Friday Morning Links

by | May 1, 2020 | Daily Links | 485 comments

Good morning my Glibs and Gliberinas and what a glorious morning it is as unsealed documents reveal Peter Strzok stopped the FBI from ending the probe into Flynn despite a lack of evidence.

 

The natives are growing restless.

 

Believe. All. Women.

 

Canada set to ban scary looking rifles.

 

Heh.

 

Mortgage rates lowest on record.

 

As is marriage.

 

That is all I have for today, I’ll leave you with a song and move along with my day.

About The Author

Banjos

Banjos

Wife of sloopy, mother to three bright, curious, and highly active young girls. Perpetually exhausted.

485 Comments

  1. Count Potato

    “Even Mitt Romney feels it: Trump ‘likely’ to win”

    Well, Biden can’t remember he’s running.

    • Count Potato

      “Romney noted that it’s been 28 years since an incumbent lost reelection, and there is “great power” in being an incumbent, especially when it comes to getting on TV during the coronavirus crisis. And he told Georgetown University students that the economy should pop once the virus passes and help Trump.”

      I hope the economy pops, but it looks as though people do not want the virus to pass.

      • Atanarjuat

        Yeah… Pop.

      • Ted S.

        At this point it’s not even snapping and crackling.

      • leon

        The economy is not Grrrrrrrreat right now.

      • straffinrun

        Grandma is going to have to pull some Trixx.

      • Not Adahn

        “Who gave you the fifty cents?”

        “Everyone.”

      • Spartacus

        Pop

    • leon

      Mitt also thought he would win the election…

      • Count Potato

        He didn’t seem that surprised when he lost.

      • Festus

        That’s because he didn’t play to win, he was afraid of the loss. It was like an idiot steering into the deer because that’s what his headlights were aimed at.

      • Toxteth O’Grady

        He was good in the first debate. Lovely suit he had.

      • Festus

        Love that avatar!

      • The Last American Hero

        And that magnificent presidential hair. My God that hair probably carried 5 states by itself.

      • Shirley Knott

        He only lost because he didn’t have a hat.

      • Drake

        He gives the best concession speeches.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Wish he had given one in the UT senatorial primary.

    • bacon-magic

      Biden will be replaced soon unless the Dems are calling this election a wash.

      • Frank Dux

        Which I think kinda sucks. I mean If we’re gonna get a dem, I would at least like to have be entertained by Biden’s incoherent ramblings.

      • R C Dean

        His interview on the Reade allegations was just painful. He sort of robotically denies, looking very staged, and then just locks up when asked about releasing his records that are under seal.

        Oh, except from his staff, who has been in and out of them right up until the University went on lockdown. Nothing suspicious there.

      • Festus

        Lots of “N” words, to be sure. And pussy-grasping…

  2. invisible finger

    I would never a believe anything from Hilary Clinton.

    • Count Potato

      I’m still astounded that such a huge over-reaction happened so quickly.

      • UnCivilServant

        The only way a panic happens is quickly.

        Given time to think rather than being whipped into a frenzy, people will adapt and grow apathetic.

  3. Atanarjuat

    Those who went in the capitol building in Michigan are brave, that could have gone sideways easily, although cops are generally most trigger happy against children, people who are sleeping, grandmothers, etc, and avoid actual dangerous folks.

    I don’t think that you would find guys willing to do that in every state. Good for them.

    • leon

      The talking points on Twitter last night was that it was still racist because when the Black Panthers did it in California Reagan passed Gun Control.

  4. The Late P Brooks

    “This is a sign that the mortgage market is functioning better,” said Keith Gumbinger, vice president at HSH.com, a mortgage information website. “The backlog of refinancing is working its way through the pipeline. So lenders are feeling more comfortable passing low rates to the consumers.”

    The Federal Reserve, which cut its benchmark rate to near zero, has jumped in to help stabilize the mortgage market over the past few weeks, agreeing to buy an unlimited amount of mortgage-backed securities.

    What could possibly go wrong?

  5. Count Potato

    “The economy has taken a nosedive since vast swaths of the country were forced to shut down in March, with gross domestic product contracting 4.8 percent in the first quarter — the worst since 2008 — and economists estimating a further fall of approximately 20 to 40 percent in the second quarter.

    The Department of Labor also reported Thursday that 3.8 million Americans filed new jobless claims last week, bringing the total number to over 30 million claims, or 18 percent of the total workforce, since the lockdowns began.”

    This is getting very depressing.

    • Fourscore

      In Depression territory. Mark Dayton’s (ex MN Gov) son, is closing his restaurant in Mpls. While Mark was a governor in mental absentia I still sort of feel sorry for his son, he’s a victim, like the other 18 M.

      • Fourscore

        Change 18 to 30

    • Don Escaped Sarcasm

      gross domestic product contracting 4.8 percent in the first quarter

      Maybe most folks here know this, but as poorly as journalist couch this, it would be easy for even a really good mathematician to misunderstand this stat.

      In this case, the BoL is saying that their first estimate is that GDP contracted an absolute 1.179% in the first quarter. When you raise 1.0179^4 for the quarters, this annualizes to 4.8%.

      Hospitality averages 2.8% of GDP; airlines are 3.6% That’s 6.4% right there of which at least half went away in terms of receipts, so the hit coming is much more than 5% annualized: other sectors were hit as well.

      I write coming because Labor stats are about compensation. The GDP equation says income = expenses, so Y = C + I + G + X – M . . . . So even though spending was down tremendously, salary collapse lags. The numbers will be grim as more firms decide to no longer pay the people who have been sitting at home running spreadsheets. Budgets are on hold, furloughs and salary reductions are spiraling, and that will fall to the bottom line soon: a bang and a whimper.

      • Festus

        Wifey is #2 on the seniority list. They’ve been paying her full wages and bennies to show up and sign in. How much longer can this go on?

      • LCDR_Fish

        Our contract just got renewed for five years (very thankful that it went through as I’m about to close on my house) – moving in the middle of this mess has been a pain and a half (albeit less traffic).

      • Jarflax

        Personally my billings are down over 50%, and that includes one decent sized bit of work that came in out of the blue. Subtract that one item and I am down somewhere between 75% and 90% over the past 6 weeks. There is a lot of pain to come even if we reopen quickly. If we actually follow this phased and restricted model we are in trouble.

  6. Mojeaux

    Mornin’ Banjos.

    This is an ungodly hour to be awake, and I thank you for your service. Here’s a discount.

    • Banjos

      Mornin’

  7. Scruffy Nerfherder

    If they get Strzok up on charges I think I’ll wet myself with glee.

    • WTF

      None of the major players will face any real consequences, so I think your pants are safe.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        *whew*

      • Festus

        Saves you a trip down to the stream and the “warshin’ rock”.

  8. straffinrun

    Not really OT:

    Joe Biden denies former senate staffer Tara Reade’s sexual assault allegation: ‘This never happened’

    Would’ve been more believable if hadn’t sniffed his finger while saying it.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      ewwwww….

    • straffinrun
      • AlexinCT

        One in the stink? And that’s the way Joe likes it?

    • leon

      There. He denied it. What more evidence do you want. Let’s #MoveOn.

      Kind of funny…

      Move On was telling people to ignore sexual harassment long before MeToo can around

    • SDF-7

      At this point I would be willing to believe “I don’t remember that ever happening…” followed shortly by “Where’s my pudding cup?”

    • Tejicano

      We really should believe him. He says that if it had happened he would surely remember it.

    • WTF

      Well, that settles it then, time to put it behind us.
      Just like Kavanaugh.

    • RAHeinlein

      “This never happened”

      Is that the first line of a haiku?

      • SugarFree

        this never happened
        my poor fingers remain dry
        where am I, mommy?

      • WTF

        Awesome!

    • Festus

      You’re on fire this morning, Gaijan.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      The scuttlebutt on the leftist sites is that Reade has made six separate accusations of harassment or assault over the years.

      Her father, Robert Moulton
      Her ex-husband, Tate
      A former employer, Krystal Rojas
      A YWCA supervisor
      A former business partner, Frankie Knight
      Joe Biden

      • AlexinCT

        You see her picture when she was younger? I bet LOTS of guys wanted to tap that… Heck, I bet lots of women wanted to tap that too…

      • leon

        I’ve been very careful with this. I don’t know what happened. I could see it both ways. What i’ve been critical of and bemused by is the #MeToo lefts response to this. Utter silence. And to see those who say “I believe Tara, but I’m going to vote for Biden still because Trump is just as bad”, is probably one of the most honest takes i’ve seen.

      • R C Dean

        Interesting. I think there are some ready explanations for some of it, but not all.

      • Not Adahn

        Love of Russia and Putin. During 2017 when Reade was praising Biden, she was condemning Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s efforts to hijack American democracy in the 2016 election. This changed in November 2018, when Reade trashed the United States as a country of “hypocrisy and imperialism” and “not a democracy at all but a corporate autocracy.”

        Reade’s distaste for America closely tracked her new infatuation with Russia and Putin. She referred to Putin as a “genius” with an athletic prowess that “is intoxicating to American women.” Then there’s this gem: “President Putin has an alluring combination of strength with gentleness. His sensuous image projects his love for life, the embodiment of grace while facing adversity.”

        In March 2019, Reade essentially dismissed the idea of Russian interference in the 2016 American presidential election as hype. She said she loved Russia and her Russian relatives — and “like most women across the world, I like President Putin … a lot, his shirt on or shirt off.”

        Yeah, that’s not a hit piece, at all. Nosiree.

      • The Last American Hero

        Fuck Biden. During the SC shuts how he was #uncriticallyacceptallclaimsbywomen

      • Hyperion

        Regardless, it doesn’t really matter. When the left started all of this identity politics and everyone is a racist and every guy is a rapist stuff, they really were too dumb to think it would ever come back to bite them in the ass. When it inevitably did, they do what they do and change the rules so that it never applies to them, only their political enemies.

        No man will ever be able to run for any high profile office again, without being accused of sexual assault. Until people finally tire of this to the extent there is a massive backlash and hard reset of identity politics.

  9. Chipwooder

    One of the true oddities of the Trump era has been Matt Taibbi, of all people, writing a lot of sensible columns. Here’s his latest, addressing the sickening push for censorship by our supposed “elites”.

    • straffinrun

      Long read. Looks good. *Bookmarked for when sober*

    • Spartacus

      There was a special (Frontline?) on PBS (yeahIknow) the other night about the Uighur concentration camps. Anyone who thinks that the Chinese approach to managing the internet and surveillance technology is worth considering needs to watch that special twice.

      Any government with the power to do great things for you also has the power to do horrible things to you, and 90% of the time you’re going to get the latter. Smart people realized centuries ago that it’s a poor tradeoff.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        We’re rather short on smart people right now.

        We’re even shorter on people who have the slightest grasp of history.

      • WTF

        We’re even shorter on people who have the slightest grasp of history.

        That is by design. Our government indoctrination centers have seen to it.

      • Mojeaux

        It is also by design that the smart people who do have a grasp of history are power-hungry sociopaths who want the benefits that come with being a Power That Be.

    • Count Potato

      “In the Trump years the sector of society we used to describe as liberal America became a giant finger-wagging machine. The news media, academia, the Democratic Party, show-business celebrities and masses of blue-checked Twitter virtuosos became a kind of umbrella agreement society, united by loathing of Trump and fury toward anyone who dissented with their preoccupations.

      Because Conventional Wisdom viewed itself as being solely concerned with the Only Important Thing, i.e. removing Trump, there was no longer any legitimate excuse for disagreeing with Conventional Wisdom’s takes on Russia, Julian Assange, Jill Stein, Joe Rogan, the 25th amendment, Ukraine, the use of the word “treason,” the removal of Alex Jones, the movie Joker, or whatever else happened to be the #Resistance fixation of the day.

      When the Covid-19 crisis struck, the scolding utopia was no longer abstraction. The dream was reality! Pure communism had arrived! Failure to take elite advice was no longer just a deplorable faux pas. Not heeding experts was now murder. It could not be tolerated. Media coverage quickly became a single, floridly-written tirade against “expertise-deniers.” For instance, the Atlantic headline on Kemp’s decision to end some shutdowns was, “Georgia’s Experiment in Human Sacrifice.”

      At the outset of the crisis, America’s biggest internet platforms – Facebook, Twitter, Google, LinkedIn, and Reddit – took an unprecedented step to combat “fraud and misinformation” by promising extensive cooperation in elevating “authoritative” news over less reputable sources.”

      tl;dr? The media sucks ass.

      • Chipwooder

        Right before that was an even better quote from….*checks notes*….this can’t be right, THOMAS FRANK???? That can’t be right, can it?

        Who needs to win elections when you can personally reestablish the social order every day on Twitter and Facebook? When you can scold, and scold, and scold. That’s their future, and it’s a satisfying one: a finger wagging in some vulgar proletarian’s face, forever.

      • Festus

        Hence the army of Karens that has best our society.

      • Festus

        Beset, bested, you be the judge.

      • Not Adahn

        Busty Karens are best, that’s true.

    • Hyperion

      “Matt Taibbi, of all people, writing a lot of sensible columns”

      Well, he sure as hell is correct about The Atlantic.

  10. leon

    Strozok is one of those swamp creatures who ought to be reviled almost universally, but due to the reasons for his public Discovery, will be a hero to half the country for the rest of his life.

    • AlmightyJB

      He should be in prison

  11. Rhywun

    Mornin’. Great song!

  12. The Late P Brooks

    Peter Strzok — the now-disgraced anti-Trump former head of FBI counterintelligence

    Disgraced? He is a true American hero, and once the nation has been freed of the racist oppression of President Cartoon Villain he will be memorialized on the Mall, as is fitting.

  13. Frank Dux

    Well if Mitt thinks Trump will win that just confirms my view that Trump is toast. Then we get to go from the Ginsburg deathwatch to the Thomas deathwatch.

    • leon

      ^^^ this. No matter what though we get 30 more years of awful kavenaugh decisions.

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        Kav isn’t as bad as Roberts. Roberts is the epitome of “bend over and pretend you don’t like it” establishment Republicanism. Kav is tugged in both directions, which makes him very unpredictable. Typically, he’s not gonna go leftward if Roberts doesn’t.

      • Frank Dux

        Yes, Roberts is garbage. No matter how much Roberts grovels a lot of progs keep talking about how broken the Roberts court is and how it needs to be stacked. I enjoy that he is so desperate for acceptance and admiration that he will NEVER get.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        You guys don’t understand. John-boy is trying to preserve the power of the court by not provoking the lunatics!

      • WTF

        Seriously, can you imagine what would happen if the court ruled strictly based on the constitution? At least 90% of the federal government would be rendered illegitimate!!

      • SDF-7

        I’ll be in my bunk…

      • Hyperion

        “Yes, Roberts is garbage.”

        Yeah, but he has a private island somewhere for inventing the Penaltax. Do you have an island?

      • Frank Dux

        Can you prove I don’t?

    • Hyperion

      “Well if Mitt thinks Trump will win that just confirms my view that Trump is toast.”

      I think Trump is still safe until Politico starts saying he will win, then he is toast.

  14. Atanarjuat

    Yes, the economy and cultural forces have affected the marriage rate. Anecdotally I’ve noticed people expect perfection because they’ve had such cushy lives and when their partners fall short, they won’t commit.

    • Fourscore

      My kids, 50s, divorced, will never remarry. I am grateful for that, no reason for them to make more people unhappy.

      • Festus

        My girls save for one married happily and well. The Eldest needed a few “test drives” but has finally settled into domestic bliss. They bought a parrot and some horses. He might be the one!

    • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

      Frankly, I think a lot of people see marriage as old fashioned and a bit… Erm… culturally oppressive.

      Hmm, I wonder where they may have learned to think that way.

      • Mojeaux

        A tool of the patriarchy.

        I’m not quite sure the teenagers are even having much sex. XX told me they still know which girls put out and which ones don’t and it’s still a shameful thing, although I’m not sure how shameful.

        Or maybe it’s just overshadowed by the gender BS and nobody’s actually thinking about the sex act in favor of gender drama.

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        Maybe there’s an article’s worth of material in this idea, but I’ll keep it to a comment.

        The extension of adolescence into the mid-20s has profound impact on the sexuality of people. Even God (through Paul) recognized that most people can’t keep it in their pants forever.

        Back when marriage at 17-19 was common, it wasn’t an impossible task to ask people to wait until they get married. 3, maybe 4 years of waiting. These days? The pious and a few others are waiting 10-15 years. The rest are not.

        I am kinda surprised that having sex in high school is still a big deal. I would’ve figured it would be the default these days. Perhaps it’s still centered around the cultural touchstones? (prom and going to college)

      • Festus

        Teen-aged girls are teen-aged girls. From Gilgamesh right up til today nobody wants to be labeled a “slut”. (until one friend dips her figurative toe in the water and then all bets are off). Kinda explains the rash of abortions that my cohort went through at the same time and a few years later, all the girls having babies at the same time. I don’t mean to be crude but people are herd animals, they mimic what the big cow does.

      • westernsloper

        Geeze Festus, no need to bring the barn yard into it.

      • Festus

        That’s on you (no fetish-shaming).

      • WTF

        people are herd animals

        Hence being easily panicked into acceptance of the draconian government responses to the Wuhan Flu.

      • Pat

        I kept it in my pants through high school. Of my two best friends, 1 got laid his senior year, the other graduated with his virginity intact. I didn’t care enough to find out how anybody else in my social circle’s sex life was going.

        Even as conservative as we were, some of the younger dudes I play video games with are in their early 20s and aren’t even slightly interested in dating. Porn is free, women are expensive, and the rules have changed. A lot. Even in the relatively short time since I was in school.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Women have been working really hard to make the prospect of being in a relationship less attractive.

        Fortunately for me, I’m married to a more traditional Italian woman.

      • Pat

        Also, they develop bizarre kinks and fetishes that can’t possibly be realized (e.g., futanari) and they get fixated.

        Some of the NoFap/YourBrainOnPorn people get a little too fundamentalist about it, but they do have a point.

      • Pat

        I maintain that I clicked the correct Reply button and the website is wrong.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Fortunately for me, I’m married to a more traditional Italian woman.

        *crosses self* God help you!

      • Bob Boberson

        Thats funny you say that. This morning I was scrolling Instagram and I happened to glance at the caption some THOT put under her bikini pic:

        “You can follow you dreams or you can follow a man. Your dreams will never roll over and tell you they don’t love you anymore.”

        I think that says a lot about the notions our culture hammers into the heads of young women. And probably about her relationship with her dad.

      • Mojeaux

        Porn [and video games] is free, women [people] are expensive [and drama-addled], and the rules have changed. A lot.

        Yes.

      • Not Adahn

        Perhaps easy porn has a double whammy of keeping balls drained and increasing insecurities?

      • Mojeaux

        Also, they develop bizarre kinks and fetishes that can’t possibly be realized (e.g., futanari) and they get fixated. Some people had a chance at competing with real-people porn. Competing with cartoon porn is not possible for anyone.

      • Pat

        Porn [and video games] is free

        Some of these kids have multiple hundreds of dollars into games and in-game clout. Definitely more than I ever spent on a girl at their age. That’s the somewhat unusual thing that’s happening, IMO. Different priorities.

      • Mojeaux

        I don’t game, so while I knew that (about the $$$), it didn’t occur to me.

        But back to that, if they do have that kind of cash, never mind the women. Why don’t they try real-life thrills? Skydiving, motorcycles, fast cars, rappeling skyscrapers?

        Take away the issue of money, and they’re paying for vicarious thrills, not real ones.

        Is it the competition factor? Sports. Any kind of sports. Or games. Real ones, like, say geocaching. That’s a fairly alone thing to do, isn’t it? Golf. Board games.

        Or is it the social aspect, in that they would have to actually talk to people?

        My question is not directed toward gamers in relationships and I’m not judging. I spend enough time blowing off steam with solitary games (matching games, minesweeper, Angry Birds, etc.)

      • Festus

        I got laid a lot right in the middle of the Aids crisis. I’m seeing the same behaviors exhibited now. We were promiscuous but not in the “danger-zone”. Number of people that I knew that died of Aids? Zero. Smell familiar? I don’t remember being this pissed off before at government actions but I’m afraid that everybody is going to turn turtle for “The Greater Good”. Fuck it. If I don’t go down swinging at least I’ll have a beer in hand and a ciggie smoldering in the ashtray.

      • Mojeaux

        @Pat (fixing your Gilmore because I Gilmore constantly and I feel your pain)

        Some of the NoFap/YourBrainOnPorn people get a little too fundamentalist about it, but they do have a point.

        I don’t think there is “a little too fundamentalist” when it comes to curing your own addiction, but the new zealots do get tedious about wanting to change the world.

        My son’s addiction is drama (per therapist). I’m not sure he cares what drama it is, just that there is some. That’s why getting him out of school and off the internet has been a boon to him.

      • Pat

        Take away the issue of money, and they’re paying for vicarious thrills, not real ones.

        They also go one further layer of abstraction and watch other people pay competitive video games. One of my gaming acquaintances spent a couple grand traveling to live events before the yellow peril (to watch, not to play). That one I’ll never get either. I guess it’s just a generational thing.

      • Festus

        To Mojo – We grew up in an ex-urb that pretty much bereft of desirable girls and we played the hell out of sports. Hockey in the winter, baseball in the summer, football in the fall. We put our testosterone to good use. Heck, everything was a contest. Who can hit that with a 22? Who can spit the farthest? I’ll bet you five bucks that I can throw a rock through that window from 200 feet away! Young and stupid and full of piss and vinegar. I don’t see anything like that, nowadays.

      • Mojeaux

        Weirdly, I think the traveling to conferences thing (to watch or play) is a better use of resources because they are leaving their house and going somewhere to interact with others of like-minded nature.

        I like the existence of conventions in general because you get to socialize in person with people who share your passion.

        There is the possibility of meeting someone with whom you can click romantically.

      • UnCivilServant

        Pat – I don’t see much difference between people who spend their time and money to spectate eSports and people who do the same to spectate sportsball events.

        Neither one makes sense to me, but they weem to enjoy it.

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        They also go one further layer of abstraction and watch other people pay competitive video games.

        I was skeptical until recently. I’ve been watching iRacing and DCS games. It may not be to the level of real sports, but it’s not that far off, and the personal feel of it is a level of access that traditional sports struggles to replicate. The XFL was trying hard, but even that was a whisper compared to Twitch.

        When it comes down to it, there’s not much difference between a former high school QB watching football all weekend, and a gamer watching the elites play their game.

      • Count Potato

        “Or is it the social aspect, in that they would have to actually talk to people?”

        I think it is the social aspect, although you have it backwards. Gamers not only talk to each other through the games themselves, they have internet forums, Discord, Twitch, etc.

      • Mojeaux

        Young and stupid and full of piss and vinegar. I don’t see anything like that, nowadays.

        I blame helicopter parents and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. That is not sarcastic in the least bit.

        I get the side-eye that I let my kid out on his bicycle to go wherever he pleases. Well, not so much now that he looks more like a late teenager than a kid. He’s got a sense of adventure that I like and though sometimes I’m scared for him, I let him out anyway.

        I don’t know. Maybe the whole video game/porn thing is an effect, not a cause.

      • Pat

        Pat – I don’t see much difference between people who spend their time and money to spectate eSports and people who do the same to spectate sportsball events.

        It’s certainly similar, and I don’t really get the fascination with watching sports either tbh. It’s just the added layer of abstraction that makes it even less understandable to me. Living vicariously through a very skilled athlete who is actually performing a physical task vs. living vicariously through a very skilled manipulator of input devices who is representing a digital facsimile of a very skilled [athlete, soldier, huge-breasted medieval dungeon master, whatever]. I get wanting to play the games yourself and have the experience of vicariously becoming something you could never be in real life. Watching other people have that vicarious experience… I mean I get it in a way, but it’s still weird to me.

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        I get the side-eye that I let my kid out on his bicycle to go wherever he pleases.

        I’m not looking forward to that aspect of parenthood. I’m much more immune to the judgment of others than my wife is, but I’m trying to set a foundation now with her that the consternation of others has zero bearing on how we raise our daughters (it’s really weird to write that)

        TrashBaby #1 turns 3 on Monday, and I’m trying to give her a little bit of space to do semi- and unsupervised activities. Things like “you can play anywhere in the backyard, but you can’t go in the woods” while I’m sitting on the back deck. If she’s out of sight for too long, I find her and make sure she hasn’t gotten into anything dangerous.

        She does all sorts of things that would give Karens heartburn. She plays with rocks and gets into things she shouldn’t be messing with and gets dirty and squashes ants and puts chalk on anything that has a surface. Y’know, kid activities.

      • Mojeaux

        Back when marriage at 17-19 was common, it wasn’t an impossible task to ask people to wait until they get married. 3, maybe 4 years of waiting. These days? The pious and a few others are waiting 10-15 years. The rest are not.

        I can buy that, but I still have to ask: What’s the chicken and what’s the egg?

        You de-stigmatize sex before marriage, so you’re having it, nobody blinks an eye, what point is there to getting married?

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        It’s a fair point. I’m not 100% on Q’s “it’s the pill, dammit” bandwagon, but I think that was a major domino to fall. However, the anti-family strain of the left started making noise 75 years before the pill.

      • Mojeaux

        It’s hard to be anti-family and sexually active if you don’t have a reliable means of birth control.

      • Shirley Knott

        Missing from the discussion are a couple of points, at least one of which is, IMNSHO, very significant.

        The major point: the utter devastation wrought on the male population by the 2 world wars, and to a lesser extent, Korea, and Viet Nam. What happens to family and relationships when a substantial chunk of the male population is just gone?

        The related point: the devastation to the positive values of family living when a non-trivial percentage of the parental population is sufficiently damaged to be unable to maintain a healthy family dynamic.
        Part of this is damaged people, part of this is a lack of examples, of ‘role models’. See, for example, Joan Didion’s dissection of the people who made up much of ‘the summer of love’.

        I submit these are far more impactful than the pill, easy access to abortion, or “politics”.

      • Mojeaux

        War killing off all the men has been a truism since ancient days, though. I’m not sure that one’s relevant, as society has flowed around it. I’ve read that that is one of the purposes of neverending war and colonization.

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        when a non-trivial percentage of the parental population is sufficiently damaged to be unable to maintain a healthy family dynamic.

        Without doing an iota of research, I wonder what the mechanism is for this. Lower mortality rate in the young? Specifically, these damaged folks would’ve died pre-reproduction in the past, but survive to reproductive age now?

      • robc

        I have heard a couple of different ministers say they don’t even ask about sex in pre-marital counseling anymore, it is just assumed that they are already having sex. If one or both is actually a virgin, it will generally come up in the conversations.

  15. The Late P Brooks

    Based on the lack of derogatory information, the Washington Field Office concluded that Flynn “was no longer a viable candidate as part of the larger CROSSFIRE HURRICANE umbrella case.”

    “We’ll have to find some other way to usurp the Pretender to the Throne.”

    • straffinrun

      “Crossfire Hurricane”. That got a twelve year old boy to name their projects?

      • Rhywun

        Every time I hear that name I go here.

      • SDF-7

        Hmm… here for me.

      • SDF-7

        Oh… possibly NSFW, now that I think of it. Those wacky Japanese….

      • commodious spittoon

        Repricants

        Lacist!

      • Rhywun

        Nope but ??

      • Not Adahn

        Considering Flynn’s codename was “Crossfire Razor”… yes?

      • Agent Cooper

        It’s a Golan-Globus production.

  16. SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

    There is no exact definition of a military-style firearm, which means the government’s decision is based on science as well as political choices.

    This is how to propaganda. Just find a way to shoehorn in focus group approved phrases, even if they make no sense in context.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      That’s like calling Stacy Abrams a scientist because she took polisci.

      • Frank Dux

        well she also has 25 years of independent foreign policy research.

    • leon

      There’s no objective meaning for this. That means our definition is based on objective science.

    • Pat

      It’s like obscenity, you know it when you see it.

  17. leon

    In pursuit of information on Flynn, the “Crossfire Hurricane” team investigating the Trump team “conducted a check of logical databases for any derogatory information” on Flynn. The January 4 FBI report states that “no derogatory information was identified in FBI holdings.”

    The memo also discusses additional FBI efforts to check information on Flynn, apparently through other US agencies. Just like the FBI, they also found “no derogatory information” on Flynn.

    That could never happen hear. The NSA is just collecting evidence for when you become a problem to the authoritarian adminstrative state.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      The Democrat true believers stand by their position that Flynn is a Putin puppet.

      • AlexinCT

        Flynn’s crimes are that he first & foremost pissed off Black Jesus by pointing out he was weaponizing the bureaucracy and lying about Iran, then ending up in the Trump campaign as his top security adviser with all that knowledge of the corruption that was SOP under Obama. The machine could not tolerate a guy like that in charge. Especially if he was working for orange man that would find out how fucking bad the abuses were by Obama’s machine in the pursuit of getting more and keeping power for team blue. They had to destroy him. And they also wanted to use him to get bad orange man, either by going after other people in his circle or directly.

        Anyone defending this shit is never to be allowed near power. I wish we could ban people from voting when they are apparently this ignorant of what abuses of power constitute. Yeah, I know. They don’t mind the abuses as long as it is their guy fucking over others. That makes them worse.

  18. Festus

    *Insert gif of Strzok Squirm* Mornin’ Banjos! I trust you are doing well? Thank Gaia the snow is gone and Wifey has some play-time outside. Of course this means that I need to see to all the small engine repair this weekend but I’m sanguine about that. She wants a deck and I need a fence.

    • Banjos

      Mornin’

  19. Certified Public Asshat

    This is what unfettered capitalism is all about. Trump demands that low-income workers in meatpacking plants either go back to work and get sick, or lose their unemployment checks and go hungry. The struggle for justice continues.— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) April 30, 2020

    Some would say, he has this completely wrong.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      This is actually the GOP/Trump’s plan:

      This is their plan, kill us in vast numbers so people are afraid, make voting be a life risking situation by stopping all early voting and mail in voting and then send in the goons with guns. This is already a far RW plan, go check out gun shops, they are empty. My husband asked a local gun dealer why the shelves were so empty, he said a lot of people are afraid that “libtards” and minorities are going to steal the election so they are gunning up to stop it. This is in purple NE FL. Purple only because we have a lot of AA living here. most of the whites are still rednecks. It’s obvious he will not settle unless there are tons of us dying in the fall. He wants the profiteering, yes, that is important to him, but mostly he wants us dead and dying and afraid, so when we riot because our votes are being suppressed/stolen, he can declare martial law and stop the voting. You know SCOTUS would affirm this which would be the death knell for our country. That, I think, is the plan, turn us into a rw fascist nation run for and by oligarchs with no rights and no money for the working class/poor.

      /DU

      • leon

        damn we have a mole. Who’s been leaking the super secret plans?!?!

      • Chipwooder

        Bo Cara esq.

      • Swiss Servator

        SPEAK NOT THE NAME OF THE DEVIL, FOR HE SHALL APPEAR!

        Of course, SP could just nuke him.

      • Not Adahn

        Was it ever determined if he was a real person or a sock?

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Seemed real to me, had a distinct tone/writing style.

      • Bob Boberson

        Thats some good projection there Lou.

      • EvilSheldon

        Funny, in my neck of the woods it’s been the yuppies and lefty types buying up all of the guns.

      • B.P.

        Yep. Going outside is an instant death sentence handed down by the president and his army of greedy, ignorant, racist goons.

    • Bob Boberson

      Tinfoil hat me really does wonder if this is a conspiracy to start food (and specifically meat) rationing. The fact that they are euthanizing and dumping cows and chickens is scary. When farmers go out of business they aren’t replaced with more farmers, and there is a growing movement of militant vegans who will lobby for “meatless Mondays,” etc and declare diminished meat supply is an unalloyed good.

  20. The Late P Brooks

    The planet is dying

    Antarctica and Greenland lost thousands of gigatons of ice in the last 16 years, according to results from a new NASA mission published Thursday.

    Scientists reported that the two land masses have lost 5,000 gigatons of ice in that time period, which is enough to fill Lake Michigan. A gigaton is equal to a billion metric tons.

    ——-

    The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said last week that Arctic ice reached its second-lowest extent on record in 2019. NOAA also said earlier this month that they are projecting 2020 will be the hottest year on record, surpassing a record set in 2016.

    The loss in Arctic ice is expected to result in rising sea levels globally.

    “It will reach us eventually here, even though it’s really far away and hard to think about,” said Helen Fricker, a glaciologist with the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California-San Diego told NPR.

    Who cares if people starve? They killed the planet.

    • leon

      “projecting 2020 will be the hottest year on record, surpassing a record set in 2016.”

      Based off the projections from the rest of the expert class I’d go long on parkas.

    • SDF-7

      And just think of the gigatons of ice that used to be where the Great Lakes are! We’re all gonna diiiieeeee….

      • Fourscore

        But at least the gigantic ozone hole closed up. Gaia is figuring things out, even while we sleep. In 10 years we’ll have moved on to Global Arctic Freezing Never Recorded Cold, food shortages are going to kill before the Big Chill has time to set the clock to normal and 2-3 new viruses will be known but this time from Africa.

      • Shirley Knott

        So, back to 80s style eco-doom?
        “We will all freeze in the dark” was the mantra of a science teacher for whom I worked.

    • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

      The loss in Arctic ice is expected to result in rising sea levels globally.

      Can somebody explain that one to me? It’s all floating sea ice, right? Liquid water is more dense than ice, right? So 5,000 gigatons of sea ice should take up more space than 5,000 gigatons of water, right?

      • Pat

        SHUT UP DENIER!

      • UnCivilServant

        Arctic ice is alreayd displacing the same volume of sea as it would if it were liquid, so melting it would have zero impact. The increased volume in a solid state is hanging out above the surface.

        Melting the landlocked antarctic ice would only have a minimum impact

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        Arctic ice is alreayd displacing the same volume of sea as it would if it were liquid, so melting it would have zero impact. The increased volume in a solid state is hanging out above the surface.

        The sad thing is I knew that, but still wrote what I wrote.

        *goes and gets another cup of coffee*

      • Claypoolsreservoir

        New guy here. Been lurking for a few years after reading a comment over at Reason about someone sounding like one of those weirdo glibertarians. I found myself in agreement with the guy being chastised so I ventured over to this cesspool.

        I was annoyed by these statistics a while ago. So I ran the numbers. First and foremost, melting “sea ice” will not cause sea levels to rise, anyone who says that has obviously never taken a basic physics class. Melting land based ice, such as the Greenland ice sheet, will cause sea levels to rise. Most “scientists” state that the sea levels will rise by 20-30 feet if the ice sheet melts completely. This is based on the volume of ice in the Greenland sheet, minus 10% for the expansion of frozen water, and then adding that volume to the current area taken up by the oceans. The assumption is pure idiocy. First, it assumes as the water rises, it rises vertically. as though the oceans are contained in some magical fish bowl. They are not. I can’t even begin to fathom how difficult it would be to properly estimate the volume occupied by moving the oceans inland by 5 feet, so they don’t. Will they rise by a significant amount? Maybe. Will they rise enough to bury the Outer Banks in 5′ of water? I would bet my life on that not happening even if the Greenland sheet completely disappeared (which it won’t).

        I’m happy to run the numbers for anyone that really wants to see them. It’s just estimating height given volume and area (the area being the real world unknown).

  21. leon

    Had the first Grill of the season yesterday, went pretty well, and was able to finish before the rain came in.

    • RAHeinlein

      Found the first morels of the season and made my husband a grilled salmon with morel cream sauce.

      • WTF

        Dayum, that sounds good!

      • bacon-magic

        I’m having trouble finding morels this year. The cold snap in this part of Illinois didn’t help.

  22. The Late P Brooks

    Any government with the power to do great things for you also has the power to do horrible things to you, and 90% of the time you’re going to get the latter. Smart people realized centuries ago that it’s a poor tradeoff.

    Some lessons have to be re-learned, every so often.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      And I’m certain it has to to do with reimbursement rates to the healthcare facilities.

      • straffinrun

        Affirmative affliction.

    • westernsloper

      A local Denver station busted the dept of health retroactively changing death certificates to Covid as the cause. I can’t find the article now. McCaffee has been harping on if for a week saying any care facility gets $39,000 for each Covid diagnosis/death. Not sure if that is true.

      • Tundra

        FEE explains all.

        “Hospital administrators might well want to see COVID-19 attached to a discharge summary or a death certificate. Why? Because if it’s a straightforward, garden-variety pneumonia that a person is admitted to the hospital for—if they’re Medicare—typically, the diagnosis-related group lump sum payment would be $5,000,” said Jensen, whose claim was fact-checked by USA Today. “But if it’s COVID-19 pneumonia, then it’s $13,000, and if that COVID-19 pneumonia patient ends up on a ventilator, it goes up to $39,000.”

        What’s that about incentives, again?

      • westernsloper

        FFS

      • creech

        “Deceased fell off ladder and broke his neck while trying to mount a ‘Thank You First Responder Heroes’ banner on his house.
        Cause of death: Covid-19.” Woohoo – $39K more for the checking account!

      • R C Dean

        Kind of misleading. We get a 20% premium for a COVID patient on whatever else we would get.

        I still haven’t checked to see how loose the criteria are.

      • Gustave Lytton

        I’m assured that no one would attempt to mis classify a death because that would be fraud. Besides, it would be too hard to do so and leave a paper trail. This is just RWN talking points that people respond to incentives.

    • Hyperion

      “I’m sure this is happening everywhere.”

      It is, and the mainstream media will never report it and so most people will never know about it. And.nothing.else.happened.

  23. Scruffy Nerfherder

    Freaky Friday: Those Crazy Turks

    Another crowd-pleasing appeal of a waterpark: Clown! Clown is a shower. From its nose and its boxing gloves, the water flows. This giant colourful shower is designed for the use of three people at once; supplying water from its nose and from its both boxing gloves. Let your guests enjoy the shower as a family with Clown!!

    • Not Adahn

      That’s nobody’s business but theirs.

  24. Not Adahn

    The new trial balloon for why the lockdown must continue is “the ‘rona causes strokes like nothing ever seen before!”

    The Morning Edition guy put on his best righteous indignation voice when demanding that a guy from the FL Chamber of Commerce admit that he was “experimenting with peoples lives” Because apparently in FL, the CoC is a governing body. Who knew?

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      They’ve been beating that drum for a couple of days now. Nevermind that it’s an “extremely rare” occurrence.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      There’s definitely a subset of people who really want this shutdown to go on indefinitely. It’s disturbing to say the least.

      • straffinrun

        Got money? You just want to exploit your workers. Got no money? You’re just being exploited. How can you argue against such sound logic?

      • Pat

        I hope they all get aggressive cancers and have heart attacks that can’t be treated because half of the fucking medical personnel in the country have been furloughed. Genuinely.

      • Count Potato

        What’s more disturbing is that they can’t tell you a good reason why.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Or recognize the economic destruction that’s occurring.

      • Chipwooder

        Or, worse, they DO admit that the economy is speeding towards the abyss, but don’t care because IF IT SAVES JUST ONE LIFE…..

      • SUPREME OVERLORD trshmnstr

        They aren’t even thinking about the shutdown. Theyre reacting autonomically to a perceived threat.

        I posted this yesterday, but my 2 year old daughter is terrified of flying bugs and flipped her lid when she saw a fly in the house yesterday. She was screaming for me to simultaneously get rid of the fly and to hold her to protect her from the fly. Pure panic. Zero thought.

        There is a not-insignificant minority of people operating in that same lizard brain mode. They just want the icky spider that is Covid to disappear, and their screams reach a high pitched furor when you try to metaphorically put them down so you can dispatch the spider or when you try to take them into the other room away from the spider.

        Frankly, there are a lot of drama queens (and kings) out there who weren’t told to “suck it up, buttercup” enough as a child.

    • Count Potato

      The goggles do nothing!

    • Drake

      Just like climate change, acid rain, white supremacy, etc – it’s all based on lies and junk science.

      But thanks to the lies and junk science, we just destroyed a booming economy. So now they can’t just say “woops” and reopen things. They have to draw it out and continue the lies.

      • Hyperion

        It could truly be the last chance to end our national nightmare and get rid of badorangeman. And if we have to become Zimbabwe to do it, then it’s worth it!

      • B.P.

        Don’t worry about the cratering in public trust in institutions once this is all over. Nothing will come of it.

    • Hyperion

      “The Karens are coming out en masse against Elon today.”

      musk is a known misogynist. He’s been flying these things into outer space that are shaped like giant penises, and the only reason he would ever fly something shaped like that is to intentionally try to trigger da wiminz folk.

  25. The Late P Brooks

    Believe it, Shirley

    Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley told Fox News Thursday that “someone needs to pay” after recently unsealed documents revealed questionable conduct by top FBI officials during the investigation of former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn.

    “Laura, this upsets me so much because when I was at the United Nations, this is what we looked at other countries doing … corrupt measures to frame people and to hide things,” Haley said on “The Ingraham Angle.” “I can’t believe this happened in the United States of America.”

    Remember those naive fools who said, “It can’t happen here”?

    Well, they were wrong.

    • Q Continuum

      “Remember those naive fools who said, ‘It can’t happen here’?”

      The Magic Dirt Theory.

  26. The Late P Brooks

    Happy May Day, Comrades!

    Strike a blow for the Workers.

    • Not Adahn

      Unfortunately, it’s against company policy to strike my workers, even though some of them would benefit greatly from a few blows.

    • Toxteth O’Grady

      Happy Loyalty Day also! (? to that too)

  27. robc

    I keep hearing these mortgage rate stories, but when I check, it is only marginally lower than the rate I got back in October, so not worth considering a refi.

    For whatever reason, the local rate hasn’t dropped as much as the national.

    • Certified Public Asshat

      I snuck a refi through this month, but the lender was swamped and while I got a good rate, it didn’t feel like the greatest ever.

      • LCDR_Fish

        Yeah, I got them to drop my rate a bit more before I sign today, but still not as low as I was anticipating from the national numbers. Will still try and see about a refi in the next year or so when things slow down.

  28. Q Continuum

    Those saying the media got “pressured” into covering Tara Reade: poppycock. They *only* cover stuff they want to and will omit, dissemble and lie to the ends of the Earth if it fits their purposes. The fact that he’s being asked about it now on outlets like MSNBC to me just confirms beyond a reasonable doubt that they’re going to find a way to get rid of him. The fact that Herself has started sniffing around seems oddly… convenient.

    *prepares popcorn… or was it cornpop?*

    • straffinrun

      Explains all of Biden’s slips of the tongue.

      • Count Potato

        Ewwwww

    • Festus

      Your description of Herself “sniffing around” just gave me some PTSD. Thanks SF. Thanks a bunch.

      • bacon-magic

        What about her other orifices?
        *shudders and ducks

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      You people have got to stop with the Hillary sex euphamisms.

    • leon

      While i think it is mostly true that the “media only covers what they want” They can’t stonewall everything. I think there was a bunch of pressure put on them by outlets outside of them that were covering it (Mostly Fox and the Hill), that it was becoming too aparent. That and the Biden Campaign did this to themselves by making their talking point that the NYT had investigated and absolved him, which they absolutely did not do. By saying that they kinda forced the NYT to come out and clarify that they did not do that.

      • Count Potato

        Well, they also knew Trump would bring it up.

    • Atanarjuat

      It might all be worth it to watch Hillary lose and refuse to accept it again.

      • Festus

        That would be lovely but I was wrong, wrong wrong last election cycle.

  29. banginglc1

    In regards to lower marriage rates . . . Incentives (like always) matter. The girlfriend and I have talked about this a lot lately. We can’t get married because it would remove all the benefits that she gets. It’s better for us to stay away from wedlock.

    (SLD: I don’t think the benefits she gets should exist, but I fully encourage her to utilize them since they do)

    • Q Continuum

      Find a woman you hate and buy her a house!

      • Festus

        Find a woman that will grow to hate you and buy her a house. FTFY

    • Mojeaux

      We can’t get married because it would remove all the benefits that she gets.

      Happened to my cousin and her d00d. Even my very straight-laced orthodox mother couldn’t fault her for it.

      Side note: Many very straight-laced orthodox people are odd ducks. They are very judgmental of other people’s sins, but given the context with people they are close to, they are totally accepting.

      • robc

        There is also the option (for some) of having a “church” wedding but not filing any paperwork with the state.

      • banginglc1

        That’s actually our plan if we get that far.

      • Jarflax

        I wonder how long it will be until we see States reinstating common law marriage precisely to close the benefit loophole?

      • robc

        9 states still have common law marriage.

      • robc

        or 8 or 13, depending on how you want to count.

  30. westernsloper

    The Federal Reserve, which cut its benchmark rate to near zero, has jumped in to help stabilize the mortgage market over the past few weeks, agreeing to buy an unlimited amount of mortgage-backed securities.

    Haven’t we played this game before?

    • Nephilium

      But this time… it’s different!

  31. Nephilium

    What? Closing businesses, and forcing people to work from home may cause tax revenue issues? Of course, the solution won’t be to cut spending… that would be crazy talk.

    • Festus

      “Black as the Ace of Spades, she was!”

      • UnCivilServant

        So, largely white with a few black splotches?

      • Not Adahn

        …so that would make a snow leopard a symbol of racism, right?

      • Chipwooder

        Huh? Lemmy was about as white as it gets.

  32. The Late P Brooks

    I watched this last night.

    An excellent documentary about Cosworth/Ford turbo F1 motor program in the ’80s. Definitely a couple of hours well spent.

    I especially enjoyed the post mortem of the four cylinder which failed catastrophically on the dyno. WHAM!!! “What just happened? Noooooo!” I’m an asshole. I wish somebody had given me a pot of money like that to destroy stuff. You computer types might enjoy the stone age engine management tech.

    Awesome history.

  33. The Late P Brooks

    Find a woman you hate and buy her a house!

    Okay, Willie.

  34. Tundra

    Good morning, Banjos!

    And a good morning to the good people of Michigan (even the silly Tactical TImmies). Our dickhead governor did a 90 minute circle jerk with his merry band of idiots and extended the lockdown until 5/18. But he did throw us a bone: some retail businesses can open up for curbside service only.

    Remember, 80 percent of our deaths were in nursing homes and 99.24 percent had serious underlying conditions. Unreal.

    Anyway, the song you chose is the perfect one for clearing my rage. Thank you!

    Make it a great day, y’all!

    • Nephilium

      The headlines here in Ohio just say that DeWine is planning on extending the stay at home order (which expired today). There’s the re-opening plan that was announced, but no new end date for the lockdown. Several cities have already cancelled all events until Fall.

    • Banjos

      Mornin’

  35. Stinky Wizzleteats

    “Canada set to ban scary looking rifles.”
    Thank God I live in the good old US of A, that shit’ll never happen here with our sacrosanct second amendment.

    • Chipwooder

      *bitter, bitter chuckling*

  36. Q Continuum

    This is the new narrative.

    https://metro.co.uk/2020/05/01/coronavirus-second-wave-even-worse-first-chris-whitty-warns-12637927/

    I gotta wonder: for the lockdownistas, what’s the end game? Surely even they can see that they can’t just keep this up forever. In the US, you could make the argument that they want it to stretch to November, but in Europe? Is there some kind of strategy, or is it just the pure, orgasmic joy they get from stomping that boot on everyone’s face?

    • Chipwooder

      Well, their original justification for lockdowns has already happened – the curve, as they say, was flattened. Hospitals are not remotely in danger of being overwhelmed by victims of the dreaded Wu Flu, so now they have no choice but to fallback to rendezvous point 1: the second wave is the REAL danger here!!!!

      • Pat

        Of course, we wouldn’t be having a “second wave” if they had let the first one burn itself out and the survivors rapidly develop herd immunity like every other fucking virus in the history of humanity.

      • Count Potato

        This guy gets it.

    • Pat

      Try to remember how many countries were involved in the plot to keep Trump out of office. This isn’t a purely US national issue.

      • AlexinCT

        Trump is a danger to every single entity that wants the plebes worshiping at the altar of big government. His rise means that the unwashed masses no longer want to just grab their ankles whenever the inept credentialed elite class demand they take it up the ass, so the inept credentialed elite class can protect it’s gains and not be held accountable for its failures (hereditary access), and they want none of that. The fucking deplorables should know their place, shut their fucking traps, and only talk when they are going the be grateful they get the fucking crumbs of the table.

      • Chipwooder

        That’s a man, baby!

        I fucking despise utopians.

      • Q Continuum

        The one on the left has a little bit of potential if she cleaned herself up, discovered makeup and how to dress. The one on the right I’m pretty sure was created in a lab in the basement of the Harvard Gender Studies Department.

      • Not Adahn

        I’m not completely certain that the one on the left has a front hole.

      • Chipwooder

        I’m fairly certain neither of them do.

      • SugarFree

        But leftie has a more obvious bulge of male genitalia.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Dammit, I had to go back and look. I was almost over the burning sensation in my eyes.

        Definitely a dude

      • Q Continuum

        Yep. Missed that the first time.

      • Festus

        Making me doubt my “jorts” endeavor. The cute one does have a “front hole”.

      • bacon-magic

        And pubic hair. Ew.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        If the one on the right’s family has money I’d be willing to take one for the team.

      • Not Adahn

        It would be bigoted to refuse a shenis.

      • AlexinCT

        That one on the right loves softball and pretending guys pay attention to her against her will…

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        My eyes just melted…

      • Count Potato

        Gaah!

      • WTF

        “Abolish work”? Exactly how the fuck does she think that will “work”? How is it possible to be that stupid?

      • AlexinCT

        She wants government to just pay for what she wants so she can just go do “meaningful” things…. Basically these people want to go back to not being responsible, and replace their parents with government. It’s the very definition from infant. And their thinking proves they are not ready for the real world.

      • Festus

        Making me doubt my “jorts” endeavor. The cute one does have a “front hole”.

      • R C Dean

        Technically, a penis is in front and does have a hole.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Maybe there will be a second wave, maybe not, but buttoning down again in anticipation of something that may or may not happen is fucking crazy. There’s also some kind of inflammatory syndrome that happens with children that I’ve seen The Sun pushing.

    • leon

      Some people are genuinely moved by the fact that they think they are doing the right thing. Then you have the weird conundrum of the paradox that when someone is doing something they truly believe is right, they will entrench even further when people argue that it isn’t just less right, but wrong.

    • Tundra

      Yeah, yeah.

      Wasn’t SARS supposed to come screaming back once it worked its way through the Southern Hemisphere?

      I’m not sure what their game is, but things aren’t looking too good for liberty peeps.

    • WTF

      Is there some kind of strategy, or is it just the pure, orgasmic joy they get from stomping that boot on everyone’s face?

      That question answers itself. The authoritarian control is the strategy.

    • Hyperion

      “I gotta wonder: for the lockdownistas, what’s the end game?”

      Get rid of badorangeman so we can rob the piggy bank of what change is left over. There, that was easy.

  37. Certified Public Asshat

    1/ Hey, remember how everyone who worked at that meatpacking plant in South Dakota got coronavirus and was going to die? This @nytimes story was April 15. As of now, 16 days later, South Dakota has 17 deaths total – ONE in anyone under 50, none under 40… pic.twitter.com/ZQKpEI1tGA— Alex Berenson (@AlexBerenson) May 1, 2020

    Has it been 16 days already?

    • leon

      Slowest. Apocalypse. ever.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Time has become warped because the news is all the same. Maybe it was sixteen days ago maybe it was the day before yesterday.

  38. Pat

    ICANN blocks proposal to let .org be sold to a for-profit group

    A for-profit group might not end up controlling the .org domain after all. The ICANN Board has rejected Internet Society’s proposal to sell control of the .org domain and the Public Interest Registry, which manages it, to private equity firm Ethos Capital for $1.1 billion. It was a controversial proposition from the start, seeing as the .org domain is mostly used by non-profits — so much so that lawmakers had to send a letter of concern to the parties involved. A bunch of internet pioneers also joined forces and asked ICANN to block the deal from pushing through.

    • leon

      But when do we get .orgy domains?

      • Not Adahn

        Those ISPs are never as good as you think they’d be.

  39. Rufus the Monocled

    This ‘we’re gonna get through this together’ line grates me like you wouldn’t believe.

    Especially when uttered by politicians and celebrities. More empty, shallow, commie words you can’t get.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Aren’t you at home honoring our essential workers?

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Cheer up Rufus, in eighteen months when they have a good vaccine this will all be over.

      • leon

        Much darker take on the vaccine than i’ve seen….

      • creech

        What’s “good?” Current flu vaccines maybe average 50% protection. We can’t end cower in place until we are sure every single life is protected. Better grandma die alone in a nursing concentration camp than any of us ever be gainfully employed again.

      • Rufus the Monocled

        I read Ofxord has one ready for September.

        All I know is there’s some real weird shit going on that aren’t adding up.

        Here, it looks like our little shit head doctor Teresa Tam (who they venerate like Fauci) may have knew about the human to human transmission and sat on it.

        How this doesn’t outrage Canadians is beyond comprehension. The left loves to babble about ‘blood on their hands’ well, if these health and public officials knew about this and did nothing about it (and I think Fauci is in this group) they failed to protect national citizens and they should be immediately investigated.

      • Rufus the Monocled

        Oxford. Yikes!

        Rfusus.

      • Not Adahn

        And in eight months, there will be a brand new deathplague caused by Trump to panic over!

    • WTF

      Oh man, join the club. Whenever one of those commercials comes on with that bullshit I find myself yelling “fuck you!”

    • Gdragon

      Canada Together!

      Also, rat on your neighbours! 😉

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Weren’t we funding bat coronavirus research in that same lab to the tune of several million bucks or was that a bullshit story?

      • Count Potato

        I read the same thing. No idea if it was bullshit.

      • Rufus the Monocled

        The Canadian government just gave it 850k.

        Trudeau is an enemy of Canada in my view. China has this country by the balls because he’s lousy, weak, emasculated, moist cuck.

        But 64% of Canadians polled (I think it was on Yahoo!) think he’s better than Scheer to handle the pandemic.

        And Canadians have the balls to mock Americans? A more dumber flock than us they don’t come.

      • Festus

        Yeah. We suck and we are soft. Dancing Boy is our leader on the world stage. Ponder that on the tree of “Whoa”…

      • Pat

        No, that was legit. Something like 4 million bucks. We also collaborated with a couple of scientists from the Wuhan lab at UNC. Guess which CDC department head wrote off on that one?

  40. Rufus the Monocled

    My cousin lives in Northern Spain. Had a chat last night. OMG, the gross incompetence and authoritarian lockdowns are sickening. He’s looking to come back home. He’s been in Europe (in three countries) for the last 20 years) and while he knew Europeans were ‘weak inside’ he saw a side of it that really freaked him out.

    Even more stupid is every night the sheep come out of their homes to clap for health care workers going home while cops turn their sirens and lights on in salute to one another. My cousin was telling the health care doctors were so incompetent they couldn’t get out of their way with each leading official getting Covid. It was pure Keystone Kops. But they all praise each other because they think they’re at ‘war’.

    His girlfriend is Galician and thinks the same thing. She works in hospital cafes as a cook (and old folks homes which are a pure disaster). They often come running down demanding for the food quickly as if they have no time and then they go sit down for two hours. Sometimes they even have, get this, small parties.

    DURING THE PANDEMIC.

    • WTF

      My wife works in a hospital as a therapist. She hasn’t had to provide her own lunch in weeks because someone is usually donating meals for the hospital staff. And yet they have a couple of units closed down and are having people go on leave and take PTO because they stopped taking elective surgeries and other non-emergency functions, and the overwhelming WuFlu crush was nowhere near what was anticipated, so they have all of these empty beds. It’s fucking insane.

      • Ted S.

        Yeah, I bitched about that in yesterday’s links.

        Where are the meals for the people now out of work?

        I just hope enough people figure out that the government sector considers itself a class above us.

      • Mojeaux

        Where are the meals for the people now out of work?

        There was a segment on the news last night about moratoriums on rent collection and evictions. The relief period here ends May 15, but people still can’t pay their rent and many landlords won’t be able to pay their mortgages.

        Where does it end?

        This is devastating.

      • Rufus the Monocled

        You just want granny to die. Admit it.

      • leon

        I just hope enough people figure out that the government sector considers itself a class above us.

        It seems that there are plenty of people who love submitting to the heel of these most base of “aristocracy”

      • Rufus the Monocled

        Ted S., come on man. People who lose their jobs aren’t heroes.

      • The Other Kevin

        Both my sisters are nurse practitioners, and both have been furloughed. But they still show their badges and cash in on the free shit from restaurants, etc. I don’t have a problem with that, they’re out of work.

        Last night while watching TV, Mrs. TOK noticed a commercial that mentioned a first responders fund. She wanted to know why they’d need that, since they are all working full time. Don’t people who aren’t working need help? Up is down, as they say.

      • invisible finger

        So when do I get my “Supply Chain Hero” free shit?

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      British newspapers should be nonessential too. The histrionics have gotten old.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Is she thicc though?

    • wdalasio

      I don’t doubt that much of the substance of this might very well be true. The thing is, that makes the case for opening up as quickly as possible. Two years of shut-down is not a viable strategy. It means the end of civilization. So, making sure we build out capacity to deal with a larger surge is absolutely essential. And you don’t do that keeping the public locked up in their homes. Moreover, the summer lull should be the period where they hope for as widespread infection, treatment, and immunity as possible.

    • leon

      Why do you hate science?

    • Rufus the Monocled

      So. They’re going to double down on the fear mongering. Awesome.

      Look man. Get out there. Face it down. Get it over and done with. You can’t fricken indefinitely manage this via lockdowns.

      My fear is there will be a spike (highly likely) during FLU season and they’re going to pounce on this.

      And Fauci needs to seriously go fuck himself now. He’s part of the problem.

      Stop listening to the medical bureaucrats. They’re going to keep forecasting worst case scenario models like the shysters in the climate change cult do.

      • Idle Hands

        Fauci is a literal insane person who needs to be straight jacketed. We can’t do this. This is total economic suicide. We go another month and we’ll all be digging through trashcans and foraging for food by september.

    • invisible finger

      WTF? I typed “politics”, not Democrats.

    • Rufus the Monocled

      They’re too busy keeping the panic up so as to push their agenda. This is too good of a crisis to waste.

    • Drake

      The idea of only allowing drugs that have been through peer-reviewed clinical studies to treat a “novel” previously unknown contagious disease is insane. Of all the suicidally stupid things I’ve seen over the past 3 months, this may be the worst. They have made it illegal for doctors to try unproven treatments on patients even though these cannot possibly be any proven treatments.

  41. The Late P Brooks

    Corrupted by power?

    Gov. Gretchen Whitmer on Thursday extended Michigan’s state of emergency and disaster declaration through May 28, hours before it was set to expire and after hundreds of protesters, some of whom were armed, gathered in the state Capitol building to voice their displeasure with the Democratic governor.

    Whitmer also took shots at the Republican-controlled legislature for refusing to extend the order earlier in the day.

    “By refusing to extend the emergency and disaster declaration, Republican lawmakers are putting their heads in the sand and putting more lives and livelihoods at risk,” she said in a statement. “I’m not going to let that happen.”

    She cares. She cares so very much. Not like those moneygrubbing Republicans who want to see you dead, just as long as they can extract a last few pennies from your labor.

    • Drake

      If I understand Michigan’s Emergency Powers Act correctly, she gets 28 days of emergency powers without the legislature. Time’s up and she’s claiming she still has emergency powers – so this is a state constitutional crisis.

    • leon

      “By refusing to extend the emergency and disaster declaration, Republican lawmakers are putting their heads in the sand and putting more lives and livelihoods at risk,

      Where’s my “Get out of here with that bullshit” face?

      • WTF

        The FYTW law, of course. What are you gonna do? Call the cops?

      • Drake

        Somebody will push it and get arrested. At that point to courts can decide if we have rule-of-law in this country or something else. I’ll plan accordingly based on the outcome.

      • WTF

        I think the courts have already mostly tossed rule of law out the window. This is just a test to see what happens to the last pathetic remnants.

    • Dry_Gin_Wet_Farts

      Holy shit, May 28? I don’t see it lasting another entire month. This could get ugly.

      • Nephilium

        Ohio extended their order to May 30th, with exceptions for some businesses to reopen today, May 4th, and May 12th.

        If there isn’t a revolt/widespread civil disobedience by Memorial Day, we’re fucking done.

      • Sean

        This also messes with businesses that got their PPP loans. The 8 week forgiveness clock starts when the funds hit their bank account.

      • Nephilium

        There’s a couple of restaurants here in Ohio that have announced they’re going to re-open in defiance of the order. Unfortunately, Google isn’t helpful in finding the stories (it doesn’t help that there’s a Defiance, OH either).

        Then you’ve got places like Cleveland Bagel that’s trying to figure out a way to reopen (they were primarily takeout already). They’re running into staffing issues though:

        “Out of a staff of 30 people, only seven said they were willing to come back right now,” Herbst admits. “Some are terrified, or if their situation is better on unemployment they don’t want to come back to work part-time. And who knows what’s going to happen with this virus. They might shut everything down again in a month or two.”

      • Dry_Gin_Wet_Farts

        I agree. I think we are going to see civil unrest in the next week or two. This just isn’t sustainable.

    • LJW

      I stop reading when I see the word “literally”

    • wdalasio

      Maybe it’s me, but why do every last damned one of these guys always look almost exactly alike. It’s like they’ve got some sort of farm where they keep the pods for growing them.

    • WTF

      Do they really not understand that all the proponents of opening up want is for the government to stop the prohibitions, and leave it up to each person whether they want to isolate or avoid restaurants and bars, etc.? If YOU are scared then YOU wear a mask, YOU stay home, YOU avoid other people, etc. etc. You have no right to force others to do so if they don’t want to.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Yeah, but if their employer opens back up and says they have to come back to work, it jeopardizes their unemployment insurance. That’s what this is about.

        It’s also why federal employees don’t give a shit about opening up because they are collecting pay regardless.

      • OBE #Learn2Essential

        Hey some of us, and Ill admit it is very small number of us, want this shit opened up! It might be because I have skin the game with our business though.

      • Idle Hands

        Um we all have skin in business. The soft troglodytes just don’t seem to understand that basic thought.

      • R C Dean

        Chatted up the waitresses while I was filling a growler yesterday. No masks, much disappointment in our governor extending the lockdown. They are getting unemployment, but want to go back to work. They were right on point with reopening meaning everybody gets to decide for themselves whether they think it’s too risky to go to bars, the gym, etc. Very encouraging.

  42. Scruffy Nerfherder

    OFFS

    Received my freezer yesterday. Doesn’t work. No replacements available, no repair available. Just spent an hour on the phone arranging a return and got cut off.

    • Mojeaux

      New one? From whom?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Yes, Insignia brand from Best Buy

        I’m assuming they ramped up production to meet demand and put out a bunch of crap.

      • Mojeaux

        Huh.

        Bought mine used. A 10-year-old Whirlpool, $200.

        I admit I’m gunshy about having a used one because the last one we bought used got fried in a lightning-strike power-surge and because we didn’t check on it, lost about $500 worth of meat.

        But that was a freak occurrence and our negligence. So I compulsively check on the thing even though it’s got an alarm.

      • Agent Cooper

        Insignia is crap. Sorry.

    • leon

      Did they ask you to check the thermostat?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Surprisingly didn’t ask me to check anything. I assume that means they have a high failure rate.

      • Idle Hands

        probably. But not enough to trigger a recall. Deal in some equipment warranty repair usually it’s one component that’s causing the problem because some genius design engineer decided to reinvent the wheel.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        not a bad question in this case, there should be a reset switch on it,

    • Count Potato

      Yikes, sorry.

  43. Not Adahn

    Fascinating.

    I’m doing referesher training and apparentlthey’re not willing to say that sleeping on the job is a fireable offense because you’re sleeping on the goddamned job. Is that a union thing? Anyway they are now saying that by sleeping on the job, you’re not maintaining the required stuational awareness and thus can be terminated for safety reasons.

    • UnCivilServant

      w0t?

      I can fire even state employees for sleeping on the job. I just have to document it and tell them to knock it off.

      • Not Adahn

        I am actually becoming uneasy about my job here. When we started, we made the most advanced chips on the planet. Everyting was focused on production, new product development, technology development etc. Lately, there’s been a massive uptick in various non-value-added “corporate” nonsense like Diversity and Inclusion, Flavor-of-the-Month management systems, and the like.

      • UnCivilServant

        Have you started looking for another job? Those are red flags that things will just get worse.

      • Not Adahn

        Not actively. This would not be a good time to move obviously. I should probably see if Micron in Boise is hiring.

      • Gustave Lytton

        It’s the same all over. The SJW type infections are spreading to formerly safe companies.

      • tarran

        Once every other week I’m getting an email from our diversity council that includes the phrase ‘and their allies’.

        It’s really, really, raising my hackles.

      • Mojeaux

        That doesn’t sound Kung Flu-induced.

      • Not Adahn

        I think it’s a combination of factors:

        1. The site has become mature. There’s less construction/demolition. The processes are more nailed down and in sustaining mode.
        2. With the above, we are required to maintain a workforce of a certain size else Caesar Andy can clawback some of the bribes incentives. Without the need for higher-paid traides/technical types, the roster can be filled with more lower-paid HR folx.
        3. We absorbed a lot of IBM people who are frankly lazy and process (as opposed to product)-oriented. There is a reason we ate IBM instead of the other way around.

    • kbolino

      I suppose it might be the distinction between sleeping at work and sleeping on the job? Depending on the circumstances, sleeping at work but not getting paid might be tolerable, though I’d say it’s unprofessional in the vast majority of cases.

  44. slumbrew

    Not Adahn:

    Reposting from last night’s thread:

    “””
    … just saw your post in the last thread re: https://www.villamexicocafe.us/salsa

    I’m stoked that you ordered some – Julie is just the sweetest lady, and I’m sure that helps her out a ton.

    I confess I was trepidatious when you said you were going to order some – I haven’t actually been to the store in a couple years – “is it as awesome as I remember? Did the quality fall off?”. Happy to hear I needn’t have worried.

    “””

    Thanks again for throwing her some business.

    • Not Adahn

      I am always happy to try something new, and the recommendations I’ve gotten here food-wise have been excellent.

      That style of salsa isn’t unknown where I used to live, but is uncomomon. I couldn’t actually tell you where I’d had it before. I actually went back out just to buy chips, beer, and the ingredients for queso after trying that stuff, and wound up eating about $10 worth of it last night.

      • slumbrew

        I don’t think I’ve seen anything quite like that salsa anywhere else around here. She gets a kick out of refusing to say exactly what’s in it.

      • Not Adahn

        I’m not sophisticated enough to really tell you the differences in Mexicans, but I think where I lived were mostly Sinoaloense and Michiocanas. I think that the Boston area has a lot of people from Puebla. I know that when I was last there at a festival that the tamale vendors were selling ones that were four or five times the size as what you’d find in (most) central Texas restaurants.

      • slumbrew

        Julie is indeed from Puebla & says her salsa is standard for that area.

        I’m not sure if most Mexicans around here are from there too or not – I know more front-of-house folks, way more Brazilians than Mexicans.

  45. Fourscore

    Heard one of the Fed Reserve bosses on with Maria this morning. He said the big danger is price deflation. Maybe we need to pump more cash into the economy, for the children. I feel like gravity has been reversed and and like Cheney, “Deficits Don’t Matter Anymore”.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      You can’t create demand out of nothing.

      • Incentives Matter

        You can’t create demand out of nothing.

        Nor, for that matter, supply.

  46. The Late P Brooks

    Power is the principle

    Hours after issuing stern warnings broadly to “the Jewish community” in the wake of a large Hasidic funeral gathering in Brooklyn Tuesday night that resulted in a dozen summonses, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio apologized for his language, but said he had “no regrets about calling out this danger.”
    “If in my passion and in my emotion, I said something that in any way was hurtful, I’m sorry about that,” de Blasio, a Democrat, said at a Wednesday news conference. “That was not my intention. But I also want to be clear: I have no regrets about calling out this danger and saying we’re going to deal with it very, very aggressively.”

    ——-

    The mayor and police commissioner were visibly frustrated as they discussed the illegal gathering — both noting that actions in the community were putting lives in danger including those of city police officers.
    “We’re here to protect human beings and people were put in danger last night,” de Blasio said. “Members of the Jewish community were putting each other in danger. They were putting our police officers in danger.”

    The real sin, of course, is “endangering” the brave heroes of the NYPD. Stop resisting.

    OBEY

  47. The Late P Brooks

    Heard one of the Fed Reserve bosses on with Maria this morning. He said the big danger is price deflation. Maybe we need to pump more cash into the economy, for the children. I feel like gravity has been reversed and and like Cheney, “Deficits Don’t Matter Anymore”.

    In the (very) short term, I see some price competition to draw customers back into the shops. But productivity has crashed, and all that helicopter money is going to be chasing a diminished supply of goods and services.

    Prices have to rise, and the geniuses at the Fed will nod and smile and congratulate themselves, for a while. And then…

    • Bob Boberson

      I’m not entirely economically literate but isn’t deflation what needs to happen? Sure it will be painful but the other alternative seems to be to continue to keep stacking the house of cards higher (or you know, get rid of fiat currency all together but that’s crazy Austrian school talk). Am I off base?

      • kbolino

        The “problem” with price deflation is that it takes a large debt and makes it larger. This is the exact thing our esteemed central bank planners do not want to have happen. From excessive student loans to underwater mortgages to people barely making their car payments, a bout of price deflation turns all of that from teetering on the edge of collapse to collapsing.

        This was all avoidable of course, but they’re going to avoid the natural deflationary corrective mechanism as much as humanly possible.

      • leon

        The “problem” with price deflation is that it takes a large debt and makes it larger. This is the exact thing our esteemed central bank planners do not want to have happen.

        This exactly. If you remember who the largest debtor in the economy is, you see why the Fed has a hard on for inflation vs deflation.

        For normal borrowers, the effect is ambiguous, because your debt becomes more expensive, but everything else you purchase becomes cheaper, so it depends on how leveraged you are. But the US Gov is not a “Normal Borrower”. The US Gov depends on borrowing more than a junkie needs that next hit.

      • Nephilium

        I’m not even sure what to put money into at this point. I’ve still got my contributions to my 401k and brokerage accounts going steady, but I’ve been trying to decide what to do with the Trumpbux and extra savings. Leave it in cash? Buy up the continued dip in the market? Purchase gold/silver? Begin investing in lead?

      • Bob Boberson

        I’ve listened to a lot of podcasts about personal finance by Austrians/libertarians and everybody has a great diagnosis but no great prescriptions. The Fed has made it so your only chance for a return on an investment is to play roulette in the stock market; savers get punished, gold can preserve wealth but is still manipulated. I didn’t know what to do with my money before this ‘crisis.’ All I know is that I’m glad I haven’t gone into 6-digit debt to own a home, with whats going on I’m prizing being debt-free above all else.

      • slumbrew

        I’m inclined to dump money into home improvements I’ve been contemplating. Those won’t be inflated away, at least.

        (technically “in debt” to own this place, but I could pay it off were I so inclined – it’s a low rate and liquidity has its own appeal)

      • robc

        Since my work 401k just started in January, it has been a textbook example of being profitable by dollar cost averaging during the down time. I went postiive this week.

        I put my Trump bucks as an additional principle payment on my house. It was a safe investment…returns 3.625%.

      • Pat

        Nah, you just need to get hip with MMT, where everything’s made up and the points money don’t matter.

    • wdalasio

      It’s surreal. I keep hearing the same people insisting we need massive government stimulus programs and keep the lockdowns in place. Even if I woke up tomorrow morning as a dyed-in-the-wool Keynesian, that would make absolutely no sense whatsoever. You’re not going to stimulate demand while the country is under national house arrest. It’s physically impossible for people to go out and spend money.

      • kbolino

        You could flip it around and look at supply instead of demand. Forget giving people money to spend diffusely, just have the government spend it directly and concentrated. Undo 50 years of economic learning and go back to 1950s-1960s Keynesianism. Or, hell, go back to the New Deal era and have the people work directly for the government in various and sundry work programs.

        But that would be putting people to work, in factories, offices, and job sites, which means more spreading of the disease. While that might not be a bad thing, it completely undermines the justification for the lockdown in the first place.

        The problem with the current situation is there is no economic model that works without economic actors.

      • wdalasio

        there is no economic model that works without economic actors.

        And that’s the crux of the problem. How they can wrap their heads around the delusion that you can have any kind of recovery absent an end to the lockdown is beyond me.

  48. straffinrun

    Managed to watch Biden’s interview with Mika. Not good, Dude. This part was especially not OK.

    https://youtu.be/seu_C08yAAM?t=958

    • Q Continuum

      The dood is absolutely gone. Like, past the point of it being “funny haha, look at old guy be stoopid!”; he actually is demented. He’s gotten noticeably worse in just a couple of months, and he’s had the luxury of hiding in his basement without the stress of being out on the road campaigning. My understanding is that when people with senile dementia get to this stage, they go downhill very fast. I’m completely convinced that he won’t be the nominee and I wouldn’t be surprised if he has to be institutionalized in the next few months.

      • straffinrun

        Saying “I don’t remember” doesn’t jive with “It didn’t happen.”

      • R C Dean

        He won’t be institutionalized. 24 hour home care, and I’m sure the taxpayers will foot the bill.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Jesus

      Bernie must be frothing at the mouth. The only reason they’re keeping Biden in the race at this point is to keep Bernie out.

      • Drake

        I believe that’s why they cancelled the NY primary – it was a chance for Bernie to keep picking up delegates which would make it harder to ignore him when they pull the switchero at the convention.

  49. The Late P Brooks

    In every cloud, a silver lining

    First, coronavirus canceled spring break. Then it was graduation. College Decision Day, an already decaying tradition of declaring one’s intent to attend a particular school, may be next.

    Many colleges, desperate for tuition money during the pandemic, have rolled back the traditional May 1 deadline to June 1. That allows families to weigh new financial concerns and get a sense of how the nation is recovering from the virus.

    Amid economic uncertainty and stunning job losses, some colleges are likely to welcome students of varying qualifications no matter when they decide to commit. Which means it will take months for colleges to know who their students will be, and whether the schools will be able to make ends meet on the tuition revenue they’ll get.

    ——-

    Already,large segments of college-going students are reconsidering their plans, recent polls have shown.

    Roughly 11% of students surveyed by the Strada Education Network said they had canceled their education plans since the coronavirus outbreak. Those who do plan to further their education are considering certificate programs or courses related to in-demand jobs instead of traditional degrees, according to the education nonprofit’s ongoing poll of more than 5,000 people.

    Grievance studies faculty and sex police administrators taken completely by surprise.

  50. The Late P Brooks

    I should probably see if Micron in Boise is hiring.

    You could do a lot worse than Boise.

    • Not Adahn

      Yeah, woods and mountains make me happy.

      • Pat

        You have get a pretty far ways outside of Boise to experience that nowadays. Not to mention politically it’s Portland East Annex.

      • Gustave Lytton

        I know. Once had dreams of escaping to Kuna or Star/Eagle. Or further out.

        /grgrandmother buried in Nampa, wife born in Boise, married at Ada County courthouse

      • Gustave Lytton

        Well, you’ll get one. Or views of them.

    • KSuellington

      Somehow I don’t see these people protesting property taxes.

    • Dry_Gin_Wet_Farts

      Rodriguez lives in Aurora, Colorado, where six of her seven children are hunkered down with her, sheltering in place. Her husband runs the family’s small business: He works as a painter…

      I don’t even know where to begin with this.

      • Agent Cooper

        To be fair (TO BE FAAAHHR) this used to be the Catholic blue-collar norm. Housepainters and homemakers and six or seven kids crammed in a little house and some upward mobility for the kids. What’s changed?

      • Dry_Gin_Wet_Farts

        Society has become more affluent and better educated. It’s pretty well known having 7 children is a horrible financial decision. That’s why birth rates have declined in most Western countries.

        Judging by her name, I think it’s a safe bet she’s Catholic and has the same world view of what used to be the Catholic blue collar norm here.

      • banginglc1

        I don’t think 7 children is a bad financial decision if you have not hope at earning 6 figures. The government will take care of you . . .seriously. For the majority of the country it doesn’t matter.

      • Dry_Gin_Wet_Farts

        The cost of raising a child is about a quarter million dollars. She has seven of them on a painter’s income. Even the most generous government programs aren’t going to make up the shortfall. Everyone in that household is going to suffer for it.

      • Mojeaux

        on a painter’s income

        At some point, 3-5 painters’ incomes.

      • Dry_Gin_Wet_Farts

        True. lol

      • Agent Cooper

        So, have we made the cost of raising a child too expensive?

      • Dry_Gin_Wet_Farts

        I don’t think so. I mean, it is what it is, cost wise. The problem with this couple is they are poorly educated, probably. Maybe if they taught money management in high school, you wouldn’t have so many people making poor decisions and then seeking handouts.

      • Mojeaux

        Her husband runs the family’s small business

        So… DIY labor.

        Big families for a small business owner is often to take advantage of labor laws. Farmers had big families (hopefully sons) because the more kids/sons you had, the more land, crops, and livestock you could manage.

  51. Bob Boberson

    Meme gold posted by one of my friends:

    “Imagine you live in a world where Cinco de Mayo falls on taco Tuesday only to be ruined by a virus named after a Mexican beer.”

    • Count Potato

      LOL

      • Gustave Lytton

        Wifey is already making them tonight.

  52. The Late P Brooks

    I’m completely convinced that he won’t be the nominee and I wouldn’t be surprised if he has to be institutionalized in the next few months.

    There comes a day when you just want to spend more time with your family.

    • Fourscore

      …only to learn your family doesn’t want to spend more time with you…

  53. straffinrun

    Anybody else having trouble with the site?

    • Not Adahn

      It’s a tich slow for me.

      • Pat

        Same. Posts take a while to go through. BUT, the 503 and 504 errors have disappeared.

      • straffinrun

        Posts taking a long time to go through, but now I can’t even F5 to speed it up.

    • Count Potato

      not me

    • Gustave Lytton

      Yep.

    • Festus

      Super slow loading comments. Hope it gets better for y’all. Imma gonna hit the sack and hope that everyone has a better day. Is Neph hosting?

      • straffinrun

        I dunno. I’d do it, but I got a full day on the morrow.

    • Drake

      Very slow.

    • Dry_Gin_Wet_Farts

      Yep.

  54. The Late P Brooks

    “Business” press

    Workers across the pandemic’s front lines plan to strike together this Friday, May 1, on International Workers’ Day, to protest what they say are unsafe conditions and a lack of protection from their employers.

    The May Day General Strike will unite employees at Amazon, Whole Foods, Instacart, Target, Shipt, FedEx, and Walmart in a single, sprawling effort. According to a press release cited by The Intercept, workers—mostly non-unionized, given their employers’ notorious union-busting reputations—will call in sick or walk off the job during their lunch break, picketing outside their warehouses and storefronts. At some sites, rank-and-file union members will stand alongside them.

    ——-

    Tomorrow’s activism comes after a string of protests held by workers at Amazon, Instacart, Shipt, and Whole Foods over the last two months, whose employers have seen unprecedented profits as staffers on the ground stock shelves and run deliveries. The demonstrations reflect a burgeoning unrest among the country’s essential workers, who are entering their third month of duty on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic. And tensions will likely rise as the federal lockdown lifts, states begin to reopen, and thousands of Americans return to their jobs.

    Workers of the World, Unite!

    • Q Continuum

      Call me crazy, but it seems pretty unwise to strike when the unemployment rate is double digits, especially non-unionized workers.

      Seems like for every one of these entitled little shits there’s 100 people lining up to take their job.

    • Pat

      Fast Company and its parent Inc have been utter fucking trash for at least 10 years. I subscribed for a while after I finished college and still thought business was cool.

    • LJW

      We must resist the slavers forcing them to work when a disease that kills .2% of people who are working age is running rampant. Besides unemployment pays way better right now.

    • The Other Kevin

      “Could the lockdown have side-effects no one has considered?”

      Plenty of people have considered them, but it’s currently fashionable to shout them down and call them murderers.

      • Nephilium

        Why come you want to kill Cuomo’s grandmother?

      • Incentives Matter

        Because if I go back in time and kill her, Cuomo would never have been born.

        If it saves just one life . . .

    • Rufus the Monocled

      It’s amazing that we have to ask the question.

      The answer seems pretty obvious to me.

      Isolating healthy people is irrational.

    • Gdragon

      “Could the lockdown have side-effects no one has considered?”

      I don’t know if they have stocked up on TP but I still know where bears are shitting…

    • UnCivilServant

      I’m not going to the rally, but I plan to be in the state because even in lockdown, it’s less locked down than New York, and there’s a chance I can buy groceries without going postal on the petty tyrants.

      • DEG

        If you want to meet up with the New England folks while you are in NH, send me an e-mail. SP can set you up with it (I’ll send her a note).

        As far as I know, masks still aren’t required in New Hampshire grocery stores but all grocery stores have voluntarily limited the number of people in stores and set up aisles to be one-way.

      • UnCivilServant

        If we can work it out, we might as well try. I was going to be in Keene, since it was the closest town to me. Though I have a full tank of gas and could make it further into the state

      • DEG

        OK. I sent a note to SP asking her to send you my e-mail address. Let’s see if we can work something out.

    • straffinrun

      Unless that’s Nishi Hachioji, I’m out. Good on ya, Deg. Sharpen your pitchfork. (Not sure if that’s how they work)

  55. RAHeinlein

    Musk just tweeted “Tesla stock price is too high IMO” – price just fell nearly 7%. “Now give people back their FREEDOM”

    • LJW

      That’s gonna end up in an investigation.

    • Count Potato

      All that was from playing hockey?

      • KSuellington

        That was before the era of goalie face masks I believe.

      • Count Potato

        Ouch!

      • Gdragon

        This is a legit question actually, Sawchuk was not a super stable guy.

  56. The Late P Brooks

    “Could the lockdown have side-effects no one has considered?”

    If you define no one as millions of people who are not governors or “public health experts”.

    • R C Dean

      Well, we are nobodies, which is close.

    • JD is Unemployed
    • Agent Cooper

      Just substitute Epstein for Disney.

  57. PieInTheSky

    Is this professor evil or a genius? Creating an unanswerable exam question and posting the “answer” on a cheating website seems needlessly devious, but then again, ~28% of students ended up cheating, so…?

    https://mobile.twitter.com/rskudesia/status/1255907542380748801

    • UnCivilServant

      They’re a copycat, tales of professors doing that have been circulating for decades.

    • LJW

      I had a professor in college who made his tests so hard that typically the highest grade in the class was a D. He graded on a curve so the highest failure was an A. I quickly realized I could guess on every question and cruised out of that class with a B not learning a damn thing.

      • Not Adahn

        I had the same Physics I prof that my dad had. He had 10 question multiple-choice tests with no numbers, two hours to do them, and any written reference materials you wanted to use. Double-strength fudge factor.

        If you turned in a blank test paper, you got a D.

        Some people failed.

      • robc

        Umm what? If he curved then the highest grade wasnt a D, it was an A.

        People who have some sort of arbitrary number range that defines letter grades are the problem.

      • Raven Nation

        I don’t grade on a curve.

      • Agent Cooper

        I grade only on curves … if you know what I mean.

    • JD is Unemployed

      Eh. Kobayashi Maru.

    • robc

      In normal semesters the average grade was a 85? What kind of joke class was this to begin with?

      And I would be pissed if I wasted time trying to figure out the impossible question.

  58. The Late P Brooks

    Talking point, ho, off the starboard bow!

    The next best thing to good times may be a promise of good times ahead with the right hand on the tiller. But as a campaign theme, this one’s track record is mixed. “Prosperity is just around the corner” was a slogan for President Herbert Hoover in 1932 in the depths of the Great Depression, just before he was crushed by Franklin D. Roosevelt.

    While Hoover’s predicament may have been uniquely hopeless, other incumbents have had also struggled when re-election campaigns had to coincide with weak or recessionary economies.

    Donald J Hoover.

    What will they think of next?

    • Agent Cooper

      I forgot the government shut down the economy to foil Hoover.

  59. The Late P Brooks

    em>I put my Trump bucks as an additional principle payment on my house. It was a safe investment…returns 3.625%.

    This reminds me of some financial advisor I saw on the teevee, who was asked something like, “What should I do with this bonus I’m getting? Should i put it in a savings account?”

    The answer- Given the choice between a savings account probably paying less than inflation, or paying sown a credit card balance with an interest rate in the teens, the sensible course of action would be to pay down the card, and then stop using it so much.

    Wow.

  60. Unreconstructed

    Anecdote from my neighbor yesterday. Could be just the local market, but I found it interesting. He builds pools, and has 35 projects going currently, with another 10 sold, but not started yet. According to him, people pouring concrete and remodeling homes are also doing good business.

    • Agent Cooper

      I am extraordinarily blessed in that I can work from home indefinitely. I have a full-time job but billed a ton of freelance work the first 4 months of the year so we are almost debt-free. We just had a contractor in to look at a few projects in the house.

      I fear this recession will hit the lower-income workers the hardest.

      Why do politicians hate poor people?

      • Hyperion

        “I fear this recession will hit the lower-income workers the hardest.”

        It’s a certainty. I don’t know any knowledge workers who are out of work. We can all work from home, at least for now, until it gets worse if the governors are allowed to drag this out much longer. None of us will be able to work when our clients have laid off all their workers and have no money coming in.

  61. The Late P Brooks

    Why do politicians hate poor people?

    That’s a rhetorical question, right?

    • Agent Cooper

      Of course.

      Let them buy lottery tickets!

  62. Hyperion

    Have any of you had a conversation with someone who is left leaning, about this hysteria and the lockdown? I don’t mean a crazy pussy hat, screaming at the sky member of antifa. I mean one of the mostly normal ones who believe everything the leftist media say and vote for democrats, because the right are extremist crazies with guns?

    I have and it goes something like this.

    me: we have to end this and let people go back to work, it’s doing more harm than it is good.

    lefty: Well… I think it is doing good.

    me: what about the economic harm, there are millions of people out of work and many of them were living paycheck to paycheck as it was. They’re suffering, not because of the virus, but because they have nothing left, no job and not enough money to even buy basic necessities. They’re getting desperate.

    lefty: well… but, no… I mean… people could die!

    me: people are going to die anyway, the shutdown is doing more harm than good.

    lefty: well, but… I mean, we have to… no, we have to… I think it’s working…

    You can go on like this as long as you want, but the answers you get, will never change because they’re not even answers.

    See what I’m getting at? They do NOT think about this at all. They just accept what they are spoon fed by the leftist media and accept it. And they don’t have any answers to any of this because they do not think about it. I’m talking otherwise intelligent people. This type person is also generally living in a bubble and do not know anyone who is being hurt by this because they can work from home and so can everyone else they know. They think their elected leaders are brave heroes who are saving people, they’re totally oblivious to how many people are suffering because of the economy, NOT the fucking virus. This shit makes me angry.

    • Count Potato

      “You can go on like this as long as you want, but the answers you get, will never change because they’re not even answers.”

      That’s been my experience too.

    • Idle Hands

      It’s a matter of faith. People are by their nature religious, the new sainted gods for the left are the scientist and expert class along with the Dem polls this was always inevitable if something like this happened. this event is going to make a great many of them heretics. Unfortunately I think most people will double down with thinking we just need a better class of leadership and experts.

      • Hyperion

        Yeah, and they freaking love science. And science as everyone knows, has always been about diversity, equality, feelings and consensus. How long until these people ban Isaac Newton and Albert Einstein from textbooks because they were racist, or something?