I know it isn’t funny, but I can’t stop laughing at that idiot Scott Adams, who fucked around and found out in recent days, and now finds himself dependent on other dumbshit racists like him to pay the bills. And his cash reserves, of course, of which I’m sure there are plenty.
Look for Dilbert T-shirts on the Proud Boys soon.
Gene Weingarten has the best take on it (so far), which spends a bit of time discussing why Adams is so, so goddamn dumb, but thinks of himself as a genius:
You are probably aware of the latest rant by Scott Adams, the creator of the pioneering workplace-related comic strip Dilbert. Adams, who has long been flirting with right-wing positions, sees himself as a rare genius — he once actually wrote that, anonymously, as a comment to a blog, as though it was an observation by someone else, and got caught. He also sees himself as a courageous provocateur and not a septic asshole, apparently on account of his doctor of geniusness degree. As you probably know, he finally went right over the top last week and did a face plant from 50 feet onto asphalt.
Citing a Rasmussen poll reporting that only 53 percent of Black people agreed with the statement “It’s okay to be White,” (roughly half of the rest were unsure, and the rest said “no.”) Adams concluded in a streaming video that Black people are a “hate group,” and that the best solution to this fact is that “White people get the hell away from Black people.” He also said Black people were at fault for “not focusing on education,” and added “I’m also really sick of seeing video after video of Black Americans beating up non-Black citizens.”
How dumb is Scott Adams? This dumb:
Rasmussen is generally regarded to be the most right-biased major pollster in the country. On its homepage right now are the following headlines, based on its recent inquiries: Conservative Viewers Are Better Informed About Important Topics; Not ‘Woke’ Yet? Most Voters Reject Anti-White Beliefs ; Local Impact of Illegal Immigration Mostly Bad, Voters Say; Fentanyl: Most Voters Rate Biden Low on Handling Problem. The only other question in the poll of whether it is okay to be White was: “Agree or disagree: Black people can be racist, too.” One can presume that Rasmussen does not exactly have its finger on the pulse of the Black community.
So why not take a stupid poll and make a stupid rant out of it, if it makes people pay attention to you? I get the feeling the stakes in a game like this, which is to say, one’s own YouTube show, is to start out saying something ridiculous and keep saying it, and escalate and escalate until, like a balloon, it pops. I’ve done radio before; YouTube can’t be that different. People say radio is an intimate medium, but only if you have the imagination to feel people out there, breathing and paying attention. Or not paying attention; maybe you’d be the kind of host who imagines attention wandering, distraction, and so you pump up the volume, hoping that the technology will somehow evolve in the next 30 seconds and they’ll talk back.
They never talk back. And so, if you’re dumb, you just keep blabbing, like Adams.
I shouldn’t talk. One of these days I’ll step in it. But no one pays attention to people like me.
OK, then. The week begins. One more to get this story done, and then we’ll be back to status quo.
Jeff Borden said on February 26, 2023 at 6:57 pm
As noted in your previous post, I fully expect Scott Adams to be booked on the White Power Hour hosted by Tucker McNear Swanson Carlson next week. He’ll be the keynote speaker at the next CPAC convention, introduced by Kanye West.
230 chars
David C said on February 26, 2023 at 7:35 pm
They can have Dilbert we can have xkcd. Adams give them the racism they want. Randall Munroe gives us science and the sweetest stick figure love letter ever.
https://xkcd.com/2386/
183 chars
Peter said on February 26, 2023 at 9:31 pm
Huff Post had the best headline ” Dilbert FINALLY Gets Fired After Creator Goes On Racist Tirade”.
I don’t get it. You didn’t see Cathy Guisewite (and how do you pronounce that name anyway?) at the Capitol on January 6th. Bill Griffith hasn’t organized a “Cartoonists For Trump” Committee (or maybe he has – these days who knows).
Scott, what’s wrong with counting your money and keeping your yap shut? Is it that hard to do?
434 chars
Sherri said on February 27, 2023 at 12:03 am
Scott Adams has been showing who he was for many, many years. I guess that YouTube videos are just a little harder to ignore than the misogynistic blog posts he put up back in 2011.
181 chars
FDChief said on February 27, 2023 at 12:19 am
I had honestly forgotten that Dilbert was even still a thing; AFAIK it had disappeared into the black hole that swallowed the old newspaper funnies like Shoe and For Better and For Worse.
That said, I’ve read that Adams kept his franchise going largely by cribbing tales of techbiz malfunction sent to him by others; I mean…when was the last time the joker saw the inside of a cubicle?
That he’s a “-ist” (racist, sexist, etc-ist) POS shocks me…not at all. There’s been a slew of these Silicon Valley techbros outed as exactly that lately, starting with the Big Boy, Elmo, and his ridiculous Twitter escapades.
He’ll have fun cavorting with his new Proud Boy fans, tho.
703 chars
Dexter Friend said on February 27, 2023 at 3:25 am
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/musk-defends-dilbert-creator-says-media-is-17806961.php?IPID=SFGate-HP-Editors-Picks
Musk’s true colors.
143 chars
ROGirl said on February 27, 2023 at 5:10 am
Scott Adams has been irrelevent for many years and he has found a way to get some attention.
92 chars
Michael said on February 27, 2023 at 8:30 am
A.R. Moxon has a pretty good take on Adams, too.
https://armoxon.substack.com/p/the-case-for-shunning
102 chars
Julie Robinson said on February 27, 2023 at 9:10 am
Not one bit surprised about Musk.
Dilbert has now been dropped by its syndicator. Cue the woke complaints.
110 chars
Mark P said on February 27, 2023 at 9:41 am
Musk has been used to being worshipped. Now that he has learned that some people don’t think he’s a god, he’s lashing out. Poor guy. I wish him luck with colonizing Mars and hope he changes his mind about going himself.
Now I have even more incentive to look for another way to get our internet connection.
315 chars
Dave said on February 27, 2023 at 1:58 pm
Dilbert was in the Indianapolis Star this morning but, as part of the USA Today group, I imagine it will disappear soon. It was removed from the Tampa Bay Times, as noted with a short item on the front page.
I, too, cannot understand why people like Adams can’t keep their mouths shut.
Cooz, I always wondered what it would be like to meet him, would he be full of rage on a one-to-one basis? But then, I always wondered what it would have been like to meet Prospero.
474 chars
Scout said on February 27, 2023 at 2:36 pm
“I, too, cannot understand why people like Adams can’t keep their mouths shut.”
Maybe because since 2016 overt racism became normalized as legitimate political discourse? I’m pleased that mouth breathing haters are starting to enter the FAFO stage and encourage all of them to crawl back under the rocks they felt emboldened to emerge from.
345 chars
tajalli said on February 27, 2023 at 4:40 pm
Being a great fan of the comics, when the transition came to online and the newspapers became unaffordable, I created a HTML page with direct links to all my favorites and a great many that was.
After reading Adam’s blog, I simply dropped him like a hot rock to let him enjoy his money and biases on his own time.
Elmo the Muppet is so sweet and I hate that his name seems to have been co-opted for Musk. A much apter sobriquet would be Elmont, referencing the deranged fiance/husband of Alice P. Schwarzman, the homeless woman in Doonesbury.
549 chars
Scout said on February 27, 2023 at 4:48 pm
Jeff Tiedrich is an account I’ve followed for years on Twitter. He is as hilariously foul mouthed as he is correct about almost anything regarding wingnut moronica. He also has a substack letter that I follow. Here’s his take on the Adams delamination.
https://open.substack.com/pub/jefftiedrich/p/fucked-around-found-out-jim-jordan?r=jovb&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email
“I’ve written before about the Wingnut Grievance Bubble. it’s that enclosed feedback loop where untruths, repugnant behavior and harebrained notions are amplified and unchallenged, causing all who dwell within to fall right on their stupid fucking faces the moment they step out into the real world.”
LOL. Remind us of anyone we all know?
734 chars
Jeff Borden said on February 27, 2023 at 5:02 pm
It’s the revenge of the cartoonists! Editorial cartoonists are having a field day with Gruppenfuhrer Scott Adams’ racist stupidity. I thought these two hit the mark pretty well.
As a side note, Jack Ohman of the Sacramento Bee worked at the Columbus Dispatch with Nancy Nall and I. He was just 22 or 23 and was just too hot for the staid old Dispatch to handle.
https://www.charlotteobserver.com/opinion/editorial-cartoons/kevin-siers/
https://www.sacbee.com/opinion/article272617072.html
499 chars
Sherri said on February 27, 2023 at 5:35 pm
Oh, Scotty Boy didn’t wait for 2016 for permission to start saying the quiet parts out loud, certainly not when it came to women. Back in 2011, he compared women asking for equal pay to children begging for candy. He also said laws against sexual assault go against men’s natural desires. He said we live in a matriarchy because men have to get permission for sex. All just in 2011. All written in his own words, on his own blog.
No wonder he might be surprised that he could be cancelled. It never happened before.
522 chars
LAMary said on February 27, 2023 at 9:17 pm
M.T. Greene voted against mourning the 46 thousand dead in Turkey and Syria. Congressman Massie from Kentucky joined her. If as a member of the human race you can’t feel sorrow for the loss of 46 thousand of your fellow humans in one fell swoop how do you make any claim to having a soul or a heart?
299 chars
FDChief said on February 27, 2023 at 10:57 pm
While the DilAdams Clown Show is keeping us distracted, back at the ranch Trump’s former OMB guy is laying out what the House GQP Krazy Kaukus should demand in return for not using the debt ceiling to implode the nation’s economy:
$2 trillion cuts in Medicare
$600 billion from Obamacare
$400 billion from food stamps, and
Half of the Head Start budget.
Your 2023 GQP, ladies and gentlemen; the Party of Ideas!
418 chars
Dexter Friend said on February 28, 2023 at 2:35 am
Prospero (Michael Jackson, real name) would likely have been banned from some pages for his rants, but he fit right in here.
I miss Ashley Morris.
147 chars
ROGirl said on February 28, 2023 at 6:01 am
Cooz used to have a blog that I checked out once or twice. His posts consisted of the same types of rants he wrote here, and he was still attacking the same people.
When he wasn’t drunk, I found Prospero interesting and engaging, but he seemed to be drinking and posting more towards the end, which was just sad.
316 chars
basset said on February 28, 2023 at 11:10 am
Let me share a couple of new experiences, one just complete and another coming up.
You can’t go too far in Nashville without running up on a “writer’s night,” in which songwriters show up at a bar, coffeehouse, church basement, park bench, or wherever to play their songs in public and maybe get some attention. Some of my friends are on that scene but I have never tried it myself, mainly for fear of public ridicule. Got invited to do one over the weekend, though… figured what the hell, I don’t know anyone down there except the one guy who asked me to come, I’ll go for it.
Did three songs, made some mistakes, stopped one song and restarted but on the whole it went over, at least the audience quit talking while I was on and reaction was positive. Nice ego bump, going back next month to try & do better.
New experience number two: feral hog hunt in east Tennessee later in March. Been on one with a camera but never a rifle, maybe we can put some semi-wild pork in the freezer.
Meanwhile, the watch is getting some more comment over on the military watch forum, including a link to video about similar ones: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2msf4qIOIY&t=17s Going to a jeweler today to try & get the back off, the workings may show us who made it.
1282 chars
Deborah said on February 28, 2023 at 11:12 am
Regarding the lying Fox News pundits: the base couldn’t give one hoot that they were lying, as long as it was/is smearing the Democrats. So how progressives think this will be the downfall of Fox is beyond me, if anything it’s probably making Fox more popular. Once the base has made up its mind they stick with it no matter what.
I’ve been reading and listening to Ian McGilchrist lately, he wrote “The Master and His Emissary; the Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World”. It explains Trumpism to a T, long and involved but definitely thoroughly researched . My interest in McGilchrist started from my reading Cormac McCarthy’s latest books, “The Passenger” and “Stella Maris” because to me they’re both about the conscious and unconscious mind. While The Passenger started out very grim, it got better and better and Stella Maris is a connected story which is very good too. I would be interested if any of you have read them and if you have what your thoughts are about them.
992 chars
David C said on February 28, 2023 at 12:24 pm
I’ve had wild boar but never feral pig. Wild boar is definitely not the other white meat.
89 chars
Jeff Borden said on February 28, 2023 at 12:26 pm
The depositions in the Dominion defamation case against Fox keep turning up horrible facts. Rupert Murdoch gave Prince Jared copies of unaired Joe Biden campaign commercials the DNC was to run on Fox. It’s simply impossible to describe Fox as a news organization. It’s a straight up right wing propaganda outfit. Damn, Murdoch has done so much terrible damage to our nation.
374 chars
Jeff Gill said on February 28, 2023 at 4:15 pm
Dexter – Prospero was Michael Johnson. Sober he was delightful to correspond with; not sober he was a pinwheel of free associations with some fascinating observations, along with just being a bit more than impaired. I do think about him from time to time, riding his bike trying to carry too many package goods back home . . .
Edit (and thank you JC for the search & edit functions): http://nancynall.com/2014/01/08/condolences/
Sadly his obit is no longer active on the funeral home site. The internet sure isn’t a granite headstone level record.
553 chars
Julie Robinson said on February 28, 2023 at 5:41 pm
Oh dear God. The Florida Department of Education has released lists of approved books. Both ninth and twelfth are misspelled. Over and over, on each excruciating line, are nineth and twelth. https://twitter.com/TheJFreakinC/status/1629541745359765507?fbclid=IwAR04UKSlGmB17mAguI4U-z2_WW0gPFoKCFRKZuw96pYWyk63K2snj_hpB3s
319 chars
David C said on February 28, 2023 at 6:10 pm
How to spel gud by Meatball DeSatan.
36 chars
basset said on February 28, 2023 at 6:11 pm
David C, I’m not sure how much feral vs wild blood those hogs have, game ranches introduced a good many in eastern Tennessee over the years which then escaped and turned wild… the main reason they are a nuisance species, as they are in many other places. Starting to look like they’re not all that tasty, though.
319 chars
Dave said on February 28, 2023 at 6:30 pm
I think this is it, found on Legacy. Yikes, he was only 62.
https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/islandpacket/name/michael-johnson-obituary?id=6574530
DeSantis must be loved in The Villages, the Panhandle, and Miami. And, oh yeah, Pasco County. I’m wondering what the changes to Disney will bring for Disney and the taxpayers of Florida. He makes Florida less attractive by the day.
388 chars
Sherri said on February 28, 2023 at 9:48 pm
I was reffing a rookie powerlifting meet this weekend and reflecting that one of the things I love about powerlifting is the diversity in the sport, at least here in Washington. We have a lot of different races, different ages, different political persuasions, different abilities, and everyone just cheers each other on.
One of the things I hate about powerlifting is that the people in charge have not changed as fast as the people in the sport. Case in point, the president of the federation I compete in. Our federation was sued by a transgender gender woman, and summary judgement was handed down in her favor today. I thought at the time that regardless of what your opinion was of transgender athletes in sports, USAPL had handled the situation badly. It was even worse than I knew. In the court document, I found this lovely email from Larry Maile, our president:
“During this very short night, I reflected on this. We already answered this NO…Someone did not get beaten enough as a child. These people were children screaming in Walmart and their parents did nothing. Now they are adults and still screaming.”
Disgusting.
1146 chars
alex said on February 28, 2023 at 10:39 pm
Basset, good on you for working up the nerve to perform. It’s making me feel inspired to get back into art. I don’t have a written bucket list and maybe you don’t either, just a lot of things in the back of my mind that I’ve always wanted to try but didn’t have confidence.
Tonight was an HOA meeting where a possible dues increase was going to be discussed, so of course we had to have a couple of cranks show up and try to run the discussion off the rails with tangents that strayed far from the subject at hand. The trouble with democracy is that stupid people get equal time and consideration. Wasn’t as bad as local school board meetings where parents show up raving mad about “wokeism,” but close.
707 chars
susan said on February 28, 2023 at 10:58 pm
Rhonda Santis is way worse than you probably knew. If even half of this is true…. What a ghoul. Who should be in prison. Maybe in Guantanamo. That would be appropriate.
292 chars
Sherri said on February 28, 2023 at 11:16 pm
Not all the people living in The Villages love DeSantis, but the developers definitely love him and his authoritarian ways.
https://theintercept.com/2023/02/05/ron-desantis-florida-villages-oren-miller/
205 chars
Little Bird said on February 28, 2023 at 11:36 pm
Dave @29, making Florida less attractive by the day isn’t really all that hard to do, it already was pretty bad.
114 chars
Dexter Friend said on March 1, 2023 at 2:31 am
Yeah, he was Michael Johnson, not Jackson , thanks Jeff G.
Arlo Guthrie listened to his muse lately and the past week has posted some stories of his travels, his shows abroad, and long drives he took, not in a VW Microbus like in the movie, but in a Jeep. He posted he was enjoying his morning Peete’s coffee yesterday and he posted a picture of his sister Nora. I commented she really favors Woody, and we had a little back and forth chat. No big deal, but he is a real cool cat. He winters in Sebastian, Florida, not far from where my daughter lives in Port St. Lucie.
And sports fans: my granddaughter Maddie who lives in Commercial Point ( Columbus ) is 11 years old and a devotee of softball. She has been training inside this winter at a complex which has batting cages. I had no idea until recently, but her coach/overseer of the schedules and training is Ali Viola. Some of you ladies here probably know who she is, Hall of Famer collegian of yore, with a coaching resume 2 pages long, including a stint as Ohio State’s hitting coach.
She told my daughter and son-in-law that Maddie is the most improved player she has seen this winter. Maddie’s swing is exactly like Mike Trout’s swing. Trout is the long-time current best player in baseball.
1264 chars
Jeff Gill said on March 1, 2023 at 7:18 am
Those Arlo posts have been a real delight to read.
50 chars
Deborah said on March 1, 2023 at 9:33 am
As other Chicagoans herewith no doubt know by now, the incumbent Mayor Lightfoot lost her bid for reelection. I voted for her yesterday but apparently a lot of people were not happy with the way she has handled crime. I almost forgot to vote yesterday, since I’ve been away from Chicago for a while it hadn’t been on my mind. We were out walking around doing chores when we passed a polling place (not ours) which reminded me I needed to vote. Our polling place was virtually empty of voters and the poll workers looked bored to death. The ballot was the shortest one I’ve ever seen, it took about 10 seconds to actually vote. You could choose whether you wanted a paper ballot or a digital version. I chose digital. I don’t remember ever having a choice like that before.
It will be interesting to see who wins the mayoral vote in April. I will have to study up on the remaining candidates.
902 chars
Jeff Borden said on March 1, 2023 at 11:36 am
The finalists for Chicago mayor bring serious flaws and questions to their race. Paul Vallas, the white candidate, appeals to me as a wonkish policy nerd who has always worked in the public sector. He did a good job as director of revenue years ago and helped fix school systems in Philadelphia and New Orleans. But, he is overly fond of charter schools and his endorsement by the Fraternal Order of Police is worrying, largely because our FOP is a hotbed of tRump followers who see themselves as warriors not public servants. Brandon Johnson has interesting ideas about a more holistic approach to dealing with crime with a focus on mental health and community investment, but he’s talking about raising taxes –again– on households making more than $100K and he’s essentially a product of the Chicago Teachers Union and SEIU, which makes me question how he’d negotiate with them.
Lori Lightfoot will remain a historical figure –the first gay mayor of Chicago– but her abrasive, confrontational style doomed her. She once even claimed to have “the biggest dick in Chicago.”
https://www.thedailybeast.com/chicago-mayor-lori-lightfoot-bragged-about-having-biggest-dick-in-chicago-in-bizarre-rant-lawsuit-claims
1218 chars
basset said on March 1, 2023 at 11:45 am
Alex, the performance wasn’t what I was worried about as much as the original songs… none of em were about beer, hot country girls, trucks or partyin’ down by the lake so I thought there might
be an issue there, turned out to be a non-commercial and non-competitive session though so all was good.
304 chars
Julie Robinson said on March 1, 2023 at 11:59 am
Run it into the ground, then put a minority in charge and tsk when they can’t fix it pronto. I predict Chicago’s next mayor will also have a short term.
After four weeks in a boot for my broken ankle, I get to ditch it! It’s almost completely healed, and he wants me to walk around and swim and use it as I normally would. I may throw the thing in the lake, like Bates in Downton Abbey. I may have gotten slightly giddy in the office and told the docor I loved him. Or something like that…
494 chars
Heather said on March 1, 2023 at 12:45 pm
I voted for Toni Preckwinkle in the last Chicago mayoral election because I listened to progressives who warned about Lightfoot. And they were right. This time I voted for Brandon Johnson and am so pleased he’ll be in the runoff. It’ll be an uphill battle, but he has a chance.
Vallas would be a disaster, and not just because he’s basically a Republican at this point. The last thing we need is another cop-loving mayor. Lots of Chicagoans want to address knotty systemic problems and understand that they will take time. Short-term solutions like “more cops” make people feel good but they do more harm and little good in the end.
636 chars
jcburns said on March 1, 2023 at 2:36 pm
So Heather, what did the progressives “warn” about Lightfoot?
61 chars
FDChief said on March 1, 2023 at 2:36 pm
Ah, cop-loving mayors…
Here in the People’s Republic of Portland – where all the anguish is over our public spaces teeming with the homeless – our city council voted to…buy the cops another airplane!
206 chars
Deborah said on March 1, 2023 at 4:44 pm
From what I’ve found today, I’ll be voting for Brandon Johnson, at least he seems like a Democrat, the other guy seems like a Banana Republican (see Jamie Raskin about that term).
What in the heck do Portland’s police even do with an airplane?
246 chars
Mark P said on March 1, 2023 at 6:00 pm
Deborah, not *an* airplane, but *another* airplane.
51 chars
Heather said on March 1, 2023 at 7:01 pm
JC, here’s the blurb on her from the progressive Girl, I Guess guide to the 2019 mayoral election:
Lori Lightfoot is a Black, lesbian, law-and-order candidate trying to run as a progressive, but is also a bit of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. The biggest issue with Lightfoot is her past as the head of Chicago’s Office of Police Standards under Daley (an investigation into OPS, which covered the time that Lori was there, found a lenient pattern toward police officers) and the Police Board under Rahm. This means that the current state of policing in Chicago falls at least partially on her shoulders, and that state is… really really really bad. While she was leading the Police Board, it delayed a decision for over a year, about whether to discipline Dante Servin for the murder of Rekia Boyd. Ultimately, Servin resigned right before that hearing would have taken place and therefore was able to keep his pension and avoid real discipline. (I recommend reading BYP100’s take on Lori here and this thread from Agitator In Chief.) Lightfoot also defended the cops against brutality lawsuits during her time working for the law firm Mayer Brown.
“WAIT but maybe prosecutors are good!”
BXTCH THEY ARE NOT.
But they can take down corrupt politicians!
THEY ARE ALSO COPS.
Lori literally lied in court to have somebody extradited (AKA deported into the hands of another country’s law enforcement). She is BAD news. She is not a progressive, and we strongly advise not voting for her. Thanks.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1NN9clyiiHKQBGoRS0QybgOfwitRe7loIkm8kBFtt5lA/edit
1599 chars
Peter said on March 2, 2023 at 10:34 am
I was an election judge on Tuesday, and other than the election judge who sat next to me and who just LOVED the sound of his voice and who needed to tell me EVERYTHING he’s done in the past 50 years (and I’m not exaggerating; I got a detailed description of his switching high schools in the early ’70’s because Mather HS wasn’t Black enough for him) the election went rather well.
Except for the result. Jeff Borden is absolutely right – Paul Vallas is a tool of the Fraternal Order of Police, and Brandon Johnson is a tool of Chicago Teacher’s Union. And, as much as the FOP is a loathsome organization, I hate the CTU more than The Trump Organization and Fox News.
I’m disappointed Lori didn’t make it out of the first round. I think all of her abrasive qualities pales when compared to Rahm Emmanuel. I also did not expect Chuy Garcia’s campaign to implode so spectacularly.
888 chars
Jeff Borden said on March 2, 2023 at 5:03 pm
Peter,
It was Brandon Johnson who shocked me. The CTU and SEIU apparently fielded an army of door-to-door foot soldiers. And poor Willie Wilson. More millions down the drain. He seems like a very nice man and his generosity is well documented, but dear lord, he’d have been a terrible mayor. Chuy would’ve been cool, I guess, the first Hispanic mayor, but despite his progressive cred, I’ve never thought of him as a particularly strong politician.
My ward (47th) went for Johnson. I guess we’ll see next month. The worst thing is another fucking four weeks of campaign ads.
581 chars
Carter Cleland said on March 2, 2023 at 7:51 pm
I voted for Brandon Johnson too, partly because I already had a Let’s Go Brandon! sign. Here’s Ben Joravsky, in the Reader, on Paul Vallas.
https://chicagoreader.com/columns-opinion/on-politics/the-vallas-surge/
214 chars
Deborah said on March 2, 2023 at 8:10 pm
I see from your link, Carter Cleland, that our alderman, Brian Hopkins endorsed Vallas, sounds about right. I’m not a Hopkins supporter, he ran unopposed unfortunately, I would have voted for a ham sandwich over him. He came to our building and spoke a couple of years ago and I was not impressed. We’re in the most gerrymandered ward in the city, the 2nd, we live in Streeterville by the lake and the ward stretches way, way west every which way. Chicago politics are opaque to me.
486 chars
alex said on March 2, 2023 at 9:52 pm
When I moved to Chicago in the ’80s I was in the ’13, part of what’s now known as East Lakeview, in a fairly solid ward. Then I moved two blocks south into the ’57 and found I was in the same voting district as people in Uptown and Edgewater, way the hell north of the ’13 and in those days quite impoverished, and wondered how the fuck did that happen. They were either diluting the votes of the rich or the poor. I couldn’t tell which at first, but I guess it was the rich, because we had Helen Shiller who was a proud in-your-face-about-it commie but she was also quite devoted to her constituents and helped me when I was unfairly ensnared by the parking nazis and other bureaucratic terrorists.
I used to marvel at the Chicago “machine” until I lived in Indiana and saw how the Republicans have exactly the same operation here but just don’t call it that, and I have to tell ya, the Republicans have no room to serve up the Dems as an example of corruption.
966 chars
Dexter Friend said on March 3, 2023 at 2:58 am
I still have my lapel pin, “Punch 8 for Harold Washington” https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/QLIAAOSw8iZamTA7/s-l1600.jpg
118 chars
Deborah said on March 3, 2023 at 9:50 am
I found this Twitter thread which explains why Fox won’t endure any down turn in viewers and why Murdoch felt he could fully admit to the lie they were spreading. The fox viewers prefer to be lied to by them https://mobile.twitter.com/julieroginsky/status/1631652065016422406
277 chars
Jeff Borden said on March 3, 2023 at 11:29 am
None of the mayoral candidates really connected with me, but then, they rarely do. I’m not down on Paul Vallas because I’ve met him many times including a couple of lunches as one of my best friends was his communications director while Vallas ran the Department of Revenue. He’s not a Rudy Ghouliani type, at least in my opinion, but more of a policy nerd. No, I don’t like everything he has said or done, but I could say the same thing about Daley, Emmanuel and Lightfoot, too. Johnson is a smart guy and he’s on the right track (so was Lightfoot) when he talks about investing in Chicago’s poorest neighborhoods and offering some hope to communities mired in poverty and gun violence. But his idea of increasing income taxes really concerns me. The city already is an expensive place to live and our recently revised property tax bills are hugely higher than in the past.
I love Chicago and plan to die inside the city limits, but damn, we need competent, collaborative leadership at the top. Whether it’s Vallas or Johnson, I pray they are up to the job.
1061 chars
ROGirl said on March 3, 2023 at 12:54 pm
Teri Gross interviewed a reporter on the Q anon beat. They’re f’ing nuts and deeply antisemitic (of course).
108 chars
LAMary said on March 3, 2023 at 4:58 pm
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-s-calls-for-building-ten-new-freedom-cities-flying-cars-and-baby-bonuses-in-bizarre-campaign-ad/ar-AA18cd0I?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=fd7067eccb7a4e93958b4c302a1bffa9&ei=13
231 chars
alex said on March 3, 2023 at 5:21 pm
Trump’s gotta do better than that. His priorities are all fucked up. I want flying cities, bonus cars and freedom babies.
I’ve dreamt of flying cities ever since I read about one in a Jonathan Swift book. The city was called “La Puta,” and it would be so fitting as it would honor any one of Trump’s wives, or even all of them.
I didn’t quite grasp what he meant, though, when he said “the federal government owns one-third of America’s land mass, but only 1.1 percent.”
I think he’s gonna have a tough time selling this to the rubes, though, unless he promises to make the cities racially pure, along with the baby bonuses.
636 chars
Deborah said on March 3, 2023 at 6:02 pm
How Bizarre, LAMary’s link to the Trump campaign promises of new cities with flying cars and ROGirl’s link to the Fresh Air report about Qanon. What a weird world we live in and how the rubes swallow it all is mind boggling.
224 chars
David C said on March 3, 2023 at 6:09 pm
A baby bonus like the family tax credit that the Rs voted not to extend. OK. Do they really believe that women want to spend all of their young adulthood, and mid-to-late adolescence if they have their way, knocked up? I don’t think there’s enough money in the world to pay for that.
283 chars
alex said on March 4, 2023 at 8:30 am
Our crusading state’s attorney, who’s into performative politics like the worst of them, has brought the GOP battle against Tik-Tok to our local court. Too bad we don’t have anything like an investigative journalist in this town anymore. Why has no one bothered to ask the simple question “Why? Why here?”
Is this some sort of venue- or judge-shopping effort like the Texas abortion pill case?
https://www.wane.com/news/rokita-vs-tiktok-takes-the-stage-in-allen-county-federal-court-case-pending/
Todd Rokita, for what it’s worth, is as big of an embarrassment as MTG, although hasn’t quite attained her national profile yet. Here’s hoping he never does.
664 chars
Suzanne said on March 5, 2023 at 10:27 am
We watched Netflix’s documentary series on the Murdaugh murders over the weekend. The people involved remind me so much of people I know in my rural Indiana environs. The son that was murdered was a ne’er do well drunk whose drunken escapades led to the death of a young woman but the mentality of his so-called friends was “yeah, we know he’s a mean drunk but he’s our buddy so whatcha gonna do?” His girlfriend dated him for several years, admitted he was abusive, but continued to date him until he rammed his boat into a bridge and killed her friend. It’s like none of them really liked the guy but continued to have him in their friendship circle because they couldn’t imagine what else to do.
I have never really been a crowd follower, so I don’t really understand. I know so many young people who complain about having to fly all over the place & spend all kinds of money for their friends’ bachelor and bachelorette parties, but none seem to have any concept of simply saying no, I can’t attend. It’s as though they don’t know that’s a choice.
1085 chars