First, just a bit of housekeeping: For the remainder of the summer, I’m taking the blog down to a M/W/F schedule. I realize it’s been erratic for a while, pretty much a four-times-a-week thing unless it’s three times a week, so why not just do it? Three times a week it is, through Labor Day. Perhaps beyond, if the quality picks up, which I hope it does.
I dunno what’s behind this, except that I’m tired, and feel like there’s a new direction to take this thing, but I’m not sure what it is, yet. It’s not shutting down, it’s just slowing down. After all, I never promised to blog Every Goddamn Day, only most goddamn days.
Not shutting down, nosirree. Rest easy. We’ll just have some longer comment threads.
So. Today the indispensable David Fahrenthold dropped this lovely item into the mix: At at least four different Trump golf clubs, there’s a framed Time magazine cover on the wall. With Trump out front, of course. And it’s fake. Of course.
There was no March 1, 2009, issue of Time magazine. And there was no issue at all in 2009 that had Trump on the cover.
In fact, the cover on display at Trump’s clubs, observed recently by a reporter visiting one of the properties, contains several small but telling mistakes. Its red border is skinnier than that of a genuine Time cover, and, unlike the real thing, there is no thin white border next to the red. The Trump cover’s secondary headlines are stacked on the right side — on a real Time cover, they would go across the top.
And it has two exclamation points. Time headlines don’t yell.
“I can confirm that this is not a real TIME cover,” Kerri Chyka, a spokeswoman for Time Inc., wrote in an email to The Washington Post.
I don’t know what to think anymore. The country is caught in some sort of horrible vortex. Why aren’t we running down the middle of the street, screaming?
If I’d been to Seth Mnuchin’s wedding, I’d sure be doing that.
Wellness: Such a goddamn scam. Thanks, Gwyneth:
When Gwyneth Paltrow first launched Goop in 2008, it was a great place to find out where to eat the best tapas in Barcelona. It was straight-up celebrity-lifestyle voyeurism, and Paltrow, with her long blonde hair and aura of complete self-satisfaction, was irresistible. There’s the expression “living your best life,” and then there is Paltrow: best life manifest.
But then Goop’s focus started to shift. Paltrow began to describe in detail her exercise regimen with her trainer Tracy Anderson, who believes one should work out two hours a day, six days a week. Then she began providing information on a cleanse she does each January. The mission became less about revealing the trappings of the good life and more about the notion that the really good life is internal. Rich and beautiful people don’t just go to nicer places, their organs work better. They even know how to breathe better, with more oxygen per ounce. They’re not afraid to try fecal transplants, with really top-notch, vegan-only feces. Goop became less about hotels and restaurants and more about chakras and thyroids, with the implication that maybe what’s actually standing between you and your inner Gwyneth is some mysterious virus that your overextended, pharmaceutically corrupt doctor is too narrow-minded to address.
If you spend even a minute of your day thinking, “Should I get a fecal transplant?” and you’re not in the hospital with C.diff, you need more things to worry about. Maybe the wrong fecal transplant will give them to you.
See you Friday.
Suzanne said on June 27, 2017 at 10:25 pm
So, I am just checking this before bed and read recal transplant.
Oh my. We are in some vortex. I don’t like it. I want to get out.
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Dave said on June 27, 2017 at 10:33 pm
There are three previous marriages between the newlyweds, I read on another site. Pence, who is so worried about same sex marriages, must not have concerned himself much about that.
Three times a week is better than no times a week.
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Judybusy said on June 27, 2017 at 10:45 pm
Just got back from Lisa Fischer and Grand Baton. Bought tix for tomorrow’s show at 9 pm. Cause I have a NAACP meeting first.
3 times per week is just fine. We all can carry one.
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Sherri said on June 27, 2017 at 10:49 pm
Are we sure Louise Linton is a real person? She looks like she falls into the uncanny valley of bad animation. And can you imagine being Karen Pence, constantly having to be photographed next to people like that and Melania? I’m certainly no fan of hers, but damn, that’s got to be hard on the ego and self-image.
Do what you need to do, Nancy. I just appreciate the place to hang out.
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Rana said on June 27, 2017 at 11:22 pm
The whole GOOP thing is sort of weirdly fascinating to me. There was a recent piece on it and one of the things that stuck with me was that it was an extreme manifestation of the “take care of yourself so you can take care of others” advice aimed at (white) women/mothers of a certain age…. only without the “care of others” part of it.
And I think it’s also of a piece of the same sort of attempt to find some place to exert control in a context where women feel disempowered. (Like bulimia, or anorexia, or anti-vax, or obsession with feeding your kids only organic, no-sugar foods.) Be pretty, be skinny, be a Perfect Mom (not mother, heaven forfend), be a girlboss (not a boss)… if it means sticking a jade egg up your wahoo and drinking kale juice, so be it.
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alex said on June 27, 2017 at 11:27 pm
Three times a week… I can think of a lot of things that don’t happen that often anymore. You should re-Christen NN.C the better-than-sex blog.
Wedding Barbie sure does make Mother Pence look like a ragamuffin, eh? She also makes her husband look like a man who wouldn’t get any poony if he didn’t pay for it. Oh, duh.
And I’m out of free visits to the WaPo so didn’t get to feast my eyes on Mr. Fake News and his cover story. Googled where I could see it elsewhere and found out that Time wants him to cease and desist.
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Jeff Borden said on June 27, 2017 at 11:35 pm
Well, I’m still on my first marriage and, man, did I hit the lottery
Today was my wife’s birthday. We celebrated it the bedside of one of her dearest friends, who is wasting away from cancer after an 20-month battle that included the removal of her entire stomach. About 10 days ago, our friend went into surgery to remove a blockage, but after 10 minutes, the surgeon emerged from the O.R. to report that the cancer had spread throughout her torso and there was no hope of a successful outcome. We learned of this last Friday morning through a Facebook note, while we were visiting good friends in southwestern Ohio. Johanna asked that her birthday gift be some time with her friend while she is still among us. We drove back to Chicago on Friday and flew to West Palm Beach, Florida on Saturday. Her selflessness moves me to tears. She has been in the hospital room for 8 to 10 hours per day with her dear friend, holding her hand, whispering encouragements, wiping her brow with a cool cloth, recalling old stories of their days at the University of Florida. The nurses believed she must be one of her friend’s sisters.
Dear god, what did I ever do to deserve her?
There is no greater calling than being a true and loving and giving friend to another person. We are both filled with grief at a life that is ebbing away much too soon. Ingrid is only 68. But I have never been prouder or closer to Johanna than I am now.
Life is so very short. And, often, so very cruel. My wife reminds me of the role we all can play in lifting up others. I aspire to be like her.
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Rana said on June 27, 2017 at 11:38 pm
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/jun/14/gwyneth-glows-like-a-radioactive-swan-my-day-at-the-goop-festival
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Rana said on June 27, 2017 at 11:40 pm
Oh, man, Jeff. What a story. And what a woman your wife is.
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Jeff Borden said on June 27, 2017 at 11:56 pm
Rana, I have no words. Anyone who knew me in Columbus knows I was a complete idiot with women. Actually, that is an understatement. I was a dickhead. How I ever came to be worthy of her is a mystery, but man, I am lucky and I know it.
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Julie Robinson said on June 28, 2017 at 12:38 am
Jeff, the evidence would suggest you do deserve her. As I read it, you cut short your trip and not only encouraged her to go, but went along with her. And when it’s over you’ll help her to pick up the pieces.
And damn Gwyneth Paltrow for promoting a quack who says you get physically sick because you’re emotionally sick. She needs to go visit your friend and face the reality of cancer.
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alex said on June 28, 2017 at 6:13 am
Gwyneth can suck an egg.
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David C. said on June 28, 2017 at 6:35 am
Mrs. Mnuchin looks like a heroin addict. Eat girl, eat.
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Suzanne said on June 28, 2017 at 7:02 am
For all his talk about being a Christain first and foremost, VP My Pants sure does seem to enjoy the company of rich white trash. You’d think as a good Christian, he’d refuse to participate in the wedding #3 of billionaire Ken & a woman trying to transition from Skipper to Barbie, but no. (If they were gay, however, and he was asked to provide dessert, that would be a different story, but you all know that)
Gwyneth Paltrow is a flake, but she is not alone. I took a fitness class for while from a woman who was all about God & fitness. She did fine with the exercise stuff but most of her nutritional notions came from Dr Axe, the Internet chripractor who dispenses nutritional information with a sales pitch for his overpriced supplements. one of the women from our church also teaches a fitness class that I attended a few times. Even whackier information (we have to keep our bodies fit & healthy so that God can use us to do his work. I guess he can’t use fat or sick people) Put coconut oil in and on everything. Essential oils are huge for curing everything from migraines to gastrointestinal issues to acne to insomnia. Sold by Dr Axe or through some multi-level marketing scheme. Talk to a real nutritionist with a degree in nutrition? They never seem to.
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Deborah said on June 28, 2017 at 8:35 am
Jeff B, your comments brought me to tears. I hope you and your wife find peace as her friend slips away.
It’s 6:30am in Abiquiu, I have the doors open to bring the cool air in (it’s 59) and a hummingbird flew in buzzed around a bit and flew back out. My husband flies back to Chicago either tomorrow or Friday to deal with the new situation with uncle J. He comes back on the 4th.
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4dbirds said on June 28, 2017 at 8:39 am
The bride is 36? She looks like a bland pretty blonde of porn actress. I’m sure she loves him very much.
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coozledad said on June 28, 2017 at 9:05 am
Poor whites are collateral damage in the Republican war on desegregation. From their efforts to undermine women’s health initiatives with the complete bullshit which is the “prolife” scam, to the move to gut federal healthcare programs, the Republicans are leaving the spoor of 1950’s radical southern politics on everything they touch.
Since Medicare’s universal coverage of elderly people brought federal funds to about every hospital in America, it also bound them by Title VI’s nondiscrimination clauses, which essentially ended segregation in those hospitals—some of the last public arenas in which Jim Crow legally held sway. Medicare was the final federal legal blow for de jure segregation, and without it, there would still be few legal mechanisms to force hospitals to integrate. It’s hard to overstate how much Medicare and Medicaid themselves did to end formal segregation.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/the-fight-for-health-care-is-really-all-about-civil-rights/531855/
McConnell is a revanchist who’s being bankrolled to decouple the government from civil rights protections. The primary driving force behind the entire party is ultimately white nationalism. The AHCA represents a dismantling of the idea of equality before the law, another open insult to minorities, and a way to force poor whites to revisit their status within a feudal white power state.
You’ve got to be a dumbass and a racist in equal parts to be a Republican.
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LAMary said on June 28, 2017 at 9:11 am
I am in fact running down the street screaming. Not at this moment, but it happens.
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Jeff Borden said on June 28, 2017 at 9:25 am
On a lighter note, Caribou Barbie says she will sue the New York Times for defamation of character for reminding readers in the wake of the Alexandria shootings of GOP politicians that she had targeted Gabby Giffords for defeat in mailers that placed a gunsight over her a few years back. Remember the meltdowns she had back then, declaring these stories were “blood libel?” It shouldn’t take much work by the Times’ legal team to prove $arah Palin has no character.
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coozledad said on June 28, 2017 at 10:20 am
This is what happens when you rip up the postwar consensus.
http://thehill.com/policy/international/339800-commerce-secretary-wilbur-ross-video-address-cut-off-in-berlin
Trump and his Confederates have ruined the US brand. It will not be repaired in our lifetimes.
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Mark P said on June 28, 2017 at 11:04 am
Cooz, I’m afraid you’re right about not being able to repair the image of the US in our lifetimes. Trust is hard to win, easy to lose, and very hard to win back. In fact, I’m not sure it can ever be won back to the same level as prior to losing it.
Many of the people in the US and virtually every politician who call themselves Christians do not follow the actual teachings of Jesus in the New Testament. You know, things like do unto others as you would have them do unto you, don’t judge people, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, take care of the sick. It’s so far beyond that I don’t think they would even understand your point if you called them on it. I know some Christians who try to live according to those teachings, but I’m pretty sure most of them don’t vote Republican.
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Charlotte said on June 28, 2017 at 11:20 am
Well Jeff you’ve got me in tears this morning (and grateful once again to live in a state where your doctor can legally help you over that last hump if you want).
My holiday project is to see if I can find folks to dress up as the Grim Reaper and follow GOP reps around at 4th of July parades. I have visions of guerrilla theater with little kids doing die ins and “old ladies” being dumped out of wheelchairs in front of these dickheads. And here in MT, if I can find some bear costumes — perhaps a couple of dead, de-listed grizzly bears as well.
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coozledad said on June 28, 2017 at 11:21 am
Take a look at Sarah Sanders lying her ass off yesterday. There’s a whole school of evangelicals who encourage the “Lying for Jesus” mindset. It’s the public copulation of witch theology Protestantism and Leninism, and it’s straight from the Putinista playbook.
They’ll kill journalists and dissenters, and they won’t bat a fucking eye. Get an gander of that clip and tell me that kind of attitude can be linked to the kind of critical thinking that stands in the way of murders judicial or extrajudicial.
These people remind me of the judge who condemned Sophie Scholl to death. God and the allies toppled a courthouse on that son of a bitch.
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Bitter Scribe said on June 28, 2017 at 11:42 am
I don’t know what a fecal transplant is. I don’t want to know. I want to go to my grave not knowing.
Apparently Mnuchin’s new bride wrote a “memoir” of her life in Africa that turned out to be highly fictionalized. I’ll never understand why people like that don’t just change the name of the main character and call what they’re writing a novel.
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Jakash said on June 28, 2017 at 12:43 pm
If one is inclined to click on the link to everygoddamnday in Nancy’s post, today’s Steinberg column is excellent: “Ignoring one baby is immoral, ignoring millions is policy.”
Here’s the direct link:
http://chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/ignoring-one-baby-is-immoral-ignoring-1-million-babies-is-policy/amp/?
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alex said on June 28, 2017 at 1:18 pm
Freedom! Woot! Woot!
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Jolene said on June 28, 2017 at 1:59 pm
We don’t have to wonder how Trump has affected our international reputation. Pew brings us new data, and it’s not good.
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Sherri said on June 28, 2017 at 2:24 pm
McSweeney’s nails it, again: https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/i-only-protested-the-affordable-care-act-because-the-president-was-black-please-dont-take-away-my-health-insurance
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coozledad said on June 28, 2017 at 2:37 pm
I wish people would start renting large vehicles to drive into Confederate monuments.
They’re monuments to dumbfucks like the current Republicans. “I do so love a man who would impoverish my family and plant cotton while his racist enablers die of starvation shits!”
Nation of dumbfucks. The KKK disease spread like wildfire through it in the 1920’s, and it’s condemned the whole fucking country to ruin.
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Connie said on June 28, 2017 at 2:46 pm
http://www.dogphotographeroftheyear.org.uk/2016-Winners-Gallery
Best dog pictures ever. Click on the pics to see them all.
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brian stouder said on June 28, 2017 at 3:38 pm
Cooz @ 29 – Amen.
I’ve told the story before, but years ago I was utterly amazed – amazed!! when the young folks and I stopped through to visit the site of the Confederate-run POW camp at Andersonville.
It is a genuinely moving national historic site, and the Park Service has a tremendous visitor center there, dedicated to American service members who became POWs in all our wars, as well as a national military cemetery, where modern-era deceased service members are still being interred …a unifying thing at a genuinely awful site.
And then….(!!!) we rolled into the little town of Andersonville, Georgia, itself.
Right smack-dab in the center of the little town was a towering monument/heroic statue dedicated to the memory of the “mis-understood” Henry Wirz (his given name was Heinrich Hartmann Wirz, fyi), war-time commander of the prison camp, and one of the very few Confederate commanders arrested, tried, and executed after the war.
As I stood there (with my mouth somewhat agape) another fellow (from Iowa, if memory serves) walked up. He & his wife parked their RV, and he was similarly amazed at the thing…and we had a pleasant – if hushed! – conversation about the oddity of the thing….and then I noticed that our (then fairly young) son had wandered off.
It was becoming dusk, and would soon be dark, and I actually hesitated to call out his name in that town (his name is Grant!!), and for a second there – real fear struck me.
But there he was, a few hundred yards away, and we loaded back up and rolled on down the road.
It didn’t take much insight on my part to realize just what it would feel like to be black (for example), and visit that town
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coozledad said on June 28, 2017 at 4:27 pm
https://medium.com/@kendralubalin/troubled-wisconsin-man-goes-on-50-state-killing-spree-f0c82c45201
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Icarus said on June 28, 2017 at 5:05 pm
“I’m taking the blog down to a M/W/F schedule”
Whatever you have to do, your site your rules. Hope it’s something you could automate so its even less work for you. But please tell us…
1) what did you think of Wonder Woman
2) how late did that party in the corner go on?
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Sherri said on June 28, 2017 at 7:58 pm
Mitch McConnell is a fucking piece of shit.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_breakfast_table/features/2017/supreme_court_june_2017/neil_gorsuch_is_everything_liberals_feared_and_more.html
https://twitter.com/JamesFallows/status/880117688244224001
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coozledad said on June 28, 2017 at 8:11 pm
Sherri: The Republicans have engineered the failure of the American hegemony to pursue a centuries old racist agenda.
They are traitor filth, and it is time many of us must die to stop them.
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coozledad said on June 28, 2017 at 8:32 pm
A shadow state of utter shit. Up against the fucking wall:
https://twitter.com/commiegirl1/status/880193734037700608
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coozledad said on June 29, 2017 at 9:38 am
Check out Nazi whore Dana Loesch’s ad for the NRA on Facebook. It’s pure Goebbels.
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coozledad said on June 29, 2017 at 9:44 am
Here it is. These people should be stripped of their citizenship and kicked out of the country. Everyone associated with this ad should be targeted for expulsion.
https://twitter.com/resnikoff/status/880419419935125504
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Suzanne said on June 29, 2017 at 10:22 am
I saw that ad on tv or somewhere recently & thought “What the heck is this crap??”
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susan said on June 29, 2017 at 10:28 am
cooz, holy shit, they are not holding back one bit. I can’t think of another ad that clenched-jawed and violent-spewing and out there. Them and us. Us and them. She needs a target right on her fucking forehead, in line with her vitriol. Holy shit.
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coozledad said on June 29, 2017 at 10:28 am
It’s straight up Nazism. It’s a metastasis that has eaten the soul of every goddamn Republican. These people have outstripped the ordinary parameters of human sympathy. They’re undeserving of any accommodation in this country. They need to be driven out.
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Sherri said on June 29, 2017 at 11:40 am
Advice that is applicable far beyond the topic in the article: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/5952753ae4b0326c0a8d0b73
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Jakash said on June 29, 2017 at 11:40 am
Imagine — if these horrible protesters she’s so concerned about were the ones insisting that everybody should be carrying guns in their purses, this bullshit attitude might actually make a shred of sense. But the idea that liberal folks have had to be suckered into protesting by Hollywood, that award shows “make” people march is uh, kinda out there, to say the least. Who’s the guy holding campaign rallies to egg his minions on, months after being sworn in, anyway? Oh, right. “You’re the puppets! You’re the puppets!” ; )
“to fight this violence of lies with the clenched fist of truth” I just don’t know what can be done about the fact that people can look at what’s going on in this country and conclude that the president who lies more than any national candidate in history needs to be defended from people who calmly note that he’s lying. One doesn’t even need to follow the evil and hated librul media to realize that — it’s uncanny the extent to which there’s so often a previous tweet from ole Rumpy’s own hands to contradict whatever his newest one is.
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brian stouder said on June 29, 2017 at 11:46 am
Speaking of (the) uncanny…extent to which there’s so often a previous tweet from ole Rumpy’s own hands to contradict whatever his newest one is. –
there’s this fresh batch of gobbled-gook:
http://money.cnn.com/2017/06/29/media/mika-brzezinski-donald-trump-tweet/index.html
Honestly – truly, this becoming more frightening by the day. We have a genuinely, dangerously unhinged person at the head of the Executive branch of the United States government
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brian stouder said on June 29, 2017 at 11:56 am
(the guy has a genuine, frightening amount of hostility toward women)
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Sherri said on June 29, 2017 at 12:37 pm
Um, yeah, Brian. That was well established long ago. Not to be sarcastic, but there were plenty of women here screaming that for months and months.
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Scout said on June 29, 2017 at 12:54 pm
The Mika B tweets are astonishing. NOTHING ABOUT THIS IS NORMAL.
Combined with this: “Some seasoned senators, however, saw a president unable to grasp policy details or the obstacles ahead, and talked with each other after the gathering about what they saw as a bizarre scene.”
Key words: ‘UNABLE TO GRASP POLICY DETAILS’
This is what freaks me out on a daily basis. Maybe I should be more grateful that the president* isn’t evil AND competent, but damn.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/how-the-push-for-a-senate-health-care-vote-fell-apart-amid-gop-tensions/2017/06/28/8cdf528e-5c18-11e7-9fc6-c7ef4bc58d13_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_healthtock-9pm-1%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.ae460ed525b5
I just hope the president’s* keepers are never successful at taking away Twitter because it is going to be morbidly fascinating for future historians.
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Deborah said on June 29, 2017 at 12:55 pm
It never ceases to amaze me that the man writing those vile tweets is the president of the United States of America. Thanks Joe.
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Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on June 29, 2017 at 1:45 pm
At least I know my hand is a full inch longer than Trumps.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/how-small-are-trumps-hands-916593
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brian stouder said on June 29, 2017 at 2:08 pm
Well, not to go off half-cocked – I nominate Jeff for Thread Win (even taking into account our new, longer[!] threads)
I’m still chuckling over that article (even though I only surpassed the Donald by 3/4″)
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Heather said on June 29, 2017 at 2:11 pm
Raise your hand if you knew Trump was unhinged way before the election.
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Suzanne said on June 29, 2017 at 2:24 pm
Hand raised.
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Sherri said on June 29, 2017 at 2:37 pm
My (smaller than trump’s) hand* raised.
*Of course, I am a woman, only 5’5″, and I will freely admit that I have short fingers. I always had to stretch to reach an octave when I was playing piano.
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Scout said on June 29, 2017 at 2:47 pm
I have tiny childlike hands. Unlike the president* I can acknowledge this. One of my tiny hands is raised while I type this with the other. My co-worker is looking at me strangely.
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4dbirds said on June 29, 2017 at 2:53 pm
Deborah, I had a good laugh at the “Thanks Joe”. This is why I feel nothing but contempt when he posts.
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4dbirds said on June 29, 2017 at 2:55 pm
Hand raised. Plus a big loud “I told you so”!
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brian stouder said on June 29, 2017 at 2:59 pm
You know – honestly and truly – I really didn’t have a ‘yugely’ negative opinion of the guy, a year (or two) ago.
I’d seen his TV show years ago, so there was that…and then – the campaign shifted from somewhat entertaining, to “this is really happening?” – to election night.
I mean, wow.
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Heather said on June 29, 2017 at 3:04 pm
Brian, you thought the campaign was entertaining, even when he became the Republican front-runner? Because I was fucking terrified. Still am. So are a lot of women, people of color, Muslims, and immigrants.
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brian stouder said on June 29, 2017 at 3:27 pm
Heather – honestly and truly – I never thought HRC would lose to him.
The fact that she won the popular vote by 3,000,000 (and probably more, once we account for the Russkies) is mighty cold comfort.
Another thing I really didn’t see coming was how poorly the Republican/conservative/Fox News folks win.
Even if one grants all sorts of exceptions and ‘on the one hand/on the other hand’ mealy-mouthed crap, still –
our ascendant(!!) political culture has no idea how to act, once they win the responsibilities of governing.
There’s no “there” there; all they know to do is whine and complain and play-the-victim.
As much as they detested Hillary (and never mind how much they detested all-things-Obama) – they clearly seem as surprised as me that they won the office (or caught the car) – and they’ve no idea what to actually do, going forward
(by way of saying – I didn’t see this coming, but neither did they, apparently!)
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brian stouder said on June 29, 2017 at 3:31 pm
…oh, and Heather – in all sincerity (no snark/no sarcasm) I am a white male, and my obliviousness and cavalier political assumptions certainly do spring from there.
I didn’t ‘feel the burn’ (or the Bern), and blithely took things for granted, probably because the stakes were (seemingly) a bit lower for me, personally
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Heather said on June 29, 2017 at 3:33 pm
I remember the proprietress several years ago expressing surprise at the reaction of the right to Obama’s victory–something about how she expected grumbling and foot-dragging, but not a years-long all-out tantrum. At this point I am not surprised by anything they try to pull.
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Heather said on June 29, 2017 at 3:34 pm
And Brian, I appreciate your honesty and self-reflection. As a relatively well-off white woman, I have definitely been made aware of my own obliviousness about many things.
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Sherri said on June 29, 2017 at 3:47 pm
Brian, with all due respect, I have specifically told you multiple times over the last year that trump was an utter disaster. Perhaps you thought I was merely hysterical, but maybe next time, you’ll listen to me, and Heather, and Scout, and Nancy, and the other women here who have been talking about this here in this very forum for a long time. If you’ve been oblivious, it’s because you weren’t listening to people talking to you directly.
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Heather said on June 29, 2017 at 3:50 pm
And this is why the GOP doesn’t seem concerned about the 2018 elections. Imagine combining this with Russian infiltration of our voting machines. https://twitter.com/_cingraham/status/880483686289817600
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LAMary said on June 29, 2017 at 4:01 pm
I lived in NYC when he was in the late Ivana period. He’s been horrible for his entire adult life. I remember him being interviewed on the Today Show when he was pretty young, and he was bragging about rehabbing the Wollman Rink faster and for less than the city of New York could do it. He was an asshole then and he still is.
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Judybusy said on June 29, 2017 at 4:01 pm
You know that Facebook “On this Day” feature? Last week, a post of mine from 2013 popped up pointing out Trump’s racist BS with the birther crapola. I always thought he was an ass. I am still stunned every time I hear President Trump. And as others have pointed out, who knows where the Russia investigation will head.
On a much happier note, it’s my birthday! We’re going out for sushi. My wife gave me my present this morning, a new, cute watering can. It went like this:
Me: “Oh, it’s a watering can…? I already have one.”
The Best Wife Ever: “Yes, you do. It’s held together with duct tape, it leaks, and it smells.”
Me: “This is adorable! I never would have bought a new watering can, much less one that’s so decorative. I love it when you get me presents I didn’t even know I wanted.”
It really is a great can, and I do love getting stuff like this.
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Jakash said on June 29, 2017 at 4:05 pm
Honestly and truly, I have small hands. This has been quite bothersome — when playing basketball, throwing a football, trying to play the piano, e.g. Beyond that, I couldn’t care less. If I were a “billionaire” or president of the U. S., I gotta believe I’d laugh and try to be a role model for the small-handed community, saying something like “small hands can do big things,” rather than denying an obvious fact and being freaking defensive about it. It’s trite nonsense, of course, but Dolt 45’s petulant, childish response to the ridiculous hand-shaming says more about him than the size of his hands ever could.
As for knowing about him before the election, I’ve despised him for years… decades. The only things I ever “knew” about him was that he was rich and obnoxious. Gleefully telling people “You’re fired” on TV was supposed to have made me admire him? Please! I gotta admit, I have been surprised in the last year to learn how incompetent he actually is, though.
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brian stouder said on June 29, 2017 at 4:09 pm
Sherri – when you’re right, you’re right!
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Scout said on June 29, 2017 at 4:19 pm
This dovetails nicely with current events and there are quite a few of us who will resonate with it. http://lithub.com/why-do-we-love-to-read-about-missing-girls/
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Julie Robinson said on June 29, 2017 at 4:55 pm
My hand is almost exactly the same size as Trump’s, except his middle finger is longer. (Ha!) I’m 5’8″ and he’s 6’2″ according to Google. So objectively speaking he does have tiny hands. My hubby is the same height as me and has huge…hands. Size 13 feet too.
Rough start to our Orlando trip, five hour delay on our flight last night and the pool is green. Mama wants to swim! Taking a day trip to St. Augustine tomorrow, first time for everyone.
If you’re feeling discouraged, and why wouldn’t you, look up Elizabeth Warren on Samantha Bee’s show. She’s a tonic.
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Sherri said on June 29, 2017 at 5:24 pm
I promise this is the last time I’ll mention my award, but the physical award itself just arrived today. I held it of course at the banquet, but rather than having to take it and the framed certificate home on the plane, ACM shipped it to us. In the excitement of the evening of the banquet, I didn’t realize just what the award was. When the package arrived, I opened it to find this box inside. It’s a little hard to take a good picture of the award itself, but yes, it is crystal, not glass!
Finally, here is the framed certificate.
/end_bragging
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Dorothy said on June 29, 2017 at 5:27 pm
Waving all appendages wildly in response to the request above. If I’ve said it once I’ve said it a billion times: Trump is a dangerous blithering idiot and it frightens me beyond all reason that he is going to bring about very serious destruction to our country. I could go on and on but you all have already said it much better than I could. I won’t sleep well again until he is locked up, facing charges that will sufficiently rid us of him forever. Or he could just keel over and drop dead. I don’t care if it’s socially unacceptable to wish the death of someone. He has earned the derision I feel about him
Okay now that I got that off my chest, Happy Birthday Judybusy!! My father-in-law would’ve been 89 today. And today is my boss’s 50th wedding anniversary.
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Deborah said on June 29, 2017 at 5:36 pm
LB and I have the same size hands 7 1/4″, I’m 5′ 7″ (used to be 5′ 8 1/2 or 9″) LB is close to 5′ 6″. What was the Trump hand measurement?
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Dexter said on June 29, 2017 at 5:39 pm
Trump simply does not understand how Congress functions, how government works…he speaks in sweeping generalities of topics he has no idea of; he makes promises that are hot air only. And look at his buffer: he chose Mike Pence, a religious maniac and pie-in-the-sky charlatan as veep. This means if somehow Trump is deservedly run out of 1600 Penna Avenue, someone much worse moves in. In past years, mostly when Bush43 ran the show (sorta), I blogged for hours on end of my rage at the futility of the 2 wars. This time around, it seems enough people “get it” about this horrible administration that I don’t need to preach my views at all. But I RAGE alright…and my wife loves to rage right along with me.
Jeff Borden, I also have a compassionate wife, and this is both our second go-arounds. For example, every nickel she made working went to getting all three daughters through universities, and when her mother had a stroke at age 60, of all five children, only Carla Lee stepped up…her mother lived with us for 8 years until death…8 years of total dedication to her disabled mother, who needed much care, a real full-time job, with zero help from the other siblings.
Great weather here in NW Ohio…I mowed the grass, did the weeding and trimmed the “done for the year” rosebush.
On cable I watched “Army of One” w/ Nic Cage as a total doofus maniac obsessed to go to Pakistan to kill OBL. It truly is a LMAO film.
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Deborah said on June 29, 2017 at 5:39 pm
Happy Birthday Judy Busy! I’m into watering cans, what a great gift.
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coozledad said on June 29, 2017 at 6:49 pm
Coffin nail:
https://twitter.com/shaneharris/status/880536545601748999
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David C. said on June 29, 2017 at 7:04 pm
The neat thing about my job is that I get to play with anthropometric tables a lot. So now that tRumps hand length is confirmed at 7-1/4″, and I think I remember he’s 6’2″ tall, so I can tell you for height he is between 90th and 95th percentile of men. His hand length puts him at between 10th and 15th percentile. Those are some small hands. What’s that they say? Small hands, small mind. I think that’s it.
If you’re strange like me and like human factors, you’ll enjoy this.
http://www.dtic.mil/get-tr-doc/pdf?AD=ADA611869
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Joe K said on June 29, 2017 at 7:05 pm
Deborah,
Check out Nancy’s Facebook page today and read the bridge piece on Kalkaska Mich.
If you want to blame me fine, I’m a big boy but you ought to take a look in the mirror also, I really didn’t think Trump was the best choice for the Republicans by a long shot, but the people like yourself that instead of talking too us talked down too us is the reason you lost the election, there were just more people in the correct places that were so tired of your condisending,higher than thou,you can’t possible think I’m wrong attitude, that we all got together and said fuck it were voting for Trump just to Piss people like you off.
Pilot Joe
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Sherri said on June 29, 2017 at 7:14 pm
Naw, Joe, we didn’t make you do it. I thought Republicans were all about personal responsibility.
I don’t condescend to trump voters. I don’t think they’re stupid. I think they are bigots, because that’s the way they act and talk and I pay them the respect of assuming they mean what they say and do.
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Mark P said on June 29, 2017 at 7:15 pm
What a wonderful reason to damn so many people to suffer and destroy the country!
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Scout said on June 29, 2017 at 7:24 pm
Is is easier or harder to breathe without the nose you cut off to spite your face?
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Deborah said on June 29, 2017 at 7:26 pm
Uh huh, “we all got together and said fuck it were voting for Trump just to Piss people like you off.” great reason to elect a president. Well, you get what you pay for. Happy?
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Jakash said on June 29, 2017 at 8:08 pm
Finally, some truth-telling, at any rate. No economic anxiety there. What patriots!
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alex said on June 29, 2017 at 8:14 pm
How many web communities befriend their trolls and don’t ban them? And you accuse us of being intolerant? Whatevs.
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Colleen said on June 29, 2017 at 8:28 pm
I just didn’t think he would actually win. I didn’t think there were so many hate filled people out there. But there are. And I can’t figure out why so many so called Christians support him. What is admirable about the man? The way he cares about people? The way he conducts himself in public? His intellect? If you are still his supporter, why? What is there about him that makes you want to even remotely be associated with him?
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Heather said on June 29, 2017 at 8:59 pm
I’ve come to understand that for many people, the Trump brand of narcissism, bluster, and utter incompetence is normal. Think of the bully father figure holding forth at dinner, brooking no opposition. Every conversation has to revolve around his interests. Any attempt at resistance is met with ridicule, anger, or violence. People learn to accept it and devise their own strategies to survive, i.e., avoiding confrontation and internalization. If you don’t have anyone to talk to or anything to read to suggest that this behavior is damaging and your voice is important, you might not ever figure that out.
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Heather said on June 29, 2017 at 9:00 pm
Or, you know, you might be the bully father figure, so of course Trump is normal.
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Joe Kobiela said on June 29, 2017 at 10:16 pm
Seriously read the bridge article on Kalkaska Michigan.
Let me Know what you think. When Nancy and I had lunch together we never talked politics, we both knew where we stood so why bring it up. We had a nice time and I can’t wait to have the chance to do it again, hope she feels the same way.
Pilot Joe
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Jakash said on June 30, 2017 at 12:40 am
“When Nancy and I had lunch together we never talked politics, we both knew where we stood so why bring it up.”
Uh, gee, I think you’re pretty well aware that we (and Nancy) “talk politics” quite a bit on this blog. “Why bring it up,” at the present time, is because we have the most incompetent, narcissistic, dangerous president in modern times, thanks to voters such as yourself. Deborah, to whom your earlier comment was addressed, has concerns about this health care legislation in particular that make your flippant comment even more obnoxious than it would be otherwise, which is saying something.
Just to recap: June 26, 3:04: “And no I’m not trying to start a fight, or trolling, just trying to look at things a few different ways.”
June 29, 7:05: “we all got together and said fuck it were voting for Trump just to Piss people like you off.”
How could we ever think that you’d be trolling?
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susan said on June 30, 2017 at 9:30 am
cooz @76 – There don’t appear to be any nails around that will keep that coffin lid shut tight. REpublican zombi pustulence keeps oozing out the sides.
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brian stouder said on June 30, 2017 at 10:57 am
Sherri – that certificate is marvelous; a thing that will out-live you!
We’re soon to be off to Bloomington, to get our oldest daughter, and thence to see Pam’s folks in Cass County, and then (eventually) back to Bloomington to drop off the Freshman and continue southward to Pigeon Forge (amongst other stops).
We rented a new Nissan Rogue for the trip, and I like the thing, so there’s that, too
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