The other thread is getting too long and scrolly, and I’ve got nothing, so here’s a picture of the Old Girl and New Boy to tide us over until something else comes along:
Dogs make everything better.
by Betty Cracker| 128 Comments
This post is in: Dog Blogging, Open Threads
The other thread is getting too long and scrolly, and I’ve got nothing, so here’s a picture of the Old Girl and New Boy to tide us over until something else comes along:
Dogs make everything better.
by Betty Cracker| 442 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads, Politics, General Stupidity
Something weird is happening in the Judiciary Committee. The vote was delayed, and there are rumors that Flake has flip-flopped:
1:30 has come and gone and still no committee vote. Senators still huddling. Becoming increasingly clear that Flake is wavering.
— Sheryl Gay Stolberg (@SherylNYT) September 28, 2018
I’ll believe it when I see it.
In the meantime, find someone who loves you as much as Badger loves this raggedy-ass tennis ball:
Open thread!
UPDATE: Flake voted yes to move the Kavanaugh nomination out of the committee on the condition that there’s an FBI investigation (within the next seven days) before the floor vote. He’ll be a no if there’s not an investigation. I’ll be darned.
by Betty Cracker| 136 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads, Politics, Republican Stupidity, The War On Women, Women's Rights Are Human Rights, Assholes, General Stupidity
At 9:30 AM, the Senate Judiciary Committee will vote on whether to send Kavanaugh’s nomination to the floor. Regardless of how they vote, McConnell can schedule a floor vote. He will because of course he fucking will — subverting the US Constitution and the will of the people is what McConnell does.
After McConnell schedules a vote on Kavanaugh, I’m 95% certain the Republicans in the US Senate will put the belligerent, entitled, rapey prick on the United States Supreme Court for the rest of his fucking life.
Which Republican will vote no? Flake or Sasse? Give me a fucking break. Collins? Not gonna happen. Murkowski? Her colleagues will find a way to bribe her.
Kavanaugh’s ranty, partisan performance yesterday pleased the belligerent, entitled, rapey prick in the White House who nominated him. Lindsey Graham successfully auditioned to replace Jeff Sessions as AG, overcoming the deficit of a cracker-ass accent that grates on Manhattan Mussolini’s ears.
This country doesn’t give a shit about treating women equally under the law, and it never has, due to a combination of malice and ignorance, with the former increasing and the latter receding too slowly.
As I’ve said here before, the reaction to Anita Hill’s testimony among male colleagues at my first real post-college job was an eye-opener for me back when I was a dewy young thing.
“If he was so horrible, why didn’t she just quit?”
“Why was she friendly to him in social settings years later if he sexually harassed her?”
“A little bit nutty and a little bit slutty.”
They didn’t get it. Some still don’t.
I was a cynic even then, but not so much that I expected to be sitting here 27 years later watching an even more revolting spectacle play out among members of my generational cohort.
Oh well. Nothing to do but vote, get others to vote, and get on with our lives, right? That’s just the way it is.
Professor Christine Blasey Ford will go on with her life after her country proves so unworthy of her courage and patriotism, just like Professor Anita Hill did before her.
Maybe, after another 27 years has passed, 80-year-old Justice Kavanaugh will retire or kick the bucket, and my 47-year-old daughter will find the prospect of his being replaced with a misogynist unthinkable.
But you know what? I wouldn’t bet on it.
The Vote to Confirm Our Second-Class CitizenshipPost + Comments (136)
This post is in: Cat Blogging, Open Threads, Proud to Be A Democrat, All Too Normal, All we want is life beyond the thunderdome
I owe one of you guys thanks for the above image. Quick notes on the (probable) Topic of the Day (assuming Trump doesn’t actually manage to fire Rod Rosenstein — remember that story? Three days ago!)…
The American Bar Association calls for an FBI background check before Senate votes to confirm Judge Kavanaugh: "Each appointment to our nation’s Highest Court (as with all others) is simply too important to rush to a vote." https://t.co/ZdiMt5qDfl pic.twitter.com/NqA58ciWph
— NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt (@NBCNightlyNews) September 28, 2018
He lied about his involvement in Bush policy decisions and judge nomination campaigns. He most likely lied about the extent of his drinking and other things he could have admitted to. He's not to be trusted.
— John Legend (@johnlegend) September 28, 2018
His politics and hackiness are atrocious but the fact that conservatives don’t even blink for a millisecond at almost incessant perjury is almost the weirdest part of this. Not the worst, but the weirdest. https://t.co/pqJesQHzlS
— Jesse Lee (@JesseCharlesLee) September 28, 2018
… aaaand let’s talk about something more pleasant. From the Washington Post, “Nearly 40,000 people applied to run a cat sanctuary on a Greek island”:
It began in 2010, when a cat gave birth in Joan and Richard Bowell’s garden on the Greek island of Syros. She had two kittens, and one was ill.
The Bowells took them in and gave them names: Pepper was the mother, Tiny and Ninja the babies. The trio joined two cats the couple had brought to Syros when they moved from Denmark, Joan’s native country, and the Bowells viewed it as a mere expansion of their two-person family. They now had not a small number of cats, but not so many that they couldn’t take the animals along when their plan to move to New York, where Richard worked with the United Nations, came to pass.
But this was Greece, where cats posing against white buildings become the subjects of many postcards, but not necessarily the objects of much affection. The Bowells kept finding felines bearing injuries and sicknesses and kittens, and soon the Bowells’ acre of island idyll had become a cat sanctuary they called God’s Little People. The name was not a statement about faith, they say, but about a philosophy — that cats are important as individuals, with a right to be free and to be cared for…
As the feline population roaming their property rose well above 60, the couple said, they realized space prevented the operation from growing much more. They wanted to finally make that move to New York, where Joan Bowell planned to establish another cat sanctuary outside the city. So on Aug. 5, she created a Facebook post soliciting applications for a modestly paid job managing God’s Little People.
The Bowells had posted a similar ad a few years back and gotten a couple handfuls of responses. This time, they hoped for 25, maybe 50.
Within six weeks, they had nearly 40,000…
The story of the job ad went viral, and the Bowells are in talks with filmmakers about a movie. Richard Bowell said he believes the enormous response isn’t about one news report starting a spiral of coverage, or even about the Internet’s infatuation with cats. He says it, too, is about humanity.
“This is bigger than just a job on a Greek island,” he said. “There’s a kind of wish for people to return to some level of humanity at a time when things are degenerating into such inhumanity . . . people want to see a future that can be worked toward.”
Earlier this month, the Bowells had whittled the towers of applications to a handful of finalists. Among those was 62-year-old Californian Jeffyne Telson, whose husband sent her the link to the job ad in August…
More positivity (yes, there are pictures) at the link.
by Alain Chamot (1971-2020)| 13 Comments
This post is in: On The Road, Open Threads, Readership Capture
Good Morning All,
On The Road and In Your Backyard is a weekday feature spotlighting reader submissions. From the exotic to the familiar, please share your part of the world, whether you’re traveling or just in your locality. Share some photos and a narrative, let us see through your pictures and words. We’re so lucky each and every day to see and appreciate the world around us!
Submissions from commenters are welcome at tools.balloon-juice.com
Have a wonderful day and a great weekend, everybody.
Once again on a Friday, we’re blessed by otmar, our indefatigable friend in Austria!
—
Troubleshooting We have an improved setup and plans for further development. I hope the new setup works as well for you as it has in testing, but should you have issues, please email [email protected] This new submission tool is one of many more we’ve got planned, and your feedback helps us craft them to your needs.
Today, pictures from valued commenter otmar.
On Sept 26th I had to attend a meeting at the other side of Vienna’s 1st district. As it was a nice day, I braved the masses of tourists and walked over. Here are some of the impressions on the way:
Taken on 2018-09-26 00:00:00
This is the Austrian State Opera.
Taken on 2018-09-26 00:00:00
Strolling down the Kärnterstraße, I arrived at the center of Vienna: St. Stephen’s cathedral.
Taken on 2018-09-26 00:00:00
The original design of the cathedral called for two spires, but due to financial issues only the south tower got built.
That side of the church is also one of the bases of the Fiaker, the traditional horse carriages which are quite popular with the tourists.
Taken on 2018-09-26 00:00:00
This an elaborate clock with moving figures in Jugendstil. See https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ankeruhr
Taken on 2018-09-26 00:00:00
A small square in Vienna: Lugeck.
See https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lugeck
Thank you so much otmar, do send us more when you can.
Travel safely everybody, and do share some stories in the comments, even if you’re joining the conversation late. Many folks confide that they go back and read old threads, one reason these are available on the Quick Links menu.
Submissions should be sent via the all-new form at https://tools.balloon-juice.com
This post is in: Activist Judges!, Open Threads, Republican Venality, Women's Rights Are Human Rights, Assholes, Decline and Fall, Ever Get The Feeling You've Been Cheated?, MONSTERS
Yelling at a job interview at the people in charge of hiring you really seems peak rich white guy pic.twitter.com/VjfOELmKQI
— Susan J. Demas ?? (@sjdemas) September 27, 2018
I have my doubts about his skill as a lawyer, and Murphy the Trickster God knows how much harm he’s already done on the bench, if Thursday’s performance was a fair sample. But there’s no doubt whatsofeckingever that he’s a loyal little Repub partisan, and that might be enough at this moment in time.
People of varying political views are talking about an “1850s moment“. That’s when the Republican Party was founded, explicitly to fight the grossest civil injustice of the day; perhaps there is some narrative arc demanding that today’s debased GOP die fighting to defend the worst current crimes against the Constitution.
Kavanaugh just absolutely proved what Democrats have always suspected of him: that he is a partisan operative masquerading as a judge.
— Matthew Miller (@matthewamiller) September 27, 2018
This outrage might be a bit more compelling coming from someone who wasn’t part of the Vince Foster witch hunt.
— David S. Bernstein (@dbernstein) September 27, 2018
Contrast: Christine Blasey Ford, who has never been near the political arena, & Brett Kavanaugh, who has spent his lifetime in it. Both expressing surprise that the political arena is so harsh and perilous. Kavanaugh seems shocked, reeling that it is become perilous for him.
— Alexis Simendinger (@ASimendinger) September 27, 2018
Kavanaugh says opposition to his nomination is “a calculated and orchestrated hit” engineered in response to dissatisfaction with Trump and to serve the Clinton’s agenda. “What goes around comes around,” he advises. “You’ll never get me to quit. Never.”
— Tim O'Brien (@TimOBrien) September 27, 2018
"you'll never get me to quit" yeah Brett that's kind of Dr Ford's point.
— zeddy (@Zeddary) September 27, 2018
Brett Kavanaugh operates under the assumption that being confirmed to the Supreme Court without any full investigation would be better for his life reputation than an additional week to investigate. Ask yourself why
— Adam Weinstein (@AdamWeinstein) September 27, 2018
Brett Kavanaugh is now highlighting at length his many years as a partisan Republican operative. The related paper trail is why McConnell originally did not want Trump to pick him. I wrote about this the day after he was nominated: https://t.co/uigfqBKarO
— James Hohmann (@jameshohmann) September 27, 2018
A text from a friend: "if he's this mean sober in front of Congress, what was he like as a drunk teenager?"
— Daniel W. Drezner (@dandrezner) September 27, 2018
Now picture this same guy 30 years younger, sloshed off of cheap 80s beer and being whipped up by his hyper-aggressive teammates. https://t.co/qFIcs7ZZPH
— zeddy (@Zeddary) September 27, 2018
we're seeing a 53 year old man facing a consequence for the first time.
— Tim Dickinson (@7im) September 27, 2018
Kavanaugh looks and sounds like every single bully who’s had somebody actually fight back:
Confused, distressed, gushing with self-pity and feelings of victimization, terrified that they’ve lost control of the situation.
— Peter Wolf (@peterawolf) September 27, 2018
Judge Kavanaugh becomes emotional when he brings up how his ten-year-old daughter suggested praying for "the woman," meaning Christine Blasey Ford, the other night. His wife puts her hand over her face.
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) September 27, 2018
What's amazing about this picture is these are the women there to support him. pic.twitter.com/WMpgxtbakl
— Schooley (@Rschooley) September 27, 2018
Don't count myself a fan, but it's nevertheless pitiful to watch Kavanaugh's self-immolation.
— Edward Luce (@EdwardGLuce) September 27, 2018
I am sorry, there are a lot of people in the world to feel sorry for. The ocean of self pity here is a bit much.
— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) September 27, 2018
Kavanaugh just so revealed himself today as such an unjudicious, self-pitying, entitled, partisan hack,
— Laura Rozen (@lrozen) September 27, 2018
Ford survived 11 rounds of questioning by the Republicans’ “female assistant.” Kavanaugh had to be rescued after two rounds.
— southpaw (@nycsouthpaw) September 27, 2018
She identified his own friend as an eyewitness, asked the FBI to investigate her story, and provided four depositions from people she'd told about it.
He hasn't asked for the FBI to investigate and his friend skipped town on the advice of his attorney. https://t.co/BGV5DnmjfL
— Kevin M. Kruse (@KevinMKruse) September 26, 2018
Meanwhile, Dr Blasey Ford, Debbie Ramirez, and Julie Swetnick have all demanded an FBI investigation, which would put them in seriously legal jeopardy if they are lying. https://t.co/H3xYu97JOL
— Josh Dorner (@JoshDorner) September 27, 2018
Over and over again Kavanaugh has been asked if he'd support an FBI investigation and over and over again he's refused to answer the question.
That's what we call a tell
— Michael Cohen (@speechboy71) September 27, 2018
This is what Brett Kavanaugh said about letting a President keep his job. https://t.co/8Gulr3ztGF pic.twitter.com/xMKMJXhaud
— emptywheel (@emptywheel) September 27, 2018
For the Record: Brett Kavanaugh Is *NOT* A Good ManPost + Comments (38)
This post is in: Open Threads, Television, All we want is life beyond the thunderdome
Hillary made a cameo on Murphy Brown pic.twitter.com/wOrkFhozY6
— Chris Evans (@notcapnamerica) September 28, 2018
The Spousal Unit and I like to watch a little TV together to wind down in the evening… but our tastes don’t have a lot of overlap. He doesn’t like anything ‘too depressing’, or that involves people shouting at each other for long stretches; I’m not a big fan of whimsy or slapstick. Leverage was the perfect sweet spot for us, also (the first ten seasons of) New Tricks (after Amanda Pullman left, I felt it degenerated into fanservice). We both enjoyed the first four seasons of Elementary, but haven’t gotten around to finishing the second season of the BBC’s Sherlock. I’m looking forward to watching the new Murphy Brown online, but it’s probably a little too ascerbic for him…
Given those parameters, any of you want to explain why The Good Place would or would not be something we’d both enjoy? I’ve got the first disc of the first season queued up on Netflix (yes, we’re old, the actual TV is upstairs in the bedroom and he ‘hasn’t gotten around’ to running a cable for the Roku box through the attic), but it’s marked ‘short wait’, so we may be testing the Miss Fisher Murder Mysteries first.
Other suggestions, of course, would be more than welcome!
TV Bleg: Any Reviews of <em>The Good Place</em>?Post + Comments (107)