Elon throwing up a couple Nazi salutes, good times...
(He'll of course deny that's what it was and say this just shows how oversensitive the libs are because that's always the game right wing edgelords play, from the OK/white power sign to whatever stupid frog meme he posted this month)
What is the social media experience like? It's a little uncanny for me to have nothing: no Twitter, no blogosphere, no group chats or whatever. (I never used TikTok or other video platforms, and no FB since 2010ish; I haven't really explored substack beyond my one subscription + friend's newsletter.) I don't want to mainline panic and doomscroll, but silence is not actually reassuring.
My twitter feed is filled with Musk sieg heiling his heart out
Bluesky doesn't seem any gloomier than normal. But you can see the way Trump just sucks up all the bandwidth. There's much less posting about anything else. Maybe that's just because it's inauguration day.
Yeah. Bluesky is fun sometimes, but even trying to follow more not-politics people, it gets really depressing when the world does. Which is probably useful, but I stay away for a while.
Someone needs to step up and do a "Nazis on Mars" sequel to "Whitey on the Moon," but I'm not sure who's best positioned to nail it.
Idly wondering over on bluesky whether that sieg-heiling might be enough to get him banned in Germany.
Ideally, we'd want to see him booted from both Tesla and SpaceX as acting contrary to the interests of the companies, right?
Oh hey, turns out that's obvious and photogenic enough that it's already hit German media. Yay!
Stern (low-rent but not tabloid), ntv (mainstream cable news), Bavarian public tv/radio, numerous others. Nice.
Honestly, I think I'm just looking for a read on the sense of menace and volatility on the ground.
Our ground is covered in ice and salt.
Border news: CBP One app disappears, etc.
Federal law enforcement officers have been using unmarked vehicles to drive around downtown Portland and detain protesters since at least Tuesday. Personal accounts and multiple videos posted online show the officers driving up to people, detaining individuals with no explanation about why they are being arrested, and driving off. [. . .]
Speaking to NPR's All Things Considered on Friday, Homeland Security Acting Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli acknowledged that federal agents had used unmarked vehicles to pick up people in Portland but said it was done to keep officers safe and away from crowds and to move detainees to a "safe location for questioning."
"The one instance I'm familiar with, they were, believed they had identified someone who had assaulted officers or ... the federal building there, the courthouse. Upon questioning, they determined they did not have the right person and that person was released," Cuccinelli said.
(Seriously, almost no one else is here? I'm chatting with myself?)
I was shoveling snow and then eating. I made little cheesecake cupcakes.
My thought was that I thought inaugurations were on Tuesdays. And that turned out to be a thought after the inauguration.
I know we're not supposed to be speculating about crazy shit the admin says, at least not in comments, but I had a thought about how X might keep ordinary people* from fleeing altogether: mandate that US government agencies use it as an official communications platform.
*Which I will arbitrarily defines as "not extreme right wing and not people who are keeping tabs on the extreme right wing."
To finish the thought in 17: that's pure speculation on my part, not based on any crazy shit I've heard the new US admin say.
12: I read about the sudden cancellation of appointments and the app. I wonder if they want in person apprehensions again, to look tougher?
So far, I haven't heard a lot of details - but that's probably because I was catching up on over the weekend posting and anticipation.
I do have friends who got too little snow to built snowmen, so they drew them on the ground instead. It was a bright moment.
11, 14: Mobes - 4 degrees F in Kane, "The Icebox of Pennsylvania." I think an "Icebox" is something like a SubZero refrigerator....
You'd think that if Lauren Sanchez can't afford a blouse, Bezos could have bought her one.
Hoping that consigning a bunch of prominent pols to the overflow room to make room for oligarchs will generate some payback down the road.
There's wind and fire danger weather out here again. I look forward to being required to show a voter registration card before receiving help in the event of a disaster.
I had thought the Nazi salute included striking one's chest, but I can't seem to confirm that. Most video is just of people with outstretched arms.
Am I making up the chest-pound prior to the salute, or is/was that a thing?
I don't know if that was always the motion, but there is footage of Hitler doing that exact chest thump-extend arm action.
And now Trump has his own little Brownshirt army, pardoning nearly* all Jan 6 criminals including head of the Proud Boys.
*Commuted 6 instead of pardoning, not sure which 6.
Commuted the seditious conspiracy convictions, pardoned everyone else, dropped all remaining cases. Everyone freed.
At least Peltier got his sentence commuted.
Withdrew from WHO. Prevented Afghanistan refugees from coming here, even some who te family members of active US military personnel. Rolling Stone is right.
*Commuted 6 instead of pardoning, not sure which 6.
The January one.
Okay yeah, Trump's back: open up the inbox and the first message begins "Today's announcement by the U.S. government to withdraw from the Paris Agreement is devastating for the future of the planet..." I remember this.
I didn't watch any of it but my son did and I am proud to report that he is appropriately horrified.
I'm not plugged in to AIM activism at all these days, but if Leonard is really coming home-home, I wonder if he will be living somewhere in my neighborhood. His health has been so poor, I don't know how many visitors he'll be seeing, but it would be nice just to be able to stroll by and wave to the house on occasion. And hopefully we'll have something to honor him at this year's May Day parade. And maybe a big party at the American Indian Center down the street. Maybe our municipal poet laureate will compose something to honor him too.
From the last time around:
http://www.unfogged.com/archives/comments_15831.html
I wrongly suggested that Trump would fire Pence and various people corrected me by pointing out that he couldn't.
Walt Someguy: "I'm not sure what a President could do unilaterally to make a Vice-President's life unpleasant (short of having his twitter followers take him out)."
Nice call, Walt.
Eggplant was also prescient in that thread. Talking about what could be done about Trump voters, Eggplant ruled out nukes: "Given the rural/urban split even nukes couldn't help the Dems win Congress. Contagion might be a better bet."
I am entirely confident that we won't be back here in 2029 watching Trump get sworn in for his third term. (Unfoggeders of 2029, please feel free to mock me cruelly)
Interesting time capsule. Lots of traditional 'fogged doom, but Bob - Bob! - was relatively pleasant and bizarrely on an LBJ great society nostalgia trip. Spike - Spike! - pointing out politely but firmly that calling people "Latinks" was dumb.
36: I'm not confident he can make it to the end of this term, even.
Small ball in comparison to much of this disaster, but I came home from ignoring the news for most of yesterday to find that AJ's new, fully remote federal job may be part of the forced return to office executive order. I hadn't seen that one coming, given that thr entire organization is fully remote and has been for years. There literally isn't office space anymore. There's an all hands meeting on Wednesday, and he's hoping it'll at least be clear whether he needs to start job hunting, but I'm kind of hoping that maybe legal compliance would be so slow as to not meaningfully change anything.
Wow, that's so dumb. What a waste of everyone's time and energy.
40: That's the best possible outcome for Trump 2.0.
25: Musk did do the chest-striking thing.
So, I have a student who is literally supposed to be getting her affirmative asylum decision in a week and a half. (I helped with her application and took her to the interview.) It's a straightforward case and nothing about it or her home country should trigger any of the current GOP obsessions. Now, of course, I spent half the night reading the text of these ridiculous executive orders to make sure they haven't cancelled or suspended all asylum decisions.
I'm also part of a private sponsorship group trying to bring in her mom and a brother as refugees, and as of last night that had been suspended for at least 90 days and it wouldn't shock me if the program as a whole is cancelled. Mary Catherine had been working with me to sponsor another brother to Canada, and that program was abruptly suspended with no notice just before we completed the application.
In short, I hate everything.
39: Truly, the epitome of government efficiency. Al Gore wishes he had been so effective.
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NMM to genius cartoonist, playwright, satirist Jules Feiffer. I wish I had Little Murders on DVD to watch tonight.
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43.1: Right. What I'm not finding is Hitler or his minions doing that along with the raised arm.
I've gone a bit into the rabbit hole on this. In a prior Nazi salute incident, a Youtube Nazi apologist tried to say it was a "Roman" salute, and said the distinction was the chest-pound. The commenter with the most detail chose the pseud "bloodandsoil," so that kind of gives away the game. But still, I'm curious.
Separately, Josh Marshall remains indispensible in this moment. He's exactly right about how we ought regard the Nazi salute. And is eloquent on the subject of maintaining optimism.
Paywalled, but you should pay.
43: that is really lousy
My friend at work is Filipina, married to a Vietnamese - American fellow. Right after the election she had to go to an all immigrants and H1-B visa holders meeting with HR. Her mom is still in the Philippines and her sister is in Canada. I am assuming she is going to be pretty safe since she's not a Muslim and her husband was likely born here. I haven't asked what her exact immigration status is, since I didn't have a reason to know, but it sucks to think about having to make that calculus for everyone you know who wasn't born in the US.
The only other good news from yesterday is that my friend who has multiple disabilities and chronic illnesses was able to score a really good deal in a used all-terrain motorized wheelchair. So now she and her little dog can get out in the nature more often. (Obviously not when it is quite this cold)
The Wikipedia article goes into surprising detail on precisely how we came to conceive of the "Roman salute" (largely a neoclassical invention) and how the others evolved in distinction from it & each other.
49: An old friend of mine makes those.
50: my god, it was originally... French.
On Saturday I was on one of the good bike boulevards in Berkeley, concrete-protected bikeway turning into slow street (some connecting car traffic blocked by monster concrete bollards) and for a while I was behind a guy in a motorized wheelchair, going as fast as a slow bicycle, puffing on a joint. Very little other traffic. If it weren't for the implications on the general quality of the sidewalks it would almost have felt idyllic.
52: in the bad old days of 2004, a Republican crowd would have torn him apart limb from limb just for that! you can't even get the bigots any more!
49: I am saddened to discover that an "all-terrain motorised wheelchair" really just looks like a normal wheelchair with more knobbly tyres. I was expecting tank tracks. Half-track, at least. A sort of electric Kettenkrad is what she should be looking for.
If there isn't an example of your personal mobility device in a shed at Bovington, you aren't really trying hard enough.
Lacking the ambition to pursue the endless possibilities only the sky can offer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Lackner_HZ-1_Aerocycle
my god, it was originally... French.
Only they would have the gall to do something like that.
First sentence of the Wikipedia article begins:
The Roman salute, also known as the Fascist salute
Highly exculpatory!
fasces are just bundles of sticks
That made me wonder if the word is etymologically connected to another word for a bundle of sticks. Turns out the answer is maybe.
I remember being taught that the words were related, back before it occurred to me to look up word origins for myself.
55: she had her eye on one of the tracked ones for awhile, but in the end decided to bow to practicality, as the tracked ones aren't really able to go indoors much, apparently. Also, they're super expensive, and she got some kind of really good deal on the four-wheeler type model.
(Before she became permanently disabled, she supported herself as a short-order cook, and she grew up on welfare, so the price aspect was the main determining factor.)
Lina Khan unfortunately ineligible to be the 2028 candidate.
Just learned that the Italian word for bassoon, which made everyone snort in high school music theory, comes from the way you disassemble the instrument into a bundle of sticks to carry it around.
Khaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!
56: Holding out for a personal ekranoplan.
This year, as part of my commitment to this site, I will buy, construct, and paint a 1:144 scale model of the Lun-class ekranoplan. This will include nose art and a name.
I will now be taking suggestions for the name. Anyone who suggests "Ekranoplanny McEkranoplanface" will be hunted down.
Suggestions for the nose art will also be entertained.
Каспийское Морское Чудовище, Chud for short.
66: I love her so much. I hope she's able to find a decent job some where. Maybe she should teach? She did her job so well that she can't sell out to corporations.
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The traditional lyrics to "Clementine" respect the NMM boundary:
In my dreams she still doth haunt me,
Robed in garments soaked in brine
Though in life I used to hug her,
Now she's dead, I'll draw the line
|>
"Only in America can a hardworking young man from Appalachia rise from his humble circumstances to enter the Oval for first time as VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES."
https://x.com/SpeakerJohnson/status/1882083118032846868
It's true; impossible in any other country in the world.
Nothing makes me as irrationally angry as Vance saying he's from Appalachia. Look at a fucking map!
Everyone born in Ohio finds a way to lie about it.
72 73 is good but may I suggest "Opinionated Grandma"? It hearkens to the early days of the blog and could also be a plausible Culture ship name.
Maybe go full James James Morrison Morrison Weatherby George Dupree with something like
Wry Wry Cooter Cooter Kobe Standpipe Bridgeplate Opinionated Grandma Fuck You Clown
This thing has ample room for graffiti in addition to its name - six Moskit missile tubes on the dorsal surface, for instance. "Fuck You Clown" seems ideal for one of those.
There was thread somewhere where we proposed graffiti for missiles (some conflict in the Middle East prompted it), but cannot think of a search term that might find it.
Speaking of the middle east and masturbating, years ago there was a woman in the bar that someone said was that one porn actress from Lebanon or with parents from Lebanon. I can't think of her name and don't want to google it. I wonder if that was true.
You misheard. She didn't say lebanese.
(My college roommate had that pin on her backpack: "NO I DIDN'T SAY LEBANESE")
I think it was Blanche who was not getting the concept.
that one porn actress from Lebanon or with parents from Lebanon. I can't think of her name and don't want to google it.
something Khalifa. Possibly Burj?
Burj Khalifa would be a good name for a porn star.
67. Have I mentioned that a friend of my father's briefly played the bassoon in the Milan opera.
He was an escaped prisoner of war who linked up with some partisans. They were wondering where to hide him, but when it emerged that he was a musician on civvy street they introduced him to the orchestra and somebody lent him an instrument. So for a while a British officer was tootling away on the faggotti under the eyes of the musically inclined among the German occupying forces. He was recaptured eventually, but none of his fellow musicians ratted him out.
Is there a strategy that Trump is pursuing? How are we supposed to fight him. He's actually claiming that Native Americans are not citizens, because they are loyal to their tribes first. NHe's going after so many things at once. What's the best strategy to oppose him in office. Is he just trying to do so much stuff, there will be no energy left to oppose him?
Yes, of course. That was his strategy the first time: the daily blitz. Would that we also practiced it.
Passing along the RAICES summary of immigration-related EOs in case it's useful to anyone: https://www.raicestexas.org/trump2point0
I didn't know that Trump had created a "Denaturalization" authority within the DOJ (press release from Feb 27, 2020, a time when people's minds were elsewhere). RAICES mentions "the administration's commitment to expand the Office of Denaturalization," without a source. It looks like this is currently very small, hardly even an "office," but its mission certainly aligns with the rhetoric.
He's actually claiming that Native Americans are not citizens, because they are loyal to their tribes first.
So you definitely have to block out the words that aren't backed by actions. Trump loves to chatter. I did not expect to see Federal Recognition of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina among the executive orders -- I'm sure there's context, but it stands out amid all the other Ministry of Truth titles on the page.
Lots of Lumbees have started voting Republican recently, so it shouldn't be too surprising.
something Khalifa. Possibly Burj?
Mia Khalifa.
Big opportunity for an Arab porn actor a la John Holmes named "Al-Burj"
He was recaptured eventually, but none of his fellow musicians ratted him out.
The only possible resolution to the story is the gradual revelation that all his fellow musicians are also escaped Brits, escaped Americans, German anti-fascists, fugitive forced labourers and so on, all thinking they're the only one, and all pretending to be Italian to each other. The conductor actually is Italian and is in constant agony at witnessing their completely unconvincing impressions of Italians.