Author: momdude

I love the portrayal of Americans where there’s a big chunk of “hold my beer, I’ve got this” mixed in with a big chunk of being the good guys, being the ones who will stand up against injustice, being the ones who put men on the moon and land rocket ships on barges just because we didn’t bother to listen to everyone saying it’s impossible, being the ones who called fascists and dictators on their shit and held them responsible.

Nazis sweeping across Europe? “Hold my beer, I’ve got this!”

The Japanese are conquering all of the Pacific? “Hold my beer, I’ve got this!”

Saddam invaded Kuwait? “Hold my beer, I’ve got this!”

Americans still have a ton of that in their constitutions. And in their Constitution. It’s just the current leadership that’s lacking it.

It’s not that they lost that part of their character, it’s that they never had it and wouldn’t recognize it if it bit them in the ass. Multi-millionaires, billionaires, and multi-billionaires all pretending to be in it to protect the little guys, while openly ignoring the little guys, lining their own pockets by breaking every law and ethical code they can find, and just assuming that we’re all stupid enough to not notice or not care.

But the people who spontaneously protested peacefully at airports all across the nation ten days ago? They understand the “Hold my beer!” mentality.

The women and men who marched on the Sunday after the inauguration, drawing crowds an order of magnitude bigger than Trump’s attempted coronation? They understand the “I’ve got this!” mentality.

The tens and hundreds of thousands who have bombarded their Congress critters with phone calls and post cards and letters and “Meet your Congressman Day” crowds? They understand that our democracy is not set in stone, but is passed from generation to generation, each of us to in our turn protect it from evil, hatred, and the power-mad creatures who would destroy us from within.

The “leadership” of the GOP in all branches of government and in all of its nooks and crannies? They’re more of the champagne and caviar types. They couldn’t tell you the difference between a Sam Adams, a Coors Lite, and a Stella Artois.

And these sanctimonious cowards who fancy themselves as the last bastion of patriotism? They don’t understand “I’ve got this!” But they’re real good at “we’re going to send your sons and daughters to die and be maimed for some ridiculous and outrageous reason while we sit on our fat asses and work on stealing our next billion dollars from you!”

I guess it doesn’t just roll off the tongue the same way.

Pure and simple, that’s what the entire GOP “leadership” has become. Or maybe they were always that way and we’re just noticing it more these days.

Despite having the Presidency, the Senate, the House, the Supreme Court (any day now), and 33 of the 50 state Governors, these invertebrate excuses for semi-sentient life (the vast majority of which are white males) are terrified of:

…the Muslim terrorist horror from abroad – while ignoring the fact that the biggest mass killings in America are done by white males. They’re so fucking scared of this that they’ll lock up 5-year old kids, grandmothers, and patients coming into the US for life-saving surgery.

…the NRA, because if they actually point out that the biggest mass killings in America are done with assault weapons and firearms in the hands of mentally ill people, the NRA will slap them upside the head, pull their bribes campaign donations, and work to get their properly ass-kissing opponents elected instead.

…Skittles, apparently – didn’t one of the Trumpencritter’s spawn go off on a psychotic (plagiarized) rant about this during the campaign?

…their constituents, who are now showing up in droves at “town meetings” which are supposed to be love fests of conservative hate mongering, but instead are turning into mobs who what to know what in hell these clowns are doing and why. This would explain why so many of these buffoons are bailing out of their own town meetings, being rushed out by security for their own protection, or just cancelling them altogether.

…anyone in the press who might actually ask a question and insist on getting an actual answer instead of simply swallowing their bullshit party line without question. (See “town meetings,” above.)

…Saturday Night Live, Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Fallon, Conan O’Brien, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, or Bubba the Wonder Ventriloquist (who’s currently appearing at the House Of Giggles in Sheboygan).

…women, particularly Elizabeth Warren. The thought of a woman reading a letter which criticizes a old, white, bigoted, racist colleague of theirs had them formally silencing another colleague of theirs on live television tonight.

Just as a side note out of curiosity – if Sessions had been reading something from the KKK Grand Dragon criticizing Warren, would McConnell have been just as fast to silence him? 

Yeah, just what I thought, too.

If Trump, Brannon, McConnell, Sessions, Ryan, and all of the other fanatical fascists in Washington were half as scared of Judgement Day from their omnipotent and righteous God as their Bible says they should be, this country would be in a lot better shape. Which, since it seems to be the only thing on the planet that they’re not terrified of, tells you exactly what kind of Christians they are.

Really, the thing that upset the Trumpencritter the most about this week’s Saturday Night Live sketch was that Sean Spicer was spoofed by a woman? That was today’s takeaway? REALLY?

Given that, how many of us would pay good money and lots of it to see Alec Baldwin out and Rosie O’Donnell in for that newly iconic role next week?

But that’s not why we’re here. (Sorry, just had to get that out of the way.)

Catching up on today’s insanity, my brain went off on its own little flight (it does that) and suddenly I was looking at what might be the second-worst case scenario for the post-Trump world.

Of course, the worst case is a barren, radioactive wasteland from pole to pole. But hey, even there you can find an up side. Global climate change will start reversing itself almost immediately! The pitiful few who are unlucky enough to survive won’t end up with an even worse fate – being stuck in a real life really horrible Keven Costner movie!

But what’s the next worst case scenario?

Let’s imagine that our narcissistic man-child, who’s never been told “no” in his entire life, tires quickly of the reality that even he can’t ignore. Since it IS all about him and he doesn’t want to play if he can’t win every single point in every single game, he declares us all to be losers (we’re nowhere near as cool as Putin, for example), takes his marbles, and retreats to his dark tower in downtown Manhattan to brood and frown down disappointingly upon us.

We proceed to tolerate and survive a little less than four years of Pence. (Comments what what a disgusting waste of protoplasm he is on another day.) We made it through Nixon, after all. (Except for all of those killed in Vietnam, of course.) We move on.

Meanwhile, the fact that we dodged the worst-case scenario soon begins to be forgotten. In fact, a significant portion of the population takes the lesson to be, “That wasn’t so bad at all! Those overreacting leftist liberals were so worried and crazed and for what? The nutcase went away, we’re fine, where was the problem? They were just crying wolf!”

In a couple of decades, the next ignorant demagogue rises up. Or maybe he or she isn’t quite so ignorant, which would be much worse. And the sane among us start sounding the alarm again – only to be shouted down or ignored by those who will point back at Trump and scream, “He wasn’t so bad – why should we believe you now?”

You scoff.

Ask just about anyone about the “Y2K” scare. Our power grid didn’t crash. Airplanes didn’t fall out of the sky. ATMs didn’t start spewing $100 bills like confetti. Nuclear power plants didn’t melt down because some clock went nuts while buried down in a piece of equipment built in the 1950s.

Which ignores the reality that the “Y2K” bug didn’t crash society because someone saw it coming a couple of years earlier and started sounding the alarm. The “Y2K” bug was destroyed before detonation because billions of dollars was spent in looking for problems in critical systems and then correcting them before the world crashed.

Just like in our second-worst case scenario, where all of this screaming and yelling and protesting and gong-banging can help piss off the President with the shortest work day and the shortest attention span in history. And when he gets pissed off enough, he’ll declare victory and quit.

But society will be just like a toddler in a car seat going through a horrific, spinning, and tumbling car crash, coming out the other side with barely a scratch, clapping their hands merrily, and shouting, “Do it again!”

Remember how bad it is, how insane, how ludicrous, how disgusting, how horrific. Remember, so you can remind your grandchildren. If we’re lucky enough to miss that worst-case scenario and live long enough to have grandchildren.

When I was a kid, back right after dirt was invented, there was a joke going around the second or third grade classrooms. “What swings from trees, eats bananas, and is incredibly deadly and dangerous?” Answer – a money with a machine gun.

Read this from today’s New York Times.

A staff that’s a fraction of the size of previous administrations, with almost none of them having any experience at all. A Commander-in-Chief who is done by 18:30 most nights and wandering around the White House, alone, in his bathrobe. A staff so clueless that they do not know how to turn the lights on in some rooms.

You can’t make this shit up, folks. But they really, really buried the lede on this one:

“…Mr. Bannon remains the president’s dominant adviser, despite Mr. Trump’s anger that he was not fully briefed on details of the executive order he signed giving his chief strategist a seat on the National Security Council, a greater source of frustration to the president than the fallout from the travel ban.”

The country, the GOP, the Democrats, the military, the intelligence community, the Congress, pretty much everyone who could fog a mirror (except for the most rabid Trump supporters) was horrified last weekend when Bannon, a self-proclaimed Leninist and white supremacist, was appointed to the National Security Council.

We now find that Trump, master genius, control freak, and ruler of the Free World that he is, did not bother to read the Executive Order that he was signing. He did not know that he was appointing Bannon to the NSC when he signed the Executive Order that had been written…by Bannon.

Monkeys with machine guns.

They have no idea what they’re doing. They want to rule the world and make everyone fall into line and think the way they do and worship the ground they walk on, but they have no clue how to do even the most simple of tasks involved with the job. They’re just going around pushing buttons to see what they do.

Some of those buttons can lead to a war that will kill a billion people.

Are you scared yet?

As my days are getting (somehow) even busier, I simply have no choice but to stay off of social media and news sites during most of the day. Then when I get a few minutes in the evening I’ll browse quickly to see what the outrage de jour is.

I’m assuming if the Trumpencritter dissolves the Senate and relies on the regional Governors and fear to keep the local systems in line, someone will call and give me a heads up.

Tonight I was pleased to see this:

Mr. Locke is correct. This is NOT Trump’s America. This is an America where one pathetic, ignorant fucker is trumped by dozens and dozens of outraged and disgusted Americans who step up in an instant and do what is necessary to demonstrate that the lowest and most hate-filled among us do NOT speak for us.

It also demonstrates why New York City is quickly giving Prague a run for its money as my favorite place on Earth to visit.

I hope the Trumpencritter and his horde of evil minions have a good time in Florida this weekend. He’s had a tough week! Poor, poor thing. He must be exhausted. His stamina must be shot to hell. He’s earned it!

I’m sure the American public won’t belittle him the $3M+ it’s going to cost to fly him there and protect him. And that’s only fair, since Trump was so fair and understanding when his predecessor was enjoying a weekend away.

So, enjoy your well earned respite from the horrors of the press and that stupid 60% (or is it up to 70% now?) of Americans who already think you’re the worst President in history.

Here’s an idea! Take some relaxing time on the beach. Practice some yoga on the beach. Lie out in the sun and soak up some rays.

Don’t worry about those thunderstorms coming up out of nowhere. They do that all of the time in Florida. It’s truly not that big of a deal. What would really be the odds of getting hit by lightning? Teensy tiny, right? Plus, those storms are probably part of the climate change that isn’t real so they’re probably not real either!

Besides, God and you are tight. Best buds! You see him as an equal – usually. Sometimes. Whatever! Semantics! He’ll keep you safe!

Just sit right there for a while. Relax. Rest.

Don’t. Move.

This alert popped up on my phone today and I damn near had a heart attack:

There are so many ways to finish that headline and so, so many of them involve the end of civilization.

I understand, it could have been “…does something sane,” “…does something moral,” or “…does something humane.” It also could have been “…announced that YOU won the Lotto!” The odds seem to be just about the same.

Get used to it. It’s going to be a rough ride.

So now we have a multi-billionaire Rex Tillerson, former CEO of ExxonMobil, sworn in as Secretary of State.

The Trumpencritter has already shown his love and devotion for Russia and Putin. One might call it a relationship that’s almost disgustingly unsavory. Perverted. Insane. Unless of course one believes that whole thing about Trump actually owing hundreds of millions of dollars to the Russian oligarchs, which could be one reason that he has refused to release his tax returns. Perverted. Maybe not quite that insane, although unbelievably corrupt and immoral.

So as of this morning the United States still had sanctions in place which put a hold on an ExxonMobil deal with Russia for drilling rights. A deal worth in excess of $50B.

That’s not a typo. Half a trillion dollars. $500,000,000,000.

Is there an over/under in Las Vegas on when the corrupt slimeball in the White House and his evil henchman Tillerson lift those sanctions?

Gee, that will make Tillerson a multi-multi-multi-multi-billionaire!

Which made me start to wonder what in hell you do with that sort of money. I mean, even with a whole stable of Citation Xs and a 500-foot yacht on each coast and another in Europe and another in Australia (whoops, better move that one quick after today!), even with all of that, it’s still tough to be able to spend two or three billion dollars.

What do you do with, say, five billion dollars? Or ten? Or twenty?

Buy your own island? Maybe Greenland. It will be absolutely subtropical after these ignorant assholes fry the planet.

Might be better to buy your own new planet.

Wait…

That’s it! I forgot! Ronald Reagan talked about this back in his day. It’s all so clear!

Trickle-Down Economics!!

Tillerson’s going to take those multi-multi-multi-billions and fund the National Endowment for the Arts, Planned Parenthood, Social Security, Medicare, and all of the other government programs that Trump, Ryan, and McConnell (heretofore to be known as “The Triumvirate of Evil”) are eliminating in the name of freedom, apple pie, and all of the lobbyists who keep shoving those briefcases full of currency at them.

He’s going to single-handedly keep the US economy going – and he’s going to make the Russians pay for it!

So now that the Trumpencritter has named his nominee to the Supreme Court, let’s review recent GOP logic on this topic.

When President Obama nominated Merrick Garland, the GOP claimed that he shouldn’t or couldn’t do that because at the time he was a “lame duck” in office. In their view (which is insane, unconstitutional, and psychotic) it would only be “fair” for him to wait and let the next President nominate someone once he (or she) had a full four-years ahead of them.

That’s so fucking stupid that I don’t even know where to start. Aside from the obvious issues with, you know, the way the Constitution is actually written, there’s also a fairly good sized body of precedent for Presidents, both Democrats and Republicans, being “lame ducks” but getting past that and doing their job.

Logic, the Constitution, and the kind of moral and ethical standards that we would expect from any first grader aside, the GOP chose to simply ignore Merrick Garland’s nomination. They didn’t vote against him – they refused to even hold a single hearing. They pretended he didn’t exist.

Just like they keep pretending that the Constitution doesn’t exist when it doesn’t suit them.

So here we are now and the Trumpencritter has nominated Neil Gorsuch to fill that seat that’s been empty for ten months because of the GOP’s disgusting and cowardly tactics.

Just so that we can decide if the Democrats should pull the same stunt now that THAT precedent has been set, what are the specifics for a President being a “lame duck”?

The GOP said that President Obama had less than a year to go, so he was a “lame duck.” And the GOP is just chock-a-block full of really good Bible-thumping folk, so they’re all firm believers in a kind and beneficent God. Although I would note (it’s relevant) that He’s something of a smiting sort of Dude, prone to throw plagues and bolts of lightning about when peeved.

So the Trumpencritter is one of the most useless excuses for a human being ever, and he’s just out there sinning like there’s no tomorrow. How long does he have before God puts him in the middle of a flood, a cloud of ravenous locusts, or the kind of lightning storm previously seen only in planet-sized hurricanes on Jupiter?

I’m thinking it’s well less than a year. So doesn’t that make the Trumpencritter a “lame duck” as well?

Vengeful God + the Trumpencritter = less than a year before ZAAAAPPPP!

Ergo, the Democrats should be just fine preventing Gorsuch from ever getting to the Supreme Court. Isn’t that truly what God and Mitch McConnell must want, given their clear-cut track record?

Well, it could happen here, but it’s unlikely for a bunch of reasons.

Last night’s post was a bit over the top. But, as promised, I won’t delete it.

There’s still a metric shit-ton of scary stuff in there, but one of the internet pundits that I most admire, Jim Wright, had some excellent points about that same article.

My favorite bit:

Americans are loud. Americans are assholes. Americans don’t cooperate and organizing them is like trying to teach synchronized swimming to cats.

“Americans are assholes.” Yes, yes we are. And damn proud of it.

This may in the end (see what I did there?) be the salvation of the Republic.