You tell it, girlfriend!

I love Joy Reid. Wish they'd use her more, and better, and more prominently.

I remember that scene - when crowds got unruly outside a club called Pandora's Box

in West Hollywood. The place closed down for good not long after. Saw some of it on the local news. I was very young then, almost totally unaware. Didn't wake up til college. Sure loved that song, though. Still do.

Can he do the same thing with trump?

Welcome to DU, Thunderbeast!

This is a good set of details. Thanks for putting it together.

I wonder who will finally cough up trump, himself? I heard, in some of the coverage, the comment that "people are going to get squeezed". As in - EVERYBODY Paul Manafort worked with, and got paid by, and how they might wind up squeezing him so he, in turn, squeezes trump. Preferably all the way out of OUR White House and into court facing multiple criminal charges.

Damn. I'm so sorry to hear this.

I'm sorry you and your loved ones have to go through stuff like this. And so many in such a short time.

I knew exactly what the tipped the scales with him, in deciding on her.

The day he introduced her, the Friday immediately after Barack Obama's big night accepting the Democratic nomination, was an obvious attempt to blunt the admiring coverage of Obama's acceptance speech and the historic moment that was.

McCain was outside, at the podium, I forget where, and made the formal announcement and called her up to the podium. Yes to the Hail Mary pass and all that. However, his behavior totally gave the game away. She stepped forward to the microphone. He stepped back behind her and over to one side. And throughout her first big speech, I watched him stand there fiddling with his wedding ring and shooting sidelong glances over at her ass. Throughout her speech! Here and there, when he figured nobody was looking at him. Just kept on glancing over at her ass. And fiddling with his wedding ring while he was taking in the "nice view." As his wife was standing right there, too, on the other side of the podium where Palin was speaking, just a few feet away from him! Well, I was looking at him. I noticed immediately! The gall! It was the same thing my dad used to do, shooting furtive glances at some nearby babe, while his wife was right there, and he too assumed nobody was paying attention while he was ogling the girl. Never even occurred to him that somebody'd notice. That's the same thing John McCain DID, that day. Busy watching the birdie.

That's when I knew - he'd had to make a decision on a running mate. The moment had come. He'd weighed everything, experience, appeal, personality, beneficial age differential, cute family, and other valuable intangibles. And what I'd BET went through his mind was "gee, all other things being equal, I could sure stand to look at that for the next four-to-eight years."

I seriously doubt he'd ever admit that. All the male political Palin groupies have lots of nice safe cliche-ridden explanations, including him. But I'm convinced THAT'S what finally tipped the scales for him. THAT'S why he picked her.

That bunch really doesn't understand the law.

OR the law of unintended consequences.

Yep.

For certain.

How do we win the day without taking their bait?

You learn a lot by observing behavior displays. I wrote about one I personally witnessed a few weeks ago when the Santa Monica Democratic Club held its regular monthly meeting. The topic was immigration. There were two phases of guest speakers. The first half involved immigrants, or sons and daughters of immigrants, speaking about the fear that now accompanies not having proper documentation. Fear of deportation, fear of coming home from school and Mama has disappeared, fear of not knowing - when you're in bed at night - if there's going to be a loud, abrupt knock on the door without warning. Gentle people. Soft-spoken, well-mannered, invited to tell their stories. Some of them didn't speak English. The second half featured California's own Democratic State Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de Leon.

But there were also hecklers and nasty, rude, verbally assaulting loudmouths. A group of them, determined to disrupt the meeting and stir shit up. They were horrible to the first group of speakers. Yelling, shouting insults, hollering "you're breaking the law!" and "go back where you came from" and even "build the wall". They brought signs to hold up and wave around. They wore trump neckties and red "MAGA" caps and various red-white-&-blue "patriotic" (HAH!) clothing motifs. They did their best to intimidate every speaker. It was HORRIBLE to watch. Horrible and embarrassing. I couldn't believe the beastly behavior! Whenever one of them piped up, I kept thinking - "who the hell brought you up?"

When Kevin de Leon took the stage the rudeness amped up dramatically. They were hollering at him almost nonstop. He could barely finish a sentence. BUT ALSO: I noticed that they seemed to be trying to provoke some sort of physical confrontation. One man took a position along the side, on an elevated aisle, with his sign and his very loud voice. NONE of these people were Democratic Club members. One of the regular club members approached from below and was trying to tell the dude to stop interrupting and being rude. He had to raise his voice to be heard above the loud bully. The rude offender, shouting insults and provocative slogans, started doing this physical thing, craning his neck downward toward the club member, sticking his chin out, in a clearly confrontational posture. They were yelling at each other, close up in each other's faces, each move being pushed, initiated, aggravated, and/or accelerated by the rude bully who did his best to shout louder and more aggressively. More in-yer-face. Meanwhile, some of the asshole's cohorts were starting to move into the picture, with their cell phones held high, recording it all on video, hoping to capture some nice fresh fisticuffs to post online and hopefully make us club members look bad. They were disappointed. The club member trying to shout him down did not take the bait, and did not amp things up. Nothing got physical. Gee, too bad for them, 'eh? As some familiar orange gas giant would say - "Sad."

Here's a local blog about it:

https://capitalandmain.com/fright-club-trumps-troops-invade-blue-los-angeles-county-0731

So the question is VERY WELL PUT:

How, indeed, do we win the day without taking their bait?

Welcome to DU, Pris.

Sheesh - I'm having this giant deja vu. Usually in posts like these, I point out how valuable DU has become - as a genuine community. Where births, weddings, and new jobs are celebrated, news of sickness is comforted, challenges are encouraged, and bad news including scary diagnoses and deaths in the family - are met with sympathy, empathy, kindness, solace, emotional support, and vigil-sitting. It's been prickly as hell here sometimes. But sometimes it's more important to put that aside and remember the good parts (she said, trying not to sound like a simpering dingbat Pollyanna).

I believe it was our own Skittles who, in one of those rough moments, offered "someone's always here." And it seems like someone's always here to buoy you up.

If Arpaio accepts, that means he's admitting guilt.

And if he ever has to face questioning about this, maybe in another case regarding this, he won't be able to take the fifth. So I understand, anyway.

Small comfort, though.