Saturday Stuff

This “Against All Enemies” segment from Meidas Touch goes after “Moms for Liberty”; Ken Harbaugh interviews Air Force vet Amanda Weinstein, who is also co-host of the Suburban Women Problem podcast (didn’t know these MFL lunatics were tied to the Oathkeepers and the Proud Boys, but no, that doesn’t surprise me either...more here)...



...and when it comes to threats against American democracy, one of the biggest we face right now IMO is that Republican U.S. Senate idiot Tommy Tuberville, who is the reason why no one is currently in charge of the Marine Corps for the first time in 164 years...



...and turning to a more commercial domestic enemy (less dramatic I’ll admit, but an enemy all the same), it turns out that “Skank of America” was forced to pay $250 million for violating Consumer Financial Protection Bureau law since 2012 by tricking consumers into paying for accounts that they didn’t authorize...and yeah, that amount is chump change compared to what they rake in overall...goes to show once more why the CFPB is an absolutely tremendous federal watchdog agency, largely the brainchild of Elizabeth Warren as Ana and Cenk tell us (Richard Cordray deserves credit as well), and it also shows why the wingnuts absolutely hate the agency so fiercely for looking out for consumers...



...and in this “rogues gallery” post where I end up call out a bunch of bad actors, Mike Figueredo (not him) tells us about the Michigan hairdresser who won’t serve trannies now because of that horrible SCOTUS ruling...I’m tempted to ask when this nonsense will ever end, but I’m not sure it will now...if Monty Python were still around (all the members anyway), they’d probably do a bit with a store owner (in a “creative business” of course) who only serves gay men on every third Tuesday, lesbians on Thursdays if it’s raining, trannies on Mondays at the end of the month in a leap year, Muslims on a Friday if the Thursday before is a full moon, etc...that seems to be where we’re headed with this madness (mildly NSFW/H)...and a bit of karma is here...



...and when it comes to SCOTUS corruption, Jesse Dollemore tells us that just because Sonia Sotomayor is on Team “D,” that doesn’t mean that she should get a pass either; apparently, her staff pressured colleges and universities to buy her books, including one for kids I believe...no, this doesn’t rise to Alito or Thomas levels of malfeasance, but as Jesse says, bad is bad, regardless of who we’re talking about...



...and Thom Hartmann gives us a wretched COVID history lesson, with The Lancet saying that 500K people in this country died unnecessarily (Combover Caligula and Wonder Boy Jared thought it would be an effective political strategy to force black and brown people back to work and blame blue states for it of course)...



...and I’m not sure that it gets more ridiculous than it does with this story about the Trump-themed burger restaurant in Texas of course, as Ben Gleib tells us...because early onset diabetes and a cholesterol count through the ceiling is what freedumb is all about, you godless commie lib!...



...and here’s another summer tune to ease us into the weekend...please be careful in the heat.

Thursday Stuff (updates)

David Shuster of Rebel HQ tells us that Bo-Bo Boebert of the CO-03 district in the U.S. House believes that she’s doing God’s work, or some such nonsense, with a camera filter to try and accentuate her teeth and skin tone, as if that could somehow hide the “Helter Skelter” look in her eyes (a timely ref I guess in light of this)...more idiocy from the allegedly “godly” Boebert is here, claiming that “No Malarkey Joe” was prez in March ’20 (uh, no), as well as her fixation on public urination in DC here; Boebert alleged that DC city councilman Charles Allen approved it as a non-criminal offense...not a big surprise I know to point out that Boebert was, as usual, utterly wrong...Boebert also lied about missing her vote on raising the debt ceiling as noted here – I seem to recall that the Bible has something to say about bearing false witness (and to do something about Boebert, click here)...



Update 7/18/23: Stay classy, Bo-Bo (here).

...and Jesse Dollemore tells us that Mike Lindell’s company My Pillow is undergoing a restructuring or reorganization or whatever (but don’t you DARE say liquidation, you godless lib), and of course Lindell is STILL railing about 2020 election fraud, which I guess he’ll be doing into infinity (more here)...



...and Mike Papantonio and Farron Cousins tell us that somebody is suing Red Roof Inn for allowing human trafficking to occur at their property, allegedly of course (the “we’ll leave the light on for you” place, and I’m sure they did in this instance), and apparently there are PFAS chemicals in freshwater fish...oh, jolly – ugh...there aren’t too many stories that make me just want to go back to bed, crawl up into a ball and basically do nothing, but this is one of them I have to admit...



...and Sam and Emma of The Majority Report tell us that it looks like UPS and the Teamsters may be getting ready to strike, along with maybe a SAG actor’s work stoppage (and good point by Emma about how, if we just paid workers higher wages, it would save the government $$ in terms of fewer workers needing assistance...so yeah, if conservatives actually cared about fiscal prudence instead of just punching down and punishing people who aren’t campaign contributors, they would realize that – fat chance with that one, I know)...



...and gee, it looks like poor, misunderstood Almost Silent Clarence Thomas of the SCOTUS just wants to be rich, dontcha know, as Lawrence O’Donnell tells us; why can’t the media and those snotty libs just leave Thomas alone while he continues to labor under the apparently unbearable burden of his Yale law degree...snark mode off (and I’ve heard of Christmas in July, but this is ridiculous)...



Update 8/6/23: I think, at this point, it may be a matter of trying to figure out which megadonor HASN’T paid off Thomas (here).

Update 8/10/23: Nothing but a goddamn crook (here).

...and I’m chastising myself a bit because I’m pretty late with acknowledging the passing of Peter Nero of the Philly Pops, who (as the obits have reminded us) often played the piano with one hand and conducted the orchestra with the other...truly another legend has left us.

Wednesday Stuff

Farron Cousins tells us in this clip about the revelation from former Trumper John Kelly that Our Treasonous Orange Pustule tried to use the IRS to target this enemies, because of course (GREAT point by Cousins about how only a mobbed-up *president like the Gropenfuhrer would think that the IRS investigating you is the worst possible fate for your alleged misdeeds)...



...and I know the stuff with Alabama U.S. Senatorial mistake Tommy Tuberville is a little past the news cycle, but I thought Beau made a good point here, namely that, by bailing on the whole “advise and consent” thing, the ex-football coach who quit on his team (going from Mississippi to Auburn) is handing more power to the executive branch...anybody who voted for this intellectual termite over Doug Jones should be made to wear ashes and sack cloth for an indeterminate period of time...and more (believe it or not) is here...



...and Ana and Cenk of TYT discuss goofball Dem Mayor Eric Adams of NYC comparing a tenants’ rights activist to a plantation owner (and the woman Adams attacked is a Holocaust survivor...just say “oops” and get out, and when I say that, I mean GET OUT OF BEING THE DAMN MAYOR!)...



...and John and Jayar bring us this Oklahoma superintendent named Ryan Walters, who proceeds to faceplant over the Tulsa race massacre, creating some utterly ridiculous straw man argument that, because we’re talking about a race riot, we’re allegedly telling white kids that they’re guilty merely because of the color of their skin, which, as John sez, ISN’T ACTUALLY A THING!...yeah Walters sure is trying to build up a national Repug Party profile, probably for a run at federal office (more Walters idiocy is here and here)...



...well, for an example of government working the right way, Chris Hayes tells us about Wisconsin Dem guv Tony Evers, who managed to secure public school funding in his state for the next 400 years, and PA’s own Dem guv Josh Shapiro, who used a line item veto to get rid of public funding for charter schools (Shapiro was initially wrong to support that I’ll admit, though it might have been a gambit to get the budget through; either way, I hope those who initially dumped on him over the charter schools will give him credit for doing the right thing now)...



...and I don’t know if I’m running out of time or not, but I DO know that this is a cool new video.

Tuesday Stuff

When it comes to “BIdenomics,” I would say that the verdict is in, as The Lincoln Project reminds us (and more from Professor Krugman on the Biden job boom is here)...



...and as a bit of a “compare and contrast” exercise, Brian Tyler Cohen tells us that the Repug Party in a few state organizations – whoopsie! – appears to be running out of money, mainly because wealthy donors won’t fork over any dough given that the party still has the “Trump taint,” if you will...and I LOVE the fact that, in all of Cohen’s videos apparently, he rightly proclaims all of the good stuff the Dems have accomplished under Biden...if the national Dem party could find their metaphorical butt with one set of metaphorical hands, THEY WOULD BE DOING THAT TOO!!! And it’s pretty sad when Mike “I Can’t Be Alone In A Room With A Woman Who Isn’t My Wife” Pence is actually the voice of reason on preserving our elections; yeah, in that event, you’re pretty far off the deep end...



...and I would argue that another reason for the money problems with the “party of Lincoln” have to do with those funds instead going to Dems by default given the utterly awful work by our “shadow docket” SCOTUS (but the Dems can’t take that for granted either)...though, to be honest (and I hate to point this out), the other side always ends up getting their dark money from their sugar daddies when they need it (with that bribery made legal by our corporatist theocrats in robes)...more here...



...and Beau gives us another typically good commentary on the U.S. sending cluster munitions to Ukraine...as usual, he cuts through the BS on this (very unlikely that these will be used against civilians) – still, I found myself thinking “why the $#@! doesn’t he just come out and say how objectively awful these things are?,” and then he did that very thing at the end of the clip...



...and Ana and Cenk of TYT tell us about a North Carolina real estate developer who is trying to mandate patriotism on the part of all homeowners in his project...yes, I’d like to see the American flag fly more often in front of homes on holidays, but it’s wrong to try and impose that sort of thing IMO (and I have to admit that Ana is 100% right about HOAs – given some of the recent background noise with these two, I’m going to keep them on a short metaphorical leash for now, but I thought this was a good commentary...more here)...



...and I'm in a bit of a mood for another summer tune, so here it is.

Monday Stuff

David Pakman brings us the video of the loony bitch in South Carolina who sez Biden should be “taken to the train station,” and she is just chortling over that apparently, along with these other mental defectives in the Trump cult including that 11-year-old girl...yeah, I don’t like saying that about a kid either, but what other conclusion is there?...



...and David Doel tells us about Ron #DeathSantis of Flori-DUUH! and his “war on woke” tanking, along with the latest anti-trans TYT nonsense, with Ana and Cenk getting PO’ed at “trans activists” for supposedly doing their part in losing elections, when in fact, as Doel points out, attacking trans people most definitely was NOT a winning strategy for the “party of Lincoln” based on last year’s midterms...I didn’t see the whole TYT clip, I must confess...sad to see that platform building such a great brand and now apparently burning it all down, though I may have some videos from them in the future, but not if they’re going to find ways to work in BS propaganda (and GREAT advice by Doel on why the utterly clueless national Dems should focus on Gen-Z voters, instead of these mythical boomer unicorn Repug-leaning disillusioned Trumpsters in an Ohio diner somewhere)...



...and Mike Figueredo discusses gay conservatives who feel betrayed by #DeathSantis...and why the #@$! would a gay person support this guy to begin with, I ask myself (a little lost in the back-and-forth between all of the groups noted in this clip, I have to add) – to me, this is yet another issue where the national Democratic Party should show a freaking spine and say, “You know what? We’re against ANY group of people being oppressed for ANY made-up reason, and we unequivocally support LGBTQ rights for that reason.” – and yes, I know individual pols like Tammy Baldwin are commendably doing that (also, I can think of no group that has a more apropos acronym than GAG, as Figueredo sez)...OK, I’ll stop beat up Dems in this post now...NSFW/H...



...and Jesse Dollemore brings us a great example of pushing back on BS wingnut talking points from Abby Phillip of CNN against this John Pierce character, who apparently represented a 1/6 miscreant named Kenneth Thomas who (as the clip tells us) was found guilty for his criminal antics...



...and I’ll admit that Lawrence O’Donnell is a bit ponderous here in his clip on the fall of our criminal SCOTUS, citing a "crisis of faith," but I think he makes some truly important points and provides vital historical context (and Elena Kagan, in particular, pulled no punches in her dissent on the student debt relief ruling, nor should she of course)...



...and it looks like there’s a bit of legal difficulty involved in settling the estate of the “queen of soul” based on this – hope it gets worked out for all concerned.