Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

When you’re in more danger from the IDF than from Russian shelling, that’s really bad.

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

You are either for trump or for democracy. Pick one.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

Disagreements are healthy; personal attacks are not.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Disappointing to see gov. newsom with his finger to the wind.

Everybody saw this coming.

How stupid are these people?

They were going to turn on one another at some point. It was inevitable.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Giving in to doom is how authoritarians win.

Let me eat cake. The rest of you could stand to lose some weight, frankly.

T R E 4 5 O N

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

Humiliatingly small and eclipsed by the derision of millions.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Jack be nimble, jack be quick, hurry up and indict this prick.

I really should read my own blog.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

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It’s Been Nearly Four Years With No Ads on Balloon Juice!

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Balloon Juice went ad-free nearly 4 year ago, and I know that I am not the only one who is really happy we did that.

Can we take a quick trip down memory lane so we don’t have to reinvent the wheel?

2021

If you’re the guy whose name is on all the bills, ditching the ads and losing $1,000 a month would have to feel a bit like jumping off a cliff without a net.

So here’s what it will take for me to feel good about having asked John Cole to do just that:

– $6,000 in one-time donations now – that would sit in an account, unused, as a safety net, to take the uncertainty out of the equation for Cole.

– no subscriptions, just recurring donations every month from those who can afford it, to pay for hosting and subscriptions etc.

– we need about $1,000 in recurring donations every month for that.

Safety net

Having the safety net has already helpful, but it’s been a long time since we’ve had a site fundraiser and for various reasons we have been whittling away at the safety net rather than putting up a site fundraising post.

So it would be super helpful if we could put some money back into the safety net, with one-time donations.

You can donate to the safety net with Patreon, Venmo, Zelle, and paper check.  Even PayPal if that’s your preference, but please mark it as personal / gift and not payment for services.

Monthly expenses

We need about $1,000 in recurring monthly donations for the monthly expenses.   Same donation options –  Venmo, Zelle, PayPal, and paper check – except I think Patreon doesn’t allow one-time donations.  (Please mark it as personal / gift and not payment for services.)

Fine tuning!

Not everyone can afford even $5 or $10 a month, but this is a community and those of us who can afford that have been helping make the site better for everyone.

If you have signed up for a monthly donation but you’re in a different financial position than you were when you signed up, please feel free to cancel your monthly donation, with our sincere thanks for having supported the site for nearly a year!

If you keep thinking you’ll set up a monthly donation, but haven’t gotten around to it, or if the timing is right for increasing your donation, this would be a great time to do it.

If you want to support the site with a one-time check, send me an email message I will send you Cole’s address.  (P.O.box)

Memory Lane

In case you want to relive the good times, here’s the post from me on Nov 3, 2021.

Good News: Who Wants a Balloon Juice With No Ads At All?

Followed by this post from John a couple hours later:

So I Guess We are Going Ad Free (With Venting and Explanation)

 

🎈Keep Balloon Juice Ad Free

Become a Balloon Juice Patreon
Donate with Venmo or Zelle

If you have any questions, let me know!

It’s Been Nearly Four Years With No Ads on Balloon Juice!Post + Comments (42)

An Addendum

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Re: My previous post.

Under no circumstances should you be under the impression that this blog is going all doomer and everything is unstoppable. On the other hand, I think it would be supremely irresponsible to pretend we are not in the middle of a gigantic, dangerous mess right now, because we are. This may come as a surprise and be unsettling to you, but I will remind you that this has been the America minorities and marginalized people have endured their entire lives. It’s just coming to the rest of us now.

As time goes by, leaders will emerge and strategies to fight back and keep ouyrselves safe will become clear. Mistermix has done yeoman’s work calling out actual leaders- Maxwell Frost, AOC, Gov. Pritzker, etc.

So do not despair, but do prepare. And this place will always be open and as safe as can be.

An AddendumPost + Comments (126)

PSA, Memory Lane, and Housekeeping

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I hate to even bring it up, but remember the Apocalypse?  Where we lost the BJ site for a period of time?

Remember the signup link we had so that we could communicate with everyone while the site was down and/or at the Home Away from Home site?

If you’re not already on the list, this is your chance to sign up, so that if we ever need to communicate outside of Balloon Juice – insert your worst case scenario here – you will receive the communication.

Signup link

You have 3 days to click the link to sign up.  We have until Friday to add more people to the list.

If you’re not sure whether you are already signed up, click the link and sign up again – I imagine that if you’re already signed up you’ll see some sort of message to that effect if you sign up again.

Mailchimp wants us to pay a $27 monthly fee now (which comes to $324 a year), so we’ll need to export the list from MailChimp, and then if / when we want to communicate with list members in the future, we’ll get a paying subscription then and import the list back into MailChimp.

I am secretly hoping that one of our BJ peeps will offer to cover the cost, but if not then we’ll go with Plan A above.

So anyway, please sign up if you are interested.  We have 850 BJ peeps on the list right now.

Open thread.

PSA, Memory Lane, and HousekeepingPost + Comments (111)

Some Post-Loss Decorum

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This starts right the fuck now and let me be clear about this. We are not going to spend the next couple days lashing out at each other in the comments. It accomplishes fucking nothing and no one needs it right now. There will be plenty of time for post-mortems and accountability when the data has been analyzed, and we can fucking wait until then and look at things with clear eyes and try to find a way forward.

I am hurt, sad, depressed, and angry. I’m scared. I have been shot at and been and been through catastrophic explosions, through two car windshields, fallen off a roof, fought alcoholism and anxiety and depression and had multiple life changing injuries. I have been through a lot of shit, and this is the scariest thing I have ever encountered. My head is spinning and I am dizzy and in disbelief. I don’t need a bunch of people in here attacking other people because Biden should have stepped down earlier or should not have stepped down or whatever your deep thoughts are. I don’t need or want your bullshit half-baked analysis. I don’t need or want you attacking other people. And I am a white man who can blend in and not at all the target of what is about to come.

People are hurting, vulnerable, and scared. We have a lot of people who do not have the privilege of being able to blend in like I do- they are exposed, defenseless, and have targets on their backs. If what you are about to spew in the comments isn’t a constructive way to move forward, just shut your rancid piehole for a couple days. We don’t need immediate internecine warfare. Coming on here and shitting all over people to make yourself feel better is not the winning play you think it is.

We are all in this together, and there is a lot of ugliness about to come down the pike and there is a very real potential the America we know and love may be gone for quite some time. So if you are not about helping those around you and lifting people up instead of pushing people down or attacking people who are in the middle of a traumatic nightmare, you are not fucking welcome.

I don’t need a bunch of edgelord douchebags reciting “hard truths” to people. I need people looking out for each other.

Do you motherfuckers understand me? Don’t say things you regret, and let’s try to be the helpers, not the haters. We have many immigrants here, people of color, gay/trans people, a lot of women. It is our job to protect them. Do not let me down.

Some Post-Loss DecorumPost + Comments (632)