How’s that for an A to Z headline?
Good morning from my office between two stadiums and a concert venue in Seattle. It’s just about 0600, and I’ve been here for about forty-five minute just going through the morning news to post here. Egads, what a mess…
What do I plan on doing today, you ask? A lot of things. The problem is, I can plan all I want, but shit happens at a rapid pace around this joint, so who knows what I will be doing six minutes from now? This is why it takes me roughly three hours to plaster this mess together here and post it. I am liable to be called away at any moment to handle something.
Headlines That Caught My Eye This Morning
Item 1: MAGA OUT VOTED – House passes $95.3B aid package for Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan
A majority of the US House of Representatives went with the majority of Americans by voting for a series of aid packages to help Ukraine defend itself from the aggression of Russia. They also passed another military aid bill for Israel, for the purpose of defending itself from attacks from others.
For “some” unhinged reason, about half of the House Republicans voted against this particular bill.
We all know what that “some” unhinged reason is, don’t we? It goes by the name, Donald J. Trump and his infatuation with being accepted by Vladimir Putin in such a way that he gets rewarded by being allowed to put his name on a hotel in Moscow.
One of Trump’s biggest cheerleaders in the House, “Moscow Marjorie Taylor Greene“, and she is downright LIVID at Speaker Mike Johnson right now, and she’s too stupid to really understand why, other than Donald Trump didn’t want this bill passed. That’s the extent of her curiosity.
Item 2: The Kremlin is Furious
I heard on NPR this morning on the way in here that the Kremlin came out yesterday and was ‘worried’ that this aid will now “destroy” Ukraine, because Russia will now have no other choice but to consider nuclear weapons to win in Ukraine.
This sounds more like desperation, to me.
In the six months that un-American fucktwats like “Moscow Marjorie” have deliberately tied up this much-needed aid to Ukraine, Russia has been pounding the dog shit out of Ukraine and taking up more and more territory after completely destroying it. THIS is on the heads of all of you who have deliberately allowed the former Soviet Union to attempt to reconstitute itself. A pox is on all of your houses.
Item 3: The House votes for possible TikTok ban in the US, but don’t expect the app to go away anytime soon
I suspect that this will turn out to be about as unconstitutional as it comes. Unless the US can demonstrate that there is a ‘national security issue’ that exists with this particular platform that doesn’t exist on any of the other ones, then I don’t see how even this rabidly-Right Supreme Court can allow this ban to take hold. It would be a blatant violation of the First Amendment.
Secondly, Tik Tok — for all its perceived uselessness — is extremely popular by the majority of tech-savvy Americans who are into the Social Media thing. In other words, every generation that has come after the Boomer Generation. (there are still a lot of us Boomers who still can’t program the VCR they haven’t given up yet, and who still haven’t quite figured out this “internet thing”.
Biden has come out in favor of this Tik Tok ban — even though the idiot is currently using Tik Tok in his campaign to get to the ‘younger kids’ who voted for him in 2020.
It’s no Super-8. Joe…
I think this is what is basically scaring a LOT of people: the fact that Tik Tok has the capability of passing a LOT of dis- and mis-information to a lot of people without these people even realizing it.
The Game Stop incident was the wakeup scare that got the attention of a LOT of partisan people. This ban thing really has ZERO to do with the customer data — that’s a red herring. If customer data was REALLY the issue behind this Tik Tok ban, they’d be trying to ban ALL of the social media platforms, along with every grocery store, box store, and any other business that collects data from its customers and sells it to anyone who wants to buy it — including our own NSA.
Item 5: Trump Fumes as Judge Orders Him to Sit Like a Dog
In just reading the headline here, I get the massive bias of the author.
“Sit like a dog”. Seriously? Just telling a defendant — or anyone else in the courtroom — to sit back down until told when to leave is not unusual at all. Courts do not allow people to just mill around and come and go as they please. Until a court is adjourned, you are to remain seated at all times unless told otherwise. It has nothing to do with being treated like anything.
Item 6: Trump’s New York trial is knocking him off balance
By balance, you mean he can’t just take a morning or afternoon nap after eating his Mickey Ds and watching Fox news?
Trump isn’t often forced to face his own actions like his is — and will be — facing over the next several months. He’s never really been held accountable for anything. Sure, a lot of his actions have costed him a LOT of money in the long run, but he never really felt it because the cost was a mere drop in the water compared to the amount of money his bad actions made for him. Civil fines for Donald Trump were just the cost of him “doing business”.
But now suddenly, he’s personally effected, by having his very liberty in jeopardy. This is something he can’t just buy himself out of, not without taking a conviction or two on his record.
I mentioned the other day that in all of these ninety-something felony charges he’s facing, that he could have spent a lot less time and money trying to obtain a plea bargain that would boil everything down to one or two felony charges that would have netted him maybe a couple of months on home confinement and an ankle bracelet. Quite possibly, not even that.
But that would have entailed him having to ADMIT to doing something wrong, and that’s the LAST thing Donald Trump will ever do: Admit he has done anything wrong in his life. ANYTHING.
Item 7: Wave of ‘narco chemical terrorism’ as cartel may soon ‘drop fentanyl from drones’
From Amazon?
We’ve had a few complex-looking homeless erections around here as well. I used to drive past on at the junction of I-5 and I-90 in Seattle that looked like a large garden shed complete with a door with glass inserts, rafters and a roof. It even had a gutter, a walk way and what looked like a flower bed. All it was missing was the white picket fence.
Item 9: Gold dust spewing volcano leaves boffins baffled as it leaks crystals worth £5k each day
There is nothing worse than a baffled boffin.
So they are all smooth ‘down there’?
Need help with substance use disorder or mental health issues? In the U.S., call 800-662-HELP (4357) for the SAMHSA National Helpline.
Recommended Podcasts for Today
Radio Lab – WNYC Studios
The Daily – The New York Times
The Journal – The Wall Street Journal
Post Reports – The Washington Post
Global News Podcast – BBC News
Memes From the Meme Box
In 1972, we had “Hanoi Jane” Fonda. In 2024 we have “Moscow Marjorie”
Anyone remember “full service”, that included car mechanics?
Note my eyes…
I’ve become Super Old Man
What, this isn’t the story you learned in grade school? You mean they were wrong?
That kid looks rather evil.
Only ONE?
I used to live in Mount Vernon…
I wish I had the opportunity to go to a “Music and Arts” high school
It would have been even a greater blast to grow up with these two
No Sunday would be complete without this meme…
