I love the end of the year. It's a time when we can't help but collectively start wrapping up the events of the previous twelve months in neat little boxes: Best, Worst, Top, Bottom, longest pandemic hair, The Meaning of it All, and yadda yadda. Personally, I'm a fan of quotes, and I’m happy to say—and you can quote me on this—that Yale associate librarian Fred Shapiro’s 15th annual Top 10 list doesn’t disappoint. Here are some of his picks, which “are famous or revealing of the spirit of the times—not necessarily eloquent or admirable.” His #1 quote of 2020 might as well be our new national motto...
“Wear a mask.”
—Dr. Anthony Fauci, May 21
Continued…
Others on his list:
“I can’t breathe.”
—George Floyd’s plea to the cop who killed him on May 25
“One day—it’s like a miracle—it will disappear.”
—President Trump, referring to the coronavirus, onFebruary 27
“Mr. Vice President, I’m speaking.”
—My favorite quote from the Harris-Pence debate should’ve made Mr. Shapiro’s list.
“I see the disinfectant that knocks it out in a minute, one minute. And is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or almost a cleaning?”
—Trump, at a White House Coronavirus Task Force briefing on April 23
“The science should not stand in the way of this.”
—White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany, referring to school reopenings, on July 16
“You’re a lying dog-faced pony soldier.”
—Joe Biden at a campaign event in New Hampshire on Feb. 9
I don’t know exactly what 2021 will bring, but I'll take a wild guess and say it'll be loud and obnoxious. This is, after all, America. Our colors may not run, but our mouths sure do.
And now, our feature presentation…
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Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, December 9, 202
Note: Due to the ramp-up of C&J's new eggnog fracking operation, you may experience mild earthquakes through December 25th. Plus eggnog will likely start oozing from your taps like lava down a Hawaiian hillside. We assure you it's all perfectly safe to drink until you hear otherwise from an authorized emergency room stomach-pumping attendant in the process of reviving you. Thank you. —Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
Hang in there. Just six more weeks.
Weeks 'til inauguration day: 6
Number of black women who will have run a major cable news network after Rashida Jones takes the reins from MSNBC’s Phil Griffin next month: 1
Minimum number of people in Trump's immediate orbit who have tested positive for the coronavirus, including anti-masker lawyers Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis: 54
Minimum number of songs in Bob Dylan's catalog that he just sold to Universal Music, at an estimated worth of $300 million: 600
The last time a defeated president refused to attend his successor's inauguration: 1869
Number of presidents who never ran for president: 4 (Tyler, Fillmore, A. Johnson, Arthur)
Percent chance, according to his wife, that former Alabama state Senator Larry Dixon's last words before dying of complications from the coronavirus were, “We messed up, we let our guard down. Please tell everybody to be careful. This is real, and if you get diagnosed, get help immediately": 100%
CHEERS to the beginning of the end. At long last, after months of (clinical) trial and error, the first Covid-19 vaccine dose was injected into the arm of Patient #1 yesterday. And the name that will live in whatever the opposite of infamy is, is…
…Margaret Keenan, 90.
The new Sheriff of Covid City has arrived.
It was a landmark moment in the global fight against the most destructive pandemic in 100 years. In approving and delivering the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine, Britain is forging a path that will likely be followed by the United States and Europe in the coming weeks.
"I feel so privileged to be the first person vaccinated against Covid-19," said Keenan, who was given the vaccine at University Hospital in Coventry, a city northwest of London. For all the buildup, it was a shot like any other. Nurse May Parsons asked Keenan to "relax your arm for me," before inserting the needle and finishing with a reassuring but routine "all done." Then came the volley of camera flashes and applause.
Sadly, moments after receiving the vaccine she got backed over by a bus driven by giant marauding mutant coronavirus thugs with blocks of wood taped to their feet so they could reach the gas pedal. Back to the drawing board, Pfizer.
CHEERS to America's new guy in charge of killing people and breaking stuff. President-elect Biden has nominated General Lloyd Austin to be our next Secretary of the Department of Losers and Suckers, including our glorious and mighty planet-conquering Space Force. Here are some of the particulars on the retired 4-star general who, if confirmed, will become our first Black Pentagon chief:
☆ Born August 8, 1953 in Mobile, Alabama
☆ Raised in Thomasville, Georgia
Vice president Biden with General Austin (c) in 2011.
☆ West Point grad
☆ The medals on his chest weigh 6.2 pounds
☆ Oversaw the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq in 2011
☆ Vice Chief of Staff to the U.S. Army
☆ Commander of CENTCOM
☆ Worked to increase awareness and treatment of PTSD and traumatic brain injuries
☆ Retired with 4 stars on his epaulets in 2016
☆ Can land jets up to the size of an F-16 on his shoulders
Some folks have expressed concern that the Defense Department should be led by a civilian, as opposed to a military guy who retired a mere 4 years ago. I can assure you he'll be fine. He's a Leo. We're perfect.
CHEERS to the #1 cause of hairy palms and sudden blindness. On this date in 1994 Surgeon General Jocelyn Elders—who, at 85, is still active at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences—got triangulated out of her job by President Bill Clinton. Her offense: having the gall to suggest that teaching kids about masturbation might help prevent the spread of AIDS.
Firing her was not one of Bill Clinton’s finest moments.
"Education, education, education," she said. "The only way we are going to get around this disease is with education. We have no vaccine, we have no magic drug. All we've got is education." Clinton should've let her stay. He might've learned that playing with yourself prevents something else: impeachment.
JEERS to Lone Star loons. Well, ain’t this just sweeter than the aroma of fracking fluid wafting over Sugar Land on a hot summer day? Yesterday the Attorney General of Texas, Ken Paxton, decided to offer a bit of friendly assistance to the fine but clearly-misguided folks in Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Georgia by whipping up a right-neighborly little lawsuit with the goal of getting the Supreme Court to see the light and unilaterally overturn the election results…for the good of the country, you understand, only for the good of the country. And the response was enough to make ya wanna pop the top on a Shiner Bock and boot-scoot-boogie the night away:
"A publicity stunt, not a serious legal pleading. … The erosion of confidence in our democratic system isn’t attributable to the good people of Michigan, Wisconsin, Georgia or Pennsylvania but rather to partisan officials, like Mr. Paxton, who place loyalty to a person over loyalty to their country."
Paxton’s lawsuit was delivered via courier tumbleweed.
“I feel sorry for Texans that their tax dollars are being wasted on such a genuinely embarrassing lawsuit. The Wisconsin Department of Justice will defend against this attack on our democracy.”
"These continued attacks on our fair and free election system are beyond meritless, beyond reckless—they are a scheme by the President of the United States and some in the Republican party to disregard the will of the people and name their own victors."
Translation in language Ken Paxton can understand: if brains were leather he couldn’t saddle a flea.
JEERS to compassionate conservabuttheads. As income inequality unnecessarily continues squeezing more and more Americans (even those with full-time jobs) through the holes in the safety net, we're reminded that on December 9, 1983, Attorney General Ed Meese—still taking up space above ground at 89—claimed that people go to soup kitchens "because food is free and that's easier than paying for it." Could Reagan pick 'em or could Reagan pick 'em?
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Ten years ago in C&J: December 9, 2010
CHEERS to payment in full??? The AIG debacle will always be the ugly tarnished jewel in the crown of the 2008 Wall Street collapse. But at least We The Taxpayers appear to be getting our money back:
The company said in a regulatory filing that it will use profits from the recent sale of American Life Insurance, as well as from its October public offering of Asia-based AIA Group, to satisfy the balance of the emergency loan that saved AIG in late 2008. ... Earlier this week, the Treasury moved to sell its remaining 2.4 billion shares in Citigroup, a deal that largely ends the government stake in that company and will result ina $12 billion profit.
AIG vowed to never make the same mistakes again that almost plunged the nation into a second Great Depression. The CEO says they'll do it instead by making a bunch of totally different mistakes.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to a peace-full moment. We'll be doing our special anniversary edition (#17) of C&J tomorrow, so we'll say this a day early: congrats this year's Nobel Peace Prize winner, the World Food Programme, which will receive its award in Rome, with a concurrent livestreamed ceremony in Oslo, Norway:
The need for international solidarity and multilateral cooperation is more conspicuous than ever. The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided to award the Nobel Peace Prize for 2020 to the World Food Programme (WFP) for its efforts to combat hunger, for its contribution to bettering conditions for peace in conflict-affected areas and for acting as a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict.
The World Food Programme is the world’s largest humanitarian organisation addressing hunger and promoting food security. In 2019, the WFP provided assistance to close to 100 million people in 88 countries who are victims of acute food insecurity and hunger. In 2015, eradicating hunger was adopted as one of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. The WFP is the UN’s primary instrument for realizing this goal. In recent years, the situation has taken a negative turn. In 2019, 135 million people suffered from acute hunger, the highest number in many years. Most of the increase was caused by war and armed conflict.
They'll receive their Nobel Peace Prize on International Human Rights Day, which will pass the usual way: plenty of humans but not enough rights.
Have a happy humpday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
“I am pleased to announce the completion of a Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool on the White House grounds. It is my hope that this private space will function as both a place of leisure and gathering for future First Families.”
Before the election I predicted that, if he won, Joe Biden would call the Butterball Hotline at least once during his presidency. I stand by that. He just gives off that vibe. As we wait for our 46th president to prove me correct, here’s another POTUS—“Joe Bethersonton”—doing the deed:
My annual list of thanks, a Molly Ivins bon mot, and a few more goodies below the fold. Then let's eat.
Cheers and Jeers for Thanksgiving 2020
Note: As for the rest of the C&J posting week, nothing formal tomorrow, although we'll post a "Who won the week" poll—the greatest ever—in the diaries at our usual Friday evening time (7:30ET). Back Monday. Have a great holiday and may your end of the wishbone be the long one.
Date of Lincoln's Thanksgiving proclamation: 10/3/1863
Number of NFL games today: 2 (Ravens-Steelers game postponed due to Covid-19)
Population of Turkey, Texas (hometown of Bob Wills): 384
Percent of Parade readers who believe calories don't exist on Thanksgiving: 69%
Number of Thanksgivings during which Eric Trump has gotten his head stuck in a can of cranberry sauce: 6
Number of Americans who intend to eat human brains for Thanksgiving dinner, up from 4,021 last year and spreading rapidly from northwest to southeast (stay tuned to your short-wave radios for updates and lock your doors): 5,641
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Your Thursday Molly Ivins Moment:
The Progress Report has come up with some dandy things to be thankful for, starting with American troops. It also lists:
Rep. Jack Murtha, D-Pa., for showing it's patriotic to speak your mind.
The 90 senators who stood up to Cheney to say that torture is not an American value.
The 79 senators who demanded the Bush administration detail a plan for Iraq.
That Sen. Bill Frist is not our physician.
Consider these additional delights: Tom Delay is under indictment, Heckuva Job Brownie is no longer on the public payroll, and for some inexplicable reason, the administration found a Republican prosecutor in the Plame affair who seems to care more about the law than politics. […]
There's music in poor bleeding New Orleans again, Ted Koppel and his hair put in a commendable 25 years, some terrific new films are out, my puppy has not eaten a shoe for an entire month now, and the Mountain West is moving from red to purple. So let's all loosen our belts and get right down to the all-American tradition of overeating on Thanksgiving. It's still a great country, even if it is a little strange. I am grateful for all my fellow citizens -- how would we know it was America if we didn't hear regularly from the nincompoop faction? Happy turkey to you all.
—Thanksgiving 2005
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Suck it up, Buttercup...
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And my world-famous annual…
Things For Which I Am Thankful: 2020 Edition
Our republic, which we've decided to keep for at least four more years
The 2020 Biden-Harris landslide
Red-to-blue flips Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and Arizona
Grassroots Democratic organizers and voters, especially in red states and doubly-especially women of color
Campaign volunteers, ride sharers, and polling place workers
Nancy Pelosi, preparing for her historic 4th term as Speaker of the House
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Katie Porter, and all the other kickass-style House Democrats
Having an astronaut (Mark Kelly) in the Senate again
The judges, legal teams, and elections officials who made Trump's attempted coup one of the clumsiest and inept debacles in American history
House Intelligence and Impeachment Committee chair Adam Schiff
The legacies of Rep. John Lewis and Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg
Maine’s state government, which will spend another year with Dem control of the state House and Senate, and Democratic governor Janet Mills navigating the Covid-19 crisis with skill and compassion
The Congressional Black, Hispanic and Progressive Caucuses
Doctors
Nurses
Hospital administrative workers
Dr. Anthony Fauci
Essential workers
The Covid-19 tracers and trackers
The vaccine researchers sciencing the shit out of the virus
The governors and state health officials making difficult decisions and sticking to them as mobs of ignorant narcissists embrace superspreader events
Americans wearing masks (including over their nose), social distancing, and frequently washing their hands
New Zealand, for showing the world how to fight a pandemic together and win
The first responders and relief organizers who went above and beyond in the wake of this year's hurricanes, floods, and wildfires
Employers who give their employees Thanksgiving off
Employees who don’t get the day off so they can keep vital services running while the rest of us do
Teachers
Immigrants
Caregivers
Our troops over here and over there
Wind turbines and solar panels
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AMERICANS WHO VOTED
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Samantha Bee, Stephen Colbert, John Oliver, Jimmy Kimmel, Seth Meyers, and SNL for continuing the renaissance in late-night political humor
Randy Rainbow and Sarah Cooper for lighting up social media
Freedom of the press
Freedom of speech fuck Trump
The cardboard boxes that'll hold the stuff of departing White House maniacs Stephen Miller, Jared, Ivanka, Mike Pence, and the most destructive and corrupt cabinet in American history
The #5 thing on internet lists that actually SHOCK me
The Lincoln Project, for showing Democrats how to throw a punch
Ta-Nehisi Coates, Malcolm Nance, Joy Reid, Bishop William Barber, Joan Walsh, Charles Pierce, John Nichols, Howard Dean, E.J. Dionne, Eugene Robinson, David K. Johnston, the Kagro in the Morning radio show
Chuck Rosenberg’s zen aura
Naomi Klein, Marcy Wheeler, Rachel Maddow, Chris Hayes, Trump money-follower David Fahrenthold, Trump fact-checker Daniel Dale (who documented all 20,000+ of Trump lies), David Corn, Lawrence O’Donnell, Nicolle Wallace, Joy Reid
Atrios, Digby, Charles M. Blow, Americablog, John Cole, Joe Jervis, Michelangelo Signorile, Dan Savage, Leonard Pitts, Lizz Winstead
Media Matters, The Hispanic Federation, The Southern Poverty Law Center, PFAW, PFLAG, 350.org, RAICES, March for Our Lives, Indivisible, Black Lives Matter, Run For Something, Planned Parenthood, NAACP, IAVA, ACLU and the many other advocacy organizations that prevented the worst of Trump’s abuses, often in coordination with each other
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Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter
Bill and Hillary Clinton
Barack and Michelle Obama
Joe and Jill Biden
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My partner, Michael, for growing old with me
Obamacare
All of my bosses (if you’re reading this, you’re one of them) at Daily Kos
The front-pagers and diarists here, for explaining stuff I don't know boo about
My morning front-page blogger-neighbors: the Abbreviated Pundit Roundup, morning cartoonists, and Elections Morning Digest
The rest of the progressive blogosphere, for having the wisdom to follow all of the orders issued by “Keyboard Kingpin” Markos “Mouse Tits” Moulitsas
Netroots Nation and its organizers, for executing a flawless virtual convention when the pandemic prevented the in-person one from happening in Denver
Those amazingly upbeat Good News Roundups
Dirty Fucking Hippies. We must breed more of them.
M’ doggie. M' pootie. M’ squirrels.
Wineries
Distilleries
Breweries
Teriyaki sauce
Mayochup yes I said mayochup!
Taco Tuesdays
Excedrin Migraine. Next to the epidural, God’s gift to pain relief.
Blueberries
Candy corn
Snow
Evolution
Electric cars
High-speed rail
NASA
The expected return of net neutrality
The expected return to the Paris Climate Agreement
Unions
Diversity
The Resistance
Maine’s proximity to Canada
Peace. (Yeah, it's a word. Really. I looked it up.)
That magic moment every day at 6am when the Bacardi 151 crosses the blood-brain barrier.
Microwave ovens, which are excellent for re-heating food that gets cold because some idiot spent three hours listing all the stuff he was thankful for.
I’d be be happy to contribute some gas money to the cause. It’s a long road to Florida.
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, November 25, 2020
Note: Here's the posting schedule for the rest of the week. Special Thanksgiving edition tomorrow, and then no C&J Friday, though we'll probably post a "Who Won the Week" poll in the diaries at our usual 7:30 time. Back Monday for the ceremonial fighting over the leftover gizzards. Bring sturdy body armor. —Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
Starts in 15 days!!!
Days 'til the start of Hanukkah: 15
Percent of Americans polled by Harvard CAPS-Harris who say it’s time for Trump to concede: 58%
Percent who believe the vote-by-mail system was fair: 61%
Age at which Patrick Quinn, co-creator of the ALS "Ice Bucket Challenge" that has raised $220 million for research into the treatment of Lou Gehrig's Disease, died Sunday: 37
Average cost of a Thanksgiving meal for 10 people, the lowest since 2010 according to the American Farm Bureau Federation, with a 16-pound turkey going for $19.39: $46.90
Rank of "sausage stuffing" and "gravy", respectively, among Thanksgiving dishes searched online most often in Joe Biden's Delaware and Kamala Harris's California, according to Google Trends: #1
Sales of recreational marijuana during Maine's first official month selling it, with the average buyer spending $66: $1.4 million
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Mid-weekRapture Index: 182 (including 3 gogs and 1 pair of sinner’s glasses). Soul Protection Factor 8 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
Maine has certified the results of the 2020 election, Secretary of State Matt Dunlap said Monday. … Dunlap said he handed the certified results to Democratic Gov. Janet Mills at 2 p.m. on Monday, the day they were due.
The final result: Joe Biden got 1 Electoral vote for winning the 1st district and 2 EVs for winning the overall state vote, and Donald Trump got one electoral vote for winning the pro-pussy-grabbing 2nd congressional district up north. By my math—and my math is the best math—that's a final count from the state of Maine of 270-1. Congratulations, President-elect Biden. I hope you don’t mind I took the liberty of activating your official transition site and organizing your inauguration in a pandemically-sensitive way. But now I have to take the dog out to pee, so you can take it from here. Good luck, sir. We're all counting on you.
CHEERS to confronting the XY-chromosomed bullies among us. Today is International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. And like all events, the pandemic looms large over this year’s observances. The United Nations provides a little reminder that…
Since the outbreak of COVID-19, emerging data and reports from those on the front lines, have shown that all types of violence against women and girls, particularly domestic violence, has intensified. UN Women provides up-to-date information and support to vital programmes to fight the Shadow Pandemic of violence against women during COVID-19.
Violence against women and girls (VAWG) is one of the most widespread, persistent and devastating human rights violations in our world todayand remains largely unreported due to the impunity, silence, stigma and shame surrounding it.
To further clarify, the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women issued by the UN General Assembly in 1993, defines violence against women as “any act of gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life.”
Just as pink is worn for breast cancer awareness and Red is worn for AIDS awareness, the U.N. urges everyone to wear and/or display orange between now and December 10 to show support for the fight to prevent violence against women. On this site I don’t think that'll be a problem.
CHEERS to another crack in the glass ceiling. President-elect Biden, brilliantly generating momentum toward his inevitable January 20 swearing-in, released a flood of cabinet nominees this week. Among them is Janet Yellen, 74, who is now poised to become the first woman Treasury Secretary. In a preview of her overall approach to her job, President Barack Obama said this about Yellen when he nominated her to be the first person with lady parts to be the Federal Reserve Chair in 2014:
In Yellen’s plus column: she’s Brooklyn tough.
"The American people will have a fierce champion who understands that the ultimate goal of economic and financial policymaking is to improve the lives, jobs and standard of living of American workers and their families.
She understands that fostering a stable financial system will help the overall economy and protect consumers.
I am confident that Janet will stand up for American workers, protect consumers, foster the stability of our financial system, and help keep our economy growing for years to come."
Among the items on her agenda: unblocking Steve Mnuchin's misogynist logjam on the new Harriet Tubman $20 bill that was supposed to be released this year. But first, once confirmed, she'll spend a few hours rolling around in a giant pile of money shouting "Yippeeee!!!!" (I hear it's a sacred tradition going back to Hamilton.)
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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"It's working!" Check out the critters big and small who are using Utah's first wildlife overpass to cross Interstate 80. The @UtahDWR shared this video on Thursday. pic.twitter.com/H7d896eiYs
JEERS to Reagan's impeachment-worthy moment. On November 25, 1986, the Iran Contra "Affair" busted wide open when Captain Shining City On A Hill appointed the Tower commission to find out what the $#!!#$ was going on. It later resulted in this public admission from Reagan:
"A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not.
Thankfully, he was finally impeached & convicted for wearing a tan suit.
As the Tower board reported, what began as a strategic opening to Iran deteriorated, in its implementation, into trading arms for hostages. This runs counter to my own beliefs, to administration policy, and to the original strategy we had in mind."
Eleven people ended up getting nailed, but George H.W. Bush pardoned them before he left office. Some of the Iran-Contra figures, like Elliott Abrams and John Negroponte, would pop up again in the Bush II administration despite the stains on their names. Abrams is still stinking up the place as Trump's special something-or-other to Venezuela. And a couple years back the NRA tapped convicted felon Lt. Col. Oliver North to serve as president, a role he quickly left because that domestic-terrorism was too corrupt for him. And George H.W.'s attorney general Bill Barr, who supported and encouraged pardoning all those criminals, became Trump's…wait for it…attorney general! Because truly scurrilous help is so hard to find.
CHEERS to mostly smooth sailing. If you're traveling today in your 2020 Tesla electric jetpack, you might get a sprinkle or two in the middle of the country. But other than that, it looks fine. Meanwhile this is what the Turkey Day map looks like, according to CNN's Atari 2600 forecast computer:
Be very careful in the southwest & Lake Erie regions, where giant spinning lozenges may form.
The gays, feminists and pagans are quick to point out, by the way, that any weather messes this holiday are not their fault. Responsibility rests solely on the homophobes, the Nazis, the KKK, and their cousins the conservative Bible thumpers. It’s residual from their huge 2020 election loss—their feelings are still delicate and tender. Hence the overall holiday outlook: scattered annoying snowflakes.
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Ten years ago in C&J: November 25, 2010
CHEERS to new rules. Starting January 1, health insurance companies have to spend at least 80 cents of every dollar on actual health care coverage. Not advertising. Not lobbying. Not junkets or bonuses. Health care coverage. Of course, the industry must be screaming about The Unfairness Of It All, right? As usual...not so much, now that the fight is over:
[I]ndustry watchers said the final regulations wound up being more manageable than investors initially feared. Analyst Les Funtleyder, who covers the industry for Miller Tabak, noted that HHS has wide latitude to adjust the rules to prevent market disruptions. "From an expectations point of view, these are rules that managed care can live with in 2011," he said.
Not that it'll stop Republicans in Congress from pissing and moaning. Which, coincidentally, constitutes at least 80 percent of what they spend their time on.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to sweet sounds. The Grammy nominations were announced yesterday and you can check out all the nominees here. I always go to the Spoken Word category first, because there's a good chance it'll have an Obama or a Carter or a Maddow on it. And this year…there is!
Flea:Acid for the Children
Ken Jennings:Alex Trebek—The Answer Is…
Her second Grammy nod. #1 was in 2013 for “Drift.”
Rachel Maddow:Blowout—Corrupted Democracy, Rogue StateRussia, and the Richest, Most Destructive Industry on Earth
Ronan Farrow:Catch and Kill
Meryl Streep & Full Cast:Charlotte's Web
President Donald Trump:White House Coronavirus Task Force Briefing—Bleach Injections Work Very Quickly, Almost Like A Cleaning
That last one isn’t officially on the ballot yet, but Rudy Giuliani is suing in all 50 states to get it added, and when has he ever lost?
Taylor Swift, Beyonce, and Lady Gaga got their usual 150 nominations each, and my all-time favorite composer, John Williams, got his 72nd nod (for his Rise of Skywalker score). Other notables on the Grammy list: James Taylor, Rufus Wainwright, Vince Gill, Ricky Martin, and a very posthumous one for Leonard Cohen. Trevor Noah hands out the awards on January 31st. And those kids better keep the noise down or I'm calling the police.
Have a happy humpday, and if you won’t be here tomorrow we'll say it now: Happy Thanksgiving! Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
Markos Moulitsas Fuming That the Cheers and Jeers Kiddie Pool is Filled With “Fools That Are Making Him Look Bad”: Report
Well, that's the ballgame, folks. The elections are all over and Republicans control the 98-member U.S. Senate 50-48. Rats. We came so close, but maybe next time we can…
Wait Wait Wait!!! Huge update!!!
After a decades-long study by government scholars, it turns out that the Senate is actually a 100-member chamber. That means there are two seats that haven't been decided yet. Apparently folks in Georgia, I’m told, never got around to picking up the phone and punching in their PIN to activate their senator accounts. (Can you verify this, PolitiFact?) So we now have a chance to even up the score—50-50—with Vice President Harris breaking all the ties and Mitch McConnell relegated to munching soggy lettuce in an aquarium tank in the basement.
Continued…
Voting for both Georgia Senate seats starts December 14th—twenty-seven days from today—and ends on January 5. Our candidates are the excellent Jon Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock. They're facing a confused and calcified curmudgeon, and a female Donald Trump. Some important dates and two links:
Democratic organizers in Georgia say they’re pumped and primed to bring Jon and the good Reverend to the Senate, and financial support from the rest of us will help ‘em get it done. Daily Kos has an Act Blue page for Ossoff and Warnock here. And we’d be guilty of political malpractice if we didn’t also lend our support to Stacey Abrams’ group Fair Fight, which was so important in taking Joe Biden across the finish line November 3rd and sealing Trump’s doom—click here for that link. As always, keep an eye on Daily Kos, especially the Elections Team, for updates and calls for action. Many thanks and fresh peaches to you all.
And now, our feature presentation...
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Cheers and Jeers for Tuesday, November 17, 2020
Note: It’s Random Drug Test Tuesday! Pick a random drug from the bowl and give it a shot. First one to smell sounds and taste colors wins Kos’s Tesla. Good luck. —Mgt.
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By the Numbers:
Starts in 24 days!!!
Days 'til the start of Hanukkah: 24
Number of the record-breaking 117 women elected to the 117th session of the House who are women of color: 48
Number of Black women Missouri has sent to the House besides Black Lives Matter activist Cori Bush, who was elected this year: 0
Percent of President-elect Joe Biden's transition staff who are people of color and women, respectively: 46%, 52%
Height and weight of this year's Happy Holidays tree at 30 Rockefeller Center: 75 feet, 11 tons
Cost to buy the 40th anniversary edition of Nintendo's Game & Watch console: $49.99
Current ocean temperature off the coast of Portland, Maine: 51F
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Reverend Warnock speak, you listen…
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CHEERS to personal POTUS pronouncements put to parchment. That earthquake you felt this morning was the tremor caused by Part I of Barack Obama's memoir landing in e-readers and on bookstore shelves around the globe:
A Promised Land…chronicles the future president's childhood and political rise, before diving deeply into his historic 2008 campaign and first four years in office. Obama dedicates hundreds of pages to the fights and characters that colored his tenure, from his work to pass Obamacare in 2010 to the complexities of dealing with a slate of world leaders and finally his decision to approve the raid that killed Osama bin Laden.
A presidency worth all that paper and ink.
Throughout, Obama casts his presidency as comprised of hard choices, sometimes made more difficult by internal disputes, mismanagement by the previous administration and obstructionism by Republicans, which he suggests was rooted in an attempt to appeal to anxieties about the first Black president.
Yet he also acknowledges his own shortcomings on a range of topics, like calling his failure to pass immigration reform "a bitter pill to swallow" and acknowledging that the economy "stank" as he headed into the 2010 midterms, where Republicans reclaimed the House of Representatives on the back of the Tea Party movement.
Fair warning: it's nearly 800 pages long. Lift with your knees.
CHEERS to happy little stabbies. Send out the town criers: "We have another vaccine! We have another vaccine!" And at 94.5 percent effectiveness, this one by Moderna appears poised to leave the one announced last week by Pfizer—at a paltry 90 percent—rotting on the shelf like yesterday's meatloaf. (I kid—we need all the vaccines we can get, and I plan to inject them all along with my usual morning gallon of bleach.) Even better, unlike Pfizer's vaccine this one it doesn't need to be stored up Mr. Freeze's tuchus to remain stable. Naturally, I never sink my personal fortune into anything without consulting human prospectus Dr. Anthony Fauci first, so the next words I read will be crucial:
“I think this is a really strong step forward to where we want to be about getting control of this outbreak,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told the "TODAY" show after Moderna’s announcement, calling the company’s vaccine data “quite impressive.”
Excellent. Memo to my broker: expect a package soon containing $200.39 cash, three Burger King coupons, a $5 savings bond and my grandmother's hearing aids. Put it all on Moderna and make me rich.
JEERS to the hunchback of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Forty-seven years ago today, in 1973, floundering President Richard Nixon uttered his immortal words: "People have got to know whether or not their president is a crook. Well, I'm not a crook."
And to prove he wasn't a crook, Gerald Ford shielded him with a "full and unconditional pardon" after Nixon resigned rather than face impeachment for crooky things like high crimes and misdemeanors. Trust me: the less you think about it, the more it makes sense.
JEERS to fakers in high places. You remember how social media exploded when Trump appointed some unqualified hack to be "acting" Director of Homeland Security, even though he never went through a proper vetting process and was, essentially, making decisions on things like DACA illegally? Remember how we were all like, "Why doesn’t someone do something about this trespasser in public office?" Finally, someone did, and there was rejoicing across the land:
A federal judge in New York ruled Saturday that Acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf assumed his position unlawfully, a determination that invalidated Wolf’s suspension of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which shields young people from deportation.
And thanks to Judge Garaufis, here they’ll stay.
“DHS failed to follow the order of succession as it was lawfully designated,” U.S. District Judge Nicholas Garaufis wrote. “Therefore, the actions taken by purported Acting Secretaries, who were not properly in their roles according to the lawful order of succession, were taken without legal authority.”
Karen Tumlin, an attorney who represented a plaintiff in one of two lawsuits that challenged Wolf’s authority, called the ruling “another win for DACA recipients and those who have been waiting years to apply for the program for the first time.”
To make matters worse, Wolf also has to replace all the pudding cups he stole from the break room fridge, the result of a separate suit filed by Mable in accounting.
JEERS to today’s edition of Toscanini Fail. And a’ one and a’ two...
CHEERS to a bouncing baby bill! The tones were hushed in the Capitol last night as Harry Reid brought out the infant healthcare reform bill wrapped in a swaddling hospital gown and gently laid it in a bed of cotton balls, where it cooed and gurgled and coiled its tiny fingers around its—my goodness—rather robust (if opt-out-able) public option. And no sign of Stupak syndrome, says Senator Kirsten Gillibrand:
"While this bill is not perfect, the anti-choice measure that was included in the House bill is not contained in the Senate bill. The House's Stupak amendment would have resulted in grave risk to women and girls, particularly to low-income women. Denying a full range of reproductive services is not only discriminatory, but also dangerous, and puts the lives of women and girls at risk.
Now comes the hard part: raising it to adulthood without dropping it on its head. Which is easier said than done. They don't call it the "Butterfingers Chamber" for nothin'.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to that people-powered dude. Since I know you appreciate being made to feel old, here's a fun fact: when Howard Dean's 2004 presidential campaign—the catalyst for bringing so many of us here to Daily Kos—was shifting into high gear, he was but a lad of 56. Today he finds 72 candles on his birthday cake. The former Vermont governor (first in the nation to sign same-sex civil unions into law—a quaint milestone, but groundbreaking at the time) became the loudest 2004 candidate to rail against the warmongering Bush II regime at a time when too many Democratic leaders were still searching for their spines. (His 2003 speech in Sacramento remains one of the most influential barn burners in modern political history.)
Happy Birthday, Howard.
Of course, we all know Governor Dean met his Waterloo after he uttered "Yeah" in Iowa at a higher volume than is allowed in polite political society. He then went on to become the chairman of the DNC, unleashing a radical strategy that would give the Democratic party a robust presence in all 50 states, and remains forever a proud card-carrying Kossack. So when you're pouring your first drinky this morning (may we recommend a cocktail made with pure Vermont maple syrup?), hoist it and send a happy birthday toast to ol’ Doc Dean. And you should also get together and bake him a cake. After all, YOU have the flour and YOU have the flour and YOU have the flour...!
Have a tolerable Tuesday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
“If Cheers and Jeers were posted anywhere else, our State Department would be issuing grim reports about the future of that country’s kiddie pool. But that country is this country—it’s happening here.”
As long as there have been books, there have been tightasses trying to ban them, and American tightasses are among the most obnoxious, Jesus-freaked, and delicate-fee-fee’d tightasses in the civilized world. There were 377 cases of attempted book banning in 2019 (over 12,647 over the last 38 years), which is why an important group has designated this Banned Books Week:
Banned Books Week is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read. Banned Books Week was launched in 1982 in response to a sudden surge in the number of challenges to books in schools, bookstores and libraries. Typically held during the last week of September, it highlights the value of free and open access to information.
Continued...
Banned Books Week brings together the entire book community—librarians, booksellers, publishers, journalists, teachers, and readers of all types—in shared support of the freedom to seek and to express ideas, even those some consider unorthodox or unpopular.
Banned Books Week 2020 will be held September 27– October 3. The theme of this year’s event proclaims “Censorship Is A Dead End. Find your freedom to read!”
By focusing on efforts across the country to remove or restrict access to books, Banned Books Week draws national attention to the harms of censorship.
The top 5 banned books last year were (cue the sound of conservative Christians grinding their teeth): George by Alex Gino; Beyond Magenta: Transgender Teens Speak Outby Susan Kuklin; A Day in the Life of Marlon Bundoby Jill Twiss, illustrated by EG Keller; Sex is a Funny Word by Cory Silverberg, illustrated by Fiona Smyth; and Prince & Knight by Daniel Haack, illustrated by Stevie Lewis. Kudos to you all, you’re definitely worth reading.
See the various events scheduled for this week here. So far Trump hasn’t called for any book bannings or burnings. He may be dumb as rocks and more corrupt than Al Capone, but I'll give him credit for one thing: he's smart enough to know not to mess with librarians.
And now, our feature presentation...
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Cheers and Jeers for Monday, September 28, 2020
Note: Candy corn is Baby Jesus’s tears of joy. No proof, really...it just makes sense.
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By the Numbers:
Tomorrow night.
Days 'til the Biden-Trump debate: 1
Percent of Biden supporters and Trump cultists, respectively, polled by ABC News-WaPost, who say the opening on the Supreme Court makes it more important to them that their candidate wins the presidency: 64%, 37%
Estimated number of people, according to the ACLU, who can't vote this year because of the patchwork of state felony disenfranchisement laws that leave them out of the democratic process: 5.8 million
Percent of American Millennials (18-36) who hold a "biblical worldview"—i.e. God is the all-powerful Creator of the universe and stills rules it today; Satan is real; the Bible is accurate in all of its teachings—according to a study released by the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University: 2%
Percent of population 56 and older who have a biblical worldview: 9%
Amount the U.S. economy has lost since 2000 because of discrimination against Black citizens in areas like education and access to business loans, according to a Citigroup study: $16 billion
Number of New York Metro workers who were suspended for building a secret man cave under Grand Central Station: 3
CHEERS to peepers protection. As a public service to you, our dear C&J reader, once a year we conduct a simple vision test to make sure your eyeballs are functioning the way they should be, thus making for a more enjoyable blogging experience. So, if you would, please read the words on this chart officially authorized by the National Ophthalmological Society:
Yes, that’s correct. It says: “The Republican President Is Fucked.” Your eyes are perfect! You’re good to go for another year. Please enjoy a complimentary lollipop from the reception desk.
JEERS to our new sadist on the bench. Over the weekend the impeached, headed-to-prison-in-2021 president announced his replacement for Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court. Here's what we know about Amy Coney Barrett:
» Born on the planet Orpglorb-7 three million years ago, upon which she immediately ate her parents, siblings and attending physicians
» Spent several thousand years educating herself in the ways of catastrophic death and destruction as a radioactive fungus-kraken hybrid
Barrett at 1 minute old.
» Worked up the ranks of Orpglorb government, becoming Director of Suffering and Pain, where she was awarded the coveted Beating Heart Ripped From The Chest And Shown To The Victim Award
» Signed an authorization that vaporized several planets devoted to peace and harmony so she could use the residual debris to launch her own Echoes of Their Screams jewelry line
» Prefers to go by her nickname: Madam Finger Lightning
» Mother of 16,000 hatchlings, all of whom she ate at birth
» Hobbies include Armageddon management, non-anesthesia abdominal surgery, and bursting out of unsuspecting neighbors' chests
Ha Ha, just kidding. She's much worse: Federalist Society.
CHEERS to G-d's Amazing 25-Hour Miracle Diet. The Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur started at sundown yesterday (which in Maine is, like, 6 O'clock now) and continues through today. According to C&J's go-to guide, Torah Tots…
Yom Kippur is a Shabbat...no work can be performed on Yom Kippur.
It is well-known that you are supposed to refrain from eating and drinking (even water) on Yom Kippur. It is a complete, 25+ hour fast beginning before sunset on the evening before Yom Kippur and ending after nightfall on the day of Yom Kippur. The Talmud also specifies additional restrictions: washing and bathing, anointing one's body (with cosmetics, perfumes, etc.), marital relations and wearing leather shoes.
The holiday is a somber one during which Jews confess their sins and seek forgiveness over the course of a day. That's why I'm not Jewish—I'd barely get started before the closing buzzer went off.
JEERS to keeping track of America’s fugliest numbers. While Trump and McConnell continued piloting their SCOTUS nomination steamroller over all that is just and good in America, the mighty Covid-19 Wurlitzer played on (33 million cases around the globe now, with over 20 percent of them in the U.S.). Our Monday tradition of maintaining a benchmark of the awfulness for the C&J historical record continues. Let’scheck the most depressing tote board in the world as our death toll now approaches the population of America’s 109th-largest city Birmingham, Alabama:
20 weeks ago: 1.4 million confirmed cases. 80,000 deaths.
10 weeks ago: 3.8 million confirmed cases, 143,000 deaths
Yup. Again.
5 weeks ago: 5.8 million confirmed cases, 180,000 deaths
This morning: 7.3 million confirmed cases, 209,000 deaths
And in other covid news, Florida Governor Ron DeSuperspreader has officially given the green light for the entire state to become a giant maskless covid bump-and-grind beer & titties pool party, while banning local governments from spoiling all the fun by imposing their own stupid "life saving" "regulations." Up yonder in the hereafter, God sighed as He logged on and placed another mega-order of bunk beds from Ikea.
CHEERS to order in the courts. Some clear-eyed action by the Knights of the Oaken Gavel in recent days as they pour the hot lead of justice from their parapets onto the heads of the schemers trying to bring down Castle Democracy:
Staffing FraudA federal judge ruled Friday that [Bureau of Land Management acting director William Perry Pendley] has been serving unlawfully, blocking him from continuing in the position in the latest pushback against the administration’s practice of filling key positions without U.S. Senate approval. The ruling came after Montana’s Democratic governor in July sued to remove Pendley, saying the former oil industry attorney was illegally overseeing an agency that manages almost a quarter-billion acres of land, primarily in the U.S. West.
Voting RightsLess than three weeks before early voting begins in Texas, a U.S. district judge has blocked the state from eliminating straight-ticket voting as an option for people who go to the polls this November. In a ruling issued late Friday, U.S. District Judge Marina Garcia Marmolejo cited the coronavirus pandemic, saying the elimination of the voting practice would “cause irreparable injury” to voters “by creating mass lines at the polls and increasing the amount of time voters are exposed to COVID-19.”
2020 Census[US District Judge Lucy Koh] ruled late Thursday night that national counting for the 2020 census can continue through October 31. … The National Urban League and several other groups, including the city of Los Angeles, had sued the government, asking for a preliminary injunction to block the government from concluding the count on September 30. …Los Angeles' City Attorney Mike Feuer said the injunction was a major win for amore accurate Census count in a statement released after the stay was issued.
And this just in: Eric Trump has to show up next week in front of a judge in New York and explain why crimes seem to follow him around like the perennial dirt swirling around Pig-Pen. The judge's first words to Eric will be: "Place your right hand on the Bible." The judge's next words to Eric will be: "No, your other right hand."
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Ten years ago in C&J: September 28, 2010
JEERS to unequal treatment. Here's another example of the oft-used phrase, "It's Okay If You're A Republican." Two years ago, President Obama announced he was ordering his departments to cut $100 million, admitting it was a small and mostly-symbolic gesture to set the tone for the new administration. Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell pounced on it as meaningless. And yet, when promoting the GOP's new "Pledge to America," one of its co-authors could only recommend cuts across the entire spectrum of federal programs that totaled—you guessed it—$100 million:
For the math challenged, [Rep. Kevin] McCarthy's proposed cuts amount to 0.01% of the federal budget, leaving 99.99% of the federal budget—including entitlements (Medicare, Social Security), defense and interest on the debt; about 80% of the budget—intact. And he won't name any non-defense discretionary programs he'd cut. Wow, is that bold or what?
Please contain your laughter. For purely selfish reasons, I want him to hear mine the loudest.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to intercepted documents. My intel squirrel Sgt. Fluffy brought back a doozy from D.C.:
From the Desk of Ronna McDaniel
This Week's RNC Motivational Action List
Sept. 28 - Oct. 4
Monday Take all the time you need to reflect on all the positive and worthwhile things you learned over the weekend from the Values Voters Summit. Spend the remaining 23 hours, 59 minutes and 55 seconds reviewing your preemptive Biden impeachment list.
Tuesday Clear your head of "stinkin' thinkin'" by picturing a happy, placid scene of illegals being shipped back to Mexico in boxcars via the main entrance through the Great Wall of Trump.
Wednesday With that nip of fall in the air, today is a good day to write a letter to your local newspaper warning about the dangers of global cooling. Go ahead and make up your own facts—they'll print it anyway.
Thursday Butt-dial John Bolton and let one rip. Then scratch a pesky itch with your open-carry Glock, but don’t bother checking to see if it's unloaded because you're a responsible Republican gun owner so how could it not be?
Friday Don't take no for an answer, give no for an answer. Then practice mansplaining lady parts in front of a mirror so you'll be ready to win hearts and hoo-hahs at upcoming Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings.
All Week: Don’t bake a single thing for the gays.
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Have a great week! God Bless America and Money and Trump and Bombs!
And here’s the Democratic motivational action list: in 36 days, make the makers of the Republican motivational action list cry.
Have a tolerable Monday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
“Bill in Portland Maine knows he’s crazy; it’s so self-evident. Quite frankly, I don’t pay that much attention to him. I think it’s really a sad, sick situation.”
I can’t possibly add to the accolades already bestowed the most-beloved Supreme Court justice in eons. So I’ll simply revisit some of her own words as we all try to get our bearings on this Monday morning:
"When I'm sometimes asked 'When will there be enough [women on the Supreme Court]?' and I say 'When there are nine,' people are shocked. But there'd been nine men, and nobody's ever raised a question about that."
"If there was one decision I would overrule, it would be Citizens United. I think the notion that we have all the democracy that money can buy strays so far from what our democracy is supposed to be."
Continued…
RBG Cont’d
"Dissents speak to a future age. It's not simply to say my colleagues are wrong and I would do it this way, but the greatest dissents do become court opinions."
4evuh.
“I would not look to the United States Constitution if I were drafting a constitution in the year 2012.”
“Every constitution written since the end of World War II includes a provision that men and women are citizens of equal stature. Ours does not.”
"The number of women who have come forward as a result of the MeToo movement has been astonishing. My hope is not just that it is here to stay, but that it is as effective for the woman who works as a maid in a hotel as it is for Hollywood stars."
“Throwing out [the Voting Rights Act] when it has worked and is continuing to work to stop discriminatory changes is like throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.”
Baby RBG survives...
“The emphasis must be not on the right to abortion but on the right to privacy and reproductive control.”
“All of the incentives, all of the benefits marriage affords would still be available. So you’re not taking away anything from heterosexual couples. They would have the very same incentive to marry, all the benefits that come with marriage that they do now.”
"I would like to be remembered as someone who used whatever talent she had to do her work to the very best of her ability. And to help repair tears in her society, to make things a little better through the use of whatever ability she has."
I don’t think that'll be a problem, ma'am. See you upstairs.
And now, our feature presentation...
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Cheers and Jeers for Monday, September 21, 2020
Note: SPOILER ALERT—"By the Numbers" comes after this note.
Number of the 298 women running for the U.S. House this year (a record) who are Democrats: 204
Percent chance that Ruth Bader Ginsburg's childhood nickname was Kiki, because her older sister said she was "a kicky baby": 100%
Year during which Ginsburg co-founded the Women's Rights Law Reporter, the first law journal in the U.S. to focus exclusively on women's rights: 1970
Length of volume 1 of President Barack Obama's memoir A Promised Land, which will be released on November 17th and cover the years 2008-2011: 768 pages
Number of cargo ships that will be needed to deliver them because the first printing of the book is so large, according to The New York Times: 3
Years since The Mary Tyler Moore Show debuted as of last Saturday: 50
CHEERS to citizens in action. A pair of fresh signs that the left is energized and pissed off, both before and after the passing of RBG:
FundraisingAs the political reality of Ginsburg’s passing sank in, the ticker that keeps track of donations soared on ActBlue, the non-profit operation that provides a tool for left-leaning activists to raise money for political candidates and issues. … The latest tally puts it at $56 million.
Early voters lined up as far as the eye can see in Loudoun County, Virginia.
Early VotingLines of voters stretched from polling places in Virginia and Minnesota as early voting started in four states, the first of the 2020 presidential election. The longest lines were found in Virginia, where voters previously needed a reason to cast an early ballot. In the state's Fairfax County, where reports showed lines stretching for hours, election workers scrambled to open an additional voting room at the county government centre. … South Dakota and Wyoming also saw their first day of early voting on Friday.
Another good omen: when Stephen Colbert introduced his super-simple BetterKnowABallotsite last week to help his liberal audience get early voting info for their state, it was hit so hard it crashed. He has since added more gerbils to the wheel. No doubt funded by George Soros.
JEERS to keeping track of America’s fugliest numbers. While Trump and McConnell plot and scheme to ram an America-killing Supreme Court nominee through the Senate, the mighty Covid-19 Wurlitzer plays on (31 million cases around the globe now, with over 20 percent of them in the U.S.). Our Monday tradition of maintaining a benchmark of the awfulness for the C&J historical record continues. Let’scheck the most depressing tote board in the world as our death toll now approaches the population of America’s 111th-largest city Rochester, New York:
20 weeks ago: 1.2 million confirmed cases. 69,000 deaths.
10 weeks ago: 3.4 million confirmed cases, 138,000 deaths
5 weeks ago: 5.5 million confirmed cases, 173,000 deaths
This morning: 7 million confirmed cases, 204,000deaths
And in other covid news, senior White House adviser Jared Kushner has some comforting words for Americans suffering during the coronavirus pandemic: "That's their problem." A real chip off the ol' father-in-law.
CHEERS to Year 5781. Happy New Year! Rosh Hashanah rolled in Friday night, and C&J wishes all of our Jewish readers a hearty "Shana Tova!" minus the Times Square ball drop:
The only similarity between the Jewish New Year and the secular one is:
Many people use the New Year as a time to make "resolutions." Likewise, the Jewish New Year is a time to begin looking back at the mistakes of the past year and planning the changes to be made in the new year. …
Rosh Hashana begins a 10 day period, known as Aseret Ymay Tshuva, (Ten Days of Repentance) or Yomim Nora'im (High Holy days). These ten days that end with Yom Kippur, are a time for Tshuva (repentance), Tefilla (prayer) and Tzedaka (charity).
Even though the C&J household is just a run-'o-the-mill lapsed-Episcopalian/lapsed-Catholic domicile, we still took a moment to blow a ram's horn outside our neighbor's bedroom window at 3am. We figured, why break with our normal routine just because it's Rosh Hashanah?
JEERS to evil people doing evil deeds to evil people. Ruh roh:
A package containing the poison ricin and addressed to President Donald Trump was intercepted by law enforcement earlier this week, according to two law enforcement officials. Two tests were done to confirm the presence of ricin. All mail for the White House is sorted and screened at an offsite facility before reaching the White House.
And awaaay we go…
Boy, Postmaster Louis DeJoy must be pissed. I mean, a piece of mail actually got sorted? How did that happen??? Ha ha!!!
Officials knew something was wrong when the envelope was addressed "To President Trump with Love." Pow!!!
If they really wanted to put his body in a coma, they should've sent him a plate of vegetables. Zing!!!
Since ricin sounds like "rice," Trump is now calling it "the China powder." Ba-dum-boom!!!
An attempted poisoning? Golly, I wonder what Trump did to piss off Putin. Hey-O!!!
I'll be here all week. I suggest you turn and run. Run like the wind.
CHEERS to filling in for your boss. 139 years ago this week, in 1881, Chester Alan Arthur of the gilded and foppish Republican party was sworn in as the 21st president of the United States, following the unexpected meeting of an assassin's bullet and James Garfield's spine. (Or, more accurately, Garfield’s spine and his medical team’s unwashed hands.)
Arthur (Official White House photo)
The Chicago Tribune wrote of Arthur what it could easily be writing today about our current president: "It requires a great deal for him to get to his desk and begin the dispatch of business. Great questions of public policy bore him. No President was ever so much given to procrastination as he is." In Arthur’s defense, he suffered from an energy-robbing condition called Bright’s Disease, and he died of it shortly after leaving the White House. Trump, on the other hand, suffers from an even worse condition. It’s called Being Donald Trump Disease.
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Ten years ago in C&J: September 21, 2010
CHEERS to a pleasant afternoon under the oaks. Yesterday Portland, Maine became even more of the center of the universe than it usually is when Lady Gaga, in a spur-of-the-moment decision, pulled up in a giant bus after spending a night on the road and opened a can of 'Don't Ask, Don’t Tell' whupass on Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe (with some nice jabs at John McCain thrown in for good measure):
"Doesn't 'don't ask, don't tell' seem to be backwards? Doesn't it seem to you we should send home the prejudiced—the straight soldier who hates the gay soldier, whose performance is affected because he is homophobic? He holds and harbors hate and he gets to stay and fight for our country. Gay soldiers, who harbor no hate, no phobia, are sent home.
I'd like to propose a new law: a law that sends home the soldier that has the problem. Our new law is called 'If you don't like it, go home.'"
Meanwhile here's what today's cloture vote is about: it doesn't repeal 'Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,' it simply allows debate to begin, but not before 30 hours pass during which everybody stands around the senate with their finger up their butt, and if they get 60 votes they’ll need another 50 votes, and in the end, Congress still won’t be repealing the policy—they'll just be turning over the authority for repealing it from Congress to the president, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the Secretary of Defense. Clear? (And people wonder why the public doesn't have a clue how Washington works.)
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And just one more…
CHEERS to America's favorite literary boogeyman. 73 skulls go on the birthday cake of most-famous-Mainer Stephen King, born September 21, 1947 in Portland. King is an unabashed Democrat (including actively helping dislodge Susan Collins from her perch) who isn't afraid to speak his mind, which he occasionally does by blowing up twitter:
» 2018: IF Susan Collins votes to confirm Kavanaugh, and IF she runs for re-election—two big ifs—she will be defeated. It would be unwise for anyone to mistake how angry most Americans are at the way this is being railroaded through.
» 2019: Let's remember that Susan Collins voted to confirm frat party boy Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court!
» 2020: Collins: FOR Kavanaugh. AGAINST impeachment. Bipartisan? Really? Please.
“Molly, aka the Thing of Evil, has decided that Trump is just a bit TOO evil. She is supporting Joe Biden. Because, she barks, ’He's the lesser of two evils, and at debate time I expect him to BITE Trump.’"
» Even if you're a supporter, you must see by now that if Donald Trump was your uncle, the family would be discussing how to gently take away his car keys.
» Just want to say that I've known several Karens in my lifetime who were perfectly nice and socially conscious and cool to animals and wear masks in Walmart.
» A priest, a minster, and a rabbit walk into a bar. The rabbit says, "I think I'm a typo."
» Tucker Carlson is your basic white, well-fed, complacent and entitled fuckdoodle.
» Ranch dressing is weird, and oddly snotlike, don't you think? Or is it just me?
» I believe—you may prove me wrong—that "Prove It All Night" is the only love song in history to contain the word "dynamo."
» I'd like to see a day when there was no news. None. Zilch. Zip. I'd turn on CNN and Brooke Baldwin would say, "Nothing happened today, so we're going to show a bunch of rock videos."
Today's special in the C&J watering hole, as always: half-off Redrum and Cokes.
Have a tolerable Monday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
'It's a first': Oldest human footprints in Arabian peninsula point to route out of Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool
Good morning, liberal hippie commie Marxist Sorosistas and your America-killing infatuation with—[Checks notes]—keeping your fellow Americans safe and healthy and able to pay their bills. Monday welcomes you. For your convenience, C&J continues to monitor two important deadlines of national importance as imposed by the Trump administration, which has never missed a deadline because of its peerless managerial efficiency and dedication to the job of running the country.
Deadline One: August 2The day on which Trump has promised to sign a “full and complete healthcare plan” into law.
Deadline Two: September 10The end of the 8-week period during which the president will deliver "many exciting things, things that nobody has even contemplated, thought about, thought possible [with] levels of thought that a lot of people believed very strongly we didn't have in this country."
Stay tuned to Daily Kos for updates, as the president’s brilliant mind works amazingly and beautifully, and his America-great-again-making developments will happen very, very quickly. Thank you and Happy Infrastructure Week.
Cheers and Jeers for Monday, July 27, 2020
Note: Last week I swatted a fly. Then, feeling guilty, I administered CPR, repaired his wings with Elmer's glue, put his hind legs in little casts, and fashioned a pair of crutches out of toothpicks. While he recovers, we’re paying to have his family stay on a windowsill at the Ronald McDonald House. He's happily vomiting in my Fruit Loops as I write this. May we all be humbled by, and learn from, this life-affirming experience. —Mgr.
Minimum number of Americans now receiving unemployment aid: 30 million
Michigan restaurants that got $150,000 or more in federal loans, according to The Detroit Free Press: 785
Number of them that are black-owned: 1
Floridians' approval of Governor Ron DeSantis in April and today, according to Quinnipiac polling:53% / 41%
Percent of Floridians in the same poll who said Republicans f*cked up by re-opening everything too soon:61%
Percent of Yankees & Nationals players and managers who took a knee in support of Black Lives Matter before the national anthem last Thursday night in D.C.: 100%
CHEERS to poll dancing. The people who pick our brains for a living have been busy little bees now that we're less than 100 days from the crashing of the blue wave on November 3rd. Let's take a spin across America and check up on their fine work. For your convenience, we've stuffed them all into a text box that you can clip out like a coupon and use to give your endorphins a little tickle as needed:
Fox NewsBiden leads Trump in Pennsylvania 50 percent to 39 percent…In Michigan, Biden leads Trump 49 percent to 40 percent… In Minnesota, Biden leads Trump 51 percent to 38 percent.
See also: this CBS News Florida poll.
Quinnipiac UniversityTrump currently stands well behind Joe Biden in the perpetually swinging state of Florida, at 38% support to Biden's 51%. [Historically, Biden’s average lead in Florida among all polls is 7 points].
By a narrow count of 45% to 44%, Biden leads Trump in Texas.
NBC News/Marist Biden leads Trump by 5 points in Arizona, up from a 1-point lead in March.
FiveThirtyEightBiden leads Trump by 8 points in the aggregate of all polls nationally, taking quality and sample size into account. Since late February, when head-to-head polling began and Biden led by 4, Trump has never led.
As always, making these numbers stick hinges on turnout. So from now until election day, your new name for every friend, family member, co-worker, and acquaintance you greet is “November Third.” Trust me, they’ll get used to it. If you don’t believe me, ask my partner November Third, my Aunt November Third, and my neighbors November Third, November Third, and November Third.
CHEERS to a sendoff worthy of the man. After inconveniencing us all by dying much too soon at 80, Congressman and humble civil rights superhero John Lewis is giving the Americans who owe him more than we could ever repay several chances to say farewell. The eulogies began Saturday in Troy, Alabama, where he was born and where he first practiced preaching in front of the captive feathered audience in his father's chicken coop:
Lewis has "come home," Troy Mayor Jason Reeves said at the start of the service Saturday morning in the city where Lewis, a son of sharecroppers, was born in 1940.
1940-2020
The mayor went on to recall the man who rose to become the "conscience of Congress" as having "otherworldly courage." […]
[Sister] Ethel Tyner, recalled how she and her family were all farmers and that Lewis—whom the family called Robert—began preaching at a young age. “When the clouds would come over the sun, he would start singing and preaching," she said. "And there’s a song he would always start with: ‘There’s a dark cloud arising, let’s go home. Let’s go home.'"
Yesterday Congressman Lewis made one last trek across the Edmund Pettus Bridge—likely to be renamed after him—where "I gave a little blood in Selma. But other people gave their lives."
More Lewis honors and eulogies will continue this week in Montgomery, Alabama and Washington, D.C. (he'll lie in state under the Capitol rotunda) before his final service at Ebeneezer Baptist Church and burial next to Lillian in Atlanta Thursday. Republicans, you can limit your words to four simple ones: “Voting Rights Act now.”
CHEERS to the end of the end. It was all over for Tricky Dick 44 years ago today, thanks to a 27-11 vote by the House Judiciary Committee to adopt the first of three articles of impeachment against President Nixon who, said ABC News's Tom Jarrell at the time, was "presumably still in his swim trunks" while on vacation in California when he heard the news. Meanwhile, then-VP Gerald Ford just couldn’t help but play a little game of up-is-downism:
Ford: It's interesting that every Democrat on the committee—north and south—voted for the article. ... It tends to make it a partisan issue.
When Trump is forced to leave in disgrace, he’ll just give the thumbs-up sign, which will look as ridiculously stupid as Dick’s victory signs.
Reporter: Even if one-third of Republicans voted for it?
Ford: Well, the fact that every one of the Democrats voted for it, I think, uh, lends credence that it's a partisan issue, even though some Republicans have deviated.
...said the Republican who later unilaterally exonerated the Republican crook. But, hey, what's a little hypocrisy among friends?
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BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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Kinetic rain is a sculpture in motion installed in July 2012 IN TERMINAL 1 Changi Airport in Singapore pic.twitter.com/KP4BJrJ25U
JEERS to keeping track of America’s fugliest numbers. The Covid-19 world tour marches on (over 16 million cases around the globe now, with 25% of them in the U.S.), and our macabre Monday tradition of maintaining a benchmark of the awfulness for the C&J historical record continues. Let’scheck the most depressing tote board in the world with all due reluctance as the death toll now equals five times the battlefield deaths from our War of Independence:
10 weeks ago: 1.5 million confirmed cases. 90,000 deaths.
5 weeks ago: 2.4 million confirmed cases, 123,000 deaths
Trump courageously dealt with the pandemic over the weekend by golfing.
Last week: 3.8 million confirmed cases, 143,000 deaths
This morning: 4.3 million confirmed cases, 150,000 deaths
Meanwhile the CDC’s new White House-approved recommendations for school openings are out, and you’ll never guess what they say: ”Pack all them kids into all them classrooms or we’ll string you up by all your thumbs. But be safe about it.” Message: they care.
JEERS to hounding the wrong guy. Twenty-four years ago today, domestic right-wing terrorist nut Eric Rudolph detonated a pipe bomb at the Summer Olympic games in Atlanta.
Sculpture in Centennial (Olympic) Park with an indentation of a nail from the July 27, 1996 bombing.
The blast killed one person and injured over a hundred more, but it could've been worse if security guard Richard Jewell hadn’t found the bomb and tried to move people out of harm's way. The hero was later pilloried in the press and by the late-night gaggle (Leno called him the "Una-doofus") when it became known that the FBI considered him a suspect. Then, when his name was officially cleared, they moved on and dumped his reputation by the side of the road like a rodent carcass. Wikipedia reminds us of what the media should've learned:
Jewell's case became an example of the damage that can be done by reporting based on unreliable or incomplete information...
Mr. Lesson From The Past, meet Mr. ADD.
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Ten years ago in C&J: July 27, 2010
JEERS to tossing a cherry on a manure pile and calling it a sundae. In the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, Big Oil says it's cobbling together $1 billion to fund a "rapid response" "company" focusing on cleaning up oil spills up to 10,000 feet underwater. BP, though, declined to participate in the venture, saying they already have a billion-dollar apparatus in place to clean up their messes. It's called their legal department.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to the only way Trump can or should be listened to. Comedian Sarah Cooper once again brings lip-synching to a new level not seen since...well, since the last time she brought lip-synching to a new level. As soon as Trump boasted...and boasted and boasted...about the results of his cognitive abilities test, the world knew this was coming, and she didn’t disappoint:
Just a quick above-the-fold reminder that, as the pandemic and the racial justice movement continue dominating our thoughts, actions, and headlines—especially with President “Look! I’m So Smart I Pointed To A Picture Of An Elephant!” still in charge—Daily Kos is supporting several organizations that are doing critical frontline work on both issues. I've made a point of donating a little bit every week, because these are long-term efforts, and consistent financial support is key to maintaining momentum that results in real progress.
Note: From the Eyewitness News Desk—Every surgeon in the world now admits mask-wearing was all just a big prank perpetrated since the 19th century to break the Guinness world record for longest practical joke. Film and gales of laughter at 11.
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By the Numbers:
15 weeks!
Weeks 'til the general election: 15
Biden-Trump matchup among likely voters in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll released Sunday: 54%-44%
Average Biden lead among suburban voters across all ABC/WaPost polls: 15 points
Percent of Democrats and Independents polled by Quinnipiac who, combined, feel Trump is making the pandemic situation worse: 79%
Percent chance that "Joe Biden would destroy our fossil fuel industry," according to Vice President Mike Pence over the weekend, apparently campaigning for the election of Joe Biden: 100%
Per-glass price at my front-yard lemonade stand: $199.95
CHEERS to parental guidance. There's a reason the moms and dads of PFLAG get the loudest applause at LGBTQ parades every year: nobody messes with their kids and gets away with it. That's also true of the Black Lives Matter movement, most recently exemplified in Portland, Oregon over the weekend when a new group marched to the front lines to confront Trump's unidentified jackbooted thugs who'd been kidnapping their kids in unmarked vehicles and terrorizing them:
Dozens of women wearing yellow linked arms to form a protective "wall of moms" around Black Lives Matter protesters in Portland, Oregon, on Sunday as the protesters clashed with federal law enforcement.
Wall of Moms in action. A movement within the movement is born.
Video from the scene showed crowds chanting “Feds stay clear, moms are here!" and "Feds go home!" before protesters toppled a fence erected around the federal courthouse. Federal agents fired back with what appeared to be tear gas and flash bangs, the video showed. […]
Some of the women were there because their children had been tear-gassed in earlier protests over recent weeks, Davis said. “There’s definitely some parents and teens out there together,” he said.
I don’t want to say they've turned the tide yet, but at last count they'd successfully sent over a dozen of Trump’s American Gestapo to their rooms without supper.
CHEERS to Christmas in July…and August…and even September! I don’t know if you heard, but the president promised last Thursday that he was going to ride through all the towns in his Air Force One Horse Open Perv Sleigh and give presents to all the peasants, says AP writer Jill Colvin:
Trump says he'll be announcing "many exciting things" over the next 8 weeks, "things that nobody has even contemplated, thought about, thought possible," with "levels of detail and levels of thought that a lot of people believed very strongly we didn't have in this country."
C&J promises to keep you apprised over the next eight weeks as we open each morning's little door on our Many Exciting Things Advent Calendar to see what un-contemplatable goodie he's left inside for us. I plucked out the morsel for Day 5, and all I can say is, don’t eat it. It's not chocolate.
CHEERS to comeuppance. 46 years ago today, on July 21, 1974, the House Judiciary Committee approved two articles of impeachment against Richard "Okay, I Guess I Am A Crook After All" Nixon. That same day, he was giving a speech at a private home in Bel Air, California. Let's see... He talked about the host's fine tent. He talked about the struggle between Greece and Turkey. He talked about his trip to Egypt. He talked about some former administration officials. And then he toasted his audience with a fine whine:
"You wonder sometimes, and I am often asked, you know, how do you really take the burden of the Presidency, particularly when at times it seems to be under very, very grievous assault.
Let me say, it isn't new for it to be under assault, because since the time we came into office for 5 years, we have had problems.
Buh bye.
There have been people marching around the White House when we were trying to bring the war to an end, and we have withstood that, and we will withstand the problems of the future."
He forgot to add four crucial words: "...for 19 more days." Silly goose.
� Rex Chapman�� (@RexChapman) July 18, 2020
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END BRIEF SANITY BREAK
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CHEERS to an end to all this nonsense, maybe? Take that you dastardly coronavirus! Your days might be numbered, now that the sleep-deprived researchers at Oxford University and drug maker AstraZeneca have hit on a possible vaccine under the brand name Possiblevaccineitol:
The trial results found that it generated two "strong" immune responses: the production of both antibodies and T cells, which find and attack virus cells.
One small problem: God’s not returning our calls.
"We’re getting both sides of the immune system stimulated and that is fairly unusual for vaccines," Adrian Hill, director of the Jenner Institute at Oxford University, told NBC News.
Even better, they say the stimulative effect increased significantly when patients were given the vaccine plus a subscription to Pornhub.
CHEERS to purty rhymin' wurds. On this date in 1893, Katherine Lee Bates—a college-educated, latte-slurping Cape Cod liberal elitist—wrote the poem America the Beautiful after visiting an inspiring spot:
One day some of the other teachers and I decided to go on a trip to 14,000-foot Pikes Peak. We hired a prairie wagon. Near the top we had to leave the wagon and go the rest of the way on mules. I was very tired. But when I saw the view, I felt great joy. All the wonder of America seemed displayed there, with the sea-like expanse.
It was later set to the hymn "Materna" by Samuel Ward. But only because Snoop Dogg wanted ten million bucks for the rights to "We Just Wanna Party with You."
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Ten years ago in C&J: July 21, 2010
JEERS to the Big Snooker. I don't know which is worse—that Andrew Breitbart and Fox News are as dishonest and disgustingly amateurish as they are, or that Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack and the White House are so hardheaded that they can't walk back an injustice even after they find out they've been totally punk'd. At least the NAACP can see the forest for the sleaze:
The fact is Ms. Sherrod did help the white farmers [the Spooners] mentioned in her speech. They personally credit her with helping to save their family farm. Moreover, this incident and the lesson it prompted occurred more that 20 years before she went to work for USDA.
The Shirley Sherrod firing demonstrated with eye-rolling frustration just how quickly the Obama administration could cave to right-wing smears. They eventually wised up.
Finally, she was sharing this account as part of a story of transformation and redemption. In the full video, Ms.Sherrod says she realized that the dislocation of farmers is about "haves and have nots." "It’s not just about black people, it’s about poor people," says Sherrod in the speech. "We have to get to the point where race exists but it doesn’t matter." This is a teachable moment, for activists and for journalists.
Shirley Sherrod doesn’t deserve to be rehired. She deserves to be rehired, promoted, given a raise and her own corner office, taken out to lunch, and given one helluvan apology. And then President Obama needs to reunite the Spooners with Sherrod at the White House to drive home the point she made in her speech last March. And since we're making lists this morning, I'd like a triple cheeseburger and a biggie fry. No pickle.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to Pluto: up close and personal..again. I have to keep reminding myself that back in grade school our favorite dwarf planet was always described as our most distant, but beyond that no one really knew much about it or what it looked like. Well, it's been five years since the New Horizons probe flew by and snapped some cool Polaroids, and now NASA has an update with some of their new discoveries:
» Pluto’s heart—one of the signature features New Horizons observed on approach and imaged in high resolution during the flyby—is a vast, million-square-mile nitrogen glacier. … Cold and far-flung as Pluto may be, its icy “heart” still beats to a daily, rhythmic drum that drives Pluto’s atmosphere and climate much in the way Greenland and Antarctica help control Earth’s climate.
» New Horizons data from the basin indicated there may be a heavier mass beneath it that played a part, and scientists suspect that the heavier mass is a water ocean. “That was an astonishing discovery,” Tuttle said. “It would make Pluto an elusive ‘ocean world,’ in the same vein as Europa, Enceladus and Titan.
Also: we now know that every 236 days it goes "Arf.”
» Zoom in close to the surface of Sputnik Planitia and you’ll see something unlike anywhere else in the solar system: a network of strange polygonal shapes in the ice, each at least 6 miles (10 kilometers) across, churning on the surface of the glacier. Although they resemble cells under a microscope, these aren’t; they’re evidence of Pluto’s internal heat trying to escape from underneath the glacier, and forming bubbles of upwelling and downwelling nitrogen ice, something like a hot lava lamp.
» [I]f there’s one abnormal thing about the Pluto system, it’s that neither Pluto nor Charon have many small craters—they’re almost all big.
After scrutinizing the surface of Pluto from every angle for five years, NASA now says it knows what it's going to send there next: a dermatologist.
Have a tolerable Tuesday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
Police used drones to monitor nudity in the Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool
Note: Wash your hands. Now wash 'em again. And again. Faster! Faster! Hotter! Hotter! Feel the burn! And again! And again! Okay. Good job, team. Now hit the showers.
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By the Numbers:
118 days!!!
Days 'til the general election: 118
Year that whipping posts stopped being used in Delaware: 1952
Estimated number of adults in the U.S. who have been subjected to some form of"ex-gay" conversion therapy, according to UCLA's Williams Institute: 698,000
Percent chance that the White House condemned the Confederate flag when asked to do so during Monday's press briefing: 0%
Number of new signups for Disney+ last weekend, when Hamilton dropped: 513,323
Length of the 2 hour, 40 minute Hamilton if it were sung at the pace of other Broadway shows: 4-6 hours
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Mid-weekRapture Index: 184 (including 4 leadership vacuums and 1 concrete Christ SAVED by the anti-Christ). Soul Protection Factor 24 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
CHEERS to cause for concern. Maine Senator Susan Collins' brows are furrowed good 'n deep this week, after getting the news that her reelection prospects are circling the drain along with her reputation. She's trailing likely Democratic challenger Sara Gideon (our primary election is next week) by four points, and here's why, according to gold-standard pollster PPP:
Collins continues to be unpopular, with only 36% of voters approving of the job she’s doing to 55% who disapprove.
Feel the love.
Collins has been an electoral powerhouse over the years because of strong appeal beyond the Republican base but that’s over for her—she has just an 8% approval rating with Clinton voters now to 87% who disapprove of her.
Even just over a year ago she still had 32% approval from Clinton voters but her impeachment vote was the end of that.
Democrats have become a massive voting bloc up here, with 40,000 new registrations over the last four years, now outnumbering Republicans and the non-affiliated for the first time in a generation. But it gets better. This is what you call eleven-dimensional chess:
It may turn out that by bringing impeachment forward Nancy Pelosi won Democrats control of the Senate because of the way Collins’ vote has effectively shut off the bipartisan appeal she had for years.
Remember how Daily Kos delivered 10,000 roses to Pelosi when she reclaimed the Speaker's gavel? If things go according to plan, Chuck Schumer's gonna owe her a million.
CHEERS to today’s edition of This One Might Send Him Right Over The Edge. The Lincoln Project hits Donald Trump where all gaslighting tyrants are most vulnerable: his brain’s gigantic, throbbing paranoia lobe...
This has been today’s edition of This One Might Send Him Right Over The Edge.
JEERS to going out with a bing. Oh dear...when you're a fierce and legendary general who becomes President of the United States, it's gotta be a little embarrassing to die from eating bad fruit. But that's what happened 170 years ago this week to "#12" Zachary Taylor. I believe his last words were: "Bad cherries??? No effing way. Seriously, guys, this is a joke, right?" Sorry, dude—life is just a bowl of you-know-whats.
The last cherry stem tied by Taylor with his tongue is currently on display in the Smithsonian’s “Ick!” wing.
Pay your respects here. And then try to remember who succeeded him without going to the Google or the Wiki. (Hint: it wasn't Millard Fillmore. Oh, wait, yes it was. Crap...I meant to write Gerald Ford. Now you know why I’m not a professor.)
CHEERS to pulling the plug. Wow. This has not been a good week for the fossil fuel planet killers. First we found out that the Duke/Dominion Energy gas pipeline that would've threatened Appalachia was scrapped because of those meddling environmentalists and "economic factors." And now we find out that the Dakota Access pipeline has to be shut down and drained:
The rare shutdown of an operating pipeline marks a major win for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and environmental groups that have fought fiercely for years against the oil pipeline.
Victory finally comes to the Dakota pipeline protesters who flooded D.C. in 2017.
In its decision, the United States District Court for the District of Columbia vacated an easement granted by the US Army Corps of Engineers that allowed Dakota Access to build a segment of the pipeline beneath Lake Oahe in North Dakota and South Dakota. The court had previously ruled the Corps violated the National Environmental Policy Act when it granted the easement because it had failed to produce an Environmental Impact Statement. […]
"Today is a historic day for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and the many people who have supported us in the fight against the pipeline," said Mike Faith, chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, said in a statement. "This pipeline should have never been built here. We told them that from the beginning."
The environmental impact statement will take over a year to write, which will be more than enough time for President Biden to take the oath, scrap the whole thing, and call it a day. And what about the emptied-out pipeline itself? Two words: water slide!!!
JEERS to unhelpful distractions. I knew this would happen. I've been saying since the beginning that when equal employment rights became the law of the land for LGBT Americans in all 50 states, the godless homosexuals would shirk the hurricane-making part of their gay agenda. Sure enough, over an entire month of hurricane season has gone by and check out the latest map from the National Hurricane Center:
Peaceful. Placid. No sign of mayhem anywhere. Just some buried pirate treasure on the Georgia-South Carolina border. Very disappointing. Consider this your written warning, gays: if this serenity lasts much longer, we're gonna take away your toaster ovens.
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Ten years ago in C&J: July 8, 2010
JEERS to milestones we'd rather forget...but good luck with that! As of today the oil has been gushing from the Deepwater Horizon well for 80 days. Nothing particularly significant about that milestone except for the fact that it perfectly matches the number of times per day the average American mutters, "Fuck you, BP." The latest news from the gulf has nothing to do with the current gusher, but rather the shocking number of "temporarily abandoned" (i.e. not capped too tightly) wells that could lead to 3,500 additional gushers. But have no fear, Congress is on it:
[T]he General Accountability Office, which investigates for Congress, warned...that leaks from offshore abandoned wells could cause an "environmental disaster." The report stated: "MMS does not have an overall inspection strategy for targeting its limited resources to ensuring that wells are properly plugged and abandoned."
You might be interested to know that the above GAO report was issued in 1994. And the punchline, courtesy of AP: "The GAO report suggested MMS set up an inspection program, but the agency never did." Course not. Too busy organizing their Christmas parties.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to blowing this popsicle stand. Every time you go outside on a clear night you’re doing yourself a grave disservice if you don’t lookup and nearly choke on your face mask as you realize that the universe up there is pretty spectacular. The elves at NASA are also aware of this, so they always let us in on the big celestial events for the month. Here’s a look at July’s skywatching tips, including Mars and Jupiter pulling down their pants and mooning us, oh ha ha so funny:
By the way, the first possible launch date for the Perseverance Rover and its personal helicopter arrives in 22 days, on July 30th. Destination: Mars. And if all goes according to plan, Trump will follow the trail of hamberders into the cockpit and then everyone at NASA will share the Nobel Prize in Medicine for ridding the planet of its biggest parasite. (I’ve won six already, and I can tell you from experience: skip the ceremony and make a beeline for the Swedish-meatball buffet before King Harald cleans it out.)
Have a heliocentric humpday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today's Shameless C&J Testimonial
Trump's misreading the map, looking for Electoral College votes in the Cheers and Jeers kiddie pool
George Washington may have been first in the hearts of his countrymen, but Donald Trump has accomplished a lot more firsts during his presidency, believe me...
First to enter office believing that America isn’t a great country
First to never come close to majority approval in polling averages of the American people
First to lie to the American people at a rate of over 6,000 times a year
First to exchange love letters with the Butcher of North Korea
First to take Russia's side over America's on virtually everything, including tacit approval of secret Russian bounties on the heads of U.S. troops overseas
First to spend most of his presidency watching TV and golfing
Continued...
First to be elected for his business acumen, despite having lost more money than virtually any other person in American history
First to recommend bleach injections to stop a killer virus pandemic
First to do special favors for countries and corporations who spend money at his golf and sex resorts
First to have over twenty credible allegations of sexual assault or outright rape against him
He’s so proud.
First to edit (inaccurately) an official hurricane prediction map with a Sharpie
First to publicly defend Nazis as "very fine people" and approve of Americans shouting “White power! White power!”
First to snort crushed-up Adderall to (futilely) keep from mentally falling apart
First to break more commandments than any other president while refusing to ask forgiveness but being forgiven anyway by his religious base who believes he was literally chosen by God
First to base his policies on what three dimwit cable TV morning show hosts say
First to blow off his daily security briefings
First to paint his face orange and his lips and eye sockets pink
First to claim he "hires only the best people" while having the highest turnover rate of any president by a mile
First to walk around in public with toilet paper stuck to his shoe
Swell legacy. Suck on that, George.
And now, our feature presentation...
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Cheers and Jeers for Monday, June 29, 2020
Note: Here's the posting schedule for the week: Regular old crap through Thursday. Then on Friday evening, around the same time Trump's fireworks are setting the forests around Mount Rushmore on fire, we'll step into our wayback machine for the annual reading of some really old crap: the very first C&J from July 4, 1776. Then we'll be off the following Monday. Please adjust your space-time continuum accordingly.
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By the Numbers:
Homework’s due in 5 days!!!
Days 'til Independence Day: 5
Biden-Trump head-to-head numbers in Florida per Fox News polling: 49% - 40%
Biden-Trump head-to-head numbers in Florida among Hispanics: 52% - 35%
Public approval, per New York Times-Siena College polling, of the way Trump is handling race relations in the wake of the George Floyd murder at the hands of killer cops: 33%
Rank of the mid-Atlantic States (NY, NJ, PA), New England states, and Pacific states among those with the highest rate of mask compliance, according to Axios-Ipsos polling: #1, #2, #3
Percent chance that the south central region KY, TN, AL and MS are the area with the worst mask compliance: 100%
JEERS to keeping count. The Covid-19 world tour marches on (10 million cases around the globe now, with 25% of them in the U.S.), and our macabre Monday tradition of maintaining a benchmark of the awfulness for the C&J historical record continues. Let’scheck the most depressing tote board in the world with all due reluctance as cases spiral out of control in Republican-governed states like Florida and Texas because, true to form, they put money over lives:
5 weeks ago: 1.7 million confirmed cases, 99,807 deaths
PandemicFact rates this claim: TRUE.
Last week: 2.4 million confirmed cases, 123,000 deaths
This morning: 2.6 million confirmed cases, 128,000 deaths
Late last week Fortress Trump held its first Covid briefing in two months. Said beleaguered infectious disease specialist Anthony Fauci to the unmasked masses who believe mask-wearing is a Soros-funded mad dog plot to fill your lungs with chemtrails:
"You have an individual responsibility to yourself, but you have a societal responsibility. We have to realize that we are part of the process. We can be either part of the solution or part of the problem."
"Yeah, that’s great we’ll get right on it," said the Trump cultists as they briefly looked up from their pamphlet Being Part of the Problem for Dummies.
JEERS to looking ahead…poorly. President Trump really, really wants a second term in office. And, by god, he knows exactly what he wants to accomplish to cement his legacy as our greatest president in history. Behold the future vision of the world's most futuristic vision guy, as revealed to the American public late last week on Fox News:
"Well, one of the things that will be really great, the word experience is still good, I always say talent is more important than experience I've always said that, but the word experience is a very important word a very important meaning. I never did this before, I never slept over in Washington I was in Washington I think 17 times all of a sudden I'm president of the United States you know the story I'm riding down Pennsylvania Avenue with our First Lady and I say 'This is great' but I didn’t know very many people in Washington it wasn't my thing I was from Manhattan, from New York, now I know everybody and I have great people in the administration.
You make some mistakes like you know an idiot like Bolton, all he wanted to do was drop bombs on everybody, you don't have to drop bombs on everybody you don't have to kill people."
And that reminds me: the National Association of Suicidal Grammarians will be gathering this evening to diagram that paragraph. Doors open at 7. Tonight's special: buy one cyanide capsule, get one free.
CHEERS to Ol' Shortypants. James Madison, who at 5'4" holds the distinction of being the U.S. president with the lowest center of gravity, died in Montpelier, Virginia 184 years ago yesterday.
Also in Madison’s corner: a rather awesome missus.
He was the chief architect of the United States Constitution, and today he's rolling in his grave over the GOP's manhandling of it. The book Rating the Presidents (a survey of 700 historians and political analysts) sums up his legacy as one of "courageous leadership as president, guided by the principles of the Constitution, which he played so large a part in framing. All Americans owe him a great debt of gratitude." Pay your respects here. But don't tell him that Republicans are now using his sacred founding document as toilet paper. He’s got enough problems as head of the Dead Presidents Condo Association. (“Dammit, Polk. For the last time, get your stuff out of Calvin’s storage unit. and quit using LBJ’s parking space.”)
CHEERS to cool science. You think Earth is a bit turbulent these days? Get a load 'o this:
A whopping 7.5 billion light-years from Earth, two black holes, each about the size of Long Island, rapidly spun around each other several times per second before smashing together in a cataclysmic explosion that sent shockwaves through the Universe.
Neighbor Gladys Higginbotham caught the collision on her smartphone.
Normally, violent unions like this are dark events, but astronomers think they saw a flare of light emerge from this celestial dance—potentially the first time light has ever been seen from black holes merging.
According to the researchers, the black holes are currently exchanging insurance information and have already been booked to settle their case on Judge Judy.
CHEERS to hittin' the road. Sixty-four years ago today, radical socialist (and probably Kenya-born) President Dwight Eisenhower signed the controversial Federal Highway Act, which authorized the construction of 42,500 miles of freeway from coast to coast. It wasn't an easy thing to accomplish:
Between 1954 and 1956, there were several failed attempts to pass a national highway bill through the Congress.
The main controversy over the highway construction was the apportionment of the funding between the Federal Government and the states. Undaunted, the President renewed his call for a "modern, interstate highway system" in his 1956 State of the Union Address.
Thanks, Ike!
Within a few months, after considerable debate and amendment in the Congress, The Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1956 emerged from the House-Senate conference committee. ... During his recovery from a minor illness, Eisenhower signed the bill into law at Walter Reed Army Medical Center on the 29th of June.
Soon after completion, parents got their first earful of "Are we there yet?? Are we there yet?? Are we there yet??" God bless America.
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Ten years ago in C&J: June 29, 2010
CHEERS to a fine reception. Wow, I was very impressed with yesterday's proceedings. It was civil, cordial, friendly, and when it was all over there was much back-slapping by both liberals and conservatives alike. I almost couldn’t believe it. I'm speaking, of course, of John Paul Stevens' final day at the Supreme Court:
The 90-year-old Stevens had the last word, telling the packed courtroom, "It has been an honor and a privilege to share custodial responsibility for a great institution with the eight of you and with ten of your predecessors."
Farewell, sir. Thanks for hangin' stickin’ around through the dark days of Bush-Cheney until the cavalry arrived. Now go on...your tennis court is waiting.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to achieving the impossible. John Bolton’s book is 500 (or whatever) pages of opportunistic Trump shaming that should’ve been presented at the impeachment hearings, but is instead stuffed between two covers so the former mad bomber can pad his bank account. But i gotta say, Stephen Colbert thought of a valid way to make it palatable: two Boltons for the price of one...
