of our shit.
Mnemosyne
@Suzanne:
Also, too, it was helpful because I watched the live broadcast at my desk while my boss went to the seminar (they ran out of seats by the time I registered), so when she came back, I was able to say, “Remember that conversation we had yesterday? It was a beach ball!” and she knew what I meant.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
Totally OT, but I went to John Scalzi’s Twitter and saw a picture of an ocellated turkey… what a stunning bird!
Mnemosyne
All right, jackals. I need to go buy a gift card for my longtime hairdresser who just got married, and then get my hair cut and colored, and then take my teenage niece to see Beauty and the Beast, unless she’d rather see Wonder Woman Catch all y’all later.
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne:
I unofficially went through that. But the fast and slow parts were reversed. It was one day in Dec 2007 when the recession hit me upside the head. I was pretty sure I was not going to be able to keep my retirement business. The slow tinkle part started on the next Monday as I sat, hoping that the recession would be short lived. It wasn’t. Of course. It could have been, had we not had conservatives fucking up everything.
BBA
@Mnemosyne: There’s another old saw that cuts against that: The market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent.
If the right-wing fever finally breaks when the coasts are ten feet underwater and the rest of the country is under international embargo stemming from the failed Iran invasion, what good would it do us then?
The wingnuts we will always have with us.
Thoughtful David
@D58826:
That one’s good too. But as a confirmed denizen of nerdland, and in the spirit of XKCD, I’d have to suggest that it would be easier for Megan to just move down to the first floor of her apartment building with Cueball, or somewhere else deeper in Earth’s gravity well, if she wants to have more time together. (At least relative to the rest of us who remain where we are.)
Mnemosyne
@Ruckus:
In that case, it was the financial system that was going through it: the collapse was slow, until it wasn’t and everyone panicked.
You were just collateral damage. ?
Mnemosyne
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
I was super excited to finally see some of the famous Pasadena parrots fly overhead outside of my office a couple of days ago. There were three of them in a tight formation — I only knew what they were by the iridescent green feathers.
And now I really do have to go — later, gators!
cain
Why does buying airplane tickets create so much anxiety?
Sphex
@cain: great question. There is a mostly great TED talk by Barry Schwartz that addresses (among other things) what I guess is part of it: too many choices, and the illusion of a “best” choice. Which brings with it the anxiety of making a “bad” choice- and the illusion that it’s your fault if you do.
ETA: the title of the talk is “The Paradox of Choice”
Another Scott
@Mnemosyne: There are wild monk parakeets living in Chicago. I remember being shocked when I saw them in the early ’80s.
Have fun today!
Cheers,
Scott.
Avery Greynold
I understand that the writer likes business-minded conservative things immigrants do, such as work hard, obey laws, and make babies. But Trumpish conservatives also want white skin, straight sex and loving Jesus. Did you notice that the writer personally believes that “God-fearing” is necessary to making America great again? Can’t wait till the NYTimes lets him slip in his views on gays and white supremacy.
BBA
@cain: The airlines have nearly four decades of experience in figuring out exactly how much is the most you’re willing to pay for a ticket. All you can say is yes or no.
Tehanu
@Frankensteinbeck:
I wish I could disagree with you. Unfortunately, what you say here makes more sense than most of the explanations I’ve seen (“economic insecurity,” yadda yadda).
D58826
@Corner Stone: AND AARP MEMBERSHIP CARD
Ruckus
@Mnemosyne:
Me and how many other millions?
My business was 2 yrs old and still not quite profitable but was growing and was very much on the road to being there in the third year. That was very satisfying, till it wasn’t. I actually stayed even for the next 4 yrs. But staying even, not losing business, without making a profit, no matter how small isn’t staying afloat, unless you have an unlimited sugar daddy. On that Saturday I had 2 investors willing to put in a sizeable chunk of money, enough that I’d have been able to last. On Monday they both pulled out and sat on their money. And that, as they say, was that. Telle est la vie. ETA or C’est la vie if you like that better.
Baud
@SFAW: If I win, they will probably self deplort.
Lyrebird
@Amir Khalid: Hi there! I waved at you (well probably in the totally wrong direction). Got to have supper near Tuas overlooking the bay or straits or whatever. All the best to you and yours.
Major Major Major Major
@Tenar Arha:
I should also note that it’s entirely acceptable to have them as temporary unofficial allies. Moving from Trump to Pence would be a big positive for the nation. We can dump them after the existential threat to the nation is gone, and we have a mere existential threat to our way of life in the white house.
sharl
OT – Front pagers have been pretty good about this, but here’s another reminder to not forget what Congress is doing – quietly and in secret (Senate) – while Twitler the Idiot attracts all the big media attention.
VOX’s Congressional reporter, Jeff Stein, has been really good in his reporting and on Twitter about how little the major media outlets are covering the secret AHCA proceedings – even the occasional report of the secrecy and importance of the issue would be welcome (and it’s news!) – with some recent unconfirmed reports being that The Turtle might have a procedural mechanism lined up to speed up the vote in a way which will shut down most discussion on the Senate floor prior to the vote.
And sure, this may cost them in 2018 if they pull it off, but by then huge damage will have been done. Well, probably not to them – please don’t think that various various rightwing “think tanks”, legal firms, and consulting groups won’t amply reward them even if they lose their seats.
This morning I saw an absolutely horrendous twitter thread – mostly pictorial – of how some leading UK Tories have been responding (not) to the Grenfell Tower disaster; real Versailles/”let them eat cake”-type shit. I got to wondering if our goopers wish to emulate the Tories in this manner. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least.
J R in WV
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
I suspect Trump actually thought it would be easy, seeing as how that black guy did so well. Now, gradually, day by day, he is beginning to realize that it isn’t easy at all, and is most probably more of a job than he, Trump, can do at all, much less do well.
Maybe he can’t really understand that. Maybe it won’t sink in until he, Trump, has made some big decisions that don’t work out as he expected at all. Maybe not even then.
But the rest of us will know, even the ones that haven’t yet figured it out, that Trump is a dope.
efgoldman
@Major Major Major Major:
I dunno’. It’d be like moving from next to the pigshit pool to another house next to the cow shit pool. Different, to some degree and with some different emphasis. Not necessarily better.
Major Major Major Major
@sharl:
If it’s a vote-o-rama they aren’t at all uncommon on budget/reconciliation bills.
efgoldman
@J R in WV:
Methinks you’re attributing processes and abilities which he doesn’t have.
Major Major Major Major
@efgoldman: I disagree. Trump is actively corroding every institution of governance, which is much harder to recover from than what Pence would do. He would just pass bad laws and stuff the executive branch with hundreds of bad appointees, who will go away with the administration. Laws can be overturned but it’s hard to un-nuke somebody. Gessen had a piece about this (and a decent interview) recently, which I found fairly convincing.
jl
NYT needs yet another conservative columnist? Hell with him.
Brendancalling
@Frankensteinbeck: exactly. Which is why I don’t feel sorry at all for racist gun freak Steve Scalise. He wanted a world where mentally ill people can buy guns and got what he wanted.
zhena gogolia
@Major Major Major Major:
I agree.
sharl
@Major Major Major Major: You got me curious, so I did a cursory search on {AHCA+”vote-o-rama”}. I’m not gonna claim I didn’t miss something (it WAS a cursory search), but the only hit I got was Jim Newell’s piece at Slate yesterday, where he claimed that it could be the Senate Democrats who could use the vote-o-rama process for offering amendments to slow down (not stop) the McConnell/GOP juggernaut.
In my previous comment I was referring to something I saw within the past week or so, but cannot now recall details of the process McConnell was rumored to be considering.
Major Major Major Major
@sharl: As Newell mentions (summary for the rest of y’all), budget and reconciliation bills can only be debated for 20 hours, or something, but all amendments are considered germane. Traditionally, if the opposition party tries to stuff it full of amendments to slow it down, the majority leader holds a vote-a-rama and considers each one ten minutes at a time. If the Democrats file 50 amendments, it will be dealt with thusly.
This is however entirely out of politeness and completely optional. If they file 50,000 amendments Mitch will just have a vote.
Usually you use this amendment process to force embarrassing votes, making people vote against something good, sometimes to the point of insanity, because any change to the bill means it has to go back through the CBO and such, so all amendments are voted down.
A vote-a-rama was held in 2010 for the ACA vote and again in 2013 for another budgetary bill.
Corner Stone
@Brendancalling:
Not sure we have arrived at mentally ill status, although he clearly had some issues. But in general, Scalise wanted every white male to have a weapon and be able to express themselves as The Founders intended. This is where we are now. A citizen who apparently disagreed with his government-by-tyranny.
Tenar Arha
@efgoldman: @Corner Stone: Yep, I’m basically trying to operate on the assumption that I’m waiting for Godot for a “you were right, and we wuz wrong.” Our goals are not their goals, and probably never will be.
I’ve been listening to both sides or Democrats are worse for too long to believe we’ve got a potential stable alliance. Especially since we can literally read from day to day how badly the media want to normalize even this President. Or how much the many commentators and never-Trumpers may want to believe that there are still some Republicans with backbone in office, even though it’s clear from the majority’s actions there aren’t any more.
Major Major Major Major
@Tenar Arha: The Communists and the West differed somewhat on the correct approach to economics but they got along well enough to fight Hitler.
Mary G
It is chaos here at my house. They are convinced that we can fit two adults, three teenagers, my manual wheelchair and all our luggage into my Subaru Forester. I don’t think it can be done, but oh well.
catclub
@Frankensteinbeck:
Obama quietly did a LOT to improve how the government deals with Native American tribes. You can bet that Rump will try to fuck that up.
Tenar Arha
@Major Major Major Major: Yep. I think I’ve used that as a metaphor too myself to conceptualize how we should think about our “allies.”
ETA “too” ? history rhymes
lurker dean
@Mary G: yikes, good luck. my dad had a wheelchair and they take up a lot of room, as you know. may need to put some luggage on the teens’ laps, or on the roof.
Chris
@eyelessgame:
This particular position at least didn’t used to be at odds with conservatives, even if they were very right wing. During the Cold War, conservatives cultivated good relations with all kinds of immigrant groups – Chinese, Vietnamese, Cuban, every kind of East European. (Sure, the common foundation was anticommunism, but c’mon: it wouldn’t be hard at all to build a similar connection with contemporary immigrants, especially the Middle Eastern ones who, by and large, loathe the same people who are enemies of the U.S). It’s not entirely surprising that there are at least a few who are still old school enough to remember that.
Chris
@Sunny Raines:
Yeah, and the problem is that to the extent that these core ideas are any good, they’re already widely accepted by the Democrats. You a capitalist? So are most Democrats. You believe in law and order and a strong defense? So do most Democrats. Heck, even being Christian is something most Democrats have.
nightranger
Can someone explain to me who this Cheryl Rofer is always with this sympathizing with the right bullshit? Is that her whole purpose here? To troll us with this “well ya know they are one of those imaginary Reagan conservatives and they do have a point” nonsense!
The right has no point. Any of them still supporting what the right currently represents should be sent off to the totally real FEMA re-education camps. Fuk every last one of them. The end. If I want to read about how both sides blah blah then I will read the NY Times or whatever. Not here.
Chris
@D58826:
It could be that, but I think it’s also the tribal-obsessed mindset at work. What really fires up people like Franklin Graham is narratives about battles between the godly and ungodly, like, in this case, “poor helpless Christians persecuted by ruthless oppressive Muslims.” But Mexico isn’t like that. In Mexico, the main problem is what you might call Christian-on-Christian crime. So it doesn’t get the same attention. Without their favorite bogeymen to rail against, these people lose interest quickly.
efgoldman
@nightranger:
Or you could start your own blog and exclude whoever you wish
nightranger
@efgoldman
Or you could start your own blog and insist eveyone gives more than 0.0 fuks about your random useless opinions.
Tenar Arha
@efgoldman: @J R in WV:
Howard Stern, of all people, supposedly warned him that he would not like what happened whether he won or lost. Benedict Donald likes celebrities (particularly the a-list) and being popular, neither was going to be in the cards after the way he ran and certainly not now he’s President.
As hard as it is to believe that a 70 year old wouldn’t understand that lots of people will always hate the
President, Stern’s comments show how truly oblivious to the actual job Trump really was. He signed up for a lifetime of vituperation for revenge/envy/money/a lark ???
There’s a small part of me (the part that just watched my father pass two months ago), who looks at his 4 adult children and wonders why the heck they didn’t stop him. Even with understanding that he’s incapable of listening to judicious advice to refrain from anything, and that at least 3 of them are grifting monsters themselves.
Chris
@D58826:
You know, I don’t know if I’d believe that in any other context, but with Trump in particular, I somehow find the black market/organized crime connection completely believable.
And you’re right about the Cubano right wingers. Based on family experience, at least. The “honestly think they can walk back into the old mansion to the cheers of the peons” is almost verbatim the critique I remember my dad making about his great-aunt.
efgoldman
@nightranger:
Because all of us who participate feel the same about you.
Send Cole an EMAIL IN ALL CAPS and I’m sure he’ll send you a full refund.
sharl
@efgoldman: In my opinion, aLtErNaTiNg CaPs WiTh SmALl CaSe LeTtErS iS mUcH mOrE eYe-CaTcHiNg. BuT yMmV…
Woodrowfan
@debbie: and Foghorn Leghorn was inspired by a character on “Allen’s Alley,” Beauregard Claghorn.
MomSense
@sharl:
Heh.
rikyrah
5 things Trump did while you weren’t looking: Week 2
From a trio of deals with China to more power for the Pentagon, here’s how the White House changed policy this week.
By Danny Vinik
06/16/2017 01:52 PM EDT
……………………………………………
2. Education Department targets Obama-era student protections
With student-loan debt a trillion-dollar issue, the Obama administration announced a new policy last October that would allow defrauded borrowers to have their federal student loans cancelled—an expensive proposition for the government, which would cover the cost. Student advocates, who had long pushed Obama to adopt such a rule, cheered the news, arguing it was simply a matter of fairness.
One problem: The rule wasn’t scheduled to take effect until July 1—and now it looks like it will never take effect. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos announced this week that the agency was delaying the implementation of the so-called “defense to repayment” rule indefinitely, on the grounds that it is the subject of an ongoing lawsuit. In effect, this means the idea is almost certainly dead: DeVos also announced that the department intends to rewrite the rule altogether, along with another major Obama-era education rule, known as “gainful employment,” that required colleges to meet certain standards or risk losing access to federal student loan dollars.
Unlike “defense to repayment,” the “gainful employment” rule was finalized in 2014 and had already taken effect, so the Trump administration will have to undertake a full rulemaking process to rewrite it, a time-consuming process.
The changes are a defeat for defrauded students and a big victory for for-profit colleges, which are disproportionately represented among both loan-fraud cases and colleges that leave students with high debt levels. For-profits loudly argued that the Obama administration was effectively trying to choke out the industry altogether. This week, DeVos gave it new life.
politico.com/agenda/story/2017/06/16/5-things-trump-did-while-you-werent-looking-week-2-000462
Chris
@Barbara:
The thing is, in this case, blaming people for their failures is largely correct. It’s the continued election of right wing politicians that’ve turned so many red districts into the economic wastelands they currently are. The rest of the citizenry isn’t on some kind of crusade against them the way they are against blacks, immigrants, wev – the rest of us would be fine with helping develop their areas, providing services to them, wev. They’re the ones who repeatedly shoot themselves in the foot because screwing everyone else just means that much to them.
There’s a cause-and-effect relationship between their political actions and their failure here that doesn’t exist for any of the communities they normally blame.
(((CassandraLeo)))
@West of the Rockies (been a while): We shouldn’t forget Cole himself.
@Radiumgirl: Agreed. I’m not a conservative myself, but neither are about 97% of today’s Republicans. The term conservatism at one point referred to a philosophy that is sceptical of change. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Republicans are reactionaries: they want to change things back to how they imagine they used to be. (Which they never were, to be clear.) I feel the term conservatism needs to be reclaimed.
efgoldman
@sharl:
Nahh. Too much work.
sharl
@nightranger: To answer your query a bit more seriously, Cheryl Rofer is a retired nuclear chemist – she worked for years on matters of radioactive materials with regards to their use (and misuse), safe handling, disposal and environmental issues, stuff like that. In such work you get used to dealing with the world as it exists, not the world as you would like it to be; although professionally one hopes that her/his work will help blaze a path from the former to the latter.
In the realm of politics, “the world as it exists” contains a lot of conservatives in power, along with a lot of just regular folks who vote them into office (or at least don’t seem to care – yet – that they are in charge). To quote the twitter header of a youngish leftie I follow, “my idols are dead and my enemies are in power”.
I like Cheryl because, despite this, she plunges forward regardless, as I assume she did in her working days when she engaged in the daily grind of supporting the people in charge of developing and sustaining various practices and policies on nuclear materials and safety and whatnot.
By virtue of temperament and hard-earned knowledge, she doesn’t leave me with the impression that she’s a “Viva la revolution!” kinda gal. That time may come – I hope not, because having read enough history, real violent uprisings ain’t exactly the stuff of Errol Flynn/Hollyweird-type glorious and entertaining derring-do – but in the meantime, those who don’t want to repeat awful history tend to hold their noses and look for whatever silver linings they can find surrounding the fart clouds created by shitweasels like Bret Stephens.
Major Major Major Major
@nightranger:
Can…
*whispers*
can you read?
Tenar Arha
@Ruckus: One of the biggest arguments I used to have with a friend (who’s not my friend anymore mostly due to arguments like this) was how the Great Depression ended. Not when, which was during WWII, but why and how.
I would point out until I was practically blue that it proved Keynes’ arguments for counter cyclical spending because we had full employment (federal, local & private) and government spending (from manufacturing thru purchasing). He actually argued that every war does that so 1. It didn’t count and 2. Even the slow down during 1936 when so many alphabet programs disappeared didn’t prove a thing. 3. And the fact that post-war we had the only functioning manufacturing sector while continuing to build arms wasn’t proof either.
The irony that we’re been forced to re-learn this lesson just as most of the people who survived the depression and the war are dying is – I don’t have a good word for it – but it infuriates me some days.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@nightranger:
I value Cheryl’s contributions very much.
Serious question: do you know no conservatives, not one, who you might describe as kind or generous or hard-working or meaningfully creative? You can find no virtue, nothing worth saving, nurturing (however slowly) in an entire group of people?
NO group is monolithic, not Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, Atheists, not cis-straight, LGBTQ, asexual, pan-sexual, not Latino, Black, Asian, Pacific Islander, or, yes, even white people. Not all people who vote progressive are good people; not all Sanders supporters are self-involved, smug assholes, and not every last person who voted for Reagan or Bush or Nixon, or even Trump is completely, utterly bereft of decency.
People in this country of every race and creed voted for the man (with the vast majority being stupid White people). I despise him. I don’t wish to despise sixty million people. Perhaps, yes, fifty million of them are truly, truly (no hyperbole) wretched, willfully stupid, evil people who are worth loathing.
But be careful of hatred. It tends to destroy the soul.
Fight back. Point and laugh. Call a racist motherfucker a racist. Call a bigot of any shade, bent, or fabric a bigot. March, protest, scream, cry, boycott. But be careful of doing additional damage to your own mind and heart and soul.
Chris
@Tenar Arha:
Like the USSR, we’re slowly dying of inflexible ideological refusal to acknowledge the reality that’s right in front of our fucking face.
Baud
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Don’t end up like me. :-(
sharl
@Major Major Major Major: I found that thing I had forgotten about: Senate Rule 14. That is what McConnell might be considering for accelerating the vote on AHCA. Other than a couple tweets that Cheryl posted in comments, I couldn’t find any front-page mentions of it here at B-J, at least not where the phrase “Rule 14” was used explicitly. But it was widely discussed elsewhere last week, e.g., here.
debbie
@Woodrowfan:
I did not know that. Thanks!
Shalimar
@nightranger: Cheryl Rofer is a valuable contributor to the blog, who Adam brought in a few months ago as a nuclear expert during the North Korea flareup. And this post isn’t a both-sides-do-it or sympathy for conservatives situation, because she actually reads the blog. It is more of an “I know everyone hates this guy but even he sees through to some reality” situation.
Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]
@efgoldman: On typing alternating caps, There’s an app for that
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Baud:
I think you’ve got your ’20 campaign slogan!
Cheryl Rofer
@nightranger: I’m a strategist. @sharl mentions my technical background. Every project I worked on had policy implications – destroying chemical weapons, making sure Soviet nuclear material was under control, cleaning up nuclear environmental messes. Getting those projects funded required strategy too. I had a couple of mentors who were very good at that.
One of the basic precepts of strategy is to know the enemy. That’s not the same as sympathizing with them. But check out Sun Tzu and Clausewitz. So one of the things I do is to look at trends in what conservatives are doing. We all need the Republicans to come back to being a normal political party. Or to break up and a normal party take their place.
ETA: Thanks to the others for good words.
Shalimar
@Baud: Good news!!!!! Your soul isn’t destroyed. We put it in an alternate universe until such time as you need it again.
rikyrah
Kenny BooYah! @KwikWarren
For ppl who luv 2say President Obama didn’t do shit, Republicans R spending 99% of their time working to undo everything he accomplished
Major Major Major Major
@sharl: better than Senate Rule 34.
Thanks!
ETA: and re this nightranger business, seriously, the title of this post should be able to speak for itself. The *title*.
sharl
@Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]:
{muttering} Damn, all that unnecessary keyboard work…{/muttering}
sharl
@Major Major Major Major:
You…you MONSTER! I hope to banish that phrase from my head before turning in tonight.
Chris
@Cheryl Rofer:
Yeah, I don’t really have much to add to what’s already been said, but I too enjoy reading your stuff. The whiner doesn’t speak for me.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Shalimar:
When you need your soul back, ask for Walter Bishop. He’s your contact guy.
john fremont
@Chris: Using existing institutions like private enterprise to expand health insurance coverage, instead of designing and erecting an entire single payer system Democrats did that too, in 2010.
Omnes Omnibus
@Shalimar:
Sorry, I accidentally shredded it with some old bank statements. My bad.
Matt McIrvin
@WereBear: Small-c conservatism is a useful impulse. It’s not always the correct impulse to follow, but it’s a useful one.
The “conservative movement” as it exists has nothing to do with that; it’s reactionary, devoted to ripping apart much of modern society to transform it into an idealized vision of a past that never existed. They’re angry about changes that happened fifty or a hundred years ago. Sometimes about things that happened 500 years ago.
J R in WV
@efgoldman:
I said Trump, and you said:
You win. Thanks …
nightranger
@Cheryl Rofer: Yes you are sympathizing with them.
I don’t see it as an enemy/friend type thing anyways. More about Insane vs Sane.
Anyways, amazing how this board suddenly turned cancervative sympathizers as soon as someone dares to criticize one of the contributors over it. The group think hive mind around here is like a communist country sometimes.
The Very Reverend Crimson Fire of Compassion
@Another Scott: Notice anything about that date? Now why might the Lakota have gone to the Black Hills at that point in history? Hmmmm? Any idea? Why might an eastern Nation suddenly decide to move west into other Nation’s sovereign territory? Maybe they suddenly got restless leg syndrome? For the love of God, if you’re going to try to analyze Native history, at least be able to read dates in context. (Hint: The Invaders here were not the Nations scrambling to get away from the genocide on the East Coast.)
Uncle Omar
@Barbara: I also read the whole thing and my impression was that the commenters at the NYT all thought he was talking about lazy good for nothing PWTs. I believe that when a conservative reads the column he (or she) will automatically determine that Stevens wants the Negroes deported and will concur completely.
Another Scott
@The Very Reverend Crimson Fire of Compassion: I think your Crimson Fire is misdirected.
At least if I’m reading this correctly:
Of course, smallpox didn’t arise out of nowhere (it was imported with European invaders), but the point I was trying to make was that the Lakota Sioux had not “always” lived in the Black Hills. They conquered the land from others who lived there before them, and it happened relatively recently. It was not meant in any way, as mentioned in a later comment, to be a justification for what the USA (and its predecessors) did (and are doing) to native peoples.
That is all.
HTH.
Cheers,
Scott.
fuckwit
When they wake up, we welcome them with open arms.
Come, join the Resistance.
Remember many of us on today’s left (myself, Kos, and our Esteemed Blogmaster, among others), were once Republicans. Something pushed us over the edge, and made us say “screw you guys” and leave.
We will have more company soon.
Villago Delenda Est
@nightranger: Your concern has been noted and logged.