Trump announcement: "Today I am identifying houses of worship…as essential places that provide essential services."
He calls on governors to allow houses of worship to reopen now.— Jeremy Diamond (@JDiamond1) May 22, 2020
Evergreen headline: "President Trump Makes Empty Threat"
— Jack Shafer (@jackshafer) May 22, 2020
.@kwelkernbc: The president said he's going to override governors if they don't reopen churches. Under what authority?
McENANY: You're posing a hypothetical
W: He said it!
M: You're assuming that governors are going to keep churches shut down. That is a hypothetical question. pic.twitter.com/AcmIVOeKF9
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 22, 2020
And a reminder that Trump's audience is white Catholics as much as white Evangelicals: https://t.co/Ho8ahVZJCE
— Masked Coward Gibson (@GibsonWrites) May 22, 2020
(When I was growing up “in the Church”, there was an ongoing mostly-underground war between the bishops (as representatives of the official Catholic hierarchy) and the parish priests (representatives of their local communities). That may have changed in the past forty years, but the argument went back to at least the Dark Ages, so… )
Swear to god if I lived through ten years of "YUR ACTIVIST JUDGES CANT FORCE A CHURCH TO MARRY GAY COUPLES!!!" just to watch the entire religious right stare at their feet and cough while a Republican and his handpicked judges order churches to do something against their will… https://t.co/d1vDuCGGfT
— Galar Regional Medical Director (@weedlewobble) May 22, 2020
Thing is most houses of worship either never fully closed or have re-opened within sensible guidelines such as 25% capacity. Trump's stunt is clearly aimed at the megachurches that need meat in seats to keep the SuperPacs funded and the pastor's Gulfstream flying.
— Zeddy (@Zeddary) May 22, 2020
I want the White House opened to science.
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) May 22, 2020
Only 18% of white evangelicals think religious services should be permitted without any restrictions. Only 42% of Americans support religious services with restrictions, 45% of Americans who identify w a religion oppose _any_ in-person religious services https://t.co/rcqyyXao1R
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) May 22, 2020
Trump pushing to open white evangelical churches is kind of an anti-GOTV program.
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) May 22, 2020
NEW: Trump’s campaign is concerned about public & internal GOP polls showing a decline in his favorability among key religious voters, including white evangelicals. This is one of the reasons he’s been so adamant about reopening churches https://t.co/aR2PR1WLUx
— Gabby Orr (@GabbyOrr_) May 22, 2020
Trump can’t survive a significant drop in turnout among white evangelicals, or not again winning white evangelicals 80-16, like he did in 2016. If white evangelical turnout drops 5%-8%, and he wins only 70-25, it’s a Republican bloodbath & Biden wins over 400 electoral votes
— Dana Houle (@DanaHoule) May 22, 2020
Snarki, child of Loki
“Rapture-ready” = “virus food”
Baud
Dana Houle misses the point. Of course it would be nice to peel off a small percentage of Trump demos. The question is how much messaging and how many resources you throw into that effort.
Baud
For the record, this is silly, even in the absurd Trump era. No church will be forced to open.
trollhattan
Best news I’ve read in awhile.
An 85% drop in price means the future of batteries, not just for replacing engines but also for off-peak storage is yuge.
raven
@trollhattan: I just bought a portable Bosch shop vac for $125 and they threw in a lithium battery listed at $119!
Baud
@trollhattan:
That’s great.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: You won’t flip these voters, but you can diminish their enthusiasm.
Mike in NC
Fat Bastard is tremendously concerned that his fellow grifters — who rely on fleecing the rubes every Sunday — are seeing their revenue streams drying up, and they’re pissed over it.
Yutsano
Personally I’m enjoying the neat little tiff between President Toadface and the Keebler Elf in regards to the Alabama Senate race. And now that I see what he’s supposedly standing for, I hope Tuberville wins. He sounds like a moron.
NotMax
Found during random internet pokin’ around.
James E Powell
@Baud:
Exactly. If any Trump voters peel themselves off and either stay home or (gasp!) vote D, it won’t be because the Democrats “reached out” to them. It will be because a few of them woke up to their own bigotry and hypocrisy. But I’m not holding my breath
What we will be reading and hearing is a lot of “I was reconsidering my support for Trump, but then [some trivial thing Biden said or did].”
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
@Baud: We’ve already converted a large chunk of people who voted for Dump in 2016 — suburban women.
Baud
@?BillinGlendaleCA: How though? What more can we do other than nominate a straight white guy?
rikyrah
Maddow did her opening segment last night about hotspots caused by church services.
It was frightening ????
Black Jesus has given you the science.
And, the science is telling you..
STAY INSIDE ????
Baud
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
Suburban woman are swing voters. Not much of a “conversion,” unless they stick with us for the long term.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: as I read that, Houle is hoping soft white evangelicals stay home.
James E Powell
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
True, but the only thing that will diminish their enthusiasm will be if it becomes clear that Trump is going to lose. This is exactly what was starting to happen in 2016 right before Comey intervened on Trump’s behalf.
If Trump looks like a certain loser in late October, we could get a Democratic year like 2008. But it will take a lot of work and a lot of luck. The press/media are going to be promoting & protecting Trump until the end.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I hope so too, but I don’t see how that’s within our control, unless we’re going to advise Biden to appear less liberal.
Keithly
@Yutsano: That’s KKKeebler Elf.
rikyrah
I have to go back to work on June 1st.
I am terrified ??
Why aren’t these people terrified?
bluehill
A few days ago, there was a post or discussion about the increase in speeding-related fatalities, and I thought that I had read something that suggested the opposite. Maybe not mutually exclusive but I saw this.
Matt McIrvin
@trollhattan: Renewable energy is gradually taking over the power grid even with all of Trump’s direct attempts to kill it, because it just gets cheaper and cheaper. Opponents of it have always cited the intermittency problem as solar and wind’s Achilles’ heel, and I used to hear a lot about how “there’s no Moore’s Law for batteries”, but it’s clear by now that even without storage intermittency is a far smaller threat to grid stability than they claimed 20 years ago, and storage is getting cheaper.
Baud
@bluehill:
I think it’s that the accidents that do happen are more likely to be fatal, rather than more fatalities.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@rikyrah:
Just not inside a church with gobs of other people.
Matt McIrvin
@bluehill: Fatal car accidents are way down overall because people aren’t driving, but they’re way up per mile driven because the people who do drive are speeding like maniacs on the empty roads and killing themselves in crashes.
Don K
My first thought was, “The lease payment on some preacher’s jet is coming up, and he needs the cash.”
Well, that and, “Some evangelicals are such willing dupes…”
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Kind of makes you wonder where we’d be if America had listened to Jimmy “Solar Panels” Carter.
zhena gogolia
@rikyrah:
Because they’re stupid?
John Revolta
That non-answer by McInaney is a masterpiece of the art of prevarication. If- IF- she actually came up with it herself, she’s got a lot more going for her upstairs than I thought. Well, unless she just got lucky. It happens.
L85NJGT
I think maybe the issue for evangelical voters is they aren’t looking for an empty declaration of victory on his way to the links. They’d like him to work on that whole 100,000 deaths from an on-going pandemic thing.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: Hand Trump a shovel.
zhena gogolia
@Baud:
Or if Mr. “inconvenient truth” had been able to take office.
TheOtherHank
@bluehill: The one a few days ago was fatalities per mile driven. The absolute numbers are down, but the deaths per mile driven are up. The absolute number has not gone down but not as much as expected.
bluehill
@Baud:
@Matt McIrvin: Oh right. Makes sense.
burnspbesq
@Yutsano:
Here’s the thing I can’t figure out. Tuberville coached at Auburn. Why do Republicans think Bama fans will turn out in droves to vote for him against Jones, a Bama grad?
Makes no more sense than running Coach K in North Carolina.
trnc
No amount of messaging will move a DT voter. The only resource you can throw at it is their dead grandmother, and that’s only if they somehow break out of the cult view.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: Yup, folk get out on the highway and say “I feel the need, the need for speed…”.
NotMax
@John Revolta
Prepared list of
talking venom points.She immediately followed it up with a remark about being in a roomful of people who all hate churches so much they never want them to open.
lgerard
Anybody think trump will show up in church tomorrow instead of playing golf?
Barbara
@bluehill: The metrics I read suggest that accidents per volume of traffic, however measured, e.g., miles driven, are up but that traffic has diminished so much, there has still been a big decrease — in other words, when adjusted for volume, the decline should have been even more dramatic than it was if the rate had remained stable.
NotMax
Code fix.
@John Revolta
Prepared list of
talkingvenom points.She immediately followed it up with a remark about being in a roomful of people who all hate churches so much they never want them to open.
Amir Khalid
What Kayleigh McNeenerneener* does in that clip is shocking. She’s denying what Trump said, she’s twisting the reporter’s question, and her claim that the reporter is raising a hypothetical is obvious bullshit. If she ever had any credibility, she has now cast it into the wind.
But who am I kidding? Trump didn’t hire her to be credible. He hired her to make his excuses for him.
*Did I spell that right?
NotMax
@Barbara
Only if they’re offering the MEcharist.
;)
?BillinGlendaleCA
@lgerard: “I’m a Presbyterian, would you believe it?”
Donald J. Trump.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Amir Khalid:
Looks good to me.
burnspbesq
@Amir Khalid:
Dead solid perfect.
oatler.
This from a site I hate-monitor:
https://ricochet.com/760585/the-science-is-settled-it-is-time-to-end-the-lockdown/
Avoid if you have high blood pressure.
J R in WV
It is certainly small of me, but I’m glad big evangelical churches run by TheoCristic Nut Jobs want to reopen right away. And most of them won’t wear masks, either! All double-plus good for me. Anyone who gets sick, even with a minor case of Covid-19,
willshould resent being lied to by Trump AND their pastor, for tithes.For every case of illness, whole groups of family and friends SHOULD but may not reject both Trump and the pastors of their church.
Pretty sure my friend, former professor of epidemiology, and now Bishop, won’t be opening any churches in their diocese for crowded services… Too sciencey educated for that shit ~!!~
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: It’s hard to say. Photovoltaic cells, the dominant tech now, were super-expensive back in those days–it made sense to use them for tiny low-power portable applications like calculators, but any attempt to generate serious power with them was either some specialized application where there were no other alternatives (like spacecraft), or a showpiece. (Carter’s White House solar panels were simple water heaters, which was a far more economical application.)
But the way this works is the experience curve: the more you roll out, the cheaper you can make them, in a power law. That could well have gotten kickstarted earlier. It’s semiconductor tech, after all, which was already exploding. (And the development of better batteries was eventually driven by the demand for laptop computers and cell phones.)
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@trollhattan: @raven:
I just bought a pretty good-size lithium ion battery. It was a little pricey, but they threw in an entire Kia Niro!
We’d been waiting for the falling-prices/increasing-range lines to cross at a satisfactory spot, and the 2019 model (the 2020s have been indefinitely delayed) hit it. It’s also a rocketship, and confess I have occasionally contributed to that increase in average highway speeds.
Amir Khalid
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
No matter what faith he claims, I don’t believe Donald Trump is any kind of Christian.
SFAW
@Amir Khalid:
“Close enough for government
lyingwork.”L85NJGT
@Matt McIrvin:
Trump and his dopey followers believe in model railroad economics. Where changes in materials, products, and services, don’t forever alter the economic landscape.
Chief Oshkosh
I think it would be GREAT to pack ’em in at the megachurches. Absolutely filled to the gills. And be sure that the everyone understands that the Baby Jesus will save you from the ‘rona and that wearing a mask is a sign of lost faith, as is not fully and loudly participating in all of the singing, writhing, speaking in tongues, and snake-handling. Rinse, repeat for July 4th, only for that holiday, we stress how mask-wearing is for wusses an is agin ma freedumb! USA! USA!
We should end up with a nice round number of about 200,000 deaths by the end of summer and cruise into the hardcore election season with a cool quarter million dead. It’ll suck for the “non-believers” and other well-adjusted people, but at least the death rolls will start to skew towards the wacko population and we’ll have a better chance of finally wiping out the Republicans electorally. That’s not political, that’s recognizing the potential for ending an existential threat to the country.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Bishops are like judges these days, when I see one open his yap, I want to know who appointed him– Tobin was gifted to us by John Paul II, the smiling right-winger. I checked Tobin’s feed to see where he’s from (Providence) and this is his twitter header, and the first tweet I saw when put his name in the search bar
I don’t know if “complicit” is a word I’d be using in this context, but… whatever
Chief Oshkosh
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: Oh man, how in the heck did you find one of those?! I am seriously envious.
SFAW
According to an NPR news report, some Baptist church in Germany held a service around May 10th (I think), as part of “re-opening.” Apparently 40 of the parishioners are now COVID-positive.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Actually Black Jesus is saying the opposite; don’t go inside with a group.
Kind of the stupid thing in all this, there is no reason Church services can’t be held outside for at lest the summer. But I bet the real reason the Mega Church pastors want to pack them inside is because it makes the marks easier to get into that mob group think mindset.
SFAW
@Chief Oshkosh:
So? According to Michael Bruenig (I think it was), Trump has personally saved more lives — 1 or 2 Million, something like that — via his COVID response than Obamacare ever has.
Martin
@trollhattan: There currently is a depreciation cost associated with batteries, so the cost to implement is higher than it might seem, but it’s still lower than traditional solutions who have both depreciation and consumables.
But really the benefit to renewables is that you can implement them at any scale. The biggest impediment to grid solar/battery is the existing coal/gas infrastructure that still needs 10-20 years to recover costs and writing those assets down to zero is simply not possible for them economically. But me as a consumer, or you as a business owner, don’t suffer from that – we can invest today because we don’t carry those assets.
NeenerNeener
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: Welcome to the Niro club!
Martin
@Chief Oshkosh: Yeah, the Niro was our top pick for an EV, but the Ms went with a used Prius Plug to save some money.
Only thing I don’t like about the Niro is the gear selector – don’t know what the fuck they were on about that.
NotMax
@SFAW
Surpassing the number present at the inauguration.
J R in WV
@oatler.:
And we can certainly see why… more stupidity and ignorance is hard to imagine.
The gutter guy who repaired gutters torn off by the tree that fell on our house knows better about masks and stay-at-home than these guys who claim to be well educated, but are not.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
I see it every day on the road outside my house, traffic is light and everyone is letting their inner Speed Racer out and driving stupid fast.
raven
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: We’ve had a Niro for about 2 years, just hit 15,000. . . and gas is a buck fifty a gallon. Story of my fucking life.
raven
@Martin: I’m really tempted to move up to a bigger KIA.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
I think he hired her because she is the only person he can get. Supposedly last week she showed Trump’s personal bank account number on national TV.
Martin
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Heh, you should see what it’s like down here in tuner central. We’ve got a group that every few nights does drift racing in the catholic church parking lot near my house at 2am – Supras, GT-Rs, some lambos and Ferraris, I’ve seen at least one McLaren out there.
NotMax
@Martin
We also have the opportunity to implement practically from scratch intelligent procedures for disposal of the batteries.
But the cynic in me doesn’t see that happening.
Wouldn’t be averse to a disposal surcharge being included in the original price, to be refunded (less a processing fee) after battery is delivered to a proper disposal facility.
Martin
@raven: EV is still cheaper than $1.50.
I’ve moved down a few grades – from a small SUV to an e-bike.
SFAW
@SFAW:
Correction: Matt Bruenig, not Michael.
Matt McIrvin
@Martin: Yeah. With wind, there’s a lower limit because a small wind turbine is not very efficient–the individual turbines want to be BIG. But big for an individual turbine and big for a wind farm are two different things–it still scales much more nimbly than traditional power sources.
And that limit doesn’t even apply to solar. With solar you can deploy in a really flexible piecemeal way.
The issue of scale and recovering your up-front cost is really the biggest problem with nuclear power, the main non-carbon competitor to renewables. The ideal size for a nuclear plant is colossal, and the things are super expensive. Once you have one, you’ve got ginormous loads of energy coming out for very little further expense, and over the long haul it can be cheap. But to amortize that initial investment you’re stuck with the plant for decades and decades, and it means you end up maintaining all this ancient equipment with design flaws that were discovered 30 years ago. It’s much less technically agile.
rikyrah
@lgerard:
Church for thee, not for me ??
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Yeah, I, uh, know a guy who knows a guy who tried to access his account with that information. Turns out Trump is overdrawn 500 million of whatever “₽” means.
raven
@Krope, the Formerly Dope: piasters
Krope, the Formerly Dope
@raven: Hmm, Google told me rubles when I completely made that story up.
beth
https://www.aarp.org/money/taxes/info-2020/stimulus-check-in-deceased-name.html
Not sure if this link will work but here’s a follow up to a discussion we had regarding stimulus checks received for deceased spouses. According to this the IRS has declared they must be returned. This article gives addresses to send the check to. I had received a payment for my husband who passed away last year – I’m glad I didn’t spend it.
evodevo
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: Yes. This. It’s just like a group of teenagers, with peer pressure (mob mentality?). They won’t give as much if they are doing it in the privacy of their homes, because there’s no one on their immediate left/right to comment about their lack of enthusiasm or the paltriness of their “love offering”. If not pressured, they’re not gonna fork over as much, plus a lot of them are now unemployed and don’t have the dough, and if you can’t shame them eyeball to eyeball, those megamansions and airplanes aren’t gonna pay for themselves, now, are they !!
Jeffro
@Baud: apparently all we need to do is let Trumpov keep talking and proposing new ways to kill his own voters.
Bring back the bananas press conferences, I say!
Starfish
I wrote something and then thought better of it.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
Watching “The Green Berets” on TCM. It has to be one of the great comedies ever made. Ed Wood would be proud.
Ruckus
@trollhattan:
Seen in some places that some mfg may be below the $100/kwh now, and that it may drop well below in the not too distant future.
Suburban Mom
@Baud: We’re not all swing voters. My suburb has gotten bluer and the local government and congressional seat flipped completely. We’re getting a COVID-related influx of buyers and renters from NYC right now, which I expect to continue the trend to blue.
dexwood
Were I to believe in such things, I’d say Trump is trying to kill Believers because he is the One True Anti-Christ. He is truly an asshole, though, who should choke on a Big Mac.
West of the Rockies
@Amir Khalid:
Trump is too lazy and smug and stupid to believe in any religion in any genuine, considered fashion. He also is not agnostic or atheist because those would require thought and a philosophical/spiritual conclusion–again, effort and reason.
He is areligious, aspiritual, aphilosophical.
He is instead only focused on himself, a creature of need, greed, and constant hunger.
Dan
When you were growing up, the parish priests were representatives of their local communities because they were FROM their local communities. Now they’re mercenaries from Africa or South America.
Krope, the Formerly Dope
Some of his supporters among them may love this because this is their one true chance to rapture the faithful. They’ve worked hard for this and won’t give up now that they’re so close.
dexwood
@Krope, the Formerly Dope: Well, I’d be happy if they achieved their goal, leaving the country to the rest of us.
Ruckus
@bluehill:
The first 3 weeks. That time and the concept of staying home seems to have dried up around here in socal. I stayed home the first 3 weeks but have worked most of my regular days since. Yes a lot of places are closed or only do takeout but there are still a hell of a lot more people out and about. And far fewer with masks. You still have to have masks to go inside a store and only grocery and stores like Target are open. But a lot of industrial businesses are open. The collision repair center next to where I work is open but without the normal turnover, which is that they have at least 75-80 cars waiting or being worked on and now it’s probably down to 10-20 at a time. So yes, a lot fewer accidents over the last few months.
Anya
I think they should open all the mega churches and Trump need to fly to Florida to attend services in the most packed mega church. They can then all hold hands and hug each other as a fuck you to the godless liberals.
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: I’m sorry you have to go back on June 1. I don’t understand these people, either.
Eunicecycle
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Tobin was our bishop in the Youngstown diocese and let’s just say he was not beloved. He ruined our very strong Catholic Charities with his meddling, and was just generally very authoritarian and not pastoral. We all said good riddance when he was sent to RI.
Ruckus
@Chief Oshkosh:
There is a whole slew of them in CA. OK slew may be a bit of an overstatement but most dealers have some in stock. Very few of the standard model, more of the up scale version that of course costs more. Batteries and motor are the same, just the amenities are more costly.
Ruckus
@NotMax:
In Germany there is a company that recycles EV batteries. 98% recovery rate.
Mousebumples
Unrelated but i wanted to share some good news about what the Wisconsin Democratic Party is doing –
Signatures to be on the ballot must be collected between 4/15 & 6/1. My State Senator (R) isn’t running , so it’s an open seat . I got a letter in the mail with info about how to have every eligible voter in my household sign nomination papers and send them in. Planning to work on that tomorrow to get it in the mail on Tuesday .
I’ve been thinking about giving them a donation , and this reaffirms (to me) that they’re spending money wisely. Any other favorite low profile races or related groups to recommend supporting ?
Martin
@Ruckus: Almost all are sold in CA. And the NA headquarters is down my way. Entirely possible CA is the only place you can find them.
Remember, automakers in CA still need to hit their % ZEV goals for each year, so they’re always going to reserve them for this market first if they’re coming up short.
Oh, and CARB upped the numbers for their soon to be released ZEV truck regulations – doubling %s, so 30%-50% of Class 2b-8 trucks need to be ZEV by 2030.
debbie
He’s drunk on the power of seeing people do his bidding.
Dorothy A. Winsor
Credit where it’s due. The early edition of the Sunday NYT has a front page consisting solely of 1000 names of the dead.
debbie
Offline all day: Has anyone shared tomorrow’s NYT front page?
frosty
@Chief Oshkosh:
JFC, this is just Christian Science all over again. That cult* is finally dying out and now we have this new one.
* That I was raised in until the day when I was 12 that I couldn’t pray away the sniffles.
rikyrah
@SFAW:
???
NotMax
@Martin
Good news for Rivian (although they’re initially wildly expensive).
debbie
@Amir Khalid:
Makes you miss SHS, doesn’t it? ?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Dorothy A. Winsor: @debbie: the dead tree Sunday NYT is still a ritual for me, so I’ll look at it tomorrow, but I’ve been seeing people tweet out some of the bios
Baud
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
New York dead? Or are they planning on doing that 100 more times.
debbie
@NotMax:
I listened to about a minute’s worth of Glen Beck yesterday. One of his minions started talking about the people who never want the country to open again. I wanted to reach into my radio and punch him.
Baud
@debbie:
These are the people who think we pal around with terrorists. They lie like we breathe.
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Heartbreaking.
Scroll down to the shot of the tweet.
Jess
@Chief Oshkosh: This!!!
WaterGirl
@beth: So they will hunt down people for individual 1,200 checks, and give away untold millions to companies that don’t deserve it. Gotta love the dumpster, at least he’s consistent in the way he treats rich vs. poor.
Dorothy A. Winsor
@Baud:
I don’t know. I just saw tweets of the front page. The headline is
US Deaths Near 100,000, an Incalculable Loss
debbie
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
If only I’d waited one more second! ?
NotMax
@Baud
And the bastards never pick up the check.
:)
WaterGirl
@Mousebumples: What are nomination papers?
Another Scott
@burnspbesq: Hehe. :-)
Fingers crossed!!
Cheers,
Scott.
debbie
@Baud:
Seems to be notable people. Though everyone is notable in their own way.
L85NJGT
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
I always confuse Jim Hutton and Dean Jones.
zhena gogolia
@Baud:
The article debbie linked says they’re from all across the country.
Martin
@NotMax: Rivian is probably a 2a truck, already covered by the car regulations.
I think Musk was trying to make his truck a 2b truck becuase of this. The current CARB regulations are that 9.5% of your vehicle sales this year must be ZEVs. So Ford only needs to sell enough Bolt/Niro competitors to cover that and they can crank out all the gas F-150s they want.
But the new regulations cover the F-250 as a Class 2b truck, so in theory, Ford may need to electrify the F-250 before the F-150 because the F-250 doesn’t have light passenger cars they can use to hit the targets.
Rivian would really only benefit if Ford stopped selling trucks here because they can’t electrify. But Rivian benefits from a lot of local talent and other state support by being a CA based company working on EVs. They’re picking up money from the penalties that Ford is paying by not hitting their EV targets.
rikyrah
??????
Dorothy A. Winsor
@debbie:
We are in sync!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@rikyrah: love to see the maskless guy strolling along with his baby
debbie
@rikyrah:
Watched several times and didn’t see a single mask. ?
Jim, Foolish Literalist
not even two months…
Martin
@NotMax: I don’t think they’re wildly expensive. Their starting price is in the top end of the F-150 price range. Assuming they’re reliable (big if for a new automaker) then I would expect total cost to be competitive with a typical F-150.
Put another way, nobody here where I live is driving a new pickup off the lot for less than $40K. If you buy a pickup, you are going to bling that thing out.
NotMax
@rikyrah
Now I want salt water taffy.
;)
Ladyraxterinok
@Amir Khalid:
James Robison, among others, periodically reports he has prayed with Trump and Trump is convertiing.
Jim Bakker and his crew daily remind audience that Trump is under constant demonic attack and needs their prayers.
And Bakker needs their donations so he can remind them to pray for Trump.
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: Oh my god. That’s horrifying. The man with the baby, what can he possibly be thinking????
edit: I see I am not the only one who noticed the man with the baby.
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Remember back at the beginning when people insisted COVID-19 was nothing and it was all an exaggeration? After all, 100,000 people die from influenza every year.
Assholes.
NotMax
@Ladyraxterinok
Well, Melania is one o’ them there Catholics.
//
Another Scott
@debbie: In two months…. :-(
Grrr…
Cheers,
Scott.
Zelma
Those pictures from Ocean City are just wild.
I live in a Jersey shore beach town. There are certainly more people here than last week but nothing like a traditional Memorial Day weekend when it is usually pretty crazy. Most of the people here are second home owners. There are no short term rentals or open motels. And we don’t have a boardwalk like Ocean City MD or Wildwood. I shall amble down to the beach tomorrow to see how crowded it is. (Being a local, I never go to the beach.)
To return to the original subject of Drump’s announcement that HE is opening up churches, I am furious because he’s made my life more difficult. I’m president of my Church Council and I know that I am going to hear it from members about “Why aren’t we opening?” Not too many, but just enough to be annoying. We are desperately trying to figure out how to open safely and legally. It ain’t easy.
Baud
@Ladyraxterinok:
I didn’t realize Bakker knows about Balloon Juice.
Mike G
Trump doesn’t give a crap about anyone but Trump.
He wants evangelicals’ votes, he doesn’t care if they drop dead after leaving the polling place.
I suspect he really has contempt for the people who slobber over him.
NotMax
@Mike G
Contempt would first require recognition they are people and not merely props on the stage of his life.
Nelle
My next door neighbors (early 40’s couple, no kids) eat about 3/4 of their meals in restaurants, normally. Since Iowa is now opened up, he told me, in the morning, that they were headed out to their favorite high end restaurant to celebrate. I expressed much surprise. (We both have porches and are used to talking at a distance.). Then his wife told me the same thing in the afternoon but expressed misgivings. She felt she needed to acquiesce as she had been saying no for so long. I told them both that I thought it was more dangerous now than it was in March – the numbers continue to climb. She said he doesn’t pay much attention to the news, but even so, they are just covering the protests and what is opening up now, as if it is inevitable and not a choice.
This morning, he told me that after talking more yesterday, they decided not to go. He had thought that, with the governor saying that it is okay, it would be. Yesterday, Iowa had the most deaths in one day and over 400 new cases.
The man next door mostly ignores politics but is a Republican because his family is always Republican. His wife is a firm Democrat. He’s always hunting when it is election day and while he orders an absentee ballot, rarely remembers to get it in, according to her. I’m working on him, I am. Just to make sure he doesn’t vote. He thinks it would be a betrayal of his mother to vote Democratic; I’m talking about how smart his mother was and that she wouldn’t have been fooled by Trump, who isn’t really Republican and hijacked his mother’s party. Hey, I gotta work with what I’ve got.
Mousebumples
@WaterGirl: Delayed response (baby bedtime!), but it’s sheet of paper where we sign (and list our address and date of signature) to be counted as one of the 200+ signatures needed to get on the ballot. There’s room for 5 on the sheet of paper we got, but the last time I signed something similar (Gov Walker recall) there were spots for the signature on the front and back of the paper. (if it’s something you want more info about for a Playing to Win post, shoot me an email. We haven’t completed it yet so I could definitely send in pics or whatever, depending on what you’re thinking).
Geoduck
The New York Times has a lot to answer for in our current situation, but sometimes they get it right- tomorrow’s edition has the entire front page filled with the names of 1000 COVID victims.
satby
@debbie: you know what, at this point people going maskless are making a political statement, they’re not ignorant of the risks. So fuck’em. As they constantly whine, it’s a free country; so they can be free to get horribly sick.
frosty
@Nelle:
That’s a pretty good start. Good luck!
debbie
@frosty:
Both of my parents were Republicans and both would have been appalled at Trump and even more appalled that their sons voted for him.
Geminid
@Ladyraxterinok: I was encouraged by one finding in the poll cited by Dana Houle- that only 18% of white evangelicals believed that churches should open with no restrictions. Tells me that Trump is making his pitch to a minority of a minority. Many of that 18% have swallowed the “spiritual warfare” ideology hook line and sinker. For them material consequences are irrelevant; this world is an illusory stage on which a morality play is being performed, and Covid-19 is an excuse for world government according to Satan’s plan, executed by the WHO, Soros, Gates etc. A few of them might be shaken out of this fantasy by a death or disablement close to them, but most are just unreachable. They are not numerous, but Trump craves unconditional support and these people give him that. As for Trump’s being a Christian, he can talk the patter, but I think he is about as Christian as my big toe, and I’m not a Christian.
zhena gogolia
@satby:
WaterGirl
@Mousebumples: Got it! I have signed many of those, but we apparently call them something else in Illinois.
WaterGirl
@Geoduck: They should keep it up – keep printing 1,000 every Sunday and there aren’t enough for the next 1,000, and then wait until there is and print that batch.
Rose Weiss
@James E Powell: Or Biden wore a tan suit, apparently one of the worst offenses anyone can commit!
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@raven: Yup, it hadn’t dipped under $3.50/gallon here in years, and the bottom fell out of gas prices the week after we bought it. I don’t care – the Prius would no longer pass the smog test and it would have cost 7 or 8 times its value to repair, so we had no choice about getting something new. It’s as much about the environment as about gas prices for us and we’re lucky we can afford to pay a premium for that preference.
@NeenerNeener: Ain’t it grand? We love it!
@Chief Oshkosh: Kia of Oakland, CA. We did have to wait several weeks, first for one to test drive and then to get delivery. I suspect manufacturers have pushed more electric vehicles to California because there’s more of a market here.
Martin
@WaterGirl: If they printed 1000 every sunday, they have enough to last into early 2022 as of today, and every week gives them 2 1/2 months more names to print.
JMG
So I have played golf the last two days. It is relatively easy to stay far apart from playing partners (foursomes only) in this sport, and my partners, whom I was meeting for the first time, wore masks getting out of their cars and on the first tee, then lowered them as play went along. This didn’t bother me. I am on Cape Cod and it has been cold, wet and windy, so beaches weren’t an issue. Town mandate that masks must be worn within the very narrow town center. It’s been good to play a game I love outdoors, even in lousy weather. All hotels, motels and short-term rentals still closed here, and restaurants are takeout only. Public compliance with mask rules is as close to 100 percent as can be. Maybe that’s because the median age in this town is 61.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Nelle:
I have a friend who I suspect always voted R until 2016– and has a lot of other odd hang-ups– because of his daddy issues (at least in part, he’s a great guy but not what you’d call a deep thinker), but to come out and say it out loud… I just don’t get that.
Matt McIrvin
Now seeing the argument about that people actually get COVID by staying at home (proof: a lot of people got COVID in New York and they’re making them stay at home).
Martin
Reminder that this Wed SpaceX is scheduled to launch 2 astronauts to the ISS. Kind of a big deal. US return to manned launches plus first commercial manned launch. It’ll be quite nice when we can send astronauts with a little more breathing room.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@JMG: that reminds me, for you and other golfers (I used to play but I was so, so bad), what do you think of his swing?
not proud of it, but I want him to be a bad golfer, and I’ve read that he’s pretty good (still cheats, but he hits the ball well)
Martin
@Matt McIrvin: The 5G towers are giving us Covid. I read it on the internet.
Uncle Cosmo
@Baud: Um – no. They aren’t that stupid. They’re not all that intelligent either, but they are clever – clever enough to realize that quite a comfortable living may be made, if you lack scruples and ethics, by conning the rubes into believing that sort of stuff & then separating them from their savings. Think Lonesome Rhodes.
Steeplejack
Depressing note from the coronasphere:
I picked up my friend at work at 7:00 at Trader Joe’s (Arlington, VA). Beautiful day, sunny, high just over 80°. I was surprised—and appalled—to see that Clarendon Central Park, a one-block triangular wedge between Wilson and Clarendon boulevards, was crowded with people. It’s a nice little green space, and it’s convenient to a lot of restaurants in the neighboring blocks. The crowd seemed to be mostly young hipsters. Nobody wearing masks. At least I didn’t see any while we were stopped at a traffic light.
I asked my friend to check me on whether this was a huge increase from last Saturday. She said yes, there were very people there last week. And she added, “I didn’t know the virus was taking the weekend off.” Exactly.
I got a bit depressed last week when I concluded that the haphazard reopening of individual states, combined with no federal leadership, is going to lead to a surge in infections but also make it harder, if not impossible, to do another general closing. I see the pattern of ongoing infections and scattered spikes in various states continuing through the winter flu season, and I’m not holding my breath for a vaccine.
Then this week I sort of came to terms with it. I don’t have to go out, so I’m not at the mercy of the herd. But there will be so much needless loss of life. And driving my friend to work is starting to feel like a job that’s going to go on for a long time.
Martin
@Steeplejack: It’s incredibly hard for those of us trying to implement plans to safely bring people back when the federal plan is whatever jumped up Trumps ass this morning.
West of the Rockies
@Rose Weiss:
It’s okay if you’re presidentin’ white.
bluehill
@Ruckus: Wow 75 – 80 cars that seems like a big auto body shop.
I guess it’s tempting to take advantage of the wide open roads. I think someone posted a link to the cannonball run attempts over the past couple of months. Sub 26 hours coast to coast. I think average speed was around 100 mph. That’s crazy.
WaterGirl
@Martin: That would certainly make a point, for anyone who cared to pay attention.
David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch
@David ? ☘The Establishment☘? Koch:
satby
@zhena gogolia: that won’t matter. It’s become weaponized assholery by the non-mask wearers. I spent 7 hours dealing with them today. And believe me, as a group I’ve never met people more deserving of some vicious karma.
WaterGirl
@satby: I tried to call you, then hung up because I figured it was past your bedtime.
No cease and desist order?
Sab
@satby: My “Don’t drink bleach!” masks came in the mail today.Yay. I can be political too.1
Bill Arnold
@satby:
They are advocating for the right to kill random people.
Button, Button, RICHARD MATHESON, 1970
The people who think like them are all armed with a similar button, but targeted much more locally.
rekoob
@Steeplejack: For what it’s worth, driving along Monument Avenue in Richmond today:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_Avenue
(ugh!), the wide “mall” had a scattering of folks lounging and sunning themselves. To your point, young-ish and mask-less. It’s expansive enough for physical distancing, and I get that apartment life can be constraining, but please be careful!
cliosfanboy
@NeenerNeener: yeah, i love mine.
Geminid
Today North Carolina announced that it had recorded 1,100 new cases of Covid-19 yesterday, 250 more than the previous high daily count. They entered phase one of easing social distancing restrictions two weeks ago, so I guess you could say the increase was right on time. Phase two of lighter restrictions still begins today. Some observers said the high count is due to increased testing. Whistling past the graveyard.
Steeplejack
@Martin:
Plus you’re going to get pushback from people saying that you’re “overreacting.” And probably problems with compliance from (some of) your students.
Steeplejack
@rekoob:
I was surprised because it was such a sudden and drastic change. I have been picking up my friend at 9:00 p.m. four nights a week and 7:00 p.m. on Saturdays, and this was a huge increase. Really felt like someone sent out the bat-signal that the quarantine is over.
The quarantine might be failing, but COVID-19 is going strong.
Prophetic graphic in this tweet:
Bill Arnold
[writing down some thoughts over the past week]
I’d be OK with limiting measures to mandatory masks/face coverings indoors in public places, plus physical distancing wherever possible. Plus cheap, easy testing, including antibody testing if the test is high accuracy, no doctor’s note required. Plus contact tracing/monitoring. This while waiting for a vaccine or a genuinely good treatment. These measures are cheap, have a low freedom-impact, and would allow the economy to slowly rebuild, with monitoring and aggressive feedback to reverse relaxation measures if they appear to be not working (Oh yeah, make sure people are not vitamin D, vitamin C or zinc deficient; vitamin D deficiency in particular seems to be associated with COVID-19 severe cases and mortality.)
Indoor places would be given procedures for auditing their airflow/ventilation and given guidelines for optional remediation.
Restaurants an issue (where/when indoor seating is required) because eating and masks don’t cooperate. Everything else (not in a similar category) could reopen. Churches too, but churchgoers and clergy must wear masks/face coverings.
Concurrently de-emphasize all the surface cleaning/hand washing stuff unless it is shown to prevent significant numbers of infections relative to breathing droplet-contaminated air. (The CDC guidelines for hand-to-face transmission, for all the CDC’s protestations, did change for practical impact purposes, though they still list hand washing etc first.) And de-emphasize anything else intended to protect against hypothetical modes of SARS-CoV-2 transmission.
RobertDSC-Mac Mini
@Martin: A flag will be going with them that was returned to Earth with the last Shuttle mission in 2011. The flag was kept safe and flew on the first Shuttle mission in 1981. Very excited to see that go back to orbit.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/05/final-shuttle-pilot-poised-to-return-us-flag-left-in-space-nine-years-ago/