Euterpe, you got me

 

These are heady days for those of us with a humanistic education.  As previously noted, Ron "I never ate pudding with my hands" DeSantis has been tutored by one Brett O'Donnell, described as "William Shakespeare and Vince Lombardi rolled into one."  I was still trying to absorb that when I read that DeSantis called Trump's Congressional allies "listless vessels" because they adhere to one man instead of being "rooted in principle" like him.  That's pretty fancy for someone who has arranged for Bowdlerized Shakespeare only to be taught in Florida public schools (no "beast with two backs" or "country matters" lest the young be corrupted by thoughts of S-E-X).  Frankly I would have expected the governissimo to lean on the wisdom of Lombardi instead.  ("We didn't lose the game, we just ran out of time" will come in handy.)  

Republican "winged words" begins to look like a trend when you hear what Trump had to say on the Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show, evidently a country music program on Fox Business:  "Putin would've never gotten into Ukraine, but that's just on my relationship with him.  My personality over his.  I was the apple of his eye and I would say, 'Don't ever do it.'  It was tough stuff there but he would have never done it."  Like Putin, Clay and Buck were too cowed to observe that when Russia occupied Crimea in 2014 there wasn't a murmur from Trump.  The apple of his eye?  Light of his life, fire of his loins?  Sorry, that's a different Vladimir.

When I heard that California's first tropical storm in 84 years was called Hilary I knew two things would be true:  We will hear about "devastation" at the homes of celebrities and Republicans will make jokes that would once have been called "sick."  Margie Greene checked in first with her Hilary/Hillary observation, but she was topped by Fox pundit Kennedy:  "The wrath of Tropical Storm Hilary.  Forty-two million desperate souls in the path of the storm, which made landfall in Mexico several hours ago.  But they let it right into the country because it's Biden's America."  (rimshot)  That's why she goes by one name, like Gallagher and Carrot-top.

Last week a couple of Federalist Society law professors, William Baude of the University of Chicago and Michael Stokes Paulsen of the University of St. Thomas, roiled the waters by positing that Trump's attempt to lead an insurrection disqualifies him from running for any public office under the Fourteenth Amendment.  (Trump once tried to repeal it by executive order because of the birthright citizenship clause and because he knows less about the Constitution than Biden's dogs.)  Now Asa Hutchinson has become the first participant in this week's Republican debate to agree with them out loud because he has nothing to lose -- most people think his first name is "Asia" or that he's a woman.  Or both.

If Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson gets elected to the top job -- and why not, he's a Republican? -- North Carolina will be in for a bumpy night four years.  He ticks all the usual nutty boxes -- climate change a hoax, David Hogg a "crisis actor," "New World Order" globalists -- and a few you don't see every day.  He's sure that Hillary Clinton, George Soros et al., mailed bombs to themselves in 2018 and poor Cesar Sayoc got the blame; that the music industry is run by Satan and the Illuminati (he has a special problem with Beyonce); and that Soros arranged for Boko Haram to kidnap Nigerian schoolgirls for some reason.  After that it gets weird.  Lizard people-fake moon landing-JFK assassination weird.  I blame Reagan and his repeal of mental health policy.

Also in fuckbonkers news, the Atlantic has an eye-opening article about Vivek Ramaswamy that makes Mr. Robinson look like Misterogers.  He's curious about 9/11 and "how many police, how many federal agents were on the planes," as if that signifies something profound.  As CEO, uh, president, he will abolish the FBI, CDC, ATF, IRS, you know, the usual suspects.  And sorry, Ukraine, you'll just have to give up some territory because he says so.  He's rich.  He knows stuff.

Lauri Carleton had nine children and owned a clothing store in Cedar Glen, California.  She was murdered for the crime of displaying a Pride flag in front of the store.  She was 66.

We already live in Ron DeSantis's America, even in the tranquil San Bernardino mountains.  I hope he's happy today.

Rudolph Giuliani has yet to surrender to Fulton County authorities but he says he has "scientific evidence" of 2020 election fraud which will exonerate him on all RICO charges.  (Really scientific or Pillow Mike scientific?  Algorithms and Chinese satellites?)  I hope it's more scientific than Sherri Tenpenny's claim that covid vaccine makes people magnetic.  Ohio has suspended her medical license.  Rejecting real science for the eye-of-newt variety is a Republican requirement now.

At a zoo in Tennessee (where else?) the world's only spotless giraffe has been born, a sure sign of the eschaton.  Pass me a snake.