I didn't have persistent dreams for the first ten years of being a parent, mostly because I didn't get enough sleep to have them. So I should instead appreciate being well-rested, I suppose.
The current Russian bounty argument seems to be whether or not Trump was briefed, maybe it was in his daily brief but everyone knows he doesn't read it, and his briefers avoid talking about Russia because it upsets him. Enough independent news agencies have confirmed the substance that they aren't flatly denying it.
So far I haven't seen one theory that seems obvious to my Trump-derangement syndrome mind- the intelligence community knew about it but kept it from Trump because they figured he'd probably blow the intelligence sources to the Russians, as he did with Israeli intelligence two years ago.
Much more likely that he knew but didn't care. After all (as I'm sure Putin has pointed out to him) the US funded and armed the mujahedin in the 1980s, so it's all part of the game.
2 It's scandalous no matter which way you'd slice it. I fully expect the Democrats to Benghazi the hell out of it. Yeah, right.
Only the 567th scandal to occur in the last few years that would sink any other administration.
3 is the most likely explanation, and whatever IC sources have appeared in the stories say he was briefed and just did nothing about it. I'm just surprised no one has connected the story to Trump having a history of sharing classified info with Russia.
But really, isn't raising the marginal income tax rates on the highest earners the greatest treason of all?
Never had persistent dreams as far as I can remember.
Re: school, I haven't thought too much about what the coming school year will be like. At this point the worst-case scenario is Atossa's school being fully online like it was for the end of the last school year. She's going into kindergarten (turns 5 today, by the way), so keeping her on track academically doesn't seem too hard. The challenge will be keeping her out of trouble and getting our own work done. We vaguely contemplated moving to either my parents' home or Cassandane's parent's home, for grandparents' help and because their local schools are more likely to reopen in person, but either option still seems pretty horrifying.
Re: bounties, it's a tiny bit nice to imagine that this will be the scandal that breaks Trump, because it alienates his jingoistic base or whatever bullshit people make up after the fact, but I wouldn't bet on it. The only sort of justice I'm hoping for is Democrats winning in November and still having some semblance of a democracy to write the history books for.
Fortunately, the United States has its own rich tradition of scalp bounties on which to draw.
You'd like to think that the people who have spent the last 20 years making literally everything about the troops would actually care about the troops but yeah, probably not.
Like I don't even have the comfort any more of saying "well at least now I will know that these assholes don't even believe their own jingoistic bullshit" because we passed that point years ago.
Yeah, at this point I don't think anything has the potential to be "the scandal that breaks Trump", no matter how bad. His support will continue to erode but nobody who abandons him will actually acknowledge they did until well after the fact.
I have almost nothing but persistent dreams. It's really quite annoying.
My new dreams are "finding myself outside and realizing to my shock I'm maskless".
I'm afraid that being home has made me lax about checking that my zipper is up. But I've not had a dream about it.
So far I haven't seen one theory that seems obvious to my Trump-derangement syndrome mind- the intelligence community knew about it but kept it from Trump because they figured he'd probably blow the intelligence sources to the Russians, as he did with Israeli intelligence two years ago.
What kills me is that they mostly likely hid it from Trump by putting it in his briefing book that he was supposed to read but they knew he wouldn't.
These dreams go on when I close my fly...
Yeah, at this point I don't think anything has the potential to be "the scandal that breaks Trump", no matter how bad.
I think Covid has this potential, but it's a combination of many things instead of straightforward scandal: 100K+ deaths, criminally negligent response, inability to hold rallies is causing his brain to short-circuit, etc. I do think he's deteriorating in a new way under all this.
Also, it turns out that the elderly aren't happy with policies that are calling for them to die as a cost-saving measure.
My elderly father has "joked" as recently as yesterday about how it'd be worth it to just give all professional sports players covid so they can all go back to playing; if 1% or whatever of them die that's just the cost of business. Black bodies being sacrificed for white entertainment.
More amusing to me, he's apparently so hard up for things to bet on that are still televised live that he's learned the intricacies and personalities of British darts.
I do think he's deteriorating in a new way under all this.
Maybe. I'm not sold. He's losing approval at a faster pace, certainly, but I don't think we're going to see dramatic discontinuities: everyone will accept he's even more deeply unpopular, but no one powerful will break from him while he's in the White House.
Also I'm not confident the people horrible enough to support him over the past four years aren't also so horrible they'll turn back toward him at some point, as COVID-19 is baked into priors. Looking at 538, his approval rating was significantly lower than it is now for the vast majority of 2017.
"aren't also so horrible they _won't_ turn back toward him" - I think that's the right way through the negatives.
21 last -- I think maybe tribalism hadn't fully jelled with his followers. Now they're all in. What was that dystopian novel where the rebel leader made everyone engage in some light cannibalism to make them less willing to break free from him?
Oh, where the Kool-Aid man made everyone drink his blood?
I do agree with 21.last though. They'd cozy back up the moment the winds blew towards Trump.
One of the coaches at a small town high school down in Ravalli said on social media that protesters etc ought to be strung up. Shit stormed, but the school board ended up not firing him. Local paper just sent me an update: father-son duo from the Blackfeet Nation are calling for a boycott. That's pretty mainstream.
Really, I think we might well be looking for something like the Flathead Apostasy. Once Trump's magic white supremacy can no longer protect the jerks who support him, they'll fall away in droves. There'll always be a hard core, sure, but who'd have bet even half a year ago that Mississippi would change its flag?
I think 23 is right, in 2017 there were republicans who voted for Trump and will vote for him again who said they disapproved. Those people no longer exist, either because they're no longer republicans or because they approve.
There's this weird phenomenon on 538 where Trump's approval, Trump's vote, and the generic-R vote are almost exactly the same (right around 41%), but there's a big difference between Trump's disapproval, Biden's vote, and the generic-D vote (56%, 50.6%, 48.5%). That is, there doesn't seem to be a difference now between being Republican and approving of Trump, and everyone else disapproves of Trump but only some of them are convinced to vote for a Democrat.
The other thing about that though is it means you don't have to win over Trump supporters, if Biden can just solidify the Trump disapprovers he'd be up 15 instead of 9.
There's got to be more than 6 percent of the country that disapproves of Trump because he's too far to the left.
30: There really isn't. Those people would be going for R on the generic house ballot, and it really looks from polls like everyone who votes R generic approves of Trump.
I'm thinking of the people who wouldn't vote for regular Republicans either.
People who hold a gun the wrong way just to they can feel "a spent, white-hot bullet casing directly into (their) nipples."
||
So, Mr. Chief Justice Balls and Strikes reaches out to convert an as applied challenge into a facial challenge, because he wants to rule way more broadly than called for in the case. Alito says history doesn't matter, but since you people act like it does with respect to racial discrimination, well here's some religious discrimination history for you. Sotomayor, continuing her streak of getting it absolutely right, says Today's ruling is perverse.
Oh, and Booking.com won its trademark.
|>
My understanding is the state tried to fund only secular private schools, the lower court said the state couldn't fund private secular schools if they didn't fund private religious schools and therefore could fund neither, and SCOTUS reversed that by saying they must fund both? Can't the state just cut the funding?
That's based on reading a thread of like four tweets so I'm probably missing some nuance.
Can't the state just cut the funding?
It's indirect: you can get a $150 tax credit for making a donation to a scholarship fund that can be used for low income and disabled students at private schools. Our deep red legislature enacted it to funnel money to religious schools. Our Supreme Court said 'no can do' and eliminated the tax credit, for everyone. US Supreme Court says 'yes you can!' and reinstated the tax credit.
I suppose the 2021 legislature can revisit the program. (It expires in 2023.) Depending on who wins the governor's race -- the Republican is so deeply in the tank for religious extremism that he's funding a museum that posits that humans and dinosaurs lived at the same time -- it could well end up increasing the tax credit. Or just paying state money to religious schools.
I think 23 is right, in 2017 there were republicans who voted for Trump and will vote for him again who said they disapproved. Those people no longer exist, either because they're no longer republicans or because they approve.
Wait, I think it's more because in 2016 lots of people disapproved of Trump but disapproved of Clinton more. Now that we don't have the most unpopular Democratic candidate possible, and there are some real problems in the news so we aren't hearing about phony scandals intended to make him unpopular too, that isn't happening.
-- the Republican is so deeply in the tank for religious extremism that he's funding a museum that posits that humans and dinosaurs lived at the same time --
What happened to "Dinosaur bones were planted by God 5,500 years ago to test our faith"? Are dinosaurs in the Bible now?
Honestly, I haven't read nearly any of the middle part, so maybe?
I guess I skipped a step. Red legislature enacts tax credit to funnel money to religious schools. Blue administration says, yeah but money can't be used for religious schools, Montana Supreme Court says, no, you can't do it that way, and eliminates the program.
Someone should propose a museum about the coexistence of humans and dinosaurs and raise money from the religious nuts and then use it to fund ornithology.
13: I went for a walk last night around 9:30 pm on the bike path, and it was completely empty, so I took my mask off and walked without a mask for 2 minutes. It was such a great feeling, but then even though nobody was nearby, I felt guilty and put it back on.
It will be wonderful when they are no longer needed.
I have yet to wear a mask outside when I'm walking outside and not near people.
Cambridge changed it to the following:
The City has amended the Emergency Order requiring face coverings. During the summer months (i.e., from June 23,2020 until midnight on September 22, 2020) masks or cloth face coverings may be temporarily removed when outdoors when a physical distance of at least six (6) feet from others can be maintained at all times. Additionally, clarifying language has been added to allow for the removal of masks for dining at food establishments in the city, including outdoor dining.
Hardly anybody here has a mask when walking outside except in the business district.
Of course, we've never had the level of infections you saw on the eastern seaboard.
Here in Maryland 100% of people wear masks inside 100% of the time, as far as I can tell, except when in restaurants. Maybe 10% of people wearing them outside. Seems to be working but I think we will see the same thing as Pittsburgh where there is a fairly spike in cases attributable 100% to restaurants/bars (or gyms, I haven't been anywhere near a gym since they opened last week).
So, I was just looking at something from BlueCross Mass Foundation about MassHealth and the Health Connector. If you've had MassHealth in the past year, for whatever reason - income, disability, whatever - you are probably ok. But the rules are kind of asinine. MA chose not to have MassHealth count the $600 extra unemployment as income. BUT the Health Connector Marketplace plans, must, by law count it as income. So, of course, you have to resubmit once that goes away to get an affordable premium a month later.
Medicare for All please.
46: OK if you can pull it back up. But the people who pull them down and then get in your space are annoying.
Lots of people wearing masks indoors here seem to leave their nose out.
Leviticus 11:29:
These also shall be unclean unto you among the creeping things that creep upon the earth; the weasel, and the mouse, and the tortoise after his kind."
Ellicott on "the tortoise":
This creature (tzâb), which literally denotes "the swollen," "the inflated" (see Numbers 5:27), occurs nowhere else in the Bible.
(Other translations besides KJV seem to mostly call it "great lizard".)
Does that mean I can serve tortoise soup when I have someone who is Orthodox over?
52: Yes! Some people cover their nose, and leave their mouth uncovered as they huff and puff.
Wish there were actual enforcement.
Unfortunately, "after his kind" seems to mean "and other animals like it". And the word means tortoise/turtle in modern Hebrew.
The Septaguint translated it ὁ κροκόδειλος ὁ χερσαῖος, "land-crocodile".
I have a theory that a cheeseburger could be kosher if the cheese was from goat milk.
Or the meat from a goat and the cheese from a cow.
I know he's been getting worse- what can you expect from an older white man in Orange County- but how does Drum write this without any awareness of how clueless it sounds? (Context is MT SCOTUS decision above, saying it took the religious right 40 years for a partial win on their original issue)
This is just your occasional reminder that cultural change takes a very long time, and the deeper the change the longer the time it takes. We should expect nothing different from the BLM protests that started a month ago. If you aren't prepared for a decades-long battle, just go home and work on something else. Because that's the kind of stamina it will take to make a real difference.
58, 59; That makes sense, but even chicken meat with cheese isn't kosher. I think it has to do with putting up a fence so that you won't even get close to displeasing G-d.
I think maybe some poor cook for tired of everyone asking for cheese to kill the taste and decided to blame G-d.
Maybe that's why that guy's wife is still waiting for shredded cheese for her fajitas.
44 to 47: My neighborhood's very suburban and it's not hard to keep 6' apart, but I've been making a concerted effort to wear masks on my morning walks. I cross paths or otherwise see a dozen or two people over the course of the walk; when you run into the one or two other people in masks, it does buoy you. I suspect that's it's far more important to get masks right indoors, but we need to normalize them everywhere -- and my wife has enough pointless fights and reminders about it in her shop that we need to make it a habit.
Agree on the importance of making it a habit and a norm.
People who hold a gun the wrong way just to they can feel "a spent, white-hot bullet casing directly into (their) nipples."
I wonder if the author of that article has even fired an AR as he apparently has no idea how they eject casings. The plaform is 50 years old. Does he think every left handed U.S. infantryman in the last half century has been constantly burning himself with hot brass? (spoiler, they're not)
If they fired it from left handed port arms they would. But only an idiot would do that.
And a US infantryman is the paradigmatic case of a non-idiot.
You can, if I remember correctly, fire it from the left shoulder, if you have to, but it isn't advised because you'll still risk getting ejected brass in the face if it comes off the brass deflector funny (though it will not be "white hot" FFS), not to mention bits of carbon fouling and gas thanks to the M16's charming "shits where it eats" direct-impingement design. Ballistic glasses are recommended.
The old SLR was ambidextrous - you could literally flick a lever over to change it from right-ejecting to left-ejecting. Great for going round corners.
re: 44 / 45
What is the point of wearing a mask if you are not near other people? I walked to the shop this morning and back, I didn't pass within 30 ft of another person until I got to the shop. To and from the shop, what possible reason would there be for wearing a mask? Other than pure symbolism.
70: Because usually there are a lot of people on that path - walkers, runners and cyclists. Lately, even at night I pass people, often teenagers or roller bladers. But there was nobody around, so I took it off. I had every reason to believe that people could come by any minute.
That said, unless you're really out in the country or nature, I think the symbolism matters.
That's how you wind up not being able to eat cheese on a chicken sandwich.
Allowing good chicken sandwiches was part of the genius of St. Paul.
72: If that's to 71, obviously you make an exception for designated eating areas. I'm even willing to go to one if there's enough distance, and it's outside.
72: If that's to 71, obviously you make an exception for designated eating areas. I'm even willing to go to one if there's enough distance, and it's outside.
Most places haven't required masks outdoors when exercising and exposure requires time not merely passing someone. Do what makes you feel safe but I'm on team "cut yourself some slack BG".
Pennsylvania just upped it's mask rule to require them when you are outside if you can't stay six feet away from others.
It's easy to stay that far from people, but I think that means I'll get funny looks at 20 feet.
OT: Does aluminum get old? Like a ladder made in the 70s that feels a bit spongy when you step on it, could it be experiencing metal fatigue?
80: Yeah, and aluminum is more unpredictable that way because there's not a set fatigue limit like there is with steel.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fatigue_limit
It's so unstable, sometimes it just sprouts an extra i.
I guess I should replace it. Thanks.
Our mayor and all 3 county commissioners just sent a letter to the health director asking for a mandatory mask rule on all businesses with city business licenses. I suppose they're looking for angles to get around limits on municipal power. (Our city recently lost a Mt Sup. Ct. case on our ability to have municipal gun safety regs, so I can see why they'd be hesitant.)
83: It's a pretty easy job if it's come out: you pick up an i from your keyboard and it fits really neatly into the space between the n and the u.
On the subject of online versus in person fall classes and other University debates, this seemed like an excellent twitter thread.
https://twitter.com/rkelchen/status/1278313049485688834