Sunday, February 11, 2024
Taking Another Big Bong Hit
I think we have, at least, passed the stage where journalists printed this shit without qualification.
I think!
Wibbly Wobbly
I'm mildly fascinated with the boring subject of how our perception of time changes we age. Pop culture (music, tv, movies) provides easy marking points for our memories of things.
I probably became aware of The Beatles when I was about 14-15. I don't mean that was when I first heard their music, or first knew they were a Big Deal, but aware in the sense of having some understanding of them as a culture phenomenon. This was both due to me getting older and due to something of a "Beatles revival" around then. Up until that point I knew them more as the early Ed Sullivan Show/boy band stuff.
Anyway, none of that is important, I'm just putting down my marker. That would be 1986-1987. The point I'm getting to is that their first Ed Sullivan show appearances were in 1964, TWENTY TWO YEARS before 1986, and to me, then, that was a million years ago. Is 2002 a million years ago to The Kids (15-year-olds) today? Was that, in part, because those were dispatches from a black and white world? Because things had changed so much?
I have no idea.
I probably became aware of The Beatles when I was about 14-15. I don't mean that was when I first heard their music, or first knew they were a Big Deal, but aware in the sense of having some understanding of them as a culture phenomenon. This was both due to me getting older and due to something of a "Beatles revival" around then. Up until that point I knew them more as the early Ed Sullivan Show/boy band stuff.
Anyway, none of that is important, I'm just putting down my marker. That would be 1986-1987. The point I'm getting to is that their first Ed Sullivan show appearances were in 1964, TWENTY TWO YEARS before 1986, and to me, then, that was a million years ago. Is 2002 a million years ago to The Kids (15-year-olds) today? Was that, in part, because those were dispatches from a black and white world? Because things had changed so much?
I have no idea.
Horny On Main For Trump
As a longtime critic of many of our finest news institutions, I am glad that (once again, it happens every 4 years or so and then the Men in Black mind wipers show up) people are coming around to the understanding that the New York Times is, top to bottom, a dumpster fire of a publication.
However it is not that way because they are "scared of the Right" or "cowed by conservative critics" or anything like that. It is that way because that is what the people who run it want it to be.
You will not "get them to do better" or "learn their lessons" by making your careful arguments. They don't fucking care. They are the New York Times, and you are a disgusting pig person.
However it is not that way because they are "scared of the Right" or "cowed by conservative critics" or anything like that. It is that way because that is what the people who run it want it to be.
You will not "get them to do better" or "learn their lessons" by making your careful arguments. They don't fucking care. They are the New York Times, and you are a disgusting pig person.
This is not an opinion piece:
Saturday, February 10, 2024
Elmo's World
Fuzzing responsibility and liability is a major part of the business plan.
An Edina man who initially denied killing a small-town doctor in a hit-and-run as she walked her dogs near Lake Mille Lacs last fall said in a follow-up interview with investigators that "he doesn't remember" hitting the woman with his Tesla, but if he did, would have been driving on autopilot and checking emails, according to newly filed court records.
Afternoon
On the lighter side I enjoyed watching Slow Horses, so watch that if you need a new story.
What Are You For
The supposed point of J-Street - though watching how it evolved from the beginning to now I wasn't surprised at all - was to delicately give Democrats (and others) some cover if they moved a bit "left" on Israel-related issues, to provide cover against attacks from AIPAC and others, to make sure AIPAC wasn't the only "Jewish group" on speed dial for reporters.
And when the moment came they showed their real purpose was not to battle "the Right," but instead to foreclose anything further left. A common tale in DC.
And when the moment came they showed their real purpose was not to battle "the Right," but instead to foreclose anything further left. A common tale in DC.
Edmondson said she understood that J Street has historically moved with caution to maintain its ability to lobby Washington officials, but argued that now would have been the time for the organization to take a clear stand: “We’ve spent 15 years building this political power to rival AIPAC. And now, all of a sudden, when that power could be wielded during a literal genocide, it’s like, ‘Oh, we actually can’t do any of the things we’ve been saying all these years that we can.’”
Your favorite orgs and outlets in DC quite often serve this purpose. Even the liberal New Republic (back in the day), even the liberal J-Street...
Going To Wake Up Tomorrow And Do The Same Thing
4 months ago did a single person in the Biden administration really believe anything different?
In a closed-door meeting with Arab American leaders in Michigan this week, one of President Biden’s top foreign policy aides acknowledged mistakes in the administration’s response to the war in Gaza, saying he did not have “any confidence” that Israel’s government was willing to take “meaningful steps” toward Palestinian statehood.Lol the angel of death, Power, herself.
Mr. Finer and several other senior Biden administration officials, including Samantha Power, the administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, traveled to Dearborn on Thursday for a series of meetings, including the one in which Mr. Finer’s comments were recorded.This has been the 4D chess excuse for everything, that they just have to hug BiBi tighter you fools, you imbeciles.
Mr. Finer also said the Biden administration should have been faster to publicly condemn statements made by some Israeli officials that, in his words, compared “residents of Gaza to animals.” He said officials had not done so because they were trying to work with the Israeli government.
“Out of a desire to sort of focus on solving the problem and not engaging in a rhetorical back-and-forth with people who, in many cases, I think we all find somewhat abhorrent, we did not sufficiently indicate that we totally rejected and disagreed with those sorts of sentiments,” Mr. Finer said.
“It did not in any way address the loss of Palestinian life during the course of the first 100 days of the conflict,” Mr. Finer said. “There is no excuse for that. It should not have happened. I believe it will not happen again. But we know that there was a lot of damage done.”You gotta believe!
And the punchline:
The Michiganders who attended the Thursday meetings with Biden administration officials described them as intense and said they were disappointed that the delegation from Washington had not committed to policy changes.
For example, administration officials declined to say whether they had advised or would advise the president to call for a cease-fire, which attendees asked for.
Friday, February 09, 2024
Sure Why Not
Normal stuff.
U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz was stopped by airport security in Dallas when it was discovered he had a Taser.
As he was headed to his flight, an agent with the Transportation Security Administration stopped Gaetz and made him throw away the weapon, according to the outlet Punchbowl News, which first reported the incident.
Nobody Who Is One Of The Lads Could Be Bad
Campos:
So why did Merrick Garland do this incredibly stupid and reckless thing? Let me give you the inside scoop here, having spent the last 38 years or so hanging around the vestibule of the Elite Lawyer Club, which I myself would never join for Marxist (Groucho) reasons. Because Robert Hur was Executive Editor of the Stanford Law Review, and clerked for the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, and was a partner at Gibson Dunn, and somebody with that kind of impeccable legal pedigree wouldn’t ever be a partisan hack, because if he was that would call into question the impeccable judgment of the other Elite Lawyers who anointed appointed him to those exalted offices, where Objective Legal Analysis always wins out over Partisan Political Considerations, because only the Very Best People get those kinds of jobs, because . . .
And What Did You Do In The Winter Of 2024
Most people came up short (including me), of course, and plenty I will never be friendly terms with again (few complaints about that, probably, not saying I will be missed).
Palestinians in Rafah, the packed city on Gaza’s southern border, were terrified Friday of an impending Israeli ground assault — which the United States and aid groups have warned risks “disaster.”The point is to drive people into Egypt and if they don't or can't go, well...
More than half of the enclave's 2.3 million people have sought shelter in Rafah, crowding tents in refugee camps stalked by growing hunger, disease and more recently fear that there will be nowhere to escape if troops enter the city.
No worries, by a year from now "no one" will be talking about it. Amazing how well that can work.
Except For Sending All The Money
Not the most important thing, of course, but I really get tired of the bullshit.
The US has warned Israel that staging a military offensive into Gaza's southern city of Rafah without proper planning would be a "disaster".You can believe the people in State/White House are the dumbest motherfuckers are alive, or you can believe they've been bullshitting for months to support the ethnic cleansing of Gaza. I dunno which to prefer.
The White House said it would not support plans for any major operations in Rafah without due consideration for the refugees there.
Can't Defend People Who Won't Do The Minimum To Defend Themselves
Not that I imagine that when I wake up every day and start posting that I am defending our democracy, or something, but it's hard to even imagine lifting a finger when we've hit about a dozen episodes of "appointing GOP Daddies to important jobs with predictable tragic consequences" with no signs of it every stopping!
It isn't simply that GOP Daddies are the only people qualified for important law enforcement roles, it's the idea that only GOP Daddies have the GRAVITAS and NONPARTISAN EVENHANDEDNESS to do these things despite decades of [looks around].
Years ago, back when there was some sense that blogs had powers (and we did, a tiny bit), the right wing noise machine went into action against a D senator, and right in the middle of the conference call set up to discuss how (legitimately and justifiably!) to defend him, he went on CNN to apologize and beg forgiveness (close enough, anyway, this is from memory). Buddy, my mighty blog can't help you if you won't stand up for yourself.
The basic defense of Garland's appointment is that he's a DOJ institutionalist, and I don't know why people think that's any kind of defense. Hoover was an FBI institutionalist. No I am not saying Garland is like Hoover, I'm saying that devotion to an institution like that is not, actually, a welcome quality, especially when it's very understood that the DOJ (and FBI) are filled with corrupt Republican stooges.
Years ago, back when there was some sense that blogs had powers (and we did, a tiny bit), the right wing noise machine went into action against a D senator, and right in the middle of the conference call set up to discuss how (legitimately and justifiably!) to defend him, he went on CNN to apologize and beg forgiveness (close enough, anyway, this is from memory). Buddy, my mighty blog can't help you if you won't stand up for yourself.
The basic defense of Garland's appointment is that he's a DOJ institutionalist, and I don't know why people think that's any kind of defense. Hoover was an FBI institutionalist. No I am not saying Garland is like Hoover, I'm saying that devotion to an institution like that is not, actually, a welcome quality, especially when it's very understood that the DOJ (and FBI) are filled with corrupt Republican stooges.
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