Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Today in our ongoing national embarrassment…

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity.

All your base are belong to Tunch.

Lighten up, Francis.

I showered with Rahm and all I got was this shitty blog.

How has Obama failed you today?

Han shot first.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

An army of rabid, anonymous commenters

Not all heroes wear capes.

The revolution will be supervised.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

This is how realignments happen…

Naturally gregarious and alpha

Where tasty lettuce and good mustard aren’t elitist.

Is it irresponsible to speculate? It is irresponsible not to.

We still have time to mess this up!

Saul Alinsky is my co-pilot

Militantly superior in their own minds…

Yes we did.

Forty-two’ said Deep Thought, with infinite majesty and calm.

This Blog Goes to 11…

Mission Accomplished!

We can agree to disagree, but I’m right.

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Anne Laurie has been a Balloon Juice writer since 2009.

Bad Faith Open Thread: … “But the CHILDRUN!!!”…

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The first resort of the modern American “patriot”…


Per the Washington Post, “‘I feel so bad for the children’: N.C. towns cancel Christmas parades after demands to remove Confederate groups”:

… In a Wednesday night video message, Wake Forest Mayor Vivian Jones announced that the town’s downtown board of directors voted to cancel the Dec. 14 Christmas parade out of concern that “outside agitators” would show up to protest or defend the Sons and Daughters of the Confederacy, who planned to march in the event.

The decision in Wake Forest, located less than 20 miles outside Raleigh, comes almost a week after another nearby town, Garner, N.C., announced it was canceling its Christmas parade over possible protests of a float sponsored by a local Confederate group, the Raleigh News & Observer reported.

By the end of her video announcement, Jones was fighting tears…

Wake Forest Police Chief Jeff Leonard said in a statement that one group had notified the town of its plans to protest, but that the police department was worried that more agitators would “show up, wreak havoc then leave.” The town had received “credible information” about a “growing number of outside groups” planning to attend to either defend or oppose the Sons and Daughters of the Confederacy, according to a statement. The town had not received any threats, officials clarified, but Leonard and Jones said they still believed safety could be put at risk.

“We aren’t happy telling kids they can’t attend or participate in this year’s parade, but it’s better than trying to explain to a parent whose child was injured why we chose to proceed despite so many warning signs,” Leonard said. “No matter what side of this issue you are on, our focus is public safety and at this point, the risk of moving forward with the parade simply outweighs any possible reward.”…

Blaming the ‘outside agitators’ — another proud Suthrun tradition, of course.


Our proud Puritan forebears actually banned the celebration of Christmas — it was considered ‘pagan’, i.e., Papist (Catholic). Christmas trees became an aspirational holiday accessory when hordes of desperate German refugees started producing tchotchkes cheaply enough for the American middle class to imitate Queen Victoria’s annual tribute to her German husband. (Which, of course, didn’t stop those good, patriotic Heartland Americans from vilifying the Germans as filthy disease-carrying criminals who couldn’t be bothered to learn English or teach their hordes of subnormal offspring decent behavior.)

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Seasonal Open Thread: Simple Gifts

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Local news subs (assuming you have a local paper) make good gifts, too.


Free for downloading, at the link. The motto patterns are pretty simple — they could be worked up in a couple of hours, even by a beginner. You could even use waste canvas to cross-stitch them onto a sweatshirt or the back of a denim jacket…

(If I can ever find my cross-stitch pattern books, I may work up ‘Capitalism without rules is theft’ in a florid pseudo-Victorian script. Which is not the Warren style, but the concept pleases me.)

Anybody want to share gift suggestions?

******
Or if you’re looking for a *gag* gift… emphasis on the gag…


(Not a big makeup consumer, but as I understand it, concealer is properly used for small areas, to disguise dark undereye circles or hide blemishes. Normal users would cover the patch with a dusting of foundation, like blending paint over spackle. If the Occupant is too lazy or too ignorant not to slather it on like street-mime slap, that would help explain why it looks so extraordinarily unnatural.)

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Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Memories of Summer

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Momsense - Peony blossoms

Sincere thanks to staunch commentor MomSense:

Finally getting around to sending some photos from my garden.

Momsense Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Memories of Summer

The photos are of peonies, irises, nepeta, salvia, and a montauk daisy.
Momsense - Montauk daisies

I probably have 5 or 6 different varieties of peony.

Sunday Morning Garden Chat: Memories of Summer

***********
“In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.”

Yes, gardeners, now that you’ve got some indoor time, please send some of those pics you collected during more clement weather!

(And if you’re currently enjoying such halcyon weather… don’t worry, we may be envious but we’ll still be happy if you share your photos…)

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Late Night Open Thread: Buttigieg Seeks Republican Votes

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(Can’t get the embed to work properly, but it’s worth five minutes to watch.)

Striving to impress the Never-Trumpers isn’t a bad move, for someone with Mayor Pete’s (admittedly slender) political credentials. But his dogwhistle wasn’t particularly well performed here, because it seems to have pissed off a lot of Democratic voters without impressing his target audience…

And were I his Comms Director, I wouldn’t have “defended” my boss to Democrats by citing The Bulwark, which is… an outfit explicitly for Never-Trumper Republicans:


(Note: Dana Houle, professional political operative, has said that the more non-professionals know about a campaign’s press staff, the less likely that campaign is to succeed.)

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Open Thread: Trading SPACE FARCE! for Paid Parental Leave

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But seriously… I doubt it will happen, because the Repubs don’t want a bunch of ‘low-level bureaucrats’ (federal employees) to get ‘freebies paid from our taxes’, especially right before Christmas (because they can’t enjoy their holiday unless they know other people are suffering). But I would happily trade an expansion of paid family leave in return for, let’s be honest, years of scheduling Very Serious Hearings about a sixth branch of the military. The Washington Post is a good guide here, IMO, because they’re reporting on what they consider a local pocketbook issue:

… The deal is part of a defense authorization bill that is slated to pass this month. If consummated, the agreement could mark one of the biggest deals President Trump has cut with Congress. It would secure a massive expansion of benefits for federal workers, something Democrats have long sought, in exchange for a realignment of the U.S. military that Trump has sought to secure as part of his legacy…

One Democratic congressional aide, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the parties are “nearing agreement on a final deal.” The package could be voted on as early as next week, the aide said.

If it is approved, the extension of paid family leave to federal workers would represent a major benefit to more than 2 million federal civilian workers, who are only eligible for unpaid leave under federal law.

It would mark a reversal of sorts for the White House, which has sought to strip pay and benefits from federal workers since Trump took office in 2017. Instead, it would mark one of the biggest extensions of a new work benefit for the federal workforce in recent history…

Trump has become increasingly fixated on Space Force as his administration faces the House impeachment inquiry, according to one senior administration official. But it has not been clear if House Democrats would approve of his request.

The Pentagon has already reestablished a Space Command that will be headed by a four-star general. But the Space Force, if approved, would stand up an organization to train and equip specialized forces whose mission would be to accelerate the country’s response to the militarization of space…

A senior defense official with knowledge of Space Force discussions said Thursday that the Air Force convened a planning task force months ago and is weighing “myriad” issues, including how service members would be transferred from the Air Force to the Space Force, what Space Force uniforms would look like, and what rank structure would be used…

Still, there are a variety of more complicated issues that will take the Pentagon time to hammer out, the official said. They include logistical issues, such as where Space Force headquarters will be housed in the Pentagon, and practical ones, such as whether the Space Force will have its own security forces on the ground or rely on other branches of service.

For federal employees, the deal represents not just a rare new benefit, but a victory in a three-year war with the Trump administration that from the start was suspicious of the career bureaucracy of 2.1 million employees.

The White House has gone to war with unions that represent federal workers and won. In recent months it has gotten reprieves from the courts over a union challenge to a series of White House executive orders designed to weaken labor’s hand in collective bargaining.

The administration has slashed long-established benefits such as telework in many agencies and taken steps to more aggressively fire workers it deems poor performers. And while Trump has proposed a raise for the workforce for next year, he did not want an increase this year until Congress intervened, demanding it under the terms of a budget agreement that ended the partial government shutdown…

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Saturday Morning Open Thread

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If Fitzpatrick is your rep, you might want to send him a thank-you message.

===========

And a long read, because it’s Saturday morning and worth the effort:

… Harry Reid, who retired in 2017 after representing Nevada for 30 years in the U.S. Senate—a dozen of them as chair of the Democratic caucus, eight of them as Senate majority leader—was supposed to be dead already; his pancreatic cancer was forecasted to prove fatal within weeks. But he’s still here, which is how I came to be talking with him, not long before Thanksgiving, in a conference room at the Bellagio, asking him why he remains the person to whom many of the Democratic presidential candidates come for advice and anointment.

Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren have both stopped by for meetings and checked in via phone. Pete Buttigieg made a special pilgrimage to see him. Bernie Sanders welcomed Reid to his hospital room after his recent heart attack. Before Mike Bloomberg started filing the paperwork to enter the primaries, he didn’t alert many Democratic Party figures—but he did call Reid…

If defeating Donald Trump rests on the Democratic Party unifying early and strong around a nominee, then the current state of things looks ominous. Polling suggests a scenario in which four different candidates could each win each Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina—with a fifth candidate, Bloomberg, the one with the deepest pockets, only then entering the primaries. Not a recipe for rapid coalescence—and conceivably a situation in which the Democratic convention arrives next July with candidates still scrambling for delegates and no one in possession of a majority. In that case, who could play the role of party elder to mediate among the various factions?

Barack Obama would seem to be the natural choice; he’s not only the last Democratic president, and the only one since Franklin Roosevelt to be elected twice with majorities of the electorate, but he remains the most popular figure, by far, in the Democratic Party. Yet it would be hard for him to appear to remain neutral. He’s good friends with one top-tier candidate, Joe Biden, his vice president for eight years; he’s expressed public doubts and private annoyance about the socialism-inflected movement inspired by another, Bernie Sanders; he’s had an uneasy relationship with a third, Elizabeth Warren, since she briefly worked for him setting up the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; and Buttigieg has explicitly tried to position himself as the next Obama. (Obama actually has deeper roots and a closer friendship with a fifth candidate, Deval Patrick, than with any of these four.) But beyond this, Obama doesn’t want to be the party mediator or convention broker. Part of why he’s retreated from the public is because he’s hoping the party will move past him, and he doesn’t think that his being seen to have handpicked Trump’s opponent would be good for Democrats’ odds in the general election. There’s also the more self-interested worry about his legacy: What would it say about him if he couldn’t get a deal done, or if his handpicked candidate loses to Trump?

So if not Obama, then who? Not Bill or Hillary Clinton—they’re too loathed by some of the very factions they’d be trying to soothe. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is the de facto leader of the party, and people close to her hope and expect that she might be asked to mediate, based on her skill at steering the party toward the center-left. But she doesn’t have much of a relationship with any of the candidates or their campaigns aside from Biden, so she wouldn’t be able to exert personal suasion effectively.

That leaves the man, hairless due to chemotherapy, sitting across from me. Reid knows all the candidates who are within range of contention for the nomination; his former aides populate their campaign staffs. Perhaps most important, given the intransigent nature of Bernie Sanders and his supporters—who were notoriously reluctant to yield to Hillary Clinton last time around—Reid may be the only politician in America other than Sanders himself who’s trusted by Jane O’Meara Sanders, the senator’s wife and possibly most fight-hungry defender…

Reid said he agrees with Obama’s warning two weeks ago that the electorate was not as into progressive revolution as some candidates and Democrats on Twitter want to believe—but he also assured me that the party isn’t on a self-destructive bender. “You can go back and look at presidential primaries for as long as you want to go back, and candidates are always criticized in the primary for being too far to the left. But as time moves on, you wind up being more center. It’s going to happen this time, just like it always has,” he said.

Moreover, opposition to Trump will unite Democrats, he predicted, and heal the rifts among them. “We know that to say four more years of Trump will not be good for the country is a gross, gross understatement.”…

If the selection of the Democratic nominee does come down to Reid brokering a compromise, whom might he back? He won’t say, of course, and has promised not to make any endorsement until at least after Nevada’s primary, at the end of February. But he’s been talking up Warren since the 2016 election ended, and she was the candidate he was decidedly the most effusive about, calling her “one of the finest people I’ve ever worked with.” And many former Reid staffers occupy prominent roles on the Warren and Sanders campaigns and on lefty Twitter.

Does all this mean that you’re a secret liberal, or you’re more progressive than people thought? I asked Reid.

“I’m glad you think it’s a secret,” he told me…

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Late Night Open Thread: Floriduh Driver

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(From the tags on the front, looks to be this guy — FL insurance adjuster & Trump fan)

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‘Season of Giving’ Open Thread: Spare A Thought for the Locally-Grown, Artisanal Bigots & Hypocrites

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The multinational big-box kleptocrats, with the Oval Office Occupant as their spokesthing, are making it impossible for the traditional regional hatemongers to get the earned media (free publicity) they rely upon to survive!

Take, for instance, newly-minted reparative-justice advocate and unindicted insurance-fraud Republican Darrel Issa:


“If the soulless legislative middle managers are gonna keep a stand-up guy like Duncan Hunter from voting with us, just because he’s pled guilty to robbing wounded veterans to pay for his golf fees, cigar bars, and at least five extramarital liaisons with lobbyists and staffers… who’s gonna be left to accuse the Democrats of immorality and lawlessness? (ME!, that’s who)”

… In August, Issa announced that he had launched an exploratory committee to consider a potential bid for Hunter’s seat, which prompted him to withdraw his nomination by Trump for a trade post.

The Union-Tribune noted that unlike other challengers running for Hunter’s seat, Issa has not criticized the embattled Republican congressman.

On Thursday, the House Ethics Committee urged Hunter to “refrain from voting on any question at a meeting of the House or of the Committee of the Whole House,” citing a House rule regarding convicted lawmakers…

Not to mention the sad status of favorite blog chewtoy Little Prince Rand, who can’t get any front-page MSM attention for the kind of puke-funnel performance that used to be worth thousands from his donors / voters…

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Cat Bleg Repost: “Merlin” Is Ready to Fly from Minneapolis to Virginia

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merlin rescue black kitty

Got some wires crossed, or I would’ve (should’ve) posted this earlier. Latest updates on the newly-renamed black maybe-not-feral Merlin, from Edith:

Laura is flying on the 12th. The total is $479. She has access to a free car rental so we don’t need to add it to the total, but it would be faster for her if a local Juicer could drive her…

And from TomatoQueen, in Virginia, who is adopting Merlin:

Edith’s black kitty, Merlin, is ready to come live with me. Travel will be from Minnesota to Virginia in December. The flight parent is Schlemazel’s niece LauraToo, who is presently visiting Australia but will be home in time to bring me Merlin on December 11th. Here is the PayPal link to help defray the cost, so if you all can help, it would be greatly appreciated.

Haven’t done the donations quite this way before, but I sent a test payment, and it went through without issues.

Let me know in the comments, or at annelaurie.bj (at) gmail.com, if you have any questions.

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Friday Morning Open Thread: Be Prepared

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As House Democrats geared up for their first impeachment hearing last month, Speaker Nancy Pelosi huddled in her office with her leadership team, downplaying expectations.

Don’t expect these hearings to trigger a massive shift in public support toward ousting President Trump, Pelosi (D-Calif.) told her colleagues the night before the hearing, according to Democrats familiar with her warning who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the encounter frankly.

Those words of caution — delivered as House Intelligence Committee members prepared in the Capitol basement for the next day’s hearing — reflected the innate skepticism that has influenced her every move as she has guided her Democratic majority through a tumultuous moment in the nation’s history…

But with a five-minute nationally televised address Thursday morning, she has become the ­reluctant face of the impeachment effort, donning a role she never wanted at a time when she’d rather be talking about anything else.

“I’m really sorry the president made this necessary by his complete disregard for the vision of our founders,” she told reporters Thursday. “An impeachment is not a pleasant experience. It can be divisive. We don’t take any glee in this at all. It’s heartbreaking. But the president gave us no choice.”.…

Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), a former CIA officer who was among the “national security freshmen” who pushed Pelosi toward supporting an impeachment inquiry, praised her handling of the process. From the beginning, she said, she asked Pelosi to ensure that the investigation was done in a strategic, efficient and serious manner, and she said Pelosi has followed through.

“I really can’t stand anything that celebrates this moment we’re in, because if you’re from a place like Michigan — swing state, you know, where your neighbors have different political views than you do — that tension is seeping into our everyday lives and no one’s happy about it,” she said. “I think she has set an important tone.”

Slotkin added that Pelosi has kept the moderate freshmen at the top of her priority list, making sure their bills are passing the House and tending closely to their political needs. Slotkin pointed to one of her top priorities — allowing patients to have immediate access to prescription drug prices from their doctors’ offices. The House passed the bill Oct. 29, two days before the House formalized its impeachment probe…

When the dust settles, there will still be legislation that needs to be made. Pelosi may or (Trickster forbid) may not be around to keep shepherding the Democratic cats, but she’s doing her best to make sure that the rules will not be forgotten and that somebody will be there to implement them.

We can hope Pelosi gets some credit in the history books, because she sure won’t get any from her very-woke “allies”…

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WH Xmas Open Thread: “The Spirit of America”… Is Very, Very White

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… White paper stars hang from the ceiling of the East Colonnade, a passageway that has been transformed by arches lined with clear plastic panels printed with white line drawings of more than 60 examples of American architecture and innovation. They spring from the ground like an austere garden of blueprints…

…[A]s she’s done before, she released a video of herself filmed during her final walk-through on Sunday after returning from Thanksgiving in Palm Beach, Fla. In it, she’s looking at an advent calendar in the shape of the White House, adjusting ribbons, and sprinkling fake snow on trees in the Grand Foyer and Cross Hall, which was filled with evergreens covered in white lights or gold paint…

Whatever tastes viewers have, the first lady’s devotion to Christmas decorating cannot be quibbled with. This year she began preparations as early as July, according to an Instagram post that showed her looking at an array of flowers and fabric swatches. This is within the normal holiday decor preparation time for first ladies, but most other first ladies have not trumpeted that fact. The Trumps have also had fewer state dinners than their predecessors. Such events are usually an opportunity for first families to show off their style. That leaves the Christmas decorations as the preeminent expression of Melania Trump’s tastes…

Former model Melania Trump finally has the advertising budget she dreamed about when she was doing all those degrading cattle calls and low-rent catalog shoots, and yet all the classy designers turn up their noses, murmuring about ‘overextended already, I’m afraid’ and ‘not exactly the kind of job where our staff is at its best, if you know what I mean.’

She wanted “extremely upscale fashion boutique” and had to settle for “mid-range Midwestern shopping mall in one of the more expensive suburbs.” Sure, it excited the Qanon crowd, but those people see portents in their alphabet soup. Even the Wingnut Wurlitzer praise seems pretty pro-forma this year (presumably someone on Melania’s staff is assigned to picking out twitter highlights)… probably they’ve just got too many other Trump-related circuses to defend / promote.

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Thursday Morning Open Thread: No Stopping, No Going Back

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gop will say anything for trump - tom toles

(Tom Toles via GoComics.com)

From the Washington Post:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam B. Schiff left little doubt with fellow Democrats Wednesday that they plan to move swiftly to impeach President Trump as soon as this month.

According to multiple Democratic lawmakers who attended a closed-door Capitol meeting, Pelosi announced no firm decision or timeline in moving toward a vote on Trump’s impeachment. But, a day after Schiff delivered a 300-page report detailing charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress against Trump, she made clear what lies ahead in the House.

“Are you ready?” Pelosi (D-Calif.) asked her colleagues, after describing grave constitutional circumstances posed by Trump’s alleged wrongdoing surrounding his dealings with Ukraine and his subsequent decision to stonewall the House investigation into it.

The caucus, according to multiple members, erupted with shouts of approval.

“We’re moving forward,” said one member, summarizing the thrust of Pelosi’s remarks and speaking on condition of anonymity to candidly describe a private meeting. “We’ve got a job to do whether people want to testify or not.”

Pelosi then turned the room over to Schiff (D-Calif.), who received a standing ovation before saying a word, the members said.

Schiff proceeded to run through the major findings of the report, add context to some of the key events the inquiry has uncovered, and explained to colleagues why, among other things, he did not wait for additional witnesses — such as former national security adviser John R. Bolton, who met with Trump to discuss Ukraine policy — before issuing his report…

In a separate closed-door meeting elsewhere in the Capitol basement, Vice President Pence rallied Republicans against impeachment — encouraging the GOP rank-and-file to “turn up the heat” on House Democrats and accuse them of focusing on impeachment instead of solving the nation’s problems.

Pence praised Republicans for sticking together and defending the president, telling them he and Trump were proud of their work standing up for the president. He also criticized Pelosi and House Democrats for what he called shameful behavior — not just the impeachment proceedings against Trump but also claiming Democrats had turned a blind eye to other issues that affect people’s everyday lives…

cold warrior putin has gop on ice - matt davies

(Matt Davies via GoComics.com)

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Open Thread: Prezdint Snowflake Scampers Off to His Safe Space

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… And yet, we’re stuck with this putz. You’ve all probably seen the video by now, and what a video it is…


Even his dedicated NYTimes courtiers couldn’t buff a gloss on this turd:

President Trump arrived in London Monday evening planning to tout a foreign policy accomplishment his presidential campaign wants him to run on: successfully pressuring allies to pay more toward the costs of running NATO.

Less than 48 hours later — after he was put on the defensive in front of the cameras and then was the subject of gossip at a private reception of world leaders, a moment caught in a viral video — Mr. Trump canceled a planned news conference before heading back to Washington earlier than planned.

The timing was not perfect. Mr. Trump had hoped the 70th anniversary celebration of NATO might provide a flattering stage and a triumphant narrative, even as Democrats on Capitol Hill on Wednesday trotted out sober legal scholars to testify at the House Judiciary Committee’s first public impeachment hearing…

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Wednesday Morning Open Thread: Another Day of Ugliness

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I haven’t been able to watch all the way through this, but from what I have it’s a good, if crowded, recap:

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Late Night NATO Open Thread: They’re Not Laughing *With* Him, They’re Laughing *At* Him

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It’d be funnier, if not for the war crimes part…

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