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Yet Another Quote For Today

Tom Nichols, writer for The Atlantic, on The Felon:

"Paradoxically, however, [The Felon]'s reckless venality is a reason for hope. [The Felon] has the soul of a fascist but the mind of a disordered child. He will likely be surrounded by terrible but incompetent people. All of them can be beaten: in court, in Congress, in statehouses around the nation, and in the public arena. America is a federal republic, and the states—at least those in the union that will still care about democracy—have ways to protect their citizens from a rogue president. Nothing is inevitable, and democracy will not fall overnight."

There will be methods to contain The Felon, even though the GOP will goosestep for Hair Furor every chance they get.

[source]

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Quote Of The Day

What did Liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I'll tell you what they did. Liberals got women the right to vote. Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty. Liberals ended segregation. Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act. Liberals created Medicare. Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act. What did Conservatives do? They opposed Liberals on every one of those things, every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won't work because I will pick that label up and wear it as a badge of honor." ~ Lawrence O'Donnell

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Marching Orders For Democrats

Jonathan V. Last:

First: Do not help Republicans. Not in any way. On any issue. Republicans can't pass a budget, or raise the debt ceiling? Tough luck. Do not provide them any bailout votes on any issue. Period, the end.¹

Second: Make Donald Trump own every bad outcome that happens, anywhere in the world while paying special attention to areas where Republicans are particularly vulnerable. Like housing and Ukraine.

BUT WILL THEY DO IT?

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Into The Cornfield

From Palmer Report:

There's a particularly chilling episode of the old Twilight Zone TV series called "It's a Good Life," a Rod Serling teleplay of a Jerome Bixby short story. It goes like this: A monster lives in a small Ohio village. He is an ordinary-appearing six year old boy named Anthony with extraordinary abilities. His every whim has absolute power. Anthony has caused everyone in the United States to "go away" because they displease him. Everyone else still alive in the village must be nice to him or he will "send them into the cornfield," a euphemism for making them disappear. Anthony can read everyone's thoughts, so everyone must always be thinking exaggeratedly happy thoughts.

The story is a metaphor for a very real existential question that was new to the world when it was first broadcast. What do we do when a madman, a child, a person of no conscience and complete indifference to human suffering, gains total control of the world? How do we behave? How do we keep him from sending us into the cornfield?

Those are questions that are relevant to Americans and citizens of the world today. For the second time in human history, a vindictive monster with hypersensitive feelings is about to be handed the nuclear codes of the most powerful nation on earth, the only true superpower. This monster isn't a six year old boy, he's a stupid, vindictive, hateful old man who will enter his 80th year in six months. The existential question we have is, how is America and the rest of the world supposed to behave? What is going to happen to any one of us if we incur his capricious and arbitrary and easily-triggered wrath?

We are about to learn the answer. Filled with hubris and stupidity, Donald Trump's recent campaign of sabre-rattling at America's allies has elicited some expected responses. While appeasing and flattering and accommodating America's enemies, the man who ran on a promise of no more wars suddenly wants war with Mexico, Canada, Greenland (and its possessor Denmark) and Panama. So far those nations will have none of it. But what harm will America's "Anthony" do to them for their failure to kowtow to him? Will he send them into the cornfield? If so, what form will that take?

Canada's soon-to-exit prime minister Pierre Trudeau says there's not a "snowball's chance in hell" that his country will join America as its fifty-first state. Denmark avers that Greenland is once again not for sale. In response to Trump's claim that the Gulf of Mexico should be rebranded the "Gulf of America," Claudia Sheinbaum, the forthright president of Mexico, jokingly suggested that the US territory that was once part of Mexico should be renamed "Mexican America."

But all joking aside, there could be real world consequences for defying Trump. We already know that the harm he promises to inflict on others is more than theoretical. In his criminal mishandling of the Covid pandemic, Trump withheld PPEs and breathalysers from blue states. In the aftermath of Hurricane Maria Trump denied millions of dollars of aid to Puerto Rico simply because he disliked the mayor of San Juan and because many of the people of the country were brown. Trump deprived his former fixer Michael Cohen of his Constitutional rights and locked him away in the cornfield of solitary confinement merely because he planned to write a book.

This time around, with no voices of sanity to restrain him and no law to answer to, what harm will Trump inflict and on whom? Who is he going to hurt? What lives will he ruin, merely because he can't handle an insult? Who or what nations will get thrown into the proverbial cornfield? We'll learn the answer soon enough.

It's not the job of the president of the United States to hurt people. It's his sworn duty to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States" by faithfully executing his office. Donald Trump has already announced that he plans to fail at his job. He prefers to hurt people instead.

Of course, a man who is constitutionally disallowed from taking office is by definition disqualified from preserving, protecting or defending that Constitution. But a man as hateful and vindictive as Trump can and will do a lot of damage to a lot of people. MAGA is about to find out that damage will extend to many of them. I hope he throws the whole bloody lot of them into the goddamn cornfield.

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FUCK MUSK. FUCK TRUMP.

And then there's 45…

From Palmer Report:

In the week that my city of Los Angeles has been burning, good people of all stripes have come out of the woodwork to help out. Firefighters have arrived here from places as far away as Canada, Mexico, and Oregon. People are lining up around the block to donate food, necessities, and even pet supplies. It's a reminder that there are a lot of good people out there with good hearts.

Then there's Donald Trump, who has spent the entire crisis doing nothing but lying about the crisis. He's dishonestly attacked the Governor of California and Mayor of Los Angeles, who have both been doing a fantastic job. He's spread lies about the water situation here. Trump has, as usual, done nothing but make things worse.

Now Trump is adding insult to injury by posting an image of the Hollywood Hills burning, with the "HOLLYWOOD" sign changed to "TRUMP WAS RIGHT." I don't know what to say about this, other than shut up, you stupid asshole. No one here wants your input, Donald. Remember when you threatened awhile back to let California burn because no one here voted for you? And now all you can offer is a fake picture of the fire with one of our cherished landmarks defaced with your name? I'll stop writing before I curse anymore, but Donald Trump needs to SHUT UP.

Yesterday I saw fire trucks roll by from the Albany Fire Department and the Harrisburg Fire Department. These folks drove their trucks thousands of miles to come to our city of Los Angeles and help fight our fires. The response from all around the nation (and the world) has been nothing short of wonderful. That is, of course, with the exception of Trump and his fellow slime balls.

We've got Donald Trump making up nonsensical lies about our Governor and our Mayor, while spewing childlike gibberish about how water supposedly works. We've also got Trump posting fake imagery of the Hollywood sign on fire with the words changed to "TRUMP WAS RIGHT."

We've also got "Speaker" Mike Johnson publicly threatening to withhold federal aid from Los Angeles for political reasons. This is even as Elon Musk posts an endless manic stream of rubber room level insane tweets about the entire situation. These people are simply disgusting.

Simply put, there's a time for decency. We've got all these firefighters from around the nation pouring into Los Angeles, and none of them are making their assistance conditional on any political leanings. Nor does anyone in Los Angeles care about the personal political leanings of these firefighters. These are simply decent people offering to help us, and we're unconditionally grateful to them. That goes the same for all the people around the nation who have been donating to the Red Cross in Los Angeles and so on. Americans are simply helping Americans, the same way we California liberals spring into gear to help whenever there's a disaster in a red state. It's simply about decency.

It's the precise opposite of what we're seeing from Trump and his Republican allies. They're reading the room very, very wrong. The American people do not want to see anyone playing politics right now. As usual, Trump is blowing it. And as usual, his Republican Party is going right along with his mistake. If that's how they want to play it, fine. We'll use it as fuel for destroying them in the midterms.