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They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

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Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Tick tock motherfuckers!

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

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

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Let me file that under fuck it.

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Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

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Rose Judson

You are here: Home / Archives for Rose Judson

A broad abroad, Rose is a Pennsylvanian based in the UK. She spent 16 years lurking on Balloon-Juice before joining as a writer in Sept 2024. She hosts the Books of All Time podcast.

Just for the Taste of It Open Thread

by Rose Judson|  April 15, 20264:54 pm| 85 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads, Bring on the Brawndo!, The Horrors

I was on the swim team in high school (and for a bit in college, but I was mostly injured). The girl who swam the breaststroke leg of my mixed-medley relay team was . . . not scientifically inclined, let’s say. She thought that Diet Coke was called Diet Coke because it somehow neutralised the calories of any food you consumed when you were drinking it. When she first shared this opinion at a post-meet McDonald’s run, I laughed, because I thought she was doing a bit. But no: complete sincerity.

Compared to some people, though, she’s a rocket scientist.

Just for the Taste of It Open Thread

From The Guardian:

“Your dad argues that diet soda is good for him because it kills grass – if poured on grass – so, therefore, it must kill cancer cells inside the body,” Oz said on Triggered with Don Jr, the president’s eldest son’s podcast. . . .

Don Jr responded by suggesting there might be something to his father’s habits: “But then maybe he’s on to something. Because I will say this: I know a lot of guys pushing 80, not a lot have his level of energy, recall, stamina.”

Do you know a lot of guys pushing 80, though, Don? Are they in the room with us now?

Open thread.

 

Just for the Taste of It Open ThreadPost + Comments (85)

The Third Lady Doth Protest Too Much

by Rose Judson|  April 9, 20263:06 pm| 213 Comments

This post is in: Epstein, Open Threads, The Horrors

Melania Trump has just delivered a statement from the White House, apparently with very little announcement beforehand. The topic? She’s denouncing anyone trying to link her to Jeffrey Epstein or Ghislaine Maxwell.

Melania Trump: The lies linking me with Jeffrey Epstein need to end today. I've never been friends with Epstein. I never had a relationship with Epstein or his accomplice, Maxwell. My email reply to Maxwell cannot be categorized as anything more than casual correspondence.

— Acyn (@acyn.bsky.social) 2026-04-09T18:37:53.381Z

Certainly she looks very casual here:

The Third Lady Doth Protest Too Much

If this were a relatively normal White House with a relatively normal press operation, we would soon find out why she’s giving this statement in the middle of a Thursday—for instance, they’re trying to get ahead of a story. But with these jokers, it could just be that Mrs. Trump 3.0 wanted to get something off her chest, and had her people call a press conference during the president’s mid-day Executive Time.

Either that, or Iran is going so badly they decided it would actually be best* to get people talking about Epstein again. However it shakes out, she has basically done this:

The Third Lady Doth Protest Too Much 1

Thought this was worth putting on our collective radar (and that it was time for a fresh thread).

 

*Absolutely intentional. I write for a living, you know.

The Third Lady Doth Protest Too MuchPost + Comments (213)

Today in Sternly Worded Letters

by Rose Judson|  April 7, 20266:26 pm| 140 Comments

This post is in: Impeach the Motherfucker!, Open Threads, Politics, It's Giving War Crime, The Horrors

Representative John Larson (D-CT 01) filed Articles of Impeachment. They’re dated yesterday, but as far as I can tell, they appear to have been published today.

They are very comprehensive, covering everything from the President’s abuse of the pardon power to his appalling rhetoric today and on Easter Sunday.

They also appear to have been co-written by Ralph Nader, because why not? Why shouldn’t the writers’ room steering our increasingly batshit telenovela of a timeline call back to him, too?

[EDIT 11:36 BST/ 6:36 EST: Just minutes after I post this, it is apparently TACO TIME. Fuck you, Don.]

Today in Sternly Worded Letters 4

 

Don’t get me wrong; I’m glad someone stepped up with the Articles of Impeachment. But it’s hard to feel anything positive will come of it. You can read the entire bill here. I already have; it’s past 11 p.m. where I am, so I doubt there’ll be much sleeping happening here tonight.

Work—at least after 2 p.m. my time, when I came out of a call and saw the President’s initial post—has been a shitshow.

Today in Sternly Worded Letters 1

show full post on front page

Today in Sternly Worded LettersPost + Comments (140)

The UK papers are already releasing images of tomorrow’s front pages. Here’s the Mirror, expressing the psychic whiplash we’re all feeling:

Today in Sternly Worded Letters 2

(Yes, the Home Office blocked Kanye West from entering the country to headline a music festival in London this summer. Focus, people.)

Finally, there’s a multi-byline extravaganza of a news story up at the NYT (which appears to be unpaywalled), “How Trump Took the U.S. to War With Iran.” It clearly relies heavily on interviews and leaks with VP Vance, Suzie Wiles, and several others—though Stephen Miller is curiously absent. Benjamin Netanyahu is shoved to the front, however, and all but blamed for Trump’s decision to start bombing.

Mr. Netanyahu and his team outlined conditions they portrayed as pointing to near-certain victory: Iran’s ballistic missile program could be destroyed in a few weeks. The regime would be so weakened that it could not choke off the Strait of Hormuz, and the likelihood that Iran would land blows against U.S. interests in neighboring countries was assessed as minimal.

Besides, Mossad’s intelligence indicated that street protests inside Iran would begin again and — with the impetus of the Israeli spy agency helping to foment riots and rebellion — an intense bombing campaign could foster the conditions for the Iranian opposition to overthrow the regime. The Israelis also raised the prospect of Iranian Kurdish fighters crossing the border from Iraq to open a ground front in the northwest, further stretching the regime’s forces and accelerating its collapse.

Mr. Netanyahu delivered his presentation in a confident monotone. It seemed to land well with the most important person in the room, the American president.

Sounds good to me, Mr. Trump told the prime minister.

Later in the article, CIA director John Ratcliffe is quoted as saying Netanyahu’s regime change scenarios are “farcical,” which he then explained in terms Trump could understand: “Bullshit.” Now, now, sir. I’m sure the lady who follows the President to print out praise-tweets for him to read had the finger puppets ready to explain what that word meant to him without the vulgarity.

While it looks like this may turn out to be another TACO Tuesday, a very red line was crossed today. This lady in Georgia sums it up well:

Georgia Voter: It's giving war crime. You can't do that. We don't just annihilate people because we can and, you know, make a grab for the money and the oil. And that's what we've done in Venezuela. And that's what we're doing in Iran.

— Acyn (@acyn.bsky.social) 2026-04-07T17:01:19.489Z

“It’s giving war crime,” indeed. See you all on the other side of the deadline.

 

Open thread.

Moon Dust in Your Eyes Open Thread

by Rose Judson|  April 6, 20262:41 pm| 86 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads, Science & Technology, Something Good Open Thread, Space

A short while ago, at 1:57 p.m. US Eastern time, the Artemis II astronauts travelled further from Earth than any other humans have done before. They are approximately 250,000 miles from home.

On their flyby, they discovered a new crater. They named it “Carroll”, after the late wife of mission commander Reid Wiseman.

What a beautiful moment.

— Jerad Walker (@jeradwalker.bsky.social) 2026-04-06T18:14:26.749Z

And not to take away from that beautiful moment, but I must have missed this on the live feed:

A jar of Nutella just gracefully drifted across the space capsule and if the company doesn’t make this an ad IMMEDIATELY, they are fools.

— Jessica Ellis (@baddestmamajama.bsky.social) 2026-04-06T17:55:49.707Z

I texted The Child, whose bloodstream is roughly 45% Nutella, about this (she’s at her Dad’s this week). “I am pleased to hear they have proper food in space,” she replied.

Anyway, all of this is a much-needed distraction today. NASA’s live tracker is here, if you want to follow along.

Moon Dust in Your Eyes Open ThreadPost + Comments (86)

Cake Pony Club (Respite Open Thread)

by Rose Judson|  April 5, 20264:14 pm| 71 Comments

This post is in: Respite

[Thanks to Sister Golden Bear for sharing these in the thread below!]

The Onion’s revived print edition has some exclusive content that doesn’t appear online. Earlier this week, a subscriber shared a real gem on Bluesky:

The horse op-ed is an instant classic. I can't tell you how much joy this piece gives me.It should be taught in every introductory writing class in no small part because the horse arguments are so compelling. "I have noticed that human children get to eat cake. But I am bigger than the children."

— RM (@dorsalstream.bsky.social) 2026-04-03T16:21:41.584Z

It’s just delightful. “But I am bigger than the children” popped into my head yesterday when I was justifying eating a second scone for breakfast. What’s even more delightful is that the good people at Merrymac Farm Sanctuary in Vermont decided to see if this op-ed applies across all horses. Video after the jump:

show full post on front page

Cake Pony Club (Respite Open Thread)Post + Comments (71)

Do horses want cake? We conducted an investigation into statements published by @bencollins.bsky.social in the print edition of @theonion.com.

— Merrymac Farm Sanctuary (@merrymacsanctuary.bsky.social) 2026-04-05T17:04:47.095Z

As you can see, they concocted a healthy treat for their test subjects, who include animals other than horses. I’ve sent this to my sister in the Poconos to see if she wants to try it on my neighphews Finn (a horse) and Albus Dumbledonkey (a donkey, obviously). I’ll report back if she does.

This thread is open for non-political discussion. It’s a holiday; let’s take a break.

Does anyone have a favourite Onion headline they’ve never forgotten? Mine is “SUPREME COURT RULES SUPREME COURT RULES.”

 

He Is, Unfortunately, Risen

by Rose Judson|  April 5, 202612:01 pm| 213 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads, The Horrors

It is Easter Sunday and we are in the midst of Passover, but The Horrors don’t stop. You all will likely have seen that the President greeted the day with this:

He Is, Unfortunately, Risen

The Discourse online veers from outrage and horror to conspiracy-brained speculation that he didn’t write this; that he is actually in Walter Reed or somewhere else in a vegetative state or receiving treatment while Stephen Miller is at the wheel. While we all know Miller et. al. are controlling The President’s information environment, it’s wishful thinking to believe this is anything other than the rough beast himself.

He is in a corner similar to the one he found himself in during the spring of 2020. As we all know, malignant narcissists are at their most dangerous when they’re in a corner. Unlike 2020, he is in a corner he thinks he can bomb and war-crime his way out of.

Below the jump, a thread from Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo which summarises the situation pretty well:

show full post on front page

He Is, Unfortunately, RisenPost + Comments (213)

I will set aside as a given Trumps rage filled threats of war crimes. He’s careening from one day to the next from Strait doesn’t matter, not r problem, will open itself to rage tweets demanding it else and then not following through on those threats. These are the actions of someone ….

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm.bsky.social) 2026-04-05T14:54:14.437Z

2/ with a lifetime of being able to TACO or bullshit his way out of anything and now hitting a kind of immovable object. He’s really falling apart. The other part of this which I think isn’t getting enough attn. the biggest tell in the last couple weeks was that times article that mbs doesn’t …

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm.bsky.social) 2026-04-05T14:54:14.438Z

3/ want Trump to stop. He needs to continue and overthrow or defang the regime. These gulf princes are Trumps guys, far more than Netanyahu. They’re sustaining much more damage than the us press suggests. Trump whacked the hornets nest and now they need him to remove it, not leave.

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm.bsky.social) 2026-04-05T14:54:14.439Z

4/ So I don’t think Trump can leave, even though he’s desperate to. That’s the context to see these rage tweets.

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm.bsky.social) 2026-04-05T14:54:14.440Z

DJT knows on some level that this war is hurting him politically and with his base, but NOT doing a war would damage his relationship with some of his key investors and—worst of all to his mind, likely—make him look weak.

Paul Krugman, sounding more anxious than I’ve ever known him to sound in the 20+years I’ve been reading him, had this to say in a video he recorded this morning (video and transcript at this link):

If Trump is actually going to give the order for massive war crimes, for destruction of civilian infrastructure, power plants, bridges, which will, among other things, lead to a lot of deaths in Iran, will the military obey it? A year ago, I would have said no. . . .

My God, if Trump gets his way, and if he doesn’t chicken out —and I think TACO is greatly overrated, I think all too often Trump actually does follow through on his insane stuff.

It’s entirely possible that basically by this time Tuesday, America will have established itself as one of the world’s great villains. I don’t want to be here, but, you know, be warned. This is happening. This is real.

I can’t stop thinking of all the cowards in the cabinet and Congress who could stop this today, but won’t. Or of all the merchant sailors, many of them from developing nations, who are stuck on tankers in the Persian Gulf and running out of food (archive link here). Or of all the people in Iran (and Lebanon!) who are already suffering because of us and who are now counting down the hours to further suffering—suffering which could last months or years.

I do not know what an Easter miracle looks like in this context. I just know I’ve never wanted one more.

Open thread, friends.

Happy No Kings Day, Juicers

by Rose Judson|  March 28, 20264:30 am| 79 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads, Don't Know Much About History, The Horrors

Thanks to how they’ve timed their visit to me, my parents are missing their local No Kings event for the first time since Trump 2.0 began. I feel vaguely guilty about it, but they insist it’s not an issue and have even purchased me a circular saw, as one does for one’s daughter.

When researching my most recent podcast episode on the Book of Job, I came across some thoughts from Benjamin Franklin that seemed appropriate to share here this morning.

Benjamin Franklin, by George-Peter-Alexander Healy: Oil painted portrait of an elderly Benjamin Franklin a blue and buff suit with white shirt.
Benjamin Franklin, painted during his time in France, by George-Peter-Alexander Healy

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Happy No Kings Day, JuicersPost + Comments (79)

Sometime around 1784, just after the Treaty of Paris, Franklin was coming to the end of his diplomatic mission to France, and he amused himself by writing a little parody of the first chapter of Job. If you’re not familiar with that book of the Bible, it opens with Satan betting God that he can get the pious patriarch Job to abandon his faith by tormenting him in various ways, which God gives him permission to do.

B-Frank’s parody is a bit tedious in itself. (You can read it here at the National Archives.) Basically, he presents God as a cloistered king and Satan as a scheming courtier with a grudge against Job—a dynamic informed by what Franklin witnessed at Versailles, no doubt. However, he later explained it in a little essay called “The Levée”:

“The book of Job is called by divines a sacred poem, and with the rest of the Holy Scriptures, is understood to be written for our instruction.

What then is the instruction to be gathered from this supposed transaction [between God and Satan]?

Trust not a single person with the government of your state. For if the Deity himself, being the monarch, may for a time give way to calumny, and suffer it to operate the destruction of the best of subjects; what mischief may you not expect from such power in a mere man, though the best of men, from whom the truth is often industriously hidden, and to whom falsehood is often presented in its place, by artful, interested, and malicious courtiers?

And be cautious in trusting him even with limited powers, lest sooner or later he sap and destroy those limits, and render himself absolute.

For by the disposal of places, he attaches to himself all the placeholders, with their numerous connexions, and also all the expecters and hopers of places, which will form a strong party in promoting his views. By various political engagements for the interest of neighboring states or princes, he procures their aid in establishing his own personal power. So that, through the hopes of emolument in one part of his subjects, and the fear of his resentment in the other, all opposition falls before him.”

Millions of Americans will prove today that all opposition has yet to fall. Wishing all of you who will be out in the streets safety, good marching weather, and renewed hope and energy.

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