Before we matter-of-factly decide to certify the re-election of Cantaloupe Capone on Monday, I thought it would be called for to present the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” (more or less) from 1/8/21...I have absolutely nothing else to add to this outstanding commentary from Seth Meyers in response to the insurrection incited by #45/47 except to point out that a majority of people in this country utterly ignored Meyers’s fine words and re-elected not just Bronzer Beelzebub, but Cancun Cruz and “Running Man” Josh Hawley also (still hard to wrap my head around the utter failure of our media, courts and political institutions that enabled this latest travesty)...
...and Chris Hayes responds to more wingnut BS in the wake of the New Orleans terror attack (this Mike Waltz and the inaptly-named Randy Fine screeching about OMIGOD THE “OPEN BORDER” AND SCARY MUSLIMS COMING TO KILL US ALL!!! as the reason for the NOLA attack which doesn’t stand up to, y’know, VERIFIABLE FACTS AND REALITY!!)...the attacker was a U.S. Army vet who rather obviously had problems, and we still need to do more digging into what exactly led to this, assuming we’ll ever find out the exact reason, and it’s quite possible that we never will...
...and David Pakman informs us that the Las Vegas truck bomber (a decorated Green Beret vet) apparently was a Trump supporter, though, as Pakman rightly says, we don’t know all of the motivation behind this act also and it’s possible we'll never find out exactly what happened here as well...and I read King Elon I sh*tposting on Xitter about “oh, this guy messed with the wrong person” more or less meaning Musk, which is a typically ridiculous thing for Elon to say given that 1) The vet driving the truck is dead, and 2) Were the vet still alive and had the chance to go mano-a-mano, the vet would likely break Elon in half...
...and here’s another unsettling item about Life In These united States, you might say; Jesse Dollemore lets us know that the FBI sez it has seized the largest cache of weapons in the history of the FBI in a Virginia home (as Jesse says, this may have slipped under the radar with the NOLA and Las Vegas attacks)...and yes, this Virgina person is also a Trumper, with pretty strongly implied threats of violence against (still for now) President Biden and Vice President Harris...
...and as if we weren’t bummed out enough, Farron Cousins tells us about babies found in dumpsters and drainage ditches (mostly dead) in Texas, which is a completely foreseen consequence of making abortion illegal and cutting funding for adoption services and pre-natal and early childhood development services...I’m sure there are destitute third-world countries that take care of kids better than they do in “the land of the yellow rose”...
...and there are times when I feel like tunes like this are the only response I can provide to all of this madness, so I hope you’ll indulge me for this occasion.
(More on that utterly sick and twisted T-shirt is here, by the way.)
Jesse Dollemore brings us the news of some Trumpist nut job in Grand Junction, Colorado named Patrick Thomas Egan, who followed a journalist (in a cab for 40 miles??!!) and then attacked this person of color, yelling “This is Trump’s America now”...add this life form to the seemingly unending list of gullible saps who’ve been utterly played by Combover Caligula, and let the heavy hand of justice fall on this attacker like the proverbial ton of bricks (mildly NSFW/H)...
...and Thom Hartmann tells us that it looks like Nancy Pelosi put her metaphorical thumb on the scale, as it were, in favor of Gerry Connolly to be the ranking Dem member on the House Oversight Committee over AOC...on the one hand, yeah, the Dem leadership proved to be tone-deaf once more by blowing off someone who could bring younger voters to the party as Thom says, but on the other hand, I think AOC is smart enough such that she would have gone along with the overall Dem House agenda, and I don’t mean that as a slam towards AOC (realpolitik at work, people)...I think Thom means the contest was over who would be the ranking Dem member; the Repugs will still run the committee (maybe Comer again) unfortunately (but don’t look for this committee to do a damn thing with The Big Orange Cheetoh in charge)...didn’t know the median U.S. age was 39 (and the question Thom asks at the very end is one I’ve asked myself a few times lately, I must confess)...
...and don’t look now, but Marjorie Train Wreck Greene recently took to Xitter to prattle on about an alleged $17 mil slush fund to pay off victims of sexual abuse at the hands of GOP politicians that MAGA Mike Johnson knew about, supposedly (gee, did I qualify things enough?)...and wouldn’t it be just way too damn funny if the “R party” did end up screwing up the election certification on 1/6 because they couldn’t elect a U.S. House speaker? And Jeff Van Drew may be the biggest embarrassment New Jersey has to offer, and if that isn’t an insult, I don’t know what is...and by the way, can we please dispense with this “electoral mandate” BS about #45/47? Trump won because the votes were suppressed for Harris/Walz, and there were a lot of different reasons for that...and boy, is Ben Meiselas right about the Dems and their disappearing act...ugh! (NSFW/H)...
...and this video from Katie Nixdorf of More Perfect Union brings us the aftermath of the devastation from Hurricane Helene in North Carolina (Asheville in particular); basically, people’s lives and businesses have been ruined...and yes, FEMA’s focus isn’t on rebuilding (that’s just how that agency was set up, that’s all), but on providing temporary relief, though that can and should include infrastructure repair...focus goes to the effect of climate change at about 6:25, which I think is spot-on (and yeah, make these dirty energy criminals pay for their misdeeds in ignoring the climate crisis...relief info is here)...
...and I’ll be honest; I can pretty much take or leave Nicolle Wallace, but I thought this was a good segment on the intra-MAGA blowup over H-1B visas (Bannon vs. Vivek and President Musk)...normally I could care less about Stuart Stevens, though he’s also OK in this segment, but I have a little more respect for Ruth Ben-Ghiat and Eddie Glaude, both of whom are spot-on also...
...and since powerful people and institutions aren't going to hold you-know-who and his minions to account, it does indeed look like it's up to us (NSFW/H also)...
...and Sam, Emma and Matt Lech of The Majority Report present a clip of Fix Noise numbskull Ainsley Earhardt who sez that Trump “fixed autism” (OWWW! TEH STOO-PID!!! IT BURNS US!!!)...and by the way, I’ve eaten overseas also, and yes, in our experience there is a difference in the food, but a lot of that has to do with the GMO garbage that’s allowed in this country versus the rest of the world (coming mainly from Monsanto, which donates to both Repugs and Dems, so good luck trying to regulate that bunch of corporate stooges...and portions in this country are indeed part of the problem also, though the whole issue is more complicated than these “news” mannequins on Rupert’s BS channel would have us believe)...
...and I hope you’re in the mood for an upbeat newer tune to help usher in the new year, because here it is.
To kick off 2025, I give you this clip of Dem Rhode Island U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse discussing proposed reforms for the High Court of Hangin’ Judge JR (including commentary from Chris Williamson of Rebel HQ)...yep, term limits are one long overdue measure for our Philistines in robes (I would say 10 years and not 18, but that’s just me I guess...new appointment every 2 years is good also, along with raising the number of justices from 9 to 13 for each U.S. circuit court), to say nothing of actual penalties for non-compliance with judicial ethics guidelines...I don’t know much about this Kelly Shackelford person from this “First Liberty” bunch of ideological hacks, but he ought to be clapped into a yardarm for implying that SCOTUS Justice Kagan is “treasonous” (Sharon Reed also provides commentary on how some in our military were allegedly “oppressed” for not being able to express their religious freedom or whatever by not getting vaccinated during the worst public health disaster this country has seen in about 100 years...and oh yeah, there are more “favorite moments” from “Almost Silent” Clarence Thomas also)...
...and David Pakman provides an overview of Why Red States Are Failing (taking a more wholistic approach)...GDP better in blue states, poverty higher in red states, more blue state subsidies in red states, health outcomes including maternal mortality worse in red states, Medicaid expansion denied and systematic underfunding of education in red states, infrastructure investment better in blue states, anti-union policies in red states...lots of important data to factor into the discussion...
...and Mike Figueredo brings us the story of a gay store owner in Lancaster, Ohio who was targeted for a boycott even though he apparently had nothing to do with what was being boycotted...oh yes, here comes more umbrage over drag queens performing at a public event which was subsequently investigated (at taxpayer expense of course), leading to the conclusion that no laws against indecency were broken in any way, and as a result, the aptly-named Brandon Love was targeted by these troglodytes - and that led to increased business at his store and other LGBTQ-friendly businesses that were also targeted (it’s possible that one of these days, it may be found out that an LGBTQ individual is tied to abusing kids for real, but that day hasn’t arrived yet and there is no sign at this moment that it ever will...on the other hand...mildly NSFW/H)...
...and Rachel Maddow provides a brief commentary on the danger posed by the oligarch-ization (for lack of a better way to put it) of this country...
...and speaking of the ruin of the "one percent," Tennessee Brando comments on some billionaire scumwad mocking the poor (in the true MAGA spirit of the season of course) with the Trumpist life forms apparently loving it – what a bunch of saps! – the guilty culprit is some entitled prick named Dan Pena (here)...I think Brando is right about “planting seeds,” and I also think he’s right about never getting credit for dragging people kicking and screaming into the cold light of day, as it were, though I’ll admit that looking for credit for oneself shouldn’t be the top priority (mildly NSFW/H)...
...and as noted here, the location featured on the album cover for “Morrison Hotel” recently burned to the ground, unfortunately, which gives us an excuse for this tune to begin the festivities for '25.
This TikTok-er made a pretty solid case IMO as to how our president-elect is doing the bidding of Vlad The Butcher once more when it comes to Greenland, Panama and Canada (more emphasis is here...NSFW/H)...
...oh, and while our corporate media and allegedly elite “decision makers” were carrying on about how Biden was supposedly too old to be president, did you know that the GOP chair of the House Appropriations Committee had apparently checked into a nursing home, and in the memory care facility no less? I’m referring to Texas congresswoman Kay Granger...and no, I’m not against Granger getting the care that she needs (even though her party would deny that to millions of others if they could), but far as I’m concerned, Granger should be forced to pay back her salary for all the days she was out (she’s officially stepping down with the new session of Congress due to begin next month)...also interesting IMO that I don’t recall hearing a peep out of “Team D” on this; at least, nothing I’ve been able to track down anyway...and yes, even when Granger was in control of her faculties, her votes were indeed terrible...Kyle Kulinski explains (NSFW/H also)...
...and this Rebel HQ clip presents Connecticut Dem U.S. Senator Chris Murphy discussing the three-pronged attack from Mango Mussolini to try and turn this country into an oligarchy (assuming we’re not there already of course, unfortunately): 1) Prosecuting Liz Cheney criminally, 2) Trump’s lawsuit against the Iowa pollster and the newspaper for publishing election information he doesn’t like, and 3) ABC paying Trump $15 million to make the George S. lawsuit go away even though Stephanopoulos was substantively correct in his reporting on #45/47...
...and David Pakman presents data to support his argument that corporate media is losing its grip given the results of the election...I think there’s a bit of a cyclical element to this as Pakman says (when the political circus gets revved up again, some of these folks will come back to CNN and MSNBC, assuming they still exist in their present form), but to be honest, I think the majority of the people tuning out of legacy media now realize how they got utterly played by the election “horserace” coverage (as opposed to dumb stuff I guess like, y’know, actual policy and proposed legislation) and walking away more or less is their form of protest...the worst part to me is that this will indirectly benefit Fix Noise because their audience of sheep will tune in regardless...and yes, I blame the media outlets themselves for allowing this situation to occur; this was entirely predictable given that the affected networks made the decision long ago to value “balance” in coverage over analysis of verifiable truth and reality, and their viewers have finally gotten wise to that...
... and speaking of The Roger Ailes BS Factory, it looks like the engagement of Sean Inanity and Ainsley Earhardt is considered “news”...and by the way, if people at that network want to play around on their spouses, that’s their business (seedy and lowdown as it is), but don’t do that and then turn around and pretend to be moral arbiters for anybody else (and isn’t Earhardt just too precious for words...“WHAT ABOUT THE MAJORITY???!!” huh? What a freaking bimbo!)...
...and in keeping with my annual custom, I want to take a minute or two and thank everyone who has spent any time at this site over the prior year, indulging me and my musings on politics, news, legal stuff, and a host of other subjects. I don’t pretend to be some font of eternal wisdom or anything, but in accordance with my bio, I try to cut through the BS, you might say, and present the best content that I can (usually from other creators who I happen to agree with, I’ll admit).
For better or worse, I started this thing in 2005 as response to Dubya and all of the myriad screwups of his ruinous term; a whole bunch of other folks did likewise, creating their own presences online, though they largely have moved on since then. I may have said this before, but I’ll repeat it...what triggered me in particular was a speech Dubya gave on the 60th anniversary commemoration of VE Day. It was written by the late Michael Gerson, who had kind of a demented “gift” for couching some really ugly attacks on those who dared question #43 by using some flowery language (Gerson, you’ll recall, was the guy who coined the phrase “the soft bigotry of low expectations” for those who opposed Dubya’s version of No Child Left Behind). In his speech, Dubya basically said that the Global War on Terror (remember that one?) was more important than World War II (again, speaking Gerson’s words). That was a cut at the sacrifice of my father and millions of other men and women during that era which pretty much infuriated me, and I decided to start this thing not having a clue as to whether or not it would make a difference, mainly to get back at Dubya and movement conservatism in general. That said, if you’d told me back then that I’d be in the middle of my 20th year of doing this and saying these words, I would have told you that you were nuts (shows what I know I guess).
Going back all of those years, though, I have to confess that I feel less certain about continuing to do this now than at any prior point over all of this time. I firmly believe that the incoming bunch of criminals, grifters and various other bottom feeders are going to prove their utter incompetence on the world stage; they’re going to try and do everything President Elon says, but they’re going to find that it is utterly tanking the economy and will end up loosening the reins a bit (on the orders of the “one percent” and no one else). However, that doesn’t mean that they can’t do a hell of a lot of damage in the meantime. Things are going to be bad, people, but what form that will take exactly is something that I don’t think anybody can determine at the moment.
Does that mean that we should automatically comply with everything this incoming regime wants? Hell freaking no! We still have myriad tools to use to resist, and we should be unrelenting in that effort. And there are a hell of a lot more of us than there are of them.
So with that in mind, I offer our final tune of 2024 to commemorate the 78th birthday of Patti Smith (and I read "Just Kids" this year which was mainly about Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe...a terrific book). Let’s do everything that our means allows to continue nurturing the oldest representative democracy on earth, for our families, friends and untold future generations.
Onward!
Update 1/1/25: And all the best in the new year to one and all, if I didn't say that in so many words.
I have to admit that there’s a lot to process when it comes to the news that former President Jimmy Carter has passed (which we were warned about some months ago as noted here), with Carter being the longest-lived former president and one of the three longest-lived world leaders.
Like many who have served in government in this country (though not so much given mostly the fools and charlatans we have now), Carter made himself through hard work, education (as an engineer), and service to our country. He has the second-longest record of military service of any president since 1950 besides Dwight Eisenhower. And you don’t end up serving on a nuclear submarine under a demanding taskmaster like Admiral Hyman Rickover by being a dummy.
I think, to really consider how Carter emerged, we need to look back (as well as we can) on the era where he rose to a politically elite status. He benefited from the template of a political “outsider” who served as a governor before he was elected to the presidency (Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton and Dubya would follow suit), though, to be fair, there were other presidents who had first served as a governor of a state before Carter who won the White House (James Polk, both Roosevelts, Rutherford B. Hayes and Woodrow Wilson, for example). This benefitted Carter in 1976 because the country was fed up both with Watergate and the Vietnam War (I was a teenager at the time and can recall this somewhat). Gerald Ford’s pardon of Richard Nixon was a pretty loud and clear message that maintaining the status quo was paramount in D.C., and that was exactly the message that enough of the country who elected Carter did NOT want to hear (to be fair, Ford was also lampooned pretty ruthlessly in the media, and he had that debate slip-up where he said that the people of Poland did not consider themselves to be under then-Soviet domination, which was decidedly not the case). The mid-to-late ‘70s was also a bad era for the economy mainly because of OPEC and inflation, which hurt Ford in ’76 (and would do the same thing to Carter four years later). Reagan also made a play for the White House in 1976 which frayed the support of the Republican Party behind Ford (and again, Ted Kennedy would do something similar four years later, which also hurt Carter).
You can’t really call Carter’s 1976 election a mandate, since the results were pretty close. However, Ford respected the outcome and didn’t whine about fraud and file 60 lawsuits along with trying to get fake electors named to certify an illegal victory (like you-know-who of course, as noted here). Ford respected the process and allowed the winner to ascend to power (again, like Carter would do four years later). Ford and Carter came to respect one another, from an era where that kind of collegiality is probably now extinct unfortunately, though President Obama and Senator John McCain did manage to achieve that for a time later.
I believe Carter’s biggest problem as president was, ironically I guess, the fact that he really did try to govern as an outsider in a snake pit of a town run by politicians, consultants, lobbyists, and media poohbahs who hold sway pretty much regardless of which party is in power. On the plus side, he made the Department of Energy and the Department of Education cabinet-level positions. The Panama Canal treaty was also a net positive for this country, and normalization of relations with China (that whole process started under Nixon of course) was pretty much recognizing the inevitable. Another milestone of sorts for Carter was the “crisis of confidence” speech where he dared to talk to the people of this country like adults about consumption, primarily concerning our energy habits (here and here). Carter actually got about an 11-point bump in the polls as noted here (Reagan would later denigrate what Carter said of course, calling it the “malaise” speech, even though that word didn’t even show up in the text), but Carter negated any positives from the speech by firing his cabinet, giving ammunition to both Reagan and Ted Kennedy. Carter also pursued Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) and the Camp David Accords with Menachem Begin of Israel and Anwar el-Sadat of Egypt in 1978 (I always thought Sadat was the most courageous of the three to pursue peace, and he was slaughtered for it by Islamist radicals three years later). To me, this all played into the narrative of Carter as the guy of big themes and actual or would-be accomplishments who didn’t suffer fools gladly, to the point where it ended up alienating most everyone around him. I’m not necessarily saying he was wrong, but only that that had a lot to do with undoing him politically (and oh yeah, was Carter ever right about the damn solar panels, which Reagan of course ripped from the White House the first chance he got). As president, Carter also deregulated the airline and trucking industries to make them more competitive, though that ended up playing into the corporate consolidation that has taken place in this country ever since. Also, I always thought Carter was completely played by his Federal Reserve Chair (and Reagan pal) Paul Volcker, who raised the federal funds interest rate to nearly 20 percent and ushered in the 1980-1982 recession (yes, it tamed inflation, but at a terrible cost to U.S. workers). Oh, and on the economy, let’s not forget candidate Reagan’s snarky quote that “Recession is when your neighbor loses his job. Depression is when you lose yours. And recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his.” Reagan also referred to “the Carter depression” in August 1980, even though Reagan economic advisor Alan Greenspan said, “I wouldn’t have used that term.” Despite inflation and a slowed-down economy, Carter still managed to create nearly 10 million jobs during his presidency as noted here.
Carter was buffeted by issues that likely would have crippled any presidency regardless of party, but no issue loomed larger than the Iran hostage crisis, which began in November 1979 after Ayatollah Khomeini took over that country. I’ll go along with the notion that Carter didn’t “read the room” in terms of how despised the Shah of Iran was (who of course this country installed after toppling that country’s elected ruler, Mohammed Mosaddegh, in 1958). It was inconceivable at that time, though, to realize that a nation-state would do what Iran did and take 52 American diplomats and associated personnel hostage for about 444 days. And speaking of Reagan, he basically committed treason by undercutting the Carter Administration’s efforts to free the hostages with his own deal to get himself elected in the bargain (here - something similar to what Richard Nixon did in scuttling the Paris peace talks to try and end the Vietnam War in 1968 so he could get elected also). I will unequivocally blame Carter for the failed hostage rescue attempt (I believe it was crippled by a literal desert storm which forced down our helicopters, taking the lives of 8 U.S. military personnel and 1 Iranian), but I will praise Carter for maintaining steadfast vigilance to ensure that all of our hostages returned even after Carter lost the 1980 presidential election. Also, boycotting the 1980 Olympics over the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was probably the right call, but it played into the image of Carter as a moral scold, which allowed Reagan to continue acting like the amiable, “don’t worry, be happy” candidate he purported to be, which went over better with way too damn many voters in this country. I also once read that Carter wasn’t more combative towards Reagan and his relentless lies about Carter’s record during the debates because he expected the media to call out Reagan over his untruths, which pretty much didn’t happen.
According to historian Douglas Brinkley, “While in office, Carter...achieved a host of less showy, but still significant diplomatic military goals, Including restoring stable relations with Greece and Turkey, NATO’s southeast flank; reducing US ground troops in South Korea; pardoning Vietnam War draft resistors; concluding the Tokyo Round Trade Agreement; providing US assistance to the resistance in Afghanistan; making diplomatic overtures to Cuba and Vietnam; welcoming refugees from Indochina; scrapping the B1 bomber; and cancelling plans to develop a neutron bomb. The Carter administration's sheer level and range of activity, if not the results, suggested a foreign policy equivalent of the domestic activity of the first year of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal,” wrote historian Gaddis Smith. Instead of praising Carter for his many significant successes, however, most newspaper columnists reviewing his presidency in the 1980s credited Carter only for what he didn't do, such as abandon civil rights or send American soldier to war. As veteran newspaperman Haynes Johnson observed “No matter what Carter did, he received credit for almost nothing. And even Henry Kissinger admitted that Carter never really got a fair shake.” It should also be noted that Carter never received the benefit of nominating a U.S. Supreme Court justice (despite that, Carter can claim to be the author of these fine words).
I realize that the sort of “Cliff Notes” version of Jimmy Carter over the last 40 years or so is that of someone who has traveled the world on behalf of free and fair elections in emerging democracies, as well as someone who (through the Carter Center, which he founded of course) has fought health ailments across the globe such as trachoma, schistosomiasis, lymphatic filariasis and Guinea worm disease (here). And again, according to historian Douglas Brinkley (and if you want to truly read about Carter’s post-presidency, I wholeheartedly suggest Brinkley’s book), “Since leaving office, Carter had been involved in mediating an impressive list of foreign disputes, civil wars, and political transitions in such troubled lands as Ethiopia, Sudan, Somalia. North Korea, Haiti and Bosnia. He had also monitored elections in Panama (1989, 1994), Nicaragua (1990, 1996), Haiti (1987, 1990, 1995), The Dominican Republic (1990), Zambia (1991), Guyana (1990 to 1992), Paraguay (1993), The West Bank/Gaza (1996), Liberia (1997), and Jamaica (1997).” And oh yes, there is the tireless work both he and Rosalynn performed for Habitat for Humanity as well as the legion of worthy causes in this post.
However, I think it’s important to look at Carter in a larger context, including his presidency and the forces he sought to bring to heel to fulfill the role I honestly believe he sought to fill as the political outsider trying to put government to work on behalf of this country (and not being shy about presenting hard truths to the nation when he believed it was warranted). As whatever tributes and remembrances unfold as we mourn the passing of our 39th president, I hope that we keep all of this in mind.
(Additional remembrances are here and here...and as always, pop culture imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.)...
And when it comes to a tune for this occasion, I have to admit that I kept coming back to this one. The Allman Brothers definitely supported Jimmy Carter, and I believe the man from Plains, Georgia lived his life as if he felt he indeed had no time to waste. I think we can all profit from such a sterling example of a life that was well-lived.
Adios, President Carter - fair winds and following seas.
Update 2: And as I drove by Jim Worthington’s Newtown Athletic Club (here), the American flag was at full staff and not half staff...what an utter POS that guy is.
Update 12/30/24: Another important Carter legacy is noted by law professor Melissa Murray here.
Update 1 12/31/24: Worthington's flag at the NAC is still at full staff - what an assh*le!
Update 2 12/31/24: Yeah, it looks like Colorado state rep Matt Soper is as big of an assclown as Worthington (here, and more on Babi Yar Park is here).
