Personal – Page 115 – Politics Plus

Open Thread September 17, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:03 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 172023

Yesterday, the radio opera was “La fille du régiment,” by Donizetti. This is a cute and funny opera, which is known outside the opera world for two reasons. For one, it is the opera which contains the aria which gave Luciano Pavarotti his nickname, “king [or admiral] of the high C’s.” (In this recording, it was, as it often is, encored. And then, just for a little more fun, in Marie’s singing lesson, they substituted “La Vie en Rose” for Donizetti. (It really isn’t possible to go over the top with this opera, since it’s over the top to begin with.) The other is that it is the opera in which Ruth Bader Ginsburg was given her first speaking cameo. {I’ll spare you the search – the link on her name is to the review, and here are links to video of the beginning and the end of the cameo. She wrote her own lines and spoke in English. Her reference to Marie’s birth certificate is not in the libretto, but is a poke in the eye at “birtherism.”) The comic plot centers on Marie (the daughter of the regiment) who was found as a baby and adopted by the regiment and raised as a tomboy. All grown up now, she falls in love with a local boy, Tonio, while the regiment is atationed in the Tyrol, and he with her. But the Regiment has sworn that she may only marry a member of the regiment. So Tonio signs up – just as a noblewoman (the Marquise of Berkenfeld) discovers that Marie is actually her illegimate daughter (though she says “niece” at first), and sweeps her away. Her mother hopes to get her married to the son of the Duchess of Krakentorp (which is where RBG comes in.) This would be a horrible fate, but it is sabotaged by Marie herself, her lover, the rest of the regiment, and especially the senior sergeant of the regiment, Sulpice (a charming role for a baritone – they are so often stuck playing the bad guy.) So all ends well. While I was listening, and checking my email, Robert Reich also cracked me up. He apologized profusely for missing his regular Saturday column, listing all the reasons why (all beyond his control, but he insisted he should have foreseen them) and ended by saying his New Year’s resolution is “to stop blaming myself for events over which I have no control, and to recognize when I have no control.” Right. Good idea, Bob. Good luck with that.

Cartoon – 17 new Norton (+JNY)

Short Takes –

Crooks & Liars – Plans For A Trump Dictatorship Are Already Drafted
Quote – There’s enough precedent — both historical and current — to show how dangerous this moment is, and what lies on the other side of the tipping point. It would be checkmate for democracy, perhaps permanently. I don’t think this will happen, at least not this time around. But the blueprint for seizing the reins of power has been in plain sight for some time. Then last week, an article in the Associated Press (AP) put it on the front burner.
Click through for details. It links to the AP story, should you want to pursue it further. Sorry it’s such a downer. But if we don’t know, we can’t fight it.

NBC News – Rep. Mary Peltola’s husband dies in plane crash in Alaska
Quote – “We are devastated to share that Mary’s husband, Eugene Peltola Jr. — ‘Buzzy’ to all of us who knew and loved him — passed away earlier this morning following a plane accident in Alaska,” Peltola’s chief of staff, Anton McParland, said in a statement. Responding to requests for comment, the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board said in separate statements that a single-engine plane crashed after takeoff around 8:45 p.m. Tuesday near St. Mary’s, a small city in western Alaska.
Click through for story. I suppose there are things happening which affect more people, but what hurts an at-large Democratic Congresswoman from a state with two Republican Senators and IIRC a Republican Governor hurts us all.

Food For Thought

Open Thread September 16, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:02 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 162023

Thursday, Robert Reich (accurately) predicted that, by Friday, the UAW would be on strike against GM, Ford, ad Chrysler. The way the giants have been acting, I really didn’t doubt it. Would you want to buy a car assembled by a senior manager on a CFO or whatever? I certainlt wouldn’t. (And that isn’t even one of his five reasons.) Yesterday was also the 60th anniversary of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing which killed four girls. Both Joyce Vance and Marian Wright Edelman commemorated this tragedy. Marian, an educator, emphasized how, in the civil rights movement of the soxties and seventies, children were forced to lead. Joyce, an Alabama lawyer, made a point of how it was Doug Jones who finally brought some closure by prosecuting the last two living perpetrators of the outrage. Both takes are valid, and both are necessary. Contrary to the anti-woke mob, one can’t be ully human withou looking at the worst (and also the best) that humans can be. Also yesterday, jury selection began for the trial of two of the officers accused in connection with the death of Elijah McClain. Yes, I realize how ironic that is, and how discouraging. But also yesterday, Denver’s neighbor Mount Evans had its name changed to Mount Blue Sky – in order to stop honoring the instigator of the Sand Creek Massacre.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Crooks & Liars – So Guess Who’s Suing Fox News Now — And Why
Quote – New York City’s pension funds and the state of Oregon are suing Fox Corporation, alleging in a lawsuit that the Fox News parent company failed shareholders…. “The lawsuit, which was filed under seal in the Delaware Court of Chancery and named Fox Corporation board members and its executives as defendants, accused the media company of having chosen to “invite robust defamation claims, with potentially huge financial liability and potentially larger business repercussions, rather than disappoint viewers of Fox News.”
Click through for details. I did not see this coming. More power to the plaintiffs!

Wonkette (on Substack) – Domestic Abuser Shot At Woman In Parking Garage, Wants Supreme Court To Give Him Back His Guns
Quote – On Nov. 12, 2020, a 25-year-old woman told police that she agreed to meet Rahimi in a parking lot after receiving a Snapchat message from him saying that he “had something for her.” When she arrived, she told police she saw him kneeling by the driver’s side of a vehicle, wearing all black clothes, including a black ski mask covering his face. Rahimi had his hands around his waistband, she said, where he appeared to hold a pistol with a magazine larger than the gun itself. As the woman got back into her car and drove off, she heard five or six gunshots, some of which appeared to strike her car. “Vehicle was shot multiple times with the driver inside,” the police report reads. Again, Rahimi went on to open fire in public five more times after that.
Click through for full story. I’m kind of out of words.

Food For Thought

Open Thread September 15, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:06 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 152023

Wednesday, I received an email from my cousin with s gift link (= no paywall) to a story at the Washington Post which totally charmed me. I guarantee it will charm you if you enjoy the animal videos, and even if you don’t, this probably will charm you anyway. Also Wednesday, i checked out all the cartoons I have made for dates in October, There are 10, but 2 of them are for the same day, so that means I have 9. Then i gathered all the ones I have made which don’t apply to any particular date. I found 10 of those, which mweans i need 12 more. Probably this weekend, I’ll start looking through the historical calendar and see whaat events really grab me.If there are more than 12, I’m home free. Going through all the cartoons I have made, I noticed a lot with November and December dates, so October may end up being the hardest for the rest of this year. Then, yesterday, I got an email from Faithful America with a link for resources for “talking to Christian Nationalists” which includes responding to their comments on the internet or replying to their letters or emails. “Talking” isn’t always necessarily face to face. Yes, it’s designed for [authentic] Christians, but if that isn’t you, it could still be useful. And one other thing – Hunter Biden was indicted on gun charges. Now, I may be misremembering, or just wrong, about this, but my understanding was that the Judge who rejected the plea deal was not upset about the deal itself but about some missing steps and/or paperwork. If that’s the case, this may only mean that the special counsel is housekeeping.

Cartoon – 15 use Republican Education (+JNY)

Short Takes –

Robert Hubbell – Biden’s five-day world tour
Quote – After a grueling schedule and multiple diplomatic successes, the leading story in much of the media is the press conference that was tucked into the schedule in Vietnam on Sunday after eleven meetings over the prior two days. The NYTimes (which covered Biden’s trip fairly and focused on substance) described the press conference as follows: “Although Mr. Biden fielded questions on a range of foreign policy issues, including China’s economic troubles and climate change, he spoke softly and appeared tired. To make a point about climate deniers, Mr. Biden rambled into a familiar story about liars in a John Wayne movie, which left some in the audience deeply perplexed.” That’s it. That is all it took to set right-wing media sources aflame with proclamations that “Joe Biden is too old” (or worse).
Click through for full article. Mr. Hubbell’s point, of course, is that what Joe just did would tire anyone out, even people who are not yet forty, and it should be – absolutely is – evidence for his fitness, not against it.

Colorado Public Radio – Kroger and Albertsons agree to sell more than 50 stores in Colorado as part of merger plan
Quote – Albertsons and Kroger have reached a deal to sell hundreds of stores, including more than 50 in Colorado, to a New Hampshire-based wholesaler. The sale moves the supermarket giants a step closer to completing a $25 billion merger. The companies, which own King Soopers and Safeway in Colorado, are offloading 413 stores across the U.S. to C&S Wholesale Grocers. The deal ensures that no stores will close as a result of the merger, no frontline jobs will be lost, and all current collective bargaining agreements will be upheld, according to a joint statement from Albertsons and Kroger.
Click through for article. Of course this affects me. But since they intend to include “hundreds of stores,” it probably also affects you if you live in the US. Both chains have been deliberately concealing the extent of their monopolies by ceasing to change the names of stores in smaller chains they have bought. Even if you have neither an “Albertson’s” nor a “Kroger” in your neighborhood, you are likely to have one under a different name which they own, Or more than one.

Food For Thought

Open Thread September 14, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 5:59 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 142023

Yesterday, the sun shone, and the temperature barely broke 70, so the yard got done. Mitt Romney announced he will not run for re-election. Liz Cheney had some choice words for what she calls “the Putin wing of the Republican Party” (AKA the Sedition Caucus.) In Pennsylvania, they found and captured the escaped prisoner. And I picked two ery different short takes from very different sources, and – surprise, surprise! – They’re both on Substack. So crank up your mouse to click on “continue reading.” Everyone on Substack whom I have seen talk about it is very happy to be there – it’s easy for authors to use, and it saves them a lot of money compared to other venues. So I don’t see any of them moving away from it any time soon.

In case you noticed Nameless missing a few days, he’s healthy, but tied up with taxes, in his own state and in the state in which a relative lived from whom he received an inheritance. He’s on an extension, but the date for that is getting closer faster than he would like

Cartoon – On 14 September 1867 —

Short Takes –

Robert Reich – Who’s most responsible for the monopolization of America?
Quote – Yet the federal courts have been reluctant to do anything about this and are pushing back against the Biden administration’s efforts. Why? Because of a man named Robert Bork…. I first met Bork in September 1971, when I took his class on antitrust at Yale Law School. I recall him as a large, imposing man, with a red beard and a perpetual scowl…. We kept challenging his view that the only legitimate purpose of antitrust law was to lower consumer prices…. Even in our mid-20s, we knew this was bullshit.
Click through for history. If you didn’t already know, you will learn why “borked” is now a synonym for “inoperable,” chaotic,” or even “SNAFU.”

Wonkette – Lauren Boebert Kicked Out Of Theater For Acting Too Lauren Boebert-y
Quote – U.S. Rep. Lauren Boebert was escorted out of a Sunday night performance of the “Beetlejuice” musical in downtown Denver, accused by venue officials of vaping, singing, recording and “causing a disturbance” during the performance. VAPING. The woman was VAPING. The paper says they got warned during intermission that others around them were complaining (LMAO), so clearly it was time to shape up and sit nicely with our hands folded in front of us, even though it is a fun show like Beetlejuice. We can go to Chuck E. Cheese afterward, OK? The incident report states that after receiving the intermission warning, about five minutes into the second act security officials received “another complaint about the patrons being loud and at the time (they) were recording.” Taking pictures or recording is not permitted at shows. Tacky.
Click through to read embarrassing details and see optional surveillance footage. The part in italics is direct quotes from the Denver Post.

Food For Thought

Open Thread September 13, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:02 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 132023

Yesterday, it rained, and I do not want anyone out in my yard with an electric weed whacker in the rain. So we are trying for today instead. Qevin McQarthy opened an impeachment investigation into Joe Biden. The New Yorker is doing reruns of Name Drop this week – Monday’s was from February 2022 and I blew itboth times. Yesterday’s was from May 2023 and I got it on the second clue – in May, it took me till the third clue to get it. If I’d remembered just a littlemoreI might have jumped 2 clues.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The Hartmann Report – SCOTUS Has Placed Itself Above Congress, the Constitution, and the Founders
Quote – The author of the Declaration of Independence and America’s third president predicted today’s Supreme Court corruption. Congress should have been listening then; it must listen now. If Democrats can retake the House and hold the Senate and White House in 2024, they must hit the ground running in 2025 with legislation to limit the corruption and powers of the Supreme Court. Which means they need to get started now. Here’s the backstory, and what needs to be done.
Click through for the backstory and what needs to be done. I don’t subscribe to Hartmann (yet), but it is Substack so you’ll need to click. I cannot argue with a single word.

Newsweek via MSN – Russian General Admits Ukraine Just a ‘Stepping Stone’ to Invade Europe
Quote – “I think there’s still plenty of time to spend. It is pointless to talk about a specified period. If we are talking about Eastern Europe, which we will have to, of course then it will be longer,” the general said. “Ukraine is only a stepping stone?” the interviewer then asked. “Yes, absolutely. It is only the beginning,” Mordvichev responded, who went on to say that the war “will not stop here.” Newsweek reached out to the Russian embassy via email for comment.
Click through for story. Newsweek and MSN can usually be relied on for accuracy. Russian generals, not so much. But the bigger question is, why say it? It won’t scare NATO off – it will only make the West more determined to crush this aggression. Russians need to wake up and realize they are no longer Vikings.

Food For Thought

Open Thread September 12, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:04 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 122023

Yesterday, Talking Points Memo’s newsletter included an update on a lawsuit in Colorado which I don’t think I have mentioned here, although I was vaguely aware of it. The Citizens for Reponsibility and Ethics in Washington (acronym CREW) has filed a lawsuit in Colorado’s State courts seeking to disqualify Donald Trump** from the Presidential ballot here. (And you know that whatever happens here will not just stay here. It will go up and up.) I’m not sure why the Emperor of Delay decided to do something which would only speed it up, but the accused filed a motion to remove the case to Federal Court. Here are the reasons given in a CREW motion to countermand: “1. lack of Article III standing for plaintiffs in federal court. 2. Lack of required consent by a codefendant.” I don’t know who the codefendant(s) would be in this case – Heaven knows there are plenty of possibiities, indicted and unindicted, elsewhere – but yeah, that second one is pretty clear, even to a non-lawyer. If that’s required and he doesn’t have it, his moton is a non-starter. Today, I’m expecting my BFF’s son to come work on my yard, so, if the threads are short tomorrow, that will be why.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Crooks & Liars – House Freedom Caucus Has Surprise Foe: The US Senate
Quote – Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington … [and] Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, who together lead the Appropriations Committee, announced Wednesday that they have reached a deal on a spending package that will include funding for Military Construction and Veterans Affairs; Transportation; Housing and Urban Development; Agriculture, Rural Development, and the Food and Drug Administration, as well as agencies under those larger umbrellas…. To get these bills considered quickly, they’ll have to be advanced by unanimous consent…. Any single senator… could derail that with a simple objection. So far, however, there hasn’t been much in the way of government-shutdown cheerleading from the usual [sosp]ects in the Republican Senate conference.
Click through for article. The avoidance of a shtdown is the point here, but these two are not the only senators who have been quietly helpng to get stuff done.

Wonkette – ‘Radical’ DA Charges Cop With Murder For Shooting Man, Lying His Ass Off About It
Quote – As Larry Krasner, the Philadelphia district attorney, said at a Friday news conference, “The videos speak for themselves. Firing six consecutive shots at close range at a vital part of the body of a person, under the law, is strongly supportive, together with other evidence, of all of these charges.”… Investigators did find two knives in Irizarry’s car — a kitchen knife and a serrated folding knife. Irizarry’s sister told the Times that he always carried a pocketknife with him but “always as a tool, not as a weapon.” Guns are obviously more lethal weapons than knives and, in many parts of the US, just as easily accessible. But I’m sure that Dill’s defense will make a big deal about the knives.
Click through for details. Larry Krasner is the one progressive DA who is nationally known and has managed to keep his position in the face of frenzied Republican efforts to remove him. They are going to be trying again. If I come across any petitons in support of him, I will certainly sign them and share them here.

Food For Thought

Open Thread September 11, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 5:58 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 112023

Yesterday, I was able to see Virgil. When I went over to the game cabinet to see what was avaiable, my jaw about hit the floor – there was a brand new deck of standard cards. It’s amazing how much easier it is to concentrate on, and have fun with, a game of cards when none of them stick together, and none are creased in half to the point of falling apart. When I left, I told the offcer who was supervising, “I don’t know who came up with the new deck of cards, but please tell them they get to go to heaven without doing anything else.” (As usual, that got a smile.) I needed the air conditioning on in the car on the way down, but coming back, it was cooler, and there was even a little rain, so I didn’t. I had to stop for gas on the way home, and yes, it’s pricey here too, but when a single tank lasts me two months I really don’t have a lot to gripe about. As usual, I was exhausted upon return. I think what is going on is that, even when I don’t realize I am, I get nervous about everything that could go wrong – and after it’s all gone fine, and there’s nothing more that could go wrong, I melt with relief.

Also, I did finish the last 2 cartoons in September and was able to look at October. TC made only 2 cartoons in October 2015, for the 30th and 31st, and they were both personal medical mayhem topics. So I’ll need a bunch. There are some images which could be made into cartoons with a frame and a watermark, and I’ll start by doing something with those. I didn’t count them. I did notice that Nameless uploaded images for an exquisite fall foliage post around the 16th. I didn’t look to see whether any were gifs or slideshows – but the images were lovely just by themselves.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Projest On Government Oversight – Routine Disqualification: Every State Has Kept Ineligible Candidates Off the Ballot, and Trump Could Be Next
Quote – In addition to the disqualification clause, the U.S. Constitution imposes several qualifications for federal elected offices. Representatives, senators, and presidents must meet minimum age requirements (ranging from 25 to 35 years of age); must be United States citizens (natural-born for presidents); and must live in the state they represent (or in the case of presidents, must have lived in the country for at least 14 years). In addition, the 22nd Amendment prohibits individuals who have already been elected to two terms as president or served more than one and a half terms from being elected president again, and the 12th Amendment prohibits a president and vice president from residing in the same state. The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that these qualifications are exclusive; Congress and the states cannot create additional qualifications for these federal offices. However, as will be discussed in this report, states do have the authority to ensure that candidates for federal office meet the Constitution’s requirements.
Click through for full article. This could have been titled “Everything you wanted to know about disqualification but didn’t know enough to ask.” In addition to general rules, the article includes case studies in several states of diqualification for different offices. Some of them it’s challenging to believe that a candidate not intelligent enough to realize they were unqualified would even apply for candidacy, or challenge the Secretary of State when exceluded.

HuffPost – 6 Things To Know About Biden’s Bad Polling
Quote – 2. The anti-bedwetting brigade is out in full force, and mostly correct. “I don’t worry about any polls a year and a half before the election,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) told HuffPost. While his timeline was not entirely accurate, he’s correct to say the predictive value of polls this far out is essentially nil. Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton both came back for clear victories after trailing the leading GOP contenders at similar points in their presidencies.
Click through for all six. Yes, another article on polling. There are two potential negative consequences to overreacting to polls. One can get overdonfident, on the one hand. And, on the other, one can get discouraged enough to fail to vote. In 2024, we can’t afford for any of us to make either mistake. We need to find middle ground. If this doesn’t help, don’t get hung up on it.

Food For Thought

Open Thread September 10, 2023

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 5:51 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Sep 102023

Yesterday, the radio opera was “The Ballad of the Canal” by Yin Qing. It is not a “Chinese Opera” which is a genre all its own. It is a western style opera in Chinese, with Chinese subject matter and roots in Chinese folk music. It does borrow some from the Chinese Opera genre, but that is but one element among others such as bel canto and singspiel. It centers around life during the Ming Dynasty around the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, the longest canal in the world (and, at 1104 miles, likely to remain so). There is a main plot, but the opera is hughly episodic, and thus can juxtapose characters from various social classes effectively. IIRC, when I was in school, this format was referred to as “a slice of life.” The performance was recorded in 2022. It was very easy to listen to, and not all that hard to follow. The brief interviews with the performers about their characters before it started and during intermission helped.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Wonkette – Fani Willis Roasts Jim Jordan’s D**k Over Open Fire
Quote – We are going to resist the temptation to share every hilariously shady comment, every time she just brutalizes Jim Jordan…. Quoting established case law, Willis writes that Jordan’s subpoenas are only valid if related to a real task of Congress, and investigations only for the aggrandizement of the investigators, or to punish those being investigated, are indefensible. “This unprecedented action serves no legitimate legislative purpose and would set a dangerous precedent for future Congresses… the American people deserve better,” she wrote, quoting directly from a letter written by [checks notes] Jim Jordan to Bennie Thompson, chair of the House January 6 Select Committee, back in 2022. That’ll set the tone for you. But it gets so much nastier.
Click through for full (NSFW) article. I doubt whether Jordan will ever learn not to leave himself wide open like that. Not if he hasn’t learned by now. (Oh yes, and it’s Substack now.)

The Daily Beast – How ‘Free Speech’ Warrior RFK Tried to Bully a DailyKos Blogger
Quote – “In truth, Mr. Kennedy gave a speech for peace and freedom in Berlin on Aug. 29, 2020, initiated by the group Querdenken—a democratic movement whose name means ‘lateral thinking’ and who vehemently oppose all forms of fascism and extremism,” the Barnes-written document reads, referring to Kennedy’s rant about Bill Gates and 5G. “Despite requests from Mr. Kennedy, Defendants have failed and refused to take down the Defamatory Article.” The problem with this argument is that The Daily Beast and numerous other organizations have extensively documented Querdenken’s extremist affinities and associations. Not only does it indulge in QAnon conspiracies and fawn over Russian dictator Vladimir Putin, but the U.S. State Department has highlighted its “anti-Semitic rhetoric and views,” and a top police official in the German city of Bremen has described it as “a serious threat to public security.”
Click through for details. “DowneastDem,” IMO, is entitled to wear this as a badge of honor. Kennedy’s siblings all (publicly) disagree with his claim not to be or associate with Nazis. (As do I – but I don’t have the standing.)

Food For Thought
I’d save this for a day when TFG is testifying – except that I’m not crazy enough to believe he will ever testify.

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