Wednesday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Wednesday, May 8, 2024
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95 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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Current Logic in America
Gift link :
Washington Post
“Militarized new Russia”
I haven’t read it yet, massively long piece.
A lot of this seems really close to far right (and some GOP) ideas for USA.
More from my Post link above, the first few paragraphs:
This puts the MidEast in context, with Hamas/Palestinians on one side over the Russia/China/Iran axis, Israel and KSA on the other.
Mask Cult: Choosing to not wear a mask in public should be treated the same as drunk driving.
https://twitter.com/EricAbbenante/status/1787996942670110938
This piece really is interesting, and it explains a lot of things about why Trump’s ardent devotees forgive him his multitudinous trespasses:
http://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/05/07/stormy-daniels-donald-trump-evangelical-appeal-00156488
Nice piece. As a companion piece I think the link below goes well with it. There is a narrative promoted by many that the US is to blame for Russia’s actions because we talked about expanding NATO and because when Ukraine tossed out the Russian stooge we told them we thought that was a good idea. Note that we didnt provide any material support but somehow it’s our fault there was a “coup”.
It’s all mostly nonsense. The Russians, largely under Putin’s guidance, have spent years re-establishing the myth of Stalin, changing their history books and erasing the parts where he killed millions in Ukraine. They have been engaging in a long term effort to erase effects of western culture in Russia with the state and the Orthodox church having a symbiotic relationship, mostly with the state in charge. It’s anti- woman, anti-gay and anti-anything that opposes the totalitarian state.
This is all in the name of re-establishing the Russian empire. This has clearly been Putin’s long term goal. It’s one that is supported in large part by most of the population, though hard to tell how much of that is due to the propaganda of the last 25 years. NATO was never the issue. Note that the same people who claim the NATO issue is at fault also claim, correctly for the most part, that the European nations in NATO didnt spend enough for defense, let alone have the capacity to go on offense. (These are also usually the same people who claimed Russia would never invade Ukraine.) Putin is many things but not stupid (mostly). He knew that the nations of NATO would support Ukraine but he also thought that Ukraine was so weak and NATO so incapable that he could quickly overwhelm Ukraine. He was wrong in the short term.
So why now? NATO was no threat and Putin knew that. As noted in the WaPO article there was probably some motivation due to the stalling of economic growth. Russia had an oil boom but that had faded and growth slowed. A foreign war would give the people cause to rally around the leader, but I think the idea proposed by Alperovitch below makes more sense. Putin wants a legacy. He wants the same kind of esteem given to Stalin the emperors (esses) he idolizes. Expansion of the empire and reclaiming Ukraine would do that. It would also allow him to accelerate the cultural changes he wanted to initiate.
https://www.spytalk.co/p/dmitri-alperovitch-on-the-new-cold
CSK- Reminds me of sex education growing up in my evangelical church. The man was supposed to want sex and try not to ask for it until married. The woman wasn’t supposed to want sex and say no until married. So on the first date with a girl who asked if I wanted to have sex the rules were shattered and cognitive dissonance established. The outcome was predictable.
Steve
@charontwo:
Throughout reading that article about how Putin is remaking Russia I kept thinking DeSantis would do that if he could. He has done some of it.
@steve:
Stalin benefited from an enemy that wanted to oppress, mistreat, and kill the Russian people even more than Stalin did.
As to the various Russian emperors, the standouts are Peter and Catherine. Both wanted to involve Russia more in European affairs, and both tried to carry out reforms to benefit their subjects. Their foreign adventurism and wars were par for the course in their time.
We live in a different time, what with the UN charter and transnational trade blocks and all. Not to mention war ceased to be some glorious, masculine adventure when WWI laid bare the carnage and suffering it entailed (which somehow the US civil war failed to do).
Mad Vlad should do well to remember all that.
RFK Jr. says he had a brain worm. I’ll just leave that here.
No, it’s not the Onion:
On other matters, AstraZeneca has withdrawn its COVID vaccine, as now there are lots of other vaccines that target newer variants of the trump virus.
I get that, but I don’t.
Pfizer, as far as I know, isn’t selling the original strain vaccine it launched in 2020, but rather the shots for the newer variants. AZ’s vaccine is a virus vector shot. It uses a non-replicating adenovirus to deliver instructions (nucleic acids) for the cells to produce spike proteins. I don’t think there’s any reason they couldn’t update their formulation for newer variants, just like the mRNA vaccines do.
I see two reasons:
1) It’s harder and/or more expensive to do this for a virus vector than for an mRNA shot (though this vaccine sold for less than Moderna’s and Pfizer’s).
2) The AZ Oxford vaccine wasn’t as effective as the mRNA ones.
I’m inclined towards the second. You may recall in early 2021 reports on its efficacy varied a lot, and there were oddities like a smaller first dose performed better than the full first dose.
I got two shots of it in 2022 as boosters. aside from a slight night time fever*, I had no major side effects. Coworkers who got the initial 2 dose full vaccination in 2021, and who then fell ill with Omicron, reported a milder, shorter course. So the AZ shot was effective in preventing severe illness of even newer variants.
In short, it may be the shot was a good first generation attempt, hurried up due to the pandemic emergency, but fell short of what other vaccines could do. So, a good thing overall.
*And fever-driven semi-lucid dreams that went on for a while, and which I could recall in more detail the following day.
@CSK:
Thanks
Interesting piece that I’ve passed along to by Southern Baptist brother.
What struck me first and foremost was the apparent dissonance between the Old Testament and the New Testament view on the qualities that men and women should emulate to be justified as believers/righteous.
(I was not as much interested in the pornography angle except that it might exemplify the Old Testament view of the righteous masculine)
@gVOR10:
Jinx!
@Michael Reynolds:
the worm/parasite died…
do you suppose it was something that the worm had eaten to caused it to die?
@gVOR10: @Michael Reynolds:
What a loser. All my brain worms are still healthy and full of vigor. Doctors say thanks to those worms’ appetites I have one of the smoothest brains they’ve ever encountered.
@Michael Reynolds: Obvious next questions: how long did he have it before he was diagnosed, and when did he become a full blown conspiracy nut?
@Paul L.: Who are Leana Wen and Eric Abbenante and why is either of their opinions on anything significant?
@charontwo:
@steve:
I’ve wondered for a while now if Putin was going to dispense with the fiction of elections and just declare himself Tsar. Looks like he’s got a couple of daughters. I wonder what it would take for him to do something like that.
@just nutha: Fair is fair. We nutpick extreme right wingers all the time and Paul L nutpicks extremist on the left. Does it really make a difference that his picks are obscure Xitterers and ours are Federal judges, members of congress, and the presumptive prez nominee?
Aileen Cannon has postponed indefinitely Trump’s documents trial.
@CSK:
Aileen Cannon continues to abuse her judicial discretion, and one might argue at some point she will be guilty of obstruction of justice. I’m less clear on whether a judge can be charged with this particular felony, if all the actions she takes are within the bounds of her position.
@just nutha: Dr. Leana Wen is a highly respected physician, a former health commissioner, and (I think) former president of Planned Parenthood. I haven’t read the article Paul linked to, but Dr. Wen does know what she’s talking about, meaning she’s an actual health professional and doctor.
I’m surprised one aspect of Stormy Daniels testimony didn’t garner more reaction: when he told her that he reminded him of his daughter (Ivanka) just before he wallowed on top of her. That, plus his many recorded declarations that he wanted to hump Ivanka that are out there, on the record. You never know what is going to pierce the consciousness of a portion of the 70% or so that vote for … whoever, but this seems like it might have some legs.
What are the odds that Ivana was able to keep Dirty Don from molesting her? I don’t think they are good.
@Jen: The cited post appears to be some kind of take down on Wen. I am not sure what it means but I wouldn’t assume it’s a credible characterization without spending a lot more time on this than I care to.
@MarkedMan: Besides the worms, mercury poisoning has some effects on brain function as well. I feel bad for the guy, but maybe just maybe he’s not fit to be President.
/also, this reminded me of the computer game Worms which provided months of fun
@Kathy:
One of the great ironies here is that although Merchan and Cannon were both born in Colombia, Trump considers only Cannon to be a true American.
I was going to buy the new iPad, mostly because I bought my 3 year old one with minimum memory and my browser experience has deteriorated to unusalbility if I go to Jalopnik, Gizmodo, or TheHill. They are so rife with ads and trapping crap that having even a couple of their tabs open often slows me down to a crawl and I have to kill the browser in order to get usability back. I’ve been using Safari with an ad blocker but that doesn’t seem to be effective. Early this morning I downloaded the DuckDuckGo browser and, OMG, it is so fast and clean and renders sites with much, much less clutter. Just saved myself a lot of money.
@CSK:
Interesting why these people are so focused on pornography.
(Greg Abbot just drove Pornhub out of TX).
@steve:
Thx for the Spytalk link, scary stuff.
@gVOR10: @Michael Reynolds: @MarkedMan:
Also known by its Latin name vermis heroinus.
@Neil Hudelson:
I can’t stop laughing.
@charontwo:
Well, porn consumption appears to them to be a masculine virtue.
@Paul L.: Masking up at the height of the pandemic was an easy test of patriotism: Would you do this one simple thing to help protect your fellow Americans?
To the surprise of no one, damned near the entire RW failed. I’d bet donuts to dollars you did too.
@Jen:
highly respected physician, a former health commissioner, and former president of Planned Parenthood Leana Wen
Now give examples on why she is highly respected.
@MarkedMan: The ad blockers that work with Safari don’t seem very good, and the internet is just not usable without an ad blocker.
It makes me think about an ecosystem with plants evolving poisons and thorns, and animals evolving defenses against them so they can get to the scrumptious plant matter.
Is there any other ostensibly innocuous human creation that has become so user-hostile? Even free jazz and poetry aren’t attacking their consumers as viciously.
@Jen:
@OzarkHillbilly:
The troll bot is still upset that the vaccine for the original strain of the trump virus wasn’t as effective at preventing infection from the Delta variant of the trump virus. She seems to believe for some reason, that scientists are all-knowing, and were therefore lying about what the vaccine could protect you from.
Expending any more brain power on their ravings would be highly counterproductive. There’s nothing new, relevant, interesting, germane, or even trivial in them.
Just this: if you ever want to picture an absolute, empty, blank nothingness, read their ravings.
@Paul L.:
This was the hope. And, if the vaccines were as effective as the initial trials, it would have been the reality. The protection wanes faster than expected and the virus mutates faster than expected, so the vaccines are good for blunting the effects, but don’t solve all problems.
We were hoping for vaccines as effective as the MMR vaccine.
I think a better comparison is drunk drivers to killer whales.
They should have. The public health case is clear, even with the weaker than hoped for vaccines, and the little we know about long covid.
Long covid has the potential to be a mass disabling event (risks of getting it seems to go up as you are exposed to Covid more often), which would be really expensive for SSI Disability.
Can we trust the unvaccinated? I think all signs point to no.
And we should absolutely have a mask requirement in hospitals, and other places where there are a lot of sick people. (I would also want it in other settings, based on wastewater virus levels)
They’re bad people who use their freedoms irresponsibly. They spread disease. We also withhold freedoms from people with tuberculosis
Seriously though, it should be treated as a public health issue with civil rights implications rather than a civil rights issue with public health implications.
Kristi Noem seems to have cancelled the remainder of her book tour.
I guess her claim that she shot Kim Jong Un in a gravel pit backfired on her.
@Paul L.:Brief reminder, stupid, that there a worldwide infectious disease sweeping mankind at the time. The best analog we could see was a similar flu that had killed millions; covid did kill millions; death rates were much higher in places with mask/vaccine resistance.
Dr Wen’s advice was excellent.
Speaker Johnson has a very loose grip on the English language. Or maybe it’s reality that is slipping away from him.
@gVOR10: I stand corrected [po-face emoji].
I’m on a transatlantic cruise and have been pretty out of touch. What is the general sense of how the Trumphush money trial is going? Fox was on at the fitness center and I watched for a few minutes and discovered that everything he is alleged to
have done is normal and perfectly legal.
@Jen: Thank you and see above comment.
@Bob@Youngstown:
Thanks. Is your brother a Trump supporter?
Those screaming “Jacobson v. Massachusetts” please remember:
1. That was smallpox – a hell of a lot more terrifying than Covid
2. Jacobson could have paid a $150 fine (today $) and gone on his merry way
3. Mandatory vaccination was only for people 21 years and older
The judges who relied on Jacobson knew they were lying. Jacobson says “if there’s a really bad plague, you get the shot or pay a small fine”
Not “if there’s a bad flu, the Constitution is suspended”
@CSK: East to explain: which one has the WASP name?
@Paul L.: All of those points made perfect sense within the context of what we were dealing with at the time. That you don’t understand context is unsurprising.
@just nutha:
True.
@Paul L.: you are such a dupe. Your pal Eric is a lying sack and you are such a willing mark. I hope everyone here actually follows your link so all can see what a ridiculous fool you are.
Doctor Wen should sue that malicious jerk to oblivion. Idiot.
@Paul L.: Truth be told, she’s not 100% wrong on all of her points and is still entitled to opinions even if some are hyperbolic.
On the other hand please feel free to use your agency to go unmasked or drive intoxicated for that matter all you want.
@Kathy:
But Delta and the science evoluted!
Did the Delta variant of the trump virus not have the spike protein that the mRNA vaccine generated to boost immunity?
Strange I don’t have to get the same vaccine regiment that I got in childhood and joining the military boosted annually DNC mask cult bot.
I understand you must preserve brain power to store the narrative and talking points from the DNC.
@Paul L.: You need help, but I doubt there is a cure for what ails you.
@steve:
In international affairs there are seldom pure black and white hats. A heck of a lot of the old-school diplomats thought our involvement in actively trying to get Ukraine out of the Russian economic sphere was provocative and unwise. They would naturally move away and/or shift to a modern western system, just like all the others (including Russia itself) naturally. All empires try to cling on to what they have or used to have.
In war everybody thinks they are the good guys so one has to consider the other guy’s perspective. Don’t have to agree with it or like it but you have to understand it and not dismiss it out of hand. Those old diplomats I speak of were old Cold Warriors, I include Pickering in that list, they are not Russian shills.
@Senyordave:
Hope the ocean gods have been kind to you.
I’m not keeping track of the trial. But just today, I learned that Stormy Daniels* is a libertarian who affiliates with the Republican Party. Don’t know why that surprises me, but it does. Not sure if folks around here find that more/less [insert adjective of your choice] than her other decisions.
ps, Andes mints are vile. It’s a fact.
*Triple checked to make sure that neither I nor the spell checker wrote Stormy Dragon.
@Paul L.:
Oh, ffs, Paul. Just Google “Leana Wen.” That should satisfy your curiosity.
@MarkedMan: “What are the odds that Ivana was able to keep Dirty Don from molesting her?”
I’ve long been disappointed by my failure to be able to start a rumor that Ivanka is actually Barron’s mother… I guess avoiding social media has its drawbacks.
@Paul L.: “Now give examples on why she is highly respected.”
You just listed five good reasons. Why isn’t that enough for you?
@Paul L.: Thanks for demonstrating that even you can see just how disastrous Trump’s current trial is for him. Why else waste everyone’s time dragging up years-old arguments over vaccines and masks and pretending to have been in the military, if not to change the subject from the appalling picture that is your Orange God in the dock?
Beth- The problem is that they are women. He is very much promoting the idea that women should give up their bodies to the state by having lots of children. Men should lead. Cathy the Great was just an aberrancy.
dazed- That’s fair, but I think that when you look at what Putin has done from when he first took over he was really building a narrative that the Russian empire needed to be re-established and he is the one to do it. American critics will be, not surprisingly, amercing centric in their analysis looking for things that we could have done better or why what we did is bad. I think that based upon the long term goals Putin has had in mind the only way he doesnt invade Ukraine is if the EU/NATO had foregone any economic ties at all and publicly announced, many times, that Ukraine could never join NATO, as a start. Then Ukraine would have had to essentially declare itself a vassal state. That might have worked.
Also, again, I cant really find much evidence that we really had that much to do with the supposed “coup”.
On Leana Wen, everything posted is taken out of context. We dont really know what she said and/or when she said it. For sure, the public health people made some mistakes. The ones listed seem more like right wing talking points than mistakes. The vaccines really were remarkably effective and did let us go back to relatively normal lives again.
On masking, again, lab studies showed that they were effective. In studies where there was externally enforced compliance they had good results (hospitals). In larger studies where compliance was not enforced the results were mixed. That was not due to masks not working but rather compliance issues. If you dont take your antibiotics they dont work, but it’s even worse for masks. If you have 5 people in a family and 4 are rigorously compliant but one is not then they can all end up infected.
Steve
@gVOR10:
Hmm. Is his new handle “Brainworm K”?
@gVOR10: I have no idea if brainworms are common or dangerous, but its going to be hard for America not to look at him differently. As gVOR10 said, I’ll just leave that here.
@gVOR10: I need to apologize. I didn’t dig into the comment by @Paul L.:. He was quoting a RW nut job claiming a highly respected expert, Leona Wen, he didn’t understand was a LW nut. However I’ll stand by my crack that they tend to pick put random lefties on social media while we criticize Federal judges, members of congress, and their presumptive prez nominee as nuts.
Paul L represents something we see regularly. He reads OAN or Breitbart or wherever he’s getting his “news” and comes over here to enlighten us rubes with the “facts” he’s found. A few years ago “epistemic closure” was a meme. I don’t see the phrase much anymore but we sure see the closure. Reading comments, and even news stories, on their sites I see that: Russia, Russia, Russia was nothing but a Clinton driven hoax. The 2020 election was rigged. Trump is pure as the driven snow but being persecuted with partisan lawfare. Crime is rising. Ukraine is full of Nazis. Global warming is a hoax. And, as here, COVID didn’t amount to anything but they were subject to persecution worse than the holocaust. I can see why they believe so fervently, if any part of it cracks, their whole worldview collapses.
Factoid of the day: Voyager 1 was supposed to head to Pluto after its fly-by of Saturn. However, in order to examine Saturn’s moon Titan more closely, its trajectory was altered. This led, as duly calculated, to the probe’s overall trajectory to be flung out of the plane of the ecliptic, and to miss Pluto entirely.
Meantime Voyager 2 stuck to its pre planned trajectory, and headed to Uranus and then Neptune for fly-bys of each, before continuing on to interstellar space.
So, New Horizons exists because NASA’s scientists were too interested in Titan.
Bonus factoid: Though very far from Jupiter by the time the comet Shoemaker-Levy impacted the planet, both Voyager probes turned their instruments in that direction. Their cameras couldn’t see much (they were designed for much closer work), but the probes added something to the overall observations.
@Paul L.:
Eric Abbenante is a comedian, and of course, an expert on so-called ‘mask cults.’
@steve:
All excellent points and well thought through.
Of course, the fact you are a Md (if memory serves) immediately makes you part of a larger cabal pushing fake lies about vaccines and climate change to forcefully reprogram the brains of real Americas who swear they have the intellectual capacity, curiosity, and honesty to actually examine things that contradict their religiously held belief that you are trying to screw them over with your crypto-socialism masquerading as science.
Remember, the only experts you can trust are the ones who agree with everything you already believe. After that, the only other honest people in the world are failed “comedians” and “filmmakers” whose major credit is partnering with Mike Lindell to reveal how the 2020 election was totally stolen even though none of his evidence has held up to date.
@gVOR10:
RFK Jr. is one of those people who, at first glance, seems to have something important to say. The problem is, after about two minutes the RFK Jr Experience starts to unravel. He starts to dissemble and equivocate. About five minutes in you understand that the mute button is there for situations like this.
@al Ameda: It’s a shame that the brain worm died. It might have had important things to say.
Poor little RFK3rd.
Google, Google… oh, I guess the brain worm is RFK4th, as he has a kid that is 3rd. Per Wikipedia:
They had two children: Robert Francis “Bobby” Kennedy III (born 1984 and married to writer, peace activist, and former CIA officer Amaryllis Fox)
More tornado warnings today (the 3rd in a week) (the one on Tuesday actually was a tornado, an EF1 that hit Sullivan, MO) but today’s storm was just lots of wind, golf ball sized hail, and 2″ of rain. Indian Creek has jumped it’s banks but HWY A remains dry. We are supposed to get more heavy rains tonight. We are also under a tornado watch.
If the rains come as predicted, it won’t surprise me if A goes under. In days to come the Meramec will become destructive too, but most folks out here are used to it and know what to do.
@OzarkHillbilly:
Meramec River…we here in Mass. and NH have a Merrimack River, meaning “swift water place” in Eastern Algonquian.
Matt- Remember that there are 12 foods that doctors dont want you to know about.
Steve
Miss Trailer Queen’s attempt to revive the Krazy Kaukus Klown Show has failed, as Congress voted to table the motion to vacate by a vote of 359 to 43.
What does royalty need to do to win a vote these days?
@Mimai: I dunno; I think they’re pretty good. Then again, I like pretty much anything chocolate except frozen yogurt or croissants (and I’ll eat a chocolate croissant in an emergency).
@CSK: Yep, not sure how ours got it’s spelling. The Meramec drains a considerable portion of the NE Ozarks. A lot of mining for iron and lead way back when around here. It jumps it’s banks on a somewhat regular basis. Indian creek on the other hand, is generally more well behaved in my experience.
@just nutha:
Vile mints for vile gents!
Your reminder that Paul L by his own admission is not interested in honest discourse:
”I don’t want to convince anyone. I want to see how people will go to defend what I see as indefensible.”
@Erik: Every time he comments, it feels like a slug slimed the comments. Never know what’s gonna draw his attention, doesn’t make any fucking sense, EVER, unless you’re stewed in RWNJ bullshit all day long, and his continued attention/vile towards long dead rape cases is creepy as fuck, as a woman.
I was glad when the admins scrubbed his comment yesterday. I actually had to step away from the computer, it felt so slimy.
@Kathy:
In minds of MTG and other hardcore trumpers she’s done a service and shown the Trump world who their real allies are by putting everyone on record. In the real world she’s done the entire United States an important service by putting on record that:
– In the end there were only 10 idiots willing to stand with her
– 196 Republicans had enough of her bullshit
– The Dems could be negotiated with, they wouldn’t exact too high a price, and they kept their word (unlike members of their own party)
I hope these realities sink in
@OzarkHillbilly:
You aroused my curiosity on the name Meramec’s origins. It seems to mean “ugly fish” or “catfish” in Algonquian. Also known as “the river of death” among the early pioneers.
@Matt Bernius:
Comedian Stephen Colbert performed an elaborate dance routine dedicated to COVID-19 vaccines on his late night show, garnering criticism online for the bit.
@Jax:
I might shut up if someone could debunk my point about gag orders instead of deleting it.
I like to view MeidasTouch and Glenn Kirschner to get the other side of the debate.
I remember highly respected expert, Leona Wen demanding the most draconian measures to deal with Covid and the unvaccinated. Guess the unvaccinated are dead (RIP Tucker Carlson) and no longer a problem. Joe Biden tried and pleaded with the unvaccinated to let him save them!!!1!!!
@Jax:
Debunk me by saying that dropping a gag order caused Due Process and Rule of Law to be abandoned as the case was “instead of tried by a public that has politicized what should be a matter for the criminal justice system”.
How The Story of Reason’s Subpoena and Gag Order Went Public.
@MarkedMan:
Dumb people don’t often realize when they’d do best to shut up.
To be fair, we’re all dumb like that from time to time, and sometimes we just don’t give a damn. But it’s particularly stupid when it’s plain to see how you’re hurting yourself and/or your cause, and you keep going and going and going like some kind of battery powered toy with a full charge.
There’s an incident told about Alexander’s campaigns, where an officer, his name escapes me, during a dinner goes on a rant against Mr. The Great, who grows angrier and angrier. Eventually Alexander orders him removed.
He comes back a short while later, and resumes his rant. Eventually Alexander either kills him, or orders him killed. I recall the scene was in Oliver Stone’s movie, and the rant was largely about Parmenio (there was good reason for officers to be sore about that matter).
Whether this actually happened or not, it’s one of the best examples of a dumb person, or a person being dumb, not knowing when to stop talking.
@Kathy: There are always people who say it is better to burn it all down. Almost without exception this is dumb
@Kathy: @MarkedMan:
As Emerson (probably) wisely observed, “When you strike at a king, probably shouldn’t do it when you’re outnumbered 10 to 1.”
MTG is done. She and Boebert should do a two-woman show, it’d kill in Branson. They could each do 15 minutes, and then it would be over.
@Michael Reynolds:
The Emerson quotation I’m familiar with is part of the lore of classic science fiction:
“If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the city of God which had been shown!”
John Campbell Jr. showed this quote to one Isaac Asimov, and told him, “I think Emerson is wrong. People would go nuts.” And then arose Nightfall.
How long until Stormy Daniels goes full E. Jean Carroll.
Stormy and E. Jean must longingly dream of their experience with Trump cursing that foreign bitch Melania. Like Cersei and Daenerys/Margaery
@Michael Reynolds:
I read that as “do each other” and now I’m sad.
…Stormy and E. Jean must longingly dream of their experience with Trump.
So you are conceding that Trump had sexual relations with both women and that his denials are lies.
@Paul L.:
I think Daniels and Carroll both want to regurgitate when they think of Trump.
And why would Carroll consider Melania a bitch? Trump was married to Marla Maples at the time he assaulted Carroll.
The only thing Daniels said about Melania was that she was beautiful.
@CSK: actually brother is NOT, however most of his fellow religious travelers are devoted to Trump.
And he can’t understand their allegiance.
@Paul L.: You know Tucker Carlson was vaccinated, right? They all were, all the “conservative” elites, while night after night, they encouraged you to kill yourselves in the name of freedumb.
I had the incident involving Alexander wrong. He did kill his officer, Cleitus, but not quite as I described it. Here’s the accepted sequence of events.
Pointed out by someone on Twitter:
Plot twist: RFKJr really did need Ivermectin.
@Paul L.: Does it turn you on that your mushroom king is a rapist? I don’t generally approve of kink shaming, but you should be ashamed.
@dazedandconfused:
The getting “Ukraine out of the Russian economic sphere” was a Ukrainian decision, in which the US played very little part indeed.
Depends; and in Russia’s case they are not so much trying to “cling on” as to regain.
A comparison might be if the UK decided to invade the Republic of Ireland to punish it for remaining a member of the EU.
Or if France decided that retaking Algeria would be a rational move.
It may be necessary to consider an opponents perspective in order to predict, or even frustrate, their moves.
That does not necessarily mean the best course is then to offer them something they desire in order to reach a deal; what they desire may be simply unacceptable.
@Jax:
That is false and misleading.
The “conservative” elites pushed the vaccine. They only acknowledged that their “crazy” viewers had the legal right to refuse the clot shot.
‘My body, my choice’: How vaccine foes co-opted the abortion rallying cry
@Paul L.: “How long until Stormy Daniels goes full E. Jean Carroll.”
You mean collecting close to a hundred million dollars from that fat sack of crap? Couldn’t happen fast enough.
@wr:
Stormy tried and owns Trump half a million. She is going to withdraw consent and claim Trump sexually assaulted her. Too bad the crime didn’t occur in New York but in July 2006 at a celebrity golf outing in Lake Tahoe.