If you’re a subscriber, you’ve already seen some of this once. That’s because I screwed up and pressed the wrong button. So the first bit might seem…familiar. On the up side, you got a sneak peak at the writing before editing. (Oh, lucky you…)

Some of the trumpery we’re subjected to. He runs around telling his victims that the DOJ isn’t coming for him. They’re coming for them. These are not deep thinkers. I’m sure that line scares the crap out of them. It isn’t true, of course, but the MAGA cons are scared of all kinds of things that aren’t true. I’d like to try to help.

Dear MAGA cons, no, the DOJ is not coming after you (unless you’ve done something to warrant it yourself). They’re after Trump. Have you seen your name at the top of any of those indictments? No. You haven’t. Trump’s name is there. You didn’t have to appear in court Thursday. That was Trump. When the trial starts, nobody is going to say anything about you. Trump stands accused, not you. Should Jack Smith’s evidence prevail, it will be Trump found guilty, not you. Trump will get the sentence. Not you. Trump will serve the sentence. Not you. YOU only pay the fines. (I don’t know why you do that but you seem okay with it so…)

Like I say, it’s a great threat line, intended to scare you and it clearly works. But it’s just a line. The DOJ is coming after Trump, not you. They’re after him because of his crimes. If you didn’t participate in the crimes, you don’t have to participate in the punishment, see? That’s how it works. The DOJ is clearly after Trump and they should be. They’re not after you. It doesn’t matter how many times he says it. It remains a lie…

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My impression of 45 after Indictment #3? He stepped up to whine, of course, but he didn’t seem the same, to me. He still said all the crazy, accusatory things he likes to say. It’s just…his heart didn’t seem to be in it, you know? He looked kind of lacking in bravado. He also lacked an entourage. That’s very unusual for the guy. He almost always keeps a couple of sycophants around to keep his ego fluffed up, you know? Maybe they were in the car…

I suspect he might be very concerned about this latest judge. Her name is Tanya S. Chutkan. She’s been overseeing a LOT of these trials regarding January 6th rioters. She doesn’t like what they did and she’s been throwing the book at them. Apparently, she’s of the opinion that people associated with January 6th should go to prison, if only for a short time. It’s an opinion I share. But if she throws the book at the sheeple who answered Trump’s call, what is she going to do to Trump, himself, for putting out the call in the first place?

So far, 45 has done quite admirably when it comes to favorable circumstances in confronting the law. The cons love, love, love to point to how he “beat” the two impeachments. He didn’t. He didn’t get convicted in those cases because of jury nullification, where the jury (in those cases, Senate Republicans) doesn’t CARE if the defendant is guilty, they just acquit. Drawing Aileen “Loose” Cannon in Floriduh was quite a boon to him, too. No wonder the braggadocio kept flowing. She might as well wear her MAGA hat and ‘Trump 2024’ paraphernalia into her courtroom.

But Chutkan is different and I suspect 45 knows it. It appeared to me that he may be finally realizing that he might- literally for the very first time in his long, privileged life – have to take some responsibility for his actions…

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People keep hyping the idea that as Trump’s indictment numbers go up, so do his poll numbers. I’m skeptical. The key is the phrase “…among Republicans.” The Republican Party is a shell of it’s former self. The MAGA cons have pretty much run rational people out of the party. (No, they’re not Dems now, they’re independents, but they’re not getting the polling calls aimed at Republicans.) As the party gets smaller, the percentage of crazy gets larger…

“But I don’t WANT to write about him again! He’s already everywhere.”
“He does seem to suck the oxygen out of the room.”
“He keeps taking all the ink at every press. I write about him all the time.”
“Well, he DID try to overthrow our country. It’s kind of a big deal.”
“Yeah, I know. I don’t mean ignore it. I’m just saying, there are other things going on.”
“Okay, so, if you could, what would you write about?”
Well, I’d mention that asshole Republican governor in Texas, Greg Abbott. Do you know he agreed to eliminate water breaks for people who work outdoors? Apparently, employees stopping to get water interferes with profits. Republicans are now out, officially, as preferring profits to human life. It gets pretty hot in Texas. Right now, the state is in the grips of Republican-sponsored, corporate-induced climate change so it’s even worse than normal. Abbott and his ilk spend their days in air-conditioned offices. Of course it was easy for them to decide it ain’t that hot outside. (Dear Texas maintenance workers, Abbott might change his mind if his A/C mysteriously stopped working for awhile. Ahem…)

Here’s a fact Floriduh students will never be told. On the sugar plantations, slaves were brought in to work the fields. It was common practice to simply work a man to death and then? Simply replace him. It’s hard to get one’s arms around that. Work a man to death and then…buy another slave – and work him to death. When I hear about a plan like Abbotts, I’m certain there are STILL men on this planet who don’t see the problem with the “sugar plantation strategy” and would readily repeat it if they could…

Or maybe I could mention how the Republicans constant and ill-advised posturing and bloviating about the debt ceiling has now brought about a downgrade in the credit rating of the United States of America. They’ll say it’s because the debt is so high but that’s not what did it. EVERY time Republicans decide to hold the debt ceiling hostage to their ideology (that is, when Democrats are in charge but never Republicans) they’re threatening the entire world with simply not paying our bills. These are the SAME guys who insist that student loan debt must be repaid in full because the borrowers knew what they were doing when they took the loan. (That didn’t stop them from accepting forgiveness for the PPP loans they took for themselves, of course…)

How about this? I should really highlight how the Republicans have taken to trying to eliminate child labor laws. That’s not hyperbole. They’re working on it in red states across the land. Put the kids back to work. They’ve had it too easy for far too long, I guess. Oh, and in Wisconsin, there are Republicans there who want to allow children as young as 14 years old to be able to serve alcohol. These guys are TERRIFIED some guy in a dress is going to read to a 5 year old about a hungry caterpillar but they’re okay with 14 year olds serving in bars? Why, because that’s a much more pure environment?

But, okay, I get it. He is the news these days. Hell, he tried to destroy the nation. That IS a big deal. We should have known, the moment – the very instant – cons started screaming about Dems stealing the election, Republicans were out to steal the election. Every accusation is a confession. It was mind boggling when it started. I had gotten quite comfortable with the peaceful transition of power. Then? One big, fat man-baby decided to throw a tantrum. “Mine! Mine! Mine! I can’t lose! I never lose! Even when I lose, I win. That’s the rule! They cheated! They rigged it. Waaaah! It wasn’t FAIR! Oh, poor, persecuted, picked-on me!”

People fought. People died. People went to jail and they’re still going. Our Constitutional Republic lies in the balance but the only thing important to him is him. How could anyone get away with that? Turns out? They can’t. It just takes awhile for the wheels of justice to roll around. I guess it even makes sense that it took so long considering he was once the President of the United States (sic). One had BETTER have one’s ducks lined up neatly if they’re going to charge an ex-President with conspiracy to defraud the United States. Fortunately, Jack Smith is an excellent duck-herd and his line is perfect.

Currently the greatest national embarrassment in the history of our once-great nation is facing, all in, something like 74 different charges – in 3 indictments, Floriduh, New York state, and Washington DC. Georgia has yet to drop but I think that’s coming this week.

It’s like watching a really good, engaging television show. You just want to binge watch straight through but we’ve got to wait for the next episode. I hope George R.R. Martin didn’t write it, or the target of the indictments will suddenly, magically become king. Short of that, though, I think his only hope is a pardon. Jack Smith has built a masterful case and it seems Fani Willis is doing the same.

Always-wrong cons are still in tantrum mode, of course. I get it. From everything I’ve seen and heard, they don’t seem to know what evidence is or how it works. (It’s much easier to get the answer one prefers if one simply makes up the process as they go along.) But he’s in trouble. He knows it. That’s why he has taken to issuing threats about all the violence and damage that he’ll call out if he’s brought to justice. (“If I can’t have it, nobody can!”) Sounds like a ‘Law and Order President’ to me.

I find myself wondering how many of his acolytes will actually fall out for violence for him after everything that has come before. It’s one thing to admit publicly, that maybe one put their faith into a false idol, it’s another to come out fighting because the idol has been shown to be false. Most of the worst of the crazies are still sitting in jail from January 6th so we don’t have to worry too much about them, but what about the rest? Truth be told, I’ve had trouble gauging the depth of stupidity that can be displayed so I can’t really say how bad it might get. I don’t care, though. We can’t apply laws according to who might throw how much of a tantrum.

I’ll tell you this: I’ll pay a slight increase in my taxes to help pay for a new prison to house them all if that’s where they want to take this but I hope they don’t. We KNOW that nearly everyone in trump’s world is going to jail and he’s happy to let them. I think the MAGA cons should repay the consideration and just…let him to go jail, too.

At least he’d be with them…

‘Deeper and Deeper’ sounds like the latest law firm he’s hired. So far, his legal Offenses suck and his legal Defenses are worse. That’s a bad combination. Oh, sorry, 45, I mean. He sued CNN because they called his Big Lie a Big Lie. He thought speaking truthfully about a thing likely constitutes defamation. He just learned, very recently, that defamation can have a big pay-out and I suspect he was looking for a new infusion of cash.

Turns out, according to trump-appointed judge Raag Singhal, telling the truth isn’t “defamation.” He threw the suit out. 45 had also accused CNN of comparing him to Hitler. The judge said “bad rhetoric is not defamation when it does not include false statements of fact.” In leading up to his comment he said, “Like Trump and CNN personalities…the court finds Nazi references in the political discourse (by whichever ‘side’) to be odious and repugnant.”

45 lost his case but his team had their spin: “We agree with the highly respected judge’s findings that CNN’s statements about President Trump are repugnant.” I guess, Singhal didn’t NOT say that so…kind of true?

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Meanwhile, on the other end of his legal woes, those that ARE sticking, Jack Smith just filed an update charging that Trump, himself, ordered the destruction of surveillance video that likely showed his flunkies moving the boxes of stolen files he was trying to keep. He ordered it, but they didn’t DO it. Apparently, the security expert didn’t know how…

So much for any attempt at “It was all my minions and I knew nothing of any of it.” (I mean, he’ll SAY it, sure, but evidence indicates he’ll be lying.) He’s not going to be able to distance himself from the crimes if evidence can show him giving the orders…

I’m struck by the reported quote (according to the indictment) in which 45 says, “I don’t want anybody looking through my boxes. I really don’t. I don’t want you looking through my boxes…” Funny, that. If you killed someone and hid the body in the trunk of your car, you probably wouldn’t want anybody looking through your trunk. If you were cooking meth in your basement, you probably wouldn’t want anybody looking through your basement. So, naturally, trump didn’t want anybody looking through “his” boxes. They were full of classified (but lots of unclassified through mental magic but not ALL declassified, mental magic or not) documents that implicated him in a crime.

Wait. Was he trying to mentally-magically RE classify them? TEO (Trump’s Eyes Only)? Okay, more likely, TPEO (Trump/Putin’s Eyes Only…) Actually, based on the evidence, it sounds like his new “classification” was TAWHSTTEO (Trump And Whomever He Shows Them To Eyes Only). Absolutely secret – except when they’re not, so have a look at this document which you should never be allowed to see…

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Meanwhile, Fani Willis is about to bring charges in Georgia. Barricades have been set up around the Atlanta courthouse. Nearly a month ago, she gave the court a heads up that they will likely need to reduce or suspend activity there for a week or two due to the high-profile nature of an impending indictment. (No, she didn’t say whom…)

I hear Georgia is going to be a RICO charge. Racketeering. As I understand it, 45’s threatening phone call to Brad Raffensperger telling him to “find” 11,780 votes was one crime, but there was another crime being committed in the furtherance of trump’s traitorous behavior. Cult 45 loyalists elsewhere in Georgia were copying and distributing information from voting machines in the hopes of “proving” how the whole voting machine “scam” went down. That, of course, didn’t prove anything but it DID provide a second crime associated with trump’s larger crime and, in Georgia, that makes it Racketeering.

At some point, I began to wonder if the dumbass knew exactly how many laws he was breaking when he was arranging this whole thing. It’s quite possible he didn’t. His elite, privileged life has protected him from consequences since day one. It probably never crossed his teeny, tiny mind that he even could get in any trouble from any of his criminal behavior. That would certainly explain the deer-in-the-headlights look he’s been sporting between rants recently…

I’ll tell you this: It’s a sorry commentary on this once-great nation that there is STILL a question as to whether or not this national, very high-profile, traitorous criminal will ever see the inside of a jail cell, first hand, for the epic-level crimes he’s accused of committing…

You know what MAGA cons hate? They hate it when some rich person tries to hide or eliminate data that might be used in a court of law from electronic devices. I know this to be true because of how upset they were when Hillary stood accused of deleting emails. They spent a LOT of time chanting, “Lock her up!” It must have been great fun for them. NOW they get another chance to revive their preferred chant, with only a slight variation.

Another rich person tried to hide data that might be used in a court of law from electronic devices . In THIS case, it’s the guy who initiated the chant in the first place, Donald Trump. This will be easy, even for a MAGA. All they have to do is change “her” to “him” and they’ve got their favorite chant back – AND for their favorite reason! “Lock him up!”

I wonder when we’ll start to hear it at the rallies…

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I heard 45 say he’s not going to let his indictments or trials or even possibly convictions turn him from his goal of becoming president again. He said there’s nothing in the Constitution that prevents it. He’s right, too. (One doesn’t get to say that very often.) There was even a guy, Eugene Debs, who ran for the office of President from a cell. (He lost…)

Well, there IS the 14th amendment. If he gets convicted of the January 6th insurrection he planned, organized, called out, and instigated, he could be barred from ever holding public office again. It prevents him from ever holding any military position, too, but we all know there has NEVER been any danger a trump might get anywhere near the military – except for the photo op.

Just as a reminder, Section 3 of the 14th Amendment says, “No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”

And so the race begins. Can the United States protect itself from a would-be, wanna-be dictator by prosecuting the offender before he gets sworn in? Or does a once-great nation suffer yet another insult from a criminal defendant who becomes President and throws the country into yet another Constitutional crisis by issuing a pardon for himself?

It’s pretty exciting, isn’t it? What’s it gonna be, a Constitutional Republic or an authoritarian dictatorship? I’ll tell you this: I’m actually quite surprised at the still-formidable number of once-loyal Americans now pushing for “authoritarian dictatorship…”

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Speaking of dumb people breaking things: X. Elon Musk’s destruction of Twitter seems nearly complete, now. Dumping the name everyone knew? Why, that’s a master stroke – if your goal is alienating yet more of the remaining users and advertisers. Replacing it with a letter? Awesome. Do you think he’ll be able to trademark the letter X? I don’t. Maybe he’ll spell it differently? No, he’s already gone for the single character. He’s even in trouble with the city of San Francisco for changing the signs without the proper permits.

I heard that his seemingly impulsive decision to just…change the name (BAM!), immediately cost the company billions (with a B) in name recognition and value. At $44 billion dollars, most people think he overpaid for Twitter as it is, but then to take every step you can think of to destroy the value that DID exist? I’m just going to say he’s not looking, to me, like the “genius” he purports himself to be. And his investors must be thrilled…

The truth is, I was never a twit and I won’t miss it. But I AM having fun watching this guy who believes a) he has the “Midas touch” and b) that’s a GOOD thing (read the actual story) turn a once-shiny platform into a wasteland of lost riches. Bye-bye, birdie…

Looks like it’s the Republicans turn to have a member openly suffering the slings and arrows of age or, perhaps, some other damage. Have you seen the video of Mitch McConnell just…stopping? He was in the middle of a sentence. He got to an “uh…” and then just…blanked out. He stops talking, stares off into the distance, and doesn’t move. Finally he’s ushered off by his colleagues. (He came back a bit later and declared himself “fine” with no further details…)

This is one of the problems with our rigged system. These guys just stay…and stay…and stay. The rest of the members cover for one of their own so they get to KEEP staying, too. Strom Thurmond was something like 100 years old before he decided to step aside. Diane Feinstein doesn’t even seem to know which state (or district) she’s in from time to time but she still gets to decide on matters of national importance and only she can decide on when she’s too far gone to trust her own judgement? But what if she’s SO far gone she shouldn’t trust her own judgement? Now Mitch the Bitch is just…blanking out. But he’ll get to decide how long is too long as well. Even if he can’t remember what he was…uh…

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Floriduh, of course. This has GOT to be intentional, doesn’t it? These guys MUST be sitting in a small, dark, smokey room somewhere working to come up with the most stupid possible position on just about every subject. The latest I’ve heard (so far) is their recent adoption of a curriculum item that teaches children in Floriduh that slaves gained “personal benefits” from their condition of servitude. You see, as slaves, they “developed skills” they could use for their own “personal benefit.”

This is one of those cover stories racists like to float from time to time. It’s a classic case of trying to put lipstick on a pig. I’ve also heard that those “lucky” slaves got “free clothes” and “free housing.” I’d bet at any time any enslaved person would have traded their “free clothes” and “free housing” for some real freedom, given a choice, which, of course, they weren’t.

I don’t really understand the end game to the stories. Certainly, they’re not going to bring back slavery no matter how much they want to. (And they DO still want to, make no mistake.) Are they just trying to assuage their guilt for having participated in the first place? That can’t be right. They’d have to feel guilty in the first place. Ah, reputation repair, America’s national pastime. “Yeah, we did it. We’d do it again, too. We just don’t want to be judged for it.”
“Well, why not just acknowledge it, maybe apologize, and learn from it?”
“What do WE have to apologize for? Slaves had it great. *I* should be so lucky. THEY should apologize to US for rejecting our generosity.”
“But you don’t want to be judged for it…”
“Well, not unfairly!”
“Fear not. The vast majority of us, I think, judge bigots QUITE fairly…”

So now Floriduh’s children will be taught that slavery – if indeed it actually happened at all – was a lovely and benign institution that served both master and slave well and benefited the slaves in ways most people don’t even know about. Yet another conservative GIANT step backwards.

From a reputational point of view, Floriduh really can’t afford this. Based on news stories that come out of Floriduh on a regular, kind of startling, basis, the state seems to be struggling – a lot – with, you know, mental competence. How the hell is teaching children wrong information in school supposed to combat THAT problem?

Here’s a key to understanding how YOU can know when the bigots are lying: I’ve never heard ONE of these guys seeking to become a slave because of how awesome the “institution” was and I’m sure I never will…

Many, many moons ago (2002, to be exact), I read a book by a guy named David Brock called ‘Blinded By the Right.’ Brock made his career as a right-wing “investigative reporter.” (That means he wrote unprovable hit pieces for the right, smearing the left.) He also happens to be gay. According to him, many people used to ask him about working for the far right in view of their attitudes about gay men. Brock said he’d never had a problem. That makes sense to me.

For one thing, lots of these “conservative” guys are closeted gay men, or at least bi-sexual. Brock wrote about going to gay bars with prominent cons. It’s just a personal opinion, but I usually suspect that the outsized, over-the-top reactions of many prominent conservatives to homosexuality is to make the gay sex they, themselves, are having hotter. Forbidden sex is hotter sex. For another, the cons don’t care about anything other than trashing their opponent. If you write vicious articles that harm a lefty, you’re good. They can just…overlook everything else.

At one point, Brock was assigned to write a hit piece on Hillary. (The right launched a sustained attack against her the minute they realized she had a real chance of, and an interest in, being president one day.) For some reason, he wrote a balanced, fair piece. That was more than they could stand and he was out…and suddenly, the gay thing mattered. Go figure.

So, Brock went on a reputation clean-up campaign. He wrote his book, a kind of mea culpa and founded a media watchdog group called ‘Media Matters for America.’ Suddenly, he was embraced by the left. As long as he attacked right wingers, everything he had done TO the left would be overlooked. For some reason (no one knows) he left Media Matters rather abruptly in November of 2022.

For my part, I never really trusted the guy. He would have stayed on the right as long as the right would have him, given the chance. He only switched teams when he didn’t have any other choice. The right wasn’t hiring him, being a risk he might write something fair, so the left was his only option. That’s not seeing the light. It’s seeking a paycheck. It’s desperation, not “reform.”

Now we’re getting the same thing again with the ever loud-mouthed Michael Cohen. Cohen was Trump’s “fixer” and he seemed to enjoy the job – and the paycheck – very much. He worked for 45 for years, doing dirty deeds for the dumbass don. Then he got busted for tax evasion and campaign finance violations.

As he does with virtually everybody around him, Trump gave Cohen a kind of ‘ho hum’ attitude and let him dangle. THAT irritated Cohen who started singing like Lucille Bogan. (Literally.) Trump abandoned Cohen, who understood he was on his own and so sought to protect himself. Enter the reputation clean-up campaign, the mea culpa, and the turn-around attacks on the person HE used to do the attacking for – and still would be to this day had he not gotten caught.

But, there he is, on lefty shows saying nasty things about Trump. It’s been awhile since he brought any new information to the table. Prosecutors now know pretty much everything Cohen knows and it’s all coming out in a drip so all Cohen has left is to go on camera and call Trump names. (Yes, I’m aware I have, sometimes, called the Orange Moron, CheetoJesus, Donnie the Dumbass names, too. But nobody’s paying me to do it. It’s just my honest assessment of 45 based on the way he is and the things he does.)

I’ll tell you this: Cohen isn’t “reformed.” He’s an opportunist and I wish the left would just let him fade quietly (please…stfu!) into the background…

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OMG, have you heard? It’s outrageous. It’s outlandish. It’s unbelievable. It’s probably racist. A MAGA con country singer sang a…a…oh, I can barely say it…a SONG! The left is very unhappy about it but I imagine the left hasn’t taken the time to listen to the song – so I did it for you. (You’re welcome.)

It’s not a great song but it doesn’t suck. It takes up a couple of MAGA talking points and talks tough. You know, country music stuff. It would have come and gone without much notice had the left just let it go. But no. If it’s entertainment related, people are talking about the song. Apparently, they even argued about it on ‘The View.’

Look, Jason Aldean’s ‘Try That In A Small Town’ (Aldean didn’t write it) is a fictional vision of small town life. The right LOVES to paint the left as out-of-control lunatics hell-bent on civil disruption and then pretend that they (the right) are the arbiters and saviors of all things good. None of it is true, of course. That’s a picture right-wing media paints for the rank and file to make them feel good about all the harmful things they’re supporting. (It’s right up there with the ever-popular, “Secretly, you’re the smart ones” fluff…)

The left says it glorifies guns. His grand-daddy gave him a gun he hears you’re gonna try and take. ‘From my cold dead hands’ is his message (but not the actual words). Nothing new there. He also says much of the crime found in big cities isn’t found in small towns. Um…yeah, okay. Not really Earth-shattering. Aldean insists that people in small towns take care of each other but even THAT is a prettied-up view of small town life. Try living in a small town as a person the right vilifies. See how well they take care of you…

Okay, so if the song is just a re-hash of MAGA talking points, what’s the problem? Oh, the video was shot at a place where a lynching took place and it uses stock video shots of social unrest to try to prove it’s point. There IS social unrest in cities. That’s just low-hanging fruit. As to the lynching, it’s the south. If you can’t take photos of a place a lynching might have happened (or definitely did happen) in the south, you can’t take photos of the south.

Me: “I’ll tell you this: MOSTLY, I just wish people who don’t like the song would just do what they do with every OTHER song they don’t like: ignore it and wait until it goes away.”
You: “Um…didn’t YOU just write, like, five paragraphs about it?”
Me: “Damn, it!”

The always wrong MAGA cons get very close to accidentally being correct about a thing when they whine that prosecuting their criminal idol is just a meanie-pants thing to do that has never happened in the history of this once-great nation. They have a point. This has never happened before. But, they’re right for the wrong reason.

They fervently pretend, like a wildebeest being eaten by a lion, that this ain’t happening. It isn’t real. Trump never stole documents, sexually assaulted women, orchestrated a coup, stole from a kids-with-cancer charity, manipulated his business books, threatened government officials if they couldn’t “find” 11,780 non-existent votes, nor fleeced his true believing followers out of millions of dollars. Hundreds (thousands?) of people are just lying for…reasons and the accused, their poor (rich), little (very much NOT little), victim (perpetrator), boy (grown man) – the ONLY benefactor of the deception – is the ONLY one telling the truth. I mean…obvs… What criminal would ever claim innocence? (Um…all of ’em?)

I agree, this has never happened before. We’ve NEVER had a criminal president (and possible Russian asset) on the scale of 45 in the Oval Office. As a result, we’ve never needed even one post-presidential criminal prosecution, let alone prosecutions for a national crime spree that stretches up and down the eastern seaboard and across the nation.

I’ll tell you this: The idea that we EVER had such a low person in such a high place is simply mind-boggling. But not nearly as mind boggling as the reality that he might actually make it back there…

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45’s team of “lawyers” went to “judge” Aileen “loose” Cannon and said the date suggested by the prosecution for the trial of the guy accused of stealing all those classified government documents MAGA cons are always pretending were just paper airplanes – December 11 – was just too quick. Apparently, reading is hard. So they suggested their own date: never.

Yeah, it’s stupid but it’s stupid/clever, you know? Her predisposition to accommodate the desires of her idol has already been established. Why NOT ask her to just never schedule the trial? Maybe she’ll bite. She didn’t. She seems to know reading is hard, too, so she set the date for May 20 in Ft. Pierce, Fl, a quick 20+ minute drive from her home. They get nearly a year to shine up their “but my client doesn’t want to go to jail” defense. It makes one wonder why other accused criminals have never tried that oh-so-clever response to charges.

That’s going to plop the trial right in the middle of what this country euphemistically calls the “campaign season.” (I call it a euphemism because – really – when aren’t American politicians “campaigning” and taking bribes…er…raising funds “for their next campaign?”) 45’s team said it just wouldn’t be fair for the accused criminal and known sexual predator to have to defend himself in court AND run for president – so they should just let the whole “court” thing go. They seem never to have even considered letting the whole “run for president” thing go, but they could do THAT, too.

By the time they get to that trial date, trump could already be sporting an orange jumpsuit for his myriad other crimes. If he wins the “election” – and never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups – do they perform the oath of office by having him stick his hand out between the bars to put it on the Bible? (I suspect he uses a ‘Bibel.’ I suspect that if he ever touched an actual Bible, he’d burst into flames…)
“Repeat after me: ‘I, inmate number 6732185, do hereby solemnly swear or affirm…'”

I’ll tell you this: I’ve never been more proud to be an American… (cough!, cough!)

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You could receive these lovely little thought pieces directly to your email inbox! All you have to do is go to ‘MyBaconPress.com‘ and click the button at the bottom that reads: “Follow.” A little pop-up appears asking for your email address but you aren’t joining anything and, as far as I know, you don’t get a bunch of spam if you do follow. It’s just the only way to deliver the thing to your email inbox. That way, you’d never miss an issue again. Wouldn’t that be great?

I woke up yesterday morning, started reading the news, and realized: Jack Smith is smarter than me. See, I’ve been very concerned about Aileen “loose” Cannon overseeing the classified documents theft case, since she so clearly holds trump as dearly beloved. I kept wondering why Smith didn’t object. I know now. She’s going to do whatever she can to help her idol. That’s a given. But if she goes too far, Smith can object to her failure to recuse in view of her obvious bias or use her terrible rulings as a basis for an appeal. Moreover, I think she’s a bit restrained by other events so she can’t go TOO far off the rails – at least, she can’t go too far off the rails without absolutely devastating her reputation as a judge.

Truth be told, I wasn’t sure we, the people would EVER see any actual indictments for our very criminal ex-president, the sexual predator Donald J. Trump. Now? Now they’re coming so fast and furious I’m having trouble keeping up! We’ve already got Florida. We may get Washington DC next and we’re all expecting Georgia to drop in August. There’s still New York state. (No, not that case, the other one.) Peripherally, the slates of fake electors are starting to reap the rewards of their malfeasance, too. Michigan just dropped indictments on the people who insisted that THEY, and not the actual electors, were the real electors, and there are several other states waiting in the wings. Hundreds of people have already been convicted of answering trumps call on January 6th.

None of this even counts the civil defamation suit he’s already lost – twice – and the next one he brought upon himself by doubling down after losing the first one. (Trump’s psychopathy isn’t helping him one little bit…)

Did you hear about the time(s) Donald Trump, when he was infesting the Oval Office, initiated IRS investigations on people who gave him answers he didn’t like, actually weaponizing the government? And that’s just 45. His deluded sycophants are lining up to defend him by trashing everything and everyone connected with the investigations. That’s a lot of people and organizations since there are so many investigations over so much criminal activity. Cons just don’t seem to grasp that a government THEY twist for their own purposes might well, once twisted, be used against them just as easily – so they dismiss all accusations against 45 as conspiracies. Sure, thousands of people are “in on it” and the ONLY honest one is the target of all of these investigations. Of course! If you think about it, it makes perfect sense. But it makes MORE sense if you don’t think about it…

MAGA cons in the House are “investigating” Hunter Biden and using their above-the-law rules to protect themselves from things that are crimes for anybody else to do. MTG just showed large photos of Hunter, nude and in compromising sexual positions, to the House. (Your tax dollars at work!) Outside of Congress, that’s called “revenge porn.” Please bear in mind, being nude and/or having sex? Not a crime. But if someone posted nude photos of MTG having sex with Kevin McCarthy without their consent? THAT would be a crime. MTG gets away with it – on the floor of Congress, no less – because it’s a “vital” part of some House “investigation” of some kind. Really, it was just an opportunity to try to embarrass the White House.

So, just to be clear…
– Which party worked very hard to present fake votes and fake electors? Republicans.
– Which party lied to courts in an attempt to disqualify actual, honest votes? Republicans.
– Which party tried, and is STILL trying, to steal an election? Republicans.
– Which party has “weaponized” the government? Republicans.
– Which party actually, physically attacked the Capitol in an attempt to interfere with an election? Republicans.
(I’m sensing a pattern, here…)
– Which party is conducting fake, unnecessary, wasteful-spending “investigations?” Republicans.
– Which party is aggressively defending a multi-indicted, sexual predator? Republicans.
– Which party keeps screaming about defending “freedumb” all the while stripping freedoms from every vulnerable group they can figure out a way to attack? Republicans.
– Which party denies climate change, even as the world burns and/or drowns? Republicans.
– Which party insists that, because oil was once the best answer for energy, it must ALWAYS remain the only answer – even long after it isn’t the best? Republicans.
– Which party hates journalism and embraces the conspiracy theories and conjecture of Bullshit Mountain? Republicans.
– Which party pretends a fetus must be brought to term (because they’re “innocent”), but a six year old who gets shredded by bullets is an acceptable loss? (Because, what? Not “innocent”? At six?) Uh-huh. Republicans.
– Which party corrupted the Supreme Court by diabolically manipulating the advice and consent process? Republicans.
– Which party wants perfect freedom for themselves but also wants to control who you love, how you love, what you read, what you think, what you wear, how you look, where you go, what you do with your body, what you learn, how you earn, what gets banned, and what gets burned? Republicans.

Those are just off the top of my head. I’d bet that if I gave it a little thought, I could come up with more. But I’ll tell you this: Republicans these days are bad for America, bad for Americans, bad for the world, and bad for humanity. Those seem like real vote-getting traits. It’s no wonder they have to cheat…

George Santos (R-NY), if, indeed that is his name, originally got elected to the House of Representatives through lies. He “inflated” his resume beyond the breaking point. He has become the punchline of jokes. Since he has claimed so many outrageous accomplishments, people took to assigning him new accomplishments. His “legend” grows, just not in the way, maybe, he had hoped. People were SO impressed with this amazing and accomplished young man they sent him to Congress. Then people found out he lied about, well, everything, really. (There really IS the possibility George Santos is not even his real name.)

Now the good people of New York are interested in sending him to jail. He could have avoided it, possibly, by just stepping down. He refused. Criminal charges were preferred. (Basically, he collected lots of money under false pretenses. Classic con job from an unusual con…) But George doesn’t know when to quit any more than the Dumbass and, instead, he’s running for his seat again! (Just like the Dumbass.)

I guess I’m not surprised. With access to lying conservative media, lying is part of the game and why wouldn’t he (and trump) guess that he’ll get away with it? The part that surprises me? In this campaign season, Santos has raised what AP referred to as a “paltry” $138,000, most of which he used to repay himself for personal money he contributed for his first campaign. Paltry? He’s the most outrageous, egregious liar since Donald Trump (though not as good at it, I submit) and he STILL raised $138,000?

Knowing what we know now, who would give this guy bus fare, let alone a campaign contribution? It’s one of those situations where I find myself wondering what the hell is wrong with people? If that “paltry” money isn’t from his family, it likely came from people contributing to the “R,” no matter whom that may be. People do it for the “D,” too, but the “D” doesn’t have anything like George Santos or Donald Trump. Those guys seem detached from reality, at the very least, and the Dems would have booted them, had they gotten that far in the first place…

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Have you heard this? The temperature of the water off the coast of Floriduh was measured at 97 degrees Fahrenheit! For comparison, hot tubs tend to run around 103 – 104 degrees. After years – no, decades – of “debate” about the existence of Climate Change, we’re ALL going to get what the deniers deserve. Thanks, cons. Your corporate loyalty was…killer…

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We might have seen this coming. As part of their campaign to “own libs” the always-wrong cons decided expertise was for idiots. If you listen to your buddy rather than your doctor, you might well shorten your life. If you let some talking head re-roof your house, you’ll likely spend the next rain storms running around with pots, trying to catch the drips. Ask a toddler to fix your car. See how long it takes… Hey, at least they’re not experts, right?

The Republican Party of at least two states, Michigan and Arizona, looks like they eschewed the services of expert accountants and financial managers. Now they’re broke, or nearly so. At $98,000, the Michigan GOP has almost as much money as George Santos raised. Suddenly, party members want to know where their money went. The party is breaking into factions and in Michigan, a violent brawl broke out. Cops were called. Looking good, GOP…

Despite appearances, there are STILL some smart Republicans out there. One guy in Michigan donated over $4 million dollars but won’t anymore because he questions “whether the state party has the necessary expertise to spend the money wisely.” (Spoiler alert: they don’t. Why would they trust experts?)

Apparently, the two states backed trump’s play to overturn a legal and proper election (aka, traitorous coup). They’ve also supported trump-lite candidates who do not appeal to the general population so much as the radical right and, therefore, have decreasingly slim chances of success as the nation finally catches on to the national GOP campaign of bunk and braggadocio. Curiously, seemingly inexplicably (if you’re a MAGA con), the red states that did NOT support the ridiculous, moronic claims of the traitorous, sexual predator Donald Trump are not suffering the same fate. It’s a mystery – to MAGA cons…

There’s an old adage: a fool and his money are soon parted. MAGA GOP decided to put the concept to the test. Bad idea. (Just another in a long line…) The smart money dried up and the foolish money is running out.

I’ll tell you this: I expect the GOP will figure it out. In our vicious Capitalist society, the money has spoken so I expect the parties to start moving left again as they seek more mainstream appeal. MAGA doesn’t sell anymore. Expect the “movement” to go the way of the pet rock…or at least the way of the Libertarians…

I think it’s common knowledge that insurers don’t make money paying claims. They’re very careful to pick and choose coverage they offer from place to place. The more likely you are to need coverage for something, the less likely the coverage will be available (or affordable). Now insurance companies have taken that standard strategy one step further: they’re simply not selling insurance in some places. Clearly the idea of some “visionary” CEO somewhere…

Several companies have abandoned California due to fires and earthquakes and sinkholes and crop loss due to drought and, well, the odds an insurer might have to actually pay out are just too high. Then I learn that they’re starting to do the same thing in Florida. That seems an odd strategy. “Hey, let’s just not sell any more policies. That should strengthen our business!” Will it, though?

It’s a tough spot for insurers. If they sell a policy, they may have to pay out and that’s bad for business. If they DON’T sell policies, they certainly won’t have to pay out but there will be no revenues and that’s bad for business, too. It seems climate change has been – and will increasingly be – hard on the insurance companies.

I’ll tell yo this: If they hadn’t been such manipulative, corporate jerks through the years, I might be able to muster some sympathy for them…

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There’s an old joke: if “pro” is the opposite of “con,” then the opposite of “progress” is “congress.” It turns out, though, it’s not much of a joke. Our Congress Critters have LOTS of ways to NOT do their jobs – all “procedural.” One such is the ‘hold.’ A hold isn’t a formal procedure. It’s something the Critters started doing as a courtesy to some member who couldn’t make a scheduled debate date but wanted to participate. It pretty quickly became a weapon to stop things from happening. A hold isn’t exactly a filibuster but can be used the same way in some cases.

Senator Tommy Tuberville, the bigot-supporting Republican (of course) from Alabama has a hold on military promotions and nominations. See, he has realized that women in the military STILL have control over their own reproduction and he effing HATES that. So? No more military promotions or nominations until Tommy says. The result? The Marine Corps doesn’t have a permanent leader for the first time in 100 years and the Army, Navy, and Joint Chiefs are all looking at the same fate in the next few weeks if he doesn’t stand down. Currently, he’s blocking more than 270 positions from being filled. So much for supporting the military…

It’s not ALL Republicans, though. My boy Bernie Sanders (D, Vt) has a hold on Biden’s nomination to lead the National Institute of Health along with other nominees to the health department until the administrations sends over it’s comprehensive plan to lower drug prices. (Biden should write Sanders a note: “My plan is to get Congress to do it’s effing job…”)

I don’t like either one of the holds, but at least Sanders’ goal is help people by lowering drug prices for ALL Americans – or at least highlight the problem. Tuberville wants, maybe needs, someone to suffer. It’s STILL the Republican way, these days.

Last month, Senator J.D. Vance (R-Oh), placed a hold on all Biden nominations to the Justice Department in “protest” of the indictment against Donald Trump, proving, once again, cons are caught up in a delusional fever-dream that pretends crime is okay if committed by someone on their team. Cons are always on about “slippery slopes” but never seem to realize when they’re actually on one…

Last year, Senator Rand Paul (R, Ky) put a hold on additional approval for $40 million in aid to Ukraine until the bill included language for an Inspector General to scrutinize the spending, which is laughable in view of the fact that military spending is sacrosanct to both parties and the Pentagon – by FAR the worst offender of “fraud, waste, and abuse” – has never once passed an audit.

I’ll tell you this: these guys – all of them – should just do their jobs. I DO NOT LIKE that one person can hold up ALL business of Congress on a given subject just by saying “Hold.”

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Every Republican accusation is a confession. The cons are out, in force, claiming the Biden Administration is “weaponizing” the government by allowing the Department of Justice to investigate the many, many, MANY crimes of the trumpster. Turns out – and you may want to sit down for this – it was the TRUMP administration that weaponized the government. When people gave trump an answer he didn’t like, he had the IRS open “investigations” into them. These were simply harassment cases, the very definition of weaponizing government.

I’ll tell you this: Of COURSE cons are screaming. They would HATE it if someone did to them what they do to people on a daily basis…