“[Conway] would shill for Trump in extensive fashion and then she would get off the air, the camera would be turned off, the microphone would be taken off and she would say ‘Blech, I need to take a shower,’ because she disliked her candidate so much,” Brzezinski said Monday.
“‘I have to take a shower because it feels so dirty to be saying what I’m saying,'” Brzezinski described Conway as saying. “I guess she’s just used to it now.”
Honestly who cares what troubles Kellyanne’s beautiful mind, but it might piss Twitler off so I hope it gets a lot of play.
schrodingers_cat
Jo’s ho says, what? Why should I care, what these two adulterous Beltway hacks have to say?
dmsilev
So, I guess the message we’re supposed to take away from this is that like an “honest” politician, Conway is an honest shill in that she’ll say anything as long as the checks continue to clear?
I suppose I can believe that.
Major Major Major Major
Considering the source (Washington Examiner, right-wing rag), I guess the knives are out for Kellyanne.
Raoul
I’m way more bothered by the checks that are clearing for Ryan and McConnell.
sharl
{…Feeling good that I get one of Doug’s musical references…
…Then realizing how old that song is, and feeling kinda down again…} ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
feebog
Conway was never a true believer. She is a mouth for hire, as demonstrated by her previous role with a rival campaign in which she denigrated Trump during every appearance. At some point, as the heat grows, she will jump ship.
NobodySpecial
@Major Major Major Major: Look, it’s like a porcupine festival in the White House, EVERYONE has knives out.
hovercraft
Twitler really does need to get his house in order. Between this Spokes Cobra revelation, my favorite part of the article is:
This from a woman who is worth 30 million.
And the POLITICO story about his staff feeding him “fake” news to sway him:
Politico: Trump Aides Pass (Sometimes Fake) Reading Material To Sway Policy
So unlike the Cheney and Co. who planted stories to fool the public, the staff are planting stories to fool their boss. SAD!
Raoul
@feebog: Come for the grift, leave before the indictments!
*If you have a decent sense of timing, that is. And Kellyanne is probably enough of a self-protecting mercenary that she will manage to just keep her nose clean enough…
walden
who’ll be the manager, who’ll be the monitor?
Just askin’
Betty Cracker
Sounds plausible to me; Conway switched her flack cap from Cruz to Trump on a dime, so I never suspected her of being true to her convictions. However, I do think it honestly pisses her off that winning the presidency didn’t automatically confer respectability on Twitler and minions such as herself. You’d think people who spent their careers trying to delegitimize Democrats wouldn’t be so naive, but they seem genuinely wounded by it. Good!
I also hope Twitler catches wind of it and shitcans her sorry ass. I’m tired of lunging for my remote every time her mug looms into view on my TV. There are rumors (no idea how plausible) that Twitler will clean house soon, getting rid of Spicer, Priebus and Bannon in one fell swoop. Add Kellyanne to the rubbish pile! I’m sure Javanka can split domestic and international affairs between them!
Thoroughly Pizzled
I hope Kellyanne shrivels up like a dead sponge.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@feebog: Adam S. always said whoever she works for, she’s really working for the Mercers. I’m convinced. In one of those long profiles that were out about a month ago, she described Rebekah Mercer as one of her best friends. The other was Ann Coulter.
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: Can we have a T free thread. How are your goggies and chickens?
mapaghimagsik
Is it to piss Twitler off, or is it to humanize monsters? Perhaps it’s to keep Joe and Co (dependant) relevant.
Jeffro
Think of how something like “ugh now I need to take a shower” will play in to Trumpov’s already massively self-loathing, overcompensating self-image.
He’s going to stroke out and then we’ll all owe Kellyanne a huge favor.
Ian G.
And Himmler was apparently nauseated by what went on at places like Auschwitz.
Fuck her. I only hope this revelation sends Dolt 45’s McDonald’s-boosted blood pressure a little higher.
MattF
The true Trump loyalists are Roger Stone, Sean Hannity, the Kushners…
hovercraft
@feebog:
I don’t think she’ll have to jump, I suspect she’ll be part of the purge that is coming. Apparently the only thing holding him back right now is his glorious trip where he will show the world just how a truly glorious leader does it. He’s already behind because he was supposed to have spent the last week “studying” and preparing for his meetings, but instead he fired Comey and a shitstorm ensued and he’s been distracted from his studies. SAD! Si I guess when we here reports from other leaders about how ignorant and unprepared he was, this will be his excuse, he was busy trying to clean up his mess to get a clue.
sharl
OT, for Elizabelle if she is around – more on this absurdly fascinating train wreck among some grifters and the Beautiful People who believed them:
Paul in KY
One thing she has done for me is make me pine just a bit for the general honesty & forthrightness of Ari Fleisher. Oh, those were the days…
Raoul
@Thoroughly Pizzled: I’m pretty sure her liver is working on that project right now.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@dmsilev:
The oldest profession, yes? “Oh baby, you’re the best, I’ve never felt like this with anyone else…. oh, leave it on the nightstand.”
MattF
@sharl: …and the estate of Pablo Escobar.
smintheus
Now she’s the one playing the janitor, and nobody’s able to monitor Trump.
Elizabelle
@schrodingers_cat: Agreed! T free thread, mandatory. There is a life beyond that maroon. Let’s not put greennotGreen’s family through it, every thread. Or us!
But here is something to amuse you. Librarians know. Seen in a bookstore in Santa Monica, CA. It’s a Facebook photo link.
ET
I would say that when o e crawls in bed with dogs one should expect fleas, but that is insulting to the dogs.
But I hope Trump sees this and creates more White House chaos.
Elizabelle
@sharl: Oh, thank you. Delectable.
Fyre Festival is rather a huge object lesson, is it not? A Bonfire of the Vanities for the Age of (Senile) Trump.
mdblanche
This.
Mnemosyne
@Betty Cracker:
Yep — it never once occurred to them that encouraging their followers to disrespect Democrats would rebound on them. Faces, leopards, etc.
It’s also that belief that a lot of racist white people have that they should automatically receive deference and respect just for being white, and that they should always receive that respect regardless of their actions. That ain’t the way the world works anymore, so they’re perpetually pissed off about it.
Corner Stone
@MattF:
Woah, woah, woah. Dial it back here a bit, amigo. None of those people are even close to “true Trump loyalists”.
To have loyalists you have to believe in loyalty. Trump pays lip service to it, all the media keep saying it is important to Trump, but just like they tried to sell us that he was a good man because “look at his kids”, the truth is Trump knows nothing of loyalty to anyone or anything. Lots of people here keep saying the only person he won’t throw under the bus is Ivanka but I call bullshit. She’s damaged goods if he needs her gone.
Mnemosyne
@Elizabelle:
Have I mentioned lately what a relief it is to live in Southern California? It’s so comforting to know that the vast majority of the people I interact with every day hate Trump as much as I do.
Mary G
Joe and Mika and their little cabal have no credibility with me. They gave Twitler a yooge amount of airtime and attention during the primary, to the point where he was caught on a hot mike telling them to go easy on the questions, OK. They delighted in the ratings his unhinged mind brought in.
Now that the tides have turned they’re abandoning his sinking ship and coming up with these comments about KC months later to sink the knives into him. If they knew that last year, why’d they keep booking her?
Weaselone
@sharl:
So they’re going to get money from what entity exactly? A couple of models/spokespeople that did advertising? The hucksters at the top? All they’re doing is tossing more money down the rat hole paying for lawyers.
laura
Well somebodies bound to be found dead in the trunk of a burning car if this keeps up.
Would it be wrong to speculate who?
Chris
@Betty Cracker:
She was complaining about exactly this back in January, if you recall.
“We get no respect! We get no deference! He’s the president of the United States, for God’s sake!”
Corner Stone
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
But she said her mom had been sick and she just needed a little help with making the rent!
pamelabrown53
Hey, Doug!, I’m not sure whether to praise you for such a clever use of a song title or curse you for the earworm. Additionally, when I read something like your post (NEVER watch the show), I get a delusion that somehow Mika’s father has convinced her that she could and should do some good with her platform. However, so far I’m more convinced that it’s a Lucy and the football thing.
Still, the optimist in me hopes that a few Trump voters saw this and somehow it at least added to their discomfort for their Trump vote. Have to maintain hope.
rikyrah
THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 5/12/17
Klobuchar: Investigators ‘will get to the bottom’ of Trump-Russia
Senator Amy Klobuchar, member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, talks with Rachel Maddow about the pressure Democrats are exerting on the Department of Justice for a special prosecutor in the Trump-Russia investigation.
Hal
I think I’ve only seen Conway on TV once or twice in the last two months. Has she been on more and I just missed her? A few weeks ago I was thinking there was going to be a missing person’s bulletin on her.
hovercraft
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Yes she’s “close” to the Mercers, the same way ones personal maid is “close” to her employer. As for Ann Coulter, they came up together, they were groomed to be a bulwark against the liberal mainstream media.
http://www.pensitoreview.com/2007/02/19/scaife-recants-arkansas-project/
Chris
@Mnemosyne:
Yeah, and this explains their voting and their general pathologies these days more than just about anything else.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Thoroughly Pizzled:
That’s the joke with her, like SNL saying she was let out of her crypt for an appearance, that she’s dried up and out from selling her soul. I don’t know that we make the same quasi-sexual insults about men.
KAC is not unattractive, by any means, at least physically… but it’s the money-grubbing, mean girl interior that is dreadful.
Males who are mean girls we simply call bullies, thugs, knuckledraggers… Bannon is such. Now that I mention it though, he actually also looks dried up and grotesque.
Roger Moore
@MattF:
I’m not sure about Stone and Hannity. I don’t think there are any true believers outside the family.
MattF
@West of the Rockies (been a while): Bannon keeps a portrait of his liver hidden in his attic.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@pamelabrown53: I’ve never seen it either, just clips, including the one where Zbig told Scarborough, “Your grasp of geo-politics is remarkably shallow”, and I think he was including his daughter in the “your”. I get the sense Papa Zbig was not a Robert Young-type dad.
This is just schadenfreude, may bet KA fired or at least put back in the crypt for a couple of weeks. And may lead to trump asking the king of Saudi Arabia in front of cameras if he’s ever heard of these two losers Joe and Mika. And maybe make it harder for Andy Lack to shitcan Lawrence O’Donnell, now that there are floating rumors that trump has personally campaigned against O’D with NBC brass
MattF
@Roger Moore: On further consideration I agree about Stone– he’d betray anyone– but Hannity is the real thing, IMO.
rikyrah
‘We are a cautionary tale’: Kansas feels the pain of massive Trump-style tax cuts
In 2012, Kansas did what Donald Trump wants to do: it introduced huge tax cuts to try to boost growth. Today, the state is out of money – and residents are angry
by Dominic Rushe in Kansas
Kansas is broke – but you wouldn’t guess it looking at its shining state capitol in Topeka. The imposing limestone monument, crowned by a shiny copper dome and limned with John Steuart Curry’s luminous murals, has just undergone a $325m facelift. What’s happening inside the state house is a lot less pretty, and may well foreshadow the far uglier battle looming over the future of taxation in the United States.
Trump under fire over ‘huge tax cut for the rich’
Read more
Last month, Donald Trump’s two key economic allies, the treasury secretary. Stephen Mnuchin. and Trump’s chief economic adviser, Gary Cohn, unveiled the outline of Donald Trump’s much-trailed tax plan. The biggest tax cuts “in history” would slash taxes for business, simplify taxes for everyone else, and “pay for themselves” by stimulating economic growth, Trump’s fiscal duo claimed.
The plan’s similarity to the one that has left Kansas in crisis is “unbelievable”, according to Duane Goossen, the former Kansas secretary of administration.
The economic spirit behind Trump’s plan is Arthur Laffer – the go-to guru of “supply-side economics” since the Reagan era, and one of the architects of Kansas governor Sam Brownback’s original tax plan.
The former member of Reagan’s economic policy advisory board is best known for the “Laffer curve”, an illustration of the theory (not his own) that economic activity is tied to taxation, and that lower taxes, up to a point, mean more revenues.
……………………………….
Campaigning for re-election in 2014, Brownback pledged his tax plans would add 100,000 new jobs over four years. By March this year, the state had added just 12,400 private-sector jobs. Kansas isn’t even keeping up with its neighbors. Hiring in Kansas increased by 0.3% in the last year; Missouri’s growth rate over that same period was 1.4%, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The prop of the Brownback plan, as with Trump’s, was a huge cut to taxes paid by limited liability companies (LLCs) – and so-called “pass-through” businesses – which meant independent business owners would pay no state tax on the bulk, if not all, of their income. Those businesses would then go out and invest and create new jobs, or so the argument went.
At the time, Kansas had about 190,000 LLCs. Now it has about 300,000, but so far they have not spurred a new hiring drive in the state. “There is no evidence whatsoever that suggests this plan worked,” said Goossen.
Corner Stone
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
To each their own and all that, but…what?
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Elizabelle:
My local B&N has her book on a side shelf facing the cafeteria… looks like one copy has been sold. Ivanka and her loathsome toad brothers are money pigs.
Mnemosyne
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Nah, Bannon looks bloated and sweaty, like he woke up on a bench at the Port Authority covered in vomit and doesn’t remember how he got there.
We are in a tricky corner with Conway, though. I hate to use the prostitute/whore slam against women, but when you have someone who’s selling the country out for money …
hovercraft
@Paul in KY:
Unfortunately I’ve fallen off the wagon and been watching cable news again the last couple of weeks and sadly they’ve been having Fleischer on to comment about the train wreck that’s currently going on, and I’m sad to say, Ari is just as sleazy and unprincipled as he ever was. I’m glad that he’s not in the White House right now, he’s a much better and smother liar and he almost makes his lies and excuses for the goings on sound plausible. No Twitler has the spokespeople he deserves they are stupid and incompetent liars just like him let them all fry together, changing personnel will not help, he is the problem, Fleischer would be a better liar but he’d still be selling a shit sandwich.
trollhattan
@sharl:
Not especially common knowledge, the song, penned by Graham Nash, was about Marianne Faithfull. One further fun fact, Carrie Anne Moss of Matrix fame was named after the song.
Elizabelle
@Mary G: Der Trump offered to officiate at Mika and Schmoe’s wedding, although they declined. That he would offer, and the engagement is recent news, does not make them all sound that much on the outs.
@Corner Stone: Incidentally, there’s a documentary out about Roger Stone this very moment. In theatres and on Netflix. From the Fuck the Fucking New York Times, an arm’s length (and ten foot pole) review by Mahnola Dargis.
Be forewarned; link brings up the accompanying photo: Stone’s unclothed back with the full Nixon in view.
Corner Stone
@hovercraft:
I’m glad you posted this because that is the only thing KAC is a true believer in – pure hatred of Clinton and CDS.
low-tech cyclist
@sharl:
OK, so the song is old, and we remember when it was on the radio because it was in the top 40, so…eh, so what?
I for one have no intention of letting the increasingly vast sweep of time I remember say anything to me about how old I am. As long as my body agrees with me that I’m not old, then I’m not old.
rikyrah
Farmworkers get sick after Trump’s EPA reverses Obama and approves poison that damages kids’ brains
David Edwards DAVID EDWARDS
15 MAY 2017 AT 10:25 ET
Doozens of farmworkers were pulled out of the fields last week after they were poisoned by a chemical that was recently approved by President Donald Trump’s administration — even though the previous administration had taken steps to ban it.
KTEG reported that at least 50 farmworkers were exposed to the pesticide on Friday, causing cabbage harvesting operations to be shut down at Dan Andrews Farms.
“We started getting an odor, pesticide odor, coming in from the mandarin orchards west of our field,” Dan Andrews supervisor Efron Zavalza told the station.
Zavalza explained that Vulcan pesticide, which contains a poison called chlorpyrifos, was sprayed on the orchards the night before workers came to work the cabbage fields.
“I’m not pointing fingers or saying it was done incorrectly. It was just an unfortunate thing the way it was drifted. The wind came and pushed everything east and you know we were caught in the path,” he observed.
…………….
According to Mother Jones, the Obama administration had taken steps to effectively ban the use of chlorpyrifos, but that changed after Trump appointed Scott Pruitt to lead the EPA.
“By reversing the previous Administration’s steps to ban one of the most widely used pesticides in the world, we are returning to using sound science in decision-making – rather than predetermined results,” the agency said in a statement in March
Mnemosyne
@hovercraft:
It’s so interesting to me that Ted Olson (Barbara’s widower) was a true believer in the early Bush II years (he was W’s Solicitor General) and slowly transitioned to the side of the good guys to the point where he was the one who argued in favor of gay marriage at the Supreme Court.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Corner Stone:
Story is, Cornerstone, that Stone has been whispering about a Trump presidency since the 80s. He may be a TB.
Elizabelle
Manners dictate that I take down my comment calling Kellyanne a skanky hoe.
Sad!
rikyrah
Trump’s son to attend private school in Maryland
Reuters REUTERS
15 MAY 2017 AT 12:11 ET
U.S. S. President Donald Trump’s youngest son, 11-year-old Barron, will attend a private school just outside Washington in the fall, the White House said on Monday.
His enrollment at Andrew’s Episcopal School in Potomac, Maryland, comes as he prepares to move to the White House with his mother, first lady Melania Trump. When Trump took office on Jan. 20, Barron stayed behind in New York City with his mother to finish out his current school year.
Melania Trump announced the choice of school in a statement.
“The mission of St. Andrew’s is ‘to know and inspire each child in an inclusive community dedicated to exceptional teaching, learning, and service,’ all of which appealed to our family,” she said.
St. Andrew’s, located about 18 miles (30 km) northwest of the White House, or about a 30-minute drive, has 580 students enrolled from preschool through grade 12, according to the school. Annual tuition for upper grades is about $40,000, and all of its students go on to college, its website said.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Mnemosyne:
Did OC vote for Hillary?
hovercraft
@Corner Stone:
There was a Twitler biographer on TV this morning saying that he has a very tight group of people, a handful who have been with him for 20 to 20 years, and he and they are fiercely loyal to each other, then you have the next layer from whom he expects them to be loyal as well, but he regards them as expendable. The only people in the White House who I think fall into the first category are Javanka, the rest are just pawns waiting to be sacrificed.
germy
And when KAC was working for the Cruz campaign her criticisms of herr drumpf were actually right on the money.
Fair Economist
@Mary G: Along the lines of what I was thinking. Why did Miki and Scarborough keep this secret in 2016 and go public now? This is fishy.
mai naem mobile
It’s a pity we don’t get a 47% tape from one of the domestic help of one of these RW pundits, except it’s them showing utter contempt for flyover country and southern hicks. If you notice, they all send their kids to elite ‘liberal’ private schools and then to the elite liberal colleges. They somehow dI not send them to Liberry Univ or Bob Jones Univ.
sharl
@Weaselone:
I assume their assorted lawyers and advisers have explained the cost-benefit analysis to them, but I’m guessing that when you have so much money, you have the luxury of taking legal actions with little or no promise of ROI, just to massage your wounded ego if nothing else.
And there may be a sensible reason for some of the corporate entities and active business people to file lawsuits: as a precaution to anyone else who might want to rip them off in the future. I don’t know if that will work against truly entrepreneurial, high-risk, balls-to-the-wall grifters, but might make more sensible wannabe grifters think twice.
I am not now, nor have a ever been filthy rich, so I’m just spitballin’ here…
germy
@low-tech cyclist: I seem to remember a song that came later (Ariel?) that was an almost exact copy of the original. An “homage” I suppose.
Fair Economist
@Mnemosyne:
Only on that one topic. He’s still a shill for the 1% otherwise. This is more a demonstration that even generally vile people can have streaks of decency in them.
trollhattan
@Mary G: For sure. Maybe they’re having a genuine shared “Oops, what have we here?” moment but it’s way to late for their purported Road to Damascus conversion to carry any meaning.
BTW, John Oliver’s set of clips with Joe demeaning Mika on camera was off-the-charts cringe-worthy. Methinks it’s Stockholm syndrome on her part. Wonder what dad thinks?
Domestic Short Hair Tabby fka...
@sharl: HaHa, me too ;-)
Elizabelle
@rikyrah: Poor commuters. What a pain in the ass to have Barron commuting to school in Maryland, and not that close in Maryland.
Maybe Melania and Barron will live on campus. Right.
Corner Stone
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Stone is a true believer all right. In Roger Stone.
hovercraft
@Hal:
She was MIA for a while, her lying was that bad, and it just goes to show how desperate they are now. APlus I suspect that SNL’s take pissed Lord Small Hands off.
Watch Where in the World is Kellyanne Conway From Saturday Night Live
ETA Live
mai naem mobile
@Fair Economist: because Lumpy isn’t coming on their show anymore. Before, they were getting big ratings from having Lumpy on. BTW, I think the engagement is also to get rid of Lumpys threat of revealing them fooling around while they were still married to their exes.
Irony Abounds
To the extent that anyone not completely in thrall with Trump had even a modicum of respect left for Kellyanne Goebbels it was destroyed with her defense of the Comey firing and her taking umbrage over anyone challenging the theory that the firing was based on Rosenstein’s recommendation. Since her lie was immediately refuted by the Orange Shitgibbon himself, people are finally saying enough is enough and will say stuff that will get her fired.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@germy: oh, christ, I remember that one. This one?
Corner Stone
@hovercraft:
Trump has never been tested like this before. Going bankrupt was more of a game to play chicken with the banks. Otherwise he crushed small time vendors and contractors because he knew they couldn’t fight back.
We’ll see what he thinks about loyalty when nut cutting time arrives, if we are ever to be so lucky.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Mnemosyne:
Agreed. Yeah, Bannon is a bloated, spoiled toxin-sausage.
Agreed about prostitute jokes, too, but if the KAC Morning Joe story is true, whore is not an inappropriate term.
germy
@trollhattan:
I’m not a psychologist, but people with low enough self esteem to accept that sort of treatment usually got practice from one or both parents.
hovercraft
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
I’m a short fat black woman who will never win any beauty contests, but WTF, that woman looks like an ugly emaciated scare crow. Yes she is unattractive!
ETA: Her personality and behavior makes her even uglier.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
CNBC: FBI Probe Could Undermine Bernie Sanders Political Clout
I wonder how many pissed off people left behind in Burlington are out to get these two now.
Corner Stone
I can’t recall where but I recently saw a picture linked off twitter that was part of the series during the RNC where Trump slapped Ivanka’s ass and stared down her dress cleavage.
Except this one was with his hand on her right under her left boob, his eyes closed and his face raised like he was going in for a kiss to the cheek. I don’t know if it was just a good still frame or if it may have been photoshopped. But it was a whole new level of disgusting if it was an actual picture.
Jeffro
@rikyrah: St. Andrews better cash that deposit check, and quick. At the rate things are going, Melania and Barron might be staying in New York this fall, making the occasional visitation day trip out to Florence, CO every now and then.
/daydream
mai naem mobile
@rikyrah: if I was Melania I would commute daily to DC and continue at the same NYC school because Lumpy won’t be there for long.
smintheus
@rikyrah:
Let’s hope that Obama never decries DDT, or Trump will bring that back as well.
ruemara
I have never understood finding comity with a viper. However, I think this open discussion of her whorish tendencies would hardly be a deal breaker for this administration.
In other fun news, I just found out I’m going to have to eat 8 hours of travel time because my employer has never understood that travel time means the full amount of travel, not just what puts you at 40 hr limit.
germy
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Yup, that’s it. It was on the radio CONSTANTLY when it first came out. Did that guy ever make another record? There are some songs I heard way too much in the ’70s that make me queasy if I hear them today.
Also, from the same school of ripping off an older song, I’m reminded of Billy Joel’s “Longest Time” being an almost exact copy of some older doo wop song I can’t remember the title of.
Mr Stagger Lee
One of the best skits on SNL involving Kellyanne(Kate McKinnon) was the one where Kellyanne tries to take a day off but has to deal with new blow ups in the Trump campaign and has to answer the charges on CNN.classic skit.
eclare
@Corner Stone: That is an interesting opinion. I mainly lurk, but I like your comments. Hmmm…
GregB
The bell may be tolling fir poor Kellyann. In order to breathe life into cadaverous credibility, the spinsters are spinning she was a Good German, but only because she was trying to make a dishonest buck.
The Trump Shit Vortex consumes another one.
hovercraft
@Mnemosyne:
His appointment as Solicitor General was seen as many as a reward feeding Kenn Star and thereby preventing Al Gore from winning outright, and then he truly solidified his standing by arguing Bush vs Gore. His good deeds re. gay marriage do not compensate for the harm he has done to the world, IMHO. The Bush presidency was a travesty from start to finish, it established that an ignorant incurious man could be president and cause “no harm” in the eyes of a party that is as unscrupulous as the current ruling party. Anything is acceptable to them so long as they get to appoint corporate judges and pass tax cuts for the rich. Throw in unfettered drilling and screwing black and brown people and you are golden.
germy
from rawstory:
Elizabelle
@Jeffro: I endorse that daydream.
Cyber Barron may not have to move schools, after all.
School selection probably just announced as a dig at Trump’s detractors: my wife will too deign to move closer than four states away, and she’s bringing the kid too. Get used to me being in Washington this fall.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Jeffro:
Not to pick on a kid, but great, another spoiled brat going to boarding school. Why do I think we’ll end up with Draco and not Longbottom?
MattF
@rikyrah: It occurs to me that this could mean the Trumps might be acquiring a pied-à-terre in my neighborhood. Oy.
mr_gravity
@Corner Stone: Disagree. I think Ivanka is safe at least until the handcuffs snap shut. Remember: she is the only one who has something Cheeto wants.
Uday and Quasay? Not so much.
Shana
@sharl: My daughter recently got back in touch with a “boyfriend” from middle school. They had bonded over left wing politics and punk rock. This was during the Bush years and they’re both about 26 now. Anyway, she went to a house party where his band was playing and his mom was there wearing a shirt that said ” Yeah, I’m old, but I saw all the good bands” Too late for a Mother’s Day present, but I want one of those.
Roger Moore
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Yes. 50.94% for Clinton to 42.35% for trump. Clinton came one county (Del Norte) short of winning the whole coast.
sharl
@trollhattan:
Thanks for that background! It was the rare DJ back in my hometown who would discuss the story behind the songs he* played (*very few “she’s” as DJs then). Had it occurred to me back then, and my cash holdings permitting, I probably would have looked for a magazine that told those kind of stories about how songs were conceived and born (as opposed to bios and glossy promo-photos of rock stars).
@low-tech cyclist: Your attitude is commendable, as – my bouts with low-level depression notwithstanding – one I also try to adopt. My comment was more of a self-targeted joke at how little I know of music beyond old top-40 stuff. Most of DougJ’s titles soar over my head.
@Shana: Hah, that’s a lovely story!
smintheus
@germy: Recently I realized that Foghat’s “Chateau Lafitte ’59 Boogie” (1974) is based on a riff stolen from a Rory Gallagher barnburner, “When You’ll Be Mine”, that he used to play in concerts in ’72 (he never recorded it). Foghat used to tour with Gallagher as their opening act.
ruemara
@Corner Stone: this assessment fits a lot of people who weren’t even out of diapers then.
Aleta
@sharl: The beauty of a yearly festival is that you can use the initial ticket sales and sponsor money to have fun and pay previous debts, like they did, and then just keep it going. Postpone paying whatever festival bills you can until the next year’s tickets sales and donation/sponsor money come in. Keep carrying those bills over into the next year.
You try to get free products for promotion and free labor in exchange for getting close to musicians, access to parties, or internships. You stiff the smaller contractors who eventually settle for less. After the festival you pay what you must out of the money that’s on the books from vendors and tickets.
The medium level musicians get paid after the ticket proceeds are in, and you also pad the show with smaller acts who will appear just for visibility, or a small cut of ‘profits’ from tickets, which can be evaporated on paper. You try to keep them happy with good housing and great green room and parties, paid for by sponsors and donors who want to go to the parties. You invite good looking girls and boys to the musician parties as a kind of barter too.
You trade a lot of tickets for anything you want for yourself, which stays off the books. You barter things like backstage access or hosting private drinks for musicians in exchange for donations that go directly into your pocket. You invite some people to hang out in the musicians’ areas (bartering the musicians in a way) and harvest those favors later when you need something (like a vacation house somewhere). You pay someone to work the press so that it will get bigger every year, and the thing keeps going.
Except they did it wrong.
Peale
@rikyrah: The evidence is that the farmworkers are poor and the manufacturers are rich. Economics and political science are sciences, right?
TenguPhule
@sharl: Fools and their money are swiftly and easily parted.
Weaselone
@sharl:
Makes sense. Having identified themselves as wealthy rubes, ready for the fleecing courtesy of their huge egos, they are signaling to future grifters and conmen that they are prepared to crush them with whatever gets left behind in their wallets.
Elizabelle
@rikyrah: Looking at your excerpt again:
“The mission of St. Andrew’s is ‘to know and inspire each child in an inclusive community dedicated to exceptional teaching, learning, and service,’ all of which appealed to our family,” [Melania’s statement] said.
Because if there’s anything that comes to mind with the Trumps, it’s teaching, learning and service. Service. Debt service?
Mnemosyne
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Yes! First time ever that a Democrat won OC. Even Obama couldn’t do it.
Gretchen
@Betty Cracker: One of the things I was mistakenly looking forward to was that I thought after the election we’d never have to listen to Kellyanne lying and patronizing in her baby voice ever again. Fooled me.
Roger Moore
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Can we substitute “mercenary” for “prostitute” or “whore”? It conveys the same idea that they’re selling services for money and have no loyalty beyond their payment, but it dodges some of the nasty sex shaming problems of calling people prostitutes.
TenguPhule
@laura:
Comey.
I know that Adam has said it would be really really stupid for Trump to even try it. But if there is one consistency about Trump, he’ll always do the stupid thing because he doesn’t believe he will ever suffer real consequences from it.
TenguPhule
@Roger Moore: And prostitutes are good at customer service. The same can’t be said for the Trumpsters.
germy
@smintheus: I’m always fascinated with songs that subtly (or often not so subtly) “borrow” from other songs.
I was curious enough to check wikipedia for info on the guy who had the one hit with “Ariel” . . . and he’s still going strong, except now he has no record contract and sells everything from his website.
Back in 1975, anyone with a song and a pulse got signed up by the record companies. They’d get a ton of publicity, get supported on tour. Of course, most of them didn’t have the ability to duplicate their success, and so they’d fade away. The “Ariel” guy did advertising work.
Aspiring singer/songwriters nowadays are mostly DIY. They have to be artists, publicists, record producers, managers, businesspeople, the whole ball of wax. The days of the deep-pocketed record companies are over.
Chris
@Gretchen:
That was me with Trump’s goddamn accent. Guy’s pretty well ruined New Yawk dialect for me.
Mnemosyne
@rikyrah:
It seems odd that they didn’t pick Sidwell Friends, which is where the Obama girls and Chelsea Clinton went. Makes me wonder again if the rumors are true and Barron has learning disabilities that they don’t want to be made public.
Elizabelle
@Roger Moore: Mercenary is great. What’s more, Kellyanne might consider it a compliment.
Anyhoo, back to Barron’s schooling: LOL that some of the Raw story commenters are suggesting that Melania can use Barron’s being in school in Maryland as an excuse not to move back to NYC when Trump gets dumped out of the Oval Office.
Ridnik Chrome
@Thoroughly Pizzled: Now I have this song stuck in my head…
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Professional sex workers will refuse to do things that disgust them morally or make them uncomfortable Conway, just saying.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Mnemosyne:
I was born down there, Fullerton… left 40-some years ago. A sister remains there; she’s a RW church of prosperity sort. I hope the leftward momentum sticks.
smintheus
@germy: I guess the classic case of pop larceny is George Harrison’s ridiculously blatant theft (“My Sweet Lord”) of The Chiffon’s huge hit “He’s So Fine”.
Patricia Kayden
@schrodingers_cat: Exactly. Wasn’t Mika all up Trump’s behind during the election cycle? Why does she care how Kellyanne Conwoman handled lying for Trump when she and Joe were okay with Trump’s lies last year?
germy
@smintheus: He even wrote a song about the lawsuit “This Song” and did an amusing video of him in a courtroom to go with it.
Jeffro
@mr_gravity:
I’m going to assume you’re talking about unconditional love and acceptance in this instance, because otherwise…ugh…
The Moar You Know
@Mnemosyne: Do not make the mistake of assuming that anyone working for gay rights is in any other way a liberal. We learned that lesson the hard way in the last mayoral race here in SD. And also with our DA race a decade ago. We don’t learn lessons very well in SoCal.
NorthLeft12
Frankly, comments like hers are so self serving it makes me sick. If she actually had any shred of decency or self respect, she might actually consider providing cover for Deadbeat Donald and his sleazy cronies.
I wonder how she will explain to her children and grandchildren the part she played in making the Trump presidency possible?
Hopefully, it will not be as a way to pass the time in their fallout shelter. Yeah, I said it.
SenyorDave
@West of the Rockies (been a while): KAC is not unattractive
If you are a 50 year old guy hitting the singles bars with a half dozen drinks in him and looking for a one night stand, KAC is the woman you wake up next to in the morning and think to yourself, “OMFG, WTF did I do last night?”
germy
@smintheus: Jeff Lynne took “I Heard It Through The Grapevine” and changed it to “Showdown”. And of course Led Zeppelin was sued by the estate of Ritchie Valens, and the Beach Boys were sued by Chuck Berry. Both got songwriter credits and $.
Chris
@Mnemosyne:
More likely the presidential man-child simply took one look at it and went “if the Kenyan thinks it’s good, I’m not touching it!”
Corner Stone
@Gretchen:
I am with you on this. I was delirious with the idea that once the election was over we would never, ever, have to hear from these D Class surrogates again. KAC, Epshteyn, Pearson. All of them would go away to some oblivion I never had to hear again.
I’m just as pissed these incompetent fools and scammers got any airtime that I am Russia got Trump elected. Ok, not quite. But it’s close.
The Moar You Know
@smintheus: An even worse example is Sheryl Crow’s blatant ripoff of Stealer’s Wheel “Stuck in the Middle With You” for “All I Wanna Do (Is Have Some Fun)”. COULD NOT BELIEVE that did not go to trial.
Elizabelle
Did we ever hear where the Kellyanne spawn ended up in school? She’s got 12-year old twins and two younger ones. She was whingeing about DC elite private schools not wanting to take her kids, or deal with her, whatevs ….
@Mnemosyne: WRT your comment about Sidwell: maybe it’s just too associated with Democrats (the Obama daughters and Chelsea Clinton), the Biden grandkids, Al Gore’s kids — although Tricia Nixon attended too. Also, it’s a Quaker school. (Nixon’s parents were Quakers.)
Barbara
@sharl: Well of course it had debt because how else would it have been able to put everything in place — entertainment, venue, food, drink and lodging? Skimming through that long article I counted money or investments in excess of $20 million. That would seem to have been enough to at least skate through the event. So I guess the real issue is what happened to it, what was it actually spent on?
ruemara
@Chris: as a NYer, I’d like to point out that his accent is his own degenerate thing.
hovercraft
@Jeffro:
No he means ugh, Twitler wants unconditional love and acceptance from everyone, what he wants from Lucretia is something entirely different.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@SenyorDave:
How do you think those Democrats ended up on Kobach’s Voter Fraud Commission?
TenguPhule
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Mickey Finns?
Mnemosyne
@germy:
A similar thing happened with Coldplay’s song “When I Ruled the World” and a Pat Metheny song a few years ago. To their credit, Coldplay went, Oh, shit, our bad! and settled immediately.
It’s not that uncommon for musicians to get a riff in their heads and forget that it came from another song, but they do need to pay up in that case. Accidental copyright infringement is still infringement.
dogwood
@Chris:
His mother picked the school. Does anyone think Trump has any interest in parenting? Hell, he’s admitted as much over the years. Didn’t even spend Mother’s Day with the wife and kid.
Roger Moore
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
The move to the left is largely a result of changing demographics. Whites are down to around 60% of the population, and non-Hispanic whites are now a minority (44%). As in many places, that demographic shift is driving the remaining whites around the bend, but that tends to just harden the Democratic lean of non-whites.
germy
@ruemara: There is a guy on youtube who takes video of Lumpy’s speeches and overdubs a “sassy” version, without changing a single word. Same inflections, just a bit more . . . sassy.
Chris
@ruemara:
It does sometimes sound not so much like “New York accent” as “parody of a New York accent,” much the same way that Trump’s words often sound more like a parody of business talk than actual business talk. But I wasn’t well versed enough in the intricacies of that city’s accents to be able to tell for sure.
TenguPhule
@Barbara:
A grifter’s quiet retirement to a country without an extradition treaty.
Barbara
@TenguPhule: The organizers do seem to be residents of the Bahamas or some other Caribbean island. A lot of countries will not extradite people for alleged “financial crimes.”
germy
@Mnemosyne: I think it bothers me most when a wealthy, successful songwriter steals the work of someone who has not prospered. Lots of talented artists of color from the ’40s and ’50s spent the ’60s and ’70s doing manual labor because someone took their music and ran with it.
dogwood
Nice to see that the new Miss America, a beautiful, seemingly accomplished Black woman from D.C. thinks access to healthcare is a privilege not a right. Get a good job like she has is the answer.
Elizabelle
@Barbara: WRT the Fyre Festival: I’ve started wondering if — if they really wanted to pull it off — they shouldn’t have just leased a luxury cruise ship, as big or small as they forecast their needs. They’d have all the infrastructure in place; meals, fine wines and spirits; could have moored it off Exuma, if that was possible.
Although that would have taken professional advance planning, and MacFarland was all about models, publicity, social media, and the rest would take care of itself.
TenguPhule
@Barbara: Hanging around the scene of the crime while flaunting immunity from prosecution usually winds up with them getting fed to the sharks with an iron weight chained to their ankles. The smart ones would vanish and find somewhere else to be.
The dumb ones are just gonna vanish from the face of the earth.
germy
@dogwood: And she’s a government employee.
Steeplejack
@germy:
Recent example of sassy Trump.
NorthLeft12
@Betty Cracker:
I shudder to think of the “best people” that Deadbeat Donald will put into those positions. Can they be any worse you may ask? I do not want to see the answer to that question.
germy
@Steeplejack: Jeesh! I hadn’t seen that one!
Elizabelle
@Steeplejack: They should do a Trump interview tape with that Randall voice from the Honey Badger videos. Although that would probably garner Trump more voters.
I never tire of that honey badger video. I wanna be a badass too.
Elizabelle
@NorthLeft12: Nyet.
Raoul
@Chris: Not sure why I even care about her, but, Kellyanne “We get no respect! We get no deference! He’s the president of the United States, for God’s sake!”
1. Your party treated the office with no respect or deference for eight years while Obama was there.
2. Your boss treats the office (and many of our citizens) with contempt.
So, fuck off, ma’am. You helped light the dumpster on fire.
NorthLeft12
Actually, the more I think of it, a more suitable fate for Deadbeat Donald’s minions might be to keep their jobs and continue to suffer the embarrassment and abuse and loss of dignity that working for the Orange ShitGibbon entails.
I gotta believe that any other job has to be more rewarding than these.
Mnemosyne
@germy:
Yeah, in case I wasn’t clear, even accidental plagiarists need to pay up when the songwriter(s) find out what happened.
Though a lot of the people who got screwed up through the 1970s got screwed directly by their record companies with no outsiders involved.
dogwood
Trump’s not tweeting. Wonder what’s going on?
TenguPhule
@NorthLeft12: Indentured Servitude. Its the only fair punishment.
Chris
@germy:
Probably not a good example, but: I stumbled across a “Chuck Berry’s greatest hits” compilation on YouTube not long ago (I only knew a couple of his songs) and was shocked at how much of the music was stuff that I recognized from Elvis or the Beach Boys.
germy
@Elizabelle: The honey badger passes out after being bitten by the cobra. He sleeps off the venom.
I’m hoping the U.S. can shrug off the venom of 45.
Mnemosyne
@dogwood:
This may be the true reason — Sidwell Friends is the school D.C. politicians pick when they want to stay involved in their kids’ lives, go to their soccer games, etc. If Donnie isn’t going to be arsed to do any of that, why not pick a different school that’s less in the spotlight?
Though I’m guessing the Secret Service is not pleased. They have a good setup at Sidwell and now they have to start with a new school from scratch.
Mnemosyne
@germy:
Also, three, this is making me reconsider the use of “My Sweet Lord” in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2. It may have been more thematically on-point than I gave it credit for. ?
Corner Stone
@dogwood: He’s too busy thinking about nuking NoKo at the moment.
Steeplejack
Okay, I don’t get a chance very often to drop a hot take, but . . . this just in:
One of my old journalism friends who is seriously connected in the D.C./New York mediaplex just texted me to “watch for Wash Post breaking news on treason by Trump. Should break today.”
This person has been very reliable in the past.
Corner Stone
@Steeplejack: I’ve always said you were a mensch.
germy
@Mnemosyne: Ronnie Mack (composer of “He’s So Fine”) died at a very young age in the early ’60s, so he never lived to hear My Sweet Lord. But his survivors got some royalties and then even more money when Harrison later bought the rights to the song.
The Chiffons even recorded a nice version of My Sweet Lord, so there were no hard feelings in the end.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
Okay, first, I don’t think I was the first in this thread to use “whore” in regards to KAC. Mercenary absolutely works though. I don’t want to perpetuate any sexist crap.
Secondly, sheesh, I just don’t find her physically unattractive. Anne Coulter is hideous. Long blonde hair and blue eyes are not a magic formula for pretty.
I think she is a terrible person. I would never wish to meet her (or Palin). I just don’t think she is hideous. I DESPISE Hannity and Ryan, too, but I can see why some women would call them physically attractive. Spiritually, morally, philosophically grotesque, yes… the two aren’t incompatible.
dogwood
@Mnemosyne:
Yep. SF has been dealing with high profile kids for decades. President’s children probably aren’t the only one’s with security around. Normal people want their child to be secure, but they also want to do it in a way that causes the least amount of trouble for the school and the security services. Jimmy Carter sending Amy to a D.C. public school was phony posing, and it didn’t last long.
germy
@Steeplejack: I went over to WaPo to check and instead saw this good news:
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@dogwood:
Well, humans of every color can be dreadful. And attractiveness is no guarantee of intelligence or decency.
TenguPhule
@Steeplejack: It is always Fitzmas until it isn’t.
Mnemosyne
@germy:
When you get to be super-rich like Harrison, that’s probably the best solution. Movie studios do it all the time to avoid potential copyright lawsuits.
germy
@Steeplejack:
They’re going to beat the New York Times again to a scoop?
.
.
.
Good.
Mnemosyne
@Steeplejack:
No offense to your friend, but I’ll believe it when I see it, and no sooner.
germy
@Mnemosyne: Off topic, but have you ever heard the album “Stay Awake” that came out in the late 1980s? Beautiful contemporary covers of songs from Disney films. One of my favorites is “Baby Mine” by Bonnie Raitt and Was (Not Was):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqir1zJ0C9I
Elizabelle
@Steeplejack: And me with no popcorn.
Will pour another glass of wine. (It’s after 9 pm here.)
Steeplejack
@TenguPhule:
We’ll see. This person used to be a reporter at the Post and still has connections there.
TenguPhule
@Elizabelle: Go easy on the vino. Expect nothing and be pleasantly surprised.
TenguPhule
@Steeplejack: And I agree it would be a wonderful surprise. But if there’s one thing Bush regime proved, its that we should never get out hopes up about Republicans being held to account for anything.
Steeplejack
@Mnemosyne:
No offense taken. Just passing along a niblet from someone I consider a reliable source. But it’s never real until it hits the page.
Mnemosyne
@germy:
Not only have I heard it, I own it! I bought it when it was first released. I think it’s the Replacements that do “Cruella de Vil,” which is oh-so-appropriate for this thread.
Elizabelle
@TenguPhule:
Excellent advice. Ta.
germy
@Mnemosyne: I remember playing “Baby Mine” for my infant son. He’s now almost thirty!
I liked “Heigh Ho” interpreted by Tom Waits. And the understated “Someday My Prince Will Come”.
I had no idea until recently about the sad story of Frank Churchill. Quite a songwriter.
MattF
WaPo says Trump revealed highly classified information to his Russian visitors. If this isn’t the big WaPo story alluded to above, then heaven help us.
Shana
@Chris: It’s also a Quaker school, and if there’s anything the Trumps would abhor it’s Quaker values.
Steeplejack
@MattF:
From the article:
ETA: No actual use of the word treason in the story, though. My bad.
sharl
@Aleta: Thanks for that explainer; I seem to recall that you explained this stuff in detail in an earlier post where the Fyre Festival came up. Based on what you have been saying, it seems really, really important to get things right that first time, after which it becomes easier in subsequent years. It sounds like frat boys and media hypesters were in charge here, so odds of success would have been dubious before the first dollar changed hands. I’m a bit gobsmacked that the people advising the big corporate money supporters didn’t catch this…or maybe, a lot of folks like that did, but these suckers were the few that took the bait. Presumably they won’t make that mistake again.
@Barbara: Thanks; I didn’t actually add up the dollar amounts cited in the article, it’s impressive as hell. I’m just in awe – still – of the whole spectacle. Obviously I’ve never worked in that events promotion environment (not even on a small scale).
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Steeplejack: Relax. He probably already spilled it at Mar-a-Lago to impress his caddy with what an important guy he is. Nothing to see here.
Seriously, this kind of stuff infuriates me with a blinding fury that is beyond rage. People will die because of this. There is a legal definition of Top Secret that includes the words “exceptionally grave damage to the US” if revealed. And this asshole… every day… yaargh!!!!!!
Did you hear that the WH at first tried to hide Kislyak’s presence at this meeting? I find that odd in a sea of odd things. I’m finding it hard not to conclude that Trump is an active agent, and his spills are not accidental but specific information requested by his handlers.
tybee
@Steeplejack:
bingo.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@smintheus: Harrison explains the whole thing in This Song.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@germy: Beat me too it, damn it. But I included the link to the vid.