I didn’t watch Biden’s speech last night. I hardly ever watch presidential speeches, especially the State of the Union. If they’re brief and of the breaking-news variety, like Obama announcing the death of bin Laden, sure. But stuff like last night, I read the transcript. And I found little that was specifically objectionable in there, although I admit I was surprised, and not in a bad way, that he mentioned Trump by name.
High time, though.
Of course, the MAGAs are flipping out over this, but I have a feeling we’re well into the “find out” phase of their fucking around, so you can’t say it wasn’t coming.
I managed to be out most of today, and came home to discover sanding is well underway. The noise, oh the noise, so I’ll keep this short. Also, the weekend awaits, and we all want to get that underway.
Just one piece of bloggage, really:
This woman, endorsed by Trump, is the GOP nominee for secretary of state. Shudder.
Have a great weekend. Swim, picnic, have a blast.
Deborah said on September 2, 2022 at 5:38 pm
Tonight is the weird traditional burning of Zozobra here in Santa Fe. It’s when they burn this giant puppet effigy of gloom and doom stuffed with peoples’ written statements of misery and bad experiences over the year. We stay as far away from the event as possible. Thousands of people go and there’s always mayhem and bad behavior accompanying it. They play moaning and groaning over a loudspeaker while the effigy burns which we can hear from our place.
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Jenine said on September 2, 2022 at 5:41 pm
Glad to hear the sanding started.
Our oldest daughter is home for the long weekend and we’re delighted. She’s been in Europe most of the summer – started with a study abroad course in Barcelona – and has lots of stories to tell.
Enjoy your holiday weekend!
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Jeff Borden said on September 2, 2022 at 6:29 pm
I don’t care about the MAGAts. They’re irredeemable. They will continue to make this nation miserable. . .stymie progress. . .embrace ignorance. . .and nurture their own private hells of hate, anger, envy, resentment and bigotry. Fuck them and fuck their politicians. I’m just sick of them.
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Colleen said on September 2, 2022 at 8:00 pm
Jeff, I concur. So what if the President says mean things about them? They deserve it. They’re reprehensible.
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Sherri said on September 2, 2022 at 8:45 pm
Let’s review. The former president and his party still refuse to acknowledge the legitimacy of the last election, staged an insurrection, and don’t accept any election in which they aren’t the winner. The largest city in Mississippi has no drinking water. The life expectancy in the US has dropped below China.
But yes, what matters is did the president say means things about some people with uniformed Marines behind him.
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Deborah said on September 2, 2022 at 9:07 pm
Holy cow I just read that this is the 98th year of the burning of Zozobra, we can hear the crappy music they’re playing for the event from our place now, the burning starts at 9:10 pm mountain time, so 2 hours more of crappy music. I think if we cared we could go up the stairs to the 2nd floor portale of our building and watch it burn later but we don’t care.
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Jeff Borden said on September 2, 2022 at 9:26 pm
If you see any of the weasels whining about Marines in the background for Biden’s speech, show them the fucking footage of W. arriving in a Navy jet aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln. Shortly thereafter, before the entire assembled crew and a banner reading “Mission Accomplished, ” he strutted like a rooster on the deck of a naval vessel held 35 miles off the coast of San Diego for the express purpose of fluffing his manhood.
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FDChief said on September 2, 2022 at 10:28 pm
The United States has a massive, indigestible minority – something between a quarter and two-fifths of the country – that want caudillo-style dictatorship if the alternative is not getting all the guns, Jesus, tax cuts, and ability to call people they don’t like rude names they want.
They’re not going to change. Nothing that we’ve seen proving the unparalleled shittiness of Republican “policy” (such as it is other than “whatever Donald Trump wants me to suck…”) or the hammering that Republican governance will give anyone not in a two-yacht family will persuade them to back anyone other than the reddest of red-meat Bircher Trumpkins.
The institutions and political structures that empower these hayshaking fucksticks mean that they can rule the rest of us unless the other three-fifths of the country 1) gets off their collective dead ass and 2) votes against every one of these C.H.U.D.s…and this is a country where barely two-thirds of the eligible population bothers to even show up in the most important elections.
They have a gajillion reasons, from ignorance to indifference to actual “reasons” (my personal favorite being libertarians, who seem to think that the opposite of “government regulation” is “freedom” and not “rule of the most rapacious and powerful wealthy individuals and groups”) but the overall effect is, again, to put these well-funded, rabidly active, right-wing nuts in power.
I have no idea what the hell you do about this.
It’s not like the danger is hard to see. It’s right fucking there, the iceberg not on a cold dark night but in broad daylight, visible for miles ahead. And yet the fucking U.S.S. Titanic seems determined to ram the goddamn thing, maybe just to see if letting these gomers put a massive hole in the Republic’s hull will fucking sink it.
Maybe just for shits and giggles.
Either way?
Pretty soon we’re going to have to decide, those of us non-wingnut, whether to bend the knee to these fuckers, or fight.
The only question is how willing those of us are to die on our feet.
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Jeff Gill said on September 3, 2022 at 8:00 am
Watch the desert noir “Ride the Pink Horse” and you get a good black & white sense of the Zozobra fiesta without the bad behavior up in your face; filmed in many segments on the streets & in the historic buildings of Santa Fe.
In my area, the student loan forgiveness has really roiled a big chunk of the community even here in our more Biden-leaning enclave let alone around the county. The annual first faculty meeting which is just an “introduce the new blood” and outside stand-up meal event was last night, and I was surprised by how many profs, even ones I don’t know well, were coming up to me to say something appreciative about my social media posts about college costs, loan policy, and where the program is more targeted than the partisan rhetoric would indicate. I smiled grimly to each and invited them in each case to join the battle, because if we don’t speak up for higher ed, who will? And then ended up in a long conversation with a fellow faculty spouse who just ended 12 years on the school board, about our mutual concerns for public education in general.
The good part was it kept me from eating too much, I guess.
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Deborah said on September 3, 2022 at 9:40 am
This shows how weird looking and gigantic the Zozobra effigy was last night https://www.santafenewmexican.com/news/local_news/zozobra-burns-90s-style/article_142bcf8e-27bf-11ed-9540-f30119a68e17.html
I fell asleep before it all happened so I didn’t hear the moaning and groaning.
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Julie Robinson said on September 3, 2022 at 5:28 pm
Today is $3 movie day and our daughter’s birthday, so we’d thought we’d celebrate the two together. Elvis seemed to be the best of what’s showing right now. Meh. I thought Baz Luhrmann would have a fresh take, but it’s just another biopic. The titles at the beginning and end are more interesting than the movie. Here’s hoping the angel food cake will be better!
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Little Bird said on September 3, 2022 at 5:48 pm
This year’s attendance at Zozobra is estimated to have been 71,000 strong. Considering that our population is estimated at 84,418 people…..
It’s truly something that people from around the world come to attend. Now given that I could hear the individual lyrics of various songs played over the sound system from my patio (about two miles away) I can only shudder to think how loud it was actually on location.
And while he’s burning it sounds a mammoth being tortured.
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Jim said on September 3, 2022 at 6:03 pm
Can you see him burn from outside the park?
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Jerrie in MidMd said on September 3, 2022 at 6:03 pm
The Editorial Board of the WaPo called Biden’s speech a “missed opportunity” and advised “You don’t persuade people by scolding or demeaning them, but that’s how the president’s speech landed for many conservatives of good will.” 99% of the comments are better reasoned than the editorial. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/02/biden-philadelphia-speech-democracy-midterms/
The WaPo hasn’t been warm to Biden but seems to be lurching to the right under Sally Buzbee. I was unaware of any money issues there until a long-time commenter posted a link to a New York Times article on 8/30 pointing out that the company is on pace to lose money this year with digital revenue flat.
Yes, I’ll gladly pay to read what Nancy writes.
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David C said on September 3, 2022 at 7:47 pm
I’m not surprised WaPo is giving Joe the shit. Joe is OK with the workers at Bezo’s side hustle unionizing. Can’t have that, can we?
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Sherri said on September 3, 2022 at 8:56 pm
“Conservatives of good will.”
Very important to placate that imaginary group.
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jcburns said on September 3, 2022 at 9:49 pm
Sherri: Heh, heh, heh.
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Deborah said on September 3, 2022 at 11:47 pm
I’ve decided not to renew my WaPo subscription, I find I don’t read it enough to warrant paying that much for it. I read the New York Times daily so I’m keeping that. So far I only subscribe to the NYT, the New Yorker, The Atlantic and the NY Review of Books. I only get the NYT and still the WaPo for now digitally. Actually the best place I get the news from is Heather Cox Richardson’s newsletter. I get Emily Nunn’s Department of Salad newsletter for food stuff. And I follow people on Twitter. I read LOTS of Twitter, too much.
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Deborah said on September 3, 2022 at 11:53 pm
Jim, to answer your question, yes you can see Zozobra outside of the park, most likely from the mountains nearby. The people who live upstairs from us can see the glow of the fire but not actual flames, a bit of topography in the way.
I had no idea that the event was that popular until LB told me those numbers today. It seems to have grown in the 10 years we’ve been here. I still don’t want to go though.
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Peter said on September 4, 2022 at 11:28 am
The linked article had a comment that hit the nail on the head: ” She said “Fuck it, I’ll kill us all”? Isn’t that the Republican Party platform?”
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FDChief said on September 4, 2022 at 2:41 pm
“Conservatives of good will”?
Assumes facts not in evidence.
There may – may – have been “conservatives of good will” somewhere in the vicinity of the GOP back in the Fifties when the plutocrats who run that taphouse ran the Birchers underground because their weird fixations on polio monkey serums and the like were scaring the normies.
Then the party nominated Goldwater.
Then Nixon.
Then Reagan.
And after Reagan came Gingrich and the lunatics and their monkey serums began the takeover of the joint.
The last three “conservatves of good will” meet every Wednesday at the Nixon Library to bemoan that there’s no energy left in their party to unleash Chang Kai Shek.
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