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

February 7, 2016 JanF Community 182

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?

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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.

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62 Comments

  1. Morning all, a quick check in before I go to work today (my one day a week teaching duties). I do think Hillary needs to sharpen her narrative – but I’m not sure there’s anything she can do to appeal to libertarian-leaning young people that Sanders is attracting. I’m not panicking about her campaign until we see results from Nevada and South Carolina.

    Have a great day everyone, I’ll check back later this afternoon.

    • She won’t be able to win those folks over but there are some others who might be persuadable. I hope she will persuade them.

      Her support is generational, no doubt about it. And kids nowadays don’t understand what it means to live under an incompetent corrupt ideologically-hidebound administration because they were babies during the Bush Administration. They want to blame President Obama for the sluggish economy but it is a direct result of the Bush tax cuts and Bush’s war of choice putting us in a ginormous hole, budget wise, limiting the amount of help that the government can provide.

      I am not panicking but it does make me sad. Kids nowadays don’t understand, like we do, that staying out of war is a big huge deal and that you need someone who can navigate foreign policy … to them foreign policy is boring!! So in some ways, those who say that we should let the Republicans win so that people will see how awful it can be, have a point (although a terrible “solution”) – in times of relative peace, we forget the horrors of war. In times of relative prosperity, we forget the recession and people losing their jobs and their homes. How do you put that into a narrative? You probably can’t without breaking out the “in my day, we used to walk to school 10 miles in the snow … uphill both ways!” stories. And those won’t work.

      • Unfortunately, Jan, when the pendulum “swings back,” as it is doing with Rethug-dominated legislatures, the rights don’t automatically return when the Dems get control again. They just don’t. Every battle would have to be fought AGAIN, like the right to abortion, the right to contraception, the right to vote.

        That’s why it’s too dangerous to “let a Republican win.”

    • Gail Collins on the generational issue:

      Still, the idea of a woman as president is a very important marker for people who grew up in a time when medical schools had tiny quotas for female students, newspapers had “help wanted” ads that divided everything by sex and half the population could get credit only in their husband’s or father’s name. Younger women don’t seem to share that yearning, and there are wounded feelings on both sides.

      This is hardly the first time progressive women have had a generational conflict. Once women won the right to vote, the older suffragists wanted to keep battling for equal rights, while many of their juniors felt they had other things to do. “‘Feminism’ has become a term of opprobrium to the modern young woman,” wrote Dorothy Dunbar Bromley in a famous 1927 essay that suggested militants of the old school had a demoralizing tendency to wear unflattering shoes. […]

      Listening to Sanders wow a crowd in New Hampshire, I remembered a 2007 speech Clinton made in her first New Hampshire primary campaign. She called for an end to a tax loophole known as “carried interest” that’s beloved by hedge fund managers. Clinton wasn’t the first candidate on that particular bus, but what struck me was the time she took to explain how the system worked and how she was going to change it. She was totally fearless when it came to risking boredom in pursuit of an issue. […]

      The women who grew up in Clinton’s time thought of a female president as a distant, glorious achievement, like going to the moon. Then the moon landing happened, but they still couldn’t get a car loan in their own names.

      It took almost 40 more years before a woman won a major presidential primary. That was, of course, Clinton in 2008 in New Hampshire. She didn’t win the election, but she was so credible, and finished so strong, that the nation came away believing a woman in the White House was a completely normal idea.

      If the younger voters who are flocking to Bernie Sanders don’t share their elders’ intense feelings about needing to elect a woman president right now, it’s partly because Hillary Clinton helped create a different world.

    • One more, then I have to drag myself away from the bright-shiny objects on the Internet.

      Michelle Goldberg: I used to hate Hillary. Now I’m voting for her.

      I spent much of the 2008 Democratic primary season furious at both Clinton and the second-wave feminists who tried to guilt young women into voting for her. In Barack Obama, I thought, America had the chance to elect a transcendent figure, a person who promised so much more than the relentless triangulation of Bill Clinton’s disillusioning presidency. It was inexplicable to me that, presented with Obama, anyone could prefer Bill Clinton’s wife. Mocking Obama’s promise to unite the country, Hillary Clinton said then, “The skies will open, the light will come down, celestial choirs will be singing, and everyone will know we should do the right thing and the world will be perfect.” She didn’t just fail to inspire—she seemed to sneer at the whole idea of inspiration. […]

      It is strange, then, to find myself, eight years later, not only rooting for Clinton, but feeling exasperated by her left-wing critics. I know their case against Clinton. I agree with a lot of it. I worry about what Clinton’s many flaws would mean for a potential presidency. Now, however, watching her be rejected by young people swept up in an idealistic political movement, I feel sadness instead of glee.

      Partly, this is because circumstances have changed. The Clinton of 2008 was running for her husband’s third term, touting her record as first lady as a qualification. Since then, she’s carved out a distinct record as secretary of state. She is running as a continuation of the Obama administration; the fact that she’s married to Bill Clinton is almost immaterial.

      THIS!!

      Perhaps most significantly, Clinton is running against a very different opponent this time around. Barack Obama is an epochal political talent who promised to expand the Democratic coalition. Bernie Sanders is a mensch whose politics are more or less my own, but I’m convinced he’d be eviscerated in a general election. I know that the Sanders camp believes they can turn out people who’ve become alienated from the political process. As long as I’ve been following politics, it has been a left-wing fantasy that legions of disconnected non-voters will suddenly flood the polls if they’re offered a sufficiently progressive candidate. I’ve never seen anything save wishful thinking to back it up.

      More:

      I don’t blame Clinton for building a carapace around her true self. There is no person in America who has been subject to such constant, withering public dissection. Tens of thousands of words have been devoted to sneering at her hairstyles. She’s been jeered at for her laugh, her wrinkles, her ankles, her clothes. The entire planet knows that her husband cheated on her. The media proclaims, over and over again, that people simply don’t like her (though she was recently voted the most admired woman in the world for a record 20th time). Of course she has trouble letting down her guard! Without an enormous capacity for self-protection, how would she have survived a level of public ridicule that would have driven any other woman insane?

      Here is where the generations split:

      For a progressive, how you reconcile conflicting truths about Clinton depends, to some extent, on how much you empathize with her. Supporting Clinton means justifying the thousands of concessions she’s made to the world as it is, rather than as we want it to be. Doing this is easier, I think, when you are older, and have made more concessions yourself. Indeed, sometimes it feels like to defend Clinton is to defend middle age itself, with all its attenuated expectations and reminders of the uselessness of hindsight.

  2. Forecasts are interesting – mine says today will be just like yesterday. Except yesterday it was 12 degrees colder at dawn – but we are targeting the same high of 55, so just like yesterday, right? Sigh.

    I wish I could think of a less “condescending” way to ask this of our youth – it’s a question I used to ask a lot when I was teaching 15 y.o.s and my own kids were still in or just barely out of their teens. “How do we teach our children the responsibility we have learned without them having to go through the deprivation we did to learn it?” For years I got a “you just hate kids” response – until my older son was 28 and had a kid of his own. Then he said, “Mom, you can’t.” At this point I talk to the ones willing to listen and hope for the best. BTW – the “best” or at least a little bit of the best came yesterday when I was talking to a undergrad (I was notarizing some stuff for her) about these kinds of things and asked her advice. She said, “Well, you can’t tell people my age these things, but I can.” I thanked her politely, but my heart was singing!

  3. Good morning, 41 and mostly clear in Bellingham today. My thoughts are with family today as Ryan sees the hip specialists this morning, and needless to say we’re all hoping for a treatment and pain management plan that will help him recover faster. He’s doing his best to cope but the combination of ongoing pain, crutches, and inactivity is an understandable challenge for him. The grand girls called Ron last night to arrange a birthday surprise for him so he’s picking them up after school and has a bemused smile, wondering what they have planned for him :)

    Jan, thank you for all the excellent links…..you are keeping us very well informed! Chris Hayes interviewed Michelle Goldberg last night and her comment re how the constraints HRC is under is preventing Sanders from being properly vetted has stayed with me. She has to be so careful in ways he just doesn’t.

      • I just read this older piece by Michelle Greenberg…….

         Can Hillary Clinton Win Over the Left?

        Whatever Clinton says, some will remain unconvinced. But in attempting to court progressive voters, Clinton isn’t adopting new positions; rather, she’s coming full circle. “I think her progressive résumé and her progressive roots are very, very strong,” says Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, a progressive stalwart who backed Barack Obama eight years ago but is now an enthusiastic Clinton supporter. “Not only has she decided to go back to her roots, but the time is different. This is a progressive moment, I believe.” What remains to be seen is whether Clinton, after all the ideological maneuvering required to climb in US politics during a very different time, will be able to seize it.

        How I hope shared progressive values will surpass the generational differences!

        • Rep. Jan Schakowsky is not a “moderate” by any means … she is a full throated liberal. But she is closer to our age than the 18-29 year olds who are telling us old feminists to get off their lawns. :) I hope we can convince them without turning them off.

  4. Woot, just went to the mailbox and there was my “absentee” ballot in the mail – I can cast my vote for HRC and mail it in tomorrow! I’m not sure why it’s an absentee ballot, I don’t have to prove I can’t get to the polls or anything, but I am so happy to get my vote in for her early!

    Jan, I didn’t mean to imply you were panicking – I was really just trying to reassure myself that I am not going to get worried yet. And I think the Sanders folks have not done themselves any favors today with the reactions on social media and elsewhere to the CBC endorsement of Hillary – do they seriously think accusing John Lewis of “selling out to get a fat position in the Clinton administration” is a smart move? wow.

    • I NEVER PANIC!!! :)

      Yes, I have been following the awful diss of John Lewis on Twitter. They really don’t care anymore … today Sen. Sanders called Barack Obama a failure as a leader.

      He has no political chops … he is dissing the base, the Obama coalition, the DNC … people he would need if he were the nominee. I don’t have a shred of respect left for him and that is a sad thing.

      • GOS is also a complete disgrace this afternoon – the responses on I think FirstAmendment’s diary on the John Lewis endorsement and statement about Sanders are just reprehensible. Not all of them, of course, but enough of them – not enough flags in the world to cover the awfulness. And of course, Twitter is even worse. I kind of feel like today was a “please proceed” kind of day for the Sanders campaign – by all means, sir, show us what you really think. A friend of mine is fond of quoting Oprah as saying “when someone insists on showing you who they are, you should have the good grace to listen”. There’s definitely some “show and tell” going on from Sanders supporters, for sure.

        • They used to have a DBAD rule which said that you must not go into someone else’s diary and be a jerk. It sounds like that rule is no longer operative.

          I agree with you: it was a “please proceed, Senator” kind of day and it rolled over into the debate. In my opinion, he did not respond well when confronted with his Obama dissing.

          You realize, of course, that the universe of BernieBros includes people who hate President Obama and a subset of those who hate him because he is black. Sanders opted to embrace one of them, Cornel West, and from the looks of Twitter, the racial component is very very prominent.

  5. Just dropped by to give the snail mail address if you want to send Hillary something that isn’t a check:

    Hillary for America
    P.O. Box 5256
    New York, NY 10185-5256

    Now it’s true I have no way of verifying that this is a real address – at least not unless/until I get a response to the Thank You card I sent :) – but this was in the HNV a couple of days back.

    • Thanks, bfitz, you are such a sweetheart! Have captured the address for my files—for a wonder, Apple Finder let me store it in the correct folder—so now I can write to her.

      • You’re welcome, of course. In a very real way the attacks on Hillary are attacks on us – early to mid-Boomer women – so it’s good to be able to let her know we really do have her back/stand in Solidarity with her.

        • In a very real way the attacks on Hillary are attacks on us – early to mid-Boomer women – so it’s good to be able to let her know we really do have her back/stand in Solidarity with her.

          Yes, that’s exactly how I feel!

  6. Good morning, meese! Friday …

    It is 15 degrees in Madison and that will be the daytime high as well. Morning clouds and afternoon sun in the forecast.

    It feels like Fried-day. I risked a sleepless night and watched the debate. So I went to bed past my bedtime and, as expected, I had debate images dancing through my head and couldn’t rest my brain.

    I tweeted and retweeted during the debate and lost a follower (I don’t know which one and don’t particularly care since I am more a follower than a followee) but I dread opening Twitter this morning in case a BernieBro found me and took exception. Here is Hillary’s close (p.s. my Wisconsin Tweeps liked the Scott Walker callout):


    I have some thoughts on the debate (and some favorited Tweets) that I will put in a longer comment or post later. My biggest takeaway: Sen. Sanders is on message so much that he sounds like a Marco Rubio doll “squeeze to hear the talking points”. If anyone had “millionaires and billionaires” in their debate drinking game, they are dead. RIP.

    Cliven Bundy was charged with enough felonies to put him in jail for 24 years. I wonder how they are going to handle the bail situation for him and his sons. I can’t imagine there is anyone who thinks that if they leave, they will peacefully return for their day in court.

    John Kerry announced that a cease-fire agreement was reached in Syria, to go into effect in a week. I just saw a statistic that said that 11% of the Syrian people have died in the conflict. :( I hope the cease-fire holds.

    Busy morning so I can’t linger. I just want to say, I stand with these guys … and those who stand up for them:

    See all y’all later!!

  7. Morning all – Jan, I had the same experience although I didn’t watch the debate live – I was following Armando’s twitter feed while I was raiding (don’t ask, it’s a WOW thing), and then watched some of it on the PBS website afterwards. I did get some sleep, but once I woke up at 5, couldn’t get back to sleep, so I just admitted defeat and got up. I’ll take a nap later – yay, no class today for me!

    I thought Hillary was terrific, and I just can’t see how a focus group in Nevada said Bernie was the winner – seriously, Hillary was cool and collected, in command of facts and her reactions, while Bernie fidgeted like a 5 year old in church and spouted his standard talking points over and over. I cannot see how it helps him that Hillary pretty much outed him on his disdain for President Obama – but then, I can’t see why anyone would think he’d be a capable President at all, so clearly I’m missing something.

    Yesterday’s internet reactions to the CBC and John Lewis endorsing Hillary were simply a disgrace, and I don’t think I can look at anything at GOS other than the Hillary’s Writer’s Circle stuff until after the primary season is over. And maybe not then – it was just a cesspool, almost as bad as some of the Twitter stuff I saw. I hope to god HRC gets clear and convincing victories in Nevada and SC, so she can start to wrap this thing up, because I’m not sure how much more I can take.

    Well, it’s another new day – and there was very good news yesterday outside the campaign. The Syrian ceasefire agreement (thank you, John Kerry for continuing to serve a country that slapped you in the face back in 2004) and the arrest of the Bundys were both great things to see, and, of course, who doesn’t love Einstein being proved right about gravitational waves, 100 years later!

    Have a good day everyone – today I will send in my ballot voting for Hillary in the Florida primary! Woot!

    • I didn’t watch either – followed a lot of it on twitter.
      Can’t tell you how disgusted I am with the trashing of John Lewis and the CBC.

      (WoW note – and I got Sultress to 100)

    • This was clear to me about Sanders: “I can’t see why anyone would think he’d be a capable President at all”.

      Funny you should say a fidgetty 5-year old … when he kept answering “millionaires and billionaires” I was thinking he was like a hyper-focused toddler who you cannot distract and will probably have a temper tantrum any minute. I thought he would explode when Hillary reminded him that he wanted to find someone to primary the sitting president of the party he caucuses with. “Low blow!”, he said. Twitter exploded with his exact quotes, from YouTube and articles at the time.

      He came across as a crabby old man and the look is not good on him. I hope people took note of the demeanor and asked themselves this question: do you want a guy this easily rattled with the nuclear codes? Maybe unfair but it isn’t a single issue world any more than it is a single issue country and Sen. Sanders is clearly out of his league.

    • That’s amazing, Geordie! Here in Virginia, you have to prove that you’ll be out of town or have leprosy or something before you can vote by absentee ballot.

      I like going to the polls with Dearly Beloved and Miss Pink Cheeks, though. I think it’s important for Miss PC to see democracy in action. :)

      • I used to take my baby to the polls for that very reason. Then she started school and because the dang elections are during the week, she can’t go.

        We have early voting here which is technically absentee voting but it is no-excuse-needed absentee. We have a certain number of days (reduced further this year by the Republicans) prior to the election when we can vote at city hall.

    • Didn’t watch – I’ll see what HNV says, but I know she was terrific because she always is. The Bernie crowd did not do their guy a favor when they insisted on more debates. But then admitting that would not only admit Bernie doesn’t do well in debates, it would also ruin their CT about the DNC and DWS tipping the scales for Hillary. Early voting starts in AR next Tuesday and if it’s not raining (or worse), I will be hiking down to the Court House to do so – definitely on the 1st day it’s not raining or worse. Kind of like the idea of casting my “Super Tuesday” vote before NV or SC. :)

  8. It is 8 degrees here in Saugerties with a wind chill warning till Sunday “Wind Chill readings, as low as 25 below to 40 below.”

    Brrrrrrrrrrrrr.

    It’s too cold in my drafty office to sit at the puter for long – so I am going to log off
    Seeyas

    • We have a wind-chill advisory posted for the weekend with 25 to 30 below wind chills predicted for tomorrow morning. I was kind of hoping for an early spring that would start right after Imbolc. We will barely get above freezing for at least the next week. :(

  9. Good morning, Meese, and may I say, thank Goddess it’s Freya’s day! It’s 19 F. on a freezing grayish morning here in NoVa, going up to 31 whole degrees Fahrenheit later, with flurries. This weekend will be so cold, with highs in the 20s, that I’ve abandoned the plan for Miss Pink Cheeks and me to deliver the Girl Scout cookies to our buyers. That will have to wait until a warmer weekend.

    Very happy to hear the news about Syria (yes, thank you, John Kerry!), and especially that relief will be on the way within 24 hours. Things get uglier and uglier—now EU boats are going to patrol the Aegean to turn back would-be Syrian refugees. Also hope the book will be thrown at the Bundys. They deserve it.

    Was sickened last night by the fact that every Witch I know (except one, in Maryland) is feeling the bern. I thought about suspending my FB account, but realized I couldn’t because of my monthly advertising for my Web site. So from now on I’ll conduct a daily search for my friend’s name so I can read his daily poem, and that will be that. I’ve hidden and unfollowed so many people on FB in the last couple of days, I’m not sure I have any friends left there.

    I more or less watched the first hour of the debate last night while keeping an eye on my spy thriller. I’m sick of debates, sick of The Bern, and sick of GOS. Will try to find something else to occupy the narrow space above my eyes. The young mothers I hobnob with (they’re being much nicer to me this year) at Daisy meetings never read newspapers nor watch the news on telly. I don’t bring up politics with them.

    Well, a year ago today I was rushed to the E.R. with that mini-stroke. A year later I’m required to wolf down all sorts of pills daily, but I have less stress (no baby care) and more rest. Wishing a good day to all at the Pond and Beyond!

    • I am glad you made it through that medical emergency!! We need you on the earthly plane, thank you very much.

      I am shocked that witches are feeling the Bern. Is it gender-based or both men and women? I do know that many of my old time witchy friends are also anti-war anti-globalist and might find Senator Sanders’ message of shutting down the banks and redistributing the wealth (and promising to never ever war!) attractive. But they might want to consider that we need the world community if we are going to save the planet from burning up and neo-isolationism won’t get us there. Saving the planet is a very witchy thing. :)

      • The Witches to whom I refer are both genders, and a lot of them are not much younger than I—they’re in the Boomer generation. The hatred shown to Hillary makes me want to redouble my efforts to influence Miss Pink Cheeks so she will grow up to appreciate other women. It’s the reason I’m so adamant about her being in Girl Scouts. The unspoken benefits she’ll receive (and give) will help her in later life.

    • Happy anniversary – very happy you’re here to celebrate it! I wonder how many people will remember that Hillary is the one who’s been calling for that ceasefire for months? Not sure what to say about your Witch friends feeling the Bern – which even as a phrase should give Witches pause. What I recommend for dealing with young folks is to lay out Hillary’s plan for whatever they are concerned about without telling them it’s Hillary’s plan. If the plan doesn’t win them, I let it drop. If it does, I tell them whose plan it is.

      • Ha!!! “Witch friends feeling the Bern – which even as a phrase should give Witches pause”. Indeed!!!!

        Last night’s debate gave us our missing hook, I think:

        We do not live in a single-issue country.

        Add to that “We do not live in a single-issue world” or perhaps a “sound-bite world”, and we are there.

        That will work in both the primary, which, please goddess, I hope does not last much longer, and in the general election.

        Hillary wins on experience: political experience, experience watching how Congress functions, how the levers of power are worked, how the economy works, how business works, how foreign policy works – how the media treats people. So when you say “not a single-issue country” you are keying up “you need someone who has a plan to deal with these issues, to stand with you on these issues, to solve the problems”. That lets her be the policy-wonk that she is while not completely losing people in the weeds.

        So on Day One (that famous day when Republican presidents – and maybe Bernie Sanders – would repeal the entire Obama Administration), she walks into the Oval Office with the confidence that comes from experience.

        (play some fine American music here)

        • Steve Benen at Rachel’s blog: Clinton finally knows what she wants to say about Bernie Sanders

          For the former Secretary of State, President Obama is both sword and shield. When pressed on some of the more controversial aspects of her record, Clinton notes the similarities between her and the president – effectively daring Sanders to condemn Obama directly. When given the opportunity to go on the offensive, Clinton uses Obama to question the independent senator’s loyalty and commitment to a Democratic agenda.

          It’s a message that played well among Dems in Milwaukee, but just as importantly, it’s likely to land on fertile soil in South Carolina, where Democrats give the president a 93% approval rating.

          93%. The Democratic Party base is not anti-Obama.

          And this:

          Clinton seems to believe she can start using this specificity against Sanders, characterizing him as a “single-issue candidate.” Clinton hopes Democrats start to see Sanders, who has admitted more than once that his campaign is doing far better than even he expected, as a protest candidate highlighting the issue he cares most about – which isn’t necessarily bad, but which doesn’t necessarily make him presidential material, either.

          The White House is about breadth and complexity, the argument goes, and even if you agree with Sanders, it’s hard to deny his principal focus [is] on the one issue that drives and motivates him.

          • I was thinking more of a John Philips Sousa march. ;)

            I listen occasionally to the Stephanie Miller Show and she often asks her producer to cue up “fine American music” for a particularly stirring political statement. I always think of brass and marching bands.

  10. Our bizarrely warm weather continues. It’s going to “cool down” over the weekend — high Sunday only around 73. I’ve got my capris & t-shirt already set out. Baked potato for dinner tonight & tomorrow. I will be so glad when Sunday is over.

    Hozier is donating all proceeds from his next single to domestic violence charities, so if you use iTunes: https://twitter.com/Hozier/status/698093378358157312

    My earworm is still my boys singing California. And I’m still excited from yesterday’s gravity waves news. So cool. And all the super happy scientists — several admitted to tears. A whole new kind of astronomy. Observations not dependent on the electromagnetic spectrum.

  11. 27 at dawn, 31 now, heading for 52 “cooler than yesterday” and sunny. Got messes to clean up at work but every single one of them is waiting for information back from somebody. Sigh. Will do HNV, HWC, Pootie diary (and the quilt sisters call for more messages for swampyankee’s quilt) – that’s it for GOS. I don’t know if Kos is going to be able to get the site back after this. I hope so as we’ve done a lot of good work for down-ballot races, but… Anyway, got to make some phone calls in the hopes of getting some of that information I need. Have a good Friday and stay warm. {{{HUGS}}}

    • I am not sure when the site owner would be able to declare it “over”. The Bernmovement, which is so “passionate”, will not disappear after Super Tuesday even if their candidate is thumped. They will instead promote conspiracy theories about stolen elections and fingers on the scale and blahblahblah. My guess is that the fumes from the Bernoff will not dissipate until after the convention at the end of July.

      Heck, maybe not until November 8th if third party promotions spring up.

  12. Good morning, 52 and cloudy in Bellingham today. I’ve been so forgetful this week…..missed appointments with my Dr and my hairdresser. Both were graciously rescheduled, but I’ve got to pay more attention to the details of daily life.

    Ryan had another MRI yesterday so the extent of his hip injury is still being diagnosed. The specialist is hoping to rule out a fracture that may involve a growth plate. So they now wait until next Wed to know the results. He did give him a deep pain blocking shot and that helped. But needless to say this is very hard for him, and for all of us. I’m so glad I got the Valentine/feel better package mailed though. Knowing he ended his day building with the Star Wars Lego set and listening to music helped me. We had a good talk about coping with adversity, and all the ways that doing so makes us stronger….even when it’s a miserable and scary experience.

    And I’m relieved to report Ava and I got the rag doll made, so now we just have the yarn hair and clothes to go. I had forgotten to buy stuffing so Ava raided some of Heide’s more chewed toys……the doll will have doggy appeal!

    And then we watched the debate. Bernie needs to be careful about the Bernie Bot approach to debating. His answers are becoming very predictable. I don’t know how the Nevada vote will go, but this article about HRC’s campaign manager is interesting.

    Clinton’s Secret Weapon in Nevada Could Launch Her Comeback

    Time for the pool, and then my rescheduled hair cut. I forgot the laundry yesterday too, so my swim suit is wet…yuck!

    • That’s right, Robbie Mook cut his teeth on Nevada politics. I was reading something about how Nevada is not a gimme for Secretary Clinton. While it has many more people of color than Iowa and New Hampshire, it is still 80% white. The unions will be huge there and I think that the endorsements have been split pretty close to even.

      So no spiking the football!

  13. I’m getting worried (not panicking just yet but worried) about this children’s crusade for Bernie, which appears to be drawing in not just millenials but some older folks too, as Diana pointed out about her Witch acquaintances, and as I see in a couple of my friends in their 40’s and 50’s. I understand the enormous appeal of “something to believe”, the pull of aspirational politics that just looks at the big picture, cheering for the desired end result without worrying overmuch about the nitpicky details of how to actually get there. But I’m seeing too many similarities between Trump and Sanders’ enthusiastic supporters – the allure of the new, although in Trump’s case not new so much as the gamour of TV celebrity and wealth, and the basic simplicity of message. Very different messages, of course, but I was just aghast at Bernie’s claim last night that race relations would be so much better under him than under Obama because….more jobs? Fewer banks? or something. It’s such lightweight stuff, but comforting for a lot of white people, at least, because it doesn’t require anything of them, just demonization of the Bad Banks.

    And now I read stuff about Bernie appealing not just to white millenials but to young black and Latino millenials as well, I guess on the same “look, shiny object, things will be better trust me” program. I’m not sure how Hillary competes with that, in the reality based campaign she is running. She looks like the teacher who will make you work hard as opposed to the Bernie Wizard of Oz call to just follow him down the yellow brick road to a better future.

    Finally, with the latest open campaigning against President Obama that Sanders and his supporters have started, I am beginning to think that Bernie’s object now, if not at the beginning of his campaign, is the destruction of the Democratic Party as part of his People’s Crusade. I don’t know if Debbie Wasserman Schultz is the right person to fight that – and if Bernie crashes in NV and SC, presumably it won’t go anywhere. But it’s worrisome to me.

    • Children’s Crusade is exactly what it is – and will have the same result (figuratively speaking). Worse than the Pied Piper (also figuratively speaking). As to the destroying the Party, well, that’s kind of what I was wondering when he declared in the first place. And I gotta say, I don’t think the white electorate is going to wake up. It is totally going to be up to the PoC folks to keep this country from turning into a nuclear-armed failed fascist state.

    • Amanda Terkel from HuffPo: Hillary Clinton Is The Ultimate ‘No’ Woman

      It’s hard to inspire others when you’re tasked with figuring out how to get things done.

      This isn’t a fun position to be in. It’s hard, after all, to inspire people when you’re telling everyone why a popular proposal isn’t practical. And Clinton, predictably, has been struggling to attract idealistic progressives — especially young people — who are fed up with the current system and want to see change. […]

      “Men are the guys who want to go out and buy the motorcycle and women are the purse-string holders,” said Jay Newton-Small, a Time Magazine journalist and author of Broad Influence: How Women Are Changing the Way America Works. “It’s a very traditional role we are putting women into by making them the one saying, ‘no, we can’t do all these really fun things.'”

      Clinton likely came to Washington with far more idealism than she now displays. But her experience with the political machine has worn her down — particularly the bruising health care battle she had in the 1990s. In those days, Clinton was known as the liberal in her husband’s White House and often pushed top officials to be more progressive.

      And now, in her exchanges with Sanders, she often invokes her experiences to explain why single-payer is unrealistic.

      The thing is that Bernie Sanders has never tried to turn his ideology into policy. So he can continue to claim how great it will be with no proof whatsoever that it is doable. And his proposals aren’t just changes around the edges, they are massive upheavals.

      He is the Disney Dad, bringing ice cream for the kids after mom said no.

      • I was married to one of those “Disney Dads” – who also usually emotionally but sometimes physically abused the boys, especially the elder. And one of those abuses was to bring home the treat and give it to the younger boy. That’s what Bernie is doing. He’s bringing home the treat for the white males. The rest of us are supposed to respect him for that because reasons. No, thanks. I was spineless enough to put my elder son through 5 years of that crap. After that we may have been, actually were, poor but even if it was a single scoop of ice cream, we shared it equally. And Hillary’s going to be able to share equally a lot more than a single scoop between us.

  14. Of course, just as I get worried, Bernie goes and pulls a dumb move that once again displays his utter tonedeafness on racial issues and his inability to handle challenges in a public forum – in a “community forum on Black America” tonight in Minnesota, he actually suggested reparations could be a “white issue” and Latino, not just black. Twitter erupted, as you might expect – I don’t think he understands the reparations issue at all. This report from Politico also says the hall was not even full, something he’s not used to at this point.

    http://www.politico.com/story/2016/02/bernie-sanders-black-community-forum-219232

      • Ta-Nehisi Coates said that Sen. Sanders did not understand reparations but would vote for him anyway so to some, it’s no big deal if the President of the United States is freaking clueless.

        Here is the poll that Geordie saw about black youth:

        African Americans support former Secretary of State Clinton by more than a 3-to-1 margin nationwide, but among young blacks 18 to 29 years old, that margin shrinks to 46 percent for Clinton versus 33 percent for Sanders, according to recent Reuters/Ipsos polling.

        Well, first of all that is still a pretty big gap. What is more troubling (and perhaps illuminating) is that they are drawn to Cornel West. I would like to see that breakdown in age to how those who came of age in the Obama years voted. It could be a case of “what have you done for me lately?” or maybe the symbol of First Black President has worn off and it is okay to support the guy who wants to repeal it all. But this is pretty funny (as in sad funny):

        Travis Pascoe, 25, a second-year graduate student at Claflin. He said Sanders’ plans for reducing inequality by taxing the wealthy and expanding Medicare to cover all Americans should resonate with the black community.

        It is not a plan. It is a “chicken in every pot”, the epitome of the impossible to attain campaign promise.

  15. Good morning, meese! Saturday …

    It is -2 in Madison, on its way up to 9. Sunny skies are in the forecast.

    Former Gov. Jim Gilmore has officially dropped out of the GOP presidential race. Hey, it must be important … 3 of my newsfeeds reported it!! Tonight the rest of the boys face off again in advance of the South Carolina primary. We are down to Trump, Cruz, Bush, Rubio, Kasich, and Carson. South Carolina will be the great winnowing for the GOP so tonight’s debate is important for at least 2 of those men. Apparently, South Carolina has picked the Republican nominee every election year since 1980 – except for 2012 when they picked Newt Gingrich. Which actually rendered it as meaningless as Iowa as a bellwether.

    Madeleine Albright penned an op-ed about her damnable comment. I laughed out loud at her intro:

    I have spent much of my career as a diplomat. It is an occupation in which words and context matter a great deal. So one might assume I know better than to tell a large number of women to go to hell.

    Ha! It is an excellent commentary, if you missed it.

    The government announced that regular airline traffic to Cuba will be restored with a pact to be signed on Tuesday. Expect Rubio to say that on Day One, he will repeal it.

    See all y’all later!

  16. Good Saturn’s Day morning, Meese, and may you all stay warm—except anotherdemocrat, who must stay cool. It’s 20 F. here in NoVa on a mixed day of sun and clouds, and that’s our high for the day.

    Don’t see why Madeleine Albright should have to apologize, but there you are. The media have a collective IQ of -30, so things have to be patiently explained to them, while the rest of us have already moved on.

    Not feeling happy about politics this morning. Decided not to deactivate my FB account, but I did log out. Thought about going to the gym this morning but have an unexpected babysitting assignment, so will do that. Too cold today for anything but chili tonight, followed by fresh pineapple. Hope everyone will have a good day!

    • Ha! It’s in the 50s this morning, I’ll wear a sweater to go hang with my team. Won’t need it this afternoon.

    • Politics will get better, Diana! It is a good idea to get away from the toxic naysaying out in the blogosphere occasionally. Right now there is a disturbance in the force.

      I agree that Secretary Albright did not have to apologize. But it gave her another opportunity to share parts of her life story and her hopes for women today:

      I do want to explain why I so firmly believe that, even today, women have an obligation to help one another. In a society where women often feel pressured to tear one another down, our saving grace lies in our willingness to lift one another up. And while young women may not want to hear anything more from this aging feminist, I feel it is important to speak to women coming of age at a time when a viable female presidential candidate, once inconceivable, is a reality. […]

      I share these stories not to bemoan how hard my life has been. It’s turned out pretty well. What concerns me is that if we do not pay careful attention to this history, the gains we have fought so hard for could be lost, and we could move backward. I do not have a magic formula for how every woman should live her life, but I do know that we need to give one another a hand.

      The battle for gender equality is still being waged, and it will be easier if we have a woman who prioritizes these issues in the Oval Office and if the gender balance among elected officials reflects that of our country. When women are empowered to make decisions, society benefits. They will raise issues, pass bills and put money into projects that men might overlook or oppose.

      • Thanks, Jan, for the Madeleine Albright explanation. This struck a chord:

        I feel it is important to speak to women coming of age at a time when a viable female presidential candidate, once inconceivable, is a reality.

        No girl in 1956 would ever have conceived of such an event. Ever.

  17. Up to go have breakfast tacos with my team then go to the expo & packet pick up. That’s today. Really early dinner & bed tonight.

  18. Morning all! Sunny and cool here today – and as always, opera this afternoon! It’s a warhorse by Verdi, Il Trovatore, not a huge favorite of mine, but the wonderful baritone Dmitri Hvorostovsky (glad I just have to type it and not say it) is singing, so I will definitely tune in. In addition to having a wonderful voice, he is a VERY sexy man, with a dramatic head of white hair (prematurely white, I think he’s in his 40’s or at the most 50’s), so I will need to have a picture of him up on the monitor to stare at while he sings! lol

    You know that saying “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence [or was it taste] of the American public”? Well, I can’t think of a politician who’s lost a race by promising pie in the sky that he can’t deliver on and that’s what Bernie is doing. It’s infuriating – but if Hillary can tune her message to focus on the positives SHE is promising, just because they are attainable, maybe that will offset some of the “mommy says no, daddy says yes” dynamic that’s build up.

    I really thought the reparations gaffe last night was revealing of his limited understanding of not just racism, but history and the realities of racial slavery as THE building block of this country. It wasn’t just insensitivity – it was out and out ignorance of what slavery was about, as he cast it as just one more aspect of poverty that affects Latinos and whites as well. I know every candidate makes mistakes, but that one just really appalled me.

    I do think Sanders’ charms should begin to wear off the more he’s forced to actually deal with people challenging him in public – those young people at that forum last night clearly made him very uncomfortable, ill at ease, and his natural irritability that is just under the skin erupted. To me it was one more demonstration that he doesn’t have the temperament to be President.

    It’s clear he loves the adoring young crowds he’s drawn through the campaign – – but put him outside that zone, into a neutral or questioning group, and he really cannot handle it well. Not that anyone is super comfortable surrounded by people questioning their policies and capabilities – but hey, Hillary’s been in that position most of her adult life (see, e.g., Benghazi hearings) and she knows how to deal with it. Bernie really doesn’t, so I hope we see more events that pull him out of his bubble of adoration.

    Have a great day everyone – and when the politics start to get to you, just turn off the social media, Diana, put on some great music and think of better days to come!

    • This!

      … those young people at that forum last night clearly made him very uncomfortable, ill at ease, and his natural irritability that is just under the skin erupted.

      He loves the adoring crowds in the big venues, where his angry voice fills the auditoriums, and the cheering buoys him. But in a smaller forum, one on one, he is just grumpy … and in the case of that panel … when questioned closely, not at all conversant in history. It is easy for a white Northeastern liberal to miss the larger picture; but then he shouldn’t act like Bernie-ism is the answer for everything.

      Someone on Twitter pointed out that he is trying to appeal to white Republicans, the ones upset by the presidency of Barack Obama. He is certainly free to do so but don’t run in our party. Maybe he and Jim Webb can team up and overwhelmingly win the butthurt white vote.

    • Here is a Florida paper endorsing Hillary Clinton. I wondered why they were endorsing now but then realized that you guys are early voting (I saw it on the Internet!!)

      Clinton’s record as a pragmatic progressive should be beyond question, and so should her resilience.

      Sanders, the U.S. senator from Vermont and self-described socialist, virtually tied Clinton in Iowa and easily won in New Hampshire by exploiting voter frustration with income inequality and stalemate in Washington. His calls for revolutionary change are as tantalizing to liberal voters as they are unrealistic, particularly in today’s polarized politics. His proposals for a single-payer health care system and free college tuition are expensive fantasies. His lack of a coherent foreign policy and tendency toward isolationist positions are particularly concerning. There is no indication Sanders is prepared to effectively protect the United States from terrorists or manage the complicated relationships this nation must nurture around the world.

      Clinton has been battle-tested, and she is better prepared to be president than when she lost to Obama in the 2008 primaries. The fight for the Democratic nomination may last far longer than anticipated, but only Clinton can win in November and is prepared for the nation’s highest office. For the Democratic nomination for president, the Tampa Bay Times recommends Hillary Clinton.

      • Yep, I’m putting my ballot in the mail today! That’s a really nice endorsement writeup, clearly explaining the problem with Bernie as well as Hillary’s positives.

  19. Good morning, 45 and cloudy in Bellingham. Heavy and very loud rain woke me up in the night, so then I worried about the basement but I when I checked this morning it’s dry….yay! I’ll still keep the path to the floor drains clear but it’s a relief to know the old pipes are doing their job again.

    I’m going to make some valentine arrangements today, using salal, red twig dogwood, curly willow, ivy, and potted primroses for spring color. I have a miniature garden look in mind…..hope I can make it happen. We all have covered porches so outdoor arrangements last a long time and bring spring to the porch.

    Hope everyone’s Saturday is comfortable and has some fun moments.

  20. Hi Meeses – 28 at dawn, 38 now, and heading for 48. Sunny but a little hazy so far. Trish still having health problems so I’m basically online more (or trying to be online more) to stay in touch. I guess I’m lucky in that the GOS and MM are my only “social media” – and I’ve collapsed both the wreck list and the most shared list, go straight to my stream when I log on. Lots of decent news in teh Hillary diaries which is nice. I mostly stay out of the comment sections except in HNV. As I posted somewhere, you can’t have a meaningful conversation with people who refuse to address the points of the diary. Hope everyone manages to stay comfortable, be that warm or cool. I’ll be very in and out, between the internet going down and my Saturday chores :)

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