The Frankish Reich

Oh, you're right about that. The Women of MAGA calendar: - Miss January, Marjorie Taylor Greene. Furiously doing her personal fitness instructor while happily married for the campaign poster. - Miss February, Lauren Boebert. Engaging in mutual, err, groping in a public theater of the non-adult kind after becoming a grandmother at 36 and dumping her husband for a new man or men. - Miss March, Kristi Noem. Carrying on a years-long affair with Trump's former campaign manager while slathering the South Dakota airwaves with pictures of her idyllic God-fearing traditional values family. Horny little bastards! What are they putting in that MAGA juice?

Well, they've gotta actually win something (like a playoff game against something other than the carcass of Tom Brady) before I'd put that label on them. In other words: The goal is to play the Leslie Frazier defense! (everyone calls it the Vic Fangio defense now, which is interesting because he's hardly the inventor of something that's been around for 25 years or so). Everything old is new again.

The actual law of criminal conspiracy: a conspiracy is distinct from the substantive crime contemplated by the conspiracy and may be charged whether or not the underlying substantive offense actually occurred. A criminal conspiracy has four elements, each of which must be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. A conspiracy exists when there is an agreement between at least two parties to achieve an illegal goal in which the parties have knowledge of and participated in the conspiracy, and at least one conspirator committed an overt act in furtherance of the conspiracy. So what about the example of a couple of morons sitting around talking about robbing a bank, and then taking a drive to the bank to case it? Yeah, if proved, a criminal conspiracy to commit bank robbery. So what if Ray Epps was a third guy in that conversation and he was actually an informant? Two responses: - unless he actually put the idea in your head to rob the bank, it really doesn't matter - given that all these Deep State MAGA Conspiracists were the core of the January 6 rioters, how naive could they be? (We are always watching you)

I hadn't noticed that. I'll spare you guys the advance scouting report on that one since I think everyone knows the Dolphins pretty well ...

Correct. Kind of shocking about how these amateur legal experts (Julie Kelly, is that you?) are completely ignorant about criminal law and the law of conspiracy.

Yes, children should not be allowed to see chipmunks with comically large breast implants getting it on in a crowded theater!

"How the situation came about" -- guy who basically bragged about how wild and out of control he's been finally has his past catch up with him I guess Harvey Weinstein's huge support of Democratic Party causes resulted in him being framed too.

Browns rushed for 198 yards last night (yeah, one was a long breakaway TD run, but still), and somehow Watson was only able to complete just over 50% of his passes? Obviously something is seriously wrong there.

This is what I'm seeing: https://www.sportskeeda.com/nfl/news-dan-orlovsky-blames-deshaun-watson-s-weight-gain-forgettable-return-football-2022 He just looks slow, and he seems to know it himself. The great improvisational plays aren't there anymore, and it's looking like they're not coming back. (Couldn't happen to a nicer guy)

The Browns did it to themselves. Here comes another decade of ineptitude.

The chance of spontaneous violence like this incident? Yeah. The chance of planned/coordinated violence, as in gang activity? I've seen a lot of that fueled by weed alone.

Something I learned here: Defending the alleged groomer makes you a groomer. Groomer.

That may be right, but come on ... I don't think I've ever known a recreational weed user who isn't also a drinker. My impression today is that any heavy user of intoxicants, separately or in combination, is more prone to doing stupid and dangerous things.

It wasn't "executed" because Pence failed to cooperate, being "very weak" and all of that. I think you need to research what a criminal conspiracy means. Conspiracy charges are all about planning to do something illegal and taking steps ("overt acts") toward accomplishing that illegal act.

Unfortunately true. Having grown up with the idea that stoners don't get violent, it was kind of a shock to me in my work to see how often people involved in violent crime were chronic weed users. Often with alcohol, but still. That whole pothead kumbaya thing was either a myth to begin with or has sadly been superseded by a new type of user.

What is "shocking" here is the inability of Trumpists to admit that a mob storming the Capitol, chanting things like "Hang [the Vice President]" would be considered anything other than an attempted overthrow of the government.

And yet they say there isn’t enough of a local audience for Phish to play Buffalo.

Moss had 88 rushing yards for the Colts yesterday.

I knew he’d be rusty when he finally got back on the field last year. But this year? What happened? Looks like he aged 10 years during that time off. Bigger, slower, less decisive. In other words, crap.

If Ronnie talks long enough, sooner or later he’ll say something I agree with. Come on, Fetterman. Get up, sh**, shave (yeah, that too) and shower, out on some dress pants, a button shirt, and learn how to tie a tie. Dork.

Second week in a row that the Bills draw the Broncos' opponent from the week before. And since the Broncos dominate my local market I watched the Raiders pretty closely last week and the Commanders pretty closely this week. The Commanders are your classic mediocre team. Actually, with a good QB (I'm not talking Josh; maybe a Kirk Cousins or something) they'd actually be pretty good. - Hard to say how much real improvement there was in Sam Howell at QB as opposed to a failing Broncos' D. What I can say is he did appear confident, didn't get rattled, and hung in there to make some nice throws. I very much doubt he's their QB of the future, but suffice to say he's no Zach Wilson or Skylar Thompson. He's a perfectly decent backup quality QB right now who can surprise you, and he may very well get significantly better. - I'm not very impressed with their skill position players. McLaurin is still good. Logan Thomas (remember him?) made a nice TD catch and then got clocked in a dirty helmet-to-helmet play that brought a concussion, so he may be out. Brian Robinson is playing well at RB, and is a receiving threat out of the backfield. He's probably the only one who I could see having a big game against the Bills. There's just not a bunch of scary offensive threats on that team right now, which makes it kind of amazing that they put up 30+ points. Again, I attribute that at least equally to an underperforming Broncos D - The Broncos pass rush did bother Howell in the first half. Randy Gregory emerged from his disappearing act to chase Howell around a few times. This tells me that our pass rush may do very well against the Commanders. I expect Rousseau, Floyd, even Epenesa to disrupt things a lot from the edge. - Defensively, they were pretty awful in the first half, and Russell Wilson (yes, Russell Wilson) picked them apart pretty easily. The second half? Seems like the Broncos offense just fell apart, their line broke down, and Wilson wilted under pressure. The D line is supposed to be really good, but again, the successes seemed more a result of Broncos' ineptitude than any great work on their part. Any Given Sunday and all that, but we are a much better team, and even on the road I'm not too concerned about this one. EDIT: I should add that Eric Bieniemy is finally calling plays, and it looked like he really knew what he was doing. Some nice adjustments to what the Broncos did in the first half. Hey, he got 35 points out of Sam Howell against a defense that is (on paper) pretty decent. I think this move is gonna work out for him.

I don't deny that it is difficult for some people, particularly on the lower end of the economic spectrum. Those without savings but with credit card debt, etc. And they would be the people who would answer the survey questions consistently: "My personal economic situation is bad; the country's economy is bad." I'm talking about the people who say I'm doing just fine (or even really, really well) but the economy as a whole stinks. I could understand a more nuanced answer like "but unfortunately there's a bunch of people who aren't sharing in the wealth who are struggling," but that's different than saying the economy overall is trash. I still believe it is is constant drumbeat of negativity from social media and the new commentariat that causes people to say this without taking some time to reflect on what a bad economic picture overall really is.

The constant harangue of social media is the only explanation I have for this: https://www.axios.com/2023/08/18/americans-economy-bad-personal-finances-good By the numbers: In the telephone survey of 1,818 adults Aug. 10-14, 71% of Americans described the economy as either not so good or poor. And 51% said it's getting worse. But 60% said their financial situation is good or excellent. Typically if you ask someone how his/her personal financial situation is and how the country's economy is doing, the answers will be the same. This is a new phenomenon, and it's one I see echoed on this board all the time: I'm doing fine. I am going to London to watch the Bills game. I have a sparkling new EV that's the best thing since sliced bread. I am sailing from Florida to Maine. I am retiring in some kind of idyllic community where the weather is warm and the beer is cold. I am living the dream. Even if I'm working I'm working at home most of the time. Or if I'm not working at home I'm charging exorbitant rates to fix your water heater on a weekend! Oh, but this country as a whole is going to hell! The economy is the worst ever.

I guess we must be in the minority here. We faced a very dangerous new public health menace in America and the world in 2020. It looked for a time as if people would be staged in trailers outside hospitals (note: THIS ACTUALLY HAPPENED in NYC), probably to die without ventilators to keep them alive. The economy faced collapse. The NBA and NHL held "bubble" tournaments. MLB was almost completely canceled. NFL games in empty stadiums. Schools went online. Overkill? Who knows for sure. Restrictions were too tight in some areas, and surely went on too long. But this was kind of a new thing. A couple years later, it was essentially over. The economy hadn't collapsed. Huge market interventions probably saved us from that. Amazing rapid development of vaccines and therapeutics. The response certainly wasn't perfect. But even so ... we made it out the other side just fine! Surely there's something to celebrate here instead of miserably groaning like angry old men (umm, maybe that's what the are) about how the world has gone to hell in a hand basket. Lighten up! Get a little perspective. The world survived, indeed, in many ways thrived. There are challenges. We will meet them.

Why are our new-style conservatives so miserable these days? Who is it that "hates America" these days? The people with absolutely nothing positive to say, ever. You really mean NOTHING is better now than it was in September 2020? Because I remember September 2020 and I don't want to go back there.