Week-long Welcomings from Moosylvania: Feb. 7th through Feb. 13th

Welcome to The Moose Pond! The Welcomings posts give the Moose, old and new, a place to visit and share words about the weather, life, the world at large and the small parts of Moosylvania that we each inhabit.

Welcomings will be posted at the start of each week (every Sunday morning). To find the posts, just bookmark this link and Voila! (which is Moose for “I found everyone!!”).

The format is simple: each day, the first moose to arrive on-line will post a comment welcoming the new day and complaining (or bragging!) about their weather. Or mentioning an interesting or thought provoking news item. Or simply checking in.

So … what’s going on in your part of Moosylvania?

NOTE: The comments page will now split off after 20 or so left margin comments with the most recent comments on the current page. To see the older comments, scroll to the bottom of the page and use the link.

66 Comments

  1. Good morning, Motley Meese! The week begins …

    It is 34 degrees in Madison WI, on its way up to 39. Mostly cloudy skies are in the forecast.

    Have a great day, all y’alls!!

  2. I “watched” the first hour of the GOP debate on Twitter with the TV on but muted (I can’t stand their voices … but I wanted to see facial reactions).

    Some Tweets …

    On the opioid crisis:

    Charles M. Blow ‏@CharlesMBlow
    Where were all of your sympathies when drug use was largely an inner-city, black/brown problem?! #GOPDebate

    Peter Beinart ‏@PeterBeinart
    when Republicans encounter white middle class Republicans in NH talking about heroin addiction, they find compassion + call it a disease

    On war lust:

    Thers ‏@Thers 7h7 hours ago
    GOP debate should just be throwing baby lamb to see who kills & devours it first with only hands & teeth

    John Nichols ‏@NicholsUprising
    In #GOPDebate @realDonaldTrump says he’s for “a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding.” So… he’s an edgier, more lawless Dick Cheney.

    On Marco Rubio, empty suit:

    Joe Conason ‏@JoeConason
    Wow: @marcorubio really is just a figurine reciting little canned speeches.

    In case you missed it, this was the candidate traffic jam at the beginning of the debate. There is a metaphor there screaming to get out:

    And this is a mashup of the “Rubio Moment(s)“, when his electability argument drowned in a glass of (furiously chugged) water:

      • I am still not sure where the media, even the supposed left-leaning media like Vox, get this narrative: “Marco Rubio is a very intelligent person. Marco Rubio is a very talented politician. Marco Rubio is a very good debater.”

        He is an empty suit with an empty head perfect to be a puppet of the rich and powerful. His repeat of his talking points wasn’t a “glitch”, it was a feature, the old tried and true Atwater/Luntz strategy that if you say the same thing over and over and over again, it eventually becomes the truth.

        If he is the nominee, he will be easy to beat, especially since his immigration policy gets more and more radical. The RNC’s post-mortem of 2012 said quite clearly that the party must sound more inclusive especially to Latinos. So they paste Marco Rubio’s face on their posters and say “Look! Inclusive!!”, believing that Latinos will buy into their identity politics. Latinos want a fair and decent immigration policy, they want a chance to achieve the American dream, not a Latino face spouting Donald Trump’s talking points.

  3. As a palate cleanser, here is a CSPAN clip (I built it myself!!) of Senator Al Franken’s opening remarks at a Hillary Clinton rally in New Hampshire. He describes perfectly what it means to be a Democrat when he talks about the social safety net that his wife’s family had after her father died in an automobile accident leaving her mother with 5 kids to raise:

      • Well, yes, the narrative is that the “establishment” comes out in force for Hillary Clinton and it does not matter what they are saying. Al Franken tells people that getting things done is a BHD and tells us how the Democratic Party’s social safety nets provide boots to attach those bootstraps to for those in need.

        He and nearly every Democratic Senator supports Secretary Clinton and want to work with her to make life better for people who need the boots.

        I heard that the Berners booed Sen. Jeanne Shaheen at the NH Democratic Party event the night before. They really have no clue how government works and how you get things done. I saw on Twitter yesterday people mocking the polls out of Georgia showing that Hillary Clinton wins the 18-29 demographic handily. Someone said “oh what is that, about 37 people?”. March 1st can’t come soon enough for me.

        • I guess you read the Julie Reardon piece

          Bernie Sanders Encourages the Rudeness of His Supporters

          Last night supporters of Sen. Bernie Sanders repeatedly interruputed Sen. Jeanne Shaheen while she was speaking at the New Hampshire Democratic Party’s annual McIntyre-Shaheen 100 Club Dinner. In my more than 30 years of attending Democratic events in New Hampshire, I’ve never witnessed rudeness and disrespect like this.

          Jeanne Shaheen was the first woman elected governor of New Hampshire. She was the first woman elected to the U.S. Senate from New Hampshire. She is the only woman in United States history to be elected both a governor and a U.S. senator. Much to the dismay of her campaign strategists during her 2014 reelection campaign, Jeanne Shaheen ranks pretty high on all the various scorecards measuring how liberal senators’ voting records are

          Why in the world would Bernie Sanders’ supporters treat this woman who made the Democratic Party a winning party in New Hampshire so disrespectfully?

          • I didn’t see it! Thanks for the link. I saw the vile reaction on Twitter but not what it was in reference to.

          • The closing paragraphs of that article are important:

            … what Bernie Sanders does is constantly tell us is Congress is corrupt and the political system is corrupt, and he calls for a political revolution. His supporters clearly have internalized this message. And if you believe Congress is corrupt and the political system is corrupt and what we need in this country is a political revolution, why would you show any respect to the senior U.S. Senator from New Hampshire? And not only is she in the corrupt Senate, she supports the devil herself, Hillary Clinton!

            Donald Trump is stoking hatred of Muslims and Latinos. Bernie Sanders is stoking hatred of members of Congress. Both forms of populism are dangerous to the future of our country.

            I suspect it is the last sentence that caused the flames.

    • Thanks Jan…… I hope this message will dominate our national airwaves! Serious stuff indeed.

  4. Good morning Sunday morning Meese

    Watching the twitter explosion over Beyonce’s new video “Formation”

    Grinning cause I am very out of it – I’m still listening to jazz singers :)

    I had no plans to watch Superbowl – but hubby said he is going to watch – and when I heard Key and Peele were going to be doing live commentary elsewhere – decided I would tune into that

    Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele have done many brave things with their comedy, but their current challenge could be the trickiest of them all. The guys who won a Peabody for “Key and Peele” will be doing live commentary starting at 6 p.m.on Super Bowl Sunday.

    The catch? While posing as aspiring sports commentators on “Real Talk With Lee and Morris, Presented by Squarespace,” they can’t use the term “Super Bowl” or call the teams or players by name.

    DETROIT FREE PRESS

    As Keegan-Michael Key’s star rises, his humor aids Detroiters

    The premise of the event is that Lee and Morris have launched a website on Squarespace for their live-stream coverage of the game, but they have no legal permission to do so.

    “Now you might think this would stop us, but, unh-uh, it only encourages us,” says Peele as Morris in a promo spot.

    You can watch them at Squarespace.com/realtalk as they attempt to do the impossible — hilariously, no doubt.

    • I don’t plan to watch the Super Bowl … I really don’t care who wins although I have to admit that I prefer when teams with loudly Republican quarterbacks lose.

      I was on Twitter when Beyonce’s new video was released! My screen was jumping!! Powerful moment near the end where they show the Traymon-like child then pan the wall with graffiti that says “Please stop shooting us”.

    • I called my friend Amy, a huge Key and Peele fan, to tell her about this, Dee, thanks so much for the heads up! She was very excited to know about it – I will definitely be tuning in too, I think they are geniuses, really.

  5. Good morning, Meese! It’s 24 F. here on a whitish-blue morning in NoVa, going up to 48 F. today.

    I watched the first hour of the “debate,” then dozed through the second hour before staggering up to bed. They’re such amateurs! No serious discussion at all, just attacks on each other. Rubio seems really stupid, or scripted, or both. Can’t bear the thought of any of them in the White House.

    Popped over to GOS for a quick look at the APR but found that even the front-pagers are turning into Berniebots. Couldn’t stand that either.

    Today is Younger Son’s birthday and I forgot about it yesterday! Dearly Beloved is going to get him a birthday card and I’ll send him an ecard. I’ve worked out that spending $20 a year to send ecards is cheaper than spending $4 or $5 for each paper card multiple times a year—and the paper cards will be thrown away after a couple of days.

    Hope it’s a good day for all at the Pond and Beyond!

    • Hiya Sis

      Happy B-day to younger son.

      Don’t be discouraged – I don’t see front page problems – most of the posts are about Republicans – which folks complain about – but imho someone has to attack the Rs since the lame-stream media is stung out on a daily Trump fix.

      Am getting read to do diary duty on my first black history month post on Autherine Lucy.

      For the rest of the month – I’ll be covering Frederick Douglass on his chosen birthday (Feb 14), then Barbara Jordan and Shirley Chisholm – was appalled to find out my students don’t know either woman’s name.

      • Eric Holder was Tweeting out #BlackHistoryMonth yesterday:

        He also waded into the Democratic Party’s labeling brouhaha with this important reminder:

        Eric Holder ‏@EricHolder 18 hours ago

        Remember these “Moderates”? FDR=NewDeal; LBJ=Medicare,VRA;JFK=PeaceCorps; Truman=integrates Army. Focus on core Democratic values not labels.

        • Glad he tweeted that – so many brave young people stood up to open the doors.

      • Shirley Chisholm, of course, I remember as being the first black woman ever to run for POTUS. The title of her autobiography—Unbought and Unbossed-–resonates to this day.

        Barbara Jordan knew the Constitution backwards and forwards and carried a copy of it in her pocket. Very glad you will be doing these posts, Sis!

      • Will read them all, of course, but really looking forward to Barbara Jordan. Goddess! that was a Woman! I wanted a twofer you know – Barbara Jordan the first woman AND Black president. Can you imagine where this country might be if… And she’s living proof that really good people come from Texas. (I was born and raised in Houston, too.)

    • A few of the front pagers have been NObamas going way back so that is not surprising. The Venn diagram of the most full-throated BernBros and the Obamasuxxers has quite a bit of overlap. Many on the far left see Hillary Clinton as Obama’s Third Term and they see Sen. Sanders’ candidacy as the opportunity to take whacks at both the president and the continuation of his policy initiatives.

      I hope the front page continues to balance that with attacks on Republicans because that is who we need to defeat.

    • Thanks for the birthday reminder Diana…..Ron’s is just a few days away and I haven’t made any plans. We’re fortunate the birthdays keep coming, but at times they seem all to frequent!

      Best Birthday Wishes to you and your son.

    • Happy Birthday to your younger son. I usually call my boys on their birthdays. I try to take the older one out to lunch since he lives in Fayetteville. The younger one is in Austin so I send him a card. But I’ll admit all the cards I send are freebys sent to me by multiple organizations I donate to. :)

      • Thanks, Sisters, for the birthday wishes! Younger Son is 41 today. This is the baby they thought wouldn’t live through his first night on Earth. The fact that he’s here at all is a miracle for which I reverently thank Goddess.

        And he has a darling daughter and sweet son to follow him. Will be seeing them all later today. Not only is it YS’ birthday and Super Bore Sunday, but it’s the eve of Chinese New Year. My DIL is Chinese, so I imagine a bit of celebrating will be going on today and tomorrow and many days thereafter. :)

  6. Eating breakfast, watching the news. Muting all the debate clips because Republicans. Today: church, probably lunch after, groceries & cooking. And I have to run by my club’s endorsement meeting, grab a ballot & vote. Yesterday’s nap was great, but maybe I should have done a few more things. Otoh, today’s my mom’s birthday so maybe having a super full schedule is best.

    • My mom’s and my grandmother’s birthdays were both in January. They are always in my mind, but even more so on their days. May your thoughts and memories of your mom be a loving addition to your busy day.

    • {{{anotherdemocrat}}} the 27th anniversary of Momma’s passing was last month – MLK Day and I could have stood/would have preferred to be at work and distracted.

  7. Morning all! So much good stuff to read already this morning! I put a comment about government and the concept of fiduciary responsibility on the Flint hearings post – unspeakably appalling, that Michigan crew.

    Oh thanks for the Key and Peele link, Dee, I will try to watch that – I love them! I have a hard time watching football any more, given the whole head injury problem that pro football (and indeed football at all levels) seems determined to ignore. This weekend, Kenny Stabler was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame – and the news had just been released that an autopsy of his brain (he died this past summer) revealed that he had Stage 3 CTE. What is it going to take for the NFL to step up and take action?

    I loved the clip of Al Franken with Hillary – people at DKos used to love him, but I guess he’s just an another establishment Dem now. Still sounds like a real Democrat to me.

    The more I read about that disgraceful display in New Hampshire of Bernie supporters booing Sen Shaheen, the angrier I get – it is really true, as I mused on the other day, that Bernie is not running against Republicans, he’s running against the Democratic Party whose primary system he has hijacked. I cannot imagine how he would run a general election where he would NEED the Democratic Party “establishment” to back him up, and where he’d have to criticize Republicans, not other Dems. Oh, never mind, I know – he’d run against Obama! It’s really gotten disgusting, hasn’t it?

    On the other hand, the Republican “debate” last night sounds like a train wreck, from that disgracefully handled jammed up introduction of the candidates (totally ABC’s fault, good golly can they not just read names from a complete list properly?) to Trump’s calling for “way worse than waterboarding” for ISIS (trying to imagine what he’s thinking of, full Mel Gibson movie torture I guess) to Rubio’s robot performance. I can’t stand Christie, but man, he really nailed Rubio there. There’s a great opera, Tales of Hoffman, in which one of the acts has the hero Hoffman fall in love with a beautiful woman named Olympia who turns out to be a mechanical doll, a robot, who keeps running down during her arias. An apt metaphor for Rubio – perhaps he’s running down now.

    Clear and cool here today – high only in the 50’s, a bit of winter back for us before summer hits probably in March, so I’m thankful for it. Have a great day everyone!

    • I saw your comment in the Flint post and replied. Snyder is the beneficiary of the Businessman Knows Better Than Politician meme that has gotten a lot of steam in right-wing circles. But the fiduciary duties are different.

      The CTE is troubling. A young man from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Chris Borland, was drafted and played for the NFL for one season. Then he did some research on CTE after he started feeling some early effects … and he retired from football. He determined that it is not worth the risks and will settle for teaching history somewhere. He was roundly castigated, called all sorts of names because he dared to care more about his brain than the game of football. I hope his story adds to the outcry over CTE. A researcher in Wales is working with 3D printing to create better helmets (video at the link):

      This 3D-printed material could help American football stars avoid brain injuries. C3 was designed by researchers at Cardiff and Cambridge universities. It’s made of multi-layered, thermoplastic elastomer folds, and based on origami. Supercomputers help the material cope with various impacts. SOUNDBITE (English) LEAD AUTHOR, DR PETER THEOBALD, CARDIFF UNIVERSITY, SAYING: “The supercomputers serve to allow us to run a series of simulations. When we find a simulation that we’re happy with that looks promising we then go through a process to prototype it, so we then use our 3D printers to produce something and we go and test that in the laboratory facilities by doing a physical impact. We then link that physical data back to our computational data to demonstrate that it’s valid and then we can continue to iterate our various designs computationally.” The team says C3 is superior to the polymer foams currently used. It absorbs the energy from multiple collision types. A quarter million dollar grant from US football league the NFL will allow the material to be developed in helmets by manufacturers Charles Owen. It could also be used in motorcycle helmets. SOUNDBITE (English) RAFAEL SANTIAGO, UNIVERSITY OF SAO PAOLO, SAYING: “This material is the future. I think with this kind of material we can more than improve the performance of the helmet but we can design a specific helmet, for example, for each head in the world.” If printed on metal, researchers say C3 could be used to cover military vehicles and stop them from being blown up. But it’s the NFL where most interest lies. A high-impact sport, players experience repeated concussions and blows to the head, which have been linked to the brain trauma chronic traumatic encephalopathy.

      If enough people cared to give this more than lipservice, they could figure out a way to make it safer. As it is, more and more parents are opting to keep their kids out of sports that are dangerous. Maybe when the NFL can’t find enough people willing to risk their future for the short term glory and money, they will get serious.

  8. Good morning, 33 and clear in Bellingham. My brain seems to need another cup of coffee this morning…..I’m to foggy to put a sentence together! So rather that ramble I’ll just wish everyone good day.

  9. Happy 1st Sunday in February Meeses – started the day at 36 (which is predicted to be our high tomorrow) heading for 55 and not clear but sunny enough to leave shadows, just not really distinct ones. Didn’t watch the R debate, go to Orange to check messages and then head for my stream. HVN, folks who write for the Hillary Writers Circle, and Pooties. That’s it. Goddess, I hope Kos cleans up that mess after the primaries. Teh Orange has done some serious good work getting the names of progressive Dems out there for the down-ballot races and fund-raising for them as well. We’re gonna need that kind of thing for the General. And with every progressive out there being thrown under the bus as soon as they endorse the progressive Democrat, well, Kos better do a good job with the ban hammer.

    I’ll be in and out most of the day but leaving my computer up (hopefully – only went down twice yesterday) so will check back whenever I pass through the living room. :) Hope everyone has a lovely day. {{{HUGS}}}

  10. Good morning, meese! Monday …

    It is 29 degrees in Madison, dropping to the daytime high of 26. Snow showers are in the forecast.

    The tenured professor from Wheaton College, Larycia Hawkins, will be leaving the school under a settlement between her and the college. I hope that she is made financially whole and that she ends up at an institution that will treat her with the respect she deserves.

    Here is Hillary Clinton in Flint MI yesterday.

    Of course she only went there for the black votes in South Carolina!! :::sigh::: You know, sometimes people get into public service to serve the public. It is not a “new way of doing politics” or “revolutionary” to cynically charge that every action is political and that your opponents are corrupt if they are not pure. It is demagoguery, unattractive from the left or the right.

    A reminder from D.R. Tucker at WaMo that Jill Stein may be the beneficiary of the frustrati-left but that most Democrats will vote for the Democratic nominee:

    In order to buy the idea that the “Bernie or Bust!” movement is real, one would have to believe that most Sanders supporters:

    [long list of truly awful things that would happen if a Republican won]

    In other words, to buy this idea, one would have to buy absolute absurdity.

    Members of the progressive family are simply having an argument over who will be the best individual to lead the country into the next decade. Yes, the language in this argument is sometimes raw, crude, personal. However, does anyone really believe that at the end of the primary, the progressive family will not set aside its differences and come together?

    I hope we see more pieces like that as we get closer to March. Because it will be all over but the shouting when the race moves to states that more accurately reflect the Democratic Party … and the nation.

    See all y’alls later!

    • Good news about Dr. Hawkins and screw the people criticizing Hillary for using her bully pulpit to shine a spotlight on Flint.

      • I know this will shock you but filmmaker Michael Moore was one of them. He gave her a backhanded compliment for going there but had to add that it was only to get black votes in South Carolina. Meh. I have never understood the hero worship people have for him, maybe because I have always been reality based.

        • Jeez. And here I was, feeling sorry for Michael Moore because he’s ill.

          I am so SICK of Hillary-hatred! May the crusty curse of Oliver Cromwell fall upon their poxy penises, say I.

  11. Good Monday morning all – I woke up and was unable to get back to sleep, worrying about the primaries and the election, and the effect of all the current nastiness on my online gaming friendships. So here I am, rambling at 6 AM in the dark (don’t want to wake up the dogs yet so all is dark in the house).

    Jan, so glad you posted that from Tucker and I sincerely hope he’s right. I still question how many of the most vituperative Bernie supporters are actually Democrats, though. And I worry about stuff like the article in the Wash Post yesterday saying Hillary is not getting support from women both young and old – I find that impossible to believe, or at least impossible to believe it’s a phenomenon that will outlast the primaries.

    I’m going to go surf the net for a bit and see what else I can find out there.

    • Actually, Geordie, many of the most vituperative Bernie supporters are NOT Democrats. They lived in the margins on the lefty blogs (and now Twitter) and were constantly fomenting against “the establishment” which was “anyone who could actually use electoral politics to effect change”. But elections are the only way to effect real change. It is what the Occupy movement got wrong. In America, you have to find a political party that gets you 90% there, join it and then work to change it to get you 95% there. It will never be 100% because it is a coalition and by definition it has a lot (we hope!) of people who have different issues that concern them. But the bottom line issue is that the Democratic Party cares about people and wants their lives to be better. A lot of really good Democrats lost their House seats in 2010 because they voted for the Affordable Care Act. Now, 18 million people who had no insurance are insured, lives have been saved, and bankruptcies avoided. That is a BHD and it would not have happened if the puristas of single payer had been in charge and refused to compromise.

      That piece by Tucker included a clip from Thom Hartmann’s show where he says that Bernie Sanders is the natural heir to the FDR Democratic Party and that starting half-way through the Carter Administration, the Democratic Party became the party of Wall Street and corporatist sellouts and warmongers. I disagree with that assessment. I think that the loss to Ronald Reagan was more than just a loss of the presidency, it was a seismic shift in politics. The Democrats could either become a permanent minority or they could figure out some way to cobble together a coalition that would have to include (by definition) people who voted for Reagan. I am not a fan of the Bill Clinton administration but he gave us Ruth Bader Ginsburg and, if you don’t look too closely, he gave us a positive message to run on: that Democrats know how to run the country and the economy and aren’t the radicals that the right painted us as. Now, by not sliding completely into irrelevance, we are poised to reap the harvest of the liberal seeds planted post-Reagan and nurtured by those in our party who embraced the values of caring about people and not wanting their lives to suck. As the highly imperfect ACA shows, you can get more when you work with American businesses than when you work against them (they will almost always win). Pragmatism suggests you nibble away at the edges and that eventually you get enough to prove your points … and win successive elections. Bernie Sanders is the natural heir to the George McGovern Democratic Party and I don’t want to think about what our country would be like now if Bill Clinton had not “wrecked it” by winning in 1992 and Barack Obama had not “wrecked it more” by winning in 2008. There is no path to the presidency for the purity wing of the Democratic Party.

      • TRUTH! Every word! Thanks for that, it gave me a real lift to read it. The first Presidential candidate I worked for was Eugene McCarthy, when I was a teenager and didn’t know any better, beyond “end the war”. But that was just the first of several “perfect is the enemy of the good” Democratic defeats – Humphrey was a good liberal inexorably dragged down by Vietnam; McGovern was partly the result of Nixon’s successful dirty tricks to get more moderate Dems like Muskie out of the race, and partly of the same purity troll-like movement we’re seeing now. We cannot afford to let that happen again.

        • Geordie, this NY Times article talks about the “women gap”. I cringed when I read about Gloria Steinem’s interview on Bill Maher’s show and shook my head when Madeleine Albright’s very very old comment about women not supporting women was depicted as the worst thing evah!! Here are the polls:

          According to a Wall Street Journal/NBC/Marist College poll of Democratic voters in New Hampshire last week, 64 percent of women under the age of 45 supported Mr. Sanders, while only 35 percent backed Mrs. Clinton. By contrast, women over 45 backed Mrs. Clinton by nine percentage points.

          Here is the problem, in a nutshell: Hillary Clinton is boring. She does not have Bill Clinton’s style or Barack Obama’s towering rhetoric (which I will miss dearly as I have been moved to tears by some of his speeches). She is wicked smart and her heart is in all the right places but she is not inspirational unless people bother to read her biography or saw first hand the absolute hell that the right-wing has visited on her for the past 25 years. They hate smart women who speak their mind.

          So it is not surprising that the women’s vote is generational – and also not surprising that the black and Latino vote is not. Many young women think that there is no discrimination against them and are willing to go with the podium banger because they like the passion he shows towards issues that move them. Blacks and Latinos face discrimination daily. The good news is that I don’t think they will vote for any of the Republican Party candidates and will vote Democratic when they see the radical anti-abortion stands of their candidate. Every single one of them wants no exception for rape and incest and most of them only give grudging acceptance that the life of the mother might maybe possibly should trump the “life” of a fetus. That such an attitude still exists should remind young women that we can’t afford for a minute to think that we have the luxury of voting for a candidate who might lose to the Republican nominee.

          • Well, Hillary Clinton may be considered “boring” by the media, whose collective IQ amounts to a measly minus-30 points, but she is not boring to ME. I am excited that a smart, educated, seasoned woman has the stamina and determination to campaign the way she’s doing, in the hope of making life better for all of us.

            She is everything the women of my generation could never DREAM of being. We early learned the lesson that we were second-class citizens and always would be. Until quite late in life I had trouble understanding transwomen because of this. I wondered why anyone born into first-class citizenship would voluntarily accept second-class citizenship with its concomitant “responsibility” to always put others first, to spend time in frivolous pursuits like clothes, hair, and makeup, and so forth.

            That was before I became friends with a transwoman at Witch Camp one summer. The transition has nothing to do with politics, I learned, it has to do with a person’s inner feelings. She completely changed my thinking, and I will always be grateful for that.

          • I knew that would resonate with you. :) You were roundly castigated for suggesting that Hillary Clinton being a woman should have anything to do with voting for her. It has a lot to do with voting for her because she is a symbol of resolve in a society that has determined that women should not want to be anything other than wives and mothers and cookie bakers (remember that?).

            I want my daughter to live in a world where the color of one’s skin and their gender are not barriers but simply another part of their biography.

          • I just dropped a “thank you” card in the mail to Hillary for America – telling her I didn’t know where she got the intestinal fortitude or the sense of duty to do this, but am grateful to her. Also noted that her programs in AR helped me way back when and what she’s done since has helped me, my sons, and my grandsons. Finished by saying that Eleanor Roosevelt, wherever she is, is proud of Hillary (since I know E.R. is Hillary’s role model). Hope she has the time to actually get/read it. :)

          • bfitz, I’m so glad you did that! I want to do it too. Someone suggested that a bunch of us on HN&V should write thank-you letters to Hillary to let her know we appreciate her. I wanted to bring it up again when there’s a new diary but I’m afraid THEY would go into the diary, find out about the letter-writing campaign, and write hate screeds to HRC.

            I’m going to write my own letter, now that I’ve finished my taxes. I plan to volunteer in some capacity after Labor Day. Not calling or canvassing, though. Hate that!

          • Ha! Love me some Margaret and Helen!!

            This is me, by the way: “I used to have a good handle on life but lately that door’s been sticking.”

            This is what I was trying to say upthread:

            I’m not saying we should vote for Hillary just because she is a woman. I’m just saying that’s a good place to start. Read a book she’s written. Look up her biography and study her career without the political pundits like Andrea Mitchell telling you how to think. You might discover that she’s been fighting a revolution for years.

            And this is really really important as it relates to electoral politics:

            Personally, I don’t think the Democratic Party running so far to the left is helpful when the Republican Party has gone so far to the right.

            This year we might just pick up some voters who would like a little more sanity. But it won’t happen if we insist that they buy into the left-of-the-left’s liberal vision. How about moving that Overton Window over to the left a little more while holding the middle?

      • heh – a bunch of them are former Ron and Rand Paul fanatics, others are Green Party and others are anti-Democrats who are self-styled revolutionaries with keyboards.

        • I had been following some of them on Twitter, just because they occasionally made sense and I am anti-war and wanted to read the discussions. But lately they are so firmly in the “Hillary is just Dick Cheney in a pantsuit” camp that I had to mute them.

        • Ha! I get a little carried away sometimes. Maybe I should post it as a Motley Megaphone and see how many Twitterers unfollow me. ;)

  12. Good frosty Moon Day morning, all, and happy Chinese New Year! This is the year of the Monkey. I’m one. It’s 27 F. on a blue-and-gold morning here in NoVa, going up to 47 F. later.

    Thank GODDESS the Super Bore is over, I was even more bored than I expected to be. The half-time show did absolutely nothing for an old bat like me. Now, all we have to do is get through the Oscar-Bore and then we can concentrate on the primaries. Re the NH primary tomorrow—will be happy if HRC vastly reduces Bernie’s lead. I like the way she doesn’t give up. Sister Meese, I am SO tired of Bernie, Bernie, Bernie! It’s all BS.

    I have three Girl Scout activities this week. How did I get into this? :) Well, I just want Miss Pink Cheeks to absorb the unspoken lessons she’ll learn from being a Girl Scout: forming a network of girlfriends that will back her up in later life, learning self-confidence, and acquiring the background to be a community leader when she grows up.

    Hope everyone will have a good day!

    • The Bernie Sanders camp is tamping down expectations so maybe it won’t be a blowout the way the pundits have predicted. I think that better-than-expected for Hillary Clinton will go a long way towards adding a little reality to the nominating contest. I really REALLY hate that the process starts with Iowa and New Hampshire. Our party leaders should insist that the first week of the primary season include states that reflect our party’s demographic makeup. Throw in IA and NH if you must, but leaven it with Nevada and South Carolina.

  13. Eating breakfast, drinking tea. I did not see any of the football game, or commercials. I did see the halftime show — my twitter feed told me when to flip over. Coldplay was a very odd choice. But they were super happy to be there. Beyonce & Bruno Mars stole the show. Melissa Harris Perry had spent quite a lot of time in the morning talking about her video — her music isn’t really my thing, but I like what she’s saying. (they spent 2 segments dissecting the video & all the images & what she’s saying — very interesting & Melissa is a big, big fan)

    I packed my workout clothes. Plan to walk up the last evil hill on the ½ marathon route twice this week, so I will have faced it & — ahem — slayed it (if I may borrow a phrase from Ms B). And there’s the lunch walking group twice this week, too. Earworm is California from my boys.

  14. 32 at dawn heading for 36 and partly cloudy this 2nd Monday in February. If she were still with us, my grandmother would be 111 today. She passed at 92 and very ready to go so that doesn’t have the pain associated with Momma going at 58 or goddess help my sister my nephew going at 17.

    Watched Hillary’s talk in Flint. How anybody – any freakin’ body – can listen to that and not hear the sincerity or the determination to make as much right as possible for these kids and their families I do not know. Only place I’m going on GOS today is HNV and pootie diaries. I will be so glad when the primaries are over!

  15. Good morning, 39 and mostly sunny in Bellingham. I’m going to the pool this morning, and then I’ll see what happens. I hope the exercise will wake up my sleepy brain.

    My daughters are in their forties now, and are busy working moms so they are my window into how younger women think. They were not happy with Gloria Steinem’s remark, feel most women will vote for D’s when they start paying attention to the issues, and that the Brunch With Bernie Guy they have listened to for years has morphed into some one else. They don’t have the time or energy for a revolution, but they do want a good life for their children. And as we all do, they worry about their families financial security. And they are very tired…..working full time and caring for their families is challenging so they have little time for much else.

    Time for the pool. Hope every one’s day has some good moments!

    • Excellent points, princesspat. Lots of people who I thought would know better are distracted by the shiney new object.

      Here is a story about black voters in New Hampshire. They are not buying into “Hillary or Bust” and will vote for whichever Democrat gets the nomination. But they are in her corner:

      PORTSMOUTH, N.H. — Freddye Ross will vote for Bernie Sanders if he wins the Democratic nomination, but she won’t campaign for him.

      A member of the mostly black New Hope Baptist Church, Ross is active in politics and is campaigning for Hillary Clinton in advance of Tuesday’s primary. She cited affordable college education, equal pay for women, and climate change as issues that matter most to her.

      “Hillary is a proven,” Ross, 75, said as she left church services Sunday. “She’s not saying anything she can’t do.”

      Her husband wondered about former NAACP director Benjamin Jealous endorsing Sen. Sanders:

      “I like a lot of what Bernie has to say,” Freddye’s husband, Fred Ross, chimed in, but he doesn’t see Sanders as a practical choice and is also supporting Clinton. He was formerly the head of the New Hampshire Seacoast chapter of the NAACP, but spoke to the Free Press solely as a private citizen and did not want his opinion to be taken as an endorsement on behalf of anyone except himself. He said Jealous’s endorsement didn’t sway him.

      “I’ve always been a person who thinks for myself,” he said.

      Their pastor said this:

      [Rev.] Hilson said Sanders is a “good man,” but he is tired of hearing Sanders speak over and over again about the rich and the poor and Wall Street.

      For many of his flock, billionaires being thrown in jail for gaming the financial system is not as much a priority as mass incarceration, people being shot and killed by law enforcement and protecting the franchise. And reproductive rights, the right to determine the size of your family

      I saw a Tweet a few days ago from Propane Jane:

      Propane Jane @docrocktex26
      Y’all still have yet to explain how he’s gonna come to the South and talk to women abt the banks when the GOP just closed Planned Parenthood

    • You can post anytime, Geordie!

      Excellent observations:

      I have concerns about the people he’s chosen to help lead his revolution, given that his team has twice now suggested in campaign advertisements that Sanders has endorsements he doesn’t actually have and used images of people without their consent in campaign advertisements, in several cases leaving people with potentially dire professional consequences they had to address. I don’t imagine these incidents to be reflective of an indifference to ethical campaigning; I think they are instead a reflection of the disorganization of a nationally untested campaign that doesn’t have the competency to ensure these sorts of things don’t happen.

      There is a lot of carping about the Clinton Machine but it is also the Clinton Rolodex, filled with people who know how to run government … and packed now with veterans of the Obama Administration. I am not sure who a President Sanders calls on to help him organize an administration.

      And this!!

      I want to know Sanders’ position on trusting advisors, even if they are former adversaries and especially if they are women, who can complement his areas of weakness, particularly as his aggressive domestic economic reform will demand much of his time and focus, if elected. I would like details on how he will balance pursuing his sweeping domestic agenda with a global environment that demands an inordinate amount of any president’s attention. It’s not that I think it can’t be done; I just want to know how it will be.

      When I listen to Bernie Sanders and read his words, I get the sense that he does not feel he has any areas of weakness. He does not seem like a consensus type guy but more a “here’s my platform … believe it or go away” guy. That attitude is great for running a revolution and finding true believers – he never goes off message – but useless to govern with.

      It would be interesting to know how many people support Sen. Sanders because of his message and how may support him because they dislike Hillary Clinton. I hear people saying “I like a lot of his positions” but when I listen to him, nothing resonates with me. Maybe because I am one of those people who hears something and troubleshoots it. So I hear “single-payer health care” and I think of the implementation. I hear “jail the banksters” and I think about how successful prosecutions work. I hear “no more wars” and I think about Nazi Germany. I hear the absolutes and I see no nuance, no compromise … and really no way to govern.

      Here are the easy ones: higher minimum wage, stronger safety net, investment in infrastructure, addressing climate change. Both candidates agree on those but both candidates do not have the temperament or the tools to build congressional coalitions to get anything done. In our two-party system, you build your party and elect members of Congress to pass your agenda. You can’t do it if you don’t have a party.

  16. Good morning, meese! Tuesday …

    It is 11 degrees in Madison, on its way up to 16. Morning snow showers in the forecast. What happened to spring???

    So we may as well all give up: Bernie Sanders won in New Hampshire! Oh wait, that was just the results from three municipalities:

    Sanders won over all four Democratic voters in the tiny town of Dixville Notch, while Kasich sneaked past Donald Trump, 3-2, among Republicans.

    Hart’s Location, went for Kasich and Sanders according to the town’s website which noted that the “polls opened at midnight and closed at 12:06 a.m.”

    The tally in the Democratic race was Sanders, 12, Hillary Clinton, 7, Mark Steward Greenstein, 2. For the GOP, Kasich had 5 votes, Trump, 4, Chris Christie, 2, and 1 each for Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush and Ben Carson.

    Texas Sen. Ted Cruz took Millsfield with nine of 18 Republican votes, according to Politico, followed by Trump who garnered three. Kaisch, Christie, Bush, Rubio and Carly Fiorina each got one vote in Millsfield, as did Sen. Rand Paul who has dropped out of the race. The Democrats of Millsfield pulled for Clinton, who got two votes, leaving Sanders with one vote.

    Why is this important? It isn’t!!!

    The success rate is just three out of seven for the top vote-getters in Hart’s Location and nine out of 14 in Dixville Notch, near the Canadian border.

    A harbinger of pretty much nothing. This is Millsfield’s first visit to the “FRIST!!” since 1952 when my guess is that they “Liked IKE”. For what it’s worth, IKE would not recognize today’s Republican Party. Although maybe he would … he helped defeat something pretty close to it in World War II.

    Here is something more relevant:

    Mike kramer ‏@MikesPencil 11 hours ago

    Lets pretend this isn’t happening #603forHRC
    TX HRC +34 NEW
    AR HRC +32 NEW
    MI HRC +32 NEW
    GA HRC +42 NEW
    SC HRC +37

    As a reminder of the progress we lose if a Republican is elected, the Obama Administration just negotiated a deal to set global carbon emissions on aircraft fuel.

    See all y’all later!

  17. Good snowy Tuesday morning, Meese! There’s a gloppy white coating on the grass, the roofs, and the vehicles here in NoVa this morning, with a gloppy mixture falling as well. Today looks like a really good day not to go anywhere.

    Geordie, I read the piece from Melissa McEwan, thanks for the link. Wow! She nails it once again.

    As I put the hard copy of the income tax papers together (both returns were accepted electronically yesterday), I’ll be checking the goings-on in New Hampshire from time to time. Think I’ll work on my March story and make a Banana-Black Walnut Cake with cream cheese frosting when I’m not doing that.

    Wishing all of Moosylvania and New Hampshire a good day and I DO hope HRC does better than expected. “It would be so nice.” as Madonna once sang.

  18. Good morning Meese.
    Snow here – but it has stopped – hope it is cleared by the time I head off to school.
    Will not be crossposting BKos here today – because due to a DK5 glitch the entire diary got erased – Dopper, Justice and I are working on the reconstruct – but won’t have time to do the reformat for Moose since I also have to go to work, and won’t be home till 3. :(

    • Thanks for the heads up, Dee. I will see if I can find something to post, maybe an inspirational speech from my archives.

      • Part of what I was covering was this Saturday Moral March in Raleigh (Feb 13) and the push for voting rights.

        Seeya – on my way out the door

    • Oh Dee how awful! The GOS has been terribly buggy since the weekend, I wonder what’s going on? Hope you guys can reconstruct it!

      • I hope so too – I haven’t checked – – fingers crossed that it is all there when it goes up in 2 minutes

  19. Super sleepy, though I don’t think I woke up last night. No thoughts in my head, like none at all. Just listening to my boys play California.

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