We wake up today with this certainty: None of it mattered. The secret documents, the sky-high covid deaths, January 6, racist statement after racist statement, the economic crash, the sexual assault allegations, the pussy grabbing, Moscow, Roe v. Wade, the conviction, and what have you. All of it amounted to a hill of beans. And there will certainly be more outrages in years to come; and once again, they still will not matter one dot. If we, on the left, come to this understanding, we can move on by simply asking: What, then, does matter? What truly counts in American politics? What is its actual ground? This kind of clear thinking might prove to be invaluable.
We also have to accept the fact that California no longer represents the future of America. In the past it did, but not anymore. The future is now found in Texas. Elon Musk knew this. He relocated himself, Space X, and X to what has become our whole country: the Lone Star State.
Kamala Harris only won deep blue states: And Trump is going back to the White House because millions of people decided to “sit this one out.” And the Senate returns to the GOP. As for the House, its final composition is yet to be known. Now, how are we to read all of this, and, particularly, the outcome of the presidential race? Well, Trump’s first term in office is something like the first book in Octavia Butler’s Parable series, Parable of the Sower, which was published in 1993 and features a Trump-like president who basically strips America of its economic assets. The second term will be like the second book, Parable of the Talents, which was published in 1998 and features an out-and-out Christofacist president who promises to “Make America Great Again.” Butler never completed the third book in the series.
“Welcome to how our only world ends. It will be like this every summer: getting worse, and worse, and worse until there’s nothing worse left.”https://t.co/vs5HAmUloY
— The Stranger 🗞 (@TheStranger) July 23, 2024
Florida and South Dakota gave abortion access the middle finger. But Arizona, Colorado, New York, Maryland, Missouri, Montana, and Nevada protected reproductive rights. However, with the Senate, and possibly the House, under GOP control, the whole states’ rights business might turn out to be worth no more than the salt you put in greens.
The Stranger Election Control Board had a good night. Alexis Mercedes Rinck is going to beat incumbent Tanya Woo for Seattle City Council Position 8. The same goes with Democratic Socialist Shaun Scott. He will certainly beat Andrea Suarez in the race to represent Washington’s 43rd Legislative District. And the man who did not catch the Green River Killer isn’t going to Olympia. Bob Ferguson handily defeated Dave Reichert for the governor seat. Sen. Maria Cantwell gave her opponent nothing but the boot. And, altogether, it seems Washington became bluer, saner, a little world, a precious stone, set in the reddest of seas.
Now that the whole country is basically Texas, Seattle might consider not staying in bed with conservative council members. Now is the time to get up and go hard to the left.
Voters showed Washington State Ferries (WSF) some love this time: The Prohibit Carbon Tax Credit Trading initiative went down in flames. This means WSF will get electric ships and some badly-needed government cheese. However, the Ensure Access to Natural Gas measure , which wants to decelerate Puget Sound Energy’s departure from carbon liberation and protec the buyers and sellers of natural gas statewide, left the gate in the lead: 51% to 48%.
Joe Kent is facing a second round of wound licking. His opponent in Washington’s 3rd Congressional District race, Congresswoman Marie Gluesenkamp Perez is, at this point, ahead by 4 points.
The sun will be out today. That’s something.
A termite mound that’s been around for something like 34,000 years was recently discovered in South Africa. Of course, termites haven’t called this mound home for thousands of years. And this is a shame, because termites are really delicious. You catch them during the rainy season; this is when termites take to the sky with lots of fat in their bodies (they are trying to start a new colony—the circle life, that sort of thing). A little cooking oil and a few minutes on the burner turns these brown critters into a tasty snack.
Let us end with this scene from Downtown 81. Ronald Reagan is president. Hip-hop is emerging. And Jean-Michel Basquiat is getting his groove on in the ruins. What I want to point out is the way he moves. So smooth. So cold. So internal. This is being with others to be by yourself. This is exactly how I feel today. Dancing to the aftermath.
ok.
wormmy:
“Joever: Yesterday, Vice President Kamala Harris addressed the nation to concede she had lost the 2024 presidential election.
She kept her remarks very positive, very boilerplate Democrat. If she truly believed Trump is the threat to the American people he is, she should have come for blood. But, no.
The Democrats love to capitulate to the right. And, it’s part of why they lost so spectacularly. They championed an extreme and inhumane immigration platform, shrugged their shoulders at Israel’s utter decimation of Gaza, and totally abandoned working people crushed by the weight of the affordability crisis.
I know you’re smart and you already know this, but as the #Resist libs start to re-recognize the ever-present threat of fascism—the precarity of reproductive access, queer and trans liberation, immigrants’ rights, workers protections, and more—remember that the Democrats’ constant sidesteps to the right landed us here.”
–@tS’s Schlogg AM; today!
@49: Still not criticizing Sawant for her successful Trump campaign?
Remember, if you had a core competency, it would be your servile acceptance of true evil, all while loudly lecturing everyone else on our supposed moral failures.
@51
our dearest wormmy
thee master Projectionist
Lecturing the commentariat
just
Another
Day in fuck-
ing Paradise.
@48 “Three times Trump has asked his fellow New Yorkers for our votes, and three times we have treated him to a humiliating rejection.”
Who was President of New York from 2016-2020 and who will be starting in January? I really doubt Trump is feeling very humiliated at the moment, but you should be for writing that nonsense.
@53: Fifteen million fewer votes cast than in 2020. Feel the landslide!
Just pointing out that we who know him best have rejected him repeatedly. (I might hope that you would understand that very, very well.)
@51. Tensor you have embraced wanton and shameless genocide. Your definition is the UN’s, and yet you support a rogue state which threw out the UN and is completely annihilating the rest of North Gaza after completing their objectives, in order to clear out the land for settlement. You are the servant of purest evil, and you never fail to subscribe to your own criticism of the far left and never have anything but a quip or two to say about Trump and the far right. You are a shameless menace to all that is right and just. When you leave this world it will be for best and your soul shall suffer for eternity.
@55: “Your definition is the UN’s,”
Which does not support the claims made here at this site, yes.
“…which threw out the UN,”
If you’re referring to UNRWA, you need to look at the evidence of terrorist infiltration of that agency.
“…never have anything but a quip or two to say about Trump and the far right.”
I’ve said Sawant campaigned for Trump and the far right. That’s more than every headline poster at this site combined has said on that topic, so you might want to take your criticism to them.
As for the rest, thank you for showing us the reasons you really should have accepted your banishment, and found other hobbies. Your fixation on things you simply cannot change continues to cause you grief. I hope you can do better soon.
“Liberals never accept any blame for their losses.
They insist that they only lost because the US is too filled with stupid and bigoted people to have recognized the greatness of the Dem candidate.
Then they wonder why the country sees them as snide, patronizing assholes.”
@57: So, less than 51% of the vote remains a “landslide,” then?
(If so, you’re in good company; see @46.)
‘You are the servant of purest evil, and you never fail to subscribe to your own criticism of the far left and never have anything but a quip or two to say about Trump and the far right.
You are a shameless menace to all that is right and just. When you leave this world it will be for best and your soul shall suffer for eternity.”
Bravisssimo, CDizzle.
fucking Bravissimo.
@58 Are you seriously still acting like it wasn’t a massive win on his part because he didn’t win New York or something? You also failed the New Yorker Don’t Constantly Refer to Living in New York Challenge
@60: So, less than 51% of the vote remains a “landslide,” then?
And again, we who knew him the best rejected him by a humiliating margin. One might think you, of all persons, would be intimately familiar with that concept.
@59: Garb really needs help, kristo’. Egging on his most self-destructive impulses shows incredible cruelty, even for you.
You’ve advocated for banishment of other commenters; how about you advocate for Garb to accept his banishment, and move on?
‘eggging on,’
wormtongue?
calling your
ass out you
meant. and
he’s Correct
& you know
it. Bravo, CD.
“Tensor you have embraced wanton and shameless genocide. Your definition is the UN’s, and yet you support a rogue state which threw out the UN and is completely annihilating the rest of North Gaza after completing their objectives, in order to clear out the land for settlement.”
and you
Know it.
a stain you
are to these
pages.
@62: Garb’ has resumed the behaviors which once got him banned. Again, I ask you not to encourage him. He needs to understand his actions here are not good for him, and your compounding his errors seems unlikely to help him understand.
@63. Oh please, cope more with your failure as an existence. Nothing you say to try to ban me can hide the truth from what you have done and continue to do. Your fate is sealed by your own hand.
as ‘gifted’ as it is
the Wormtongue’s
battles for the Wrong
Side gotta be Pathological
seek
Help
wormmy
or go join
nutnyahoo
he could Use
a Lotta youse:
he already Has.
Garb@64: You’ve already been banned. You really should think about why that happened.
As for your use of “genocide,” you told us you have your own personal definition:
“I know it when I see it.”
(https://www.thestranger.com/guest-editorial/2024/04/24/79483068/why-we-held-seder-in-the-streets-this-year/comments/63)
So, I can’t engage anything you write about “genocide,” because I use the definition the entire world has used for 75 years, and you have chosen not to. I stand by my use of the word. Disagreeing with your ad hoc, made up definition of any word doesn’t make anyone a bad person.
“… because
I use the definition the
entire world has used for 75 years… “
utter
fucking
nonsense,
Wormtongue.
I’ve posted Numerous
Examples right Here @tS which
you Always choose to Deny Deny Deny;
even a cursory look at my history’ll bear that out.
“Disagreeing with your ad hoc,
made up definition of any word
doesn’t make anyone a bad person.”
no one says any-
one’s “a bad person,”
wormmy. you merely Support
Evil, at seemingly Every single opportunity.
@67: You’ve weaseled out of every attempt to have an honest dialogue, and even you know it.
Go ahead, provide quotes & urls from your “…Numerous
Examples right Here @tS..,” and maybe include some of the quotes you also claimed to have made, condemning Hamas? Because the last time you tried that, you found absolutely nothing.
@68 yet
another Lie
from Wormtongue’s
apparently Bottomeless pit.
pass.
but here’s my
Comment History
for those so Inclined:
https://www.thestranger.com/users/25419161/kristofarian
oh and don’t
forget (if you’ve
the Stomach for it) to
check up on wormmy’s ‘math’ too:
https://www.thestranger.com/users/76969210/tensorna
good luck!
& don’t
Forget
Your
barf
bag
here’s a query for our Resident
grammar nazi – would you say el-
trumpfsfter is or ain’t a actual Nazi?
from
In the Public Interest
Electing
an American
Fuhrer as Wall
Street Cheers & Soars
On September 17, 1787, the last day after the drafting of our Constitution in Philadelphia, Ben Franklin was leaving the building when a prominent resident, Elizabeth Willing Powel, asked him “Well Doctor, what have we got – a republic or a monarch?” Franklin replied, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
On November 5, 2024, our fragile Republic became a Monarchy-elect. A majority of voters elected a Dictator. This is no exaggeration. Look at just some of the damage Trump has done and the appalling things he has said. In July 2019, he declared “With Article II, I can do whatever I want as president.”
And he did, throughout his four years, he violated all kinds of federal laws and provisions of the Constitution, mostly openly, with impunity. He obstructed justice from the White House as a way of life. He defied over 125 Congressional subpoenas.
He is a very successful fugitive from justice with lawyers skilled at endlessly delaying judges and courts where federal and state prosecutors have obtained indictments.
His convictions and adverse civil verdicts are like water on a duck’s back.
He openly admires foreign dictators and meets with them proudly, musing about wanting to be more like them. Moreover, he is gathering around him a large number of vengeful, dictatorial Trumpsters readying to take over the federal departments and agencies.
The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, 900-page report prepared a detailed blueprint for the corporate state that is the definition of fascism, American style.
Together with Trump, they have their “enemies list” both individually and collectively.
In speech after speech, Trump, Vance, and others have spoken as if they will have boundless power after January 20, 2025. They are not wrong.
They control the compliant Republican House and the Senate. The U.S. Supreme Court (6 to 3) decided fanatically last June that a president’s “official” conduct no matter how extreme was immune from criminal prosecution.
Three of the Justices were Trump’s nominees.
–by Ralph Nader; November 8, 2024
oodles more of the travesty
aka ‘Citizens Fucking United’:
https://mailchi.mp/nader/electing-an-american-fuhrer-as-wall-street-cheers-and-soars
wormmy — I know how much
you Adore Ralph, so here’s
One pro fucking Bono.
your Welcome.
@Garb: The moderators of this very blog have already decided that when you leave it, that will be for the best. You have loudly rejected their judgement. Why, then, should you expect anyone here to care about your judgement? True, it’s not a symmetrical comparison; the moderators here can enforce their judgement upon you, yet again, any time they like, whereas you can do nothing of any kind whatsoever to enforce yours. (Also, that kristo’ alone agrees with your judgement should function as a shriekingly undeniable indicator of the real value of said judgement. Yet, you continue here asserting the value of your opinion, in the very place you have been told your opinion is not valued.)
@69: Yet again, you assert your own words support you, and yet again, you cannot find any evidence for your assertion. No one of sound mind will risk contact with your ever-spewing volcano of gonorrhoeal logorrhea, especially with the foreknowledge it absolutely lacks the value you falsely ascribe to it.
Speaking of ‘checking up on math,’ you managed to miss almost half of my comments (https://www.thestranger.com/users/2402388/tensor). So good to see you are, in fact, capable of actually reaching all the way around to doing a (literally) half-assed job once in a while. Must be a nice break from your constant failathon concerning your own worthless words.
small Wonder
Wormtongue seeks
to have CDizzle excom-
municated when the Latter
amongst the oodles of others
can See thru his obfuscations and
rationalizations and call him out for
the insidious, hateful
Distractions he so
often brings to
these pages
You GO,
CDizzle, Garbby
“averagebob,” barth
COMTE auntie Gee and
Hosts of others unwilling
to allow Wormtongue free
reign for his oftimes Monstrous
pov. the World’ll be a
Better Place with
wormmy some-
where’s Else.
@72: “…to have CDizzle excom-
municated…”
That’s actually what you’re doing: egging on behavior very similar to what got him banned the last time he did it. I’m merely noting it might get him banned again. Do with that what you will, but don’t blame me if his very similar behavior results in exactly the same consequence.
Thank the benevolent powers that be that Washington State mercifully remains blue and the Sane Washington.
I have no desire to venture much of anywhere east of the Cascades.
Go, SuperBob, GO–kick ass, take names, and congratulations on the checkmate on the “I Caught the Green River Killer!” Clown Car Captain Dave Third Reichert.
And YAY to Marie Gluesenkamp Perez for handily beating devoted Trump sock puppet Joe Kent in the 3rd District for the second time. One would think RepubliKKKans would realize that fascism, misogyny, and systematic racism aren’t the way to effectively govern.
With the exception of MAGA red “Drill baby, drill” Alaska, I wonder if the West Coast (Washington, Oregon, California, and Hawaii specifically) will secede from the looming Trump fascist union. Alaska is so close to Russia, and used to be a Russian Territory.
The Orange Turd is so mentally deranged what would stop it from sending the 49th State gift wrapped “With Love” to Vladimir Putin?
Happy Veterans Day and Happy 62nd Birthday, Demi Moore!
@16 boatgeek and @18 thirteen12 et al: I believe a big reason why we’re stuck with a twice impeached, convicted felon and neofascist Putin butt kisser for a second term is because too many idiots in this country are too chickenshit to ever elect a qualified woman President of these Divided States of MAGA Confusion.
@38, I’m retired and some times I have nothing better to do than watch TV & YouTube. To the best of my knowledge I’ve seen every second of every video taken of the police’s interactions with Floyd & most of his trial.
I think George Floyd was a junkie counterfeiter who died from a combination of exhausting himself, due to his dilapidated physical condition caused by years of drug use, & the drugs in his system at that time. The police most certainly had the right to arrest him based on his participation in an organized criminal attempt to pass counterfeit money to be used to finance drug purchases. (Organized crime doesn’t always look like Don Corleone & the Five Families siting around an oak table in a mansion.)
Floyd was a fraud because the claustrophobia manure was evident: He was sitting in a slightly smaller vehicle with 2 or 3 other people doing just fine. But then started screaming “claustrophobia,” & “I can’t breathe,” when the police tried to put him in a slightly larger vehicle……by himself. Crap.
If he couldn’t breathe when they had him on the ground, that’s just too damn bad. Watch the tapes: Every time the police tried to loosen their grip & cut him some slack, he fought even harder. And Floyd wasn’t just trying to avoid arrest or restraint. Among other episodes, there’s a place in the videos, when they had him almost horizontal in the back of the police car where he clearly tried to kick one of the officers in the face. And I mean kick, not bump. Floyd looked straight at the officer and kicked (as hard as he could it looked to me).
THERE WAS NOTHING THE POLICE DID TO GEORGE FLOYD THAT THEY WOULDN’T ROUTINELY DO TO ANY WHITE MAN FOR THE SAME CRIMES. I can say that with good authority as I was a pretty large pain in the ass when I was younger and I had plenty of interactions with the Chicago police. On a number of occasions I only avoided the exact same treatment Floyd got because as soon as I realized the plainclothes men were police, I played dead & didn’t resist even one iota. That includes having police point their service weapons at me (real guns, not tasers. This was all before stun guns were invented.) And all my offenses were only in the disturbing the peace class. I was never into any serious crime……and make no mistake, counterfeiting is the big time, even if only for $20. Rent the movie The Art Of Counterfeiting. It’s about a real guy named Art. He passed millions, $100 at a time. I’m sure this wasn’t Floyd’s first rodeo. And as they say, If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime. I went to court. I paid the lawyers. I paid my fines. And I just generally never made any trouble that I couldn’t buy my way out of. Floyd just didn’t want to pay the bill.
And I don’t want to hear any of that crap that Floyd didn’t deserve to die over a $20 crime. Floyd died because he was a junkie who tried to kick police officers in the face. Anyone who can’t understand that attacking police officers will get you killed needs their head examined. And there’s a warm spot in hell for all the YouTubers who are giving permission to all the dummies out there who want to argue with the police. I’m not talking about the real lawyers who have YouTube channels giving first & fourth amendment advice. I’m talking about the ones who encourage dummies to argue with police over every word.
Derek Chauvin got thrown under the bus. If you watched his trial, he had a meek lawyer, a jury that’s never been out on the street or a victim of a crime, and the prosecution called in all Chauvin’s bosses to dump on him. All these bosses were responsible for putting Chauvin in his job as a training officer. All these bosses have approved for years of the job Chauvin was doing. All these bosses sang the mantra of how law enforcement is systemically racist while they pull the levers of that very same system. THE ATTNY GENERAL OF MN IS KEITH ELLISON, A BLACK MAN. There are black police chiefs all over the USA. Black men & women. There are black mayors all over the USA. Black men & women. How can anyone say that a system is racist when it is run, in large part by black men & women? (The answer is easy: There’s money, jobs, political power, & jury awards that are easier to get by crying racism than by working for a living. And I’m not saying there’s no such thing as racism. But the mantra that the entire US judicial system is racist is a scam.)
The reason IMHO all these law enforcement officials threw Chauvin under the bus is because Sharpton & Crump Inc told them that they could either pay Floyd’s family (After Sharpton & Crump took their cut) $29Mil, or they could unleash $100Mil of damage & destruction on the city of Minneapolis. All Chauvin’s bosses & superiors saw their jobs gone next election if they let the city burn, so they paid the extortion………with OTHER PEOPLE’S (taxpayer) MONEY. (It was reported that the lawyers for the Floyd family, including Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci, would receive around $8.5 million to $10 million from the $20 million allocated to the Floyd family, with some reports suggesting that the amount could be as high as $12 million to $15 million for the lawyers, but the exact amount is not certain…….per Llama 3.1 70B, my local neighborhood AI. That means Sharpton, Crump, & Romanucci took MORE money for themselves than the $7Mil that was allocated for the entire community it was donated to. And people think Trump knows how to scam a charity!) Civil rights settlements that involve community riots are nothing but extortion.
You should have heard all Chauvin’s bosses squeal in delight when they threw him under the bus from the witness stand in court. They never heard of Chauvin. Chauvin was a rogue cop. They had no idea of how Chauvin got his job. They had nothing to do with Chauvin. St Peter couldn’t have done it better when he denied knowing Christ. Pilate couldn’t have done it better when he washed his hands of Christ. And I don’t have all that much sympathy for Chauvin. But don’t EVEN try to tell me that George Floyd was a poor unfortunate or that Derek Chauvin was an out of control, racist cop.
Watch the tapes. ALL OF THEM. I dare you.