Which is to say that there are few people in American politics I loathe so much as the wholly owned Koch subsidiary operating under the name Scott Walker. There are plenty of folks doing more national damage, but few, if any, with the utter, total, almost heroic lack of redeeming qualities as the man Charlie Pierce epithets** as the goggle-eyed homunculus.
So his pain is the sugar in my coffee this a.m.:
“The Far Left” — thanks for the proper nouning** there, btw; I didn’t know we were a franchise operation — as in a decisive majority of Wisconsin voters. “Anger and hatred” — nothing like the mild mannered folks on the right,*** amirite? “Outside special interest money.” Child, please.
But, if it’s all projection with these guys, well we knew that. That subterranean pleasure you feel this morning is that all the faffing in the world can’t hide the genuine panic flowing through Walker like you-know-what through a goose.
And because we need something pretty to wash the memory of Walker’s pallid, grasping mug from our brains, here’s a bird that one-ups that poor goose:
And w/that…open thread.
*That or coke on your Wheaties.
**I verb sometimes. Sue me.
***Very, VERY far from the worst, as we all know, but selected for its exceptional combination of absurdity and cowardice.
Image: John James Audubon, Cygnus buccinator, Trumpeter Swan, 1838.
schrodingers_cat
Don’t worry, Snooze Hour is mainstreaming the right wing hate as normal, by tongue bath interviews of Peter Navarro and rosy portrayals of Roseanne. They too are dangerous Kochers.
SiubhanDuinne
He spells and capitalizes better, and brings superior grammar to his tweets, but otherwise they are as angry and panicky as Trump’s.
ETA: Nice swan. I thought perhaps you chose it because the RWNJs are singing their own swan songs.
Ridnik Chrome
“The Far Left”? You mean to tell me that there were candidates in Wisconsin who wanted to nationalize all banks and industry and abolish private property? And one of them got elected? Cool!
Jager
A friend of mine ( we grew up together) lives in Milwaukee. He’s totally unaware of what’s happened to the state he’s lived in since college. If I bring up Walker, he just says, “they’re all the same” He doesn’t give a shit what’s happened to Wisconsin under Walker. He doesn’t vote, he doesn’t care at all. How many Wisconsin citizens are just like my old hockey teammate? Tens of thousands, I’d guess. He’s a good guy, but….
satby
This is also schadenfreudistic (yeah, I know that’s not a word, still..)
Hat tip: El Caganer
germy
Washington Post:
efgoldman
Anger and hatred? Fucking-A-right.
Snotty took a great progressive state and made every effort to turn it into a Randian hellhole, going so far as to refuse a new, subsidized plant that was going to make trains.
Losing elections is too good for the fucker.
danielx
@Jager:
No.
And he won’t until things start happening that affect him personally.
I suspect people won’t start grasping the implications of trade war, for example, until their new iPhones cost $1500 all of a sudden. Or flat screen monitors cost $500, or…..
dmsilev
Meh. Swans are just geese with better PR.
jimmiraybob
“The Far Left”
Should we have more discussion of the Overton Window – hardly ever hear about that anymore.
I’m not a political analyst by trade but I’ve been relatively conscious since the 60s and today’s “far left” seems more like the olden liberal Republican to conservative Democrat. Or just your run of the mill concerned citizen. Is it just me?
Of course, the OW now needs to be expanded to account for pushing past conservative into grifter, wild-eyed radical and reactionary “conservative” extremism (steal the expensive stuff and burn the rest ……it’s for their own good).
Ridnik Chrome
By the way, I hope that after that Blue Wave rolls around and Walker is out on his keister someone with some legal authority takes a good hard look at the way he ran things these past eight years. I am fed up with these smash-and-grab Republicans and their deliberate mismanagement of our institutions. Something has to be done to prevent these kinds of gross abuses of power in the future.
satby
The commodity traders I used to do tech support for at the CBOT must be suicidal right now.
Most of them were Republicans too. ?
efgoldman
@Jager:
He’s a fucking asshole that’s too stupid to breathe on his own without coaching.
Fuckem
cmorenc
The GOP’s national win streak at the ballot-box, nationally and within so many states, was because their base voters were more motivated in greater numbers than our base voters in enough strategic locations, not because there were more of them than of us in numbers. Our problem has long been how to motivate a high enough percentage of our voters to get up off their ass and vote, completely aside from even the effects of voter suppression. At least, until now it has been.
ALSO: too much has been made of the stubborn loyalty of Trump’s / the GOP base, and the fruitlessness of trying to reach or change them. Bollocks – we don’t need to change the 90% of them who are pig-headed happy (or at least in unbreachable denial) about supporting Trump / the GOP. Peel away just 3 to 5% of them, and the electoral balance profoundly shifts, even before factoring in our hopes that FINALLY the numerically larger (but often too high a % too little motivated) democratic base will turn out in a “wave”. Heck, if even 3 to 5% of the GOP base can be demotivated to stay home, that would be enough of itself to tip the balance in many jurisdictions.
PPCLI
Outside special interest money is bad? Let’s stroll down memory lane to when Walker got punked by a radio talk show phone call pretending to be one of the Koch brothers. Walker spoke to him for nearly an hour, and discussed fine details of governing, in a slavish way. I didn’t realize that the Koch brothers lived in Wisconsin.
I wonder how many actual Wisconsin voters could get through to Walker on the phone, without an appointment, and talk about the government policies affecting their lives.
Frankensteinbeck
For the first time in my life, this may be true. Not the ‘far left’ part, but literals are absolutely fucking furious. Thank God.
The Fat Kate Middleton
I didn’t think I could loathe that little shitheel more than I already did – and then he paid a visit to Iowa last year, to give “our” Republican governor and legislators advice on how to destroy a perfectly lovely state, just the way he did it to Wisconsin. Now we no longer have true union representation for public employees, will soon have charter schools dotting our rural landscapes, currently have a bankrupt treasury, and … well, you get the picture, I’m sure. Oh … and he left a friend and Koch Bros. functionary behind named Drew Klein, who’s been put in charge of carrying out whatever his masters want.
feebog
We keep talking about retaking the house in a blue wave, but the state houses and legislatures are where the real action is. We need to unseat a bunch of Governors and flip a shitload of state legislatures.
Major Major Major Major
@satby: the correct word is schadenfreudelicious.
Yarrow
As mentioned in the previous thread, Penzey’s walks their talk. Stores and call centers are closed today and employees get a paid day off in honor of MLK. Also in their email:
Keep speaking that truth!
Amir Khalid
Quoth Walker:
And in his alternate universe, the Reasonable Right is no doubt driven by serenity and love.
japa21
@cmorenc: That may well be the most hopeful thing about these special elections. Normally turnout is low, specially on the Dem side. What we have been seeing is highly motivated Dems turning out in amazing numbers and dispirited Republicans staying home. This is probably what is scaring the GOP the most. They are going to have to spend so much money on districts they always considered safe that all of them are going to be shortchanged.
And the impressive thing about last night is that despite tons of dollars from the NRA (which usually has a big impact in WI) and Koch, the Dem candidate still won by double digits.
PPCLI
@cmorenc: If people in China stop buying the parts of the pig that nobody else wants from US farmers and starts getting them from (say) Australia or Canada instead, I have a feeling that there might be some softening in the Trump base. Multiply that by 100 different agricultural products (Trump country in northern Michigan grows a lot of cherries) and you are looking at serious problems. People who can’t be reached by arguments or shame will still pay attention when they start to lose money.
A huge pile of pig snouts languishing in an industrial freezer is hard to ignore.
LAO
The level of butthurt in Walker’s tweets are delicious!
sdhays
@schrodingers_cat: I caught that discussion of Roseanne on the drive home last night. I don’t give a shit about Roseanne, so it’s such a waste of time for a news program to discuss it. I was chagrined to hear that it’s already been picked up for a second season; Roseanne Barr is such a nasty crazy person that she really should have been allowed to be crazy in her bunker in Hawaii leaving us all in peace.
Of course, “nasty crazy person” describes a large number of people with public platforms nowadays, so I guess it’s a prerequisite…
Major Major Major Major
@jimmiraybob: this ‘political compass’ graph is such an amazing description of American politics that I think of whenever somebody mentions the American far left.
danielx
@Ridnik Chrome:
Yup.
I’m really, truly tired of the “look forward, not back” meme pursued by Dems (Obama and Pelosi both come to mind) in the aftermath of electoral victories. Fuck a bunch of that idea. If there is no price to be paid for Republican misdeeds in office, said misdeeds will continue at the next opportunity, a la Wall Street. Why not? There’s no downside.
I want pasty faced criminals doing perp walks. I want scalps, goddamnit.
Frankensteinbeck
@PPCLI:
Minorities. I was raised among people who when they heard the words ‘special interests’ knew automatically that blacks had a corrupt hold on the government… somehow.
@jimmiraybob:
It’s not quite that simple. We are a deeply divided nation, and the two halves have utterly different definitions of every term used in religion, politics, or morality (so, damn near the whole language). The national press leans somewhere between ‘treat both as equal no matter how insane Republicans get’ and ‘agrees with Republicans.’ Of course, since nothing but total capitulation is acceptable to Republicans anymore, that makes the media ‘liberal.’
Barbara
@Amir Khalid: I certainly hate voter suppression and as far as I am concerned it defines Walker: a politician who chooses voters instead of the other way around.
schrodingers_cat
@sdhays: Vichy Times and Snooze Hour, mainstreaming hate, one issue at a time. So much for the myth of the liberal media.
Amir Khalid
@PPCLI:
Given the Trump administration’s general level of competence, I fear that it will try to compensate for the lost China market for American pork by putting some poor sap in charge of increasing pork exports to the Middle East. “The President looked at the numbers, and it’s an untapped market!”
mainmata
@SiubhanDuinne: Or because Trump’s election was the black swan event gifted to America by decades of GOP fascism and Pooty. (Obviously wrong color; details.)
Jager
@efgoldman: I’ve actually told him that, you know what his answer was? “I don’t pay any attention to that shit, you do.” So yes, you’re right he is an asshole…I’ll have to check with his wife to find out if he’s still breathing on his own.
LAO
@dmsilev: Years ago I went of a golf trip to Ireland with my mom. At some course, the starter warned about the swans in a pond on a particular hole and I must say they were vicious. By far more aggressive than I could have imagined.
Major Major Major Major
@LAO: swans (and geese) are assholes.
Betty Cracker
@Jager: There are so many apathetic people like that nationwide. I know scads of them. Trump has woken some of them up — for good and ill. But in aggregate, the smugly apolitical because “both sides suck” are as grave a threat to democracy as exists in the world, their personal virtues notwithstanding.
I don’t blame them 100%; they couldn’t have gotten this way without being subjected to ceaseless both-sides propaganda, but I do blame them 90% because they’re shirking their responsibilities as citizens. I don’t know how we fix our ailing democracy, but hitting folks like that with a clue-by-four has got to be part of the solution.
LAO
@Major Major Major Major: Agreed. They are the republicans of the bird world.
Barbara
@LAO: Swans are not to be messed with. There is a swannery in Southern England that has been in existence for over 800 years. You can walk on trails through a coastal estuary and see swans in their natural state. The first time I went I saw a mother swan tucking her cygnet under her wings, and also encountered two males fighting in the middle of the trail. It was damaged by the massive flooding in England around 2014, but it’s still there.
Booger
@Amir Khalid: You can recognize them by their goatees.
Gelfling 545
@germy: He’ll soon forget about it.
mainmata
@Jager: Dunno for sure. I have a sister who is a now retired Asst. DA for Milwaukee Co. Given her job, she was a lot more center-right than the rest of our family (we are all from Pittsburgh originally) but Walker and his pet Leg then Trump has outraged her and her whole family (her husband is a Marquette graduate like Charlie Pierce and unlike Dumbass Waker who dropped out). So, yes, there is a lot of fedupness in WI right now.
Expect that the Walker Administration will double and triple down on the voter suppression tactics they used in 2016. (Though I recognize that wasn’t the only factor in the WI loss.)
Frankensteinbeck
@Major Major Major Major:
Really? That graph pisses me off. It assumes there is no mainstream Democratic left, and reads like the kind of idiocy I hear from ‘both sides are corporate tools there’s no point’ assholes.
@Major Major Major Major:
Ducks are worse. Ducks are some vile sons of bitches. They are petty, sadistic, and the most highly evolved rapists in nature. However, they’re adorable and small enough to know they can’t hurt us, so most humans never notice.
The Pale Scot
@CharlesPPierce
Dark money guy haz sad.
Poor dark money guy.
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: I blame the media too. They are awful have been at least since the time I started paying close attention to politics, that would be around the time of Bill C’s impeachment.
mainmata
@germy: Exactly what he criticized Obama about for Afghanistan but he’s too feeble-minded anymore to remember that.
Barbara
@Amir Khalid: I realize that these tariffs are real and substantial, but China’s demand for pork is so vast it caused a Chinese company to acquire the Smithfield Company. In the long run, I expect that pork exports will not be greatly affected. I don’t know that the same will be true of auto parts, soybeans, wine, etc. (although the increasing consumption of wine in China has single handedly raised the price of French wine). It’s all unnecessary and stupid, it won’t help the U.S. in either the short or long run, the only question is the extent of the damage.
Radiumgirl
@dmsilev: Fab! Can I quote you?
mainmata
@dmsilev: Like!
Hungry Joe
@Yarrow: Penzey’s spices are GOOD, and reasonably priced. And the employees (in the San Diego location, anyway) are way cool. Great outfit. Order online if there’s no store near you.
Hungry Joe
@Barbara: Okay, I gotta ask:
For years I’ve been hearing how nasty swans are — vicious and aggressive, don’t mess with them, etc. But … I mean … what can a swan actually DO to you, besides freak you out by charging and flapping its huge wings and making blood-curdling sounds? They don’t have teeth, or claws, or knives, so … ?
I hope this doesn’t sound like swagger, but I have to believe that, one-on-one — mano-a-wingo — I could take a swan.
El Caganer
@Amir Khalid: I’m sure the Saudis are eagerly awaiting their first shipment of halal scrapple.
Jager
@Betty Cracker: The only thing that got a bit of attention out of him was an economic comparison of Wisconsin vs Minnesota, he was surprised for a minute or two and then forgot about it. His son runs a paper mill and one of his young, shift supervisors is a DACA guy, it got his son up in arms over trump’s policies and that was the only reason it got my friend’s attention, he muttered something about it “being unfair”
TS
@cmorenc:
This is apparently what happened in the election of the Judge in Wisconsin yesterday. Sorry I can’t find the link, but the dem turnout was way above the GOP.
satby
@efgoldman: I would agree. A lot of people who disengage from politics can afford to because of class or white privilege or laziness.
So fuckem.
Betty Cracker
@Barbara: I saw a TV program once about an annual swan census on the Thames River. The Queen technically owns all the swans in Great Britain, and they do an annual count of the cygnets on the Thames (or parts of it, anyway). The parents are not happy about it!
satby
@Major Major Major Major: thank you! Noted.
The Moar You Know
@Hungry Joe: Getting bit by one is like being attacked by a psycho child with a pair of pliers. They can take a finger off. And there’s never just one, they attack in packs. Nasty fuckers.
Frankensteinbeck
@Hungry Joe:
Kill you. Keep in mind the strength required in flight muscles for a bird that large. Even geese can break human bones with their wings. Swans are dangerous.
Booger
@Hungry Joe: Swans have very strong wingbones, equivalent to your forearm, and are adept at using then to break noses/teeth/faces. They can also move very fast, so between kinetic energy and incredibly strong breast muscles, can wreak havoc with a human’s facial bone structure.
Then they will mock you.
El Caganer
@Betty Cracker: I’m not sure how many of them are smug. I do know some like that, but most of the apathetics I know are in despair – the bothsiderism they hear has them believing they’re screwed no matter who’s running the show.
mainmata
@PPCLI: Supposedly, the two a**hole brothers live in Kansas City MO and the exiled supposedly gay brother lives in NYC. There’s fourth one too. I doubt that Charles and David spend much time in Kansas City MO, frankly when their libertarian arses are probably much happier in the left or right coast cities.
Major Major Major Major
@Frankensteinbeck: yes, really. I think our federal representation, Bernie included, falls into that sub-quadrant for the most part. I think “likes free stuff but afraid of politics” is a good description of people like me. It’s obviously tongue in cheek.
ETA also obviously the Republican Party has broken it, but it’s a fun chart for circa 2011.
bemused
@Jager:
Does he have kids? I can’t fathom how people, the trumpers or the ostriches, aren’t more worried about the futures of their kids and grandkids, at least try to figure out how their family is/will be screwed and who is responsible for that. It seems to me that rightwing cultist voters have to expend a lot of effort to believe all the fake news and keep their rage stoked. The people like the guy you grew up with are also going out of their way trying not to know a damn thing, can’t be bothered.
Hungry Joe
@The Moar You Know: @Frankensteinbeck: @Booger: ***GULP*** Really? Okay, now I know. Guess I’ll pick my next fight with something else. An anaconda sounds safer.
bemused
@Amir Khalid:
Thoughts and prayers, also, too.
Major Major Major Major
I always thought that question “would you rather fight a hundred duck-sized horses or one horse-sized duck” was stupid, and only enjoyed by people who’d obviously never had a run-in with a bird bigger than a duck.
Barbara
@Hungry Joe: I have to tell you that I have never been motivated to find out whether I could best a swan in a duel. So I don’t know the answer, except that their wingspan, and wing area, is larger than I am so that, right there, gives them the advantage over me.
Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]
@Major Major Major Major: Heh, my mother is a wild bird rehabilitator, focusing on raptors. you NEVER go into an eagle cage alone.
MisterForkbeard
@Betty Cracker:
This is my personal beef – I know way, WAY too many people who told me that “Politicians are all awful, but maybe Trump will be awful in a different way and let things change a bit.” When I educated them on what his actual stances and policies were vs Hillary, most were pretty surprised. Some refused to acknowledge that Hillary was any better, claiming that she was secretly for all the same things and had never actually shown it Because Reasons.
Most are incredibly horrified by Trump’s actions now, but it hasn’t ever occurred to them that they and people like them who didn’t vote are responsible in some way. And that “Would things really be any better if I’d voted Hillary” is also common. Or alternately “I just couldn’t vote for someone as awful and corrupt as Hillary, so I voted Jill Stein or wrote in Bernie”.
Jager
@bemused: Adult son and daughter, 3 grandsons. He’s devoted to the boys, all three are on the US National Hockey age level teams. Funny thing is he is really outspoken about how USA Hockey is run, hates the way college hockey scholarships often hinge on a kid going off to play Jr Hokey away from home, etc. The oldest turned down 3 D-1 scholarship offers because he didn’t want to play Jr Hockey in Kamloops or some god damned place. The kid is smart and is going to Harvey Mudd and is playing goalie in a beer league, my friend was super supportive of the kid’s choice.
Barbara
@El Caganer: There are a lot of people — my mother in law was one of them — who feel they cannot get through the day and maintain their sense of optimism about life if they are presented with negative information, especially when it concerns something they don’t think they can do anything about. That’s why the overt cynicism or pessimism of any public figure, whether it’s a celebrity or a talk show hosts or whoever, is one of the most pernicious forces for decreasing engagement.
The Moar You Know
@Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]: My violin teacher did this, long ago. She let me hold one. Little tiny thing. Gave me this glove with like a quarter-inch of stiff leather, which I though was total overkill for such a little bird. Just a little bird, right?
So she puts him on my gloved hand and OH MY GOD MY HAND IS BEING CRUSHED TO PULP
I have vast respect for those birds after that. Don’t fuck with them.
Barbara
@Jager: A kid who is going to Harvey Mudd only ever needs to play hockey or any other sport for fun.
bemused
@Jager:
As danielx said, a lot of people don’t pay attention until bad policies affect them or loved ones personally. Then, even it is only one issue, they still have a lot of catching up to do.
trollhattan
@The Moar You Know:
A møøse once bit my sister.
Cheryl from Maryland
@Hungry Joe: Had a swan attack me in Colonial Williamsburg. The fucker jumped up, grabbed the ends of my muffler, and started pulling, thus choking me. Was wearing boots so I was able to kick it until it let go.
danielx
@bemused:
I disagree. There’s a whole industry devoted to keeping their rage stoked, starting with Fox. They need a rage fix on a regular basis, lest cognitive dissonance raise its ugly head and start whispering “you’re getting screwed, and it’s not by black/brown people”.
Yarrow
@Barbara:
I love this definition of voter suppression and gerrymandering. It is a very simple and clear way to explain it to people and it’ll anger most voters. People want to think their vote matters. They don’t want to think politicians hand pick the voters they want. I think it’s one of the best ways to get people to turn against voter suppression and gerrymandering.
Smiling Mortician
@Major Major Major Major: That is perfection.
El Caganer
@Barbara: A very sticky problem. You can’t grab the non-voters just by telling them Republicans suck – they already know that. At the same time, it’s tough to put forward a positive agenda unless you’re able to control pretty much all of the state and national government structure, since the Republicans will try to torpedo anything you do and then will turn around and accuse you of lying about what you told voters. There must be ways around that, since good legislation has been passed before, I guess the answer is to try to get as many of the people you support get elected and then to hope for the best.
Jager
@Barbara: Exactly, he was recruited by damn every school that has a hockey program,including Yale and Harvard. Even the Naval Academy wanted him to spend a year in Jr. Hockey, he said no thanks. He’s a good kid we see him and feed him every once in awhile..
dmsilev
@Radiumgirl: I’m flattered. Please feel free to reuse.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@sdhays:
Are you fucking serious? It’s been picked up for a second season? Why??? What are it’s ratings?
Yarrow
@Betty Cracker: @Jager:
Exactly. I good question to ask people like Jager’s friend is, “What are you doing to live up to your responsibilities as a citizen?” Citizens have both rights and responsibilities. Rights are discussed a lot. Responsibilities are discussed a lot less. Increasing the discussion of citizenship responsibilities might be one avenue to reach people. It’s government of, BY and for the people. It’s us. It’s incumbent upon us to be involved.
Major Major Major Major
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: very very high.
mainmata
@Barbara: And, of course, England’s swans or at least the mute swans are “owned” by the Queen (or King) and have been for centuries so you mess with them at your peril.
dmsilev
@Cheryl from Maryland: My brother was nearly attacked by a swan when he was 6 or so; it was taller than he was and quite a bit more defensive (parent protecting its cygnets). I say “nearly attacked’ because I think the bird really just wanted to scare him away. It worked.
patrick II
@cmorenc:
Kevin Drum pointed out the other day that Trump’s poll numbers are historically low for an economy that has such high employment. People vote the basics, so when the economy does worse, as our fool President seems to want to hasten with a trade war and a fed chair who believes in tight money and rising interest rates, we will see just how stubborn their loyalty is.
bemused
@danielx:
I still think it takes a lot of people’s time, focus and energy to avoid watching, reading or hearing anything but rightwing media. A deliberate choice they made long ago.
Betty Cracker
@Yarrow: Troof! I had a really depressing conversation with a disgruntled local Democrat a while back when I was phone banking. I mentioned it here at the time. Basically, she was vaguely pissed about the direction of the party but short on specifics. I told her to show up and change it — the party is US — the people who bother to show the hell up. She wasn’t ready to hear me that day, but maybe some day. It really is true, especially on the county level: there’s no moneyed cabal dictating the party’s direction. And even if there were, staying home and pouting still wouldn’t be the appropriate response.
gvg
@Hungry Joe: google search says they have killed at least 1 Michigan man by knocking him out of his Kayak and attacking till he drowned. A different report says they will fly on top of something they perceive as dangerous and sit on it to hold it underwater…usually something like a racoon? Lots of reports of broken arms but also many people think it’s funny to report exaggerated stories so I am not sure those stories are true. I also heard that about geese as a child and my father hated and feared a goose that lived near him as a child. That made me assume the stories about swans were true, and I hadn’t actually checked before your question.
manyakitty
@trollhattan: Moose bites can be pretti nasti
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: I am going to my first town Ds meeting next week. I live less than an hour away from the Green Mountain state. Its BS country here. My town went Bernista in the primaries but went for Hillz about 75% in the general. Should I be worried?
Yarrow
@Betty Cracker:
I think we need to say this over and over again. The Parkland kids are a good example. They have a cause, they organized, they’re making change happen. If you show up you have a much better chance of being heard and making change happen.
Hkedi [Kang T. Q.]
@The Moar You Know: Yep, with those razor sharp talons just Barely poking through the leather. with Raptors the feet are what you have to watch out for, with a close second for the beak.
mainmata
@Barbara: The Chinese are all about pork but a lot of what drives imported American pork is a) modern Chinese upper middle class vanity (I eat imported pork) and b) the conditions under which a lot of Chinese (and Southeast Asian generally) animal/fish products are raised regarding contamination/pollution. China is now starting to clean up its act. but It’s having a much quicker impact on energy (solar and electric cars) than in the food and pharmaceutical industries, which have a lot of legacy issues. Be careful.
Yutsano
@dmsilev: This is normal for most birds. Most avian species have fragile skeletal structures so direct confrontation outside their species gets risky. (It does inside the species as well but that’s where evolution works its magic.) But even with that swans aren’t afraid to attack because oh damn do they got some power in those wings.
ruemara
@Jager: He’s a good guy? Ummm, no, he’s not.
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: Highest ratings for a comedy in years and there’s no bad press, i.e., even if we’re hate talking about it, we’re talking about it. That’s how those execs roll. Plus the amount of lefty hollywood types standing for Roseanne is gross.
bemused
A guy I know works at a car dealership. He had no idea the insurance company adjuster who he’s worked with for years was a trump voter. He doesn’t remember how the conversation started with another employee in the body shop and the adjuster but she was proudly a trump voter, watches Fox and wouldn’t watch cnn ever. This was not a heated conversation but immigration did come up. Guy in body shop said, “But how am I going to order a BLT sandwich if there’s no one to pick the tomatoes?” Other employee says, “You just get a BL sandwich”. “But what if there’s no one gathering the lettuce?”. “Well, if the tariff war causes a glut of US pork, you will just have to be happy with a BBB sandwich”.
Dave
@Hungry Joe: I’d say you could take a swan (you should dominate it given prep time though that should is doing a lot of work) but it’s likely to cost you and there is usually more than one. So the question is more should you try to take a swan even if it’s likely you can? Best case scenario you are on the local news as crazy man at the park strangling a swan; worst case you are the crazy guy at the park who was maimed or killed by a swan and that’s just humiliating.
Geese are smaller and only 95% as mean but they come in larger packs.
Barbara
@mainmata: I am not underplaying the importance of these tariffs. They impose huge uncertainty, and part of the impact at least in some areas will be to spur the use of alternative suppliers, which, once tapped, might continue even after tariffs have been lifted. How do you decide whether to expand production or continue producing at the same level? Mexico started importing more corn from South America before waiting to find out whether Trump would actually follow through with his threats to change NAFTA. It was the actual purchase of Smithfield by a Chinese company that makes me believe that pork, in particular, is less likely to be affected by short term issues.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@Major Major Major Major: @ruemara:
I’d like to see actual numbers. I also wonder if things like Dish’s Primetime, Amytime (records all new shows during primetime on networks automatically) inflates the ratings?
zhena gogolia
@Booger:
I wish Edgar Wright were here. There’s a fine movie in here waiting to be made. And of course he already featured a swan in Hot Fuzz.
scott (the other one)
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: If I recall correctly, it was picked up for a second season the day after the first episode, when the execs were so pleased by the debut’s ratings.
Of course, that was before the Hitler photo. Which, if that doesn’t show how things have changed in the past few years: can you imagine any broadcast TV actor being able to brush that off in years past?
Barbara
@Dave: The thing to remember as a human being is that nearly every other species has a much higher strength to weight ratio than we do. That means an animal much smaller than you can do a big number on your bodily structures even if it won’t likely kill you. My little dog weighs 17 pounds and is insanely strong for her size because she is all muscle. Other primates are much stronger than we are. We are able to get away with being slack because we have brains, opposing thumbs, and eat cooked food.
Yarrow
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: @ruemara: Adam’s prediction that “Roseanne’ would be canceled or shelved sure didn’t come true. Mnem said she thought the Disney execs would be having an emergency meeting that night and wouldn’t like their company associated with the photos. Nothing seems to have happened along those lines.
Wonder how the latest ratings were. Has it had a second week?
germy
@scott (the other one): Here’s hoping she self destructs the show. Didn’t she create a toxic environment the last go around 20 years ago? Lots of the writers on the original show had horror stories.
She’s like drumpf in that way… she’ll get so full of herself she’ll end up f**cking herself in a million ways.
randy khan
The thought of Scott Walker quaking in his boots because his team is losing elections gives me an unreasonable amount of pleasure.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@scott (the other one): It’s second week was weaker. Not by much, but I don’t see it lasting.
I think people were simply gawking and curious, wanting to see if it was good. It lost 3 million viewers in the second week from it’s 18 million viewer premiere. That doesn’t sound good. Methinks the execs who greenlighted a second season were premature.
I’m also ignoring the IMDb and TV.com user ratings as I don’t trust those.
NotMax
@Barbara
There’s a number would credit with but two out of three of those.
germy
El Caganer
@NotMax: For example, somebody who has no brain, tiny thumbs, and eats burnt animal flesh?
Major Major Major Major
@schrodingers_cat: what’s the worst that could happen?
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: from what I’ve read, people decided it was good—in some cases very good (and those are liberal reviewers).
The most watched sitcom last season was Big Bang Theory averaging 5-6 million viewers per episode.
MisterForkbeard
@Yarrow: The problem is that Roseanne has been adopted by Trump supporters – as well as adopted by the media as their ideal example of a Trump Voter.
Ratings will go down quite a bit over time (I imagine, because it won’t be relentlessly pimped by Trump and the media. People will stop paying attention), but it will be mostly immune to scandal for the same reason that Trump is – Trump Supporters do not care about racism, sexism, internal consistency or ethics. And the media has a lot invested narratively. So the show (and Trump) continues on.
schrodingers_cat
Since everything old is new again, especially with anti-Semitism. I have been reading up on German Indology (Orientalism) and how Sanskrit and India’s symbols were appropriated by the Nazis to promote their agenda of hate, including the fucking word they call themselves, Aryan, which mean pure in Sanskrit.
The German indologists equate brahmins with Jews, and accuse them of contaminating Indian scriptures.
Ironically many RWNJs in India love these Indologists.
J R in WV
@dmsilev:
Swans are way meaner than geese, who are pretty angry on their own.
Swans seem like rabid geese, although I don’t think birds can be infected by rabies. But way mean and aggressive.
ruemara
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: You are correct. They are overestimating nostalgia & controversy benefiting the show. She’ll keep the MAGAts, of course, because stick it to the liberals. She will lose everyone else who knows the shit she says online. It might still be worth it for a season or two, but the bad press is going to stink up John Goodman & Sara Gilbert/Sarah Chalke’s careers. That’s some ill will right there.
rikyrah
@danielx:
Lots of scalps
eric
@Barbara: so what you are saying are “both sides can do it”
(merging two memes)
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@Major Major Major Major:
The question is, will that stay the case, as @ruemara: mentions. Ever heard of Seasonal Rot?
schrodingers_cat
@schrodingers_cat: *means not mean
Major Major Major Major
@ruemara:
All five of them who would be watching the show otherwise. Not a lot of overlap between leftish twitter and network sitcom viewers methinks.
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: A couple seasons of a popular show is good enough right now given the way things are going. Again, it just has to be at or near Big Bang Theory to be a winner.
germy
@MisterForkbeard: I didn’t watch the show – but in interviews the producers called it an “exchange of ideas” … but in the few clips I saw, roseanne always gets the last word.
Kay
@randy khan:
Me too, but we knew it before he started whining on Twitter. He tried desperately to cancel some elections.
That was probably a pretty good indicator.
Mike Hutchison
@danielx: A-fucking-men
Ella in New Mexico
I have a relatively short list of people who, whenever I hear them speak or read their words, trigger a vivid fantasy in which I jump into my car, drive however many miles away they are without stopping, enter the building in which they work, find their office, bust open the door and repeatedly power-shove them in the chest yelling “Who the fuck do you think you are, you stupid lying son-of-a-bitch!!!” until they tip over backwards and scramble away in terror.
Scot Walker is definitely on my list
Kay
@germy:
I never liked the show. She’s too crazy for me. There was always that edge of real instability there- like just barely hanging on.
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: I just couldn’t get over her voice, when I happened on it while changing channels or something. Never had the slightest inclination of subjecting myself to that.
MisterForkbeard
@germy: Roseanne always gets the last word and liberals are caricatures, while Roseanne is the kind, caring Trump voter that doesn’t actually exist.
It’s not an exchange of ideas. It’s a fake and reasonable looking version of a Trump supporter exchanging barbs with a ‘liberal’ strawman. But this is what I mean – the media has decided it’s a great, so therefore it is.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@Major Major Major Major:
I hope it bombs. Anything less is insufficient. What did “liberal” reviewers like about it? Does Roseanne get the last word all the time or made to look like a fool occasionally? Doubtful as it is her show.
Feathers
With all the bird blood lust knowledge being shared in the thread, must add a link to the bestest song ever March of the Sinister Ducks, by the Sinister Ducks, aka Alan Moore and Bauhaus bassist/vocalist David J.
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major:
@ruemara:
One crazy thing is that the show has some good writers. Among them is SNL vet Norm MacDonald. And the head writer and consulting producer is Wanda Sykes. And neither of these people are typical right wingers.
Comedy, like politics, sometimes makes strange bedfellows.
No Drought No More
Walker sounds a lot like LBJ and the Vietnam war hawks describing the perils to Honolulu and San Francisco of not stopping the red menace in Vietnam
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@MisterForkbeard:
So… a hackfest just like I suspected it would be.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
@Brachiator:
That’s super crazy. Wonder how they’d react to being told they’re normalizing fascism?
NotMax
@schrodingers_cat
Well, the term Aryan (as in Aryan peoples – note the plural) pre-dated Adolf’s birth, being in use earlier in the 19th century. The delegation of it by bigots and ultra-nationalists to apply to only a single people, and later to emend that as an ‘Aryan race’ and as a so-called ineffable mark of superiority also pre-dated Nazism, although as you say it was appropriated by them.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
I saw on twitter where she said “viewpoint diversity is diversity”.
But saying Obama and Clinton are running a child sex trafficking ring is not a viewpoint. They either are or they aren’t. It’s not like “I support single payer”.
BTW, the child sex trafficking ring stuff goes all the way back to Bush II on the far Right. They took it from a cause they supported to utter and complete insanity in the course of a decade. I’m not at all surprised they rolled Hillary Clinton into it- that was inevitable.
schrodingers_cat
@NotMax: Yes I know, but the original Indologists of the 19th century were racist bastards too. Since Germany didn’t have the antiquity of say an England or a France as a nation, they set out to appropriate Sanskrit for themselves while casting the people who actually wrote the stuff (Vedas and the Puranas) as meddlers.
BTW do these fuckers even the ones that predated the mustache of evil, consider people from the subcontinent as Aryans? Didn’t think so.
? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?
I’ll just leave this here from the Vulture article (Roseanne is a political series, full stop):
I don’t think I’m missing much. That’s waterboarding and it’s torture.
Major Major Major Major
@Brachiator: from what I’ve read, if you consider it as a tv show separate from everybody’s real lives, it’s quite entertaining and well-done.
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: that’s neither waterboarding nor torture. It’s not even a swirlie.
Kay
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
Oh. God. You know, they could just admit what they’re doing. It’s a tv show. They said at the outset the intent was “to appeal to the heartland” – tv shows make money and they think they hit on a lucrative market, so why not just admit that and drop the posturing that it’s not “political”? Of course it’s political. The star knows that, which is why she’s tweeting out promises to smack down some libtards.
Yutsano
@Major Major Major Major: It’s…not even that funny really.
schrodingers_cat
@Yutsano: Indeed, a grandmother dishing out corporal punishment? Who does that? No sanskar, as my grandmother would say. A raised eyebrow should be enough.
Duane
@MisterForkbeard: Remember when Roseann butchered the national anthem, including a crotch- grab at the end. So much disrespect for our country, anthem, flag. Think of the soldiers! Now she’s a right-wing heroe. We live in interesting times.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: one of the original themes of the series was that the character was physically abused by her father, in one episode she was traumatized when she lost control and spanked her son
A bunch of her old tweets resurfaced last week, including such crackpot favorites as chew-trails, GWB did 9/11, and Huma Abedin was a Muslim agent controlling “jew-hater” Hillary Clinton. Kind of surprised none of them were a bigger deal. Also, she’s a crackpot
NotMax
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
The kids in the original show being written as eternally bratty, undisciplined, selfish and/or creepy was what squelched any interest I might have developed in the program.
ruemara
@Major Major Major Major: I was a fan of the original. I’m not that different.
@Brachiator: Money makes strange bedfellows. As things go on, it may mean people leave the bed of shit they prepared.
You guys don’t get it, do you? Hollywood is banking on things stay as they are or moving more towards fascism. This is just a money-making hedge on a far more conservative America needing entertainment. It takes a while to get up & running, but I bet this has been in the works since Trump was winning the primaries. It’s all a bet. There’s no truer principle in this business than will it make money. Things stay the same, they have this niche product that appeals & stars scum but put out by minorities & liberals. Things go even more dominionist in gov, they greenlight more stuff like it. Things get better, much like when all those black reporters lost jobs at major networks, the shows and deals get cancelled because they lost their audience. That’s how it rolls.
Wild Cat
And of course, if it’s stench, intrepid journalist Amy Goodman ambled out of her UWS brownstone and got there first:
https://www.democracynow.org/2011/7/25/pioneering_comedian_roseanne_barr_on_her
evodevo
@danielx: Yes. This. I know a LOT of people here in Ky like that. “Both sides do it!!” “They’re all the same!!!” HOWEVER, there are a LOT of Trump-voting teachers out demonstrating in Frankfort this week – THEY finally woke up because pensions lol . NO conservative I know notices ANYTHING until it directly affects them or theirs..
eric
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: so wait a fucking minute….SHE is blaming the child SHE raised for not being a good parent? Nothing could be more emblematic of the ethos of GOP personal responsibility. Holy fuck that lacks self-awareness.
Major Major Major Major
@ruemara: network sitcoms, especially live-action, aren’t what they once were, and neither I assume is the viewership. Do you watch any? I don’t. I haven’t regularly watched a network comedy since Futurama went to cable (eta was canceled the first time), not to mention a live-action sitcom.
Which is in no way contradictory with what you seem to think I don’t get.
Brachiator
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
Good question. Some reviewers are falling all over themselves to praise the show’s depiction of real, hardworking white people, and seem to be blind to the larger political implications.
@Major Major Major Major:
I never really watched old Roseanne. Not going to watch new Roseanne. The few clips I’ve seen of the old show made my teeth hurt.
TenguPhule
China announced $50 billion counter tariffs on American products including soybeans.
Shit is real and just got fucked up beyond all recognition.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@Barbara: I’ve wrestled with a lot of dogs in play so thought I had a pretty good idea of their strength. Then one day I was dealing with a dog who meant business. Sort of. It was a police dog demonstration, and I jumped at the opportunity to put on the training gear and let the dog attack me. And boy did she get excited when she saw me put it on.
She was a German Shepherd, not huge, say 80 pounds. She runs across the field and leaps up to chomp into my arm. I thought I’d been hit by a freight train. I was amazed how hard the impact was. I’m proud to say she didn’t knock me over, but it was a close thing.
(I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, to the point that I went up to the officers afterward and asked if they ever used civilian volunteers in training. They all looked horrified and said absolutely not, the liability issues would be insane.)
rp
@eric: And a big theme of the original show was the fact that she constantly fought with her rebellious kids and they often ignored her. It was a chaotic house but she managed to put food on the table, everyone loved each other, etc. So for her character to say “back in my day things were different” is beyond idiotic.
Barbara
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?: I didn’t like Roseanne the first time around and I certainly won’t be watching it now, but the idea that not hitting your kids makes you permissive is stupid.
Ella in New Mexico
@? ?? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ? ?:
Weird thing is, on the Old Roseanne show, she and Dan were NOT spankers. They were talkers, reasoners, even if they did get exasperated and make mistakes with their kids they always demonstrated parents who were non-violent. Even when the kids were seriously disrespectful or did pretty egregious things.
I did watch the old show. And I can tell you that it leaned working class/ progressive as far as it’s political message. Which, to be honest, it really put in your face– It was just a story of people struggling to have a decent life.
So in other words, this New Roseanne is not only different, she’s not even the same character as the Old Roseanne. What did they do, write a storyline where she had a TBI or a stroke to accommodate it?
zhena gogolia
@rp:
Everything about it sounds inconsistent with the previous show, which I liked in its first couple of seasons.
zhena gogolia
@Ella in New Mexico:
Well, John Goodman’s character came back from the dead so it’s not so surprising.
Barbara
@schrodingers_cat: My grandmother (whom I barely remember) used to dish out punishment to some of my older cousins. She was an outlier. Most grandmothers are happy to gang up with their grandkids against their common enemy, the parent.
Betty Cracker
@schrodingers_cat: Probably not. People who show up at local meetings aren’t the take their ball and go home type.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
In the movie Coco, there’s a scene where Grandma attacks a guitarist in the marketplace with her sandal (because she considers musicians a bad influence on her grandson). Apparently that particular scene gets a lot of laughs from Mexicans in particular, because (according to an article I read) Grandma dishing out punishment with the sandal is a pretty common thing.
It’s a testament to the animators that they made the effort to get even tiny cultural details like that right.
schrodingers_cat
@Barbara: I was the apple of my grandmother’s eyes. She was fairly strict with her children, although corporal punishment was never her style. But I don’t remember a cross word forget corporal punishment.
rp
I’m surprised John Goodman went along with this.
schrodingers_cat
@rp:Then Goodman is not such a good man after all.
J R in WV
@Frankensteinbeck:
The graph is a joke, not intended to bear any resemblance to reality. Let real politics piss you off, and then save your ire for Republicans, who need it poured down their backs.
EthylEster
FPer wrote:
um…that would be grass, no?
I’ve never heard anyone use the phrase “shit through a goose”.
IMO alliteration is a good thing.
Barbara
@rp: From the few episodes I did watch, I remember that in one of them it dawned on her that her weight problem was attributable in part to the fact that her own mother constantly gave her food to placate her. Whereas Jackie, the thin sister, was a PITA no matter what she tried to do.
Rand Careaga
@Frankensteinbeck:
I’m trying to imagine what affirmative consent between a mallard and a hen might involve. Are there Antioch Rules for avians? Asking for a finch.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@schrodingers_cat: I suspect he joined the project as a favor to Sara Gilbert.
schrodingers_cat
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: I have no idea who she is, nor do I care for her or the show. I plan to ignore it, like I did with the original.
Kathleen
@Barbara: You have hit on truth here. Much bigger factor than what is normally discussed. Jon Stewart was huge contributer to this IMO.
a thousand flouncing lurkers (was fidelio)
@ Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) : You’ve only ever seen All in the Family as re-runs, if you’ve ever seen it at all. One of the points that makes it different from Ms. Barr’s oeuvre is that Archie Bunker doesn’t always win, and isn’t always vindicated. So when you here people call her a female Archie Bunker, keep that difference in mind.
prostratedragon
Way late, but has to be done:
J R in WV
@Cheryl from Maryland:
After my mom and dad retired, one thing they loved to do was driving trips in dad’s convertible roadster. They mostly kept the top up on account of mom worrying about her hair. Thank Dawg for that.
They visited Delaware once, which has many vast estates built by various DuPont jillionaire magnates, most of which are now state parks, with the mansions used as museums for the vast collections of incredible art.
Driving up the 2 mile long curved drive at one such estate, they passed a large pond with swans serenely gliding across the water, so dad paused to take a picture. One drake (is that the right word for a stud swan? It is for ducks anyway…) swan came out of the water and ran toward the car, and mom said “Maybe you should run the window up, honey!”
So dad did run his window up, like 0.7 seconds before the swan rammed the car, leaving swan spittle all over the window. If he hadn’t closed the window in time, he would have been hospitalized with a broken face!
Swans are among the more dangerous animals kept around without being caged!!
I’m still hoping the swan was left with serious a injury to think about before attacking another car, 25 years later. I’ll never know, will I?
J R in WV
@schrodingers_cat:
Well, maybe the very pale people!??
Couldn’t resist, sorry in advance!!
TN
@Hungry Joe: Swans can’t kill you, but they can do some damage if you don’t know how to handle them (or sometimes even if you do – a zookeeper I know had his front teeth knocked out by a swan). They are much stronger than they look and can probably fracture your forearm with a wing strike if they are trying hard enough.