10 Years and Never Bored With All The Winning
It's a well-established fact by now that C&J's "Who won the week" poll, introduced ten years ago this week, is considered America's 500-pound gorilla of weekly polls. Every Friday we pluck a gaggle of worthy candidates from the previous seven-day news cycle and affix them to their place of honor on the front page.
I can't remember what inspired me to create the first one, but today it's a feel-good feature that stands shoulder-to-shoulder with such time-honored American traditions as stickball, setting pies on window sills to cool, and following competent and popular Democratic presidents with Republican shitbags. As you contemplate tonight's candidates, enjoy a recap of some notable past winners during the Trump administration. It’s a reminder that, bleak as things seem, the resistance is alive and kicking:
February 3, 2017 The tens of thousands of Americans who took to the nation's airports to protest the "Muslim travel ban" on already-vetted men, women and children from seven countries
March 24 The Resistance, for squeezing Republican congress members so hard they abandoned their attempt to gut the Affordable Care Act
April 28 The 'March for Science' participants, who joined in from every continent to add fuel to the resistance movement
May 19 The Justice Department, for appointing former FBI Director Robert Mueller as a special counsel to investigate the various Russia-Trump scandals
June 2 The U.S. states and cities that have vowed to honor the goals of the Paris Climate Agreement
July 21 The beneficiaries of the ACA, as Republican infighting and incompetence scuttle Trumpcare 2.0
September 29 Democrats in the Senate & The Resistance, who stopped Trumpcare 3.0 before it even got to the floor
October 6 San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz, for working 24/7 to save her citizens and being a thorn in Trump’s side over his slow response to hurricane Maria
November 3 Team Mueller, for delivering indictments to Paul Manafort and Rick Gates, and revealing a guilty plea by George Papadopoulos
November 17 The courageous women who have stepped forward to tell their stories of sexual abuse, including those involving Alabama senate candidate Roy Moore and underage girls
December 15 Doug Jones, for his miracle senate victory in Alabama
January 26 The millions who took part in Women’s March 2.0---in some cities turnout exceeded last year’s events
February 23 The #NeverAgain movement, as students from Stoneman Douglas HS and millions of student supporters fan out on social media and in person to demand action on gun control
March 23 Britain’s Channel Four, for their bombshell investigative reporting on the Mercer family-funded sleazebags at Cambridge Analytica
The tradition continues tonight, and I’ve left a special gift for you, so read ALL the choices carefully. Go vote, then c'mon down and splash in the kiddie pool. Tonight it’s filled with warm Cadbury goop and coconut nests. Great exfoliant.
Your west coast-friendly edition of Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Cheers and Jeers for Friday, March 30, 2018
Note: Due to Billy's new religious objection to working on Monday, there will be no C&J on Monday. But because he believes in redemption, he will rise again to post on Tuesday. Your lights may flicker for a few seconds---this is normal.
---God, via Snapchat
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By the Numbers:
Weeks 'til the start of the Memorial Day weekend: 8
Days 'til Forks, Corks & Kegs in Deadwood, South Dakota: 7
Percent favorability of the Stoneman Douglas students and the NRA, respectively, according to a new PPP poll: 56%, 39%
Minimum number of state AGs who are suing the Trump administration over the addition of a U.S. citizenship status question on the 2020 census: 12
Age of Brown v. Board of Education plaintiff’s daughter Linda Brown when she died this week: 76
Number of chocolate Easter bunnies produced this year: 90 million
Year Cadbury cream eggs were introduced: 1971
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Bo and Sunny with their adopted family---Easter 2015:
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CHEERS to today’s C&J prayer. Please bow your heads:
O Lord!
Please, O please, let it be that America’s dumbest governor has a hand in the impeachment and conviction of America’s dumbest president.
If it turns out that Paul LePage’s stay at Trump’s D.C. hotel becomes one of the key pieces of evidence that buries the president, I promise I will go to Sunday school every day of the week and twice on Sunday. (Unless I have a thing, in which case I’ll write a note and put in my make-good jar.)
In Your Name I Eat Candy Corn,
Billeh in Portland
Amen.
CHEERS to champions of the little guy. Happy 91st birthday tomorrow to the late Cesar Chavez. He founded the National Farm Workers Association, which gave a voice to migrant farm workers. He also used a spiffy motto (coined, we should note, by Dolores Huerta) that might sound familiar: "Si se puede!"---Yes we can! These days we could use all the Chavezes we can get, and the anti-Trump resistance movement is certainly busy producing some. Here’s a few who will be honored next week:
Pay your respects here. Today in his honor: total boycott of lettuce and grapes. Yes...even for the squirrels on the roof.
JEERS to space invaders. Just a quick heads-up that you and/or all of your earthly possessions may come to a fiery end this weekend as a Chinese satellite hurtles through the atmosphere and disintegrates into thousands of pieces of molten metal that will cool just enough to harden back into razor-sharp daggers able to puncture roofs, walls, basements and survival bunkers, and slice through flesh, bone, wood, tile flooring, and formica countertops with the ease of a hot knife through butter, upending life as you know it (if you survive at all) and leaving enough radioactive fallout to prompt a massive evacuation of all the surrounding counties.*
*Or not. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
CHEERS to holiday fevuh! 2018 years ago today (or thereabouts), a bunch of Roman thugs nailed a rabbi to a cross while a filthy rabble with six teeth among them and a combined IQ of 12 watched the poor sap suffer and moan and dehydrate and bleed to death in the baking sun. I'll never understand why Christians call it “Good Friday.” Sounds more like Monday to me.
Today also starts Passover. For Jews it's a celebration of the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt. For conservatives, it's a celebration of what modern-day Republicans do to competent people in their ranks.
Then, two days from today is Easter Sunday, which is notable for two things: the day the aforementioned Christ the Savior rose from the dead, and the day Lenny the tomb attendant checked into rehab.
No matter how you celebrate the holiday, C&J reminds you: please gorge on Easter candy 'til you explode responsibly.
CHEERS to---squeaky squeaky!---that clean plate sound. On Sunday’s date in 1889, the first dishwashing machine was marketed in Chicago. We have one in our house---a rescue mutt named Haley. Upside: she saves us a bundle on electricity. Downside: poops way more than a Kenmore.
JEERS to taking your non-existent relationship too far. Thirty-seven years ago today, on March 30, 1981, President Ronald Reagan, along with Press Secretary James Brady, police officer Thomas Delahanty and Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy, got shot by some whack job who wanted to present a dead-president-skin rug to Jodie Foster as a wedding gift. (Gun nuts take note: they were all surrounded by “good guys with a gun,” who all completely failed to stop the “bad guy with a gun.”) At first they didn’t think Reagan's wound was serious, but something about losing half his blood prompted a diversion to George Washington Medical Center. The rest ("Honey, I forgot to duck," "I hope you're all Republicans") is history. By the way, anyone care to take a guess as to what group the president from the now-union-hating party was lavishing praise on at the Washington Hilton that day? The AFL-CIO. Don’t that just boggle the mind.
CHEERS to home vegetation. The elephant in the room on TV this weekend is the 50th annual Easter-weekend airing of Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments tomorrow night---for nearly FIVE…freaking…hours---on ABC, featuring the mom from The Munsters as Moses' wife and music by the guy who also scored Airplane! and Ghostbusters. (Spoiler Alert: Ramses chooses poorly.)
But first we start tonight with Chris Hayes (essential viewing tonight for the latest on the slo-mo collapse of the Trump administration) and then at 9 Richard Engel retraces the moments before Russian ex-spy Sergei Skripal was poisoned. For best results, watch with the sound turned down and create your own dialogue. New home video releases include Star Wars VIII: The Last Jedi and nothing else on the list matters. The basketball schedule is here, the baseball schedule is here, and the hockey schedule is here. But most sports-obsessed eyes will be on the NCAA tourneys, and you can check out the women's bracket here and the men's bracket here. 60 Minutes, still basking in the glow of the Stormy Daniels interview, looks into the mystery of the Herculaneum scrolls and a theory that PTSD in war veterans may be linked to simple scar tissue. Sunday night: NBC’s live version of Jesus Christ Superstar with John Legend, Alice Cooper (I’m so, so sorry I thought he was dead…for, like, years) and Sara Bareilles. And John Oliver wraps up the weekend in a happy little Easter bow on HBO's Last Week Tonight.
Now here's your Sunday morning lineup:
Meet the Press: Fired VA Secretary David Shulkin; Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI); White House counsel to President Obama Bob Bauer; Harvard Law’s Alan Dershowitz.
This Week: TBA
Face the Nation: Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) and Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), two of the most divisive Republicans on Capitol Hill today, will talk about their new book titled---I kid you not---Unified.
CNN's State of the Union: After suggesting last week that The Kids Today need to shut up and learn CPR, CNN employee and “all-star panelist” Rick Santorum returns, having paid no penalty for making such a disgusting remark; Author Ronald Kessler talks about his new book on Trump.
Fox GOP Talking Points Sunday: Rep Brad Sherman (D-CA); Shawn Nelson, Vice Chairman of the Orange County Board of Supervisors; Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-Pawpatch County).
Happy viewing!
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Ten years ago in C&J: March 30, 2008
JEERS to today's pop quiz. Question for the class: Why is it that, whenever a story about an intrusion on our privacy comes out---like, say, a presidential candidate's passport getting illegally accessed by some private contractor with more zits than brain cells---there always seems to be a follow-up story that says: "Ruh-roh...it's worse than we thought." Remember, penmanship counts and I'll be grading on a curve.
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And just one more…
CHEERS to Rachel Maddow---TV host, razor-sharp political analyst, hypocrisy slayer, Rhodes Scholar, avid angler, dog owner, and birthday chick! MSNBC's brightest bulb turns 45 Sunday. (I’m old enough to be her father, assuming I sired a child at 8.) Every night, piece by piece and brick by brick, she peels back the layers of the Trump-Russia conspiracy and other GOP tyranny with such grace and dexterity that her conservative guests (those with the guts to show up, which is pretty much no one these days) usually end up thanking her for the shellacking. She tolerates no BS, and that's why we---and there’s a shit-ton of us, judging by her record ratings---love her. In her honor, a classic Maddow-concocted cocktail from 2012…
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Cheers, Rachel, and---everybody say it with me---many blessings on your camels.
Oh, and tomorrow is the Eiffel Tower’s 128th birthday. In its honor, climb up on your roof, light a cigarette, bite a chunk out of a baguette, and look down on your neighbors with detached bemusement as you recite passages from Sartre. (And don’t forget the beret!) Have a great weekend. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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