I know some of y’all dislike prurience, are depressed by bitterness, do not like “not normal” framings and despise GIFs. As a courtesy to you, I’m putting most of the content below the fold. You’ve been warned!
You realize Trump will probably tweet a picture of his dick to dispute her description, right?
Now, I’m not a fan of the “imagine if President Obama had done this” game. But imagine for one fucking second if President Obama paid off a porn actress, who then blabbed to the media about his junk!
The legs on fainting couches nationwide would groan under the weight of their insensate owners. Democratic leadership on Capitol Hill would huddle under their desks in the fetal position. Republicans would immediately convene committees to explore every aspect of the scandal with an objective of impeachment.
But it’s Trump, so the story is not prominently featured on any major news outlet I’ve seen. If that could be interpreted as a signal that Beltway types are less interested in politicians’ bedroom peccadilloes, maybe it would be a positive thing.
But it’s a sign that Trump has so flooded the zone with every conceivable type of perversion, corruption, mendacity, etc., that our press corp has simply gone catatonic. It’s a stunning indication of just how far we’ve strayed beyond the bounds of NORMAL. As a malignant narcissist, Trump believes he deserves special treatment.
But his voters want desperately for the rest of us to accept this surreal clown show as normal. That’s the unspoken plea in every conversation I’ve had with the Trump voters in my life. You can hear it in this recent exchange at a Chuck Grassley town hall in Iowa, which was dominated by criticism of Trump in a rural, conservative area.
We pick up the scene after Iowans have raked Grassley over the coals for obstructing the Trump-Russia investigation and normalizing Trump’s bizarre behavior (via The Des Moines Register):
Heather Nejedly of Pisgah caught Grassley’s attention, stood and said: “I just love our wonderful President Trump,” drawing a chorus of mocking laughter mixed with sincere applause.
“I just think we’ve all got to come together,” Nejedly said, turning to Mikels and others. “You know, I don’t know you, I don’t know you, but don’t hate so much. We’ve got to come together and stop hating so much.”
“We’re not hating. It’s not that we hate Trump,” replied Pat Crosley, 67, a home-school teacher from Kimballton who brought her two children to the meeting as a field trip. “We are recognizing behavior that’s not normal. We’re not psychiatrists, but we can see abnormal behavior when we see it.”
Unlike Ms. Crosley, I do hate Trump, with every fiber of my being. But her remarks about recognizing abnormal behavior are on point.
It’s only been a year. Can we hang on to normal? Have we lost it forever? I don’t know. I’m just grateful my daughter came of age during the Obama presidency. Hers may be the last generation that remembers what “normal” felt like.
Olivia
The boundaries of “normal” have been stretched mightily but there is no limit, I’m afraid. At least no limit until we get a Democratic president and then you just watch Republicans pull those boundaries back and start demanding propriety. I am going to heavily invest in companies who manufacture fainting couches and pearls for clutching.
dmsilev
Hell, we don’t even have to imagine, we just have to remember back to Ken Starr and his relentless pursuit of the Great White Clenis.
opiejeanne
Stormy Daniels talks about Trump and sharks:
http://www.newsweek.com/trump-stormy-daniels-shark-week-785379
“He was like, ‘I donate to all these charities and I would never donate to any charity that helps sharks. I hope all the sharks die.’ He was like riveted. He was like obsessed. It’s so strange, I know,” she said.
Roger Moore
I think you have that completely wrong. If he posts dick pics, it will be to brag about the affair, because that’s what Trump does and somebody on his staff will tell him it’s the way to connect with his base. If he wants to refute the claims, he’ll have to use pictures of another dick, because his would only confirm them.
Lee
I don’t really watch the major new channels. I’ve seen this on every news website I visit. It has also gotten tons of mileage for the late night comedians.
I’m pretty sure i saw a blurb about this on MSNBC while I was working out.
Just goes to further the argument that the major news networks have significant blame for Trump.
Villago Delenda Est
I am beginning to think that Impeachment is not enough. The damage being inflicted on the country by this creature and his cultists can only be reversed by extreme measures.
Frankensteinbeck
I’m not sure that’s true. I think it’s that Democrats are judged on an entirely different standard, partly because the media are partisan Republicans, partly because we give a damn about holding our leaders to account and actually try to follow our publicly expressed morals.
We’ve lost it for quite some time, not because of Trump, but because of the gigantic (It may be 30%, but 100 million is a lot of people) population block that has thrown such an insane bigotry tantrum has no reason to stop or slow down. This is a trend, not a sudden jump. Still, there are question marks there, because much of this loss of norms is driven by having wildly extremist individuals in Republican congressional leadership, and they are not inevitable. And if Democrats get mad enough, norms may be restored by electoral force. Normally that latter would be absurdly unlikely, but it’s been quite a year in special elections.
Jeffro
As I said in the last thread, just setting up an LLC alone would have gotten Obama impeached. Even if it had been just for funsies. Heck, he could even produce tapes of him and Handsome Joe giggling in the Oval Office about, “…let’s set up an LLC, just for funsies!” and the GOP would just say it shows an additional level of criminal conspiracy.
I can see Trey Gowdy now:
TG: “Mr. President, surely you are aware that LLCs can be used for any number of illicit purposes.”
PBO: “Um, sure, but I set this one up just to show America how nuts y’all are.”
TG: “You SAY that, Mr. President…but how do we know you won’t, say, use this LLC to pay off a porn star after an affair? Hmm? HMM??”
PBO: (shocked, blank look on his face) “What…what the hell? What kind of sicko would do that?”
TG: “So you’re not denying it’s a possibility?”
Cac
The tawdry stuff is good headline fodder, but the media is just starting to pick up on what I called from the start as the impeachable issue:
“Stormy” says that Trump paid her through a shell corporation. If it was recorded as a business expense, that’s tax fraud.
Cac
Help. Stuck in moderation hell.
Nicole
Headlines on the Washington Post are about how its the Democrats’ fault if the government shuts down.
And I see there will be a WH briefing on the potential shutdown. Do you think a single reporter will ask about the Stormy Daniels thing?
Ugh. I hate the enabling media.
Cacti
The tawdry stuff is good headline fodder, but the media is just starting to pick up on what I called from the start as the impeachable issue:
“Stormy” says that Trump paid her through a shell corporation. If it was recorded as a business expense, that’s tax fraud.
Spanky
@Villago Delenda Est:
Wait! What? After all this tumbrel talk? Which, BTW, now everyone on this blog has picked up.
Don’t start getting soft on us, mister!
(Yes, wordsmithed to match the OP.)
Chip Daniels
We don’t have to imagine. Just recall the way the hunt for the Clenis was handled.
germy
Last night we watched BBC World News America on pbs and didn’t throw anything at our TV when their correspondent went back to revisit Trump supporters she’d interviewed a year before. (Spoiler alert: They still love him and would vote for him again without hesitation.)
After that segment they had a brief interview with Kenneth Starr. He told them Trump has been cooperating fully with the investigation.
I waited for them to ask Starr “What about Bannon refusing to answer questions while his lawyer texted the White House for advice on what and what not to answer?” but apparently there was no time for that followup.
bystander
@opiejeanne: Hearing of twitler’s hatred of sharks makes me want to invite the Left Shark to the SOTU. And wear black.
BroD
All she has to do is say, “massive” and he’ll admit to it in an instant.
The Ancient Randonneur
She does have a point. I am hearing people in my professional and personal circles who generally don’t talk about politics express publicly they are worried about the behavior and policies of the Current Occupant.
bystander
Remember when the press felt compelled to report Lewinsky’s description of the Clenis? Just so we could all compare and contrast, I suppose, or maybe to elicit refutations?
germy
Out of curiosity each day I check the websites of my local TV news stations. The three of them often pick up national news stories from larger places like the WaPo and FTNYT.
There was nothing about the recent NRA story. Absolutely no mention of it.
Since the majority of my neighbors get their news from these local sources (and the national stories that trickle down to them) I’m sure my neighbors aren’t aware of the NRA story.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
You got to admit after treason a sex scandel is almost charmingly normal.
Anyway, doesn’t change anything, everyone who thinks Trump is a twat still has reason to believe that and belief in Trump being right is a matter of faith to his base like they believe the earth was created 4,000 years ago.
d58826
Just imagine if he even said a polite hello.!
The Ancient Randonneur
@Villago Delenda Est:
Agreed. Terre Haute has a gurney at the ready. It should be put to use starting at the top.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@bystander:
Sort of like Colbert going off about bears. Fear of nature some conservative thing?
KickBoxBanana
I too have had these conversations with Trumpanzees. Give him a chance blah blah. It’s hopeless even talking to them when they don’t seem to realize that a disgusting human being like him does not even make the start line. Never mind the fact we also knowthat he is a horrible president who has no idea what he is doing. But that’s not even the worst part of it and a lot of these Trumpanzees are incapable of understanding that for some bizarre reason.
sherparick1
Remember, IOKIYAR is one of the guiding rules in the MSM for the last 25 years. It is certainly true of those who identify with the Republican tribe that the leader can do no wrong.
My feelings about Trump. ..”He is Tom Buchanan come to life and sitting in the presidency.
They were careless people, Tom and Daisy – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made…,
Fitzgerald paints Tom as a huge racist in the book if you have not read “The Great Gatsby” lately.
“”Well, it’s a fine book, and everybody ought to read it. The idea is if we don’t look out the white race will be—will be utterly submerged. It’s all scientific stuff; it’s been proved.” (1.78″
I hate about everyone around him who are destroying the Republic and its reputation.
germy
JPL
Me also.
The idea that Franken was forced to leave the Senate, while the commander and chief gets away with paying blackmail money is repulsive. We have sunk down a rabbit hole.
eric
@KickBoxBanana: I did give him a chance. In fact, had I given him 100 chances he still shit the bed — given what we know from the Russians, that might be literal as well.
Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD)
She doesn’t go into details (thankfully!), but I’m guessing it’s shaped like a wonky Cheeto.
d58826
@Chip Daniels: IIRC Paula Jones claimed that her story could be verified by the unique marking on the Clenis. As a result of Monica it was determined that no such marking existed and Paula Jones became an instant nobody. Please pass the brain bleach. The only good thing about Der Fuhrer is that we no longer have to debate he said/she said and simply ask how many more ‘she’s are there
Aimai
@Jeffro: they threw a god dsmned fit over the obamas redecorating their private wuarters, having the grandmother live there, and putting up a play structure.
germy
Gelfling 545
@Olivia: I’m waiting for him to piss on the Washington Monument and have them explain why that’s perfectly acceptable. Any day now.
germy
@sherparick1:
I thought that quote fitted Bernie and Jane.
Barbara
Anyone who can say “We’ve got to come together and stop hating so much” with a straight face after living through 8 years of the demented hatred that was expressed for Obama is too stupid or too deluded to have an opinion on anything.
dr. bloor
IT’S TVUE!
Betty Cracker
@Frankensteinbeck: I agree that Trump is part of a larger trend, but I believe he represents a radical departure from the norms of American politics all the same. My hope is that he’s such a radical departure that he’ll doom the forces that propelled him forward to irrelevance — the ultimate overreach.
opiejeanne
@The Ancient Randonneur: Just for the info that he didn’t use protection he deserves it. The man really is a monster.
opiejeanne
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Fear of nature a conservative thing might be true about a lot of them. Some idjit commented on the WA governor’s Twitter, or maybe it was Sen. Patty Murray’s Twitter, that he didn’t eat fish so he thinks it’s fine if they drill off-shore here. That was the only thing he thought of in relation to an oil disaster.
Kind of like those idiots who laugh about global warming and say they’ll just turn on the AC.
The Moar You Know
I called it. Fuckin’ bareback.
Humdog
It is disconcerting for liberals to wish fondly for the good old days where people had shame. I miss shame.
JPL
@Betty Cracker: I doubt they care.
Everyday the government is open, his cabinet members destroy our democracy and I hope they shut it down.
SiubhanDuinne
@Cacti:
I have confidence that Bobby Three Sticks will be checking it out thoroughly.
opiejeanne
@sherparick1: Gah! I haven’t read the book and the opening lines, while a brilliant description of them, is one of the main reason I haven’t read it.
And then my sister was gushing about the movie and I wanted to smack her and ask if she understood what it was about, that they were terrible people. (I didn’t see it) She was reacting to the costumes and the opulence of the kind of wealth described in the book and displayed in the movie.
SteveinSC
I am just reading the Simpson material from the House Intelligence Committee. It is stomach churning and frightening. From Justice Roberts, to the Republican Party, the Wall Street Crowd, the country is under assault from a mafia nation-state with nuclear weapons with Godfather-Generalissimo Putin in charge. A takeover of countries of and for the super rich. The president of the American subsidiary of this International-level Crime syndicate is Donald Trump.
Link
The fate of this country hangs in the balance.
sherparick1
@KickBoxBanana: The sad fact is that he is exactly who and what they have always wanted in a President; one who will call their enemies names, who makes liberals “cry,” and who puts the jack boot on minorities and others that need to be brought into line. He is their “Id,” like the monster in “Forbidden Planet” tearing apart their enemies. That he will ultimately tear them apart has not register yet.
opiejeanne
@Butthurt Jordan Trombone (fka XTPD): I am going to bet that in the intervening years he has had surgery for prostate cancer, so whatever it was in 2005 it has now been reduced to a nubbin, a shadow of its former self, and he probably needs the blue pills to get an erection that is about 2/3rds what it used to be, if that.
JPL
@SteveinSC: I read the Senate transcript and it read like a Bond novel, and I don’t know how the story ends.
WaterGirl
@The Moar You Know: Maybe they don’t make condoms small enough.
trollhattan
@germy:
Bastard Starr is wandering the media landscape like a returning hero, not the tsar of rapists at Baylor and the empty-handed Clinton witch hunter he is. We’re fools to ever point a mic at him.
schrodingers_cat
I don’t need to know about the President’s sexual proclivities to know that he is not suitable for the job.
trollhattan
@Aimai:
Obama put his feet on the desk! Obama wore a tan suit! Monster! Boff sides!
Frankensteinbeck
@The Ancient Randonneur: and @Betty Cracker:
What’s weird to me is that it’s starting to look like ‘heightening the contradictions’ finally worked. Of course, the people who want to pushed that logic still don’t see a difference, and it wouldn’t be necessary if they’d just vote Democrat in the first place. But Jesus Christ, are people who are normally meh on politics pissed.
Just One More Canuck
@opiejeanne: someone in Washington State not caring about the fishing industry? Sweet jumpin Jeezus
opiejeanne
@Betty Cracker: from your lips to God’s shell-like ears.
sherparick1
@germy: Well, Senator Sanders and his wife really don’t have that much money compared to the Trumps and Buchanans of the world. Although Burlington College might certainly agree with you about Jane. http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/local/2017/07/21/unraveling-jane-sanders-burlington-college-legacy/486054001/
germy
@trollhattan:
I know. I see him being interviewed like some elder statesman and I wonder if he’s simply hired a new publicist? Why is his opinion worth anything? Especially after his behavior at Baylor.
BroD
@sherparick1:
Glad to find a another fan of Forbidden Planet here.
Yarrow
I was out of the loop since yesterday with only a few glances at the phone for news. What’s the latest on the shut down?
Zach
Paul Ryan is a sick man. The CR extends CHIP funding for 6 years. Why 6 years? Because much of the tax cuts will sunset in 2024 and that’s also when the bill eliminates the estate tax. He wants to hold poor kids’ healthcare hostage again… doesn’t give a wit about the welfare state in reality.
Amir Khalid
@WaterGirl:
They probably do make them that small. But it would be too great a blow to Trump’s vanity to wear an XXS-size.
opiejeanne
@Just One More Canuck: He got jumped on over that. My youngest’s job in shipping depends half the year on the fishing industry in Alaska, but not caring about the coastline and the industries supported by it, let alone the loss of wildlife, just because you don’t eat fish is so stupid it boggles the mind. Blinders.
Yarrow
@The Moar You Know: You don’t get to fight your personal Vietnam of STDs if you wear condoms.
Amir Khalid
@Yarrow:
Trump’s at Mar-a-lago for the weekend, as usual
opiejeanne
@Amir Khalid: I figure it’s just pure selfishness that caused him to not wear protection.
Marmot
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
I think the answer is yes!
In his declining years, my conservative dad became increasingly concerned/interested/fearful of natural disasters and where to live to avoid them. He’d always kind of been that way, and the ramp-up was bizarre.
opiejeanne
@Amir Khalid: No, they’ve cancelled the Mar-a-Lago trip because OPTICS!
germy
I can’t believe trump isn’t just naturally ribbed for her pleasure.
SteveinSC
@BroD: Remember the Krell with their Id coupled to the power of the planet’s core, destroyed the Krell in one evening. A visually spectacular movie with amazing depth and prescience.
Yarrow
@Amir Khalid: Is he already there?
sherparick1
@opiejeanne: Well,Fitzgerald did not want you to like the characters, except perhaps for Gatsby (who was a bootlegger, after all). Nick, Fitzgerald’s alter ego and narrator, did not particularly like himself. The book is a tragedy after all, the hero Gatsby dies and the villains, the Buchanan’s go on, and on.
Watched the great “Chimes at Midnight” on TCM last night. Another tragedy where the King turns out to be a dick, and destroys his closest friend (Fallstaff).
germy
I’m sure the National Enquirer is all over this story, right?
Right?
Amir Khalid
@opiejeanne:
They did? What about that first-anniversary party for the Trump Residency that they were charging the big bucks for?
chris
Define normal.
Kay
We’re not allowed to judge them on their words, we’re not allowed to judge them on their actions, so maybe ask Heather what we’re supposed to go on here? Am I supposed to figure out what’s in her heart, or what?
Mean-spirited, nasty people are often perceived as mean-spirited and nasty. That’s not my fault and it’s not my responsibility.
I don’t want to “come together” with this Trumpster. I don’t have any obligation to join his team.
On Trump paying off his girlfriend, NPR actually covered what I want to know about it- I want to know why it was covered up by media until after the election. I think we should get a detailed, documented explanation of why the public weren’t told the candidate was paying his girlfriend hush money until after the election, when 4 separate media outlets knew it.
Good on NPR for raising the question. Now let’s see someone answer it.
opiejeanne
I was like, ‘Dude, what’s up with that?’ and he laughed and he said, ‘You know, everybody wants to give me a makeover and I’ve been offered all this money and all these free treatments.’”
She added: “And I was like, ‘What is the deal? Don’t you want to upgrade that? Come on, man.’ He said that he thought that if he cut his hair or changed it, that he would lose his power and his wealth. And I laughed hysterically at him.”
https://nypost.com/2018/01/19/all-the-dirty-details-of-trumps-alleged-porn-star-affair/
Matt McIrvin
@Frankensteinbeck: “Heightening the contradictions” usually works to some degree. It just rarely works well enough to justify the damage that heightens the contradictions in the first place.
James E. Powell
The “What would you be doing if this were Obama or either Clinton?” question has to be directed at the press/media along with the follow-up, “Why are you handling it differently now?” And we need to demand answers. The right wingers carry on a constant barrage against the press/media and the result is that they bend over backwards to please the right winters. We need to do the same.
Just One More Canuck
@Amir Khalid: non-refundable deposit, no doubt
opiejeanne
@sherparick1: I know, and that’s exactly why I’m not interested in reading it. Life’s too short to read things that will depress me, and that book would. After a certain age and treatment for Hep C that really took a lot out of me and ate a year of my life plus some of my memory, I lean hard to comedies and satire and happy endings.
Just One More Canuck
@opiejeanne: His house is probably made from brick, so fuck the forest industry
opiejeanne
@Amir Khalid: I suppose he’ll just pocket whatever they’ve collected so far. Put it in his pocket. Maybe they’ll hold a small, tasteful soiree at the WH to celebrate in a scaled down manner, since the government is going to shut down this afternoon. Yes, I crack me up.
trollhattan
@chris:
“I’ve worked really hard, nearly all my life, believe me, to create as many fetuses as possible. I continue support you in my quest!”
rk
I can only speak for myself, but I’m not interested in Trump’s antics anymore. It’s not that I don’t care, but it’s more that I believe he’s a complete degenerate and knowing about one more degenerate activity means nothing. He had sex with a porn star, paid her off, yeah I’m not surprised. He had sex with Ivanka while Jared watched. O.K. I believe it because he’s capable of it. The only thing I’m interested in at this stage is what is going to be done about it? So far nothing. Otherwise it’s just a string of degenerate stories. It’s like watching a stream of sewage pass by. If you have no control over it all you can do is turn away, because that’s all you can do. The time to act will be November when I’ll go vote and drag everyone around me to vote. I know that he’s a completely worthless human. It doesn’t need constant reinforcement.
germy
Stormy’s quote ‘Ugh, here we go.’ replaces Milo’s editor’s ‘UGH. DELETE’ as most representative of how I felt the morning after the election day.
SiubhanDuinne
@Amir Khalid:
Actually not. The WH announced a short time ago that he’s scrapped the trip to Florida for now. (Breaking out world’s tiniest violin for all the people who shelled out $100,000 each for a First Trump Anniversary dinner and photo-op at Mar-a-Lago.)
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: Exactly, I have zero interest in knowing why you are not a racist even though you support every bigtoted, racist and xenophobhic action Rs take. That’s what I told my ex-friend when she defended the first Muslim ban. That’s my response to every R enabler.
opiejeanne
@Just One More Canuck: You’re probably not wrong, although he may be living in Mom’s basement for all I know. It’s just, how blind can you be to the interconnectedness of everything in nature? This state is so beautiful*, has gorgeous summers that are not likely to cause heat stroke, winter activities for those so inclined, and some people never poke their noses out the door to look at it except when they run out of toilet paper. We have whole apartment/office buildings full of (Amazon,, mostly now) employees who stream down to the park to find food when the Farmer’s Market on Denney opens every Saturday, and they don’t seem to know how to feed themselves the rest of the week. Reminds me of when Yahoo was a startup and people slept at the office for days, didn’t bathe, and ate Twinkies.
*and I’m a native Californian so I feel like I know beautiful when I see it.
Tazj
@chris: It’s absurd isn’t it ? However, I doubt many conservatives have a problem with him speaking at the rally. After all, he did his part like Paul Ryan. He had sex and we don’t know yet if he pressured any women to have an abortion.
danielx
Discussion of Trump’s junk….should be held late night, not in the light of common day.
No Drought No More
Abnormal is also the democratic party clamming up in unison when it became apparent that Bush-Cheney had lied the country to war. Insult was then added to injury when the conclusions of the “bipartisan investigation” of that catastrophe were tacitly endorsed as essentially as being “a honest mistake made by honorable people” (Kerry, Clinton, Gephardt, and Daschle’s names are all included on that list).
But that wasn’t the case, was it? Either then, now, or tomorrow. I bow to no one on the face of the earth in the depth of contempt I harbor towards Trump and the republican party. But it needs be said that the democratic party would at once and immeasurably strengthen the reputation of their party by renouncing the chickenshit taboo of confronting the great war crime of 2003- a crime committed in ALL are names- and begin speaking with honest candor about what went wrong, and why. The historic reputations of those congressional democrats that got it wrong are already written in stone. The rank and file should disregard their reputations altogether, for their own good and the country’s sake. Democrats across the board damn well should own up to the party’s undeniable role in the great tragedy. Keeping uppermost in mind that the tragedy was initiated, plotted, and unleashed by the republican party. I submit it’s vital that democrats do so, if for no other reason than to most quickly and effectively kill today’s republican party when it’s within reach to do so. There exists no good reason for today’s democrats to hesitate inflicting that kill shot on the republican party, especially when all they need do is own up, and speak in honest fashion.
Of course, there never was. Never, and any democrat that still contends otherwise might as well vote republican for all the real good they’ve been doing their own party. “Look forward, not back” was always bad advice, even if proffered with the best intentions.
Suffice to say, I bow to no one in seeking the death of the GOP, either. Never have, never will…
Aleta
It’s all up to Melania now. If she would walk out, the story would stick around for 3 weeks. Then she starts with the interviews. Her book comes out. Her recordings during the campaign. More audio files. After impeachment, a triumphant Dancing with the Stars.
chris
@Tazj: That too would be an entertainment expense.
Yutsano
@No Drought No More: …
What are you babbling about?
@Aleta:
I could also see her booking it back to Slovenia with Barron and her share of the cash. She’d live like royalty. Probably buy her own castle.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Yutsano:
Pie.
Betty Cracker
@Kay:
Exactly. I had a conversation with a Trump-voting aunt that went something like that recently. She brought it up! She truly seemed distressed that we’re still so pissed off a year later and was bleating things like “Can’t we all just get along?” and “It’s just politics, no reason to get so upset about it.”
My answer is no we can’t, and yes there is. The only Trumpsters I voluntarily associate with are relatives, and I’ve made it clear they can either STFU about the Trump shit-show in my presence or expect my unvarnished opinion when they bring it up, complete with the implications for their character and judgment. I see less of them these days! :)
Just One More Canuck
@opiejeanne: I know what you mean – I’m from Victoria but currently exiled to Ontario. We’re in our January thaw, which probably means freezing rain this weekend. Summers here mean 100 degrees or higher with humidity plus crazy-ass thunderstorms. There’s about four months per year that the weather is tolerable. God I miss the west coast
Kelly
@Frankensteinbeck:
I’ve seen evidence of this among my not very political Republican leaning and Libertarian leaning friends and neighbors. They have blithely accepted the Republican Party will keep the government’s hands of their wallets and nothing else mattered. Both sides and all that. How they still thought that when Art Robinson was elected head of the Oregon Republican Party is beyond me. The open racism, incompetence but particularly the distasteful circus around the Orange One has really upset them. I think about half of them will never vote R again. The conservative hunters and fishermen among them have surprised me with their dismay over Trumpista offenses against the environment.
Matt McIrvin
@Betty Cracker: It’s of a piece with “all politicians are liars, both sides are equally bad”: a fallback position under pressure from “my side is awesome and you are evil”.
Yarrow
@Betty Cracker:
Most of the Trumpian Republican policies won’t hurt her. Yet. She might even get an extra $20 in her paycheck once the tax cuts start. It has to hurt her before she’ll see it’s bad. Like all of them, lack of empathy.
opiejeanne
@Just One More Canuck: Oh Victoria is lovely. I have distant cousins in Ontario but I’ve never been. Shockingly, they seem to like Trump; I blocked them on Facebook when they said nasty things about Obama. I had intended to take my computer and my family research with me and go visit and get some answers. I think the guy might have Alzheimer’s these days. though.
Mel
@WaterGirl: Finger cots?
Pinkie finger ones might be wee enough. Maybe.
opiejeanne
@Betty Cracker: I like that, your unvarnished opinion. You go, Betty.
I had to set limits on political discussion with my Dad the last few years of his life; he died in 2012 age 94 and for about 8 years I kept telling him that life’s too short to fight about politics with him because I loved him (and because he was wrong). And a lot of his nonsense was stuff no one would care about in 5 or 6 years.
Ksmiami
@Villago Delenda Est: like denazification measures and shutting down Fox News as hate speech/propaganda
opiejeanne
@Yutsano: I noticed a name that was casually omitted from the list of Senators who voted for the Iraq war.
rikyrah
Yep.
Nope.
Not really. We’ll get back to normal.
As soon as the traitors go off to jail.
WaterGirl
@Mel: I had never even heard of those until a couple of months ago when I hurt my finger. When the pharmacist showed me where to find them, I laughed out loud. They looked like tiny little condoms! Too funny.
Brachiator
Trump supposedly had sex with Stormy Daniels before he became president, right? So, I pretty much don’t care what he did or what his orange junk might look like. It’s a non-story. I guess I could rattle about conservative hypocrisy, but the looney toons among them would comeback with how the Baby Jesus picked the imperfect vessel Trump to do His work.
I admit, though, that I am disappointed in Stormy Daniels. I hoped that she would have had better taste.
Yarrow
@WaterGirl: That’s so weird. I was at a meeting last night and one of the people there was wearing one of those because she’d cut her finger. None of us had ever seen one before. And now it’s mentioned in this thread.
PVDMichael
I continue to believe that the most newsworthy aspect of the Stormy story is that Donald Trump can be successfully blackmailed.
Yutsano
@Just One More Canuck: Oh ye gods man. Get back here. Victoria is wonderful for a provincial capital. I actually have a friend who lives there and I should go crash in on him some day.
(Might be in Vancouver come March/April, but just BC.)
@opiejeanne: Shocked, I am not.
bmoak
@Nicole:
Every news broadcast, headline, chyron crawl, etc I have seen are blaming the Dems for any shutdown.
Brachiator
@Betty Cracker:
Sadly, Obama could simply praise his wife and talk about his affection for her, as he recently did, and racists become enraged and spew hatred. They would never need an example of “bad behavior” as an excuse.
@Aleta:
Melania probably had to sign a pre-nup, a post-nup and a nup-nup. Also probably a special rider that she cannot leave him until at least 5 years after the end of his presidency (or death, whichever comes first). She ain’t talkin’.
Aleta
I swear I think this is a planted theme, pre-election propaganda. One of my cousins was wearing it on a sweatshirt at her annual Christmastime breakfast. She’s a staunch Democratic voter. She told us it was a present from her good friend at church, who had moved her by saying “Let’s stop arguing over politics; we can’t let this ruin our friendship.”
She’s also a devoted Christian, never mean. I hated to burst the season of love bubble but couldn’t let it go, so I said ‘Coming together would be good, but this administration doesn’t believe in coming together with people in poverty or immigrants or African Americans or Muslims. Cutting programs for folks with disabilities and their families and cutting health care and food for kids isn’t coming together.” Silence in the room, then she agreed, talked about the city center for homeless teens, where she used to work, which has been shutdown.
Tom
@Yutsano: The wife and I visited Slovenia two summers ago. Beautiful country, Ljubljana keeps winning Greenest City in Europe award, wonderful food, friendly people. Plus, when Yugoslavia was breaking up in the 1990s and Milosevic sent an armored brigade to make an example out of them, they kicked the shit out of the brigade and told Slobodan to go f**k himself. You’ve got to love that.
Just One More Canuck
@Yutsano: I’m trying to convince my wife but she is sadly and inexplicably attached to her family who are here in Ontario. Maybe once our daughter is finished school.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@sherparick1:
I’ve always found Gatsby wanting a little. His tragic flaw isn’t love, really, because Daisy just IS NOT WORTHY of grand passion. She’s dreadful. Tom is worse.
Kay
@Betty Cracker:
That Trumpster with his “this isn’t the real me” makes sense, because he has an idea of himself that is different and better than what he says and does. But let’s not kid ourselves here. That’s about him. His ego. His need to think of himself as somehow much “better” (theoretically!) than his own words and actions. That has nothing to do with me or anyone else and demanding that I validate what I see as self-serving nonsense is too much to ask. It’s an imposition. Do whatever you need to do to feel better about yourself but don’t ask me to co-sign this bullshit. I’m not doing it.
Mnemosyne
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
That’s a pretty common theme for novels of that era, though — the guy who falls hopelessly in love with an unworthy woman. Hemingway loved that plot, and it’s what Maugham’s Of Human Bondage is all about.
I do like the theory that Gatsby is secretly Jewish passing as a Gentile and that’s why he’s so desperate to hook Daisy, a genuine blue-blooded WASP. It’s not just love, it’s social status and acceptance.
The Moar You Know
@West of the Rockies (been a while): That was kind of the whole point of the novel, I thought. They’re all shitty, shallow, useless people whose lives, ambitions and dreams are worthless.
Leto
Maddow has covered this, but has the same stomach churning reaction that Betty has, though she’s been covering the money angle: where did the $130k come from? On that front, The Wall Street Journal has been following that trail. Last night she had Michael Rothfeld on to discuss his article: Trump Lawyer Used Private Company, Pseudonyms to Pay Porn Star ‘Stormy Daniels’ : Michael Cohen created limited liability company just before $130,000 payment
This.Is.Not.Normal. Never stop repeating that.
Yutsano
@Tom: My going back to Europe itch is strong but is probably going to have to wait unit 2019 at least. I was aiming more for Holland/Germany however I do know a couple folks in the Czech Republic. Maybe we can take a quick trip south from there.
Aleta
@Brachiator: In seriousness, I think it’s probable that (if by chance the rumor is true that she did want to leave, before he ran) he would have threatened her with taking custody of her son. I have no idea what motivates her. But if she were escaping abuse (and imo he’s violent), that can eventually outweigh a pre-nup. But fear for the welfare of a child can outweigh escape. Threats on her life are believable too since he loves to threaten.
Brachiator
@opiejeanne:
@sherparick1:
I am not a huge admirer of the novel, but acknowledge that the writing is brilliant, some of the best American novel writing ever.
I half-joke with friends that “Gatsby” is like an American “Hamlet” for blonde male actors. At some point, the role has to be taken on.
Got to watch Chimes again. I love Orson Welles. His interpretation is at odds with the Henry of the plays. Falstaff tries to draw Henry back into the amoral world he had inhabited as an adolescent and young prince without responsibilities. The tragedy of Falstaff is that he doesn’t understand, or care, that his antics only encourage Henry’s enemies, who think that he is still a callow, untested youth.
germy
@The Moar You Know:
Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh.
JPL
@Brachiator: Melania tweeted her support for the people of NYC after the truck ran over pedestrians on 10/31. Her phone was in Trump tower. I don’t think that the pre-nup can prevent her from traveling back and forth.
Brachiator
@Aleta:
Trump is too public a figure to threaten Melania. Also, whether he could be violent is questionable. Melania has Secret Service protection, just like Trump. It would be tragi-comic to see both their protection details going at it if Trump tried to harm Melania.
Also, she only has to step in front of a microphone and say “Help!” and all kinds of shit would come crashing down.
And the bottom line is that I don’t know squat about Melania, or her relationship with Trump (and so was joking about a nup-nup). Hell I don’t know if she cares for Trump, or their son, or gives a shit about his welfare.
Brachiator
@rk:
Did I miss something? Is there video?
Uncle Cosmo
@WaterGirl: Recalls to mind the old joke about FDR meeting Stalin & after agreeing on quantities of Lend-Lease materials, FDR asked, Is there anything else you need?
A million condoms for our brave troops, Uncle Joe replied.
We’ll have them shipped. What size?
Normal size. Thirty centimeters.
After the meeting one of FDR’s aides whispered, Mr. President, that’s almost a foot long! What’ll we do?
Have them made up, the President laughed – but have every box stamped SMALL.
/rimshot
LongHairedWeirdo
You bring up an interesting point. I’m not sure if I could hate Trump.
I could hate Rush Limbaugh. He made it cool to hate, so long as you call it “entertainment”, he’s bright enough to see the damage he does, but continues to be what he is. (Or “continued to be…” if he’s finally left the airwaves!) He doesn’t believe the crap he spews, see, and that’s what makes him evil – he’s willing to profit by causing damage to others. I don’t *hate* him. But I could.
Trump strikes me as a true believer – the GOP likes to pretend that they see the simple, obvious truths that “elitist liberals” miss, and Trump would be *so* into that – pretending he’s, like, a really smart person, without the difficulty of actual thinking. I don’t hate people like that. That’s like hating smallpox, or a hurricane.
But if he’s playing the game, not being played by the game, yeah, that’s hate-worthy. I still wouldn’t hate him; wanting to see him destroy the GOP and leave office in disgrace isn’t *hate*. It’s a desire for justice.
(
manyakitty
@germy: Anything by Evelyn Waugh
Brachiator
@germy:
Very interesting work. And a pretty good 1988 film featuring Kristin Scott Thomas.
I love late critic Roger Ebert’s description of the film:
“A Handful of Dust” has more cruelty in it than a dozen violent Hollywood thrillers, and it is all expressed so quietly, almost politely.”
I can easily imagine that Trump is the center of a world in which cruelty and contempt is casual, everyday fare. You see hints of it in the way that he enjoys humiliating people.
Waugh wrote another work with a provocative title: Vile Bodies.
Brachiator
@Zach:
The new tax law increases the exemption before the estate tax is imposed, but does not eliminate it.
Kirk
@Amir Khalid: I thought that size was called bigly?
Captain C
@Betty Cracker:
It’s just people’s lives getting ruined and the republic undermined, if not outright destroyed. No reason to get so upset about it.
Ab_Normal
@Just One More Canuck: Betcha a nickel they’re from my side of the Cascades (the dry side).
Mayur
@Brachiator: which has a great film adaptation as well.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0325123/
Captain C
@Captain C: I kind of had to have this conversation with one of my (only remaining) Trump-voting friends. He was doing an obnoxious victory dance on my Facebook wall, ragging on my brother-in-law, and I basically told him: 1) you don’t pull that shit with family, 2) since you’re laughing at the idea of people suffering, you’re being an asshole, and 3) unless you inform yourself (he never does) and can argue like an adult, don’t talk politics on my wall unless you’re prepared for well-justified ridicule and abuse, which will consist of pointing out how you’re a total hypocrite and an awful person who thinks other people’s suffering is funny.
I then gave him a link to a Farenthold (I think, it might have been Eichenwald) tweet thread (of around 100 tweets) pointing out all the problems with Trump as a human, businessperson, and potential president, and invited him to pick a few tweets and comment. He never did.
Any Trumpster who says “Can’t we just get along” now is basically the abuser saying “can’t you just forget the huge volume of my past (and present, and probable future) abuse and act like I’m a good person (read: give me stuff and adulation)?” The correct answer is always “no, not until you’ve done everything you fix the situation, and that starts by voting Democratic for the rest of your life, and admitting you fucked up royally because you thought it was fun to hurt people.”
Uncle Cosmo
@West of the Rockies (been a while): @Mnemosyne: @The Moar You Know: Fercrapsake, the “whole point of the novel” is that there is money & there is MONEY. Gatsby ne Gatz thinks he can climb into the land of high castes & castles where Daisy lives by the sheer force of riches (& for that matter maybe what he wants is less Daisy than membership in the high caste having her would represent) & he’s wrong because, as FSF famously put it, The rich are different. (Of course when he said that to Hemingway the latter shot back, Yes – they have more money. Ernest wasn’t buying what Scott was hawking.)
Anyone recall the famous scene in the Redford/Farrow movie when in Daisy’s presence, Gatsby pulls out gorgeously colored shirt after shirt after shirt & hurls them around her? Doesn’t matter if it’s blatant conspicuous consumption or the sheer exuberance of being able to have such beautiful things in such abundance – that behavior screams out Parvenu!
(FTR last time in Prague I bought a dual-language version of TGG, page facing page, for when I get my gumption back for learning Czech.)
Captain C
@Captain C:
ruemara
@Brachiator: It’s the blackmail, the LLC and the hypocrisy. Not the damned sex.
swbarnes2
@sherparick1:
Tom Buchanan had one advantage over Trump, he believed in climate change.
Boatboy_srq
@dmsilev: Two decades ago a scandalized GOP attempted to impeach a sitting President for being less than candid about an extramarital affair.
This year, POTUS is on record as a womanizing sexist boor (never mind all the far more tangible, meaningful missteps and misdeeds), and apparently now that’s OK because he’s not Blah.
Citizen Alan
@d58826:
Hell, he was accused of palling around with terrorists basically just because he was once in the same room as a former weatherman.
matt
Ancient Rome: say hello to Caligula, a cousin fucking serial killer
Modern day America: hold my beer
matt
@Betty Cracker: We can all get along when we put these corrupt pieces of garbage they elected in jail and get a functioning country again. They can help or not. If they won;t help, they’ll be thrown out of the way.