Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Human rights are not a matter of opinion!

Our messy unity will be our strength.

So many bastards, so little time.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

After dobbs, women are no longer free.

If you thought you’d already seen people saying the stupidest things possible on the internet, prepare yourselves.

T R E 4 5 O N

Republicans cannot even be trusted with their own money.

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

Those who are easily outraged are easily manipulated.

In after Baud. Damn.

DeSantis transforming Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

If a good thing happens for a bad reason, it’s still a good thing.

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

Petty moves from a petty man.

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.

Speaker Mike Johnson is a vile traitor to the House and the Constitution.

Is trump is trying to break black America over his knee? signs point to ‘yes’.

75% of people clapping liked the show!

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

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Wednesday Evening Open Thread: Repro Rights Are Human Rights

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Dubious At Best

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I am still not over the ridiculous and murderous ruling that came from the Arizona  Supreme Court yesterday.

The territorial Speaker of the House in 1864 – for the territory that later became Arizona – was William Claude Jones.

He’s the one who is legislating from beyond the grave.  He’s quite the role model, and definitely someone whose views should be determining women’s rights to self-determination and controlling our own bodies.

According to his Wikipedia page. William Claude Jones married a 15-year-old and was described contemporaneously as a “pursuer of nubile females”.. 

He abandoned his 15-year-old wife a short time later, and then married another 15 year old.  

***

Speaking of dubious at best, I listened to a great discussion of Supreme Court rulings and more.

YouTube summary:

As the first-ever trial of a former President looks imminent & certain, an only-on-Talking-Feds roundtable of Molly Jong-Fast, Josh Marshall, & Sen Sheldon Whitehouse joins Harry to assess how the spectacle of Trump-in-the-chair will play on the campaign trail. They then move on to the re-emergence of abortion as a year-long white-hot political issue in Florida & therefore the election before taking on Trump’s vulgar attempts to exploit base anti-immigrant sentiment.

YouTube left off a description of the most interesting part where they talked briefly about the US Supreme Court and how they have recently become “triers of fact”, which is supposed to be reserved for the lower courts, and making rulings based on bullshit and “facts” that aren’t facts at all.   That conversation starts around the 35-minute mark, and lasts maybe 10 minutes.

Sheldon Whitehouse and Josh Marshall were both at their best.  I’m not that familiar with Molly Jong-Fast, so I can’t speak to whether she was at her best, but the whole thing was a great conversation.

Open thread.

 

 

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Wednesday Morning (Semi-Respite) Excellent Read: Chef José Andrés Is *Also* A Golfer

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I follow @CleanObserver for his political takes, and this was a lovely bonus. From Golf, “The man behind the Masters menu? He’s feeding a hungry world”:

… SOMETIME IN THE WINTER OF 2016, José Andrés’ phone rang.

It was Sergio Garcia.

As almost every story involving José starts, somebody needed help. Garcia had been an excellent professional golfer, achieving fabulous wealth and international fame, but on the eve of his 34th birthday, Garcia still had holes in his resume. With 20 pro victories but no major wins in 73 attempts, his legacy hung dangerously in the balance between historically good and quickly forgotten.

“He called me out of the blue,” José remembers, his eyes widening. “He had this … energy.”

The request was formally a job offer: Garcia needed an in-house chef for Masters week, and he could think of no one better suited to run his kitchen than the best chef he knew, José.

Trouble was, José was already booked solid. He was busy trying to feed the world. And feeding the world doesn’t necessarily allow for a week of flipping omelets at a rental home in northeast Georgia, as Andrés tried to explain…

Garcia was relentless, and soon it became clear that he really did need José…

… And you’ll have to click through to find out what that involved. C’mon, it’s a great read!

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War for Ukraine Day 776: Russia Continues to Bombard Kharkiv and Sumy!

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Screen shot of new artwork by NEIVANMADE. The background is black. In the bottom foreground are grey Ukrainian homes and apartment buildings being bombarded by red Russian missiles with the Special Military Operation "Z" symbol on them. Above the missiles, written in red is the word "Ruzzians". Below the buildings being attacked is the statement "Turns Homes Into Graves".

(Image by NEIVANMADE)

As of 8:20 PM EDT the air raid alerts are only up over Kherson, Mykolaiv, and Odesa Oblasts, in addition to the ones that are always up over Russian occupied Luhansk and Crimea.

Russia bombarded Kharkiv again!

Kharkiv needs a robust defense. There is a solution to Russia’s constant terror: we need additional air defense systems and missiles. The world has no right to remain indifferent while Russia deliberately destroys the city on a daily basis and murders people in their homes. Ukraine needs greater air defense.

I am grateful to everyone who is there for our people—eliminating the consequences of shelling, assisting, supporting, and working hard to keep normal life in Ukrainian cities.

And Sumy Oblast:

From The Kyiv Independent:

Russian forces struck six communities in Ukraine’s northeastern Sumy Oblast in 14 separate attacks throughout the day, the regional administration reported on April 9. At least 50 explosions were reported in Sumy Oblast over the past 24 hours.

The communities of Yunakivka, Bilopillia, Krasnopillia, Okhtyrka, Esman, and Seredyna-Buda came under attack.

Throughout the day, Russia assailed the border communities with mortar, artillery, grenade launcher, and rocket attacks. The community of Esman saw at least 14 mines dropped according to the Ukrainian military.

No casualties or damages to civilian infrastructure were reported.

Russian strikes against Sumy Oblast have become increasingly destructive over the past month, leading to multiple civilian casualties. On April 8, Russian aerial attacks against the town of Bilopillia and the city of Sumy killed one person and injured six others, one of them critically.

Amid intensified attacks, Ukrainian authorities ordered the evacuation of children from 52 settlements in Sumy Oblast on April 5.

They also hit Poltava!

Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier today. Video below, English transcript after the jump:

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GOP Venality Open Thread: Is Trump Trying to Set Up Another ‘October Surprise’?

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Are a bear’s sanitary arrangements convenient to its woodland home? Of course he is. Is the GOP happily abetting the crime cartel, ‘patriotism’ be damned? After Nixon, Reagan, and Bush… of course they are.

Will Bunch, at the Philadelphia Inquirer — “Trump’s family takes Saudi cash and deals with MBS and Netanyahu. That’s troublesome.”:

It’s now been seven years since one of the most iconic political moments of the Donald Trump era: the 2017 photo of the then-newly elected 45th president surrounded by Saudi Arabian royals and oligarchs dressed in traditional garb, all fondling a mysterious, glowing orb.

But for Trump and his family, the afterglow from that encounter — and the beginning of what fictional American emigree-to-the-Arab-world Rick Blaine would have called “a beautiful friendship” with the Saudis — has never dimmed.

This weekend, the endless gusher of petrodollars from Riyadh left their oily mark on the dim jewel of Trump’s fast-fading empire, the Trump National Doral course outside of Miami. There, the Saudi-funded LIV Golf tour brought yet another televised and star-studded tournament to a resort owned by the 45th president’s business arm.

We don’t how much the LIV tour — largely a creation of the massive sovereign wealth fund controlled by the Saudi dictator Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) — paid the Trump Organization for the three-day event. The LIV people insist the money is nominal, but no one would argue that the widely seen tournaments are propping up Trump’s coffers at a time when his hotel brand is in the loo, and the established PGA golf tour is avoiding the ex-POTUS and his 88 felony charges.

The New York Times, in a deep dive this weekend into Trump’s business world and its ties to the MBS regime, reported that Trump’s 15 golf resorts from California to Scotland — including one under construction in Oman in partnership with (surprise!) Saudi business interests — are his last remaining profit center, as the LIV events draw fans and also boost the cache of his private clubs that can charge as much as $400,000 for an individual membership…

It all looks like textbook corruption, since the Saudis didn’t start doing substantial business with the Trump family until after his presidency — when, among other things, his administration whitewashed any real probe into MBS’ involvement in the killing of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi — and before his current campaign, which has him in a dead heat with President Joe Biden. But in a world on fire, there are even bigger geopolitical reasons to be alarmed over Team Trump’s close ties…

…[W]hat if the current leaders in Jerusalem and Riyadh thought they could get better deals by waiting nine months and seeing if Trump becomes 47th president? What if Netanyahu, increasingly unpopular and, like Trump, facing criminal charges, thinks that another term for Trump — whose policies were rabidly pro-Israel, even if his personal friendship with the Israeli prime minister cooled after the 2020 election — is his best hope for staying in power?…

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Tuesday Afternoon Open Thread

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Hey everybody, busy all morning elsewhere, so I haven’t even seen any new.  Please share new below, and talk about any else you like, too.

I liked this so much from one of yesterday’s tweets, I thought I might use it to dress up various posts.  Seriously can’t think of a post where this wouldn’t fit with at least some of the comments.

Open thread!

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