Monday’s Forum

FILED UNDER: Open Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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). Follow Steven on Twitter

Comments

  1. OzarkHillbilly says:

    Son of US federal judge killed after answering door to gunman

    A gunman shot and killed the 20-year-old son of a federal judge as he answered the door of the family home on Sunday in New Jersey, and shot and wounded the judge’s husband before fleeing, according to judiciary officials.

    The shootings occurred at the North Brunswick home of the US district judge Esther Salas, and killed her son, Daniel, said the chief district judge, Freda Wolfson. Salas’s husband, the defence lawyer Mark Anderl, was injured in the attack, Wolfson said.

    Salas was in the basement at the time and wasn’t injured, according to a judiciary official who spoke anonymously to the Associated Press.

    The perpetrator, believed to be a lone gunman posing as a FedEx delivery person, was not in custody, the official said. The FBI tweeted on Sunday night that it was looking for one suspect in the shootings.

    Daniel Anderl, a college student, was Salas’s only child, the official said.

    It’s a sign of our times that my first thought was, “I wonder who appointed her?” and only later did it occur to me to wonder what cases she is/has heard.

    2
  2. OzarkHillbilly says:

    Ed Markey
    @EdMarkey

    Here’s the scoop on my time as an ice cream man.

    A funny little story.

  3. OzarkHillbilly says:
  4. Sleeping Dog says:

    Looking at the NYT coronavirus map this morning, I now favor building a wall. My wall will begin on the coast of NJ at the border with Delaware and then continue along the southern, then western borders of PA to the Canadian border.

    If not a wall, then internal, then closing of minor roads and installation of virus check points, anyone attempting to enter the virus control area will need to relent to a supervised, mandatory quarantine before being granted free access.

    1
  5. Jen says:

    Democrats on Twitter are losing their dang minds over John Kasich speaking at the DNC’s virtual convention.

    They do not get it. This isn’t Democratic endorsement of Kasich’s policy prescriptions, it is an attempt to present a united and broad-based front against Donald Trump. In other words, it’s meant to show to independents and the handful of rational Republicans who remain that this year is so important that partisanship needs to be set aside for the vote.

    That’s it. Everything about 2020 is bizarre and weird and atypical. Coming unglued because a former Republican governor has an online speaking slot is a waste of energy.

    20
  6. Pete S says:

    @Sleeping Dog:

    https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EcrAW_JXYAAiGOX?format=jpg&name=small

    Hopefully this link works – a photo comparing social distancing on two tour boats at Niagara Falls. One from New York, one from Ontario. I suspect we won’t need to worry about the Canada/US border opening anytime soon.

    1
  7. OzarkHillbilly says:

    @Jen: Yes, it’s about piling on.

    2
  8. JohnMcC says:

    @Sleeping Dog: You do realize that Mr Mason and Mr Dixon have done the early surveying of the land you’ll need, right?

    1
  9. @Jen: There are a fair number of people who seem not to understand that politics has to be coalitional.

    4
  10. OzarkHillbilly says:

    @Steven L. Taylor: “Compromise is what weak people do!” Tea Partiers are what pops into most people’s heads but there are more than few who feel the same on the left.

    3
  11. OzarkHillbilly says:

    Sarah, RN
    @shesinscrubs

    This thread will be about the abhorrent conditions at the covid “hospital” DHR put up in McAllenTexas. Staff have walked out of this facility because of the conditions in which there are literally ants crawling over critically ill patients. Hiding PPE from staff.

    More in the thread.

    ETA: noted in the thread that the NYT has a story up about it now.

  12. CSK says:

    @OzarkHillbilly:
    That was great. Thanks.

  13. Teve says:
  14. Jen says:

    @OzarkHillbilly: That is utterly horrifying.

  15. JohnSF says:
  16. JohnSF says:

    UK science is rockin’ it today!
    Synairgen reporting interferon beta treatment trial indicates possible 70% reduction in severe symptoms.
    Caution: prelim results only, not yet fully reviewed or full data release.

    1
  17. CSK says:

    @JohnSF: @JohnSF:
    This looks very hopeful. Fingers crossed.

    2
  18. Sleeping Dog says:

    @JohnMcC:

    They did yeoman work, note how straight that border is. 🙂

  19. Sleeping Dog says:

    @Jen:

    When I saw that Kasich would be speaking, I did a virtual fist pump.

    It is not surprising that a section of the Dem electorate get it, if they had their way there would be a DINO purge, they’re that obtuse.

    🙂 Dang, the high point of the morning, getting to use their, there and they’re in one (admittedly, run-on) sentence. The romance languages may have gender confusion, but nothing beats English for multiple spelling and meanings for the same pronunciation of a word.

    5
  20. MarkedMan says:

    Like it or not (and I, for one like it) the US has been at its best when there were broad coalitions of interests that could survive swings in the presidency and the Congress. We need to get back to that. Democrats shouldn’t see themselves as the party opposite of the Republicans, but rather as the party that accomplishes things. Joe Biden was right to brag about working with whoever was voted into the Senate, regardless of how he felt about them personally, to accomplish things that needed to be done.

    7
  21. Teve says:

    Seen on the tubes:

    “The same people telling Americans that if they don’t like their government they should leave, are the ones telling asylum-seekers that if they don’t like their governments they should stay there and try to change them.”

    4
  22. JohnMcC says:

    News not widely reported: Lt Col Allen West (ret) the former FL congressman has been elected by the Republican Party of the great state of Texas to be their Chairman. You remember the TeaParty favorite who’d had to retire because he committed war crimes in Iraq?

    He said Texas R’s had to oppose ‘tyranny that we see in…Texas…executive orders and mandates, people telling us what we can and cannot do, who is essential, who is not essential’.

    The President twitted congratulations.

    3
  23. Jim Brown 32 says:

    I was updating my news blog this morning and came across a couple of new treatment vectors I thought fitting to share. Perhaps steve or another one of our Dr commenters can comment.



  24. senyordave says:

    I consider myself well left of center, and probably to the left of 90% of commentators here, but to me Kasich speaking at the convention can only be a good thing. Just like when Biden says he would consider Republicans in his cabinet I don’t see a problem. It is the correct answer, it shows bipartisan. Now if he went through with it…

    7
  25. Joe says:
  26. Jen says:

    I’ve considered the impact of covid on hurricane/disasters, but was not aware of this detail:

    Typically, the National Guard and some active duty forces respond to hurricanes to provide things like search and rescue, engineering, and medical support. Rooftop helicopter rescues make for dramatic footage, but the truth is that the military does not do the bulk of the work. Instead, volunteer organizations like the Red Cross lead the effort by managing shelters, feeding the hungry, and processing displaced families. [snip]

    Foremost, most members of these volunteer organizations are over 60 years old, putting them into the high-risk category for COVID-19. According to the American Red Cross, of their 21,000 trained disaster responders, 42 percent are over the age of 65, 43 percent are between 40-64; and just 13 percent are between 18 and 39. This means the people we need most in a disaster are also among the most vulnerable. The Red Cross says that it has procured PPE for its disaster workers, but we found that other volunteer organizations, given the already nationwide shortage, might not have enough. Everywhere we looked we found data indicating if we failed to flatten the curve, we would be risking the volunteer infrastructure so vital to hurricane response and recovery. It gets worse.

    Indeed it does get worse. Pretty frightening article, if one lives in the Gulf region.

  27. EddieInCA says:

    Not the Onion….

    https://www.rawstory.com/2020/07/take-the-masks-off-gop-county-commissioner-in-new-mexico-urges-people-to-get-exposed-to-covid-19/

    Couy Griffin, a Republican commissioner for Otero County, New Mexico, is now encouraging his supporters to stop wearing face masks to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus.

    Griffin, who is also the head of the “Cowboys for Trump” organization, posted a video on Twitter this week in which he falsely claimed that wearing face masks weakens human immune systems.

  28. Monala says:

    The two white men who attempted to lynch a black man in Indiana on July 4th have been arrested for assault. The incident was captured on video, and the black man was rescued by several white people who witnessed it.

    Link

  29. CSK says:

    @Joe:
    Unlike the NYTimes, I don’t believe that Trump is tacitly acknowledging that COiv-19 is still spreading like wildfire. I think he’s doing this because he can’t have rallies, and this is the next best thing. TV time every day! He even said he’s bringing back the briefings because of the “large audience.”

    I wonder how many people tried to talk him out of this stunt.

    1
  30. Scott says:

    @JohnMcC: Yep, Republicans are going to go even more into crazy town here. West came to Texas from Florida, drove the National Center for Policy Analysis into the ground. Also retired from the Army after he took an Article 15 (non-judicial punishment) action rather than being court-martial for UCMJ charges. There will be a lot of sound and fury but organizationally the Texas Republican Party is hosed.

  31. MarkedMan says:

    Google question:
    I was searching for something I said here back in 2016. According to Google (site:outsidethebeltway.com MarkedMan) I only posted 4 times between when Trump got the nomination and Election Day. Seems pretty unlikely. Anyone know what I’m doing wrong?

  32. EddieInCA says:

    @Joe:

    Joe says:
    Monday, July 20, 2020 at 14:00

    Trump announces he’s reviving the virus daily briefing as cases continues to surge.
    Can you hear the high fives from Biden’s basement?

    I’m sure sphincters tightening at the campaign headquarters of every at-risk Republican Senator and House member.

    Honest questions. Does anyone here think that ANYONE in the White House, other than Trump, thinks this is a good idea? If so, who?

    1
  33. EddieInCA says:

    @MarkedMan:

    You’re probably not doing anything wrong. It’s just that the other results are probably way, way, way down in the results count, due to the algorithm. You might be better off searching the OTB Archives. I’ve found some old posts there that I wanted to reference recently.

    1
  34. Joe says:

    @CSK: To each element of your response, my point exactly. In addition, how well do you think Trump using a daily Covid briefing to talk mostly or entirely about his campaign will go.

  35. Jen says:

    Holy cow the suspect in the federal judge/shooting case is an interesting piece of work. A “men’s rights” attorney.

    2
  36. Jim Brown 32 says:
  37. OzarkHillbilly says:

    @MarkedMan: Anyone know what I’m doing wrong?

    Hmmmm… Take a good close look at those 4 posts google archived and whatever you did, don’t do it again.

    3
  38. Jen says:

    *snort*

    Corporate giants shut down Trump texting program

    It took days to resolve anti-spam concerns that halted a July 4 test run, costing Trump donations and raising GOP fears about November.

  39. Kingdaddy says:
  40. steve says:

    Jim- I wouldn’t bet on the Fenofibrate. Metabolic therapies dont pan out very often. Nice if it does but it needs a real study and I would be surprised if it does much. (Just for the record I am skeptical about most diet studies also.) The second one has a bit more promise I think since we know interferons can play a role with other viruses. As to this particular study it is not very strong. It is small and the p values are not good. There is about a 30%-40% chance these results were just random. (I am not an ID guy so take my opinions with a grain of salt, a big one.)

    Steve

    3
  41. MarkedMan says:

    @EddieInCA: Thanks. Do you mean the “Search OTB…” box at the top of the page? Do you know if there is a way to sort or narrow by date range?

  42. de stijl says:

    I thought right-leaning folks were appalled at a government boot on the throat of a constitutionally protected protestor.

    Wait! That was conditional? Their principles apply only to some but not all. Shocked! I am so shocked!

    Originalist and textualism is driven by partisan tribalism? No freakin’ way! They were very clear they were just calling balls and strikes.

    If they were fooling the entire time I will be very vexxed.

  43. de stijl says:

    @Jen:

    Anything that begins with “men’s rights” does not end well.

    1
  44. Mister Bluster says:

    @MarkedMan:..Google question:
    I was searching for something I said here back in 2016. According to Google (site:outsidethebeltway.com MarkedMan) I only posted 4 times between when Trump got the nomination and Election Day. Seems pretty unlikely. Anyone know what I’m doing wrong?

    I frequently use that same format in the GOOGLE address box to search for old posts of mine.
    (site:outsidethebeltway.com pseudonym X)
    (site:outsidethebeltway.com pseudonym Y) or
    (site:outsidethebeltway.com pseudonym Z)

    As recently as yesterday I used all three and got the results I was looking for.
    Today when I entered (site:outsidethebeltway.com pseudonym Z) GOOGLE replied:
    “About 0 results (0.28 seconds)”
    I checked my entry MANY times for typos and tried again: “About 0 results (0.28 seconds)”
    After screwing around with OTB Archives I finally returned to GOOGLE and entered:
    (pseudonym Z) by itself and hit the enter/return key on my MacBook Air EUREKA! all my pseudonym Z posts reappeared?
    The other two entries (site:outsidethebeltway.com xxxxxx) still work as they always have.

    I have found the “Search OTB” box to be useless. If you click on the “Archives” tab on the bar below and scroll down to the month and year you are searching for you might come up with something.

    1
  45. Daryl and his brother Darryl says:

    Mike Barnicle points out that 51 years ago today Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon…but today Americans cannot go to Europe, Canada, or the Bahamas.
    MAGA!!!!

    1
  46. CSK says:

    @Joe:
    I think Trump’s daily campaign rallies, very thinly disguised as Covid-19 briefings, will be greeted by outpourings of mockery and disgust except on the part of Cult45, who will receive them with ecstasy, or at least pretend to do so.

  47. Kathy says:

    @CSK:

    The briefings should never have stopped, provided trump did not appear in them. the man’s incapable of informing. All he knows is self-promotion, and fraudulent self-promotion at that.

  48. Sleeping Dog says:
  49. Sleeping Dog says:

    @CSK:

    I suspect that unless there is solid information provided, the press and in particular TV will stop covering them live. I also can see them covering Fauci and others, even Pence, but cutaway when you know who speaks.

  50. de stijl says:

    @MarkedMan:
    @Mister Bluster:

    Really curious.

    Why would you want to do that?

    I appreciate the effort, but I am curious on the why.

    I could go “grep” but why?

    1
  51. Mister Bluster says:

    @Daryl and his brother Darryl:..51 years ago today Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon

    I wanted to be there with them but I couldn’t be an Air Force pilot because my vision was not 20/20.
    I don’t guess they would have let me be the third man either.

    FOR MICHAEL COLLINS, JEFFREY AND ME
    Tull

    I’m with you L.E.M
    Though it’s a shame that it had to be you
    The mother ship
    Is just a blip from my trip made for two
    I’m with you boys
    So please employ just a little extra care
    It’s on my mind
    I’m left behind when I should have been there
    Walking with you
    With you
    With you

  52. Kurtz says:

    @MarkedMan:

    try this. Three mages of results from 2016.

    ETA: I’ll leave the typo. Don’t get turned into a newt.

    2
  53. Jim Brown 32 says:

    @steve: Steve, thanks for your perspective! This is why I come to OTB [fist bump]!

    2
  54. Mister Bluster says:

    @de stijl:..Why would you want to do that?

    At 72 my memory is fading so fast I have to look back just to see if I was really there several years ago. Besides like anything else I have done it was a good idea at the time.

    grep???

    1
  55. de stijl says:

    @Mister Bluster:

    grep is a Unix command to find all text that matches the search parameter.

    Sorry! Really obscure.

  56. CSK says:

    @Kathy:
    I think there was and is absolutely no chance Trump would allow any briefings to occur if he didn’t star in them. After he made his imbecilic comments about disinfectant and light, he could have quietly vanished from the stage and the briefings could have continued with Fauci, Birx, and whoever else had anything legit to contribute. That didn’t happen. No Trump, no briefings.

    @Sleeping Dog:
    That would be marvelous if the cameras would cut away when Trump appeared. But I fear it’s wishful thinking. Trump would kill the briefings again.

    2
  57. de stijl says:

    @Mister Bluster:

    Maybe why was the the wrong question.

    People discover cool ways to search archives which I love the ingenuity of.

    To what purpose?

    Most of my old comments are topical to that thread or are just bs or gassing about. I don’t disavow them, but that was past me on an old thread.

    What is the purpose? If you’re just looking for a juicy past quote for a rejoinder it seems like a ton of effort for something you can do in the now.

    You said x. That’s bs because y. Just say that. No need to footnote from the archives.

    I like the attempt. It is a cool task. I do not understand the purpose.

  58. Kathy says:

    @CSK:

    Naturally.

    Remember the SNL sketches of a store called “All Things Scottish”? trump is like their slogan: Welcome to all things Trump. if it’s not Trump it’s CRAP!”

    I don’t know if his self-promotion disguised as COVID-19 briefings will create any backlash, but he won’t be able to keep from making a fool* out of himself again. For one thing, he’ll keep on with his idiocy that tests cause infections.

    *More of a fool, I should say.

    3
  59. sam says:
  60. de stijl says:

    Trump headlining the Covid-19 daily briefings in May is why he is underwater now.

    He was a fool. Looked like an idiot. Walked like a braggart. Seemed like an ignoramus. Sometimes a duck is a duck, and everyone was at home watching it live and forming or re-evaluating opinions.

    If Trump thinks re-starting the daily C-19 briefings will fix his re-election woes I will not interrupt him. Digging his own grave.

    He is convinced ratings equals approval. Ssh! No one tell him different!

  61. Jax says:

    @MarkedMan: I was looking for Modulo yesterday, I don’t recall hearing from him/her since they indicated they were going to a protest a while back, and it seemed like there were a lot of comments that weren’t showing up.

  62. de stijl says:

    What the hell wrong went with Matt Taibbi?

    I know he has been treading in Maher space a long time now, but that new piece is self-congradulatory garbage. Stress is a way to view the true character of a person.

    Sullivan’s first reaction to 9/11 was to call “the Left” fifth columnists. In pressura veritas.

    Under Pressure is a great song. The Queen / Bowie version or any other.

    1
  63. JohnMcC says:

    I see it’s not the newest of news but thought I’d post that Dr Fauci is going to throw out the 1st pitch at the Washington Nationals opening game.

    Well played, Nationals!

    4
  64. Jen says:

    It is remarkable how quickly some of my friends went from “lol, look at the Q-anon crackpot conspiracy nuts” to “hey that federal judge was killed by a Jeffery Epstein child trafficking cabal.”

    I’m so tired.

    4
  65. CSK says:

    @JohnMcC:
    Trump’s never thrown out the first pitch on Opening Day since he became president. He says the body armor he’d have to wear would make him look fat.

    3
  66. de stijl says:

    @Jen:

    Get new friends.

    1
  67. MarkedMan says:

    @de stijl: I like looking at what I wrote in the past. Half of me hopes for consistency and half of me hopes I evolved.

    During my last move I was once again deciding what to move and what to chuck and came across something that I posted to an online group that I honestly could have written yesterday. I don’t remember the exact year but suffice it to say the header had “ARPAnet” in it…

    1
  68. Kylopod says:

    In the commentary on Trump’s laughable claims about the cognitive test, there are a couple of points that I think people are missing. First, people are making fun of Trump for thinking doctors who acted surprised at how well he did were paying him a compliment. But I don’t think what happened is that he misunderstood the doctors’ reactions. Rather, I think he just made up the story out of whole cloth. Trump is always inventing stories about people acting amazed at his achievements.

    Second, while people are correctly pointing out that doing well on this test is nothing to boast about (it’s sort of like boasting about being a champion tic-tac-toe player), most of the commentary is taking for granted that he did indeed do well on the test. I don’t believe he did. I think he did poorly on the test and is covering it up. In fact, I’d wager he didn’t even take the test–at least not recently. He apparently took it a couple of years ago under the supervision of Dr. Ronny Jackson, who was clearly compromised and can’t be trusted. That was when Trump first started boasting about how he had aced the test. He just happens to have revived this boast recently, though there’s no proof he actually took the test, and certainly no proof he did as well as he claims.

    One of the most consistent things about Trump is that whenever he insists on something, it’s a good bet it’s the absolute, polar opposite of the truth. In an odd way, his lies are inadvertent confessions, since he seems unable to express himself except through extremes. It’s as if he thinks he’s Obi-Wan Kenobi doing a Jedi mind trick (“These aren’t the droids you’re looking for”) where he simply declares something to be so and thinks he can get people to believe him through sheer force of will (and in fairness it does have an impact on the weak-minded).

    8
  69. de stijl says:

    @MarkedMan:

    I get that. Kinda.

    Your past self is past. You have responsibility for your past actions, yes. But I don’t get re-reading past comments.

    I think we are two ships passing in the night on this. Not my thing.

    I do enjoy genius ways of optimizing search, though. Creativity always engages.

  70. CSK says:

    Trump tweeted:

    “We are United in our effort to defeat the Invisible China Virus, and many people say that it is Patriotic to wear a face mask when you can’t socially distance. There is nobody more Patriotic than me, your favorite President.”

    This accompanied by a photo of him in a mask, now that, 3 months late, he’s decided to promote masking. I may throw up.

    4
  71. Moosebreath says:

    @CSK:

    “He says the body armor he’d have to wear would make him look fat.”

    I don’t think it’s the body armor…

    3
  72. Jen says:

    @CSK: I told my husband about this. He was, in short succession: a) disbelieving, b) stunned, c) laughing, and then said d) “you know, I bet in less than 48 hours he’s congratulating himself on this being his idea.”

    I couldn’t agree more, with all of it.

    2
  73. CSK says:

    @Kylopod:
    I’m with you. He invented this story out of whole cloth. He seems to have taken the test a few years ago, and now has revived the story about out superbly he did on it, probably to contrast himself with Biden, whose intellect Trump is perpetually disparaging.

    3
  74. Kathy says:

    @CSK:

    Trump tweeted:

    And that’s where you lost me 🙂

    2
  75. CSK says:

    @Jen:
    Yes, he probably will congratulate himself, and say that he’s been an avid supporters of masking all along.

    I wonder how badly this will confuse Cult45. Most of them are vociferous anti-maskers, and for Dear Leader to come out all of a sudden singing the praises of facial covering has got to throw them for a loop.

    1
  76. Mister Bluster says:

    @de stijl:..To what purpose?

    Sometimes I stumble on items like this. I forgot that I wrote it.

    Friday, July 27, 2012 at 19:22
    My ex-girlfriends tomcat, Ratso Rizzo, ran off after we moved about 15 miles west of our old apartment. He was 7 years old.
    All 5 of our felines had been fitted with collars adorned with tags showing their name and our new phone number. Since our new abode sat on 1/2 acre they were indoor/outdoor cats.
    He was the only one that split.
    For weeks everytime the phone rang we had a little hope.
    By summer it had been a couple of months. Every time I spotted road kill I had to take a closer look to confirm the worst.
    When the phone rang one night in August and a voice said: “Does someone named Rizzo live there?” we had given up all hope.
    He was up a tree…12 miles south through the country. Any number of predators could have gotten him in that stretch considering how many times he could have gone in circles to be 12 miles from home in 3 months.
    When we got him home and in the light he looked as skinny as a rail but otherwise healthy.
    We did not see him come out from under the couch for two weeks.
    Eventually he wandered outside but I don’t think he ever left the property again.
    Ratso Rizzo was 16 when he was put down by the vet.
    Cat cancer or something.
    He shoulda’ died on a bus to Florida.

    2
  77. Kathy says:

    @Jen:

    Give him some time, and he’ll claim to 1) have known that masks stop* the spread of SARS-CoV2 before the experts did, and 2) that he’s been wearing a mask longer than anyone.

    *Masks reduce the spread of the virus. they don’t stop it. But trump, if he goes full in, will claim they absolutely STOP it cold.

  78. CSK says:

    @Moosebreath:
    Oh, he’s as fat as a pig. But anyone with his capacity for self-deception probably looks in the mirror and sees a 24-year-old triathlete.

  79. Tyrell says:

    @OzarkHillbilly: Few people expected this assassin to have been captured alive. This may well be someone who was set up.
    The news reporters will not dig into this very deeply, and who can blame them. Whoever is behind all this is powerful, and can get to anyone.
    When Lee Harvey Oswald was apprehended I remember everyone saying that he would not live out the week. As it happened he was killed two days later at the Dallas police station! I remember my father commenting on Saturday night before how the police kept moving him openly through the halls there, holding him out almost like a target! Anyone could have walked in that police station, and did.
    The man who killed Oswald, Jack Ruby, died* of “cancer” a couple of years later, before his second trial.
    President Johnson said that he did not believe in the “lone gunman” theory.
    *Ruby died at Parkland Hospital in Dallas. The same hospital that Kennedy died in!

    1
  80. de stijl says:

    @CSK:

    At uni in the girl’s dorm Manor House, the head housekeeper was originally a German speaker and would randomly capitalize words in notices she would post. The original Twitter I suppose. It was pretty fascinating. Her English was pretty good but some part of her brain insisted that Trash be capitalized.

    Just by reading her posted statements about allowable behavior made me think she was kinda a hero and then I met her and she was super grumpy and not very pleasant.

    Trump capitalizes words randomly because he is uneducated and ignorant.

    Definitely not stupid, but very ignorant. He is brilliant at distracting, and at blaming others.

  81. Sleeping Dog says:

    @Jen:

    You need some new friends 🙂

  82. Monala says:

    @Jen: I’d say that there is a huge difference between a group that has been claiming, without proof, for the last several years that any day now, there will be widespread arrests of Democrats and liberal celebrities for the evidence-free accusations of child trafficking and pedophilia, and that the non-existent basement of a pizza parlor is the haven for such activities; vs people who are concerned about the actual murder of the son and critical wounding of the husband of a federal judge involved in a case against Deutsche Bank related to Jeffrey Epstein. It may be that the attacks on her family are unrelated, but this is an actual, frightening incident that requires investigation.

    2
  83. de stijl says:

    @Mister Bluster:

    Okay. That was a good story.

    You could have retold it instead of block quoting the old…

    Not a reason for a perfectly searchable archive.

  84. de stijl says:

    In Portal there is no cake.

    In real life, Ping Pong Pizza does not have a basement. Hillary Clinton is neither a cannibal nor a pederast. Give it up!

    1
  85. de stijl says:

    @de stijl:

    What is scary is that given access, I could design a perfectly searchable archive in a half day.

    It would be a bad idea, but I could. Easy as pie.

  86. de stijl says:

    @Tyrell:

    If you are a troll you are really good. Years long. Good characterization.

    If you are real, you swallow conspiracy theories like chocolate.

    Remember when you were sporting about Jade Helm 15?

    Speaking of Chocolate, Snow Patrol kicks ass. Weird song structure, but good.

    2
  87. Mister Bluster says:

    @de stijl:..You could have retold it instead of block quoting the old…

    Whenever anyone asks me “what do you do?” I always reply “As little as possible.”

    1
  88. HarvardLaw92 says:

    @Monala:

    federal judge involved in a case against Deutsche Bank related to Jeffrey Epstein

    The case is tangentially related, at best, to Jeffrey Epstein. Without getting into the legal minutiae, the plaintiffs in that case are investors who are suing Deutsche for what they allege was lying to them. In their allegation, Deutsche was not forthcoming about the sufficiency of its anti-money laundering measures, and failed to exert sufficient oversight with regard to high risk clients like Epstein, leading to a downturn in its businesses and material loss of their invested funds. Epstein’s relevance to this case is nothing more than serving as an example of the plaintiff’s allegations. You could fill in any number of other names there and have the same effect.

    The short version is: shareholders lost money, they’re pissed about it, and they’re suing Deutsche to try to recoup some of their losses. It doesn’t involve Epstein; it’s entirely about Deutsche.

    The best evidence we have wrt Salas at this point is that a disgruntled attorney with a prior grudge against the judge snapped.

    3
  89. de stijl says:

    I asked a colleague out to lunch because she was interesting and knowledgeable. She knew stuff I didn’t.

    We talked about indexing and hashing. In her old job she had sort of invented hashing before it was an acknowledged thing. Just did it because she thought it up.

    We also talked about market baskets and how that is a nigh unsolvable problem. People are weird.

    Couponing, and how that should be administered and tracked.

    It was truly fascinating.

    Eventually, we truly were colleagues and worked for the same mercenary team after I had levelled up my skills. Almost a decade later.

    She went to SW Missouri State and was the only woman in all of her classes. I’d have to do the math. At the time of our lunch she was ~ 55 and I was ~ 25. Way back when when women did not study programming or computer science. She was tough when she needed to be.

    Carol was a bad-ass and an OG.

    Hat tip to Carol. We went to Red Lobster.

    2
  90. Jen says:

    @Monala: It’s the immediate leap, without *any* evidence, that clearly this is some massive conspiracy to somehow(?) something, something, Epstein.

    It is absolutely a horrible crime and needs to be investigated. I just hate the almost instant leap to conspiracy, and the fact that people don’t see how problematic the behavior is that they are engaging in.

    4
  91. MarkedMan says:

    @Tyrell: I’m assuming your father was either a Dallas cop or a Dallas criminal, seeing as how he knew enough about a prisoners movements to comment about it to his kid. I would ask which, cop or criminal, but I recognize that’s a bit of a personal question.

  92. de stijl says:

    @Mister Bluster:

    I can appreciate that sentiment. I too am lazy at some things.

    But in retelling old stories you relive that moment. Blockquoting past you is too easy.

    I really enjoyed sharing about Carol and our super nerdy lunch talking about indexing.

    Had not thought about in years. That was a nice memory.

    I am glad to have relived it.

  93. Teve says:

    Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity accused of sexual misconduct in new lawsuit

    It never made sense that Sean Hannity was Cohen client number three but they just talked briefly about real estate. Hannity was talking to his buddy’s sleazy fixer about how to deal with some bad behavior.

    https://www.vulture.com/2020/07/tucker-carlson-sean-hannity-sexual-misconduct-lawsuit.html

    1
  94. Gustopher says:

    @de stijl:

    Your past self is past. You have responsibility for your past actions, yes. But I don’t get re-reading past comments.

    Sometimes is fun to read your past comments to see who you were, way back when.

    1
  95. de stijl says:

    @Gustopher:

    I get that. I see how it could be interesting and fun in moderation.

    I like how people have discovered tips and tricks to do that. That is cool.

  96. Mister Bluster says:

    @de stijl:..Blockquoting past you is too easy.

    When I start living my life for your approval I’ll let yo know.