In a related story, Brian Tyler Cohen shows how Dem U.S. Senator Kamala Harris of CA basically cornered Trump legal fixer Bill Barr into confirming that he didn’t go through the evidence presented in the Mueller Report, even though Barr said that he did (we need to keep fighting of course, but I’m beginning to wonder if the full report will ever see the light of day, unlike the results of the Ken Starr inquisition during the Clinton years, which was completely unredacted when it hit the bookstores – Republicans will keep abusing power until the day comes when they actually lose it, which, outside of a courtroom judgment, is the only penalty they will ever understand)…
…and TYT tells us about that numbskull Brian Kilmeade attacking the firefighters union head over its endorsement of Joe Biden (with Brett Erlich, Cenk and Hasan Piker…unfortunately, as nearly as I can determine, Erlich is right about HRC from ’16…and good points here by Piker about Biden, the Teamsters and Cozen O’Connor)…
…and Farron Cousins tells us of the increase of the price of consumer goods related to the Gropenfuhrer’s tariffs (such as washing machines and dryers just for kicks also apparently, among a lot of other stuff – and yeah, you would think this would make the price of these goods cheaper…you would think)…
…and happy belated 80th birthday (!) to Judy Collins.
I thought this was some pretty clear-eyed commentary from David Pakman about what we’re dealing with concerning our Lunatic-In-Chief at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (and yeah, on the matter of stonewalling and the impeachment question, I think he’s right to forget about waiting for the “constitutional conservatives”)…
…and there’s almost too much that is wrong about Stephen Moore to properly catalog here – it’s an understatement to say that this Koch-backed shill has no business in public life whatsoever, to say nothing of being grossly unqualified for a positon at the Federal Reserve Board, but this video pretty much puts the proverbial exclamation point of all of this awfulness (more Moore stuff is here)…
Update 5/2/19: Yeah, it's never a good sign when what you've said and written is being "reviewed" after your nomination has already been put forward, even for the Trumpsters - Moore can now go back to Fix Noise and bloviate with impunity again (here).
…and speaking of Trump sycophants, Repug Sen. Charles Grasshole of Iowa recently talked down to a constituent when she confronted him over his awful health care votes; I think this is the “Aggressive Progressives” crew – I’ll pay more attention to them now that Jimmy Dore is gone…
…and, apparently, even though the Dems managed to retake the U.S. House last fall, somehow this Repug fathead from Minnesota named Jim Hagedorn ended up getting elected – Hagedorn recently gave us this jewel of wingnuttery, which made me recall the following clip; let’s see what we can do about erasing this mistake next year…
…and RIP director John Singleton (of “Boyz N The Hood” of course)…
…and somehow I neglected to note that yesterday was the birthday of the one and only Willie Nelson – hope it was a great one.
This clip from NowThis tells us about the documentary film from Jen Senko about her dad being indoctrinated by Fix Noise and right wing talk radio – sounds like he made it out the other side, fortunately for him and his family (more here)…
…and of course the “Democrat” governor reference in this clip is the least awful thing that our Insane, Tiny Handed, Treasonous Lunatic In Chief has recently concocted, as Brian Tyler Cohen tells us…
Oh, and even though Trump is unleashing more of his typical BS, this time on the whole “born alive” garbage, you would think that the Catholic Church would realize that they’re a party to all of this and say, “hey, we want to get rid of Roe v. Wade, but this is all a bridge too far, as it were.” You know, on account of that whole “bearing false witness” thing.
I mean, that’s what you would think, right?
Well, as it turns out, you would be wrong. This is a link to the web site of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and do you know what they have to say about this?
Cue the sound of crickets…
That’s because the Catholic Church is perfectly happy to keep using ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION as a proverbial wedge issue regardless of the harm it does to individual families having to make painful decisions where support from faith leaders could provide some measure of healing, instead of, say, hectoring those same families. And this is to say nothing of harming communities, municipalities, states and (for that matter) the whole damn country (to say nothing of the entire world, since they support the political party that wants to do nothing while the world continues to boil...though, on the other hand)...
…and turning to more legal garbage from our Deatheater-In-Chief, as I watched this, I couldn’t help but get the sinking, despairing feeling that Comey, Rosenstein and now Mueller just turned out to be the same old Republicans falling in line like they’re supposed to, as Bill Maher tells us (NSFW)…
…and Sam Bee gives Number 45 the treatment he deserves for chickening out – again – on the White House Correspondents Dinner (NSFW again - more here)…
…and I think Farron Cousins is a little behind on the thing with Ollie North (here – and what kind of a scumbag do you have to be to be booted out of the NRA, I wonder?), but otherwise he’s spot-on about the Giffords Law Center trying to get the FEC to do its job…
…and this may be a bit of a “Nixon Goes to China” musical selection, but as far as President Fergus Laing is concerned, the title definitely fits.
I now give you the latest chapter of “This Day In Doomsy History” (more or less) from 4/25/17…just taking a comparatively short trip around the corner as it were to see everything that our Treasonous, Tiny-Handed Deatheater-in-Chief managed to NOT accomplish in his first 100 days…
President Trump promised A LOT for his first 100 days – and he accomplished none of it pic.twitter.com/RBA4dcP0pV
…and if you think I’m being a little too fatalistic conjuring up death references concerning the “party of Lincoln,” this clip from Cenk Uygur, John Iadarola and Jayar Jackson of The Young Turks tells us that Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao is doing that without any help or prompting whatsoever (and Cenk is sadly correct about the Dems and their messaging, as well as our utterly useless corporate "both sides" media)…
…and speaking of overly dramatic and corrupt Republicans, Steven Arnold King of the U.S House from Iowa compares his censure over white supremacy to the Crucifixion (here); still waiting for King to be flayed with a cat o’ ninetails and nailed to a tree (part of me wonders how he made sure his staff was made up of “solid, faithful people at every level”…gee, I wonder if their civil rights were violated somehow…wouldn’t surprise me)…
…and yeah, a lot of us got hosed on our taxes, which I intend to keep mentioning – and no, it wasn’t our imagination – and yeah, why in God’s name would you even consider voting for a Republican after this...
…and I suppose I should opine on the entire dustup over taking down the statue of Kate Smith in front of the WTF Center in South Philadelphia, with Smith identified as the singer of “God Bless America” for the uninitiated, which is frequently played in place of the national anthem before Flyers hockey games…I have no information whatsoever on the question of whether or not Smith was a racist in any way; I’m inclined to assume she wasn’t, and even if she was, she’s not here to defend herself – I have a feeling that a music publisher and/or a recording company told her to sing these two incredibly vile – but somehow acceptable – songs from long ago, “Pickaninny Heaven” and “That’s Why Darkies Were Born,” and she pretty much had to…now, as noted here, it turns out that she also gave a 1945 speech about tolerance, to her credit…in some ways this is a tough call, but given the age we live in, you have to respect people’s sensibilities – I think the fact that the New York Yankees also bailed on Smith (they had a similar relationship with her music apparently) hastened the Flyers’ decision since they didn’t want to be legally liable by themselves…and I had to laugh reading former Flyers VP Lou Schienfeld complaining that Smith was a victim of “political correctness”…want some cheese with your whine?...and if the mayor of “chicken wing beach” wants the statue, let him have it – except for the Crest, my shore memories of Wildwood are lousy anyway…the only part of this story that makes me side with the wingnuts is the part about covering up her statue, which was truly ridiculous…
...and here's another obligatory tune from yours truly, perhaps a bit elegiac for spring, but there you are.
It looks like the Repug tax scam of December 2017 (voted for by every U.S. congressional Repug, including Bri-Fi and “No Corporate Tax” Pat Toomey and signed into law by our Treasonous, Tiny-Handed Deatheater-In-Chief) did what it was supposed to do, which is to comfort the comfortable and stick it to everybody else, as Kyle K. reminds us…
…and Brian Tyler Cohen gives us Adam Schiff’s response to Chris Wallace of Fix Noise on the issue of the Gropenfuhrer and his ruling cabal in the matter of Russian collusion (and no, Uday Jr., stupidity isn’t a defense, despite what you demonstrate in ample quantities)…
…and militias are “helping” our U.S. customs and border patrol to detain immigrants at our southern border (here) – what could possibly go wrong, I wonder? And did anybody deputize these ammo-sexual lunatics? If so, who?...
…and I know I included a Bernie Sanders clip yesterday, so to be fair, I should highlight other candidates seeking the Democratic Party nomination for president, and I can think of no one more deserving than Elizabeth Warren, speaking here on our criminal justice system and the issue of for-profit prisons, which to me is an obscenity (Cenk, Ana and the TYT crew explain) - and what she calls for here works for me also…
…and AOC continues to fight the good fight against trying to privatize health care through the VA – yeah, she’s such a radical Marxist, isn’t she?...
…and I apologize for neglecting to mention that yesterday was Earth Day – hope it was a positive day, because our environment definitely needs it (here).
Given that today is the 65th anniversary of the beginning of the Army-McCarthy hearings, I think this is a timely video (also considering how perilously close we are to returning to those awful days given the influence of the Gropenfuhrer and his vile minions, with the thoroughly infamous Roy Cohn as a link between McCarthy and our Treasonous, Tiny Handed Deatheater-In-Chief)…
…and I don’t think it’s that big of a “get” here to apply the Nixon standard of impeachment, if you will, to the actions of Generalissimo Trump, but I still thought this was a good background segment hosted by Ari Melber with David Corn, Betsy Woodruff and Joyce Vance on a deeper dive into the Mueller Report (“Why does Bill Barr want to be Roy Cohn?” – good question...and I don't know how much the Democratic Party leadership gets it or not, but this is an opportunity to show the country what they would do with the reins of power; they'd better know what to do with it or it could blow up in their proverbial face)…
…and Farron Cousins tells us about this Repug lunatic in Washington state named Matt Shea, who apparently wants to carry out violent attacks against liberals – please explain to me how we’re supposed to make some kind of common cause with this insane biped life forms…
…and if you throw down the proverbial gauntlet in front of AOC, you’d better be prepared to pick it up, as Sam Seder and the TMR panel tell us (and yeah, that “glass of water” remark from Nancy Pelosi was pretty dumb, even though I think she was talking about a generic “D” and not necessarily AOC and the other freshman House Dems)…
…and I have to admit that I thought this was a terrific video from the Bernie Sanders campaign (here); THIS is what the election should be all about…as I watched this, I realize that there are a lot of Democrats and independents out there who have gone on record as saying that they won’t support him for the nomination, and yeah, the purist in me thinks the nominee of the Democratic Party for president should be an actual Democrat, but if he does indeed get the nomination, we’d better put all of that aside and do our best to help him since, if 2016 taught us anything, it should be to take ABSOLUTELY NOTHING for granted; that being said, I think the opposite definitely holds true, and the Sanders camp for sure needs to do something about this - more context is here)…
We interrupt our regularly scheduled treasonous insanity to give you this utterly demeaning and moronic idiocy from Washington State Senator Maureen Walsh about “nurses playing cards” (here – my hope is that Sen. Walsh needs a nurse one day; she’ll get expert care I'm sure, which definitely isn’t what she deserves…and sorry I haven’t included a pic of a Yemeni child again)…
…and speaking of stoo-pid, Farron Cousins tells us that the Repugs are arguing that wind is a national security threat and bad for the economy – sometimes there are no words, people…
…and for anyone who may not know, today is the 20th anniversary of the Columbine gun massacre…
...and I feel like bringing back this tune for the occasion.
(Yes, I know I’m going back on my promise from last time to show Yemen kids – I’ll try to do so again as soon as I can.)
Brian Tyler Cohen gives us his take on Shep Smith’s reporting on the utterly ridiculous whitewash press conference held by Attorney General William Barr yesterday pertaining to the Mueller Report (and the “illegal leaks” stuff from Barr is particularly stoo-pid)…
…and Lawrence O’Donnell gives us his take on the redacted Mueller Report also, including what may be the most memorable line of all; I think O’Donnell is absolutely right – at least I hope so – on how the Dems will follow up (even thought this is a particularly pathetic response from the party’s “leadership,” though this from AOC is typically spot-on...you can tell how much she hit a nerve by how rabid the trolls are in the comments, misspellings, typos and all) and the Repugs will try to bury everything…
Update: As far as I'm concerned, she's been leading the way on every issue that matters, so I'm not surprised she's ahead on this too (here).
…and Stephen Colbert weighs in also (didn’t see anything else from his show or from Sam Bee)…
…and I thought this was a precious little nugget from history; the Gropenfuhrer comments on the Bill Clinton/Monica Whatsername stuff from ’98 with Tweety…see if you can detect criticism aimed at Number 42 that now applies to our Russian Operative head of state – we’ll see what kind of “Teflon” remains from our current occupant of An Oval Office…
…and I have to admit that I got a kick out of this; if Fix Noise covered Our Treasonous, Tiny-Handed Deatheater-in-Chief the way they covered his predecessor, it would probably go something like this…
…and this Monday marks the 60th anniversary of the final session for “Kind of Blue” by Miles Davis, which (last I checked) was still the largest selling jazz recording of all time (I know the solos are by Davis and by John Coltrane, and I think the pianist was Wynton Kelly, but I’m not sure of the other musicians).
I know that, at this site as well as many others, we ridicule Republicans (quite rightly as far as I’m concerned) when we think they deserve it, which is just about (but not quite) all the time…sometimes they actually AREN’T horrible, such as the one time out of at least 10 (closer to 20) when Brian Fitzpatrick actually does the right thing. And of course that includes our Treasonous, Tiny Handed Orange Dictator, though I haven’t had a reason to give him credit for ANYTHING and I don’t expect that I ever will. And a lot of that has to do with the typical political/media/Beltway insider BS that passes for so much of our political dialogue.
However, it’s a very different story as far as I’m concerned when stuff in the news isn’t the typical idiotic fodder (such as our supposedly elite opinion-makers bloviating as usual), but matters pertaining to genuine human misery and actual life and death.
And yes, I’m talking about Trump’s veto of the honest-to-goodness bipartisan Congressional resolution (and truth be told, when does THAT happen anymore?) to end our involvement in the slaughter in Yemen (here).
It should be obvious to even the most casual observer what kind of a monster truly resides in An Oval Office these days (oh, and by the way, don’t think he’ll be a pushover with fundraising numbers like this unfortunately). And it is just as apparent that there are waaay too many life forms out there all too eager to let our Deatheater-In-Chief have his way (under the guise of religion, hatred of “the other,” whatever Fix Noise tells them…or any and all of the above). So for that reason, I’m planning to include pictures of the children Trump has sentenced to an all-too-short life of pain and misery with these posts as opposed to snarky cartoons and other memes.
John Iadarola and Alex Emmons of The Intercept give their commentary (and yes, unfortunately a lot of presidents might do this, but we know who is responsible)…
…and here’s further embarrassment from Number 45, this time on his typical idiocy about fighting the Notre Dame blaze with flying water tankers or something (oh, but he’s SO GODLY according to those evangelical sheep, waiting to be led to the proverbial slaughter)…
…well, maybe this is the version of Him who those supporting the Gropenfuhrer truly worship (and about the Vote part, let’s not forget the primaries in many locations next month, including our beloved commonwealth)…
…and yeah, leave it to the “land of the yellow rose” to come up with some wackadoodle who is so pro-life that he’ll kill people for it, as Kyle K. tells us (NSFW - more here)…
…and Seth Meyers somehow finds comedy from this and related nonsense concerning our Russian Operative chief of state…
…and I now give you what I would call a rather interesting piece of musical trivia; on this day in 1971, all four members of The Beatles had a single on the UK chart as solo artists…”It Don’t Come Easy” by Ringo, “My Sweet Lord” by George Harrison, “Another Day” by Sir Paul, and this tune (as true now as ever).
Update 2 4/16/19: And I think this is well said also.
…and because the “meat and potatoes,” if you will, of this site is political stuff and related news, I give you Brian Tyler Cohen on Chris Wallace and Shep Smith pushing back against Trump BS on immigration.
And by the way, I am SO FED UP with watching Democrats act absolutely flummoxed on the whole “sanctuary cities” thing…the term, like so much other garbage in our dialogue, came from a right-wing think tank…a “sanctuary” city or state obeys the rule of law; someone from ICE can’t just come up to you and say, “I don’t like you, and you fit my profile of someone breaking the law, so you’re coming with me”…bullshit! In a “sanctuary city,” someone purporting to arrest you has to produce a warrant and show cause.
This tells me, then, that conservatives favor “detention cities” where you can be strong-armed against your rights, in violation of anything approximating due process. BUT I NEVER SEE CHICKEN DEMOCRATS ACTUALLY MAKING THAT ARGUMENT!
Anyway, here is the BTC clip…
…and CNN’s Brian Stelter tells us here how the latest garbage about Dem U.S. House Rep Ilhan Omar got started (a little uncomfortable with fire references at the moment given the Notre Dame tragedy)…
…and I can’t think of too many other tunes to offer right now besides this one.
It looks like the wingnutosphere is all in a rage yet again over Dem U.S. House Rep Ilhan Omar – so, people lose their minds over her saying “some people did things” about 9/11 but the routinely offensive actual garbage from people like Generalissimo Trump, Louie Gohmert and Steve King draw yawns by comparison? Uh…yeah – I guess that’s where we’re at.
For the benefit of anyone who doesn’t get this by now (maybe one or two), please allow me to explain.
Fix Noise and the New York Post are probably the chief operators in what is (I would guess) about a billion-dollar outrage machine in this country. And as far as their “subscribers,” if you will, are concerned, hate is like oxygen to them. In point of fact, Omar could have given a news conference and said, “Gee, I woke up this morning and saw that the sky is blue,” and there are people out there who would still go nuts and say, “OMIGOD, IT WAS CLOUDY OUTSIDE THIS MORNING! SHE’S PART OF A GLOBALIST CONSPIRACY!!”
Well anyway, I thought this was a good response from Cenk and Ana (along with their sadly apropos commentary on the Democratic Party congressional “leadership”)…
Update 4/15/19: By the way, when it comes to Democrats Behaving Badly, I suggest that you follow Lee Fang on Twitter (here) who has been doing great work (along with some other folks) following the proverbial money between the Center for American Progress, the New America Foundation, and some truly strange bedfellows, as it were.
…and when it comes to Democrats with actual guts, I give you this about AOC giving it to the “banksters” in a recent congressional hearing, as Brian Tyler Cohen tells us (this is what actual representation in a democratically elected government looks like, by the way...and so is this)…
…and it looks like the Trumpsters found a way to weaponize the tax code, as CNN’s John Avlon explains here…yet another reason to hate this bunch of criminals; I can personally attest to this…we haven’t owed on our federal return in over 15 years, but we do now - and you voted for this, Bri-Fi)…
…and this is one hell of an argument for getting rid of the filibuster from Dem Sen. Elizabeth Warren…
…and I give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” from 4/13/14 (I know I haven’t done this for a little while)…the next time you see anything having to do with Dem Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, remember that her former fellow Dem Senator Al Franken, speaking out here against the proposed Comcast and Time-Warner merger (which eventually failed, by the way), who was accused of sexually related misconduct as we know, wanted a Senate ethics committee investigation in response but Gillibrand said no – Franken had to resign immediately…not condoning what Franken was accused of in anyway, but I think this video gives us an idea of just how much of an important voice we ended up losing…and in a related story as they say, Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao will NEVER allow a vote on Net Neutrality in the Senate, and I think this is the main reason why...also, here is more on McCutcheon which Franken referred to...Bri-Fi also voted against Net Neutrality, as noted here)…
…and exactly 50 years ago today, this song was Number One on the Billboard Top 40 chart (more here - and yes, this was yet another production with The Wrecking Crew).
Former Obama Secretary of State John Kerry recently appeared before the U.S. House on the climate crisis, and met with typical wingnut Repug idiocy, as Brian Tyler Cohen tells us (more here...and in a related story, this was a thing too as it turned out...good Lord)…
…and here is more proof WHY OUR STUPID CORPORATE MEDIA IS PATHETIC, Part The Infinity as Charlie Pierce might say (here) – it takes a COMEDIAN to tell the truth anymore, as usual, though I realize Stephen Colbert is pretty damn “woke” in his way (I could feel brain cells dying as I watched that pitiable orange meat sack)…
…and Farron Cousins tells us about the U.S. House Dems standing up to pharmaceutical executives; of course, Teahadists Mark Meadows and Gym Jordan are telling Big Pharma not to cooperate with the request from the party in power in the House, as you might expect…
..and I think they’re coming to the Mann Music Center in these parts in July – might pay StubHub a visit shortly.
Brooke Thomas and John Iadarola of The Damage Report tell us here about Dem U.S. House Rep Katherine Clark of MA squaring off with Cruella DeVos over the Ed Secretary’s citing of a propaganda screed disguised as serious research claiming that minority kids basically aren’t going to do anything in school but cause trouble – yeah, that’s about par for the miserable course for this regime of criminals, charlatans and fools (more here)…
…and I give you the latest Trumpster fire nominee for the Federal Reserve Board (more here)…
…and Farron Cousins tells us about the departure of DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen – don’t let the door hit you on the way out, lady (more here)…
…and I know I already said something about the Dems in the U.S. House (and some Repugs including Bri-Fi) voting to reauthorize the VAWA, but I wanted to note in particular the utter Neanderthal treatment given to Dem U.S. Rep Debbie Dingell, with a commentary from Brian Tyler Cohen…
…and Kyle of Secular Talk tells us about Stuart Varney and some other talking head-ette who are mad at Pope Frank for opposing the Gropenfuhrer and his stoo-pid wall (very mildly NSFW by Kyle’s standards)…
…and last Friday marked the 25th anniversary of the death of Kurt Cobain of Nirvana…not trying to sound like a Pollyanna, but try to stay away from the bad stuff and always reach out to try and get help if you think you need it or you know someone who does.
John I on The Damage Report tells us how our Treasonous, Tiny Handed Orange Dictator is deciding to face off somewhat with AOC – I largely try to ignore that misogynist methane dispenser taking up space in An Oval Office, but I guess sometimes I have to actually acknowledge his existence…
…and Dem U.S. Senator Michael Bennet stands tall again in the face of more garbage from Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao on blowing up the U.S. Senate, cutting the time for debating judicial nominees from 30 hours to 2 hours, as Brian Tyler Cohen tells us (and in a related story, I think Sen. Elizabeth Warren is on the right track here – let’s end this fairy tale that the U.S. Senate, the “world’s greatest deliberative body,” is some kind of collegial place where everybody gets along in a respectful manner…BS; Repugs have been doing everything they can to knee-cap the Dems for decades, and if getting rid of the filibuster helps to return that “favor,” then that works for me)…
…and Cenk and Ana of TYT tell us about the renewal of the Violence Against Women Act in the House, and the wall it is likely to run into when it reaches the Senate (related to the prior clip as far as I’m concerned…and to be honest, the actions of Dianne Feinstein here trying to play nice with Repug Joni Ernst are more worrisome to me IMHO than when she talked about the Green New Deal in her office in front of those school kids…and though I have a lot of issues with him aside from this, I have to be fair and note that our Repug house rep Brian Fitzpatrick voted in favor of VAWA renewal)…
…and I’m afraid that we may be looking at the beginning of the “Trump slump” on the economy (terrific), as Farron Cousins tells us…
…and Sam Seder and The Majority Report tell us about some idiot named Roger Williams in Texas (of course…not “born free,” I guess…sorry – a bit of an obscure joke) who asks “if you’re a capitalist or a socialist” and says “Yes or No answer” – uhhh, brainiac?You’re not asking a “yes” or “no” question…just say “oops” and get out…the subject is reauthorizing the national flood insurance program, apparently – oh so clever, this one is…
…and as a parent, I have to tell you that I’m not crazy about the drug references in this song, but otherwise I think this is a great tune for a Friday night.
Yep, I think this pretty much tells you what Fix Noise thinks of its audience, as Farron Cousins points out; anyone south of the border is just a member of the scary brown horde I guess as far as that network is concerned…
…and this clip from Velshi and Ruhle of MSNBC offers a bit of analysis on Trump-nominated ambassadors and how much some of them apparently contributed to his inaugural - yeah, I get it that it's up to the discretion of the president, but has this *president* shown much discretion about anything else? (oh, and Doug Manchester apparently has other issues besides not knowing the Bahamas is an independent country, as noted here)...
…and Cenk and Ana of TYT tell us that the Gropenfuhrer is apparently getting rid of the DHS group that overlooks domestic terrorism (and it’s pretty unbelievable that a report on this topic was commissioned by Dubya but shelved by Obama, but I guess that’s where we are…and do you really have to think about where our “very fine people on both sides” Tiny-Handed Orange Dictator comes down on this issue?)…
…and happy 70th birthday to none other than RT (definitely NOT the Putin propaganda channel).
(Note: I’ll admit that I’m behind when it comes on the Dem presidential campaigning stuff…I don’t know whether or not Joe Biden was a little inappropriate with touching some women, which to me sounds like a tempest in a proverbial tea pot especially in comparison to the Gropenfuhrer – if you don’t like Biden for other reasons, I get it, but this stuff so far sounds weak…and I’m wondering where it could be coming from, even though all signs point to the Bernie Sanders campaign – love him on policy, but I think he needs to clean up a lot of this stuff among his ranks – and believe me when I tell you that I hope I’m wrong; I also have tried to stay out of this because I think it’s pointless to obsess over every little bit of what our corporate media decides is important…from what I can gather, Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris sound like the most serious candidates on policy so far, but the white guys including this Indiana mayor are the ones getting all of the attention, which is sadly typical I know…I’m afraid we’re looking at about another 18 months of ridiculous distraction, including some “Never Trumpers” who say our Russian Operative at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has already won his second term based on these way-too-early signs, which tells me what these people are really all about after all, and I DEFINITELY don’t meant that in a good way.)
OK, with that admittedly boring bit of “meta” stuff out of the way, It looks again like the “party of Lincoln,” with its Treasonous, Tiny Handed Orange Demented Lunatic-in-Chief, is once again teeing up health care as the main issue in 2020 with their cruel stupidity, as Kyle explains (without denigrating the media over covering the Mueller investigation, which is a welcome change…NSFW)…
…and speaking of cruel stupidity when it comes to health care, this is easily one of the most heartbreaking stories I’ve ever seen – my very deepest sympathies go out to the brave Curtis family of Indiana for the loss of their daughter, and all because medical pot isn’t legal in that state…we’re wasting our time in this country with the political horserace BS and dwelling on every single lie from our ruling cabal of criminals (don’t ignore them, but maybe just keep a running list online somewhere being refuted with reality – not sure what else to do), when THIS, climate change and common-sense gun laws are some of the stories we should be focusing on instead…
Update: OK, I admit that I opened a bit of a door previously, so to be fair (and also since it pertains to Indiana), I should include this.
…oh, and don’t look now, but The Supremes under Hangin’ Judge JR just went a long way towards destroying the 8th Amendment of the Constitution recently in the case noted here, led by Neil Gorsuch (once more, great coverage on the legal stuff by Ian Millhiser)…the subject here is difficult I’ll admit; it has to do with someone convicted of murder and sentenced to die, but he’s trying to dictate the terms of his sentence because he suffers from vascular tumors that could exacerbate his execution.
Here’s a big part of the problem; a lot of the drug makers offshore know that, in this country, we use their products to kill people, and they don’t want any part of it. So we’ve had to come up with all kinds of ways to put people to death using painkillers of questionable reliability which, in Justice Elena Kagan’s words (and as Millhiser tells us), left death row inmates with “the feeling of being burned alive.”
And I’m not trying to garner any sympathy whatsoever for Russell Bucklew, who was convicted of a brutal murder 23 years ago. But since we’re talking about the Supremes here (basically, the highest appeals court that there is), we’re talking about creating a legal precedent (if someone dies by being “burned alive” today…well, what kind of punishment will they decide to inflict tomorrow? And, if we don’t know how to kill someone in a medically efficient way that ACTUALLY ISN’T TORTURE, can’t we just default to life in prison instead?).
I don’t know the answer to these questions. At a minimum, though, I think we should be talking about them, particularly since our now-solid conservative majority on the Court thinks that inflicting something akin to resurrecting the Inquisition is no big deal.
Oh, and with that in mind, I should note that “I Like Beer” Kavanaugh wondered why we couldn’t just kill the guy by firing squad instead.
You know, kind of like this (from “Paths of Glory,” the finest anti-war film ever made IMO)…
…and making things a little less heavy for the moment, I bring you this commentary from David Pakman about Chris Wallace of Fix Noise briefly standing up against his own network’s BS on what led to the Mueller probe…I’m not sure that we’ll ever see a clean, un-redacted version of Mueller’s report, though we should keep fighting for it of course – I would think it would be a hell of a campaign issue if we don’t, but there is literally so much other crap to dig through from our ruling cabal of traitors that I’m afraid it might get lost in the noise; I take absolutely nothing for granted for 2020, and neither should anyone else…
…and gosh, it looks problematic as to whether or not longtime wingnut shill Stephen Moore may actually make it to the Federal Reserve Board (Maddow once showed up Moore on “Real Time,” which was totally deserved because, as usual, Moore was lying his ass off)…
…and with the weather starting to get a little nicer around here, I thought I’d offer this selection – a little more upbeat and fun-filled I hope.
I want to give you a bit of insight as to what it’s like to be a Roman Catholic in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia these days.
I attended services a few weeks ago at my parish in Bucks County, and there was an announcement at the end of the service that they would be hosting a screening of the film “Gosnell” (here) about the insane monster masquerading as a physician who was convicted on numerous criminal counts including first-degree murder and 21 felony counts of illegal late-term abortions. The screening would be held the morning of March 9th in the school cafeteria. And yes, we’re talking about showing a movie about this butcher in an elementary school on a Saturday morning to an audience of grade school kids.
As if that isn’t repugnant enough, this evening at services, I heard a promotion for the alleged movie called “Unplanned” about someone’s experiences supposedly running a Planned Parenthood center in Texas (more here...apparently this is showing in area theaters).
I am purposely not mentioning the name of the church that I attended because I don’t want to say anything that could possibly denigrate it in any way. Also, I believe the pastor is a good man trying hard to do the right thing, and I don’t want to say anything to negatively impact him either.
Besides, I believe the orders for all of this stuff are coming from “downtown,” as it were. And I’m laying all of this hateful crap at the feet of this guy.
Do you want to know why there’s a push for this NOW? Because it’s Lent, when people who aren’t regular churchgoers (and I guess I’m in that category a bit…mea culpa) are likely to come back to attend Mass leading up to Easter. Also, I would argue that this is happening because the Catholic Church sees an opportunity to drive a stake through the metaphorical heart of Roe v. Wade once and for all now that “Schlitz” Kavanaugh has been installed as a member of the Supremes.
Either way, this stinks. And as always, the only issue the Church cares about any more is ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION and, in case you somehow didn’t get the message already, ABORTION. Also, you can forget about me linking to anything related to the theaters showing “Unplanned”; I’m not going to make any effort to give this propaganda any traffic whatsoever.
However, if you’d like something approximating a more even-handed treatment of what Planned Parenthood REALLY does as far as I’m concerned, I’d like to offer this instead…
…and I give you Brian Tyler Cohen on Adam Schiff’s response to attacks aimed at him and the attempted whitewash by AG Bill Barr on the Mueller Report (and we already knew Devin Nunes was a disgusting, repugnant character typical for the Trumpster ilk, but I guess he was making jokes and some other stupid remarks while Schiff was talking…what a POS)...
…and gee, maybe we ought to do something about this climate change thing (by the way, I don’t know what the hell Pap means when he talks about what AOC is “projecting” at about 4:15, though he and Farron Cousins are right about Republicans jumping on their BS framing of an issue ahead of the Democrats, along with the typical lying nonsense of the Gropenfuhrer saying you won’t be able to watch TV if the wind isn’t blowing, or crap like that…and by the way, Catholic Church, if you want to speak out on something besides ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION ABORTION, maybe this would be a good issue for you also…you know, the whole “stewards of the earth” thing…)…
(I've had a little more time than usual to post this week, but I think that will come to an end for a bit after today.)
Of course Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao would block releasing the Mueller Report to the U.S. Senate – why on earth would he do the right and honorable thing, as Farron Cousins explains…
…and I don’t know anything about Brian Tyler Cohen, but boy is he right about what we have to do about climate change (and Mike Lee thinks AOC’s proposal is “unserious”?? – See, that’s Reason Number 4,327 WHY I F*CKING HATE REPUBLICANS!!! Disagreeing on this is dumb enough, but Lee gets BONUS DUUUHHH points for trying to ridicule something THAT HE CLEARLY DIDN’T GO TO THE TROUBLE TO TRY AND ACTUALLY UNDERSTAND!!)…
…and for the common sense opposing point of view, AOC herself brings the proverbial fire here; I think she’s mixing up the issues a bit (the Flint water disaster has to do with criminally failed Repug non-governance and not climate change), but great work on her part to draw attention to these issues…
...…and happy belated birthday to Tony Banks of Genesis, with what I would consider to be a totally apt tune.
Even though I’m Roman Catholic, there’s a reason why I don’t think it’s appropriate to try and cram my beliefs down anybody’s metaphorical throat; this “prayer” by Repug PA House Rep Stephanie Borowicz would be merely awful if it weren’t for the fact that it came on the day that Movita Johnson-Harrell, PA’s first Muslim-American woman legislator, was sworn into office, which, as far as I’m concerned, make Borowicz’s remarks a slap in the face at Ms. Johnson-Harrell (here)…”Pennsyltucky” strikes again (the "prayer" came before the swearing-in, by the way)…
…and I thought this was a good take on the potential for obstruction of justice in the Mueller Report by Farron Cousins, and as far as I’m concerned, the jury on that is still out on that because WE HAVEN’T SEEN THE WHOLE DAMN REPORT AND I DON’T TRUST WILLIAM BARR (and I think it should be noted that Cousins is a lawyer…oh, and by the way, Dems, can we now give Nancy Pelosi a little credit for downplaying impeachment talk about the Gropenfuhrer? Wouldn’t she look pretty damn silly right about now if she’d plowed full steam ahead on that before the report was out?)…
…and any death for any reason is awful, but this is particularly bad (as is this) – what I wouldn’t give to see one of these gun-humpers have to deal with an active shooter drill; of course, they’d probably try to be “a good guy with a gun” and shoot a teacher or police officer instead…
…and I’m sorry that I’m in a particularly sour mood today – with the first clip in mind in particular, I felt like hearing this song.
OK, so now we have a bit of a look at what is contained in the Mueller Report about alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia in the 2016 election (I think it was actual and not, in fact, merely alleged, but I realize that the Mueller Report didn’t find the proverbial “smoking gun”).
Now before we get into too many histrionics over this, I believe we should consider the following:
Attorney General William Barr is a Repug “fixer” from the days of Iran-Contra, and he was nominated for this job exactly because the Trumpsters saw this coming down the road and wanted Barr to sanitize this mess for them.
Generalissimo Trump wasn’t even deposed by Mueller as part of the investigation (not trying to impugn Mueller, but just stating a fact).
We haven’t seen the whole damn report yet, just Barr’s summary of it.
This is in no way whatsoever the end of Trump’s legal woes.
Also, I would add that Mueller (it seemed to me) was looking more for the in-all-likelihood financial illegality between Trump, Russia and other actors/entities in Trump’s business dealings, and I have a feeling that that is what is largely in this report. And I’ve included the clip below from Ari Melber on this for two reasons: 1) Melber is a lawyer, and 2) He makes the important point that Mueller apparently believed that the resolution for any potential “high crimes and misdemeanors,” should they be found, was in the U.S. House through impeachment as opposed to indicting Trump, which is about right as far as I’m concerned.
With that being said, I should note that we should expect nothing but the typical corporate media caterwauling about Trump supposedly taking a victory lap over this, as utterly preposterous as that is. And Glenn Greenwald unleashed a truly petulant tweetstorm after Barr produced his interpretation of the Mueller report, attacking MSNBC for their fixation on Trump and Russia.
Were they fixated on this in their reporting? Yes. For ratings? Uh huh (Chris Hayes was honest enough to admit that he wanted to do more reporting in climate change, but as nearly as he could tell, viewers would tune him out). However, I personally believed this story was important enough to merit that kind of treatment. And I believe it still is.
However, I have to admit that I was shocked by some of the lefty push-back on this also (the reason for the Bozo pic). Kyle Kulinski also attacked the typical corporate media suspects with initials for names, saying he was right and they were wrong (even though the most ridiculous pontificating I’ve yet seen on this is contained in this tweet). Um, the whole damn report hasn’t even come out yet! If you want to be mad for the over-reporting on this versus actual policy issues that impact our lives more directly, then fine, I get that. But please don’t do Fix Noise’s work for them, OK? Their platform is plenty big enough for them to do that on their own.
Anyway, here is the Melber clip…
Update 3/26/19: Yep, I think Greenwald has pretty much devolved into self-parody here.
…oh, and in case anybody out there thinks I’m nothing but a shill for the Democrats, I give you this, which is truly deflating and cause to worry for 2020…between shooting ourselves in the foot with a Howitzer like this and Trump having the power of incumbency on his side, I remain genuinely concerned that the Democrats, as a national party, are going to try and win this by bringing a knife to a gun fight, as it were, and if so, we know what will happen (The DCCC remains an utterly useless organization as far as I’m concerned)…
…and I think these are some important words from the guy who went after Tucker Carlson (everyone running the DCCC should be tied to a chair and forced to listen)…
…and happy 72nd birthday to Elton John, with a bit of a Russian-flavored tune for the occasion.
It’s nice to see that Former President Highest Disapproval Rating In Gallup Poll History is giving the recent anniversary of his ruinous war in Iraq the reverence and respect it deserves (here…and yes, that most definitely is snark) – made me recall this clip…
Update: Yeah, I think a lot more could be said on this subject, but Chris Hayes is definitely on the right track here.
…and speaking of clueless Republican presidents, Seth Meyers gives us the latest on our Traitorous, Tiny-Handed Orange Mental Defective, including his “feud” with the ghost of John McCain; the Devin Nunes stuff is hilarious the way Meyers tells it, though I realize this is funny in no way, shape or form…
…and as long as I’m talking about chief executives, this tells us that Jimmy Carter is about to become our oldest-ever living president; I just felt like bringing back this vintage SNL clip for the occasion…
…and supposedly the world’s greatest superpower can somehow only scrounge up $57K for what I would consider to be a legitimate emergency, and that’s the opioid crisis in this country, as AOC points out…
...and Brooke Thomas and Jayar Jackson of “The Damage Report” comment on more typical Fix Noise idiocy from this Katie Pavlich person saying the U.S. should get credit for ending slavery...so many directions you can go with this I realize, but let me just ask this question; do you want to know what Great Britain did about slavery? They passed the Slavery Abolition Act in 1833 (here). And that was it (or just about). No horrible, five four-year war with an utterly abominable list of people killed or wounded and family and property destroyed and enmity to this day between geographic regions of this county – if anybody deserves an “award” for ending it, I think THEY do (oh, and don’t worry about Harris Faulkner – she knows EXACTLY what she’s doing...and by the way, I'm not in favor of reparations - subject for a whole other post I realize, and this is part of the reason why...I'm not saying we can't talk about it, though)…
...and happy 334th birthday to J.S. Bach - time for a bit of culture.
Cenk, John and Tommy Vietor tell us about Louie Gohmert’s reaction to the New Zealand gun massacre (and, by extension, the Republican Party also…yep, as far as I’m concerned, Gohmert remains the stupidest life form in the universe)…
…and Stephanie Ruhle interviews David Enrich of the New York Times, who wrote the story about the Gropenfuhrer and Deutsche Bank, which has a lot to answer for as far as I'm concerned…
…and speaking of money, Mike Malloy brings us another NSFW commentary on the latest Repug bait-and-switch on taxes; we’re about to find out if we got socked also (not optimistic here I have to admit)…
…and with the Ruhle clip in mind…well, don’t look now, but I think I stumbled across the “Trump For President 2020” campaign theme song.
