Most Americans recognize that Trump is a shitty president. He’s polling worse at the six-month mark than any president, going back through 70 years of polling. Via ABC News:
Just 36 percent of Americans polled in a new ABC News/Washington Post poll approve of Trump’s job performance, down 6 points from his 100-day mark, itself a low. The previous president closest to this level at or near six months was Gerald Ford, at 39 percent, in February 1975.
People also hate the massive transfer of wealth from the working poor and middle-class to the super-rich that is disguised as a healthcare reform bill known as “Trumpcare,” AHCA or BCRA:
On his party’s signature campaign issue, health care, Americans by a 2-1 margin prefer Obamacare over the Republican plan to replace it, 50-24 percent. (Another quarter either want something else entirely, 17 percent, or are undecided, 9 percent.) “Strong” preference for the existing law surpasses strong preference for the GOP plan by 20 percentage points. Relevant to proposed GOP cuts in the growth of Medicaid, the public by a broad 63-27 percent says it’s more important to provide health care coverage for low-income Americans than to cut taxes.
None of this matters much right now since the GOP is playing to its base, which resides in the Fox News propaganda bubble. But if Trumpcare is defeated, this odious administration could go into a death spiral, which is why we should use the wealthcare bill vote delay occasioned by McCain’s health issues to jam congressional phone lines, visit local offices, etc.
Trump has seen this polling, and it left a mark:
The ABC/Washington Post Poll, even though almost 40% is not bad at this time, was just about the most inaccurate poll around election time!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2017
Yeah, if you exclude the fact that every other president in the history of U.S. presidential polling posted better numbers at this juncture, it’s “not bad” — and besides, it’s inaccurate! Trump also takes comfort this morning in his ability to visit a self-branded country club for a golfing event and encounter more supporters than detractors:
Thank you to all of the supporters, who far out-numbered the protesters, yesterday at the Women's U.S. Open. Very cool!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2017
Oh, and the media is unfair, and projection remains a thing:
HillaryClinton can illegally get the questions to the Debate & delete 33,000 emails but my son Don is being scorned by the Fake News Media?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2017
With all of its phony unnamed sources & highly slanted & even fraudulent reporting, #Fake News is DISTORTING DEMOCRACY in our country!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 16, 2017
What a fucking crybaby. What a colossal failure. What an embarrassment.
I’m steeling myself for a family event later this month where I expect to encounter and argue with Trump supporters. As always, my goal won’t be to try to talk sense into them. Anyone who pulled the lever for that bigoted degenerate given what we knew on 11/8/16 is beyond the reach of reason or decency, and anyone who is still defending him given what we know now is a cultist.
My objective is to sow seeds of doubt, to communicate that they’ve been had, so as to suppress future turnout among people who are clearly too goddamned stupid to entrust with enfranchisement. Wish me luck!
Chris
To paraphrase Groucho Marx, I find these kinds of family reunions very educational. Every time someone starts talking about politics, I go into the next room and read a good book.
Gozer
ZOMG!!! Dems engaging in voter suppression! Both sides…Killary…Etc.
I think I might hit the Tanqueray early today.
EDIT: Almost forgot, Both Sides!! Fake News…And what other brain-dead conservative tropes am I missing?
Elizabelle
Luck.
Tilda Swintons Bald Cap
This may be true, but right now he is giving you and everyone else the finger and laughing about it. Remember, when the deep state was going to go nuclear and Trump would spend the rest of his days in jail? Good times. Hunker down it’s going to be a loooooong 4 years.
Iowa Old Lady
It seems to me that the reaction of the Rs and Trump voters to the Russia scandal has tipped a whole lot of people into calling them “beyond the reach of reason or decency.” I know it did me.
ETA: I should add that for me, this feels like despair. I know despair is useless and self-defeating, and yet, it seems to be where I am at the moment.
Jerzy Russian
Good luck Betty.
JMG
I’d say “sorry you were tricked by that con man” in a tone of voice letting them know you’re anything but sorry.
ET
But, but didn’t some poll say that 50% of those polled in areas he won still support him?
(even that doesn’t sound so good, I would have pegged that higher)
Frankensteinbeck
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap:
All evidence is that Trump spends every waking moment writhing in misery because he’s the worst winner ever, and the Deep State IS going nuclear. That just takes months or even years to reach the ‘behind bars’ stage. Whether he’ll finish his first term is hard to say. Elected Republicans will defend him in lockstep until suddenly they turn against him. That’s how it has always worked.
debbie
I do not see the word “cool” coming out of that pudgy mouth.
Villago Delenda Est
Whiny ass titty baby tweets wut?
NeenerNeener
Sowing chaos, confusion and disorder among Cult 45 members is a noble goal.
debbie
Betty, I do hope you’ll share your techniques for those of us in the same horrible boat.
Yarrow
He’s just working to undermine people’s trust in the media so that when the really bad stuff comes out they won’t believe it.
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap:
No. This whole thing is accelerating. Trump certainly won’t finish his term.
OzarkHillbilly
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap:
I don’t see any laughter from him. The finger? Yes, but no laughter. I see tantrums, whines, finger pointing, deflection, distortion, ignorance, misery, sociopathy and a whole lot more, but Laughter? No, none of that.
schrodingers_cat
Get them to defend his most embarrassing failures and insane policies and don’t let them deflect the question in whatabouttery and change the damn topic.
OzarkHillbilly
@Yarrow:
No, he doesn’t plan any further ahead than the next bowl of ice cream. He is reacting, always reacting.
gene108
I wonder what the geographic distribution of the 36% is?
High disapproval in CA, NY, etc does not offset approvals in MS, AL, WY, WV, etc, even though more people disapprove in NY and CA, the four states that approve still get two Senators each, and electoral votes and members of the House.
Population is so unevenly distributed and the Constitution, and unwillingness to increase the number of seats in the House, rewards rural areas over urban areas national disapproval is not as meaningful as it could be.
Sentient AI from the Future
@JMG: “at least it was only the direction of the country and the further immiseration of millions at stake, rather than losing your life savings or something important”
moops
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap: yeah, I recall Fitzmas. I would say the media is more eager for a scandal now, and only the outlets with the mandate to support the GOP are shy about the animosity.
I wonder if journalists will eventually try and go native again and trade favorable reporting for access. I’m surprised Trump hasn’t figured that one out.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
Indeed, best of luck — once more unto the breach!
Shaming Trumplings doesn’t seem to work, and logic and reason are useless. For every actual fact, they have their own secret squirrel facts. They whip out charges of fake news. When they acknowledge an actual GOP failing, it leads to immediate diversion — “Yeah, well, what about Clinton?”
Hey, maybe this is part of an actual playbook! Didn’t the Coulterwockey put out a book about how to argue with liberals?
JMG
@ET: The point of that poll was that Trump’s approval percentage is significantly below the percentage of votes he won in those places in 2016.
gene108
@Yarrow:
I think it is working effectively with his base.
Jinchi
When did getting questions to a debate become illegal? And in who’s universe is “deleting emails” comparable with colluding with a hostile foreign power?
WaterGirl
I tried reason and logic with a family member a week ago and was left only with disappointment and disgust. I think your approach is much smarter than mine was. Sowing seeds of doubt is brilliant and ‘letting them know they’ve been had’ is something that would come back to a person time and again. Yours may be the only way forward!
Betty Cracker
@Frankensteinbeck: I really believe defeating Trumpcare could be a turning point, if we can pull it off. Most of the elected officials in the Republican Party Above Country Party know Trump is a dangerous know-nothing and an international embarrassment, but they’ll support him as long as 1) their fear of his base surpasses their fear that Trump’s incompetence could endanger their own reelection prospects, and 2) they can use him to rubber-stamp their unpopular plutocratic agenda.
If Trumpcare is defeated, Trump will flip the fuck out and act even more erratically. He’ll viciously attack fellow Republicans. The Villagers will obsess about his stalled agenda, and he’ll obsess over the coverage. I’ve been a broken record on this all week, but I sincerely believe it could be a huge shockwave that could move all anti-Trump efforts forward.
Yarrow
As fast as things have moved this week, who knows where we’ll be by the end of the month. Maybe the pee tape will have dropped. Maybe Trump will have thrown Pence under the bus in an effort to save himself. By that time you might be discussing completely different things with your family than you are even thinking about now. “So how do you feel about Trump giving Putin our nuclear codes?”
father pussbucket
@Yarrow:
I hope you’re right, but Nixon at least had enough cognitive function to recognize when his goose was cooked. I worry about what Trump will do.
Jinchi
@gene108:
It’s not so much ‘working’ as deeply entrenched in their psychology at this point.
Yarrow
@OzarkHillbilly: Should have been clearer that his team that also has access to his Twitter account is part of doing that.
germy
“wealthcare bill”
best description I’ve seen.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Jesus, Joy Reid has some “equal rights advocate” talking about how Democrats, “we”, have to stop talking about black lives matter and gay rights, even though these things are important!, all those things Hillary Clinton talked about in her convention speech, and talk about jobs, that’s what we Democrats have to do. The only what-we-Democrats-have-to-do buzzword she missed is “bathrooms”.
Here’s a word cloud of HRC’s convention speech. One of the biggest non-generic words (“country”, “people”, “america”) is “working”, in what looks like tier-two is a big “jobs”.
debbie
@Betty Cracker:
I was listening to the New Yorker Radio Hour this morning. There was an interview with Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, an oncologist who helped with ACA and now (tries to) counsels Trump. He was asked what he thought about the Senate’s healthcare plan. He said it was “cruel.”
I’m going to go with this when dealing with family members.
WaterGirl
I surely hope the pee tape isn’t as nonexistent as the whitey tape. That would be truly disappointing.
OGLiberal
This describes our situation perfectly:
http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/leonard-pitts-jr/article161473023.html
Andrew McCarthy, whom I despise…really despise, wrote recently in the National Review that opponents of Trump who argue about what’s illegal or legal are wasting their time. The only solution to Trump is political and depends on the GOP turning away from him. Not happening anytime soon. These people are either so certain they’ll win or so frightened of a primary challenge that Trump’s 36 percent approval rating – and who those 36 percent are – is enough. And can’t discount that there may be 2-4 percent who disapprove because he hasn’t yet had Clinton drawn and quartered in the public square. As somebody tweeted recently, the Constitution anticipated Trump – it did not anticipate a failed Electoral College and a Congress this compliant.
If the Senate is voting, Mitch has the votes. Collins and Paul will get their hall pass – she from the “center”, he from the right. These people don’t care. McCain will come back from surgery provided by healthcare that many seniors soon may not have and happily vote yea despite his “concerns”.
As Michael Che as Lester Holt said, “Absolutely nothing matters anymore.”
Brachiator
I think this might be fun. For example. Trump promised to replace Obamacare with something better. Why has he abandoned that promise and left all the work to the Congress? Why is it that he has not provided any input, any framework, any guidance on healthcare reform?
Trump claimed that world leaders did not respect Obama. But why is it that Merkel and other world leaders clearly and definitively rejected Trump’s position on climate change? Why is the clear world consensus that in Trump, the US has abandoned its role as world leader. Is this what really what you wanted or expected?
Trump and his family bragged about their smarts, that they knew how to make deals. But Fox News pundits now claim that all these illegal Russian meetings happened because Team Trump are a bunch of amateurs, and we should forgive them because they don’t know the rules. Which is it? Are they bold new leadership or a bunch of dopes?
Why does Trump love murderous dictators? Reagan didn’t?
Oh, the fun that you can have.
MomSense
@Villago Delenda Est:
Twitter on the shitter!
Wish I could take credit but I saw it in a tweet last night.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Who’s the bearded guy? He was good on the piece I saw.
germy
MJS
My suggestion is to point out how poor living conditions are in Russia, and ask Trump supporters why they want that for America. Except I wouldn’t use those terms. I’d ask them why they want America to be a shit-hole like Russia is.
Sloane Ranger
Good luck Betty.
There’s a story over at Raw Story that Trump the Dump has told Theresa May that he’s not coming to the UK until he’s guaranteed a warm welcome.
According to the report May responded that we are not North Korea!
It looks like the State Visit is off permanently as the only warm welcome he will get here would involve burning at the stake.
Ah well, our loss (not)!
Yarrow
@father pussbucket: He will throw EVERYONE under the bus first. Anyone he knows has a connection to Russia, he’ll out them. Look how he at first didn’t support Don, Jr. If he won’t support his own family, he’s sure not going to support his staff. He has no loyalty, although he expects complete loyalty to him.
It’s going to get ugly as hell as he tosses everyone under the bus and blames first this person and then that person. I don’t know if he’s going to stroke out from the pressure or they’ll find him huddled in a corner in the residence of the White House wearing a bathrobe, eating KFC and mumbling “fake news” over and over again as they drag him out.
Baud
Dear Betty,
One suggestion. Wear a flag pin. U.S. Flag.
Waspuppet
This is important; it’s something they do to us and we never think to do to them. Just because WE don’t want a border wall, don’t want Obamacare to be repealed and don’t want tax cuts for the Goldman Sachs Cabinet, that doesn’t mean we can’t or shouldn’t express our fake sympathy that Trumpites have been had.
“No wall? No Obamacare repeal? You must be really upset.”
zhena gogolia
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I swear, every day the New York Times publishes the same letter over different signatures. “The Democratic Party will never win again until it fully embraces the Bernie Sanders agenda.”
Sentient AI from the Future
@WaterGirl: I’m pretty lucky in that noone in my social or family circles is a trump voter. If I did have them, though, at this point I would be relentless in cracking jokes about having a bridge to sell, or waterfront property in Florida.
Tracy Ratcliff
@gene108: Not quite an answer, but NBC/Wall St Journal just dropped a poll of “Trump counties”, counties in which Trump outpaced Romney or flipped from Obama to Trump. The average is 50% approval, with “outpace” counties at 56% and “flip” counties at 44%.
zhena gogolia
@Brachiator:
Those are good.
A Ghost to Most
Good luck with your get-together.
My MAGAot family has been angling for a Colorado trip, to which I have been non-committal, at best.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Joy Reid’s even-we-Democrats panelist is now nodding along with a human email from your crazy right wing uncle who says the real scandal is Hillary selling Putin uranium and Obama led from behind
ETA: She’s a Democrat who understands the plight of the the American people, especially Fox News viewers, because she used to work at Fox News
Good fucking god
@Baud: Bald bearded guy is Kurt Eichenwald from Newsweek, dark-haired bearded guy is I think Dem politico from Miami
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@OzarkHillbilly:
Good point. And all those responses you list come from his fear, rage, narcissism… the lot of them in the administration are sweating. They’ve achieved their dream, but it’s turning into a nightmare.
I hope it hurts Yertle the way it hurts a shy third grade boy to know he’s regarded by many as a chinless, loathsome taker. I hope Spicer feels humiliated by SNL, that Kushner knows he didn’t look cool in a flak jacket, that Eric knows he looks like a psycho, that Conway hears comparisons to The Crypt Keeper, that Trump knows he is bloated, a buffoon, and that death is flying ever closer to end his useless existence.
Sentient AI from the Future
@debbie: ugh. Zeke Emanuel is possibly the worst bioethicist on the planet. I frequently marvel at how he can be so consistently both wrong and full of shit.
Stopped clock though, I guess.
Davis X. Machina
@ET: Carter had the support of +85% of his supporters and got blown out,.
WaterGirl
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: My RSS reader tells me that there’s a new post up at the Washington Monthly called Trumpism: This Too Shall Pass?. It was a really quick read*. I would summarize it this way:
Ugh. Bernie Sanders is the new Sarah Palin. They just will not let him fade into the oblivion he deserves. And I say this as someone who voted for him in the primary.
edit: forgot to say that it was a *really quick read because I saw Sanders in a paragraph and glanced at the next paragraph and the next and it was all Sanders all the time. Close Tab. The End.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: The dark haired bearded guy. He had a good, clear riff on Trump a few minutes ago.
Mnemosyne
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
The one thing I’ve found that kind of works is to make them explain their secret squirrel facts. Don’t argue, play dumb. Make them talk you through their entire crazy conspiracy theory. Nine times out of 10, they’re just parroting back something they heard and will realize how dumb and illogical it is if you can keep them on track and not let them wander off into what Hillary supposedly did.
OzarkHillbilly
@Jinchi:
You have to ask?
zhena gogolia
@Sentient AI from the Future:
Rahm’s brother.
tobie
@Betty Cracker: I agree. McConnell’s pushing this turd about as hard as he can because he knows if he fails the party will bear the one mark it fears more than anything else: being branded losers.
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap: For all their bluster Trump supporters are scared. They see the wheels coming off the train and are trying desperately to defend it because it’s their cause but at some level they know their hero is incompetent and he’s destroying the country.
Waspuppet
@Yarrow: My bold prediction: Unless he dies in office (and maybe even then), Trump will at some point in his life say he never really wanted to be president.
It won’t be like a confession, or like letting us in on the scam. It’ll be like a bratty pre-teen screaming “I didn’t ASK to be born!” before slamming his bedroom door.
I also think there’s a small but non-zero chance he spends his post-presidential life (again, if there is one) in another country.
Tilda Swintons Bald Cap
@WaterGirl: How can he fade away when he’s actively maintaining his campaign? He’s already playing coy about 2020.
Villago Delenda Est
@MomSense: So which of his sons is Tyrion Lannister?
Barron is the shortest, I suppose…
Betty Cracker
@Sentient AI from the Future: I’ve scored a few points by deriding Trump as a real estate developer con man. That’s an archetype of evil that resonates with Floridians across the political spectrum. “Oh well, Uncle Tater, you’re not the first to fall for a real estate con man’s pie in the sky promises, only to get stiffed good and hard when he and his cronies run off with your money. Better luck next time!”
Mike in NC
Republican talking point is that nobody cares about the Trump-Russia connection. Move along. Must be because Trump is white and Putin is white, so it’s all cool. Panel of idiots debating this right now on MSNBC includes some shithead named Mark London.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Betty Cracker:
If Trump(doesn’t)Care passes, it will take longer, but the rage of those losing coverage or paying more for shit coverage will lead to trouble for the GOP.
Doug R
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap: TWO years
Baud
@WaterGirl: I don’t think he or his designee will get the nomination. It’s just a question of whether we can overcome the sore losers next time.
Brachiator
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
James Carville once told Bill Clinton, “it’s the economy, stupid.” That’s still true. You have to make that the focus, and connect everything else to it. The country is already more accepting of same sex marriage, so the Democrats need to build on this.
Democrats used to be good at this.
OzarkHillbilly
@Yarrow:
I’m not sure his team can look any further than his most recent tweet for which they are duty bound to engage in epic levels of obfuscation**.
**2nd time today I got to use that word, must be my “word of the day”
smintheus
I think the best way to persuade trumptards away from their day-glo savior is just to call him a loser. The lizard brain has no affinity for losers.
Sloane Ranger
@germy: Please tell me this is satire. Because otherwise this innumerate woman is in charge of education!
US science is doomed!
Mnemosyne
@Sloane Ranger:
It’s satire — Andy Borowitz is a political humor columnist for the New Yorker.
Tilda Swintons Bald Cap
@Doug R: How do you figure that? You think the Dems are going to take back the House and the Senate and get rid of him? Not happening. What possible situation other than health removes him before his term is up?
germy
@Sloane Ranger: Satire, but she IS that stupid.
OzarkHillbilly
@debbie: Just don’t use the word “punitive”. They like that word because they don’t think it ever applies to them.
Ohio Mom
@Waspuppet: That’s my question, how do you sow seeds of doubt? Asking if they are disappointed with the lack of progress on their pet causes might do it.
Any other tips? I know from bitter experience that facts and logic don’t work.
Baud
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap: I suggest stop trying to predict the future.
Iowa Old Lady
@zhena gogolia: I was talking to a friend of mine who was a Sanders precinct captain, though she later supported Clinton. She went off on how bad Stein voters were because they allowed Trump to win and then was all excited about hearing Sanders speak some time soon. She was shocked when I said I blamed him for some of those Stein votes.
OzarkHillbilly
@germy: High school drop outs are smarter than her.
Tilda Swintons Bald Cap
@Baud: Meh feeling very pessimistic.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@WaterGirl: I’ve gotten a bit away from reading the Washington Monthly blog, but my recollection is that Nancy LeTourneau and Martin Longman are really good, and their weekend crew, Tucker and Atkins, are pretty much our two initial troll and Dwight: “Democrats are the real problem!”
Emma
I have been reading some but not commenting much, party because of personal issues but partly because I am so tired of the negativity. At this point, someone is going to start recommending mass suicide as protest events. Fatalism is a creeping disease, and I think we’re all being infected. I certainly am. But it’s also debilitating and I (we) can’t afford that. One way or another, whatever happens, we have to survive this.
Sloane Ranger
Jodie Whitaker is the new Doctor. Just announced on the BBC.
Karen
The latest to be thrown under bus, the secret servie
https://theintellectualist.co/jay-sekulow-trump-atty-alleged-christian-grifter-blames-secret-service-trump-jr-s-meeting/
Baud
@Iowa Old Lady: My guess is that something like 75% of Democrats don’t even know of the conflict.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: An upside down US flag pin.
debit
My strategy for dealing with Trump supporters online is simply to respond to them “Traitor.” That’s it. I don’t engage with them in real life.
smintheus
@OGLiberal:
The Constitution didn’t anticipate political parties, just as my 18th century stone house didn’t anticipate air-conditioning…or global warming.
WaterGirl
@Betty Cracker: I love you, Betty!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Brachiator: Hillary Clinton talked about jobs and the economy and the middle class all the fuckign time. People didn’t want to hear it, didn’t want to listen to her, for a lot of reasons.
I’ve got so many criticisms of Hillary Clinton somebody here once asked when I decided I hated her (I, personally, would take Hillary Clinton over her husband any day of the week and twice on Sunday), but you can’t honestly say she didn’t talk about jobs.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly: Hell no. Upright and proud. Reclaim that motherfucker from treasonous Putinites. Let them wear ??.
??????????????????????
smintheus
@Karen:
WaterGirl
@Baud: I don’t think he/they will get the nomination, either. The question is how much harm they will do to the democratic candidate. Can the DNC not allow him to run as a Democrat? Because he clearly isn’t one.
Yarrow
@Waspuppet:
I agree. He’s going to try that but it won’t work. He ran for president and he took the oath of office. At any point he could have stopped. He didn’t. It’ll be a last ditch effort from him.
@OzarkHillbilly:
Trump’s not the only one who tweets from his Twitter account. It’s obvious from style that Dan Scavino does from time to time. Bannon has been clear about undermining the credibility of the press and it’s a Russian tactic as well, so they have help in amplifying the fake news hashtags.
My point is that some of the Fake News stuff is a plan, maybe not so much by Trump but by those around him and Russia who owns him, to undermine people’s trust in the press so that when the real news about Trump’s treason comes out people will blame the news organizations not Trump.
As for Trump himself, he’s not really smart enough to game this out. But he’s a puppet so he plays along all while thinking he’s controlling things.
Iowa Old Lady
@Baud: That’s probably true. They certainly never heard of Stein.
azlib
McCain’s timing of his surgery is intriguing. I believe he is playing games with McConnell. Putting the vote off another week helps the opposition. McCain’s strategy seems to be to hope the bill never reaches the floor and he can avoid taking a formal vote. He may be trying to help Flake at this point in time. McCain has nothing to lose.
Keep in mind AZ did expand Medicaid and while the Repubs do not really care about the poor, rolling back Medicaid will blow a big hole in the state budget and the hospitals are not happy about a rollback either since a lot of uninsured care will fall on their emergency rooms. The hospitals even agreed to pay a fee to help fund the program.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Agreed, everything T crew is doing is undermining the United States, isolating it and destroying its competitive advantage,
WaterGirl
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Agree about Nancy and BooMan. DH Tucker had a good article earlier this week, and that stood out, possibly because it was better than most.
Sadly, my RSS reader doesn’t show me the author’s name.
edit: oh, ugh, you’re right. I just clicked to find out who wrote it – This one was by DH Tucker.
Baud
@WaterGirl: I don’t know. But if he runs for reelection as an independent, which I expect he will, I don’t think it will sit well with primary voters.
GregB
When dealing with Trumpies, find the best 5 points of his shitty behavior and pound them relentlessly.
Whenever the say.. but Hillary or Obama, just say they aren’t president.
Then return to hammering those points.
One idea to hammer is that the Trump has made the GOP so unhinged that they are defending a thrice married, womanizing, pussy grabbing draft dodger.
Repeat often.
OzarkHillbilly
@Ohio Mom: Use his own words to refute whatever argument they are pursuing. “He now says the wall will only need to 7-900 miles long.”
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
@WaterGirl:
I’m still a little mad at Booman that he let Steven D use his blog to peddle conspiracy theories about the California primary.
WaterGirl
@Sloane Ranger: I think I saw something about this being the last season of Doctor Who. Can that be right?
I only know her as the mom whose kid was murdered on Broadchurch. She does a great job in that.
Yarrow
@Baud: Hell, yeah. Hey, Betty–maybe you can bring Russian flag pins for your family members to wear. When they protest you can then say, “It’s just a joke!” just like they do when caught being racists or misogynists. It’s not a joke.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Good point on Flake, I would also argue helping Lindsey Graham stave off a Tea Bagger-cum-trumpian primary, which is why we may all need to do a go fund me for Susan Rice’s lawyers.
ETA: @Baud: oy, I quit reading Booman when Long went to Monthly. Yeah, Steven D is Applejax blogger brother from another mother, prolix and purity-obsessed.
WaterGirl
@Iowa Old Lady: Wearing my old glasses because I still haven’t replaced the ones that broke. I read that as Satan, not Stein. But close enough!
Sloane Ranger
@Mnemosyne: Thank God!
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud:
I prefer to not lie.
Schlemazel
Would it be unkind to hope that Sen. McCain never returns to the Senate? That would stall the wealthcare bill a little longer
Patricia Kayden
Ask them how the hell Trump Care is better than the ACA? How is it beneficial to anyone outside of the 1% who will be getting huge tax cuts?
Ask them beyond Republicans stealing a SCOUTS seat, what are Trump’s accomplishments here and abroad?
The one individual I know personally who voted for Trump (a White woman who is a former co-worker) has been mum about him since his inauguration and his slide down into the rabbit hole. I believe she understands that there is no way she can defend him and appear rational at the same time.
Baud
@Schlemazel: A long convalescence is not too much to ask for.
OzarkHillbilly
@Yarrow: My point is sarcasm, taking a small truth and blowing it up out of all proportion to reality. It is my default setting. Sadly, in this day and age it can be hard to tell the difference..
WaterGirl
@Baud: Yeah, I never understood why he let Steven D post. I had no idea about the conspiracies, though, because as soon as I read the first sentence and it looks off, my eyes jump up and I see that it is Steven D and I quit reading. It’s been a long time though, is Steven D still there?
I saw a post from Booman in the past couple of weeks where he says that it’s no surprise that his readership is dropping off, though I forget why he said it was no surprise. It was no surprise to me because he seemed to fall off the deep end before the election and lots of people in the comments jumped even before he did.
edited first sentence for clarity.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Sloane Ranger:
At least it’s not Johnny Whitaker.
Patricia Kayden
@Schlemazel: Not really. You’re not saying why he’d never return so there’s that.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: I thought Sanders running for reelection to the senate as an independent was a done deal.
Baud
@WaterGirl: I used to read him as religiously as BJ. Even commented a couple of times. Not any more.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Schlemazel: I hate John McCain’s guts and liver, but I”m sure the governor of Arizona can and might dig up worse. Of course he might appoint Cindy, which would probably be lateral move. “As you know, Chuck/Cokie/Doocey, as a Senator I always ask myself, what would my late husband, the war hero and POW John McCain….
Karen
@smintheus: it strikes me as really stupid to disparage the people charged with physical protection; the job of secret service isn’t to protect them from being idiots
woodrowfan
@Jinchi: she didn’t even actually “get the questions.” She got a memo with a list of possible questions on it.
ding7777
Do the people attending your family event read your blog postings?
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: As a senator not as President. Most BS supporters around me are Bernie’s age not the mythical young people that the media speaks of.
GregB
@Emma:
I think people need to take heart.
Trump is taking on water fast.
The Russia investigation is slowly rolling towards him like lava.
I had feared he would have been able to bury this shortly after taking office.
The GOP coalition is buckling. Krauthammer, Rubin, Will…Shep Smith went Howard Beale the other day.
Trump is flailing at GOP Governors, US intelligence, now the Secret Service.
The Russia scandal us consuming his family.
His business, his family business, his family name, all cracking and summer isn’t done yet.
Schlemazel
@Waspuppet:
I am sure there is a homey dacha waiting for him
Baud
@Betty Cracker: I don’t know the official status. I don’t think it’s too late to change his mind if he wanted to. I do wonder what the Vermont Dem party will do. Apparently, Sanders has a Dem challenger!
WaterGirl
@Karen: Those were my two thoughts. Exactly. Trump has clearly never heard of the adage to not shit where he eats. First the intelligence community and now this. His demise can’t come fast enough.
Oldgold
Good thing this clown never offered my mom a lame excuse like this. I did at the age of 5 and never forgot it!
Jay Sekulow, a member of President Donald Trump’s legal team, on Sunday aired a new defense for Donald Trump Jr.’s meeting with a Russian lawyer who promised him damaging information on Hillary Clinton: The Secret Service should not have “allowed these people in” to meet with Trump’s eldest son.
Yarrow
@OzarkHillbilly: Okay. I guess it went right over my head. These days I kind of feel for comedy writers. The truth is crazy enough.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: @Betty Cracker: That’s what I read. Don’t recall where, may have just been a comment here.
Sloane Ranger
@WaterGirl: I hadn’t heard that but it’s always a possibility. Viewing figures were down this season apparently. I think a lot will depend on responses to the new season.
Still processing the news. Not sure what I think yet.
Aleta
Fake news, never happened and it’s Hilary’s fault.
Yarrow
@Oldgold:
This is them flailing. They have no excuse.
Schlemazel
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap:
He drags down Republican candidates. Flipping the House in 18 is critical (the Senate is out of reach I believe) and if the GOP no longer fears the wingnuts as much as they fear losing they will turn on him in a heartbeat.
MomSense
@WaterGirl: @Baud:
He let somenof the commenters like our man in Portland take over the place and it became unreadable. I still read his posts but I never wade into the comments. Cannot believe that he didn’t vote for Clinton. I do not understand people who didn’t consider the consequences to the most vulnerable in our communities when they supposedly voted their consciences.
debbie
@OzarkHillbilly:
Except if I tell them they will learn the real meaning of punitive when they find themselves standing before St. Peter. ;)
Neldob
Make China Great Again.
hovercraft
Did anyone catch Ken Kurson, former editor of Jared’s New York Observer on CNN just now? According to him Twitler has many accomplishments that the media is ignoring in it’s obsession with this Russia business, the latest Uday episode is a complete nothing burger, they have been very transparent, yet the media won’t let it go. The media is obsessed with undoing the election, the democrats are irrelevant. He says the media is biased and he cites the NYTimes editorial page, specifically Bobo going out with a high school graduate and Gail Collins column rating Twitler’s kids.
One would think that as a former “Editor”, he’d understand what and editorial is. SAD!
Baud
@MomSense:
Booman or Steven D? Primary or general???
Belafon
@WaterGirl: it’s not the last season. That’s something people say every year.
Belafon
Duplicate
FlipYrWhig
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Steven D was horrible. Almost as bad as WaMo weekender David Atkins, who is a thin-skinned abrasive dumbfuck with delusions of grandeur.
Karen
The new Dr Who is a woman!!! It is about time, makes me almost wish I had tv service here
http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-40624288?ocid=socialflow_facebook&ns_mchannel=social&ns_campaign=bbcnews&ns_source=facebook
debbie
@Sentient AI from the Future:
Even with what you say, and also being reminded that he’s Rahm’s brother, I still think “cruel” is a very good descriptor.
Aleta
@OzarkHillbilly: https://www.sevendaysvt.com/OffMessage/archives/2017/07/07/walters-advocate-for-the-homeless-to-challenge-sanders-for-senate-seat
Svitavsky, who calls himself “a bona fide, strong, left-wing Christian liberal,” says he shares many of Sanders’ political views — if anything, he adds, “I’m more liberal than Bernie” — but he is no fan of Sanders’ conduct, calling him “a vicious politician. So many good words, but so arrogant.”
Svitavsky says he was spurred to enter the political arena by the 2016 presidential campaign. “Bernie was very much responsible for Trump’s election,” he asserts. “I was amazed that Sanders wouldn’t do all that he could, once Hillary [Clinton] got the nomination, to elect Hillary over Trump, who would destroy all the things he supposedly believes in.”
The 60-year-old Bridport resident has a history with Sanders that goes back to the senator’s days as Burlington mayor. In 1982, the then 24-year-old Svitavsky was a young social worker who helped to found Burlington’s first overnight homeless shelter — and in the process, found his own calling. “Before that, they were the faceless homeless,” he recalls. “Then they became John and Mary and Tim.
“These people could be helped,” he continues. “They didn’t need to be so disrespected that they were thought not to be capable of helping themselves.”
Svitavsky directed the Burlington Emergency Shelter, which refused entry to anyone drunk or on drugs, and required them to seek help or find work. By his account, his shelter ran into opposition from then-Burlington mayor Sanders, who was — again, by Svitavsky’s account — opposed to the Emergency Shelter’s stance against drugs and alcohol. The Sanders’ administration eventually set up a shelter called the Waystation, which placed no conditions on entry and resulted, according to Svitavsky, in an abrupt increase in the city’s homeless population.
woodrowfan
Their consciences only focus on themselves, not on how other people are affected! They are as much a narcissist as Trump
Sentient AI from the Future
@GregB: I would like to believe this, especially after reading excerpts of that Mona fucking Charen article at NR. Holy fuck, when you’ve lost her, you’re in deep shit.
Schlemazel
@Emma:
I am in the same boat. The problem has been whether I read/comment or not the negativity is still with me. At this moment I do not see how we ever recover. Putin has ‘won’ in that he has brought the US down and we will have decades of turmoil even if the Dems magically took all three branches. While Putin has gotten his revenge his nextdoor neighbor, China has won and will control the world (or what is left of it) for the next century at least. It will not go well for us. The one bright note in all that is the fact we have fucked the environment to the point where 100s of millions will be dying over the next 100 years and, if it even survives what is to come, humanity will not look anything like it does today
FlipYrWhig
@WaterGirl: His comments were a viper pit of one-upping leftish craziness for years. It seemed like it was dominated by small-party European radical wannabes and then Davis X Machina yanking their chains.
Brachiator
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I mostly agree. However, I am not interested in defending Hillary or revisiting the election. I am more interested in what Democrats should do going forward.
Trump promised and still promises that people will get jobs like they used to have and that they will keep the jobs they currently have. This is an empty promise, but easier for people to imagine.
If you talk about new glorious jobs in the solar industry, does this mean I have to move, will I have to take a pay cut, will I have to spend my own money on training before I can get a new job in the solar field?
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Patricia Kayden:
Still, it might be fun to watch her try
sdhays
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yep. My own parents, who are liberals and voted for Hillary, said that they couldn’t understand why the Democrats weren’t talking about revitalization (they live in the Mid-West and they’ve seen how a once-thriving “large town” has collapsed into poverty – it’s really quite sad to see what’s happened to my hometown over the last 2 decades). When I told them that actually Hillary had detailed plans on the subject and talked about it all the time, they were surprised. While they do make an effort to follow the news, they were ill-informed because the media simply wouldn’t talk about boring policy.
Yarrow
@MomSense:
Yep. This level of selfishness in the service of how special a snowflake they are as individuals just astounds me. Maybe it is somewhat understandable if someone is in a state that’s strongly blue or red, but in this election I don’t even give them that. This time it was about the fate of the country. Anyone with half a brain could see what was going on with Trump. It wasn’t hidden.
woodrowfan
AMEN! but the press was all EMAILS!!!!!
Oldgold
Bingo!
Jeff Yarbro @yarbro
The Constitution anticipates a President like this. It does not anticipate a Congress so indifferent to a President like this.
hitchhiker
I’ve adopted a long game strategy with the family Trump set. It involves shamelessly screwing with them. Goes like this:
1. When the subject arises, calmly and happily ( a little sheepishly, even) pretend that I’ve always been a DT fan, or at least DT curious. This makes them scoff, but I just act as if anything I said before was just me being confused. I don’t let them talk details … just handwave and smile and say I don’t know why I ever thought that. This has the effect of lowering the temperature and making them wonder what I’m up to, but as long as I keep my placid demeanor, I’m golden. It’s a form of gaslighting. What? You thought I meant that? No, no, no, never!
2. At the next gathering, and as time passes, continue to lie about what I think, but do it in such a way that it sounds like I’ve just discovered this one thing that seems a little tiny bit weird … it can be totally invented, but should be distanced from Trump himself. I heard that that guy — the one with the weird name, what is it, Preeb, Pleeb, something like that — was actually a Democrat. This is just me doing what they’ve taught us all, which is to make shit up.
3. Keep playing. The way to plant doubt with people who are capable of thinking that Trump might be a good president has nothing to do with reality, and it’s a mistake to pretend it does. So, I’m trying to meet them where they live, in lala land, a place of supreme indifference to everything I care about.
4. Create more and reasons for them to believe they’ve been had, but not ones that they’ve already seen debunked in their crackpot media. Lament the slowness of everything and blame the system … suggest that it’s pointless to vote at all.
It may not have any effect, but at least I’m enjoying myself and not going bonkers trying to teach a dog to make scrambled eggs.
MomSense
@Belafon:
Booman. Both.
Brachiator
@Schlemazel:
Putin is not a magic man and has his own problems. He has to keep his oligarchs happy. And he has similar Trump problems. The average Russian expects Putin to deliver, but his flashy deals have not amounted to much. Not to many major development deals have come through. And these aren’t the old days of Communism. The Chinese are competing with the Russians. They are not always buddies.
A great deal of the problems that Putin has caused could be undone if the Republicans would get their heads out of their asses.
The situation is tough, but it ain’t hopeless.
Baud
@sdhays: I swear that one of the criticisms i heard of her campaign was that she was too policy oriented and wasn’t thematic enough.
Schlemazel
@woodrowfan:
I think many are just naive, they honestly thought that hair furor had no chance of winning so their vote for BS/JS did not matter. First rule of politics: never ever believe it is in the bag and you can take the day off
Aleta
https://www.sevendaysvt.com/OffMessage/archives/2017/07/16/walters-bernie-sanders-reports-49-million-campaign-war-chest
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Sentient AI from the Future:
I’d read that piece. I wonder what NR founder Buckley would make of Trump.
Baud
@MomSense: Not that I don’t trust you, but so you have proof? Not voting for Hillary in the general crosses a red line with me. If Booman did that, then I know never to care about what he has to say ever again.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@sdhays: Jon Favreau, O speech writer, talked about meeting some friends of his fiancee, one of whom– a college-educated, thirty-ish, two-time Obama voter– asked him about some goofball HRC conspiracy theory as if it were true. I wish I could remember which one, but it was more right-wing than Wilmerite, IIRC.
sdhays
@Brachiator:
Democrats don’t make these blanket promises because they’re empty and they fear a backlash over broken promises. If Trump and the Republicans can lie about this and the people voting for them decide that they haven’t been betrayed, I don’t know how any Democratic messaging strategy can fix that. Reality has to mean something.
Schlemazel
@sdhays:
Because they are not liars? How, exactly, would you revitalize the Midwest? The factory work is never coming back. Farming has moved to massive automated juggernauts. Local stores were eaten by WalMart. What magic is going to make things better? The GOP has no solutions but they lie and claim the do (clean coal!, fracking!!). I guess we just need to bullshit voters into believing in miracles too.
Amir Khalid
I mentioned yesterday that the Republican party wasn’t going to abandon Trump until he became an immediate danger to it. In addition to that, Trump can afford to disregard his shitty polling numbers, at least for now; it’s the House and one-third of the Senate who will face an election next year, not he.
As for a 2020 presidential candidate from the Democratic party, I reckon that first of all you got to look at preparedness for the job. “Is He Ready For The Job?” is always a good question about anyone running for POTUS. Wilmer showed he wasn’t prepared, despite his support among younger people. Trump believed he was too awesome to need preparation, and we see the consequences of tthat every day. Demand that every Democratic candidate show their work. After all, they are running for the biggest executive job in the world.
tobie
@Aleta: Somehow my first association reading this was of the medical fund Walter White’s son sets up for him in Breaking Bad but which actually served to launder money. All small contributions.
Yarrow
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Probably love him. Racists gonna racist.
sdhays
@Baud: They talked about her “theme” of “boring policy” and neglected what that boring policy actually was.
MomSense
@Baud:
I’ll have to go back and check but he wrote about it following the election.
Baud
@MomSense: Thanks. That is unforgivable.
Schlemazel
@Brachiator:
But the damage has been done, he has his revenge for the fall of the USSR. If he were executed tomorrow by the Russian mob tiny hands is still in the WHite House, millions of Americans will still be manipulated by the propaganda machine he set up in the US. He has already ‘won’. He is just too short sighted to see what that victory means.
It is never hopeless but until I hear some actual plans with actual potential for success I will remain doubtful. The damage has already been done, we may recover but it won’t be within my lifetime or that of my children
EDIT: BTW – that does not mean give up, it means we have to fight harder. We cannot recover until those people are gone, or such a minority as to be ineffective. I will not go down until I have spent every effort to stop those people
sdhays
@Schlemazel: My point was that Hillary did identify that this is a problem, had constructive ideas on this, and talked about it quite a bit, but no one knows that because the media considers this stuff boring and unimportant.
Yarrow
@Schlemazel:
Things happen fast. Remember when the Republicans were doomed and never coming back to power? I do agree with you that when all this stuff comes out in the open it’s going to upend our political system. It will take a strong leader who is willing to work on a bunch of angles to fix a lot of the problems.
Doug R
@Tilda Swintons Bald Cap: The special elections in “safe” seats lost around 12 points, and he’s at 36% and that’s 6 months in. House is flipping, Senate may but it will still be close. If Senate doesn’t go for impeachment, he could still resign, drop out for “health” issues. Worst case, we can lock down their crazy then until 2020.
Even now with all branches they’re having trouble getting shit passed.
Baud
@Yarrow:
The choice is clear.
Brachiator
@Sloane Ranger:
Still not a ginger. But freaking cool!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Not a complete solution, but Vox had an interesting (to me) proposal about relocating some large gov’t agencies out of DC, along the lines of the CDC in Atlanta
of course, that would open up the Senate and House to some huge fights about who gets what
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Funny. Robert Byrd used to do that for West Virginia. The Village made fun of him for it.
Kay
I’ll continue to call my Senator but at some point the people who receive Medicaid are going to have to step up and stop voting for these people.
They don’t even have to vote for the Democrat. Just stop adding +1 to GOP congressional campaigns. This isn’t going to work- they can’t ask one group of voters to protect the programs they receive because they want to make some political statement about how they hate libtards so want to continue backing Republicans. It’s fucking childish, idiotic and self-indulgent.
The moderates will fold. They always do.
Brachiator
@Schlemazel:
I don’t agree. Putin is not the bogeyman. But even if he were, I believe in John Wick, the guy you hire to kill the fucking bogeyman.
Yarrow
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: That’s actually a great proposal. But, you know, government jobs aren’t real jobs, so….
Betty Cracker
@Brachiator: I don’t supposed it has dawned on Trump’s dim-witted supporters yet, but he has transitioned seamlessly from talking about economic carnage, heartland desolation, etc., to tweeting bullshit like this:
He’s coasting on the Obama economy, but now he’s taking credit for it instead of undermining it. Now, when low unemployment numbers come out, it isn’t “fake” but instead evidence that the Trump plan is working (never mind that he’s passed fuck-all of substance since taking office).
Trump’s cultists will call the streams of piss falling on their heads rain, but I’m hopeful that at least some of the unaffiliated will get wise to the scam. We’ll see.
Schlemazel
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
My experience with NASA taught me that these things become giant welfare projects for the local Congressman. Spread across 42 locations in 30 states does not make for an efficient or effective organization. OTOH, it could be just the thing, sort of a guaranteed income program. Gonna be hard to pay for if everyone works for the government though.
Yarrow
@Kay: It’s not a political statement; it’s racism. They are voting their self-interest in voting for politicians that will keep the non-white people down. Figure out how to counter that and you’ve got a winner. Logic doesn’t work on the hate brain.
Baud
@Betty Cracker: The Obama economy is the only thing keeping his approval rating above 27%.
Baud
@Schlemazel: The military has been successful with such a strategy.
Schlemazel
@Brachiator:
see my earlier response. He already has deeply damaged the US and it will take years to undo the damage. He built (with a lot of help from assholes like Dimbart and many others) a propaganda network that will live long after him. Don’t focus on Putin, he has already done what he set out to do and is no longer needed for the continued destruction of the US
Brachiator
@Schlemazel:
These are some damn good questions. And you know what? The Democrats need to paste these, and more on a board, and come up with some good answers. And the answers can’t be infrastructure, job training, or other vague crap.
I believe the Democrats can do it. If not, they deserve to lose.
..
Sentient AI from the Future
@West of the Rockies (been a while): “well he’s certainly racist enough, no doubt about that. There’s some other stuff I’m not as sold on though…”
Baud
@Brachiator: The answers can’t be the answers???
And if we deserve to lose, I hope we take some folks down with us.
Schlemazel
@Baud:
and look what a bloated carcass that is! It might be the only way to go but I am not seeing how to pay for it yet.
Iowa Old Lady
@sdhays: Yeah, it was all horse race all the time.
Emma
@Schlemazel: I understand what you’re saying but… I know you’re a student of history. Look back and see how often “everyone knew” an outcome that NEVER HAPPENED. We can only grab onto a goal and steer towards it no matter what.
Aimai
@Baud: yup. I took it off my blogtoll over that–and Boomans general misogyny. Maybe you have to be a woman to notice it but booman had an extreme antipathy towards some politucal women and to the distraction that is womens issues.
eclare
@JMG: And be sure to add at least one “Bless your heart, you were tricked”….Good luck!
Betty Cracker
@Kay: Agree. If this horrible Trumpcare abomination passes, it’ll be bad for everyone, but could it serve as a clue-by-four upside the heads of the dole-dependent, austerity-enabling idiots? Probably not, “idiots” being the operative word and all. We could be doomed to replicate the Kansas experiment on a national scale.
frosty
@Baud: And make sure the flag pin you’re wearing is right side up.
sdhays
@Baud: Booman voted for Sanders in the primary, but he was definitely not talking like someone who was going to risk not voting for Hillary in Pennsylvania. I took a mental health break from politics following the election catastrophe, but this from Nov 11 sure doesn’t sound like someone who didn’t vote for Hillary. Maybe we’re getting the primary and general election confused?
Kay
Pence was out lying about Medicaid yesterday and he said Medicaid will be protected for those who truly need it or something like that. All Republicans use this weasel code language when they’re reassuring the base that the government programs the base relies upon will be unaffected.
Every GOP voter is thinking “yeah! people who deserve it! like me!” – Pence knows this.
This is a conceit these voters cannot continue to indulge. This idea they have that other people will get screwed so that means more for them has reached the end of the road. They’ve run that thing as far as it will go. They’re going to get hurt now and they voted for it.
? ?? Goku (aka The Hope of the Universe) ? ?
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Is physically threatening them off the table?
Iowa Old Lady
@Brachiator: One of the things I’m horrified by is the loss of expertise in govt departments. Think of State or Justice or HHS or Education. Building that up takes years.
Schlemazel
@Brachiator:
Agreed! I have run this through my mind a thousand times and come up dry. It will take people smarter than me (not hard) to offer real answers. I always end up with programs like minimum guaranteed income but there is the little problem of where does the money come from? Billionaires don’t pay taxes, corporations are fleeing to tax havens so what can the government do to make money?
I have ideas there like, patent the discoveries made by NASA, DoD, CDC and sell them instead of giving them away. But I am not sure how much that would generate
Baud
@Aimai:
You and your identity politics…
@sdhays: That would be good to pin down. It really is a red line for me.
Brachiator
@Schlemazel:
I said before, and say again that I don’t agree with you. You give Putin more power than he really has. Your damage assessment is not based on available facts. Your “years to undo stuff” is a function of your pessimism, not reality.
I think the larger problem to democracy has come from within, from voters who seem to want an authoritarian, and who want to wallow in fear and hatred.
But we can choose to do better. Maybe we will. Maybe we won’t. I don’t think it’s too late yet.
Again, I hear everything you have said. I appreciate you taking the time to clearly lay out your views. But I do not agree.
Yarrow
@Schlemazel: I would say the cracks were there and Trump took advantage of them as did Putin. No foreign government made us hollow out our middle class over the last 30-40 years, for instance. There are a lot of examples of divisions in our society. The Russians used propaganda techniques from the KGB to target our already existing divisions and make them larger.
Trump didn’t start the propaganda network. It was in existence when he stepped into the race. He took advantage of it and got a big assist from the Kremlin. But our society was ripe for the picking. Our government has not been serving us for decades. It’s time for that to change.
artem1s
@schrodingers_cat:
Yes, this. I would add that every one of those ‘whatabouteries’ was invented by the GOP to keep Cult45 distracted while they stole their health care, homes, medicaid, social security, pensions, and their children’s and grandchildren’s lives when they start up their next wag-the-dog war to deflect from the massive deficits and plummeting stock market.
these tools have been used against dems precisely because the GOP knows they work on their dumb rube base.
Formerly disgruntled in Oregon
@OGLiberal: “Then the Emperor has already won…” I got no time for that lack of imagination.
MomSense
@sdhays:
Maybe we are confusing the two votes but I remember him writing something about why he didn’t vote for her.
p.a.
Sow seeds of doubt? On cement? Good luck with that. I reached the stage of calling them morons to their faces. The invites dropped off considerably after that. Oh well…
Schlemazel
@Emma:
That is why I say never give up. I am not saying things will never change, they will. The problem is what will change & what it will take to change for the better. The Civil War didn’t last forever but it was required to get through it to save the nation and the outcome was not what it should have been as we are still fighting that war today (and losing recently) because people didn’t continue fighting for what was right once the shooting stopped.
frosty
@WaterGirl: The WaMo story is by D.R. Tucker, one of their weekend writers. Supporting Sanders and dissing the Democratic Party ‘s his consistent schtick. I quit reading him, since there was no new news there.
dww44
@MomSense: I read Booman regularly. I thought he said that he supported Sanders in the primary but voted Clinton in the general. I could be mis-remembering.
Some of his commenters these days don’t seem to agree with his take on Russiagate. He believes it’s the real deal and collusion has been demonstrated. His strangest commenter is taking the opposite tactic and has accused Booman of going off the rails on the Russia issue.and having sold out to the IC.
sdhays
@Baud: Me too. If he didn’t vote for Hillary in the general election, especially in Pennsylvania…
I already read him less than I used to, but if he actually didn’t vote for Hillary in the general election, I’m done.
Villago Delenda Est
@Baud: She was “overprepared”, according to the Typhoid-Mary analog for Broderism, Chuckles the Toddler.
sdhays
@MomSense: I remember he did write about not voting for her in the primary. A quick look didn’t surface anything like that for the general.
Aleta
Since I’ve mentioned (independent) Seven Days Vt:
I started reading it because of Alison Bechdel. Since the election she’s drawn a few new cartoon strips of the DTWOF (Dykes to Watch Out For) characters. (Seems they would not be quiet, even though they were sort of retired a few years ago from new public appearances.)
Her latest strip is here: https://www.sevendaysvt.com/vermont/dykes-ponders-how-to-unify-a-divided-country/Content?oid=6581946
Two other post-election ones:
Nov 23, from Seven Days Vermont
March 14, from Seven Days Vermont
Schlemazel
@Iowa Old Lady:
and that is exactly why, even if the Dems own all 3 branches in 2020 it will be years repairing the damage. First qualified people will need to be found & placed & then years will be spent ferreting out the leftover bastards that have accumulated over 40 years of mostly Republican maladministration.
People thought BHO was a magic man & simply putting him in the White House would fix everything. Nobody could have done that even if they had the full support of both Houses (which he didn’t & that led to the 2010 debacle). Whoever follows this wrecking crew has 10 times the work ahead of them and people better understand nothing will get fixed overnight
MomSense
@sdhays:
I seem to remember something after the election. December maybe?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
if she talked about policy, she was robotic and couldn’t connect to people, if she tried to make a joke, she was phony, if she mentioned her grandchildren, she was using them….
Betty Cracker
@Aleta: DTWOF! Thanks so much for the link. A lot of truth there.
Brachiator
@Iowa Old Lady:
@Schlemazel:
I don’t like to invoke FDR because it can be too glib. But reacting to the Great Depression took a lot of experimentation. They didn’t come with a bag of tricks that they could easily reach into and pull out a quick solution.
There’s a lot of expertise to rebuild, but also a lot of deadwood to clear out.
Between Bush and Trump there has been a disdain for intelligence and new ideas. Obama tried to reverse that. There is a lot of stifled veteran expertise out there and a lot of new people with new ideas to be cultivated.
MomSense
I found the link I was thinking of and I think it’s unclear. At one point he says he didn’t vote for her which could mean just the primary and at another point he says he was a good soldier. Sounds like he probably voted for her in the general.
What I Did Wrong
TriassicSands
@Kay:
Yes, like it was in a state like Mississippi (Is there anyplace like Mississippi?) before the ACA. First, in many, if not most states, if you were a single male, it didn’t matter how poor you were, you were deemed not needy enough. But for women the income cut-off was something like $3,000 a year, I believe, in Mississippi. So, if you were living the good life on $300 a month, you could just buy yourself a great private policy — you know, low or zero copays and deductibles, no lifetime cap, etc. — and keep on partying on the Riviera.
I don’t know how people like Pence (i.e., the entire Republican Party) can live with themselves. I just can’t imagine what not having a conscience is like.
Steeplejack
@Betty Cracker:
Also, Wall Street is not Main Street. Ordinary people don’t see immediate benefit from stock market gains.
frosty
@Schlemazel: Booman’s idea for revitalizing rural areas is to return to TR’s trustbusting. Walmart broke small towns because it was legal to do so and keep getting larger with no limit. Finding a way to make owning and operating small businesses feasible again would help. I have no idea if it can be done.
randy khan
I have to say I laughed at “almost 40 percent.” The guy can’t even count.
joel hanes
@debbie:
share
“Yeah, I like Trump”
[In the same tone as if they had announced that a friend has stage 4 lung cancer]
“What a shame. I’m sorry to hear that.”
And then drop it completely.
BTW, this technique works (as well as anything does) on children who use won’t-eat-that in control struggles:
“I don’t like fish. Ick.”
“What a shame. I’m sorry to hear that.”
FlipYrWhig
@frosty: People in small towns… shop at Walmart. They think the kinds of people who object to Walmart think they’re better than them. I think undoing Walmart-ization is politically extremely difficult.
WaterGirl
@MomSense: Booman didn’t vote for clinton??? I had stopped reading before i knew y=that, i guess.
WaterGirl
@Belafon: okay. I thought I had seen that on TV when they (appeared to be) saying it was the last season not just for Orphan Black and Doctor Who. But maybe i misunderstood.
MomSense
@WaterGirl:
I think he did. Not sure. I found the post that I remembered and it is a bit unclear.
WaterGirl
@Baud: I was just about to write that. How could I ever look to BooMan for analysis or strategy again?
WaterGirl
@MomSense: I may still have to deal with my family who voted for Trump, or didn’t vote, or voted 3rd party, but I certainly don’t have to support a blogger who did the same. If Booman didn’t vote for Clinton in the general, that would be it for me with Booman Tribune, so i thought this was important enough to just ask him outright if he had said that
I just left a comment on the latest Booman thread saying I had been away, had heard that and was wondering if he indeed had said that or if perhaps someone was thinking about the primary rather than the general election. Will come back here and post the answer.
Gelfling 545
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I hate this particular argument. Let’s win by pretending to be who we are not or, still worse, abandoning our principles. Even if we did win -and I doubt this is a winning formula for us- at what cost? Leave such shenanigans to the GOP who have no conscience to worry about anyway.
Citizen Alan
@Sloane Ranger:
It is a satire. But unfortunately, that does not answer the question of whether Betsy DeVos is innumerate
glory b
@debbie: ‘ I’m steeling myself for a family event later this month where I expect to encounter and argue with Trump supporters.”
“Betty, I do hope you’ll share your techniques for those of us in the same horrible boat.”
Once again, I invite allof you in this situation to get adopted by a black family. Almost any black female over the age of 65 will invite you for a holiday if she thinks you’ll be alone.
I invite you again to read the Caucasian guides to black cookouts, Thanksgiving, church services and Christmas and you’ll be fine.
Just remember that big mama doesn’t eat just anybody’s potato salad.
TriassicSands
@WaterGirl:
I did a quick check and Booman wrote this on November 8, 2016
I don’t see how he could have written that and not voted for HRC.
J R in WV
@Baud:
I just saw somewhere on the Internet this morning that there are 9 major Army bases in the US named for Civil War Heroes – Confederate ones!! Quite a list it was! Mostly in the CSA states, of course, but not all of them.
Yoda Dog
Coming in late to the thread but good luck, Betty.
Most of my whole extended family are trump cultists and its just a constant fountain of sorrow for me. Engaging or ignoring the problem feels equally futile.
Gretchen
Local paper urged Sen. Moran of Kansas to vote against Trumpcare because rural hospitals say it will force them to close. He’s been doing townhalls with large turnout opposed to the bill.
WaterGirl
BooMan’s reply to my question about voting in the general election:
WaterGirl
@MomSense: @Baud: BooMan voted for Hillary in the General. See comment directly above this one.
Just wanted to close the loop.
WaterGirl
@TriassicSands: And you were right!
Gretchen
@Betty Cracker: Kansas learned from the Kansas experiment and voted a bunch of moderates in last election. Busy Dem primary for the governor’s race next year.
MCA1
@Betty Cracker: Not only that, but he’s hurrah’ing about the approval being expressed to him by a bunch of executives at a fucking professional golf tournament. In other words, the exact people who’ve made out like bandits in the New Gilded Age while leaving everyone else behind. They’re the ones who love the stock market climbing. WWC real ‘murka don’t got no 401k, much less no goddamn IRA or individually traded accounts or any of them stock option things.
The degree of his betrayal of his base is rivaled only by its predictability.
Baud
@WaterGirl:
Oh wow. You didn’t just keep on guessing. How anti-internet. Thanks, WG.
WaterGirl
@Baud: I guess I wasn’t raised right. :-)
TriassicSands
@Gretchen:
The use of the word moderate in describing Republicans is an iffy proposition. Given what has happened to the Party — its descent into wholesale idiocy and undemocratic madness — it is possible to be considered a “moderate” Republican and still be a complete disaster. I’m not familiar with the Kansas “moderates,” but I’d have to know a lot more about them apart from they voted to undo some of Brownback’s trainwreck to believe they qualify as deserving to be called moderate. Measured against Brownback it isn’t hard to look moderate.
I saw a copy of “What’s the Matter with Kansas” for sale at my local library the other day (HBs are a dollar; Paperbacks are $.50). I almost grabbed it to see how it reads years later after the Brownback revolution. Alas, I didn’t have an money on me at all.
TriassicSands
@WaterGirl:
You got definite proof. That’s good.
There’s a big difference between preferring Sanders to Clinton and not voting for HRC in the general.
Lurking Canadian
@TriassicSands: Kansas would do well to find some Republicans who understand that two is greater than one. They seem to have a real problem with math
O. Felix Culpa
@Baud:
Hear, hear! I’ve started flying the American flag – on patriotic holidays, at least – exactly with the intention to reclaim our national symbols for those like us who actually care about our country.
Ruckus
@FlipYrWhig:
You have to also remember that in small towns there usually wasn’t much choice. Maybe one furniture store, a couple small markets, a pharmacy/drug store and prices were higher than the cities because they didn’t sell enough at city prices to make the profit they were looking for. I’ve worked events in towns like that, when the circus comes to town the local stores have to stock up way past what they normally sell. Walmart may be all the bad things we think they are (and they are!) but for a small town, getting a Walmart is a huge deal. Yes it runs local business out, but it replaces those jobs with more. Sure they are crap jobs but a crap job is better than no job.
TriassicSands
@Ruckus:
I’m not going to defend Walmart (I opposed their coming to my town, but they’re here.), but I’m not sure that the small “mom and pop” businesses that Walmart put out of business had good or better wages than Walmart does. It’s more about atmosphere, service, and the fact that Walmart can afford to do much better than they do and they don’t.
Citizen Alan
@debit:
In real life, I have told Trump voters in my extended family that I don’t want to hear anything they have to say. They can save their excuses for Jesus when they’re begging him not to send them to hell. Since I live in the Bible Belt, you can imagine how well that went over.
WaterGirl
@TriassicSands: Yep, kind of like the difference between, “oh, okay” and “you’re dead to me”. :-)
Karen
they are spending campaign money on legal fees, how is this even legal?
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trumps-legal-bills-soar-as-russia-probes-grow/ar-BBEsrTO?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U348DHP
WaterGirl
@Karen: I don’t think it is legal. That doesn’t seem to stop Trump.
Ruckus
@TriassicSands:
As I said, they are all the bad things we think about them. I’ve seen them decimate small town business when they moved in and I lived in a county that would not let them move in. There was Target, Costco and a HD in the county, that’s as close to big, current MBA capitalism that they would allow in.
Ruckus
@WaterGirl:
Legal, illegal, why should he care, he has the bestest lawyers.
Wanna bet he doesn’t understand the difference between stiffing contractors (civil law) and stiffing citizens (criminal law) and how much different the two are handled?
moops
@woodrowfan: I thought everyone got debate questions ahead of time, or is that just for Presidential and Vice-Presidential debates?
Did Hillary actual get any Primary debate questions ahead of time, or just topics and a suggestion list?
One question I do have is: Is the dirt on Hillary receiving *funding* from Russian actors a real possibility? or once again super-hard boner projection? Or the Russian’s knowing that for the GOP everything is projection and hence that is the kind of hypothetical dirt they knew Trump’s people would believe and accept a meeting that compromised all of them.
I suspect the third option. You want an event that is patently scandalous so you offer the thing that the opposite party is totally prone to believing: The exact crime they themselves are filthy of.
WaterGirl
@Ruckus: I am very much hoping that he soon finds out. So far there hasn’t been anything for him that money can’t buy. Pretty sure he owns even his own wife, loosely speaking. I hope he learns this lesson soon, and learns it the hard way.
Ruckus
@moops:
Don’t forget everything, that’s every fucking thing with republicans is projection. If they are accusing someone of something, it’s because it’s what they would do, most likely have been or are doing.
jayjaybear
@West of the Rockies (been a while): At least he’d finally be a ginger.
TenguPhule
@Iowa Old Lady:
Well, yes.
That’s who they’ve always been.
And they’re not going away peacefully.