My chickens get to free-range under our supervision just about every evening, but during the day, they are confined to a 320-square-foot coop containing a hen house. They scratch around in the coop all day long and have dug up some interesting things over the years, including vintage toys and large, mysterious bones.
This morning, I went out to distribute some scraps and tripped over what appears to be a farm implement of some sort, oxidized beyond all recognition — perhaps a hoe head? The chickens rushed me when I stumbled, battling over the scraps I’d dropped and pecking my (unfortunately!) sandal-shod feet to scoop up bits of apple peels that had landed there.
It was mildly alarming. But if I were a Trump campaign operative, I’d headline this incident as follows:
Heroic Food Purveyor Fends Off Dastardly Attack by Ravening Horde of Velociraptors!
I say that because Team Trump is trying to spin the incident last night — in which a Republican protester unfurled a “Republicans Against Trump” sign and was tackled and ejected as Secret Service agents hustled Trump offstage — as an assassination attempt. Via WaPo:
Donald Trump Jr. and top aide retweet baseless allegation of assassination attempt
Trump was quickly rushed off-stage by Secret Service at a campaign rally in Reno, Nev., on Saturday night as a scuffle erupted in the crowd directly in front of the stage and a man was led away. It wasn’t immediately clear exactly what had happened.
But amid the chaos, some people seemed sure. Within minutes, at least two top Trump campaign voices — Donald Trump Jr., and top social media aide Dan Scavino — passed along unsubstantiated claims that the GOP nominee had just survived an “assassination attempt.”
Christ on a crumpet. I’m sure it was a genuinely scary incident — someone allegedly yelled “Gun!” The gun-humpers in attendance briefly regained enough sense to want to avoid the unwarranted and unauthorized presence of an instrument designed to cause swift death.
And as much as I despise the shrieking, hirsute, apricot-hued shit-sack, I don’t resent a cent of my tax dollars going to protect Trump during this campaign. As we are all too aware, this country is chock-full of dangerous lunatics with unrestricted access to powerful firearms.
But seriously, they’re going to try to milk the fact that they panicked over nothing for sympathy votes? My cranky-ass hens are braver and more sensible than those big fat chickens.
Open thread!
PS: I highly recommend today’s garden chat, even for non-gardeners. Valued commenter WaterGirl shares a lovely story of remembrance, renewal and hope.
Baud
Agree about the garden chat
Interesting post on canvassing at LGM.
aimai
Love you so much, Betty!
WereBear
What is truly astonishing about the Deplorables is how their hero is the Most Deplorable of them all.
Their dream world has become a nightmare, and the longer they put off facing that, the longer they will be down there in it.
Wake up!
NotMax
Will Carrot Flop channel Green Day for the first ever musical concession?
Maybe have Himself and his entire irredeemable, odious clan/Klan dance on stage?
debbie
I noticed Trump’s hair didn’t move while being hussled offstage. His body has to have absorbed a toxic amount of lacquer over the years. Could this be the link to explain his insanity?
Baud
And more productive.
WaterGirl
When I saw the title Cranky-Ass Hens and Big Fat Chickens, I thought maybe you were calling us names after reading one of the overnight threads. :-)
Trump and his family have no sense of shame. Not Trump, not his wife, not his kids. It’s disgusting.
Trump: Vote for me, I’m a pathetic, whiny coward. And a bully.
WaterGirl
Betty, thanks for your PS and your kind words about the garden chat. (Baud, too.)
WaterGirl
The pups got me up early this morning. And so it begins… a week or more of trying to explain to the pups and the kitties that no, it’s not time for breakfast /lunch /dinner yet.
Luthe
You’ve found the official Ballon Juice rusty farm implement of self-fornication! Keep it handy; there’s plenty of call for it in these parts.
Corner Stone
Ack! Ambulatory Cream Cheese Sculpture on my TV!
Karen S.
Yes. Yes, they are going to milk the fact that they panicked over nothing in an attempt to get sympathy votes, and they may get a few. The Trump campaign is shameless and people inclined to vote for Hair Fuhrer are, on the whole, mean spirited and gullible.
tobie
Republicans love nothing more than painting themselves as victims. You know their shtick–‘war on Xmas,’ ‘silenced by PC culture and the liberal media,’ ‘discriminated against because of affirmative action,’ ‘derided by the elite,’ etc. They’re spinning this story of a protestor as an assassination attempt because they know it will fire up their base. And CNN as always is carrying the water for them. That network–among others–really needs to be exposed after this election for its consistent conservative bias this cycle. Shameful.
ThresherK
America’s Worst Editorial Cartoonist was interviewed for a blurb on CBS Sunday Morning.
I don’t remember which CBSer filed the story, but his remarks weren’t worth shit.
Schlemazel
@debbie:
more likely tertiary syphilis.
Kay
Interesting. The story has been Trump would take Ohio but I never saw any indication Clinton was giving up on it- none-other than the reporting about a month ago that they were pulling out (which must have been wrong because they didn’t pull out).
She probably doesn’t need it and it might be more of a pain in the ass than it’s worth because Trumpsters will be a giant pain in the ass screaming voter fraud if it’s close, but it is interesting that it might still be in play.
Corner Stone
Polls are tightening, you guys! Did you realize that? POLLS.TIGHTENING.
Schlemazel
@ThresherK:
only fair since they had America’s second worst painter on and a story about the second worst President in US history.
It was Mara Liason I think.
Schlemazel
@Corner Stone:
WHY AM I JUST HEARING THIS NOW?
WaterGirl
@Kay: Kay, I was thinking that you said recently that you thought Clinton would win Ohio. Did I make that up?
Also, I’d just like to take a minute to say how much I have appreciated your voice these past couple of months, especially in the past couple of weeks when you have been channeling my anger at the FBI and everything else that has been going on.
WaterGirl
@Schlemazel: Now that’s funny.
Corner Stone
@Schlemazel: Also too, Trump is coming for all your Minnesota.
dmsilev
@Corner Stone:
Heh. Meanwhile, in the world of professional pollers, Hillary Clinton Is Leading In A Greater Portion Of Polls Than Obama Was In The Last Two Elections. I’m going to start a Kickstarter campaign to tie a bunch of journalists down with their eyes strapped open, ala A Clockwork Orange, as a bunch of basic statistics texts are projected on a screen. I trust I can count on your support?
NotMax
The biggest problem with changing the clocks for you who do is that it means one more hour of having to endure he who shall not be elected.
ThresherK
@Schlemazel: I didn’t catch the painter’s name, but calling him “second worst” is doing damage to the names “Leroy Nieman” and “Thomas Kincaide”.
I guess it’s funny to listen to a hack like Ramirez call himself a “conservative journalist” in an 8-minute piece, including Colbert, where CBS can’t be bothered with the axiom “facts have a well-known liberal bias”.
PS “AGoodCartoon” on Tumblr is a great way to see all the worst political cartoons without having to search them out. And of course it’s run by a saint who subjects themselves to all that shit so I don’t have to.
Lois Radford
When the “assassination attempt” happened last night, I immediately logged on to Twitter and watched a bunch of individual videos being Tweeted. From what I could tell, a lone, white guy, held up a sign that read “Republicans Against Trump.” Trump immediately shouted, “Get him out of here.” At which time the protestor was wrestled to the ground. Then, Trump shouted. “He’s a Hillary supporter!” And someone in the audience responded, “C*NT!” Which was misheard by the Secret Service as “GUN!” They immediately shuffled The Donald off stage. No gun was ever found. I’m fully expecting Trump to demand a Purple Heart.
Corner Stone
@Kay: When you take a look at who is campaigning on her behalf in OH it sure looks like HRC is not giving up on it. King James is a natural but the Castro brothers, Wendy Davis, Jay-Z and etc? Jim Brown isn’t exactly chicken feed scraps either in OH.
Kay
@WaterGirl:
Ohio is weird this time because there’s no indication they think they’re losing. My son got two local calls to return his absentee ballot (he did) and I had a live canvasser at the door looking for my husband yesterday- he votes on election day. That’s like Obama campaign levels of pestering voters :)
I know they were having trouble getting people for GOTV Tuesday but that’s normal- we don’t have that many activist Democrats and a lot of them are poll workers. There has to be a D (or an I) for every R at a polling station so we run out of Democrats on election day itself.
Schlemazel
@Corner Stone:
I think that is great! I stand as good a chance of taking MNs 10 EVs as cheeto dust turd does. he can waste all his time here he wants.
satby
@dmsilev: I’m totally in.
WaterGirl
@Lois Radford:
Did you make that part up, or is it true?
I am still laughing about it, and I am hoping that it’s true and not poetic license.
edit: You know, that whole paragraph could be something from the onion.
Corner Stone
@dmsilev:
No. BECAUSE EMAILS
Kay
@Corner Stone:
I have heard my whole adult life that Clinton is ” a fighter” but it honestly got on my nerves because it seemed like just this thing people said- Chris Matthews saying it immediately discredits it- but I am genuinely impressed. She is a fighter. She’s tough. Strickland was a horrible candidate and the OH Senate race imploded and she seemed to be 5 points down but she’s still throwing all this effort into the state.
Iowa Old Lady
I have to point out that on Friday night, Lawrence O’Donnell referred to and actually addressed Sam Wang as Sam Wong. Irrelevant but amusing.
WaterGirl
@Kay: Interesting!
WaterGirl
@Iowa Old Lady: ouch!
Schlemazel
@ThresherK:
I am not unaware of Mr. Nieman but I believe the other one is who I had in mind. Isn’t he the one that does those horrible ‘historical’ paintings? That guy earned worst ever.
Here is the site I go to every day for political cartoons. They do not carry everyone but many I don’t see on gocomics.com. There are several “self published’ clowns there that make the one on TV this morning look like Rembrandt and Einstein had a child who does political cartoons.
debbie
@Kay:
The pulling out of Ohio a month ago was for Strickland, wasn’t it?
Harold M Persing
@dmsilev: Where do I sign up?
Corner Stone
The NBC/WSJ national poll MSNBC is touting has Johnson at 6%. Looking forward to see how his voters break on election day when he receives 1% or less of the vote.
Jim Parish
@Iowa Old Lady: “Wong” is the correct pronunciation.
Joel
@Baud: I canvassed entirely white voters in western PA and they had no issues. Elderly folk, mostly, and some touched by the holocaust. They have perspective.
amk
guachi
In Ohio (and many other states) the Republican districts are marginal so increased Democratic turnout might be enough to flip them to a Democratic Representative.
The same is true in Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin. The marginal Republican districts far outnumber the marginal Democratic districts. (Using PVI.) There are 11 districts less than +10R in Ohio but zero D districts. It’s 5-0 in VA, 9-1 in MI, 13-3 in FL, 4-1 in MN, 6-6 in NY (but it’s all the R districts in the state), 10-1 in PA, and 4-1 in WI.
Kathleen
@Kay: I think she’ll take Ohio. Gut feeling based on anecdotal evidence while canvassing. People will get out and vote for her. The GOTV org is very good in Hamilton County.
ETA: Also, too what Water Girl said in #20.
Peale
@Corner Stone: if the election were held November 28, he would surely win. Momentum, media bias, and vote Fraud so massive that the cops are too overwhelmed to arrest all the Democrat illegal voters…really destroying his candidacy right now.
pamelabrown53
@Kay:
Kay, There’s a new Columbus Dispatch poll out today and it’s Hillary 48; Trump 47!
Mike E
@Schlemazel: too many LOUD NOISES
Schlemazel
off the current topics but it was brought up last night
I watched the first two episodes of “Dirk Diggly” what a hot mess. If they tried to be just a little bit ‘kookier’ I think they would run the episodes in reverse. I wondered how they would translate the books to images & it probably was not possible to do well. I may watch more episodes but they are on a short leash.
Some good acting though.
Corner Stone
I am not of the opinion that surrogates move too many votes but I think it does kind of speak to the candidates themselves. And when you look at who HRC has on her side closing this election season down and you take a look at the absolute emptiness on the Trump side of the ledger….shouldn’t that be as clear a signal as possible?
And can we all agree to take some of dmsilev’s kickstarter funds and pay KellyAnn Conway to go away, forever.
Schlemazel
@Mike E:
That really should be Trumps middle name, not the ‘J’.
Donald Too Many Loud Noises Trump
Kathleen
@debbie: Thanks for providing the link in last evening’s thread. Every election my precinct information and voting location change. It’s almost as if they’re trying to confuse us.
Larkspur
@Joel:
If you ever want to write a longer story about this, I’d love to read it. Thx.
ThresherK
@Schlemazel: Nieman had a spell in the 70s or so, largely with sports subjects done in a wild pallette of colors.
That editorial cartoons is a useful site to which I’ll return; thanx. I value the good ones after reading a raft of others which are based on facts are things “everyone knows” that simply aren’t so.
Speaking of which, is the corpse of Mark Russell doing his biting BothSides comedy schtick this autumn?
Ivan X
I’m on a bus to PA to GOTV this AM. Campaign has it together.
Doug R
@Corner Stone: EMAILS?
Elizabelle
@Corner Stone: not into paying Kellyanne one cent. It’s all she’s about. Cash for performance.
Brachiator
I don’t get this. Knowing that something was nothing in retrospect and reacting in the moment are not the same thing. The Guardian story on this incident detailed two previous incidents, one in which a guy rushed the stage, and another in which a guy tried to grab a policeman’s gun and shoot Trump.
One thing that is interesting and disturbing is the degree to which Trump supporters are willing to act as a goon squad for him, even possibly putting themselves in harm’s way.
No one was shot. I’m not even reading that anyone pulled a gun.
That said, that Trump’s people are suggesting that this was a real attempt on his life is typical. Propaganda is their thing. It will only solidify the support of their base and help keep Trumpism alive even if he loses the election.
jeffreyw
Moar Prisma fun! Bitsy likes the ledge my belly makes.
OzarkHillbilly
@Corner Stone:
Agreed but I think it reassures voters: ‘All the “right” people are for her too.’ and that should help the GOTV.
Elizabelle
@Ivan X: enjoy! You will meet some great people at the doors. And then you look past them, into their living room, and CNN has some horse race caption up. On mute.
GrandJury
@Corner Stone: This will be another excuse for Trump to try save face.
“Johnson Nadered me”
The Ancient Randonneur
@Baud:
Thanks for the link. This lady nails it at the end of that LGM post:
ThresherK
Bob Scheiffer is totally sucking someone’s knob on CBS. Nice to see an old white guy totally gloss over claims of “The election is rigged” by a major party.
Hey, you useless flaming bag of shit, even Brian Williams had a moment of journalism this month. Give up TV and go onto the lecture circuit, where you can be ignored.
Elizabelle
@OzarkHillbilly: I think PBO and Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden can change some minds that are actually open to change.
OzarkHillbilly
THIS CHART: 800+ Polling Places Closed Since SCOTUS Gutted The Voting Rights Act
403 in TX alone. Don’t think TX is gonna flip anytime soon.
Iowa Old Lady
@Jim Parish: Seriously? Don’t steer me wrong on this because I trust you!
different-church-lady
Now let’s be fair: if that guy had held up a bucket of KFC insted of a sign Trump would have rushed at him just as fast as your hens rushed you.
debbie
@Kathleen:
Exactly! And why John Husted must always, ALWAYS be watched.
different-church-lady
@The Ancient Randonneur: I loved that. Whoever she is, she should have her own HBO special.
Thor Heyerdahl
@Iowa Old Lady: I’ll second Jim’s comment. That is the correct pronunciation. Like “aw” and not a nasal “eh” sound (wasn’t sure how to best explain this).
Macbethchick
@dmsilev: I’m in. PayPal okay?
The Ancient Randonneur
Great new feel good video from the Clinton campaign: The Story of US
The Lodger
@ThresherK: The Capitol Steps will be at the Schnitz in Portland on election night. That’s almost as bad.
Ivan X
@Elizabelle: Ha. Thanks. We were warned that the bigger obstacle might be football.
They gave us an Uber promo code for getting around the suburbs. I’m impressed!
PPCLI
@Peale: So True! Just like Romney totally would have won all 50 states if Hurricane Sandy hadn’t given Obama a chance to look presidential and to show that unlike his crony-appointing, incompetent predecessor, he had set up an organization that could cope with a disaster effectively.
It’s pretty clear that the decision in 1845 to make election day the first Tuesday in November was a plot by the Democrat party. RIGGED!
Villago Delenda Est
The entire Drumpf clan, less Ivana, Marla, Tiffany, and Barron, to include all surrogates (particularly Ghouliani) need to be removed from the public eye. If the Inuit will have them, I suggest all of them be exiled to a compound of igloos on the North Slope with a Faraday Cage built around it. Alternative: somewhere in the Amazon Basin in thatch huts with a Faraday Cage built around it.
dmsilev
@Corner Stone:
Oy! Start your own fundraiser! It’s a worthy cause, granted.
dr. luba
@Iowa Old Lady: Our hospital system was bought out a few years back by a southern based hospital system. Which means that we now use their contractors for things like phone answering systems and communication. The system mispronounces the name of our hospital by calling it “hoo-ron” (instead of Huron). I also have to call my colleague Dr. Waaang (instead of her pronunciation of Wong) to get the communications system to call her for me.
Those Chinese families that transliterated their names using British English get horribly mispronounced in the USA. Some go with the flow, others put in a lot of effort correcting people. I think they generally give up after a generation or two. Just like most Ukrainians and Poles I know……the immigrant experience!
Betty Cracker
@Brachiator: It’s totally understandable that they reacted with panic in the moment — that’s a sensible response if someone yells “GUN!” in a public place. What’s inexcusable is the post-incident spinning detailed at WaPo, in which Trump’s son and social media hack irresponsibly characterized it as an assassination attempt and retweeted “STOP DEMOCRAT VIOLENCE” slogans, etc. They’re still doing it this morning. Pathetic.
geg6
Hilz has two new closer ads. One is a 1-minute to run through to election. Positive and based on Katy Perry’s “Roar.” The other is a one-shot 2-minute ad for Monday night during CBS (“Kevin Can Wait”) and NBC (“The Voice”). Leaving all on the table.
I’m with her. ROAR!!!!
Davis X. Machina
Some day your grandchildren will ask you “Where were you when the smoke detector at the Reichstag went off?”
Davis X. Machina
@GrandJury:
This will only confuse graduate students of the future already trying to figure out whether it was Clinton’s Johnson, or Johnson’s Clinton, that drove the GOP over the edge in the first place.
ThresherK
@The Lodger: Whoopee! Four of them!
If I want to see four people do some creative and incisive singing about current events, I’ll go to Forbidden Broadway. Granted, it’s theater events, but it’s still light-years better than Capital Steps.
Hey, no right-winger has carved a backwards “H” into their face this election cycle! Maybe they’re getting smarter.
bemused
@WereBear:
It’s jawdropping how easily Trumpanzees believe whatever Trump says and make excuses for his wretched character. Evangelical Republicans give Trump a free pass for breaking 9 of the 10 commandments because SC Justices/abortion. They’d probably still give him a pass for thou shalt not kill if we learned that Trump paid for abortions of women he may have impregnated.
It kills me to read about those people who weren’t Trump fans until they spent 20 minutes talking to Trump or heard him speak and suddenly they became ardent supporters convinced that he will really do what he promises them he will do, deportation, economy, jobs, etc. Their conversions are based on nothing but Trump hot air and their own projection fantasies. They fill in the blanks all by their own selves.
WereBear
@Villago Delenda Est: They could be frozen in the Arctic.
At least until global warming thaws everyone out; the Blob, the giant flying mantis, and Trump.
Davis X. Machina
@ThresherK:
They’re working on the whole “How do you do a backwards “H” thing first…
Elizabelle
@Ivan X: football is actually useful. Means some are more likely to be home, and with friends and family you can remind. But no long winded spiels! There’s a game on.
OzarkHillbilly
@Betty Cracker: Projection Betty, always it’s projection and nobody is listening except them.
PPCLI
@Davis X. Machina: Or “Where were you when Hindenberg said “OK, Papen: You and the rest of the Catholic Centre Party conservatives will be able to completely control that blowhard Hitler if I make him Chancellor, right? OK, done deal.” ?
GrandJury
@bemused: It’s tribal. If you think about it that way it’s easier to understand. At least for me it is.
So even if the tribe leader is against may of the things they say they stand for, he’s still the tribe leader.
smintheus
It’s not true that Trump panicked over nothing. The man was brandishing a sign, and paper cuts can be a real b!tch.
Scamp Dog
@Iowa Old Lady: The standard Mandarin pronunciation of Wang does sound more like Wong than something that rhymes with clang. I think it’s more like a short “a” sound in English. Of course, I have no idea how knowledgeable LOD is on pronouncing Chinese names, so who knows.
Corner Stone
@bemused:
Thought I’d shorten it a little without removing any of the accuracy.
Anonymous At Work
Betty: 31-10 Hogs. Woo Pig Sooie
WaterGirl
@Corner Stone: You never know when you might need all those extra letters and words that you just saved!
Jeffro
@Baud: “interesting” = pretty damn hilarious! Thanks Baud!
GrandJury
@geg6: Links?
The Golux
@NotMax:
I’ve always been partial to this one.
Ties right into the “I’ve got a lovely little basket of deplorables” thing.
The first verse is Trumplethinskin’s campaign in a nutshell.
The Lodger
@ThresherK: Don’t be misunderestimatin’ those right wingers now.
Jeffro
@Corner Stone: 3%
Not that I want it to be that high but hey at least it’s not higher. You’d think, considering everything we know about Johnson, he would actually be super-high by now…
Jeffro
@Davis X. Machina: LOLing here
hovercraft
@ThresherK:
He has, the networks have been dragging their dinosaurs back to offer us their sage advice.
Lizzy L
At the campaign rally in Reno yesterday, Trump complained about a polling station Nevada being kept open late so that (early) voters could actually, you know, vote.
Tuesday (and Mme. President!) can’t come soon enough. I signed up to make calls for the campaign on Monday, and I will do it, but I am really done with this election.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
It would he awesome if the supposedly sane conservatives in the media and politics would address this “event”…
Hey, Frum, Will, McCain, Ryan, you wanna take a moment to call out your conservative spoiled-diaper cohorts and alert them that HRC did not order a hit and that the “gunman” was a Republican with a sign?
Won’t matter… 27% of white America already believes the lie. My ex aunt-in-law is a prime example. 78 and certain Obama is a Kenyan-born Muslim/atheist homosexual drug addict.
bemused
@GrandJury:
The tribe be way more crazy-ass than Betty Cracker’s hens.
Villago Delenda Est
@WereBear: The idea is to have the igloos melt around them through non-existent and/or Chinese conspiracy global warming. If they happen to freeze on one of the more old fashioned seasonal days, so much the better.
GrandJury
@GrandJury:
I guess this is the 1 minute Clinton closer ad someone else mentioned.
Roar
different-church-lady
@bemused:
Fixed
Kay
Stories like this are oddly…missing with Donald Trump:
hovercraft
@amk:
Adam reported that he’ll have Ted Nugent with him tomorrow, so he you liberals are wrong. He does so too have the huggest celebrities supporting him and willing to go to the mattresses with him. I bet good old Ted will use only the best words and he won’t use foul language unlike that nasty Jay-z.
JPL
@GrandJury: Donald also bought air time, but he’s running the anti-semeiic ad.
Joe Scarborough thought it was a great ad because it appeals to populism. link
debbie
@hovercraft:
No, not Ted. He’ll just stick to the anti-Semitic stuff.
different-church-lady
@hovercraft: but will he use weapons?
The Lodger
Just out of curiosity, can anyone think of a bad political idea from any time in the last 200 years that some Republican hasn’t run with this year?
I’m thinking of the Fugitive Slave Act, but I might have missed something.
Betty Cracker
@Anonymous At Work: I grudgingly acknowledged the superiority of the Hawgs in response to your comment in the appropriate thread last night. It smacks of bad manners to bring it up in this one.
Villago Delenda Est
@Baud: Donald Drumpf: The white supremacist’s idea of the Aryan Superman.
Kay
I remember the Kasich poll. I believe I attacked Nate Silver right about that time in the 2010 election :)
WaterGirl
@Kay: There seems to be something in my eye. Both eyes, in fact. Wonder what the odds are of that?
bemused
@different-church-lady:
Ha, true. They might have some qualms about Trump abortions but not killing women, at least as long as they aren’t pregnant. After they deliver the baby, no prob.
Villago Delenda Est
@hovercraft: Wang, dang sweet poontang.
Corner Stone
Pretty good interview with Michael Moore on AMJoy. He didn’t go Full Michael Moore at any time.
Never go Full Michael Moore.
WaterGirl
@Kay: From your link:
This guy is a good writer.
smintheus
@The Lodger: Invading Canada. Nobody has trotted that one out this year.
Villago Delenda Est
@JPL: Donald Drumpf’s shitty branded merchandise is made in Mexico and China, yet the offal that supports him doesn’t give a rats ass that he is lying directly in their faces.
hovercraft
Steve Schale’s 2nd to last Florida Update
Head on over for more detailed analysis. Steveschale.com
amk
@Kay: so, what is their prediction this time?
GrandJury
How in the hell did the bankrupt Trump Hotel in Toronto story get almost no traction???
This is a candidate that is running on his ‘success’ as a businessman?
I don’t usually believe in conspiracies but this is really strange to me.
That’s just one of many stories that mysteriously never went anywhere. All were 10x more substantial and relevant compared to never ending chatter about friggin emails.
debbie
@Kay:
That is a great post!
Peale
@amk: Clinton n by 1%.
Latino J
We definitely need to wait until after Tuesday, but there might need to be some serious soul searching by all these poll aggregators and prognosticators about using partisan linked polls. Even if they are transparent an are somewhat within the margin of error, too many of these pollsters seem to exist solely for the purpose of showing a tight race.
That doesn’t mean you get rid of all polls with partisan links. But to use FL as an example again – of the top 10 polls, 6 have Clinton winning. 1 is a tie. And 3 have Trump winning by 4. But 2 of those 3 polls with Trump,winning are Remington and Trafalgar – both (R) Republican pollsters. There are no (D) pollsters in the ten.
I get using all polls in order to not bias your numbers. But it is no secret that certain public polls exist solely to create opinion instead of reflect it. Whatever, Tuesday night can’t get here fast enough.
Kay
Installment 12,391 in “pundits are terrible judges of character”
Political media-pundits- consistently admire bad people. They have to examine why they love bullies so much- why that job seems to self-select for people who admire fake tough guys. It’s a real problem! They make bad choices over and over and over. Who raises these people that all their heroes can be described with words like “swagger”?
hovercraft
@Villago Delenda Est:
I was wondering if he would remind us that he still considers Hillary a C**T.
amk
@GrandJury: Media was a total fail on everything from his tax returns to obnoxious rhetoric to even more obnoxious intent to zero policy enunciation.
GrandJury
@Peale: Is that a snapshot if the election were held today or a 3 days into the future prediction?
The downtrend stopped a couple days ago and there are still a couple days for things to edge up a bit.
I guess early voting muddies that a bit.
Kay
@amk:
They have Clinton up 1. 1 is too close. 1 is within “screeching about voter fraud” distance. I feel sorry for election officials if it’s + 1 Clinton.
amk
@Peale: Thanks. I hope it comes through.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
Asking ordinary voters about Clinton’s email scandal. Well played, media, well played.
Corner Stone
Well, that had the potential to be a really good segment re: demographics on AMJoy but for some fucking reason they included Omarosa as well as the two experts on the actual subject matter.
Talk about nonsense and fantasyland. Sheesh.
GrandJury
@amk: The other stange thing is how pu$$ygate mysteriously just stopped. Like someone turned off a faucet even though women were still coming forward.
Yet somehow, the email thing just droned on and on. You cannot tell me that never ending email stories, mostly just the same story over and over, are a more clickable story than pu$$ygate.
It’s really strange.
amk
@Kay: Nope. I hope it IS 1% and the racist pos of the ‘base’ go bonkers.
Corner Stone
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: I asked my “mixed message medium info voter” ex about the recent update on emails and she had no idea what I was talking about. It’s all a big swirl the media just relentlessly keeps stirring the pot with in order to gin up interest and clicks.
Anya
@Kay: I can’t believe how terrible Strickland is at this. How did he win the nomination? Democrats need to work on building a viable bench of candidates at all levels. I wish POTUS would establish some sort of leadership group where he supports fostering local & national leadership. We’re not competitive in many places and we ceded so many seats. We basically gave up the south and we’re barely competitive in so many state houses. Those local folks become national candidates so we better start some investment in these local elections.
Fair Economist
@Kay:
Strickland wasn’t horrible, he was overwhelmed by dark money. Dark money has put $450 million into Congressional races this year, and the majority (literally) is Republican money into competitive Senate races. Don’t rag on any of the Dem Senate candidates; they’re doing their best in the face of a very destructive flood.
drylake
Just a short linguistic note here: O’Donnell was correct: it is pronounced “wong,” so all the jokes are somewhat misplaced. Having taught in SoCal for 20+ years I had innumerable students surnamed “Wang” and, fewer but still a good number, “Fang.” They were used to all the teasing and bad puns, having grown up with them, but still found it all incredibly annoying. They didn’t invent the spelling, it was two British 19th century gents named Wade and Giles. After all, I don’t recall all that many jokes about Weiner’s name until he himself, shall we say, brought them to the point.
Doug R
@GrandJury: Well, to spread a story properly you gotta have a link. Here’s the Seattle PI’s story on the Trump tower in Toronto going into receivership.
hovercraft
@Corner Stone:
I want to just cold cock her, she’s just like all the other Trump surrogates she just tries to fillibuster and talk over everyone else.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Kay:
Yeah, I can’t get too excited about a 1% lead. I thought polls suggested a more robust lead for Hilz.
debbie
@Fair Economist:
It is about more than money. Strickland is a very weak candidate. He got the nomination because it was his “turn.” The establishment wanted the establishment candidate, and they annointed him as such and actively suppressed his challenger. PJ Settenfeld would have stood a better chance, but Strickland’s refusal to even debate him in the primary, in my opinion, sealed his fate. I’ll vote for him, but only because I hate Portman more.
GrandJury
@Doug R: No, to spread a story you gotta have links from NYT, LATimes, WaPo, CNN etc.. Not from their “opinion” sections either. And to be clear it’s not YOUR links that are spreading those stores. It’s their links and hundreds of thousands of people like you linking to them.
I hope you are not under some illusion that Ball Juice is a major website getting hundreds of thousands or tens of thousands or even thousands of unique visits a day.
Corner Stone
@Fair Economist:
The dark money angle may be true. But look at all the other legit Senate races we’re talking about – NH, FL, NC, IN, WI, NV and it looks good for IL – and they are all competitive or somewhere in low single digits. Strickland is getting his doors blown off. That leads to the contemplation that he has ugly forces arrayed against him *and* he is a dog as a candidate.
Forgot PA.
geg6
@GrandJury:
Damn phone won’t let me, but TPM has the short one on the edoitor’s blog post about latest polls.
Another Scott
@Baud: Thanks for the pointer. I shortened the URL – goo.gl/OmIMxU
– and passed it on to a friend who lives in Dayton. He’s an ABC, but maybe he’ll get a kick out of it anyway.
Cheers,
Scott.
NoraLenderbee
@WaterGirl: Yes, thank you, Kay, for your commentary! (as well as your work)
ThresherK
@drylake: According to the wiki, these can be all the same name translated to the Roman alphabet: Huáng, Hwang, Huong, Houang, Hoang, Wong, Waan (and more).
So, it’s random translations from exactly two Brits? Wow. I mean, I’m old enough to remember when the city was called Peking, and now that’s only the duck.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: That’s depressing and infuriating, even if I’m not really surprised by anything any of them said. Mostly less sophisticated, if equally thoughtful, versions of the NYT’s infamous justification for Ken Starr– with this much smoke, there must be a fire somewhere.
Corner Stone
@hovercraft: Just the stupid shit she was saying. Man alive, Trump is not going to draw in massive AA or Hispanic votes. If trends hold HRC may claim up to 80% of the Hispanic vote before this is over, with a massive record setting raw vote total as well.
Peale
@hovercraft: cable news reform…how do we do it? I’m sure there are plenty of photogenic conservative “demographic” experts to have on a morning show. But since they feel the need to make every discussion on these shows a shouting match, does it really matter who they invite on? Someone who is well known and preps for the topic by reading world net daily…someone whose job it is to analyise these things…all the same.
Doug R
@Kay: I think pundits loving jerks with swagger is really narcissism. The world of punditry doesn’t involve much skill except for sounding confident. They’re just recognizing fellow cons is all.
hovercraft
@Fair Economist:
It’s funny how everyone in the media and all of our activists forget about the Koch Brothers. Remember when we all made a big deal about their secret conferences that raised 900 million dollars. They did not play in the GOP primary, and when Trump won they said they weren’t going to play in the general. Where do you think that money went? When democrats were crowing about Evan Bayh having 9 million in his war chest, that was nothing. Each month as we’ve crowed about candidates beating their candidates in fundraising, we were being lulled into a false sense of security. The numbers we are going to see after this is all said and done will be staggering. While it’s true that money at the presidential level is not as important as it used to be, especially when the candidates are household names, down ballot it can make a huge difference.
hovercraft
@Corner Stone:
Nooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!
Mrs Andrea Mitchell Greenspan.
I guess I’ll have to watch Jake Tapper, I hate him too though. What to do?
Doug R
@GrandJury: Hey,I hear this is a top 10,000 blog.
I saw links from the CBC, Bloomberg, Politico and the Toronto Star.
gogol's wife
@WaterGirl:
I think it’s Adam Pally, whoever that is.
Betty Cracker
@West of the Rockies (been a while): A one-point lead is excellent news in Ohio. Clinton has been trailing there.
gogol's wife
@Lois Radford:
C U Next Tuesday!
GrandJury
@Doug R: Are there 2 or 3 stories a day on their front pages about it, like with the never ending email story they just keep reposting day after day?
This conversation is stupid. I don’t even know what point you think you are making. One story is being pushed, the other isn’t. The end.
Libby's Person
Hillary is holding a midnight rally in Raleigh NC tomorrow night – I guess she thinks NC could go Blue after all! I’d LOVE to go, but I’ll be doing Voter Protection for Democracy NC at a polling place on Tuesday and my first shift starts at 6:30 am. Bleh. I hate getting up early, but I’ll feel like I’m doing something useful. I don’t expect real problems at the polling place I’ll be at, but it is in a more conservative area than where I live, so it will be good to keep an eye on things. I did GOTV activities during early voting; I decided that voter protection might be more important on Election Day.
gogol's wife
@Iowa Old Lady:
That’s how he pronounces it.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Prediction: McCain, Grassley and Portman, and any other Rs just elected or likely retirees, vote to confirm. Upcoming class of ’18 all vote against
different-church-lady
@GrandJury: Oh, hi shomi.
Amir Khalid
@drylake:
I remember reading a German newspaper story (in the Süddeutsche Zeitung, as I recall) which had to explain the pronunciation of his name to its readers. First of all, the English “w” consonant sound isn’t found in German — they call that letter “veh” and pronounce it in words as English speakers do the letter V. Second, the diphthong “ei” always rhymes with the English “eye”. So a German-speaker might see the name as “Weiner” (one who sighs/whines). It seems to me that the American English slang term “wiener/weener” for “penis”, which to my knowledge is used nowhere else, derives from “Wiener” (i.e. Viennese) as in sausage.
I just saw a discussion forum in which a commenter suggests Anthony’s ancestors immigrated to America with the name “Wiener” (“Viennese”) which then got typoed/misspelled/mispronounced until it acquired its current pronunciation and spelling.
Corner Stone
God damn. Andrea Mitchell has mentioned the “FBI letter” 4 times in the last two minutes.
Fuck me.
WaterGirl
@gogol’s wife: Hmm. Only the skinny (and scruffy!) photos of Adam Pally seem to look like the guy in the video, but maybe that is him. Whoever the hell Adam Pally is. (off to google some more) Thank you!
The guy in the video is cute and charming and willing to be silly. That’s a winning combination for me! So I confess to having kind of a mini, instant crush on the guy. “It’s really fucking important!”
Peking Man
@ThresherK: You forgot Peking Man (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peking_Man)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Corner Stone: is she doing it with a ‘balanced’ panel? For the love of god, one person ask her exactly what in that letter is so interesting.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
It also shows that they don’t get they are running for president and not doing a reality TV show. George Washington had many guns aimed at him, shrugged it off and got the job done. That’s part of the job.
hueyplong
My plan had been to watch Fox News for the Schadenfreude, but I’m beginning to wonder whether a better dose would come from watching Andrea Mitchell have to swallow the result on MSNBC.
tobie
Just saw on TPM that the 6th Circuit Court overturned the temporary restraining order against Roger Stone’s and Trump’s vote monitoring / voter intimidation efforts in Ohio. This just sucks. I gather the 5th and 6th Circuits are the two most conservative in the nation. Let’s hope Clinton can change that soon.
Corner Stone
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It was a segment with Sen Shaheen and Andrea was using it to push it as the reason polls were tightening and why HRC wouldn’t win the Senate. And then what would she do?
hovercraft
@Corner Stone:
It’ll be on her tombstone. Hillary is up, she’s going to win but Andrea wants to ask why she is not trusted, why the word cloud is so negative. Shaheen should have just said, it’s because idiots like you never have anything positive to say about her. Even when she has to report something positive about her you can’t resist sticking a shiv in at the end of the sentence.
Latino J
I keep getting a database error went I try to get on Sam Wang’s website.
Russian ?? Hackers working with Nate Silver and the Trumpistas.
lollipopguild
@dmsilev: Do I get to pick the journalists?
HinTN
@guachi: That’s exactly how the gerrymandering was done. Create lots of barely R leaning districts and cram huge surpluses of Ds into those D districts you must have. If Ds would all vote they could flip those marginal districts over half the time.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Did MSNBC Chief Optics Correspondent Andrea Mitchell about the Optics of campaigning with Ted Nugent?
Kay
@tobie:
I wouldn’t worry about it. A real grass roots voter effort takes a lot of organization. Months. They have to put actual people at polling stations in 88 counties.
They can’t just wander in and start harassing voters, either. There are poll workers and there’s a lead poll worker and half of those poll workers are Democrats who either live in the precinct or the county.
Election observers have to “enter” in Ohio- they file a doc with a court of common pleas or a county bd of elections. If they’re disruptive they can be held accountable. Polling places are like courthouses- the place itself seems to tamp down loonies- like civic religion :)
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Betty Cracker:
Good heavens, can I claim to not have been fully awake? I thought the blurb was about Florida.
Frankensteinbeck
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Teddy Roosevelt was shot on the way to a speech, and delivered the speech before seeking medical attention!
Kay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I must say her national security experience has been very valuable during this long fake email scandal and the long fake Benghazi scandal prior to that.
Maybe she wisely switched to the optics beat. Anyone can do that.
hovercraft
How deep does the blue wave go?
Jon Ralston 5:04 a.m. PST November 6, 2016
He also has us picking up two congressional seats. If he’s right woo hoo.
Kay
@tobie:
If you really want to suppress AA voters the thing to do is change state law to make it harder to vote or get an early start and “cage” or challenge registrations. It’s hard work. Takes planning and organization and lawmaker buy-in.
FlipYrWhig
@Doug R: Pundits by and large think politics is a cynical game, and they admire the politicians who refuse to try to please people. They also think being earnest and serious is wicked uncool.
hovercraft
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Right now she’s too busy trading disparaging remarks with Sarah I Flores about Clinton, it took Flores to explain to her the reason they are focusing on PA and NH in the final stretch is that they do not have early voting so you have to push the GOTV at the last minute. It’s almost as if Greenspan has never covered an election before.
Corner Stone
@Kay:
If you want a masterclass in suppressing the AA vote then study up on NC. If you need to know how to depress Hispanic/Latino voters then sign up for TX’s expert level instruction.
Latino J
@Kay:
I also think that’s one of the reasons why actual voter fraud is so rare.
Pretty much every poll worker I’ve ever met in the places I’ve voted (rural South Georgia, Tallahassee, Tampa, and Savannah) is an older person who is performing a civic duty. I might be naive (though I don’t think so), but these are people who take the process seriously. They seem happy to see you vote and intolerant of any shenanigans.
But maybe I’ve just been fortunate.
Kay
@FlipYrWhig:
Like it was hard to figure out Chris Christie is an asshole bully. He’s not even a competent governor. His whole budget relies on bullshit. This is a person who proudly put up video of himself screaming at teachers. Why do they admire these people? They’re bad people.
Betty Cracker
@Frankensteinbeck: TR would likely say of Trump: “I could carve a better man out of a banana.”
bemused senior
I was surprised to read my Facebook feed yesterday and discover that the guy with the poster in Reno was the brother in law of a Facebook friend. He was beaten by Trump’s supporters before being hustled out by the Secret Service, who released him after seeing that he didn’t have a gun.
jenn
@Brachiator: I’m confused by your comment. There was no gun. There was a protester with a sign who got assaulted by Trump fans. All of these facts have been out almost immediately – that hasn’t stopped the Trump campaign from continuing to claim “assassination.” In the middle of the incident, not knowing what’s going on and spouting off anyway is bad. Continuing to spout off that crap even after the incident has turned out to be 100% otherwise is unacceptable.
Kay
@Latino J:
No, you’re generally right because it’s not a good job. It’s a really long day and it pays next to nothing. The process itself tends to weed out rabid partisans too because it’s so rule-bound and nitpicky.
I’ve been involved in for about a decade and if I could change one thing I’d break up the shift. I’d put fresh people in after 6 hours because the last hour is the hardest (reconciling your books, essentially) and by then a lot of them have been there 10, 11, 12 hours. The most difficult part is when they’re the most tired. More people might do it too if the shifts were shorter. It can be something simple- they skipped a line and that’s why the ballot count and book don’t match but they’re tired so they can’t find the error.
hovercraft
@bemused senior:
YOU LIE !!
I read that he was a ninja assassin sent by Hitlery to kill America’s future.
The media want Hitlery to win so they are suppressing the news to help her win.
Doug R
@srv: Secession is a bad idea, but I see nothing wrong with California getting more senators, even just doubling up.
tobie
@Kay: Thanks, Kay. I know you’re in the know about all of this and I’m glad you and Bella are based in Ohio and working to protect the vote.
Sab
@Iowa Old Lady: I have some Chinese in-laws and they say Wong, Wang and Huang are all the same name in Chinese.
different-church-lady
@Corner Stone: Be kind to her — she has to look at Alan Greenspan every morning.
retiredeng
Ah, chickens.
I recently visited my 93 year old aunt in rural NH. She’s still going strong with failing eyesight. But the odd part of my visit is that she has about 10 chickens wandering around her house.
The story goes like this. A year ago her great granddaughter (living next door) hatched a dozen or so eggs for 4-H or a science project and then left with her mom due to a marriage gone bad. The punch line is that my aunt was thinking about bringing the chickens inside for the winter and (I’m not really sure if she was serious) talking about putting diapers on them.
hovercraft
@Kay:
Chris Christie was yelling at teachers, his budget gimmick was to fuck with the public pensions. The media is all in with the “school reformers” and they like the privatization of public pensions. He had the right enemies and was doing it in a blue state, so he was a hero. His pal across the river is also popular with the media, but he’s not popular with his base, so he doesn’t get the fawning press that Christie used to.
FlipYrWhig
@Kay: They admire that he doesn’t do what they think of as the usual politician thing: trying to please everyone as much as possible. The script is to be nice; that’s the meaning of the word “politic.” They always fall for that ploy. The same thought process is why they like Democrats who want to cut “entitlements”: it shows a willingness to be upsetting.
James E Powell
@Scamp Dog:
I thought the “an” in Wang was more like the “an”in “want” than the “on” in “long”
different-church-lady
@Betty Cracker: In this case, he wouldn’t really need to carve it — he could just kind of mush it together with his bare hands.
hovercraft
@different-church-lady:
No, she chose to marry him and stay married to him. She is financially independent, and has no kids, so he is her choice. She made her bed so she can just sleep in it with her Crypt Keeper.
Omnes Omnibus
@Kay: My experience in WI has generally been that the poll workers take their jobs seriously and that they would be genuinely outraged if someone tried any antics at their polling place. They get virtually no pay and table full of snacks that they probable made themselves. They are there because they believe in what they are doing – even the ones in poor, rural townships that I know are voting Trump.
Kay
@tobie:
That’s what so bewildered me when the voter fraud thing started (around 2000 is when they really geared up) because that is SO not the attitude and atmosphere in the sort of “poll worker community”. It’s like “hi, what’s your name please?” It’s not “are you IMPERSONATING SOMEONE ELSE?” I mean, Jesus. What the hell is that? Where did this hostility and suspicion come from?
James E Powell
@Kay:
People who apply their brains and their organizing skills to solve problems are boring.
People like Christie provide good stories and spicy quotes that draw viewers and readers.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
Ten minutes in, and the Browns starting center has been ejected.
Iowa Old Lady
An older lady at the gym is taking the training to be a poll worker. She was talking about it this week, and said that there were so many safeguards that she couldn’t see how people would cheat. The wingnut in the class was surprised to hear this, and startled to learn that there were official poll watchers from both parties.
Kathleen
@debbie: I regret not voting for PG, but I don’t think it would have made a difference. At the time I thought Ted was the better candidate because of name recognition in the state. Portman – GAAAACK.
Somewhat OT, on my local R&B station who targets GenX and Baby Boomer African Americans, Rethuglicans have been running lots of ads. Some PAC not associated with Trump campaign has run tons of ads, during which Ben Carson’s name is invoked. Rob Portman started running ads and was endorsed by a long time African American activist/pastor/community leader Damon Lynch. Now Congressman Combover (Steve Chabot, Ohio 1st) is running ads. I find that interesting, especially considering how they don’t want African Americans to vote period. Have you seen that up in Columbus?
hovercraft
Chris Wallace To Pence: ‘You Think All Those Hispanics Are Coming Out To Vote Trump And Not Clinton? Really?’
By John Amato
Gov. Mike Pence almost made Fox News Sunday’s Chris Wallace burst out in laughter this morning when he claimed Trump’s Hispanic rallygoers in Miami signaled a big voting turnout for Trump from the Latino community.
Kellyanne Conway Suggests Trump Protester Deserved Beating Because He Was ‘Probably A Plant’
By David
Conway Attacks CNN When Asked About ‘Assassination Attempt’ Claims
Kay
This is a good piece:
I heard a group of them interviewed on the radio- the BBC- last week and they were great.
Kathleen
@hovercraft: Why should a cable star have to sully her beautiful, well connected self by learning details of a process when she can just spout scripted cliches?
Doug R
I had no trouble finding Wang.
He has an article on Nevada that seems to agree with Ralston.
Jeffery
Ha! I guess the secret service took Trump’s advice to grab that p–sy.
WaterGirl
@Omnes Omnibus: What are these snacks that you guys talk about at polling places. I have never seen snacks here. Ever. Not since I started voting in 1972.
bemused senior
@WaterGirl: we don’t find snacks at our polling place, but our Post office puts them out on April 15.
Omnes Omnibus
@WaterGirl: There is often an area that is for poll workers only. The snacks would be there. Usually homemade cookies and the like.
WaterGirl
@Omnes Omnibus: Hmm. I was a poll worker in 2008 and I thought I would spontaneously combust from rage at the shenanigans of the Republican County Clerk who kept people from doing the register/vote thing during the allowed period for that in Illinois. And now i find out that there were supposed to be snacks and there weren’t any? Grrr.
D58826
@tobie: Decision issued by a Bush 41 and Bush 43 appointee. Apparently they issued the stay even before the defendants had filed the papers for an appeal. I guess that just wanted to add their thumbs to the Comey scale.
debbie
@Kathleen:
No, but to not even give him a chance to debate, I thought, was very old school (in a bad, corrupt way).
I’m not aware of any overwhelming AA support for Portman in Columbus. What I do hear is how he’s going to save the unions by getting rid of the treaties (which he negotiated) and protecting their pensions (which he wants to privatize). If it weren’t so sad, I’d be laughing. These guys are so desperate, they’ll believe anything. Just like those little guys believing there was no risk to buying a home well beyond their means.
My memory’s lousy. What part of Ohio are you from?
Anya
I cringe every time I see someone referring to Andre Mitchell as Mrs Greenspan. Do we do that with male guys married to politicians or odious characters. She’s horrible all by herself no need to surrender our values.
Doug R
@WaterGirl: You could always bring some. Here’s a cookie recipe I found online.
Jeffro
@hovercraft: amen and it is not just the Kochs – the Mercers are heavily involved in this as well
Haroldo
@WaterGirl: There are Wisconsinites and then there are FIBs.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Iowa Old Lady:
In a reply to a comment on his blog, Wang said that O’Donnell got it right.
As with a lot of surnames, Wong/Wang/Huang depends on the individual: which written Chinese character is being romanized and which spoken dialect (Mandarin, Cantonese or other) the person comes from. Interesting blog post on the subject here.
Ceci n'est pas mon nym
@GrandJury:
I think you got some semantic leakage from a previous persona there. You might want to have that looked at.
Latino J
@Jeffery:
That joke wins the 13-18 year old boy demographic to which my sense of humor still belongs more than 25 years later.
Buttermilk Sky
@Schlemazel may have been joking, but syphilis explains everything about Trump — complete lack of self-control, truncated attention span, grandiosity, hallucinations (or lies if you like). And why does he need a neurosurgeon on his staff? Does Carson drill holes in his skull to drain the fluid? Is that why he has to wear that stupid cap sometimes? Hey, CNN, voters have a right to know.
hovercraft
TRUMP’S REHABILITATION: PREPARING THE GROUND
Steve M
Your Liberal Media is already preparing to tell us all that it was all just an act, you can come back now, it’s okay now to like him again.
Another Scott
@GrandJury: Nice. Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
debbie
@hovercraft:
Cheeky brio, my ass. Trump has been an insufferable pig since he came of age.
Cermet
Well, the voting will begin very soon and the results will be what they are; that said, looks like Hillary wins easy but the race ends up close (both possible because her floor exceeds Rump’s ceiling – result, conclusive.) However, does the house certify the election if it ends up close – say, 270 – 275 Hillary?) If not, there are NO constitutional remedies and frankly, such an event has NEVER occurred. The inferior court has no jurisdiction nor does the executive branch; ditto even for the Senate! This isn’t a subject that I am aware that has ever been considered. No matter, unlikely to occur but if the dems don’t take the Senate, kiss all work by Hillary good-bye.
Omnes Omnibus
@hovercraft:
Too fucking late. No do overs.
Omnes Omnibus
@WaterGirl: Not every polling place place I visited had snacks. It was usually the rural places fwiw.
Anoniminous
@Cermet:
Clinton will win more than 272 Electoral Votes.
The Senate will probably flip.
I still haven’t given up hope for the House. There’s an awful lot of GOP held seats that could flip in a 2008 style voter turnout.
GregB
@hovercraft:
Lulz. They aren’t going to be able to stuff that bloated swastika wearing genie back in the bottle.
I do hope the idiots in Camp Trump are aware that their world ad they knew it will be forever changed in a bad way.
Shell
In Annie Hall, Woody Allen mocks one of her ex’s disclosure of how he’d like to die, “Torn apart by wild animals.” “Ooh”, Allen says, “eaten by squirrels.”
How about pecked to death by rabid chickens?
Shell
Aaaaaaaah, The “T” word is one I can do without hearing for a looooong time.
Just really, really hoping it IS over and done with by Tuesday night. Then we can either pop the champagne or take our suicide pills.
hovercraft
Listening to Newt lie to Chuck Todd, when asked if Trump may have lost the election on the day he announced by calling Mexicans racists, he turns it to Clinton’s corruption and lies and says she is guilty of multiple felonies and how lawless the Clintons are and that Trump is bringing in lots of new voters.
Mnemosyne
@hovercraft:
They’re going to try, but it turns out that non-whites (plus a lot of whites) don’t find Cheeky Racist Grandpa as charming as media elites do.
Betty Cracker
@Omnes Omnibus: Yep. I don’t think a rebranding campaign can mitigate the damage from running as a racist, sexist, xenophobic demagogue, even with a media assist. Here’s hoping it bankrupts Trump and pauperizes his foul offspring.
hovercraft
@debbie: @Omnes Omnibus: @GregB:
You liberals should stop being sore winners, you won, accept this and be gracious about it. What’s that you ask about endless investigations and gridlock?
You need to understand that by winning you showed you weren’t listening to the needs of the Trump voter, they want their country back, they are disappointed and bitter, and since you didn’t let them win this is the price you must pay.
If they win, they won so shut up. If we win, they are hurt, so shut up.
STFU libtards, period.
WaterGirl
@Haroldo: I’m afraid I don’t know the acronym.
WaterGirl
@Ceci n’est pas mon nym: Pretty sure he IS that previous persona.
hovercraft
@Mnemosyne:
Tom Brokaw says it’s because the country is fractured, we the AA’s, we the Hispanics, we the women. Basically saying identity politics are the problem.
Cermet
@Anoniminous: The house is way out of reach and the Senate is very close and may not fall dems way. Again, a small electoral win by Hillary could lead to a house not certifying the election results causing a major constitutional crises … especially if they don’t certify a critical democratic small state – that is my fear; considering just how extreme the house nuts have become, this possibility can occur. There is no procedures in the constitution to remedy such an event – considering the thugs goal of undermining all democrats, such an act would be very believable.
Latino J
@hovercraft:
The problem for Trump and his MSM enablers is that buying doesn’t work that way. Purposeful boycotts without true emotional ties are hard to maintain (hello BP). But it is hard as all get down to change an ingrained emotional belief about a brand. The name “Trump” is just simply shot with “certain groups.”
And from what we’ve been told, Trump’s real income in the new millennium has come from slapping his name on things other people own or control (The Apprentice being a prime example). That brand is now really only worth anything in the digital Alt-Right information world at this point. And really, if he loses bigly, I’m not sure that those folks won’t turn on him in due time. “You know, Trump was buddy/buddy with the Clintons and was never really a conservative….'”
Haroldo
@Haroldo: ETA: Dear Ms WaterGirl, I certainly did not mean to include you in that wretched hive of scam and villainy. As Mr. Omnibus indicated, rural Wisconsinites (but certainly not those, generally speaking, from the Fox River Valley and sub- and ex- burb Milwaukee, and, er, Adams County) are the bees knees.
Haroldo
@WaterGirl: @WaterGirl: Dear Ms. WaterGirl, Please see Comment #256 before reading further……. It’s a time honored one from my youth: Fucking Illinois Bastards.
Omnes Omnibus
@WaterGirl: FIB = Fucking Illinois Bastards. Oddly, the Chicago style hotdog, polish sausage, and Italian beef sandwich food cart in Madison is called FIB’s
Mnemosyne
@hovercraft:
Don’t you love how the country is “fractured” when every other group unites and turns to racist old white people to say, Hey, pipe down, assholes?
Mnemosyne
@Haroldo:
The only persistent Trumpers on my Facebook feed are my cousins who live in Waukesha County.
I rest my case, cheesehead. ;-)
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: He already carved them out. Waukesha County is suburban/exurban Milwaukee.
different-church-lady
@Cermet: are you looking to be talked off that ledge, or are you inviting us to join you on it?
Peale
@hovercraft: well then…maybe the GOP should try doing things to appeal to those groups.
hovercraft
Charlie Cook’s senate prediction:
Dems: Il, WI, PA, NV, NH
GOP: FL, IN
Too close to call: MO and NC
So he has us taking it back. Fingers crossed.
WaterGirl
@hovercraft: I think there should be a news show called Just Answer the Question. You are allowed to spin in your answer, of course, but if you try to completely shift to something else then the buzzer sounds and then someone says “Just Answer the Question”.
In return, the host would agree to only ask questions of substance, none of these “why doesn’t anyone like you?” questions. I think that would be awesome and I would watch that show. Question 1: who could host and stick to the rules? Question 2: would anyone be willing to go on that show?
gogol's wife
@different-church-lady:
lol
WaterGirl
@Haroldo: Ah, well it turns out that I am one of those Fucking Illinois Bastards. Who knew? I’m sure I’ve been called worse.
Peale
@hovercraft: I really wish Florida would bite Rubio. But then I look forward to watching him get kicked again in 2020.
WaterGirl
@Omnes Omnibus: Cool. The real question is: Is the italian beef any good? And is it served with giardiniera?
Omnes Omnibus
@WaterGirl: Yes to both. Hot or mild. I’ve never tried the mild.
Anonymous At Work
@Betty Cracker: My apologies, I hadn’t seen the earlier one. Florida’s defense is usually stout but injuries the Gator Offense being almost entirely absent prevents a strong defense from staying strong.
hovercraft
@Peale:
You are missing the point dammit! Integration and assimilation mean recognizing that what is best for maintaining the white patriarchy is what’s best for America, once you start down the road of taking any other groups wants and needs into consideration you start down the slippery slope of fragmentation.
PPCLI
@hovercraft: And they think that it makes it better to say “He didn’t really mean that Mexicans are all rapists, and that Kahn’s mother didn’t say anything because Islam forbids her to. He has the highest respect for the handicapped, he was just mocking the reporter because his fans love that stuff. etc.”
If anything, it makes it worse if he didn’t really believe those things, but said them in order to get cheap cheers and to get elected.
Haroldo
@WaterGirl: Tho’ you weren’t (at least in this instance).
Omnes Omnibus
@Haroldo: Where are/were you in the state?
hovercraft
@WaterGirl:
That would require an entirely different media, the people we have now, will never ever do this, Substance bores them.
At the end of MTP the Savannah Guthrie pointed out that Trump was given the Comey gift, he stayed on message and the polls tightened, imagine what could have been if he’d been like that the entire campaign. Tweety lamented that Trump is Trump because he had the message, and democrats must not ignore that half the country agreed, and maybe more with a different messenger. Hillary is old and boring, they wish Trump would have kept his mouth shut, so they could have fluffed him into office and given them someone exciting to cover for the next 4 years. They don’t cars about policy, they want to be entertained.
Ruckus
@Latino J:
I’ve been voting for over 45 yrs and I’ve voted in 2 states, CA and OH, and in CA both northern and southern. In southern CA I’ve lived and voted in 4 completely different areas. Every single time the people running the polls have been very pleasant, and also as serious as a heart attack.
Haroldo
@Omnes Omnibus: I grew up in Green Bay. I spent many more-or-less Educational years in Madison (near east side, if it isn’t obvious). I now live in New England. From my lurking, it seems you are in the Madison area. I was recently visiting my old haunts. I miss everything about them except the perma-cloud which pretty much is part of life until April, if memory serves.
WaterGirl
@Omnes Omnibus: I didn’t even know there was a mild version. What would be the point? Answering my own question, I guess the crunch. But still, what would be the point. I miss good italian beef so much.
WaterGirl
@Haroldo: I am fairly well-behaved. Eight years of catholic school taught by nuns. I had two aunts who were nuns in the same order, so they always got the word on us, which was shared with our parents when the aunts came to our house at christmas.
WaterGirl
@hovercraft:
I’m sorry, where’s the down side to that? :-)
Haroldo
@WaterGirl: @WaterGirl: Well, I am sorry to very hear about your behavior. My Mom (not a nun) taught at the catholic girls’ high school in town. That connection was invaluable!
Omnes Omnibus
@Haroldo: I am originally from central WI and am now in Madison. I once heard someone describe it as “the long, gray November that is Wisconsin.”
WaterGirl
@Haroldo: We had one teacher who was not a nun. That teacher was, in fact, a man who taught 2nd grade at the catholic school. He didn’t even make it through a whole year. He made kids sit in the filing drawer of his desk when they misbehaved. Apparently that was frowned upon at our school.
Haroldo
@WaterGirl: He probably just couldn’t afford the Skinner Box that was standard issue in Wisconsin.