It’s another busy day here in the CatBox as grocery shopping on Amazon Prime Now is very time consuming. Wendy’s late arrival threw off my schedule, but I was more sorry she felt ill than inconvenienced. She just texted me that she is feeling better today.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 4:00 (5:13). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From YouTube (Inequality Media Channel): Trump’s Brand is Ayn Rand
Like I’ve said from the beginning, Rump Dump Trump is not an aberration from the Republican Reich. He’s a reflection of it. Our Reich (Robert) is better. RESIST!!
From NY Times: When Representative Daniel Lipinski, a conservative-leaning Democrat and scion of Chicago’s political machine, agreed to one joint appearance last month with his liberal primary challenger, the divide in the Democratic Party was evident in the audience that showed up.
Mr. Lipinski’s outnumbered supporters were the diminished lunch-pail Democrats that once dominated his Southside district. Those of his rival, Marie Newman, came from the party’s ascendant coalition — young progressives and women like Elizabeth Layden, a Patagonia-clad teacher who explained her opposition to Mr. Lipinski in blunt terms.
“Because he’s a dinosaur, ’cause he’s a phony, ’cause he’s a Republican who claims to be a Democrat,” said Ms. Layden, 49, who has been making phone calls and knocking on doors to help unseat Mr. Lipinski, a seven-term House member, in the primary race this month. “Hello, women’s rights, and hello, my reproductive rights. Get out of my uterus.”
As the midterm election season gets underway with races in Texas on Tuesday and Illinois on March 20, contests like this one illustrate the turmoil of the Trump-era Democratic Party. Democrats need to pick up 24 seats to take back control of the House and are hoping a surge of grass-roots energy, activism and fund-raising at levels unseen since the rise of Barack Obama can help play a crucial role.
Yet the backlash to President Trump’s divisive politics has also fueled a demand by the party’s progressive wing for ideological purity and more diverse representation, a tension that could reshape what it means to be a Democrat.
“This is part of the reason Donald Trump won,” Mr. Lipinski said in an interview, adding, “Democrats have chased people out of the party.”
Click through for an interesting read. I believe that the Democrats need to lean toward progressive ideological purity, but if Democratic voters choose a moderate, or even a DINO, over a progressive in the primaries, then we should support the voters’ choice. The worst DINO is far better than the best Republican. RESIST!!
From Alternet: Former MI6 spy Christopher Steele has reportedly told special counsel Robert Mueller that he believes the Russian government directly intervened to block President Donald Trump from appointing Mitt Romney as his secretary of state.
In a New Yorker profile of Steele published Monday, reporter Jane Mayer writes that Steele — who authored the infamous Fusion GPS dossier alleging deep ties between President Donald Trump and the Russian government — wrote a memo in late 2016 claiming that Russia worked to stop then-President elect Trump from making noted Russia hawk Romney his chief diplomat.
“This memo, which did not surface publicly with the others, is shorter than the rest, and is based on one source, described as ‘a senior Russian official,’” writes Mayer. “The official said that he was merely relaying talk circulating in the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, but what he’d heard was astonishing: people were saying that the Kremlin had intervened to block Trump’s initial choice for Secretary of State, Mitt Romney.”
He with the tiny hands, etc. would never disobey the man with the key to the pee tapes and a ton of other dirt. RESIST!!
Cartoon:
10 Responses to “Open Thread – 3/5/2018”
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YT: Very, very true – and sadly so.
NYT: Daniel Lipinski and his ilk are the bane of the Democrats. I am sick of these DINOs, these fake Democrats who are in reality GOP Lite. Go Marie Newman! There’s no use in flipping seats red to purple – we need to flip them to True Progressive Blue.
Cartoon: That would be funny AF if it wasn’t brutally true.
I agree, with the caveat that, if the final choice comes down to him or a Republican, even Lipinski is better.
4:49 I’ve seen Boreon twice, but I’m sure this is the first time I’ve seen Baiti.
Scary cartoom
This appears to me to be the definitive rebuttal to the proposition “Don’t give (mass murderers, conspiracy theorists, general wingnuts) the publicity which is what they are really looking for.”
Ayn Rand – It is, I suppose, proof that sociopathy and malignant narcissism can be appealing – even if only to other sociopaths and malignant narcissists. I’m downloading this BTW.
NYT – “The worst DINO is far better than the best Republican.” Reminds me of an old Chinese proverb – “The strongest memory is weaker than the palest ink.” That might be an analogy that could get through to
Puritanspurists.AlterNet – Definitely gives me a little respect for Romney (damned little, but a little.) Poor Steele. He must think we are awfully stupid not to make better use of his hard work.
Cartoon – Yup. Here’s some ammunition.
Amen several times over.
RR: Good video, as always. We need to bring back the ‘Common Good’ for all, it’s a cluster w/o it.
NYT: Vote BLUE !!!
AN: Read weekly of some kind of interference or collusion with Russia. Mueller must have a thick file by now.
Cartoon: So sad.
Hope that you get in a relaxing evening. Take good care, and Thanks, Tom.
IMC/Reich: And, after whom do you suppose Rand Paul is named?????? In my college days I read both of those novels, and did not get bitten by the greed bug. I am sure that I am far from the only one in that category. I do not think that tDump is a follower of Rand, or that he’s read anything she wrote. In fact he may be even less read than G.W.Bush. Wanna-be POTUS is just out for the center of his universe, period, and is being used by the GOPIG Rand fans. They have quietly setting up legislation to end the EPA, the Dep’t of Ed, (one of Rand Paul’s favorite targets, by the way) , while we all watch the idiocy in theWH.
NYT: “The worst DINO is far better than the best Republican. RESIST!!” You bet!
Alternet: Mr. “Best words,” who knows better than the generals, etc., is nought but a cipher, aka: ZERO.
IM: Robert Reich is absolutely right: “Without Common Good…there is no Society.” But what would the Republican Ayn Rand followers care about that? They don’t want you to be part of their ‘society’ anyway. They just want you to sustain it.
NYT: My mind tells me it’s not for me to say, but my heart goes out to Freya’s comment.
Alternet: This doesn’t surprise, does it, nor would it surprise if the Kremlin not only blocked Russia Hawk Mitt Romney but then told Drumpf to appoint Russia lover and recipient of Russian honorary medals, Rex Tillerson, instead.
Glad to hear WWWendy is feeling a bit better today. You’re so lucky to have her come over and clean you up even when she’s feeling out of sorts, TomCat. Kudos to you, Wendy. I hope you’re completely recovered soon.
a demand…..for ideological purity and more diverse representation
I wonder if many people who read this, or even the person who wrote it, realized what a bald contradiction this is. Purity and diversity are mutually exclusive. Of course I know what they had in mind — people of racially diverse origin who all think alike. Bu that’s not real diversity.
I fully agree. The people I call the regressive left want ethnic, religious, sexual, and cultural diversity, but ideological goose-stepping conformity.
Thanks all. Hectic Hugs!