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by liberal japonicus Well, some good news. Susan Crawford won the race for a seat on the Wisconsin supreme court on Tuesday, a major win for Democrats who had framed the race as a referendum on Elon Musk and Donald Trump’s popularity. […] In remarks on Tuesday night, Schimel said he and his team “didn’t … Read more

by liberal japonicus I thought that this deserved a separate thread. I'm sure everyone knows, but just to put it out there, a circus sideshow where National Security Advisor, Michael Waltz convened a Signal chat consisting of the three main Cabinet secretaries (in the UK, they refer to the Great Offices of State but for … Read more

by liberal japonicus I had been trying to write an email concerning this Ezra Klein podcast, with Matt Yglesias and Dara Lind, dealing with their discussion of birthright citizenship. I've not been able to pull it together, so I'm just posting my draft here. Klein and Lind (Yglesias didn't have much to say about it) … Read more

by liberal japonicus in facebook comments (which is the only place, for the most part, I see any political discussions in the wild), I've seen something interesting crop up. Obviously my facebook feed is pretty heavily weighted towards liberal opinions, though I do have some friends from high school who are MAGA types, but more … Read more

by liberal japonicus I don't really have much time for the genre of 'let's explain why Trump is doing X',  however, I might make an exception for this Ezra Klein discussion with Gillian Tett, which hits a lot of very interesting notes because Tett was trained as an anthropologist, so her take on the mess … Read more

I found this article quite interesting, it's about Vision Zero, an initiative which began in Sweden and is being taken up in other countries. What I find most interesting is that this is a great example of what happens if you change your perspective. I read that New York is trying to adopt it, but … Read more

by liberal japonicus Russell suggested a new thread around Macron's speech (here and here). The title is the old name for the French nuclear capability, it is now called Force de dissuasion. Whether it will live up to the new name and this pdf from 1965, which details Soviet reaction to this nuclear capability, is … Read more

by liberal japonicus Started out as a comment, but thought I might spin it out to a post. Russell, building on nous, suggested that communal care is self-care and I want to unpack a bit. Nous mentioned in an earlier thread about the difficulties he is having (difficulties that I share) of students who have … Read more

by liberal japonicus https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cr72n1yyj30o Federal workers received an email on Saturday afternoon asking them to list their accomplishments from the past week or resign – the latest development in the Trump administration's efforts targeting the federal workforce. The emails came after billionaire and Trump confidante Elon Musk tweeted that workers would "shortly receive an email … Read more

by liberal japonicus Been watching Kara Swisher, who has spent time with Elon Musk and has a number of insights. So I caught this episode of her podcast with Scott Galloway (here, teed up to the quote) Don't I agree with every point they make, but this point by Galloway made me sit up.  I … Read more

by liberal japonicus The other one has moved over to dot-matrix printing, so I thought I'd open up another one. Have at it.

by liberal japonicus I'm sure everyone is following the various clown cars the Orange the 1st is setting/has set in motion, and you are welcome to talk about them here. But, a bit of meta  (surprise, surprise), I think it is illuminating to identify what is the 'superpower' that underlies all these things. While I'm … Read more

by liberal japonicus It seems like it's time to take a step back and see if we can come to some agreement about the use of AI here. This is primarily directed at Charles, which is highly unfortunate, because I don't want to make him an object lesson, but it seems unavoidable. A while back, … Read more

by liberal japonicus I'm sure everyone who hangs out here realizes that this isn't going to be the place where we do try to cover every moronic proposal/action by the Orange Turd. (though if anyone has something that they want to opine on as a front page post, let me know) However, given my history … Read more

by liberal japonicusWhen you have Charles making a privatization argument based on some tragedy that, if not caused, certainly exacerbated by the Orange Cretin, it's time for an open thread!

by liberal japonicus from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hail_to_the_Chief "Hail to the Chief" is a piece originally about a boat in Scotland… An open thread and all that goes with it.

by wj Between the fires raging in Southern California and the ice storms in the eastern part of the country, it's pretty obvious that climate change is starting to hit us big time. The obvious question is, Why do people here in the US have such trouble accepting that? The answer, I think, is simple: … Read more

by liberal japonicus This Robert D. Kaplan interview by the New Statesman (sorry, it's a youtube, but you can get Kaplan's general gist from this or this) was burbling along with a frothy blend of might makes right when we get to this at the 12:03 mark. After explaning that the Middle East is blowing … Read more

by liberal japonicus The animal for the Chinese zodiac this year seems apropos, though perhaps unfair to our limbless friends. Even though there are some small differences in calendars, they all hit (with the exception of Burma/Myanmar) on snake this year. Some links if you are interested. Japan https://musubikiln.com/blogs/journal/all-about-the-japanese-zodiac-signs and https://www.nippon.com/en/features/jg00110/ China https://www.liverpoolmuseums.org.uk/stories/animals-of-chinese-calendar Vietnam https://vinwonders.com/en/wonderpedia/news/vietnamese-zodiac/ … Read more

by liberal japonicus https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2024/dec/29/jimmy-carter-dead-video-obituary This story is probably most indicative of the manhttps://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/chalk-river-nuclear-accident-1.6293574 Requiescat in Pace  

by liberal japonicus Both my daughters are out of the house, so the whole present rigamarole has passed us by, but I did get something I wanted. https://www.axios.com/2024/12/27/elon-musk-contemptible-fools-maga-doge I'm sure most of you are up to date on this, but a couple of gems to pull out, We are being censored! https://www.axios.com/2024/12/27/musk-x-loomer-h1b-maga-verification Bannon jumps in! … Read more

guest post by Tony P Christmas is coming, with its tidings of comfort and joy to American Christians. MAGA is coming, with its promise of mass deportations to American “Christians”. So I have a question for both Christians and “Christians”:  

by liberal japonicus Just a couple of links that looked interesting this morning I'll have to look more into how South Korea is dealing with foreign policy in the aftermath of their dumpster firehttps://thediplomat.com/2024/11/south-koreas-dockyards-a-new-factor-in-korea-us-military-burden-sharing/ Well, it took them time, but maybe they got there? https://www.axios.com/2024/12/19/house-democrats-jeffries-hell-no-johnson-bill Nelson Muntz comes to mind unbidden https://www.politico.com/live-updates/2024/12/19/congress/gaetzs-revenge-00195398 I'd be interested … Read more

by liberal japonicus Sure that I'm reaching too hard in the title, but the juxtaposition of the bloodlust invoked when celebrating a white guy gunning down a CEO and the editorial tut-tutting that is taking place in talk about the various forces that are now in the ascendancy with Assad out is, well, interesting. I … Read more

by liberal japonicus This Just over a year before United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson was murdered this week in Midtown Manhattan, a lawsuit filed against the insurance giant he helmed revealed just how draconian its claims-denying process had become. Last November, the estates of two former UHC patients filed suit in Minnesota alleging that the … Read more

by liberal japonicus It occurred to me that all this talk about US centric politics may not serve the blog very well, so this is a quick post about something we might want to talk about. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_South_Korean_martial_law I post the wikipedia page, because wikipedia editors do a pretty good job of collecting lots of info … Read more

by liberal japonicus This is another quick post about something that I've been following. My family has not had to deal with these sorts of issues, so it is not because I have some personal experience or a personal stake in this, but because I have an interest in the UK, watching how this has … Read more

by liberal japonicus GftNC pointed out that there isn't a true open thread. Reading her comment, I just got an image of an open manhole, which, according to OSHA, requires that "a railing, temporary cover, or other barrier" be erected around the manhole immediately after the manhole is safely removed. This is to prevent accidental … Read more

by liberal japonicus As tempting as it is to dwell on whatever outrage the Orange Turd has committed, I thought this Grauniad article, about the Korean 4b movement, might be interesting to discuss. The 4B name stems from four Korean words beginning with “bi” (meaning “no”): bihon (no marriage), bichulsan (no childbirth), biyeonae (no dating), … Read more

by liberal japonicus The title is a nod to a quote often attributed to Dorothy Parker. I thought it was apropos, and this is your place for those observations. As Ezra Klein observed (via Scott Lemieux at LGM), these are loyalty tests, so absurdity is the point. This Campos post at LGM has pics of … Read more

by liberal japonicus I've not been able to look at analyses of what went wrong. I read a paragraph or two, or at most a half page, and just have to go to something else. Same for videos and podcasts, a sense of nausea and disgust after a few minutes. It seems like there is … Read more