The World is Laughing at Us -- Open Thread

by wj

I recall that one of the lines Trump used in denouncing his predecessor was "the world is laughing at us." And now, finally, it has come true.

Today at the UN, Trump got a novel reaction. Nobody applauded him. But there were chuckles, and some outright laughter, when he tried telling everyone that in “less than two years, my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country.” Apparently not the reaction he was expecting.

An open thread, just in case there is something beyond Kavanaugh to talk about.

Comments

[Michael Cain]

In other coal ash news, yesterday the US Sixth Circuit Court ruled that while leaks from a massive unlined coal ash pit into the Cumberland River in Tennessee via groundwater is a major environmental problem, the Clean Water Act is not the proper legal tool for addressing it.

[Nigel]

Whether or not the second allegation is true, this just makes me very angry...
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/09/25/white-house-lashes-out-feinstein-838942
There’s no reason to delay this more, unless something new comes out of the hearing on Thursday," said Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn of Texas. "As you can tell, people are coming out of the woodwork making incredible, uncorroborated allegations and i think you can just expect that kind of nonsense to continue."...

And these are precisely the same people who just can’t understand why a woman might hesitate in saying anything at the time.

Assholes.

[Nigel]

Sorry - dropped that last post n the wrong thread by mistake. No matter.

As a Brit, I hesitate right now to mock the US for becoming a worldwide laughing stock....

[wj]

Sometimes it's just so hard to decide if you are the party of business owners, tax haters, and gun enthusiasts, or of family values.
https://www.economist.com/united-states/2018/09/22/nevadas-most-notorious-brothel-keeper-is-also-a-republican-candidate

[CharlesWT]

Unfortunately, neither party is the party of leave people alone.

[Sebastian H]

They should laugh. He’s ridiculous.

[russell]

Just for fun.

[wj]

Even better
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwpyXLURkgY
About 1 minute in....

[JanieM]

wj, trigger warning next time please. Luckily I saw his face before I heard his voice and managed to click the back button before contaminating my day with the sound of it. ;-)

[wj]

Janie, you could have just skipped forward to the laughter -- that's why I put the time stamp in. ;-)

[cleek]

Unfortunately, neither party is the party of leave people alone.

people aren't in the "leave people alone" business. that's a big part of why they group-up and form governments.

[CharlesWT]

Stop the video at one minute. Click "share." Click "start at." Click "copy." Paste link.

[wj]

Thanks, Charles. (There is just so much still to learn....)

[Merrick Garland]

Laugh, laugh I'd thought I'd die!

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

Done laughing?

Now, read the Prologue to Woodward's "Fear", now available.

A Taste: "Real power is, I don't even want to use the word ... Fear."

But he can't even commandeer his desk from a swivel chair.

Still laughing?

Now, read the first chapter, in which we meet David Bossie (Citizen's United) and Steve Bannon in 2010, the Angela Lanburys/Eleanor Iselins of America, recruiting mp for the Presidency.

Pro-Life? What's that? Sure, I'm pro-life. That can be fixed.

And since Vince Foster came up in the last thread, consider that IF the Clintons were REALLY murderous Macbeth and His Lady, instead of your regula run of the mill petty corrupts (for the sake of argument), as the fucking subhuman vermin running the Republican Party tried so hard to have us believe, they would not have wasted time offing Foster.

No, David Bossie's body would have been found in that park, sans his diabolical head.

[Countme-a-Demon]

Gotta say, in the spirit of bi-partisanship, the merger of Dennis Hof's Nevada House of Whoopy prostitution business and the business of politics could reap major synergies, as Wall Street .. financiers and johns to both .. might say.

You could cut overhead majorly merely by using the title "prostitution" for both, and dropping the expense and time of constantly invoking the word "constitution", since they rhyme so similarly.

Who's gonna notice?

Also replacing Paul Ryan with Felony the Fellatrix at the Moonlight Bunny Ranch would produce major savings and less hypocrisy.

Now, Stephen Miller could fully take over whatever BDS/M operation the Bunny Ranch has going at the moment at a lower cost, especially if we let the immigrant kids play.

Pence and his wife could be the beards for the entire shebang in case the rubes become discomfited.

[dr ngo]

An open thread allows me to inform you that I'm home from the hospital. The surgery was a success, I'm told (I slept through it), but the recovery has been rather more stressful than I had anticipated.

Never mind. The last couple of days trends have been upward, and I look forward to at least lurking here again.

(For those of you with long ObWi memories, I will say that I absolutely could not have made it without the incredible help of our son, who flew out from Wisconsin for three days to make everything happen during the transition from hospital to home. You may remember him as "Anarch.")

[Marty]

Great news! Children are a blessing.

[russell]

Excellent news dr ngo!

[sapient]

So happy to hear this, dr ngo!

[JanieM]

Seconding everyone on the good news, dr ngo. And "Anarch" is a memorable handle, even for someone who overlapped him for not all that long a time.

[wj]

Wonderful news, dr ngo! Here's to a rapid and full recovery

[CaseyL]

Great news, dr ngo! It sounds like your son has gone home - do you have other people to stop by, see how you're doing, and keep you company?

Wishing you a speedy recovery.

[Countme-a-Demon]

Wonderful, Dr.

Great sons (and daughters), our children, show up.

You could have informed us as well on a dedicated closed thread and we would have dropped everything, ya know.

[liberal japonicus]

Had I know, I would have posted an open surgery thread. Or maybe not. But wonderful news!

[Girl from the North Country]

dr ngo: hip hip hooray! So very glad to hear almost every part of this (stressful recovery excepted). Let's hope a stressless recovery continues apace.

[Girl from the North Country]

OT, so:

I'd never heard this, or even heard of it, til I read a reference to it in the NYT review of the Joan Baez farewell tour. I thought it was wonderful, and (no need for an OT after all), an extraordinary contrast to any feelings about the current incumbent:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9iYBifsOPI

[sapient]

That's so beautiful, GftNC. Thank you. What a different way, now, to approach the day.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

Since the UN meets in NYC, Trump should have been greeted with a chorus of Bronx Cheers.

Would have made him feel at home, I suppose.

[hairshirthedonist]

Good news, dr ngo! I remember Anarch. If I recall correctly, he's a mathy sort of fellow.

[cleek]

great to hear, dr ngo!

[hairshirthedonist]

On the laughter, my Trumpist friends were crowing about how he was setting the world straight at the UN, not like that wimp Obama who got pushed around all the time. I don't bother to respond. It's pointless.

I know people here get frustrated with Marty and McKinney, but they're far more worth arguing with.

I have things in common with my friends, not including politics, or even the argumentative discussion thereof, in many cases.

[wj]

GftNC, that's beautiful.

It speaks to how far we have fallen that something like that happening today is simply unimaginable.

[Senastian H]

Congratulations dr ngo! And I remember anarch!

[bobbyp]

It is truly a mark on our politics that the brutal political warfare over the Kavanaugh nomination has not generated widespread revulsion about his so-called jurisprudence. He does not belong in a courtroom, much less handing down legal decisions.

Get a load of this one.

Or this one.

Members of the Federalist Society exist for only one reason, to be the handmaidens to the rich and powerful. Anybody supporting this scum to be on the Supreme Court should hang their head in shame.

[sapient]

bobbyp, yes, Republican policies (and Federalist Society legal positions) are cruel, greedy and hateful. Honestly, I'm not sure that obtaining their policy goals with people who "seem nice" is any better for the U.S. than putting up the villains that we're seeing. It's all despicable.

We need to fight on every front.

[Countme-a-Demon]

If we view the federal regulatory agencies and those Americans harmed by pollution and unsafe working conditions as women, perhaps nannies, it's as if the Republican Party/Federalist Society chose Kavanaugh for his long practice of pinning them down, finger fucking them, and clasping his hand over their mouths to stifle their speech and their breathing, while taking their names down in his little black book as future candidates for gang bangs against their will.

The diabolical difference is that he writes these opinions while sober.

[Nigel]

Dr ngo, welcome back !
May you keep on getting better.

[Countme-a-Demon]

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/trump-i-would-much-prefer-keeping-rod-rosenstein

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/trump-could-be-persuaded-blasey-ford

Don't turn your backs on a predator when it purrs and acts surfeited:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kj0O_K3AZ3k

Best to lie still until it's gone:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GOlVRHsVzE4

[bobbyp]

That's good news, doc. All the best.

[hairshirthedonist]

Donald Trump is Iran's BFF.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wade-iran-commentary/commentary-trump-and-rouhani-flip-scripts-at-the-u-n-idUSKCN1M62KE

[Lurker]

dr ngo,

So happy to hear the good news! I wish you and your family a good recuperation.

[Nigel]

On topic, just in case this might make you feel better...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-sh/the_instant_noodle
On a large computer screen, he begins to click through all of his reviews. Most scores hover around three out of five. Suddenly, a shockingly low score pops up - a 0.1 out of five stars.

“Those noodles were really thick and ‘guagua’,” he says. “It was a really bad texture in my mouth. And the soup is really thick. It’s a very kind of artificial flavour. And the condiments you chew but they just keep staying in your mouth. They were very difficult to swallow.”

The product in question? One of the UK’s top sellers - Cup Noodle Chicken and Mushroom flavour. Millions of British university students survive on this, I tell him...

[wj]

Another try for some good news, on a day that seems short of it:
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/election-update-why-our-model-thinks-beto-orourke-really-has-a-chance-in-texas/

Even if the Democrats don't take the Senate, getting rid of Cruz would be a big plus for the nation.

[Sebastian H]

Since this is an open thread. Did typepad break a bunch of old posts? Or potentially is my memory totally shot. I would have sworn I wrote a post on CS Lewis’s inner ring speech but google can’t find it. Can anyone find it? (Note I’m using the domain limiter obsidianwongs.blogs.com which finds lots of posts, but is that wrong maybe)

[Sebastian H]

Lol li,other is of course obsidianwings.blogs.com. Fat fingers.

[cleek]

site:obsidianwings.blogs.com lewis "inner ring"

http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2005/02/the_inner_ring.html

[Sebastian H]

Interesting. I usually try to put my name in a string like that because it usually finds posts I’ve authored. But in this case it doesn’t.