FEIDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2025
Gabriel Conroy's thoughts: Yes, it's the third Friday of the new and improved "every third Friday" medical cycle.
Despite that fact, we thought we'd be able to sneak away, at 10 a.m., to continue our look at Joyce's treatment of (metaphorical) "paralysis" and (metaphorical) "death." But given how way leads on to way, a minor, time-consuming complexification arose.
We do believe that Dubliners can help us contemporary Americans see ourselves as we currently actually are. We'll return to that task, most likely tomorrow, as we continue to ponder what Gretta Conroy's husband said, even if only internally:
The air of the room chilled his shoulders. He stretched himself cautiously along under the sheets and lay down beside his wife. One by one they were all becoming shades. Better pass boldly into that other world, in the full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age.
I fade and wither dismally.
ReplyDeleteWhat a coincidence. So does Somerby.
DeleteMe, too.
DeleteEveryone does eventually. Where's the coincidence?
DeleteGlad that Bob clarified that it's Blue America that's metaphorically dead, not the entire country. IMO there are three big reasons.
ReplyDelete1. Blue America succeeded almost too well. They got civil rights laws, welfare programs, substantially government health coverage and a great many other programs. There's nothing much left for Dems to offer.
2. Trump is a master showman and incredibly active. Almost every day, he says or does something that dominates the news. Today it's changing DOD to DOW.
3. Government programs over-expanded. Many are inefficient, The combination is unaffordable. Thus the Reps do have a relevant issue.
Checks notes, Trump disappeared for a week a couple days ago you lying piece of fascist fucking shit. They pump him full of stimulants, paint his face orange, grease his hair plugs, wheel out the teleprompter, and wheel him out to the applause of his corrupt loser cabinet aka N Korea to shower him with what a great man this demented old fool be. Fuck you lying David the fucking fascist prick.
DeleteAlso too, why are Republicans actively working to undue these successful programs "and a great many other programs" instead of working to enhance them like a party of non fuck sticks would?
When something is broken, it makes more sense to fix it than to throw it away. The people who throw things away when they get annoyed with them are the billionaires, who do not live in the same reality as the rest of us in the real world.
DeleteWe don't throw people away. We do not throw away institutions. We do not rewrite and destroy our history because it doesn't meet someone's fantasy notions. We don't shoot puppies because they are slow learners and we don't erase black people from museums because we think they are stoopid (or we're ashamed of our role in their history). Trump throws away wives who displease him. He only likes things that are gold, and he doesn't care where they came from (i.e., other people's medals and trophies). He makes the women on his staff do cosmetic surgery in order to audition for cabinet jobs and he deliberately humiliates anyone who shows independence. That is what billionaires do, but we are not a billionaire nation. We are normal people trying to spread the prosperity around in order to produce a good life for the many. That's concept Trump does not understand.
I doesn't matter whether Trump had sex with Epstein's party girls or whether he just egged him on and admired his enterprise. Trump is not impressed with Stephen J Hawking (because he has no idea how physics works) but he is impressed with the way Epstein could wheel and deal those teenagers to a bunch of famous people. Because Trumps loves despots and dictators and cruelty above all. Putin is his new bff because he has people pushed out of windows.
So, David, how can you find the tinest shred of admirable behavior in a person as depraved as Trump, someone so antithetical to American values that he wants to remake America into a third world dictatorship? There is nothing good there. Your little lists show the pathetic lack of soul you carry around in your empty skull.
We throw long-winded commenters away.
Delete"3. Government programs over-expanded. Many are inefficient, The combination is unaffordable."
ReplyDeleteSolution: Wreck FEMA and the CDC. Eliminate USAID. Put anti-science loons in charge of HHS.
And make ICE one of the world's largest armies!
Who do you blame for making the US army so large in 1942? Roosevelt, or Hitler and Tojo? I'd say its the latter.
DeleteSimilarly, one could blame Biden for a huge ICE army, because Biden created the need for a huge ICE army.
I blame Stalin.
Delete
DeleteNow Biden is Tojo?
Get help.
"one could blame Biden for a huge ICE army"
DeleteThis is pitiful. In my youth, conservatives lectured us about personal responsibility. Now their mantra is: "Trump gets credit for the good and Biden gets blame for the bad!"
Biden created the need for a huge ICE army.
DeleteIt's worse than I thought.
DiC - I guess Trump should fire the new Commissioner of the BLS, right? It's starting to look pretty scary -- a measly 22K new jobs in August, and a negative 21K jobs in revisions. We may be staring into the abyss here. I'm starting to get chills.
ReplyDeleteGeorge - Your comment could be interpreted to imply that Trump NOT firing the new Commissioner of BLS demonstrates Trump's integrity.
DeleteReally?
DeleteSimon Rosenberg has a substack essay today that shows the favorability ratings for Trump, or should I say unfavorability ratings. Nearly a majority of Americans (46%) now strongly disapprove of Trump's performance as president. That is not including the people who somewhat disapprove (another 9%). Americans also strongly support vaccination in general (70+ of Republicans and 80+ of swing voters). So RFK Jr.'s antics are not playing well with American voters.
ReplyDeleteRosenberg says:
"This analysis supports what I’ve been arguing here - that a very large percentage of the country is no longer available to Trump and the Republicans, and that it may [be] impossible now for him to build broad support for any of his initiatives, regardless of their virtue. This data also suggests that pro-democracy forces have an awful lot of energized people that they can channel into protests, election volunteer work, info warring and donating. This intensity has been showing up in our overperformances in special and local elections this year and is an explanation for why Trump has been so desperately trying to find ways to blunt our advantage in the mid-term elections next year. They have real pollsters and see what we are seeing."
This data does not support Somerby's moaning and groaning over death and paralysis, especially on the left.
https://www.hopiumchronicles.com/p/the-reckoning-for-trumps-idiocy-extremism
I am ashamed of our country for changing the DOD to DOW and shooting suspected drug dealers dead without due process in international waters. If other countries did that to us, no amateur boaters could load up for a round-the-world sail without fearing for their lives. Trump says they are terrorist drug cartels, but how can anyone know that without evidence and due process to protect the innocent? If Trump has the technology to ID drug dealers at sea, he should have the technology to arrest and try those guys for their crimes.
ReplyDeleteNot to mention the tens of millions spent to illegally blow up a dinghy.
DeleteThe idea is to get us used to seeing this sort of thing. Get us rooting for the home team.
DeleteTrump is very good at getting his opponents to take unpopular positions. Defending drug smugglers. Defending men in girls' sports and locker rooms. Defending crime. Defending illegal immigration. Defending cartel members. That's why Dem popularity is dropping like a stone.
DeleteOnly 33 percent of voters hold a favorable view of Democrats, with a meager 8 percent holding a “very favorable” opinion, for a net negative favorability of 30 percentage points.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/26/democrats-approval-rating-poll-00478141
You fucking weirdos are only popular in your own weird minds and weird polls. Fucking weirdo fascists, nobody wants your busybody bullshit. Fuck off.
DeleteYou are a really warped fucked up in the head jerkoff, Dic.
Delete“ Defending drug smugglers”
DeleteLet me take this as an illustration of twisted ie Republican or shall I say Trumpian logic. Because Democrats and well, others, frankly, don’t believe in summary executions of people suspected of a crime, executions carried out in international waters, that equates in your warped mind, DiC, with “Democrats support drug smugglers.” You all do this deliberately to destroy discourse and quash dissent. As an added bonus, Trump and his administration lie about just about everything. Remember the photoshopped MS-13 tattoo? How or why would you trust them to inform you of the facts?
My car is not maximally efficient, if it ever was. Shall I just park it by the side of the road and walk home? My daughter missed two questions on her latest math test. Shall I trade her in for an orphan from China? Maybe I'll just tell her she will never be an actuary. What is that saying that is always aimed at Democrat: "Perfect is the enemy of good." It means that perfectionism is no excuse for not trying to solve our nation's problems.
ReplyDeleteBut we all know that "inefficiency" is not the reason why DOGE dismantled govt agencies. They are implementing an ideology that wishes to shift govt functions to private entities so they can make money off them. Private schools, private weather services, private wealth management of pensions for the elderly. And of course, more inflation, less affordability of necessary services that people currently rely on, and greater inefficiency because when greed is involved, quality for each $ goes down. Businessmen only are about making money not providing value to consumers. And by the way, those consumer protection agencies are being dismantled too. So we are all on our own against a combined govt-business partnership to defraud the public, and too bad for all you old people with medical needs, like Somerby. You're just going to have to fend for yourself.
"Businessmen only are about making money not providing value to consumers"
DeleteA more nuanced statement might be:
Businessmen want primarily to maximize profit. If they can do so by providing value, they will.
If they can do so more profitably by providing less value or even no value, then they'll do that.
Good point, @1:54. I'd add a couple of observations. Although there are exceptions, businesses generally do need to provide value in order to survive. OTOH federal agencies, once established, mostly do not need to provide value in order to survive.
Delete"we all know" is one of those phrases used when one doesn't have actual evidence for one's assertions.
DeleteDOGE is part of a concerted effort to hand America over to our enemies. Prove me wrong.
Delete"federal agencies, once established, mostly do not need to provide value in order to survive."
DeleteHow can you tell if a governmental entity is adding value or not?
@4:22 - It depends. The entire Dept of Education is almost impossible to measure. Head Start is possible to evaluate, because you can look specifically at the kids who were in Head Start. You can conceivably measure the ineffectiveness of our enormous defense budget, by our lack of victory in Iraq, Afghanistan and Vietnam.
Delete@2:51 - the proof that you're wrong is the enormous federal deficit and debt. Everything DOGE eliminated is paid for with borrowed money. And much much more. The national debt is enormous and growing very fast. It will cause financial disaster here in a few years. DOGE is a small step towards saving the US from disaster.
DeleteThe principle that we will have learn is that much of what the government does is unaffordable. Many valuable programs will have to be eliminated, because we just don't have the money to continue them.
Bullshit, DiC.
DeleteThe Achaeans didn’t come over the walls in the Iliad. Nor did they ever, really.
ReplyDeleteI tried to explain this to Somerby but he doesn't read his comments. When a city is being laid siege, the way the conquerers gain access is to starve them out. The Achaeans were supposedly on the beach for 10 years. It seems to me that a city that could survive a siege for 10 years could do so indefinitely. That's why the treachery of the Trojan Horse story makes more sense than a battle in which Achaeans living on a beach suddenly were able to storm the walls.
DeleteMost cities surrounded by armies paid tribute to the leaders of the army, pledged allegiance to them, and then the armies went down the road to the next city. That is what Alexander the Great did and what the Romans did. When battles were fought, they occurred in an open field, forces against forces, tens of thousands on each side. No walls involved.
The Iliad is fiction. No one knows what happened to the city thought to be Troy (or even whether it actually was Troy). That is similar to many other ancient cities worldwide. They are lost in history because there were no written records of what happened to them. Some left because of overpopulation of their city, depleting the resources necessary to provide food, water, and accumulating waste.
The idea that there was a cycle of warfare in which men were valiant warriors comes from today's white supremacist bros, who idealize warrior culture and wish they could engage in combat and claim women as prizes. It is an adolescent fantasy that Somerby seems to be obsessed with, as are a lot of extremist right wingers in bro culture.
There was less structured guerilla warfare against barbarians who hid behind trees and ambushed invaders.
DeleteRomans had archers but mainly used short swords which required an enemy to be close.
The Iliad is about heroism.
DeleteThe Romans kept their enemies close and their friends closer.
DeleteHeroism, 1:50? Not sure about that. It focuses quite a bit on the rage of Achilles. He was a bit of a crybaby, spending much of the Iliad refusing to fight and thereby depriving the Greeks of his purported battle prowess.
DeleteMaybe the Achaeans really did scale the walls of Troy.
ReplyDeleteA bunch of South Koreans were here on business. Trump deported them.
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What causes the level of employment to go up or down? I would love to see the impact of the following factors analyzed.
ReplyDelete1. Uncertainty caused by tariffs
2. Jobs moving to US or staying here because of tariffrs
3. Reduction in regulatory burden on businesses
4. AI
5. Over a million migrants leaving the country and relatively few entering the country.
Good to know. I would love to see… DiC do some actual research of his own for a change.
Delete