Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

It looks like winning debates is a black job!

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

Let’s show the world that autocracy can be defeated.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

I wonder if trump will be tried as an adult.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Ah, the different things are different argument.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

I have other things to bitch about but those will have to wait.

Trump’s legal defense is going to be a dumpster fire inside a clown car on a derailing train.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

Pelosi: “He either is stupid, or he thinks the rest of us are.” Why not both?

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Putin dreamed of ending NATO, and now it’s Finnish-ed.

I’m starting to think Jesus may have made a mistake saving people with no questions asked.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

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Marching Orders Have Gone Out To The Useful Idiots

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I’m no expert on war, but I do know a thing or two about timing, and it seems like the “only America has agency” ‘left’ is pivoting en masse to blaming Putin’s aggression on, you guessed it, Democrats.

I’m sure Matt Taibbi and Glenn Greenwald are furiously masturbating drafting newsletters on this as we speak.

It’s all very predictable, but that doesn’t make it less galling. I thought I was over these people but their Russia takes are just so deranged that they always get a rise out of me.

Open thread, happy Friday!

Update: in what I’m sure is a staggering coincidence…

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Breaking: Big Dumb Baby Big, Dumb, A Baby

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As some of you may have noticed, the President has taken to displaying a map of his unspeakably huge electoral victory.

What I didn’t know until yesterday is, it’s not even a map of his election!

Obviously a county map is stupid anyway–land doesn’t vote!–but good lord.

Open thread! Anybody got exciting plans for the long weekend? I’m seeing Weathering With You tomorrow, which I’m looking forward to. Aside from that, I’ll probably be binging The Expanse, and playing the Metal Gear Solid 2 remaster I just bought.

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Speaking of Watching the Disinformation Being Made: The Stupid Edition

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Absolute morons Jacob “I’m Really Going to Commit a Big Boy Crime Any Day Now” Wohl and his unzipped co-conspirator Jack Burckman, fresh off failing to actually dox the Intelligence Community Whistleblower yesterday and today, have reverted to their usual modus operandi of creating sex scandals out of nothing. Having failed to actually bring down Special Counsel Mueller and Mayor Buttigieg with bogus allegations of sexual assault and impropriety have have announced their latest masterpiece. Behold:

The stupid, it burns!

The Warax asked the important question:

It is important to remember that Jacob Wohl is the twenty-something aspiring career petty criminal who is currently facing actual real felony charges in California state court. He is also the son of one of the President’s key Jewish-American surrogates. I have been authorized on behalf of the Elders and our revered and venerated leader, the Supreme Babka, to apologize on behalf of the rest of the tribe. We are tremendously sorry about the Wohl mess.

And our own Food Goddess had the best take when I texted Burkman’s tweet too her:

If at 72 Elizabeth Warren is having a fling with a young Marine I say more power to her

Is everyone still enjoying this extra special Jewish New Year and Day’s of Awe Infrastructure Week?

Open thread!

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“Superior Genetic Material” Open Thread: Eric Takes Back the ‘Dumbest Trump Offspring’ Title

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I’m absolutely sure Eric sent this *EXCORIATING* tweet on blast to every single Trump employee, because that Fahrenthold guy made him so BIGLY MAD.

Hopefully somebody (many somebodies) will screenshot Eric’s message, before he reads (has somebody read to him) the replies:

Only pro-Eric response I’ve seen, so far, with response:

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Failson-in-law

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Jared is so fucking dumb:

The White House has been working for several months to prepare for President Trump to commute the disgraced ex-governor’s [Blagojevich’s] sentence, of which he has already served seven years. The move was spurred on by Trump son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, who reportedly thought it would throw a bone to Democrats. Despite LaHood, Bost and CNN’s other sources’ claims, an administration official told CNN that Blagojevich’s case had been “vetted significantly.”

Every single thing about a Blago sentence commutation is stupid.  Democrats won’t appreciate it; his corruption was so comically obvious that Trump’s commutation will have everyone wondering what Blago gave Trump to get him to do it, and it will piss off Republicans.  So, of course, Jared thinks it’s a good deal.

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“I Have Never Made But One Prayer To God…

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…’Oh Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.’…”

And, for us as well as Voltaire, “God granted it”:

More than 20,000 Christians have signed a petition calling for the cancellation of Good Omens, the television series adapted from Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman’s 1990 fantasy novel – unfortunately addressing their petition to Netflix when the series is made by Amazon Prime.

The six-part series was released last month, starring David Tennant as the demon Crowley and Michael Sheen as the angel Aziraphale, who collaborate to prevent the coming of the antichrist and an imminent apocalypse.

The petition is the work of Return to Order — a program of the American Society for the Tradition, Family* and Property, which is itself a project of the Foundation for A Christian Civilization — all of which is tied up in radical right anti-Vatican 2 revanchism in its modern guise.  The group(s) is/are deeply offended by contraception, all things to do with same-sex relationships, and the entire notion of a secular democratic state. to be replaced, according to the Brazilian founder of the movement, by a feudal form of governance in which the husband exercises authority over his family, more powerful family heads over their lessers, and kings over all.

There is, of course, a whiff of sexual scandal in and about these defenders of family, tradition and all that property — the speediest of google searches turned up an abuser at a school run by one tentacle of these folks.

They are, in other words, radical authoritarians who want to establish religious dictatorships in which women are subordinated and non-extremely-conservative Christians (perhaps all non-Catholic followers of Jesus) will have a very rough go of it indeed.

So, nasty bits of work, but, as it appears from their so-well-placed howls of rage about a satiric comedy in which neither Satan nor his counterpart come off that well, not the sharpest implements of torture available to the Inquisition.

TL:DR — you can’t fix stupid, which we knew. You can’t repair self-righteousness either, and the stew you get when both combine is…

Special.

Open thread.

*Approved traditions do not, it seems, include the Oxford comma.

Image: Hieronymus Bosch, inner right wing (Hell) from The Garden of Earthly Delights, between 1480 and 1505.

 

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Today in Great Moments in Senatorial Debate: Senator Mike Lee Edition!

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Senator Lee gave a speech delineating his opposition to the Green New Deal today as part of Senate Majority Leader McConnell’s attempt to put the Senate Democratic caucus in a bind by making them take a stand either for or against one of the House Democratic caucus’s signature issues. Fortunately for us all, Senator Lee is, well, Senator Lee, which is sort of the Congresswoman Virginia Foxx of Senator Ted Cruzes. Or something… Even more fortuitously, Senator Lee posted a YouTube video of his remarks and posted a transcript of them at his Senate website.  He’s so considerate!

Senator Lee’s major proposal for resolving the problem that is climate change is to have more babies*, because one of them might actually come up with a good idea to resolve the problem at some point in the future.

This, Mr. President, is the real solution to climate change: babies.

Climate change is an engineering problem – not social engineering, but the real kind.
It’s a challenge of creativity, ingenuity, and technological invention.

And problems of human imagination are not solved by more laws, but by more humans!

More people mean bigger markets for innovation.

More babies mean more forward-looking adults – the sort we need to tackle long-term, large scale problems.

American babies, in particular, are likely going to be wealthier, better educated, and more conservation-minded than children raised in still-industrializing regions.

As economist Tyler Cowen recently wrote on this very point, “by having more children, you are making your nation more populous – thus boosting its capacity to solve [climate change].”

Finally, Mr. President, children are a mark of the kind of personal, communal, and societal optimism that is the true pre-requisite for meeting national and global challenges together.

The courage needed to solve climate change is nothing compared with the courage needed to start a family.

The true heroes of this story aren’t politicians or social media activists.

They are moms and dads, and the little boys and girls they are, at this moment, putting down for naps… helping with their homework… building tree houses… and teaching how to tie their shoes.

The planet does not need us to “think globally, and act locally” so much as it needs us to think family, and act personally.

The solution to climate change is not this unserious resolution, but the serious business of human flourishing – the solution to so many of our problems, at all times and in all places: fall in love, get married, and have some kids.

I yield the floor.

This, however, wasn’t the most batshit insane part of Senator Lee’s audio-visual extravaganza. Pride of place for that honor goes to the graphics and images he used to help make his point.

President Reagan on a velociraptor wielding a machine pistol while the velociraptor carries a tattered American flag – this is apparently big on one of the Chan boards/sites:

A still image from The Empire Strikes Back of Luke Skywalker riding on a tauntaun on the ice planet Hoth:

A still image from the Hannah-Barbera Saturday morning cartoon series Superfriends of Aquaman on his seahorse Storm from the early 1970s (in the earlier 1960s Filmation Aquaman-Superman Adventures Storm was white with gold ears – do not ask how I know this…):

A picture of a bunch of babies (awww!):

This is stupidity, disingenuousness, and bad faith on par with Kyle Reese’s description of the Terminator:

Listen, and understand. That terminator is out there. It can’t be bargained with. It can’t be reasoned with. It doesn’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead.

I don’t care if you’re Senator Booker who is claiming one of his key strengths is that he can, because he has in the past, work effectively across the aisle or Howard Schultz who keeps stating that as an independent centrist that he can work with both sides, THERE IS NOTHING HERE TO WORK WITH!!!!! There’s no difference to split here, there’s no accommodation that can be made here, and there is no compromise that can be reached. Right now, whether you agree, partially agree, or disagree with what the Democrats are proposing, you’ve got one party actually proposing solutions that have been thought through and one party that proposes the same four things no matter what is going on: 1) cut taxes, 2) cut regulations, 3) gut the social safety net and undo the New Deal, 4) and allow unlimited amounts of money in politics because money equals speech and corporations equal people. And, if there’s a crisis involving brown people with funny accents: 5) deploy troops to deal with them. The shame that is the United States in 2019 is that there is one party, the Democratic Party, that is dealing with reality, even if you don’t agree with what they’re proposing and then there’s this insanity being peddled by the Republicans.

At this point I’m about two weeks away from declaring myself Sub-Commandante Citizen-Leftenant Zero and storming a radio station… **

Which leads to one of my favorite political cartoons of all time:

Open thread!

* I’m sure at some point this will be rolled into an argument why Roe V. Wade must be overturned and abortion made illegal so we don’t accidentally abort the baby that will save us from the climate change crisis that Senator Lee doesn’t actually believe exists.

** This is SARCASM, lest someone eventually show up or use this to claim I’m advocating the overthrow of the US government or endorsing the use of low intensity warfare and political violence.

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