I was hoping to say more about the latest in Syria, but Halloween weekend won that battle. I just finished this book as well, so no way to pull my thoughts together with two kids jacked up on candy and stuck in the house because of the rain. Hope to pull it off for a later one.
Here’s what’s been happening the last two weeks…
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Colbert: Meat ‘n smug vegetarians.
Thom: Are we seeing the rebirth of the KKK?
Mental Floss: Why is there a joker in a deck of cards.
The ten richest members of Congress.
The 2016 GOP Clown Show:
White House: West Wing Week.
The GOP is wrong for us.
John Oliver: I’m not a journalist.
Chris Hayes: Romney defends ObamaCare.
The poorest members of Congress.
Hillary and Friends:
Farron Cousins: Koch brothers spend millions to eliminate solar power.
Benghazi: a reaction:
Sen. Lehey joins the 15,000 vote club.
Thom: ObamaCare back in court again?!?.
Mental Floss: 22 Horror Movie Facts.
Thom: Public goods & health care.
Maddow: Movie resurrects George W. Bush National Guard service scandal.
All Hallows’ Eve Politics:
Stephen: The Hungry for Power Games.
Seth Meyers: Jokes of the week.
Thom: NOAA defies the GOP McCarthy witchhunt.
Farron Cousins: Did Sarah Palin destroy the Republican Party?
Mental Floss: Misconceptions about pirates .
Congressional Hits and Misses of the week.
Ryan Eyes:
Matthew Filipowicz: Pro-police group thrilled that FAUX News compared #BlackLivesMatter to the Nazis.
Thom: The Good, the Bad & the Very, Very Luctiferously Ugly!
Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.
– I haven’t turned in my ballot in yet, so I sort of feel like Seattlish is yelling at me. I was going to vote Goodspaceguy to protest how Gregoire has been bad in the position. But now that the Seattle GOP endorsed him (and also he has terrible positions as opposed to blah blah space), I don’t want to send the wrong message. Should I leave it blank? Also, I usually just blindly support the tax advisory votes, because it’s dumb that they’re there, but I’m opposed to the marijuana one because it seems like it took a mess and made it messier in an attempt to clean it up. Also, Port of Seattle and Seattle School Board always feel like they’re close to turning a corner, but it never seems to actually get there. Also, why do we vote on judges? That’s kind of dumb.
– It’s really pretty striking how much the ACA has helped states that are willing to accept that help.
Well…I got a late start at it, but here is your open thread for the GOP debate…
I’ll add some snark and tweetery as the mood strikes.
So…one of the reasons I am so late is that I didn’t realize there was no livestream from CNBC. I ended up on some live-feed that includes a panel of wingnut pundits. Google infowars.com and livestream or something.
One pundit dude refers to “Paul Rino” and later says he doesn’t think Rubio is unqualified.
That Rubio-Jeb(!) exchange is like when your kid whips your ass in one-on-one for the 1st time.
— Chris Cillizza (@TheFix) October 29, 2015
5:43: Issues? Issues anyone?
5:47: I agree with Cruz…let’s put some substance into this debate!
5:48: Of course, Cruz dodged a debt ceiling question in the process.
I don't know if anybody else has noticed, but Carly Fiorina consistently comes of as a tad unlikeable. #GOPDebate
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
5:49: Awwwwww…that’s adorable. They let Rand talk.
5:50: Christie gets a turn. Christie claims the govt. lies to you about Social Security, and then goes on to make the amateurish mistake of calling it “an entitlement”. It isn’t. You paid in.
I don't know if anybody else has noticed, but Carly Fiorina consistently comes of as a tad unlikeable. #GOPDebate
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
Mike Huckabee to Ted Cruz: Keep your Big Government hands off my Social Security.
— Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) October 29, 2015
Remember how the RNC was going to keep GOP debates all civil and orderly this time?
— Kasie Hunt (@kasie) October 29, 2015
By the way, how come Rubio gets counted down for his youth and inexperience while Cruz, the same age and experience, gets a pass?
— David Horsey (@davidhorsey) October 29, 2015
Good question!
Are we at the "I was a poor kid and now I'm rich" part of the debate?
#WheresTheFastForwardButton? #GOPDebate #CNBCGOPDebate
— Left Out Loud (@LeftOutLoud) October 29, 2015
Cruz, "My dad was a single mom…."
— Darryl Holman (@hominidviews) October 29, 2015
So far, the moderators are doing the most damaging thing possible to @realDonaldTrump: ignoring him
— Jon Favreau (@jonfavs) October 29, 2015
6:18: Carson is ALL for equal rights for same sex couples…but NO MARRIAGE!
Actually, Ben Carson, believing that LGBT People should have fewer rights than straight people DOES in fact make you a homophobe #GOPDebate
— Will McLeod (@WillMcLeod99) October 29, 2015
Guys, I think Jeb Bush has to make out with Obama: https://t.co/gfDGjXHcJP pic.twitter.com/2c3xUD2QkJ
— igorvolsky (@igorvolsky) October 29, 2015
6:27: The Donald goes after SuperPacs…is he running for Bernie’s VP?
All night candidates have smelled blood, unfortunately for the moderators it's their own
— Joe St. George (@JoeStGeorge) October 29, 2015
6:30: Cruz, “Loose money”. For some reason David Vitter jumps to mind….
I’m still blown away that CNBC couldn’t cite the source on the Trump question. IT’S ON HIS WEBSITE. https://t.co/1cgzqASUYR
— daveweigel (@daveweigel) October 29, 2015
6:34: Mr. Huckabee, I’ve known gas bags and you are one gas bag.
The CNBC moderators seem like substitute teachers: not particularly competent and bullied by smart-alleck students
— Rick Hasen (@rickhasen) October 29, 2015
Incompetent questioning yes, but this was the most important debate to date: it finished off the Bush campaign.
— David Frum (@davidfrum) October 29, 2015
Kasich: "Income inequality is driven by a lack of skills." Not true. Income inequality is driven by rules that are rigged in favor of the 1%
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
My guess: After this debate gets factored in only R’s over 5% in national poll average will be Trump, Carson, Rubio and Cruz.
— Samuel Minter (@abulsme) October 29, 2015
Trump clearly doesn't understand what somebody wrote in his immigration plan about H1-B visas. #CNBCGOPDebate
— Josh Rogin (@joshrogin) October 29, 2015
Trump Once Said Of Guns: “Nothing I Like Better Than Nobody Has Them” https://t.co/sEx6df62bl
— Andrew Kaczynski (@BuzzFeedAndrew) October 29, 2015
So far, I think every candidate has had a moment worth touting or YouTubing… except Bush. #NBC2016
— Chuck Todd (@chucktodd) October 29, 2015
6:52: Christie, “When I’m president, police will know it!” Yep. Overtime traffic jam duty pay.
Fiorina makes call for return to Lochner era, saying that there's no constitutional authority for the government to set min wage. #GOPDebate
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
Clearly, somebody is doing well in his fantasy football league (amirite, Gov Christie?) #GOPDebate
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
Christie just ate Bush's lunch! And probably others. Now this is the inning we have to get some runs!!
— Bill Maher (@billmaher) October 29, 2015
Were this an actual horse race, I'm pretty sure the entire field would be shot. #GOPDebate https://t.co/lD5KIbSCwq
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
Winners:
Rubio
Cruz
Christie
Losers:
Paul
Trump
CNBC
— Noah Rothman (@NoahCRothman) October 29, 2015
Huckabee thinks it's easy to eradicate diseases because he knows they don't evolve. #GOPDebate
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
Fiorina: "The federal government should not be in a lot of things. The only things they should be in are marriages & women's private areas."
— Craig Rozniecki (@CraigRozniecki) October 29, 2015
7:10: Chris Christie’s run-on, repeated rant is the second “runaway blimp” story of the day!
Chris Christie using that "keep your hands on your wallet line again." (Though to be fair, whenever I'm in NJ I keep my hands on my wallet.)
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
7:15: Christie repeatedly said he was “deadly serious” about changing things. Did he mean “dead serious”? In any case, brings to mind that bridge traffic jam….
Rand Paul wants a government so small he can't see it. Like a GOP penis. #GOPDebate
— Wonkette (@Wonkette) October 29, 2015
Trump promises America a lifetime of shorter debates. pic.twitter.com/I7OGMHAICl
— Jim Roberts (@nycjim) October 29, 2015
#CNBCGOPDebate Shut up #MikeHuckabee You're there to sell your book.
— esd2000 (@esd2000) October 29, 2015
"I will change the culture in Washington," says the son and brother of two of the last four presidents. #GOPDebate
— Goldy (@GoldyHA) October 29, 2015
That concludes tonight's debate. We return to ongoing blimp coverage underway in Pennsylvania pic.twitter.com/L1eDPf1nph
— Tim Mak (@timkmak) October 29, 2015
@srjones66 I thought tonight's GOP debate was won by @BernieSanders and @HlLLARY split evenly
— ChuckTv (@Chucktv2) October 29, 2015
Well…that was “a thing.” It was my first GOP debate this cycle (and I was mostly listening to the audio), and it was pretty much the vacuous puffery that I expected. The only surprise to me was Trump’s strong statements against PACs. Other than that, Trump was just a meaningless braggart. Rand Paul morphed into Ron Paul, and came off more fringy than ever. Christie spewed pre-prepared platitudes. Rubio sounded angry and whiny. The Huckster is still a nut. Carson said things, but I don’t really remember them. And there were some other people talking, too. The debate moderators were TERRIBLE (and I am sure that is a bipartisan sentiment).
– Martian Law: Is Mark Watney Really a Space Pirate?
– Baby orcas you guys.
– Abby Wambach is retiring.
– Do conservatives have a different Constitution than the rest of us?
Please join us this evening for a pre-Republican-debate-discussion-group edition of Drinking Liberally. The Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally meets tonight and every Tuesday at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. You’ll find us in the small room at the back of the tavern. We start at 8:00 pm.
Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings happening this week. Tonight the Tri-Cities chapter also meets. On Wednesday, the Burien and Bellingham chapters meet. The Woodinville chapter meets on Thursday. And next Monday, the Yakima and South Bellevue chapters meet.
There are 184 chapters of Living Liberally, including eighteen in Washington state, three in Oregon and one in Idaho. Find—or start—a chapter near you.
– Seattle Bike Blog has endorsements.
– The process for selecting the next Federal judge from Idaho is strange [h/t].
Revelation 1:9
We suffer because Jesus is our king.
Discuss.
Trevor Noah calls Wolf Blitzer a mean girl bully.
Larry Wilmore: Will the NRA suggest arming every toddler?
How gun advocates sound to normal people:
Young Turks: Lincoln Chafee drops out.
The 2016 Festival of Clowns:
White House: West Wing Week.
Red State Update: Political news of the week
BENGHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaZZZZZIIII!!!!!1!!11!!!
Thom: The Good, The Bad, and The Very, Very Lutulently Ugly!
Farron Cousins: Republicans are paid to be stupid.
Texas Blues:
Mental Floss: Misconceptions about the Greek and Roman myths.
Farron Cousins: Nutjobber House Republicans are talking about impeaching Clinton when they lose
Trevor Noah: Canada’s hot new Prime Minister.
Ryan Eyes:
Ole Miss students want Mississippi state flag off campus.
Farron Cousins: Sen. David “DiaperBoy” Vitter got prostitute pregnant and told her to have an aborition.
Congressional hits and misses of the week.
Biden His Time:
Jon and Tracey Stewart on life after the Daily Show.
Mental Floss: 41 fascinating sports facts.
Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.
I was reading about JEB! Bush’s campaign problems (h/t). This struck me in particular:
The campaign is removing some senior staff from the payroll, parting ways with some consultants, and downsizing its Miami headquarters to save more than $1 million per month and cut payroll by 40 percent this week, according to Bush campaign officials who requested anonymity to speak about internal changes. Senior leadership positions remain unchanged.
Republicans often tell us that they want to run the government more like a business. I didn’t realize they wanted to run their campaigns like a failing business: Cut payroll but keep everything “unchanged” at the top. No matter how much the senior leadership fucks up, they’re untouchable.
No, the problem isn’t that senior leadership managed to take the campaign all the way to single digits in the polls and money drying up! They still deserve what they get. I assume they’re mostly Bush family loyalists, so why should they suffer just because the campaign they’re leading is flailing?
To be clear, I’m not even saying you should count Bush out yet. A similar thing happened to McCain in the ’08 primary. And getting rid of at least the consultants makes sense. But keeping the same people at the top is pretty shit.
– I’m sure this estimate of when Bertha will be back up and running, er digging, will be the accurate one.
– The people trying to prove how Planned Parenthood isn’t necessary are really proving how necessary it is.
– Who knew Benghazi would turn out to be a fake scandal about Hillary Clinton?
– This sums up Clinton’s response
– Conservatives should maybe take the we’re patrolling the border people as a loss.
– Sorry this was so late. I had a bit of a work emergency.
– If you want to read the Democrats’ Bengazi report, here you go. It’s a 124 page PDF, so I have not.
– I wasn’t planning on voting for Biden if he ran for President, but I still always think more people running is better, so too bad he’s not running?
– Oh look, not everyone in Ballard is the absolute worst.
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My previous analysis in this race showed Secretary Clinton just barely leading Sen. Rubio 65% to 35%. Rubio was second to Jeb Bush in performance against Clinton. In the intervening weeks, Rubio has started to crawl out of the mid-tier rankings in the G.O.P. primary. A week ago he placed third in SC, and today we see he is second in NH
Rubio’s primary “surge” hasn’t translated into general election gains. He seems to be losing ground to Clinton. Now after 100,000 simulated elections, Clinton wins 92,430 times and Rubio wins 7,570 times (including the 404 ties). Clinton received (on average) 304 to Rubio’s 234 electoral votes. In an election held now, Clinton would have a 92.4% probability of winning and Rubio would have a 7.6% probability of winning.
Here is the distribution of electoral votes [FAQ] from the simulations:
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I know, what can you expect? Gigantic asshole gonna gigantic asshole (I saw this on Facebook over the weekend, but I can’t find who linked to it now).
During his October 7 show on KIRO-FM, Dori myopically focused on a part of POC Yoga’s class description which put forth “white friends, allies, and partners are respectfully asked not to attend.” Despite on-air claims that he had “zero problems” with POC Yoga, was “perfectly fine” with the practice, and believed POC Yoga “should be free”—he also openly accused POC Yoga of being “racist,” “exclusionary,” and more than once (instead of calling the collective by its self-chosen name) referred to it as “no whites yoga class.” Dori gave no historical context, did not acknowledge whites disproportionate privilege in a white-dominated culture, and made no mention of the ongoing microaggressive to extreme racism people of color have faced in America for centuries.
Jesus. When I hear his show, he isn’t typically interested in, for example, making sure that Black kids aren’t gunned down by the police. Maybe I missed it. He’s on the air for like 500 hours a day. And, inexplicably, halftime in the Seahawks’ radio broadcast.
I guess, if he wanted to make a perfectly race neutral type argument, he would naturally spend time trying to figure out why there’s still a wage gap between the races. Again I haven’t seen it. You’d certainly think someone who wants to call out racism so much he’s worried about a yoga class wouldn’t be so quick to call George Zimmerman “a hero” and “a superhero” in the clip (not in the context of murdering a Black child, but still: Holy shit).
Anyway, that’s the argument qua the argument. But were there any consequences to his dumbassness?
Directly following Dori’s heated criticism, Teresa said hate calls and death threats started pouring in every five minutes. There were all together over 200 phone calls, and hundreds and hundreds of emails filled with hostility and hate. What had just been anger generated out of a Nextdoor post spiraled into a violent, racist fervor that swept the country and made its way onto inflammatory websites like Infowars and Drudge Report. She rushed out that day to get a security system for her home though she stayed with a friend that night for safety. From that point through the weekend POC Yoga and Rainier Beach Yoga (the studio where class was held) filed several police reports. On Monday they filed an FBI report.
“Those death threats alone illustrate exactly why people of color need safe spaces,” said Joe R. Feagin, Distinguished Professor of Sociology at Texas A&M. Feagin is author of over 200 research articles and over 60 books on race, class, and gender. He has been studying patterns of white discrimination against people of color in the United States for 50 years and has reviewed hundreds of empirical studies. Feagin says the empirical data is clear. “Racism is still extraordinarily widespread in this country and does great harm to people of color,” he explained. “Therefore it is not only logical but necessary that people of color create safe spaces away from whites in which to deal with the stresses of racism and build up strategies to resist.”
Now Dori isn’t responsible for all the dumbassness that his dumbass listeners do. But maybe he’ll think a little next time.
An election is happening in Washington state, and by now you should have your ballot in hand. So pack up your political questions and opinions and let ’em loose over the beverage of your choice at the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally.
We meet tonight and every Tuesday at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. You’ll find us in the small room at the back of the tavern. We start at 8:00 pm.
Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings happening this week. Tonight the Tri-Cities, Vancouver, WA, and Shelton chapters also meet. The Lakewood chapter meets on Wednesday. The Spokane, Kent, and Woodinville chapters meet on Thursday.
There are 183 chapters of Living Liberally, including eighteen in Washington state, three in Oregon and one in Idaho. Find—or start—a chapter near you.
Eager to share our brilliant political commentary and blunt media criticism, but too genteel to link to horsesass.org? Well, good news, ladies: we also answer to HASeattle.com, because, you know, whatever. You're welcome!