35 Comments
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

I don't do the Twitter thing, so you're a much braver man than I for wading in. I'm sure there are some who look at Twitter as another way of engaging other people, but as near as I can tell, it's just one more way for people to talk past one another.

Keep up the good fight, Roy!

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Understandable. I use twitter primarily as a news aggregator. I don’t tweet publicly but just DM with friends and family. I publicly reply to tweets from only a handful of “safe” people like Roy, because I know their mentions aren’t a cesspool for trolls. It really can be an open sewer unless you curate your timeline carefully.

Expand full comment

When I hear that a friend isn't "yet" on Twitter, I tell them, "Don't start. You'll never do anything else." I find it enraging, yes, but also hilarious and interesting. Granted, after an hour or so I feel like I've eaten a tub of popcorn--"full" but crappy. Still...

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

There is no power on earth which can make me look up what kind of "quiet peacemaking" David French was crediting Ben Carson with, but I can speculate. Was he talking a meth-addled Nazi down from his plan to shoot up a black church by pleading that the folks there weren't his real enemy, that he could find black friends like James David Manning and Jesse Lee Petersen and himself who could help him fight the real enemies: the Muslims and homos?

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

"Quiet peacemaking" meaning "nepotism and spending $31K on office furniture": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Carson_office_furnishing_scandal

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Hear hear! (Truly, “Roy wades through the fever swamps so we don’t have to” has GOT to take a toll.)

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Glad you’re taking a step back from Hardcore for your own mental health, Roy. No sane person should have to spend time, virtual or otherwise, with the shrieking Grandpa Shakes Fist At Cloud population. I really believe the recipients of those tripe newsletters are people who used to buy the National Enquirer at the supermarket but are now homebound and their caregivers refuse to get it for them anymore.

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

As they say at Balloonjuice, "Don't get out of the boat, don't touch the mangoes."

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Regarding the latest Uncle Joe fiasco, we know Biden gets a lot of goodwill from many moderate white Democrats for being a familiar, affable old white guy who will right the ship without shaking things up too much. He gets a lot of goodwill from many black Democrats for having been Obama’s Veep. But that can and hopefully will change the more he opens his mouth and people are reminded that Biden is, well, Biden. The only thing more on-brand than the aviator sunglasses and the handsiness are the gaffes. He’s quite capable of shooting himself in the foot, multiple times, during the course of a lengthy pre-primary season.

I mean, I get the political strategy behind “Sure, I’ll work with my buddies across the aisle, wouldn’t you folks like some peace and quiet in Washington for a change (wink, wink, I know I can’t really work with them).” But by literally campaigning like a candidate from the last century for whom the last 30 years didn’t happen, it feels more and more like he’s getting high on his own supply and it’s actually pretty unsettling.

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

For a taste of the Biden fan club, check out the comments at TPM. If some of the commenters lived in any more of a bubble, they’d be in Spacelab (and politically, their savvy analysis is from about the same era). There’s no argument too specious or flimsy to tote out in support of Biden because he alone has the Best Chance To Beat Trump.

Just kill me now. I can’t take a repeat of 2016 with even dumber politics and worse logic.

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

I know, and I think the electability argument for Biden doesn't hold water. A mistake a lot of us make about Trump is to give in to the temptation to dismiss him as a total moron (I’m no exception, and I constantly fight the urge). It’s certainly true he’s ignorant and far from being an intellectual, but that doesn’t translate to him actually being stupid. He’s an effective con man, and successful con men aren’t stupid. And he has an instinctual talent for driving the narrative and finding his opponents’ weak spots.

So I interpret Trump’s focus on insulting and generally denigrating Biden to mean he WANTS to run against Biden. I think the leaks from WH sources saying he fears Biden more than other candidates are disingenuous (e.g., please don’t throw me in that briar patch). I believe he perceives Biden’s vulnerabilities and thinks he can exploit them. This isn’t giving Trump credit for playing 12-dimensional chess, just observing he’s trying to run another con he can turn to his advantage. I could be wrong, of course, but that’s how I see it.

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

The one thing he’s good at is being a con man, and he’s very good at it. Meanwhile, too many Dems are repeating the fool’s errand of divining who’s “most electable” based on their own flawed guessing about what other people are going to do. If they’re so awesome at that crap, why aren’t they professional poker players? I know: How about we all just vote for the candidate we genuinely like best, and see where that gets us for a change?

Expand full comment

Hear, hear! Citizenship isn't Family Feud. Vote for what you want, not what you guess other people want.

Expand full comment

If only debates were moderated by a drunk Richard Dawson...

Expand full comment

Moving in to kiss Kamala Harris and halting as he gets a glare that could cut diamonds....

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

All of what your wrote makes me want Biden to not be the nominee. My only quibble is that I'm pretty sure Biden is not doing the "wink-wink" part--he genuinely believes that he can work with Republicans and that it was only Obama's failure to keep reaching out that made McConnell and the Freedumb Caucus so ornery.

But there's way more that I dislike about Biden. His entire political history is certainly one part of why I don't want him as the next Democrat in the White House. From his hard work making sure Clarence Thomas became a Supreme Court barnacle to his hard work making sure no American could escape their debt through the bankruptcy laws he rewrote for MBNA, to his hard work spackling over Republican crimes great and small for the last 30 years, he's proven beyond a doubt (to me, at least) that he most definitely does not have the interests of the Democratic base (or even the country as a whole) as his top priority.

Having written all of that, I will vote for Biden in the general. I will campaign for him, even fundraise for him if he's the nominee. But I will NOT be supporting him in the primaries.

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Agreed. Biden is tied with Tulsi Gabbard in last place on my list of preferred candidates to win the nomination. And like you, if he's the nominee I will do everything I can to see he's elected. Let's just hope it doesn't come to that.

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Anybody doing the wink-wink routine to court Republican voters is being too clever by half. Republicans vote for Republicans. Period. They’re not going to vote for the Democrat if we nominate a different old white guy who kinda-sorta accommodates Conservative policies and keeps the racism on the down-low. They’re going to stick with their team, not switch to the off-brand merchandise.

Dems are constantly learning the wrong lessons from their defeats. They always chase “moderate” Repubs and Reagan Democrats, and they never get them. A gaffe-prone mashup of Dean Martin and Archie Bunker isn’t going to be the magic formula this time either.

Maybe we could do something radical like stop pissing on our own base, and instead *court* them in an attempt to increase turnout—and hey, popular policies might get some apathetic people to the polls to counter the MAGA crowd who’s going to show up (flashing white power signs) no matter what.

Expand full comment

Right on, as we used to say. How come I'm the only one saying the prez or veep should be African American, to re-inspire the Obama coalition? I like Liz better than Harris, and think two women is unwise, so I'm Liz/Booker. No?

Expand full comment

I need to see how things start shaking out before firmly committing to any particular ticket. However, I really think we should avoid an Old White Guy 2020 ticket because the only people inspired by that are already voting R.

Expand full comment

Warren is my favorite candidate by far and I would pull the lever for a Liz/Booker ticket with a song in my heart.

Expand full comment

I've been thinking Liz/Pete, but Liz/Booker is probably smarter. Man, I'd join ACORN to vote that ticket six times here in Cali.

Until this week, I'd been thinking Uncle Joe would be an amiable placeholder president. A solid fifth choice in the primaries for any reasonable person. But this week? We need him off the stage, fast. Hang it up, Joe. You did good in 2008-2016. Hit the showers.

Expand full comment

On French, I got smacked down on Twitter for saying something to the effect of wondering whether his compassion for the martyrdom of a kid who offended the Harvard admissions committee and may be forced to attend a state school is matched by his compassion for kids who get murdered by cops--he's actually written quite a bit in the past year or so from your Good Conservative standpoint on the need for cops to learn to restrain themselves, showing a recognition that the victims are human beings, so I wanted to note that. Not changing my mind about his work in general.

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Twitter is a Hellsite where everyone is slowly driven mad. Yet I cannot look away from the abyss.

Expand full comment
author

Every time he does something like that, though, it's a way of differentiating his product. It doesn't add up to anything. That's why I brought up his Coates phase. It just reeked of, "Look, I am dialoguing with their black champion!" And he dropped it when the Good Conservative on Race act was no longer viable. With the killer cops, he did occasionally act surprised and indignant (I use the past tense because he seems to have abandoned this shtick), but that was all about defusing the theme that police get away with this shit because of systemic racism, rather than as a case of "mistakes were made."

Expand full comment

And that was the point, no doubt: "You CAN display compassion for human suffering without suggesting that there is anything wrong with the divinely-appointed hierarchy of power."

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Boot didn't think the price of invading Iraq was too high, but health care, education and parental leave? ¡Están carísimo! It's always about not spreading the wealth. Shoveling it to Raytheon, good, more for Headstart, bad.

Expand full comment
Jun 20, 2019Liked by Roy Edroso

Sometimes I wish Joe would just shut the f@#$ up.

Expand full comment

Thinking like the people who accept the nuttery you glean as Gospel Truth _hurts_. I have a hard time reading too many of these collections, so I'm easily convinced that you need a break assembling them.

On the other hand, I'll admit that stupidity shown by people I oppose is actually reässuring, but that pleasure is a stupid one, and could leave me unequpped to deal with smarter opposition.

Expand full comment

David French should be tonsured, forced to don a monk's cowl, sent to a monastery on a remote Greek island, and there kept under a vow of perpetual silence. (I've been reading Byzantine history lately.)

Expand full comment

(It's not serious if no ritual blinding is involved.)

Expand full comment

I sometimes post comments on the hardcore stories and sites. Some of the responses from the older men are kind of moving once you get past the immediate hateful stuff. They are convinced that every media outlet is deliberately lying to them at all times and they feel entirely lost.

I might talk about going to the Christmas party at the local mosque (imam: in know it's a Christian holiday kids, but me and the man in red are close) or how much less crime there is now than 40 years ago: the population now is more peaceful than people back then. It works a bit sometimes, maybe for just that moment but maybe it helps.

Expand full comment

A day late and a dollar short as usual I’m here to say I like this series concept and support your desisting with the hardcore series. Those things are incoherent and demented themselves - never makes me their drooling audience - and the whole thing is too depressing for words.

Expand full comment

I meant never MIND their drooling audience but the typo reminds me that if i kept on reading them I’d soon be drooling myself.

Expand full comment