Month: July 2024

Fakin’ It…

by MyBaconPress

Wow, Trump’s choice of a running mate, JD Vance, seems to be hurting the ticket. What, for having a little sex with a couch? I’ve never done that, never even thought about it. But hey, maybe it was a really sexy couch. For being a fraud? MAGA doesn’t care about frauds. MAGA depends on fraud. MAGA is built on fraud.

Now, suddenly, it’s MAGAGOP that wants to replace a candidate. To be clear, Trump keeps saying he’s fine with Vance. Possibly, Vance wrote the biggest check and it cleared first, so Vance is the guy. But the base doesn’t seem happy.

Apparently, he’s not too magnetic at the microphone. So far, he’s been nothing but storms for the campaign. He’s pretend Appalachia, and very likely pretend MAGA. He was once a ‘Never Trumper’ but seems to have gotten over that.

It’s weird. I know how they feel. The left was just in the exact same conundrum a mere two weeks ago. Knowing you have a candidate who doesn’t appeal to people is challenging. But what does Trump do?

If he keeps Vance on the ticket, he’s hurting his own chances in the election. If he dumps Vance, I guarantee you the left will pounce on that as an error Trump made. (At least, this corner of the left will.) Trump picked him. Trump named him as the running mate. Trump thought he would be good for the ticket. Trump was wrong. WAY wrong. I wonder if MAGA will be able to see that their infallible leader made an egregious mistake.

No, I don’t. They see it. They just re-write it to make Trump a hero anyway. Or, they’ll suddenly embrace Vance. Either way, they won’t have to face the reality that Trump messed this one up pretty badly – just like everything else he touches…

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MAGA keeps trying to convince somebody, somewhere that it’s absolutely unacceptable that people in the White House may have lied about Joe’s situation. (They haven’t.) They’re acting like it’s a major breach of ethics to lie. Excuse me a moment.

A-ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! Oh, tears! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha – Oh, my sides hurt. Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha… heh, heh… ohh…

I think the party that LIVES on lies trying to make a single, possible lie into the worst thing ever might be among the funniest things we see all summer…

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One of the stories MAGA loves to tell is that illegals are bringing Fentanyl into the country. It turns out – you’ll never guess – they made that up! It turns out, if you ask former head of Border Security Gil Kerlikowske, nine out of ten convicted Fentanyl traffickers are US Citizens. He even says the cons KNOW that most of the traffickers are US Citizens. It’s just a nice, little attack line they made up out of whole cloth because they don’t have anything real to complain about.

I guess that’s why the cons were so comfortable shooting down that bi-partisan border bill, written by a Republican, supported by Dems AND the border patrol, and denounced by Donald J. Trump because he didn’t want Dems to have a “win.”

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Wait, was it just yesterday I wrote, “I find it ironic as hell that it’s the pseudo-Christian community ushering in the age of the Anti-Christ by putting their faith into this Earthbound clod but, hey,that’s how the Bible said it was going to happen…”

In fact, it was. So, here. A little bit of support for my position. Shall we open our Bibles to Second Timothy? Not ‘Two Timmy,’ as some Trumps might have it. It’s toward the back. A lot of the pseudo-Christians never got that far. Ah, here it is.

2 Timothy 3, “But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, slanderers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God…but they will not make further progress; for their foolishness will be obvious to all…”

Does any of this sound like any (every) MAGA you know? It seems, to me, to be a pretty accurate (read: perfect) description. Leave it to the “lovers of light” to lead the world into the darkest darkness…

Losing Strategies…

by MyBaconPress

The GOP seems to be having some difficulty coming up with an attack line against Harris. They’ve tried all their usual stuff. Racism, misogyny, nothing is working. They’ve attacked her laugh. The Russians have, too. STILL, not much traction. In fact, those attacks seem to be hurting his campaign.

Trump has been courting black voters. Or trying to, anyway. I STILL don’t think black people, as a bloc, would have voted for the guy in the white pointy hood, but now they have Kamala and I’d bet Kamala can relate to black issues better than Trump. Just a hunch.

Trump wants people of color but keeps saying anybody who arrives in the US from south of the border are A) Mexicans (It’s like he doesn’t even know there are other countries down there.) and B) ALL violent criminals. How does that bring them into the fold? I imagine that if I were, say, an undocumented but not-violent, non-criminal from, oh, I don’t know, El Salvador, I’d be off-put by the idea of being depicted as a violent criminal.

So, they attack her gender. That seems like a losing strategy. But, I guess, you’re already doing great with the ladies, you might as well denigrate them entirely. Holy gods, the GOP has been attacking women hard and blatantly. They really, really want women back in the home, barefoot and pregnant and, by GOD, they’re going to use their freedumb to put women back where they belong, like it or not.

I would think trying to paint Harris as a DEI hire because of her race or gender could only offend women. I just don’t think it’s a winning strategy to suggest that successful women can only BE successful women if they somehow trick a man or get a boost from some program. I suspect that’s more likely to repel women than attract them.

Geez, come to think of it, I hope the GOP keeps it up…

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Okay, so, Trump keeps telling the Deceived he doesn’t care about votes. He says he doesn’t need votes. He says he’s got all the votes he needs. It’s not a one-off. He KEEPS saying it. To my mind, that should be a losing strategy. On Friday, he told a bunch of pseudo-Christians they only need to come out “just this time” and then they “won’t have to do it anymore” after the election in November. He said, out loud, “In four years, you don’t have to vote again. We’ll have it fixed so good, you’re not going to have to vote.”

Dear MAGA, you NEVER “have” to vote. (In fact, please don’t.) You GET to vote. Yes, it’s a little harder, that way. It requires you to keep up with things. It requires you to know things and I know how much you hate that. You don’t get to just stick your head in the sand and let someone else solve your problems for you. But it’s still an opportunity, not an obligation. It’s one of those “freedoms” you’re always on about. You should WANT to vote…

I find it ironic as hell that it’s the pseudo-Christian community ushering in the age of the Anti-Christ by putting their faith into this Earthbound clod but, hey,that’s how the Bible said it was going to happen…

I’m filing Trump’s comments under “Confessions of the Cons.” He’s telling them – and all of us, for that matter -that voting will be yesterday’s news if he gets back into the White House. He’s ALSO admitting that he intends to get back into the White House through fair means or foul. (How else could he “not need” their votes?) Thom Hartmann exposed their plan. Win or lose in November, the cons intend to simply install Trump in January by pretending to question the integrity of the election and throwing it to the GOP-controlled House to decide. Trump KNOWS about the plan. Clearly, he’s counting on it.

Sidebar: The only way I can think of to stop it, is if a couple of Republicans with integrity step down after the election, giving control of the House to the Dems and stopping MAGAGOP from just stealing the election outright. Depending on the integrity of a couple of Republicans, though, is NOT the kind of thing that just fills me with confidence…

Anyway, after he’s installed, they’ll have it “fixed so good,” no more voting. That doesn’t sound good, to me. That sounds like a dictator confessing. He has all the votes he needs – he gets them from his good friend Putin. Then? No more voting? He’s running around saying it out loud – and MAGA is cheering!

I’ll tell you this: Celebrating the end of our democracy seems…misinformed, at best…

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The Daily Beast is reporting that Trump was seen in public without that feminine napkin on his ear. He didn’t even have the smaller bandage on. In fact, there was nothing, and I mean exactly that. Nothing. No bandage, no wound.

Look if you have the top of your ear shot off, or even if it’s shrapnel, it takes a while to heal. I don’t think he still needs a bandage of any kind. He probably never did. He was barely hurt, but playing it up for his base. It was VERY disrespectful to the family of the man who lost his life for real. But losing the top of your ear is going to take a while to recover. Trump was shot at on July 13. Trump was seen on the 26th. 13 days to full recovery? Not even a scab?

That whole thing stinks on ice. Bits just don’t add up. We never got a trustworthy medical report. As an ex-President, I would have expected as much information as anybody could find. I might have expected photos of the wound. It might have been a bit gross but it would have really driven home the “got shot” thing. The attending physician at the hospital should have given an update. All we ever got was a story from Trump, himself, and a “medical (-ish) statement” from “Dr.” Ronnie Jackson Johnson Jackson…Johnson.

But somebody died. Would Trump risk (end) the life of an actual human being for a political stunt? Actually, come to think of it, yes, he might. I can’t really get my arms around that, though, so I accept the idea that the shooting was real. But I say again, something stinks on ice about the whole thing…

Dating?

by MyBaconPress

Is it fair to attack Kamala’s dating history? Hey, it’s politics. Worse, this is MAGA. The lower they can go, the happier they are. It seems like a contest with them. All right, so, fair or not, let the comments on Harris’ dating history begin. Of course, that’s likely going to bring on comments about Trump’s dating history, too.

At the beginning of her career in politics, Kamala dated Willie Brown, a powerful California politician, for ten years. (Not exactly a one-nighter to boost her status.) To cons, that means she “slept her way to the top.” It never even crosses their “minds” that maybe, her association with Brown was what got her interested in politics in the first place. Besides, at best, she “slept her way” to the San Francisco AG office. Her political career after that was on her and the things she did.

But, speaking of using sex for success, would NOW be a good time to re-release the nude photos of Melania? I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen nude photos of Kamala. Frankly, I wish I had never seen the nude photos of Melania. She’s very… manufactured…

I don’t have any information that Kamala ever spent time with Jeffery Epstein, like Trump did for years and years – and years. Trump has acknowledged his insider information that Epstein “liked ’em young.” Based on comments from Trump himself about wanting to sleep with his own minor daughter, I’d guess Trump likes ’em young, too.

I don’t have any information that Harris cheated on her partners. Trump has cheated on EVERY partner he has ever had. That’s what makes the Daniels story so stormy, to me. He’s an infamous philanderer and suddenly claims purity when it comes to sex with his one-time porn star?

I have no information that Kamala has ever groped women – nor men, for that matter. Trump does, though. Remember? He told us all about it in the Access Hollywood recording. He doesn’t even wait. He can grab them by the…um, inappropriately because he’s a “star,” “unfortunately or fortunately.” The law has ruled that Trump gropes women for fun. He’s being punished to the tune of millions of dollars for groping at least one woman. What a freaking classless pervert. If he hadn’t been born rich, I suspect he would have been an “Incel…” (That means, ‘involuntarily celibate.’ Aka: can’t get laid…)

No, I’m not sure bringing up Harris’ dating history is a good move, considering the dating history of their very old, senile guy…

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So, the Kangaroos issued an “opinion” that it’s okay to sweep homeless people away. Gavin Newsom has embraced the message and ordered officials to remove homeless camps from state property. Lovely. Quick question, where are they supposed to go? These are actual human beings, not numbers on a page or manifestations of the mind. They can’t float above the ground. They ARE going to exist somewhere, so… where?

Government has done nothing to address the problem, which, as we all know, is that Wall Street is buying up single family homes as quickly as they come on the market. It drives the price of ALL housing up. It was illegal until 2011. It should be illegal again. Then, prices will stabilize and begin to drop. Until then, the problem will just get worse, leaving more and more people homeless – and with no place to go!

Not to put too fine a point on it, but, ‘no place to go’ MEANS they have no place to go. So, where do they go? The policy punishes the victims of corporate greed. Talk about adding insult to injury. If they can make it a crime to be the victim of their greed, what does that mean? To me, it means we had better be prepared to pay more – LOTS more – to incarceration costs because we’re going to be throwing a lot of people in jail for the “crime” of being homeless with no place to go.

Unless and until Wall Street buying single family homes is prohibited again, this problem will just keep getting worse. Pushing the victims around is NOT the answer. Punishing the victims is certainly not the answer. I say, address the problem before you attack the symptoms…

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Texas is suing the Biden administration. There’s a federal program that provides access to birth control to teenagers without parental consent. But Ken Paxton, Texas’ Attorney General, wants more pregnant teenagers, not fewer, and he wants that program out of Texas. What, you thought teaching young people about sex or providing birth control encouraged them to have sex? That’s some really backwards thinking, right there. It turns out, people have sex and birth control and some knowledge as to what’s what is beneficial. Those two tools reduce some of the possible negative impacts of having the sex they’re going to have anyway.

“Fun” fact: according to the Guardian, Texas has the highest repeat teen birth rate in the US. Oh, AND one of the most restrictive abortion laws on the books. And now they want to make it harder to get contraception? How does that NOT equate to ‘Texas wants MORE pregnant teens?”

More importantly, file this little chunk of knowledge under ‘Pay attention to what they do, not what they say.’ Cons are all running around acting like they have no intention of going any further trying to stop women’s right to choose. Why, they don’t know WHAT you’re talking about or where you even GOT such a crazy idea as that! Then we get more ‘every sperm is sacred’ insanity in aggressive efforts to increase unwanted pregnancies.

Oh, BTW, STILL, I still have not seen one law proposed requiring the provider of said “sacred sperm” to take financial responsibility for HIS part in the passionate little moment. I guess, in Texas, the “stud” still gets a gold star while the “slut” gets to be punished. That says a LOT, I think, about Texas’ attitude toward women and their proper role in society.

My advice? If you’re a woman, or you love a woman, or you even KNOW a woman, DO NOT VOTE Republican. If you care about women at all, in any way, DO NOT VOTE Republican. The Republicans will never SAY they intend to end all access to abortion and contraception. But they spend actual time every day trying to end all access to abortion and contraception. Their actions and their words to NOT align. Their words are lies. Their actions WILL harm women across the nation…

MAGA Mad…

by MyBaconPress

Wow, the right is melting down over the change. Joe left. Kamala stepped in. MAGA is mad! They say it’s undemocratic. Is it, though? Does democracy mean someone is not allowed to change their minds? It’s important to remember, Joe was the “presumptive” nominee. He had not secured the nomination, yet. That’s the key. As of this writing, the Democrats don’t have a nominee. They have a presumptive nominee. We assume Kamala will be the nominee but that isn’t confirmed until the convention.

Mike Johnson said the switch was illegal in some states. Maybe Ohio, but they’ve already addressed that. Ohio has a law that the candidate must be named 90 days before the election but they’ve already issued a waiver. After that, though, there weren’t any specifics. There never are. Which law has been broken? Which states? Because those I’m hearing about refer to the nominee, not the presumptive nominee.

It looks, to me, like their actual concern is that now they’re running a geriatric patient (and in their case, a felon) against a younger, smarter, person. (A one-time prosecutor of felons.) Now Trump is the old guy who can’t complete sentences and needs help walking down ramps. MAGAGOP is now running the guy they thought (hoped) they were running against. And there’s no way in hell Trump would make as selfless a move for the good of the country as Biden made.

Both Biden AND Harris are running for lots of reasons. They want to help people who need help. Trump is running as a ploy to avoid prison. He HAS to stay in the race. Even if he had the integrity of Biden, he couldn’t step down – because of prison! I mean, that’s a real high-quality candidate, right there…

Besides, at this point, I’m not sure I want him to step down. The momentum is with the Dems right now. People on the left seem energized by the change. Trump saddled himself with effing JD Vance as his running mate. Remember all those things MAGAGOP keeps saying are illegal for Biden to have done? They aren’t, because he wasn’t the candidate. But those laws DO apply to Trump/Vance because they’ve been formally nominated.

So far, it looks like people find Vance just as vile and opportunistic as we find Trump. Maybe more so, if that’s possible. Vance was an excellent choice to needlessly shore up Trump’s already firmly dedicated base but Vance won’t do much to attract moderates, and MAGA can’t do it alone. They’ll need Russia, again, I guess. Fortunately for Trump, Putin is ready to help…

Remember when I mentioned that the cons plan to attack the way Kamala laughs? They’ve even done a montage reel. It’s supposed to be mocking. I didn’t really get the big deal, though. People laugh. She didn’t sound like Janice from ‘Friends.’ She just laughs. But, they needed something and they needed something fast – and that was the best they had.

But here’s the part that gets me. It came to my attention that MAGA isn’t the only group attacking the way Kamala laughs. Do you know who else took the exact same line? Russian state broadcasting. The attack on the way Kamala laughs is a pretty weak attack in the first place. The idea that both MAGA AND Russian broadcasting might come up with the same, very stupid attack doesn’t seem so much like a coincidence, to me.

To me, it seems Trump is working with the Russians again. You know, like he did before. Putin and Trump go back a long way. Putin’s daughter and Ivanka are friends, though they put the relationship on hold during Trump’s 2016 campaign. Putin helps Trump and Trump lets him. Of course Putin wants Trump to win. Putin wants access to the American intelligence apparatus again and the only way he gets it is if his spy gets back into the White House…

Like I said, that’s a real high-quality candidate, you got there…

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For reasons that elude me, the cons continue to attack Biden. I guess they’re just used to it. Like, they had all this good, vicious garbage they planned to spew and now they NEED to spew it, relevant or not. So they started attacking Biden’s ability to govern after he stepped down from the race. “If,” they ask, “Biden is too demented to be the candidate, isn’t he too demented to be the President?”

The thing is, he didn’t step down because he’s too demented to be the candidate. He stepped down because he had lost the faith of the people. He’s like a coach who has, for some reason, lost the locker room. It doesn’t matter, any more, that he’s a good coach. Once you lose the locker room, other factors come into play. Biden will be able to finish out his term just fine. But, hey, MAGA, you stay focused on Joe. Kamala will benefit from the distraction…

Thank You, Joe…

by MyBaconPress

Well, lets’ see, what to write about? I mean, has anything… Well, there’s this: Joe Biden has stepped aside as the Democratic nominee! Biden has been a very good President. If he was twenty years younger, nobody would have had anything to complain about. (Well, except MAGA. They make things up to complain about. They just like to complain.) Biden did the right thing for the country. He has created an opportunity for the Dems to win the election.

One of the reasons I like to write is that I can go back and see how often I’ve estimated correctly. It’s too easy for people to simply shift a position and decide that’s how they’ve always felt but when you write it down, you’re sort of committed to a given position, right or wrong. This one gets filed under ‘wrong.’ I really thought Joe was going to stay, for better or worse. Truth? My admiration for Joe just went up. A lot.

Don’t get me wrong, I like Joe. I’ve always liked Joe. He ran for President in 1988. I was thinking of voting for him, then, but he had to leave the race. He got caught up in a – and you can’t make this up – plagiarism scandal. Imagine that. He quoted a speech given by someone else without proper attribution – and had to stand down from the campaign! Standards, people!

Compare that to at least one of today’s candidates, the very old, cognitively impaired Donald Trump. Biden once had to stand down because of plagiarism. Trump is beloved by his base despite his crimes, failings, crimes, lies, crimes, outrageous claims, crimes, bullying, and crimes. Once, presidential candidates stood down over plagiarism. Now they can brag about groping women and issue openly racist diatribes and there are enough people who don’t care about any of it that they actually make excuses for him. “Ooh, he’s our guy!” Plagiarism, indeed.

Joe stepping down gave the left an immediate weapon against Trump: his age. Suddenly, the GOP is the party with the broken down old man suffering cognitive failures at it’s helm. The left pounced but the right does not, will not care. Equally as suddenly, the right simply decided that old and senile isn’t such a bad combination, after all. But the left will have fun doing to old, senile Trump what the right did to Biden, so…there’s that.

Biden kept insisting he was staying in the race. He would have, too, except for one key element. The Dems were perfectly prepared to totally ignore the desires of the rank and file. (When have they ever cared about the rank and file?) But when the money dried up? There was a pretty quick course change. I might have known. It’s always about the money in this submerging nation.
“Hey, Bob, millions of Democrats are distressed about Joe and feeling demoralized. They may not come out to vote. What are we going to do?”
“Say, Dan, why would we do anything? We’re the DNC! Joe Biden is our guy and they’ll vote for whoever we tell ’em to vote for, just like in 2016.”
“Um, we lost in 2016.”
“The point is, we didn’t let the voters push us around. WE call the shots. This is Joe Biden’s campaign to lose and we’re…”
“Yo, Bob, the big money donors are closing their wallets until Joe Biden is out.”
“Who? Joe who? No, name’s not familiar. Our candidate is Kamala Harris.”

Is Kamala the best choice? I don’t know. But she’s not the worst, of that I’m certain. She already has national name recognition. I think a lot of people will be excited to vote for her, in part because she’s a woman, in part because she’s a person of color (several colors, in her case). Mostly, because she’s younger (59 years) and more vigorous. She’s definitely in the ‘protect Roe’ mode. Most important of all? She’s not senile and there’s little risk of her becoming senile during the next four years. That, alone, gives her a huge edge over Trump.

I’ll ride with Kamala. I think she can do the job.

It’s funny. The first person I thought of after I’d heard the news was Gavin Newsom. Gavin has been running a shadow campaign. (He denies this.) He was all set to go in 2028. Now, with Kamala being pushed up, Gavin is being shut out until at least 2032, should she win. (If she loses, of course, we’ll be done with elections in this country. Trump will never leave.) That means Gavin wouldn’t get the nod until he’s 64. What does he do in the meantime to keep his name in people’s minds? Oh, well. That’s a different problem for a different day.

Meanwhile, Trump is in full attack mode. Of course, he’s still attacking Joe. After the announcement, Trump said Joe was a threat to democracy. (Trump, projecting.) Trump attacked Biden’s mental competence again. (Trump, projecting.) Tell you what, Donald, we won’t run Biden, how’s that?

I hear they DO have a plan to attack Kamala. They’re going to pick on the way she laughs. (That’s true.) They’re going to try to tie her to the border problem nobody has been able to solve (despite lying claims to the contrary) and which the GOP specifically sabotaged. They’re going to shift their blame for corporate greed from Biden to Harris – but it’s STILL just plain old, run-of-the-mill corporate greed.

It still doesn’t matter. Trump is still Trump, the same old (VERY OLD) criminal, sexual molesting, anti-American, democracy hating, lying, self-serving blowhard he’s always been. People STILL want a viable alternative to the same old (VERY OLD), same old and Kamala gives them that. Now, Americans can vote with confidence against very old, senile Trump. It’s a good thing. Thank you, Joe. The nation, along with the rest of the world, appreciates your sacrifice. You did the right thing – something Trump would never, ever do…

Do Not Go Gentle…

by MyBaconPress

There are people who are upset that Biden may step aside, concerned that the Dems have no one else who can beat Trump. I know one thing, Biden isn’t going to beat Trump. Yes, he’s had a successful administration. But his age is an insurmountable issue and unless you can find the Fountain of Youth, that issue isn’t going away. It’s true, the Dems may not have anyone who can beat Trump. But Biden is surely NOT going to beat Trump. So, we lose for sure or change horses and maybe lose. Which do you prefer?

Besides, I don’t think Biden ever beat Trump to begin with. No, I believe the outcome of the 202o election, but I think people were voting against Trump, not for Biden. Dems are desperately hoping people will come out against Trump again but the enthusiasm just doesn’t seem to be there. We’re not currently in the throes of a pandemic that was SO mismanaged it killed over a million Americans and I fear Roe has receded in people’s minds. Women in blue states know they can still get required services and women in Red states may be able to travel.

But the GOP wants to impose a nationwide ban on abortion and, likely, birth control. Of COURSE they’ll tell you differently. Cons lie all the time. They KNOW their program is not popular so they have to bring it in secret. Ignore what they say. Pay attention to what they do. Once Trump is in, though, he’s IN. Only death will remove him, so his unpopular agenda will move forward, like it or not. That’s the weird part. People WANT to vote against Trump but Biden’s presence on the ticket is killing enthusiasm.

I think Biden is killing his legacy by staying in the race. I wonder if he knows how much people will revile him when he loses, knowing everyone wanted him to step down but HE wanted HE wanted and screw everyone else. HE says if he loses, he’ll be okay with that if he just ran a good race. But staying in the race doesn’t just hand it to Trump, it hands the country over to the One Percent, once and for all. If you believe Project 2025, it ends the Republic as we know it…

Wow. That’s some real ‘hair-on-fire’ stuff, isn’t it? Do you know what’s funny about it? It doesn’t matter. Some of us already know the cons have a plan to just steal the election in January if Trump doesn’t win it outright in November. I’m sometimes told that’s paranoid hyperbole. Do you remember Merrick Garland and his appointment to the Supreme Court? No, because the seat was stolen, outright. Neil Gorsuch stole it. (Moscow Mitch did the work. Gorsuch ended up with the seat.)

Why would they have ANY compunction about doing it again, especially for such a prize? What a Dem win in November MIGHT do is light a fire under the butts of the left and get them into the streets when MAGAGOP makes it’s evil move. There’s either going to be some France-style social unrest at the theft, or we’re all just going to go gentle into that good night. I wonder if there’s any revolutionary spirit left in Americans…

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Remember Bob Menendez, the Democratic Senator from New Jersey who was accused of accepting bribes in exchange for his influence in certain legal matters? He blamed his wife. He insisted he didn’t know anything about it. He said he was innocent. A jury said otherwise. It’s almost as if high-profile people ALWAYS claim to be innocent of the crimes they commit. Think Donald Trump.

Now he says he’s confident he’ll win on appeal. I’m confident there won’t even BE an appeal. It’s just what they say…

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On the left, people are shaking their heads at the complete and utter turnaround of the “Never Trump” cons to full-on MAGA. Nikki Haley said a LOT of anti-Trump things and she was right when she said them. A few days before her South Carolina primary, for example, she questioned his mental competency. “Trump and Biden are two old men who are only getting older,” she said. “We’ve all seen them fumble their words and get confused about world leaders. That’s not who you want in the Oval Office when Russia launches a nuclear weapon at our satellites or China shuts down our electricity grid.”

She said Trump had brought chaos to the GOP. She remained defiant and in a fighting spirit. “I feel no need to kiss the ring. I have no fear of Trump’s retribution. I’m not looking for anything from him,” she added. “My own political future is of zero concern. So I hear what the political class says. But I hear from the American people, too.”

Now? Oh, she’s all-in. “…for the sake of our nation, we have to go with Donald Trump.” Yeah, that makes sense. He’s mentally unfit and thrives on chaos so he should be running the show for the good of the country. Oh-kay…

JD Vance was a firm anti-Trumper who has now transitioned so completely into MAGA, he’s Trump’s effing vice-presidential running mate. During 2016, he wrote in a letter to a friend, “I go back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical asshole like Nixon who wouldn’t be that bad (and might even prove useful) or that he’s America’s Hitler. How’s that for discouraging?”

He said he thought Trump was “…the most-raw expression of a massive finger pointed at other people.” In social media posts, he called Trump “reprehensible” and an “idiot.” Now he doesn’t seem to remember any of that. He has even deleted the critical posts.

These two Trump critics (and others) have one thing in common: they’re politicians. If you want to know why so many Never-Trumpers are suddenly all in on Trump, do what Mark Felt (aka, ‘Deep Throat’) told Woodward and Bernstein during the Watergate investigation: follow the money.

Trump put his daughter-in-law in charge of the RNC. She (and, therefore, he) controls the money. Politicians need money to run. It’s how the parties control candidates. What, you thought Dems just collectively chose not to run against Biden? No money, no political future. So? Bend the knee. Kiss the ring. HAVE a political future. No? Get a real job, you’re out of politics. It’s simple, straight-up control – and they’re all doing as they’re told. Good dogs…

It’s a little micro look at what the entire nation is going to look like, here in the near future as Project 2025 rolls out. Everyone will be loyal to Trump – or else.

Threats, Real and Not…

by MyBaconPress

It turns out, I know why the right thinks the left incites violence. At least, I know their story. They know it’s really the right that incites most of the violence but they have to keep the lie going, so they do. Their story is, the left incites violence by saying Trump will usher in Fascism, comparing Trump to Hitler, and insisting he’s an existential threat to democracy.

It’s weird, isn’t it? When the right says all Democrats are existential threats to democracy, that, somehow, is NOT an inciting threat. But when the left says Trump is an existential threat to democracy, suddenly, that’s an unforgivable incitement to violence? If you’re curious about which side actually represents an existential threat to democracy, I’d look at the team that has a 900+ page plan to dismantle democracy.

Okay, technically, Trump won’t be ushering in Fascism. The United States has been a fascist state since the Kangaroos egregious Citizens United ruling which silenced average people’s voices and allowed rich people – and ONLY rich people – to own and operate their government. Trump is just going to consolidate that power and sprinkle in the authoritarianism – all while gutting the treasury and stuffing his pockets.

Is it fair to compare Trump to Hitler? That depends. If the subject is language spoken or which country was corrupted by evil, sure, there’s no comparison. Hitler spoke German. Trump speaks gibberish. Hitler corrupted Germany. Trump corrupted the United States. No comparison. But…

If one looks at the “playbook” the two men used in order to rise to power? Trump’s plan is VERY “Mein Kampf.”
Pick a group to “blame” and lay all of the nation’s problems at their feet. It was the Jews for Hitler. It’s brown people for Trump.
Make SURE the base knows the “threat” the “scary” people represent.
Attack journalism as “fake news.”
Lie so much people start losing the ability to discern truth from fiction.
Keep your supporters angry and scared, no matter what.
Tell your base they’re special and everyone else is out to get them.
Tell your team YOU are the only one “strong enough” to fix the problem.
Promise to fix ALL the problems with easy, simplistic answers but never offer details.
Lie, lie, and lie again. Then lie some more.

If someone exposes some of the…let’s say, darker portions of your intentions, deny it. (Project 2025, anyone?) Lie about it. Downplay it. Sure, trump will SAY he’s pro-America and wants to make America great. But what he DOES and what he says are generally NOT the same. Only time will prove the deception. History now has a clue on offer with Germany’s experience with Hitler, but one has to know history for that to matter.

So, for clarity, the comments that Trump will formally bring us Fascism, is like Hitler, and intends to dismantle our Republic are NOT “inciting calls for violence.” They are simple recitations of things the left understands from the evidence. In other words, facts. Cons hate facts. I’ve just explained why we think the things we think. They’re not conspiracy theories or scare stories. They’re factually accurate. Project 2025 is a fact. I can hold the plan in my hands.

But, the cons insist the comments are incitements to violence. Okay, so here’s the thing. Projection much? It’s just simple human nature that people have a tendency to project their own perceptions to a situation where space exists for it. I mean, let’s agree, shall we, that each of those comments has a spoken part and an unspoken part. Let us further agree that the unspoken part is a call to action of some kind.

When a lefty hears “Trump is an existential threat to democracy,” the spoken part, they fill in the unspoken part with their understanding of what it should be: “…so don’t vote for him.” That’s it. Don’t vote for him. That doesn’t seem violent at all. Cons do the same thing. They fill in the blank, too, but they use their own perception. Cons hear, “…so kill him.” Of course they see those comments as calls to violence. It’s how they see the world.

I’ll tell you this: The very fact that cons hear violence in left-leaning summations of our current situation betrays their allegiance to the very violence they pretend to abhor…

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All Musk’s X’s are moving to Texas. He says he’s taking his Space-X program and his dwindling web site and moving them to Texas. Well, their headquarters, anyway. Thanks, in large part, to subsidies he received from California, he has billions in infrastructure invested in Southern California. Is he going to just walk away from all of that because he’s having a tantrum? (He doesn’t like a law Newsom signed.)

If he moves everything, lock, stock, and barrel, it would harm California, I suspect. But if it’s just the headquarters? That will open up a few parking spaces in San Francisco and Los Angeles. Generally speaking, there aren’t enough people working in a headquarters to generate much impact.

Then again, maybe he moves nothing at all. It’s one thing to announce a move. It’s another to actually do it. It’s expensive. When he’s done, they have to live in Texas. (They don’t. Moving the technical location doesn’t mean they have to physically move at all but then, what’s the point?) I’ve lived in Texas. It doesn’t suck. There are a lot of things I like about Texas but the weather isn’t one of them. It’s miserably humid there.

Meanwhile, Musk says he’s giving $45 million to the Trump campaign every month until the election. To me, that’s stupid money. Because the Dems prefer to lose, the election is already over. We all know it. That’s why the country has fallen into the miasma we have. So why donate to a campaign that has only to show up on election day? (Oh, yeah, more of that ‘rich guy getting into the good graces of the dictator’ stuff…)

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I just want to say this: American pseudo-Christians are running around saying God saved Trump’s life in the shooting. Here’s the rule: if you believe in the Christian God, you must also accept the Christian God’s counterpart, Satan, who, apparently, sports a few metaphysical powers of his own. Quick question, why would God save the physical manifestation of the Seven Deadly Sins? More importantly, why would Satan NOT save him?

No, if there was some theological intervention on Trump’s behalf, it came from Satan, not God…

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Hey, speaking of Satan, one of the Deceivers died! Lou Dobbs has gone on to his reward. Or, in his case, his eternal punishment. One reaps as they sow. The world is better off without him…

A person the world is decidedly NOT better off without is Bob Newhart, who also passed this last week. He was a funny man. He did one of the best TV shows on the air in the 1970’s and then had another hit show in the 80’s. The finale of the second show had Bob waking up in bed next to his sit-com wife from his FIRST show. It was a brilliant callback to a device they had used regularly in the first series, an in-joke for his long-term fans. A joke at least ten years in the making. I laughed for several days. Really, genius. I’m sorry he’s gone.

Misrepresentations From The Right…

by MyBaconPress

I’ve got two sentences buzzing around in my head. One is a line from a Paul Simon song, ‘The Boxer.’ The other is a comment from Ayn Rand, of all people. Here, let me put them side by side for you:
‘A man hears what he wants to hear and he disregards the rest…’ (Simon)
‘You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.’ (Rand)

I think those two sentences go together quite well to form a near-perfect warning. We’re about to enter what will likely be an ugly period brought on by people who chose to hear what they wanted to hear while disregarding the rest. Then, and only then, everyone will get to see, feel, and live the consequences of avoiding reality. There won’t be anything anyone can do about it.

MAGA is openly gleeful about it. They’re about to win and they know it. If I was excited about the end of our country, I’d probably be gleeful, too. But I’m not. History has already shown those of us who were paying attention where we’re headed. Most of MAGAS excitement is based on a reality that never existed and never will. They’ve been living in a world of illusion, brought to them by internet-based MAGA media that never hesitates to lie to them.

Do you know they think the LEFT has been responsible for the rise in violent rhetoric and actions in this country? The LEFT! It’s easy, see, if one just ignores, well, reality. Only one presidential candidate told his followers to “Knock the crap out of protestors,” promising to pay their legal bills (until he withdrew that promise). That was Trump during his 2016 campaign and political violence has been increasing steadily ever since, according to people who study such things.

The right planned to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer. The right made jokes when Paul Pelosi was smashed in the head with a hammer. One of theirs intentionally crashed his car into a crowd, killing one and injuring several at Charlottesville, the ‘Unite the Right’ rally. We all watch whenever there is some headline grabbing shooting, waiting to hear which team THIS crazy comes from. By a wide margin, the crazies come from the right. So? The right lies. ‘When the truth doesn’t work for you, ignore the truth.’ What a stupid mantra.

Oh, yeah. J6. The right pretends it was just an unauthorized tour, a peaceful gathering so they simply don’t count it as political violence. The rest of us saw the video and believe in reality. According to Reuters, since the documented violence of J6, “Of the 14 fatal political attacks since the Capitol riot in which the perpetrator or suspect had a clear partisan leaning, 13 were right-wing assailants. One was on the left.”

You know what? This is stupid. I could keep noting political crime after political crime, each attributable to right-wing ideology for a long time. The list is long. But thinking Americans already know the right is lying about who is responsible for the upsurge in these types of crimes and MAGA doesn’t care. I mean, they know, too. They just won’t admit it. And when they feel like they’re in a “safe space,” they’ll even make jokes about it.

I’ll tell you this: The right promoting and engaging in violence but pointing the finger at the left? Why, that’s classic MAGA. All they ever have to work with is lies. Ever. That’s okay with them. They’ll lie. The part that bothers me so much is how easily they’ve been deceived – and what it’s about to cost us all…

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OMG, have you SEEN the bandage? Look, I know Trump got hit by a bullet, but he wasn’t “shot” in the sense most Americans think about when thinking about “shot.” Trump is among the LEAST “shot” people who have been shot by crazies with guns. He was “grazed.” Yeah, his ear got cut. I’ve seen worse injuries from shaving nicks.

But Trump is playing it for all he’s worth. (I don’t blame him, mind you. He’s a politician.) He’s got a bandage on about the size of a postcard. It looks dumb as hell but the point of it is to BE seen. “Ooh, remember when he got shot?” Now MAGA is wearing similar bandages in “solidarity.”

I’m sure there was a smaller, less intrusive covering that could have been put over his owie. That’s what a man would do. He wouldn’t go looking for sympathy by highlighting the injury. I’m surprised Trump didn’t put on a florescent bandage that glows in the dark with blinking lights that spell out “shot.” I guess he couldn’t find one in time…

Coming For Our Guns…

by MyBaconPress

Here’s a funny thought I had. For years, nay decades, we’ve been listening to gun rights advocates (GRAs) whining that the left is trying to take their guns. We’re not. We’d like to control which crazies have access to guns but I haven’t heard any serious calls to repeal the Second Amendment.

Trump, rather infamously, insisted during his J6 ‘Wind-Em-Up Rally’ that the Secret Service should remove the weapons detectors at the gates. When told that there were many credible reports of armed people in the crowd, he (again, rather infamously) retorted that they weren’t there to hurt him. Trump felt safe around all those armed people because he felt like they were all on his side. But now, one of HIS people has taken a shot at him.

Even Trump might well figure out that his reasoning on J6 may have been less than perfect. Loyalty is an unpredictable thing in crazy people. You know who Donald J. Trump loves more than anything or anybody? Donald J. Trump! On July 13th, he received instant information that, despite his preference, people with guns could, very well, constitute a threat to his oh-so-beautiful self. How do YOU think a self loving, paranoid, megalomaniac authoritarian is going to react to the possibility that some gun nut might use one of those guns to try – again – to kill him?

So guess who I predict will be coming for people’s guns. Go ahead, take a guess. If you said Donald J. Trump, you win. (There is no prize so, nice job!) Only Nixon could go to China. Only Trump can take the guns. I suspect it won’t be too long after he’s installed that he feels the paranoid need to remove the threat – that is, the guns. Especially if there’s a second attempt.

Remember, it was a gun nut conservative who took the shot. Trump may well realize that ANY gun nut, left or right, could become a serious threat – to HIM – with little or no warning. After all, the guy who kills Trump gets to live in history forever the same way the guy who killed John Lennon did it to live in history forever. It turns out? There are twisted people out there…

My head will spin as I watch MAGA media denounce gun ownership and see the new laws banning guns imposed by MAGA from sea to shining sea – all to protect their dear leader. It’s going to be fascinating watching GRAs try to decide how to respond. Will they just turn their weapons in? Some will. Will they go all “from my cold dead hands?” Maybe. Will they withdraw support from Trump? (Too late, guys. Once he’s in, he’s in – and you will be, I predict, disarmed.)

I guess the Lord DOES work in mysterious ways. Sure, the entire world suffers and burns under another Trump maladministration – but at least we will have finally managed the gun problem in this once-great nation…

Terrible is Still Terrible…

by MyBaconPress

So, yesterday, I wrote about Trump getting winged. I speculated on possible reasons, since nobody knew anything substantial at the time I was writing. One of the possibilities I mentioned was that it was NOT a political hit. It was just another in a long line of MAGAGOP/NRA shootings in which crazy people compete with each other to try to get the most horrific mass shootings and stand atop the crazy shooter pile. It turns out, this was that.

MAGA thinks the Dems have to tone down the violent rhetoric, though. Yeah, cause Dems are the party of shooting beer to protest an ad they don’t like. Wait, is it the Dems who run political campaigns by shooting… anything they can think of that they relate to liberalism? No, that’s right. I mean, that’s THE right.

MAGA also thinks their god protected their guy. Apparently, their god didn’t give two figs about the others who got shot. Quick question, if god is out there protecting certain people from becoming victims, why does he allow innocent seven-year-olds to be cut to pieces but saves the life of the personification of the Seven Deadly Sins? I mean, which “god” are you people praying to? Because it seems to stink of Sulpher…

At least one guy suggested BIDEN should be arrested for attempting a political assassination. If he would tune in to reality for even a second, he would know that a) Biden had nothing to do with it and b) even if he had, Biden enjoys perfect immunity for official acts, thanks to the conservative Kangaroos on the way-high court.

All Biden would have to say is he was “testing the effectiveness of the Secret Service” as part of his official duties. You know, the same story Trump tells about his attempt to steal the election. Besides, if Biden was going to attempt an assassination, do you really think he’d send a poor shooting kid? Biden has access to the best snipers in the world, people who know how to account for windage. Why would he send that failed human being?

But, alas (because when does one get a chance to use ‘alas’) it was just a run-of-the-mill standard conservative nutball trying to make the record books…

So then the other question is, how is this going to affect the race? Did Trump just win? If anything, Trump won on debate night. I don’t think getting winged is going to offer him much, long-term. Sure, he’ll play it up as much as possible. (Be honest, Dems would, too.) MAGA will rend clothing and clutch pearls and swoon but now that we know the shooter was just a standard crazy doing MAGA-endorsed crazy stuff, we’re kind of back to normal.

I saw an article in the Guardian suggesting some of Biden’s talking points were now muted. I disagree. Trump is still an existential threat to democracy and to the health of America. Am I really not allowed to say so because of some conservative crazy? Are we on the left not allowed to mention the Trump inspired violence of J6 because of the MAGA enabled violence at ONE political rally?

Yeah, sure, MAGA is going to try to blame the left. MAGA always blames the left. MAGA has not proven itself a very well informed group. I can’t see standing down on facts because of one event. Especially when (with respect for those who were seriously hurt or killed) it’s a such a non-event for MAGA. The only one who counts for them is Trump – and he was only scraped.

Of course Trump will see a bump in his support. I hear shares of his struggling media venture have gone up in value. Polls might bump in his favor for a short time. But Trump is still who he is. He has still done what he has done. Having a bullet whiz past him isn’t going to change that and there’s still time to remind everyone of the threat.

As an example, on the same page where the Guardian is doing the inevitable post-shooting stuff, there’s an article from leading economists warning that Trump’s proposed economic plan is going to do FAR more harm to the US than not. One guy is even from the far-right conservative stink-tank American Enterprise Institute, so it’s not just lefties ripping on their opponent.

I have to confess, he DID get a pretty good photo out of it. He did. But he’ll plaster it on T-shirts and mugs and sell it for way too much money and the photo will become as hackneyed as his “never surrender” surrender photo. Yes, MAGA is going to get a little “chubby” every time they look at it but the rest of us?

Since, like everything, it was NOT what MAGA will say it was, to my mind, it’s already yesterday’s news. I don’t think people will jump aboard the crazy train because of a cool photograph and his policies still suck. Saying the shooting won Trump the election is like saying the shooting made women comfortable about losing bodily autonomy and that, maybe, rampant, outright racism isn’t so bad.

I’ll tell you this: Terrible is still terrible, cool photo or not…