Friday Stuff

David Pakman gives us info on the nationwide protests planned for tomorrow...and after yesterday’s stock market news, I would say for sure that it’s “torches and pitch forks” time...and I hope you can access this thread from Dem U.S. Senator Chris Murphy on Bluesky in which Murphy makes it pretty damn plain that the goal of the Gropenfuhrer isn’t economic, it’s political (as in, #47 wants to be a dictator, which should have been obvious already to anybody with their eyes and ears open, and Pakman is about 150 percent correct when it comes to making sure that there’s no violence from within any group tomorrow that gives the cops an excuse to bust heads and for wingnut media to screech about paid crisis actors from George Soros or something...more here)...



...and as Brian Tyler Cohen tells us here, can we please dispense with this “reciprocal tariffs” stuff...I mean, I suppose that applies in some cases (I’m hardly an econ expert), but it turns out that the Trumpers came up with some bogus calculation on what other countries are doing in response to our tariff madness (I know, color me shocked that Bronzer Beelzebub is lying again)...and hey, when you’ve lost even Fix Noise (to say nothing of the other networks with these alleged financial geniuses), I would say that it’s time to stop digging that hole (“If these people were capable of shame, they wouldn’t be able to sleep at night” indeed, including the beyond-useless Byron Donalds from Flori-DUUUH!)...



Update: But Biden looked lost and confused in a debate, so "whatev," right?

...and when it comes to these cruel, stoo-pid and beyond ridiculous tariffs of Our Treasonous Orange Pestilence, Rachel Maddow tells us about our ruling cabal targeting the island of Tokelau in the south Pacific, a place with “swimming pigs” but no people...Maddow tells us about other out-of-the-way places that have been hit with more beyond-ridiculous tariffs, including the Heard Island, where penguins apparently posed a mortal threat to what is hopefully still the most powerful economic engine in the world, though I admit that I’m starting to have doubts about that (and a 41 percent tariff on the Falkland Islands...God, I need a drink...oh, wait)...



...and Sam and Emma of The Majority Report present what I would say is an interesting theory claiming that Yambo wants to be like McKinley after surviving an assassination attempt, though I see no way whatsoever that he could’ve come up with that idea on his own (and I’ll always have questions about what happened in Butler, Pa, by the way, including the fact that #47’s ear healed so miraculously afterwards)...and yes, dear reader, Harris Faulkner is truly that big of a “dim bulb” – I seriously wonder what kind of a “shared sacrifice” SHE is prepared to make in response to this tariff destruction (here)...



...also, it looks like our outlaw ruling regime has gutted health care for veterans (speaking of cruel, stoo-pid and beyond ridiculous)...Brittany Page lets us know about vets forced to meet with counselors in open cubicles as part of the “return to office” push from Cantaloupe Capone and King Elon...I mean, returning to the office wouldn’t be terrible if there was adequate closed-door meeting space, which obviously there isn’t (and by the way, that appears to be a violation of federal law, primarily HIPAA)...just no end to the depravity from these monsters behind this stuff (based on fine reporting from Judd Legum)...



...and turning to non-economic matters having to do with Congress, Yasmin Khan discusses Repug wingnut Anna Paulina Luna coming up with a “discharge petition” to force a vote to allow remote voting for members on maternity (and paternity) leave for 12 weeks in response to a parliamentary gimmick that MAGA Mike Johnson came up with to block the proposal from Luna and 2 Dems...as usual, a wingnut only does the right thing when it affects them personally, but I would be remiss if I didn’t give Luna credit here (and I’m sure you’ll be absolutely shocked – well, maybe not really – to hear that Chip Roy is lying yet again...great point by Khan that proxy voting already took place during the pandemic and the political life of the country didn’t come screeching to a halt...and by the way as noted here, Brave Sir Brian Fitzpatrick found a way to miss this vote...I guess he was busy dedicating a post office or handling out a plaque to Boy Scouts or something...more here and a Bluesky link is here)...



...and RIP Val Kilmer – I was tempted to include a clip also from that totally silly movie “Top Secret,” but I settled on this from a personal favorite flick (and I thought he did a workmanlike job in “Batman Forever” given that he had to deal with so many other actors hogging the screen, notably Jim Carrey)...



...and it's time once more for another yearly remembrance (but be careful since our would-be dictator would just say "this is DEI" and ban any mention of it).

Thursday Stuff

Mike Figueredo tells us about the Schimel/Musk/Trump loss in Wisconsin to Judge Susan Crawford...and even by the Roberts-esque standard of Citizens United corruption, what Musk ended up setting on fire here is a truly mind-blowing sum...and we have more allegedly courageous “reporting” from Tiger Beat On The Potomac deciding to publish anonymous quotes from Repugs who want King Elon to fail; get these cowards on the record so we know who the f*ck they are!...they could care less about anything approximating democracy, but they only want their party to not get blitzed at the ballot box next year....and indeed, Elise Stefanik’s UN nomination was withdrawn because the Repug in the special election for her seat was expected to lose...and while it’s also a drag that the two Dems in Flori-DUUUH! lost, the story there is indeed the margin of victory for Repugs in 2 solid R districts, which was cut in half from just a couple of months ago (NSFW/H)...



...and David Pakman gives us more evidence of White House spokes-liar Karoline Leavitt doing probably the only thing she can do competently, and that’s propagandizing and talking down to her audience...one example is a Maryland man who had protected legal status who was illegally deported anyway, and ICE already acknowledged that it was a mistake (but it was a “clerical” error? What an utterly shameless, irredeemable harpie!) And of course, there’s still MORE lying BS about tariffs, and aren’t you comforted that the internal investigation into the Signal mess was resolved to the satisfaction of Our Ochre Abomination without releasing any info to the public? (all of this makes me recall this post FWIW, and I honestly don’t know if Leavitt is worse than Kayleigh McEnany...both are utterly awful for similar reasons)...



...and when it comes to assh*le Republicans (redundant?), I need to include U.S. Senator Jim Banks of Indiana...I guess I really need to dust off the memory banks to find the phrase “compassionate conservatism” somewhere...here, Banks tells an HHS worker caught up in King Elon’s DOGE purge that he “probably deserved” to lose his job...yes, this is awful, but somebody elects clowns like Banks, people...an utter pox on the numbskulls who put Banks in this position.

Want more lowlights from Banks? OK...

As noted here, Banks was a big 2020 election denier and said the January 6th panel was created to “malign conservatives,” which, if true, is because they deserved it.

Also, Banks sent a letter to the Department of the Interior saying that he was a member of the 1/6 committee, even though he wasn’t of course (here).

Additionally, Banks blew off a debate invitation during last year’s U.S. Senate campaign as noted here (taking a page from Bri-Fi’s sorry book, as it were).

A veritable smorgasbord of right-wing BS from Banks is here.

More idiocy from Banks is here.

...and with all of this in mind, Nicolle Wallace highlights Banks’ garbage in the following clip...also, HHS Secretary Bobby Brainworms decided to lay off 10,000 workers at the CDC, FDA, and the NIH, referring to a “brain drain” of scientists and researchers, letting go of people who just want to move this country forward with scientific research and doing their best to protect our health (Basil Smikle, Everett Kelley and Mini Timmaraju provide analysis)...



...and speaking of attacks on government workers, this clip from More Perfect Union tells us about a TSA screener warning of chaos due to the recent illegal move from this utterly lawless administration, and that is for the DHS to tear up the union contract for TSA workers (quite correctly called “PATCO on steroids” by the flight attendant rep, harking back to the legendary awful move by The Sainted Ronnie R)...I honestly cannot imagine why someone who is, after all, a government worker, would decide to vote for Bronzer Beelzebub, but this man working for the TSA bemoans the “chaos” (to which I ask, what the f*ck did you expect? And sorry if I’m being mean because I’m sure this man cares a lot about making people safe)...and yes, once more, this ties into the garbage privatization model of Project 2025...



...and Tennessee Brando discusses Dem U.S. Senator Cory Booker breaking the longest filibuster record previously set by Strom Thurmond in defense of segregation as Booker notes...I guess I’m just a bad Z-list blogger because I didn’t pay attention to what Booker was saying, but mad props to him for killing it as he did...and nice work by Brando to call out the wingnutosphere and all the “bro podcasters” out there (slightly NSFW/H)...



...and on this day in 1980, Chrissie Hynde of The Pretenders was arrested for an altercation in a bar and reportedly kicked out the rear window of the police cruiser that carted her away...she was released and performed the next night – what a badass (and the band probably included this tune in the set).

Wednesday Stuff

Our ruling cabal of idiots, grifters and lowlifes is indeed a bad joke, and at this moment, I don’t know what else there is to do except to stay alert and involved as best we can...on an unrelated manner, this, fortunately, is a development to celebrate...



...and John and Jayar Jackson of The Damage Report inform us that that WHCA has dropped comedienne Amber Ruffin as the headliner for the “nerd prom,” which, as John says, is apparently part of the campaign to make comedy illegal under the administration of Cantaloupe Capone...this story is particularly ridiculous because #47 never attends the dinner anyway (and “only their jokes count” indeed as far as our ruling regime is concerned)...



...and I know I already touched a bit on the story of Kristi (“Unsafe At Any Speed”) Noem visiting the El Salvadoran prison and flashing her Rolex, but Chris Hayes gets into a little more detail here, including the part about making deportation clips as fascist propaganda...”prisoners stacked behind (Noem) like firewood” indeed, with people deported because of their tattoos (including one man with a “tat” promoting Autism Awareness, which was apparently a bridge too far for the Trumpers), based on reporting from Mother Jones...Hayes speaks with reporter Noah Lanard of MJ...



...and Jesse Dollemore lets us know about this Joel Webbon character and his flunky Wesley Todd going along with the notion of calling Trump a king and pressuring government to seize church property that flies pride flags and has women in positions of leadership in these churches - oh, but it would be “kindness” to stick the heel of my boot in your neck and pretty much curb-stomp you – uh huh...yep, it is indeed the privilege of growing up as a white straight man in the U.S...hard to determine what it worse here, the arrogance or the stoo-pidity...probably the most NSFW/H clip from Jesse, but for a good reason IMO...



...and Rachel Maddow tells us about the cruel idiocy of DOGE coming for the US Institute of Peace, forcing their way into the USIP building with the help of the FBI, the State Department, diplomatic security service and a private security firm (here)...the US Attorney’s office in DC also threatened the leaders of this organization apparently, and someone actually called in the DC cops also, who physically evicted the USIP staff from the building, and then handed everything over to Elmo and DOGE...well, these DOGE nematodes tried to fire everyone from USIP, with termination notices “riddled with mistakes,” and the topper I suppose is that USIP isn’t even part of the executive branch of government; it’s a non-profit created by Congress...oh, but the “cunning plan” is to steal the building, apparently; fortunately, this whole fandango is now in the lap of DC District Court Judge Beryl Howell (God, I wish all of this were just an episode of Rocky and Bullwinkle)...



...and do you ever get to the point where the whole mess just gets to be a bit too much and you just want to decompress with a tune that takes the edge off a bit? Well, I hope this achieves the desired result.

Tuesday Stuff

Tennessee Brando brings us the story of a Georgia woman arrested for disposing of her miscarriage, and apparently the cops are treating it as the disposal of a dead body (yes, you read that right – the fundie zealots have been trying to prosecute women and health care providers for abortion for-freaking-evah, and this is just the latest wretched development in this process...and yes, this is indeed tied to Project 2025); the mother could have been looking at a 10-year prison sentence if she had gotten medical help with her pregnancy which had taken a catastrophic turn, though we’ll just have to see what happens now...and no, this isn’t an April Fools’ joke; I wish it was (mildly NSFW/H)...



...and Thom Hartmann gives more detail on Our Treasonous Orange Pustule turning this country into a playground for billionaire psychopaths...and I would say that Gustav Gilbert’s assessment about these nutjobs having a total lack of empathy is pretty spot-on (Gilbert was discussing the Nuremberg trial defendants after WWII, but he could have easily been talking about today also)...Thom says the lack of empathy in the GOP goes back to Ayn Rand and The Sainted Ronnie R, and he makes a good argument, but I would say it goes back further to Nixon...Thom has told the story of William Edward Hickman (and Rand’s celebration of this monster) before, but I think it bears repeating (“Even mice have more empathy than the people running our government now.”...I would also say that that speaks volumes)...



...and this Rebel HQ clip tells us that it looks like Yambo is Making Private Prisons Great Again, in particular CoreCivic run by Damon Hininger, with this ghoul looking for another 60-100K beds for housing individuals captured by this utterly lawless administration...and yep, we should indeed “follow the money” on this...I think AOC was speaking out against the utterly horrible Laken Riley bill, in which the “party of Lincoln” typically took a horrific tragedy and made political fodder out of it in order to speed our descent into fascism...and these videos showing immigrants in chains are supposed to be “fun”? No end to the depravity from these life forms...and I must have missed the memo saying that the glibertarian Cato Institute is somehow a legitimate news source (and yet again, there was the Lankford-Murphy bill in the U.S. Senate to address our immigration issues, of which there are many, but Combover Caligula ordered his minions to spike it so he’d have the issue to demagogue over in the election last year...I know I’ve criticized Sharon Reed in the past, but this is a good report about an utterly awful topic)...

...and as far as that typically ridiculous claim from White House spokes-liar Karoline Leavitt that the CBP One app was something like a Disney World pass for illegal immigrants from President Biden, I give you the following from an actual news report here...

The program was a key part of the Biden administration’s effort to gain control over migration through the southern border. On the one hand, the administration blocked asylum for migrants who crossed illegally. At the same time, U.S. officials believed that by offering migrants an organized way to enter legally through an app, they could discourage attempts to gain entry without authorization. Border numbers have dropped dramatically in recent months, and officials believe the program is a major reason.

Here is the Rebel HQ clip...



...and this CBC report informs us that Kentucky bourbon makers are getting hate mail from Canada...Victor Yarbrough of the Brough Brothers distillery is profiled; the man is definitely a casualty in all of this Trumpist tariff BS, and I’m sorry, but honestly, what else can you expect? And I just can’t find the words to express what I think of these individuals who actually think Generalissimo Trump has a “plan” for ANYTHING, including his utterly pointless tariff/trade war nonsense...I’m sure they’re thoroughly indoctrinated by right wing BS and their own biases/prejudices...I suppose it will take all of this wrecking their own finances before they see the light, but given that we’re talking about Kentucky, I don’t suppose I can count on that either...



...and Farron Cousins informs us that Cantaloupe Capone is now under water polling wise for the boomers, with a net -9 disapproval, and the numbers are even worse when you isolate his performance on the economy...and is Cousins ever right about making sure my demographic never selects that “R” checkbox again when it comes time to vote...



...and I don’t blame Nancy Wilson of Heart one bit for echoing this sentiment; this song was written in a wholly other context many years ago, but I think it also fits for our present circumstance given the fraudsters in our lawless governmental regime.

Monday Stuff

Belle of the Ranch informs us here about consumer confidence hitting the lowest level since the last month of Trump’s first term, with the index number at about 92.9 I believe; we learn about other indicators telling us that we’re likely heading for a recession (I keep remembering all of the caterwauling about that when Biden was president and it didn’t happen, but now that Cantaloupe Capone is wreaking havoc, yeah, that appears to be what’s coming)...

via GIPHY

..and Kyle Kulinski lets us know about red states rolling back child labor law, including in Flori-DUUUH!, where a bill in that state’s legislature would allow 14-year-olds to work overnight shifts...and no, I can’t believe I’m typing those words either...great point by Kyle to note the double standard of allowing kids to work in dangerous facilities at all hours on the one hand while, on the other hand, banning books in the name of “protecting kids”...and boy, is Kyle ever right about not treating corporate criminals the way they should be treated...and a 283% increase in child labor violations since 2015? What country am I living in again?? (NSFW/H)...



...well, to make a positive change in The Sunshine State tomorrow, vote for Josh Weil in the FL-06 special election...



...along with Gay Valimont in FL-01...



Update 4/4/25: So Ron #DeathSantis-stan continues its march to the 13th century...how pathetic (here).

...and Robert Reich informs us that Our Ochre Abomination seems to have given up on making groceries cheaper...can’t believe anyone is actually shocked by that after all this...what #47 is trying to hide, of course, is doing his best to cut the corporate tax rate to 15 percent, leading to a record amount of stock buybacks for company executives (and once again, that practice used to be illegal until The Sainted Ronnie R came along)...also, those beyond-wretched tariffs with Canada and Mexico in particular will ensure grocery prices continue to rise, along with mergers and acquisitions on steroids...and oh yeah, let’s not forget about Yambo’s barbaric deportation of immigrants; aside from what this means from the perspective of human rights, there’s also the economic impact to consider...



...and did you know that, according to Bronzer Beelzebub, we’ve had “two perfect months”?? Does he have any brain matter at all?? And the Signal app mess is a “glitch”? Sounds like a feature instead of a bug to me (and dear God, we’ve got another 3 ½ plus years of this garbage to endure...Rachel Maddow covers a lot of the utter madness that has transpired to date, leading off with the Signal app "cluster"...oh, but this should have happened because Biden looked lost and confused in a presidential debate, amirite?)...



...and Jesse Dollemore tells us that Our Treasonous Orange Pestilence wants the Smithsonian to remove black history and culture; I mean, he has no say in what the Smithsonian does...what an utter clod, and I definitely don’t mean Jesse...yeah, #47 isn’t a racist, is he? Not much he isn’t...and good for Jesse to call out the AP; it was indeed MURDER, AP...don’t try to sanitize what Derek Chauvin was convicted of (mildly NSFW/H)...



...and here is a nice upbeat little ditty to listen to while we rearrange the deck chairs on the Titanic as the iceberg approaches (I had a long tune on Friday, so I guess it makes sense to have a short one here – and this is a timely related item).