Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Jack Smith: “Why did you start campaigning in the middle of my investigation?!”

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

Someone should tell Republicans that violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, or possibly the first.

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

Washington Post Catch and Kill, not noticeably better than the Enquirer’s.

When they say they are pro-life, they do not mean yours.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

GOP baffled that ‘we don’t care if you die’ is not a winning slogan.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

People are complicated. Love is not.

The republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

Hell hath no fury like a farmer bankrupted.

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

Is it negotiation when the other party actually wants to shoot the hostage?

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

Compromise? There is no middle ground between a firefighter and an arsonist.

Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves? (hint, door #2)

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

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You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Open Thread: Mockery of A Sham of A Mockery

Open Thread: Mockery of A Sham of A Mockery

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Ms. Bartiromo sure understands how to draw out an aging narcissist. You could subtitle this exchange “When Granpa Bought a Second-Hand Convertible for the Part-Time Hooker Down At the VFW”.

I will never forgive the Republican Party for “gifting” us, and the world, with this grifting clown.

Reader Interactions

135Comments

  2. 2.

    jharp

    One by one we are keeping our promises – on the border, on energy, on jobs, on regulations. Big changes are happening!

    Just cannot believe this is happening.

    Holy fuck.

  5. 5.

    Adam L Silverman

    Before anyone freaks about either The Jester’s tweets on the subject, anyone else’s tweets in response to the The Jester’s tweets, or any other coverage about just what the DPRK leadership is doing or planning to do, I have asked Cheryl Rofer to do a guest post for us. She has graciously agreed and it should be here within an hour. So provided nothing goes kaboom between now and then…

  6. 6.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    posted this below on the subject of trumpy’s culinary tastes, though I will fight anyone who says there’s something wrong with chocolate cake, especially served warm with a nice creme anglaise

    Jeff Ross, the comedian who has taken over the roasting gig and has some kind of past show biz relationship with the Rough Beast, said on the Marc Maron podcast that he saw trumpy at one of his properties in December, and they chatted. Ross said he found the flabby dimwitted ape to the same as he’s always been, and mentioned, “he was dipping his cheeseburger in mayonnaise”

  7. 7.

    SuzieC

    I just can’t stand to look at the bloated sagging face of this asshole. His face looks like a rotting orange Halloween pumpkin that has been left on the front porch for too long. I applied the app MAKA (Make America Kittens Again) on my laptop to change the Rotting Pumpkin Head to kittens, but too many still get through.

  8. 8.

    jl

    Wow. I am trying to count the dimensions of Total Fail in Trump’s comment on how Xi explained things too him re North Korea.

    I think it works like, a stable theory can exist if I can keep it under 12, but then everything falls apart into some kind of indescribable chaos. Is that right? I think that is some kind of egghead physics or math shit.

  9. 9.

    Corner Stone

    I keep waiting for press pool photos of Trump running around the White House grounds naked except for an open bath robe and a fake imitation crown.

  10. 10.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Adam L Silverman: that’s great, thanks to you and Ms Rofer (Dr?)

    I hope she’s going to tell us the the situation is less terrifying than it appears. Ever since the Syrian strike, my first thought when I wake up every morning is “I wonder if he started a war over night”. I’m ready to dip a cheeseburger in mayonnaise, or eat an entire pan of lasagna,

  13. 13.

    columbusqueen

    Every time I think Trump can’t possibly beclown himself further, he proves me wrong. May all our fellow citizens who voted for this asshole go fuck themselves with chain saws.

  15. 15.

    Corner Stone

    It’s a god damn disgrace to have Gen Wesley Clark and Katrina Vandenhovelscheiss on the same panel, Lawrence.

  17. 17.

    Mnemosyne

    @Adam L Silverman:

    I know you guys get irritated when these things freak me out, but I’m a good 2,000 miles closer to the potential action than you are. Even if it’s “only” Japan or South Korea, there will be not-good aftereffects on this side of the country for a very long time.

  18. 18.

    Corner Stone

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    I’m ready to dip a cheeseburger in mayonnaise

    What was the defense against that creepy kid in Twilight Zone that could wish anything to happen to people? Or maybe we pull a Simpson’s treatment in a Halloween Special and, “Just don’t look! Just don’t look!”

  21. 21.

    amk

    Goldman Sachs running the economy and Jeff Sessions running law enforcement and immigration is truly the perfect higher synthesis.— Matthew Yglesias (@mattyglesias) April 12, 2017

    mission accomplished, wwc, sarandon and co.

  22. 22.

    jl

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: The situation is scary. Our hope is that Trump folds quickly when challenged. Who the hell knows what Xi told him, and how much of it was BS designed to keep Trump off his back on NK, and how much was accurate info that Trump was (naturally) completely ignorant about? But fact that a corrupt old fart and hack running an authoritarian regime can just jaw Trump into submission over some warm chocolate cake at a tacky FL resort fake up of a state dinner, that is a good sign even Trump can sense when one of his goofy plans won’t work. When he is slapped in the face with the evidence.

    Now we have to hope that Trump goes to his central casting generals and make some inquiries, and that Mattis’ nickname ‘Mad Dog’ is just a little military humor, and the guy can give Drumpf some sound advice.

  23. 23.

    SFAW

    One by one we are keeping our promises

    Someone should remind him of his campaign promise to commit seppuku if he didn’t repeal Obamacare in the first 10 days.

  24. 24.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @SFAW: Not sure mayo goes well with lasagna, so you might want to rethink that.

    that’s how they serve at Trumpini’s, teh best Italian food anywhere, many people say, fantastic, the best. People come from Rome and Naples, all the time, real Italians, for Trumpini’s lasagna. The secret ingredient, is Heinz 57 and Velvet

    ETA:

    @jl: nd that Mattis’ nickname ‘Mad Dog’ is just a little military humor

    I take comfort in the fact that he’s said to hate that name.

  25. 25.

    danielx

    I have to wonder if they’re having to use an atomic clock to measure Doomsday Clock time.

    Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying ‘we’re doomed, all is lost’, Dies Irae, etc. The question is whether whatever work we do will be in time to bear fruit.

  27. 27.

    Adam L Silverman

    @jharp: I fixed the formatting in your comment. Also, the good news is, despite what he’s saying tweeting, they’re not actually accomplishing a lot. Yes, what little they’ve been able to accomplish is nasty and mean, but they are fortunately not very good at what they’re doing. Hell, when you have to request a budget increase to cover 24/7 security coverage as a cabinet secretary and the stated reason is fear of the civil servants in your agency, you’re both demonstrating being a pathetic coward and telegraphing that you’re not going to accomplish much.

  29. 29.

    SuzieC

    @Mnemosyne: Just out of curiousity, are you in Hawaii? And are you active duty military? I ask because my Navy son is being sent to Pearl Harbor. Otherwise fabulous duty but of course we worry about NK. If there is anyone here who is based in Hawaii I would like to correspond with you.

  31. 31.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: The only reason to use mayonnaise is as a thin layer buffer on the top and bottom of the bun to keep the juices from seeping in and turning the bun into mush and making the burger impossible to eat. That is the actual structural purpose of putting mayo on a burger, unless you are someone who likes mayo on a burger.

  35. 35.

    SFAW

    @jl:

    at a tacky FL resort fake up of a state dinner,

    Where I grew up (North Shore of Long Island), the go-to tacky bar mitzvah joint was a place called “Leonard’s.” Even at that age, I could tell it was world-class, and not in a good way. I’m thinking Shitgibbon went there a bazillion times, and said “This is the way to go!”

    [And I can hear the screams of BJ-ers familiar with the place, right now, yelling “Fucking Leonard’s? Jesus H. Christ!!!!!”]

  36. 36.

    Yarrow

    Tonight TCM was showing the 1962 film “Panic in Year Zero,” which opens with a nuclear attack on Los Angeles. You get to see the mushroom cloud and everything. Normally I’d think it was a quaint cold war film. But now…

  39. 39.

    SFAW

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    that’s how they serve at Trumpini’s, teh best Italian food anywhere, many people say, fantastic, the best. People come from Rome and Naples, all the time, real Italians, for Trumpini’s lasagna. The secret ingredient, is Heinz 57 and Velvet

    I’m oscillating between laughing and puking

    ETA: I’m guessing that “Velvet” was supposed to be “Velveeta”?

  42. 42.

    Adam L Silverman

    Cheryl’s guest post is up! She has indicated she’ll hang around in comments for about an hour to answer whatever questions you all might have.

  43. 43.

    Corner Stone

    @gene108: Maui. We have another BJ person on Kauai, LauraPDX. Nobody on Oahu that I can remember but it’s possible. This blog contains multitudes!

  48. 48.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Mnemosyne: As I wrote in reply to you down below:
    In this case I think it most likely they’re going to do a 6th test, and as large a one as they can manage, at their testing facility in NE DPRK. They can’t get a medium range missile to fire successfully so I think you’re pretty safe for the time being.

  50. 50.

    joel hanes

    @Corner Stone:

    What was the defense against that creepy kid in Twilight Zone

    There really was none, because he was erratic, and was holding everyone left in the world hostage to his emotional needs.

    Hmm, why does this sound relevant ….

    …anyway, the best strategy for survival seemed to be effulgent flattery coupled with a refusal to acknowledge any aspect of reality that the child-with-power did not wish to be so.

    The original story is “It’s A Good Life”, by Jerome Bixby
    https://www.librarything.com/topic/179520

  51. 51.

    schrodingers_cat

    OT aside. In the Americans*, Frank Langella’s who plays the KGB handler of our lead pair says, they once had Lincoln, now they have Reagan. I wonder what he would have said about T.

    Its about 1984 in their world, I think.

  54. 54.

    Mnemosyne

    @SuzieC:

    I’m not — I’m in California. I know that commenter NotMax is in Hawaii, and a few others pop in from time to time.

    We have gotten some radiation from Fukushima in California (detectable but not at dangerous levels) and they’ve found Fukushima-identifiable radiation in our fish (though, again, at low levels that are not dangerous). So a nuclear event in South Korea or Japan would affect us, probably starting several years afterwards.

  55. 55.

    jl

    @SFAW: I don’t particularly care that Trump throws tacky fake-ups of state dinners at sketchy filthy rich resorts, for certain leaders who probably don’t really deserve any better. To the extent that it insults the diplomatic niceties and makes good deals harder to negotiate, it’s bad. But, it’s Trump so those are not going to happen anyway.

    Fact that the expense of it is larger than entire programs that Trump’s hacks propose to eliminate bothers me. And after all the racist crap about how Obama disgraced the WH, his office and the country, every time he moved a finger, and then Trump pulls this shit and no one says even a word about it, that also bothers me. But then Trump is filthy rich old white asshole, so I guess that is to be expected.

    I notice in pics that at official functions Melania Trump always seems to be frozen in some mixture of agony, panic and dread. Not sure why. But that doesn’t bother me as much as Trump swanking around his resorts.

  57. 57.

    Adam L Silverman

    @amk: Actually my training as a chef, which helped me pay for my education, is showing. Also, I watched the Good Eats episode about this…

  59. 59.

    Mnemosyne

    @Adam L Silverman:

    See my comment at #54 — even if “only” South Korea or Japan gets nuked, we will still get aftereffects in California. A big enough earthquake in that part of the Pacific puts us on tsunami watch.

  61. 61.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Villago Delenda Est: supposed to be Velveeta, dammit. Stupid autocorrect.

    @schrodingers_cat: speaking of Lincoln (the party of) , did everyone see the NC legislator, and because of course he is, pastor, who compared Lincoln to Hitler, and not indirectly or accidentally or…

    Pittman’s response: “And if Hitler had won, should the world just get over it? Lincoln was the same sort (of) tyrant, and personally responsible for the deaths of over 800,000 Americans in a war that was unnecessary and unconstitutional.”

    Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article144216324.html#storylink=cpy

  62. 62.

    Corner Stone

    @joel hanes: I seem to recall a mildly pretty woman with a perky rack taking his hand in friendship and all seemed to be well…for a time.

  63. 63.

    ThresherK

    @Corner Stone: I believe if you snuck up behind the.boy without thinking about it there would be no thoughts to read.

    The idea that not thinking is the way to conquer Trump’s effect is pretty funny.

    Well, it would be funny if this presidency didn’t make me think, Which Twilight Zone will America’s demise most closely resemble?

  66. 66.

    jl

    @jl: In a way the traveling Trump Rump House is grimly hilarious, apart from the rank hypocrisy of the corporate media for not even noticing Trump’s gaucherie after broadcasting racist GOP talking points about how awful Obama was, and the sheer waste and expense.

    When I can distance myself from it, funny to see Trump put on these tacky diplomatic and administrative shit shows in FL, or wherever, like the WH is not good enough for him.

    I’m not for going back to what I considered the sometimes just too precious Obama class about this stuff. I’d prefer a healthy mix of the down home tacky, but I think honest, BS Dub threw, and the high Obama style. But maybe I am wrong. Did Obama ever throw a BBQ, or damn pic-a-nic with baskets and paper plates? If so, I take back my comment.

    But the Trump show alternates between betng hilarious and infuriating.

    Edit: any element favorable to Dub in comment only applies to social and diplomatic events, nothing else about Dub. At least that admin could throw a g-damned Easter Egg Roll. And knew how to staff it. Dub and Laura had a boffo Easter Bunny, didn’t they?

  71. 71.

    Corner Stone

    @Steve in the ATL:

    I feel like this whole blog is a lie!

    You know what’s a lie? I’ll tell you what’s a lie! The damn cake is a lie! That’s what is a lie! There was no beautiful chocolate cake! Maria Bartiromo Antoinette never said anything about letting them eat cake!
    It’s all a fucking lie! A lie! LIE!

  75. 75.

    Yarrow

    @zhena gogolia: Yeah, me too. I did watch the first five minutes out of curiosity. That’s when I got to see the mushroom cloud. I turned it off when someone stole gas from the gas station attendant by punching him in the face and driving off.

  76. 76.

    joel hanes

    Which Twilight Zone will America’s demise most closely resemble?

    The hot part of the earth-moves-closer-to-sun / earth-breaks-out-of-solar-orbit-and-freezes episode,
    “Midnight Sun”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiWjdYOeNqQ

    We’re doing nothing about CO2 under Trump and the Rs, rather the opposite , and some recent projections have us at 600 ppm atmospheric CO2 by 2050 — in just 33 years. That’d be the highest concentration in 50 milliion years, since the Eocene.

    Truly a victory for the Heartland Institute and “sound science”. Fuckers.

  79. 79.

    jl

    @joel hanes: Chuck D recently recommended that episode. I was going to watch, but I am delicate and Twilight Zone scares me. Probably scared from memories of watching creepy re-runs when I was a tyke.

  80. 80.

    debbie

    @Mnemosyne:

    I haven’t had a real burger in years, but I’m going to have to make one this weekend. I’ve got plenty of Hellman’s on hand.

  81. 81.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Dinner with Xi

    Trump made an egregious mistake
    When he poured bottled ketchup on steak.
    He choked on the gristle
    And launched off a missile,
    Sat back, smirked, and said “Piece of cake.”

  86. 86.

    David Spikes

    Nothing big has been made of the baby kushes singing a Chinese song at the dinner.
    Try to imagine your feelings at somebody’s house when they bring out the grandkids to entertain, then multiply those feelings to infinity.

  88. 88.

    Steve in the ATL

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    Dinner with Xi

    Trump made an egregious mistake
    When he poured bottled ketchup on steak.
    He choked on the gristle
    And launched off a missile,
    Sat back, smirked, and said “Piece of cake.”

    Well played

  89. 89.

    SFAW

    @Steve in the ATL:

    OMG I’m going to have to pie you now.

    Mayonnaise pie? That’s as weird as a mayo martini (which, according to Tom Robbins, was a thing, at least in his circle of nutcases).

  90. 90.

    SFAW

    @David Spikes:

    Nothing big has been made of the baby kushes singing a Chinese song at the dinner.

    Maybe because they were singing “Arirang,” and it didn’t translate well?

  99. 99.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Colorado Congressman holds town hall

    Nick Riccardi‏Verified account @ NickRiccardi 2h2 hours ago
    MikeCoffman on @ seanspicer: “he’s got to go.”
    I think we have our gaffe: “Those of you on the extreme left will never be satisfied,” Coffman says when asked why doesn’t stand up to Trump

    It didn’t play well in the room, it seems.

  100. 100.

    Suzanne

    @SFAW:

    Where I grew up (North Shore of Long Island

    Where at? I was born on LI and lived there (Huntington Station) until I was nine. I dream about moving back.

  105. 105.

    SFAW

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    I am going to pretend that this comment never happened.

    Pretend all you want. I heard Robbins (I think) talking about it on NPR, five-or-so years ago. Kinda fucked up, to my mind, but that’s just me.

  107. 107.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @debbie: Mayonnaise is horrible. Fighting about brands of horrible strikes me as silly. Seriously, it is literally the only “food” that automatically triggers my gag reflex. I have a mayo issue.

  111. 111.

    efgoldman

    @Omnes Omnibus:

    it is literally the only “food” that automatically triggers my gag reflex. I have a mayo issue.

    Just because YOU have an issue doesn’t mean no-one else is supposed to use it.
    I mean, mrs efg and millions of other people like lamb, which makes ME gag. You can eat whatever the fuck you want – I don’t tell YOU not to drink vanilla brandy

  113. 113.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Mnemosyne: We had testing in Nevada in the 50’s and CA was pretty much effected much, but you could see the sky light up towards the northeast when they tested. There was the partial meltdown in the Simi Hills in 1959.

  114. 114.

    SFAW

    @efgoldman:

    I’m not worried about the mayo, vanilla brandy, or lamb — it’s the anthrax and tire rims that I try to stay away from.

  118. 118.

    SFAW

    @Sab:

    Of course not. She didn’t speak English.

    Look, just because she was a Geordie doesn’t mean she couldn’t speak English. The accent just takes some getting used to, is all.

  119. 119.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @efgoldman: Also slather what you want on you want. As I said, I have a mayo issue. I didn’t ask you to have one.

    Edited a bit.

  120. 120.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @(((CassandraLeo))): No one actually said anything, it turns out. There’s a whole category of famous quotes that float around between being attributed to Shaw or Wilde or Bertrand Russell and almost every single one of them when you look into it turns out to be from none of those people but assembled from two snippets, one in a magazine somewhere and the other something in an ad, neither of which even resemble what they got assembled into all that much to begin with.

    Snopes is the only actual real thing in the world I think, and even that is probably all just made up.

  121. 121.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Bill E Pilgrim: The internet is just an internet hoax

    ETA: This is Josh Barro’s pinned tweet

    Josh Barro‏Verified account @ jbarro 3 Dec 2016
    Everybody loves mayonnaise but nobody wants to admit it, even to themselves.

  122. 122.

    SFAW

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    There’s a whole category of famous quotes that float around between being attributed to Shaw or Wilde or Bertrand Russell

    “Your Majesty is like a stream of bat’s piss” is real, however.

  123. 123.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @SFAW: I think you could replace “Snopes” in my comment above with “Monty Python” and it would work also.

    I was looking at a year old This Modern World cartoon the other day and it was so close to what’s now just reality that I thought okay that’s it, we keep saying this but now life itself really has just become wild exaggerated satire, making real satire the closest thing to reflecting it in print or pixels that we have.

  124. 124.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: How people pronounce mayonnaise is the interesting one for me. I grew up saying “maynase” but other kids said “mahnase”, 1st syllable rhyming with “map”, and it was just the weirdest thing, there’s the real divide in the world IMO. This is leaving the “YO” part completely out of it by the way, neither of us pronounced that at all.

  129. 129.

    Corner Stone

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    No one actually said anything, it turns out.

    It’s weird. Because i wanted to. i thought about it several times. What would happen when i said something? Could i say something? Would the situation be better or improved by my saying something? Maybe it would just be selfishly making myself feel better if i said something. Would they attack me if i said something?
    In the end i decided not to say anything. i guess that’s it.

  130. 130.

    hovercraft

    @jl:
    Apart from the Fourth of July WH picnics, this is probably why there were no publicized “cookouts”.
    Just kidding this one is satire, unfortunately the second one isn’t.

    Obama Promises To Have “BBQ Cookout” On White House Lawn Before End Of Presidency

    Obama made a comment on Monday that has his opponents and some Americans upset. Some people are even saying that President Obama is disrespecting our country’s s heritage. In his announcement, Obama discussed his plans for exiting the White House by holding a summer barbecue cookout on the White House lawn.

    “I’m gonna say it because I’ve been wanting to say it,” said Obama. “Everybody wants to talk about the first black president. Black this, black that. Sure I played some basketball at the White House, even listen to rap music when nobody was looking. But now I’m going to show America how black I can get. We are barbecuing and throwing a cookout on the White House lawn. Obama Out!”

    Throughout history, cooking in the front yard was a means of showing prosperity, to show off what you were cooking. Cooking in the front yard is widely accepted in many cultures, except the white culture. 99% of the protesters that showed up at today’s rally in opposition of the White House barbecue were caucasian. The other 1% were Asian. Technically, there is no rule, regulation, or law that can stop the president from having his party. The summer barbecue going away party is set for June 18th.

    Obama’s Hip-Hop BBQ Didn’t Create Jobs
    Published August 5, 2011

    Celebrity-filled bash, as entertainer Chris Rock reported on his Twitter feed: “Just left the Presidents birthday party at the White House. Herbie Hancock played, Stevie Wonder sang and yes they did the electric slide. A great night.”

    Daughter Malia, 13 just arrived home from summer camp in time for the Rose Garden party as she was joined by her sister, Sasha, 10, First Lady Michelle, grandmother Marian Robinson and their godmother, Eleanor “Mama Kaye, Wilson,” who flew to Washington from Chicago on Air Force One with Obama when he returned from his Thursday fund-raiser back home.

    Obama’s party–paid for, the White House said, by the First Couple–was closed press and not on his official schedule. Obama’s team was not eager for pictures of the bash, coming as the stock market was plunging and a new jobless report comes out Friday morning.

  131. 131.

    joel hanes

    anthrax and tire rims

    Cole is immortal for that metaphor.
    Maybe for other things too, but that one will live on.

    And what a perfect description of Republican policy ideas!

  132. 132.

    Comrade Colette Collaboratrice

    @SuzieC:

    I applied the app MAKA (Make America Kittens Again) on my laptop to change the Rotting Pumpkin Head to kittens

    Thanks for the reminder. I just did that and my world is already a softer, fuzzier, cuter place, tiny claws and needle-like teeth notwithstanding.

  134. 134.

    Sunny Raines

    I will never forgive the Republican Party for “gifting” us, and the world, with this grifting clown.

    credit where credit is due: the republican establishment tried to avoid trump. It was the 62 million republican voters that gave us the orange maggot as POTUS. (And of course ALL of the republican alternates to trump were as bad policy-wise so it wouldn’t have mattered.)

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