Sunday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Sunday, October 27, 2024
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62 comments
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About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science and former College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
Follow Steven on
Twitter and/or
BlueSky.
Well, everything is explained now. The day the Washington Post killed its endorsement of Harris, Bezo’s other company met with Donald Trump:
“Donald Trump today met with executives at Blue Origin—the space company owned and operated by Jeff Bezos…Blue Origin has struggled for relevance in the fight to reach space. The company has become Bezos’ primary preoccupation since he stepped down from day-to-day management of Amazon in 2021…”
Source: https://www.thedailybeast.com/is-this-the-reason-jeff-bezos-owned-washington-post-didnt-endorse-kamala-harris-blue-origin-donald-trump/
@Not the IT Dept.:
Lex Bezos’ company hasn’t “struggled for relevance,” it just hasn’t done much that is relevant.
Their best known accomplishment is a suborbital single stage rocket that does the same thing the vomit comet does, only at a higher altitude, for less time, and for a lot more money.
Their most relevant accomplishment to date, is the BE-4 rocket engine. While this is supposed to be the engine Bezos’ eventual orbital rocket will use, so far it’s relevant only as the first stage engine for ULA’s Vulcan rocket.
Lex employed the tortoise strategy in development of his space toys, because he was busy running his online store and spending millions fishing for Saturn V first stages in the Atlantic (seriously). He further delayed with his joyride rocket for some reason (possibly copying Sir Dick’s joyride spaceplane). Meanwhile Xlon’s been running circles around him, even if he’s the ultimate trumphole (with Lex not that far behind).
My Canadian brother-in-law sent me this link. Dan Gardner is a Canadian writer. He makes a very interesting point:
“Instead, let’s read Musk’s statement literally: “We had one president who couldn’t climb a flight of stairs…”
Yes, we did. And it’s not Joe Biden. His name was Franklin Delano Roosevelt.”
Very good read and a reminder that all too often Americans need to be reminded of our own history.
Source: https://dgardner.substack.com/p/elon-musks-true-test-of-character
Heather Cox Richardson today on Fascism:
“Link”
Excellent description of the Fox News/Trumpism shtick back in 1945.
@Not the IT Dept.: looks like my analysis the other day was correct.
Yesterday we had a birthday party for my littlest grandkid. I went down to our daughter’s house and spent the night to help prepare for an onslaught of 24 first graders. It was to be an outside affair, with a bouncy house filled with balloons to play in and a yard to run to run around in.
So, with a serious drought going on with no rain in almost a month, a pop up rain event occurred and forced all kids and accompanying parents inside.
We had to scramble and adapt. We played Simon Says and had mummy wrapping contests with toilet paper. We sent out for doughnuts, hung them on line with some string and the kids, hands behind back, tried to get a bite.The parents, standoffish at first, joined in to help. There were some truly memorable moments, like when Reese just stood up in frustration and literally crammed her doughnut into her mouth, string and all, stunning her competitors and causing her shocked mother to then double over in laughter.
One parent exclaimed “This family knows how to have fun!”. That made me happy and proud. Real memories were made, Reese and her mom will recount the doughnut story many times and always get a laugh, or just remember to themselves and smile. Everyone embraced the moment and it turned out really cool.
As I was being fitted for a tuxedo, I stood in front of a three-way mirror and wondered why an overly-large boiled ham was sticking out of the neck. To my horror, I realized that was my head. So, I’ve made some changes. I’m growing out hair I used to shave off, resulting in a fringe sort of thing. White in color, which is fine because I used to be blond. I’m also growing a beard which is salt and pepper in about the same proportion as those two seasonings are used in many recipes. ie., much more salt.
I’ve now been told by three different people, that I look like late-stage Sean Connery, but with less of a wife-beating vibe. Naturally, I hate this, because I hate ever being told I look like anyone. Long ago I’d be told I looked like Major Winchester from MASH, but not actually because I looked like him, (I still had a bushy, bushy Beach Boys hairdo) but because, like that character, I tend to speak in complete paragraphs. I was also told I reminded people of Steve Landesberg from Barney Miller for the same reason. The only reason I’m not getting, Tyrion Lannister, is down to size.
In any event I’m now stuck with the care and feeding of a beard, which I keep short, but which nevertheless wants to go more Tormund Giantsbane than Jamie Lannister. So I find myself staring for too long at beards. Not in the sense of Rock Hudson’s wife, Phyllis, but actual men’s beards. I’m envious of nice, straight beard hair. I’m resisting just going back to boiled ham. In the meantime my staring has resulted in speculative looks from bears. Not the Yogi type of bear.
@becca:
“This family knows how to have fun!”
Same event at my house:
Katherine: How about if I tell them I’ve just tested positive for Covid so they all have to leave?
Me: Kids, have you given any thought to the fact that everyone here will die some day?
@Kathy: Kathy,
I forgot to mention who was the communications officer of that parallel universe star ship.
How about Morn?
ABC-Ipsos poll:
Harris 51%
Trump 47%
“Compared with earlier this month, Harris has regained a more customary Democratic advantage among Hispanic people and widened her advantage among suburban women, while remaining strong in core groups including Black people.”
This poll also shows Harris outperforming Biden with Black and Latino men:
Black Men:
Harris +74 (Biden 2020 +60)
Latino Men:
Harris +27 (Biden 2020 +23)
@DK:
Well, I certainly hope that the election bears this polling out to be true.
In 2020 the Media Herd kept running with the story that a significant number of Black and Latino voters were moving over to Trump, and that turned out to very overstated. Now, maybe that was because Biden was the alternative to Trump, I do not know.
During a cable news interview today, Jen O’Malley Dillon said,
The first sentence is nothing new, but the next one is a surprising bit of optimism from the Harris campaign chair. Definitely a big step up from David Plouffe saying last week, “I think I’d rather be us than them.”
@Kathy: all I can think of is how many more effective ways he could be using his fortune. My local Habitat for Humanity is moving away from building individual homes to building planned communities with dozens of homes. They’re still targeting the same people to house—low to moderate income, stably employed. These planned communities will also include spaces for retail and social services, along with community gathering places. I’m guessing that Habitats across the country are moving to this model. Think how much Bezos could help this country if he invested in a few hundred planned communities.
@Michael Reynolds:
I’m in the middle of trying to eradicate my facial hair, which involves bimonthly two hour sessions of paying hundreds of dollars to have someone jab a probe into each of my hair follicles one by one and electrocute them…
@Michael Reynolds:
I don’t have a tuxedo*, but two suits with matching ties plus one set of dress shoes.
The only time I wear them- Christmas and Easter mass
Dear wife likes me wearing them. I’m about to embark on a book signing tour. She says I should wear them at the signings or if I give media interviews. My LA agent says it isn’t necessary. Polo shirt and pants** are fine. The wife is the boss but she isn’t coming on this trip. Our nephew Carl is accompanying me.
*- So I won’t be going on the QM2 or visiting French casinos like you. No problem. I am glad you are enjoying it.
**- My normal daily attire are those same shirts but with shorts or jogging pants.
@Michael Reynolds and Bill Jempty: Two years ago, I had a need to wear a tuxedo and was unnecessarily pleased to be able to fit into (read: wedge myself into) a tuxedo that I had bought 35 years earlier during a time in my life when I would wear it about once a year.
@Monala:
Yes. That would be wonderful. Sadly, to get him to do that, you’re going to need to show him how he will profit from the investment. If there were a bottom line in low-moderate income housing, Warren Buffett would be “the housing king.”
Steve Schmidt has a bit to say re fascism and violence:
“Link”
snip
“JustSecurity”
Blockquotes above are excerpts from Schmidt newsletter and do not match up with the links.
@Bill Jempty: @Joe: I’ve never had an occasion to wear a real tux but in high school in 1965 I did rent a powder blue 007 Dinner Jacket Ensemble (jacket, tie, shirt with studs and black pants with those black stripes) for the senior prom. Me and about 50 other guys looked the same.
@Michael Reynolds:
@Joe:
I seriously don’t get the western cultural paradigm that requires men to dress like waiters on very formal occasions.
@Joe: I had a tuxedo while I was still performing and teaching music. Because I was always on stage with orchestras and choirs, it only needed to pass the 50-50 test.* Really seedy looking at the after parties, but I was in good company there.
* How does it look from 50 feet away driving by at 50 mpg?
@Kathy:
Kathy,
Me either. You’d be surprised how many men I’ve seen wearing them at Kravis Center concerts or Broadway Shows. Me? I’m there wearing my Target purchased clothes. Palm Beach is 5 minutes from the Kravis and those residents are loaded but still…..
@Kathy:
Funny you should say that. The last time I owned a tuxedo I was busy making table-side Caesars and cherries jubilee.
That said, I tend to be a notch more formal in my dress than whatever the standard is. Same reason I drive fancier cars than I need to. It sends a message. Not my fault people are superficial enough to think it matters.
In my home and work life though: sweats and t-shirts.
@Kathy: It started with making the waitstaff look presentable, and then the guests had to look better than the waitstaff.
I’m still holding out for shiny silver and gold jumpsuits. With capes.
The MSG rally starts on a classy note.
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2024/10/throwing-out-the-first-racisms-2
@Kathy:
This is a key plot feature in the very best of G. K. Chesterton’s Father Brown stories, titled “The Queer Feet”. It’s the third story in The Innocence of Father Brown, which was the first anthology.
@Kingdaddy:
Here’s another clip:
https://bsky.app/profile/esqueer.bsky.social/post/3l7jgjasrid2x
“And these Latinos, they love making babies. They do. They do. There’s no pulling out. They don’t do that. They cum inside, just like they did to our country.”
Very classy. Very very classy.
Oh, did I say classy? I meant racist. He then goes on to say that the Republican Party is the one with a sense of humor.
@Gustopher: so gross.
Party of Family Values ™
I want to read Swordmen of Gor to children instead of Gender Queer.
@Paul L.: So you want to replace “gender queer,” whatever the hell that is, with John Norman’s extended S&M fantasy? Effing brilliant.
@Paul L.:
The Gor novels?
Seriously?
Started off mildly silly, and went downhill fast into barking nuts.
I’ve mentioned before, most of my previous-generations male family, and friends-of-family (and at least one female), were rather extensively acquainted with the use of weapons.
My father: “After spending several years sat behind some rather large guns, I really don’t think they are of much utility in the functioning of a civilised society.”
None of them were pacifists or inclined to put up with bullies, either state enabled or freelance.
But if your social order inclines you to consider the use of military battle-rifles as a basic good, you might want to think about what more fundamental issues might going wrong.
And try to rectify them.
Hey al –
Purely an anecdote… My phone has been blowing up the last 45 mins. I’m Dominican, and many of my Dominican relatives are married to Puerto Ricans. Bad Bunny coming out today and endorsing Kamala Harris after the racists at Trump’s NYC Rally called Puerto Rico a floating pile of Garbage is massive. He has 45M followers on Instagram and blasted it out about an hour ago. 3rd largest population of Puerto Ricans? Pennsylvania with about 500K and more than 125K in Philly alone.
https://consequence.net/2024/10/bad-bunny-kamala-harris-kill-tony/
This is huge. Trump fucked up. If my “I’m okay with Trump” relatives are texting saying “F this guy” and “WTF did we ever do to him?”, this is going to move some votes, and it’s going to move alot of Latinos who were thinking Trump to either sit it out, or vote Harris.
I cannot underestimate how big a deal with is in the Puerto Rican, Dominican, Haitian, and Cuban Communities. Bad Bunny’s endorsement is what the Harris has been pushing for for months. He’s considered the one Latino who can actually move votes.
Ricky Martin also blasted it out to his 20M followers.
Edit: Just saw a great quote:
Bad Bunny, J. Lo and Ricky Martin have over 315 million followers on Instagram alone. This is the Puerto Rican version of the Avengers joining forces to support Kamala Harris.
@EddieInCA: They’re aware PR is part of the USA, right?
@Kingdaddy:
One of my favorite is Media Matters’ Ari Drennen got upset that people were sending him pornography when they sent him pictures from Gender Queer that were banned from school board meetings.
@JohnSF:
The long dissertations on why women should be enslaved will trigger most progressives who support drag queen story hour.
Disarm Law Enforcement?
@Joe:
That would be ‘No’
@Monala:
Imagine if he paid living wages, or treated employees like people.
My previous post didn’t do justice to the level of outrage happening how across the country in the entire Latino Community.
Rick Scott and several other Florida politicians are furiously walking this back, and talking about how it was just a bad joke, and how PR is a great place, and how Puerto Ricans are great people.
This might be the biggest self-own in the history of politics. The anger is real. It’s huge. It’s growing exponentially. My 90 year old mother called me, almost crying, asking if it was true. She spends alot of time in PR.
If you have any Latino friends, ask them about this them and report back here. I’m genuinely curious as to responses.
Puerto Ricans in various swing states:
PA – 450K-500K
NC – 100K-110K
GA – 100K-110K
WI – 60K
MI – 50K
FL – 1.2M
@Paul L.: Tell us you have no experience with life in the UK without telling us you no experience with life in the UK. (And you DO get that JohnSF lives in the UK, right? I’m not sure I see the “gotcha” in asking a UK citizen if constables should patrol unarmed. To be fair though, I’m not sure you do either; you’re just going on reflex.)
Meanwhile, Paul’s just getting upset about drag queen story hour and wondering why nobody wants to hear him read about guns and how all the LGBTQ need to die.
Know your audience, Paul. As Matt B often says, post that shit on your own blog and link it here. It appears this forum is the only place you get any attention. We’d appreciate you not leaving your droppings here, if we wanted to engage with you, we’d go to your blog.
@EddieInCA: I’m honestly baffled. Talk about shooting oneself in the collective foot.
The anger SHOULD be real. The racism certainly is.
My first thought was that nobody of Hispanic descent should even consider voting for Trump. That’s actually a very narrow view. No human should even consider voting for Trump. This is who Trump is. This is who JD Vance is. This is who Elon Musk is. And this is who Jeff Bezos wants to normalize and suck up to. Because he needs that third hundred billion dollars.
@Paul L.:
On the one hand, most UK police operate entirely unarmed
On the other, when needs must, the UK police can be very fucking armed indeed.
It rather depends on the circumstances.
Thus, my uncle Bill would not be likely to wander down the high street with a battle rifle at high-port.
Whereas, during much of WW2, he was carrying a Bren gun, and a variety of knives and grenades, with malice aforethought.
Situational, dear boy.
@Jax:
I am pointing out the champions of free expression and free speech opposing to banning book in schools for underage children have a problem with the Gor books because they are demeaning to women. Gor is a true patriarchy.
@JohnSF:
I enjoyed the British authorities showing their [people] subjects to not step out of line by stumping their boots on dissenters’ necks hard.
The Kingsmen need to ban subjects from possessing crossbows, swords and knives.
Wasn’t there another troll recently who said something about a Harris rally not being “family friendly”? I would like that person to stand up and explain to me how I should approach this “cum and pulling out” thing to my hypothetical child that I dragged to a Trump rally. I mean, cum on, man.
Puerto Rico, my heart’s devotion…
Really?
In fact they are likely to trigger a lot more than that.
I recall, from many years past, a rather elderly, and definitely Tory female, who remarked on what fun she, and John Norman, might have.
And being an ex-SOE person, I suspect she’d have got the best of such an encounter.
To the rather permanent disadvantage of John Norman.
On the whole, enslavement of women is not a consensus political position.
ymmv
Storytime children
@Paul L.:
And we repeatedly point out (but you are apparently deaf) that, despite the fact that these books are indeed demeaning to women, THEY ARE STILL AVAILABLE FOR YOU TO READ. Not banned. Not censored. Because, you see, the champions of free speech actually do walk the walk.
@Paul L.:
What?
Are you referring to the recent, rather pathetic, yet also obnoxious, anti-migrant riots?
Here’s the thing: the British people have a parliamentary-monarchical state, in large part for the utility of such a state of being capable of coming down like a shed-load of red-hot bricks on those inclined to breach the King’s Peace.
Moral: Don’t.
Shakespeare and Milton, Tennyson and Wordsworth, eat your hearts out.
Or else die laughing.
When does the official video of the latest Weirdo Rally directed by Leni Riefenstahl come out?
@Kathy:
Rally “for the convicted felon and adjudicated rapist”
I thought you promised to hammer on that until the heat death of the universe.
Speaking of videos, here’s a surprising one from Amy Shira Teitel, 45 minutes long, attempting to explain the party flip. About half is the history of political parties in America.
I say surprising because she usually does videos on the 60s-70s space program, including planned missions and programs that never were.
And Paul still can’t figure out why nobody wants to bang him. (eyerolls)
@Kingdaddy: “So you want to replace “gender queer,” whatever the hell that is, with John Norman’s extended S&M fantasy”
But he can’t. Because as he has already explained, the Democrats have banned all the Gor books and apparently destroyed every copy. Apparently Paul L is like one of the characters from Fahrenheit 451 who have committed an entire book to memory.
@Paul L.: “I am pointing out the champions of free expression and free speech opposing to banning book in schools for underage children have a problem with the Gor books because they are demeaning to women. ”
Of all the self-delusions of our resident Trumpies, I don’t think there’s one nearly as hilarious as Paul’s apparently serious belief that anyone anywhere in the country has given Gor books a single thought in decades.
@Paul L.: Tell us you’ve never had a date in your life without telling us you’ve never had a date in your life.
@Paul L.: look, boyo. Leave your BSDM fantasies to your own blog and quit trying to shove them down everyone else’s throat. We’re a) not interested and b) it’s vulgar to bring them out in public. If you can’t even control your own behavior why should anyone else listen to you?
@Grumpy realist:
Where did I quote BSDM fantasies in my John Norman Gor quotes?
@JohnSF:
I reject the worthless political opinion about the US of a loony UK wanker.
@wr:
Democrats are complaining about banning explicit LGBTQIAMXYZ++ books from school libraries. I am doing the same with the Gor books.
@Paul L.: “Democrats are complaining about banning explicit LGBTQIAMXYZ++ books from school libraries. I am doing the same with the Gor books.”
Sure. Except MAGA freaks really are banning books from school library that dare suggest gay people exist, whereas no one anywhere is banning Gor books from school libraries.
So basically you are wasting everyone’s time bitching about a “problem” that doesn’t exist.
Although I will admit that last sentence could have ended after the seventh word…
@wr:
I want to donate Gor books to school libraries. Do you think people may have a problem with that?
My dear Paul, you entirely free to do.
But my post you refer to had nothing to with US politics at all, just the hilariously bad writing of John Norman.