Standing for the national anthem is political speech.

The NFL is not, in any way, required to play the national anthem prior to games. So why do they? Here’s a TIME article that gives some of the history of it. The short answer is they did it due to trying to express solidarity as a country during times of war, and it’s become a tradition few people have ever thought to criticize.

This, though, is an act of political speech. And this is a point I think that is lost on most people because it has become so deeply ingrained in the American psyche that it is unquestioned and taken as the normal, de facto part of American life. Americans have been taught to stand for the anthem. That’s just what you’re supposed to do. Nothing political about it.

In reality, it’s a very political decision to stand for the anthem. To do so that means that you support this country, and to some degree, depending on how religiously devoted to the military you are, that you support American troops overseas and at home. And both of those things, supporting the country and supporting the troops, are actual political speech. They are statements of support of American policies and military actions.

So who’s being political here? The players when they kneel? Or the NFL when they decide to play the anthem? Both. They’re both bringing politics into football, but one of them is only reacting to the other.

Showing support for America, or even wanting to show solidarity against foreign influence, is a political stance. Playing the anthem is a political decision. And I want to make this clear:

Standing for the anthem is a political choice. Not standing for the anthem is a political choice. Kneeling for the anthem is a political choice. There’s not a non-political choice here. You have to endorse a position. So what do we do if we don’t want players being political at games?

Stop playing the anthem before the game.

Then we’re done. All politics removed.

That should be the solution we can all agree to if choosing to kneel for the anthem is anathema to some people.

But that’s never been what this is about, so that wouldn’t mollify the people who are complaining about it the loudest. This has always been about two things:

1. Making sure that black players do not have a chance to express their feelings because nothing pisses off some people more than when a black person has an opinion.
2. Forcing people to take a political stance because they endorse that political position.

This is all about forced “patriotism” and forced “respect.” The people complaining about kneeling during the flag want the NFL, a private company, to force their employees to give up their freedom of speech. Once again, choosing to stand for the anthem is a political choice. And punishing people who don’t is punishing them for refusing to endorse a position with which they disagree.

So we’re down to two options for people aggrieved by other people who kneel during songs:

1. You either agree that the anthem shouldn’t be played at the games.
2. You agree that private organizations can compel people to endorse political positions they do not support.

And if you agree to #2, you’re saying that your boss can ask you to wear a Hillary Clinton shirt tomorrow, and if you refuse, she can fire you. For that reason.

Personally, I think option #2 is fucking stupid. If my job is to make sandwiches, as long as I’m making sandwiches, you should leave me the fuck alone. If you want to force me to start endorsing political positions, like supporting abortion or standing for the flag, while I make those sandwiches, that’s just bizarre and fascist. It’s totalitarian. And I would argue: un-American.

And if the NFL punishes a player for their political speech when they kneel or sit, then they’re effectively saying: “We get to be political by playing the anthem, but you don’t get to be political by kneeling.” To which I reply: get fuckethed, NFL.

I don’t care if the anthem is played at games. I’ve always found it bizarre and useless, but whatever. Play it, don’t play it; it makes no difference to me. But forcing people to stand for it? Go fuck yourself. Get over yourself. Other people are allowed to do things you don’t like providing they’re not hurting anyone else. And kneeling down or sitting hurts precisely no one. Unless your feelings are hurt. Then grow the fuck up.

Why It’s Different

Someone refusing service to Sarah H. Sanders is not the same as someone refusing service to a gay person.

Do places of business have a right to deny service to a person? Absolutely. However, since the Civil Rights Act of 1964, you can’t refuse service if the reason you’re doing it is to discriminate against a protected class of citizens. You can’t refuse a service to someone based on their gender, their color, their race, or a whole host of other things you can read in the linked document.

The reason for this is that, historically, certain classes of citizens had been denied access to services in entire states or counties because there were enough bigots in the area to effectively render services unreachable. The government saw this, and under nationwide pressure from minorities and their non-minority allies, was forced to change the federal laws regarding discrimination. So now, if you want to refuse service to someone because she is a woman? You can’t do that. Refuse service to someone from India? Not allowed. Refuse service to someone with dark skin, irrespective of national origin? Nope. You can’t do that either. Those groups of people are now protected under federal law.

This requires us to look at two things? 1. Well, which kind of people CAN you refuse service to? 2. Are homosexuals protected under the Civil Rights Act?

The short answer to question 1 is pretty much anyone, provided you’re not doing it based on those protected classes. Walk into a store without a shirt? They can kick you out. Walk into a store and curse up a storm? They can kick you out. Walk into a store with a shirt the owner finds offensive? They can tell you to go kick rocks. Walk into a store and just be brown? No. They can’t kick you out for that.

The answer to question 2 is that under federal law, no, homosexuals are not protected. Many states have protected homosexuals from discrimination, but not all of them have. In the recent SCOTUS decision on a bakery in Colorado who refused service to a gay couple, SCOTUS didn’t really decide the issue. The Court punted that case into the sun, completely refusing to deal with whether or not homosexuals were a federally protected class. Not only that, Colorado is a state where homosexuals are protected from discrimination, and that didn’t save the homosexual couple who merely wanted a cake for their wedding.

So really, with question 2, we’re in a sort of legal gray area. SCOTUS decided that homosexuals had a right to marry, but they refused to decide if they had a right to protected status on buying cakes for the wedding. It’s a disgrace, really.

That being said, we’re left with two more questions. A. Should homosexuals be a protected class? B. What should be happening in places where homosexuals aren’t protected and they are denied services?

A. Of course you fucking dummy, and I don’t give a shit about your religion. Homosexuals have been discriminated against in this country since before it was even a country, and the fact that we still have to ask questions about this because someone’s religion teaches them to hate homosexuality is something future American citizens will look back upon with horror.

B. This should be irrelevant because see previous question. The rest I leave to lawyers.

Okay, now back to Sarah H. Sanders. Why was she refused service? Was it because she was a woman? No. White? No. Her age? No. Was it because she was a Republican? No. Conservative? No.

Well what was the reason?

The reason was that she’s a fucking asshole.

Sanders has spent the last 13 and a half months lying to the American people in an attempt to defend a man who is trying to tear this country apart, erase the rule of law, promote unbridled racism, and seize authoritarian power from a democratic republic. I mean, if you need me to explain to you why Donald Trump is a fucking asshole, then you’re a fucking asshole. Here’s a good twitter thread about it if you want, but Jesus. Trump is an indefensible shitbag who very likely worked with a hostile foreign power to get himself elected*, broke campaign finance laws in his bid for the presidency, denigrates American veterans who have been captured or killed, strips children from the arms of their parents and puts them in cages, targeted an entire religion to stop its presence in this country, chose to start a confrontation with the NFL because its players are black and he can use their pain to further his political agenda… and this only scratches the surface of why he’s such a contemptible piss-drinking** dickhead.

*pending the outcome of the Mueller investigation, which has already led to at least a dozen indictments and guilty pleas.

**allegedly

So Trump is a fucking asshole. And Sanders is his mouthpiece. Therefore, she’s a fucking asshole, too.

Sanders is not in a protected class of individuals who have been historically discriminated against in this country. Comparing the refusal of service to her with the refusal of service to homosexuals, who have been historically discriminated against in this country, is fucking stupid.

Here’s an example for you to flesh it out completely. Let’s say you own a store and someone comes in looking for a pair of scissors. You sell scissors. They go up to the counter, put the scissors down, and take out their wallet. You ring them up, and as you watch them fumble with their wallet, you notice that they have a rainbow flag on their wallet. You ask if they’re gay. They say, “Yes.” Then you slam the register shut and tell them to get the fuck out because you don’t sell to gays.

That would be fucked up, right? One second, you were totally willing to help them, and the next, you weren’t because you wanted to discriminate against them, a member of a group of people who have been targeted for discrimination for centuries.

Is that what happened to Sanders? No. Not even close. So what’s her analogy?

Imagine you’re a store owner, and there’s a guy in your neighborhood known for all kinds of shitty behavior. He taunts local residents by saying racist shit. He spreads lies about you and your friends. He beats his wife. He lies about his family. In other words, he’s an asshole.

This asshole walks into your store and asks you for some scissors. You tell him to go fuck himself. You can do that! And it’s not even fucked up!

That’s what happened to Sarah H. Sanders. It’s not the same as what happens to gay folks. It’s not even close to the same.

And let’s say, as many stupid people have said, that she was targeted because she’s a Republican or a conservative. This isn’t true, and it’s very important to point that out. But let’s say it was. Well, conservatives and Republicans are not protected classes of citizens. They haven’t been subject to hundreds of years of discrimination, and because of this, there are no laws, and should be no laws, protecting them. Same as Democrats and liberals.

Now, do I think it’s a good idea to refuse service to someone because they’re a conservative or Republican? No. That would be stupid. It would be legal, but it would be stupid, and I think the free market will figure out a way to make that stay true.

So, if you’re a person who was previously confused as to why liberals were okay with kicking Sanders to the curb but not okay with denying homosexuals services, it should be clear by this point why there’s a difference. That isn’t to say it was right to kick Sanders out. You can disagree on that point. But comparing the two separate issues is fucking stupid. Don’t be stupid.

This Was Not a Win for Liberals

These people deserve zero “credit” for Trump’s failure.

Did you just ask for someone to show respect to Donald Trump?

Hi,

You must have recently asked for someone to be respectful to Donald Trump. Go fuck yourself and eat shit.

Why?

Trump is a thing which mocked a disabled person in front of a massive crowd to get applause.

Trump is a thing which suggested an American judge could not do his job because he had Mexican heritage.

Trump is a thing which has been calling women fat pigs in public for around a decade.

Trump is a thing which insulted his political opponents by calling them names.

Trump is a thing which threatened to jail his political opponents.

Trump is a thing which insulted the family of a dead soldier for political gain.

Trump is a thing which bragged about hitting on married women and grabbing other women by the pussy.

Trump is a thing which bragged about being able to walk in on beauty pageant contestants as they undressed because he owned the pageant.

Trump is a thing which insulted a civil rights hero who marched for equality as a man who was “all talk” and “no action.”

Trump is a thing which insulted an American war hero and said he wasn’t a war hero because he got captured.

——–

Anyone with half an hour and an internet connection could compile a list of hundreds of instances of Trump being disrespectful to other people, many of whom he doesn’t even know.

And you want this guy to be shown respect? Have you been asleep for the last two decades? Are you for real?

Get fucked and eat shit.

Thanks for your time.

Hamilton, and not Wanting to Listen

I made my first blog post in years today, and I tried to keep it concise. I didn’t succeed like I’d wanted, so I’d like to try again, but this time with an object lesson. (The other one is here.)

Here it goes:

Trump won because white people don’t want to hear what people of color have to say. Like at all. And they voted for the guy who they thought would tell any complaining brown person to shut the fuck up. And they got the right guy.

Trump voters have been expecting silence from minority communities over the last several years. And they haven’t gotten it. Now that they have their man, they’re demanding it. And they’re doing so rather transparently.

This is best exemplified by the reaction of many Trump supporters to what the cast of Hamilton decided to say to Mike Pence. Before we get to just how unhinged and deranged the reaction is, let’s examine the text of the statement:

Vice-president elect Pence, we welcome you and we truly thank you for joining us at Hamilton: An American Musical. We really do.

We, sir, we are the diverse America who are alarmed and anxious that your new administration will not protect us, our planet, our children, our parents, or defend us and uphold our inalienable rights, sir.

But we truly hope that this show has inspired you to uphold our American values and to work on behalf all of us. All of us.

We truly thank you for sharing this show—this wonderful American story told by a diverse group of men, women of different colors, creeds, and orientations.

It should be noted that just before this statement was read, the person reading it quieted the crowd and stopped them from booing Pence. The person was genuinely reaching out to Pence. Then, after reading it, I can come to no other conclusion other than that this statement is the most respectful statement anyone has made this entire campaign.

Thanks for coming, Mr. Pence!

We’re afraid.

We hope our performance made you less likely to hurt us.

Thanks again for coming!

You cannot more respectfully make a point than that. It is torturously respectful. It goes out of its way to show respect.

And Trump supporters are calling it disrespectful and demanding apologies.

(I’m going to ignore for a moment that people who voted for and support Donald Trump think someone should be respectful to someone else. That is, in a phrase, bat-shit fucking insane, and it should make you question your ability to form opinions. About anything. And I mean anything. Like including your favorite color. Or shape. Or even flavor of ice cream. If you vote for Trump and then complain about a lack of respect, seriously, go fuck yourself with a branding iron.)

A person of color cannot stand on a stage and express fear without being shouted at and told to shut up. That’s what’s happening right now.

Trump supporters: YOU’RE PROVING THE MAN’S POINT FOR HIM.

Why on earth would brown people and minorities feel like Trump won’t protect them? Because a brown person cannot say, “I feel afraid,” without being yelled at and told to shut up.* That’s why they feel like Trump won’t protect them. And that’s why overwhelming numbers of white voters elected him: to send a message of “get fucked” to people who are already feeling under attack.

And if you think Trump is going to heal that? No no. He’s not even interested in healing it. If there’s a problem, it’s not the problems articulated by brown people. Those aren’t problems. The problem is that brown people are articulating their feelings. Still. Even after the election. THAT is what needs to stop, in the mind of a Trump supporter.

It’s going to get worse. A lot worse. This is a beginning of something terrible.

Make sure you’re on the right side of it.

(And if you’re not sure what side you’re on, the right side or the wrong side, the right side is ALWAYS the side defending the powerless against the powerful. Always.)

*What’s interesting to me is how the conversations I’ve been having regarding this have gone. First, it’s “disrespectful.” Then, when confronted with how it is clearly actually respectful, they pivot to some other point about not wanting to hear it for some asinine reason.

The reason they don’t want to hear it is simple: they have no respect for the person who is saying it. This isn’t hard, people. It’s only hard to listen if you don’t fucking want to. And that’s the point. They don’t want to hear it. At all.

Politically correct.

It’s gotten to the point where whenever I see the term “politically correct,” I kind of just read it or hear it as “educated.” It’s a really handy tool. Here’s an example.

Someone says, “Things are too politically correct these days.” All I see is, “Things are too educated these days.” See how simple that makes it?

When people complain about things being politically correct, they’re complaining about the nuances of what it’s like to be living in a modern society. They yearn for the days when they could just talk about people as being “wetbacks.” Like Republican Don Young did recently. Young can’t be bothered to learn or understand how terms like “wetback” or “spic” are actually harmful to certain communities—until it threatens their political careers. Then they learn really quickly what other people have learned steadily over the last 50 years:

Language has a force to it, and using it to denigrate entire communities has real world, legitimate social effects. Every time we use words like “wetback” or “spic,” it reinforces the notion that there are “real Americans” with names like Young and “fake” Americans with names like Rodriguez or Gonzales.

This isn’t “political correctness.” It’s education and understanding, and it applies to just about every situation where groups of people are being targeted as homogenous entities. The kind of people who want to lazily talk about “the blacks,” or “Muslims,” or “the gays” as singular groups are the same kind of people who complain about things being “politically correct.” They can’t be bothered to understand the complexities of today’s America, especially the complexities of what it’s like to not be in the majority. And so they lament how other people are forcing them to confront the fact that saying things like “the blacks whatever just need to work harder, then they’ll succeed” has been and continues to be an incredibly stupid way of looking at how a society works. It’s not that simple now, and it never has been.

It used to be okay to respond to women who report rapes as though they were lying or making things up. It used to be okay to look at a woman dressed a certain way and say, “Oh, she deserved it.” It used to be okay to say, “If my son’s gay, I’m sending him away” (my father said this about me once—threatened to send me to Texas when we lived in NY). It used to be okay to call men with earrings “faggots.” (Score another one for my father! He called me that when I put on a fake, magnetic one to judge his reaction.) It used to be okay to compare gays to pedophiles. It used to be okay to say, “Hey look at that successful, talented woman over there. She’s really attractive!” It used to be okay to suggest that the way for women not to become pregnant was to keep an aspirin between their knees. And it used to be okay to say:

“There is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I hold that he is as much entitled to these as the white man. I agree with Judge Douglas he is not my equal in many respects—certainly not in color, perhaps not in moral or intellectual endowment. But in the right to eat the bread, without leave of anybody else, which his own hand earns, he is my equal and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of every living man.” – Abraham Lincoln

But those things aren’t okay to say anymore, and it’s not because they’re politically incorrect: it’s because they’re staggeringly ignorant and ignore the real inequality that so many people in this country face on an everyday basis.

“Stop being so politically correct.” = “Stop being so educated.”

Racial Harmony in America.

So, after a long nightmare of having Time Warner cable service, I had finally had enough of channels disappearing, garbled audio, and staticky picture on channels as simple as ABC. I swear to you, and I am not exaggerating, I called Time Warner’s customer service line more often than I called anyone else. It was ALWAYS at the top of my recent calls. They are simply the worst. I don’t know why I toughed it out for so long because I barely watch television, but I did.

But that’s all over now. I canceled the service. Good riddance. I hate them with the power of about a third of the sun.

So, I was left with two choices:

1. Have no cable television whatsoever and save money.
2. Get DirecTV.

I was leaning heavily towards having no cable. I’d done it before for around two years. The only drag is not being able to watch live sports on ESPN or SNY or YES or MSG. Was it really worth it to pay for cable just so I can watch something as silly and meaningless as sports?

Well, when you add DirecTV’s Sunday ticket, for free, hell yeah it’s worth it. For signing up for two years, I got a year of Sunday ticket free. Awesome.

So I go online and set up an installation. I only realized afterwards that this might be a problem. My landlord has been renovating both the interior and exterior of the building for about the last three months. It’s endless. Every morning I wake up to the sound of hammers and saws cutting through something. Only now, though, has the exterior of the house finally come close to completion. And now, with DirecTV, I had to ask my landlord if it would be okay for me to bolt a giant dish to his house.

This is kind of what the back of the house looks like now.

It didn’t go well.

He wanted nothing to do with it being on the house. He didn’t mind it being somewhere else, but on the house he just spent months renovating? I completely understood his position, and figured, “Screw it. I don’t need cable.” I called DirecTV to cancel. They told me not to worry about it and let the technician come and see what he could do. My landlord said to call him and ask before they did anything.

So the technician comes over and suggests putting it on the roof of the garage, which had not been renovated. All he and his partner would have to do is run a wire along existing phone wires. Perfect. But still, my landlord was resistant. He was against putting even a single new line into the house. I’m on the phone with him trying to explain how simple it would be, but he’s not having it. He’s Russian (a Russian Jew, and there are many Russian Jews in the area), and he speaks English much like many other Russian men speak English: he yells it. So, I’m standing there on the phone trying to reason with a man who’s yelling at me, and the technician and his partner are just waiting with their hands on their hips. Eventually, my landlord is tired of yelling English at me, and he asks to talk to the technician.

I hand over the phone, the technician says exactly what I said, and after a minute, we have clearance to put one single hole into the house. Awesome.

I get back on the phone with my landlord and he says to me, “Is he a black guy?”

I was NOT expecting that question, but I answered truthfully, “Um… yeah. Yes he is.”

“See, black guys they don’t care about the work. He’s going to make a mess. I don’t need him putting four holes in my house. You need to watch him and make sure he doesn’t mess anything up.”

I started to laugh at how fantastically racist all that was, but I was a little worried about my own part in this process. I don’t need the blame if this guy makes a mistake. I say, “How am I supposed to make sure he doesn’t make a mistake? Once he makes the mistake, he makes it. I can’t unmake it.”

“Just watch him. Make sure he doesn’t drill like four holes in the house.”

“Um, okay. I’ll do what I can.” Which was literally nothing.

So, I hang up and walk up to the technician. What do I say? Well, I tell him exactly what my landlord said, about the whole black guys doing bad work, and explained that this was probably why he was giving us such a hard time. The look on the guy’s face was perfect. It was a great blend of “WTF” and “Oh, now it makes sense, I’ve gotten this dozens of times before.” I start laughing and just shrug my shoulders, and he shakes his head. We start walking back into the house, and he asks me, “Well what the hell is he? Pakistani or something?”

“Nah, man. He’s a Russian Jew.”

“Oh a Jew? They’re the worst. That explains it. I don’t know why they’re so mad at us. Black people didn’t do nothing to them. They need to be mad at the Muslims. They’re the ones trying to kill them.”

Wonderful. I just stand there laughing, enjoying the beautiful racism these gentlemen are throwing around. It’s really interesting to watch it be exposed like that. It’s not often you get to see it that honest, that removed from political correctness. It’s like seeing a deer in the wild. You know they’re in the woods, but you don’t see them all that often. When you do, you just kind of have to slow down and take in the moment.

So, the technician motions to his partner and he asks if he heard what I said. The partner is dark-skinned, definitely some kind of Indian/Arabic lineage (I didn’t ask him to specify). I told him what my landlord said and the guy, with a face which would have been expressionless were it not for an ever-so-slight angry sneer, just shook his head and said, “He’s lucky he’s not here right now.”

Yikes.

Ah. Now I know what Towers you’re talking about.

Then he tells me a story about how earlier in the day, he was installing something for some white lady. He was outside of her window running some wires, and he overhears part of the woman’s conversation with another man in the house. He heard the woman say something to the effect of, “down the towers.” He only caught part of it. The man she was speaking to said, “The towers? What towers are you talking about?” The lady answered that question by simply pointing at the Indian/Arabic guy working to make sure she can watch Cupcake Wars. Oh, those Towers. Right.

I ask the guy, “Really? That’s insane. It was that obvious?”

“Yeah. But, what can I do? If I confront the lady or say anything back, she could complain and I could lose my job. I couldn’t really do anything.”

“Wow. That is just awful.”

With that, the three of us fell into an awkward silence. Not much else could have been said. The technician told me where he was going to run the wires, and I asked him how he was going to do it. He started to explain, and now I have DirecTV. It’s awesome.

Obama Interrupted by Conservative Blogger During Immigration Speech.

Watch as the president, for the second time in his term in office, is interrupted in the middle of giving a speech like no other president has ever been interrupted before.

Joe Wilson, who has the self control of a small child.

First it was Joe Wilson (R-SC) who screamed, “YOU LIE!” at Obama during Obama’s State of the Union address. That had never happened in the recorded history of this country. And, it wasn’t like those “Code Pink” idiots  who interrupt Republican politicians during speeches. Let me repeat: Code Pink are a bunch of assholes for the way they go about getting their message into the media. Those are extreme activists. They’re a part of a vast, unsupported minority.

But, when Obama was interrupted during his SotU, that was a sitting member of the United States House of Representatives screaming at the president. It wasn’t some fringe group. It was an officially elected member of the Republican establishment. Sure, he apologized afterwards, but then he went and raised money off of what he did. He raised money off of his disrespect for the president. That’s how sorry he really was.

And now, a few years later, we have another first. Another time the president is interrupted in the middle of a speech. This time, it wasn’t a member of Congress, but it also wasn’t a member of Code Pink or the Tea Party or PETA. It was a “professional reporter” for the hyper-conservative blog “The Daily Caller.” His name is Neil Munro, and he is a professional member of the conservative media. He gets paid to report things that conservatives want to be told. He was given a pass to have the ability to cover the president’s speech, and he used that privilege to disrespect the president by interrupting him mid-speech, just like Joe Wilson did.

(While I was writing this, Munro and the Daily Caller published a reaction to this mess. My updated reaction is on the bottom.)

Neil Munro, who is as professional as a waiter sneezing into your dinner. Photo outright stolen from NPR.

Whether or not Wilson or Munro are factually correct in their assertions is irrelevant. They may be, but as a politician and a media member respectively, they have to know that the way to disagree is not to be disrespectful. But they seemingly don’t think this president is deserving of the same kind of respect the last 43 presidents have received (I wonder what’s different about this one…?) This is pure disrespect, and it’s not coming from extremist groups who hold up signs at rallies of less than a hundred people. It’s not coming from idiots on Twitter who aren’t educated or civilized enough to form a coherent thought.* It’s coming directly from the conservative establishment. It’s coming directly from the people who are professional representatives of conservatism.

And conservatives have the gall to claim that it is the president who is dividing the country? It’s the elected representatives and the paid professionals of the “right” who are setting the example for inappropriate and disrespectful behavior.

Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity and Mark Levin do nothing but trash the president all day on their radio shows. And you know what? That’s fine. That’s fair game. But, it also sets the stage for these kinds of outbursts which have heretofore not been seen in American politics. One side of the argument is dragging the American media and politics further into the gutter, and it’s people like Joe Wilson and Neil Munro.

They’re a disgrace to America.

*And so is Michelle Malkin’s “Twitchy” page…

—————————

Update: Munro and the Daily Caller have published their reaction, and needless to say, it’s laughable. From Munro: ““I always go to the White House prepared with questions for our president. I timed the question believing the president was closing his remarks, because naturally I have no intention of interrupting the President of the United States.”

Watch that video again. There is no way you think Obama is finished, especially given the way Obama speaks. He constantly pauses for effect (and likely to gather his thoughts). And even if he did think Obama was finished, Munro interrupted consistently afterwards. It wasn’t a one time, “Oops, thought you were done. Sorry,” kind of interaction. It was a repeated interruption, so much so that Obama had to remind Munro once that it wasn’t time for questions, and then AGAIN that it wasn’t time for an argument in the middle of the president’s speech. To say he had no intention of interrupting the president is laughable, to say the least.

Then there’s Tucker Carlson’s point about Sam Donaldson and Ronald Reagan. Watch the difference here.

Tucker Carlson, muppet.

Reagan was CLEARLY done. How do we know? Because he said he was going to let someone else (AG Meese) take the podium. That’s what people do when they’ve finished with their remarks. Compare that to Obama, who had simply paused for a moment. For Carlson to even attempt to create an equivalency here is preposterous. Rather than own their mistake and apologize, they’ll double down on it. Why? Because the conservative media has created such a toxic atmosphere for this president that they know they’ll be able to make more money out of insulting him than being respectful. And insulting him to his face? Even better. Pretty soon, just like Joe Wilson, they’ll be selling t-shirts and raising cash. Just pathetic.

————————

Flushing, Queens, New York. Not Vlissingen, New Amsterdam.

Johan Santana celebrates after his no hitter. Straight up stolen from the AP.

I’ve always thought “Flushing” was a stupid name for a city. We associate the word mostly with toilets.

Terrible.

I was reminded of it last night as I watched Johan Santana throw the first no hitter in New York Mets history. In watching and reading the coverage from several media outlets across the nation, I saw many of them refer to the events happening in Flushing, and every time they said it, I remembered myself as an eight year old kid. When my dad told me the Mets played in Flushing, I was perplexed. “There’s a town called ‘Flushing.’ And the Mets play there? Gross.” I kind of felt like the rest of baseball has always silently snickered about how the Mets play in Flushing, referring to Shea Stadium as a toilet.

So why the hell is that town called Flushing?

Turns out that the area was originally named Vlissingen by the Dutch when they settled in what is now New York City. Vlissingen is also the name of an existing town in the Netherlands which has been around since 1315. All the way back in the 1600’s, the English started referring to that Dutch town as something more Anglo: “Flussingue.” That eventually became “Flushing.” So, after the British took over the New Netherlands colony, the New World Vlissingen simply became Flushing around the end of the 17th century.

All this happened a few hundred years before flushable toilets in homes became popular. The phrase “flush the toilet” was nearly non-existent in English writing until the 20th century. Here’s the Google Ngram picture for the phrase.

“Flush the toilet” historically.

So, you know, the name of Flushing, Queens where my New York Mets play has NOTHING to do with toilets. Not even close. I feel way better about the name now. My inner, snickering eight year old has been somewhat pacified.

*Most of the information about the historical aspects of Flushing and Dutch/English occupation was culled from Wikipedia, so I generalized it to make sure it didn’t really make a difference for the point I was trying to make. If I made any important mistake, feel free to point it out in the comments.

Job totals disappoint, but still on the right side of the graph.

Not exactly the kind of growth we’ll need in order to keep the unemployment rate from rising again, but considering how Congress has done absolutely nothing to help businesses create jobs since last January, it could be much, much worse.

The Maddow Blog – Job totals disappoint, unemployment rate dips.