Heather Heyer’s mom isn’t interested in talking to Trump:
WATCH: "You can't wash this one away by shaking my hand and saying I'm sorry." Mother of Charlottesville victim speaks out. pic.twitter.com/vNiGNgFERi
— Good Morning America (@GMA) August 18, 2017
Ms. Bro says she received “frantic messages” from Trump’s press secretaries during her daughter’s funeral (these fucking people!) and later that day; she was willing to speak to Trump at that point but simply missed his calls since she was occupied with burying her child, who was murdered by a Trump-supporting Nazi. But after seeing a clip of Trump drawing equivalence between her daughter and other counterprotesters and the white supremacist mob, Bro is no longer willing to speak to Trump. Good for her.
On the lighter side, Tina Fey has a suggestion for how sane people might respond to heavily armed white supremacist goons descending on their towns — eat cake:
And speaking of heavily armed white supremacist goons:
Armed Group Appears at San Antonio City Council to Oppose Statue’s Removalhttps://t.co/0EkeH2u5Ig
Fear rules pic.twitter.com/hg2QEfHwoX
— Peter W. Singer (@peterwsinger) August 18, 2017
"to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion" — 18 USC 2331 – domestic terrorism https://t.co/s7g80djPG2
— Pierre Omidyar (@pierre) August 18, 2017
I am not a lawyer, and I realize the NRA has its bloody fingers wrapped around the throat of legislatures at the state and federal level. But doesn’t Omidyar have a point here? Wasn’t it a public safety issue when these militia goons swarmed through the center of Charlottesville?
Governor McAuliffe said the local cops were outgunned by the militia goons. Sounds like a public safety issue to me.
We may not be able to roll back these bugfuck-crazy open carry laws any time soon, but can’t cities and towns require unarmed participants as a condition of issuing permits for marches and demonstrations? I know when the RNC held its 2012 convention in Tampa, people were not allowed to bring concealed weapons into the convention zone, even though an NRA representative personally writes every piece of legislation that affects firearms, which our governor then rubber-stamps.
If gun-free zones are good enough for Republican Party delegates, by God, they should be good enough for city centers when homegrown Nazis assemble to spew hate speech. It won’t solve our Nazi problem, obviously — Vanilla ISIS can run people down in the street, as one of their number did in Charlottesville. But it’s a start.
Radiumgirl
Public safety issue, indeed. I confess I expected more carnage given the number of morons running around with automatic rifles. But there is still time for one of these loons to let fly into a crowd of counter-protestors. I fear it and expect it. God help us.
Iowa Old Lady
The thought of shaking Trump’s hand makes me recoil and he didn’t just equate my murdered daughter to Nazis. And that doesn’t get to being used as a political prop.
Ten Bears
Look at that fat ass, that fat belly. Those fat cheeks, chins and jowls; ankles, calves and thighs. Hairless pink skin, covered to inhibit the propensity to boils, cancers and lessions, fists gripped tight around its little pee-pee like maybe he’s gonna lose it! And that stink!
I am laughing, at the “superiority”.
Peale
Yep. Who could have foreseen that the point of open carry was to arm right wing militias to enforce conservative and racist norms.
MomSense
Yes, Omidyar is correct. This is domestic terrorism. These same gun assholes have been harassing and threatening mostly women gun safety advocates for years largely unchallenged. Maybe now something will be done about it but I’m not holding my breath.
Mary G
That Cantwell guy in the Vice video pulling a whole arsenal out of his clothes was pathetic and scary at the same time.
Tokyokie
I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again: Why does anybody want to open-carry a semiautomatic weapon in public? It’s to intimidate those who are not doing so. Period. Without exception. And that’s the common-law crime of assault. The Second Amendment, as currently interpreted, protects the right to bear arms. That does not mean that those who choose to exercise their Second Amendment rights can do so in a manner by which they are committing crimes against everybody who doesn’t so choose.
Betty Cracker
@MomSense: You’re right — they’ve been at it for decades. It’s an intolerable injustice, and yet here we are.
O. Felix Culpa
I know this probably ranks low among the ever-growing list of Trump administration offenses, but calling/texting a mother during her daughter’s funeral to arrange for a whitewashing photo op? I can’t even.
Betty Cracker
@Mary G: It was. Hope you also saw the video of him blubbering like a baby when he found out there was a warrant for his arrest. A cowardly bully, just as we suspected.
rk
@Mary G:
And the same guy was crying like a baby the next day. SAD!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyeTj002DCo
SFAW
“You libtards can have my External Death Peni$ when you pry it from my cold, dead, tiny hands!”
Of course, many of us remember that, when Vincent D’Onofrio delivered that ultimatum in Men in Black, the response was “Your proposal is acceptable.”
LABiker
Lawfare blog has a good piece on groups with guns.
MomSense
@Betty Cracker:
It hasn’t been taken seriously by law enforcement and I have wondered just how many LEOs are sympathetic.
SFAW
@O. Felix Culpa:
And THAT is why you’re a lowly blog commenter, instead of President, you loser! Sad!
Big Ole Hound
Every march/demonstration permit issued should specify no firearms, allowing police to arrest any violator. That, or an order that open carry has been suspended for the weekend for public safety reasons.
Elizabelle
This is ridiculous. Would any of us want to go visit another country, where the local yahoos were strolling around in public spaces, outfitted for an assault invasion? Why is this allowed in our society?
Yeah, NRA and everything. I get it. But this is fucking idiocracy. At least more people can see it now.
Vanilla ISIS. LOL. Works on many levels.
WaterGirl
@MomSense: If I’m not mistaken, you have experienced this first hand. It’s long past time for things to change.
Major Major Major Major
I hate these people so much.
Hungry Joe
Sooner or later one of these manbabies will feel “threatened” and, his hour and twenty minutes of combat training taught three years ago by a guy who has a well-thumbed collection of Soldier of Fortune back issues in his garage kicking in, will respond by sending some stitches of bullets into a crowd. His manbabies-in-arms colleagues, recognizing a full-on combat situation when they see it, will follow suit, and …
Jeffro
Those goofs are just one firecracker or muffler backfire away from lighting up the entire city square.
And they most certainly are there to intimidate. There’s no way to open carry an assault rifle in public and not intimidate others. What say you, ACLU?
On another note, this is awesome and needs to be FB-shared, Tweeted, and email-forwarded far and wide: Whataboutism: What about it?
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Ten Bears:
Hey, he’s TOTALLY a nice guy, and undoubtedly laments that “hot bitches won’t fuck me – I only get 2s if they’re really drunk” on MGTOW boards…
Joe Falco
I wish Tina Fey could have done without the joke about drag queens (who for some reason are 6’4″ black men in Fey’s joke) kicking the snot out of Nazi scum. The racial and nearly transphobic punchline comes across to me as punching down on people other than Nazis. And if Fey is joking about people other than herself confronting Nazis in what would be a really frightening situation, she can take a seat.
LurkerNoLonger
Underneath the fatigues, the body armor and the pale, undulating, blubber is a little boy crying out, “Mommy, I’m scared!” These pathetic assholes don’t engender fear in me, only disgust.
Jeffro
And speaking of moral clarity, more of this please: White NFL Player Supports Black Teammate’s Protest
Citizen_X
@Jeffro:
See the “First Trumps Second” post a couple of posts down: the ACLU announced that they will not defend armed protests.
barb 2
Something is really bothering me == Tiki Torches
These Nazis are brain dead — or perhaps this is an inside joke to the idiots — but the use of Tiki Torches is an insult to Pacific Islanders. TIKIs are representations of gods of the Polynesians. These gods have been carved in wood and stone for thousands of years. I'm most familiar with the Hawaiian version of Tikis — the Bishop museum in Hawaii has many examples. There are contemporary artists still carving Tikis and who still believe in the old ways and the old gods.
Montanareddog
I cannot express how fed up I am of seeing photos of fat, vagina-bearded goondas in camo fancy dress, pointing their dreadfully-lethal assault weapons ostentatiously at the ground in the heart of peaceful communities, and wobble-strutting around “in defense of freedom”. It is beyond pathetic.
germy
@MomSense:
that’s been on my mind as well.
I’ve always suspected there’s a large overlap between the groups.
Guy I went to high school with. (1970s) I lost touch with him over twenty years ago. I know that after high school he joined a branch of the military (was an M.P. in Germany, got introduced to amphetamines, no real combat experience) Then became an employee of his local police dept.
One reason we never remained friends was a constant, low level of racism from him and his family (including his mother). I sort of stopped communicating with him.
Recently, out of curiosity, I looked at his twitter account. BIG dolt45 supporter. Retweets “patriot” stuff, ann coulter, even sarah palin. During the Obama admin, the tweets were borderline deranged with white-hot hate.
Somehow I doubt he’s offended by the gentlemen pictured above.
Anecdotal, I know, but I believe he’s typical.
Nicole
I just shake my head, remembering that at the Women’s March, we weren’t allowed wooden sticks to carry signs- we had to use cardboard tubes. Could be a weapon, you see. But a crowd of young men- the age group and gender responsible for most violent crime- sure, let them bring torches and guns and whatever they want. That’ll be just fine.
germy
@barb 2: They wanted hand-held fire. One of them probably suggested votive candles and got hooted down by the others.
Roger Moore
@Jeffro:
Apparently they’ve said they’re now going to question the free speech commitments of groups that want to protest armed. It’s not coming right out and saying they’re going to stop helping Nazis get parade permits, but it’s as close as they’re likely to come to saying so explicitly.
zhena gogolia
The mother’s statement is so simple and powerful. She is miles ahead of the POTUS in moral authority.
I love “Vanilla ISIS”! I knew it was a sign when they were playing Vanilla Ice at the gym yesterday morning, and then he popped up in a word puzzle I was doing before bed (did you know his real name is Robert Van Winkle?). I hadn’t thought of him in years. My husband said, “He must be 70 years old!”
Our gym has a system where you can select the songs from your smartphone. Please tell me it wasn’t a white supremacist message that somebody picked “Ice, Ice Baby.”
MomSense
@WaterGirl:
Yup. Fortunately my neighbor, a retired union organizing thug, has made it very clear that he is always carrying. Do not mess with angry Korean War vets.
ThresherK
@barb 2: I think the item has been “Party Store”d to generic status in the US. (I don’t consider that loss of meaning to be a good thing.)
The snarker in me, raised Catholic in the northeastern US, would compare it to some people in East Asia providing modd lighting on a patio with a quartet of candles in a ring, three purple and one pink, because they don’t know about advent candles.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
in a White House ruled by cable tv political coverage, when those networks were all talking about the memorial service, the nitwits who work for Kellyanne Conway and (somewhere up the organizational chart) Beltway Demigod Mike Kelly, no one thought they should word to her the night before? Maybe? A small part of the whole fuck up, but just amazing just how stupid these people are.
germy
@zhena gogolia:
He was, is, and always will be a talentless asshole.
The last time I saw him, he was on some realty TV show, with Gary Coleman. He kept teasing Coleman, insisting he say “What you talkin’ ’bout, Willis?” Coleman got more and more irritated, refusing to do it. Meanwhile, Van Winkle was refusing to sing “Ice Ice Baby” because, as he explained pompously, he’d “evolved” from that phase of his artistic career.
A Ghost To Most
@Tokyokie: Macho dick measuring. They use semi-automatic dildos to make it look bigger.
Jeffro
@Citizen_X: @Roger Moore:
Thank you both! Off to catch up on earlier threads, I go…
MomSense
@germy:
I think there was a report released a long time ago that talked about infiltration of those groups into police departments and other law enforcement agencies. I also think recently a copy in NY showed up with a white supremacist tee shirt and was assigned to desk duty.
I may see if I can find that report later today when I have some time.
germy
@MomSense: They were showing up in court with those tee shirts, IIRC.
OzarkHillbilly
@Nicole: We need another 2nd amendment protecting the right to sticks for protest signs.
Shell
You’d probably get a ticket for not picking up your dogs poop. But sashay thru town with automatic rifles? No problem!
JPL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: They were busy googling to see if Mrs. Bro had granite counter tops.
O. Felix Culpa
@SFAW:
Yes. I own it. :)
sherparick
@barb 2: They are just easy to buy at Lowes and Home Depot.
Yarrow
Re: the issue of armed militias, this Twitter thread is kind of interesting. Click through for the whole thing, but here are some samples:
B. A. Friedman @BA_Friedman Aug 13
The State of Virginia is now in a strategic competition with a loose coalition of Right-Wing groups over the legitimate use of force.
B. A. Friedman @BA_Friedman Aug 13
It has not yet grappled with the rise of illegitimate militias like the Oathkeepers and Three-Percenters. It’s ceding the competition.
B. A. Friedman @BA_Friedman Aug 13
It should be remembered that the KKK only metastasized after Federal troops were withdrawn from the South, stopping the competition.
B. A. Friedman @BA_Friedman Aug 13
Illegitimate violence (the KKK) flourished only when there was no competition from legitimate violence (Federal troops).
B. A. Friedman @BA_Friedman Aug 13
In a strategic competition, violence and the threat thereof is equal. The alt Right gathering should have been dispersed Friday night.
B. A. Friedman @BA_Friedman Aug 13
What the Left needs to do is figure out the nature of the competition its in and recognize that some state-sponsored violence is legitimate.
B. A. Friedman @BA_Friedman Aug 13
We have to do that because we have to use it. Responsibly and prudently, but use it we must. Our opponents already are.
OzarkHillbilly
US Rep Mo Brooks was unable to vote for himself in the special election for US Senate because he got purged from the voter roles. It was “a mistake by the USPS”. Right, sure…
Mike in NC
@Montanareddog: How is that all of these flabby, hairy, middle-aged shitbirds look alike: rebel flag ball caps, sunglasses, lots of army surplus gear bought at gun shows or on eBay. If somebody tossed a firecracker at them they’d assume the fetal position and cry for momma. Bunch of idiots who watched Rambo too many times.
bystander
One poster (I can’t remember who) posited that Trump’s thumb/forefinger circle with the 3 fingers extended was his signal to the racists that he was with them despite the words he was forced to read. I now think the poster was absolutely correct.
Why are our tax dollars being used to send Putin’s stooge Rohrabacher to visit the guy who committed treason?
JPL
This doesn’t make sense
https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1
Mr Stagger Lee
@Ten Bears: Meal Team Six.
Another Scott
@Nicole: Yeah, but that’s another reflection of the effect of local laws on our Constitutional rights. DC has very strict gun laws (though they are being chipped away). Just across the river in Virginia, guns are too easy to get and too easy to brandish.
Constitutional rights must be uniform across the USA. People have a right not to be intimidated by terrified idiots who think that “Cowboys and Indians” or “Castle Wolfenstein” is real life.
I really want to go up to one of those idiots with their AR-15s, or whatever, and ask them, “what are you so afraid of?” – but of course I never will…
(sigh)
We have to fight them every single day.
Cheers,
Scott.
'Niques
@Jeffro: Every utterance from the orange shitgibbon should be answered with “but what about your tiny hands?”
schrodingers_cat
@barb 2: The original Nazis appropriated the Swastika, a sacred Hindu and Buddhist symbol and the Sanskrit word Arya == pure, they are just following their ideological fathers
schrodingers_cat
@bystander: Another appropriated Buddhist symbol for peace.
OzarkHillbilly
@JPL: It makes trumpsense.
trollhattan
@germy:
Given the tiki torch is a suburban staple I feel the only proper response is for counter marchers to carry pink lawn flamingos, any and all John Waters references intentional.
Yarrow
@germy: Vanilla Ice was on Dancing with the Stars recently. He became bested friends with Rick Perry. Yes, for real.
HyperSphericalCow
@Ten Bears: Not one of those guys would make it through basic training.
NotMax
Fear that, if history is any guide, this will lead to calls for up-arming police as a matter of course, further blurring the line (and the distinction) between police and military enforcement.
HyperSphericalCow
@Another Scott: Chicago has a related situation, which is a major part of why there’s so much violence. Strict gun laws here, but you can just drive across the border to Indiana and buy a Glock at a gun show, no questions asked.
Yarrow
@bystander:
The “okay” hand symbol (thumb and forefinger in a circle, with other three fingers in “W” type position) has been taken over by the white supremacists and definitely is a white supremacist signal. They use it all the time. You’ll see the emoji for it in white supremacist Twitter names as well.
Major Major Major Major
@schrodingers_cat: That one’s a weird story. The 4chan crowd wanted to prank us normies into thinking that said ‘OK’ hand sign was a white supremacist thing… so they got a bunch of white supremacists to do it… and now it’s a white supremacist thing, OR SO WE THINK, but really they’re just pranking us… but it really is a white supremacist thing.
This is how their brains ‘work’.
schrodingers_cat
BTW BC, Vanilla ISIS is the perfect name for T’s fan base.
aimai
@Joe Falco: I agree with that. I liked the piece, on the whole, but that was really tone deaf. I have to believe she was thinking about particular people she knows and supports and riffed on that, but she should not have said it. It came across not so much as punching down buying into transphobia.
Patricia Kayden
@Big Ole Hound: In any other country, what you suggested would be the law. But not here in the good old USA. For some reason, guns rule.
JPL
@OzarkHillbilly: It’s a waste of time to try to make sense, but I still try! lol
Major Major Major Major
@aimai:
Given that she’s friends with Tituss Burgess…
bystander
@schrodingers_cat: I hadn’t made the connection. Thanks.
@Yarrow: Do you think Trump has consciousness of this? I guess just because it’s new to me only bespeaks my lack of interest in anything supremacist.
Patricia Kayden
@Montanareddog: It should be illegal. How do you run a democracy when thugs get to point weapons at them? Doesn’t make a lick of sense.
Yarrow
Here’s a good thread on Trump’s use of the OK hand signal. Has photos of a bunch of white supremacist types using it.
Yarrow
@bystander: Read the Twitter thread I just posted at comment 71. You have to click through and keep going down it, but it talks about how Trump changed his most well known hand symbol from the “You’re fired” hand signal to the white supremacist “okay” hand signal. He didn’t use it much when he was on The Apprentice. And how even those that imitate him now have to do the “okay” hand signal because it’s part of who he is now. It’s a really interesting analysis.
Omnes Omnibus
@Joe Falco: @aimai: How does drag = trans?
Mike in NC
@bystander: Yes, Trump gets a daily briefing on all things happening in the Alt-Right universe from Bannon, Miller, and Gorka.
Mike in DC
Incitement and fighting words are real exceptions to freedom of speech and assembly. The ACLU just said they will no longer defend hate groups that march carrying weapons. Good call, guys.
germy
@Yarrow:
Nuff said.
schrodingers_cat
@bystander: It reminds me of the Padmapani Boddhisatva (Buddha with a lotus)
Major Major Major Major
@Omnes Omnibus: it’s a long and uninteresting (IMO) story…
bystander
@Yarrow: This needs to be more widely known. Thanks, Yarrow!
different-church-lady
Wonderful. Now I can’t use the OK gesture to mean OK, or tiki torches to light my patio. Is there NOTHING these shitheads won’t fuck up for everybody?
The Moar You Know
@different-church-lady: I have asked the same question. I think we’re going to regret even asking it.
zhena gogolia
@different-church-lady:
Inorite? I’m just thinking, damn, when I’m teaching I’m going to have to remember never to make that sign! I don’t THINK I ever do, but what if I do it inadvertently?????
Dman
Can’t wait for the Twittlers tweet calling Ms.Bro a grandstander and equating her to fake news.
Mnemosyne
@different-church-lady:
Polo shirts, too. They’ve fucked up polo shirts.
aimai
@Omnes Omnibus: My error.
different-church-lady
@Mnemosyne: No, polo shirts have always been fucked up.
schrodingers_cat
@Mnemosyne: And khakis.
ETA: Or we can not let them define stuff for the rest of us.
Pengie
@Jeffro: Chris Long is the son of Howie Long and is a graduate of UVa. I think a lot of people with direct associations to Charlottesville are taking all of this very personally and it’s making them think about what they want to stand for. I’m not in his head and can’t say that’s what he’s thinking, but it’s something I’m hearing from friends who still live there and I’m feeling it myself. It’s definitely pissed Tina Fey off.
Joe Falco
@Omnes Omnibus: It doesn’t necessarily so. Trans people can be into drag just as cisgender people can. As I said, it seemed like the joke was taking itself up to the line and catwalking up and down it like a RuPaul reality show but not crossing it (your mileage might vary). In any case, the joke was tone-deaf and was made at the expense of sections of the populous who are already vulnerable to the menace of the white supremacist shitheads.
nonynony
@Major Major Major Major:
The Nazis in 4chan used the Nazi symps and “ironic idiots dabbling in Nazi imagery because it made them feel like they were bad boys” in 4chan to co-opt the symbol. White supremacists know that they need hidden symbols to be able to communicate with each other because outside of their little circles of Nazis and symps they’ll get their asses kicked in multiple ways if people find out that they’re white supremacists.
Not everyone that uses an OK symbol is a white supremacist. But when some racist dirtbag is flashing the OK symbol during a video or photo – especially if its out of context for an OK symbol – that dirtbag is intentionally communicating “I’m not just a racist, I’m with you guys” to white supremacists. In a way that makes it sound ridiculous to anyone who hasn’t found out that it’s become essentially a gang symbol for white supremacists.
@different-church-lady:
Nazis fuck up everything. The swastika is a symbol of peace and good luck in Eastern religions, but it’s a symbol of hate and fear everywhere else. This is a group that can manage to make white polo shirts into a symbol of Nazi scumbaggery because they chose it as a symbol. They’re the anti-Midas – everything they touch turns to garbage.
fuckwit
My god, they are fucking the shit out of that chicken.
it’s not fun to watch anymore, since it turned so violent. But the end result is the same: the deeper they fuck that chicken, the more finished they are politically.
lamh36
Sorry to be a debbie downer but Tina bit was cute but i didn’t really chuckle…way too close home to what a lot of people seem to do…instead of speaking up speaking out when/where they can or even speaking up/out to their own friends and family who they KNOW have expressed these racist/bigoted views
But hey it was cute
lamh36
“The negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his benefit.” – Roger Taney, Dred Scott v. Sandford
lamh36
“The most pervasive mistake I made was believing that white ministers would rise to our aid.” – MLK
zhena gogolia
@lamh36:
Yet she did speak out, on national television, quite pointedly and I think almost more toughly than Stephen Colbert. So the joke was, I’m just going to wallow in this cake, but while eating the cake (as the skit) she was actually doing something (in reality). Does that make sense?
I don’t know about the drag-queen joke. It was supposed to be a version of “There are certain sections of New York I wouldn’t advise you to invade, Major Strasser,” but maybe didn’t work. But there were other moments that were brilliant and more on-point than anything I’ve heard.
JD434
@Radiumgirl:
zhena gogolia
I see from John Cole’s twitter feed that the Twitler’s new poll numbers are going to be devastating. Please make it so!
The Moar You Know
@lamh36: I kind of get the statues of Lee and Davis (well, not really Davis). Lee I get. Soldier doing his job, we put up statues of those guys, even though every one of them is a mass murderer, but OK.
Putting up a statue of Taney? I didn’t even know that had happened. Show me another statue of any jurist, anywhere, in this country. There aren’t any. Putting up a statue of Taney has one and only one meaning. I’ll listen and participate in a discussion about the merits of a statue of Lee, and then tell you to go fuck yourself because he was a traitor, but Taney? There’s no possible justification at all.
BretH
Armed political protest is not political protest. It is, as others have said, intimidation. It stifles rather than encourages free speech.
Sasha
Over/Under before Trump calls Ms. Meyer’s mom a pathetic loser?
burnspbesq
Of course Omidiyar has a point. Now all you need is a U.S. Attorney, who serves at the pleasure of Donald Trump and reports to Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, to authorize a prosecution.
Major Major Major Major
@nonynony: re 4chan, yep, exactly. And if it’s a new gesture for trump then he knows this too, at least enough to know he’s pissing off liberals, punking the media, and flashing a white supremacist symbol.
ETA: I feel like he’s used the pinched-fingers-for-emphasis thing for a while but the OK in random poses stuff is new.
Matt McIrvin
@Jeffro: The ACLU came around: they’ve said they will no longer support rallies with armed participants.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@barb 2:
Their idiots pure and simple. As Arnold pointed how they are celibrating a pack of losers noted for their evil visciousness. Thier pure idiocy is what makes the Neo Nazis so dangerous.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Jeffro:
I wish Chris was still with the Pats. I wonder why he left. I admire him enormously and have donated a few hundred dollars to his charity Waterboys. Boy was raised right. As a Masshole, we’ll claim him as one of ours – dad was a local. What he’s doing is brave, even though he could manage himself in a confrontation, every white guy who can needs to step up. It’s gotten so that when I see a group of white men now, I’m revulsed knowing that most likely more than half of them voted for white supremacy and Nazis.
burnspbesq
@Jeffro:
Chris Long went to prep school at St. Anne’s – Belfield in C’ville and spent four years at UVa.
H.E.Wolf
@Montanareddog:
Re: “vagina [sic] – bearded”
1. There is a common (and rather odd) confusion of the vagina, an internal organ, with the vulva, an external part of the body. How to remember the difference? Very few internal organs grow hair.
2. It is unhelpful to use figures of speech that perpetuate toxic stereotypes of “a female quality” = “a bad quality”. (See the cogent comments by Joe Falco at #23.)
3. As a follow-up to point 2: If one is intent on using a derogatory term for beard shape… men, too, have pubic hair. And I bet there’s a locution for that, somewhere in the world’s languages, past or present.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
The militia morons all look so damn angry. Shaved heads, pork-fed fat guts, dressed up in costumes, and playing soldiers. Okay, I played soldier a few times… when I was nine!
lgerard
@The Moar You Know:
Strangely, Taney had freed all his families slaves after his father died
Jeffro
@Sasha: I doubt it’ll be loser, it’ll probably be something equally horrible though. “I tried to help heal the community but was rejected by people with anger/hate in their heart” “now you see what I mean by ‘both sides’/’many sides’ are to blame here, I was trying to reach out”
No doubt he will cast himself as the victim, that’s for sure.
Jeffro
@Matt McIrvin: Yes – a few other folks pointed me to the earlier thread. Thank you and good for the ACLU!
Yarrow
@Major Major Major Major: Read through the Twitter thread I posted at comment 71. It’s interesting how the “okay” hand signal has become the required Trump hand position for anyone who imitates him. When did that happen?
@bystander: You’re welcome! Please pass along the Twitter thread. I hope it gets more widely seen. I’ve been telling people I know about the okay symbol being a white supremacist symbol and not one person yet has had any idea, even those who are active online and fairly politically active. Still running a bit under the radar, I guess.
rikyrah
Vanilla ISIS is so stolen and shared.
burnspbesq
John Henry, the managing director of Fenway Sports Group (owner of the Sox and Liverpool FC), is reportedly considering renaming Yawkey Way, the street outside Fenway (Yawkey, the longtime Sox owner, was a virulent racist of the type unique to Boston). A little polite encouragement on social media couldn’t hurt.
Ohio Mom
Of course Trump’s people called during the funeral. That’s the same trick I used myself during my shy younger years: call a cute guy when you know he’s not home. You don’t have to actually talk to him that way but you get points for reaching out.
ETA: I’m not awarding any points but you know others will. And then they will use Heather’s Mom statement that she doesn’t want to talk to Trump against her.
gvg
@The Moar You Know: Thurgood Marshall has several statues to him. Other Judges do too although it’s not common. Marshall’s seem to be mostly in Maryland. Some judges are really consequential to history, naturally those get statues. I suspect some law schools might have famous alumni around. I think Taney was probably pretty important back then and I suspect most people didn’t think he was a villain then, only later, well white people anyway. the statue seems overdue for removal but is one of the few I think worth putting in a museum since there aren’t a lot of him, and he is someone who needs to be explained and not whitewashed out. A shame that needs to be remembered and taught, but not honored with a good place.
Villago Delenda Est
The NRA is this nation’s premier terrorist organization, providing support to the KKK, the Nazis, and the rest of the scum of the so-called “alt-right”.
Villago Delenda Est
@gvg: Thurgood Marshall made history. So naturally, he has statues. Clarence Thomas has made history, too, but not history in the way Marshall made it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I liked Fey’s bit, except for the “just stay home and be quiet” part. And now she’ll be held up by the Ron Fourniers and Cokies as an example. “Even well know New York leftist Tina Fey thinks all you people need to pipe down and be Reasonable”.
Penus
@Jeffro: That’s Long for you. He’s always had his head on straight and never been shy about speaking out. Howie raised him right.
Mnemosyne
@Joe Falco:
It’s tricky, though. I can see the appeal of a revenge fantasy like that for people in that oppressed population. Most people who’ve been bullied fantasize about being able to take on the bully and win, and I doubt that gay and transgender people are any different.
It may just be a case of good joke, wrong teller. Having that joke come from Tituss Burgess or RuPaul would sound different than it does from Tina Fey, even if she wrote the joke for them.
schrodingers_cat
@lgerard: So even he was better in his personal life than that moral midget, Lee.
Adam L Silverman
Close your dust covers you dipshits!
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@burnspbesq:
A caller into the local sports radio station made an excellent point – not only reiterating how racist Yawkey was, but how it created the 86 year championship drought. Willie Mays used to tell Ted Williams that they should have played together, and what kind of team would it have been with Jackie Robinson on it?
Darrin Ziliak (formerly glocksman)
@Mike in NC:
Ironically enough, many of the militia types I’ve seen in the past wore lots of cheap Soviet-era East Bloc surplus…
Betty Cracker
@Mnemosyne: The way I interpreted it was Fey was projecting the macho Nazi marchers’ worst fear back onto them — you’ll get your ass kicked in public by a group you marginalize as inferior and weak. But yeah, I can see the point folks are making about it being tone deaf.
There are people on Twitter taking Fey to task because they think she’s suggesting people should stay home and not oppose Nazi demonstrators. I think she’s saying the exact opposite.
Elie
I believe strongly that though we must stand up to these groups, that the principles of non-violence advocated and practiced by MLK, is the only way to defeat this. If we match their violence, we will normalize them by eliminating any comparison. What we want can only be won by non-violence and ongoing assertion of the values of justice and humanism. Also, matching their violence in effect normalizes the behavior of their less violent but no less egregious policies and leaders. We cannot be seen as using the same tactics. Those who oppose these groups, like black lives matter, must not use violence. This is very important…
Omnes Omnibus
@Betty Cracker: FWIW I had the same interpretation on both issues.
No Drought No More
Maybe the funniest interview I’ve ever heard took place between Terri Gross of NPR radio and Eldridge Cleaver, during which Cleaver described the first day the Oakland Black Panthers took to the streets legally armed to the teeth and looking for a cop hassling a member of the community. As you might imagine, hilarity ensued..
ruckus
@germy:
Actually I’ve met him and he worked for one of my managers at events. He was at the time a nice, quiet, hard worker. No mus, no fuss. And he isn’t 70 or all that close, that’s for sure.
E
@Mnemosyne: That’s why they had the camera pan back to the black guy nodding (sorry — don’t know his name) at the precise moment the joke landed. Also note the blank stare, which lasted an extra beat, from Fey. This was brilliantly executed in my mind. She’s saying, okay, here we go in some really dangerous territory but just think about it a second.
Mnemosyne
Okay, my boss went into a meeting, so I had a chance to watch the Tina Fey video. IMO, she’s not mocking or disparaging drag queens. She’s saying that drag queens are more than capable of defending themselves against these little Nazi dweebs.
I can’t quite make up my mind about that final “stay home” part. I think she means it, and I think she’s wrong.
Mnemosyne
@E:
Yeah, I think the Nazi dweeb who thinks he can punch a NYC drag queen with no consequences will find out how wrong he is very, very quickly, and I think that’s what Fey is saying.
E
@Mnemosyne: My feeling too. As for the stay home part, I am on the fence. I think this is one of very few things about this awful situation that reasonable people can disagree on, so I’m leaving that part alone.
Betty Cracker
@Mnemosyne: The “stay home and eat cake” thing has blown up on Twitter. Maybe Fey will clarify. I think she meant literally stay home and eat cake the same way Swift literally meant feed Irish babies to the Brits, but maybe I’m wrong. If she did mean people shouldn’t show up to oppose Nazis, I think that’s wrong too.
Mnemosyne
@Betty Cracker:
The cake thing is so obviously supposed to be rage eating that I’m having a little trouble parsing the end. ?
Sister Golden Bear
@Mnemosyne: The 11th Commandment: Thou shalt not fuck with drag queens.
FWIW, I’m one of those trans people who’s also a drag performer (and drag is arguably its own gender.)
debbie
@Mnemosyne:
The entire bit is about binging on cake to stave the feelings of rage and hysteria plaguing all of us. Her last statement about staying home is shared by more than a few people: If counter-protesters don’t show, the Nazis won’t have anything to provoke and will look like fools. I disagree, but I think some here are overreacting to it.
Dice
@Tokyokie:
“Why does anybody want to open-carry a semiautomatic weapon in public?” Smallcox disease.
Dice
@zhena gogolia:
Rob Van Winkle flips houses in south Florida. He has or had a show on DIY network. He doesn’t look too old, but he’s still kind of a putz.
Tehanu
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
It doesn’t matter what anybody left of Attila the Hun would say. The Fourniers and Cokies and Hannitys and Limpballs will find ways to twist anything; the answer is keep right on saying what we really want to say and not let ourselves be silenced.
No One You Know
@H.E.Wolf: Thank you.