154 thoughts on “Open Mic for the week of 12/9/2024”

    2. People are wondering why there was a trial at all, and the point is that without a trial to establish that Violence Is The Provenance Of The State, you get “Death Wish”.

      Although given that people here are still cheering on that nutball who shot a guy in the street, apparently that’s what they want these days.Report

      Reply

  3. Krugman’s last column for the times comparing when he started to now: What strikes me, looking back, is how optimistic many people, both here and in much of the Western world, were back then and the extent to which that optimism has been replaced by anger and resentment. And I’m not just talking about members of the working class who feel betrayed by elites; some of the angriest, most resentful people in America right now — people who seem very likely to have a lot of influence with the incoming Trump administration — are billionaires who don’t feel sufficiently admired.

    It’s hard to convey just how good most Americans were feeling in 1999 and early 2000. Polls showed a level of satisfaction with the direction of the country that looks surreal by today’s standards. My sense of what happened in the 2000 election was that many Americans took peace and prosperity for granted, so they voted for the guy who seemed as if he’d be more fun to hang out with.

    In Europe, too, things seemed to be going well. In particular, the introduction of the euro in 1999 was widely hailed as a step toward closer political as well as economic integration — toward a United States of Europe, if you like. Some of us ugly Americans had misgivings, but initially they weren’t widely shared.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/09/opinion/elites-euro-social-media.htmlReport

    Reply

    1. The 1990s were an optimistic time despite some geopolitical problems because the Cold War was over, Aparheid ended, and the I/P and Northern Ireland conflicts seemed resolved. North Korea and South Korea were talking to each other and the global economy was booming. Society seemed to be going globally in the proper direction. There were some sore parts like the Yugoslav Wars. Rwanda, and the Talinban ruling over Afghanistan but nothing that seemed unsolvable. The big liberal spectrum won and they won big. Then 9/11 happened and everything seemed to go to hell fast and hard.Report

      Reply

        1. It is worth pointing out how that poll is _completely deranged_.

          And also not measuring ‘satisfaction’. It’s measuring ‘In general, are you satisfied or dissatisfied with the way things are going in the United States at this time?’.

          And even there, it’s just nonsense.

          It has skyrocketing satisfaction during the 2008-2009 subprime mortgage collapse. I know Obama was a popular president, but I seriously doubt he was _that_ popular. It’s almost 25% movement! Wait, is this maybe the ACA? I don’t recall that being super-popular either?

          It also isn’t at its highest for 9/11, that was a dip…it’s at it’s highest for _the months after_.

          I have no idea what that poll is measuring, but it not anything sane.Report

          Reply

          1. Attacking the poll is a good choice.

            But is does not surprise me that satisfaction is high a month after 9/11. That is when we declared war on the Taliban and I think people were happy to have a target and the rallying to Pro-America.

            Maybe a poll of US on the right path better?
            https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/trackers/direction-of-the-united-states

            Goes only to 2009, and at that point every year the majority of people think the US is on the wrong direction. The closest it came was about a -7% in Sep 2012 until Biden took office, but that sure did not last long.

            https://today.yougov.com/topics/politics/trackers/direction-of-the-united-statesReport

            Reply

    1. I found coverage for this story in four places: The Jerusalem Post, The New York Post, Commentary, and The Daily Bruin. I trust the Daily Bruin most of all but it seems to largely monitor the coverage in the Jerusalem Post. I don’t trust anything that comes from the NY Post because it is part of Murdoch’s right-wing lets smear liberals with nutpicking empire and every time I see a story only covered there and in Jewish newspapers, I decry that it can be dismissed on those facts.

      Student government is good but perhaps given them a lot of training first.Report

      Reply

      1. The facts fit with the general pattern in academia and activism in recent years towards the Jews. Other media might not be covering it because it is not a major story to them and they see it as unimportant. Your attitude that this story can be dismissed because it is only found in enemy media.Report

        Reply

  6. Adam Schiff has come out and said that he doesn’t think that he should get a pardon.

    Two schools of thought:
    1) This only goes to show how principled Adam Schiff is! And, by extension, how principled *ALL* Democrats are! The Republicans would *NEVER*!
    2) This is pretty good cover for getting a pardon and then being able to say “I didn’t want this!”Report

    Reply

          1. “We do not suggest that the President could not have chosen to condition Lorance’s pardon on a confession of guilt, only that he chose not to do so here, instead granting a pardon that did not purport to address Lorance’s innocence or guilt. We reject the district court’s suggestion that every presidential pardon constitutes a legal confession of guilt unless expressly grounded on a presidential finding of innocence. Although acceptance of a pardon may imply a public perception of guilt, it does not have the legal effect of doing so where the pardon is not expressly conditioned on such a confession. ”

            Seems clear enough to me: my initial recollection was incorrect and the acceptance of a pardon does not confess guilt. At least not in the Tenth Circuit.Report

            Reply

      2. Saying “I don’t want this, it’s unnecessary and unwise!” and saying “I will refuse to accept this and thus cannot be compelled to testify” are two very different things.

        I’ve only seen him say the former…Report

        Reply

        1. Actions speak louder than words. If he accepts a pardon, he can’t say “I didn’t want this.” If he doesn’t, he can say what he damn pleases. If he isn’t offered one, there’s nothing for him to say and we can make up whatever we like, based on our priors about about Schiff, and nobody can prove us wrong.
          Place your bets.Report

          Reply

              2. I heard the same speculation from sources not generally hospitable to conspiracy theories, not about Schiff specifically, but about the entire class of potential Trump targets to which he belongs.Report

              5. Eh, the problem with “credible” is that a lot of places that used to be credible aren’t anymore.

                Like they did stuff like call stuff “conspiracy theories” that they eventually admitted actually happened.

                Like “conspiracy theory” is used to shut down disagreement or something.Report

              6. And a lot never were. But the urge to have a hot take drives far too many people to jump on rumor or speculation on Monday rather than wait until Thursday to get things right. Maybe they get some value out of it, but it’s hard to see.Report

      3. That’s not exactly what it says. What that says is you can, in court, _disclaim_ a pardon that has been issued to you. And if you wish to use one, you have bring it up to the court, or the court can just ignore it, which I think we all assumed was true if we thought about it.

        As far as I can see, nothing stops Biden from issuing Schiff or anyone a pardon, and them just…not saying anything. They don’t have to say they reject or accept it. (In fact, it probably doesn’t matter if they _publicly_ say anything, they’d have to do it in court.) And maybe it doesn’t ever come up.

        It’s Schrödinger’s pardon, and the box doesn’t have to be opened until the person wants to open it.

        Now, Republicans could try to force the issue by trying to make them testify on the grounds they were pardoned, but…that does raise an interesting question, because that’s not the courts, and that’s just sorta assuming they already accepted the pardon, which they didn’t.

        In fact, playing this out, I almost feel they could be forced in front of Congress, assert they will not be accepting the pardon and thus do not have to testify, and then, if charged, could…say, in court, they are accepting the pardon. Things they say to Congress are not part of court, they are not bound by them. (They have to tell the truth, but saying ‘I plan to reject the pardon’ and then later accepting it is not automatically _lying_. Maybe they just changed their mind, an entirely reasonable thing when actually faced with criminal charges.)

        At which point they could get hauled back in front of Congress, but we’re pretty far in now.Report

        Reply

    2. Another thought is that Adam Schiff is stating that he doesn’t think he committed any crimes and he doesn’t need one. He is challenging Trump and co to bring it like Adam Kirtzenger didReport

      Reply

      1. I still think chances Biden does this are low. But if it is really on the table the only honorable stance is the one Schiff appears to be taking. No one should be asking for pardons. Any request would be an admission of unfitness for office and should be accompanied by a resignation.Report

        Reply

        1. This is a lot simpler and more plausible than the eleventh-dimensional chess scenarios. They won’t ask for or accept pardons. In any sane world, they will not be prosecuted for anything because they haven’t done anything for which they can be prosecuted. If Trumpworld isn’t Saneworld and they get prosecuted, I expect they will fight on the merits. If they are asked to testify before Congress, they will do so because nothing they could truthfully say would incriminate them.Report

          Reply

  7. Nikki Giovanni’s death and events in the news reminded me of this little gem, “Allowables”:

    I killed a spider
    Not a murderous brown recluse
    Nor even a black widow
    And if the truth were told this
    Was only a small
    Sort of papery spider
    Who should have run
    When I picked up the book
    But she didn’t
    And she scared me
    And I smashed her

    I don’t think
    I’m allowed

    To kill something

    Because I am

    FrightenedReport

    Reply

    1. If we’re talking about Jordan Neely then “harmless but scary spider” isn’t the correct comparison.

      Neely had a cycle of mental health crises, arrests, hospitalization, (presumably then release) and then repeat. His criminal record includes three unprovoked assaults on women in the subway.

      Penny stepped in to prevent what would have been his fourth. The problem isn’t that the people are scared. The problem is they should be scared because that’s where Neely was in his cycle.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Jordan_Neely#Jordan_NeelyReport

      Reply

        2. Correct. However if we assume no one needed to use any force we have a different problem than the reality.

          The guy with a history of attacking random people was at it again. The random people needed to figure out what to do about this. The amount of force used to stop him from being violent was also enough to kill him.

          It is indeed a question whether the force used was excessive. Jury couldn’t make up it’s mind. It’s seriously unfair to put random people in that situation and expect no problems.

          City knew Neely was a problem and living in the subway. He’d been arrested 42+ times and was thought to be one of the 50 craziest homeless people in the city.

          If we want the subway to be used, then we can’t also be asking random people to deal with Neely and also tell them they’ll go to jail if they don’t deal with him correctly.Report

          Reply

          1. Premise: The Virtuous thing to do is to have done nothing. Just look down at your shoes.

            Premise: If I were there, I would have done nothing. I would have just looked down at my shoes.

            Conclusion: I would have been virtuous in this situation.

            Conclusion 2: Daniel Penny was *NOT* virtuous in this situation.Report

            Reply

          3. I generally agree with this point. There is a big decorum problem on public transit in the areas where it is used. BART has similar issues if not to the extent of somebody like Jordan Neely. BART has been installing tall fare gates to dissuade fare gate jumping. Since the faregate jumpers tend to be the types that like acting obnoxiously on transit, it has the side benefit of creating a more well behaved ridership.Report

            Reply

            1. DC metro isn’t in nearly the disarray you hear reported from other cities but I had a not great experience last spring. Some guy smelling like weed and feces was sitting a few rows up yelling profanity and racial slurs at my 7 year old son. This was a Sunday afternoon on the way to an NHL game. Thankfully it was so garbled I don’t think my son understood what was being said or that it was directed at him and the dude stayed over in his corner.

              I’ve ridden for many years and have seen some out there stuff but it felt different having it directed at my kid. I would not have seen anything wrong with him being removed from the train and sent to a psych ward or the drunk tank or wherever he needed to go.Report

              Reply

              1. A couple of weeks ago, there was a group of point six to seven teens on my BART ride home. They were sharing what can best described as a marijuana cigar and behaving badly. They confronted people who looked annoyed at their antics and pushed one guy off the BART station when he was getting off.

                These types of incidents aren’t common and this was unusually bad but they are common enough that people are fed up.Report

              4. My information became outdated somewhere in the first Clinton administration.

                But I saw “grape cigar wraps” at the 7-11 and idly wished that we had such luxuries back in the day.Report

      2. I don’t know about you, but I don’t have AI glasses that tell me a person’s criminal history when I look at them.

        What’s more, I’m not to keen on the idea of random people choosing when to intervene, and when not to intervene, when a person is having a mental health crisis in public, or when several people are clearly afraid of someone how has not yet to the random people’s knowledge harmed anyone.

        Putting aside the question of whether Perry used excessive force; the precedent we’re setting here is a disturbing one.Report

        Reply

        1. Disclaimer- I don’t know the particulars of NY law.

          In Maryland defense of a third party is arguably a lower standard than self defense. Without going into all of the details (among other things, the force has to be reasonable), the reason for that is that the analysis includes whether the accused reasonably believed that the person they were defending also had the right to use force to defend themselves, which turns to some degree on the unknowable in the moment mental state of the third party being defended. I don’t believe Maryland’s approach to this is unusual on the east coast, where the law has a strong basis in common law principles, even if they have technically been re-written as statutes.

          If this went to a jury in Maryland you could debate the way the jury weighed the facts. However an acquittal would not be precedent setting in a strictly legal sense. Practically speaking having witnesses like Penny did come forward and say they were afraid they were going to be harmed had he not intervened would always make a prosecution like this pretty difficult.Report

          Reply

          2. The normal rule for prosecutors is to charge the highest-level offense that you have a decent chance of proving. That’s why there was a manslaughter charge. I don’t think anyone would have made a big bet that the charge would stick, but there was a legitimate case. After all, the jury hung on it. The lesser charge, criminally negligent homicide, was what I thought the evidence showed. The prosecution theory was that Penny was justified in intervening*, which moots all the complications about defense of others, but that at some point he continued to choke Neely to death when it was no longer reasonable for him to do it. The threat had subsided, other passengers warned Penny that the guy was choking to death and that he should stop — a by-the-numbers case for criminally negligent homicide. Given that one or more jurors had been willing to convict on manslaughter, it is hard to understand why those same jurors voted to acquit on criminally-negligent homicide. Unless they had been one or two holdouts on a manslaughter acquittal and were just worn down on criminally-negligent homicide.
            That said, it wasn’t entirely surprising that the jury acquitted. Juries have been remarkably sympathetic to defendants in this sort of case.

            * I once tossed a disruptive loon off the subway, to the cheers of fellow passengers. I didn’t kill him and probably didn’t hurt anything other than his pride. And I was never the trained physical specimen that Penny is.Report

            Reply

            1. I certainly don’t harbor the outrage some have expressed about charges being brought at all. Maybe some outrage is justified about how and against whom these types of charges are brought but that is a matter for the voters of NY to decide. To me this was a close enough call that you shrug and say the jury did what it did, that’s the system.Report

              Reply

              1. What’s not disputed is that some of the frightened passengers were telling Penny to ease up and that Neely was subdued and choking. If Penny were merely “holding him down,” then there would have been no trial even if it were 12-15 minutes because Neely wouldn’t have died. But you can easily choke a man to death in 3-5 minutes; Penny had been trained how to do that.Report

              2. I thought it was just one, not “some”. Under the circumstances it could be self serving.

                Within the margin of error/reporting we could be looking at a 15 minute choke with people telling him he was going to die, followed by jury nullification.

                We could also be looking at a 3 minute choke where Penny didn’t know he was over the line and the “warnings” not believed by the jury.

                We’re getting into who the jury believed and who they didn’t and they spent a lot more hours at this than I’m going to. Both times I was a witness to a car accident I sharply disagreed with other people about non-trivial issues.

                Sitting here in my chair I lean more towards the first story, i.e. too long a choke with the jury refusing to do anything. However the second story is also within the margin of error so “reasonable doubt” and all that.Report

          3. The witnesses who testified that they were scared definitely didn’t help. There was the woman who testified that she barricaded herself and her child behind the kid’s stroller because she was scared. One witness said that she wanted to *THANK* Penny! She said this under oath!

            Seriously, it’s like the Prosecution was deliberately throwing the case.Report

            Reply

            1. As I said to CJ above, maybe there’s an issue with the decision to have brought charges. If the voters feel that way they have a mechanism of changing it.

              I’ll put my neck out and say I think in a democracy a jury is probably the only way to make a call on something like this and that call have a high degree of legitimacy.* The state made its case to a handful of randos that went through the archane meat grinder of the selection process, and the randos weren’t convinced that this guy should go to jail.

              *Yea there are problems with it but there are problems with everything.Report

              Reply

        2. Several of my gym friends had a convo about this back in the day. One of the brown belts has specifically created a training regime that he calls “crackhead defense”. It does not use rear naked chokes because that can, even accidently, cause death. In his program you immobilize the person by keeping them pinned to the ground, but still able to breathe. It’s pretty good, but there is quite a bit of skill involved and associated time training, but it does work. He’s put me in it several time. Not something a civilian with zero martial arts training could do unless they got lucky.Report

          Reply

        3. Chris: I don’t have AI glasses that tell me a person’s criminal history…

          We are after the fact quarter backing. But Neely’s history shows that Penny judged Neely correctly.

          Ergo we have the problem that the people in the subway were (correctly) scared and (correctly) believed Neely was going to start attacking random people.

          Chris: the precedent we’re setting here is a disturbing one.

          The people here were locked in a room with this guy.

          The root problem is they’re in this situation to begin with, i.e. that the city is allowing this guy to live in the subway and continually subject the passengers to this. This was his 43rd mental health crisis.Report

          Reply

          1. None of which was legally relevant to the negligent homicide charge, which was presented on the theory that Penny didn’t do anything wrong at the beginning of his intervention, but only when he continued choking Neely long after he was effectively subdued and was, in fact, dying.Report

            Reply

    1. Seems serviceable; but I’m not a fan of that style… way too much background noise and far too detailed (esp. background) — creates a distraction to the subject.

      Wife and I went to the National Portrait Gallery last year and looked at all the presidential portraits… my now settled opinion is that the Rembrandt school re-interpreted through Singer Sargent is the best(TM) style for portraits.

      The distinction is painting the eyes… that’s what we look at and that’s how we make initial judgements about people… the further from the eye, the less detailed the stylings. The background is notional or just a solid color. But, it’s hard to really capture the eyes and the person — that’s where genius resides.Report

      Reply

  9. Ken Klippenstein claims to have a copy of Luigi’s Manifesto.

    “To the Feds, I’ll keep this short, because I do respect what you do for our country. To save you a lengthy investigation, I state plainly that I wasn’t working with anyone. This was fairly trivial: some elementary social engineering, basic CAD, a lot of patience. The spiral notebook, if present, has some straggling notes and To Do lists that illuminate the gist of it. My tech is pretty locked down because I work in engineering so probably not much info there. I do apologize for any strife of traumas but it had to be done. Frankly, these parasites simply had it coming. A reminder: the US has the #1 most expensive healthcare system in the world, yet we rank roughly #42 in life expectancy. United is the [indecipherable] largest company in the US by market cap, behind only Apple, Google, Walmart. It has grown and grown, but as our life expectancy? No the reality is, these [indecipherable] have simply gotten too powerful, and they continue to abuse our country for immense profit because the American public has allwed them to get away with it. Obviously the problem is more complex, but I do not have space, and frankly I do not pretend to be the most qualified person to lay out the full argument. But many have illuminated the corruption and greed (e.g.: Rosenthal, Moore), decades ago and the problems simply remain. It is not an issue of awareness at this point, but clearly power games at play. Evidently I am the first to face it with such brutal honesty.”

    Freakin’ kids.Report

    Reply

    1. A young middle-class white cishet man running into a serious medical problem and actually discovering that existing ‘free market’ systems can, in fact, be unfair and knowingly cause a bunch of harm to people by design while making massive profits…and getting so outraged he shoots the people in charge…is just funny.

      Like, just one form of being marginalized, just one system that is actively harming him, and the guy just _snaps_.Report

      Reply

        1. Someone pointed out that the average age for schizophrenia kicking in for males is between the late teens and early 30s and 26 is right smack dab in the middle of that.

          I mean… maybe he believes things?

          But a lot of people believe things.Report

          Reply

  10. Safeway to close struggling S.F. location over concerns about customer safety, theft.

    Safeway announced on Tuesday that it would close its Webster Street supermarket on Feb. 7, a blow to San Francisco’s Fillmore and Japantown neighborhoods that have pushed to convince the grocery chain to keep the struggling store open.

    In a letter to Mayor London Breed, Safeway said it had been set to close 11 months earlier, in March of this year, but “extended its operations … to provide a greater transition period for the community.”

    The company said it was “proud” of its 40-year history in the Fillmore but that the decision to close the store was made “due to ongoing concerns about associate and customer safety, as well as persistent issues with theft.” All employees will be assigned to other stores. Pharmacy customers can elect to have their files transferred to other stores, Safeway said.

    In the short term, people negatively affected might be able to get some of the stuff they need at the 16th Street BART Plaza.Report

    Reply

    1. I’m looking forward to hearing an explanation of how it was only declining sales and had nothing to do with theft and Safeway’s a bunch of racist liars, and said explanation failing to consider the fact that the reason sales were declining was that all the stuff they were trying to sell kept getting stolen.Report

      Reply

      1. What will have to happen for another investor to open a store there?
        What pre-reqs will be required?

        It strikes me that it will require something close to vigorous deterrence of shoplifting to the point where a police presence will be no longer needed on-site but maybe there will be enough incentives offered by government that they’ll find a sucker or a philanthropist for whom feeding people is more important than breaking even.Report

        Reply

        1. What will have to happen for another investor to open a store there?

          Who owns the land and the building? We have a former Albertsons here locally that closed a decade ago. The company is not interested in leasing the building or selling the land. They’re interested in the asset is appreciating at something over 10% per year. It looks like something will finally happen, but only because the city started waving around attractive nuisance (homeless people lighting fires) and eminent domain.Report

          Reply

  11. Saudi Arabia awarded 2034 World Cup by FIFA. I am generally not as outraged at this as other liberals might be. International cooperation and diplomacy requires dealing with some unsavory countries on the democracy index a lot. Having them participate in the general global economy and society is much better than having a lot of Taliban Afghanistans.

    https://www.theguardian.com/football/2024/dec/11/saudi-arabia-confirmed-as-2034-world-cup-host-despite-human-rights-concernsReport

    Reply

    1. What you say is true but my goodness you don’t suppose that some boosters of the Saudi bid might have used corruption or bribery on the FIFA officials who c

      Sorry, I couldn’t finish that paragraph because I was laughing too hard.Report

      Reply

    2. No he hasn’t. He is going to cowardly resign at the end of Biden’s term.

      Hey, for this fascism, what if we _all_ complied in advance, for fun?

      Biden should ask him to resign now and appoint another. I know there isn’t actually time, but at minimum it means the acting head of the FBI will be someone _Biden_ chooses until a replacement is confirmed.Report

      Reply

          1. Jaybird is humorously suggesting that the Luigi fandom is coming from his sex appeal and that this new information that he’s not tall reduces said appeal.

            I wonder if ChatGPT could’ve figured this out…maybe someone can set up the appropriate prompts to make a custom Jaybird interpreter for the folks who struggle.Report

            Reply

  14. Can we build stuff anymore? There is talk of building a subway line around Geary Boulevard, an important east-west thoroughfare in San Francisco. There has been talks and plans of building a subway line down Geary Boulevard since 1949 from what I’ve read. The current conversation predicts that work on the Geary Subway will START, not be completed, but START in 15 years. Who knows how long after that it will take to finish the project.
    Not only do people have to do study upon study but there are always several lawsuits to stop the project because some group wants to save the nesting environments of the sewer rats. I get how the old bulldoze through things paradigm was not great but we swung too far in the opposite direction. People can’t wait a generation for a subway line.Report

    Reply

  15. I have no idea how to deal with people this detached from reality even though it is my job:

    Rosa said she is glad her children voted for Trump. She’s not too worried about deportation, although she asked to be identified solely by her first name to reduce the risk. She believes Trump wants to deport criminals, not people like her who crossed the border undetected in the 1990s but haven’t gotten in trouble with the law. “They know who has been behaving well and who hasn’t been,” she said. . . .
    In our reporting on the new effects of immigration, ProPublica interviewed dozens of long-established Latino immigrants and their U.S.-born relatives in cities like Denver and Chicago and in small towns along the Texas border. Over and over, they spoke of feeling resentment as they watched the government ease the transition of large numbers of asylum-seekers into the U.S. by giving them access to work permits and IDs, and in some cities spending millions of dollars to provide them with food and shelter.

    https://www.propublica.org/article/immigration-latino-trump-election-resentment-asylum?fbclid=IwY2xjawHHL_BleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHZ0DTrI-RzxHI_x2iAd0ZSPf3-cinuYiDT82djpnl5UFY1q1g1_GZVlM6Q_aem_eBZzNPjIQyREKWfdVvs_EgReport

    Reply

    2. Given the history of tough rhetoric and lack of follow through I’m not sure she’s as dumb as you think she is. If she’s been here since the 90s she has been through threatened crackdowns in the past.

      But I’m also not sure how many tears people are supposed to shed over those in her situation generally. I’d rather a border crackdown plus a pathway to legal status for those long here but I also know that’s a contingency that may not happen, and hasn’t happened for the 25 years people have been saying something like it should happen. Ultimately she took her chances when she came to the country illegally and only has herself to blame if she ends up sent back to wherever.Report

      Reply

        1. I don’t believe the threats are intended as idle. I just think the logistics are hard, the level of cooperation and prioritization across the country and different agencies inconsistent, and the courts unpredictable in what they will and won’t allow, especially when confronted with novel actions by the executive.Report

          Reply

    3. It is heartwarming, in a way, to see that immigrants so thoroughly assimilate to median American culture that they develop the same energy as a white man who thinks he can talk his way out of a traffic ticket by calmly explaining to the police officer that he’s not that bad of a driver compared to the real maniacs out there.Report

      Reply

    1. Here’s the price part of the transcript from Time’s Man of the Year interview:

      If the prices of groceries don’t come down, will your presidency be a failure?

      I don’t think so. Look, they got them up. I’d like to bring them down. It’s hard to bring things down once they’re up. You know, it’s very hard. But I think that they will. I think that energy is going to bring them down. I think a better supply chain is going to bring them down. You know, the supply chain is still broken. It’s broken. You see it. You go out to the docks and you see all these containers. And I own property in California, in Palos Verdes. They’re very nice. And I passed the docks, and I’ve been doing it for 20 years. I’ve never seen anything like it. You know, for 17 years, I saw containers and, you know, they’d come off and they’d be taken away—big areas, you know, you know, in that area, you know, where they have the big, the big ships coming in—big, the port. And I’d see this for years as I was out there inspecting property and things, because they own a lot in California. And I look down and I see containers that are, that are 12, 13, 14 containers. You wouldn’t believe they can hold each other. It’s like crazy. No, the supply chain is is broken. I think a very bad thing is this, what they’re doing with the cars. I think they lost also because of cars. You know, there are a lot of reasons, but the car mandate is a disaster. The electric, the EV mandate.

      Yep. He absolutely said “Look, they got them up. I’d like to bring them down. It’s hard to bring things down once they’re up. You know, it’s very hard.”Report

      Reply

  18. Today in lolsob:

    https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/12/world/africa/trump-massad-boulos-middle-east.html?unlocked_article_code=1.g04.kvZk.eE-d0JxFTQec&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

    “Trump’s Middle East Adviser Pick Is a Small-Time Truck Salesman

    The lore around Massad Boulos, Tiffany Trump’s father-in-law, is that he is a billionaire dealmaker. Records show otherwise.”

    President-elect Donald Trump’s incoming Middle East adviser, Massad Boulos, has enjoyed a reputation as a billionaire mogul at the helm of a business that bears his family name.

    Mr. Boulos has been profiled as a tycoon by the world’s media, telling a reporter in October that his company is worth billions. Mr. Trump called him a “highly respected leader in the business world, with extensive experience on the international scene.”

    The president-elect even lavished what may be his highest praise: a “dealmaker.”

    In fact, records show that Mr. Boulos has spent the past two decades selling trucks and heavy machinery in Nigeria for a company his father-in-law controls. He is chief executive of the company, SCOA Nigeria PLC, which made a profit of less than $66,000 last year, corporate filings show.

    There is no indication in corporate documents that Mr. Boulos, a Lebanese-American whose son is married to Mr. Trump’s daughter Tiffany, is a man of significant wealth as a result of his businesses. The truck dealership is valued at about $865,000 at its current share price. Mr. Boulos’s stake, according to securities filings, is worth $1.53.

    As for Boulos Enterprises, the company that has been called his family business in The Financial Times and elsewhere, a company officer there said it is owned by an unrelated Boulos family.

    Mr. Boulos will advise on one of the world’s most complicated and conflict-wracked regions — a region that Mr. Boulos said this week that he has not visited in years. The advisory position does not require Senate approval.Report

    Reply

          1. Do you really think that they’re taking “I testified falsely against them by saying that they raped me when they didn’t, and that was wrong, and I betrayed the trust of a lot of other people who believed in me” out of context?

            Here’s the Duke Chronicle.

            Are you going to still be skeptical and demand something from CNN? You can. I have a link and I’ll post it if you say something like “I require you to post a link from CNN!”Report

            Reply

    2. Crystal has had more drama than any one person should.

      She’s in prison for murder, she’s been charged with attempted murder in a different incident. Claims she was raped then backed away from those claims (yet another incident). Reported other things but backed away from those claims (different incident). Stole from one of her customers and had a drunken police chase (different incident). Reported that thing at Duke. Got an associate degree and was working on college. Jury deadlocked on convicting her of 1st degree arson.

      Sounds like she found god in prison and coming forward like this is part of it.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crystal_MangumReport

      Reply

    1. From what I can tell, it’s the *NEW* vaccine that they want approval suspended for because they tested the new vaccine against the old vaccine instead of testing the new vaccine against placebo.

      So it’s not a movement against polio vaccines in general.

      That said, people should throw rotten tomatoes at this man in public for the rest of his life.Report

      Reply

        1. Don’t blame me, blame the NYT:

          He has called in his petitions for the shots to be pulled from the market until placebo-controlled trials — which would deny some children polio shots — can be completed. Given the known risks of polio causing paralysis that can seize major organs and kill people, such work is considered unethical.

          It’s stupid and silly and he’s undercutting anything good that might be accomplished and I hope that the FDA writes back with a letter that consists of nothing more than variants of “lol” and “rotfl” and “stfu”.

          And, yes, the tomato thing.Report

          Reply

          1. (And, let me point out, we tested placebo against Polio for a few centuries. Asking for placebo-controlled trials demonstrates massive mendacity. The guy should never be allowed to eat at restaurants ever again.)Report

            Reply

      2. This raises the question of how a new polio vaccine can even be tested, given the rarity of the disease, and why it’s needed, which leads to an interesting explanation:

        The old polio vaccine used a weakened form of the virus which is shed in feces, and in communities with low vaccination rates and poor sanitation, this can actually help vaccinate people through the fecal-oral route: You drink some contaminated water or whatever, you get infected with the weakened virus, and now you’re at least partially vaccinated.

        The problem is that in communities where the vaccination rate is too low, the weakened virus can mutate into a more virulent form, known as circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus. The wild-type poliovirus has been eradicated in Africa, and cVDPV is the only remaining circulating form of the virus, so the new vaccine, which is more mutation-resistant, is needed to combat this.

        Note that the situation with the old vaccine is still greatly preferable to the pre-vaccine situtation; there are only about a thousand cases per year documented in all of Africa.Report

        Reply

        1. It’s absolutely asinine and if the FDA says something like “He raises a good point… we should test with Placebo!”, I’m going to assume a massive conspiracy to kill people given the stupid overreach the FDA takes in pretty much every other situation.Report

          Reply

          1. You realize that a double blind trial like what you’re talking about would involve exposing unvaccinated (placebo) children to fishin polio? Doing it back when no vaccine existed is one thing but doing that now? You don’t see any problems with that?Report

            Reply

              2. Please read this as if I said it earnestly:

                It’s absolutely asinine and if the FDA says something like “He raises a good point… we should test with Placebo!”, I’m going to assume a massive conspiracy to kill people given the stupid overreach the FDA takes in pretty much every other situation.Report

  22. Democrats need to let Republicans and voters know the consequences:

    If Johnson wants to do something that’s good for America, shouldn’t Democrats lend him their support regardless of whether his own caucus backs him or not? Shouldn’t Democrats act responsibly even when Republicans won’t?

    Surprisingly, there’s a correct answer here. And it comes, of all places, from the field of addiction recovery.

    For the last two years, Democrats have thought they were acting in the country’s best interests by helping Republicans govern. They have not been. They meant well, but they have actually been protecting voters from the consequences of Republican dysfunction and enabling bad Republican behavior.

    Republican politicians are now addicted to drama, outrage and “owning the libs.” When you shield addicts from the consequences of their actions, you’re not doing them any favors. All you are doing is enabling their addiction.

    The same goes for their voters. Many are hooked on the political performance and continue to elect unserious, bomb-throwing zealots who pander on social media for the clicks and the television appearances. But Congress is not a reality television show. In real life, dysfunction has consequences.

    The country won’t be on the road to recovery until it is allowed to experience those consequences. If that means giving free rein to the collection of clowns with flamethrowers that now passes for the Republican Party, so be it. Democrats should resist the urge to intervene when the inevitable happens and they set themselves on fire.

    For the next two years, Democrats have no responsibility to govern. They should focus on politics instead and take a longer view of the country’s best interests. If, for example, House Democrats had allowed Republican dysfunction to shut down the government in September, they almost certainly would have won a House majority in November. A few weeks of furloughed workers and shuttered national parks would have been a small price to pay for an effective check against Donald Trump’s plans for an American autocracy. Democrats should be practicing tough love and allowing Republicans to inflict pain on themselves, even if that also inflicts some pain on the country.Report

    Reply

        1. To be perfectly honest, I think that the mismanagement of Blue Cities is responsible for at least some of the backlash that resulted in Democrats losing voters in pretty much every demographic except for Men+College and Men+Postgrad.

          Politician recalls, ballot initiatives, and, yes, progressives losing elections (that they won a few short years ago) are part and parcel with the whole “What Happened?” thing.

          So if we’re talking about whether Democrats have no responsibility to govern, I think the whole “well, how has Democratic Governance done over the last 8 years?” question has salience.

          Of course, now might not be the best time to wrestle with that question, as we’re now building up to November 2026 (the most important election of our lifetimes).Report

          Reply

    2. The same goes for their voters. Many are hooked on the political performance and continue to elect unserious, bomb-throwing zealots who pander on social media for the clicks and the television appearances. But Congress is not a reality television show. In real life, dysfunction has consequences.

      Truer words.Report

      Reply

  23. Chief DEI officer at University of Michigan shocked to learn that anti-Semitism is seen as racism rather than resistance:

    https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/12/us/university-of-michigan-dei-administrator-antisemitism.html?unlocked_article_code=1.hU4.voeJ.cZqQF94j4VHj&smid=url-share

    Also Jewish University of Michigan regent has his home vandalized by anti-Semites, I mean Pro-Palestinian activists:

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/103f7dfd6e64ba236194a452ddfaa8314876d38fbb9617b3d04c1f4bd12c97fc.jpgReport

    Reply

    1. Marc Andreessen has a tweet about “Preference Falsification“.

      What happens when society-wide preference falsification unwinds in a sudden cascade, from the work of @timurkuran, explained by Professor Claude:

      Preference falsification occurs when people publicly express preferences that differ from their private beliefs due to social, political, or economic pressures. When this falsification unwinds suddenly, it creates a cascade effect that can rapidly transform society. Here’s how the process typically unfolds:

      Stage 1 – Hidden Tensions Initially, many individuals privately hold beliefs that contradict the official or socially acceptable position. They keep these views private because expressing them carries real costs – social ostracism, job loss, or worse. This creates a gap between private and public preferences that can persist for years or decades.

      Stage 2 – Initial Cracks Some triggering event reduces the cost of expressing private preferences. This could be a political reform, an economic crisis, or simply a brave individual who demonstrates that dissent is possible. If this person isn’t immediately punished, it signals to others that the cost of truth-telling may have decreased.

      Stage 3 – The Cascade Once enough people begin expressing their true preferences, a self-reinforcing cycle begins:
      Each person who speaks out makes it safer for others to do the same
      The perceived cost of dissent drops rapidly
      People update their beliefs about how many others share their private views
      This creates a multiplier effect where small initial changes can trigger massive shifts

      Stage 4 – System Transformation The rapid revelation of true preferences often leads to:
      Collapse of existing institutions that relied on forced consensus
      Emergence of new social and political arrangements
      Psychological shock as people realize how many others privately opposed the system

      A classic example is the fall of communist regimes in Eastern Europe in 1989. For decades, most people publicly supported the system while privately doubting it. When Poland and Hungary began reforms, it triggered a cascade that revealed the true level of opposition, leading to the rapid collapse of seemingly stable governments across the region.

      The key insight is that social systems can appear stable while masking enormous underlying tensions. When preference falsification unwinds, the change isn’t gradual – it’s sudden and transformative, like a phase transition in physics. The system doesn’t gradually decline; it maintains a façade of stability until it suddenly transforms into something entirely different.

      What if we’re seeing a Preference Falsification Cascade? How different would it look like from this?Report

      Reply

              2. Yarvin has some interesting thoughts and some exceptionally interesting criticisms. His prescriptions are crap… but ain’t that always the way?

                Anyway, Yarvin is a pretty good example of “how does San Francisco’s governance affect you *PERSONALLY*?”

                Well, the governance was so bad that it resulted in a new political philosophy that helped the so-called “grey” tribe to change their alliance from blue to red (however temporarily).

                In any case, I’m not sure that “My god! He quoted a bad person!” is a good avenue of attack. I mean, it assumes either moral authority or a shared moral territory and if you don’t have either, your criticisms just ain’t gonna land.Report

    1. I hate to yuck your yum, but as much as the idea that that’s intended to be read in a fawning tone may turn you on, there’s no real basis for that interpretation. Michelle Goldberg used the same wording in a clearly hostile manner a while back:

      Once Trump won, decent outcomes for the country were probably off the table. The institutions are unlikely to hold. Establishment Republicans cannot be counted on to protect us. The best we can hope for is that our new rulers will be stymied by incompetence, infighting and self-sabotage. In that respect, Gaetz may be just the man for the job.

      Here’s Eugene Robinson in the Washington Post, throwing a tantrum because the Supreme Court decided to rule based on the Constitution rather than on Eugene Robinson’s personal policy preferences:

      This isn’t your country anymore. You are now governed by a secretive and unaccountable junta in long black robes, and there are going to be some changes around here.

      Our de facto rulers are Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito Jr., Neil M. Gorsuch, Brett M. Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. usually joining in. Be sure to remember their names, because they are now large and in charge — and because they envision a United States far different from the nation we’re accustomed to.

      I describe them with a term more commonly used for Latin American military regimes because, well, that’s what it feels like.

      The term is also sometimes used neutrally to describe a government, but it’s more often used sardonically, and it would be deeply weird for someone to unironically use the term the way you want Collinson to have used it here.

      Here’s a recent piece by the author of the screenshotted article which is clearly critical of Trump. Note that it was written on November 26, after the election had been decisively settled.Report

      Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Related Stories

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro’s Residence Attacked, Suspect Arrested

Andrew Donaldson April 14, 2025 16

Open Mic for the Week of 4/14/2025

Jaybird April 14, 2025 16
DOGE Savings

From the NY Times: DOGE Savings “85 percent less than its objective”

OT Editors April 13, 2025 6

You may have missed

Abrego Garcia

The Lawless Lying Duplicitous Bastards of Abrego Garcia

Michael Siegel April 15, 2025 23
2025-04-14 Joy C8315 (04.12.15)

Somebody is Always Taking the Joy Out of Life

Clare Briggs April 14, 2025
Panama Canal

Panamanicans: U.S. Troops in Panama

Issac Faulk April 14, 2025 10
tulips

Danny Dreamer: The Tulip Thief

Clare Briggs April 12, 2025