.
On the other hand, twelve-year-old me might actually have made an effort to understand math, if I’d known jobs like “Planetary Protection Officer” were an option. From the Washington Post:
There’s a vacancy at NASA, and it may have one of the greatest job titles ever conceived: planetary protection officer.
It pays well, between $124,000 and $187,000 annually. You get to work with really smart people as part of the three- to five-year appointment but don’t have to manage anyone. And your work could stave off an alien invasion of Earth or, more important, protect other planets from us…
The job announcement is rather dense. But Catharine Conley, the NASA scientist who has been in this role for three years, has spoken candidly about its scope and responsibilities, telling Scientific American in 2014 that her focus is to ensure that the agency’s activity complies with a 50-year-old international treaty that set standards for preventing biological contamination outside of Earth and safeguarding the planet’s biosphere from any alien life….
***********
Apart from dreaming of close encounters (but not with Republicans), what’s on the agenda for the day?
Baud
Donald Trump called me last night to tell me what a great job I’m doing. Weird.
satby
Good morning everyone!
Enjoying classical music while sipping my first cup of coffee, the peaceful way I try to start every day. It’s dark out though, the days are shorter already. A month ago it would have already been getting light.
satby
@Baud: that is weird. And worrisome.
Shalimar
Trump wanted to fire the U.S. commander in Afghanistan for not winning that war during the first 6 months of the administration. Mattis and Dunford had to gently explain to Trump that he was insane.
Baud
@satby: Nah. It’s ok. Like the president, I am lying.
Lapassionara
@satby: Right after the election, I spent my mornings listening to requiems. They seemed appropriate at the time. What are you listening to?
NotMax
@Baud
Collect call or
personasshole to person?Baud
Some good morning news from NPR
Baud
@NotMax: I wonder if young people even understand what you are referring to.
Baud
@NotMax:
I wonder if young people even understand what you are referring to.
OzarkHillbilly
Forget about alien life, and start protecting the planets biosphere from humans.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly: Right. We might need the aliens to save us.
ETA: Better yet, To Serve Us.
NotMax
@satby
A little something a bit rousing to get the day in gear.
(Have this LP; one of the ones on the desert island list.)
Schlemazel
@Baud:
Must have been a busy night for him. During his call to me he told me I was the best BJ commenter there ever was and how everyone loves my comments. “I know mixed reactions and there are no mixed reactions to your comments, everyone loves them. Your comments are YOOOOOGE!”
p.a.
Just tell tRump we won, plant a statue of him somewhere in Afghanistan with one of those 24/7 solar, internet linked cameras like they use for eagle nests, and leave one of the WH tv’s linked to it.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: So when he said he had the greatest phone conversation in the history of presidential phone conversations last night, he wasn’t talking to you?
NotMax
@NotMax
And – screwed up the linky.
Here is the correct one.
satby
@Lapassionara: this: Prince Igor: Polovtsian Dances – Alexander Borodin, my local college classical station streams Minnesota’s classical KSJN station overnight.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly: I screen my calls.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: Linky no worky
satby
@NotMax: link pops back to my comment, not music.
Edit, never mind ?
NotMax
@Baud
Turnabout is fair play. Half the time I have nary an inkling of what they’re referring to.
satby
@Baud: let’s call it… Snarking.
Central Planning
@Shalimar: I thought trump said he had a plan to win that war, but he didn’t want to give it away during the debates
David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch
Prebuis just leaked the greatest story – EVAH!
► Drumpf screaming insults at the generals
► Drumpf screaming he wants to fire generals he never met
► Drumpf screaming “WE’RE LOSING!” (video)
► Drumpt screaming at Mattis not to listen to officers but to waiters.
► Drumpf screaming why hasn’t the US has stolen Afghanistan’s natural resources.
► Drumpf comparing Afghanistan to a fancy restaurant in Manhattan.
(link – Wooooooocooooonode Knew Afghanistan Would Be So Difficult?)
satby
@NotMax: nice! Now I need moar coffee!
sukabi
@Central Planning: he apparently doesn’t want to give it away to the Generals in charge either.
Baud
@NotMax: I know! The young people with their memes and their emojis and their acronyms. WTF? ?
David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch
Even the liberal Dmitry Medvedev:
Baud
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: Meh. Talk is cheap. Release the pee pee tape.
satby
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: and since a huge number of those military voted Republican (probably), it serves them right. Consequences. I hope they have nightmares 24/7.
rikyrah
Good Morning,Everyone ???
Baud
@rikyrah: Good morning.
rikyrah
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch:
Unreal
I believe every word, but it is still disturbing?
Baud
@satby: I read that active military supported Hillary. Vets overwhelmingly supported the traitor, however.
rikyrah
@satby:
I know about the days getting darker.?
rikyrah
@Shalimar:
That is just a cover. He wants to fire him because he refused to take a meeting with Erik Prince.
rikyrah
@Baud: LOL?
David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch
So they won’t combat ISIS or Al Qaeda because it’s linked to fighting Russian meddling in western elections and their PyschOps in Ukraine.
Can you imagine the endless scandal if a Democrat did this.
Elizabelle
@Baud: And Trump does not even have the excuse of drunk dialing.
NotMax
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch
Also too:
David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch
schrodingers_cat
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: Mummy and our new overlords.
Schlemazel
@Elizabelle:
the does not preclude the possibility he is chemically impaired. His behaviour should make us want to look into that shady excuse of a doctor he used as a front
OzarkHillbilly
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: From the article:
It’s not the strategy that is lacking, it’s the dogdamn resources. Time and again the US gets involved in these idiocies pretending we can do it on the cheap and time after time the result is the same. We never should have invaded because we were never going to invest the necessary amounts to “win”, whatever the fuck that means. I said so then and I say so now.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly: It should have meant get Osama and get out.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Elizabelle:
Is coke dialing a thing?
Baud
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: It’s interesting that his best character trait is intelligence.
OzarkHillbilly
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch:
No it’s not, the 58% that he is strong and 55% that he is intelligent are very disturbing. He is an idiotic WATB and people think that is intelligent or strong? WASF.
NotMax
@OzarkHillbilly
Why am I picturing him saying “Let’s ask Russia for help. Not many people know this, but they have experience there.”
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly: I misread the “strong” question. That’s his best trait in the poll.
The “strong” response is probably due to his bullying, and the intelligent because he is a rich guy.
satby
@Baud: so I tried to google it. Most sources implied enlisted supported Clinton and career or officer ranked members were Republican supporters falling in line as they always do. But most of the sources I found were pre-election or RWNJ sites.
Baud
@satby: That’s consistent with what I remember.
Elizabelle
They polled on President McCain too:
Republicans are crazy asses. I suspect you’re seeing the Fox News/rightwing sources misinformation bubble there, especially on “That Russian Thing.”
gene108
@Shalimar:
What I heard on one of the MSNBC programs last night (can’t remember which one) is the Trump is mad that the military has not paved the way for U.S. companies to gain exclusive mineral rights in Afghanistan. Basically, he doesn’t see the point of spending years in Afghanistan, if U.S. companies cannot economically profit.
Elizabelle
@Baud: Suspect the “strong” and “intelligent” responses indicate you’re dealing with delusional poll respondents. People still in thrall with the reality TV show aspects.
Fits with the “Gingrich being a dumb guy’s idea of a smart guy” type of assessment.
ETA: And the level of whining from Trump, and he still gets that “strong” rating? Surprising to me.
eclare
@NotMax: Hahaha…I could see that
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Not even that. Getting UBL should always have been a goal but that was like using an aircraft carrier to kill a hornet. The purpose of any action against Afghanistan after 9/11 should have been to make the Taliban pay for their complicity. What that action should have been I can not say because I do not know what all the options were, but invading was the equivalent of chaining ourselves to a 500 lb chunk of concrete. Now were stuck with either the Sisyphean task of turning Afghanistan into “victory” or the embarrassing alternative of cutting the chain to free ourselves of that burden.
We won’t sufficiently fund the former, and we will avoid the latter as long as possible because that would require us to face the fact of what a paper tiger we really are.
satby
@Elizabelle:
Yes. Yes, they are. And they chose that, and cling to it.
So fuckem.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
Agree. And since American deaths there are relatively few, there’s no political pressure to end this quickly.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@OzarkHillbilly: Trump should put Jared in charge, he can fix anything.
Baud
BTW, remember that each new 1000 point milestone in the Dow is less impressive than the last, since the Dow is a proportional index.
satby
@Elizabelle:
It shouldn’t. They (RWNJs) all whine: their churches are persecuted, minorities get free stuff they don’t, their taxes are too high, they have to be “politically correct” and can’t use racial slurs or say Merry Christmas. It’s all a ball of crazy grievance about everything, none of it actually based in reality. They see the fake president as strong because he gives voice to their “unfairly suppressed” views.
debbie
@Central Planning:
Don’t worry. He’s handling it.
NotMax
@BillinGlendaleCA
And while he’s at it, Dolt 45 can make Jared a five star general.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud:
Yep, people are idiots. Thinking that getting your lawyers to bleed people dry makes you a tuff guy and being born rich makes one smart.
bystander
@Baud:
As long as the voices in your head are those of living people, it can’t be a lie.
debbie
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch:
Don’t worry. He’s handling that too.
gene108
@OzarkHillbilly:
The US is a long way from being a paper tiger militarily. We are not involved in the types of convential wars our military has been designed to fight.
We are trying to referee a multi sided civil war in the Middle East, and a civil war in Afghanistan, where the Taliban is funded by Pakistan, so they are not going away and have little reason to negotiate a peace settlement with the Afghanistan government.
And the fact we keep electing Republicans as President, who will and have fucked up everything they touch, we keep digging a hole after we have sort of filled it back in.
Elizabelle
OT. In non-Trump craziness, one of my fave stories this week was about a Dallas newlywed couple from hell (she being a “lifestyle and beauty blogger”) who defamed their wedding photographer, via social media and emails, right up to setting up a ridiculously one-sided news segment on the local NBC station. Photog sued; jury returned a $1 million verdict against the bridezilla and groom.
I hope they are made to pay every penny. Horrible people. Stupid too; lots of email evidence that worked against them.
They trashed their wedding photographer over a $125 fee, so a jury told them to pay her $1 million
Moldova (!) might want its good name back, too.
gene108
@NotMax:
Jared would only agree, if Ivanka can design the uniform. He’d probably look for a way to incorporate a nifty navy blue blazer and khaki pants into the look. Maybe some tasseled loafers too.
SFAW
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
And now that he no longer shills for Subway, he has plenty of free time.
debbie
The more I hear about Stephen Miller’s press conference, the angrier I get. I didn’t know until this morning that his grandparents emigrated from Belarus. I wish someone had the cohones to point out to Miller that his grandparents would have failed the test he’s proposing, and as a result, he wouldn’t have grown up to be the American exemplar he pictures himself to be.
Or maybe I misjudge the grandparents. Maybe the grandparents wanted to move to a more horrible country than their homeland. Yeah, that must be it.
Elizabelle
@satby: Yup. Paranoids in Depends.
Enjoy what must be your third cuppa coffee by now. I am still hoping to nap a bit, but maybe should just get up and put on the coffee pot …
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Yep, people don’t care when it’s not their son or daughter. All the money we are dumping into that comedy of errors, the things we could do with that.
NotMax
@Elizabelle
Going out on a limb here but I don’t foresee a golden wedding anniversary in their future.
NotMax
@gene108
Right wing tips.
OzarkHillbilly
@?BillinGlendaleCA: It’s going nowhere. Are you sure he isn’t?
Elizabelle
@NotMax: Truly. Bridezilla’s blog is down, and they are laughingstocks. Regrettably, they have already spawned.
I wish the photographer could go after the NBC affiliate next. They had a duty to investigate more before running the segment; they did some catch up a few days/weeks later, but the damage to the photographer was done.
Photographer (who is actually model gorgeous IRL, unlike bridezilla) preferred not to go on camera herself, and I wonder if that might have backfired on her, because the email letter she sent may not have been as compelling to the NBC affiliate. It’s likely the TV news story that really spiked her business.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: Lots of finance websites plot it on a logarithmic scale for that reason.
Brachiator
@gene108:
And Pakistan pays them in US dollars they get from us.
germy
Facebook Zuck wants to be president.
Iowa Old Lady
In random news, a friend in Oklahoma City tells me they had four earthquakes yesterday, the last one strong enough to knock the pictures off the wall.
germy
Sam Clovis, Trump’s pick for USDA chief scientist, called progressives ‘race traders’ and ‘race traitors’ online
OzarkHillbilly
@gene108:
The US is a paper tiger. Our military forces against the Taliban aren’t even measured in the same increments. But they are running circles around our vaunted Army/Air Force/Navy/Marines. It’s not because our military is not up to the task, it’s because we refuse to spend the necessary capital. We keep trying to sew the damaged fabric of that country back together pretending that the needle and thread of another 6500 troops would finally do the job when what we need to do is get some new fabric (change the views of the populace by investing tons of money on infrastructure and education etc etc dragging them into the 21st century).
But we won’t, because that would cost more money than we have any intention of spending, and there is every bit the chance that it wouldn’t work anyway. It’s a fool’s errand, always was.
gene108
@debbie:
Considering Trump’s mother was born and raised in Scotland, Trump has first cousin’s in Scotland (who seem to not want to have anything to do with him), and his paternal grandfather immigrated from Germany, Miller is just copying his boss’s hypocrisy on the matter of immigration.
Obama’s family, on his mother’s side, has been in the U.S. longer than anyone in Trump’s family, with each having one immigrant parent, yet Obama is considered the “foreigner”.
evodevo
@satby: yes. you have hit the nail. Whining about “It’s not FAIR” is their one talent.
OzarkHillbilly
@gene108:
Also, can’t blame this fuck up on Republicans alone. DEMs were every bit as complicit and it was Obama who said that Afghanistan was the right war, as tho 9/11 justified shooting ourselves in the face.
debbie
@gene108:
Grrr.
Elizabelle
@OzarkHillbilly: But I think we could have killed OBL and gotten ourselves out, having made the point. Instead, W and Cheney lied us into Iraq too.
Democrats were expecting a shorter and more targeted action in Afghanistan. That is true. No one expected this thing to drag on longer than WW2 or Viet Nam.
(Honestly, several probably did foresee that, and warn. Graveyard of Empires, and all. But I don’t hold Democrats equally complicit.)
Baud
@germy: Obviously a founding member of Scientists With Economic Anxiety.
germy
@OzarkHillbilly: Afghanistan. The graveyard of empires.
Betty Cracker
@Elizabelle: I read that earlier this week. What a pair of assholes. I hope the notoriety of the case can help the photographer build her business back up, but that’s hard to do.
germy
@Baud: A spokesperson for the USDA told CNN, “Dr. Clovis is a proud conservative and a proud American. All of his reporting either on the air or in writing over the course of his career has been based on solid research and data. He is after all an academic.”
Betty Cracker
@Elizabelle: Agreed — we should have declared victory and gone home after waxing OBL. I’ve read that the Russians are now funding the Taliban, which is a supreme irony. If Trump had any sense, which he obviously doesn’t, he’d get us the hell out of there. As it is, we’ll have to wait for President Gillibrand or Harris to extract us.
Betty Cracker
@germy: I get that “race traitor” is a common phrase among white supremacists, but what is a “race trader?”
germy
@Betty Cracker:
The usual suspects will show up here to explain to us why both those ladies are tools of 1) Wall Street 2) The military-industrial complex or 3) The Clintons.
germy
@Betty Cracker:
At first I thought it was a typo. But apparently it is a thing?
Kay
The new theme is “Trump has a sense of humor”. His super funny lines include jokes about police beating handcuffed arrestees. That’s why they help them into the back of the police car- because they’re handcuffed and it’s hard to get into a car with your hands tied behind your back.
This is what “custody” means, and they are in custody:
“the protective care or guardianship of someone or something”
When you take away someone’s ability to look after themselves by restraining them, you become responsible for what happens to that person. This is hundreds of years old- the jailers duty to the imprisoned. It isn’t a new and “liberal” idea. It’s the same idea that undergirds custodians of children- they have an enhanced duty because their charges can’t take care of themselves.
OzarkHillbilly
@Iowa Old Lady: Fracking really shakes up a relationship.
Patricia Kayden
@Shalimar: Fire the “Loser” and replace him with the Wonder Kid who can solve all problems known to man, Jared Kushner. He’s about to solve the hundreds year conflict between Jews and Palestinians so he could go in and resolve the Afghanistan conflict as well.
satby
@germy:, @Betty Cracker: in the context of the article, evidently it’s black people who “trade” on their race by addressing racism.
Patricia Kayden
@germy: Nice to see that Trump has so many White Supremacists to choose from to fill key federal government positions. Great to know that our tax dollars go towards paying for White racists. But Clinton used an unauthorized email server so it’s all good.
satby
@Elizabelle: I gave up at about 4:30 and just got up. May take a nap when I get home from the market.
OzarkHillbilly
@Elizabelle:
It doesn’t work that way. To get UBL via invasion required us to do exactly what we did: Remove the Taliban from power. As soon as we did that, we were then responsible for the country, we could not just turn around and let it fall into chaos.
Of course, we didn’t even get UBL at Tora Bora because, get this, we were too cheap to deploy the US troops necessary and used Northern Alliance forces as the blockers to trap him there. You know what they say about Afghans: They can’t be bought, but they are for rent.
tokyo expat
@debbie: I read Alexandra Petri’s WaPo OpEd this morning on the Press Conference and I thought it was something out of the Onion. But then I read a straight news article that excerpted the same material. These people have no filters. Do they even know what’s coming out of their mouths?
I met up with two colleagues today, one British and one Canadian. My British colleague said she found Trump “amusing.” She said she had always thought Americans were “sensible.” My Canadian colleague agreed. We are so screwed.
Eric S.
@gene108: Psst. In case you missed it, Obama is black. /snark
Patricia Kayden
@Kay:
Trump is a joke but his sense of humor is severely lacking. He can’t even laugh at himself which is a big giveaway. If “joking” about brutalizing suspects is okay with Conservatives, they should have shut their mouths about Kathy Griffin’s bloody head joke. They can’t have it both ways.
bemused
@Elizabelle:
Ugh, the reek of entitlement from that couple. I hope they at least have to pay Polito revenue she lost plus legal expenses and stress. They’re bullies, Mr and Mrs Scut Farkus.
Patricia Kayden
@debbie: Apparently Stephen Miller was raised by liberal Democrats so it’s interesting how he fell off the train and became a belligerent White Supremacist. One thing I can give Trump credit for is finding the scummiest people to work in his administration. He’s a magnet for the bottom dwellers that we normally would never hear of.
Baud
@Patricia Kayden: I’m really happy I never had children.
bemused
@Iowa Old Lady:
I recently saw somewhere a USGS one minute animation of increase of earthquakes in OK and surrounding states 2004-2016. Terrifying. Bad enough living in tornado alley and size and intensity o tornadoes growing and now uptick in earthquakes. None of this is normal!
gene108
@OzarkHillbilly:
The problems in Afghanistan are more complicated than just money. Part of the problem we have in rebuilding Afghanistan is the Bush, Jr White House was very ideologically driven, with regards to free markets solve everything.
We did not objectively look at how to recreate the government of Afghanistan. At best we ignored them, while Bush & Co plotted to topple Saddam.
We never put the intellectual capital that needed to be provided to create effective government institutions there.
We diverted those resources to Iraq.
From figuring out how to build industries there that benefit the people to weening farmers off of growing opium* for war lords and the Taliban, we did not invest enough non-monetary capital in the beginning, when it would have done the most good.
* Heroin use in Iran, Pakistan, and then India, Central Asia, Russia and Europe spiked sharply 10 years ago as cheap heroin from Afghanistan flooded those countries. I sometimes wonder how much of our current heroin problem is due to the cheap heroin from Afghanistan finally making it across the oceans to our country.
gene108
@debbie:
The difference between how Obama and Trump are treated, with regards to their “Americanness” is also exhibit infinity of white privilege.
If you are white, you are automatically American.
Patricia Kayden
@debbie: Yep. His own Grandparents couldn’t speak English when they immigrated here. Just more standards variety Conservative hypocrisy being dished up by Stephen Miller.
Shalimar
@Central Planning: Trump had a secret plan to defeat ISIS in Syria/Iraq. I can’t recall him making any references to Afghanistan during the campaign. It might have been a shock for him to take office and find out we were still at war there.
A Ghost To Most
Rump is a symptom; “conservatism” is the disease:
rawstory
Shalimar
@rikyrah: That sounds like classic Trump too, always protecting the people worth more money than him (in this case Betsy DeVos; I don’t think the Chinese pay Prince enough for him to still be a billionaire).
MomSense
@gene108:
Same as it ever was. When we announced we were going into Afghanistan, I knew this would happen. You can go back to the Anglo-Afghan Wars and see the spike in opiod use/addiction.
oldgold
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
·
5m
“Our relationship with Russia is at an all-time & very dangerous low. You can thank Congress, the same people that can’t even give us HCare!”
Two things you traitorous fool:
1) They have been much worse in the past. I don’t think school children are currently practicing hiding under their desks.
2) It is not the fault of Congress. You and your buddy Putin are responsible.
OzarkHillbilly
@gene108:
Yes, hence my “and there is every bit the chance that it wouldn’t work anyway. It’s a fool’s errand, always was.”
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
Yes.
and Yes. but I feel the need to point out that this non monetary capitol you speak of? It costs money too. especially when fighting a war from 8,000 miles away. Every single one of those criticisms of Bush and Co could also be leveled at Obama and co tho to lesser extents. In Obama’s defense, he was handed an impossible mess, but he didn’t do anything more than try to maintain the status quo because again, we do not have the will to do what is necessary there, if we are even capable of figuring out what that is.
And I have serious doubts that we or anyone else is capable of figuring it out. Always have had those doubts. Invading was a stupid thing to do.
gene108
@germy:
To be fair, Gillibrand is in bed Wall Street, as her husband is a New York based venture capitalist.
He’s also British. I am sure that will be used against her.
One thing Hillary had going for her is Bill was President. In no way could she overshadow her husband.
There’s a strong implicit bias in society against men sacrificing their careers to support their wife’s ambitions. This makes men seem weak. Conversely, it is assumed women will do this for their husbands and not doing so is a blot against the wife.
The amount of crap the would be First Gentleman will take will exceed the shit Hillary had to put up with in 1992, when she was given shit for daring to have a career outside of her husband’s polical ambitions and not being solely the good political wife/prop.
Kay
@gene108:
It is really blatant. Can you imagine if Michelle Obama had been born in another country? There would have been ENDLESS discussion. Everything the Obama’s did was analyzed under this “one of us?” measure. They had to so carefully stay within the lines.
Trump is a fucking oddball. He’s a weirdo and he surrounds himself with this bizarre collection of weirdos and he’s just assumed to be in the club. That’s freedom, what he has. It’s just handed to some people and withheld from others.
Kay
@oldgold:
He’s just commenting on the state of affairs at this point. He’s a Morning Joe guest with a really big microphone.
O. Felix Culpa
@OzarkHillbilly:
Great idea! Only problem with that is that the T budget eliminates all of NASA’s climate monitoring programs. Funds instead go to putting “American boots on Mars.” Another white male dominance display. SMH.
Kay
@oldgold:
I knew it would bug the hell out of him that Congress disallowed his preference for Putin. It IS humiliating.
I bet he gets madder and madder as time goes on and it festers. He’ll be lashing out here shortly! Someone must pay!
Jeffro
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: It’s almost like Medvedev chose his words carefully…ones he knew would get under Trumpov’s skin the most: “humiliating” “total weakness” “fully outwitted”. Good thing Trumpov doesn’t reveal his innermost thoughts publicly (and in private 1-on-1 conversations with, say, Vladimir Putin)
Immanentize
@oldgold: that happens to be exactly what Medvedev said when taunting Trump for being weak.
ETA well except the health care part.
Jeffro
@Elizabelle:
Yup. Fox is there primarily to try and keep the GOP’s floor at 40% of voters. I’d have to say they’ve been doing a pretty good job, but even their ‘dam’ is showing cracks…
MomSense
@gene108:
She got so much shit for having a career, a more impressive one than her husband in many ways, and yet I cannot tell you how many supposed progressive women felt she hadn’t achieved anything on her own and was somehow a bad feminist because she was leveraging her husband’s accomplishments for her presidential aspiration.
Jeffro
@Elizabelle: I saw that one too…justice, sweet justice!
gene108
@Kay:
I think it is just assumed Melania is there as arm candy. It doesn’t matter where she is from or even if she lives with her husband.
But if you think Hillary Clinton gave white men economic anxiety, imagine a woman candidate, whose husband had to quit his day job to help his wife run for President. The economic anxiety would just be overwhelming.
Keep in mind Hillary Clinton, in 1992, and Michelle Obama, in 2008, and Heidi Cruz, in 2016, were/are women with successful private sector careers, who put those on hold so hubby can run for President.
I just can’t picture the media giving a man the same benefit of the doubt these women were given that supporting their spouse’s Presidential run is the expected thing to do.
He is beyond odd. He does not do things normal people do,like laugh and smile. Ther is something seriously wrong with him.
White male privilege in action.
Kay
I live in an area that went 70% for Trump and can I just say to my fellow white people that of all the problems we have with a lack of educational attainment “affirmative action” is like number 2 million down the list?
If you think you didn’t all get into the University of Michigan because of black people may I respectfully suggest that this is both misguided and doesn’t address your real problems? You have to finish high school to apply to college. Let’s work on that before going to “the tiny number of affirmative action admits to a university I would never get into anyway?”
Let’s fix our own communities and stop blaming black people.
Matt McIrvin
@O. Felix Culpa: Their budget also increases the funding for robotic Solar System exploration, maybe the one Trump administration policy I approve of. But at the expense of all the Earth science stuff, it seems unconscionable to celebrate it.
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: When I was in college in the 1980s, the belief that white people were having a hard time getting into college because of affirmative action (and that any black student with half-decent grades would surely get a free-ride scholarship) was omnipresent. It’s a white article of faith at this point, beyond the reach of evidence.
Wapiti
@Baud: This. Once the Rangers and SF and all drove the Al Qaeda forces out, back in ~2002, we should have left Afghanistan.
Whether Trump fires the current commander there or not, I don’t think Trump has a winning strategy. I don’t think the generals have a winning strategy. I don’t think there is a winning strategy.
Matt McIrvin
Many whites believe that black people all go to college for free.
Jeffro
Btw did y’all know Trumpov is going on his first vacation since he was inaugurated? It’s true: the AP says so.
Guess where he’s going? No, seriously. HIS OWN GOLF COURSE!1!!
From the end of the article:
Yes, a guy who already golfs every 3.8 days definitely needs to refresh and renew himself…OMFG…
If you have a free moment (and just to keep those phone-dialing fingers in shape for the next crazy bill that comes down the pike), why not call the AP and tell them to fuck off and die? AP HQ is 1 212.621.1500.
The Thin Black Duke
@Matt McIrvin: White people will believe anything that reinforces their prejudices. Economic anxiety, my ass.
Wapiti
@Kay: I had an African-American (AA) guy working for me when I was in the Army (about 1999). He asked if perhaps it was time to get rid of affirmative action. He was seriously good at his job; a better officer than I was, for certain. From his perspective, his accomplishments had a taint. My reply then was that affirmative action is still needed in the government, because that’s the way we set the example for the rest of the country. We are 14% AA. When we get to 14 AA Senators and 14% of the CEOs in the Fortune 500 companies being AA, then we know that affirmative action has worked.
Chris
@David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch:
Oh, that’s going to leave a mark.
Tenar Arha
@debbie: As a fellow Jewish person, for me he’s literally a walking talking shanda fur die goyim calling someone a globalist as an insult, because that scheisse was started by Stalin and used against Jewish people ever since. The Anne Frank Center even points out how bad he is here.
Chris
@OzarkHillbilly:
It’s not even that we won’t sufficiently fund them (though certainly we won’t), it’s that we don’t even know how to rebuild societies anymore. The Reaganite bug has infested enough of the U.S. government that our idea of reconstruction is to drown the government in the bathtub and wait for the Free Market Fairy to do its work. Successfully rebuilding the country would mean acknowledging that this is not and has never been how functioning developed societies are made, and since we can’t even acknowledge that at home, we’re not about to do it over there.
Elizabelle
@Matt McIrvin: No words. Except: “ugh.”
@Wapiti: I agree with your take on it. And can see your Army colleague having to put up with folks who couldn’t see his talents and fitness for his skin color.
I always wondered if Harry S Truman’s approval rating soared in later years because it was low partly because he integrated the Armed Services. (Could have been war fatigue too.)
O. Felix Culpa
Another target for the administration’s wrecking ball:
Iowa Old Lady
Link
satby
@Chris: we don’t know how to rebuild societies because it would mean that the Republicans would have to admit that our own needs serious rebuilding. Our society is living proof their theories about almost everything are wrong.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Baud: So that 7 months in to get what took GW 7 years.
Iowa Old Lady
@oldgold: That’s right, Trump. Go to war with the people who can block you and/or remove you from office.
The Thin Black Duke
@Chris: This is true, unfortunately. If this country tried to put an astronaut on the moon or build highways or create a vaccine for polio, we couldn’t do it. Morans hate smart people and these days the morans are in charge of everything.
Iowa Old Lady
@Jeffro: How can we even tell he’s on vacation rather than just doing his normal TV/tweet stuff?
Jeffro
@O. Felix Culpa: We’ll need to beat on Congress like all heck in order to preserve this.
Jeffro
@Iowa Old Lady: I know, right? A guy who is out golfing every fourth day…HE needs a vacation??
O. Felix Culpa
@Jeffro:
Yes. The problem (and likely strategy) is that the administration has so many targets, it’s exhausting even to think about fighting them all. But we can’t let up. Must keep on calling and doing whatever it takes to roll this evil tide back.
Gin & Tonic
@Iowa Old Lady: Because he won’t be showing up at that dump at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
Elizabelle
@Iowa Old Lady: Bring it on, Pope Francis.
The rightwing leadership of the US Catholic Church is rancid. On purpose. John Paul II and Benedict Ratzinger did this. Which is why they couldn’t canonize JP2 fast enough. And threw in John 23, as appeasement.
From the NY Times article:
Earlier in the article (which is worth a click):
Elizabelle
@Jeffro: The more time Trump spends golfing, the safer we are.
Gelfling 545
@satby: we are extraordinarily fortunate here in WNY to have WNED – a 24/7 classical station with fine programming and knowledgeable program hosts coming up on its 40th year on air. Now, of course, they stream online worldwide at WNED.org as well. They accompany me through my day.( I’m looking for a decent wireless outdoor speaker that wont cost a fortune so I can listen more easily in the garden.) Well worth the twice a year fund raisers and yes, I am a member. Playing some Puccini now.
Uncle Cosmo
@NotMax: I recommend Puccini’s music for the runup to lovemaking. IOW –
– wait for it –
=;^p
Uncle Cosmo
@Schlemazel: “Dr. Morell, please pick up the white courtesy phone”…
Chris
@Elizabelle:
Frankly, good for them. I’m fucking exhausted with a Catholic Church that acts as an arm of the GOP and gives its preferred party’s politicians a pass on every single un-Catholic thing they do.
Uncle Cosmo
@germy: Clovis is a self-confessed traitor to the only race on this planet: the human race. He desperately needs to DIAF.
NotMax
@Uncle Cosmo
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rimshot
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