Albanyguy

I worked in TV news a couple of decades ago (on a much lower level) and I learned that's how you tell the REAL reporters from the phonies. If journalism is in your blood, you don't go home when a big story breaks. You stay in the newsroom, even if it's not your shift or your story, because there's no place on earth you'd rather be and nothing else that makes you feel more alive. You can see it in Ari Melber and Nicole Wallace. You can see it in Steve Kornacki on election nights. You can see it in Rachel Maddow, who pulled herself out of a trout stream when the news about the Mueller report broke on Friday and did her show Friday night from a makeshift studio in Tennessee. Joe and Mika? They always look like they have one foot out the door at 8:59 every morning.

I don't miss TWOP's obnoxious, power-mad moderators. I find PTV to be far more relaxed and a lot more fun.

This is pure speculation, but I think that Sam's birth left Jill unable to have more children. I don't mean that her doctors just advised her not to have another pregnancy. If that were the case, she'd simply ignore them and get pregnant again as soon as she could. After all, what do those doctors with all their so-called "education" know? No, I think Sam's birth resulted in emergency surgery that left her unable to conceive again. If it had simply been another horrendous bloody mess of a childbirth like Israel's or Spurgeon's, they wouldn't have draped a big cloak of secrecy over it. These women are ridiculously proud of suffering during childbirth: it's like a contest to see who has the longest labor, who comes the closest to cheating death, etc. But not being able to produce more children for Jesus? In their world, that's not only a source of shame, but a sign that God is punishing you for your sins. That's something they would definitely keeps a deep, dark secret. It would leave poor Jill not only deeply depressed, but wracked with guilt at her "failure". And if that were the case, who does she have to look to for empathy and support? Her mother? Her husband? I think we all can guess how much understanding they'd offer her. Jill and Derick have always been peculiar, but prior to Sam's birth they were peculiar in the way all the Duggars are: lazy, entitled, self-righteous, proud of their own ignorance. But after Sam's birth, they really went off the rails. There are other factors involved of course (Jill has always had a tendency to cling and something bad happened in Danger America), but I think Sam's birth marked a trauma that has left them unable to live with themselves.

Then throw in the nearly unbearable heat and humidity for much of the year. Some people may get accustomed to it over the years, but for others it produces a chronic low-level state of irritation and anxiety which carries over into impulsive or hostile behavior.

Or she just keeps re-heating and serving it to Derick and the kids night after night until it's gone. Making them eat the same casserole three or four meals in a row saves her time and effort and frees her up to do more important things like following Derick to his law school classes.

Yeah, it's okay for them to show off their feet by going barefoot or wearing flip-flops because Michelle said that "feet aren't sexual", but knees are apparently a real erogenous zone? But of course when the modesty rules were laid down for them by their cult, bare feet were given a free pass because that filthy old creep Bill Gothard happens to have a foot fetish.

I think TLC came up with the idea for the renovation, did most of the work and paid the bills for it. By this point the network must be desperate to find things to film to sustain the illusion that the Duggars do anything other than sit around the house all day. At the same time, I think that TLC is no longer willing to spend a lot of money flying the Duggars around the world and creating "adventures" for them. Slapping a coat of paint on the bedroom walls and buying some new furniture gave them fodder for a new episode without costing a lot.

He always has to keep the upper hand, make sure everyone knows he's smarter and superior.

If Jana ends up being Jim Bob and Michelle's caretaker when they're helpless and housebound, I suggest we take up a collection and send her a DVD copy of "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane". Lots of pointers for her there!

I think he's really pissed at Derick and that has won out over his fondness for Jill. I'm sure he still loves her (Jim Bob, unlike Michelle, does seem to have some sort of affection for his children), but he has probably stopped indulging her, since any generosity to her also benefits Derick.

If Jessa can play songs on the guitar for her kids to sing along with, it's odd that she doesn't do it for the camera; she's always looking for ways to show off what a good mother she is and how adorable her boys are (and generally, she's much better at it than Jill). My guess would be that she was forced to learn the guitar back in the days when Jim Bob and Michelle pushed the kids into performing like trained monkeys (remember those delightful violins?) and she HATED it. Perhaps she had no natural gift for it or perhaps there was severe punishment for failure to perform to her parents' expectations. If that was the case, she probably burned her guitar as soon as she was married and semi-independent, vowing never to touch one again as long as she lived.

Along with the occasional shrine to Confederate war "heroes".

Jill learned from Jim Bob and Michelle's example. When you're out in public, you and your spouse must put on a big show of being deeply in loooove, so that everyone can see how blessed and perfect your marriage is. The kids aren't important, they can fend for themselves.

This should be enough to start media rumors that Cade and Jana are in a courtship and headed to the altar!

Somewhere, Bill Gothard's ears just pricked up.

At a casual glance, she could be mistaken for a woman in her fifties. She looks so haggard and run down.

Oops, I forgot about that.

The boys who marry into the Duggar clan have two things in common with their new spouses and in-laws: they're fundamentalist religious fanatics and they are lazy grifters who want to live comfortably while doing as little as possible for themselves. Ben and Derick are both "students" who have never actually held down a real job (unless you count Derick's time in Danger America). Jeremy is technically employed as a pastor, but he seems to prefer traveling around the country, eating in nice restaurants and posing for pictures than attending to his church. They're all dependent on TLC money and "love offerings" and those funding streams are eventually going to dry up. The jury is still out on Austin, who seems like a hard worker, but for him, it's early days yet.

I agree it really is more of a conservative philosophy. Right-wingers like the Duggars love to harken back to the days when people lived in extended families of grandmas and maiden aunts who helped with child care or in neighborhoods where everybody kept tabs on everybody else. But, even if they agree with its underlying message, hard-core conservatives now regard the phrase "It takes a village" with contempt because Hillary Clinton used it as the title of one of her books (and if it comes from Hillary, it must be liberal propaganda). I'm not ascribing that to anyone here, but I've heard it often from people on the far-right.

I wonder if Michael's original plan was to get his foot in the door by marrying Ben off to Jessa and then use that to broker marriages for his daughters with Duggar sons, thereby entrenching himself thoroughly in the family. More kids married to Duggars would mean more opportunities for him to get his face on "19 Kids and Counting" and maybe even get a spinoff series of his own. Then something happened to sour the relationship. Ben is married to Jessa and part of the show, but Michael is definitely on the outside looking in. Stupid as he is, Jim Bob is still quite shrewd when it comes to his own self interest. Michael might have been a little too eager to be part of the show and set alarm bells ringing for JB. I've always thought that JB must regret the day he let his "dear, close friends" the Bates family appear on the show. Next thing he knew, they were given their own show and were now the competition. He's been careful ever since not to give other Fundie families a chance to publicize themselves at his expense.

As Archie Bunker explained to his daughter, Gloria, "Don't ever say you're pregnant! Only bad girls get pregnant. Nice little married girls like you are expecting or in the family way!"

Mine, too. And of all of them, she's the most like her mother.

If TLC told Jim Bob that the show would be cancelled if Jana didn't have a courtship/wedding, he'd make dammed sure that happened fast. He'd pull a suitor out of thin air and Jana would "fall in love" just in time for a Very Special Episode.

I think TLC is really tightening its belt when it comes to underwriting the Duggars. The current contracts probably pay them less than they were getting in the golden days of "19 Kids and Counting" (there has to be a reason that all the girls are suddenly shilling products online) and the expensive perks have probably dried up a bit. The show is still doing well in the ratings and it remains a linchpin of TLC's schedule, but the end is clearly in sight. The brand has been tarnished by Josh and Derick, which puts Jim Bob in a weaker position when it comes to negotiations: "This is what we're offering this time, take it or leave it". In addition, there is nothing to film anymore but an endless cycle of courtship-marriage-childbirth because the Duggars no longer even pretend to do anything else. Even the leghumpers seem to be getting bored with "new" episodes that are 90% old clips and recaps and with "very special episodes" that announce an engagement or showcase a birth that everyone knows actually happened months earlier. Right now, everyone is avidly awaiting a Jana courtship storyline, but once that plays out, what's left?

I think Derick has a lot to do with that. I don't think he feels welcome at the TTH after getting himself, Jill and their kids bounced off TLC and if he's not comfortable going there, then he doesn't want her going there either.