Wednesday Stuff

Joy Reid talks with author Mark Whitaker along with Fernand Amandi and Brandon Wolf (survivor of the Pulse nightclub shooting) on Ron #DeathSantis making it easier to get a gun in Flori-DUUH! than to read a book (indeed, like Disneyland, but in Hell...GREAT job by Reid to point out the horrible legislation and measures #DeathSantis is trying and has tried to pass while everyone is distracted by his terrible “culture wars” cruelty as the lead-in to the Amandi segment)...



...and sticking with #DeathSantis-stan, Kyle Kulinski tell us about #DopeyMcForehead Matt Gaetz wanting a work requirement for people getting SNAP benefits and Medicaid, with Kyle making the almost-obvious point that, if they were working, they PROBABLY WOULDN’T EVEN NEED the benefit in the first damn place...by the way, do you want to know how Gaetz came to have the means to buy himself into a government job and engage in predation of young girls? Well, his old man runs Vitas Healthcare, which is a corporation (let’s not forget that!) in the hospice care business, and it probably isn’t surprising to point out that Gaetz Sr. was accused of Medicaid fraud (here)...



...and Ana and Cenk of TYT tell us that “Imeach Biden” Lauren Boebert went to the floor of the U.S. House to complain about DirecTV dropping Newsmax (which, at the moment, is the “outrage du jour” among the wingnuts as also noted here...yeah, “socialism” for everything I want as far as they’re concerned, and rugged, predatory capitalism for everything and everybody else)...



...and Thom Hartmann asks if you want a side of liver cancer with your fries in this segment about a 2022 analysis by Consumer Reports of food packaging for fast food showing the presence of PFAS everywhere, apparently (terrific)...Our Ochre Abomination’s emasculation of the EPA, as Tom explains, is one reason for the proliferation of these deadly chemicals, and believe it or not, the influence of the U.S. companies who don’t want to do a damn thing about PFAS is yet another odious consequence of Citizens United...



...and as a tribute to Barrett Strong, I included his hit “Money” yesterday, but to do him justice, I should also include at least one of the many Motown hits he authored or co-authored, mainly for The Temptations, including this one...



...and here is another “green” tune in preparation for the Iggles vs. Chiefs in Super Bowl 57.

Tuesday Stuff

I know this is a little old, but I didn’t want to let it slip through the cracks – Francesca and John talk about Our Treasonous Tiny-Handed Former Dictator-In-Chief and the tweets from sportswriter Rick Reilly about #45 cheating on the greens...”I have only the best scores...many people tell me how strenuous it is to play golf as well as I do.”...



...and switching gears a bit to actual (proposed) legislation, Lawrence O’Donnell speaks with Dem U.S. Senator Jon Tester of Montana about the latter’s strenuous (and commendable) opposition to the Repugs’ utterly awful idea of a 30 percent national sales tax, a bill which would have the thoroughly odious two-fer of sticking the “99 percent” and cutting the metaphorical legs from under the IRS (I don’t completely buy into Tester’s ridiculous “the Dems have become the coastal elites party and I’m from the heartland” framing at times, but he’s spot-on here)...



Update: More good work by Tester here.

...and I am sooooo glad to see this segment from Mehdi Hasan where he speaks with political scientist (always thought that was an oxymoron, actually) Loch Johnson and lawyer Barbara McQuade about the “party of Lincoln” and their nonsense on Gym Jordan supposedly reviving the Church Committee from the ‘70s (yeah, when “weaponization” is already in the title of your committee, you’ve pretty much given away the game...kudos to McQuade for mentioning COINTELPRO)...

via GIPHY

...and Mike Figueredo tells us that Ruben Gallego raised $1 million in about 24 hours! against “Curtsy Kyrsten” as the presumptive Dem U.S. Senate candidate (unless somebody ELSE enters the primary) from AZ...it’s going to be a fight all right, especially with that loon Kari Lake in the picture (as Figueredo says, there’s no path to victory for the “independent,” only to screw things up for Gallego, which I’m sure is what Sinema’s funders want...mildly NSFW/H)...



Update 3/23/23: "Old dudes eating Jell-O," huh? More utterly contemptible behavior from this unfortunate accident of an alleged human being (here).

..and this clip from More Perfect Union tells us something we probably already know, and that is the “Republic” Party wanting to cripple Social Security and Medicare by holding the debt ceiling hostage (I admire the idea behind this video of getting politicians to promise to leave Social Security alone, but the game they’ll play is that they want to make it “discretionary” spending as opposed to “mandatory” spending, which means it would be up for renewal every year if it were discretionary, which means that it would eventually be cut one day for real...and yeah, I know what Mango Mussolini has to say on this subject, but I gave up believing one word out of his mouth long ago, when it comes to golf, this or anything else)...



...and Beau gives us his take on the same subject (not the party of personal responsibility, but the party of grievance of course...slogans are indeed still there, though...”they don’t want to represent, they want to rule”...I would only add to Beau’s analysis by saying that the “R” bunch hates ANYTHING to do with government that is successful and popular...Dubya already tried his own privatization of Social Security scam, for example, and he got his butt handed to him, you might say)...



...and RIP Motown legend Barrett Strong, with his signature tune...

...and speaking of sports and “greens,” allow me to show a bit of pride as a somewhat lapsed Philly sports fan with the news of the Iggles facing the Kansas City Chiefs in the Super Bowl (LVII I think); when this happened five years ago, I presented some “green” songs for a bit of support, so I’d like to do the same thing again now, starting with this tune.

Monday Stuff

Farron Cousins tells us about students in Flori-DUUUH! commendably getting ready to sue Guv Ron #DeathSantis over trying to ban an African American studies course (more nonsense from the original “monkey this up” guy...interesting explanation of the college exemption here, and I'm also sure Benjamin Crump will take no prisoners)...



Update 1/31/23: Welcome to Fascist #DeathSantis-Stan, where you can be ruthlessly punished by the state for reading the "wrong" book (here).

Update 2/1/23: Well, the College Board caved - sigh (here).

Update 2/12/23: A better response here.

...and on the subject of censorship, Jesse Dollemore discusses The Daily Wire using the Bible to justify book bans (didn’t know anything about this Michael Knowles character before, but of course he starts out with his conclusion and tries to fit the facts to support his utterly specious argument...have to admit that I also didn’t know about this Greg Locke insanity until now...mildly NSFW/H)...



...and Chris Hayes tells us about the Repug-led U.S. House’s witch hunt committees (God almighty, do I want to see both Trump and Barr wearing orange jump suits...Hayes does a terrific job here IMO in laying out how absolutely futile it was to investigate alleged wrongdoing into the investigation of Our Ochre Abomination and why The Roger Ailes BS Factory should NEVER, EVER be trusted to report any story straight whatsoever)...



Update: Good related stuff on what a criminal Barr truly is here.

...and John and Brett Erlich of The Damage Report bring us this week’s horrendous lies from “George Santos,” this time about making an alleged joke about killing Jewish and black people (sometimes I can’t even...)...



Update 2/9/23: Stealing from the Amish is pretty low even for this miscreant (here).

...and I thought Beau had some good advice on not taking the cops’ word when they try to hide what really went on by using what you could call mushy language (citing the Tyre Nichols case of course)...



...and RIP Tom Verlaine of Television.

Saturday Stuff

Every once in a while, reality intrudes and my posting gets interrupted, and that’s what happened over the last few days; that is probably the best way to sum things up...and of course, now we get back to this with the news of the awful beating and murder of Tyre Nichols in Memphis (here)...I have a feeling that Cenk is right about this type of behavior generally being rewarded, though it obviously went way too far in this case, and I’m sure these murdering cops have done this stuff in the past also...kudos to the Memphis police chief for moving right away on these killers so they won’t end up being churned through whatever system the cops have so they’ll land on another force somewhere...We’re looong past the point where we need to move forward on some kind of structural reform when it comes to the cops, but the minute anybody breathes a word about that of course, Fix Noise and idiot Repug politicians start caterwauling about the Dems trying to “defund the police” or something, and then the “D” party gets a case of the willies and nothing gets done (link to the TYT video is here - it's age-restricted so I can't embed it...of course, it would be nice if more boomer-ish people and slightly younger in the suburbs would join us in trying to rein in the cops, but they probably don't even see an issue that needs to be addressed).

Meanwhile, Mike Figueredo of The Humanist Report tells us that Ron #DeathSantis wants to jail teachers and librarians who don’t comply with book bans - he also bans an African American studies course in high school, and this garbage isn’t happening in just Flori-DUUUH, but other Repug-run states also (what country am I living in again?) - and I would call giving #DeathSantis an award for ANYTHING an absolutely tone-deaf move by the Union League of Philadelphia as noted here)...



...in response, though, I want to present this TYT clip of a guy at a Central Bucks School District school board meeting (and boy, has THAT district gone around the bend too!) reading comments from a Yale professor blasting the wingnuts in charge of the school board (more here)...



...and David Pakman tells us that, apparently, voters in the district of “George Santos” have buyers’ remorse...makes me recall that quote where Santos said he would resign if 142K people wanted him out...high school students are interviewed, and the Republican student spoke out against Santos more than anyone else...



...and it looks like “15 Votes” Kevin McCarthy managed to get Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell tossed from the House Intelligence Committee, but he quite rightly is running into a roadblock with trying to get Ilhan Omar removed from the House Foreign Affairs Committee (and of course, McCarthy doesn’t answer the question about Santos on the Intel committee because there IS no justification for it)...



...well, I'm glad to see that Swalwell isn't taking this lying down, you might say..



...and happy belated 70th birthday to Lucinda Williams.

Wednesday Stuff

The Lincoln Project (and once more, yes, I know what they are) give Marjorie Traitor Greene the treatment she merits here (and more is here – what a mental patient this woman is...and yeah, she’s pretty much Edgar Bergen to Kev’s Charlie McCarthy; you can Google it...mildly NSFW/H)...



...and David Doel tells us that classified docs were also found now at the home of former VP and white bread albino model Mike Pence, after he did his whole “tsk tsk tsk” thing against Number 46 for that infraction...for the umpteenth time, as Doel says, the issue with Biden and even Pence isn’t that they refused to turn the docs over after they were caught, as the Gropenfuhrer did for eight freaking months after he had been told to come clean by the DOJ...



...and Jesse Dollemore tells us about former Trumpster CIA head and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (who received the coveted Mike Pompeo endorsement for his book as noted here) made some comments about slain journalist Jamal Khashoggi that were pretty cowardly and disgusting...I hope Khashoggi’s widow sues Pompeo’s fat ass (also mildly NSFW/H...it looks like Pompeo will get some publicity for that ridiculous book of his, but in the scummiest way possible...and yeah, I’m not “Ridin’ with Biden” by a long shot on this story concerning our “dear friends” the Saudis – definitely caving here, and not a good look by any means)...



...and on the legal front, Ari Melber tells us that Dominion isn’t playing around in their defamation lawsuit against Fix Noise, making Rupert The Pirate feel the heat also along with that network’s personalities, for lack of a better word (a lot of pre-trail maneuvering at this point...as Melber says, the trial is slated for April...and as I alluded to earlier, like everyone else, I’m STILL waiting for our alleged media geniuses to find out from Our Treasonous Tiny-Handed Former Preznit WHAT THE HELL HE WAS DOING WITH THE DOCS AT MAR-A-LAGO THAT HE WOULDN’T GIVE BACK!!)...



...and the network on trial noted in the prior clip (including Tuckums) has helped to propagate the particularly scurrilous lie about Damar Hamlin of the Buffalo Bills as noted here; namely, that getting “the jab” contributed to his near-fatal collapse on the football field...Trae Crowder discusses that and more (also mildly NSFW/H)...



...and happy 65th birthday to Gary Tibbs of Roxy Music.

Tuesday Stuff

Farron Cousins tells us about the results of a recent poll indicating that approval of the SCOTUS has fallen to an all-time low, though 75 percent of Repugs approve, of course (Cousins’ history of when people should have started caring about the High Court of Hangin’ Judge JR is spot-on IMO)...



...and Ben Gleib of Rebel HQ tells us that Matt Walsh continues to be an utterly selfish prick (re, breaking the “pay it forward” chain at a drive-thru food place, apparently...and how pathetic is that?)...

via GIPHY

......and David Doel tells us that Dem U.S. House Rep Ruben Gallego is IN! against “Curtsy Kyrsten” (and I wouldn’t say that “nothing” got done over the last two years, but it was very much ripped apart by Manchinema...I hope Sen. Mark Kelly makes an ad with Gallego and they give each other a “high five”)...



Update: The last thing Sinema deserves is a reward, but I stil thought this post had some good ideas.

...and this clip from More Perfect Union tells us about workers in Cedar Rapids, Iowa fighting back against Ingredion, a huge multinational food manufacturer, and they just won a new contract with concessions from management including a pay raise...kudos...



...and I now give you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” from 1/24/13...under the heading of corporate bad behavior, I present a clip of President Kennedy going off against U.S. Steel and their pals in a press conference from April 11, 1962...imagine a U.S. president or ANY politician from this country saying words like these now (more here)...



...and Warren Zevon would have been 76.

Monday Stuff

This NBC News report tells us about yet another mass casualty event from gun violence in this country, this time in Monterey Park, CA (and apparently, another one was planned by this lunatic who the cops think was the shooter before he killed himself...one of the reasons why the gun lobby and their bought-and-paid-for politicians don’t want to change this wretched status quo is because gun sales go up after insanity like this happens – more here)...



Update: You've got to be freaking kidding me! (here).

...and yesterday marked what would have been the 50th anniversary of Roe v. Wade...



...and Bernie Sanders tries cutting through the gobbledygook of media and political BS (including Big Stupid Head “I Like Underage Girls” Matt Gaetz, along with "Both Sides" Smerky, who are doing nothing but trying to confuse the issue) and shine a light on the games the “party of Lincoln” is playing over entitlements (which we have paid into for our entire working lives, let’s not forget)...



...and lest we forget about “George Santos,” David Doel tells us about his escapades as a drag queen (which he denies of course) and more on that bogus animal charity...



...and Mike Figueredo of The Humanist Report presents a segment to prove that the arrest of climate activist Greta Thunberg in Germany wasn’t staged – frightening in a way to see a government basically bulldoze an entire town for extraction purposes, but it’s only slightly worse than to see a town’s water supply poisoned by fracking...



...and I usually don’t pay attention to every little legal dustup with Our Ochre Abomination since I think it’s loooong past time for him to be wearing an orange jump suit, but I think this recent development that Jesse Dollemore discusses is particularly noteworthy, and that is the $1 million fine #45 and his lawyers were hit with by a federal judge (a “sophisticated mastermind” according to Judge Middlebrooks? Are we talking about the same ketchup-throwing life form?)...



...and Beau tells us that the Biden DOJ recently (and quite correctly) told the incoming House Judiciary Committee to, in essence, go take a flying leap (which I’m sure they’ll go wailing about to Fix Noise and simpatico wingnut media...the House Committee I mean)...



...and I hope you’re all in the mood for a little Monday anarchy – please don’t try this at home.

Friday Stuff

Ana K. of TYT brings us the story of Scottsdale AZ cutting off the water supply to nearby Rio Verde due to a drought, though this ultimately goes back to freaking climate change, people (there are times when I think TYT gets a little strident against Dems, and I respect that that’s their opinion even though sometimes they’re wrong, but in this case Ana does a great job of connecting the dots between deregulation/developers getting politicians to rewrite the laws to favor them and screw over homeowners in places that are pretty much nothing but deserts at this point, even though agri-businesses NEVER have a problem with getting water, and neither do golf courses apparently)...



...and Kyle Kulinski tells us about a report in The Daily Mail on a crackdown within Saudi Arabia by Mohammed Bone Saw based on U.S. intel from the CIA after Jared Kushner got $2 billion...and yeah, I know we’re talking about the Daily Mail, but really, would this be surprising if it were true, as Kyle says? And note to Kyle, by the way...Burisma was a nothing burger; if someone finds out something contrary on that, I'll update this post for sure...



...and Farron Cousins tells us about Repug U.S. House Rep Rick Allen of Georgia (mentioned here also), who says we should raise the retirement age because people want to work longer (and good job to mention the Social Security privatization scheme under Dubya)...there are many responses to this a-hole, but one is to point out that, if you actually took the time to watch the Thom Hartmann video yesterday, you would know that that is an utter lie (and Allen is worth about $52 mil, as noted here)...



...and last week’s Second Thought video tells us why social democracies won’t work (and yes, I’m a week behind again) – “Like other capitalist countries, in order for the (profit) line to consistently go up, wealth needs to be extracted from poorer countries.”...and I’d forgotten about the stuff with Francois Mitterand, but yeah, that’s a cautionary lesson for sure (and I say that DEFINITELY as someone not in love with capitalism by any means)...and the stuff about Sweden is absolutely horrifying...he performs such a service with these videos IMO; I hope he’s able to stay afloat despite what I’m sure are efforts to demonetize him in response...



...and if you knew anything at all about Philadelphia-area music (or popular music over the last 50 years or so generally, actually) and you mentioned The Geator, that could only mean Jerry Blavat, and I honestly don’t know how you can sum him up in a single phrase...disk jockey, TV personality, archivist, ambassador of sorts for all kinds of genres of popular music...doo-wop, soul, R&B, pop – tributes are pouring in of course, as well they should be (here)...and I know there were allegations that he knew people in organized crime; you can say that about a few entertainers actually, and it me, it doesn’t diminish their work...

...and the news about The Geator comes on the heels of the news of the passing of David Crosby, which is another musical body blow of sorts...I guess, if the reports are to be believed, he could be difficult at times (you could say that about just about anybody I’m sure), but he was much beloved also of course, and as noted here, he was nobody’s fool...here are three tunes as a tribute.

Thursday Stuff

Mike Figueredo tells us about the antics from Manchinema at Davos recently...I thought the “high five” thing was metaphorical when I first heard about it, but I should have known that these two insufferable scumwads would literally do it, and leave it to Sinema to wear that weird wool stole thing (and OF COURSE Chris Coons was involved also...and gee, how freaking clueless is CBS “News” anyway...Edward R. Murrow must be spinning in his grave)...



...and of course, given that we have a Dem in the White House and the “party of Lincoln” in control of one of the chambers of Congress, there is all of this pearl-clutching going on and looking for the fainting couch over “THE DEBT THAT IS STEALING FROM OUR KIDS!” or some variation thereof...well, do you want to know WHAT ELSE adds to the debt? Corporations not paying their damn taxes, that’s what, and Kyle Kulinski tells us that 34% of profitable corporations paid $0 in the first year that the tax law from Our Treasonous Orange Pestilence went into effect in 2018...



...and Jayar Jackson tells us about a lady working for a company that laid her off who made a TikTok video about it...I’ve definitely been in her position and it sucks more than you can imagine, but when it happened to me, I got the word from this a-hole head of quality assurance at the main office in MA, and the local HR rep who helped me did the best she could, and I didn’t blame her for it...oh, and by the way, I was also expected to train the offshore person about how to do my job as a condition of getting my severance; at least I had a couple of months to look for something before I got kicked to the curb (and when it comes to layoffs, a related item is here...and that second clip looks like it’s right out of Glengarry Glen Ross, but it’s from some rally or something from some outfit called The Elliott Group, which I guess does all of this sales motivational BS...wonder how much a company paid these clowns to scare their employees like that?)...



...and sticking with (sticking it to?) corporations, Robert Reich tells us The Truth About Corporate Subsidies (and yeah, a lot of the subsidizing instead of regulating started under The Sainted Ronnie R, in case you were wondering – big surprise, huh?)...



...and Thom Hartmann discusses Why Inequality Makes Americans Miserable (Thom mentions the Buckley v. Valeo and FNB of Boston v. Bellotti SCOTUS rulings in 1976 and 1978 respectively, along with Citizens United of course in 2010 as the causes of what opened up the metaphorical floodgates in favor of corporations...and three guesses who fought to keep closing the “hedge fund loophole” out of the Inflation Reduction Act, as Thom says? Thom also mentions the Tillman Act against corporations and campaign contributions passed under TR...the intent was good, but Tillman was always difficult to enforce because of the tricks corporations would pay with hiding illegal campaign expenses)...



...and I have to admit that I didn’t know Pittsburgh had so much soul; have to get over to the other side of the state more often.

Wednesday Stuff

In our latest example of clueless U.S. House Republicans, we have Anna Paulina (“Taxation Is Theft”) Luna of Flori-DUUUH! basically saying that we should spend for defense and apparently not much else (which would eliminate her salary too, something she’s obviously too clueless to realize, as David Pakman tells us)...



Update 2/11/23: Just call her "Mrs. George Santos" I guess (here - more on him shortly).

Update 2/18/23: And apparently, at least one other U.S. House Repug is guilty of having an imaginary resume as noted here.

...and I know the whole Chuck Todd/RoJo thing is a couple of days old by now, but I thought I should bring up this clip from Jesse Dollemore anyway...one of the reasons why I avoided this subject is because RoJo is such an utterly contemptible POS who has managed to make a financial killing at taxpayer expense (here), to say nothing of the fact that (as pointed out already by fellow Wisconsin Repug Robert Spindell), Johnson WOULDN’T EVEN BE in the U.S. Senate any more if the ’22 midterm had actually be run fairly without massive voter disenfranchisement in Milwaukee (here)...I may end up saying this for 6 years, but I’ll say it again...Spindell claimed that 37K voters were suppressed, and Rojo won by 27K votes...as for Chuck Todd, yes, give him credit for trying to hold Johnson’s feet to the fire, but RoJo IMMEDIATELY turned into a whiny little bitch as soon as he was called on his BS talking points...if this is supposed to be some kind of a flaming controversy, I think this is actually pretty weak stuff (and wingnut media is, as always, particularly pathetic in giving RoJo his “fainting couch”)...



...and David Doel tells us about the over-focus by our corporate media on the alleged classified docs “scandal” (mildly NSFW/H)...I think this is a pretty good analysis of what the Gropenfuhrer did versus what Biden did, but with all due respect to Jamie Raskin, I don’t think mentioning the 1/6 insurrection was the right way to go here, though he was right to hammer home the fact that Biden and his team have complied and tried to clear this up versus what happened with Our Ochre Abomination at Mar-a-Lago...I honestly don’t know if Biden should run for another term or not; I think his record as president is good enough, and I also don’t believe that this “story” by itself should be a basis for that decision one way or the other...



...and as long as we’re dealing with the legislative branch of our government, I should bring you this clip of Farron Cousins telling us about congressional Democrats introducing the “SANTOS Act,” aimed right at you-know-who (good stuff - and the video is a little amusing, but this is genuinely disgusting)...



...and some caveman attorney general in Alabama named Steve Marshall wants to prosecute women who take abortion pills, even though such prosecution is illegal thus far, even in that state (John and Jayar tell us more – and yes, you can blame Republicans for being horrible bad actors on behalf of the uber-wealthy and nobody else, wanting to persecute anyone who can’t shower them with campaign cash, and you can blame the Dems for not screaming about this the way they should, but here is my question...WHERE THE HELL IS OUR BEYOND-USELESS CORPORATE MEDIA ON THIS STUFF??!! And yes, I know all they care about is the “horse race” and I know they think actual policy that affects real people is BOOOR-ING, but stories like this shouldn’t be covered only by brave local media that may be extinct one day, unfortunately)...



...and kudos to John Fogerty for this - well deserved at last.

Tuesday Stuff

Jesse Dollemore tells us that the U.S. House Republican majority is bringing back smoking in that chamber of Congress (well, to their offices anyway)...to hasten their own extinction I guess (to say nothing of others ingesting second-hand smoke)...what a cunning plan!...



...and I should note that I added that counter on the home page to show how much time there is before we can vote out the ruling clown-car caucus in the U.S. House; I have to tell you that I can’t stomach the thought of the ’24 presidential election...despite that, I’m bringing up this clip of Farron Cousins (nothing against him) pointing out that Flori-DUUUH! Repug guv Ron #DeathSantis apparently is a scared little kitty kat around non-friendly media...wow, what a tough guy!...



...and as long as we're talking about the U.S. House, Mike Figueredo brings us this Repug idiot named Rick Allen in Georgia (of course) who wants to raise the retirement age for Social Security (and I think the clown shoes are a little "on the nose")...



Update 1: Yeah, this sure figures, doesn't it?

...and Rachel Maddow last night brought us the story of Trumper and election denying lunatic Solomon Pena, who is in custody in New Mexico, accused of having a hand in shooting up six homes/offices of Democrats in that state (don’t hold your breath waiting for 45 to decry what this guy allegedly did...how the hell did this guy end up as a Repug nominee for elected office? But then again, I know you can also ask that question about "George Santos")...



Update 2: More here.

Update 3: I have a feeling a lot more "rocks" will get turned over with this Pena guy before too much longer (here).

Update 1/18/23: And why is this not surprising?

...and speaking of bone-headed Republicans, John and Brett Erlich tell us about this Jack Nelsen guy in Idaho comparing women’s reproductive health to cows (here)...umm, don’t let the door hit you on the way out, jackass, though I have to admit that that was halfway decent apology for real...



...and Sam Seder gives us a bit of a Tragical History Tour about Baby Newton Leroy, Tom DeLay and their pals (and I have to admit that I’d forgotten about Bob Livingston too) based on Jake Tapper tossing out a sound bite to shoot down Dana Bash (which was completely true about Dennis Hastert, by the way)...



...and also with a nod to our country’s history over the last 30-40 years or so, Kyle Kulinski discusses a poll telling us that 9 percent fewer Repugs support MLK day as a holiday than when it was signed into law in 1983 (a new “mask off” period indeed...Kyle’s history on MLK Jr. is spot on, BTW...and yes, Dr. King got mad at Dems and liberals, but only because they didn't go far enough to the left, and King was correct to be that way IMO)...



...and with the first clip in mind, I absolutely couldn’t resist this selection (titles scroll by too fast at the end...oh well).

Monday Stuff

David Pakman tells us about Jason Schofield of Troy, NY, who, until recently, was a member of the Rensselaer County Board of Elections; the problem is that Schofield apparently applied for absentee ballots for himself on behalf of 12 already-registered voters, which happens to be real, honest-to-goodness voter fraud, people...and of course he’s a Republican (more here)...



...and here’s another case of it in Iowa, and from the same political party; John, Francesca and Maz Jobrani fill in the details (more here)...



...and Chris Hayes tells us about Robert Spindell Jr., a Repug (of course) member of the Wisconsin Election Commission, who recently bragged about suppressing about 37K fewer votes in Milwaukee, and given that Rojo The Clown won re-election to the U.S. Senate from that state by 27K votes, basically, without that, Mandela Barnes would be a U.S. Senator...



...but now, turning from illegality to mere stupidity, Jayar, Yasmin Khan and Wosny Lambre of TYT tell us about Missouri legislators who are apparently afraid of women exercising their right to “bare arms” (sorry – couldn’t resist...more here)...

...and for MLK day, I think it's appropriate to revisit this speech from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. at Barratt Middle School in Philadelphia on October 26. 1967, with the them of “What Is Your Life’s Blueprint?"....



Update 1: An important note is here (here and here also).

...and this tune is apropos for the holiday also.



Update 2: And oh yeah, there's this...

Update 3: Well said.

Friday Stuff

Trae Crowder tells us about wingnuts losing what little exists of their actual minds over the FAA grounding flights recently and how that, as far as they're concerned, absolutely had to be the fault exclusively of Biden Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and nobody else, and of course those screeching the loudest are using this as another projection festival...an update is here...



...and this TYT Investigates clip shows that the “party of Lincoln” hasn’t learned a damn thing about trying to cram anti-abortion bills down the metaphorical throat of this country...



...and Thom Hartmann tells us what this new U.S. House Committee chaired by Gym Jordan could be up to, basically giving the McCarthy treatment to anyone opposing the treasonous 1/6 insurrectionists, with Hartmann giving us some background on the “Hollywood 10” and potential parallels to now (and as Thom says, who knows what other “fishing expeditions” such a committee could launch, and against who, especially since we’re talking about a character like Jordan)...



...and Mike Figueredo of The Humanist Report discusses the Glacier v. Teamsters case before the “shadow docket” SCOTUS (with a tweet thread by Elie Mystal...cement workers went on strike and the cement hardened in the process, and the company is going after the workers for the cost of the hardened cement...yeah, it’s definitely a “tell” unfortunately that “Strip Search Sammy” Alito and “I Like Beer” Kavanaugh and their pals are involved, trying to take over from the NLRB)....



...and Jesse Dollemore discusses the U.S. House Repugs going after BLM and pride flags – “The Old Glory Only Act”...yeah, I’m surprised this Jeff Duncan character didn’t include a display of a cross burning in the press release from his office announcing this joke of a bill (mildly NSFW/H)...



...and this is probably the most clear-eyed commentary I’ve heard yet on all of the debt ceiling BS gamesmanship from the unruly children in charge of the U.S. House of Representatives from Beau – challenging this nonsense in court based on the precedents Beau sites here is a great idea, and I think the "trillion dollar coin" is another alternative as noted here (and I haven’t said much on the “Biden secret documents” stuff because I don’t think there is a “there” there)...



...and here are two more tunes as a tribute to Jeff Beck.

Thursday Stuff

In this video from More Perfect Union, we learn about Moderna raising the price of the COVID vaccines by about 400 percent and how we, as a result, are getting utterly ripped off as taxpayers (full disclosure: I got the first 2 COVID shots and both of my first two boosters from Moderna and the bivalent from Pfizer...the first booster knocked me on my ass, but I know that, in some cases, that’s what the "jab" is supposed to do)...



...and Chris Hayes brings us the latest source of wingnut umbrage, namely, the utterly preposterous claim that the Biden Administration is coming for our gas stoves...as usual, the issue isn’t the veracity of the talking point, because there isn’t any, but the attempt by the “party of Lincoln” to drive their BS narrative (more on that here)...



...and Ana of TYT brings us more details on the Brett Favre scandal in Mississippi ($5 million for the volleyball arena which we knew about), taking $$$ from the TANF program, which makes it even worse of a slap in the face I know given that we’re talking about the most impoverished state in the country...total cost of the alleged abuse of the program is $70 million – people need to go to prison, and I don’t care if that means Favre too...



Update 2/9/23: In addition to being elitist and nepotistic, this move is also a really stoo-pid legal strategy because it opens the door for all kinds of stuff I’m sure Favre doesn’t want to bring out as part of discovery.

...and John and Yasmin Khan of The Damage Report discuss the protests going on in Brazil in response to the attempts by Jair Bolsonaro and his crowd (including Steve Bannon of course) to overturn a free and fair election...looks like another case of the rich and powerful in this country who are up to their elbows in criminal behavior who may end up skating for it...love to be wrong...



...and in the latest episode of Utterly Clueless Rich White Guys Displaying Their Entitlement, Sam Seder (not Sam) discusses Larry Summers and his analysis that unemployment basically has to go up (despite the fact that we’re at a 50-year low, or maybe because of it - ??) to bring down inflation (which is going down already) and rebuild our economy from COVID, or something (and of course Lars con-vee-niently fails to mention corporate price gouging, as the ocean waves gently lap and foam behind Summers in the background)...



...and I’m planning to include some selections as a tribute to guitar legend Jeff Beck, including this number.

Wednesday Stuff

Ana and Cenk of TYT talk about the Biden Administration notifying the archivist that they accidentally came across some classified docs from something called the Penn Biden Center that they apparently found out about last November...you could say there are YUUUUGGGE! differences between this and what the Gropenfuhrer did (Cenk kind of goes off the rails with the Pelosi/McConnell stuff IMO; not saying he doesn’t have a point, even though you should also consider the legislation and policy differences between them, but I think those remarks belong in another video)...



...and gosh, whaddaya know? “All hat, no cattle” Greg Abbott is now begging for $$ from Biden after the Texas guv’s immigration busing stunts (the number I heard on what Abbott did was $12 million, but I suppose it could have been $20, and I forgot about the cost of getting the National Guard forces from other states involved in this nonsense)...



...and Thom Hartmann speaks with Greg Palast about the “secret history” of the 1/6 insurrection, including a lot of discussion about this Ali Alexander character and his rants about violence coming dated from 1/5/21, when he was in Georgia for the runoffs...I think Brazil and Lula offers a lesson in contrasts at a minimum, given this story and the fact that our DOJ (still under Our Ochre Abomination, I realize on 1/6) basically let everybody go home and put Merrick Garland in the position of having to chase these culprits after the damage was done...



...and I know this item is probably about a week old or more, but I’m still pretty disgusted by it, to the point where I checked up on this Cory Mills character a bit, and I found this clip with Jayar and Rick Strom...yeah, I like the “Radical Left Protestors, Philadelphia” thing in his ad where, of course, you can’t verify who it is he’s referring to (and the “Hillary Clinton Protestors” thing is about what you’d expect I guess from a cave man like Mills)...we’re supposed to just take his word for it...uh huh...and as Jayar correctly notes of course, how con-vee-nient that 1/6 protestors aren’t included in that little clip of his with that rock music soundtrack...yep, this sounds like another case of #DeathSantis gerrymandering a Dem out of existence to make room for this troglodyte...something tells me that somebody is going to get the goods on this guy one day, and he’s going to be in a bad way when that happens...we’ll see...



...and the latest from Second Thought tells us Why Corporations Are Evil, or something (on the “B Corp” certification scam...and good job to go after Salesforce, which has been in the news lately as noted here, but not for good reasons...”Under a capitalist system, you cannot be unprofitable, and that will always take precedence over any concern for social and environmental justice.” and “You can always just ignore a protest when you’re in charge.”...yep)...



...and on this day 100 years ago, insulin was injected for the first time to treat diabetes (here)...makes me think of this tune (a bit of a tangent I realize :-).

Tuesday Stuff

I call this a terrific opening ad for Lucas Kunce, running against Josh Hawley in Missouri for the U.S. Senate...more here (and as far as I’m concerned, one of the MANY failures of Sean Patrick Maloney, head of the DCCC, in the last election cycle was to not funnel more resources to Kunce running against Trudy Busch Valentine...TBV won the Dem primary, ran against Repug Eric Schmitt and lost...Busch didn’t even know what the issue was with Citizens United)...



...and speaking of Dems running for the U.S. Senate, David Doel brings us some GREAT news about Katie Porter, running for that chamber from CA; wouldn’t it be awesome to see her doing her thing with the whiteboard right in the face of Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao? And I’m genuinely sorry to hear about Di-Fi, but that’s all the more reason why she needs to retire...and with all due respect to Ro Khanna, I hope he stays out now also, and though I respect Barbara Lee and Adam Schiff too, I hope they remain on the sidelines as well...



...and Farron Cousins tells us more about Matt Gaetz almost getting his ass kicked last Friday night from Mike Rogers of Alabama before some Repug named Tim Burchett intervened on Gaetz’s behalf...yeah I know I’ve had the pic of this around for a day or so with a link to a story, but here is more on exactly what happened...



...and John and Brett Erlich of The Damage Report discuss a school district in Flori-DUUUHH! using a #DeathSantis law to ban a book about gay penguins...smh (good point about how self-defeating this idiocy is by drawing attention to a book that would probably be largely ignored otherwise)...



...and the prior story is mildly amusing, albeit in a truly stoo-pid way, but this one is dangerous; Mike Figueredo of The Humanist Report tells us about Oklahoma (of course) trying to enact an anti-trans bill eliminating gender-affirming care for anyone under 26, in a state where bigotry is “as high as an elephant’s eye,” you might say (you can Google it :-)...



...and I neglected to mention the story of the 6-year-old in Newport News, VA who shot his school teacher (here)...yeah, just chalk this up as another example of a hand-wringing problem in this country that EVERY SINGLE DEVELOPED NATION ON EARTH has managed to solve except us...



Update 1/13/23: Beyond belief (here)...

...and with the proper amount of righteous outrage, I bring you the latest installment of “This Day In Doomsy History” (more or less), and we’re taking just a short trip today back to 1/8/21, in which Vaush (in a very NSFW/H clip) gives a commentary in response to the 1/6 insurrection in this country...I had this video in mind given what just took place in Brazil and what is likely to be the total cluster of a Republican-run U.S. House for the next two years...



...and this may be a bit of an incongruously upbeat tune given the prior videos, but I still thought it was pretty good.

Monday Stuff

(Something about “George Santos” displaying the white power symbol here makes me laugh unintentionally. Why do all of these life forms doing the “OK” gesture hold their hands low the way they do? Do they honestly think they WON’T be seen making that gesture if they do that?)

John and Brett Erlich of The Damage Report tell us that the NY-03 U.S. House Rep pictured isn’t exactly getting off to a good start as he begins his career of constituent service, allegedly...office not set up yet, nobody taking calls or responding to emails/texts, etc...and yeah, I get Erlich’s tongue-in-cheek response - more here...



...and David Doel tells us about supporters of election-loser Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil staging their own 1/6-style insurrection...my hope is that this gets linked back to Bannon and Miller and those two cretins end up getting the justice that has escaped them in this country (GREAT point about the Repugs screeching about criminals illegally emigrating to this country over our border...well, what the hell do you call Bolsonaro... mildly NSFW/H...more here)...



...and it looks like the “party of Lincoln” in the U.S. House REALLY has a problem now, not because they care about the 99 percent of this country, but because their donors are apparently mad over last week’s ridiculous attempt at governance from the new Repug majority – Farron Cousins tells us more...



...and Sam, Emma and author and filmmaker Astra Taylor talk about right-wing judges tying to kill Biden’s student debt forgiveness plan – sounds like there are 2 trial cases, one in Missouri and one in Texas (of course) that have bubbled their way through the appeals courts to sympathetic conservative judges who have allowed the cases to proceed even though, in at least one, the plaintiffs don’t appear to have standing...but why bother with trivial details like actual legality when you’re trying to screw Democrats? And Sam makes a great point about how our “shadow docket” SCOTUS is looking for ANY possible excuse to take away any possible benefit from non-rich people (and why does it not surprise me in the least that this nonsense is funded by reactionary corporate assholes like the Mercers and Bernie Marcus of Home Depot...and with that in mind, isn’t this interesting)...



...and here is a compilation of clips from Rebel HQ...first, David Shuster brings us some Republican women being somewhat informed on abortion and others not having any idea of what the hell it is they’re talking about; next, Max Burns focuses on “Christian” preacher Jonathan Shelley wishing for Biden to die and opposing ANY woman running for office, and then back to Shuster discussing the spat between 1/6 insurrection organizer Ali Alexander and Marjorie Traitor Greene (should just lock the two of them in a cage and let them do their worst to each other)...



...and happy belated 75th (!) birthday to Kenny Loggins.