The Ben Curve

But wasn’t it GOP policies and lack of leadership (irresponsible tax cuts which gutted gov revenues, deregulation of environment/finance/pretty much everything, an invasion of a nation not involved in 9/11 that should never have been done, fucking up said occupation, hiring of unqualified people like Ice Cream Truck driver and Arabian show horse guy, letting New Orleans drown, inaction on global warming, etc, etc, ad infinitum) that crippled US Amercia in the first place?

@ManchuCandidate: Before deciding to riff on Ben, I was toying with the “more dangerous time” idea, having lived through the last thirty years of the Cold War, including the Cuban Missile Crisis (which I don’t remember, but still).

We didn’t do Duck & Cover, but we still had to sit through nightmare-inducing nuke films. Today’s equivalent is not Towel-Headed Terrists, but classroom instruction on how to head for the closets when the latest gun-wielding madman bursts in.

@nojo:
Nothing to fear but fearful crazy ass guntoting US Amercian maniacs themselves.

@nojo: Sadly, sheltering in closets is actually a useful, life-saving response. Ducking under a desk during a thermonuclear event not so much.

Sad, because although our kids are finally learning practical things in school, it’s the reason they are learning them that is disturbing.

PS: has this became Goodreads? Kee-rist, at least it ain’t as bad as Brand W. Seen that shite lately?

@flypaper: For the past three years, pretty much. I keep up the weekly book posts to maintain the illusion of freshness, but politics is in such a rut there’s no point trying to feign interest.

@flypaper: Ah, here it is…

http://www.stinque.com/2012/08/06/professional-wrestling-with-ties/

Right now, I don’t see myself getting worked up about Hillbot vs. Last Republican Standing.

So who will be the first Republican to blame Obama for the Paris attacks? I say probably Fuckabee, maybe Trump.

@blogenfreude: Trump’s Charlie Hebdo tweet from January is making the rounds: “Isn’t it interesting that the tragedy in Paris took place in one of the toughest gun control countries in the world?”

Then and now, the answer is: Let’s compare stats.

@flypaper: What nojo said. I have posting privileges here, but I find myself too exhausted to think about the politics. I can start posting pictures of soccer hotties and dogs, if you want….

@SanFranLefty: Don’t forget our favorite PMILF.

Agreed. The kleptocratic, open criminality and incompetence of Caligutard’s administration totally imploded whatever paper-thin economic and intellectual facade the RepubliKKKan Party once had, and now watching them descend into absolute lunacy has been less satisfying than expected. Frankly, it’s just frightening and exhausting considering how much political power these psychopaths wield, especially at the state level, along with the rabid, deranged tongue-talkers, snake-handlers, and bath salts cannibals that vote for them no matter how far off the deep end they’ve gone.

@¡Andrew!: Well that’s true we do have Justin Trudeau. Maybe he’ll pose for a picture holding a puppeh?

@¡Andrew!: Not to mention Caligutard invading the wrong country and setting off a chain of events leading to the current Mideast shitshow and terrorism. It’s just really hard to be snarky; I’m just depressed and defeated. Maybe I need to up my antidepressants another few hundred milligrams a day?

@SanFranLefty: Wish that I had an answer. For me, it’s often more satisfying to follow local/state politics, since I can have more of a positive impact. I worked with local gay rights groups for years on issues like non-discrimination protections, domestic partnership rights, and marriage equality, for example. Incredibly, all of those issues have been enacted into law over the last decade. In contrast, with national politics I feel like a bee hitting a windshield at highway speed. (Hugz)

@¡Andrew!: Living in Deep Blue Denver — and having grown up in Deep Blue Eugene — you do get the sense that our destiny is to huddle in urban conclaves for warmth.

At least until 2020, when Demrats will be presented yet another opportunity to blow a redistricting election.

Speaking of which, there’s a movement afoot in Colorado to get Single Payer on the ballot next year. Fascinating if they pull that off, but I haven’t seen enough details yet to pass judgment.

@nojo: Washington is effectively insolvent due to our state’s lack of an income tax combined with obscene corporate welfare, like the $9 billion dollar tax cut for Boeing, and that was with the Demonrats in charge. The state also lost a landmark lawsuit that found the legislature is underfunding education by billions per year, again with the Demonrats in charge. Our state supreme court found the legislature in contempt and has been fining them $100,000 per day for months and they don’t even care, or rather their 1% puppet masters don’t care. Truly, income and wealth inequality in tandem with open political corruption will be the defining issues of our time.

@¡Andrew!: Sadly, right now all of the local politics in Ess Eff revolve around how the eff we’re going to keep anyone who makes less than $150K a year living in the City, thanks to the techies that would rather ride the Google bus from my neighborhood to Mountain View instead of finding an apartment on the Peninsula (which is not a suburban wasteland, Mr. SFL and I actually moved from the Peninsula to SF because we couldn’t afford any condos for sale down there, but given our druthers we would have stayed closer to the hiking trails, kayaking inlets, and Half Moon Bay).

Wow, world’s longest run-on sentence.

IOW, I feel like it’s a losing battle on the local/municipal front. The progressives have done some good stuff on the state level on enviro issues (thank you DodgerBlue!) and on criminal justice reform and mitigating the horror of mass overincarceration….so I guess there’s that. A ballot initiative on abolishing the death penalty almost won in 2012 and will be on the ballot again in 2016, so that may be where I devote my energies for the next year; certainly I won’t spend any money or expend any effort (other than grudgingly voting) to elect the Handmaiden of the 0.0001%.

@SanFranLefty: Oh, please. Faulkner’s still warming up the engine by that point.

@nojo: Thank you for the jolt of reality. I’m not that bad.

Combine a native Texan’s ability/ need/ tendency for parentheticals, pauses, passive voice, sighs, passive verb tenses, and semicolons in a random sentence of no meaning; offset with an intensive “declarative sentences of six words or less only” training at law school, and you have yours truly.

@SanFranLefty: Maybe that’s why every other word out of my mouth is “shit” or “fuck”?

@SanFranLefty: I’ll almost certainly canvass for Hillbot in Virginia when the time comes, but I’m not jazzed at the prospect. At least there’s the generic GOTV element of it that could help some more worthy candidates down-ballot.

@SanFranLefty: I combine a journalist’s AP training with a geek’s desperate desire for someone, anyone, to understand what the fuck I’m doing all day.

@mellbell: Bingo! I have no passion for Hillary, but Democrats have to put blue butts in state seats. All the horror stories from the past four years stem from Rupublicans running the table in low-turnout elections.

@SanFranLefty: Yeah, we have the same massive prob here: a household income of $100K might give you a coveted crack at joining the lower middle class, but forget about ever buying your first home unless you can hop in a time machine and set it for 1979. We have people in their early 30s now who’ve been forced to endure their college-dorm, cereal-for-dinner lifestyle for an additional decade. We did get $15 an hour passed, but it won’t be fully phased in for years, and it won’t mean shit by that time due to out-of-control housing costs.

At least with local elections, we can call our city council members fascists to their faces, and I’m grateful to live somewhere in which we can elect actual socialists.

@SanFranLefty: Also, you should avoid the US media: it is mental poison. I scan the headlines, yet I always turn to the CBC, the BBC, or the Guardian for actual news and analysis. The CBC’s coverage of Paris has been multi-dimensional, calm, and rational. It’s times like this when you discover just how propagandist, jingoistic, and incompetent that the US media truly has become. Stay sane–avoid American news outlets at all costs. The US and international coverage by the foreign press is far superior and without the anything-for-ratings/clicks, right-wing hysteria.

@¡Andrew!: No kidding. I had just arrived in the US from London on Saturday, and was stuck in a hotel at SeaTac due to weather and the incompetence of Alaska Airlines. Imagine my horror at discovering the only news channels available were CNN, MSNBC, and Fox. Where was my BBC or Al Jazeera English when I needed them? I just followed live updates on the Guardian.

@Mistress Cynica: I hope that you weren’t stuck at the hotel for long. We would’ve been happy to keep you company : )