It Wasn’t China. It Was Russia…

by MyBaconPress

At one of his speeches, recently, 47 said China was a threat to our elections and he pointed to an intelligence report to support his statement. He can do things like that because he knows his base will just take his word for it and he doesn’t CARE that his opponents will go and look at the document in question. Sure, thinking people know he lied about China, but MAGA won’t know one word of it. Nobody will tell them – so I will.

His opponents DID go look at the report he referenced. Guess what? Big surprise, it doesn’t support one word of the stories he told about China. Donny’s working hard to terrify his base. (It ain’t that hard.) He wants them to think foreign powers interfered with the election but he can’t implicate Putin. Never Putin, most especially when Putin is obviously involved. Still, what the report DID do was support charges that Russia interfered with the 2020 election in an attempt to help the Drumpfster.

“We asses that Russia is using a range of measures, primarily to denigrate former Vice-President Biden and what it sees as an anti-Russia establishment. For example, it’s directing or encouraging proxies to spread claims about Vice-President Biden. Some Kremlin linked actors are also seeking to boost President trump’s (sic) candidacy on social media more broadly. Moscow’s efforts seek to amplify social discord in the US and undermine Washington’s global standing.” (They certainly succeeded on that one, didn’t they? “…undermine Washington’s global standing.”)

MAGA won’t know. If anybody ever told them what is actually going on, their support for him might fall away and they can’t risk that – so they just don’t TELL MAGA what’s actually going on. It has worked like a charm for decades, now, and there’s no reason to assume it will stop any time soon…

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And, just as a quick sidebar, Biden won 2020 because Donny did such a terrible, terrible job as President when he was 45. Nobody voted FOR Biden. We all voted against the trumpster. Because of Donny’s incompetence, the entire world economy was flatlined. Dead. Biden spent his whole presidency fixing the damage Donny had done, only to hand the whole thing back to the self-same Dumbass who flatlined the economy in his first term. (And he’s doing it again!)

Yes, it’ possible to accurately quote dismal metrics under the Biden administration, but they are nearly all from the beginning of the term, when the trump hangover was lingering. By the end of Biden’s term, the country was strong again and on the rise. We weren’t perfect – Donny had done a LOT of damage – but we WERE doing better than any other developed nation at the time. Joe Biden was a better President than Donald Trump. But then, every President has been better than Donald Trump – and we survived Bush 43…

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It’s always gratifying to see Lying Donny booed by the world. The whole world hates that evil boy and they don’t hesitate to make that clear. When he went to the World Cup final – likely on your taxpayer dollar, BTW – he said he supported Messi and Argentina. Of course he did. So guess who lost? Yep, that would be Messi and Argentina. More trumpster destruction?

What is it with that old, old man? After Spain won the World Cup, 47 went and inserted himself in their celebration. He took the stage with them, then stood like he was part of the team for the team photo. They can edit him out and they have done. That corrupt Bozo that runs FIFA, Gianni Infantino, had to rush over and suggest 47 leave the damn stage so the team could have their moment. I’ll tell you this: people either hate that guy or think they can make money with him. I don’t think there are any other categories…

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Okay, this is completely unimportant. A sculptor out there, Sergio Furnari, thought he saw a moment. After Charlie Kirk was killed, Furnari thought a statue of Kirk would sell big. He thought maybe there were millions of dollars in a Charlie Kirk statue so he plowed ahead. He spent (he claims) $100,000 dollars of his own money to make a life-sized statue of Kirk.

Now? Nobody wants it. Hell, he can’t give it away. He has received the largest number of messages from people writing they intend to find and urinate on the statue rather than celebrate the thing. The guy fronted $100,000 dollars for this thing. He was hoping to get that back. Nobody bit, so he set up an online fundraising campaign trying to get $150,000. As of this writing, he has raised $1,400.

The reason I mention that is this: Furnari is angry, in general, that nobody wants his statue. Mind you, nobody asked him to make that statue, either. He was just so sure people would want it, he moved forward. His choice, of course, but, typical of any conservative, he’s furious at the world over his own poor decision. He says, “It’s like wow. People are cheap, man. You know, people talk, talk – I know lots of people out there, and everybody’s so cheap. You know, like, it’s disgusting how cheap they are.”

Yeah, WE’RE cheap because nobody wants to buy your uncommissioned statue of a loudmouth bigot? That’s not on us, con. YOU made a poor choice. Several of them, it sounds like. Nobody owes you. YOU chose to blow $100,000 in a really peculiar, rather stupid way. What’s the old saying? ‘A fool and his money are soon parted.’ So, take comfort that you’ve proven an adage, Mr Furnari. That looks like what you’re gonna get outta this…

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I still go to Facebook. You can tell, because I post these pieces there. But, damn, Facebook isn’t much anymore, is it? It seems to be all ads, all the time. Boring. It was once a popular site. People still know the name. It’s just that nobody cares, anymore. The truth seems to be that if Facebook isn’t fomenting fury and outrage, it has very little value at all. That’s rather sad…

Nobody’s Cheating But Donny…

by MyBaconPress

So… Donald Trump is out there claiming that that last couple of elections have been rigged. Republicans control the House of Representatives. Republicans control the Senate. A Republican is currently “President.” But the last couple of elections have been rigged? Is he suggesting the Democrats rigged the 2020 election while HE was President? Did the Democrats rig the 2024 election in favor of the Republicans, who won most of it?

Maybe he’s just confessing through his normally lying mouth that Republicans have cheated in every possible way at every possible turn? But he won’t shut up about it. He has the obsession of an Alzheimer’s patient who became focused on some trivial thing and now can NOT let it go. Okay. I have randomly decided I believe him, for the moment. The 2024 election was rigged. There’s not a single Republican who won his or her seat honestly and they should be removed immediately. This is not from me. This is from Donny, himself.

“What I want to do is this. I just want to find, uh, 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state.” Do you remember that? That’s the Dumbass himself, working as hard as he could to cheat in an election, so we KNOW Donny was cheating and/or trying to. I would like somebody, ANYBODY to show me some evidence that supports Donny’s lies that is at least as clear as his request of Brad Raffensperger. “I just want to find, uh, 11,780 votes…”

But nobody can DO that, can they? There IS no evidence of cheating that so clearly supports the charge – from anywhere else, really. And Donny didn’t just get upset that he lost the election he put so much effort into cheating to win. (There’s a reason he wants you using voting machines instead of mail-in ballots, and it ain’t vulnerability.) He also bragged that “nobody knows” tabulating machines like the cheating con Elon Musk, who, Donny suggests, manipulated said tabulating machines in 2024 just enough to give Donny his ever-so-slim victory.

Seems like the solution is MUCH simpler than his stupid SAVE My Ass Act. Really, if he wants to stop elections from being rigged, all he has to do is stop rigging them…

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Oh, SNAP! The benefits, I mean. SNAP is the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program. It provides some food for struggling citizens. Well, it did. Now the cruel regime is cutting SNAP benefits and increasing the requirements to qualify. They’re also shifting more of the cost to individual states. Some states can absorb that cost – to a degree. Other states (largely red, noticeably) can not. Or, perhaps WILL not. Either way, it’s possible entire states will leave the program. I think we had better get ready for an increase in crime. It will be low-level stuff, but it’s coming.

Mostly, the cons try to hide their evil doings until AFTER the mid-terms, and, indeed, SNAP gets an even harsher gut-punch after the election. But they’re starting in on SNAP now anyway. That seems like a bit of an oversight, to me. Maybe the idea is, they can start cutting now and the public won’t find out about the consequences before the election. But here’s the point I think will rule the day: people need to eat. Once assistance is no longer available, those same people STILL need to eat. Do the cons really just think those folks will curl up and die? They won’t.

What they WILL do is engage in petty thefts and other low-level crimes in an attempt to eat and/or feed their families. What choice do they have? “Well, they could get jobs,” sneer the very comfortable pols. Mostly? They HAVE jobs. The US is a huge nation of what are called “working poor,” because what else could you expect from the ‘Richest country on Earth?’™ Many people in this country work their asses off all week and still can’t make ends meet in our brutal and selfish society.

These creepy cons in Congress WILL cut SNAP benefits, but they WILL NOT increase the minimum wage to ensure the workers get enough pay to survive. In short, they’re leaving people no choice but to do what they’ve got to do to survive. Brutal America sucks and it will become an increasingly unpleasant place to be for anybody NOT in the One Percent…

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The next time you’re talking to some Israeli sympathizer who thinks anybody questioning Israeli tactics is antisemitic, point them to the current news that Israel is building MORE illegal settlements in Gaza and the West Bank. My read on the entire situation focuses on these actions. Encroachment after encroachment. The Palestinians know it’s happening every day and they get mad about it.

Nobody will (or, perhaps, can) stop Israel and so Israel doesn’t stop. But they’re stealing the land and the people they’re stealing it from don’t like that. Israel’s constant, relentless, slow-moving invasion is why I support the Palestinians over there. It has nothing to do with Judaism. It’s all about the actions of a government, not a religion, and those government actions stink. You’d think so, too, if it was YOUR home being stolen…

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Okay, so I understand it’s a game of the media to find the very worst examples of “the other side” and then pretend they are just standard representations of that side. But some of the messages going out to some of the weaker thinkers in our midst are proving dangerous in unexpected ways.

Take the case of Andrea Shaw, a woman who stands accused of murdering her two children. Twins. They were suffocated. I don’t know who did what but I know her defense isn’t going to work. She says it was vaccines that killed her kids. Can you imagine being SO enthralled to fake news you’d try to blame the murder of your children on a conservative talking point? I’m thinking Mrs. Shaw isn’t exactly the most dazzling star in the sky.

This, um, person (and I use the term lightly) really thinks she can make a case that she got her kids vaccinated and then they died – eight days later! She actually believes vaccines are SO deadly, she could hide a murder behind them and nobody would even question it. But the whole vaccine story is just pure unadulterated horse dung. It’s not going to hold up in court because vaccines aren’t dangerous in the way the right pretends – and they don’t suffocate babies eight days later. I suspect Shaw is looking at a couple of life sentences because she believes conservative propaganda. That’s a pretty high price…

An Address in Prime Time…

by MyBaconPress

Oh, gods, his prime-time address. Look, Donald J. Trump is a liar. He lies about elections, among other things. That lying piece of human waste never, never, NEVER presents even a shred of evidence. That’s because there IS no evidence to support his stories, and THAT is because his stories are lies. He’s desperately trying to convince somebody, somewhere that American elections are untrustworthy because HE tried to steal 2020 and lost anyway.

He’s been telling these lies for years. The charges do NOT just spew into the wind where everyone ignores them. They get investigated. Extensively. Over and over – every time he starts accusing someone, somewhere of meddling, another investigation. He filed lawsuits but never presented any valid evidence. His election lies have been investigated by the intelligence community, the FBI, DHS, DOJ, bipartisan state election officials, audits, recounts, and the courts.

Never ONCE have they found evidence of extensive cheating – the level one would need to change the outcome of a national election. In fairness, each election DOES usually turn up a Republican or two who tried to vote more than once. But a single vote, here and there, doesn’t have much effect on the outcome.

So trump is definitely lying. Well, I suppose he could be delusional. Maybe he really believes he was cheated. Some people really believe they can see six foot tall, pink rabbits, too. That doesn’t mean they can. Mostly, though, I think evil Donny is crazy like a fox. He knows the elections were secure. He didn’t like the outcome. And now, he’s terrified there’s going to be another fair election.

By every measure, Donald J. Trump has been a terrible President. He has done more harm to America and her reputation around the world in a single year than anybody could have imagined. There’s not a single metric to which one can point that shows positive results for the largest number of people. In fact, he’s hurting as many work-a-day Americans as he can, as badly as he can, as quickly as he can.

Cons like to point to the border and pretend that’s a success but even that effort has resulted in American law enforcement gunning down innocent people – including Americans – in the street with no charge, no trial, and commonly, no crime. People are dying of maltreatment in detention. The program is brutal and cruel and actually and honestly dangerous – AND, it’s damaging the economy! I’m not ready to call that a success.

By now, even MAGA knows this. I know, they’re telling pollsters they’re still fully on board. They’re still, mostly, not ready to confess their disappointment publicly. But they know. They buy gas. They buy groceries. They pay rent. I’ll tell you this: even if all of that WAS Joe Biden’s fault – which it absolutely is not – Donny is still in the driver’s seat now. Whether he likes it or not, it’s his responsibility. He doesn’t get to ignore that responsibility based on the idea that Joe did it.

It’s Donny’s job to address and correct problems. Who did it isn’t relevant. That’s what his supporters voted for him to do. That’s what he promised. Then, after he’s in office and the money starts flowing into his personal pockets, suddenly “affordability” is a made-up word? He’s really just going to TELL you inflation is down and you’re supposed to believe him, despite actually going into grocery stores?

Although he’s failing completely in Iran, he lied. He said (again), “We are…winning big in Iran, and you will see the fruits of that labor very, very shortly.” Uh-huh. Let me guess. In about two weeks, right? Right after you release your new and improved health care plan? Should we hold our breath?

The economy is struggling and headed down. The food supply is threatened, thanks to all of that beautiful deregulation. Once-eliminated illnesses in both humans and livestock are making grand comebacks, thanks to the anti-science stance. We’re voluntarily, unilaterally, surrendering any/every lead we had in technology because he prefers yesterday’s technologies. His ill-advised war continues. We’re paying millions to bomb a foreign, sovereign nation for no discernible reason – and these Bozos on Team Evil are laser focused on – sperm counts and algae blooms?

Yeah, a terrible, terrible President. And he’s being supported by terrible, terrible people, all of whom hope to profit, personally, from the corruption – and all at the expense of the work-a-day American people. The vast majority of the American people want this guy stopped and elections are our ticket to do that. But he doesn’t WANT to stop. He has literally made BILLIONS of dollars, grifting from the Oval Office. Worse, he faces criminal charges already and there’s a long and increasing list of new charges just waiting for him.

He knows that. He knows he’s looking at a shellacking at the polls and he knows that means taking responsibility for his actions. He HATES that more than just about anything. He simply can NOT afford a fair and secure election. He’ll lose, and he knows it. So he’s lying. He has cooked up a scheme. All he has to do is convince MAGA to ignore their own eyes and listen to him instead. Some actually will, or they’ll try. Some will know better but support him anyway. <Shakes head.>

I suspect everyone knew this was going to be nothing more than a tantrum. MAGA watched, anyway, just to get a glimpse of their glorious Precious. Most of the world looked away, unable to look at that ugly mug or hear that grating voice for one more second. Even most of the major networks refused to air the thing. They put it in their social media feeds, but not the airwaves. He whined about that, too. He just whines about everything. But, really, who needs to listen to more lies? And, really, that’s all this loser has…

47 Wants To Dismantle The ICC? Of Course He Does…

by MyBaconPress

Well? I guess now we know Donny understands his liability on the international criminal stage, as well as his domestic crime spree. HOW do we know? Marco Rubio has launched an effort to dismantle the International Criminal Court (ICC). Rubio pretends the court interferes with American sovereignty. It doesn’t. It only deals with international problems and the US is not a signatory. Generally speaking, empires don’t sign on to oversight.

Kenneth Roth, former executive director of Human Rights Watch responded, “Rubio is dressing up his quest for impunity for American war crimes under the label of national sovereignty, which ignores the sovereign right of other nations to invoke the ICC for crimes committed on their territory.” He added, “Trump wants to be able to commit war crimes on the territory of countries that have accepted the court’s jurisdiction – that’s what this is about.”

From the criminal point of view, if you’re going to commit crimes, it would be best to get rid of law enforcement first, right? We know Donny. He’s GOING to commit crimes. He can’t help himself. Hell, he probably already has, just like his dear friend Bibi Netanyahu. Netanyahu has already been the target of an arrest warrant from the ICC over his crimes in Palestine.

I suppose getting rid of the court is one option. I suggest that not committing crimes is a better option, but then I remember who we’re talking about. THAT ain’t gonna happen. These criminals are going to crime. It’s what they do. So they’re getting rid of legal oversight. It really sucks living in a corrupt country…

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“The nature of the suit itself and the conduct of the parties and counsel from its filing make plain that this was an attempt to use the court to provide some legitimacy to an agreement to confer immunity to people and entities affiliated with the president and to earmark billions of dollars from American taxpayers to redress grievances not defined in the law…The court finds that this matter was brought for an improper purpose – to gain the imprimatur of judicial legitimacy for a ‘settlement’ that had no viable basis in law or fact.”

That’s the ruling from the bench issued by US district judge Kathleen Williams in the southern district of Florida against the “settlement” between the Drumpfster and himself. See, he sued himself because his government allowed his tax returns to be improperly released. Everyone knows that’s stupid. Our National Embarrassment tried anyway, because of course he did.

This ruling legally kills the trust fund for the J6 insurrectionists AND it kills the tax audit immunity arrangement that had been handed down. Well, for now. The Republicans corrupted our court system by posting toadies as judges. But they were smart enough to do it at the appellate level. More power there. A lower court can – and does – get the law right, but the corrupted loyalists appellate courts just overturn the lower court ruling. All they need is an excuse. And they don’t mind making those up.

Curious. I wonder why a guy like trump would need tax audit immunity for himself, his family, and their businesses. Surely they run clean businesses and file honest tax returns, right? Why, oh WHY would he need immunity going back decades and more immunity going forward? Hey, wait. You don’t suppose Donny is considering committing a crime, do you? Nah…

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Apparently, music CD sales are up. I count that a good thing. I suspect people are starting to realize that if they “buy” some streaming feature, they don’t really own it. At best, they’ve rented it, potentially long-term. You can “buy” it, but if the streaming service removes it, you’re out of luck.

On the other hand, if you buy a physical disc, a CD or a DVD or even vinyl, you get to keep that. Yeah, you’ve got to take care of it and move it from house to house from time to time but it’s yours for as long as you like. I count that as better. Apparently, I’m not alone…

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The Dotard is planning to steal more of our lives this evening. He’s “addressing the nation” tonight at 9 ET. The story I saw said he was planning to speak on the subject of elections and may discuss the war in Iran. Of course he will. He’ll also spend inordinate amounts of time bitching about how unfair life is to him, why people won’t just let him do whatever he wants (um, have you SEEN the Reflecting Pool?), how people holding him responsible for his actions is SO unfair, and how everybody who disagrees with him must hate him completely and how he’s going to get even with his political enemies. So, you know, same ole’, same ole…

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I don’t know. Maybe there’s some YouTube school that teaches content creators how to get clicks. My YouTube feed has really devolved, of late. I mean, it’s YouTube. It’s always been bad but now it’s getting worse and I don’t think that’s on YouTube. It’s on the creators.

I pay attention to certain political thinkers, like everyone else. I prefer people who work with facts and evidence. But recently, the left has gone a little bonkers with click-bait headlines and over-the-top claims. A judge rules against something 47 wanted to do (or has done) and the lefty headlines blare, “Trump Collapses As Courts Rule Against Him.” He didn’t collapse. “Trump Runs And Hides As His Plan Is Revealed” He doesn’t run and hide. It’s just clickbait.

Worse, someone told these people the videos need to be a certain minimum length so there’s more and more padding in the videos. The content creators have something that might take five minutes to cover but they need their videos to be twenty minutes. They’ve learned that if they put the stuff someone wants to hear at the beginning, the viewer can stop the video when they get the information they came for (IF they get the information they came for), so they put the message they want to deliver at the end. THAT means we get to sit through fifteen minutes of drivel just to get the message – and the message, increasingly, is NOT what was indicated in the clickbait headline.

That kind of garbage irritates me and I’m watching less and less. I presume I’m not alone. I wish the content creators would just give us honest content but apparently, that doesn’t generate enough clicks…

Reality Bites Back…

by MyBaconPress

You DO realize, do you not, that the worst, most harmful effects of the GOP’s “Big Beautiful Bill” are set to kick in AFTER the mid-terms, right? They passed the bill and it contains some real ugly stuff. They KNOW it’s ugly stuff and they KNOW it’s going to infuriate it’s victims (i.e., the American people). So they delayed it. Oh, to be sure, they DID it, but they delayed it so you wouldn’t feel it until AFTER the elections. The Republicans were trying to protect Republicans from the actions of the Republicans…

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Ah, rats! McConnell still pollutes Earth. He stuck his head out from his shell yesterday to explain that he fell down. Oh, AND he had a “mild case” of pneumonia. He says doctors have no explanation as to WHY he passed out. He just did. Actually, I suspect he’s on blood pressure medication and he stood up too fast. That gets REAL as you age. I once stood up too fast and blacked out. When I fell, I banged my head on a door, putting a nice little head-shaped dent in the thing.

This could be like a ‘Christmas Carol’ moment for him. Maybe he could read most of the stuff written about him by people who thought (hoped and prayed) he had died. Maybe he could understand how people feel about him, the legacy he’s leaving behind. Maybe he could reconsider being the evil jerk he is and do a personal “reset.” I mean, he won’t, but he certainly could.

It’s important to note that many people are pointing out potential flaws in the photo his team released. Even people on the far right are questioning the validity of the photo. They say – correctly, in my view – that McConnell should have released a short video instead of a photo. People ALSO want to know why all of the metadata has been stripped from the photo. That’s a fair question.

Perhaps the photo and statement are AI. People are also pointing out that rescuers were performing CPR on McConnell when he was taken to the hospital. Does one do CPR for a fall? Does pneumonia respond to CPR? It’s possible the cover-up continues. It’s possible McConnell can’t make a current video. It’s possible he really is dead. I wish I could know for sure. I’d like to know if I should be celebrating or just still disappointed…

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The thing about McConnell is that he might have fallen down as a result of the polio he contracted when he was a kid. He had only a minor case. His mobility was impaired but he got away without much worse. Another victim, Martha Lillard, contracted polio when she was five. SHE had to use an iron lung while she slept for her entire life. She just passed away June 26th. She was the last known polio survivor who used an iron lung. She was 78.

I imagine people like Lillard and possibly even ‘The Bitch’ McConnell were happy when a vaccine was introduced, so nobody else would have to go through what they went through. Then we get RFK, jr with his message of, “Heck yes we can stop it. We just don’t thing you should.” I can’t believe people – young mothers – started lining up to avoid the vaccine for their child. So long as stupidity rules the day, professionals should keep a few of those iron lungs around. We’re still going to need them. It’s very embarrassing to be an American, these days…

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This is just a passing thought, but the ONE thing I regret about Graham Platner having to drop out of the race in Maine is that we’ve missed the opportunity to listen to MAGA bitch and moan about how terrible, horrible, disgusting, and incomprehensible it would be to elect a person accused of sexual assault.

They wouldn’t even notice that their Precious has to pay E. Jean Carroll the five million he owes her for defaming her after he sexually assaulted her, and they’ve certainly “compartmentalized” the Trump/Epstein files. “OUR raper is okay. YOURS is an outrage!” That’s a hell of a case to make. American politics just ain’t what it used to be…

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Sad! Donny can’t get out of his stupid war-that’s-not-a-war in Iran. It’s got me wondering: how come he claims to have “solved” a bunch of wars nobody can see or knows anything about, but he can’t solve any of the active wars the entire world knows about? It’s almost as if he’s just lying.

Expect gas prices to jump again. The Strait of Hormuz is closed still/again/still/again. OPEC has increased their output but that takes a little time to affect the market. Missiles in the Strait take no time at all. I’ve got to tell you, I liked it better when the United States had competent Presidents…

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The GOP is considering a vote to end Daylight Saving Time. I support that. Their actual goal is to KEEP Daylight Saving – that is, to stay on that schedule instead of locking in on standard time. I do NOT support that. I only have evidence to rely upon, here, and we all know how cons feel about evidence, but I’m going to mention it anyway.

California tried that once, staying on Daylight Saving. It was a test program, intended to run two years. The first year was SO disastrous, they ended the program after the first winter. Too many dead kids. That’s real. It turns out, staying on Daylight Saving for more light in the evening, means more darkness in the mornings.

You know mornings. That’s when kids walk to school or to school bus stops. Making sure it’s extra-dark during those hours got lots of kids killed by drivers who just couldn’t see them. There’s no reason to assume the same thing won’t happen again.

Besides, Daylight Saving doesn’t provide any benefit. Americans live by clocks, not sunshine. Let’s stop the time changes, but stay on standard time. Americans lose nothing and school kids are safer. I call that a win-win…

Don’t Fear The Reaper…

by MyBaconPress

Well…I guess I’m being offered another chance to be a better person. When Mitch “the bitch” McConnell (probably) died, I wrote, “I’m supposed to say I wish McConnell good health and a speedy recovery, but I don’t. I actually hope that some of what he sent around is coming back around to him.” I readily acknowledge that I’m not displaying a good, Christian attitude about things, but, since I’m not a good Christian, maybe that’s okay. I DO struggle with it, though. One does not have to be a Christian in order to be a decent person. (In fact, I’d argue…uh, never mind…)

On the one hand, I understand people might be bothered by the death of a loved one. On the other hand, in McConnell’s case, I have difficulty believing he HAD any “loved ones.” The guy betrayed the United States and the American people. He was self-serving. His actions directly harmed millions of people – and he didn’t care. He laughed about it. So I need some work on that whole ‘forgiveness’ thing.

Now I’ve got another chance. Apparently, Lindsey Graham,71, has died after a “brief but sudden illness.” Boy, I’ll say. He was in Kyiv giving a speech on Friday. He showed no signs of distress. He was scheduled to appear on ‘Meet The Press’ on Sunday, where he likely would have lied and lied in an effort to defend 47’s mind-boggling failures. He got home from Ukraine just in time to die on Saturday. It sounds like he had a heart attack. Heart attacks are, generally, NOT considered “brief” or “sudden” illnesses. They’re heart attacks.

Graham was no better than McConnell. Maybe they can be roomies in hell. He was a war hawk, so long as HE didn’t have to go. He condemned Trump as a “jackass,” a “race-baiting bigot,” and “the most flawed nominee in the history of the Republican party.” He warned on Brand X: “If we nominate Trump, we will get destroyed … and we will deserve it.” Then he supported the Drumpfster pretty much completely. Those are the kinds of principles that made him the man he was. Wishy-washy flip-flops.

After trump’s J6 insurrection, Graham said he had had enough. He said, “All I can say is count me out. Enough is enough,” withdrawing his support from Donny. Well, temporarily. He threw out some tough talk after the attack, but tucked his tail and returned to the fold fairly quickly. He refused the vote for conviction during the subsequent impeachment and he wholeheartedly supported Donny’s campaign in 2024.

It turns out his prediction was correct. The Republicans did nominate Donny and now the country is being destroyed. Graham was a strong supporter of that. So you see, I’m not faring much better in my attitude when it comes to Graham than I did with McConnell. He, too, betrayed the United States and the American people. He, too, was self-serving. His actions also directly harmed millions of people – and he didn’t care any more than McConnell did.

One less lying liar. One less blight on humanity. One less threat to America. Lindsey Graham’s death was no loss to the nation. I’d like to believe they’d replace him with a person of integrity, but these are Republicans. They don’t DO ‘integrity.’ They’ll just replace one loyalist toady with another and nothing much will change. The unexpected announcement of his death DID give my day a little boost, though. It seems I’m less ‘condolences’ and far more ‘good riddance…’

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Well, crap. There’s a fire in southern California and it’s burning Joshua trees. To be clear, not Joshua Tree, the town. Actual Joshua trees. Joshua trees can only be found in the Mohave and Sonoran deserts (I can never tell when I’ve left one and entered the other) and the San Bernardino Mountains. That’s it. No where else on Earth. I doubt the fire will destroy all of the trees, but it’s a real loss. This climate change thing is going to cost us in so many unexpected ways, we can’t even guess…

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This bit is for football fans. No, not futball. Football. NFL style. Specifically, Brandon Aiyuk. That last name is pronounced like an Apple product, ‘the iYook.’ The guy came into the league with great talent and he showed that talent early on. Now? Now the guy is burning his career as quickly and hotly as he can. His actions have cost him millions of dollars and will likely cost him more. Worse, after all of the public whining and bitching and moaning and complaining, what team might want him?

He walked away from the 49ers. Just quit. Did other teams notice? The Niners had just paid him a HUGE contract. He quit anyway. Honestly, nothing Aiyuk is doing makes any sense. He’s destroying everything he ever worked for and in every way, they’re unforced errors. It’s just strange. It got me to thinking and I realized we’ve seen this before.

There was a player a short time ago named Antonio Brown. He suffered a tremendous hit during a game. It gave him a severe concussion and, apparently, did some brain damage. Before the hit, he was something of a Prima Donna but he could walk the walk and he contributed to the team. AFTER the hit, it was all about him, all the time.

His behavior became more and more erratic until, finally, during the third quarter of a game, he stripped off his jersey and undershirt, threw them on the ground, and left the field. It was the last time he ever played in the NFL. I suspect that when he dies, they’ll find evidence of the brain damage known as CTE. It’s everywhere in the NFL.

I find myself wondering if Aiyuk might have taken some similar kind of hit. Something less obvious but no less damaging. He had everything, man. Now he’s just walking away and he can’t even describe a decent reason. He’s just pissed off. It’s irrational. I suspect Aiyuk has played his last game in the NFL. That’s a loss to the team and the fans who love the game but it’s a much larger loss to Aiyuk, himself. Weird…

Cracks…

by MyBaconPress

I have more than one friend who support Trump – or, more accurately, supported. I ran into one the other day. He was very clear that he’s totally over 47. He knows without question that Donny is serving Donny and nobody else. I find it comforting to know the facade is falling. Of course, there will always be loyalists and nothing, but nothing, will dissuade them. Hell, Hitler was surrounded by sycophantic loyalists in his bunker in his last days. Some people just never learn.

But some people do learn and many of his one-time supporters are learning – and they don’t like what they see. I suspect if he could ever do anything right, and if he ever bothered to even try and do something for the masses, he might possibly win them back. But with Donny, asking him to do anything right is a huge lift – which doesn’t matter because he’ll never, ever do anything for the masses. This is all about him, baby. I know for a fact some of my rightie friends see it and don’t like it. I count that a good thing…

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I saw an article, ‘Trump Fans Confused by How Their Investments in His Crypto and Stock Are Now Worth a Tiny Fraction While He’s Getting Richer.’ It focuses on how a true trump believer saved $100,000 dollars to buy a house, invested it, instead, into 47’s crypto scheme – because he believed – and watched his $100,000 dollars turn into nearly $30,000 dollars almost overnight. Meanwhile, Donny just gets richer and richer.

This guy, Vadim Fistikan, knows now he was the victim of a scam. That’s an expensive lesson. There’s no word on whether his support of Donny has decreased any, though. Hell, he might end up supporting him more. “Well, he sure burned me. What a business genius!” When it comes to Fistikan and 47, it looks like there are NO geniuses between them…

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Well, they did it again. The Dems, I mean. They backed a guy in Maine who had some…baggage. Graham Platner. Sheesh. He made the case that he HAD behaved badly for a time but it was due to PTSD and he had been successfully treated. People wanted to believe and give him a second chance, or tried to. But things kept coming out. Ultimately, Platner suspended his campaign because only Republicans elect rapers.

Now the Dems have nothing in Maine, a state considered vital to them taking back Congress in the mid-terms. They’re running against Susan Collins, of all people. They SHOULD have been able to defeat her, so they backed a guy who won the primary handily, then turns out to be, um, less-than. I wonder if there were any precedents in history they might have looked at to guide them through a situation like replacing an elected candidate with a substitute after the primary.

Has there ever been a situation in which the questionable candidate (say, Joe Biden) stayed in the race only to be replaced after the primaries by a person (Kamala Harris) foisted on the voters by the party? That’s a challenging question. Has it ever happened? Perhaps the party could have learned? Learning is a thing people are supposed to be able to do.

Oh, yeah, I almost forgot; the Dems are owned and operated by the same One Percent as the cons. They take orders from their funders just like the cons. Their JOB is to lose – and they do that job well. What they need in Maine is the same thing they need everywhere else, a Democratic Socialist. But the party doesn’t like Democratic Socialists. Some segments of the party blame Bernie, of all people, for Platner, as though no mainstream Dems endorsed him too. The Dems will find a nice, safe, boring, stay-the-course candidate, then celebrate that their loss was close. Oh, so close…

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Do you know how expensive it is to fly the President of the United States (or, in this case, Donny) around? Of course you do. I mean, not to the penny, but we all know it’s expensive. MAGA only knows it’s expensive when a Democrat is on the plane, but that means even THEY have some idea. But to Donny, it doesn’t matter HOW expensive it is, he needs to find a way to make it MORE expensive.

To that end, he took his shiny new Qatari bribe plane to a conference in Turkey where he embarrassed and humiliated himself and the US on the world stage, then brought over the OLD Air Force One and flew that one from Turkey to England, then boarded the Qatari bribe plane again for the flight back to the US.

Some say he was worried about security. The Qatari bribe plane doesn’t have the same defensive capabilities as regular AF1. I remember when the bribe was first delivered, news came out that the plane is SO big, it can’t land at most airports. It needs a special runway. Maybe that’s a factor. Maybe Donny is just an impulsive and poor planner who didn’t think ahead and realized halfway through the trip he should have stuck to OG AF1 in the first place. There’s a LOT of evidence for that last option, for sure…

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Oh, lovely. Nearly 3,000 people in 31 states have cyclosporiasis, a gastrointestinal illness marked by severe diarrhea, according to local health departments. It’s associated with fresh produce. It’s not unheard of. Michigan, for example, gets 40 to 50 cases each year. Right now? 1,562 cases. 80 people have been hospitalized. Officials are scrambling to find the source. I’m out on a limb, here, but my guess? I suspect the outbreak will be tied back to some policy of Team Evil, some “unnecessary” regulation they rolled back as harmful to the industry…

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Remember a few years ago when the whole world seemed to be going crazy over a play called ‘Hamilton?’ Of course you do. It was everywhere. Spoiler alert: Alexander Hamilton dies at the end because he got shot in a duel with Vice President Aaron Burr. Well? Today is the anniversary of the duel, July 11, 1804. He died the next day.

Obviously, the duel ended Hamilton’s political career – death does that – but it essentially ended Burr’s, too. His attempt to reclaim his honor backfired and people were horrified by him. He wasn’t arrested. Too rich, you know. But he DID have to hide out for a while and his reputation never recovered.

Yer Outta There…

by MyBaconPress

Okay, I guess justice can be served in more ways than one, eh? FIFA decides to change the rules for one team? Fine. Just give Belgium a shot at said team. Elimination settles the question, once and for all. Only Belgium had to face the artificially improved USA team and they were having none of it. Four goals later? Problem solved. 47 shouldn’t have gotten involved. Everything he touches turns to rubble.

Did the overturned red card have anything to do with motivating Belgium in their game? “No,” says USMNT coach Mauricio Pochettino, “It had no impact.” After their victory, Belgium posted, “Overturn this!” into social media. That sounds like it might have been a factor, to me.

Oh, I solved another problem while I watched. Part of my lack of interest in soccer is based on how slowly the game moves. Players just kick the ball around. A LOT. Up and down the pitch, up and down. They’re looking for strategic advantage, of course, but it’s just a bunch of guys kicking a ball back and forth. There’s not much aggressive play, trying to get the ball to the net. There doesn’t have to be.

I realized somewhere along the way the thing that would pick things up in soccer is an idea borrowed from basketball: a shot clock. Give each team a certain number of seconds while they control the ball to take a shot on goal. None of this go forward, go back stuff. You push the ball, you shoot the ball, or you lose the ball.

It would increase the speed of the game. It would, likely, increase the scores as teams changed strategies to comply with the new rule. It would also increase the chances of a come-from-behind win if you find your team down, say, 4-1 with time running out and the team with the 4 just keeps the ball away from you. If they have to shoot, you have a chance to get the ball back.

It’s just an idea but one I’m rather fond of. Of course, I’m in no way qualified to come up with new rules for a game in which I don’t even know the old rules, but that didn’t stop me…

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X-box is heading down. I don’t play video games like I used to. I don’t have (or make) the time. I DO still enjoy a good game, though. The thing is, as corporations monetized video gaming, they also ruined it – just like they do with all of their monetized misadventures.

Ultimately, they reduce whatever product or service they offer to it’s lowest common denominator, which usually loses much of whatever attraction it had in the first place. People become less interested because the product isn’t as good anymore and the geniuses in corporate scratch their heads? “Why are we losing market share?”

It’s a known dynamic of every corporate venture but in the case of video games, the answer is, “Well, you harmed your product by stripping out features. You harmed your product by charging real money to have any chance at success in the games. You destroyed the social aspect by taking out local multiplayer options. You dropped titles that sold unless they were TOP sellers. You bought up all of the independent studios in an effort to eliminate competition, but in eliminating competition, you eliminated creativity.”

In their efforts to squeeze every nickel out of every penny, they focused their attentions on online games – games you play while thousands of other people – strangers, mostly – are playing at the same time. They focused on franchises. “Oh, this game sold well? Make it again.” In short, corporations gutted the video game industry, watched interest decline, and now wonder why interest declined.

No matter. Shut down the service. It’s not profitable enough anymore. Microsuck is slowly backing away from video gaming, laying off something like 4,800 people from their X-box section and spinning off some of those studios they bought and corporatized.

Sony has announced they’re going to stop making physical discs for players to use on their PlayStation decks, too. That addresses a problem game corporations hate. People can share games or buy them second-hand if there’s a physical disc. Lots of games are worth the second-hand price, though, and not the full retail price. Buying a game becomes a MUCH riskier proposition if it’s only a digital download.

I suspect PlayStation game sales are going to drop. Then the corporate types will complain that people aren’t buying video games anymore. Then they’ll start cutting. I feel like they should give people what the people want instead of what the corporation feels like giving. They would do much better. Hmm, this turned into much more of a rant than I had expected…

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So, do you suppose his stupid war is back on? THIS round, I think, is on Iran, though overall responsibility for all of it remains with the moron who started it based on delusions and fantasies. Iran is trying to control the Strait of Hormuz completely. They required ships to take a specific route and follow Iranian protocols. A few ships tried a different route. Iran fired on them. The US fired back.

I think it was a mistake on Iran’s part. They had sympathy on their side. They had been victims of an unwarranted attack and everyone knew it. They had the chance to stand down and walk away the winners but they just couldn’t take yes for an answer. It was a ridiculous overreach. More people are going to die. Gas prices are going up again. More stress on the world economy. It turns out, the problem with putting a moron in charge, is that, then, you’ve got a moron in charge…

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So what’s up with Mitch ‘the bitch’ McConnell? He collapsed recently and was rushed to the hospital. Nobody has seen him since. Speculation ranges from ‘He’s recovering nicely, thank you,’ to ‘He’s dead.’ If he’s dead, goes the theory, the cons don’t want to announce it until AFTER August 3 because that’s the deadline to call a special election. So pressure is mounting to prove McConnell is still alive.

We have comments by two or three Republicans claiming they had conversations with him and he was fully lucid and ready to come back to work. Comments from Republicans?!? Can we get something credible please? How about having him hold a twenty minute conversation in which he’s lucid and ready to come back to work with, say, Rachel Maddow? Hey, how about having him just, you know, come back to work, since he’s so ready?

I’m surprised at the number of far righties that hate him. He did a LOT for Team Evil and their evil intentions. Now they hate him because he didn’t do every single little thing. He probably should have, though. His place in history is already very definitely assured – and it ain’t great.

Like most people, I still struggle as a human being sometimes. Because it’s what decent people are supposed to do, I’m supposed to say I wish McConnell good health and a speedy recovery, but I don’t. I actually hope that some of what he sent around is coming back around to him. Yeah, I’m working on that…

Bunglers And Fools…

by MyBaconPress

“Morons. I’ve got morons on my team.” That’s Percy Garris, a fictional Bolivian mine boss from the movie ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.’ It might as well be 47, though, because he DOES have morons on his team. Take the DOJ. They’re suing someone, Former federal prosecutor Carmen Lineberger, for “leaking” the second part of Jack Smith’s scathing report that summed up all of trump’s crimes and attempted crimes.

That part of the report was SO clear on trump’s crimes, one of his federal judge toadies, Aileen “Loose” Cannon, sealed it and said nobody should see it because of the harm it would do to her Precious. But DID Lineberger “leak” the report? She saved a copy, changed the name to something innocuous, then emailed a copy to herself. There’s no evidence she ever did anything more with it, but the DOJ sued anyway.

Then, as part of the discovery process, because Team Evil is populated by toadies and morons, they accidentally included the very report they’re suing her over and sent it on over. Now I suppose someone in the DOJ is going to have to be sued, too, for leaking the very report they’re suing someone else for leaking. These guys constantly come off like a bad sit-com. I’d be laughing except they’re also so dangerous to everything I hold dear. Someone gave these Keystone Kops real bullets. They’re still bunglers and fools, but they’re very dangerous bunglers and fools…

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My interest in soccer is generally quite low. I’m not much of a fan of the game. In this World Cup, I’ve watched one half of one game. It was Mexico vs England, though, so it was a good game. I DO like organized sports, though, and I understand larger concepts – like cheating.

There’s a player for the US team, Folarin Balogun, who earned a red card in a match against Bosnia and Herzegovina. A red card is a punishment for playing too aggressively. They often seem to follow one player threatening another player’s legs or feet. Legs and feet are pretty important in a game where you can’t use your hands. Essentially, the player is ejected from the match at the time of a red card. In the World Cup – I don’t know about regular season play – the ejected player is then required to serve a one game suspension.

It should be noted that Balogun’s offense was debatable. Was it an accident or did he step on another player’s foot on purpose? That makes a difference to the punishment, a yellow card or a red card, but it doesn’t matter after the card has been issued, and a straight red card was issued. Balogun was ejected. He should have served a one game suspension. It should also be noted that other players have received red cards during this World Cup and they have all served their one game suspensions. Both FIFA and US soccer confirmed that such a red card can not be challenged.

The US faces a very good Belgian team next. They could really use their star striker, Balogun. 47 got involved. He started pressuring FIFA to lift the suspension and let Balogun play. FIFA caved. They cited this rule, Article 27, which apparently gives their judicial committee authority to just change the rules as they desire – or as someone else desires. But if the rules of a contest can be changed just to satisfy some private demand somewhere, ARE there rules?

I’m not the only one feeling this way. Pretty much everybody in the World Cup is furious with the sudden change. Belgium’s team is extra angry. They thought they’d be facing a team lacking it’s star striker and instead Balogun will be there because FIFA changed the rules, possibly because Donny stuck his ugly face in.

The US team is all happy about it, of course. They think it’s just fine that they get their star player back for the match. They’re defending the decision as having corrected a bad call in the first place. Yeah, the team that benefited from the unexpected, against-the-rules change thinks it’s a great thing. But nobody else does. ALL of the other teams think rules are rules and should be followed equally by everyone. I agree.

The US credibility as a team will be questioned now. If the US beats Belgium, the response will be, “Cheaters!” Worse, that response will be right. The rest of the US involvement in the tournament will be overshadowed by the change. Should the US manage to win the whole thing, their victory will be tainted by this one bad decision. The change, not the red card.

It looks like my interest in soccer is going to STAY generally quite low. I’m not about to get involved with a game that doesn’t even follow it’s own rules or will change them if the right person calls the right person. I’d guess I’m not alone in that sentiment…

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Wow. Just wow. The assault on media in America is heating up. Cons don’t like Jimmy Kimmel because he makes jokes about their Precious. Kimmel is on ABC. So, obviously, the cons are coming after ALL of ABC in an effort to shut down Kimmel. The Drumpfster’s FCC, led by boot-licking toady Brendan Carr, demanded ABC file requests for broadcasting license renewal early, then invited public comment.

The “public” – in the form of a number of self-serving, far right groups – filed objections claiming every affront in the book. They even tossed in the idea that ABC is cozies up to the Communist Chinese Party. “Ahh, the commies are coming, the commies are coming!” Kimmel tells jokes. Another show, ‘The View’, interviewed a Democrat from Texas, James Talarico. “Ooh, too partisan,” the partisan complainers complained.

The short version of this is simple: the US Federal government is harassing a US broadcasting company into compliance. “Broadcast less of what you want and more of what we want or we won’t let you broadcast at all. Because, you know, free speech.” What the government wants broadcast is lies and misinformation. Sure, that will kill ABC but that’s kind of the point.

It’s a very good argument against allowing people to accrue so much wealth. If you can afford to spend billions of dollars buying a broadcasting company, only to gut it and destroy it, thereby surrendering all of those billions of dollars as nothing more than pocket change, you have too much money…

Wrapping Up The Weekend…

by MyBaconPress

Ah. I knew there would be a gimmick. I just didn’t know what kind. He bragged he’d give a long speech despite the high temperature just to prove he can do anything. I thought maybe he’d give the speech from an air conditioned building or maybe with coolers directed at him. I didn’t think of ‘late-at-night,’ but he did. That worked, too. He gave the speech from a stage strategically located to hide the Reflecting Pool. But he promised he’d have the Reflecting Pool finished and ready to show off by the Fourth. Yet another promise made, promise not kept.

Apparently, he tried to give a standard political ‘Ain’t-America-Great?’ speech. He only veered off into his favorite tangents a little bit. It lacked greatness. No memorable lines, no soaring rhetoric. I even heard it referred to as boring rhetoric. He’s not good at staying on topic when the topic is not him. Someone referred to him as ‘Teleprompter Trump.’ They try to get him to stay on task by getting him to stick to the teleprompter but he has the attention span of a three-year-old and his aging mind wanders.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a trump event if it didn’t include white supremacists. So the hate group Patriot Front showed up, faces carefully covered, and marched the Confederate flag down the street. Do you think they covered their faces out of concern over Covid-19? That’s awfully respectful for a hate group. But they weren’t just hiding their identities, were they? Wouldn’t that be cowardice? How does one take a stand on an issue while hiding? If you believe a thing, why hide? No, it must have been the Covid thing. Thanks, haters.

White supremacists marching down the street? Obviously, when 47 started flapping his lips, he used the opportunity to condemn, uh, <checks notes> right, communism. Obviously. Communism isn’t a problem of any kind in this once-great nation, and racism and white supremacy have been put on steroids since our racist pedophile president came to public attention so it makes perfect sense to condemn the imaginary problem while overlooking the actual problem. Classic trump.

He pretended there were 350,000 people there, too. From what I’ve seen, he might get a tenth of that throughout the entire event. I often find myself wondering if those people he always see are in the room with me right now? Hey, maybe he does see them, like Cole Sear in ‘The Sixth Sense.’ “I see dead people.” Maybe he’s seeing the ghosts of all of the people he’s killed already…

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Israel is establishing thirteen more new settlements. They’re strategically positioned to ensure no contiguous Palestinian state can ever exist. I suspect that also means they’re strategically positioned to ensure no peace in the region in the foreseeable future. These settlements are one of the biggest complaints of the non-Israelis living in the area.

Ever since Israel expelled the Palestinians from the area called Israel in 1948, the Palestinians have been fighting back. Badly, it’s true but they’ve tried. Israel, though, tends to encroach a little at a time. They’ve never stopped. It’s like the person sitting next to you on an airplane who slowly, but surely, pushes your elbow off the armrest by pushing their own further and further onto the armrest.

Israel just keeps encroaching. Another settlement, then another, then another, then another. The goal is clear and obvious. Israel wants ALL of that land for themselves and they’re taking it – by stealth and by force. If you happen to notice that Israel is always the aggressor in these matters, you run the risk of be called antisemitic. That’s a cheap dodge by defenders of Israel. What the government of Israel is doing has nothing to do with Judaism – and it’s just plain wrong…

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In a rare moment of sanity, the corrupt Supremely Kangaroo Court upheld the US Constitution over Donny’s whims. In this case, they supported birthright citizenship, just because it’s written in plain English in the Constitution. That’s no guarantee with these clowns, but, in this case, they did the right thing. Donny doesn’t like being told no, and he absolutely abhors when people do the right thing.

So now Team Evil is considering banning foreign pregnant women from entering the country at all. Isn’t that lovely? Now women have to promise they’re not pregnant if they want to visit. Cons think there’s such a thing as “Birth Tourism,” in which women travel to the US for no other reason than to deliver an anchor baby. Now they’re doing everything in their power to stop that.

Come to think of it, if 47 stays in power much longer, the US will become such a crappy little country to be in, nobody will want to be here. Perhaps he’s not just a terrible manager, after all. Perhaps he’s destroying the country to discourage “birth tourism.” That’s a little like setting a broken arm by killing the patient. The broken arm won’t be a problem anymore, sure, but it seems like going too far to achieve the goal…

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So, did you notice the number of events that were cancelled because it was just too effing hot? Not so much here in the west but in the east, oh, man, are they suffering. All kinds of traditional Fourth of July events were cancelled. Parades? Gone. Fireworks displays? Out. Too hot. Too dangerous.

I’m really split as to which threat wipes out humanity first, AI or climate change. I’d say this weekend, climate change has made a bold move to be in first place. AI is going to have to come from behind, like an unexpected checkmate in a game where you just didn’t see it coming until your opponent is laughing in your face.

Besides, climate change has a real advantage. We set it up to operate automatically. It’s in it’s own feedback loop so, as long as we just keep pumping more and more pollutants into the air, Donny’s goal, it will get worse and worse on it’s own. After a while – and the deadline is fast approaching now – we won’t be able to stop it. Hell, the deadline may have already passed. Please note the term: DEADline.

We were warned. Long before we started seeing the effects of climate change, we started hearing about them. We ignored them. Once the effects started, we couldn’t ignore them anymore. But we did anyway. When public awareness picked up, so did mis- and disinformation. Our very existence was reduced to a political game, and there it sits.

Now we’re starting to suffer the more severe aspects of climate change – and we ain’t seen nothin’ yet. But politics is still in charge. That’s just stupid at this point. It looks very much like humanity is going to stupid itself out of existence. That’s just embarrassing…