I don’t think he needs a defense, honestly. If ever there was a legitimate right-wing claim of free speech it’s a presidential candidate being able to visit with and address whoever he or she chooses.

But the rest of us are also free to deduce what we will from who he chooses to stump to.

Sorry bro, that just cost you the presidency.

While I have no doubt the swifties can move the needle, I have this feeling that some other recent events have already put him on the path of defeat.

I’m really tired of Trump not being in prison.

Yes, but I’m more tired of realizing he will never be in prison. There’s not a judge in the country that seems willing to do more than make him fork over a little of his pocket lint. And if it’s ever more than that, it’s still going to be an ankle bracelet and a 1% lifestyle.

One justice system for the rich and powerful, another for the rest of us.

As best as I can tell, the jawa sandcrawler was fully functional and well constructed. Meme fail. ;)

I’ll give it an upvote for the fact that they worked spoken-word Rasputin and a Windows BSOD into the same music video.

So now that NYT has taken the gloves off for trump, I guess it’s even more clear that all that soft pedaling before was just because they wanted Biden out. 🤔

Subsidies are not to promote a free market, but to secure production.

And price controls are not to promote a free market but to reign in corporate greed. I could absolutely not spare a moment of concern for whether they are “anti free market.”

They have plenty of margin to work with, and the gig has been up about their “supply chain costs” excuse they started pulling during the pandemic for quite some time now.

Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chair Lina Khan is pushing for an inquiry into the ongoing surge in grocery prices that started during the Covid-19 pandemic and that remains a hot topic in this year’s presidential election.

On Thursday, during a virtual public meeting hosted by the FTC and the Department of Justice, Khan said the probe would “shed light” on why prices and profits at grocery chains “remain so high even as costs appear to have come down.”

“We want to make sure that major businesses are not exploiting their power to inflate prices for American families at the grocery store,” she said.

Puh. They absolutely ARE and HAVE BEEN exploiting their power to inflate prices.

Between grocery prices, fast food shenanigans, and shrinkflation, anyone with little enough disposable income to be at all conscious of prices has known for a long while that these companies have picked the pandemic as their excuse to pull in as much money hand over fist as they possibly can, all while fighting tooth and nail against wage increases to even approach the overall rate of inflation across the same period of time.

From the first link in that para:

TheStreet reported that Medium French Fries went from $1.79 in 2019 to $4.19 in 2024, a 134.1 percent increase. A McChicken went from $1.29 to $3.89, a 201.6 percent hike.

The price of the beloved Big Mac increased 87.7 percent, from $3.99 to $7.49. An order of 10 McNuggets rose by 68.8 percent, from $4.49 to $7.58. Of the five popular products examined, cheeseburgers saw the largest price increase—going from $1 to $3.15, a 215 percent spike.

These increases exceed the general average for inflation calculated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which shows that prices went up by about 21.5 percent between the end of 2019 and March 2024.

From the second link in that para:

Few details were released about the change, but Wendy’s CEO Kirk Tanner said the new menus will let the fast food chain test “more enhanced features like dynamic pricing and day-part offerings along with AI-enabled menu changes and suggestive selling.”

“We expect our digital menu boards will drive immediate benefits to order accuracy, improve crew experience and sales growth from upselling and consistent merchandising execution,” Tanner said on the call.

Surge pricing could be a “turning point” in the industry, according to Jonathan Maze, editor-in-chief of trade publication Restaurant Business. “If Wendy’s idea works, it could get others to do something similar, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see another chain or two test the idea themselves, given what Wendy’s is doing.”

Fuck you Wendy’s. You’ve been a favorite since I was 12, and I tried to ignore your decreasing quality in recent years. You are dead to me now. (Yes, I know they rolled the idea back after they heard what the announcement did to the pitchfork futures market.)

From the third link in that para:

Frito-Lay shrank bags of some of its Dorito’s from 9.75 ounces to 9.25 ounces. Bags in both of these sizes, as well as some 9.5-ounce bags, are currently for sale at Target for the same price. "We took just a little bit out of the bag so we can give you the same price and you can keep enjoying your chips," a Frito-Lay spokesperson told Quartz.

Fuck you Frito-Lay, what kind of Orwellian doublethink is this?

Anti-Free market indeed. Free market in this country no longer means anything other than unrestrained corporate greed.

We don’t have a true free market anyhow. Corn subsidies (among other policies) anyone?

Well I’ve been imagining the wrong drink all these years, I’m sure you are right. (and that sounds yummy)

I just about guarantee such a picture exists somewhere.

The three other girls in the picture were the president, treasurer, and secretary, according to the outlet.

Are they trying to bait him??!! 😂

I’m pretty sure they just didn’t want to say Orange Julius. That was the big brand at the time, and it was amazing. Looks like they are still around, but I don’t know if they have been enshittified. https://www.orangejulius.com/en-us/

It was just a frothy orangey creamy cold drink - not icy like a slurpee or icee, just very cold and frothy. Somehow amazing.

Fuckin’ A how could I forget John Candy? Anyone want an Orange Whip?

LOL, sorry I forgot it wouldn’t be obvious to everyone.

The Blues Brothers

I just don’t have the words to describe how awesome this movie is to folks who haven’t seen it. It’s a must-watch.

• Awesome soundtrack with
• Very many celebrity cameos (including musical performances by Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, others), and some you won’t even notice until you google them
• Funny and bad things happening to Nazis
• Cops looking like fools (to be fair, that’s nearly every movie of this era)
• Folks who would today be magas looking like fools
• Late 70s/Early 80s kinda ribald humor
• Over the top car chases (see OP)
• Carrie Fisher
• An actual mission from God (in the context of the film)
• John Belushi at his best
• Dan motherfucking Aykroyd
• The Blues Brothers
• Almost bizarrely, a positive message of inclusivity and brotherly love.

sorry I forgot it wouldn’t be obvious to everyone.

The Blues Brothers

Fair point, but I don’t know when we’re going to get a shot at someone like Bernie in office again. AOC is an up and comer, but the right has already vilified her Clinton-style since she took office, so I’m slightly worried that’s not in the cards for her. I guess I’m just lamenting that, even while realizing that even as president they can only do so much.

I see your point, but also still feel the primaries were intentionally manipulated. (twice)

I’m not very familiar with DM beyond the album this song is on (all of which is good) but I was surprised to learn years after the fact that they were a punk band - very little on that album sounds like what I think of as punk, but it’s all good, and mostly quirky and fun.

While MeToo and BLM were fairly short-lived political movements, they had an incredibly large and positive impact on the culture.

I think MeToo is still felt, and its my perception that it’s changed culture and attitudes in a way that will persist, even as I acknowledge it’s not complete.

I’m expecting another BLM-style country-wide protest in about another twenty years when it turns out once again we’ve done nothing but wallpaper over the status quo on police brutality. The only thing that gives me some hope is that we’re clearly into the era where everyone having a good camera in their pocket is a wildcard that so far seems to be a very positive detail most of the time.

Ending qualified immunity, the legal standard that prevents police officers from being sued for wrongdoing even when they knowingly break the law, was deemed not urgent by Jim Clyburn, then the highest-ranking Black member of the Democratic House majority, despite that being a core demand of the protest movement.

I’ll go to my grave believing the reason Bernie wasn’t the candidate in 2020 is because of coordinated primary dropouts and Clyburn’s endorsement of Biden.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Clyburn#Presidential_endorsements

You can bet Bernie would have made police reform happen.

Clyburn’s endorsement of Joe Biden on February 26, 2020, three days before the South Carolina primary, was considered pivotal in the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries. Several analyses have determined the endorsement changed the trajectory of the race, due to Clyburn’s influence over the state’s African-Americans, who make up the majority of its Democratic electorate. Until Clyburn’s endorsement, Biden had not won a single primary and had placed fourth, fifth, and a distant second in the Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada caucuses and primaries, respectively. Three days after the South Carolina primary, Biden took a delegate lead on Super Tuesday, and a month later he clinched the nomination.[84][85][86] Biden went on to win the 2020 Presidential election. Clyburn’s endorsement of Biden, and subsequent political endorsements in later democratic primaries, have given him a reputation as a political “kingmaker”.

Having said all that, it seems a little shitty that they wrote this piece before the primary.