Submitted for your Delectation or Rue

 

President Donald Trump justified his administration's mass firings of federal workers by claiming, without evidence, that many of them simply were collecting a paycheck and doing nothing, NBC4 Washington reported on Wednesday. https://t.co/mgU8CC9FgA

— Raw Story (@RawStory) March 13, 2025

So sayeth the Constant Golfer. But what of ElonWorld? 

Glad you asked: he's made sure he has a gaming system in his big boy DOGE government office. 

These are supposed to be people we take seriously. I don't even know how they take themselves seriously. 

(I've started writing science fiction (again!) over at one of my other places. Because sometimes fiction is easier to take seriously than whatever this is.  You don't have to read it. It's like my poetry, just another thing I turn to when I've got a lot of thoughts and practical outlets feel very awkward.) 

The Un-American Project 2025

 

Heritage Foundation president celebrates Supreme Court presidential immunity ruling: "We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be" https://t.co/ndMJlNlUKH

— Media Matters (@mmfa) July 3, 2024

Look at this Bond villain bullshit: "which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be." What he's saying right there is, will remain bloodless if the left lays back and lets it happen. Because I guess it's fun to threaten a whole Revolution. Tea Party people. I swear. They really want to see themselves proudly fighting to--

Install a monarchy? Undo the first American Revolution? Institute a lot of Christian nationalist and white supremacist rubbish that the majority of Americans don't want? 

Um--exactly. And there are a lot of former Trump Administration officials supporting this blueprint for chaos. 

Anyway, when I saw that term, "bloodless", all I could think of was 1/6 and the testimony of a Capitol police officer that she was slipping in people's blood that day.  They thought they were re-creating 1776. What they were doing was insurrection. What the 'bloodless" Project 2025 document boasts is undoing the American experiment of a government of, for and by the people--unless those people are conservative activists.

Ballots vs. Bullets

 

NEW: Colorado Secretary of State "extremely concerned" about pro-Trump violence

Jena Griswold received 64 death threats and 900+ threats of non-lethal abuse just within the first 3 weeks of filing the case to keep Trump off the state ballot. https://t.co/aEwbadUZtZ

— Jennifer Bendery (@jbendery) December 20, 2023

This follows a pattern that occurs around Trump, mostly because he encourages it. Trump's people do not respect the law because they have decided that supporting Trump is something higher than the law. What people who want to say that Trump has to be rejected at the ballot box don't understand is, Trump's insurrection started with undermining the importance of the ballot box. That pattern of violence and threats--includes poll workers and election officials.  

Trump has already established his people don't respect the ballot--he lost in 2020, and 1/6 was the result of that. There are two things I strongly suggest cause this. The first is the Tea Party and militia-based kayfabe that the 2nd Amendment is a remedy against one's own government in the event that it becomes "tyrannical" (which seems to include Trump receiving due process for indictments received at the determination of a grand jury).

Loomer Apparently Lost to Webster--Didn't She? (Updated)

 

Apparently professional racists Peter Brimelow and Nick Fuentes were at the election night party with Laura Loomer in Florida. They were joined by an assortment of other racists and far-right figures. pic.twitter.com/QTbOT9T7b9

— Nick Martin (@nickmartin) August 24, 2022

Dan Webster feels like a Tea Party-era relic. He's a homeschooling guy who has feelings about covenant marriage and was pitched as a replacement for John Boehner as Speaker of the house circa 2015 a couple times, but it came to naught. Anyways, he is well to the right of lots of folks. He's very anti-abortion and pro-keeping brain dead people on feeding tubes. And yet, he's a lot less problematic than Laura Loomer, who once chained herself to the Twitter HQ and doesn't quite understand why being a Jewish white supremacist has to be so hard. 

I'm going to go as out of the way as I possibly can about this and desperately avow I do not understand this district, because these people are awful and either one of them would probably have been a cinch to win the seat. How are people in this district ok with these choices? 

Also, too, Loomer might not think the thing is over and yet she is totally swimming in the support of the kind of people no rational soul should think is normal or good. This makes her a viable candidate for the GOP in the future. 

This party needs to be totally fucked up, if this is what flies with them. This is a candidate steeped in conspiracy theory, attention whoring and racism. And yet she did pretty well, considering. 

UPDATE: Carl Paladino, the Elise-Stefanik-backed "Trump of Buffalo", lost his primary in the NY district 23 primary, and that was also closer than it should have been and Paladino could have won--even though he is basically a thoroughly revolting person based on the trash that falls from his face on a regular basis. And this is the Republican party. Even when the vicious, bigoted people lose, you can see they still had their wells of support, and were not rejected to the extent they would be abandoned had they won their primaries. Oh no.  They are taking what they can get. It's a bad thing. 

UPDATE: Wow, Loomer is having a normal one. Well, for her version of "normal":

TWGB: There's Something About Ginni

 

The thing that makes TrumpWorld what it is, is the sense of an alternative reality. It almost feels like they aren't drinking the same water or breathing the same air. I've been fascinated with Ginni Thomas as an activist in a world where we presume some degree of judicial impartiality but also consider SCOTUS justices based on partisan lines--and how she is an unabashed conservative warrior. A Tea Partisan. A supporter of Project Veritas. A conspiracy theorist. 

So, it doesn't actually surprise me that Thomas texted White House COS Mark Meadows running the full QAnon gamut regarding the Venezuelan voting machines, Italian satellites, Chinese thermostats, German servers, green clovers, blue diamonds, and the evil liberals who were after Trump's lucky charms and were definitely going to go to GITMO and face a military tribunal. 

She's been out there where the buses don't run for more than a minute. 

What is concerning is that she was talking with her "best friend"--her spouse, the temporarily, one presumes, hors de combat Justice Clarence Thomas, who was in a capacity to rule on matters concerning the contested election, and on matters concerning what documents became available to the 1/6 Committee.  And knowing of his wife's various intercessions on this issue, never thought to recuse. 

But the thing of it is, people like Ginni Thomas are still at work. Now, Mo Brooks, now that his endorsement by Trump has been rescinded, might be saying that despite Trump's continued entreaties, he was determined to draw the line at the impossibility of the election being somehow rescinded or done over after 1/6!? But ask yourself, how many other people besides Mo Brooks who have made the political pilgrimage to Mar-A-Lago to kiss the hem of the golf pants of St. Don might have vowed a path of continued fuckery?  After all, there are Trump supporters to this day who might acknowledge that Biden is president but draw the line at calling him "duly-elected". 

And as for the mindset of Trump himself, he has taken it upon himself to sue everyone for the "rigging" of....2016?  The election he actually won? Because he blames the "Russia, Russia, Russia" thing for his uneasy time in a job he was not especially suited for. 

So clearly, more alternative reality, there, folks. It's a plague in TrumpWorld, you see. Or it's just a grift to garner attention and donations in that particular case. 

And don't get me started on all the reasons why Trump wanted to stay in the White House, but seems just as protected outside of it. I will scream. 

Well, Of Course They Were

Leaked Texts: Jan. 6 Organizers Say They Were "Following POTUS' Lead"https://t.co/UcVQtyuvIm

— Rolling Stone (@RollingStone) November 22, 2021

Why yes, it does appear that organizers of the Jan. 6th rally were! Fun detail at the end of them also spending a lot of money and being off their behinds wasted. But the important part:

Two days later, Kremer texted some of the organizers to let them know she was temporarily getting off the bus to travel to Washington for a White House meeting.  

“For those of you that weren’t aware, I have jumped off the tour for the night and am headed to DC. I have a mtg at the WH tomorrow afternoon and then will be back tomorrow night,” wrote Kremer. “Rest well. I’ll make sure the President knows about the tour tomorrow!”  

The message describing Kremer’s White House meeting is one of several where she and Kylie, indicated they were in communication with Trump’s team. Both Amy and Kylie Kremer did not respond to requests for comment on the record. Chris Barron, a spokesperson for the Kremers, called Rolling Stone to insist elements of this reporting are untrue. 

“You are printing things that are 100 percent factually untrue that we can prove are not true,” Barron said. “You are printing things that are absolutely, factually untrue and, beyond being factually untrue, for anybody who knows Amy are like hilariously preposterous.”  

Barron repeatedly declined to answer specific questions about which aspects of the story he wanted to dispute.

 Last line in italics per me: sounds like he doesn't want to specify until he figures out which part is the most damaging and can't be independently corroborated. Also it's all true.

UPDATE: Amy Kremer reminds me of the IRS kerfuffle of around 2013ish. Anyhow, she started her scrappy grass-roots climb from obscurity as a part of the Tea Party Patriots, and defected to the Tea party Express, and I'm not going to pile through which of all these similarly-named groups are 501(c)3's or 501(c)4's, but anyway, these nonprofits are not supposed to be campaigning for individual political campaigns but, um. They totally do. You know, just like Super PACs really don't coordinate with campaigns (wink). 

Which was the original sin of the IRS back in 2013--it was a couple folks in I believe the Ohio office who thought all these applications might just be a bit dodgy and partisan. Oh--the outrage that anyone would delay processing these applications! It was going to interfere with time and resources that could be devoted to...midterm campaigning! 

Anyhow she's also a birther and has done very nicely for herself. (Which is why her organization should pay its damn FEC fines. Are the Uihleins not good for it? They are good for everything else!)  Which is I promise you the whole point for a lot of these goddamn people. 

It Could Make Someone Think

 

The lawyer for the so-called "Qanon Shaman" has some interesting words regarding his colorful client and his colorful client's friends:

“A lot of these defendants — and I’m going to use this colloquial term, perhaps disrespectfully — but they’re all fucking short-bus people,” Watkins told TPM. “These are people with brain damage, they’re fucking retarded, they’re on the goddamn spectrum.” 

“But they’re our brothers, our sisters, our neighbors, our coworkers — they’re part of our country. These aren’t bad people, they don’t have prior criminal history. Fuck, they were subjected to four-plus years of goddamn propaganda the likes of which the world has not seen since fucking Hitler.”

And I guess that sort of thing is just great for I guess trying to get public sympathy for the poor deluded dupes (or is it, as my eyes stay resolutely dry regarding the plight of the people Marjorie Taylor Greene is now telling us are being "abused") , but are we really supposed to believe that the actually violent people were only there because they were stooges....

And somehow not call the actual liars who, um, be-stooged them, to account?

This reminds me an awful lot of Trump election fraud lawyer Sidney Powell's defense that no "reasonable person" would believe the claims that she tried to make stand up in court. Her intended audience was, she should have had every reason to know, no longer fully reasonable, and she was using the court to make unreasonable claims seem plausible. My opinion was that her claims weren't supposed to stand up in court though--they were solely for the benefit of keeping the dumb mullets on the hook.

And this is, to get to the crux of it, a large part of why Trump, McCarthy, and McConnell don't want a January 6 commission to get to the bottom of how things went so wrong. It might cause people of very strong opinion to commit the unthinkable--and think about the things they think about.

Like whether Trump lost because the election was stolen--or because he was incompetent. Like thinking about whether the party is being incompetent in following Trump's losing lead, instead of trying to actually be some kind of half-assed governing party instead of devoting their time to stunts and "comms".  And maybe people might start wondering if the things Trump and company did looked bad because they were actually bad. And if supporting a party that could support him (even over the Constitution itself) is bad.

And that would simply never, ever do.

It's like what I've said about Fox Mushroom Farm. They want to keep people in the dark and feed them shit. It's the only operating model they've got.

More Evidence For Your Lying Eyes

 

Andrew Clyde (@rep_clyde), the person screaming at the far left of this photo, is the person who recently likened the brutal, wildly out of control, deadly violent Jan. 6 insurrection on the U.S. Capitol to overthrow the will of the people, to a "normal tourist visit." pic.twitter.com/bs4twxu1lZ

— Bryan Smith (@bryrsmith) May 18, 2021

The photo above shows that Clyde in action, apparently taken aback at the actions of the tour group that came to visit back on January 6. In retrospect, from the numerous still photos and videos compiled from that day, it really does seem like something was a bit out of the ordinary--doesn't it? Take a look at that picture in the Tweet--what were Rep. Clyde's lying ears telling him he was hearing?

Rep. Louie Gohmert wanted to have us believe that the January 6 melee wasn't an "armed insurrection" because no one supposedly had firearms. Which I guess would be true if you didn't count the people with guns. I don't know for a fact if Gohmert can count though. Maybe he wasn't aware there were guns and felt disappointed, since he apparently has called for a revolution. 

Women for Trump PAC founder and former Tea Party Express chair Amy Kremer is deeeeeeep in the denial on Twitter this evening. She doesn't know a damn thing about insurrections and anyway, she doesn't think Trump supporters are that stupid, so why would we?

Is she trying to claim she didn't have a good enough seat and couldn't see any of the action? Because she surely had all the access she could have wanted. She's right that there was "NO COUP" of course.

It failed like everything else Trump touches. But yeah, they really did try it. And the damn dummies took selfies the whole time they were doing it.  That;s how we know they were dumb enough to advertise 4 wks in advance, uh, document it as we saw in abundance, watched them beat up cops with Trump flags and yes, take their families, because yes, they are dumb, and what the fuck else did they do it for? Shits and giggles?

Sure, the right has become awfully cozy saying things like "The tree of liberty is watered with the blood of patriots" and insinuating that lobbing leftists into helicoptor blades would be ideal and also, funny as hell, and are even trying to legalize running people over with automobiles for the crime of marching for civil rights, and we're not supposed to think maybe, yeah a little, they were going to try to kill elected officials as they also have threatened rather a lot? 

Maybe they are worried we have seen them a little too well. Maybe they are loathe to take a look at themselves. But facts are facts.

The truth matters. Trump lost. His followers lost their shit and are still in shitloss mode. And if we want to keep our republic, we need to take a very goddamn good look at it.

Look Who's Still Wrong and Mad As Hell

 

Things escalated quickly on CNBC this morning.

This is fantastic...pic.twitter.com/BMlluNDhE5

— Rex Chapman🏇🏼 (@RexChapman) December 4, 2020

Why, he's just as wrong now as he was back in March. For that matter, he's just as wrong now as he was about moral hazard a dozen years ago. Rick Santelli has no concept that people are worth more than existing as work units and value producers. And he also labors under the delusion that if one YELLS REAL LOUD, somehow it will improve upon BEING WRONG AS ALL HELL.

And he's still employed. His POV is actively sociopathic, and he's still on the fucking tv.

Grandma, What Did You Do During the Pandemic?

MAGA anti-masker making a point. Not sure what it is but she’s making one... pic.twitter.com/oQm8aBj93m

— Rex Chapman🏇🏼 (@RexChapman) September 21, 2020

There's an absurd unreality show going on out there. This is a contestant who wants to "Make a Deal" for Trump as Monty Hall's* future behind door number two. But you know what? It's going to be more COVID-19 and more dystopia. Also, she has balls on her face.

There's something weird about the mostly-female phenomenon of "Karens Gone Wild" that bothers me: they do get filmed, and they seem to rather like it. Like the ladies getting their turn on what should be a "Walk of Shame" are acting like they passed their "Star Search" auditions. They are happy to get stared at, and I don't get it. I guess it isn't just middle-aged biddies who are doing this foolishness. (Disclaimer: I am a white lady who just turned 48 myself, so I consider myself at least a young biddy.) But I have to assume they like it like that. Because until you go be legendary, who even are you?

And this is where I am going to be mean: worse, but with people watching! And while many people on Twitter will deride, there's a certain martyrdom available to people who are willing to fuck it up for ideology. (This woman violated the privacy of a customer and claimed victimhood and welp! she got it.) There will always be an audience for people who want to spectacularly represent, even if their point is a little weird or misguided.

"Economic Anxiety"

Now this is happening. pic.twitter.com/w1CkLB3T3s

— Leon Hendrix (@LeonHendrix) April 30, 2020

There has never been a better case for economic anxiety being some kind of reason for what folks do, and yet, based on this clip from yesterday's protest in Lansing to open up restrictions due to the pandemic, I still can't help but think there's something else going on here.

UPDATE: There was more where that came from, and while I agree Trump frees these people to act however, we saw this same thing with Tea Party folk all through the Obama years. And yes, indeed, GOP leadership and elected officials are fine with it.

Perspective

Two nurses, who have witnessed first hand the toll Covid is taking in Colorado, stood up and peacefully counter protested. Here is how they were treated. I had join them. pic.twitter.com/iJnNcqZxSv

— Marc Zenn (@MarcZenn) April 19, 2020

The woman's sign, above, actually reads "LAND of the FREE", so that, for a person seeing it from a distance, only "LAND" and "FREE" can be read. It's possible that she never considered the perspective of her sign from the pulled-back, digitally-distanced view, anymore than she considered what it meant to tell anyone to go to China while her vehicle sat in the midst of a country that was truly Number One--in coronavirus fatalities. The disconnect between her sign and her vocalizations and objective reality might not come home to her even after an internet roasting, because her media isn't my media.  Her LAND and her idea of FREE are different than mine.

This is a thing I've puzzled over--the idea of red and blue America superimposed like transparencies over the same geographical map. But I think the perspective to keep in mind here is more than conservative vs. liberal. Freedom doesn't just mean individual rights but also personal accountability. A society doesn't just mean enforceable public law, but democratic community decision-making.

Deep down, I want to believe that responsible adults possess the personal accountability to determine if they can responsibly open their businesses while practicing social distancing and strict hygiene. I'd like to think that communities will determine the "market", so to speak, of public commerce by choosing to go out less even if more spaces are available, by being scrupulous about how they congregate, etc.

But the gun-toting perspective-less cuddle-puddle of the protesters makes me think that the level of responsibility required to save possibly tens of thousands of lives, can not possibly rest in the hands of feeble fucking idiots who wear flags and think waving slogans about negates the best possible information we have gotten from science and the actual death toll occurring right in front of us.

When I see this glib dimwit and her sign:

There’s a mommy and a daddy who work as first responders to save miserable lives like yours. They want their 5 year old daughter back. Wipe that grin off your ugly face, this isn’t a game. Fuck your haircut and fuck you. pic.twitter.com/8xquC4mcuE

— Michael Ⓜ️ (@michaelschweitz) April 20, 2020

(The sad story of the 5 year old is here.)

I consider I've been cutting my own hair since I was a broke college student, well over twenty-five years ago during the first recession I recall, and by the way, who is even seeing this woman or her dumb hair that anyone should risk dying over it? If she truly wants a haircut, scissors are cheap and YouTube (for many excellent tutorials) is free. If she wants to not look like a fool, sorry, game over. She already does.

That is some perspective, no?

And when Trump thinks that because these people are waving flags it means they love America, I have to say "No, it means they love flags." They love the symbolism, and don't give a shit for what any of it actually means. Which says a lot about his attitude as well.

Freedom and Responsibility

WATCH: Rod Meloni, of WDIV-TV, reports from Lansing, Michigan, where protesters in cars and on foot show opposition against the state's stay-at-home order.

"A lot of people feeling like their liberty has been infringed upon."https://t.co/6rNgiD1dKu

— MSNBC (@MSNBC) April 15, 2020

There were some weird scenes in Lansing this Wednesday as a caravan against Governor Whitmer's stay-at-home order descended to protest on the grounds that they feel their rights are being infringed. There were some open-carry folks and some Confederate-flag waving folks and some people did even have masks (because there's a virus going around, you know) and they honked at mostly-empty government buildings (because many state employees are working at home) and they blocked the entrance of a local hospital and held up some ambulances. It was observed that the overall impression was something like that of a Trump rally; indeed, there were several Trump signs to be seen.

Similar protests have been engaged in Idaho, in Ohio, and in Kentucky. It's a bit reminiscent of Tea Party rallies (remember when those were a thing?), which were largely against government regulations and especially when those regulations had to do with health care, during the Obama Administration.

As with evangelical church gatherings in defiance of local stay-at-home orders, there's a lot of talk about rights, but little talk of responsibility. I feel like a good discussion could be had (probably one that needs more depth than I can manage in a blog post) about how to exercise one's rights responsibly (the sort of thing that often comes up in, for example, 1st and 2nd amendment discussions). There should be some room for discussion, but these protests seem to be taking part partially in an aura of denial of the point of the stay-at-home directives (the actual lethal pathogen wreaking havoc on lives, businesses and the health care system). They seem to operate from President Trump's early claims that the seriousness of the COVID-19 pandemic was overstated by the media as a kind of hoax. (Something Trump himself has now pulled back on.)

Capitalism is Sick

#BREAKING
WATCH: Rick Santelli suggests infecting everyone with coronavirus — to lessen the economic impact
https://t.co/NskH4LuIS9

— Raw Story (@RawStory) March 5, 2020

It's hard to think of a more apt encapsulation of what is wrong with the short-term gain, small-picture view of modern capitalism: in the clip above, CNBC's Rick Santelli, famous for his inane "moral hazard" rant that launched the Tea Party movement, thinks it would be a great idea if everyone just got COVID-19 at once so we could all get it out of our system.

Except that is not how anything works. I mean, we aren't actually talking about a 2% lethality rate (which is bad enough compared to ordinary flu) but possibly 3.4% even assuming adequate healthcare infrastructure. The figure I'd be concerned about is the 15-20% who require hospitalization. Under a scenario in which everyone was infected at once, the healthcare system would be too overwhelmed to accommodate care for all those seriously afflicted, and the lethality rate would soar because people who need ventilators, etc., would not get that care. The afflicted would include health care workers. Ordinary diseases and injuries would still occur, in some cases as secondary opportunistic infections for people already afflicted with COVID-19.

Beyond the nightmare this poses for health care, work productivity and consumerism would be at a standstill. Shelves would go empty. The likelihood of price gouging (like we're seeing with masks and hand sanitizer, but for things like tinned beans and bottled water), looting or riots would increase. Weather events like flooding, severe thunderstorms, straight line winds, blizzards, etc., major fires, accidental explosions through things like gas leaks, would all have more devastating impacts on local communities because the emergency support would be down. People would lose their habitations and not have the means or support structure for easily finding temporary shelter. Suicide rates would climb. Substance use/abuse would climb. Service industries could just go under. People who live paycheck to paycheck would go under. People who can't afford an unplanned $2000 emergency would go under. There would be misery for everyone.

And no, the stock market would probably not rebound in a short time after all that.

Be Brave!

Friends, I'm in. We can't take four more years of Donald Trump. And that's why I'm running for President.

It won't be easy, but bravery is never easy. But together, we can do it. Join me... join us: go to https://t.co/d40HA9h2Kz.

Let's show the world we're ready to be brave.

— Joe Walsh (@WalshFreedom) August 25, 2019

Look, I think there's a certain political fanfic quality to trying to sort out how these primary matchup things play out, but I can say, barring some major disqualifying event for Trump (devastating evidence of serious crimes, major illness or injury, starting WWIII, etc.), I don't really think Walsh has a great shot at knocking off Trump in a primary. This thing is, even if Trump's brand loyalty among his base isn't exactly as great as he thinks it is, it's still really high, and as far as I can tell, the difference between Trump base people and the Walsh base people is arguing over a microscopic fraction of a fraction.

However, and this is a big qualifier, there is something Walsh might be able to do that I don't think former MA Governor Bill Weld would do, that none of the 2016 GOP primary candidates were able to do, and that no Democrat probably can do, which is, capitalize on Trump's one major strength--that weird, train-wreck, eyeball-drawing, earned media coverage effect he manages to pull off, where he's so extra no one can look away.

It's a Goddamn Shame, Lady

Rand Paul's wife says she keeps loaded gun by her bed over fear of liberals https://t.co/cStwIhC4Ts pic.twitter.com/SYSxWlYQsZ

— Newsweek (@Newsweek) October 9, 2018

I'm so old, I remember when Robert Dear shot up a Planned Parenthood,

when George Tiller was killed in front of his church,

when James Alex Fields Jr. ran into Heather Heyer with his car,

when Dylann Roof shot nine people in a church,

when Taylor Michael Wilson tried to take over a train,

when Nikolas Cruz wore a MAGA hat,

when a Sikh gurdwara was shot up because a white supremacist only knows they looked foreign,

when a horrible Canadian mass shooter was a fan of US right wing voices,

and so on, and so on, but I guess the thing that really sticks out for me is when a mob of Rand supporters curb-stomped a journalist,  while Rand Paul himself was cozying up to people with names like the Southern Avenger.

Because "Meh? Sometimes white supremacy, deep thinking, right?"

But no, really, even though I know there was this one guy that shot Steve Scalise a bunch of times, the angry young men of the right have been sending death threats and pictures of rape and shit to people all the time.

I guess instead of embracing the gun, you could encourage your man to get out of politics. I think this would be most salutatory. Because then he, and by extension Mrs. Rand, would culture war no more.

CPAC is Just Such a Sell-out Anymore, Man

It's like, there was a day when CPAC seemed like a fringe festival where conservatives could really let their freak-flag fly and you could see Log Cabin Republicans play cornhole in the parking lot with Tony Perkins and stuff, but those days just seem like bygones.  I dunno. I mean, when the US President and Vice-President show up--that's pretty mainstream. When Nigel Farage (who for some reason keeps coming up in the Trump/Russia thing)  and Marion LePen get thrown up on stage to represent their particular type of nationalist movements (fascism!) it starts to lose that unique loosey-goosey uniquely American flavor of bigotry I've gotten used to from the CPAC folks. 

It is, of course, a thrill to have Wayne LaPierre of the NRA pretend that the Democrats are basically the same as European socialists and also want to take all the guns and melt them into roach clips.  I mean, that's the hit of the true crazy that makes CPAC such a rare brew. Having Dana Loesch indict the mainstream media for loving to see crying white mothers after an episode of gun violence for the sake of ratings was sheer vicious hate-watching--of course she wonders where the crying black mothers are (I guess she missed the BLM movement?) and fails to consider that maybe the NRA doesn't mind that part of the response to these episodes is also an uptick in gun sales and a flurry of activity from their paid-for congresscritters, so maybe they profit a bit from mothers' tears, too. 

It doesn't surprise me that a comment at the Ronald Reagan dinner Friday evening specifically addressed former RNC chairman Michael Steele by race. One could definitely point to shortcomings during Steel's tenure in terms of RNC party spending, but I think Steele genuinely tried to depict the GOP as still a "Big Tent" (a Reaganesque, if you will) party, even as the Tea Party movement and conservative media continued to show that the party was whiter, older, very straight and Christian and uptight. 

This party is Trump's now. The current RNC chair changed her name for this president. He is extolled as a great Christian by the theocrats, and no amount of money paid to porn stars or Playmates will disabuse them of that idee fixe. That he is uninformed and patently corrupt can't bother them (they are much the same, thanks). But how boring it all seems when the lurid, racist, theocratic, misogynist, gun-humping and ethno-nationalist stuff is all front page, rather than marginal thinking! Even the hate against journalism isn't anything you wouldn't have heard the good folks at Fox News say night after night. 

It still seems a bit boutique at times.  Ben Shapiro seems to have a weird need to bring up transfolx as if "nuh-uh" and "because I say so" are valid arguments, as if many people weren't already pretty clear that lived experiences are a unique kind of truth--but at least he addressed the idea that Trump lies. Although he did it in a speech where the audience also did a "Lock her up" chant regarding Hillary Clinton, for reasons that in 2018 I feel are some kind of psychological thing.

I can't see the humor in their parallel Bizarro universe. It has become too much a part of our shared reality to enjoy a thrill-ride though the carnival, when some of us feel we are trapped in a funhouse with malevolent clowns.

Look Who Shut Down the Government

The US government has shut down (again) but Congress is working overnight to reopen it. The last shutdown was 3 weeks ago https://t.co/VhjSV43Vx5

— BuzzFeed News (@BuzzFeedNews) February 9, 2018

Did Rand son of Ron Paul also vote for the tax cut bill that promised to increase the almighty fuck out of the deficit (and thereby, the debt?).  He sure the hell did. Doesn't this mean he's just being self-aggrandizing right here? Yeppers.

Unless he's pretty much decided a shutdown was going to happen one way or another, so he might as well get weird and put his name on it. But this technically makes this a Republican shutdown.  After Trump went out of his way to insist he was cool with a shutdown it is really great to see his fellow Republican pitch in this way. Of course, this has nothing to do with DACA.

Nancy Pelosi had some things to say about DACA, but of course, she has no power to make a shut down happen. She just thought it would be great to talk about some fine undocumented but totally American folks for a handful of hours in her four inch heels.

Now, some kind of budget will get passed, and DACA might get shut out--but Dems stood for them and will remain there. It's Republican self-owning that keeps the CR a thing and the regular bickering over what should be easy choices alive. The GOP majority looks like "Rand Pauls" all the way down to us libs, anyway.

UPDATE: We've got six more weeks of government!

Defending Liberty? Is *THAT* What They Call it?

Wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, @GinniThomas, presenting an award to @JamesOKeefeIII today for "defending liberty." pic.twitter.com/bWXFgWa36x

— Kenneth P. Vogel (@kenvogel) December 6, 2017

I always called it grifting. Ah, well.

UPDATE: So, this shindig happened at the Trump International Hotel in Washington D.C. and was put on by United For Purpose. Trump donated more than a little bit to good old Project Veritas,  as did some of his main backers, the Mercers.  I couldn't find any darn thing about a group called "United For Purpose". (I don't know anything about that group--I did a search and found a "United In Purpose", but I have no idea if there's any connection.) Anyhow, Fox News' Sean Hannity and Judicial Watch got some participation trophies for fucking up mainstream media's shit, too.

O'Keefe was, in a way, humbled to the point of near-honesty:

O'Keefe appeared to acknowledge the operative was working for Project Veritas in a fundraising email after the Post's report.

“Following months of undercover work within The Washington Post, our investigative journalist within the publication had their cover blown,” O’Keefe said at the time.

“This is how undercover work goes. This isn’t the first time that has happened, and it won’t be the last time.”

Yes, folks, please send them money. They are only explicitly busted most of the time, and that's how the cookie crumbles. Otherwise, just invest in mallets to hit yourselves in the nards with. Same deal.

Ginni Thomas is, as I shouldn't neglect to point out, the spouse of SCOTUS Justice Clarence Thomas, and is a conservative activist, which should only trouble you if you pay attention to such things, and maybe there's reasons.  Clarence Thomas and his accuser, Anita Hill, represent how we used to talk about sexual harassment, when it was still new to do that.  I still believe Anita. And I'd still kind of like Clarence Thomas to "retire".

Roy Moore Won The AL Senate Primary Despite Trump's Strange Endorsement

It's easy to look at the picture of Roy Moore, above, and just see a man with a big flag, a tiny gun, and a middling hat. But he is a genuinely fascinating creature in that he seems to be entirely the worst of old-fashioned Bible-banging demagoguery. He's virulently anti-gay.  He seems confused about geography, current events, religion, and law, despite once upon a time being a judge.  He's of course anti-choice when it comes to women's reproductive choices, and he's also a creationist who even considers the teaching of evolution incompatible with the Constitution.  He is mostly known as the judge who took on the "Establishment clause" regarding religious speech to the effect of basically offering himself up in service to a graven image, which sort of cluster-fuckedly makes a mockery of both the First Commandment and the First Amendment. He thinks the 9/11 attacks were a punishment from God (which I think would align quite nicely with what Osama Bin Laden thought, too.) And he has nice words for Vladimir Putin. 

He's almost a parody of fringe right-wing whackadoodledom, and was endorsed by Ben Carson, Steve Bannon, Sarah Palin, and not by the actual US President, Donald Trump, who gave a rally for "Big Luther" Strange.

I don't pretend I know what this means. This is Alabama, which is not my neck of the woods at all. But if Moore's genuine unfitness* for anything at all could be adequately articulated, I'm thinking this culture war grudge-vote against the "DC establishment" might have maybe made a Doug Jones win vaguely possible? He's a civil rights lawyer and seems like a real stand-up guy.

*No, I am serious, this guy should not be a Senator.

UPDATE: Trump is purging Tweets about his support for Strange like a sad loser-baby:

UPDATE ALSO, TOO: Roy Moore was also a Birther, just so we can fully take in his up-fuckedness.  But that, at least, he has in common with Trump.