Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

SCOTUS: It’s not “bribery” unless it comes from the Bribery region of France. Otherwise, it’s merely “sparkling malfeasance”.

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

Let there be snark.

When we show up, we win.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Never give a known liar the benefit of the doubt.

The press swings at every pitch, we don’t have to.

Find someone who loves you the way trump and maga love traitors.

I did not have this on my fuck 2025 bingo card.

… gradually, and then suddenly.

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

They spent the last eight months firing professionals and replacing them with ideologues.

They want us to be overwhelmed and exhausted. Focus. Resist. Oppose.

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

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

Text STOP to opt out of updates on war plans.

Stand up, dammit!

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

We still have time to mess this up!

🎶 Those boots were made for mockin’ 🎵

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

You are here: Home / Politics / Activist Judges! / Some Good News to End This Week!

Some Good News to End This Week!

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The Federal courts have worked diligently to make America great again and provided us with three items of good news to end this most infrastructure of weeks.

1:

https://twitter.com/KFILE/status/1182664387355664385

2:

3:

Let’s all hope that next Infrastructure Week is as productive as this one.

Open thread!

Reader Interactions

121Comments

  1. 1.

    mrmoshpotato

    I hope Lady Justice is just warming up.

    “Hit him harder! Repeatedly on his orange nuts this time!”

  3. 3.

    dmsilev

    Re: item one, don’t forget the crazy-pants reasoning of the dissenting judge, a Trump-appointed Federalist Society ideological hack (and yes, there’s a certain degree of redundancy in that description). It wasn’t quite l’etat, c’est Trump, but I think that was only because she knew Trump doesn’t understand French.

  8. 8.

    NotMax

    @dmsilev

    History text which dropped through a wormhole from the future has the chapter heading about this maladministration “La merde, c’est moi.”

    :)

  9. 9.

    Ken

    @dmsilev: I wonder how she’ll react when the next President asks her to come to the White House and renew her pledge of personal loyalty to the President.

  11. 11.

    Yarrow

    This is New York state, so not a federal decision, but still very good news:

    New York State just banned anonymous real estate purchases using LLCs.

    That's bad news for kleptocrats hoarding their stolen wealth in Manhattan penthouses.
    t.co/BuBN2MTJrH— Kleptocracy Initiative (@KleptocracyIntv) October 10, 2019

  17. 17.

    Suzanne

    I have been beyond busy for the last two weeks and have had very little time to follow politics. May be relocating to a purple state. Excited and stressed.

  18. 18.

    Keith P.

    The coup de grace of Rudy being under investigation is that all this time, his wife has him in court trying to take half of all that money he’s been chasing for the last couple of decades. And even *she* has him dead to rights on shenanigans. I bet he strokes out before Trump does.

  21. 21.

    Wag

    This past infrastructure week was just a slow pitch wind up for next week. I am quite certain that we ain’t seen nothing yet. Once Rudi gets thrown under the bus, all bets are off. Rudi and Trump face off in a vindictive cage match. It is going to be awesome.

  22. 22.

    Yarrow

    @Suzanne: You haven’t missed a thing. Totally dull couple of weeks. Congratulations on the possible move! Which state?

    @Suzanne: Ewwww….gross! Who would want to bang Jr.? Maybe for money but even then…yuck.

  25. 25.

    West of the Rockies

    @Suzanne:

    Are you currently in a red state? I’m in a red county in royal blue California, so I can’t gripe too much.

  27. 27.

    Yarrow

    Speaking of Kamala:

    Jacob Wohl’s latest fake accuser says Wohl tricked him into making allegations against Kamala Harris, convincing him he was just auditioning for a fictional Spike TV show. t.co/LK97Iy3XRG— Will Sommer (@willsommer) October 11, 2019

    How is Jacob Wohl still walking around?

  28. 28.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @TaMara (HFG):

    @ KamalaHarris
    You wouldn’t know a joke if one raised you.

    Ouch

    also, too….
    trump just said that putting a man on the moon is his goal for a second term

    11th Hour @ 11thHour
    Trump moments ago: “We’re going to defeat socialism and put a man on the face of the moon.”

    To clarify… we’ve already put a man on the face of the moon.

  31. 31.

    Another Scott

    @Suzanne: I hope any relocation is for excellent reasons. How’s the youngest and all the rest of the Suzannes doing?

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  33. 33.

    clay

    So there ARE still judges who are capable of both a) reading a law and b) understanding it. Good to know.

  36. 36.

    West of the Rockies

    @Keith P.:

    He does look terrible. He has a thick, stout chest and neck, and not from exercise. Major stress, way overweight, and a rundown 75…. Not optimal health outlook.

  41. 41.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Yarrow: Again, I am the “this is how you make a military plan to overthrow a government on behalf of US nations security objectives” front pager. I am not the legal analysis front pager.

  43. 43.

    mrmoshpotato

    @NotMax:

    Junior, preening in front of full-length mirror, “How could any chick resist this?”

    California is moving away from oil and into renewables.

  45. 45.

    Suzanne

    @West of the Rockies: I am in Arizona. Pretty red, but occasionally surprising. I am interviewing at firms with offices in Philly and Pittsburgh. Also potentially some other locations.

    I am excited, but I feel badly…..as my current office just got two big wins and I am leading one of them. Oi.

  48. 48.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Ryan Browne @ rabrowne75
    Pentagon now confirming: “U.S. troops in the vicinity of Kobani came under artillery fire from Turkish positions at approximately 9 p.m. local Oct. 11. The explosion occurred….in an area known by the Turks to have U.S. forces present…”

    Aaron Rupar @ atrupar
    “We’ll take a look at it” — President Trump doesn’t exactly seem concerned about reports that Turkish troops accidentally bombed US special forces in Syria

    ETA: In fairness, he had his Sixty Minute Hate to think about at that time, he was thinking about that Man On the Moon line

  49. 49.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Yarrow:

    How is Jacob Wohl still walking around?

    Too stupid to know to put one foot in front of the other and repeat, or not in a full body cast from the humiliated “accusers” who make jackasses of themselves?

  50. 50.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Since the Turks were participating in the Coalition’s Combined Air Operations Center (CAOC) until Tuesday when the US locked them out, they know exactly where each and every US base and each and every US element in Syria and Iraq is. This wasn’t an accident. This wasn’t “we aimed at something else and had it dialed in wrong”. This was a deliberate attack.

  51. 51.

    Jeffro

    @Gravenstone: Sweet! My brother texted me earlier to say he had a ticket for me if Game 4 happens…could be amazing to be there if that’s when they clinch their way into the World Series!

  52. 52.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    By the People ? Sun Oct 13 Mass Mobilization @ by_the_ppl
    BREAKING: a brave group of young Louisianans disrupted Trump’s speech at a rally in Lake Charles with a banner reading “#ImpeachNow”

    Join them at an IM? march near you on Sunday: http://october13.org

    damn, that is brave, those howler monkeys are unpredictable, a lot of them just looking for an excuse to get violent

  54. 54.

    cain

    @Adam L Silverman:
    I don’t have questions.. but I do believe that our President might get some ideas on a doll for himself. It would be a terrible tragedy however if coding errors causes something to happen to his manhood.

  60. 60.

    The Dangerman

    @Adam L Silverman:

    Sex robots with ‘coding errors’ prone to ‘violence and could strangle humans’

    “Hey, Donald, wanna test drive the new Ivanka doll?”

    ETA: Done better in 54.

  68. 68.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Yarrow: I do not know. I actually tried to do a snarky late night post compairng the pictures of the real doll from the article and Guilfoyle three weeks ago and for whatever reason WordPress would run the picture of the real doll, but despite saving it to the desktop, uploading it to the Balloon Juice media library, and from there into the post, it wouldn’t actually run the picture of Guilfoyle. So I yanked the post after about five minutes when I couldn’t get the problem fixed as it made no sense as snark or anything else without Guilfoyle’s picture.

  69. 69.

    Yarrow

    @debbie: That is too funny!

    @Adam L Silverman: Thank goodness. Not sure anyone could have handled those pictures on the front page. She’s really odd looking. She already looks like a doll so the doll itself doesn’t seem unexpected.

  70. 70.

    West of the Rockies

    @debbie:

    Isn’t saying someone is or was a drug addict libel? The capacity for 30-40% of humanity to be vile toads is disheartening.

  77. 77.

    Ruckus

    @dmsilev:
    Quantum Rudynamics is impossible for the Rudy to understand. All he can do is shout at the wind. And wonder what his jail cell will look like. Mayor of NYC and federal prisoner in one lifetime. Not bad. For him.

  80. 80.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Jeffro: Um, the league championship series are best-of-7, so by definition there will be a Game 4. You lucky dog you. Go Gnats!

    ( I recall reading that when the Orioles returned to Baltimore after winning Games 1 & 2 of the 1966 World Series in LA, one of the crowd of fans who met them at Friendship International Airport** had a sign that read LOSE JUST ONE – I HAVE TICKETS FOR GAME 5! Alas for him, the Birds swept the heavily favored Dodgers, winning Games 3 and 4 by identical 1-0 scores on solo HRs from Paul Blair and Frank Robinson, respectively.)

    ** Opened in 1950; renamed Baltimore-Washington International Airport (BWI) in 1973 and Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport in 2005.

  81. 81.

    Yarrow

    @Ruckus:

    There comes a moment in every narcissist-enabler’s life when it dawns on them that they may have made a grave mistake and banked on someone who will leave them to twist.

    Rudy’s epiphany is coming.
    t.co/TMr84TIZgG— The Hoarse Whisperer (@HoarseWisperer) October 12, 2019

    Trump is clearly throwing Rudy under the bus. He seems to think it’s going to save him but it’s not. Everyone around him will get their turn under the bus and then it’ll be Trump’s.

  85. 85.

    frosty

    @Suzanne: Best of luck to you. Glad to see you again. I always enjoy your comments.

    (Speaking from “Alabama up the middle” PA. I miss living in Maryland)

  86. 86.

    patrick II

    @lgerard:

    I might have a little more respect for McAleenan’s principled stance except the principle he is standing up for is better public relations from the White House in support of Trump’s immigration policies. McAleenan is afraid he looks bad. People have been talking mean to him.

  87. 87.

    mrmoshpotato

    @NotMax: Fleet of buses.

    ?The wheels on the bus crush mobster trash, mobster trash, mobster trash.
    ?The wheels on the bus crush mobster trash including the Trumps

  88. 88.

    randy khan

    @Adam L Silverman:

    It’s hard for public figures to win when the false statements were published by someone who was trying to tell the truth, but when the other person is consciously lying, it’s a different story. Something like the failed Harris smear, where it turns out they hired the guy and he thought he was auditioning for a show, actually wouldn’t be too hard to win if you were so inclined, since it certainly qualifies as reckless disregard of the truth to hire someone to lie for you. On the other hand, if you’re Harris or Warren or Pelosi or Schiff, you probably just want to ignore them or laugh at them instead of suing even if you would win – it will work out better for you.

  90. 90.

    Ruckus

    @Yarrow:
    You think rudy is still, if ever, capable of an epiphany?
    I’m not so sure, he’s swallowed a lot of trump……..
    @NotMax:
    And a lot of them. Drivers should be no problem.
    8 to 80, we’ll have them lined up and ready.

  91. 91.

    frosty

    @Suzanne: Philly and Pittsburgh are both great. My son is in PGH and I’m partial to it. Stunning topography with rivers and hills, and lots of great neighborhoods. We’re headed there tomorrow.

    PS Hope you and spawn the younger are doing well.
    PPS PGH is where my mom grew up … but Philly is where my parents met in college.

  92. 92.

    frosty

    @Suzanne: Similar work situation. We just had a contract drop into our lap that’s in my wheelhouse and I’m about to retire. Terrible timing!!!

  94. 94.

    Yarrow

    @Ruckus: Sure. When the phone calls and texts to Trump and his kids and so forth stop being returned. When Trump pretends not to know him during chopper talk. When he stops getting booked on Fox shows. He’ll realize something has changed. He’s not a completely dumb guy. He’s smart enough to know he’s being thrown under the bus.

  97. 97.

    Aleta

    Mentioned earlier in a thread …

    (NYT) Federal prosecutors in Manhattan are investigating whether President Trump’s personal lawyer Rudolph W. Giuliani broke lobbying laws in his dealings in Ukraine, according to two people familiar with the inquiry.

    The investigators are examining Mr. Giuliani’s efforts to undermine the American ambassador to Ukraine, Marie L. Yovanovitch, one of the people said. … Federal law requires American citizens to disclose to the Justice Department any contacts with the government or media in the United States at the direction or request of foreign politicians or government officials, regardless of whether they pay for the representation. Law enforcement officials have made clear in recent years that covert foreign influence is as great a threat to the country as spies trying to steal government secrets.

    … Mr. Giuliani … now finds himself under scrutiny from the same United States attorney’s office he led in the 1980s,
    …
    It was unclear how far the investigation has progressed, and there was no indication that prosecutors in Manhattan have decided to file additional charges in the case. … Mr. Giuliani said that federal prosecutors had no grounds to charge him with foreign lobbying disclosure violations because he said he was acting on behalf of Mr. Trump, not the Ukrainian prosecutor, Yuriy Lutsenko, when he collected the information on Ms. Yovanovitch and the others and relayed it to the American government and the news media.

  100. 100.

    Origuy

    Republicans have been throwing so many people under buses, they’re going to have to spend more money on public transit.

  103. 103.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    @Yarrow:
    It sounds almost like self-parody.
    I was thinking earlier today, if I had no principles or self-respect, I could dupe these dumb fucks into thinking I was the hitman who killed Seth Rich or something. Is that still a “thing” on the right? Like, I could actually make tens of thousands of dollars or more on the far-right wingnut conspiracy circuit.

    But honestly, even someone like Wohl probably wouldn’t be that stupid. I don’t have that “hitman” type look anyway

  108. 108.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    @NotMax:
    What did I do?
    @Chetan Murthy:

    Husband: Darling, is there something wrong?
    Wife: Why no, dear; why do you ask?
    Husband: You moved.

    That reminds me of a similar joke.

    A wife is telling friends all about her wedding 25 years after the fact. She turns to her husband and asks, “You love me still, don’t you dear?”

    The husband replies, “Honey, that’s the only way I love you.”

    Heard that on a Little House on the Prairie episode once. Go figure. If you have Amazon Prime, the whole series is up

    @mrmoshpotato:
    She’ll be a boogeyman for them until she’s dead

  112. 112.

    Cameron

    @frosty: Some of the small cities in central PA are pretty cool. I like Carlisle and Lancaster a lot, and you really have to go to Troeg’s in Hershey to drink the best beer in America.

  113. 113.

    Cameron

    @frosty: Some of the small cities in central PA are pretty cool. I like Carlisle and Lancaster a lot, and you really have to go to Troeg’s in Hershey to drink the best beer in America.

  116. 116.

    Matt McIrvin

    All of these decisions are just going to get reversed by the Supreme Court, probably 5-4.

  117. 117.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Millard Filmore: Showing you ain’t from anywhere near here – it’s pronounced “bee-dub-yi” & occasionally “bee-dub-yi-marshall” (NB a good deal more often than anyone left of Stephen “Reinhard Heydrich’s Mini-Me” Miller calls Washington National “Reagan”).

  119. 119.

    dimmsdale

    @Cheryl Rofer: Sure they’ll appeal the decisions, ALL of them, right up to the Supreme Court. The timing could be interesting, though–the Court might be in the position of hearing some of them (or even deciding whether to grant cert for some of them) in the midst of a growing torrent of publicity about the Presidential/Congressional Crime Syndicate’s activity. If our talking anus succeeds in taking the Federalist Society down with him (and investigations into where their money comes from, MIGHT) then our conservative “Justices” might be thinking somewhat differently about “legacy” than they are now. Random thought–dunno about you, but I’m tired of living in “interesting times” …..

  120. 120.

    Kristine

    @Matt McIrvin:

    All of these decisions are just going to get reversed by the Supreme Court, probably 5-4.

    I watched a discussion of this last night (on Maddow? Don’t recall). According to Stephen Miller, they’re not concerned about the garbage arguments they’re putting forth or the fact that they’re losing in the lower courts. Their goal is to appeal to the USSC, which will given them the wins.

    There was some push back on this–would Roberts want to invest even more power in the executive branch? Counting on him for the sanity vote seems a pretty bad bet, but it may be all we have for now.

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