Friday Stuff

Josh Gay of Ring of Fire tells us about PA Dem Senator John Fetterman sending out a fundraising Email to Repug donors, saying he’ll “reject socialism” and that he apparently is working with his best bud Dave McCormick on behalf of Mango Mussolini; at this point, Fetterman should probably just make it official, especially since he doesn’t appear to have a war chest anymore as Gay tells us...contrast that with Fetterman raising $10.5 mil in just three months when he opposed Dr. Crudite in ’22, as opposed to raising just $21K now, which is a microscopic amount of dough (and yeah, I know it shouldn’t be about the money, but it is unfortunately)...and 75 percent of the donation may go to some shadowy group behind the fundraiser and not to the candidate (and Fetterman gets a MAGA donor list?) God, what a mess our campaign financing is (once more, love and kisses to the High Court of Hangin’ Judge JR for Citizens United)...also, at this point, I don’t see how Fetterman has an excuse any longer to at least bother to dress like an actual U.S. Senator and get rid of the hoodie and sweat pants...



...and Brian Tyler Cohen tells us about some Fix Noise hairdo trying to attack Pete Buttigieg; actually, she’s right that inflation was 9 percent in June ’22 under “No Malarkey Joe,” with all of the post COVID supply chain disruption and energy price surges, but as “Mayor Pete” notes, it was 3 percent when Biden left office (and as BTC points out, it’s currently 3.7 percent under Dementia J. “I Love The Inflation” Trump)...and “1.7 – 1.8 inflation over the last three months”?? Looks like gramps is sundowning again...also, I could put up that quote form former Ambassador Michael McFaul again about how Obama prevented Iran from getting a nuke and didn’t totally f-up the Strait of Hormuz to do it, but I think you get the picture (and I could also remind everyone again about #47 killing the Murphy-Lankford bill that would have addressed immigration, but yeah, I know that gets repetitive also)...



...and Jesse Dollemore informs us of Cantaloupe Capone sending out his DHS goons at the direction of former plumber Markwayne Mullin to try and intimidate Ilhan Omar (I would ask if Fetterman feels like an idiot for endorsing Mullin, but I’m sure I already know the answer)...and I swear, it’s always the same utterly stoo-pid pattern; some idiot online influencer puts out a garbage meme (Trumpist lickspittle Benny Johnson in this case), then a Trumpist lackey promotes it or acts on it, and then Dear Leader gets the glazing he wants over it...and I’m not the least bit surprised that Fix Noise was the only alleged news org involved in this...so the supposed excuse for this is citizenship paperwork allegedly filled out by Omar’s father??? Yep, doesn’t even come close to passing the “smell” test (NSFW/H)...



Update: Offered without further comment...

...and Sam and Emma of The Majority Report tell us that it looks like Freedom Caucus head Andy Harris in Maryland flipped out because he got laughed at for claiming that “environmental regulation” is the reason diesel prices have gone up (and yeah, as Sam says, the First Amendment to the Constitution doesn’t disallow getting laughed at...Harris is truly a numbskull)...and oh, Harris continues with his wankery in the second of two clips here, attacking reporters for recording him as a PUBLIC PERSON in a PUBLIC SPACE, as noted (which, again, is protected by that pesky First Amendment...a “Bulworth moment” indeed)...mildly NSFW/H also...



...and it looks like Bronzer Beelzebub has decided not to televise the firing squad execution of Fort Hood killer Nidal Hasan, so we won’t necessarily be in league with Iran, North Korea and other despotic regimes for the moment (here) – Jesse Welles still came up with a typically pithy little number over it, though...



...and here’s a tune for tomorrow’s “No Kings” protest to help us get into the mood to stand up against our fascist regime.

Wednesday Stuff

This is your periodic reminder that our PA-01 U.S. House Rep Brian Fitzpatrick has refused to debate his Dem challenger Bob Harvie, which is in keeping with Fitzpatrick’s pattern of avoidance in that he refuses to hold in-person town halls also.

Update 10/15/26: And Bri-Fi is getting help from Apartheid Clyde? Figures (here).

To begin, this clip from CBC News discusses the beyond idiotic anti-Canada rhetoric from the Gropenfuhrer and his utterly pointless trade war with that nation and the economic impact that we’re dealing with over it...we revisit the NAFTA debate between Poppy Bush, Bill Clinton and Ross Perot, featuring the “giant sucking sound” quote from Perot about jobs going to Mexico, which turned out to be prescient...



...and this TYT segment takes a look at #47’s immigration crackdown hitting red states pretty hard – c’est dommage...report discusses #47’s declining support among Latinos, particularly in Texas and businesses along the border including agriculture and construction...not familiar with the concept of “elite over production,” but I have to admit that it makes sense unfortunately...also, though it appears that enrollment in trade schools did decline, it looks like enrollment is rebounding fortunately based on this...glad to hear that the typically disgusting gerrymandering by Texas Repugs might bite them in the ass...I honestly don’t know what the hell Ana Kasparian means by “unmitigated immigration,” but otherwise I think she makes some good points here (I also wish she’d mentioned the Murphy-Lankford Senate immigration bill and how that got killed to help Don The Con two years ago)...



...and Farron Cousins gives us more on the decision to live stream the firing squad execution of Fort Hood killer Nidal Hasan...yep, the Trumpist regime is acting like terrorist outlaws because 1) They can, and 2) That is what they are...Cousins is right that this will encourage further nut jobs who want to publicize themselves while they go out in a “blaze of glory,” and it will ALSO give those who would do us harm an excuse to do this to OUR OWN MILITARY, if, God forbid, any of them are captured – I realize this didn’t occur to any of the alleged adults running our government, but I definitely think it needs to be mentioned...



...and John and Jayar of The Damage Report tell us that it looks like Our Sweaty Orange Bronzer Boy is going to his Russian benefactor to help with gas prices...typical...I have to admit that I didn’t have Brian Kilmeade actually making sense on my Bingo card (and Rachel Campos Duffy is about as “out to lunch” on this as you can expect)...as noted here, those supposedly great numbers on the amount of diesel fuel Don The Con says we’ll get from Vlad The Butcher doesn’t even cover a day of the actual demand for the stuff – more like 12 hours, unfortunately...four Repug U.S. Senators and two Dems actually found spines on this and stood up to Mango Mussolini, which, given that our *preznit certainly won’t listen, is merely a symbolic gesture, though admittedly it is still important...



...and the Onion News Network presents “In The Know” with Dwight Richmond, concerning the matter of #47 running as a “mid-term *preznit” (as usual, messing with us with satire, though probably not by much versus actual reality)...



...and happy 80th birthday to Justin Hayward, the last surviving member of the Moody Blues.

Tuesday Stuff

This is an update to the “Daisy” ad from LBJ way back when, which only ran once, though its impact on the ’64 presidential election was for sure undeniable; the difference this time around is that, sadly, it’s based on a literal quote from our *preznit (I think you could argue that Barry Goldwater, the subject of the original ad, though he was a big-time wingnut, knew where to draw the line partly because he served our country, something Cantaloupe Capone ridicules of course)...



...and Logical Leftist Jeff Waldorf informs us that it looks like ICE is deporting the father-in-law of the son of Paul LePage, former awful governor of Maine and now a congressional candidate (oh, but DHS says a work permit doesn’t give legal status, huh? Gee, karma sure is a bee-yaa-tch, isn’t it?)...LePage has called for the Maine cops to work with the ICE Gestapo to get rid of all of those baaad criminal illegals, no matter which innocent folks get swept up in the mayhem...I’d forgotten that “little Marco” Rubio voted against his own immigration bill, and of course they also scuttled the Murphy-Lankford bill that would have addressed the issues they’ve been caterwauling about, but the “party of Lincoln” doesn’t actually want to solve any issues, as we know - I realize this clip/story is a little old, but I didn't want to ignore it...



...and this report from Status Coup tells us about the protest in NYC against Palantir’s push into health care, overseeing Mt. Sinai and their CEO Dr. Brendan Carr...it should definitely set off all kinds of alarms to realize that AI will likely be used to make health care-related recommendations, to say nothing of potentially deciding to deny coverage... more on Palantir supporting the Israeli military and the ongoing Gaza carnage is here, along with Palantir supporting ICE and their ongoing thuggery (here)...



...and David Shuster of Rebel HQ lets us know about Professor Paul Krugman calling out Trumpist Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent (definitely miss Krugman’s columns in the NYT, but I also understand why he walked away from writing them)...interest rates and borrowing costs (including the 30-year treasury yield) are increasing according to Steven Rattner and some other folks who actually know what they’re talking about on this stuff, reaching their highest levels in 24 years...oh, and #47’s policies are “non-inflationary,” huh? I don’t think so (here)...



...and Mr. Newberger gives us another pithy little sendup of Cheetoh Hitler based on today’s headlines...



...and the first “Bridge” school benefit concert was held by Neil Young on 10/13/86 for the institution he played a major role in founding and developing (here) – his involvement stemmed partly from the fact that Young’s sons were born with cerebral palsy, with one profoundly affected (here)...hard to find the words of appreciation for the courage of everyone involved with trying to overcome an obstacle like that.

Monday Stuff

Lawrence O’Donnell tells us here that there are 3 reasons why Generalissimo Trump spouts off his crazy nonsense: 1) Pathological lying, 2) Stupidity, or 3) Dementia, or some combination of the three...more evidence to support this is presented in an interview #47 gave with Time Magazine...I realize our *preznit is allergic to actual facts and data and I know it’s tiresome to mention that anything he doesn’t like is automatically branded as “fake,” but alas, it does need to be pointed out...I also get it that there’s not much new stuff here, but I believe the case needs to be made periodically that Combover Caligula is a demented lunatic...O’Donnell tells us about some of the “enemies of ours” who have been paid back for the Gropenfuhrer’s illegal (and utterly ruinous) tariffs, including Walmart, Apple, Target, and Amazon; of course, by association, since we’ve paid those stinking tariffs as O’Donnell points out, that “enemies of ours” line by default also applies to everyone else in this country...



...and Jesse Dollemore lets us know that ICE thugs recently shot a man named Oscar Belgal during an attempted arrest on the border of Manhattan and the Bronx; Belgal survived with a neck wound, while his 5-year-old son in the vehicle was uninjured – oh, and this ICE lunatic was apparently masquerading as a construction worker...NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani stood tall IMO with his response, as opposed to professional dipsh*t Markwayne Mullin (as Jesse correctly puts it IMO) and those soulless humanoids flanking Mullin (mildly NSFW/H)...



...and I know I haven’t had anything from The Lincoln Project for a little while, and I also realize that they’re mainly yesterday’s (and probably tomorrow’s) Republicans, but when they do good work, I think they need to get props for it (clip is very slightly NSFW/H...and when it comes to Repugs supporting Dementia J. Trump, let’s not forget about Bri-Fi, and to do something about him, click here)...

...and Brian Tyler Cohen tells us more on Roger Marshall in Kansas going after his patients for unpaid medical debt, and for some truly piddling amounts in some cases (like $100), with Marshall charging 18 percent interest, which is higher than some credit card APRs (also, it looks like Marshall FINALLY got around to comping that family baker who made cookies for Marshall)...glad to see Dem Adam Hamilton making an issue out of all of this (definitely NSFW/H)...



...and Jonathan Pie tells us about the live streaming of the execution of Fort Hood mass shooter Nidal Hasan, as announced by SecDef Kegseth (here)...didn’t know the latest nonsense about Zuckerberg, Bezos, Peter Thiel and King Elon I getting access to military intel, but yeah, what could go wrong with THAT I wonder...NSFW/H also...



...and I thought this was a bit of “goth” animation for this newer tune which is apropos for this month I suppose.

Friday Stuff

This is your periodic reminder that our PA-01 U.S. House Rep Brian Fitzpatrick still refuses to stick his head out of his shell and debate his Dem challenger Bob Harvie; I realize at this point that isn’t likely to change, but I also believe it’s important to keep reminding everyone about that.

David Shuster of Rebel HQ lets us know about another Trump voter (Ronald from West Virginia) apologizing on CSPAN, and it looks like a three-time Trump voter in MA, of all places (points for being contrarian I guess) also now has regrets...but oh, Spray Tan Satan is planning to give seniors 90 WHOLE DOLLARS to help with health insurance premium costs? What a guy! I guess that promise is about as reliable as his claim to give everybody $5K if the Repugs hang onto power next month (more here)...

...and I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” (more or less) from 10/10/18, with John Iadarola and Jayar Jackson talking about the FBI report on “I Like Beer” Brett Kavanaugh and how the “investigation” was rigged to not ask questions that would put the then-SCOTUS nominee in a negative light, as well as not bothering to investigate claims from Deborah Ramirez, one of the women who accused Kavanaugh of s*xual abuse (looks like “Disappointed” Collins got a nice payday for playing along as noted here, and to do something about her, click here)...



...and David Pakman informs us that the “party of Lincoln” collectively had a nightmare evening with recent candidate debates, including Susan Collins and Troy Jackson in Maine (yeah, as far as I know, a reduction in the cost of road salt won’t do a damn thing to help with health insurance coverage or the cost of groceries)...also, Dem Governor Wes Moore of Maryland apparently had a good night against his Repug opponent Dan Cox, specifically on the question of the SNAP error rate, as in incarcerated folks getting SNAP who should be disqualified (Moore is kind of a mixed bag for yours truly I’ll admit, but credit where it’s due)...additionally, we go to the Michigan governor’s race between Dem Jocelyn Benson and Repug John James...finally, we get Georgia Republican Rick (“Gas Stores”) Jackson flailing around in his gubernatorial debate versus Dem Keisha Lance Bottoms (and Jackson is a healthcare company CEO, by the way)...



...and Thom Hartmann speaks with Alex Lawson, Executive Director of Social Security Works, about the increasing popularity of Medicare for All (I may look into that book by Nancy Altman)...I would tend to agree with Lawson’s claim that the neoliberal experiment, if you will, has failed, and extracting whatever profit out of people for the sake of a few oligarchs is indeed the driver behind unaffordability...a study from Yale University tells us that M4A will save 100K lives (and $1 trillion) a year – works for me...I also agree with Thom about St. Jude Hospital as well as these stories about people starting Go Fund Me pages to pay for medical treatment – yes, those are heart-warming tales, but THE POINT IS THAT IT SHOULDN’T BE NECESSARY TO DO THAT!!!...health care in this country is indeed a “rich care” system...



...and Chris Hayes discusses Bronzer Beelzebub’s taxpayer funded PSAs – yeah, right (am I the only one who can whiff out yet another scam from Cantaloupe Capone? Somehow I don’t think so)...and these ads cost $10 million, huh? Figures (and again, the whole thing with the background noise forcing reporters to shout questions was a trick perfected by The Sainted Ronnie R)...Hayes speaks with Dem U.S. House Rep Jamie Raskin about the illegality of #47 coordinating with his Super PAC; I’ll grant you that our campaign finance law in this country is a joke, but at least there are SOME restraints at the moment, which Don The Con doesn’t care about of course...I’m glad to hear what Raskin is saying about red states including Flori-DUUH, but I definitely won’t count our chickens before they hatch, you might say...



...and since I try to keep the content as timely and relevant as possible here, I think it’s apropos to give us the latest from Lewis Black – don’t quite share his apparent desire to transcend to the afterlife, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t have a laugh over our mortality either...



...and I know I just included a tune from Jackson Browne, but since today is his birthday, I’ll add this as well...hope it’s a good one...



...and The Eternal John Lennon would have been 86 today.

Wednesday Stuff

Tennessee Brando points out here that Dementia J. Trump just spoke publicly about bombing Los Angeles and San Diego – I totally agree with Brando that that means that Cantaloupe Capone needs to be carted out of the White House and put in a cell a la CECOT or something comparable RIGHT FREAKING NOW (and I don’t know where the hell he uttered those vile words, but it looks like the “MAGA faithful” just pretended it was another day with a ‘y’ in it based on their reaction)...”a depraved bunch of lunatics being led by a lunatic” indeed (referring to those attending that Bund rally of course...and I think it’s also correct to say we’re being “governed” by an unhinged maniac and his death cult - NSFW/H)...



...and Robert Reich tells us How To Eat Healthy in Trump era, and apparently the answer is to barely eat anything at all since the FDA under our ruling cabal has been derelict in ensuring the safety of our food and medicines, with Bobby Brainworm deciding not to monitor cyclospora (explosive diarrhea) and other pathogens...and this Dr. Heidi Overton who has been nominated to run the agency looks like she’ll be another cipher for her boss – terrific...didn’t know that the Gropenfuhrer got $2 mil from Taylor Farms after delaying implementation of a traceability requirement that could have proactively taken care of the diarrhea outbreak before it struck (slightly NSFW/H)...



...and Brittany Page informs us of a Christian Nationalist audience cheering “Running Man” Josh Hawley’s call to restrict access to the mifepristone abortion pill...important to note the comparative safety of abortion pills versus other medications like Viagra as well as carrying a pregnancy to the full term (as I and others have said, if men got pregnant, there would be abortion rooms at every Lowe’s and Home Depot right next to the aisle selling power tools)...IMO, the “D” team is at fault on this issue for its failure to overturn the utterly wretched 1873 Comstock Act that provides the flimsiest of excuses to try and ban the distribution of abortion pills (which Hawley and his other anti-choice zealots are using as a rationale for their cruel position against women’s bodily autonomy)...and Tony Perkins is indeed a cretinous right-wing hack on the abortion issue as well as LGBTQ rights...Page also gives us more on Heidi Overton, who apparently thinks an IUD is used for abortions (Overton I mean of course...can’t think of a word to describe how pathetic it is that that belief is out there in this day and age, and by an alleged medical professional also)...NSFW/H also...



...and I’d like to mention a couple of milestones...first, today is the 20th anniversary of the murder of acclaimed Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who was one of the people from way back warning us of just how bad Vlad The Butcher truly was...I realize not many folks besides yours truly may think it’s worth it to keep reminding everyone about this, but I do because I believe it still matters...three people were convicted in 2014 for her murder, though the person who ordered the killing has to date not been identified (though I’m sure you can imagine what kind of speculation has been ongoing given this awful crime, considering what has happened also to Alexei Navalny and others opposing the Russian warmonger)...



...also, today is truly a date that could live in infamy, you might say, because it’s also the 30th anniversary of Fix Noise going on the air (here)...Carlos Maza discusses the impact of that accursed network...I could probably fill up this post with about a hundred examples at least of The Roger Ailes BS Factory choosing to manufacture a “scandal” that gets picked up by our beyond useless corporate media, but one example is how the Obama Administration and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton supposedly played a role in the deaths of four Americans in Benghazi, Libya (including Ambassador Christopher Stevens) while choosing to completely ignore this...and oh yeah, we’re also reminded about the outrage over Dem U.S. House Rep Ilhan Omar’s remark related to 9/11, saying “some people did something” as if Omar was trying to trivialize the attacks (she wasn’t of course)...NSFW/H as well...



...and I suppose this newer number is apropos given the prior clip in particular...hope you agree.

Tuesday Stuff

Ali Velshi of MS NOW takes a look at the impact of the Big Beautiful Clusterf*ck on Arizona’s 6th U.S. congressional district, where the Dem candidate (and U.S. Marine vet) Joanne Mendoza is trying to unseat Trumper Juan Ciscomani...apparently the district is more than a quarter Latino in terms of population; looks like, based on the Repug and Dem candidate votes, it’s a pretty “purple” district (R for U.S. House and prez and D for U.S. Senate)...Ciscomani’s vote for that legislative atrocity is getting called out by Mendoza (interviewed by Velshi), which is as it should be, since the SNAP cuts are particularly ruinous in this district apparently...and I realize wingnuts like Ciscomani will be blaming Former President Biden for whatever they can for at least the next couple of years and maybe longer (and I'll have something related to SecDef Kegseth shortly)



...also, it seems that s*xual predator (and former Repug U.S. House Speaker) Dennis Hastert recently died...this TYT segment from awhile back includes a discussion of what likely were payments from Hastert to at least one victim...I get the point here that investigating what were likely hush money payments sounds a bit illogical, though I don't think those payments should have escaped scrutiny either (clip also includes John Iadarola, Ben Mankiewicz, and the beyond ridiculous Jimmy Dore...NSFW/H)...



...and Sam Seder of The Majority Report talks about a local news station in Iowa calmly taking apart the typical propaganda from the Gropenfuhrer on a proposed $10 billion steel plant in that state...”they’ve already started building” – maybe in the fever dreams of Dementia Donnie, but not so much in the real world...no permits issued, no plans for surrounding infrastructure that would be needed, etc....I also hadn’t realized that Janet Mills in Maine has not endorsed Troy Jackson in the latter’s U.S. Senate contest against “Disappointed” Susan Collins; kind of wondering why the hell not...also, speaking of Maine, I keep waiting for charges to be filed against Graham Platner for those allegedly awful actions that forced him to leave the race; if that happens, I’ll acknowledge it of course...



...oh, and speaking of SecDef Kegseth, it seems that he’s trying to institute an Office of Religious Affairs at the Pentagon, something else that has not a damn thing to do with helping our military escape the Iran quagmire created by this awful regime (Mr. Newberger gives that the treatment it deserves IMO here)...



...for another take on matters tied to spirituality a bit, however, I give you this from Rachel Maddow on why protest matters...Maddow discusses the cumulative impact from a mass movement even when those protesting may be impacted to varying degrees, and I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that ties into a faith tradition since that also has to do with belief and a lack of empirical evidence...I have to admit that I’m not familiar with the latest protests in Ireland, so I can’t comment on that...also didn’t know about the protest march against ICE in California; props to them for that, nor did I know about the upcoming anti-ICE march in Seattle led by Japanese Americans and their descendants who were victimized during World War II, as well as a similar protest outside Tucson, Arizona against opening another ICE concentration camp...additionally, there was an anti-ICE protest in Williston, Vermont led by clergy trying to shut down an ICE surveillance center...anti-ICE protests are ongoing in Alexandria, Louisiana also as we learn...props also to the Interfaith Alliance, trying to register people to vote on moral grounds...there is also resistance to the Trumpist jackbooted tactics in Utah, where Repug Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson is getting pressured to turn over voting data to our criminal ruling cabal...there will be additional reminders here about the next “No Kings” protest on October 17th also FWIW...



...additionally, I should point out that yesterday marked the 40th anniversary of the beginning of the Iran-Contra scandal, with Eugene Hasenfus getting shot down in a plane carrying military supplies for the Contras fighting an insurrection against the Nicaraguan government under the Sandinistas, which was in violation of U.S. law (doing my best here to make sure that that appalling episode under The Sainted Ronnie R doesn’t get the “memory hole” treatment)...makes me recall this tune.