Life comes at you fast

 Mark Dawson is almost certainly not the first writer to buy his own book -- four hundred copies! -- to nudge it up the best-seller list, but boasting about it on his podcast was perhaps not a good idea.  The Sunday Times has demoted him from its Top Ten.  This is bad news for Junior Trump, whose latest literary effort has been bulk-purchased by the RNC, like the last one.  (His ghost writer must be faster than Barbara Cartland.)  I guess there's a significant discount if you buy by the pound.  Called Liberal Privilege, it contrasts his hardscrabble youth with the sheltered upbringing enjoyed by people like Joe Biden.  Look for it in your goody-bag at the Jacksonville plague-fest.

Maksym Kryvosh hijacked a bus and took thirteen hostages in Lutsk, Ukraine, demanding that a number of government officials admit to being terrorists.  In the end, he settled for a Facebook post by President Zelensky which said, "The film Earthlings from 2005.  Everyone should watch it."  It's a documentary about animal rights narrated by Joaquin Phoenix.  No humans were harmed in the resolution of this crisis, despite a 500-page manifesto which someone will eventually have to read. 

Nadim Shamma-Sourgen will publish his first collection of poems next year.  Sample:  "Baddies love their baddie friends/Even very baddie ones/Policemen might arrest them/But they'll still have their love."  Cut him some slack, he's four years old.  Could you even read at four?

Trump tried to pressure the British government to steer the 2018 British Open to his failing golf resort in Turnberry, Scotland, according to the American ambassador.  It didn't happen, leading to his calling Prime Minister Theresa May "stupid," among other things.  Probably have better luck with Boris Johnson, who is desperate to do a trade deal with almost anyone as no-deal Brexit approaches.

Some workmen lifting a manhole cover discovered Rudolph Giuliani relaying a long-debunked story about Ilhan Omar being at a terrorist training camp, featuring video from before she was born.  Should she sue him?  Or put it down to the ravings of a pathetic old drunk?  In other fake video news, the Trump commercial depicting urban violence in Unnamed City With Democratic Mayor turns out to be a pro-democracy demonstration in Kyiv, Ukraine, in 2014.   They pulled it off Wikipedia.  Oops.

A large portion of the Ohio Republican Party was arrested yesterday for "public corruption racketeering conspiracy," including the speaker of the House.  Two bankrupt nuclear plants were involved, so there's something here for everyone.  Hey, Kellyanne, order more pardon pads, willya, honey?

I've been successful so far in ignoring the "presidential campaign" of Kanye West, or Ye, as I call him.  After a stranger-than-usual appearance in South Carolina, his wife Kim Kardashian thought it necessary to explain on Instagram, "As many of you know, Kanye has bipolar disorder."  Waiting for your excuse, Melania.

Despite getting at least three of its devotees on the ballot and recruiting Michael Flynn, the QAnon  Continuum has a lot of work to do:  Twitter has shut down its conspiracy sites for fear of instigating violence.  Twitter is part of the Deep State!  Does Trump know?  He should close his account immediately.

Back when the Department of Homeland Security was new, Paul Rosenzweig was a "senior policy official."  He's disturbed that "Trump is morphing DHS into his private little rogue, secret army."  Back in 2001 I thought the whole notion of "homeland" security was undemocratic, as was the PATRIOT Act authorizing even more domestic spying.  It was suspicious that the bill was all ready to be passed unread before the first plane hit the World Trade Center.  When something like this falls into the hands of totalitarian monsters, what do you expect? 

In its continuing game of diplomatic tag, the US ordered China to close its consulate in Houston, of all places.  Last night the fire department was called because consular staff were burning papers in a courtyard, which is what you do when you expect invading troops to surround the place.  Trump is again calling covid "China flu" because he has washed and sanitized his hands of the whole "sniffles" problem, as the death toll passes 142,000.  In about a month, farmers in Iowa and Nebraska will be trying to market a fuckload of soybeans and wheat.  We'll see what happens then.

Last year the New York Times published The 1619 Project, Nikole Hannah-Jones's essay on the entangled roots of slavery and the future United States, and it lit a fire under racist asses that continues to flare up.  Last week in Philadelphia, racist ass Mike Pompeo lectured a group of diplomats on how wrong it is to even imagine that slavery was integral to getting this country off the ground.  He has started something called the Commission on Unalienable [sic] Rights and they've already reported back -- it seems the only rights you need are property and religious liberty.  Of course, classifying humans as property is exactly what Hannah-Jones was writing about.  Did he read the piece or just look at the pictures?  As for religious liberty, I seem to remember it's linked to free speech, a free press and free assembly -- and now we're back to DHS goons in Portland.   "These days, even saying that 'America is fundamentally good' has become controversial," Pompeo pouted.  No country is "fundamentally good," you ass.  An exceptional teenager wrote that about "most people" in 1944, just before she was hauled off to Bergen-Belsen.  Some people are good.  Countries are morally neutral.  When good people predominate, they do good things.  When they don't, children die in squalid camps and protesters are disappeared off the streets. 

Absolutely everything is on the World Wide Internets, including the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, which Trump is still bragging about.   So he probably does not have Parkinson's.  Happy now, haters?  He would have done even better on an American test.