Wednesday Stuff

Thom Hartmann interviews Judd Legum of popular.info who tells us about 6 corporations (including AT&T, CVS, Merck and Comcast) funding attacks on women’s reproductive rights...it’s true that the Dems and Biden have to get their messaging act together for the fall elections, and yes, this is a recording, sadly (and some actual, y’know, policy like student debt forgiveness or Biden trying to extend the child tax credit on his own since Manchinema will block him on that of course would be good too), but if the SCOTUS of Ginni Thomas’s husband, “I Like Beer” Kavanaugh, “Strip Search Sammy” Alito and Amy Coney Island Baby Barrett totally eviscerate Roe, as is expected probably this June...well, that will indeed cause an electoral earthquake, and I’m not sure anyone is prepared for that (hopefully the “D” party is, but yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it)...



...and as a follow-up to the prior clip, Robert Reich points out that abortion bans are pro-poverty, not pro-life (one of the reasons why this issue disgusts me so thoroughly – aside from the fact that women are treated like chattel who shouldn’t have agency over their own bodies – is because, when “balls and strikes” Roberts had his confirmation hearing, he along with other conservatives at their hearings professed a respect for “settled law,” which Roe most definitely is, and now we know how they really feel about that, being the liars that they are)...



...and Jayar Jackson of The Damage Report tells us about that assclown Charlie Kirk trying to scare his single-digit-IQ’d base over Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson and some assumed privilege Kirk thinks that the judge conveyed at her recent SCOTUS confirmation hearings; Jayar in response tells us about Franklin Barrett Sechriest who (allegedly) set a synagogue on fire and committed armed robbery against black and Hispanic students at Texas State University, having been indoctrinated by wingnuts like Kirk and his foul ilk...



...and Farron Cousins tells us that it looks like some of the folks in the “trucker convoy” had some brief moments of clarity, you might say, when it comes to whatever it was they thought they were protesting...



...and Lawrence O’Donnell speaks with Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe on the business of Clarence Thomas failing to recuse himself in cases where his nutball wife and the regime of the Gropenfuhrer are involved...considering how far the “Dixiecrats” went to drive Abe Fortas off the SCOTUS so Tricky Dick could appoint 2 justices (Thom Hartmann once more brings the real story here), Dems could definitely raise the same ruckus over Thomas, but yeah, that will happen when the proverbial pigs fly (and let’s not forget this too)...



...and this CBC report tells us about the Russians taking a military beating of sorts in Ukraine, though that doesn’t mean they still aren’t a lethal force, according to military analyst Konrad Muzyka (and I suppose whether or not Ukraine can actually "win" depends on how you define what victory is - I would guess that a stalemate with Russia would count for that...I don't see Ukraine being able to completely drive out Russia, despite their heroic efforts so far, but we'll see of course)...



...and to include some positive news, I give you this from The Lincoln Project...



...and as part of my tribute to artists protesting Spotify over the Joe Rogan anti-vax and anti-mask garbage, I give you another Joni Mitchell tune...winding this down and I have a couple of more selections to go.

Tuesday Stuff

Robert Costa reports on the CBS Morning News about the approximately-7 1/2-hour gap in the White House phone logs on January 6th, 2021...as others have already pointed out, Rose Mary Woods covered up (allegedly of course) about 18 minutes for Tricky Dick way back when, so what does that say about the degree of probable criminality among disgraced presidents between then and now?...



Update: And speaking of the "third eye" network, I sadly give you this, this, this (and I think Aaron Rupar means "Mick"), and this.

...and this Now This clip tells us about the recent display of body bags on the mall in D.C. to spell out “thoughts and prayers” to commemorate the 4-year anniversary of the March For Our Lives against gun violence...great report, and kudos to Manuel Oliver for his bravery in the face of such awful trauma that we all hope and pray to never experience; to do something on this issue, click here...



...and John and Francesca of The Damage Report tell us about Trump-supporting goons going door to door in Colorado to intimidate people of color to try and stop them from voting...and actually, the Dems DID have a plan in the Senate – the For The People Voting Act or whatever that was – but it was killed by #CurtsyKyrsten and #MaseratiManchin...this is why AG Merrick Garland – remember him? – should have already appointed a special prosecutor to investigate this garbage across the country and refer charges to a grand jury if they turn out to be warranted, and I have a feeling Doug Jones would do a great job of heading up something like that...



...and some right wing nut case named Jarrin Jackson, running for the Oklahoma – of course! – state senate, invokes communists while discussing shooting people in the face and brandishing a knife too while he does so...charming (oh, but let's not forget that he worships Jesus Christ also, who, as we know, readily condoned murdering the Pharisees when they disagreed with him - uh huh...Emma Vigeland, Cenk and Jessica Burbank tell us more)...



...and Ali Velshi, reporting from Poland, tells us that the countries backsliding in a non-democratic direction outnumber the ones going in a democratic direction according to a report by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance - terrific...



...and happy belated 60th birthday to bassist Ged Grimes, currently of Simple Minds and previously with the band Danny Wilson – this was the latter’s big hit.

Monday Stuff

Beau of the Fifth Column leads off with the latest report on warming at the Arctic and Antarctic poles; gee, maybe we ought to do something about this climate change thing, huh? And with all due respect to Beau, climate is different from weather...



...and this Rebel HQ clip with Jessica Burbank lets us know that, yes, Rand Paul is a total dope, Part The Infinity as Charlie Pierce might say, and of course he runs kicking and screaming to Fix Noise where he can bloviate and the news mannequins on that network won’t give him any push back at all, and this time of course the subject is COVID-19 (and oh yeah, I’ve got a few G’s just collecting dust in my pocket, so I’ll just go get some monoclonal antibodies if I get ‘Rona as opposed to getting vaxxed and boosted and wearing a piece of cloth on my face, OK?)...



...and John and Francesca of The Damage Report compare the Ketanji Brown Jackson SCOTUS hearings with the process of screening and holding hearings for “I Like Beer” Kavanaugh (the double standard is enough to make you throw up in your mouth IMO)...



...and Joy Reid interviews Dem U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, who “brings the receipts” on Leonard Leo, The Federalist Society and the three SCOTUS justices who they promoted, timed for the Ketanji Brown Jackson hearings of course (actually, all 6 conservative justices either belong to The Federalist Society or did at one time...I hope Whitehouse serves in the Senate for many more years because I don’t know anybody else who has “cracked the code” on this issue like he has)...



...and with the mercury taking a dive big time in these parts (recalling the Beau clip somewhat), I had this comedy bit from “back in the day” very much in mind...



...and speaking of Saturday Night Live, RIP drummer Taylor Hawkins of The Foo Fighters (and nobody was slapped during this performance, I should note – and then Smith was rewarded with an Oscar and a standing “O” later...GMAFB! And somewhere, a wingnut is screeching, "See, I told you about black-on-black crime!").



Update: For real.

Saturday Stuff (updates)

(Thanks to @JamesTate121 on Twitter for the pic.)

David Doel tells us all about the reporting (I hesitate to use the word “bombshell,” but in this case I think it applies) on Ginni Thomas texting Mark Meadows to overturn the election and potentially imprison Joe Biden off GITMO (which is turning the cray-cray meter up to 11 as far as yours truly is concerned)...as a result, congressional Dems should look at EVERY RULING affecting the Trump White House in which Almost Silent Clarence Thomas was involved and, if there’s enough of a body of evidence in which Thomas sided with the Gropenfuhrer, call for Thomas’s impeachment on grounds of conflict of interest (and yeah, I know what the realistic probability is of that actually happening...and once more, Ilhan Omar shows some guts on a vitally important issue)...



Update 3/28/22: Another GREAT history lesson from Thom Hartmann very much related to this matter (here)...

Update 3/29/22: If Abe Fortas could be driven from the High Court over an alleged financial impropriety in the amount of $15K, then Thomas should get the same treatment for this.

...and John and Adrienne Lawrence discuss AOC calling out #MaseratiManchin and the Dems and others who coddle him (good luck not flying into the air and landing on your back after you try kicking the football but miss because it’s yanked away from you, John...and I'm not going to trust Manchin to vote Yes on confirming Ketanji Brown Jackson to the SCOTUS either until Manchin actually does it)...



...and Ana of TYT wonders (along with a hell of a lot of other people) why Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg dropped charges against Former President Fergus Laing, who is guilty of multiple felonies according to a Manhattan prosecutor under Bragg who resigned (Ana killing it going solo again)...



...and longtime climate activist Bill McKibben tells us what’s really going on with higher gas prices (really interesting stuff about the smarmy relationship between Putin and international dirty energy industry executives; these people are irredeemable scum IMO, particularly for their ridiculous stock buybacks and refusal to lower gas prices and drill on leases that have already been approved, but I wouldn’t go so far as McKibben seems to do here and blame these criminals for the war in UIkraine...that’s on Vlad the Butcher and nobody else)...



...and the latest Second Thought video tells us how fascists are taking advantage of climate change...among the many great points in this clip is the discussion of the intersection of eco-fascism by people like Marine Le Pen (“yeah, I’m ‘green’ all right, but that means that I want to keep out the scary ‘other’ to maintain my imaginary environmental ‘cred’”) and eco-nationalism (“Build That Wall”) – the last 4 minutes or so of this about the failure of neoliberalism to respond to the climate crisis should be viewed by everyone and used as an excuse to try and effect meaningful political change, as admittedly hard as that is...



...and happy belated 75th birthday to Reginald Kenneth Dwight – hope it was a good one ("Rocketman" was a terrific biopic, by the way).

Friday Stuff (update)

It looks like Cancun Cruz hit a new level of rock bottom this week at the hearings for Ketanji Brown Jackson to be (hopefully) confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court, looking up himself on Google apparently to see how many hits he got for his typically idiotic escapade against the most worthy nominee to appear before “the world’s greatest deliberative body” in quite a while (David Doel explains... and I would have more respect for Ben Sasse if he hadn’t voted against aid for Ukraine)...

Update 3/27/22: And apparently sales of this book are through the roof after Cruz's antics - nice (kid is adorable too).

...and this Don Winslow video reminds us what a gutless worm Cruz truly is – If someone told me that my family and I had to up and relocate to Texas, I would seriously have to look at emigrating to Canada (though I’m sure Austin is pretty nice)...definitely don’t want any parts of a state that thinks people like Cruz, Cornyn, Greg Abbott and Ken Paxton are the type of people who should serve in public office...



...and Trae Crowder gives us his NSFW/H commentary on the U.S. Senate Repugs (including Cancun Ted) trying to derail Ketanji Brown Jackson from being confirmed to the Supreme Court...



...and turning to Vlad The Butcher and the carnage he has inflicted in Ukraine, Francesca and David Shuster tell us, among other things, that President Biden has said that the U.S. will accept 100K refugees...and yeah, I’m sure we could do better (along with a discussion about sanctions and potential future developments in the ongoing tragedy inflicted by Russia – among the many galling failures by our utterly bought-and-paid-for corporate media is their almost complete and utter refusal to hold those 8 Republican U.S. senators to account who travelled to Moscow on July 4th, 2018)...



...and Jayar Jackson and Michael Shure of Rebel HQ tell us that Repug senatorial idiot Mike Braun in Indiana recently talked about making mixed marriage illegal (re, the Loving ruling), and basically Griswold on privacy also...yep, saying the quiet part out loud for sure (what century is this again? And yeah, when you hear a wingnut say anything along the lines of “letting the states decide,” rest assured that that’s code language for “make it illegal”...interesting to mention Joe Donnelly by Shure and what can happen when you primary a Dem; of course, I don’t know anybody who opposed economic populism, and I also don’t know how much Donnelly embraced that or not...kind of academic at this point I know, sadly...more here)...



...and Sam and Emma of The Majority Report give us that great video from Kentucky senator Karen Berg giving it to the white men in charge of state government who think they have the right to pass anti-abortion bans (15 weeks pertaining to women’s health care...pretty bleeping barbaric all right)...



...and on the subject of powerful, important women (still a few days left in March), RIP Madeleine Albright, the first woman Secretary of State (a tribute from Mrs. Greenspan follows)...



...and here’s a tune to kick-start what I hope is a good weekend for us all; apparently the thermometer is going to take a bit of a dive in these parts.

Wednesday Stuff

Sam and Emma of The Majority Report talk about Dem U.S. Senator Dick Durbin giving Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson a chance to respond to that beyond ridiculous tweet thread from Josh Hawley that he vomited out alleging the Repug evergreen charge that the judge is somehow “soft on crime”...GREAT point to contrast the way Judge Jackson is being treated with the antics of “I Like Beer” Kavanaugh...and here is my reminder that this DEFINITELY WOULD NOT EVEN BE HAPPENING if it weren’t for the people of Georgia who voted out their Republican senators, which of course is why the “party of Lincoln” is working soooo hard to take away the franchise from voters who would use it to make a difference, in a good way I mean...



..and Chris Hayes speaks with Elie Mystal and Melissa Murray on the nonsensical GOP line of questioning/attacks on Judge Brown Jackson (including Cancun Cruz and that kids’s pop-up book, or whatever that idiocy was)...



Update 3/31/22: Yeah, you go for it on Judge Brown Jackson, wingnuts - the country is united behind you in opposition...suuuure (here).

...and isn’t it funny how the “party of Lincoln” is so up in arms when they think kids are getting indoctrinated into an ideology the wingnuts don’t like, but are so willing to do it to further their own agenda (yeah I know – water wet, sky blue...)...



...and on the subject of the ongoing Russian war in Ukraine, Mehdi Hasan calls out media bias here in favor of MOOAAARRR WAAAARRRR...this is a little tricky because, though I think there is a pro-war bias on “the cables,” I’m not sure that there are good peaceful options with Vlad The Butcher, though believe me when I tell you that I want to be wrong (good job by David Doel to bring up the Phil Donahue MSNBC garbage while Bushco was ramping up for Iraq War II in ’03...that network hated liberals/progressives until they started making $$$ off K.O., Rachel Maddow, etc.)...



...and in a related vein, David Pakman discusses the recent beyond-bonkers Lara Logan interview spouting pro-Putin apologia basically (wacky for all of the reasons Pakman notes here...yes, I think Logan needs help and what happened to her was awful, but that doesn’t excuse such through-the-looking-glass commentary)...



...and Farron Cousins tells us that Repugs have filed about 240 anti-LGBTQ bills so far in under 3 months (and 670 since 2018...as usual, it’s “jobs, jobs, jobs” for Not Your Father’s Republican Party...and yes, this is nothing but a ploy to drive 2022 turnout later this year as Cousins says, and if a few trans kids get harmed in the process later...well, that’s just a big “meh” as far the “R” party is concerned...more here)...



...and some Daily Wire idiot calls out Greta Thunberg on Tucker’s Fox Nation show in this clip, blaming Thunberg’s Asperger’s condition for her climate activism (with Ana and Cenk...awesome for Ana to “follow the money”...yeah, such big strong “men” to attack a teenage girl...what LARPing soy sad sack clowns Tuckums and this other numbskull both are)...



...and speaking of the water and the environment, yesterday was World Water Day (hat tip to our awesome PA state rep Perry Warren for that piece of info...made me recall this tune).

Tuesday Stuff

Jayar Jackson and David Shuster of Rebel HQ tell us all about Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao and the “lonely voices” supporting Vlad The Butcher and his incursion on Ukraine (and the pic in this post includes 31 other “lonely voices” in the GOP/Russia “quisling caucus”)...



...and speaking of Vlad The Butcher and his war in Ukraine, this CBC report tells us about the attack on the shopping mall in Mariupol and how Poland is handling an influx of refugees (and kudos to the brave people of Ukraine for telling Putin what he can do with his ultimatum against that besieged city)...



...and I thought this was a pretty good synopsis from Beau on the war so far (particularly what Russia has to do if they think they’re going to actually win this, assuming that’s even possible – and hopefully not)...



...and to be fair to the “other side,” David Doel tells us about Russians victimized by “cancel culture” for real including Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space who (last I checked) had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO with Vlad The Butcher’s horrible Ukraine incursion...



...and it appears that the despicable antics of the “party of Lincoln” in the U.S. Senate are proceeding apace in the SCOTUS confirmation hearing of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson (with Tail Gunner Ted, #MoscowMarsha, etc.), and the sickening tone for that was set by the thoroughly execrable (and treasonous) Josh Hawley with his awful tweet thread (more here)...Ana and Aida Rodriguez of TYT tell us about it...



...and I’m continuing my salute to artists who’ve said no to Spotify over the Joe Rogan anti-vax business (well, for a little while longer anyway) with this number from Neil Young, for all of the Door Dash, Grub Hub and Uber Eats drivers out there.

Monday Stuff

Thom Hartmann tells us about a subsidiary of Chucky Koch’s which refuses to leave Russia, because of course, especially considering that his father had a history of building refineries in that country (family came to despise communism all the same for what it’s worth)...



...and I haven’t seen Cenk of TYT this PO’ed in a long time, and I think he’s completely correct to go off on a leader (unfortunately, given the hateful anti-gay garbage this guy is spreading... not Cenk of course) of the Russian Orthodox church (more here)...I don’t think the answer is to ban religion as Cenk says, but people like this POS need to be held accountable for sure...and I know it’s not exactly the same thing, but I would also chastise “faith leaders” in this country such as the person who gave ashes to Joe Manchin on Ash Wednesday, given the fact that Manchin’s disgusting opposition to the child tax credit put 4 million kids into poverty...glad Cenk calls out that wretched National Prayer Breakfast here too, and a pox for sure on Republicans and plenty of Dems who participate in that also...



...and the latest Second Thought video tells us why “neither right nor left” is right-wing – definitely applies to “No Labels” as far as yours truly is concerned; interesting look at "Bonapartism" (the real payoff here IMO was at about 14:31)...



...and Caroline Johnson of Rebel HQ brings us voter intimidation caught on tape in Otero County, New Mexico (I think Merrick Garland at the DOJ needs to appoint somebody just to look at the garbage related to voting all over this country for potential illegality and referring charges to a grand jury if need be, and I’d love to see Doug Jones in charge of something like that)...



...and as a bit of a follow-up, this Now This clip tells us about voting rights under attack 57 years after the “Bloody Sunday” protests on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama (backgrounder is here)...



...and John and Kyla Frank of The Damage Report tell us about Congress profiting from weapons we’re sending to Ukraine (by virtue of stock price increases with Lockheed Martin and Raytheon which is going through the roof, bitches...oh, and MTG shrieked about “profit over peace” when she’s one of the life forms in Congress cleaning up – wondering if the stunning financial fraud will register with her lizard-brained followers? Not holding out a lot of hope on that – to do something about that loon from The Peach State, click here)...



...and how about if we stay below that Mason Dixon line for this report of South Carolina deciding to bring back firing squads (that state, by the way, is #42 on this list of the 50 U.S. states across a wide range of measures, including health care accessibility, educational opportunity, economy, quality of infrastructure, fiscal stability, etc. – of course, trying to address these issues might slow down the flow of people in poverty primarily being the ones cycling in and out of their corrections system, and we can’t have that, now can we?)...



...and consider this my periodic reminder that we all need some help from time to time, and please reach out if you need to do so (this can help).

Saturday Stuff

So, in addition to being an idiot conservative U.S. Senate Republican, #RussianRonJohnson of Wisconsin is also a traitor to our country (as noted here, though, he has a lot of dishonorable company...click here to do something about RoJo)...



...and this clip from the German TV service DW features Canadian journalist Olha Klymenko (heroically taking care of her father) talking about the Russian shelling around Mariupol, which has become pretty much a hellscape thanks to Vlad The Butcher...



...and Chris Hayes discusses the speech from Arnold Schwarzenegger talking mainly to Russians and soldiers from that country – definitely helpful, and props to him for his effort...



...and Ana and Cenk of TYT discuss Putin’s latest twisted speech on the war...lots of good commentary here IMO including the four scenarios mentioned at the end, and the last one especially is indeed the stuff of nightmares...



...and Ari Melber “brings the receipts” on conservatives now trying to “walk back” their past praise of Vlad The Butcher (repeating the clip of the dead Ukraine bodies in the hospital basement from the DW segment I know)...



...and RIP one-hit wonder Timmy Thomas, singing a song with a title that is pretty much universal, especially now.

Friday Stuff

Farron Cousins tells us that Mango Mussolini egged on his great unwashed followers in South Carolina (kindred spirits with the woman in the pic I’m sure) to lay down and die over critical race theory...yep, every bit as cringingly stoo-pid as it sounds (along with the fact that he’ll be hiding in his limo nursing a McRib and a Coke while these life forms stage more violence...I’ve been putting off including anything on this for the whole week, but I guess I can’t avoid it anymore)...



...and continuing with the category of wingnut misbehavior, I give you this from More Perfect Union about activists banning books and doxing teachers in Texas (nice – kudos to the kids starting the banned book club, which should be a shame on those trying to restrict the kids from learning about the world, assuming those culprits were capable of understanding shame)...



...and I thought this was a GREAT report from Chris Hayes on how the Syrian refugee crisis started by Putin of course set off an immigration crisis which fueled a right-wing backlash in Europe and the UK, with that scenario from Syria getting played out again in Ukraine, tragically...



...and I think Beau once again nailed it here on the topic of Putin eventually having to deal with “hit and run” unconventional warfare, potentially within Russia’s borders (though I’m sure we don’t want to see that against any more innocent civilians than have been harmed already, with Ukraine staging the sort of attacks our military faced in Iraq and Afghanistan, but as Beau says, when you take everything from a people getting attacked, what other way can they fight back?) ...



...and Ben Carollo discusses the windfall tax bill on oil companies proposed by Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Ro Khanna...

via GIPHY

...and John and Francesca talk about “Curtsy Kyrsten” losing support from Democratic backers, but they’re absolutely right in that Sinema has made the calculation that her new friends in the “party of Lincoln” will come and bail her out...will she be right? Dear God, I hope not – she’s absolutely toxic to her Dem base at this point...she may make it running as an independent, but if she thinks she’s going to make it running as a Republican, she’s more naïve and idiotic than I imagined...



...and I know I’m just a filthy, unkempt liberal blogger, but I have to admit that I screwed up by failing to note the passing of one time PA Dem U.S. Senatorial candidate Lynn Yeakel in January (she ran against “Snarlin’ Arlen” Specter before he became a Dem again...we’ll have to see if Sinema follows the Specter playbook on that, switching parties I mean...more here)...



...also, this week marked the 75th birthday of guitar legend Ry Cooder...I guess I could do a few different things to commemorate that, but I decided to put up this clip of Little Village for the occasion (in which Cooder performed with Jim Keltner, Nick Lowe, and John Hiatt...I think he has a performance this May in San Francisco).

Thursday Stuff

Ari Melber brings us new information on the 1/6 insurrection indicating that there was more close coordination with some of these right-wing groups and Ginni Thomas than first reported (imagine that), with her husband Almost Silent Clarence Thomas as the sole SCOTUS vote in favor of Mango Mussolini and his attempt to hide White House records from the investigation into that treasonous episode (Melber speaks with attorney Joyce Vance)...



Update 3/25/22: Keep digging that hole, Mrs. Thomas (here).

...and turning to the ongoing tragedy in Ukraine, Jordan Uhl of Rebel HQ discusses Fix Noise cheerleading for MOOAARRR WAAAARRRR (and Dems would "cut and run"...typical for The Roger Ailes BS Factory) telling young people in this country that they need to fight it for the boomers pretty much (and yeah, it figures that that pusillanimous meat sack Marc Thiessen is right in the middle of this mess)...



...and Sam and Emma of The Majority Report tell us about Sherrod Brown giving it to Joe Manchin in a tweet over Manchin sinking Sarah Bloom Raskin’s nomination for the Federal Reserve because she supports clean energy (more here)...



...and I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” (more or less), a repeat segment originally from 3/16/12, which is a reminder of what Not Your Father’s Republican Party thinks of women voters...



...and with the prior video in mind, Ana and Cenk tell us that Idaho has passed its own anti-abortion bill, enabling family members to go after ANYONE who had anything to do with the abortion including the health care provider of course...requires women to get a police report and provide it to their abortion provider...God freaking almighty (more here and here...I haven’t seen Ana this pissed in a long time, and is she ever right...I knew child care was expensive, but boy, has the cost gone up in recent years...and the person they referred to at the end is this loser)...



...and happy St. Patrick’s Day – may the road rise up to meet you, and that goes for all of those other good wishes too.

Tuesday Stuff

Ali Velshi, sitting in for Rachel Maddow (and commendably reporting on the ground in the vicinity of Ukraine – hope he and everyone manages to stay as safe as possible) speaks with Ben Collins about the sources of the garbage about the alleged Ukrainian bioweapons...I know I touched on this business earlier, but we need to keep refuting this stuff apparently...



...and I share nothing whatsoever politically with outgoing Repug U.S. House Rep Adam Kinzinger, except to say that he’s 100% correct to go after the criminals involved in the 1/6 insurrection (along with Liz Cheney, and that definitely applies to her also...probably more so), but Kinzinger makes one of the best arguments I’ve ever heard for not giving “Tuckums” the benefit of the time of day, especially given Carlson’s most recent treasonous garbage (and I agree with Ro Khanna on a lot, and I understand his point of view, but despite what he says, I wouldn’t give a forum to those Fix Noise bastards either)...Brian Tyler Cohen explains...



...and David Doel tells us about the brave Russian woman who protested the war on TV (more here)...I honestly hope she doesn’t end up in a black hole somewhere deprived of just about everything she needs to live, but given what Putin has become, I wouldn’t put it past him (actually, he’s really been a monster all this time, but a succession of U.S. presidents and congresses were too busy playing patty cake with him to properly pay attention)...



...because, as Don Winslow reminds us, Putin has been lying all along (gee, a head of state telling nothing but lies - why does that sound familiar?)...



...and I’m a little behind on my Second Thought videos, and this one has to do with Why Liberalism Won’t Solve Anything (uh oh; NOW he’s getting personal...just kidding...and I LOVE the activism he discusses at about 10:20, though I honestly part with his discussion about third parties, since I think they’ve been used as trojan horses mainly but not totally by the red team...Jill Stein, anyone?)...



...and if there’s one artist whose music I’ve pretty much ignored on this site (there are a few I know), it’s Dolly Parton...this has nothing whatsoever to do with her personally (she’s truly a hero as far as I’m concerned, and another reason why I feel that way will be presented in a moment), but it has more to do with the fact that I’m pretty selective when it comes to country music...I respect the artists who go WAY back since I think they were trailblazers, but I could do without the vast majority of them now because I think the music all sounds the same, as well as for all of their triumphalist garbage most notoriously during the awful Bush/Cheney years...anyway, as noted here, Parton turned down a nomination to the Rock N’ Roll Hall of Fame for a really classy reason, and I think that deserves a tune in her honor.

Monday Stuff

Trae Crowder gives us the latest on the wingnut umbrage over Biden and gas prices...OK, I’ll try this one more time...1) Inflation and high prices are an issue ALL OVER THE WORLD because of corporate greed and restarting the global supply chain after COVID, 2) NO PRESIDENT can control the price of gas, and 3) There are so many capped wells in this country that have already been approved for exploration by our dirty energy criminals that they could use them instead to increase supply and lower gas prices, but the people who could do that won’t because they’re making too much goddamn money and have no desire whatsoever to cut us all a break (NSFW/H)...



...and speaking of anti-Biden BS, Thom Hartmann tells us about the Top 4 Lies about #46 promoted by Fix Noise...



...and this clip from DW German TV tells us that Japan has joined the fray against Russia in a revived dispute over the Kuril Islands...it would almost be comical to see Putin sitting as far away as he is at that table, though of course there’s nothing even remotely amusing about what’s transpired because of his actions, which befit the demonic dictator he has become...



...and this clip from Really American reminds us of those Republican U.S. senators who visited Moscow on July 4th, 2018 and were never called to account for it...



...and Adrienne Lawrence of Rebel HQ discusses the racist attacks of The Swanson TV Dinner Heir against Biden SCOTUS nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson, leading into other clips including the fight between the two kids in that Bridgewater, NJ mall and all the “CRT” BS refuted by Brett Erlich and Jackson White...



...and I don’t think I’ve had a “relationship” tune here for a little while, so please allow me to add this – yeah, whenever I break up with someone, the best thing to do is lie down in a creek by the woods by myself and take a nap...what could go wrong?

Sunday Stuff

Ana and Cenk of TYT tell us about the Inspector General’s report on how the Department of Homeland Security dropped the proverbial ball on information sharing on intelligence prior to the 1/6 treasonous insurrection (and yeah, the T-shirts displayed by the characters in the pic is pretty damn treasonous as far as I’m concerned..."if the U.N. comes in here" - you're livin' out where the buses don't run, dude)...



...and Ari Melber interviews former UN ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul about Fix Noise amplifying claims (wrong, of course) from the Kremlin about Ukraine having a bioweapons lab (good for Melber cutting to the proverbial chase at about 6:20)...



Update: And right on cue, along comes "Tokyo Rose" Gabbard (here).

...and McFaul was spot-on in the prior clip, but as David Doel tells us here, McFaul also basically made the recent ridiculous claim that Hitler didn’t kill German-speaking people (an update is here - yes, McFaul was wrong and admitted he was wrong, and he really should say nothing further on this topic except “oops” and get out, but here’s what gets me about this...someone like McFaul who is basically a pretty solid source slips on the metaphorical banana peel ONCE and it’s FREAKING OPEN SEASON on the guy (and as soon as you see a row of tweets in response starting with Mike Cernovich, you can rest assured that the wingnut outrage party is now underway), but on the other hand, the wingnutosphere runs wild with their nonsense on a routine basis, gets called out, and then does nothing but yell louder and double down, and there’s nothing even remotely comparable in terms of the outrage (yes, our side is supposed to be better, but there’s a double standard at work here for sure)...and I realize that McFaul said this on The Rachel Maddow Show, but for Maddow to be trending is beyond absurd since she basically is on leave for her book/movie project and has nothing to do with this (though she does pop up from time to time to be fair)...



...and John and Francesca analyze the SCOTUS basically saying that our government won’t be accountable for torture sites and in particular for their actions in the case of Abu Zubaydah (shocking that Gorsuch is on the right side of this issue along with Sotomayor...once more, some of the very worst excesses of the rotten Bushco years are going to get the “memory hole” treatment)...



...and RIP William Hurt...he’ll be remembered rightly so for The Big Chill, Broadcast News, Body Heat, Children of a Lesser God and a slew of other pictures (including what I thought was a courageous Oscar-winning performance in “Kiss Of The Spider Woman,” as well as playing former Bushie Henry Paulson in that movie based on the book by Andrew Ross Sorkin, which I thought was a bit of revisionist history...not Hurt’s fault though), but I have to admit that an underrated performance of his (in my mind, anyway) was in “The Accidental Tourist” (featured in this clip) and that goes for Kathleen Turner and Geena Davis also (Davis won the Best Supporting Actress award for her “Tourist” performance, which I thought was another Oscar “makeup” call, as in an award that an actor should have gotten for a prior performance...Davis was OK in “Tourist,” but she REALLY should have gotten it for “The Fly”)...



...and I hope everyone was able to make the adjustment to daylight savings time in these parts – I’m still working on that to be honest.

Friday Stuff

John and David Shuster of The Damage Report tell us about some lady (using the term loosely) in that trucking protest around D.C. saying she didn’t want to be “digitiled” (???) and that other loopy guy who’s protesting because??...



Update: If any of those knuckleheads mess up the 911 response system by stupidly flooding it and someone dies as a result (hopefully not of course), then the person responsible should be prosecuted for manslaughter (here).

..and Richard Ojeda of Rebel HQ tells us about Vlad The Butcher bombing a children’s hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine...so many levels of despicable that it’s hard to capture them all...



...and I thought this was an interesting clip of CBC correspondent Andrew Chang interviewing foreign affairs correspondent Brian Stewart on Ukraine’s military resiliency, to say nothing of the resiliency of its people overall...



...and Ana and Cenk of TYT tell us about Ukrainian forces lighting up a Russian tank column (and in addition to his thoroughly numerous other faults, it’s surprising in no way that Jimmy Dore is an apologist for Vlad The Butcher)...



...and David Doel discusses Biden’s decision not to import Russian oil (good point about the price gouging that’s of course still raging unabated in our economy and potential ripple effects vs. Russia as Doel explains – interesting note about gas prices being $5 a gallon under Former President Highest Disapproval Rating In Gallup Poll History, and to be fair, there wasn’t much George W. Bush could do about that either, though I definitely don’t remember people losing their minds over that issue then as they are now...gee, I wonder what could be different about that...and good points by Ilhan Omar against our “dear friends” the Saudis and their slaughter against Yemen (here), as well as the fact that we should have been investing in renewables to a hell of a greater degree than we have already as Doel says)...



...and speaking of cruelty to kids, Emma Vigland of The Majority Report tells us that Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao wants to block federal waivers that offer universal free school lunches during the pandemic...yep, #MoscowMitch strikes again (more on that death eater from Kentucky and his caucus of Russian quislings is here)...



...and I thought this was an unusually good local news report, this one from Ch. 10 in Tampa Bay, about FLA Guv #DeathSantis getting a bill passed to “police” elections and basically discourage Democratic voters – the clip also looks at states that not only have stupidly restrictive voting access, but others that have expanded people’s ability to exercise their franchise (and I realize they have to have a clip of a lying Republican for “balance,” so as a counter point with the reality-based perspective, I offer this...what an insufferably smug a-hole #DeathSantis is)...



...and when it comes to artists boycotting Spotify (remember that?), I know I haven’t included anything from Joni Mitchell for a little while, so I’d like to make up for that with a couple of her tunes from “back in the day” (yep, I watched Dick Cavett many moons ago).

Wednesday Stuff

Chris Hayes gives us a history lesson on the cost of relying on corrupt regimes for energy (with clips of pretty much every prior president speaking on this going back to Nixon, including The Sainted Ronnie R, who idiotically got rid of the solar panels Jimmy Carter wisely installed at the White House...the person Hayes ended up interviewing was Dem U.S. Senator Ed Markey of Massachusetts, who is pretty damn knowledgeable on the subject of renewable energy...and Biden has banned importing Russian oil as noted here)...



...and that’s probably a good lead-in to this DW report on the Russian military apparently targeting civilians – bastards...also, volunteers are coming from all over the place to help Ukraine, to their eternal credit...security analyst Ed Arnold is interviewed once again...



...and John and Francesca talk about Generalissimo Trump cheering on war between Russia and China (labeling U.S. military planes as if they’re from China, then those planes bomb Russia, then Russia and China go at it and won’t that supposedly be great...unbelievable – yeah, as if that isn’t one of the first things Russia and China already figured out...Francesca makes a lot of good points particularly in the last minute...84 freaking minutes of that numbskull??)...

...and Farron Cousins tells us about the “mighty rodent” in FLA contributing to politicians behind the “don’t say gay” bill...scurrilous monsters supporting that awful legislation – related links are here, here, here, and here...and I guess it shouldn’t surprise me that there’s a bit of an intersection between people supporting awful bills like these and the anti-mask crowd as noted here...



...and with the prior clip in mind, I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” (more or less) from 3/6/17, in which former Texas sports commentator Dale Hansen (who I believe has since retired) speaks out in defense of trans athlete Mack Beggs – definitely something to keep in mind in light of this...



...and this is probably one of the best clips I’ve seen in awhile on the subject of taxation from Ben Carollo of Rebel HQ (an unidentified guy on TikTok does a good job of blowing up some wingnut talking points on this subject) – I have to admit that I was skeeved out a little at the end, but that’s my problem and I have to get over it (re, the prior two clips)...



...and returning to what I guess you could call more traditional gender roles, Ana of TYT tells us about Joe Manchin joining Repugs to block a Senate bill that would codify Roe (and no, I don’t let Bob Casey off the hook here either; even though the political calculation made that a smart move for an important base constituency for Casey, it was still a crappy move for all the other reasons...I wish I could get mad at Anna for her summing up at the end, but in good conscience I really can’t)...



...and happy 80th birthday to Mark Lindsay of Paul Revere And The Raiders.

Tuesday Stuff

Mehdi Hasan speaks with Oxana Shevel, president of the American Association for Ukrainian Studies; they discuss Vlad the Butcher of course and the war in Ukraine (echoing earlier clips about Putin refusing to tolerate the presence of a democracy on his border...and this is another typically disgusting move)...



...ang Joy Reid talks with Prof. Nina Khrushcheva and former Russian U.S. ambassador Michael McFaul on the ways Putin is clamping down on social media and messaging overall in Russia concerning the Ukraine war (along with companies pulling out of that country...also, Reid plays the video of that captured Russian soldier at the end; the full clip is roughly about 10 minutes, and it is indeed very powerful)...



...and this is probably the most topical video Second Thought has ever produced, and it’s about Putin and Ukraine of course (definitely can do without Johnny Harris, I must say...the real payoff, such as it is, comes at about 17:00, discussing the conditions that brought us to Putin)...



...and Brian Tyler Cohen tells us that “Blow ‘Em Up” Bolton recently said that Trump would have taken the U.S. out of NATO if he’d had a second term...I think Bolton is a scumbag, but sadly, this remark makes sense (and regarding that typical Trump lie about Obama and blankets, I give you this)...



...and Jayar Jackson and Rick Strom tell us about this KY Repug idiot named Danny Bentley over RU-486 talking about Jewish women and cancer...yeah, a real Darwin award winner here (more here)...



...and happy International Women's Day (more here).

Monday Stuff

I don’t know much about the makers of this clip, made by a bunch who call themselves the Republican Accountability Project, but it’s pretty damn good (would that, y’know, the Democrats had the spine to do something like this)...



...and it looks like The Daily Show has discovered the drug suddenly used by everyone in the “party of Lincoln”...



...and Ayman Mohyeldin, sitting in for Rachel Maddow, tells us about the last independent TV channel in Russia that was forced to shut down...figures (interview with Tikhon Dzyadko, editor-in-chief of TV Rain)...



...and Lawrence O’Donnell gives us a bit of a history lesson on the Cold War (including the “daisy ad”...I basically don’t have an issue with O’Donnell and I think he’s generally spot-on, and once in a while he “hits it out of the park,” and I think he does that again here)...



...and Beau gives us the latest on Huckleberry Graham’s remarks that probably will get a lot of play in Russia (calling for the oligarchs to “off” Vlad The Butcher...how many ways of duuuh! to count here...not sure I can recall the last time I saw Beau so genuinely disgusted, and for damn good reason)...



...and Cenk and Ana of TYT discuss Pat Robertson’s particularly bonkers take on Putin supposedly “on a mission from God,” or something, trying to hasten the “end times” (kudos to Cenk for his “take no prisoners” commentary on this)...



...and returning to matters affecting this country, this clip from More Perfect Union describes UPS workers getting hurt on the job and apparently getting forced back to work (and dishonorable mentions go out to Concentra and Liberty Mutual, who apparently work with UPS to force workers back onto the job when they’re not ready)...



...and here’s another Nils Lofgren tune with this in mind.