Friday Stuff

Rachel Maddow brings us this story on how two incredibly brave Russian journalists have found a way to communicate to people in that country about what is truly going on with Vlad The Butcher’s horrible war of choice in Ukraine (and timed for that country's May 9th celebrations, which is even gutsier still)...



...and yep, we finally hit that unbelievable milestone when it comes to COVID deaths; we have indeed lost 1 million people, which is absolutely inconceivable, but that’s what happens when you have people who don’t get vaxxed and ignore/ridicule mask mandates; as far as I’m concerned, this is also a consequence of this country not finding a way to get vaccines to the third world in the necessary quantities to prevent more variants...



...and I thought this was a great report from Ana of TYT about U.S. Senate Repug idiot Steve Daines of Montana giving a speech about “pre-born babies of sea turtles” or something, basically comparing these animals to women...nice (I’d forgotten about Daines interrupting Elizabeth Warren – good job by Ana to link Daines’ idiocy to gun deaths, which, as Ana says, was made worse by the pandemic...Ana’s analysis of Daines’ votes is terrific – this should be the rule for our media instead of the exception – if guys ended up giving birth, there would be so many morning-after bills you wouldn’t be able to keep track of them all, and it would be easy to get an abortion – Home Depot might even wall off a section where to get it right next to the heating and air conditioning equipment and the aisle for power tools)...



...and sticking with the subject that the wingnuts love above everything else (with the possible exception of tax cuts), Jayar and Francesca tell us about this idiot Oklahoma state senator named Warren Hamilton who opposes abortion for ectopic pregnancy, even though such a condition poses a threat to the life of the mother, and of course any form of life birthed in this way wouldn’t be viable anyway (and Adrienne Lawrence also tells us at the end that Louisiana has introduced a bill stipulating that any abortion provider is guilty of murder...yep, this is the direction all of this has been going for decades, and we’re finally here unfortunately)...



...and David Doel tells us that dirty energy criminal Joe Manchin joined every U.S. Senate Republican in voting No on codifying Roe v. Wade (NSFW - and it shouldn’t be a big surprise that Manchin’s support is now coming from Republicans – and yeah, I’m sure Biden/Harris can be doing more against Manchin, but THEY ALSO DON’T HAVE THE FREAKING NUMBERS IN THE SENATE! If Bernie Sanders and/or Angus King decided for some godawful reason to start caucusing with Repugs, the Dems would be in the minority again) – and I also get a little fed up with the whining over the failure of Build Back Better...yes, it should have passed, but Biden also helped to deliver COVID relief and the infrastructure bill, and does anybody seriously think that would have happened with a Repug congress?? That being said, Doel does have a point about executive orders to make cannabis no longer a Schedule 1 drug and student debt relief (which Biden campaigned on, let’s not forget), as well as Jessica Cisneros vs. that guttersnipe Henry Cuellar...



...and Thom Hartmann tells us here that protestors in front of “Strip Search Sammy” Alito’s house who showed up recently in protest of the upcoming ruling to gut Roe v. Wade were served wine and cheese by Alito’s neighbors...gotta love it (and good for Thom for discussing McCullen v. Coakley, which has made it even more problematic for women trying to exercise their rights of bodily autonomy - more on tomorrow's march in support of abortion rights is here)...



...and I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History,” and today, we’re “setting the way back” for 5/13/10...do you want to know how IMO we got to the point in this country where some people (and as usual, I believe this means about 30 percent of the population) think that Lauren Boebert, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Madison Cawthorn are the sort of individuals who should be elected to the U.S. Congress, with the expectation that these life forms would actually act in the interests of their constituents? Well, in addition to a lack of education in civics and social studies, as well as a steady diet of nonsense from Fix Noise and their T.V. clones as well as conservative AM talk radio, I would argue that another culprit are garbage political ads just like this one, in which Bradley Byrne, who once served Alabama’s first congressional district, was attacked for being “too liberal”...apparently, this ad helped to sink Byrne in the GOP primary that year (which, down there, is basically the election), though Byrne did end up getting elected to Congress from 2014 through 2021...



...and here’s a tune for all of you triskaidekaphobics out there – don’t walk under any ladders or step on sidewalk cracks, OK?

Thursday Stuff

Sam and Emma of The Majority Report tell us that Alabama just passed a law making it a crime to perform gender affirming surgery on trans youth under 19 (very rare), as well as applying hormonal treatments, and apparently targeting medical providers too with that idiot gov Kay Ivey – terrific (more on Ivey is here)...



...and I know I alluded to this previously, but it looks like Repug Sen. Susan “Disappointed” Collins did indeed call the cops for a chalk sidewalk message written in front of her home in Maine (David Doel tells us more)...



Update: And it looks like “the Christian handmaiden” is getting her turn in the barrel here...

...and this local news report with NBC’s Ukee Washington and Siafa Lewis tell us about the team bus full of Delaware women’s lacrosse players getting pulled over in Georgia (and did I mention that the women came from a historically black college?)...even if the state troopers thought the bus driver was erratic for driving in the left lane (For how long, I wonder? Was the driver trying to pass on a two-lane road?), they should have confined their search to the driver and his/her belongings. There is NOTHING that condones the degree of invasiveness of the search carried out by the troopers with their dogs! (more here).

And don’t give me this, “Well, we would have done the same thing if the players on the bus were white.” Just don’t even imagine that you’re going to lie to me like that...



...and Jayar and Rayy Vana of Rebel HQ tell us about the rumor that “Strip Search Sammy” Alito moved to an “undisclosed location,” which, as it turns out, is totally baseless, though Fix Noise ran wild with it all over the place anyway of course (I’m sure the women who will be victimized by overturning Roe won’t have that luxury)...



...and kudos to the Second Thought guy for stepping in front of the camera to give us an intro to socialism, and it’s not what you think (re, Stalinist apparatchiks...as usual, lots of important history in these clips, including Salvador Allende in Chile...kind of lost a bit IMO is more of the reason why Nixon/Kissinger intervened in that country on behalf of Augusto Pinochet...yes, there was a foreign policy component, but more than anything, it was to defeat the socialist improvements under Allende – this is discussed in this great book, and another example of this country screwing over a people-powered government is here)...



...and I know JT is coming to Allentown on 6/27; not sure if tickets are still available, but hopefully they are.

Tuesday Stuff

David Doel tells us about the protests at the homes of SCOTUS justices “I Like Beer” Kavanaugh and Hangin’ Judge JR (and it looks like "Strip Search Sammy" is getting his "time in the barrel" also as noted here...and Biden is wrong on criticizing the protests, as is Begala and Harwood of course...what the hell do you expect when the SCOTUS puts up fencing to keep out protestors? Gee, ya’ think they expect people to be pissed about this? And of course, the lightning speed with which our elected representatives moved on this shouldn’t be surprising, and for the record, I’m saying that through clenched teeth – it sure would be nice if the same metaphorical fire were lit under these U.S. Senate cretins to ensure the safety and privacy of women’s health care...and gee, now the cops are policing people making chalk drawings in front of the home of "disappointed" Collins? Gee, what chronological age is the Maine senator? 12?).

And speaking of protests on this subject, let's not forget this...



Update: Jamelle Bouie gets it (here).

Update 5/11/22: And three guesses how #MaseratiManchin voted here, and the first two don't count.

And by the way, this is being reported as “Senate fails to vote” or “Senate fails to pass” or “U.S. Senate Democrats Fail...” This is typically disingenuous corporate media framing, but I realize that shouldn’t be a surprise.

The goddamn bill was blocked by U.S. Senate Republicans and that Democratic dirty energy criminal from West Virginia. Try reporting it straight for a change!

...and as indicated in the prior clip, the wingnuts want corporatism to run amok while any notion of government providing any service for anyone but the uber rich is thoroughly destroyed, but above and beyond that, they also want anything having to do with the right to privacy to be gutted as well, and that means they’re also coming for contraception, gay marriage, mixed marriages...you name it (with Tate Reeves of Mississippi being too dumb and/or callous enough to do anything but go along with the program like the empty-headed sycophant he truly is – John and Francesca bring us more)...



...and I thought Mehdi Hasan did a real service here drawing a line from the present thoroughly disgusting moment of screeching corporate activism all the way back to Brown v. Board and the rise of the wingnuts under The Sainted Ronnie R (Hasan covers a lot of important stuff here, but I would have also liked to see the clip of Paul Weyrich saying that he doesn’t want everyone to vote, making a snide “goo goo” remark as he did so... and yeah, good point at the end by author Randall Balmer that LBJ, rightly or wrongly, knew how to wield power, and that skill has largely escaped current Dems on Capitol Hill – Hasan also speaks with author Anthea Butler)...



...and Brian Tyler Cohen does a deep dive into Lex Luthor Scott’s 11-point plan to basically turn this country into a corpocracy and make sure government provides absolutely nothing for anybody or anyone who needs it...yes, I know this is a recording, but it bears repeating (and you'd have to be a stone cold moron to trust one word coming out of the mouth of Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao)...



...and Sam and Emma tell us about Steve Schmidt, former Repug political operative and advisor to the 2008 John McCain for President campaign, going off on McCain’s daughter Meghan recently because she liked a tweet alleging that Schmidt was a pedo, and that would be enough to make me go off too (and I have to admit that I blamed Schmidt for Sarah Palin, and apparently I was wrong...sorry about that, though I guess that also depends on who you talk to – I pretty much agree with Sam’s analysis that Schmidt has his own issues too...and yeah, it figures that Meghan McCain would pose in front of her dad’s headstone with a copy of her book, which was crass in the extreme as they discuss...apparently the book sales tanked – c’est dommage)...



...and it’s too nice of a day in these parts to have a brooding, melancholy tune – how about something a little upbeat to help us keep carrying on with the good fight, as it were?

Monday Stuff

Caroline Johnson of Rebel HQ brings us the latest anti-Roe garbage (though she does get in a word on Catholics for Choice)...so, it does look like Almost Silent Clarence Thomas is pretty much telling everybody to shut up and deal with it (here – funny that his wife didn’t feel that way about the November ’20 election), with Amy Coney Island Baby Barrett also telling everyone we need to overturn Roe because we need to replenish our "domestic supply of infants," or whatever that noise was (here – I could possibly take that seriously if the “R” party gave a damn about the child after he/she is born, which they really don’t of course), with Barrett’s remark to me being the 2.0 version of that “human capital stock” garbage from Trumper Kevin Hassett about two years ago, as noted here...



..and Ali Velshi tells us about wingnut state rep Susan DeLemus in New Hampshire and her recent outburst against the protest in response to the leaked Roe ruling, along with the rest of Repugs being quiet, hoping it will go away (and the 4 Dem U.S. Senate candidates – Warnock, Hassan, Kelly and Cortez Masto – speaking up against Alito and his band of thugs on the High Court...about DeLemus, I can tell you that, having visited New Hampshire, it’s a beautiful state, though it is utterly chock full of wingnuts)...



...and David Doel tells us about this lunatic named Andrew Wilhoite who recently won his primary election in Indiana even though he is currently in jail...yeah, this is horrible and ridiculous, but to me, the problem here is more with Indiana election law since there were 3 open seats and Wilhoite was one of the 3 Repugs who basically won by default since no Dems ran...but the fact that Wilhoite got 60 votes anyway is beyond disgusting...great advice by Doel at the end aimed at the Dems – “throw your name in” indeed...



...and because idiot TX guv Greg Abbott created such an utter cluster at border crossings recently, it looks like “the land of the yellow rose” is going to lose out on construction of an international rail line with Mexico, with the job going to New Mexico instead...just say “oops” and get out – Yasmin Khan explains...



...and cutting right to the chase, it should be pointed out that billionaires pay more in taxes under Dems, and they pay a hell of a lot less while the rest of us get it in the metaphorical neck when the insurrection party is calling the shots...



...and happy 60th birthday to Dave Gahan of Depeche Mode.