The Economy – Politics Plus

Open Thread April 21 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:00 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Apr 212025

Yesterday, I saw Virgil and we played cribbage. More “two double run” hands than I’ve ever seen in a sitting, but also more zero hands. I was the only visitor, and Virg was sorry for people who weren’t getting a visit. I pointed out that those people might have kids or grandkids that their family needed to spend the day with, and also that Sunday is not the only visiting day and they might have been visited on Friday or Saturday, which seemed to relieve him. It is true that most people in prisons in the US (and probably elsewhere) don’t get visited at all. I’m more tired than usual; it’s been a rough week for me. So instead of looking for an article explaining “NORRA” (which really should be spelled “NoRRA,” but we all know Republicans can’t spell – and have no feel for language), but instead I’ll recommend you do a search on it. It’s pretty much a declaration of open war on the Judiciary.

Joyce Vance writes on the mass deportation cases we have seen (and can expect to see more of.) She makes it I think as clear as anyone possibly could.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/132270244
https://www.democraticunderground.com/132270260
Here are two videos, both posted at Democratic Underground which have information – information that I wish I didn’t need to know, but since I so, I’d rather have it blunt. Both are embedded at DU so no ads for anyone who watches them there. But also no comments from YouTubers.

Open Thread April 12 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:08 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Apr 122025

On this date in 1945, we lost President Roosevelt. But, in spite of having to preside over a World War (which our side won, and I’m not sure we could have done so without him), he pushed for and got legislation which set us up for national prosperity which lasted 80 years. And which it has taken less than three months to trash.

I think I accidentally deleted the Open Thread for Friday. And I have no backup. So sorry. If you had commented, that will also be gone.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/supreme-court-alien-enemies-act_n_67f56408e4b046bb946e0242
The Supreme Court has made several decisions regarding immigration and deportation. including good, bad, and indifferent. The net effect is not all that good. HuffPost explains.

https://www.theroot.com/michelle-obama-has-an-answer-for-those-who-think-her-ma-1851775610
If you are not on social media, and don’t follow black news outlets, you may not even be aware of the rumors. I was aware of them and was also pretty sure they were BS. But then, I have lived through a lot of the same kinds of interactions she has, so I know the territory. The little video in the middle is pretty short and really part of the article so I recommend not skipping it (and yes, the fact that I watched it does mean that The Root has stopped disappearing mid-read for me. Yay!)

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100220226632
Be sure to at least scan the comments on the Democratic Underground post. I checked the link to Snopes, but feel free – it is a good solid link. Yes, this is what ICE is doing.

Belle Debit Card

Cat

Open Thread April 10 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 5:53 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Apr 102025

Yesterday, I watched the first ten minutes (the part that was free) of a video with Harry Litman who had Paul Krugman as his guest. Obviously, in ten minutes, they did not exhaust the subject, but they covered enough to make it worth watching IMO. I also want to note that so often we have remarked on how fast Presidents – real ones – age while in office. Well, Krugman is aging like a President. I was surprised, almost shocked, by how white his hair has become – all of it. I’m eight years older than he is and mine is not anywhere near that white.

This article is from The 19th, which, to quote their masthead, reports on “gender, politics, and policy.” I have to say that any Jewish Americans or LGBTQ+ Americans who are only now seeing echoes of history in the current regime need to fully wake up fast. And straight cis women should probably pay attention – if they can refuse to issue “X” passports, wat stops them from refusing “F” passports?

The F Team nails the regime – not surprising or even anything new. But cheer up. Axios cites an analyst who says we will likely not see the full impact of tariffs until June. so you still have some time to stock up on whatever you need to stock up on.

Open Thread March 21 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 5:47 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Mar 212025

Yesterday, I hid a boatload of fonts and downloaded a couple of my favorites. I already discovered on the previous computer that not only are the English fonts that come with Windows 10 all alike and equally boring, but that, with all the non-English fonts displaying, it takes forever to find the right font for the project (if it’s even there.) I had been coping by constructing memes on the 8.1 and either bringing them to the 10 on a flash drive, or just uploading them to PP from the 8.1 and searching for them if they had been pushed down from the top. I don’t have all the fonts I will want yet, but i have a good start, and I need to be choosy, since paint can only show so many before sending me to font jail.

This from Wonkette was posted Wednesday. And there’s a lot in it. Now that the Clementine Caligula figures he’s not accountable to anyone, I don’t know how much it will really do to slow him down. But at least there are people with some authority who are trying.

Harry Litman has more to say about Justice Roberts’s social media post. He makes the implications of it pellucidly clear. I agree that the Roberts who made that post is the Roberts we need. But it’s not enough.

Open Thread March 6 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 5:59 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Mar 062025

Yesterday, a petition I signed for Care2 reminded me vividly of “The Kennel Murder Mystery,” a Philo Vance mystery by S.S. Van Dine. The Vance novels are not for everyone, not even for every mystery fan. The series ran in the 1920s and 1930a, and in the 1920s it was the fashion for young men of some means to be eccentric, and Vance was probably the most eccentric, to the point that this jingle became what we would today call viral: “Philo Vance/needs a kick in the pance.” (Off topic, but wouldn’t that work nicely with the substitution of J.D. for Philo?) The Kennel Murder Mystery is from the 30’s and one critic said it was the best of the later ones because it was a locked room mystery and because in it Vance was “less unbearably obnoxious than usual.” But I digress. From time to time a petition, particularly one involving dog abuse, will remind me of this novel, and the look in the eyes of the dog in this photo pushed that button. The content in question is in Chapter 19 (or XIX), and i see the link I copied should take you directly to that chapter – but it doesn’t. But putting “As we approached the western entrance to the park” take you right to the place to start. There are several points to stop at, but when Vance says he wants to talk to Liang, the episode is as over as it’s going to get. I went a bit farther and found this quote from Lao-Tzu: “he who abuses the weak is eventually destroyed by his own weakness.” It might make a decent protest poster.

On Monday, I received a “Damn-giver Dispatch” from John Pavlovitz, and decided I needed more. So I signed up for a free subscription to his Substack (“The Beautiful Mess”) When I got there and started looking, I discovered that one of his posts there has been picked up by MoveOn and turned into a petition – not that it’s asking for anything, but to provide a vehicle to get it to the person to whom it is addressed, and to express the number of people who are in agreement. He certainly speaks for me, so of course I signed it. The link here is to the column – the petition link is at the bottom (before the comments). speaking of Substack, I seem to remember when I started linking to Substack articles and the “please subscribe” request looked like a paywall, saying something like “Please get adjusted because this thing is growing so fast that just about everyone who has something helpful to say will be on it.” Well, I also got an email from Theater of War – and checked the email address – and yup TOW is now on Substack. [The Pavlovitz and the ProPublics article below were intended for Tuesday.]

ProPublica’s weekly “The Big Story” newsletter from Saturday was just packed with news, most of which others are not covering. Fortunately, they provide a “view in browser” link – which as you know not everyone does.

I don’t suppose anyone here doesn’t know this now. Although you may not know just how far back it goes. Evan Hurst with Wonkette also has his own Substack, titled “The Moral High Ground.” Having that mind set, he sees things which other sometimes miss.

Open Thread January 28 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:11 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jan 282025

Yesterday, I had not only yesterday’s email to deal with, but also Sunday’s and about half of Saturdays still. So what did I do? I attempted to get my sewing machine working, of course. This took most of the day. I had not used it for so many years that I had forgotten how to thread it, both upper and lower. So I went to DuckDuckGo and at least has a stroke of luck with the results. My model number is 3577, and it wasn’t a very popular machine, so no search results showed it. One result showed 3537, and I thought, well, that’s close, maybe they’ll work alike, so I went to that page, by golly, the manual was written for both 3537 and 3577. So I now have a manual. But it then took some time to clean it up – and I didn’t stop to oil it, which I clearly should have. I was able to get two urgent repairs done, but not without breaking a needle, and all the rest will have to wait. And I still need to oil it – but at least this time I covered it. Also most of the email will have to wait. I’ll do my best to at least

I don’t think Robert Reich says anything here that y’all don’t already know. It does provide evidence that we are not overreacting or imagining the horrors of this administration. They really are doing what the Apricot Antichrist said they would. And yet black people, women, Latinx people voted for him. Oh, and seniors too. And the price of insulin for one senior on Medicare had the price of a month’s supply of insulin go up by $772 from December to January (from DU)

As Heather Cox Richardson says, we have all earned a break from last week. Sadly, it’s a break we are not going to get, or not today. This is why I decided to do good-news-only Sundays – it’s the only way I can think of to give us all a tiny break. But this is Tuesday – so that’s over for this week. Instead, here’s news you’re going to need a break from.

Open Thread January 22 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:07 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jan 222025

Yesterday, The 19th shared a Vogue article about Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’s collar for the inauguration (spoiler: it was a “strong statement.”) I don’t know whether she is on a Vogue cover, or will be, but it would be a lovely rebuke to Melania. You go, Vogue! Also, The F*News did a summary of executive orders and other junk, which made me wish I could just read nothing but it (and The Contrarian) for the next four years. But I can’t do that. Finally, Wonkette referenced an article by Tim Snyder about Cabinet nominees who were rejected by the Senate in bygone days, when we still had a Senate.

I doubt this will make the news … and I also wonder how many stories there are like it.

This Democratic Underground link is to a list of economic indicators and exactly where they were when Biden handed over to the Apricot Antichrist. Bookmark it, or copy to a word document or anything else which will also save the live links. It will be needed when the media starts parroting MAGA lies about what happens to it.

Open Thread January 12 2025

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 6:06 am Open Thread, Personal, Politics

Jan 122025

Yesterday, the radio opera was “Rigoletto” by Giuseppe Verdi. It was the second opera I ever owned on vinyl. It’s also the opera from which a scene got me my A grade in conducting class. It’s notoriously dark, it had trouble with censorship (which was routine when everywhere was governed by an absolute monarch, and they were all terrified of looking bad, even just by proxy, so to speak), and the music is exquisite (and in places heartbreaking.) Noteworthy was the tenor, who is the very first opera singer born in Samoa, in his Met debut. Hearing him, I suspect his delay in singing at the Met may have been due to his being so in demand elsewhere that they just couldn’t get him. But all the principals were impressive. It’s an opera which draws tears, and then they piled on by picking this week for the annual review of people we lost last year. Somehow I missed the deaths of Seiji Ozawa and Lucine Amara (among others.) But it’s Sunday, so I’ll stop here and share an Andy Borowitz take on more current events. And, if anyone is interested, Robert Hubbell has transcribed Judge Merchan’s complete remarks from the sentencing Friday. Not that the Canteloupe Caligula will hear, understand, or care. But he was pretty clear in distinguishing between the public office and the person who holds it.

well, this is something new. I know we have at least a few readers who ar into astronomy, and that light pollution is a problem for anyone who wants to watch the stars, planets, galaxies, etc. I would also warn anyone over 50 that the San Luis Valley is mostly more than 7500 feet above sea level, and if you have any heart or respiratory issues, you should consult your medical team before planning a trip (and it isn’t open yet anyway.) Living at 6500 feet as I do, it would almost certainly not bother me. But it isn’t, sadly, possible to make lenses which would allow me to aee what everyone else sees when they look at the sky, so it would be wasted on me. Still, I’m all for it. And Mosca is a good location. Roughly 15 miles north of Alamosa – a college (excuse me, now a university) town – close enough to get to easily and far enough to provide a good dark sky. And now I’m off to see Virgil, and will check in when I get home.

It’s telling that the only good news I noticed this week was from Colorado Public Radio (at least this week, CPR is cpr for the soul). And I’m well aware that people close to my age (and many of us are), old enough to remember “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, are going to be very skeptical. I was. But this treatment appears to be working very well for this young man, and the smile on his face in the accompanying photo is evidential. Especially compared to the second photo. I wish him and his family the best.

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