Thursday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Thursday, December 2, 2021
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41 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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A handful of fanatics.
My comment didn’t post.
For the second time: http://www.thebulwark.com/trump-tried-to-kill-biden-with-covid-19/
The gift that keeps on giving.
[emphasis added]
America is Running on Fumes
In film, science, and the economy, the U.S. has fallen out of love with the hard work of invention.
He goes on to provide examples and finishes with some reasons.
He goes on to point out that the best argument against his position is the internet and specifically the software industry, but counters that with:
Worth the read.
@CSK: The more I think about this, the madder I get.
I know it’s a pipe dream, but I’d really like to hear from the Secret Service on this one. Given how close they are (physical proximity) to the President, it’s highly likely that they knew he had tested positive. This means that at least one of their agents presumably knew that the President was putting someone else under the Secret Service’s protection (Biden) at risk. So, the Secret Service was aware that a person–albeit the President–was putting a candidate for the presidency in harm’s way.
There’s something not remotely right about this.
@Sleeping Dog: I was just thinking about this a day or two ago. I wonder how much of this was affected by the extension of the length of time a work could be covered by copyright. Because of that, the ability to rework and use older works was seriously curtailed.
@Jen:
I’ve always assumed that the Secret Service was empowered to override the president’s wishes when he wanted to do something that would endanger himself. Dick Cheney, although VP, got carried out of his office on 9/11 when he refused to leave voluntarily.
SS agents are supposed to give their lives to protect the president, which is why they had to accompany him in a closed car on his joyride around the grounds of Walter Reed while he had Covid.
I have no doubt that Trump was hoping to kill Biden. As for any other deaths that might occur…so what?
@Mike in Arlington:
The whole copyright issues is likely a result of and a cause. An unvirtuous circle if you will. For corporations, keeping control of a franchise is far more profitable than the risk of finding something new.
The patent/copyright process is a mess that only serves the interests of a narrow section of the economy. The reality is that you can patent/copyright almost anything and it is left up to the courts to determine whether the patent/copyright was for original work conducted by the holder.
@Sleeping Dog:..go take a shower…
My reaction when the Atlantic informed me that I have only one free article left this month.
@CSK:
That or make him ill or incapacitate him, yes. My point being, if a random general member of the public knowingly exposed someone under Secret Service protection to a deadly pathogen, what would happen to that individual? Presumably there would be some ramifications due to the intent to harm. So, why would Trump be exempt?
It sounds like the plot of page-turner genre fiction, I know, but the bottom line is that someone under the Secret Service’s protection knowingly exposed someone else under the Secret Service’s protection to a pathogen. It feels to me like Trump did something here that would result in serious ramifications had it been a member of the public and I want to know WHY the Secret Service isn’t being asked about it.
@Jen:
I’d like to know, too. You’d think the Secret Service would like to know as well, since over 900 of them have been infected by Covid.
Obviously the SS knew about Trump’s diagnosis after he was carted off to Walter Reed, but possibly they didn’t know about the positive test prior to the debate. Alyssa Farah Griffin, Trump’s comms director, said she didn’t know. And she was very angry about it.
@OzarkHillbilly:
Well, Trump is bitching that he didn’t get credit for the size of the crowd that showed up for his Jan. 6 “rally.”
Of course, she’s a Trump fan as well as an illiterate:
http://www.nypost.com/2021/12/02/accused-michigan-gunmans-mom-wrote-letter-praising-trump/
This might be my favorite headline of 2021:
UFC boss Dana White, family positive for COVID-19, relying on Joe Rogan recovery methods
This is like someone who is on trial for a crime relying on Lionel Hutz for legal advice*
* This might be an insult to Lionel Hutz, who although he is a cartoon character, seems to be much more qualified to give legal advice than Joe Rogan is qualified to give medical advice. Maybe White should turn to Dr. Hibbard for his medical advice.
@CSK: from the article:
I praise the prosecutor for considering charges, but castigate them for not just charging. There’s bound to be something on negligent child welfare blah blah blah relying upon the harm done to their own kid, even if the prosecutor cannot find something that ties the parents directly to the deaths of the other kids.
@Gustopher:
When they lived in Florida, both parents accumulated misdemeanor records for DUI, driving on suspended licenses, and writing bad checks. None of these things would prevent them from passing a background check in Michigan for a gun purchase.
@CSK: I’m not sure why the parents’ background matters — scumbag or upstanding citizens. Once they have a gun in a house with a kid, they have a responsibility to keep the gun away from the kid, at least when the kid is unsupervised.
If the kid gets access to the gun so he can hurt hurt himself or others, that’s negligence just from a child welfare standpoint. It’s like filling your home with bear traps.
@Gustopher:
I don’t think scumbags would bother to keep a gun under lock and key, so it matters from that standpoint, I suppose.
Given Mama Crumbley’s obsession with her Second Amendment rights, I’m not surprised the kid had easy access to the gun.
She ended her letter to Trump with the words “I’d rather get grabbed by the pussy than fucked in the ass.” A lady to her fingertips.
@CSK:
I was speaking from memory. Here is how Ms. Crumbley actually describes herself:
“A Hardworking Middle Class Law Abiding Citizen who is sick of getting fucked in the ass and would rather be grabbed by the pussy.”
@Gustopher:
Agreed
I wonder if this will actually happen: Angela Merkel says Vaccination could become mandatory in Germany from February.
Second omicron variant case in the US–a Minnesota man who was fully vaccinated and boosted in November.
Via WaPo.
@Jen:
This is why I see the vaccine as a layer of protection against the trump disease, and not absolute protection by itself. This virus is too dangerous and changes too fast (given the fertile ground we’ve given it).
BTW, I’m deep in work for Hell Week 1, and more is coming. Hopefully we’ll be finished by the end of December with the work, rather than being finished by the work.
@CSK:
Yes and no. The chaos of real violence can not be anticipated in strict set of regulations and personal protection details accept that. Common sense and a willingness to not only catch a bullet but face the legal music if disobeying a direct order are needed.
Illustrative may be Pence’s reported actions on 1/6, in which I’ve read his PSD and their 20 car detachment demanded Pence get in an armored car while they were in the garage. Pence refused, saying that he knew that if he got in one he and his entire detachment would leave.
There Pence acknowledges his limit of control, but at the same time knows they won’t physically pick him up and toss him in a car.
I give Pence credit for something here. With 20 cars, he had at least 20 heavily armed and highly trained men. By instead placing himself in the same room with Nancy, he placed her and the other congress critters within the cordon of his formidable PSD.
Semi-good news, buzz is building up about a booster shot for everyone 18 and up in Mexico. I may not have to brave a trip to San Diego.
@Kathy: Agreed. If anything, the fact that the individual’s symptoms were mild and resolved quickly should be reassuring that getting a booster is a good idea. It also doesn’t indicate when he received the booster–getting boosted 2 weeks before the convention is different than 2 days before the convention.
I am both vaccinated and boosted and am watching this mostly because it interests me.
@Jen:
Yes. This, to me, demonstrates the efficacy of the booster.
@OzarkHillbilly:
I don’t see Benito, Giuliani, Meadows, Wood, or Powell the Kraken lawyer in that picture.
@Jen:
Two days might be better for a booster. We know the first two doses take about 2 weeks to get an adaptive immune response, but the booster might get one faster. All it has to do is wake up the memory B cells from the previous two doses.
I wish I knew for sure.
@Kathy:
I’ve read that with the booster, your immune system begins to “rebound” within days (no specific number provided), but peak protection will take 2-4 weeks.
@CSK:
Taking a page from the long hunt for the Higgs boson, I’ve taken to calling the immune system “the goddamned adaptation.”
@Kathy: And you won’t either. The people in the picture are the ones who will get arrested. Back during my childhood when John Silber was president of Boston University, he once told a group of assembled students that if they didn’t want to get arrested at protests, they should watch their professors and leave at the same time.
@CSK: What really stuck out to me is how her rant were about things that the left are trying to address but are being blocked by the GOP and establishment. Such as how her husband suffered a stroke and a broke back which strained the family financially. Universal healthcare would of lessened the hardship greatly but it appears that such thoughts never connected in her head. Instead she begs Trump to solve everything despite it being GOP policy to not help with any of her complaints.. Then runs off and buys a $400-$800 handgun instead of paying for car insurance or whatever….
How do you reach people so delusional they expect left wing policies to be enacted by conservative republicans??
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
That was Howard Zinn’s trick, according to a friend of mine: He’d urge the students to revolt, then vanish a minute before the cops appeared.
@Matt:
Trump is her savior, she believes.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
I know.
But the handful of fanatics Meadows correctly blames are him, his boss, and his boss’ lawyers and boosters, no?
Didn’t see Lindell in the photo, either.
@Matt:
Loony Lady also wrote about children of illegal immigrants getting an education, so I think it’s pretty clear how you reach her.
Her kid won the “shitty parents setting you up for trouble” lottery. Even with the best parents, he might have been genetically predisposed to be an asshole, or doomed to a lower-class job, or whatever, but he wouldn’t be taking his parents’ unsecured gun to school to kill his classmates. Barring actual mental illness, he probably wouldn’t have thrown his future away at 15, and wouldn’t have taken anyone else with him even if he did.
@Matt:
@CSK:
Aye. They probably don’t believe the GQP has to enact anything. Benito can just wave his magic wand, or whatever Jesús did, and make things all better.
Hell, he ran as though someone else had been sitting behind the Resolute desk for his whole term, and got many millions to vote for him.
Which reminds me: the Republicans allegedly disgusted with trump and happy to see him gone, are those who’ve already quit, like Corker, or are the two serving in the House Select Committee on the putsch. Maybe Romney on a good day, and ditto Collins and Murkowski. Everyone else either backs El Pito Pequeño, or acts as though they do.
Sure, for a short while between January 6th and 7th, Mitch and others looked ready to toss him under the bus. But then that odd feeling of decency passed.
@CSK: There are a number of people who met with Trump in the days after his positive test, who then got Covid. Some of them were Republican operatives who likely think that getting Trump’s Covid was an honor, or that want to have a future in Republican politics. But, I’m thinking of the reporter who was talking with him in Airforce One.
I want that reporter to sue for reckless endangerment, or something similar that is actually grounds to sue. Not for the damages, but for the discovery.
@Kathy: PictureS.
There are 3 links to different pictures in that post. One for “handful”, one for “of”, one for “fanatics”. For the record, neither “Benito, Giuliani, Meadows, Wood, or Powell the Kraken” are in any of the pics. Just a “handful of fanatics” or 1700.
The Sex Pistols had it right.
No future. No future. No future. No future for you.
What with the Supreme Court primed to gut Roe v. Wade, and the D’s are gonna get totally slaughtered in the midterms, and the Rs are gonna press advantage what with continual gerrymandering. We are fucked.
We are headed towards disaster. The bad guys are winning. Fear is beating hope.
I am in no way confident the American Experiment will last this era. Frightened, actually.
I am truly scared. I think we might be fucked. I am petrified.
No Future for you.