MAGA MAKES ITS MARX
One thing you can say about the MAGA movement and Trump’s presidency stuffed with oligarchs who keep reassuring us we’re doing just fine, by which they mean they’re doing just fine:
They’re starting to make socialism look pretty reasonable.
QUORUM, SCHMORUM
Turning from New York to Texas, there’s nothing to see here except tumbleweeds and buttes.
And Blue states giving legislators from Red states sanctuary from arrest when they break quorum to keep the president from stealing the midterm elections.
I wrote my (Republican) state representatives and told him that the redistricting effort is not a good-faith bipartisan effort to comport with constitutionality but a naked power-grab by a president whose interest in constitutionality is casual at best.
In his form-letter reply he completely agreed with me that this is absolutely a good-faith effort to comport with constitutionality in accord with the heroic efforts of the president.
You really start to understand the French Revolution at moments like this.
Meanwhile, Democratic State Rep. Talarico gets it right. Video in the link.
AND SPEAKING OF TEXAS…
Seen at a bar:
Zing. ‘Nuff said.
OF LOVE AND BONDIAGE
Attorney General Pam Bondi last year: “If people in that [Epstein] report are still fighting to keep their names private, they have no legal basis to do so, unless they’re a child, a victim, or a cooperating defendant.”
Or, apparently, the President of the United States.
So, Bondi right now: Oh my fucking fictive deity.
You know, it’s nor really that I think that Trump is a pedophile, though there have been credible sworn statements that he is; that’s for evidential deep-dives and court-cases.
It’s that he is so transparently trying to control the truth-perceptions of an entire planet. Whether he did it or not, he’s clearly terrified of having Epstein’s crimes hung around his neck.
When I don’t know the truth, which is pretty much always the case, I look hard at who’s trying to deprive me of it. That’s usually a good thread to follow.
I’d have had more respect for him if he’d just said, “We were friends. Good friends, even. But I never supported his proclivities.” You won’t get that from Trump, because he knows there are videos out there showing him at least smiling at Epstein’s proclivities. There are credible reports out that he first enjoyed the First Lady of the United States in Epstein’s company on his plane, and it’s pure hearsay and also entirely likely.
Instead you get denial after denial of easily proven facts: he knew Epstein, they were friends, they partied together. There’s zero reason to believe a Trump denial at this point.
BALLS TO THE WALLS
The construction of a gilt ballroom at the White House where the rose garden used to be is…
Trashy as fuck.
POLITICS IS LOCAL
And speaking of the multi-million dollar ballroom, we have a new idiot of the week: Rep. Mike Flood of Lincoln, Nebraska joins the Ghoul Patroul.
Lots of undertaxed billionaires out there, Mike. Shake the tree.
If we can afford:
(1) A masked secret police force that’s better funded than the Marines;
(2) A gold-painted ballroom;
(3) A billion dollar refit on a flying Qatari bribe;
(4) A nuclear reactor on the moon for Christ only knows what purpose,
then yes, we can afford to feed kids that are forced to be in school all day staring at the Ten Commandments and look into the reasons they’re dying.
”THE FRENCH KNEW HOW TO LYNCH”
À propos of nothing at all, here’s T-Bone Burnett’s 1992 “I Can Explain Everything.” Pre-Internet, but the concept still holds up pretty well:
The genius of France can be seen at a glance, / and it’s not in their fabled fashion scene. / It’s not that they’re mean, or their wine or cuisine. / I refer of course to the guillotine. / The French knew how to lynch.