Friday Stuff

(I saw this message when I was taking my constitutional nearby Le Manse Doomsy, and I thought it bore repeating, particularly in our current context.)

Rachel Maddow interviewed NYU med student Gabrielle Mayer, who, of her class, offered to graduate early in order to help with the COVID-19 pandemic…much gratitude to her and her fellow students who are following her commendable course of action…



…and going from one altruistic extreme completely to the other, John and Ana of TYT tell us about Orange Satan trying to basically reopen the economy by Easter…a typically disgusting and cynical pitch aimed at the “Fundies,” who will no doubt dutifully lap it all up en masse…



…and this Now This clip tells us about our ridiculous sanctions against Iran during COVID-19 making that country’s crisis worse…and I’m sure it’s no surprise that, given that he works for a regime of liars, Pompeo is lying himself in this clip – naive, pin-headed liberal that I am, I cannot help but think to myself that this crisis, calamitous as it is, presents the whole world with an opportunity to work together in some fashion to each other’s benefit to help recover somehow from it and ensure that it never happens again – yes, I know…sunshine, lollipops and rainbows every day…



…and this clip presents Repug U.S. House Rep Thomas Massie in his thoroughly dunderheaded idiocy, questioning former U.S. Senator and Secretary of State John Kerry on the issue of climate change (I’m not saying Kerry shouldn’t be questioned, but only do it like an actual adult) – I know this is history, but given this (Massie trying to hold up the COVID-19 relief bill), it’s safe to say that Massie is giving Louie Gohmert, Steve King, Matt Gaetz and a few others runs for their money as the stupidest individual on Capitol Hill, so say nothing of being the most craven and corrupt (and for sure, Massie made this list - more here)…



…and kudos to Brianna Keilar of CNN for not letting Trumpster Peter Navarro off the hook over the provisioning, or lack thereof, in response to the outbreak, as Brian Tyler Cohen tells us (yeah, blame China and Obama - what a disgusting cabal of frauds and idiots!)…



…and David Doel has quite rightly laid into our thoroughly bought-and-paid-for corporate media over their reporting on the Dem presidential primary, and he’s right, and he can barely contain his disgust again here (Bernie giving it to the U.S. Senate Repugs on Coronavirus relief…yeah, Bernie had better hurry up and drop out, huh…removing my tongue from my cheek)…



...and since it's a day of the week with a "y" in it, it looks like it's time for this video once more (more here)...



...and happy 70th birthday to Tony Banks of Genesis.

Thursday Stuff

(I should note that, sometime probably over the next week or so, I’m going to be scaling back with posting on this site. For now, though, I am able to do what I can, but we’ll see.)

I saw the card that I captured in the pic above in our mail yesterday, and at first, I thought The Onion was trying to solicit for a subscription.

What’s next? “President Trump’s guidelines on nuclear disarmament”? “His guidelines on international diplomacy”?

Looks like it’s time once more, then, for this video (more here)…



…and Thom Hartmann tells us what other countries are doing in response to the outbreak (and speaking of Mnuchin, I give you this - this crowd is more repellent by the day hour, including this wretched excuse for a human being)…



…and I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” (more or less, from 3/19/10 – kind of off by a bit I know)…with all of the COVID-19 stuff raging, my apologies for neglecting to point out the recent 10th anniversary of the signing of the Affordable Care Act into law (here)…this clip is intended mainly to present the utterly bogus arguments against health care reform, made particularly more odious now given our current calamity (I think the ACA turned out to be better than Arianna Huffington’s pronouncement here, speaking with K.O., but I agree with her point that we need to build on it and expand it, not try to tear it down…and kudos to Rachel Maddow for showing Dick Armey to be what he truly is, and that goes for The Sainted Ronnie R also)…



…and sticking with Maddow, she points out the true insanity of what Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves has done in his state (as noted here, they are dead last when it comes to health care ratings among all 50 states)…



…and Kyle K. tells us about the fight related to the virus in Lake Worth Beach City, FL…and boy, do I get what Kyle is saying about “the wall”…nice work by Omari Hardy to stand up for residents losing their power during a pandemic (more here...what country am I living in again?)…



…and I’m in the mood for kind of a trippy, current video – I hope this will suffice.

Wednesday Stuff (updates)

Cenk and Ana of TYT tells us about the back-and-forth over the COVID-19 bill coming from the Democratic U.S. House and “the world’s greatest deliberative body” under the thumb of Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao (an update is here – a bill featuring something actually closer to sanity passed)…



Update 1: Apparently I spoke too soon - yeah, and there are people who will actually blame Democrats for this.

Update 2: I’m going to relax my rule about profanity on this site for a minute and say that Lindsey Graham is a steaming pile of dog shit for this – to do something about him AT LONG LAST, please click here.

Update 3: Hey, philly.com and the AP! Where is your REPUBLICANS BLOCK CORONAVIRUS AID PACKAGE screaming headline?

You know - kind of like this...

Update 4: Oh, suuure, give the "party of Lincoln" the fluffing it deserves, right? What a joke...

Update 5: What I said about Graham goes for Tom Golisano too (here).

Update 6: And by the way, like you I’m sure, I’m already starting to see the outrage over the Dems potentially caving in the Senate on this bill and its likely giveaway to our corporate “betters” (here). And no, I don't like it one bit either.

But Democrats aren’t in charge of the U.S. Senate, people. Look what happened when voters put Democrats in charge of the U.S. House. They passed about 400 bills that #MIdnightMoscowMitch lit up for kindling (here). And many of them were bipartisan.

You want change for real? Stop whining and bitching and work/donate/speak out to elect Democrats. EVERYWHERE! You can start by clicking here.

…and one day, when we eventually get a handle on the catastrophic medical impact from this virus and are able to provide for everyone infected as much as our means allows, I want it to be recorded for posterity forever that ONE POLITICAL PARTY AND THEIR MEDIA ACOLYTES IN THIS COUNTRY WERE PERFECTLY FINE WITH ALLOWING PEOPLE TO DIE FOR THE SAKE OF PRESERVING THEIR WAY OF LIFE AND THEIR DISGUSTING IDEOLOGY.

And somehow, it will just be expected of us to make peace with these monsters. When in reality, they have made it utterly clear to the entire world that ONCE MORE, THEY ARE PERFECTLY FINE WITH ALLOWING PEOPLE TO DIE IN THE NAME OF MAINTAINING THEIR CAPITALIST CULTURE THAT BENEFITS THEM AT THE EXPENSE OF NEARLY EVERYONE ELSE.

I remember how vilified Dem former U.S. House Rep Alan Grayson was for saying the GOP wanted you to die quickly, when in reality, he was more correct than he ever could have imagined…



...and more garbage from The Roger Ailes BS Factory is noted here (comparing this to Obama's response to Ebola)...



...and I'm not necessarily including this as an automatic endorsement of "Malarkey Joe" (though he has my endorsement by default of course if he ends up getting the nod), but this definitely needs to be pointed out for the record vs. Our Pumpkin Pestillence...



Update 7: So I guess, given this, I should put up this video every day for awhile - maybe I will.

...and Rachel Maddow speaks with Dr. Esther Choo about what's taking place on the front lines with health care providers - Choo is based in Seattle (this report aired on 3/20, so I hope any update would be positive, but given that we're talking about the regime of the Gropenfuhrer, I definitely don't expect that)...



...and this guy tested positive - shit.

Tuesday Stuff

I realize that the phrase “insane press conference” having to do with Generalissimo Trump long since became redundant, but apparently he was particularly crazed yesterday, basically telling everybody to get the hell back to work and hurry up and die to keep the markets from plummeting still further (as if doing that would calm the stock market...Cenk Uygur gives us the gory details, with more to come later today...more here).

Republicans are trying to kill us. Literally. How many more goddamn ways do we still need to point that out?...



Update 3/25/20: Yeah, I would call this an appropriate response.

…and the Rational National tells us about Texas (of course) Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick trying to sacrifice the lives of potentially thousands of people, even millions, to preserve capitalism “for the children”…every time I think these cretins can’t find a new bottom…



…and David Pakman tells us about the crowd selling snake oil, you might say, trying to enhance their wretched profiles from COVID-19 (what a collection of bottom-feeders)…



…and Kyle has more on the Gropenfuhrer getting rid of the pandemic preparedness experts (oh, riiight – they were just standing around doing nothing, so Mango Mussolini gave them their pink slips – uh huh, suuuure)…



…and this clip from Brian Tyler Cohen tells us about a woman at a Dollar Tree store in Florida who bought up all of the paper products (not sure why the store didn’t put a per-customer limit in place and enforce it, but what do I know?)…



Update: To try and do something constructive in the face of this insanity, please click here (and yeah, it's pretty sad when we have to count on "No Corporate Tax" Pat Toomey to do the right thing, but unfortunately, this is where we are).

…and happy belated 90th birthday to Stephen Sondheim – this selection is almost too easy I know.

Sunday Stuff

Rachel Maddow, to her credit, “goes there” on the Gropenfuhrer and the “L” word…he utterly shredded any notion of credibility long ago, as she correctly points out…



…and Brian Tyler Cohen tells us that it’s not only Our Pumpkin Pestilence who has acted like a dangerous fool on this issue in particular, but others in his party also (the Mika and Joe Scar clip comparing Paris vs. Clearwater probably led to this, though DeSantis made the move too late)…



...and this Now This clip features Dr. Peter Hotez testifying about the delays in developing a vaccine for COVID-19...as this clip points out and as NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo, among others, has also noted, our health care system in this country is market-based, attuned to meet current demand...well, normally that's fine, but it doesn't allow for catastrophic situations such as the one we're currently dealing with...and no, I don't have a magical answer to solve that either short of Medicare for All, single payer, and nationalizing our health care system (and I'm not even sure how good of an idea that is), but I'm just pointing out the problem...



…and Farron Cousins tells us here that, according to yet another poll, only 30% of Repugs will pay attention to doctors and others over their warnings on COVID-19 (figures, unfortunately)...mildly NSFW…



...and Thom Hartmann sheds more light on this typically bogus recommendation from "Dr." Trump...



...and RIP Kenny Rogers.

Update 3/23/20: You quite literally have to get to Paragraph 20 in this story accompanying this thoroughly misleading graphic to find out the following:

Democrats are particularly fighting for constraints on the largely Republican-led effort to provide $500 billion for corporations. Democrats call that a “slush fund.”

Democrats won a concession — to provide four months of expanded unemployment benefits, rather than just three as proposed, according to an official granted anonymity to discuss the private talks. The jobless pay also would extend to self-employed and so-called gig workers.

But Republicans complained Democrats were holding out for more labor protections for workers, wanting assurances that corporations taking federal aid will commit to retaining their employees.

Another moment in "journamalism," as Atrios calls it, courtesy of philly.com (where, last I noticed, Christine Flowers still is awarded a paycheck).

Update 3/24/20: Gee, maybe our corporate media should have taken her a little more seriously (here - and yes, I know there was a misstep or two along the way in her campaign, but imagine Warren as the standard-bearer now instead of "Malarkey Joe"...oh, sorry - I forgot that the U.S. Presidency, thus far, is a patriarchy).