Strange things are happening

 

Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) was indicted again, together with his wife Nadine and others, in a corruption scandal involving cash, a nice car, a "job" for Nadine and gold bars.  That's old school.  Clarence Thomas has to attend Koch events and even make speeches for swag like that.  Menendez faced similar charges in 2017 but was acquitted.  If there is a Hunter Biden connection, or even if there isn't, we'll hear about it in good time.

As it does for all men, death did not come for Rupert Murdoch, but you'd be forgiven for thinking it had.  The Lizard of Oz has received so much praise for growing rich by undermining democratic institutions and employing shitstains like Hannity, O'Reilly and Carlson, the MSM seems to think we should weep at the end of an era.  

By astonishing coincidence Michael Wolff has a gossipy book out next week called The Fall:  The End of Fox News and the Murdoch Dynasty, which seems overly optimistic.  (Lachlan lives and reigns;   Gutfeld! is master of the revels still.)  Suspicious, I checked to see if Henry Holt & Company is a Murdoch satellite, and it seems to be part of a German conglomerate called Holtzbrinck.  Sometimes synchronism is just synchronism.  Anyway, it contains this quote from Tucker Carlson:  "I am not antisemitic and I am not anti-Black; that's a complete misunderstanding of what I am.  I am anti-Catholic."  He hid it so well all these years.  Along with Freemason panic, anti-popery is the bedrock of American hates, dating to the early 19th century.  Maybe he's just anti-modernity, which would give him common ground with patrician papist William Buckley.  If you go back far enough, there's a place we can all hold hands and sing -- 

  

No!  I am not touching that hand, or the one he appears to have slipped a ring onto.  I won't.

(Say...could that be why Tuckoo hates Biden even more than he hated Obama?)

There's still no budget or even a continuing resolution, and the Kongressional Klown Kaucus have been sent home for the weekend because Kevin McCarthy is very bad at his job, which he may not have much longer.  A "motion to vacate" was left in the men's room (what better place?) and speculation about a successor continues to spread.  (Is that mold on the skirting board?) 

Speaker Gaetz?  Speaker Jordan?  Second-termer Margie Greene is setting her sights a little higher.  She thinks she is already president and has drafted a "Declaration of War against the Mexican cartels."  That's nice, dear, why don't you relax and get your boyfriend to take you out?  Maybe a musical.

Meanwhile the real President just keeps working away.  Today he announced the creation of the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, to be overseen by the Vice-President.  Yesterday they launched the American Climate Corps, an updated version of 1933's Civilian Conservation Corps with an emphasis on climate change.  (Keep comparing him to FDR, idiots, and see what you get next.  How about a New Federal Theater Project?)  The White House has instructed federal agencies to brace for a shutdown if the weaklings in the House obey Trump's yelps for the government to go dark.  (Law enforcement would go on, including his prosecutions.  Someone should tell him.)  Biden addressed the UN this week and nobody laughed, another nice change since Trump.  But he's so old...

And in "Heidi and I" news, Ted Cruz has opinions.  "Heidi and I are incredibly heated over Joe Biden's rising gas prices."  (Hey, get a room.)  "In August of 2024 the Democrat kingmakers jettison Joe Biden and parachute in Michelle Obama.  I view this as a very serious danger."  Mrs. Obama would agree -- she didn't even want her husband to run for president.  Or did you mean a danger to Trump?  Or to America, which would never survive having two Black women at the head of the executive branch?  Especially if the Speaker of the House is --- Hakeem Jeffries!

Oh, the humanity.  Heidi and you should emigrate now.

  

  

Nasty women and others

 People have been all over Kristen Welker's inability to act as anything but Trump's stenographer during the outrageous "interview" that inaugurated her Meet the Press tenure (more like Press His Meat, am I right?), but maybe she was under orders to get something on video that could fill up an hour without him ripping off the mic and waddling away.  Don't forget what she was up against.

Megyn Kelly sat down with the twice-impeached loser on Sirius XM and brought up his possession of the Bathroom Papers.  Or as he interpreted it, "Boy, she became nastier all of a sudden.  She was pretty nasty, didn't you think, anyone that watched it."  And Kelly is white, emphatically so, even with "blood coming out of her wherever."  She thinks she asked "tough questions."  

As if freed from an evil spell by the retirement of Rupert Murdoch, the Wall Street Journal demands to know why Trump is "afraid" to debate the other losers.  "Is he worried he'd look his age at 77 next to younger candidates?"  Before you throw your hat in the air, recall that the WSJ thinks almost anyone has a better chance of defeating Joe Biden than the strawberry blond.  They went on to mock his murky anti-choice policy as well as his physical fitness ("[not] exactly in shape to set records at the YMCA senior triathlon"), which must have stung as Deranged Jack Smith is a triathlon competitor and not in the senior division.  "What is he afraid of?"

Even Charles Koch is desperately seeking a Trump alternative for 2024, for which he received the customary abuse on Ministry of Truth Social:  "Very stupid, awkward, and highly overrated Globalist Charles Koch of the Koch Network doesn't have a clue."  Maybe not, but he has eleventy-billion dollars and doesn't owe a dime to a Chinese bank.  Globalist?  Funny, he doesn't look Globalist.

According to Rolling Stone, what "your favorite president (me)" fears is the clink.  Trump is asking his lawyers if he'd be sent to a comfortable Club Fed establishment and whether he'd be forced to wear a jumpsuit that might clash with his orange skin.  One of his remaining lawyers, Alina Habba, says he's so confident that he isn't even preparing for the trial(s) because "You don't have to prep much when you've done nothing wrong."  Or when you're monstrously lazy and have the attention span of a sand gnat.

Ever hear of Victoria Spartz?  Nor I, but she represents some subsection of Indianaians in Congress and yesterday was her day to grab the spotlight.  She really stuck it to Merrick Garland by demanding to know why he didn't do a better job of policing the January 6th coup at which "families with strollers" were inconvenienced by smoke bombs.  Garland, a judge on the DC Court of Appeals at the time, was unaware that he was supposed to.  (It's an article of faith among Congressional insurrectionists that the coup was a peaceful tourist event that went south because Democrats prevented the National Guard from providing security, but they usually blame Nancy Pelosi.)  Also, he sent the FBI to her district to harass people in their homes.  Garland must have destroyed all the video of families with toddlers  because I've never seen any.  Perhaps only Spartz saw them.  Have you seen Tim Scott's girlfriend, by any chance?  Is she here now, Victoria?

Despite the best efforts of Tommy Tuberville and Vladdy Putin, the Senate confirmed Air Force General Charles Q. Brown, Jr., to be Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.  Chuck Schumer should cancel all recesses until the rest of the list has been worked through.  And no sneaking out to the cloakroom to watch football.  If General Brown's video statement on the murder of George Floyd is anything to go by, he's just as woke as Mark Milley.  Suck on it, racists.

  

A creeping sense of dread

 A lot of people felt apprehension on January 6, 2021, as the mob began to march on the Capitol.  According to her new book, however, Cassidy Hutchinson had more to fear than most:  "I find Rudy in the back of the tent...the corners of his mouth split into a Cheshire cat smile.  Waving a stack of documents, he moves towards me, like a wolf closing in on its prey..."  A bit of a mixed metaphor there, but she doesn't claim to be a professional writer.  "Rudy wraps one arm around my body, closing the space that was separating us.  I feel his stack of documents press into the small of my back.  I lower my eyes and watch his free hand reach for the hem of my blazer.  'By the way,' he says, 'I'm loving this leather jacket on you.'  His hand slips under my blazer, then my skirt.  I feel his frozen fingers trail up my thigh.  He tilts his chin up.  The whites of his eyes look jaundiced.  My eyes dart to John Eastman, who flashes a leering grin."  My god, a threesome?  

As present-tense first-person coup erotica goes, this is pretty good.  It's from Enough, Hutchinson's account of her disillusionment with the Trump court, in fine bookshops everywhere on September 26.    Besides the sex scenes she also explains that Trump's dislike of face masks during the height of covid stemmed from his reliance on orange makeup:  "The press would criticize him for not wearing a mask, not knowing that the depth of his vanity had caused him to reject masks -- and then millions of his fans followed suit."  What did Rudy do to her with his stack of documents? 

Literary sex of another kind is in the news from Texas, where a teacher was fired for exposing her eighth-graders to a graphic novelization of The Diary of Anne Frank.  That was roughly the age when I read the book and I don't remember any pornographic passages, but these days in places like Texas it's porn if it acknowledges that men and women are different.  Now jobless, the teacher is ordered by the Hamshire-Fannett school district to "communicate her apologies" to parents, bigots and anyone else whose corsets are a-twist; if I were she, I'd tell them to take a flying jump in the direction of Yucatan.  The problem seems to be that Anne was a normal adolescent living in a horrific time.  She did not obsess about Nazis every minute but thought about her body and its changes and whether she would ever fall in love and have a life.  If you can get past her shocking descriptions of her own breasts, it makes the Diary even more poignant.  Thousands of other girls met the same fate.

Fallout from the change in the Senate dress code continues, with the Republicans writing Chuck Schumer a heartrending letter begging him to think of "the sanctity" of the chamber.  You know, the one where Joe McCarthy ran amok and a dirt-dumb football coach currently sabotages the US military.  The man at the center of the hurricane, John Fetterman, is ready to compromise:  "If those jagoffs in the House stop trying to shut our government down and fully support Ukraine, then I will save democracy by wearing a suit on the Senate floor next week."

No response yet from the jagoffs but they've been busy.  Gym Jordan's committee spent six hours demanding to know why Merrick Garland has not announced an execution date for Hunter Biden and why his prosecution is in the hands of Trump-appointed US Attorney David Weiss instead of Attila the Hun.  Also, Matt Gaetz had advice for the President -- quit treating Hunter as a son he loves and inviting him to state dinners and such.  Why can't he be more like Trump, who barely remembers the names of his sons?  Next week Jamie Comer and the Comettes will kick off their impeachment inquiry under the legal theory of Lewis Carroll (impeachment first, evidence second).  Would it not be excellent if they had to fund the government just to keep their bullshit alive? 

Is Alabama the most lawless place in the nation (and now I'm not talking about Coach Numbnuts)?  The Supreme Court -- yes, the one in Washington -- ordered them to create a second majority-Black Congressional district and they defied it.  They're using a condemned prisoner as a guinea pig to test an untried form of killing, nitrogen hypoxia.  Now they're going after musicians.  A high school band director in Birmingham was conducting the players after a football game and ignored orders from police to stop, whereupon he was tased and arrested before hundreds of traumatized students.  "They came for the musicians and I did not protest, for I was not a musician..."

  

  

Grabbing the hog

 Somewhere between the golden elevator and the golden toilet, I lost an important reflex -- the capacity to be surprised by Trump.  I can fake it but I can't make my knee joint respond to the rubber hammer anymore.  The avalanche of criminality, stupidity, avarice and moral insufficiency was too much.  An occasional whimper of outrage is all I can manage now.

Like most people I had never heard of Molly Michael.  When I hit the google she wasn't even the first Molly who came up on this, the noisiest day of her life (I'm guessing), although it says she's a "well-known media figure."  (Who isn't?)  It says she was Trump's executive assistant and I think I can guess why he hired her.

I'm not saying backrubs were part of her assignment, but I'm not saying they weren't.  Whatever she did -- McDonald's run, order Titleists, fire Fauci -- her instructions were apparently scrawled on the backs of some of those stolen classified documents that caused Jack Smith to become deranged.  Upon hearing that the FBI wanted to talk to Michael about this, Trump told her, "You don't know anything about the boxes."  She talked to them anyway.  I guess she's not his type anymore.

Like Jesus, Tim Ballard has been portrayed on film by Jim Caviezel.  Unlike Jesus, Ballard has been accused of sexually harassing colleagues at Operation Underground Railroad, an organization  supposedly dedicated to taking down child traffickers.  According to Vice he was forced out last June for skeevy behavior toward female employees during overseas trips.  The QAnon conspiracist was an adviser to the Trump administration, so draw your own conclusions.

No doubt Ballard will find at least one Democrat to blame for his sleaziness.  Lauren Boebert has.  She was shocked -- shocked -- to discover that her Beetlejuice date is a Democrat and owns a bar which hosted drag shows.  Like the talking serpent in that book he led her to destruction and has now been D-U-M-P-E-D.  Of course, she is still a punch line.  Not surprisingly, the best line came from John Fetterman:  "If I take up vaping and grabbing the hog during a live musical, they'll make me a folk hero."  You already are, Senator.

Five Americans have returned from captivity in Iran in a complicated four-country deal.  Qatar brokered the arrangement which saw the five exchanged for five Iranians held in the US, while $6 billion in Iranian funds was unfrozen by South Korea with restrictions (humanitarian uses only).  Three of the Iranians decided not to go home.  Already the Republicans are complaining that this diplomatic triumph will only encourage Iran to take more hostages.  And what about the Americans in Russia, huh?

Another thing that will piss off the party of decorum and good taste was Volodymyr Zelenskiy's speech to the UN General Assembly today.  Not only did he accuse their favorite dictator of genocide for abducting thousands of Ukrainian children, as the Nazis once stole "Aryan-looking" Polish children and gave them to Germans to raise.  (Most never found their birth parents again.)  He did it without a suit and a tie.  How is this guy even a president?  

Today is Talk Like a Pirate Day but perhaps it would better be called Talk Like Robert Newton Day.  The actor's portrayal of Long John Silver in Treasure Island (1950) is primarily responsible for the impression that all pirates spoke in the accent of the west country (he was born in Dorset).  Actually they sounded more like Michael Caine.  I don't know, I'm guessing.  Anyway, let's see what's going on across the sea.

Keir Starmer is not prime minister yet but he seems to be talking to the leaders of Germany and France about the UK rejoining the European Union as an "associate member."  Nobody knows what that means as it has never happened before.  But even a senior Tory like Lord Heseltine says it needs to be studied.

SUNAK TO BIRMINGHAM:  DROP DEAD has not yet been a tabloid headline but it could be.  The city is bankrupt and may have to sell off assets including the Central Library and the airport.  Who buys an airport?  Please, not Richard Branson.  He had enough trouble running a railroad.

The Brits love their dogs, not wisely but maybe too well.  Three people have been diagnosed with brucella canis, a disease which causes lameness and infertility in dogs and can cause septicemia and meningitis in humans.  This may be of interest to the doing-my-own-research folks who refuse to have their dogs vaccinated because they think it will make them autistic.  (Not really.)

Russell Brand is a sleazebag.  Listen if you care, and there's no reason you should.  He's getting support from lots of other sleazebags but YouTube has de-monetized his channel.  (YT is severe about rape, maybe overly so.  I recently watched a doc about World War II and they bleeped the title of Iris Chang's book The Rape of Nanking.)

Not British but too bizarre to omit:  Kais Saied, the president of Tunisia, was talking about Storm Daniel, which caused catastrophic flooding in Libya:  "Didn't anyone wonder why the name Daniel was chosen?  Because the Zionist movement has infiltrated minds and thinking, we've fallen into a cognitive coma."  Yes, they control the weather with their space lasers.

Happy new year to disloyal liberal Jews

 At this point it's not news that Trump is an antisemite who adores Israel.  They named a rest stop or something after him because he moved the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, making him the best friend Israel has ever had.  American Jews who are skeptical of his motives or indifferent to Israel, or even critical of its increasingly right-wing government, they're the problem.  So he found a screed from something called JEXIT, whose mission is to lead Jews away from the Democratic Party and into the arms of those "very fine people" who marched in Charlottesville, and shared it with his basement-dwellers on Ministry of Truth Social.  The only holidays Trump doesn't trash are the ones he doesn't know about.  Over at Wonkette Liz Dye dissolves this toxic sludge better than I could.  

I'm not sure the classic terms of racism even apply to Trump.  He's just a praise whore.  He will share praise of himself even if it comes from Jews, or African Americans, or undocumented trans Muslims, because he is an empty sack that can never be filled.  His empty existence, devoid of love, ideas, hobbies, requires constant replenishment to fill the hole left by his inattentive parents.  Money, nursery food, the cheering of mobs, female bodies, he gobbles them and will never be satisfied.  And now he's our problem.  He wants a kingdom, and that won't fill him up either.  He won't shut up and go away no matter how many elections he loses.  We have to rely on the creaky machinery of the law.  But law relies heavily on precedent, and there is no precedent for imprisoning an ex-president, even Jefferson Davis.  Even good judges hesitate to treat this criminal like any other.  I don't know where it ends.

In his weirdly timely new book about Mitt Romney, McKay Coppins describes how Congressional Republicans said they wanted to support Trump's impeachment but feared for their lives and those of their families.  Romney himself says he spends $5,000 a week for private security (his life was saved on January 6 by the quick thinking of Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman).  Jack Smith has repeatedly asked Judge Tanya Chutkan to stop Trump from intimidating witnesses and polluting the DC jury pool, or as he calls it "TAKE AWAY MY FREE SPEECH."  So far, nobody with the power to do so has been willing to bell the cat.  But it's a golden age for bodyguards.  I'm sure Ken Buck has some.

Yesterday the President -- the real one, Kristen Welker -- was in Delaware as usual and a protester who appeared to be armed was spotted walking near his house carrying a sign festooned with the usual lies and talking points.  It's not clear if he was arrested -- reporters were busy following the Bidens to church and yelling intelligent questions like "Are you going to pardon Hunter?" outside the cemetery where members of his family are buried.

Kristen Welker is being credited in some quarters with Pulitzer-level journalism for inducing Trump to admit that he ignored the advice of his lawyers when they said the election was not stolen, undercutting his own legal defense.  Any junior high school reporter for the Weekly Intramural could have done the same just by smiling and calling him "Mr. President" and letting him babble.  Asked if he likes democracy -- a question you can't imagine any president even devoting time to -- he said, "I do.  I do.  But it has to be a democracy that's fair."  Did Welker ask what the hell he was talking about?  ("You mean a democracy where you win?")  I guess she forgot.  Chuck Todd's legacy is in good, well- manicured hands.  If he swerved to a discussion of the Panama Canal or windmill cancer, it didn't make the final edit.  When Monica Lewinsky performed this service for Bill Clinton, it got him impeached.  Remind me:  Did the Democrats then impeach George W. Bush to get even?

The dignity of the Congress is under siege, and certainly not because of Margie Greene's dick pics or John Kennedy's dramatic readings of sex acts.  No, it's the dress code.  Chuck Schumer announced a loosening of Senate requirements, and the Republicans consider it as outrageous as January 6 wasn't.  It's all so John Fetterman can come to the floor and vote in his signature hoodie and shorts.  No mention of Gym Jordan and his apparent ignorance of how to put on a jacket.  

And in other news of the stylish, Melania Trump has a new venture.  Having failed to interest buyers in her used hats, NFTs of her used hats or something to do with laptops for foster kids, she is peddling -- wait for it -- fooking Christmas ornaments.  A patriotic red, white and blue star and other must-haves in the $35-$45 range.  Notice that she's selling them on Xitter, not her husband's collapsing platform.

As he prepares to end his term as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Mark Milley had to tell Fareed Zakaria that "woke" is not the problem with the military.  Zacaria forgot to ask how he feels about having no immediate replacement thanks to the Kooky Koach from Alabama.  Maybe these TV "journalists" need someone to remind them of important questions so the rest of us won't have to scream at the television and frighten the dog.

It's Fashion Week in London and not only the clothes are ugly.  Models wearing them have been made up to simulate bruises, cuts and black eyes.  (I hope it's makeup.)  I wonder if this would "work" with male models.

Joshua Norton, a/k/a Emperor Norton I of the United States, was a beloved figure in 19th century San Francisco.  His response to business setbacks was to take on imperial trappings and promote patently absurd notions like building a bridge across the Golden Gate.  He was colorful and harmless, and thousands attended his funeral.  The same can't be said of Romana Didulo, Queen of Canada, etc., who got a frosty reception when she arrived in Kamsack, Saskatchewan, to make war on covid vaccines and those who administer them.  (What is it with the mentally unbalanced and vaccines?)  HRH threatened to "shoot to kill" anyone vaccinating a person under 19 and "clean up" Kamsack, where many First Nations people reside.  The Kamsack hospital had to put on extra security because her subjects are as screwy as MAGAts.  The queen has been proclaiming that mortgages and utility bills need not be paid (sounds like our Sovereign Citizens), resulting in people losing their lights and then their homes.  Read their Telegram posts if you dare.  Say it with me:  "Oh there's brain damage in the east, and brain damage in the west..."  

               

Into the weekend

 We've all enjoyed Trump's rage- and mis-spelling-filled tweets or whatever they're called this week.  Imagine what his text messages are like.  Jack Smith doesn't have to -- Xitter turned them over to him last month, at least thirty-two of the juiciest, probably of the Leader directing his troops on January 6.  He's still issuing orders, acknowledging to Megyn Kelly that he told the pathetic Kevin McCarthy to cobble together an impeachment of Joe Biden without the requisite House vote because "they did it to me."  

As Pathetic Kevin struggles to hold onto his job he can expect the support of the CrossFit Cracker, maybe.  "I'm not a member of the burn-it-all-down caucus anymore," Margie Greene told anyone who would listen.  As long as she gets everything she wants, she's all in for the Squeaker.  But will she vote to shut down the government if it interferes with the very serious impeachment?

Who will lead the impeachment?  Well, who could lead an impeachment based on revenge and sawdust better than a broken-down, disbarred, criminally indicted, bankrupt, flatulent drunk?  Yes, Rudolph Giuliani has volunteered (not really, he'd need to get paid) to display the prosecutorial skills he showed long ago while his drinking was under control.  

Florida has a new law which prohibits individuals displaying images on a building, structure or property without permission, clearly aimed at Rainbow flags and unflattering pictures of Ron DeSantis.  It's amusing that the first individual arrested under it is Jason Brown, for hanging swastikas and "other antisemitic images" on an overpass near Disney World in Orlando.  Brown claims to be a member of a local hate group called the Order of the Black Sun ("the cheaper the crook, the gaudier the patter," said Samuel Spade).  State law enforcement was careful to praise the Governissimo for "working to rid this state of intimidation, vitriol and hate directed toward people of faith," which is a whole other level of funny-weird.

What have we learned about Lauren Boebert?  When she goes to the theater with her boyfriend she leaves her Sarah Palin glasses* at home and climbs into a dress two sizes too small.  Then she vapes, sings along, fondles her friend and gets thrown out at the request of people who paid for their tickets and want to enjoy the show.  The pregnant woman behind her objected to the vaping and Boebert called her "a sad and miserable person."  She's a grandmother!  And a Christian.  God told her to impeach Joe Biden.  Your lawmakers, America.  Thank you.

Today is the sixtieth anniversary of the bombing of Birmingham's 16th Street Baptist Church.  Remember Denise McNair, Carole Robertson, Addie Mae Collins and Cynthia Dianne Wesley.

"We have to own even the darkest parts of our past, understand them, and vow never to repeat them."  (Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson)

*Non-prescription glasses which give the impression that the wearer can read.

  

"I am ready, Chuck"

 I never watch the Sunday morning "news" shows but I'm told they have a lot of influence among people who want to be well-informed without all the trouble of reading a newspaper.  Apparently the flagship is Meet the Press, running since 1947.  There was much rejoicing when Chuck "Both Sides" Todd quit last week, and people thought his replacement, Kristen Welker, would have to be an improvement.  People are often wrong.

Welker and NBC decided her debut this week should make a splash by featuring a pre-taped, carefully staged interview with none other than Donald Trump.  Such a scoop.  Rather than risk enraging the non-demented, completely competent Putsch-plotter, she will ask polite, anodyne questions and the network's army of "fact-checkers" will refute some of his lies afterward, on the website.  Evidently the ground rules were set by Trump, including Welker's trip to Bedminster like any other supplicant.  "I am ready, Chuck, and I just want to say I am so thankful and grateful to you...for entrusting me with this monumental, important role."  So don't expect "both sides."  Viewers will get only one.  Having begun as she presumably means to go on, Welker (or whoever tells her what to do) can score many more interviews with very important Republicans who don't like to be challenged by uppity women.  Or by Chuck Todd, who suddenly looks like I.F. Stone by comparison.

If Meet the Press still involves a panel of reporters -- as I said, I haven't seen it since Lawrence Spivak -- I nominate the anonymous guy who showed up at a press conference in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, yesterday.  The state police commander was talking about the hunt for a murderer named Cavalcante, who had escaped from prison and been re-captured after two breathlessly reported weeks.  He is quite short, and Jimmy Olson wanted to know, "Was there any concern he would team up with another small man to step inside of a trench coat, 'Little Rascals'-style?"  "No," said Lt. Col. George Bivens, probably thinking "You asshole."  I'm thinking, why isn't this guy reporting from the White House?

It looks like we won't have Romney to kick around anymore.  The junior senator from Utah with the Paul Mitchell-ad hair is disappointed:  "It's pretty clear that the party is inclined to a populist demagogue message," he said sadly, announcing that he won't run again next year.  Oh, Willard, so near and yet so not.  Can't you recognize full-on fascism when you see it?  Have you been standing up too close or back too far?  OK, enjoy retirement and don't tie the dog to the car roof, so long and best wishes from one of the 47 percent.

Investigative journalism?  Isn't that redundant?  No, it's not.  According to the Washington Post Ron DeSantis took "undisclosed" freebies from rich people in 2018, including hotels, eats, private jet travel and the inevitable round of golf at Augusta.  They even know the names of his sugar daddies, real estate developer Mori Hosseini and John Cwik.  Hosseini got $92 million in federal pandemic funding at the governor's discretion.  Believe it or not, Google lists several John Cwiks, so I can't tell which one bribed Puddin' Paws.  Let's act shocked.

I don't know the Italian for "coglioni in a vise" but thanks to Nancy Pelosi, I know the hand gesture.

The former Speaker was explaining the predicament of the present one to Anderson Cooper, who may have winced and crossed his legs a little.  If someone will reproduce this on a shirt, I'll take a dozen.

Hunter Biden got indicted, Joe Biden may be impeached by six o'clock, and Aaron Rodgers hurt his ankle.  Don't expect the network "news" to cover the earthquake in Morocco, the flooding in Libya or Ukraine's successful drone attack on Russia's air defense system in Crimea.  Up yours, Musk.

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