This story from CBS News marks the 6th anniversary of the Sandy Hook gun slaughter which I alluded to yesterday (and this tells us what has transpired since - of course, as we know, there has been no action on the federal level...but plenty of this, of course)...
...and by including this video, my intention isn't to go for a cheap laugh in response, but, among other things, to point out the utter idiocy of those who resist us the most on this issue (Dan Bongino was dropped by NRA-TV, as Sam Seder tells us...womp-womp)......
...also, Hosni Mubarak Walker signed off on all of that garbage in Wisconsin, which I guess should surprise exactly no one (here and here...and this "new tradition" is coming from one side only, let's not forget)...
…and John Iadarola and Brett Erlich tell us the horrible story of the 7-year-old girl who died in border patrol custody (and yeah, I think this about says it…I glanced at the YouTube comments per John’s request, and many were thoughtful but many were also the typical “bot” hate dreck BS, which isn’t surprising I know...do you honestly think, however, that we'd be having a discussion like this if she were white and well-to-do in, say, Norwich, CT?)…
...and here are a couple of more seasonal tunes ("palate cleanser" time again).
Lawrence O’Donnell tells us that the Gropenfuhrer will have to tell more lies to his utterly deluded followers who are still left about the debt – again, if our corporate media with initials for names had held this utter fraud of a presidential candidate to account two years ago, it would have been plain to the entire world that he was nothing but a narcissistic maniac who was in waaay over his head…but…
…and Cenk and Ana of TYT tell us about Fix Noise host Marie Harf who held that moron Jason Chaffetz to account recently (here), and was slapped down for her commendable effort by this life form named Harris Faulkner…
…and Kyle K. (NSFW) tells us about the 5 U.S. House Dems who recently voted against the resolution to stop our involvement in the Yemen massacre on behalf of the Saudis, and their failure ended up being critical since the final vote count was 206-203…and check this out – the maneuver to block consideration of Ro Khanna’s commendable effort to end our cooperation with the Saudis on this slaughter was buried in a farm bill, and in case you’re wondering, Bri-Fi voted in favor of continuing this insanity (here)…this may end up as the final legislative move by Mr.-Puppy-Dog-Eyes-With-The-Shiv as U.S. House speaker, and it is every bit as disgusting, foul, fetid…and yes, deplorable…as you would expect from someone who claims to be a Roman Catholic (here) – at least the Senate did the right thing, and I GUARANTEE you this will be revisited when the Dems take over in January, and Khanna’s bill will pass (of course, more people including kids will die in the meantime...if Ryan had a molecule of humanity, maybe he would ponder that while he attends Sunday services - naaah)…
…and I know when I do the holiday music thing like right now, I kind of skip new tunes and musical milestones, but as far as the latter goes, I DEFINITELY did not want to miss this one…happy belated 75th birthday to Dickey Betts of The Allman Brothers Band (and speaking of milestones, I know today is an important one for a particular news event - I think we all know what it is - and I'll have something on that soon)…
...and speaking of seasonal tunes, here are four more (well, the last one is open to interpretation I guess :-).
I had some videos about climate change yesterday, and for the alternative STOO-PID point of view in support of dirty energy (or maybe "dirti-est"), I give you this from The Majority Report (at COP24, which apparently was the forum where the latest Trumpster BS was exposed..."clean fossil fuels" is a ridiculous lie even for them)…
…and Ali Velshi filled in here for Chris Hayes on “All In” about the Google CEO testifying before some of those knuckleheads in the U.S. House, including Goober Gohmert and Steven Arnold King (heckuva job, you numbskull voters who keep returning these clowns to Congress every two years…and yeah, I think Ted Lieu nailed it – not sure exactly why Zoe Lofgren said what she did…I am the LAST PERSON to defend the Gropenfuhrer, but I have MUCH BIGGER issues with Number 45 than what comes back from search results)…
…and “Pap” and Farron Cousins tell us about CEOs using tax cuts to boost their pay, and of course to stick it to their workforce – an example is here, even though the layoffs were reported to be voluntary…GREAT point about the Boards of Directors rubber stamping the CEO pay raises…they’ve talked about McKesson and the opioid epidemic before, and I know they need to keep beating that proverbial drum…
...and Cenk and Ana of TYT tell us about Chuck Todd and his typical “both sides” BS about the Repug garbage in Michigan and Wisconsin with incoming Dems…
Seth Meyers tells us about the White House dustup yesterday between Generalissimo Trump, incoming U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer about that stoo-pid wall (and yeah, it looks like you-know-who said he would own the shut down – figures; this is what happened the last time we had a shut down in January)…
…and just upon some kind of perfunctory reading, I think there is a bit of a back story with Jazmine Headley, the mother in this video (apparently there is an outstanding warrant for credit card fraud that her lawyers are trying to get dismissed), but you know what? As Ana and the other panelists point out here, maybe the go-to move by the people working in this office SHOULD NOT BE TO CALL THE POLICE if you think she is making a disturbance for some reason, and you NEVER, EVER take her child from her unless she is threatening the child, which CLEARLY wasn’t the case as shown (an update is here)…
…and NYC Council Member Rafael L. Espinal Jr. tells us of the importance of fighting climate change…yeah, man…
…and with the prior clip in mind, Kyle K. tells us about Repug (!) Mayor Dale Ross of Georgetown, TX who is taking his town to 100 percent sustainable energy (talking with Bernie Sanders…NSFW…don’t know about Thorium; wind turbines are in MA which has Repug Gov. Charlie Baker, just to let you know…I don’t quite see eye-to-eye with Kyle on the comparison to recreational pot since I think there are a bit more sides to that issue…yeah, it should be legal for medical purposes definitely but still restricted also IMHO…probably more I could say about that)…
It seems James Fields will go to the slam for life for running over and killing Heather Heyer during the neo-Nazi march in Charlottesville, VA (here); not sure why he isn’t getting a date with the needle - I guess he pled guilty to avoid a trial; as far as I know, the death penalty is still in force in that commonwealth…
…and speaking of unruly mobs, Hasan Piker tells us more about the French riots – an update is here (it looks like President Macron, wisely, is listening and watching)…
..and Mike Papantonio and Farron Cousins tell us about former DHS under-secretary Suzanne Spaulding, who criticized the two for being dupes of Putin, or whatever (I think the “Hillary-bot holdover” remark was a little stoo-pid, though – SHE ISN’T IN GOVERNMENT ANY MORE!!! And yes, Pap, we know what “Wag The Dog” is all about…I’m automatically leery of anything from “The Putin Network” also, though, to be fair, a lot of their reporting has held up as far as I’m concerned)…
…and I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” from 12/11/15…a lot of times, when I present these old clips, I’m trying to update them to some other story or context that is a little more current, but I’m not doing that this time – I’m just giving you the clip once more of the Gropenfuhrer being almost-attacked by the eagle in the photo-op for Time Magazine, and I think the symbolism of that speaks for itself (and I love Cenk’s reaction too...and speaking of "flipping the bird," you might say, to Number 45, it seems that this is noteworthy - huzzah!...oh, but let's cue the "corporate Dem" caterwauling from the usual suspects in response...GMAFB!)…
I thought this was a terrific segment by Ari Melber pointing how just how terrible Mr.-Puppy-Dog-Eyes-With-The-Shiv was at his role as U.S. House Speaker; in keeping with other predecessors from his party, though, they (including “Man Tan” Boehner) were pretty pathetic also…of course, Ryan and the “young guns” sold themselves as allegedly something different, but they’re all part of the same collective “con” to pile tax cuts for the rich upon each other, blow up our ridiculous defense budget even more and, all the while, steal from everyone else including those who can afford it the least…
…and to show just how far we have to go on that score, this tells of the brutal repression by the Chinese of the Uyghurs and their efforts to lobby the world for justice on their behalf…
…and sticking with world stuff, Kyle K. tells us about the back-and-forth between Jeremy Corbyn & Theresa May in “question time” during a session of the British Parliament about the effects of British austerity (NSFW – and I agree with Kyle that we should have “question time” here too – not just for the presidents, but the House Speaker and Senate Majority Leader too; definitely not trying to pass myself off as an expert in overseas politics, but as I’ve said before, when we traveled to the U.K. a couple of years ago right after the Brexit vote, it struck us as a little fishy that the black cab drivers all supported Brexit for the same reasons – certainly not saying they were dumb at all, but just that the same propaganda campaign had apparently worked on all of them…an update is here)…
In the latest edition of “The Damage Report,” John Iadarola and Michael Shure tell us how some Fix Noise talking heads are finding out now that, gee, the Gropenfuhrer’s tax cuts really suck after all – just a little late on this I would say…
…and we have yet another humanoid from the Republican Party Propaganda Network being tapped by Generalissimo Trump for a government job, and this time it’s Heather Nauert named as UN Ambassador (and as noted here, this hairdo once cited D-Day as some kind of a milestone in U.S./German relations – were my father still alive…like many men of his era, he served in the European theater in World War II…I’m sure he would communicate his response to that in no uncertain terms)…
...and I'm not really concerned about the back-and-forth on the other NJ news stories involving Dem Gov. Phil Murphy - not saying they're not important also, just saying I'm not focusing on them - but I wanted to include this clip because of the upcoming 12/15 health care enrollment deadline in the Garden State as well as nationwide (kind of dovetails a bit into this, this and this as far as I'm concerned)...
Cenk and John Iadarola give us the latest “police blotter” info involving the Gropenfuhrer, with Special Counsel Robert Mueller and the SDNY both coming down with their own sentencing guidelines for Trump fixer Michael Cohen (more here - and yeah, if "Individual 1" thinks he’s in the clear – heh)…
…and Farron Cousins dutifully reminds us that the debt/deficit is something Repugs only care about when Dems are in charge; good job by Cousins to draw a line here to CEOs and Dubya – long past time to do something about the demented, tiny-handed orange maniac in An Oval Office who let the debt get out of control again, but good luck doing that with the Repugs having built on their Senate majority…
…and once again, heckuva job for letting THAT happen, voters in North Dakota, Indiana, Missouri and Florida!...
…and Kyle K. tells us about Franklin Graham defending Trump (and by the way, Kyle, it’s not as if ABORTION is one of the things that Repugs are “down the line” about when it comes to their interpretation of religion – it’s the ONLY thing…and I think Kyle’ “cultural identity” theory is spot-on…NSFW I think)…
…and Hasan Piker gives us another “Breakdown” segment on the U.S. House NC-09 garbage, despite the Gropenfuhrer’s protestations (which, after all, is code for “whites only” of course…Tweety was on the proverbial ball on this issue, though, of course, since we’re talking about Tweety…and good job by incoming Speaker Pelosi here; funny that I’m not hearing any “corporate Dem” caterwauling about her lately, which, as far as I’m concerned, is a welcome respite)…
...and here is some seasonal stuff...
...and since it's December 8th - well, I think you know what comes next.
(And of course, not mentioned in the graphic is this.)
I don’t expect anybody to give a damn about my “hot takes” on anything, but since this is my dumb blog, I’m going to inflict them on you anyway :-).
I get incredibly fed up with Bill Maher whining about political correctness given all of the critical issues we face (and yes, I know he is definitely smart enough to know issue priority since he has said the environment is number one, and he couldn’t be more correct). But when I hear him going off on the PC stuff, I’m tempted to stick a butcher’s knife into the middle of my TV screen (after I unplug it, of course).
And then I come across this story…PETA can take the proverbial running jump at a rolling donut as far as I’m concerned for trying to be the “language police” (so I guess “flog the donkey” is RIGHT OUT, huh?).
And I also came across this – and yes, I know it’s the daughter of song composer Frank Loesser saying that now forced to defend “Baby, It’s Cold Outside.” shouldn’t be played any more because of Bill Cosby, but I’m sorry; I still think it’s ridiculous to say that.
Update 12/9/18: OK, I messed this up, so I’ll try it again – it’s the radio stations that are using the Bill Cosby stuff as an excuse not to play the song, and Susan Loesser is now in a position where she’s forced to defend the song by her father. And yeah, I think that’s pretty damn ridiculous on the part of these radio stations – I’m not even going to dignify the possibility that Loesser the composer was seriously trying to encourage anything whatsoever to do with what Cosby did.
Yes, I definitely support #MeToo and the issue of treating women with respect shouldn’t be an issue because YOU SHOULD JUST KNOW TO DO THAT WITHOUT HAVING TO BE TOLD. But I just think we’ve gone way too far with trying to view the past through the often shrouded, fog-colored (and way too orange) prism of the present and we need to “turn this bus around,” you might say.
Now, as pertains to the pic above, John I. of TYT tells us about the latest Repug efforts to undercut legitimately elected Democrats, this time in Michigan (nothing against Cenk or John, but how many times does it need to be pointed out? Repugs don’t want to “govern.” They want to RULE! And they’re NOT INTERESTED in any dissent on that from ANYONE!)…
…also, Hasan Piker gives us what you could call a final-for-good postscript on GHWB (some of this was echoed by Jeremy Scahill, among others – I’m glad that we have this video as a counterpoint to the corporate media mythology about our 41st president…wish we had more of this when The Sainted Ronnie R passed, which is one of the reasons why I came up with this...NSFW)…
…and Robert Reich tells us just how much we need undocumented immigrants in this country, to say nothing of a path to citizenship that is actually sane for these folks who are trying, despite ridiculous odds, to do the right thing…
…and Farron Cousins talks with Scott Hardy of Top Class Actions dot com about lax food regulations making people sick (and so the food producers save about $12 mil, but it looks like we’re paying the price)…
Farron Cousins tells us here about the Repugs in Wisconsin and Michigan doing their best to totally screw over the incoming Democrats voted in to replace many of them, including our beloved commonwealth (and boy, are the last 30 seconds here important – more here)…
…and Kyle K. discusses Jake Tapper talking with Dem U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio about NAFTA 2.0 and hosing our workers (again – with the Gropenfuhrer incentivizing outsourcing, with 93K jobs lost – the Dems had damn well better make an issue of the jobs that disappeared under this lunatic…NSFW)…
…and Sam Seder and The Majority Report tell us that Canadian PM Justin Trudeau apparently found a way to get under the skin of our tiny-handed, demented lunatic preznit recently, referring to him as “Donald” (whatever works at this point)…
…and Mike Malloy tells us that Bruce Springsteen recently said that Trump is “deeply damaged at his core”…I have to think that Generalissimo Trump has provided The Boss with enough material for another recording, but on the other hand, I wouldn’t blame Springsteen at this point if he just wanted to step back and live his life with a minimum of distractions like this…
…and turning to the seasonal stuff, I think that gives us an excuse to hear The Boss in a holiday mood…
…and if you want to get utterly hammered over the holidays, please make sure you give the car keys to somebody sober.
Seth Meyers tells us about Generalissimo Trump’s recent performance at the G20 summit – again, I’m a little behind on some stuff because of the “dead Poppy Bush” thing going on…and “get me out of here,” huh? Just grab a change of clothes, suitcase of Russian money, hop a plane and take off for parts unknown, then – definitely works for me (not in love with the idea of “President Pence,” though, I hasten to add, since that’s a whole other version of crazy too)…
…and gee, maybe we ought to do something about this climate change thing, as John I. tells us…
…oh, and the Dow lost almost 800 points yesterday, and the other major market indices lost ground too (maybe “Tariff Man” should STFU…yeah, good luck with that I know…markets are closed today for Poppy Bush’s funeral)…
…and last Saturday was World AIDS Day (every December 1st), and my bad for forgetting that as I know I have in the past; here is a scene from “And The Band Played On” with Matthew Modine as Dr. Don Francis (and with all of the remembrances about Number 41 currently going on, I don’t think we should forget this either)…
Yep, nothing to see here all right – just Wisconsin Repugs trying to “burn it all down” after voters in that state told them to get out of the governor’s office (and actually, pretty much the state “lege” too despite the gerrymandering as noted here and here)…Rachel Maddow talks with Dem state senator Jon Erpenbach…and as noted here, it looks like the “party of Lincoln” is trying to do the same thing in Michigan…
Update 12/5/18: And yeah, this fits the profile too.
…and I know I’m a little late with this, but it looks like Temple Professor Marc Lamont Hill dared to advocate for the Palestinians, so OF COURSE he must be attacked, censured and fired from his job, right? God forbid ANYONE in our media communicates ANYTHING but lockstep fealty to Israel (so Hill saying he wanted to see a Palestinian state “from the river to the sea” is a firing offense? Did I fall asleep and wake up in the Ministry of Love? John of TYT comments along with Michael Shure, Brooke Thomas, and Maytha Alhassen)…
…and speaking of suppressing free speech, Farron Cousins tells us here that federal workers aren’t allowed to say the “I” word when discussing our Treasonous, Tiny-Handed Orange Dictator (heh)…
…and CNN’s Poppy Harlow talks to Carmela Denno, whose family members lost their Youngstown GM jobs and who apparently knows other folks who will experience the same horrific loss, and just in time for the holidays of course…it would be easy for me to ridicule her for voting for Trump, and God only know why anyone would do that given his conduct in the 2016 campaign, but I’m sure she’s a well-meaning person and I hope things work out for the better somehow…if you elect Democrats, you at least have a shot of hanging on to what we once called a fairly secure middle class way of life…you have NO SHOT AT ALL if you support a Republican…
So, what are we to make of our 41st president, George H.W. Bush, when all is said and done?
I suppose, like a lot of people with a larger-than-life public profile, we remember the contradictions more than anything else (or at least I do anyway, for what that’s worth). He served our country bravely in World War II, and he also worked for years in government service as CIA head, U.N. ambassador and ambassador to China. Of course, he in all likelihood helped further his oil business in the process, but I have no knowledge of any illegality in doing so, and I’m not alleging that here (all this and more is here).
Much has been made of the fact that he was often a gracious man, which I think should be recalled also since that commodity is just about extinct any more in public life in particular (his letter to incoming president Bill Clinton in 1992 has been fondly recalled, even though that used to happen on a regular basis when presidencies, and parties, changed hands). He also had enough of a sense of humor to let comedian Dana Carvey do his riff impersonating him as Bush Sr. was leaving the White House.
And as far as I’m concerned, he was basically president for 12 years – I think he had a lot to do with keeping this country largely stable when it came to foreign and domestic matters during his own presidency as well as that of The Sainted Ronnie Reagan. I can recall a time in the 80s when hostages were seized by Iran/Hezbollah on a pretty regular basis, but that came to an end under Poppy Bush. I don’t know all the whys and wherefores on that and how exactly to apportion all of the blame, but I think credit should be handed out where it’s due. He also waged the first Iraq war efficiently, directed by generals who knew what they were doing. Of course, you could also say that the bungling of our ambassador to Iraq at that time, April Glaspie (in which she reportedly gave a green light to Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait) had a lot to do with the ensuing war (as well as the PR campaign that was basically waged by the Kuwaiti government to spur our involvement, including the utterly false claim that Iraqi soldiers were bayoneting babies in incubators taking babies out of incubators, exposing them to cold and letting them die - here).
And boy, do I remember how conservatives HATED Bush 41 for not going into Baghdad, but instead leaving after the Iraqi troops were removed from Kuwait, which was in accordance with the U.N. mandate. Of course, you hear ABSOLUTELY NOTHING on that now, given the ruinous consequences of his son’s version of the Iraq war years later (and when it comes to the first Iraq war, we should recall this and this from Jeremy Scahill).
Basically, when Bush 41 was in the White House, I didn’t have to worry about the future of the Republic like I (and the rest of us) have to do now (and he was spot-on in the pic above of course).
Well, that was all of the good stuff, more or less. The bad?
As Will Bunch noted here, 41 and his administration basically entrapped a drug dealer in DC named Keith Jackson for a photo-op showing crack cocaine, alleging that it was being sold within blocks of the White House. Bush Sr. also helped propel the careers of Roger Ailes and Lee Atwater, who both brought a whole other dimension to “the politics of personal destruction.” The two were instrumental in the 1988 presidential campaign of Bush vs. Dem Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis, including the “Willie” Horton ad, claiming that Horton was furloughed by Dukakis and went on to rape a woman (of course, the furlough policy was instituted by Dukakis’ Republican predecessor and was similar to policies in other states including California where Reagan was once governor, but why quibble over details like that when blowing a racist dog whistle?). Basically, Sr. was losing according to some polls that summer and outsourced the dirty work to Ailes and Atwater, as Charlie Pierce recalled here.
To say that the utterly vile 1988 presidential campaign was a precursor to the everyday political attacks we experience every two years any more (having just concluded the latest round of interminable, hateful insanity) is as big an understatement as you can make. And oh yes, that year, we also saw Sr.’s “tough guy” faceoff with Dan Rather over Iran-Contra, with Sr. responding by criticizing Rather for once walking off the set (you could argue whether or not Rather handled that as he should have – it was cringe worthy on both sides – but the veep was not shy about plummeting to new depths, which kind of belied the patrician image we've held of him over time and will, I'm sure, be ever more etched into our corporate media mythology).
And you could also argue that the 1992 election was a gathering of forces that nobody could control completely, with conservatives blaming businessman Ross Perot for siphoning Republican votes and enabling Bill Clinton to win (and Republicans, true to form, responded with an 8-year hissy fit). I would say in response that the candidacy of “Uber Alles” Pat Buchanan had more to do with that than anything; Sr. saw the direction his party was going…I’m not sure he could have stopped it, but I don’t recall that he did much to slow it down either. There was also that business of Sr. looking at his watch during a presidential debate and not knowing how a supermarket scanner worked…of course, if Fox News had been on the air at the time, they would have alleged that both were cowardly liberal plots to discredit a war hero, and related Reddit posts would have been forwarded a few hundred thousand times, leading to a typical conservative vs. liberal screaming match with nothing much accomplished.
Oh, and speaking of Iran-Contra…on his way out the door, Bush Sr. pardoned all of his pals who might have been able to implicate him, as noted here (no pardon or commutation for Jackson, though, who ended up serving 10 years in prison). Number 41 also nominated Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, who of course was confirmed despite the testimony of Prof. Anita Hill.
So yes, let’s give President George Herbert Walker Bush the accolades he deserves, but let’s not forget the foibles, missteps and other bad stuff either (including the episode noted in the clip below)…
...and I was actually OK with the "thousand points of light" thing, even though I guess, since we're talking about a Repug, it also meant undercutting federal agencies and services doing good work also since, as far as Repugs are concerned, gov't can't be good for anything – and you know of course the Gropenfuhrer made fun of what Bush said anyway...
Update 1: Somehow, there HAS to be good in a man who would inspire this.
Update 2: Quite on the other hand (here...h/t Karoli Kuns)...
…and speaking of our Treasonous, Tiny-Handed Orange Dictator, Chris Hayes commented on the recent Michael Cohen testimony, saying basically, that “the president was compromised – full stop” – hats off to Hayes for his “no BS” approach to this (speaking with Dem U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal also)…
…and Thom Hartmann talks with Dem U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley on the latter’s attempt to prevent price gouging in this country by the drug makers…
...and all the best to everyone observing the "celebration of lights" which began last night...
I’ll defer to David Corn here since I think his take pretty much says it - and on the matter of whether or not our Treasonous, Tiny-Handed Orange Dictator is going to meet with our former ol’ buddy Vlad Putin, I give you this…
…and yes, give SC Repug U.S. Sen Tim Scott credit for basically killing the nomination of former Jesse Helms stooge Thomas Farr for U.S. District Court judge for North Carolina, but yeah, as Scott Lemieux says here, it shouldn’t have been that close of a vote for the reasons Sen. Elizabeth Warren stated recently…
…and Thom Hartmann tells us of the Gropenfuhrer’s latest lie, about alleging that he had no financial interest in building a Trump Tower in Moscow during the 2016 campaign (confirmed from former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen’s latest revelations…the corporate media conventional wisdom seems to be coalescing around the claim that our demented lunatic of a preznit didn’t make any $$ off of the deal, at least as far as we know, and that should be it, but hey, news organizations with alphabets for names, try keeping your eye on the goddamn ball, as noted here, OK?)…
…and as you watch this video about the number of uninsured kids going up in this country (from John, Ben and Aida Rodriguez, dovetailing a bit from the Hartmann clip), I would ask that you also keep in mind this utter lie from Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao (as well as this about a Russia/Mueller-related item)…
…and I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” from 11/30/11, in which many of the usual suspects in the GOP Senate caucus professed to oppose a sales tax holiday, though they eventually reneged here, including the Senate Majority Leader; as noted here, yeah, a sales tax holiday is probably bad tax policy, but it strikes me as the equivalent of scrambling for table scraps while the one percent enjoy a banquet of filet mignon by comparison…tax policy that actually makes sense across the board is the answer, but good luck with that given that the Repugs will actually INCREASE their Senate majority in January…
…and once again, heckuva job for letting THAT happen, voters in North Dakota, Indiana, Missouri and Florida!...
...but it's just about time for the weekend, so here's somewhat of an upbeat seasonal tune to listen to (depending on what we observe of course) while we wait for holiday stamps at the post office and fight the mall traffic.
For many reasons, I haven’t been paying as much attention as I had previously to the Russia investigation involving the Gropenfuhrer and his cohorts (including this), but though I know this has been a ratings boon for MSNBC, I also think they’re doing some commendable work on this still-hugely-important story, particularly Rachel Maddow…it’s easy to let this blend in with the typical flotsam and background noise from this often-comically inept regime of crooks and traitors, but I thought this was a particularly good refresher of sorts with the exactly appropriate historical context (didn’t see the follow up story)…
…and Hasan Piker has another “Breakdown” on that “death eater” Tomi Lahren and tear-gassing asylum seekers (if pepper spray is supposed to be so edible, as they put it, try consuming it on camera, which they won’t do of course – and for the record, on a related matter, I give you this…NSFW)…
…and Farron Cousins tells us about Ivanka Trump claiming innocence for using a private Email server (from one clueless conservative blonde to another - GMAFB!)...
…and David Pakman tells us that Germany, Finland and Denmark, commendably, are going to stop weapons sales to Saudi Arabia in response to the Jamal Khashoggi murder and the Yemeni genocide (as opposed to us of course)…
…and Sam Seder and The Majority Report tell us more on the Mississippi election between Cindy Hyde-Smith and Mike Espy; it's true that the racist won, but there were some interesting down-ballot results as it turned out (and yeah, we know what Pete Hegseth of Fix Noise truly is...Sam got her name wrong, but we know who he's talking about)…
…and here’s another seasonal selection – there are times I wish I could skate away too (good day for hot chocolate with marshmallows).
Gee, I wonder if Gritty will end up as the new Flyers GM?
As somewhat of a lapsed fan of the orange-and-black, I feel compelled to weigh in on the recent firing of GM Ron Hextall (here), for whatever my opinion is ultimately worth in these or other matters (I've followed the team on an ever-less-frequent basis since they made it to the Stanley Cup Finals in 2010 mainly because of the front-office screwups that frequently occurred before Hextall was named as GM).
Let’s see now – I believe, when Hextall first took the reins, the Flyers had previously unloaded Patrick Sharp, Dennis Seidenberg and Justin Williams since the team had ZERO patience with developing prospects (and all three went on to win Stanley Cups with other teams) and, in return, the Flyers, being stuck in their 1970s mindset, acquired bigger but slower and less-talented players who usually ended up getting hurt, waived or traded themselves.
Oh, and did I mention Sergei Bobrovsky? The guy who posted about a 2.40 goals against average in his rookie year and who was traded to the Columbus Blue Jackets? All he did was go on to win a Vezina trophy, that’s all.
The Flyers’ salary cap situation was a joke when Hextall took over. He got them out of deals where they had to pay off Vincent Lecavalier basically for NOT playing, as well as Chris Pronger and that Russian tragedy of a goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov (it was former GM Paul Holmgren’s brilliant idea to basically rip the team apart by trading Mike Richards and Jeff Carter to be able to pay for “Bryz” based on Pronger’s recommendation…I’ve seen Pronger’s name floated as a possible GM replacement, and great player though he was, I think he should be disqualified for that reason alone, though I have to admit that Holmgren, partly due to Richards’s drug issues, ended up doing all right with acquiring good players in both moves).
The team also didn’t have any younger talent coming up from the minor leagues to push the veterans, but now, players at Lehigh Valley such as Oscar Lindblom, German Rubtsov, Mikhail Vorobyev and Mike Vecchione have all either seen time with the parent club in Philly or are on the short list to eventually make the NHL roster for good. And Hextall deserves the credit for that more than anyone else. And I know fans are anxiously awaiting the callup of Carter Hart as the long-hoped-for answer to the ridiculous game of musical chairs the Flyers keep playing with goalies (worse than the band Spinal Tap going through drummers), but he’s at least a year away – he needs time to develop; the worst thing to do would be to bring him up too early and watch him flame out.
David Scott, one of the owners, spoke out publicly about Hextall’s firing and cited the evergreen “philosophical differences,” more or less, with Scott saying he wants to “win win win” now, as if that was somehow in opposition to what Hextall was doing (oh, and did I mention that, as a player, Hextall was the winningest goalie in Flyers history?). And of course now-team president Paul Holmgren, wanting to remain employed himself, went along.
Do you want to know what’s really going on here?Envy and spite, that’s what.
The Eagles just won a Super Bowl, even though they’ve now imploded themselves partly due to injuries and are now scraping for some way to win their division and get in the post-season (and somehow winning the NFC East is the only way they’ll do it). The Sixers have taken big leaps forward also, though they’ll have to find some way to resolve this situation with Markelle Fultz, who may end up as the biggest number one overall draft bust in NBA history. The Phillies have rebounded also, though, with the exception of Aaron Nola, they have some big-time pitching concerns.
And that leaves the Flyers. And short of coming up with another Disney-esque on acid, Muppet-ish mascot, they had to find a way to be talked about again or risk utter irrelevancy once and for all among the Philly sports/fan/media cognoscenti (or so they think they are).
Here is the bottom line: I don’t see a plan from this organization. The only person who had one (whatever you may think of it) was Hextall. He knew the parent club of course, he knew the minor league affiliates, he knew all the coaches, he knew the scouts (I’m sure he hired more than a few), he was (and still is) known and well regarded throughout the league and had contacts all over the place. And now all of that is gone, even though (by Holmgren’s own admission) the fans have kept attending the games and have shown more loyalty than I ever would have if I were a season ticket holder.
And even though he’s dead, I have to say it anyway – this move to fire Hextall for specious reasons at best (as far as I’m concerned) has Ed Snider written all over it.
And it seems that the purge continued today, as noted here – I definitely respected Gord Murphy as a player, and I don’t know enough to critique him as a coach, but the Flyers have been absolutely awful defensively this year. And apparently it was enough for Chris Pryor as a Hextall loyalist to merit him getting canned also, regardless of whether or not he did a good job as head of scouting.
The Flyers continue to act like they think they’re the New York Yankees. In reality, they’re a lot closer to the Charlestown Chiefs (here).
And as you watch this from last night, keep in mind that Ottawa statistically is at about the same place as the Flyers (and when it comes to the goalie carousel thing, Anthony Stolarz is innocent as far as I’m concerned – he’s basically a rookie anyway...that winning goal by Matt Duchene was a pretty amazing play I thought that you couldn't do much about)…
Update: And while the Flyers make headlines for stupid reasons, the Eagles make headlines for great ones (here).
Update 12/5/18: All the best to Chuck Fletcher (here) – not exactly sure why he decided to join the cast of this soap opera, but he’s innocent as far as I know.
…and now, I return to what is typically more normal fare for this blog…I admit that I touched on the GM layoffs yesterday, but I thought this was more in-depth commentary from Farron Cousins on that and our farmers getting creamed from Generalissimo Trump’s tariffs, as well as straight-up corporate greed of course as Cousins says…
…and Willie Geist of “Morning Joe” brings us the latest on the Gropenfuhrer’s declining approval with a panel including Eugene Robinson (I understand the numbers here are pretty positive for the Dems and they’re reported as such, but I still think the “Republican-centric” focus of this commentary/reporting is pretty disgusting…and I hate to admit it, but I think Sam Stein is absolutely right about the remaining Repugs being even more beholden to the orange lunatic after the election)…
…and Kyle K. reminds us of the true cost of befriending the country that produced 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers…of all of the atrocities committed by our ruling cabal of fools and criminals, support for the Saudi regime has to rank as one of the very worst…
Update 11/29/18: Yeah, I think this says it all right.
…and Cenk and Ana tell us about the latest horrible anti-abortion bill being contemplated by Republicans, this time in Ohio, making it punishable by death – yeah, keep telling me that “The Handmaid’s Tale” isn’t a documentary for the life forms sponsoring this monstrous cruelty…by the way, laws like this already exist in South/Central America, where women are prosecuted if they even miscarry (here), to say nothing of trying to end a pregnancy on their own...and boy, is Cenk right from about 6:29 to the end…
…and sometimes I put up these holiday tunes in particular as a bit of a palate cleanser if you will as opposed to some of the other relentlessly bad news, and this is one of those times (dogs are great, but I don't have the patience to take care of them - sorry).
(More on the pic is here, by the way...also, today is the runoff election in Mississippi between Cindy Hyde-Smith and Mike Espy; once more, everything you need to know is here.)
Hasan Piker gives us more info on the Wisconsin high school Nazi salute thing vs. selective instances of punishing other students, particularly African Americans (yep, sounds like, once again, “free speech for me, but not for thee”)…
…and in a similar vein, Sam Seder of The Majority Report tells us about Louis Klemp of Kansas, he of the “master race” comment who has since resigned as county commissioner as noted here (yes, I know this is bad, but somehow this sounds like the makings of an SNL sketch…”Christmas With The Klemps”?)…
…and I thought this was a well-done report from the WaPo on the history of General Motors, and it reinforces my opinion that the company's senior management are clueless idiots...sinking $$ into driver-less cars??? And speaking of clueless idiots, it looks like this is more bad news for the Gropenfuhrer...
…and I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” (again, more or less) from 11/25/14, in which former Indiana governor (and now VP of course) Mike Pence came up with the following allegedly cute analogy of people on food stamps supposedly helping themselves up by their bootstraps, which is Republican Boilerplate 101 from The Sainted Ronnie Reagan of course (yep, sounds like “The Hunger Games” for real…Cenk is hilariously tongue-in-cheek here about the “banksters” and the oil company criminals, though yeah, I know the bottom line is that this is more wingnut BS)…
..and kudos to Philly rapper Meek Mill for this (very NSFW)...
...and JB knew a thing or two about the criminal justice system also - didn't end up hurting his great artistry either.
(By the way, everything you need to know about the U.S. Senate runoff election tomorrow in Mississippi between Repug Cindy Hyde-Smith and Dem Mike Espy is here.)
And yeah, it looks like, now, we have no problem with shooting tear gas at migrant women and children trying to cross the border (here...makes me recall this in particular...and what a typically soulless, execrable remark from this harpie)…
…and speaking of people who are destitute, did you know that, according to one Arkansas Repug (of course), poverty was a “choice”? Me neither, as Kyle tells us (NSFW)…
…and yeah, nothing to see here, just an African American veteran getting shot and killed at an Alabama mall while the police originally reported that he was the “perp,” only to find later that the shooting victim was innocent while the in-all-likelihood suspect got away (more here and here)…
…and of all of the atrocities of wholly-Repug "governance," this may be the absolute worst – without a decent climate, nothing else matters (don’t understand why this wasn’t more of an issue during the election…maybe because too many voters tuned it out? And releasing the report on Black Friday is about what you would expect from the regime of Generalissimo Trump)…
…and speaking of Black Friday, I didn’t know there was a Philly connection to the holiday – this is one of those times when I actually learn something doing this blogging thing…
…and based on the CBS clip above, I would trust the cartoon cops here more than the AL ones (yep, this is a seasonal item all right).
Sam Seder and The Majority Report tell us that CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin has come around on the whole “Hillary Clinton Email Server” thing given this (Toobin is a little brighter than many of the dim bulbs on that network, I should hasten to add)…
…and gosh, I guess the Gropenfuhrer never heard that line from President Harry Truman that “The buck stops here,” meaning the desk of the president, since Number 45 is apparently too much of a goddamn snowflake to hear about what happened to Virginia resident Jamal Khashoggi…oh, but “America First,” right? GMAFB!...
…and partly with the Khashoggi murder in mind, Seth Meyers dutifully tries to create comedy from the latest awfulness from Generalissimo Trump, particularly his servile pandering to the Saudis (and speaking of servile pandering…)…
…and as long as we’re in the travel season, I thought I should mention this from Farron Cousins; I guess when Tom Bodett says, “We’ll leave the light on for you,” that means ICE too apparently, as Scott Hardy says…
…and I know I’m a little late with this, but I still thought this was important history from Joy Reid on the holiday we just celebrated (and I think we should keep this in mind too)…
…and dear God, it really is that time of year again, isn’t it?
And it looks like the ever-fashionable Cindy Hyde-Smith went down in flames in her recent debate, as it were, here (and given her campaign with Espy, I think this should be kept in mind also).
Update: And I have no doubt whatsoever that this is true.
