Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

They don’t have outfits that big. nor codpieces that small.

Stand up, dammit!

A fool as well as an oath-breaker.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

“Alexa, change the president.”

Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves? (hint, door #2)

We can show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

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

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

A tremendous foreign policy asset… to all of our adversaries.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

Fight them, without becoming them!

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

Not all heroes wear capes.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.

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Evening open thread

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We haven’t had snow around these parts until yesterday morning, we got up and there was a couple inches of fresh snow on the ground. It stayed all day, so we had a white Christmas. Got up this morning, and it was raining, so all the snow got washed away.
Some people like it that way, but if I could get several feet of snow, I’d prefer that.
It keeps the idiots down.

Christmas happened, and we all got pretty much what we wanted. We’re an easy bunch. Freddie got gourmet dog biscuits and a sweater because of course he did.
My wife bought a Cure 81 spiral-cut ham, and I smoked it. Yes it was already cooked, but we smoked it low with cherry wood and a glaze made from brown sugar, honey and the drippings. Turned out really nice. I’m getting better at this smoking thing all the time, and yes, I realize I’m a walking stereotype, but it was either smoking meats or becoming an expert in one battle of the civil war or ww2, and I get hungry now and again so that’s the way I went.
Our negotiations with the agency are on hold for the holidays. We’ll hit it hard when we come back and while I strongly suspect the incoming administration will force the agency to cut a bunch of stuff out, we’ll wrap them up in paper for as long as we can because what else can we do?
Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Labor, Lori Chavez-DeRemer happens to be the only Republican that my union, American Federation of Government Employees, endorsed the last election. She has a history of supporting organized labor and supporting civil servants. I wonder how long she’ll last in Trump’s admin, and I wonder what’s going to happen. I honestly don’t think the GOP-controlled Senate would confim her.
Trump’s nominee for Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins, 52, graduated from Texas A&M University with an undergraduate degree in agricultural development before completing law school at the University of Texas. She served as domestic policy chief during Trump’s first term, a portfolio that included agricultural policy. After leaving the White House, she became president and CEO of the America First Policy Institute, a group helping to lay the groundwork for a second Trump administration. Rollins, in an interview earlier this year, called Trump an “amazing boss.” 
I find that last bit ominous.
We’re going to California for a week here in a couple days.  Looking forward to it.

How did everybody make out for Christmas?

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It looks like I’ll have a not-shitty Christmas after all

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So after President-Elect Musk blew up the Continuing Resolution deal, and the Placeholder-Elect Trump jumped in a couple hours later, it looked like I was going to be furloughed over Christmas again.
The last time around, 35 days in 2018/19, I took a big chunk out of my savings to make two mortgage payments, 2 gas payments, 2 electricity payments, four car payments, groceries and so on, so that the auto-debits didn’t blow us up. It took almost a year to replace all that in the savings account–which, admittedly, was made easier to an extent by not being able to travel anywhere or really do anything because Trump fucked up the COVID response.
I want the Dems to make things as hard for the GOP as possible, and I think one way to do that is let them keep ratfucking each other. But of course, I and a lot of other people would have gotten hurt.
As it is, they partially appeased Musk and Trump by taking away money for pediatric cancer research. Because of course they did.
I seem to recall something about Trump and pediatric cancer hospitals in the past.
It seems that letting sick kids die is his thing.
We spent this week in contract negotiations cleaning up areas where we had not settled articles earlier, so we didn’t break new ground, but we did fix some holes so we’ll be in good shape to startup again after the holidays. 
I just cut out a whole paragraph here because while I think you guys are interested, and there’s nothing illegal about telling you what’s happening, I think it’s probably prudent to not get into details.
President Biden gave everybody in Federal service Christmas eve as a paid day off. Our current secretary, Tom Vilsack, likes to give out 2 hours here, 4 hours there, and occasionally a full day.  He did that when he was Obama’s SecAg, too. His successor/predecessor, Sonny Perdue never did that stuff and neither did Trump. I’m going to miss it.
What does everybody have on tap for the week?
Oh, and Freddie wants to show off his new flannel sweater.

It looks like I'll have a not-shitty Christmas after all 5 It looks like I'll have a not-shitty Christmas after all 6

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SOLIDARITY FOREVER FOR THE UNION MAKES US STRONG!

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So we’re negotiating our Collective Bargaining Agreement with the agency.
The rhythm is Tuesdays we flip a coin to decide which party’s team leads, submitting contract articles and explaining, and the other party’s team responds with our articles and explanation. Then we question each other, and then begin to build an article both sides can agree to.
On Thursdays, the lead is reversed.
It’s about as fun as it sounds.
Some articles are boilerplate. This is the Bargaining Unit. This is the management. This is the union. These are the rights and responsibilities of all the parties.
Those things are restatements of statutory language and prior practices. They gotta be in there, and for the most part everyone on both sides agrees to the substance.
Now we’re into the nitty gritty this week.
How is the contract enforced, how does the union operate within the context of the agency’s mission? Who is responsible for what things, and why?
We spent all day Tuesday this week arguing about the meaning of the word “shall” and where it belonged in one particular sentence. Today we covered a lot of ground until we got to the article the agency submitted that would render the union impotent with the stroke of a pen.
Yeah. Not adopting that one. We’re going to be arguing that one again on Tuesday next. We submitted our proposal, which doesn’t read anything like their proposal and we’ll see what they say.

The agency reps, from the Labor Relations team, are not bad or evil people. They’re trying to get the best deal they can for the agency and protect the agency’s perogatives. I try very hard for myself and my team to not let this become personal, while we are trying very hard to secure our Employees’ rights.

Please also consider this an open thread.

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