There’s a new awards program in town — The Sully Awards. It is run exclusively by me, and it’s named after Andrew “How Can We Miss You If You Won’t Go Away?” Sullivan of intermittent blogging fame, not Sully Sullenberger, Hero of the Hudson. Therefore, it celebrates politically driven collapses onto inflatable fainting cushions, not feats of airliner piloting skill and courage.
First nominee: avid false equivalency salesman Ron Fournier, who is leaving Atlantic Media to spend more time with his family become associate publisher of Crain’s Detroit Business. Evidently even a both-sides-do-it hack like Fournier realizes there are only so many ways one can write, “Sure, Donald Trump is a dangerous demagogue who lies constantly about everything, all the time, but OMG HILLARY’S EMAILS how-can-we-trust-her?!1!1!?”
Good riddance to bad rubbish. But in recognition of his conspicuous lack of gallantry in the service of Broderism during this most vexing election season, here’s a trinket for Fournier’s new Detroit office: the very 1st Semi-Annual Sully Award. Because when the going gets tough, punk-ass quitters get going…right outta DC.
Regretfully, we must venture into Non-Hack-Land next, where Charlie Pierce disappoints — and scores an elusive Sully Award nomination:
If Hillary Clinton Seeks (or Accepts) an Endorsement from Henry Kissinger, She’s Lost My Vote
…I live in the bluest damn state there is east of Hawaii. My senators are Senator Professor Warren and Edward Markey. Less than a third of my fellow citizens are Republicans. (Granted, one of them is the governor, but let’s move on.) HRC could not lose the Commonwealth (God save it!) even if she drank a polyjuice potion and campaigned here transformed into Alex Rodriguez. So I can say this full in the knowledge that what I say will not have the slightest effect on the outcome of the presidential election. But it is not negotiable.
If Hillary Clinton actively seeks, or publicly accepts, the endorsement of Henry Kissinger, I will vote for Gary Johnson and Bill Weld on November 8. (Jill Stein, you might’ve been a contender, but going off to Red Square to talk about Vladimir Putin and human rights? Being an honored guest of a Russian propaganda channel? I don’t think so.) Kissinger is a bridge too far.
Oh, FFS. This is the kind of “Game over, man! Game over!” political delirium exemplified by Sullivan after Obama bombed at the first 2012 presidential debate. As should be obvious to any pol-watcher with Pierce’s experience, Clinton is trying to run up the score on He, Trump — she wants to utterly humiliate the shouty jack-o’-lantern by framing him as unacceptable to anyone who has ever played a role in government, regardless of party and ideology, thus giving wavering GOP voters an excuse not to vote for the serially offensive asshole.
Like the Republican president he served and that paranoid wank’s successors, Kissinger left a giant shit-stain on the planet and is therefore considered an elder statesmen by Republican voters old enough to remember him or conversant enough with history to know about his sinister turn in the Nixon White House.
Damn near half our fellow citizens are tragically uninformed assholes, okay? But if Kissinger and less lethal fellow GOP foreign policy fuck-ups like these 50 people plus Condi Rice, George Schultz and James Baker dump Trump for Clinton, that’ll be yet another hit to Trump’s reputation as a serious person within that seriously shitty party.
What it will NOT be is an indication that Clinton co-signs GOP foreign policy disasters past. Is it really necessary to explain this? This non-troversy reminds me of the foofaraw surrounding then-candidate Obama’s statement that he wished to be as consequential a president as Ronald Reagan, which was received in some quarters as “Gawd save us, Black Ronnie Raygun is coming after our Social Security.”
Therefore, I bestow upon Pierce the 2nd Semi-Annual Sully Award for conspicuous timorousness in political reporting. Still love ya, Charlie, but didn’t the 2000 election teach us anything about the futility of casting a vote as a political gesture? I know you’re in Massachusetts, but get a grip, man!
Now, deep, cleansing breaths, everyone. Can we get through the next 90 days without covering ourselves in beagle shit and running through the streets bellowing doom and woe? Yes, we can.
Villago Delenda Est
I don’t like saying this, but Charlie, you’re a moran.
schrodinger's cat
@Villago Delenda Est: Not a fan of CP and his pop culture references from 30 years ago. I never understood the CP fandom.
LAO
BC, you are a national treasure.
dedc79
Fair enough, but it would be great if kissinger endorsed and Hillary said “thanks but no thanks.”
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
No we can’t. You know that.
Wiesman
Some of my #NeverHillary liberal friends pointed to that Charlie Pierce post as vindication for their purity nonsense. My reaction: it’s not fair to penalize Hillary because Trump is so vile, so contemptible, and so unacceptable that even slightly-less-vile Republicans are supporting her.
BR
Reminder: please sign up to volunteer for the campaign. We need all hands on deck.
dedc79
Fournier should get the Sully Lifetime Achievement award
LAO
@schrodinger’s cat: I generally, really enjoy reading Pierce — even when I don’t agree with him. His sports writing is really quite good.
schrodinger's cat
I has the perfect lol to accompany this post.
msdc
Respectfully disagree that Charlie Pierce has ever been a citizen of Non-Hack Land. The guy’s entire shtick is whipping up one unfunny joke (seriously, this “He, Trump” shit has got to stop) and then beating it into the ground until he latches onto his next utterly obvious target.
Somebody here once commented that Pierce is only good at the thing liberals and progressives all think we’re good at, which is wordplay and snark, and so liberals and progressives like him. Except he’s not even all that good at them: he sucks in the exact ways we all suck at them, only moreso.
rikyrah
Uh huh
Uh huh
…………..
Trump Agrees To Three Debates—But He Wants To See The Conditions First
By ESME CRIBB
Published AUGUST 9, 2016, 2:01 PM EDT
Donald Trump said Tuesday that he will “absolutely” commit to three presidential debates with Hillary Clinton, but he suggested that he’d try to renegotiate the terms first.
“I will absolutely do three debates,” Trump said in a phone interview with Time. “I want to debate very badly. But I have to see the conditions.”
He went on to imply that he may try to change the terms of the debates.
“I renegotiated the debates in the primaries, remember? They were making a fortune on them and they had us in for three and a half hours and I said that’s ridiculous,” Trump said.
During the Republican primaries, Trump planned to skip two debates, although the second debate he planned to skip was ultimately canceled.
Trump said he also reserved the right to object to the Commission on Presidential Debates’ choice of moderators, telling Time that “certain moderators would be unacceptable, absolutely.”
Tissue Thin Pseudonym
@schrodinger’s cat: Me, either. His “oh, so cute” writing style annoys me.
But I’m in too good a mood to let that bug me right now. I just got an acceptance letter for one of my stories, “Life, or Something Like It.” It’s going to be published by Cosmic Roots and Eldritch Stories, a publication in the process of qualifying for acceptance by the Science Fiction Writers of America. If they get it, then I will retroactively have my first sale that counts towards membership.
They also pay a lot more (6 cents a word) than any place that has accepted a story of mine to date.
schrodinger's cat
@LAO: See, I am not the sports pg reading kitteh. I only know CP because of Anne Laurie.
Omnes Omnibus
@rikyrah:
Let it be so.
D58826
Now they tell us!!!!!!! Obama is not qualified to be president according to Rudy because – wait for it – he never built a golf course. Can add Rudy to a growing list of GOOPERS that should never be let out of the house without a leash and muzzle (and maybe Cole’s shovel from the Walter thread)..
ruemara
Pierce is the perfect example of inured from the consequences upper class liberalism and appeals to those selfish assholes. I like his comedy and appreciate his statements on many things, but a lack of criticism often results in a lack of critical thinking.
rikyrah
Battleground Missouri! Trump barely leads Hillary in the Show Me State, 42%-40%, finds new non-partisan poll. https://t.co/zudVVaP0bW
— Russell Drew (@RussOnPolitics) August 9, 2016
Susan K of the Tech Support
Wait, what? Didn’t “I’ve seen the Equivalence from Both Sides Now… From Ronnie’s mouth to Fournier’s Brow” Ron F just join The Atlantic? How come he’s leaving so quickly?
(okay, I’m going to read the rest of the post. But just that right there was a major “Hold Up!” moment. With a baseball bat.)
schrodinger's cat
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Congratulations! That’s so exciting.
OzarkHillbilly
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: congrats.
Michael Bersin
Met the man at the 2014 Harkin Steak Fry in Indianola, Iowa. He recounted that he had campaigned for Morris King Udall for president back in 1976. That explains a lot. Mo Udall was my Congressperson in Southern Arizona back in the dark ages.
administrator of networks
Ron Fournier is a really fucking sad and disturbed individual. His kid has autism, and Ron has a huge chip on his shoulder about this situation. Anyways Bush the Younger (Dumber) once met his kid and after the meeting looked at Ron and said “love that boy”. Ron used that as the title for his book “Love that Boy” and ever since then was utterly convinced of how wonderful Bush and conservatives were and how evil and malicious liberals are.
Everything he writes and his entire “but the liberals” is entirely about his own hang ups, social fears, and shame because he has an autistic kid lives in nice upper class liberal areas and he feels uncomfortable around them. But Bush said “love that boy” which makes Bush and conservatives the best ever.
Some of the interviews he has when he talks about this incidents are real eye openers on just how fucked up he is because of all this.
Trollhattan
@rikyrah:
And you will, Donny, you will.
I can’t wait for November when I can chant, “Donny got beat by a gir-rl, Donny got beat by a gir-rl.” Will almost make the last merde-strewn last eighteen months worth it. Almost.
PST
For that matter, didn’t the 2010 election teach us not to take Massachusetts for granted.
Omnes Omnibus
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Congrats.
Miss Bianca
So, has Charlie Pierce actually looked at the Libertarian platform?
tl/dr: “Americans are entitled to all possible rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. However, government cannot and shall not guarantee those rights; government is a big old poo-poo haid, unlike Free Enterprise! ™, which can do no wrong. In other words, you have no rights unless you can afford to sue someone to maintain them or regain them.”
But Clinton is going to be the Worst.Thing.Ever if Henry Kissinger endorses her.
I’ve just thrown Charlie Pierce onto the Douchebag White Winger DudeBro pile.
Mnemosyne
@dedc79:
IIRC, Hillary and Henry are personal friends but don’t talk politics. I think he’s probably too savvy to make a public endorsement.
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym:
Congrats!
Susan K of the Tech Support
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Congrats!!!!!!!
Miss Bianca
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Good for you! That’s amazing!
Iowa Old Lady
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Go you!
donatellonerd
tbh, as an older person (65 in October), i remember HK as a horrendous war criminal and seeking and/or accepting his support would certainly renew the constantly suppressed fears of her hawkishness. and it’s certainly a way to say fuck you to all the progressives who were initially on her side and the ones she tried to woo at the convention. don’t know what i’d do but what whatever it would be would be done very unhappily. my state is D+22.
germy
And then there’s this:
Roger Stone Confirms That He’s In Communication With Julian Assange
Betty Cracker
@Michael Bersin: Nice write-up! I am very fond of Pierce; I just thought that post was overwrought.
Now, perhaps you can answer a question I’ve long wondered about: How do they fry steaks in Iowa? Down south, a fried steak is breaded and fried like fried chicken, hence the interchangeable “chicken-fried steak” description. Is that also the method in Iowa, or is it some other variation?
aimai
Can I just say that i read that as “inflatable farting cushions?” And that seemed kind of…just right.
BR
I wonder if Trump has early-stage dementia, and that’s driving his tangential speech.
msdc
@Trollhattan:
Zing! James McNeill Whistler FTW.
rikyrah
Hillary Clinton agrees to debate schedule, Donald Trump breaks out in hives
Liberal Librarian
August 9, 2016
““`
The latest news is that Hillary Clinton has agreed to the presidential debate schedule for the fall. As of now, Donald Trump has not. Mrs. Clinton, being the alpha that she is, is challenging Trump to stop being a weenie and get in the ring with her. This is a challenge which I’m sure is making him flail his little hands about.
From tax returns to debates, Trump is trying to upend the accepted conventions of US presidential politics. Having lived a life of privilege, he thinks he doesn’t have to do the things every presidential candidate has done for the entirety of the Republic. He honestly thinks that the gameplan which won him the Republican nomination would work for the general election, assuming that the general electorate was as gullible and uneducated as his GOP base.
He is quickly finding out that not to be the case. The latest NBC/Survey Monkey poll has Sec. Clinton up 51% to 41%. Other polls have shown Trump pulling in support in the high 30s. This is not just a dumpster fire; this is a tsunami which is about to wash away the GOP.
Trump has built up a cult around himself as being the ultimate alpha. It’s a sham. The fact that he can be goaded so easily by criticism is evidence that he is far from a self-confident titan of industry, but a scared, insecure little boy with little boy hands who is washed in paranoia.
germy
@Miss Bianca: I have to assume Pierce would vote for the libertarian only if he knew the libertarian had no chance of winning. He does say he lives safely in a blue state.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@schrodinger’s cat: Have you taken a look at your username?
schrodinger's cat
@rikyrah: Trump reminds me of a Hindi proverb
Rough translation, Doesn’t know how to dance, then complains that the yard is tilted (not level).
rikyrah
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym:
Congratulations :)
mike in dc
I think it’s sufficient for Kissinger to not endorse but voice “grave concerns” about Trump. The others can simply affirm that Clinton has the experience, judgment and temperament to handle our national security, and Trump does not, so vote accordingly.
Miss Bianca
@germy
I have no patience with a fucking Performance Art Voter. Particularly one who is presumably smart enough to know better.
rikyrah
This went into moderation. I shall try it again:
Battleground Missouri! Trump barely leads Hillary in the Show Me State, 42%-40%, finds new non-partisan poll.
— Russell Drew (@RussOnPolitics) August 9, 2016
Mike J
@BR:
I’ve got MiniVAN and I’m not afraid to use it.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@Wiesman: Sure, but Kissinger is not “less vile” than Trump. Kissinger has actual blood on his hands. If she gets his stamp of approval, is Dick Cheney next?
PNW_WarriorWoman
Ahhhh yes, the old “people who voted for Ralph Nader threw the election to Bush” trope. Don’t Fall for It: The Nader Myth and Your 2016 Vote
The race is over. Hillary will win, Trump doesn’t stand a chance. Electronic vote theft will assure it all. No, I don’t need to vote for Hillary. Not going to make a damn difference. We all know it.
schrodinger's cat
@MoeLarryAndJesus: What of it? Has nothing to do with pop culture but refers to a famous thought experiment by Erwin Schroedinger, one of the brains behind Quantum Mechanics.
aimai
@Miss Bianca: I’m afraid I have to, too. The entire idea that anyone running for President isn’t going to have some endorsements from some pretty hideous people is absurd. You just, for the most part, don’t realize it because they aren’t important in your social circles. But I can assure dear Mr. Pierce that there will be sociopaths, murderers, assholes, racists, theives and assorted villains voting for and even (gasp!) endorsing whichever candidate he gives his much sought after imprimatur to. Because even sociopaths, murderers, assholes, racists, thieves and assorted villains have a right to vote and, shockingly, even they may be so disgusted with one or the other aspect of Trump’s foreign policy tht they choose to use their franchise to support Clinton.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym:
Woot!
germy
@Miss Bianca: I agree.
aimai
@PNW_WarriorWoman: You need—really, need, to fuck off and die.
Pogonip
Beagle shit? I don’t get it.
Doesn’t have anything to do with Walter, Cole, or both, does it?
schrodinger's cat
@aimai: Berners are back, just when you thought that they were on the back burner.
schrodinger's cat
@Pogonip: Sully has or had two beagles.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@ruemara: This is the first time Charlie Pierce has ever been accused of being “upper class.” He may frame it.
germy
@LAO:
I felt the same way about Albert Goldman. His prose and his humor carried me along, even when I knew some of his facts and viewpoints were fucked up. He was an entertaining and witty writer. His Lenny Bruce biography was hilarious and sad.
Mnemosyne
@PNW_WarriorWoman:
Well, that was some authentic frontier gibberish. Nice amount of white privilege on display, too.
After all, Trump winning the presidency won’t disturb your comfortable life much, so why should you care what happens to Muslims, people of color, and poor women, amirite?
Roger Moore
@rikyrah:
We’re sure you will, Donald.
lamh36
So I’m off today and finally watching Olympics LIVE.
Watching Mens Volleyball, this US team is so frustrating…ugh.
So yesterday I caught a bit of the the US Women’s Volleyball team and I heard them saying something about Coach Karch…and the name didn’t register.
Today I’m watching the Mens game and they mentioned the Women’s team and said the coach’s name and sure enough. The Women’s coach is Karch Kiraly.
If you follow Beach Volleyball then you will recognize the name or maybe the pink hat he ALWAYS wore when playing.
wjs
I totally agree with Charlie Pierce. Having said that, yes, I would still vote for Hillary.
Henry Kissinger is a war criminal. If the Clinton campaign accepts and celebrates his endorsement, they’re in danger of alienating a lot of people who understand that there really was a dark prince of American foreign policy who made Dick Cheney look like a pretender to the crown.
Mike J
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym:
Not spelling “fuck” correctly drives me up the fucking wall. Either use the the word or don’t. If your boss won’t let you use it, find another word.
The Other Chuck
I find Pierce occasionally witty and refreshing, but most of the time he phones it in. Particularly annoying is how he does a search-and-replace to insert the exact same nicknames for people over and over again. He must really love writing about Brooks, since his nickname is a fucking paragraph, making the amount of actual content he has to write that much shorter. I grabbed his book Idiot America, and probably 2/3 of it is filler consisting of a bio of an infamous crank from a previous century. He should just stick to being a panelist on Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me.
aimai
@MoeLarryAndJesus: A lot of people have blood on their hands from that period in time. A.Lot.Of.People. This current level of Kissinger hysteria is just really interesting. Its as though all of the combined passions of the left have focused, like a laser, on only one part of that foreign policy elite. I think its because Kissinger, being a Harvard professor and jew, was supposed to be more like a liberal than he was and he is hated, as a result, with the hatred that we reserve for near relatives rather than for evil strangers.
There are a fuckload of people who voted for the Iraq war–and I don’t just mean Hillary Clinton–and who actively supported that war who have never been attacked and drummed out of public life. And democrats don’t even ask that they be attacked the way Hillary is. There is basically almost no one on the Republican side of the aisle who doesn’t have Iraqui blood on their hands yet we are expecting Hillary to work with those goons and we expected Obama to do so too. This purity passion, this shrieking hysteria, over Kissinger is just another sign that a certain sector of the left still wants the world to be a morality play in which god, or our presidential nominee, punishes those who we have not been able to. That’s not the world. That’s a child’s fictional version of a just, storybook, universe.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@PST: Now that’s just stupid.
kindness
I’m impressed Betty. Charles Pierce is such an honored figure I didn’t think anyone else would have thought he was pulling a Sully with that piece. When I read it yesterday, that’s exactly what I thought about it. Sully. But I don’t go to the now Facebook feed to comment so I didn’t say anything.
Well done.
Emma
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Bravo!
The Very Reverend Crimson Fire of Compassion
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Freakin’ awesome! That is amazingly cool.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@PNW_WarriorWoman:
So let me get this straight – The Clinton Machine(tm) is going to hack the electon results so they can win and election they’ve already won just going by the polls?
Roger Moore
@germy:
Wouldn’t that qualify as illegal coordination between the campaign and an outside group?
lamh36
On politics, been seeing this same HRC commercial during the Olympics. It’s a good one. With Trump on Letterman, and ya’ll know Letterman def has no love lost for Republicans…so Dave is just bringing out Trump items and asking where they were made…and Trump so laissez faire about it just shrug
Pretty good ad
Anoniminous
@srv:
They’ve been doing that for several months now dumbass. And they also built a bridge over the
river KwaiEuphrates for a direct logistic route between Kobane Canton and the FEBA.Michael Bersin
@Betty Cracker:
No frying. The grilled them. Also chicken for non-red meat eaters and whatever for non-carnivores.
I had attended the annual Harkin Steak Fry with a media credential since 2007 (missing only 2008). Sadly, the 2014 event was the last – it was one of the great and really fun political events in the Midwest.
In 2014 I caught a sequence of images [camera on a tripod, shutter burst] of Hillary’s opening: “I’m back!” The crowd roared.
To my eternal regret I passed on the opportunity to drop my four pound camera/200 mm lens rig on an old media pundit’s head from my position at the back of the main press riser. It would have just been too expensive to replace the camera and lens. But I did think about it. More than once.
schrodinger's cat
In the only debate between Hillz and the Berning Man that I saw. I remember Bernie going on and on about Henry Kissinger. Its seems like its a thing with his followers. Question: Is HK worse than a neoliberal corporatist shill?
Anoniminous
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym:
Congratulations!
Betty Cracker
Someone has definitely hijacked Trump’s Twitter account. Elizabeth Warren ripped his economic speech to shreds yesterday, and so far, nada… How long will it be before he wrests it back?
@Michael Bersin: Nice photography! And thanks for explaining about the Steak Fry.
germy
@Roger Moore:
If the Democrats were doing it, yes.
aimai
@lamh36: Yeah, the bartender at the restaurant I was at last night had just seen that Hillary commercial. He was a bearded, hipster, white dude and he loved it! He really was quite anti Trump. But I think having those ads on during the olympics was genius. Lot of people have the Olympics on in the background of workplaces and other public places (like the bar) so they are seeing the ads all the time, subliminally.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@donatellonerd: Yes. Have you ever read Barry Crimmins’ book “Never Shake Hands With A War Criminal”? I’m sure Pierce has.
Hillary is going to stomp Trump flat without shaking hands with that piece of shit. She should avoid him like the fucking plague that he is. And if he dies while she’s in the Oval Office, she should avoid issuing a bullshit flowery tribute.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@PNW_WarriorWoman: Blow it out your ass, Keyboard Warrior Woman, Boudicca of Patchouli, Joan of Arc of Hemp Sandals and Your Fevered Imagination.
The Other Chuck
@BR: Christ, he makes Sarah Palin sound like Benjamin Disraeli.
The Very Reverend Crimson Fire of Compassion
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:Oooooh, snap!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I wonder if Pierce imagines that Johnson and/or Weld– they are at least friendly, if not friends–would refuse Kissinger’s endorsement, or refuse his phone calls once in office.
ETA: And is the Sully Award a ten statue of Sullivan in mid-stride, naked and smeared with beagle poop, mouth open to release the keening wails of disappointment?
Gravenstone
@Omnes Omnibus: Yeah, that particular phrase jumps out as likely being quite prophetic.
aimai
@schrodinger’s cat: Yes, its a niche hatred. I mean–I hate Kissinger too but the sheer number of people who claim to remember Kissinger’s evil is waaaay out of proportion to the people who were actually alive and voting during that period. Kissinger just stands in for something, like a revenge people think they can’t get, for the enormous evils that are perpetrated by our government every day. I mean–Kissinger’s bad, sure, but he’s no worse than people who worked for Reagan who trained people at the School for the Americas, or basically anyone in Reagan’s cabinet or private circle. He’s no worse than Cheney or anyone who supported Cheney and plenty of those people are still around and still in power.
Mnemosyne
@aimai:
I was thinking the other day that there’s definitely a segment of the modern left that defines itself by opposing things. They think that a “win” is stopping something. The problem is, that’s the ONLY kind of win they can imagine, and winning by actually BUILDING something is beyond their ken.
viking_kitten
There is no upside to pursuing a Kissinger endorsement. Zero. The demographic that (a) knows enough about who HK is to care about him and (b) doesn’t hate his guts and (c) would ever, ever consider voting for Clinton is small enough to count on my fingers.
Clinton may have just lost more votes from that Kissinger trial balloon than she could ever hope to gain from associating Kissinger with her campaign.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@aimai:
There were a fuckload of people who were given a choice
a) vote “War is AWSOME!”
b) vote “Pledge myself to Al Quida and hate FREEDOM!!!”
You’re forgetting the post 911 hysteria.
The difference is outside Wingnut fantasy the Left has never been fellow travelers with the Jihadists, as it was with the Communists during the Cold War. Kissinger had socialists tortured to death for the crime of wanting to create a better society and that’s why he’s loathed.
Joe
So, is there no way to tell a candidate that she’s making a horrible mistake? If Pierce sees Clinton about to do something that will sap the enthusiasm of a big chunk of her supporters, he should speak up before she does it, or he’s no friend to her. It’s the obligation of anyone who takes citizenship seriously to do so.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@schrodinger’s cat: No shit. Schrodinger’s cat has also been a constant in pop culture since I was a kid. There’s even a Schrodinger’s Cat For Dummies t-shirt floating around. Maybe you’re not as aloof as you think you are.
Patricia Kayden
@rikyrah:
The Republican primaries are over. Someone needs to tell Trump that while he could cajole and bully the GOP into giving in to his silly demands, there is zero reason why the Commission on Presidential Debates needs to give in to any of his demands. In fact, Secretary Clinton should vigorously pushback at any CPD gestures to appease Trump.
If you can’t handle the heat, stay out of the kitchen.
RandomMonster
I’m a CP fan, but when I saw that article this morning I had to roll my eyes. If it’s such a huge moral issue for you, then protesting by casting a single ballot in an entirely safe blue state is about as bold as Hitler’s barber in the Woody Allen essay from years ago: “Once, toward the end of the war, I did contemplate loosening the Fuhrer’s neck-napkin and allowing some tiny hairs to get down his back, but at the last minute my nerve failed me.”
aimai
@MoeLarryAndJesus: Well, I ‘m sure I hope this works out:
But I wouldn’t give a flying fuck if she did appear at his funeral or even spoke kindly of his shade. The desire people have to see their own most uncivilized, angriest, weakest, impulses acted out on the dead is infinite but not shared by everyone. In particular I don’t think it needs to be shared by our President (s). Both Obama and Clinton are way, way, classier than that. I would expect that Obama and Clinton both will speak, generously, if asked, at Bush’s funeral or at the funeral of any public servant who, however awfully or imperfectly, served in a key position in a US administration. We can’t shed our national horror by pretending, after someone is dead, to punish his corpse when we did not have the ability to do so when they were alive.
Patricia Kayden
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Congratulations!! That’s a wonderful accomplishment. We have so many writers at BJ.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
True, but I’ve got to think it’s larger than the group who would say, “I was gonna vote for Trump, but now that Kissinger has endorsed Clinton…” Are there a lot of ninety year old Nixon fans on the fence? That’s what I can’t figure out, that anyone, even if this rumor was started by one overly excitable campaign staffer with one too many cocktails in him, that anyone would think that the old ghoul’s endorsement is a prize. Like I said last night, I don’t have much use for St Colin, but I think that’s at least an endorsement people would pay attention to.
dedc79
Betty, maybe you should’ve held off a few days before awarding a winner. Here’s a new gem from Michael Kinsley.
My favorite part is where he says “We all make mistakes.” Funny, I don’t recall him owning up to some of his most embarrassing “mistakes.” Like that time he said Obama should just give in to the Republicans on the ACA years after it had been signed into law.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@aimai: She needs to fuck off and die? Are you some sort of sociopathic shitbag or what? Or are you just some vapid hipster amadan?
Amir Khalid
@rikyrah:
Such a transparent ploy: Trump wants to make it look like he has the power to decide whether the debates go on or not. The Commission should just call his bluff: it should declare that the debates are on, whether he shows up or not; that it, not the candidates, shall choose the moderators, that this has all been decided and is not open to further negotiation; and that if he misses a debate then Hillary will get to speak without rebuttal.
walden
A well-considered and deserved award. He, Pierce has evidently been hanging around his own shebeen for too long, has imbibed the home-brew absinthe, and has perhaps forgotten how the work of government’n is done.
Somehow he jumped on the email kerfuffle bandwagon too in the last week. Has he been kidnapped? Forced to listen to too many late night political sessions in the byways of Cambridge? Hope Professor Senator (or is it Senator Professor) Warren will set him straight.
Gravenstone
@Miss Bianca:
This is the crux of what most pisses me off about glibertarians. They like to talk about using the courts to seek legal remedy all fucking day long. But what value are the courts without a functioning government to give weight to and enforcement of those same judicial decisions? Then again, thinking has never seemed the long suit of most glibertarians.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@aimai: We can ignore his sorry carcass, you silly little turd, Issue a simple condolence to his family. No need to remove his warts post mortem.
Betty Cracker
@Joe: Then tell her (via your column that she almost certainly doesn’t read) that she’s making a horrible mistake, acknowledging, BTW, that this is a mistake she has not yet made, and the prediction that she’s going to make it is based on nameless sources from fucking Politico. But don’t vow to vote for a pair of libertarian knobs if she disappoints you.
lamh36
Oh…so now it’s a national issue…eyeroll
@NBCNightlyNews
JUST IN: Florida Gov. Scott calls for Congress to “immediately come back to session to resolve” Zika funding: “This is a national issue.”
Patricia Kayden
@aimai:
Very well said.
@Joe: Aren’t you presuming that Pierce has access to Secretary Clinton or her inner circle? Pierce has a right to his opinion and it’s okay to call him out for silly things he says in the heat of passion. I assume, he’ll backtrack once he calms down and thinks about how this particular ultimatum is a bit over the line.
Immanentize
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: WOOT! Good on you!
schrodinger's cat
@MoeLarryAndJesus: I never claimed to be aloof. I just don’t get his dated references and don’t find him funny. YM obviously varies. As someone who can and has actually solved Schrodinger’s equation for many systems, my awareness of the thought experiment is independent of pop-culture.
aimai
@Joe: This isn’t that. Pierce isn’t calling up his (many) friends in politics and warning them of something (and there’s nothing to warn them about). He’s grandstanding and posturing like a wounded chorus girl with a fake twisted ankle. The guy’s fucking Irish and he ought to know that stone cold murderers were let back into the political process in Ireland. Because after a while no one can hold these hold grudges with any utility. Its absurd to stagger around gasping and wailing over the possible endorsement of a former Secretary of State of another Secretary of State. It would be more surprising and noteworthy if Kissinger endorsed Trump. Kissinger may be evil but he’s not stupid. And as a US citizen he’s entitled to do what he wants with his vote–I hear that a lot from the ex bernfeelers and the libertarians. Is she supposed to make some kind of public example of him to please a set of scenery chewing hacks who aren’t going to turn out to vote for her anyway? Because I can assure you that even caring about Kissinger indicates that you are in such a tiny sliver of the population that your votes can be counted on the fingers of a few hundred hands.
lamh36
Ya’ll…I know, I know, it’s a “serious” sport, but I just can’t with table tennis..
#Olympics
dude bouncing the ball on his lil paddle…like he was Pete Sampras…and then flicked his wrist…grunting like Serena
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
Charlie has his moments and I generally find his blog entertaining, humorous, and insightful for the most part, but he is prone to histrionics when it comes to Hillary especially. He believes there really was a vast right wing conspiracy to take down the Clintons and keep Hillary down, but he’s absorbed enough of it that he’s constantly skeptical of her as a candidate for no really good reason.
hedgehog the occasional commenter
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym:Congrats!
Patricia Kayden
@lamh36: Scott needs to tell Republicans in the House to stop mucking up the Zika bill with poison pills such as pro-Confederate flag nonsense or attacks on Planned Parenthood. That’s the only way a clean Zika bill will get through Congress.
aimai
@MoeLarryAndJesus: I think worrying in advance about what a future Hillary Clinton may do when Kissinger dies is…almost the stupidest thing you could be worrying about. But then, I haven’t read all your posts.
Gravenstone
@PNW_WarriorWoman:
The fuck is wrong with you?
slag
Sully Scream wins the day for me already. And Charles Pierce will forever have a place in my heart for David Brooks’ trusty Irish setter Moral Hazard.
Roger Moore
@Betty Cracker:
There’s some interesting analysis of Trump’s tweets based on the Twitter platform. The tweets using Android are Trump’s personal tweets, while the ones using iPhone are from his staff. The style and vocabulary is completely different. Trump personally quotes tweets in an obsolete style, rarely uses pictures or hashtags, and uses a much more negative vocabulary.
Poopyman
@donatellonerd:
Which is why we’ll never see her do anything of the sort.
Honestly, I’ll be disappointed if anyone whatsoever connected to her campaign volunteers a statement, although I’m sure our feckless press will hound Clinton staffers for something/anything about Kissinger’s statement. But I’ll be gobsmacked if Hills herself makes any mention of it.
There’s no there there, and I’ll be damned if I know what Pierce is trying to accomplish here.
bystander
@dedc79:
Let’s call it the Sully Lifetime Achievement Prize. I like the acronym better.
schrodinger's cat
Pierce has some dedicated fans, they seem to have crawled out of the woodwork to defend their hero from BC’s vile slander. Carry on.
germy
@srv: I think it has something to do with the men going first, leaving their families behind, building a secure future, and then sending for their wives and children.
But you’re quoting a sage like Megan, so maybe she has some inside information, given to her by her bosses.
Betty Cracker
@Gravenstone: She’s a kook. If you were trapped on a subway car with her, you would desperately avoid making eye contact because you really, really don’t want to hear about the chem trails. Probably best to take a similar approach when she crops up in comments…
cmorenc
Where’s Ralph Nader when we so urgently need him??
/ducks out of the way of flying brickbats.
ok folks, geez, I was just kidding. Unlike Charles Pierce, unless that was just another bit of hyperbolic Pierce humor.
Patricia Kayden
Things can only get worse for Trump as other Republicans flee his sinking ship.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/08/09/we-may-be-about-to-get-a-wave-of-republicans-deserting-donald-trumps-sinking-ship/?hpid=hp_no-name_opinion-card-a%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
aimai
@Gravenstone: Its a tell. There is a sliver of the ex bernfeelers who get all their information from Russia Today, and the current wave of anti-democratic/anti democracy propaganda from RT is on the “futility” part of the “Perversity, Jeopardy, Futility” part of the reactionary attacks on change. In A.O. Hirschmann’s brilliant book (Rhetoric of Reaction) he identifies these three things as the three ways in which reactionary forces argue against social change. But you will see these same tropes again and again mouthed by the left in this country to discourage the progressive/liberal democratic actors from trying to ameliorate conditions, increase social justice, fight inequality, or excercise the franchise. Whenever you come across a poster who explains to you that your vote is meaningless you can be sure that they are parrotting lines straight from RT and aim to make you feel like its not worth getting up to vote in November. The purpose os this excercise I leave to your own imagination.
dedc79
@bystander: Good edit!
Roger Moore
@Gravenstone:
Then they turn around and support tort reform that in practice denies people a realistic chance to sue.
lamh36
Ugh… there is a line where sarcasm is just really passive agressively saying what you really feel..
Betty Cracker
@Roger Moore: Fascinating. Thank you for linking it.
dedc79
The responses to this tweet from Bernie Sanders (“Anybody claiming there is widespread voter fraud, trying to suppress the vote, trying to keep people from voting, is a political coward.”) are as depressing as I thought they might be.
slag
@Gravenstone: I find that it really helps me understand BoBs if I picture them like this. I wish cleek would create a special BoB filter that just replaced each of their comments with a random Lucille Bluth gif.
Kay
Horrible for Trump, because it’s Quinnipiac :)
They can’t even prop the giant, bellowing idiot up.
Miss Bianca
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Yeah, this.
Emma
@aimai: Thank you. I live in Florida, and my attitude to all of this is the same as Churchill’s: If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favourable reference to the devil in the House of Commons.
Poopyman
@schrodinger’s cat:
As someone born in 1954, I’d say yes. Far, far worse.
Kay
Has anyone asked Chris Matthews why Trump is doing so poorly in PA polling? As our nation’s foremost expert on “lunchbucket” voter preferences I’d like an explanation for this. Does he still call Trump “a builder”?
Mitt Romney did better with them than Trump is.
gogol's wife
@PNW_WarriorWoman:
Kazhetsia, Vladimir Vladimirovich nachal platit’ opiat’.
catclub
@MoeLarryAndJesus:
Nonetheless, if Kissinger said “Trump is so bad that I would endorse Hillary to avoid his election.” I would be fine with that.
Emma
@MoeLarryAndJesus: If I cared any less what a politician says, I’d be catatonic. I care about what they do and what causes they support. As far as I’m concerned, if Hillary follows through with her policies, as she has stated them, she could wear sackcloth and ashes for the soul of the King of the Belgians.
Kay
Big jerk is running his mouth again:
This pivot is going well, I must say.
Immanentize
@walden: Pierce has been a barely disguised, albeit realist, Berner. He is still looking for his promised pony. I like that he puts up a few posts a day and some of his catches are excellent, but he is a little too cherce for my tastes
OzarkHillbilly
@Gravenstone:
She is still breathing.
msdc
@Mike J:
Thank you! Either curse right or don’t fucking bother.
Also applies to local commenters who love to call bullshit but are apparently incapable of typing it.
Patricia Kayden
@Kay: What the ?!! Secretary Clinton and all Democratic leaders need to call him out on that. This is the straight up fomenting of violence for when he inevitably loses. Absolutely disgusting.
Gin & Tonic
Who called out the Bernista trolls all of a sudden? And where’s Jonathan Livingston Bechamel if all the others are back?
Amir Khalid
@Kay:
Is Trump hinting that his supporters should come gunning for Hillary? The Secret Service won’t approve, methinks.
gogol's wife
@Patricia Kayden:
That’s good.
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@BR: HIs father, according to Wikipedia, died of Alzheimer’s.
Patricia Kayden
@lamh36: I don’t think Trump is intelligent enough to be passive aggressive. He has no dog whistle and is straight up encouraging his supporters to use violence when they don’t get what they want. He needs to be called out on this.
Princess (now General) Leia
@srv: Hence George P. Bush’s recent Trump endorsement!! He is running right at Cruz. LOL
gogol's wife
@lamh36:
That’s pretty blatant.
Jeffro
@lamh36: @Patricia Kayden: @Kay:
CANNOT.
STAND.
Let’s hear it, Republicans: your candidate just called for a “2nd amendment remedy” on his rival…it is past time to walk away and come join the Sane Party.
Call him out, leave the party, do whatever you have to. But this is it.
catclub
@lamh36: A sport is useful in my view, if you can do it when you are 80 or at twenty. So TT is very high on that ranking. Gymnastics and football, not so much.
Dmbeaster
@aimai: Well, maybe make an exception for Dick Cheney.
catclub
@Patricia Kayden:
Baloney. at least Hitler had brownshirts. He’s got nothing. Laughing at him on Nov 10 when nothing happens will be fine.
Kay
@Amir Khalid:
Either that or the judges she appoints. And she will be appointing some, I guess. Sounds like even he thinks she will win.
Immanentize
@bystander: @dedc79:
I do not think “Achievement” means what you think it means….
Lizzy L
@Kay: That’s an OMG WTF don’t-say-that-boss moment for his staff. I hope the media jump on that with both feet, starting now.
This mofo is the exact same age as I am, does he not remember what it was like to live through political assassination after political assassination? Because I sure the fuck do. (Rhetorical question: I am not asking anyone on BJ to try to deconstruct Donald Trump’s memory.)
gogol's wife
@Jeffro:
To me this is the biggest story yet. This should be a banner headline on every newspaper.
Maybe because I watched the PBS White House doc last night and was reminded of Nov. 22, 1963, this is making me physically ill.
Joel
@msdc: I like Charlie Pierce as a sportswriter.
Ambivalent otherwise.
gogol's wife
@catclub:
Uh, have you watched any footage from his rallies?
Peale
@Kay: Yep. I wish it weren’t so close in Florida. But its good that she’s ahead in all of them.
Miss Bianca
@Jeffro: But let’s not forget that if Kissinger endorses Hillary Clinton, *she’s* the Real Monster ™.
Immanentize
@aimai: Such an excellent explanation. Thank you!
scav
@germy: Interesting stats from in here: Most Syrian refugees coming to U.S. are women, children dated today.
Miss Bianca
@aimai: I’m wondering what the crossover is between staff for “Russia Today” and “Pravda”. Speaking as one who used to index the latter. Sure sounds like they have a similar approach to proselytizing to/about the political institutions of the West.
Immanentize
@Princess (now General) Leia: I was wondering WTF?
ETA — This is the type of behavior JEBlite’s enorsement) this is going to separate the white supremacists from the God Botherers. This should be fun, given that JEBlite is a “little brown one” after all….
Princess
@Kay: My guess is part of it is WWC Catholics from former east bloc countries: Poland, Slovakia, Czech Republic. They should be his voters but they are going to hate his “dismantle NATO” talk and his coziness with Putin.
catclub
@gogol’s wife: I think he has no organization. That would take planning and delegation. Those guys with an ethos, they had delegation and planning. Inchoate rage does not overthrow elections. Ask Roger Stone what does – organized rage.
Peale
@D58826: Please keep running your mouth off about the qualifications of the current officeholder. Please, Donald, keep calling him the “dumbest president in our history.” Please, Rudy, go on and on about how Obama just isn’t right for the job. (Voters had a chance to choose you for that job, and found you wanting. In your own party. After you had that horde of corporate cash and everyone knew who you were. Everyone knew who you were and because of that, didn’t want you to be President. Must suck to be you, but Obama was and always has been more qualified for the office than you were).
Joel
@Enhanced Voting Techinques: When I’m feeling optimistic, I agree with you.
But it’s important to remember that the Iraq war didn’t lose popularity until it became apparent that the US wasn’t going to outright *win* the war.
James E Powell
@Betty Cracker:
Amateur etymology – “Steak Fry” is a riff off “Fish Fry” and refers as much or more to the “large outdoor gathering” aspect than the method of preparation. This meaning of fish fry is more common in the southerly regions than the northeastern Roman Catholic regions where a fish fry is usually like a menu special on Fridays in restaurants and bars.
pinacacci
That comment about 2nd amendment people is so far beyond the pale. I am actually shocked.
gogol's wife
@catclub:
How much planning and delegation did Lee Harvey Oswald, Sirhan Sirhan, etc. need?
Mary G
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Congratulations!
Aleta
@rikyrah:
Trump’s 1st demand: an easier opponent.
2nd: his name given top billing in the biggest letters above the stage.
3rd: luxury podium and world’s tallest ever.
4th: Ivanka et al. arrayed attractively around him.
Dadadadadadada
@The Other Chuck: I’ve always found him very annoying on Wait, Wait Don’t Tell Me. So much so that it took me a long time to realize that the annoying WWDTM guy and the good writer from Esquire were the same person.
Fair Economist
@Princess (now General) Leia:
P’s endorsement was a tepid split-the-baby affair. He said you have to support the nominee no matter who he is. He’s trying to avoid taking sides in the split happening in the Republican party, and I don’t think it’s going to work.
Trollhattan
Was hoping Pierce would be on the panel when we went to a “Wait…Wait” taping in hopes they’d take audience questions (they did) because I was prepared to ask him what he really thinks about Rick Santorum. Alas, no Pierce.
Jeffro
@gogol’s wife:
Let’s hear it Ryan, McConnell, McCain, Rubio, Christie, Cruz, Bush, Cotton, Ernst, everybody get on record, let’s go: you on board with “2nd amendment remedies” or not?
Wait lemme put it another way: “If Hillary Clinton had just called for ‘2nd amendment remedies’ against Donald Trump, wouldn’t you immediately insist that Democrats from Biden down to dogcatcher disavow her? Wouldn’t it immediately disqualify her for office? No? Why not??”
Oh we are SO incredibly not going to ‘negotiate a surrender’ with these clowns…
Gelfling 545
@Mike J: He uses “fecking”‘ no? It’s not misspelled, just Irish usage, not uncommon in Pierce’s writing.
Trollhattan
@Fair Economist:
Wonder if Bar has smacked him on the head with her thimble yet? She’s officially anti-Trump.
Aleta
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: seriously admirable. congratulations.
James E Powell
@aimai:
I was sittin’ here winding up to write a rebuttal, but then I thought about it for a minute and realized you were right.
What makes Kissinger more infuriating is that he has forever been treated like a successful, wise, grey eminence of American foreign policy. And he is treated that was not just by the dolts, dunces, dullards and dumbbells in the press/media, but especially by elected officials who have no valid reason to genuflect before him and who really should know better, e.g., Bill and Hillary Clinton.
japa21
@dedc79: Heck, I find them even more depressing than I thought they would be.
Miss Bianca
@Dadadadadadada:
Ha! Sounds like the split between the “good” Shen Te and the “bad” Shui Ta in The Good Person of Setzuan!
OzarkHillbilly
@msdc: Go fvck yourself and your oh so righteous indignation that some of us actually comment at places where words like fuck, shit, and bitch get one thrown automatically off the site, so we get into the habit of typing sh!t, fvck, b!tch, bstrd, just like everyone here types ‘ni**er’ or some variation thereof.
You know exactly what the fvck we are saying. Stop pretending you are some how or other the last bastion of brave truth and honesty. You aren’t. You’re an asshole.
Dadadadadadada
@srv: I’ve been predicting this for weeks. I’ve also been predicting that he will lose in 2018.
MJS
@catclub: You don’t think Trump has any followers that are right now thinking, “You know, he’s right – I CAN exercise my 2nd Amendment rights if the election is stolen from him”? You’ve clearly not been paying attention.
OzarkHillbilly
@Patricia Kayden: What, the Republicans don’t need to call him out on this too?
Patricia Kayden
@catclub: That’s if nothing happens. With how deranged and violent his supporters have already proven themselves to be (remember all the pushing, punching, kicking, etc., against protesters during Trump rallies), I’m not sure if we won’t see violence when Trump loses.
http://wonkette.com/605164/trump-supporters-stomping-crap-out-of-protester-again-really-love-usa-senseless-violence
Patricia Kayden
@OzarkHillbilly: Everyone needs to call him out.
Patricia Kayden
@Miss Bianca: Trump has already said that she’s the monster. How soon we forget.
Mnemosyne
@OzarkHillbilly:
Also, “ish” is now a perfectly cromulent version of “shit.” It’s even turning up in hit Broadway plays.
Dadadadadadada
@Lizzy L: But he has the best memory! He himself said so!
Mingobat f/k/a Karen in GA
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym: Congratulations!
Uncle Cosmo
@Michael Bersin: Well helzbelz, I too campaigned for Mo Udall in 1976 (in MD; shook his hand when he came to Baltimore once; damn that man was TALL) but it doesn’t ‘splain a lot about me politically.
If Charlie Pierce tries to abandon HRC over Henry the K, the white-entitled spud-sucker deserves to be lathered with a shillelagh & dropkicked back into line before he’s three feet gone..
msdc
@OzarkHillbilly: “fuck”
Uncle Cosmo
@srv: Fuck off & die, shitstain!
rikyrah
@Kay:
As many Latinos as there are in Florida..I’m not buying it.
rikyrah
@srv:
Cruz won because the primary was either in July or August.
Villago Delenda Est
@PNW_WarriorWoman: NADER IS DOGSHIT.
central texas
The morphing of “HRC is the only sane vote” into HRC cannot, by definition, do any wrong and anything you think is wrong is because you are an idiot or Trump supporter is getting a little thick for my taste. There is plenty of time to canonize her after her term in office. Until then I will remain highly suspicious of her instincts with respect to much of foreign policy and more than happy be to proven wrong.
Miss Bianca
@central texas: your concern is duly noted – and hey, nice ellision of “HRC is the only sane vote” into “HRC can do no wrong” – which precisely none of us here has said or believed, but slippery slopes are so exHILarating, aren’t they? WHEE!!
Meanwhile, *just* in case you hadn’t noticed, she’s so far stopped short of advocating the assassination of her political rivals. So, at least there’s *that* going for her, eh?
grandpa john
@central texas: yeah,reality can get pretty blunt when you start dealing with truth.
Steeplejack (tablet)
@Gelfling 545:
No, he uses cutesy abbreviations, e.g., ratfcking.
Bob
@aimai:
Ah yes, the “they’re all the same” argument. The go-to argument of choice for precocious 16 year olds the world over. Henry Kissinger, Terrel Bell. Be damned if I can see a difference.
Btw, allow me to point out the issue here concerns Clinton’s actively seeking the support of Henry Kissinger. As there is no indication she is actively seeking the support of the people who worked at the School of the Americas or any of the other straw men you have littered your replies with I’m not certain I see their relevance.
J R in WV
@Mike J:
Yes indeedy, but I’m kind of fond of rikyrah’s FUQ speling. It violates the u-after-q rules, too. And it sounds so right when pronounced loudly.
FUQ LBJ – there, you see? And Raven, you’re welcome.
Grumpy Code Monkey
It’s no secret Clinton’s a hawk, and she has plenty of company in that respect – WIlson, FDR, Truman, Kennedy, Johnson. Clinton’s bringing the Dems back to the ’60s – tax, spend, and project force like a sonofabitch around the world.
And let’s think about this – Kissinger’s seriously evil fucker who regularly hobnobbed with other seriously evil fuckers while working for a seriously evil fucker, and he’s running away from Trump saying “nopenopenopenope…” – I mean, what better endorsement do you need?
Matt McIrvin
Berniacs in my feeds quoting other Berniacs demanding that Sanders threaten to rescind his endorsement over Kissinger.
But they’re quoting them kind of derisively.
GOVCHRIS1988
Isn’t it amazing that Bernie loons are threatening to withdraw support over a man they have no real knowledge of outside of their school textbooks from high school that they didn’t read. For Christ sake, Charlie, get out of the 70s. Kissinger HAS NO POWER anymore. No GOP’ers are stating that he would have a role in a future Republican administration. Nor has Hillary Rodham Clinton stated that she would have him in hers. He can endorse anyone he wants. Its his freedoms. And its not like its an academy award, no one really accepts endorsements. We all know these Republicans are endorsing Clinton not out of love for her, but out of abject fear that Trump would end up the face of the Republican Party if elected. This would be more of a blow to Trump than to Clinton, but some Liberals lack the vision thing, as well as looking long term at anything.
Barry
@srv: would this be the same pack of mice who failed to bell the Trump?
J R in WV
@MoeLarryAndJesus:
Asshole, she was talking to a troll, they’re already dead between the ears. I can’t say about the fuck off part. The brain dead is self-evident.
In fact, you too need to FUQ OFF and die, right away!
danielx
Ooh! Awards! Will this be anything like the Kippies? I can’t wait to vote for Ron Fournier to be awarded The Purple Teardrop with Clutched Pearls cluster.
Omnes Omnibus
@PNW_WarriorWoman: I notice that you didn’t end by saying “I am not a kook.”
sunny raines
Charlies need to read Clay Shirky’s “There is No Such Thing As A Protest Vote”: https://medium.com/@cshirky/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-protest-vote-c2fdacabd704#.8sc4qla41
here’s the money quote: “Citizens who vote for third-party candidates, write-in candidates, or nobody aren’t voting their conscience, they are voting their ego, unable to accept that a system they find personally disheartening actually applies to them.”
SiubhanDuinne
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym:
Good news! Congratulations, TTP!
J R in WV
@central texas:
You do that, shitstain. The rest of us are going to do whatever we can to insure that she is elected with a landslide.
In the meantime, you just go off in a quiet corner and fuck yourself with a nail gun. A framing nail gun.
BruceFromOhio
That picture makes me think that the lawn guy forget his iPhone.
aimai
@Bob: I’m 56 years old.
SiubhanDuinne
@aimai:
Even Cheney?
SiubhanDuinne
@srv:
There’s that pesky number again.
SiubhanDuinne
@aimai:
Brava, aimai!
SiubhanDuinne
@Trollhattan:
So basically you wanted to hear him say “colossal dick” out loud.
central texas
@grandpa john:
Yes, and so can the ideologues who have found the true religion. Allow me to introduce J.R. from WV, the voice of reasoned argument and logic, so very, very different from all those thoughtless, immature bernie-boys. Most convincing.
222
J R in WV says:
August 9, 2016 at 8:00 pm
@central texas:
You do that, shitstain. The rest of us are going to do whatever we can to insure that she is elected with a landslide.
In the meantime, you just go off in a quiet corner and fuck yourself with a nail gun. A framing nail gun.
central texas
@Miss Bianca:
Your forbearance is likewise noted. I am aware that she has not advocated the murder of the republican candidate and since you seem to think that is sufficiency noteworthy, good for her. It remains my opinion that while no one has explicitly said, “She can do no wrong”, there is precisely zero tolerance of any form of questioning or criticism of any of her record, positions, or current performance. In tone and quality of argument, I find very little to differentiate this sort of passion from that of the Bernie-or-Bust idiots. Below, J.R. in WV, makes an apt example at 222.
To be clear, I have every intention of voting for her and other Democrats as I have done since Kennedy; some with more enthusiasm than others.
ShadeTail
Charlie Pierce is good on a number of beats, and he knows how to turn a phrase. But when it comes to election horse-racery, he’s utterly clueless. Sorry, but he is. He also, tragically, subscribes simultaneously to the Green Lantern theory of presidenting, and to the idea that the President can do absolutely nothing without Congress passing a bill to allow it (which requires a high level of cognitive dissonance, since the two notions are almost direct contradictions).
kmeyer the lurker
I know I’m late to the party but this trophy really needs to be in the shape of a fainting couch.
MoeLarryAndJesus
@aimai: Yeah, that’s it, you shallow millennial shithead. People despise Kissinger and his acts because he’s a “jew.” Yeah, that’s totally it.
How do people as shatteringly stupid as you avoid drowning in the shower?
Next you’ll say we abhor Rusty Calley because we don’t like nicknames. You’ll have to look old Rusty up. He never gets mentions on TMZ.
ShadeTail
@MoeLarryAndJesus: Wow. Apparently, reading comprehension isn’t your friend, to put it mildly.
Vanya
Hilary is no 60s radical, and she certainly does not hate Kissinger as much as CP and most leftists of his generation wish she would. In retrospect, does Hilary agree that Pinochet was better for Chile than Allende? Probably, like most people. There are no perfect politicians. Hilary has shown she is perfectly willing to use state-sanctioned violence in pursuit of larger goals, as has Obama for that matter. And after living through the Bush/Cheney years, Kissingerian cynicism and power politics doesn’t look quite as bad as neo-con fundamentalism. Kissinger is a bad man, certainly, but in politics you generally don’t get to only make deals with angels if you want to succeed. Charlie’s petrified 1960s instincts are leading him astray.
Dan Riley
Putting Charles Pierce in the non-hack category seems overly kind. CP has succeeded in turning his blog into the closest thing the Internet has to a high school cafeteria…with a kewl kids table and all (“OH, look, there goes Vice Principal Granny Starver with Nurse Dumbass of the North….sitting in a tree…K-I-S-S-I-N-G….hee…hee…”). And every once in a while old Mister Dead Poets Society stops sniffing the snark from the bottle in his bottom drawer long enough to turn out something genuinely weepy and elegiac to remind the kids of what he was before their adoration got to him. Anyway, as to the question raised above if Charles Pierce is a misogynist due to his incessant abuse of Hillary Clinton, I’m here to tell you as someone who has swum in the same baptismal waters, we Catholic boys were raised to view women as virgins or whores…and in Charlie’s still boyish eyes, Elizabeth Warren is virgin and Hillary Clinton is whore. It’s that simple. And for more such deft analysis, I submit this:
http://thenobbyworks.blogspot.com/2016/08/sophies-choice-2016.html
Lee Hartmann
@Dan Riley: @Dan Riley: you sir, are an idiot.
Lee Hartmann
and by the way, Betty, much as I enjoy your writing, CPP has your number. I remember all too well what Henry the K accomplished, and while in Michigan I will be voting for HRC, I sympathise entirely.
Also too, for all the blog whining here 30 years ago blah blah blah, putting that aside if one looks at his long-form pieces, CPP is a much better writer than anyone I have encountered here.
and someone is wrong on the internet.
seospider
@Dan Riley: It is funny that someone criticizes CPP writing style using that same style.
Beatnik Bob
@Villago Delenda Est: I’ll never forget the day John Cole called me a fucking moron for criticizing Obama for not fighting for a public option instead of the Heritage Foundation plan Hillary rejected in 1993 that became the ACA. He accused me of helping to sabotage Obama’s re-election, and tagged his response “Black Jimmy Carter”.
John Cole and Betsy aren’t good enough political commentators to tie Charles P. Pierce’s SHOES.
Fuck you both, and I’m glad to be reminded that I have a good reason to avoid this POS website. Yeah, we agree much more than not, but comparing the incomparable Charles P. with Andrew Sullivan is yet one more bridge too far. Almost as bad as calling me PERSONALLY a fucking moron.
Slaughter
Oh, come on. Pierce can afford to throw away a Democratic vote in Massachusetts. I won’t in pinkish Arizona, as much as I loathe Kissinger, who let 35,000 more guys die in Vietnam so he and Nixon could “save face.”
Bern
@schrodinger’s cat:
• funnier than most anyone else writing political comment
• close to 20/20 vision re: how politics worked back then and how it has not changed
• pretty much still loves New Orleans
(he loses points for accepting comments only via facebook – I hate facebook with the heat of a billion blazing galaxies – and thus have never commented there)
DocAmazing
It would be nice if I believed that Clinton–drone-lovin’, Iraq-war-approvin’, Honduras-coup-friendly Clinton–really wouldn’t go down a Kissingeresque path. Sorry, too much history there for me to give her the benefit of the doubt.
Dan Riley
@seospider: Thanks for noticing.
DocAmazing
@Vanya :
In retrospect, does Hilary agree that Pinochet was better for Chile than Allende? Probably, like most people.
That’s just scary. You really think the mass-murdering fascist was the better ruler? And you wonder why people on the left mistrust many “liberals”?
HelloRochester
Hobnobbing with politically expedient genocidal monsters is not really something Democrats should tolerate; this is part of that set of bad Clinton political stincts that Bernie helped keep in check. While I would never let Trump get any closer to winning PA by shitting away my vote in protest here, it certainly doesn’t make it easier for me to vote for Hillary. Comparing Pierce to Sully for that piece is kind of bullshit @bettycracker
Christian Roettger
@aimai: the point is not that Negroponte is voting for HRC. The point is that HRC is mentioning this on her webpage and her campaign even has this picture of them together. It won’t mean a huge deal, I keep my fingers crossed that he won’t even have any influence. But it sends all the wrong signals about her foreign policy hawkishness to people like me. Grrrrr. Same with Kissinger. And leave Charlie Pierce alooone! he’s smart enough to know he only has the luxury of “performance art” voting because he lives in MS. Also, “running up the score” is nice but is it worth this kind of stunt? is the stunt even helping? after 70 Repub dignitaries have endorsed you, do you really need 71?