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Ghost of LL

Burnt Ends
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Posts posted by Ghost of LL

  1. 9 minutes ago, BamaATL said:

    I kind of want to vomit after thinking this, but on this McConnell is right.  It's telling that him and Romney are leading the charge airing this to essentially derail the stonewall.  The two of them have no fucks to give and aren't in any way beholden to the orange dummy.  It's pretty embarrassing they had to do this.  

    I hate McConnell.  He has destroyed the Senate as an effective deliberative body.  He is a hypocrite of unbelievable proportions.  He has undermined America's political culture and the ability of Congress to act as an effective branch of government.  And he's done so all in furtherance of a white-christian-nationalist vision for America that is noxious to anyone with any moral code developed after the seventeenth century.

    But Mitch McConnell knows what he's doing.

    Romney's shouting it from the rooftops that "Trump is preventing a deal on the border."  But what McConnell is doing is infinitely more clever.  And more cynical.  He's saying, "we all need to get in line and support Trump, and that prevents us from doing anything on the border because Trump wants to campaign on that."  He's saying the same thing as Romney.  But he's doing so from the purported position of supporting Trump.  And in so doing, he gives it greater weight, credibility, and creditability.

    It's fucking cynical as hell.  But in this instance, it works to the benefit of issue positions I favor.  So I'll support it.

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  2. 47 minutes ago, Js1 said:

    You discount how quickly that would have ended up at SCOTUS and slapped down quickly by the christofascists 

    I don't discount anything.  I said he could've done more.  He could've.  Maybe it would've been ineffective.  Even if effective, it wouldn't have been sufficient.

    But he could've done more.

    20 minutes ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

    The GOP dragging their feet with border security reform can still be spun as a win especially if it’s easy to tie it back to Trump. Call it reasonable reform that protects America while simultaneously allowing needed workers into country.

     

    Which is why McConnell blew the whistle on it.

    The Turtle knows what he's doing.  By saying, "the Ukraine/Border bill is dead because we need to support Trump," he's laying the failure of the border bill at Trump's feet.  And that's going to do a lot to ensure that a Ukraine/Border bill actually gets advanced.

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  3. 6 hours ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

    Florida will be more in play than usual. There is going to be an abortion referendum on the ballot and that's shown to help Dems in other states.

    My guess is that Trump and the FL GOP will work overtime to not have that referendum on the ballot this year.

    Counterpoint: having a referendum on the ballot enables suburban white women to vote for Trump, thinking that they've safeguarded abortion rights through their referendum vote.

    2 hours ago, Js1 said:

    I was specifically mentioning that Biden hasn't "done enough" for women's bodily autonomy.  He can't, because he doesn't hold the House, and when he did, Manchin/Sinema would not vote for a filibuster carve-out for abortion rights.  He literally isn't a dictator, he can't do just wave his magic wand and restore abortion rights.

    Voters have to vote for Biden and Dems if they want that restored.

    Yes and no.

    I think he could've done more with his executive power.  Open VA hospitals and military medical facilities to civilian reproductive care.  Sic CMS on any pharmacy not filling abortifacient prescriptions (I'm looking at you, Walgreens).

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  4. 42 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

    The American people have only room for one conflict at a time and we switched to Israel because that gets emotions higher. 
     

    McConnell oddly seems to care about Ukraine, but not enough to outweigh his (and the entire) GOPs goals of destroying the United States sources of stability and prosperity at home and abroad. This really is the agenda and abandoning Ukraine helps that goal so that’s what they’ll do.  

    McConnell does care about Ukraine.  And he does care about the United States.*

    And that's why he's running to everyone from The Washington Post to Punchbowl News saying that the Border/Ukraine deal is dead because he doesn't want to hurt Trump.  And that message is now gaining traction out in the world.  So it perversely puts pressure on the Republicans to pass this legislation because it threatens to lay the failure on immigration on their doorstep.

    McConnell has just taking a lot of the steam out of Trump's attacks on immigration.  And the purpose of that is to get money for Ukraine.

    So yeah--I'm oddly more confident of Ukraine funding today than I was 48 hours ago.

     

     

     

    * Please do not mistake this as an apologia for Mitch McConnell.  His vision of the United States is a white-christian nationalist vision.  It's absolutely repellant.  But worse--to attain that vision, he has undermined the United States Senate as an institution and damaged American political culture, perhaps irretrievably.  Mitch McConnell will go down in history as not only one of the worst politicians in American history, but as someone who imperiled the Republic for his own political benefit.

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  5. 47 minutes ago, gmr548 said:

    Nevada's got a Republican Governor right now so they've won something. Tend to agree that it's a D tilt; it'll be a tough out, but beating incumbents is hard.

    Cruz will win Texas by 4-6 points. He can only lose if he alienates Cult 45. He's already endorsed Trump so I am assuming he'll stay in line the next 10 months and it'll be a non-event.

    Florida, I mean, there are some bright spots for Dems in the past 12 months if you squint but yeah I can't see it with Trump on the ballot.

    Senate is a heavy R overall. I mostly agree with @Js1's assessment of individual races, though I'd move WV to Safe R. But those lean/likely D's include a few that are just slight leans, and FL-T are really likely R. Dems have to make sure they take no losses in AZ, NV, WI, MI, and PA; win tossup-at-best defensive races in MT and OH, and win the presidency. Long odds on a parlay like that. Lose even once in any of those and it's a GOP senate.

    Biden and Schumer need to get busy with judicial vacancies.

    I don't think Montana is a tossup.  Tester is very popular there, and the power of incumbency is very strong in small states.  It's not like here, where people have heard of Ted Cruz.  In Montana, most people have probably met John Tester.  He's probably provided some constituent service for a significant percentage of the voters.  So in a small state like that, there's got to be a good reason to toss out an incumbent.  And barring an absolute red wave that I don't see forming with Trump at the top of the ballot, it's unlikely to happen.

    I put that as a "Lean D."

    Ohio's a different matter.

  6. On 1/22/2024 at 12:51 PM, Js1 said:

    I guess it's been a while to discuss the state of the Senate

    • 7 retirements - Laphonza Butler (CA), Tom Carper (DE), Mike Braun (IN), Ben Cardin (MD), Debbie Stabenow (MI), Mitt Romney (UT), Joe Manchin (WV)
    • Rumored retirements - Bernie Sanders (VT) (still deciding)
    • Safe D seats - CA, CT, DE, HI, MD, MA, MN, NJ*, NM, NY, RI, VT*, VA, WA
    • Safe R seats - IN, MS, MO, NE (both seats), ND, TN, UT, WY
    • Lean/likely D seats - ME*, MI, NV, PA, WI
    • Lean/likely R seats - FL, TX, WV
    • Tossups - OH, MT

    *NJ - Menendez is absolutely going to lose a primary, but whoever wins that is going to win the election
    *VT - Safe D even if Bernie (I) retires
    *ME - Angus King (I) running for re-election

    The Republicans will win WV easily.  No contest.

    They are currently trying to lose OH and Montana as best they can.  Bernie Moreno is the weakest GOP candidate in OH and he got the Trump endorsement.  Rosendale is not the Senate GOP's pick for the race and is likely going to jump in and has had some good sized leads in primary polling.  He'd probably get a Trump endorsement too. 

    Michigan, Nevada, PA, Wisconsin - what a bunch of crap they are trying to run.  I'm not worried about these seats.

    FL, TX - I know Cruz's campaign seems to have some "alarm" about polling/trends, but I don't see either Allred or Gutierrez finishing within 5 points of Cruz in a presidential race.  Florida is Florida - Scott has never won a statewide race there by more than 1.15 (2010 governor 48.87-47.72; 2014 governor 48.14-47.07; 2018 senate 50.06-49.93). 

    I agree with all of this.

    As I've said before, Nevada is like Democratic Florida.  The Republicans always think they're going to win there; they never do.  It's not to say that the Dems don't need to work for it.  It is to say that given a decent Democratic incumbent--and Jacky Rosen is an above-decent incumbent--the Democrats shouldn't have much trouble holding this seat.

    On Texas, I just don't have a feel for it yet.  Cruz is wildly unpopular.  But it's going to take an exceptional Democratic candidate to beat him.  And even then, the presidential race is really going to dictate the outcome.  If Trump is down big in the polling and Republicans are demoralized--something akin to 1996--I could see an upset.  But otherwise, . . . no.

    In Florida, you're right about Rick Scott.  But Florida has become a lot more Republican over the past six years.  The Dems are probably going to have Debbie Mucarsel-Powell as their nominee and . . . yeah--I just don't know how strong a strong a candidate she is.  I don't think she really lights me up.

  7. On 1/19/2024 at 3:13 PM, royiv said:

    Wife and I had a trip to Europe back in November. BA Club World on the way over and UA Polaris on the way back. Polaris was 1000% better than what BA trots out as a premium product. BA is an embarrassment of an airline.

    Much like Jules Winnfield, BA is in what you might call a "transition period."  It was the very first to introduce lie-flat seats in its Business cabin, but those seats are now way out of date.  They're now replacing those seats with the new Collins Aerospace Super Diamond reverse herringbone seats in a 1-2-1 configuration.  That seat is pretty common across a lot of airlines.  BA's innovation is that they have a door on those seats to create a private pod, which is very nice.  Currently, those seats are on all of BA's A350-1000s, which is the equipment BA flies to AUS.  So for those of us in the Austin market, the BA product is really very nice.

    Now, I will say that for those of us in AUS, the BA club situation at Bergstrom sucks because they use the AAdmirals Club, which is small, dark, and shitty.  But that's not BA's fault; it's AA's.

    At LHR, I think the Galleries Lounges are above-average business class lounges.  They're busy, yes.  But they're also big enough to meet the demand.  And they have a great view of the runway at LHR.  So that's nice.

    On 1/20/2024 at 9:37 AM, Liquor and Poker said:

    Question for those who know a lot about American.  
     

    My wife has had two trips on American in the last 5 months. Picked American mostly for the schedule.  Both trips were Houston to Dallas then change planes at DFW.  
     

    Both times (Asheville and NYC) she got to DFW fine, but both trips the second plane did a thing where it would taxi away, sit on the tarmac for hours, come back to the gate, sit in the departure area for hours, then cancel and AA gave her a voucher to a shit hotel and said try again tomorrow.  Various inconsistent explanations for why the plane didn’t go depending on who you asked.   No known weather issues on either end, though.  
     

    I fly a lot on everything from Spirit to Emirates, but not much on AA since we moved to Houston.   When we lived in Dallas AA was my go-to, partly because hub and partly because I had a company AA visa so expensing was easy.  For a lot of people I know and work with in Dallas that’s still pretty true.  

    But anyway I have never had anything like that happen to me unless there was some raging storm or clearly explained mechanical difficulties.  And never have I sat on the tarmac for hours and not eventually taken off  

    So I have asked a bunch of Dallas friends an colleagues and quite a few of them say AA pulls this kind of shit all the time.  Since they fly AA nearly exclusively, they just assumed all airlines did it. 

    Have I just been unreasonably lucky and people like to bitch, or is this actually some AA DFW thing? Asking because wife right now refuses to ever set foot on an AA plane again. 

    That doesn't make any sense to me.  I never really had that happen at DFW outside of weather, and I've flown through DFW a lot.

    Weird luck, I guess.

  8. 23 hours ago, Baboontyme said:

    It has been a few years but there is light rail from the airport to downtown that integrates with the subway. As I recall it was quite easy and convenient. Maybe a 20-30 minute ride. 

    That's right.  The UP Express goes straight from the airport to Union Station in downtown.  Trains depart every 15 minutes, and the ride takes 25 minutes.

    From Union Station, it's a block to the Hockey Hall of Fame.  I mean, if you like hockey at all, it's worth a trip.  The Stanley Cup is on display, and you can walk up to it, hug it, caress it, and take a selfie with it.

    A block in the other direction is the CN Tower.  And that's fun if you want to walk over the glass floor.  If you have a fear of heights, it's somewhat less entertaining.

    Across from CN Tower, at the old rail turntable, is the Railway Museum.  And if you like trains, it's a pretty cool museum.  There's also a brewery and a decent sports bar in there. 

  9. Really good dinner at Atera. Maybe my best dining experience ever.

    its only 14 seats, and you sit around a counter like you’re in someone’s kitchen. There was, of course, a wine pairing. But the much more interesting was the non-alcoholic pairing.

    IMG_6785.thumb.jpeg.b7d55a95157ab85a740121e13a2ba159.jpeg

    IMG_6787.thumb.jpeg.f4eb0800a824ed2b145ae086a9eddb61.jpeg

    Here’s the aesleskiver (or whatever) it was kind of like a cheese puff with truffle.

    IMG_6769.thumb.jpeg.bb1068d7855bc81e038377e90dc44d51.jpeg

    The hamachi was amazing.

    IMG_6771.thumb.jpeg.ff9f485d0b15fffd1987011e7b52b844.jpeg

    I mean, it’s A5:

    IMG_6776.thumb.jpeg.d8b9e7681b90e65bebe48b2abbece443.jpeg

    Is squab my favorite? No. Was it still great? Yeah.

    IMG_6777.thumb.jpeg.ef747c7b6c3b869cde113a684b544549.jpeg

    The pistachio was nice and light, while the milk on the right was hit with liquid nitrogen.

    IMG_6779.thumb.jpeg.99ff6d78c92b2a9f92a6f1a828c23025.jpeg

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  10. 5 minutes ago, bschoolprof said:

    Maybe it's time to arm yourself if you walk in that area regularly.  Machete seems appropriate. 

    Seriously, I feel like Tommy Lee Jones as Sheriff Bell.

      

    With as many people carrying as I assume there are, and as aggressive as the homeless are downtown, I'm really amazed that we don't have more dead homeless people than we do.

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  11. 1 hour ago, wild_turkey said:


    I have eaten at Musume a couple times.

    Doesn’t look good at all. Internet says there have been some injuries but hopefully everyone makes out okay.

    I don't see how that'd be possible, just looking at that building.  Anybody in the bottom two or three floors has got to be in pretty bad shape.  And anybody on the street outside almost certainly suffered life-threatening injuries.

  12. On 1/6/2024 at 1:55 PM, Bevo said:

    One of their issues is that they are competing against a company that is subsidized by multiple countries and can afford poor decisions.

    I really don't want to hear it when Boeing gets all the largesse that it does from the DOD.  It's all dressed up as a procurement, but let's be real clear--the United States Government makes sure nothing too bad happens to Boeing.

    On 1/7/2024 at 9:14 AM, FartingMonk said:

    I bet my bottom dollar NTSB finds out there were no bolts installed and QA/QC ate a dick

    It's the only explanation I can come up with, but it's an absolutely shocking conclusion to reach.

    Boeing has a real corporate-culture problem right now that needs to be addressed ASAP.

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  13. I thought Lucky Boy was very meh.  Perhaps it's just that a SoCal breakfast burrito is never going to hold a candle to a good ATX breakfast taco.  But regardless, it was underseasoned, over-potatoed, and the salsa wasn't good.

    We went to brunch at The Butcher, the Baker, and the Cappuccino Maker on Sunset, and it was fantastic.   Highly recommend.

    Also recommend Katana on Sunset.  That was a fun place for dinner.

  14. So with AA massively cutting its schedule out of AUS and DL saying that it is going to (slowly) increase its flights, I'm wondering if I ought to switch from AAdvantage to SkyMiles.  I've not flown DL in about 25 years after a really bad experience.  But maybe it's time to end that embargo.

    But the thing is, switching primary airline rewards programs seems like such a pain in the ass.  It's not just starting from scratch on the program, it's getting all new credit cards and all that shit.

  15. So we're leaving next Thursday to go to the Billy Joel concert at MSG.  Friday night is dinner at Atera.  Saturday night is Gutenberg.  

    Don't have any plans for the daytime.  I've never been to the Museum of New York City--that looks kind of interesting with a subsequent walk through northern Central Park.

    Thanks for your suggestions @PenelopeWitherspoon.

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