Eager to see what the Washed-out Toast says about crowd sizes – something of a hobby for me – not because I care about the accuracy of estimating, but I do care about simple maths and whether/not an estimator was actually there...
For example, I'm seeing claims of 50,000 'anticipated' for last nights show, and 75,000 after the fact. Which I compare to the 35-to-50,000 claimed at the Jan6 kerfuffle. I can confirm there were more people at the Ellipse and surrounds last night, but 75,000 feels high to me (not as too-high as 50,000 on Jan6 tho). The interesting difference last evening was how tightly packed the KamalaKrowd was. Apparently Kamalans are not put off by being in close contact with other (apparent) Kamalans. Jan6ers spaced much further apart, possibly due to the bulk of their weapons, but also possibly because they understand how sketchy some of their brethren/sistern really are.
I was so far away from things I could not make out anything they showed on the big screens. Mighta used my binos, but was a little reluctant in the dark to whip out a dark metal device that fits in the palm of my hand and aim it towards the ... well, towards where I guessed the stage actually was...
Read from a certain angle, that WSJ quote is actually funny.
Anyway.
Bezos and WaPo: is he submitting to a forthcoming fascist leader or is Bezos supporting the fascist leader in question? We can guess my answer.
As for "liberal media": enough already. It's a slur and lie like conservative propaganda and other bullshit is based on. The establishment media's liberalism is limited to lifestyle shit which, by definition, is per se liberal -- new stuff gets pushed at the expense as it were of ignoring the old. It's the antithesis of conservative. No money in pushing the same old same old. And, there was the brief anomaly of anti-Nam (which is to say honest) and Watergate reportage. Other than that, actual liberal reporting's of course the exception, not the rule.
Meanwhile, because roll on a perverse sense of humor (or probably worse), I'm still hopeful of Bezos selling WaPo to his ex. Meanwhile, so proud of the ~250k who cancelled their subs.
All you saw through the 80's and 90's (it's still going on today, but not quite as bad) was people complaining about "liberal media". But they *were* the media, so there wasn't really much room for liberalism! I'm glad to see people complaining the other way nowadays.
Bezos bigfooting his way over his editorial board is too obvious to ignore, which is undoubtedly a good thing. And I hope you’re right that this is the beginning of a groundswell, Roy. I mean, “we must bend over backwards to placate the 40% of the population who would rather shoot staples through their tongues than ever read our paper” was certainly never a pragmatic business decision. It was a concerted effort to soften up people in the center into viewing fascists and fascism as not so bad. So let’s hope this brings some clarity as to who is calling the shots and whose interests are being served when media adopts a policy of neutrality towards fascism.
Of course it isn't about the money the paper makes, it's about Bezos' little rocket sideline with the government. Harris probably won't punish him all that much, whereas Trump will much more than decimate him.
Amazon/USPS is about preventing a loss in his share in the spoils, and Blue Origin is about grabbing future spoils. So maybe just a different shading to the sociopathy.
Because Blue Origin is a joke that is going nowhere. Its existing rocket is nothing more than a suborbital rich tourist roller coaster, the larger New Glenn remains vaporware and Musk froze them out of the Artemis program. I’m actually surprised Bezos keeps wasting money on it.
The dick measuring contest with Space Karen. I've started thinking of the two weirdos as running a malign version of the competition from Pink Flamingos: to become The Filthiest Person Alive.
I am TOTALLY cognizant that the "men would rather [fill in blank with any outrageous/stupid action] than go to therapy" meme is more than a joke but speaks to a deep truth. Yet it is still amazing to me that you can be one of the richest guys in the world and it doesn't help you be better as a person, it just gives you an enormous platform from which to display your neuroses and shortcomings.
One pictures Elon Musk, in his ratty fingerless gloves, peeling off shares to hand over to his Socialist Masters while consoling a tearful Grimes, “if things get very bad be can always pawn the blood emeralds.”
Internet Journalism Fact: Eric Alterman and Roy Edroso are excellent liberal / progressive commentators who also write equally well about culture , especially music. That's pretty rare!
We need to figure out how to set the billionaires actively against each other. Of course that leads us to showdown with the one, remaining Super Billionaire, The most vicious and aggressive of them all. There's a real good chance it's Taylor Swift though, who may prove to be a perfectly benevolent overlord.
WaPo and the NYT would be better if they followed the old Wall Street Journal scheme: print excellent news pieces by reporters like Susan Faludi on the front page while handing the editorial page over to far-right assholes to spew fascist shit. Of course, Murdoch has wrecked that dichotomy so no wonder the Murdoch-adjacent editor hired on at WaPo is enabling the death of that paper.
Obviously billionaires like Bezos like the idea of paying even less tax and having no oversight, but I wonder too if part of it is fear of poking the sociopath. He's not shy about his plans for retribution, in fact, that seems to be the sum total of his campaign pitch. Beyond that, there's been a thing going around right wing Xwitter the last few days, even Leon got on board (or maybe led), goes something like this: Trump's economic plans sound crazy, and sure, they're going to tank the world economy -- for a while. But then we'll come roaring back stronger than ever. Just you wait. So you might suffer for a while, peons, but stick it out. Be the he-man we know you are. I wonder if some of 'em -- Bezos? Dimon? a whole lot of them? -- know he could very well take us all down. But they're also worried about what he might do to them if they piss him off. My guess is the thing he admires most about Putin is his ability to chuck anyone he doesn't like out a window.
Since the Supreme Court has ruled directly that Donald Trump is above and beyond all laws, I think they're right to fear him. Piss off Harris and you might not get an invite to some White House function. Piss off Trump and find yourself subject to death threats from his followers (at best) or subject to arrest and summary execution if Trump decides he really doesn't like you.
He has fantasized, out loud and in public, about killing people he doesn't like. Of course, maybe that's just "locker room talk," or "you know how he is." Let's give him absolute power and find out.
"Trump promises to explode nuclear warheads in the U.S. heartland if elected. It's a bold move, let's see if he's bluffing or if it works out for him."
Peggy Noonan: "While I do not care for his improvident tone, Trump brings a welcome rhetorical brawn to a nation much diminished by the Biden administration's sob sister sensitivity."
"Some say American grit and determination are not up to the task of weathering a many century-long nuclear winter. But the sainted Ronnie and I know otherwise."
Re: "piss off Harris" -- remember a couple of months ago when they tried to make hay out of "she's a mean lady who yells at people who aren't doing their job." Being reprimanded by a chick is way worse than being summarily executed by a fascist.
Defending their male privilege is literally the only way these guys are tough. And they will go to the mat for it even if it means blowing up the world. Who wants to live in a world where you have to respect women, I ask you.
Leon is too stupid to realize that what he said is not a selling point. He regularly says stupid things, like when he told Twitter advertisers to fuck off if they didn’t like his politics. He sells to an instinct in the angry boy GOP base to kick over apple carts, and they call him a genius, and that’s it. There’s no sneaky double reverse to make voters hesitate about trump.
"He sells to an instinct in the angry boy GOP base to kick over apple carts"
Where it will be the job of some (underpaid) Black woman to clean up the mess, just like in L. Ron Musth's and Der Blutgraf's beloved Seth Efrika. (Where they regularly beat their servants.)
This is why alla the minions'll be fightin' over those ground floor offices. Course, the mightiest minions'll already have locked up the basement suites.
Speaking of supposedly "Liberal Bias" media narratives, how about the one wherein white suburban women and their children are constantly under threat of human trafficking in the parking lot of the Piggly Wiggly or other large stores. "I touched the gas pump handle and immediately felt my fingers tingling and so I knew I had only seconds to shoot the 750 mL of Narcan that I keep in my purse or else I'd end up in West Barebrestistan." When in reality, stranger abductions are almost insignicantly improbable, women of color (especially in immigrant communities) & queer teens (usually already homeless) are at the highest risk, and the cops do a huge share of the trafficking.
I'd say this is originates mostly in urban legends enforced by lurid local new reporting. Yet rejected via statistics compiled by that famously left-wing-lunatic FBI.
One Rightwinger I work with occasionally told me that 10 million children get abducted every year. I pointed out that 10 million is approximately 1/3 of the total number of children in the country, and we might notice that many missing kids. "It's all covered up," he assured me. When I noted that there would be no children left after about 4 years, he just shrugged and told me I don't know.
"stranger abductions are almost insignificantly improbable, women of color (especially in immigrant communities) & queer teens (usually already homeless) are at the highest risk"
People who talk about a problem in fantastical terms do more harm than good, obviously. If you really care about X then you strive to know and discuss the truth of it, without which there can be no progress. Worse still, fantasists sow confusion and provide cover for real bad actors.
It must be very frustrating to work in law enforcement going after pedophiles. Or in safeguarding elections, for that matter. The loudest voices are the least tethered to reality. They define themselves as the only people who really care. Meanwhile they're objectively making things worse.
Somewhat tangentially, I think about how marketing works. Liquor advertisements sell the product with fantasies of good times, comradery, social status, etc. The product that gets sold is the real one. The fantasies are never fulfilled.
Can you imagine being a sex crimes detective in this time when hurling pedo accusations is sport? I wonder how much of their time is wasted chasing phantoms.
I wonder, if your whole persona is built around "LOL, don't give a shit", because you've bought into some idiotic notion that this is what "cool" means, that might wear on you over time, and maybe a small voice says to you, "Hey, at least PRETEND to care about ONE thing." The One Thing must come to you over the internet (no way in Hell are you gonna leave your house to find something to care about) and it has to offer the opportunity to vent unlimited RAGE, which is the closest you can come to faking "I care."
Also, ever notice how all conservative "caring" is direct-to-rage? I care a lot about climate change, but my primary response to it isn't rage at the oil companies (although I can work some of that up if I make the effort) because there's lots of constructive things that need to be done and I'd prefer to focus my attention on that stuff. Must be something wrong with me, I guess.
There's a short story I remember, a small fire breaks out in a house, a neighbor sees the smoke, and with an aluminum baseball bat in hand, goes into the house to break out all the windows (mistakenly believing this is what you're supposed to do in a fire instead of the opposite of what you should do in a fire.) The narrator says, "He was willing to help people, if helping people meant breaking their windows."
Same thing, they're willing to pretend to care about children if it provides an opportunity for legally-sanctioned murder.
A couple I know who live in DC and are quite active in progressive causes have explained on their socials that cancelling your WaPo is only hurting journalists - but that cancelling Amazon is actually hurting Bezos and therefore the better option as the reason for them keeping their sub there. This to me is ludicrous. For one thing, Amazon reaches millions more unwitting 'I'm Alright Jacks' than WaPo ever will who don't give fuck one; secondly, how about a little gaslighting from within our own tribe? No thanks. I think telling WaPo to fuck off is more of a direct hit.
The cherry on top of the subscription cancellation sundae is that this is all happening at a time when the WaPo itself is slashing its free subs program. For years the paper has offered a free sub to anyone with a .gov email address. This makes perfect sense, of course, as DC is a company town, the company being politics, and WaPo is the company paper. Now they want to convert those people to paid subs and from all I’ve seen the response has been mostly “lol nope.” So fewer subscribers, few free eyeballs, meaning fewer ad dollars, yeah, bold plan, fellas. Let’s see how it works out.
I read that Bezos sent out a memo to upper-level staff, how public trust in the media is now lower than Congress, arguing "We can't just keep doing things the same way any more."
And I agree. 40% of the country has, for decades, eagerly bought the lie of "media so librulbias", and the prestige press response has been to deliberately alienate the rest of us, the people who actually buy the subscriptions and would be willing to give you a fair hearing if you'd just try to do your job better. Now you have no friends. Sucks, don't it?
I think I would just as soon read a publication that openly states its point of view. Nobody can achieve the Godlike objectivity that news outlets pretend to strive for.
It's striking that that Godlike objectivity was the accidental creation of 3 US TV networks in the mid-20th century, and it somehow became the ideal of all US journalism, contrary to its entire history. British journalism doesn't labor under such an illusion, for example, and I think thats partly why Bezos hired Lewis, despite Lewis's turd-polishing ode to "independence" (from reality). Sprinkle a little Hitchens fairy dust and bingo, you can justify anything as "objective". But possibly the only force more powerful than Bezos's ego is the self-regard of journalists who believe in the Nicene Creed of Journalism. All those Ivy grads who coasted into a sincure at a Great Metropolitan Daily solely on their Merit and Hard Work.
Boss: in re auto-renewal. I do appreciate the heads up, I think that's appropriate. That said, my yearly subscription will renew. Just sayin'.
ETA: And if Entergy will *finally* start the pension payments (like pulling teeth) it will make it even easier. I drew the line at giving up my first-born child. I said they could have the missus, but they turned that down, drat it, oops did I say that out loud?
The heads-up is Substack's idea, and I approve of it, which is good because I don't pay attention and if they instead sent a cartoon robot around to hold subscribers by the legs and shake their pockets out I wouldn't know unless you told me.
So forewarned is forearmed, I guess, and thanks for re-upping.
Forewarned is forebudgeting. That's my concern - we get down to beans and cornbread by the end of the month. But that's not an issue, so no worries. You da man!
I really like the heads-up. Getting one from another subscription (that is on Buttondown) would have saved me a lot of trouble, as I saw the charge in my banking and didn't recognize it. Checked the "info" line for it and it said that Buttondown was for clothing, so I marked it as fraudulent, and all hell broke loose with the bank.
Speaking of subscriptions, has anyone seen anything from Alex Pareene lately?
Ya gotta remember that what we're "seeing" is Journalism's reaction to Bezos's impression of Lonesome Rhodes explajning his hot-mic outburst (the never-produced sequel, and boy would that be fun based on current events). All Media is a fun-house mirror (and I wonder how many Youtz would get that reference) with the carny working the ride picking what we see. The 200K droppers are a heartwarming callback to When There Were Consequences, in the Before Time, but this too shall pass. Bezos soiled Journalism's self image with that transparant non-endorsement and radioactive "explanation" clinging to the life preserver of objectivity, and this injustice will not stand, man. The ongoing project to turn WaPo into a British tabloid won't help the old morale in the newsroom either, though the topless pictures on Page 6 should shake up Washington, eh wot?
"Literally, I’ve got a million of them."
Do go on...
Eager to see what the Washed-out Toast says about crowd sizes – something of a hobby for me – not because I care about the accuracy of estimating, but I do care about simple maths and whether/not an estimator was actually there...
For example, I'm seeing claims of 50,000 'anticipated' for last nights show, and 75,000 after the fact. Which I compare to the 35-to-50,000 claimed at the Jan6 kerfuffle. I can confirm there were more people at the Ellipse and surrounds last night, but 75,000 feels high to me (not as too-high as 50,000 on Jan6 tho). The interesting difference last evening was how tightly packed the KamalaKrowd was. Apparently Kamalans are not put off by being in close contact with other (apparent) Kamalans. Jan6ers spaced much further apart, possibly due to the bulk of their weapons, but also possibly because they understand how sketchy some of their brethren/sistern really are.
50,000 at MSG, which holds 19,500! A miracle of loaves (loafs) and fishes.
Funnily enough, it was usually spelled "sustren" in Middle English.
You, with your grouchy medievalism!
"Forty Seven MILLION adoring fans" = Ren Hoek voice
Yeah, but that Kamala, tellin' the Secret Service, "Take down the fuckin' mags, they're not here to shoot me."
I was so far away from things I could not make out anything they showed on the big screens. Mighta used my binos, but was a little reluctant in the dark to whip out a dark metal device that fits in the palm of my hand and aim it towards the ... well, towards where I guessed the stage actually was...
This is why nobody goes to Harris rallies, they're too crowded.
does the B stand for Berra?
A million bullshits
Read from a certain angle, that WSJ quote is actually funny.
Anyway.
Bezos and WaPo: is he submitting to a forthcoming fascist leader or is Bezos supporting the fascist leader in question? We can guess my answer.
As for "liberal media": enough already. It's a slur and lie like conservative propaganda and other bullshit is based on. The establishment media's liberalism is limited to lifestyle shit which, by definition, is per se liberal -- new stuff gets pushed at the expense as it were of ignoring the old. It's the antithesis of conservative. No money in pushing the same old same old. And, there was the brief anomaly of anti-Nam (which is to say honest) and Watergate reportage. Other than that, actual liberal reporting's of course the exception, not the rule.
Meanwhile, because roll on a perverse sense of humor (or probably worse), I'm still hopeful of Bezos selling WaPo to his ex. Meanwhile, so proud of the ~250k who cancelled their subs.
Wither WaPo.
Whither WaPo's long-suffering staff?
Poor Michael Parenti -- called bullshit on that so long ago.
On what exactly?
It’s awful all the time wasted or lost relearning things…
All you saw through the 80's and 90's (it's still going on today, but not quite as bad) was people complaining about "liberal media". But they *were* the media, so there wasn't really much room for liberalism! I'm glad to see people complaining the other way nowadays.
Bezos bigfooting his way over his editorial board is too obvious to ignore, which is undoubtedly a good thing. And I hope you’re right that this is the beginning of a groundswell, Roy. I mean, “we must bend over backwards to placate the 40% of the population who would rather shoot staples through their tongues than ever read our paper” was certainly never a pragmatic business decision. It was a concerted effort to soften up people in the center into viewing fascists and fascism as not so bad. So let’s hope this brings some clarity as to who is calling the shots and whose interests are being served when media adopts a policy of neutrality towards fascism.
Of course it isn't about the money the paper makes, it's about Bezos' little rocket sideline with the government. Harris probably won't punish him all that much, whereas Trump will much more than decimate him.
It’s not about Blue Origin, it’s about Amazon and USPS.
https://www.jacksonville.com/story/news/2018/03/31/trump-goes-after-amazon-again-over-postal-delivery/12855181007/
¿Por qué no los dos?
Amazon/USPS is about preventing a loss in his share in the spoils, and Blue Origin is about grabbing future spoils. So maybe just a different shading to the sociopathy.
Because Blue Origin is a joke that is going nowhere. Its existing rocket is nothing more than a suborbital rich tourist roller coaster, the larger New Glenn remains vaporware and Musk froze them out of the Artemis program. I’m actually surprised Bezos keeps wasting money on it.
Psycho billionaire competition may be enough of a motivator?
It certainly wouldn’t be the first time.
Space feels more Historical and Important than dueling super yachts.
Elmo *did* light $44bil on fire in the name of freeze peach, after all.
The rich are not like you and me. They're STUPIDER.
I'd almost forgotten that like Musk, Bezos rocks his own little "I want to be an astronaut when I grow up" hobbyhorse.
The dick measuring contest with Space Karen. I've started thinking of the two weirdos as running a malign version of the competition from Pink Flamingos: to become The Filthiest Person Alive.
I am TOTALLY cognizant that the "men would rather [fill in blank with any outrageous/stupid action] than go to therapy" meme is more than a joke but speaks to a deep truth. Yet it is still amazing to me that you can be one of the richest guys in the world and it doesn't help you be better as a person, it just gives you an enormous platform from which to display your neuroses and shortcomings.
Bingo https://alicublog.blogspot.com/2021/06/theres-ross-perot-dr-laura-megan.html
One pictures Elon Musk, in his ratty fingerless gloves, peeling off shares to hand over to his Socialist Masters while consoling a tearful Grimes, “if things get very bad be can always pawn the blood emeralds.”
I hear a distant Great Sucking Sound...
Oh, if only there will soon be footage of them both eating shit, I'll be happy.
I've long been of the opinion that both of those guys (and their cohort) can eat shit, so yes, absolutely.
LOL
Technically, Bezos went to space. IIRC with William Shatner
The Flannel Frontier!
You. Get. Two. Marks.
Jean Stapletongue was WAY ahead of the curve!
Internet Journalism Fact: Eric Alterman and Roy Edroso are excellent liberal / progressive commentators who also write equally well about culture , especially music. That's pretty rare!
We need to figure out how to set the billionaires actively against each other. Of course that leads us to showdown with the one, remaining Super Billionaire, The most vicious and aggressive of them all. There's a real good chance it's Taylor Swift though, who may prove to be a perfectly benevolent overlord.
I'm betting on my governor, Great Khan of All the Illinois, JB Pritzker: Kneel or be broken!
Auric Goldfinger vs. Ernst Stavro Blofeld
Ah, that explains it, your parents give you a name like "Ernst Stavro", what choice do you have?
Better blow purt' damn well, with a name like that'n...
WaPo and the NYT would be better if they followed the old Wall Street Journal scheme: print excellent news pieces by reporters like Susan Faludi on the front page while handing the editorial page over to far-right assholes to spew fascist shit. Of course, Murdoch has wrecked that dichotomy so no wonder the Murdoch-adjacent editor hired on at WaPo is enabling the death of that paper.
Is the WSJ holding back this year on the Presidential endorsement so people won't think they're biased? No? Funny, that.
Obviously billionaires like Bezos like the idea of paying even less tax and having no oversight, but I wonder too if part of it is fear of poking the sociopath. He's not shy about his plans for retribution, in fact, that seems to be the sum total of his campaign pitch. Beyond that, there's been a thing going around right wing Xwitter the last few days, even Leon got on board (or maybe led), goes something like this: Trump's economic plans sound crazy, and sure, they're going to tank the world economy -- for a while. But then we'll come roaring back stronger than ever. Just you wait. So you might suffer for a while, peons, but stick it out. Be the he-man we know you are. I wonder if some of 'em -- Bezos? Dimon? a whole lot of them? -- know he could very well take us all down. But they're also worried about what he might do to them if they piss him off. My guess is the thing he admires most about Putin is his ability to chuck anyone he doesn't like out a window.
Since the Supreme Court has ruled directly that Donald Trump is above and beyond all laws, I think they're right to fear him. Piss off Harris and you might not get an invite to some White House function. Piss off Trump and find yourself subject to death threats from his followers (at best) or subject to arrest and summary execution if Trump decides he really doesn't like you.
He has fantasized, out loud and in public, about killing people he doesn't like. Of course, maybe that's just "locker room talk," or "you know how he is." Let's give him absolute power and find out.
"Trump promises to explode nuclear warheads in the U.S. heartland if elected. It's a bold move, let's see if he's bluffing or if it works out for him."
Peggy Noonan: "While I do not care for his improvident tone, Trump brings a welcome rhetorical brawn to a nation much diminished by the Biden administration's sob sister sensitivity."
"Some say American grit and determination are not up to the task of weathering a many century-long nuclear winter. But the sainted Ronnie and I know otherwise."
"When you're a celebrity they let you do it," he said as he loaded yet another banana clip into an AK-47.
"It's baked into the vote", as that asshole Sununu said recently about Trump's liking of that nice Mr Hilter.
Re: "piss off Harris" -- remember a couple of months ago when they tried to make hay out of "she's a mean lady who yells at people who aren't doing their job." Being reprimanded by a chick is way worse than being summarily executed by a fascist.
Defending their male privilege is literally the only way these guys are tough. And they will go to the mat for it even if it means blowing up the world. Who wants to live in a world where you have to respect women, I ask you.
Or go to therapy.
Leon is too stupid to realize that what he said is not a selling point. He regularly says stupid things, like when he told Twitter advertisers to fuck off if they didn’t like his politics. He sells to an instinct in the angry boy GOP base to kick over apple carts, and they call him a genius, and that’s it. There’s no sneaky double reverse to make voters hesitate about trump.
"He sells to an instinct in the angry boy GOP base to kick over apple carts"
Where it will be the job of some (underpaid) Black woman to clean up the mess, just like in L. Ron Musth's and Der Blutgraf's beloved Seth Efrika. (Where they regularly beat their servants.)
This is why alla the minions'll be fightin' over those ground floor offices. Course, the mightiest minions'll already have locked up the basement suites.
Speaking of supposedly "Liberal Bias" media narratives, how about the one wherein white suburban women and their children are constantly under threat of human trafficking in the parking lot of the Piggly Wiggly or other large stores. "I touched the gas pump handle and immediately felt my fingers tingling and so I knew I had only seconds to shoot the 750 mL of Narcan that I keep in my purse or else I'd end up in West Barebrestistan." When in reality, stranger abductions are almost insignicantly improbable, women of color (especially in immigrant communities) & queer teens (usually already homeless) are at the highest risk, and the cops do a huge share of the trafficking.
I'd say this is originates mostly in urban legends enforced by lurid local new reporting. Yet rejected via statistics compiled by that famously left-wing-lunatic FBI.
One Rightwinger I work with occasionally told me that 10 million children get abducted every year. I pointed out that 10 million is approximately 1/3 of the total number of children in the country, and we might notice that many missing kids. "It's all covered up," he assured me. When I noted that there would be no children left after about 4 years, he just shrugged and told me I don't know.
How many of them are returned with different genitalia? I'm gonna venture a guess of 12 million out of those 10 million. MAGA math.
Yeah, but just leave your kid out in the parking lot and they'll swap it back.
Convenient!
Like Jiffy Lube!
If Kamala Harris would publicly pledge a chain of drive-thru sex change clinics, she'd have my vote.
Sorry – I have no idea. Should I start checking alla the kids up front?
"there would be no children left after about 4 years..."
Ooh, I see what you did there, and that kind of thing makes these guys FURIOUS.
Maths guy H/T.
I can’t argue with that. (No, I literally can’t argue with that wall of nonsense.)
Even if 10 million is correct, the vast majority of those abductions are by the divorced father of the abductee
I gotta reach back and lay some of the blame for this shit on Nancy Grace, who did untold damage. Girls and women should be afraid to do anything!
The Counter Femininist Revolution
Kathleen Parker has been working that corner since the 1980s.
For some value of the variable "working."
Read 'corner', hear 'counter', as in "behind the, where she belongs..."
Oops, I didn't scroll down far enough before making the same comment! Totally agree with this, though.
"stranger abductions are almost insignificantly improbable, women of color (especially in immigrant communities) & queer teens (usually already homeless) are at the highest risk"
People who talk about a problem in fantastical terms do more harm than good, obviously. If you really care about X then you strive to know and discuss the truth of it, without which there can be no progress. Worse still, fantasists sow confusion and provide cover for real bad actors.
It must be very frustrating to work in law enforcement going after pedophiles. Or in safeguarding elections, for that matter. The loudest voices are the least tethered to reality. They define themselves as the only people who really care. Meanwhile they're objectively making things worse.
Somewhat tangentially, I think about how marketing works. Liquor advertisements sell the product with fantasies of good times, comradery, social status, etc. The product that gets sold is the real one. The fantasies are never fulfilled.
Can you imagine being a sex crimes detective in this time when hurling pedo accusations is sport? I wonder how much of their time is wasted chasing phantoms.
I wonder, if your whole persona is built around "LOL, don't give a shit", because you've bought into some idiotic notion that this is what "cool" means, that might wear on you over time, and maybe a small voice says to you, "Hey, at least PRETEND to care about ONE thing." The One Thing must come to you over the internet (no way in Hell are you gonna leave your house to find something to care about) and it has to offer the opportunity to vent unlimited RAGE, which is the closest you can come to faking "I care."
Also, ever notice how all conservative "caring" is direct-to-rage? I care a lot about climate change, but my primary response to it isn't rage at the oil companies (although I can work some of that up if I make the effort) because there's lots of constructive things that need to be done and I'd prefer to focus my attention on that stuff. Must be something wrong with me, I guess.
True!
Thanks, I'm so glad we can agree there's something wrong with me.
That almost goes without saying
There's a short story I remember, a small fire breaks out in a house, a neighbor sees the smoke, and with an aluminum baseball bat in hand, goes into the house to break out all the windows (mistakenly believing this is what you're supposed to do in a fire instead of the opposite of what you should do in a fire.) The narrator says, "He was willing to help people, if helping people meant breaking their windows."
Same thing, they're willing to pretend to care about children if it provides an opportunity for legally-sanctioned murder.
"Senator, do you still swear fealty to Hillerich & Bradsby? After all these broken windows sir, have you no sense of shame?"
I think Nancy Grace gets a huge amount of credit for getting that whole "stranger danger" idea really cooking here in the US.
Timothy Snyder points out that fascism wins when people obey in advance, when the threat lacks power and is mostly bluff.
When the wealthy concede early it is even worse. And what further concessions will they make later?
The burden then falls on those less able to fight back.
Final note: Mussolini and Lenin were editors of papers prior to taking power. Harari points out, that was the career path: editor, then dictator.
Of course, now we have actors who become politicians. Perhaps the first monarchs were play kings and queens? Trump's only success was reality TV.
A couple I know who live in DC and are quite active in progressive causes have explained on their socials that cancelling your WaPo is only hurting journalists - but that cancelling Amazon is actually hurting Bezos and therefore the better option as the reason for them keeping their sub there. This to me is ludicrous. For one thing, Amazon reaches millions more unwitting 'I'm Alright Jacks' than WaPo ever will who don't give fuck one; secondly, how about a little gaslighting from within our own tribe? No thanks. I think telling WaPo to fuck off is more of a direct hit.
The money saved by cancelling a WaPo subscription can be redirected to support real journalism:
https://www.propublica.org/
REBID wanna word...
Substack is owned by Nazi scum and takes a cut of the money we pay for REBID
Roy is the bug in the machine!
I have no cause for argument with your sentiment.
May Jeff Bezos be this era's Crispus Attucks.
Black guy killed in a shootout with Redcoats?
I'm more thinking about him ending up the way Crispus did.
The cherry on top of the subscription cancellation sundae is that this is all happening at a time when the WaPo itself is slashing its free subs program. For years the paper has offered a free sub to anyone with a .gov email address. This makes perfect sense, of course, as DC is a company town, the company being politics, and WaPo is the company paper. Now they want to convert those people to paid subs and from all I’ve seen the response has been mostly “lol nope.” So fewer subscribers, few free eyeballs, meaning fewer ad dollars, yeah, bold plan, fellas. Let’s see how it works out.
The Bezos note sounded to me like it was also penned by Will Lewis.
But of course, would we expect a TRILLIONAIRE to write his own editorials?
That's what ChatGPT is for
I read that Bezos sent out a memo to upper-level staff, how public trust in the media is now lower than Congress, arguing "We can't just keep doing things the same way any more."
And I agree. 40% of the country has, for decades, eagerly bought the lie of "media so librulbias", and the prestige press response has been to deliberately alienate the rest of us, the people who actually buy the subscriptions and would be willing to give you a fair hearing if you'd just try to do your job better. Now you have no friends. Sucks, don't it?
I think I would just as soon read a publication that openly states its point of view. Nobody can achieve the Godlike objectivity that news outlets pretend to strive for.
It's striking that that Godlike objectivity was the accidental creation of 3 US TV networks in the mid-20th century, and it somehow became the ideal of all US journalism, contrary to its entire history. British journalism doesn't labor under such an illusion, for example, and I think thats partly why Bezos hired Lewis, despite Lewis's turd-polishing ode to "independence" (from reality). Sprinkle a little Hitchens fairy dust and bingo, you can justify anything as "objective". But possibly the only force more powerful than Bezos's ego is the self-regard of journalists who believe in the Nicene Creed of Journalism. All those Ivy grads who coasted into a sincure at a Great Metropolitan Daily solely on their Merit and Hard Work.
Reminder that Will Lewis was the foreman of the phone-hacking factory known as the Times of London, and that he owes Harry Sussex money because of it.
Now THERE's a reason to cancel a subscription!
"We must reach out to those who will not read!"
Boss: in re auto-renewal. I do appreciate the heads up, I think that's appropriate. That said, my yearly subscription will renew. Just sayin'.
ETA: And if Entergy will *finally* start the pension payments (like pulling teeth) it will make it even easier. I drew the line at giving up my first-born child. I said they could have the missus, but they turned that down, drat it, oops did I say that out loud?
The heads-up is Substack's idea, and I approve of it, which is good because I don't pay attention and if they instead sent a cartoon robot around to hold subscribers by the legs and shake their pockets out I wouldn't know unless you told me.
So forewarned is forearmed, I guess, and thanks for re-upping.
Forewarned is forebudgeting. That's my concern - we get down to beans and cornbread by the end of the month. But that's not an issue, so no worries. You da man!
Obligatory: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6yy6qICUTe0
I really like the heads-up. Getting one from another subscription (that is on Buttondown) would have saved me a lot of trouble, as I saw the charge in my banking and didn't recognize it. Checked the "info" line for it and it said that Buttondown was for clothing, so I marked it as fraudulent, and all hell broke loose with the bank.
Speaking of subscriptions, has anyone seen anything from Alex Pareene lately?
For those of you who don't know what last night's bullshit was over, count your blessings. But I will share this take from POLITICO's Rachael Bade
"Biden campaign on clean up duty. ->
Regardless of what he meant, Rs are already using this as a way to pivot from the Puerto Rico controversy."
An immediate classic in a least two ways.
"We were Nazis for six hours? Yeah, well- well- Biden said a thing, so there!"
The half a million Puerto Rican-Americans in Pennsylvania may not care who Biden called "garbage" or they might even agree with him.
That does it! I can't vote for Biden now!
Biden called *them* garbage, and after the last four days, they have the temerity to be offended.
And he was supposed to unite us!
You spelt 'untie' ncorrectly.
His low energy campaign is why I'm voting for Trump. I haven't seen him out on the trail in weeks. /s
Yeah, and where was he on 9/11, huh? Probably out golfing with that Obama guy.
Ya gotta remember that what we're "seeing" is Journalism's reaction to Bezos's impression of Lonesome Rhodes explajning his hot-mic outburst (the never-produced sequel, and boy would that be fun based on current events). All Media is a fun-house mirror (and I wonder how many Youtz would get that reference) with the carny working the ride picking what we see. The 200K droppers are a heartwarming callback to When There Were Consequences, in the Before Time, but this too shall pass. Bezos soiled Journalism's self image with that transparant non-endorsement and radioactive "explanation" clinging to the life preserver of objectivity, and this injustice will not stand, man. The ongoing project to turn WaPo into a British tabloid won't help the old morale in the newsroom either, though the topless pictures on Page 6 should shake up Washington, eh wot?