245 Comments

  1. WTF

    Biden Approval Sinks to All-Time Low, Again

    Doesn’t matter, nearly half the country will dutifully vote for him in large enough numbers to facilitate the necessary “fortification”.

    • R C Dean

      Proving again that propaganda, works, the drumbeat of absurd accusations against Trump (I saw one recently that said he would shut down the internet on the first day of his Presidency) will result, not in people pointing and laughing at Our Betters, but in people voting against him.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        ‘Member net neutrality?

      • Ownbestenemy

        Nah, I literally died.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Are we even on the internet right now?

      • UnCivilServant

        No.

        That would be silly.

      • Not Adahn

        I only use the internet for the score to the Cal game.

    • AlexinCT

      I think the fortification this time will be more difficult to do because they don’t have a scandemic to hide behind. I expect them to do their best to lock up Trump, and if that doesn’t work, they might just shoot him (although I bet they do not want to go there and make the guy a martyr for the cause that the country is being run by a cabal of evil fucks). Team blue’s propaganda about Bidenomics or evil Hitler will lock us all up shit has not been sticking, and more and more people are wising up to the fact they are down right a destructive entity when in power, which now has them scared.

      I would not be surprised they do something to Biden & Koh-Moh-Loh so they can rally the troops.

      • WTF

        There’s no scandemic but most places have kept the mail-in ballots and other ridiculously loose voting rules that facilitate fraud.

      • Rat on a train

        They got away with it and can now do it openly.

      • R C Dean

        Indeed. The plague was the pretext for blowing up election security. It didn’t really provide cover for the backroom shenanigans. Very little of the election security has been restored. Nobody has been punished. The Ruling Class is fully committed to denying anything went on, and keeping our crap election system.

        So, yes, there will be more shenanigans. Why wouldn’t there be?

      • Pine_Tree

        Said it before, but I think they’re gonna:

        Martyr Harris. Replace with SecDef Austin. Remove Biden one way or another. Austin’s it.

        Reliable prog and tool of the progs. Black so can’t be criticized. Ex-General so fools the Tom Clancy syndromers.

      • Rat on a train

        I would like to believe the Republicans in the House could block confirmation.

      • Pine_Tree

        Well, I’d like a lot of things that are similarly not in the realm of possibility.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        My prediction: They run Biden and Harris; no one’s thrilled but they jam it down everyone’s throats; they gope the Trump hatred will suffice and + a million if he gets convicted with something and he gets kicked off the ballots and the courts go along with it. In other words, they’re going to continue with what they’re already doing now-hopefully it doesn’t work.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        Stinkys right. They made this bed, thinking that Kamalamadingdong was, by the transitive power of intersectionality, going to step into Biden’s shoes, so to speak. What they were blind too was just how bad she was at, well, everything. They really did think it was racism that held her back.

        And while they knew Biden was showing signs of dementia of some sort, they didn’t count on there being this big of a split in the Dem powers. Jill Biden will not give up power that easily, and I don’t think the rest of them even took that into consideration, that she is as power hungry as the 1st lady as Hilary was, but in a homemaker sense, oddly enough. And there isn’t enough concentrated power topple her. So, they get to run what they had last time, and hope that fortification works again, without screwing up the brand even more.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Not just Jill but everyone whose benefiting from Team Biden “running” things.

      • Tonio

        That’s an interesting scenario, Pine_Tree. I had considered a similar scenario with Buttgieg replacing Harris, but Austin is probably a better choice.

      • B.P.

        “Team blue’s propaganda about Bidenomics or evil Hitler will lock us all up shit has not been sticking…”

        I know several people who prattle on about the rising fascist Trump tide, him saying things about vermin and polluted blood, the end of democracy, etc. It’s working enough.

    • juris imprudent

      These guys don’t seem to think this is all wrapped up.

      Meanwhile, as ancestrally Democratic rural areas began trending more Republican, the state became more competitive at the presidential level, culminating in Donald Trump capturing it in 2016 and becoming the first Republican since Ronald Reagan to win the state’s electoral votes.

      In 2020, Wisconsin swung back to Democrats at the presidential level, though Joe Biden’s win margins of 0.6 points and 20,682 votes were even narrower than Trump’s were in 2016. In the 2022 midterms, Wisconsin delivered one of the few split-ticket results in the country, re-electing both GOP Senator Ron Johnson and Democratic Governor Tony Evers by 1.0 point and 3.4 points, respectively.

      Whole thing is a pretty good read with some interesting graphics.

    • juris imprudent

      Speaking of fortification. Of course Obama’s IRS ruthlessly scrutinized conservative non-profits.

      • AlexinCT

        If people only knew that Obama’s intel machine spied on political and other enemies long before they went after Trump, I think we finally might get focus on the fact that the D.C. machine was weaponized and encouraged to fuck the constitution and Americans over by that jackass and his fundamental change shit.

      • juris imprudent

        Why do you think people would suddenly be up in arms about it? Swiss nailed it down below – “it hurts people I don’t like”. That’s fucking political America my friend. It may not be the America of day to day life, but that is our politics. It won’t change until people that view politics as primary in life are reduced to decomposing matter.

  2. Not Adahn

    Is HM or another NH Glib participating in an effort to get Biden to lose the NH (D) primary? I’d help with that.

  3. Not Adahn

    Where is everybody?

    • Rat on a train

      It took a while to find the place. I lost my map to the internet.

      • juris imprudent

        Us men, won’t ever stop and ask for directions, right?

  4. R C Dean

    “Democrats Say Justice Thomas Should Recuse Himself From Trump Supreme Court Case”

    Well, Democrats say a lot of things.

    • WTF

      Most of them stupid.

      • AlexinCT

        Most?

      • WTF

        Well, Fetterman of all people has actually said some sensible things about the Israel-Gaza conflict.

      • DrOtto

        Did he also say something coherent on the border?

      • Ownbestenemy

        The glitch he suffered has restricted his processing to serial operations only with a data buffer of 16 bytes.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        So, you are saying he had his morning bran flakes?

      • Certified Public Asshat

        He did!

      • juris imprudent

        Some of the people are dumb all of the time, all of the people are dumb some of the time…

    • TARDis

      I say Soros funded DAs should have to fellate him on live TV.

      I would settle for having them removed from all cases involving a non-Democrat defendant though.

  5. Fourscore

    Adams admits the Grift Stops Here. There is not money for the migrants and the other free loaders. Someone has to take a haircut. The idea was sound but reality is a bitch.

    • Rat on a train

      You already got your grift from the COVID, infrastructure, and inflation acts.

    • AlexinCT

      They are going to take him out for that.. He is basically undermining their strategy of inundating the country with welfare rent seekers that will help team blue win elections because he won’t shut up. And team blue is pissed these people are being shipped to blue states because that means they need a lot more invaders to change the demographics of Texas or Florida..

  6. Swiss Servator

    “Watchdog Alleges DeSantis Campaign Illegally Coordinated with Super PAC”

    Right on cue.

    We are going to get stuck with the Orange Spending Machine vs Senility Joe.

    We deserve this.

    • juris imprudent

      Is this what social justice is – punishing everyone for the sins of the few?

      • R C Dean

        Since “social justice” is just a euphemism for “collective punishment”, yes.

    • Drake

      Other than the Cobra, all the Republicans running are bought and owned by uniparty donors – including DeSantis. The party is incapable of producing a reform candidate internally while the voters will accept nothing else.

      • Not Adahn

        I’m not up on my candidate nicknames to know who you’re referring to.

        Relatedly, proof positive this primary season sucks is it hasn’t generated any new characters for/spinoffs of H&H.

      • Drake

        I call Vivek Ganapathy Ramaswamy the Cobra.

      • DrOtto

        I like it

      • juris imprudent

        Kotkin picks on the Dems here – but the truth is it is mediocrities as far as the eye can see. As noted, there is no great alternative in the Republican ranks.

    • Sensei

      “Our insurance policy was the federal government. They’re not paying us,” Adams said, using a house as an analogy for the city. “so everything in that household is going to be impacted.”

    • R C Dean

      I can’t imagine that any honest judge would allow that. It’s about as blatant a violation of freedom of travel and interstate commerce as you can come up with. Not to mention, for those so inclined, a violation of antidiscrimination laws due to disparate impact on race and nationality.

      • Pine_Tree

        So what yer sayin’ is we should expect a lot more of this, right?

      • Tonio

        Was that law unconstitutional? Were we not supposed to do that? Sorry, that bus was sold at auction…

    • Brawndo

      Build a wall around NYC? I like it. I can’t wait for Escape From New York to become non fiction

      • Sensei

        Hey – I’m still here!

      • UnCivilServant

        You’d better escape from New York.

      • Bobarian LMD

        As I pointed out earlier this week, Snake Plisskin ain’t coming to save you.

      • UnCivilServant

        I plan to become the next Duke of New York after whathisname gets offed.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        What year did that take place?

  7. juris imprudent

    According to the company website, Masimo, founded by Joe Kiani in 1989, holds thousands of healthcare and consumer-focused patents.

    Patent trolls should be forced to live under stone bridges.

    • DrOtto

      Hard to pick who I hate more here. Apple has a practice of stealing/implementing technology and daring the patent holders to defend it if they have the money and time to. They did this to Kodak, which was hardly a patent troll. I almost see Apple as a modern day Sears in that regard.

      • juris imprudent

        All IP disputes should be settled by the CEOs engaging in one-on-one combat – yield or die.

      • DrOtto

        I could support that.

      • Brawndo

        Women hardest hit?

      • Lackadaisical

        He didn’t say anything against using pistols.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        So, clubs and sticks?

      • Ownbestenemy

        To wider than a thumb

    • Swiss Servator

      …and a German insurer to boot!

      • Sensei

        Yes. That’s why I thought it so funny.

        /former Fireman’s Fund Insurance aka Allianz employee.

    • WTF

      They will keep the grift going until the death of every last Ukrainian.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Well beyond it I wager. Reconstruction, reconciliation, and on and on. We love our money pits.

      • juris imprudent

        Not necessarily. Once we’ve decided we’re done with them – we drop them ruthlessly and leave them to the mercies of the enemies we helped create.

      • WTF

        Our “leaders” are like the idiots from Animal House: “You fucked up, you trusted us!”

      • Drake

        You would think that after Vietnam and Afghanistan, they would know better.

      • Bobarian LMD

        Iraq, Yemen, Libya, Nicaragua, Philippines, most of Africa, and probably a third of South America are feeling left out of the conversation.

        But Kuwait and Korea say hi!

      • UnCivilServant

        Would that leave anything as “Ukraine”?

      • juris imprudent

        There was a post-WWI, pre-Soviet Western Ukrainian Republic.

      • UnCivilServant

        I need a map, I have a trouble finding the borders without cartographic assistance!

      • Certified Public Asshat

        As long as you are not running for President and supporting war, it’s okay to be fuzzy on these territories.

      • UnCivilServant

        No, no it’s not okay.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Yes, there is no value added to your life.

      • UnCivilServant

        You are in no position to make that assessment.

        I like cartography.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        I have a trouble finding the borders without cartographic assistance!

        You are in no position

        Oh really?

      • UnCivilServant

        Just because I can’t grammar doesn’t mean I don’t want the precious, precious maps.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        I’m not Ted, I wasn’t pointing out the grammar mistake.

        But I do apologize for saying a map lover doesn’t need to know about Ukrainian boundaries.

      • Lackadaisical

        That’s all part of Poland.

      • Lackadaisical

        … But we need Belarus back too.

      • Bobarian LMD

        Bring back the Greater Austo-Hungarian Empire!

      • juris imprudent

        No – we must have the return of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (which unlike the hapless Hapsburgs, was a pretty decent form of govt).

      • R C Dean

        Putin has pretty massively failed in what was supposedly his reason for invading – to keep NATO from having any borders with Russia.

        I guess the consolation prize of seizing territory by force of arms will just have to do. Fortunately, this won’t any precedents that might lead to military adventurism going forward.

      • Brawndo

        My map knowledge is bad and I’m too lazy to look it up, but wasn’t Finland admitted into NATO during this conflict, and they share a border right?

      • Lackadaisical

        Right, and you had the Baltics already. Predictably, lots of neighbors got nervous about being next to Russia after they invade someone else.

      • R C Dean

        Yup. And Sweden is cued up, once they pay off Turkey.

      • UnCivilServant

        Turkey can get paid off with an expulsion. Kick them out of NATO if they don’t return Asia Minor to Greece.

      • WTF

        And give up the Incirlik air base? Fat chance.

      • UnCivilServant

        I was angling to supplement it with the Byzantium Naval Station.

      • Drake

        With Turkey booted out of NATO and directly into a tighter relationship with Russia, you have contradicted RC’s point. Far more strategic real estate and powerful military than Sweden and Finland combined.

      • UnCivilServant

        The Turks have no right to that land in the first place and should be driven back to the Steppes.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Yeesh, they’re all lining up in the comments over there to give the guy verbal fellatio. Apparently you can fool some people all the time, either that or they’re bots. Fucking pathetic either way…

  8. Not Adahn

    Yesterday NPR teased a story about Ghana building Wakanda City. They did NOT run the story this morning as they promised. I can only imagine why. Searching the internet gave me nothing recent, only https://travelnoire.com/ghana-to-build-wakanda-city

    • slumbrew

      A depressing number of people think that Wakanda is/was real.

  9. Not Adahn

    I was given a link to a well animated but scientifically unimpressive youtube video. However, this one (by the same guy) is staggeringly good:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1J6Ou4q8vE

    Warning 1: Needs to be viewed full-screen HD.
    Warning 2: Is fifteen minutes long.
    Warning 3: The Euler number is not that much of an asshole.

  10. Sensei

    Unforeseeable!

    Scarred by the Latin American and Asian crises of the 1980s and 1990s, when dollar-denominated loans forced dozens of countries to default or restructure their debts, a wave of economists pushed a plan to remake low-income countries in the image of richer ones. Instead of borrowing in dollars and falling hostage to currency swings that could make debts unpayable, governments would issue bonds in their own currencies, like the U.S. or Japan do. If a crisis hit, they could inflate their way out of trouble or change payment terms without courts in New York or London going after their assets…

    Rather than using them to phase down foreign-currency borrowing, cash-starved governments for the past decade and a half relied on local-currency bonds to plug budget shortfalls on salaries and other running expenses without building up sufficiently strong institutions to manage that debt. Local-currency debt is now the biggest drain on many developing countries’ balance sheets.

    https://www.wsj.com/economy/global/how-a-plan-to-end-poor-countries-debt-crises-created-a-new-one-102ca56e?st=3s40sgo466tv5ar&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

    • R C Dean

      Something about foreseeable consequences applies here, I think . . . .

    • juris imprudent

      When even Vox admits there is a problem, we may well be too late.

      [no quote because well Vox and it’s mostly thumb-twiddling with a few facts sprinkled here and there]

    • Lackadaisical

      Governments aren’t fiscally responsible, no matter the borrowing vehicle. News at 11.

  11. juris imprudent

    I did not know that the J6 convictions were based on some bit of federal corporate law.

    In a nutshell, after more than two years of litigation before federal judges in Washington, SCOTUS will review the Department of Justice’s use of 1512(c)(2), obstruction of an official proceeding, in January 6 cases. A “splintered” 2-1 appellate court ruling issued in April just barely endorsed the DOJ’s unprecedented interpretation of the statute, passed in 2002 as part of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in the aftermath of the Enron/Arthur Anderson accounting scandal.

    • Ownbestenemy

      How people can cheer on prosecutors that needs to torture the law to get their scalps is beyond me.

      • Swiss Servator

        “It hurts people I don’t like.”

      • Ownbestenemy

        This is why this community and the rest of the country is not compatible.

    • juris imprudent

      A less hysterical take.

      The plan, which still has to be approved by various political bodies, calls for a $2 billion investment on an initial 17 acres and will include a state-of-the-art arena, a practice facility, a concert venue, and offices for MSE. The projected funding is $1.4 billion from the state which will issue a bond, $106 million from Alexandria, and $459 million from private sources. 76.6 percent of the funding will thus be drawn from public monies, and this doesn’t tell the full story.

      • slumbrew

        “investment”

      • KK, Plump & Unfiltered

        I know of 11 acres literally next door to a Metro stop that’s for sale in Alexandria …

    • Certified Public Asshat

      Kevin Blackistone, a sports journalist and professor, rightly expressed concern about how demographics play a role in the Washington sports teams’ potential move to Virginia. The optics of a team moving from a predominantly Black area to a predominantly white one will produce more problematic rhetoric about poverty and crime in urban Black communities.

      I really don’t want to side with the Wizards and Capitals, but you are really trying.

      • juris imprudent

        “rhetoric” is a strange spelling of reality.

      • R C Dean

        He’s got a point. These moves will generate anti-white racist rhetoric that is, in fact, problematic.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Hmm, $1.5B and incessant bitching from the Kevin Blackistone’s of the world < $500M and slightly less bitching from the Kevin Blackistone's.

      • Ted S.

        If they stayed in DC, the writer would be complaining about them needing land on which black people live.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Self security coming to TSA soon…cannot wait for that cluster to come about.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Self-service TSA would be very close to our current TSA in efficiency. Probably as negligible as the difference between day old lottery tickets and current lottery tickets.

    • slumbrew

      HIgh-trust society. It’d be instantly abused in our now low-trust society.

      • Brawndo

        We notice tag switching all the time in the meat department. Someone takes the price sticker off of a pound of ground beef and puts it over the sticker of a Japanese wagyu strip. Wegmans recently tried a cart scan and payment app and it was scrapped because theft was in the millions. The stupid thing is, i said this would happen before it was rolled out, but they don’t listen to the little people in the stores, and I’m sure the genius who came up with the idea is currently failing upwards the corporate ladder.

    • Raven Nation

      Our local Whole Foods is doing something very similar. Has potential.

      • Sensei

        Some supermarkets have tried to do something similar with the shopping cart itself.

        It gets tricky if you change your mind and remove items or put the wrong item in the cart.

      • UnCivilServant

        Oh, no, no, no. the cart is the worst place to do that tally.

        Things go back on the shelves too often.

      • R C Dean

        It’s like people think “This is interesting technology. What’s the stupidest possible way we can implement it?”

    • UnCivilServant

      No. That still stinks.

    • Pope Jimbo

      Do people really hate self-checkout?

      I’m a fan. I’ll always use it. I don’t have to fight with the clerk about whether they really need my zip/phone/etc or not. I can scan nearly as fast as they can. No stupid small talk.

      I keep seeing stories whinging about self checkout, but I have never heard anyone complain about self checkout in real life.

      • UnCivilServant

        I hate them. They’re slower, more cramped, less convenient.

      • Pope Jimbo

        You just need some proper scanning gloves.

        Isn’t the current setup good for everyone though? A mixture of both so people can choose their own destruction?

        I’ve spent so much less time in checkout lines since they have been introduced.

      • UnCivilServant

        It’s not, though. The stores have been short-staffing the real checkouts, so there’s often not any open.

  12. Sean

    I played https://squaredle.com/xp 12/19:
    *19/19 words (+4 bonus words)
    📖 In the top 1% by bonus words

    I played https://squaredle.com 12/19:
    *25/25 words (+6 bonus words)
    ⏱️ In the top 21% by speed
    🔥 Solve streak: 86

  13. hayeksplosives

    Moring fellow humans.

    Yay Seahawks!

    *dunks head in bay of coffee*

    • Drake

      That’s a lot of coffee.

      • juris imprudent

        Probably not for Seattle.

    • DrOtto

      …swipes badge and goes home.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        Coffee Badger DGAF

        (shamelessly stolen from Tonio)

    • Pope Jimbo

      I was sort of for the Seahawks last night. Then after they scored that last TD I had to watch the QB and Pete Carroll run around acting like they did it all on purpose. Totally lost me.

      That QB threw terrible passes and was lucky enough for his receivers to come up with 3 insane catches. Go to the sidelines and thank the receivers profusely. Do not pose like you are some bad ass who engineered a game winning drive. And Pete Carroll? Well he has always been a horse’s ass, so I don’t need to go into details.

  14. rhywun

    Adams was forced to cut the budget for the New York City Police Department last month, taking the department below 30,000 personnel.

    Malarkey. He could cut millions from any number of less visible areas first. That’s IF the free-ride spigot is turned off. Nobody is going to do that, so yes eventually the city will bankrupt itself.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Yep. Take the most public facing line item and make it front and center of the cuts. See also: National Park closures, no VA services for burials, etc during ‘government shutdowns’

      • Gustave Lytton

        Washington Monument strategy.

  15. The Late P Brooks

    Apple-

    Congratulations, Apple. You have made a commercial so jam packed with hipster obnoxiousness I have to change the channel every time it comes on.

    I think you know the one I mean.

    • Not Adahn

      Is it worse than Google’s self-congratulatory “25 years!” one?

      • DrOtto

        Hey, I think they managed to “don’t be evil” in at least 1 or 2 of those years. There’s something to be said for that.

      • Brawndo

        “As part of the needed budget cuts here at Google, we will be cutting the ‘dont be’ from our slogan.”

      • Brawndo

        *just supposed to cut ‘dont’ godamit.

      • Not Adahn

        I dunno. “Evil.” Simple, classy, to the point.

      • R C Dean

        Style question:

        Should Google add a comma or a period after “Don’t”?

        Don’t. Be evil.

        Or

        Don’t, be evil.

        I’m thinking the period.

      • Brawndo

        Don’t 👏 be 👏 evil

        That’s how the kids do it on the toktiks

      • juris imprudent

        Ya’ll are missing the obvious – drop the “n’t” and “be”. Do evil! [exclamation added gratis]

  16. Mojeaux, font of all evil

    Getting sick. Did not get good sleep. Mom texts me early. Sitting here bleary-eyed and miserable, waiting to take Dude to the hospital for his rotator cuff repair.

    It is 8:21 in the fucking morning. Who does this???

    • hayeksplosives

      Good partners do this.

      Make sure your camera phone is on while he his waking up from the drugs . Always fun!

    • Mojeaux, font of all evil

      Fuuuuuuuck. Hospital canceled the surgery because of technical issues.

    • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

      Everyone over the age of 14 who texts needs to grow up. Talk on the phone like a real person.

      • Sean

        No.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        This.

      • UnCivilServant

        Don’t be silly.

        Asynchronous communication is more likely to get through. Playing telephone tag for the inconvenience of having to deal with voice communication is less efficient use of time and effort.

      • R C Dean

        It’s a balance between the quality of the communication (and its quantity) and its convenience. Texting works for “Sup, yo.” But not for “We need to sort something out.”

      • UnCivilServant

        somewhere greater than 90% of my communications do not require direct immediate response from the other party. The only person I routinely call is my mother so I can hear how she’s doing from her voice.

        Work stuff is all teleconference which doesn’t go through phones all the time anymore.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        Nah, just think texting is the stupidest form of communication.

        I am an adult, I don’t walk around clutching my phone like a religious talisman. If it doesn’t ring, I don’t pick it up.

      • Mojeaux, font of all evil

        I don’t know what to say. Seems to me your range of experience is very narrow or else you’ve trained all the people in your life to call you for all the tiniest snippets of information that are, in fact, still important. Or you have no inconvenient times to pick up.

        AND you must have a mind like a steel trap to remember shit you were told a week ago. Texting frees up brain bandwidth AND I have a paper trail.

        Or nobody calls you for anything, which is, in fact, convenient.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Texting as a single parent was fantastic because I got a whole paper trail of crazy ex-wife rants to present to the judge and not a he-said/she-said situation. “Here is the print out of the last 10 conversations”…

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        No one calls me. I’m a libertarian.

        But, seriously, I do not text. Why? Because I don’t walk around with my phone. I refuse to be a slave to it, I don’t have to be one, and I have arranged my life so as not to be one. I don’t like the stupid things and so I refuse to buy into that. Yes, I do have a good memory, made better by not having my phone be a memory for me. As far as people calling me for the “tiniest snippets”, good, then you don’t need to call me. As far as a paper trail, email works just as well for that. And I might not want a paper trail for my conversations.

        The world got by just fine 20 years ago without texting and It isn’t going to esplode now if people don’t text. Rhywun doesn’t drive, and yet the world hasn’t ended despite the fact that much, if not most of the world is set up for people driving.

        Of course, people do text me, but they have to realize that I might not answer that text for 2-3 days, if not a week. Why? Because I might not pick up my phone in that time. So, if it is important, call. Or, email. Some form of communication that doesn’t require me to stab at a piece of plastic with my right forefinger, repeatedly looking for keys, when I can, with greatest of ease, talk. Or actually type. And communicate precisely and correctly.

      • Mojeaux, font of all evil

        Saying you don’t need it is a far cry from saying that because you don’t, nobody else does, either, and if they do, they’re idiots.

      • kinnath

        But, seriously, I do not text.

        Good for you. Live your life the way you want to live it.

        Stop bitching about people that like to use cell phones for lots of different reasons.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        But then I wouldn’t be a Glibertarian.

    • The Other Kevin

      I’m taking a sick day to take care of my wife. She was up all night with heartburn and “stomach issues“. She babysits my niece and nephew so that’s my jam today.

      • The Other Kevin

        I tend to not use sick days. At my last job I had 30 accumulated and when I quit I got nothing for them. Lesson learned.

  17. juris imprudent

    Just a few paragraphs before this the article is discussing – unironically – the belief in witchcraft amongst these men. It is a strange world where advanced technology, atavistic belief and economic desperation all collide.

    Two nights after the last men jumped, lights appeared in the sky. Those awake quickly turned on their smartphones and activated the devices’ flashlights, waving them in the air. Lacking cell reception in the middle of the ocean, they had kept their phones off during the voyage to save battery.

  18. The Late P Brooks

    Circling the drain

    Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Monday signed legislation that makes it a criminal offense to enter the state illegally, setting up a potential clash with President Joe Biden’s administration over immigration policy and border enforcement.

    Abbott, a Republican who has implemented other policies directed at migrants that have drawn court challenges, signed the bill at an event in Brownsville, Texas.

    “Biden’s deliberate inaction has left Texas to fend for itself,” Abbott said, adding that the bill’s goal was to “stop the tidal wave of illegal entry into Texas.”

    Crossing into the United States between designated ports of entry is already a crime under federal law.

    It’s only a crime if they enforce the law.

  19. The Late P Brooks

    In recent years, local authorities in Texas have been arresting migrants on state misdemeanor charges of criminal trespassing under Abbott’s border enforcement program known as Operation Lone Star.

    The law signed Monday makes it a misdemeanor to enter or attempt to enter Texas from a foreign county at any location other than a lawful port of entry. It is scheduled to go into effect in March.

    A Justice Department spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday night on whether the DOJ planned to sue Texas over the new law.

    White House spokesperson Angelo Fernandez Hernandez called the measure “an extreme law that will make communities in Texas less safe,” adding that the federal government, rather than states, “is charged with determining how and when to remove noncitizens for violating immigration laws.”

    The country is broken.

    • R C Dean

      The thing is, there is very little “public land” in Texas other than federal land. The state itself has very few and relatively small parks, etc.

      So you could skip the whole cross the border part, and just call it plain old trespassing the minute they step off a public right of way. I’d love to see DC claim that federal law pre-empts ordinary trespassing, as long as you’re not a US citizen.

    • The Other Kevin

      Keep going dems. Take this to court and go on record opposing any restrictions of people crossing the border.

  20. Brawndo

    “Democrats Say Justice Thomas Should Recuse Himself From Trump Supreme Court Case”

    Paywalled so I’m commenting blindly, but isn’t there a better case to be made that the justices that Trump appointed should recuse themselves for a case about Trump than a guy who’s been there since Trump was giving Kevin McCallister directions in Hole Alone 2?

    • Ownbestenemy

      Wasn’t Hole Alone 2 recently just filmed and released?

      • slumbrew

        I think it’s available on a number of documentary sites on the internet.

      • Brawndo

        When typos make a post better lol

      • juris imprudent

        Aidan Maese-Czeropski was not Alone.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Look, I was trying to slide the joke in hoping no one would be a tight ass.

      • juris imprudent

        Isn’t this the time of year for spotted dick?

    • slumbrew

      “Thomas is married to someone who works with the Republican party, therefore he should be forcibly retired recuse himself from, uh, everything”.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        “Thomas is a black Republican. Therefore should recuse himself.”

    • juris imprudent

      From Reuters

      “We strongly implore you to exercise your discretion and recuse yourself from this and any other decisions in the case of United States v. Trump,” Representative Hank Johnson, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee’s court subcommittee, and seven other Democrats wrote.

      Contest – name for Hank and the other seven a la Snow White and the Seven Dwarves.

      • juris imprudent

        Damn – no one? OK, how about

        Hank and the Seven Jerks?

  21. Sensei

    Under the military’s definition, Class A incidents—the most serious—encompass those in which someone was killed or permanently disabled, or in which damages topped $2.5 million.

    In the decade through last year, the Osprey Class A incident rate in the Marines was 3.87 per 100,000 flying hours, compared with 2.45 for all crewed Marine flights. The rate in the Air Force, which flies the aircraft less often, for the Osprey was 5.08 per 100,000 flying hours in the decade through 2021.

    U.S. Military Struggles to Stop Osprey Crashes After Decades of Flaws
    https://www.wsj.com/politics/national-security/u-s-military-struggles-to-stop-osprey-crashes-after-decades-of-flaws-d1341a69?st=uhovqze5mqhuivd&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

  22. The Late P Brooks

    Do they really want to go down this road?

    Trump’s comments on Saturday, at a rally in the first-in-the-nation GOP primary state of New Hampshire, are contrary to America’s founding values and political traditions.

    We’re going to be here a while if we want to catalogue everything in the so-called inflation reduction act which runs contrary to America’s founding values and political traditions. And that’s just for starters.

    • juris imprudent

      The harder they preach to the congregation, the more they believe they will attract converts.

    • Pope Jimbo

      Disappointed it wasn’t this.

      • slumbrew

        Yes. Going to hell but that’s _always_ where my head goes for Carol of the Bells.

  23. The Late P Brooks

    He is also exaggerating the threat from undocumented migrants to play on the Biden administration’s failure to control a surge of arrivals at the southern border. Republicans have long argued the situation is a crisis, and the White House hasn’t come up with a political narrative to counter that.

    We couldn’t careless about fixing the problem. We just need to get out in front of the political narrative.

    • The Other Kevin

      That’s the Democratic strategy in a nutshell. They just aren’t propagandizing enough.

      • prolefeed

        If you’re never wrong about anything, regardless of outcomes, then the problem HAS to be the messaging. You’re not splaining hard enough. Duh.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        Quick, have VOX write an explainer!

    • B.P.

      With ever-dizzying rapidity I’m being instructed to not believe things I can see in my own neighborhood with my own eyes.

  24. The Other Kevin

    Great song choice. Man, those castrati can sing!

    • rhywun

      Employers would have to provide “accessible” and “equitable” facilities for all workers—e.g., bathrooms that correspond to gender identity—and “personal protective equipment” that fits “according to each apprentice’s size and body type.”

      OFFFS!

      It is hard to come to any other conclusion than Biden’s handlers do want to deliberately destroy the economy.

      • R C Dean

        Since we’re up to, what, 30-odd gender identities now, that means you have to go from two bathrooms to more than thirty?

      • Bobarian LMD

        Just require everyone to use the tree.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Sure, Amazon can afford it; Wal-Mart; etc for other enormous similars-no one else though and certainly no small businesses.

      • Zwak says the real is not governable, but self-governing.

        At that point, you move to single use bathrooms.

        And, boy, they lines will be loooooooonnngg, and shit everywhere.

      • Bobarian LMD

        Single use bathrooms?

        Depends.

  25. The Late P Brooks

    The most profound question raised by his weekend of zealotry and bigotry is this: What does it say about America, its political culture and mood of its people at this critical moment in history, that millions of voters appear ready to embrace his extremism?

    Don’t look in the mirror, whatever you do.

    • juris imprudent

      Given their transparency and vacuity, there isn’t anything in the mirror for them to see.

    • prolefeed

      Umm … maybe you’re the baddie here?

      Nah. Couldn’t be.

  26. The Late P Brooks

    From Sensei’s link:

    DOL’s manifest goal is to limit non-union programs that don’t result in more union jobs. The rule would let the department dissolve programs accused by unions of misconduct or found to be non-compliant with minor government regulations and DEI benchmarks.

    I think we can expect a flurry of lawsuits brought by “apprentices” much as we have seen ADA lawsuits by the “disabled”.

  27. Pope Jimbo

    Minneapolis is oh-so-woke

    The nonprofit organization where Buck serves as president — Owámniyomni Okhódayapi — is seeking to restore the area now occupied by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in a way that restores, as much as is possible, an area that was a spiritual and cultural home to the Dakota people. Formerly known as Friends of the Falls, the organization was started to protect the falls from further hydroelectric generation and has since evolved to advocate for new uses if and when the Corps walks away.

    It evolved again in early 2023 when the founders turned over leadership to Dakota members. Buck became president, and a majority of the board are Native American. Non-tribal members, including co-founders Paul Reyelts and Mark Wilson, are still involved in the natural restoration project that hopes to reach the development stage by 2028.

    Of course, Minneapolis will not consider any other group to hand control of 5 acres of downtown Minneapolis over to. Not when there are 4 Dakota tribes with a group with such a cool name. Our only hope is for the Ojibwe tribes to object and stop this. It is also interesting that they are talking about fundraising when the tribes in question all have super profitable casinos. Maybe they could spend their own money on this sooper important sacred place? I also like that the tribes are against hydroelectric power.

    • Sensei

      Comments suggest that it possibly was part of the car and not the driver.

      • R C Dean

        Unless he crawled back into the car as it was rolling back onto its wheels, it wasn’t the driver, because there’s nothing on the ground. I think it may have just been a shadow. Hard to tell.

  28. The Late P Brooks

    Where is our 21st century “Daisy” ad

    Celinda Lake, a pollster for Biden’s 2020 campaign, said that earlier this year, she was concerned voters might not take seriously the threat that another Trump presidency poses. In focus groups at the time, she said, voters remarked that, though Trump sometimes “speaks without thinking,” his time in office “wasn’t a disaster.”

    As Trump’s language has grown more severe in the last month, however, that has changed.

    “We’re seeing in focus groups many more people comment that he’s too divisive, that ‘I don’t like his temperament,’ that ‘I don’t like his personality.’ It’s really starting to come back,” Lake said. “He’s gone too far.”

    Jim Messina, who led Barack Obama’s reelection campaign in 2012, also said it’s important for the Biden campaign to stress “that this guy is even crazier than he used to be — and it takes a long time to get that through.”

    “I’m not worried about [voters] hearing about this stuff too much,” he said. “I’m worried … if you don’t call him on it that it becomes normative.”

    Biden campaign aides said that this is not merely a debate about language, and they are intent on showing voters what a more autocratic second term of Trump would mean for their own rights.

    To help make that case, the campaign launched a TV advertisement last week, in both Spanish and English, that likened Trump to Latin American strongmen. In the spots, images of Trump flash alongside those of Hugo Chavez and Nicolas Maduro as a narrator says that Republicans, “like dictators, want to take things away — our health insurance, our rights and freedoms, and even our safety.”

    If Adolph Trump is elected, you all will DIE! Women and little children most of all.

    • R C Dean

      “a TV advertisement last week, in both Spanish and English, that likened Trump to Latin American strongmen”

      Hmm, maybe not the best way to get their hordes of illegals to vote against Trump.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        He should come out for his next rally with a South American presidential sash. Really lean into it, look like he’s running for President of Uraguay or something.

      • KSuellington

        You take a bribes from your crackhead son’s foreign business partners, straight to jail!

    • WTF

      How stupid do you have to be to take this shit seriously when we already know what a Trump presidency is like, and in the face of daily reminders of the Dems actually behaving like no-shit banana republic authoritarians.

      • juris imprudent

        First – projection. Always, always, always proggies project their own worst tendencies.
        Second – fear usually works.
        Third – it isn’t they are dumb, they think all of those voters are. [And, they aren’t entirely wrong about that.]

      • The Other Kevin

        It’s not what they say, it’s what they don’t say. A lot of voters just watch the news and don’t realize there’s a lot going on they’re not hearing about.

      • Ownbestenemy

        In that case it is being said but ran through the Dumbass Voter Cleanup 2000 that was gifted to each news organization.

  29. The Late P Brooks

    Guy runs as red light. Hilarity ensues.

    I watched that clip ten times, and still have absolutely no idea what I’m supposed to be seeing. Good work, reddit.

    • Mojeaux, font of all evil

      Car gets hit (you can tell from the little jolt of the camera). From the back of the frame, going left, is a blue SUV that is heading across the street and hits a tree and rolls over.

  30. The Late P Brooks

    He should come out for his next rally with a South American presidential sash. Really lean into it, look like he’s running for President of Uraguay or something.

    In a few weeks the NYT and WaPo will have some juicy anecdotal sob stories from Argentina to slather on him. Vote for Trump and your granny will be turning tricks for cans of Alpo.

  31. The Late P Brooks

    Car gets hit (you can tell from the little jolt of the camera). From the back of the frame, going left, is a blue SUV that is heading across the street and hits a tree and rolls over.

    I finally went back and watched it full screen. Okay. SUV appears out of nowhere, ricochets off left headlight, goes up bank and tips over. Whoop dee do.

    Comments? Nein.

  32. The Late P Brooks

    First – projection. Always, always, always proggies project their own worst tendencies.

    What you hate most in others is that which you hate most about yourself.

  33. The Late P Brooks

    Of course that’s completely wrong, because progressives exhibit no discernible shame or remorse, no matter how far consequences of their actions stray from stated intent.

    • juris imprudent

      They aren’t concerned about real world consequences because their entire worldview is about an imaginary future.

  34. Derpetologist

    A great thing about FL is the results of state tests get posted online so everyone can see who has the best and worst schools. The math performance for my county is a disgrace. I wish I could help that, but they fired me when I tried. Oh well, their loss.

    https://data.tallahassee.com/school/levy/

    • juris imprudent

      You were under the delusion that you were there to actually teach?

      • Derpetologist

        Well, math is the most apolitical subject there is. That was true even in the USSR. It seemed like a safe choice. They were excited to have me at first. I haven’t given up on it. I don’t want to waste my education, though I have considered and worked in jobs outside the field of math.

        https://platedlizard.blogspot.com/2023/12/smarter-than-average-bear.html

      • UnCivilServant

        You’ve missed the recent developments in Academia which determined that Math is Racist?

  35. The Late P Brooks

    Containment

    Russia summoned Finland’s ambassador on Tuesday to object to a new defence agreement granting the United States broad access to the vicinity of the new NATO member’s long border with Russia, Moscow’s foreign ministry said on Tuesday.

    The ambassador was told Moscow would “not leave unanswered the buildup of NATO military potential on our border, which threatens the security of the Russian Federation, and would take the necessary measures to counter the aggressive decisions of Finland and its NATO allies,” spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement.

    ——-

    Monday’s agreement with the United States is aimed at allowing swift military access and aid to Finland in case of conflict, officials said ahead of the announcement.

    The agreement lists 15 facilities and areas in Finland to which the U.S. military will have unimpeded access and where it can also store military equipment and ammunition, including four air bases and a military port.

    We have more troops and equipment than we know what to do with. Let’s send some to Finland.