August 22, 2019

"It’s boring, at this point, to talk about the cost of living with Donald Trump as president... the massive toll, in terms of time and energy stolen from Americans forced to pay attention..."

"... to inane tweets and half-baked policy, this presidency has had on all of us," writes Dahlia Lithwick  "The Demoralizing Reality of Life Under Trump/Every day is the same, but still awful" (Slate).

And I just wonder why people keep giving Trump what he's only asking for. He's not stealing your attention.

I know the reflexive answer is that because he's President, we must keep paying attention, jumping at his every instigation, but you have to look at yourself. You can only do your part in this wild enterprise. Why can't you figure out how to do that in a way that doesn't give him perpetual dominance?

The reflexive answer to that question is that you think you're defeating him. But no, he's doing it in a way that makes your opposition energizing to him. That's how he became President in the first place. You can't stop, and he's doing it again and again and again.

A little more Lithwick:
The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling. The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time. They start to chip away at your health and at your soul. The healthy response would be to tune it out altogether, but since actual people are actually suffering the brutal consequences, we cannot. And so here we are back in the narcissist’s loop, fueling his need to be at the center because, well, there he is at the center....
Take responsibility for yourself. Any therapist will tell you that!
Self-care in the form of manicures and time with the kids isn’t making a dent in it.... We are all doing too much. And we are all also not doing enough. And there is nothing wrong with you, beyond being a human being in categorically insane times.
To say "there is nothing wrong with you" is to assert that there's nothing you can do. But you can always only ever do you.

230 comments:

1 – 200 of 230   Newer›   Newest»
Gahrie said...

The left fails to understand that we felt exactly the same way about Obama. We just behaved like adults about it.

Beasts of England said...

’The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling.’

Only five-and-a-half more years left, buttercup - enjoy!!

BarrySanders20 said...

Is Lithwick is considered an important intellectual among the coastal elites? I don't get it.

cubanbob said...

To have a Dahlia Lithwick tag is in of itself mentally debilitating. Please avoid anything with Dahlia Lithwick for one's mental health.

Jessica said...

Well put, Gahrie.

People need to turn off the TV, stop checking twitter, and go out and live their lives. You only get one. To sit around perpetually furious about Donald Trump or Barack Obama? What a waste. Be informed enough to vote responsibly, and then be disciplined enough to tune out. Living in the 24 hour news cycle enriches those who peddle outrage, and ruins your life.

tim maguire said...

There's a saying in sports that if you find something that works, you keep doing it until they stop you. That's how I feel with complaints about Trump's tweets.

Want him to stop it? Then stop making them effective. Stop responding to his tweets the way he wants you too.

MayBee said...

The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling. The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time.

At some point, you have to realize that you are doing this to yourself as a choice you are making. On some level, you enjoy it. You enjoy the thrill of thinking your existence is threatened. It's like choosing to live an escape room existence. You are completely safe, but you want your heart to race.

Caligula said...

"Above the antique mantel was displayed
As though a window gave upon the sylvan scene
The change of Philomel, by the barbarous king
So rudely forced; yet there the nightingale
Filled all the desert with inviolable voice
And still she cried, and still the world pursues,
"Jug Jug" to dirty ears." -- T.S. Eliot, "The Wasteland," A Game of Chess.

What the author means is what T.S. Eliot meant: "so rudely forced" is an allusion to rape. The author has been raped by Pres. Trump! (Well, OK, maybe not literally.)


(In Greek myth, Pilomel/Philomela was raped and mutilated by her sister's husband, Tereus.)

Dave Begley said...

My youngest was in college when Trump got elected. She said she was scared. I said, "About what?"

Nothing terrible has happened since then. In fact, Trump has made America great again to any objective observer.

My big questions: 1. If America is a racist country then why didn't Barack fix that during his 8 long years? 2. Didn't Barack's elections prove America isn't racist?

rhhardin said...

Trump isn't asking for attention. He's derailing the news media. He's doing it by taking over their inane stories.

So that the entertainment choices of soap opera women no longer offer a free ride to idiots.

Evidence is that a lot of the deep state worldwide is depending on those idiots.

Seeing Red said...

“Forced to pay attention” is really funny but sad. I pity her. She lives an unhealthy lifestyle.

She’s a junkie in need of a fix. Normal people have lives, raise their kids, focus on important things.

You will be made to care.

mccullough said...

Lithwick is a nut job. She should move to a place where people don’t fret about politics 24/7. It’s not a substitute for religion. It’s a prescription for insanity.

Sebastian said...

"The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling."

"Our"?

"since actual people are actually suffering the brutal consequences, we cannot."

"we"?

@Althouse: "Take responsibility for yourself. Any therapist will tell you that!"

Whoa. This is progs we are talking about. The point of progressivism is to hand over responsibility to expert Big Brother, to make the timid secure and the weak strong. You are not responsible for your obesity, you are not responsible for your pregnancy, you are not responsible for your student loan, you are not responsible for the man masturbating in front of you, you are not responsible for raising the kid you brought into the world, you are not responsible for behaving well in school.

Except when you are a man, then you are responsible for the kid even if it isn't yours, and except if you are a white man, then you are responsible for racism.

Of course, something more basic is at work here: Orange Man Bad, repeat, 24/7.

mccullough said...

All policy is half baked. The designs never match the reality. Life is messy.

Laslo Spatula said...

"The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling. The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time. They start to chip away at your health and at your soul..."

I think this just mostly tells us about the people she surrounds herself with.

Virtue signaling is a cruel disease.

I am Laslo.

rehajm said...

Not a single one of you losers moved to Canada because of him. Ergo, Trump is better than Canada. And Canada's pretty nice...

Mike Sylwester said...

If Hillary Clinton had won the 2016 election, the USA now would have open borders forever.

Clinton would have done to the USA what Angela Merkel did to Europe.

That is why Donald Trump won the 2016 election and will win the 2020 election.

mccullough said...

Lithwick could comfort herself with the reality that black Americans as a whole have better employeeyment and wages than ever.

Her anxiety is White Privilege.

Wince said...

The emotional extremes Lithwick lists describe the neurosis of clearly a small minority of the population comprised of hard left activists.

The piece is really about "othering" the greater number people who might admit that at least sometimes they view Trump as a breath of fresh air.

Megthered said...

I really don't understand these people. How is their life miserable? They really are mentally ill. I don't think of Trump from one day to the next, I am busy living an actual life.. I don't use twitter and I go on the internet early in the morning and am off the rest of the day and not every day. I don't have enough hours in the day as it is. Honestly, I don't understand this at all.

MayBee said...

Gahrie said...
The left fails to understand that we felt exactly the same way about Obama. We just behaved like adults about it.


That's the thing, isn't it? After a time, almost every word he said grated on me. And the adoration in the press and in entertainment just made it worse. So what did I do? I stepped away from political twitter. My actual life did not change one iota. The idea that you have to know every single political argument and statement out there is just a terrible idea. My mental life improved. My peace of mind, which is mine and mine alone, improved.

Derek Kite said...

It is working as designed.

What Trump does is challenge the accepted wisdom. He has forced people to defend the indefensible, forced them to reconsider their position, or forced them to modify their position. He doesn't fit into the tidy little boxes that all these small minds have designed to explain a complicated messy world.

There are lots of things the West does well. Lots of things it does very poorly, and there are lots of catastrophes that condemn ways of thinking or common practice but are unassailable. He isn't breaking things that work. He is breaking things that don't work.

I listened to a Commentary magazine podcast the other day. Not Trump apologists. The subject was China and Hong Kong. They stated forcefully three policy positions that were contradictory, forcefully and salted with insults to Trump. It is worth listening to. There is no safe position for the lazy.

Trump is challenging the so called smart people to be what they purport to be.
But they aren't smart, they in fact are blithering idiots lucky to be born in a place and time where nothing really mattered.

This woman should be placed in a project manager position in a large commercial real estate development project. She wouldn't last till lunch time.

Mike Sylwester said...

The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time. They start to chip away at your health and at your soul.

Our President Trump makes me laugh happily every day.

Lucid-Ideas said...

"Cool Clock Ahmed!"

- Barrack Obama

Lucid-Ideas said...

"If you like your Doctor, you can keep your doctor."

- Barrack Obama

Lucid-Ideas said...

"If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon."

- Barrack Obama

Seeing Red said...

I loathe The Clinton’s. I checked out back then. I loved Ronnie, but I also had a life to lead and live, goals to be met.

chickelit said...

Barack Obama will require you to work. He is going to demand that you shed your cynicism. That you put down your divisions. That you come out of your isolation, that you move out of your comfort zones. That you push yourselves to be better. And that you engage. Barack will never allow you to go back to your lives as usual, uninvolved, uninformed.

And people still applaud that asshole who ruined healthcare to avenge his mommy's death.

And people around here invoke Peter Hitchens to defend cynicism on the one hand and to deplore Trump supporters on the other.

Sometimes the hypocrisy of Althouse commenters justifies turning away and ignoring them.

Lucid-Ideas said...

"Bitter Clingers!"

- Barrack Obama

Calypso Facto said...

"Please avoid anything with Dahlia Lithwick for one's mental health."

Exactly. Back when Newsweek gave Lithwick a column, I cancelled my subscription. The absolute nonsense she wrote (and apparently continues to write) actually hurt my head. I didn't agree with Meg Greenfield, Dahlia's predecessor at Newsweek, on much, but at least she could write well and make a thoughtful point now and then.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

Do they not understand how this delights their opponents? Or does the phony emoting about some phony sense of oppression offer some kind of social credit that makes it worth the self-clowning? I understand that chicks don’t get how this works but even their girliest guys should know better. No wonder they think the Antifa brownshirts are heroes.

Fernandinande said...

The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling.

Perhaps the neurotic authorette realizes that a lot of people are laughing at her and her TDS.

Self-care in the form of manicures

Well. A manicure is my "go to" for self-care, she must be doing it wrong.

Lucien said...

The possibility that years of nonstop hatred of President Trump including dire warnings of his “authoritarian tendencies” his racism and xenophobia, all slavishly intoned by the Dahlia Lithwicks of the world, might possibly contribute to anxiety on the left doesn’t seem to occur to dear Dahlia.

MadisonMan said...

Things are going so well in the USA I guess that die-hard Democratic journalists are reduced to writing about how Trump makes them feel.

Lucid-Ideas said...

"I have a message for Donald Trump, I will at least BE President."

- Barrack Obama

(Absolutely my most favorite one of all)

Francisco D said...

The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling. The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time.

Lithwick needs to change therapists. Her current one is likely enabling her severe neuroses.

My other reaction is grow up!

MayBee said...

There is a lot of ego involved in the belief that everyone needs to think like you do and agree with your thoughts. But no! Your thoughts are your own, and you are welcome to them. Someone not agreeing with you, someone saying something you don't like, is not an attack on you. You don't have to change their minds. They don't have to agree with you. It isn't a condemnation of *your* worth to have someone think differently than you. Let it go! Let them think their thoughts and you think yours. You can both be bright, valuable people without agreeing. And you can get along just fine if you accept this.

John henry said...

When my kids were small, in the 8-12 year old range, my son used to enjoy tweaking his sister and getting her all spun up. We worked on him to get him to stop and that helped some.

What really worked was when we convinced our daughter to ignore him when he did it.

PDJT is a master baiter. He baits the hook, trolls in in front of repeaters and they grab it every time.

Stop falling for it Dahlia. Actually don't. I find your distress amusing in the extreme. But it is YOUR fault, not PDJT's.

John Henry

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Ah yes - when Obama and the democrats were chipping away at your freedoms and health care, life was easy.
While the cost of living and homelessness surged under Obama - life was grand. Why? Hollywood and hack press said so.

Lucid-Ideas said...

Voting for Trump was how I stole my energy back Dahlia from the vampire known as Barrack Obama.

And you my dear. And you.

Dude1394 said...

It's all bullshit. Just another political opposition method. Screw em.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
chickelit said...

Mike Sylwester said...If Hillary Clinton had won the 2016 election, the USA now would have open borders forever.

The most disturbing news I read yesterday was that Hillary Clinton was once again the chief fundraiser for the DNC. She and Mexican nationals, cleverly disguised as impoverished American expats living abroad.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Another coin on the HIllary-lost Butthurt fountain of wishes.
Another sad song at the Butthurt hotel bar.

Laslo Spatula said...

If they really were THAT psychologically upset by TrumpWorld we would be seeing a lot more suicides.

But they keep not killing themselves.

C'mon, Dahlia: show us that you mean it.

I am Laslo.

MayBee said...

It isn't just Trump's tweets. If it were, they would be ok with Melania. But they went AFTER her after her speech at the RNC. I remember CNN saying they would just love to be covering the other speeches from the RNC that night but they just couldn't because Melania had stolen from Michelle Obama's speech. And then it's Melania's shoes and her "Be Best" phrase and her fear of him and her unwillingness to be in the spotlight and her willingness to stand at her horrible husband's side.
So no, when Trump doesn't tweet enough they go looking for something to bother them.

Patrick Henry was right! said...

Could someone please ask her to list the things our President has done and to explain, individually, how each one has caused her so much angst?

Standing by....

MayBee said...

BleachBit-and-Hammers said...
These people give who is president so much power. It's really odd and freaky.


Right?

dreams said...

And these are the people who presume to be our betters, I don't so.

gilbar said...

I just wonder why people keep giving Trump what he's only asking for?

Things got a little out of hand. It's just this war and that lying son of a bitch Trump

Dust Bunny Queen said...

I love it when Althouse is doing to the deranged leftists, what Cher did in Moonstruck to he obsessed BIL.

SNAP OUT OF IT!

Really. Here is some advice that I know you guys on the left will not take.

Control yourselves lefties. If you can't do that then you have no one to blame but yourself. Don't give Trump the attention and stop acting like crazy people.

Blaming someone else for your own failures is childish. Stop feeding the beast. Stop throwing toddler tantrums every time the Bad Orange Man makes you have the "sads". Grow up. Snap out of it.

You can't and you won't. And Trump will continue to get stronger. Ha ha ha :-D

Fernandinande said...

If you like your son's doctor, you can keep the complimentary Radio Shack clock.

gilbar said...

i had to look up the quote, and i found this
https://thingfinder.blogspot.com/2016/10/its-just-this-war-and-that-lying-son-of.html

which has THIS line: I came across this via Ann Althouse who does a thorough fisking.

Fernandinande said...

Where did the Orange Man touch Dahlia?

Michael K said...

In addition to the phony anxiety this poor soul is exhibiting, Chris Cuomo (Fredo) is worried that Trump is not aging in office.

Cuomo then showed before and after photos of Presidents Clinton, Bush 43, and Obama and how they had “aged” as compared to President Trump who “…looks exactly the same.”

After the comparison, Cuomo protested: “I mean, come on. Look at Clinton’s hair – went white. George W. Bush looks like he got a beat down. Obama looks like his own grandfather…this is a very hard job because of the stress they carry with them.”


Maybe they just weren't up to the job. :)

Kevin said...

Being outraged for others is a full-time job.

It has nothing to do with Trump.

traditionalguy said...

A giant psyops operation perfected by CIA psychologists to brainwash the world since 1963 is crashing down around them as Trump keeps speaking one truth after another and his Q operation exposes their absolute evil. And that is driving them crazy.

Sorry about that.It's a difficult business.

doctrev said...

Speaking as someone who thrives on liberal tears: GOOD.

Their popular perception is that conservatives are all weepy about being banned from the Internet. Not at all. We don't cry. We get mad. Then when Donald Trump tells us to take CNN and spare no one, we'll do it with a song in our hearts. Why do you think we have so many guns?

Meanwhile, liberals need therapy animals and adult coloring books just because Orange Man Bad. Don't worry, babies. We'll give you something to cry about.

Seeing Red said...

...James Poniewozik is the emotionally constipated nit who wrote the article, in which he came perilously close to a moment of self-awareness:

I know it’s not as if ABC just hired Sean Spicer to anchor the evening news. I know I might sound like a humorless scold for attacking the stunt-casting of a silly reality show....

Beasts of England said...

’This woman should be placed in a project manager position in a large commercial real estate development project. She wouldn't last till lunch time.’

Spot on. Trump is exposing the self-declared ‘elites’ as nothing but vacuous frauds. And I appreciate that he’s doing so to both sides of the ledger.

stevew said...

I see Ms. Litwick is a writer and journalist that follows and writes primarily about law and politics. President Trump is involved in politics ergo she is doing her job by following him and paying attention to his communications. She does not have to respond to them, particularly the ones that are provocative or manipulative or whatever other negative thing she imagines them to be.

But like lots of those on the Left she is incapable of doing this. I am the eldest of six kids. Us siblings would often tease each other, usually focused on the one of us that was most likely to react and get upset. Cruel, I know, but we were kids. My mother would always tell the one being teased that the best way to make the taunting stop was to ignore it or not react to it. One of my sisters famously said, "I try but I can't". Likewise Dahlia.

Guildofcannonballs said...

"The healthy response would be to tune it out altogether, but since actual people are actually suffering the brutal consequences, we cannot."

The Congo War (1998-Present) - historyguy.com
Search domain www.historyguy.com/congo_war.htmhttps://www.historyguy.com/congo_war.htm
Estimates place the number of dead (the vast majority civilian) at somewhere betweeen one million and two and a half million dead in Congo. Most of the dead were the result of famine and disease brought on by the war. -

Hope this concerned writer never sleeps again, unless she is a racist who doesn't care about the Congo. Then of course she will just sleep away the million plus dead, because they are black.

Mike Sylwester said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Mike Sylwester said...

I am happy that our President Trump is appointing so many judges who rule on the basis of laws and the US Constitution instead of ruling on the basis of the Democratic Party's political platform.

If Clinton had become the President, the appointments would be just the opposite.

Jack Klompus said...

My friend in Kabul whose cousin was killed in the wedding bombing seems to be holding up reasonably well. I can only imagine how he would be breaking down if he had to live in the US while Trump is President.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

TDS is real.

Shouting Thomas said...

We're living thru an era of peace, great prosperity, record low unemployment, solid economic growth, etc.

What's the problem?

ga6 said...

The Congo War (1998-Present) - historyguy.com

Cannot ignore must link lizard brain now typing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6s5Kjw5BEQ

Dust Bunny Queen said...

Maybee said On some level, you enjoy it. You enjoy the thrill of thinking your existence is threatened. It's like choosing to live an escape room existence. You are completely safe, but you want your heart to race.

This is a valuable insight into our pampered, western, society.

I don't recall where I read it. Perhaps Victor Davis Hansen. If I remember correctly it went something like this...........

The human mind and body is conditioned to respond to danger, trials, hardships to overcome. That is how we have survived.

Psychologically, we crave an enemy, challenges. We need to strive. Feel the adrenaline! Become righteous!!! When our society has become so secure, wealthy in comparison to the human historical condition.....people have to create enemies, boogeymen, people to blame for their imaginary disasters. Convincing themselves they live in trying, horrible times. When as Maybee says...they are completely safe.

In the past we had plenty of challenges without having to create them. In our living memory here area a few WWI, WWII, Cold War, Great Depression.

Now the Millenials (and others) need to have something to strive against, so they invent Global Warming, Orange Man Bad, Capitalism is evil, racism under every couch cushion.... Etc Etc. Instead of living a peaceful life, they make up obstacles to try to give their lives meaning.

Inventing evils and bad imaginary things to strive against is a mental illness.

Anonymous said...

Gahrie: The left fails to understand that we felt exactly the same way about Obama. We just behaved like adults about it.

Who's "we"? I'm not an en-bubbled neurotic putting out silly stuff for a target audience of other neurotic, hysterical bints.

So no, my emotions re Obama (to the extent that I can be said to get emotional about politicians) are very far from being "exactly the same" as their emotions re Trump.

virgil xenophon said...

Pure drivel. This woman wouldn't have lasted ONE HOUR on a Conestoga wagon in a wagon train during an olden-day trek on the old Oregon Trail to Sacramento, let alone Derek Kites (above) selected modern-day project managers morn-til-lunchtime survival rate example..

BarrySanders20 said...

Sylvester said:" "Except if you are a white man, then you are responsible for racism."

It's the new White Man's Burden.

Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years,
Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!

Quayle said...

Pride is a tough master, isn’t it. You can’t gratify your pride and also get free of the competitive struggle.

Someone once said ‘take *my* yoke upon you for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. That yoke entails rendering unto Cesar what is Cesar’s, yes. But it mostly shifts the focus of your attention away from the power structures of the world toward how you treat those immediately around you and in particular those that are or appear “below” you in some vein.

I doubt Dahlia’s life is so sheltered that there wasn’t a homeless person or a downtrodden person or a poor person or a sick person somewhere along her daily path, or near her in a hospital, or a lonely person or someone who is distraught or morning within her reach of friends that she could have gone and served or listened to more or help in some small way that would’ve made her and their day happy and their life more joyful. As far as I can tell that’s one of the secrets of life. Donald Trump come and Barack Obama’s go, but looking right around us is all we need to live a happy fulfilling life

doctrev said...

Given how badly spoiled liberals deal with genuine adversity, and how completely inept they are at making lifestyle changes that would save them (ex: moving to Canada), I can say with certainty that they will collapse instantly when pushed. Especially because their pet minorities will at best stand aside, at worst point and laugh. As Chappelle says about his experience as a hostage, "I think those black guys are going to try and save us... Mmm-MMM!"

Nonapod said...

This article reads like a parody of a leftist elite grousing. It's offering up a target rich environment of absurd claims. The "people are actually suffering the brutal consequences" line is pretty goddamn funny. Evidently Trump's tweets are inflicting psychological damage that is on par with war crimes.

I see this article isn't from the Babylon Bee, but are we sure the Dahlia Lithwick person isn't secretly in Trump's employ?

doctrev said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Fernandinande said...

Three headlines which are made funny by their Drudge proximity, like this:

FALL PREVIEW: ABC NEWS ANNOUNCES DETAILS ON THIRD DEM DEBATE...

Life-like robots closer to reality...

Learn, adapt...


chuck said...

Dahlia should read the stories of recovery and #walkaway.

Shouting Thomas said...

I read the first paragraph of this article.

Lithwick is flat out lying.

She's angry because she disagrees with Trump on policy. All the stuff she makes up about Trump's mental and emotional state is bullshit. She's not pissed off because Trump is a mess. She's pissed off because he's been effective in implementing policy she hates.

Lithwick needs to learn to deal with disagreement. And accept the results of elections when she loses.

Temujin said...

The 2016 election made so many people crazy. That, and social media, which is like taking an issue and putting it under a magnifying glass in sunlight. Its make people living mostly on the coasts, literally crazy.

I still wake up everyday and do exactly what I was doing while His Majesty Barack was in the White House. I didn't feel the coziness of His Graceful Presence. I thought he was a fraud propped up by a fawning press and academia. But I still got up and lived my own life on my own terms. I watched as he gutted our health care system with a late Christmas Eve legislative swindle. I watched as he yawned during the Arab Spring and the Iranian uprising. I watched as he promised Vlad he'd be more amenable after the election. I watched as he sent pallet loads of cash to the Iranian Supreme Leader. I watched each year as he seemed to be more interested in appearing on ESPN to give us his NCAA brackets (with the ESPN people just gushing over him). And, yes, I watched as he caged immigrant children.

Still- I got up everyday and worked on my own life. Why cannot these people just get on with their lives?

Rob said...

People are being awfully hard on Dahlia Lithwick. She was compelled by Trump to get a manicure, and even that turned out to be insufficient. Perhaps next time a mani-pedi will be more restorative.

Leland said...

I still haven't seen one Trump speech. The most I've heard him talk since being on The Apprentice is about 2 minutes. Yet, I'll vote for him again. He's not making my life miserable; and the people who are acting miserable have always seemed miserable to me.

I did wonder, why do these people think Trump is destroying things when employment is up, the stockmarket has recovered all loses from 2007-2010 recession, and actual race relations are better than the previous years. Then I realized; the people who made money in government by controlling where funds went, those who made a living on currency manipulation, and the race baiters are struggling. Yeah, I bet they are upset. As stated above, suck it up buttercup.

Original Mike said...

Blogger Gahrie said..."The left fails to understand that we felt exactly the same way about Obama. We just behaved like adults about it."

That's what makes this all so delicious.

Fernandinande said...

What is best on the Intertubes?

To crush your enemies, see them talk about Greenland, of all places, and to hear the lamentations of their opinion columnists.

tcrosse said...

To be fair, if Hillary had been elected, I'd be losing sleep, too.

GatorNavy said...

Lithwick's own words...And so here we are back in the narcissist’s loop, fueling his need to be at the center because, well, there he is at the center....

Substitute she for he and you will know the real narcissist.

h said...

Great insight from DustBunnyQueen. In the 1950s and 60s there were real racial injustices: school segregation, Jim Crow, redlining home loan policies, voting discrimination. And the people who fought against those injustices were, and are remembered as, heroes. The young people of today want to be heroes too, but the real injustices have disappeared. So they are required to inflate minor injustice into big deals (confederate statues), or to invent injustices (hands up don't shoot), or to create monsters who oppose them (Trump = Hitler). There are ways to act heroically today; but the actions are not so headline grabbing, and the sacrifices required are less dramatic than facing prison cells and water cannons.

gspencer said...

"The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling. The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time. They start to chip away at your health and at your soul."

Here's a little song I wrote
You might want to sing it note for note
Don't worry, be happy
In every life we have some trouble
But when you worry you make it double
Don't worry, be happy
Don't worry, be happy now

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-diB65scQU

Bob Boyd said...

She's confusing cause and effect.
Trump's election didn't cause the left's mental health issues.
Their obvious mental health issues caused Trump's election.

Bay Area Guy said...

Remind me again who Dahlia Nitwit is, and why her political opinions matter?

Mr. Forward said...

Q: What do you hear when an elephant steps on a grape?

A: A little whine!

Bob Boyd said...

"There's something about August going into September where everybody in Washington gets all wee-weed up. I don't know what it is. But that's what happens." - Barack Obama

Ice Nine said...

The lament of a mentally ill person describing the the burden of her derangement.

narciso said...

I remember the huntress, drove dahlia to these scanners level freakouts

Ken B said...

“Virtue signaling is a cruel disease.”
But a neutral one.

buwaya said...

With all these people, remember that they are paid to write as per the party line.
We have no idea what they really think, or, if they generally agree with it, the degree of their sincerity or intensity.

You cannot productively argue with insincere people, even in your own mind.

Calypso Facto said...

"Instead of living a peaceful life, they make up obstacles to try to give their lives meaning."

I've often said that Progressive politics are like asthma; hyperventilation as a response to often imaginary threats.

Wince said...

I'm eagerly awaiting Dahlia Lithwick's upcoming memoir, Prozac Hack.

Fernandinande said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
MayBee said...

I remember when Trump was elected, even Megan McArdle flipped out. He's going to cause nuclear war! It was sad, hilarious, and unexpected from her. But we don't really hear that particular fear anymore, do we? It's on to the next, without maybe considering they are doing this to themselves.

Fernandinande said...

I used an algorithm to remove the extraneous words from the TDS rant:

Demoralizing Trump awful boring cost Donald Trump Tax massive toll energy stolen forced inane half-baked squanderer wasting Trump haphazard forces doomed errant corrosive forces inane oppose half-baked consequences psychic costs resisting stupidity stress anxiety health impacts unequally less power ripped apart miscarriages cruelty suffering concerned confused embarrassed exhausted angry insulted frightened worsening cardiovascular health sleep problems anxiety stress Trump wasting physically ill buried lies hubris threats meaningless gibberish lies anxious worried stressed cost outrages mental toll worse psychic toll crippling lost sleep anxiety fears squandered chip away brutal consequences narcissist Trump Trump burnout confess cruelty dreaded feared sidelining Trump fatigue syndrome fugue state numbness burnout loss of reality concerning jealous authoritarianism fatigue chaos punched gerrymandering interference suppression concede loses Trump refused anti-Semitic conspiracy Trump reversed taxes Dancing With the Stars cold profoundly wrong insane.

SGT Ted said...

There has never been clearer evidence that left-ish progressive ideology attracts emotionally imbalanced people who seek validation and promotion via the mutual support of group-think and cultural signalling in place of principles guided by intellect.

Trump acts as both a Black Light that reveals otherwise hidden crazy and a laser pointer that can distract and occupy his cat-brained opponents.

DarkHelmet said...

"The healthy response would be to tune it out altogether, but since actual people are actually suffering the brutal consequences"

Tell us more of these 'brutal consequences.' Low unemployment? An attempt to enforce the nation's immigration laws? Judges who try to adhere to the Constitution rather than re-write it on the fly?

Absolutely brutal.

Anonymous said...

I disagree that the political hysteria we see around us is just the product of people with cushy lives making up problems. That the problems and anxieties of life in well-off societies are very different from those in societies closer to basic-animal-survival mode does not mean that they're imaginary.

It's hardly a novel observation that large, highly complex, highly mobile, technologically advanced societies can produce a lot of very real pathologies in the human animal. When I look at the really fucked-up young people out there, I also see the older generation that abandoned them to all that fuck-uppery, or, worse, actively imposed that fuck-uppery on them.

When I see an obese 15-year-old who doesn't know what sex "xie" is, who is lacking in any emotional resilience, who is abysmally ignorant of anything that happened prior to last week, and who has been deliberately denied any understanding of and participation in the culture of his forbears, my first reaction isn't to think "wow, loser, it's your own damned fault you did such a lousy job of raising yourself, you pathetic losing loser weakling". My first reaction is to look around for a smug Boomer or Gen-X-er to punch - or yes, even a sainted GG-er.

paminwi said...

This blog post and the comments on it have been, for the most part, an absolute joy to read.
It makes me happy to see so many well written comments basically saying, Stuff it liberals. We are truly enjoying your angst and suffering. Actually, at times laughing out loud at you. Too bad, so sad.

Thank you for your comments and getting my day off to a great start.

rcocean said...

You think Deb Latwick is a wuss and a weakling but she's signally her fellow Leftists that "She cares". She's working for "The revolution" and is so dedicated that a counter-revolutionary like Trump is driving her crazy (a short drive in any case). So, its a form of Lefty virtue signalling. Thinking of her as a normal, apolitical person, is a mistake.

But Dr. Althouse gave some good advice.

mockturtle said...

Women with names like 'Dahlia' are really demoralizing. Where did they all come from? Did they come from pods sent by an intergalactic enemy?

Michael K said...

When I look at the really fucked-up young people out there, I also see the older generation that abandoned them to all that fuck-uppery, or, worse, actively imposed that fuck-uppery on them.

If you would like a face to punch over this, here is one.

Dr. Burke was also recently awarded an ASA Fund for the Advancement of the Discipline grant to host a national Summit on New Frontiers in the Study of Colorblind Racism, which took place in May 2016; she is also Guest Editing an upcoming Special Issue of Sociological Perspectives on this same topic. On her campus, Meghan co-developed and directs the Engaging Diversity pre-orientation program, a 3-day intensive program for incoming white students to deeply consider white privilege and antiracism so that they can work as allies for social and racial justice.

MacMacConnell said...

Bay Area Guy said...
"Remind me again who Dahlia Nitwit is, and why her political opinions matter?"

Well it's simple,

She is a Canadian, check.
She attended Yale, Ivy League!, check.
She got a JD at Stanford, check.
She has a crush on Rachel Maddow and Emma Goldman, check.
She thinks a combination Rachel and Emma would make a perfect Supreme Court Justice.
Dahlia is an idiot, check.

Anonymous said...

MayBee: I remember when Trump was elected, even Megan McArdle flipped out. He's going to cause nuclear war! It was sad, hilarious, and unexpected from her.

It was sad and hilarious, but it should not have been unexpected. Granted, at that time a lot of us people outside the "great and good, best and brightest" bubble weren't aware of just how impervious its defensive perimeter was, and just how much nonsense was being entertained within it.

I think McArdle is a good cautionary tale illustrating how suscuptible we humans are to herd mentality and groupthink. Even the more level-headed, intelligent, and curious among us. We don't even see it happening to us.

Hey Skipper said...

I'm a lurker of advanced age.

I was reading Slate when Micheal Kinsley was in charge. It was kind of sort of like Quillette is today. Ms. Lithwick was writing for Slate at the time (IIRC), and did a very credible job of writing legal analysis columns.

Then, round about 2005, she went off the rails and right into the nearest ditch.

Never to return.

Ralph L said...

History the first time as farce.

Engaging Diversity pre-orientation program

In the 90's, my alma mater had one for new minority students to help them adapt/self-segregate.

mockturtle said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Birkel said...

Nobody paid attention to the PURPLE ELEPHANT warnings.

Donald Trump is the master of saying "Don't think of PURPLE ELEPHANTS."

You were warned years ago.

dreams said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
mockturtle said...

I think the 'bubble' explains a great deal. These people apparently never take the time to travel outside that bubble to meet people from other backgrounds and livelihoods and get to know them. They don't want to, because their self-worshiping faith might be shaken by the fact that most people do not bow to their [obvious only to themselves] superior knowledge.

mockturtle said...

"The healthy response would be to tune it out altogether, but since actual people are actually suffering the brutal consequences, we cannot."

And who are these 'actual people'? The only people I know who are suffering from Trump's presidency are insufferable Progs like the author.

JPS said...

Gahrie,

"The left fails to understand that we felt exactly the same way about Obama. We just behaved like adults about it."

What you forget (nah, I know you don't) is that the left does not believe in a single standard. If we were upset or bothered by Obama, then obviously we deserved to be, and could therefore fuck right off. Whereas if the left is collectively on the verge of a nervous breakdown, since they're the good guys this is a real problem!

Nonetheless, yes. I agree with you - and Temujin has a spot-on description of behaving like adults.

MayBee:

"even Megan McArdle flipped out. [Trump]'s going to cause nuclear war!"

Yes. And McArdle had been one of my favorite writers when it came to taking a skeptical look at narratives and saying, Now, wait a minute. To me, and I was no fan or defender of Trump, he was obviously challenging his prospective nuclear policy advisors to articulate a premise so settled, it would be tempting not to bother thinking about why. I wouldn't want anyone advising me on nukes who couldn't produce a compelling answer off the cuff. To McArdle, the man straight-up didn't understand: If we have all these nukes, why don't we use them? What good are they if we don't?

Richard Dolan said...

"And I just wonder why people keep giving Trump what he's only asking for. He's not stealing your attention."

'Cui bono' is usually the best place to start. They do it because it's good for their business or their fundraising or their career or their reputation with whatever audience they're trying to impress. The rest is just fake news.

Anonymous said...

Dr. K:

If you would like a face to punch over this, here is one.

Dr. Burke...


That is a very punchable face, but she's very young. Her parents and teachers and professors, and then *their* parents and teachers and professors, and then *their* parents and teachers and professors, are the ones who need working over with a tire-iron first.

People her age are not the ones who turned the field of anthropology into a woke joke. She's just the latter-day gullible lightweight who squatted opportunistically in the wreckage.

Robert Cook said...

"Trump has made America great again to any objective observer."

Said by a subjective observer.

Michael K said...

People her age are not the ones who turned the field of anthropology into a woke joke.

Maybe not but I am glad my kids don't have to sit through "a 3-day intensive program for incoming white students."

My youngest was being taught lies at U of Arizona but still came out conservative.

JAORE said...

He's going to cause nuclear war!

Can't be. We all turned to ash and cinders in the Ronald Reagan War.

I didn't like most of the policies of the Obama terms. But, guess what, MOST of them had little to no impact on my day to day life. So, while I follow politics, I followed a bit less closely. Did NOT comment on politics on social media. Tried not to get all wee-weed up over every danged thing.

Never felt like a mani-pedi was a potential solution.

Felt good most of the time during the 8 years of O. Feeling even better now.

Michael K said...

Then, round about 2005, she went off the rails and right into the nearest ditch.

A lot of the left went nuts then. Bush was re-elected and they all went nuts,

hombre said...

“Take responsibility for yourself. Any therapist will tell you that!”

These columns about Trump are beyond self-indulgent, they are pathological. It is inherent to lunacy that lunatics cannot take responsibility for themselves. Hence, the insanity defense.

narciso said...

Well it was a short trip, for many, quite a few bloggers like john cole went completely insane, james joyner slid a little slower.

Robert Cook said...

"If Hillary Clinton had won the 2016 election, the USA now would have open borders forever."

Why do you think that? After all, Obama deported more illegal immigrants than Trump has, and Hillary very well might have continued with Obama's policies. (Why didn't those opposing Trump's wall get exercised over Obama's deportation? Well, they loved Obama, and so they didn't pay attention to what he was actually doing, or they justified his behavior to themselves in various ways to allow themselves to think Obama was doing a bang-up job.)

Obama was basically a (mildly liberal) Republican in practice, despite his deceptive oratory otherwise. (Hillary might even have been a conservative Republican in practice, had she won the office.)

Seeing Red said...

To you.

Chuck said...

No, Althouse. We have no choice. Trump has told us we have no choice. We have to vote for him. We have to vote for him or else our 401k’s will become worthless.

So I don’t understand why you think we have any choices when it comes to Trump. Trump told us plainly and explicitly that we have no choice.

narciso said...

Nbc serves as minder for china



https://m.theepochtimes.com/release-of-congressional-transcripts-confirms-the-epoch-times-prior-reporting_2840288.html/amp?__twitter_impression=true

Quaestor said...

Won't someone please demonstrate to me the reality of Dahlia Lithwick as a real flesh-and-blood human and not some bald ripoff of Tatiana McGrath? Judging from the article either Slate is trying to ride Andrew Doyle's coattails to some distant horizon resembling fiscal solvency or the anti-Trump MiniTrue has devolved far past boundaries of satire.

narciso said...

Well shes been around for a bakers dozen years or so.

Steve M. Galbraith said...

Go back and read Lithwick's works, circa 2004/6, before Trump. She was irrational and over the top then. Anything that went against her politics meant disaster for the country.

Yes, she's turned it up a notch but she's always been this way.

n.n said...

The establishment strikes, the rebels respond, then the establishment whines back, for one trimester, two trimesters, in progress. Yes, we can. No, you can't. Yes, we can. Kneel before the journolists you serve. You're going to get what you deserve... A witch hunt. A warlock trial. A whine parade.

PackerBronco said...

The healthy response would be to tune it out altogether, but since actual people are actually suffering the brutal consequences, (of the Trump presidency) we cannot.

I'm trying really hard to think what these brutal consequences are, but I'm coming up empty.

Quaestor said...

We have no choice.

Out of everyone who now or ever submitted a comment to the Althouse blog only LLR Chuck is plausibly one who acts and writes entirely out of coerced compulsion. Only now he admits as much, or more precisely, Trump commanded him to admit as much.

From now on let us all take note that LLR stands for left-leaning robot.

Skeptical Voter said...

Dang me Dahlia. I can barely stagger along under the awful psychic burden of the Trump presidency. I mean I look out at the landscape and see people of all colors having a bit more cash to jangle in their jeans. As a retired geezer, I look at my retirement savings, and despite Paul Krugman telling me that the markets would never recover after Trump's election, they do seem to be rising sorta like a well yeasted dough.

I've had a few Hillary Clinton lost the election! style reverses in my life. There was a college girlfriend/first love that moved on to something better; later my wife suffered a miscarriage of what would have been our first child {I've still not got over that even though it was more than 50 years ago}; there've been some career reverses etc. But you get up off the floor and carry on. And the reverses (Obama) tend to get balanced by the successes (Trump).

Life is tough and then you die. Anybody who gets all wee wee'd up (like Ms. Lithwick) about who the President may be, is playing with much less than a full emotional deck. I'd say Dahlia needs an intervention where someone will take her computer away before she dies of a self inflicted emotional and mental wound.

Eric said...

Dahlia ought to get out more.

Robert Cook said...

"And people still applaud that asshole who ruined healthcare to avenge his mommy's death."

Ha! The U.S. Healthcare system was fucked up long before Barack Obama was in the White House (as seen in Michael Moore's movie Sicko, released in 2007). Our healthcare system is fucked because of the profiteers running it.

Shouting Thomas said...

So, Trump ain’t hip.

It’s OK. The president doesn’t have to be hip.

Anonymous said...

SM Galbraith: Go back and read Lithwick's works, circa 2004/6, before Trump. She was irrational and over the top then. Anything that went against her politics meant disaster for the country.

Yes, she's turned it up a notch but she's always been this way.


I concur, but I'd even push it back a couple of years. I thought she was an emo hack then, and remember lots of arguments with people who were (inexplicably to me) impressed with her stuff.

Shouting Thomas said...

Our healthcare system is fine.

It was better before Obamacare.

I had surgery yesterday. Nurses and doctors both spent the pre-op time bitching about how Obamacare had taken care decisions out of their hands and forced them to be mindless drones and employees.

Obamacare doubled, then tripled my premiums before I retired. I saw no consequent improvement in services. The paper work requirements went wild. And a lot of bureaucrats (i.e., Democrats) got feather bedding jobs.

We need to return to as near a free market as possible.

buwaya said...

"Trump has told us we have no choice. We have to vote for him."

As a practical matter you don't.
When you are in such a state of conflict it is either one side or the other, or flee.

The consequences for very many are in fact existential. Do you reproduce?
Do your children? Do your grandchildren?

Or the consequences could implement much faster. In this state the madness of crowds apply.
Which crowds will go mad when is an interesting question.

Michael K said...

(Hillary might even have been a conservative Republican in practice, had she won the office.)

Cook thinks all Republicans are thieves like Hillary and Bill.

Some are but we have seen nothing like Hillary and Bill in American politics since the Gilded Age and even then the crooks were mostly underlings like Albert B Fall.

Bob Boyd said...

Trump told us plainly and explicitly that we have no choice.

Is he wrong?

Skippy Tisdale said...

"The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling. The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time. They start to chip away at your health and at your soul."

What the fuck is wrong with these people?

Narr said...

Last fall we made our first trip to Savannah GA--lovely town, lovely weather, lovely stay in a small restored (by our host and owner) 1853 townhouse just blocks from the river.

Our host is an old friend, but this was our first long visit with his second wife. My friend is a squishy-washy old liberal former hippie who yupped up and retired well from a corporate job, but his wife has a bad case of TDS. (My wife leans D by family and upbringing, but doesn't obsess on political shit. Thank god.)

Now, I cultivate what Updike called "tolerance bordering on disdain" for others' tastes and opinions, and I was able to enjoy myself--and amuse our hosts--by telling them about the 8th C. Byzantine Emperor Constantine Copronymus--"whose name is Dung."

Narr
He was an iconoclast

buwaya said...

"Obamacare doubled, then tripled my premiums before I retired."
"We need to return to as near a free market as possible."

This is one of those places where I disagree.

Medical services costs determine "premiums" whether they are paid out of public funds through taxation or made mandatory private purchases through labor laws, as in the US. Indeed, comparisons with European (or Canadian, Australian, Japanese, Singaporean...) systems shows that such categorization is fudged and enormously varied. The US system is already mainly "socialist" as it is, using a strict taxation based category, or very nearly entirely so by a more generous comparison with developed-world systems.

The only place where the US is very distinct is in its extreme medical services delivery costs. I don't think this has anything to do with how the system is paid for, but with politically driven cost escalation through regulation and its legal regime.

Arguing about how things are paid for, consequently, seems much more political sloganeering than finding a solution. The whole thing has been sidetracked into ideological arguments about irrelevancies.

Anonymous said...

Robert Cook: Obama was basically a (mildly liberal) Republican in practice, despite his deceptive oratory otherwise. (Hillary might even have been a conservative Republican in practice, had she won the office.)

This is an example of a semantically decipherable sentence that is yet utterly devoid of any informative content about the real world.

(In your defense, that's true of many sentences including the words "Republican" or "Democrat".)

Michael K said...

The paper work requirements went wild. And a lot of bureaucrats (i.e., Democrats) got feather bedding jobs.

I was talking to a new internist (for me) last week. He was entering my medical history in his laptop. All those academics who want "Medicare For All" have "scribes" to do the typing for them. Many of the scribes are premed students or nurse's aides. I wonder how many mistakes they make. I used to be an enthusiast about medical informatics, as it used to be called. I thought it would automate many repetitive tasks. Instead, the Obama people went low bidder and it is a mess. It is basically a billing and surveillance system. Clinical assist is very low priority. Many systems don't communicate with each other. Cedars-Sinai is UCLA's biggest hospital outside the medical school Cedars' and UCLA's EHRs are incompatible. Most UCLA faculty are on both staffs.

Most leftists don't realize that Obamacare was written by 25 year old staff lawyers and insurance lobbyists. Hillary made a huge mistake with her secret health care task force with no insurance or provide input. Pelosi and Reid let insurance companies write the law. Insurance companies hate health insurance. They do like processing claims, though. As long as someone else pays them.

narciso said...

It was written by com artist robert creamer
https://dailycaller.com/2019/08/20/violation-michigan-flint-lead/

mjg235 said...

Dalia Lithwick was always an asshat, but with that article, she literally amputated her ass and made it into a hat.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"We have to vote for him or else our 401k’s will become worthless."

Likely true. What is the worth of something that has been stolen from you?

"Ha! The U.S. Healthcare system was fucked up long before Barack Obama was in the White House (as seen in Michael Moore's movie Sicko, released in 2007)"

Michael Moore. Cookie? I'm seriously disappointed in you.

Michael K said...

its extreme medical services delivery costs.

This is mostly claims processing cost. Health care funding is probably 50% process cost, not care cost.

If we went to a cash system, as we had in the 1950s, with insurance for insurable events, costs would go down tremendously.

We may yet end up with a largely cash system. One insurance company, a couple of years ago, came up with a hybrid life/health policy.

We need to get the prices rationalized first.

Your examples were mostly small countries. France has the best system and then highest satisfaction in Europe. Australia had a great system but the ALP won the 1986 election and wrecked it. It may have recovered but the system before 1986 was the best in the world, although small population.

Japan's system has been described to me by patients as cruel and inhumane.

Anonymous said...

ST:
Our healthcare system is fine.

It was better before Obamacare.

[...]
Obamacare doubled, then tripled my premiums before I retired.

Obamacare jacked up my premiums, deductible, and OOP to a jaw-dropping degree. It no doubt injected more bureaucratic misery into the practice of medicine. But our healthcare system was not "fine" before that. Obamacare just made in worse, and was in no way a solution to any of the system's problems.

Thuglawlibrarian said...

Articles like this make me smile. I was somewhat lukewarm about Trump running in 2016; however, his 2.5 years in office have been a pleasant surprise and I absolutely love what he is doing to our so-called "elites."

The dude is living rent free inside their heads.

Fen said...

The people who held their breath till they turned blue are now suffocating? Good riddance.

narciso said...

Indeed:

https://legalinsurrection.com/

Seeing Red said...

Obamacare jacked up my premiums, deductible, and OOP to a jaw-dropping degree. I


Me too. It’s not cheap providing “free” birth control and breast pumps.

MeatPopscicle1234 said...

Schadenfreude bitches... at long last you get to feel the gut wrenching, soul crushing existence that our side had to endure during Obama's 8 year reign of error... I pray to God that you the same full measure and have to endure another 4 years of Trump... HAHAHAHAHAHA...

Michael K said...

But our healthcare system was not "fine" before that.

It was for the 85% with employer based coverage. It was just very expensive.

All the Obamacare program did was provide free care for 12% of the population and make the other 88% pay for it. The Democrats planned to force the employer paid group into their plan but chickened out when they saw what a mess it is. They would have lost all the unions.

Seeing Red said...

The majority of the exchanges have failed. I don’t think anyone has figured out the cost of that gift to big tech.

Fen said...


Robert Cook: Obama was basically a (mildly liberal) Republican in practice

If that had even a glimmer of truth, Republican turnout for his second election would have been massive.

How many Republicans voted for Barack Obama again? Twelve?

You're such a dishonest marxist hack

narciso said...

Just regular folk:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.dailycaller.com/2019/08/22/obamas-martha-vineyards-mansion

wildswan said...

Dahlia Lithwick, of course, is just a pampered-suburban narrative salesgirl, moaning and screeching out whatever sells to the media which is whatever the DNC thinks will be make suburban women vote for Democrats.

But her article and the Wapo article it is based on are unknowingly using the new eugenics which identifies social situations as causes of physical sickness through the mechanism of a heritable sensitivity to stress. Lithwick is using an article in the Wapo entitled "Trump’s presidency may be making Latinos sick." The social science articles referenced in the Wapo article include articles authored by social scientists who have written for Biodemography and Social Biology, the journal of the American national eugenics society presently called Society of Biodemography and Social Biology.

One such article cited by Wapo was
Association of Preterm Births Among US Latina Women With the 2016 Presidential Election
Ralph Catalano, PhD; Alison Gemmill, PhD; Joan A. Casey, PhD; et al
In 2013 Ralph Catalano published in Biodemography and Social Biology:
Income Gains and Very Low-Weight Birth among Low-Income Black Mothers in California. Tim A Bruckner, David H Rehkopf, Ralph A Catalano. Biodemography and Social Biology 59, 2, 2013
Another article cited by Wapo was
Change in birth outcomes among infants born to Latina mothers after a major immigration raid
Arline T Geronimus, Nicole L Novak, Aresha M Martinez-Cardoso
International Journal of Epidemiology, Volume 46, Issue 3, June 2017, Pages 839–849
In 2015 Arline Geronimus published in Biodemography and Social Biology:
2015 Arline Geronimus, Annie Ro, John Bound, Derek Griffith, Gilbert Gee. Cohort and Duration Patterns Among Asian Immigrants: Comparing Trends in Obesity and Self-Rated Health. Biodemography and Social Biology 61, 1

The concern is that the proximate goal of these researchers at present is to ally their research to Trump bashing thus rendering it respectable and assuring it a hearing. But the ultimate goal is to relate sickness to heritability through the mechanism of genetic sensitivity to social stress. And then to use that "science" designated victims. Example of this research trend among current eugenic researchers are:
2016 Jason D Boardman, Benjamin W Domingue, Robbee Wedow, Dalton Conley, Matt McQueen, Thomas J Hoffmann. Genome-Wide Estimates of Heritability for Social Demographic Outcomes. Biodemography and Social Biology 62, 1
2017 David R Williams, Yusuf Ransome, Denise C Carty, Courtney D Cogburn. Racial Disparities in the Association between Alcohol Use Disorders and Health in Black and White Women. Biodemography and Social Biology 63, 3 (David R Williams of the Harvard School of Public Health is Chair of Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2019)

The Wapo article ends by saying:
"....it’s important to document the impact of political decisions on public health [Zayas said]. 'The research being done now is laying the foundation for advocacy, for legal arguments and for the future so that maybe this [Trump's election] doesn’t have to happen again.” If this line of argument in Wapo is going to lead to "advocacy" and "legal arguments" and affect the future [the 2020 election? social policy under a Democratic President?] then we must be very careful that we truly understand where the arguments come from and where they are going. Arguments that come from eugenicists, go toward establsihing eugenic policies. Government intervention in public health led by eugenicists was not good in Germany, it was not good in sterilization campaigns against American indigenous people and = has it ever been a good thing?

Seeing Red said...

Our healthcare system is fucked because of the profiteers running it.

Which is the USG.

Fen said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Fen said...

The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling. The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time. They start to chip away at your health and at your soul.

"What the fuck is wrong with these people?"

They are crafting an alternate reality that will justify their resort to violence.

I've seen it enough now to recognize the pattern.

"You're speech is doing violence to me" will be the next illusion they cast. Remember, you are not their audience, they are trying to convince themselves and each other.

Fen said...

This is why I have so little patience with the Chucks and Farmers.

A Night of Broken Glass (Kristallnacht) is coming for us Deplorables, maybe worse after, and they want to stake out some Righteous Stand on the high road to satisfy their vanity.

Anonymous said...

Dr.K: If we went to a cash system, as we had in the 1950s, with insurance for insurable events, costs would go down tremendously.

Looks that way to me, but how to get that back? Seems that would mean a direct attack on the interests of the many players who are deeply invested in the status quo, and they aren't going anywhere without a fight (heavy artillery barrage from K Street incoming). Or maybe a good part of the problem is just the sheer difficulty of overcoming the inertia inherent to large, complex systems that over time inevitably accrete ponderous inefficiencies.

Wilbur said...

"The actual psychic toll on our mental health is crippling. The lost sleep, the grinding anxiety, the escalating fears don’t just represent squandered time. They start to chip away at your health and at your soul."

The truth is, I wish it would indeed ruin her health and end her miserable existence. That goes for her whacked-out prog friends too.

Earnest Prole said...

Dear Dahlia: The problem is not just that Trump is living rent-free in your head, but that you've consented to it for reasons only a first-rate spiritual advisor can help you understand.

Fen said...

Farmer: Trump is not building the wall fast enough for me!

Chuck: Trump called some diplomat a poopy-head!

Meanwhile, many miles away

Spoiling Attacks. Tactical maneuvers employed to seriously impair or delay a hostile attack while the enemy is in the process of forming an attack.

Gotta say, if I was running an Agit Prop Op as a spoiling attack on Trump, it would look exactly like Chuck and Farmer. Seed them onto the boards where Trump's base networks, sow doubt and discord in an attempt to undermine and delay Trump so the Establishment Wings of both parties can just wait him out. Anything to limit the number of things he can accomplish his term expires.

TestTube said...

You know what would soothe all those TDS'ers?

Barack Obama, stepping up and reasserting himself as leader of the Democratic Party. Making soothing speeches. Holding rallies. Discussing policy and the progressive way forward on talk shows. Endorsing candidates and appearing on stage with them, perhaps at the debates. Weighing in on issues foreign and domestic.

So where is he? Hanging with his rich friends. Producing Netflix content for hefty $$$. Raking in the money with private speeches and appearances.

If Trump is so awful, why isn't Obama doing more to counter him and to support Democratic candidates? Or, for that matter, Hillary.

Fen said...

Another suburban family morning
Grandmother screaming at the wall
We have to shout above the din of our rice crispies
We can't hear anything at all

Mother chants her litany of boredom and frustration
But we know all her suicides are fake
Daddy only stares into the distance
There's only so much more that he can take
Many miles away something crawls from the slime
At the bottom of a dark Scottish lake

Skippy Tisdale said...

"Our healthcare system is fucked because of the profiteers running it."

That's some grade-A stupid right there.

Yancey Ward said...

Lithwick should just kill herself.

Yancey Ward said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Yancey Ward said...

I see Fen had already linked to it.

Earnest Prole said...

I was running an Agit Prop Op as a spoiling attack on Trump, it would look exactly like Chuck and Farmer. Seed them onto the boards where Trump's base networks, sow doubt and discord.

Opinions that differ from your own are spoiling-attack agit-prop ops?

Gotcha.

bagoh20 said...

Wow! So now we have TDSDS (TDS Derangement Syndrome): derangement about your own derangement. That is so perfect for our times. You are a victim of your own self-inflicted victimization, and of course, despite that fact that you did this all on your own, it's Trumps fault.

Here is my recommendation to help with your illness: STFU, and talk about something else, you dipshit. How about how thoroughly fucked up you health insurance is now after Obamacare helped us all. Premiums have doubled, and care is harder to find everyday. Nice work supporting that truckload of bullshit. I know, I know, it's still probably Trump's fault.

narciso said...

But its such a woke campus:



https://dailycaller.com/2019/08/22/yale-psychiatry-professor-sexually-assaulted-five-male-students-report/

Fen said...

Gotta say, if I was running an Agit Prop Op as a spoiling attack on Trump, it would look exactly like Chuck and Farmer.

Of course that's not fair. Fair is where you take a pig to win a prize. You have to look at the whole board: a key part of Trump's Presidency has been the unmasking of all the "Life Long Republicans" who had been betraying the base for at least the last decade.

So OF COURSE we are looking at everyone sideways. We have outed a ton of Concern Trolls as a result, and unfortunately we have erred aggressively and wrongly accused a few decent folks who were honest and acting in good faith.

It's like we just hanged Benedict Arnold, and you stroll into the room saying "he was right about a few things though". And you are surprised that the room goes silent and everyone starts scrutinizing you as a British sympathizer? If you are acting in good faith, you will understand why you are suspect. If you are not acting in good faith, you will caterwaul about "loyalty oaths" and express fake outrage about our "paranoia"

Fen said...

Earnet: Opinions that differ from your own are spoiling-attack agit-prop ops? Gotcha.

Of course not. Good faith criticism of Trump is welcome. Differing opinions are needed to challenge opinions held, for the better. Echo chambers are lethal, as we saw with Hillary's camp on election night - they never saw that their Blue Wall had been crumbling for months.

You have rephrased what I said into something different, a strawman for you to attack.

And you are exemplifying the exact kind of dishonesty I just described: we just hanged Benedict Arnold, and you stroll into the room saying "he was right about a few things though". And you are surprised that the room goes silent and everyone starts scrutinizing you as a British sympathizer? If you are acting in good faith, you will understand why you are suspect. If you are not acting in good faith, you will caterwaul about "loyalty oaths" and express fake outrage about our "paranoia"<

Thank you for providing an example so quickly.


Birkel said...

The Left does not attract mentally unstable people, per se. Rather, it attracts people who want dominion over others. They wish to exercise raw power. The purposes that drive their respective pursuits of power are nearly inconsequential.

Nothing Dahlia Lithwick writes has any purpose other than to extract power over third parties. Not a single solitary thing. She wants dominion.

Deplorables will not abide.

Mr. Forward said...

A tender Dahlia named Lithwick’s
Reaction to Trump was to get sick
She mewled and she cried
And thought she would die
But really she was just a nickwick.

LA_Bob said...

Chuck said, "So I don’t understand why you think we have any choices when it comes to Trump. Trump told us plainly and explicitly that we have no choice."

Hush, Chuck, and do as you're told.

buwaya said...

"Japan's system has been described to me by patients as cruel and inhumane."

But it doesn't seem to be killing them very quickly.

Szoszolo said...

I think she's humble-bragging: "I care so deeply about the actual people he's hurting that I ache and lose sleep myself!"

Narrator: Actually, she thrives on it.

LA_Bob said...

Yancey Ward said, "Lithwick should just kill herself."

The Lament by Dahlia Lithwick....

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.....

I woke up this morning, and I realized Trump is still president!

OMG, what has life come to!

I called my therapist right after breakfast. When, oh when will she call me back!

The hate, the racism, the tweeting! When will it end! I can't take much more.

My friends aren't answering their phones. We need to get together for a scream session and a good cry.

Thank God, I don't believe in guns...or I might...just...do...myself...in.

eric said...

Here's where the left goes astray.

Know why you have to pay attention? Because you've given the Federal government too much power.

Remove that power and you won't have to worry and pay attention anymore. Your life will be better.

Earnest Prole said...

If you are acting in good faith, you will understand why you are suspect.

If you're acting in good faith you'll understand why I suspect you're Dahlia Lithwick's right-wing twin.

Beasts of England said...

’Thank you for providing an example so quickly.’

You say that as though their responses are predictable... ;)

narciso said...

With obama he threatened the cleanup crew at aig, didnt go after cassano or mozilo or gutfruend, they paid he and biden off after all.

narciso said...

Now their greed was encouraged by govt policy which contrary to conventional wisdom, encouraged the subprime bubble through regulation at hud at justice et al

Michael K said...

Blogger buwaya said...
"Japan's system has been described to me by patients as cruel and inhumane."

But it doesn't seem to be killing them very quickly.


True. The NHS holds the record for that. I only have one example but he was a very successful restaurant owner in Tokyo.., He and two sons all came here for treatment after the father's experience with surgery for cancer of the rectum. He had a translator with him.

Japanese surgery has always been very advanced. I think the compliant was less about quality than how surgeons treat patients. German surgeons frequently do only a small part of surgeries. Assistants do most of it. Similar system, I think.

Remember surgeons are frequently at the top of the pyramid. Margaret Thatcher introduced a reform in the NHS.

It was called "Fund Holding" and it empowered GPs who could send their patients to another hospital if they were being ignored by the hospital specialists. I was at Dartmouth at the time and was sent over to help teach GPs how to negotiate with hospitals. It resulted in much better care as the GP knew what had happened in the hospital.

When Labour came in after Major, the Fund Holding was cancelled. Back to ignoring GPs.

narciso said...

Its not an accident that eugenicist bernard shaw was a big labour supporter.

Birkel said...

What eric said!!
The purpose of federalism was to remove the worry over the federal government.
The answer is to return the federal government to its proper constraints.

Freedom to contract should be revived.
Freedom of association, too!

Known Unknown said...

Some people embody their names. Dahlia Lithwick is one of those people.

One of the others was a house painter who came to paint the interior of my home recently. His name was Dale Hewitt. He was everything you'd ever expect out of a guy named Dale Hewitt: Dirty blond scruffy hair, one earring, a twinkle in his eye, a failed surfer somnambulism, and a devil-may-care attitude about life.

He did a great job on the house, by the way.

narciso said...

Yet they never learn:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.dw.com/en/climate-change-what-germany-can-learn-from-the-netherlands/a-50130937

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