Aborting the Ban, Truth Social Icarus, Gaza Famine, Trump Air, Putin GOP

Continue reading “Aborting the Ban, Truth Social Icarus, Gaza Famine, Trump Air, Putin GOP”

Chosen One, God and Man and Trump, Eclipse, Abortion Rights, Gaza, NATO

  • Hackwhackers travels through social media to explore mr Trump’s relationship with police, law & order, and all that is holy.
     
  • Vixen Strangely, at Strangely Blogged, senses a contradiction as mr Trump refers to himself as the Chosen One, posts notes from occasional gushing fans comparing him to Jesus, and sells scripture for $60.
     
    All while attacking potential witnesses and families of judges and prosecutors.
     
    Key example:
    So how does this modern-day martyr show his Christ Consciousness? You know, the way Christ did, by letting his disciples know what Pilates’ family members look like, so they could…use their imaginations. Who wants to tell me where in the Bible Jesus would have done anything of the sort?
     
    Trump is no Jesus and Judge Merchan is no Pontius Pilate–what the hell?
     
  • Charlie Sykes, conservative Republican who declines to support Trump, gets a Happy Easter message:

    But Wisconsin conservative James Wigderson has words of comfort:

  • From The Borowitz Report, all copies of Trump’s Bible are recalled, after they are found to contain nuclear codes.
     
  • Conservatives were outraged this past week:

    I had a brief response:

    But North Carolina pastor John Pavlovitz is more detailed, and much more eloquent.

Continue reading “Chosen One, God and Man and Trump, Eclipse, Abortion Rights, Gaza, NATO”

Herod, the Christ Child, a President, and Brothers and Sisters in Christ

[Note: Updated and revised since 2018.
As Christians, we should still be ashamed.]


 

The message seems so clear.

Why are so many fervent believers in the Christmas message unable to apply it to today’s world and much of the leadership of our own nation?

Continue reading “Herod, the Christ Child, a President, and Brothers and Sisters in Christ”

Easter, Trump Bible, Biden Batters GOP, Key Bridge, Abortion, GOP Hilarity

Happy Easter (King Trump Version) Weekend:

Continue reading “Easter, Trump Bible, Biden Batters GOP, Key Bridge, Abortion, GOP Hilarity”

Trump Bonding, Loose Judge Cannon, Poison Our Bloodbath, Social Security

  • Dave Columbo reports, as only he can, on mr Trump’s financial travails:
     
  • Vixen Strangely at Strangely Blogged has questions about Trump money. Like Where did it all go? Where will it come from now?
     
    Key talent:
    He’s a magician–he makes money disappear. It’s like making money go POOF was his whole ass job.
     
    Key worry about bringing on already convicted Russian asset Manafort:
    Does that mean he’s opening the window to Russian influence again?
     
  • Andy Borowitz has one possibility:
     

     
  • So mr Trump’s attorneys argue that the legal requirement of a bond in order to appeal his convictions should be waived, since he can’t afford to post it.
     
    Our favorite Earth-Bound Misfit finds it of interest that mr Trump’s argument is taken seriously by anyone.
     
    Key equivalence:
    I’d like to know whether or not non-rich folks who can’t afford an appeal bond in civil cases get to have the bond waived. I’ll hazard a guess that the answer is “no”.
     
    Also, shamelessly stolen from Comrade Misfit:
     

     
  • M. Bouffant at Web of Evil does a ton of homework with links to every side, all of them wondering how Trump can get a half a billion dollar bond.
     
  • Iron Knee at Political Irony points to the former president’s intense financial problems as an obvious national security risk.
     
  • A writer for The Bulwark asks us to imagine how much Trump would owe in defamation damages if his routine defamations were held to the strict legal standards he applies to others
     
    Julian Sanchez finds it an easy task:

    Post by @normative
    View on Threads

  • Green Eagle watches US District Judge Aileen Cannon stun a cross section of the legal community by weirdly agreeing to listen to strange document/theft arguments by Trump lawyers on whether the Presidential Records Act means the opposite of what it says it means.
     
    Basic fact:
    You do not have to be a lawyer to see that this claim is utter rubbish
     
    My thought:
     
  • In Hackwhackers Donald Trump got weirdly creative during many years of tax fraud.
     
    Key pattern:
    …one of the things we know from the Donald Trump returns we finally got, is he created 60 fictitious businesses, took tax deductions for a number of them that reduced his overall tax bill, even though they had no revenue, and in other cases the revenue and expense matched to the dollar…
     
  • News Corpse thinks it pointless for mr Trump to sue ABC News and George Stephanoloulos for defamation over the question of whether he is, for real, a rapist or just a creepy sexual predator.
     
    I have to agree:
  • In Happiness Between Tails da-AL writes a bit about experiencing cultural differences while growing up. She celebrates love that finds its way beyond, around, and through political, national, and ethnic borders. She suggests intermarriage is becoming more common.
     
    Which is pretty much what poison our blood is about, isn’t it?

Continue reading “Trump Bonding, Loose Judge Cannon, Poison Our Bloodbath, Social Security”

Hur Hurled, Senile Mastermind, We’re Losing! uh Winning!, Katie Klobbered

  • Green Eagle watches the Hur hearings with the miserable failure of Republicans to find evidence of any wrongdoing by President Biden, and the miserable effort of Mr. Hur to smear Biden anyway, and contrasts that reality with the miserable press coverage of the miserable Hur travesty.
     
  • Libertarian Michael A. LaFerrara presents an angry screed about inflation being sky high (sic) and Biden’s policies fueling that inflation (sic). He sees Biden’s attacks on reduced competition that makes possible price gouging and deceptive retail practices as attacks on capitalism itself(sic). (Sick)
     
    My view:
    The ideal world of competitive free market capitalism would have businesses keeping prices low in order to maximize profits in a competition for customers.
     
    In the real world, documented by actual history, that competition gets wrinkled by continuous corporate mergers when the market becomes dominated by a few super-sized businesses.
     
    Informal collusion, deceptive practices, and hidden fees are legitimate political targets. Teddy Roosevelt’s trust busting remains a worthwhile government goal.
     
  • My extreme conservative longtime friend Darrell Michaels takes a high dive into the deep end with a lengthy catalogue of Republican talking points on how the decrepit, senile, incapable Joe Biden is also a criminal mastermind who outsmarts Republicans.
     
    One problem many of us have in dealing with extremists in casual conversation is the unresearched brevity and sheer massive avalanche of discredited accusations. Fifty baseless charges hurled in a minute or two can take half an hour to refute.
     
    So let’s just take the first three of my friend’s long litany:

    1. Illegal Immigration
      This image has been floating about the internet for a while, replicated in Congress many times – One typical vote of many:
       

      Hey Darrell, how about we give the guy the resources he’s been demanding from day one?
       
    2. Weaponizing Federal Law Enforcement
      Says my friend: “Biden continues to use the government to persecute and prosecute political adversaries.”
       
      The most frequently used examples by MAGA folk are prosecutions of mr Trump and the January 6 insurrectionists – the violent lynch mob who were on the hunt for legislators to assassinate.
       
      Facts:
      mr Trump has, so far, been defeated in court by multiple juries and judges. No Biden participation can be found.
       
      The January 6 violations have been dealt with by law enforcement in ordinary judicial proceedings.
       
      Darrell has other vague generalities as well, without any specific cases.
       
    3. Retreat from Afghanistan
      Darrell might consider the Trump negotiated agreement to reduce US presence from over 30,000 personnel to 8500 troops (Trump then unilaterally cut that down to 2500), promising that even those, and all other coalition forces, would be withdrawn in 2021.
      mr Trump also forced the immediate release of 5,000 hardened Taliban prisoners.
       
  • North Carolina pastor John Pavlovitz explains why the next election is vitally important. It’s a brief listen:
     

  • Wisconsin conservative James Wigderson brings us a BBC broadcast about Wisconsin voters and Donald Trump, with the briefest and best interview with the best concise opinion from the best conservative in the state:
     

    James has many reasons for his opinion, here is another:

  • At The Moderate Voice, editor Joe Gandelman suggests that, if we think Trump is not winning, we are deluding ourselves
    OR
    maybe not.
     
    Now THAT’S fair and balanced.

Continue reading “Hur Hurled, Senile Mastermind, We’re Losing! uh Winning!, Katie Klobbered”

Biden, SOTU, Trump Temp Immune, 14th Waits, GOP 2025 Plans, Bye Mitch

  • Disaffected and it Feels So Good reviews this week’s SOTU and sees President Biden demonstrating health, vigor, and wit as he provokes Republicans into heckling him, then incorporates their televised boorishness into his own presentation.
     
  • Tommy Christopher has the President delivering a sharp and energetic SOTU that was well received by everyone except partisan Republicans, then “accidentally” slamming Bibi Netanyahu on a hot mic.
    (That would be accidentally, right?)
     
    Key Oops:
    I’m on a hot mic here! That was good!
     
  • Dave Columbo analyzes, as only he can, Biden’s SOTU, weird reaction from Congressional Republicans, and the weirder official Republican response:
     
  • Andy Borowitz brings us Trump’s dismay:
     

    Also from Borowitz:
    Amazing command of English for a guy who grew up in Kenya!
     
  • Max’s Dad reacts. Joe Biden won the night even before taking the podium, won it during the SOTU, then won it again at the very end.
     
    Key fighting style:
    Sleepy Joe became the Scranton Slugger last night.
     
  • My old friend Darrell Michaels is back (Welcome, Darrell) with his distaste for the prospective candidates from both parties. Darrell’s primary concerns (I did that on purpose) have to do with the malignant infection of progressivism in our schools, culture, businesses media, and even in many of our houses of worship AND the current senile and thoroughly corrupt head of the Biden Crime family.
     
    So he’ll vote for Trump in November to save America.
     
    Note: In fairness, my friend wrote this before the demented, old, incapable Uncle Joe went all SOTU, suddenly got energized, and cast his evil spell on the nation.
    However, I can’t find an excuse for his embrace of the Biden Crime Family tall tale.
     
  • Frequent Fox fantasist John Solomon has long joined Steve Bannon and Matt Gaetz in pushing the Biden Crime Family narrative. Sadly, evidence has been lacking.
     
    Republican attempts in Congressional hearings to prove Joe Biden is involved in something shady comically exploded as their main witness turned out to be an agent of Russia, paid to spread disinformation. Then Hunter Biden was forced into a transcribed hearing and managed to embarrass his Republican interrogators.
     
    Frances Langum has conspiracist John Solomon admitting that things are falling apart for the anti-Biden accusations.
     
    And she generously provides video of poor downtrodden Solomon conceding the obvious. He makes feeble excuses for a fallen narrative.

  • This past week included Super Tuesday. PZ Myers lives in Minnesota and voted Uncommitted.
     
    FWIW, Missouri goes to ballot in a couple weeks. I’ll mark mine for Biden.
     
  • News Corpse looks at the tabs in Super Tuesday results and finds good news for Joe Biden and Democrats.
     
  • CalicoJack in The Psy of Life argues that we are stuck in a mental health issue. Nobody likes to be forced to do something. And Republicans are forcing us to vote for Biden.
    Again.
     
    I like President Biden. A lot.
    But Jack’s reaction reminds me of a comment by the late Foster Brooks about a fantasy election from decades back.
     
    Barry Goldwater lost in 1964 to Lyndon Johnson in a landslide election.
    Eight years later, George McGovern lost to Dick Nixon, getting a majority in only one state and one district.
    (One wit capped it: As Massachusetts goes, so goes the District of Columbia)
     
    Foster Brooks:
    What if McGovern ran against Goldwater and nobody won?

Continue reading “Biden, SOTU, Trump Temp Immune, 14th Waits, GOP 2025 Plans, Bye Mitch”

Immunizing Trump, Umm Cone, IVF, Unpeach, Biden DNA, Mitch, Ukraine

  • Julian Sanchez, on Threads, had chided those whose view of the Supreme Court had turned to jaded cynicism.
     

    Now he confesses he had been insufficiently skeptical about the integrity of SCOTUS justices:
     

  • Dave Columbo explains how so many Trump shocks get quickly forgotten because of subsequently more shocking Trump shocks.
     
    With a shocking example of shock:
     
  • Green Eagle, always willing to help, has a way for an increasingly forgetful, absent minded, easily distracted, deteriorating Donald Trump to remember an important fact.
     
  • At The Onion, a new poll of likely voters finds only 19% believe the country is ready for a competent president.
     
  • So mr Trump thinks he, his own self, is the reason for the soaring Biden stock market. See, it’s actually caused by the anticipated Trump victory in November. (Uh huh…)
     
    Frances Langum thinks it significant that, of all people on the Fox Network, Neil Cavuto is having none of it.
     
  • At The Moderate Voice, Joe Gandelman suggests that big wins by Biden and Trump in the Michigan primary still represent warnings to both candidates, but perhaps a bigger warning to one than the other.
     
  • The Palmer Report says this past week’s voting in Michigan told us what we need to know about where things stand. Biden got 81% of Democrats, while Trump got 68% of Republicans.
     
    The media, however, keep ginning up stories about bad news for Biden.
     
    In reality:
     
    Protest voting on the Dem side kind of fizzled. Uncommitted got 13%, way fewer than the Biden-gloom many televised analysts projected.
     
    Still, the nobody vote was way more than that of Marianne Williamson. She was ecstatic, though, having edged Dean Phillips by almost a third of a percent (Yay you, moon child!).
     
    My overactive imagination gave me competing preemptive headlines for drama addicted media.
     
    Nobody is more popular among Democrats than Williamson!
    AND
    At least Biden is better than nobody…
     
    Come on! I’m trying, okay?
     
  • Scotties Playtime goes Twittering (or is it Xing) for the intersection of Republicans, Christian nationalists, and November elections.
     
  • As The Psy of Life puts it, Election 2024 should be a shoe‑in for the Democrats. So why the uncertainty?
     
    CalicoJack suggests a neurological reason, combined with such human tendencies as carryover mode, ageism, hindsight bias, fig‑leaf rhetoric, and follow‑the‑leader.
     
    Key complicity:
    The press is doing its level best to make it a politics‑as‑usual horserace election because profits are people too, my friend.
     
  • driftglass restates the case against unexamined, reflexive both sides do it arguments.
     
    Key question:
    What’s more addictive than meth, more profitable than iPhones. more indestructible than Kevlar and easier to make than Top Ramen?
    Come on, folks. Let’s not always see the same hands!

Continue reading “Immunizing Trump, Umm Cone, IVF, Unpeach, Biden DNA, Mitch, Ukraine”

Navalny Murder, Tucker Taken, Putin’s Congress, Selling Soles, In Vitro Ban

  • At The Moderate Voice, Robert Levine explains why the conspicuous heroism of Alexi Navalny makes his murder by Putin a conspicuous evil.
     
  • Vixen Strangely, at Strangely Blogged, listens over the weekend for the reaction of mr Trump to the murder of Putin opponent Alexei Navalny, and hears nothing. She suggests, wisely, that the killing of someone who dares to defy non‑freedom of speech teaches us the natural result of Trump’s proposed presidential immunity.
     
    Key consequence:
    It would be the power of the thin-skinned and weak man to no longer have to argue his case, but to end the argument with one fatal command.
     
  • After a silent weekend, mr Trump finally reacts, somehow neglecting to mention his mentor Vlad Putin. The sudden death of Navalny makes mr Trump aware of …well… all the things wrong with the United States, which turn out to mostly be injustices to Donald Trump – his own self:
     
  • Dave Dubya‘s exchange with a conservative on social media provides insight on Tucker Carlson and Vlad Putin.
     
  • Hackwhackers chalks one up for the good guys as global law enforcement hacks the hackers.
     
    Key criminal:
    It would be utterly naive for anyone to believe that these cyber criminals operating out of Russia are doing so without the knowledge and involvement of the Russian state and its chief criminal/ thug Putin.
     
  • Iron Knee at Political Irony explains who, aside from mr Trump, cheers as Congress seizes up.
     
  • Wisconsin conservative James Wigderson carefully considers the Trump Declaration on NATO and Putin, and comes up with a logical extension:
     

  • Julian Sanchez, on Threads, reflects a common take on mr Trump – the human expectation that the future usually resembles the past:

    Post by @normative
    View on Threads

  • Eric Trump is especially upset by the ingratitude:

    And I couldn’t help it:
     

  • I really didn’t think we’d find anything much better than what we were given from Boebert’s brain.
     
    The left interfering in this political witch hunt:

    Until Marjorie Taylor Greene asked for her chance:

  • News Corpse watches Trump attorney Alina Habba on Fox as she offers her most compelling argument against the massive Trump corruption ruling: Prosecutor Letitia James went barefoot as Trump was fined.
     
    Key prosecutorial misconduct:
    Ms. James had her shoes off in court. Let’s not forget that.

Continue reading “Navalny Murder, Tucker Taken, Putin’s Congress, Selling Soles, In Vitro Ban”

Trump Tromped, 14th, Super Bowled, Hur Smear, NATO, Navalny Murdered

Wisdom and generous love are where you find them.

  • tengrain at Mock Paper Scissors has a solid summary of the massive judgment against Trump & sons, and mr Trump’s initial reaction in social media.
     
    Key spoiler (mine):

  • Our favorite Earth-Bound Misfit goes to the text of the $355 million dollar decision to show that Trump’s conduct in court contributed to the amount.
     
    Key personal blunder:
    By being an asshole and by having a witness who admitted perjury, he made it really easy for the judge to whack him with the Ruler of Justice.
     
  • Dave Columbo considers both sides of Trump legal troubles:
     
  • Interesting Thursday in Trumpville. Trump claims he is immune for whatever he did to anyone (that he says he definitely didn’t do to anyone) while he was President.
     
    An appeals panel goes unanimous against, while they avoid laughing. They say that mr Trump can appeal, but just directly to the Supreme Court. Saves time.
     
    Trump lawyers file a request to the Supreme Court to delay whatever they were going to do on his immunity claims. Then mr Trump decides to drop the whole appeal, delay and all, and go to trial.
    But Trump lawfolk say they will keep claiming immunity.
     
    The Palmer Report takes a look at the filing that Trump lawyers dropped, and finds only Trump style gibberish.
     
    So maybe the entire lawyer filing was not intended to win in the Supreme Court. But it might have satisfied the unraveling mind of their client.
     
    Bill Palmer speculates with reason: Senility may have become a major factor in mr Trump’s criminal trials
     
  • Wisconsin conservative James Wigderson manages to slam Trump on Presidential immunity, Trump on border mendacity, and Trump general ignorance all in one brief passage:
     

  • I admit to my own bias on the 14th Amendment case against mr Trump:

    Which leads us to New York Times columnist David French:
     

    Cato Institute’s Julian Sanchez, writing as @normative, has some initial empathy with the judicial predicament:

    …then burns to a cinder all logical bridges that might have led SCOTUS to safety:
    Ouch!

  • Nan’s Notebook considers the actual wording of the 14th Amendment and sees a mostly unexamined, but better, reason Trump should be declared ineligible.

Continue reading “Trump Tromped, 14th, Super Bowled, Hur Smear, NATO, Navalny Murdered”