Friday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Friday, August 18, 2023
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40 comments
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor of Political Science and a College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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https://twitter.com/jules_su/status/1004475500721401856
@charontwo:
Oh, there’s no mystery at all. Monkey see, monkey do.
CSK wins the Trump’s reasons for withholding his report sweepstakes.
@Joe:
“MSNBC”
https://twitter.com/Acyn/status/1692269880685306299
I had to pay a visit to the urologist this morning. On of the wildest things, post bottom surgery, has been re-learning how to pee. It’s been a trip and I’m having some issues.
Well dear friends, after some 40 odd years of increasingly bizarre trick shots, today I was asked to pee in a cup. Friends, I used to be able to write my name in the snow with perfect penmanship. This morning, I was reduced to contemplating physics and engineering in order to fill that cup. It was an ordeal.
But I am brave and I survived. I’m sure my cackling was unsettling to anyone outside the bathroom.
@Joe:
Well, Trump could hardly sazy that he was wrong, or worse, that this report doesn’t actually exist, could he? 😀
By the way, a report of some sort does apparently exist. It was written by Liz Harrington.
@Beth:
Beth, perseverance and grace (and a really snarky attitude) are what I’ve come to expect from you. In the meantime this was what I was hearing in my head…
https://youtu.be/gbeHkZiJBWA
(ETA on a 3 minute loop)
@Flat Earth Luddite:
That’s pretty close
I long for Jack Smith to demand Trump’s Irrefutable Report as part of discovery, or by some other mechanism. Perhaps the Judge should schedule a hearing for the filing to be made.
@Beth:
I tend to cycle between Witch Hazel’s & Vincent Price’s maniacal cackling. Wish I’d been there to see the staff reactions.
@Daryl:
I do wonder what excuse they’ll come up with for not presenting this at trial, don’t you?
https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/09/politics/mo-brooks-january-6-dismissed/index.html
https://twitter.com/MuellerSheWrote/status/1692530754566418592
@Daryl:
Interesting. Now that you mention it, that does seem obvious. And I bet his lawyers have a copy.
If Benito has irrefutable proof of crimes like fixing elections, shouldn’t he present it to, I don’t know, the FBI, the DOJ, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, or some competent authority who can investigate his evidence and charge those responsible?
On the other hand, I see none of the above, nor any others, beating a path to his door.
Well, Senator–oops, make that COACH–Tuberville has no plans to cease holding up promotions.
@Beth: You’ve got this! Plenty of us born with this equipment have peed on our hands when asked to fill a cup. Not easy, logistically speaking.
@charontwo:
That’s a great point that had eluded me. Your statements can either be part of your official duties, OR they can be protected First Amendment speech — but not both. Pick one.
The headline of the day- A neonatal nurse in a British hospital has been found guilty of killing 7 babies
@CSK: If it were me, I’d claim that it’s in the same SCIF facility as the Secret Republican Plan to Improve Obamacare and that the room key is lost.
@charontwo: Hadn’t thought about that. Wouldn’t Meadows participating in campaigning from his WH office be a violation of the Hatch Act?
OK, they all do it all the time. Biden’s people do it. No one gets prosecuted. But is Meadows request for removal to Federal court based on an admission of illegal actions?
@Just nutha ignint cracker: And his tax returns. Or are they still under double secret audit?
@Just nutha ignint cracker: @gVOR10:
Then I would advise them to summon a locksmith.
Someone is trying to humanize Ron DeSantis, and make him seem endearing despite being basically evil.
The latest puff piece is WaPo’s “Awkward Americans see themselves in Ron DeSantis”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2023/08/17/ron-desantis-awkward/
@charontwo: Where have I read this concept before? hmm. Oh it was Wednesday and it was me.
@Jen:..@Beth: You’ve got this!
@Mister Bluster:
Wow…it’s been a minute since I even thought about Castaneda.
Read all of those books back in the 80’s.
Thanks for triggering the flashbacks…
@CSK:
I’m not going to follow the links to see what conversation this is part of, and just assume it relates to Beth’s urination.
I’m hoping locksmiths aren’t necessary, but if that’s what it takes, I wholeheartedly support Beth in her time of urination.
@Daryl:..flashbacks…
I read some. Looking back at the titles I still can’t remember which ones. There are images of the desert that I recall but that could have been several titles.
Sometimes memories of things that I have read get conflated with actual life events. Like my travels with my disabled friend Joe when we camped out in his van in the desert near Thousand Palms, California on our four week west coast trip in ’74.
@Gustopher:
Your assumption would be quite wrong. As for Beth, she seems to have handled the matter ably without assistance from anyone, locksmiths included.
@Gustopher:
When I read The Last of the President’s Men by Bob Woodward, the way Butterfield describes Nixon, made me see him as an introvert.
That got me to sympathize with him, for about two seconds.
@gVOR10: Oh yeah! The tax returns, too. I’d forgotten about them. 😉
@CSK: Clearly, you have no understanding of how hard it is to find a locksmith with the necessary security clearances. Nope! You’ll just have to wait until the key is found.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
It’s not at all hard to find a locksmith with security clearances. There are several near me. 😀
I finally got around to resurrecting my laptop. I haven’t used it much since 2018, as I’ve not traveled much since then. And with the trump pandemic, I used it even less.
I’d forgotten I’d installed Start8 back when the poor thing suffered under the Win8 (may it rot in Hell). Since then I’d upgraded to Win10. So I removed Start8. Now it’s been updating Win10 for the past 90 minutes or so.
The only problem is the battery isn’t charging. I’ll have to get it looked at soon.
Sorry I dropped off today, I did a couple of things my depression told me not to do and it took revengance.
@Flat Earth Luddite:
So I am terrified of drs for personal and cultural reasons. This generally manifests in me going to full brat mode. The humor gets real weird real fast. Drs tend not to like it. Or they do cause they’re as weird as lawyers are, they just hide it better.
@Daryl:
OMG, I want this to happen so freaking bad.
@Jen:
My partner laughed me when I told her about it. Peeing has been one of the absolute wildest parts of this. Like, the closest conceptual framework I can think of is, before it felt like peeing started at a point outside my body, and now it starts from a point inside. Like, that’s an oversimplification, but kinda accurate. Also, just to be clear, I’m not like my cis gay male friend who was (maybe still is) convinced that women pee from their cervix.
@Gustopher:
I posted this as an unattributed, out of context quote on a Trans discord I’m part of. They gave me my own channel there and I generally use it as a more unhinged version of my writing. I’ve had several other girls say to me “Oh, your Beth! you’re weird, but your channel really helped me.” I also communicate partly in gifs there.
@CSK:
I did my best. Lol. I’ll figure this out someday.
I said I’d wait for the new Mexicana to actually fly before forming an opinion on it, but this piece by Brett Snyder at Cranky Flier captures my thoughts so far.
@Kathy: I always liked Classic Start for those Win8 laptops. It upgrades all the damn time, but it made it a classic Win7 interface.
I’ve been setting up some new computers lately, and I really kinda like Win11, right out of the box. No need for Classic Start. It’s intuitive, and you can get to every setting pretty quick, without having to search too hard for the damn ACTUAL Control Panel.
@Jax:
I remember Classic Start. I looked at a lot of apps to fix Win8 (may its code be crushed). I settled on Start 8
In the end, I got a Win7 desktop PC, one of the last ones made with it. I forget when exactly, but it couldn’t have been in 2013 (I still have it. In fact I’m posting on it). I got the laptop in 2014, with Windows 8, because I’d tried Start 8 in a partition in my old laptop. Eventually I upgraded both to Win10, which works well as a desktop system. For some reason I didn’t remove Start 8 afterwards.
I am trying Win11 in my work laptop. It should replace my desktop laptop next week when I get back to work.
@Jen:
Well, you see, this is why men run the world. Our ability to pee standing up has led to the close-up study of nature, especially trees, and a depth of musical awareness borne of judging tonal differences between center pee and edge pee. Little known fact? Sonar was inspired by a man peeing at night and realizing he could target blind using only variations in sound depending on depth. And I hope I don’t need to remind anyone of our superiority in the area of emergency jellyfish sting treatment.