49 thoughts on “Sunday Serendipity”

  1. SNL as usual panda-ering to the lowest denominator, but for a change in a cold open actually making some good points on media coverage of biden.

    President Joe Biden (Mikey Day) holds a press conference after meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

  2. wow all that hacky partisan comedy on SNL now makes me long for the days of Toonces the Driving Cat

  3. Colorado Official Slams Judge Over ‘Very Troubling’ Trump Insurrection Case Ruling (msn.com)

    Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold (D) ripped a state judge’s ruling last week after she turned down an effort to bar former President Donald Trump from Colorado’s primary ballot in 2024.
    Griswold – in an interview with MSNBC’s Ali Velshi on Saturday – chimed in on the judge’s decision that found Trump engaged in insurrection but rejected an attempt to prevent his name from appearing on the state’s ballot.
    The decision arrived after a lawsuit from a D.C.-based ethics watchdog argued that the former president’s actions linked to the events of Jan. 6, 2021 conflicted with a Civil War-era Constitutional amendment to bar people from holding office who “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the Constitution.
    Griswold, after Velshi referred to the decision as being far from a “victory,” said she was “surprised” by the ruling and the MSNBC anchor was “really hitting it on the head.”
    “The idea that any official who would engage in insurrection would be barred from taking office except the presidency is incredibly surprising. That basically means that the presidency is a ‘Get Out of Jail Free’ card for insurrection,” said Griswold, adding that it was “very troubling” to her.
    “The American people need to know that the president, the person – if anybody – the person most in charge of protecting the Constitution, actually has a duty to do so. So I’m right there with you. I find it very troubling that the president of the United States could engage in insurrection and unlike everybody else, could then be president again.”

  4. The only thing that makes sense to me about the Colorado judge’s 100+ page order is she wants to be reversed — not for her finding of fact that he led an insurrection (facts concluded from a trial not usually reversible), but on her tenuous-at-best decision that 14th Amendment disqualification doesn’t apply to the presidency. I can see why she’d rather kick upstairs a decision to keep Trump off the ballot, that would be a very big deal better coming from a higher court. And if she is reversed there is no need for a trial and a new verdict on the facts. It’s already done.

  5. i appreciate an occasional minor legal victory for former-guy, this one given by a registered-Democrat judge, as they invalidate his claims of a government-wide conspiracy against him

  6. ‘Simply incorrect’: Judge Luttig and Tribe react to Judge’s decision to reject Trump 14th Amendment challenge (yahoo.com)

    Judge J. Michael Luttig and Laurence Tribe join Ali Velshi to discuss the Colorado judge’s “historic” decision to reject the bid to keep Trump off the ballot in 2024 and why they believe the ruling is “incorrect as a matter of constitutional law.” “The whole rule of law would be shredded if we said that the president is above the law because his oath, because of its wording, exempts him from the most fundamental requirement of law: that when your term is up you leave. It’s only dictators who stay as long,” Tribe explains. “That’s why the fate of the United States and democracies around the world is at stake in whether Donald Trump is allowed ever again to take the oath to support the constitution.. He’s clearly not going to mean it. That’s the scary part.”

  7. The judge’s legal reasoning is so flawed (intentional or not) it almost has to be overturned, but the appeals court might find another reason to keep him on the ballot.

  8. – my apologies to anthony newley for the parody –
     
    who can take a summit
    sprinkle it askew
    cover it in handshakes and a smile or two?
     
    the panda man [the panda man]
    oh the panda man can [the panda man can]
    the panda man makes the world feel good
    the way he knew he could 
     
    the panda man can
     
    Major Panda Man - YouTube
     
  9. New poll to excite the trump hopers from K. “New Chuck Todd Just Like the Other Chuck Todd” Welker.   They are bound and determined to have themselves a horse race.

    Being bound is one thing—but being bound AND determined—that’s quite another horse of an entirely different color, led to the water from which he might or might not choose to slake his thirst.
    I’d stake my reputation on it.

  10. With Axelrod and Maher ratcheting up their dump Biden talk in the last couple of days we are now seeing this scenario under discussion: Choosing a different nominee at the convention. Under Democratic Party rules it appears delegates are not exactly required to vote for the candidate picked by their state, but are only told to “reflect the sentiments of those who elected them”

  11. If it’s intentional it’s brilliant legal error. An appeal will be a review of her reading of the 14th amendment, which is a purely legal question, which is reviewed de novo, which as Poobah, Luttig and Tribe (heady company that) noted can be reversed with no need to remand for application of law to facts. Bravo, Judge Wallace.

  12. General opinion polls for 2024 POTUS election are meaningless, only the swing-state (electoral college) numbers are relevant, we don’t elect based on popular vote

    https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/latest_polls/state_president/

    the numbers are all over the place- if mussolini jr. is truly ahead by double-digits in some of these states, those people are living in their own hate-filled alternate reality

    i personally don’t think someone who could only muster 2% in their own party’s 2020 primaries is a better candidate than the incumbent*

    *edited for politeness

  13. Every thing looks smooth and ok now because so far it’s Joe and Kamala without much static.  But once the democratic idiots (Axelrod for one, mahar for another) get their way and crack the dam open there is going to be an absolute HELL of a fight over WHO.
    WHO ?
    And the nominee will still be Joe but once again the democratic idiots will have become able to command great amounts of AIRTIME.  And who knows they might just could blow the whole thing up.
    So ok chop up the guy who beat chump.
    .
    Who is Axrlrod’s guy to replace Joe? Does Axelrod have a favorite or is his gig just to get the gates open and yada yada.  
     

  14. is his gig just to get the gates open and yada yada

    To be fair, democracy isn’t supposed to be “either this candidate or fascism, no other viable options”.  People should be able to have these conversations without imperiling the entire institution

  15. This is no time for fairness.  
    (ar ar)

    I think The Fascist has been able to create the situation to where it actually is “this candidate or fascism”.

    Democracy might have allowed that but it was The Fascist who did it.

  16. i blame asshole rank-and-file suburban republicans 

    The Dark Lard (yay, i win the misnomer game) would have no power without them

  17. https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/19/tech/sam-altman-open-ai-firing-board/index.html

    “The company is a nonprofit.”

    “But Altman, Brockman and Chief Scientist Ilya Sutskever in 2019 formed OpenAI LP, a for-profit entity that exists within the larger company’s structure.”

    “ That for-profit company took OpenAI from worthless to a valuation of $90 billion in just a few years…”

    A for-profit embedded in a non-profit. How routine is that? How does the tax structure work? The valuation…it’s all speculation. Nothing is real.

  18. Nothing is real.

    You don’t subscribe to the idea of a hope-and-dream-based economy?  Are you some kind of communist?! 😜 

  19. Onliest thing I know about the economyis that with democrats I can buy things and with republicans I have to sell things.
    (and put up with a bunch of preacher noise)

  20. it would be a nice-tie in if that song ended with a horse-race, but i think it’s actually a fox-hunt.
     
    ok, pardon my over-participation, just sittin’ here in quarantine 😑 
     
    …am done ✌️ 

  21. pogo, any thoughts on

    Can a socialist ex-marine fill Joe Manchin’s seat in West Virginia? | West Virginia | The Guardian

    To launch his campaign for US Senate, Zach Shrewsbury chose the site of one of America’s most famous hangings.
    Charles Town, West Virginia, was where state authorities executed the abolitionist John Brown after he led an attack on a federal armory a few miles down the road in Harpers Ferry, a pivotal moment in the lead-up to the civil war. One hundred and sixty four years later, Shrewsbury – who decided against attempting to get a permit for the event at the site of the insurrection, which is now a national park – stood on the courthouse grounds where Brown’s hanging took place to announce that he would be the only “real Democrat” running to represent West Virginia in the Senate next year.
    “We need leaders that are cut from the working-class cloth. We need representation that will go toe to toe with corporate parasites and their bought politicians. We need a leader who will not waver in the face of these powers that keep the boot on our neck,” Shrewsbury said to applause from the small group of supporters gathered behind him.
    “So, as John Brown said, ‘These men are all talk. What we need is action.’ I’m taking action right now to stand up to these bought bureaucrats.”
    The remarks were a swipe at Joe Manchin, the Democratic senator who for the past 13 years had managed to represent what has become one of the most Republican states in the nation. In recent years he has used his power as a swing vote in Congress to stop several of Joe Biden’s legislative priorities – attracting the ire of progressives and prompting Shrewsbury to mount a primary challenge.
    A few weeks after Shrewsbury began campaigning, he was showing a friend around an abandoned mining town when his phone rang with news: Manchin had decided not to seek re-election, leaving Shrewsbury as the only Democrat in the race.
    By all indications, Shrewsbury, a 32-year-old Marine Corps veteran and community organizer, faces a difficult, if not impossible, road to victory. West Virginia gave Donald Trump his second-biggest margin of support of any state in the nation three years ago, and Manchin is the last Democrat holding a statewide office. Political analysts do not expect voters to elect the Democratic candidate – whoever that turns out to be – and predict Manchin will be replaced by either Governor Jim Justice or Congressman Alex Mooney, the two leading Republicans in the Senate race.
    Shrewsbury’s message to them is: not so fast.
    “People were really sold on the fact that Joe Manchin could be the only Democrat that could win in West Virginia, and I very much disagree,” Shrewsbury told the Guardian a week after the senator made his announcement.
    Also a former governor, Manchin is considered the most conservative Democrat in the Senate, and when the party took the majority by a single vote in the chamber in 2021, Manchin stopped the Biden administration from passing policies that would have made permanent a program to reduce child poverty, and more forcefully fight climate change.
    Sitting in a conference room at the Fayette county Democratic party’s headquarters in Oak Hill, where visitors pass a lobby displaying an American flag, a pride flag, and a stack of Narcan, the opioid-overdose reversal medication, Shrewsbury outlined his plans to run a campaign distinctly to the left of Manchin’s policies – and one he believes can win.
    “People want someone who’s genuine. They don’t want a politician. They want someone who actually looks like them. I mean, hell, you can’t get much more West Virginia than this,” said Shrewsbury, fond of wearing flannel shirts and hunting caps.
    Among his priorities are creating universal healthcare and childcare programs, and reducing the role of incarceration in fighting the opioid epidemic ravaging West Virginia.
    “Everyone here just is thankful for the scraps or crumbs that we get from whoever we elect. And that’s who we keep electing – whoever can keep the little crumbs coming along. I’m trying to say there is a better way,” Shrewsbury said.
    [continues]

  22. Not to be morbid, but when President Carter passes, can Orange Adolf be prevented from appearing at a State funeral?   

  23. Being elected president or being married to one almost guarantees you live past 90.  That’s some quality health care!

  24. Patd, never heard of Shrewsbury.  Still, short answer is no.  The D word for anyone but Manchin is rat poison here, and the S word, … even if false, is pig flight level. He might get enough name recognition to run for a state delegate or senator by running against Fat Jimmy, but if he beats Big Jim if you’re a Christian, get ready for the 2nd coming. 

  25. https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/19/world/argentina-vote-milei-massa-nov-19/index.html

    “Far-right outsider Javier Milei wins Argentina’s presidency”

    “His campaign promise to dollarize Argentina, if enacted, is expected to thrust the country into new territory: no country of Argentina’s size has previously turned over the reins of its own monetary policy to Washington decisionmakers.”

    “Milei has also said he would slash government spending by closing Argentina’s ministries of culture, education, and diversity, and by eliminating public subsidies. He is a social conservative with ties to the American right; he opposes abortion rights and has called climate change a “lie of socialism.”

    “Milei’s win will be closely scrutinized around the world as a potential sign of a resurgence of far-right populism. Milei has ties to the American right, and former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro had endorsed Milei’s candidacy.”

    Well, Lula beat Bolsonaro, but it does seem like it’s getting more fascist-y.

  26. Mr. Ivy strung/stringed/strang up some lights today before it gets cold and rainy. We only do the back yard. We never look out front. 

  27. The best birthday gift the oldest president in American history could hope for would be a strategy for assuaging voters’ concerns, but that has been hard to come by. Mr. Biden and his team have taken the approach that his record of domestic legislation and international leadership should belie any worries about his capacity, even though polls have shown consistently that that line of argument has not been persuasive, at least not yet.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/19/us/politics/biden-birthday-age.html

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