Althouse: At the Quality Cafe...

August 3, 2017

At the Quality Cafe...

... apply yourself to some all-night conversation.

27 comments:

Bad Lieutenant said...: http://www.bostonherald.com/news/local_coverage/2017/08/rmv_clerks_nabbed_in_fake_id_bust; 8/3/17, 10:22 PM
David Begley said...: When does WaPo print transcripts of all of Obama's private telephone conversations with world leaders? Discussions regarding Iran and Syria would be very interesting.; 8/3/17, 10:29 PM
MaxedOutMama said...: I can't sleep, so I am up cleaning the house. Down to the floors.

Every once in a while I sort of have a flashback to when I was kid. I could never have conceived of the horrors happening in the world today. ISIS alone is hard to comprehend.

The prompt for this particular bout of revisited angst is the German/Italian spat. An NGO called "Youth Saves" (Jugend Rettet) has been chartering a boat to rescue refugees in the Mediterranean. The Italians say they have evidence that representatives of the organization had parleyed with the human smugglers, so that the smugglers basically brought their cargo out to sea to meet the ship on ocean-unworthy craft. There wasn't even a pretense of crossing the Mediterranean on their own ships. The illegals were then transferred to the ship and then smugglers went back for another load, detaching power engines that had basically been hitched to life-rafts.

Yes, it saves lives. And yes, they are running a taxi service for illegal immigrants. Anyway, it's going to turn into another European brawl, looks like. We have lost the capacity for a basic honesty in the West.; 8/4/17, 12:47 AM
Etienne said...: Having suffered two fires now, I suggest that "The Torch Tower" in Dubai be renamed.; 8/4/17, 1:22 AM
David said...: "David Begley said...
When does WaPo print transcripts of all of Obama's private telephone conversations with world leaders? Discussions regarding Iran and Syria would be very interesting."

Maybe he was smart enough not to have transcripts.; 8/4/17, 1:50 AM
Humperdink said...: Time to wiretap every reporter at NYTimes and WaPoo.; 8/4/17, 4:53 AM
MaxedOutMama said...: Wisconsin Dems complaining about Foxconn deal. I think it would be pretty dumb to let it drop.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-toyota-mazda-idUSKBN1AK0RF?il=0

Wisconsin's proposed $3 billion incentive package for a new LCD screen plant by Taiwan's Foxconn is in danger of being pushed through the state's Republican-controlled legislature too quickly, Democratic critics said on Thursday.; 8/4/17, 5:17 AM
Laslo Spatula said...: Althouse,

Do you feel a tinge of nostalgia for these storefronts that echo an earlier age, or do you view them with cruel artistic neutrality?

I am Laslo.; 8/4/17, 5:40 AM
David Begley said...: David at 1:50 am

I believe the customary practice for the Office of the President is to record and transcribe all calls with foreign leaders. I doubt a new guy would think up such a practice.; 8/4/17, 6:09 AM
Bad Lieutenant said...: Having suffered two fires now, I suggest that "The Torch Tower" in Dubai be renamed.

Why? Truth in advertising.; 8/4/17, 7:37 AM
Tommy Duncan said...: Let's assume Trump survives the attacks for 3 more years and runs for a second term. It seems to me he will be able to deliver a powerful populist message about:
(1) Battling the swamp creatures
(2) Nominating conservative judges
(3) Reducing illegal immigration
(4) Rolling back regulations and the EPA
(5) Delivering on his promise to focus on jobs
(6) Rebuilding our military
(7) Negotiating better trade deals
(8) Killing the Paris climate accord

The risk the do-nothing Republicans run is being viewed as the enemy of the populist President. Or being viewed as enemies of America. The RINO's are, of course, just slimy politicians focused on reelection. If they don't take the long view on supporting Trump I suspect they will pay a heavy price in future elections, probably starting in 2018.; 8/4/17, 7:49 AM
rehajm said...: Wisconsin Dems complaining about Foxconn deal.

Lefties didn't not learn anything from the last 30 years did they? At least have enough sense to wait until they build the thing before you clamp your hooks into them...

Have WI Democrats ever heard of Vermont' Act 250? Once a business grows to a certain size it grants nearly unlimited power to any number of leftie grassroots organizations to dictate terms to private enterprise. I'm sure it could catch on in Madison.; 8/4/17, 7:50 AM
Kevin said...: The RINO's are, of course, just slimy politicians focused on reelection. If they don't take the long view on supporting Trump I suspect they will pay a heavy price in future elections, probably starting in 2018.

Only if Trump supporters run primary opponents against them like the Tea Party did. If they run unopposed in majority Republican districts and states, they'll continue to do just fine.; 8/4/17, 7:54 AM
David said...: "I believe the customary practice for the Office of the President is to record and transcribe all calls with foreign leaders. I doubt a new guy would think up such a practice."

I did not say he thought it up. He should consider ending it if it's not secure.; 8/4/17, 7:55 AM
rehajm said...: If they run unopposed in majority Republican districts and states, they'll continue to do just fine.

Congressional approval is down to 'not even the dog still likes them' levels but this is still true. They'll be just fine...; 8/4/17, 7:59 AM
Kevin said...: Congressional approval is down to 'not even the dog still likes them' levels but this is still true. They'll be just fine...

Right, never confuse Congressional approval with the reelection chances of an individual Congresscritter. Your Congressman certainly doesn't.

It has always been true in my lifetime that people hate Congress as a group but love the person they keep sending there. "My guy" is never seen as the problem, particularly when contrasted with that idiot from the other party...; 8/4/17, 8:12 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "Do you feel a tinge of nostalgia for these storefronts that echo an earlier age, or do you view them with cruel artistic neutrality?"

Hard to describe how I feel about them.

1. I am out in the real world open to anything that I might walk past. I don't photograph everything, but the thing has to be there in the first place.

2. I like inanimate things that represent human beings. I don't intrude on real people, but I like things that have to do with people, and signs and buildings and objects assembled by people fit that category.

3. Things we see all the time won't work. I wouldn't photograph a McDonald's storefront unless there was something interestingly wrong with it. So older things are better. A hand-painted sign on a new place is probably not interesting enough. The photo will just look like an ad or a promotion for the place. It has to seem unusual in some way that can be framed in a photograph.

4. I'm not feeling particularly nostalgic or contemptuous or anything. It's more about interestingness and a taste for the unusual, especially when it seems to reflect individual humanity in some way.

5. I rarely see things that are old-timey in a way that relates to my own young life in the 1960s. I'd be interested in that, but I don't think much of it has survived. This particular sign is so generic it's funny for that reason. The store name, the stove and the refrigerator, but the images look like fairly recent stuff. I don't know what time period is supposedly represented. There's a lot of bad and good in that sign, actually. The placement of the lettering is atrocious. The stove is encroaching on the lettering. It's actually pretty bad. I think I was interested in the low-key badness. It's just there, part of the landscape, no worse than the ordinary green-and-yellow building that frames it.; 8/4/17, 8:24 AM
Fernandinande said...: Asians Sue Harvard Over Affirmative Action in Admissions; 8/4/17, 8:28 AM
MadisonMan said...: Wisconsin's proposed $3 billion incentive package for a new LCD screen plant by Taiwan's Foxconn is in danger of being pushed through the state's Republican-controlled legislature too quickly, Democratic critics said on Thursday.

Translation: We Democrats need time to insert Union-Positive language into the Legislation. Because how else can we repay Unions for their support?; 8/4/17, 8:34 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "Asians Sue Harvard Over Affirmative Action in Admissions."

I blogged that last May: http://althouse.blogspot.com/2015/05/a-coalition-of-more-than-60-asian.html; 8/4/17, 9:01 AM
Curious George said...: "MadisonMan said...
Wisconsin's proposed $3 billion incentive package for a new LCD screen plant by Taiwan's Foxconn is in danger of being pushed through the state's Republican-controlled legislature too quickly, Democratic critics said on Thursday.

Translation: We Democrats need time to insert Union-Positive language into the Legislation. Because how else can we repay Unions for their support?"

Nah. The real translation is that they look at the state and know that they can't get it back politically, but they simply cannot allow Walker to have success. Can't. Because all they have left is appeasing their insane base. And hold on to their offices.; 8/4/17, 9:08 AM
rhhardin said...: So much about air quality and so little about appliance quality these days.; 8/4/17, 9:13 AM
Kassaar said...: Why is the Seymour Hersh audio tape ignored by the MSM?; 8/4/17, 9:14 AM
Laslo Spatula said...: @Althouse -- thanks for the 8:14 comments. I enjoy your photography, and this helped put the finger on what I like about it.

"The placement of the lettering is atrocious"

Yeah. Quality is centered, but off-setting "Appliances" causes the letters to get thinner halfway through the word.It does give it the hand-made feel, though.

I am Laslo.; 8/4/17, 9:48 AM
Rusty said...: so the condenser part of the AC took a dump the other day.
Did you know that the new freon is $116 a pound and your system takes from 12 to 16 pounds of the stuff?; 8/4/17, 1:27 PM
ccscientist said...: I must point out that "quality" is like "color". If you have a paint store you can say your paints have "color" but that doesn't mean they are good colors or bright. There can be poor quality or good quality or exceptional quality, but "quality" by itself is like "color" by itself: meaningless.
/endrant; 8/4/17, 8:02 PM
Bad Lieutenant said...: Did you know that the new freon is $116 a pound and your system takes from 12 to 16 pounds of the stuff?

Maybe a little more detail here, rusty. For instance my Suburban takes about 3 pounds of coolant, which is not Freon because Freon is now illegal if I recall correctly. Were you talking about an industrial application perhaps? In China?; 8/5/17, 1:08 PM